#you know what ship made me open my eyes to that years ago?

[epickiya722]

Okay, but pink does goes well with green!

[madaqueue]

WHILE WINTER HOLDS ITS QUIET BREATH

a visit to childe's home

pairing: childe x gn!reader

themes/content: fluff. mentions of his family, violence, blood, he gets called his birth name, basically just a character study i guess. 18+ MDNI (wk: 3.4k)

a/n: nobody look at me

"Winter collapsed on us that year. It knelt, exhausted, and stayed." - Emily Fridlund, History of Wolves

Ajax smells different in Snezhnaya.

Coming from the shower on your sixth morning in his home, steam fading from his skin, it takes a moment for your mind to register that it’s him standing in the doorway, to connect the neurons and cells that know him, the ones that would recognize his curves and muscles draped in a burgundy towel. In Liyue, you’re used to the heavy scent of metal hanging on him, mingling with spices and clove, musk and sweat. It’s still him, of course, but there’s something else here, something closer to the earth that bore him.

He doesn’t notice the way your thoughts stall, already rambling about what his mother is planning to cook for dinner, where Teucer wants to go in town today. His steps fall the same, though, as he moves through his childhood bedroom, the floorboards barely creaking under his familiar weight. This house seems to remember him, although it’s only ever known this version of him, the one who smells like pine and rosemary, who loves to ice fish and hike and laugh, the one whose shoulders rise easily, whose eyes crinkle and flutter when snowflakes land on them.

Truthfully, the thought of asking you to join him on his journey home made his stomach ache. When it finally came time to make the request, he had returned only a few hours ago from some far-off city you’d barely remembered the name of, one with too many vowels in it, you think, one that took him away from you for too long again, his freshest scars already beginning to heal.

“My mother wants to meet you,” he hummed, nuzzling his face into your neck. “Tonia, too.”

Your heart lurched in your chest, and you were just as glad his eyes had strayed from yours to hide the way warmth began creeping up your neck. “They know about me?”

“Of course they do, silly” he pulled away, grinning. With a pinch of your cheek, he rubbed his nose against yours. “Who do you think I write all those letters to?”

When you didn’t respond, he hid his face back in the den of your shoulder.

“Would you come with me when I go back to Snezhnaya? To meet them? Just for a week.��� Tightly, he closed his eyes, afraid of what your eyebrows or the corners of your mouth might say, things he didn’t want to hear. The journey is too long or I’m needed at work or I don’t love you, Ajax. But the words never came.

“Of course I’ll go,” you whispered instead, sweet like the honeyed wine you served with dinner. The waves crashed softly outside the open window, carried by the other sounds of the harbor, ones of labor and ships and travel.

In the haven of your skin, his lips curled into a smile.

The first day you arrived, his family greeted you behind the thick wooden door. Teucer lugged your bags upstairs, each thud as they collided with the old wood came with a giggle. His mother hugged you, and she smelled like cinnamon.

“Is that the only coat you brought?” she asked, rubbing the worn leather that draped your shoulders.

Before you could respond, she was already turning away, rummaging through the closet. Inside, you caught glimpses of old brooms and half-patched stockings before she thrusted a piece of cloth into your arms.

“Here! It’s not perfect, and it’s certainly not new, but this should treat you much better.”

She smiled with her teeth, like the grin that slips from Ajax on nights when the two of you sat outside and counted the stars. Devoid of second meanings, of control or deceit.

Unfurling the item, warm wool rubbed against your fingertips in the shape of a soft grey outer-jacket. The buttons held on by single threads, and the pockets had holes, and you pulled it into your chest.

“Thank you,” you said, and you hugged her.

Later that evening, his father showed you where they stored wood for the fire as Ajax swung a rusted axe, each crack echoing against the silent trees.

“It gets cold here at night, so make yourselves comfortable,” was all he said before ducking back inside. You slept in Ajax’s childhood bed under three layers of blankets, his limbs intertwined with your own.

On your second day in Snezhnaya, Tonia insisted on going into town.

“You’ll love it,” she promised, dragging Ajax by the wrist out the door. “You have to see it.”

He huffed some retort, but his eyes glimmered when he looked to you, reflecting the sky that seemed almost too blue here, unsoiled by humidity and sweat.

The city itself was busy, or at least, busier than you expected for a place known for its unforgiving climate. The worn-down cobblestone lended itself to easy steps, the sound of chatter bouncing off the brick buildings. Everyone moved easily past one another, like salmon in the harbor, all traveling back to the depths of the sea.

Suddenly, Ajax turned to you. “I have to run some errands. Don't get into any trouble, you two,” he winked, glancing down at Tonia who only giggled in response.

“We won’t!” she reassured; as he faded into the crowd, she looked up at you. “Now, I can show you the really cool stuff.”

With her hand clasped firmly in yours, she led you through narrow alleyways until you emerged under the bright, cold sun. Tall glass panels greeted you, lining the storefronts. Behind each one, layers of gold and jewels were carefully displayed, reflecting spots of light onto the marble like small fish eyes watching your every move.

“That one’s my favorite,” she stated, pointing through the window that fogged under her breath. An icy sapphire sat in the center of the arrangement, nestled into rich black velvet.

Just as you opened your mouth, a firm hand landed on your shoulder. “Now, don’t tell me you’ve taken a liking to these, or do you want me to go broke?” Ajax chuckled from behind you, his sudden presence making Tonia squeal in delight.

As the three of you made your way home, Tonia clinging onto his back and resting her head in the fluff around his coat, a light snow began falling, and without wind, it hung in the air. Ajax stuck out his tongue, pink and warm, to catch them; Tonia followed, opening her jaw as wide as a child could to capture the melting crystals.

That night, around the fire, Ajax quietly pulled something from his pocket: a small, black velvet pouch. Without a word, he handed it to Tonia. Her eyes widened, and with careful fingers, she pulled a bright blue gem from inside. She screamed and leapt towards him, rosy cheeks pushed high.

“Now, don’t you go losing that, okay?” he said, pulling her into his chest.

“It’s perfect, it’s perfect, it’s perfect!” she exclaimed, encircling his neck in thin arms and knobby elbows.

In bed that night, wrapped in blankets, he held his hands to you. “Close your eyes,” he whispered. Gently, he placed something cool in your palm, metal. “And, open.”

A silver ring nestled itself into your skin, glowing under the flickering candlelight, a wire-wrapped opal held in the center that sparkled like the moon.

“It’s beautiful,” you finally got to say.

“It reminded me of you.” Like the sun and the clouds and the stars and anything that shares the pleasure of orbiting you, he thought.

His lips are warm and soft when you kiss him, like melted snowflakes, and the ring fits perfectly around your finger.

His hair falls differently in Snezhnaya, too, you realize. It dries lighter after being dampened by wind-carried flurries, less heavy than the unfiltered city water of your home, where the shower always ran red as it circled the drain. Even the sea would leave its own mark when he swam in the harbor, salt and brine adding crisp edges.

But here, he’s all fluff, and you wonder if he ever feels like he’ll get blown away with a strong enough gust. Maybe that’s why his parents said he seemed too mature for his age - when his hair lets him stand two inches taller, it’s easy to say he must be older, larger, wiser.

By your second day, you noticed he never lets Teucer go into the woods alone, in spite of his little brother’s incessant begging, in spite of how he stepped through the front door just moments ago and his fingertips ached from the walk back from town. He always redressed, pulling on his jacket and buckling his boots. He always put Teucer’s hat on for him, too.

On the third day, a blizzard tore through the woods and blinded everything in white. The children played upstairs with their father, and the wind howled through the window panes, a whistling and lonely sound. There was no sun, so instead, candles were lit in every corner, the warmth of the fireplace beckoning you to its hearth. Bottles of firewater made their way through you, poured with a heavy hand into ceramic cups, ones with paintings of trees and a child’s handprint.

“You know, when Ajax was four, he tried to fight a bear,” his mother began from the silence.

Ajax, in turn, groaned, rolling onto his side and resting his head in your lap. “Mama, not this story again.”

“Hush, hush,” she giggled, taking another drink from her mug. “He was out by the lake, and his father had gone back to the house with the fish. He heard something in the trees, and so he grabbed this tiny little fishing knife.” With her free hand, her fingers drew out a three-inch space in the air. “Just as his father returned, he saw his little boy facing the woods. ‘Papa, run!’ he called. ‘There’s a bear!’ But what kind of father would he be to let his son face that danger alone? So, just as he began to run towards him, this-” she laughed, liquid nearly spilling from over the top lip of her cup, “-this teeny bunny hops into the clearing! The terrifying bear Ajax was ready to fight was just a little rabbit!”

Burying his face in his hands, Ajax once again groaned. “It was scary for a kid!”

“I know, I know,” she hummed, wrinkled hands patting his shoulders. “And you were very brave for a kid, too.”

The fourth morning you awoke in Snezhnaya, the bed was cold. Your muscles shivered and you reached for him, but found only empty sheets and blankets bundled around your shoulders.

The stairs still creaked under your weight, not yet used to the way your feet landed on them, stepping on tired and aching bones. In the kitchen, his mother greeted you with a soft, “Good morning.”

Without another word, a warm mug was placed before you, its steam rising into the wooden rafters.

“I hope it wasn’t too cold in that old room last night,” she began - words seemed to flow easily from her, some motherly instinct to comfort, to keep out the silence. “Yesterday was one of the chillier days we’ve had. I’m glad you two didn’t have to go anywhere.” She sipped from her own cup - tea, you presume from the bergamot hanging in the air. “Have you been sleeping well? I can bring up some more quilts if you need.”

You took a drink, letting the liquid scald your tongue, and stifled a wince (the burn isn’t too bad after this long in the snow, you suppose). “Yes, we’re sleeping very well, thank you.” Your fingers tapped on the wooden countertop. “Have you seen Ajax?”

“Oh, yes! I think he’s out by the lake.”

Grateful, you hummed into your hands, letting them be warmed through the ceramic.

“May I ask you something?” she suddenly spoke. It was so unplanned, no hint of the trickery or underhandedness you were accustomed to - when someone in Liyue asks a question of this sort, one must think on it, must contemplate their intentions and how to use it against them - you couldn’t help but nod. She blurted, “Does Ajax seem happy?”

Her gaze fell to the table, tracing its familiar knots and veins. “It’s just…” her thumbs twirled around the handle, nails clinking, “you see him more than me. I mean, at this point, you certainly know him better than me.”

The only thing you could think to do was reach your hand to hers. It was warmer than your own, more wrinkled and crooked, a tree with a life well-lived. “I do. I do think he’s happy.”

That morning, you buttoned your coat yourself, careful not to rip the remaining buttons from their threads. It was a slow task, one that required more precision than you were used to, but it got done all the same.

The walk itself was pleasant, the wind having settled and only dusting the occasional batch of flurries from the trees that danced under the morning sun like birds. You wondered if there were many nests here, if the fledglings could survive these winters. Beneath your boots the fresh snow shifted, and at the edge of the whitened path, a small flock of red flowers poked through the frost.

The lake was still beneath the ice. Ajax sat with his back towards the trail, but didn’t flinch as you approached. He didn’t speak, either.

Instead, he let you sit beside him on the old tree stump, his fingers clutching the fishing rod as its invisible string delved into the icy abyss below.

“Have you caught anything?” you asked.

”Not yet.” He didn’t look at you, he didn’t move a centimeter, not even to breathe. “You know, after so long doing this, you’d think I’d be better at it by now.”

”Is fishing something you can really get better at?”

His lips parted in a grin. “I suppose not. It’s mostly waiting.”

“Are you good at that?”

“No,” he laughed.

“Do you like it?” You leaned onto his shoulder, letting your hair spill over the fur of his coat. It used to smell of salt - now, it was all smoke and wool.

“You aren’t wearing a hat,” he observed.

“I must have forgotten.”

He nodded, a leather-clad hand reaching up to cover your ears. In the wind, the branches shook, and his lure left the water’s surface as smooth as glass.

“Do you think my family is alright?” he finally asked, to no one in particular - perhaps the trees would have answered if they could. But in their stead, you’d have to do.

In the distance, a bird called out its tune, a lilting whistle, and the snow danced in time. “I think they are.”

Beneath your weight, his shoulders relaxed.

“Your mother loves you,” you continued. “Tonia and Teucer, too. They all do.”

Silently, he reeled in the line before placing the rod upright in the snow. When he looked to you, he was smiling. “Let’s go back home.”

The longer you stay, the softer his skin seems to get, in spite of the way the frigid air digs cracks into your own. With each move of your wrist a new crevice makes its way to the surface, rubbed raw and dry. And yet, his fingers still trail lightly over them, soft lips ghosting over bloodied ravines.

“The cold never really bothered me,” he told you years ago, and you thought it strange, but here’s proof: warm, smooth hands, unfrozen. Each joint moves freely, each blood vessel pumps easily, as though they were made for this. He fidgets less here - maybe he always ran hot in Liyue. The heat makes people jumpy, you know.

Yesterday, on your fifth day in Snezhnaya, the snow crunched below your feet as he led you through the woods. You had asked to see the trails that led around the house, and although silently, he nonetheless helped button the grey coat his mother loaned you, tugging a hat over your ears.

He spoke too much while you walked, the sounds bouncing off the frail and peeling bark. “And there are animals out here, if you know where to look,” he rambled. “Rabbits, and bears, you know, and deer, too. You can trace them by their footprints, and it’ll lead you to their dens. Sometimes you have to seek them out, but it’s easy once you know what to look for.” His eyes closed, and you realized his boots left no indentations in the hardening snow. “Some people think the animals are dangerous, but they won’t hurt you, not while you have me here.”

Off in the distance, a branch cracked. Ajax flinched.

Wide eyes scanned the horizon, frenzied. A gloved hand reached for yours, and he pulled you behind him.

The air in his lungs burned cold, and he held it there for three seconds.

“Oh, must just be an old tree,” he laughed, and he took a few steps to hide the way it shook in the wind. “The snow is heavy, especially this time of year. It gets wet and icy, like a hard shell. Sometimes the older trees can’t take it anymore, and they fall.”

You hummed, the breath in front of your lips foggy. The walk continued, and he spoke and spoke and spoke, and the trees listened. You tried to listen half as attentively.

The questions began to stick in the back of your throat, ones you wanted to spit out, ones that tasted thick and bitter and burned your esophagus, ones about the abyss: if it was dark, if the moon shone down there, if he could see the stars or feel the snow. If he remembers where he fell, where the earth opened beneath him and swallowed him whole. If he’d been back there (he hadn’t), if he’s still afraid (he’d tell you he’s not).

He knew the woods well, even though he was only a child in them. 

When you returned home, his cheeks were pink, and he smiled as you unbuttoned the coat bunched up around your neck. In the kitchen, meats and vegetables stewed over the stove, their scents drifting as his mother stirred with her wooden spoon. The logs in the fireplace shifted, sending sparks into the air. His shoulders relaxed, and he hung his own scarf next to yours. It was harder to pick out his freckles through wind-reddened skin, but they’re always there, of course: you know where to look.

You wondered if this is how he carried himself, how he felt, how he smelled, when he was young. If the fourteen-year-old boy who went into the woods was chased because the wolves could smell the smoke and spices and fear lingering on him.

He sounds different here, too.

You’ve rarely heard him speak his native tongue: “It’s a rough language,” he always said; and yet, each consonant that falls from his lips is soft like wool; “You wouldn’t even understand anything I say,” and yet, when he turns to his mother and says “спасибо,” as she hands him his morning tea, the love it carries is enough.

She always smiles and pulls him into a hug, and he always laughs, bright like the crackling flames in the fireplace. She never calls him Tartaglia or Childe; here, he’s always ‘Ajax’ or ‘my son’ or ‘my precious boy’ (he says he hates that one, but he lets her preen his hair, and fidget with his coat, and tell him he looks too serious for his age, too angry).

Here, he has no titles, no violence or conflict or nobility to stare over his shoulder. Here, he’s not a Harbinger, he’s not a killer, he’s just Ajax: a kind boy who wears knit scarves and catches snowflakes and likes to ice fish.

Today, on your sixth day, the mattress shifts under his weight, and his warmth spreads across the bedding as he blankets you, still damp and smelling like the earth, like the trees and the herbs and his childhood. Fresh from the shower, one where the water ran clear instead of red, where there were no crimes or sin to wash away. Droplets land on your cheeks and he giggles as you try to shoo him away with a gentle shove to his shoulders; he lets you push him back onto the quilt his mother made for his tenth birthday, one with images of heroes and swords and the sun. There’s snow falling outside the frosted window and landing heavy on the trees, the ones that don’t mind holding it. Soft hands cradle your skin, and he whispers “I love you,” and his breath is warm, and he smells like pine and rosemary.

[demonic0angel]

Anger Management prompt where there is a car accident, except it's in space, between Team Phantom and The Outlaws.

(Lmaoooo this is so freaking funny bc my sister got into a car accident just a week ago. She’s fine tho, dw)

Part 2

“Fuck you!” The teenager immediately screamed. “Where the hell did you learn to drive?! Go back to school, fucking dumbass! You can’t even drive, you piece of sh��”

He was then pulled back by one of his friends, who grabbed him and dragged him back to their normal looking, definitely not broken spacecraft. A girl, dressed in a very distinctive style of goth, then made an awkward face, popped her gum, and said, “Sorry about him. He has really bad road rage.”

Jason’s eye twitched. “I can see that. So what’re we going to do now? You crashed into our spacecraft!”

“Well, you don’t have spaceship insurance, do you?” The girl drawled.

Jason was suddenly reminded of why he hated Tim Drake and Damian Wayne. They were goddamn insufferable, obnoxious, annoying, irresponsible teenagers.

Jason suddenly felt like he aged 20 years in an instant and wondered if this was what Dick felt like, being so old.

Roy patted him on the arm. “Want me to take care of this?”

Jason gestured for him to go ahead, already feeling a headache. Roy walked forward and smiled charmingly. “Hey, kiddo! So, it’s not a big deal that we got bumped into— happens all the time! But we just want to know where your parents are! And why you’re out in space! And how we’re going to get back to earth, since our shipped is now wrecked. You know what earth is, right? Earth is—”

“We know what earth is,” the same cursing teenager from earlier said with a snide tone, “We live there too.”

Roy and Jason blinked.

