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six-eyed-samurai · 4 days

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Quirkless AU where Hitoshi is a street musician and reader has been with Bakugo since high school; and yes, it's based off That XX by G-Dragon. Apologies to all Bakugo fans out there for making him the villain...

I was walking down the street when I saw your man (Yeah, I saw him)

Everyone knew the dark blue-haired street musician who sat by the fountain every day and the person his eyes, outlined by black rings, would always be staring at while some song of longing and life strummed out from his guitar.

I saw that my predictions were right (I told you)

If someone were to ask why he fell in love head over hells for a complete stranger whom he knew nothing about, he’d answer in either two ways: an inability to do so or expound on a very detailed lecture on the fractured glimpses of you he’d caught over time.

Something about the way you clicked with the stray cats who rushed to your side, meowing for attention and you’d give it with no hesitation (would you play with his hair like that one day? he grew extremely flustered at the thought). A fellow cat lover, for one.

Something in that grin you’d send effortlessly to everyone and everything, in the worst of weather, at the most cranky of people, to those pretty flowers turning their head up to the sunshine like you. Everything made you so happy, it seemed. Hitoshi liked that, a stark contrast to his resentful, depressive personality.

Something along the line of how you made him feel seen. Most people just listened to him play and walk on, never bothering to show a little appreciation or acknowledgement, but you’d point him out to whoever you were with, beam at him and toss him some coins. You were the reason he got up some mornings to go there and play.

Or maybe it was simply because humans wanted what they could never have.

He took off the ring you gave him and linked his arm around someone

Hitoshi wondered if you knew him like the people who stopped by to hear him play and toss some spare change did - did you know he was even there, or was he just another struggling nameless talent to you? Did you know how he switches to those pining love songs he used to scoff at whenever he spotted you? Did you know how he's been infatuated with you since the day you threw him a smile and all the cash your wallet had, always trying to figure out a way to convey his need to get to know you through his music?

Did you know how much he wished and prayed and dreamt of being the one to be holding your hand, be able to dedicate his lyrics to you, hold you close next to him and giggle like little kids, flip coins into fountains for meaningless wishes, have you beam that brilliant grin at him like you do to the scowling blond that went almost everywhere with you?

I'll just leave it at that (I don't wanna hurt you)

Whether you knew or not, Hitoshi hadn't a clue, but everyone around him did. It was obvious from his starry eyed gaze boring into you like the celestial beings up in the sky weren’t the center of the universe but you. It was clear from the abrupt changes to the song genres whenever you would walk past his particular street. Hitoshi did a crap job at hiding how he’d glance at you (did you hear him? Were you impressed? Please, please, just stop trying to get his attention, he doesn’t treasure it like Hitoshi would) with adoration and a silent plead for approval, recognition, anything when he’d finish and passersby would clap and tip him.

The old lady sitting at the cafe opposite would quietly chuckle and recall the days of young love. The giggly gaggle of teenage girls would squeal and swoon, rooting for the both of you in the background. Even the parents of the park would smile knowingly seeing him. Between the two of you, there was a definitive, unspoken connection sparking.

But it wouldn’t work out. For as long as Bakugo Katsuki was there Shinsou Hitoshi stood no chance.

But you actually get mad at me (Why?)

He constantly puzzled over how you never noticed how Bakugo didn’t return your affections. How could not see the way his phone was more fascinating to him than you? Maybe you didn’t count the number of dates that got cancelled, but surely at some point it was too much to be considered acceptable? When would you stop interlocking your fingers with him and be sad when he didn’t even return the gesture?

What Hitoshi saw most, however, was how Bakugo would never look at you the way you looked at him. No, he only looked at you with indifference and coldness.

If you only just woke up from the daydream you were clinging onto so hard, you’d see Hitoshi’s eyes were the exact mirrors of yours: full of want and wish and just-

Why? Why not love somebody who’d love you right?

But he’d hurt you if he said anything, pointed out anything, when you oh so pathetically refused to see Bakugo how he saw you, so he said nothing.

Saying that there's no way he'd do that (Sure, you're right)

The first time he met you was about half a year ago - half a year of pining over you pining on someone who clearly didn’t love you as much as you did - when he was trying to tune his guitar and was getting annoyed with the loudmouth who was yelling too loudly into his phone for him to hear what he was doing. Frankly everyone was fed up with the shouter but for whatever reason no one told him to shut up.

Okay, Hitoshi was going to be the first.

He glanced up irritably and immediately spotted him, a spiky blond of average height and piercingly furious red eyes screeching into his phone with language vulgar and noisy enough to have every church in the world plot to wash his mouth out with lye soap. The way he was glaring at everyone as he hung up on the poor wretch gave Hitoshi a rather good idea as to why no one had told him to lower it down - not to mention the way his hand was gripping the phone so tightly.

But he digressed, focus wandering to the figure interlocking arms with the blond, embarrassedly urging him to not get so worked up in public. By the looks of it the both of you were a couple and Hitoshi vaguely felt a little sorry for you.

Especially when he heard how the blond simply brushed you off quite rudely, returning his attention to his phone with a shoulder jerk that shook off your hold.

I became aware of you being upset

So that was how he began to know you, at least at the start, as the submissive puppy of a beau that followed the man around (Bakugo Katsuki, he found out, later on when Hitoshi heard him bellowing it into the phone at some schmuck that had spelled his name wrong), always trying to enjoy the park like any other couple. Hitoshi never paid you much mind at first; to him you were just one of those delusional dream-chasers so high on their convictions of love they never noticed it was never really returned.

Then the day came when he finally watched Bakugo impatiently snap at your light question of whether you’d still be heading to that dinner place tonight. You retracted your hand slowly (he didn’t even notice, but if it was Hitoshi he’d promise to never let go of it) and hesitatingly told him you’d give him some space.

He didn’t expect you to sit by the fountain and absently, miserably play with the spray while glancing hopefully back at your lover, but when it was never returned you gave up. Hitoshi pretended not to notice, pulling at some strings to fill the awkward silence.

And I said I must have seen someone else

“Do you take requests?”

“…not really.” Hitoshi hadn’t expected you to speak either, so the words came out rather rushed and patronizing. He backtracked quickly. “I mean, not usually.”

You hummed in reply.

“But if you want I could.” Hitoshi cleared his throat and like usual his horrible, failing humor would pop up to “lighten” the situation. “Something depressing, I’m guessing?”

“Maybe? I dunno.” You tilt your head and side eye him slyly. “Don’t act dumb, I know you saw everything. You’re not exactly the sneakiest with your staring.”

Hitoshi’s ears turned a shade of red bright enough to rival his sneakers. “…sorry about that, but it’s kinda hard not to hear you guys with someone like him.”

“Katsuki’s always been like that,” you shrug listlessly.

“Why’d you stick around then?” nearly fell out of his mouth, but he swallowed it down. That was too rude, and he’d be lying if he said he’d never seen the affection in your touches and love in your eyes when you were around Bakugo. “So, what’s your request?”

You flashed that angelic, sweet smile at him and it was all over.

Yes, I'll lie for you (I'm sorry)

It started out as a small interest, a tiny crush, the mini blush forming on his cheeks when he’d see you wearing something especially good that day. He held himself back from openly expressing anything or further conversing with you though, not when you were taken and while it was obvious that Bakugo could care less about who you spoke to you yourself certainly wouldn’t look twice at any other man. Hitoshi respected the boundaries and never pushed.

Nothing stopped him from thinking about you 24/7, 365 though.

It really made him feel like a creep. He didn’t even know your name. Or your job. Or your hobbies. Or your interests. Or anything really. All he knew was gathered off staring and hoping you’d look his way (he celebrated internally whenever you did, but it was poorly disguised to other onlookers) every other day and that just intensified his belief he was being a stalker and that made him even more unlikeable. Even the sorry excuse of a boyfriend was the better choice here.

He knew what music you liked though, when you told him the tune you requested came from one of your favorite bands, when he’d observe you brighten when he played a specific genre, when you’d tip him a little extra with something in your eyes that said you were relating very hard to that depressive song of being left behind all too well.

Hitoshi wondered if you knew his too.

Oh, I hate you for not knowing me

Maybe the time when the crush really transformed into a full-blown desire happened about a few months back. He was strolling out of a nearby cafe, guitar strapped to his back and coffee in hand, bending down to pet the fluffy black kitten that had started following him around and of course his morning just had to be ruined when yours was.

You were seated by the window, picking at the cake in front of you while you anxiously glanced out and about, so obviously stood up in the way you were practically begging your phone for a notification (why did you chase after a man who would never appreciate you like Hitoshi?). He paused ins his tracks, wondering whether to go over, talk once more, provide comfort (for you he’d try, although his bedside manner was rather lacking), but just then the bell rang violently, harbinger to Bakugo.

I hate this waiting

Hitoshi turned away in disappointment, content to let you slip away once more until he heard the rushed apologies that didn’t sound as sincere as they should be, the broken, belated assurances of rescheduling your date to another time - for now he had somewhere to be and people to meet. He sees Bakugo leave and he decides, you know what? Fxxk it, it’s his turn.

You look up from wallowing in your misery to see a familiar hand slam down a coffee cup on your table. You look up, but whoever they were had already rushing out the door with an equally familiar guitar on their back. A soft laugh escaped you as you see the sticky note hastily stuck on the cup.

Smile, don’t want your face as bitter as the coffee.

Something long lost and forgotten stirs up in you, new butterflies hatching out of their cocoons and old ones waking from their long sleep as you turn the cup to see a name probably written by the barista during the order.

Shinsou. So that was his name.

Please let go of his hand now

Thinking that was that, Hitoshi let himself exhale and his wingman the cat purred, rubbing itself on his legs as if congratulating him for making a move. What was wrong with him, acting like some silly schoolboy mooning over a new student. He shook his head to clear his thoughts and walked off to his usual perch in the park.

Over the next week Hitoshi continued to see you at the park and the war raging in his head tearing at his heart went on: did you appreciate the drink? Did he accidentally order something you didn’t like? What if you didn’t like him doing this while with Bakugo?

Maybe he was wrong about the last one, for you had started to wave at him. He thought once again that was that, but once again you surprised him when you showed up one day and held out your hand and a breathless “For you”.

When you are sad, I feel like I could die, baby

He blinked and looked down. A guitar pick, blue and purple with a black cat and his name, Shinsou. “Um…what?”

“It’s for you. I mean, you don’t have to take it, I just wanted to thank you for the drink that day, and I noticed you’ve started to play with your fingers instead and that much be painful, so I had a friend who did this sort of customization! And your name was written on the cup, I promise I didn’t stalk it out or whatever, the cat was just because I noticed you petting the stray-”

He cut off your rambling with a brief, genuine smile of his own. “Thanks. I like it a lot.”

(Hitoshi would like anything that came from you, honestly.)

Not a friendship yet, but just a special kind of acquaintance. He’d take it. It was progress, at least.

What does that bastard have that I don't?

Hitoshi had no idea real progress would be coming so soon though.

He’d been trying out a new song that had been trending on social media lately and so far it was bringing him a little extra. The coffee shop had finally brought back his favorite drink and he had finally convinced his dad Aizawa to let him officially adopt the little black kitten, although he and Eri were still arguing over the name. All in all, it was a good day.

But as always if it was a bad day for you, it was a bad day for him.

He spotted you and Bakugo almost immediately as you two came to the park like he did every time, and while it wasn’t uncommon for Bakugo to be frowning it wasn’t normal for you to be. You looked awful, blinking back tears while Bakugo crushed your spirit bit by bit with his blunt words. Hitoshi didn’t mean to listen, he swears, but he couldn’t help it.

Why can't I have you, exactly?

“I just don’t get it, why? Did I do something wrong? I - I know I’m not the best, Katsuki, but if anything - I mean - we’ve been together for so long, why didn’t you say anything?”

“I did really love you at first, but I guess over the years I realized we’re not really suited for each other. You’ll find someone more suited for you and I’ll find someone better for me. This is goodbye.”

“…alright. I’m sorry - I’m sorry we didn’t work out.”

“Me too, but that’s just how things are.”

The song finished and Hitoshi had no heart to continue something anything cheerful anymore, not when Bakugo walked off and you plopped down on a nearby bench to bury your face behind your hands as your shoulders shook. Every part of him strained to go and reach out to you, go get angry at Bakugo for you, tell you everything he’s been wanting to say this past months.

That bastard doesn't love you

But how? What was he even supposed to say? Ask how could you have not seen this coming and saved yourself some heartbreak? Comfort and act sad for you when inside he was simmering with joy and delight that this was his chance, his one and only god damned chance?

Tell you with every day Bakugo fell out of love with you, he fell deeper?

Yet that would just hurt you to know that your pitiful devotion to Bakugo being never returned was apparent to everyone around you, so he said nothing.

…he didn't really have to say anything now, did he? There was another way.

Until when are you going to cry like a fool?

The sudden change of song and strumming startled you enough to look his way with wide eyes.

“Expensive cars, pretty clothes, classy restaurants, they suit you well; but that bastard next to you really isn't it. He smiles falsely next to you, he touches your cheeks and hair - but inside, he is definitely thinking of some other girl.” The words flew out easily, without him really thinking. Sure, it wasn’t the exact truth, but he knew this was the one opportunity he was going to get to tell you how he felt all this time watching Bakugo break you down bit by bit with his vanishing “love”. “How could he do that? It's like a sin. As much as you shed tears, I'll treat you better, baby. The pain you handle by yourself, will you share some with me, baby? Please look at me, why don't you know that your love is me? Why are you the only one who doesn't know?”

The worst thing a musician could hear is silence. Hitoshi stared at the ground, heart thundering away at the lack of response. Did you understand? Did you finally understand who really was the one to eternally be in love with you all this while? Did you know how he was so tired of seeing you being treated like that when he knew you deserved better?

“That's a sad song you're singing.”

Hitoshi nearly fainted right there - thank god he didn't fall into the fountain - as you suddenly appeared to sit down and scoot next to him to smile, slightly dimmed by watery eyes (he'd wipe them away, he'd never make you feel that way, if only you'd choose him). “Sad song for a sad someone from a sad boy.”

Something changed right there and he saw it in your eyes. You used to smile at him so brightly but that spark in your eyes were always directed at Bakugo - now they caught alight at him and he knew, he knew, he knew you finally knew too.

You reach over to rifle through the music sheets on his stand, smile a little more genuine this time. “Well…sad someone wants a happier song now and wants sad boy to duet together.”

Everyone knew the dark blue-haired street musician who sat by the fountain from that day on and the center of his affections his eyes, outlined by black rings, would always be staring at adoringly next to him while some song of a slow burn kind of love strummed out from his guitar.

#sanzuyaps #hitoshi shinsou x reader #shinsou x reader #hitoshi shinsou x y/n #shinsou x y/n #hitoshi shinsou x you #shinsou x you #mha x you #quirkless au #mha x reader au #mha x reader #mha x y/n #hitoshi shinsou #Spotify

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eddysocs · 8 months

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Kingpin Strikes (Eleanor Bishop x OC)

Summary: The moment Emma lets her guard down is when Kingpin takes what she loves most; Eleanor.

Word Count: 834

Warnings: Angst, kidnapping, bombs, love confession

"Eleanor? Eleanor! Please, tell me you’re out here somewhere." With every word out of Emma's mouth she was losing hope. She’d just stepped away for a minute. Eleanor promised her it would be fine. She could go get them drinks and she’d be right there where she left her. But it wasn’t fine. Her world was falling apart all at once. Eleanor was gone.

She spent hours roaming the streets, losing track of time, losing her mind over this. She shouldn’t have stepped away, not even for a second. Emma let out an anguished cry into the dark and empty street. The scream reverberated off the nearby buildings and echoed back at her. This couldn’t be it. She would find her.

She didn’t want to involve Kate, not where Kingpin was involved, and he was certainly involved. Emma had been keeping tabs on Eleanor just as much as she’d been keeping them on Kate. No, this was something she had to do alone. If only she knew where to start.

Emma made her way to Times Square, needing to lose herself in a crowd because she couldn’t think in silence. Before she had a chance to plan her first move, an interruption sounded from the many screens of Times Square. "White Knight," boomed a deep voice, drawing the attention of almost every passerby, "we have your Bishop."

A recording then began to play. It was Eleanor, visibly unharmed, but at the edge of tears. Something had been done to her, even if Emma couldn’t see what. She tried to observe and catalog everything, but there wasn’t much to go on. Outside. There were leaves rustling in the background. A park, perhaps? Central Park? "I would hurry if I were you. We have much to discuss, and she doesn’t have much time."

Emma, head craned up at the nearest of the screens, watched as they all went black before returning to their usual programming. She burst into a run, thinking for the entire distance, It should have been me. Her lungs burned with the sheer effort it took her to reach Central Park. And it was no small space to explore. But she knew it had to be somewhere remote. She didn’t have much time to think, so she went with her gut and headed for the Shakespeare Garden.

Scanning benches and ducking behind hedges, Emma's heart beat double time in hopes she’d find Eleanor around the next corner. This part of the park wasn’t very populated at this time of night, so any noise she heard could be Eleanor or Kingpin, she just had to listen.

A faint sound of crying caught her attention and Emma headed straight for it, not caring that it might be a trap, as this whole thing so clearly was already. As she rounded the bend, she saw her. "Eleanor," she cried out in relief.

At the sound of Emma's voice, Eleanor looked up, her eyes conveying fear unlike she’d ever seen. "Don’t come any closer. I can’t move. There’s a pressurized bomb under this bench and if I get up, it goes off." Emma froze. Diffusing a bomb was not something on her to do list. She’d managed it once or twice before, but then she’d had someone in her earpiece grinding her through it. Today, she was without that luxury.

"That was faster than expected." Kingpin came out from the shadows, leisurely advancing towards Emma. "As you know, your little girlfriend here wants out of my business. I don’t take kindly to people who want out. But I may be willing to strike a deal. You come and work for me, and I’ll let her go."

"Simple as that? Forgive me for not believing you," Emma shot back, standing her ground. She couldn’t push too far and piss him off. She couldn’t fuck this up. Not with Eleanor at stake.

Kingpin chuckled darkly. "It is that simple. You’re in. She’s out. Unharmed, might I add. Whatever you pull her into from there is on you."

"Disable the bomb and let her walk away."

"Emma, no!"

Emma turned to Eleanor, still rooted in place out of fear and self preservation. "I’m the White Knight, remember? I’m your White Knight. It’s my job to save you and if this is how I’m able to do that, then so be it. I love you." It was the first time she had said it so plainly and it had stunned Eleanor into silence. "Let me do this for you."

She turned back to Kingpin. "I accept your deal, now let her go."

Kingpin pressed a button on the remote in his hand, and a high pitched beep rang out. "You’re free to go, Ms. Bishop." Slowly, Eleanor shifted, as if testing the truth of his words. Eventually she stood and no bomb went off. He’d kept his word. Emma didn’t know what this meant for her, but Eleanor had come out a free woman, and that’s all she could ask for.

Forever Tag: @arrthurpendragon, @baubeautyandthegeek, @foxesandmagic, @carmens-garden, @bossyladies, @getawaycardotmp3, @misshiraethsworld, @kmc1989, @curious-kittens-ocs

#whumptober 2023 #oc: emma knight #fc: jess bush #fd: marvel #emma x eleanor #eleanor bishop #eleanor bishop x oc #marvel

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glitchyalchemist · 2 years

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mermaid au cp.2

Perceptor watches his predator do apexing while the benny hill theme plays in the background

this chapter can also be read on ao3

I have no beta so this is just pure thought beamed straight from my brain to yours. I don't even know what is happening. the mermaid au spirit is possessing me for the time being.

