#28 days later fanfiction

[pedropascallme]

OH GIVE US SOME JEALOUS JIM!

Think He’d Do What I’ve Done?

Pairing: jealous!Jim x f!Reader

Summary: "He knew it was ridiculous, knew that what the two of you had was nothing short of intense, something wonderful and miraculous that had come out of catastrophe. Still, he couldn’t help but feel a pang of embarrassment surrounded by these people while the girl he loved was seemingly ignoring him."

Warnings: SMUT (18+ MINORS DNI), oral (f & m receiving), fingering, p in v sex, creampie, cum play, praise kink, overstimulation, dom/sub dynamics (dom!Jim x sub!Reader) (listen Jim FUCKS I do not make the rules), if I missed anything please let me know!

AN: Your wish is my command! Sorry that this took so long, but good lord I had fun writing it. I will always be a slut for dom!possessive!Jim it's not even funny.

Jim was indebted to the people that surrounded him in the house he stood in; Hannah’s family, however distant they may be, had made an amazing effort to ensure you all had a fresh start in America. The cousins and aunts and uncles and whomever that stood around the living room, sharing well wishes and anecdotes, who had provided housing and employment opportunities, were all so kind. So he didn’t like the voice in the back of his head that told him otherwise when he looked over at you.

One of Hannah’s cousins had an arm around you while you admired the different pictures sitting on the mantle. Jim watched you laugh at whatever remark he was making and scoffed, disillusioned by the way your eyes shined up at the man when you spoke to him.

He knew it was ridiculous, knew that what he had with you was nothing short of intense; something wonderful and miraculous that had come out of catastrophe. Still, he couldn’t help but feel a pang of humiliation surrounded by these people who bordered strangers while the girl he loved was seemingly ignoring him. After all that, it seemed as though every time you found yourself in a room with these relatives, this cousin found his way to you, and you to him. It had Jim silently fuming.

Jim left the gathering early, only muttering a goodbye to Hannah, who, for what it’s worth, rolled her eyes at his obvious melancholy.

“You’re not waiting for her?” In true fourteen-going-on-forty nature, Hannah pried.

Jim mumbled a noise of rejection, padding out of the house and heading for the apartment he shared with you.

~~~

“You left early!” You walked back into the apartment you shared with Jim, jokingly accosting him the moment you crossed the threshold. Jim didn’t look up from his spot on the couch, flicking through the TV channels and bouncing his leg.

“Didn’t think you’d notice.” He was dry, and you felt your heart somersault at his cadence—he felt his do the same. He knew he was acting like a child, but he didn’t know how to confront what in his mind was an issue.

“Course I noticed,” you shook off your jacket, dropping it on the coffee table in front of him, “you alright?” Jim shrugged, and you sat down on the couch next to him. You watched him continue to browse TV channels.

“Hannah’s cousin likes you.” It was blurted and came out as more of a shout than a statement; it caught you both off guard.

“No he doesn’t.”

“I didn’t say which one.” Jim was brooding, upset that you were further proving his point without even trying. He shut off the television and set the remote down next to your jacket on the table.

“You—you didn’t have to, I know who you're talking about,” you looked at your hands, folded on your lap, “but he doesn’t.”

“Do you like him?” Jim followed your line of sight, looking down at your hands. He felt a knot forming in his stomach; the concept of such strong feelings that had nothing to do with the need to survive made him anxious.

“Jim…” You looked up at him, brows knit and lips curving up at the edges, “are you jealous?”

“N—” he tried to protest before you cut him off.

“You are.” You grinned, and he could see the devious glint in your eye. “You think I want him.”

“Didn’t say that.”

“It was implied.” You crossed your arms, somewhat offended that he could think you would be able to look at any man the way you looked at him, but pleased by his possessive nature.

Jim reached around you and rubbed up and down the back of your neck, and you playfully turned your head away from him, hoping he would put in the work for whatever answer he wanted. When you moved your body away from his, you felt the hand resting on the back of your neck stop moving, taking hold of you in a gentle, haughty manner.

“Look at me,” he asked nicely, and so you did, “think he’d do what I’ve done?”

You smiled, enjoying the way he responded to your teasing, “I don’t know. Maybe.” You batted your lashes and Jim pouted. “Depends on what you think you’ve done.” You felt the hand he had on your neck tighten, and a shiver ran down your back.

“Think he’d kill for you?” The air felt thick around you, and you remembered how much you enjoyed Jim’s more domineering moments.

“No.” You whispered, tilting your head up in the hopes that he would give in.

“Do so much for you, don’t I?” He smiled, and you saw the Jim you fell in love with shine out from under the dominant exterior he had fashioned for himself tonight.

“Show me what you do for me.” Your pleading was acknowledged in seconds when Jim grabbed you by the waist and helped you find the proper footing to straddle him. You moaned into his mouth, and he made quick work of the top you were wearing, throwing it blindly onto the floor. You ground your hips down into his, and you could feel the gentle friction of his growing erection against your clothed core. The kisses were messy, teeth clacking gently against each other as you licked his tongue. You pulled away from Jim, who moved down to your neck and chest, marking you with love bites and licking gently at your pulse points. You pushed him back onto the couch, wordlessly lowering yourself to your knees and beginning to undo his zipper.

“Baby…” He smiled down at you, head resting on his arms as he leaned back into the cushion of the couch. He helped you remove his cock from the confines of his jeans, stroking himself. “Open.”

You opened your mouth wide, happy to let him take control, to prove that you were his and his alone. He watched as you placed a kiss on the head of his cock, taking his length in your hands and shooing his own hand, still loosely holding the base of himself, away. You moved your wrist up and down, steadily taking more of him in your mouth as you did, using the spit that dribbled down his shaft to lubricate the motion of your hand. Jim let out a breathy chuckle when you managed to fit most of him down your throat, running his fingers through your hair and pulling stray strands out of your face.

“God—yeah, like that.” His jaw was slack while he analyzed every move you made. “Just like that, sweetheart.” You tried to smile with his cock in your mouth, getting another huffed laugh from him, before you returned to your prior movements. You licked the tip of his cock in a circular motion, pumping up and down with your hand, before attempting to take as much as you could into your mouth. You repeated these gestures to Jim’s delight.

“Fuck, so good—fuck, that’s it, oh my god, baby.” He tugged on your hair in a half-hearted effort to remove you from his cock, but you allowed yourself a few more bobs up and down before listening to the message he was sending.

Jim cupped your cheek in his hand, his thumb wandering over your swollen, saliva coated lips. “So good for me.”

“All for you.” You found a steady rhythm for your breathing.

“That’s right.” He pulled you in for a kiss, letting the spit on your face cover his own mouth and chin. “Do you like sucking me off, baby?” You nodded, eyes hooded and pupils blown out; you wanted to tell him that you could go down on him for hours, but the words wouldn’t come out, head too clouded with need. “Want me to show you more? Let me show you how good I can make you feel?” It was rare that Jim became this controlling, but you felt it go to your cunt every time he did. You nodded again, and Jim stood up, removing what remained of his clothes—and of yours—before easing you onto the couch and moving your legs to rest on his shoulders as he knelt in front of you.

“Say please.” Jim kissed your inner thigh.

You might’ve rolled your eyes under different circumstances, but something about his tone and the way he nipped at your leg turned you into the picture of obedience. “Please, Jim…”

“Please what?” He grinned, perfectly aware of how torturous his treatment was.

“Please,” you were getting impatient, and he knew it, you could see in his eyes how much he relished watching you squirm, “please fuck me, Jim—touch me, please, please.”

His smile turned into something more sinister when he heard you beg, and it was only then that he dove into you. You felt his tongue make contact with your clit and you yelped, the sudden and intense feeling making you jump under his hold on you. He tightened his grip on your legs, holding them firm against his shoulders so that your thighs all but engulfed his head. You could feel the vibrations of his moans travel through your body, and you wriggled underneath him when his tongue broke past your entrance and he licked gently into you. You couldn’t tell what was his spit and what was your wet, everything seemingly running together—and you didn’t really care, either. He suckled on your clit and teased a finger into you, looking at you intently while you came undone for him.

“Think he could do it better?” He moaned into your core, and you were broken out of your haze mostly by the shock that he still had the time to be jealous while he was buried between your legs —though not dissatisfied by the way he managed to show you who you belonged to while forcing you to acknowledge it.

“N—o!” You squeaked at him when his finger hit your sweet spot.

“Think anyone could do it better than me?” He continued to hound you between licks over your bud, fingers rubbing gently across the spongy spot inside of you.

“N—just—fuck, just you! Only you, Jim, only you.” You moaned, pleasing him immensely and motivating him to press down just a bit more on your g-spot while he sucked harder on your clit. Your legs, weak with gratification, shook in their spot on his shoulders, and you felt the fire that had started in your stomach spread across your body. He continued to lick stripes up and down your clit, finger still curling inside you while you rode out your climax.

“That’s right,” Jim kissed your dripping hole, noticing the way you flinched when his breath fanned the now sensitive area, “only me. All for me”

You moaned a pitiful confirmation, and he stood up. He rearranged you so that you were lying properly on the couch, head propped up by a pillow next to the cushioned arm.

“Gonna let me show you more, now, yeah?” You trailed a hand down his stomach, looking up at him from your spot underneath him as he straddled your legs. “Wanna let me fuck you into the couch?” You sighed dreamily, nodding with enthusiasm. “So good f’me.” He lined himself up with your entrance, continuing to whisper praises down at you, before pushing his cock into your desperate cunt little by little.

“Fuck, Jim!” You couldn’t help the expletive; no matter how many times he fucked you there was still so much joy in the way he filled you up to the very brim.

“Good, yeah? Feels good, sweetheart?” He bent forward and pushed your legs up more to allow him to fit deeper inside your cunt.

You whined, eyes screwed shut and lips parted, as he pressed his cock into you. You felt him bottom out, and he brushed his fingers over your cheek, kissing you gently across the face.

“Want—will you—will you fuck me?” You encouraged him, wanting—needing—him to move, to let you enjoy the way he pumped in and out of your pussy.

“You want me to move, baby?” He cooed, leaning forward to whisper into your ear, “Want me to fuck you nice?”

“Please!”

“Say it, then. Say my fucking name.” His breathing was labored, a product of the effort it was taking to hold himself back.

“Please, Jim, I need you to fuck me, I need it, Jim—I need it!” You felt like crying, the way he filled you up and mocked you was entirely too pleasurable. Hearing you beg as if you were on the verge of tears was all he needed, and he pulled out until the tip of his cock was just barely kissing your hole, before he thrusted deep and rough back into you. You cried out, feeling the friction from the way your back rubbed against the couch with each of his hard thrusts into you, and the way his hips rubbed against your own with every move.

“God, fuck,” Jim watched the way your eyes rolled back after a particularly deep plunge into you, “gonna fuck you like I own you.”

“Y—oh! You do—Jim! You do!” You were so far into your own pleasure, you weren’t even sure if the words had come out properly or if they had been reduced to gibberish between the time it took for them to travel from your brain to your mouth. But when you heard him growl in your ear you knew he had heard you, and it registered to you both what you had said.

“Yeah?” His voice was laced with care but was so outwardly assertive, “yeah, I own this fucking pussy.” He raised your legs to rest them on his shoulders as they had when he’d eaten you out, and he used them now as leverage to bend you backwards so his cock was seated as far as your body would allow him. His name fell from your lips continuously as he pounded into you with seemingly no regard; he managed to pick up the pace slightly and your eyes watered, overwhelmed by the sensation of being used to the fullest extent and absolutely loving that you had this effect on Jim.

“Gonna fucking cum—fuck, I’m gonna cum,” he was panting, chest rising and falling rapidly in sync with his thrusts, “tell me—tell me how you want it, sweetheart, tell me.”

You didn’t respond fast enough to satisfy him, and you whimpered when his hand came down to smack your clit, then gasped at the way he soothed you by rubbing tight circles on the bud.

“Tell me.” He grunted.

“Want—Jim!—please, please, want you to cum in me! Please—please, Jim, need—need it inside.” Your back arched up in response to his ministrations, and his hand that wasn’t massaging your clit came up to squeeze your leg to his cheek.

“Fucking—oh, hell, gimme one more, baby, please.” The mask of dominance slipped slightly when Jim began to beg for you to cum one more time, “cum on my cock, baby, I’ll give you what you need—all for you, fuck!—good girl, my good girl…” He placed kisses onto your calf, still holding it over his shoulder while he fucked you stupid. You felt his cock sliding in and out of you, every vein catching against your walls and the fat head of his cock nudging the spots that you could never reach on your own. He felt velvety inside you, and the way he spoke only heightened your pleasure, the promise of feeling him fill you up with his cum only spurring you on further to reach your peak.

“Ji—I—fuck!” You choked out a string of profanities, punctuating each with a gasp of his name as you came for him. He smiled into your leg, turning to look down at your face to watch your eyes roll back and your mouth hang open while you came on his length. He felt the way you clenched around him and the sheen that your cum added to his cock, his own head lolling back as he felt himself fall over the edge.

Still squirming under him, overcome with the strength of your second orgasm and the way he continued to use your spent cunt, you felt him paint your insides with his load. He moaned out your name, still shallowly thrusting in and out of you, admiring how your pussy milked him for every last drop he had to offer you. You whined, needy and messy and fucked out, and he gave your clit a final few swipes with his thumb, smirking sadistically at the way you cried out at the overstimulation. Jim began to pull out of you slowly, eyes glued to your hole to observe how the mixture of his cum and yours leaked out of you and down over the curve of your ass, dripping over your asshole and thighs. He leaned down, pulling your legs open to lick and kiss at the mess the two of you had made.

“Jim!” You squeezed your legs together, thighs pressing against his ears. He came up from between your legs, licking his lips, before he brought himself up to your face to kiss you softly. You wrapped your arms around him, and you could feel the pressure of his chest against yours as he rested his weight onto you.

“Too much?” He whispered after a while of heavy breathing and fingertips tracing over one another.

“No…perfect.” You squeezed him closer to your body, lips grazing his ear. “You’re right, y’do so much for me.”

Jim laughed against you, and you shook with his chest, “I do two things for you—kill and cum.”

“Hope you only have to do one of those things from now on.”

“I plan on it,” he smiled, then deadpanned; “you mean cum, right?” You pushed him away playfully and he laughed. Scooping you up into his arms, he let you rest yourself against him, letting the liquid seeping out between your legs trickle down onto him. He hugged you to his chest, eyes suddenly heavy and body light with satisfaction. “I’d do anything for you.” He whispered, breath fanning the top of your head.

You pawed at his chest, eyes closed. “I know you would. Feeling is mutual.” He cradled your head in his hands, “He doesn’t like me—Hannah’s cousin—he doesn’t. He’s married. You’ve met his husband.”

Jim felt you smile into his skin, and he felt himself go red, embarrassed that he hadn’t made the connection, but too blissed out and used up to backtrack and claim he had known all along. “I love you,” he chuckled, “I love you so much.”

“I love you, too.” You looked up at him, cozy and content with your position on his lap, “would’ve said something earlier, but I like when you get possessive.”

“Thanks for letting me prove a point.” He rubbed your back, head falling against the couch cushion behind him.

“Always happy to help.”

#cillian murphy #cillian murphy fanfiction #cillian murphy smut #cillian murphy imagine #cillian murphy x reader #cillian murphy x you #oppenheimer #peaky blinders #peaky blinders smut #thomas shelby #tommy shelby smut #28 days later #28 days later smut #jim 28 days later x reader #28 days later jim x reader #28 days later fanfiction #jim 28 days later

[vampireluck]

would anyone be interested in me writing for Cillian Murphy/his characters???? I've been writing for a very long time and have never really posted anything and its certainly not like phenomonal..,.mnb maybe someone should rq smth.....

#cillian murphy x reader #patricia braden x reader #kitten braden x reader #jackson rippner x reader #neil lewis x reader #breakfast on pluto #thomas shelby x reader #watching the detectives #28 days later jim x reader #28 days later #28 days later fanfiction #peaky blinder fanfic #peaky blinders #peaky blinder imagine #red eye 2005 #the delinquent season

[im-immortal]

Longer Than A Heartbeat

a beth greene/daryl dixon adaptation of 28 Days Later

A mysterious virus suddenly sweeps across the United States, sending the entire nation into chaos. It is unlike anything the world has ever seen before, turning healthy human beings into lethal, feral, bloodthirsty shells of their former selves within seconds of exposure. It is described only as “an infection of rage.”

Then the mass evacuations begin.

28 days later, Beth Greene wakes up all alone in a deserted hospital.

Moonshine Awards 2022 Winner for Best Multichapter WIP and Best AU WIP!

chapters: one | two | three | four | five | six | seven | eight | nine | ten | eleven | twelve | thirteen | fourteen | fifteen | sixteen | seventeen | eighteen | nineteen | twenty | twenty-one | twenty-two | twenty-three | twenty-four | twenty-five | twenty-six | twenty-seven | twenty-eight | epilogue  

#bethyl #bethyl fanfiction #28 Days Later adaptation #movie adaptation #rage virus #beth greene #daryl dixon #beth and daryl #beth x daryl #beth/daryl #found family #survival horror #zombie apocalypse #apocalypse parenting #strangers to lovers #beth greene & daryl dixon & judith grimes #abraham ford #pope (reapers twd) #twd x 28 days later #first kiss #slow burn #religious fanatacism #mc fic #weekly updated fic #SquishyCool #my fic: LTAH

[idksmtms]

Cillian Murphy Masterlist

Cillian Murphy Fics

Cillian Murphy & Y/n L/n | Actors on Actors - (Cillian Murphy x young actress!reader - coming soon)

The two biggest movie stars of the summer sit down to discuss all things acting, the success of their movies, and... possibly flirting with each other?

