#piers x gn reader | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

untilnildies · 3 months

Text

Red Thong, Party's On

Piers Nivans x GN!Reader

WC: 1.5k

Warnings: GN!Reader, no y/n, no gendered terms, penetrative sex, oral sex, unprotected, fucking in a nasty alley!! boot worship

a/n: this was a gift for my friend!! im working on a krauser fic, soon to be out <3

It had been a long night for both of you. Between the flashing lights, the skimpily dressed waitresses carting around glowing trays with drinks, and people screaming in your ear to talk to you, you were exhausted by the time closing time was rolling around. It was 2 AM on a Saturday, and your boyfriend Piers had decided to treat you to a night out at his favorite nightclub, Euphoria Nights.

As you stepped out of the nightclub, your breath condensed into a fog cloud at the frigid temperature. While the day had been warm, the nights were still bitterly cold, biting at your fingertips despite the gloves you were wearing.

“Thanks for paying for my drinks.” You spoke after a few long moments of walking in silence. “I’ll have to repay you somehow.” You hummed thoughtfully, not noticing the look he gave you.

“I have an idea,” Piers replied, his hazel eyes glinting mischievously as he scanned over your body.

Before you could open your mouth to ask how, Piers guided you into an alley, shying away from public view. Piers glanced around in the alley before leading you to hide between two dumpsters, providing adequate cover for whatever he had planned. You glanced at him with a confused expression on your face, wondering why he had pulled you into this alley.

“What are you planning, Nivans?” You inquired, looking up at the shit-eating grin he was wearing.

“You said you wanted to repay me,” he started, his hazel eyes clouded with something needy. “I’m giving you that opportunity. How about you start with licking my boots and then sucking me off?” He suggests.

“Here, I thought you were going to let me pay you back normally, lieutenant. Some sick kicks you have.” You mumbled, sinking to your knees.

You stared up at him as you ran your tongue across the leather of his boots, your tongue, cleaning and polishing them perfectly. The taste wasn’t as bad as you had thought it would be, but it was more earthy than you thought it would be. Piers nudge your face with his other boot, a gentle reminder to focus on him. You returned to cleaning his boots, focusing your attention on the other boot, thoroughly cleaning the leather with your tongue and sitting back on your knees after, gazing up at him expectantly. Piers glanced down at your work, seemingly pleased with it.

“I knew that filthy mouth was good for something,” Piers taunted, gazing down at you for a snarky reply to fly from your lips. To his surprise, none came. “S’pose you impressed me. Here's your reward.”

Piers unbuttoned his pants and pulled down his fly agonizingly slow, that stupid grin on his face. He just loved torturing you, making you wait as long as possible to have him in your mouth. You noticed he had gone commando, and all he had to do was pull his cock out over the rise of his pants. You gently took his cock in your hands, hearing him hiss under his breath at the contact, his cock throbbing in your fist. His hazel eyes bore into your own as you started stroking him to full mast, your mouth opening and your tongue flopping out, letting his tip rest on the warm muscle, a promise of what was to come.

“Tease,” Piers grunted, his hips involuntarily bucking into your mouth. “Start sucking already, dumb toy.” He demanded, grabbing your hair and pulling you onto his cock, almost spearing your throat.

You sputtered and glared up at him, smacking his hands away as you took the pace into your hands. You tentatively dragged your tongue over his slit and the head of his cock before taking the length into your throat and bobbing your head. Piers let out a relieved moan, leaning against the brick wall lazily as you bobbed your head along the length of his cock, focusing on making his knees buckle under the pleasure. You made sure to use the back of your tongue on the tip of his cock just the way he liked, listening to how his breathing got heavy, how his hips stuttered, and how his hands grasped for anything to keep himself from collapsing on you. You pull off his cock with a wet pop and look up at him.

“You plan on fucking me or getting all the attention to yourself?” You snarked at him. He seemed a little taken aback.

“Well, I don’t have a condom on me; I was planning to wait until we got home,” he replied, his voice shaky.

“That went great, huh, Nivans?” You barked out a laugh. “Besides, you can just pull out.” You shrugged

“Well, you’ve convinced me.” He chuckles breathlessly, pulling you to your feet. “Face me,” he demands.

You did as he asked without a second thought, just running off your horniness alone. His hands traced down your body, unbuttoning your pants and tugging them to your ankles. He got down onto his knees and began to drag off your underwear with his teeth, his canines gently scraping across your sensitive skin, causing a shudder to pass through your body. You weren’t sure what he was doing until his tongue ran over you, slicking you up with his tongue, the warmth a striking difference to the frigid air, causing you to jolt. While you could benefit from the extra lubrication, his spit had to do, seeing as neither of you had thought of having sex in an alleyway. His tongue was warm, leaving trails of spit behind as he prepared you for him to the best of his ability. You breathed out soft moans, your hand flying up to muffle the pathetic noises spilling past your list, but his hand reached up and yanked your arm away.

“That should be enough,” he mumbles thoughtfully, stroking himself to smear pre over his cock. “I’m just going to have to take it slow.”

“Fine with me; I prefer not to be torn in two,” you joked.

Piers seemed amused judging by the snort he let out. You felt the tip of his cock prod against you, testing how loose you were. While it had been a while, he seemed to ease you into it. His tip popped past the initial resistance, both of you letting out a low moan. Piers gently held your leg up, his gun calloused hands smoothing over your skin, gently sinking into you at a slow but even pace, watching your face contort with every inch that sunk into you. You were glad that you had some type of lubricant, even if it was just spit and pre. Eventually he bottoms out, staying still to admire how well you had taken him and the way your body just seemed to accept him, as if you were molded around his cock.

“Are you going to ogle at me or actually fuck me?” You snark.

“It looks like I’ll have to fuck that attitude out of you,” Piers bellowed,”That’s no way to speak to your superior.”

“Superior my ass-” You go to snap back, but before you can even spit the sentence out, hes pulling back and shoving his length right back into you.

An undignified sound leaves your throat as he begins to pound into you, feeling the stretch of his cock and every slam of his hips against you. His free hand moves between your legs, stroking to bring you closer to your edge. Your pitiful mewls and whines sound like music to his ears. You were entirely sure anyone outside the alley could hear him pounding you like an animal in rut, but that was the least of your concerns.

“Piers,” You breathe out pitifully,”Need you deeper,”

“I’m as deep as I can get, love.” He laughs breathlessly, maneuvering your positions so you had your legs wrapped around his waist as he bounced you on his cock, hitting deep into you. “Better?” He growls out

“Better,” you affirm between whines.

You could feel the coil in your stomach build, making you squirm and squeeze around his cock. Piers lets out a moan, his eyes fluttering shut at the tightness enveloping him. Judging by his reaction, he wasn’t going to last much longer either; you just hoped he remembered to pull out. Piers wraps one arm around you, the other coming between your legs again and resuming his previous ministrations. You whimpered pathetically, overwhelmed by the feeling of his hand and every drag of his cock inside your sensitive walls. It proved too much as you came, moaning loudly and squirming away as he continued to thrust into you, chasing that tight heat for a moment longer before pulling out and stroking himself, cumming onto the stone below.

“Fuck, sweetheart,” He breathes out, stroking himself through his high. “How are you feeling?”

“Like I need a bath,” You mumble.

“Then let’s go home.” He laughs breathlessly.

After helping each other with your clothes, he hands you his jacket. You look at him, confused, for a few long moments before he wraps it around you himself.

“Don’t think I didn’t notice how cold your hands were,” he says, as if to answer your thoughts.

“Enough flattery, let’s go home.”

#nsft writing #piers nivans x reader #x reader #piers nivans #resident evil x reader #gn reader

19 notes · View notes

antidotesprout · 2 years

Text

I Want You To Stay (Piers x GN!Reader)

CW: Alcohol, Drunken conduct, vague mentions of past physical abuse, mentions of alcoholism

Rating: T?

Angsty Fluff while taking care of a sad drunk, nothing spicy.

The call came in at one in the morning, as it had almost every Friday night for just under the last 2 years.

You’d learned to just stay up on Fridays, watching a movie or reading and waiting on the anticipated call. Sure enough, the slightly grumpy worker on the other end let you know that, once again, Piers required your assistance.

(A/N: Not so much a songfic based on "I Want You To Stay" by Maximo Park as like, that song is just the mood/energy. Also one of my headcanon Piers singing voices so like.. give it a listen I guess. Sketch at the end of crying drunk Piers because I'm a mess and my brain won't stOP)

The call came in at one in the morning, as it had almost every Friday night for just under the last 2 years.

You had met a certain Gym Leader and musician at the Spikemuth Chamber of Commerce’s New Year’s Eve Bash™️, and after a few Chamber-related mishaps that you’d been assigned to handle relating to his Gym, you’d developed a friendly rapport. In what seemed like very little time, he'd felt comfortable enough to reach out to you on nights like this.

Thank god he had built-in babysitters with the more responsible members of Team Yell, otherwise you’d be seriously concerned about his childcare capabilities doing this on an almost weekly basis. Though, the fact he decided to not go home blitzed out of his mind probably showed more concern for his younger sister than anything.

You left your apartment dressed in sweats and an oversized hoodie to protect you from the cold night air, and walked the brief distance to the metal door of the neon-soaked pub. Going inside, your eyes immediately met the bartender’s, the one who had actually placed the call. They nodded towards your charge, hunched over a table in the back corner– cheek pressed to the surface, still gripping onto a glass with melted ice on the bottom. Your eyes returned to the establishment's keeper and you shot them an apologetic smile and a shrug. You don’t know why he’d always come into this hole-in-the-wall of a bar alone after a gig.

Maybe it was to get a little alone time to decompress after the overwhelming crowds of a concert. Maybe it was just because he knew it was close to your flat, and that you’d always come to get him.

You knew you probably should refuse, teach him to be more responsible. In spite of basically becoming the Chamber’s designated ‘talk to the intimidating looking city mascot’ person at the office because ‘you were about the same age, right?’ you were in no way responsible for his actions.

But… abandoning him when he needed help would seriously make you feel like an asshole.

You reached out a hand to his shoulder, shaking it. “Hey buddy, c’mon, it’s time to go.” His eyelids fluttered open, pale green eyes with blown out pupils met your own. You had to chuckle, because currently you probably both had matching bags under your eyes. “Mmmsorry, din’t meena this time...” he started to mumble, pushing himself up on his elbows. You shushed him, slipping the lanky man’s arm over your shoulder and supporting his waist. You pretended not to notice when his head hit your shoulder and his lips grazed your neck.

You dug the cost of his tab and a fairly generous tip out of the wad of cash in your pocket, knowing Piers would pay you back, and left it on the bartop. With a casual salute to the barkeep you pushed out into the cold night air to walk the block to your flat, spikey friend stumbling drunkenly at your hip.