Stripmine had meant well when he had come to Perceptor’s aid and when he started bombing him with rapidfire questions, but the way he had practically vibrated at having something actually happen under his watch was borderline tiring to deal with. Fortunately with some gentle guiding questions the minibot had refocused on what actually mattered, and they had discussed the next steps as they had walked back inside the building.

Perceptor told him that he had just intended to get a closer look because he hadn’t been sure what he had even been looking at, and that he hadn’t meant to put himself in danger by allowing their intruder that close to him. Not that he had felt like he had been in any danger at all, but to Stripmine an intruder was an intruder, and every person in the research center was under his protection during his shift.

But now they knew what they were dealing with, an actual live mermaid, and first things first they needed to make sure that there weren't others with him and that whichever way the mermaid had gotten in wasn’t still open somewhere. Stripmine had ran off while rambling about intending to get to the root of this, and Perceptor had finally been able to pause and just let all of this sink in.

He looked at the datapad he was still carrying, thinking of how amazed the mermaid had looked at it. And he thought of the mermaid, who was now hiding somewhere in their precious project pool. What a strange turn his morning had taken.

Stripmine was probably going to make sure that the maintenance department went to investigate the pool, so that left him the responsibility of attempting to salvage their project.

Scrolling through his saved contacts Perceptor picked out Diver, the official supervisor of their project and the current head of the whole research center, and sent him a short message detailing their situation in the pools. Usually Diver was too busy to mingle a lot with the members of their project and only attended bigger meetings, but this seemed like important enough news to bother him with directly. And while Perceptor was still wondering who else he should contact he was already receiving a response from Diver telling him to keep this on the downlow for now until they figured out the full scope of things, and that he would be coming by the project wing as soon as he could.

Taking that as a sign to stand by and wait until otherwise instructed, Perceptor dropped the plans to contact others and instead walked the rest of the way to the rooms that were fully in use for their genome project. A project that had just yesterday been interesting enough to occupy his mind day and night, but which now seemed almost dull in comparison to his new thoughts of golden optics and a smoothly swimming form.

When he got into the laboratory, where he had used to be sitting for long hours over a laptop and a pile of datapads, he wasn’t even sure what he was supposed to do there now. Just trying to go back to work normally was out of the question surely. He wasn’t even sure if there was work to do anymore after they managed to find out how much destruction the mermaid had caused. But still he had to kill the time somehow while he waited for Diver to call the shots, which would probably lead to a meeting of some sort eventually today.

Deciding that he might as well indulge on his curiosities in the meanwhile, Perceptor picked out one of the laptops from a rack and then made himself comfortable on the corner of a table, pulling out a stool to sit on. The datapad had finally been subspaced away in favor of having both his hands to type with as he navigated his way to the Cyberpedia and searched for mermaids, intending to just quickly browse over the general information they had about these elusive creatures.

Of course he knew that mermaids existed, and that they were thought to be rather high on the food chain of the oceans since they seemed to be rather cunning predators. He could make educated guesses on many aspects of their existence by osmosis from his general knowledge of marine biology from the evolutionary standpoint, but he had never actually sat down and read about mermaids specifically. This seemed like the perfect time to educate himself, and he eyed through the article that confirmed what he had thought to be true. There just wasn’t much they knew about mermaids at all.

An aquatic form of advanced mechanimal that hunted smaller mechanical creatures. They were known to be smart enough to make for effective hunters and to be able to avoid Cybertronians and their traps, and there had even been people that insisted they had seen them use tools. Which would make a lot of sense considering how advanced their forelimbs were; they looked practically identical to Cybertronian servos.

The few rare that had managed to get close enough to a mermaid reported limited verbal capabilities, mostly parroting back words and short sentences. They were thought to be on the upper end of intelligence when it came to Cybertronian mechanimals, but still far below the cognitive capabilities of actual Cybertronians. But what he had seen today had not been simple mimicking. The mermaid had clearly communicated with him in Neocybex and shown the capabilities to both understand what it had been shown and explained, and ask questions to further expand its understanding.

Of course there was an endless list of possibilities and questions those thoughts brought on, but it was impossible to say if the mermaid in their pool was an average member of its species, or an exceptionally smart one. Or if it had been a mermaid at all.

Deciding that the wiki article wouldn’t offer him much more, Perceptor instead opened the appropriate director to search for any research publications that related somehow to mermaids. But he wasn’t surprised to see that there was only a handful of them and even most of those seemed to be published by the same team. He opened a few of the interesting ones into tabs anyways, because maybe he could pick out the best ones and browse over them later. You never knew what kind of extra information would come handy when dealing with this situation and it wouldn’t take him long at all to read through all of this. Well prepared was half done after all, as he liked to think.

Eventually he was interrupted by an incoming call, and for a moment Perceptor thought that maybe Diver finally had something to report. But the comm number wasn’t Diver’s. And after a bit of searching his memory for the name he realized that it was the mech who had helped him with a tech problem when he had moved in.

/’ Perceptor? Heard you were the one who met our new guest before and thought you might be interested in seeing this. ’/

Chromedome worked in maintenance and tech support. A tall orange and yellow colored mech who didn’t seem to be taking his work too seriously, by what Perceptor had seen during their one meeting at least, but he had been helpful before and certainly had his interests now.

/’ I did. Did something happen? ’/ Perceptor asked, surprised to realize that he was feeling concerned for the mermaid, automatically assuming that something bad had transpired while he wasn’t looking.

/’ Oh, no. Nothing like that. I was just woken up by Stripmine and went to check the tank integrity. I couldn’t find anything wrong with the tank or the filters so we decided to check the security tapes instead, and uh… Well, as I said. You might want to see this. ’/

The offer was rather cryptic, but Perceptor thought that he better go and check it out anyways.

/’ I’ll be right there. ’/

Chromedome asked him if he knew where the security office was, and after getting the directions Perceptor sent the open tabs to his datapad before he closed the laptop and headed out.

It was a ten minute walk when he wasn’t dragging his pedes, and it wasn’t even the first time he had been hurrying somewhere today. There were a few more people up already, and he tried to not look like he was this close to running in the hallways as he passed them with hurried nods and greetings.

Stripmine was waiting for him by the doorway of the security room, holding it open for him by clinging to the edge of it and ushering him inside when he got close enough. Perceptor stepped inside, nodding at Chromedome who was sitting in the chair in front of the monitors, and receiving a nod of acknowledgement in return.

“Sorry, we don’t have seats to offer but make yourself comfortable,” Chromedome apologized and then reached for the controls, motioning at the main monitor that was situated on the table itself. The three of them huddled around the monitor, Perceptor standing right behind Stripmine who had to practically stand on his toes to be able to see.

“So what are we looking at exactly?” Perceptor asked, optics scanning the video feed that was wound back to last night, if the date and time were to be believed. Chromedome stopped the rewind and then more gently poked the feed forwards again by around twenty minutes before the time stamp said 3:45am.

“Keep your optics here,” he simply said, tapping over a brambling living metal bush that was meant more to block vision from outside the wire fence than for its pretty looks. The feed was dark, and Perceptor squinted his optics as he tried to see anything, but after a moment the bush seemed to shake and from below it poked out a white helmet with wide optics.

The three of them were watching the video in shocked silence, more so Perceptor than the other two who had already assumedly seen this once, as the mermaid squirmed and forced its frame through the bush (and probably the wired fence behind it as well). How it managed to fit through from there seemed to defy logic, but first you could see both of its arms, dragging its chassis through, and then one long fin popping into view at a time, before the rest of its frame seemed to slither through with much more ease.

“How did it get through the fence?” Perceptor muttered in question, one hand covering his mouth in thought while the other was hugging over the glass of his chest. Chromedome leaned back in the chair and shrugged his shoulders.

“I didn’t yet go check, but I’m sure there’s one mermaid sized hole there behind the bushes.”

Well that much was clear, but how had it made that hole? Or had it already been there and the mermaid had just discovered it?

“That fence is made out of N grade cybersteel. You would have a hard time cutting it even with hand tools,” Stripmine muttered knowledgeably, and that was another thing Perceptor wondered. It couldn’t have just chewed its way through a wire fence.

On the video, once the mermaid was all through it was propping its chassis up with its arms as it looked around curiously, its long tail curling up behind its form. It was hard to see details from the security feed but the tail seemed to be a lighter color compared to the chassis, and its waist was framed by some sort of skirt platings that emphasized the curve of its hips. But it looked oddly slim.

After surveying its surroundings, the mermaid was then moving forwards with determination, its movements looking slow and clumsy when it had to practically drag its weight over the ground with nothing but its arm strength and slithering movements. And when it finally made it to the edge of the pool where Perceptor had found it, it was starting to look like the reason it had picked this pool was simply because it was closest in proximity to the mermaid’s entrance.

The mermaid was leaning over the edge, its helm bobbing up and down as it tried to see if there was anything worthy in the pool, probably spying for the fish. And it seemed to have seen something it liked because a moment later it was smoothly diving into the water below, shedding all of its awkward clumsiness the moment it was back in its element.

“It’s harder to see it in the water in the dark, but after the sun is rising you can spot it at times,” Chromedome said, straightening up again just enough to be able to reach the controls. He changed to another camera’s feed that was positioned to film the pool itself, and started to skip over footage to reach the sunrise.

“It obviously came in to hunt. Those fish are probably easy prey to a predator like that,” Perceptor mused aloud, his optics still fixated on the monitor even when you couldn’t really see anything from the fast forwarded feed.

“Uhh, yeah. Well, you’ll see,” Chromedome replied rather cryptically again and Perceptor glanced at him in question. But once the pool in the video feed was illuminated by sunlight he was looking closely again, the video continuing at normal speed.

You could spot the mermaid when it was closer to the surface, but if it went too deep you could only spot the shadow or nothing at all. The tank was deep enough for the sun to not reach the bottom of it, with enough impurities in the water to hide whatever was happening in the deeps. But fortunately the mermaid decided to occasionally try and go for the fish that were trying to snack on the water’s surface.

The mermaid was circling the school of fish from a distance, probably trying to keep them together while picking out the weakest individual. And judging from the smooth way it was able to swim in the water it shouldn’t have been a challenge to capture one of the poor creatures. But when it came time to lunge for the kill the mermaid seemed to be hesitating. It was attempting to lunge forwards, but always stopped, as if it wasn’t quite sure when to go in. And after going back and forth a few times the fish eventually spotted the predator and decided to smartly scatter, making the mermaid finally try and make a final lunge for the closest fish. But just when it would have sank its claws into it it was hesitating again and recoiling away.

“That’s…” Perceptor started, trying to put his thoughts into words but failing miserably. Fortunately Chromedome was ready to fill in for him, his tone something between amusement and pity.

“The saddest attempt at catching a fish I have ever seen.”

“Well, I would not have used those words exactly but…” he couldn’t quite disagree either. Mermaids were supposed to be one of the most efficient killers that deep waters had seen. He had witnessed the claws and fangs and the strong coiled frame personally just few hours ago. Even the mermaid himself had been bragging about its hunting skills! It was supposed to be a predator but it almost looked to be…well, afraid of the harmless fish…

“That’s not even all. Check this out,” Chromedome said, sounding almost sorry for what he was about to show, but not too sorry to not sit up straighter so he could find the spot in the video faster.

He stopped at just after 6am, not that long before Perceptor would be walking down there himself. The mermaid was swimming back to the spot where it had dived in, leaning its palms against the wall again as its helm tilted upwards, seemingly considering the high edge. Perceptor hadn’t thought about it at the time, not even when he had had to lower the datapad for the mermaid to be able to see it without having to crane its neck, but there was no way for the mermaid to reach the edge and be able to pull itself out the same way it had gone in.

“It’s stuck,” Perceptor stated the obvious out loud.

“Very,” Chromedome added, and Perceptor was sure that behind his facemask was an amused smile even when he couldn’t see it.

“Couldn’t it decide to get stuck somewhere else?” Stripmine asked, apparently not happy to have a troublemaker in his hands after all.

Perceptor was still staring at the monitor, watching the mermaid consider the edge, scratching the vertical metal surface with its claws before it seemed to give up and just continue swimming along the wall. As if it could find a spot that would be easier to scale.

“So it’s alone and struggling. I think we might need someone with more knowledge to take a look to see if it’s because it's hurt,” Perceptor said, more to himself than to the other two. He considered their options for a moment while Chromedome was pausing the video and turning it off. There was no mermaid to be seen in the live footage of the pool, and maybe it was still hiding from being scared by Stripmine.

“There’s no way to track it under water?” Perceptor then asked, looking at Chromedome who tilted his helmet as he gave it thought.

“Not with the security cameras, no,” he hummed, and while Perceptor hadn’t thought that to be possible in the first place he still felt a bit disappointed. “But we have those heat vision cameras in the B-wing. They were using them on that dive a few weeks ago. I helped them prepare them. We could try to borrow one and see if we can find your fish?”

Perceptor felt slightly flustered at the comment, but thought that it was just an unfortunate choice of words. It made it almost sound like they were doing this for him and not the poor mermaid. He considered the other idea for a beat before he nodded in confirmation. The mermaid’s body heat might be just enough to show up on the camera, at least surely the machinery around its spark casing should be warm enough to be tracked.

“Thank you, if you could ask them for it that would be a great help. I informed Diver about the mermaid before but that was before we knew that it was having trouble hunting. Is there any way that we could get a record of that footage to show him?”

Chromedome’s EM field rippled with clear amusement despite his facade being so permanently passive, and it was clear how funny he thought that video would be. But Stripmine reached to his tiptoes once more to pipe up before the other could say anything and before Perceptor could feel truly annoyed.

“I can do that! Leave it to me, I’ll get the videos mailed to you in no time.”

“I can have those cameras set up today. The team shouldn’t have any use for them on land anyways,” Chromedome said and whirled around in his chair and got up so he could let Stripmine have his chair back.

“Alright, I’ll leave you two to it then.”

Perceptor exited the security room with Chromedome, but they split ways as they headed to opposite ends of the building. This day was only getting weirder and weirder, and he felt like he shouldn’t have even been shown this footage. He was just one scientist that had been called to help with a gene project. Sure that was the precise project that the mermaid had gotten tangled in, but he wasn’t even in charge of caring for the tank. He literally just spent his time in the lab looking through samples.

But now as he thought of that curious creature possibly being hurt, he could feel worry simmer in his spark.

#maccadam #simpatico #perceptor #brainstorm #tag for my writings #sft tag #mermaid au #do you know that feel when you think you're much better at writing brainstorm #and still end up writing everything from percy's pov?#clown wig is on

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misty-wisp · 2 years

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9, 13, and 24 maybe :3?

9. Do you prefer Headspace, Black Space, or the Real World? Why?

Ughghghgh part of me REALLY wants to say Headspace because it's such a cool funky little RPG world....I love it...so much....but the fact that it's just an escapist's dream world to run away to is what stops me from going with it.

Nothing beats reality! I loove how the fact that it's real life is reflected in the few times we see the RPG mechanics: The only way to heal is through bandages and first aid kits, emotions only happen on a whim, the fights themselves are a lot more difficult...

I really really love Black Space, too. It's inspired by Yume Nikki, but the vibes it has are more akin to .flow(which is a yume nikki fangame lol) which makes it SO much cooler and I was really close to going with that one lmao

13. Do you have any Omori headcanons?

None that I can come up with off the top of my head. Whenever I have a headcanon, I try to root it in canon as much as possible...

...Anyways, asexual biromantic Sunny. Don't argue with me.

24. Scene or moment in-game that shocked you the most?

OH. EASY.

THE ONE DAY LEFT TITLE SCREEN.

See, by the time I made it into Black Space in the game, I read up on every scary thing that happens in the game along with every Black Space area there is to make sure I was fully prepared to go through it with no issue. I was streaming it to my boyfriend so he could comfort me while I was playing, because I am but a weakling who cannot handle spooky games.

I managed to get through all the required doors without freaking out by turning down the game's volume and playing shitposty music with a discord bot. Me and my bf also joked around to keep me calm. It was fun. I got through the entirety of Black Space, witnessed Basil fucking die, and made it to One Day Left in reality.

It was 5 in the morning. I decided we should head to sleep. I saved, fully relieved that the scary things were over, and went to the title screen.

big. fucking. mistake.

I swear, seeing that red background and hearing the screeching behind it(thanks omori ost 151 listening+screeching) is nightmare-inducing. I knew that Black Space got its own title screen, but I completely forgot the same went for One Day Left. I literally screamed when I saw that shit, and somehow it didn't wake my family.

So uh. Yeah. Title screen did it. Not any actual jumpscares.

Pain. Suffering, even.

Ask me about OMORI

#ask #anonymous #thank you for the ask!#ask game thingy #omori spoilers

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martinedjohn · 1 year

Text

The Damned Dance at Night Part 2

PART I

TUESDAY

SEPTEMBER 1997

Chapter One: Joe’s Mixtape

How Bizarre – OMC

Joseph James regarded the pale blue sky while he ran his feet through the grass. He put his hands in the air and admired the coat of cobalt-blue polish on his nails with the paler background. They looked lovely.

It was the first day of school, but he didn’t care because he didn’t attend school; he was on his lunch break. He ate a piece of jerky and wished it were dried moose meat. It made him miss his Atsoo. She was soft and round, and she chewed tobacco and beaded moccasins. She had paid his way off the Rez.

His earbuds blasted Push It by Salt N Peppa. The drum machine hit hard, always on time, but the song pulsed with life.

He went over his plan one more time: work, save up money, leave the West Coast, fly out to New York and become a hairdresser. He planned to make the world more beautiful, one person at a time, starting with himself. The city had movie stars, musicians, artists, and professional basketball players. If everything went according to plan, he would have saved enough in a year to move out of his basement apartment and into a basement apartment in the city.

His lunch hour stretched out, and a fresh cool breeze blew across his shaved head. He clipped the one guard up the side to where his head rounded and then a two on top.

He daydreamed that he would work at the most beautiful salon and have designer clothes and shoes and a haircut other than what he’d done himself with a clipper. THE Madonna would phone, “Listen, Joseph,” she would say, “my regular hairdresser has come down with rheumatoid arthritis. I need your services. My roots are out of control, and my ends are a tragedy. Please! I need you.”

“Madonna, I’m busy,” he would say, “with Janet Jackson. I might be able to fit you in. But -- I’m so busy.”

“Name your price,” Madonna would say, “You’re the BEST.”

“A cool half million,” he would reply, “But you have to tell me the deets on Tupac and Dennis.”

“And Jean-Michel,” she would say, and Madonna would become his best friend.

He succumbed to the cushion of grass and looked up at the clouds. He picked out soft shapes and named them ‘dog-faced horse’ and ‘venomous spider monkey.’ There was a dreamlike quality to today, and it made Joseph feel beautiful.

Me against the World started playing. Pac was a poet. His anger felt real, and the third verse was incredible.

He knew it wouldn’t be easy. No one was coming to save him; he had to save himself—just him against the world.

His thoughts drifted to basketball. There was a game tonight. He watched every Chicago Bulls game. He loved Michael Jordan, Scottie Pippen, and especially Dennis Rodman. Dennis was the hardest-working player and always had the most fantastic hair (pink, purple, leopard print). Dennis had tattoos and piercings and was the first man he had ever seen in a wedding dress. He looked so beautiful in that dress.