Golden Globes - (Cillian Murphy x reader)

Written from the perspective of press and viewers of the golden globes; how cute are Cillian Murphy and his girlfriend Y/n L/n?! From the red carpet to his acceptance speech, look at what a mesmerising couple these two make!

Directed by Christopher Nolan - (Cillian Murphy x young actress!reader - coming soon)

Looking for your next challenging role, you write a letter to Christopher Nolan hoping to work with him at some point. You never expected to get an audition for his next project, to work alongside Cillian Murphy, to fall in love.

Meet the Kids - (Cillian Murphy x younger!reader - coming soon)

It's finally time for the kids to meet Dad's new girlfriend. Cillian thinks they don't even know that he's started dating again. The kids already know who it is and more. How is this going to go?

evermore series

1. willow 8. dorothea 12. long story short

AUs

Don't Jump in the Mushroom Ring - (Fairy King!Cillian Murphy x human reader - coming soon)

There's a reason people tell their children not to jump into a mushroom ring. They say it's a portal into the world of fairies. The only way out? Judgement handed by the king. You were curious. You jumped in...

A Gift from the Sidhe - (Hurt Human!Cillian Murphy x fairy!reader - coming soon)

After a dog walk in the woods ends with Cillian hitting his head and passing out, he wakes up a few hours later fully rested with not an injury in sight. Something doesn't sit right with him, and he returns to the spot the next day, happening upon something he only knew from Irish folklore...

Plié, Jeté, Relevé - (Ballet Teacher!Cillian Murphy x Ballerina!reader - coming soon)

You may not have been the best ballerina in the company, but you worked hard. Ok maybe the last couple of weeks weren't the best evidence for this but in your defence, there's a lot going on in your life! And maybe Mr. Murphy doesn't appreciate lazy, slacking, ballerinas...

Emmett - A Quiet Place Part II Fics

Silence - (Emmett x younger!reader)

Who cares about propriety? Everything is gone.

Tommy Shelby Fics

(Coming soon)

#cillian murphy #cillian x reader #cillian x fem!reader #cillian x y/n #cillian murphy x y/n #tommy shelby #peaky blinders #cillian murphy fanfiction #thomas shelby imagine #thomas shelby #peaky blinder imagine #cillian murphy imagine #cillian murphy x reader #cillian murphy smut #a quiet place 2 #a quiet place part ii #a quiet place ii #28 days later #christopher nolan #oppenheimer

[domaystic]

Domaystic 2023 is back!

link to bigger image: click here

[Image description: a blue clothes hanger with clips where socks are drying under the sun; among the socks the word domyastic is separated in three parts and hanged as well. On the right side: the list of 31 prompts and 5 alternatives.]

Hello! This is THE post for DOMAYSTIC 2023 :D

Domaystic is the combination of “domestic” and “May” and it's a prompt event run on May based on the domestic trope: anything inside, outside, beside the house or that has that normalcy flavor of everyday life.

If any of these prompts inspire your muse, please, don’t hesitate and join!

Text prompts

01 Housewarming   02 A stash of...   03 List   04 Packed lunch    05 Learning something new   06 Under the same umbrella    07 Stained clothes   08 The things in that drawer    09 Mistaken identity   10 Bath   11 Volunteering   12 Crisis    13 Taking turns   14 Parade   15 Junkmail    16 Sleeping habits   17 Marked date on calendar    18 Discount at favourite store   19 Police at the door    20 In the nearby park   21 Handmade gift   22 S/o on the local news    23 Small couch   24 Secret language   25 Misdialed calls    26 Sounds from above   27 Passage through a fence 28 Recycling   29 Lottery   30 Feeling of doing nothing    31 Midnight snack

Alternatives

A. No, no, don't lift it!   B. There's a ... in the room! C. Stop the car, now!   D. Look, I made it work! E. Oh, I can't wait to do it!

Text prompts in German: click here Text prompts in Spanish: click here Text prompts in Italian: click here Text prompts in French: click here

Lots of text under the cut!

General rules and guidelines

All fandoms or original content are welcome.

Any kind of media is welcome: fanfiction, fanart, fanmixes, puzzles, diy art, quizzes, podfics, edits, fic recs or whatever it is you feel like doing. That’s all good.

No restrictions in ships, size, min/max word count or the language you want to write into.

As last year, feel free to mix the domestic prompt with anything you like: more drama and lots of crying? YES! The thrill of an investigation for the disappearance of your characters’ fave socks? YES!

There's one prompt for each day for a total of 31 prompts + 5 alternatives with an exclamation point at the end (predictable!).

You can share your work on any platform you like. If you share it on tumblr and tag the blog, I’ll reblog it.

Combine more prompts together? That’s fine but I will reblog the entry only once here on tumblr.

Combine these prompts with another event? Fine too.

You don’t have to do all the prompts to join the event. Do the ones you enjoy.

The event is consistently checked upon during the month of May, but in case you want to share your creation at a later date, you can. I just reblog on a lower pace after May is over.

As for the reblogs, last year I gave myself a bit of an headache, so this time I’d like to try it this way: once the day of the corresponding prompt comes, people will post their work and then I’ll reblog it when that day comes for me too. Does it make sense? I hope so. I’ll miss the world clocks but let’s just trust each other.

AO3 collection

The domaystic2023 collection is open from May, 1st: click here - all the info and prompts are also on the profile page of the collection.

In your tumblr post I ask you to:

Mention the blog in your post @domaystic - tracked tag: #domaystic2023

State clearly the fandom name or if it is original content

State clearly if it is sfw or nsfw

State clearly which prompt you used

In case of lengthy posts, use the “read more option”: ctrl-shift-k on rich text; [[*MORE*]] on html (remove asterisks)

Please, TAG PROPERLY. If there are any trigger warnings, I will base my own reblog on your tags so, please, take even a moment longer to carefully tag it. I hope all participants to stay safe in this event.

Here’s an example:

blablabla my story is beautiful, look @domaystic ! 

#domaystic2023 #day1 #[extraA - E if alternative prompt is used] #[fandom name or oc] #[sfw or nsfw] #[trigger warnings that I get from your post] tw

If you have any question feel free to send an ask, inbox is always open. :D

Hi, @thebigbangblogproject​ can you reblog this?

#domaystic #domaystic2023 #post about the event #domestic trope #prompts #multifandom #prompt event #prompt list #fanfiction #fanart #edits #I hope all the essential infos are included ò_ò #edit of the 1:15pm NOPE I typed some link wrongly ... now everything should work ouch

[jtargaryen18]

His Inheritance ~ Chapter 28

Part 28: Fatal Trespasses

Series Masterlist

Words: 6.7k

Pairing: Mobster Steve Rogers x Mobster daughter reader

Warnings: References to mob crime families, strong language, physical violence, character death. This is a dark fic. Please read responsibly.

Disclaimer: The author of this work claims no ownership of characters aside from the reader, and original secondary characters mentioned. This work is not intended for those under the age of 18 due to explicit sexual content and darker themes. By reading this work or any works on my blog (jtargaryen18), you agree that you are at least 18 years of age. I do not consent to have my work hosted on any third party app or site. If you are seeing this fanfiction anywhere but archiveofourown and tumblr, it has been reposted without my permission.

Summary: For @alexakeyloveloki. Your father is the head of one of the most powerful crime families in Boston but he’s protected you from that life. In your quiet home outside the city, you’ve been cared for and protected. When the desires of a more powerful man with the will to dominate bursts into your life, all your illusions are shattered as he comes to claim what is his.

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

Clint paused to see Belova’s number on his phone, especially since Steve tossed her out. He understood why his boss did it, he just didn’t entirely agree with it. Belova was young, but she had a lot of potential. She was strong and loyal. Clint had no reason not to trust her.

That, more than anything, had him answering the call.

“Belova?”

“I’ve got a location on Banner,” she said.

That got his interest. “Where?”

Belova gave him the address, an apartment over a dive bar on Stark’s turf. He knew the place.

Neal’s words about Belova falling into enemy hands crossed his mind.

“How do I know you’re not walking me into a trap?” he had to ask.

“I may not be working for the Rogers family at the moment,” she said. “But I still serve Mrs. Rogers. She would want me to relay this information.”

“Yeah, she would,” Clint said. Mrs. Rogers trusted her and considering how she’d supported him and Nat, well, that meant something to him.

“There’s more on Banner,” she went on quickly. “It will be sent to you from an unknown number when this call ends. I hope you’ll find it helpful.”

Clint did too. “Take care of yourself.”

“You too,” she said, ending the call.

Sure enough, the text came through a few seconds later. The attachment didn’t have much to offer about Bruce Banner. But his Senator brother? Clint had to read over it again to make sure he read it correctly. If what he was reading got out, the scandal would ruin the entire Banner family.

How the hell did Belova pull it off?

He and Scott were supposed to carry out their part of the boss’s plan tonight, around midnight. Clint had almost six hours to kill before getting ready for that. Did he trust Belova? Would he find Banner if he went to that address?

Anger for every bruise, every cut on Nat’s body rushed to the surface as he considered the intel he’d just been given. His Nat would need weeks to physically heal from the beating she’d taken at the hands of her husband. The fear she’d experienced in the trap of her marriage would take a lot longer to recover from if she ever did.

Guilt clawed at him from the inside, like an old, wounded beast. He could have put a stop to it. He could have taken her and run. He would have betrayed his loyalty to her brother, his boss. But maybe they’d be somewhere safe right now. Maybe she wouldn’t have terrible nightmares and shadows behind her eyes.

Maybe Steve would have killed them.

No, Clint told her over and over that he loved her. That one day, maybe Steve would change his mind and they could be together as they were always meant to be. And that day finally came. Neither of them dared to ask for more. Steve allowing them to be together was more than they could have hoped for.

But Nat had taken a severe beating to get them to that point. And Steve still wouldn’t have gone to check on her if hadn’t been for his wife’s insistence. Not with everything going on all around them.

He would have given anything to take that beating for Nat.  He’d felt so helpless that day when they found her like that in her husband’s house, broken and small. Yet again, Clint had been forced to contain the rage he hadn’t been allowed to express or act on. It had been one of the hardest things he’d done in his whole damn life. And he’d been recovering from getting shot on top of it.

But now, just maybe Belova had given him something he desperately wanted – a chance at some payback.

Steve? Well, Steve warned Banner that he needed to disappear. That the man only made it as far as Stark territory was surely not what the boss had in mind.

Banner never paid any attention to the soldiers outside his house. He took them for granted. Setting up a diversion for the armed guards staying with Banner was just too easy. Within an hour, Clint had Banner delivered to the old warehouse on the outskirts of the city. They often used it for such special occasions.

Slumped in the wooden chair with his hands bound in front of him and a sack over his head, Banner just sat, waiting. Clint would have had him tied to that chair but his arms, shown off by the dirty white t-shirt he wore, showed layers of bruises. They looked as bad as those on the woman he loved.

Clint smiled. It was the least of what the fucker deserved.

When the sack was pulled from his head, Banner’s gaze wildly scanned the room. When he spotted Clint, outrage blended with fear to find himself at the mercy of his wife’s lover.

“What the fuck is this?” Banner asked. His lower lip was cut, a dark ugly scab at its center. One of his eyes was blackened. “Steve and I had a deal.”

“Sure you did,” Clint told him. “You either disappear or you would disappear. But holing up on Stark turf? That’s not really disappearing, is it?”

“And you’re doing this to prove what?” Banner asked, eyeing him warily.

“Got nothing to prove,” Clint told him, taking a step closer.

Banner’s dark eyes hardened in anger. “Don’t you?”

Clint watched the anger that Nat described so many times about darken his face. Banner always seemed so calm, collected whenever Clint observed him during business transactions for the family.

When the two men crossed paths, the anger Clint held in check was always close to the surface. Banner was married to the woman he loved, and the man’s entitlement and contempt made Clint sick inside, like poison. Banner had Steve fooled, painting Nat as pampered but unstable and dramatic. Banner had to know Nat was with him every opportunity they had – and there were precious few times. Bitterness that he could never make Nat love him drove Banner to abuse her, verbally and mentally.

That was bad enough. When Nat learned she was pregnant, Clint came so close to getting her to run away with him. She thought about it. One tearful night, she told him she would. That was the night of the horrible fight Banner had with Nat. The one where Nat was left broken at the foot of the stairs.

She lost the baby. His baby, not Banner’s. That loss haunted her, and she blamed herself. For him, that loss was a wound that never healed, a hole in his heart.

Clint waited, not willing to let the lawyer draw him into a debate. It wasn’t easy.

After a moment, Banner chuckled, shaking his head though Clint could tell the effort physically hurt him.

“Steve’s got his sister back home now,” Banner taunted him. “He’ll even let you take care of her like the good dog you are. But he’s never going to give her to you. Not even now. Not while he can marry her off to benefit the family. You are stupid if you believe that.”

Clint had to give the bastard credit. He always knew the worst thing to hit someone with, how to strike at their deepest fears. He was a fucking lawyer. He’d been doing it to Nat their entire marriage. On nights when Clint was out there in the night, waiting to do Steve’s bidding, he’d reflect on the stories she told him. On the cutting things her husband would say to her.

Clint shrugged. He wasn’t about to play the game.

“Sounds like he already has someone in mind,” Clint lied casually. “Yeah, she needs to heal up. She looks worse than you do. But once she’s on the mend, I imagine Steve will marry her off again.”

The smirk on the other man’s mouth faded. Banner hadn’t expected him to say that.

“What?” was all Banner could say.

Clint folded his arms across his chest, standing over the bastard. “Steve can’t have Nat in his house for long. Not with his own little wife. It’s not an ideal situation. I’m sure you understand.”

Banner’s snort was an ugly sound. “Steve can’t handle his wife. If he knew how to deal with her, we wouldn’t be here, now would we?”

“Sounds like you’re blaming all this on Mrs. Rogers,” Clint pointed out.

“It’s pretty obvious, isn’t it?” Banner demanded. “Steve doesn’t usually make time to do welfare checks on his sister. He could handle women just like I handled his sister. Until he married her. I showed up at his house and that little bitch met me at the door. I knew it was her that sent him to my house. She wasn’t even trying to hide it.”

“Then you get why Steve can’t let Nat linger.” Clint tried to keep the emotion out of his voice, to sound like he didn’t care.

Banner’s mind looked to be going a mile a minute. Anger flashed in those dark eyes as he studied Clint hard.

“I hope she gets what she deserves,” Banner’s tone took on a hint of bitterness. “Honestly, Nat played you and me both. She didn’t love either one of us… Ungrateful bitch.”

Clint’s fist flew before his mind could override it, striking Banner’s unbruised eye. Banner somehow managed to stay in the chair, a grin on his face when he returned his gaze to his rival.

“I knew you were full of shit,” Banner called him out.

“I’m full of shit?” Clint demanded. “I’m not the one that’s cast out, am I?”

“I served Steve well,” Banner shot back. “He couldn’t have had a better consigliere and he made a mistake. A huge mistake.”

Clint didn’t like the way he said that with a sly grin playing along his split lip.

“Now he’s got another consigliere,” Clint pointed out. “He’ll be fine.”

Banner dropped his head, shaking it in frustration. What was he not saying? That Banner was still bitter about how his marriage ended? That was obvious. But somehow, he didn’t think that Nat was the sole issue here. Why had Banner still stayed close by?

“Something else you wanted to say?” Clint asked meaningfully.

It pissed him off that Banner was now trying to ignore him. It had always pissed him off that Banner considered himself better than Clint. But that was nothing compared to how he’d treated Nat, the woman he knew Clint would die for.

Anger rose as Clint grabbed a fistful of Banner’s hair and yanked his head back sharply, making the man look at him. And Banner did look him in the eye, pure defiance flashing in those cold depths. But he wasn’t saying anything.

With his left fist, he punched Banner in the nose. The second time he felt the cartilage give beneath his knuckles. Blood gushed from the man’s nose, but he stoically kept silent. Clint struck his chin, his injured eye. Banner muffled his cries of pain, fighting to be silent.

The glee Clint expected to feel at such a moment just wasn’t there. Banner wasn’t begging him for mercy. He wasn’t cowering as Clint imagined he would. That meant the fucker had some hope he was hanging onto. He thought about Banner’s senator brother.

“Counting on your brother to save you?” Clint asked, smirking. “I wouldn’t count on that.”

Clint released his hair. Banner held Clint’s gaze. “Yeah?”

The bastard didn’t look concerned. Yet.

“Yeah,” Clint said. “He’s going to go through some things.”

Banner looked only mildly concerned. “Is he?”

Pissed off, Clint leaned down to get in his face. “You’re not worried about that girl that died on your brother’s boat last summer?”

Banner rolled his eyes. “Why should I be?”

“Someone out there knows her death wasn’t an accident,” Clint informed him. “And they have proof.”

Of all the things he expected the fucker to do, laughing wasn’t one of them. It irked Clint so fucking much, he reared back and punched Banner again, the blow knocking him off the chair. Banner was still laughing.

