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rainingpouringetc · 3 years

Text

but god i want to feel again

written for alastair pain day 2021 (even though it’s two days late) title from ‘touch’ by sleeping at last, which i listened to on repeat while writing

tw for brief implied period-typical racism, abuse, alcoholism, bullying, toxic relationships

read on ao3

all i want is to flip a switch before something breaks that cannot be fixed.

invisible machinery, these moving parts inside of me well, they’ve been shutting down for quite some time, leaving only rust behind.

well i know, i know- the sirens sound just before the walls come down. pain is a well-intentioned weatherman predicting God as best he can, but God i want to feel again, oh God i want to feel again.

~‘touch’ sleeping at last

---

Alastair rolled his shoulders back. He’d done this a hundred times before. It never got easier.

“Come on, now, Baba,” he groaned, lifting his father’s arm across his shoulder. Elias mumbled something incoherent and drooped further, stumbling over his own feet as he was dragged over the cobblestones. “Time to go home,” Alastair murmured, silently tallying how many times he had taken this exact route from this exact tavern in just the past month.

Twelve years old and he knew the location of every pub in every city he’d ever lived.

Their house was visible just up ahead—the third they’d lived in this year. Alastair noted that all the lights were out and thanked whatever god was listening. He couldn’t deal with redirecting Cordelia’s questions on top of getting his father cleaned up. Tonight was already draining enough.

He managed to get Elias up the steps and into the washroom with less trouble than usual, a sign that his father was perhaps more lucid than he’d originally believed. The clock on the mantle had read just past midnight—perhaps he was just tired as well.

“‘M fine, ‘m fine,” Elias slurred as Alastair attempted to wipe his damp forehead with a wet cloth, pushing his son’s hand away.

Alastair huffed and set the cloth aside before turning to rummage through the cabinet for a glass. They always kept a glass in the washroom for times like this. He filled it halfway and offered it to his father. When Elias only glared at it, slumping down on the seat and leaning heavily on the wall, Alastair held the glass to his lips and tipped it back, forcing him to drink.

When he pulled the glass back—his father having blessedly drunk it all without much of a fight—Elias stood abruptly. He was still quite drunk and thus swayed on his feet for several long moments. Alastair leaped forward to steady him, but was immediately pushed away with all the force of a heroic—however disgraced—Shadowhunter.

Alastair hit the wall hard and gasped as the breath whooshed out of him. His head spun—had he hit it? He must have—and his vision blackened at the edges. Elias was still struggling to keep himself upright. Alastair watched as he took a step and immediately crumpled to the ground. He stumbled forward yet again, trying to help, wanting to help, but his father cried out and Alastair froze in place. The last thing he needed was his mother—or, worse, his sister—hearing the noise and coming to investigate.

Alastair looked down and realized that at some point he’d dropped the glass. It had shattered on the floor. Head still spinning, he bent down to try to gather it together, instantly cutting his hands. He inhaled sharply, ignoring the pain and sweeping the remains into a small pile in the corner. He could ask Risa for helping taking it out in the morning.

His hand was bleeding rather substantially, blood running over the Voyance rune on the back. The only Mark he had.

“Are you alright, Baba?” he asked quietly, careful not to speak loud enough to agitate his father’s headache.

“‘M fine,” Elias repeated. “Go to bed, Alastair. I’ll be just fine on my own.”

Alastair didn’t believe it for a second. He stood and carefully maneuvered his father’s arm around his shoulders again. He couldn’t risk taking him up the stairs—Elias might fall, or someone might hear. There was a small room just down the hallway that Alastair had left his father in on numerous occasions to sleep off a hangover. It seemed tonight would be another one.

He shouldered the door open and deposited his father on the couch, making sure to leave him on his side and support his head with a few pillows. He knew he shouldn’t leave his father alone. Something could happen, and if Elias died because he suffocated on his own vomit there would be no one to blame but Alastair and his selfishness. But his hands were throbbing now, and his stele was upstairs in his room. He took the stairs two at time, skipping the ones that creaked the most, and shut the door gently behind him.

As soon as it was closed, Alastair slumped down against it, trying to steady his breathing. In, hold. Out, hold. In, hold. Out, hold. Over and over until the spinning stopped, until he could think again.

His stele was on his desk. His mother had given it to him last year, claiming it was a birthday present. Alastair knew it was because she’d spotted the bruises on his arms.

For a moment, Alastair considered leaving the cuts be. They would scar if he did, and it would hurt until then. But Alastair would revel in the pain, in the ability to feel something—anything—besides dull fear and numbness. It was the direction he knew he was heading towards. If he allowed it to consume him—

No. He wouldn’t let it. He wouldn’t let it change him.

Carefully, Alastair picked up the stele. It stung where it pressed against his cuts. He traced an iratze flawlessly and held his hand away to survey his work.

Practice makes perfect, he thought wryly.

---

Alastair sat almost fully turned around in his seat on the carriage, watching as Cirenworth disappeared into the distance. Cordelia, who had run behind them down the lane, struggling to keep up, had long since faded into nothingness.

“Turn front or you’ll fall off the moment we hit a bump,” Elias snapped from beside him. Alastair did as he was told, stubbornly looking anywhere but at his father.

Alastair did not understand why his father had insisted on seeing him to the Academy. Alone. There would be no one to make sure he returned in one piece, no one to steer him away from welcoming taverns or haul him out of a pub before he drank himself to death.

But for once, Alastair found he didn’t particularly care. He was going to the Academy, and his father’s health would no longer be his primary concern—his primary burden. He would be around children his own age. He would have a chance to finally—finally—make friends.

It was much more exciting and nerve wracking than he’d expected.

Cordelia had Lucie, a fact that Alastair was endlessly grateful for. But he was all alone. Cordelia could hardly count as a friend. She was his sister, after all, and therefore obligated to tolerate him, yes, but also to tease him at every available opportunity.

This was something he couldn’t risk messing up. He needed this. He was more desperate than he wished to admit.

Alastair spent the remainder of the journey in silence, shutting down all of his father’s attempts at conversation with a stoic nod or by blatantly ignoring him. It wasn’t his favorite method, but he truly could not deal with his father making him more nervous than he already was.

When they finally arrived at the Academy, Alastair’s stomach was a jumbled mess of nerves and whatever he’d eaten for breakfast—he couldn’t even remember at this point. He was too busy praying his father would leave before he could embarrass Alastair.

The universe wouldn’t give him a break, though.

Elias clapped his son on the shoulder and insisted on helping carry his bags up to the dorms. He nearly slipped on the stairs four times. He dropped the bags twice. Alastair wanted to crawl into a hole by the time they arrived. His roommate was nowhere to be seen—likely they hadn’t arrived yet—so Alastair went to stand beside the bed nearest the window. His father dropped the bags to the floor beside the other bed.

“No, Father, this one,” he said, pointing.

Elias blinked at him. “This bed is closer to the door,” he told Alastair, speaking slowly as if the implications should be obvious.

“I know. I just—I want the one closer to the window is all,” Alastair stammered, face hot. What did it matter? In a minute his father would leave and he could take whichever bed he liked most.

“Closer to the door is safer,” Elias insisted, sitting down on the bed and folding his hands together.

Alastair simply nodded, trying to play along. He might’ve gotten away with it, too, if the door hadn’t burst open at just that moment, revealing a slightly disheveled looking boy. Alastair assumed this was to be his roommate then.

“You’ve chosen your bed already then?” the boy said without preamble, nodding to where Alastair’s bags were sitting next to his father.

“He has,” Elias answered.

The boy nodded and swung his bags up to rest on the bed next to the window. Alastair swallowed thickly and said, “Thank you for your help, Father, but I think I’m alright now.”

Elias grinned. “Of course you are. I’ll be on my way then.” He stood and strode to the door, turning to say, “Goodbye, Alastair joon.” He disappeared into the stairwell.

Alastair turned to his roommate to find the boy was staring at him. “What was that he called you?” the boy questioned a bit rudely.

“Joon?” The boy nodded. “It’s Persian,” Alastair said hesitantly. “It’s just—something you call people you care about.”

The boy wrinkled his nose. “That’s weird.” Alastair flushed. Before he could defend himself, the boy stuck out a hand. “Piers Wentworth.”

Alastair took his hand. “Alastair Carstairs.”

Piers’ eyes widened. “Carstairs? As in—was that Elias Carstairs?”

Alastair nodded, confused at his tone. “He’s my father.”

“Your father?” Alastair nodded again. Piers dropped his hand. “I heard he spends most of his time at the bottom of a bottle.”

Before Alastair could process the words fully, Piers pushed past him and was gone from their room. When the words hit him, Alastair picked up the first thing he could find—a volume of poetry from his bag—and threw it as hard as he could at the wall.

---

Alastair wasn’t sure when he started to become numb. He thought it might’ve been sometime during winter, when Augustus Pounceby kicked him down the stairs and he broke two ribs. Or perhaps it was after that, when Piers locked him out of their room overnight and he slept curled up in an alcove, waking to find Augustus and his friends crowded around him, laughing.

All he knew was that it was a slap in the face the first time he heard his sister’s name come out of one of their mouths. It was Augustus who had said it—said something so awful Alastair’s mind had blocked it out immediately. All he registered was Cordelia and danger.

That was the last straw.

He’d grown used to their abuse, to their snide comments and kicks and punches, but if there was one thing that could snap him out of this it was his determination to protect his sister. She was too young, too kind, for this. He wasn’t too numb not to protect her a bit longer.

The next day when Augustus and his gang cornered Alastair again, he made sure there was a clear sight of some of the dregs—the mundane students. Alastair had tried to befriend them as well. They had turned him away, exclaiming that they didn’t realize they allowed people like him in the school. What should he care if a few of them were hurt to save himself and his sister?

The moment Augustus looked like he was going to make his move, Alastair made his, raining down insult after witty insult on the small group of dregs watching on. Augustus stared at him in surprise, then burst into laughter, even joining in once he regained his balance. Piers was there too, and Clive—soon enough the whole lot of them had turned their attention from Alastair and were focused solely on those poor mundanes.

It happened again, and again. Soon enough, Augustus and his friends weren’t seeking Alastair out to kick him around—they were seeking him out for help in their own schemes.

Is this who I’ve become? Alastair wondered faintly as Clive pulled him along down a corridor, speaking rapidly about a prank they were going to play on a few of the girls.

The numbness began to creep back in, diluting the anger and pain of which he’d long been so afraid.

---

Things were different, certainly, when Alastair returned from the Academy. Cordelia managed to pry some of it out of him, but he couldn’t allow her to see the full picture. That would mean telling her about their father’s drinking, and even he wasn’t so selfish as to tell her that yet.

The years passed, and Alastair allowed that numb shell to solidify and thicken, dampening the swirling mass of indignation and heartbreak that lay beneath.

And then he met Charles Fairchild.

Or, really, he met Charles again. They had seen each other—talked, even—at various Shadowhunter functions whenever the Carstairs were near London or whenever the Fairchilds were traveling to an Institute near them. Alastair had always picked Charles out effortlessly at such events, with his slicked back red hair and piercing green eyes.

Alastair knew better than to pretend he did not find Charles attractive. It had been no secret to himself that he preferred men—he’d known it since before the Academy, really. But it also wasn’t as if he’d had any opportunity to act on it.

So, when he was sixteen and in Paris for a few months, when he saw Charles again and the man dropped one too many thinly veiled hints, Alastair allowed himself to be swept away by the romance of it all—the mystery and charm and utter newness that came with Charles and all he represented.

It was wonderful those first months. Perhaps not what Alastair had expected. He supposed he hadn’t thought there would be quite so many rules, but Charles was very insistent. No one could suspect a thing. It was exhilarating.

Until it wasn’t.

He didn’t know when, exactly, it shifted from exciting and new to tedious and tense. Perhaps it was when Charles became engaged to Ariadne. Perhaps it was after the first dozen or so broken promises. Perhaps it was when Alastair realized a life with Charles was a life with doors shut and curtains drawn.

But who was he to complain? That was life, wasn’t it? Few people in the world were lucky enough to have a perfect whirlwind romance, and those who did often left others in the dust.

And Charles liked Alastair, had told him he loved him. He smiled at Alastair and didn’t act like he was a waste of space.

So while that numb shell stayed firmly in place to keep everyone else away, Alastair propped open a back door for Charles to come and go in his life as he pleased.

They didn’t see each other as often as Alastair would have liked, and when they were apart they didn’t risk sending letters—“Letters can be intercepted! Opened and read without your consent,” Charles had explained—but that didn’t stop Alastair from dreaming of a time when they could be together without the strings of society attached.

He dreamed of a time when he could feel again.

So he let the little things slide. When Charles and Ariadne didn’t split up when Charles had said they would, Alastair just said, “Next time.” When Charles chose Clave meeting after Clave meeting over Alastair, Alastair simply attended the meetings himself for a chance to see Charles.

And when Charles pushed him away at every oncoming footstep, every creak of the floorboard, Alastair pretended not to see the fear and shame in his eyes.

---

Alastair decided that Thomas Lightwood was the single most lovely person to have ever existed on the planet.

He also decided that he must be loopy from the exhaustion of the day because he’d never been prone to such sickeningly sweet thoughts before.

But he couldn’t deny it either. There was something in the way he wore his heart on his sleeve that made Thomas so approachable, so loveable.

Alastair found himself wishing he could bottle up this whole day and carry it around with him wherever he went. This whole murder trial business was far more bearable with Thomas there with him.

And yet—all good things must come to an end. Alastair knew it, perhaps better than anyone. And this… this was too good a thing to last very long.

Alastair did not wish to hurt Thomas. Thomas was good and kind and all the things Alastair never had been. Beyond all possible expectations, Thomas had entered the small group of people for which Alastair would do anything.

Even if it meant pushing him away.

Thomas was grieving. Alastair knew that. He knew that it was messing with Thomas’ head, making him act more recklessly and crave things that were bad for him. Alastair didn’t want to be bad for Tom—he wanted desperately to be good for him. But that couldn’t happen until things changed.

If they ever did.

If anyone would ever be willing to step forward and claim their feelings for him without fearing embarrassment or shame. If anyone would ever be willing to open the door for him and let him step out into the light.

At this point it was almost second nature to pull away from his touch, turn his eyes down and let the lies roll off his tongue. If he closed his eyes, he could almost ignore the sound of his own heart cracking.

As he strode away from him—from that single loveliest person to have ever existed—Alastair wondered if this would do it, if this would be the thing to push him over the edge and break something in him that couldn’t be fixed.

He could feel it—feel the gears inside him grinding to a halt and shutting down. Soon there would be nothing but rust left behind, and he would be blown away by the wind.

[tags - @littlx-songbxrd @anarmorofwords @foxglove-airmid @barbra-lightwood @lifewouldbebetteronmars @imherongraystairstrash @itsdaughterofthemoon @stxr-thxif @knifescythe @axoloteca ; i just used my standard taglist, sorry if you didn’t want to be tagged <3]

#tumblr doesn't copy italics so i prob missed some lol #if u read it on ao3 it'll be better tho #alastair pain day 2021 #alastair carstairs #charles (derogatory)#i love that tag #elias (derogatory)#ooh that one too #the last hours #coi spoilers #tlh fanfic #artie tries to write #tlh

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serenityseventeen · 3 years

Text

Love & Letter: To The Thirteen Boys I've Loved Before

The Sixth Letter

----------------

To: Lee Jihoon

From: Y/N

I'm sorry.

Jihoon, I will not blame you for anything. If I were in your shoes, I would have been even more irritated than you were. I'm still irritated, actually.

I know for certain that you probably hate me so I will begin this letter for you by reminding us of our good times when no one was there to butt in.

When we first met in tech audio, I was really surprised that you were a musical genius. You knew how to work the garage band app right away and since we sat next to each other, I could already tell that you were familiar with it.

You were also able to play the guitar and the piano. I've always liked music so seeing someone play those two instruments just fascinated me. Not only that, but you also played the clarinet well.

You've probably lived around music all your life, right? I listen to music almost everywhere I go, every day, it's one of my human needs, but I have to admit, even after learning a bit of piano from you, I still have almost no idea about music. Genres of music are still hard to identify for me and I can still barely tell the difference in chords. I'm still thankful that you took the time out of your worktime to help me understand more about music.

Honestly, when I first saw you, Jihoon, I was intimidated. You didn't like exactly friendly and I just stupidly thought that you were one of those ‘perfectionist’ students who only cared for their grades and being the best. Also, just the way you looked when you didn't smile gave me that impression. However, when you smiled, you looked completely different. You looked cute. We laughed a lot together too.

I bet you that on our first assignment, I must've looked like a complete tech idiot. The assignment was just to come up with your original piece of music by messing around on the app. Was my confusion that easy to see through?

I don't know, but I think the moment that you helped me was when I started to realize you as the person you are now. You taught me how to use the app in such a gentle tone, you know that? I still feel like I can listen to your voice forever and I won't get bored of it.

I was happy with our forming friendship. I felt like I could truly be your friend. Plus, we had one other class together so I was able to talk with you a lot about music. Everything you say fascinates me and makes me believe that you are a musical genius. I still believe that you are even if I can't hear your songs anymore.

Speaking of your music, I think you should become a ‘pro’ music producer, lyricist, composer, songwriter, of them all. Your talent in music is truly undeniable!

That first piece you showed me called “17”, I have to say that that song may be my favorite out of all the songs you've sent me. I still have all the music files stored in my phone and I'll never delete them. It's not because I still like you that I'm keeping them but it's because I like the song. I might put them into an mp3 player and stick them on the back of this letter. Out of the 13 songs you've shown me, there was not one that I disliked.

Your voice is also heavenly. I love it. I don't understand why you aren't getting yourself a whole career already! You don't know this but when I was playing your song “Rock”, my father was totally digging it! Even my next-door neighbor wanted to know who was the artist behind “20”!

There was also that time when you were helping me learn how to read music using the piano and our hands kept brushing against each other. Our shoulders were also glued together because the seat was so small. If your heart was racing just as much as how pink your ears turned, then please, believe me, my heart was beating twice as fast.

You didn't just teach me music and show me your creations, you also shared music that you enjoyed. A lot of the songs are still in my playlist. You have great taste in music too, Jihoon. I enjoyed every moment we spent just sitting at the window of the classroom, sharing headphones and listening to the songs you liked.

When they were love songs, I just couldn't help thinking that you chose the song for a reason. I'm quite an overthinker. I always thought that maybe one of the songs you showed me held your heart and maybe they did, but now I'll never know.