Then Jason spat, “Well, that doesn’t do us shit! We still have a wrecked spacecraft and we’re stuck here on this moon until you fix it! Don’t think you can just fly away! We’re stranded because of you brats!”

Kori then appeared out of the spacecraft and flew down to them all. The kids all immediately stopped, eyes wide in awe. She smiled and said, “Hello, children! Is there anyway you can help us? You did wreck our spacecraft after all.”

Immediately, in the most respectful tone Jason had ever heard, the two-faced brat from earlier then said, “I’m so sorry, miss. We didn’t think that anyone would be exploring this part of space out here, so we weren’t looking! We’re sorry. We don’t have the tools to fix it either.”

Jason’s entire face suddenly wanted to break out into the nastiest glare he could muster. So not only did this kid blatantly show favoritism to Kori (even if she was definitely super cool), he also couldn’t help at all despite the fact that he completely stranded them in space after being careless with a spaceship?

Kori frowned and they all shared a look. Now what? Jason could feel the migraine get more annoying and he almost wanted to pull out his gun just to kill some kids and feel better about his shitty fucking day, when the other teen, who had pulled away the feral brat, spoke up and said, “We can call Jazz!”

“Oh yeah! Jazz! Quick, Sam, call her up!”

Roy narrowed his eyes. “Who’s Jazz?”

“My big sister,” the brat said, “She’ll fix this.”

Great. Another annoying person who would only make his headache worse and possibly piss him off even further. However, just as he finished thinking this and sharing another annoyed look with Roy, a green portal opened up and a goddess stepped down.

She was tall, with a curvaceous figure wrapped in black and blue robes, as well as a fluffy cape around her shoulders. Her hair fell down over her back, colored red like fire and sunsets and tiger lilies, and her face was that of a statue, carefully designed, crafted, and admired by all. She was so beautiful and picturesque that the air around her seemed to glow like a halo.

Just looking at her made Jason’s sorrows disappear.

She blinked her fluttering eyelashes over her turquoise eyes and then asked, “What seems to be the problem?”

Her voice was so angelic that Jason didn’t even feel his headache anymore.

“Nothing now that you’re here,” Jason said dreamily.

“Oh my god,” Roy said, hand over his mouth as he stared at Jason in shock. Even Kori looked shocked and amused.

The boy with black hair shared a disgusted look with his friends. “I thought that would’ve been my line.”

[amsznn]

can you do a story about how chris and the reader meet at tara’s party but before that, reader accidentally revealed that she found chris cute and the she went viral for it (idk if that makes sense)

SOCIAL MEDIA FRENZY - c. sturniolo

2 days ago..

“chat are we enjoying this haul? don’t flame my style in the comment section.” you warned to your viewers on instagram live before grabbing the next package of clothes off the floor, ready to show your 14k viewers the next batch of items. “next youtube video when?” you read off from a comment.

“this was going to be a youtube haul, but i got lazy so..new video this week!”

your rise as an influencer had to be studied. from a random youtube vlog that you made out of the want to romanticize your life a bit and a rant on tiktok people found funny that gained 2.5 million likes caused you to not only receive near to 3 million subscribers on youtube but almost 1.9 million on tiktok.

this was only in the span of 2 years. growing and working to not only please your new fans but to also have fun for yourself as you still decided to go to college for that degree.

social media was just a hobby for you like a lot of people say. but you truly couldn’t expect the new wave of attention you would revolve for a simple comment you made.

the next item of your haul was a fitted cap that you saw at a pop up shop in your city. you recognized it from somewhere else and decided to buy it since it was also cute.

“guys this cap i actually bought because this youtuber, chris sturniolo also wears it in his videos.” at the mention of the social media star your comments flooded. “guys calm down, im not crazy, he’s just cute okay?” you laughed before setting the cap down then moving to the next piece of clothing.

soon enough you ended the live and went on with your day as normal. filming a bit of your vlog for your new video, answering emails from brands, doing some household chores and of course, settling down in your bed with some snacks for your nightly tiktok scrolling.

as soon as you opened the app you got bombarded with a screen recording of your live with the bit where you said chris was cute. it was all over. even on twitter you began trending for the potential new relationship between you and the social media star.

all you could do is read the comments, some encouraging and some hateful, watch edits of you two being shipped, and quickly text your manager profusely apologizing for the mess you just made.

you groaned while rolling around in your bed. sometimes you just forgot you were too well known to be spewing whatever nonsense came to mind.

which brings us here.

at taras party.

since she was inviting influential people, and her friends, you were a definite invite on her list. and you knew either all of one of the triplets would be there too.

you were nervous to bump into chris. would he even speak to you? and if he did would he be uncomfortable or understanding? well you were about to find out in a moment since he was walking in your general direction.

you mustered up all the courage you could and began to walk towards him. feeling the need to apologize to him since the situation was your fault and it must be annoying for him as well.

you came to a stop as he turned his body to fully face you. your breath hitched for moment taking his appearance all in. his black hoodie and black baggie jeans with his messy hair was a lot to take in in person.

either way you were gonna say what you needed to say. “hey, my names y/n. you might know me. or not thats fine too!” you stumble across your words for a minute before taking a deep breath. you could feel his eyes on you but you remembered hes just a person too.

“you may have seen the plenty of edits and a lot of my supporters in your comment sections or dms, and i just wanted to say im sorry since its been going for three days now and you must be annoyed.” you said it all in one breath and finally met the boys eyes. instead of confusion you were met with a look of amusement.

“oh you’re completely fine. honestly i felt bad for you since you were getting a lot of hate for a simple comment.” chris shrugged while giving you his signature smile. you smiled as well glad that he seemed fine with the recent uproar.

“ive heard worse.” chris said while grimacing at the thought which caused you to laugh nodding in agreement. the night went on with you and chris sticking together for the majority of the party. introducing one another to friends, chris introducing you to nick (your new best friend) and overall having a great time. before you left chris made sure to get your number and texted you to make sure you arrived home safely.

you couldnt help the smile that was spreading on your face as you recall the events of the night. maybe making that comment wasnt so bad after all.

walking towards your room of your apartment, you plopped down onto your bed and decided to make a quick instagram post for the night.

and guess who liked the post?

a/n: i hope yall enjoy this cus i sure did (i was so close to making this into a smut 😭)

[pedroscurls]

you broke me first (one-shot)

summary: logan comes running to you after yet another disappointment with jean, but he's hurt you for the last time and you can't do this dance with him any longer. pairing: xmen series!logan x fem!reader content warnings: angst, unspoken feelings (logan has his reasons), logan pining for jean, broken friendship, no use of y/n. word count: 1.2k a/n: ok, so forgive me in advanced lol, this is my first time writing xmen series!logan (and idk if i'm the only one, but i do not like the jean x logan ship - i didn't feel any chemistry between them in the movies). anyway, enjoy this! this song came to mind and immediately i thought of this version of logan and it seemed fitting. song: you broke me first by tate mcrae

“She doesn’t love you, Logan,” you tell him once again after he comes straight to your room after Jean had told him that she would never leave Scott for him. You could never understand the feelings he had for Jean, his relationship with her purely physical. 

And each time he tried to convince Jean that being with him would make her happier than she was with Scott, he was always left disappointed. 

And each time, he always came running to you. The one person who had always been there for him since he had come to the mansion all those years ago. 

“You don’t know that,” Logan says, brows furrowed and his usual scowl written on his features. 

“Why do you keep going back to her?” you ask quietly, looking down at your hands. “She hurts you every time, Logan.”

“She just doesn’t know what she wants.”

“Logan,” you sigh. “We both know that’s not true.”

“If she knew what she wanted, why do we keep sleeping with each other, then? Hm?” 

You feel your heart break at his words. The more time you spent with Logan, the more you realized just how deeply you felt for him. He had become your best friend, and had made you feel welcome in a house full of mutants. Charles had hired you as a teacher despite not having any powers and while you loved your job, you always felt like you didn’t belong and you yearned to be one of them, to be part of a group like this. You couldn’t even be angry though, this was how every mutant had felt in this world. An outsider. 

But Logan… Logan had always made you feel like you belonged. He would talk to you about his problems and you would talk to him about yours. He’d be there to hold you whenever you had a bad day, to brush your hair away from your face when you were on the brink of tears. He’d always come to you whenever he couldn’t sleep, when his nightmares would take hold of him because he had admitted one night that you make him feel safe, calm, peaceful. 

And he’d always come to you whenever Jean didn’t want him anymore. 

And you’d always be there to welcome him with open arms. 

“I don’t know, Logan,” you finally answer. “She won’t ever leave Scott… You and I both know this.”

“She just needs to realize–”

“Stop,” you interrupt him. “Please, Logan.”

Logan looks down at you. “What?”

“I’ve always been right here,” you say quietly, teary eyes staring up at him. 

“I know,” he sighs. “And I’m lucky–”

“We both know that’s not what I mean,” you interrupt. “You can’t be that dense, Logan.”

He tightens his jaw and you look down at his hands to see them curled into fists. All it takes is one clench and his claws would come out. “We can’t. That can’t ever happen between us.” 

“Why?” you ask. “What’s so wrong with me that you can’t see that I would choose you?”

“Nothing’s wrong with you,” he sighs. “We just–” Logan shakes his head. “No, bub.”

“What’s so special about Jean, hm?” you ask, voice raising as tears now slowly trickle down your cheeks. “What does she have that I don’t? Is it her powers? Is it because she’s a mutant?”

“No,” he shakes his head. “I don’t care if you’re not a mutant.”

“Then what?!” Your lower lip quivers and you take a step back when you yell at him. You can feel your entire body shaking, emotions and feelings that you had kept bottled in now coming to the surface. “Then what, Logan?” you repeat. 

“I can’t love you.”

“You can’t, or you don’t?” 

“Bub,” Logan sighs, hand slowly reaching out for you but you shake your head and step away from him. 

“Whenever you needed someone, I have always been there. When you needed to leave for whatever reason, I was always here waiting for you to come back. It’s always been me, Logan. Me.” 

“I know…” Logan’s eyes soften at the sight of you and he wants so badly to just pull you into his arms. He would never admit to you the feelings he has for you, would never tell you how much he wishes that things were different. Part of him thinks he loves Jean, knows that she can handle her own if anything were to happen, but you… If you were to ever be in danger because of him, he would never forgive himself. So, he keeps you at a friendly distance, never displaying to the rest of the team just how much you mean to him. 

“I can’t do this anymore,” you whisper, voice shaky. “I can’t be the person you keep coming to whenever Jean doesn’t want anything to do with you. You deserve someone who’s going to choose you, Logan,” you stare up at him, eyes glistening with tears. “You deserve someone who’s not going to hurt you.”

Logan’s jaw tightens. “What do you mean you can’t do this anymore?”

“I fucking love you, Logan!” you bite your lower lip, your own hands clenching into fists in hopes that the action would ground you, would alleviate some of the frustration that you’re feeling. “I fucking love you and I can no longer just sit around and act like I don’t.” 

“Sweetheart,” his voice cracks and suddenly, he realizes that losing you hurts far more than the disappointment he continues to feel with Jean. “Don’t–”

“You break my heart every fucking time you come to me about Jean,” you admit. “And I can’t do it anymore. I can’t do this anymore,” you repeat. 

“Baby,” Logan whispers. 

“I’m going to tell Charles that I’ve got a family emergency and that I will need to leave immediately,” you tell Logan, moving around him to gather your duffle bag and setting it on your bed. “I’m sure he’ll know the real reason why I’m leaving, but–”

Logan reaches out for you, his hand a gentle touch against your wrist. “Stop, please…”

You pull your hand away from his grasp and look up at him, “Be honest with me and tell me that you don’t see anything here… That you don’t feel something for me.”

Logan stares into your eyes and he tightens his jaw, hand reaching up to gently brush a tear away from your cheek. “I can’t,” he whispers. “I need you to understand that I can’t, baby.” 

You nod and step away from him. “I won’t ever be enough, will I?” 

“That’s not true–”

“Just get out, Logan. Please.” 

“I don’t want to lose you. I can’t lose you. You’re breaking me–”

“You broke me first, Logan,” you interject and turn back around to toss your clothes carelessly into your bag, tears strolling down your cheeks. You can still feel Logan’s presence, can hear him huffing lowly under his breath. 

When your clothes are in your bag, you toss it over your shoulder and turn around to see him standing near your door. You walk over to him and reach for the door handle, gripping it tightly as you look up at him once more. For one last time. 

“Don’t go, please,” he whispers. 

“I wish you nothing but the best, Logan,” you reply. “And I hope one day you realize that you deserve so much more than what Jean is giving you. You deserve to be happy, to be loved, to be chosen.”

“Baby–”

Slowly, you turn the handle and open the door, tearing your gaze away from him. “Goodbye, Logan.”

[theladyofmanyfandomsfanfiction]

Imagine telling Luffy about why you don’t like Shanks…

“Why are you always so upset with Shanks?” Luffy wondered.

You brushed the young boys damp curls and twirled a finger around each strand to define the shape.

“He and I used to travel the seas, you know? We fought sea beasts and all kinds of pirates together.”

Luffy leaned forward. “Really? Was it cool?”

“Very cool and dangerous.” You reminded him with a small hair ruffle to set him back on the chair properly. “We were caught in an ambush and I was injured. Shanks brought me home, promising that we’d set off again after I was healed.”

Luffy grew excited. Maybe if Shanks came for you, he could also be taken along for the journey.

“Are you healed? Do you know when he’ll take you?” He asked.

You frowned and replied rather bitterly. “I was healed up over four years ago.”

Shanks had the audacity to pay a visit these last few months and spend time with Luffy while pretending like nothing had happened. It infuriated you and Luffy clearly caught wind of it.

There was a knock at the door. Your eyes darted up to see Makino standing there with a smile for Luffy.

“The ship has made port.” She told the boy.

Luffy jumped off the seat and ran for the exit. “Sorry Y/n, I have to go!”

You sighed at his speed hoping that he’d be careful on his way to the docks.

Makino looked at you while you put the chair away. “Are you coming as well?” She asked and when you didn’t reply she continued. “He’s been asking for you.”

You glanced over your shoulder. “Tell him I-”

“I’m not telling him you drowned again. You’ll have to face him one way or another.” Makino said and then left to resume her duties at the bar.

Honestly, you’d rather not seek out the pirate who abandoned you. Let him have his fun. Yes, you couldn’t avoid him forever but you could reduce the hours in his presence.

And so that’s what you set out to do, you walked wherever the straw hat wasn’t. If he was at Party’s Bar, you were at home. If he was at the docks, you were by the furthest windmill.

You last saw the red-haired pirate downing a bottle of booze at the bar with his little curly haired shadow on the chair beside him. While they were busy, you decided to rearrange the furniture in your home finally able to tend to things that had been long neglected thanks to Luffy always running in and out of trouble.

Fixated on stacking books by the corner of the front room, you missed the soft padding of footsteps coming to a halt by the open door.

“I heard you ‘drowned’.” A voice said, sending chills down your spine. “Imagine my surprise when Luffy told me that you did his hair this morning.”

Shanks mused at you as he stood by the threshold of your door.

Damn, when did he leave the bar? You rolled your eyes and then turned around to place a blanket into a wooden drawer near to where he stood.

“Odd.” You hummed. “I thought you would have welcomed a lie? Aren’t you filled with them or is that only when they’re directed at me?”

Shanks stepped into the room and took your hand to stop you from walking to the next task. He knew exactly what you were referring to. For months you both had avoided the topic by the way you dodged him but this was finally the opening he needed to clear the air.

“I never lied. I fully intended to come back here in three months. But each danger I faced, every terror that sailed into our path and all I could see was the risk of losing you.”

You scoffed at him. Captain Shanks of the Red-haired Pirates was scared? You were surprised his nose hadn’t grown.

Not wanting to talk further, you attempted to leave the house entirely when the man who stole your heart caught you once more.

“Hey,” Shanks took the reins and guided you to the wall, gently bracing you against it. He was tired of the anger of the anger in your eyes, only wanting you to see him like you once did. His hands settled in their rightful place on your waist.

“There are very few things that I am afraid of - but from that list, the fear of losing you is at the very top.”

As you stared in his warm eyes, you were reminded of a saying he often said aboard calmer seas and private moments.

Shanks gazed back at your face, the one he was deprived of seeing each day. He brought one hand to rest against your chest and raised your own to sit above his own. He leaned forward and pressed his lips against yours in a delicate kiss before pulling away gently.

“I’m not a selfish man by nature.” He whispered. “But for your life and your love, I can be.”

~ More imagines here ~

[livelaughloveluffy]

The straw hat crew with reader who likes to give them compliments, but hates it when the crew gives reader compliments?

compliments - with the straw hat crew

a/n: ahhh thank you for the request!! it's been a long time since i've written a fic like this, so hopefully i can do it some justice!! 💗 (i like skimmed proof-read this so forgive me if there is some grammatical and spelling errors 😭😭)

a/n: (also sorry, the sanji girlie in me is always going to bring it back to sanji, so yeah... there's some sanji x reader in here too 😭😭😭)

a/n: ((sorry idk how to tag this guys 😭😭😭😭😭😭))

word count: fuck idk man, its kinda long though (hehehe that's what she said)

nothing but fluff here💗

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it has only been two weeks since you first joined the straw hat pirates, and it was definitely a huge change of pace from your life before them. the crew, as eccentric, spontaneous, and bold, as they are were also some of the kindest people you had ever met. you couldn't help but be in total awe of them. i mean- how could you not? the amount of countries they've helped, people freed from oppression, friends they have defended and supported even when the whole world was against them...

it was hard not to feel insignificant, through no fault of theirs, it was just a lot to live up to.... and it was hard to feel enough at times.

• ♡ •

while your time being apart of the crew is nothing to write home about, hardly even considering yourself a true member yet, you still couldn't help but be utterly amazed with the people around you, and you just couldn't help yourself but to let them know.

mornings on the sunny were truly a special time. the mouth watering smells leaking out from under the kitchen door, as well as the sounds of a soft melody from brooke's violin fill the ship.

"good morning brooke! what song are you playing? it sounds wonderful!" you ask as you made you way to the kitchen, too eager to see what wonders awaited for breakfast

"yohoho!! just a ballad i've been composing!" he replied, sharing a smile with you before you turn and open the kitchen door.

