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notnctu · 4 years

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switchin’ lanes - l.jn | ridin’ club

━ welcome to the ridin’ club smut series

genre ➠ slow burn, smut, pwp???, fluff (if u squint) wordcount ➠ 8.3k details ➠ fem!reader, streetracer!jeno, badboy!jeno, college!au, ━ where you and jeno are in a relationship, but not with each other. warnings ➠ explicit language, cheating, flirty banter, alcohol consumption, drugs, yall at a party, physical fighting (not with you), mentions of cuts/bruises, hickeys, drunk public dry humping, thigh riding, fingering, oral (f/receiving) synopsis ➠ If your boyfriend didn’t decide to join such a stupid unofficial club, then maybe you wouldn’t be in such a sticky situation where Lee Jeno is literally knuckles deep in your sticky situation as he drives you home. Or maybe if your boyfriend actually touched you, then you wouldn’t be seeking it from someone else, who can’t keep his hands off of you. taglist ➠ @rabbit-doyochi ; @darkneogotmyback ; @im-lame-irl ; @p-mini ; @niniluvsmarkhyuck ; @saniahmichael ; @jaehy9ngs ; @danyxthirstae01 ; @jaehyunoos ; @pikijaemin ; @suhweo ; @dearlyminhyung

a/n ➠ hi yall its author doie❀!! i hope you enjoy the series pls leave me feedback lmaoo ill literally take anything. we also hit a milestone for followers and honestly its so crazy to know how quickly this tiny sideblog has grown! we’re so thankful that yall follow us, thank u for lovin us and we will try our best to put out more content!! also through the lens hit 1k notes how is that even possible like wow im speechless thank u for everyone who left such kind comments i treasure every form of feedback :)

The heavy double doors of the classroom stare tauntingly at you. The evening setting in, painting the sky with strokes of orange and pink. You managed to remain complaint free the entire day, until your forgetful boyfriend canceled on you because of a club meeting. A meeting for an unofficial club on campus because it is illegal to street race. A club consists of delinquents that are obsessed with cars and steal your boyfriend away from you.

This is the fifth time this week that your boyfriend stood you up or coincidentally forgot your dates. You can’t remember the last time he physically stood in front of you and not through a phone screen. However, it is not completely the stupid club’s fault that your boyfriend has neglected you.

He truly is the worst boyfriend ever. He blames everything on his bad memory and does not prioritize you in his life. He loves one thing --- his car. You could be lying in a hospital bed, and he wouldn’t care to check up on you.

So why did you stay with him? Because you’re scared of being alone? Possibly, but it is a can of worms that you did not want to open just yet. Sex is definitely not the reason you stay with him. He hasn’t touched you sexually since the first and now, last time you two slept together.

You try your best, to only be waved off with a yawn. He doesn’t compliment you. He doesn’t look at you lovingly. He doesn’t even kiss you for longer than two seconds. You are a toppling tower, ready to crumble at any given moment.

The anger in your body fuels you as you pull the door open to reveal several men in leather jackets chatting away with each other. One by one, they all begin to lay their eyes on who abruptly interrupted their joyous conversations. Your eyes scan the room full of intimidating men, whose auras cause a shiver to run down your spine.

Your boyfriend is nowhere in sight, given that there are plenty enough guys who have the ability to cover him. You walk into the open space and the entire mood of the room shifts.

Heavy cologne and a deafening silence fill the air. One particular male, who has been eyeing you the entire time, gets up and walks towards you.

“Are you lost, baby?” Scoffs and chuckles sparsely cover the corners of the room. The unknown male has a jarring cut on his eyebrow, matching a small bruise on his upper cheekbone.

“I’m looking for my boyfriend…” Your weak voice trails off from the sudden attractive male intimidation. The tall man peers around the room, crossing his arms.

“If you are this beautiful woman’s boyfriend, please fucking come out now. It’s very rude to keep your girl waiting for you!” Initially, his low throaty shout startles you. A heavy heat falls on your cheeks when you register his choice of adjectives.

The whole room falls silent once more, before your pitiful boyfriend steps out from between two bulkier men. “Hey babe, what are you doing here?” His eyes nervously bounce around the room, a shaky laughter erupting from his gut.

“Sorry, Jeno. I didn’t mean to cause such a scene. I didn’t even see her come in.”

Like a trigger, you remember your intentions for storming in uninvited. Jeno gauges your flaming reaction to your boyfriend’s apologetic words. He nods, not out of acceptance of the apology, but out of disbelief.

He pulls your boyfriend by the collar of his white shirt and your eye widens at the condescending tone that causes your boyfriend to cower, “I’m not the one to apologize to.” With a careless toss, your boyfriend ends up shaking in front of you.

“Jeno is not the only one you should be scared of.” You whisper angrily to him as the rest of the room continues on with their previous chatter.

Your boyfriend rolls his eyes, “listen, Jeno’s been arrested before. You don’t want to get on that man’s bad side.”

Your eyes wander behind your boyfriend’s hunching shoulders, catching Jeno steal peeks at you too. There is no interest in the other rambling male that stands in front of him. He just wants to check you out a bit more.

He is the hottest person you’ve ever gotten the attention of. You feel flustered, and a bit flattered at his lingering gaze. His brown hair is slicked back messily, giving you more to admire. Jeno is an absolute cliche from a bad boy fanfiction. He is unreal, and the odd chance that he can’t keep his eyes off of you, is also unreal.

But with a light nudge from a blue haired fellow, Jeno’s eyes peel away from your’s. They exchange a few words, which then propels Jeno to hurriedly put on his slightly tattered leather jacket.

You lick your lips to the sight of his body lines as he stands up to follow his friend, but not without another look back at you. Noticing your stare still on him, he bids you a tiny wave goodbye with a smirk to die for. And like that, he’s gone.

“Are you listening to me?” Your boyfriend’s voice finally reaches your reality. Your focus shifts to the obviously irritated expression on his face.

“I guess, I’m not. Don’t fucking stand me up again or I will key your car.” You aren’t actually those kinds of girls, but your boyfriend didn’t take a threat seriously unless it involves his highly treasured car.

And like Jeno, you also make your exit out of the steamy room. The chilly night brush against your unknowingly hot cheeks. Then, you take yourself to the only unhealthy coping mechanism you can think of: a place of free alcohol and no boyfriend.

It takes you a few months to completely stop caring about your dying relationship. You figure how easy it is for your boyfriend to do it, so you make the same decision.

He spends his nights with his friends he made from his club, and has totally become a self proclaimed car enthusiast. You lose yourself in copious amounts of cheap alcohol at your local parties and it’s almost like you stop sulking over a man who kisses his car goodnight.

While being alone did not bother you as much as you had been dreading, the sexual frustration is a completely different issue. You are absolutely drooling whenever your eyes find Jeno in the crowds of sweaty bodies.

If there is one good thing that came out of your boyfriend’s membership in that club, it had to be Lee Jeno and a few other notable people who attended the same parties as you.

He became a very close acquaintance, and you had learned some very important names associated with the Ridin’ Club. Na Jaemin, Lee Haechan, and Huang Renjun. But the three could not compare to the kindhearted Jeno that makes butterflies stir in your lower abdomen.

Over the months, you also had learned rather quickly that your sexually clouded mind had tricked you previously into thinking that Jeno’s stares were full of lust for you. His girlfriend makes it clear that it isn’t the case.

Although you have caught the couple making out several times when trying to use the bathroom, your feverish, impure attraction toward Jeno never calmed down.

“You’re looking very tempting tonight, baby.” Jeno’s beaming eye smile greets you, even after completely undressing you with his gaze. His arms are wide open to embrace your warm body.

The parties are always too hot to wear a fully clothed outfit. You often settle for a cute tank top and a short skirt to prevent your legs from collecting extra moisture. Jeno, without a fail, shows up in black jeans that clad his lower half, tucked with a simple white shirt. His tattoos and toned arms being on full display for you to admire.

“Better make sure your actual baby doesn’t hear that.” The loud beats of the music make Jeno’s chuckle almost inaudible, but his expression remains cheerful, as per usual. “Did you get into another fight?”

The fresh wound cut through his smooth complexion, which will eventually join the rest of his collection of fading scars. He mindlessly grazes over the new bandaging and dramatically winces. Clearly concerned, you grab his hand away from the injury. “Don’t touch it, stupid.”

His smile curves into a sly smirk, as he intertwines your fingers and kisses the back of your hand. “It doesn’t hurt at all.” His chest heaves into a fit of giggles, “just wanted to see you care for me.”

Groaning, you shake his massive hand off of your’s. “Very funny. I should start charging you for my attention.”

“Name your price, I got all the money in the world for you.” He winks, while lightly pinching your cheek. You are lying to yourself if you thought you could ever stay away from him. Jeno stirs up a part of you that craves the cheesy nicknames, flirty comments and the undivided attention.

He motions you to follow him into the mess of people. Almost as if he’s a god, the crowd parts for you two to walk through without unnecessary extra bodies. The fear that settles in many individuals’ chest is understandable.

Like your first impression, Jeno is a complete walking fanfiction trope. He negotiates better with his fists, usually with good reason. The guns of the Ridin’ Club, though, his friends are very much to be feared as well. They will not hesitate to run someone over, if given the heated situation to do so. And most definitely, you can count them to be backing up their fighter, Jeno.

You had not been mindful before of the chatter that regarded the secret Ridin’ Club. They are notorious for fast paced very illegal races in the middle of nowhere destinations and tempers that aren’t meant to be provoked. Besides their intimidating aura, it melts away after getting to know them.

Lee Haechan, the most annoying brat, but has the strongest, the most loyal bond to his boys. He’s also notably funny, often making you laugh with an exchange of banter.

Huang Renjun, the whiniest and initially quiet boy, but grows to be one of the loudest and will chew you out if anyone dares try engaging in verbal combat.

Na Jaemin, the flirty playboy who always has a swarm of girls, but the gentlest man with a soft spot for cute things.

And finally, Lee Jeno, the owner of your nights. He is the friendliest of them all, despite him being the toughest one. While his stare can kill, melting away his layers reveal the warmest heart. Not that Jeno is the only one to show initial interest in you, but he is the most considerate to the people he holds close to him.

He has taken care of you for many drunk nights and watched protectively over your intoxicated figure in the crowds. He makes you feel safe and seen, which are some of the many reasons you are entirely attracted to him.

“(Y/N)!” Jaemin’s scream pierce your ears the moment the blueberry catches your eye. He excitedly nudges the other two boys, who are busy pouring drinks into red cups.

“You’re going to make me spill it, idiot!” Renjun grumbles, but looks up to see your dazzling smile and tremendous excitement. His own smile grows, “so the life of the party finally decided to say hi.”

“Hi, my fanclub. I appreciate the long awaited greeting.” Your over the top, sarcasm causes all of them to chime loudly. Haechan hands you a cup and wraps his arm around your shoulders.

Jeno joins you at your side and the five of you clink your drinks to the ceiling. A fit of yells over the music and a competition of who can finish first. As per usual, you set your cup down after draining the entirety. The others are still chugging the burning liquid down their throats.

Haechan coughs after dropping his cup onto the counter. His face is twisted with the most disgusted contour, “I don’t know how you do it, (Y/N).”

“I already drank more than you guys, so it just tastes like water now.” You scream over the loud music. Jeno, Jaemin and Renjun toss their empty cups into the sink.

At this rate, you are completely blindsided by the effects of the alcohol as your legs give out to gravity. Jeno catches you quickly, holding your elbows and your head is placed on his shoulder. Jaemin chuckles lovingly, before helping Jeno balance you against the island. Your head feels heavy on your shoulders, as the room spins in front of you.

“You good?” Haechan pats your head gently, whispering close to you.

“I---” You try catching your breath after being winded. “--It’s hitting me now.”

Jeno wraps his arm around your lower waist to draw you close to him, “want to go sit down?” He mumbles into your hair. You nod, Jeno and Renjun supporting your limp body to walk over to the couch.

The dark living room is lit up only by colorful led lights, but it is not enough to make out much of anything. Everyone is in their own world, dancing and socializing within their own selves. The two men set you down on the cushion, but your impulse catches onto Jeno’s wrist before he leaves. Renjun is already lost in the crowd.

“Can I sit on your lap?” You pout cutely, all the shame in your body has been displaced with courage. Jeno’s eyes soften at your sudden request, and kisses the top of your forehead.

“The throne is all yours.” He says as he sits at your side and pulls you on top of his thick thighs. His arm is loosely dangling around your waist, resting on top of your thighs.

The intimate position causes your mind to wander into dark thoughts. His strong, sturdy legs feel delicious against your clothed core. While you’ve been in this position once before, you could never forget how protected, yet very horny it makes you feel.

“What’s on your mind, (y/n)?” Jeno’s deep voice brushes against your bare shoulder and you feel his chest press against your back. “You’ve been pretty silent tonight.”

You turn slightly to face him, “if I told you, I’m scared it would ruin things between us.”

“There’s nothing in the world that can hold me back from you.” He is always so quick to spill such alluring words. His soft lips graze lightly on your skin as his sparkling eyes look up at your expression.

All it takes is one more tiny kiss on your arm to get you grabbing his face, drawing him into a steamy, long awaited kiss. Surprisingly, he kisses you back, open mouth and tongue lapping with your’s. His hands reposition your legs to where you straddle him. Your faces dive deeper into each other’s as the kiss continues to intensify.

Jeno’s lips still have a hint of alcohol, but he mostly tastes like mint gum. And they are comparable to a cloud, the softest lips you have ever made out with. It is like kissing pure heaven, completely different from your boyfriend’s two second pecks. Jeno devours you in a needy way, like he’s been waiting to explore the wonders of your lips.

However, you pull away when you feel the vibration of his phone against your inner thigh, almost like a wake up call. As if all the liquid courage disappeared, you blink back in shock at Jeno’s plump wet lips. The thought of his girlfriend crosses your mind, and maybe slight guilt for your own boyfriend fills your system.

You quickly start getting up from his hot body, “fuck, I’m so sorry..” But his hands pull you back onto him, your legs finding their way open above his thighs again.

“Don’t be, I’ve always wondered what your lips would taste like.” A smirk, then a hearty chuckle relaxes your contracting nerves at the potential of a ruined friendship.

“But, your girlfriend..” Your tiny voice trails off and Jeno picks up your chin. His fingers rubbing along your jawline.

His eyes do another lap around your features. He admires your averting shy eyes, your beautiful lips, and how they all come together to make a stunning you.

There is no doubt in Jeno’s mind that he is very attracted to you. He knew it the moment you barged into the club meeting. You are his type of woman, a good mixture of confident and timidness. You like to have some fun, and aren't afraid to be bold. Not to mention, that you are incredibly hot and every time you flirt back just makes him melt inside.

“She won’t care. She hooks up with people all the time.” It puzzles you, all this time you had been holding yourself back from Jeno because he has a girlfriend. All to find out that the relationship isn’t as serious as you thought it to be.

“I know, it doesn’t make sense. But we aren’t two people to be tied down, but at the same time, we like each other enough to want to stay together.”

Your confused expression causes Jeno to laugh and ask, “what’s the dilemma with your boyfriend?”

Rolling your eyes at the mention of your boyfriend, you sigh, “it’s like we’re still together, but we aren’t at the same time. We’ve abandoned the relationship unknowingly.”

Jeno runs a warm hand up and down your thigh, while he listens intently to you. He nods, grabbing your waist to pull you over his groin. “I’m sorry to hear that.”

“No, he’s a shitty person and an even shittier boyfriend. We literally haven’t fucked for the past year. I’m practically a virgin again.” His hand automatically gives your thigh a light squeeze.

Jeno’s eyes light up as you quickly cover your mouth out of embarrassment. A devilish smirk raises his cheekbone, and lust clouds his mind. Gauging his reaction, your cheeks turn hot.

“We’ll have to change that, don’t we? My baby must be all kinds of frustrated. Tell me, do you like when I touch you then?” Jeno drops in tempo, usually when he wants to be more intimidating with a deeper voice.

You clear your throat intending to speak, but you can only nod your head in response. “C’mon, (Y/N). Use your words, like a big girl.” Even with the loud music and continuous chatter, you can hear Jeno‘s taunting whisper.

His words tickle your collarbone as he runs his lips against your neck. Your heart is pumping rapidly at the turn of events, as if the possibility of having something beyond a kiss from Jeno is more than possible at this rate.

Jeno enjoys your small whimpers as he marks your neck with purple love bites. Right in the center of the crowded room, Lee Jeno is just casually giving you hickeys.

“Yes, I love that you can’t keep your hands off of me.”

Almost immediately, you can feel his lips curve into a smile on your skin. Pop! Jeno marvels the darkness against your skin in the mood lighting. A small part of him hopes you do end up seeing your boyfriend sometime soon, so he can see who you really belong to.

“How about we try touching like this?” Jeno pushes you down hard against his pelvis, the veins on his hands becoming evident from the grip and the tiny drawings permanently staining his fingers.

You gasp the moment you feel Jeno’s hip begin to move underneath you to the beat of the song. He rolls your hips rhythmically to match his speed. His clothed hard on can be felt through the only barrier you have on --- your panties.

The thin fabric is soon drenched in your juices after the continuous friction up and down his length. You throw your head back to every bump against your clit, the electrifying feeling enact more of your wetness to puddle.

You can’t believe you were grinding against Jeno in the middle of a full party, as if his friends aren’t a few feet away. It is a good thing that your skirt pools around both of your waists to conceal the dirty deed underneath.

Jeno’s lip escapes under his top row of teeth as he rubs his clothed length against your barely covered pussy. He can feel his jeans dampening from your wetness and his eyes roll to the back of his head from how the feeling of wanting you consumes his body. He really becomes uncontrollable when it comes to you.

This is the most sexual activity you have had with another person for over a year. Jeno just looks absolutely heavenly intoxicated with lust, and your mouth waters at how big his cock must be. You can feel his length the harder Jeno rolls against you, and it is definitely bigger than your boyfriend’s.

You are trying so hard to stay quiet and unnoticeable, but the pleasure seeps out every crevice. Jeno is trained on you as your hand reaches up to cover your mouth, the muffled whimpers escaping your lips uncontrollably.

“I’m so close.” You admit, your body jolting every time his jean button grazes against your sensitive bud.

Jeno moves you over his thigh, forgetting his incredibly hard dick straining in his jeans. As long as you are satisfied, he can care less about his own pleasure. A low scream erupts from your throat when he flexes against you.

His thigh is much more stable, with more control for consistency. You quickly notice the dark, wet spot on his jeans and you blush even harder. Your underwear clings onto you from the excessive moisture, but Jeno continues to help you finish.

The strands of hair cover your face, but Jeno needs to see your fucked out expression. He is taken aback when you start riding his thigh faster, grinding harder without the aid of his hands.

His mouth hangs slightly open in awe at your neediness, he truly did not know the extent of your sexual frustrations. Oh, but how he is incredibly turned on by you getting off on him.

“I want you to cum for me, you deserve it.” Jeno brings you in for another passionate kiss. The mixture of his tongue sucking harshly on yours, and the friction on your clit are more than enough to reach your climax.

Your legs clenched tightly around Jeno’s thigh. The small knot in your stomach that built, drops like the beat playing in the background. The feeling of white is familiar, but it is more intense than when you would touch yourself. You are finally receiving the pleasure from someone else’s touch, someone who wants you to unravel for him.

Jeno pulls away from your lips, kissing down your neck and collarbones as your chest heaves for air. His palm soothes your shaking legs as your climax subsides. You fall into his arms, and he laughs. The reality that you two just did that publicly registers in both of your minds.

Digging your shy face further into Jeno’s shoulder, he whispers lovingly, “let me drive you home.”

“Are you still drunk?” The muffled question tickles Jeno’s neck.

“I think you beautifully cumming on my thigh sobered me up.” He jokes and you quickly cover his mouth. Your heart practically stops and you hope no one else heard him.

It is silly that you are now self conscious, as if the whole room didn’t just watch you and Jeno grind on the couch. But, the feeling of embarrassment and regret lingers in your stomach. You mentally thank the dark room for concealing both of your identities.

“I’m sorry for your jeans.” A pout begs for forgiveness as you stare at Jeno’s beaming smile. He takes your hand off of his mouth, not forgetting to give your fingertips a lingering kiss.

“I’m sorry for your boyfriend. He doesn’t know what he’s missing.” Jeno parts your hair from your neck, admiring the marks he left on you. A small sense of pride builds inside of him, accompanied by a tiny bundle of possessiveness.

“Let me say goodbye to the boys and I’ll take you home.”

Nodding, Jeno carefully lifts you off of him and onto the cushion. He leans over to kiss your cheek. As he gets up, you see the darker shades on his jeans from your doing. However, Jeno is completely unbothered and continues to find his friends.

Now that you are alone, you feel a bit nervous that someone would come up to you and talk about what they saw. Checking your phone, your screen blinds you with absolutely no notifications from your boyfriend. Going on social media is worse, as you scroll to see that your boyfriend posted a photo.

It is a photo of his hot, red polished car. He obnoxiously posed squatting next to the front wheel, his lips puckered up and kissing the rims. With a caption that makes every regret in your body disappear, “with my one and only.”

The phone is tossed somewhere else, wishing to delete the image from your memory. Your eyes wander around the room, when they spot a suspicious man sneakily dropping a small pill in an unattended drink. He, then, looks up and catches your stare. Caught red handed.

But the male smugly smirks, “you’re going to pretend you didn’t see that, like how half of this room pretended to not see you grinding on Jeno.”

“You’re complete scum, I can’t believe you just roofied someone’s drink.” You yell in utter disbelief at the unwavering man. His disgusting smirk changes into a menacing smile.

He approaches you, his height allowing him to tower above. You gulp, scared at how he can easily overpower you at any second.

“And what are you going to do about it? What? Jeno didn’t loosen you up enough?” His revolting hot breath beating down your nose, invading every corner of your personal space.

Before you can find any insult to speak back, his figure goes flying sideways and out of your face. It’d be a lie to not admit your heart skipping a beat at the sight of Jeno’s clenched fists and locked jaw. His sharp gaze watches as the stranger gets up from the ground, inflammation already growing on his left cheek.

“Dude, what the fuck!” He shouts angrily, holding his cheekbone as he winces at the pain. Immediately, the conversations are replaced with gasps, and small whispers at the sight. People gather around the living room to see the commotion. Even you are unsure how to react to the sudden fight.

The other man lunges at Jeno with full force, but Jeno stops him by grabbing the man’s collar, “this,” Jeno punches his lip, busting it open, “is for dropping a roofie in someone’s drink.”

The stranger groans at the impact, but still gets up with a fist straight for Jeno’s gut. Watching Jeno take a blow is much more difficult than you had been expecting.

He crouches over from the punch, but quickly regains his composure to put the man in a headlock. A few more gasps erupt and wonder if you should stop him before he does something unnecessarily stupid.

“This,” the man squirms to try to get out of Jeno’s iron grip, “is for disrespecting my babygirl.” And with a shift snap, the male falls limp and unconscious.

A surprised intake of air and Jeno peers up at your scared expression. He calmly walks over to you, ignoring the swarm of people that had gathered around the scene. He can only see one thing — you. Jeno’s wandering eyes try to read your expression, but all he sees is a terrified girl.

“I’m sorry you had to see that, are you okay, (Y/N)?”

Blinking blankly for a few moments, you are mortified at the laying body, “what did you do to him?”

Jeno looks back at the stranger casually, “I put him to sleep for a bit. He’ll wake up in about 20 minutes.”

A rush of reassurance washes over you knowing that he is alive and Jeno didn’t just kill someone in front of you. You exhale all the anxiousness and nerves,

“thank you for stepping in.”

“I don’t fight without a good reason. You are more than a perfect reason to fight for.” He pinches your cheek cutely, and his tough exterior fades away yet again.

His famous eye smile that warms your insides is back as if the scary, intimidating expression didn’t exist a few seconds ago. Jeno’s good sides only appear with you. Nevertheless, you are happy to know how special you are to see them.

“Violence is never the answer.” He nods, only taking it for a grain of salt. “Are you okay? It looked like stringbean knocked some wind out of your gut.”

The teddy bear thrusts himself forward into a fit of laughter, his head resting on your lap. His melody lights every dark corner inside of you. “He did get a good punch in there, didn’t he?”

His rumbling laughter stops, and he peers up at you. “I can’t believe you were still worried about a complete asshole.”

Scoffing, you break the shared gaze. “I’m a compassionate human being.” Jeno stands up, extending his hand for you to take.

“I know, you’re the best kind of person.” He genuinely means it with the way his tone remains quite stern, eye contact unwavering. He is revealing more of his intimate parts, and in return, you wish for him to see your’s.

Silence drowns out all the commotion between you two. Jeno grows shy at the way the galaxies reflect in your stare. “I--” Never once, did you think you would witness Lee Jeno stammer over his words. “I-I, let’s-- I want to take you for a drive.”

To Jeno, a drive to him is equivalent to your hand in marriage. Even his own girlfriend has never been on a drive with him. It is a big part of his personality, given that he is a crucial member of the Ridin’ Club. However, out of all of them, he is the last one to flaunt his hobby. It is special, almost sacred to his entire being.

“Me?” It is the dumbest question to ask, but you really want to clarify his intentions. Before this night, you two were barely considered friends. You two never saw each other outside of the late night parties.

But now, Lee Jeno wants to take you on a drive. It makes you wonder if the desire of companionship is mutual, that he too pines to further your relationship.

“I’m not looking at anyone else,” Jeno still waiting for your hand and holding an intense eye contact. His heart lays exposed for you, just right on his sleeve. An innocence paints his usual intimidating aura, “let me show my special girl, what is special to me.”

He must possess some magic because he knows every way to make you swoon. And like that, your palm meets his and he locks his fingers between yours.

The moment you enter Jeno’s striking, eye catching car, you automatically relax into the leather seats. His pristine car matches his personality --- simple, but captivating. Your boyfriend’s car is the exact opposite, which is why you never enjoy sitting in it.

Jeno has pieces of himself that scatter his car, like an adorable small plushie that watches out the back window. A beaded lanyard dangles from his rear view mirror. It even matches his scent of a deep ocean breeze.

Unlike your boyfriend’s obnoxious details, Jeno did not have a light up stereo that flashed annoyingly to every beat drop in a song. Instead, a sweet lilac color illuminates at your feet, along with his.

“You like what you see?” Jeno catches you astonish at the tiny aspects of the interior.

“Of course, it’s yours. It’s exactly like how I would imagine it to be.” Jeno is proud, hearing you praise his car. Even he can admit, it is a bit weird to be so connected to an inanimate object.

Nevertheless, his car, racing, driving became a huge part of his life. And unlike his friends, he feels rather shy and slightly embarrassed for being such a geek.

But hearing you actually appreciating the small details of his car when you probably hate every aspect of racing due to your boyfriend’s doing, it makes him feel very happy.

Maybe happy is an understatement, more like overjoy at how you freely can recognize the things that make him content. You respect him, and are mindful that as mundane as a car is, you know that it is something important to him.

Silence becomes the majority of the ride out of the quiet, suburban neighborhood. While Jeno’s eyes remain focused on the road ahead, you are concentrated on him.

He drives with one hand on the wheel as he rests his elbow on the middle console. His eyebrow creases here and there. It is the most normal, mundane activity anyone can do --- drive. That is all he is doing, yet the effect it suddenly has on you can not go unnoticed.

Abruptly, with the rev of the engine and a press on the gas, the car practically flies on the empty freeway. It catches you off guard, causing you to hold onto the grab handle. Jeno peeks over at your shocked figure, and smiles to himself.

“Relax, (Y/N).” He calls your name, reaching over to rub your thigh as a way to calm your anxiousness. Automatically, your hand grips onto his for support and the other one drops from the handle.

Exhaling, your eyes are trained ahead. The car is moving so fast that you can’t even make out anything around you. Everything becomes nothing, but colorful streaks against a dark background. The gravity against your chest feels crushing.

“How-- How fast are you going?”

Jeno glances at the speedometer and intertwines your fingers into his own. “I don’t think I should tell you that, you might actually have a heart attack.”

The window rolls down and you are hit with rumbling wind, “I know you’re scared right now, so stick your head out the window and take a deep breath.”

You look at him in pure fear, “what?! I can’t even move, let alone stick my head out the window!”

Jeno shakes his head, “trust me. Please, trust me.” He needs you to experience the same thrill he does. His own adrenaline is through the roof, out the entire atmosphere of the vehicle. The amount of joy he is experiencing became tenfold now that you are sitting beside him.

You trust him and very meticulously, go against the wind. Your hair crazily dances along with the rush and your eyes water from being dried out. Adjusting to the pressure, you also stick your hand out the window. It whips backward, but you feel the wind slip between your fingers.

The rise in heartbeat and excitement pump through your veins. The beauty in the white streaks that create a runway, it is nothing but you and the open space. There is no other way to explore it, except at a high pace. You understand why Jeno loved it so much.