Joseph was a solid baller himself. He was quick, wiry, and just as likely to steal the ball from you as pump-fake you into the air. He was the type of guard you wanted on your team: he could shoot the three-ball, pass into tight traffic, and be a fierce defender. More specifically, His defense was maddening to those he played against. He bodied you hard from half-court and made you pay for every step. He made your life miserable on the court. He knocked you just enough if a ref was watching, and if you were playing Rez ball, he hacked at your arms until you couldn’t hold the ball properly. He worked a lot, but he still shot around at one of the nearby schools when he had the time.

He struggled to rise from the comfortable lawn and returned to the restaurant. His manager greeted him with a cold smile that drained his confidence. It was frowned on that he’d left the restaurant to eat his lunch outside. White people: they were always watching you. He put his apron on and headed into the bustling kitchen. He was looking forward to finishing work. He had promised himself a present, the mall had a two-for-one special on piercings, and he planned on taking advantage of it.

Chapter Two: Sam’s Mixtape

Basket Case – Green Dayhttps://open.spotify.com/embed/track/6L89mwZXSOwYl76YXfX13s

1997 was the worst year, and Sam Graves had decided to end it; he was going to kill himself on Friday night. Punk and comics weren’t working as diversions anymore; all he could think about was death.

Green Day’s Dookie played on his yellow Walkman. It clicked and whirred annoyingly as it played. Its chassis was made of bright canary yellow industrial-strength plastic scarred from carelessness. He carried it with him everywhere.

Tapes were cheaper than CDs, but he wanted a Discman. All the cool kids had them, but he didn’t classify himself as cool; he felt like everyone overlooked him. He stuffed his Walkman further into the bottom of his jacket pocket, pushing his fists into the denim, hoping no one could see how poor he was.

Welcome to Paradise’s solo kicked in, and his stride quickened to the bass drum. He was halfway to school. It was the first day of his senior year, and he had just turned seventeen. He hardly remembered the party. There was a montage of cake and presents in his head, muddied by his depression.

When I Come Around started playing as he stopped to look at his High School across the street. He noticed most kids had all-new clothes, shoes, and backpacks and looked down at his outfit, feeling embarrassed. He had picked up used Levi’s that were too big for him, a second-hand Rolling Stones tongue-logo shirt and an old black jean jacket that he tie-dyed himself.

He felt poor and stupid. He didn’t want to be here. He turned up his music, put his head down and walked forward.

Chapter Three: Kim’s Mixtape

Energy Flash – Joey Bertram

Kim stopped at the fridge to grab a beer on her way out of the house. It was the first day of school after a fantastic summer. She slipped on her pink gumboots, popped the top off her Budweiser with the flick of a wrist, and bounded out the front door.

The first school day was always disappointing, and she planned on ditching. Kim walked down her driveway, taking small sips of her beer and scheming. She stopped, took a slug of beer, and admired her two-door 1986 AMC Eagle 4x4, a blocky black vehicle that resembled a tank more than a car. She drove it over everything. She took it everywhere, off-road down thin trails to beaches, over meridians in the center of the road; whatever she threw at the Eagle, it took and kept going.

Kim took her last sip of beer and poured the rest on the front lawn before entering the Eagle and firing the bottle into the backseat. She turned the engine over, felt it ‘BRRMMMM’ to life underneath her, and surveyed the road.

She barreled along the roads to the school, following Sarah’s route. Sarah was her best friend. She enjoyed walking -- said it was an excellent way to clear her chakras and invigorate her mind.

Kim liked driving. Peasants walked.

She placed her hand on the black onyx necklace Sarah had gifted her. It protected her from negative energy and made her patient and determined. She wasn’t sure about the patience piece, but she felt more determined with the necklace. She felt optimistic about her senior year.

She noticed someone walking down the sidewalk. What was his name? He strutted with his headphones on and looked rugged and handsome with tousled auburn hair and jeans worn out in the ass and knees. He looked like he never straightened his shoulders because he wanted to appear smaller. His jaw looked chiseled, but not from working out, more like from grinding his teeth together. Was his name Nick? Didn’t he use to be a soccer player or something? He was mysterious. Did he hang out with the skids or the nerds now?

She arrived at school and noticed Sarah in the gravel parking lot, chatting with one of the Goths. She drove over to her and turned up her music. The stereo flooded the parking lot with Mental Cube’s Q. She skidded to a stop, spraying gravel, and Sarah turned around with a smile. Kim jumped out, leaving the car running and the stereo blaring. Sarah’s face went bright red, but she smiled and danced along.

“Who’s this hot boy?” she said, “Too hot to stay at school today.” She ushered Sarah to her car. “We need beers and bikinis and a beach.”

Sarah pulled away, pondering the right course of action, and then piled into the passenger seat, “Okay,” she said, “but get us out of here before someone sees us.” Kim got into the driver’s seat, hit the gas, and nearly ran into ‘Nick.’

“Hey, you!” Kim shouted, “What’s your name? Nick?”

“No,” he said quietly, “My name is Sam.”

“What are you doing today?”

“Nothing,” he said, staring at his feet.

“Well, how about you hop in with some babes, and we go to the beach?” She looked at Sarah for verification, and she shrugged.

“Well, I don’t….”

She grinned at him, “Last chance.”

“Sure,” he stammered, and Sarah got out and let him climb into the back of the car. His face was flushed red from excitement.

Kim snickered to herself and hit the gas.

Chapter Four: Sam’s Mixtape

Until It Sleeps - Metallicahttps://open.spotify.com/embed/track/63aVbch5VRXtQnCITdeDTZ

Sam stood in the back of the CD store, browsing the metal section to put space between himself and his schoolmates.

“Whatcha looking at?” Kim surprised him, looking over his shoulder at the CD he held. She plunked her chin on his shoulder, grinning from ear to ear. Sam felt her breasts on his back, and his breath quickened. Her energy was frenetic, haphazard, chaotic, and provocative. It was hard to break away once you got sucked into her gravity field. She was incredibly charismatic.

“Metallica.”

“Oh yeah. Those guys used to be cool. Back when they had long hair. They sold out and cut it off.” Kim picked up the album Load. “I heard they mixed all their blood and semen for the cover image. You might get AIDS from the album.”

She rubbed the album on him. He backed away, and the album clattered to the floor. Kim laughed at him as he bent to pick it up, “You can’t get AIDS from just touching something,” she changed topics, “What do you want to do? We’ll buy some hot bikinis and then head to the river. We could bring a picnic. Go grab a couple of beers.”

Sam’s heart leaped into his throat. Beer? He didn’t drink.

“That sounds great,” he heard himself say, and he immediately regretted it. Sam’s heart pounded in his chest.

“And I’ve got magic mushrooms at my place that I’ve been saving for a special occasion. We should get those too.”

Sam looked down at his feet. He sighed and looked back up at Kim’s beaming face.

“It’ll be great. Trust me,” she said, “I might even let you listen to Metallica in the car.”

#cult #daemons #demons #highschool #horror #horror-thriller #horrorfiction #indigenous #lgbt #lgbtlove #supernatural #vampire #Spotify

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fictionstuff · 2 years

Text

Status: played through in less than 15 hours, guide used but was mostly tricked by trico’s (insanely slow) ai

Points: 3.75/5 [3,84375]

I still remember having started the game shortly after it’s release and it seemed kinda cryptic, but the most disappointing feature was probably, that this cat-dog-bird companion never seemed to react and I eventually stopped playing, because I couldn’t advance in the future. Having heard that one of my most lovely friends did like the game, I picked it up on stream once again and voíla it was a good experience with a massive, massive portion of frustration for how not smooth the gameplay can be, if you have to rely on an unresponsive ai in the disguise of our very cute dog-cat-bird companion named Trico.

Nonetheless I have to say that the story and visuals are truly stunning and in retroperspective upgraded the game immensely and let me forget about the frustration I felt while running through the main plot line. No wonder the team needed 6 whole years to make the game look as stunning and deliver a well written storyline. Perhaps the AI improvement would have been a quality of life improvement, too, but onto my review anyway.

Artwork/Design - 4.5/5

TLG’s graphics are truly stunning. It's already a pleasure to just run around and stare at the environment and backgrounds. The textures look nice and while the ruins can be a bit repetitive, once you’re on top everything looks spectacular. Even Trico’s design is absolutely amazing. I doubt anyone could not fall in love with his dark sparkling eyes! Even his feathers appear to be absolutely realistic and it’s easy to notice how much love was put into presenting an eye-catching game. There is perhaps not much variety environment or character design wise, but everything that was created for this game remains drop dead gorgeous and realistic.

Framerate ain’t always the smoothest thing, especially when you’re on top of Trico, but that could hardly stop me from venturing onwards.

Story/Gameplay - 3.75/5

I did have my ideas about how the story would play out and that perhaps there’s neither right nor wrong in this world, but the deliverance and execution of the main plot line was great. As cryptic as it started out, the story started to piece itself together the higher you went up the tower and although the end could have been foreseen, it certainly didn’t take away the excitement of finally resolving the mystery of the ruins.

The picks up slowly, mysteriously, as a young boy is seemingly thrown into some sort of prison among ruins. Only later on, you will get to know what truly happened to the kid and why he ended up in the tower. In the cave he finds a furry large creature, a mix of cat, dog and bird. It is severely wounded and chained. Through offerings of barrels that glow in the dark rather suspiciously, he gains power and eventually you help him out of his chains. Now while this seems cute, there is not even much of a hint telling you what you’re supposed to and it takes some time to get used to such a mysterious gameplay.

In between if you just stood rooted in one place, thinking of what to do, clues would come up via a voice in the boy’s head, reminding you that this story is not taking place in the boy’s present, but in his past. The entire plot is merely a memory and the boy is showing us what wondrous things happened to him.

While making you’re making you way up the tower through quite a few puzzles, that aren’t always easy to solve, the boy and Trico grow ever closer together, until a certain point where the boy can give Trico commands and the gameplay relies more on Trico’s AI, rather than just puzzles you can solve as the boy. Now if the AI was any… more responsive it wouldn’t have made me plug out my hair bit by bit. The forging of bonds is a truly heartwarming experience, especially so when the boy gives him food or even destroys signs Trico is for some reason insanely scared of, but it does not diminish the frustration you feel climbing up towers when all Trico does is either stare at you or even go back just because the command was not 100% correct.

I had to find several guides on how I could make Trico move and even more often did I ask myself if there was anything I missed, like solving a puzzle, just because Trico didn’t move the way he should have. This really severely got on my nerves and something that could have been enjoyed easily turned into a nightmare.

Another small thing I have to mention is the wonky gameplay moments where you’re controlling the boy. Climbing onto and down Trico is always a little difficult, taking way too much time, especially so when you for some reason end up under his head or butt. Jumping becomes incredibly annoying, when your timing is not 96% on spot. Falling does not mean you have to start miles away, but if you always fall at the same spot just because your timing was not spectacular, then it gets a little… disturbing, especially so since the story is so interesting and you’re dying to know the truth. Nonetheless I gotta say that the gameplay of the boy is befitting, since he’s just a small weak child. Hence there also is no combat system. I guess it might have been interesting to see him pick up a spear, but as soon as soldiers come, which somehow want to stop you from advancing, you have to rely on Trico to punch them away.

Despite my frustrations, very obviously on stream, TLG tells you a very mysterious, unique dark twisted story that has many heartwarming sweet moments and also a bittersweet ending. Thank you for actually making my weak heart cry.

Enjoyment -3/5

#game review #review

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illicitlimerence-writes · 3 years

Text

cherry | b. barnes

pairing: quarterback!bucky barnes x cheerleader!fem!reader word count: 1.2k words warnings: sorta-smuttish??? like not full-on sex but like, making out?, dry-humping??, language, bucky's a horny little shit. don't know how to explain this but, forbidden love?? sorta??? idk author's note: i wrote this in like an hour, kinda short but i really like how this turned out. did not proof-read, though! as always, english is not my first language, so please be nice and sorry for any mistakes.

My Masterlist

(gif not mine, creds to owner!)

the loud cheering was now just background noise, all your focus was on the lips that kept assaulting your neck, sucking lightly.

"baby, no marks." you muttered, soft sighs escaping your lips as you threw your head back.

you heard him grunting in response, his grip on your waist tightening, pulling you closer. his other hand went to the back of your thigh, and you wrapped it around his waist, leaning against the brick wall for support, rolling your hips.

"fuck, cherry. you're gonna be the death of me," he moaned into your ear, hot breath that made goosebumps erupt on your skin, your nipples hardening against your top from the chilly night air. you shivered, throwing your arms around his neck, fingers threading through his soft hair.

he pulled his head out of your neck to take a good look at you. your neck a bright red color. cheeks flushed. loose strands of hair that fell from your ponytail framing your face. and your his favorite cherry red lipstick, completely untouched.

that was the rule whenever you and bucky made out before a football match. he could not ruin your red lipstick. it matched perfectly with your cheer uniform. but it looked even better on his neck, the stain of the trail of kisses you left on his neck clashing with his blue and gold football jersey.

bucky was the quarterback and captain of the west high wolves, meanwhile, you were captain of the cheerleader team of the east high eagles. it was basically common knowledge that your high schools were rivals, so imagine the scandal that would break loose if someone found the picture-perfect head cheerleader making out with the bad-boy quarterback of the rival team... it was risky, you both knew it, it would ruin both your reputations. but it was a risk you were willing to take, the thrill of the forbidden made your mind dizzy, your heart beat faster.

you had been careful up until that night. but you hadn't seen him in weeks, which was why you were a little too caught up to hear someone shouting bucky's name in the distance.

too lost in the feeling of bucky's lips back on you, small kisses on your cheek, your jaw, behind your ear, before finally settling back on your neck. he tapped your other thigh, and you wrapped both your legs around him, rolling your hips when you felt his hands settling on your naked skin. the red skirt you wore was now scrunched up around your waist, your red spandex shorts underneath the only thing protecting your heat from making contact with his tight jeans.

he grunted when he felt you around him, head snapping back to look you in the eyes.

"are you..?" he started, lifting one eyebrow, eyes darting to where your front met his. you bit your lip, nodding. a smirk threatening to break on your face. your heart stopped at the look he gave you, eyes dark, his grip on you tightening. "one kiss. please. i just need to taste you," he whispered, his lips on top of yours. you opened your mouth, tongue sliding out, licking his top lip.

"no, you know the rules." you muttered, rolling your hips again.

"such a fucking tease," he spat and the smirk you wore made him want to go to church to confess the thoughts that invaded his head, all the sinful things he wanted to do to you at that moment.

"you love me," you said, cocking your head to one side. with his hands on your ass, he lifted you up, making you hiss at the harsh friction.

"fuck yeah i do, cherry." he admitted, burying his face on your neck once again. "missed you so much, missed your tight little body all over me. missed my cherry," he chanted, lips traveling to kiss your breasts on top of your full shell top. in bucky's mind, you had never more beautiful on that cheer uniform. even if you were rooting for the wrong team.

"missed you too, buck. fuck." you whimpered, your senses taking control, seeking the friction you desperately needed. your soft sighs and his low moans were like music to your ears, each sound sending tingles down your body. "love you, buck. you're gonna win this game for me, baby?" you sighed, feeling adrenaline running through your veins.

"fuck, yes, cherry. gonna-"

"bucky? what the hell are you doing?"

you both froze, your eyes widening as you felt bucky setting you down on the floor, hiding you from whoever interrupted you two. he turned to face a blonde guy, bright blue eyes trying to get a glimpse of you. he wore a blue jersey that matched bucky's.

"nothing. i'll be there in a minute," bucky motioned for his friend to leave, his hand wrapping around yours protectively. the guy rolled his eyes, and instead walked up to you both.

"hi, i'm steve. you must be cherry, this idiot can't stop talking about you." he greeted you, offering you his hand.

with flushed cheeks, -the guy had caught you humping his teammate, for pete's sake.- you looked at bucky, and he sighed in surrender.

"cherry, this is steve. my best friend, he's an ass and everything he says is probably a lie. steve, this is my cherry. you know enough about her. there. now, go." he said, leaving you stunned for a second. your eyes met bucky's, you interlocked his fingers with yours. with your other hand, you took steve's.

"hi, my name's y/n. nice to meet you, steve." you smiled, shaking his hand.

"okay, enough," bucky separated your hand from steve's. taking it in his instead, which made steve laugh.

"geez, chill, man. i'm leaving. pleasure to meet you, y/n. good luck out there," he pointed to your uniform, which made bucky grunt.

"steven, i swear to god," bucky started, but was cut off by your laughter.

bucky finally relaxed his shoulders when steve turned to leave, you removed your hands from his, tracing your fingertips up his arms, locking them around his neck, fingers playing with his hair.

"your cherry?" you asked, biting your lip. and bucky wanted nothing more than to drown in the taste and feel of your lips on his.

"hell yes, cherry. mine. all mine. i'm yours, too." he wrapped his arms around your waist again, leaning your back against the brick wall, your hips flush against his.

"you're mine, bucky. and i'm all yours." you whispered, lips touching.

and right then and there, you broke the rules.

you lifted your mouth to meet his, lips crashing in a sensual, needy kiss. he didn't respond for one second, too stunned that you were actually kissing him, right before a game, ruining your his favorite cherry red lipstick. you couldn't care less. the only thing that mattered was kissing your lover like your life depended on it.

at that moment, you decided you didn't care if anyone found you. high school drama and rivalries meant nothing compared to what you felt right then. and, if the entire town decided to cast you out for being traitors, you could live with that.

all you needed was bucky.

and all he needed was his cherry.

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scandalsavagefanfic · 3 years

Note

Hello! I am a huge fan of ur writing. I've loved everything I've read of yours. I've read alot of what you've posted, except for a couple of the tags that are squicky for me (so I'm very thankful you tag very thoroughly). No judgement for the squick, it's just not for me. & when I'm having a bad day, I usually just go thru ur ao3 and find something to reread. I think about Therapy's Bruce & Jason every damn day. While I obvs appreciate ur darker more "problematic" content (I really vibe with some of the themes you write about bc of my own trauma, & so it's very cathartic to read about in a fictional setting), I am truly a sucker for ur more happy content. The Happily Ever After verse also lives in my head rent free. Idk more wholesome stuff just seems more special when you write it. Anyways. I would die for you. But the point of this ask is cause I'm curious as to why you don't like Urban Legends? I'm sorry if you already talked about it here or on twitter and I missed it. I was just wondering because I really enjoy your take on things and would love to hear why you dislike it. I've been enjoying it so far personally, but I am always open to DC comics criticism.

Aw thank you so much! I'm so flattered by everything you just said. You're so sweet ❤❤❤❤❤

I haven't talked about Urban Legends here or twitter (I haven't been very active in either place lately. Just a lot going on and no energy 😔) but I'm happy to do it here.

Before I start though, I just want to add a standard disclaimer and make it clear that if you like it, there's nothing wrong with that and you don't have to let me ruin it for you lol. Like what you like.

That said, since you asked...

I said this when I was talking about it on discord, that there is a difference between hope and expectation. I always hope that a new story centered on Jason (or anyone really, but things have been especially egregious for Jay for 15 years) will be good or at least treat the character with a minimal level of respect (to be honest, the bar is super fucking low). But my expectations always temper my hope, to keep it from getting unrealistic. Because my expectations are based on experience.

The long history of Jason Todd, since even before his resurrection, has been one of retroactively trying to make him "a bad seed" in order to absolve Bruce of any responsibility in his death.