After somehow managing to drag him up the stairs while he uttered a thousand mumbled apologies, you finally were able to get him through the door of your apartment and, using his own uneven momentum, maneuvered him to your old couch. With some minor struggling, mostly due to his unsteady movements, you were able to remove the stiff leather jacket he had performed with, the lining slightly damp with sweat. He exhaled in what was probably actually a burp, slumping down into the well worn cushions. “Mmmdad was ‘nalcoholic y’know…” he started to slur. You patted his knees, a silent request to lift his leg, one at a time, giving you access to remove his heavy boots so he didn’t get dirt all over your furniture. You only paused for a moment to smile at his zigzagoon patterned socks. “Wuzzah a mean drunk tho. Hit me an’ mum. Probly would’ve hit Marn.” you nodded, setting his boots by the door. You'd heard this story before. You had never met the previous Gym Leader, but you'd heard enough from others and Piers to know he was an absolute menace, but not in the charming way like Piers was.

What you hadn’t heard before though, and what made your head shoot up was the sniffles that came next.

There he was, the notoriously tough punk rocker, head tilted back, letting tears pour from his still open eyes “Couldn’ do that to people I love. Not Marn. Not you.” Your eyebrows furrowed at him as you flushed slightly, but knew it was more likely a drunk’s slip of the tongue. Something embarrassing he wouldn’t even remember in the morning.

You snapped out of it. Wasn't the first time he had implied or outright said he loved you while drunk, probably wouldn't be the last. He was just an emotional and affectionate drunk.

What he said right now wasn't important.

Right now, you had to make sure he had something in his stomach besides booze and that he was hydrated. The Chamber would probably be pissed if their sponsored Gym Leader went into work hungover and you weren't about to let that happen. Taking the few steps to the small corner that constitutes a kitchen in your apartment, you put some tap water into one of your larger mugs (why did you have so many mugs?) and grabbed a snack you knew he'd like. Walking over to your couch you plopped down next to your crying companion "Piers, we all know you aren't like your dad. You're fine." Wet green orbs rolled to look at you as you spoke "Well, you won't be if we don't get some food and water in you." He nodded, rubbing his tears and snot away with one hand as you forced the water-filled mug into the other. You honestly wish you'd had something with a lid to give him but thankfully he managed to finish the water with only minimal spillage.

Taking the mug from him to set aside, you then pressed the snack bag into his chest. His arms stayed limply at his side. Unfocused eyes looking directly at you he just opened his mouth.

Oh hell no.

"Piers, I am not feeding you." you said flatly, looking unimpressed. This was met with a drunken whine as his expression changed to a glower. To the untrained eye, he might’ve looked threatening, but to you he just resembled a giant toddler. "Pouting won't change my mind, you know. Where's Mr. 'I can handle this'? Old Mr. Responsibility?" Continuing his whine he finally moved to break into the previously opened bag and feed himself, flopping down on the pillow to the opposite side of the couch from you. You took the opportunity to go back to the sink for more water when you heard him mumble something. Rejoining him on the couch you asked to repeat himself. He definitely was still having a tantrum, refusing to make any kind of eye contact. Between crunches you were able to make it out:

"Fed me on newwyears tho."

Had you? You flicked back through your memories from a couple weeks back. It had been the second New Year's party with the Chamber, this time you'd actually cut loose a bit more than your first one, when you were trying desperately to impress the higher-ups. You do know you hung out with Piers quite a bit that night, and you'd gotten so used to taking care of him drunk– well, it seemed plausible. "Yeah, well, I was drunker than you are now. Shouldn't get your hopes up," You smirked and leaned over to ruffle his already mussed ponytail with your non-mug-occupied hand. He still refused to meet your gaze.

You sighed at the sulking inebriated adult you’d found yourself caring for.

“I got you more water.” you held the refilled mug out towards him. He hummed but continued crunching away. Ah yes, holding a grudge over something silly as only a drunk man could.

“Piers…”

His eyes darted over to your frustrated and dismayed expression and he begrudgingly sat up straight again, but over-corrected and ended up with his head on your shoulder, his beloved munchies set aside and forgotten. “S’fine. Mmjus gonna waiddil nex’ year,” you could feel him grinning drunkenly into you. Like whiplash this man was.

“Okay so you’re going to finish this water,” you offered him the mug again, taking advantage of his mood shift. He accepted it again, holding it in both hands to keep it steady. Drinking greedily he hummed an affirmative.

“And then after that, you’re going to get some sleep, right?”

“Mmmmhm,” he mumbled into the mug, as it quickly ran empty. A refreshed exhale declared the water part of the agreement finished, now it was time for the sleep part. This was punctuated by him pressing the empty container into your chest. Once it was firmly in your grasp, he immediately flopped back onto the couch, but his legs still hung off around you in a way you were sure wasn’t comfortable.

Getting up to set the mug in the sink, you helped right him on the couch so he had his legs up. Once the mug had been handled, you reached for the blanket sloppily folded over a chair back from the last time he had crashed at yours. You tossed it over him from behind the couch in such a way that it covered all but his ponytails, which were themselves slung over the armrest haphazardly. He flipped it off his face with one arm swung up and a grunt, much to your amusement. You bent over the couch back, leaning on your elbows, looking down at the man whose companionship you’d come to value over the last couple years.

“Okay, if you don’t need anything else, I’ll be heading to bed myself. You good?”

For the second time that night, Piers managed to surprise you when the hand that had shoved the blanket away softly grasped the arm of your hoodie. You looked at the hand and then met his eyes, once again looking a little misty.

“Stay.”

“You know we won’t both fit comfortably on this couch, Piers.”

“S’fine. Jus stay. Please.”

And how could you abandon him when he really needed you?

—-

I always said you could rely on me

Now it seems that I was wrong

I want you to stay

I want you to stay with me

—-

#babys first fanfic in over a decade #no beta we die like men #piers x reader #piers swsh #pokemon piers #pkmn swsh #gym leader piers #pokemon fanfiction #reader insert #x reader #I've been sitting on my trash and this is a test to see if any of it should see the light of day #swsh #tw alchohol mention #tw alcohol #gn reader #fluff #fanart at the end #sprout writes

174 notes · View notes

theepiccharizard9 · 2 months

Text

The Mourning Never Goes

Posting after 6 months cause my brain refused to work for fics. It only wanted bots and drawing (mostly bots)

Anyways, disclaimer: MCD, No beta (or even a second glance) we die like my self-esteem in the womb, grieving, drug and alcohol use for coping, no pronouns used for the reader except you

Word Count: 621

It had been months since you’d seen Piers, it was always hard not having him around. You did anything to fill the void. Namely illicit substances and getting too drunk to see straight or even think.

This was one of those nights, drinking after taking some pills you hadn’t bothered to read the label on. “You know you shouldn’t do that,” Piers’ voice sounded so close and so far away all at once. You shake your head. “It’s the only way to have you around anymore.” Piers sighs, a frown etched onto his face. He tilts his head as his hazel eyes study you. “Even if it is, you shouldn’t ruin yourself for a glimpse.” He reaches to place his hand on your head, you can’t tell if he even made contact.

“You’re not okay.” At this point he was sounding more like your conscience than your boyfriend. You, albeit wobbly, get up and go to your bedroom to rifle through the drawers. Eventually you find what you were looking for, that same scarf Piers would always wear always wears even when off duty.

You sit on the edge of your bed, clutching the scarf close to your chest. Piers sits next to you and just watches for a moment. “That scarf was always a comfort to me on the field, you know. It became at home too before I had you.” You look at him, his hazel eyes seeming dimmer than before. “You should get water and sleep this off,” Piers urges you, “this isn’t healthy.” “I know,” you solemnly reply. “But I’m desperate. For you, and your fucking presence.” You run a hand through your hair, getting frustrated.

Getting up, Piers’ scarf is discarded on the bed. A glass of water is consumed before laying back in bed. Looking towards the doorway you see that Piers is just standing there. “You coming to bed or are you just gonna stand there watching me like a creep?” you ask in a playful voice. He lays with you but doesn’t get under the covers. A confused expression graces your features, but you let it be and just hold onto his scarf.

“I love you, pumpkin,” Piers says as he lays by your side. “I love you too.” You go to lay against him, but Piers shakes his head. “Don’t. Let’s just enjoy the moments before sleep takes you.” The two of you lay staring into each other’s eyes. You’ve missed this closeness for so long. Piers’ hand ghosts across your cheek. Were his hands always this cold? You didn’t have time to think about it before quickly drifting off to sleep.

The next morning is filled with a splitting headache from a hangover, but the bed is empty, save for you. “Piers...?” you call out. Sitting up you call for him louder but there’s still no response. You go to get up but feel the scarf fall onto your lap. Feeling it hit your lap tears start falling down your cheeks.

You stare at a grave, finally having a clear head from last night. It reads “Here lies Piers Nivans. Loyal to the bitter end.” His captain, Chris Redfield, had told you about his last moment, how Piers sacrificed himself to protect people. He'd also given you Piers’ scarf upon his request.

Collapsing next to the grave, flowers are clutched in your hands and his scarf is around your neck. Despite the mood being melancholy, the sun shines bright. You lay the flowers on his grave. Petunias representing your anger and resentment at his death, lilies of the valley representing pain and loss, and red roses to show the love you still feel for the man that always gave his all.

#piers nivans x male reader #piers nivans x reader #piers nivans x you #piers nivans #resident evil x reader #resident evil x you #gn reader

6 notes · View notes

sanguineterrain · 15 days

Note

im begging you to write a part 2 of vigilante reader because the way you write??? the dynamic between reader and jason??? the sex tension???are chef kiss!!!

thanks very much! part 2 and I couldn't put off the reveal bc I'm just too impatient lol 🫶 but I might write another part post-reveal? maybe? cuz I'm growing attached to these two <3

jason todd x gn!vigilante!reader (nocturne). tw explosions, smoke inhalation, reader passes out, canon typical violence, identity reveal, asshole bruce. jason is in love? jason is in love.

read pt 1 here! | all fics are reblogged to @sanguinelibrary

****

"Go home."

"Bruce, I—"

Bruce looks at you, eyes sharp with fury and... something else. Something older.

The others know how to talk back. You still haven't gained the courage to sass The Batman.

"Go. Home. If you need an escort, I can call Superman."

You take a step back at his coldness.

"Bruce, I know I messed up, letting Hood escape but—"

"Yes, you did. You deliberately disobeyed an order. I told everybody to stand down. He could've killed you."

But he didn't, you don't say. He could've, but he chose not to.

He'd felt safe.

"I had it under control, honestly. He wasn't—it wasn't like the other encounters you've had with him. He wouldn't have hurt me."

That is the wrong thing to say. You realize that after the words leave your mouth and the muscles in Bruce's jaw jump.

"You can't be this naive. I know I wouldn't have chosen someone who's this naive," he says savagely. "You know Hood can't be trusted, and you're defending him to me. We've seen time and again he's rogue. He doesn't make sense and that's exactly why he's dangerous."