Jeno bounces between the road and half of your figure out his window. Your eyes are closed initially, before you barely squint open. Tears fly by with strands of your hair, but you start to move your hand to physically feel the thrill pass between your fingers.

Then he sees it in the side mirror: the sweet curve in your lips he loves the most and the wideness of life in your eyes. It only makes him press the gas harder.

“That was incredible! You should take me riding with you more.” You marvel at him as he starts the route to your place. It is complete playfulness that hints in your tone because you are aware of how sacred these are to him. Nevertheless, a part of you still hopes he agrees to do so.

Jeno nods, “only because I like you,” He pauses, gauging your reaction with his side eye gaze, “a lot.”

Your heart sinks to an unsettling place in your stomach. Jeno could not possibly be serious, however, his tone no longer matches the playfulness of your own. It almost seems like he is telling the truth. But you didn’t want to believe that.

Your eyes make a full circle before settling at the disappearing sidewalks, “stay in your lane, Jeno.” It is to keep the mood still light, you and Jeno aren’t ones to be serious.

His hand has been on your thigh for the whole night, whether it be out of habit or comfort. His touch is always welcoming and warm, but suddenly, you feel the small squeeze on your flesh. Turning your attention on his face, you can see how a smirk has grown.

“But yours seems much more fun.” Immediately, your stomach leaps with somersaults. Your throat gets dry and tight, not anticipating that response.

“Beside, you can’t act like we both haven’t swerved. It was barely moments ago that you were cum---”

“---No need to further explain.”

“And I’d proudly do it again.” His voice drops several decibels and his hand slowly snakes it’s way up your thigh. All the while, his eyes still on the road ahead.

You gulp as every heartbeat constricts your throat. Lifting the ends of your skirt higher to expose more, you secretly want Jeno to cause your legs to shake again. “D-Do what again?”

Jeno perks up to the sweetness of curiosity in your tone. He pulls up to a red stoplight, being able to finally look over to your innocent face and needy hands gripping the cute, thin fabric. He stares deeply into your eyes, “make my baby cum.”

Similarly to the stoplight, you give Jeno the green light to pull your panties to the side. You spread your legs wide as his finger massages your pussy lips. He gets dangerously close to your erect clit, barely skimming over it.

A needy, yet delicate moan escapes your lips and Jeno’s jaw tightens. He’s more upset that he’s missing the view of your legs spread, open mouth in ecstasy, half lid eyes all in the passenger seat of his car. He hopes for another red light, just so he can peek over at your delicious figure.

“Jeno, please touch me.” Your voice is airy and desperate. He hummed in response, completely withdrawing his hand from your core. However, you catch his wrist and bring it to rest on your inner thigh. “Please.”

The distinct beg in your tone drives him crazy. As he dips his finger into your sudden wetness, a shiver runs up your spine. Right when he applies minimal pressure on your bundle of nerves, you jolt and close your thighs around his hand.

One touch already feels too good to be true, that finally someone, Lee fucking Jeno, is actually touching your nakedness. Peering down, Jeno’s arm is flexing in between your legs. His veins popping ever so slightly and his tattoos paint his smooth skin.

“Open your legs, babe.” His low devilish chuckle rumbles in your lower abdomen. “Let me give you the lovin’ you’ve been deprived of.”

You shudder at his cadence and slowly pry open your legs. Jeno stops at a red light and gets to see your reaction as he rubs you in a fast rhythmic pace. A soft cry yelps from your throat and you have to grip the handle to keep yourself from spazzing out any further.

Almost like a trance, he doesn’t notice that the light turns green. He’s locked into the sight of your contorting body. Your hips have a mind of its own, yet again, as Jeno feels you rolling deeper into his touch.

“Poor baby, you’re so touch starved that you can’t control yourself.”

“It feels better when you do it.” You whine, your lip being bruised from your biting. But your eyes notice the green illumination and you blink over at Jeno.

He is practically drooling at the sight of you, his eyes are trained at your needy hips and dripping wet core that soaks his fingers. You stop every urge to steal more kisses from him.

Jeno briefly recovers from the trance and steps on the gas. He takes this opportunity to ease a finger into the core, causing you to exclaim and squeeze around his digit. “Oh fuck, you’re so tight.”

“More, Jeno.” The way his name rolls off of your tongue makes his heart flutter and his dick to raise in his jeans. Without much hesitation, he slowly slips in another finger and you moan at the stretch. Pumping and curling, he ensures that you are enjoying every action.

His fingers curl against your plushy flesh and your legs spread wider for him to go deeper. You’re a moaning mess when he curls up to your sweet spot, rubbing his fingertips quickly. The familiar queasy feeling builds in your lower regions, and Jeno becomes merciless with his fingers.

He guides them in and out of you, feeling your tightness release and invite him back in. The sloppy wet noises fill the car and drown out the engine. Your half lidded eyes bounce at Jeno’s unbothered figure and the entire scene seems absolutely unbelievable to you.

One hand on the wheel. The other knuckles deep in your pussy. Eyes focus on the road ahead. A comfortable man spread. His hair is messy from the long night.

It is all too unbelievable, that Jeno’s already giving you a second climax of the night when you could barely get one in a year before. And he loves touching you as much as he loves driving.

However, the guilty raises as fast as the ball of tension in your gut. You two pull up in front of your apartment building, while Jeno’s tugging his fingers against your flesh aggressively. In a split second, you hold onto his wrist to stop him.

He shifts into park when the car settles into a spot and peers over to you. A curious expression daunts onto him, rather concern that he might have been too much. “I’m starting to feel guilty.”

Jeno nods, and retrieves his fingers out of your dripping core. The feeling of emptiness causes all the built up pressure to dissipate.

“I understand,” he begins, but pauses at the sight of your sticky juices glistening on his fingers. Your eyes widen as he licks them clean, a soft moan escaping from the back of his throat.

The small action spikes your heart rate and you rub your legs together. With a pop! Jeno hums delightfully, “baby, you taste so good. I’m a little sad I won’t be tasting more, especially directly from the source.” His lustful eyes glance down at your thighs and back to your profile.

“I’ll walk you up to your apartment.” He says way too casually, unbuckling his seat belt. A mixture of emotions are running through your head. There is guilt, but lust is too powerful to ignore, especially when it’s Lee Jeno. The damage is already done, right? It’s not like it wasn’t moments ago that you humped him in the middle of a party.

“Wait,” your hands find themselves gripping onto his leather jacket tightly. Jeno gently reaches over to release your strong grip and replaces the leather with his hand.

“Yes, babygirl?” Jeno’s round, friendly eyes meet yours. The lust clouded darkness is no longer there. His hand feels hot and somewhat rough.

“I’m going to break up with my boyfriend, so promise me, you’re not going to dip out of my life afterwards… I don’t need you to be anything more than a friend. I just can’t lose you too.”

He turns around in his seat to face you comfortably. “I don’t think you’ve noticed, but I can’t stay away from you, let alone have the ability to leave you.” He reassures you with a soothing and calm tone. His thumb draws circles around your knuckles. “I’m always going to be your friend, whether or not I know how you taste.”

“Do you still want to try it … you know, from the source?” You shyly ask, an innocence embodying your gaze and voice cadence.

Jeno raises an eyebrow, a smirk on his lips. “I’d love to, only if you let me.”

Instantly, you shift to get on your lower back. Jeno watches as you excitedly position yourself open for him and actually finds your eagerness quite adorable. Your left leg bends behind the driver’s seat and your right rests on the dashboard.

He hooks his arms underneath your thighs to pull you forward towards him and your whole body slides against the leather. With a slow lift, your skirt reveals your drenched panties. Rolling them off and tossing them to the back seat, he lays eyes on your still dripping pussy. Jeno takes a second to admire your flower, this being his first time he’s seen such a private part of you.

“You’re beautiful, you know that right?” He chuckles deeply, before his tongue licks a long strip up to your clit. You exclaim out of the tingling pleasure that seized your insides.

He flattens his tongue against your bundle of nerves, flicking and circling. His finger enters your pussy again, curling up to rub at the same pace he is licking. The pure sight of Jeno’s head in between your legs is enough for butterflies to explode.

His sole motive is to make you feel good. There is nothing else in the world that he wants at this moment beside pleasure to overtake your body. Jeno eats you out like he hasn’t had a meal in months. His mouth wraps around your clit. The mixture of his flicks and sucks cause electric bolts to run down your legs.

You get more wet as Jeno pumps his finger in and out of your hole. Your juices are practically dripping onto the interior of the car, but Jeno doesn’t care.

He fucking loves it. He loves the taste of you lingering on his tongue. Your breathless moans. Your waterfall dripping on uncontrollably. The view of you unwinding because of him. Nothing can be more perfect.

Running your hands through his messy locks, you press him closer into you. A devilish smile draws on his face as he flicks his tongue side to side. “Oh, fuck! I’m.. so c--close.”

Your back arches upward into Jeno’s mouth, feeling his muscle lick harder and faster on your throbbing clit. He adds a second finger, and the simultaneous stimulation practically throws you into another dimension. The pleasure overtakes your entire lower half, your legs trembling from pure ecstasy as you approach your orgasm.

“Don’t stop, I’m going to---” Then, Jeno pulls away and shoves his tongue into your warmth. A gasp hits the air as he also continues to rub circles on your sensitive nerves. His tongue fucked your pussy incredibly skillfully and deliciously. With this switch, your legs violently shake and try clamping together.

However, his strength holds you wide and open for display. A low grunt follows suit as his dark eyes zone in on your contoured facial expressions. Then, the white light blind you once again and the ball of tension unravels itself on Jeno’s tongue. Squirming and screaming, your hips buck forward on their own.

It is close to being too catastrophic, this being the most intense orgasm you’ve had after a whole year. Nevertheless, the satisfaction is right on the tips of your toes and you greedily indulge in the euphoric moment. Jeno feels your walls squeeze around his muscle as he laps every last bit of you up.

He is absolutely addicted to your juices, making sure he catches every drop. Finally pulling away, he wipes the extra drip on the back of his hand. Jeno blinks at your raising chest and limp legs. Chuckling, his warm hand massages feeling back into your body.

“Do you want me to carry you back up?” His hoarse, raspy voice wakes you from your post orgasm daydream. You flutter your lashes at him fondly and happily nod at his offer.

Getting out of the car, Jeno walks over to the passenger side and your arms rest nicely around his neck. His palms support your butt, but also smoothing your skirt over to cover your decency. A poke against your outer thigh makes you realize that Jeno is strained against his jeans.

“I can take care of you too.” You pout cutely at Jeno, but he shakes his head.

“It’s not about me tonight. It’s about you.” Leaving a soft kiss on your cheek, his eyes turn into moon crescents from his lovable smile. The kind, friendliness makes an appearance again.

Or so you think! In a sheer second, Jeno’s deep voice rumbles your stomach and his hooded eyes pierce your soul, “next time though, I’m fucking you real good, babe.”

You hum in response. Saliva collects in your mouth, already looking forward to more of Jeno. But a chilly draft brushes up your exposed area as Jeno carries you up the flight of stairs.

“Wait, Jeno… I don’t have my underwear on.” The ‘Level 3’ sign is in view as Jeno turns to walk.

He only laughs and shrugs nonchalantly, “it’s better that way anyways.” Without another word, he continues upward to your floor and you playfully punch his solid chest. In all honesty, that’s not going to be the only time you leave behind your panties in his beloved car.

Your hatred for the notorious Ridin’ Club subside after such a wild night. If anything, you owe it all to your shitty ex-boyfriend for joining such a ridiculous club. Without him and the club’s existence, who knows if Lee Jeno would’ve still swerve into your lane.

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divine-mistake · 3 years

Text

this is our last stop, love — one.

Everyone knows you don’t leave the Organization. No one wants to anyway—until they do. Assassin AU.

Characters: Bucky Barnes/(f)Reader

Warnings: 18+ (no smut), mentions of death, guns, violence, mentions of suicide

Word Count: 3408

A/N: It's finally here! My baby is finally here!

SERIES MASTERLIST | AO3 | PLAYLIST

the place you exist you never call home, did you know that?

"More than anything, I want you to know that I love you. And I’m sorry."

The only beautiful thing about Neon City is that it’s lawless.

I’ve seen Neon City from the highest floor of the tallest skyscraper and I’ve seen it from the sewers so far underground you think you’ll suffocate, and this city looks the same from every single angle.

Fluorescent and dirty and lawless.

From up here, on the darkened roof of a crumbling hostel that’s been abandoned by everyone but the squatters ‘cause the walls have sucked up so many blood stains and bullet holes they’re threatening to collapse, the city looks exactly like that. The bright lights of Upperside pulse with every single color the universe could have created, tinting the darkness of the night like a kaleidoscope. Even on the eighteenth story, the thumping bass from the strip of clubs just a street over shakes the foundation underneath my feet.

Peering through the scope of the sniper positioned on the roof’s ledge, I zoom in on the street corner at the left-hand side of my vision with a lazy twist of my wrist. Two women, one with hair as dark as night that streams down her back like a river, the other with a short, platinum-dyed spiky cut, smoke rolled cigarettes. They’re dressed to the Neon City nines: a leather corset underneath a metallic jumpsuit unzipped below her belly button and a slinky dress paired with a buckled harness and knee-high platform boots. Leaning against a grimy street lamp with a busted bulb, it isn’t long before a man dressed in a white fur coat shows up, throws his arms around them, and walks them toward the nearest club.

When he adjusts his coat, it lifts just enough to reveal the assault rifle hanging from a shoulder strap. There’s a pistol just above the hem of the dark-haired girl’s dress, strapped to her thigh, only visible by the faint outline in the silk. I don’t even want to guess how much heat the other chick is packing; that hideous jumpsuit she’s got on is loose enough to hide an arsenal without suspicion.

In the distance, all the way from the Kill Zone, a rapture of gunshots goes off just louder than the EDM pouring from the strip. Or maybe it’s quieter down on the streets, air hazy with cloven smoke and threat of death. Maybe no one gives a fuck.

The ugly thing about Neon City is that it only has one law.

No one leaves Neon City. At least not alive.

A weak vibration against the inside of my left wrist, right above my pulse point, steals my eye from the scope. Fifteen minutes.

“Aren’t you supposed to be doing this?” I sit back on my haunches to glance at my partner.

“Why?” He’s laying flat on the roof, boots crossed at the ankle and an arm thrown over his eyes, not a care in the world. A prickling of annoyance makes its presence known at the back of my neck—not the first of the evening and certainly, definitely, unfortunately not the last.

“‘Cause you’re the sniper?” I hiss, but he only laughs quietly in response. The sleek black cuff that bumps against my radius flickers to life with one tap of my finger, an interface made of light projecting itself upon my forearm to show the countdown. Thirteen minutes.

“The World’s Best Sniper,” he corrects, sitting up with a grunt. His legs are sprawled over the dirty ground, black combat pants picking up a coating of dust that’s collected on the roof for what must’ve been ages.

I purse my lips. “World’s Laziest Sniper, you mean.”

“Hey, I resent that.” The heavy soles of his boots crunch gravel and grit beneath them, a grating sound, as he shifts over and bumps me out of the way. “Move.”

“Oh, now you want to do your job?”

Bucky doesn’t reply and it should make me feel better, but it only serves to annoy me further. I fold my legs underneath me and sit back to stare at the building across from us, the one he’s busy scoping out now, letting the irritation simmer through my veins as the cool air of the night rolls over my skin like toxic gas. The black stealth suit glued to my skin does nothing to keep the freezing air from chilling my bones. I envy Bucky’s tactical suit, the combat vest hugging his chest with all its bulletproof padding.

Not that it’s cold enough outside to hurt. Neon City is so alive with masses of squirming, sweaty bodies and drugs and guns and lights and music that I swear the air is always ten degrees hotter than it should be. I don’t even think the dead bodies stick around long enough to grow cold.

The buzz on the inside of my wrist alerts me.

“Ten minutes,” I say.

“God, you’re annoying.”

“How long have you known that?” I pick grit out from underneath my fingernails idly.

“Since the day I met you,” he mutters back. “When they told me you were my new partner, I almost choked one of the Exec’s out.”

I snort. “Which Executive?”

He doesn’t even glance over at me. “Not tellin’ you, snitch.”

My teeth grind together. He’s said it so easy, nonchalantly, like a joke, but it strikes a nerve in me that turns those prickles of annoyance into something more aggressive. Something that heats my blood. I’m not a snitch.

But everyone thinks I’m a little goody-two-shoes just ‘cause I’m on Pierce’s good side.

I take a deep breath and ignore him. “The mark is coming from Black Mamba—he’ll be here soon.” With a quick turn of my wrist, I check the time. “Eight minutes.”

“He own the place?” Bucky asks, twisting the scope and centering it on the fourteenth floor of the apartment building in front of us. The mark will arrive from the left side of the complex, just off the elevator, where the landing is lit with a soft yellow light. The glass windows give Bucky a perfect shot.

“Dunno,” I tell him honestly. “I didn’t read the file.”

Bucky’s head snaps back to look at me. “What?”

I recoil, eyes narrowing. “What?” I mimic. “What’s your problem?”

“You didn’t read the file? And you’re calling me lazy?”

“Calm down.” I wave him off, but he doesn’t turn away from staring at me, his eyes narrowed into a glare. “I read enough of his file to know when and where and how he’s arriving, as usual, so don’t get your panties in a twist. You do your job, I’ll do mine. As usual.”

It’s like I can hear the blood vessels in his neck pop and burst as his jaw tightens.

“Your job is to read the dossier,” he grits through clenched teeth. “The whole dossier. On every single mark.”

A new surge of anger rushes through me, drowning out the loud cacophony of the city beneath us. My fingers twitch and flex, heat pooling in my palms like an itch that needs scratching. Bucky Barnes, out of all people, shouldn’t be sitting here treating me like a goddamn child. Calling me annoying, calling me a snitch, calling me out for not wanting to read a full case file on a man who deserves to die.

I have to twist my fingers in the thin material of my stealth suit to keep my hands busy.

“I don’t need to know a single thing about these marks besides how to kill them,” I say, voice low, and Bucky presses his lips together. “He’s on our list for a reason. I don’t need, nor want, to know why.”

Bucky scoffs, blowing a stray lock of hair out of his eyes. “You really don’t want to know what he’s done to get the Org’s attention? To get a contract?”

The image of the stacks of files piling up on Pierce’s desk, threatening to fall over and collapse, worms its way into my head. Only a week ago I had seen the brown folders collecting in his office, strewn about his shelves, all filled with names and numbers and photos of people who need to be eliminated.

They’re all bad. I’m not going to sit around and read a dossier about what they’ve done; whose blood stains their hands for money or for fame or for shits and giggles and fucks. If Bucky wants his reading material to be covered in a thorough coating of Neon City squick, then by all means, he can read their files.

Not me, though. I just need to know how to kill them.

“No,” I answer honestly. “I don’t want to know.”

He shakes his head, like he’s disappointed in me, and his eyes fall on the apartment complex again. “Part of our job is reading those dossiers, y’know.”

Embarrassment spreads through me, the heat of an anger that threatens to boil over flooding my synapses. It’s like he’s scolding me. Like he’s insinuating that I can’t—that I’m not doing my job right. It makes my palms start itching again so bad that I curl my fingers into a tight, shaking fist.

“The only people who read the full files are the ones who don’t trust the Organization,” I snap, and Bucky’s neck nearly breaks from the speed at which he turns to look at me.

Like you, I let go unsaid.

From far away, but still close enough to send a shiver up my spine, the rattle of Neon City’s train tracks hits me as the cars speed past Upperside, never slowing, never stopping. If I look off into the distance, peer down past the rest of the skyscrapers blocking the view, I bet I could see it making its rounds, a black bullet rocketing through the brightly-lit city night, its horn never braying.

The black band on my wrist vibrates. “Three minutes.”

Bucky opens his mouth, closes it, and stares at me. His eyes look black tonight. With another shake of his head—in disappointment or frustration, I’m not sure—he pulls his goggles down from his hairline and sets them in place as he looks away from me. He palms his sniper rifle, back to adjusting the scope, and my hands are still shaky with a fury I didn’t think would rupture from inside me tonight.

“I don’t get how we’ve worked together for years and I never knew you didn’t read the files,” he grunts.

“‘Cause we’re killers,” I spit, “not Birdies. I don’t need to sit and read a dossier to know how to kill a man.”

He snorts. “Not Birdies,” Bucky mutters sardonically. “As if we don’t skirt the law the same way they all do.”

That’s the problem with being lawless. All the gray. Bucky might think we’re like the Birdies—the cops and the corpos and the politicians who walk around like they’re untouchable, like they’ve got a Get Out of Jail Free card in their pocket—but Neon City doesn’t have laws for people like us. All Neon City’s got is a morality scale weighted by cash. Neon City doesn’t care about the Organization.

‘Cause the Organization is who’s really in charge of this city. We’re the ones who keep the streets clean of Birdies, like tonight’s mark, for the right price.

“That’s him,” I say, nodding my head at the black car that just pulled up to the front of the apartment complex, disappearing around the corner we can’t see from our angle. “One minute.”

“Damn, you’re annoying,” Bucky says again, and he pulls his mask up from where it hangs around his neck, covering the rest of his face.

“Shut up and do your fucking job.”

Everything goes quiet and I shift forward, laying flat on my stomach beside Bucky. About the only time that he ever goes quiet is when he’s behind a scope—my favorite place to have him. In the darkness, Bucky looks like nothing more than a shadow. Dark hair, dark clothes, dark mask. But in the artificial highlights of Neon City, I could almost paint him as a god, with streaks of bright, holocene colors slicking through his hair like an oil spill.

He looks like a killer. A Neon City native.

But I guess I am too, since I’m right here next to him.

There’s only the slight squeak of the scope that Bucky adjusts and adjusts and fucking adjusts, whether in nervousness or in necessity, and the hammering of my heart as we watch the apartment complex from our vantage point. Bucky can probably see the numbers on the elevator as they light up, signaling our mark’s arrival. I don’t get much special equipment like he does with his sniper’s visor. All I have is my C-Link wrapped tight around my wrist as it buzzes with alerts. Infiltrators never get much—occupational hazards and all that. The Org never knows how long an infiltrator will last.

And even after a decade of doing this, of lying prone on rooftops watching Bucky aim for a mark’s forehead, of dressing in a disguise that isn’t my own to sit on the lap of a greasy-haired gang leader with rings on each finger, of slipping poison in my own drink and hoping its effects won’t just take my target—

Even after all these years, I still get nervous before the kill.

“Thirty seconds,” I murmur under the cacophony of Neon city and the twisting of Bucky’s scope, more for myself than for him.

“Can you stop staring at me?” he answers back, and a spark of irritation shoots up my arms like my nerves are on fire.

“I’m not staring at you anymore,” I hiss. “Please, for the love of god, concentrate.”

His voice is smug. “So you admit you were staring at me?”

“God no.”

Then, suddenly silence drapes itself upon us like a cold, tense air as the mark steps off the elevator Bucky has been watching. The bodyguard who flanks him is too relaxed, moving too languidly, and I can tell, even from a distance, that he barely glances out the big glass windows that we use to peek into their lives like a little kid pressing their face to a fishbowl.

A mistake like that is fatal.

“Count me in, sweetheart,” Bucky says, and I can’t help but scoff.

“A second ago you were telling me that it was annoying.” My eyes track the position of the mark as he speaks to someone—another one of his guards—on the landing just outside his apartment.

“I changed my mind. C’mon, doll, for good luck.”

“Yeah, alright Barnes. Like you need any luck.”

The countdown is quiet, breathy, and feels like a rollercoaster crashing straight into my stomach as Bucky squeezes the trigger and the shot rings out, deafening, the glass shattering upon impact, blood spilling all over the white tiling beneath the mark’s feet as he staggers back into the arms of his closest bodyguard, yellow light illuminating his dying face from so far away.

Easy. Quick.

Always so quick.

Then Bucky’s hand, a little warm from his hold on his rifle, is pressing down on my head and forcing me to duck down. We lay there for a few seconds, with only his gun between us, listening carefully for the sounds of someone rushing the building. My cheek is pressed against the cold, dirty surface of the roof, staring at Bucky as we wait the last few minutes.

When he’s sure that no one is coming after us, Bucky pulls his mask back down and shoves his goggles up through his hair, catching some of the chestnut strands in the straps.

His blue eyes flick up to meet mine and he flashes me a smug grin. “See?”

I snort. “Yeah, okay. So you did need the extra luck.”

“Hey.” He frowns dramatically, and I almost crack a smile.

“World’s Best Sniper my ass.”

Bucky breaks into a laugh at that, chuckling softly as he shifts onto his knees and grabs his rifle. A giggle nearly slips through my lips in tune with his own. He props himself up on his elbows to peer over the ledge of the roof one more time. I turn my wrist inward to check my C-Link, swiping past the map of our area to scroll over to the mark’s file. His bio-feedback uploads directly to my Link and a red word projects over the dark sleeve covering my forearm, blinking brightly.

DECEASED.

“Clear,” Bucky declares and I nod my head in agreement, the interface of my Link disappearing as I twist my arm.

Good job, I want to tell him. My lips feel sewn shut and my tongue is dry.

Instead, I watch as he takes apart the pieces of his rifle, slowly, carefully, fluidly. The hands that know where to shove a knife to neutralize a target, that know how to keep still in order to pull a hair trigger and still take the recoil, those hands know how to take apart each intricate section of his gun without hesitation. As if he’s on autopilot, Bucky unscrews each part and packs them in a padded case with a delicacy I only ever see him exert on firearms.

Maybe he uses such care when handling his weapons because he wishes someone would use such care when handling him.

Bucky’s always said he’s just a weapon, too.

In the background, the rattling of the train tracks bursts through the stagnant air of Neon City yet again. This will be its last circuit through Upperside for a while, making its way down to the Lowerside to loop around the gutters of the city instead. And by the time it comes back our way, we’ll be far enough away that the rumbles of the cars won’t vibrate through the concrete. In fact, on the top floor of the Org’s high rise, the black train is but a speck of speeding lights, nearly invisible.

I roll onto my back, the roof hard on my spine, cold seeping through the thin fabric of my stealth suit. The faint clink of fiberglass fades and is replaced by a snap of metal and the click of a lock as Bucky presumably closes the case to his rifle. Above me, the sky is as black as the train that rockets through the city, dark and unending.

“You haven’t always lived in Neon City,” I mention, hearing Bucky’s combat boots shuffle toward me.

“Yeah,” he says, but there’s something hesitant in his voice. He doesn’t offer anything more, and I breathe in the smoky, dusty air, my eyes searching every corner of the sky that I can see for something—for anything.

But there’s nothing there.

“What do the stars look like?” I ask him quietly. On the edges of my vision, the glowing lights of the nightclubs below us tint everything in red and blue and pink and purple, so bright, so sickening, and it drowns everything in the vicinity. I wonder if there’s a sky out there, somewhere, that can’t be drowned.

‘Cause Bucky might not truly be a Neon City native—and fuck him for that—but he’ll never leave it now.

And I’ll never know why Bucky traded a sky filled with stars for a city born of blood.

He never answers, and I never expect him to. Instead, Bucky’s hand appears in front of my eyes, his calloused fingers reaching out for me. And when I put my cold hand in his warm grasp, he locks our fingers together tightly, and a spark ignites when our palms meet as if my mind is still asking to see the sky light up, electric.

As easy as he pulls a trigger, Bucky pulls me up from where I lay on the roof. His arm slips around my waist to hold me as I gain my footing, and he’s so fucking warm it makes me shiver in response, but when I look up to meet his gaze, he tugs his hand out of mine and drifts away. Without a word, Bucky grabs his weapon case and nods toward the open hatch where a ladder leads us back down to the eighteenth floor.

“C’mon,” he says. “Let’s get out of here.”

No one leaves Neon City alive—and that’s usually why no one chooses to arrive.

#bucky barnes #bucky barnes x reader #bucky barnes x you #bucky barnes fanfic #bucky barnes series #enemies to lovers #bucky barnes angst #assassin au #assassin!reader #this is our last stop love #thanks for supporting me!