I'm your fan, Jihoon, even though you probably wouldn't want me to be anymore. I still admire you and I respect you a lot, that's why I'm deciding to write you this letter. I'm not going to get too close to you, I won't even try to bring us back to what we were because now, it's too awkward between us. I know that deep inside, you must feel so a deep hatred toward me, even if it wasn't entirely my fault.

I've realized what kind of person you are, Jihoon. You're kind, caring, talented in almost everything, shy, and stubborn. You love music. You hate it when someone who isn't close to you gets all up in your business as if they know everything. You also hate narcissists. You're selfless and humble.

I don't know who you told but I'm sorry. Your trust must have been completely broken. I mean, I can just imagine how painful it would be, being an introvert and telling someone your crush while trusting them to keep the secret only to have them spill it to the person's friends.

I hate my friends because they ruined our relationship but since they are my friends, I just can't abandon them as if we didn't spend years being best buddies. I've been distancing myself from them for a while now but I think it won't be long until we continue hanging out again. I want to hang out with you too but you must feel so... angry.

I heard that you're not friends with the guy who leaked the secret that you liked me. I truly hope that you can find a friend that is a true friend. I don't want you to live in fear and keep everything to yourself. I'll always be here for you though, so please, even if I don't speak with you, you can speak to me.

Gosh, what am I saying? It can't be fixed.

You must've overheard it when my friends dragged me away from your cafeteria table and whispered to me, “Did you know? He likes you!”

I was flustered and when I turned back to you, I still remember seeing your hands clench. That's when I sort of knew that we wouldn't be friends anymore.

Even after having your trust broken, you continued to hang out around me, which made me believe that if I confessed my feelings to you when the time was right, we could fall in love. So, I spent a lot of time learning about you.

That's when my friends came in again. They started teasing us in front of the whole class, saying all that stupid cheesy shit. I was ready angry and kept telling them to stop but they wouldn't because they just thought I was like them.

‘When you're in high school, you don't want the person in the relationship, you just want a relationship.’

That was not the case for me but that's what they thought. I wanted you, Jihoon. I was ready to teach you about me and get to know you better so that when I was ready to love, we would be able to stay together.

My friends are stupid.

They continued to pressure us to be together.

Knowing you, you must've gotten extremely annoyed and fed up with it, enough for you to end your friendship with me. And that's exactly what happened, right?

Each day, for a month, they came to our desks singing stupid love songs meant for children. They were so childish and I was growing so sick of it. I knew that you didn't like that shit. I knew that you were just enduring it but I couldn't stop it and I'm sorry.

We went through all that humiliation together. I think we could have had a better love story if your friend didn't leak your secret and my friends didn't act like children. I saw sparks in your eyes, that's why I had hope that we could fall in love together, but we couldn't even get ready to love.

I just remember that day when you ignored me. I was telling you that your piece sounded good and asked if I could get a listen, but you didn't reply to me at all. You still don't talk to me. It makes my heart ache.

When our friendship got ruined, I almost ruined my other friendships too. You don't know this but they kept pestering me, asking if you and I were finally dating and if we had a couple fight. They kept reassuring me as if they knew what we were going through and saying that it was just a small love fight and that we would recover soon. They didn't even know the problem was them so I yelled at them.

In the middle of the cafeteria, I slammed my hands on the table and shouted at them. I'm sure you heard me, you were in the same room. I'm pretty sure that you didn't know about this either but when I left the cafeteria in anger, I cried in the stall of a bathroom.

Now, I'm fine.

I wonder what you thought of me then. I mean, we still had to see each other but we didn't talk to each other like we were strangers. I was angry at you for not understanding me so I didn't want to speak or even glance in your direction, even if it did hurt to ignore you.

I think I know what you feel but all I'm thinking about your emotions are just assumptions in the end. You're a stranger to me now. A stranger that I loved.

You brought me the colors of music.

If only things didn't have to turn out so negatively. If only one friend kept his promise of keeping a secret... If only a group of friends didn't tease so annoyingly... Maybe then, things would be different.

Oh yeah, I'm sorry about this too. I overheard you playing a song the other day. Don't worry, I didn't record it but I cried to it. I just have a feeling that the song was about me. All the lyrics, the depressing but gorgeous sound of the piano, your emotional voice, it all brought tears to my eyes. Were you in pain?

I had never heard the song before. When I cried to it, I had my hands covering my mouth to keep noise from slipping. I don't know if you heard me because you just continued singing.

“Maybe I could have been a man

when everyone was telling me to.

But both choices were selfish,

keep you close or let me go,

so I chose

let's just not fall in love.”

I think your choice was for the better.

Sincerely,

Y/N

------------------

6/21/21 - 11:01 am

a/n: sigh... I feel like this letter was so relatable on so many levels. My former friends were like that, always wanting a relationship but not the person in the relationship. They're too desperate. + ARTHUR KYEOM COMEBACK!??!? SVT CHINESE DRAMA OST!?!?

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athys-obelia · 3 years

Text

character/s: claude de alger obelia, diana of siodonna, felix robane

synopsis: it's...uhm....an empress!diana x concubine!claude crackfic 😭😭

warning/s: uhh a sprinkle of politics, the robane duchy is now siodonnan and not obelian screw canon, diana is lowkey mean to rogrog

a/n: i'm so sorry this is so bad

part one

felix's foot taps against the tiles of the empress' room impatiently. "you stayed up finalising the agreement all night, your majesty, perhaps some rest is due?"

diana spares him glance, turning sideways from her position on her bed. "what was his name again?"

"pardon?"

"the painter," she elaborates, pointing towards the painting on the ceiling above the bed. "i keep...i don't know, i keep finding new things the more i look at it."

"is that so?"

the painting itself, a coronation gift from felix, depicts the goddess diana reaching out to the children of the world and vice versa. "if you look at the sky closely - remember our old siodonann classes?- 'for the people' is hidden in the stars. isn't that cool?"

the knight squints at the painting. "oh, i see it! i wonder why it's in old siodonann, though?"

"i would guess it's because the imperial family wasn't worshipped in the old days," diana explains, "for example - right now, in some parts of the empire, my late father - bless him - and i may actually have shrines because people believe the imperial family's descent is from the gods. when the kingdom was just formed, though, kings and queens weren't allowed to ride alone in carriages as they greeted their subjects- they needed to have a slave with them at all times, who kept on repeating 'you are human' to them. 'you are human', 'we are all the same in the eyes of the true gods."

the sound of the army of maids behind the door is enough to pull felix out of his trance. "er...horatius calvus, your majesty."

"hm?"

"the artist, that's his name."

"ah." diana turns to the painting once more, eyes staring at the goddess' hair that melted into the night sky. "would you be able to get in contact with him? i'd like to commission a piece."

felix bows gracefully. "as your majesty commands. oh, and - for the obelian delegates' farewell celebration tonight...has your majesty decided on an escort?"

she groans, falling back on the bed. "i've had so much free time lately, the harem is all i think about!"

"very funny, ma'am. then...shall i prepare the usual?"

diana shakes her head. "i'll visit viscaria palace later and see for myself. the obelians brought some concubines with them as presents, it's be nice to weed through the bunch."

felix's eyes nearly pop out. "you're visiting the harem?! your majesty! did you find someone you like??"

she chucks a pillow at him before he can continue. "you weren't loud enough just now, fe, i don't think all of siodonna heard you."

"...apologies, ma'am."

three years ago, when she had only just come into power, diana remembers being afraid of the large, gold doors between her and the council room. she remembers pausing before entering, regaining her breath, preparing her mind. projecting an image.

if there is one thing she has learnt, though, it's that only fools can be afraid of their own property. their assets. the larger-than-life doors swing at her command, allow or deny entrance with solely her permission. confidence comes easy when you act like you own the place - nevermind the fact that she did own most places.

but i have no reason to be afraid.

the obelian delegates stand at her arrival and bow like good little lords should before an empress. one of the more prominent ones stands to address her as soon as the meeting commences.

"blessings and glory upon the sun of the great siodonnan empire," he says.

diana raises an amused eyebrow. this game, hm? "is that an obelian greeting, duke? how interesting. here, one would usually wish 'a long life to the protector of the siodonnan people'. that's all i am, after all - how could i be the sun?"

duke alpheus sputters. "er...i failed to acquaint myself with siodonnan culture appropriately, my apologies, your majesty. i shall do better next time."

how arrogant. still, she smiles, "i must confess, duke alpheus - i am slightly susceptible to praise, so i'll let you off this time."

"thank you, ma'am."

"although making the assumption that there will be a next time at all was quite courageous of you." diana signals the guards, who open the door to let the final participant of the meeting inside. "however -courage and bravery are traits best suited for kings and queens, duke. not lords."

the obelian delegates pale as they watch their - former - emperor, wrists bound, enter the hall with an entourage of knights.

diana glances at the newcomer. "although i suppose even for an emperor, too much of a bravado may cost a war."

anastacius de alger obelia glowers at her.

she frowns at the knights. "how come such a precious friend of mine is tied up like this? is this how we siodonnans treat our guests?"

felix bows deeply. "i apologise, ma'am - he was resisting far too much."

"whatever the case. get a seat set up right here, beside me - after all," diana smiles at the fuming obelian, "we were dining together just a few months ago, weren't we?"

"three months ago, to be precise," anastacius spits out, "after which you decided to switch tides and invade us like a coward."

she watches one of the knights set down a fancy chair to the left of hers, reaching out to untie the bindings on anastacius' wrist. diana frowns suddenly, waving over felix, "ah, is this the leash my brother used when he tamed his dragon?"

the former emperor flinches, staring down at it. "someone here tamed a dragon?" a light pink dusts his cheeks - did he really touch the actual leash of a dragon?

felix shakes his head with a small smirk. "this is the leash her majesty the late dowager empress used, ma'am. for her dog."

"-ah, right, i remember now! all the ones marked with this little purple line are used for tying down senseless animals, aren't they?"

"yes, your majesty." felix returns to his spot behind her, clear amusement swimming in his grey eyes as he watches the obelians try and maintain their composure.

diana gently lets the leash loose, a hand on the stunned anastacius' shoulder to lightly push him into the seat. "you aren't wrong - i did betray your hospitality, didn't i?"

roger alpheus winces at the sudden authority in her tone as the knights pass out a document to each of the obelian lords.

"obelia's greeting and offer for peace was kind to me, so i must return this generosity. your country is now part of the siodonnan empire, so we should be parting on a good note. will a little present suffice?"

a brunette diana remembers to be a count speaks up, "...a gift, your majesty?"

felix moves closer to the table, watching the detailed map of siodonna carved into its centre. as he raises his hand, almost as if it were a chess piece, a small island moves to the left. its color flickers between a siodonnan purple and the obelian teal.

diana sighs. "i was planning on the island of delphine, since it not only contains a relatively large gold mine, but also much tourist attraction."

oh, she can see the stars in alpheus' eyes already. "thank you, your ma-"

"but." he shrivels under her piercing gaze, "but, obelia doesn't need gold, does it? what you need is better foreign relations. and what better way to form an alliance..."

she eyes the map, and with a flick of felix's wrist, a small stretch of land connecting two continents switches from its original purple to a hue of blue.

diana looks up now, meeting even anastacius' shocked eyes. he eyes her suspiciously, "do you really-?"

she nods. "...consider it a gift from your sovereign. it is enough, yes?"

"i- uh," duke alpheus blinks twice, "the isthmus of erven is...an adequate present, yes, your majesty. the people of obelia shall thrive due to your generosity."

"it is not generosity, duke. your people are my subjects now. however, i hope you realise the isthmus isn't obelian property for obvious reasons. there is no trust between us. despite this, what i will allow is some access." diana stands, watching the foreign nobles mirror the action. "the terms and conditions of our relationship from this point onwards are in the papers before you and are, obviously, subject to change. feel free to approach me with concerns, should you have any."

"you were firmer than i'd expected with the obelians, your majesty," felix comments.

diana recoils as his eyes light up at the sight of viscaria palace. "remember when i visited obelia for anastacius' coronation? i was only seventeen, but two years into my studies as heir - and they were all over duke renauld's son! poor cousin ronnie couldn't stop apologising."

felix snorts. "the renaulds wouldn't have dared challenge your majesty's claim, not while the late empress dowager was behind you."

"ha! that's right, everyone was scared of mama." she grins fondly, "papa most of all."

the knight nods, murmuring a prayer.

"i want them gone as soon as possible," diana admits, "but there's much to settle before that. i need to fix up anastacius before we can let him back, the second prince is still...what was his name, again?"

"claude de alger obelia, ma'am."

she winces. "yes, he's an impo-"

a commotion sounds from within viscaria. felix raises an eyebrow at the shouts echoing from the beautiful building, a hand already atop his sheathed sword. "ma'am, stay back, i'll have a look- your majesty! where are you going-?!"

navigating through the decorated halls, diana halts before the entrance of the garden. the argument is between two men she doesn't recognise, as the older concubines gather to the side, amusing twinkling in their eyes.

"attention!" felix roars, "her imperial majesty, empress diana celeste!"

the two freeze in fear.

"disrupting my peace. how dare you?" diana demands.

one of them, dressed too finely for someone she hadn't even seen yet, steps forward. "your majesty, my name is xerre, i was only-"

she raises a hand, effectively shutting him up. tone softening, diana turns to the group crowding around the desert table. "lex?"

the group shuffles to let a young, silver haired young man forward. lex bows gracefully, laugh lines around his eyes crinkling. "yes, my lady?"

"do you know what happened here?"

lex nods. "the monthly salary was being distributed, your majesty, and xerre - being a present from the kingdom of masur - had some trouble believing his amount was the same as a former obelian slave's. verhan stepped in to argue that your majesty was the one to decide this, and they began fighting."

"shall i prepare for his voyage back to masur, majesty?" felix asks, as the rest of the concubines roll their eyes at his antics.

diana studies the masurian concubine, beckoning him closer. "it is common knowledge i do not generally accept gifted concubines from territories out of my own."

she watches his adam's apple rise and fall, tracing a nail over the well defined jawline. xerre shivers.

"however, your king is new to his throne, and his queen one of my dearest friends. do you realise how our alliance will look were i to send you back?"

he nods cautiously.

"i do not wish to withdraw support from someone i consider a brother, xerre. especially when he is engaged in armed conflict on two fronts."

"i- i am prepared for any punishment your majesty deems appropriate."

diana sighs softly. "i would send you to work for me in the capitol, but the rules state every concubine entering must reside here for a certain amount of time. until then, bear with it. this palace, and a life of luxury, is only meant for my favorites. clear?"

"yes, your majesty."

"my apologies, ma'am," felix says once the crowd disperses, his head hanging. "i should've prepared for your arrival with more care."

she waves off the apology, heading to the guest hall to take a look at the new obelian concubines.

"vera leaves for her son's wedding for a week and we've already had an incident. honestly, felix."

"...who's vera?"

diana pauses at the unfamiliar voice. her gaze falls on the figure sitting on the window seat, entirely immersed in the book in his hands. she blinks, stunned, watching the colourful window's filtered light paint the brilliant blonde of his hair.

felix is the first to address him, scoffing, "i believe your majesty's beauty has enchanted one of the gods - who else would dare address the empress of our nation so casually?"

diana chuckles, watching as the man stands, intrigued. she stays silent, breath hitched, as he towers over her, studying her with a curiosity that rivals hers from a moment ago. and only when he finally lowers himself to a knee does his hair part, and diana flushes at the red tinting his ears.

"greetings to her imperial majesty, may the gods grant the protector of the siodonnan people a life long and blessed."

she offers him her hand. "rise. and tell me your name."

a beat of silence passes as he stares at her outstretched hand before hesitantly accepting. "claude, your majesty."

"claude," diana tries, finding it rolls of her tongue deliciously.

he raises an eyebrow as she regards him. "your majesty...?"

diana smiles, her hand moving to touch the various jewellery adorning his fingers. gently, she slides off the gold ring off of his ring finger. "you must have a good reason to be donning an unauthorized magical item in my palace."

he doesn't answer, head lowered.

her hand lets go of his, raising to grip the blonde's jaw. diana tilts up his face, meeting his gaze. the dull grey eyes from before have vanished, replaced by glittering blues.

she inhales sharply. "you're...the obelian pr...the second prince of obelia."

he nods.

diana turns, more puzzled than angry. "why is he in my harem?"

"... didn't your majesty wish for it?" felix tilts his head in confusion.

"what? no?"

the knight frowns. "but i was so sure...your majesty said you didn't have an heir because you wanted a concubine as beautiful as me...when we took over the imperial palace, as the army swore their allegiance...your majesty said the prince was the prettiest you’ve ever seen?"

"i- felix, i was kidding!"

"...oh."

she turns to the prince then, "and you! you're a prince! how come you just went along with this??"

"well...it was the most peaceful part of the palace..."

diana gapes at the two men, before finally sighing in defeat. "you're telling me i was scouring the lands for you, while you were right...?" she raises a hand to massage her temple, "...gods grant me patience."

felix cautiously steps forward, "your majesty...i understand this is shocking, but... tonight's escort..."

she glances up at the obelian prince. "allow them all to retire. i've found the perfect escort."

a/n: hmmm this was a bit empty claudiana wise, wasn't it? their development is coming though, i had to give empress!diana an intro :) also !! the situation may seem a bit confusing rn, but next chapter will clear things up! or you can just ask me for clarification <3

💕 felix is dying to find a concubine diana likes bc he really really really wants to be an uncle

💕 in siodonna, emperors/empresses are referred to by their first(diana) + middle name(celeste) and not a last name bc they technically can't belong to a house, they belong to the empire. but the middle name is important bc you have to ask for it (from someone you love and respect usually), you're never just born with one (so you could ask a parent / friend / mentor yada yada and they give you a name they believe fits best)

#wmmap #sbapod #who made me a princess #suddenly became a princess one day #au #empress!diana #concubine!claude #the word concubine annoys me for some reason smfh #claude de alger obelia #felix robane #diana of siodonna #wmmap fic

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oftenderweapons · 4 years

Text

The Calm After the Storm - hyung line

Pairing: hyung line member x reader

Wordcount: 1.0-1.2k words

Genre: smut, angst, fluff

Rating: 18+

Hello jell-o to everyone again! I usually try to publish by Sunday night but it’s exam season so I’m a bit busy with uni. Also, Jin’s part was super difficult to start but then boom, it turned out to be the longest, so every delay is due to that and I refuse to postpone again so I’m publishing it unedited. Might reread in a couple days and actually edit the post. Every piece is about 1100-1200 words (they’re getting longer and longer!)