Trying not to let frustration best him, Clint turned back to one of the two men he brought with him, silently watching from behind him. “Give me those pliers.”

Clint didn’t take his eyes off Banner, gripping the metal tool once it was placed in his hand. The man trying pull himself off the floor with his hands bound before him did look less amused. His dark eyes were on the pliers Clint held.

Wait. Banner wasn’t worried at all about his brother’s scandal, the only reason Steven didn’t make him dead for what he did to Nat. But he was worried about the pliers.

“Put his ass back in the chair,” Clint told his men. He watched as they rushed over to Banner and none-too-gently hauled him back into the chair. “Tape him to it.”

That had Banner’s attention. Wildly, he watched as one of his guys pulled a thick roll of duct tape from his pocket. Pulling up a strip, it made a loud familiar sound.

“Wait,” Banner was worried now. “What are we doing here?” They started taping him to the chair and Banner was shouting “hey!” and “stop!”

It occurred to Clint that Banner wasn’t worried about his brother’s potential scandal. That was in the future. He was worried about having his teeth pulled out of his mouth one by one in the next few minutes. The time frame…

“What did you do, Banner?” Clint moved closer once his guys finished taping him to the chair. “What’s coming?”

Banner was silent. Now he was scared. Holy fuck. What was going on?

“Hold his head,” Clint ordered.

Banner shouted “No-no-no-no-no-no-no!” Smart enough to know what was going to happen.

Grabbing Banner’s upper lip, he pulled it painfully back from the man’s teeth.

“You know something,” Clint told him. “For every minute you don’t tell me, I’m pulling out one of these pearly whites. Got it?”

Banner didn’t immediately speak. Clint took the pliers, using them to grip one of Banner’s upper front teeth. Thrashing in the chair, Banner grew more desperate by the second, drooling and yelling “no!” at turns while Clint’s men held him steady.

“What’s coming?” Clint asked.

“I d-don’t know,” Banner managed around the tool and with Clint holding his lip. “Don’t!”

Clint pulled the tooth out with a quick yank while Banner screamed, thrashing in the hold of his men. Blood flowed from the hole where his tooth had been, from his nose, and his eyes were wide when Clint tossed the tooth casually away.

“Let’s try this again,” Clint said calmly, fear of what he didn’t know battling with the satisfaction of torturing the miserable fuck.

Clint aimed for the other front tooth when Banner cried, “Wait!”

He paused, but he didn’t move the pliers. Banner appeared desperate.

“Barnes knows!” Banner yelled.

Those two words had Clint taking a step back, taking the pliers with him. “Barnes knows what?”

Clint was all too afraid he knew the answer to that.

“Everything!” Banner cried. “You pulled my fucking tooth out!”

At Clint’s nod, his men stepped back. He got in Banner’s face again.

“What do you mean everything?” Clint wanted to know. “You been a rat all along, Banner? Is that it?”

“Hey, I’m not the rat,” Banner told him, blood filling his mouth.

“Then how do you know anything about Barnes?” Clint didn’t like this. Was something going to happen tonight? Had someone told Barnes all about their plan. This is bad. “If you’re not the rat, who is?”

Banner was shaking his head, blood running down his face, staining his clothes. Forcefully, he spat out blood.

“They’ll kill me,” Banner told him, worry flooding the man’s expression.

Clint had to laugh at that.

“What do you think I’m going to do?” Clint demanded. “You were just handed the woman I love, and I had to watch that shit, all these years. I got to watch while you betrayed her, laid hands on her.”

“Betrayed her?” Banner yelled. “She betrayed me! She never gave me a chance. I was her husband. I would have done anything for her. And she didn’t care. She was off fucking you every chance she got. Faithless bitch!”

“I will pull every goddamn tooth out of your head if you say another fucking word about her,” Clint promised, waving the pliers in front of his face. “What does Barnes know and how does he know it?”

“I wasn’t involved with any of it… until Steve broke off from Katerina,” Banner said after a moment.

And that was before Steve got married.

“Paulina’s sister, right? The one you’ve been fucking?” Clint asked.

Banner spit at Clint in anger, the bloody lob barely grazing Clint’s shoe. “I wouldn’t have fucked anyone else if I have a loyal, loving wife.”

“What did I say?” Clint’s grip tightened on the tool in his hand. “And?”

“After Steve cut her off, Kat took up with Barnes,” Banner explained.

Clint was already shaking his head. “Kat wouldn’t have known anything,” Clint told him. “Steve wouldn’t do that.”

“But I did,” Banner admitted. “One night I got to Paulina’s place and Kat dropped by. Barnes was with her.”

Holy shit.

“Barnes wasn’t trying to get me to rat anyone out,” Banner explained slowly. “But he made me an offer.”

Clint was sure he did. “What offer?”

“Barnes told me he was looking for a new consigliere,” Banner said, defiance shining in his dark eyes. “Everybody knows Petruzello is going to retire soon. Hell, he’s been with them for decades… Barnes told me he could use a guy like me. He saw me for my talent. Saw how I was being treated over here.”

“How you were treated?” Clint’s voice rose. “Are you fucking kidding me? What were you fucking lacking? You had Nat and she’s all I want in this world. You had a beautiful fucking house, nice cars, nice whore. Lot of money. Explain it to me.”

“You know what else I had?” Banner grumbled. “I had competition. And no matter how many fucking times I begged Steve to get rid of your sorry ass, he refused.”

“But Barnes was willing to, right? Is that why I got shot?” Clint shook his head, barely holding his rage down. “You must have been so fucking disappointed that I lived.”

“I was.” Banner’s glare stayed on him.

“So then what? In your anger, you beat the shit out of Nat? Is that it? You took it out on her?” Oh, something Clint said had angry color flooding Banner’s face. “Am I wrong?”

“I wouldn’t have laid a hand on my wife,” Banner said indignantly. “Not without good reason.”

“There is no good reason to hit a woman,” Clint shot back. “Never… It also wasn’t the first time.”

“How would you have felt?” Banner yelled, struggling with the tape holding him in the chair. “It was bad enough that she cheated on me with you. She never got fucking over you. Then she turns up pregnant… I completely lost it.”

The back of Clint’s hand flew, sending Banner’s head spinning. But he wasn’t backing down. With an angry glare, Banner said, “You think you would have done better? If it had been my baby, you wouldn’t have done the same?”

It took everything in him not to just shoot the bastard. Banner knew Nat was pregnant and he knew it wasn’t his. Rage clouded his mind but as he blew out an exhale, Clint tried to focus. The pregnancy had been the reason he’d beaten his wife the first time.

Why did he do it the second time?

“Did you agree to beat Nat that night for a diversion?” Clint asked him calmly. “Because the very next day, Steve called a meeting of the families. The very next day, Hansen attacked Steve’s house. He tried to take Steve’s wife. And that was your job, wasn’t it? You beat Nat to try and draw Steve out. Barnes would have known Steve only leaves the house now for business talks. Am I right?”

The corners of Banner’s mouth tipped up as he glared at him. The answer to Clint’s question was in that self-righteous smirk.

Barnes wanted Steve’s position that badly. They’d underestimated him.

“What was in it for you?” Clint had to know. “Besides taking over as Barnes consigliere. What?”

“What the fuck do you think?” Banner shot back. “The plan was for him to take Steve off the board and you with him. I’d be his new consigliere and Nat would be mine. No more interference from her brother or you. She would finally, totally be just mine.”

Swallowing back the sting of bile in the back of his throat, Clint stared him down. “Is that the plan for tonight, Banner? Is tonight Barnes’ second shot at it?”

But then it occurred to him, Banner had been tossed out. He wasn’t there when they made the plan for tonight. He had no way of knowing what was coming down. Not while his only ties left to the Rogers’ family was Paulina.

The bullet came out of nowhere, piercing Banner’s forehead and sending his head sharply back.

Clint dropped the pliers and hit the floor as another shot from behind him hit one of his men in the head. Fuck! Finding cover behind a stack of shipping pallets, Clint pulled out his .45 and began trading fire with whoever the hell it was. The other soldier he brought with him stayed behind him.

Popping up, Clint fired shots at where he thought the shooter must be. One of his bullets found the target, the rough cry sounding familiar. The sound of retreating steps had Clint sprinting in that direction, trying like hell to see who exactly who the fucker was.

If it wasn’t the rat in their family, and Clint suspected it was, it was one of Barnes men. By the time Clint reached the old rusty warehouse door, whoever had been there was gone.

Clint’s mind spun. Barnes was coming after them tonight. His first responsibility was to get to Steve and let him know they were in a world of shit right now.

His heart had him making a different choice. With shaking, blood-covered hands, Clint pulled out his phone and called Nat.

“Clint?” She still answered the phone quietly, as she had the last several years when no one was supposed to know they were talking. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine, baby,” he assured her. “But we have a very big problem right now and I need you to do something for me.”

“Okay,” she said.

“When I end this call, I’ve got to tell Steve that we’ve been ratted out,” Clint explained quickly. “Barnes knows what we planned and that puts all of us in danger.”

“Oh my, God,” she whispered.

His heart squeezed in his chest. His Nat had been through so much.

“I don’t want you to worry about that,” Clint told her. “I want you to go get your sister-in-law. Right now. Get her out and take her to your mother’s sewing room. I need you to promise me you’ll do this as soon as you get off the phone.”

“Clint, I’m n-not dressed,” she said in a shaking voice. “I’m in pajamas—”

“You’re not going to take the time to get dressed, baby,” Clint said firmly. “You’re going to do what I tell you. Get the two of you in there as fast as you can. Okay? Do this for me?”

A moment passed. Finally, she said, “Yes… I’ll go now.”

“I love you,” he told her. “Always remember I love you so much.”

“I love you,” she said through tears. “Please stay alive. I can’t l-lose you now.”

Clint didn’t know what they were facing. He really didn’t.

“You won’t lose me,” he told her. “Now go. Get to that room and stay there.”

“Clint!” His other man yelled to get his attention as he pocketed his phone. “Incoming. Look like Barnes’ men.”

Taking a deep breath, Clint got ready for whatever was coming. And he had every intention of getting back to Nat.

***

The sound of the key rattling in the doorknob of your room pulled your attention from the book you really weren’t reading. It was a little early for dinner but maybe Dyson had a reason for arriving early. You knew the family had plans tonight. Dangerous plans.

You didn’t expect Nat to scramble into your room like a scared mouse, swallowed by the dark green bathroom she wore over her pajamas. Her eyes were wide, and fear reflected from those depths.

Something was very wrong here.

“Nat?” You rose from the bed, and she dashed over to you, her hands twisting around the old-fashioned ring of keys like nervous birds.

“Clint called me,” she whispered. “H-he said something about us being ratted out and… he wants me to come get you and take you to my mother’s sewing room.”

“What?” You didn’t understand. “Nat, slow down. Is he talking about—”

“Please,” she begged you. “He wouldn’t have told me to do this if things weren’t really, really bad. We have to go.”

You were shaking your head.

Nat was trying to pull you by the arm. “Why are we going to your mother’s sewing room?”

“Please, just come with me,” Nat begged.

“Okay,” you told her. “Just a minute.”

You wore a sweater with jeans, quickly pulling on a pair of ankle boots. You sprinted for the closet, pulling out the cloth bundle that concealed the handgun Dyson left you. Slapping a loaded clip into the 9 mm, you shoved the other clips and boxes of ammo into a tote bag, carrying it out with you as you went back to Nat.

Her green eyes were wide on the gun in your hand. “How do you have that?”

“Dyson,” you told her. “Let’s go.”

Instead of leading you down the stairs to the rest of the house, Nat led you the other way. You passed her bedroom, the other guestrooms. She stopped in front of what you thought was a linen closet. She opened the door, and the neat shelves of bedding and towels confirmed your suspicions. When she pushed a button on the wall, the shelf and the wall behind it moved, sliding away to reveal a small chamber behind it.

A secret room?

Nat pushed another button and the shelf and wall slid back into place, closing the two of you in a darkened room that was about the size of a child’s bedroom. In her defense, there was a small table with a very old sewing machine on top of it sitting off to the side and a dressmaker’s dummy next to it. There were cobwebs everywhere, like no one had been in the room for years. There was a small oval window, filtering sunlight to brighten the room.

“Oh,” Nat said, kneeling by the sewing machine and pulling a box from under it. There was a small oil lamp and a cigarette lighter. Setting it next to the sewing machine, she lit the lamp to brighten up the room around you.

“So, a sewing room?” you asked, tucking the gun in the waistband of your jeans at your lower back.

Nat nodded. “It really was once. I think our grandmother or great-grandmother actually sewed in here.”

“With a secret door?” You smiled.

“That was put in later,” Nat explained. “By my father. I guess something happened when we were kids that got him thinking. He decided we needed a room that no one else knew about in the house to hide. You know, us and Mom. Sometimes whatever illegal thing he wasn’t supposed to have. He was very proud the feds never found it.”

You nodded. That made sense. But you really needed to know what was going on.

“Okay, now that we’re here,” you spoke quietly, “what did Clint say? What’s going on?”

Taking a seat on the padded bench seat by the sewing machine, Nat took a deep breath. You didn’t like the way her hands shook in her lap.

“He just called me and told me that we’d been ratted out,” she told you. “He said Barnes knew our plans and that put us all in danger.”

Shock and fear had you staring at her. Dyson told you that those plans were dangerous to begin with and now Barnes knew them? You’d all been ratted out?

“Wait, he told you to get to the sewing room?” you asked.

“No, he told me to come get you and for us both to come here.”

Things were serious then. Fuck.

“Did Clint tell you anything that was planned?” you asked. “Anything at all?”

Nat shook her head. “I wouldn’t understand if he did. I’m just so afraid… if something happens to him., I don’t know what I’ll do.”

“Try not to worry,” you told her. “Clint’s not going anywhere now that you’re together.”

Her lips quivered like she wanted to smile but was afraid to.

“I hate this,” she said quietly. “I always have. This business they are in. I know it’s how I’ve had a roof over my head and all the nice things I’ve had in life. But it’s so terrifying to know it can all be gone in the blink of an eye. I remember sitting in here with my mother and Steve a couple of times when we were kids. It wasn’t just knowing we were in danger. It was not knowing anything.”

Your parents had been part of that world too. You’d been spared that. Everyone thought you were disfigured, kept off to the side because of it. If you’d ever been in any danger before Steve came into your life, you weren’t aware of it.

Now? You understood it.

“We know some things,” you told her. “Apparently someone ratted us out. I have a pretty good idea of who that is.”

“Who?” she asked.

“It’s Neal,” you told her. “I’m sure of it. I don’t know how or why but it’s him.”

Nat snorted. “For all we know, it’s Bruce.”

“It’s possible,” you told her. “He probably has a hand in it. I mean, we know he has a link to Barnes. Kat and her sister.”

Her green-eyed gaze never left you.

“But, no offense, he’s a lawyer,” you told her. “He might have gone to Barnes when Steve got you out of that house. But what does he really know that would benefit Barnes? He’s not a soldier. Not part of their plans… But Neal?”

Just the thought of the damage the man could do flooded your mind. He would have been part of planning whatever was supposed to happen tonight.

And Neal was flagrantly ambitious and arrogant. The way he conducted himself in your household with everyone but Steve? Especially you. What would have happened with Banner that day if Scott and Yelena hadn’t been there?

Clint was right. Everyone was in danger. Jesus. You had to think.

“Where was Clint when he called you?” you asked.

Nat shook her head. “I don’t know. All I know is that he said he and Scott were ‘running into town’ tonight. And that was when he left this morning.”

You didn’t miss the fear in her tone.

“Did you bring your phone?”  you asked her.

Nat pulled her phone and a charger from the pocket of her robe. You smiled when she handed it to you.

You tried texting Dyson first but got no response. Steve? You weren’t going there. He needed to have his head in the game and think you were safely tucked away.

Luca answered when you texted him, thinking you were Nat. If you could get him up there, to trust you, he might have the information you needed.

Luca: What you need, hon?

“What’s something you’d normally ask for, Nat?”

“Tea,” she told you. “But not for a couple of hours yet.”

Can you bring my tea up early, please? My nerves are bad today, you typed.

Luca: Sure. Give me bout 15 minutes.

Fifteen minutes exactly, Luca came up the stairs with the tray. He’d just reached her bedroom door when you approached him from the other direction. Luca’s dark eyes were wide on you.

“Shit,” he muttered.

You motioned for him to follow you. His expression was a study in reluctance, but he followed you back to the linen closet, waiting for you to open the door to the hidden chamber. Nat stood up when the two of you walked back in.

“What’s this?” Luca asked, handing the tray to Nat and focusing on her.

“Nat just did what Clint asked her to,” you told him. “He called Nat and told her to come get me and for us to come here. He said we’ve been ratted out.”

Luca scrubbed a hand over his lower face, concern bleeding into his expression. “Seriously?”

You nodded. “We don’t know where Clint is. Dyson wouldn’t answer me.”

Luca’s gaze on you was a wild mix of uncertainty and dread. You understood the position he was in.

“I’m not sure where Clint is,” Luca told you. “Dyson? Here in a while, he’s supposed to be meeting Neal. Something to do with Hansen.”

Your anxiety was consumed by fear then. “What? Oh, my God. Luca…” You took a deep breath, trying not to let fear get the better of you. “Luca, if Clint’s right and we’ve been betrayed, and I believe him, who do you think the rat is?”

