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thefallennightmare · 2 years

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Guilt-Eighteen

Pairings: Andy Barber x Reader

Warnings: fluff, mostly angst, swearing, and some implied smut here and there.

Summary: When a murder hits the small-town reader lives in and personally attacks the family she works for, she would never image the toll that it would take on her as well. But not for the reason people would think. The last thing Reader thought she would find herself in during the murder trial was falling in love with her boss, Andy Barber and him returning those feelings.

Authors Note: Are people upset about this hot and cold between Andy and reader? Also, I have no idea how the laws of a courtroom work so bear with me as some things may not be correct. Mentions of domestic abuse in this chapter fyi. Tags are open!

Tags: @emimaki @liecastillo @patzammit @evansgal @posiemax @iamemy4 @falling-solar-system @tothemoonandbackx3000 @beckygirl95 @artis1979 @mommad @jennamarieee623 @mansaaay @bellaireland1981 @torntaltos @greeneyedblondie44 @yosoysere @lowkeysebby @dissapointmentofthefam @mansaaay @moonie-brbs @winterberryfox

My stomach was in my throat while my heart hammered loud in my ear as I sat in the chair, a large group of eyes on me. They couldn't see the way my knee bounced with anxiety and anticipation for what was about to come. None of them mattered, however, because I kept my eyes trained hard on the man who sat next to Joanna. He was allowed to be second chair but was unable to speak at all during the trial.

Andy gave me a warm smile, letting me know that everything would be alright. Jacob was sitting next to him, his eyes trained hard on the table in front of him. Laurie, of course, was there behind them. She avoided my eyes at all costs.

“Y/N, can you tell the court how you know the defendant?”

Tearing my gaze away from Andy, I spoke my answer softly to the man that was standing in front of me.

Neal.

“Uh, I’m the housekeeper for the Barber family.”

He nodded. “For how long?”

“Almost a year.”

“So, you know a fair amount of what goes on in that house?” Neal looked to the jury then towards me.

“I guess,” I shrugged.

I was afraid of where this line of questioning was headed, both Andy and Joanna noticed.

“Did the defendant ever confide in you on what happened to the deceased?”

The way that Neal was talking about Jacob and Ben made me realize he really didn’t care for who they were, just proving what everyone thought; Jacob was some kind of monster.

I shook my head. “No. To be honest, it’s none of my business.”

Neal sported a sly smirk while nodding. “Can you tell me what happened to your eye?”

My gaze quickly jumped towards Andy. “I was attacked.”

“By whom?”

In the flash instant I looked at Andy, Joanna’s voice boomed through the small courthouse.

“Objection! What does this have to do with the case at hand?”

Neal held up his hand. “I can prove it by the witness’ answer.”

The judge looked between us all before nodding. “The witness will answer the question.”

My heart continued to pound in my chest when I looked back to Andy.

“It’s okay,” he mouthed.

“I don’t know who, they wore a mask,” I cracked my knuckles with anxiety.

“If you don’t know who then why were you seen with Andy attacking Leonard Patz?”

My gaze sliced into Neal. “We didn’t attack him.”

“Then why did Leonard Patz say that you did?”

I had to bite my lip at the comeback that danced on the tip of my tongue, knowing that if I did have an outburst in court, it would only hurt Jacob’s case.

“And yet, I’m sitting here with a black eye and bruised ribs.”

“Keep it down, Ms. Y/L/N,” the judge warned.

“I’ll change my line of questioning. Do the Barber’s know about your past?” Neal stood with his hands deep in his pockets.

“Objection!” Joanna stood up to her feet. “What does Ms. Y/L/N past have anything to do with the case, your honor?”

Neal walked over to his table, picking up a dark folder, and handed it towards her. “With this evidence, I can prove that.”

Joanna reluctantly took the folder from him, and my stomach was in my throat when Andy’s eyes met mine before reading over the papers himself. Sweat gathered at my brows while tears burned at my eyes, knowing exactly what was in that folder.

Andy let out a sigh, a broken gaze staring deep into me, and with the way his jaw tensed I knew that he was more pissed than disappointed about the current situation we were now in. There was no way that I would be able to explain the situation to him in this courtroom so I prayed that afterwards he would give me the time.

Once the judge looked over the new evidence, he reluctantly nodded. “I’ll allow this new evidence. Keep your questions to the point, Neal.”

He nodded. “Y/N, I’ll ask again; Do the Barber’s know about your past?”

“No,” I let out a shaky breath.

“Can you explain to the court what happened to your mother?”

My eyes snapped up towards Neal and anger was felt deep within my stomach. I wanted nothing more than to jump over the booth I was seated behind and wrap my hands around his throat for even bringing her up; she had absolutely nothing to do with this case. But the judge agreed so I had no choice but to divulge into some memories that I promised I would never think of again.

“She died when I was ten,” I said with as much strength as I could muster.

Neal nodded. “How?”

I shook my head, knowing that he was secretly enjoying this, and wiped away the tears.

“She was murdered; by my father.”

The quiet gasps that sounded in the room fell on my deaf ears as I stared straight ahead towards Andy. He looked at me with sympathetic eyes when he realized why Neal had brought this up.

“Can you explain how he did it?”

“God you’re sick,” I snapped, venom eyes slicing into him.

The judge pointed a finger towards me. “I’m not going to give you another warning, Ms. Y/L/N. One more outburst and I’ll hold you in contempt.”

“Answer the question, Y/N,” Neal spoke without an ounce of apology in his voice.

“My father shot her in the head, right in front of me! Because she cooked his chicken wrong! Is that what you wanted to hear?”

My voice had echoed throughout the small room, the pain evident.

Neal ignored that pain. “You were raised in a violent home, correct?”

Andy’s body tensed under his suit with his own pain and anger, knowing he could do nothing to stop Neal’s senseless verbal attack on me. Jacob, who had kept his gaze down, now was staring at me with a shocked expression and my heart fell to the pit of my stomach, knowing that I was a worry in his mind.

I didn’t want any of this which is why I was so afraid of testifying. I didn’t think, however, that Neal would be able to get his hands on that file. Since I was a minor, it was supposed to be sealed.

“Yes,” I seethed. “Cleary.”

I did my best to hold back the tears but knew that I was failing, tasting the salty bitterness on my lips.

“Did your father ever hit you?”

Andy kept his gaze on me, but I refused to meet him, feeling ashamed that he was finding all of this out during his son’s trial.

Reluctantly, I nodded. “A few times.”

Flashbacks of my father’s fist slamming hard on my skin filled my mind, so I screwed my eyes shut tight.

“You did get revenge on him, correct?”

“Your honor, can we request a small recess? Y/N is clearly not in the right mental space to answer these questions,” Joanna spoke from her chair.

Andy was speaking something in her ear, and I knew it was because of him that she was requesting the recess. He was trying to spare me some time before divulging the biggest secret I kept all these years.

“No,” I shook my head with a sob and my bottom lip trembled. “I can answer.”

With a nod from the judge, I trained my gaze onto Neal, letting the power I suddenly felt fuel me. This secret weighed me down for so long and I refused to let it control me any longer.

“The night my father killed my mother, he was so busy with trying to stage the scene that he didn’t even realize I took the gun. He came after me and before I could stop myself, I pulled the trigger and shot him in his own head.”

“Did you tell Jacob how to commit murder?” Neal asked, unfazed with my confession.

“Absolutely not.” I answered without missing a beat.

He stuffed his hands into his pants pocket, looking between Andy and I, mewling his next question around on his tongue.

“No further questions,” Neal finally spoke, sitting back behind his own table.

My body shook with the quiet sobs, but I continued to hold my head up high, not letting anyone see how defeated I was. Andy prepared me that Neal would stop at nothing to make all of us seem like the bad guys and that’s exactly what he did. Every pair of eyes that sat behind the gate looked at me with sorrow as if I was a small, fragile, human being that would break.

The members of the jury, however, looked at me with something different in their eyes, distrust.

In that moment, under their gazes, I realized my confession had made everything worse.

“You may step down, Ms. Y/L/N.”

With the judge's orders, I quickly slipped out of my chair and passed Andy, who reached for me. My hand snatched away from his grasp, not wanting to feel anyone's burning gaze any longer.

#guilt andy barber #andy barber x reader #andy barber and reader #andy barber x yn #chris evans #andy barber reader insert #andy barber #andy barber fanfiction #andy barber x you #andy barber smut #andy barber imagine

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flowercrown-bard · 3 years

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I was today years old when I found out that cornflowers can also be white/purple and pink.

My first instinct was to never refer to Jaskier’s eyes as being the colour of cornflowers again. My second instinct was to write this instead:

Soulmate AU

word count: ~3k

pairing: Geraskier

Content warnings: blood, injuries

The Colour of Cornflowers

Jaskier’s eyes were the colour of the sky, of the sea, of sapphires. At least that was what people said, when they tried and often succeeded in wooing Jaskier. People who had been lucky enough to have found their soulmates and foolish enough to risk that happiness for a bard who would leave them come the morning.

Geralt would never understand those people. They had something so precious, so special and they were willing to throw it away for a pretty pair of eyes.

Geralt never understood those comparisons to sky, sea and sapphire either, and not only just because he had never seen the colour of either of those things. They just sounded so… cliché. As if someone tried painfully hard to sound like a poet. And didn’t the sky change colour during the dawn or at night? Did every body of water have the same colour? And didn’t some lord or another once proudly present his differently coloured sapphires, knowing full well that Geralt wasn’t able to distinguish between them anyway?

And he never would. It wasn’t uncommon for people to never see the world in colour – soulmates were rare and it wasn’t unheard of that some people lost all sight of colour after rejecting their soulmates for whatever reason.

But all of those people could at least still hope to have the world burst into colour at some point in their lives. Unlike Geralt.

“It is a mercy,” Vesemir had said when he had explained to the frightened boys that would become witchers or die in the trials that they would lose the ability to ever find their soulmates, “that you won’t have to go through that. You won’t get distracted by searching for them. And you won’t get your hearts broken.”

Because even then, Vesemir hadn’t made them believe what everyone else accepted as fact: That witchers didn’t feel, didn’t love.

Vesemir had known better. And he had known that that didn’t change a damn thing. A witcher would fall in love all he wanted, no one would ever accept a witcher’s love.

When Geralt had been younger, he had told himself he would be different. He had thought himself a knight that would one day rescue a damsel or meet a stable boy who loved horses as much as he did. He had thought they might fall in love – for who wouldn’t want to love a hero? – and they would be happy together, Destiny and soulmates be damned.

And then he had saved his first damsel. When she had seen his face, she had screamed and vomited and passed out. And Geralt for the first time understood what Vesemir had meant when he had said it was a mercy not knowing one’s soulmate.

Whoever was cursed to be a witcher’s soulmate, they would draw back in horror once they saw the sickly yellow of their eyes – at least that was how Geralt’s eyes had been described to him – and they would reek of fear rather than of love when they realised just whom Destiny had bound them to.

No human should have to get punished with such a fate. And Geralt knew that he wouldn’t be able to keep himself from shattering if he ever saw disgust on his soulmate’s face.

So it was better that he would never know if he ever met them. It was better that he would never see the colour of Jaskier’s eyes.

He didn’t need to anyway. People never shut up about them, after all.

Between all of those descriptions that made Geralt want to roll his eyes, there was one that somehow got stuck in his mind, no matter how he wanted to shake it off.

Cornflowers.

For some reason it sounded right. Geralt was sure a poet, or even just about any man who was better with words than him, would be able to create a beautiful and meaningful connection between Jaskier and the preciousness of gems, the ever-moving sea or the freedom of the sky or other such sappy nonsense.

But cornflowers…Jaskier had named himself after a flower, hadn’t he? And cornflowers weren’t so different from buttercups. He had heard farmers complain about them, about how difficult they were to get rid of once they had started sprouting in their fields.

Geralt’s lips had twitched upwards when he had heard that and looked at Jaskier who had returned his side-eye with a cheeky wink, as if he knew exactly that Geralt was thinking about the way Jaskier had attached himself to Geralt no matter how hard he had tried to prevent that.

He tried no longer.

He had grown used to Jaskier’s presence. No, it was more than that. He had gotten to appreciate it. To enjoy the humming and chattering. To relish in the feeling of Jaskier running his fingers through Geralt’s hair. To feel his stomach twist in anticipation when he saw Jaskier again after months spent apart.

And when they were apart, Geralt found himself looking at cornflowers, unable to stop his lips from twitching into a soft smile. He might not be able to see their colour and never would, but that didn’t change the fact that they reminded him of Jaskier and of how he hadn’t drawn back in disgust or flinch from his touch even once.

Of course it helped that Jaskier had never seen his eyes in colour either. He couldn’t have. Because if he did, then surely he would have reacted in some way. No one, not even Jaskier was that good an actor.

True, his songs about Geralt often featured descriptions of his eyes – of honey, gold and sunflowers – but Geralt didn’t need to see colours to know that those descriptions were ludicrous. Predatory, sickly, creepy. That was how his eyes were normally described. Jaskier must have just heard the word ‘yellow’ and then asked other people for other, more pleasant things of the same colour. For surely, no one who had ever seen his eyes as they really were would think of something so kind that the first time Geralt had heard it, he had to leave the room for he was sure that he wasn’t able to keep the fondness and admiration he felt in that moment out of his eyes.

Fleeing hadn’t helped, of course. Jaskier didn’t need to sing of honey-eyes or silver moonlight-hair to make Geralt’s chest clench and his fingers itch to reach out and pull Jaskier close.

A single smile from him was enough. A quiet moment shared by a fire. Laughter and bad jokes as they travelled side by side.

Witchers could love and in those moments, Geralt was more thankful that fact than he had ever been for anything else. Loving Jaskier was beautiful.

And it was the most painful and terrifying thing Geralt could imagine.

Never in his life had Geralt been as scared as he had been when he had seen Jaskier run towards him while he was in the middle of a fight. For a terrifying moment, when the griffin’s talons had hit their mark and torn deep gashes into Jaskier’s chest, he had thought this was it. This was how Jaskier died. Because of him.

But as Geralt had dropped to his knees next to him, pressing his hands against the wounds and pleading with Jaskier to stay with him, Jaskier hadn’t blamed him, hadn’t yelled at him or tried to evade his touch. Instead he had lifted one of Geralt’s hands to his lips and pressed a soft kiss against it, heedless of the blood sticking to them.

Jaskier’s eyes had fallen shut and Geralt’s blood had run cold.

His eyes had opened again, later, when Geralt had bandaged up his wounds and brushed his hair out of his forehead tenderly, the same way Jaskier sometimes did with Geralt’s hair when he woke up, drenched in sweat and with his heart racing from a nightmare about the trials, about the day he had lost all hope of ever finding his soulmate.

When Jaskier’s eyes had fluttered open and his face had broken into a smile so soft as if Geralt was the most beautiful sight Jaskier could imagine, Geralt had known. He could never let something like this happen again. As long as Jaskier was with Geralt, he was in danger.

But Geralt had also known that he wouldn’t be able to get rid of Jaskier – neither would he be strong enough to push him away, nor would Jaskier ever willingly go.

Not until Geralt did the unthinkable. Through friendship, through deadly injuries and insults being spat at them, Jaskier stayed with Geralt. But even he had his limits. Even he wouldn’t be able to stay with a witcher, knowing he was loved by him. By a mutant, monster, butcher.

Geralt knew it, the world knew it and surely Jaskier himself knew it too: Jaskier deserved better than someone like him, better than being loved by someone like him. Confessing his feelings to Jaskier would be the last straw that would finally make Jaskier act upon this knowledge and go find someone good enough for him. Someone who wouldn’t put him in danger. Perhaps even someone who could tell Jaskier that his eyes looked like cornflowers and see it too.

Geralt knew that saying the words would irrevocably drive Jaskier from his side. He knew the moment of rejection and disgust would forever be branded in his mind. It would be the thing Geralt would remember when he got injured on a hunt while knowing that Jaskier wouldn’t be waiting for him with a worried look and tender touches.

And yet. Geralt couldn’t bring himself to just say it. He only got one chance to tell Jaskier how he felt, and although it would end in Geralt being shattered and alone, he wanted to relish the moment, the chance to let himself believe for even just a moment that Jaskier wouldn’t push himself away.

So Geralt waited and planned. A part of him knew that he was selfish, that he was only drawing this out so that he would get to keep Jaskier by his side a little longer. Another part of him wanted it to be perfect. He wanted Jaskier to think back to Geralt and remember someone who had tried despite everything to give Jaskier a confession that he deserved.

Except, Geralt wouldn’t ever be able to give such a thing to Jaskier. He wasn’t good enough for him and neither would anything he could ever give him be.

He didn’t have poetic words or grand gestures.

A simple gesture would have to be enough. Maybe it would even help to make Jaskier leave.

It was pure coincidence that they passed the field that day. Jaskier’s hair was lighter than normal in the sun and his smile was bright and easy. Geralt let himself look at him like this one last time. Jaskier was beautiful. Too beautiful for someone like Geralt.

Geralt shouldn’t get to keep him. He had to do it. Now.

Taking a shaking breath and clenching his jaw as if that would stop his hands from trembling, he bent down and plucked the cornflowers right out of the field.

To Geralt they were different shades of grey, ranging from almost white to dark grey, but to anyone else, they would be blue. Like Jaskier’s eyes.

As much as Geralt had always told himself that it was a good thing that he wasn’t Jaskier’s soulmate, he now wished more than anything, that he would have gotten to see the colour of Jaskier’s. He didn’t need to see the world in colour. Knowing blue would have been enough. Then he would have more than grey flowers to remind himself of Jaskier when he was gone.

“Jaskier.” His voice came out slightly hoarse and he had to clear his throat.

It was of no use. As soon as Jaskier turned around and laid eyes on the flowers Geralt held out to him, his throat tightened again.

At the same time, Jaskier’s eyes darted between the flowers and Geralt’s face, searching for something, looking almost achingly hopeful. Though for what, Geralt couldn’t tell. Perhaps Jaskier was for once silently pleading Geralt not to continue talking.

He did it anyway.

“Jaskier, I…these are for you.”

He took a step closer to Jaskier, half-expecting him to draw back. Instead Jaskier too came towards him with hesitant wonder in his eyes and took the flowers from Geralt’s hands. Their fingers brushed and the simple touch sent a jolt through Geralt. This would be the last time he would ever get to feel Jaskier’s skin against his.

“Geralt.” Jaskier sounded choked and there was a watery shine to his eyes that made Geralt’s chest tight and his now empty hands ball helplessly into fists. “Those are beautiful.”

“Like you,” Geralt said, before he had time to think and swallow the words. “Like your eyes. They – cornflowers. They look like your eyes.”

Jaskier stared at him for a long moment but he didn’t move. Geralt knew he had to say more, had to get Jaskier to turn tail and leave Geralt behind, but the words got stuck in his throat and burned like shards of glass cutting into him.

Still, as the moment dragged on, it seemed that Geralt didn’t need to say anything else. Jaskier let out a strangled sound, clearly supressing something else. Not for long, though. Not a heartbeat later, a laugh tumbled from Jaskier’s lips and once that first chuckle was out, he wouldn’t stop himself.

Ice pierced Geralt’s heart and he had to look away. For the first time he couldn’t bear to look at the way Jaskier’s face lit up as he laughed. He should have known. Jaskier was kind, but he was also expressive beyond believe. Geralt had no doubt that he would have tried to let him down gently, but it seemed that the idea of a witcher trying to be romantic was too ridiculous for even Jaskier to keep his composure.

“Oh, oh Geralt,” Jaskier said in between laughs, gasping for air and wiping away tears that had spilt free with his free hand. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I know I shouldn’t laugh. You’re being very sweet, it’s just-“

“I know. You don’t need to say it. I know.” Geralt interrupted, suddenly desperate not to have Jaskier say it out loud. Seeing him leave was one thing. He could still pretend that it was no different than when they separated for the winter. But hearing Jaskier outright tell him that Geralt’s feelings were a joke to him – Geralt wouldn’t be able to bear it, to have these words join the ones of hatred and disdain that he remembered whenever he lay awake at night, kept awake by self-doubt and shame.

“Oh, I don’t think you do,” Jaskier said and his smile didn’t falter, as if he wasn’t tearing Geralt’s heart out with it. “It’s just…Geralt, I know you can’t know this, but…my eyes are blue.”

“I do know.”

“Yes, well, but these flowers aren’t. They are lovely, of course, but this one for example is very clearly pink.” He tilted his head to the side like a bird as he looked at Geralt with mirth in his eyes. “You know, it’s almost the same colour your cheeks get sometimes when I sing about you.”

A painful spike shot through his heart. The flowers weren’t blue. The one thing he had known to do to try his hand at a romantic, albeit simple gesture and he had messed it up. Of course he wouldn’t be able to do even such a simple thing. Of course Jaskier would –

His thoughts came to a screeching halt and his eyes widened as the full meaning of Jaskier’s words came crashing down on him.

The flowers were pink. Jaskier knew, he saw, that they were pink.

“You can see colours.” He had meant for it to be a question, but it came out as a bitter truth.

Jaskier’s cheeks darkened. “I…yes. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean for you to find out.”

“Why-how long?”

Jaskier swallowed nervously and his eyes darted away for a second, before finding Geralt’s again, pleading and scared. He clutched the flowers to his chest as if he feared Geralt would tear them off his hands.

“You know how long,” he said softly, almost apologetic. “Ever since I first saw you.”

“No.” Geralt shook his head. This wasn’t- this couldn’t be. He had expected Jaskier to flee from him, to tell him that he didn’t feel the same way. He had never expected him to be cruel. “No, you don’t – You can’t be. I can’t be.”

“I’m sorry.” The apology tumbled out of Jaskier’s mouth fast enough to slur the words together and his hand shot out to seize Geralt by the wrist. The touch burned him even through his clothes. “I know you don’t like Destiny. I never should have said… I don’t want you to force you into this. You must believe me.”

Geralt’s mind went blank. It almost sounded…he shouldn’t be foolish enough to believe this. He shouldn’t feel hope burning in his chest, but the way Jaskier said it….it didn’t sound as if he himself hated the idea of being soulmates with a witcher.

“You wanted me to choose you?” Geralt asked bewildered, still unable to comprehend.

Jaskier’s eyes softened and his smile turned into something bittersweet. “That was all I had ever wanted. I always thought you wouldn’t, but now…Please don’t take this back. Don’t tell me this isn’t what you chose, just because it’s the choice Destiny wanted you to make.”

Geralt’s brows drew together. “I couldn’t care less what Destiny wants me to do.”

Jaskier’s face fell when Geralt pulled his wrist out of his grip. After a moment of hesitation, Geralt lifted his now free hand to cup Jaskier’s cheek.

Jaskier let out a soft gasp, before leaning into the touch with an unknown desperation.

“I choose you,” Geralt said, his fingers caressing Jaskier’s skin. “I love you.”

“I love you too,” Jaskier said urgently. “I would choose you time and time again, whether Destiny wanted me to or not.”

Geralt’s throat went tight once more. “You know I can’t see colours. You know I won’t ever be able to compare your eyes to something and know it’s what they look like.” His gaze dropped to the flowers in Jaskier’s hand. “I can’t give you flowers the right colour.”

Jaskier let out a watery laugh. He turned his head and kissed the palm of Geralt’s hand, before taking one of the flowers – perhaps a pink one, perhaps one of a different colour entirely – out of the posy and tucked it behind Geralt’s ear.

“It doesn’t matter. The colour never mattered. They are beautiful. Because they come from you.”

“You are beautiful,” Geralt echoed. “Because you are you. Colour or no.”

His hand trailed down until he was gently holding his chin, titling his head up ever so slightly.

“Jaskier?” he asked, one last hesitation, one last chance for Jaskier to choose to take his words back.

Jaskier made his choice.

He leaned forward and pressed their lips into a soft kiss.

Geralt had always known that loving Jaskier was beautiful, but in this moment Geralt learned for the first time, that nothing, no flowers and no colours could ever be as beautiful as it was being loved by Jaskier.

#i know nothing about flowers #so if those aren't cornflowers after all I'm sorry #soulmate au #geraskier #geraltxjaskier #geralt x jaskier #geralt #jaskier #fic #my writing #witcher #witcher fic #fanfic #i should have finished my other wip instead #or prepared for the presentation i'll have to do tomorrow #or slept #this is once again not edited #pining

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ulalumewitch · 3 years

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I’ve had this Elucien fic rolling around my brain for a while and decided to put it out there. No warnings with this one. Just angst and bits of hope for possible futures (I swear I write things other than angst all the time - haha).

Happy Sunday everyone!

Word count: 2,807

Themes: Angst/Hope

Choices

Lucien couldn’t believe it. He could not believe that another Winter Solstice ended in utter ruins because of his mate. Because of his godsdamned mate and he’d had enough. He would end it, and end it now.

“Elain!” He shouted at her retreating figure.

But she pulled the ruby red cloak tighter around her shoulders and quickened her steps. Fresh snow remained mostly untouched on small front lawns and sidewalks of Velaris as he ran from the front door of the Riverside Estate after Elain. Most families and friends likely hunkered down in their homes enjoying fires and brandies and gifts and laughter with no cause to go out walking as the last hours of Solstice crept by entering the darkest hours of night before the dawn.

The longest night of the year. The longest three years of his life. Three years of being both rejected and not rejected by his mate. And he couldn’t take it anymore.

“Would you stop,” he growled as they reached the gate, “You owe me one conversation.”

Elain stopped. Her spine snapped straight. She turned and glared at him, her eyes molten with pure hatred.

Lucien had chosen his words carefully. Tempers he could handle, he’d had enough practice over the centuries with a hot headed High Lord. He could handle master manipulators and sweet talkers. He could handle battle worn generals and courtiers of the most delicate constitution. He could handle gossipers and those genuinely interested in friendship.

But what he could not handle was nothing. He could not handle the looks that went right through him. The unanswered questions. The blank stares. The Solstice presents delicately placed to the side and left alone as if they didn’t exist at all.

“I owe you nothing. Leave me alone.”

“I won’t. You are my mate -“

“I don’t want to be your mate!”

“Then reject me and reject he bond!” Lucien yelled, his voice echoing through the silent night.

The stars glittered in the black sky, now completely clear after the fast moving snow clouds from earlier in the evening had dissipated. It brought just enough snow to coat the city white before moving on. As if the Mother heard every prayer from the younglings of Night Court for a white Solstice, and then granted their wish.

Elain’s nostrils flared and for a moment, the briefest moment, her eyes flashed an emotion he couldn’t quite place but had seen before. And it hit him. She’d possessed the same look of bewilderment when she’d still been sopping wet from the Cauldron’s waters, Nesta clawing at her sobbing. The look of knowing but not knowing.

“Reject it,” he rasped, the fight and fire receding slightly, “Reject it so that I can move on. You think I enjoy this? You think that any of this has made me feel good over the last three years?”

“I didn’t choose you. I didn’t choose any of this. I didn’t want any of this,” she cried.

Lucien took a breath. It was rare he lost control like this. He’d spent centuries honing his reactions and temperament to be the Fox and mold his features and behaviors into whatever he’d needed in order to ferret out information, or to keep his own secrets safe. But he couldn’t do that around her, his mate.

“I didn’t choose you either,” Lucien said.

She flinched, and looked away down the street. She crossed her arms and shivered. Her cheeks flushed a pink as if kissed by two rose petals and once again her beauty struck him like a slap across the face.

“I know you were in love with another male -“

“Stop it -“

“I know you hate being Fae. I know what you did to try and turn yourself human again -“

“I said stop it,” Elain growled through clenched teeth, “Stop it. Why are you doing this?”

“Because I can’t take it anymore,” Lucien stated, willing himself to be calm, to stop shouting.

He needed this conversation. They both did.

“You wouldn’t know this because you refuse to ever speak to me but I was in love once too,” Lucien said and took a step closer to her, “I was in love with a female and planned to marry her. And my - And the High Lord of Autumn had her killed in front of me and I couldn’t save her.”

Elain’s lips parted in a silent gasp. Her brow furrowed. For a moment he thought she might ask a question, but instead she closed her lips and looked down at he ground.

“I didn’t choose to live without her. I didn’t choose to run away to another Court and make a home there. I didn’t choose a life of intelligence work, books, sparring, warring, and everything in between. But we don’t always get a choice, Elain. What we can choose is what we do with the things that happen to us.”

Lucien paused but she remained silent. Because of course she would stay silent. Fine. Maybe it would be easier this way.

“I chose to deepen my friendship with Tamlin and to truly be a part of his Court and I made the best of it. I chose to continue my education of Courts and history and everything in between so that I could help keep the peace as much as possible. I chose to become trained as a warrior so that I could be as strong and prepared as possible for any situation. I chose those things to make the best of my life. I chose not to wallow in the what-could-have-beens for centuries because no one can survive that way.”

Lucien took another step towards her so that they were only a few inches apart. He could see Elain’s breathing had increased slightly. Her arms tightened across her chest. But she did not move away.

“I did not choose to be your mate, no one gets that choice,” Lucien whispered, “But we can choose, together, whether we want to reject this mating bond to try to lessen its effects as much as possible. It will never go away completely, but if we officially reject it then we can at least bury it and move on separately and away from each other.”

“Is that what you want?” Elain whispered, and she glanced up at him, her eyes somehow still sparkling as if the sun reflected in them.

Lucien’s heart ached. It was the first question she’d asked him since asking if he could hear her beat those years ago. And she’d been so broken then, he could barely breathe around the memory of seeing her in such a state. So he told her the truth.

“What I want is for you to talk with me and be honest with me,” he began carefully, “I want to know why the Cauldron and Mother saw fit to pair us together. Do you know that mates are equally matched and often so is their magic, their power?”

Elain glanced away and nodded. She shifted on her feet slightly.

“I’ve done some research on it.”

Lucien leaned closer to her and clasped his hands behind his back. He didn’t need her or those obnoxious bats, whom he knew lurked in the shadows, to think he would touch her. Overbearing babysitters the lot of them, even if their hearts were in the right place.

“No one knows what I’m about to tell you Elain. You could use the information against me and spread it to the Inner Circle, or anyone who might wish me harm, or you could tuck it away for private reflection. But I have much more magic and power than anyone thinks. I only let a very little bit show in the company of others. And since we are mates, I have a theory that you are the same. You only show a small bit of what you are actually capable of and have hidden the rest away. Your sisters are powerful, Elain, and I find it very hard to believe that you would be different. I also think that one of the reasons you are so unhappy is because it scares you. I could help you discover what you’re capable of - learn about it, grow with it, strengthen it, control it, and use it. You were not given a choice to become Fae and I am sorry that neither Tamlin nor I realized what was happening until it was too late. You have no idea how sorry I am. And I am sorry that you lost the love of your life in the process. I’m sorry.”

Elain stared at him. Stared and stared.

Lucien could scarcely breathe. His heart lurched forward in his chest, begging him to tug on the bond, to bring her nearer. To touch her. Kiss her. Love her.

But he forced the instinct down. Even though every beat of his heart echoed, my mate, he shut all of it down.

“There are options other than rejection,” he began slowly, “If you would like, Elain, we could discuss it, but it can’t only be me talking. And if I’m being honest, it kills me that I don’t know you. Feyre used to talk about you all the time at Spring Court when she lived there. And over the past three years I’ve gotten bits from her and Nesta, on the rare occasion I speak with her. But those are their perspectives. I would like to know first hand, about you.”