The original theme for the week was going to be aftercare, but me being a chaotic mess made me go a little bit wilder than just aftercare. I tried to adjust every scenario to how each boy would approach intimacy with his partner, and how each couple would recover from different types and degrees of interaction, It also depends a lot on the kind of ideal girlfriend I imagine for each of the boys.

TRIGGER WARNINGS: ahem. It’s very descriptive, some parts more than others. So, let’s get this started. Oral sex galore (highly recommended if you’re a fan of being eaten out yay!) crude language, unprotected sex within a safe and established relationship (please be careful guys, use condoms and dental dams I can’t recommend it enough), foodplay, overstimulation and squirting (ten points if you can guess who’s featured in that scenario), biting, spanking, mild bondage, some bold PDA, angsty/insecure reader. Also, swearing and consumption of alcohol.

Member disclaimers: very jealous, possessive!Namjoon, Eat!Jin can be wildly inspirational, Yoongi is a tease feat. some higher tongue technology, Hoseok is a very stretchable freak, but also a sunshine boy with magic hands and a big, fat-

-heart. (Binch, you thought.)

Enjoy!

Here you can find the maknae line

And here you can find my masterlist!

Namjoon

His heavy body suddenly fell on top of yours, followed by some deadly stillness. You knew why the French called this "the little death". It sounded very elegant. Very erotic.

But really, Namjoon seemed almost dead in his postcoital slumber.

There had been an excessive carnality in your latest encounter, made of bites and bruising grips. He was spurred by an unmotivated jealousy that almost tempted you to tease his possessiveness more often. But that's what you thought before letting him take you. Now your opinion was strongly different. It would be unlikely for you to be able to handle him like this more than once a month.

He was an animal.

It took him some solid two minutes before brushing his mouth and chin on your chest, though you didn't believe he could wipe his face on your damp chest. He placed open mouthed kisses on your breasts, snaking his hand once more between your thighs, hoping to get you to cum again while he recovered from his previous high and got ready once more.

"Joon, baby, please don't." You whined.

He moved his hand away, spent and pliant, bringing it to your outer thigh, dragging your leg over his back, his body sliding up towards your neck, nuzzling in the crook beneath your ear. It was deliriously intimate.

He kept pushing until there wasn't a way to be closer to you. You felt engrossed in warmth and skin and his comfortable weight. He was massive on top of you, so vast he was all you could see. He was your entire world. The sense of comfort overwhelmed you and you let your eyes close, however you knew you both needed a clean up.

"My woman. My little vixen, my darling god. My love, " he murmured in your ear. "Are you okay, kitten?"

You felt adored like never before. "A little tired, but I'm ecstatic. I can barely feel anything at all."

"Did I hurt you?"

You thought back to the way he had pushed inside you. The sound of the bed scraping again the floor. The crude noise of skin against skin. Usually he wouldn't go so hard at missionary, keeping it intimate and loving. That violence was for more carnal and animalistic positions, but tonight had been extraordinary in many ways. He had carried you over his shoulder from the lobby of the apartment complex to your front door, entered your shared apartment and thrown you over the back of the sofa, where he had lifted your skirt and spanked you almost too aggressively. He had taken your first orgasm there, with his fingers inside you, and his spare hand covering your mouth; then he had carried you again, this time to your bed. He had dropped you on the edge of it, your back on the covers, your hips hanging from the edge as he sat on the floor and put your thighs on each of his shoulders, straddling his face. He had been voracious, making you cum twice with his tongue on your clit. Then he had ripped all of your clothes off, damaging your lace knickers and tearing away a couple buttons of his own shirt. And finally he had entered you. He started with you on top but as he grew more desperate he flipped you on the bed and got into a violent pace, growling about you belonging to him and him being the only one who could fuck you this good, of you being too used to him to be happy with anyone else. You couldn't comprehend how a man as smart and civilised as Namjoon could become such a beast, but still... He had chased his high unrelentlessly, and you hoped he would be done after the two of you came together, your inner muscles squeezing him tight, but apparently he was so desperate he kept going, finding his release again. As he noticed you hadn't enjoyed as much he proceeded dragging his lips down your body and eating you out once more. If it were for him, fuck it, he would live with his mouth latched between your thighs.

Back to reality you comforted him, "Don't worry love, you didn't hurt me. It was just... Very intense."

"I don't know what got into me."

"Well, I know what got into me."

"Don't joke about it just yet, I still feel pretty volatile."

"Sorry."

"Damn, that man couldn't keep his eyes off you. And even a girl from the catering was checking you out."

"I couldn't care any less." You stated, combing his hair. You grabbed a bottle of water from the bedside table and a delicate cloth napkin you kept in your bedside. You wiped at your face and neck without disturbing Joon, than you tried to freshen him too. He let you maneuver around him, cleaning him up, then you moved to the rest of your bodies, Namjoon getting more collaborative.

"I love you so much. I can't think about anyone else I would do this with. I love that you're strong, that you can take that without even wavering. You are unafraid, and you welcome me as I am. No one else could." He declared.

You kissed his head and tried to continue cleaning. You reached between your legs.

"Let me" Joon said. He stood on his knees and parted your legs gently, observing the results of his frenzy. "I'm sorry I got carried away."

He kissed the side of your knee and pressed the cloth to your outer labia, gently, especially after he noticed how red and swollen they were. A sick part of him got turned on again. He wasn't that surprised at all. He loved seeing his effect on you. Knowing it was him, that you wouldn't let anyone else do this to you. He moved his hand gently on your crotch, opening you and now cleaning the more delicate skin of your vagina. You couldn't believe that this was the clumsy man who regularly asked you how to wash his stained clothes and if you could help him fix his bruises. He was attentive and careful. "All right?" He asked.

"Yes, I think I'm going to fall asleep, though."

He briefly wiped himself, then he felt his own lids grow heavy. "Let me get rid of this and I'll be back in a second. Do you want clothes?"

"Please." He knew it was a yes. He took the cloth to the dirty laundry, then picked up one of his old, worn out t-shirts and a pair of cotton briefs. He wore clean boxers and came back to you, helping you wear the clothes. You quickly curled up against him, your head on his chest, and he brought you closer, hugging you tightly, and brushing your hair from your face. After a few minutes you were both asleep.

Seokjin

“Honey I can’t find the chocolate sauce- Oh, hi there!” Jin walked in your bedroom only to see you naked on top of the covers, the aforementioned chocolate sauce sitting on the bedside table, and also drawing pretty decorations over your naked skin.

“Would you like to clear your intentions?” He said, leaning against the wall, his arms crossed and a playful smirk lifting his lips to one side.

“I think it’s all very clear, here...” You commented. You were a little bothered by the fact that even though he had come back from tour two days ago, he still had to lay a finger on you. And also he had been sleeping at the dorms, uselessly increasing the number of night you had to do without him.

“Is it a new beauty treatment?”

“No.”

“Would you like me to leave?” He asked. You were upset by the fact that he was still avoiding intimacy with you. You felt like smacking him in the head right now.

Maybe something had happened during the tour, maybe he didn’t like you anymore… Maybe he had found someone else, somehow, even though he didn’t have much spare time to get to know someone, maybe it was a member of the staff…

Your mind was going to really bad places in that moment, knowing that you could trust him, but also craving for the smallest sign that he still wanted you.

He took a step closer, the absent look on your face getting him worried. “What is it? Why all of this now?”

“I really missed you.” You said, after taking a while to steady your voice.

“I missed you too.” He said, sitting on the bed, one of his fingers touching a heart-shaped stain of sauce on your belly. He brought it to his lips. “And I really appreciate the whole chocolate thing you have going on here—”

“Do you still like me?”

“Where is all of this coming from?” He asked, bringing his clean hand to your hair, pushing it back, holding your face in his palm. “You are making me worried, sweetheart.”

“You haven’t been coming home and I want you so much, damn I’ve wanted you so much for so long and you haven’t been coming home and maybe during tour you realised you don’t like me that much or—”

“First of all, I love you. And there’s no changing that. Secondly, we’re working on the muster, you know how much work there’s into that. Loads of choreographies, background checks, reworking songs, it’s a mess. I didn’t come home because I was very stressed, I knew I would unleash all my nerves on you. I didn’t want to put you through that.”

“So you still want me?”

He nodded, a tender smile on his face. “Can’t you tell?” He shot a glance to his lap, where you could see the shape of him under the trousers. “I’m trying very hard to hold back right now.”

“I need you to show me how much you want me.”

“Let me go grab some whipped cream.” He suggested with a devilish grin.

“Didn’t know we had that.”

“I just brought it home for the strawberry salad we were supposed to have tonight. But I guess we have better plans now, don’t we?” He said, his voice coming from the kitchen and then approaching the bedroom slowly. “I hope you don’t mind getting messy because there’s no way you’re getting out of here clean.”

“Do you mean literally or morally clean?”

“Let me shut that smart mouth up.” And then he kissed you. It was hotter than your normal kisses, even though his body was angled away from yours.

“Take ‘em off. I need you,” You whispered, pulling at his shirt. He undressed impressively quickly, keeping his boxers on and grabbing the cream.

“I’m gonna start with something innocent.” He commented, spraying some on your mouth and lips and taking it away with a kiss. “Want more?”

You nodded, your mouth ajar, tongue eager to meet his. He complied, joining your lips once more. “Let me get that sauce now, I don’t want you to imprint all that chocolate on me.”

With that he started licking all the small heart away from your upper chest. “I think I need something to balance it off.” He had the actual audacity to spray some more cream around your nipples. “Better now.” He said, diving in. He devoured the food adorning your belly, again using your belly button to spoon in some cream.

When he reached the invisible line dividing your belly from your pubis, he stopped, laying a soft kiss there. “Do you want me to...?”

“Do you want to?” He didn’t eat you out often, the act implying a level of confidence you weren’t quite familiar with.

He nodded timidly. “But I’d rather be inside you.”

You couldn’t dream of anything better. Quickly, you sat up, helping him remove his underwear. God, you had missed seeing him naked. You had missed feeling him under your palms, against you, below you, inside you, on top of you.

The proportions of your longing hit you right there. “I need you.”

He laid beside you, on his back. “I know it’s been a while, so maybe you’d like to be on top and pick your pace.”

“You are incredible,” you declared, admiring how considerate and smart your man is. Climbing him, you let your intimate parts brush against each other, his hands laying on your thighs.

“I missed having you like this.” He said, caressing your skin. “I couldn’t stop thinking about this the other night. I was so close to coming back home, wake you up and fuck you into the mattress.” He said with a small embarrassed giggle. He didn’t dirty talk that often, and when he did, sometimes he felt too shy.

“I thought you would come home. I waited for you naked in bed.” You told him in a soft, breathy tone.

“God, I missed out on that.” He pressed his hips upward, augmenting the friction and enjoying your increasing wetness.

“You really missed out.” You wrapped your hand around his wrist and brought his fingers to your lips.

He moaned quietly. “But I’m here now.”

You nodded, your tongue wrapping around his fingers. As his eyes rolled shut, you grabbed his length, enjoying the incredible thickness of the veins running under his skin, and pressed the tip to you entrance, a high-pitched sound escaping your throat. You let your hips roll gently downwards. With his hand accompanying your backside, you let him help you ride him, your own hips dictating the pace, the angle and the depth of your movements. As you felt that sense of fullness come to a peak, you brought the fingers resting in your mouth down to your sex, Jin naturally finding the sweet spot that had you mutter soft curses to the ceiling. His spare hand caressed your back gently, encouragingly, until finally you constricted around him, dragging you both to completion.

Collapsing on his chest, you took a few deep breaths. “We’ll need a shower now.”

“I licked you clean, though.”

“That was amazing.”

“You were delicious.” He commented, kissing your forehead.

“Let’s just lay here for a while.”

“We’ll fall asleep, you know that.” Seokjin said, stroking your hair.

“That’s what we always do.”

“God, we suck at aftercare.”

“We really do.” He still got in that position you usually fall asleep in. All considered, you could deal with this after a nap.

Yoongi

Yoongi had… tastes, in the bedroom.

Not just strictly within the bedroom, but yes, he had tendencies which would not belong to most people regarding intimacy.

That’s why everyone was looking at you funny at dinner. In the asphyxiatingly hot Korean summer you were wearing a sleeveless turtleneck with the lame excuse of a sore throat. Which you had, but for reasons absolutely unrelated to the weather. And your eyes were getting droopy. Yoongi was right at your side, being unusually touchy-feely with his affections. At such a point of your relationship, you were used to holding hands, you loved it and you loved the content expression on Yoongi’s face whenever you reached for his hand, or whenever you noticed he was reaching for yours. But tonight, with an arm around your waist, offering you his shoulder to lean on, you knew he was absolutely conscious of your situation — you wanted to kill him because of that: how could he drag you to dinner with the whole group with you in these conditions? — and he was trying to support you and help you close your eyes, at least to regain some energies.

Every time you let your eyelids fall, you had flashbacks of him less than a couple hours ago, you could feel his hair tickling your naked nipples, his mouth lavishing your skin, covering it in bites and bruises — hence the turtleneck — and you could see his head thrown back, his pout opening in a moan tender as his stare when he looked at you like a goddess, like the most precious of treasures. You could still feel the drag of his hot and hard sex between your breasts, his hips snapping as he pushed the tip past your lips. At some point he had stood perfectly still, ordered you to stay put as he flipped around, his thighs straddling your face as he leaned down to reach your left hip bone with his mouth. He had proceeded taunting you with his dick right in front of your face, you desperately trying to get it in your mouth while he deliberately denied you as he kept rubbing your inner thighs. When you finally managed to get his tip with your tongue he enveloped your clit between his lips, making you cry out gently and lose your feeble grip on him. After a few minutes he had realised he didn’t really like that position, since your ministrations could distract him from the task at hand and make him get sloppy and inefficient. He spent a couple more seconds thinking whether he preferred getting inside you or eat you out till you orgasmed, but he thought he could postpone the actual sex after dinner and get you riled up in the meanwhile. He got himself into a more comfortable position, not without remembering to put some more hickeys of the pale skin of your crotch and pelvis, and proceeded to pleasure you just like you always needed him to. You had been confused, and slightly disappointed, when he had rubbed your belly tenderly after you had recovered from your high, and then briskly stood up and headed for the bathroom.

“Are you good?” He whispered lovingly at your ear.

“I don’t think I’m really here mentally.” You admitted.

He was tempted to bring you home, wrap you up in the covers and caress your hair until you both fell asleep.

“Do you wanna go home?”

“I don’t want you to miss dinner with everyone.”

Everyone had noticed you weren’t at your best; you were being less talkative and even though you were doing your best to hide your yawns, they were still very frequent. Plus, you couldn’t help but cringe and hide inside Yoongi’s shoulder whenever Hoseok got particularly loud.

Yoongi felt his heart soften everytime you clung to him, some possessive part of himself feeling proud that you showed so explicitly who you belong to. But some other part of him was already thinking what could he possibly do to start you up again. Maybe he should just be settling for some calm and fond lovemaking, maybe he could…

You touched his knee with yours, his hand snaking under the hem of your shirt. Something dark awakened within your belly and suddenly you opened your eyes, meeting your man's gaze. He licked his lips and used his other hand to caress the inside of your knee. Your whole exchange continued, encouraged by the small booth of the restaurant and the table hiding your mildly inappropriate endeavours.

“Are you feeling better now?” He whispered in your ear. Goosebumps rose on your nape, your mouth feeling too dry. A quick nod — you couldn’t really trust yourself talking.

His hand sneaking higher and higher on your leg, he teased you some more: “If you behave, I’ll let you suck me till I cum, then I’m gonna turn you around and slap your pretty bum as you ride me. Then I’m gonna hold you tight and eat you out, until I’m ready to make love to you again. And when I get inside you again, I’m gonna go so slow you’ll beg me to fuck you harder. You’ll beg me to hurt you. Understood?”

You blinked a couple times before lifting yourself from your slouching, now very awake, almost oversensitive.“Yes, sir,” you replied obediently.

“Good kitten.”

You managed to be more interactive during the rest of the dinner, still limiting yourself to those sitting closer to you, Jungkook, Namjoon and their girlfriends, who appeared to be on the more quiet side.

As the night went on and Jimin started suggesting going somewhere else, Yoongi looked at you, his expression completely unreadable, still you knew it meant that it’s completely up to you. You also knew he didn’t enjoy the night scene at all. He’d much rather stay home with you. And the wetness you felt coating your panties gave you one more reason to turn down Jimin’s offer and head home.

Yoongi grinned wide as soon as you entered the car taking you to your apartment. He kept every single promise. And when you finally both laid spent on top of the covers, your bodies laying naked and unashamed, he took a few deep breaths before standing up and rinsing himself in your ensuite. As soon as he was clean and dry he slipped on a pair of shorts and got to the kitchen, grabbing some water and some ice cream. When he came back you were still vegetating on the bed, breathing heavy, eyes opening at the dip of the mattress beside you. He offered you the bottle, brushing your hair away from your face, kissing your cheekbones, your temples, the tip of your nose and the middle of your forehead.

“Do you want me to run a hot bath?” He offered in a whisper, taking you in his arms and caressing your face continuously.

“You got ice cream...” you mumbled.

“You didn’t eat much at dinner and you rode me pretty fiercely. You need to eat something.” He explained. “Bath or no?”

“Yes, please.”

Hoseok

“Just one more, _____”.

You didn’t like the way he used your name to manipulate you into doing things that you’ll regret tomorrow morning.

“I can’t, really.”

“I know you can baby, just one. I know you’re gonna love it. I’ll make you love it.”

You whined slightly at the shift of angle. “I’m currently loving this one.”

He quickly withdrew from inside you, making you huff in disappointment as he repositioned himself, rolling you on the side and hooking your leg over his side. “Thank God I’m elastic.”

“Thank God you’re so good me. I love you, angel.” And with that he entered you again, your neck arching so that you could kiss him. “My baby, my joy. You’re incredible. Keep squeezing me, ____, don’t you fucking dare stop now.”

“Please, I need your hand on me.”

“I’m here, angel. I got you.” His fingers slipped to your front, immediately finding your clit and teasing it desperately, your head whipping back, his tongue caressing the crook between your neck and shoulder. The stimulation made you clench further and Hoseok too gained profit from the furious activity of his digits.