I don't even expect DC or their writers to start honoring the fact that Jason was not an angry, reckless Robin (and less of the later than Dick or Tim and definitely Damian). There plenty of ways that retcon can be folded into his history and be compelling and sympathetic. And if they're going to stick with that retcon, I'm only asking that they do it in one of those compelling and sympathetic ways because Jason was 15 when he died, heroically, in one of the most selfless acts in comics, to save a woman who literally handed him over to be brutally murdered. He was 12 when Bruce plucked him off the streets, he'd been homeless and fending for himself for at least two years. I personally think that Jason's story hits harder for him and Bruce if their original, canon relationship, of Jason as starry-eyed and eager to learn and absolutely devoted to Bruce and Bruce to Jason, is preserved. But Jason's origins does leave room for a meaningful interpretation of him as angry and frustrated at the lack of meaningful results of Bruce's methods.

And that's really where my irritation at stories like Batman: Urban Legends, Cheer and Batman The Adventure Continues has it's roots.

Every time one of these stories comes out, I think (or hope, rather) that this will be the one that remembers and respects the origins of the Jason and the Red Hood, that takes into account the changed sensibilities of comics readers in the 30 years since Jason's death and the subtle, 20 year, retroactive campaign to make him the "bad Robin". The "born bad" trope is played out and literally no one likes the message it implies. That some kids are just bad eggs and there's nothing parents or the adults around them can do. Especially when it's played as the kid's fault. If Jason's time as Robin is going to be characterized by anger, then it should be rooted in anger at the social injustices he witnessed as he grew up in an impoverished, crime-ridden, area and the horrors he faced raising himself when every day was a battle for survival. There are topical, meaningful, stories to tell with that backdrop.

But those are never the stories we get.

⚠⚠ Spoilers for Batman: Urban Legends, Cheer ⚠⚠

I'm particularly disappointed in Urban Legends because for the first issue, it looked like that was the kind of story we were going to get. I was put off by the first flashback of Jason being mesmerized by Bruce's guns, and I got that feeling in my gut that it was a bad sign. Jason depicted as impatient and overconfident and the scene with the guns is heavy-handed foreshadowing that got my spidey-sense tingling. I had a inkling then (in the first three pages) of how this story was going to play out, but it was early and I could still see many narrative paths that could lead to a satisfying story. My concerns were soothed somewhat and the little flame of my hope fanned, with the flashback of Alfred scolding Bruce, with Barbara's concern for Jason. A bit of worry returned with the way Jason ruthlessly pursued an addict who didn't appear to be a dealer and with the ending of the issue. The stuff with the addict sat wrong with me but the ending was tempered some by how despicable Tyler's dad was written. The scene was clearly set so that the reader could sympathize with Jason's decision and the scene with the addict could be brushed aside as a side-effect of comics over-the-top need for constant action, so I still held hope.

Issue 2 made me uncomfortable and it's where my hope starts to take a backseat to my expectations. I can dismiss Jason's self-deprecating internal monologue as unreliable narration, except that the flashback reinforces his thought process to explicitly show that it's not unreliable narration, and should be taken at face value. Jason faces physical abuse at the hands of his mother's drug dealer and when the flashback continues later, Jason kills the drug dealer. To be clear, this is a pre-Bruce Jason. His mom is still alive. He's like... 10. He kills this guy for shoving his head into a wall and implying Jason's mother paid for her drugs with sex. This is a scene that serves a single purpose. To show that Jason has always been prone to violence.

In the spirit of full disclosure, there is the small chance the drug dealer might not be dead. But the story obviously wants the reader to think he is, and it hasn't done anything to change that yet.

Starlin already did this story with The Diplomat’s Son in 1988 and he did it infinitely better. AND that’s still technically canon. So now I’m supposed to believe that Jason lost his cool bad enough to kill two douche bags before his sweet 16? Like it’s totally normal for abused kids raised in poverty, who’ve led hard and heartbreaking lives to just... haul off and kill people? That’s bullshit, and when taken with the Jason in the third issue, who is little more than an idiot thug, this story is really doubling down on some fucked up stereotypes.

Which brings us to the most recent issue. I went into this installment with very low expectations. I thought this story was going to be about Jason, through this experience with Tyler, a young boy with a similar background to Jason's, coming to the realization that Bruce's way is the best way and that Bruce did his best by Jason.

That would be annoying (in no small part because it takes increasingly absurd levels of plot armor to keep Bruce's no kill rule relevant, let alone irrefutably right). But I can probably live with that, if only because maybe if Jason officially falls back into line with the Bats crusade, maybe I'll get stories that treat him with respect, stories that don't relegate him to comic relief, dumb brute, or a background body with no lines in a story about the Joker burning Gotham (like Jason would just fucking stand there quietly for that).

And that may still be where the story is going, Jason realizing Bruce is right.

But holy shit do I not have the right words to describe how fucking insulting and gross issue three is.

From start to finish--including the flashback--Jason is written as cruel and fucking stupid. Like straight up dumb.

The entire issue is Bruce explaining the fucking basics to Jason like it's his first day. And Jason flies off the fucking handle and terrorizes a doctor he knows isn't a part of making the Cheerdrops, beats the shit out of some random addicts, and finally, when he can't accomplish anything on his own because he's a dumb brute he calls Barbara for help and rushes in with no information where he's promptly incapacitated and must now wait to be rescued by Batman.

This panel is the least of the issues sins but I can’t screenshot the entire story but it’s representative of the tone for the whole issue (and retroactively tainted the prior two issues).

This is beyond insulting. The only conclusions Jason comes to in this issue are the ones Bruce leads him to by talking to him like he can’t make the simplest connections. And like... in this story Jason can’t make the simplest connections.

This (and the Jason throughout the entirety of this issue) is a far cry from the Jason we fell in love with in Under the Red Hood, who was competent and strategic and intelligent enough to seize control of Gotham’s underworld from Black Mask (who’s no fucking slouch, he’s the first and only person to unify organized crime in Gotham) AND elude and manipulate Bruce until the time and place of his choosing.

This is a far cry from even the Red Hood and the Outlaws Jason who is competent enough to fight the League of Shadows and Ra’s al Ghul (among very dangerous and skilled others) and smart enough to create antidotes for mind control nanotech viruses.

As he should be, by the way. Jason Todd is one of the best, most comprehensively trained fighters in DC’s stable of non powered vigilantes. He’s not irrational or hot headed. He’s pragmatic, tactically minded, and patient. He’s a detective. Right now. Has been since he was 12. Bruce doesn’t have to make him one because he already is.

Jason is not a stupid thug who uses his fists because his brain doesn’t work. And I can’t tell you how so very exhausted I am by this narrative.

This is actually the most egregious example of Jason’s skills and intelligence being not just undermined but dismissed entirely. Even Morrison’s Jason had some degree of competency.

The one, single redeeming factor of this story is the art. It’s beautiful. And Marcus To is a godsend he seems to be one of only a couple of artists who remember that Jason was a child when he was Robin and I’m literally only buying this book because of him.

Anyway, I’m sorry. I didn’t want that to come out so... um... passionately lol. I’m just very very tired. My intention with this isn’t to ruin it for you, if you like it, that’s fine.

But this issue shot this story to the top of my "Vehemently Despise” list. 1) Batman: Urban Legends (Cheer), 2) Battle for the Cowl/Morrison’s Batman and Robin, 3) Batman The Adventure Continues.

I hope the next issues somehow salvage this dumpster fire. But I’m not expecting it.

(Damnit. That sounded harsh again. To reiterate, I’m not trying to judge anyone who enjoys it, I just personally hate it and you asked me why lol 😅)

#Batman #red hood #batman: urban legends #nice art #shit story #or at least shit characterization #jason todd deserves better #this response got long and I didn't edit it #please forgive any errors #and/or unclear spots #spoilers

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wormstacheangel · 3 years

Text

Second part to the mixtape headcanon. Dean’s reaction to Cas being at his door in the middle of the night with the mixtape in hand.

Dedicated to Liv ( @blue-eyed-cutiepatootie ) sorry it took me a while but here it is. Might not be what you expected but hopefully you enjoy it either way.

Cas stopped short in front of Dean’s door. His heart raced as he held the Walkman to his chest, clinging to the words he just heard, but he knew those words were years old. So much has changed in general, but between them, it felt like a still lake.

Since coming back, Dean has acted as if those dying words weren’t even spoken. Sometimes Cas wondered if he imagined the whole thing, but he knew the truth; Dean didn’t feel the same way and didn’t want to make it uncomfortable for them.

It was something Cas has accepted the last few weeks of being in the bunker, being home, but now, with Dean’s secret message, he felt the courage in him bubble up his throat.

Cas quickly knocked three loud, quick bangs with his fist before waiting for a response. He heard a groggy, “What?”

“Dean? May I—Can we talk?”

Cas didn’t hear an answer right away, and for a second, he thought maybe Dean fell back asleep; he knew it was the early morning hours but wasn’t quite sure of the exact time. Still, time never really meant anything to him before, but now, as a human, time has become precious, and he didn’t want to keep wasting it.

He took a deep, shaky breath, raising his fist to knock again, but the door then clicked open. Revealing a disheveled and disoriented Dean.

He leaned against the door frame wearing lemon patterned boxer briefs and a hand up his t-shirt to scratch at his chest, as he yawned before he blinked at Cas a few times, “Dude, it’s 3 am. What can’t wait ‘til morning?”

Cas swallowed his nerves down before looking down at the Walkman to take out the tape. He brought it up to Dean’s face, and with an earnest voice, he said, “You said to come ASAP. So I’m here.”

Dean only looked at the cassette tape; a small gasp of a breath raised his chest, but then his face scrunched up in the familiar fixed glare, so Cas continued knowing Dean won’t talk. Not yet anyway.

He put the cassette back into the Walkman as he talked, rewinding it to keep his nervous hands busy. “I believe I understood what you—what the songs mean, but I am still so new at all this. If I am wrong, I don’t want it hurting us.” Cas took a sneaky look back up at Dean to find him watching the Walkman with the same intensity Cas was.

It only took a few seconds, and then Dean was shuffling in the doorway as the first song, Ramble On, started to play through the headphones. With no other words, Dean opened his bedroom door open just a little more, an invitation to come in, before he walked back over to sit at the edge of his bed.

When Cas walked in, he closed the door behind him but stood awkwardly by it. He broke the silence first as he looked anywhere but at Dean.

“You know what, maybe this can wait until morning.”

“You already woke me up.” Cas looked up to meet Dean’s stare, it wasn’t cold, but it still sent a shiver down Cas’s spine. “So talk.”

Cas opened his mouth, not knowing what words he was even forming, but Dean stood with a hand up to stop him before any words were spoken.

“Actually, first, why are you bringing this up again? I gave you that thing years ago.”

Cas put the Walkman down on Dean’s desk, the music softer but still background music, before looking at Dean with guilty soft eyes, not knowing how to explain himself. “Yes. I just heard—I appreciate the gift, Dean. Thank you but-um.”

Dean seemed taken back by the words, and, by his hardening demeanor, Cas knew they were the wrong ones. Dean was building walls up again.

“You know what, Cas,” Dean scrubbed a hand down his face as he glared past Cas with an uneasy smile settled on his face. “I can’t do this right now. How about we leave the rejections for some other time? Yeah?”

Cas opened his mouth, confused, but Dean nodded.

“Good. Night, Cas.”

Oh. He was already being rejected. It made sense that Dean’s feelings changed after all this time. He must have been waiting for Cas to mention the message, but it’s too late now. He lost Dean’s love.

Cas reached for the Walkman, but now he wasn’t sure if he wanted to listen to those songs, understanding why Dean skips them now. So he fists up his hands, leaving the Walkman where it laid, before giving Dean a stiff nod in return.

“Understood. Goodnight, Dean.”

Dean didn’t say anything in return, his jaw clenching as he looked at anywhere but Cas. “And take your damn gift with you.”

Cas’s chest tightened at the words. He felt familiar pain spread through his body, one he wished had a physical reason than an emotional, psychological one because a fist to his chest would hurt less.

“I don’t want it anymore.” Cas spit out as he opened the bedroom door and walked out into the hallway. “Throw it away for all I care.”

He slams the door closed behind him and stalks to his room, slamming that door behind him as well.

Then as soon as he is in the safety of his own space, he can feel the pain making itself known, like a hot blade slowly cutting into him or something heavy sitting on his chest. Either way, he wanted it to stop. Wishing he never heard that message or that he heard it at the right time.

Cas laid wide awake in bed, curled up around a pillow he was hugging to his chest. He stared at the wall, wishing he had a better imagination to keep him entertained, but all he could see was Dean’s glare. The glare those green eyes dug into him really digging roots and pulling him apart from the inside out with an invisible pull.

He couldn’t go out there and face him now. Maybe, Cas should have just ignored the long-ago message. It was apparent Dean had lost those feelings for Cas; he would have brought up Cas’s dying words weeks ago if Dean felt remotely the same. Now Cas was left with an awkward situation he didn’t want to be a part of.

He needed to leave.

Cas knew that. This is how it always went. Cas needed to go.

Cas stood up to walk over to his desk to grab his wallet and keys before grabbing his coat, ready to sneak off before the sunrise. He’ll be gone before Dean can kick him out again.

He didn’t even get a chance to open his bedroom door before Dean was striding in with a determined glare, “Okay, fuck this, I think we really need to-” Dean stopped to look Cas up and down as his shoulders dropped. “You’re leaving.”

“I think—I think it’ll be best.”

Dean nodded, his bottom lip being sucked into his mouth as he stared back at Cas. “Sure. Just do what you do best. Runaway.” Dean threw whatever he held in his hand across the room and broke it with a loud bang. Cas flinched as he saw what it was, the Walkman. “Fuck if I care!”

Dean was already turning to walk away, but Cas grabbed hold of his arm to stop him. “Why are you so damn mad, Dean?” Cas walked to step in front of him. He moved until he finally locked eyes with the angry hunter. “I’m only doing this for you.”

Dean rolled his eyes and shrugged Cas’s touch away. “Don’t bullshit me, Cas! You’re running away cause you don’t want to face me.” Dean poked Cas’s chest as he continued his angry rant. “Why don’t you start acting like a fucking man and face the damn consequences instead of being a little bitch and running away?”

Cas didn’t stand down as he glared back at Dean. “Enlighten me then. What would those consequences be?”

Cas took Dean’s finger and pulled it away from his chest, but it stayed in his grasp as he took a step forward, never taking his eyes off the familiar angry glare. The angry man he left behind still here after all those years, looking back at him with an ‘I dare you’ stare, but Cas could always read past those words. Dean was hurting.

“Why don’t you stop acting like a…like a little bitch, and just-!” Cas stopped with a loud sigh while he dropped Dean’s hand, along with his stare. Instead, he looked down at their socked feet. Dean was wearing pizza socks while Cas wore matching burger ones. They came in the same pack, and Dean split it up for them. He cracked a small smile thinking of that day before looking back up at Dean with pleading eyes. “Dean. I’m tired of this. Can you please just…Just talk to me?”

“Nothing more to talk about, Cas.” Dean sounded more defeated than angry now. “I got the message. Loud and clear.”

Cas blinked at him a few times. “Well, I’m sorry, but I apparently haven’t gotten the same message.”

“Don’t play dumb.” Cas just stood there staring at him, waiting for him to continue. “Geez, Cas, how many times are you going to fuck with my—I get it, dude, you don’t feel the same! I am doing my damn best here to be fucking normal about this, and then here you come bringing that old relic back as if—Did I fuck up somehow? Am I not giving you enough space?”

“I have enough space, Dean.” Cas tried to understand Dean’s words, process them, but they all felt just as jumbled in his mind as they did, leaving Dean’s mouth. “I—I’m sorry, I just don’t understand.”

“Shocker.”

“Did I understand the message wrong?” Cas ignored him as he asked, turning his head towards the shattering remains of his gift.

He felt his shoulders fall as a pang of sadness hit him from seeing his first gift broken. Cas walked towards it, hoping he would find the tape safely stored away inside the deck of the Walkman. He crouched to pick up the big chunk of plastic in his hand. It was smashed beyond repair, and the eject button was not working. Great, he’s going to have to break it more.

“ASAP,” Dean mumbled to himself, and Cas hummed in response, twisting the part in his hand.

“Yes. That’s what you said, so I did.”

“I told you to talk to me ASAP years ago, Cas.” Cas didn’t have to look up to know Dean was walking closer to him. “Did you just listen to the message?”

“I did.” Cas’s shoulders slumped in guilt. Dean has been waiting for a response all this time. “Sorry.”

“So when you were—when you tried to return the tape, that wasn’t a, um, a rejection?”

Cas looked up at him before he stood up, the broken Walkman in his hand. “I have loved you then like I love you now, Dean. I would never. Is that what you think happened?”

“Yes!” Dean took a step forward as he ran his hand through his hair, his eyes traveling down to the broken shards. “Shit. So wait, when you said you loved me, before the empty…did you mean,” Dean cleared his throat as he walked closer, nervously scratching his beard when he realized he didn’t have any pockets to hide his hands in. “Did you mean romantically? Like, like human romance?”

“I,” Cas felt his throat dry up as he tried to swallow a lump as he nodded earnestly. “I did. Yes.”

Dean looked at him, looking for something, and before Cas could ask what it was, Dean had his hands on either side of Cas’s face—pulling him in close until they were chest to chest. Then lips to lips.

Cas didn’t even realize he dropped the machine until he realized he had his hands on Dean’s skin. Feeling his body lift off the floor until he was being dropped on the bed, and Cas was watching something he never thought he would have or hear.

“I love you, Cas. I love you so much.”

Happiness isn’t always in the having, but fuck, this was so much better by a long shot.

#miscommunication sure is a bitch #sorry they are frustrating idiots but they are in love so thats something #Destiel #Deancas #Supernatural #SPN #A More Profound OTP #destiel fic #destiel ficlet #destiel mixtape #My Writing #WormstacheWrites #Dean #Cas

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bonny-kookoo · 3 years

Text

Ready Player 01 | JJK x Reader | 🔞❤️☁️

Pairing: Jeon Jungkook x Reader

Genre: dystopia!AU, former Game developer!Jk, former pro gamer!JK, former IT specialist!Reader, former programmer!Reader, romance, Smut, slight cyberpunk elements

Warnings/tags: injustice, forcefully controlled public, violence (police/government officials against citizens), unfair powerplay, interrogation, tech talk, Jungkook be antisocial as FUCK but so is the reader lmao wbk, fear of physical contact (Haphephobia), past trauma and mentions of a bad childhood, insomnia, crime, smut because yes it’s me hello my content isn't kiddy-proof in the first place what yall want from me I'm not sure, but that’s waaY at the end ya know, friends to lovers, a slightly sassy AI but we love her, reader struggles with emotions, I mean same tbh, they're both so sweet tho I cant, not proofread because let me live

Summary: there’s a war going on; silent, but it’s there. Media has been strictly become controlled and regulated- to the point of making it illegal to own a TV or phone with internet access without a valid license. But there’s always some people that will try to break free from the controlling force.

"-a new age. This is a new year. And remember; we're doing this for the greater good. Until tomorrow." The news reporter stops talking after she somberly looks somewhere behind the camera that is pointed at her.

Your room is dark- the TV brightness on it's lowest setting so you can see what's going on- but outside, no one can see the light shining in your tiny apartment. Investing in blackout curtains had really paid off at the end of the day.

You don't want to get caught.

There's an announcement van driving past your window; the tiny slits in your curtains where the light from outside can creep its way inside brightening a bit as the headlights pass your windows. Something is spoken, and by now everyone knows the routine speech.