Elain looked away and cleared her throat, “What is it you want to know?”

Hope sparked in Lucien’s chest. He tightened his hands behind his back. Carefully. He had to tread so, so carefully.

“Well, for starters, I’ve always wondered if there is anything other than gardening you enjoy? What do you like? What are your passions? Your dreams? What makes you happy? Upset? Do you have any religious or spiritual beliefs? Do you enjoy sports? Do you have a favorite season? Hobbies? Preferred genre of music? Books? I want to know about you, Elain, and not from anyone else. I want to experience you. I want to know why the godsdamned universe decided why you and I should be together.”

Elain let out a breath that could have been a laugh or a huff of annoyance. He wasn’t sure which, and it killed him that he didn’t know his mate well enough to know which it was.

“I hate winter,” she whispered and looked up at the sky, “I hate the cold. I never want to be cold again. I’ve had enough of it after living in that godforsaken hovel all those years. Spring has always been my favorite season. Is … how is it there?”

Lucien frowned slightly, “Improving at a glacial pace.”

“I remember the night Azriel and Feyre came to rescue me at Hybern’s camp,” she whispered, her arms tightening around her, “And I remember Azriel holding on to me as I held on to that poor girl and watching in horror as those beast things closed in on my sister. I thought she was dead. And then Tamlin came out of no where and saved her. Saved us. I think of that quite a bit actually.”

Lucien stared at her. What the hell was he supposed to say to that?

“If he needs assistance with his gardens, I could help. I’m bored to tears in winter here and I don’t think the High Lord of Spring should have flagging gardens, do you?” Elain asked and met his eyes then.

Strength shone in them. Her chin tipped up slightly and Lucien lost his breath. A shiver ran along his spine as he realized his assumption on her untapped and hidden power had likely been correct. He did not stare into the eyes of a doe but a Wolf. Of course a godsdamned Wolf would would lurk under her skin. She was an Archeron sister after all.

“No, I don’t think so either. It might help Tam, to have his estate restored a bit,” Lucien suggested carefully, “If you ever wanted to get away from the cold of Velaris during winter, I could arrange it.”

Elain looked away again and whispered, “I’ve been so lonely. I don’t know what to do.”

Lucien frowned as pain wrapped around his heart, and realized with utter horror, it was not his pain but hers. Gods, had she been living with this?

“Elain,” Lucien murmured, “All I’m asking for is to share one meal. One conversation. I’m not suggesting we get mated or married or any of it. Hell, I’m not even asking for a date. I’m only asking for one conversation so that we can both maybe decide if rejecting the bond really is the best thing or if maybe, maybe, there might be something here worth exploring, growing, tending like one of your gardens. No expectations. Just …”

“Just time to decide what kind of choice we want to make with what the Cauldron gave us?” Elain offered quietly.

A breath he didn’t know he’d been holding rasped through his lips. His gold eye whirred. He blinked and golden light swirled around Elain hedged with blush pink and warm vermillion. She looked like a goddess inside the sun, and gods did he want to worship her. But was she worth worshiping? He desperately wanted to find out.

He blinked and his eye showed her as any one would see her once again. Lucien nodded his agreement.

Elain cleared her throat and looked down the street, “I didn’t eat. Did you?”

“Not much, those fools love their drink on holidays,” Lucien offered with a small laugh, “They’re a happy lot though aren’t they?”

Elain shrugged, “I suppose. Are you hungry?”

Warmth spread through his chest. Lucien allowed a smile to touch his lips.

“I could eat.”

“Do you think any of the restaurants are open?” Elain asked.

“You want to have this conversation now?” Lucien asked incredulously.

A smile bloomed across her face. Her rosy cheeks pinked further and he’d never wanted to kiss anyone so badly in his life before.

Elain released her arms and crooked an elbow to him. He stared at the offered arm. Was he dreaming?

“Well, Fox?” Elain asked, “Shall we?”

Lucien’s heart leapt in his chest. He closed the last few inches between them and looped his arm through hers. Suddenly, the weight of a thousand stones of grief and dejection lifted from his shoulders. His heart felt so light he could have wept.

“I know of one restaurant that will be open. It’s not the best, but it’s decent and within walking distance,” Lucien began, “And after this conversation, if you would like to have another - if we would both like to have another - then I can take you to my favorite restaurant. It is in the middle of the largest botanical gardens in all of Prythian.”

Elain raised an eyebrow, “In the middle of winter?”

Lucien grinned at her and winked, “It’s in Summer Court.”

She nodded, “I would like that, if,” and softly cleared her throat, “If we both decide we would like another conversation after tonight that is.”

Lucien nodded, “Very well, Lady Light. Are you cold?”

A small smile. An even smaller snicker.

“A little.”

“Give me your hand,” Lucien offered his free hand to her, palm up.

Elain stared at his open palm. Lucien felt a small lick of pride at how still she became, like a true Immortal creature, she’d mastered the art of preternatural stillness.

Then, she lightly rested her hand against his. Lucien maintained eye contact with her as he closed his fingers around her hand and touched the spark of fire within him. Elain gasped and her eyes widened.

“How did you do that?” She murmured, and a small laugh escaped her, “I’m positively toasty.”

Lucien’s heart fluttered but kept his tone airy, almost bored, “A small bit of magic for me. It’s a gift not everyone possesses. Not many know I can do it. Shall we eat? I’m rather hungry myself.”

Elain nodded, “I would like that, thank you.”

Lucien nodded and let go of her hand but tightened his arm still hooked around hers slightly. He didn’t bother to hide the widening of his smile as she gently squeezed back.

He sent a silent prayer of thanks to the Mother as they walked arm in arm down the street, their tracks the only pair as they made their way away from the High Lord and Lady’s Riverside estate and into Velaris.

Lucien didn’t know what choice she would make in the end. He didn’t know what choice he would make in the end. But at least, for now, there was a sun dawning to end the longest night of the year. And he’d never been happier to see its light.

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

#elucien #acotar fanfiction #elain archeron #lucien #angst #possibility

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andreafmn · 3 years

Text

I'm Not Afraid - Chapter 1

Word Count: 3,325

Characters: Female Reader Argent Character, Original Male Argent Character, Derek Hale, Allison Argent, Scott McCall, Stiles Stilinski, Isaac Lahey, Lydia Martin, Chris Argent, Jackson Whittemore

Story Description: (Y/N) Argent arrived at Beacon Hills to put to rest her father's sister, Kate Argent. For the first time, her family has decided to settle down and sustain a life in this interesting small town. After 17 years, (Y/N) has the opportunity to establish interpersonal relationships but will she be ready to face the complications that come with relating to her cousin's, Allison, friends; especially, the infamous Derek Hale. She will face the adventure of being associated with the Derek and McCall pack as well as being faced with the discovery of certain aspects of her life she never imagined.

*DISCLAIMER* I do not own in any way Teen Wolf, all credits of the pre-established characters, script, and storyline belong to Jeff Davis and MTV Network. The only thing I own is Argent Reader insert, her immediate family, and her storyline, as well as her effects in the others' storyline.

Chapter: 1/?

Chapter Description: (Y/N) finally arrives at Beacon Hills for the funeral of her aunt and meets a certain wolf to which she feels a special connection.

A/N: Second fandom I'm writing for. I love Teen Wolf so much and the trope of hard Derek but only soft for you makes my heart sing. If you enjoy my writing I’ll also be posting them in AO3 and Wattpad along with other stories (I also hope to start taking requests if ya’ll want) Hope you enjoy and all constructive criticism is encouraged.

Next ->

Chapter 1

I hugged the black coat to my body as hard as I could whilst pushing through the sea of press. Our family's last name became quite known after the reports about my aunt, whose burial we were attending. She had allegedly burned down a house with people in it. She killed them in cold blood. I hugged my grieving uncle and his less grieving wife, then my cousin who had a painful look on her face. I hugged her the longest. She let herself crumble on my arms, sobbing uncontrollably. Even though she was a horrible person she was still our aunt, family.

I took my seat behind Allison when my father, my mother, uncle Chris, and aunt Victoria stood up. Allison didn't lift her head and neither did I. I just tried to comfort her.

"It's been such a long time I don't expect you to call me grandpa." We both looked up to see a white-haired man who resembled the Argent features. "Don't worry about it, just call me Gerard." He hugged both of us, an overpowering aura emanating from his being. When we were engulfed, I looked to the side and saw two boys squatting behind a gravestone. If they were hiding, they were doing a horrible job at it.

"But I prefer Grandpa," Gerard said walking to his seat. I sat back down and drifted off during the whole ceremony. Once it was over, I joined my parents and we drove to our new house. I have a feeling that life here will be very interesting.

That weekend I decided that I had been putting working out off for too long. I changed into comfortable workout clothes and gave food to my dog, Brody. I headed out the door, put my earbuds on, and started to jog. I really didn't know where I was going since it was a new place for me, all I know is that I kept running until I reached the woods. The bad thing about this, I had no idea how to get back home. Even though I knew of this sidetrack and I knew I would be late to get back home, I kept running, needing a release from the mundane feeling of being new in town and having to reunite from our estranged family in a funeral.

I had gained a lot of momentum. God knows how fast I was running at this point that is until I hit something, it almost felt like a wall. When I looked up, I saw a very handsome guy. Spiked hair, green eyes, and slight stubble. If it weren't for the fact that I was already sweaty I would have started to sweat showers of how nervous I was. That is until he opened his mouth.

"Watch where you're going." He growled at me.

"How about you fucking move and not be a prick?" He looked at me with big eyes, probably in surprise, but quickly changed to his menacing look. Who was he trying to fool?

"Well, this is private property, which means that you're trespassing, meaning you should pay more attention to your surroundings."

"I'm sorry but a burnt-down house with almost no walls or roof is barely a property. So, how about you stop being an idiot and I can be on my way." I started to jog once again but he gained my attention once more.

"You're new here, aren't you?" I turned around to face him.

"What's it to you?" He raised his eyebrow.

"I'll take that as a yes." The cockiness oozed out of his pores.

"And why the hell should that matter?"

"Because no one would dare talk to me that way."

"Who would be afraid of a little sour wolf?" He tensed up. "Dude, chill. I'm just kidding. But I doubt anyone would be afraid of Mr...."

"Hale. Derek Hale." He said extending his hand to me. Gee, after screaming at me he wants us to be acquaintances. I thought about not shaking his hand, but I didn't want to be rude. Well, more than I have been already.

"(Y/N). Argent." I shook his hand. Strong grip. Suddenly I felt a rush of déjà vu; I had met him the day before. "Wait, aren't you that guy I accidentally hit with my grocery cart yesterday?"

"Yeah, that really hurt. You hit my ankle. You could've had me limping."

"But you're not, so be grateful I didn't break your ankle." He laughed. "Damn, if I had known how cocky you really were, I would've hit you harder."

"So, you admit that you hit me?"

"Oh yeah, of course, I hit you. Accidentally that is."

"Yeah, yeah."

I looked around trying to find where the hell I had come from but there wasn't even the slightest trail as to where I was to go.

"So, miss (Y/N). Do you even know your way home?"

"No, but I'm sure I can find my way back." Then, he took keys out of his pocket and pointed to his car.

"Come on, I'll drive you around and you just tell me when something seems familiar."

"And why should I go with the guy that almost ripped out my throat for bumping into him? For all I know you could be driving me to my death." I crossed my arms over my chest, and he let out a loud sigh.

"Look, I'm sorry for snapping. But I'm trying to be nice. That doesn't happen very often."

"Alright, Mr. Hale. I'll let you take me home just because you are being nice now, after being a prick, and I'm exhausted."

"See, no one can resist me." I rolled my eyes at his cockiness. Seriously does he buy cans of it on eBay?

"Don't get cocky with me. I can punch the living daylights out of you." He chuckled and started to drive.

We drove for about 20 minutes until I finally recognized the curb that led to my house. Upon arriving at my driveway, I got out of the car and walked to the driver’s side.

"Give me your hand” For some reason, I felt compelled to do so. He took a pen and wrote down a number. "Call me if you ever need a tour of the town."

Three weeks later, I walked inside the school to meet up with Allison. I moved here with my family since dad had some business taking float. Being the new kid in town is never fun. I would know. I switch schools almost every year. The pro and con about this would be not being attached to anyone. Usually, I'm the one who doesn't talk to anyone and is called a freak. A derogatory term given to people who are way too different from others, but a title I wore proudly.

"Oh my gosh, (Y/N)! How have you been?" Allison wrapped her arms around me and hugged me tightly. It was as if she hadn't seen me just three weeks ago.

"Hi, Allison. I've been good, getting acclimated to the new town. You?" You would think that because we were cousins, I would be more affectionate towards her but honestly, I wouldn't see her again for like three more years, so what's the point?

"I'm good. A little rocky at the start of coming here but good." Then, a boy with a buzz cut and one with great brown hair walked by and smiled at Alli. "Ooh, you should come meet my friends. Stiles, Scott!! Come here." The boys turned around with goofy grins on their faces.

"Hey, Allison. Who's this?" Buzzcut kid said.

"This is my cousin, (Y/N). She just moved here from Virginia."

"Pleasure to meet you. I'm Scott." The one with the great hair said.

"Nice to meet you, I'm Stiles." I shook their hands and smiled.

"Nice to meet you, too, buzzcut." Allison and Scott laughed but Stiles only ran his hand through his hair, suddenly becoming hyperaware of his lack of locks.

"Allison. Who might this sexy lady be?" I rolled my eyes. The last thing I need is a narcissist with a god-complex trying to get close.

"Oh, Jackson, this is my cousin, (Y/N)."

"Hi." He extended his hand and looked me up and down.

"Hi." I smiled sarcastically, and when I didn't extend my hand, he dropped his.

Finally, after standing awkwardly behind Allison whilst her friends talked, the bell rang. Talk about saved by the bell.

"Hey, (Y/N), what's your first class?" I checked my schedule.

"Um, chemistry."

"Oh, good, then you're coming with us to Mr. Harris' class," Scott said pointing towards him and Stiles. I smiled and walked behind them.

Once we got to the classroom everyone turned to me, the ever-present sign of being new in the class evident in the stare of my classmates.

"Um, hi, my name is (Y/N) Argent and I'm new." The teacher, whom I guess is Mr. Harris, turned around to face me.

"Oh, yes, Miss Argent. Welcome. You will be sitting next to Isaac Lahey. Lahey, raise your hand." Once Isaac raised his hand, I noticed he was sat near Stiles and Scott. Two people I was trying to avoid. As I walked past, I accidentally pushed Stiles' book on his lap, startling him, resulting in an awkward descent from his lab stool onto the floor.

"Hi, again. I guess we are gonna see a lot of each other for the rest of the school year." I nodded and he scratched the back of his neck. "So, um, what school did you come from?"

"Lancaster High," I responded whilst writing down what Mr. Harris was writing on the board. Stiles kept trying to talk to me, but I would only give him short, cold answers or just ignore him. That is until Mr. Harris called our attention, that's when he finally got the memo to shut up.

"I'm sorry to bother you, but I just wanted to introduce myself since we're gonna be seated next to each other all year. I'm Isaac."

"I figured." I tried giving him my best smile. The vibe he was giving off seemed like he needed it. "I'm (Y/N)."

"Well, nice to meet you, (Y/N). Now I'll leave you to the class because if I don't I know I'll be failing even more than I am."

"Oh, well, maybe I can tutor you some time. I'm actually really good at science. My mom was a chemist professor once upon a time so I'm bound to understand all this."

"Really?!" His puppy eyes seemed to light up and I nodded. "That would actually be amazing."

"Sure thing. Now let's get back to class."

After Chemistry finished, I put everything in my bag as quickly as possible and sped to my next class, Math. Thankfully, none of Allison's friends shared this class with me but I did share it with Isaac. I didn't consider him much a friend but more an acquaintance in desperate need of help.

As the day progressed, I noticed the rest of my classes were shared with one or more of Allison's friends. They all tried to strike up a conversation but were quickly discouraged when met with my one-worded or vague answers. Especially, Stiles. He tried especially hard to get answers out of me, only being met with the occasional laugh or stare at his comical occurrences. He seemed like the kind of person you could just open up to. The same could be said about Scott. His shy nature was alluring, and he portrayed himself as a very trustworthy and loyal being.

But I would not allow myself to let them in. My whole being yearned for a real friendship, someone to share nothing and everything; never again.

At lunch, I sat outside and ate my food quietly, a book in front of my face to shield my eyes from the sun the prevalent stares of my peers. After some minutes of appreciated loneliness, the empty table was filled with conversating teenage bodies. I smiled politely but, in my mind, I was cursing them out.

"So, (Y/N), how's your day been?" Allison asked whilst munching on an apple. I swallowed what was left of my bite and answered.

"Fine, thank you." This time no one pressed on after my short answers, finally getting the hint of my disinterest. In the corner of my eye, I saw Isaac sitting under a tree munching on half a sandwich. I excused myself and went to join him, heavily enjoying his tranquil aura.

"Oh, hi, (Y/N)." He smiled sheepishly.

"Hey, Isaac. Is that all you're eating?"

"Yeah. I'm not very hungry." He looked down as if he were ashamed.

"Nonsense! Here," I gave him the other half of my burger and another bag of chips I had in my bag. "You can't tell me you're not hungry. You're a boy in peak development."

"Thanks." He smiled as he continued munching on his food. I put on some music and we continued eating in silence. No conversation required.

The day went on smoother than it started. Classes flew by fairly quickly and the incessant chit-chat seemed to diminish. During last period I was like every other student, anxiously waiting for the bell to signal the end of the school day. When my pleads were answered, I packed the necessary book into my bag and left the rest in my locker, expertly avoiding any more social encounters. Quickly, I made my way to the waiting open car door of my father's car, ignoring Allison's beckoning me t.wards the small group of friends.

"How was your first day, darling?" My father spoke up breaking my attention from the scenery.

"Like any other first day I've had." I smiled. "The towns might change but school is always the same."

Finally at home, we were greeted with the sight of my mother cooking; people were coming over.

"(Y/N), honey, Chris, Victoria, and Allison are coming over tonight. So, go do a quick workout and come back to get ready." I nodded and ran to my room to change into workout clothes.

My routine would normally consist of waking up, working out, go to school for a dreading eight hours, come back home, workout again, do my homework, eat, and go to sleep. I lead a very monotonous life and it had been this way since I could remember. One of my earliest memories was of my father teaching me archery alongside Allison, a great distraction to our always disrupted home life. As I got older, my father started training me in boxing and knife maneuvering. How would these skills help me in life were still a mystery but I felt safe knowing them.

I got changed and decided to take Brody out with me on a quick jog through the woods. "Hey, boy, ready to go?"

He jumped on me which I took as a yes and started for the woods. We ran down the same trail I had been going on for the past three weeks. Mostly, I went down this track in hopes that Derek would make an appearance, and today was not the exception. As the ruins of his house came to view so did his tall figure.

"Trespassing again?"

"It doesn't count if I know the owner." During our greeting, Brody's leash slipped out of my hand and he ran to jump on Derek, leaving slobbering licks on his cheek. "I'm so sorry."

"Don't worry about it." He chuckled and helped me bring him down.

"I guess he likes you, even though he doesn't like anyone but me. Guess you're special."

"Maybe." He grinned.

Out of nowhere, I hit him in the shoulder. "What was that for?!"

"For trying to run me over with your shopping cart two days ago. It was uncalled for."

"No, it was revenge. You hit ME first. In the ankle."

"You're still on with that. Come on, sour wolf. That happened three weeks ago, and it was an accident."

"Whatever. Come on, I'll give you a ride home. It's getting kind of dark." This had also become part of my routine. After "bumping" into Derek he would offer to drop me off at my house, claiming it was for security.

"Okay, we're here. By the way, the offer to show you around town is still up. Just call me whenever." He said as he stopped the car in front of my house.

"Alright, will do, and thanks for the ride, Derek. I'd invite you in, but my family is coming over."

"No worries, maybe another time."

"It's a date. Anyways, thanks again. See you when I see you."

"Okay, goodnight."

"Night." He waited until I entered the house and drove away.

"Munchkin, is that you?" My father screamed from the kitchen.

"Yeah!" I screamed back.

"Okay, well, go take a shower and get ready your uncle will get here soon."

I hurried up the stairs and hopped in the shower letting the hot water stream down my body calming any aching muscle that was palpitating. In my room, I searched through my closet for an acceptable family dinner outfit, deciding a grey sweater and black jeans would be enough. I braided my hair out of my face and went downstairs to help my mother set the table.

After we put the last plate the doorbell rang.

"I'll get it!" I ran to the door and was greeted by my uncle. "Uncle Chris!" I jumped and he hugged me. There was no doubt that he was my favorite family member, his presence was always welcoming. His wife on the other hand was as cold as the winters we spent in New York. She was nice but absolutely scary. "Hi, Aunt Victoria."

"Hello, (Y/N)." I hugged her and said hi to Allison.

"Come in, guys." They walked in and I closed the door behind them.

"So, (Y/N), how have you been?" Uncle Chris asked while stuffing his mouth with mom's famous lasagna.

"I've been good. I mean, moving all the time takes a toll on you at first, but I got used to it. It's easy now to pack it all up once the school year ends."

"Oh, honey, that must be so hard on you," Victoria said. I could not read her tone, her words spoke in sympathetic notes with an underlying melody of sarcasm. Not knowing what to answer, I bit my lip and nodded.

The whole evening was spent on us catching up and eating, laughing, playing games, but the good times came to an end when the clock hit 9:00 pm. It was stupid to set a curfew, but my mom usually had everyone in bed at this time, 10:30 as of late.

"You better come around the house more often." Uncle Chris demanded and hugged me.

"Yes, sir." I raised my hand to my eyebrow and saluted, as did he.

"Let's go, Chris. And thank you for the lovely dinner, Rebecca," Victoria said linking arms with my uncle and smiling at mom.

"No problem. Come by any time." They talked for a bit more and after they left, I went upstairs to change for bed.

"Momma, I'm gonna go to sleep."

"Okay, honey. Goodnight." I went upstairs, brushed my teeth, and put my hair in a ponytail.

Before bed, I made sure everything I would need for the next day was packed into my bag and made sure my alarm was set. I pulled all the throw pillows from my bed and set them aside, then making my way to the window to draw the curtains. Something caught my attention in the backyard, though. My eyes squinted trying to make out the figure in front of me. Blinking the confusion away, I made a double-take and looked back at an empty yard. I laughed to myself as I crept into bed. Why would Derek be in my backyard?

Next ->

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softyoongiionly · 3 years

Text

For Whom the Bell Tolls

Just outside the boundaries of your town, deep within the trenches of the forest sits a massive tower made from smoke-stained ivory. Decrepit and ominous, it looms over your town like a warning- like a shadow...

There are opposing rumors as to what resides in the tower.

One of them, the one that just so happens to appeal to you the most, is that there is a deity living in that tower.

The one who knows.

The one who blesses and curses the deserving and offers wisdom that no mortal can.

And now, faced with the imminent demise of your family- you have no choice but to seek answers in the darkness.

What, in god’s name, will you find?

Pairing: Jimin x Reader

Genre: demi-god! au, demi-god! Jimin, mythology, slight angst, smut, fantasy

Word count: 8k (THIS WAS SUPPOSED TO BE PWP)

Warnings: likely inaccurate representations of greek mythology lmao, unprotected sex (wrap it up plz), mentions of violence/death, slightly spooky??? allusions to corruption and murder (non-explicit), JIMIN (cause he’s always a warning), probably a messy plot cause I went feral with this one. parts are unedited oops.

A/N: i have nothing to say. this was supposed to be demon porn and now we have a completely new au. SOMEONE PLEASE STOP ME. okay anyways,,,, i love u.

Corruption.

It ran rampant through your town like the plague, devouring everything in its path. One right after another, you have seen it swallow those who you had come to respect; good town folk, who at one time, moved through the world with a moral compass stronger than the one you felt you possessed, had now fallen ill to the disease.

And you understood...to an extent. The universe was not a benevolent dealer. It randomly assigns cards to its patrons and cares not about the outcome- or the losses. You understood that sometimes people were simply without a winning hand.

But the need to win was still present.

However, your town was spoiled with a type of greed that wafted through the streets and turned everything to mold. Neighbor betraying neighbor, partner betraying partner- even mother’s betraying their children...

All to please one man...

Lord Instinctus was the ruler of your province. Born into nobility, he took over the position after his father passed away and began turning the tides in his favor. Taxes were raised, work hours following suit and, harsh punishments were administered to anyone who dared questioned the new system. He forced your town to pledge their loyalty to him on the day he took over and sent ‘enforcers’ to hide out in the town in search of any signs of rebellion.

However, his cruelty was not unique. Too many men have followed the path paved before them and suckled at the teet of avarice, until they were compelled to out do one another.

To outkill one another...

What made Lord Instinctus unique was the fact that he had never shown his face before. During his initiation into the noble court, the townspeople were given blindfolds and told to face away from their Lord and simply listen. Few people broke the rules but, the ones who did were immediately executed.

You still remember the shudder that ran through your body as you heard the sound of your townspeople hitting the pavement. From that point on, the tone was set. Insubordination means death; the terms were simple.

The lack of knowledge and the possibility of death didn’t stop speculation from blooming. In fact, the appearance of the Lord was essentially the usual topic of conversation at every pub on the main street. After the freeing of spirits, both liquid or otherwise, the rumors begin pouring into the atmosphere.

“He’s probably horribly deformed...”

“Inbreeding is common amongst the nobility; it would make sense...”

“My cousin walked by the villa the other day, he said Lord Invictus had a tail!”

“A tail you say?! So is he some sort of hybrid?!”

“Oh please, that’s preposterous- he's probably just hideous...”

You bite your bottom lip, as you wipe the whiskey from the chestnut countertop, resisting the urge to smirk. Bartending was certainly not a glamorous job but, it paid your taxes and helped put food on the table for you and your family.

Glamorous it was not but, amusing it definitely was.

“I bet you he still beds a new woman every night though...”

“A pretty face ain’t worth more than all that gold he has aye?”

“Maybe he’s cursed...”

“That wouldn’t surprise me either- I hear noble families make deals with the magic folk all the time.”

“If you all want to know so bad, why don’t you just pay the tower a visit?”

With that meager suggestion, the bustle of the pub comes to halt- all eyes now on the man who mentioned a topic that is normally banned from public spaces.

“What? You can’t tell me you haven’t wondered what was up there...”

“We know what’s up there-”

“Or rather- who's up there.”

It’s said to be the home a monster.

The tower was used as a prison for the most dastardly of criminals. For years, just before the establishment of your town, it served as a last resort for the rotten underbelly of society. Countless lives were taken, madness ensued- until the revolution came. The tower was set aflame by revolutionaries but for whatever reason, it did not crumble.

The ivory merely sizzled and turned gray and then over time, it turned black. For years it was abandoned until one day, just after sunset, light emanated from the tower once more. Onlookers who were near the building went inside to see if some vagrant had moved in.

And they never returned...

Several spiritual advisors have visited the town, including religious figures from various faiths, and they have all arrived at the same conclusion: a demon has taken residence in the tower. Despite the efforts to bless the building, the light comes on every evening.

Thus, it is assumed that the demon remains unharmed.

“What about Mrs. Jeon? She left offerings for the beast and her son was cured of the plague the next morning.”

“Or Mr. Kim- he left one as well and found gold in his backyard that very night...”

“You aren’t suggesting there is a benevolent being in that tower, are you? Should I remind you of how many disappearances have occurred?”

There are opposing rumors you suppose.

One of them, the one that just so happens to appeal to you the most, is that there is a deity living in that tower.

The one who knows.

The one who blesses and curses the deserving and offers wisdom that no mortal can.

“Hey here’s a thought- how about Jacob tests his theory eh? Why don’t you go down and find out yourself? Report back to us with your findings...”

The pub erupts with laughter now, the uneasiness slowly melting away from the room.

You elect to keep your thoughts to yourself, as you finish up counting the money you had made from that evening- making sure to leave a portion for the incoming team.

The bite of the winter wind is harsh and untamed as it scraps across your skin, causing you to hurriedly put your coat on. It feels like winter never ends in your town and if it weren’t for the fact that your family stocks up throughout the year, you would be worried where your next meal is coming from.

Walking down the street towards your home, you catch sight of the tower in the distance. The way the windows begin to glow, almost makes you feel like it’s somehow staring back at you- taunting you.

You would be lying if you said it didn’t tempt you.

It always has.

Even as a young girl, you remember being drawn to the infamy, to the danger...

Your mother always told you that being curious was a good thing, that it led the greatest minds of humankind. You kept that with you as you moved through life, trying your best to understand what your purpose was.

But times were hard...

With a malevolent lord hanging over the morale of your town, digging his fingers into the heart and soul of your people and crippling them with eternal debt, it was causing you to look for answers.

And you were beginning to look in some unorthodox places.

Dinner with your family soothes the aching curiosity in your chest as you try and remind yourself of all the things you have to be grateful for. After your meal, you wrestle your little brother into his bed before telling him his favorite bedtime story. Once his eyelids have kissed, you turn out his light and move into the main room to wish sweet dreams upon your parents.

And although the pleasantries are nice, there are a few things throughout the evening that disturbed you.

The limp in your father’s movement.

The blisters on your mother’s hands.

The bags beneath the otherwise unburden gaze of your little brother.

Exhaustion was palpable.

Living beneath the weight of a corrupt leadership will do that to you.

As your head hits the pillow, you can hear your mother murmur in desperation.

“I won’t have enough to pay him this week...what are we going to do?”

“I can work extra hours at the mill- we will figure it out.”

“How could you possibly work any longer-”

You feel your chest twist with guilt as you hear the crack in your mother's voice.

“You’re falling apart my love...if you continue pushing yourself this way, I’m afraid I will lose you and I can’t- I can’t-”

The muffled nature of her cries suggests that your father has pulled her in for a hug, trying to erase the inevitable with his affection.

“We will endure, I promise. Just hang on a little longer.”

With your father’s final words, their conversation begins to die down.

This can’t possibly go on much longer. You might be able to pick up more hours at the pub and, perhaps procure a second job but, the dues will never end.

Your family will never exist for any other reason aside from paying to the noble family.

So you make a decision. Hard work clearly isn’t the answer and revolution would only shed innocent blood. If the practical world had nothing else to offer then, you would seek answers from beyond.

Your parents retired to their rooms shortly after their conversation but, you wait until you’re sure the house has fallen silent before you make your next move. Embarking on this mission would be simple but what lies at your destination is anything but; so, you try to be prepared for the possible outcomes.

Wrapping yourself in the thickest coat you can find, you slip your dagger beneath the onyx material and slowly creep out of your bedroom.

The streets were still bustling with life; your town rarely ever rests and the pubs and shops are open well past midnight.

It might sound like the product of a vibrant town but, it’s mainly due to the ever-present demand for profit.

Limited hours mean limited sales.

Thankfully, no one really notices your presence as you traverse your way down the streets and through the alleyway. The noise echoing from the main street slowly diminishes and makes way for the sound of the wind dancing through the trees. The forest itself does not frighten you. You grew up memorizing it with your father as he taught you the fundamentals or foraging and gardening. The sound of the owls is expected as is the chill that runs up your spine with the increase of the breeze.

However, as you near the tower- fear begins to slither its way into your veins. It’s quite a sickening feeling as it seems to stop you in your tracks but, you push on anyway- determined to finish what you have started.