"it smells delicious sanji!! seriously, im salivating out there! when's breakfast going to be ready?"

a faint blush appeared on his cheeks, but after a quick drag from his cigarette he quickly regains his composure "you're actually right on time! i just finished up!!"

• ♡ •

after breakfast, you weren't surprised to find zoro working out, as he had told you "any second not training, drinking, or sleeping, is a waste" one of your first nights on the ship. you watched in awe as he carried an inhuman amount of weight with ease, not even breaking a sweat.

feeling your stare, his eyes wander to meet yours, "need something?"

"oh! um.. no sorry!! i just can't believe you can lift that so easily!! you're not even sweating!"

"well yeah, this is just my warm up" he replied, a small smirk appearing from the corner of his lips as you wandered away

• ♡ •

in the girl's shared bedroom, you found nami hunched over her desk, carefully and slowly drawings lines for yet another one of her maps. it had been a few days since you had seen this particular map, so you quietly peered over her shoulder to see her progress

"nami, this is incredible!! i could've sworn two days ago there was only a vague outline on this page!! look at that detail!!"

she turned around, beaming at you "thanks!! after years of practice i could draw a map this simple with my eyes closed!"

• ♡ •

the sounds of sawing and nails being pounded into wood grew too loud for you to ignore, so you finally decided to leave the girls room to see what the commotion was all about.

in the three seconds it took you to get to the door, the sounds had ceased. curiosity overtaking you, you couldn't help but step out and see what had caused it all.

the first think that caught your eye was a small greenhouse the seemingly appeared out of thin air, since it definitely wasn't here earlier, and usopp and franky opening up some colas nearby

chopper ran up to you, giddy with excitement "do you want to see the new greenhouse usopp and franky made? its perfect for all my medicinal herbs! now i can grow them here on the sunny!!"

taking the small deers hoof into your hand, you followed him down the stairs to the greenhouse. "wow!!! you guys just built this?"

"franky drew up the plans after breakfast and did the labor, and i added a special watering system!" usopp chimes in, ready to boast about their design, and for good reason

"consider me impressed!!! i may even dare to say that it's SUPER!" you proclaim, earning giggles from all three of the boys

• ♡ •

the following morning you woke up with a purpose. stars still in the sky from how early it was, you tiptoed out of the shared bedroom and to the kitchen. trying to be as quiet as possible, not wanting anyone to hear you, you turned on the lights and gathered the ingredients to make some lemon bars, as a thank you for the crew, they did save your life after all.

as you baked, occasionally glancing out the kitchen window every once in a while you slowly saw the stars leave the sky, the moon disappear, and the sun slowly beginning to rise. its just about dawn now and your lemon bars had finally finished chilling, ready to be cut and served.

sanji, a typical early riser since he has to prep and cook breakfast, opened the kitchen door shocked to see the lights already on and you inside. "oh! mellorine!! i didn't expect to see your beautiful face this early! to what do i owe this pleasure?" he asks.

"sanji.. i'm not- um.... i just made some lemon bars... as a thank you for the crew.. maybe we could eat them with breakfast if thats okay..."

"of course we can!!! im sure i can whip up some stuff that would compliment them perfectly! get some rest! it's still super early, i'll call when breakfast is ready!"

• ♡ •

"breakfast!!!" sanji's voice rings throughout the sunny, and slowly but surely everyone made their way to the kitchen, you being the last to arrive. once you had been seated, you noticed sanji walking his way over to the table, with your tray of lemon bars in hand as he announces "this morning we also have a very special dish prepared by our newest member!"

luffy's eyes widen as he looks over at you and practically shouts in excitement "wow!! i didn't know you could cook! what did you make? im sure its amazing!!! i want some!!"

with all eyes on you, you couldn't help but feel a bit shy, the confidence and determination you had this morning suddenly dissipated "just some lemon bars... its really nothing special... i just wanted to thank you guys.. for everything.. it's just you're all so amazing, you guys are crazy talented and strong and so kind and thoughtful... its really nothing special... i'm sure they don't even hold a candle to the elaborate desserts sanji makes every night..." you mumble, cheeks burning red with embarrassment.

"i'm sure they're delicious! definitely better than anything our captain could ever make" nami says with a sly smile. "all this talk about food is making me even more hungry!! let's finally eat guys!" luffy shouts, grabbing for the closest plate of food to him, too impatient to wait any longer.

• ♡ •

one chaotic, fast and messy breakfast later, and all the plates on the table were practically licked clean.

"thank you for breakfast sanji, you outdid yourself as always! those omelets and the potatoes, freshly squeezed orange juice, delicious as always!" you said absolutely glowing, sanji's breakfasts truly were the best, you wonder how you ever lived a life without them before.

"thank you mellorine!! but those lemon bars! they were divine!! who taught you how to bake?" he asks.

before you can get a reply in, the entire crew bursts into an uproar of compliments.

"yeah!!! i never knew you could make stuff like that!! i might have you replace sanji!!!" luffy exclaims

"i totally would've thought sanji made them if you hadn't said anything!" nami says, usopp nodding along and adding "yeah!! i was totally worried they would be bad at first because you seemed so nervous, but i can't believe sanji didn't make them!"

a soft spoken "absolutely delicious" coming from robin

zoro, lifting his head up and meeting you eyes, decided to chime in on the topic "i guess they were good." but after an intense glare from sanji then mumbles "...really good" his cheeks flushing ever so slightly.

"they were SUPER!!!!" franky shouts, causing luffy, chopper, and usopp to giggle.

and by this point, the compliments became a bit overwhelming. you didn't feel confident enough to accept them, but didn't want to be rude and ignore them either. your silence was definitely noticed by the crew who began to quiet down a bit as your face grew hotter and hotter, blush way too visible to hide behind your hair, you looked down and muttered as quietly as possible "they're really nothing special... im glad you guys liked them though..." and rushed out of the kitchen as fast as you possibly could.

• ♡ •

you retreated to the crow's nest to collect yourself. it was truly the perfect spot on the sunny to get some alone time. out of sight from everyone, but still in a spot where you can enjoy the warm sun, the ocean breeze, and the sound of the waves crashing as you sail the sea.

thankfully, you managed to leave a book up here the previous day, so once you caught your breath and the blush cleared from your face, you read. just to take your mind off of the interaction with the crew.

• ♡ •

you weren't sure how much time had passed, as you had gotten unexpectedly absorbed in the story of your book, but it wasn't until you heard the sound of a lighter.

you look up to meet the sky-blue eyes of sanji, he takes a drag of his cigarette before taking a seat on the floor next to you. the two of you sat together for moment of silence, minus the sound of the waves beneath you both. a quiet sigh leaves his mouth, before he breaks the silence "i just wanted to apologize. i didn't mean to put you on the spot in there. we didn't mean to make you uncomfortable."

"no you don't owe me an apology! really! it's fine!! i know you guys were just trying to be nice and compliment me but.... i don't know... " you paused to collect your thoughts for a second. trying to word how you felt. sanji waiting patiently, taking a couple drags before you finally found the words to continue talking.

"it's just hard sometimes.. to feel like i'm good enough... especially around you guys, i mean the countless people and countries you guys have saved, your strength, your kindness... sometimes, i guess i just feel like a fraud being in the same crew..."

sanji took a moment to consider your words and feelings, and with a quiet sigh said "yeah.. i get it. it's funny because i actually feel the same way sometimes... but you know, luffy chose you to be here for a reason, and even if you don't see that, he does. we all do. we all serve a purpose on the crew, one thats invaluable to our captain, and he has no doubts about what that is."

finally turning to meet those sky-blue eyes, you looked at sanji with a small smile. "thanks, that really means a lot.."

he returned your smile with a bigger one and replied "of course!! i mean.... come on, those were some damn good lemon bars and i think luffy would kill me if you never made them again."

you shoved his shoulder, and in between laughs, you look over and sanji and reply "whatever!!"

and it was at this moment, for the very first time under the warm summer sun and ocean breeze blowing through your hair and the faint smell of sanji's cigarette smoke, that you began to felt a little more sure of your place in the straw hat pirates...

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a/n: i totally didn't expect to make this as long as i did so thanks for sticking around if you made it this far!!! i love and appreciate you!! have a great day/afternoon/evening/night!!! 😭😭😭

a/n: enjoyed this fic? here's my masterlist!

[inthedayswhenlandswerefew]

In The Gloomy Depths [Chapter 7: Sapphire] [Series Finale]

Series summary: Five years ago, jewel mining tycoon Daemon Targaryen made a promise in order to win your hand in marriage. Now he has broken it and forced you into a voyage across the Atlantic, betraying you in increasingly horrifying ways and using your son as leverage to ensure your cooperation. You have no friends and no allies, except a destitute viola player you can’t seem to get away from…

Series warnings: Language, sexual content (18+ readers only), parenthood, dolphins, death and peril, violence (including domestic violence), drinking, smoking, freezing temperatures, murder, if you don’t like Titanic you won’t like this fic!!! 😉

Word count: 5.2k

💜 All my writing can be found HERE! 💜

Tagging: @nightvyre @mrs-starkgaryen @gemini-mama @ecstaticactus @chattylurker, more in comments 🥰

💎 Thank you for reading (and tolerating all my nautical puns)! 💎

How can love be a curse? How can it be something to fear, to condemn, to break?

She has dreamed of him all her life. First he was a protector, almost fatherlike, and then a remote, bewitching phantom as she crept into adolescence, and then when Harwin Strong died Daemon sailed over Saint George’s Channel to offer her solace in England, and at last the fantasies she never would have confessed to anyone were fulfilled, two marriages and four children later. Rhaenyra remembers what he told her in the mist-draped lakeside cottage where they met in secret, crossing paths like an asteroid striking a planet: My wife means nothing to me. She’s not like us. She is young, and weak, and afraid, and I could never respect that kind of person. Her father owns the last Connemara marble quarry in the world, and I needed a son. But the only woman I want is you.

Aegon fires the pistol as he chases her through the corridors of A-Deck, and when she shrieks nobody hears, or if they do they don’t appear to rescue her; the ship is full of people screaming, sobbing, clawing for their lives against wet walls and locked doors. He shoots and misses again. There’s something wrong with his hands. He keeps fumbling with the gun and almost dropping it, hissing in pain as he squeezes the trigger, and there’s blood staining his fingers.

Good, Rhaenyra thinks. I’m glad he’s hurt. I hope he’s dying.

She sees an open room and ducks inside, slamming the door behind her and barring it with the weight of her body as Aegon rams it with his shoulder. Rhaenyra is surrounded by the trappings of another family who purchased first-class tickets: chairs with velvet upholstery, a faux fireplace, paintings by Rousseau and Boccioni and Homer. The lights flicker and the steel beams of Titanic groan, low and disastrous. There isn’t much time left.

“Daemon!” she yells as loudly as she can. If he hears her, he’ll come running. I have to get to a lifeboat. I have to live for my father, for Jace and Luke and Joffrey, for the children I will one day give Daemon.

Rhaenyra struggles with the lock as Aegon batters the door and it quakes on its hinges. Just as she latches it, he fires the pistol through the door. Wood cracks and splinters; a bullet pierces Rhaenyra’s ribcage like a blade. There is unbearable pressure, and then a sharpness, a pain she believes she cannot stand until it keeps getting bigger, deeper, ripping her open and filling her with dark wet weight like the ocean surging into Titanic. She crumples to the floor. When she coughs, blood spurts out onto her lips. Rhaenyra wipes it away and then stares at the red on her palm.

I can’t die now. My life just became what it was supposed to be.

Aegon punches a hole through the mangled door large enough for him to reach in and unlock it. Then he stands in the threshold looking down at her, his hands shaking but his eyes hard, fierce, unflinching. Rhaenyra has never seen him like this before. She didn’t know he could be good at anything.

“How the fuck did you get on the ship?” Rhaenyra snarls as she scrambles away, hacking up more blood. The black opal ring Daemon gave her gleams like onyx or obsidian, something born of heat and earth and insurmountable, ancient gravity.

Daemon and I were made for each other. The same blood, the same bones, the same will to carve treasures from the bleakest places.

Aegon follows her across the floor, slow stalking steps. He doesn’t answer; instead, he shakes his right hand a few times—steadying himself, casting out tremors like demons—and then grips the pistol with it. He raises the gun, the barrel aimed at Rhaenyra’s face.

“Daemon?!” she screams, but he isn’t here. Then she asks, sudden desperate confusion, her blue eyes wide: “Why are you doing this?”

Aegon’s voice is calm. “Because she can’t be free unless you and Daemon are gone.”

That girl? Daemon’s sad, stupid wife? I’m dying because of HER?

“Father never loved you,” Rhaenyra seethes, red on her teeth, blooddrops spilling from her lips like rubies. Her eyes are cold, glinting sapphires, pools of freezing water that only needs minutes to stop the heart. “Just like Daemon never loved her.”

“I know. And I used to care. It almost killed me, it almost ate me alive. But now I’m better. And I finally know exactly who I’m supposed to be.”

Aegon pulls the trigger.

~~~~~~~~~~

As Daemon descends the Grand Staircase, you crawl down towards the next landing, your head spinning, your hands empty, writhing on your belly like a snake.

The dagger???

But you can’t find it, and you don’t have time to stop and search. Daemon is only a few steps behind you. When your palms hit B-Deck, you try to drag yourself upright, grappling for the banister; but before you can get your feet under you, Daemon kicks you and sends you hurtling down the next flight of stairs. You tumble towards C-Deck, clawing in vain for something to break your fall. Your head strikes the English oak wood and you hear your father’s bewildered voice as he sat at the dining room table in Lough Cutra Castle: Where are you going? When will you be back?

Never, never, never; and now from somewhere below you recognize the roar of rushing water.

“You were going to kill me?!” Daemon taunts as he bears down on you like a storm. Blood soaks his throat and the white shirt beneath his black suit jacket. His eyes are bright, feral, monstrous. “After all those times I spared you when I could have drowned you in a river or a hot bath or the sea? You’re so fucking useless. You really can’t do anything right. All you had to do was shut up and endure, and you could have lived to be an old, old woman with all the comforts my empire afforded you. Now, my dear, you will never see another sunrise. And when Titanic sinks, you’ll be buried with her.”

Down, down, always down towards the ocean floor, you crawl faster away from him as his footsteps grow louder.

“Help,” you moan weakly. Aegon? Anyone? But the only reply is the echoing of your own voice and the sounds of the dying ship: breaking metal, distant screams, gushing torrents of seawater.

You crash into C-Deck and again try to stagger to your feet, but Daemon is here, shoving you as if from a cliffside or off a balcony. And as you plummet down the Grand Staircase towards D-Deck—where the First-Class Dining Saloon is, where Thomas Andrews once assured you that Titanic was unsinkable—it is not hard wooden steps you collide with but swirling ice-cold seawater. You plunge beneath the currents and then come sputtering up to the surface, your white wool coat drenched and threatening to pull you below again like an anchor. You struggle to shed it with arms that are rapidly going numb.

I’m so cold, I’m so cold, if I don’t get out of the water I’ll be dead in minutes—

Daemon’s fingers close around your throat and he forces you under the waist-deep water. You thrash and try to push him away, to pry him off of you, but your muscles seem to have disappeared, they have been scraped off your bones and now you can only wait to die, your breathless lungs burning as your body freezes. You have a sudden vision of Daemon in his firelit study at Lough Cutra Castle, marveling at a shard of Larimar dredged up from the Caribbean Sea and quoting the first known treatise on gemstones, written by Theophrastus in the time of Alexander the Great: Of things formed in the earth, some have their origin from water.

“No!” you scream through the depths, bubbles rising up to air you cannot taste. You claw at Daemon’s hands, but you cannot wound him, cannot get a grip on him, and hasn’t that been true since you married him five years ago?

The dark, freezing water makes you want to give up. It makes death feel easy, painless, inevitable. You imagine faces you’ll never see again: Draco, Aegon, your parents, Fern. You hope Carpathia will be here soon to rescue the survivors. You wonder what will happen to Aegon’s paintings.

Through the water come the muffled booms of explosions, four of them, surely something catastrophic, the ship splitting in half or a distress flare misfired or boilers bursting and shearing through what’s left of the hull. Then Daemon’s hands vanish from your throat and someone is hauling you up out of the icy currents, they are freeing you, they are disinterring you from an oceanic grave.

“I’m here!” Aegon is shouting as you burst into open air, gasping and flailing. He drags you towards the Grand Staircase where you can climb out of the flood, but you’re looking for Daemon. He is a few yards away and floating face-up, one hand clasping his chest and a gurgling sound leaking from his throat. The water around him is turning red. He’s fading, but he’s not dead yet.

“Aegon, he’s still—”

“I know. I’ll take care of him once you’re out of the water. I don’t have any more bullets left.”

“I want to do it.”

“We need to get you dry and warmed up—”

“I want to do it,” you say again, and Aegon lets you go.

You twist off your black opal engagement ring and throw it into the water beside Daemon. Then you place both of you hands on his chest and push him beneath the surface, Aegon standing just behind you with the barrel of the pistol in his grasp in case he has to use it as a club. The glacial seawater froths and whirls as it rises over Daemon’s hemorrhaging chest. He startles—a death rattle, a late rite—and resists feebly, gazing up at you with glassy, disbelieving eyes. They ask: How did this happen? I was supposed to kill you, remember? I own you. I own jewels trapped in subterranean darkness all over the world, and you are the very least of them.

“Draco isn’t yours,” you tell Daemon as you force him under. “Rhaenyra isn’t yours. And I’m not yours either. Now sink and die and make me free.”

He twitches, he bares his crimson teeth at you, but after all this time finally Daemon is the weak one. The rising water flushes maroon around him, his skin goes a frail and translucent bluish-white, his heart is drained until the chambers are cold and grey and empty. You hold him beneath the water until the bubbles roiling up from his nose and mouth disappear. He will never touch you again, he will never hurt anyone, he will never bruise or break or ensnare or captivate. And who will inherit his mines scattered across the planet?

Draco. His only son. And my family and I will act as trustees until he’s eighteen.

“We have to go,” Aegon is saying. He must have taken off his coat before he went into the water after you. He stands shivering in only his white shirt and green corduroy pants, the ocean now lapping at his chest.

“Rhaenyra?” you ask.

“She’s gone. I’m sure.”

“It’s over,” you say softly, feeling weight like stones roll off of you, feeling warmth like sunlight on your face.

As if in reply, the listing ship groans and the lights flicker again. “Not yet,” Aegon says, grabbing your hand. “Let’s hope there’s a lifeboat left.”

You wade to the steps and climb out of the water. Aegon helps you wring out your soaked hair and the skirt of your gown, then snatches his black wool coat off the steps where he left it and puts it on you. You race up the Grand Staircase to C-Deck, and then B-Deck, and then the A-Deck landing where you find your green handbag with Aegon’s tiny aluminum lighter still inside.

“I think you dropped this,” Aegon says when he spots the dagger on a nearby step, still covered with Daemon’s blood. He wipes it clean on his corduroy pants and then passes it to you. When you hesitate to take it, he grins. “Who knows. You might need to stab someone else tonight.”

“I never want to draw blood again.” But you accept the dagger and place it in your handbag, the captive gemstones glimmering there: amethyst, tiger’s eye, black opal, emerald, ruby, bloodstone, sapphire like the North Atlantic Ocean that is swallowing Titanic down into her cold, crushing belly. Then you ascend one last flight of steps to the Boat Deck, passing the bronze cherub statue and the ticking clock, stealing a glimpse up at the dome of glass and wrought iron that will soon shatter when the sea punctures through it like a bullet or a blade.

Outside the night air is so frigid that ice crystals begin forming in your hair, and the hem of your blue gown begins to stiffen as it freezes. You are barefoot, you only now realize, and if splinters from the pine planks of the deck needle their way into your flesh you won’t be able to feel them. There are only two lifeboats left on this side of the ship, one of which is already being lowered down to the sea. Officers are still directing women and children into the other. Benjamin Guggenheim and his companions are very drunk, clumsily herding frantic first-class passengers towards the boats. The string quartet is now playing The Merry Widow by Franz Lehár.

“Come, come quickly, Lady Targaryen!” the officers shout when they see you, knowing by your gown that you belong here, perhaps recognizing you from strolls on the Promenade Deck or when you and Daemon boarded Titanic in Cork with much fanfare. Aegon helps you into the lifeboat, his wounded hands cradling yours. Another distress flare is shot into the sky, metallic rain, doomsday portents.

We’re going to be alright, you think. We’re going to survive this.

“Darling, you’re sopping wet!” one of the women in the lifeboat exclaims, and they all begin to fret over you. There are dogs here, a Pomeranian in one lap, a Yorkshire terrier in another.

“Get her under a blanket,” Aegon is saying. “Keep her warm or she’ll get pneumonia. Give her a lifebelt.”

“We will, we will,” another lady shimmering in jewels—a mother of two boys in heavy coats and blue-striped pajamas—promises him. “We’ll take good care of her.”

You turn back to Aegon. “What?”

He tells you, his voice quiet: “Petra, they’re not going to let me in.”

“No, no, you can’t stay here—”

“Women and children only!” an officer booms, then begins waving several shrieking maids towards the vessel, just moments from launching.

“Aegon,” you say, horrified. He’ll die if he stays. He’ll drown or he’ll freeze and he’ll be entombed at the bottom of the Atlantic. “No.”

“I’ll be okay.”

“No you won’t,” you sob, then look desperately at the officers. How can I change their minds? “He’s a Targaryen, he’s a first-class passenger, he must be allowed aboard!”

“A Targaryen?!” one of the officers says distractedly as he battles with the rigging. “I know all the Targaryens on Titanic, and he’s not one of them!”

“Just look at him,” the other officer mutters, meaning: He isn’t dressed like someone with castles or mansions or titles or mines. He can’t be someone who matters.

“He is,” you plead, tears stinging on your cheeks as they freeze. “He’s Aegon, he’s a Targaryen, please, he can’t be left behind—”

“Women and children only!” the first officer barks at you as the other pushes away a group of panicked young men in black suits trying to bribe their way into the vessel. “And if you want to stay here with him, that’s your business, but get to it so the rest of us can try to make it off this ship alive!”

“There’s more than enough room for him, for Christ’s sake, there are dogs in here!”

“There will be other lifeboats, love,” one of the women tells you as she drapes a scratchy wool blanket across your shoulders, but you don’t believe that’s true. The maids are climbing into the lifeboat; the officers are beginning to lower it with sharp lurches that make the occupants gasp.

You reach for Aegon, your hands catching on his drenched shirt, the thin layer of ice cracking beneath your fingers. “No, no, Aegon, I can’t go like this.”

“You have to,” he says calmly, and he holds you face still and touches his lips to your forehead, a kiss goodbye, gentle and lingering.

“No—”

“You have a kid. You have to go. Draco will be looking for you on Carpathia.”

“You deserve to be free too.”

“I’ll stay out of the water for as long as I can,” Aegon says like a vow. “I’ll try to find something to float on. And once Titanic goes down…maybe the lifeboats will come back to pick up any survivors.”

The water is too cold. I’ve felt it, I’ve been paralyzed by it, once you go under you only have minutes. “You can’t…you won’t…”

“Petra,” Aegon says, and his eyes turn desperate. He knows it’s his only chance. “Make them come back for me.”

“I will,” you swear to him.

And he pries your fingers off his shirt and rips away from you before your resolve can weaken. High above and through tears that blur your vision, constellations of stars gleam like diamonds.