"Electricity will be shut down in five minutes. We advice to save all progress immediately- and we wish a good nights rest. Electricity will be shut down in five minutes..-" It repeats, over and over, counting down the minutes. You slowly move into your kitchen, opening one of the loose floor tiles to turn on your own emergency electricity system. With well practiced movements you close the tile again, moving the rug over it as you walk back into your living room, swiftly sliding the TV behind your wardrobe to make it disappear. As if on cue; there's a knock at your door.

The same as always. Routine. Two times, loud and clear. You don't even have to look through the peephole to know what awaits behind it.

"Yes?" You ask, rubbing your eyes as if you had been already asleep. The officer behind the door nods at you shortly, a mild smile on his face as he looks down at you.

"We didn't mean to wake you miss. Just routine, as usual." He says, peeking into your apartment to look for any electronics still running. It's pitch black however- so he simply nods, as his colleague notes something into his tablet. "We wish a good nights rest miss. Again, sorry for intruding." He apologizes, and you nod, closing the door.

Only when the street lights turn dark, do you move from your bed.

"Creator." The AI voice chimes up, her voice greeting you as as you lift the tile on the floor again- your phone connecting to the AI to show information you instantly decode and note down inside your head. "Player01 has just connected." The voice states, and you sit down on your cold kitchen flooring, smiling a little. "He has sent a message. Would you like me to play it?" The voice asks, and you take a deep breath.

"Yes." You say, and there's a small sound indicating the start of the voice message. A male voice is head.

"Hey, whats up?" He asks, and you can hear something in the background- maybe an empty can or something similar. "I uh.. I'm on my way. Should I bring anything? Ah wait, I know the answer to that.." He says, chuckling at the end of his sentence, and you can hear him zip up his jacket as he moves around. "Yeah uh.. just text or something, I'll bring stuff over. Can't have you starve." He ends, and the AI speaks up again.

"Would you like to repeat the message?" She asks, and you shake your head at her; a signal the artificial intelligence has come to detect quite well. "Should I archive it?" She questions again, and this time, you nod- something your invisible assistant can pick up due to motion sensoring.

"Send him a message." You say. "Tell him: I only need you. Get yourself here in one piece and I'm happy. And I'm very capable of taking care of myself." You state, and your phone shows a small loading message- indicating that the voice is doing as you said. It chimes up after a moment. "Thanks Kana." You say.

"No problem creator. Would you like for me to run through the databases now?" She asks, and you nod, a smile on your face. "Database search in progress. Estimated time: sixteen minutes and eighteen seconds." You huff out a breath as you look at the tiny display on your arm; tiny, yet powerful as it's your way of keeping Kana- your AI assistent- close at all times. Tonight, there would seem to be a lot to dig through.

They really added a lot of content these days.

It's not the door that makes you notice that there's a visitor after a while- He never uses it anyways for some reason. You're sitting on your kitchen floor with a small cup of tea in your hands- kept hot inside a slightly beaten-looking thermos can since you can't use to water boiler at night. Using anything other than Kana would cause a spike the police would be sure to notice; and you're not ready to get caught yet.

Not tonight.

It's a boy who, after a moment, opens the unclosed kitchen window to climb in; his combat boots getting a little snow and dirt from the outside into your apartment as his 80's looking jacket makes distinctive noises as it brushes against the sides of your window. His blonde hair has grown out a bit these days you notice- the roots clearly showing. It's a little wet and slightly curly from the moisture. It must be snowing outside- or maybe it had. You couldn't know for sure.

You never left your apartment.

He closes the window after slipping on the tiles inside a little, the plastic bags noisy as he almost drops them- sheepishly taking off his boots as he smiles at you. His socks are different from one another- but that's another thing so distinctive and just so.. him. He's his own person, always has been; it's what brought you two together, after all. You both stood out against the 'regular public' these days; with his brightly almost white-bleached hair he was like an albino in a sea of crows.

But you knew he didn't need that to stand out to you.

You can still remember the first few times the boy in front of you has visited you; the times where he had just dyed his hair to rebel out, or when he pierced your ears in exchange for you to do it to him as well. It was like you had made a blood pact in your kitchen that night- you had somehow gotten closer, formed a little more than just a simple companionship in order to riot against the law. He began growing close. Gave you a nickname. Began calling you his player 2. Began calling you his 'ace'. He had explained that he thought of it from memories of his gaming days; the two fighting teams always called red and blue, and one of his favorite weapons having that nickname- simply because it always 'saved his ass last minute'. He had rambled on about his last tournament after that, eyes sparkling and cheeks round from cold noodles.

You had become friends.

"hey." He says after sitting close across from you on the cold floor; the opened tile and Kana's core exposed to you two, the only source of light apart from your bracelet. The colorful LED's paint marks on his face and illuminate his features to you; but it does the same to you from his point of view. It's a familiar sight. "How are you?" He asks, almost shyly, but you know that's not what's bothering him.

"Hey Jungkook." You simply say with the hint of a smile, as you answer him. "Haven't slept well these days but, what's new I guess." You chuckle, and Jungkook smiles too- though a glimpse of concern is still shown your way. He knows however that forcing you to sleep won't do much good- your insomnia was too bad to really conquer it in a day or two just by taking naps.

And also; who was he to talk about solving personal issues.

"Have you seen the most recent reports?" You ask him, and the boy somberly shakes his head.

"I was unable to." He states. "They were patrolling close to my apartment complex because there had been someone reporting a Glitcher today." A 'glitcher'- a slang word now commonly used for people like Jungkook and you. People who went against the nightly routines, people who tried to trick the system by using electricity at night, owning media, consuming it, or dealing with it. It somehow became worse than underground drugs. "They pulled him out at around twelve or so- but they seemed too on edge the entire day, so I didn't risk it." He says, and you nod. Jungkook had always been a very good person when it came to calculating risk versus reward. He was good at reading people too- even though he didn't interact much, he got out of his apartment a lot more than you did. "Anything important?" He asks, and you shrug.

"There was a report that China and Japan were still on edge- with the chinese government arguing that they would soon start with 'more drastic measures to get things under proper control', whatever that means." You say, and Jungkooks brows furrow as he starts to pick on the skin of his jaw. "Let's just hope the flood doesn't throw us under the sea as well if it escalates I guess.." You say, and the boy across from you nods.

"Creator." Kana's voice chimes up, making Jungkook look up before remembering that the only source would be your bracelet, which you look at as well. "My scan of your body shows that you have not consumed a sufficient amount of calories today. I recommend a meal in the next five to eight minutes to avoid malnutrition." She says, and you groan. "I take this as a form of verbal communication. Running data search..." She says, as Jungkook looks at you; thoroughly amused by the teasing banter between the AI and his friend. "My data search concludes that you are annoyed, creator. I have only stated a fact however-" She continues, and Jungkook steps in.

"I've brought some leftovers from my dinner today we can eat." He says, pulling out some plastic containers as he moves to get proper cutlery out of your drawers. He makes sure to push them towards you, making sure to nod with a smile as you nod and thank him a little embarrassed. "It's nothing. You know I love you too much to let you starve!" He states with a grin, bunny teeth on full display as bitterness creeps up your throat- something you make sure to swallow down before beginning to eat.

Because the kind of love he's talking about right now, is not the kind of love you want him to feel for you.

"You forgot to give it a proper validation there-" He points out as you type away. "Otherwise it will just run instantly, and everything at once. That could crash older systems, and we know that V95 uses an older laptop, so we should take that into account." He says, and you nod, clicking back to the spot Jungkook is talking about.

This is what you're both good for.

Writing code for you had always been something you did with a passion- simply because you were good at it. Numbers and short phrases were something you could remember with ease; but you never had to think much about the visual aspect of programs in your department back when you were able to work for a simple programming company. You had simply always been tasked to program security systems and automatically updating firmware, or simple AI's for factory robots. Jungkook however had been all about the visuals; he had been programming games after all. That's why you two fit so well together in this scene. Whenever he would be in complete awe of the broad knowledge you had about official guidelines and security breaches, of staying undetected and unseen while still gaining as much as possible from every single line of code, he could always throw in his input to make sure the program you were both writing and updating for the glitch community was easy to use and simple enough so it could run smoothly on as many systems as possible. Be it phone, laptops, PC's- you two made it possible.

This program was connecting Glitchers all over the globe- and with yours and Jungkooks knowledge, you made it almost invisible. And even if it was somehow detected; there was no possible way to track down any of it's users.

The fact that you had to hide a simple program from the government made you sigh.

"Okay. Yeah I think that fixed the bug." He says, and looks at your arm- at Kana. "Oh, by the way, Kana?" he asks, and the chime gives him the cue to talk. "I heard you had a bug-fix too recently." He says, and the AI chimes again.

"I did, Player01." The AI answers. "The addition of code to my current program has proven to significantly increase my ability to observe and save more data." The female voice answers, and Jungkook grins. "You are happy, Player01." She states, and he nods.

"I am." He says.

"Why is that?" The AI asks, and Jungkook shrugs.

"I'm just happy you're doing well. Someone has to take care of ace when I'm not close by, yeah?" He states, and you try not to react to it. Jungkook is by now used to your more stoic expression; you're not too emotional and barely let things get under your skin. You've been hurt before, he knows this even if you never told him- he can see it in the way you hide inside the safety of your home, how you're so cold on the outside but still clinging onto him. Sometimes he wishes he could touch you; run his hand over your head to ruffle your hair like in those cheesy movies, hold your hand, or simply give you some reassurance in the form of a gentle hand on your back whenever you struggle.

But he's got his own demons, and they love clinging onto him just as much.

"V95 has connected to voice chat. Would you like to talk to him?" Kana states, ripping him out of his thoughts as he watches you nod.

"JK? Y/N?" A deep voice asks.

"We're here. Heard there was a raid close to you?" Jungkook asks, and he can see you grow a bit more serious at that. "Are you okay?" He adds, and V answers, although quite.. tired?

"I'm good. They got Jimin though." He states, and you sigh, running a hand through your hair as you stand up, frustrated. Jungkook knows you're trying to calm down by pacing. He doesn't mind. "They didn't officially arrest him, took him for 'questioning' though. We know what that's about." He states somberly, and Jungkook takes a deep breath.

"Jimin is a master manipulator V. He'll get himself out of it, I'm sure." Jungkook tries to reassure, but it doesn't gain him much than a hum from Taehyung on the other end of the line. "What about Sleeper?" He asks, and a chuckle is heard.

"He's been checking the videofeed from inside the past few nights. He said he's send some of the big bites to Ace though?" He says, and Jungkook looks over at your form.

"Yeah I've seen it." You simply say, though Jungkook grows uncomfortable with the way you're suddenly standing there. You're a little hunched, biting the skin on your thumb as you look at the tiles as if they suddenly began to move. He knows himself that things inside the 'rehabilitation centers' weren't all that nice to see- but you rarely ever displayed so much distress over it. "Let's just hope Jimin get's his ass out of this situation. We can't afford to loose him." You say, and V stays silent before he sighs.

"Yeah. I tell sleeper you've seen the stuff. Oh, and our prince charming has asked for a date with Ace. Again." Taehyung chuckles, and you groan- while Jungkook can't help but clench his jaw. Kim Seokjin was a very good asset to the team; with connections reaching deep inside the government and his position as a former lawyer- but he still hated his guts.

You didn't need to waste your time dating. You were totally capable of taking care of yourself, you had even said it personally! And for anything else Jungkook would provide for you. You didn't need anyone else than him.

He was totally not jealous of him.

"Can he not use our underground connections for that circus?" You say. "I don't even go grocery shopping, why would I want to go on a fucking date?" You mumble, sitting down next to Jungkook as you take a spoonful of rice. Jungkook feels a weird sense of satisfaction about the situation.

"Who knows." Taehyung says. "Alright, 10 Minute mark- I'll hear from you two soon. Take care." He says, and you both say your goodbyes before the line goes silent.

Although Jungkook hates physical contact, he likes keeping you close.

His heart is melting like chocolate as he notes the way your hand grips his jacket tightly as the two of you walk through town to get your license renewed- a way of holding onto him, and he somehow wishes it could be his hand. He knows yours would fit so perfectly in his, and yet he can't bring himself to do it.

His body is not cooperating.

He remembers vividly how his fear had developed; with his father and mother both being dramatically overworked and overwhelmed with having a kid at a young age, they had no idea how to make a child behave. Every second touch would bruise, every time he had been held would be force.

And at some point, he started to dislike physical touch completely.

It had just been like his growing interest in freelance climbing- the way he would walk and jump high over the heads of unsuspecting people, away from all judgemental gazes they'd throw his way for behaving the way he did. Only when the wind could hit him freely, only when he couldn't make out faces of anyone down below, only when he was high up- that was when he felt safe. The ground below had nothing of interest for him, no point in going down, as his apartment was located on the top floor of the complex. Jungkook never took the elevator, always the stairs.

He liked being reminded how high he lived.

And yet, there's one thing that pulls him down, brings his feet to the earth below, calls him like a siren song. It's you, hidden away from everyone's sight inside your tiny home, just as troubled and judged as himself.

He'd fallen in love with you the second you told him his name.

It had been a rainy night, his clothes drying on your heater as he was wrapped in two of your blankets; the smell of your fabric softener and something so typically you surrounding him like a mother's hug would a child. It had given him a feeling of comfort he had never quite experienced before, and it had also been the first time he had imagined what it would be like to hug you.

To have you close.

He had explained to you why he had freaked out when you reached for his arm to steady him when he almost fell inside your apartment through your window; had apologized and bowed his head in shame until you had simply shrugged.

"You don't have to justify yourself to anyone, Jungkookie." You had said. Jungkookie. "You're you. And I like you." You had said, not looking at him as you typed in some code to Kana's internal system.

His heart had warmed up at that.

And while you had accepted him, he had accepted you just as much. While at first caught off guard by your quiet and sometimes harsh way of treating him, he had also gotten to know just how gentle and delicately you treated the ones you loved. You were a loyal person, always going out of your way to be helpful, and silently basking in praise any time it was directed at you.

He loved that view. The way your cheeks would grow warm, how your eyes would sparkle; and he loved most of all, that he had been, according to Taehyung who was the second closest to you, the only one to see you smile.

You even laughed with him.

It filled him with pride to know that you were able to let go around him, even if it was just a little. It made him feel like he did something huge. It helped him sleep at night knowing that you were trusting him enough to let down your guard a little.

And it hurt him even worse knowing that he couldn't do the same thing for you.

He was a coward-

and you deserved a hero.

"Ace?" He asked, slipping through your window as he noticed the apartment silent and dark. Nothing greeted him. "..Ace?" He tried again, maybe you were asleep? But your apartment was quiet, empty, nothing spoke of your presence. Dishes were in the sink, a cup of water left untouched on the counter, and something inside of him churned painfully at the way this looked. He checked the kitchen tile, sliding it to the side like he's seen you do it countless of times.

It was dark.

Instead, he was greeted by a post it note. "Underneath the bed. Take care." Was all it read. He stood up, pushing your bed away from the wall noticing how your carpet had been torn a little. And as he lifted the cut flap of carpet, there was an envelope.

Your watch. A small in-ear piece, and your old IT-identification, folded.

A noise outside your hallway made his head snap up as he pushed the bed back into place, making an escape for it as he climbed outside the window, watch safely inside his jacket as he climbed back up on top of a building, before he examined it further, turning it on, after putting the earpiece in.

"Hello, Jungkook." Kana greeted him, and it felt weird to hear the AI say his name like that. "Creator has advised me to answer all questions you might have, and assist you from here on." She said, and Jungkook simply put the watch on, making his way to his own apartment.

"What happened?" He asked, his face serious as he walked.

"At around 6:12 O'clock, creator was taken into further questioning regarding illegal possession and knowledge of classified information and technological equipment. She had shown no resistance and complied with authorities. My observations however showed that she was taken with more force than necessary." Kana explained. Jungkook shook his head. "She had prepared for this instance during the night, approximately twenty-six minutes after you had left."

"She knew?!" He suddenly said, shutting his apartment door violently as he started to pace around, throwing his jacket on the couch. "Why didn't she contact me?"

"Analysis; your body shows signs of-" Kana started, but Jungkook interrupted.

"Shut up. Why didn't she tell me?" He asks again, and Kana seems to hesitate for a moment.

"Considering her close relationship to you, she probably wanted to not get you involved." She stated, and Jungkook sighed, sitting down on his couch as he gripped his hair. He should've stayed. Hell, it wasn't the first time he wanted to stay. He had dreamed of staying over, of fucking living with you for months to no end by now, but he was a coward. And this was his paycheck.

"Kana." He said lowly, and the small tune gave him the cue to talk. "Contact V95. Tell him it's urgent. We got an emergency." He says.

"I can't watch this." He says, jumping up and holding onto his head as to not punch his wall, unable to go through the videofeed of your interrogation room.

There's not much to see, but Jungkook knows that's simply because they haven't had the time to see to you yet. You and him knew best what really happened in these rooms, and he hated knowing that deep down they wouldn't go easy on you simply because you were a young woman. It didn't matter to them.

He'd seen teenagers way younger than you and him getting the rough treatment before- and elderly didn't get spared either.

The government bragged about having everything in order; yet they couldn't even control their own law enforcement it seemed. When he really thought back on his history lessons in school, not much had changed at all.

The world was still in utter chaos.

His palm shuts his laptop harshly- earning a tiny chime from the AI he’s already forgotten shares his home with him now. “I suggest that you practice care in treating your electronics to-“ he groans, successfully shutting it off at that. “Why are you frustrated?” It- she? Asks, and he sits down.

“I don’t know how to help her.” He admits in shame, thinking back to the footage of your hidden camera; the way they had pushed you to the ground, before grabbing you, leading you out of your apartment a few minutes away from him. “I don’t know what I should do.” He says.

There’s a bit of silence, until the AI speaks up again. “Do you have a romantic interest in my creator?” She asks, and his head snaps up at that.

“What the fuck? Why would you ask me this?!” He barks, unsure where to look since he can only hear the voice.

“I have observed both my creator and your behaviors; you seem to have a very deep rooted interest in each others well-being and opinions. This is commonly found in partnerships. I was only asking you to confirm if my assumption is correct.”

He’s silent for a moment, until he speaks again, watching the announcement van pass his window; voices dull and unintelligible though the walls and windows. “It’s no use anyways. Who wants someone they can’t even shake hands with?” He sighs, looking into his lap again. He hates that he’s like this; that even though he very much loves and adores you, there’s no magic moment that makes him forget- even though he craves the contact, he can’t do it. Every time he’s close to you, he knows that he could simply hug you; or let you rest your head on his shoulder, like in romantic movies. He wants to hold your hand, wipe your tears- but his body won’t cooperate. He can’t do it.

Not even with you.

“Creator seems very comfortable with you.” The AI states. “I have been asked to archive all text messages and phone calls of you two recently. When I asked for a reason, she claimed she would need it someday- I was unsure what she meant.” Jungkook furrows his brow, raising his head again. “Sometimes, when creator is deeply upset, she has the habit of playing some of the recordings of you singing, or reminding her to take care. My research has shown that it slows down her heartbeat to a more normal level and also improves her insomnia.” Jungkooks eyes widen at that.

Does that mean.. that you like him back?

"Kana, fuck- cut the feed." He says, agitated.

"Are you sure?" She asks, and he sighs, before yelling his frustration out, sitting down to take a deep breath. He slowly shook his head no. He couldn't let all your hard work go to waste like this.

He couldn't stay a coward.

"Jungkook, it appears to be that the creator is being let go." Kana suddenly chimes up, and Jungkook rushes to his pc setup to see for himself. And she's right- your arm is being held tightly, and something is being said to you, but your hands are no longer chained to the chair- you're free.