The wrought iron surrounding the tower is stained with rust, corroded and crackling with age, the creaking of its bars alarms you, stopping you in your tracks and forcing you to look up.

And there it is: the tower.

It stands above you like a menacing giant and although it’s presence should deter you, it doesn’t. Making an effort to be as silent as you can, you slip past the opening in the gate and begin walking up the broken cobblestone pathway.

There is nothing but dirt surrounding the perimeter of the tower and other than the moon, the only light before you is coming from the very top window. It’s glowing but the color isn’t stable- it's as if it were shifting slowly from red to green to blue and then back again. Faced with the wooden French doors, you question the idea of knocking.

If someone truly did live here, it would only be polite...right?

With a shaky hand, you knock three times as loudly as you can. For a moment there is nothing, but just as you ready your hand to knock again, the door groans and begins to slowly creak open.

The already unstable heartbeat in your chest begins to rattle without mercy as you brace yourself for whatever horrible creature might lay on the other side. Instead, however, there is no one.

The door opens entirely to reveal that instead of the simple but filthy interior you expect from an abandoned tower such as this one, there is a rather decadent home. Large marble pillars extend upwards seemingly holding nothing in place while glamorous furniture positions itself through the foray. Everything is cooled tone with greys and shades of blue, black often lining the borders of the funiture. There is no lantern, the moon lighting up the interior of the room just as it led your path up to the door.

The layout doesn’t make sense.

The tower is cylindrical and doesn’t offer enough space for such an open floor plan so, how is it that the inside looks like lavish mansion?

You swallow your fear and newfound confusion as you tentatively look around the expanse of the room.

“Hello?”

Nothing.

You take a deep breath and decide that the likelihood of someone (or something) answering that call is slim, especially given the way you were welcomed into the tower in the first place.

You place your hand inside your pocket, gripping the dagger for good measure before beginning to make your way towards the staircase. The moonlight is sufficient enough at first but for whatever reason, as you begin making your way up the stone staircase, the interior of the tower seems to slowly darken. Your grip on the dagger tightens as you stop walking, frozen in your steps, cursing yourself for embarking on a journey so reckless.

Suddenly, all of the light from the room vanishes, forcing a gasp from your throat. You manage to grip the railing to steady yourself but you have no idea what you are to do next.

And then, someone speaks.

“Well- you’re awfully far from home...aren’t you?”

The sound of the voice rushes through your senses much like the wind did. It’s too sweet for your liking but, it entrances you none the less.

“Who are you?”

As much as you try to steady your breathing, the way your voice cracks, gives you away instantly.

Laughter bounces off the stone walls, sinister and playful all at once before the voice speaks again,

“Don’t you think that’s a question I should be asking you? You are the intruder after all...”

Disembodied or not, the voice makes a valid point. You did walk in unannounced and you most certainly weren’t invited.

“I’m Y/N Y/L/N.” The strength in your voice comes back slightly as you grip the railing a bit tighter, “I came here because- “

“I know why you’re here...” The voice is much closer now, likely positioned at the top of the stairs, “Humans are so predictable; always looking for a handout.”

This offends you greatly and regardless of the amount of danger you might be in, you let the voice know anyway.

“I am not looking for a hand out. My family and I work from sunrise until sunset to make ends meet. I’m here to make an offering- not merely to take whatever miracles that you make.” Stronger and stronger, your voice rises to the occasion, preparing itself to either spar with the beast or scream for help.

“Miracles hm?” Sinister laughter slinks down the staircase, practically teasing the exposed skin of your neck, “Is that what you think I do?”

You swallow the bile that creeps up your throat, “I’ve heard many stories- but I wanted to see for myself. Some of my people claim you’ve blessed them but, the clergy said a demon lived here...”

“Oh?” It rises with inquisition, “And you came anyway? Do I have a heretic in my presence?”

Shaking your head does nothing in the darkness but it’s instinctual, “I don’t believe in demons- at least, not the kind who dwell in abandoned towers.”

“Is there a kind you do believe in then?”

There is something in you that urges you forward, captivated by the sweet sound of the voice above you, desperate to view the owner and desperate to see the moonlight again.

“Hell is nothing but a metaphor and it’s demons all the same. There is plenty of evil here, plenty of suffering- by definition, there is a demon ruling over my town- he is draining us of our resources for his own gain. I couldn’t imagine a more accurate representation.”

Suddenly, you hear the sound of boots clicking slowly and steadily down the stone stairs. You brace yourself, still feeling frozen in your place- wishing to see whoever or whatever is front of you.

“If I did make miracles,” It muses and, now you’re able to discern that it’s only a few steps in front of you, “What exactly would you be offering me in return?”

Taking a deep breath through your nose, you place all your effort into trying to make out whether or not there was an actual owner to this voice. Finally, your eyes adjust enough to see the faint shadow of a figure which appears to be sitting on the second set of stairs.

“Name your terms, I will do my best.”

“Ah ah-” The voice corrects along with a side of twinkling laughter, “That isn’t how this works...”

You’re growing frustrated with the apparent mind games but, you know it’s in your best interest to be patient; you still don’t know what you’re dealing with.

“How does it work then?”

Silence passes through the air for a moment before the voice speaks again, “You must bring me the thing you treasure the most so, that I may know your true intentions- I cannot help you until I can see you properly.”

You snort, “You’d be able to see me if you hadn’t wiped the light from this room...”

Laughter comes again but this time, it’s lower and deepened with suggestion, “I’m not referring to physical sight, human. You might not be able to see in the dark but, I can.”

For whatever reason, its response sounds salacious and riddled with an innuendo that you’re slightly afraid to comment on.

And the reaction it creates within you, only frightens you further.

“I’ve just told you that I barely have enough money to scrape by- I don’t have anything of value to give you.”

“I never asked you to bring me anything of value nor did I ask you to give it away- you’re not listening very well...I don’t know how I’m supposed to help you if you can’t follow instructions.”

It sounds irritated and fond all at once, prompting you to nod immediately, not wanting to upset your only shot at freedom.

“I’m sorry.” You breathe, “I’m just-”

“Don’t lie to me...”

Your gaze strains to try and make out the expression of the figure in front of you but, its futile- the darkness impeding your effort.

“What do you mean?”

“You were going to tell me that you’re scared.” The voice accuses, “But you’re not- even though, you most certainly should be.”

It wasn’t wrong. You should have ran when the door opened on its own, when the lights began to dim, when a voice began speaking to you...

But you didn’t.

You were undeniably intrigued.

“Are you going to hurt me?”

An insidious bought of laughter comes from the figure before it sighs, “Hmmm, maybe a little bit.”

When your lips part with something that resembles shock, the laughter comes again only slowing to a halt for the sound of the figure’s tongue tutting against its teeth.

“You are a curious girl...” It observes, “...promises of harm should not excite you and yet- excitement flows from you anyway. Why?”

It kills you to refrain from denying it but, you have no choice.

“Your voice-” A sigh leaves your lips, “it’s very intriguing.”

Maybe it’s part of the creature's abilities, you think, its voice is the main weapon to lure unsuspecting and vulnerable humans into its clutches. The only question is- what happens once it has you.

“Is it now?” The voice sounds intrigued, “Most humans don’t seem to think so. Are you sure you’re hearing me right, girl? I’ve been told my voice is the thing of nightmares.”

This perplexes you; how could anyone possibly think such a voice was frightening? Despite this creature being anything but human, it sounds very much like a man- a warm and mischievous man who seems hellbent on getting you into bed.

“What does my voice sound like to you?” It asks, a smile in its tone.

You ponder this question for a second, realizing very quickly that you can’t exactly tell this creature that it sounds like it’s trying to seduce you. But still, that does seem to be the only appropriate description.

“Sort of...like a melody.”

Laughter comes again but, this time it’s paired with the moonlight slowly fading back into the tower, covering every surface until it finally reveals the appearance of the figure.

Beautiful.

Not an it but a he...

A man with wings.

On the steps before you, he stands, leaning casually against the railing now. Atop his head is a tousled mop of sapphire hair, just below are his eyes- nearly black and hooded with the same seduction as his voice and cloaking his figure is a black linen ensemble fitted only by the same color corset. His pillowy lips and soft skin would be a masterpiece on their own but coupled with the giant pair of onyx wings protruding proudly from his back- his visuals become simply devastating.

“What do you see?” He smirks, licking over his lips.

Unable to resist, you shake your head in complete awe, all of the sensible words dying before they leave your throat, “You- are you an angel?”

The light allows you to see him now as his head tilts another round of laughter, “Try again...you’re very close.”

Perhaps the clergy was right...

“A demon then...” You resign because despite your previously-held beliefs, if this really was a demon, then you know very well you shouldn’t be dealing with him. “I should go.”

His smirk broadens, “But I thought you didn’t believe in demons?”

“I didn’t but, that’s clearly what you’re alluding to. If a winged man tells me he’s a demon, I think it’s wise that I return home.”

Through your moment of clarity, your desire for him persists- especially now that you see what he looks like. But you know better than to make a deal with a demon, even if you are desperate.

“Do you think the universe is that simple? Angels and demons? Good and evil? You don’t think that maybe- in all of his vastness, there is a chance for the inbetweeners?” He presses and now his black eyes seem to glow, his gaze slightly hypnotic.

Tightening your coat around your body, you stay staring at him for a moment before you respond, “Is that what you are? Something in between?”

He licks his lips, his eyes finally allowing themselves to wander over your figure. There isn’t much of you showing but, he still drinks you up regardless, exposing and exciting you all at once.

“I was sent by the underworld to do business for the gods...” He drops his voice to a near whisper, his gaze burning a hole in you, which now aches to be filled.

You take in a shaky breath through your nose, nodding in understanding, “Did you kill the people who disappeared here? Is that what happens when their judgment goes south?”

He arches his brow, tilting his head with his inquiry- his voice dripping with darkness, “Maybe I did...maybe I didn’t. I don’t see how that’s relevant- especially since you’ve already decided you were leaving. Which of course-” He waves his hand then, the wooden door behind you creaking open, “-you are free to do.”

There is something about him you haven’t touched on but, it’s beginning to eat you up inside. He may be an otherworldly being, possessing the tower like a beautiful virus but, he is starting to look familiar. This of course, is hard to imagine because his beauty is so striking that you don’t see how you could ever forget it. But nonetheless, you feel like you’ve seen him before.

And this is what has kept you frozen.

“Will you not give me any answers?” You border on pleading but, attempt to keep your tone firm.

He chuckles, “You didn’t come to me for answers. You came for help- which I’ve already agreed to give you.”

The supernatural discourse that has transpired, thoroughly distracted you from the reasons for seeking him out in the first place. Your situation had not changed; you were still desperate for money, desperate for justice and desperate for peace.

“You won’t hurt my family...” It’s not a question, and it leaves no room for any other response aside from the one he gives you.

“I won’t.”

Nodding, you glance behind your shoulder towards the door, “I have to go home. I don’t have the item you asked for. I can be back within the hour...”

For the first time, he looks slightly disappointed but as you complete your sentence, he shakes his head, “No. Don't come back tonight.” He insists, “If you wish to do business with me- you must return tomorrow after midnight. I will wait for you at the shoreline.”

This confuses you, “The shoreline? Why can’t we meet here? The water is dangerous after dark.”

The smirk returns to his tender lips, “I know.”

With that, he waves his hand again- causing the door to swing open and slam against the tower walls.

Jumping at the sound, your gaze shoots back behind you before returning to where the creature stood.

But he had vanished.

You have no choice but to heed his requests and rush away from the tower, the curiosity inside you almost too much to bear.

Nothing is out of the ordinary as you walk back home, at least not at first. But when you pass the massive clock tower in the center of town, you realize something strange...

The clock hadn’t moved, not even a second.

You remember very clearly reading the time as you hurried past it on your way to the tower and now, even as you’re staring at it, it stands perfectly still. Until suddenly, without warning, the hands of time begin to move again. The clicking almost startles you, your brain filling with a million questions despite your decision to turn away and return home.

Time had seemingly stood still whilst you were in the tower.

Slipping beneath the covers, you try your hardest to get to sleep despite being bombarded with images of the haunting man you had just encountered.

You know you should be terrified.

You know you should be wary.

But the familiarity of him has possessed you and, you’re determined to understand why.

The next night, with your treasured object tucked securely in your coat, you make your way back to him.

You make sure to check the clock tower before you do, logging the time away for later to see if last night had been more than just a fluke.

12:32am.

The clock tower has never lied but, you’re starting to think it might be influenced by whatever resided in the tower- magic, beast, or otherwise.

As you pass through the many trees, you begin to hear the chaotic crashing of the waves in the distance. The tower may be frightening but, few things could match the malevolent temper of the sea. In fact, you’ve always believed that nothing could. The sea was unrivaled in her cruelty, consuming the world at will, just for the fun of it- you've theorized that she likes the screams. During the day, she simmered- blue and serene, allowing boats to decorate her surface like candles on a birthday cake. At night though, her temper worsens and it’s as if she suddenly remembers all the injustice she has faced. Her waves swell to horrific heights, smashing into the seawalls built around your town, creeping over like a titan looking for vengeance.

You’ve always felt pity for her. It must be hard: being the heart and soul of humanity, being responsible for the very nature of things- only to be forgotten. Only to be mistreated...

Your boots are discarded near the last patch of grass before the sand and, your toes brace themselves icy chill of the sea breeze. You’re especially thankful for the coat now as you suspect that your teeth would have already begun chattering had it not been for the thick fabric protecting you.

The waves haven’t begun their violent dance just yet but, you can sense their temper beneath your feet. They will begin soon.

“The sea-” The voice from the tower is behind you, “it suits you.”

Breathless, you turn to face him and even though you’re more prepared for his beauty than you were last night, it still shocks you.

He’s wearing a black silk gown, that drapes effortlessly off his body, the sleeves made out of French lace and extending well past his fingertips. His wings are shuttered behind him, folded almost modestly against his back.

“Thank you.” It’s the only response you have before you reach into the fold of your coat, “I have the-”

He holds up his hand, his voice commanding but gentle, “Wait. I want you to walk with me first. I don’t like rushing through my business deals.”

Your hand slowly retreats from your coat as you warily look behind you, “You want to walk along the shoreline? I told you, it’s too dangerous- at least for me it is, I don’t exactly have an escape mechanism attached to my back.”

He smirks, his tempting gaze flourishing with fondness you cannot place, “What causes you to mistrust the sea so much? Surely she wouldn’t hurt one of her own...”

Your brow furrows, “What do you mean?”

Extending from the confines of silk, his fingers reach out to you, fluttering with invitation, “I will show you.”

And really, you’d be a fool not to accept.

Interlacing your fingers with his, you feel electricity simmer ever so slightly beneath your skin. You’re assuming it’s from the power that likely resides within him but, you don’t expect it to affect you so much.

The sound of the waves begins to softly roar in the distance but the water isn’t close enough to the shoreline to pose any immediate threat.

Not yet at least...

You begin walking alongside him as he leads you both in the opposite direction of your town border. For quite a few moments, he just gazes at the eternal stretch of sand before you, his soft mouth curved up ever so slightly. He looks pensive and serene all at once and, it confuses you.

“May I tell you a story?”

His request surprises you but, you aren’t really in a position to say no. And if you’re being honest, you really didn’t want to.

“Yes.” You murmur, feeling compelled to keep your volume at a minimum.

He smiles softly to himself, glancing towards the water briefly before beginning.

“The water has many gods...” He speaks softly, letting out a sigh, “Lir, Irish god of the sea, Tefnut, Egyptian goddess of the rain, Amimitl, Aztec god of lakes and fisherman...” His explanation already has you interested. You were taught much of the stories beyond your land but, it had always fascinated you, “The gods of the sea are known for the temperate nature, they often stay away from humans and avoid interfering with the mortal coil. Death by water is merely a request they carry out for the gods of death and destruction and thus, there is goddess who rules over the violence of the sea itself.”

Just as he finishes his sentence, the temper of the sea seems to roar to life, the swollen waves crashing aggressively, still not close enough to reach you.

Not yet at least...

“Cymopoleia, is the goddess of violent sea storms. Poseidon, her father, tasked her with overseeing the malignant waters and tending to the causalities. She was not the creator of the storms but she carried the ability.” He moves through the story as if he has told it a 100 times but he seems captivated by it nonetheless, “When it came time for her to bear a child. She conjured up a spirit from within her very core. She crafted them out of the essence of the sea and placed them inside of clamshell in her palace. She was awaiting the full moon when someone snuck into the depths of the ocean and stole them from her.”

The gasp that leaves your lips cannot be helped, you didn’t realize how engrossed you were until suddenly you recognize the port from another town nearby.

You had been walking awhile.

“Why would someone do that?” You press, shaking your head.

He sends a solemn look your way, “Many thoughtless humans believe that if they capture the essence of a god, they will become one themselves. Foolishly, he opened the clam shell and released the spirit into the world. By the time the goddess found him, it was too late- but she delegated his fate anyway. She took his life beneath the depths of a violent storm and placed a curse upon anyone who shared his bloodline. She made it so that any one of his descendants would bear the physical embodiment of his fate.”

“So, they look like they’ve died at sea?”

He can’t help but smirk, a bit of the darkness you saw at the tower, beginning to creep back. “Indeed. They are horribly disfigured and regardless of their efforts, they all meet the same fate. His lineage believes that if they send enough offerings out to sea or if they build high enough walls, that they will somehow escape their deaths. But of course, this if futile- the goddess vowed that she would continue to collect them until her spirit was returned.”

His story ends and it’s like something clicks within you. Without warning, you squeeze his hand, slowing both of you to a stop, just before the light of the upcoming pier hits you.

“Does this have something to do with my town? Is that why you’re telling me this?”

Lord Invictus certainly fit the description for a descendent of this thief and, although it bores no sense of logic- you have no choice but to believe it anyway.

It all fits together too well...

He turns towards you now, his smirk now a small smile, “It has to do with you Y/N.”

Your brow furrows, “Me? What do you mean?”

He nods to your coat, something otherworldly lingering in his eyes, “I’d like to see what you’ve brought with you now.”

Still riddled with confusion, you reach inside your coat and find that the item you had brought with you (a beaded necklace gifted to you at birth by your parents) had turned into something else.

And now, sitting in the palm of your hand- was a clamshell.

“What is this? This isn’t what I brought to you- I-” You begin to panic, confusion and fear starting to take over, “Did you do this? Did you take my necklace?”

Finally, the sinister smirk returns as his wings begin to unfurl from behind his back. Along with his shift in expression, another danger is brewing very close to you- you can feel it.

The sea is growing irritated and whipping the wind and the water up into a frenzy. As you look toward the water, you have no choice but to look on in horror as you see the beginning of something deadly.

A rogue wave.

The grip on your hand tightens as his extraordinary strength keeps you in place.

“I think it’s time I formally introduce myself-” His voice is loaded with bad intentions but it sounds sweet anyway as he burns his gaze into yours, “My name is Jimin. Son of Tartarus, the god of punishment and Nyx, the goddess of the night.”

Your eyes are wide with desperation, not fully registering what he said before he’s yanking you against his chest and turning you to face the sea. Standing behind you, he unleashes a spell of wicked laughter as his wings unfurl from behind is back to wrap around the both of you, so that the only thing you’re able to see is the wall of water coming for you.

“I have to come to send you home Y/N...your mother has been waiting for you a very long time.”

His arms are wrapped around you now, crushing you against his chest as his wings begin flapping- the wind picking up furiously around you.

“Jimin!” You scream, eyes welling up with tears, “You promised you wouldn’t hurt me! You promised! Why are you doing this to me?!”

He laughs at you, and it isn’t necessarily malevolent but merely amused, as if he in on a joke you weren’t part of.

“Shhhh, quiet down my little sea nymph...” He whispers salaciously into your ear, “...your fate will be painless.”

You’re crying now, digging your nails into his skin, attempting to break free as the massive creature that is the ocean rushes towards you without mercy. The crest of the wave arches above you proudly, the swirling darkness of the water mocking the mere audacity of your existence but, as you brace for impact- it never comes.

Only the darkness does...

And it’s the darkness that consumes you.

“Jimin!” A voice breaks into your subconscious, luring you out of what you hope was a nightmare, “You couldn’t have brought her home without scaring her? She was practically driftwood when she arrived here.”

That familiar twinkle of laughter sounds then and, it forces your eyes open.

“I’m sorry your grace- it's just in my nature.” He defends poorly, still chuckling to himself, “I can’t imagine my brothers are doing much better.”

You are somewhere extraordinary, that much is certain. Above your immediate line of sight is an ornate glass ceiling that seems to glow a cerulean blue. All around you are gold furnishings, each decorated with various moldings of sea creatures.

“She’s awake!”

Your vision, still slightly cloudy, now lands upon a being so beautiful- that you have to blink a few times to ensure you’re seeing the right thing. Draped in blue silk and decorated with gold and pearls, is a woman who looks at you with nothing but love in her eyes.

“Oh my- its really you...”

She seems tentative but, you’re suddenly overcome with joy- filled with an almost cosmic sense of peace.

“Mother!” You cry, rushing off of the bed you were laying on and into her arms.

She takes you in her arms immediately, her skin cool against yours like the tepid waters of the bay. She sniffles, tightening her grip on you,

“I knew you’d come home...I knew one day I would find you.”

And it really doesn’t make much sense does it?

How could your life swing so violently from one direction to the next?

Your life on earth seems so insignificant now...now that you’re back with her.

Cymopoleia- queen of violent sea storms and, your mother.

She explains it all to you, gently stroking your hair and fawning over you.

The spirit in the depths was you. Born into a human body, you were fated to one day meet with the demi-god of darkness, who with a bit of trickery- would return you to your rightful place in the cosmos.

Your mother assures you that your mortal family would be relieved of your memory until it was safe for you to visit them, until the gods of fate decide. In addition, Lord Invictus would be the last of the bloodline to pay for what his ancestor had done and, the fog of greed and corruption- which begin the day you were born, would soon be lifted.

The explanation is long and doesn’t leave you completely fulfilled but, your mother assures you that you have all the time in the world to understand the complexity of the universe.

Hours later, after you’ve had a decent feast, your mother instructs Jimin to escort you to your bedroom.

As he leads you down the hallway towards your chambers, you send a playful glare his way, “So- how much of what you told me was a lie?”

He merely smirks, “None of it.”

You scoff, “Even the part of about your voice? And all that nonsense about excitement and me being curious? You knew all along what was to happen- you just tricked me.”

Jimin chuckles darkly, stopping just outside your bedroom door before turning to you, “The part about my voice frightening people wasn’t a lie, Y/N. My father is the god of punishment, any mortal that hears my voice usually cowers in fear...”

“Is that why I felt so drawn to you? Because you were meant to take me home?”

His smirk broadens, “No...you feel drawn me because you want to fuck me.”

Your mouth goes completely dry at his bold statement but, you are unable to deny it- your fingers suddenly twitching at your side.

“Wh-”

“It’s not your fault really...” He murmurs, his body shifting towards you, “...it’s just the way I was made. I am used to people lusting after me- however,” Jimin reaches out then, to brush his thumb over the swell of your cheek, “-I have never known true lust until I had the pleasure of meeting you.”

“You lust for me?” You whisper, completely drawn up with desire- finally allowing your true nature, the nature of a demi-goddess pour out of your soul.

He licks his lips, his gaze upon you timid as he presses his thumb into your face, “I do.”

You turn to the side suddenly, capturing his thumb between your lips, “Show me.”

It's all it takes: that one phrase of consent being enough to unleash all the urges within him.

You’re inside your chamber seconds later, Jimin clawing at the fabric of your robe, his fingers digging into your skin as he does, his lips latching on to every part of you he can reach.

“I knew the moment you walked into my tower-” He grunts, “I knew- there was no way a mortal could be tempting, so dreadfully seductive.”

You sigh hopelessly, raking your hands through the sapphire tendrils on his head, your lips ghosting along the swell of his cheek, the tail of his brow, the shell of his ear...

“In the underworld...” He’s practically growling now, scratching his nails up the newly exposed skin of your back, “We are never taught to refuse our desires. You were my greatest challenge- it took everything in me not to devour you right there.”

You smirk now, positioning your lips at his ear, “I wouldn’t have known what to do with you though- aren't you glad you were patient?”

He grunts again, pressing his hips against yours defiantly, “Patience is for virtuous gods- “ He doesn't answer your question but, you know that he means yes. In spite of his darker nature, Jimin still believes in doing the right thing.... most of the time.

He has you on the bed moments later, his wings spreading proudly. He’s panting, his eyes completely black with lust as he nudges your legs open, determined to finally taste what he’s been craving.

For the demi-god of darkness, denying his desires for even a second is painful. He aches to fufill them over and over again...

You were certainly no exception.

But you want to keep teasing him...

Reaching down, you spread yourself open for him- feeling the visceral substance of your arousal sticking to your inner thighs.

“What are you waiting for then?” You lean up, grasping your hand behind his neck and staring directly into the abyss that is his gaze, “Defile me...”

Jimin growls, sliding into you instantly, his hands quickly bracing themselves on either side of your head. He smirks as your eyes roll back the sheer pleasure of him inside of you causing your nipples to harden.

“Oh look at that-” He chuckles, his own expression unstable with pleasure, “Are you going brain dead already hm? Is this cock that good?”

Your eyes come back into play as you stare up at him, your hands gripping either side of his face as he starts a power rhythm within you.

This wasn’t meant to last long, the carnal desire too much for either one of you to handle...

Perhaps, if your feelings permitted it- you'd make love another time.

Nodding, you moan as he increases the rhythm, pressing your forehead against his own.

“You feel so good.” You whisper, “I didn’t know it could- oh...” A whimper leaves your lips as he hits that spot inside of you, the pleasure completely ruining your ability to speak.

“Of course you didn’t- you’ve only ever let mortals play with your pretty cunt haven’t you?” He laughs, mocking you and cooing all at once, “And now that I’ve gotten ahold of it, you’re never going to want anyone else. I will ruin you ugh-” He finally breaks, his own brow furrowed with the onslaught of his release as you tighten around him, “-ugh fuck yes. I can feel how badly your cunt wants me- it's like you’re begging me to cum.”

“I want you to cum,” You whisper shakily, kissing at his mouth, “Fill me up please, I need it.”

He growls, kissing you back with just as much fervor, his hips moving so fast that the pleasure fucks with your vision.

“I’m going to make a mess of you, they will smell me on you until I can come back-” He promises, smirking ever so slightly, “and then- I'll paint the inside of you all over again won’t I? Such a masterpiece this cunt will be...and you’ll be all mine, cumming only for me.”

And he wasn’t wrong because, mere seconds later- the two of you are cumming all over one another, ruining the silk sheets with your release and clawing desperately at one another.

With the mutual utterance of your names, Jimin collapses beside you and, moments later- when you get your wits about you, he is ushering you onto his chest.

Sweaty, exhausted and satisfied, you lay together in silence for quite a while.

Until finally you speak, “I’m not quite sure what came over me.”

Jimin chuckles but this time, the sound is much warmer than you’re used to, “Immortal lust, it’s a blessing and a curse but, eternal life has to stay interesting somehow.”

You trace patterns on his chest whilst he covers your body with one of his wings, the feathers teasing at your sensitive skin.

“Did you mean it?”

And he doesn’t even bother asking, he knows exactly what you’re referring to.

“I want you.” He affirms, “If you’ll have me- I felt quite possessive of you then but, I won’t insist on anything you aren’t comfortable with.”

You smile, tracing a heart directly over the spot where his heart would beat, “It fits doesn’t it? You and I?”

If the past few days have taught you anything, it is that sometimes- it is appropriate to succumb to fate. Sometimes, believing in the simplicity of destiny works out. Being with Jimin felt right and, for now, this was enough.

“It does.” His statement is simple but his expression says it all: he is elated.

You fall back into comfortable silence once again before one more pressing question leaves your lips, “Did I hear you mention something about your brothers earlier?”

Jimin nods, his eyes half-closed as he cuddles closer to you, “You did. I have six of them.”

“Are they- like you?” You murmur, unable to stop your curiosity.

He nods again, “They are.”

You think one more question will suffice but, his answer will unfortunately bring about a thousand more, “Are they all on missions too?”

Jimin’s trademark smirk shows itself once again as he snickers, “They are-” He repeats before a great sense of pride comes over his expression...

“I was just the first one to return.”

A/N: should this be a series? asking for a friend...

#ficswithluv #bangtansorciere #jimin #park jimin #bts #bts jimin #jimin smut #jimin x reader #bts smut #bts writing #jimin writing #jimin fanfic #bts au

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v-hope · 3 years

Text

Puzzle Pieces

Pairings: Artist!Kim Taehyung x Heiress!Reader, OC x Heiress!Reader

Genre: Roommates AU, Enemies to Lovers AU, Arranged Marriage AU (OC x Reader)

Word Count: 4.7k

Summary: Two things you knew for sure. One, although you and Taehyung were roommates, you were still complete strangers to one another. And, two, he did not like you one bit. It was funny, however, how you didn’t need to tell him you would appreciate his company that particular night for him to see right through you. And it was even funnier how you didn’t need to ask him to stay for him to do so.

Warnings: Mentions of alcohol and drinking.

A/N: Helloo, this is from part 7 of my Social Media AU “Belong”, but since it turned out to be so long I decided to post it in one shot format lol. I hope you guys enjoy!

Taking things back to your place —more like, Tae’s place— had truly seemed like a good idea earlier that day. After all, it was either that or have the paps follow you and Sungjin around for what was left of the day, which would later be followed by romantic headlines regarding the two of you that would not precisely be far from the truth, if you looked at it from the plans your families had for the both of you.

Of course, there was always the option of ending your hang out right then and going your separate ways, but after having homesickness hit you like a truck that week after hanging out with your brother a few days ago, and knowing well enough Taehyung would not even acknowledge your presence once you made it home, you found yourself relying on Sungjin more than you had wished to, that being the third time in the span of a week you were hanging out with him, as you really wanted to have someone with you. And if that someone just happened to be the heir your marriage was being arranged with against your will, then so be it.

However, now, when you were straddling his lap as he leaned back on the sofa, with your fingers entangled on his hair and his hands on your back as he pulled you closer against his chest, heavy breathings and lips needingly pressing together, you were not sure of how good of an idea this had been.

You had not expected him to kiss you that evening. And, most importantly, you had not expected to kiss him back once he did. But you were lonely, and craving affection. And so one thing had led to another, and now here you were, making out with the one guy you were not supposed to fall for. Or was he the one guy you were supposed to fall for?

It all depended on the point of view you looked at it from. If you wanted to prove to your parents you could manage to live on your own and that way call off the wedding, then going to the guy your marriage was being arranged with and whom you had no feelings for was most definitely not the way to go. On the other hand, if you wanted things to go back to normal and be able to go back home, wouldn’t falling for said guy be the perfect way out? That way, your marriage would still be an arranged one, sure, but it wouldn’t matter anymore because you would still get to marry the man you loved.

Nevertheless, although the second choice did sound very, very appealing, you found yourself removing your hands from his hair and pressing them on his chest instead as you pulled away from the kiss. For although you were craving intimacy and had discovered right then Sungjin was one hell of a kisser, you felt nothing. And it was unfair on both of you to keep this going and pretend like you did feel something.

“No, no” your voice came out muffled as his lips pressed once more on yours. “This is wrong”.