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chunhua-s · 3 years

Text

WITH OUR FATES TANGLED TOGETHER ➽ ATSUMU MIYA X READER

requested by: @tsumue

➪ hi davi! so, as you know i fell deeply in love with your soulmate fics (a while ago and so did some of my friends!!) your writing is really beautiful and i couldn't stop myself from intruding your inbox🥺 if it's not too stupid or uninspiring could i mayhaps ask for a soulmate scenario angst to fluff (only if you feel up for it!) with atsumu? thank you!🤍

genre: angst to fluff

soulmate au: soulmates are bound together by a red string

warnings: angst — my ability to write this genre isn’t necessarily the best :v but i tried my best with it, and i did enjoy the experience! hopefully with time i’ll be able to write more and get better at it!

you meet your soulmate at age sixteen.

the fear that grips at your heart is mind numbing. it sinks cold fingers into your neck and bruises it with a cruel hand that cuts off all air from your lungs, and leaves you empty so that the only other thing you can feel is hot, hot anger.

the anger isn’t yours — the red chord that’s gotten all tangled up between your fingers tells you as much. instead, it belongs to him.

the him who stands before you with hard brown eyes and lips pressed into a thin line. the him who you’d always wanted to meet ever since that red chord tangled itself between your fingers at the age of seven. the him whose name you’d dreamed of without ever knowing it, had fantasized about how it would feel to let it roll from your tongue. he’s here — you’ve finally met your soulmate, but why does the red chord that connects you two together feel so heavy all of a sudden?

miya atsumu sighs, lifting a hand to run through his sweat-matted blond hair: your eyes follow the motion. it was easier to watch that red string and think about the way it wrapped around his fingers than to meet brown eyes that burned under a muted fury. “look, i—“ the voice that you always imagined would cause your heart to take flight on butterfly wings reaches your ears on a cold, flat tone that locks your body down to a barren winter land. “i know this isn’t what you expected for when you meet your soulmate.” by the time you finally pull your eyes to look at his face, they’re burning with tears and blur the image of him until he’s a blend of colours you can’t tell apart. his lips move behind a sheet of haze, like a spell cast over your vision that should protect you from breaking.

“but i don’t think i can be together with someone else right now.”

that spell can do nothing for your heart that rips apart underneath the blunt end of his blade.

when he looks at you, there’s something behind the light of anger and hatred — hatred for you, why does he hate you, you don’t understand... did you do something wrong? what you see behind flames of brown sugar and autumn leaves is a chasm: wide and glaring and so consumingly empty. it spits on the bedtime stories of warmth and unimaginable joy and fulfillment that a soulmate should bring — it chews on those fairytales and coughs them out on a plate of cold indifference, hate, contempt. and it hurts.

“o-oh,” you choke. there’s no way you can meet his eyes like this; your voice is cracking under the weight of your pain and your tears threaten to paint your skin with the colour of blood red agony. “i... I understand.” you don’t. this isn’t what your friends told you would happen. nothing prepared you for your own soulmate to reject you. “that’s fine, i—” breathing becomes hard, your very lungs reject the air that you so desperately drag between your trembling lips. when you look up at him, what hope that you feel is quickly smothered when you catch his eyes. he looks at you as if the sight of you here, on the verge of tears, disgusts him. “i can wait for you... i don’t mind.”

he scoffs: the sound of it is like the grating of metal against your ears. “sure, whatever.” and that’s how he leaves you. broken hearted and crying for the ache that cripples your body as the red chord tightens around your fingers.

now, the picture of him standing before you is so jarringly different that it causes your world to spin so violently that you feel as if your legs might collapse in on themselves. your reality turns itself on its side so that your cup spills out from between your hands and leaves your heart vulnerable to the cold water that floods through your body.

atsumu miya’s eyes are searching as he stands beneath the winter night’s sky, the brown colour in them filled up with a warmth that you know for a fact wasn’t there on that day you met him. there’s pain on his expression, regret so tangible that it tastes sour on your tongue, and when he says your name on trembling lips, you feel the last of your will crumble into dust.

“y/n...” he’s pleading. his eyes are wet with the same tears that had touched your cheeks throughout the two years he’d left you waiting. they tell the story of unmistakable suffering and agony — the familiarity of it tears your heart into pieces and leaves you gasping for air. “please.”

and oh, by the gods above, you want so desperately to welcome him into your arms, want nothing more than to hold him so that you can feel whole for the first time since meeting him. but the pain that still echoes inside your chest is loud and demanding, rumbling through your ribs like a thunderstorm that pushes words you don’t want to say out from between your lips. when they fall, they reach atsumu’s skin like the little snowflakes that fall from the winter sky. they melt into his tears and dig their way into his heart until he’s left breathless because he knows just how he hurt you.

“you made me wait for so long, atsumu.”

he can’t begin to tell you how much he regrets it.

“i’m sorry...” his apology falls from him like a whimper. it dances on his tongue so that he can taste the salt of his own tears. he discovers that it’s awfully bitter. “I shouldn’t have done that to you.”

the emptiness, the helpless acceptance in your voice echoes inside his mind. “i was so close to giving up, you know? i thought you’d be happier if you weren’t tied down to me...”

he knows. god, he knows. every minute of pain and hurt had trickled down to him through the red string that connects the both of you, and the knowledge that you suffered so much because of him, it tears him apart as he stands before you.

“no, please— i can’t live without you...”

he really can’t. he tried to forget about you. he threw himself out into a reckless life and ate the hearts of others who sought for his affection, hoping that they could somehow erase the wretched piece of cloth that tied him down. he submerged himself underwater hoping to breathe, and found himself drowning without you.

“you hurt me.”

“and i was selfish, i know...” he reaches out for you on a single, hesitant step that crumbles the snow beneath his shoes. when you don’t step away, he takes another, pushes himself forward until you’re standing directly in front of him, tear-stained eyes tilting upwards to stare into his. they’re burning, you notice: the fire that consumes the brown in them this time, though, is different. it’s changed.

he reaches for your hand, holds it between the both of his and cups it close to his chest, and his eyes never leave yours. they reveal to you the secrets that his lips won’t tell to you, they bare every ounce of yearning that his spirit screams out silently, and it’s as if every cell in his body is desperate to feel you against him when you can feel the heat of him through your gloves. “but let me make it up to you...” his whisper falls underneath the soft winds, it caresses your skin just as gently and, as you’re looking up at him, your soulmate, you can’t help the tears that sting behind your eyes. you realize that, just like back then, his image is blurred by the curtains of water, but now he glows like the sun itself. everything about him manages to warm your heart on a cold winter night, and god knows you’ll never forgive the pain that he’s caused you — all those years filled with doubt and insecurity and despair — but you think to yourself as you lift one of his hands to hold against your cheek that, at the very least, you want to take a chance with him.

his eyes shine like the stars when you show him a watery smile. “yes...” you whisper back to him. he thinks the sound of it is sweet, and he imagines that your voice may be what it means to dance among sunflowers.

“i want to take a chance with you, atsumu.”

haikyuu!! soulmate au taglist: @nishiya-is-baby

general taglist: @aiiishiiiteru @tsumue @bootylikepeachy

send an ask to be added!

so this is admittedly one of my shorter works and i did struggle a little with transitioning from angst to fluff :( i originally had two ideas, this one which is mostly angst, and another that’s mostly fluff, but in the end i decided to go with this one since i know runa likes angst a lot :0 bb i hope it was okay!

for atsumu’s character in this i wanted to push across that he didn’t want to be tied down with a soulmate when he had his volleyball aspirations to follow through with. although i don’t recall it being specifically stated in canon, i get the feeling that his dedication towards volleyball is nearly on the same level as kageyama’s and oikawa’s, where they wouldn’t be able to give themselves into a relationship when they had their dreams to seek after. so at the point in time when he meets the reader, he’d already decided to disregard any attachment for his soulmate, and so his attitude towards them is a result of that decision he made. however, time spent intentionally trying to separate yourself from your soulmate causes suffering and i wanted to show in the end that it was that pain and longing that finally drove him back to the reader. i feel like if i’d shown from atsumu’s perspective, i could have portrayed that pain and suffering that he’d have gone through without her, but i really wanted to show that through the reader instead. did it work well?

this is part of a series, so please send me an ask or dm if you’d like to be apart of a taglist! i’m currently taking request for haikyuu characters and soulmate au’s, so please come and leave your requests for those as well! thank you for reading! ♡

previous: hajime iwaizumi | next stop: requests are open!

#haikyuu!! soulmate au 💕✨#atsumu x reader #atsumu miya x reader #atsumu angst #haikyuu x reader #haikyuu!!#haikyuu reader insert #haikyuu soulmate au #runa!! 🌻

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alienheartattack · 3 years

Text

To All Of Us, From 2000 Years Ago

I got so mad about 139 and the leaks that I banged out my own 3000+ word ending to the manga today. Please keep in mind that this is a non-shipping story. Although I’ve exclusively written Rivamika before, this is not a Rivamika story, and although there’s an Eren/Mikasa scene at the beginning. there is no relationship between them, only the implication of feelings that are not quite reciprocated. I also threw some Levi fan service in there because why the hell not?

CW: There are references to and non-detailed descriptions of rape in this story.

You can also read this on AO3!

"You know what you have to do," Eren says. Mikasa pretends not to hear him over the rush of the little creek they're sitting by so he says it again, louder.

"I know," she sighs. "Even now, knowing that you've done something so unforgivable, a part of me doesn't want to."

"You're a good person, Mikasa. You'll be even better without me."

She snorts a laugh. "I've killed people, too. Just not as many as you did."

"You always had the weirdest sense of humor." Eren puts an arm around her, presses a kiss to her cheek. "I'm going to miss it." That's what finally brings him to tears, the thought of not seeing Mikasa again. Or Armin. Or Connie, or Jean, or Captain Levi, even the rest of them. He's had plenty of time to accept that he'd die at nineteen, was always going to die at nineteen, but now that the moment has arrived he wants to hold on just a bit longer.

Mikasa doesn't cry, at least not the way he expects her to. Tears stream down her face but she doesn't sniffle, doesn't sob, doesn't rage or scream the way she’s done in the past. He sees them both, Mikasa the girl and Mikasa the soldier, perfectly coexisting in the inky blackness of her eyes. She has made her decision. She made it before she even stepped into the mouth of the Titan.

"Kiss me one last time," Eren weeps. "Please."

"Okay," she nods, cupping his face with one hand and leaning in close. "See you later, Eren."

When Mikasa pulls away from his lips, the deed is already done. His severed head feels sickeningly heavy in her blood-stained hands. His eyes gaze beyond her, beyond the veil of this world, clouded with the knowledge of the void. The Titan around her begins to disintegrate in plumes of white steam. Mikasa swears she can smell wildflowers.

"Mikasa Ackerman," a girl's voice echoes. Mikasa whips her head around, looking for the source of the sound. Someone seems to materialize from the steam, swirling eddies of smoke coalescing in the form of a small girl, scraggly blond hair falling into her eyes, barefoot in a dirty white dress. Her face is blank, her eyes downcast.

"Ymir," Mikasa says, the name forming in her mouth before she can think of it.

Ymir nods, then points to Eren's head. "You loved him. Why did you kill him?"

"I had to."

"Why?"

"Because some things are more important than my love." Ymir stares blankly, seemingly confused. "The millions of people who died are more important. The world is more important. Besides, what kind of person would I be to stand beside someone who could slaughter so many people so senselessly?"

"You… don't love him?" The little girl blinks quickly, white lids snapping over black eyes. Something about it seems inhuman, wrong somehow. Mikasa cannot help but think of insects.

A tear falls from her face and lands on Eren’s, snaking a trail down his cheek as though he'd shed it himself. "I can never forget what he did and I don't know if I'll ever be able to forgive him for it, but I'll always love Eren."

"You wouldn't die for him?"

Mikasa answers without hesitation. "Never."

Ymir's gaze snaps up to Mikasa's, and she feels sick from what she sees in the girl's odd, dark eyes: a hunger, almost starvation, for the scraps of affection Karl Fritz would throw at her; a longing to be treated well, to be fussed over and doted on and adored. Ymir would close her eyes and dream of a shining, beautiful man when the king held her down and fucked her, made her recoil, made her bleed, beat her when she cried out or complained of the pain. She carved out a space in her mind for him where she sculpted him into her ideal. Sometime between that first bloody night and the day the assassin's spear pierced her chest she invented a Karl Fritz out of whole cloth, a man whose cold entreaties and brutal assaults were proof of his undying love.

Mikasa sees these things from Ymir’s eyes, feels the bruises forming on her back, the tearing and bleeding between her legs, the rotted wine breath of Karl Fritz in her mouth.

"I would never have jumped in front of that spear," she says, more confident than she’s ever felt. "I wouldn't even have considered it." Ymir frowns, cocks her head like she's trying to understand. "You thought you were doing the right thing, but you protected a man who never loved you. You laid down your life for a man who forced your daughters to consume your body. He didn't even mourn you."

A flash of anger contorts Ymir's face. Her eyes dart around wildly, turning Mikasa's words over in her mind. "But he loved me," she insists.

"Did he ever tell you he loved you? Or did he treat you like a slave?" Mikasa's voice wavers at the word slave, at the memory of Eren screaming at her across that restaurant table; the moment her wall of denial came crumbling down. No matter what his plan was, it became clear that day that he would step on any of them to achieve it. She had no idea how true that assessment would become, millions of bodies crushed into the contaminated earth beneath the feet of Eren’s Titans.

She wonders if things would have happened differently if he'd just admitted once that he loved her.

"You are free," she tells Ymir. "You choose your own destiny. I am free, and I chose mine."

Ymir says nothing, her eyes luminous with tears, and then dissipates into the smoke. Mikasa is vaguely aware of the wavering steam around her, of Levi flying on Falco's back and pulling her out of the Titan's mouth before everything turns hazy and white.

She can see the scene from two thousand years earlier as clear as though she were there, floating above it all: the crowd come to see King Fritz's speech, the hooded assassin's arm pulling back, the tip of the spear glinting in the daylight. The assassin lets the spear fly, its arc perfectly aimed at the heart of the tyrant. His wife Ymir, older and slimmer than the girl Mikasa met but still with those same sad, black insect eyes, watches in horror as the tip of the spear flies closer and closer; but she does not move, not even when it impales her husband through the chest and the light in his eyes is snuffed out.

In time-lapse, Mikasa sees it all: the accession of Queen Ymir, wise and fair, and the moderate reigns of her three daughters, and their daughters after them. The power of the Titans remains within the royal family, passed down from mother to daughter, a shameful, secret birthright. They create diplomatic ties with other countries, offering succor and counsel, avoiding the path of war so as not to reveal their ultimate power. There is no Great Titan War, no walls, no telepathic manipulation. The world moves forward in fits and starts as it always has, small skirmishes and occasional wars, but the Eldians remain steadfast and committed to peace. Satisfied with Ymir's choice, Mikasa finds herself closing her eyes, opening them for the first time again in the year 835, in her parents' house just outside Shiganshina, as a new doctor pulls her into the world. He is not Grisha Yeager, she notes, and then she forgets who Grisha Yeager is entirely.

In the year 845, there is no Wall Maria for the Colossal Titan to breach, and no Colossal Titan to breach it.

Inside one of the cities in what was once Wall Rose, a history teacher writes notes on a chalkboard before his first class arrives for the day. He draws a crown in the middle of the board and writes the subject of the day's class inside of it: QUEEN YMIR THE WISE. The teacher is startled by a noise behind him; he turns to find one of his students, a shy girl called Sarah, taking a seat at her desk.

"School hasn't started yet," he says. "You're supposed to be outside."

"I'm sorry, Mr. Smith," Sarah replies. "I was looking at a really interesting bug and the other girls started making fun of me."

The teacher nods. "All right, just this once. If you’d like, sometime I could teach you how to stand up to those girls."

Hundreds of miles away, the forests of Dauper ring with the whoops of an exuberant girl, triumphing at having killed her first deer with a bow and arrow she carved herself. She doesn't care that she's scaring the other game away with her commotion, or that she has no idea how she'll lug a hundred-pound carcass all the way back home.

In Trost, a young boy lingers over his breakfast; not because he wants to miss school, but because his mother's omelet is the most delicious thing he's ever eaten and probably ever will eat. His mother ruffles his hair and pinches his round cheek, then gently chides him to eat faster or he’ll be late.

A little boy in Ragako District, a few inches shorter than his friends, demands another explanation of the multiplication tables. He doesn't quite understand the concept, goes blank when his friends try to explain arrays of rows and columns, but he believes that he can pass today's test if he tries hard enough.

Across the sea in Marley, the prosperous Eldian District is strewn with streamers, celebrating the 2000th anniversary of the assassination of the cruel King Fritz. The children have the day off from school and are gathering in the streets, purchasing candy and ice cream from vendor stalls and exchanging them as gifts to celebrate the sweetness of life. A little blond girl receives an extra coin from her father, who tells her to get something special for herself.

A few blocks away, a doctor fills his medical bag and sets off to see his first patient of the day. As he walks through the crowd of happy children, many of whom he’s delivered himself, he hopes that his only son will change his mind and join the family business.

In Mitras, a shopkeeper opens his door for the first time, pausing for a moment in the early morning sunshine to admire the wooden shingle hanging by his doorway, gently swinging in the breeze. It depicts a hand wrapped around a mug of tea, wisps of steam rising into the air above it.

The door opens while he's adjusting the canisters on the shelf behind the counter, making sure their labels face perfectly forward. His heart leaps at the tinkle of the doorbell. He picked the most musical one, the one that made him happiest when he heard it, and he feels very good about his decision.

"Hello, welcome to Ackerman Tea— Mom!" His voice takes on an adolescent whine when he addresses his mother, which makes him feel like a child and impossibly old at the same time, despite his twenty-six years.

"Did you really think I wouldn't be your first customer?" she asks, beaming. "Of course I'm going to come support my sweet boy." Her gaze sweeps over the shop, its walls painted a deep forest green, the mahogany counter polished to a mirror shine. "I'm so proud of you, Levi. You've worked so hard and it shows." Her voice quavers, her eyes filling with tears.

"Moooom," he trills, softer this time, quietly moved. Her presence feels like an auspicious omen, a reminder from the universe that someone will catch him should he fall. "Is there a tea you’re interested in, or would you like me to help you choose? We have more than thirty varieties."

"You've been practicing," his mother notes with a nod.

Levi shrugs off her comment, feeling a bit bashful that she’s noticed his hard work. "I've never been great with people, and this job is nothing but people. At least until I can hire someone to cover the counter while I blend tea in the back."

"You'll get there soon," she says, pulling a few coins from her purse. "Get me something you'd think I'd like."

He thinks for a moment, his brow furrowing in concentration, before his face lights up and he grabs a step-stool to reach a canister of black tea flavored with strawberry and rose. "This one is sweet and floral, but it becomes so much more when you add a bit of milk. You don't even need any sugar."

"Perfect. You even thought about how I take my tea." She places a few coins on the counter, watching her son approvingly as he scoops the tea into a bag, folds it closed with surgical precision, and ties a blue ribbon around it. "You're going to be a success, my love. I know it."

"That makes one of us," he smirks, then scoops the coins into his palm and puts them in the cash register, enjoying the feel of the heavy keys under his fingers, the spring-loaded pressure of the drawer. He hopes he gets to use it many more times today.

"Will you be home for dinner?"

"I should be. I can't imagine people will want to buy tea at night."

"Good," his mother says. "Because now that you're in business, we should talk about finding you a wife."

"MOM!" he exclaims, a furious blush coloring his face.

Further south in Shiganshina, Mikasa sulks as her mother walks her into town, not wanting to leave the safety of her parents' cabin to learn and play with the other children. She is perfectly happy to do chores on the farm, to learn the simultaneously mundane and arcane secrets of coaxing a plant from seed, to throw feed to the chickens and pull weeds in the garden.

"Mikasa, you're ten years old. Your father and I can't teach you everything," her mother says.

"I can learn from books. I don't need to go to school."

"The fact that you're saying that means you need to go. There's more to the world than just our farm, my sweet. You might want to see the world someday."

The little girl huffs. "I doubt it." Her mother simply shakes her head and smiles, ruminating on her daughter’s impending teenage years, a possible hint of rebellion, but finds that hard to imagine. Mikasa is usually a calm, easygoing child, though perhaps a bit too inquisitive and stubborn for her own good.

Mikasa hugs her mother fiercely at the school gate, watching as she turns and walks back up the road that leads to their farm. She’s excited to make new friends and learn new things, but she misses her home more than she ever thought possible. She lets out a soft sigh, then turns to face the crowd of running, yelling children; her new classmates.

She trudges around the grassy schoolyard, dodging groups of kids chasing each other or playing impromptu games. Everyone seems to know each other already; even if she did feel comfortable enough to go up to someone and introduce herself, she has no idea who to approach first.

"Hey! Give that back!" someone screams behind her. Mikasa turns around to see a small blond boy jumping up and down, reaching for a book that a larger boy dangles just above his grasp. The larger boy just laughs at him, taunting him with the book, threatening to tear it from its spine.

Mikasa frowns, balling her fists at her sides, then approaches the boys. "He said to give his book back," she says to the bully. "Give it back."

The bully laughs. "You think you can tell me what to do?"

"I think you should give the book back if you know what's good for you," she snarls, putting her hands on her hips. The bully laughs again and shoves Mikasa out of the way with one hand, making her stumble backwards, tripping over her own feet until she lands on her behind in the dirt. She gets up, dusts herself off, and runs up to the bully, punching him square in the nose. He falls to the ground, dropping the book. Mikasa tosses it to the blond boy. The bully grabs his nose, tears welling in his eyes, and lets out a wail when he sees his hand smeared with blood.

"You leave him alone!" Mikasa threatens, looming over the bully, her dark eyes shining. He scrabbles to his feet and runs away and she lets out a relieved breath, her heart hammering in her chest.

"That was amazing!" the little boy says. When he approaches her, she finds that he's not actually that small, only a few inches shorter than her. "I've never seen you before. Are you new?"

"It's my first day," she replies. "I've lived here all my life but I haven't been to school yet."

"I'm Armin," the boy says. "What's your name?"

"Mikasa."

"That’s an interesting name. Are you from Hizuru?" Armin asks, his eyes wide with curiosity. He holds up his book, a thick, leather-bound tome, A Brief History of Hizuru and the Minor East Sea Islands written in gilt lettering. "My parents told me that the whole country is built around a volcano. A big mountain filled with liquid fire! Well, technically it’s molten rock."

"My mom's family is from Hizuru, but I’ve never been there and I don't know anything about any liquid fire mountains," she says tentatively.

"It's real!" he gushes. "I'm reading about it now. I could tell you about it more at recess if you want. I like to sit under that tree over there." He points off in the distance, at a huge pine tree that shades a corner of the yard. "They're going to ring the bell soon, otherwise I'd tell you now. Volcanoes are so cool. Sometimes they explode and shoot the liquid fire into the sky like a firework."

"Wow!" Mikasa marvels with a smile. "I can’t wait to hear about them."

#snk 139 #snk spoilers #snk leaks #snk fanfiction #alienheartattack writes

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antihero-writings · 3 years

Text

Vanity and Wax (Ao3 | FF.net)

Fandom: Pandora Hearts

Summary: The black feathers my be Glen's crown, but they're Oswald's chain.

Notes: This was written for @phmonth2021, Tragedy Trio Day 7 prompt: Feather. Sorry it's so late!!

I really liked this prompt and wanted to see if I could take it to a darker/deeper place. So...have some more Oswald angst!

I hope you like it! It would mean a lot if you could tell me you enjoyed it in the comments!

(By the way, the title comes from Alesana's album title "On Frail Wings of Vanity of Wax")

What do you think of when you think of feathers?

Soft and light, surely. A gentle thing, floating down. A patchwork of flight. Separate they are merely a collection of little useless trinkets. But when sewn together with vanity and wax they allow little hollow boned things to fly.

Such a beauty. Soft, harmless, and benign. Tied to the backs of angels and songbirds and hope.

For Oswald they were something altogether more foreboding.

The feathers he knew were black. They were attached to birds, yes, but not the little ones who sat in trees and sang songs. Rather, ones who beaks spit fire, and whose wings called chains. Well, three birds, one creature more akin to a monster out of a fairy tale, and another something in between.

Perhaps this was just a sinister fairy tale after all.

He didn’t like the ceremonies. But he would never tell anyone that. He had no choice but to through them. It was a great honor.

There was no blood relation, no heredity. But he was the successor all the same. It wasn’t a job he could just refuse. Puppet strings. Something like destiny.

We like to think of destiny as some divine inspiring force, but maybe in the end, all destiny is the puppet strings we don’t like to admit are there.

For other kings and princes and dukes, succession is a grand and wonderful honor. It happens once, when they come of age. A harmless, gallant and gallivant affair. Like a bird being pushed out of the nest, discovering his light and gentle and marvelous feathers allow him to fly.

Whoever heard of a prince having more than one succession ceremony?

Oswald would have five, each more bloody than the last.

The first happened when he was very young. He drank the blood of the Raven, and accepted its fire into his veins. Raven was gentlest, that’s why they always started with him.

The mark appeared on Oswald’s chest then, and he wouldn’t tell anyone but his sister than he cried that night, and didn’t know entirely why. But it felt like something in him had died.

The feathers fell the day, like ink splotches on the floor, on the pages of his life. Inerasable. Sealing his fate.

These feathers didn’t allow him to fly. These feathers were Chains.

The next, a few years later, was the Dodo, and though the boy’s eyes had always shown him much more than anyone else’s, the illusions told him this wasn’t all sane, or the same. That sometimes people lied.

That would be an important lesson to remember later.

The next was the Owl. The little creature with the big, starlit eyes, and the night’s wings.

The darkness suffocated.

And the feathers. Every time. Always the feathers. At the end of the day, all that was left wasn’t the fire, or the illusions, or the dark. It was the feathers, like a hole in the pages, revealing the truth of who he was becoming. He may be becoming a thing with wings, but they were flightless wings, merely for decoration, and intimidation, like the eyes on the backs of a moth’s.

Next to last was Gryphon, the one that allowed him to open the way. It was bigger and scarier than the first three, but he accepted it, tamed its blood, like the rest.

The last: Jabberwocky—(and it’s true, this didn’t make any sense at all)—the one that’d allow him to erase all his sins.

It looked altogether monstrous that day.

…Or maybe he did.

He drank the blood, and he looked at his sister—a flower bud, disallowed to bloom—and he raised his hand to her forehead, and he tried not to break.

He was the prince of the breakdown. This was the price of the crown. Sometimes one must put down their family for their profession in the end.

The feathers sprinkled the world like blackened snow as the chains ran her through.

And she smiled, and she said something he couldn’t make out. Her spirit may have been devoured that day, but the ghost of her unspoken last words would roam these halls until he was torn apart.

The feathers were all that was left of her when she died.

The feathers became his mark, as they had been his predecessors; the knowledge that Glen had been here, and had done something wonderful, and possibly terrible. The moth’s eyes.

He didn’t have to use them often, but sometimes there were deals, and duels, and neither were quite fair.

He always won. It was five against one after all.

—(Until that day. When that one was a bloody black rabbit)—

When others saw those feathers, they saw the seal of a noble king. The proof that he flew, and he fought, and he knew, knew everything, knew a little too much—(Do I really know anything at all?). They were the signet that he was Glen, a more telling mark than any brooch, medallion.

When Oswald saw those feathers, he could only see Lacie’s blood, like melted wax.

Sometimes he even thought he saw a drop of red in the black, until he understood it was nothing more than the memory of her eyes pooling in his brain.

He used them all the same, and he tried to remember that these feathers were his crown.

The only day he saw them as something different was that day. The day when the Chains that held the world together came down, and the sky was falling. He sent his Chains to hold it back up, their feathers a trail of hope for any who came across them, knowing that the five would use their wings to hold the sky up if that’s what it took. He rarely had to use all five, nor understood why he needed so many. On that day he understood. On that day…they were beautiful.

But, sending them into the fray left their master defenseless and exposed to friends, and their scythes.

******

The family held each others hands tight, sweat carving tracks across their skin, breath shallow as a tide pool. They didn’t understand what was happening, but the Earth was shaking, and Sablier was burning.

They ran through the streets, unsure where exactly they should go—and, clearly, neither did anyone else—just trying to get away, wherever that may be.

A building crumbled before their eyes, falling with a deafening thud upon the street before them to a chorus of screams, and they skidded to a halt, looking all around.

The mother looked to her husband for guidance, and the father tried to look brave, like he knew where to go next, but pain and panic was infecting his eyes.

His daughter held tight to her parents, trying not to cry.

Even the son, who always liked to seem brave, bit his lip as he looked up at his parents.

But what could they do? Everything was falling apart, and no one had any idea why, or where to go. What hope was there? They didn’t even know which direction to run towards.

As they were standing there trying to figure out where to go next, and not lose hope, a great gust of wind rushed by them, and drifting down to them upon the ashen air, the light shape of a black feather.

“Papa what is this?” The daughter asked, reaching out to catch it.

“It’s Glen-sama,” he exhaled.

He looked into the horizon to see the wings of a great and terrible beast; a Chain that in that moment was the personification of hope. He wrapped his arms around his family, both a smile and tears breaking out across his face.

“He’s going to save us.”

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fytheuntamed · 4 years

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I used to see WWX as sunshine incarnated and how it hurt me when I realized that it's mostly just fake and he's really not. I thought he was such a genuine person and when I realized that he hides so much of himself that he's not very genuine at all my heart broke a little and I needed to share my feelings. I still love him though, but it was a huge shock to me that everything I initially fell in love with was actually wrong. I hope this little ramble wasn't a bother.