"But if you would just listen—"

"Enough," he snaps. "Enough. Go home. I'm suspending you for three weeks."

"Three w—I'm not even injured!" you cry.

"No, but you need the time. You're not thinking clearly. Go. I don't want to see you until next month."

You press your lips together before you say something truly foul. Something about Batman's habit of pushing people away. Something about dead Robins.

You don't let the tears fall until you leave the Cave. This is all Hood's fault. You know it would've been a different conversation if you'd managed to successfully capture him.

You'll take down the Red Hood if it's the last thing you do.

****

It takes you approximately two days to break your suspension.

In your defense, you meant to follow Bruce's orders. You would've stayed put and helped Barbara with research instead.

But not at the expense of civilian lives.

"All units to Canal and Riverview, 10-80. Standby. Do not enter the factory until given clearance from the Bomb Squad."

You turn off the police scanner and stuff it in your drawer. In Gotham, explosions usually come in multiples. If there's one, there's bound to be another. The police are generally inept when it comes to evacuating civilians. You know one of the other Bats are on their way, but you're the closest to the docks.

You glance at your suit. No. If you go as Nocturne, Batman might suspend you indefinitely.

You grab your gas mask and put on a black hoodie and a domino mask. You'll just have to make do.

The marina is blanketed in thick smoke. It makes your eyes water. But in the commotion it causes, you're able to slip past the barriers and help workers out of the factory. It's difficult because without the suit, people don't give you the same trust and respect. But you're anonymous, and that's all that matters.

"What the fuck are you doing here?"

You ignore the voice and keep hauling two elderly workers towards the exit. They're barely outside before you turn around, determined to clear every level of the factory.

You're yanked backward by a hand on your hoodie. You nearly lose your footing, but the hand is firm, dragging you towards the pier.

You're spun around and put face to face with a red helmet.

Oh, of all the fucking—

"Let go of me!" you shout, smacking his arm. Hood's grip tightens.

"I will as soon as you stop doing stupid shit. What were you thinking, coming here?"

You pause. Whoops. This isn't how a plain civilian would react to being apprehended by the Red Hood.

And that's definitely not how the Red Hood would react to getting swatted by a random civilian. Shit.

"I was, um, I was thinking I could help," you say haltingly. "P-please don't hurt me, Mr. Hood, I was—"

Hood sighs and lets you go, then tucks his gun into his holster.

"Cut the shit. I know you're Nocturne. I also know that you need some acting lessons because what the hell was that? Mr. Hood?"

A chill washes over you. "I don't know what you mean. Nocturne?"

Hood shakes his head. "I don't have time for this. The building's gonna collapse any second. Stay. Put."

He goes back toward the smoking entrance. Your eye twitches as you follow him.

"Last time I checked, you don't have that kind of authority, Hood."

He turns around and looms over you. "Don't I?"

Anyone else would back down. You might've a week ago. You should, after the tongue lashing Bruce gave you.

But there's no soot on Hood's helmet or vest. He doesn't smell sweet like gasoline or pungent like motor oil.

He was in the factory to help.

Something shifts. Batman is wrong. Batman is more wrong than he's ever been.

Because Hood's not the enemy here. Not anymore. Maybe not ever.

You push past Hood. "It'll be faster if we work together."

"Oh, absolutely not. You're not even in your suit."

"As per your request," you say, flashing a plastic smile. "You're welcome."

"Don't get cute with me, you—hey!"

You dart past him and go straight into the factory. Hood shouts your name, which makes you pause, just for a moment.

But revealed identity or not, you need to clear the building. So you pull on your mask and run faster.

Your worst fear is confirmed when you check the upper level: someone was missed in the evacuation. It's a worker, and she's unconscious.

You don't think about how explosions come in pairs in Gotham. Don't think about how long it'll take to get to the exit.

You take off your mask and slide it onto her face. The smoke burns your throat immediately, but you ignore it and lift her in a fireman carry, just as you were taught all those years ago by Robin. He's the one who taught you how to save people without relying on brute strength or height.

You hope he's alright, wherever he is. You hope he's not too upset seeing you rush into a burning building.

That's your last thought when you see the entrance. Your face is covered in sweat and grime. The heat from the fires is exhausting. You can feel your eyes beginning to close.

"There's something seriously wrong with you," a decoded voice says in your ear, and then the woman's weight is lifted from your shoulders.

Hood grabs your hand, the woman over his opposite shoulder, and you make it out just as the second explosion goes off. It knocks you forward.

Hood puts the woman down just in time to catch you. His arm is around your waist, the other hand cradling your head. His gloved thumb touches your mouth, and you feel his dawning realization as he finally sees your mask on the woman.

"Don't tell Ba'man," you slur.

"Jesus fuck—" Hood starts to drag you. You feel lightheaded. He's moving, and you wish he'd stop. "You don't take off your mask. You never take off your mask. We taught you that!"

"She was unconscious, J'y..."

Arms tighten around you. Everything goes dark.

****

You wake up to the smell of scrambling eggs.

For a moment, you just bask in the smell. It smells like Alfred's breakfast scramble. Bacon. Butter. Golden potatoes.

Then you wake up further and realize that you're not in the Manor. You're in your apartment.

So who's cooking?

You get up quietly, slipping out of your room. You pause in front of the full-length mirror.

Honestly, you've looked worse. Your hair needs a wash, and you're in the same clothes you went into the building with, which are now a little charred. But your face is clean of soot, and your throat hurts only a little.

The kitchen sink runs. You slowly creep out into the living room, keeping your breathing even and silent.

The mess of black hair, you recognize. Sort of. You might've mistaken him for Bruce if you didn't know that Bruce has a lifetime ban from kitchens all over the world.

He's too tall to be Dick. Too skilled in the kitchen to be Bruce. Too nice to be Bruce, too—you can't imagine Bruce Wayne making you eggs. Especially when you disobeyed his orders. Again.

The red helmet on the kitchen stool turns your blood to ice.

You grab the letter opener from a drawer and wait a few seconds to see if Hood's heard you. Then you throw the letter opener with near perfect aim at his exposed shoulder.

He catches it without turning.

Your heart skips a beat. Every time you think you might get the drop on him, Hood reminds you just how competent he really is.

A mix of fear, aggravation, and something you don't want to examine too closely swirls in your gut.

"Impressive," he says. "Dami been training you? Mama Al-Ghul spent a lot of time on his knife lessons."

"Why are you in my apartment?"

Hood sets the letter opener down on the counter and turns off the stove. Then he serves the breakfast scramble on two plates, then sprinkles chives over them.

This is the weirdest kidnapping ever.

He sighs, back still facing you.

"You can't tell anyone it's me," he says.

"You make a lot of demands for a guy who just used the last of my eggs."

Hood laughs. It sounds wet. It sounds like grief.

"God, I've missed ya, honeylove."

Your heart pounds. You try to find another weapon, anything. Hood doesn't give you the chance.

He turns around.

The first thing you see is the stark white streak of hair and the curls you once loved. The curls that were near unrecognizable in the casket.

You were right: Batman was wrong.

#jason todd x reader #jason todd x you #red hood x reader #red hood x you #jason todd fanfiction #red hood fanfiction #red hood imagine #batman fanfiction #dc fanfic

526 notes · View notes

revasserium · 3 months

Note

hello there !! I love reading your l&ds posts and I would like to request from prompt 1, stolen kisses + xavier please? thank you <3

send me one + a character and i'll write u a drabble

49. stolen kisses

xavier; 1,009 words; fluff, gn!reader, no "y/n", xavier being cheeky

summary: a few stolen kisses

a/n: exactly what it says on the label; the lightest of spoilers for his veiled whispers card, but the literal lightest.

001

In the forest, on the edge of the battlefield, with the remnants of smoke still filling the air; he tastes of sweat and sweetness, reassurance and regret — you press your palm to his chest and push slightly, gasping for breath as he pulls away.

“X-Xavier?”

He hums, licking his lips, his eyes wide and warm as he grins, reaching up to touch his mouth experimentally, as if uncertain of what he’d just done.

“Sorry — I just… suddenly wanted to…”

You blush, leaning in for another soft peck, shaking your head.

“It’s okay… I don’t mind.”

You squeak as he tugs you towards him, an arm now tight around your waist.

“Good… because I actually think I quite like it.”

002

On your couch the night after it rains, and you’re not drunk anymore but there’s something so steady and solid in the way he presses his lips to yours that somehow, when he pulls away, you wonder if the world is still spinning. Or maybe it’s just the way he makes you feel, how he twists your stomach and tangles in your laughter — how he leans in to press his forehead against yours, breathing you in.

“Feeling better?”

You nod, heat kissing up your spine as one of his hands drops to your waist to pull you closer.

“When I said you were being a little distant…” your words trail off as he lifts your chin with a finger, shaking his head.

“You don’t have to explain… I get it. And… I’ll do better,” he grins, leaning in again, pausing before his lips meet yours.

“Starting right now…” he says, and you can taste the promise, honey-sweet, right on the tip of his tongue.

003

On the pier, beneath the sparkling lights of the Linkon Tower, his lips warm against your cheek as he pulls you in. And by the time you turn to look at him with wide eyes, he’s turning back to the tower, pointing at the top.

“Isn’t it pretty?” he asks.

You smile, blushing as you lean up onto your tip toes and kiss his cheek as well.

“The prettiest,” you say, landing back on your feet.

He turns to face you again, something warm and unreadable in his eyes — they’re so blue, and up close, you start to realize that they’re a celestial phenomenon. They are the hearts and dreams of ancient stars, cast through the lens of a telescope pointed toward the deepest, darkest corners of space. They are endless in a way that only eyes can be. In them, you find galaxies; in them, you find yourself.

“Yeah… I think you are,” he says, unabashed as he bends down for a proper kiss, one that is less breath and more wanting, less search and more belonging. When he pulls back, you purse your lips and glance back at the tower.

“We missed the whole light show.”

Xavier shakes his head, “We got something better instead, didn’t we?”

004

When he finally comes home, bruises littering his torso like footprints in the snow. Your back pressed against the bedroom door, his fingers digging into the meat of your hips.

“X-Xavier?”

“I was —” his eyes are dark, his chest heaving as he swallows and tears his eyes away. His voice is harsh when he finally catches his breath, “There was a moment when… I thought —” he lets his head fall forward onto your shoulder, his grip on you slackening.

You reach up to wrap your arms around you, murmuring in his ear.

“I’m here… it’s alright…”

His arms snake around you, wrapping you in a tight embrace as he takes a deep breath, and then another. Faintly, you marvel to yourself that you can feel his heartbeat thumping against your chest, so much faster than its usual steady, almost terrifyingly slow rhythm. But now…

“I’m sorry… was I too harsh?” Xavier pulls back, his gaze softening as he looks you over.