Sungjin knitted his eyebrows together, finally opening his eyes as he pulled slightly away from you. “We’re engaged, how could it be wrong?”

“We’re not—” you sighed heavily, carefully looking at your hand pressing on his chest, which was missing the engagement ring you had taken off before moving in here to start your new —and hopefully permanent— life. “We’re not engaged…”

“You taking the ring off doesn’t change anything, Y/N” he tried to say it as sweetly as possible, yet his words could do no other than make your chest feel heavy. “We are engaged and we will get married so far, unless you stay here once your time is up”.

Lowering your head, you removed your hands from off his chest as you got off his lap and sat next to him on the sofa, not being able to hide how much this whole topic affected you. “That’s not the way I see it” you murmured.

The way you saw it, you were not engaged anymore, and only would be if you decided to go back home once the year went by.

No one out of your social circle knew what was going on with you and your family. No one knew there was a chance you would be marrying Lee Sungjin in a good couple of months. However, he was right. The ring had been there before you fought hard enough for your parents to give you this chance to prove yourself and break free from this arrangement, but you had taken it off on your own terms. You had asked them not to tell the media about it, so you could truly try and carry a life as ordinary as you could. And honestly? You were terrified you would wake up one day and find first thing as you opened Twitter that the cat was out of the bag and everyone knew about your —arranged— engagement.

“You should tell that to your parents then,” he shrugged. “So they can put on hold the whole wedding planning”.

Your head snapped up at the sound of that. “They’re planning it already?”

Sungjin’s eyes opened wide. “You didn’t know?”

A scoff abandoned your mouth, shaking your head in disbelief as you felt tears well up in your eyes — ones that you would neither let roll down your cheeks nor let your so-called fiancé see. Of course your parents were planning as much as they could of it already. Should’ve seen it coming. It was like they already knew you would fail and this was nothing but a mere formality. And although a part of you was fuming and could not wait to prove them wrong now more than ever, another one could not help but wonder if maybe they were right.

“I don’t want to talk about this,” you spoke in what came out like more of a whisper, almost begging him to drop the topic. “I can’t do this right now. Please, leave”.

Sungjin shook his head. “You’re always avoiding the topic,” he pointed out. “We’ll have to properly talk about it and what you plan to do at some point”.

“Well, I don’t want to talk about it yet” you moved further away from him on the sofa. “This was a mistake. Please, leave”.

He sighed. “Y/N…”

“Sungjin, leave”.

“But—”

“Um…” Taehyung’s deep voice coming from the front door had both your heads snapping in his direction. “I don’t know who you are,” his eyes were fixed on Sungjin next to you. “But she shouldn’t have to repeat herself when asking for you to leave”.

You awkwardly gazed over to Sungjin, whose body had tensed up at both Taehyung’s presence and words.

“And you are?” he asked, his previous soft tone whilst talking to you having now turned into a lower, stronger one.

“Her roommate,” Taehyung replied, taking a step inside yet keeping the door open — and although you were used to always seeing his serious side, you had never seen him this serious before. “The owner of this place”.

Sungjin’s eyes were now fixed on you, a frown taking over his very displeased expression. “So you’ve been living with his guy this whole time?”

“She has” Taehyung answered before you could, catching your —on hold— fiancé’s attention once more. “And I’m sure she had just asked you to leave, so…”

Moving aside, he opened the door wider for the man next to you to see his way out. So, sending you one last glance, which was filled with both confusion and disbelief, Sungjin reluctantly stood up, not saying another word before making his way over to the door Taehyung was holding open for him — not taking a step out of it without before having glared at your roommate, who did not hesitate to do the same right back.

Now, why were they glaring at each other? Sungjin knew his reason very well, for, one, Taehyung was forcing him to leave against his will, and, two, he was living with you. That alone, as someone who had feelings for you, was reason enough not to like Kim Taehyung from the beginning. Taehyung, on the other hand? He had no idea. He had just met the guy and decided right away he did not like him one bit.

Once that one second they had been holding glares as they passed by was gone and Sungjin had finally made his way out of the apartment, Taehyung wasted no time in closing the door, in what was far from the gentlest of ways. And although he had gone home to get the instant popcorn bags he had told his friends he would bring over to movie night, he didn’t head to the kitchen right away, but stood there by the door staring at you instead.

“You okay?” he wondered at the sight of your visibly upset expression.

You nodded your head more eagerly than intended, not sure if trying to convince him or yourself. “Yes. Uh, thank you…”

He let you know it was nothing with a small nod. With that out of the way, he turned to his side so he could resume to do what he had come here to do.

“How much of it did you hear?” you couldn’t help but weakly ask before he could take another step.

He stayed quiet for a second. Was there something he wasn’t supposed to listen to? “Just the part when you asked him to leave”.

You nodded quietly, hating the fact that you had no certain way to confirm he was actually telling the truth, and having nothing left to do but hope he hadn’t heard a thing regarding your dreadful marriage.

“Sorry if I made things awkward with your boyfriend,” he apologized after seeing the conflicted look on your face. “I just saw you were upset and—”

“He’s not my boyfriend” you corrected him before he could even finish his sentence.

Taehyung smiled cynically. “The smudged lipstick on your face says otherwise”.

You bit down on your bottom lip, feeling your cheeks heat up in embarrassment as you lowered your head — forcefully running your thumb over and around your lips to try and remove as much of your lipstick as you could.

“He’s really not, though” you repeated what was technically not a lie. “It’s just… complicated”.

“Same as what Jimin said” he shrugged.

With your eyebrows knitting together, your eyes followed his figure as he went inside the kitchen. He and Jimin had been talking about you?

As much as you wanted to know the details about that, you knew asking Taehyung wasn’t an option, for he was never willing to actually talk to you, let alone tell you about the conversations he had with his friends — even though you had been the main topic of it. So, deciding to just let it go, you stood up and went to grab the coat of yours you had hung by the door when you and Sungjin had arrived earlier that evening, putting it on and grabbing your purse as well right as Taehyung came back into the living room holding a bag in one of his hands.

“Where are you going?” he asked with furrowed eyebrows.

You couldn’t help but stare at him quite dumbfounded. He had never really minded you going out, and you wondered if you looked that vulnerable right then for him to actually be concerned about you doing so.

“I don’t really drink, but…” you shrugged, not needing to finish your sentence for him to take a hint.

“A bar?” his voice came out louder than expected.

Although taken aback at his reaction, you nodded. “I won’t make a mess if I come back drunk, you don’t have to worry”.

Taehyung snorted. As if that was what worried him about you going out drinking alone at night.

Not telling you that, of course, he shook his head instead as the corners of his lips curved up in amusement — your breath hitching when his hand firmly yet somehow still gently grabbed your wrist and dragged you back over the sofa you had been sitting down on before. Letting go of you, he left his bag on the small table in front of the couch and gestured for you to take a seat, having you do as told while your attentive eyes followed his every move, watching him once again disappear into the kitchen, only for him to reappear seconds later with a bottle of wine in one hand and a glass along with a corkscrew in another.

Leaving everything on the table in front of you, he took the bag he had left on it before and stood up straight, making you have to tilt your head slightly back so you could look up to him.

“If you’re drinking your feelings away, do it here” he stated, later rolling his eyes at the way you were silently staring at him, almost as if you had just seen a ghost. “Don’t look at me like that. Jimin would kill me if he found out I let you go out alone like that”.

You smiled weakly. “He wouldn’t have to know”.

“Have you forgotten who you are, princess?” he reminded you, causing you to roll your eyes at the annoying nickname he had chosen for you and you were apparently never getting rid of. “Get drunk in a bar and, next thing you know, a hundred headlines are written about you. Especially if you’re not used to drinking”.

“Right,” you sighed in defeat. “Thank you. Again”.

Taehyung nodded like it was no problem, later pointing at the bottle he had placed in front of you. “You know how to open it?”

“Yes”.

You did not. But you were not telling him that. You could not afford to not know how to do yet another mundane thing, for you were already useless enough in his eyes. You could always just look it up later and pray it would work out once you tried to do it, just like you had done with pretty much every other thing you had learned to do on your own after moving out.

“Okay” he mumbled, turning around and making his way to the front door so he could leave and get to his friends for once and for all.

“Taehyung?” you called him before he could reach for the doorknob, and before you could stop yourself.

“Yes?” he mindlessly turned his head in your direction.

You bit your tongue not to say what you wanted to, regretting already having called his name out without thinking before.

You wanted him to stay. You didn’t want to be alone. You hated being alone. And you were tired of this bad blood going on between the two of you. You wanted to talk. Actually talk. Not to spill your deepest secrets or become best friends, and most definitely not to tell him about your possible marriage and all about your family drama, but maybe just talk enough to get to know each other a little more. Nevertheless, it had only been a few days since you had asked him to keep you company and he had turned you down, making it very clear he had no intentions of spending his time with you. You couldn’t bother him again, let alone when you already knew what the answer would be.

“Have fun” you settled for saying instead, sending him a close-mouth smile that you truly believed was convincing enough.

And, you see, although you were smiling right then and couldn’t see how vulnerable you actually looked, being oblivious to it even, Taehyung could see right through you. And although he did not like you, not one bit, he was not heartless. So, letting out a sigh, he stopped trying to reach for the doorknob altogether and went back into the kitchen instead.

You just sat there puzzled as ever, believing he might have forgotten something else he needed to get before leaving, until you saw him come into the living room, no longer holding a bag in his hand, but another glass instead. And if that itself hadn’t been surprising enough, when he sat by your side and placed the glass next to yours, silently proceeding to open the bottle of wine —with such ease that couldn’t help but make you feel dumb over how it would’ve taken you a good couple of minutes to do what to him took less than one— so he could pour a good amount of it into them, you felt like you were hallucinating.

Your astonished eyes followed his hand as he held one of the glasses up for you to take, silently nodding as a way of saying ‘thank you’ once you held it in your hand. Not saying anything else, he grabbed his glass and took a sip of wine, having you follow his actions right after.

Words weren’t needed right then. And quite honestly, neither of you knew how to initiate the conversation anyway to begin with.

It was all untold. He didn’t need to give you a reason as to why he had decided to stay, and you didn’t need to thank him out loud for him to know you were thankful. You just knew.

“I’m sorry about the other day…” he was the first one to speak — partially to put an end to the uncomfortable silence filling the room, partially to actually apologize, for he had wanted to say that ever since he had spoken his mind about you when you texted him from another room the other day.

“Don’t” you shook your head. “I’m sorry I was pestering you. It was on me”.

Taehyung stared at you in astonishment, never having expected you to apologize right back when, in his eyes, he had been in the wrong. “You weren’t—”

“Taehyung,” you cut him off. “I get it” a weak smile formed on your mouth. “We’re not friends. You don’t like me. I know those things, yet I still went and tried to get you to spend time with me. I won’t ask again, I promise” your eyes fixed on his, not being able to know what the look in them meant at all. “And honestly, I know you’re only here right now because you feel guilty about it, so please, just... go do whatever you had planned to do tonight instead. I’ll be fine”.

He smirked, leaning against the sofa and taking another sip from his glass. “Well, good thing that, unlike that friend of yours, I do live here and can stay if I want”.

You rolled your eyes in annoyance at his smug ways, making yourself more comfortable as well on the sofa and bringing your cup up to your lips to take a small sip of alcohol. Of course telling him to leave would only increase his will to stay here with you. How could you not see that coming.

“I’m really sorry, though” he repeated, his previous smirk no longer there as his sincere words left his mouth. “Shouldn’t have brought your family up”.

You shrugged. “Like you said, I left home, and I have to own up to it. You’re not supposed to be there for me whenever I want. I know I’m spoiled and entitled, so don’t… feel bad for putting me in my place”.

He said nothing, trying to collect the conflicted thoughts of his that were running through his mind. How could you be so self-aware yet still not let go of that mask you had on when it came to showing parts of your life to everyone else? Why did you still pretend to be living your perfect life when you had just said you had to own up to the fact that you had left home? It made no sense to him. It was like there were missing puzzle pieces to you and no matter what angle he looked at it from, he could just not quite figure you out.

“Is there a reason why you left home, though?” he found himself asking before he could even process his words.

Maybe the answer to that was the only missing puzzle piece he needed to understand the whole picture. Maybe then he would see you like something other than a spoiled girl who had thrown a tantrum and ran away from home, yet was not willing to entirely let go of her privileged lifestyle and perfect public image.

A bittersweet smile curved up your lips, eyes intently staring at the dark liquid in your glass. “You really think I would’ve left my oh-so-perfect life without one?”

“Almost sounds as if it wasn’t that perfect”.

You shrugged, eyes travelling from his to anywhere else. In comparison to other families, to other lives as a whole, you knew you were privileged as hell. Perfect, however? It was way far from being so.

“Will you ever tell me said reason?” he wondered, not even trying to hide his interest anymore. “You know, so I can actually try and understand your situation?”

Locking your eyes with his chocolate ones for a second, you furrowed your eyebrows, genuinely considering to just drop all your problems on him so you could both get it off your chest and try to make him understand why you had done it. However, it was only that, a second — breaking the eye contact before you shook your head no, as if you had suddenly come back to your senses. “We’re not friends…”

He chuckled. “Is that your way of getting me to want to be your friend?”

You shook your head no again, a weak smile barely curving up your lips. “That is my way of telling you it’s personal”.

He nodded softly, understandingly. You were not friends, he knew that better than anyone, for it was him the one who had pushed you away ever since the beginning. It would be hypocritical of him to expect you to open up to him just like that. And although you wanted to trust him, although he was Jimin’s best friend and that alone made you feel like it would be alright to trust him, you did not.

You didn’t know if it was comical or tragic, how you had been living together and seeing each other daily for a month now, yet were complete strangers to each other.

“You don’t have to become my friend to know, though. So don’t worry about that” you tried to lighten up the mood. “Everyone will know in a little less than a year. Just be patient”.

“That big of a deal?” he raised one of his eyebrows.

You nodded quietly, for although you wished it wasn’t, it was indeed that big of a deal. If you failed, everyone would know you were getting married to Lee Sungjin. If you managed to prove you could fend for yourself, on the other hand, everyone would know your family was disowning you. Either way, no matter what happened, the media would make a big deal out of it. And honestly, you didn’t know which scenario was worse.

“Can we talk about something else that isn’t family related?” you pleaded.

“Fine by me” he sighed, raising his glass before he brought it up to his lips. “Any ideas?”

You shrugged, looking around in search for something that would make you come up with a new topic, anything that would take the attention away from your life yet keep him interested, until your eyes fixed on a few used brushes of his that remained inside a cup on one of the shelves at the other end of the living room.

“Your art?” you proposed, eyes going back to his already attentive ones and bringing your glass up to your mouth.

The simple mention of his work brought a smile to his face. “What about it?”

“Are you preparing for an exhibition or something like that?” you wondered. “You know, since ever since I got here you’ve spent most of your time locked up inside your studio…”

Taehyung nodded. “Yeah, I’m having an exhibition that’s kind of a big deal in a few weeks, and it’s driving me crazy”.

“Oh, really?” you tilted your head, genuine interest clear in your voice. “That’s great, though. What is it going to be about?”

“You sure you’ve got time for that?” he playfully squinted his eyes at you, that being the first time he had dropped his serious act in front of you. Good thing was, he could always blame it on the alcohol. “I could talk about art for days”.

You chuckled, taking another sip of wine and then shaking your head in amusement as a melancholic smile curved up the corners of your lips. So could you when you were younger, although you had really no one to talk to about it back then. It was nice, though, seeing someone be just as —if not more— eager about it as you used to be, and the fact that he could actually be able to express his excitement and love for it only made it better.

“Well, we’re not going anywhere tonight, so…”

Taehyung shook his head in amusement at your statement. You got a point, though — your respective bedrooms being as far as you would go that night, and considering getting there wouldn’t take you any more than ten seconds, it was fair to say you had the whole night ahead of you, or at least until you ran out of wine.

“You like popcorn?” he asked out of the blue, earning a giggle from you that for some reason had him biting down on his bottom lip not to smile as well.

“Weren’t you just about to start talking nonstop about your art?”

He rolled his eyes at the call-out. “Yes, but I’m hungry and have got lots of popcorn in the kitchen,” his eyes glanced over there for a second before they were back on you. “Plus, I need to text the guys to let them know I won’t be coming over anymore, so…”

You smiled, tilting your head over to the kitchen. “Off you go then, I’ll just wait here”.

“Is that a yes to the popcorn, though? Or...”

Another light laugh escaped your mouth at how uncertain he had sounded. “Totally a yes to the popcorn” you agreed, watching his tall figure as he stood up. “Never had it with wine before, though”.

“What?!” his eyebrows furrowed in utter disbelief. “That is like, my go-to friday night combo”.

“Nutritive” you teased him.

“Says the salad girl” he bit back, causing you to raise your free hand as a sign of truce, which had him once again rolling his eyes at you. “So what is it for the upper class? Good wine and fine cheese?”

“I mean...” you shrugged, sipping on your glass.

“You think you’ll be alright trying out such a lower class snack?” he teased, earning an amused smile from you as you shook your head and looked away, biting on your bottom lip to try and erase it.

“I’m sure I will make it” you let him know rather dramatically.

Letting out a low chuckle, he decided to say nothing more in return. Instead, he dug his hand in his pocket and took his phone out, starting to type on it —to let his friends know he was staying here, you guessed— as he a made his way over to the kitchen for what felt like the tenth time that night.

Taking your phone out of your purse as well, you leaned against the sofa as you scrolled through your social media while you waited for your roommate to come back, feeling a little bit more at ease now that you had managed to take your mind off things and the tension between you two had seemed to be gone.

Yes, you were not friends, and maybe you never would be. Maybe roommates was all there would ever be between the two of you, yet as long as you were able to hold a proper conversation every now and then, you knew you would be able to make it through this year in the end.

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gimme-mor · 3 years

Text

BETWEEN THE LINES: NIGHT COURT ELAIN & SPRING COURT FEYRE

*DISCLAIMER*

This is a really long post and based on my interpretation of the text.

This is strictly an analysis of Elain as a character because, in my opinion, there isn’t a lot of talk about Elain outside of ships and conversations about her character arc typically revolve around to whom she is paired, especially if that person is Azriel. She is her own character and gets the short end of the stick in the fandom because everyone is more concerned about who she’s shipped with rather than her as a character.

Also, anyone who is rude/condescending will automatically be blocked.

In ACOSF, SJM went out of her way on two occasions to highlight Elain not looking good in black. While it may be minor or insignificant to some, I think those instances were meant to show something about Elain specifically and what she may be going through in the Night Court. Elain has been a passive character for the most part, contributing to things in her own way earlier in the series. But after she was taken by the Cauldron, her safety has become everyone’s main concern and the other characters have slowly excluded her from courtly matters. In ACOWAR, this was understandable because she was traumatized and not fully present. However, as of ACOSF, Elain was still excluded from courtly matters with the other characters heavily relying upon Nesta, who made her reservations known, because they were on a time constraint and couldn’t afford to wait for Elain to reacquaint herself with her powers.

The fact that the other characters use the kidnapping situation to excuse their current actions toward Elain is eerily similar to the way Tamlin and Lucien used the Under the Mountain events to excuse Tamlin’s actions toward Feyre in ACOMAF. And the characters use Elain and Feyre’s safety to justify why neither of them should be involved. In my opinion, Elain in the Night Court resembles Feyre in the Spring Court because not only do they experience similar things, but both of them are (or were in Feyre’s case) in places that stunt their growth. Even though Night Court Elain isn’t exposed to all of the things that Spring Court Feyre was exposed to, the similarities in their experiences (and how those similarities might potentially impact Elain similarly to the way they impacted Feyre) shouldn’t be overlooked.

Being monitored

Feyre

I was too watched－too monitored and judged. Why should the bride of the High Lord learn to fight if peace had returned? That had been Ianthe’s reasoning when I’d made the mistake of mentioning it at dinner. Tamlin, to his credit, had seen both sides: I’d learn to protect myself...but the rumors would spread. (ACOMAF)

“Tamlin－Tamlin, I can’t...I can’t live my life with guards around me day and night. I can’t live with that...suffocation. Just let me help you－let me work with you.” (. . .) “I’m drowning,” I managed to say. “I am drowning. And the more you do this, the more guards...You might as well be shoving my head under the water.” (ACOMAF)

Elain

Nesta said, “The Trove. And what happened the last time I scried.” Feyre said, “We won’t allow any harm to come to Elain. Rhys warded her this morning, and we have eyes on her at all times.” “Eyes can be blinded,” Nesta said. “Not the ones under my command,” Azriel said with soft menace. Nesta met his stare, knowing he was the only one aside from Feyre who could truly understand her hesitation. He’d gone with Feyre into the heart of Hybern’s camp to save Elain－he knew the risk. “We won’t make the same mistake twice.” She believed him. “All right.” (ACOSF)

Trying to fit in

Feyre

I hated the bright dresses that had become my daily uniform, but didn’t have the heart to tell Tamlin－not when he’d bought so many, not when he looked so happy to see me wear them. Not when his words weren’t far from the truth. The day I put on my pants and tunics, the day I strapped weapons to myself like fine jewelry, it would send a message far and clear across the lands. So I wore the gowns, and let Alis arrange my hair－if only so it would buy these people a measure of peace and comfort. (ACOMAF)

I sometimes debated asking her to pray for me as well. To pray that I’d one day learn to love the dresses, and the parties, and my role as a blushing, pretty bride. (ACOMAF)

Elain

And he knew the cruelty of the Hewn City troubled her. But she hadn’t hesitated to come. When Feyre had offered to let her remain home, Elain had squared her shoulders and declared that she was a part of this court－and would do whatever she needed. (ACOSF)

So Elain had let her golden-brown hair down tonight, and pinned it back with twin combs of pearl. He’d never once in the two years he’d known her found Elain to be plain, but wearing black, no matter how much she claimed to be part of this court...It sucked the life from her. (ACOSF)

Pretending everything’s all right

Feyre

“Fine,” I breathed. I made myself look him in the eye, made myself smile. (ACOMAF)

Elain

“And you?” I made myself say. “Are you－all right?” Elain looked over a shoulder at me as we entered the foyer, then turned left－to the dining room. In the sitting room across the way, all conversation halted at the smell of food. “Why wouldn’t I be all right?” she asked, a smile lighting up her face. I’d seen those smiles before. On my own damn face. (ACOFAS)

Clothes not looking right on them

Feyre

I really, truly hated my wedding gown. It was a monstrosity of tulle and chiffon and gossamer, so unlike the loose gowns I usually wore: the bodice fitted, the neckline curved to plump my breasts, and the skirts...The skirts were a sparkling tent, practically floating in the balmy spring air (. . .) I might have dealt with it all if it weren’t for the puffy capped sleeves, so big I could almost see them glinting from the periphery of my vision. My hair had been curled, half up, half down, entwined with pearls and jewels and the Cauldron knew what, and it had taken all my self-control to keep from cringing at the mirror before descending the sweeping stairs into the main hall. (ACOMAF)

I again surveyed the room, my wedding gown hissing on the warm marble floors. I peered down at myself. You look ridiculous. (ACOMAF)

Elain

Elain in black was ridiculous. Yes, she was beautiful, but the color of her long-sleeved, modest gown leeched the brightness from her face. It wore her, rather than the other way around. (ACOSF)

Looking good in clothes that suit them and that fact being pointed out

Feyre

My high-waisted peach pants were loose and billowing, gathered at the ankles with velvet cuffs of bright gold. The long sleeves of the matching top were made of gossamer, also gathered at the wrists, and the top itself hung just to my navel, revealing a sliver of skin as I walked. Comfortable, easy to move in－to run. Feminine. Exotic. (ACOMAF)

But those claws now dug in－and my entire body, my heart, my lungs, my blood yielded to his grip, utterly at his command as he said, The fashion of the Night Court suits you. (ACOMAF)

Elain

Gone was the ill-suited black dress from the ball, replaced by a gown of amethyst velvet, her hair half-up and curling down to her waist. She glowed with good health. (ACOSF)

People not wanting them to be involved in things

Feyre

“I want to go.” “No.” I crossed my arms, tucking my tattooed hand under my right bicep, and spread my feet slightly further apart on the dirt floor of the stables. “It’s been three months. Nothing’s happened, and the village isn’t even five miles－” “No.” (ACOMAF)

“I could use my powers against Hybern.” “That’s out of the question,” Tamlin said, “especially as there will be no war against Hybern.” “Rhys says war is inevitable, and we’ll be hit hard.” Lucien said drily, “And Rhys knows everything?” “No－but...He was concerned. He thinks I can make a difference in any upcoming conflict.” Tamlin flexed his fingers－keeping those claws contained. “You have no training in battle or weaponry. And even if I started training you today, it’d be years before you could hold your own on an immortal battlefield.” He took a tight breath. “So despite what he thinks you might be able to do, Feyre, I’m not going to have you anywhere near a battlefield. Especially if it means revealing whatever powers you have to our enemies. You’d be fighting Hybern at your front, and have foes with friendly faces at your back.” “I don’t care－” “I care,” Tamlin snarled. Lucien whooshed out a breath. “I care if you die, if you’re hurt, if you will be in danger every moment for the rest of our lives. So there will be no training, and we’re going to keep this between us.” (ACOMAF)

Elain

“Nesta’s spine straightened. No one spoke, but their attention lingered on her like a film on her skin. ‘You will not go looking for it.’” (ACOSF)

“Then go off on adventures,” Nesta said. “Go drink and fuck strangers. But stay away from the Cauldron.” (. . .) “Keep out of this,” she hissed at her youngest sister. “I have no doubt you put these thoughts in her head, probably encouraging her to throw herself into harm’s way－” (ACOSF)

Amren said, “We do not have the time to wait for Nesta to decide. I say we approach Elain tomorrow. Better to have both of them working on it.” Azriel stiffened, an outright sign of temper from him as he said quietly, “There is an innate darkness to the Dread Trove that Elain should not be exposed to.” “But Nesta should?” Cassian growled. Everyone stared at him. He swallowed, offering an apologetic glance to Az, who shrugged it off. Amren drained her wine and said to Cassian, “Nesta has a week. One more week to find the Trove with her own methods. Then we seek out other routes.” She threw a nod toward Azriel. “Including Elain, who is more than capable of defending herself against the darkness of the Trove, if she chooses to. Don’t underestimate her.” (ACOSF)

“I think Eris is our ally, and will expect to dance with a lady of this court at the ball no matter what. I won’t let Feyre within five feet of him, Mor might kill him, and Amren is more likely to scare him off than win him over, so you and Elain are the only options.” “Elain doesn’t go near him,” Feyre said. (ACOSF)

Their safety being brought up when they want to be involved

Feyre

“Please. The recovery efforts are so slow. I could hunt for the villagers, get them food－” “It’s not safe,” Tamlin said, again nudging his stallion into a walk. The horse’s coat shone like a dark mirror, even in the shade of the stables. “Especially not for you.” He’d said that every time we had this argument; every time I begged him to let me go to the nearby village of High Fae to help rebuild what Amarantha had burned years ago (. . .) “People want to come back, they want a place to live－” “Those same people see you as a blessing－a marker of stability. If something happened to you…” (. . .)Tamlin said softly, “I can’t do what I need to if I’m worrying about whether you’re safe.” (ACOMAF)

“I’m sorry about earlier,” he murmured. “It’s fine,” I breathed. “I understand.” Not a lie, but not quite the truth. His fingers grazed lower, circling my belly button. “You are－you’re everything to me,” he said thickly. “I need...I need you to be all right. To know they can’t get to you－can’t hurt you anymore.” (ACOMAF)

“Tamlin got what I didn’t,” Lucien said softly, his breathing ragged. “We all heard your neck break. But you got to come back. And I doubt that he will ever forget that sound, either. And he will do everything in his power to protect you from that danger again, even if it means keeping secrets, even if it means sticking to rules you don’t like. In this, he will not bend. So don’t ask him to－not yet.” (ACOMAF)

“Did he let you take me today,” I said hoarsely, “so that I’d stop asking to help rebuild?” “No. I decided to take you myself. For that exact reason. They don’t want or need your help. Your presence is a distraction and a reminder of what they went through.” (. . .) “I know you wanted to help,” Lucien offered. “I’m sorry.” So was I. (ACOMAF)

Elain

“The last time we involved ourselves with the Cauldron, it abducted you,” Nesta countered, fighting her shaking. (ACOSF)

“Like calls to like,” Amren countered. “You were Made by the Cauldron. You may track other objects Made by it as well, as Briallyn can. And because you are Made by it, you are immune to the influence and power of the Trove. You might use them, yes, but they cannot be used upon you.” A glance to Elain. “Either of you.” Nesta swallowed. “I can’t.” But to let Elain involve herself, jeopardize her safety－ (ACOSF)

Nesta’s pulse pounded throughout her body. “Do you not remember the war? What we encountered? Do you not remember the Cauldron kidnapping you, bringing you into the heart of Hybern’s camp?” “I do,” Elain said coldly. (ACOSF)

If it was between her and Elain, there was no choice at all. She would always go first if it meant keeping Elain from harm. Even if she’d just hurt her sister more than she could stomach. (ACOSF)

Pushing back against what others want

Feyre

He hissed, “You have no idea how hard it is for him to even let you off the estate grounds. He’s under more pressure than you realize.” “I know exactly how much pressure he endures. And I didn’t realize I’d become a prisoner.” “You’re not－” He clenched his jaw. “That’s not how it is and you know it.” “He didn’t have any trouble letting me hunt and wander on my own when I was a mere human. When the borders were far less safe.” “He didn’t care for you the way he does now. And after what happened Under the Mountain…” The words clanged in my head, along my too-tense muscles. “He’s terrified. Terrified of seeing you in his enemies’ hands. And they know it, too－they know all they have to do to own him would be to get ahold of you.” “You think I don’t know that? But does he honestly expect me to spend the rest of my life in that manor, overseeing servants and wearing pretty clothes?” (ACOMAF)

Elain

Cassian shifted in his seat. “So we track down the Dread Trove－how?” Elain spoke from the doorway, having appeared so silently that they all twisted toward her, “Using me.” Nesta’s head went silent as Elain’s words finished sounding in the room. Feyre had twisted in her seat, face white with alarm. Nesta shot to her feet. “No.” Elain remained in the doorway, her face pale but her expression harder than Nesta had ever seen it. “You do not decide what I can and cannot do, Nesta.” (ACOSF)

“It nearly killed me. It trapped me like a bird in a cage.” Elain said, “Then I will find it. I might require some time to...reacquaint myself with my powers, but I could start today.” “Absolutely not,” Nesta spat, fingers curling at her sides. “Absolutely not.” “Why?” Elain demanded. “Shall I tend to my little garden forever?” When Nesta flinched, Elain said, “You can’t have it both ways. You cannot resent my decision to lead a small, quiet life while also refusing to let me do anything greater.” (ACOSF)

Being used as pawns against others

Feyre

“We need you to tell us everything,” Tamlin said. “The layout of the Night Court, who you saw, what weapons and powers they bore, what Rhys did, who he spoke to, any and every detail you can recall.” “I didn’t realize I was a spy.” Lucien shifted in his seat, but Tamlin said, “As much as I hate your bargain, you’ve been granted access into the Night Court. Outsiders rarely get to go in－and if they do, they rarely come out in one piece. And if they can function, their memories are usually...scrambled. Whatever Rhysand is hiding in there, he doesn’t want us knowing about it.” (ACOMAF)

Elain

Rhys angled his head at the not-quite question. “I trust in the fact that we currently have possession of the one thing he wants above all else. And as long as that remains, he’ll try to stay on our good side. But if that changes...His talent was wasted in the Spring Court. There was a reason he had that fox mask, you know.” His mouth tugged to the side. “If he got Elain away, back to Spring or wherever...do you believe, deep down, that he wouldn’t sell what he knows? Either for gain, or to ensure she stays safe?” “You let him hear everything tonight, though.” (. . .) I considered his question: Did I trust Lucien? “I don’t know, either,” I admitted, and sighed. “I don’t like that Elain is a pawn in this.” “I know. It’s never easy.” (ACOWAR)

Cassian glowered at Amren. “It’s not right to wield Elain as a threat to manipulate Nesta into scrying.” “There are harsher ways to convince Nesta, boy.” (ACOSF)

Although Elain and Feyre are surrounded by two different groups of people with varying levels of care for their wellbeing, they’re treated similarly which is hard to overlook. In Elain’s situation, Nesta, Azriel, and Feyre take on the “Tamlin role” (either undermining Elain’s attempts to contribute to things or preventing Elain from helping altogether) while everyone else takes on the “Lucien role” (validating the concerns of others while also enabling their behaviors, which doesn’t support Elain’s desire to be involved).