Hello, anon! First off, you’re not bothering me at all; even if I can’t reply to all of them, I read and appreciate every ask I get. I’m sorry to hear you’re feeling a bit disillusioned with WWX; I know some would say he’s just a fictional character, but I think all of us here can attest to the power fictional characters have in impacting the lives of real people. Your ask made me think a lot about who WWX is, so I hope you don’t mind me sharing my own thoughts on the matter! Just a few disclaimers before I get into it: all analysis is based off of drama!WWX, as that is the adaption I know best, so keep this in mind as you read because I know his characterization varies a bit from adaption to adaption. WWX also happens to be my favorite character from the show, so this could will get long :’) I’m also going to continue on with the assumption that you’ve seen the show in its entirety!

I think one of the most important things to understand about people, fictional or real, is that we, like ogres, have layers. This is just what happens when you exist in a world where different settings with different people bring out different sides of us as dictated by societal norms. Does this make someone fake? I would say no, mainly because I think there’s a difference between acting “fake” and being fake. Anytime I speak on the phone with a stranger I automatically assume my “telephone voice,” which sounds quite different from my talking-with-friends-and-family-voice. I don’t leave such phone calls thinking to myself, “wow, I’m such a fake,” because I know that when speaking with strangers, being more polite than I would be around close friends and family is respectful. I think what it comes down to for me is, regardless of how I am presenting myself, am I staying true to my beliefs and values? This is why I think WWX is in fact very genuine, and I would also argue that it is his genuine nature (once revealed) that attracts LWJ to WWX.

Returning to the idea of people having layers, we must recognize that people are not static; we are constantly reacting to our settings and thus our moods fluctuate accordingly. WWX is sunshine incarnate, but he is also someone who has suffered a great deal over the course of his life. To expect him to smile no matter what is a cruel burden to impose on him, and I believe it is a burden he feels in canon. Because both Jiang Fengmian and Madam Yu impress upon WWX that he must keep Jiang Yanli and Jiang Cheng safe, that they are the priority, WWX feels compelled to smile and put on a strong facade so that he doesn’t crumble and fall apart, thus “failing” his adoptive parents and siblings. So while these smiles may simply be masks to hide his pain, thus not “real” smiles, they do not make WWX himself fake, but rather (imo) reinforce his genuine nature because his motives are genuine, even if his smiles may not always be.

There are also times when he smiles and acts extremely cocky in front of others, only for this facade to immediately fall away the moment he is alone/out of the public eye. One of my favorite examples of this is in episode 26 when he questions Jin Zixun about the whereabouts of Wen Ning. The entire time he is there, he exudes a cocky disregard for formality and the established hierarchy, even going so far as to say, “If I, Wei Wuxian, want to kill someone, who can stop me? Who would dare to stop me?!” Once he has the information he needs and turns to leave, however, we immediately see the cockiness fall from his face to be replaced by one of...remorse? I’ll let you guys decide for yourselves.

[gif credit]

I think it is worth noting that his facade fades once he looks at LWJ, because LWJ is one of the few people at this point in time who WWX respects, and whose opinion of WWX still holds value to WWX. And so again we see that WWX’s outward behavior does not seem to align with his inner feelings. Look at the situation that WWX is in, though. He is just one man, albeit a powerful one, going against the biggest, most powerful clans. If he shows an ounce of weakness, they’ll eat him alive. And so in order to stay true to his beliefs, WWX puts on a show. In episode 25 we also see WWX put on a show of shooting many arrows simultaneously while blindfolded. @cal3ris made an excellent post on here stating that WWX was not just doing this to show off, but that he was ensuring the temporary safety of the Wen prisoners by pulling off such a feat so as to ensure no other cultivator would attempt the challenge after him. In situations such as this one, it works in WWX’s favor that the vast majority of the cultivation world believes him to be nothing but a showoff with a big mouth. And of course, there is a part of WWX that does enjoy being in the spotlight! Especially if someone he wants to impress is watching~

At the beginning of the Gusu days flashback (ep 3), we see WWX before everything goes to hell. He’s constantly smiling, goofing around, and is a genuine gremlin of a lad. This is real! He’s a teenager in the flush of his youth, he’s with his beloved siblings, he’s smart and talented, the list goes on and on. For people who don’t know WWX, he comes off as a shallow person with no real depth who thinks of nothing but goofing around all day. For those who know WWX intimately, like Jiang Yanli and Jiang Cheng (though he’s less vocal about it), they know this is not the case. The point is, WWX doesn’t care what people think about him. He doesn’t care because he knows who he is and what he stands for. This is a huge part of who WWX is as a person: “I don’t care if they slander me, as long as I have a clear conscience.” It is also one of the defining things that connect Wangxian to one another, which brings me to the point of LWJ being someone whom WWX hates to deceive, because he greatly values LWJ’s good opinion of him. We see how much it pains WWX to put distance between himself and LWJ, but we also see that WWX is willing to do so if he believes it is for the best. In episode 20, after being reunited with Jiang Cheng and LWJ, we see WWX purposefully push LWJ away with cold precision. Once more he plays his role with practiced ease, but we see his mask fall as he watches LWJ walk away.

WWX goes from this:

[gif credit]

to this as soon as LWJ isn’t looking at him:

[gif credit]

Having just returned from the Burial Mounds, WWX is very unstable, both physically and mentally. For the past months that he’s spent in the Burial Mounds, survival has been his priority. We see this instability and the signs of PTSD manifest quite a bit throughout the Sunshot episodes. In episode 20 Jiang Cheng hugs WWX, who honestly seems at a loss as to how to respond. In episode 20 we see LWJ step towards WWX, who immediately steps back. We also see WWX shrink away from Nie Huaisang’s touch. This is incredibly telling because WWX is someone who likes physical touch and proximity. He’s constantly putting his arms around Jiang Cheng and Nie Huaisang and constantly puts himself in LWJ’s personal space (much to LWJ’s initial chagrin). I believe WWX’s behavior post Burial Mounds comes from a desire to protect himself from those around him as well as those around him from himself. [apt gifset here] Nothing about this WWX is fake to me. He is acting differently here because he is different. Trauma does not define a person, but it does change a person. Post Burial Mounds WWX is a different person, but he has not lost what makes him him, which is his strong commitment to his beliefs and morals. For WWX during this time, I don’t believe he has the emotional strength to relive his trauma to those closest to him, so he settles for brushing them off with excuses and yes, fake smiles. This also ties into WWX’s habit of internalizing his own struggles so as not to burden those around him. Hopefully at this point a clear pattern has revealed itself: no matter how WWX presents himself on the outside, he never compromises his beliefs.

After being resurrected in Mo Xuanyu’s body, we see a WWX who is far more reminiscent of the carefree teenager back in Gusu. We see WWX slowly heal from the traumas of his past life and we see him begin to smile again, not because he needs to, but because he can’t help it. We might be tempted to look at this WWX and think, “ah, this is the real him,” but I think this does a disservice to the complexity of his character. The point is, it’s all WWX. The pranks, the smiles that crinkle the corners of his eyes, the creativity, the cockiness, the way his laughter bursts out of his body at times and at other times comes out like a sigh or an afterthought, the way he looks out for the juniors, and both his quiet and loud rage are all what makes him who he is. Certain aspects may be muted at times, but that’s to be expected. WWX is by no means perfect, but I would say he is painfully genuine. Just think, would LWJ feel so strongly about him if he weren’t?

As I feared, this got way too long and I probably rambled and repeated myself and got off track, but it’s fine…..

#the untamed #wwx #wei wuxian #wei ying #ask #anon #Anonymous #does this count as meta? pretty sure it's just me blabbing about how valid wwx is lmao #also DUDE why is tumblr putting the read more in the ask and not where i want it???

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commander-isekai · 3 years

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Commander Isekai - commander from an another world

A/N:

Hi all! This my tongue-in-cheek fic about a commander, who’s actually a human player from the real world, and who now lives through the game, but armed with previous knowledge about it. They aren’t happy just to follow along a story, so things will get different quickly enough. Hence their name is commander Kai, as a pun from the isekai genre. I’ve been inspired by similar fics done about other games, and I thought gw2 could be a fun one too.

Chapter One:

The Second Awakening or how I found myself in a video game world

Sometimes, all you can remember is falling. It was the only sensation I could comprehend. The world around me was a blurry, like a messy watercolor painting. If there were any noises, I couldn't hear them. I just fell.

A painfully bright light drilled into my eyes.

I woke up with a great thump, as I landed into a large pile of dry leaves. They managed to soften my landing to a degree, but I was aching from all over, like if I had rolled downhill like a cheese in a cheese-wheeling competition, determined to win the first place no matter how crumbly my state would be at the finish line.

"This fucking sucks.." I groaned, tossing my arm out and trying to find my glasses, or my phone, but only grasped more leaves. I hoped I hadn’t broken either one during my fall.

"Are you alright, Valiant?" I heard a concerned voice ask, "the awakening can be sometimes rough, but you'll find your bearings soon enough."

Oh no, had I fallen asleep outside? I had a bad habit of dozing off, but the embarrassment of sleeping outside and this kind person having to wake me up made me wish I could knock myself out permanently rather than face them.

"Yeah yeah, I'm sorry about this, just give me a minute..." I tried to form coherent sentences while pushing my hair away, but my hand gathered only more leaves? and no hair??

I pulled my hand in front of my face and yelped in surprise when I saw that it was bright lavender, a color that my regular human hands should not be, and that I was grasping purple and pink ferns instead of my regular colored human hair.

"Wh-what the hell is going on?" I looked at myself and the person helping me, and only then I realized they weren't human either, but a pea-green person who seemed to be made out of plant material and flowers. Behind them, I could see a shimmering lake and a small village, with more denizens similar to them and me.

As I gasped upon the scene, the two braincells inside my skull finally hit a nerve and made the connection that I had been missing:

A) Somehow, I was in Caledon Forest. Like, the starting zone in Guild Wars 2, an MMO I used to play lot back in the day until I got too busy with my life and other video games.

B) Also somehow, I wasn't a human anymore. I was a walking, talking, internally-panicking sylvari.

C) Last but not least, I could see everything clearly without glasses. This fact stressed me out the most. Had my vision somehow been fixed when I fell? I did like my old glasses, and really hoped they were in one piece somewhere.

"Are you feeling enough well to stand?" the sylvari that must be a mender asked me, offering a hand that I gladly took as I wobbled onto my feet like a newborn calf.

“I think I am?” I answered hesitantly, not certain if I’d stay upright after she’d let go of me.

" I am mender Lorean. What's your name?" the sylvari asked me.

" Um, Kai" I said, as the first name in my mind was the name of my commander character, "short of Cainneach, but just Kai is fine."

It didn't feel right to introduce myself with my given human name, as it was definitely not a sylvari name, and that would have revealed me being something else than your regular baby sprout. I really wasn't married to that name anyway, so Kai came out naturally. I had already used Kai as a all-around nickname, so I settled into it like putting on a new, yet surprisingly comfortable shirt.

"Alright, Valiant Kai", seeing as I could hold on my own against the gravity, Lorean let go of my hand, and explained: "Now, it can take some time to get used to the world outside the Dream. You shouldn't wander off too far from the Grove, at least not until you're experienced enough. You should find anything you need inside the city, and the mentors will help you along. Caithe also asked me to tell you that she wants to speak with you, when you are ready."

The mender that helped me did not seem to comment on my errantic behaviour - they must have seen a wild variety of saplings in their time.

"Wait, why do you keep calling me a valiant?" I asked, trying to wrap my head around what I could remember about Caithe. The total sum was not much - an assassin with a troubled past: a guild of heroes that basically cut ties after a failed dragon killing quest and ex-girlfriend who's in the lead of the bad Nightmare sylvari. That'd be a lot for anyone.

"Caithe told me, about how you joined forces with her to defeat the a large nightmare beast in the Dream. That must be a sign of a great Wyld Hunt", Lorean explained, and asked curiously: "don't you remember the Dream?"

Oh right. The Dream, or the tutorial part with the big dragon monster. I somehow completely skipped that in this new, 4D-supported version of Tyria. At least I did not remember experiencing anything resembling fighting a giant dragon to death, not after waking up here. I had an inkling that telling so would only raise more questions, and I had plenty of those myself.

"Oh yes, it's all coming back to me", I lied with a practiced straight face, "I must have just hit my head hard when I awoke, that's all. I'll be on my way now, thanks!"

I waved and nearly dashed to an exit before Lorean could respond. They were being just nice, sure, but I needed a moment for myself with no one else right now, or I would explode on the spot.

'''

Not far from the village, but enough far that no one would hopefully bother me, I made my way to the large pond, to really take in all the changes.

"Oh no, the fireflies are actually that big", I grimaced when I saw a group of the flying creatures gather around one of the light-giving plants, "That's going to take some time getting used to."

I sat down next to the water's edge, and I could finally take a look at my new features. They were nothing like what I'd been used to - instead of soft skin, my face was hard, bark-like texture. My hair was like plant's leaf, yet sturdier - it hurt when I tried to pull it. My form was different too, almost like I had had a second puberty without knowing it - my limbs were taller than what I had been used to, and I felt my presentation was more masculine than what it had been when I was human.

The more I sat and contemplated my situation, everything around me seemed to make no sense. I was stuck in an unfamiliar body, in the role of the main character of a video game, and while I did not remember every detail of what happened in the story, I knew it wouldn't take long for things to get hairy. Why I was here? Why did I look like this? No matter how I tried to rationalize it, I had no answers, and I was only left with piling up frustration, and tears began to form in the corners of my eyes.

“Hey, are you alright?” A new voice dragged me out of my depths. It belonged to a blue sylvari with a mushroom-capped head, and whose leaf-like outfit seemed to grow naturally as a part of their body.

“I don’t know, it’s just - a lot of stuff to process. The whole awakening, and everything”, I told them as honestly as I could.

“You seemed to be a little more lost than the other sprouts - and I do not mean that in a judgmental way”, the sylvari said and hold out something: “here, take this, it will help.”

“Oh, thank you”, I accepted the carved bowl that seemed to be made out of a giant nut, and the gentle smell of pumpkin soup overwhelmed me. Gods, I realized only now how starved I felt, like I had not eaten properly for days.

“I don’t have any money, or gold-” I tried to say, but the other sylvari cut in quickly:

“Do not worry about it! I hope you have a pleasant evening!”

The sylvari took off, and I was too mesmerized by their kindness towards a random stranger like me that it did not even occur to me to ask their name. The soup, still warm in my hands was a temptation too great to resist, and I wasted no time devouring it.

Maybe this world isn’t too bad after all, if people are gifting food freely to others like that, I thought to myself, earlier anguish almost completely forgotten.

#gw2 #guild wars 2 #yes the player is like free soup free gender? yes please

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nvalentino · 4 years

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𝐭𝐰𝐨 𝐚𝐠𝐚𝐢𝐧𝐬𝐭 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐝 {𝐬𝐢𝐥𝐯𝐞𝐫 𝐬𝐜𝐫𝐞𝐞𝐧 𝐬𝐰𝐞𝐞𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐚𝐫𝐭𝐬} • 𝐧𝐢𝐜𝐤𝐲 𝐯𝐚𝐥𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐨

𝐧𝐨𝐭𝐞: this is my way of putting the story of two against the world into my own style and fixing things that bug me about the game. This is in no way meant to diminish the writer’s work, but everyone has different taste.

𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐝𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭: 2k+

Movies have always been my escape. A way to distance me from a crumbling economy and stressful days at work- something simple. There’s nothing quite like mindlessly inhaling popcorn in the dark, alone with no one to judge you. All the while staring at an enormous silver screen for two hours straight. I love that it’s a world away from my own.

My town’s movie theatre isn’t much, but she’s got character. Sat on the corner two run-down cross streets, her paint- peeled walls crawling with thick vines and the crooked marquee sign whose lights don’t work has almost become a second home. So when I heard she was hosting an all-night crime movie marathon, I’ve never bought a ticket faster in my life.

When I show up to the theatre, there’s a line wrapped around the block and they’re all dressed as mobsters, Femme Fatales, wise guys... these are my people. I look up at the marquee, which reads: ‘FILM MARATHON: ALL NIGHT GANGSTERS.’

My heart nearly jumps from my chest. I’d been waiting all week for this, for my break. I finally reach the front of the line, and I’m greeted by Murray, the owner of the place. I think he’s been hunched behind that ticket booth since Bogart ruled the box office.

“What’s a looker like yourself doing here alone on a Friday evening?” It’s always the same. No matter how many times it seems I show up in his lobby- Murray always forgets me. It’s lovely to know I’m so memorable.

“Are you ever alone when you have the characters on screen?” I keep my tone light and teasing. Can’t be cruel to Murray- bit like roundhouse kicking a puppy.

“You look familiar, you a regular here?” Ah, there it is. Scratch my previous statement, I’m at least a little important. Guess all those hours spent in front of him’s paying off.

“That I am.” I rest an arm on the counter, an even smile on my face. Murray leans closer, getting a better look at me. I’m all too used to all his antics by now, and smiling is the easiest way to get alone.

“And your name is?” Can’t have everything in life, I suppose, and, as lovable as he is, he hasn’t been all there for the better part of a decade.

“Murray, it’s me, {Y/N}.”

“Oh, right,” he smiles, straightening back to look me over. “Why didn’t you say so? You know my eyes ain’t what they used to be.” I have to hold back a laugh, but it’s easily covered with a large grin. “I didn’t take you for a fan of gangster movies.”

This time, an amused scoff passes my lips. Resting my hip against the counter I feign an offended look, “It’s like you don’t even know me anymore, Murray. I love gangster movies.”

“So do I, kid. The slick-talking, the high drama, the whirlwind romances.” A wistful look crosses his eyes, like that of a family member flicking through family photo albums reminiscing about the old days- then his face clears up. “Speaking of romance, where’s your date?”

Talk about beating a dead horse. I nearly always turn up alone to the movies- no matter how much I’d like to have someone to bring. But I come the same way each time- all by myself. “I just told you. I fly solo. I don’t need a wingman. Besides, why bring a date when you have the company of the beautiful people on the big screen.”

A look of concern washes over Murray’s face- something much unlike anything I’ve seen on him before like he was deep in thought. “Fair enough. A movie star will be your date tonight, then.”

“Exactly,” I laugh. “Now, can you let me in?”

“Can you show me your ticket?”

I reach into my pocket, eager to get inside so I can buy a box of popcorn and soda. But my pocket’s empty. Oh, god no. I reach into my other pocket. And to my absolute shock, there’s nothing inside but lint and a cracked phone. Instantaneously, I’m checking everywhere: coat pockets, shirt pockets, back pockets- each and every one of them like the last: empty. My heart sinks- I lost the ticket. Only me. I nervously read my surroundings. A line of impatient movie-goers behind me, an elderly ticket-take in front of me, and a sign in big bold letters that hangs above him. Tonight’s showing: Sold Out.

“Your ticket, please?”

“Oh, god, Murray- I-I can’t find it,” my hands glide over every pocket again- desperately trying to find some trace of the ticket.

I feel a lump burning in my throat and a wet gloss beginning to coat my eyes. If losing my ticket wasn’t bad enough- feeling the burning stares of the long line behind me is tipping my scale. “I’m sorry, dear. I’m not sure what I can do. We’re all sold out.”

My eyes fall to my feet as murmurs sound from behind me, doing my best to hold back the disappointment and embarrassment boiling over. “Right. My fault.” My cheeks feel hot, my entire body’s burning. I can’t believe it. A week’s worth on excitement drained out of me in a matter of seconds.

Just as I take a step away from the counter- Murray calls my name. “Hold on. Maybe there’s something I can do.” I turn around, and Murray looks at me with a sceptic’s eye. “You really want a date with a movie star tonight, do you?”

“Yes. Please, I can’t tell you how long I’ve been looking forward to this.” My pride’s the last thing on my mind, focusing solely on pleading with the man in front of me.

He reads my expression, seeming to gaze straight through me, and then he straightens out his vest. “You’re positive?”

“Murray, I’ve never been more positive about anything in my life.” Okay, drama queen- dial it back a bit.

“Very well.”

“One of my customers cancelled their reservation last minute. And they were very important. From Hollywood. You can take their place if you’d like.” And with those words, my face is overtaken with joy.

“Wow, Murray, thank you so much.”

Murray retrieves a golden ticket stub from the booth, and it sparkles underneath the glow of the marquee. He rips the stub in two and hands me the other end. Something in his eyes sparkles like he knows something that I don’t. “Choose your adventure wisely, kid. It’s almost showtime.”

For a moment, I’m captivated by the ticket- the grumbling line behind me forgotten. Admit One has never felt so... special. I stride past Murray, toward the doors to the lobby, the sweet smell of salted buttered popcorn pulling me inside.

But when I waltz inside, everything about the rundown movie theatre is different. The sticky floors have been replaced by slick velvet carpeting. A grand staircase sits where the pinball machine used to be. Thick red curtains have replaced the shredded B-Movie posters. And the people around me are dressed like they’re from a ball in the 1920′s. This room alone could buy all the places I’ve ever lived. This isn’t my theatre. The dimensions aren’t even correct. I’m either hallucinating or this is all a dream. Either way, I’m spooked. I’ve got to get out of here.

I pivot back to the door and yank at the handle. But it won’t budge. I can feel my heart bursting from my chest. Everything feels so real- there’s no way I’m dreaming. I wrap both hands around the handle this time, clutching the ironclad door. But it’s completely seals shut. Okay. Don’t Panic. There has to be an explanation. For why... for how... for how I’ve been magically transported to a movie palace from the early twentieth century. Just hearing myself think that makes me light-headed. This can’t be real.

I turn around once again, and in my delirium, I see a sharply dressed man eyeing me from amongst the crowd. His angelic smile looks like it’s worth a million bucks, and his eyes are like none I’ve ever seen in person. The colour of honeyed whiskey and unbelievably sharp. This only happens in the movies. He only exists in the movies. One of the crime flicks about the Roaring Twenties. But I can’t place exactly which one. With a sly wink, he confidently turns away from me and moves through the crowd.

Intrigued, and left with little other options, I follow him. But he’s elusive. I walk faster, but the faster I walk- the further away he seems to be. He reaches for an expansive, gold-plated door. And before I can even call out to him, he’s on the other side of it. Oh, come on.

I hurry my pace, clumsily weaving my way between the other guests until I reach the door myself. Without so much as a thought, I pull the door open and step into a buzzing room packed with boozy patrons dancing to the boisterous symphonies of Broadway jazz. I watch in amazement as women in sequin flapper dresses do the Charleston with men suited up in black tuxedos. Unless I’m mistaken, I’d say I’ve just stepped foot in a rowdy speakeasy from the jazz age.

Am I dreaming? I must be dreaming. I pinch myself. Ouch. Not dreaming. I turn my attention to the crowded bar, its customers getting tipsy on saccharine highballs. If there’s one thing I need right now, it’s a glass of something strong. I move swiftly to the stool studded counter.

“What’ll it be?” The bartender, a bow-tie clad man whose greying hair is slicked back from his forehead, asks.

“Oh- uh, what are my options?” He points to a chalkboard behind him, which has the names of several drinks etched into its surface. Fuck. I should’ve paid more attention to the drinks featured in all the movies I watch because I have no idea what any of these mean.

“She’ll have a Gin Rickey with a dash of syrup.” The words come from behind me, saving my breath. “And I’ll be having an Old Fashioned, old-timer.”

The mystery man pulls a glistening silver case from his jacket pocket as the bartender begins synthesizing our drinks. He flips open the case revealing a handful of perfectly rolled cigarettes inside. How do you talk to a man from an entire century ago? Especially one so... gorgeous. Don’t reference memes. Easier said than done.

“Care for a smoke?” He flashes that five-star smile at me again as he retrieves a matchbook from his coat. I shake my head- mind racing. Don’t mess up, don’t mess up, down mess up...

“Where am I?” Way to go- not crazy at all. Definitely, something a completely normal and functioning human being would ask.

“You don’t know where you are?”

You’ve fucked up- own it, but try and keep your stupid contained. You’re supposed to be wooing him- not scaring him off. “Not exactly.”

The man ignites a match, the flicker of a flame painting his face in moving shadows as he lights the cigarette. He returns his silver case and the matchbook to his jacket pocket. “You tell me your name and I’ll tell you where you are.”

“{Y/N}.” So far so good. My mind is still reeling- eyes combing over every inch of the room- trying to find a sign, anything, to prove that this is all real. “I’m dreaming. Aren’t I?” The sudden sensation of being spun around takes over my body.

“If this is a dream, I don’t ever want to wake up.” I feel my cheeks warm at the words, at least one of us is articulated. “The names Nicky. Nicky Valentino.” Nicky brings my wrist to his lips, pressing a kiss to the top of my hand. I swear I can feel my soul departing

“Charming as you may be, I’m not from here-” my already jumbled sentence gets interrupted by the bartender. He places the candied, kaleidoscopic drinks before us. Nicky slips the man two bills, then looks at me with those mischievous hazel eyes.

“Cheers.”

I hesitatingly clink my glass with his and place the cold drink to my bottom lip. I take one sip and my mouth contorts with the overwhelming taste of tart. “Right- so as I was saying.” My tongue feels dry, tight as I glance around the room once more. Think, think.

“Doesn’t take a wisehead to know you ain’t from New York.” Even with my own tense posture, all his words hold a lilt of teasing.

“Yeah. But I don’t think I’m supposed to be here.” What do you even say? ‘Hey, I’m not just out of state, I’m out of century.’ I don’t know how that’d go over, but I’m imagining not well.

“Of course you’re supposed to be here,” it’s a good thing I’m not standing because the look on his face is enough to buckle my knees. “You’re the person of my dreams, and this is my dream, right?” His honeyed and soft words do loosen my shoulders- but I can’t help my tangled mind.

“Okay. How can I explain this... I’m not even from your...” Right words, right words. “Your... dimension” Could be better.

“So, like from upstate?” I have to hold back a scoff- he’s a total dork. Nicky coyly grins to himself, expression morphing into one I’ve only ever seen on a silver screen. “Can you pinch me? ‘Cause now I know I’m dreamin’.“

The tightness in my shoulders dissipates as I laugh at the remark. If there’s one thing he’s exceptional at- it’s being annoyingly charismatic. “I’m still not sure I can explain this right. Do you like going to the movies?”

“Yeah. I like the ones about wise guys, car chases, and the ride or die sidekicks.” Fitting.

“W-well... it’s- it’s... it’s like everything became a... a movie for me.” How in the world do you word this? “You’re like a-”

“A movie star?” I nod, and he considers this like it isn’t the slightest bit absurd. He exhales a thin stream of smoke from his lips then chases it with a sip of the Old Fashioned. “Listen, if it’s a movie, you gotta know some things. This movie is fast, it’s dangerous. Until about five minutes ago, all I wanted was the entire world and I wanted it all to myself.”

“And now?”

“Now I still want the world. But I want it for two.” Between the alcohol and the compliments, my head is spinning in the best way possible. Nicky was right: if this is a dream, then keep the damn lights off.

“That’s very poetic of you, F. Scott.” Everything about him is magnetic, drawing me closer with each word. I can’t help myself but lean in.

“You forgot my name already? It’s Nicky.”

Lord, he’s definitely a dork. “No it’s- never mind.” Nicky places his hand into the pocket inside his coat and pulls out a thin black jewellery case.

“I want you to have something.” He cracks open the case, and inside sits a breathtaking diamond bracelet with enough shimmering carats to blind me. It’s excessive. It’s perfect.

“Nicky, what is this?” I train my eyes on him, trying my best to get a read on him, but he’s impossible.

“Do me a favour. Just try it on.”

“I can’t... I’ve only just met you. And-”

My argument is cut short with a raise of his eyebrows, “I’m a movie star, right? So why not play the part. You can’t take it off soon as you finish your drink.” I let my eyes fall back to the case, combing over the bracelet.

“I may never finish my drink.” The words tumble past my lips with little thought- nearly catching myself off guard with the brashness.

“I’m counting on it.” I watch as Nicky removes the bracelet from the case, fingertips brushing my skin as he cuffs it delicately around my wrist.

“So, what’s your game, Nicky?”

“My game?” He seems confused by the inquiry, but I can’t think of a reasonable time someone would fork over something so expensive to a total stranger.

“Yeah. What do you want from me?” Nicky stares at the strand of diamonds that fits perfectly around my wrist. I suddenly feel off- like I’d overstepped an unspoken boundary. “It’s a fair question considering five minutes after meeting me you’re giving me diamonds. Usually, guys wait to the third date for that.”

“I’m setting my price.”

“Your price?” Baffled by the words, my eyebrows knit together, “your price for what?”

“Leaving it all behind.” Shoulders dripping, I scan over his face. He’s just as unreadable as before. What does it mean? Leaving it all behind. Nicky only offers a warm smile, like he can read mind and in his eyes, I catch a glint of sincerity behind the bravado. “Now, if you’ll excuse me. I have somewhere to be.”

“You’re kidding?” I scoff.

“We’ll be in touch. I guarantee it.” I can’t even protest, Nicky gets up from his stool and walks away.