You laugh, shaking your head, “No — and you’re the one who just got back from a difficult mission — c’mon, let me look at these injuries.”

You push him back onto the bed till he’s sitting, tugging open his shirt even as heat creeps up your cheeks. You try to focus on tending to his injuries, the smattering of cuts that lace his right arm, the dark bruise blossoming along his ribs. He holds still and quiet for most of it, but when you finish, he catches your hand as you try to reach for the first aid kit, spread open on the bed next to him.

Slowly, he tugs you up to press a kiss to the tender skin just inside of your wrist. Shivers skitter through you, setting your body ablaze with want as he looks down at you, kneeling before him. A hand comes up to cup your cheek, and then he’s pulling you forward again, falling back till you’re straddling his hips, his hair spread out beneath him like a halo of pure starlight.

“I’m fine,” he says, pressing your palm to his chest. And there, you can feel his heartbeat slowly steadying out to its usual rhythm. Ba-dump… ba-dump… ba-dump…

“I know,” you say, leaning forward to cage him in with your arms, one on either side of his face. He blinks up at you, his palms settling on your thighs as he traces abstract patterns into your skin.

“Good… then you don’t have to be so careful with me.”

“Was I?” you feel a thrill of desire tingle up your spine as he lets his hands wander up your legs to the hem of your nightshirt, “I didn’t notice.”

Xavier’s smile is sweet and indulgent as he pulls you down for another kiss, and then another —

“I notice everything you do… because I’ll always notice. Because… it’s you.”

#love and deepspace #love and deepspace headcanons #x reader #love and deepspace x reader #love and deepspace drabbles #love and deepspace fic #l&ds #love and deepspace x you #xavier x reader #xavier headcanons #xavier scenarios #lads drabbles #lads x reader #xavier x you #xavier x y/n #xavier drabbles #xavier fic #xavier love and deepspace #floofy floof floof

556 notes · View notes

milkyst4rs · 1 year

Text

BF headcannons

Diluc, Kaeya, Scaramouche, Xiao, Zhongli x GN reader

Fluffy floof☁️

Diluc

Though some might think otherwise, dating Diluc is SO FUN.

I feel like Diluc would like to tease his s/o a little? He wants to see you all smitten and flustered ya know?

Will get you tiny trinkets that reminds him of you. Bro doesn't care about the price ofc, he loves your reactions to his tiny gifts.

Diluc prefers to be the big spoon but won't mind if you wanna hug him too.

When y'all are in bed, he is the type to sling his large leg over yours so you can't go anywhere while y'all sleep.

Gets SOOOO happy when you come visit him at the tavern (he doesn't show his excitement tho cause he though like that💯🔥)

Is the biggest softie for you behind closed doors. He's just a little shy outside, don't worry.

Kaeya

SUCH a tease oml. He always does his "oh?~😏" whenever you speak.

He doesn't care if you both are in public or not, he will always try to make you flustered somehow.

Loves kissing you. Your soft lips on his just makes his heart go KDNDHDKWKHDISOW

Like Diluc, he also prefers to hold you while you both are sleeping. But he won't argue if you want to be the big spoon.

I feel like Kaeya is a light sleeper, so if he has trouble falling asleep he'll just admire your pretty face till he does close his eyes.

He loves tracing your features leaving small pecks afterward.

He knows he can trust you so he seeks you out for comfort when he is feeling down :(

Immediately feels 100% better after being in your embrace tho.

Scaramouche

Mega-tsundere 1000. Boss level.

Absolutely loves holding your hand. (Secretly though ofc)

Scaramouche is a big mean guy so he doesn't have time for romance!😡 (Except, he is extremely touch-starved so please PLEASE hug him)

Both of you are honestly shocked that you are still in the relationship and are loyal to him.

He slowly realises that you genuinely love him and are not trying to betray him or hurt him in anyway, so he warms up to you.

Likes kissing your forehead. Whenever he sees you, you are going to have a peck on the forehead 100%.

He finally can feel some form of happiness with you.

Xiao

Mega-tsundere 1000 boss level #2.

MY MAN IS SOOOO SHY

He probably has never gotten intimate with anyone ever before so he is a nervous wreck. Which leads to him panicking and resorting to throwing insults at you.

Obviously he doesn't mean it, he just doesn't know what to say when you kiss his cheek! You know he means well, so the "you have no respect for the adepti" insult goes in one ear and out the other.

Eventually warms up to you and tries to be romantic by bringing you flowers and such,(with the help of hu tao and friends^^).

Likes to watch the sunset with you on the roof of Wangshu Inn. His hand always finds its way to intertwine with yours.

He probably doesn't sleep so he keeps watch and makes sure you are safe irl and in dreamland.

Zhongli

Zhongli...what a gentleman.

Boyfriend material ON PAPER‼️

Helps carry your bags, showers with you, reads with you. He just loves being by your side.

He can sense that you truly love him so he lets himself go and his walls crumble for you.

Most people would be bored of Zhonglis constant talking, but not you no sir. He appreciates that you genuinely listen and add in your own sentences in his story telling.

Loves to pamper you!!!!! Making you delicious tea, date nights, skin care routines, you name it.

Both of you are probably named 'Liyue's #1 power couple' by locals who often see the two of you hand in hand walking by the pier.

His kisses are always soft and gentle, each one reminding you of how much he adores you and loves you <3

#diluc x reader #genshin fluff #genshin impact x reader #zhongli x reader #xiao x reader #scaramouche x reader #kaeya x reader #scaramouche #xiao fluff #zhongli #diluc x gender neutral reader #kaeya headcanons #genshin x reader

1K notes · View notes

witch-hazels-musings · 7 months

Text

this is what it feels like

warning: sfw, fluff, comfort | seeing them after a long time apart

includes: Albedo, Childe, Diluc, Thoma, Zhongli, Xiao

character x gn reader | anthology | short read

You could feel your heart, how it thrummed in your chest and fluttered slightly when you picked up the pace. The closer you got to your destination, the more painful the waiting became. You wanted to be there, wanted to see him with eyes you swore were growing cloudy and getting more challenging to keep clear.

You were ready, so you practically ran.

Albedo

Sounds of whirring machines spilled into the hallway. They mingled with the swift, drumming pace of your footsteps. A voice, his voice, slipped through the cracks in the door and you pushed forward, ignoring the kind strangers who greeted you.

There was only one thing - one person - on your mind.

Albedo.

"It may be that a miscalculation occurred; I would recommend we review more closely the --" Alebeo paused mid-sentence and lifted his head from the bent-back notebook he was previously reviewing. The student who was sitting in the chair next to him saw you as soon as you stepped through the door. They glanced at Albedo and tried to hide their smile.

Albedo twisted and your eyes met.

"Hi," you said with a small wave. Panting, focused on the man you'd dreamed about seeing for days. Now that you were here, however, it was hard to move again. Was it appropriate for you to be here, had you interrupted something important?

You let your one-track mind get the better of you again.

Albedo let the notebook slide into the ready hands of his student. His gaze locked, taking all of you in.

You laughed, relieved, "I'm home," you professed with a smile and opened your arms as Albedo left his work behind to greet you with a wanting embrace.

Childe

You better return to me - I promise

The promise you made over a week ago swirled in your mind. You'd let the scene play out so much that it was starting to twist and distort into fallacies and imaginations untrue to the source. However, nothing dared warp the feeling of his lips when he pressed them to your cheek and whispered, 'Don't make me wait long.' Those recollections lived on in destitute moments just before bed and the bittersweet seconds of rising from it.

But, now. Now the boat was pulling into port and you could hardly contain your excitement.

Would he be there? Would he be the first thing you see when you docked?

You were desperate, hopeful, but most of all, you were tired of feeling lonely.

The dock appeared slowly. You scanned the sturdy boards for him and rushed to the other side of the bow to get another view. No matter how hard you looked, you couldn't find him. You jerked forward as the boat docked and wasted no time making it to the pier below.

With your bag slung over your shoulder, you ran into the thick of the crowd. Eyes scanning, head on a swivel as you searched for him. People glanced your way but kept on. One woman looked at you with knowing eyes - eyes that lamented, 'You're looking for your lover too, aren't you?'

You turned to look down the stone harbor but couldn't see him. Disheartened, you let your bag fall to your side.

Then, like the whistling wind of the sea, you heard your name. Snapping your head to the left, you saw a man standing at the top of the stone hill, chest heaving, shoulders rising and falling, and eyes zeroed in on you.

"Ajax!" You called back, dropping your bag where it was and rushing up the hill to meet him. He did the same, and as you ran toward each other, you crashed into him like a wave. Childe hoisted you in the air. The momentum carried the two of you toward the water, but he never let you go. "I've returned. As promised," you told him, tears bubbling up in your eyes so you hid your face against his shoulder.

"So you did," he replied, kissing the top of your head and tightening his hold on you as if his hands were making their own vows to never let you go again.

Diluc

It had been weeks since the two of you had seen each other. Weeks since you had woken up next to him or found him lost in thought in his study. Countless hours had gone by since you heard his voice or felt the warmth of his touch. You were desperate for it but also nervous to accept it again.

Distance was meant to make the heart grow stronger, right?

As you paced back and forth across the floor, you were starting to regret your decision to hide in the upper room of Angel's Share. Charle's assured you he'd send Diluc your way, but what if they got busy, what if Diluc realized he needed to walk back to the Winery? You should have gone to the estate instead of concocting some elaborate surprise - especially when you were terrible at them.

Shaking your head, you made for the door. Unable to keep the antsy tingling of your nerves from taking over, but the moment you grabbed the doorknob, heavy footfalls made you freeze and you were just fast enough to stumble back when the door swung open with immense force.

Your alarm was replaced by overflowing elation at the sight that greeted you. Diluc's hand gripped the doorknob, his eyes held pools of desperation as they looked at you, as they searched your face, pleading to reassure him that you were, in fact, not a dream.

"I'm home-" you started but he cut you off by pulling you into a suffocating hug. His body leaned into yours, his palm cupped the back of your head and his other gripped the back of your clothes. You returned the hug with just as much fervor.

Pulling back, you pressed your hands against his cheeks and found his lips like one finds a flicker of light in utter darkness. You heard the sound of the door slam shut but didn't care to pull away enough to look. Diluc's fingers tugged at your hair while he kissed you with famished lips.

"I hate when you leave," he professed when he let you finally catch your breath, his eyes heavy, lost in you.

"I'm not fond of it either," you admitted and let your fingers rest against his chin. "Did Charles tell you I was back?"

Diluc shook his head, his lips brushing over yours and placing several more heated kisses against them, "I heard you."

Furrowing your brows, you pulled away even though he tried to chase you, "Up here? That could have been anyone," you chuckled.

"No one else's footsteps sound like my dreams," he explained and you answered him with a trembling lip and a warm, forever, embrace.