#elain archeron #feyre archeron #gimme meta #gimme queues

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that-damn-girl · 3 years

Text

(2) Daze of Pollen

(Work in Progress - 2 of 8; Slow updates)

Chapter 1

Daze of Pollen Materlist

Pairing: (cis)fem!Reader x Bucky Barnes x Steve Rogers x Sam Wilson

Words: 2500+

Warnings: Smut. 18+ only please. Oral (female recieving). Threesome (penetrative sex is in the next chapter). Not exactly bondage but restraining using physical strength. Size kink. That’s it I guess.

Summary: Bucky, Steve, Sam and you are in the safe house post mission when a retrieved Hydra device activates, releasing a kind of pollen you don’t know of, but the effects of which are soon discovered.

A/N: And the smut begins! Sorry this took some while. I’m still taking kink requests if you have any. Hope you enjoy it!

Request included: Not sure if this qualifies but for Daze of Pollen how about a scene where they decide to pin down/restrain one of them while the another person goes to town teasing them?

Also, since size kink was in demand it’s a personal favorite of mine, it’s gonna be kinda constant throughout the fic. So the reader is short in height only. For rest of the part, I’ve tried my best to stay neutral.

You didn't know who leaned into whom, but you didn't care. Soft lips touched yours, drawing you in a kiss. His metal arm curved around your waist, pulling you impossibly close to himself instantly, the other hand slithering up your neck to cup cheeks. His tight hold on you caused you to lean back, but his arm kept you firm against him, tightly pressed to his form.

Despite his eager demeanor, Bucky kissed you with such a gentleness, his lips playing with yours with such soft, feather light touches, it genuinely took you aback, only leaving you yearning for more. Tilting his head, Bucky deepened the kiss. Soft moans arose from your throat, which were swallowed by him.

His hands streamed down to your butt, squeezing your cheeks appreciably. Grabbing your thighs, he hiked them around his waist, lifting you off your feet and into his strong hold. He carried you to your bedroom with slow, measured steps, your hands tightening around his neck to balance yourself. The two other men were left all by themselves in the living room.

Sam and Steve looked at each other, a little dumbfounded, unsure what they needed to do, where they stood.

"Do we…" Steve started, gesturing to follow you and Bucky.

"Uh, I guess…?" Sam answered, unsure of how to go about it. It wasn't every day that he and his friends inhaled some evil organization's pollen and needed to get each other's rocks off to survive. Nevertheless, he followed you and Bucky to your bedroom, curious to see how this would unfold. Steve wasn't far behind.

Bucky sat down on your bed, settling you on his lap, legs on either side of his waist. One of his hands stayed on your butt, kneading your ass, while the other traveled back to your face, cupping it in his protective hold. Your face nuzzled into the heat of his palm, seeking more of him.

Everything else was lost to you, your mind abandoning all thoughts except one. Bucky. Bucky. Bucky. His gentle touches on your body. The delicate kisses on your lips. His hands kept you close to him in his caring and protective hold, pulling you into the heat of his body. Your shorter frame settled snugly in his larger one.

"Always wanted to do this, doll. You don't know how long I've wanted to kiss you, taste you, devour those fucking sweet lips." Bucky said in between the kisses. "Didn't know it'd come down to this though. Kissing you only because I had to."

You pulled back, taken aback by his confession. "You did?" You asked, heart thrumming wildly.

Bucky nodded. "Day and night, doll. Since forever." The rough pad of his thumb glided across your bottom lip. "Always wanted to hold and kiss you silly so fucking bad."

You couldn't believe it. You had always liked these men, wanted them too - because fuck, how could you not? Admittedly, Bucky a little more than the rest. But to know Bucky wanted you too? Not just as the close friend you had become over the years, but really wanted you in the most sinful ways as you wanted him? It drove you to a new high.

"Fuck, Bucky. Me too." Your lips dawned on his in a harsh kiss.

It lasted only a moment before Bucky pulled back. "Because of the pollen?" He asked, brows furrowed. Worried that your response was only because of the effect the pollen had on you.

"Fuck the pollen. You're what I want, Bucky. You're what I need." You insisted, determined to make him see that you wanted him just as much.

Looking into your eyes, Bucky knew that you weren't lying. That there were no reasons to doubt your words. The disclosure released something primal in him. Knowing that he was wanted, needed even, that too by you, the one person he desired above everyone else? He couldn't hold himself back for a second longer.

With a growl, he pulled you back into him, plump lips kissing you wildly. Any trace of softness left him as he kissed you with an unparalleled hunger. A desire you had never seen before. The kiss grew hot and heated as his tongue traced your lips and entered you not long after. His tongue danced with yours skillfully, lips devouring yours passionately. Bucky gave his all into the kiss, his mind clouded with the thoughts of you and only you.

The outline of his half hard member was prominent beneath your thighs, even through the thick fabric of his jeans. Without giving it much thought, you ground your hips into his, focusing your movements around his length. Bucky groaned at how good it felt. Fingers grabbed your ass as he guided your flow, pushing your hips down on his. Slotting your core directly over his shaft, you rolled your hips unceasingly, drawing pleasure filled moans from both of you.

Not long after, you felt your body heat up. The clothes stuck to your form, the fabric brushing against your skin in the harshest and most irritating of manners. It was nearly suffocating, the feel of the offending fabric overwhelming all your other senses. It only left you with the urge to get rid of them and free your body of the confines.

"God, I'm so hot." Murmuring against his lips, you made to pull off your sweatshirt, leaving you only in your bra.

Bucky only gazed at your chest in wonder for a moment, eyes shining bright. "Fuck, you're perfect." His face landed on your chest, nipping and sucking right above the swell of your breasts. Hands went around your back to unclasp your bra, taking it off you and chucking it across the in record time.

You released a contented sigh as the cool conditioned air swept over your hot skin, the feel of Bucky's lips on your skin even more heavenly. His lips left a wet trail as he traveled down to the valley between your breasts. Your head tilted back, fingers raking through his fluffy hair to grip them tightly. Aroused even further, you could feel your panties getting damp as you rocked your hips further over his erection.

"Get me out of these clothes, Bucky. Please! It's getting too hot." The metal armed man heeded your requests, knowing that the pollen had started affecting you now, knowing exactly what you needed. Not wasting any more time, he made quick work of discarding your sweats and panties before undressing himself.

Bucky threw you down on the bed, your back hitting the mattress with a bounce. With an unsuppressed growl, he climbed on top of your small form, his broad shoulders and tall frame almost covering every bit of you, his hard cock resting heavily on your thigh. You whimpered beneath him, intimidated by his large frame in the most arousing of ways.

Bucky loved feeling your bare pressed into him, your small body quivering beneath him with a desire, a need only he could quell. "You're so fucking beautiful, baby." He breathed, lips attached to your neck, shrouding your delicate skin with hickeys. Hands wandered down your sides until he reached your core. A loud gasp left your lips as his fingers touched your bundle of nerves, stroking it skillfully and steadily.

You could feel your wetness seeping out of you little by little, the insides of your thighs already slick from your arousal. Though it was greatly appreciated, you didn't need him to make you anymore wet. All you wanted, all you needed was him stretching and filling you to your limit on his erection.

"I need you inside me. Need your cock filling me, Bucky." You whimpered under him.

"Easy, baby," He chuckled, "I'm not gonna fuck you without tasting you, making you cum on my fingers, pretty girl." And with that, he slid down your body, kneeling on the floor. Taking a hold of your legs, he dragged you down until your pussy was in his reach, all his for the taking. Resting your legs on his shoulders, he went to town.

You let out a loud, broken moan as Bucky licked a long stripe through your slit. He firmly attached his mouth to your bundle of nerves. The moist, strong muscle of his tongue drew round patterns on your clit, occasionally sucking it into the heat of his mouth.

Bucky and you were lost in each other, uncaring of the world around you. Bunching the sheets by your head, your head turned to sideways of its own accord, your body reaping the pleasures he gave you. So much so that only then did you notice your other two friends sitting on the mini couch in your room. Even from a distance, you could see the outlines of their erections, the thin material of the grey Shield sweats doing nothing to hide them. Their shirts discarded, they both palmed their erections through the fabric, a mix of discomfort and arousal on their faces. It only made your mouth water more. Extending your hand, you called out to them "Sam, Steve…"

Exchanging a glance, the men stayed rooted to their spots. It was only after another desperate call of yours that Sam's resolve broke. Striding across the room in long steps, Sam was at your side within moments. Clutching your extended hand, he brought it to his lips. "My baby girl's enjoying herself, hmm?"

Squeezing his hand, you replied, "Want you too, Sam." A wanton moan escaped your lips right then as Bucky worked magic down below.

Sam smirked. "All greedy, my baby girl is, isn't she? Always wants more and more and more."

You pathetically nodded your head in response, anything to get his hands and lips on your body. Any and all rational thoughts had left your being, leaving behind an unbridled desire, a thirst which could only be satiated by the three men.

Sam couldn't hold himself back as he saw the yearning on your face, a dazed look in your eyes, a sweet little pout on your lips. Grabbing your neck harshly, he pulled you into a long, bruising kiss.

You gasped at the suddenness, but it didn't take long for you to kiss back just as enthusiastically. His hands streamed your body as if memorizing every curve and plain, occasionally stopping at your breasts to squeeze them. You would whimper into his mouth every time he did that, and he would grin into the kiss. He turned your body a bit to the side as he laid down beside you, only enough so that you'd be comfortable and Bucky would still have space.

You grew a little bolder, deciding to creep your hand down your bodies and gripping Sam's erection through his sweats. The new Captain America choked on nothing but air in surprise. Instantly pulling away, he looked at you to find a shy grin already playing on your face, lips caught in between your teeth. You never ceased rubbing his shaft as you looked at him. Sam groaned. "You're gonna be the death of me, baby girl."

Your grin turned brighter in response. Tugging at the waistband, you whined, "Take these off Sammy, need to feel all of you against me."

Sam didn't delay in heeding to your whims, needing himself to get out of the constricting cloth. Discarding it, he quickly resumed his position beside, taking your lips in a hungry, heated kiss. Fingers running over his thick member, you took it in your hands, gripping and stroking it with a tad bit more pressure than necessary, but it was exactly what Sam needed to relieve himself. The protruding veins of his member were prominent, making your mind salivate at only the thought of his veins pulsing inside your pussy.

Something about seeing the way Sam kissed you, bordering on rough and eager. The way his palms squeezed your tits, his fingers playing with your nipples. The way your hand pumped his cock, wrist flicking, occasionally fondling his heavy balls as well, drawing out gravely moans from his throat. The way your face contorted into a mix of pleasure and bliss, a hint of longing still persisting. It spurred on Bucky even more, his length twitching.

The man in between your knees took his own uncomfortably hard cock and stroked it. After giving himself a moment of relief, Bucky left his cock to circle his arms around your thighs, diving into your core with renewed passion.

You couldn't lay still from the sensations coursing through you. Hands roaming your body, a tongue playing skillfully with your own while another working mercilessly with your clit. It was too fucking much to stay still. Your body quivered beneath the two men, your hips rising off the bed. You were yourself confused if you were pulling away from Bucky's touch or rushing towards it.

Regardless, Bucky's hand splayed over your stomach, keeping you in place. But it wasn't enough. Your body was too excited to stay in one place. "Sam, hold her down." Bucky said.

Sam lifted your hand off his cock, bringing both your hands above your head. Crossing them, he clutching both your wrists in one hand simply. The other pushed you on the bed so that you completely laid on your back, before going back to your breast and teasing your nipple. You whimpered at the change in position. Sam clicked his tongue softly. "Shh, it's for your own good. Just enjoy it, baby."

And enjoy, you did.

Sam went back to kissing you furiously, his hands alternating between your breasts, taking turns in playing with your pebble hard nipples. Bucky ate you like a man starved. His tongue pressed down hard on your bundle of nerves, alternating between flicking and swirling it in the most pleasurable of angles. The moist heat of his mouth enveloped you. Tongue attached to your clit, at times he would shake his head too to stimulate you further.

You were truly, blissfully overwhelmed. The Falcon and the Winter Soldier took your body to new heights, closer and closer to your peak.

Thereafter, It didn't take long for your body to tip off the edge, pure pleasure coursing through your veins as your orgasm washed over you. Sam pulled back to see the blissed out expression of your face, loving the way your closed shut and your mouth opened, your toes curling as you moaned loudly, your hips bucking into Bucky's face. The man lapped at your pussy, slurping your release directly from the source, not missing one single drop of it. He moaned at your taste, his vibrations flowing through you, only prolonging your first orgasm of the night.

The first of many.

Chapter 3

Don’t worry, Steve will join the fun soon!

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the-witches-you-couldnt-burn · 3 years

Text

It started with a whisper

I originally wrote ‘Like I did with you’ as a one-shot but people wanted a sequel. This turned out to be waaaaay longer than expected (4.7k word count). Inspired by Everybody Talks by Neon Trees. I hope you lot enjoy!

Ao3

(Also this is Mari’s new outfit, all credits go to the original artist)

————

Two teens stood upon the balcony of a large banquet hall, exposed to the midsummer night air. The sky was a lilac blanket that hung over the Parisian buildings, speckled with glowing stars. The moon, with it’s crescent smile, beamed down of the young couple.

Hey, baby, won't you look my way?

Marinette’s eyes were closed as she rested her head upon his shoulder, relaxing after the night’s rapid escalation. Tonight she had arrived at the ball with the intent to be there for her friends, but somehow she found herself within the arms of Gotham’s (and probably Paris’) Ice Prince. She had overheard his nickname from the Gotham students, one of which being Jon, who was in the middle of mocking the young Wayne. She had never considered that nickname as suitable; sure he was temperamental & had a tendency to snap, but icey to the core? No.

I can be your new addiction

Damian was calm. For the first time in his life he felt like he could take a breath. His exhale was carried off by a small gust of wind, the bush over hanging the stone railing rustled. With his inhale, the scent of Marinette’s perfume became present once more. Mixed with the crisp night’s air, her usual scent of pastries was mixed with what could only be described as ambrosia. His phone vibrated within his pocket, it was never on volume due to the potential risk it caused during his heroic activities.

“Shit.” Notifications covered his screen, multiple tweets, Instagrams and Tiktoks in which he had been tagged in. But the alert came from his family’s private messaging chat. The whole thread was a shit storm, Grayson and Todd’s messages were completely capitalised (he learnt years ago this meant ‘to yell’ in writing form) and both had multiple ‘keyboard spasms’. Drake, like the thorough detective he is, had combed through the images and videos, investigating their validity. His honorary sisters had replied with ‘awwwww’(s) and ‘Omg we MUST meet this girl! I need to know how she tamed the demon!’. He could practically hear Brown’s shrill voice from across the ocean.

Hey, baby, what you gotta say?

No reply from his father or Alfred. The two of them were the only semblance of ‘normal’ paternal figures he had within his life, after the sham of a relationship he had previously held with his grandfather. Their silence unnerved him.

Marinette had noticed his attention had shifted to his phone, her own mobile was buzzing away within her baby pink purse. Messages, notifications of account tagging and comments galore. A sigh left her lips when she saw her parents seemed to be none the wiser. Good, she didn’t need to deal with future adoration for ‘The boy who swept our daughter off of her feet’ (or something along those lines).

Her cheeks regained some of the warmth they held before as she thought of her parent’s reaction. Scrolling through her Twitter she saw her friends had posted multiple images of the night’s events, majority being her shared dance.

Chloé Bourgeois @TheBestBourgeois

what kind of Disney shit is this? (Insert video of two teens dancing around an mostly empty dance floor.)

Alix Kubdel @Sk8trGirl

Replying to @TheBestBourgeois

I KNOW RIGHT?! THEY WERE FUCKING FLOATING!!!

All you're giving me is fiction

She was thankful that they hadn’t tagged her but she hadn’t been spared by others in attendance. Her post thread had blown up, thousands had commented and even more had viewed the evidence. There was no way she would come out of this unscathed.

“Has anyone been on Twitter today?” The blonde of the family asked as she walked into the dining room. Her eyes focused on her scrolling screen, brows furrowed in confusion. “Actually has anyone seen what’s happening on any of our socials?”

It was early in the afternoon and the family had recently returned home after a straining stakeout. The Joker had broken out of Arkham and the Batfam had to deal with his minions. Dick’s arm was in a sling (sprained from a grapple gone wrong), Jason was icing his hand, Alfred was stitching Bruce’s chest wounds while Tim and the girls escaped without severe injuries. All were still recuperating and finally able to recharge.

Alfred always enforced a strict ‘no devices at the dinner table’ rule; no matter how urgent it was, it could wait until after sustenance was consumed. Tim strongly opposed this, but there was no arguing with Agent A. This all surmises that probably no one had seen the crap storm on social media.

I'm a sorry sucker and this happens all the time

Bruce sighed, bringing his free arm up to rub his eyes. Tilting his head back to look at Steph, “Who was it this time?” Barbara quickly took out her phone to see what Stephanie was talking about, all the while glancing accusingly at Dick and Jason. Both of whom held up their arms (or in Dick’s case arm), declaring their innocence.

“It wasn’t fucking me!”

“Jason! Language!” Dick shot a glare at Jason and was met with one in return. “It wasn’t me either.”

“Then who-“ Bruce started before being cut off by his most rambunctious daughter.

I found out that everybody talks

Stephanie with a squeal, exclaimed that it was Damian. Visions of what the Wayne brat could have done flashed through the heads of everyone in the room. He had been sent overseas before the quarantines and lockdowns hit. During Damian’s first month in France he had been forced into online schooling and then finally when he got to go to in-person classes he hated it. Described the class as a kindergarten with petty and vindictive toddlers.

Had he broken someone’s arm? Was that person of such importance that it had spread over multiple social media platforms? France’s government had announced on June 15th, that teens were now being inoculated so him having COVID-19 was doubtful. Had he insulted the wrong person? Had he taken over the government? He certainly had the potential.

Everybody talks, everybody talks

What they saw stunned them, even Steph as she watched it for the 7th time. Damian Wayne was dancing. But not only that, he was dancing with a girl.

It started with a whisper

“What is this shit?”

No one verbally objected to Jason’s outburst but he was sent a harsh glare from Alfred, Dick and Bruce. Their focus soon returned to the images and videos before them. Babs’ and Steph’s phones were returned to them as the others ran to grab their own devices. They all met back at the table, comparing the posts and comparing their notes.

I can hear the chitchat

“There’s no way this can be real.”

“Jesus Tim,” Barbara rolls her eyes, “have you seen the amount of posts there are? You’d be an idiot to think otherwise.”

Take me to your love shack

“I’m with Tim, how do we know this isn’t some skit. I mean, Demon Spawn almost looks normal. That’s a matter of concern.” He almost dry heaved when he agreed with Tim. Damian couldn’t be capable of naturally exuding that amount of humanity unless there was something in it for him.

Mamas always gotta backtrack

“I was just saying Babs, that we should check the credibility of these images. For all we know they could be gorilla glued together and trying to get unstuck.” Tim cringed at his own reasoning, he really needed to either sleep (probably not going to happen anytime soon) or find his favourite coffee brand (which had been one of the first to vanish after the covid hoarders appeared).

When everybody talks back

Dick was too busy freaking out and spam messaging the youngest Wayne, to defend Damian’s humanity. The family saw this and followed suit, wanting to get information from the source.

Chat name: Alfred supremacy

BigBird: AHHHHHH DAMIAN!

BigBird: YOU LOOK SO CUTE!!!

BigBird: HAIFJDNDNFI

LittleWing: WTF HAPPENED DEMON SPAWN YOU LOOK ALMOST HUMAN

Babs: who knew the city of love would influence the brat

Blondie: they are so cuteeeeeee!

Blondie: We HAVE to meet her!

Silent-but-deadly: agreed.

Timbo: YO DEMON

Timbo: Apparently the videos are legit

Timbo: are you being blackmailed?

And it just devolved into more chaos from there, fueled by the fact that they saw Damian’s ‘Blood Son’ account appear online before vanishing once more. Dick shrieked, “I FOUND HER ACCOUNT!”

The family gathered around the eldest son, peering over his shoulder to view his iPhone 12max screen. They saw a young girl’s Instagram account. It was locked but they could see her profile pic, the girl had black hair and looked to be if Asian decent. They compared it to the videos but it was hard to see due to the hall’s lighting and the minimised facial features of the pfp. Alfred suggested that they search up her username and see who has tagged her, some might have other photos of her.

After research for awhile, the family began to get frustrated with lack of results.

Hey honey you could be my drug

You could be my new prescription

“Come on!” Jason complained, “What kind of teenage girl doesn’t post her life online?” He ignored the girls glares and went back to researching. How had the account by the name of ‘mariiiiinette’ to managed to prevent the entire Wayne clan from accessing it? Damn Instagram privacy settings. He groaned, dragging a hand down his face, “We are fucking stupid. Why don’t we just use the Bat-computer? It would be so much fucking easier.”

“It shouldn’t be used for civilian issues-“

Too much could be an overdose

“The girl could be a meta for all we know! We aren’t safe until we know who she is.” Jason points a finger at Tim, his paranoia flared up and even though he would never admit it, Jason would do anything to protect each member of his family (although Bruce is still debatable).

All this trash talk make me itching

Barbara and Tim took their usual positions as Oracle and Red Robin (who had been banned from patrol due to lack of sleep). The rest of the Batfam stood behind them either with arms crossed or still failing at researching.

Oh my my shit

“The account is owned by a girl called Marinette Dupian-Cheng. She is French-Chinese and her parents own a popular bakery. Also if it wasn’t already obvious, she goes to Collège Françoise Dupont, aka Damian’s French school.” Tim begun informing his nosy family, “But this account has been inactive for the past 6 months, which is strange due to her frequent posting schedule before hand. It seems she probably has a second account and this is her old one.”

Everybody talks, everybody talks

“Not only that,” Barbara interrupted. “There are unopened messages from other accounts that accuse her of being a bully. There is a whole Facebook page about this girl and how she has been hurting her old friends, but neither side seems reliable. The so called victims seem to be twisting the truth but there is barely any information about Marinette so we can’t disprove it either.”

“Read out some of the messages.” Bruce took a cup of coffee from Alfred and sipped it.

The main screen of the bat computer displayed a Facebook group with the banner picture being a photo of Marinette. “They are mostly complaints expected of teen girls when there is a girl they don’t like; ‘Marinette is such a know-it-all’, ‘She is constantly insulting Lila’s intelligence’. They go on to talk about how Marinette was briefly expelled from the Collège before being reinstated by the principle for a reason unknown to them.”

Everybody talks too much

“Her school reports up until this year were good. The newest one states, ‘While Marinette is a wonderful and bright student, I encourage her to settle her disagreements outside of class. This seems to only be a recent occurrence and I implore her to go to the guidance council if she is in need of help.’” A beat of silence echoes through the cave, Tim sighed. “Jason’s meta theory could be correct. She could have just recently started exhibiting her abilities and using them to get what she wants.”

“Bruce what do you want to do?”

“We’re going to Paris.”

She opened her eyes to the blaring morning light that streamed through the blinds. Her lashes still painted with mascara that refused to leave. She felt a pang of sorrow when she was removing her makeup and dress last night, she never wanted the night to end. She shuffled down the stairs to the kitchen, covering her mouth when she yawned. She greeted her mother as she entered the kitchen to get breakfast.

She glanced at her phone and there was the chaos that was started hours ago and it was still occurring. It was the weekend, she wouldn’t need to deal with her classmates until Monday. But she would still have to survive her parent’s interrogation. Out of the corner of her eye she caught her mother smirking at her.

Everybody talks

“Nadja told me some interesting news about last night.” Marinette held her breath, glaring at the toaster, willing it to hurry up so she could escape. “Well,” Sabine patted her shoulder before rubbing Mari’s back. “I know you didn’t want to go but I hope you had fun.”

With that she exited the kitchen, probably going to help her father in the bakery. The ravenette stared after her, eye widened in shock, jumping when the toaster went off. Buttering her toast she went over the conversation, her brows furrowed in confusion. She had expected a ‘When do I get to meet the oh so famous prince?’ or ‘Should I be expecting a new guest sometime in the near future?’ or at least a ‘Who was that young man, Bǎozàng (宝藏 it means treasure)?’ But she said nothing.

A small smile was plastered upon her face as she changed and went down to help her parents in the bakery. Her father didn’t say anything either, he gave her a knowing smile before continuing to kneed the dough. She sat at the the store front as the cashier whilst her parents were busy making ‘Paris’s Finest Pastries’.

Her musings slowly faded as she was brought back to reality by badly hushed whispers. Two young preteens were by the bread roll casing near the door. She had seen them come in before with their parents, the girls went to the prestigious international school over in the 16th arrondissement. The one with purple hair kept whispering to the brunette, both ‘subtly’ glancing towards her. Using her enhanced hearing she listened in on their conversation.

“That’s her, I swear that’s her in the video.”

The blonde’s face soured likes she sucked on a lemon. “No, it wasn’t good lighting there is no way he would dance with someone like her.”

Everybody talks

Marinette had tough skin but their words had an impact, only a small one due to her defence mechanism of repressing emotions. She stopped listening and went back to drawing in her sketchpad, she was in desperate need of a new school outfit.

The two girls eventually came up to the counter, goods in hand. Marinette rung up and bagged their items (paper because save the turtles sksksk) in a tired daze. A phone was shoved into her face, her eyes barely adjusted to view the screen before the blonde spoke.

“Is this your instagram?” She asked in a tone so snobbish that it should be illegal from a person her age. Marinette finally was able to view the screen that was barely an inch from her face. Her old Instagram ‘mariiiiinette’ was displayed on screen, she hesitantly nodded, gaze flicking back to the two in front of her.

The blonde’s nose scrunched up and the purple goth girl squealed in delight. They soon after left the store, their conversation had devolved into ‘See! I told you’ and ‘Yeah, yeah. You were right.’

Walking to school on Monday, she had finally come down from cloud nine. She still rode the tail end of her high as she rushed along her path to her campus, she wasn’t going to be late but she sure wasn’t going to be early. She had spent the better part of the weekend designing and sewing a brand new outfit. Her new look was composed of a black cropped singlet (L'amour gagne hemmed into it and it’s straps), paired matching peach plaid cropped overshirt and a-line miniskirt. Her hair was down, ballet flats were worn and her makeup was the usual with the added edition of a rose gold eyeshadow.

Even though her face was covered in a black and gold mask, she looked hot.

She reached the campus and the whispers started again, people were still buzzing from Friday night. Her classmates, the majority of her grade and the younger years seemed to gossiping before class about the formal’s events. She couldn’t spot any of her friends or the two Gotham transfers, so she was stuck listening the the chitchat. Why couldn’t she have been late like usual?

Damian had a fowl disposition and it showed in multiple icey glares (and that was before he even reached the collège). His family had made their appearance known in Paris at 1am Sunday morning. He could have used his dorm to escape but his family didn’t have the word ‘privacy’ within their vocabulary. He didn’t want to have to pay for a lock replacement due to his brothers’ (most likely Todd with Drake & Grayson laughing at him) lock picking habit.

The Ice Prince was back with full force. He had just been... influenced by all the other couples. Yes he did respect Dupain-Cheng and he appreciated her company & pleasant conversations. He would struggle to hide a small smile at the memory of the dance, even if he denied himself the happiness of normality, he felt content when reminiscing.

“Ooo the Ice Prince is here, did he have a fight with his princess or something?” The voice seemed to mock him.

“The Disney Magic is gone. The demon is back.”

Everybody talks

At the second jeer he shot a glare at the perpetrator. Jon held his hands up in an ‘I surrender manner’, laughing as he joined Damian at his side. The two entered the school’s large foyer and looked to see if any of the classes were open yet. Sadly they weren’t, before he was wrong and the his class was plain torture but this was truely hell.

He saw Dupain-Cheng sitting alone on the stairs, drawing within her sketchpad. He wondered how a girl like her, who always seemed to be involved in other’s lives (for the better) was ignoring all of the comments about her. She felt his focus centre on her, eyes flicking up to meet his, she provided him with a small wave before continuing to draw.

Jon nudged him with an elbow to his ribs and dragged him off to the side, into the boy’s locker rooms. Jon scowled at the door, “It’s a mad house out there. You’ve heard what some people are saying right?”

“Why would I care about these imbeciles?”

Jon jabbed Damian in the chest, causing the demon to stumble. Green eyes darted from blue eyes to the tan finger. “You care when lies hurt people you care about.”

The day began to rapidly decline once the two dance partners took their seats, next to each other. They had both been placed up the back of the class and them sitting together hadn’t been a problem until now apparently. She wasn’t even safe when the teacher started their lecture, whispers and glances were cast towards them. Once the two got to biology it was better, Ms Mendeleiev was a strict teacher and was able to control the class.

Everybody talks

But the recess came. When the bell rang she slowly started packing up her equipment, Alix and Max (who she shared biology with) waited for her; she watched as the Ice Prince left through the door. She knew she didn’t need to be concerned about her friends joining in with the gossiping, if anything they would dispel people and tell them to ‘Mind their own fucking business’ because this whole situations is ridiculous, utterly ridiculous.

She did receive some slight teasing from Alix about being a Disney princess, but Marinette quipped back about the skater’s fairytale story being ‘Pinknette, the Geek and the Beast’. The three met up with the other two of their group, they had just come from geography. Kim was complaining that Argentina was a state in America.

“That’s Arkansas you idiot!” Chloe shrieked, lightly hitting his arm with her white handbag. Max held his head in his hand as he approached, how had his tutoring sessions failed so badly?

Chloe turned to Marinette, a smile forming from her glare. The blonde examined the designer’s clothing, nodding. “You look like you are about to have a hot girl summer.”

Marinette’s face burned, the tips of her ears coated in red. Alix chuckled and nudged her shoulder.

Everybody talks

“Look at her, she is so desperate for his attention that she probably copied those designs.”

“Why do you think he danced with her anyways? Maybe she has something on him? I mean, she forces him to sit next to her in class, who knows what else she has done.”

What. The. Fuck.

Chloe glowered towards Lila’s posy. “We have a fucking seating plan, those cretins-“ She made a motion to storm over but was caught by the ravenette, looking back to Mari, her rage decreased from a boil to a simmer.