“No, Nicky- you’re not- you can’t leave me with this bracelet!” My protest is futile, falling to deaf ears. He’s already a third the way to a far door. “Nicky!” But he either can’t hear me or doesn’t want to hear me. “Damn it!” Once again, Nicky eludes me as he finesses his way between guys and dames.

This time, I’m not letting him get away from me. I leap out of my seat, and the barstool nearly crashes to the floor as I hurry after him. I knock into a couple in the throes of a drunken kiss, interrupting what would have been a perfect moment. I collect my footing and peer ahead. Nicky is more than halfway now.

I’m a foot from the couple before a hand circles my wrist, spinning me on my heel to find a man already a few drinks deep. “Where you goin’, sugar?” His breath reeks.

“I-I... gotta,” his fingers are curled into the bracelet. “Let me...” I wrench myself free from him, stumbling back into another drunken couple standing behind me, “go.”

As Nicky’s hand wraps around the door handle, I take off, leaving the man and couples in my rearview. Just as I get within spitting distance, he pushes the door open. I reach out for him, grabbing a hold of his wrist before he can take another step. Feeling my grip, Nicky spins around to face me. The door slams shut behind him. A brash grin enveloping his face.

“You’ve done good, kid.”

“What do you mean? Was this some kind of test?”

“If it was, how do you think you did?”

“I’m not sure the type of person who wants to test me is the kind of person I want to be around.” Nicky lays his eyes on my hand, which is still tightly gripping his wrist.

“You sure about that, toots?” Instantly, my skin goes hot from embarrassment. I quickly retract my hand from his. He’s so frustratingly sauve.

“I’m- I’m sure.”

“Hold on, I didn’t say you should let go.”

“You didn’t need to.” Nicky inches closer to me, interlocking his fingers with mine.

“{Y/N}, I was only teasing. I don’t want you to let go.” He grasps my hand as if letting go would mean he’d lose a part of himself, a lifeline. “In my world, the less people you keep close, the less chance you have at getting hurt. But... you’re not from my world, right? So maybe there’s room for an exception.”

I squeeze his hand tighter, our hands clasped together in an unspoken devotion. I look up into Nicky’s eager eyes, and then at his lips before asking, “you want me to be your exception?”

“That’s right.” Nicky lets go of my hand and turns away from me. “Follow me.” He pushes the door open, enthusiastically walking into another sizable group of strangers outside. As I follow Nicky out of the room, he’s gone from sight. And so is everyone else.

I’m back in the movie theatre lobby- my movie theatre. The place is completely empty, and an eerie quiet has set over the room. I pace a few steps until I’m smack dab in the centre of the room. And now that I’m back to my world, I’m already longing for the adventure promised by the other. And my hand’s feeling awfully empty. So is my wrist. The bracelet. Fuck. I’ve had the damn thing for forty seconds and it’s already been nicked.

“Is someone going to explain all this to me? What the hell is going on?” Then, a hand taps me on the shoulder. “Whoa!” I yelp, startled at the other presence in the room. “Murray! Jesus, you nearly gave me a heart attack.”

“What’d ya think, kid?”

“The movie. What’d ya think about my movie?”

“Murray! You knew about all- all this?”

“I know what goes on in my theatre.” Murray momentarily looks down and polishes a brass button on his coat. “I’ve been showing movies for the better part of my life, and I know when I see a movie star. You, my friend, are a movie star. The question is: are you ready for your close-up?”

“What... what do you mean?” Everything is hitting me at once. That really wasn’t a dream.

Murray inhales with pride as he observes his theatre. “There are many theatres in this joint, all playing crime films from the great American eras. You’ve been fortunate enough to see the trailer for one, but did it suit you?” He places a hand on my shoulder, and we walk to the entrance of the first theatre. “Is the ostentatious world of Gatsby’s New York, of raucous speakeasies and illegal rum-running in the roaring twenties your adventure?”

He turns to look at me, kind eyes shining with expectancy. My heart rate jumps at the question, giddy for the prospect of adventure but anxious for the consequences. No movie is perfect. “I can just... be a part of it?”

“For now.”

“What about this world? The real world?”

“You wouldn’t be here if you didn’t want to escape. Besides, who’s to say what’s real and what’s not.” Murray smiled a wistful and weathered smile. Like what I pictured a clock would smile, full of known and unknown. “What’d you say, kid?”

He’s right, I’d be fooling myself if I said otherwise. I want this- I think I’ve always wanted something like this. With a calming breath and a final look around the theatre, I nod. “Yes.”

“Very good, your co-stars are waiting inside.” Murray steps aside, gesturing to the door. “Enter whenever you feel ready.”

“No time like the present.” I take another deep gulp of air, trying to silence my screaming heart rate. I’m not dreaming. This is real.

“But remember, this is a cinema: once the movie begins, there’s no rewind button.” Thanks, no pressure. I’m nervous, to say the least- but this is what I’m supposed to be doing. I proceed into the movie theatre entrance, its double doors awaiting my arrival. I push open the doors and walk into my starring role.

Lights. Camera. Action. Two Against the World.

#fictif #two against the world #nicky valentino #fictif nicky #fictif two against the world #nicky valentino x mc #nicky valentino x reader

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prurientpuddlejumper · 4 years

Text

A Punchable Face That I Want to Kiss, Ch. 8

<- Chapter 7 | Chapter 9 ->

Summary: Snapshots of life with a fussy brat over the three-year time jump. Including: a few holiday specials.

3,949 words

With the lease up on your apartment, Frederick invited you to move in with him. It seemed like the next logical step in your relationship, especially considering how frequently you slept there anyway—though he had to justify the choice by saying he “could not stand seeing you live in squalor.” The house was certainly big enough for two people (or several less-wealthy families).

It was nice living with him, because you lived very different lives. Rather than finding it stifling to be trapped in the same house, it was freeing that you could spend so much of the day apart—or weeks, as it often was, traveling for cases or book promotion tours—and yet always be connected by the home you would return to at the end of it all.

You were planets of the solar system orbiting the same sun.

The stability of that was comforting. So much had changed—Will Graham left and cut ties with the FBI, Hannibal Lecter was imprisoned at the Baltimore State Hospital for the Criminally Insane where Alana Bloom now held Chilton’s old job, and you were considering following Will’s lead and pursuing new career options. It made you glad to have someone familiar to keep you company, and always be there when you needed him.

For all the good, living with Frederick Chilton was not always easy. He was a shameless snob who did not believe in laundry chairs, and panicked when his state-of-the-art kitchen was filled with sugary cereals with cartoon characters on the box. There were many clashes of egos early on, some of which never fully disappeared. Now that his star was rising, he insisted you dress a certain way when you were to be seen in public together—particularly at any sort of publicity event or psychiatric conference, but anywhere really that he might be recognized. He was yours, and that meant you reflected upon him. He updated your entire wardrobe like you were starring in an episode of Queer Eye, and had your hair professionally styled.

You couldn’t even be annoyed at the controlling implications of it—you were never great at dressing professionally, and it was exciting to see yourself looking so sharp in the mirror. You could surrender that to him. He enjoyed sophisticated things, like the opera and restaurants where celebrities eat, and now you didn’t feel so out of place when you joined him.

“You actually look quite elegant,” he nodded in surprised approval at your new attire.

You stuck out your tongue.

“Do not tempt me with that,” he said with a feline wiggle of his shoulders. “We have engagements to get to, and I do not want to re-do my face.” He wrapped the hand not gripping a cane around your hip and kissed you, coaxing your naughty tongue into his mouth with a lustful growl.

Any time he was too fussy and judgmental to the point of being unkind, you were quite practiced at flicking him back down to earth. He rarely apologized, of course, but would look up and purse his lips in thought before admitting, “You may be right.”

He was a sassy bitch, but you knew that. It’s why you loved him.

You loved him.

You did. It was strange to realize how much you loved someone you used to hate, whose traits you would normally find incompatible with your own. He was a miserable little rich boy with a self-satisfied sneer, a flare for drama, and perpetually questionable ethics, yet you would do anything to keep him safe. You wanted to stay by his side forever.

And there was something to be said about his difficult personality when you were not on the receiving end of it.

Being on his side was fun—his hand at your back as he verbally destroyed someone with a catty insinuation that left their eyes glowering with indignation. That used to be me, you thought. Now you were up on his throne with him, and the view was much better.

You wanted to stay through all the medications, physical therapy, and regular hospital visits to tweak his prosthetics and make sure his remaining organs were all still functioning properly. You wanted to stay even as you questioned how much of your affection for him was pity in disguise, as he had suggested the first time you slept with him in a fit of explosive passion—that you liked wounded birds.

If it was pity, and being pity meant you would have to leave, then you resolved to stuff your fingers in your ears and ignore it. No psychoanalysis would make you give him up. You wanted to keep orbiting the sun together.

*****

Calliope music paraded through the air with aggressively cheerful pneumatic whistles that grabbed your eardrums and pulled them screaming into the 1920s. Shrieks, laughter, bells, and shouts rushed by.

Frederick Chilton stuck close beside you and mistrustfully held a greasy paper plate like it was a venomous snake.

It seemed only fair that in return for dressing up, you made him dress down and do normal-person things, like go to the county fair and eat deliciously greasy fried foods. It was like a cultural exchange program.

“Every moment I am not writing my next book is another moment the world goes without a groundbreaking revelation on the human psyche,” he had snipped when you first suggested the outing. He barely looked up from his computer, where he sat typing in a suave leather office chair.

“Oh come on, you owe me,” you persisted. “I am sick and tired of fancy museums and fancy restaurants and fancy psychiatric conventions. Next time we’re in a hotel, there should be Star Trek costumes involved!” He straightened like you’d shoved a rod up his spine, and you chuckled inwardly at his petty aversion to being seen at that type of convention. “Come on, it’s just the fair,” you rubbed his shoulders and he groaned with annoyance. “Nobody important will be there. You’ll be totally incognito. Be a commoner with me.”

“I suppose it is the least I can do,” he caved in at last, leaning his head back to rest on your chest, glancing up at you through his eyebrows. “Since it is so important to you, I shall partake of your proletariat festivities.”

“Don’t say proletariat when we’re at the fair, you bougie dork.”

He wore a plain black t-shirt, and his hair wasn’t quite as primly styled as usual, letting a few strands fly free. The less he stood out from the crowd, the less likely a professional acquaintance or fan would recognize him.

Even living with Chilton, it was rare to see him dressed so casually, and you had expected it to be disconcerting. Instead, you found yourself drooling. He was sexy in a suit, but so was everybody with the correct fit. The unstructured t-shirt hugged his broad chest and revealed those alarmingly muscular arms that were usually a secret hidden under sleeves.

It was odd seeing your private Chilton—reserved for nights and mornings—out in the world, and a reminder of how lucky you were.

He managed to look dapper even with powdered sugar on his shirt.

“Funnel cake?” he cringed, as if the word itself was in poor taste. “Are we certain this is food?”

“You are ridiculously hoity-toity.”

“I do enjoy the finer things in life,” he boasted in a smooth, self-congratulatory hum.

You were about to sass him when you realized his admiring eyes were fixed on you, and he wore an expectant smirk on his lips. Your scowl cracked open into a tender laugh, and you linked your arm with his, giving him a playful hip bump.

His eyes widened at you in mock horror. “You would attack a man with a cane?” He awaited your answer with that same peevish smirk, but you didn’t have anything clever on your tongue, so you pulled him into a kiss instead. He melted against your lips, having gotten what he wanted.

Frederick refused to go on any rides, citing safety concerns and his delicate viscera, but you perused a hundred breeds of chickens, pet the World’s Tallest Clydesdale, watched pigs racing, browsed local artwork, and sampled craft beers which he had to admit were pretty good. You paid far too much money to shoot water guns at a spinning target faster than other carnival-goers so you could win an oversize plush of a corgi, which turned out to be filled with disappointing foam stuffing.

After finally placing a piece of sugary fried dough in his mouth, his eyes closed, and when they opened again, he declared it “not terrible.” Then inhaled it and spent the rest of the fair surreptitiously looking for another funnel cake stand.

When you got home, he confessed, with his most stern and dignified demeanor, that he may have, perhaps had fun, juvenile as it was. Then he quietly suggested that he would make an excellent Spock.

*****

“I am never going to be perfect enough for you, am I?” you cried after another petty argument over another petty thing like stacking the cups in the cupboard in precisely the correct order. “How do you live with me? It must drive you crazy.”

Months of feeling inadequate bubbled to the surface all at once. Everything he did was so controlled, so exact, you really did wonder why he would ever be with someone like you.

“No,” he frowned, and as he gently took your shoulders his heart was crumbling in his eyes. There was a sorry on the tip of his tongue, but this was not the lottery-winning occasion he would say the word itself. He didn’t need to. He would say it in other ways.

His warm lips pressed your forehead as he rubbed loving circles on your arms with his thumbs. “Do you know who was perfect? Hannibal. I would rather live with a hot mess than a cold-blooded monster. One of us should be warm, anyway,” he gave a self-deprecating smile. “I must do better to remember the beauty of imperfection, because you are perfect to me.”

*****

The front door opened well after the sun had disappeared and the stars had begun to come out. Frederick came home drained and exhausted from being on his feet all day trying to dominate professional rivals who were all, in turn, out to get him.

Conferences were invigorating, an exciting place to strut one’s superiority, make connections, and scope out the competition… until they were not, and they became whichever circle of Hell it is that makes one have to continually defend oneself to people for whom one will never be good enough.

You looked up from the book you were reading. You didn’t get up from the couch cushion’s gravitational embrace, but smiled with stars in your eyes, and called, “Frederick!”

Home.

He crawled onto the couch next to you, and laid his head in your lap. You set the book aside and ran your fingers through his hair, listening to the sweet, sleepy noises of pleasure the action evoked. Fantasies of this moment had kept him alive all day. You caressed his neck and the prickly stubble along the side of his jaw, and he turned his face into your palm and kissed it. He adored the way you touched him with your gentle, caring hands. Yawning, you reclined into the deep, plush cushions, and he shifted so you were both laying next to each other, content in each other’s embrace. He cuddled into your chest, face buried in your shirt.

“You smell like tacos.”

It was unclear how peevishly he intended the observation, so you simply replied, “I made tacos for dinner.”

“The cheap American kind that are nothing but ground beef, shredded cheese, and an insult to Mexican culture,” he said, voice muffled by the fabric.

“Mm-hmm,” you said.

“They are not real food.”

“Do you want some?”

“God, yes.”

*****

With physical therapy, Chilton was finally able to walk comfortably without assistance again.

Technically, he had been able to for a long time. The cane was a crutch—in the figurative, not the literal, sense. In the literal sense it was very much not a crutch, or even a cane. At best, it was an expensive, silver-topped walking stick. He clung to it like a security blanket, or as a prop to garner pity, or simply because it was a dramatic accessory. The threat of physical therapy simply convinced him to let go of the pretense.

Like the spiral staircases of his home, some things about Dr. Chilton were fussy and theatrical for no reason.

It was almost a shame, you thought. That thing was the epitome of his dapper style (he might as well put on tap shoes, a top hat, and put on the Ritz with Fred Astaire), and it brought to mind such kinky images.

It was not one of those lightweight BDSM canes, and therefore was far too heavy to do any spanking with, assuming you wanted to be able to sit down any time in the next month. However, you recalled with some excitement his tapping it on the inside of your heels to get you to spread your legs open, using the pommel to gently tip your chin up to him, or running it slowly along the inside of your thighs.

You would miss that cane.

You still argued sometimes—but not as often. You were accustomed to his haughtiness and felt less need to try and change it, and he knew you well enough to relax when the two of you were alone. He took your advice that life was not a competition... but only when it came to you, not to his career and public reputation.

He was still obsessed with proving his superiority to the world. Still obsessed with seeing Hannibal Lecter grow old and feeble inside a cell. Those edges were so integrally a part of him you could never smooth them out.

*****

You were good for his book tour.

Though he never raised his voice or threw insults around, Chilton still had the journalist sitting in your living room on edge. She gripped the recording device harder, nails turning white. Flanked by imposing towers of leather-bound books, he stared her down like a shark, bragging about his psychiatric achievements and describing grizzly details of the Lecter case with a heartless detachment—he smirked when the more graphic parts made her squeamish.

Dr. Chilton was (contrary to his own opinion) not the best mind in the psychiatric field, but there was one thing he was the preeminent expert in, and that was leaving people with the impression that he was a callous douchebag who thought he was better than everyone else. Which was more or less accurate.

When you entered the room, his whole demeanor softened.

“Hey honey,” you poked your head in with a plate of cookies. “Sorry, I didn’t know you had that interview today. Should I come back later?”

“Nonsense, darling, come in.”

The haughty stare he’d been giving the journalist broke and turned to a warm gaze and a kind smile as he crossed the room to escort you in, his hand on the small of your back. You sat down on the sofa next to him, and set the plate of good-will-bribery cookies down on the coffee table between you and the journalist. She politely refused, at least until the recording was over, but instantly seemed more relaxed, loosing her death-vice on the recorder. You quietly leaned your head on Frederick’s shoulder and discreetly clasped his hand on the cushion between you through the rest of the interview, which he spent blushing and unable to maintain the coldness of his stare.

You brought out a side of him few were able to see. Whenever you made an appearance during his book promotions, the article published was always just a bit more favorable.

*****

“Gotta go!” you called across the house, slinging a pack over your shoulders. Dawn was barely cresting the purple sky, and Frederick was barely awake. He didn’t even have his prosthetic maxilla in yet; he was only up to say goodbye. “I’m going to be in the field for ten hours straight today!” You thought about that for a moment, and groaned with anticipated exhaustion.

“You have water?”

“Yes, mom.”

“You cannot blame me for worrying,” he smiled with some pride at his gallant adventurer. You were wild in ways he would never understand, and it terrified as much as thrilled him. He smoothed a few wrinkles out of your shirt—a rugged garment for outdoor wear—and said you looked presentable enough for what you were doing. You kissed him, and wished him luck with the book signing he was attending that day.

He wandered into the kitchen to search for breakfast, when an idea occurred to him.

“Take some of my meal-replacement bars,” he offered, opening the pantry. He had the organic superfood detox variety that he was able to digest.

“I already did, thanks!”

He sighed with annoyance. “I noticed. It looks like an animal went through the packaging.”

“You love me,” you grinned cheekily in the doorway.

He prowled up to you, eyes narrow, trapping you against the door. He growled. He wrapped his arms around you and buried his face in the crook of your neck, kissing you and sucking a small bruise just under your collar. Yeah, he loved you. You purred, arching your back so you were pressed more firmly against him, and breathed in his scent. If only you didn’t have to leave.

“Come home safe.”

*****

Halloween was your favorite holiday. Perhaps it was gauche for one involved in investigating real murders, and real dead people, but then, that might have been what made it so appealing—on Halloween, all the blood was corn syrup, the skeletons danced to 80’s rock, and the serial killers wore their identities on their sleeves and carried plastic weapons. It had been your favorite holiday as a kid, and it still was.

“No.”

“Please?” you begged, drawing out the E. “It would be so awesome!”

“No.”

“But—”

“I am a bestselling author. An esteemed expert in my field. I will not be subjected to such an undignified, childish display.”

“But you would have the best costume and nobody would know!”

He wasn’t sure how you talked him into it. It must have those adorable pleading eyes he could never resist, or the enticing appeal to his ego that it would be an extraordinary costume, certain to leave everyone guessing how the effect was done. Somehow, he was walking into a Halloween party as a zombie. Without his contact lens or prosthetic jaw.

He frowned. It was humiliating.

You were dressed as an apocalypse survivor with an infected bite, and were hamming it up, telling the other guests you were fine, totally fine, with a shaky panic-edged voice and a tremor in your limbs. You had done an impressive job on the makeup, too, giving your complexion a sallow haze and reddened eyes. The bite itself was a gory masterpiece constructed from latex and tissue paper, with dark veins spider-webbing up your arm.

He didn’t have to ham it up. He only needed to walk in the room and Shrek and Fiona, Pennywise the clown, and a sexy velociraptor all gasped in horror at his face. How was that meant to make him feel?

“So cool!” someone said before he could turn on his heel and walk out of there. Words like, “There isn’t a contest, is there? I should have put in more effort,” and “did you hire a movie SFX artist? No fair,” started to get tossed around—including toward costume elements that you had designed and had nothing to do with his natural grotesqueness. Then they offered him a drink and moved on to the next impressive costumes and regular party chatter.

You were right. Nobody knew it was real, and while it stung to be stared at and called grisly—you would later apologize profusely for being too gung-ho and not thinking through what would happen—he had never imaged being able to have a normal conversation in public with his real face exposed. There was something daringly vulnerable about it. He had never imagined not being ashamed, but at least in this niche context, his old injury made him the leading man of the evening.

By the end of the night he got so into it, he was chasing you around snarling for your brains, and getting a kick out of scaring trick-or-treaters.

*****

He took you to Paris for Valentine’s day. Last time it was Italy, and you strangely suspected he was touring the shadow of Hannibal Lecter as much as he was trying to impress you. You had suspected, that is, until you asked, and he rather bluntly admitted to it. He hadn’t expected you not to notice by the time you got to Florence, although Venice had been purely about romance (he loved all those touristy gondola rides that he swore he hated and were just for your benefit).

Now that he finally had the chance to lavish his considerable means upon someone, he was throwing himself heart and soul into the holiday, and would not stop until he had spoiled you senseless. When he was single and accustomed to spending the day alone, he used to loathe February 14th—Valentine’s had seemed a cruel joke directed specifically at him. He couldn’t even spitefully ignore it by staying late at work, because the more perceptive inmates always took notice.

“You do not know hell,” he told you, “until a man convicted of raping his mother’s severed head taunts you about your lack of sex life.”

This year, he treated you to everything Paris had to offer: the Louvre, Notre Dame, an opera at Palais Garnier, a morning stroll through the gardens of Versailles, delicious bakeries, cafes, chocolate, and macrons. You insisted upon seeing the Catacombs, of course.

When you went to the Eiffel Tower and he showed up with roses and dinner reservations for sunset in its refined first-floor restaurant, your gut clenched. You were terrified he was going to propose. Of course he would make a grand gesture! You carefully inspected every champagne glass for hidden engagement rings, but found only bubbles. After dinner, when you ascended to the top of the tower to watch Paris light up at night, you knew that was when the proposal was coming.

But it didn’t. And you found yourself disappointed.

You had never talked about it, so there was no reason to assume it was something he wanted. It seemed far too soon to you, too, until it was snatched away and you realized that after three years together, you still couldn’t imagine wanting a life without him in it.

Arriving home at last, you breathed a sigh of relief into the still air. Paris was exciting and rich with history, but you were glad to be home in the peaceful familiarity of that snobbishly oversized house with its ridiculously spiraling staircases and its somewhat-less-fastidiously-pristine rooms, which now accommodated both of your things. All of the picture frames that once held impersonal stock photos displayed real snapshots of your lives together.

You weren’t even going to shower. You were so tired, you just wanted to rip all your clothes off and drop into bed. Frederick pulled his tie off. Hair frumpy from the long plane and taxi rides, his fingers worked to undo the top buttons of his shirt as he lumbered to the bath. He stopped at the door and turned back. You were taking a sip of water before leaving the cup on your nightstand.

“Marry me?” he said.

#Frederick Chilton x reader #frederick chilton #Hannibal #Raúl Esparza #my writing

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moltenhair · 4 years

Text

Season 3 minus Gothel

So here’s the deal... I don’t have the energy to finish this complete rewrite. And I don’t know when i will... But I wanted to share what I’d written so far. Or most of it anyway. There’s still a lot I haven’t written- like where the canon Captain of the Guard comes in. I have explanations for everything that isnt featured here I just... Haven’t been able to get around to getting them in writing.

But here it is! My much talked about new backstory/rewrite for Cass that has absolutely nothing to do with being related to Gothel or even knowing her. Enjoy.

It was surreal. Like stepping into a different moment in time. Too real to be a dream. No.. This was a memory. But whose memory was it? And why was Cassandra here?

Olive colored eyes scanned the world around her. The door she’d walked through gone from sight and mind. Something inside her compelling her to drink in her surroundings. The sights, the sounds, the smells. A tiny farmhouse. A barely impressive plot of land but it looked like the owners were getting by. The land had clearly seen better days, the animals and crops were few and the home was crumbling at the foundations. But it radiated warmth and comfort. Cass couldn’t explain it but she was drawn to it. Like it was something she knew once. Like this place was safe.

“Hello, Cassandra.”

Cass turned quickly, her black hair whipping into her face as she looked for the sudden voice. Who was there? No one, at first glance. But then her gaze fell, and standing before her was a small child in a frilly gown. Ethereal in a way and an almost transparent blue. Like a ghost from another time. It stared up at the lady in waiting with big, shining eyes and a sweet, innocent smile. Tiny gloved hands folded as she waited for Cassandra to speak.

“Who are you?” Cass asked, her brow furrowing suspiciously. This was some magic trick, she knew it. And magic rarely worked in her favor. The ever stinging wound that was her right hand was a constant reminder of that.

“A friend.” The girl happily replied, walking around her, a bounce in her step that shook the twin buns atop her head. “Or at least I’d like to be.”

Cass watched her walk away toward that farmhouse, only for her to turn and look back. Waiting with an expectant look for Cass to follow. She glanced around before taking that first reluctant step. This was really weird but it didn’t seem like there was anyone else around to talk to. And even if Cass had to follow this child, at least she’d get a closer look at that farm. Find out why she had such a familiar feeling about it.

The two walked together up to the misty glass of the farm house and peered through. It was dimly lit inside. Whoever lived within clearly didn’t have the money for candles and relied on the sun for light. There was movement in the shadows but Cass couldn’t make out what it was. She leaned in, closer to the glass, and squinted to try and see. But that was when she felt small fingers curl around her hand. A gentle touch that drew her gaze away. The child’s smile remained as she pulled Cassandra toward the door. Guiding her through it. Literally. The wood gave no resistance and they passed through it with ease. Like it was nothing but smoke. Even if it looked very real. Something that would have alarmed Cass in any other moment.

Once they were inside, the woman could get a much better look around. The walls were bare except for some flowers that hung to dry and some shelves stacked with jars and baskets. The fruit of the home owner’s labor. Meager vegetables and preservatives. The air smelled like sweet bread. A rare treat from a distant part of Cassandra’s memory. She couldn’t recall a time she’d eaten it, but she could vividly remember the taste.

“What is this place?” Cassandra asked, taking a few more steps, “It feels so-”

She stopped mid-stride as that moving figure came back into view. A little girl, no older than 4 years old. Smiling brightly with one missing tooth and carrying a handful of fresh flowers. Her hair was long and messy, but those ebony curls and olive eyes were unmistakable.

“Do you recognize that child?” The ghost asked.

“That’s… Me.” Cass all but whispered as she continued to watch the child move about the room.

“I got some fresh flowers, Mama!” her past self chimed, holding the humble boquet up to an unseen figure behind a closed door.

Cassandra’s heart leapt into her throat. ‘Mama’? Her mother?

The creaky old door opened and a tired looking woman appeared. Her long brown hair tied up in a messy bun. Loose curls dangling in front of her face.. But despite her clear exhaustion, she smiled tenderly at the child before her. She took the flowers and brought them up to her nose for a long sniff. As if they were the finest flowers she’d ever smelled and not common wildflowers from the neighboring field. The sight pulled at something in Cass that she wasn’t aware she could feel. Or maybe it was something she’d always tried to suppress.

“These are lovely, Cassandra. Thank you.” She sighed, reaching down to smooth a hand over her daughter’s hair. “These will look very nice on the dinner table tonight. I’ll go fetch some water.”

“Okay!” the little girl scurried out of the way to dive into the kitchen cabinets to find a vase. There weren’t any but she found a wooden cup that worked just as well.

Cass watched, emotions bubbling just beneath the surface as she watched this happy little family go about their lives. Without a care in the world. Her gaze followed her mother. When she came closer Cass could see her mother’s eyes matched her own. But they were tired. Worked to the bone, all alone on the farm. Cass’ father… His absence said everything Cass needed to know about him. Everything she never cared to remember. But her mother… It flooded back. The love she had for Cassandra in her youth. The days slaved so that her child could have a good meal or new clothes. Her mother had worked so hard for her…

“They look happy, don’t they?” The ghost spoke again, her voice almost somber. “You had a wonderful family, the two of you… Didn’t you?”

Watching her mother strain to carry a pail of water back into the house, a small, gentle smile curled Cassandra’s lips. Yeah… They do look happy. They were happy. It wasn’t much… But it was all they needed.

So what happened?

“I don’t understand… If this was my life, why don’t I remember this?”

“We all have things we repress to protect ourselves…” The ghost told her, big eyes turning to her once more. A sadness Cass wasn’t used to seeing directed at herself. “You made yourself forget her so you didn’t have to remember how you lost her.”

Lost? Cassandra’s confusion must have been apparent on her face, because the spirit child continued as if she knew.

“The fire.”