~~~~~~~~~~

He runs to the other side of the Boat Deck, searching for lifeboats that haven’t launched yet. He can’t find any. There are swarms of passengers weeping, shouting, jostling, and officers trying to restore order. Pistols and flares are fired, chairs are tossed overboard for passengers to cling to as they float. But Aegon knows that won’t be enough; if they stay submerged, they will die.

I need something bigger. I need something I can lie on. A door or a dresser or…

He shoves through the crowd to get to the ship’s railing. Below, the ocean has gotten so much closer. He sees a lifeboat bobbing in the waves, just far enough away that someone brave enough to leap could not get to it. Inside, along with perhaps twenty first-class women and maids, Aegon recognizes Laenor Velaryon and his ever-present Parisian friends. They are puffing on cigars and toasting glasses of brandy, celebrating their good fortune. They must have successfully bribed their way aboard.

“Fuck,” Aegon sighs, his breath fog in the frigid air.

How am I going to stay out of the water long enough to survive until I’m rescued?

Then he replays the evening in his mind—his first night with Petra, perhaps his last night on earth, red silk and candles and oil paint and the warmth of her beneath his hands—and Aegon gets an idea. He sprints back to the Grand Staircase and soars down to B-Deck, seawater ankle-deep on the floor. He splashes through the corridors to the staterooms once occupied by Daemon Targaryen’s wife and child, now rid of him, now waiting for what will come next. Aegon hurries through the sitting room, passing the taxidermied tiger head above the fireplace and the large, heavy chest where Daemon made Petra lock up the art she bought in Paris.

She didn’t remember to put the real Picasso’s paintings in a lifeboat, but she saved mine, Aegon thinks. If I make it out of this alive somehow, I’m marrying her the second we dock in New York.

He goes to the bedroom, finds what he needs, carries it with him as he returns to the maze of hallways. Now the icy water is nipping at his knees.

~~~~~~~~~~

The ocean is calm, the lifeboat rocking placidly on inky surf. The women comfort their children and their dogs. You take Aegon’s aluminum lighter out of your handbag and light yourself a cigarette, then pass it around so the other passengers can thaw their lungs with hot plumes of nicotine, here in the early hours of the morning when it feels like you’ll never be warm again. The officer who took command of the vessel—the same one who shouted at you and refused to admit Aegon—is rowing vigorously as you and several other women help him, staring horror-struck at Titanic as she goes down by the bow.

“We have to get away from the ship,” the officer keeps saying, and he sounds genuinely petrified. A woman in a glittering gold gown steers with the tiller. “Or she’ll suck us into the water with her.”

There are shadows of other lifeboats nearby, also fleeing from the condemned Titanic, that miraculously colossal and opulent triumph that everyone had told you was unsinkable. You wonder which one Draco and Fern are in, undoubtedly cold and frightened but safe.

Aegon deserves to live too. I have to find him, I have to save him.

Now there is seawater flooding over Titanic’s deck at the bow, where you and Aegon saw third-class passengers—now dead, or very soon to be—kicking around pieces of the iceberg that they didn’t know had doomed them. The ocean surges higher, covering B-Deck, and A-Deck, and finally the Boat Deck, where the towering funnels collapse and you can hear shrieks and guns firing. You know you won’t be able to see Aegon from here—you won’t be able to tell if he made it into a lifeboat somehow, or if he is one of the figures that falls from a lethal height into the waves, or if he is crushed or shot or trapped below deck and drowned—but still, you cannot stop looking for him, peering through the night to where Titanic glows in her spotlight of white-gold electric luminescence.

As the bow sinks, the stern begins to rise, higher and higher until the tension cracks the ship in two, and the passengers you share the lifeboat with wail and sob as the ship’s lights blink out for the last time and the gravesite goes dark. Women call out the names of their husbands, fathers, brothers, adult sons, knowing they must be dying. You can only watch with tears streaming down your face, thinking: How could he survive that? How could I have left him?

The stern bobs for a while in the nightscape sea, a shade, a phantom, and then it plunges into the ocean. The water—indifferent, dispassionate, not a mortal but a titan, here long before humans and destined to outlast them, not unlike the treasures of the earth—gulps down metal beams and pine planks and split bones and shredded flesh. There are screams, so many, so pitiful, so loud they fill the sky, and the howling women in the lifeboat cover their ears and those of their children so they will not have to try to exorcise the sound from their memories later.

As soon as the stern has been consumed by the depths, you say to the officer: “We have to go back to look for survivors.”

“Are you mad, Lady Targaryen?” he snaps at you; but there are tears in his bloodshot eyes. “We’ll be mobbed if we sail into that. They’ll pour into the boat until we go under too. Do you want to freeze to death with them?”

“People will die quickly. They are dying already, the water is cold enough to kill in minutes. If we start rowing towards them now, most of the passengers will be dead by the time we get there. And then we can rescue anyone who’s left.” Please still be alive, Aegon.

“Not a chance in hell,” the officer says.

You turn to the other women. They blink back at you in dazed, timid terror. “It’s murder to leave your men behind,” you implore, you beg them to agree. “Help me row to them.”

But the women only weep softly to themselves and look to the officer to tell them what to do. He smirks at you victoriously, an expression of no humor but rather grim, fearful misery that could drive someone insane. In the lap of one woman, the Pomeranian whimpers.

I can’t leave Aegon, you think. I can’t, I can’t, I can’t.

You open your green handbag and pull out the dagger, the blade pointed at the officer. He shouts and bolts away from you, incredulous, furious.

“You’re threatening to kill me?!”

You shake your head. “I’m offering you a gift.” You turn the dagger around so the officer can grasp the handle. His gaze catches, transfixed and wondrous, on the gemstone spheres like perfectly aligned planets. “This dagger is worth more than you would make in a decade of work. Go back for survivors, and it’s yours. Refuse, and when we are rescued and my son inherits my husband’s fortune, I will make it my life’s work to destroy you. I will follow you anywhere on earth. I will ruin you. So take the dagger as payment and break my curse, and let us save the people who are left.”

The lifeboat sways in the small, serene waves, and the stars revolve high above in a moonless sky, and you and the other women wait for the officer to reply. After a minute or more—we have to go back now, right now, we don’t have much time—he finally lifts the dagger from your open palm and tucks it into his belt.

“Fine,” he says, picking up his oar again. “Let’s go. I cannot abide your damnation. I’ll be haunted by enough ghosts already.”

He and several of the other women row into the throng while you find the flashlights stored in the bottom of the lifeboat, then perch at the bow searching for Aegon. Instead you see hundreds of bluish corpses floating in their lifebelts, dead men and women and children, some of them first-class or crewmembers of the ship but most of them third-class passengers: Italian, Polish, Greek, Syrian, Russian, Chinese, Irish, discarded people, good for dying in the operations of mines or factories or railroads and little else.

“Aegon!” you shout over the water, but he does not answer. There is only the mist of your own words and the sound of cold currents rippling as the lifeboat cuts through them.

Your group saves two people from the sea, both nearly frozen to death and unable to speak: one man floating on a table washed out of a dining room, one little girl clutching her dead mother. Then a long time passes with no living souls to salvage.

“Have we done enough now, Lady Targaryen?” the officer asks you gravely. “Have you seen a sufficient number of the dead to assuage your wrath?”

“Not yet,” you say, steely, your eyes fixed on the water as the flashlight illuminates lifeless faces, scraps of wreckage, nothing, nothing, nothing. And then the light settles on him.

When the stern of Titanic went under, so did Aegon: there are ice crystals in his hair, and his clothes are freezing to his skin, and his lips are blue, and he’s shivering violently. But unlike over 1,000 other passengers, he didn’t stay in the depths long enough to perish as the cold stopped their hearts and lungs. He had something with him, a life raft, a second chance, a treasure mined not from some far-flung crevice of the earth but from the bedroom where he uncovered you, where you found each other and never wanted to go back to the way life felt before.

Aegon is sprawled across the oval-shaped mirror that once stood beside your bed, the fractured glass reflecting the stars that glimmer in the night sky. His ravaged hands cling to the wooden frame. And when the beam of the flashlight skates across his face like moonshine, Aegon knows you’ve come back for him, and he reaches for you until your hands link with his and help pull him aboard.

~~~~~~~~~~

Carpathia arrives an hour later, just before four in the morning on April 15th, and as the sun rises over the North Atlantic Ocean you and Aegon find Draco and Fern on the bow deck, where stewards are distributing blankets and tea to the survivors. Women wander the ship pleading for help finding their lost loved ones, weeping endlessly for their brothers, their fathers, their husbands. Your tears have stopped entirely.

Carpathia’s passengers are generous. They offer in charity their food, their clothing, even their rooms. Children share their books and toys with Draco. Fern teaches him how to play marbles; you read him The Story of Saint Patrick. A doctor onboard disinfects and bandages Aegon’s hands, and assures him that he will be able to play viola again, not now, perhaps not even soon, but one day.

That first afternoon, as you and Aegon are taking a stroll on the Boat Deck, you spot a man painting a scene of the sunset: gold, tiger’s eye, ruby, red beryl. Aegon shows him some of the portraits from his scuffed leather portfolio…though, of course, one in particular is not suitable for mixed company. The man is so impressed that he insists Aegon must not be deprived of the ability to create such beauty for lack of supplies, and gifts him an easel and some paper, brushes, and oil paints.

It’s difficult with his sore, bandaged hands, but Aegon still wants to try, and when his brush begins to shake he asks you to help him. Aegon explains things to you as you steady his hands: chiaroscuro, scumbling, alla prima, glazing, impasto, a foreign language that will soon become familiar. Already, you are learning. And as Carpathia sails into New York Harbor on the evening of April 18th, Aegon takes a paintbrush and draws a circle around your ring finger in vivid, sapphire blue, a worthless gift of no gleaming gems or metal, a vow that means everything.

It’s been years, but Aegon remembers the way to his mother’s house. He leads you, Draco, and Fern to the doorstep of the Hightower mansion on Fifth Avenue. He knocks and a butler answers, a middle-aged man who gapes at Aegon in shellshocked disbelief.

“One…one moment, sir, if you’d be so kind to…to…to just wait here, please,” the butler stammers, then disappears inside. A few minutes later, a different man appears in the threshold. He must be Aemond, tall and white-blonde and precise in every movement, his left eye concealed by a black leather eyepatch. His remaining eye, a clear alert blue, darts to where Fern is holding Draco on her hip and then to you and Aegon, his bandaged hands resting so lightly on you they could never leave a mark.

Then Aemond’s face softens, and there is a kind sort of relief that seeps in, and you imagine your parents will look the same way when you return to Lough Cutra Castle. “You’re home,” he says quietly.

And Aegon smiles and replies: “We all are.”

[saberlight1]

— can’t help fallin’ in love, coriolanus snow

pairing: coriolanus snow x fem!reader

warnings: slight tbosas spoilers, mentions of trauma, depression, standard ballad of songbirds and snakes warnings.

authors note: another one!! i am a goddamn writing machine these days lmao. i wanted to write something lovey dovey about my boy, i think i may have gone a lil overboard but this app is seriously lacking coryo fluff fics. i hope you enjoy soft coryo as much as i do! <3

masterlist

Coriolanus sat with an emotionless look on his face as he sat on the rocky train that was taking him to his worst nightmare. He was being shipped off to District 12 for cheating to help you win the games. He didn’t regret that, he never would.

But this was not the ideal outcome he’d imagined.

At least he wouldn’t be completely alone— after all, he was going to your district. He just wished it was under different circumstances.

“You know, I thought I might find you here,” Sejanus’ words caused him to turn around immediately, breaking him from his thoughts. “Sitting all by yourself.” He teased, walking into the train cart Coriolanus was currently in.

“Sejanus, what’re you doing—” He stood up, his eyebrows knitted together in concern and annoyance.

“What do you think?” He cut him off with a scoff. “After what I did in the arena? My father had to buy me the Academy a brand new gym just so I could get my diploma.” He put his bag down. “He begged me to stay, but once I found out where they were sending you, I couldn’t get out fast enough.” He admitted with a sigh, moving to sit down. “Barely made the train ‘cause of this stupid knee, but it’s okay, they gave me some morphling for the pain.”

Coriolanus looked at him with judgment. “You volunteered for this?”

“I figured if I get through basic and then maybe I’d become a medic.” He beamed. “Maybe make a real difference out here… just like you said.” Sejanus’ gaze turned downward. “They never told us what you did,”

“I cheated.” He answered, shamelessly. “To save Y/N from the snakes.” Sejanus’ nodded slowly, understanding where his friend was coming from. After a beat of silence, Coriolanus’ tearful eyes met his. “Do you think they killed her?”

“Why would they risk it?” Sejanus questioned with furrowed brows. “She was a big hit, if there is a games next year, they’re probably gonna invite her to sing at the opening ceremony.” He joked with a smile.

Coriolanus didn’t laugh. “You know, when you came in, I was weighing the merits of suicide.” He half-joked, his smile not meeting his eyes.

“When we’re about to be free?” Sejanus shot back. “When the girl you risked everything for might be waiting for you at the end of this track?” At his words, Coriolanus’ throat ran dry, the tears returning to his eyes. The possibility that you might be waiting not even crossing his mind. Sejanus looked at him with a knowing glint in his eye. “My friend, don’t give them the satisfaction. Your life has just begun. You’re gonna do great— We’re both gonna do great.”