“No Chlo. It’s fine, it’s not worth it.”

Everybody talks... back

The group walked out to the school’s front steps, it was a mad house... a mad courtyard? Students sitting on the stairs, on the grass and standing around mingling, all of them now were staring at her. She held her backpack close to her chest (she had swapped her signature coin-bag purse for the pastel pink bag), pretending its a shield. Her friends circled around her becoming an obstacle to prevent their stares. If people were afraid of a scowling Kim then they don’t know the scorn of Chloe or Alix’s bite. And Max, sweet quiet Max.... you better hope he doesn’t have blackmail on you (he probably does), he can dismantle your life with a single anonymous post.

Rushed footsteps approached them. The group was broken apart by a rude Wayne boy, he swept Mari away from the school and the gossip crowds within. Her four friends shouted at him and he kept walking, shooting a glare at them in response. He kept pushing Marinette forward with a hand placed on the small of her back, her backpack was now swung over his other shoulder.

They ended up in her favourite alcove. She had brought him here with the other Gotham transfers for a native’s tour of Paris. It had always been her safe place to be creative.

It started with a whisper (everybody talks, everybody talks)

“My apologises for our rushed departure but you seemed to want to get out of their anyhow.” His gruff tone danced through the silence, his head still peaking around the corner; watching for any unwelcome guests.

“Thank you.” She whispered, her voice almost being carried off by the gentle wind. A genuine smile illustrated upon her face.

“We weren’t able to converse after the events of the other night. I would like to formally apologise once more for my actions causing this adverse reaction. If I had kn-“

“You don’t need to apologise!” She squeaked, hiding her eyes behind her fisted hand. Her shoulders curled inwards as she tried to make herself seem as small as possible, a side effect of her common use of her secondary miraculous form: Multimouse.

“I chose to dance with you, you don’t need to apologise for my own actions.” He stared at her with confusion. He had taken the blame so she wouldn’t need to do so herself; but she had taken it anyways. He had given her an out. Why does she always take the blame, even for things out of her control?

“But if I hadn’t danced with you then you wouldn’t have been the focus of the entire school.”

Marinette stepped forward, her eyes hardened and blazing. “Damian Friday night I went there out of obligation to my friends, I didn’t want to be there. But dancing with you? That was the highlight of my week, probably my month too. I enjoyed our time together.” Her face softened, lips twitched downwards ever so slightly. “I don’t regret anything about that night, but do you?”

He was bad at comfort. Everyone in his family avoided him when they were in need, he plainly didn’t know what to do. She wasn’t visibly upset but he sensed that she is disappointed that he apparently didn’t share the same opinion of the night. The only thing he regretted about that night was letting Jon call him a coward, but then again if he didn’t he never would have danced with Dupa- Marinette.

He picked up her clenched hand, the tension in her body alleviated at his embrace. He remembered how Grayson would apologise to Kor’i or how his father interacted with Ms Kyle. He brought their hands up and placed a kiss upon her knuckles.

And that was when I kissed her (everybody talks, everybody talks)

“I do not regret anything either—“ he cleared his throat, “In fact, I’d appreciate if we would be able to interact more, especially outside of that cesspit.”

Was he...?

It didn’t matter.

She smiled the same dazzling smile she gave him at the dance. She nodded while laughing, “I’d love that.”

Everybody talks

The two stay talking, hidden within their secret alcove for the rest of the day. She texted her parents to say she was with a friend and would be back later that night. Damian didn’t bother texting his family, Marinette knew he had to be back soon due to his dorm’s curfew.

The sun was setting at they walked back together, he did the gentlemanly thing and dropped her off at her bakery door. She could see her mother behind the register inconspicuously looking over at the two of them. Damian’s lips quirked upwards, she was satisfied with his kinda-smile.

He walked back, hands in pockets and a neutral expression upon his face instead of a scowl. He reached his door and took his keys, he found that it was already open. Damn.

His family was splayed out within his two roomed dorm. Todd and Drake were fighting over a place to sit on his bed, whilst his father sat at his desk, watching the commotion. The three of them turned to him as he enter the room, they were the only family members able to attend on short notice; Cain had a ballet audition, Gordon & Brown had concert tickets for tomorrow, Grayson had to take care of Mar’i while Kor’i was on Tamaran and Alfred stayed to ensure no one died during their night time activities.

“We need to talk Damian.” His father stood, leaning onto the desk chair. “The school called and said you had an unexcused absence for half the day. Where were you Damian?”

Damian stared into his father’s eyes. He was fifteen, almost an adult, but was treated like he was ten again.

“I was with a friend.”

“Probably the girl from the dance. Marinette, right?” Todd mocked him. Damian snapped his head in the direction of his bed, glaring at both his brothers.

“That’s what I want to talk about with you Damian. Now I don’t know her personally but from what we’ve discovered through our investigation we have some concerns. What’s happened Damian?”

The youngest Wayne’s glare shifted off of his brothers to the floor, and then finally to his father; his family sitting in wait for his answer. Straightening his posture, his shoulders clicked as he rolled then back. His statement’s tone was sure and steady, “Everybody talks father.”

Everybody talks... back

#maribat #marinette x damian #mlb x dc #batfam salt #batfam is concerned #Daminette #the aftermath of ‘Like I did with you’#everybody talks by neon trees #max kante has blackmail and will use it #Alix will bite if provoked #dc x mlb #damian wayne x marinette dupain cheng #Marinette Dupain-Cheng is a meta?#supportive Dupain-Cheng parents ❤️

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wonlouvre · 3 years

Text

pairing: doctor!wonwoo x lawyer!female oc genre: modern royalty, arranged marriage, fluff and future angst word count: 3.2k WARNINGS: ANGST, VIOLENCE, GUNS

a/n: we are nearing the end guys :( and i promise, it’s a HAPPY ENDING! but for now we have to face the angst, i’m so sorry. disclaimer!! as i have said from the previous parts, i am not well-versed with investigations and court procedures. PLEASE CORRECT ME IF I’M WRONG. thank you very much!! please enjoy this new part and hit my ask box with what you think of it <3

nine: grief | masterlist

Wonwoo has had difficult times in his life and he has managed to overcome them all. Growing up in the public eye, fulfilling duties decreed to him even before he became a teen, a break-up, excelling both academically and physically and most of all, loving himself for who he is. He knows his parents did everything in their power and love to make it a little easier for him. They are the reasons he kept going and going.

But his heart can’t seem to carry this overwhelming heaviness.

His parents wanted to end the engagement immediately. It was an argument, an angry one. His mother had her ears closed even before he could speak meanwhile his father’s closed lips already said it all. Of course, he was defensive. He understands his parents concern for their citizens, but nothing is final until a verdict is reached. He has to come back to Jung and Sam and he has to come back to you. Surely enough, when he stepped out of the doors of his home, he had chosen love over duty.

It’s just that he didn’t know that you had different plans.

“Where’s the pretty lady?” Sam asks out of the blue while he plays with the new toys Wonwoo brought for the kids at the welfare.

He has been visiting them frequently, at least four times a week in between his hospital schedule. Especially after you decided that he should distance himself from you, he has been in and out of here because the boys are one of the only reasons he’s here other than you. He’s hoping you only meant a break if that’s what you wanted. Because he’d give it to you with as much distance as you want just come back to him. Come back to him because he doesn’t and can’t let you go.

“She’s a bit busy now,” he tries to make up an excuse and Sam raises his sparkling eyes at his face, probably searching for some truth in his lie.

“You look different when she’s around,” the young boy says and goes back to his toys.

Wonwoo’s ears perk and his brows knit in question. “What do you mean?”

“Jung thinks I don’t see it, but his face,” Sam explains and gestures to his tiny yet swelling cheeks. “It changes because of this girl here that I think he’s crushing.”

Wonwoo can’t help the growing smile on his face. “Jung has a crush?”

“Yes.” Sam bobs his head cutely. “You’re just like Jung with the pretty lady around.”

“How about now?” He asks the observant boy who purses his tiny lips before narrowing his eyes at him.

“You look a little sad.”

Wonwoo didn’t need to ask who’s the pretty lady Sam was talking about because to him, you’re the only pretty lady in his life (second to his mother of course even though she’s angry at him at the moment). He tried to not make it obvious. He doesn’t want anyone to see him that the controversy and your father’s arrest is breaking the two of you apart. He can’t let them see him falling apart for that matter because he wants you to see him confident and strong.

He doesn’t want to further fuel your doubts and fears. If he can’t support you closely, he’ll do his best to support you even from afar.

That’s why life for him continued. He goes to work, attends to his patients and co-workers needs, he eats, he exercises and he even entertains drinking with Soonyoung despite having to take care of him because of how fast he gets drunk.

It’s an ineffective distraction because he misses you terribly. He misses going to your office just to take you away from your computer, he misses driving around town with you in the passenger seat and listening to your stories, he misses sleeping over at your apartment after a tiring day shift, he misses your warm and welcoming embrace, he misses your shy and soft kisses against his lips, cheeks, nose, forehead, neck and everywhere else.

Did he tell you he misses you?

He sends you messages every day. He doesn’t call and he doesn’t wait for a reply. He just wants you to know that he’s here whenever you’re ready. Jeongyeon is kind enough to keep him in the loop, but the updates are very minimal because she’s still your subject and she doesn’t want to hurt you any further.

For a moment, Wonwoo was afraid to take the leap. But when you asked him if he still wants to marry you which could be equivalent to you ending things, he had to. If you stay or not, he had to say it with all his heart. You had to know because he was sure that whatever it is his whole being is feeling, it’s only for you.

“I love you.”

Your heart drops at his confession, making you sob to the palm of your hands. He can’t do this to you right now. It’s already hard and painful. You want to be selfish, but it would be wrong to let him suffer with you when he has been nothing but kind and honest.

“You’re not your father, Y/N,” he promises and holds your hands down. “Please look at me.”

You shake your head, sniffling. You want to scream you love him too. But the words are nothing but a lump at the back of your throat. You continue shedding your tears and the sight breaks Wonwoo’s heart.

“It’s okay.” He lifts your head up by your cheeks. He wipes your tears away even though it’s futile. He wishes to share with your anguish, but he also respects the desires of your heart.

His smile was small when he leans down and briefly presses a kiss to your trembling lips. You accept it, fearing it might be the last. You also listen to his last words before he leaves with his bag and coat because it also might be the last time you’ll ever hear them.

“I love you.”

The rain patters on the roof of the car when Wonwoo’s words echoed inside your head. Just the thought of what had transpired the last few days brings tears to your eyes. You haven’t seen him since that night and the longing is unbearable. You wish to hear his voice, feel his touch against you or just see him. But you can’t and you have to persevere through it because you owe justice and accountability to your people.

You haven’t spoken to your mother even if you tried. She’s just tired, so tired you can’t bring a word out of her. You try to be understanding and a little more patient. After all, getting over a betrayal doesn’t happen overnight. That’s why you continued working even though almost every client you have has backed down and declined your services. Nonetheless, you still go to your office every day as if everything is okay. You drink your coffee, you run over your files and even do a little organizing and disposing here and there.

Your father’s first trial is today and you’re on your way to speak to him at his detention center. This is the first time you’ll see him aside from the television and newspapers. You’ve been crying ever since he got taken away. You can’t help it. You already know the truth and there’s no blinding away from it. But you want to hear from your father, whom you thought you have known all your life. You want his truth and maybe find some closure.

When you arrive at the parking lot, the rain has ceased and little by little the temperature is rising again. You really wish things were different. Something in you wishes that this is a set-up. You wish that your father was innocent and only being framed. But there is a bigger something that’s telling you to throw away those wishful thoughts because it’s wrong.

You ask yourself, am I angry at my father? while walking to the entrance leading to the visitor’s area. I should be, right? You argue because your family name and career is tarnished. Your upcoming marriage is no different which is most likely to be over.

“Hi my darling,” The King, stripped from his expensive suit, greets you with his usual smile.

The glass between you and your father is clear enough to see that he doesn’t look good. Your father used to look every day ready with his suit on and slick back hair. But right now, he doesn’t. Tears well up in your eyes but you hold it in. It will take a long time to get used to seeing him like this. It will take a painfully long one.

Maybe you’re not angry. Maybe you’re just hurting.

“Hi dad,” you greet back. “How are you?”

The old man smiles and warms his thighs with his hands while looking around the small room. “I’m okay.”

You nod and the cold silence engulfs the room.

“I’m sorry darling,” he finally says and hearing those words made you burst into tears. He sees you crying and this is the first time he can’t reach his hand out to wipe the tears away. “I’m really sorry that your father’s greed has left you and your mother a wound that might never heal.”

Greed. The news, the Royal Police, the prosecution and everyone else were talking about this. They’re still talking about this. It’s scandalous, it’s controversial. It’s unbelievable too. How could the head and protector of the kingdom do this?

How could your father do this?

“Dad,” you sob. “Dad.”

“I know,” he tells you. “I know.”

“Please tell me they’re lying,” you begged, your voice shaking.

“I cannot betray you any further, my darling,” he sadly says. “I have to set you all free from my lies.”

You harshly rub your fingers against your eyes, trying to dry the tears that won’t stop from falling. “Who’s Kim Mingyu?”

The alarming buzz! blasts, indicating that your time’s up. You’re quick to your feet and hold your sweating palm against the glass. Your father mirrors your action but it didn’t last long because he was being handcuffed again.

“Remember,” he says, struggling a little against the two uniformed men. “You are your own person, my darling.”

Maybe you’re not hurting. Maybe you’re grieving because you just lost your father.

You know who Kim Mingyu is. You already knew before you could even ask your father. You just wanted to know how your father met him and entangled himself with such a man. What led him to fall for his lies and money that he could trade every ounce of dignity and integrity in his being? Something of that sort.

Kim Mingyu’s mining business was proposed to the Secretary of the Trade and Industry Department. A mining business that will have children go underground for long agonizing hours. At first, they were immediately rejected knowing that there’s an obvious and strict law disallowing foreigners to the kingdom’s mineral resources. Much more the exploitation of young children. But, Mingyu was ambitious and a sniper to every man's weakness. It didn’t take long for the Secretary of the Trade and Industry to bite. It was easily followed by the Secretary of the Justice Department and your father. They all, among many others, eventually fell for his trap. Everything worked out for Kim Mingyu.

Your hip is against the hood of the car as you watched the prison guards surround the vehicle your father will ride to the court. Everyone is on high alert. Well, they should be. No one else is more high profile than a criminal king. It’s only the first trial but you’re already more than aware of how things will turn out in the end.

You clutch the lifebuoy pendant of the necklace you’re wearing, nervous and trying to keep everything together.

You could leave now, but the time and opportunity to see your father is running out. This prison is the only place you could linger just to see him, even for a short while. You won’t be able to follow him at court because Seungkwan advised you not to. Which you understand. This whole case involving your father is already causing a media frenzy so staying away is the smart thing to do.

As you wait, your phone suddenly rings with an unknown number flashed on the screen. You blink, wondering who could it be at this hour. After a beat of hesitation, you answered and held the phone against your ear.

“Hello?”

“Ah, Princess Y/N. How’s the King doing?”

You’re not that forgetful to not recognize this voice. “Mr. Kim, how did you get my number?”

“That’s not important right now,” he dodges the question. “What’s important is what I am about to tell you.”

“What do you want from me?” You say with gritted teeth and from your peripheral you can see the guards scramble. Your father is about to come out.

You can hear him scoff. “I don’t want anything from you, Your Highness. But listen…”

Your heart starts to beat faster. It’s a hard visual but your father is nearing the exit. Your bottom lip is starting to hurt from how hard you’re biting it and the few seconds of pause and suspense that Mingyu’s giving you is not helping at all.

“Listen you sick---” He cuts you off and your blood runs cold.

“I’m going to kill your father.”

What is the fondest memory that you have of your father?

They’re too many to count and every memory with him, small and big, will always mean everything to you. But as an example, it would be the day you finally took oath as a lawyer. He didn’t tell you, but he, together with your mother, was secretly present at the venue. He told you beforehand that they shouldn’t go because he didn’t want the people to make you uncomfortable and steal the spotlight. You ignored his lame excuse of fame and told him that he can do whatever he wants.

But he was really there. Tears brimming on his eyes together with pride beaming on his heart. Your mother had to calm him down because he got a little out of control, almost screaming with all his chest at the venue that you’re his daughter.

You only found out when you hopped on the car and they’re inside with a small cake, flowers and party hats on, shouting loud congratulations and surprise simultaneously.

Your father was always there. Your parents were.

You remember those when you ran and pushed your way against the guards blocking your father’s view. You were frantic as you screamed at them to get your father back inside. You fought with all your strength and thrashed against their hold just to reach your father. When you slipped away from them, you ran again, fast.

You did your best to not get caught. You just have to be close to your dad and push him back inside. You just have to be close to him. You just have to protect him.

You have to be there for him.

“Please stop!” You shout when another guard takes hold of your waist, locking you to the ground. “You have to bring my father back inside!”

“You’re Highness, please calm down!” The guard shouts back and you fight against him. When he didn’t let you go, you stomped the heel of your shoe on his feet, making him fall in pain.

“Dad!” You call when you’re finally nearing him. His head lifts up at the sound of your voice and searches for you among the sea of men. “Please! You have to take him back inside! I received a call from Kim Ming---”

BANG!

It was searingly fast. Your whole body collapses on the sweltering concrete before you could reach your father and when his eyes finally find you, you are already swimming in the pool of your blood.

“It’s always good to see you Mrs. Wang,” Wonwoo compliments the old lady who’s starting to frequent the emergency room. “But not in this manner.”

The old lady gives him a cheeky grin and pinches one of his cheeks. If Wonwoo doesn’t know any better, she’s doing this to not get scolded any further.

“Your blood sugar is high and I don’t think your granddaughter appreciates her grandma endangering her own life,” he lightly scolds her, if that’s how he can put it. He’s still a doctor after all. “She loves you and she wants you to be healthy when she walks down the aisle in the future.”

Mrs. Wang gives him a silent nod at the mention of her granddaughter, promising that she won’t disobey anymore. That relieves Wonwoo, his lips lifting in a smile. He signs her clearance and hands it back to the nurse. After a few more instructions, he takes his leave and walks back to the information desk.

He takes one of the patients charts to read. The phone rings and the nurse in charge immediately picks it up and answers. At first, Wonwoo didn’t bother looking up from the paper because emergency calls happen every three seconds. But when there was an eerie silence amidst the loud and busy room, his curiosity made his head tilt up only to get surprised at the widened eyes the nurse was giving him.

He was about to ask what’s wrong but when he heard the sound of the siren nearing, he ignores his suspicions and runs to the entrance.

The ambulance parks at a safe distance and the paramedics get out. They move quickly to get the patient out and when they see him, their mouth falls open but no words come out.

Wonwoo didn’t notice so he proceeded to ask, “How’s the patient?”

“Wonwoo!”

Soonyoung almost tripped on his feet as he tried to get a hold of his friend. He takes his arms and tries to pull him away from the ambulance he’s about to open. Wonwoo is starting to get irritated at the bizarre and disconcerting feeling that’s starting to settle in the emergency room.

Wonwoo knocks him off with a glare. “What the hell are you doing?”

“Wonwoo, please,” Soonyoung begs with an unsteady voice, clinging to his friend.

“Female, late twenties, two gunshot wounds,” one of the paramedics finally yet carefully reports while the other opens the doors of the ambulance. “It’s Her Highness, Princess Y/N.”

Wonwoo roughly removes his friends hand from his arm to step closer to the ambulance and when he sees your lifeless body, he didn’t waste any more time and helped the paramedics move the stretcher out. Soonyoung can see his friend’s hands shaking as he takes hold of the bloodied gurney. He knows he has to stop him right now.

“Baby,” Wonwoo calls as he runs and wheels you inside. You can’t hear him, but he has to try. He observes proper protocol of transferring you to the bed of the emergency room before applying more pressure to your wounds. You have lost a lot of blood already and it’s not helping Wonwoo that he can’t see your eyes.

“Please, please, please,” Wonwoo whispers as he removes all the obstructions on your body and when his eyes catch the necklace he gave around your neck, his legs grow weak and removing it from you made his tears fall.

“Baby, please,” he pleads. “Open your eyes, hmm?”

Soonyoung steps in together with the doctor who will perform the surgery and take everything from here. He slowly pulls his friend away from your body. Wonwoo didn’t protest anymore, there’s nothing in him left to do so. Your blood is in his hands, in his white coat, it’s everywhere.

This is not the distance Wonwoo wanted.

He can’t be apart from you forever.

#seventeen #wonwoo #seventeen scenarios #wonwoo scenarios #seventeen imagines #wonwoo imagines #seventeen scenario #wonwoo scenario #seventeen fluff #wonwoo fluff #seventeen imagine #wonwoo imagine #seventeen angst #wonwoo angst #seventeen wonwoo #wonwoo seventeen #fic: ifliys

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accio-moony · 3 years

Text

Precedented Reputation || Remus Lupin x Reader SMUT

Request: Yes: {anon} What about a Remus smut where the reader is in a skirt and maybe has a hair pulling kink?

AN: They’re both 17 (legal age for wizards) Not Proof-read

Word Count: 3.7~k

Characters/Pairing: Remus Lupin x reader, James Potter, Sirius Black, Lily Evans

Summary: [marauders era] You’ve been riled up all day, and take your opportunity while under the influence of firewhisky at a Gryffindor party.

WARNINGS: Underage drinking, public make out, unprotected sex, hair pulling, spanking, edging, slight cock warming, creampie

*not my gifs*

The loud chatter that fills the Gryffindor common room feels like it shakes your soul when combined with the thump of the music. It makes your head kind of fuzzy, but the Firewhisky in your hand can’t be helping with that either. Of course, like most Saturdays after a quidditch match, the Gryffindors would celebrate, whether they won, or even played, or not. Another excuse for the house to exude its rowdiness. Today is no exception, especially since they had won by more a good fifty points. Students are running around in every direction; every corner is filled with a group of friends or a couple. It is well past after hours for the castle, and this tower remains lit with excitement. If you pay enough attention, you would notice that there are a select few students who aren’t even a part of the Gryffindor house. Some students just can’t turn down the opportunity to get bashed by Firewhisky.

On the coffee table of the center group of couches stands Sirius Black, your boyfriend’s best friend. As Sirius rambles off some nonsense no one understands and dances around on the table, you lean your head against your boyfriend’s shoulder, taking in the scene. Admittedly, if it weren’t for the extra dose of courage your drink provides you, you wouldn’t be down here. Likely you would be off reading a book or studying. You don’t even usually drink, but your friends had coaxed you into it this time. It being your last year at Hogwarts, you don’t want to be the one to say they never attended any parties.

That aforementioned extra lot of courage has you excited in more ways than one, but you aren’t the type to just hop on your boyfriend in the middle of a crowded space, unlike many of the students filling the common room. Said excitement has also been in your gut all day, for what reason you don’t know, but the alcohol on your tongue was just gasoline to the fire. You’ve stayed by Remus’ side since supper was over and the lot of you left the Great Hall. You’ve kept your arms around him, occasionally squeezing his sides in hopes that he’ll get the intended nonverbal message. Though, as most days, he was unaware of your actions, simply playing it off as your regular affection.

You’ve been pushing your urges to the side all day, but they kept coming back. After dinner, just before the party had started, you disappeared upstairs to your dormitories with your room mates to get ready. The idea stroke you then that you should wear Remus’ favorite outfit of yours, and maybe then he’ll give you a reaction. Even with the denim skirt, the reaction he gave you when he saw you was insufficient. He merely bit his lip and wrapped his arm around you, holding you close and claiming you as his.

By now, Sirius has tripped off the coffee table and spilled his drink all down his and some poor girl’s shirt. Jading to you and many others, he has managed to play it off to is advantage as he snogs her on a near-by couch. As Remus talks to Peter about something unimportant, his arm still protectively wrapped around you, you look for the fourth marauder. You find him, sitting in a far corner practically swallowing his girlfriend, whom he had pined for since first year. Lily had rejected him so many times, and you’re still baffled by what changed her mind.

You think to yourself, if James can get his dream girl after six years of rejection, you can figure out how to get your boyfriend to take you to bed. It’s never been a problem for Sirius, and even though he has many characteristics you don’t, how hard could it be for just one person — the one person you’ve let have you before and that you’ve loved since you first spoke to him.

Even as the room is stocked with sweaty teenagers, Remus manages to still wear his usual many layers. It’s no surprise, given the tokens his ill-favored condition has left him to bare for all the years to come. You’ve never shunned him for his lycanthropy, loving him and all the baggage that comes with, as he does you.

As shrewdly as possible, you untuck Remus’ button down and sweater from his trousers. Being so preoccupied in his conversation with Peter, Remus doesn’t seem to notice, giving you the advantage. You hand you cup to some random student passing by you without a word, without even a glance, and you slide your cold hand under his button down, resting it on his flushed abs, all while turning in his arms so you’re comfortably facing him. The stark contrast in the temperature of your skin to his quickly seizes his attention as he tenses under your touch, his head whipping around as he looks down at you. The moment his eyes meet yours, he knows. He can see the need that he’s missed all day, but he decides to see how far you’ll go in such a public setting, the Firewhisky also having given him an extra ounce of courage. He lets out a breathy laugh as he relaxes under your touch, and he bends down slightly, only kissing the top of your head before turning back to talk to Peter, to your displeasure.

You huff, and before you can make a decision on how to proceed, or even if you should, you body speaks for itself as you move to stand between the two men, pushing Peter back as you face Remus. But you don’t just stand there expectingly. Your hands grab the sides of his face as you push up on your toes to get yourself closer to his height and pull his lips down onto yours in a feverish kiss. Though Remus was still playing snitch, not giving into the kiss as much as you wanted him to. You groan as your lips move across his jaw and up his neck to rest just under his ear, pulling him down by the neckline of his sweater with one hand, the other placed on his shoulder. Instinctively, his arm wraps around the small of your back, holding you close as he’s bent over to match your height. The hand one his sweater releases and slyly slides down his chest.

“Stop being an arsehole on purpose, Remus,” you breath, your breath hot as it fans over his ear. You let your hand finally reach its desired destination, gripping him over his trousers and finding him to be just as aroused as yourself. “Or neither of us will get what we want.” Your hand slides over his length, squeezing ever-so slightly.

Remus finally gives in to his act, his need to feel your lips overriding his intoxicated fantasy. His posture marginally straightens as he grabs your face with both of his hands, crashing his lips down onto yours in a hungry kiss, still full of passion. His left hand slide back from your cheek and his fingers lace into your hair. As his plan of action succeeds and he pulls your hair slightly, you gasp against his lips, and he’s able to force his tongue into your mouth to explore the familiar expanse. You moan when you feel his tongue press over your own, his other hand leaving your face and wrapping his right arm around your lower back, pulling you closer to him. His erection presses against your hip, and you can feel him throbbing behind the denim restraints. Remus feels your cold hands run up his sides from under his shirt, and he knows that if he doesn’t move you now, he may end up having to take you on the nearest open piece of furniture. His cock twitches slightly at the thought of everyone watching you, but he knows that no one gets to see you in your most vulnerable moments accept for him. He also doesn’t want that reputation to follow either of you through the last several months of school.

He pulls away from you completely, not even staying by your side but instead walking away from you. You’re left standing in the middle of the common room, eyes wide and mouth ajar as you try to process the fact of how suddenly your boyfriend left you in such an intimate moment. After the moments or two it takes to regather your composer, you spin around, searching the room to find where he could have gone. Along the perimeter of the room, against the back wall, you see him. Your eyes catch his expecting look as he motions up the stairs next to him, the stairs that lead to the boy’s dormitories. Again locked in your spot to comprehend the situation, you force your feet from their spot seemingly bolted to the rough carpet and quickly maneuver your way through the crowded room to the back wall.

You don’t stop when you reach him; you just wink at him with your lip between your teeth as you scurry up the spiral staircase. You feel him follow behind you, and once your around the first bend of the stairs, no longer able to be seen from the common room, you feel his hand fall down onto your ass roughly. You squeal and giggle as you bend over from the excitement, ascending the rest of the steps on all fours.

Behind you, Remus throbs painfully in his trousers when he sees your panties peak out from under your short skirt, when he sees the wet mark adorning them. He growls perforce as he wraps his strong arms around you, easily picking you up as you giggle and carrying you the rest of the way to his dorm. Once in his room, he puts you down, not letting go until he’s sure you’ve got your balance, and his foot kicks the door closed behind him.

“Colloportus,” he mumbles as he pulls his wand from his pocket and lazily points it at the door, locking it before throwing his wand down on his bedside table.

“Muffliato,” you cast your own spell, still giggling from the excitement as you blindly walk backwards until the back of your knees hit the edge of Remus’ bed. You sit down, breathing heavily as you watch as your boyfriend quickly removes his belt, throwing it on the floor somewhere meaningless to you both in the moment.

Remus kicks his trainers off easily, then hurriedly removes his socks as he stumbles closer to you. You follow his lead and slip your flats off your feet, discarding them behind you with a heavy thunk. Once his socks are on the floor to be forgotten, Remus strides over to where you sit on his bed, graying your face in his right hand as he reconnects your mouths in a passionate kiss. His free hand quickly tugs the hem of your sweater from your skirt so he can slide it underneath, cupping your plump breasts over your bra, squeezing roughly. You moan at the feeling, releasing his mouth as your hands stealthily remove his own sweater, quickly pulling it over his head and getting to work on undoing his button down, his last layer. He stands up straight, something he usually doesn’t do, but seeing your nimble fingers working over the buttons of his shirt as you look up at him will love-blown eyes boosts his confidence. His fingers slide through your soft hair as he watches you finish with the last several buttons, his eyes full of lust.

When you’ve released the final button on his white chemise, you don’t push it off his shoulders, instead enjoying how it hangs open, his tan chest exposed to you. Unable to resist, you begin kissing over the span of his chest, taking a moment here and there to suck your mark into his chest. As you do so, you gradually stand up, kissing up the length of his torso on the way. Once you’ve stood up straight and left one last purple bruise on his neck, just above where his collar sits, you step back, holding the intimate eye contact as you guide his hands to pull your sweater over your head, revealing your lace-clad tits to your boyfriend. You smirk as his eyes fall from yours and onto your cleavage once it’s revealed.

He grabs them in his large hands, squeezing roughly as he drives his lips back onto yours, forcing your mouth open again to accept his tongue. He only kisses you for a moment, his member painfully rubbing against the denim of his trousers, begging to be released from the confinement. “I bet you’re ready for me aren’t you?” He smirks against your lips before attaching them again. “You’re so needy and desperate for me to fuck you, huh?”

“Yes, Remus,” you moan at his words. “Please. I’m ready.”

“Good girl,” he groans as he spins you around, strenuously pushing you down face first onto his bed, you ass towards him. In one swift movement, Remus pushes your skirt up, bunching it at your waist and quickly rips your panties down your legs, leaving your slick heat bare to him. “Fuck,” he mutter as he takes a step back, admiring your swollen lips as he unzips his pants, pushing them down with his boxers just enough to get himself free. “You’re so wet, baby.”

You quickly grow impatient, needing to be touched, to be satisfied, and you slide your hand between your legs, rubbing your fingers through your wet folds and spreading your arousal around your core. All to Remus’ displeasure, as he grabs both of your wrists, easily restricting them behind your back in his right hand alone. His other hand grabs his thick cock at the base, rubbing his head through your folds to soak himself in your arousal, pressing it against your clit, smacking it against you several times.