Thoma

It had been nearly two weeks since you'd been near Thoma. Since you'd received the comfort he was so keen on giving. Since he reminded you of the qualities you forgot when he wasn't around. Since you could caress his face and have him touch yours.

Each night was more challenging. Sending letters was too slow. Hearing updates from others felt impersonal. You wanted to see him, wanted to hold him, wanted to hear him. So, you picked up the pace and apologized to the attendants you waved off so you wouldn't get distracted.

Your chest tightened the moment you saw him. Even when you tugged at your clothes to create space, it wasn't enough to alleviate the pressure building inside your ribcage. Your heart ached. Involuntary tears ran down your cheeks. Taking a step toward him, the wooden boards beneath you creaked and, though it was small, quiet, impossible to detect even for you, Thoma stopped what he was doing and turned toward the noise.

Confusion shifted to disbelief until realization set in and the pounding sound of his footsteps made their way toward you.

Thoma wrung his hands on the towel tucked into his pants so that when he made it to you and slid his arms under you to lift you into the air before letting you fall toward him, against him, in his arms that felt so much like home, he made sure his hands were clean and void of any stain that could tarnish you.

"I missed you," he proclaimed, one hand flush against the back of your head while the other kept you as close as it could.

"I missed you more," you admitted and held onto him with no intent of letting go.

Zhongli

You pressed a finger to your lips to hush the receptionist whose eyes lit up at the sight of you. "He's in his office," they whispered with a smile. You nodded and crept further into the parlor. The halls were coated in familiar scents. Scents you associated with the resigned archon who walked them every day.

When you got to the door, you lifted your hand to knock, hesitated, then let your knuckle rap against the door one, two, three times.

"Enter," the voice on the other side said, so you did. "I have yet to sign off on the procession request. The contract is of issue, which I will review with careful consideration ..." Zhongli explained, and you stifled a laugh.

He was turned away from you. His elegant chair turned to face the window. A steaming cup of tea had been left abandoned on his desk - a clear sign he was lost in thought.

When you were close enough, you slid your hands around his face to cover his eyes. Without missing a beat, Zhongli said your name, ruining the surprise.

"How did you know it was me?" you asked as he twisted in his chair to take your hands in his and hold them tenderly against his lips.

"I would recognize the sound of your footsteps even if time had taken all my senses," he professed as if it were a simple fact, as he kissed the tips of your fingers in adoration. When he looked at your face you were trying your best to keep your eyes upward to stop the tears that fell because of him.

Because of the love of him.

"I missed you dearly," he added, his thumb caressing your cheek to wipe away the warm tears.

"I missed you. So much," you mirrored and wrapped your arms around his shoulders even as he rose to his full height to draw you nearer to him.

Xiao

The marshland smelled just the way you remembered, the clinging warmth of it lingered on your skin. After being on the dry, salt-biting sea for so long you could feel yourself reacclimating to the climate.

It had been weeks since you last saw him.

You almost couldn't stand it.

The tower that was Wangshu Inn lingered in the distance but no matter how close you got to it, the further away it seemed. You were frustrated, anxious, ready to climb to the top and wrap your arms around the man who invaded your thoughts more often than you thought possible.

You imagined him, remembered the comfort of him, could recall the lingering presence of him - like something familiar was hovering in the edges of your view, but you could never quite place it. He was always there - or, at least, the intensity of your love for him felt that way.

"Almost there," you promised as you climbed one of the red bridges above the streams surrounding the marsh.

"Took you long enough," a voice answered, making you spin on your toes to see its owner.

Xiao stood at the bottom of the bridge, arms crossed, eyes falling to the ground while you stared at him in disbelief.

Was it really him, or was it another figment of your desperate imagination?

When his eyes met yours, you knew. You knew it was real, and so you ran to him. Xiao caught you like wind rushing through his hair, and you slid your fingers across his back to remind your hands what he felt like.

"Aren't you going to say it?" he asked, gruff and close as he pressed his forehead against your neck.

"Say wh--? Oh, sorry," you laughed, overwhelmed with love and joy, "I'm home."

"Welcome home."

#genshin impact #genshin impact x reader #genshin elixir #genshin impact x gn reader #genshin imagines #hazels works #albedo x gn reader #thoma x gn reader #diluc x gn reader #zhongli x gn reader #xiao x gn reader #childe x gn reader

466 notes · View notes

sfznyxio · 25 days

Text

❝ 𝐂𝐈𝐏𝐇𝐄𝐑 ❞

𝐒𝐘𝐍𝐎𝐏𝐒𝐈𝐒. codename “cipher”, you’re an enigmatic assassin who has a perfect track record of leaving no trace behind. until your current target is actually bait to lure you in by jade of the ten stonehearts, elite spies of the international peace corporation. now they can’t let you go, not when they’ve finally caught the inconvenience of their missions. and so you’re forced to cooperate to prevent the destruction of the nation.

𝐂𝐇𝐀𝐑𝐀𝐂𝐓𝐄𝐑𝐒. aventurine, dr. ratio, topaz

𝐂𝐎𝐍𝐓𝐄𝐍𝐓. gn!reader. spy au, assassin au. 1.0k words. inspired by the the “assault squad” fanart of the ipc trio by @/625light on twt and spy x family. jade is referred to as “that jade woman”. diamond and opal are briefly mentioned (dr. ratio and topaz). gambling (aventurine). assassins execute each other if ever there’s a traitor among them (dr. ratio). there are drunk lower-ranked spies who size reader up (topaz). natural disasters (dr. ratio and topaz).

𝐕𝐄𝐑𝐀. whoa, a new fic a week later? what a surprise. i kinda cooked with all these parts, especially aventurine's. enjoy your meal.

𝐀𝐕𝐄𝐍𝐓𝐔𝐑𝐈𝐍𝐄.

the golden hour is a club popular among gamblers. you wonder why that jade woman chose this place specifically for you to go; she doesn’t seem to be the high stakes, high rewards type of person. once you’re settled at the bar, a flamboyant man who seems to be a regular tells the bartender to put your order in his tab. he then invites you to play poker as his way of welcoming the newcomer.

“oh? looks like my new friend here is quite the experienced player,” the man comments when you two make it to the final round. your previous assignment was at a casino, so you learned about the game in order to reach your target. the spectators are anxiously anticipating to see who will be the winner.

perfect. the aces in your hand and on the table are keys to your victory. the man thinks otherwise by betting all his chips. the spectators roar, resounding your disbelief. when it’s time to unveil your cards, a smirk spreads across his face. you’ve been beaten by the odds.

“royal flush,” he drawls, picking up his ace. “when your opponent has an ace up their sleeve, find the opportunity to use it against them. that, my friend, is why you’re here today. you’re welcome, by the way, for sparing your life. think of it as gratitude for being merciful to our men.”

“… stoneheart.” he smiles at your conclusion. this man is responsible for fooling you twice with your own cards. convinced that your methods do safeguard your identity, he manages to pinpoint specks of traces left on pieces of evidence and use them to his advantage. so he’s been tracking you down for a long time. “impressive. it appears i was careless enough to get caught. to whom am i speaking with?”

the ace on his hand disappears with a wave, and then reappears in your pocket when he gestures to your clothes, having you pull it out. “name’s aventurine. pleasure to make your acquaintance, friend. now, why don’t go somewhere quieter. i’ll answer all the questions you may have.”

𝐃𝐑. 𝐑𝐀𝐓𝐈𝐎.

an interrogation room is the last place you want to be in, let alone pier point the headquarters of the international peace corporation. that jade woman has arranged a meeting between you and “someone who is good with words” - according to a certain gambler. you expect it to be their spymaster, however the person sitting across from you is anything but.

“uh… are you supposed to be spymaster diamond?” jade mentions that diamond thinks you’re interesting enough for him to meet you, but his schedules are keeping him occupied. based on that logic, you’re pretty sure that the person in front of you is not him. because, who wears an alabaster head outside?

“even if i am, that should be the least of your worries.” right, you and the stonehearts need answers from each other. time is of the essence; other assassins may be sent to kill you for betrayal if you don’t make use of it wisely. if only that man would take the alabaster head off; it’s unsettling.

“you’re eager to know who i am.” as if he has read your mind, he puts his hands on the alabaster head. “because that damned gambler managed to expose you, i may as well do the same to myself out of fairness. should my identity satiate your curiosity and have you confess, by all means.”

your eyes widen at his features. wavy violet hair, amber eyes, and a gold headpiece. he was your previous target - the exact reason why you’re in this room, veritas ratio, the handler of the stonehearts. when you think you had him fall into your trap, he has you fall into his instead. you’re at a loss of words.

“we meet again, assassin.” he lays out files that immediately pique your interest: the incident that robbed you of your childhood and made you into the person you are today. “judging from your expression, you’re in the know of the stellaron crisis. we have much to discuss, don’t we?”

𝐓𝐎𝐏𝐀𝐙.

the reverie hotel is too fancy to be a prison. that jade woman reserves a room for you and covers service costs so you don’t need to worry about payment. the stonehearts are treating you awfully well as if you’re their guest, only if you have useful information in return. their subordinates on the other hand, they’re trying way too hard to intimidate you to the point you’ll spill your secrets.

“hey! what did i say about drinking during work hours?” a woman with short hair storms into the hallway where your room is with more agents behind her. “take them back to their rooms. i’ll meet with them later on how to not treat a person who was invited by jade. i sure hope they don’t want this to be included in my reports.”

she dismisses her squad with the drunk guys in tow and looks at you for permission to enter your room, which you soon grant. she settles on one of the chairs, gesturing to you to sit next to her. “nice to finally meet the elusive cipher. i’m topaz; jade sent me here to keep you company on her behalf. luckily it’s not opal, or else he would’ve given you a hard time.”

that jade woman has arranged meetings between you and three specific people within the stoneheart network, including her young associate in your room. you left the golden hour with more questions than answers, and the interrogation room made you upset through a series of debates about the stellaron crisis. so what’s her purpose for accompanying you here today?

“ah, you want to know why jade sent me here? i can tell from the look in your eyes.” she pulls out documents on her person, which spells out the event you dread most. “thanks to your productive conversation at the bar and your outburst at headquarters, we believe that you’re our key player in preventing the crisis from happening again. we understand that this is a lot to take in, so please carefully consider.”

“other than that, feel free to make yourself at home. the ten stonehearts look forward to your decision.” she waves farewell as she retires for the night. you put your head in your hands and sigh, realizing that the only choice available is to cooperate with those spies. already at the point of no return, you decide to chase after her.