“Just because you don’t like Neal doesn’t make him a rat,” Luca said calmly.

“I wasn’t there for tonight’s planning session,” you said. “But I’m guessing you were. If we’ve been ratted out, it had to be someone in that room. I know it’s not you or Dyson. I know it’s not Clint. Who else was there?”

“Scott and Neal,” he said.

“Do you really think Scott would do that?”

“Fuck,” Luca muttered, his answer telling you he didn’t believe any more than you did.

“Wait, where’s Steve?” you asked in a panic.

“Locked away in his study with the new consigliere.”

Nat set the tray with the tea on the floor at her feet, riveted to the conversation.

“He just got a new lawyer.” You shook your head. “Do you know him? Could he be a problem?”

“Nah, Murdock’s good people,” Luca told you. “Besides that, he’s blind so…”

If Luca didn’t suspect anything there, you’d trust his judgment.

“Where’s Scott?” you asked. Any of Steve’s trusted circle could be in danger right now or worse.

“Scott and Clint are supposed to be heading this way in the next couple of hours,” he said. “To meet with Steve about their part in this.”

“From the way he sounded, I don’t know if Clint will be there,” Nat whispered.

Steve and Luca were safe. You didn’t know where Clint and Scott were. And Dyson?

“We have to find Dyson and Clint,” you told him before turning your attention to Nat. “Clint called you first, to tell you there was trouble. If Steve’s down there meeting with his lawyer, Clint didn’t get in touch with him which means he’s in trouble.”

Nat’s face crumbled and you hugged her, eased her back down onto the padded bench.

You and Luca both tried Dyson and Clint, you on Nat’s phone. That he wasn’t answering Nat had your fear escalating.

When Luca’s phone rang, he answered immediately. “Scott? Hey, where are you?”

You couldn’t make out what Scott was saying. Luca nodded, mouthing “he’s fine.”

“Do you know where Dyson or Barton is?” Luca asked him, shaking his head.

“S’alright. I need you to get over here,” Luca told him. “Now.”

Luca ended the call, looking from Nat to you. “Scott don’t know where anyone is… Listen. You two need to stay right here, okay? I got to get to the boss and let him know we have a situation. We gotta find Dyson and Clint right fucking now.”

Nat buried her face in her hands, crying. You met his gaze squarely, nodding. Luca had trusted the two of you on what you knew. You were grateful.

“Stay in touch with me,” you told him.

“Will do,” Luca said, making his way out of the sewing room.

There was one more call you had to make. You knew Yelena’s number by heart. You didn’t know if she would recognize Nat’s number or if she’d answer, even if she did.

On the fifth tone, someone answered. “Natasha?” Yelena’s accented voice whispered.

“No, it’s me,” you said.

“You’re already out?” There was a pause then. “I’m so sorry about—”

“I am so sorry about what happened,” she said in a rush. “I’m so sorry—”

“You have nothing to be sorry for,” you cut her off. “But we’ll talk about that later. Are you safe? Dyson said you were safe and with friends.”

“I’m safe,” she told you. You could hear the smile in her voice. “I promise.”

“Do you have any idea where he is right now?” you asked.

“Dyson? No,” she said. “Why? Is something wrong?”

You heard the same fear you felt in her words. “Yes, and we don’t know where he is. Or Clint.”

“Clint?” Yelena asked. “I talked to him earlier. I gave him some intel on where he could find Banner.”

Oh, shit.

“Can you give me the location?” You needed it. “He might be in trouble.” You told her how he called Nat and what he’d said.

“Where is Neal?” Yelena asked.

“Not sure, but I’m told his part of the plan was to go with Dyson to see Hansen,” you explained.

“Neal is the traitor,” she said gravely.

“I know. And we can’t let him kill Dyson.”

“We won’t,” she assured you. “Does Steve know?”

You had to laugh at that. “He soon will. Luca’s going to talk to him.”

“Let me know the second you get any leads on Dyson,” she told you. “We will go find Clint.”

You didn’t know who we were. But you trusted her.

“Thank you.”

“Stay where you are,” she told you. “With Nat. For now.”

You couldn’t promise her that, but you also didn’t want to mess with her head.

“I will,” you said. “Please be careful.”

***

Yelena ended the call, walking back into the living room of the little cabin where Dyson had stashed her for safety. Dyson’s friends, who needed a place to lay low from some trouble they found themselves in, were scattered across the room.

Clay and Aisha were watching something on the History Channel, drinking beer and eating popcorn. Pooch and Cougar were still playing cards. Only Jensen looked up from his laptop to see her return.

“What’s up?” Jensen asked.

“Dyson maybe in trouble,” she told them.

And that was all she needed to say. Now that she had everyone’s attention, she filled them in on the details. Like her, there wasn’t a lot they wouldn’t do for their mutual friend.

Clay was a strategist and didn’t take him long to come up with a plan of action.

“Three of us are going to the location where we sent Barton,” he said. “Three of us are going to Hansen’s place.”

She didn’t miss the distaste in his voice when he said the name Hansen. She wasn’t the only one the bastard had fucked with over the years.

“Yelena, you take Pooch and Cougar and find Barton,” Clay said. “I’ll—”

“No,” Yelena cut him off. “I’m going to Hansen’s.”

Aisha and Clay exchanged a worried glance. “You sure about this?” Clay asked her.

Yelena nodded. After everything Dyson had done for her, for all of them, she wanted to be there to protect him if she could. If anything happened to him, it would devastate her.

It would devastate her boss. And Yelena had no intention of having to tell Mrs. Rogers that anything happened to Dyson on her watch.

Clay nodded. “Aisha, take Pooch and Cougar and go find Barton. Yelena, you and Jensen are with me.”

PS: Just on my fic posts, I’m adding a tip function. In honor of the kitty we just lost in February, I’m donating everything to our local animal shelter. Tips are not, will never be, and have never been expected. But if you feel so inclined, thank you. 🙏

@valsworldofcreativity @21stcenturywitchcraft @coconutqueen21 @buckybarnesplumwhore @bval-1 @caffiend-queen @candy-and-writing @capsicle-shield @chaoticfiretaconerd @chrisevansgirl @chris-evans-indian-fanfic @coldmuffinbanditshoe @daughterofthenight117 @hv-chw3 @iheartsebastianstanstuff @imanuglywombat @just-one-ordinary-fangirl @justrae9903 @lok1sgrl @lokislastlove @mariaenchanted @marvelouspottering @maxwelllee2020 @nannies-dont-date @nekoannie-chan @nerdwholikesword @notyourtypicalrose @optimistic-dinosaur-nacho @peaceinourtime82 @rainbowkisses31 @rayofdawnworld @richonne4life @rissysthoughts-blog @saiyanprincessswanie @scarletsoldier21-blog @shygirl-000 @supernaturaldean677 @sweater-daddiesdumbdork @team-iron-wannabe-man @titty-teetee @tonib666 @villanellevi @vitamingummies @weebid @what-is-your-plan-today @what-is-your-wish @xoxabs88xox @rosalynshields @naturalthrone22 @marvelovernfan @gotnofucks @nekoannie-chan @capicheleo20 @eralen @helenasmirkedno @samwinter09 @kawairinrin @tinystudentfirepurse @bluemusickid @inlovewiththefictionalcharacters @geminievans1 @daughterofthenight117 @sunmoonandbucky @dwights-new-plague @akkinda10 @aubageddon91 @sunflowerstony @jennisahoe @kalesrebellion @candy3002 @tardis-23 @wish-i-was-a-mermaid @cynic-spirit @angstsfordays @tamashigirl @akkinda10 @laurenreadsfics @buckysteveloki-me @justlifethingsx @dancer3205 @shtposting101 @iloveshawnieboi @denisemarieangelina @moonlacebeam @btitannaaaaa @pastathighs @pinkzsugar @lunamyangel @siriusjohnpotter @bababasti @priii @retrxbarnes @norababora @savinasavers @holl2712 @4charmed @janelongxox @jeremyrennerfanxxxx123 @sarcasmoverlordxo @iridescentwafflesauce @ajbunky @dontbescaredtosingalong @candy3002 @joossieisdabomb icrytomuch @buckybuckobucky @nonsensicalobsessions @Bebop282 @onceuponahuntersrealm @crashbarbie @valsworldofcreativity @sunflower-writings @siriusjohnpotter @naelovescandy @rootcrop @traceyaudette @dre6ming @ajdjshei @saraaras17 @broadwaybabe18 @pbeckn26 @ughdontbeboring @terry2227 @beyoutiful9413 @winesex @eclipsxntice @missaprilt23 @Tardisin221bst @Sunflowersoldat @sanfransolomitatm @angrykitsune01 @jesgisborne @lilac-monster @samxira @steverogersismycrush @prettywhenicry4 @lalaooopsie @kboogie98 @captainkimmy87 @lowkeysebby @liecastillo @saranghaey @traceyaudette@ ktrivia @@wintasssoldier @andydrysdalerogers @patzammit

@rosedpetal @sincerelytlh @wolfieeebbbyyy @stories-by-hails

[femslashfeb]

HELLO ALL

TLDR

No reblogging from the blog this year - posting prompts tomorrow the 31st

For the past few years I've very much struggled with reblogging everyone's activity in the tag. So this year I will not be doing so.

(OR maybe I will? I just don't want to commit)

Even if I knew how to make a bot that reblogs - a lot of people still use the unique tag to tag outside challenges. So I've always had to hand submit. However it became too stressful for me and for the past few years I ended up avoiding it until later weeks or even months.

If you noticed I didn't finish reblogging last year so- I've just given up on that.

Honestly I've struggled a lot with depression for the last 7 years or so. It's been harder and harder to find my way back to tumblr. It doesn't help that my phone can barely handle the amount of apps it already has.

My main account @puff-pink hardly ever updates because of my big sad. And I don't know if I'll ever get back on the horse in the same way I did before.

Some of you know me as an artist, and tho I still churn out subpar art for my day-job I've struggled a lot to make art for myself during my depression. Partially because one year I overworked my hand - and still deal in continual wrist aches. Even the weeks I don't pick up a drawing tool.

I intended this challenge for myself and maybe the small fandoms I was in at the time. But it took off among writers and creators of all types across all fandoms.

One year I even tried to tally the most popular fandoms but there were honestly too many to keep track of- and I stopped after the first three pages of submissions.

I don't claim to have invented the concept of FemSlash February. Before I started the prompts I swear I had heard the phrase somewhere. Tho not sure where. Perhaps it had been amongst my friends on Skype. Back when I had online friends and Skype(I'm still not sold on Discord🤷‍♀️).

However that January I thought it would be fun to partake in a challenge of some kind. But scouring tumblr and the general internet. I could only find half hearted efforts on fanfiction sites from years past.

I'm so proud of all my Sapphic creators on here that have partaken every year. Even if I've never shown favoritism or awarded anyone. I do notice those that actually complete the challenge AND those that keep coming back each year(looking at you H20 writer(I don't remember your username but there's a mermaid writer that's a writing machine)). I truly am proud of you especially in my shriveled state of creativity. Thank you for your efforts. For your hype. And for your love of women of all kinds across all the universes.

Each year I'm surprised to find even more categories I never thought to include. From mood boards, to doll photography, to ofc the classic art and writing. May your pencils forever be in union with your sister mediums.

On that note. There is a strict NO AI GENERATED ART or writing this year.

Not that I could physically stop anyone who does use AI. But I do not want that sort of thing associated with this challenge. It's become scarily good in 2023 to the point it can't always be identified. So I simply ask for the honor system when it comes to AI generated creations.

That being said. If you've made it to the end of this post:

Prompts will be posted tomorrow.

I usually prefer to give yall more of a buffer, but I've been busy. Both with Big Sad, rescuing some feral cats, my own life, errands, chores and work.

If you're still here- here is a preview of the first three days.

FEB 1 - black

FEB 2 - spring

FEB 3 - cake

The 14th as usual will be some sort of Valentine romance type theme(haven't decided specifically yet) and as always there will be a Rest Day.

Expect some repeat prompts. In the past I tried to avoid them but idc anymore.

It's also a Leap Year this year so expect one extra prompt to throw off the symmetry of what's normally 28 days.

Thanks for coming back this year. And thank you to those that still check on this blog.

❤️🧡🤍💜🩷

Keep loving girls

-PuffPink

#femslashfeb #femslash february #femslashfeb2024 #lesbian

[iwtvfanevents]

Saint Louis of the Vieux Carré —an LDPDL fan event

A month-long creative challenge to celebrate Louis's 146th birthday, this October 4th. Starting October 1st and through the whole month, we'll be celebrating AMC IWTV's Louis de Pointe du Lac, who turns 146 this year! 

Starting October 1st, you’ll be able to see the fan creations shared as part of the event in the tag, here »

31 prompts

day 1. humanity | human life

day 2. crossover

day 3. confession | penance

day 4. through the decades

day 5. hunger | feeding habits

day 6. canon divergence

day 7. memory | keepsake

day 8. fashion

day 9. epistolary | handwritten

day 10. missing scene

day 11. literature | intertext

day 12. intoxication

day 13. floral | the last bouquet

day 14. dubai

day 15. love | lust

day 16. parenthood

day 17. canvas | visual arts

day 18. storytelling

day 19. marriage | relationships

day 20. new orleans

day 21. performance | gender

day 22. family

day 23. fairy tales | monsters

day 24. photography

day 25. faith | purpose

day 26. alternative universe

day 27. grief | ghosts

day 28. paris

day 29. childhood | innocence

day 30. music

day 31. halloween | haunted houses

How does this event work?

Every day of the month has an assigned prompt. The real challenge is to try and create something new for each day and each prompt.

But, of course, that is an ambitious goal! There are easier options.

If you...

create only one thing, or two, or three

only create something for two or three of these prompts

create something for a prompt but post it a few days later

don’t follow the prompts at all

...you’re still participating —as long as your creation is about Louis de Pointe du Lac, as portrayed by Jacob Anderson. 

And Louis's character exists in relation with others, of course! So your contribution could be a portrait of the entire du Lac family, a playlist about one of his romantic relationships, a comic about his relationship with Claudia from her point of view, etc.

If Louis is at the heart of your creation, then your piece is in the spirit of this event.

This challenge isn’t limited to fanfiction or fanart!

Your contributions as a fan don’t have to be restricted to the most usual mediums. Beyond fanfic and fanart, some things that you may decide to create include: fanmixes, moodboards, gifsets, photomanips and graphics; fanedits and AMVs; meta and analysis in written, audio or video form; poetry, music, a blog post about your headcanons, your meta, or your favorite fanworks; and anything else you can think of. 

Your creations can be related to your own or others’ existing work as well —if, for example, you want to use one of the prompts to add to an existing fanfiction series, or as inspiration for fanart of your favorite fic, that’s totally within the scope of this challenge! 

You can start working on your creations for this challenge with as much (or as little) anticipation as you like, but remember to hold off from sharing them until the event starts. And, if you are taking inspiration from a prompt, we encourage you to share your work on that day.

Reblog or repost this text and graphic to spread the love; and don't forget to tag your posts with #IWTVfanevents or tag @iwtvfanevents so we can share them on the blog, and add them to the collection on AO3: Happy birthday LDPDL!

#louis de pointe du lac #interview with the vampire #amc interview with the vampire #AMC IWTV #IWTV AMC #IWTV #st. louis of the vieux carré #IWTVfanevents

[pascalslvt]

Tangled Alliances

Summary: When faced with sickness in your community in an already post-apocalyptic world, it is up to the strained professional partnership of you and Joel Miller to embark in a perilous and difficult journey in order to retrieve life-saving medicine. With your destinies intertwined, shrouded in tension, you confront the unforgiving challenges of your environment together, gradually forming an unexpected bond. Will that be enough?

Pairing: Joel Miller x fem!Reader, f/m

rating: 18+, minors dni

series warnings:, pre!ellie, during outbreak, set in TLOU 2022, age gap (28 & 52), swearing, mentions of violence, also actual violence, mentions of sickness, heavy angst...., fluff, trial & tribulations, severe weather, a lot of fucking animosity and hostility, enemies to lovers ???, infected people, tension...TENSION!!!, bickering, copious amounts of alcohol, inebriation, y'all don't get along...but y'all also have to, smut!!!!...a semi-slow burn, anxiety, exhaustion, NO USE OF Y/N.

chapter warnings: Mentions of backstory (involving the death of readers parents), bickering, bad langauge, tess is mother, mentions of sickness and death, aclohol, sharing a tent (wink wink), cheeky morning wood, just a sprinkle of smut if you squint its not really smutty but not completley clean, bad luck ??, tension. lots of it, intrusive improper thoughts.

word count ≈ 8,3k Estimated reading time: 37 minutes, 4 seconds (225 wpm)

a/n: This is the first part of a series i am writing!! I haven't actually written fanfiction since i was like...15, so be very very kind and gentle and patient with me because i am literally just a girl.....i have dusted off the cobwebs & busted my writing out of its retirement to create a story to quench my current joel miller obession. This storyline is actually inspired by a dream i recently had and i am very excited to reeeeally get into the series as i have a lot of plans that i cannot share with you right now.... also sorry if the tags are wierd i gennuinely have no idea what the fuck to write. Part two will come pretty shortly (don't get used to it) because after i awoke from the dream i literally wrote almost 20k words in one sitting so im splitting it up and giving this one some time to see if people are even interested in reading more...please enjoy!!!!!!