“Hobi, I’m—”

“Yes, angel, keep going.”

“It’s too much.”

“You can take it.”

“Hoseok—” with that you realised your orgasm had surpassed the ordinary — and the previous two — and suddenly you were drenching the sheets.

“Oh my god, babe that’s too hot. Damn it.” He bit down hard on your shoulder, suppressing a scream, finally ramming into you.

Sex with Hoseok was always pretty energetic, leaving you exhausted and barely functioning. And usually pretty sore the morning after, no matter how religiously he followed your special aftercare etiquette. He had confessed loving all the special attentions you needed afterwards and it helped him unwind and relax before sleep.

It was probably the second time you’ve ever squirted. The first time was because of the joined forces of your Hoseok’s fingers and a new vibrator you had decided to experiment, some months ago. The whole messiness of it upset you slightly. But the happiness and pride radiating from Hobi’s grin compensated fully.

“Are you feeling good, my angel?” He unhooked your leg gently, massaging your thigh and knee.

You moaned. Too good for words. He’d been right, the angle was amazing and the snapping of his hips teased your bruised backside just enough to mix the pleasure with a sliver of pain.

“We’ll have to change the sheets, love.” He massaged one breast delicately, innocently, slipping his hand between the side of it and the mattress, lifting it and helping you ease the soreness due to their excessive bouncing while you rode him earlier on. “Shower or bath?”

You moaned again. He giggled. “My fucked out princess...” Cradling your head in his arm, he looked at you fondly. “Don’t tell me I have to sponge bath you.”

You gave him a side glance, slowly coming back to reality.

“I want you to bath with me.” You whispered. Bath time was sacred time. Usually you didn’t let him in with you, needing some distance to get back to yourself, recovering from whatever folly he had led you to. “Please.”

“I’ll get your bath ready, then I’ll have to change the sheets, but I’ll be with you as soon as I’m done.” He promised reassuringly.

A few minutes lately you felt his svelte body slide in behind yours inside the bathtub, his arms wrapping around your middle.

“You were amazing tonight, ____.” Again, your name coming from his lips loosened a tight knot inside you. “I love you so much.” He ran the tip of his nose along the edge of your ear, “You have no idea of how much you’re loved and cherished, sweetie.” He was calm and almost quiet during this exchange and it surprised you, especially since one of the reasons he wasn’t allowed to bath with you was because he was a human powerplant, always emanating an alarming level of energy.

“Want me to wash your hair?”

“Thank you so much.” You didn’t say for what, but the heaviness of the words made it clear that you didn’t mean only for him washing your hair. He was very careful, pressing his digits on your scalp to ease your nerves and rolling them slowly but with a lot of pressure, just as you liked. As you finished rinsing and exited the tub, he made you stand in front of him, checking your skin attentively, especially your wrists, which had been bound together to the headboard with a rope, and your backside, bruised by his slaps. Finally he inspected he hickies on your breasts and the bite mark on your shoulder. He put some lotion on your wrists, hoping that the red marks wouldn’t turn purple, and did the same on the bite.

“Let’s get your hair dry,” He said. It took about twenty minutes, his hands skillfully handling the hairdryer. He let his own hair dry naturally, the locks turning slightly curly in an absolutely endearing way.

He picked up some lotion from the cabinet in the bathroom and offered you his hand, leading you to the bedroom. “Do you need some water? Some juice?”

“Just water would be nice.” You sat on the fresh sheets, immediately wincing at the slight burn of your behind. Laying down, you rolled on your front, not without releasing a pained breath.

It didn’t take long for Hoseok to come back, the stark contrast between the white sheets and your bruises making him ten times more apprehensive. In his hands he carried a bottle of water, a small ampoule and a cold cloth -- usually he prepared some wet cloths in the freezer when you planned out heavier impact play. Offering you the water and the ampoule, he reached for your lotion and straddled the back of your legs, pouring some ointment on his hands and slowly, delicately beginning to rub your glutes, focusing where the bruises were already turning a dark shade of crimson. Then he laid the cloth on your skin, the cold causing you to hiss.

“Did you get your muscle relaxant?”

“Yes, baby. Thank you.” You reached for his leg, caressing his hip reverently.

“It’s okay. Let me ease your legs, they look tense.” He proceeded massaging you thoroughly, taking his time. As he slowly ascended from your calves to your shoulders you felt you herbal muscle relaxant kick in, the hawthorn berry extract working its magic in tandem with Hoseok’s magic hands.

“I love you so, so much, Jung Hoseok.”

“I love you too, babe.” He smiled, devotion filling his heart.

#bangtan sonyeondan #bts imagine #bts reaction #bts #namjoon x reader #seokjin x reader #yoongi x reader #hoseok x reader #bts hyung line #namjoon imagine #seokjin imagine #yoongi imagine #hoseok imagine

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slaveformingi · 4 years

Text

Come Back (M)

READER (y/n) X PARK SEONGHWA(Ateez) Genre: Smut, Makeup Sex, SlightlyDom!Seonghwa Word Count: 2779 Words. Summary: Human relationships are complicated. The same person who makes you laugh can make your heart break in an instant. You got into a heated argument with your boyfriend Seonghwa, but hey.. nothing a little makeup sex won't fix.

(AUTHORS NOTE: FIX ON! Okay so this smut has been in my drafts for a while now and I finally finished it <It’s 5.22am, where I live rn. What is sleep?> Anyways, originally this smut was supposed to feature Wooyoung but like half way through writing it, I felt Seonghwa would fit the role better. So if you see Wooyoung’s name pop up, I apologise. I’ll fix it in the morning when my brain is working again 😂 For now please enjoy! UPDATE: I’ve reedited this fic :) Thank you everyone who helped point out my mistakes and gave me feed back. I freaking love you guys!!)

“How did I even end up dating someone so stubborn as you are?!” The sound of his voice was deeper and louder than usual. A rush of emotions flooded you, you felt scared, angry, disappointed. Your boyfriend had been yelling at you for hours and you’ve been trying to keep your cool but this was the final straw. “Well, I know how I ended up dating you and I regret even wasting my time with a piece of shit like you Hwa!” you snapped at him as you took a step forward. Your eyes were filled with anger and all you wanted to do was get him out of your sight. You were so close to slapping him across the face and you would have done it if it wasn't for the love you still felt for him. Truth is, you loved your boyfriend no matter how much of an asshole he could be.

“If you regret it that much, then it would be best if I just left! Why would I waste my time with someone as pathetic as you if I could get every girl I want?!” “Then go! Get out of my house!” Seonghwa didn't reply, instead he simply obeyed your wishes. He kept quiet as he grabbed his stuff and rushed out of your house, slamming the door shut behind him. You grabbed a framed photo of the two of you that was on the coffee table next to you and threw it against the door. The framed shattered as soon as it hit the door, pieces of glass and wood flew around the room.

Staring at the door, you realised Seonghwa wasn't coming back and that you had lost the man that you once called your “soulmate”.

At first, you didn't feel anything. Like literally, you felt empty in the inside, emotionless. Your emotions were completely shut down. It was the first phase of your body processing what just happened. You were just staring at the closed door, secretly hoping that Seonghwa would come back running into your arms, hoping that this was all a nightmare.

Shortly the second phase kicked in, you were angry, pissed-off, furious. You started counting all the pros for the break up. A list with all the good reasons to break up with Seonghwa, everything that bothered you about him. It was a pretty long list in your mind at which you numbered down will all his failures and mistakes. But in someway you still found yourself loving all his imperfections, his little kinks and weird things he did unconcsiously, which brought you to the last phase of a break-up, sadness and grieve.

You kneeled down in front of the broken photo of you and Seonghwa. It reminded you of all those lovely and romantic moments when he made you felt like the luckiest girl in the world. All gone. Just because of a stupid argument.

Ignoring the pieces of glass around the floor, you made your way into your bedroom where you wanted to crawl into and fall asleep. Sleep was always your answer for moments of sadness and stress, it helped clear your mind and make you realise things better. You crawled into your bed and closed your eyes, but instead of sleeping your mind wandered to the thoughts of Seonghwa.

Seonghwa seemed to handle the break up a lot better than you. He didn't even shed a single tear as he walked out of your apartment. He walked away from you as if you were a stranger to him, someone he didn't need and would not even think twice of. Thinking of him being happy without you made you cry.

The bed felt empty without Seonghwa, but there was nothing you could do. He was gone. You missed him being next to you, kissing you and making you feel loved. Instead of easily falling asleep, you spent hours crying yourself to sleep.

While you were sleeping, Seonghwa returned to your apartment. He was a mess. He was tired and sorry. He yelled at you, and said things he did not meant and all because of the anger that built in his body for no reason. He let everything out on you and he felt sorry for it.

Coming back felt hard, since he didn't know if you would forgive him or throw a vase at his head. He keyed in your house password and let himself in. Once inside, he saw broken glasses and pieces of wood on the floor. He sighed as he picked up a photo of both of you from the floor, he knew you cried and was desperate for comfort.

As he walked towards your room, he thought of things that he should say to you, words that could make you feel better. But the only thing that was on his mind was how much he loved you and that there were no words that would explain his actions to you.

Seonghwa made his way into your bedroom, where he found you sleeping. Your pillow was covered with dried tears and your body hugging a pillow as if it was him. A sad smile grew on his face as he realised how much you loved him, and him leaving was the worst thing he could do. Slowly, he removed the pillow from your body and replaced it with his body, pulling you closer to him. You snuggled into him since you thought it was all a dream.

“Baby, I am so sorry.. please forgive me love. I didn't mean to say all that bullshit.” he whispered into your ear, “You are my soulmate and I hate myself for hurting you.” You heard every single word he said no matter how sleepy you were. Him being so sweet made you almost forget about all the shit he did and said earlier.

“You can really be a little piece of shit Hwa.” you said as your eyes were still closed. A smile grew on his face as he heard your voice. You felt slightly angry and you didn't want to forgive him that easily but you couldn't help but feel safe that he was back home. You silently thank the stars for not letting the fight ruin your relationship with him.

Seonghwa tangled his fingers in your hair as he pushed some of it back to reveal your neck, he moves closer to your neck and starts sucking hard on it, leaving his mark; you wince in pain and pleasure.

Your eyes slowly opened as you shot him a glare, still slightly pissed about the fight you had. A little smile formed on his face as he presses his lips against yours, kissing you passionately. Your hands started to roam around his body, wanting more of his touch. Your fingers started to button his shirt but he immediately grabbed your wristband held your hands above your head with one hand.

“Nuh uh.. No touching baby.” Seonghwa says against your lips.

His lips met yours again as he slides his free hand under your hoodie, squeezing and rubbing your nipples as his tongue explores your mouth. You moaned into his mouth as you tried and release your hands from his grip, you could feel yourself getting wet. Seonghwa pulled himself out of the kiss and a smirk on his face when he saw how desperate you were for him.

“You’re pretty cocky for someone I almost broke up with!” you said glaring at him. He let out a small chuckle before releasing your hands.

“I’m sorry baby. Just, let me do all the work so I can show you how much I love you.”

He pulls your hoodie off and throws it across the room. He begins placing a trail of kisses all over your chest, slowly nipping and sucking at it and leaving love bites. He gives your breasts a hard squeeze as he sucks on your nipple, moans leave your lips as pleasure clouds your head. His tongue caressed between your breast as he made his way down to your stomach, leaving kisses in between as he stopped right above your shorts.

“I’ve barely touch you yet I can smell your juices babe.” he teases as his fingers play with the waistband of your shorts.

“Please don’t tease me Hwa.” you said half whispering.

Seonghwa smirks as pulls down your shorts and leaves you in your panties, he leaves a trail of wet kisses on your bare thighs.

“Seonghwa,” you whined “Ple--please don’t.”

“Don’t do what babe?” He said as he stood up and wrapped his arms around you, pulling you closer to his body.

“Ple--please stop teasing me.”

You gasped as he sunk his teeth into your neck, sucking and abusing it. Your moans got louder as the pain turn into pleasure. He slipped his right hand between your legs and caresses your heat over your soaked panties. You grabbed his hair and pulled his face closer to yours, pulling him into a rough kiss. You pushed him backwards against the bed so you were on top of him but Seonghwa was quick to flip you over and positioned you in a way you were lying on your stomach.

“I said no touching.” he said in a stern way, his voice turned low and seductive. You felt yourself getting wetter hearing his voice that way. Your breathing got faster with each passing minute.

“Hands up on the bed and keep your head down.” he ordered.

You could hear him move around the room, the anticipation was killing you. He traced his finger around your back, sending chills all over your body. He started to place soft kisses on random spots on your back.

“Emm, baby you smell so good.” he says as he nuzzles your neck from behind. He rubs your breast and slips his finger in your panties, catching you off guard.

Seonghwa moves his fingers on your clit slowly, his fingers moving in a circular motion. You threw your head back and leaned against his chest. Your vision starts to become cloudy as he applies more pressure to your clit.

“Seonghwa.” you moaned up his name.

He uses his free hand to brush your hair to the side and attacks your neck, giving him complete control over you. He sucked hard on your neck as his fingers rubs your clit. You could feel your legs getting weaker as his fingers picks up their pace.

“Hwa--please--” you moaned as his touch got slower. “Seonghwa-- don’t stop.” you begged but it was no use, he stop right before you were about to reach your high. You whined at the lost of his touch as he pulls his fingers away and flips you over to face him.

“Don’t worry baby, I’m not done with you yet.”

He slips his wet fingers into your mouth, making you suck on it and taste yourself. He groaned at the sight of you sucking on his fingers. He pulled his fingers away and kisses you, gently sucking on your bottom lip.

You pulled him closer to you and deepened the kiss; you wanted him so badly. Your hands wandered to his shirt as you quickly unbuttoned it and threw it to the side of the bed. You traced your hands over his lean abs as you placed your lips on it, leaving art kisses down his happy trail, slowly kneeling down.

You looked up at Seonghwa, teasing him as you played with his belt, unbuckling it slowly as you ran your tongue on his v-line.

“Is this your payback for me teasing you earlier?” He smiled at you as his pants slid down and pooled around his feet. His boxers was stained with his precum.

You gave him a wink and pulled his boxers off and took his hard dick in your hand, slowly rubbing his precum all over his red tip with your thumb. You could hear his breathing get shallow. You positioned yourself properly between his legs and took him in your mouth, one hand slowly moving up and down his dick while another massages his balls.

Seonghwa let out a loud groan as you moved faster and deep-throated him. His eyes were shut tight, his moans and groans were music to your ears. You licked and massage the tip of his dick, causing him to throw his head back. You name left his lips as he gritted his teeth, sweat started to form on his forehead. He groaned as you slowed down your movements and pulled away from his dick.

“Fucking hell y/n.” He cussed under his breath, he pulled you up to his face by your chin.

“I want you to face that mirror and ride me.” he said as he stared intensely into your eyes, his hands placed on your waist. “I want you to watch yourself riding me, understand?”

You bit your lip and nodded. He placed a soft kiss on your lips and positioned you on him. You lowered yourself slowly down on him with your back against his chest. A moan left your lips as you felt him stretching your walls. His hands were on your hips, guiding you as you started moving.

“Fuck.” you cried out as you felt him deep in you

Seonghwa’s head was buried in the crook of your neck, you could hear his breathing getting heavy. He began to move you up and down. Watching your reflection in the mirror drove you crazy, seeing him slid in and out of you threw you over the edge. Both of you were a moaning mess.

You forced yourself off him and turned yourself towards him before sliding onto him again, your boddies wrapping around each other. Seonghwa pulls you into a sloppy kiss as you grinned on him, you both moaned into each other’s mouth.

You wrapped your legs around him as he slowly lies you down on the bed, so he was on top of you. He began to thrust hard and deep into you as you screamed his name, your nails dug into his back.

“Fuck baby, you feel so good.” he groans as he moved faster.

Sweat was dripping from his body. He pressed his wet chest on yours, veins popping out of his neck as he grunted and bit his lip. His breathing getting hard and shaky. He pounded into you harder almost knocking your sanity away. Your vision starts too blur as your mind clouded with pleasure.

“Hwa, I’m going to--”

“Cum for me baby. I want you to come all over my dick.” He said as he thrusted deeper, pushing in and out of you as your walls began to tightened around him. “Fucking hell baby, you’re so tight.”

“Fuck, Seonghwa!” You moaned loudly as he hit your g-spot.

Your back arched as he abused the same spot over and over again. You screamed his name out and wrapped your legs tighter around him. Seonghwa buries his head in your neck as you both reach your climax.

“OH MY GOD, FUCK.” you screamed out as you could feel yourself about to reach your high. Seonghwa’s eyes were shut close as he moaned out your name. He rolled his hips onto yours as your walls tightened around him.

“Seonghwa!” you yelled out as your walls tighten and filled with pleasure.

A few thrust later and Seonghwa comes undone into you. You watched him curse under his breath as his arm muscles flex with each thrust, both of you ridding out your highs. Seonghwa slows down his movements and rested his forehead on yours, both of you trying to catch your breaths.

“I really fucking love you, y/n.” Seonghwa whispered as he catches his breath, “I know I am an asshole but please forgive me. You’re my soulmate remember? and I can’t live without you.”

You did forgive him but you were too tired to reply him, so instead you just gave him a little smile. Seonghwa sat up, taking you along with him and cuddling you in his arms. You nuzzled your head in his chest; you were back in your happy place. You both stayed like that for a while, Seonghwa occasionally giving you kisses on you head and whispering sweet promises while you stayed quiet. You really love him with all your heart. You looked up eat him and kiss him gently on the lips, then on both of his cheeks.

“What was that for?” He said raising an eyebrow.

“For coming back, I love you Seonghwa.”

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witharsenicsauce · 3 years

Text

Two Hunters, Both Alike in Sympathy (SFTD/Chosen Stories Crossover)

(I know this is a couple days late, but happy belated anniversary to @grace-kohai and her wonderful story! Inspired by a year of happenings over at the SFTD Discord, thank you for giving my Gur-Rai an even bigger family!)

Content Warning: This story has mentions of relationship/parental abuse

Mordenna heard her footsteps before he saw her, and as the cloak melted away to reveal Kon-Mai Mordenna, he knew she had wanted him to find her.

He stepped away from his workbench and turned, smiling warmly until he saw her face: lined with worry. “Something troubling you, sister of mine?”