Sejanus’ words still rung in his ears, even if they were spoken all those months ago.

Even now, when you were delicately tucked under his arm, your head buried in his neck as you slept soundly. That conversation seemed to take home in his mind, never leaving.

You were, in-fact, waiting for him, and the moment you saw him you ran into his arms, and he cherished you every day from that moment. The pair of you spent as much time together as you could, and you loved every second of it. As did he.

You were like a star of brightness in his darkness— lighting up places he didn’t even know existed and granting them with your warmth. And now that you weren’t fighting for your life, he got to learn so much about you.

He learned about your quirks, your personality, your smile, all of it. You learned the same about him.

But nights like these where he couldn’t find sleep and was left up alone, the silence and ringing of the bugs outside consumed him, the man getting caught up in the ropes that was his thoughts.

He often didn’t believe he deserved you, that you were too pure for him. You were gifted to him by mistake, but he was too selfish to let you go.

And, God, you never wanted him too.

Coriolanus had a bad habit of not speaking his mind, and bottling his emotions until they bubbled over, everything coming out in one out burst of rage and sadness. You didn’t blame him, you never did. Instead, you picked him up from the floor and held him until he calmed down.

He had never experienced the type of love you gave him, and it scared the shit out of him. He didn’t know how to return it, he wasn’t good with kind of stuff. You taught him things everyday, though.

You snuggled deeper into his neck, his uneven breathing causing you, a light sleeper, to wake up. Or, according to your theories, you were so interlinked with Coryo that you could sense when he was overthinking.

You left a small patch of kisses on his throat, cracking your sleepy eyes open to confirm your suspicions— the boy was staring off into space, not a drop of sleep in his eyes.

“Coryo,” You whispered, leaning up to kiss his jaw softly. He turned at your acts, his eyes meeting yours as his previous frown was replaced with that lovey smile you adored. “Can’t sleep?”

He shook his head, temporarily pushing you off of him in order for him to turn on his side to properly look at you. Once he got situated, he pulled you back into his chest, a giggle leaving your lips.

Your fingers came up to knead through his messy platinum locks. “What’s on your mind, baby?”

His eyes fluttered closed for a moment. “Nothing.. it’s just, sometimes I think you may be too good for me.” He admitted slowly.

Your eyebrows shot up. “Coryo, if anything, you’re too good for me. Remember, honey, I’m ‘District Trash’.” You laughed, repeating the words Lucky Flickermen had said about you before wrapping your arms around his neck and leaving kisses all over his face. “You must be a fool if you can’t see how in love I am with you. You are more than good to me, I couldn’t imagine my life with anyone else.” You promised, continuing to leave kisses on your lover’s smiling face with every word you spoke.

His arms wrapped around your waist, hugging you closer to him. “I love you,” He whispered in your ear, beginning to leave his own kisses on your neck and jaw.

Butterflies creeped up your spine at his confession, a love-sick smile tugging on your lips as you leaned up to really kiss him.

His hands came up to cup your face as he slipped his tongue into your mouth, the kiss only being further fueled with your burning passion for each other. Your hands slipped back into his locks for purchase as the kiss grew more needy. You let out a whimper against his mouth when he began to kiss you harder, angling your body back to deepen it further.

He smirked against your lips at your noises, before pulling back for air. His thumb swiped back and forth across your cheekbone as you both stared at each other, love strong in the both of your eyes.

“I love you, Coryo.” You whispered back, before taking your spot back in his arms. “Get some sleep, my love.” You left another kiss on his throat, the boy hugging you somehow closer, leaving a kiss on your forehead.

“Thank you,” He softly spoke, leaning up to blow out the candle you had lit earlier.

“Always,”

[zarnzarn]

@irondork tags on the first post made me go heheh out loud so heres part two of the reverse odyssey au

||

1/2/3/4

They set out in the morning.

Laertes and Anticles have taken over the throne until they return with the lost king, tears in their eyes as they wave the ship off, the smallest and sleekest one, fitted with twice the sails. Penelope and Telemachus keep their eyes on Ithaca until the last moment, her nails digging into his shoulder as they stand at the bow, and then she sighs and turns them to the captain's cabin with determination.

They turn into the open ocean with nothing but hope, all thirty five men that could fit in the boat rowing unrelentingly. She remembers some of them from the march out. They had left years ago as farmers and theives, come back as weatherbeaten soldiers, loyal and hardworking.

And guilty. Grieving, even, that their king gave up his life for them, thirty-five of them with either no one to go home to, or over-dedicated to the king, or filled with some odd sense of machismo, Cmietine had said, the night before they left.

Penelope knew better. They loved her husband, these men, to the bone, as had all the others who had begged and pleaded to be chosen to come. She knew better than anyone what it was like, after all, to have Odysseus look at you with his Athena-gifted eyes, to have him pull you in with a warm around your shoulders and a rakish grin as he flattered and joked and laughed. Knew better than anyone what it felt like to be caught in his wit and loyalty, to have his love and knew that helplessly, you could not help but love him in return. And for him to have fought by their side for ten years, brought almost every man home alive?

She knew the men loved Odysseus.

And she would use that well.

"Full speed ahead!" She shouts, trying to remember the confidence of her husband's orders, and keeps her eyes on the birds.

The first year, they sail until they run out of food, all the way back to Troy and then around, with one man in each direction awake at all times to search for even a glimpse of their wayward king. Penelope demands stories while they sail, of every scrap of her Odysseus from their eyes, encouraging them with what she can, making plans and strategies with Polites and Eurylochus and everyone else for when they find him.

They treat her with respect, to her surprise, never favouring another's order over hers or hesitantly explaining the reasons why they couldn't instead of dismissing her outright, that she wryly thinks must be at least partly borne of fear.

"I mean no offense, my lady," one of them says one day, rowing hard as he talks, after she says this. "But he really never shut up about you, ever. He once spent an entire evening after battle yelling at us how you would have done better."

She laughs at the thought, cheeks hot, even as the other sailors yell about disrespect and conduct before the queen and throw various things at the young man's yelping face.

Telemachus grows well on the ship. He finds it as easy to adapt as both his parents, and is beloved by the sailors as their own as he learns to handle ropes and oars and sails.

He does not understand the curse, does not understand why the adults around him weep so much, only knows that his father now swims in the waters and needs to be brought home.

Perhaps that is why he is the one to glimpse the scales in the water on the day they run out of food, despite Penelope's strictest rationing, when they all gather on the deck to hang their heads before one last speech, as the order is finally given to turn the ship back around home.

"Hello!" He shouts, waving wildly. "I'm Telemachus! Your son!"

His father blinks at him with five eyes- greyer than his, but still grey like his own- then smiles widely, waving back.

Telemachus hears gasps and cries and his mother's shout, but doesn't really wanna turn- he's finally seeing his father! After so long! Which means they can finally go home!

Penelope nearly trips them both overboard with how hard she rushes into him, one hand to her mouth as she sees Odysseus at last, at last. He looks gaunt, tail no longer silver but bright with dappled orange and red and yellow, dark brown like his hair, and they watch his expression wobble and tears leak onto his wet face as all thirty five of them clamber to the side of the ship, trembling with emotion as they shout greetings at him.

"Odysseus!" Penelope screams, laughing with joy as she gathers her chlamys up and steps onto the edge of the ship, ignoring the panicked rush of men trying to grab at her and the begging for Telemachus to stop trying to follow her bad examples. "Come here, you great idiot- where have you been?"

He swims closer almost hesitantly, diving under a wave and then reappearing next to the boat. He looks- shy, of all things, something like raw fear crossing his face as he flicks his tail and comes closer, even as the men run to get the nets, the ropes, the tub. Penelope laughs and reaches over the bow of the ship to strain downwards, arm outstretched to her husband, tears streaming down her face as he catches the next wave enough to meet the tips of her fingers.

And then Eurylochus next to her bellows, "NO!"

They all nearly jump out of their skin, and Penelope turns to look at her brother-in-law running across the deck to where one sailor is undoing the rope wound around a dirty rucksack, bag falling from his hand in shock.

Odysseus' fingers barely touch her own as the wave passes by, and then the winds of Aeolus still trapped in the bag burst out in a furious maelstrom, carrying their ship away in one direction, pushing the ocean waters in a forceful blow in the opposite, leaving Penelope screaming her husband's name in desperation as they're pulled apart once more.

Odysseus' answering scream of horror carries on the wind back to them, and then nothing at all.

[serxa]

HERE'S MY OPEN ARMS! — TEN

Word count: 1.4k

Summary: Polites and Y/n, his wife, reunites after he gets home from war:3

Pairing: Fem!Reader x Polites, but I do see polites with a man

Warnings: mentions of blood.

𝐇𝐄'𝐒 𝐇𝐎𝐌𝐄, 𝐇𝐄'𝐒 𝐅𝐈𝐍𝐀𝐋𝐋𝐘 𝐇𝐎𝐌𝐄. Polites and Odysseus had made it home with the rest of their crew. Ithaca still shining bright the same way it used to when they left 20 years ago to fight for the Trojan war.

Yet, had a few stop overs for materials and foods, and made a few gods and monsters mad. Yet, he didn't think that he would still be here after seeing what happened.

Polites was practically buzzing to finally see his wife again, and to see his daughter. As they went off the ship, the other people in the kingdom happy that the warriors and soldiers finally got home.

Polites and the others congratulated them, welcoming them again, and Polites was just waiting for Odysseus before he goes back home. When they were walking back to the palace, Polites felt a sudden swirl in his stomach.

He wasn't sure if his wife would still love him the same. Or would his daughter even care that he's back home. He adjusted his glasses with a shaky hand, which Odysseus noticed. "... Polites." He murmured, making Polites look over. "Captain?" He said, before shaking his head and correcting himself. "Odysseus.."

"Mind helping me with the suitor problem.." He murmured. "... Others told me theres a whole lot of suitors in the palace." His voice low. Jealousy basically dripping in his spit. "... Like.. Kill them?" He asked as he adjusted his glasses again.

"Yeah.." Odysseus smirked a bit. "The entrance of the palace, lies my bow. Be a friend and grab a few arrows." He smiled at Polites. Polites sighed and nodded. Needing to help his best friend before he see's his wife.

‧͙⁺˚*･༓☾　☽༓･*˚⁺‧͙

Polites was bloody from his legs to his toes and his face a bit of blood. As Telemachus and Odysseus finally reunited, Polites tapped Odysseus shoulder. Odysseus looked over and immediately softened even more. ".. Go to her.." He mumbled.

Polites practically beamed, bowing to his best friend while muttering a small thank you before running out of the different halls of the palace. His feet wobbling with almost every single step he takes, just wanted to be in his darling Y/n's arms.

The wind passing through his as he ran through the last Hall, seeing the exit of Odysseus' palace. He ran out to the kingdoms, seeing the familiar kingdom he used to roam around.

He suddenly saw a figure running towards the palace, a woman to be exact. Their chiton moving with the wind at they ran. They stopped in front of the palace and saw Polites. His legs and bottom of his tunic covered in red, after the suitor problem was solved.

"Polites...?" They whispered. "Y/n." He mumbled. His wife he had been dreaming and yearning to see once again, only a few feet away from him. He sniffled as he saw her.

He looked.. Different. His tan skin tanned a bit more, his eyeglasses had a crack, knowing he and his wife would have to go to the eye doctor to get new glasses for him.

He had a beard, his old peach fuzz grew into a small beard now. He looked a bit more tan than he used to, being out in the ocean for years.

Polites opened his arms hesitantly, thinking that his wife might've hated him for being gone for so long. He closed his eyes, and whispered. "I'm home.."

He felt his heart race when Y/n hugged him tightly, his eyes widening as she started sobbing. He wrapped his arms around her and twirled her around before relishing the closeness of her body with his, his hand gripping at her arms and waist like a crying child as tears flew down their cheeks.

"Oh, Polites.." Y/n mumbled against his shoulder while she started kissing his neck and brought up her lips to his face. "I've missed you.." He whispered back, closing his eyes.

Y/n took his glasses off, putting it on his head and caressed his cheek. "You need new glasses, my love.." She mumbled as she played with his curls at the nape of his neck.

"I know.." He whispered as his vision was a bit blurry. "Put my glasses back on, I want to see you." He said teasingly as he sniffled. Y/n chuckled and put his glasses back on his face. "Where's Sena..?" He whispered, remembering his daughter.

Like right on cue, they heard a voice behind them. "Dad..?" Polites turned around and saw his daughter, She's grown. Almost as tall as her mother, and her skin was the same tan he had before war. Polites looked at Y/n, asking for permission to withdraw his arm around her. She nodded and pulled away, and Polites quickly went towards Sena.

She was kind of uncomfortable, especially not knowing her father as well,and seeing him covered with a bit of blood. Polites felt his heart shake a bit, as he took a small step back. He waited for his daughter to speak, but she looked starstruck. He hummed and opened his arms a bit, seeing if she'd also come forward like her mother.

She looked hesitant. She looked over at her mother who just smiled softly, silently reassuring her about any of the problems floating in her mind. Sena then took a big step forward before hugging her father, not caring about the blood on his legs and arms.

Polites looked at her and smiled. "Why we're you at the palace, huh?" He asked, a bit curious. She pulled away and blushed a bit, not wanting to say anything. "Uh-.." She smiled awkwardly. Y/n smirked and cleared her throat.

"Mom- Please don't-" Sena clasped her hands, embarassed of the reason. Polites looked over at his two girls and raised an eyebrow. "I just got home and you're hiding secrets from me, huh?" Polites teased as he ruffled his daughter's hair.

"Fine.. I'll tell you." She murmured, feeling guilty after his teasing. "... I was.. I.. Blegh.." She stumbled on her words and covered her face, making Polites and Y/n chuckle. "Let's go back home, you can tell your father while on the way." Y/n said softly.

As they started walking down the steps of the palace, Polites still walked with a smile and radiance around him, even though his limbs are full of fried blood of the suitors.

Sena started to explain. "Me and Telemachus-" she started, making Polites halt and laugh a bit. "Really?" He smiled excitedly, making Sena turn pink. "I'm not even finished!" She hissed at her father as she basically saw the teasing comments trying to pry his lips open to be let out.

Polites kept his mouth shut for his daughter to explain. "We've been. Really close, that is." She started off, rubbing her arms in embarrassment. "And, I just realized you were home too when I saw Odysseus with Telemachus." She explained. "That's why I ran out here and saw you and mom." She blushed.

"Are you and Telemachus, I don't know, together? Hints of interest?" Polites smiled, which made Sena cover her face and grumble. Polites wrapped an arm around his wife's waist while paying attention to his daughter also.

"..." Sena peeked out her fingers. "We're together, yeah.." And once those words were out of her mouth, Polites celebrated silently. "That's amazing for you two." He praised. They all got to their house and walked in, where Polites just stood on the doorway, looking around.

The house had a few more new furniture, and a new format, but it still looked the same. Y/n walked over and held his face which he immediately softened. "What was that for?" He smirked as he pulled her closer to him.

"You just look so charming." She complemented as their face were centimeters away. "Even with the blood on me?" He smirked. "Makes you look a lot more charming than you are now.." Y/n giggled as she felt Polites squeeze her waist.

Sena was just on their couch, and quickly stood up one she saw her father's hand traveling down to her mother's backside. "We just got in the house! Please, control yourselves!" She blushed as she started walking to her room.

Y/n and Polites chuckled softly and immediately kissed each other once Sena was out of the room.

‧͙⁺˚*･༓☾　☽༓･*˚⁺‧͙

Once Polites and Y/n were in their cleep wear, Polites laid down on the bed, opening his arms wide. "Here's my open arms, love." He raised his eye brows suggestively, and a knowing smirk on his face.

Y/n walked over and laid on his chest, his arms wrapping around her. "I'm not going to so anything unless you intiate it." Polites said softly as he kissed her forehead. Suddenly, Y/n sat up, looking down at Polites with hooded eyes. "... Well this is gonna be a fun night." Polites smiled.

[scrompsmilanodiaries]

Suit up !!

Hey y'all, sorry for the lack of Rocket stories here, time to make up for it. Word count:775

Peter has been waiting anxiously for a certain package to arrive, having ordered it months ago, it suffered backorder and multiple delays, but today was the day it's meant to arrive, But the postal service has been scut as of lately so he wasn't trying to hold his breath. "Come on... come on..."

"Yo Pete !! Something came for you" Rocket called out from the living area, carrying a large box and placing it up on the table.

"Yes !! Finally !!" Peter rushed down the stairs of the bowie to get to the package. "Just you wait, A whole lot of awesomeness is in here" He grabbed a box cutter and gently opened it.

He gathered everyone on the ship to the living area and showed it off, Their brand new official uniforms. Decked out with the logo on the chest and donning a blue and red colour scheme. "Ok so everyone pick yours and try 'em on. Drax don't worry I made sure to get the sensitive material."

"Much appreciated" He nodded

"Still can't believe you have sensitive nipples" You snickered as you took your uniform and ran off.

Rocket was the first out with his suit on, after a quick adjustment, he nodded as he looked around. "Hmm not bad" It even made sure their was room for his tail in the back.

You soon came out with your uniform on, It felt nice and comfy. Not too tight and not constraining.

"Looking good y/n" Rocket complimented, which was a rare thing.

"Thanks, you too" You nodded to him.

But the compliments went only so far, You've been struggling with self love all your life, always comparing yourself to other people around you, were you too fat ?? Too skinny ?? Too bulky ?? Not bulky enough ?? But this suit just made it a little worse, were the compliments they were giving just out of pity ?? Were you fit to be a guardian ??

The others didn't quite pick up on the fact that you weren't doing so good, But later that day when Rocket was moving onto another task on the ship, He happened to catch a glimpse of you looking into the mirror and not in a confident kind of way.

He perked a brow and cleared his throat to get your attention. "You uh... You doing ok ??"

You looked behind and saw him. "Hmm... oh... I'm ok" You nodded, trying to reassure him.

But Rocket saw right through you, He was your best friend, he knew when something was never right. "Nah, You ain't ok. I know that tone" He crossed his arms.

"Shit..." You rubbed your face before looking at the mirror again.