Part One: Hostile Beginnings

You were nearly seven years old when the outbreak started. To you, the world crumbled before your feet in what seemed like an instant - shattering the very ground on which you stood. One day after school, you saw your own mother's jugular be ripped straight out of her neck from the mouth of your neighbor, an old and fragile woman who used to babysit you from time to time. Before running away in fear, you saw your mother bleed out, right there on the lawn you used to play in. You never saw your father that day, and neither did you ever again. You always accepted that your father's fate was that he most likely died in that little cubicle he worked in. Or that he now spends the rest of his life infected. Whichever the case, it doesn’t really matter to you, you don’t think about him anymore. 

You got away with your life by the skin of your teeth that day. That little girl ran until her tiny legs could carry her no more. Your English teacher, Theresa, had found you in a ditch, sobbing. You had been wearing the same outfit you did that day in class, a purple shirt with a flower on it, along with some blue pants. Theresa didn't have the heart to leave the little girl behind, so she took you under her wing.

Throughout the years, Therese - or ‘Tess’ as you liked to call her - taught you how to survive this very unfortunate world disaster. While you were still young, she taught you to crawl into small holes to retrieve food or water, and to hide whenever you felt something was wrong. She taught you to trust your instincts. She taught you to be resilient. Resourceful. In later years, you were taught to use a gun, to mend knifes, to defend yourself - how to navigate this apocalypse safely. 

When you got older, Tess made use of you in her line of work. Smuggling. And you were good  

This is how you got to know the man named Joel Miller. A cynical, gruff man of very few words. But, he always got the job done. You and Joel didn’t interact much. Now that you think about it, you hadn’t met him more than.. what? 5 times before today? even less so had you spoken with him. Tess didn’t want you to work alongside Joel as she believed his methods could sometimes be…taking unnecessary risks. He could sometimes be reckless. And you were not a risk she was willing to take. Not yet.

Ever since finding that shattered little girl all those years ago, Tess always felt an unwavering, deep sense of responsibility to keep you safe. She owed it to you, and she owed it to your parents. You were now a full-grown woman, 28 years old - and Tess knew you had a strong head on her shoulders. With the years, the fierce overprotective nature gradually softened. She gradually unfolded her wings of trust, and sent you out on more and more jobs. But, it wasn’t until recently that she felt comfortable enough to let you work with Joel. Nothing big, none spanning more than a day or three. To her dismay (but yet also relief), the two of you ended up ultimately proving to be an incredibly efficient team. However, the two of you could not get along even if your very life depended on it. 

It was a silent alliance. It had to be. Otherwise, you’d end up getting on each other's nerves and damn near kill one another. Joel always made it incredibly clear that you weren’t friends - he wasn’t there for pleasantries, he was there to finish a job. Not that you objected. The less condescending shit you had to hear him say, the better. You didn’t care much, either way. You were a professional - after all, you had done this since you were a child. This was your reality. You never had much choice.

Lately, a lot of people in your community have fallen very, very sick. It is some sort of pulmonary bacterial infection that starts off with a fever, and will leave you coughing up blood a couple of months later. A slow killer, but a killer nonetheless. Some of the older folk have already started dying.

“No, absolutely not, Valerie” you heard Tess’s voice come from downstairs. You just happened to walk past to hear it. “It’s way too risky”. These words piqued your interest. “She is our best option, and you damn well know that” Valerie, a woman you live and work with says, a stern undertone in her voice. You slowly walks towards them, walking down the stairs without making a creak, eavesdropping.

“This would take months to complete..” Tess sighs, adding in, “We don’t even know if we have that kind of time, folk’ are already dyin’. We don't even have no idea how heavily surveilled it is”

“Do we have a choice? We’ll run out of our own supply within a month if we’re lucky. They will all die” 

Tess is quiet, you could almost hear her thinking if you listened hard enough. You enter the room, “What’s going on?” you ask 

Tess stands still and shares a look with Valerie before looking at you, sighing and crossing her arms. “We have received intel that there is a massive supply of vital medical equipment as well as medication, medication that we need. It’s In a settlement controlled by some sort of… faction. They call themselves the ‘reclaimers’. Nasty bunch. We need the medication, and well.. If our sources are correct, which they haven't failed us before, it’d be enough to not only cure the folk round here; but we could also sell for an enormous profit. We could make a lot of money. Maybe buy a new truck. Supplies. Guns….”

“I’m in.” you say, without hesitation, cutting her off. Tess shakes her head, she opens her mouth to speak, but you interrupt her before she can “I can manage myself, you made sure of that.”

Valerie looks at Tess with a ‘I told you so’ look. “You’d have to walk for, probably, months on end just to get there and back. They’re west, somewhere in Montana, located deep into the forest. You have never been on a mission that lengthy, and it's fucking cold as shit - and it's only going to get worse” 

“What’s our other option here? Let people die?” you ask, and pause. They stay silent. “I wouldn’t accept if I didn’t know I was capable of handling something like this, Tess….”

You look at each other for a long time. She knits her eyebrows together, somberly, and shakes her head. She doesn't know if she can let you do anything like this. Not because she doubts your ability - rather, she cannot get herself to put you in that type of danger.

“You heard the woman…” Valerie says smugly. 

“Fine”. Tess says, slightly annoyed and probably feeling very protective. “I need to stay here and take care of some things, keep track of the radio and such.. Valerie needs to tend to the people here. It…It would be you and Joel.” 

This takes you slightly aback. On one hand, even though Tess might think his methods are unconventional - she trusts him, and you trust her. Besides, you have worked professionally very well before and always get the job done. But on the other hand…it’s Joel fucking Miller. 

“Months on a job with Joel Miller? Fuck me…” You scoff. Tess’s lips curl into a slight smile evidently trying to hold back her laughter. She knows the kind of disdain you feel for him. 

“There’s no one else I’d trust to send you away with on a mission like this. Except for me, of course” Tess says, leaning against a wall. “Are you still in, even if it’s him?” “Well.. i don’t really have a choice now, do i?” you say, and they chuckle. “When would we leave?”

Tess pauses. “You’d have to leave tomorrow” she studies your demeanor, waiting for you to opt out. Hoping in a sick, twisted way that you would - since that would mean that you’d be safe. You don’t hesitate. “He doesn’t know…yet. But, I know him. He would not turn this job down. Besides, he owes us too much, he can’t” 

You nod. “Well…he’ll probably be as pleased with working with me as I am with him” you say, rolling your eyes. 

“It’s about time the two of you get over that little feud of yours” Valerie interjects, you send her a warning look 

“Ain’t my fault he’s fucking unbearable” You point at her, gesticulating your annoyance already brewing by the mere thought of him. She shrugs. 

“I’ll call him on the radio - let him know.” Tess says. 

--

“With her?!” You hear Joel’s voice boom down from the hallway, annoyance evident on his voice. ‘yup. i was right’ You think to yourself, chuckling as you’re eavesdropping from the other room. They start start walking towards the kitchen, where you are stood. When he sees you, he nearly rolls his eyes, stopping in his tracks. “Well. Looks like we’ll be partners.”

You smile tight-lipped, nodding and holding back an eye roll of your own - trying your best to be civil. “Seems that way”

“We leave at 8. ‘Expect you to be ready by 7 forty-five” He commands. You nod at his instructions. ‘One minute of a partnership, and he has already taken the leading role. Fucking jackass.’ you think to yourself. “Better get some rest”

“Yeah, no kidding…” You mumble to yourself, sneering. He gives you a warning look. One that says ‘don’t start’.

Knowing there’s no point in furthering this conversation as tensions are already high, and you have months to argue with him, you turn to walk “I’ll go pack then” You announce, turning around.

“And try not to piss me off” Joel says loudly as you walk away. You just hold up your middle finger and leave the room. “Real mature!” He scoffs as he looks at Tess with a look that says ‘can you believe her?’, she just shrugs. 

That night you packed all that you would need - supplies, food, weapons, a tent…the everyday outing must haves in the midst of an active apocalypse, also…for the cold. Of course, you are not a total stranger to it, living here in Boston, but you also know that the cold here won't compare to the temperatures you are about to face - as you know walking through the north of the US in late autumn, early winter will not be an easy feat - and in a little tent, at that. It was estimated you would be gone for about a couple of months, at least - which is by far the longest job you’d ever been on. But, it was essential. 

That morning you wake up particularly early, to make it a point not to be late. Wouldn’t want to give Joel the satisfaction of berating you. You can already feel yourself wanting to spite him. Tess helped you carry your things down, not that you needed help, rather she felt bad for sending you to do something like this. Capable or not, she had a …. Somewhat motherly instinct for you. She also gave you the map with the places you’re headed, where you’re meeting the informants, where the safehouses are located and so on - and gave you the same rundown as she did for Joel, keeping the both of you informed. You are now stood in the kitchen, with your things in your arms. She paused and looked at you, having trouble finding the words, feeling herself getting choked up by the reality of the situation. Before you can diffuse the fears you see swirling in her head, she holds you tight. “You be real careful of yourself, got it?” 

“Yes m’am.” You say, voice slightly strained by the suffocating tight hold she has around you. She lets go of you, and cups one side of your face with her hand, and smiles with glassy eyes. She shakes her head as she takes a step back, as if to snap out of the sentimentality. 

“Now go and get that medicine.” she nods, trying to sound emotionless and strong. You nod and turn to walk out the building. “Oh, and… give him a tough time. Joel, I mean” She laughs

“You know I will” You wink, as you finally leave the house. Tess stands there with an awful feeling inside the deepest parts of her. She was meant to be the one to protect you, and here she is; sending you off to a mission where she doesn’t even know the magnitude of the threat it poses to your life. But, it’s too late now. Way too many people are depending on you. 

You continue walking out, as you lean against the truck parked outside. You’re not going to drive far with it, only 10-12 hours or so. They wanted to transport it somewhere else to sell (since the ongoing surge of illness has eaten away at your community fund), and since it was on the way Tess figured it would not hurt to cut down the length of the trip just a little bit. You stand there for a while, until you check your clock: ‘7:46am’. You snigger by yourself. Without noticing, Joel was walking towards you, gear in hand

“Right in time, for once” He mumbles. 

“You’re the one who is late, Joel” You correctly point out. 

“It’s one minute, stop yappin’” He says, walking over to the truck, throwing his stuff into it and getting into the driver's seat, slamming the door. What a cheerful man. 

You throw your bag into the car “I don’t understand why you’re the one driving” you mutter, getting into the passenger seat

“You know exactly why. Now shut it before I rip off ‘ya jaw and shove it up ‘ya ass.” He says, matter-of-factly, putting the keys in the ignition, turning it and starting the engine, looking forward. 

“Ooh, very kinky, Joel” You say sarcastically, taunting him.

He puts his foot on the clutch, as he shifts the gear. “Keep talkin', and I'll leave ya here.” he says and starts driving. 

“If only I’d be so lucky…” You mutter silently, watching out of the window as he pulls out on the narrow road through the tall buildings, keeping away from the major roads as they are heavily used by FEDRA.

“I heard that” He said, pointing at his ear, eyes on the road. 

“I’m glad your hearing is working, old man. Gives us a bigger chance of survival” you chuckle

“Old man?” He asks, insulted by what you said. “I'll show ya old man if you don't shut the hell up.” 

You roll your eyes, and decide to sit this one out. You know it’s not worth bickering, as you have a long, long road ahead of the two of you. “That’s better” He said after a little while of silence. You roll your eyes once again, deciding with all your will and might not to respond with a snippy comment, as you didn’t want to give him the satisfaction of giving him the reaction he so obviously is searching for.

You two drive for hours and hours without saying a word, sitting in the thick tension that is between the two of you. It wasn’t necessarily a comfortable silence, rather a silence that comfortably didn’t mean you had to talk to him. After 7 hours, you can start seeing the shift in the sky, the colors indicating the impending sunset that's occurring. 

“Maybe we should find somewhere to find shelter? Suns going down. “ You point out.

“I could work that out myself, thanks” He mutters. “We've still got a few hours left of daylight. Push on.”

“So I’m guessing your plan is that we sleep in the car?” You question, looking at him. He doesn’t leave his eyes from the road. 

“Yup.” he says. Well, you couldn’t think of any better plan, to be fair. A truck is not a bad place to sleep given the alternative. 

After about an hour or so, the car starts suddenly sputtering. “What the fuck?” Joel mumbles, as he quickly checks around the dashboard to see if there’s any indication as to what’s going on. You look over at him, quizzically. “Fuck!!” He shouts, hitting the steering wheel so hard that it honks, as the car comes to a halt. “That’s just…that’s just fucking great” He says, trying to restart the engine - to no avail. 

“So much for your plan on ‘pushing on’” you said, looking out at the quickly darkening sky, mocking him. He looks annoyed at you, as he gets out of the car, to check the hood. When he does, a light amount of smoke seeps out. 

Well, that sucks. But, you try to remind yourself that this truck was always going to be a temporary luxury, and you got 8 hours into the 12-hour trip. Oh well, more time with… Joel.. Sigh..

“Engines out” He grumbles, waving the smoke away from his face as he closes the hood again, standing and watching hopelessly at the car with one hand on his hip. “We’re not too far from the trucks drop off spot, guess we’ll have to walk the rest of the way.”

“So we just leave it here?” You ask

“Got a better idea? We’re in the middle of nowhere, nobody gonna steal it.” He answers. 

“It’s your head, miller…” You mutter. He chooses not to answer to your snark.   

“I say we still sleep in the car. It’s better than a tent.” 

You nod in agreement “In the middle of the road?” You ask, looking at an already annoyed Joel. He grimaces, whilst he mocks what you just said

“No, you idiot, we’ll have to push it” he stated, looking around the road to see a good spot, and ended up pointing at a spot by some trees a couple meters from the road. “And it ain't an easy feat. Let’s see if you got the strength to push a two tonne vehicle, little miss” 

You shrug. How bad can it be? Joel gets in the car and makes sure its gear is in neutral, as the both of you stand at the back of the car, starting to push. It takes some time, and Joel was right that it was, indeed, not an easy task. By the time you got the car by the trees you’re both catching your breath, Joel sweating profusely

“That wasn’t so hard, was it?” You say between breaths, holding your hands on your hips. He’s bent over in exhaustion. 

“Oh bite me” He hisses. You try not to laugh. “We’ll have to leave it here, try to radio Tess somewhere along the way, so they can pick it up - at least before someone steals it” 

You nod. It’s gotten dark, it’s time to sleep. So, you climb into the truck and start leaning back your seat to get as comfortable as you can. Joel does the same.

“So…” You say, breaking out the map. “We’ll have to recalibrate… it’ll be…what I'm guessing… 2 to 3 weeks to walk to our first meetup spot with the informants.” I sigh, already tired. 

Joel nods. “I'll carry ya if ya get tired” He teases, looking over at you as he lays back in his seat.

“Right back at you princess” You answer without a beat, changing the pins in the map, folding it back and lying on your side, away from Joel. He smirks at your answer. 

“Y’sure got a mouth on you” He says.

You roll your eyes as you close your eyes “night”, you mumble, ready to sleep. 

“G'night” he lies back on the seat and put his hat over his face before falling asleep.

--

The morning after, you wake up in a stir. The car was very cold, and the sun was just rising. You look around, and find that Joel is not in the car. You blink the sleep out of your eyes, and realize he’s popped the hood to check if there's any way to salvage this car. He sees you move around your head and peaks on the side of the hood

“g’morning, darlin’” he smirks. Is he more annoying than usual or is it because you just woke up? You can't decide. You furrow your eyebrows. He chuckles to himself at how displeased you seem to be awake. You were, after all, never a morning person. “We gotta get movin’”

“Yeah, yeah..” You mumble, getting out of the car to stretch and go to the backseat to collect all your things. Sleep still in your system, the two of you start walking along the road. After a while, you opt to walking through some hills, as Joel got more and more paranoid of meeting someone on the road. You walked for what must have been…14 hours, only taking a small break to eat something small that Tess had packed, sitting on two different places and not exchanging any words. The sun started setting, the sky turning an orange tinge.

“We better find shelter..come on” He said, looking around and seemingly found a spot not too far away - yet secluded enough to sleep for tonight. He increased his walking pace in a determined manner. You follow along not too far behind. Suddenly he stops dead in his steps. 

“Jesus fucking Christ” He whispered to himself, anger and frustration very, very evident in his voice

“What?” You ask, eyeing him a bit worried about his reaction.

“God fucking damn it” He whispers to himself “Dammit - I forgot my tent. We'll have ta sleep in the open. Hope you ain't afraid of the dark…” 

“Speak for yourself. I brought mine. I ain’t sharing.” You say, resuming your steps. 

“You're a real treat to travel with you know that.” He says, looking at you stood still, frozen by his own frustration as he is kicking himself for forgetting that damn bag.  

“I bet I am!” you yell, as you have managed to walk a bit further along than he has. He sulks as he continues walking. 

You both decide on a safe spot to make a shelter. Joel and you start instinctively preparing to make a fire and collecting anything that will burn. To his dismay, a light downpour of snowflakes suddenly fall from the sky. You look up and laugh at the sheer irony of the situation, the frustration of the day just piling onto Joel. And it’s only the first day at that. “Ain’t that a bitch, huh, Miller?” 