Kon-Mai nodded and stepped closer. “Mordenna…” She hesitated saying his name “-I’m sorry, it feels strange to use that to refer to someone else.”

“It’s a good name, I’m glad to share it with you.” He chuckled. “But I don’t think you’re here to discuss that.”

“No, I am here to discuss my brother...our brother. Gur-Rai.”

“Oh yeah?” Mordenna raised a brow, intrigued. “What about him?”

“You two have been spending a lot of time together.” She said, leaning on the bench. “Do you think he trusts you, Mordenna?”

Mordenna blinked. “I hope I haven’t given him any reason not to.” He said. Truthfully, he had been spending more time with Gur-Rai than the others, but that was only because the younger Hunter always seemed to seek him out, especially in the workshop. And Mordenna had to admit, Gur-Rai was a nice workshop buddy, and he wasn’t going to say no to a (particularly skilled) extra set of hands. True, Gur-Rai was also a bit more…intense than Mordenna was, but in him was a kindness that the Elders seemed not to have been able to stamp out. Mordenna found solace in that.

“I assume you have heard tell of his newest lover.” She curled her lip on the last word. “The Rookie, Emil.”

Mordenna thought for a moment. “...I haven’t been upstairs in a minute.”

“He was the one throwing a tantrum in the halls two days ago, because nobody could fix his Gewehr 98/40.”

“Oh. Oh.” Mordenna hissed. “That guy. Served him right for bringing a bolt-action to a plasma fight.” He then thought for a moment. “...Gur-Rai’s dating him?”

“Gur-Rai managed to fix the gun.” Kon-Mai elaborated. “And I suppose Emil whispered some sweet nothings into my brother’s ear that made him fall head over heels, like he does.”

“Is that why you look upset?” Mordenna asked.

“It’s why I am here to ask for help.” Kon-Mai replied. “I believe Emil is a liability to those of us on this ship, but more importantly I fear very much that he will lash out at my brother. That he’ll do something to hurt him.”

“So what do you need from me?” Mordenna leaned forward, both hands on the bench. “Because I’m not murdering someone over a tantrum. Trust me if I did, my blood trail would be thicker and stop much sooner.”

“I do not need him dead. Yet.” Kon-Mai hissed. “If it did come to that, I would not be calling on you. What I need help with is convincing my brother to let this rat of a man go before this relationship spirals into a sinkhole.”

Mordenna nodded. “And…why won’t he listen to you? He’s my brother too, but you’ve been around him longer than me.”

“That is why. I have developed a reputation for worrying about my brothers…” She brushed a strand of white hair behind her tiny ear. “...Perhaps to an excessive degree, I admit. If I confront him with this myself, I fear he will assume I’m being paranoid and disregard me, or worse: dig his heels in further.”

“And you actually think this guy is bad news?” Mordenna asked. “I’m not doubting your judgement, but if I’m stepping in, I need more proof than just ‘your sister thinks the guy is a prick.’”

“I would not trust him on a mission with any of our fellows.” Kon-Mai said. “He is volatile, he is argumentative and throws insults around like rice at a wedding. I would go so far as to say it seems like he is intentionally causing sabotage.”

Mordenna bit his lip. “Hearty claims, Kon-Mai.”

“I know they are. I have been staking him out myself but only recently, in case he truly does pose a threat. But in the meantime…” She clasped her hands. “I just want to be assured my brother is safe.”

“Well how about this, I’ll check up on Gur-Rai. If it seems like he needs help, I have ways of making sure nobody messes with him.” He shuffled forward. “But I can’t promise anything.”

“Just…as long as you try.” Kon-Mai bowed to him. “Thank you, Mordenna. I owe you so much.”

“You just owe me one thing.” He opened his arms. “Come on. Being siblings means you gotta pay your dues.”

Kon-Mai rolled her eyes and embraced him, giving him a squeeze almost as strong as Jax would.

Mordenna was originally going to find Gur-Rai when he was done with his project, but he didn’t need to. Behind him, the door slid open, and as he turned around, he saw Gur-Rai shamble inside, that stupid German rifle in his arms and eyes cast to the floor.

Mordenna’s heart dropped and his brows went up. “Hey, little brother.” He said, trying to sound casual so as not to scare him, but Gur-Rai still startled.

“Hey.” He gave Mordenna a quick, unsure smile and then took up one of the benches, quickly getting to work on the gun. Mordenna peeked over and caught a glimpse of a huge chunk of the wood splintered off, and the metal underneath was bent and peeling away.

“You still messing with that thing?” Mordenna murmured. “I’d just let it go. That gun is older than me.”

“Aw. You’re not old.” Gur-Rai muttered, his voice lacking it’s usual chirp.

“I’m older than you.” Mordenna put down his own project and slowly moved around the bench. “I just hit my fifties and am still going strong.”

Gur-Rai stopped and looked up. “...No way. You’re lying.”

“It’s true. I was in my thirties when the Elders nabbed me.”

“I think even I was younger than that.” Gur-Rai looked interested. “You must’ve been a great shot, for an old timer~”

“I would’ve taught you everything I knew.” Mordenna patted his hood, mindful not to pull it down at all. “I know your Volk is being an asshole and that’s his loss. I’d be proud of you, Gur-Rai. Even after all that, you haven’t lost that spark in your eye yet.”

Gur-Rai fell silent and stared down at the gun on the table. “...Really?”

“Yeah. You’re not as jaded as me, that’s for sure.” Mordenna chuckled. “Take my advice, now that the Elders aren’t holding your leash, hang onto that spark. It’s a wonderful thing you got there, and it makes people really happy to see.”

“What do you mean it makes them happy?” Gur-Rai grabbed some pliers and began pulling off the damaged wood. “And be straight with me, Mords. I don’t want jokes right now, and I really don’t want pity.”

Mordenna paused. “...Hey.” He put his hand closer to Gur-Rai’s arm, almost dangerously so. “What’s going on?”

“I don’t want anyone else telling me how good a person I am when clearly, that is not the case.” With a crack, the remaining wood broke into two pieces and flew across the table. “At best? I’m annoying and childish, and at worst I’m a psychopath who uses humor to forget the horrible things I’ve done, and the latter is probably the most accurate.” He tossed the pliers aside. “Nobody is getting joy from this ugly mug, Mords. Only the Elders do, when they hear me scream.”

Mordenna paused, knowing he’d just hit a huge nerve and would have to proceed slowly. Luckily though, it also seemed like he unearthed something. “Do you really think of yourself that way?” He said softly. “Or is that what someone told you?”

“Does it matter?”

“Yes, it does.” Mordenna put his hand on Gur-Rai’s shoulder. “Put down the tools for a minute. We gotta talk.”

“Talk? About what?” Gur-Rai turned to face Mordenna. “I already know where babies come from.”

“Well that’s good but that’s not what I mean.” Mordenna leaned against the bench beside him. “Does all this have to do with that broken gun at all?”

Gur-Rai sighed. “...It was my fault.”

“Doubt it. But continue.”

“Emil was trying to fix a chip in the wood, I couldn’t really tell what he was doing, and I reached around to kiss him and...I guess I knocked the gun, and something came loose…” He gestured to the table.

“And your giving him a kiss managed to bend the metal?” Mordenna sounded skeptical.

“No, just chip the wood. The rest--the huge gash on the side and the metal--he did himself when he threw it at me.”

“He what.” Mordenna suddenly, deeply understood Kon-Mai’s worry. In fact, he was beginning to see red himself. “Over a scratch on a gun that should have been decommissioned before he was born?”

“I guess it’s a super important gun.” Gur-Rai muttered. “More important than me. And…yeah. I believe the exact words were ‘I could get any Muton with a dick twice your size and less of an attitude to fuck me, it’d feel exactly the same and be a lot easier.’”

Mordenna paused. “And then you offered to...fix his gun?”

“I mean, I broke it.” Gur-Rai crossed his arms. “And I just…” He pulled away from Mordenna, moving toward the middle of the room and stopping. “I’m gonna bring it to him later with some wine or something, he’ll take it all back…he’s been a sweetheart before, he made me feel…” From the crack in his voice, Mordenna could tell he was holding back tears. “Special. Chosen. And I went and fucked it up just like I did before.”

Mordenna knew of Gur-Rai’s other relationships (and the details, thanks in part to Gur-Rai’s prolific storytelling), but something about the way he said that felt different. It rang in Mordenna’s ears, loud and familiar.

“It’s not your fault that Camazotz hurt you.” Was all he said.

That seemed to do it. Gur-Rai curled in on himself like a shriveled up leaf, and began to shake violently as he sobbed into his hands. Mordenna came up behind him and put a gentle hand on his back, which then turned into him taking Gur-Rai by the shoulders and pulling him into a loose hug. Gur-Rai froze for a moment, still shaking, and then wrapped his arms around Mordenna so tight it almost made the latter cough. He buried his face in Mordenna’s shoulder and let out a weak, quiet sob.

“You didn’t fuck anything up.” He assured him, speaking to him as he would a comforting child. “Camazotz…maybe he thought he loved you, but what he did isn’t love. And it’s not how you treat your children. You didn’t deserve to be hurt by him, and you didn’t deserve a gun chucked in your face today.”

Gur-Rai sounded like he was trying to speak, but it came out as sobbing once again. Mordenna guided him over to a sitting bench and the two collapsed onto it, With Gur-Rai retreating into himself again until Mordenna unwrapped him from that knot and brought him back into his arms.

“I know how you feel.” He said. “God, I spent so long trying to get Odin to be proud of me. And sometimes he’d shell out little bits of praise, bits of affection that kept me hanging on just that much longer, but that’s not enough. It’s not enough to occasionally say you love someone until they upset you, because people who really love you will love you even when they’re angry.”

Gur-Rai flinched at that. “God, please, no. I can’t…I don’t want anyone else to hate me.”

“Gur-Rai, this ship is full of people who love you.” Mordenna insisted. “Let's start with your siblings. Your sister loves you so, so much, you know that?”

“I make her worry.”

“She worries herself, which is her own problem. But she wants you to be safe and happy. Your brother too. And us.” Mordenna rubbed his back. “You’ve been spending so much time down here with me…I feel like we’ve been family forever.”

Gur-Rai hesitated…then he looked up and chuckled. “I mean, you are old enough to be my dad.”

Mordenna snorted, then smirked. “Okay, fine. As your new dad, I’m vetoing all of Camazotz’s previous rulings.”

“Wait.” Gur-Rai blinked. “...Mords. Mords you…” He shook his head. “You probably shouldn't…you know me, I’m a trainwreck on very long legs! I’ll give you a heart attack before you hit 55!”

“Do you realize who you’re talking to?” Mordenna chuckled. “If Odin had had hair, I like to think I’d have turned him grey years ago. I’m not intimidated by the concept of guiding a slightly younger, frankly more childlike version of myself.” His face softened. “If you want it.”

“I…” Gur-Rai swallowed. “I just never had a dad…like a real dad…what do I even do?”

“First off, you sit here and let me hold you while you cry.” Mordenna pulled Gur-Rai back into a hug. “And, when I tell you I love you…you believe me.”

“...Okay.” Gur-Rai squeezed Mordenna back, burying his face in the warmth of his father’s shoulder. “Okay. I can do that.”

“Good job. I…” Mordenna swallowed. “I love you, kiddo. Just as you are.”

As Gur-Rai settled in, and Mordenna gently rocked him back and forth, he began to plan out in his mind exactly what he would do to Emil when he was done down here. It had been a hot minute since Eliza had let him interrogate someone.

And maybe he’d bring Kon-Mai along too.

(I know SFTD will be reaching it’s final act sooner rather than later, let me just say again what an honor it has been to read it, to fully appreciate the Chosen and to get inspiration for my own story too! Hoping for more wonderful writings in the future!)

#xcom #xcom 2 #xcom hunter #chosen hunter #mordenna is a good dad #gur-rai is just a boy

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gingerwritess · 4 years

Note

Ok so first of all just read your latest installment of predating idiots and OMG IM IN LOVE, as always when I read your fics!😍 you were asking for ideas and my brain spit out a random piece of crap, feel free to hate it.... maybe Loki/Laing has another patient, that requires a LOT of magic to heal, and he uses so much effort in that his illusion starts to fade and reader sees his scars again and patches him up I guess? Angsty, soft, want to trust each other but afraid? Feel free to hate it😂

GASP i love it !!! thank you for sending this in! (combined with a request for “fingertips trailing over a bare shoulder blade” from @grufflepuff !)

part 15 FINALLY of predating idiots, featuring much idiocy, lots of cluelessness, and slow progression towards understanding

warning: includes mentions of Loki’s past abuse, descriptions of injuries, blood

— — — —

Robert Laing, as you are slowly finding out, has gathered quite the reputation among Stark employees.

Scattered whispers of saving a life, curing a disease, even reattaching limbs float among the break rooms and bathroom sinks, following you everywhere you try to escape.

Whether any of that is true or just a rumour started by the “doctor” himself, you don’t care.

Loki is…confusing. Not someone you should be worrying about when rebuilding your life is looking up, your professional life seems to be doing well, and someone even left a gift card for the bakery you frequent on your desk.

You’re guessing Marcus, one of your guards. The one who holds the doors for you—“not because you can’t,” he’d assured you, “just because I can.”

Your romantic life can’t possibly be on the rise, too, when everything else is going so well, right??

The rumours about you have started circulating, too.

Popular opinion decided that you and Dr. Laing never broke up in the first place, so you find yourself back in that fake little relationship—without having talked to the other member in nearly a month.

That does make it easier, though.

Acting is much simpler done solo.

Until, of course, someone comes up and asks you how skydiving over Paris was last weekend and you realise that oh yeah, this fake-relationship has to go two ways.

One of these days, one of you will screw this up.

You just weren’t ready for it to be today, and you always figured it’d be you who screws it up.

—

“I’ve made a mistake.”

You’ve heard that before—and in that case, you were the mistake he was referring to.

“I don’t care,” you reply, not bothering to look up from your laptop.

“Please.”

Figures that he chooses now to come taunt you.

“I’m sick of you, Loki, I’m not joking. Leave.”

All you hear in response is a heavy thud.

“Get out,” you repeat, slamming your hands on the desk as you stand. “I swear to god, I don’t want to hear—oh, my god.”

Fallen to his hands and knees, Loki’s covered in blood.

“What the hell—”

It’s not Loki, but it’s not Laing, either.

You slam the door shut and drop to your knees by his side. “What happened to you?”

“Messed up,” he grunts, eyes squeezed shut. “Can’t go to anyone else.”

Yeah, clearly; he’s half-and-half, right now, if anyone else saw him, there’s no denying who he is. Dark eyebrows furrow in pain over Loki’s blue-green eyes, but his hair is as short as Laing’s—though still as dark as Loki’s.

If he weren’t bleeding through his lab coat, you’d surely make fun of him for it…and desperately ignore how short, curly hair really suits him.

“How do you—uh, what do you want me to do?”

He winces, smashing a fist against the floor with a grunt of pain. “I need a cloth,” he says hoarsely. “Extra shirt, towel, something. Stop the blood.”

Nodding quickly, you hurry to the nearest bathroom and grab a handful of paper towels—they’ll have to do.

For a split-second you pause at the door. Déja vu sends your mind reeling—you’ve been in this situation before.

Loki has crawled to you before, bruised and bloodied, and here he is again.

“If you’re looking for gratitude, mortal, look elsewhere.”

You hear a grating cough from behind the door and steel yourself.

Compassion doesn’t come with gratitude.

You’ve already almost killed him twice now; the least you could do is not make it thrice.

“I need you to sit in a chair,” you say when you slip back through the door, shutting it behind you. “Come on, I’ll help you up.”

Setting the paper towels on the desk, you crouch beside his slumped form and sling his arm over your shoulders, heaving him as best you can into one of the chairs in front of your desk.

His weight falls limp onto your support—like a dead weight. Slumped and defeated.

The bleeding is coming from his back, no doubt from the cuts you saw all those days ago.

“Loki?”

Another grunt.

“I’m going to help you.” You crouch in front of him to meet his pained gaze. “But. You cannot threaten me, wipe my memory, kill me, or anything else to undermine my help after this.”

Slumped forward and gripping his knees to his chest, his eyes remain fixed on yours, silent.

“Is that clear?” Placing a tentative hand on his shoulder, you raise an eyebrow at him. “I don’t trust you, I need to hear you say it.”

He grits his teeth, but croaks out a quiet “I understand” all the same.

“Great,” you smile dryly. “I’m gonna have to touch you, too, I hope that’s okay.”

All you get is a quick nod.

“Can you take your shirt off?”

Coat caked with blood, you take it from him and gingerly dump it in the trash before helping him carefully peel the soaked button-up from his torso.

“No questions,” he chokes, immediately going back to hugging his knees to his chest.

You can’t bring yourself to respond.

This is worse than you could’ve imagined.

“What happened?”

Ignoring his request completely, you quickly whet some of the paper towels and set to work wiping the blood off any unopened patches of skin, as few as there are.

His whole body jerks with each touch, every gentle press on a cut, and he ignores your question just the same.

“Loki,” you say again. “Just tell me what happened this time.”

Something awful, clearly, but surely not as bad as whatever made these scars in the first place. Blood trickles from each of the countless reopened wounds, and he just sits there, silently shaking as if the pain he must be feeling actually feels like nothing at all.

Your heart pounds, and you fear you can’t be soft enough for how badly he’s broken.

“Please, tell me something.”

“I made a mistake.” His voice cracks and wavers, like it might die altogether. “As usual.”

“Did you…blow your cover?”

“Nearly.”

“What happened?”

You know there’s a first aid kit in the bottom drawer of your desk, so you hurry to retrieve it when the blood flow slows, and Loki quietly answers.

“I tried to take another patient. Shrapnel lodged behind the ear, nothing I can’t handle. But people were watching, I–I had too many illusions, I couldn’t—”

“Loki,” you interrupt with a wince, the couple bandages from the kit in hand. “Get rid of all the illusions you’re using.”

“What?”

“I, uh, don’t know how your illusions work.” You tap the back of his head. “But your hair is still short, and that means you’ve still got one on. We should be treating you, just you. No illusions, then maybe you can actually heal.”

You hold your breath—he’ll either do it, or that’ll be the straw to break the camel’s back…

“No questions,” comes the quiet reply.

“No promises.”

He’s silent as the last bits of his energy wash over him.

“Loki.”

“I said no questions.”