He guides himself to your begging hole, pushing just the swollen tip into you before letting go of himself. His now free hand wraps in your hair, pulling it as he thrusts into you, bottoming out in one quick movement. He moans at the feeling of your velvet walls tight around his member, and you cry out from the contentment of being filled so perfectly in an abrupt moment. Your walls clench around him, not wanting him to leave as you feel complete, but your hips have a mind of their own as you push back against him, still needy and impatient.

Remus’ right hand releases your wrists, letting you have them back to brace yourself against the mattress. Instead his hand comes down over your ass before holding your hips still. Your yelp in surprise of the pleasurable sting quickly slides into a moan.

“You’ve gotta learn to be more patient, love,” Remus’ low voice calls from behind you just as he pulls back, almost out before ramming himself back in again, forcing against that spot inside you. You cry out his name, whining and panting with every harsh thrust he gives you, each thrust accompanied by a blow to your cheeks.

Your ass quickly glows red, leaving Remus satisfied with his visible handprint. His soft hands smooth over your plump flesh, squeezing as he relishes in the feeling of having his hands full of you. His reputation of quiet book-boy is one he’s okay with. You and him alone know this passionate side that comes out in the bedroom. And he knows how you try to bring it out of him outside of privacy, like you had tried only moments ago, successfully he might add. He doesn’t know, or really care for that matter, who saw it. You make him the most comfortable he has ever been.

He pulls your hair harder and you moan at the tension, his cock twitching inside you at the sound. “Up, baby,” he commands, and your shaky arms fight to push yourself up. His right hand leaves its hold on your ass to help you up so that your back is pressed and arching against his firm chest. His hand slides your bra strap off your shoulder, leaving him room to leave his mark on you, then slides down your stomach and between your thighs, rubbing rough circles against your clit.

You moan out, wildly pleasured by the way he knows you so well. Your hand reaches behind you, grabbing the back of his neck and holding him closer to you as the coil tightens within you. You think he’s going to let you fall apart, but he notices the way your walls are tightening and fluttering around him, and he pulls out, leaving just an inch or so in you as his finger leave your mound.

“Remus,” you whine, feeling empty, and when he takes too long, bring it upon yourself to do the work, pushing yourself pack and forth on his rock-hard cock. Your hands leave his neck, grabbing behind you to hold onto his sides, your finger nails digging into his already scarred flesh.

You feel that coil reform in your gut, knowing you only need a little more. But Remus seems to know your body better than you do, and he stops you, pulling away from you completely with a dark chuckle.

“Fuck you,” you pant as he steps away from you.

“Isn’t that what you’re trying to do?” He smirks as he sits himself on his bed, his head leaned back into his pillow.

You groan and turn to him, easily straddling his hips as he spreads his legs, giving you a wider base. “It’s what I am doing,” you try to taunt him, but you panting and breathlessness, your messy hair, it all makes you seem so desperate for him. And you are, you have been all day. Not wanting to wait any longer, you immediately sink back down on him, his length reaching a whole new level within you and your high pitched moan thrills him. His hands slide behind your back, unclipping your bra and pulling it down your arms. His hands fill with your breasts as you starts lightly sucking on your nipples, your back arching and forcing more of you into his mouth.

Though soon, as he feels himself getting ever closer, his hands drop your breasts, one sliding back into your hair and the other lay on your lower back to guide you as you rock your hips against him. His hand in your hair pulls back, exposing the column of your throat to him on which he leaves numerous bruises from the force of his mouth on you.

“Remmy,” you whine, barely able to form coherent words. “I-I’m so cl-close. Please.”

He takes your warning, falling away from you and back onto his pillow as his hands hold your hips above his over. He starts pounding up into you at a relentless speed and your hand falls to your clit, pushing yourself over that edge.

“Oh, fuck,” you moan loudly as your orgasm washes over you. Your walls create a vice on him, squeezing and gushing your hot fluid over him. Your legs shake violently as you call out his name, collapsing forward onto his chest.

The force of your orgasm makes Remus cum, bucking his hips up into you, involuntarily jerking them as he stills, buried to the hilt within you as his balls tighten. Thick ropes of his hot sum paint your insides as he holds you against his chest with his arms wrapped around you. “Fuck, princess,” he moans into your ear, his hips moving slightly to work the last of him into you, though quickly fall to the bed as he relaxes in exhaustion.

He stays inside you for a moment longer, still impossibly hard, then flips you both over before slowly pulling out of you. He groans as his swollen cock leaves the warmth of your cunt, and you quietly whine at the loss, your voice barely returning after having cum so loud.

He grabs his wand and mutters a spell, one you can’t hear over the white noise of the aftershock. You feel him remove your skirt the rest of the way, and then presumably his own pants, pulling his boxers back up and softly tucking his sensitive member back into them. He finds your panties from the floor, then decides that you need fresh ones. He stumbles over to his trunk in exhaustion and pulls out the extra pair of panties you’ve left in his room for such occasions and a plain black t-shirt for you to put on incase his roommate return unexpectedly.

He helps you into the shirt as he kneels in front of you on his bed, then carefully guides you back onto the pillow. “Are you okay, baby?” He asks, concern flooding his voice. “Did I hurt you?”

“No, no,” you mutter, a lazy smile playing at your lips. “That was… oh, Merlin, I can’t even put it into words. You’ve no idea how badly I needed that, Rem.”

He smiles as he lays with his hips between your thighs, pushing the t-shirt up over your breasts. “I love you, Y/n,” he says softly before his lips wrap around your nipple. You moan softly and arch your back again.

“What’re you doing that for now, Remmy?” You whine.

“They didn’t get the attention they deserve,” he explains as if it were the most obvious explanation and you laugh. The laugh quickly subsides into a moan as his teeth graze over your nipple, releasing it with a satisfying pop before moving to leave more hicks over your chest.

“If you don’t stop that now,” you pant, still breathless from your excursion, but your breath being stolen from you again. “I’ll need to ride you again, Remus.”

He hums against your skin before pushing up onto his arms. “I have no complaints there,” he smiles as he places a soft kiss to your lips.

#hogwarts #the wizarding world #wizarding world #Harry Potter #JK Rowling #JKR #the marauders #the marauders era #Marauders #marauders era #remus lupin #remus lupin smut #remus lupin x reader #remus lupin imagine #moony #Andrew garfield #Andrew Garfield remus lupin

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ryozoro · 3 years

Text

Hades Playlist - i.

NOW PLAYING : I n t e r l u d e [J. Cole]

cw; name calling, blood, mentions of murder, major spoilers

“Fate is a very weighty word to throw around before breakfast.”

Despite the red-light district thriving through the night, it looked just as beautiful during the early morning. Yn was roaming the streets on her pedal bike for the first time since winter break as she plotted different ways to surprise her big brother at his newly opened bike shop. She had already purchased his favorite breakfast meal from the little café she worked at, and all that she was left to do was see the said man. Getting out of thoughts and returning to reality, she stopped at the side of the traffic light to press the ‘crossing’ button and to text Draken to make sure he was at work before she made the trip.

“hey there pretty girl, ya wanna come ride something more interesting than the little kiddie bike yer on right now?” some bleach blonde junior high kid called out to her, smirking as he man spread and took up most of the space on the park bench. “I know ya hear me pretty girl,” he leaned and rested his elbows onto his knees, “maybe ya want me to come over and beg for yer attention, huh? Want me to come and make ya listen to me?”

She scoffed and waited for the light to signal for her to cross, but its as if the gods wanted to punish her and traffic kept flowing out of her favor. Getting restless, she pocketed her phone and tapped on her bar handles in hopes of the cars to all be generous and let her through; of course, this did not happen and the young fuck boy in training had began to approach her alongside his friend who were hyping him up and recording the event.

“You might be older than me,” he walked up behind her and kicked her bike tire before circling around and leaning against the basket in the front, “but that doesn’t change the fact that I hit girls.” Yn had to refrain from spitting in his face because Draken always said ‘never start anything with others first, let them choose their fate.’ In other words, big bro just didn’t want her to put herself at risk due to minor inconveniences that were presented towards her.

Just as the light switched from a hand to a walking figure, yn politely smiled at the boy in hopes of him getting the hint that she did not wish to engage with him anymore, but – of course – that was just asking too much of him. He turned back and looked at the sign noticing it was their turn to cross, and he surprisingly moved out the way. Yn smiled realizing that her brother did know it best when he said that the ‘dumb young boys will leave you alone after they realize you’re not going to give them the time of day,’ and she moved to pedal across the cross walk with a large smile.

However, big bro’s words are not the golden rule amongst men and the boys did not leave her alone; in fact, they decided to run at her hit the back tire with a bat and caused her to lose control and fall in the middle of the walkway. The drivers were kind enough to wait for her to get up and cross the street with scraped knees and a dirty pull over. She turned back to glare at the boys, but their backs were already facing her as they leisurely walked away laughing. This wasn’t going to ruin her day, after all, she still gets to surprise her brother with her presence and might even have the chance to see his hot amazing friends whom you grew up around. After realizing that the former gang members might all be hanging around her brother’s workplace, she got up with a huge smile and skipped the rest of her way on the crosswalk. Once to the other side, yn hopped back on her bike without checking her bloodied shins and made her way on the quickest route to the shop.

Glancing up at the familiar billboards that danced in sky and looking down at the alleys being populated with street cats and new gen delinquents, she realized she was only a block down from seeing the man who has always put her first and raised her to strive to her fullest potential. Smiling as closed her eyes for just a second - she swears it – to bask in the excitement and next thing she knew, she was on the ground covered in coffee. She could hear faint voices but those were cancelled out by her skin screaming at her to get up and quickly remove any rubble and dirt that had entered. Moving to get up, she took note of blood staining the concrete and became slightly alarmed.

“Oi, you dumb bitch, you should watch where you’re going,” a man’s voice echoed through her head, “you got a drip of blood on my Milano’s.” Trying to get up, yn went to wipe her eyes, but as soon as she lifted her hands, she felt them share the similar sting that her knees and chin felt. “You deaf or something? Ha, lucky for you I’ll take the food in your basket and whatever is in your wallet as an exchange. Pin code for your card must be included, love.” Hearing as she was about to get stripped dry of her hard-earned cash, she shot a glare up at the well-dressed man’s body just to be sent in a more state of terror when she noticed the tattoo that decorated his temple; it was the infamous Bonten symbol.

“I say we just take her to the back alley and make her pretty throat match the rest of her bloody body,” she turned and seen a pinkette with long hair and two scars that sat on each corner of his ?beautiful? mouth. to be completely honest, he would have been very much at the top of her most attractive list if he weren’t just plotting to slice her neck right in front of her; she wondered if he ever heard of the Element of Surprise. “She hasn’t even apologized yet and it’s been at least 45 seconds, that is pretty rude don’t you think, Mochi-kun?”

“It is very rude,” the built man with slicked back blonde hair spoke up, “do you want me to take her in the alleyway?” He squatted down to meet yn at eye level and she didn’t know if it was the fact he was able to stare into her soul with lifeless eyes or the extremely structured shoulders that could break her bones if he had tackled her, but she genuinely felt that she was going to die. “You seem like a worthless kill if I am being honest, and I don’t like claiming meaningless prizes. So, if you want to live,” ‘Mochi-kun’ reached over and gripped her bloodied chin, “or are you going to be good dog and run your pockets?”

She couldn’t believe it; for all her life, death threats have never been directly shot at her as Draken and the others have always been there. Of course, she emptied her pockets as quick as she could and began wiping the man’s Milano’s with her cloth lens wipe.

“Good girl,” the man with the temple tattoo said mockingly, “but I’m gonna need you to put your pretty mouth to work since you don’t know – or rather – you act like you don’t know how to speak.” She felt her eyes began to fill with tears as she looked up from the ground; they mistook it for fear, but yn was just angry she was powerless to them. “Don’t worry, I like older women, so I won’t need your mouth for that,” he laughed loudly in her face, “lick the blood off.” Her glare returned and tears began to spill over her cheeks. “Be a good bitch, and lick my –“

“What are you idiots doing?” a man with a long pink and purple mullet-like hairstyle came from behind her. “Are you guys bullying young kids again? Oh, wait, you’re not a kid.” He stared at you through his multi-colored bangs and tilted his head, “Why are you all bloody like a sewer rat walking through the back alley of feral cats?” he pushed the girl’s forehead back, straining her neck to hold eye contact with him, “you’re not some whore, are you?” He craned his neck back to the man who has been treating her like a dog, giving yn a full view of his Bonten symbol tattooed across the middle of his pretty throat. “Neh, Koko, you do realize that if you want a girl’s attention you can’t just rough her up in hopes that she takes you to bed.” He turns back to yn before sighing, “You’re cute,” for some reason she felt herself swelling with pride, “but you’re not my type,” – well there goes her ego.

“Oh what-fucking-ever,” ‘Koko’ mumbled as he gently pushed her away, “I didn’t want some inexperienced princess anyway, so don’t get your hopes up.” He quickly bent down and took all the cash from her wallet and began to slide out the card, but a baton quickly swatted at his hands.

“Your obsession with money is crazy, but you can’t take hers if you still owe me 45,000 yen.” Yn turned to see a man with pushed back purple and pink hair holding the offending stick. Unlike the other members, his tattoo was in the same place as the mullet man – maybe they took over the organization after her other big brotherly figure, Mikey, left. She drank in his appearance, and although he was thinner than the other members, something about him just screamed ‘stay away;’ but for the first time in her life, yn didn’t want to listen to such obvious red flags. “Oh no, you’re bloodied up like a rat –“

“I have already said that nii-chan,” the mullet head said, “what do you say? Wanna jut get rid of her like Sanzu-san suggested?” The now known younger brother asks. She began to tremble but not out of fear, no, out of a weird feeling at the pits of her stomach that came about as soon as the stranger stumbled onto the scene. “Oi,” the younger brother flicked your chin, reminding your body that it is supposed to be in a state of stinging pain, “staring is rude. What are you – a deer in headlights?”

“Now, now, Ridou,” the man continued to meet yn’s gaze as he motioned for her to take his hand, “where’s the fun in hurting a good little lamb? Especially one who shows that she knows to yield to her Sheppard.” Against her better judgement, yn took his hand and allowed him to help her up. “Look at you go,” he smirked and scanned over her body through hooded lids, “such a strong little girl you are standing on wobbly legs after the big bad wolves tried to tear you down.”

She should feel offended, mocked, and appalled, but she couldn’t – not with the voids he called eyes staring at her. “T-thanks,” she weakly mumbled as she began to gather her bag back together and prop her bike back up, “I know you guys said you needed the pin number, but I can’t give it to you.” She hung her head and balled her fists; she was waiting for someone to hit her but that never came. Looking up she sees the ‘older brother’ standing in front of the brooding ‘Koko’ and the other members just staring around the streets.

“That’s fine, little one,” the older brother said, “we don’t need your card. Koko here will be fine with just the cash. But I will need payment of the sort since I did calm the bully over here, don’t you think?” He smiled at yn, quickly scanning her student ID and then turning back to her face, “You’re 18, yeah?” she nodded, and he smiled lazily, “Good, give me something of yours that is valuable. I want to talk to you again and if I take it, you are going to want to take it back, correct?”

“I – um,” she began to go through the bag and seen that the only things she deemed valuable were her phone and the spare keys to her room in the brothel, “all I have is my k-keys and phone.” She huffed out in hopes that he took mercy and just let her go already; if she kept in his presence any longer, she feared that every piece of knowledge on common sense would fly out of her brain.

“Well, no one wants a pedal bike here and your phone and keys wouldn’t be of use to me,” he spoke in a rather degrading tone, “how about, you give me that pretty little necklace that you’re wearing… hmm, ... oh! Give me your number as well. After all, how are you going to know when I want you to take back your precious gems without being able to plan a proper date?” His smile was too secretive to be comforting, but this was probably the best way to saving her own life.

“Okay,” she replied quickly, “just please, don’t break the necklace…” her hands shook as she unclasped it and placed it into the man’s hands. “That’s a gift from my brother, so I promise you I’ll come and get it whenever you ask.” Yn put her hands on her bar handles before straddling the bike.

“Thank you,” he smiled and put away the baton before fishing out his phone, “put your number in it and call to make sure you’re not fucking with me, yeah?” He tilted his head and softly hummed at the soft sound of her phone vibrating in her bag. “Thank you, yn-chan.”

“No, thank you,” she lightly coughed and waited for him to look back up at her after saving all her contact information. Once he finally looked up, she flinched but proceeded to stare him dead in his lovely irises, “May I have your name… if ya don’t mind that it.”

“Haitani Ran,” the older man laughed and shifted his weight onto his hip, “and I expect you to text me whenever you get the chance.” He turned around and the other members began to follow. For what felt like an eternity, yn finally let out a small breath, well at least until he had turned back around. “Oh!” Haitani-san smiled at her, “Leave it under ‘Ran-senpai’ so your brother and friends don’t get spooked. Don’t want the fun to end before it has barely even started.” With that, he turned back around and waved half-assed before disappearing into the distance.

Yn decided to just to walk the rest of the block because riding the bike has been nothing but bad luck so far. Once at the shop, she sighed and made her way to the back where she knew would be unlocked because no one dared walk up into her big brother’s place of work. Parking her bike, she quickly takes her phone back out with 3 texts from an unknown number.

Unknown: hey little lamb, its yer senpai <3

Unknown: yer probs with yer bro so ill call you later, mm around midnight so stay up

Unknown: text me back soon or I mite accidentally break your pretty necklace and youll have to owe me a big favor for ignoring me :)

“what the actual fuck,” yn whispered as she quickly began typing away. She didn’t know if she be upset with his back-to-back messages treating her like she was his property, or mad at herself for feeling this little need inside of her that wants to please him. Yes, all of the gang members were extremely hot and DANGEROUS, but something about ‘Ran Senpai’ gave her the cold chills; what made it worse was the urge that she possessed to go against all her morals for him.

Yn: hi! Im sorry,, I was just trying to get to my brother’s shop

Yn: wait,, do you know draken-nii?

She tilted her head and rocked lightly from side to side, waiting for a reply instead of going in and surprising her brother like she initially had planned to do. While she waited, she changed his name to ‘Tani Senpai <3’ with a small smile as she imagined Draken freaking out over the fact that a boy has caught her interest. Of course, she wasn’t romantically interested in the man, but his face isn’t one that she would mind seeing from time to time – at a safe distance that is.

Tani Senpai <3: mhm, some good and bad history

Yn: oh?

Tani Senpai <3: you do know curiosity killed the cat, right little lamb?

Yn: you flirt a lot

Yn: how old are you ?

Tani Senpai <3: 28 years young bb

Yn: youre ten whole years older than me?? You look so,, young.

Tani Senpai <3: I have aged, but trust me, I am rather youthful in different aspects.

Yn: do you by chance,, like memes?

Tani Senpai <3: ofc, especially hornee ones.

Yn: haha.. well I gotta go,

Tani Senpai <3: mhm go ahead baby, remember. Midnight <3

Yn: aye aye captain.

She felt another vibration as she placed her phone in her backpack, but she was finally able to see and surprise her brother and that is exactly what she planned to do. Quietly pulling the door open, she noted that the music blaring and Draken’s back was to her as he was fixing up what looked like Pah-chin’s old CBX 400F. It was a cute sight if she was being completely honest; her brother rebuilding his old friendships. She seen the other boys’ bikes lined up too: Draken’s Zephyr, Mitsuya’s little Impulse, Kazu-kun’s Rocket, Mikey’s CB250T, and even the late Baji’s Goki.

“Pah-san still has the old thing,” she decided to speak up instead of tackling her brother, “are you guys gonna give it to some younger kids?” right as she finished her sentence, draken whipped his head back and went to cradle yn to his chest. Suddenly, all of the stinging on her skin had vanished and she was giggling while circling her arms around her brother’s waist. “How are you ya wannabe greaser?”

“I’m doing fine you idiot, how are -,” draken lifted his head to get a good look at her, but all his excitement drained as he was met with a sight of dried blood and scraped skin. “Who the fuck did this to you? I’ll kill them right fucking now, what the hell happened yn?”

“DRAKEN,” he stopped and stared at you expecting an answer, “I tired riding my bike down the big hill by the park and this happened, okay? I’m okay.” She stared at him with a soft expression and relaxed once she noticed he slumped in his posture, “I know you said to stop riding down the hill because it’ll bite me in the ass one day, so I guess today was the day.” Yn laughed and draken tried to fight the small smile that was threatening to fall on his lips.

“Go sit on the counter and watch the store for a bit, I’m gonna get the first aid kit in the back and I guess I’ll patch ya up.” With that, he disappeared into the office hall and left yn to be lost in thought. She had never lied to Draken this heavy before. It might not seem like a big deal to others, but she just told her brother she fell down a hill instead of saying that some /Bonten/ men were just threatening her life 20 minutes ago and they treated her like a dog; well, she didn’t feel that bad anymore, considering that he would have gone and wasted his life against men that played dirty. “Get out of your head, I’m back.” Draken teased her before getting an alcohol wipe and wiping the dried blood, “don’t squirm too much, loser. iss’ gonna sting a bit tho, so try to not hit me.”

It went a lot more smooth than she had expected, yeah, the cleansing wipe and ointment burned, but now she was bandaged and able to not worry about even more blood staining her clothes til they go to the brothel.

“Here,” he handed her a spare shirt and some sweats, “I don’t like seeing you all beat up, makes me want to fight the side walk. You know where the bathroom is.” Draken slightly punched her shoulder before heading back to seat near the bike, “once you’re done, we can go meet the boys for breakfast. I bet yer hungry.”

“Yer the best, ya know that,” yn smiled before taking her bag and clothes to the bathroom. “It won’t be long,” she turned before entering the hall, “make sure the cute one is there!”

“Stop trying to fuck my friends,” Draken called out in an irritated tone as she walked away laughing. It was an ongoing joke yn had played on her brother, where she would pretend to have some crush on his friends and it’d just make him twenty times more protective around them; he never knew if she was serious or not so he had to be cautious.

Once in the bathroom, yn quickly changed into the clothes her brother had lent her and stared at herself in the mirror. She laughed when she realized she kind of looked like one of the main characters from her favorite psychological thrillers. Yn took out her phone and decided to message Mana, mitsuya’s younger sister and yn’s best friend from home, with a picture of her bandaged state and the caption, ‘take out my ankles next time, daddy <3.’ It honestly surprised her to get a reply that fast as Mana was always one to sleep until noon. She didn’t know what scared her more, the fact she sent it the wrong person, or the fact the person knew exactly what she was talking about.

Tani Senpai <3: you look hot like that

Tani Senpai <3: like being called daddy, but in this context arent I supposed to call you mommy or something LMAO

Tani Senpai <3: I can break your ankles with my baton

Tani Senpai <3: make you my little housewife and call you ‘Bum.’

Tani Senpai <3: don’t worry, I won’t turn into ashes ;) <3

“Yn,” Draken called out, “you okay in there?”

“Don’t worry about it nii-Chan,” she giggled in hopes of masking her terror, “just bumped into a wound. I’ll be out soon.”

“Okay,” draken slipped a pad and a tampon under the door, “don’t know if you might want these -,”

“LEAVE YOU IDIOT,” yn genuinely laughed and heard draken’s heavy chuckles through the door, “thank you though, I’ll be out soon.”

“I’ll be outside on the bike, bubs.”

After hearing draken’s foot steps vanish, she quickly began typing.

Yn: that wasn’t meant for you -

Tani Senpai <3: shame, I love killing stalking

Yn: wait,, really? 👀

Tani Senpai <3: mhm,, we’ll talk about it later tonite ‘bum ;)

Yn: .. deal :)

Despite every shitty thing that has happened to her since she got back, it felt as if they were supposed to meet; fate as one would call it. She was offering herself to one of the most dangerous men who rule the underworld, and she didn’t even find herself to minding.

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an: hi hello, hope yer all eating well :)

ryozoro©

#haitani ran x f!reader #f!reader #tokyo revengers haitani #tokyorev haitani ran #tokyo revengers haitani ran #tokyo revengers haitani ran x reader #haitani ran #ran haitani #haitani ran x reader #haitani brothers #tokyorev #tokyo revengers x reader #tokyo revengers

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jedimaesteryoda · 3 years

Text

What was in Prince Nymor’s Letter to Aegon I?

Background

Aegon the Conqueror managed to forge the Seven Kingdoms into one with his dragons, but there was one exception: Dorne. The First Dornish War marked the only war where a kingdom managed to avoid subjugation by the Iron Throne.

The Dornish avoided open battle as well as holing in fortresses. Rhaenys found all the castles in Dorne empty as she flew on Meraxes as the Dornish forces melted away.

Meria: I will not fight you, nor will I kneel to you. Dorne has no king. Tell your brother that. Rhaenys: I shall, but we will come again, Princess, and next time we shall come with fire and blood. Meria: Your words, Ours are Unbowed, Unbent, Unbroken. You may burn us, my lady, but you will not bend us, break us, or make us bow. This is Dorne. You are not wanted here. Return at your peril.

Princess Meria waited for her in Sunspear just to tell her off. Aegon placed his men to control castles, and declared victory only for the Dornish forces to return. Meria threw Lord Rosby from a window herself.

Also, apparently the Dornish didn’t play nice. Entire garrisons were put to the sword. Knights were tortured, and Lord Wyl cut off the hands of captured prisoners-of-war, including Aegon’s Hand, Orys Baratheon. These actions violated the codes of chivalry, and had Aegon and his bannermen howling for vengeance, which led to a bloody cycle of retaliation and reappraisals.

Aegon’s retaliation was swift as he and his sisters took to their dragons and burned Dornish castles. The Dornish responded by burning half the rainwood and sacking half a dozen towns and villages. The Targaryens then responded by burning more Dornish castles in dragonflame. The Dornish response to that was Lord Fowler capturing Nightfall and taking its occupants hostage and razing the nearby villages and towns. The Targaryens, then predictably, responded with their dragons again, but this time, miraculously, the Dornish managed to take down a dragon. A scorpion bolt in a one in a million shot, hit Meraxes in the eye, killing the dragon and ostensibly, the rider, Rhaenys.

The death of Aegon’s favorite sister-wife was of course a huge personal blow, and it marked the start of the next two years of the war appropriately named the Dragon’s Wroth, the nadir of the war. Aegon and Visenya's initial response was to burn every castle in Dorne, except Sunspear. Some castles were even burned more than once with Hellholt, the site of Meraxes’s death, being burned three times. Aegon and Visneya also placed bounties on the heads of Dornish lords to which the Dornish responded by placing bounties on their heads as well as those of their allies. Half a dozen Dornish lords were assassinated while Aegon and Visneya survived several assassination attempts, and Lord Fell was murdered in a brothel.

Finally, Meria Martell died, and was succeeded by her son, Nymor. Nymor took a different approach compared to his mother, and sent his daughter and heir, Deria, to King’s Landing with Meraxes’s skull and a letter. While Aegon’s queen and advisors pushed for Aegon to harm Deria, Aegon refused and heard out Deria.

Dorne wanted peace, according to Deria—but the peace of two kingdoms no longer at war, not the peace between a vassal and a lord. Many urged His Grace against this, and the phrase "no peace without submission" was often heard in the halls of the Aegonfort. It was claimed that the king would look weak should he agree to such a demand and that the lords of the Reach and stormlands who had suffered so much for his cause would be angered.

Swayed by such considerations, it is said, King Aegon was determined to refuse the offer until Princess Deria placed in his hands a private letter from her father, Prince Nymor. Aegon read it upon the Iron Throne, and men say that when he rose, his hand was bleeding, so hard had he clenched it. He burned the letter and departed immediately on Balerion's back for Dragonstone. When he returned the next morning, he agreed to the peace and signed a treaty to that effect.

Aegon read Nymor’s letter, burned it, and left for Dragonstone on Balerion that day, only to return the following morning and to his court’s surprise, agree to Nymor’s terms of ending the First Dornish War with the Iron Throne recognizing Dorne’s independence.

No one knows the contents of that letter, but there are theories as to what was in that letter that led Aegon to forgo his aim to conquer Dorne and agree to Nymor’s peace. Let’s look at the possibilities offered.

1. Did he threaten to take all the wealth of Dorne to hire the Faceless Men to kill Aegon's young son and heir, Aenys?

The problem with this one is Aegon "flew to Sunspear on Balerion on the tenth anniversary of the peace accords to celebrate ‘a feast of freindship’ with Deria Martell” with Aenys accompanying him. I doubt Aegon would willingly celebrate such a treaty with Princess Deria, and do so, by bringing along the son they threatened to kill if he didn’t sign. That would just make things awkward.

Also, the whole point of hiring an assassin, especially a Faceless Man, is to get someone killed without you being implicated. If you say that “if person A dies, it's definitely because of me,” that would be a clear invitation to retaliation from the victim’s family and allies.

The man whom this threat was made to burned every castle in Dorne in retaliation for Rhaenys’s death. It doesn’t take much speculation to imagine how he would have responded to the death of his son borne by that same woman. A threat like that likely wouldn’t have intimidated Aegon into signing the treaty, but more likely angered him and provoked threats of retaliation.

One must also note that by the time of the meeting (13 AC) Maegor had just been born the year before (12 AC). Even with Aenys dead, Aegon would still have had a son to continue the Targaryen line, and it wouldn’t have been a permanent end to the Targaryen threat.

2. Did Nymor reveal that Rhaenys lived still, broken and mutilated, and that he would end her suffering if Aegon ended hostilities?

It doesn’t take a genius to see the problems with this one. For Aegon, the idea of Rhaenys having been left broken after being tortured and mutilated for two years undoubtedly would have enraged him in such a manner that would have befit his sobriquet “the Dragon”, and had him threatening swift and brutal retaliation. He would have demanded Rhaenys back, no matter what condition she was in. I also seriously doubt Aegon would take Rhaenys’s son, Aenys, to celebrate the peace with Deria that was signed on the condition of killing his tortured mother.

Nymor would also have demonstrated himself to be an idiot by needlessly endangering his daughter, Deria. By sending her, he would have handed Aegon a potentially valuable hostage on a silver platter that Aegon could use to counter any threats against Rhaenys. It also undermined the message of goodwill by bringing the skull of Meraxes.

There is also the question of if they had Rhaenys alive this whole time, why the hell didn’t they use her before, the moment they had captured her? The Dornish would have to be complete fools to not see how valuable a hostage Aegon’s favorite sister-wife could be. They at the very least could have used her to negotiate a ceasefire, and given themselves some respite.

3. Was the letter ensorceled?

Short answer: no. I don’t think we’ve seen magic capable of influencing someone’s consciousness with the most being tales of love potions.

4. Some claim it was a simple plea, from one father to another, heartfelt words that touched King Aegon’s heart.

This seems a little too romantic. I mean even if the words did touch Aegon’s heart, there were still political realities to consider, and I don’t see how relating as a father would move Aegon enough to forget about Rhaenys, the woman who first made him a father to begin with.

5. Others insist it was a list of all those lords and noble knights who lost their lives during the war.

I admit while showing a king the human costs of his war isn’t unappealing to me, one must note that “the Reach, the stormlands and the marches had suffered grievously during the fighting, and would never forgive and forget.” The relatives of those same lords and knights who died in the Dornish War largely wanted the war to continue to avenge their relatives, and would potentially have seen a Dornish peace without submission seemingly make those deaths in vain.