“Gotta be fucking kidding me” He groans. “That’s just great” 

The two of you start a fire, and put two cans of soup on it for dinner. He is sitting against a rock, drinking whiskey, looking as happy as you could in his situation (spoiler alert, he is sulking). You are putting up your tent, which you dutifully brought (unlike Joel) and you pause as you catch a glimpse of the sad man who seems to be very stressed with the current predicament he has found himself in. He is visibly freezing his ass off. You feel strangely bad. He can't sleep in this cold…

“Look, miller” you pause, he looks at you. “You’re going to die in this cold. Let’s just share tents. Ain’t nun weird.”

He scoffs, and looks back at the fire, taking a sip of the whiskey “I'm good”  

You sigh. “Stop being such a fucking Stoic and get over yourself. If you share your whiskey, I’ll share my tent” you say. Maybe by making a deal out of it, it’ll be easier for him to accept your help, you thought. 

He thinks for a while. He weighs out his options, as if there is not only one he can realistically go with - which is to accept your help. “Fine. Half-and-half?”

You nod, somewhat happy that he accepted, yet less happy of the reality - which was that you have to share a tent tonight. “Half and half” You repeat, nodding. You walk towards him and sit next to him. 

He gets another cup from his bag and fills it with his cheap, illegally brewed scotch, and passes it to you. “That’ll warm us up nicely” He said. It tastes like piss and firewood.

“Aye” You say. “How did you manage to remember bringing your whiskey, and not your tent?” You ask, with a slight hint of laughter to your voice. 

He huffed. “Priorities” He smirked, turning to you. 

“Well. I hope you have brought enough to maintain your end of the deal” you say, taking a sip. He silently lifts his bag, emitting a number of clinking noises, entailing he has probably got enough to last him weeks. Maybe a week now that you are involved. 

“Seems like an unnecessarily heavy weight to carry” you remark, taking a sip of the strong liquid. 

He stays silent for a while. “You’ll understand it soon enough” is all he says. Not knowing what he meant, neither caring all too much, you shrug and kept drinking aside each other in the dark silence. You eat the soup when it’s done, too. You pulled your legs to your chest to maintain more warmth, as it feels as though its getting colder by the minute, a few stray snowflakes falling onto the ground and quickly melting away. 

“Didn’t think you were so damn sensitive to the cold” he suddenly said.

“M’not, it’s fucking freezing” you say, breathing out. 

“Don't think I don’t see you shivering, princess” he says, with a sly smirk on his mouth

“Right back at you, princess” You say, mocking the way he said it to you. “Don’t fucking call me that ever fucking again, by the way”

“Someone’s a tad touchy, ain’t they?” He laughs, taking a swig from his whiskey

“Shut up, Miller” 

“Why? M’igetting on your nerves?” he asks, sarcasm swelling in his voice.

“Always have been” You quickly retort. 

“I’d say it’s mutual” 

You nod, as you kept drinking. The whiskey has become a lubrication for the regular anguish you’ve felt in the presence of Joel. Now you felt no more than subtly irritated. The drunker you got, the happier you were of the deal you did with him. You kept drinking in silence, until you’ve drained about a quarter of the bottle - which might seem like a little, unless you calculate the amount of food you’ve ingested compared to the whiskey you’ve drank. Your cup is, once again, empty - and you guide the cup towards Joel, who dutifully fills it with more. 

“Here ya go, princess” he says sheepishly, and you turn to give him a warning look

“I’m serious Joel, I’ll knock the teeth right out of your mouth if you keep calling me that.” You say, rather aggressively. 

“I’d like to see you try” He snorts out. 

You decide not to answer, as he is clearly getting a rise out of antagonizing you. You roll your eyes and chug the rest of your cup. So did, Joel.

He, again, filled your cup. “You seem happy I brought the whiskey. Like you could use some of it” He comments

“No shit. I’ve got two to three months on a mission with you. And it’s only the second night” you  shrug. “Not to mention that we have to share tents…”

“I ain't that bad” He chuckles. 

“You’re drunk” you add. 

“So are you” he quickly responds.

You nod, and sit in silence for a while - both, quite drunk. “I’m fucking tired. You tired?” 

You feel a bit loopy from all the alcohol, but stand up and agree, walking over to your tent. The closer you get to the tent, the more you realize just how small it really is. I mean, it’s small for just one person, imagine how cramped it is for two? Surely, the both of you cannot fit in there - what the hell have you gotten yourself into? You think to yourself. 

Joel walks slowly towards the tent as he watches you look into the tent, worriedly. He looks himself, and the same thought passing your mind right now has suddenly dawned upon his, “Oh, boy….” he mumbled

“Yeah, I know.”. You are both stood there, looking, for a while - until you initiate and climb into the tent, and lie down on the right side - making as much space for Joel’s body as you can. 

“This ain't gonna be comfortable, not one bit...” he says, as he lies down next to you in the tent, in a clumsy and stale motion. 

Your bodies are uncomfortably pressing together, without there being enough room to move away, nor was there to shuffle to a more spacious yet also non compromising position. You tried lying back to back, as it seemed the natural and least intimate way to lie next to one another, thus facing away from one another. Still then, there wasn’t enough space to spare personal space - not in this tent. 

“God this sucks.” you mutter from one side. 

“You got that right.” He answers from the other. 

You groan, as you try to get comfortable, nudging your elbow into his back in the process. He huffs out of pain. “You're making it worse.”

“Shut up. I’m just trying to get comfortable” You say, feeling an unrest in your body - one that the whiskey was not strong enough to numb. 

“So am I” He gets more irritated as you keep nudging into him. 

Finally, you settled to lie on your side, facing away from Joel. He takes the newly found empty space and lies with his arms against your back. You groan. “Your arms are hurting my back”  he does not seem to care, and stays silent. You finally give into defeat, as the mixture of the sleepiness and alcohol slowly seems to overtake your body and you both fall asleep.

Somewhere at night, you had rolled over. Joel was very warm, so naturally, subconsciously, you drifted closer to the source. With your face against his chest, he was softly awoken by the warm breaths coming out of your mouth, in small snores. He looked down, and saw you sleeping peacefully, right against him. He lied completely still, not sure if he should wake you up. The snores were not loud enough to keep him up, so he presumed that is the price he’ll have to pay to sleep somewhere warm tonight, so he tried closing his eyes and fall back asleep, repeating in his head not to look anymore at you - and just go to sleep. 

Suddenly you wake up, the morning after, head plastered against Joel’s chest, with his arm slung around your body, and your arm slung over his shoulder. It felt comfortable and warm….strangely.. Good lying like that, but you didn’t know how to react. It was utterly intimate and had crossed the border to cuddling very long ago.  And oh god…is that your saliva on his shirt? Did you drool on his chest?! You were so close to him that you could smell the stench of whiskey on his breath, no less your own bouncing from his chest and back to your nostrils. You were basically on second base with the man, without ever remembering if you fell asleep that way or if you had done it in your sleep. I mean hell, you barely remember getting into the damned tent…’we must’ve gotten very drunk’ you thought to yourself. You must’ve rolled over and not thought about it.

You lie frozen, unsure what to do in this situation. If you jerk too much, you’ll wake him - but if you don’t move… he’ll see what you are seeing as of right now - which is you two in an extremely compromising situation. Maybe you could turn around? But then it would border spooning…curse this god-damn tent! 

As if awoken by your thoughts, Joel’s body moves as if he’s waking up - and in a hasty and rushed move, he jerks his arm away from you - as if he just went through the same train of thoughts you did when you woke up. “What the fuck” He groaned, looking at you in an.. Almost disturbed manner. 

“Fuck.. Uh, mornin’..” You peep out, embarrassed. Kicking yourself for not acting faster before he woke.

“Morning” he says in a rushed voice as he looks around, slightly panicked. None of you know what to say, an awkward silence hanging over you. He is quick to peel away from you to climb out of the tent. “We gotta get going” he announced.

“Y-yeah” You say, sitting still in the tent, processing the situation. When you have mustered enough strength, you crawl out of the tent too - stretching as you stand up. You pack up and walk alongside each other in silence, might as well have been miles apart. The weight of your unspoken closeness from the previous night's ‘cuddling’ lingers in the air, you were both a bit thrown off, sharing the occasional glances at each other, unsure of how to address what had happened, or whether it was better left unspoken. There wasn’t much to say, to be honest. I mean, what was there to say? 

You got quite accustomed to the silence, to hearing nothing but the sound of your footsteps, wet against the humid grass. You’d think that walking for hours on end without the distraction of conversation would be something that would bother you, it proved to do the opposite. Without it, It was as if the world around you had muted its colors and sounds, leaving only the barest minimum of sensory input - which made time somewhat fly by. The aching in your feet and legs slipped to the back of your mind. You wondered if Joel was quiet because he was doing the same. 

You also wondered what his thoughts were regarding this morning, and how you woke up. You didn’t talk about it, that’s obvious enough…but, what was he thinking about? Maybe he didn’t think about it at all - it was, after all, innocent, you rationalized. Was he also trying to decipher the mixed emotions you were feeling without giving them too much weight - since that might make them real, after all? You can’t deny just how safe and comfortable you felt, regardless of who it was. 

Joel spotted you glancing at him here and there, he was equally aware of the tension. He, too, couldn't shake off the memory; He couldn’t help but to replay the events of last night in his mind, wondering if it was merely a product of shared body heat or something deeper. I mean, he could have just pushed you away…yet the unexpected warmth of your body against his, the rhythmic rise and fall of your chest as you slept, your breath hot against his chest.. It had been an intimate moment, and he couldn’t help but…enjoy it. However, he was as stubborn as ever, unwilling to broach the topic nor delve into the act itself. Instead, he focused on the mission at hand, pushing the awkwardness aside, shaking his head, not wanting to think too much of it either.  

As you continued on the journey, the trees began to thin out, and you found yourself standing at the edge of a clearing, the sun going down behind a mountain up ahead. You looked at Joel, who seemingly had the same thought you did - it was time to find shelter. He took the map out of his bag and looked around. “We aren’t too far away from a safe house” he grumbled.

You nodded, taking out a map of your own, trying to help him in the search of said safe house. As you slowly approach the road leading to the building the weather began to change. Dark clouds gather in the sky, and the first few raindrops fall, pelting against your clothes. The urgency of getting under a roof became more apparent, so you quickened your pace. 

Your breaths are visible in the cold, damp air, and the water has seemingly seeped into your clothes - leaving you feel colder and heavier. The cold made your thoughts kept circling back to the tent. The unexpected warmth of Joel's body against yours.. ‘God damn it. Get a grip. it's not even day four, and you're losing your mind.’ You thought to yourself. 

Finally, you reached the safe house, which wasn’t what either of you had hoped for. It was an abandoned decrepit building, a relic of the world before the outbreak, with a roof that had seen better days. It was a stone building, partially hidden away by the tall unkept grass surrounding it, as well as tall trees huddling around it, vines growing on the walls. It was probably old 20 years ago, let alone now… The building was leaking from the roof and had gaping holes in the walls - making the shelter far from ideal. It offered some protection from the rain, but not much else. It was, however, better than getting drenched in the pouring rain and being exposed to the elements. You closed the door behind you and took a moment to catch your breath, looking around. 

“Well.. This is the best we've got for now” He finally muttered as the wind howled through the gaping holes in the walls. 

You look around and find it was pretty empty. There wasn’t any furniture, just a chair. Floor filled with scattered garbage and miscellaneous, dusty items from people who have been here before. The water is dripping from your clothes onto the stone floor beneath you, creating a puddle. "We need to get out of these wet clothes," he finally stated, his voice practical and no-nonsense. 

You knew he was right, but the timing of it made it slightly uncomfortable. He knew he was straining on the already strange atmosphere that has been looming over the two of you since you found each other in the brace of one other. However, you also knew the reality of the situation. Your pride was warring with the necessity of the situation. The chill in the air and the knowledge of the dangers of hypothermia prevailed, and rational thought found its way back to you. You have months left to travel with Joel - and undressing in front of him to ward off sickness should not be an embarrassing thing, it ensures your survival and should be nothing more - is nothing more.

He could see the hesitation in your eyes, as you shivered, teeth chattering. He looked around for any dry fabric he could find within the safehouse—tattered old blankets and worn-out jackets. It wasn't the most comfortable solution, but it would have to do for now. He picked up a jacket. “Here.” 

You nodded in agreement and began peeling off your drenched attire. Joel did the same, his back turned to maintain some semblance of privacy. Finally free from the soaked garments, you are quick to put on the jacket, zipping it, covering your body enough to feel more comfortable. You start wringing out the excess water from the clothes you wore, leaving a puddle of water there. You avoided even looking in the direction of Joel, who you know is (most likely) currently butt naked. Instead, you find a moth-eaten blanket in a corner of the room that the rain hadn’t reached. Shivering uncontrollably, you wrap it around your waist, covering your exposed legs. You could see a not so naked Joel who had found some pieces of clothing to cover himself, thankfully. He was now hanging his wet clothes against the singular chair that he moved to one of the few dry spots in the house, so you opt to do the same. The room was still far from warm, and the leaky roof didn't help matters, but, at least you were in dry clothes, if you can call them that.

You spot the ever so tiny wood burning stove in the corner of an empty adjoining room. You check if there’s any wood in there, and to your surprise there is - however, not much of it. Enough for tonight, and that’s all that mattered. You started a small fire and quickly huddled up against it for warmth. Joel walked into the room, as he’d seen the light from the fire from the corner of his eye. He nodded in approval as he silently walked towards you, sitting down next to you to also keep warm. You both sit there in silence, waiting for the clothes to dry. 

Joel broke the silence, his voice softer this time "We'll have to wait out the storm here, and then we can continue our journey." You nod, agreeing.

As the night wore on, the humidity in the room strangled the feeble fire you had managed to kindle earlier, ultimately snuffing it out. The temperature inside the safehouse plummeted, and it became apparent that you couldn't rely on the fire for warmth any longer “Damn it” You mutter, shivering once again, trying to revive the fire - to no avail. 

What was also apparent was that the two of you were so obviously treading around the one thing you knew would help warm you up, very much proven by last night. Unsure, feeling awkward, you didn’t know if you should bring it up. Proudly, you both sat there in silence. The memory of the previous night and the warmth that entailed lingered in the back of both of your minds. It had been an unspoken but undeniable source of comfort in the midst of the harsh world you inhabited, and now, with the cold seeping into your bones, and the urgency to get warm overtaking the awkward tension looming over you, the thought of that shared warmth became impossible to ignore.

Without saying a word, you shifted closer to Joel, seeking his body heat. Joel, initially surprised, looking over at you, understood the unspoken request and shifted to accommodate you. It was an unspoken agreement, a silent acknowledgment that you needed each other's warmth to survive the harsh, cold night. 

With a shared understanding of practicality and mutual vulnerability, you created a makeshift sleeping area consisting of zipped up sleeping bags, dry blankets and whatever else fabric you could spare that would dampen the solidity of the cold, damp floor. This was where you settled as you finally lay side by side. You tried to find a comfortable position, mirroring the way you had slept in the tent the night before, with him against your back. Your bodies pressed together, and your breaths synchronized in the cold darkness, neither of you speaking about it, rather you let your bodies instinctively gravitate closer, seeking the heat that the other provided. 

In the quiet of the night, as you shared body heat to stave off the biting cold, the tension that had lingered between the two of you began to seemingly fade. Despite the uncomfortable surroundings and your strained relationship, you both found a strange comfort in your shared warmth and the familiarity of each other's presence. There was no need for snark, nor sly remarks; pissing each other off. Neither did you have to discuss the somewhat uncomfortable, albeit innocent yet necessary, situation you’ve found yourself in. The cold was unforgiving, and your priority was to avoid hypothermia. You were, after all, nothing but two survivors making the best of the harsh and unforgiving circumstances given to you, finding solace and comfort in each other's company, even if it was unconventional.

He hesitantly kept his arms to his side. Joel broke the silence, clearing his throat, his voice barely a whisper, "I never thought I'd miss that damn tent." trying to diffuse more of the tension. 

You slightly laugh, feeling a slight cramp in your body from the duress of the situation. The laugh eased up some internal tension you didn’t even know you were holding onto. “It was for sure warmer than this” You chuckle. 

He smiled. And that was that. You were both admittedly exhausted, and drifted off into a very well-earned sleep, lulled by the heat radiating between the two of you. Secretly, you couldn’t help but to wish for the extra warmth that came from his arms around you, as it did yesterday, holding you impossibly close, keeping you safe in his big strong arms. Little did you know that he was thinking the same, but it was simply a line that Joel couldn't bring himself to cross. You had already navigated enough awkwardness and unspoken emotions that night. That didn’t stop him, however, from subconsciously doing so in his sleep - just as he did the night before. 

Morning came, and you were awakened by the sun shining through the window, and onto your face. To your surprise, you felt your body be wrapped in the warmth of Joel's embrace. He must have instinctively put his arm around you whilst he slept. At first, you felt a sense of contentment. It was strange, but also undeniable. It was a reassuring feeling, knowing that he was there, holding you tightly - just as you had secretly hoped. But, as your senses fully woke up, you became acutely aware of something else - a firm pressure against your back that couldn't be ignored. You froze, your eyes widening in shock, and your heart raced as you registered the presence of Joel's erection pressed against your back. Joel was still asleep, as far as you were concerned. His breath heavy and warm on your shoulder, light snores leaving his mouth. Your mind raced as you tried to process the situation. You two had already crossed so many boundaries during the night to stay warm, but this felt like an entirely different kind of boundary altogether. Was this intentional? Or just a physiological response to their proximity? 