What just happened?

Jungkook sometimes really hates himself for being the way he is.

There's no sugarcoating it that you need comfort now more than ever, even though you don't openly show it to him. He can see it in the way you're still biting your nails, he can see it in your eyes which never stay on one point for too long. And he can definitely see it in the bruises on your upper arm, and the cut on your lower lip where you had bitten in anger and frustration. He wants to comfort you, he knows you'd let him- and yet he can't move any closer than where he is right now; only the length of his palm of space between you two. And yet it's like his joints are locked into place. He can't touch you.

What if he hurts you?

And it dawns on him right then and there while he watches you drink your can of overly sweet soda while typing your code like second nature, that he's not scared of you hurting him. He's scared of doing to you, what's been done to him. Because deep down he is aware that his parents never had bad intentions, never hated him or wanted him to suffer; they were simply unsure and not at all confident in how to really care for a child. They had been caught off guard and gotten overwhelmed by the sudden shift in their situation that they never truly knew what to do. And nowadays he felt like he was simply heading down the same road.

He was starting to feel like he was becoming just like them.

"Hm?" You ask him, ripping him out of his thoughts as he looks at you, your eyes wide and worried as you put down your almost empty can of soda. "What is it?" You ask him, and he wants to scream. He wants to throw a fit like a child at the way you seem to worry for him every time you should worry for yourself. He's a coward, he's useless, he's everything you don't need nor deserve in his eyes, and yet you always look at him like he's the main character of your favorite movie.

If he was, he was sure he'd be merely a sidekick- because you deserved to be the focus of every story told in his eyes. And if you weren't included in the tale, he knew he didn't want to ever know about it.

He swallows, before he manages to make his hand move, finger pointing at your arm where a green-ish bruise already formed. "Does it hurt?" He asks, and he's not even sure if he's asking you about the bruise, of if he's asking something else. He doesn't know what he's saying, doesn't even know if he's asking you or himself.

"No." You answer, and he looks at you, searching for any hint of a lie in your eyes. But he only sees that slight smile, lips turned a little, almost unnoticeable. But its there, he can see it, and he wants to print it into his mind to never forget it. You were so observant, knew him so well, that he was almost certain you knew of his inner fight and what he really meant with his blurted out question. "Are you okay?" You ask him, and he swallows again, eyes stinging with unshed tears as his body grows rigid like an unoiled machine, only moving with as much force as he can manage to come up with. His breathing is heavy as his eyes can't leave the spot on your arm, and your watch him with wide eyes as his shaking hand slowly reaches out.

He doesn't know what he expects to really happen.

Maybe like those electric shocks you get when someone had rubbed their socks on a carpet before touching someone else. Maybe he had expected to recoil instantly. Maybe he had expected nothing- but he was suddenly in a rush the moment his fingertip touched your warm skin, delicate, soft, everything his rough hands weren't.

And you were still as prey in front of a wolf.

But the wolf in this scenario was holding his breath while his tears finally fell. He wants to speak, but he can't, he doesn't know how to ask for something when he doesn't even know if he wants it.

But suddenly he moves again, his palm now resting fully against your upper arm, shaking, as it moves over the length of it, softly, as he imprints the way your soft skin feels. "Jungkook.." You whisper out, and he suddenly snaps, leans forward, his legs on either side of your body as he snakes his arms around you from behind, pulling you close to his chest. You can feel him shake as he holds you, his cheek resting against your back and you don't care about his tears staining your shirt as he suddenly cries openly and possibly for the first time since he was a mere child.

He's unsure, overwhelmed, because you're so warm, you smell so nice, you're so soft, and he can't let go, doesn't want to let go. He whines out as you turn a bit as he thinks you're moving away but you're simply placing your legs over his as you sit in his lap, hugging him back as you make sure to give him a gentle squeeze.

He calms down after a long while of simply existing. Of breathing you in, of feeling you. "You're right." He whispers into your neck, and you can't help but shiver, leaning into his hug.

"It doesn't hurt at all."

"You know, I get why you come up here." You comment, as Jungkook makes sure to hold your hand tightly in his, your feet dangling off the edge of the building you're sitting on top of. "It's nice." You say.

He's not listening that well though.

All he can really do is watch your face, illuminated by the neon lights of the city, hair swaying in the wind as you look down below. He doesn't quite know what you two really are, doesn't know how long it will take him to really come out of his shell and give you the love you deserve, but he's trying. He's fighting, he's left his cowardly self behind.

He want's to change.

And not just for you alone, because while he hates seeing you hurt, he knows what you two are doing- what all of you are doing- is for the greater good.

Jungkook hates your ideas sometimes.

Simply because he knows they will work, but also end up with you getting into danger at the end of it. And just like now, all he can do really is hope that you make it out as he keeps a watchful eye on your movements from above, giving you directions via Kana as you sometimes trip and stumble a little.

You're not a very active person; running wasn't really your thing.

Fuck, you were basically a hermit, the most you walked around was from your bedroom into the kitchen!

But then again, sacrifices had to be made somewhere. And Jungkook really admired you; because every time he thought that you had reached your limit, you would face it head first and break through it.

"Ace, try and somehow get to higher ground. They're caging you in from all sides." He urgently tells you as he watches police chase you down the roads, pushing citizens aside to not loose sight of you.

The plan had been simple. Gain all the attention so Taehyung could infect one of the police station's servers with a new worm, giving you all a better and easier access to any data and communication of the area. Jungkook couldn't play the bate well enough; and you had been on their radar already, making you the best option to gain their interest quickly enough.

Although Jungkook hated that part.

"Come on, ah fuck it." He grits out, jumping down to grab a ladder, making his way to a nearby area he could pull you up. There was no way you could reach any of the fire ladders yourself, and by now, things were getting too hot for him to risk anything. "Here!" He barks out, not thinking twice about grabbing your hand and helping you upwards, trying not to worry too much about your heavy breathing. And then there's it.

A pop, loud, followed by another, and another, and another. You're suddenly falling, scraping your knees on the ground below as he can't catch you, too startled by the fact that they had actually decided to shoot to react quick enough. "Fuck!" He says, eyes wide and pupils blown as he looks at you.

"Jungkook, why the fuck aren't you running?!" You yell at him, a scratch on the top of your left cheek as you push his leg away from you- the only thing you can reach. "Go!" You bark again, and he growls out something, before he manages to pull you onto his back, adrenaline not letting his brain process what he's doing.

He can't just leave you.

"Taehyung, get out, Ace has been shot. Whatever was uploaded has to be enough." He says via the in-ear piece, doesn't wait for a response. He still gets it.

"Fuck, what?! Okay okay, I'm out" He says, and Jungkook can only catch a glimpse of the older man leaving the building via the backside entrance. He's only concerned with getting you somewhere safe.

"Urgh." You groan, slowly sitting up on Jungkooks couch. "I mean, I know paintball hurts, but rubber bullets? Jesus.." You complain, while Jungkook looks at you with a dark expression. "What?" You ask him, and he huffs.

"You sound like you haven't almost been killed yesterday." He grimly says, and you shrug. "Stop. I'm serious." He tells you, and you let yourself fall back down onto his couch.

"Whatever. At least we killed their communication." You say, closing your eyes. "Must've at least pissed them off." You say.

"Kana." Jungkook suddenly says, waiting for the familiar sound to tell him she's active. "Shut down for now." He says, and you sit up, hissing instantly at the sudden movement.

"Hey- ah fuck!" You say, as you watch on your bracelet how Kana complies; shutting down. "Why would you do that?" You say in an offended matter, before you grow quiet, watching him go onto his knees in front of you, as he lets his head rest on top of your lap.

"I just want.. you to myself. Just.." He mumbles, and you slowly bring your hand to his hair. "Just for a moment." He says, and you sigh. Jungkook had been under a lot of stress recently, you no doubt being the main cause of most of it recently. So you simply let him be, as he closed his eyes. "Y/N?" He asks suddenly, and you answer him. "I love you." He says, and your body stops moving.

What?

"It's okay if you don't." He says, not moving from his spot, and neither opening his eyes. "I mean it. I only want you to know." He explains further. "Because I.. couldn't fucking live with myself if something happened to you, and I've never told you." He admits, and you can't help but stare at him. Jungkook looked down on himself so much that it was sometimes frustrating to see; simply because you saw him as such an amazing human being with countless talents and beautiful flaws.

You knew you couldn't muster up the strength to actually answer him; not so spontaneously. You weren't that expressive, you couldn't communicate as freely and colorful as he could. All your words seemed black and white to you, mixing into grey and mundane sentences while his words seemed to bloom into the most amazing paintings. He had a way of charming those around him- and he didn't even know.

You slowly leaned down instead, moving his hair to the side as you placed a feather-light kiss to the top of his cheek, close to his eye.

You hoped he would somehow understand you.

And as he moved again, looking at you with eyes that sparkled brighter than any city's skyline ever could, you knew he did.

He'd always understand you, no matter how you communicated with him.

You didn't need words to understand each other.

The shy kiss you two shared, bathed in the purple glow of the neon lights outside his window, spoke enough.

"You should try and sleep." Jungkook tells you, taking away your can of soda as you whine at him. "No buts. Come on, I'll finish this for you." He says, and you let him take over the keyboard of your laptop. It's something you really only let him get away with- anyone else would've probably lost a finger or two trying to touch your work.

You don't trust anyone but him at this point.

"I know that Kana snitched." You comment, as you lean your back against his shoulder. He chuckles. "Can't believe my own creation goes behind my back like that." You mumble, and Jungkook has a light tune to his voice as he speaks.

"Well, it's a good thing though." He tells you. "I worry about you." He says.

"Ugh come on, you know that's not the part I meant." You laugh, and he grins.

"Oh, you mean the part where you listen to my crappy ass singing to help you sleep?" He tells you with a teasing undertone. "No wonder you got insomnia trying to find rest to that." He chuckles, and you playfully hit his thigh.

"Shut up, your voice is nice." You say, and he's glad your eyes are closed, and you can't see him blush.

Somehow, moments like these re-energized him again. Because it proved to him that there was still a piece of that innocent and untainted you inside that thick shell you had put up to protect yourself. And considering that you let him see you like that made his pride grow taller than any of the skyscrapers of his city.

Maybe one day the two of you will have a future together that won't be so difficult and unfair like your current one was. Maybe one day, you both will have changed enough to teach the next generation about what you've overcome.

But then again; living in the moment seemed to fit a lot better in his eyes, as he watched you sleep soundly against his shoulder.

Yeah, this moment was more than enough for now.

The world won't change over night- you both know that. All of you know that. But small things were starting to make a difference here and there; for example, the letter you held towards Jungkook as his eyes widened.

"..and we have officially decided that we no longer want to participate in the case against the defendant. The result of this agreement is that all charges against Y/N L/N have been dismissed and are no longer being investigated." He reads out loud, almost whispering as if saying it too loud could make it a lie. "They let you go?" He asks, and you nod, the small bandaid on your cheek making you look even cuter in his eyes as you shrug.

"Jimin had reached out too. They've let him go home as well." You say. and Jungkook huffs out in disbelief.

After infecting the police station with the worm you had all worked on, you had scared the entire country enough to take a step back from the overall aggressive tone. It wasn't much- but it meant that they knew you were there. You existed, and you were not bowing down.

You were still untamed.

Jungkook smiled brightly as he put the letter down to the side, reaching out to you to pull you onto his lap. He simply holds you for a moment, his lips kissing the skin of your shoulder as if in a trance. "I love you." He tells you, and you smile, squeezing him a bit in your arms. "I really do." He assures you, and you nod.

You don't answer him, and he doesn't seem to mind as he leans back from you, his eyes crinkling at the edges as he grins, hands holding your face so delicately as he places a kiss onto your lips, making you close your eyes as he breaks away from you, letting you rest your head against his shoulder.

He's still not letting anyone very physically close other than you; he's still scared of going out and around like everyone else. You're still rather hiding inside his apartment- both of your apartment now- and you still have trouble sleeping.

But Jungkook keeps the nightmares away.

And you make him brave in exchange.

It's really weird to hear the sound of a radio nowadays.

Things are still far from normal- but recently, citizens had been given radios to listen to public broadcast again. It only played crappy music with some rare good tracks here and there, but it was better than nothing.

Jungkook couldn't help but think that your breathless voice was far more entertaining than any music station he can remember from his youth.

While he hates touching other people, even friends and family, he can't help but feel a rush whenever he touches you.

His hands can't stop on one specific spot, can't seem to stay still even for a moment as his lips nip and suck at the flesh of your neck and shoulder, marking what's his, visualizing that you really belong to him. He bears the same mark on his collarbone from last night, and he should have been satisfied, but even an early morning couldn't keep him away from you.

The rain hit the window harshly, but he didn't notice at all. All his eyes could see was your form underneath him, skin glowing as he moves above you, euphoria filling his veins as he can't look away from where you're connected, where his cock disappears inside of you over and over and over again.

"I love you." He breathes out as he comes undone, holding you close, resting his head against your shoulder, as you hold onto his arms, a smile, a genuine and big smile thrown his way as he can't help but smile along.

"I love you too, Jungkook." You say, and he chuckles.

The radio in the background still playing, as you lay in each others' arms.

(c)Bonny-Kookoo. Please stop reposting my content on AO3 thinking I won't find it. I'm literally everywhere you clowns.

To everyone else: Thank you for reading this mess- I really apologize for the messy storyline, but I just wanted to put this out before the entire thing escaped me again and I would end up struggling to find my way back into it (cough cough flashback to mean lmao). I promise to somewhat post more regularly. Thank you for your kind words and for sticking with me!

#bts imagine #bts #bts fanfic #jungkook imagine #bts fic #bts smut #bts jungkook #jeon jungkook #jungkook #bts reactions

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lady-o-ren · 3 years

Text

The Dig

Part Two (Because I was bullied into this . . .)

//Which can be read (HERE) for easier reading// And Part One (HERE)

In a little rented room above auld Geordie’s pub, Claire Beauchamp stood in nothing but her silk undergarments as she flipped open her weathered suitcase (once belonging to her dear uncle Lamb) she had heaved atop her bed. She rummaged through the contents, blowing at her curls clouding around her face, before pulling out a single dress of pale blue.

It wasn't something she usually packed whenever she went off on a dig but the dress had caught her eye in a department store window in London just before coming to Suffolk. She reasoned one never knew when the occasion might call for her to dress in something other than dirt stained trousers.

And never had she been more relieved by an impulse buy.

Or thankful for a rainy day that halted her excavation.

It was a chance to be with the Scot who thought her more precious than the iron rivets they discovered a few days ago, proof that the burial site they were knee deep in was a ship to honor a fallen king. She would've kissed him on the spot if it weren't for Foster and Pound.

The kiss however did come later.

After her and the lads celebrated with too many pints, she and Fraser went back to Sutton Hoo, slightly swaying with every step beneath the twilight, until their arms found their way around one another. Soon they were laying side by side in the grass and dirt, the air cool on their whiskey flushed cheeks, and she wrapped in his coat. Big and warm and enveloping like himself.

"We may very well be unearthing a legend here ," said Beauchamp, leaning back on her elbows, eyes closed facing the moon.

Fraser grinned.

" Beowulf ?"

She laughed and turned her gaze to him. "Arthur, King of the Britons !"

He laughed along with her, a deep and hearty sound, then joking all aside said -

"Anglo Saxon, ye think?"

She nodded and rolled to her side, nearly pressing herself against Fraser's chest, heaving from a sharp intake of breath.

"I told you before that something grand and marvelous was buried here . . ."

"Ye did."

Then shyly Fraser said -

"Bha mi a ’bruadar mun bhròn mhòr. . . Remember that bit from my notebook?"

Her eyes softened and her features took on a pretty shade of pink remembering a great deal more of what that book contained.

How each page held a piece of his heart.

And laid a hand over his chest, against that fervent beat.

"Of course I do," she answered back, but frowned a little when Fraser bashfully kept his gaze to the small gap between them where a dandelion bloomed.

"Weel, I wrote it that night after we first met, from a dream I had. Sounds a great deal better in the gaelic though. . ."

Beauchamp raised her hand to cup his cheek, thumbing the fine cut bones beneath his skin, before pressing her soft warm mouth against his lips.

"Tell me," she insisted, when they managed to part and nudged her nose against his.

And so he did, voice low and more than a little breathless.

I dreamt about the mourning.

The deaths of great men. Terrible men. Old and young. Of Kings lost in battle buried beneath us.

They cried out to me and the Earth came to life and twisted her roots around me, dragging me inside her womb. Dark and cold, breathless like a cave.

But I wasn't frightened. I saw lights rushing around me, bright as the twilight sky. The souls that lie ahead. Surrounding us.

They brought me to you.

He shrugged sheepishly then.

Just before she kissed him again. Knowing she'd never want anyone more than she did right then and there amongst the swaying trees and spirits of auld.

This man whose soul spoke to her own.

Too bad a crack of lightning had to ruin the night.

But at least the rain blessed them with a day to themselves in apology.

Taking one last glance in the vanity mirror (that was about as big as her compact) and another quick check that her nails were clean of dirt, Beauchamp left her room and walked down the hallway to Fraser's, knocking softly against his door. When no one answered she pressed her ear curiously to the door hearing voices and knocked again, just a bit more louder, tapping the toe of her slingback heels against the beaten wooden floor. With still no response (and patience never being a virtue she ever possessed) she flat out turned the knob finding it unlocked.

She poked her head in and found a room even smaller than her own and the source of the voices coming from a small red radio playing an adaption of a film from the windowsill.

- I might have known you were here. I had a feeling just as I hit the floor.

- That was your hat.

- Oh, Susan! Just look at it! Look!

Fraser himself was fast asleep and spread out atop the bed sheets dressed for a date to the cinema with his long arms crossed above his head and his big feet dangling off the edge of his too small bed.

Beauchamp stood watching him for a moment, filled with a sudden tenderness at his sleeping innocence . . . and a bone deep wickedness that gave her an idea. She closed the door quietly behind herself and flipped the lock, grinning as she did so. She then slipped out of her slingback heels and crossed the room in two short strides (the floorboards creaking with the pitch of a mouse beneath her), to carefully lay down beside him.

Fraser turned to her in sleep, a throaty murmur on his lips, and laid a heavy arm around her slim waist, gathering her heart to heart. She sighed happily and reached to caress a curl hanging low at his brow, admiring the color that reminded her of the scorching sunsets in Giza she basked in with her uncle so many years ago. Her fingers then threaded through his thick mane down to where they began to curl at his neck and was rewarded with an unexpected smile. Pure and sweet.

"You're too perfect for words, lad," she whispered against his wide mouth, but before she could seal their lips together his long blonde lashes fluttered open.

Fraser gazed at her sleepily, his smile only growing wider as the word Sorcha was adoringly breathed against her cheeks.

She wanted to ask him what that one meant. It might be her favorite bit of gaelic so far.

But then . . .

"Claire!" Fraser exclaimed, and nearly toppled them both out of the bed if not for Beauchamp clinging to his shoulders, steadying him above her.

"How di' ye - Why are ye -"

Beauchamp giggled loudly at his befuddled face and at his hair sticking up in all directions like a sunflower crown. She coasted her hands up the wide breadth of his shoulders to cup both his scarlet cheeks.

"You're door was unlocked, and you know how cold I easily get . . ." she playfully pouted, and tugged his face closer, enjoying how his skin felt like a glowing hot coal between her hands.

But Fraser pulled away.

"Claire. . ."

She sighed yet kept her amused grin.

"You're not a lad of sixteen, you know. You can have a girl in your room."