#♪ .fics #honkai: star rail #honkai: star rail x reader #hsr x reader #aventurine x reader #dr ratio x reader #topaz x reader

277 notes · View notes

yeyinde · 9 months

Text

lavender skies | Kyle "Gaz" Garrick x GN!Reader

Then suddenly, and all at once, there's a loudness in your head: a hundred whispers echoing in time to the same off-beat rhythm, full of memories and moments shared between you, threads woven throughout the years all buoying to the surface as you realise you're a little bit in love with him. (And that, maybe, you've been a little bit in love with him the whole time.)

tags: friends to lovers (but the type of friends who are basically already dating and everyone knows except them - until suddenly they do), mutual pining. Slight Kent bashing, oops. Golden Girls as a coping mechanism. warnings: none. very tame, considering who I am as a person. Heavy make-out sess, though. word count: 6,6k notes: This has been sitting in my requests forever (I lost the original, but the gist was: Gaz + pining + idiots in love). You can blame a lot of this on summer rain and 80s city pop. Been going to the pier and listening to it while I wrote this. Not my best, sure, but it was fun.

The Tinder date he warned you not to go on (and seriously, mate, who uses Tinder anymore?) ends like this:

Your date, the biggest gentleman in Kent, as proclaimed in his bio (a red flag in hindsight—there's no such thing as a gentleman from Kent), sneaks his number to the waitress, and then leaves you behind in downtown Manchester to go bar hopping with a group he just met.

It's not a great loss. All things considered, it's not even the worst date you've ever been on. It was just a spur-of-the-moment whim—equal parts anxiety and megrim: the sudden fear of being single forever (and no, despite what Kyle might say, it has nothing to do with the wedding invitation you'd gotten on Facebook, or the three others that came before it)—and therefore, there isn't much to be upset about. Not really.

But the world doesn't work on half-hearted lies and shaky truths, and on a dank little corner in Manchester, abandoned by your ride home, your abysmal date who barely looked at you, you can't deny that it hurts. That it's a little bit of a hit to your self-esteem in a way that makes you angrier than you were before, because, honestly—he wasn't even a catch to begin with.

Stupid.

You should have listened to Kyle, to his immaculate wisdom and emotional maturity far beyond his years, but you hadn't because—

Well. Sometimes the world should work on little lies. If only to the ones you tell yourself. Ones like:

It's completely fine—really it is—if your friend of nearly eight years is moving on with his life. And it's totally, absolutely okay if your best friend meets some flighty barista in Amsterdam and won't stop talking about her for the meagre three weeks he's been back from his impromptu trip to the Netherlands, then to Mexico. It's fine. It's all fine.

Because maybe you are, too.

And maybe that's the reason you went out with David from Kent.

From Kent? He texted, only hours before your date. (Hours because he'd been busy with this thing for his job—his boss is corrupt and the world is, too, but at least Amsterdam Barista is doing fine). You can do so much better than that, birdy.

You wanted to say, what? Like someone from Amsterdam instead? but you're doing this new thing where you try not to sound as mad as you think you are. Zen, maybe. Internal peace and happiness. So, instead, you say:

He's nice. I like him.

Words that, of course, have come back to bite you.

He isn't nice. He wouldn't stop staring at the waitress, and talking over you, or just generally ignoring your existence. He left you downtown, stranded without a way home. You don't like him. You really don't even think you were that interested in him.

But it makes sense.

Kyle is moving on. Your friends are getting married.

And where does that leave you?

Well—

It leaves you stuck downtown with shoes that were intended to be used for aesthetics, the kind that means standing entirely still and immobile, and not walking the fifteen kilometres to your flat because you'd spent all your money on this super flattering outfit and these unfunctional shoes, and can't afford a cab or an Uber.

Sometimes, you pretend you're a functional adult—one who knows how to navigate everything with ease, and you live in the present, the real world, where time is fluid and unchangeable, and things make sense (maths and geometry and physics) unless they don't (black holes and the vastitude of space and fate)—but moments like these remind you that you don't. That you live, instead, somewhere in the parentheses of both.

The indigo sky, murky black and void of any stars, seems to grumble along with you as you turn toward the street, readying yourself for the long walk home. Except the groan sounds less commiserating and more ominous. A noise that seems to reverberate through the crowded street, and right into your bones.

Some have the wherewithal to find shelter. A smart move because almost a moment later, the heavens split, and a summer deluge drenches the street. It's unrelenting in its downpour, soaking everything in its path in a shrill roar.

Caught in the middle of St Peter's Square, there are not many places to duck under for sanctuary, but you find an alcove beside a store, and dart toward it. The non-functional boots are pretty to look at, but with each step, you feel the hard synthetic rubber grind against your heel. Blisters form, break. The burn makes you inhale sharply against the pain, hobbling now on tender feet.

The wall is slick with condensation, but you lean against it to keep your feet from taking the brunt of your weight.

It reminds you, quite suddenly, of that night in Cardiff with Kyle. When you'd drank three-dollar margaritas at some downtrodden bar with your friends and ate rather limp-looking fish tacos (a mistake, of course, and Kyle still can't look at corn tortillas the same way), and laughed until your belly hurt at something he'd said—the words lost to alcohol and faded with time—and then leaned over, promptly throwing up in a bush.

You still can't drink tequila without giggling (and gagging) at nothing, a phantom memory, and the thought presses against a tender spot in your chest in all the wrong ways.

Time is fluid. An unavoidable truism that you can't escape.

There are people you've known since you were a child whose faces you can barely remember. Ones you promised the world to, to always be together, who you hardly think of anymore.

Moving on. Moving forward.

You think, then, of Kyle. Of the distance that lingers between you both, widening each day. It's nothing you've done, nor he; it's just—

Life. Concurrent. Everpresent.

It hurts to lose a friend, you'd always think. A small moment of grief, of loss. But not like this. Never like this.

Stuck in a downpour in the middle of Manchester, you realise you miss him. Have been missing him.

Huddling under an awning, you fish your phone from your soaked pocket, and pull up the only person you want to be around right now, in this moment of vulnerability. Loneliness.

You send him a quick text, date was a bust. Stuck downtown. Are you busy?

Kyle's reply comes three breaths later. For you? Never. Send me your location.

You send him your pin.

Another message pops up: stay put. I'm on my way.

You met Kyle Garrick at university.

It's one of those things in life that just sometimes happens. A happy accident. An eventuality that makes the world feel a little less daunting. A lock and key sliding into place. Sunsets in pretty ochre.

Someone you knew and someone he knew (two people who are now best man and groom in the upcoming wedding) decided to invite all of their friends out for a night, and it was then, slightly tipsy on cheap ale when you realised the boy in the back—a head taller than everyone else and more befitting inside the glossy pages of a magazine—was different, somehow, from anyone else you'd ever met.

It started when some stupid kids decided to pick on another. A smaller boy with a blue cap.

Kyle was the only one who noticed. The only one who seemed to care.

It was his anger that drew you to him in the first place. Moth to a flame. It's quick—the sizzling flame of a lit match: suddenly burning the wick and nearly uncontrollable. But it's short. A flickering star, burning bright, burning hot, and then being tempered and swallowed down until it's smouldering. Still hot, still dangerous, but—

Managed.

It was a snap. He was laughing, jovial. Telling jokes, and having fun, but still maintaining that enviable enigmatic persona: reserved but kind. Funny, but mature. And then it crumpled in an instant, folded away into anger. Bright and blistering. He walked to them, eyes blazing, and didn't wait for any excuses when the kids noticed him, just quickly decimated their foundations, and crushed their feeble lies between his teeth.

"Bullyin'? That's a pretty foul thing to do, innit, mate?"

And that was that.

He handed the kid back his hat—the one the others knocked off into the gutter—and told him, clipped, that he was better than them.

Just keep your chin up, yeah? Fuckin' losers, that lot. Don't go messing about with them anymore. Fucking pricks. That's a nice hat, too. Where'd you get it? Really? Oh, that's mint—

It was that moment when, unprompted and unnoticed, he easily slipped away from the group to help some kid he didn't even know that you realised you were very keen to get to know him.

"Fancy a kebab, hero?" You asked, smirking up at him.

A grin broke across his face. Sharp, feral. "I could always go to a lamb kebab."

The rest, really, just came quite naturally. Your best friend. The person you go to for anything—even terrible dates that leave you stranded in the rain.

You just wish you knew when it all began to change, to fall apart.

Kyle meets you near St Peter's Square.

You spot him first from your hiding spot beneath the awning, catching sight of his form moving through the (now) empty streets, hands shoved in the pockets of his denim trousers, the bottoms tucked, sensibly, into his fawn-coloured boots.

Even with the hood of his windbreaker pulled low over his brow, you can pick him out of a crowd with an ease that is as warming as it is jarring.

You wave him over when he stops on the mouth of Mount Street, looking in toward the Starbucks on the corner.

He finds you just as easily. And oh, his expression makes your toes curl in your misshapen boots.

Anger pinches the corner of his mouth, and hangs off the furrow of his brow, the divot between his eyes.

"Unbelievable," he huffs when he reaches you in the middle of the street, and sucks his teeth when you open your mouth to protest.

"It is what it is," you offer, playing the peacekeeper. You fall into step with him, trying not to wince. "I'm over it."

"Yeah?" The shadows across his brow deepen. "Are you sure? 'Cause… I'll fuck him up for you."

Setting your friend on a man from Kent feels entirely too vindictive, despite how much of a rush you get at the thought of seeing the man cowed a little bit. You shake your head, playing the part of a reasonable adult.

"It's okay. I'm just—I'm just, over this, yeah? Can we—"

Kyle stops you with his hand against your shoulder. "You alright?"

"My feet hurt," your smile is strained. "Terrible shoes."

"Take 'em off."

"Are you crazy—?"

"I brought slides for you. Figured you'd wear something stupid."

"Okay, fair. But—ouch? We can't all be crazy good-looking Armani models. Some of us have to work for it."

Kyle snorts. "Just take your shoes off, yeah? Throw 'em in my bag."

You can't deny it feels blissful when you lean against the slick wall outside of a shop, toeing off your tight boots. Aching feet freed from their prison. The sigh you let out makes him glance up at you from the pavement, bent over the rucksack he brought.

There's disapproval in his gaze—maybe at your choice. Choices. The date he warned you about. The boots. The socks he spots are stained with blood on the knob of your foot.

He tuts. A soft admonishment that cuts through the silence of the empty square. But it's all he says. He swallows the rest and drops the shoes he grabbed on the pavement in front of you, slowly pushing them forward with the tip of his toe.

You try not to grin when you see them.

Crocs. The ugliest ones you could find in Schuh. You'd bullied him into getting a matching pair with you. Neon yellow adorned with little clips.

You slip them on as Kyle reaches down to grab your boots. He pauses with them in his hand, eying them with something that taints the air with his disdain.

"When did you buy these?"

"On Friday." When he was sleeping off his impromptu trip to Chicago. He brought you home deep-dish pizza, frozen, and promised that it tasted much better fresh. "For the date."

"Why?" Is all he asks.

You shrug. "They're cute…?"