Was there a sick, twisted part of you that engulfed your mind with fantasies of alleviating the pressure burning in the pit of your stomach with the (from what your back could feel was a very appropriately sized) dick prodding at your back? Yes. You were only human, after all. Were you going to do anything about it? No. You knew this was not intentional, not realistically. You’re a grown woman and know that he couldn’t control it just as much as you couldn’t control your deep guttural reaction to such an… event.

You debated over your next moves, unsure of how to navigate this uncharted territory. If you move away, he will wake up, realize he has a boner and think it scared you off. But if you lie there, hoping it goes away, and he wakes up with a raging boner still in full swing rubbing against you - he’d be mortified. Him, being a proud man would never live that down, and would probably not talk to you again, or at least not know what to say, in the midst of his own embarrassment. After yesterday, and the progress you made in your ‘partnership’, you couldn’t help but to dread the deafening silence that came with the impending awkwardness. You’ve been through so much already, and have yet to even get close to finishing this mission. So much left yet to go through. You have crossed so many bridges, this is just one of them. This was just a fleeting moment and not as significant as it might feel in the heat of the moment. It’s not a big deal, not really, just bodies doing body stuff. Or at least that is what you are telling yourself.

Carefully, you adjusted your position ever so slightly, shifting your body away from his rock solid member to relieve the pressure between your bodies, all the while ensuring that you didn't wake him from his peaceful slumber. It was a delicate maneuver to maintain the pretense of sleep, but you hoped it would be enough for you to potentially feign ignorance, just in case he was awake. You, flustered by the situation and the thoughts lingering in your (albeit perverse) mind, could not fall back asleep. Rather, you lied there letting your thoughts run wild. Couldn't hurt to indulge into harmless fantasy?

A couple of moments later, you could feel shifting next to you. Joel slowly woke up, feeling the oh so familiar throbbing that welcomes him in the mornings from time to time. Joel comes to his senses as he gently wakes up, quickly remembering the way he fell asleep against you and how much of a compromising position that would be for him right now. He quickly snapped his eyes open to see, to his relief, that you had moved away in your sleep, or at least so he thought. ‘Phew’ he thought to himself. He quickly sprung to his feet, leaving the room - hoping it goes away before you wake. He was not entertaining the idea of taking care of it, it could be too risky. 

Him waking up reminded you of his existence, which filled your lust driven mind with an enormous guilt and shame regarding your thoughts. He didn’t have control over that, and your insatiable mind went and ran with it. You quickly shook the thoughts off and tried to think of something else as you laid there, unsure how to proceed.. 

You laid still until you heard Joel packing his bag. You took it as an indication that you were out of the woods, and had dodged a bullet - even though the both of you are flustered by it, without the knowing that the other one knew. You get up, and start folding the cloth and blankets that made up your ‘bed’, and walked out to the room with the bags and packed. Joel didn’t say anything. 

“G’mornin’” You announce your presence. He, already hyper aware of it, hums as a response. You don't look much into it, relieved he isn’t treating you differently considering last night's sleeping arrangements. When you packed up, you put your backpack around your shoulders, your rifle around your neck and the rest of your gear clinging to the bag. You look at Joel, who is watching you as you pull the straps of the bag. You look up and nod. “Let’s go?” 

He nods. You’re off.

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[baroryuuweek]

BARORYUU WEEK 2023 PROMPTS - August 21st to August 27th

We'd like to give a huge thanks to everyone who responded to our prompt poll! With an amazing 70 responses, here are the results:

DATE: August 21st - August 27th | 8/21 - 8/27

PROMPTS

Day 1, 8/21: Dark/Light, Living Together | 闇/光・同棲

Day 2, 8/22: Trust, Swords | 信頼・剣

Day 3, 8/23: Long Distance, Wine | 遠距離恋愛・ウィン

Day 4, 8/24: Cat and Mouse, Cultural Exchange | 猫/ねずみ・文化交流

Day 5, 8/25: Ballroom, Any AU | ダンスホール・なんでもパロ

Day 6, 8/26: Onsen/Hot Spring, Saviour | 温泉・救世主

Day 7, 8/28: Free Day | なんでもあり

Additionally, as inspiration for Free Day, here were a few ideas proposed by you, as well as the runners up on the vote: Vampire, Inheritance, Growing Old Together, Until the End, Service, Smile, Truth, Letters, Afternoon Tea

TO PARTICIPATE:

When the week comes, tag your posts as #baroryuuweek2023, #バロ龍ウイーク2023 or you can @ this blog!

Submit any fanfiction to the baroryuu week AO3 collection, which will be shared at a later date, closer to the event.

We will reblog any posts that are tagged from one week prior to the week. Late entries will be accepted as well. We hope to see you in August!

#baroryuu #ryuubaro #the great ace attorney #大逆転裁判 #バロ龍 #barok van zieks #naruhodo ryunosuke #tgaa #dgs #dai gyakuten saiban #baroryuuweek #バロ龍ウイーク #the great ace attorney chronicles #ace attorney #ship week

[justhere4thevibez]

Anniversary Ficlet Fest

My one year anniversary for my hellcheer fics (or any fanfiction, really) is tomorrow, september 2! To date, I've created 28 works, published 368,511 words on ao3 (what. the. fuck.), and received a grand total of 46,071 hits! This is absolutely bonkers to me because one year ago I was hovering nervously over the "post" key, certain no one would ever read my fic, let alone want more. But the hellcheer community has been so welcoming, positive, and encouraging that here I am, one year later and still going strong.

In celebration of this, today and tomorrow (sept. 1 and 2) my inbox is open and welcoming for any hellcheer prompts (SFW or NSFW) you'd like to send. And over the next few days I'll try to answer as many of them as possible in ficlet form!

Thanks again, you guys, your comments and interactions have been such a bright spot in a really tough year. I treasure each and every word 💛

#ficlet fest #hellcheer #hellcheer ficlets #ficlet asks #vibez answers #vibez anniversary

[pedropascallme]

u said u are always looking for a reason to write jim smut so let me deliver bc i’m actually so fixated on this movie it’s CRAZYYY!!!!! anyways i would like like a build up to a confession kind of? like there’s so so much romantic and sexual tension and it just like breaks and yeah😭😭 idk if that makes any sense but yk!! ok thank u so much!!! you are amazing dude

In Our Perfect Present Tense

Pairing: Jim x f!Reader

Summary: "And where had this sudden, deep infatuation with Jim come into play? Was it sudden?"

Warnings: SMUT (18+ MINORS DNI), p in v, fingering, praise kink, Jim can be soft!dom if I say so!! Allusions to canon typical violence, I know Cillian Murphy is 5'8 but Jim is 6'2 in my mind, if I missed anything please let me know!!

AN: Max you make my heart go badumbadumbadumbadum (good) I hope this is to your liking <3 Also continuing to cross tag my Cillian fics because my Jim fics rarely gain traction so we are trying some METHODS.

The cottage was so quiet.

You could hear Hannah shift under the blanket and sigh in her sleep, and though seeing her so peaceful made you feel a pang of protectiveness, watching her chest rise and fall, your mind was elsewhere. Maybe you were still in London, or Manchester, or anywhere else; maybe this was all fake and you had died somewhere along the way. Was this Heaven? Or maybe Purgatory, given that nothing seemed to have changed much.

And where had this sudden, deep infatuation with Jim come into play? Was it sudden?

No. You closed your eyes and his face flashed across your mind; eyes you wanted to drown in and cheekbones sharp enough to make you bleed. Maybe that’s why you kept him around in the first place. You’d never had to help him, save him from the congregation that chased him down the road; never had to take him to your hideout in the underground. At first, (and you knew this for a fact, at least) it was simply because Mark…bored you. He was cheesy and had a chip on his shoulder, and you didn’t like how he looked at you—didn’t like that he seemed to expect you to fall in love with him. Jim made a good buffer. And it helped that he had such kind eyes that seemed to be full of fear and morbid curiosity, and that he was, in every sense of the word, pretty.

You hadn’t been sad when you’d had to kill Mark.

But once you had made it clear to Jim that you didn’t want to fall in love with him, either, your snap judgement fogging your mind, you thought that was the end of it. Thought maybe he would go out like Mark did. And was it really your fault that Jim assumed you didn’t care about him? You didn’t. You wanted him to think you didn’t. Wanted him to think that he was essentially on his own when you ran up the stairs to the top floor, with his head splitting in pain and your legs going as fast as they could carry you. But when he came up to you that night to apologize to you, thank you, hold out an olive branch, it was then you realized that you felt isolated. And, yes, doomsday will do that to you, but it wasn’t just that. It was that even when humanity was rearing its ugly head, Jim still had the time to recognize and respect you; he was willing to put you first in a way nobody would’ve done even if their life didn’t depend on it.

You felt so guilty that night, touching yourself under the covers with everybody else just a few rooms over.

It was one thing to be wandering around the desolate city with him as your only company, but once you had Frank and Hannah (and a car) you felt like maybe, just maybe, there was hope. There was a glimmer of something behind Jim’s eye when you were eating out on the countryside after ransacking the supermarket—and it could’ve been the way the light was hitting him, or the way he laughed with Hannah, or the fact that he was eating fruit for the first time in weeks, but you thought maybe it had something to do with you. Maybe he had figured out that you did care. About him and about the state of things and about what the hell you would do if there was any sort of relief from running away. You thought about kissing him then, and he might’ve, too. There was a certain tenderness in the way he curled up next to you that night, under the stars.

In another life, he might’ve done it for reasons other than keeping warm.

And then, of course, that all came crashing down. It had been too good to be true, and in retrospect you hated yourself for allowing any harm to come to your small posse. You got out alive, but the hope you had was minimal, at best. Was alive good enough anymore? Was alive good enough when you’d fought off every evil you could think of in the span of 12 hours?

No. It wasn’t until Jim turned around, soaking wet and bleeding, that you realized that being alive was no good if he wasn’t there with you to enjoy it. You’d wanted to wrap yourself in him, to feel the sweat and blood caked on his chest and kiss him until you lost consciousness. Instead, you crumpled to the floor in the red dress that had been forced upon you, hugging yourself to his shins and begging him to tell you he was ok. It was mortifying, only made slightly more bearable when Hannah lobbed a bottle over his head. At least you knew there was still humor to be found in the worst of situations.

Shortly thereafter, when Jim got shot, you were certain that it was all over; you might as well follow him out. Maybe you would’ve if it hadn’t been for Hannah crying silently next to you as she floored the gas and begged you to stay. To do something. For once you felt like you had people worth fighting for other than yourself. It made you dizzy.

Which brought you back to the present.

There were two rooms in the cottage; both were damp and smelled like the lint from a dryer, but having a bed was enough. You had discussed the sleeping situation the night of your arrival, and there had only been some mild bickering.

“I’ll sleep on the floor. S’ok.” Jim remained gentlemanly throughout, but it was apparent, to you, at least, that the person with the bullet hole through their stomach should be able to sleep comfortably.  

“Hannah and I will take one, you’ll take the other.” You were blunt, dancing around the subject of who would end up sharing by deciding then and there to divide it based on sex.

“Wha—” Hannah began to protest before deciding to shut her mouth.

“It’s really not that big a deal,” Jim stood his ground, “I’ll find something to rest on.”

“Absolutely not.” And that’s where you ended it. Saving face, dismissing any deeper urges, leaving no time for Hannah or Jim to propose a different arrangement.  

But now that you were somewhat settled, it felt wrong to be in this room. The wallpaper was a reflective pink, and it felt too bright even in the pitch-black night. You couldn’t get comfortable, and all you could do was mull over every past interaction you’d had with Jim. Every interaction, and the way his mouth moved when he spoke, and the way he smiled at you, and the way he had quite literally killed for you—nearly been killed for you.

You felt hot. Nauseous, even, to the point where you felt that you had to move around or take a walk or do anything to feel more at ease. But it just so happened that you felt the most at ease around Jim.

You tiptoed across the floor and into the hallway. You almost didn’t bother knocking on the door, but felt that you at least owed him that decency.

“C’m’in.”

You peered into the room, allowing yourself a small view of Jim’s shirtless figure splayed out on the bed. You smiled, feeling shy out of nowhere.

“Just wanted to check on you.” You excused yourself, not wanting him to think it any more odd than it already was for you to be in his doorway at midnight. “You feeling ok?”

“Better than ever.” Jim crossed his arms behind his head, sitting up against the pillows. You could see the bandage on his abdomen, and his skin covered in a ray of moonlight.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.” He smiled, patting the mattress to encourage you to sit with him. You closed the door behind you. “Why’re you really up?”

“Honestly?” You paused to build tension, leaning in slightly, “Hannah snores.” Jim chuckled under his breath. “And…and I don’t really feel at home in that room.”

“Would you feel more at home in this one?”

“Maybe…”

“’Cause if you’d like it, you and Hannah could have it. ‘V’always wanted pink wallpaper, anyway.”

You rolled your eyes, “No, that’s—it’s not that.”

“Then…?” Jim tilted his head slightly, and you looked down and away from him, inhaling deeply.

“Can I stay in here tonight? With—with you?” You could feel your pulse in your throat and though he responded almost immediately, you felt as though hours were passing.

“Sure, f’course.” Jim nodded; eyes wide with eager bewilderment. You swing your legs over the mattress, straightening yourself out beside him. You looked up at the ceiling, lying on your back and waiting to fall asleep.

“Closer.” Jim whispered.

“Hm?”

“Y’can come closer. If you want, I mean.”

“Oh…yeah.” You shuffled closer to him. Somehow you ended up spooning, his hand draped hesitantly over your waist. You could feel the heat radiating off his body, and his breath blowing against the hairs on the back of your neck.

“Comfortable?” He was still whispering, as if he would wake the crickets if he spoke any louder.

“Yeah. You?”

“Yeah…” You both fell silent again, and you wondered if he could feel the tension, too, or if it was something you had just made up. You turned over to face him.

“I’m sorry.” You spoke, though his eyes were closed, and you thought maybe he had already fallen asleep.

“For what?” His eyes were still closed when he responded.

“For—you know…” You reached out to graze your fingertips over his bandages, withdrawing it just as quickly when you realized that what you were doing was so forward.

“You didn’t shoot me.”

“I didn’t stop you from getting shot.”

“Not much you could’ve done. Three of us and more of them.” He opened his eyes, “Plus, you drugged Hannah, so just the two of us, really.”

You buried your face into the pillow, “Was trying to help.”

“You did.” Jim reached out to goad you from your hiding spot. “Been nothing but helpful since I met you. Consider this me returning the favor.” You managed to peek an eye out from the pillow to look at him smiling at you. He was so gentle. How could a man who had been comatose while the world was thrown into shambles remain so empathetic?

“Didn’t want you to get hurt.” You mumbled, barely audible when the words came out through the pillow.

“Didn’t want you to get hurt, either. Think I went to all that trouble for myself?”

“No.” You brought your head up to fully look at him.

“Exactly. You would’ve done the same for me.”

“You say that with so much confidence.”

“Cause it’s true. Cocky, but it’s true.”

“It is.”

“True?”

“Cocky,” you smiled when he feigned defeat, “but also true.” You quieted again, keeping eye contact with one another. Jim’s smile faded slightly.

“Why did you help me?” He asked.

“Hm?”

“In the first place, by the gas station—why did you help me?”

You didn’t know how to answer. “I needed the company.”

“You had company.”

“I needed company I would enjoy.”

“What if I wasn’t enjoyable?” He raised an eyebrow.

“I was willing to take that risk.” You raised an eyebrow back at him, mocking his curiosity and his pushback. “And…I mean, plus, you were…I d’know. Tragic. And pretty.”

“Pretty?” His other eyebrow shot up.

“And tragic.” You giggled. “It’s not like I saw you tearing down the street screaming and thought that you only deserved help ‘cause you were good looking, it was just—it’s why I kept you around.” You rolled your eyes, trying to stop yourself from sounding too sincere, unsure if Jim was willing to recognize the attraction you had toward him. Unsure of whether or not you were willing to admit it right here, right now.

“You liked me.” Jim teased.

“I like you,” you clarified, “Present tense.” You averted your eyes from his gaze, opting instead to look down at his wound once more. He gawked at you, grinning. Placing a hand on your chin, he redirected your gaze to his face.

“How long have you been holding out on me?”

“What?”

“How long’ve you been wanting to say that? Not since day one, hm? Since we went to my parents’ house?”

“Didn’t want to say it,” you huffed, “wanted to help you stay alive.”

“C’mon, all that talk about how you didn’t care if I fell in love with you? Cared more than you let on, I knew it. Could’ve saved us so much time if you just came out with it.”

“Shush.” You tried not to dwell on his words, the realization that, this whole time, he was waiting for you.

“Say it again.” He gleamed, “say it again.”

You took his hand from your face, holding it in your own. “Jim,” you brought his hand to your chest, “I like you.”

You couldn’t take a breath before he was on you. You felt his lips first, plush against your own, and then his hands over your waist and his legs tangling with yours. For someone who had almost bled out less than a week ago, he was shockingly quick on his feet. You wrapped your arms around his neck, feeling the release of weeks’ worth of tension that had been festering inside of you when his tongue slipped between your lips. You moaned, hands grabbing at any part of him you could reach: You felt his chest against your own and ran a trail down his spine with a finger, feeling him shiver at your touch. He ground his hips into you slightly and you reached for his arms, pulling him in as close as you possibly could.