"I ken that," he answered back, with a defensive spike in his voice.

Beauchamp ignored his tone letting her hands wander to his chest, the muscles taut beneath his crisp white shirt straining to contain his racing heartbeat.

"We even spent a night under the stars together."

"That was altogether different."

Her eyes flashed with mischief as she toyed with the buttons of his shirt. "How so?"

"For one," Fraser breathed hoarsely, placing a hand over hers lest she get too carried away. "It wasn't all night, the thunder made sure of that, and we mostly were talking anyway."

"Mostly?"

"And two," he said firmly, ears pink. "There wasn't a bed either of us could fall out of."

"No, there wasn't," she agreed, deciding he'd had enough of her teasing (and only because she had never taken anyone seriously enough to go slow). "But you can still keep me warm, Fraser. Virtue intact. I promise."

He arched a ruddy brow, doubtful of the lass with cheeky hands and a red cheshire grin that could lure a man to break every sin. Yet he eased himself beside her anyway and in the only way that worked.

With their legs twined together, nearly flushed against one another.

And his big hand braced along her back, the fabric soft against his callused palm as he smoothed it up and down, feeling the gentle rise of her ribs as she breathed in absolute contentment.

“Better than sitting in the cinema don't you think?” said Beauchamp, as she nuzzled her face to the crook of his neck, warmed by his skin that smelled freshly clean. Yet she found herself missing the scent of a hard day's labor on him.

“Aye, much - wait!” Fraser shifted to his elbow. “We missed the film didn't we?"

Beauchamp, a little annoyed at being jostled, shook her head and tugged at his collar to settle her lad back down.

"No, there's still some time left. Cary Grant just lost his intercostal clavicle bone to a dog named George. . . Or was it a leopard named Baby?"

Fraser stared at her like she'd gone completely daft until he noticed the radio playing in the background and heard the inimitable voices of Grant alongside Katherine Hepburn.

- Now it isn't that I don't like you, Susan, because, after all, in moments of quiet, I'm strangely drawn toward you, but - well, there haven't been any quiet moments.

"Oh,” he chuckled lightly, dropping his head to the side. “I must've fallen asleep listening to Lux Theatre . What I meant was the actual cinema though.”

“I think Judy Garland is merrily singing down that yellow brick road as we speak. But don't be sorry," she said, with a kiss to the hard line of his jaw, before the words could fall from his mouth. "It would've been far too crowded anyway."

“But you got yourself all dressed up," he protested, as his eyes traveled down to where her dress had been rucked up tight over her breasts and waist (and where his hand involuntarily flexed over the winged flare of her hip) before hastily clearing his throat.

"Ye look lovely by the way, mo chridhe. More than lovely actually. . ."

That shy and tender smile of his was her undoing and made her feel light-headed and reckless.

"Either that clever mouth of yours keeps on with the compliments, Fraser, or . . ."

Her voice carried off as her knee glided up between his thighs and her arms clasped around his shoulders so that any thoughts Fraser had of being a gentleman were forgotten in a wanton blaze of heat.

Some time later, with Fraser's cheek pillowed against her breasts, breath hot and seeping through the thin blue fabric thoroughly wrinkled now, he groaned.

"I wish we weren't in a room above a pub that reeks of cigarettes and wee."

She hummed softly, her fingertips stroking the back of his head, twirling around his curls. Admiring their beauty.

"Where should we be then?"

Fraser lifted his gaze to hers, blue eyes glimmering with that undeniable emotion that should've scared her yet it only made her want to claim him forever.

"A woman like you. . ." He smiled. " In a tent somewhere outside the ruins of a temple or in a cave in the Himalayas."

Her chest bounced with sparkling laughter.

"How about when this is all over and our names are the talk of the town, you take me anywhere you please. Preferably with a bed we can both fit in."

It was a tantalizing thought yet Fraser couldn't help but think of Scotland. Of his home Lallybroch. With her hand in his passing through the centuries old stone archway as his lady of Broch Turach.

Someday, maybe. God willing.

"I can think of a place," he murmured, and tightened his hold around her lush frame and pressed a daring kiss of hope above her heart. Felt her shiver beneath his mouth.

- I've just discovered that was the best day I've ever had in my whole life!

- But I was there!

- That's what made it so good!

And together they drifted off listening to the rain and the silly, sappy music.

I can't give you anything but love, baby.

That's the only thing I've plenty of, baby.

Dream awhile, scheme awhile

We're sure to find happiness . . .

A/N: There’s a lot of notes so I’ll keep them to ao3. And there’s probably mistakes galore but I needed to post this before cringe settled in and I deleted it, Thank you for reading!

#jamie x claire #outlander fic #outlander fanfiction #gobbledygook writing

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armysantiny · 3 years

Text

Letters For You - KSN

Pairing: Sunoo x female reader || Enhypen

Genre: fluff, oneshot, request

Includes: Soobin (TXT) mention, translator reader, idol Sunoo, massages, spa day, texts, gifts, coming home late, eating at a café, café, dying hair, KakaoTalk, cuddling, watching kdrama together

Word count: 1518

Warning: food cw

Rating: PG

Networks: @kwritersworld, @kdiarynet, @kpopscape, @ultkpopnetwork, @kpopficsnetwork, @kpopcontentcreatorsclub @k-dinernet, @lovesick-net, @whipped-kpop-creators, @prism-nw, @hybenet, @k-library, @k-mysticsnet, @enhypenwriters, @enhypennetwork, @knet-bakery

Tagging:@teeztheflag, @intokook, @cherry-hyejin, @difcore, @ofaffectionate || Taglist Form

An: I hope you like this @xxatinyminionxx! I had so much fun writing this~

Long days at the agency weren’t anything new to Sunoo; just regular procedure. But coming home later than usual felt different ever since he had met y/n. Y/n was his lucky charm – Sunoo’s grounding presence when he would come back from the hectic rush of his schedule. And that night was no different, as the music artist sipped on his coffee on his way home. Entering the passcode for the shared apartment, the dyed-blond removed his jacket and shoes, a relieved sigh falling from him.

The apartment was quite that night however, much quieter than usual – the faint sounds of y/n working on a transcript nowhere to be found. Switching on the lights as he made his way to the kitchen, Sunoo’s eyes were drawn to the covered dishes on the table, and a note addressed to him.

“Does she have a part-time shift today...?” Voicing his thoughts as he went about following the neatly drawn instructions on the note, Sunoo warmed the prepared meal. Y/n had made his favourite, and he could almost distinctly hear – in his head – the subtle sound of y/n humming a nameless song under her breath, occupied with her next cooking project. His face flushed at the thought, humming the last melody he heard y/n singing. Perhaps y/n knew that he’d be home, because she’d video called Sunoo as he was putting the dishes on the drying rack. Picking up the call with a slight yawn, the teen perked up almost immediately.

“Noona! How was your day? Oh – where are you?” Sitting down on the sofa, Sunoo asked his question, parts of y/n’s background seeming vaguely familiar.

“Sunoo baby~ my day was good, I missed you today~ Ah – do you remember my sunbae? The one who went to study film?”

“Oh… Soobin hyung, right?”

“Mhm~ he needed a translator for his project late minute and I was the only one available. I’ll probably be gone for the weekend. I’m sorry baby~ will you be alright?” Y/n explained, an apology finishing her words. Soobin’s call had been the very definition of ‘out-of-the-blue’, but at the time y/n couldn’t deny that her sunbae sounded urgent. In any case, it was only for the weekend; Sunoo would be okay.

By next morning, Sunoo stretched as he slowly started to awake, his bedroom glowing from the light of the morning sun. Looking over to y/n’s side of the bed with a gentle but longing smile on his face, Sunoo traced his fingers over her pillow. She’d be back. Throwing his legs over the side of the bed and making his way to the bathroom to freshen up, the idol went about getting ready for the day ahead. Caught up on whether he should eat breakfast at home or go to a café, Sunoo grabbed a bottle of water from the fridge while he pondered on his options. Not expecting any calls for at least an hour from noon, Sunoo’s brow raised in curiosity when his KakaoTalk notification went off. Once he had read the display name, little butterflies bloomed in his chest as he opened the text message from y/n.

Y/n Noona: Morning baby~ I’ve been translating scripts until 2 am ☹ but I’ve got a long day, so it’s early alarms for me. Have you woken up yet? I saw a really nice breakfast café yesterday, I think you’d like it! I should vanish now, I’ll call you later. Love you, sunshine~

“Breakfast outside it is~”

Finding the café with the address y/n had given him, Sunoo marvelled at the exterior of the café once it had come into view. Had he walked into a kdrama set? The inviting scent of baked treats and hot chocolate were doing him no favours as it took a gentle hold over him, luring him into the ‘trap’ of a sweet breakfast – not that he was complaining, that is. Finding himself in line to order, Sunoo scoured the menu, easily finding something to eat that Saturday morning.

Watching people walk past the café windows while he nibbled on his pastries, Sunoo drummed his fingers against the table, unsure of what he should do to occupy his time. He could go and have a ‘me-day’; go to the spa, get a massage, redye his hair, all of it. Or he could head to the park and have a little picnic for himself, enjoy his break away from filming and schedules. Sipping on his iced coffee, the teen let himself get lost in thought as he set about finishing the rest of his breakfast. Food came first.

Making his way to the spa, Sunoo didn’t forget to make a stop by the library, buying one of the notebooks they had on sale. Y/n would definitely like it. The gift tucked away neatly in his satchel as he walked through the doors of his favourite spa, Sunoo went ahead and booked a massage for himself, a grateful a smile on his face as he took the clothes handed to him and went to the locker rooms to change.

A sigh of relief fell from Sunoo as the masseuse worked on his back, the knots in his shoulders finally being relieved after a long week. Feeling the urge to sleep getting bigger, the faux-blond let his eyes shut, the next thirty minutes passing by like a blur. Next thing he knew, the massage was over and he was being gently woken up by his masseuse.

“Mr Kim...?”

“Oh-oh, I must have fallen asleep. Thank you for the massage!”

“Oh no worries, you must have had a long week. Have a good day~”

“You too!” Bowing after he collected his things, Sunoo left the room, heading back to the locker room – where his clothes were waiting for him. Taking a seat and unlocking his phone, the teen scrolled through Twitter for a while before an – arguably cute – idea struck him. Opening KakaoTalk and recording a voice message for y/n, he sent it, a pleased smile on his face. That pleased smile soon turned into a wide grin as y/n replied almost instantly, cute stickers being sent his way. Snapping a quick picture and sending it, Sunoo put his phone aside as he changed, his heart beating as he anticipated his girlfriend’s reaction.

Y/n’s equally cute picture-reply on his mind as he sat in the salon chair, Sunoo had been getting his roots done, his hair layered between sheets of aluminium as he waited for the bleaching to work. His black roots had started to grow out, and he was due for a redye before it started looking like he had dip-dyed only half of his hair. Or before he started looking like a poorly designed manhwa character. Calling y/n, he asked about her day, listening to her speak with an endearing sense of curiosity on his face.

“I may have good news~” Y/n teased from the other line, watching the scenery pass by from her seat on the coach.

“Oh? Tell me~!” Sunoo replied, a light-hearted whine in his voice as he egged y/n on. He could just about hear the sound of steady traffic in between the momentary silence. “Are you driving Noona?”

“Hmm, kinda? I’ll see you later sunshine! Make sure to eat dinner~”

“I will!”

Returning home that evening after spending the rest of his day with his members, Sunoo opened the door to his shared apartment, a gift bag in hand. The sound of shuffling feet from the bathroom alerted him as he treaded slowly towards the front room. He wasn’t expecting any company, and y/n wasn’t due to return for at least the next day. Snapping his head to the sound of the bathroom door opening, Sunoo’s features brightened almost instantly, leaving his bags on the sofa as he ran over to y/n, engulfing his girlfriend in a hug. A laugh coming from the slightly older woman as she returned the hug, y/n cupped Sunoo’s face in her hands, pressing a soft kiss to his lips.

“Y/n Noona! When – when did you get home? I thought you were coming home tomorrow?” Following y/n to the sofa, Sunoo pulled y/n’s hand into his own, playing with her fingers while she spoke.

“Ahh, the translator my sunbae was originally going to call made it to the location today. Most of the work was already done, so I managed to get home early. I did well, didn’t I?”

“Yep~”

Cuddled up together as they caught up on their drama, Sunoo paused the scene on screen when he realised that y/n was fast asleep on his shoulder, her subtle comments on the characters no longer accompanying the sounds of the romcom playing on TV. Resisting the urge to take a picture, Sunoo gently lifted y/n’s head, carefully holding her up while sliding a cushion underneath. Tiptoeing to the bedroom and returning with a blanket, he chuckled and covered y/n’s sleeping frame. Tucking in the edges and brushing a stray hair out of y/n’s face, he placed a kiss on her forehead.

“You’ve worked hard Noona. I’ll give you your gift tomorrow. Get some rest~”

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polonium-snap · 3 years

Text

The Beauty & the Deku chp. 2

Summary: Izuku and Katsuki somehow get trapped in a book of fairy tales, to get out of it they decide to play their part in the stories. How far are they willing to go to fulfill the romantic plotlines? Will Katsuki be able to play the role of a fairy tale princess?

ao3

Wattpad

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When Katsuki comes to, he is washing some stairs.”Wha-? This again? You’ve got to be forking kidding me.” He stood up, inspecting his clothes, some raggedy top, and pants, which at least is not a dress, and went to a nearby well, staring at his reflection on the water, scowling.

“Kacchan?” He heard Deku’s voice from behind, and the blonde turned to him.

“Deku!” Katsuki said. “As you can see, we are still trapped in this nightmare.” He frowns. “What do we do now?”

“Let’s continue trying to go along with the story, maybe if we do it enough times, we’ll get out of here.” Izuku suggested.

Katsuki growled. “Shut up! What do you know? This is probably your fault since you didn’t have to be at the house in the end.”

Deku frowned. “Oh yeah, Cinderella totally broke through a door like you did.”

The blonde scowled back, blustering and turning to look away from Izuku. “Whatever.”

Which was Kacchan-speak for ‘I’m sorry, you’re right', good thing Deku was an expert at reading his childhood friend. “We should continue trying to go along with the story, this time as much as we can with the original.”

“No way, nerd. I already gave that a try and we are still trapped in this hellhole.” Katsuki argued. “It makes more sense to try and make the story different, if it doesn’t let us move on we can find the reason more easily.”

“What if that just makes us be stuck here forever, Kacchan?” Izuku argued back. “Let’s do it like the story says one more time, then if we are still here we’ll try your thing.”

The blonde frowned but sighed. “Fine.”

Izuku let out the breath he was holding and stared into red eyes. “Thank you.”

Silence hung heavy for a second between them for several seconds. “I’m sorry…” Bakugou mutters, surprising Deku. “You know, for kissing you at the end…”

Izuku blushed furiously. “Oh! Uhm, i-i-it’s ok Kacchan, that actually made us move on, so…”

The implication of the previous statement weighs on them, and the silence only makes heat rise faster and more intensely into Deku’s face. If the kiss was what made them move on, did that mean they would have to again until they were out of there?

The most obvious answer was there, if they were in Snow White, like Izuku suspected, that meant they had to kiss to be able to continue with the story.

“Wh-What story are we in anyway?” Katsuki asked if only to fill the silence.

“O-oh, I think we are in Snow White.” Izuku reasoned.

“How are we meeting so early then, isn’t the prince supposed to kiss snow white at the end?” The blonde tried to remember.

“No, I think they met right at the start of the Disney movie.” Izuku explained.

“Crap I can’t remember.” The taller teen rubbed his hand on his face. “How am I going to go along with the story if I can't remember how it goes?”

The green-haired boy bit his lip, he couldn’t blame Kacchan, apart from this being a stressful situation, it has been a long time since either of them either saw the movies or read any books with fairy tales on them. “I think I know how it goes, just make sure to go near the forest and run away from the huntsman and look for a small house, it belongs to some dwarfs.” He explains. “Make sure they let you stay, cook and clean for them or something, the evil queen will look for you, to kill you, she will give you an apple, bite it, I’ll take care of the rest and then we’ll ride off to the sunset.”

“My prince.” Katsuki said sarcastically, and Izuku glared, but his cheeks felt hot. “I got it, I got it, I’m just tired of cleaning stuff, like I knew old men hate women in these stories and think their only use is to cook and clean, I get it, old news, but it’s annoying as heck, you know?”

“I get it Kacchan, I’m sorry, but I really think that we can get out if we follow the script as much as we can.”

“Yeah, except we can barely remember how it goes, you lame nerd, even just talking like this can change the story.” The fiery teen started to raise his tone. “We’re already doomed.”

Izuku cringed. “You’re right, but there must be plot points that make us move on, you know like in Cinderella, the background repeated until we did what it wanted, to move on we need to keep doing just that.” He tried to placate the other man. “This is the best plan we have right now, just go with it until we can think of something better.”

Katsuki stands staring at the other teen for a few seconds, glaring, but pondering what was said all the same. “Fine, but we better get out of this, or I’m going to explode.” He turned away and started walking toward the palace. “See you later, nerd, don’t you dare die.” He closed the doors, leaving Izuku staring.

The wardrobes the stories were putting the blonde in were killing him, he looked so handsome, even in dresses. Now the blonde wasn’t exactly wearing a dress, but elements of it were clearly borrowed, Kacchan was in rags but still looked amazing.

Izuku shook his head, this was not the time to be fawning over Kacchan, he turned around and left the grounds of the palace, unsure of what to do with himself. Jesus, fairy tale princes really were useless and had one shitty line, like Kacchan had said, though maybe like this, he could look for clues.

He looked down and sighed, even his clothes were boring.

۵⚜-The Beauty and the Deku-⚜۵

Katsuki changes his clothes because he is not staying in some ugly rags, besides he is 70% sure Snow White wasn’t dressed so badly, she needs to be marketable, little kids wouldn't buy merch of her if she looked ugly right?

He went near the forest, as Deku had said, and sat on a rock, at least the scenery was always interesting in these stories, as Katsuki had never gone out of Japan, he could almost pretend he was visiting Europe or some shit.

“I’m sorry, princess.” Said a voice, which startled the fuck out of the blonde.

“Jesus fu-!” Katsuki turned around to find Rikido Sato, from his class. “Sato?! You are the huntsman?”

The other man’s eyes widened. “You know my name?!” His eyes watered. “The queen has never called me by my name.”

Katsuki hadn’t either until just then, but he wasn’t about to say that to a man with a weapon while he remained quirkless. “Yes, of course I know your name!” He lied, he was lucky with Sato’s last name, he was between Sato and Sota. “I’m going to be the next ruler of this kingdom, and you my loyal subject.” He was talking out of his ass. “How could I not know your name?”

Sato dropped the knife. “I can’t do it!” He cried. “The queen is trying to kill you, your best option is to run as far as you can and hope she never finds you!”

Katsuki stood up from the ground and scrubbed the dirt off his clothes. “Right, thank you, I guess, for not killing me or whatever.” He jogged into the forest, enjoying it more than he normally would, maybe because it had been a while since he had been able to make one of his mornings runs.

At some point, his foot got tangled on some tree roots and he came crashing to the ground. “Argh!” He exclaimed. “Dumb tree, dumb story, dumb Deku!” He raged, and sat on the ground, finding the cabin could wait. As he lay on the ground feeling sorry for himself he felt small tweets from above, and slowly, animals from the forest came out and stared at him.

The blonde groaned. “One of you better not be Dunce face or Hair for brains.” He couldn’t take any more woodland animals as his friends, although thankfully it seemed none of them was anyone he knew. “What are you doing here then, If not to torture me?”