Black and blue and purple and yellowed, he’s pale, bruised and lashed to pieces, slouched in front of your desk with his head on his knees, his spine protruding much too prominently from his skeletal frame.

Minutes from death, manifested in a human form.

“Oh, my god,” is all you can manage. You can’t wrap the bandages fast enough, shaking hands holding gauze to the cuts and wrapping the bandages tight around his chest and stomach. “Oh, my god.”

Securing the last bandage, you stumble away from him, still staring in horror at the barely alive form struggling to breathe.

“Don’t look,” he rasps.

You don’t want to, in all honesty, but you round his chair and crouch in front of him, cautiously laying a hand on his arm. He flinches as expected, but slowly lifts his head to look at you.

This isn’t a god.

“Oh, my god.”

“Stop,” he hisses, shoving your hand off his arm. “Stop pitying me, stop, stop it—”

“Shut up,” you order, still gaping at the state of his face, and surprisingly, he does.

Bloody, dotted wounds line his dry, cracked lips, his eyes sunken and bloodshot, lined with yellowed flesh that seems as if it’s been blistered from too much heat. You stare, shamelessly.

“Are you quite done—”

“No.”

Stuck in a horrified trance, you lift a hand towards his face and carefully, gently trace your fingertips along the wounds lining his mouth.

Those ones are peculiar. Small and precise, matched perfectly along the upper lip and under the lower.

Your mind jumps to the worst and you try not to entertain the possibility of needles, but Loki gives a grim laugh.

“Had to silence the silvertongue somehow.”

Your stomach churns just at the thought.

“Who did this to you?”

“That’s not of any importance.”

“This isn’t okay,” you say, a finger moving helplessly to trace down his nose, bruised and looking as though it’s been broken a couple times. “Oh, my god, Loki, you have to tell someone.”

He shakes his head, that same grim smile on his grotesque face. “People only listen to what they want to hear.”

“I–I think they’ll want to hear about this!” You gesture incredulously at, well, all of him. “Obviously someone was using you, tell Thor.”

“No. They wanted an origin story, so I gave them one.”

“But it’s a lie,” you plead, pulling yourself to unsteady feet.

“God of lies.” He points a bony finger at his chest.

Caught up in the shock of his horribly beaten state, you don’t catch the confession.

“Well, y-you need help,” you decide, voice shaky. Your hand ghosts along his shoulder, bringing a wince to the god when you reach his bruised neck. “Can I take you to a hospital?”

“Absolutely not.” Closing his eyes, he takes a couple deep, steadying breaths and the wounds start to fade, some stitching themselves shut. “Please, move your hand.”

You do, quickly pulling your hand back from his neck.

“At least tell me what’s going on.”

“I messed up,” he slowly replies, still focused with eyes closed. “Bit off more than I could stomach.”

“Learning your limits is good,” you offer quietly.

He gives a dry, breathy laugh, hands starting to shake as his skin returns to a normal, healthy colour. “I’m the only one keeping myself alive, at the moment,” he explains. “Between trying to heal, keeping up a facade, and now trying to treat your wounded kind, I’m losing strength.”

You hesitate, unsure as to why he would be admitting that to you.

“Losing the double was a relief.” He’s still talking, eyes shut and a trembling hand brushing over the the needlepoint wounds lining his mouth. “I couldn’t have kept it up much longer anyways.”

“Can’t you talk to Thor?”

“No, I—”

“Why not?”

He shakes his head. “I can’t go back to Asgard.”

“But Thor will understand,” you press again, meeting his gaze when he finally opens his eyes. “He’s your brother, all you have to do is explain what happened to you…don’t laugh.”

Loki just keeps laughing, shaking his head and leaning back in his chair. Cold and humourless, but now falsely stronger.

“He’s not my brother.”

“What do you mean?” You laugh, too, just once and puzzled. “Of course he’s your brother, he talks about you all the time and calls you his brother—”

“I am not of the house of Odin,” Loki whispers, and a sick smile works it’s way onto his face. “If you knew what I am, you would have killed me when I asked you to.”

You steel yourself, gaze hardening against his own.

“No.”

“No?”

“I’m not doing this again.”

His eyebrow lifts—you glare back, no backing down this time.

“Doing…what, exactly?”

“Anything that has to do with you,” you snap.

It’s just more illusions, you know, but he gets so cocky and mean and cold when the facade is up. Always after you finish patching him up and send him back on his way.

The god smiles.

“I’m sick of you taking advantage of me,” you quickly blurt before he can say anything. “A–and I don’t get why you won’t just help yourself by talking to someone.”

“No one wants to hear my story,” he says simply. “Trust me.”

“You’re wrong.”

One of the bandages slips out of place, the end of it falling onto his thigh.

With a sigh, you trudge behind him again, grab the bandage, and start winding it around him, sure to make it more secure this time. “Kindness isn’t some myth,” you huff, tugging tighter than may be necessary. “Some people actually care about others and actually want to help other people on their journeys, but the universe hates you, hm?”

Loki doesn’t respond anything more than a grunt when you yank the bandage tight against one of the cuts.

“I get it though.” The bandage secure, your hands come to a stop just below his neck, staring at one of the scars streaking along his shoulder blade. “It’s a lot easier to feel sorry for yourself than to ask for help.”

“Don’t belittle me.”

You try not to roll your eyes. All that, and that’s how he interprets it.

“Well. If you ever get around to swallowing your pride, just know that there’s people willing to help you.”

Your gaze drops from the scar to his shoulder blade, half covered with a bandage but still adding a lovely dip to the planes of his battered back.

Without thinking, you touch him one more time.

“People like you?” He asks sharply, tensing under your touch.

Your fingers trail ever so softly, barely there to begin with, along the edge of his shoulder blade.

“Yeah.”

― ― ― ―

fuel the writer?

~ masterlist link in my bio ~

loki tags: @bluediamond007 @himitoshi @drakesfiance @destiel1597 @dangertoozmanykids101 @archy3001 @jcalpha1 @yzssie @skullvieplu @forthesnakeofdragons @skulliebythesea @wegingerangelica @storiesfrommirkwood @agarwaeneth @adaliamalfoy @laurfangirl424@fitzsimmons-is-forever @ladylokimischief @katelinwrites @tarynkauai @polaristrange @loavesofmeat @canadian-ravenpuff-multishipper @lou-makes-me-strong @holyn0vak @chocolatealmondmillk @swtnrholland @kenzieam @jessiejunebug @catticas @the-republic-and-face-of-texas

~ breaking up the taglist to fix the scrolling problem! ~

@doralupin01 @whitewitchdown @atomiccharmer @falconfeather23435 @babygirlicecream @avengrcs @vethrvolnir2 @bookgirlunicorn @wabisabigrl @myhealingstar @khaleesi-marvel @ei77777 @spacecrumbs @scarlettghost13 @rocks-are-pretty-odd @confessionsofastrugglingteen @easilydistractedwriter @arttasticgreatnessoftheawesome77 @fluffyllamaswearinghats @milktearose @lcyouinhell @h0tshotholland @dontmesswithmemundane @southsidesarcasticwriter @helnik-s @lilith-akemi @fire-in-her-veinz @unlikelysamwinchesteronahunt @mischievousbellerina @kcd15

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@highfuncti0ningfangirl @epicfallenismine @stubby-toe-589331 @fandomnerdsarecool @retrofantasyland @arch-venus25 @forever-trapped-in-my-dreams @littleredstarfish @marshyrebelcloud @okie–loki @atterodominatus @stfxlou @pandacookieowo @tonakings @shinisenko @tinchentitri @nildespirandum @thefallenbibliophilequote @vodka-and-some-sass @highfunctioningfangirl19 @sadwaywardkid @lokioneshot @brooksaza @wild-honey-piy @ellaenchanted91 @watermelon-lights19 @just-another-romantic @skinny-macncheese @lokisironthrone @rorybutnotgilmore

#loki x reader #loki reader insert #loki imagine #loki slowburn series #loki x reader fluff #pre-dating idiots #loki requests #lets get some tension up in here #loki fanfiction #loki drabbles #loki laufeyson

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ashintheairlikesnow · 4 years

Text

Welcome to Surgery: Kauri

CW: MEDICAL WHUMP - includes muzzling, dehumanization, past noncon ref pet whump, and the leadup to hospital/surgery whump (which will be in Kauri’s next piece, just as a warning). Also some thoughts on an abusive relationship from the perspective of someone still trapped in the cycle of abuse. stay safe.

Tagging: @maybeawhumpblog, @pepperonyscience, @haro-whumps, @18-toe-beans, @burtlederp, @finder-of-rings, @giggly-evil-puppy, @whimpers-and-whumpers, @whump-it, @lumpofwhump, @pumpkinthefangirl

“Aw, he’s sleeping.”

Kauri jerks awake at the soft male voice entirely too close to him, trying to pull away and curl up, turning his face against the cold tile floor with something like a whimper. He shivers in his regulation clothes, the thin white shirt and black shorts hardly enough against the chill in the stale, recirculated air coming from a vent somewhere up in the ceiling.

They had blindfolded him, after the last visit from the handlers, and in a room that is nothing but thin white light and identical white walls and 162 white tiles, he doesn’t really mind the darkness. At least it’s something different than the white.

He doesn’t want more handlers, more black sticks, more punishment that they keep telling him isn’t even his actual discipline. This isn’t the same place, they say. He’s not here for training. There will be a new kind of discipline, here.

His mind runs in circles, every day he’s stuck in the room where the light never changes, the tiles never count to any other number, and there’s not even a single black speck on the wall to think about. Only thinks about what he did wrong, and what they’ll do to fix it.

Discipline is a necessary and humane event ensuring the continued obedience and well-being of a pet

shut up shut up shut up

“Hey, it’s okay, buddy.” A hand moves roughly through his hair and Kauri flinches away, tries to twist himself free, lifts his hands to push at the stranger’s arms. Fingers twist into the clean, brittle black curls until his scalp hurts. “Hey. No, sir,” The voice scolds, like he’s a misbehaving dog. “We don’t do that here. Look, I don’t want to pull a handler in, but if I have to…”

Kauri goes very, very still, drops his hands back down immediately. Just as quickly as the sudden grip had tightened, it loosens and the hand starts petting him again.

Kauri gets it - he doesn’t try to escape this time.

“There you go,” The voice coos. “Good, good, 645898.”

He doesn’t know this voice at all, but it’s the first touch since he was brought back here - two weeks or three weeks or maybe just two days ago - that hasn’t involved hitting him with something. He takes a breath as the fingers relax and start carding through his curls again. He doesn’t know who it is, or what they’re going to do, but… it feels so good. So much better than everything else has felt. “Ssshhh, it’s okay. It’s okay, buddy. You worried about those big mean guards coming back? Don’t be scared, it’s just us, bud. Just us. We don’t even have those big old sticks, we’re the scientists. You can trust us.”

The voice isn’t familiar - but Kauri’s life has been reduced to pain and the chalky drink they give him instead of food. Maybe he has heard this voice before and he just doesn’t remember. The voice talks to him like he should know it, at least, and Kauri’s days have run together anyway.

They’re boiled down to daydreams about how good it had been with Owen, how nice Owen had been to him, and how much he wished he’d just… understood how fortunate he was. If he’d only been grateful for the life Owen gave him, for the way he touched him and treated him - if he’d only been grateful that Owen let him spend unsupervised time with another pet, this would never have happened.

This is what you get.

He’s here to be repaired, but no one will tell him what the repair is, exactly. They just leave him here in this room, and then they hurt him with the black sticks, and then they leave again. He hasn’t seen anyone from before, he doesn’t think - his original training is still fuzzy, beyond individual memories that come and go - except for a single handler.

It had been the one with dark hair and eyes and expensive black boots. He’d come by and smiled with the same sharp flash as the light off the edge of a knife. That handler came by to see him.

His own, Everly, didn’t. He’s not Everly’s trainee anymore - as far as he can tell, he’s not anyone’s actual trainee any longer. But… in a world both numbingly familiar and totally new, Kauri had sort of expected to see Everly as a part it, too.

No visit from him… but Handler Connor came by.

Long time no see, 645898. Did you miss our days together that much? Had to act up just so you could get sent back for disobedience and I could get you up against that wall again?

Y-you can’t touch m-m-me, they, they said I have to be, to be left al, alone… for, for s-s-surgery… He’d still been shaking from the last round of the sticks, the electricity that never seemed to stop racing through his nerves. Kauri hated what being shocked did to his voice, hated it.

No, you’re right. I don’t get to have all that much fun with you. I’m only here for a little… hello. Say hello, sweetness.

H-Hello… Hello, Handler.

Good. So you still know how to follow a real man’s order, at least. Honestly, I’m a little sad you didn’t get handed over to me for repair, but there’s always next time. I missed you. That son of a bitch they sold you to… he doesn’t know how lucky he is.

Kauri had swallowed against a weird feeling at the words, pressed with his back against the wall, Handler Connor in his space without quite touching him, his skin crawling and wishing for touch at the same time. The man who hurt him most here had said something Owen himself never had - that maybe Owen was the lucky one, and Kauri the gift.

H-How lucky… I am?

Oh, sweet thing. If I took you home you’d be trained for pain and I’d count my lucky fucking stars every day. Someone should tell you how perfect you are - those big eyes that get so scared, your hair, I know you’d bleed so well if you went to the right guy with the right knife… someone should tell you you’re perfect. It might as well be me.

He’d felt gratitude, at the closest thing to kind words he’d ever heard from a handler, and disgust at himself for being grateful - both in equal measure.

But… as nice as it was to hear, it isn’t true. Kauri is the one who should be grateful. Owen wants him back - Director Renford promised he did, she said Owen wants him back and even as Kauri, so he clings onto his name and onto how wonderful Owen is, not to want him refurbished after he broke his protocols so badly.

“I don’t know why you insist on doing this.” A second voice - female, maybe? - and Kauri twitches again. The hand gently petting through his hair pauses, and then pulls away, and Kauri fights an urge deep down to reach out and try to pull it back.

Please, please, someone be nice to me again. Someone touch me. Someone be kind. I feel like I’m not real unless someone is touching me.

“Doing what, Delevigne?”

“I don’t know… that. Interacting with them. It’s not like we’ll see him after his post-op care is over with. He’s just a number.”

“I mean, I know, but look, he’s so scared… poor little buddy. You just had a hard time following the rules, huh?” The hand pats through his hair one more time, and then Kauri feels fingers close around his arm, pulling him up. He goes willingly enough, turning his head slowly in the direction the man must be standing. It’s so cold in here that even just being near him is warmer than the air everywhere else, and Kauri unconsciously moves closer, almost pressing against his side.

“Man, gotta love how needy they get,” The man cooed. “He’s a sweetie, right?”

“He’s a skinny, is what he is,” The female voice says, flatly. “Was he skinny when he got here?”

“Yeah. He’s not too skinny, though, he’ll do fine on the table. I think he looks pretty good for his first week in R&D to be honest. They said his owner went a little crazy on him…” A fingertip traces along the dark, healing bruises at Kauri’s throat and he flinches away from it out of sheer surprise, blinking rapidly behind his blindfold. “I’d believe it.”

“That’s an owner for you. Roll of the dice, every time - and don’t tell the Director I said it, but it takes a certain kind of cold motherfucker to order a Romantic, if you ask me.”

“… don’t you own a Romantic, Delevigne?”

There’s a pause, and then a sort of brittle, cynical laughter. “I didn’t say I wasn’t one of those cold motherfuckers, Ty. I work long hours, no time for a relationship - so I bought one. Employee discount makes it a pretty decent investment, actually, especially if you have them trained for housework, too. Besides, I’m only home long enough to even see him awake like twice a week, so I figure he’s got it made. He and my cat are fucking inseparable. He doesn’t complain about it.”

A pause.

“Del, you and I both know they make sure the merchandise is good and grateful before they ever leave. How many of them even can complain? Can yours?”

“You know, I have no idea. I never asked. He’s a really good listener, though.”

The fingers that were so nice in his hair are suddenly back up on his skin, ghosting up Kauri’s cheekbones and around behind his head, untying the blindfold. Kauri blinks hard as his eyes have to adjust to the brighter light coming in behind them in the open doorway, hunching his shoulders just slightly away from the overwhelming sharp… cologne? bodywash? smell and presence of the man in front of him.

The woman is leaning against the doorway with her arms crossed, short dark hair in a pixie cut and thick black glasses perched on her nose. The man has long hair pulled into a low bun at the back of his neck and a bright, engaging smile. Both of them are wearing long white coats with scrubs on underneath. They look more like actors playing scientists or doctors, like the scientists in Owen’s movies, than what Kauri thinks an actual scientist would look like.

There’s a flash, in Kauri’s mind, of a woman standing beside him as he sits on an examination table swinging small legs, getting to pick a toy out of a special box because he’d been so good during his checkup today, and Keira is off to the side playing with her dinosaur toy-

A blinding flash of pain and Kauri whimpers, clenching his eyes shut, as the memory is forced back behind the broken wall of his mind.

“Ooooh, what’s this? You okay, buddy?” Hand in his hair, taking his chin to turn him to look, and it never occurs to Kauri to try and fight the touch, because that’s what being a human pet is - you are touched, or not, and you have no control. He only nods, slowly, breathing in and out. The man takes both hands and begins to rub at his temples, and it feels… so good. “Trying to remember something, huh?” Kauri nods, slowly, keeping his eyes closed. “Well you should know better by now, little man. The whole point is to make sure you can’t do that. Take deep breaths, it’ll pass.”

“I wish you wouldn’t talk to them. This wastes so much time, we could have him halfway prepped by now.”

“Oh, shut up, Del. He’s freaking himself out. You have no heart, you know that?”

“Yeah. That’s why I work here, numbnuts.”

The man rolls his eyes, giving Kauri a bit of a wink, as though they’re conspiring together. Kauri only stares, wide-eyed, unsure how to handle this new type of person entirely unlike anyone else he’d ever met at the Facility. The man pulls his hands back. “There we go… better, right?” The man grins as Kauri slowly nods.

He has a wide mouth, and even with everything that has happened to him, Kauri nearly smiles back on instinct alone. The man’s expression is just that infectious.

The man steps back to look him over, suddenly businesslike. “All right, kiddo, enough time wasted. Let’s see you ready to go.”

Kauri swallows, moving into Position One, clasping one wrist with the other hand behind his back, lifting his chin without ever quite looking them in the eyes, either of them. “G-Good… morning,” He tries, and his voice is rough and hoarse - he’s been screaming too much, wearing his throat back to raw even as it heals from what Owen did.