“Knew it.” He whispered when you pulled away for air. “Knew it.” He began sucking on your neck, running his tongue over your pulse point and licking stripes down your throat. You gasped at the feeling, still trying to touch him wherever you could. You found yourself stroking his jawline while he sucked bruises onto your chest, feeling the way his cheeks hollowed when he made an especially strong mark.

“Jim—” You pleaded, trying to touch him, feel him, all around needing him. It was almost all too much.

He returned to eye level. “Mm?” He kissed your neck again, soothing over the fresh hickeys. “Tell me what you need.”

“You—need you.”

“C’mon,” his grin returned, “specifics.”

“Please,” you needed to feel everything, everywhere, “fuck me.”

“God, sounds so pretty coming out of that mouth.” He stood up from the mattress, pulling you up slightly to allow him to disrobe you. It didn’t take much effort; the threadbare clothes you were trying to pass off as pajamas had already practically disintegrated the moment you had put them on. He shucked his bottoms off before retaking his place on top of you in bed.

“So fucking beautiful,” he kissed you again, “so, so pretty. Wanted to make you feel so good f’so long.”

Feeling confident, you cupped his cheek in your palm, “touched myself thinking about this.”

“F—when? Thought about me while you touched yourself? Tell me.” It was a breathless demand, and you could feel his erection throbbing above you.

“The night in the apartment. Came on my fingers, came so hard while I thought of how good you’d fuck me—oh!” Your sexy display was cut short when you felt his fingers brush your clit.

“Yeah? Touched right here and thought of how nice I’d fuck this pussy?” You whimpered at the way he massaged you just right, and his words only added fuel to the fire. “Should’ve just asked me to take care of you, baby, would’ve helped.” God, he was wicked. Such a good man, and so, so wicked for speaking to you like this. You arched your back, and he took the opportunity to slide two fingers into your cunt. “Fuck,” he huffed, delighted by how wet you were for him, and your eyes rolled back, “get yourself this wet? Or is it just me?”

“You, fuck, Jim—it’s you.”

“Yeah, I know.”

“Cocky bastard.” You managed between whines and gasps.

“You love it.”  He continued to push his fingers in and out of you, and a delightful squelching noise filled the bedroom. “Fucking beautiful.” He kept at it for a while longer, enjoying the noises you made for him and the way your face contorted when he hit an especially sensitive spot. When he pulled his fingers from you, you sighed, feeling the low of being empty, until he brought the wet digits to your mouth and encouraged you to clean them off for him. He let out a low groan when you began sucking, using your tongue to gather your slick off from in between them. “Yeah, good girl.”

He slotted himself between your thighs, and you could feel the drag of his cock over your stomach. You looked down, wrapping a hand around him and ogling him; so long, so beautifully outlined by thick veins. He gently grasped your wrist, pushing your hand back onto the mattress.

“Wanna make this last.” He half-joked. He kept your arm pinned under him, and you could feel his tip exploring your folds, until finally he pushed himself into you. You let out a shaky, breathless moan as he shallowly thrusted into you, working you open to take him as deep as you could. When he bottomed out, he leaned his forehead against yours, and you could feel the stickiness of sex and sweat on your skin.

“Good, yeah?” He was still being smug, though ensuring you were comfortable. You felt devious, rolling your hips against him and grinning in response, earning a choked “fuck” from him. “Dirty fucking girl.” He pulled out almost entirely before thrusting back into you, forcefully enough that you felt your back drag against the bed. Your tits bounced as he rocked his hips into you, and he took the opportunity to grab one in his hand, taking the other in his mouth.

“Jim!” You couldn’t remember your own name, could barely remember who you were or how you got here; all you could think was Jim, Jim, Jim. “Fu—uck, oh my god, Jim!”

“Gonna wake up the whole neighborhood?” He was incapable of being serious even in the most intimate of moments, knowing full well that the people in this house were the only living souls for miles. “Gonna make sure everybody knows who’s fucking you?” Your lips parted, letting out small moans and whimpers of his name with every thrust.

You could feel his fingers on your clit again, and the feeling was electric; maybe it was because you had wanted him for so long, and tried to deny it for almost as long, but you’d never felt this good—never felt this perfectly sated. The way he kneaded your swollen bud while pounding into you hard enough to make the bedframe shake, the way he whispered such filthy things into the skin of your breasts, the way he wanted you too.

“Gonna—Jim, I’m gonna cum!” You tried to move in sync with him, but it was all too much; he was everywhere, and it was going to be your undoing. You wrapped your legs around his waist, urging him to fuck you deeper. He leaned over you, tracing his fingers down your cheek before grabbing your face in one hand.

“Cum for me, baby. So good, my perfect girl, cum on my cock like this.” You were as good as gone. You felt your legs tighten around his body at the same time as your cunt clenched around his length. You dug your nails into the skin of his arm, and he growled at the way your body responded to him. “Yeah, like that—just like that, sweetheart.”

You were trembling, dripping down his cock and unsure of how to rationalize this amount of pleasure in the midst of end times. Who cared, anyway? You felt fuzzy, barely registering Jim’s words as his strokes became messier and rushed, catching up to you with his own high.

“Want it inside,” you mumbled through your haze, “please, inside.”

“Can’t fucki—can’t say that baby, can’t risk it.”

“Please…” You knew how stupid it was, knew that he would have to say no, but you’d be damned if you didn’t at least try.

“When we get out of England—when we get out of England, I’ll fill you up as much as you want. Yeah?” He slammed himself into you, and his words bounced around inside of your head: “When we get out,” “as much as you want.” If you weren’t so spent, you’d cum for him again from that statement alone. “Promise I will, whenever you want it, baby.”

“Mm.” You sighed contentedly at his assurance. “Tummy.”

“Yeah, good girl, gonna paint you with my cum.” He groaned when you reached up to brush your fingers down his happy trail.

“Give it to me. Please, Jim. Needed it f’so long.” Your mouth hung open, sensitive and sore from his cock and his hands, and somehow still so needy for him, desperate to see him to completion. He buried his face in your neck, breathing in your scent and letting your moans fill his ears as his hips stuttered and he pulled out. You felt his knuckles against your stomach as he stroked himself, finally feeling the warmth of his spend land and spread across your abdomen with a long moan of your name. You stayed like that, both of you breathing heavily, Jim lying on top of you. The gluey feeling of his cum on your stomach and your own between your thighs only heightened when he sat up on his elbow, looking down at you to appreciate how pretty you looked after being fucked out, and you could see the strands of cum dripping between your bodies.

“So beautiful.” He kissed you again, and despite the passion from the last kisses still being present, he was significantly gentler with you in your bleary state.

You blinked up at him, smiling through the fog in your brain, and hugging him close to you. “Gonna have to change your bandages. Covered in your own cum.”

“But what a way to go, right?” He laughed, and you buried your face into him further. “Tomorrow,” he promised. “Need a towel?”

“Would it be gross to sleep like this?”

“Gross? No. Uncomfortable? Maybe.”

“I’ll take my chances. Too tired to wash off.”

“As long as you’re alright.” He brushed your hair away from your eyes, maneuvering himself to look down at you while you were pressed to his chest.

“Feel amazing.” You reassured him. “Should’ve said something earlier.”

“No,” Jim pet your hair, smoothing it down over the back of your head, “this was perfect timing.”

“Perfect timing.” You murmured his words back to him in agreement.

#cillian murphy #cillian murphy fanfiction #cillian murphy imagine #cillian murphy x reader #cillian murphy x you #28 days later fanfiction #jim 28 days later #28 days later #jim 28 days later x reader #28 days later jim x reader #peaky blinders #tommy shelby smut

[pinkthick]

REQUEST ARE OPEN

You can choose from down below any prompt/prompts you want with the following characters:

✩ Stephen Strange

✩ Defender Strange

✩ Sinister Strange

✩ Doctor Strange Supreme(What if?)

✩ Supreme Strange

✩ Monster(from vampires to werewolves lmao) Stephen Strange

✩ Sherlock Holmes

The fanfictions won’t be really long (1500 max ig?) and they would probably be Fem!Reader (I could try with gn!reader too). Choose a sentence/sentences from down below and you can give your own ideas too.

I will be going on a trip so they probably won’t be posted this week(bear with me please).🙏

Prompts

✩ Angst

1. ”Is everything a joke to you?"

2. "It's my fault, I didn't listen to everyone saying this would be a mistake!"

3. "Why does everything have to be a struggle with you?"

4. "I can't believe you sometimes!"

5. “Great. Really great, this is just perfect.”

6. "Why can't you just let it go?"

7. "That is the dumbest excuse I have ever heard!"

8. "Maybe you should just leave now."

9. "Oh yes, you're so great.”

10. "I really don't understand what's going on with you sometimes!"

11. "I will leave now, or I'm going to say things I will regret later.”

12. "Have you never actually thought about how I would feel about this?"

13. "Maybe this is it, because I can't do this anymore!"

14. "Don't you dare just walk away right now!”

15. "This wouldn't even be a problem, if you wouldn't make one out of it."

16. "How does that make it okay?"

17. "Do you even listen to yourself?"

18. "I'm glad I finally get to see who you really are.”

19. "Hey, hey, it's okay. Breathe."

✩ Fluff

1. "I thought you left" "Nope, just making pancakes"

2. "I never want to let you go.”

3. "I can't believe you remembered that" "I remember everything about you"

4. "I'm so proud of you"

5. "Did you just call me sweetheart?"

6. "Take my affection before I choke you with it"

7. "Is it okay if I fall asleep here?"

8. "I can keep you company till you fall asleep"

9. "I can't imagine my life without you"

10. "You complete me"

11. "I'm counting down the days until I see you"

12. "I love your apartment" "Our apartment"

13. "Sorry for borrowing your clothes" "Dont be. You look great in them"

14. "One more kiss?"

15. "I'm so glad I met you"

16. "Can I try some of your food?" "Of course. Open wide"

17. "Thanks for believing in me"

✩ Horror(?)

1. "I want to know how you'll taste between my teeth."

2. "I can never get enough of you. I'll drink you down to the last sip."

3. "You look delicious. I won't stop until I've eaten every bite.”

4. “I'm going to engrave myself into your very being.”

5. "We won't stop until you're so covered in my scent, no one will dare touch you again.”

6. "Don't play with fire if you don't want to burn.”

7. "Don't complain now you did this to yourself.”

8. "You reap what you sow."

9. “This hurts me more than it hurts you.”

10. "Why are you acting like you don't know me?”

11. "Why are you running? I did this for you!"

12. “You don't need a job, baby. Your job is being mine.”

13. "You're better off without them anyway.”

14. “I removed the problem. You should be thanking me.”

15. “I would never hurt you. You know that, right?”

16. "Why are you scared?”

17. "You're the only reason worth living for.”

18. "Why would you want to leave? I'm keeping you here for your own good!”

19. "There's nothing left for you but me. Everyone else is gone."

20. "No one will ever find you here."

21. “If his filthy hands touch you again I'll kill him.”

22. "Shouldn't you be spending more time with me?”

23. "I can't control how I react when your eyes wander.”

24. “The truth would have just hurt you.”

25. "I'm not lying - I bent the truth a little to protect you."

26. "Don't you believe me?”

27. "I've done everything for you and this is how you repay me?”

28. "I can't eat, I can't sleep. You're all I can think about.”

29. "To my dying breath, I'll never let you go."

30. "I'll follow you to the ends of the earth. No matter where you run, I'll catch you.”

31. "Did you really think I wouldn't find you?”

Credits for the prompts @diety-prompts, @writeformesinpie and @creativepromptsforwriting

#stephen strange #doctor stephen strange #stephen strange x reader #doctor strange #doctor strange in the multiverse of madness #doctor strange x you #doctor strange fanfiction #doctor strange supreme #doctor strange x reader #stephen strange x you #sinister strange x reader #sinister strange #defender!strange x you #defender strange x you #defender!strange x reader #supreme strange x you #doctor strange x female reader #marvel fanfiction #wong mcu #america #america chavez #sherlock x fem!reader #sherlock x y/n #sherlock x you #sherlock x reader #doctor strange fluff #doctor strange angst #stephen strange x female reader

[im-immortal]

Longer Than A Heartbeat

a beth greene/daryl dixon adaptation of 28 Days Later

A mysterious virus suddenly sweeps across the United States, sending the entire nation into chaos. It is unlike anything the world has ever seen before, turning healthy human beings into lethal, feral, bloodthirsty shells of their former selves within seconds of exposure. It is described only as “an infection of rage.”

Then the mass evacuations begin.

28 days later, Beth Greene wakes up all alone in a deserted hospital.

[updates every Sunday]

chapters: one | two | three | four | five | six | seven | eight | nine | ten | eleven | twelve | thirteen | fourteen | fifteen | sixteen | seventeen | eighteen | nineteen | twenty | twenty-one | twenty-two | twenty-three | twenty-four | twenty-five | twenty-six | twenty-seven | twenty-eight | epilogue

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[themandaloriandaily]

The Mandalorian Daily Secret Santa event 2022

Hi Everyone, The Mandalorian Daily would like to invite you to our very first Secret Santa event! ✨ If you create any sort of visual arts for The Mandalorian or The Book of Boba Fett (graphics, gifsets, fanart, fanvideos), this event is for you! You can register here until November 27 (you can expect our message about your giftee a few days later), and the gifters will post their arts on December 28.

For a fanfiction specific Secret Santa event (for Pedro Pascal characters) you can join @pedrostories​’s Secret Santa event. 

Please read the rules carefully before submitting your application!

Please respect the deadlines: application ends on November 27 and you will need to post your gift on December 28

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Please tag your gift as #TMDSecretSanta22 and #themandaloriandaily so we can track and reblog all your arts on the day of the gifting, and don't forget to tag you giftee as well!

If for any reason you need to drop out, please do let us know so we can find a pinch hitter for your giftee

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Join us and spread the word! 🖤

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[gabetheunknown]

Hello, Gabe.

I've been reading your Geraskier fics on AO3 and enjoying them a lot. Especially Dandelion Kisses.

Now, I'm on the third installment of Improper use of Witcher signs, and in one of the notes, you state that you're asexual and I'm curious. It's definitely not meant to be judgmental or mean. I'm just genuinely interested.

An asexual who writes smut. I've seen other asexuals do the same thing, and I'm just puzzled. Is it a wish to expand your horizons in writing, stretching your abilities? Or is being asexual not being completely disinterested in sex, just not with others?

Does smut "Do anything" for you when you read or write it.

Again, I'm just curious, since I would probably label myself as overly sexual.... I write and read because it turns me on. I guess I'm just trying to understand a bit more about asexuality. I realize you cannot speak for everyone.

I hope this question isn't too much. If so, I apologize and you can just ignore it....

Hello there Anon! Aah 💕 I'm so glad you're enjoying my fanfictions!

Ooh, some good questions! I hope I can answer them and that my answers make sense lmao. Also I can never keep things short, sorry in advance.

These questions are not too much for me and I'm actually very open 💕 to anyone reading this TW talking about sexuality/asexuality under the cut. Also this might not apply to someone else, purely talking about my experiences.

I have been writing smut ever since I first found out what fanfiction is. Which was when I was about 15 or 16 years old, the perfect age to figure out what it all means, the whole romantic or sexual world.

After a lot of 'fucking around and finding out' it was only years later that I realized I am on the asexual spectrum. In my environment (and honestly, I feel like this is the case in a lot of environments) talking about sexual feelings wasn't really normal. Still I wanted to talk about it, so I was actually being viewed as someone who was obsessed with sex. But I wasn't. I never had sex, and if I did (because of the want to 'be perceived as normal') it didn't really do anything for me.

When I say years later, I mean I am currently 28 and with my first partner who I can discuss these things with in a healthy way. And I am actually more intimate with him than I have ever been with anyone else. Intimicy and sex are also two different things for me. Like the touch of skin, just cuddling and being close to each other or leaving kisses on bare shoulders, without actually doing the do. *chefs kiss *

The funny thing is, writing smut doesn't do very much for me, so I can turn something off in my mind and just... write whatever the fuck I want? xd

Reading smut does do something for me. Always has. And the more I learn about myself, the more I think it's because I am not involved. My body, my being, my brain is not involved, I'm merely fantasizing about fictional characters doing the dirty and that's so different for me. The moment I include myself, I want to roll myself up in a blanket for at least 3 hours, but I do get excited if I can focus on a fictional character's feelings. Or my partner for instance.

I am the biggest sucker for romance though. I'm the sappiest motherfucker you'll ever meet. And I also start kicking my feet when I think about my fictional characters having a romantic moment and I absolutely love writing/reading/watching those.

My relationship with writing smut still manages to surprise even me, and that's why I sometimes add the 'anyways I'm asexual' tag because I can casually write a nasty threesome between three men while having a conversation with my boyfriend about what's for dinner. And I think that's so funny.

I usually just say I'm on the asexual spectrum, because sometimes I think I'm demisexual, sometimes I think I'm aegosexual (it's worth it looking this one up, it made me feel very seen)

Hopefully I answered your questions 💕💕 I hope you have a good day!

#anon #answered #asexuality #asexual #aegosexual #demisexual #fanfiction #tw sexuality #gabe yells