The world shifted suddenly. In a bright flash, like lightning striking where they stood. In the blink of an eye the home around them changed. The roof opened up to reveal a dark, reddened sky. Pillars of smoke reached for the heavens. Red flames licked at the walls and climbed toward the crumbling rafters. Like a great, ravenous beast it devoured the house. The beautiful flowers the little girl picked lost forever to the flames.

Cass looked around to try and find her younger self. Was she trapped? Where was her mother?

“Mama! Mama, where are you?!”

“Cassandra!”

It almost happened too quickly to see. A beam broke free, falling heavily from the roof. Beneath it stood a frightened little girl looking desperately for her mother. It was only with the quickest of reflexes that her mother dove in to save her. Taking the four year old into her arms. Her mother shielded Cassandra with her own body as she ran through the smoke and fire. Her shoulder collided with the front door and broke it free so she and her child could get out. Never flinching at the pain it must have caused, nor letting her ragged coughing slow her down.

The grown Cassandra was in awe. She’d never realized her mother was so brave.

But they’d gotten out… What happened? Why didn’t her mother stay with her?

Cass followed. The flames passed right through her as she chased. It looked so real but she felt none of the heat. All that mattered was finding the truth. Learning what happened to her mother. Why Cass had ended up alone. How she ended up as the Captain’s daughter. How her life had gone so wrong.

She followed her mother down the dirt road. She watched as her mother looked desperately for a Guard with young Cassandra held tight to her chest. For anyone to help her and her child. Then, in the distance, guards on horseback came into view. Armed with crossbows and riding furiously through the woods. On a mission from the king.

“Sir, please help!” Cassandra’s mother called, running up to one of the men. An older man with white hair and a taller helmet than the rest. The old captain, maybe? Cass couldn’t remember anyone but her dad ever being Captain. “My house. You have to-”

“Ma’am there’s no time!” The man growled, yanking on the reins of his horse to move around the frantic woman, “The princess has been taken and we need every guard to track down the kidnapper. By order of the king!”

Cassandra’s mother’s face paled. Her heartbreak clear as the man just rode away. Leaving a pleading woman and her child standing alone in the darkness… Helpless as their home and livelihood burned to the ground. And Cass felt as gutted as her mother looked.

She fell to her knees, eyes wide and shining with stinging tears as she watched her home burn beside her mother. How could this happen? How could the king order all of his men away from their posts and leave the rest of his people defenseless? For Rapunzel? For one girl? She was more important than all of his citizens? Didn’t the people who lived in Corona matter too?

“I’m so sorry this happened to you, Cassandra.” The ghost murmured, joining her at her side once more. “Do you remember now…? How you lost your mother?”

… Yes… She did.

“She… She had to give me up.” Cassandra croaked, tears streaming down her cheeks. “Without the farm she… Sh-she couldn’t provide for me, s-so-”

“So she left you in an orphanage. In the hopes that someone could give you a better life.” The spirit child added. Cass squeezed her eyes shut. She didn’t want to hear it. She didn’t want to remember. “But they never could, could they? All your life you’ve had to face that you would never matter as much to them as Rapunzel..”

Bitterness swelled inside Cass, mingling with the pain in her heart. Maybe the fire could have been fought if every last guard hadn’t been looking for Rapunzel. Maybe if the people in charge hadn’t decided that the citizens didn’t matter. All they cared about were their own people. Anyone less than royal was disposable.. They always had been.

“I know it hurts.” The child soothed, resting her small hand upon Cass’ shoulder. “But there is a way you can make that pain go away... To make sure it never happens to anyone else.”

Cass’ eyes opened. Staring ahead to the smoldering remains of her childhood home. The images of herself and her mother were gone. Leaving Cass alone in the smoke and rubble.

“How?”

A/N delete later: (there is a reason the Captain we know is absent.)

_______

Power surged through Cassandra’s veins. Burning like the fires that destroyed her life and of her passionate hatred. Years of being walked on, cast aside and belittled had all come to this. This moment of sweet catharsis. After twenty years of being passed by in favor of people with “power”, now she would be the one with real power. And a kind of power money couldn’t buy. An authority no birthright could give her.

THIS was her destiny.

“Cass… I had no idea what happened-”

“Of course you didn’t!” Cass snapped, the moonstone embedded in her breast flashing with violent, angry light. “It never mattered. I never mattered.”

Rapunzel stepped forward, hands raised and eyes pleading. Her hair had stopped glowing the moment Cass seized the opal for herself. Now it hung loose off the bridge they stood upon. Dipping into the darkness below. Behind her Eugene, Lance and Adira looked on in awe and horror.

“Of course you matter, Cass-! I’m your friend! But this is dangerous! The moonstone-”

“-Is the only way to fix the damage done by people like your father. By people like YOU.” Cass cut her off, clutching the stone tightly. Rapunzel’s eyes widened and she froze in her step. Shocked at the words she was hearing. “I thought when you came back that maybe YOU might change things. That maybe you might actually care what I had to say.”

Black spikes, glowing with blue energy burst from the ground around Cassandra. Illuminating the inky black armor that now consumed her from head to toe. Covering any weakness she may have held.

“But I know now that trying to make your kind listen only leads to pain.” She held up her right hand. The grave injury now concealed behind stony armor. “But no longer...”

“Cass-”

Rapunzel took another step forward only to be met with a spike jutting out toward her. Her hair illuminated, shining bright and golden as it moved to defend her. The princess flew back at the impact, tumbling painfully against the ground and into Eugene’s arms. He caught her, eyes wide and horrified at what he was witnessing.

“Blondie-! Rapunzel, are you okay?”

Adira jumped into action, placing herself between the princess and “fishskin”. Her shadowblade drawn. Without a shred of hesitation or fear for her own life she lunged at Cassandra, pinning her back to the black rocks with the flat side of her blade.

“Release the Moonstone, Short Hair. You have no idea what you’re dealing with.”

Rage flared in Cassanra’s chest, the opal flashing with white-blue light as her glowing eyes narrowed. Still people dared tell her what to do? Still no one would take her seriously?! “No… YOU have no idea what YOU’RE dealing with.”

In a blast of bright light and black stone, Cass threw the other warrior away. Adira’s previously superior size and skill now useless to save her. Her back struck the wall and the air was knocked from her lungs. She collapsed into a slump on the ground. Lance- the clinging fool he was- rushed to her side. Cass didn’t care what he had to say to Adira. None of them mattered now. She took up Adira’s sword, dropped after that pathetic attempt to stop her. A fitting weapon for Cass to shape the world with.

Rapunzel groaned, her hair falling out of her face as her eyes opened. She was hurting in more ways than one and winded… But she was okay. It was Cass she was worried about. As she sat up, Cassandra charged the bridge, running in a sprint. Each step summoning black rocks to guard her. To keep her “friends” from getting too close. But Eugene was on his feet regardless. Ready to stand his ground and square up with one of his best friends. To defend Rapunzel’s honor and possibly the entire world-

But chivalry was cut short as a large black spike shot upwards before him, colliding hard with his body and sending him flying backwards into the wall. The wind knocked from his lungs, he fell to the ground with a groan. Cass didn’t look back as his pained noises reached her ears. She only ran further. Away from her “friends” and onward toward freedom. Everything inside her was twisted and angry. Angry at Rapunzel, at Eugene, at this broken world, at herself. But she couldn’t stop so soon. Not after finally having the tools she needed to do what needed to be done.

No one would stop her now. No one COULD stop her now.

#rapunzel's tangled adventure #tangled the series #cassandra #Season 3 minus gothel #my art #sorta #I do have art to add to this later #it's just in sketch form #it's the first full chapter #I have one more full chapter but Cass isnt in it

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thenewnio · 3 years

Text

The Statement of Randolph Carter

I repeat to you, gentlemen, that your inquisition is fruitless. Detain me here forever if you will; confine or execute me if you must have a victim to propitiate the illusion you call justice; but I can say no more than I have said already. Everything that I can remember, I have told with perfect candour. Nothing has been distorted or concealed, and if anything remains vague, it is only because of the dark cloud which has come over my mind—that cloud and the nebulous nature of the horrors which brought it upon me.

Again I say, I do not know what has become of Harley Warren; though I think—almost hope—that he is in peaceful oblivion, if there be anywhere so blessed a thing. It is true that I have for five years been his closest friend, and a partial sharer of his terrible researches into the unknown. I will not deny, though my memory is uncertain and indistinct, that this witness of yours may have seen us together as he says, on the Gainesville pike, walking toward Big Cypress Swamp, at half past eleven on that awful night. That we bore electric lanterns, spades, and a curious coil of wire with attached instruments, I will even affirm; for these things all played a part in the single hideous scene which remains burned into my shaken recollection. But of what followed, and of the reason I was found alone and dazed on the edge of the swamp next morning, I must insist that I know nothing save what I have told you over and over again. You say to me that there is nothing in the swamp or near it which could form the setting of that frightful episode. I reply that I know nothing beyond what I saw. Vision or nightmare it may have been—vision or nightmare I fervently hope it was—yet it is all that my mind retains of what took place in those shocking hours after we left the sight of men. And why Harley Warren did not return, he or his shade—or some nameless thing I cannot describe—alone can tell.

As I have said before, the weird studies of Harley Warren were well known to me, and to some extent shared by me. Of his vast collection of strange, rare books on forbidden subjects I have read all that are written in the languages of which I am master; but these are few as compared with those in languages I cannot understand. Most, I believe, are in Arabic; and the fiend-inspired book which brought on the end—the book which he carried in his pocket out of the world—was written in characters whose like I never saw elsewhere. Warren would never tell me just what was in that book. As to the nature of our studies—must I say again that I no longer retain full comprehension? It seems to me rather merciful that I do not, for they were terrible studies, which I pursued more through reluctant fascination than through actual inclination. Warren always dominated me, and sometimes I feared him. I remember how I shuddered at his facial expression on the night before the awful happening, when he talked so incessantly of his theory, why certain corpses never decay, but rest firm and fat in their tombs for a thousand years. But I do not fear him now, for I suspect that he has known horrors beyond my ken. Now I fear for him.

Once more I say that I have no clear idea of our object on that night. Certainly, it had much to do with something in the book which Warren carried with him—that ancient book in undecipherable characters which had come to him from India a month before—but I swear I do not know what it was that we expected to find. Your witness says he saw us at half past eleven on the Gainesville pike, headed for Big Cypress Swamp. This is probably true, but I have no distinct memory of it. The picture seared into my soul is of one scene only, and the hour must have been long after midnight; for a waning crescent moon was high in the vaporous heavens.

The place was an ancient cemetery; so ancient that I trembled at the manifold signs of immemorial years. It was in a deep, damp hollow, overgrown with rank grass, moss, and curious creeping weeds, and filled with a vague stench which my idle fancy associated absurdly with rotting stone. On every hand were the signs of neglect and decrepitude, and I seemed haunted by the notion that Warren and I were the first living creatures to invade a lethal silence of centuries. Over the valley’s rim a wan, waning crescent moon peered through the noisome vapours that seemed to emanate from unheard-of catacombs, and by its feeble, wavering beams I could distinguish a repellent array of antique slabs, urns, cenotaphs, and mausolean facades; all crumbling, moss-grown, and moisture-stained, and partly concealed by the gross luxuriance of the unhealthy vegetation. My first vivid impression of my own presence in this terrible necropolis concerns the act of pausing with Warren before a certain half-obliterated sepulchre, and of throwing down some burdens which we seemed to have been carrying. I now observed that I had with me an electric lantern and two spades, whilst my companion was supplied with a similar lantern and a portable telephone outfit. No word was uttered, for the spot and the task seemed known to us; and without delay we seized our spades and commenced to clear away the grass, weeds, and drifted earth from the flat, archaic mortuary. After uncovering the entire surface, which consisted of three immense granite slabs, we stepped back some distance to survey the charnel scene; and Warren appeared to make some mental calculations. Then he returned to the sepulchre, and using his spade as a lever, sought to pry up the slab lying nearest to a stony ruin which may have been a monument in its day. He did not succeed, and motioned to me to come to his assistance. Finally our combined strength loosened the stone, which we raised and tipped to one side.

The removal of the slab revealed a black aperture, from which rushed an effluence of miasmal gases so nauseous that we started back in horror. After an interval, however, we approached the pit again, and found the exhalations less unbearable. Our lanterns disclosed the top of a flight of stone steps, dripping with some detestable ichor of the inner earth, and bordered by moist walls encrusted with nitre. And now for the first time my memory records verbal discourse, Warren addressing me at length in his mellow tenor voice; a voice singularly unperturbed by our awesome surroundings.

“I’m sorry to have to ask you to stay on the surface,” he said, “but it would be a crime to let anyone with your frail nerves go down there. You can’t imagine, even from what you have read and from what I’ve told you, the things I shall have to see and do. It’s fiendish work, Carter, and I doubt if any man without ironclad sensibilities could ever see it through and come up alive and sane. I don’t wish to offend you, and heaven knows I’d be glad enough to have you with me; but the responsibility is in a certain sense mine, and I couldn’t drag a bundle of nerves like you down to probable death or madness. I tell you, you can’t imagine what the thing is really like! But I promise to keep you informed over the telephone of every move—you see I’ve enough wire here to reach to the centre of the earth and back!”

I can still hear, in memory, those coolly spoken words; and I can still remember my remonstrances. I seemed desperately anxious to accompany my friend into those sepulchral depths, yet he proved inflexibly obdurate. At one time he threatened to abandon the expedition if I remained insistent; a threat which proved effective, since he alone held the key to the thing. All this I can still remember, though I no longer know what manner of thing we sought. After he had secured my reluctant acquiescence in his design, Warren picked up the reel of wire and adjusted the instruments. At his nod I took one of the latter and seated myself upon an aged, discoloured gravestone close by the newly uncovered aperture. Then he shook my hand, shouldered the coil of wire, and disappeared within that indescribable ossuary. For a moment I kept sight of the glow of his lantern, and heard the rustle of the wire as he laid it down after him; but the glow soon disappeared abruptly, as if a turn in the stone staircase had been encountered, and the sound died away almost as quickly. I was alone, yet bound to the unknown depths by those magic strands whose insulated surface lay green beneath the struggling beams of that waning crescent moon.

In the lone silence of that hoary and deserted city of the dead, my mind conceived the most ghastly phantasies and illusions; and the grotesque shrines and monoliths seemed to assume a hideous personality—a half-sentience. Amorphous shadows seemed to lurk in the darker recesses of the weed-choked hollow and to flit as in some blasphemous ceremonial procession past the portals of the mouldering tombs in the hillside; shadows which could not have been cast by that pallid, peering crescent moon. I constantly consulted my watch by the light of my electric lantern, and listened with feverish anxiety at the receiver of the telephone; but for more than a quarter of an hour heard nothing. Then a faint clicking came from the instrument, and I called down to my friend in a tense voice. Apprehensive as I was, I was nevertheless unprepared for the words which came up from that uncanny vault in accents more alarmed and quivering than any I had heard before from Harley Warren. He who had so calmly left me a little while previously, now called from below in a shaky whisper more portentous than the loudest shriek:

“God! If you could see what I am seeing!”

I could not answer. Speechless, I could only wait. Then came the frenzied tones again:

“Carter, it’s terrible—monstrous—unbelievable!”

This time my voice did not fail me, and I poured into the transmitter a flood of excited questions. Terrified, I continued to repeat, “Warren, what is it? What is it?”

Once more came the voice of my friend, still hoarse with fear, and now apparently tinged with despair:

“I can’t tell you, Carter! It’s too utterly beyond thought—I dare not tell you—no man could know it and live—Great God! I never dreamed of THIS!” Stillness again, save for my now incoherent torrent of shuddering inquiry. Then the voice of Warren in a pitch of wilder consternation:

“Carter! for the love of God, put back the slab and get out of this if you can! Quick!—leave everything else and make for the outside—it’s your only chance! Do as I say, and don’t ask me to explain!”

I heard, yet was able only to repeat my frantic questions. Around me were the tombs and the darkness and the shadows; below me, some peril beyond the radius of the human imagination. But my friend was in greater danger than I, and through my fear I felt a vague resentment that he should deem me capable of deserting him under such circumstances. More clicking, and after a pause a piteous cry from Warren:

“Beat it! For God’s sake, put back the slab and beat it, Carter!”

Something in the boyish slang of my evidently stricken companion unleashed my faculties. I formed and shouted a resolution, “Warren, brace up! I’m coming down!” But at this offer the tone of my auditor changed to a scream of utter despair:

“Don’t! You can’t understand! It’s too late—and my own fault. Put back the slab and run—there’s nothing else you or anyone can do now!” The tone changed again, this time acquiring a softer quality, as of hopeless resignation. Yet it remained tense through anxiety for me.

“Quick—before it’s too late!” I tried not to heed him; tried to break through the paralysis which held me, and to fulfil my vow to rush down to his aid. But his next whisper found me still held inert in the chains of stark horror.

“Carter—hurry! It’s no use—you must go—better one than two—the slab—” A pause, more clicking, then the faint voice of Warren:

“Nearly over now—don’t make it harder—cover up those damned steps and run for your life—you’re losing time— So long, Carter—won’t see you again.” Here Warren’s whisper swelled into a cry; a cry that gradually rose to a shriek fraught with all the horror of the ages—

“Curse these hellish things—legions— My God! Beat it! Beat it! Beat it!”

After that was silence. I know not how many interminable aeons I sat stupefied; whispering, muttering, calling, screaming into that telephone. Over and over again through those aeons I whispered and muttered, called, shouted, and screamed, “Warren! Warren! Answer me—are you there?”

And then there came to me the crowning horror of all—the unbelievable, unthinkable, almost unmentionable thing. I have said that aeons seemed to elapse after Warren shrieked forth his last despairing warning, and that only my own cries now broke the hideous silence. But after a while there was a further clicking in the receiver, and I strained my ears to listen. Again I called down, “Warren, are you there?”, and in answer heard the thing which has brought this cloud over my mind. I do not try, gentlemen, to account for that thing—that voice—nor can I venture to describe it in detail, since the first words took away my consciousness and created a mental blank which reaches to the time of my awakening in the hospital. Shall I say that the voice was deep; hollow; gelatinous; remote; unearthly; inhuman; disembodied? What shall I say? It was the end of my experience, and is the end of my story. I heard it, and knew no more. Heard it as I sat petrified in that unknown cemetery in the hollow, amidst the crumbling stones and the falling tombs, the rank vegetation and the miasmal vapours. Heard it well up from the innermost depths of that damnable open sepulchre as I watched amorphous, necrophagous shadows dance beneath an accursed waning moon. And this is what it said:

“YOU FOOL, WARREN IS DEAD!”

#WTF

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thecleverdame · 5 years

Text

Sleepy Hollow - Chapter Six

Series Master List

Pairings: Sam x Reader, mentions of Dean x Jo

Summary: In 1799, specialized police constables Sam and Dean Winchester are sent from New York City to a small town called Sleepy Hollow to investigate a series of murders. Approached by the town’s council, the Winchesters discover the local residents believe that the murders are the work of a deadly Hessian horseman whose head has been mysteriously chopped off. With help from the beautiful Y/N Van Tassel, Sam Winchester’s investigation takes him further through the dark wood where more murders have been occurring. What Sam does not realize is that the mysterious Horseman is being controlled by someone in a sinister plot to kill the most suitable men in the village.

Warnings: Canon-level violence, murder, smut, horror, gore and a little fluff for good measure.

Words: 40k

Beta: ilikaicalie

This series is completed. You can read it on my Patreon for a monthly pledge of 2.50. This pledge includes early access to all my stories and Patreon exclusive content. >> CLICK HERE <<

Van Tassel House - Sam’s Room

Sam is startled awake, frightened and sweating. He lies in bed staring at the ceiling wrapped in the darkness of the night. There’s a candle flickering beside the bed almost completely burned down to the chamberstick and the smell of sweet salve, it’s a tell-tale sign. Dean must’ve dressed his head wound. He gingerly touches his forehead, wincing when he gets close to the gash and shakes sleep away.

It’s dark outside the window. The fall from the horse knocked him for a loop but now he’s able-bodied and not sure he’ll be able to sleep any more. He gets up, dresses and heads out to explore the house at night.

Entering the kitchen, he sets his lantern on the table and sits down to open his father’s ledger. It’s only as he settles in that he notices a faint light coming from down the hall. -

Most nights you retreat to the sewing room. There’s no one about the house at this hour and your bedroom can often feel like a prison. So after everyone is asleep you sit by the fire and read until the early hours of the morning.

You don’t hear Sam approaching, he’s quiet as a mouse until the door creaks open and you nearly jump out of your skin. For a moment you think it’s your stepmother, only to be met with the face of the handsome Constable.

Slapping the book closed and tucking it in beside you in the chair, you sit at attention, watching him inch inside the door. “You scared me nearly half to death.” “Pardon my intrusion. I saw a light.” He smiles softly, a wonderful, gentle smile you wouldn’t expect from such a beast of a man.

“It is no intrusion. I come here to read when sleep eludes me.” You can’t help but feel a thrill as he steps closer. “Will you sit with me, Constable Winchester?”

You pat the sofa beside you, watching as he bites his bottom lip. He bows his head in confirmation, then he takes a seat.

“How would your fiance’ feel about you being alone with me?” Sam asks, awaiting the answer with bated breath. He cannot deny his interest in you, especially to himself.

“I believe I told you Brom had proposed, not that I ever accepted.” Looking him over you scoot to the side, making more room. “I would expect more attention to detail from a man of the law, Constable.” “You must call me Sam,” he offers, leaning close to get a better view of the volume you hid away. “You come here to read books which you must hide?” he grins, tilting his head to read the spine of the book in question. “The Knights of the Round Table...isn’t that for children?” “Not everything is as it appears.” You pick up the large book, taking another, smaller volume from inside. “It was my mother’s book. My father frowned at them when they were hers, he would frown at me now. He believes tales of romance caused the brain fever that killed my mother. She died two years ago come midwinter.” Sam nods, “I am very sorry. I saw it written in the front of the family bible.” “The nurse who cared for her during her sickness is the new Lady Van Tassel.” “There was something else too.” Sam can’t stop the investigator inside him. “Why did no one think to mention that Van Garretts are kit and kin to the Van Tassels?”

“Why because there is hardly a household in Sleepy Hollow that is not connected to every other by blood or marriage. I have more cousins than fingers and toes to count them on.” That thought seems to amuse him, cheeks rounding, dimples appearing. “What?”

“Dean is all the family I have the world.” He looks up, his eyes lingering for a moment too long.

A cock crows outside, dawn is coming soon.

“This land was Van Garrett Land, given to my father when I was in swaddling clothes,” you continue, eager to find any reason to keep him with you. Enjoying this sweet moment of privacy. “Given by the dead Van Garrett?” he inquires. “Yes,” you nod. “The Van Garretts were the richest family around these parts even then. When my father brought us to Sleepy Hollow, Van Garrett set him up with an acre, a broken-down cottage, and a dozen Van Garrett hens. My father prospered and built us a new house. I owe my happiness to him. I remember living poor in the cottage. Would you like to see it? I could take you there.” “Yes. I would like to see where you were as poor as I am.” He grins, unnaturally handsome and you want nothing more than to throw yourself at him.

Sam stands to leave and you stand too, revealing the book you had been reading. You give it a final look before handing it to him.

“Take this. It is my gift to you, Sam.” He carefully takes it from you, big hands curling around the spine as he reads the title: A Compendium of Spells, Charms, and Devices of the Spirit World. “I am grateful for the gift, but perhaps you should keep it. I have no use for it.” He steps closer to hand it back. “Are you so certain of everything?” You look at him, purposely holding his stare.

He inspects it, opening the cover and flipping to the back. There’s your name but in different handwriting is also the name Elizabeth Van Tassel.

“This was your mother’s?” He looks up, surprised.

“Keep it close to your heart.” You inch closer, nearer than you should be. “It is sure protection against harm.” His eyes narrow, looking from you to the book. “Are you so certain of everything?” “Almost always…” you whisper, tiling your head toward him like a plant hungry for the sun.

His lips meet yours in a single, longing kiss as his hand curls around your arm. He lingers for a fleeting moment, nuzzling his nose into your cheek before pulling back just enough to look you in the eyes. “I should go. It’s almost dawn and the staff will be waking. Being caught together as day breaks would certainly stir rumors.”

“I’ve never cared what people say about me.” You swim in the feeling of the kiss as he backs away.

“I will see you soon, Y/N.”

Sleepy Hollow Farmland

You and Sam make a pretty picture on horseback, riding slowly toward the ruins of the cottage you lived in as a child.

“I saw the photos on your desk,” you mention casually, watching him ride beside you. “Are they your family?”

“Yes, people I have lost.” He offers you a forced smile, hand tightening around the reigns. “My parents and someone I cared for.”

“A lost love?” you ask gently and he nods. “Did you lose her recently?”

“No, it was ten years ago now. But if I’m honest there are days when it feels as if no time has passed at all.”

“The heart heals slowly. There are days when I forget my mother is gone. Just this morning I had a fleeting thought. I wanted to tell her how excited I was to bring you here, only to remember that she is gone.”

“I know those moments as well.” He slows his horse as you approach the cottage. There’s almost nothing left but the hearth and part of a crumbling chimney.

Sam dismounts, turning to offer you a hand and help you off your horse. There’s a thrill at the feeling of his hands on yours and you’re about to let go when you notice little scars on his palm. You take his hand between your own, running your thumbs over the little dimples.

“These are strange,” you look up to him. “What are they?” “I wish I knew. I’ve had them since I can remember.”

You inspect him for a moment longer, before taking his hand into yours and leading him into the ruins of the cottage. Sam's attention is caught by a red cardinal on a branch, much like the bird he had in New York. He reflects a moment, then turns to watch you crouching by the hearth. You look back at him, threading the stem of a flower into your hair. “I used to play by this hearth. It was my first drawing school and my mother was my teacher.” Unwittingly, you’re mimicking Sam's dream. You pick up a twig and start drawing on the hearthstone, just as his mother did. His blood runs cold but you’re unaware of the effect it’s having on him. Then he notices the few small wildflowers growing in the old fireplace and feels short of breath, leaning against the stones for support. “Oh, look! I'd forgotten this.” You smile. “See, carved into the fire-back, the Archer.” Using your fingers you clean off the dirt around a simple carving of a man with a Bow and Arrow. “This was from long before we lived here.” You look to Sam, who’s pale as a ghost. “Are you alright?” He nods but says nothing. You’re about to press him when you spot the cardinal too.

“Look there!” you point. “They are my favorite. I would love to have a tame one, but I wouldn't have the heart to cage him. “Then I have something for you.” Sam unslings his satchel, watching your face light up. You’re too beautiful and vibrant a creature to be stuck in a dark place like Sleepy Hollow.

It’s a paper disk with a red bird on one side and an empty cage on the other. Both ends of the disk are pierced by a looped string so that the disk can spin and twist. It was his mother’s gift to him many years ago.

“Come here, let me show you.” He steps behind you, indulging as he presses his chest into your back, arms reaching around your waist. You hum to life at the sensation of his large body curled over yours.

“A cardinal on one side, and an empty cage on the other.” You watch with bated breath as he spins the disk. “And now…” Once he moves it fast enough the bird appears to be inside the cage. You’re thrilled and excited, tilting back to look up at him. “You can do magic! Teach me!” “It is not magic. It’s optics,” he chuckles, lowering his mouth to the side of your head, he’s close enough you can feel his breath on your temple. Sam gives you the toy and shows you how to spin it. “Separate pictures which become one when the picture spins. Like the truth which I must spin here.” He steps away, shifting to the side and watching while you spin the disk, the bird appears in the cage. “I may keep it?”

“Of course.” He confirms. “I’d give you anything you asked for to see you smile like this.”

His words send a flush to your cheeks and the disk in your hands is momentarily forgotten as you gaze at the handsome man before you.

“Anything?” you ask coyly.

“Anything.” His stare is unyielding, eyes fixed on yours.

“Another kiss?” you inquire, only to have him swooping down to pull you into his arms and his mouth close over your own. There’s a desperate passion that was not there this morning. This kiss stokes a fire in your belly, fanning the flame that his touch sparked in the sewing room.

You moan softly into his mouth, only to have him take advantage as his tongue slides past your lips, gliding, plunging, delving deeper and deeper until you’re breathless.

Before you know what’s happening his hand is on your stomach, pushing you back until you’re flush with the hearth, trapped between cold stone and the heat of his body. He pulls away with a pop, only to move down your jaw, drawing a breathless mewl from your lungs as he nips and sucks at the skin of your neck.

“Touch me,” you pant, fisting your hands in his hair.

Sam doesn’t need to be told twice. He’s wanted to kiss you, to ravage every inch of you, since the first moment he saw you. It’s a desire that’s only grown with time. He groans against the hot, sweating skin in the crook of your neck as his hand finds its way under your dress.