But when they start hitting him, it’s hard not to scream.

“Mid-afternoon, really,” The woman says dryly. “But a good try, I’ll give you that, ‘898.”

“Look at you, being so good for us,” The man praises, his voice thick with patronizing, condescending affection. Kauri feels blood pooling in his cheeks even as he drops his eyes to the floor. Even Owen never talked to him like this. “What do you think, Del? Isn’t he so good?”

“I think I’m here to do a fucking job, not drool all over the merchandise,” the woman - Delevigne, apparently - says in a voice that is trying for annoyed but mostly landing on amused. “Honestly, Tyler, you spend so much time petting them, it’s a wonder you keep turning down the Director’s offers to give you one for a bonus.”

“Nah, I don’t want that kind of obligation in my life. Bring one home and you have to feed it, give it water…” Tyler frowns, considering. Kauri doesn’t move, doesn’t even shift position. His legs and feet tingle from getting up off the floor, and every once in a while he twitches, a little, an involuntary muscle spasm left over from all the electricity that’s been forced through his skin. Tyler moves up and around him in a slow circle, taking in the visible bruises, the healing marks around his bare neck. “Plus… you know I don’t really like that if you get one everyone assumes you’re sleeping with it.”

“Yeah, well, you and the Director are probably the only ones who don’t at least try it out. You like them so much- why not, Ty?”

“They can’t say no, Del, that’s why.”

“So? Isn’t… that kind of the fucking point?”

Tyler shook his head. “If they can’t say no, they can’t say yes. I’m not interested in taking someone home who can’t consent.”

“Oh, but performing surgery on them-”

“That’s different. What we do here is important work, we’re making really important scientific discoveries about human behavior modification that could impact the industry for decades.” Tyler finally stops, back around in front of Kauri, and reaches out, lifting his chin slowly with two fingers. “Besides, this guy signed a contract.”

None of us ever remember the signing. I bet he knows why we don’t remember signing.

Kauri’s eyes raise and finally meet Tyler’s.

Shining, warm brown, but not the right kind of brown. Not dark and intense, but open and light and all these new eyes do is remind Kauri of what his stupid fucking aberrant behavior cost him… his chance to have something just for him, even if it had been in passing, in private, in the quiet mornings before Owen woke up.

With an aching heart, Kauri looks from the man - Tyler - to the Delevigne woman, waiting for an order, for some idea of what to expect.

Tyler pats him on the back, a little too hard, and he laughs when Kauri stumbles and catches himself, forcing his spine back to straight. “Sorry, bud,” He says in a tone that suggests he doesn’t actually care at all. “Okay, 645898, you need to head to the OR to get prepped. Now normally there’d be more of us involved - you’d have nurses, couple of handlers. But the Director wants this hush-hush, so Del and I are it as far as getting you into the room today. Can you handle that? Can you follow us like a good boy?”

Kauri bites back some hint of himself - of who he really was, maybe - that wanted to snap if you stop talking to me like I’m a dog, I’ll get right on it. All he does is look between the two of them again and slowly, carefully nod.

“I can follow you.”

Just because they aren’t handlers doesn’t mean they won’t have the black sticks, or some other way to hurt him.

When the Delevigne woman twists herself around to grab something that must have been hanging on the hooks outside his door, Kauri feels his stomach drop. “W-wait-” He whispers, barely able to manage even that much of a protest. He’s not drugged, but he’s hungry, they haven’t given him any of the chalk-drink since yesterday. The world is seems to smudge itself, a little, around the edges. “Wait, I’ve never w-w-worn, never-… I’m not a, a biter!“

Just the once, only the one time, and he had learned his lesson after that.

“Ssssshhh.” Tyler’s voice stays soft and saccharine even as he moves around behind Kauri, pulling his wrists behind his back. It never occurs to Kauri to fight him. “Sorry, bud, I’m sure this is all super new to you, but if we’re not going to have handlers to help us, we have to take some extra precautions.”

“But, but I don’t bite,” Kauri whispers.

“I know, buddy, I know. Look, you have to wear one for surgery, anyway, so we might as well get you ready now, huh? Think of it as saving you some time later on, okay?”

Kauri has never actually had to wear what Delevigne holds in her hands before, but he’s seen them on other boys, the ones who had a reputation for biting. The ones who tore skin, did real damage, who weren’t so easily drugged into the pliable, loose-limbed empty boxes they could build into perfect little-

Stop it, stop it, this is how you got sent back here, don’t think like that don’t think

Owen doesn’t want you to think

You weren’t made to think

He manages a nod, just to show he’s listening, wide blue eyes focused absolutely on the black straps and dangling, unattached mask hanging from Delevigne’s hand as she steps closer to him. Behind the dark glasses, her eyes are distant, businesslike. She looks beyond him, not directly at him.

“All right, 645898. Open up. Tyler’s a nice guy-” Tyler squeezes the hands holding his wrists twice, as if in emphasis, but all it does is hurt and Kauri winces. Some of the trainees are good at taking pain, it’s all they ever do, but Kauri isn’t trained for it. “-but I’m not a guy and I’m not nice. So open up.”

Kauri’s heart is pounding, but he slowly hesitantly opens his mouth.

The cylinder of heavy, slightly soft plastic slips between his teeth too easily, pressing lightly against his tongue with a faint chemical taste. When she tells him to close, he feels the solid plastic give just slightly between his teeth.

“You’ll be able to bite down on this when the pain is bad,” Delevigne tells him, looking it over thoughtfully. “Trust me when I say you’ll want that option, because the pain will be bad. We’re only allowed to give you a local anesthetic this time.”

“We are?” The man behind Kauri speaks right in his ear and Kauri jumps in nervous surprise “Oh, sorry, buddy. You didn’t know I was this close, huh?” He laughs again, and his laugh is odd and hard to understand - it sounds nice, but he is holding Kauri’s wrists behind his back while Del fastens the straps around his head, forcing the bit in further as she tightens them, until it pulls at the edges of Kauri’s mouth, making them ache.

He’s never worn a muzzle before.

One comes with the box the new owners get, but Owen had thrown his away.

What’s the point if I don’t get to hear you? He’d asked a newly-woken Kauri, who had still been blinking sleepily at him, trying to shake off the transport drugs, sweaty and so, so glad that he’d been given to his owner at last.

Once it’s fastened, he stares a little blankly, biting down on the plastic to test it, trying to move his tongue to get more comfortable. The black mask section is added, clipped onto little hooks on either side along his cheek, and fresh air comes only through small holes punched into the front.

Not that the air here is ever fresh.

“There, how’s that?” Tyler asks brightly. Kauri has no idea what he expects, exactly - he can’t talk, he can barely get enough air to breathe. The straps are too tight along the back, and the corners of his mouth are already aching.

He plays it safe and nods, but his heart is beating too hard, and he’s sure - so sure - the scientists can hear it in the perfect silence of his room, broken only by the soft constant ssshhhhhhh of the ventilation system.

“Perfect. All right, let’s get you moving, bud.” Tyler grabs him by one arm and pulls him and Kauri stumbles along behind, leaving the room and feeling suddenly an absurd wish to turn around and go back to it, to the tenuous safety of 162 tiles and the flat matte white and the light that never fades or changes.

He knows his room - but he doesn’t know where they are taking him, and he doesn’t know what happens next.

He shivers in the cold air, walking between them, his eyes moving to take in details of a part of the Facility he’s never really seen. The interiors of the holding rooms all look the same as everywhere else, but there’s color here - color-coded folders hang next to doors, muzzles hang off hooks. Now and then a number is scrawled on a dry-erase board next to a door - if he doesn’t look right at it and doesn’t try to know what the numbers are, it doesn’t hurt him to make the observation - and Kauri wonders if there are others here, listening to the shuffle-scrape of the pulling him down the hallway.

“Now, you should expect a lot of pain, like we said,” Tyler says, a spring in his step. Delevigne walks beside him without any perceptible emotion on her face, even though Kauri steals glances when he thinks she’s not looking. She looks like she’s thinking, like she’s somewhere deep inside her head. “A lot of pain. Normally we like to knock ‘em out for stuff this invasive, but the Director was pretty… adamant, and honestly, 645898, you do not want to piss her off, not even if you’re us.”

That he understood, and Kauri nodded quickly to agree with him, making a low, affirming noise in his throat. Tyler grinned and slapped him on the back encouragingly, nearly knocking him off his feet.

Delevigne caught him by his other arm, rolling her arms. “Hey, don’t damage the fucking merchandise before we’ve even finished the prototype, dumbass.”

“Whoops, sorry. You’re okay, aren’t you, ‘898?”

Kauri nods quickly, but his eyes are still scanning the hallways. As they turn a corner, the white walls are suddenly blue, and he feels assaulted by the color, even though it’s not all that bright. Blue walls with photos hung at regular intervals, of people doing important scientific work, he thought. Lots of people in the same white long coats Tyler and Delevigne wore giving a thumbs-up next to dazed-looking trainees.

Director Renford pops up in one photo, standing next to a kneeling man with short dark hair. Kauri stumbles to a stop, and the two scientists stop with him, shooting each other a look of something like curiosity, then looking back to him.

The tall dark-haired man has darker eyes, too, although Kauri can’t tell what color they are from the photo. Director Renford looks… young, even though he can tell it’s her. She has long hair in a braid, and her hand lays along the back of the kneeling man’s neck in an obvious display of possession.

Kauri wants to ask, but all he can do is make a muffled, curious sound and point.

Delevigne snorts. “The Director’s first, I think. Ten. He was the tenth successful trainee or something? I don’t know, we have to do a whole… orientation packet with company history, but I’ll be honest - I took a lot of smoke breaks that day.”

“I didn’t,” Tyler says. “I remember most of it. Poor bastard signed his fucking life away thinking they were going to fix his anxiety disorder. Now he balances her goddamn checkbook.”

“I heard a rumor once that he, uh, balances more than that, if you get my drift. Apparently the Director is generous with her friends. Besides, he’s less anxious now, isn’t he?” Delevigne laughs, and Tyler laughs, and Kauri wants to shrink into the floor until he disappears, but there’s nowhere to escape to. All he does is look at the kneeling man’s dark eyes and try to find some sign of life there, stare and stare at the blank expression and Director Renford’s hand on the back of his neck, her self-satisfied little smile, until finally they yank him by the arm and pull him away.

Three cheers for tyranny, unapologetic apathy, sings some ghostly voice in the back of his head, a song he’s never heard and doesn’t know… but maybe he knew before. His head starts to hurt, at least, usually a sign that he’s trying to dig something out from the wall, something that isn’t ready to break free.

They turn another hallway - this one is painted a soft pastel yellow, has more photos on the walls. Now he can see that the rooms have open doors and carpeted floors. They’re offices, with great wooden desks and warm lamps and decor. Some of the desks have people sitting at them, shuffling papers or signing things, typing away at computers. When the people look up, they don’t look at Kauri but through him, the way Delevigne does. They call their greetings to the scientists holding him, but no one stops working, and Delevigne and Tyler don’t stop walking.

Another hallway, a soft dusty red. Now the rooms look like… hospital rooms at the clinic, the place Kauri hates most in the world beyond the Facility training rooms themselves. Each room has two hospital beds, curtains to draw around them, a bunch of machinery. He sees only one boy, lying on his back with some kind of thing down his throat, the soft hissss, hisssss of a machine moving.

“Shit, looks like 533456 isn’t looking any better,” Tyler mutters.

“Yeah, well, you can’t bash someone’s head into the wall that many times and expect them to pop right back up good as new,” Del says, with an angry edge to her voice. “Trainees are an investment. If I were the Director, I’d sue for damages, not just fire the stupid bastard.”

Tyler laughs, and it’s not the soft, patronizing laughter he’s been using with Kauri but a harder-edged sound, and Kauri twists his head to look at him, anxious biting on the bit in his mouth, pushing into the plastic that gives only a little between his teeth. “I wouldn’t worry about that. That asshole’s good-looking and he’d make a good guard dog. I think the Director will get her investment back.”

Suddenly Kauri wondered, for the first time, what the guards signed when they agreed to work here. And what the Director would do to the guard who damaged company property badly enough to get fired for it.

Finally, they moved into a hallway painted a gentle gray, like a winter sky somewhere flat and frigid cold where Kauri thought, with a sharp stab of pain inside his skull, he might once have lived. It looks like the clouds when it snows, but Kauri has never seen snow except on the ski trips Owen takes, and in those places they are high up in the mountains and the skies don’t look the same up there.

No, this is like when Mom comes back from the diner and says, You remember old George VanHoorn, he says there’s snow coming. Man knows his skies, I guess I can’t disagree or I’ll owe him the next slice of pie-

Kauri groans, muffled, as the pain nearly knocks him off his feet, feeling like a blow inside his skull that throws him forward, only staying on his feet when Tyler and Delevigne hold him up, limp between them.

“He’s trying to think,” Delevigne says, disinterested. “I don’t have time for that, we have three surgeries today, and this is the one we have to nail. I am not letting this little asshole get me dragged in front of the Director for failing to meet expectations.”

“He’s fine,” Tyler says, just a little defensively, and leans over to pet through Kauri’s hair, holding him gently as he gets his feet back underneath him, tears leaking from the corners of his eyes as his world spins with agony. He can’t remember any longer what it was that caused the pain, only that he had done something wrong, tried to remember something he wasn’t supposed to know. “You’re okay, right, buddy? Not gonna mess up our schedule today, are you?”

Kauri shakes his head rapidly, blinking away the tears, making low hnnnh, hnnnnh, hnnnnh noises behind the muzzle, struggling to take enough air in by sucking it through his teeth and breathing through his nose to stop feeling the world’s sick-dizzy spin around him.

“Good boy, that’s what I thought. All right, bud…” They all but drag him further down the hallway, Kauri struggling to get his feet back under him, bare heels smacking into the floor unevenly. Then they stop in front of a big set of wide double-doors, open to show a room larger than four or even five of the training rooms inside.

There’s a hospital bed there, already. A large sort of metal table that’s bolted into the floor. There are machines everywhere.

Kauri tries to take a deep breath, but he can’t. So he takes several shallow ones, and the world spins again. His heart pounds in his chest, tries to break through, has to settle for nearly bruising his breastbone. The hands on his arms tighten, become inexorable, inescapable.

On a small table on wheels next to the metal table, there’s a tray with a stippled, textured pale blue paper laid out on it. On top of the paper there’s a series of things Kauri vaguely recognizes from Owen’s movies and TV shows as surgery tools - he can see what he knows is a scalpel, actually two scalpels. He can see some tools he doesn’t know, too.

And next to the tools is something he doesn’t recognize at all - it looks like a necklace made up of small flat circles with blue stones in the middle, but the connection isn’t thread or chain but wires.

There’s a loud beep from somewhere nearby, and Kauri nearly jumps out of his skin.

“Welcome to surgery, little buddy,” Tyler says, in a low sweet voice.

“Let’s get you on the table,” Delevigne says, kicking the doorstops so the double-doors swing closed behind him and latch with an audible click.

“Let’s get me my promotion,” Tyler laughs, and Kauri can barely walk as they drag him towards the table.

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the-odd-job · 4 years

Text

Up in Flames chapter 3 - Leave It All Behind (Ashes Part 2)

Warnings: Major Character Death, Chose Not to Use Category: Other Fandom: Transformers Relationships: Megatron/Sunstreaker, Megatron/Sideswipe, Sideswipe & Sunstreaker Characters: Sunstreaker, Sideswipe, Megatron, Soundwave, Ravage, Hook, Optimus Additional Tags: Dubcon, Mechpreg, Sticky Words: 3140

( Previous )

::Sunstreaker: presence requested at comm. room.::

Soundwave’s voice floated through his comm. line after he’d accepted the request for the link, and really he wasn’t… He just wasn’t going to slagging question how Soundwave knew his frequency when Sunstreaker very much had never shared it with him.

Soundwave knew way too many damn things, that much was for sure.

::I have no fragging idea where that is,:: Sunstreaker grumbled back.

They hadn’t even had the slagging time to find Hook’s repair bay yet. His valve cover was absolutely not attached to his person yet, and Sunstreaker didn’t much fancy walking around without it.

Especially since he was still likely to drip a trail wherever he went.

Primus could damn all of this right now, please.

::Soundwave: will send Ravage to show the way.::

Right. ::Well, thank you, but would he mind showing the way to Hook’s medbay first?::

Soundwave paused for a second, and Sunstreaker wasn’t sure what the frag he did during that pause, but where he’d half expected the answer to be ‘no, now hurry up’, Soundwave instead responded with, ::Ravage: will show the way to medical bay.::

And then Soundwave cut the call.

...Alright. So. Apparently this was a thing now. Getting shown around by a damn cat.

He shared a glance with Sideswipe and they finished what they were doing, namely, touching up their paint jobs and finishes. Aside from his missing valve cover and some dents, he was looking just like he hadn’t gotten railed by the almighty Megatron the night before.

They knew what they were doing on the frame care front, was all.

Limits to everything, though. Dinged and bent valve covers went beyond their ability to touch up. Sunstreaker had stored his in his subspace for now. Maybe it could be used, maybe it couldn’t be used, but if nothing else, it was scrap metal. That was always useful to someone.

They didn’t have to wait long after that before there was a ping at their door, and… It wasn’t opened immediately after. Instead the person at the other side waited politely until Sideswipe opened the door and looked down.

None other than Ravage was sitting in front of their door, meeting Sideswipe’s gaze with that thoroughly neutral look that the panther didn’t seem capable of getting rid of. “You needed to be shown to the medical bay, yes? If you’d please follow me.”

Polite. But the brothers filed out after the cat and followed along as Ravage trotted down the hall. A few ramps up, more hallways that they did their best to keep track of, and they came to the end of a short hallway ending in large double doors. They opened on their approach, and on the other side was indeed a repair bay.

“Hook, if you would!” Ravage called out as they entered. The twins had a look around. It was as gloomy as the rest of the ship, but beyond that it looked reasonably well equipped. And clean. Sunstreaker wasn’t sure why he’d expected the Decepticon medbay to be grimy, but it wasn’t.

Hook appeared around a corner and had one up down look at them.

“What do you need?” he asked when nothing immediately jumped out at him.

“Megatron kindly ripped off my valve cover,” Sunstreaker responded, crossing his arms across his chassis. “I’d like it reattached.”