All the animals started to walk toward somewhere, and Katsuki, having nothing better to do went with them, only to find the small house Deku talked about. He opened the door, finding the insides absolutely filthy. And as much as Katsuki had complained he disliked cleaning, he disliked even more letting it stay filthy.

‘Fucking fine’ He thought because only in his mind he could use his favorite words. “You win, stupid Deku, I’ll clean this pigsty.” Katsuki picked up a broom and started sweeping the comical amounts of dust and dirt, the animals around him started to do the same, and for the first time, he didn’t mind the small woodland animals that seemed to follow him lately.

When he finally finished he realized how tired he was, it had been a few days since he last slept, so maybe now he could take a nap. Bakugou climbed the stairs, peering at the small beds with the dwarf's names, he pushed some of them together so he could fit in and dropped like a log on them, paying no mind to the few small animals that cuddled him, he was too tired for that shit.

He closed his eyes and lost consciousness.

۵⚜-The Beauty and the Deku-⚜۵

“What is that? Is it a ghost?” Said a fearful but familiar voice.

“Ha! There’s no such thing as a ghost.” An angrier voice said.

“Who cares, ghosts can’t touch you, let’s just sleep and be done with it.” Said another voice that sounded just like Aizawa.

With his sleep finally disrupted Katsuki decided to sit up and fuck up anyone who dared wake him. When he rose from the bed, multiple gasps were heard. “What is it now?” He said, the blanket still over his head, which he removed slowly.

When he finally could see, he found seven eerily familiar dwarfs looking at him and gasping once again.

“Prince!” One of them exclaimed. “What are you doing here, young prince?”

Holy shit, this dwarf was All Might. Katsuki gaped at the blonde dwarf, his face a picture of the man’s old glory.

The teen looked at the others, Aizawa, Present Mic, Koda, Kirishima, Kaminari...and Endeavour?!

“Let me guess, you,” Bakugou pointed at Aizawa. “Are sleepy, you,” Present Mic, who let out a very loud sneeze. “Are Sneezy, you,” Koda blushed. “Bashful.” Then Kirishima. “You are Happy, I guess.” Kaminari. “Dunce face, you are obviously Dopy.” Bakugou laughed. “This must be Todoroki’s old man, Endeavour.” The red-haired dwarf fumed. “That leaves you All Might, I guess you are Doc.”

All Might smiled. “Yes, young prince.” He eyed Katsuki as if searching for answers. “What brings you here?”

“Yeah, that, the queen is trying to kill me or something.” The younger man dismissed carelessly.

“The queen is trying to kill you?!” Several of the small men exclaimed.

“Yes, so let me hide here, I’ll cook and clean, or something.” Katsuki forced himself to say.

“Like we would let a stranger stay here in our h-” Endeavour started to say.

“Of course you can stay, my boy!” All Might said. “Isn’t that right?”

“Yeah!” Kirishima, Kaminari, and Present Mic said, Koda blushed, and Aizawa grunted his approval from where he slept.

Endeavour growled.

The next day, after making the seven nuisances breakfast and them lining up at the door to go to the mine, Kirishima took of his stupid hat and watched Katsuki expectantly.

“What do you want.” The blonde said, but he had started to piece what hair for brains was silently asking, the redhead wanted a kiss on his forehead, Bakugou fumed, missing the cracking sound of his quirk. The thing was Snow White obviously did so in the movie, and if he wanted to be truthful with what he promised Deku, he had to kiss the foreheads of these dumbasses and thank god they wouldn’t remember, or at least he hoped so.

He reluctantly kissed Kirishima’s forehead, cringing when the dwarf continued in his way. It didn’t take long for the rest of the short men to follow suit.

Kaminari laughed and thanked him with a teasing smile. Katsuki struggled not to punch with his bare hands. Koda, bless him, just blushed and continued on his way, Aizawa grunted, Present Mic whooped in happiness, and All Might thanked him.

Lastly, there was Endeavour, who Katsuki categorically and morally opposed kissing, as much as he hated the half-and-half bastard his old man was trash and he wasn’t about to ignore that. But he had made a promise to stupid Deku who was probably living it large somewhere as a prince.

Katsuki swallowed his pride if only because he was a man of his word.

He slowly bent to press his lips on Endeavour's dwarfed forehead, closing his eyes to avoid extra trauma, and gave him a lightning-quick kiss.

“It’s not like I wanted you to, brat!” What the fuck? Was Endeavour a tsundere?

Bakugou would never be able to look at the number one hero ever again.

While Katsuki baked a pie in the old-fashioned oven he heard some commotion on the outside. Bristling Katsiki let go of the hot pie and peeked through the window, only to see Shigaraki dressed in black rags and carrying a basket of apples.

Holy fuck, Shigaraki was the queen?!

Katsuki couldn’t help it, he burst out laughing. “You?! Your crusty musty ass is the queen? HAHHAHA” He was nearly crying, Shigaraki looked worse than normal, and that was so hard to do in the blonde’s mind that he had to give the man kudos for surpassing himself.

“W-what? No, I’m no old queen, just an old man offering such beauty an apple.” Shigaraki stuttered, quickly jumping into convincing the teen into taking the blood-red apple in his ugly hands.

Katsuki wiped his tears of laughter. “I’m just, haha, sorry, It’s just been an annoying day.” He explained. “But alright, since you made me laugh so much I’ll take the apple, thank you for the few hours of peace, while that stupid Deku makes it here.” The blonde bit the apple, promptly falling asleep as he heard Shigaraki’s pathetic laugh.

۵⚜-The Beauty and the Deku-⚜۵

Izuku panted as he followed the forest’s animals toward the dwarf's house, where he knew Katsuki was waiting for him, the queen, whoever they were, was probably already chased off a cliff and Kacchan was placed in a crystal case.

He arrived at a clearing, watching as the dwarfs mourned Katsuki’s apparent death.

Wait. Was that Endeavour?! No. No, no time for that, literally everyone they knew was becoming a supporting character in these stories, it was entirely possible Endeavour was too.

...Was he supposed to be grumpy?

Izuku shook his head away from those thoughts and focused on Katsuki’s relaxed face as he slept and the dwarfs took away the glass casing on top of the snoozing blonde. Deku had always wondered why on earth the dwarfs just took off the case for some random prince to kiss the princess? What if it was just some creep? Though he had heard the age of the actual prince was 31, while Snow White was 14, which, what the hell.

Anyways he was getting sidetracked, maybe due to the nerves of having to kiss Kacchan, and the intense gazes the dwarfs were sending the green-eyes teen. He gulped, approaching the other man’s face, suddenly feeling very hot. It's not like they hadn’t kissed before, just two days ago Kacchan had kissed him, and there was always that one time they were 4 and wanted to know what kissing felt like.

However, both times it had been Katsuki who had initiated, not Izuku, Deku had never been the one to kiss someone, and the fact they were not conscious was really bothering him. It was morally incorrect to kiss someone who was unconscious, even if he somewhat knew Katsuki would be ok with it.

He felt dirty, like a 31-year-old prince kissing a 14-year-old girl, well maybe not that dirty.

But still, he did not feel great about this.

Finally, as his lips were millimeters away from Bakugou’s, Deku avoided the pink plump lips of his classmate and kissed the other’s cheek swiftly and reeled back. Katsuki’s eyes remained closed for dreadful long seconds, until red eyes fluttered open, sleepily batting long blonde eyelashes at Izuku.

“Took you long enough, nerd.” Katsuki complained as Deku offered him a hand and a taller teen rose from the adorned crystal bed.

“Sorry Kacchan.” Izuku said, relieved that the kiss on the cheek was enough to wake the other up. “Let’s go?”

Katsuki blinked. “Oh, yeah, you said we now ride into the sunset.”

“I-I mean, y-yeah, that’s how I remember it ended.” Izuku stuttered.

“Thank god.” Katsuki launches himself at Izuku's horse, waving at the dwarfs and animals as Izuku himself mounts it.

“Are you ready?” Izuku said, feeling like he forgot something.

“Yes.” The blonde rushed, a fake smile plastered on his face as he waved. “Let’s go you stupid piece of crap.”

“Right.” Izuku instructs the horse to start moving toward the horizon where a large range of beautiful reds and oranges paint the sky.

“Thank you for nothing!” Katsuki waves again, this time his smile is more genuine as he does a pg version of his usual cursing at the dwarfs and animals that probably don’t hear him due to the distance. “Hope you trip on your horrendous beards and die!”

The green-haired teen sweat drops as Bakugou finally settles down.

That is until he notices the horizon only seems to get further away. “No! Look, we aren’t moving on!”

Deku has to agree, as he notes his surroundings, while the background isn’t repeating, there seems to be no end to the valley even as seconds turn into several minutes. Well, if it isn’t the consequences of my actions, Izuku thought as he meditated the best way to confess why they may be unable to finish the story.

“Darn it!” Katsuki growled in frustration. “I swear I did everything you told me.” He tried to explain. “I even kissed Endeavour’s old geezer head.”

“I know, Kacchan.” Izuku reassured, gulping as he realized he needed to come clean. “It is my fault.” He confessed.

“What?”

“So you know ten minutes ago when I was supposed to kiss you and wake you up from the sleeping curse?”

“Yes…?” Katsuki nodded. “What’s your point?”

“I may or may not have kissed your cheek instead of kissing you in the lips like in the traditional story.” He said sheepishly. “...Sorry...?

Katsuki slowly turns to look at the dumbass he called childhood friend. “What did you just say?”

“...I’m...sorry?” Izuku’s voice got weaker.

“What on earth is your problem?!” Katsuki bellowed, his eyes glowing red. “You SAID that we needed to follow the story to get out, you made me PROMISE I would go along with it just this once.”

The other man cringed. “I know, I know.” He whined. “I’m sorry, it’s just when I had to kiss you, you were unconscious and it just felt wrong since you never explicitly agreed that I could kiss you.”

“It was implied that I wanted to kiss you!” Katsuki yelled and then blushed, Izuku did too. “I mean, it was implied I was ok with it, you bumbling buffoon!” He screeched.

“Buffoon...?” Izuku mumbled as he stared in surprise at red embarrassed eyes.

“Ughhh!” Katsuki said in frustration. “Being this mad without using my quirk is making me lame.” He explained to himself, he took the reins of the still moving horse and yanked it so it stopped. Then he threw his legs over the animal so Bakugou was fully facing Deku. “Let’s just kiss so maybe this can be over, you piece of garbage.”

Katsuki pulled Izuku roughly so their noses were touching. “Don’t think for a second I’m not going to kick your ass into the next century after we get back to UA.”

Before Izuku could respond, their lips smashed together, harder and deeper than necessary, all while he was vaguely aware the world started to crumble and fade into white once again.

#izuku x bakugo #bakudeku fan fiction #bakudeku art #bakudeku #katsudeku #katsuki x izuku #the beauty and the deku

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nightingaelic · 3 years

Note

FNV Companions react to being re-united with the Courier after the Second Battle of Hoover Dam (NCR Best Ending)

TW: Blood, gore

As the screams of men, metal and guns petered out, movement on the Hoover Dam slowed. The sun was low, red as the ground beneath it, and the heat rising from the concrete and hundreds of gun barrels gave the area a faint shimmer. Most of the Legion lay dead or dying, their last gasps covered by the sounds of NCR soldiers calling to each other, looking for friends or officers or just reassurance that what had happened was true.

Victory.

Arcade Gannon: Though plenty of the NCR heavy troopers were popping off their helmets as the battle came to a close, Arcade kept his on out of fear someone would recognize him. The Brotherhood of Steel attendees appeared to be of the same mind, so he did his best to linger between the two groups and hoped both would assume he had arrived with the other.

Someone slapped the side of his metal-encased arm, and he looked down to find the courier beaming up at him, gasping like they had just run a marathon. "Hey, Six," Arcade said, surprised. "I thought General Oliver would've packed you on a flight to Shady Sands by now."

"Not yet. How're you holding up in there?" the courier asked breathlessly. "Looks like it'd be an oven under the sun."

"Oh, it is," Arcade assured them. "But it also stopped a few bullets and a machete or two, so no complaints here."

The courier bent over and put their hands on their knees. "I saw Daisy... saw her chopper off with the others after the fighting stopped. Oliver's confused as all hell, he doesn't know who they are, where they came from or where they went, but he's got bigger problems to deal with right now than chasing them down."

They looked up with a grin. "Thanks. Tell them all I said hi."

Arcade laughed. "Will do. And thank you."

"For what, dragging you and your only surviving family into this?"

"Well, yeah." Arcade looked down sheepishly. "Fortune favors the bold."

The courier nodded. "Fortis fortuna adiuvat."

"You remembered?"

"Of course I did." They gestured at the broken and scattered weapons and men of Caesar's Legion that lay around them. "After today, we're running low on people who know how to speak Latin."

Craig Boone: Though the other NCR snipers around him packed up their gear and headed toward the dam, Boone stayed put with his rifle until the courier made their way up the rocks to his position. They waved when they spotted him, and he put up a hand of greeting as well.

"And it's over," they said, plopping down to take a seat next to him and dangle their legs over the drop-off.

"Yep."

"Was that you who got that shot in and made Lanius drop his sword?"

Boone smiled. "Mm-hmm."

They smiled back. "Thanks."

The two of them sat together in silence, watching the activity below. Boone's smile grew and grew, wider than it had in years.

"Do you want to go down and join in?" the courier asked, when a group of NCR soldiers started putting broken defenses and wooden Legion weapons into a pile to burn.

Boone straightened his sunglasses and looked toward the horizon. "Yeah. I do."

Lily Bowen: "Pumpkin!" Lily bellowed when she spotted the courier across the dam, leaning on the concrete barrier next to the edge. She pushed her way past several surprised NCR troops, who yelped and jumped out of her path. "Pumpkin, are you alright?"

"Lily." The courier was pale, nursing a jagged wound on their arm. "I'm okay, Lily. I just need..."

Lily barred anyone else from approaching them as they rooted around in their pack. Finally, they extracted a stimpak and jabbed it into their arm, hissing as the medicine found its way into their bloodstream.

Lily inspected the cut carefully. Aside from its ragged appearance and the blood surrounding it, the wound was clean. The stimpak was working its magic, and the redness seeping out was already slowing. "Is that better, dearie?" she asked.

"Much." The courier sighed and leaned back against the concrete. "Legate Lanius had a sword. Not as... as big as yours, but big enough to slice me up when I got too close."

"You rest, pumpkin." Lily sat down on the barrier next to them, careful to hold her hat on in the breeze. "The fight is over now. Leo is quiet again."

"Mmmm-hm." The courier nodded sagely, before turning to face the steep drop below to the bottom of the dam. "We did it."

"How do you feel?"

The courier opened their mouth to answer, but instead threw up over the barrier and into the crevasse below. Lily carefully patted them on the back and produced a box of gum drops from her overalls pocket. "Here. For your breath, dearie."

Raul Alfonso Tejada: "Courier!" Raul pushed his sombrero back with the tip of his revolver, scanning the battlefield atop the dam. "Six, dónde estás?"

An injured NCR soldier looked up from the curb he was sitting on. "What's a ghoul doing here? He's not with us, is he?"

"Chinga tu madre," Raul swore, pausing his search. "You see the courier anywhere around here?"

"Raul!"

He turned back to the devastated landscape and there they were, jogging through the mess of bodies, shell casings and busted concrete. Raul laughed and spread his arms in relief, in welcome. The courier dropped their gun and threw themselves into his embrace, ignoring the blood and dust that covered his costume. Truthfully, they were just as covered in the battle's detritus as he was.

"I lost you so quickly," they breathed hard in his ear. "No wonder... no wonder they call you the ghost vaquero."

"Mij@." Raul embraced them tightly, then held them at arm's length to inspect them. "You had me worried. I thought I was the one who was going to have to track down twelve mariachi bands to play at your funeral."

The courier grinned. "Still want your medal?"

"Think the NCR'll give me one?"

They made a face at that. "If they wanna give me one, they'll have to give you one, too. Come on. I want to see the look on General Oliver's face when I tell him that you did just as much work here as me."

Rose of Sharon Cassidy: A lone NCR trooper stood by the nearest flag pole, hoisting a scrap of fabric high above the scene. Cass could make out the two-headed bear emblazoned upon it, and something in her heart rose. She was still standing there, watching the red star whip in the breeze atop the dam, when the courier made their way over to her.

"Cap for your thoughts?" they asked.

For a moment, Cass tried to find the words for that feeling inside her. When she failed, she turned away from the flag. "Nah. Nothing you don't already know. What next, Six?"

The courier scratched their head and looked around. "Clean-up. Round up the Legion boys who are still kicking, grab everything that isn't nailed down before anyone else does, and pull this place back into some kinda shape."

"And then?"

"And then we drink." The courier pulled out their canteen and offered it to Cass. "But here's a little something for right now. Go on, keep it."

Cass drank deeply. Whiskey, just the way she liked it. "The NCR did good today."

Her traveling companion smiled. "We did good today."

"Mmm, not yet." Cass waved them off. "Don't lump me in with the bear before the work's all done. Ask me later, we'll see how I feel."

"Way I see it, if you had any actual qualms about this, you wouldn't have come," the courier replied with a chuckle. "But I'm damn glad you did."

They'd walked off toward the NCR top brass before Cass could answer, but she let the wind take the words anyway, small as they were. "Me too."

Veronica Santangelo: As soon as the courier was finished speaking to General Oliver, Veronica pulled them away and unearthed a handkerchief from inside her robes to wipe away the worst of the gore from their face. "Eugh. Is this... did somebody explode on you?"

"Hard to say." The courier pulled out their own bandanna and began wiping Veronica's face down in return. "How do you feel?"

Veronica laughed and accepted the help. "Honestly? I'm not sure what my parents would think of me fighting for the NCR, but for New Vegas it seemed like this was the best chance at stability. I don't regret it, if that's what you're asking."

The courier gestured at the Brotherhood of Steel Knights and Paladins that were milling about next to and among the NCR soldiers. "Your family doesn't seem to regret it either."

"Yeah." Veronica brightened somewhat. "They actually came. That ought to show both the Elders and the NCR that this, this is possible."

She watched her brothers and sisters from afar, making awkward introductions and conversation with the defenders of the dam and even comparing power armor pieces with the NCR heavy troopers. She smiled faintly.

The courier followed her gaze. "Did you want to join them?"

"No." Veronica looked down at her power glove, flexing the joints as if lost in thought. "No, that's okay."

ED-E: The courier found ED-E stuck beneath a collapsed barricade, where it had been knocked during the fighting by a lucky Legion swipe. They pulled the eyebot out and dusted it off. "You okay, buddy?"

ED-E beeped its reassurance and pulled itself from the courier's grasp, shaking in midair to dislodge any remaining debris. It did one final loop-de-loop to lose a large splinter before blasting its triumphant music at top volume.

Surprised, the courier laughed. "That's right. We did it. We won."

Rex: The chaos around Rex began to fade into the background, overwhelmed by the scent that clung to the courier at his side. A rush of endorphins, dopamine, a whiff of serotonin- Rex didn't know the words, but he knew what they meant when mixed together in that way. Relief. Happy relief.

The cyberdog yawned, signaling his own stress, and looked up at the courier. They noticed his movement and dropped down to his level immediately, running their hands through the ruff of fur around his neck and inspecting his mechanical parts carefully. "Good dog. Good boy. We did good today, you and me."

Under their touch, Rex relaxed. He opened his mouth to pant. It had been a long, hot day.

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