When his knuckles meet the soft skin of your thighs you gasp in response, pressing forward into his touch. Two fingers brush over the thatch of hair at your sex, scooping forward until he finds warm, wet flesh. You must want him as much as he desires you because you’re thoroughly slick.

“Sam,” you moan, spurring him on as those fingers thrust upward into the tightness of your channel. His thumb goes in search of your delicate pearl, sliding back and forth until you nearly squeal, two hands grabbing at his back confirming he’s found his target.

You can feel him inside you, two thick fingers thrusting in and out as he rubs your bud, bringing a wash of pleasure and wanton lust over every inch of you. You can also hear it, the sound of your sex taking his fingers and then the sensation of his mouth biting across the swell of your breasts.

If Sam had any less self-control he’d throw you to the ground and rip this ridiculous dress right off you. He’d fuck you here in the dirt, but he won’t. A woman as sweet as you deserves things like a bed and mattress.

He can feel it when you cum. You whimper, desperate cunt tightening around his knuckles, little sucking clenches that draw him deeper until you’re boneless in his grasp.

He pulls his hand from between your legs, sullied fingers on your throat as he hooks both hands under your jaw and kisses you again and again, swallowing every gasp and sigh until you’re lost in his mouth and his touch.

You spend the better part of the morning enthralled with each other, gentle touches and passionate kisses until the sun rises high overhead and you have no choice but to return home.

#sam winchester smut #sam winchester x reader #sam winchester fanfiction #sam winchester au

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rosemaidenvixen · 4 years

Text

Gruss vom Krampus

One night on patrol Jim experiences a case of mistaken identity.

Ao3

Jim vaulted the fence in a single leap and landed in a crouch in a snowbank, holding as still as he could. Sirens flared briefly before fading into the distance. He let out a sigh of relief, he should really be more careful when hunting down goblins in a suburb, but it looked like he was in the clear.

A soft whimper came from behind him.

Crap, spoke too soon.

Jim froze, the eclipse armor was good as a stealth suit, but only provided he didn’t start jumping around in it. That was pretty hard to miss. Holding the rest of his body perfectly still, Jim slowly turned his head in the direction of the sound.

Two-- no three, kids were huddled against the side of the house, practically shaking in their snow boots, eyes wide with fear.

Jim’s heart sank in a way that had become far too familiar in the past six months. There were obvious cosmetic differences between humans and trolls, and to the unfamiliar the latter could appear...intimidating, and the black-red glow of the eclipse armor didn’t help.

He tried to swallow the unexpected tightness in his throat. These were just kids, the biggest one of them couldn’t be more than eight years old, and Jim was a seven foot tall, horned intruder in their backyard. There was no reason for him to be upset, it was perfectly natural for them to--

“....please don’t take us away Mr. Krampus…”

Wait, what?

Careful to stay in a crouched position, not wanting to frighten them any more than he already had. Jim turned to face them.

“Hi there,” he hoped his smile came off as friendly rather than bearing his fangs “What was that you just called me?”

They were silent for a few beats before a girl with dark curly hair took a step forward, it looked like she was the oldest of the bunch “You’re Krampus...aren’t you?”

Krampus? What was-- oh yeah, Krampus was the Christmas demon. He’d heard about that before, some kind of reverse Santa, punishing bad kids instead of rewarding good ones.

Jim let out a sigh of relief. An easy mistake for a kid to make, with the horns and the black armor and all, at least the secret world of trolls wasn’t exposed.

He could work with this.

“Yep,” he sat back on a snow drift, stretching his legs out in front of him “I’m Krampus,”

The kids let out a chorus of wails, whimpering as they pressed themselves even harder against the wall of the house.

Jim blinked. Oh, that’s right, Krampus punished kids...woops.

“But I’m not here to punish you guys!” he said hurriedly.

“You’re-- you’re not?” one boy sniffled.

“Nope, I’m just in the neighborhood, taking care of some...other naughty people, not any of you,”

“But…” the littlest one peeked past the others, a girl of about four or five, massive afro crushed under her glittery, pink hat “I ate the cookies that were for my grandma,”

“I lied to my mom,”

“I cheated on a test at school,”

“I took my best friend’s necklace without asking,”

Jim sat hunched in the snow while the elementary age group rattled off their ‘sins’ to him. How was he going to fix this? He really wished he was better with kids.

What would Strickler say to them? Scratch that, what would his mom say?

“Ok...look,” he twisted his hands together “You know why doing those things was bad, right?”

They nodded.

“And,” he gestured toward the afro headed girl that had first confessed “You said sorry to your grandma right?”

She nodded “Yeah, and I helped make more cookies for her,”

Jim looked back towards the other two “And you all said sorry and tried to fix things to, right?”

They all nodded.

“That’s what’s important, everyone makes mistakes and does bad things, but it’s ok as long as you apologize, help fix things, and try to do better next time,”

The kids whispered among themselves, slowly detaching from the brick wall of the house.

“So, wait…” the bespeckled boy spoke up “If you don’t punish people for doing that stuff, what do you punish them for?”

Jim’s face went blank, he had not thought that far ahead into his ‘Krampus’ persona.

“You see I….” one of his feet tapped nervously against the ground “Stop people that are naughty...from....hurting other people,”

Seeing as how the kids weren’t screaming, Jim kept going “And if someone’s doing things that would hurt people and doesn’t stop or say sorry or try to fix things, that’s when I come in to stop them,”

Pink hat afro girl scurried up to him, eyes wide and curious “Like who?”

“Well...uh…” Jim struggled to come up with something to tell them, improv was not his strong suit “There was once this really bad guy named Gunmar...”

That was how Jim found himself retelling a heavily edited version of the battle of eternal night to three kids while sitting in a snowbank at nine o clock at night. By the end the kids, whose names he learned were Marisol, Liam, and Veronica, were practically sitting on top of him, Veronica’s pink hat dangling from one of his horns.

“...and so with my friends helping me we were able to lock Morgana up in Shadow jail,”

“Whoa…” Liam whispered, eyes wide with awe, expressions mirrored by Marisol and Veronica.

“Yep,” Jim said while getting up to his feet “That’s how it happened,” he handed the sparkly pink hat back to Veronica, who wasted no time in shoving her afro into it.

Jim was glad he’d been able to calm them down, but now that he’d thought about it for a while, something was bugging him.

“So what are you guys all doing outside so late at night?”

Marisol sheepishly pointed at a large, but crumbly looking mound of snow “We were trying to build a wall so we could keep you out,” she flushed and looked down at her snow boots “Sorry,”

All Jim could do was stare at the sad looking pile of snow that couldn’t even stop a racoon, much less a troll like him. Maybe things had changed since he was a little kid, but as far as Jim remembered, building snow walls to keep out demons was not a typical holiday activity.

“Why were you doing that?”

“Emily told us it would work,”

Jim raised an eyebrow at that “Emily?”

“Our babysitter,” Liam held out a small box “She told us about you and showed us the movie,”

Curious, Jim reached out and plucked up the offered box. It was a DVD case titled ‘A Christmas Horror Story’ showing a staff wielding Santa Claus facing off against a tall chain-swinging, horned figure that-- ok the movie actually looked pretty cool, he was definitely going to have to show it to Toby later. But it was rated R, these kids were way too young for that.

“So Emily, your babysitter, showed you guys this movie and then told you to go outside and build a snow wall to keep Kr-- me out?”

The trio nodded.

Jim frowned “No one’s going to come attack you guys, not me or anyone else, Emily shouldn’t have told you that, and it was really...not nice of her to scare you like this,”

Marisol’s eyes widened “Are you going to...punish her?”

“No,” Jim stepped around the side of the house, looking for the breaker box “I’m just going to have a talk with her,”

“Great job getting rid of the rugrats,”

Emily giggled and plopped down on the couch next to Jacob. Scaring the twerps with that movie and sending them outside to build a wall to keep ‘Krampus’ out was the best idea she’d ever had. She’d barely been able to keep from laughing the whole time. Now they were free to make out on the couch while the munchkins were out digging the snow for the rest of the night.

Leaning back, she cuddled even closer to Jacob “So where does your mom think you are?”

He smirked and wrapped an arm around her “In the dorms working on my thesis, that should get me out of any holiday dinners this year,”

Emily grinned “Perfect,” she licked her lips and moved in for a kiss, Jacob puckered up and prepared to meet her.

Suddenly all the lights shut off, plunging the room into darkness and causing them to freeze in their pre kiss.

“Is this a blackout?” Jacob said while propping them both up into a sitting position.

A quick glance out the window revealed that the sparkling red and green Christmas lights of the houses on either side of them were still lit.

“I don’t think so, none of the other houses are dark,”

Squirming uncomfortably, Emily pushed herself up off the couch “C’mon, there should be some flashlights in the kitchen,”

Jacob stood and followed her as she headed over to the next room. She reached out and was about to turn the knob when she heard a loud clang coming from within.

Her heart skipped a beat. She whipped back towards Jacob “Did you hear that?”

His wide eyes and pale face told her that he most certainly had. Not saying anything, Jacob slowly reached into the duffle bag behind the couch and pulled out two baseball bats, wood and aluminum. He gripped the wooden one firmly and soundlessly passed the aluminum one to her.

Emily gave him a quick nod of gratitude before gently grasping the knob and easing the door open.

“Marisol? Liam? That you in there?”

No reply.

Pulse pounding in her ears, Emily slowly stepped into the kitchen, Jacob on her heels, scanning the room for axe wielding maniacs.

The room appeared empty, save for the table and chairs swathed in shadows.

No serial killers in sight.

Emily was about to sigh in relief when the door slammed shut behind them. Causing them both to jump and let out a shriek.

“I hear you’ve been talking about me,” a gravelly voice snarled.

An enormous figure stood by the door. It was too dark to see him clearly, but glowing red lines running down his arms and legs pulsed through the shadows and let them know exactly how massive he was. Emily squinted, what was wrong with his he--

“You want to know what’s really naughty?” the figure stalked towards them, moving slowly but with deliberate purpose “Purposefully scaring kids that you’re supposed to be taking care of,”

Emily felt the blood drain from her face as the figure came into view. He looked different than in the movie and the pictures she’d seen online, but there was no mistaking those horns.

Krampus.

The real Krampus.

Instinct took over and she swung the bat at his temple with all her might.

He caught the bat in his hand without so much as flinching.

A shudder coursed through her as Emily started trembling all over. From the corner of her eye she could see Jacob doing much of the same.

Oh god, she told the kids about Krampus just to scare them and now the real Krampus was here and she and Jacob were going to die here like dumb teenagers in a bad slasher film and--

Krampus snorted and released the bat. It slipped from Emily’s limp grip and fell to the floor with a metallic clang.

“I’m going to let you off with a warning this time, but if you pull something like this again,” he let out a low growl “I won’t be as understanding. Got it?”

Somehow Emily still had enough of her faculties left intact to nod slowly.

“Good,” Krampus gave them a smile that would have been threatening enough even without exposing his sharp teeth “You all enjoy the rest of your night,”

With that Krampus turned and left, shutting the kitchen door behind him. Emily and Jacob didn’t move an inch the entire time, fear rooting them in place. After a few minutes the lights flicked back on.

Less than ten seconds later Jacob dropped his bat and started bawling. Emily sank to the floor, feeling as hot and limp as an overcooked noodle. The raw terror slowly draining away formed its own kind of numbness, like warm, lumpy oatmeal slogging its way through her veins.

She was faintly aware of Jacob fumbling for his phone while scampering in the direction of the front door.

He punched at the screen with his thumbs and raised it to his ear just before heading out the door “H-- Hello, Mom? I-- I-- I’m sorry, I’m not working on my thesis-- I lied...”

His words trailed off in a sob as the door shut behind him, leaving Emily alone in the house. Kneeling on the kitchen floor, staring at the four, perfect finger shaped dents in the aluminum bat.

Jim flipped the master switch of the breaker box back into place, brightening the dark house.

It looked like things were pretty well taken care of here. But he really had to get back and regroup with the others.

He turned towards the three kids “So remember guys, anytime you think someone is trying to scare you with a story like that, tell your parents. They’ll know for sure if it’s true or not,”

Jim paused, feeling like he should add onto that “And if you see anymore...magic...creatures like me, be careful, not all of us are nice, ok?”

“Uh huh,”

“Yep,”

“Yes,”

“Good,” he headed back towards the fence “I need to take off now so--”

He was caught off guard by Veronica running up to him and hugging him around the legs. Effectively holding him hostage despite their vast differences in size and strength “Thanks for visiting Mr. Krampus,”

Touched and more than a little flustered, Jim attempted to return the gesture by giving her a soft pat on the back “Happy to help, you guys take care now,”

Veronica released his legs, allowing Jim to jump to the top of the fence, swinging a leg over the top, getting ready to leave.

Marisol, Liam, and Veronica waved goodbye from the snow filled backyard.

“Bye, Merry Christmas,” Marisol shouted out to him, parroted by Liam and Veronica seconds later.

“Merry Christmas,” Jim called back with a wave, with that he turned and leapt off the fence, taking off into the dark, snowy night.

A/N: A Christmas Horror story is a real movie and one I highly recommend, but definitely not for kids.

The scene at the end was based on what happened to me when I helped out with the Christmas party in my mom's kindergarten class. I spent the whole time decorating cookies with them and as I was about to leave, one of the kids ran up and hugged me. It definitely caught me off guard, but I was pretty touched.

#tales of arcadia #Trollhunters #toachristmas #christmas #rmvwrites #fanfic #jim lake jr

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thepurplebutterflythings · 5 years

Text

Damsel in Distress (Part 2) - Jason Todd

Gif: Dxnninja on Tenor

Word Count: 2.6K

Paring: Jason Todd (Titans) x (f)Reader

Summary: Y/N gets closer with Robin and Jason, not realising the connection between the two of them.

Warnings: N/A

A/N: This is a little series I am doing about Jason Todd in Titans. I don’t know Comic!Jason very well so I’m taking all of this from the show, and at the moment he hasn’t been in very often, so please forgive any mischaracterizations.

Damsel in Distress Part 1 | Masterlist | Damsel in Distress Part 3

________________________________________________________________

It was all against Jason’s better judgement, talking to Y/N about Friday. He didn’t want to give her any hint that it was himself who saved her that night, not only that but he didn’t want to upset her by reminding her or forcing her to relive that night, but every time he looked at Y/N all that was in his mind was when he held her in his arms to comfort her and how distressed she was – he just had to make sure everything was alright with her, and then he’d go back to normal he told himself. That seemingly all went out the window the moment he was within a metre of her. Suddenly Jason became overwhelmed and his heart jumped in his chest when looking at her.

“Hey,” he said quietly when he found her in the library. Her back was to him and her nose was buried in the textbook they were using for their assignment. Y/N sat upright at the sound of his voice and for a second he panicked, thinking she recognised it as the voice of Robin, but those concerns vanished when she turned around and gave him a small smile.

“Hey.”

“I saw the footage from Friday, about you being saved by Batman and Robin,” he said, “It’s viral, trending number one on Twitter.” He told her. The moment he said it, Jason felt like a complete idiot. Why wouldn’t she know that? It was about her.

“Yeah.”

“I’m sorry that happened to you, Y/N.” He said. All Jason wanted to do in that moment was hug her and pull her close to him like he did as Robin, to tell her that he knew how upset and scared she was and that he would do anything to stop her feeling like that.

“It’s okay, Dad is making sure the guy never sees the outside world again,” Y/N told him.

“I would too if that was my kid.”

“And people are finally listening that those like Batman and Robin are actually needed in the world.”

“But it shouldn’t be at your expense,” Jason shook his head, “How are you?”

“I’m good.” Y/N nodded, “I was lucky that Robin was in the area.”

“No, Y/N,” Jason said, “How are you? I mean it.”

Y/N sighed and leaned back in her seat as she looked around. Had he pushed the line? Was she catching on to the fact that he was Robin? He should have listened to Bruce and kept his distance, but Jason was never one for listening to the rules. Anyway, Y/N was always someone he couldn’t help but look at, even if she never noticed. Jason always sat a few rows behind her in Physics to watch her. He glanced at her laughing with her friends. Heck, even the night of the party he stayed closer to that area hoping to catch a glance of her leaving with her friends, only to come across something else, something he wanted to kill a man for. Jason acted distant and offish around her at first because he was nervous, which he didn’t like, but Y/N was from the Y/L/N’s, what chance did he have with a girl like that? So he thought it better to cut his losses, yet that night he let his guard down a little and now he was hooked. Hearing her say how lucky she was with Robin being in the area made him shudder. What if he hadn’t been in the area? Jason thought after he watched her go into her building that night. He didn’t dare continue that thought as he knew he’d break into where that man was being held and finish the job that Y/N stopped him from.

“I feel like everyone, except my parents, keep asking me about Batman and Robin,” Y/N said, “and not about me, and how I am. Not in a vain way, but I just want one person to pause and say ‘I’m glad you’re okay, Y/N’, but not a single person outside of my family has said that to me.”

“Well, I hope you know I’m not just saying this, but…” Jason took the seat next to her. “I am so glad that you are okay.” He placed a hand on her upper arm and gave it a gentle squeeze.

“Thank you, Jason,” Y/N smiled, placing her hand on top of his.

“If you wanna talk, about anything, don’t hesitate,” he offered.

“Okay, who are you and what have you done with the Jason Todd, I know?”

“You don’t know me, Ivory Tower,” Jason teased.

“And you don’t know me,” Y/N smiled back.

“I hope to change that.”

So much for going back to normal.

_____________________________________________________________

It was near on a week from that Friday night and Y/N had spent that past week doing her work and listening to her parents on the phone saying their daughter would not be giving any interviews about the incident, and it was her right to reject them.

Y/N sat in the chair on her balcony connected to her bedroom and stared out over Gotham. For the first time in a week, Y/N had peace and quiet. Now that she was alone, Y/N found herself feeling drained and so tired, but she didn’t want to sleep, because when she woke up, she’d have to deal with the questions and phone calls again. So she stayed up. According to her phone, it was about half past one in the morning.

“Everything alright?” called a voice from above her. Y/N stood up and looked at her roof. Robin was crouching on the edge of the building’s roof with a grin.

“Hey,” Y/N said.

“Hey yourself, Damsel,” Robin sat on the edge now, leaning back on his hands, “now, are you gonna answer my question?” Y/N nodded, “everything alright?”

“It’s been weird.”

“Yeah, I saw the video,” Robin said. Y/N leaned against the railings of the balcony and looked up at Robin. “I am quite dashing in action, aren’t I?” He winked and Y/N started laughing with her head shaking in disbelief, “come on, you know I make girls swoon. You nearly crumbled to your knees that night.”

“Yeah, had nothing to do with the gun pressed against my back, it was all those grins you flashed,” Y/N teased, “nearly dropped my panties too.”

Robin burst out laughing and hopped down to the balcony, stepping towards Y/N. He was grinning the whole time. It was that charming, boyish grin that made Y/N blush and look to the ground. Why the hell was she acting like this? She couldn’t really be developing a crush on a guy whose real name she didn’t even know, could she? No. That would be stupid, ridiculous, totally crazy. Robin placed his hands either side of Y/N on the railings and looked her in the eye. Yep, she was getting a crush on Robin.

“Would you have invited me up under different circumstances?” He wasn’t invading her space, he wasn’t making her uncomfortable and he wasn’t propositioning her. It was just a guy asking a girl ‘if it wasn’t this if it was just me and just you, no secret identity, no crime, would you have liked me?’

“I think I would’ve,” Y/N nodded. Robin smiled and pulled back, taking the other chair on the balcony and gesturing for Y/N to do the same. Y/N sat down and pulled her legs to her chest, resting her cheek on her knees and looked at Robin.

“What?” He asked.

“Do you check in on all the girls you rescue?”

“Just you,” Robin admitted, “not everyone I rescue goes viral on Twitter.”

Y/N nodded and smiled tightly as she thought the reason Robin solely came to check on her regarding the aftermath of their encounter. It made her feel a little stupid. Here she was hoping Robin had just come by to see her, but that was a foolish notion really.

“Oh.”

“But I also wanted to see you.”

“Oh!”

“I enjoyed chatting with you,” Robin stated, “you’re interesting.”

Y/N blushed again and looked down to hide the redness of her cheeks, but Robin caught it and grinned widely. Robin thought she was interesting, Y/N couldn’t help but find herself smiling gleefully. Y/N looked back at Robin.

“You’re not too bad yourself.”

“Thanks,” he chuckled, “I heard that your family is taking the guy to court.”

“Dad doesn’t want any girl to get hurt.”

“I get that.”

“People are starting to listen a little bit more, about why you and Batman and others like you are needed… to an extent at least,” Y/N explained, “hopefully they won’t be harassing you that much.”

“Public has never been a problem,” Robin told her, “not to toot my own horn, but I know that people like me are kinda celebrities. The police though, that's a different thing altogether.”

“Is it bad?”

“They kick my ass every night,” Robin lowered the collar of his suit down to reveal a large bruise on his collarbone. Y/N leaned over to his seat and gently placed her fingers on the bruise. Robin winced a little at the contact.

“Sorry!”

“It’s alright, Damsel,” Robin assured her. Y/N then stroked the bruise carefully and Robin relaxed a little at her touch, almost sighing. “It’s not the worst I’ve gotten,” he said. Y/N then looked up at him.

“What is?”

“That’s more of a fourth date conversation, Damsel,” Robin chuckled, leaning back and putting his collar back up. Y/N smiled and fiddled with her fingers.

“So…” Y/N scratched just underneath her ear and cocked her head to the side, “you wanna see me again?”

“If you don’t object.”

“I’d really like that,” Y/N nodded.

Robin smiled and stood up. He just stared at Y/N for a moment, taking her all in. Y/N wasn’t wearing any makeup, but that didn’t bother her. When they first met, she had mascara streaks down her face. Her clothes were a pair of jogging bottoms, a deep navy blue and most likely her older brothers which got mixed up with hers in the wash based on how baggy and unflattering they were. Her top of just a long-sleeved top with horizontal stripes decorating it, grey and black stripes. She wore large white fluffy socks.

“I’d really like that too,” he said, “I gotta go, but I’ll come by again soon, yeah?”

“Yeah,” Y/N smiled and nodded. She watched as Robin climbed back up to her roof and then run and leap onto the next building. When she saw him jump, Y/N inadvertently let out a small yelp. Robin heard and turned round to give her a thumbs up, assuring her everything was alright, then he waved goodbye. Y/N waved back and watched him run off into the night.

__________________________________________________________

“Morning, Y/N,” Jason Todd plopped into the seat next to Y/N and smiled at her on the following Monday.

“Morning, Jason,” Y/N nodded in response.

Jason seemed to have grown fonder of Y/N and had been very nice to her, and Y/N in response had been a lot nicer back. They were friendly to each other and got along quite well. He came and spoke with her in the library and she would sit with him in classes now, and when not in the university building, the pair would be texting.

“Have you heard about the Gala for the Gotham City Police Department next month?”

“Yeah, I’m being forced into going.” Y/N said with a roll of the eye. She hated the Gala’s she had to attend, they were always stuffy and she had to wear horribly uncomfortable dresses, but she went anyway because it was part of her responsibility as a member of the Y/L/N family. “You?”

“Likewise,” Jason nodded, seeming just as despondent of the idea as Y/N did. “Maybe we can make the best of a less than appealing idea,” he offered.

“And do what?”

“I’m thinking we stand together, drink and then we bitch to each other about the people there. What’d you say?”

Y/N looked at Jason. He gave her a large grin and his eyes sparkled with the prospects about what could happen with them hanging at the Gala. Y/N started thinking too. She kinda liked the idea of hanging with Jason the whole night.

“Yeah. Sounds fun, or at least bearable.”

“Oh, you wound me, Da- Darling.” Jason chuckled, “I’m lovely company for a night. There are many who can vouch for me.”

“Are these P.G. evenings, Todd, or 18?”

“Mixture. But I never disappoint.”

“Oh my god!” Y/N laughed.

“You’ve got a nice laugh,” Jason told her, “I like hearing it.”

“Is that why you joke so much with me?”

“That,” he nodded, “and you have a good sense of humour. Why you hanging with me then?” He asked. Y/N frowned in confusion, “come on, I told you I like your humour, why’d you like being around me? Or am I a pity case for the Y/N Y/L/N?” He teased.

“You’re easy on the eyes,” Y/N grinned.

“Oh, so I’m not a pity case, just a nice piece of eye candy for you.”

“Exactly!” Y/N poked him with her pen, “I mean, you’re alright at talking too, I guess,” It was her turn to tease now and Jason laughed, throwing his head back before looking at her intensely.

“Let me know what colour dress your wearing and I’ll get a matching tie,” he told her.

“It’s a Gala, not a prom.”

“We’re going to be standing around and bitching about everyone – this is the closest thing to prom we’ll get at our age.”

“Wanna get me a corsage too?”

“Don’t tempt me.”

__________________________________________________________

Y/N knew Robin would be dropping by her building that night by the little gift he left on her balcony the night before. The night before every visit, Robin would place a red feather on her balcony as a calling card, so he wouldn’t be unexpected. Every time Robin visited, Y/N would get two cans of coke out from the fridge and a snack, tonight it was Oreos.

“How can you have Oreos without milk?” Robin asked as he opened his can.

“I just don’t like it with milk,” Y/N shrugged.

“I knew you were too good to be true, there had to be something wrong with you,” Robin sat down with a shaking head but still took one of the cookies.

“I don’t see you rejecting them though.”

“It’s free food from a pretty girl, I’m not stupid.”

“Pretty?”

“Drop dead gorgeous.”

“I just need to learn how to love Milk and Oreos, huh?”

“Then you’ll be the complete package,” Robin spoke with a mouth full of Oreos. There had been a question in Y/N’s mind since Robin first started visiting her, one which she had to ask.

“What does Batman say to you dropping in like this?” She asked. Robin became awkward and rigid, “come on, one of us had to bring it up eventually.”

“He doesn’t know,” Robin explained, “even vigilantes have nights off.”

“And this is what you do with yours?”

“Can’t think of anything better,” he shrugged, “food, drink, good company, conversation and an incredible view.”

Y/N nodded and looked over her balcony taking in the view. It was a view of all of Gotham, and from this viewpoint, you could trick yourself into thinking that there was no bad in Gotham, that it was a lovely safe city. But it wasn’t.

“It is a lovely view.”

“I’m not talking about the city,” Robin said. She heard him stand and place his can down, then Robin walked over, his chest against her back, placing his arms on the railing either side of her. “City is nothing compared to the view I’ve got,�� he whispered in her ear. Y/N blushed and tucked her hair behind her ear. Robin then placed a kiss on her cheek before hugging her close to him. “This alright?”

“This is perfect,” Y/N sighed, leaning back into him.

#Jason Todd #Jason Todd Titans #Titans #Titans DC #Titans Imagine #Jason Todd imagine #Jason Todd x reader #Robin #Jason Todd Robin #Robin imagine #Robin x reader #jason todd x y/n #imagines #oneshot #fanfiction #queue me up scotty

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the-marvel-imagines-blog · 5 years

Text

Madness | Chpt.30

Chapter Title: “The Storm”

Pairing: Loki x Original Female Character (Eva)

Word Count: 7,519

Warnings: Fluff and angst (what else is new?)

Name Pronunciations: Hjalmar: “He-all-mar” | Aaldir: “All-deer” | Ephinea: “Eh-fin-ee-uh”

Summary: Eva reconciles with Thor, and Aurora seeks comfort in the storm.

A/N: I’m sorry once more for the delay. I’ve been working out the coming chapters as the story comes to a close, and I’m pulling things that don’t seem as important and adding things that need to be added. It’s taken quite a while to edit this chapter, but I hope you enjoy it. Thank you all a thousand times over for reading this; it truly means the world to me.

Tagged: @teddyboobear @alledeglyfunny @xletmetaste-yoursmilex @itsknife2meetu @mynameisyara @j-j-ehlby-writes @jillilama-blog (anyone who wants to be tagged can message me and ask. It’s not a problem at all)

The movie came to a close quicker than I anticipated. Aurora had been so invested in watching that one movie that not even Tony could deny her, no matter how badly I saw he wanted to. The movie was nothing spectacular, and if I was given the opportunity to watch it again, I wouldn’t; however, Aurora seemed to be fond of it, so the movie held a special place in my heart. As I sat between Steve and Tony, I stole glances at her in the darkened room, her face illuminated by the light from the television, and I watched as she mouthed each line of dialogue as if it were her own. She was entranced by the movie, loving every moment of it. Tony offered once to swap places with me so that he wasn’t between the two of us, but I couldn’t take that risk. I couldn’t be so close to her when all I had worked for was teetering on the edge. If I gave in and embraced the life I so desperately desired, it could crumble in my grasp. I had to be patient.