It also wouldn’t be the first time Aegon suffered a personal loss in his conquest. He lost his distant cousin and one of his family’s closest friends, Daemon Velaryon, in the first Targaryen assault on the Vale. Yet, he continued his conquest regardless.

What actually was in the letter?

Think back to Robert’s Rebellion with Dornish anger over the horrific deaths of Elia and her children as well as the death of Lewyn at the Battle of the Trident. Jon Arryn managed to avoid rebellion by the Dornish by returning Lewyn’s bones to Dorne, and negotiating with Prince Doran.

Returning the remains of a fallen relative is an act of respect. It is mentioned that Rhaenys’s bones were never returned. Neither were the bones Elia and her children, but that was because they were given the Targaryen custom of cremation.

I think Rhaenys’s body was likely given the same treatment. What Nymor may have mentioned in the letter is that he was returning Rhaenys’s ashes from her funeral pyre to Dragonstone. That is why Aegon left for Dragonstone that day on Balerion, he wanted to meet up with the ship carrying her urn.

That leaves the question of why Aegon burned the letter. The reason is probably the same as why Aegon had no close friends except Orys: he was a very private person, and this was a very personal matter to him.

Throughout the war, both sides did a lot of awful stuff with the Targaryens burning everything in Dorne in dragonflame, and the Dornish responding by engaging in torture, mutilation and assassination (which the Targaryens did first). All those actions did was escalate the war, and result in more brutal retaliation from the Targaryens with each side upping the violence, brutality and destruction. However, by performing this one honorable gesture, Nymor managed to succeed where his mother failed in ending Aegon’s attempts to subdue Dorne.

#dorne #asoiaf #a song of ice and fire #house targaryen #rhaenys targaryen #aegon the conqueror #aegon targaryen #aegon #visenya targaryen #house martell #uller #balerion #meraxes #aenys targaryen #sunspear

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e-milieeee · 4 years

Text

the enemy of my enemy (must be my ally)

Summary: When one of his akumas attacks Adrien and one of his classmates, Gabriel Agreste discovers that Marinette Dupain-Cheng would prove a very useful ally against Ladybug and Chat Noir.

How had he not discovered sooner? But oh well—better late than never. Ladybug will never know what’s coming.

Notes: from this post because everyone wanted me to write it. i warned y’all. feat. gabriel’s 2 functional brain cells.

AO3 | Kofi

Gabriel Agreste isn’t past admitting his mistakes.

Most of them have involved Adrien, so he supposes that it’s time to pay attention to the trend. And all of those mistakes have involved his growing career as Hawkmoth—and, more specifically, the choices he makes for whom he akumatizes.

Lila Rossi, now known as Princess Perfect—seriously, what the hell was wrong with this girl? He’d given her the liberty of choosing her akuma name, but such a godawful name is a bad reflection on him as well—kicks down the door of the classroom.

He sees it all through Lila’s eyes, like he does with all the akumas. Doesn’t mean he’s particularly happy about the turnout of this particular akumatization.

“What are you doing?” Gabriel demands to her. “I want Ladybug and Chat Noir’s Miraculous! You’re going the wrong way.”

Relax. Lila’s voice drifts into his head. I need to take a little detour.

“What detour—” Oh. Oh, shit.

In the classroom, packing their bags, is his son and that Chinese girl with pigtails—Marinette. The one that Gabriel knows Lila Rossi intensely hates. The one that he doesn’t like either, because for some reason, his son is infatuated with her. It’s Marinette-this, Marinette-that these days, and Adrien just won’t stop gushing about her. Father, look at these designs! They’re Marinette’s. Father, look who’s on the news—it’s Marinette! Father, can you hire Marinette to work at Gabriel Brand?

Marinette, a real headache. Gabriel rubs his temples. Maybe it’s a good thing that Lila’s after her. Better to nip it in the bud before Adrien’s attachment becomes a real problem.

“Fine,” he grounds out to Lila. “But leave Ad—leave the blonde boy alone.”

Already ahead of you, Hawkie.

“Don’t call me that!”

She ignores him in favour of turning to the two victims. Adrien is standing in front of Marinette, arms spread in a protective stance, glaring at the akuma. For a couple moments, nobody speaks.

Then, Marinette, eyebrows furrowing, says, “You’re Lila, aren’t you. Seriously? What is this—your third akumatization? Fourth?”

“My name is Princess Perfect now,” Lila growls back. “Get out of my way, Adrien.”

Marinette literally gags. “Did Hawkmoth choose that name for you?”

“No, I didn’t,” Gabriel seethes. Unfortunately, none of them can hear him.

“Yes, he did,” Lila lies breezily. “But that’s not important. You think you’re such a hot shot, Marinette? You think you can take the spotlight from me without repercussions? I’m going to make sure everyone hates you and loves me, and you’ll learn your lesson for trying to cross me. After all, who can say no to Princess Perfect?”

Gabriel sighs through his nose. Are all teens this dramatic?

Apparently, they are. Betrayal comes from those closest to home, because it’s Adrien that holds up his arms even higher, still staring Lila down. “You’re going to have to go through me if you want to hurt her,” he promises. “Marinette, get out of here! Run!”

Oh, for heaven’s sake—

Two things happen at once. Lila darts towards them, her whip lashing out directly at Adrien. Gabriel swears under his breath—why isn’t Adrien moving out of the way? Why is he so intent on protecting that useless girl? “Lila!” he barks through the bond, but the akumatized girl is too far gone. “Touch him and I’ll make sure—”

Gabriel trails into dumbfounded silence when Marinette shoves Adrien aside, grabs the end of Lila’s whip, and tugs the weapon straight out of the girl’s hands.

“You’ve gone too far,” she growls in a tone so chilly that it even reaches him. “Adrien, get out of here! I can handle her.”

Lila’s own shock lasts for a couple of times before she regains some of her composure. “You?” she sneers. “Handle me? Why, you pathetic—”

Adrien chucks a pencil case at Lila. It hits her cheek, and she whirls on him, enraged. At the same time, Marinette darts away from the window and slides behind the large wooden desk at the front. Gabriel, still watching the scene unfold, scoffs. So for all her big talk, she’s still nothing but a coward.

“Stand down,” he commands Lila once more. “Don’t you dare touch Adrien—what the hell?”

Lila seems to have noticed the source of his bewilderment as well, but it’s far too late. From underneath the desk, Marinette has lifted the thing—the giant, wooden desk—onto her shoulders.

Gabriel’s positive he stops breathing.

“Wait—” Lila begins. He sees it all through her eyes: Marinette braces herself for a moment and then throws it—throws the desk that a grown man shouldn’t be able to lift—right at Lila.

She doesn’t stand a chance. Lila goes down in a crash, pinned under the weight of Ms. Bustier’s desk that this small, petite girl had somehow bench-pressed and then chucked.

As much as Lila struggles, she is unable to remove the desk from on top of her. Given that his akumas have enhanced strength and she’s still incapable of lifting it, just how strong is Marinette?

Said girl in question stalks over to Lila. She plants a foot firmly against the overturned side of the desk and looks down at the girl trapped underneath.

Gabriel is certain that somehow, impossible as it sounds, Marinette is staring right through Lila’s eyes, through their connection, and into his own. His body freezes. His jaw locks. And for the first time in a very, very long time, Gabriel Agreste is absolutely terrified.

“Next time you try something like this,” Marinette growls, leaning in, “I won’t let you off so easily.”

With that ominous note, she snatches the necklace off Lila’s neck and marches right out of the classroom.

Gabriel remains frozen for a couple more moments. He isn’t certain if he still remembers how to breathe.

It wasn’t Ladybug nor Chat Noir that had foiled this plan. No, it was Adrien Agreste’s classmate, a girl who had previously annoyed him, that had single handedly defeated an akuma and scared him absolutely shitless.

What. The. Fuck.

***

“Adrien,” Gabriel says over dinner. “You know that girl you always talk about? Marinette Dupain-Cheng?”

His son looks up from his meal with a bright look on his face. Once upon a time, Gabriel would’ve been annoyed. Now, after reevaluating the girl, he comes to the conclusion that it’s best Adrien stays on Marinette’s good side. She’s probably more than capable of beating his son up.

“Yeah, Marinette?” Adrien echoes. “You know how there was an akuma attack today? Well, Marinette was actually there in the classroom with me when the akuma came for us.”

Gabriel is forced to play ignorant. “Oh? What happened?”

“Well, the akuma tried to attack us, and Marinette picked up a desk—you might find it hard to believe, and honestly I would’ve too if I hadn’t seen her do it—and threw it at the akuma. When Ladybug and Chat Noir finally showed up, there wasn’t even anything for them to do.”

Gabriel shifts in his seat. “That is… rather unbelievable."

Except he swears he can still feel the heat of Marinette’s glare, and is forced to accept that this is the reality he’s living in.

“Why did you ask about her, though, father?”

He snaps back into the present. “Huh?”

“Marinette—why did you ask about her? Wait, father, are you reconsidering hiring her? Did you finally look at the designs I sent you? This is amazing. I’m sure she’ll do amazing. Your stocks will rise. You’ll get more customers. Marinette’s basically a walking lucky charm—this will be the best decision you’ve ever made, father. I promise.”

He frowns at Adrien. “Don’t make preposterous suggestions. But yes— I am considering giving Marinette Dupain-Cheng a job at the company, perhaps an internship one of the senior designers. She’s very… talented.”

He thinks of the way she’d lifted the desk and flung it at Lila. Talented, indeed.

Perhaps talented enough to finally give him an edge against Ladybug and Chat Noir.

***

Marinette Dupain-Cheng is more than eager to come in for a so-called interview. Nathalie has done her digging on the girl: she’s made it pretty big quite a couple times already, in the fashion industry and has quite a few connections. Even if Gabriel’s motivations aren’t technically for the company, he has to admit that she has much future potential to tap into in the future. But for now, that’s not his goal.

She’s impeccably dressed when Nathalie leads her inside his study. Her eyes are positively shining when she beams at Gabriel. “Mr. Agreste!” Marinette chirps. “I’m so happy to be here. When Adrien told me you wanted to interview me for the job…this is such an amazing opportunity to be presented with, and I am so honoured.”

Gabriel exchanges a glance with Nathalie. She nods subtly.

“It’s my pleasure to meet you, Ms. Dupain-Cheng.” He rises from his desk and holds out his hand for her to shake. She does so.

It takes all of Gabriel’s self-control not to show the pain on his face when she grips his hand.

How the fuck is this girl so strong?

Thankfully, Marinette doesn’t seem to notice anything wrong. Gabriel draws back his hand and tucks it behind his back. It’s throbbing.

“So, Marinette.” He sits back down at his desk. Marinette is practically bouncing on the balls of her feet. If she were any normal person, Gabriel might’ve snapped at her to settle down, but after that show with Lila yesterday, he decides that it’s for his own good not to get on her bad side. He’ll just have to channel all his patience—for self-preservation, really. “I understand that you’re interested in interning at my company?”

She nods excitedly. “I’ve been designing for years, Mr. Agreste—I’m aware that I have a lot to improve on—”

“What I have in mind for you—” Gabriel pauses, realizing that he’d interrupted her. Hurriedly, he gulps. “Never mind. Continue.”

“I’m aware that I have a lot to improve on but I’m a very quick learner! I promise I’ll do my very best to help you and your company.”

He nods. “That’s good to hear. For now, I’ll… I’ll arrange with Nathalie what we can assign you to do in the company. And I have another favour to ask of you, if it’s not too much.”

Marinette smiles. “Whatever it is, I’ll do my best to help you!”

Nathalie had warned him to be careful with Marinette—one wrong move and he could be ousted as Hawkmoth. He takes a deep breath. “I have become aware that there are some bad influences around my son in school. You are friends with Adrien, yes?”

“Yes, and… bad influences?” Marinette frowns, shifting her weight. “Oh, yeah, there’s one in particular. Actually, I’m not sure if you’re aware, Mr. Agreste, but I’m glad you brought it up. You know that akuma yesterday? That girl’s name was Lila Rossi. She’s been hanging around Adrien quite a bit these days, and ‘bad influence’ barely covers what she does. And—oh! When I confronted her once about making Adrien uncomfortable, she told me she had a ‘friend in a high place’ that was backing her up. I think you might want to look into that too, Mr. Agreste. It was pretty worrisome, to be honest.”

Gabriel’s mouth has gone dry. “I… yes. Yes, I shall look into that too.”

Marinette rolls her shoulders. “God, if I knew who they were, I’d throw them into the Seine. How dare they.” Then her eyes widen. “Sorry, Mr. Agreste! I was just… um, I was just talking to myself. I’m so sorry.”

“It’s perfectly alright,” Gabriel reassures immediately, although it doesn’t do much to ease the chill that is travelling up his spine. “Then it’s decided? Nathalie will give you her contact information—you can send her your resume just for formalities, and she will organize the rest. And… be sure to keep an eye on my son at school.”

“I will!” Marinette chirps, ever so chipper. Behind that attitude lies the strength to lift the desk he’s currently sitting and crush him. And much, much more.

Nathalie guides the girl away. Gabriel is unable to breathe fully until she leaves.

He has to calculate this well, because he can’t afford to lose a potential ally like Marinette Dupain-Cheng. He’s already thinking—perhaps she would do well with the Peacock Miraculous, or the Bee Miraculous, if he can get his hands on it again. If—if he can somehow convince Marinette to help him with his cause, all of his other plans don’t even need to go into action. Ladybug and Chat Noir will never see this coming.

Nathalie returns. “Sir, your face is rather pale,” she notes. “But may I ask what that was about? You were… unusually lenient today.”

Gabriel clears his throat and straightens in his seat. “Never mind me,” he dismisses. “But first, I need to contact Lila Rossi as soon as possible to cut off all ties. Let her know she’s fired.”

“Is this because…?”

He allows himself a small smile. “You’ll see soon, Nathalie,” he reassures. “We’ve finally got the upperhand in this fight.”

Notes: i lost brain cells writing it, and i’m sure y’all have lost brain cells reading it.

Fics masterlist here!

#miraculous ladybug #marinette dupain cheng #adrien agreste #gabriel agreste #hawkmoth #bamf marinette #gabriel is TERRIFIED of marinette #as he should be #crack #humour #yall asked for this its not my fault #ml #mlb fic #my writing #that being said if you tag this gabrinette i will hunt you down

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wakaoujisenhime · 3 years

Note

May I please request some angst with Kise being busy with basketball and modelling career neglecting his s/o? Additionally his s/o thinks he's cheating on them and just a big misunderstanding. Thank you very much 😊❤️

A/N: Even though I am quite late, happy Valentine’s Day! This actually got longer than I planned it to be, but I hope you’ll like it nonetheless! (｡•̀ᴗ-)✧

Tags: Kise x reader ✅ angst ✅ fluff ✅

━━━━☆ ━━━━☆ ━━━━☆

Misunderstanding - Kise x reader

If someone had told you that you’d become the Kise Ryouta’s girlfriend some time ago, then you wouldn’t have believed it.

Kise was a young face everyone would’ve recognized if they had seen it somewhere in public. His blond hair was partially at fault for that as well, but the main reason for his immense popularity was his side job as a young model for different fashion and makeup brands. On top of that, he had been a part of the legendary Generation of Miracles, a group of six young and talented basketball players who each had an extraordinary and never-seen-before skill that could turn every game around. He was very fond of this sport and wished to steadily improve himself at every possible opportunity so of course, it was a given that he’d continue his training even after middle school.

Thinking about this handsome man and all of his achievements made you wonder just how lucky you were for being able to call him your boyfriend. You still couldn’t wrap your head around the fact that the two of you went to the same school and were in the same grade, but never mind that, what surprised you the most was the moment he’d asked to meet you and then sheepishly confessed his interest in you and the wish to be by your side as your boyfriend. It was such a surreal situation that you couldn’t help but nod throughout the entirety of it.

The two of you didn’t know each other that well at first so the process of finding out everything possible about the other was quite fun and really made both of you forget about the stressful part of your daily lives. At first, you had expected that Kise was your typical playboy who’d just confess to anyone who met his preferences, but as time went on you actually saw past those prejudices of yours and were pleasantly surprised at how different he was than what you had imagined. He was a very caring, gentle, and nice guy who’d do anything to see you smile and hear you laugh or giggle. He made you feel like you were the only person in the entire world and that there was no one else he’d rather spent his time with than you. The surprises he prepared for you on special days such as Valentine’s Day or your own birthday were mind-blowing as well.

You of course made sure to always return that amount of love you’d received and his adorable reactions were the reason you felt like you’d fallen in love with him yet another time.

Everything was working out perfectly and the two of you were as happy as can be, but life, unfortunately, likes to ruin perfect moments like these...

The two of you were now third-years and Kise was slowly starting to think about his future plans, so he began taking on more modeling gigs during his free days, some of these even overlapped with the days on which you had planned a date. You were pretty understanding at first and even told him that you didn’t mind, but as these date reschedulings began occurring every single time it really made you sad. In fact, you were so sad that as soon as Kise mentioned having an upcoming free day you simply nodded and whispered a silent ‘I see.’

Nevertheless, you kept on visiting him during his basketball club’s training sessions and watched him steadily improve his performance with each passing day. His bright smile after every basket made your heart throb and a couple of weeks ago you would’ve interpreted it as a positive feeling but now? It simply pained you. Negative thoughts flooded your mind and is if that wasn’t enough, a group of his fangirls stormed the field moments after the referee had blown his whistle three times.

“Kise-kun, please look this way!!“

“Kise! Can you please sign my t-shirt?“

“C-Can I have your number please!“

Sights like these weren’t uncommon and you were used to ignoring them, knowing that Kise wouldn’t do anything that might upset you or his fans, but as of late situations such as these annoyed you. You sighed, stood up, and left the gym.

“(Y/N)! Wait up!“

At the sound of the familiar voice of your best friend, you obeyed his plea, turning back to the young man who was running up to you.

“Yukio! What’s wrong?”

He stopped right before you, greeting you with a small smile as he rubbed the back of his neck in slight discomfort.

“Is...Is something bothering you? Or more like...has everything been alright as of late? N-No that’s not it...Do you-”

“There’s no need to beat around the bush Yukio and you know it,” you say with a small smile as you gently bump your fist against his arm, “just tell me what’s been bugging you.”

He sighs in relief and you see how some tension leaves his shoulders as he asks you a rather surprising question: “I’ve noticed the tension between Kise and you, so tell me...what’s up with that? Do I need to step in and help you out with something?”

Yukio was quite perceptive, especially when it came to your and Kise’s relationship, he always made sure to keep up with your well-being since he knew how carried away your blond boyfriend could get. If it were any other occasion, you would’ve told your best friend what had bothered you so much, but now that you reflected on it, it seemed a rather meaningless reason for you to be upset over so you just shook your head lightly and brushed it off. Your counterpart on the other hand just squinted his eyes in suspicion but decided to let it go for now.

“Just make sure to tell him if something is worrying you, ok? Remember, communication is the key to every relationship.”

And with those wise words, he bid you farewell and jogged back to the gym...

“Hey...(Y/N)-cchi? Would you like to go on a date next Saturday?”

“..? Excuse me?”

The two of you looked into each other’s eyes with equally surprised expressions and not short after you both burst out laughing.

“I’m sorry Kise, I just didn’t expect you to invite me on a date, that’s all.“

Your boyfriend sat down next to you and took your hand in his own, gently caressing each of your fingers as he let his eyes roam around your facial features. Looking at him being that deeply lost in thought made you wonder just what was going through his mind. Usually, he’d try and avoid dating you in public or when it was still daytime because of the potential rumors and scandals it might start, so you couldn’t help but wonder just what brought this sudden change. With a rather sad-looking smile, he brought your hands to his lips and gently kissed your knuckles, his action causing your cheeks to redden ever so slightly.

“Hehe, sorry (Y/N)-cchi, it’s just...we haven’t been able to spend much time together and I need to tell you something important as well, so I thought that a date might be the best solution for this...”

Nothing he’d just said sounded good to you. Kise was rarely a person who’d organize something according to things he’d like to tell or discuss with you so the idea alone was a massive red flag for you. And yet, you couldn’t ignore the seriousness with which he’d approached you, so despite the uneasy feeling that was building up within you, you put on your best fake smile and nodded.

——

“Oh my god did you read today’s news?“

Stop it...

“I just can’t believe it and here I thought that he was a down-to-earth type of guy!“

But he is, I swear!

“You guys are exaggerating! He’s a playboy, you can see that from a mile away!“

N-No, you’re wrong!

“Did you guys actually know that these were actually some long-term fans of his from way back when he first debuted?“

So what...? I’m sure there must be some backstory to this...

“They could’ve at least picked a better and more hidden-away location than a love hotel right at the center of Shinjuku...“

Maybe they had a photo shoot around that area!

“Ugh, he makes me sick...and to think that I shared my book with him once.”

Please don’t say that...

“I feel sorry for his managers and teammates. Who knows what these poor souls have to go through because of this.“

T-That’s一

No matter how many corners you turned, stairs you climbed, or rooms you entered, everyone was talking about the same thing: Kise. The moment you had woken up, your phone was full of notifications, questions, and missed calls, but before you could even comprehend what was going on, one particular message had caught your attention.

♡ : I’m sorry (Y/N)-cchi but I won’t be coming to school today. This is all just a big misunderstanding...trust me

It was then that you had noticed the big headline of your phone’s news app:

MODEL KISE RYOUTA CAUGHT RED-HANDED! IS ONE NOT ENOUGH? Steamy adventures in front of Shinjuku’s most famous love hotel!

It had been such a massive slap to the face, that the entire morning was foggy to you, reality hit you the moment you had stepped on school grounds.

Gossip. Rumors. Lies. Disgust. Aggression. Madness. Sadness.

No matter how hard you tried to avoid any ill-meant word from your classmates, you just couldn’t escape. Your belief in the man whom you called your beloved, the one who promised you that you’d always be the one in his eyes, the same one who swore that this endeavor was nothing but a misunderstanding, was starting to waver.

Suddenly everything started to make sense.

His distant behavior towards you, the increasing amount of modeling gigs he took on, your surprise visits during his training that he’d loved so much went unnoticed and that important topic he wanted to discuss with you on your next date. Everything.

You felt how all those negative feelings you had accumulated during these past few months started to come forth. Just as you were on the verge of tears and wanted to do nothing but fall to your knees, scream and cry you came across Moriyama and Yukio.

“(Y/N)! There you are! How long do you think I’ve been looking for you?!”

The tall man alongside your best friend was quick to notice that you were quite distraught and immediately took a hold of his captain’s shoulder and squeezed it slightly. You truly appreciated that these two were looking for you and intended to calm you down or encourage you to think positively and rationally about this, but right now you couldn’t manage to listen to their kind and caring words, so you apologized, thanked them, and headed straight towards the rooftop, the place where Kise had confessed to you.

As if on cue, your phone began vibrating and as you looked at the screen you saw that the incoming call was from no other than the man who’d been on your mind since the early morning.

“K-Kise...?”

“(Y/N)-cchi! Thank god, you picked up! I’m sorry for the short and sinister message this morning, but I had to clear some things with my managers first bef-“

“So your image was once again more important, huh?”

“W-What...?”

Before you could stop yourself from saying something you’d regret later, your mouth was unfortunately quicker.

“Lately I hardly recognize you, Kise, it’s as if you’ve become an entirely different person. First, you confess your love to me all sheepishly, blushing from head to toe, then you treat me like I’m the center of the world and the only reason you live for, but as of late you’ve been prioritizing your work more than our joint time. I tried to be understanding, I really did, but if you asked me out just so that you could fulfill some kind of goal and boast to whoever with it, then I’m really the wrong person for this.”

Nothing but silence came from the other end of the line, so you took this as a sign to continue.

“Listen, Kise, I don’t need nor expect you to adore me as if I’m some kind of deity, but I at least would like to know what the backstory to today’s tabloid news meant...and I sincerely hope that you aren’t going to trot out some lame excuse because I wouldn’t be able to handle it.“

“...(Y/N)“

“I’ll see you this Saturday Kise.“ you whispered as you ended the call without waiting for his answer.

——

You looked at yourself in the mirror, dreading what this date would mean for your future with the blond young man. The entire week-long you had deliberately avoided him in order to keep your thoughts as rational as you could and not let them get influenced by neither your feelings for him nor the supporting words of your friends. It was hard to ignore the guilty and worried stares he sent your way and whenever you saw the vicious glares others gave him, it really tugged at your heartstrings, but somehow you managed to withstand any possible temptation.

During the bus drive to the city center, you once again looked at the screenshot you took of the article that had caused you so much despair over the past few days. The blurry photo showed a tall blond man who was without a doubt Kise, trapping some girl whose face was covered by pixels between himself and the wall of the love hotel while the second one was pulling on his dark blue jacket, the same one which you had given him as his last year’s birthday present. Judging by the image alone it did look like Kise and the two girls were on their way to the rather flashy establishment, but your boyfriend couldn’t quite hold himself back and decided to start on the fun beforehand.

Cheating, huh...?

You bit your lip and thought about it. A famous and perky guy like him already had a stable fangirl club that followed him at each step so him feeling tempted during your time as a couple wouldn’t have surprised you in the slightest and yet it pained you so much that you could’ve started crying right then and there in front of all the other people that were sitting in the bus with you.

The city was brimming with people left and right, exiting and entering shops and restaurants. Today should’ve marked a happy occasion since it was the first public date the two of you had ever planned while the streetlights were still off. You had agreed to meet right in front of a small cafe that was close to the station and wasn’t one of the popular hangout spots so that you could at least have some sense of privacy. Each step you took fueled your anxiety of what was about to come and no matter how many deep breaths you took, you just couldn’t calm your raging heart down.

You finally saw a blond head sticking out among the crowd and just as you were about to raise your hand and wave to him, you halted. Kise was apparently not alone and had come alongside yet another girl who was constantly clinging to his arm, trying to get him to move.

“What did I even expect...?”

The crowd before you started to disappear and the two of them finally came into full view, but so did you. His yellow eyes met with your glassy ones and you could immediately see how regret and sorrow distorted his already distressed face.

“(Y/N)-cchi, wait...i-it’s not what it looks like..!”

You felt something warm fall down your cheeks and without paying it any mind you simply turned around and began walking back where you came from. Kise’s desperate calls for you to wait up were ignored and whenever his voice seemed too close to you, you sped up but he was too persistent. Despite the dense crowd you constantly walked amongst he never lost track of you.

(Y/N)-cchi! Please wait!

It’s all a misunderstanding, I promise you!

Listen to me, please!

(Y/N)!

You were trying to isolate his desperate pleas to such an extent that you hadn’t noticed the park you had just walked in. There were barely any people who strolled around this small yet beautiful piece of nature. The thought of elderly people walking their pets here, children running around and couples occupying the benches made you imagine just what excellent spot this would’ve been for a proper first date...

The young man behind you had used the time you were lost in thoughts to close the distance between you, but as soon as had returned from your small daydream and noticed how close he was to you, your body involuntarily urged you to run. And you did.

N-No, wait...!

You were fully aware of what you were doing, and you felt terrible for it. Kise’s leg had been injured for quite some time and he was told to not overdo it, which meant that he had to renounce running for most of the time so that he had enough energy and leg power left for his basketball matches.

And yet why..?

Why was he running after you as if his life depended on it? As if it was the last point his team needed for victory? Why?

You stopped sprinting and swiftly turned around. The man who had been an arm’s reach from you didn’t expect your sudden halt and collided with you, but luckily he caught you just before you lost your footing and pulled you towards his heaving chest. His trembling arms wrapped around your body and tightened their grip.

“Finally...”

The way he hugged you made all the wonderful and sweet memories of your life with him came up, leaving you with no other option but to return his embrace with the same amount of love.

“Kise...are you crazy? Why did you start running after me with your injured leg?” you asked after a short while and even though your question was intended to sound like a lecture, it ended up having a worrisome tone instead.

“This small amount of pain is nothing compared to the pain I made you feel these past few weeks.”

A small smile adorned your lips, but at the same time, you had to continuously think about all the things that had happened in this week alone, causing your smile to vanish almost immediately. You wanted answers and you needed them now.

“Kise, please...I want you to-“

“Explain. Yes, I know.” he interrupted and slowly backed up, looking you directly into your eyes.

After he’d taken hold of your hands, he began by defusing the situation that had transpired some mere seconds ago. The girl that was tugging on him was apparently a fan of his who’d drunk one too many beers. She’d unintentionally run into him and had almost lost her balance, but as caring as he was he held onto her and that’s when she had found out his true identity. Kise tried to keep her as silent and calm as possible, but that was easier said than done. The moment you had arrived was when she had started pulling his clothes, pleading him to come to her house and sign all of her merch.

“So about that article...on that day we had a photo shooting in Shinjuku and I was asked to take a break so I wandered about and that’s when two girls came from the love hotel. I wasn’t disguised so they immediately recognized me and tried to ask me out and whatnot. They were so persistent that I told them about you...they thought I was lying and then...”

You saw his sudden change in demeanor, his jaw muscles had tensed up and his grip on your hands was harder than earlier. Kise was rarely mad at something or someone, but what you saw before you, that anger and unspoken hatred were a first for the normally cheerful young man.

“They began insulting you, saying how you were together with me just because of my looks and nothing more. How dare they talk you down to their level? Just who do they think they are?!”

You expected any random excuse but seeing him get so worked up for your sake made your heart ache and now that you knew the backstory, the pictures made more sense. Your lover explained that he’d lost his temper and had pushed the girl who’d trash-talked you against the wall, warning her to keep her mouth shut before he really lost it. Meanwhile, her friend had tried to get him away from her by pulling on his jacket, and apparently, that’s when one of the passersby shot the photo. He took a short break after telling you that and then out of nowhere he brought his face closer to your own.

“(Y/N)-cchi...that’s not all. Do you remember our phone call when you told me that I’ve changed?“ he asked and waited for your confirmation before continuing, “...well the reason I didn’t call you first and had to deal with my manager is that we considered making my relationship with you public.”

“Wh-What...?“

“I’ve had enough of people trying to flirt with me and not believing when I say that I’ve found the perfect partner already. You see...graduation is just a few months away and after that I wanted to concentrate more on our relationship, hoping that maybe you’d like to...to live together with me.“

If you weren’t shocked enough before then his proposal just know had given you the finishing blow. Your heart was beating so fast and so loud that you feared he could’ve heard it.

“Was...was this the reason you took on so many jobs?”

He noded in embarrassment. “I wouldn’t feel confident enough to propose such an idea when it seems so far away and unrealistic, so I wanted to gain some sense of stability and independence before I asked you.”

Kise continued his explanation, but you didn’t catch most of it since you were so lost in your thoughts. The man before you had taken so many overtime shifts, had sacrificed so many of your dates, had gotten himself in a scandal for your sake, and yet here you were doubting him and doing something so childish like running away from him. You bit your lower lip and jumped into his arms, silently apologizing to your lover for your presumptuous behavior. He simply returned your embrace and kissed your temple.

Sometimes, misunderstandings such as these do have their benefits...

#knb scenarios #kise x reader #kise ryota x reader #knb fluff #knb angst #━𝙺𝙽𝙱 #━𝙰𝙽𝙾𝙽'𝚂 𝙴𝙲𝙷𝙾

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