"Come on, spit it out" He walked closer before jumping on a nearby shelf to match your height..

"Do.... Do I look like a guardian ??" You said without breaking eye contact from the mirror.

"Do you look like a- Pal... You look like a guardian an' a damn good one at that, Whatcha mean "Do I look like one" ?? You don't think so ??" Rocket couldn't help but droop his ears slightly, he too had many years of body dysmorphia and it panged him to see someone he cares for deeply feel the same.

"I... Your just saying that" You gripped the sleeve tightly.

"Nah, I don't do that crud and you know me better than that, I speak my mind"

So rocket decided to try and help you in one way, he then shifted you around, making you turned to the front of the mirror, fixing up your back so you could puff out your chest.

"I want you to do this... Say I'm a freakin Guardian of the galaxy" He encouraged.

You grew a little shy before mumbling... "I'm a freaking..."

"No no, a little louder, Come on. "I'm a freakin Guardian of the galaxy !!"

You nodded, speaking up a bit more. "I'm a freaking guardian of the galaxy"

"Louder !!"

"I'M A FREAKING GUARDIAN OF THE GALAXY !!" You shouted at the top of your lungs, it felt... Liberating, suddenly those insecurities were just sort of washing away bit by bit. How that trick worked was beyond you but he was right.

"I'm a guardian of the galaxy" You looked at yourself in the mirror, now fully confident in your suit.

"That's what I like to see, So don't go moping next time I see ya" He chuckled and playfully punched your shoulder.

"Yeah yeah" You got him back by ruffling his head.

"Hey watch the fur !!"

You were a freaking Guardian of the galaxy

Taglist: @callofdudes @rogertaylorswift @mybelovedraccoon

[the-universal-sun]

could you write something about stan being claustrophobic? i saw a couple works on that and wanted to see your take on it and/or regressed stan ver

I’m sorry if this wasn’t quite what you were thinking of! I don’t really have personal experience with claustrophobia, so this was a bit hard for me to write. This also started out as some head canons and turned into a Drabble? I don’t feel exactly proud of this work, but I know this was asked a while ago and I’ve been pondering it for days. You know what? Don’t even read this I’m sorry. Again, I’m always open for constructive criticisms and helpful advice on my writing!

-For Stan, rather Lee, there’s a big difference between the nice and comfy small spaces and the chest hurting and scary tight spaces

-Being wrapped up in his blanket? He loves it. When he’s feeling sick, or anxious, or overwhelmed, or really any negative emotion, he loves to be smushed underneath his weighted blanket, he loves feeling the pressure surrounding him, calming his mind and body. When Lee’s feeling extra bad, Ford will lay on top of the weighted blanket on him, giving him both that extra pressure he needs and the comforting presence of his brother surrounding him, chasing all the bad and icky feelings away

-But those tight spaces? Those all encompassing spaces with no windows? The dark cramped places? He can’t do those. It reminds Lee too much of those…darker times that Lee doesn’t want to think of thank you very much

-Being on the ship was an adjustment for him at first. After 30 years of having his open and bright spaces in the Shack and in Gravity Falls, the small boat and smaller rooms gave him the tight feelings in his chest that he hates having. Luckily, Ford made sure that every single room has a window and a door, a link to the outside for him to look at, to know that he’s not stuck

-If Lee finds himself stuck in one of those spaces, like if the door to his toy closet accidentally closes on him while he’s in there, he panics. He cannot think. He cannot move. He cannot do anything. He starts banging on the door, yelling for his Sixer, he’s sobbing, and he cannot breathe.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Ford opens the door as soon as he hears the banging, catching Lee in his arms as he collapses, hardly able to breathe through his panting. It becomes obvious to Ford very quickly that having Lee match his breathing wasn’t happening, not here on the floor at least, so Ford picks him up (he will worry about his back and knees later) and hauls him to their room.

Thankfully, Lee’s weighted blanket was left out on the foot of the bed, so he grabs the blanket as he sets Lee down, swiftly pulling it over him, careful to leave his head exposed so he can see the light spilling out from the windows. He lays down on Lee, rubbing his hand against Lee’s chest and breathing deliberately. He sees Poindexter shoved halfway under a pillow and pulls him out, stuffing the stuffed animal underneath the blanket, next to Lee’s face, hoping the familiar toy will help calm him down

It takes some minutes and a lot of head stroking before Ford can feel his brothers breathing start to calm. He sees his eyes regain some clarity, still in his smaller headspace, but not as panicked and scared. He feels his own heart rate slow down; Lee’s attacks always makes him very anxious as well.

When Lee’s awareness comes back to him, he finds himself in bed, comfortably crushed underneath his blankie and his Sixer, Poindexter’s face nuzzled into the side of his own. His body feels heavy, but he manages to look over at his brother, rubbing his head against Fords, humming softly. He usually finds it hard to speak when feeling small, but now he can’t speak at all. But he knows Sixer wouldn’t be mad that he can’t speak, words aren’t always needed with them. He feels his brother wrap an arm over him and relaxes into the extra pressure. His Sixer always knows how to make him feel okay again.

Ford reaches over to the night stand with his free arm and grabs the half full sippy cup from last night. Lee needs water, day old will do, and he doesn’t want to try to lift Lee right now for a cup, knowing how heavy he can be after an attack. Plus his brother looks so soft and comfortable, he’d hate disturbing him. He brings the sippy cup to Lee’s mouth, watching him drink so he doesn’t accidentally choke on water.

Lee drinks the water greedily, his throat was dry and hurting. It wasn’t a lot of water, but he didn’t mind, feeling too…he didn’t know how he was feeling beyond “blah”. He wasn’t sleepy, but he didn’t want to get up. He’s fine right here, with Poindexter and Sixer and the light from his window. His bedroom isn’t dark and small and scary, and plus he has his brother here. Lee knows Ford will protect him from anything scary. Even his own thoughts. He snuggles deeper into the bed and Ford, sighing softly as he feels the tightness still in his has calmed down, his mind getting fuzzier, but in a nice way, as he just breathes in and out. In. And out.

[solestixx]

1- lukas matsson x reader

word count ≈ 6600

warning: smut and mid writing

____

“Ken- you know this isn’t my scene.” Your voice goes quiet, simply just peering at your brother, anxious for his reaction.

He’s been a bit of a pain in the ass lately, the whole family was a pain in your ass lately, but perhaps it was always this way. The Roy family created chaos and unnecessary drama, that was a given. It was something you tried to detach yourself from; the business, the craze, the constant chatter– it all drained you. From the moment you were born, it was as if your family was screaming from all sides whether it be Roman and Shiv fighting over shit all, or your dad blowing up in your faces.

You always knew that you didn’t fit into the puzzle. You were born a little bit too late, grew up with faint glances of your older siblings, and dismissed like the baby you were. Maybe that was the reason you never considered joining Waystar, or perhaps why a place was never offered. 

Your dad was your dad, perpetually disappointed in you – while at the same time maintaining that you were his favourite. You all knew it was Shiv, but the very fact he insisted that it was you made you villain number one to your siblings. 

So there you were, their little sister who was a fucking writer, twiddling with your ungroomed thumbs, waiting for your family to forget who you were. That being said, it was a surprise when you opened your email to find a very flashy invite to Kendall’s 40th. You didn’t think that your brother would want what he perceived as his Debbie Downer boring little sister at his grandiose douche fest.

“Come the fuck on, it’s my party, Bambi, cheer up, enjoy yourself for once,” Kendall says. “Come on, I’ll take you somewhere special.” As he’s about to leave, you stop him, placing a hand on his arm.

“Wait, Ken. I have a gift for you.” You hand him an envelope, “I didn’t want it getting lost in the mix.”  

Kendall stops with his buzzing, which is probably coke-induced and takes the envelope from your hands. “Thanks.”

“You’re welcome,” you sigh as you watch your brother tuck the envelope into his coat. 

He quickly puts a hand on your shoulder before he starts to navigate you around, waving and fistbumping his friends walking by. As quickly as you had gained Kendall’s attention, it faded away from you, as he yelled over at his assistant who seemed new, but you weren’t around enough to know. “Yo! Comfrey, ship up my little sis to the treehouse.”

His assistant – Comfrey, who you knew had definitely been speed walking away from her boss before he hollered out at her – whipped her head towards the both of you. You were the odd couple, Kendall’s glazed over eyes and dopey smile mixed with your grimacing under his touch. “Coming!”

Kendall gives you a pat on the head– a move he often did in childhood, his eyes dead as always as he gives you a good-enough smirk,  “You should avoid the other sibs, they’re strictly business right now – serious work only.”

You smile at his unconscious insinuation. You weren't a serious person to them. You weren’t anything you guessed, “Have fun, okay Ken? And try not to be a complete dick tonight,” you ask before Comfrey pulls me away and Kendall saunters off. 

You watch your brother from the corner of your eyes, and quickly try to keep up with the bouncing ponytail of his young assistant. The hollowness in your chest that used to exist – that there would be ten years ago –  had disappeared now, you were completely okay with the empty promises and empty phrases. 

It’s what you grew up on. Raised in the top two floors of the highest buildings in New York, the Scottish highlands with your father’s forgotten castles, or in sprawling ranches in the middle of nowhere for tax purposes. At least that was the childhood you had with the Logan Roy experience.

After Uncle Ewan’s wife passed away, when you went to her funeral with your whole family, Dad decided that he’d leave his youngest with his brother to build your character. Your siblings were already almost in college and you were, well, the youngest and still complaining about multiplication and school field trips. So, from then on, you distanced yourself. Not entirely by your own volition, but every decision after was. And you prayed that every decision following would be as well.

As you try to keep pace with the taller woman, “So Comfrey, how’d you become Kendall’s assistant?” 

The woman turns around for a second to get a glance at the youngest Roy, she presses her lips together before curtly responding, “I’m his PR rep.”

All you do is hum in understanding, she was a PR rep that was running around like a low-level worker bee trying to satiate her older brother. It was like all people in their lives. 

You pass by the flashing lights, tall glass windows, and strange art installations, not so much admiring them, more like begging to just dissolve into the floor. To melt like the witch in the Wizard of Oz would be your opus, your ooey-gooey pile of person simply having a hard time leaching onto the rich person floors.

When you spot the all-too-familiar treehouse you wince. It seemed that Kendall’s childhood trauma manifested in an exuberant part of his fortieth birthday party. “This is Kendall’s little sister, she’s cool.” Comfrey motions the guards behind her, as you stand awkwardly – it looked like they needed visible confirmation you were you? It took them a second for their heads to look at your orientation. 

While they make way for you, opening up the roped fence, you thank Comfrey, then watch her scatter away, and hurry away probably to clean up Kendall’s inevitable fuck-ups. 

She was nice enough, you guessed; could be worse. 

You wandered through the treehouse with no purpose, staring at the tree trunk columns that looked borderline tacky and its leaf-casted shadows on the walls. You weren’t alone in the room, no there was a boatload of Kendall’s rager hedge fund friends, or celebrities whose faces you remember enough to dart away from – but still, you were alone. You felt eyes on you, people knew that you were a Roy, but eyes don’t give you company. 

The space was large enough to walk around for a few minutes, but eventually, you assumed you just looked out-of-place. Pacing around like a failed dracula, circling his already knowing victims. So you resigned yourself to a couch near a wall, praying that nobody approaches you. At least you wouldn’t be sneak-attacked from the back. That was your worst fucking nightmare – a hand on your back and a networking LinkedIn smiley techie. 

Leaning into the couch’s thin leather you try to get comfortable. The lights were bright enough you hoped, to not ‘ruin the vibe’ with your phone’s obnoxiously bright screen. Staring at your home screen, you forget any work that you had to do – literally nothing of importance that would make you look like you were doing something. Yes, you were writing a screenplay right now, which would be a good thing to work on if you could concentrate in the noisy fucking room. So you just went on Candy Crush, your finger languidly swiping your high school iPhone wanting to shoot yourself. 

You spent an adequate amount of time doing that, getting cozy enough to tuck your feet under your body and let your hair out from the bun it was in. It felt okay, you still wanted to go home, but you were waiting until at least ten percent of the crowd was gone so Kendall wouldn’t get prissy. 

But you couldn’t keep the peace, of course, you couldn’t. Because there Kendall comes into the room, not looking for you, but for a man sitting on one of the benches in the middle of the party.

“There he is!” You internally shrink, like a deflated balloon as your brother approaches. You hide like you were habitually doing as a child, trying to dart off from where you were oh-so comfortable. You hear Kendall saying some other bullshit which you tune out in your panic, but as you’re set to leave he calls out your name. 

“Bambs!” He turns to the man next to him, “This is my sister– she isn’t a vulture like the other ones, don't worry about that.” He looks back at you, then at the man again, “She’ll take care of you, they avoid her like a fucking plague.”

“Really nice, Ken,” you say, walking towards them reluctantly, resigning to sit next to the blonde man. He was tired-looking with hardly-noticeable but still visible rings underneath his eyes, a small smirk of interest on his face as he doesn’t shuffle to give you space, instead moving closer to you.

Kendall leaves, for a reason you are unsure of. You try to stare in his retreating direction as you feel the stranger’s hot eyes on you. You couldn’t read this guy, he seemed like a regular dude at first glance and to your relief he didn’t seem crazed in the eyes or serial-rapey.

“You’re the youngest one, aren’t you? The recluse?” he asks, his accent isn’t American, it was something Nordic – you hadn’t met many of them in your life. 

You turn towards him, to be polite of course, although your body tries to twist awkwardly, making sure he isn’t too close, “Good use of deduction.” He’s attractive, vaguely familiar like everyone in the room, obviously important to your brother, but you still have no fucking clue who he is. “And you’re? One of my brother’s friends?”

He smirks, laying back on a column behind him, “Yeah, we’re best buddies, like peas and a pod.” 

“No name?” He laughs, like he was in disbelief that you didn’t know who he was, “I like this, I’ll be your mystery man, hmm?” He leans further towards you, raising his eyebrows – the lack of space making your face hot. 

You try to escape any feelings of chagrin, crossing your legs, and staring into his eyes which felt like it was more of his soul. Who was this fucking dude? “A mystery man in my childhood treehouse, you’re sounding like a pedophile to me…”

He nods as though he agrees, laughing, “You have a history in this, I assume, with your family.” Oh yes, Uncle Mo. “What do you do? The tabloids say… writer?” 

A part of you feels insecure in your lack of knowledge about him. He knows your occupation, your name, and would probably be able to trace your life back to childhood through the internet, while you sat here like prey for his predator. All in his casual clothing and wolfish smile. 

“Yes, some screenwriting, some things more authorial, enough to get by.” 

It seemed like the idea of ‘getting by’ was amusing to him as he smiled when you said that. Almost as if he was in disbelief that a Roy would ever need to make enough to get by. Maybe he was older money, maybe he grew up in a big castle like you, a prince or something… your mother had always had people like that over when you were young. It was funny, the old aristocrats with their wine and screaming kids. No he wasn’t old money... his whole being read new. New money. New power.

“You dress like you write children’s books, like a sexy-librarian-kindergarten teacher – it’s hot, if I dare-say,” he says. You can feel him looking her up and down and she doesn’t know if you hate it or like it. You may be leaning to the latter with how lonely you’d been feeling for so long. 

You almost roll your eyes, although your face heats up. How long has it been since someone somewhat complimented you? Sure they called your writing good, praised you in those magazines– no journals they called them, but nobody ever looked at you. Even if it was a half-insult. 

You did dress conservatively, at least to control the narrative of yourself. Stemming mostly from when the paps took pictures up your skirt as a teenager. They weren’t even decent enough to wait until you were eighteen, the moment the vultures saw that you wore a short-enough skirt they chased you around trying to get a glimpse of the most elusive Roy sibling; the paps were constantly chasing a story, and for the duration of your childhood you were the most interesting part of the billion-piece puzzle belonging to the Roy family.

Without any response, he moves even closer, if that’s humanly possible – your arms pressing up against each other. He was warm, warmer than the stuffy room around the two of you, “Trying to insinuate something, mystery man?”

“Ja, maybe I am,” he says, before leaning close to your face. “Let’s go somewhere more private.” He offers you a hand to get up, which your body wills you to take, but your brain knows logically any man your brother wants to woo is a douche, yet you’d always think with your feelings. He pulls you through the treehouse, walking into more of a secluded room. 

You feel people watching you, more than before, more than they would the youngest Roy, but his hand feels so warm in yours, and he was even more attractive standing up. Taller than your smaller stature – you were the shortest of your siblings along with the youngest, the baby. It felt nice walking next to him, it felt safe. But still, it felt almost dangerous.

You breathe out a thank god as the two of you get off of the wooden bench and your butt touches a soft surface again. It’s more secluded than your spot before but like every corner of the party, there were still people around you. 

“Not a fan of crowds?” he asks, getting comfortable on the couch and leaning back as you feel his hand rise slowly on your thigh. Like he’s apprehensively confident.

“Is anyone really?” you ask him, he nods slowly, his eyes asking me to go on, “I don’t know why I’m here, maybe just feeling shitty about my family situation, you know? I don't spend much time with them… ever.” You eye the man as he intensely looks back at you – eyefucking you believe it’s called. Oh and his eyes are blue, you’d never noticed that before — remarkably they’re not empty, the soul was still there, at least right now. You have to admit that he’s hot, in this light even more so. His features affirm my suspicions of where he’s from– and as you stare at him even longer you can't quite remember when you’d ever seen a hotter man. “Do you still have no name?”

He grins, looking away, “You’ll know soon enough, won’t you? This is fun for now.” 

“The only name I know you by is pedophile, and I don’t think you want people overhearing. Seems like we have eavesdroppers,” you glance over at the small groups of people around you. You assume that they’re small investors, that they probably know Kendall and whatever business he has with the mystery man. 

“You’re right, my facial expressions plus my conversation are very relevant to the stock market and usually equals tanking.”

“You talking to me will probably tank it, whatever stock you’re talking about—“ you stop yourself from continuing, would Dad be mad that you were talking to him? “You’re not part of Kendall’s crusade, right? Like my father won’t try and assassinate me for speaking to you?”

It’s almost like he enjoys that notion as he laughs to himself, “Don’t worry about Kendall, your dad hiring a guy maybe, but right now I’m to be courted.” He gestures with his hands – which to you are strangely very animated, “You care about what your dad says, do you?”