His eyes stray to your shoulders. The wet fabric of your shirt. His chin lowers slightly, but his eyes stay fixed on your flesh, on the goosebumps that bubble to the surface, spreading over your exposed skin. Eyes flicker, catching a droplet of water you can feel running down from behind your ear, falling over the slope of your neck. It breaks against your collarbone. He watches it all.

There's tension in the air. Static. The pressure builds and reeks of ozone when it presses into you, knuckles digging into the hollow of your throat. It renders you unable to speak—locked in a paradigm where the world beyond the honeycomb of his eyes ceases to matter, to exist almost. Thick honey ensnares you. Molasses. It clots against reason, logic, and makes you feel weightless. Floating, unmoored, in this unfamiliar abyss that closes in around you.

Except—

It isn’t.

There’s something aberrant about it, anomalous, that you can’t ignore; but beneath it sits a preternatural sense of familiarity that bends the paradox into knowns. Into tangibles. Concretes.

This is the same tension that has been simmering—festering, almost—since before he joined the miliary. In Cardiff when he leaned against you in the taxi, boney shoulder digging into your arm, and said, ‘dunno what I'd do without you, y’know?

It was the hazy smear of neon from the shops perched on the street. An ethereal gold hue streamed in from the window, cutting across the tenebrous in an asymmetrical chiaroscuro. The light was soaked up by him. Warm honey, the perfect compliment to his eyes, to the soft pink of his lips.

How could you possibly describe the feeling that spumes in the pit of your stomach outside of undiluted comfort?

Home.

It feels like like in shades; muted. A soft undercurrent that lingers inside something else, something deeper—

Moments in the foyer when he was heading back home for the evening. When he’d linger in the doorway, shoulder balanced against the frame, arms folded over his chest, and warned you not to watch Taskmaster without him.

He’d know, he said.

When you asked how, he just said:

“Because I know you.”

It feels like that. Like that and something more. Everything, all of it, coalesces into this. Into this moment where you can’t stop staring into the flecks of mahogany and charred birchwood in his eyes, and he can’t seem to decide where to keep his, vacillating between the slope of your neck and matching your stare. A lurch, a flash of something in your chest when your gazes meet. The deep sfumato of a bare forest in the middle of winter—rich browns, raw topaz, honey and amber in a sea of white. A sleepy hinterland. Solemnent and peaceful. Dreamy. Hypnogogic.

The world always seems to shudder into a deep slumber whenever he’s around.

He dips closer, swaying into you. Gravity, maybe. Tidally locked satellites on the same rung. Something bubbles in your chest. Unwinds from its dormant perch between the gaps in your ribs, and climbs up your esophagus. Ready, you think, to be free—

In the distance, tyres squeal against the pavement.

—and all at once, the moment burst, breaks. Shatters into a million pieces, cosmic dust, and you watch them fall around you, blinking rapidly, as though you’ve just woken.

It feels like slowly coming down to earth when you quietly gather your things, words now stuck in your throat. In their prison.

Kyle tears his gaze away from your bare skin, clearing his throat.

"Hardly." He murmurs after a moment and slips his jacket off his shoulders before wrapping it around yours. It smells of rainwater, wet rubber. Beneath the polymer, you can smell Kyle—vetiver, cypress, jasmine; sweet and heady—and you bury your nose in the hood when he turns back to the empty street. “Well, uh—”

You can’t speak. Not yet.

He seems to understand.

"Yeah," he nods, and reaches out, tugging on the end of the drawstring. "Let's get out of here."

The rain lightens into a muted drizzle, soft droplets that fall, almost rhythmless, on the wet pavement. The town sleeps, the streets bare. Empty. The only sounds come from your slick footfalls, a horn in the distance.

It’s an easy silence that lapses between you—not at all unlike the lulls before, when things were easy and featherlight and endless; when you could talk to him about everything, anything, and all of the worries in your life were saved for something else. Never him. Never, ever him.

But it tugs at something in your chest. The same pressure blooms at the edges, lingering in the periphery. You think of the spell you fell under—quiet yearning—and shake your head, desperate now to break it.

It’s just as easy to slip into familiarity. To tease, and taunt. And so, you do.

"I'm surprised you haven't said I told you so by now. That's so impressive self-restraint."

His gaze slides over to you. "Well, you know, it's implied."

"Oh, is it, now?"

"Yeah, like when you messaged me and told me about it and I said—"

"Who even uses Tinder?"

"—that he's knobhead, and you're gonna get hurt."

You scoff. "He's from Kent, so."

"Even worse," he makes a face, derision contrasted by the jaundiced lamp spilling over the pavement. "A Tinder date with a guy from Kent? What's next? Moving to Bristol?"

"It's a nice area."

He rolls his eyes. "Sure. As nice as Essex, maybe."

"The two are not even comparable—"

"'Dunno why you're rushing into anything, anyway,” he angles his chin toward you. “If this is about Carver's wedding, I said I'd go with you, didn't I?"

"Yeah, but…"

"But what?"

"That's sort of—like, you just have your own thing going on. I don't want to get in the way."

"I've always had my own thing going on. So have you. But that's never stopped us before, has it? What's changed."

"What about—" you swallow down something thick, bitter that wells in the back of your throat. "You know. Amsterdam. The Barista, or whatever."

His brow knots together. "And what about David from Kent?"

You sweep your hands out, motioning morosely toward your Crocs, your damp outfit. "This is what happened with David from Kent. Not exactly the fairytale meet cute you have with Amsterdam—" he makes a noise, like he means to interrupt. You cut him off. Bury it. "And besides, you should take her. I'll just—"

"I want to go with you."

"Why?"

Kyle falls to a stop near the Kebab shop you usually go to whenever he comes back from his missions, when he's craving good, hearty food that will rot his insides and clog his arteries. A small comfort from before, when everything he has now was just a dream, and you were struggling students in university who could barely afford a meal each and would split a lamb dinner over ale and terrible movies from the noughties back at your flat.

The suddenness of it all makes you blink beside him, slowly angling your chin up at him. A questioning noise wells in the back of your throat, but when you finally turn your gaze to him, it does out. A snuffed flame.

He brings his hand up, finger scratching at the soft patch of skin on the bridge of his nose where it starts to arch up. The look on his face, hidden, slightly, by the night blanketing overhead, but just illuminated enough by smears of neon and flushed street lamps for you to see it clove into something slightly flustered, hesitant. Sheepish, almost, like he hadn't meant to say what he did, and now doesn't know how to proceed forward. Cards tucked tight to his chest. Does he play his hand or fold?

You blink. Then blink again. Struggling, almost, to take in the suddenness of his flustered state.

Because the thing is:

Kyle doesn't get embarrassed or sheepish.

A running gag in your mutual friend group is that Kyle is twenty-eight going on sixty-five. An old man crammed inside the body of a young adult. He runs hot—passionate about his beliefs, quick to temper when he thinks an injustice is being doled out; a disciple of loose stoicism, but of a new age variety that is half parts stereotypical stoner chillness and ripe maturity—but he rarely is ever caught unawares enough to become embarrassed by something. He just has a perfect gauge of himself and those around him, able to quickly make friends with anybody he meets, and self-aware enough to know when he's in the wrong, when he needs to dial it back.

Being his friend for so long, you know the nuance of these expressions. His mien is ingrained in your head: known and catalogued. Nothing about Kyle is a mystery to you except the things you're barred from knowing (his second life away from home, you often joke: wholly confidential, entirety draped in secrecy).

But the look on his face is entirely alien to you. An expression you hadn't thought him capable of making.

It's jarring. It bludgeons into you with a ferocity that takes your breath away.

You know the man standing beside you, but this, everything else, is so unearthly. So foreign.

"Kyle," you hedge, taking a small step closer to him. You're not sure why. Maybe to reacquaint yourself with the man standing before you. Maybe to find something of familiarity within him to comfort the sudden crescendo of your pounding heart because even just the heady scent of his cologne—vetiver, amber—quells the sudden bloom of anxiety in the pit of your stomach. "Are you—?"

"No," he mumbles, then huffs out a soft laugh. It sounds mean, in a self-deprecating way, and your heart lurches for him. "Yeah, no. I'm alright. I just—shit, you know? 'Course I'd wanna go with you. Should be kinda obvious, no?"

Sure, you want to say. Sure, no, totally. Very obvious. And maybe had he not stopped, not made this peculiar expression on his face—like he isn't sure what to do when he always knows what he wants, what he's meant to do—you might have said them. Might let them tumble from your lips, equally self-deprecating and a touch forlorn despite never really knowing why, but that would be a lie, now.

Because you do.

The look on his face is upsetting—not because Kyle never makes that expression, or because he's never uncertain about anything, ever, but because you don't know it. It's not something you've ever seen before. And it hurts.

It's stupid. This whole thing. It shouldn't make you feel some sense of loss when he does something you don't expect. He always does. It's his brand, now—jettisoning across the world to catch bad guys and slap the trite American sense of justice and liberty for all across the faces of anyone who tries to oppose it—and you're very much acclimated to this side of him, the one he hides away from you, giving nothing at all about where he's going, what he's doing, what he's done, until he's back in England, safe and sound, and texting you at six in the morning for an English spread because he missed home. And maybe, maybe he missed you, too.

Those quiet moments are tucked into a cosm where it's only you and him, and greasy food, and reruns of Golden Girls together with your feet in his lap as you sit on the chaise and pick favourites (his is, of course, Rose) until the sun goes down, and he heads home because he has a debriefing in the morning in Hereford, and you have work. It's bereft of unease, of tension. Time slips through your fingers fluidly, and you hardly notice it's been hours since he first arrived. Comfortable, wholly, in his presence and in your skin.

Soulmates, everyone used to joke. You just get each other. Near finish each other's sentences.

Except for lately, where there has been this undeniable tension simmering between the two of you—a sense of fragility that you can't comprehend.

Growing apart, you thought. And then: guess it's time to do the same.

It made sense to make the first move. To download Tinder—much to his chagrin—and start looking for your—

Your Barista from Amsterdam.

And oh.

Oh.

Maybe it's the way the street light frames the angles and plains of his face, or the shadows that run deep lines of tenebrous across the valleys in his eyes, the sharp slope of his lips, the soft pout. The inscrutable expression that rents a jagged divot between his brow, and an unsure twist of his mouth. Maybe it's everything. Nothing.

But the only thing you know right now is that you know him. Have known him. Deeply. Intimately. In a way that goes beyond the boundaries of bodies, of flesh and blood. Bones and marrow. You know his soul. His essence. The foundations of who he is cobbled together in a lonely kebab shop over cheap ale, commiserating on an endless stream of papers and assignments; the eventuality of ever after when you hand in the final one. Over beans and toast in the afternoon, a whole day spent lounging in your flat watching reruns of Golden Girls, and petty arguments over Taskmaster that always seem to go a little bit too far, and never far enough. Fights that end two days later when he shows up with Greggs and a complete box set of that show you said you wanted to watch but never had the time for. Bargain shopping in Tottenham on an early Saturday morning because there's this chair, you see, one that you saw on their Instagram page and you simply must have it.