Once it was over, I retired to my room with only a few words to everyone. I didn’t want to make it obvious that I was preparing to leave the following morning before they awoke. There was no sense in causing a scene, so I said my goodbyes as informally as possible. I hugged each of them and wished them goodnight, not knowing whether that would be the final time we spoke or saw each other. Either way, I wanted them to remember me as I was, not how I left them. Steve held me for longer than the others, knowing what this was. I knew that he fought himself not to follow me back to my room to stay the night by my side, but in the end, he released me and retired to his room with a grief-stricken heart that left mine a little heavier. The only one who had the nerve to follow me to my room was the very man I had no desire to speak to, the man who stabbed me with the knife I gave him.

Upon entering my room, I left the door open for Thor to enter behind me. The click of the latch caused me to wince, unsure of whether or not I would be having another argument with a man I knew as one of my very best friends. I took my normal spot standing before the glass wall with my arms crossed over my chest. The lamp on the bedside table offered the only light in the room, and I watched my reflection in the window as the rain pelted the glass, “you’re still upset with me, and I can understand why,” I noted, interrupting the deafening silence that surrounded us, “you’re upset with me, but she can’t sleep during a thunderstorm. I’m not asking for myself-I’ve slept through many a storm-but...for her sake, can you please stop this?” I asked, continuing to gaze out at the blackened sky.

“I’m not doing this,” he replied, his voice barely cutting through the quiet air surrounding us.

I scoffed, “says the God of Thunder!”

“Yes! I’m saying that I haven’t been doing this and that I’ve tried to stop it, but it keeps coming back,” he insisted, taking his place beside me. Instead of staring out the window at the rain, though, I felt his gaze on my cheek, but I couldn’t bring myself to look into his eyes. After what happened during our previous interaction, I felt small in his presence. I did the best I could with what I was given when it came to my daughter, but I couldn’t help but feel guilty for all the ways I had hurt Thor with my decision to send Aurora away. He was there for me when Loki wasn’t. He was there for me when Loki decided to leave me in the garden, forcing me to raise our daughter alone. Thor was by my side through it all, even when Loki failed to be. While I understood why Loki did what he did and how he was all but forced down the path he went down, Thor stayed by my side. I had no right to call him my friend after what I had done to him. He shared a connection to Aurora; she was his family, and I tore her away from him. I couldn’t bring myself to look at him, but he continued to study me, “I’m saying that I have no control over this because there is another-one more powerful than I-whose link to this world is so deep, so profound, that the bat of her lashes sends hurricanes across the ocean, the drop of a tear causes a thunderstorm, and her laughter blows away the clouds to reveal the sun. I’m telling you that this isn’t me.”

My jaw clenched involuntarily as I processed his words. He couldn’t be serious. I shook my head, not willing to believe in such claims, “you can’t possibly be insinuating that this has anything to do with me.”

“This has everything to do with you,” he argued as the heat of his gaze felt like it would burn a hole right through me, “when we thought you were dead, the universe wept for you. The skies opened up with a rain that-if you hadn’t come back-wouldn’t have stopped until it washed away every trace of humanity. When you awoke, the clouds in the sky cleared, and the sun began shining like it was meant to shine for you and only you. When you saw her for the first time in so long, the sun shone brighter than before, but it was quickly swallowed up by the rain once more. Lately, the sky has been covered in clouds, but when you spent the day with her and Natasha, the sun came back out. Tonight, you are struggling with a grief that I cannot understand, and this is the evidence of it,” he argued his point, gesturing out the window at the rain.

I watched the raindrops hit the window and cascade down the glass, doing what Tony often did as a child. He would choose two raindrops that were close to one another, and he would bet on which one would reach the bottom first. We would often play the game together as Howard and Maria argued in the other room, but I made sure that Tony’s laughter and the sound of my voice drowned out the muffled hollering. It wasn’t a game of calculations or numbers, but it was a game of luck. We just had to hope we chose the right one. I shook my head again, trying to drown out my own fear with the sound of the rain on the window, “this isn’t me. This can’t be me,” I insisted, my voice quivering as I thought that I could hold any power at all. The universe would’ve been better off if I had stayed dead because the power I couldn’t shake would’ve been a threat no longer. I couldn’t control it, and I didn’t have anyone to teach me how to handle it. There was only one who promised to teach me, one who was burdened with the same power, but...I couldn’t trust him. My heart told me to run to him, told me that he could be saved, but I didn’t know if I was willing to sacrifice my everything for his anything. I didn’t know if I could trust that Ezra wouldn’t try to turn me against myself.

Thor’s voice ripped me from my own fearful thoughts, “you know who you are as well as I know who you are,” he remarked, his words sending a shiver down my spine. I didn’t want to talk about my parentage or the fact that I was an abomination. I didn’t want to add fuel to the fire in my heart that told me I wasn’t good enough for any of the good things in my life, for the man I loved, for the children I gave life to, for the friends I would give my life for, or for the blade of grass tied around my finger. There were so many voices that told me I was worthy of the love I received, but there was that one-the voice that hid in the darkest recesses of my mind-that told me I was worth nothing because of where I came from, and that voice was the loudest one. Instead of berating me, though, Thor continued with pride emanating from his chest and a smile on his lips, “there should be no question in your mind that you’re capable of this-that you’re far more powerful than I could ever even hope to be.”

“Don’t say that!” I hissed under my breath. The anger shot through me like a fire in my veins.

He furrowed his eyebrows, “why not?”

“Because what if I’m the one who needs to be stopped?!” I snapped, turning to face him as the rage manifested itself once more in a physical form. My eyes shone red in his, causing my heart to drop. I wished that it would stop. I wished that I could convince myself that I had no special gifts at all because what if my special gifts were terrifying ones? I brought my hands up to show him the proof of what I was becoming. Not even the persistent tears in my eyes could drown away the vivid, blood red hue in my eyes or the burning in my hands as my veins appeared to have the same blood red fire coursing through them. Just like he had before, Thor winced away from me when he saw this part of me. I had been able to control my anger all my life, but with every sudden change that had been happening, I lost control. I blinked away the tears or frustration, “what if the darkness swallows me whole, and I can’t do anything about it? What if your father was right all those years ago when he wanted me to be locked away in the dungeons if I were to stay? What if he was right to be afraid of me? What if I’m the villain in this story?”

“Then you’ll rewrite it!” his voice boomed, cutting off my questioning. He had more faith in me than I did; however, even Odin had more faith in me than I did, which spoke volumes of my relationship with myself.

“What if I can’t?” I asked, my voice softening as fear took the place of the anger. I was afraid of myself-of what my presence could do to the people I loved. Life was easier when I believed I was just a simple sorceress, but when I was brought back to the land of the living, I felt more powerful than ever before, which left me terrified because I lost all sense of control I thought I had. Closing the space between us, my eyes locked with Thor’s, “I feel like I’m not the one holding the quill.”

“Then you take it!” he huffed, his hands trembling as my fear left him feeling just as uncertain of the future. He looked to me for a sense of stability, and I couldn’t be that foundation for him in that moment. His eyes scanned the room, almost as if he was searching for an answer hidden in a darkened corner, and when he turned his eyes back to me, I saw his renewed faith in me, “you take it and you do what I believe you can do-what I’ve always believed you could do: you write the ending the way you believe it was meant to be. You have the power to change the tide of this war with Cul, and you act like this new power has somehow changed you, but this power isn’t new. This power has always been a part of you, laying dormant in the recesses of your heart until the time was right. Now is the time to learn how to control it, and everyone will be there to help you, to guide you, and to support you. My father was wrong about you. He was wrong about everything I know to be true about both you and my brother. Loki’s not an abomination, and neither are you. You are our last hope, Eva. You’re Asgard’s last hope at defeating Cul and his armies, and I understand that you’ve given more than enough of your life and blood to serving the throne; however, I’m not asking you to serve the throne...I’m asking you to serve your people once more...as the princess of Asgard,” he insisted, his voice filled with determination and unwavering support.

I shook my head, his words leaving a bad taste in my mouth. Attempting to laugh it off, I nearly made myself sick. The sudden fluttering of butterflies wings in my abdomen was a harsh reminder of all the reasons why I should ignore my responsibilities to Asgard and to the ones I loved. For a fleeting moment, I entertained the idea of staying on Midgard with my children and ignoring the needs of my people, allowing them to be slaughtered. The mere thought caused a panic to race through me, so I shook it off, “don’t call me that,” I requested, the title not sounding quite right.

He smiled, seeing how uncomfortable it made me. He knew that it was a light request, so he would take the opportunity to tease me in the future about it, but the time for teasing and childish banter was tabled for the time being. The smile fell from his face as his eyes became filled with memories that I was not present for, memories I wished to decipher, but he asked once-many years ago-that his mind be off limits to me, “I never understood why Heimdall seemed to have a deeper loyalty to you than to my father, how he could bring himself to bend-even break-the rules for you. When I read your letter and discovered that you had come to Midgard, I demanded he send me here. I didn’t know what I wanted to do, really, but I just wanted to be close to you. Heimdall always referred to you as a princess, but on that night, I told him that he must listen to my command because I was the prince of Asgard. He told me that you were the princess, and his loyalty began to make more and more sense. It wasn’t until I discovered your parentage that I realized why he called you that, why he served you, why his loyalty has never been to the throne as long as you were alive. His sword has always been at your feet, and it’s not only because you’re the princess of Asgard: it’s because you are the light that leads the weary travellers home. You’re the foundation that empires are built upon, and he believes in you as a leader, as a warrior, and as a ruler. Your father may have been usurped, but you still hold a claim to the throne-one that many people would be happy to see you sit upon.”

“I want nothing more to do with that throne-I never have,” I confessed. The burden of holding an entire kingdom in my hands was a daunting idea in and of itself, and those who could remember Cul’s reign were sure to harbor animosity toward me once they discovered my true parentage. I was sure it wouldn’t be kept secret for too long should a war reach us. I wasn’t fit to rule, and I had to make Thor understand such things, “I wanted to marry Loki for love, not the throne or the royal titles that would come with it. I wanted to fight in Asgard’s wars for light and life, not for the throne. I serve my people because I cherish every life I encounter, not because I desire the throne. After this war is finished, I wish to never even see that throne room again for the rest of my life,” I snickered, remembering all the times I had been reprimanded for my wild behaviors in that throne room and all the times I spoke out against the Allfather. My youth was slowly lost in that throne room, and I couldn’t bear to lose anything else, “besides, I’m not meant to be chained to a throne, and you know that. I’m like the wind: wild and ever-changing. I could never rule the way past kings have ruled.”

He shrugged, “well, maybe it’s time for a change. Perhaps Asgard needs a queen.”

“It already has a queen: your mother,” I reminded him, not wishing to speak of the matter anymore. It was an idea that was good for nothing but the imagination, for it would never come to fruition anyway. I smiled, brushing past him as I made my way over to the bed, “you should go get some sleep. Midgard has us both lost in our own dreams, and we could both use some rest.”

“I have one last thing to say. It’s the reason why I followed you into your quarters tonight,” he interjected. He shifted his weight, wringing his hands together before our eyes connected. With a deep breath, he finally spoke, “I’m sorry,” he blurted out, his voice like a low rumble. Before I could offer up my words of forgiveness and my own apologies, he continued, “you are the woman I’ve always been in love with, but even more than that...you’re my best friend. The way I spoke to you-the words I said to you-are abhorrent, and they caused irreparable damage to the very fabric of our friendship. You have no reason to forgive me, for I should never be forgiven. I used my words as ammunition against you because your decision to save your child’s life was hurtful to me. I never considered the alternatives or the fear that lead you to your decision to bring her here. Instead, all I saw was how that decision impacted me and how it hurt her, but I never realized that it’s very possible that she wouldn’t be alive to hurt if you hadn’t made the most difficult decision of your life. Instead of supporting you the way friends are supposed to, I was angry with you and treated you with contempt. I wasn’t there for you when you needed me the most, and I judged your decision as an outsider to the situation. My heart has been heavy with guilt since our last discussion, so I came in here tonight to apologize and hope that you could find it in your heart to forgive me for what I have done.”

“There’s nothing to forgive. You spoke to me as your friend who was hurt, and I find myself grateful that you care so deeply about my well-being and the health and happiness of my daughter to fight for her. I saw you advocate for my child, and while it wasn’t necessary, it gave me a sense of peace. Should I die, she will have you there to always advocate for her and keep her best interests in mind. She will be surrounded by people who will love her and protect her,” I explained, offering up a smile, “I wish you would have asked me why I did what I did because my decision was born out of my unconditional love for her. Not a day goes by that she’s not the very first thought I have in the morning and the very last thought I have before falling asleep. I love her more than I’ve ever loved another living thing. I look at her, and I see every happy memory I’ve ever had. She is sweet-natured like your brother, but she is wild like me. When this war with Cul is over and my presence will not present her with any harm, I will piece my family back together, and this pain will be a memory of my past. Once this is over, I will finally be happy.”

*Aurora’s POV*

Every bolt of lightning struck more than just the surface of the world, it also struck fear in my heart. I didn’t understand why a sound so natural would be one that scared me so much, but it left me trembling on the floor, staring out at the darkened sky. The rain fell hard enough that it drowned out the dwindling conversations around the apartment-like living quarters of the tower. Natasha and Clint were still throwing their usual banter back and forth, catching up as much as they could before Clint left the following day. He had opened up to me about the alternate life he lived aside from S.H.I.E.L.D. and the Avengers. He spoke of his wife, Laura, and his children, Cooper and Lila. He discussed with Natasha how he and his wife were eager to have another baby, and Natasha would jokingly name the non-existent child after herself. Clint told her about his interest in building an addition onto his house, and she would recommend different colors if he was looking for a change. I was left entranced in most of their conversations, but it wasn’t for the banter or the friendly smiles back and forth.

I lost myself in the idea of having my own little family with a mother and father and siblings. I lost myself in the idea of going outside with my father and having him chase me around a field until he finally caught me. I lost myself in the idea of helping my mother redecorate our home on a whim because she needs a change of scenery. I lost myself in the idea of bickering with my siblings, which would lead to us eventually making up with each other and causing mischief that would drive any normal parent to the brink of insanity; however, our parents would love us all the more for it. I lost myself in the idea of my father overhearing my mother talking about adding an addition to our home, and he would surprise her with the necessary supplies before they both worked on renovations together, laughing and falling even more in love with every passing moment. I lost myself in the idea of a family that I could call my own. The team was my family, but I still dreamed of the one I must’ve had at one point when I was too young to remember.

There was another crack of thunder that startled me out of my silent dreaming. I flinched at the sound, and I knew that it was time to make the usual trek into one of five rooms. I could sleep with Natasha, but I knew that when I woke up, she would be holding me so tightly that I wouldn’t be able to move until she awoke. I could sleep with Bruce, but he was the lightest sleeper I knew; therefore, my nightmares that left me struggling to breathe would only frighten him just as much. I could sleep with Clint, knowing that he could offer me the most father-like care, but he had to leave in the morning; I didn’t want to be a bother. I could sleep with Steve, but he didn’t sleep when I was with him. Instead, he resorted to staying awake to watch over me whilst he read or lost himself deep in thought. Tony was the only other option, since Thor and Eva were both made “off limits” to me, and Tony may have needed me just as much as I needed him.

Before I could push myself off the floor, I caught the reflection of my own eyes in the glass. Eva’s eyes were the same color, but when I saw hers for the first time, I felt whole. Strangers we encountered while we were out with Natasha often did a double-take at Eva and I before noting that we looked like we were somehow related. I tried to laugh it off the way Natasha did, but I couldn’t help but wish that there was truth to it. While Eva was distant with me, there was something about her that my very essence was connected to. I loved her without knowing a single thing about her. I knew that she had a love of literature and that she was an Asgardian, but my knowledge was far too limited to claim love for her; however, love was present each time I even thought of her. No matter how many times she tried to push me away, I was pulled back to her by my own heart.

Another crack of thunder had me scrambling up off the floor. I slipped out of my bedroom, closing the door behind me and making sure to turn the handle to keep from the signature clicking sound of the latch that would give me away. I made my way to Tony’s room, my feet padding along the cold floor. My pace quickened with each crack of thunder until I reached Tony’s bedroom. I hoped that he would be in there and not in his workshop again. He had spent night after night in the workshop, refusing to sleep until he found a cure for the Extremis serum. Bruce helped him most of the time, but Tony worked non-stop. It was his way of coping. He told me that at one point, coping came in the form of drinking, but he claimed that he had made a promise to my mother that he would stop. He struggled to keep that promise when they brought Eva to the tower, though. When I visited him in his workshop, he would sit with a glass of his favorite whiskey right next to him, eyeing it every now and then. He claimed that the bottle hadn’t been opened since shortly before he made the promise to my mother.

I knocked on his bedroom door and breathed a sigh of relief when he called out for me to come in. I opened the door just wide enough to slip into the room and see him scribbling notes into one of the various journals he kept. It was no secret that he was still working on figuring out the Extremis and how it affected Eva. He wanted to have a solution before she left, which he feared would happen any day. Each time he looked at her, his expression was mixed between fear, endearment, and immeasurable guilt. He hadn’t spoken much to her since she woke up, but he sat with her day in and day out while she was still unconscious. I found him countless times passed out, leaning against the wall outside of her bedroom. Each and every time-after helping him back to his room-I found my way back to her room. Too afraid to open the door-I sat in the spot that was still warm from when Tony occupied it, and I fell asleep with dreams of a faceless woman with an all-too-familiar voice. Tony slept outside her room because he blamed himself for what happened. If anything could possibly be Tony’s fault, he felt guilty for it. I didn’t know why I slept outside her room.

He cast his eyes over to me without a word before turning his attention back to the words he was scribbling into his journal. I was silent as I entered the room and proceeded to crawl into the bed next to him, making myself as small as possible under the blankets. I curled my body as close to his as I could get, feeling safe around the people who swore their lives to me for some ungodly reason. As soon as I found a suitable and comfortable position, he closed the journal and pulled off his glasses, setting them both on the bedside table. He let out a long yawn and adjusted himself so that he could lay on his back, “can’t sleep?” he asked, cocking an eyebrow as he cast a fleeting glance over at me before turning it back to the ceiling. Another crack of thunder caused us both to flinch. I shook my head as my response, clutching the blankets around me and pulling them tighter. Sensing my fear, he did what he always did. He wrapped an arm around me and pulled my body flush against his, surrounding me in his warmth. I felt safe with Tony, but I also felt so much fear. I knew that should my life be on the line, he would sacrifice his to save mine, and I wasn’t worth such a tremendous sacrifice. I feared the depth of his love for me because it could only hurt him. Once he relaxed his muscles, he let out a long breath, “yeah, me neither,” he replied, rubbing circles onto my back.

I rested my head against his chest, listening to his strong heartbeat, allowing it to lull my heart back into a steady rhythm. Tony and I-much like the rest of the team and I-were connected in a way that was unexplainable. The connection was the same one I felt with Eva, even though few words had been exchanged between the two of us. The connection made it impossible to imagine a life without them, and when I thought of the prospect of not seeing one of them for even a single day, it tore me apart. I hated being away from Tony when he sent me to live with Steve, and I hated being away from Steve when I lived with Tony. It was a connection that breathed life into my heart, but it also caused such extreme misery. I loved without limits, almost as if my very soul was the same as the soul within each of the people I loved so dearly. I felt that connection especially with Eva. The idea of her departure caused even more panic in me, so I turned my focus back to Tony, “tell me a story,” I pleaded, thinking that maybe this time would be different. Rest never came to me during thunderstorms; however, it didn’t stop me from trying. This would’ve been a first if it happened.

“You really know how to put me on the spot, don’t you?” Tony chuckled, resting his right hand on his abdomen, his thumb gently brushing my forearm that was draped across his waist in an attempt to pull myself as close to him as possible. I didn’t trust many people, but I trusted Tony. With his left hand, he stroked my temple, brushing my hair back like he did whenever I was feeling sad. I listened as his breath hitched and his heart skipped a beat, but when I turned my gaze up to his face, he didn’t show the signs of fear that I anticipated. Instead, he wore such an endearing smile, as if he were reliving memories that had been living on the surface more so recently than ever before, “once upon a time, there was a princess, the most beautiful, delicate woman to grace the face of this world. She was gentle like people expected her to be as a princess, but she was fierce with a tongue sharper than any sword she ever wielded.”

“She watched over the world, and she hung the moon and the stars in the night sky to guide home every weary traveller, and she captured each of their hearts even though she promised herself to another. Her beloved, the prince of the land, was a gentle soul, and it was fitting that they end up together. They were two sides of the same coin, but they also couldn’t have been more different in some aspects. Fate pulled them apart time and time again, but the princess never lost hope even when her prince did. The prince was...different,” he searched for the right word and landed on that one, which he clearly didn’t think fit the description of the character, “the prince was kind and shy, but many people cast him aside. He wasn’t a warrior like other princes had been before him. Instead, he preferred books and nature. He was soft-spoken and gentlemanly. He helped the princess hang the moon and stars in the night sky because he cared about the weary travellers just as much as she did, but the people didn’t see his kindness and gentleness as strengths like they did in her. This drove him to build up walls around his heart, and he thought that he had to prove himself in order to earn her love. Little did he know, he would have her love no matter what.”

“The prince became a man the princess didn’t know, and she took to the cliffs, ready to throw herself off. The water crashed against the rocks and drowned out her own tears. Right before she leapt from the cliff, she heard the desperate pleas of a man out at sea. You see, there was a lowly craftsman-a man who didn’t belong out on the sea-who set out to fish in order to satiate his own hunger, and he was lost in an unforgiving storm. His boat wouldn’t last through the night, and he was afraid of dying. The sky was so thick with clouds that looked to be made of soot, making it impossible for him to even see with the help of the moon and stars that the princess had hung for people like him,” he choked out, that part of the story hitting a soft spot for him. I knew that the story was far more than just a work of fiction. It was a story about my parents, and he was the craftsman. I figured it out the moment he mentioned that the princess hung the stars in the night sky. Those were the only words I could remember my mother saying to me. I could remember nothing else.

Tony continued, his voice thick with emotion, “the craftsman was ready to give up just like she was, even though he was terrified of what would happen if he did. He was just so tired of fighting the storm, so he was ready to succumb to it. Then, he heard a distant voice. It was a song. The princess-even in her moment of grief and sorrow-pushed aside her emotions to guide him home. He followed the sound of her angelic voice, rowing himself toward the shore. When he reached the shore, he fell into the sand at her feet. She had descended from the cliff to stand on the shore to greet him when he finally returned. Tears blurred his vision when he looked up to take in the face of his savior, and his heart nearly stopped. He hadn’t expected the princess. He never expected that a princess would ever concern herself with a peasant like himself, but she did. She was far more beautiful than people described her, more stunning than he could even fathom himself. The moment he saw her, he fell madly in love with her. She was his saving grace, but what he didn’t know was that she had found another purpose, and it was to continue to save all those she could even while her heart was aching.”

“The princess and the craftsman became closer and closer as time passed, and they helped each other. Each day, he fell deeper and deeper in love with her, but he knew in his heart that it wasn’t meant to be between the two of them. He knew that her heart and soul were still promised to the prince, and he was happy if they could find happiness together. Her love saved her prince, and they found happiness together once more. The prince was saved from himself, and no matter how badly the craftsman wished she would end up in his arms, he knew that the princess was always meant to be with the prince. Instead, the craftsman promised his craft to her, and from that moment on, she lived within his heart. Everything he crafted was tinged with the color of her eyes, even if it was as small as an emerald on the hilt of a sword. He incorporated a piece of her into everything he did, and as he got to know the prince-a man he grew to consider a friend-he found a way to include the sky blue hue of his eyes into his work as well. In his work, the prince and princess would live forever, and he found a way to keep them close even when they seemed to be worlds away,” he finished, forcing a smile onto his face as he spoke. There was a sorrow in him when he told the story, a sort of homesickness that came whenever I asked about my parents.

“Is there something wrong with me?” I asked, biting my bottom lip to keep it from quivering as the emotion washed over me. It felt as if I was in a state of constant confusion. What had I done that was so wrong that they left me? If they were these beautiful, amazing, miraculous people who strived to help everyone, what was so wrong with me? Sensing Tony’s confusion, I continued, trying to explain my question a bit more, “you tell me all about how they loved the world, how they were the type of people who would take a bullet for a complete stranger because they had so much love in their hearts, so why couldn’t they love me like that?”

Tony pulled away from me to prop himself up onto his elbow and stare down at me. His eyes had never been so serious in all the time I’d known him, “I never want you to think that you weren’t loved by them-that you aren’t still loved. Your mother made the most difficult decision of her life when she decided to give you to me. She told me every little thing about you, every little idiosyncrasy that united to make you the girl she loved so fiercely. I never want to hear you even insinuate that you weren’t loved because your mother loved you more than she ever loved another living thing. She loved you more than she loved herself. She loved you until it hurt,” he explained before resting back onto the bed next to me, allowing me to pull our bodies close together once more. It was the most difficult concept to wrap my head around-how two people could love me so deeply but send me away. I didn’t understand it. Before my thoughts could run their course, Tony’s voice sounded again as he stared up at the ceiling, “your mother and father were meant to have children, but fate hurled hardship after hardship their way. Fate was cruel to your parents, and in order to protect you, a difficult choice had to be made. Never think...not even for a moment, that the decision to leave you with me was made lightly or that it wasn’t made with your best interests in mind. You are with me because your mother made a choice that hurt her so deeply, but that choice was born of nothing but pure, unadulterated love. Fate had other plans for your mother and father, plans that they were undeserving of. Fate was cruel to you, too. I remember how your mother cried when she brought you to me, how she wept as she spoke her final words to you. I watched her heart shatter that day as I held her in my arms, and I wished with all I had that I could just fix it. That’s what I do: I fix things. I just couldn’t fix what she needed me to.”

His words caused a jolt of sadness to surge through me like a bolt of lightning. I wished to hear her recollection of it. I wanted to hear the gentle quiver in her voice as she told me of the most difficult day of her life. I wanted to hear it because I wanted to comfort her. My dreams were simple, and that was one of them. I cleared my throat, “she’s the princess in the story, and you’re the craftsman. You loved her,” I remarked, feeling an immediate pang of guilt for putting him on the spot, but it disappeared when his breath hitched and his heart skipped a beat. I smiled at the thought of them together. Tony would’ve made such a good father, and he was the closest thing I ever had to one. I felt a sense of wholeness when I imagined a little family with him and my mother, but something still didn’t feel right about it. My voice cut through the silence once more, “I only remember one thing about my mother. I don’t remember her face, her name, or even the sound of her voice. All I can remember are the words she said to me. She told me that she hung the moon and stars in the sky so that they would watch over me throughout the night, and if I were to ever feel lonely, all I needed to do was look up into the sky, and I would find her here amongst them. I can...I can remember that. She was the princess in your story, and you...loved her.”

He nodded his head, and I lifted my head just enough to see a stray tear fall from the corner of his eye, slide past his temple and make a home somewhere in his dark hair, “if I could choose one woman to marry, if I could be totally selfish, I would choose her. A fair few of us who met your mother have fallen in love with her. She was this ethereal being who you couldn’t help but become entranced by. She could lure you in with her physical beauty-a gentleness and a wildness unlike any I’d ever seen before. Then, once you heard her laugh, once you saw that smile, once you felt the warmth of her heart, it was over,” he wore a fond smile, “I loved them both in different ways. It’s hard to admit this, but your father deserved her far more than I ever did. He deserved nothing but happiness and joy, and she brought that to him. They were meant to find each other in every reality and every lifetime, and all I ever wanted was to see them happy.”

I closed my eyes and tried to fall asleep, but with each crack of thunder and flicker of lightning outside, I was startled back awake over and over again. Just when I was on the brink of falling asleep, I was pulled back into full consciousness. The desperate attempts to drown out the sound of the storm were in vain. Tony’s steady heartbeat could only offer me so much solace, and his quiet breathing wasn’t nearly loud enough for me to use as a way to ignore the sky that opened up with such agony. Before I knew what I was doing, I was padding down the hallways, pacing back and forth between the living area and the library. I could stay up all night and watch movies, or I could lose myself in a few books in the library. I couldn’t make up my mind, and in my pacing, my feet decided on a new direction, and I was involuntarily pulled toward Eva’s bedroom. She didn’t want to see me, and I didn’t expect her to want to comfort me. I couldn’t help but wonder, though...what if?

The princess was my mother, and Tony said that her eyes were green. My eyes were green, and Eva’s eyes were green. People mistook us for being related when we were out shopping with Nat. Tony seemed to have strong feelings for Eva, which were only heightened after all the tragedies that unfolded recently. He slept by her side and worked tirelessly on a cure for the Extremis serum. Tony was also vocal about his love for my mother. Perhaps it was my exhaustion or my desperation for a mother-figure to bond with, but I secretly wished that the woman on the other side of the door was my mother. Eva built up walls, but I saw little bits and pieces of the woman within those walls, and she was the person I was looking for. I didn’t know what my past looked like, but I knew that I wanted her to be a part of my future.

With another crack of thunder, I wrapped my hand around the doorknob, knowing somewhere deep in my soul that Eva was the only one who could chase away the storm.

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