You respond nonchalantly, though your hands squirm and you look to the ground, “It’s a constant fuck him, and at the same time I love you, Daddy, I guess. He was shit, is shit, but sometimes he’s not too bad.”

“You call him daddy?”

For the second time today, you feel yourself crawl into your skin, “Oh yeah, when we’re in bed together definitely.”

Mystery man almost giggles at your comment, and there’s something affable about that. He was constantly switching from this serious man to a very unserious one. There was some strange part of this that you liked, you liked the attention the way that he looked at you, the bubble he created around the two of you, the way his hand was increasingly inching. 

You think back to the way this night started. You were quite desperate to leave, a bit dampened by the way Kendall accepted your gift, and guilty that you weren't at home taking care of your cat and working. Then you were delivered by this tall Viking man and you were uncomfortably comfortable with the way he made you feel. 

“I kind of want to get drunk.”

“I have no qualms with that,” he responds, a grin on his face as you both get up and inch towards the bar, his hand slipping onto your back easily. 

The time at the bar was spent in easy conversation, you stand against the wall, with him looming in front of you as you drink together. Him a beer and you a drink with a name you’re unsure of – hating yourself for so much enjoying the tang of the liquified poison. 

“Why aren’t you part of your family’s business?”

The way he looks at you… you feel like there’s genuine interest, you look into his eyes and there’s a gleam that scares me. Was he playing with you? Was this a play for your family? You still have no clue who this man is. You let him get too close to yourself, hand on your waist – eyes on yours, too close for a stranger. But you just want to be happy,  to feel like you exist again. Not a fly on the wall, the main course. 

“You know,” you shrug your shoulders, taking another sip as he just looks at you with a weird facial thing that you don’t quite understand. Like he’s teasing you, but ever so slightly, begging you to spill – which you do. “I’m the baby, y’know – Bambi or whatever.”

He tilts his head back as he absorbs, “Bambi… I like that, you look like a Bambi – the deer right?”

“Yes the deer, they–” I hurriedly take another sip of my drink as I recount the story of my ubiquitous nickname, “Once Dad went hunting and brought me along, we spotted a deer and instead of uh– killing it I kind of ran towards it, while his gun was still aimed. He said that he was about to shoot me like I was a Bambi, he said I was so fast that he almost pulled the trigger while watching me through the scope.”

Mystery man looks at me with wide eyes, “Jesus fuck, that’s a shit thing to say. How old were you?”

“Uh maybe ten, by then my siblings were gone and he visited me where I lived with Uncle Ewan in Canada.”

“What a fucking prick.”

“Yeah.”

You stare at each other for a minute, him in front of you and you below him, you really like his eyes. You break it though, your head was starting to spin from the one drink and he was making it almost worse. “Come on, let’s go sit down, I’m gonna get stumbly.”

Pushing yourself away from the wall, you walk towards an empty space with a few chairs around a table and plop yourself down. Curling into yourself, you can just feel him situating himself next to you.

“You’re a lightweight, aren’t you? You look like one too,�� he says, taking a swig of his still-almost-full beer.

You glare up at him as you start dozing off, “I’m gonna nap, you do you, pedophile.”

He guffaws, “Okay, no more pedophile jokes, the press hears and I’m done.”

“I wouldn’t know,” you mutter before tucking your head into your own shoulder. 

“I have to ask you something before you nod off.” He seems almost genuine in his words as he furrows his eyebrows and leans towards your chair. You lift yourself ever so slightly showing that you’re listening. “We’ll fuck later right? Like guaranteed?”

You close your eyes again before you can roll them, although a tiny smile slips onto your face – you hope he won’t see it as you bury your face into the back of the lounge chair. 

“I saw that grin, I’m going to take that as a yes.”

“Fuck off, asshole.”

“Don’t contradict yourself now.”

You shake your head in mock embarrassment as you go to sleep. Your head was throbbing a bit, and your heart was beating faster – but you realize that you’d forgotten the loud music, and the crowds of people around. You’d forgotten. You’d found solace after so many years looking for it, in the middle of a mock replica of your childhood treehouse.

And this sleep was peaceful for a while, but then a fucking earthquake rumbled you awake. 

“What the fuck,” you grunted as you felt hands on your shoulders, your eyes bulge open and you see Roman above you. “Rome, leave me alone, you bitch.”

“Were you trying to seduce Matsson for dad?” 

You just roll your eyes, not understanding in your incoherent state what the fuck your brother was talking about – per usual. Looking around you saw that mystery man was gone, and the party was still raging around you. And his name was Matsson? Strange name, but a little bit fitting. 

“I have no clue what you’re talking about… why’d you even wake me up, miss me that bad?” you asked, clearly trying to antagonize him with your whiny voice.

Roman with all his pessimism and ass-holery deadpans at you, “Well I’m fuckin’ sorry, you totally missed the six foot tall Viking who was camped out beside your unconscious body?”

“Is that not the point of being unconscious, dumbass?” 

“Did you fuck him, Bambi? Were you so fucking tired after fucking him that you had to take a big girl nap?”

“There’s something psychologically wrong with you.”

Roman sits squatting on the top of the chair as he pseudo-interrogates you, “Y’know he didn’t let me fucking wake you up, was that a power play or did you let him do you?”

“Rome, I have no idea who that man was, he just said he was your friend and Ken told me to keep an eye on him.” Half-lying was your thing, you guessed. Your life was full of half-lies, momentary omissions of details, ignoring parts of sentences so you seemed more innocent. That was the life of a youngest child out of five you guessed.

“And since when were you Kendall’s bitch?” “Since he invited me to something, unlike you.” 

Roman completely skipped your comment before going off again, “Did he tell you anything, Matsson?”

“Oh yeah, he told me he fucking hates your guts,” you say with a smile, watching your brother getting riled up.

“I’m going to tell Dad that you fucked him if you don’t tell me the truth,” he threatens, it was fun being in this position. You’d so regularly in your childhood been put down by your older siblings, so it was interesting being the one to give it back to them. You finally understood the appeal. Ah, leverage. 

You smile as you pretend to recount, a finger to your chin as you mockingly itch it, “Oh he told me that Dad’s an asshole and he has no interest in business with any of you creeps.”

“You’ve seriously been spending too much time with Uncle Looney? You know that right? You sound delusional, completely and utterly gone.”

As you sit up straighter trying to compose yourself, you eye Shiv coming over to where you and Roman sit (although he’s very much standing, pacing, like a lunatic), her hair a mess and her makeup smudged all over. She’d either just had mind blowing sex or something was seriously wrong with her. 

You and your sister were strained to say the least. You wanted the idealized big sister who would braid your hair and make you up. The sister who would talk about boys with you and argue with you over stealing her clothes. You guessed Shiv more so wanted to prove herself to Dad – she���d always been his favourite. You were more of an afterthought to her. The kind of afterthought that made you do a double take when you remember that you’d buried it so long ago. 

There wasn’t any sentimentality in the title of sister with the two of you. You were just another sibling, and probably her third favourite before Connor. But still, you love her, and you know in the deep recesses of her heart she loves you too. All the siblings love each other, although a strong belief for you was that there were certain dynamics that you were excluded from because of your age and difference in childhood. 

“You do you, Roman. Just know that I’m hoping for your business with him to fail, just handing you my two cents.” Business was a strange concept to you, you were always pushed away from it as a child, leading you to know less than nothing about it. At one point you felt like you would go into it, but that too was ripped away from you. So right now, you just wanted to make Roman feel bad. Sure it was wrong to want to churn your brother into pieces, but it felt so good.

“I know you’re a fucking liar, so just like, sit with that, okay?” 

“Whatever, Roman.”

Roman ignores your words calling out for Shiv. Shiv runs a finger through straight but frizzy hair before coming to give you a half-hug.

The hug was weird and a little bit detached, but it was something, and it made you feel not instantly uncomfortable, but almost happy. Happy to see your sister again a little bit. “Bambi, it’s been like two fucking years.” 

It hadn’t been, but you agree. It felt like it.

“I didn’t know you were keeping track–” you try to say, but Roman quickly cuts you off. Biting off that Shiv was out dancing. Dancing was a human thing. You didn’t know your only sister was a human. 

“Guys, I’m gonna go now, I’ll probably not be in touch, so yeah,” you try and gracefully leave as your siblings bicker about finessing or some shit. 

They both nod non-committedly as you trot off observing Kendall and Connnor at the opposite poles of the room. You choose to not go off towards Kendall, who you knew probably already ruined his night with his overthinking or underthinking. Instead you go to Connor, probably your only kind brother, albeit the fact sometimes he was fucking lawful psychotic.

“Con, Con,” you call out, your small purse at your side as you push it around your body – you’d refused to give it to security earlier, citing personal reasons which they were too scared to deny. They probably assumed it was your period or something like that – you’d made that insinuation when they didn’t relent for your last name.

You see Connor’s coated body turn around as he returns your call, “Bambi! My favourite sister – you remember Willa?” Connor gestures to his arm candy, who didn’t seem too excited to meet you – or meet you again, but obviously faked it. She was very pretty, nearly to the point where she made you feel insecure. But then again, no hate for your brother, but she was with your brother. You were sure Connor had mentioned her in a phone call, but you two never really talked about those kinds of things. He was always ranting on about politics (you think you’re the only one who would listen, so he took advantage of that) or you would talk about your life – never about the company, or really how he was doing besides his ranch. 

“Yes, at Shiv’s wedding, I believe?” She just nods, and you’re both just pretending to know when you last met. There was no recognition in her eyes, and you don’t think you’d ever interacted with her. It was a nice connection you’d had, a shared lie always brings people together.

“Ken, told me you were here, but I thought you’d be gone by now.” Connor pulls you into a hug before saying, “Have you been taking care of yourself, sis?”

“I’ve been doing okay, normally as always.” Noticing his cast, she asks, “What’s up with your arm, Con’?”

“Oh, I was doing an Irish jig as one does, and boom I slipped and it bent in all different directions,” he describes in a strangely vivid way. “I’m feeling better though, Willa helped me recover, right sweetheart?”

“Yep,” she nodded, a smile on her face as she bore her eyes into mine – uncomfortable? Very.

Connor was probably the only one of your siblings you regularly spoke to, yes it was by phone, and no you didn’t always enjoy it, but there was a beautiful normalcy to speaking on the phone with your brother. With Kendall or Roman it always turned into business– about Dad. With Shiv it was her ranting about some political thing, well maybe that was before she turned so Waystar-loco. 

Connor was your normal brother.

“Have you heard of my recent presidential proclivities?” he asks, tilting his head as he looks at Willa for support – in which she enthusiastically nods her head.

Maybe he wasn’t exactly the most normal of brothers, but he was more normal than the brother who spoke about you having sex weirdly too much or the one who can’t stop fucking over your dad and snorting cocaine. 

You nod, but before you hear a tumble and watch Roman bending over a kneeling Kendall. What a fucking dick. Kendall’s girlfriend, who you also didn’t recognize was helping him up, and you stood there with no intention to help or rush in, frozen to your spot.

Connor shouts out, “Everyone take it easy, okay?” as Roman maniacally laughs and Kendall helps himself up. 

As Kendall walks past you, Connor, and Willa he grumbles, “Take your fucking coat off,” repeating it to Connor as he walks like a man scorned. Willa blocks Connor from Kendall trying to calm the younger brother down. You avert Kendall’s gaze, standing next to Willa blocking Connor who looks to the ground much like you.

Shiv seemingly walks away from the scene as well, but in the opposite direction from Kendall, and immediately after Willa and Connor walk arm in arm out, saying a quiet goodbye to you.

With one glance to Roman, who’s still muttering curses under his breath on the sofa chairs, you leave. You’d quickly sobered up, and it was time to face the darkness of New York. Walking out of the luxurious Manhattan skyscraper you peer at the artificially brightened roads and the strange silence of the backroads. Instead of taking an Uber or Taxi, you opt for the Subway. You didn’t take an allowance from your Dad like Connor did, you never inherited anything ever, and your last poetry anthology wasn’t lucrative enough to have casual taxi money. You were sure nothing would happen on the Subway, from experience you know that there would just be a few people throwing up and tired workers coming home from the night shift.

Before walking down into the station, you check your phone, one hand on the railing and the other carefully gripping onto your phone. Attention split both ways.

Unknown

Know who I am yet?

1 Missed Call from Unknown

Your heart skips a beat, an adrenaline rich positive-ending to the night beat skip.

Instead of heading inside, you turn around, sitting down on the top step of the stairs, hoping a coked up crypto-bro doesn’t push you down. 

Pressing the call, a part of you hopes he doesn’t pick up, so you can return to normalcy, but the heart wants what the heart wants.

“Bambi?”

You groan, “I thought the story would stop you from calling me that.”

“Not because of the story, it suits you–” he pauses, the line going crackly as you hear him talk to someone, “You’ve left the party?”

“Yeah, walking home now.” “Walking? This is America, ja? You’re on a death mission.”

“It’s not too late, you know serial killers only come out after two in the morning.”

“I can send a car, hmm? You can come over here.”

“What does ‘over here’ mean? To a stranger’s home?”

“You promised me something, didn’t you?”

“Hmmmm, a promise? I don’t remember.”

“Send me your location, I’ll get my guy to get you.”

“Okay, I’ll send my location to a stranger just because he was nice to me at my brother’s party.”

“See you soon then.”

____

The drive was awkward to Matsson’s (you preferred mystery man to what seemingly sounded like a last name, although it might be a first, Europeans were in themselves a mystery as well). The driver was quiet, and the car was a rich person’s. It was a car you were all too familiar with, the car you drove in during your childhood, the same tinted windows and leather seats.

Same thing of riding up to the penthouse of a hotel – he was only here temporarily you surmised. You’d probably be a one-time thing. 

When the elevator doors beep open and you’re in a hallway with one door, anxiety fills you up. What if this was a trap? If he was some sort of sexual pervert, or even worse an axe murderer with an even worse temper than anyone you could find on the New York streets?

But before you can even knock the door swings open and a hand pulls you in, “Fucking asshole,” you whisper as you feel his lips trace over yours, your breath in his. 

He’s rough, and rushed, like he’s a man starved – of you. 

As he starts tracing his fingers underneath your shirt you push his back, two hands on his chest as he kneels his head to meet yours. “What’s wrong?” “I don’t know your name,” you say, almost embarrassed that you hadn’t found it on your own, “Matsson? That’s your name.”

He doesn’t respond, just pulls you close to him, before picking you up into his arms. You restrain a squeal as you struggle in his arms. He navigates through the hallways, looking as though he was confused on the layout of his own homebase, he finds the bed – splaying you down and standing above you like an animal.

“You know, I refuse to orgasm without your name,” you insist. He moves closer and closer, uncharacteristically quiet as he pulls your shirt up laying a hand on your stomach, the other tracing over your soaked panties, slowly creeping towards your sensitive skin. 

He’s strangely gentle with it, until he pulls your panties to the side, spreading open your legs as he buries his face into your pussy. You move your two legs onto his shoulders, as plays with your nipples – languid twisting and faint touches that leave you just wanting more.

You let out a yelp as you feel his tongue move into you, like a fucking shark he dives into your clit as he watches you for your reaction. You know you look like a mess, breathless and desperate. “Please, please–” you moan, desperate for his tongue, for his touch, his everything. 

“Your pussy’s so good, baby– fucking heaven,” he whispers into where his head lay between your thighs. As he blows gently on it, you are wholly exposed and cold, you start squirming. Your thighs start pressing around his head, trying to push him further, which seemed to turn him on even more. Your legs start to shake as your orgasm builds up and builds up, you feel like screaming from the bliss of it, his attack on your pussy is like God reigning down on earth. “Refuse to orgasm, hmm? Want me to stop?”

You shake your head as he continues, “Please, keep going, keep going—” He listens to you, beginning to rub your clit as the feeling of everything continues to crash down on you

“Come baby, come.” He keeps on licking you up, every fucking crevasse. 

Your orgasm came hard and quick, with a groan and a twitch your eyes rolled over as you released his head from in between your thighs, and as quickly as he got there, he climbed on top of you – his larger body engulfing yours as he hurriedly kisses you. 

“I want to inside me,” you say into his ear, you could feel him from underneath his pants as he grabs your ass, groaning into you as you palm him. 

“Take off your fucking clothes,” he orders, as you do it, you take off the loose t-shirt you’d been wearing to Kendall’s party off slowly, you can feel him staring at your tits, and a part of you loves it. Loves the attention you get from him. As you take off your pants from where they are bunched up from your ankles, and then the greenish-blue granny panties you wear, you watch him take his suede pants and then his boxers off. Oh god, you feel yourself thinking as you stare at him. 

He picks you up as he brings his length into your entrance, rubbing it on your clit. He keeps going, relentless before he surprises you and slips it in, tilting your head towards him so he could watch you as he fucked you. 

You hear him groan as he starts with slow thrusts, he would push in and then wait five seconds before slowly sliding out— making sure you felt every inch of him. He was too big and you felt so full, with every time he pulled out you felt like five years were taken from your life span, that time had slowed down too much. You fucking needed him.

Of course he starts going fast, rough. There were no thoughts in your mind as you arched against him, and moaned in his mouth as he kissed you. Deeply and raw, like he had everything to lose and you would disappear in a heartbeat.

Pinning your hands above your head, he continues with his pace, passionately and without bore– “You’re so good for me, I just want to be inside you all the time,” he says a grin on his face as he watches your face before glancing down looking at his dick pound into you. 

He presses kisses to your throat as he whispers, “My name’s Lukas, Lukas Matsson–” strangely enough hearing his name sends you off the edge as you moan out unintelligibly, overstimulated as he keeps on going, getting more and more erratic. 

Not long after, he pumps into you a few more times before completely spilling inside of you, collapsing on top of you, not leaving your warmth as he buries himself deeper.

You don’t say anything afterwards, you let him lay on top of you as he stays inside of you all the same. It feels like time doesn’t pass as he wraps his arms around you, “Stay the night?” he asks, all you do is nod. 

You lay in silence for a few more seconds before you tell him, “I’m on birth control, by the way, pretty fucking risky to cum inside me without asking though.”

“I wouldn’t be mad at a little me running around if I could fuck you again.”

Not saying anything, you press a kiss to his neck before tucking yourself closer into his body– finding sleep comes to you when so often it fails you.