Soft moments in between, brackets where life doesn't seem to wrap its cold hands around your throat. Time spent in each other's company just for the sake of it.

Climbing onto your roof—a thatched mess of moss and straw and broken asphalt shingles that will one day give under your weight—and watching the stars, always searching for one that rockets across the sky while he murmurs beside you, quiet in this stillness that falls like snow in the dead of night around you. A hushed whisper as he relays the places he's been—all stars, he rasps, hand brushing wide strokes across the raspberry sky, dusted with light pollution: I'll take you there one day to see. Best fucking beer I'd ever had, too, just don't tell my cousin because he thinks the shitty lager he makes for his bar is good—and you try to picture it amongst the grey clouds. A life on the opposite side of the world. Just the two of you. Always.

And that's what it's always been, hasn't it? Just you. Just him.

It's sometime past midnight on a street corner in Manchester. Your feet hurt from walking all night, and your clothes are damp from the rain that caught you off-guard. A summer downpour. It clings to your skin in a way that's both freeing and wholly uncomfortable, but you're not thinking about that. You're not thinking about anything at all, not now. Not really. There's a silence in your head as the world falls into pieces, breaking like the jaundiced light that cuts crevasses and canyons in the tenebrous that colours sharp valleys of his face. He turns, then, a gentle list of his head as he takes you in, breathes your silence and questions the wideness of your eyes, the soft parting of your lips. The movement makes the light spill over the arch of his nose, the slope of his brow. The dawning of a new day. A new world. The untouchable of the moon where no light shines now burning hot under the sun.

(And maybe you've been a little bit in love with him the whole time.)

So, you say it. You whisper all the words that bubble up, impatiently waiting between your teeth, effervescent and burning white-hot as they throw themselves over bone and flesh to be free.

Confessing goes like this:

Molten agony in your guts as the secrets you barely understand yourself dissolve into the atmosphere, spoken aloud and born on cobblestone and petrichor. Wide-eyed shock, uncertainty, as a new quiet falls over your shoulders, louder than anything you'd ever heard. Guncotton in your nose. A million detonations in your ears.

You've never much liked the silence. You break it, then, with your bare hands.

"...and that's basically it."

It isn't much. It isn't poetry. You're not even sure the words were real. A figment of your imagination, broken free because of baristas in Amsterdam and losers from Kent, abysmal dates and the unending fear of being wholly alone in a world you're not prepared for, all without the person who makes you feel a little bit better about the nothingness that permeates around you.

And sure. Sure. You don't need him. If Kyle decided never to speak to you again, you'd cry and you'd hurt, but you wouldn't be less of a person because of his absence. He doesn't complete you in the same way you've read about in thick books with strong-willed protagonists and an abundance of petty misunderstandings, but he compliments you. Elevates the good and stifles the bad. You want to experience things with him—not because there's some grand force at play, red strings knotted around your fingers that lead you back to him—but because you like his company. His thoughts. His mind. His presence. His essence fills you with joy in the same strokes it makes you want to pull your hair out sometimes. Good and bad. You want it all.

You want it. Want him.

And he—

He's taking you home a little past midnight where you'll make yourself beans and toast and maybe try and sleep, or turn on the television to watch four women you're intricately connected to eat cheesecake and solve each other's problems. He could be at his own flat right now, playing that video game he said he wanted to try when he got back, or watching that movie he was supposed to with his flatmates, his friends. He could be talking to some barista in Amsterdam.

But he isn't.

He's here with you. Still. Still.

"I just—," you say, or try to.

But the rest is a muffled gasp against soft lips when he presses his against yours, stealing the words out of your mouth.

You can feel your heart beating through your lips. Taste him on your tongue when he draws you closer, hands reaching, grasping. Pulling you into him, into his body. You fit against him, tucked safe between the parentheses of his arms. He tastes of cardamom and cornflower. Lavender notes between his molars. Hints of milk on his tongue. You drink him down and know, then, that this is what they mean they talk about love being a feast because you chase this taste for the rest of your life and never be satiated.

He loops his arm around the small of your back, dragging you closer still. As if any atom between your bodies is an affront. There’s no hesitation in the action, in the way he burrows into your skin. No trepidation.

And maybe it would be silly for there to be any. You know him—every iota, every inch; secrets whispered at midnight in a shallow breath and dreams uttered at noon. To be known, to know, is a powerful thing. You feel it ghost across your flesh, featherlight, and reach for it with your bare hands. Seeking, searching. You don’t stop until the tips of your fingers meet his warm skin, curling around him. Anchoring yourself to him. Stuck, now, in permanence.

You find spots that were untouched before. Behind his ears, the dip of his brow, the curve of his nose, and the slope of his jaw. Cupping it in the palm of your hand, a plinth for him to rest his chin.

Your canvassing makes him groan, makes him tilt down into you as he begins his own exploration, chasing you in a mad pursuit. Sliding over your valleys, your plains. Running over the rugged mountains and the steep cliffs. He scours your topography with eager, nimble fingers. It’s slow, languid. There’s no rush with this, a consensus you both seem to come to rather quickly when he pries open your mouth and tangles his tongue with yours. It’s sweet, soft. His hands mimic his chase, sliding along your body as if he means to commit the entirety of you to memory, searing it in his brain.

It’s only when he comes to a crossroads at your navel, pushed flush against his body, does he stop. You moan in despair at it, wanting more and more, not ready to give up this taste that curls over your tongue—saccharine sweet, salty—and Kyle echoes the noise with a groan, a quiet plea for air that both of you desperately need but can’t quite make yourself take.

“Fuck—” he groans again, breath stuttering out in sharp, deep gasps. “Can’t bloody tell you how long I wanted to do this for, fuck—”

His words seem to peel back the dreamy gossamer of a slowly burning sensuality. It ignites in a blaze, not at all unlike the swiftness of his anger. The sharp, sudden strike of a match. The crackle and hiss of flames renting the air.

The blaze starts at the point where your upper lip touches his, and almost immediately, it consumes you.

It's frenzied when he kisses you again—feral and wild: all teeth and tongue and nips against your bottom lip but the moment you sink into the fervour, Kyle changes it. Slows down. Chaste pecks to your sore lips amid a sensual onslaught. A languid roll of his tongue, soothing the burn his teeth left behind.

The way he kisses you feels like a paradox.

It's organised chaos. Refined madness. A cluttered mess of finesse and deliberate suckles; an artist's masterstroke.

You can't keep up. His rhythm is fierce and uncatchable.

Each step seems to stutter. An avartan you can’t keep pace with. Elongated taals, dips. A crescendo of harmony that is matchless, unreproducible. You struggle along with his swift current, his unerring tide that sweeps you away; unmoored, adrift. The tentative exploration ends. He knows you, now. All of you. And this is his summit. His scramble to the top. It’s biting passion; roaring flames.

You cling to him, holding tight to the liferaft he offers in a slow huff, a gust of mirth across your lips and into your lungs, slowing down to accommodate you. Malleable, now, he lets you lead, lets you take over, and move seamlessly with him. In tandem, parallel. Equilibrium brings you to heel, and you sigh into his mouth—a deep exhale of everything that has been building and building, tipping the scales around you until it was unbalanced and precarious. Teetering on the edge a precipice unknown.

His hand roams across your known geography—hills and streams, rivers and canyons—until he reaches your hand still bracketed around his cheeks, slowly peeling it away from his flesh to slide his fingers between yours, holding tight, and—

Kissing is immaculate. Bending at an altar, and making an offering to something bigger than yourself. It’s the spark of lightning flashing overhead, static in the air. Magnets drawing closer and closer until they snap together in the middle.

But holding his hand?

It feels like coming home.

The world tipping back into place. Amber warmth in your veins; the softness of a jasmine petal. You suck in a deep breath at the shock of it all.

You think of missing puzzles and loose sea ice drifting alone in the vastitude of the ocean. You think of a life where he isn’t in it and find yourself shuddering at the wrongness that emanates from it.

You want him. Want him—

It’s Kyle who pulls away first, resting his forehead against yours. You blink slowly, eyes catching dark amber, honeycomb. It draws a smile from you, full and deep. Giddy on the taste of him, of this.

The only thought in your head is finally, finally.

You see his lips curl in response, eyes lidded and heavy. Blooming with want, affection. Adoration.

"What, ah—," he laughs a little, then, breathless and happy, and the noise anchors itself to your breastbone, pressing into the hollow of your ribs. A place you'll keep it forever. "What now?"

He hands you the starless sky, and places it into the cup of your palm. Breathes laughter in the air, paints the moon with his joy. You think about the places he wants to take you, and the ones he swears you'll never go. You think about aeons from now when the world is gone and the stars all die out, when there's just the hazy lavender of endless abyss you can't make sense of. You think of him, and you think of you, and you wonder when it started to just make sense for there to always be two.

Maybe that night in Cardiff when he held your shoes and gave you his coat. When he draped his arm around your shoulders, laughing at something stupid you'd said. A year before he joined this task force he makes cheeky remarks about but never goes too deeply into detail. When it was just endless summers spent working and drinking and eating good food.

He'd asked the same thing, then, half slumped over in the taxi, and three sheets to the wind. It made his eyes darken, endless pits. Black holes. The expanse of the sky is framed by brown lashes, and drooping lids.

And you'd said—

"Beans and toast?" It feels right. It feels good. "We can—"

He huffed, too, just like he does now, and squeezes your hand once, tugging you along.

"We're not watching Golden Girls."

You watch Golden Girls. Kyle wraps his arm around your neck, keeps you tucked in close to his side. He steals kisses from you when Sophia says something that makes you laugh until you're breathless and trembling.

When David from Kent texts you, he grins wide, and whispers in your ear, think I've always been a little bit in love with you, you know?

Yeah, you say, and kiss back until the taste of him is etched into the space between your teeth. Since Cardiff. For you?

"Since Uni for sure." He smiles again, sheepish and a touch flustered. It glitters on his brow and nips the apples of his cheeks. "You stole my heart when you devoured four lamb kebabs and then ate my tabbouleh. Said to myself, yeah, that's the one for me, innit?"

"On second thought, what's that Barista's number? Might try my luck instead."

"Nah, you're smitten," he presses his lips into the hollow of your throat, nips his teeth against your pulse point. "And you're all mine. No take backs."

"Ah, for fuck's sake—"

Ahhhhhhhh. Sappy romcoms are my kryptonite and it shows.

COD MASTERLIST | NAVIGATION

#kyle gaz garrick x reader #gaz x reader #cod gaz x reader #cod mw2 fanfic #ehhhhhh #these are my sloppiest tags #i didn't feel like making a gif so i threw this together real quick #will fix in the am #when my eyes aren't on fire

730 notes · View notes