[msbigredmachine]

New To This - Chapter 11

MASTERLIST

By the time she touched down in Pensacola, all Delilah wanted to do was sleep for the rest of the month. This past week had been exhausting, both emotionally and physically, and as she climbed into the Uber she ordered, she sincerely hoped it wouldn’t get worse when she arrived home and had to lay eyes on Andre for the first time in a week.

Judging from the layers of guilt that had been padding in her belly since she boarded the plane, ‘worse’ seemed more inevitable than anything.

Walking into the trailer park home she didn’t realize she would miss so much, a voicemail appeared in her notifications. Seeing it was from Josh, she quickly shook her head and rid herself of any of the numerous X-rated visuals her brain could resurrect. Putting him on speaker, she dragged herself and her suitcase toward her bedroom, his low teasing voice bringing a smile to her face even though the memory of him swirled in her gut like a ship in the middle of a storm.

"Hey, baby. About to get on the plane back to ATL. I had the best time with you this week. Uhh…miss you already, girl. Miss everything bout’chu, and I mean everything…Anyway, call me. Yeet! Mwah."

Dude actually blew a kiss. So cute. 

Pushing open the door to her bedroom, her heart leapt into her throat, her eyes wide at the tableau before her. The bed she shared with Andre was perfectly made, something she wasn't sure it ever had been since they moved into the house together. The expensive white satin sheets they’d unwisely splurged on one random day years ago and never used since then, draped the bed. On her side of the bed, a single red rose lay on her pillow along with a piece of notebook paper, folded with her name on it.

With numb legs, Delilah managed to lower herself to the mattress and took the note slowly from its place. Her fingers trembled as she unfolded the paper, which she realized he’d spritzed with his favorite cologne. To top it all off, one scan of his familiar scribble caused the tears to instantly fill her eyes.

My Dee-Dee girl,

You've been gone for six whole days and I think I went a little insane. I think this was the longest time we’ve ever been apart and it sucks ass. All week Khalid kept telling me that you’re all I talk about since you been gone and I didn't even realize it. I've missed you being home with me. I wondered if the tryout was everything you dreamed of and I really hope you had fun. I was gonna call you, but I didn't wanna mess up your flow. 

I know you’re home already and when I come back, we're gonna have a candid discussion about you probably getting called back by WWE. Something tells me you did and I can’t wait to hear all about it.

I love you.

Dre.

P.S. Did you see the video I sent you?

Reaching for her phone, she searched around for said video and her heart sank to discover he’d sent an email to her three nights ago. Her chest tightened further as she remembered exactly where she was – whom she was with – at that exact time. She tapped the video open and found Andre standing in front of the mirror in their bathroom. Then, he opened his mouth and began singing the first couple of lines from what she recognized as Justin Bieber’s ‘Ghost’, one of his favorite modern songs. 

As her fiancé’s melodic voice sounded around their bedroom, her arms dropped to her thighs helplessly with his note still in her hands. Her eyes looked to the ceiling and saw nothing thanks to the tears blurring her vision and spilling down her cheeks. This video, this letter, didn’t sound like the same old Andre. This was a repentant Andre. An Andre she didn’t expect at all. She had come home with metaphorical boxing gloves on, waiting to confront the guy who still couldn't understand why the woman he was marrying was pursuing such a wild, unattainable dream. She had come home ready to move on from him. She had almost convinced herself that it was his fault she had ended up in bed, multiple times, with another man.

That if I can't be close to you

I'll settle for the ghost of you

I miss you more than life

And if you can't be next to me

Your memory is ecstasy

I miss you more than life

I miss you more than life

Sobs wracked Delilah’s body as she curled into the fetal position on the bed, her watery eyes resting on the video playing of Andre’s handsome face, his eyes closed as he sang his heart out to her. 

She fucked up. She fucked up so bad.

And the guilt was going to eat her alive.

----------------------

Five hours after some much-needed sleep, Delilah stood at the kitchen counter picking at the bowl of chicken salad she had made for herself. She had been disappointed to wake up and realize that the unscrupulous decisions that she made in Orlando were not one bad dream. She had gone to the bathroom to freshen up and winced as she was instantly transported back to said bad decisions, her mind replaying the visual of herself bent over the sink, Josh pumping away behind her. Same reason she was standing by the counter and not sitting down, as the image of her back arched against the countertop with his face buried between her thighs materialized the second she laid eyes on the table. Ditto with the majority of the furniture around her house and the numerous positions she’d been twisted into on each one. Long story short, she would never look at any of them the same way again.

The front door swung open, causing Delilah's stomach to lurch once again. She wished she could run away, and that notion did not waver as Andre bumbled inside the house, his trusty backpack on his shoulder and a big relieved smile on his face. "My baby is back!" he exclaimed, slamming the door with his foot as he made his way over to her. When his arms wrapped around her in a tight hug, she fought the urge to throw up on his flannel shirt.

"You're home early," she feigned a smile, crossing her arms defensively as she took refuge behind the counter once again.

If he noticed her strange behavior, Andre didn't let on. "I worked a lot of overtime this week when you were gone," he shrugged, grabbing her fork and stabbing it into her bowl of salad as he lowered himself down to the stool next to her. Even with his mouth full, his lips curled into that goofy little boy smile that always made her heart melt, and not for the first time, Delilah felt the bile rise to her throat.

"So how was it?" he asked her.

The simplest of questions, yet he might as well have asked her about quantum physics. How on earth was she meant to tell him that it was the greatest week of her life without telling him that she had cheated on him? How was she meant to admit that she hadn’t given him much thought because she was with another man? Could she bring herself to break his heart like that?

"It was good." Her answer was flat and curt, her gaze studying the countertop like it was the most fascinating thing in that moment.

Andre just laughed, his face still alight from the triumphant return of his fiancee. "That's it? Just good?" he asked. "So modest. C’mere." He stood and held his hand out. When Delilah took the invitation, he led her away from the kitchen, over to the couch and gathered her into his arms when they sat down. "Tell me. I wanna hear all about it."

So many times she had hoped for this, him finally showing an interest in the life she was pursuing. But instead, this abrupt personality turn of his was rubbing her the wrong way. His happy-little-camper attitude was grating on her nerves, and the guilt bubbling inside her was the reason.

"Why?" she demanded, the question spilling out before she could think it through.

Slightly taken aback by the question, Andre pushed on. "Why? Cuz you're my girl. Cuz I know how much you want this and I'm anxious to hear how it all went down."

Oh, he went down, alright, Delilah thought angrily. She understood that most of the rage she was feeling was directed at herself, but she couldn't help but what the hell had gotten into this man sitting before her. It was as if he knew he was on the verge of losing her, and now he was pulling out all of his famed charm to reel her back in. "Oh really? You care now? What changed?" she asked coldly, pushing out of his arms and crossing hers defensively over her chest.

The wounded look in his eyes made her heart sink. "Baby, I've been an asshole about this. I admit it," he said softly, taking her hand once more. "But I missed you so much, you have no idea."

"Oh riiiiight, I see. You didn’t have your fuck buddy for one week and now you’re all up in your feelings!" Delilah argued. She knew that she sounded bitter and wounded, but she couldn't help it. The emotions of the past week were rushing over her at such a dizzying pace and she wasn't coping well at all, struggling to find her footing on this rollercoaster that her life had suddenly become.

Andre, meanwhile, had had enough of Delilah’s antagonism. "Dee, what the fuck is going on?" he struggled not to raise his voice, scooting back on the couch a few inches. "I thought you wanted me to be more supportive!"

Delilah jumped to her feet. "I want you to be supportive because you believe in me, Andre! Because you're proud of me. Not because you got lonely!" Sometimes she wondered if he understood her at all, if he had heard anything she had said over the last several months.

But Andre was tired of this already. He had just admitted to being wrong and yet she was still berating him. "I can't win with you," he threw his arms out, standing to regain some sense of equilibrium. "What the fuck happened out there?"

"Nothing!" she answered, a bit too quickly.

“Well something happened!” Flinging his arm to the side, Andre was in fight mode. "Just days ago, you were talking about how I didn’t care about you, and now that I’m putting in some effort, you want me to just back off and drop the whole thing? What kinda bipolar bullshit is that?" They had been here too many times, all over this house, outside this house, arguing about anything and everything, specifically on one increasingly annoying subject.

"I want you to actually mean it!" Delilah lashed out, no longer able to contain her emotions. The tears threatened to fall again as she pleaded with him, arms extended helplessly. "I want you to come to one of my matches. Dre. Just one. I want you to see what I do, see why it's so fucking important to me!"

"How many times have I told you, wrestling ain’t my thing," he dismissed. "You don't like all the things I like, but you don't see me cryin’ and beggin’ you to like ‘em."

Crying and begging. He couldn’t even see that his nonchalance had forced her to confide in someone else, and she’d ended up doing much more than that with him. Maybe if he knew, maybe if she told him what his apathy had done to their relationship, his mind would finally, finally change. But she refused to feel guilty for following her dreams. She refused to settle. "I don't need you to be a fan of wrestling!" she argued, "I don’t give a flyin' fuck if you don’t know any of the moves or any of the wrestlers’ names!"

"Then what is this abou-" Andre interrupted.

"For fuck’s sake, Andre! I want you to be a fan of me!" she screamed, her voice breaking as she kicked their wooden coffee table across the tiny room, “I want you to know my name! I need you to support me, to care about my wrestling, dammit!”

An awkward silence fell over the room, punctuated by the heart-wrenching sounds of her sobs as the love of his life’s words sank into his soul. For nearly a year, he had watched her morph into someone he no longer recognized, and not liking what he saw, he distanced himself, hoping it would be out of her system in due time. But now it was clear that this wasn’t going away, and it was breaking both their hearts as what they had – what he thought they had – was starting to collapse before his very eyes. 

"You wrote me some letter and sang a song. Big deal!" she continued through her tears. "You're doing everything but taking an actual interest in watching me find myself, because that’s exactly what I’m doing, Andre, and you can't handle it." She shrugged, even more emotionally exhausted than she was before she returned home. "You laugh, and you joke, and you tease me about it. You laugh at me with your friends. You laugh with my mother." Letting out a sardonic laugh, she shook her head, relaxed her shoulders and met his eyes. If she was going to be honest, she was going to have to be completely honest. 

"You have never believed, not one time, that I could do this. You wanted me to fail just so your life wouldn't have to change. But I didn’t fail! They liked me out there! They want us to move to Orlando in three months so I can start training at the Performance Center. That’s another step closer to NXT, and from there, I could make it to the main roster. I went out there and I left it all in the ring and for the first time in my life I felt like I belonged somewhere and they agreed! The biggest wrestling company in the world wants me, Andre! It ain’t no dream no more and I’m sorry if that’s a problem for you."

Again, silence. Sniffling, she wiped her tears with her forearm and turned, walking toward the bedroom. She was done. And it had nothing to do with Josh, or with wrestling. She was just over it, and she was desperate to let off some steam because if she stayed this way she would most likely combust.

"Where are you going?" Andre asked, watching her change into her sneakers, which he noticed were brand new. Her suitcase was open and filled with more items than it had when she left. Things that, in real time, neither of them could quite afford. She wasn't lying. WWE were pulling out all the stops to bring her into their ranks.

Grabbing the keys to her motorcycle, Delilah responded, "To Tank’s gym. Need to work out." She was still a little tired, but she’d much rather be outside than stuck in this hellhole she was about to call her matrimonial home. She longed to talk to a certain someone but he was in faraway Atlanta and she really couldn’t keep running to him with her problems. Not anymore anyway. Not when he had become one of those problems.

Andre looked dumbfounded that she was leaving this unfinished. "We ain’t done talking, Delilah! You can’t just walk out on me!" 

With a bitter chuckle, she picked up her gym bag. "Damn right I can," she informed him, walking past him towards the bedroom exit. Just as she swung open the door, he grabbed her, his strong arm wrapped around her slender waist. Blushing as she glared hard at him, he cleared his throat. 

"A’ight. Gimme ten minutes to change. I'm coming with you," he said quietly, blushing harder when she raised an incredulous eyebrow. "I'm serious, baby. Let's take the truck. I wanna see you, see what you're all about."

--------------

THOUGHTS? Is Andre finally coming around?

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[crowsofdarkness]

Vas Prizrak: Chapter Five

-gif not mine. credit to owner-

Pairings: Bucky Barnes x Female Agent! Reader.

Content Warnings: language, 18 + implied smut, angst, fluff, violence, mentions of losing a pregnancy, thoughts of taking one's life, an attempt to take one's life. I will give another warning when that chapter is posted.

Summary: Bucky and Reader have been in their own solace while in Wakanda for years. They were finally happy to create the life they wanted and deserved. That was until a new foe came along to dust it all away.

Authors Note: This takes place during Infinity War and Endgame! If you haven't yet, please read Soldat and Dorogaya beforehand.

Tags: @globetrotter28 @sakuracyberhex @chinggay85-blog @bookofriverr @misatxox @that-blonde-girl @cats-chaotic-mind @wintrsoldrluvr @sebastians-love @pumpkin-babydoll @ordelixx @starfly-nicole @j23r23 @baw1066 @capswife

Soldat Masterlist | Dorogaya Masterlist | Vaz Prizrak Masterlist

A flirtatious giggle fell from my lips as I pulled the body closer to me, drinking in the warmth. His fingers raked through my hair, plump lips meshing with my own, and his voice caused my heart to skip. 

“I love you,” he breathed across my face. 

The soft tune of music wrapped around us like a ribbon as our body’s danced slowly to the music. One hand linked with my own and the other, vibranium fingers were placed gently on my lower back. 

“I love you too,” I replied. 

“I don’t ever want to forget this moment,” Bucky said. 

Lips curled upward in a soft smile, feeling the love radiate through his body into my own. I stood on my toes to reach his lips, wanting to feel them on mine again, however as I was so close to close the distance Bucky vanished through my fingers. 

He fell to dust in my grasp. 

“Y/N?” 

My eyes snapped open from the dream and Bucky’s ghost was gone, my gaze staring at Steve. 

“Did you say something?” I asked. 

He was standing in front of my seat on the jet, staring down at me with worried eyes. 

“Are you okay?” Steve asked, kneeling in front of me now. “We’ve been on board for a few hours and you haven’t said one word.” 

I shrugged. “There’s not much to say. I’m going to kill Thanos.” 

“Y/N-,” Steve sighed. 

“Are we done here?” I questioned, interrupting him with a hard gaze.

I went to stand, wanting to end this conversation, however Steve’s hand gripped my thigh to stop me. 

“I understand that you’re angry at everything and everyone right now but to take it out on me is bullshit,” he said. 

The anger in his eyes made the anger in my body dissipate, guilt pulling at my heart. Steve had been by my side ever since the snap and I knew it was wrong of me to take my pain out on him. 

“I’m sorry,” I muttered. 

Steve lifted my chin. “This is going to work, Y/N. We’re going to get him back.” 

I let out a shaky breath, trying to hold back the tears. 

“It has too because I don’t know what I would do if it doesn't,” I admitted. 

With a soft sigh, Steve stood to his feet and placed a kiss on the top of my head, and walked over to Nat. They conversed, something unreadable from my spot a few meters away. For a quick moment, the thought of Bucky left my mind and was replaced with the thought of Steve. 

Our relationship was confusing to a lot, me included. We shared a bed every night, some nights we would find ourselves entangled together when I would have nightmares of the snap. Steve was there, pulling me into his arms to soothe me. 

I knew that deep down Steve still felt the same way towards me as he did years ago but I couldn’t give him the same feelings. My heart will always be with Bucky. 

“Guys, it’s just him.” 

My eyes snapped to the front of the ship where Carol flew in place in space. She had flown down to the planet to scope out, seeing what we were up against. 

“Perfect,” I muttered as we all got ready for the descent below. 

The lone cabin in the middle of an open field meant nothing to any of us as I blasted a large flame towards the door, it falling to ash in seconds. Carol, Bruce, and Rhodey were inside in seconds, holding Thanos in place. 

Thor, who held the same rage as I, busted inside and with a swift movement of Stormbreaker, Thanos’ hand with the gauntlet fell to the ground with a thud. His cries were nothing to me, as the fire still burned at my fingertips. 

Steve, Nat, and I stepped inside, all side by side just like how we used to be back in the day. 

Rocket went to pick up the fallen gauntlet but when he turned it over,  a gasp fell from his lips. 

“Oh no,” Rocket muttered. 

The stones were gone. 

“Where are they?” Steve asked. 

“The stone served no purpose besides temptations,” Thanos said. 

“YOU MURDERED TRILLIONS!” I bellowed, my banshee scream caused him to fly back to the other end of the cabin. 

His broken body lay at my feet and Thor had to hold me back from setting him a blaze right there. 

“Where are the stones?” Nat asked, tears in her eyes. 

“Gone. Reduced to atoms,” Thanos choked. 

“You used them two days ago!” Banner screamed. 

“I used the stones to destroy the stones, it nearly killed me in the process,” Thanos admitted. “I am inevitable.” 

Blackness took over my vision and the heat burned low in my stomach. Whatever hope we had about bringing everyone back was gone, along with the stones. 

Thanos and Gamora exchanged words but it meant nothing to me, white noise in the background. Without a second thought, I shot a fire ball into his face, his cries being short lived as Thor went for the head, rolling below to our feet. 

“Y/N,” Steve spoke while he reached for my hand. 

I smacked him away, tears welling in my eyes. “You promised.” 

His heart sank at my broken words. 

“We’ll find a way,” he tried to reassure me. 

“No! It’s done, Steve. Bucky’s never coming back!” I yelled. 

I turned on my feet to walk away from him, away from all of them, but he stood in front of me to stop me. 

“Where are you going?” Steve asked. 

“Leave me alone,” I snapped trying to get away from him. 

His hands were firm on my shoulders. “I’m not letting you leave.” 

I raised my hands at him, the fire burning to life while my eyes went black again. The flames danced along on my hands. 

“Don’t make me hurt you, Steve,” I hissed. 

Steve reluctantly stepped to the side, letting me leave. He knew that this was a fight that he wouldn’t be able to win. My whole world was gone, never coming back all because Thanos blew the stones to hell. I couldn’t find it in my heart to live anymore. I was tired of fighting for nothing. 

Without giving a second glance back to my friends, my family, I left them all behind. Nothing mattered to me anymore, not even Steve.