To his credit, Hook didn’t much react, just gestured to one of the berths and went to get some whatever tools. Sunstreaker took the invitation and got on the berth, spreading his legs at Hook’s approach.

Hook didn’t give him any damn warning before he started poking around. Sunstreaker twitched when he felt the Constructicon’s digits pawing at the edges of his valve—probably checking the connectors and the integrity of the surrounding plating. “There’s some bending,” came Hook’s verdict. “I’ll need to fix that too. Do you still have the cover?”

Sunstreaker nodded and reached into his subspace, fetching the piece of metal and handing it to the medic. Hook turned it around in his servos before nodding. “I can still use this. A moment and I’ll have this fixed.” With that, he wandered over to a workbench and began the process of straightening the cover back to its original shape.

It took… Way longer than he would’ve expected from Ratchet, but Sunstreaker tried to wait patiently. Sideswipe fidgeted restlessly and tried to strike up a conversation with Ravage a few times, but the cassette turned out to not be incredibly chatty. Sideswipe had very little success and eventually just slouched against the wall next to the doors.

Finally, though, Hook came back over to him and busied himself between his legs again. His touch was sure in the way of someone who knew what they were doing, but slow like one’s who wanted to make sure they exercised the utmost care in what they did.

Ratchet was sure, but he was also swift. Not so much it would have reduced the quality of his work, he was better than that, but he didn’t waste time.

Sunstreaker wasn’t sure if Hook was wasting time either, but pits, he could’ve still worked a little faster.

But even if it took twice the time, his cover was eventually snapped neatly in place and Sunstreaker felt significantly more… Covered. “That should do it,” Hook said with a satisfied nod. “Try to retract it next time, maybe?”

Sunstreaker grunted. “No promises. Thanks.”

“Yeah yeah,” and Hook left, disappearing back around the corner he’d come from. No ‘now get out of my medbay’, surprisingly.

Or maybe it was just Ratchet who was grouchy enough to chase you out with a wrench.

Sideswipe shrugged at him, so Sunstreaker went ahead and jumped off the berth. Ravage nodded at the both of them before he led the way out of the medbay.

“Why does Soundwave want us in the comm. room, anyway?” Sideswipe asked as they followed the cassette.

Ravage glanced at him before answering. “Optimus Prime wishes to speak with you.”

Sunstreaker growled. “What the slag does he want?”

“He hasn’t said, but I expect it concerns the matter of your defection.”

Yeah, that’s about what they’d figure too. It wasn’t really a stretch to imagine there were things that had left unsaid when they’d left the Autobots, as sudden and unplanned as that had been. Or whatever else regarding the whole situation.

There was a heck of a lot to unpack. Take your fragging pick of what it could be.

“Has he just been… Waiting? Like, Soundwave asked us to come to the comm. room first, the whole medbay detour wasn’t much planned,” Sideswipe asked.

He wasn’t sure if Ravage’s face could even form the expression, but it almost looked like he smiled. “Lord Megatron informed him of the reason for your delay, fear not.”

Wait.

Wait wait wait.

“Are you telling me,” Sunstreaker hissed, “that Megatron fucking told Optimus he took off my valve cover and I needed to have it reattached?”

“Yes.” And that was definitely amusement in Ravage’s voice, smile or no smile.

Sideswipe burst out laughing, but Sunstreaker couldn’t resist the urge to facepalm. Right, now the fragging Prime of all people knew Megatron played it rough—like that couldn’t be expected anyway. Prime didn’t much like it rough, though.

He could only imagine Optimus’ goddamn concern at news like those. And it did look a little bad. Usually when both parties agreed to interface, the covers came off voluntarily.

He was going to hear about this still, wasn’t he?

They came to the doors of the comm. room before he had the chance to say anything more on the topic. Soundwave was standing on one side of the room, there but out of the way. Megatron stood in front of the large main screen with his arms clasped behind his back, glancing their way as they entered.

And on the screen itself was Optimus, the Ark’s orange interior as his backdrop.

“Ah, he’s here,” Megatron intoned upon seeing them, gesturing for them to approach. Sunstreaker scowled; Sideswipe still felt a bit giggly—but they walked over to the screen until they were within Optimus’ view. “As you can see, in perfect health.”

“No thanks to you,” Sunstreaker snarled with a glare at the warlord.

Optimus cleared his vocalizer. “Twins,” he said in greeting. “Are you alright?” And there came the concern, right out the gate. Optimus’ optics dropped a little lower, although it looked like he was rather looking at their ruined insignias, rather than anything further down.

Sunstreaker rolled his optics, but Sideswipe threw his arm around his shoulders and grinned at Optimus. “Just dandy~ Hook’s totally decent at the repair stuff,” he laughed, just to see Optimus’ look of distress at the reminder of what the slag Sunstreaker had needed fixed. Sunstreaker barely resisted the urge to have his palm meet his face again.

At least Sideswipe was having fun.

“What do you want?” Sunstreaker asked with that out of the way, crossing his arms and frowning at the screen—and very aware Megatron was standing at his shoulder, overlooking the whole conversation. It didn’t matter to Sunstreaker, but he wondered if it was giving Optimus a hard time.

Maybe he wouldn’t expect Sunstreaker would dare speak the truth with the tyrant present. To pits with that! He wasn’t a fragging coward and he was not here to please Megatron. Damn mech could think what he wanted of anything Sunstreaker said, it was no paint off his back.

...Up until the moment it might be. He was far from putting violent retaliation past Megatron.

Not enough of a deterrent, though. Optimus would get the fragging truth, no matter what that might be.

“I wanted to ask how you were doing…” Optimus started, which was fair enough coming from him–

–But he continued, “...and remind you that you’re always welcome among the Autobots, twins.”

Sideswipe removed his arm from his shoulders and straightened, the both of them more than a little surprised at the declaration.

And suspicious over it. “Seriously?” Sunstreaker asked, his disbelief ringing loud and clear in his voice. “After I fragged Megatron? And got knocked up by him? And kept the sparkling? And lied about what the frag was going on?”

“I won’t pretend those aren’t serious, even condemnable infractions,” Optimus said, sounding like he was choosing his words very carefully, “but I don’t want you to think that joining the Decepticons is your only choice in this situation.”

Oh, so that was it? Optimus just didn’t want them on the Decepticon side? Why? Because he just happened to hate the Decepticons? Because he didn’t want the twins fighting against him?

Sunstreaker scowled. “And would the other Autobots agree? I’m pretty sure Cliffjumper and Red Alert are glad to see us gone, and they’re not the only ones.”

“They can be reminded,” Optimus rumbled, and where that would’ve sounded all kinds of threatening coming from someone like Megatron, he knew what Optimus’ ‘reminders’ were like.

Peaceful talks in his office with some light berating, that’s what.

It never worked on anyone except those far too eager to please. “You never managed to shut Cliffjumper and Red up even before we did anything to earn their distrust,” Sunstreaker growled. Well, hadn’t done anything beyond being too violent, too Decepticon.

They weren’t Decepticons, never were, still weren’t, but that didn’t mean their conduct wasn’t more becoming of the purple faction. “What reason do I have to trust you’d have any more luck now that my disloyalty has been proven?”

“You’d have the command on your side,” Optimus said. Aside from Red Alert? And as if that was enough if the rank and file were busy hating on them.

There was one more issue here, too.

“Even if I wanted to come back—which I don’t—you really think he’d let me?” Sunstreaker asked, pointing a thumb over his shoulder at Megatron. The tyrant had made it abundantly clear he wasn’t going to let Sunstreaker just leave while he was carrying the damn mech’s sparkling, even if Optimus wasn’t necessarily aware of the extent of Megatron’s determination.

But the Prime should be able to guess, just based on the manner in which Megatron had fetched him—just based on the warlord’s general personality. Optimus was more familiar with it than most on the Autobot side.

“I’m willing to force the issue,” came Optimus’ answer, his optics flicking to Megatron. Sunstreaker could hear the tyrant’s engine rev quietly, although Megatron stayed silent otherwise and didn’t interrupt their conversation.

Force the issue, huh? Megatron would assuredly do the same, and then what? Sunstreaker would be stuck with two factions fighting over him? If the Autobots even agreed to fight for him.

Somehow that thought didn’t much appeal to him. Oh, it would be entertaining no doubt, but it wouldn’t necessarily end so mighty well for him.

“I don’t need you to,” Sunstreaker said, revving his own engine loud enough that it was sure to carry to Optimus. “I’m perfectly fine staying right here.”

Optimus looked disbelieving, prompting Sunstreaker to roll his optics again. Of course the Prime wouldn’t fragging believe him, especially after that valve cover incident. Someone like Optimus wouldn’t understand how the slag someone could be fine with suffering through things like that—mech was fragging convinced Sunstreaker needed saving from the evil, evil warlord named Megatron, wasn’t he?

He needed no saving. Frag, he’d save himself if it came down to it. He didn’t need one Prime’s help for it.

Megatron’s servo landed on his shoulder, heavy—a claim for Optimus to see, if there ever was one. For as long as he carrying the mech’s offspring, Megatron had a vested interest in him, and with how possessive over the sparklet he was behaving, Sunstreaker wasn’t sure there was anything anyone could do to stand in Megatron’s way if someone tried to remove it from his sphere of influence. His sparkling, how many times had the tyrant repeated that?

Was the weight of the servo approving too, though? Sunstreaker had just denied he wanted to return to the Autobots, exactly as Megatron wanted.

But he didn’t do this for Megatron, he did this for himself, and for the lack of a future he had in the Autobots.

Nothing the Prime could say would change how his troops felt, and no doubt his troops would feel Sunstreaker was nothing but a certified traitor. And the sparkling, too. Its future would be guaranteed with Megatron, at least in some way—but the Autobots? Would they treat it as anything more than the goddamn creation of their enemy? Prejudiced against it from the beginning?

No, the Autobots weren’t an option.

Optimus looked like he was about to say something, but Sideswipe pulsed a question at him that Sunstreaker proceeded to voice before the Prime could get a word in. “Would you have pulled me from battles if you’d known I was carrying?” as Megatron claimed?

The Prime hesitated for a second or two before nodding. “Yes. I would not risk the life of one who had no say in it.”

Did he know Sunstreaker found that answer displeasing? Well, he did after Sunstreaker narrowed his optics at him. Megatron’s servo tightened on his plating—no doubt the tyrant wanted him to remember he had called the truth on this matter.

So Optimus wouldn’t have let him fight, even though it was his fragging frame and his fragging life—shouldn’t he have a say in what he did with it, sparkling or no sparkling?

The Prime wasn’t so different from Megatron. They were both interested in controlling him now that he was carrying—just for slightly different reasons.

But both of their reasons revolved around the sparklet. His goddamn sparklet.

Everyone seemed very ready to brush that little detail under the rug. He was the carrier. Shouldn’t he have some fragging say?

“Cool. So, recap, I’m not coming back, I’m perfectly okay with staying right here... Was that all, then?” Sunstreaker asked, snapping his words—aggravated.

Optimus sighed and his shoulders slumped just so. “Will I see you on the battlefield?” he asked still.

Sunstreaker hesitated for a moment before he shook his helm. “No. I’m not fighting for him.”

He couldn’t tell if Optimus was relieved, although he would’ve guessed yes. It would be so like the Prime. “Then that is all,” Optimus nodded. Sunstreaker could just feel Megatron shifting, and Sideswipe glanced up at him—Megatron nodded to Soundwave, and the screen blinked to black, cutting the call rather abruptly.

“That went well,” Megatron commented after. It didn’t sound like sarcasm, and really, what reason for sarcasm was there? Hadn’t Sunstreaker said everything Megatron had wanted to hear? Not because he gave a damn about what the tyrant wanted, but… For now, and through some force, their wills aligned.

He had no options but to stay with the Decepticons or try to get back to the Autobots’ ‘protection’, and it was easy to choose between those two. So… What Megatron wanted.

“Why did you let him call?” Sunstreaker asked, looking up at the warlord.

Megatron met his optics. “He needed to hear for himself that you’re not leaving.”

Sunstreaker scoffed. “You think he’ll believe me with you hovering there the whole time? He’ll think I’m scared of you or something, and just saying what you’re pressuring me to say.”

“If he didn’t believe you and tries something, he will regret it,” Megatron growled at that, rather viciously. His grip on his shoulder tightened again—possessive, almost.

Sunstreaker shivered from helm to pede. Oh, there were promises of so many bad things in that gesture.

He didn’t find himself minding any of them very much.

“Are you scared of me, though?” Megatron asked, a bit out of the blue. Sunstreaker cocked an optical ridge at him.

“Of course not. Why would I be?” Was he stupidly fearless, considering who the slag he was asking that from? Maybe, but it was the truth.

Megatron’s rumble sounded amused, but he didn’t try to give him reasons. “So you meant what you said about not wanting to return to the Autobots?”

“Of course,” Sunstreaker repeated, shrugging his free shoulder. “They’d treat me as an outcast after the slag I did, even more than they already did. And what of the sparkling? I doubt they’d view it as an innocent bystander to this whole spectacle, considering who the frag its sire is.”

“Precisely,” Megatron snarled. The corner of Sunstreaker’s mouth twitched up into a half smile.

“Basically, we have nothing to go back to,” Sideswipe said, shrugging too—and nowhere else to go, although he didn’t say that much. Everyone knew it was the state of things, anyway. “So you’re stuck with us for now.”

“And I’ll make you regret it,” Sunstreaker promised.

Megatron laughed. “I look forward to that.”

( Next )

#transformers #maccadams #megatron #sunstreaker #sideswipe #ravage #hook #optimus prime #fic #2020 #up in flames #ashes

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xserpentlife · 5 years

Text

Pretending

You can’t keep pretending it didn’t happen, cause guess what? It did!” Would be great to have with FP and where the reader is younger but legal of course from @keepcalm-and-beyou

Warnings: Mention of blood, fighting

A/N: Fp and reader though they have a large age difference they are both of age and were of age at the start of dating

Word Count: about 2200

You have been dating, well seeing FP behind everyone's back for a year. A year of kisses, hugs, cuddles, but also hiding around corners, closets, and the shed. Every day of your relationship was kiss here but hide there, you loved it nevertheless. Being with FP, meant everything to you. He had been there for you through the toughest times of your life, and he loved everything about you and you, him. You were tired of hiding but you had to, no one would understand the way your relationship was. Yeah, there was an age gap, but it was legal, everything… well besides serpent trips, everything you had done with him was legal. But everyone saw it differently. The first person to find out was Toni, she caught you and FP up in his office, she thought he had left for the night and needed to lock the cash up, turns out you and him were staying the night and lost track of time. She caught you lying on the couch watching a movie and kissing, nothing crazy, but it still did shock her.

Months later. You were on a job with Sweet Pea, and Jughead. It was a dangerous job, the police and Mayor Mcoy knew of it, it was an inside job trying to catch the Ghoulies on their drug ring. You lost connection with the serpents and FP in your ear piece, which led to you being in danger. You made the turn before you were supposed to the go-ahead getting confused over the line of sound. You turned rounding the corner before the Serpents were ready, shot in the shoulder you fell to the ground, shot again once more in the leg and Malachai standing over you.

“Well… who do we have here, oh little Y/N” A punch to your face causing blood to pool into your mouth

“Mal-Malachai” you tried getting up before his finger was pushing into the bullet wound on your shoulder “Fuck-fuck stop what do you want Malachai”

“You, see you Y/N, should not have came into this building, poor girl, and no one knows they need to save you, because well we caught on sweet cheeks, these ear pieces are doing you no good now”

“How!”

“Preventative measures sweetheart”

“Fuck you” You spilit blood out again

“You know Y/N it would be very very appealing to me to kill you right here, shoot you straight in the head, or maybe the heart, but you know what would be better. Letting you bleed out, leaving your body here to rot until maybe some coyotes come of find you, better yet maybe hot dog does, and everyone gets led to your body” He cut your cheek before leaving the blade dragging slowly across your skin as he walked closer to the door. “bye Y/N, have fun dying alone”.

You were a fighter, never giving up before you had to, you tried standing first the pain too much to wear, looking down at your leg the wound was so much worse than you originally believed, bleeding profusely your leg had no feeling left. You ripped the tattered flannel you had on making two bandages. One for your shoulder and leg, hoping that maybe it would buy you some more time.

*FP POV*

“Jug, Sweets what’s your position?”

“Outside of the building FP”

“Why! What do you mean outside!” “The plan what awry dad, ghoulies standing guard outside, front and back, Sweets got in but had to come back out due to guards”

“Wait guards?”

“We stoked it out the other day there were no guards, fuck we were compromised boys, where is Y/N”

“She hasn’t been answering back, we checked 10 minutes ago but got no response, told her not to move forward”

“You are just telling me now! What the fuck is wrong with you!”

“Sweet pea! Try to make contact” Sweet Pea tried for a total of 5 minutes before FP knew that something had gone terribly wrong. On all the missions you were never one to forget to contact back or update your team, you are the reason so many missions went right, this time being the only one that had gone very, very wrong.

“FP the guards are leaving”

“I’m coming!”

“Dad no stay where you are or your cover will be blown!” FP ran from the masked van like his life depended on it. You, being the thing on his mind right now, everyone was present and safe except you. The girl he promised to always keep save, the one he would risk his life for no matter what. He ran into the building straight past Sweet Pea and Jug, “Stay here and wait for the ambulance!” searching every room gun drawn, before finally making it to you.

“Y/N!!” he crashed to the ground next to you, blood leaking through the fabric you had used. “Who, who did this”

“Mal-Malachai FP”

“Baby look at me, keep your eyes open”

“It’s hard”

“I know princess, I know how hard it is okay, I’ve been here, Jug has been here but you can do it okay, fuck I know how strong you are I know you can do this, an ambulence is coming okay, gonna get you fixed up in no time”

“FP…”

“What princess?”

“Kiss me” His lips met yours in a panicked frenzy before he felt them slowly relax, opening his eyes he saw yours slowly closing. “NO! NO! NO! NO! Y/N!, Baby don’t fucking close yours eyes, I need you baby. Fuck I love you okay, I’m gonna get you fixed up”

What Fp didn’t know was that day, the boys were behind the stack of boxes, watching every move. After that FP got you to the hospital, sitting in the room every day until you woke up. Eating there, showering there, having serpent meetings there, he never left. Someone took over his work at the station, his main priority being you. People always asked him why, he didn’t do that when Fangs got shot, or when Toni was put into the hospital for getting beat up. No one knew why until Jug had asked.

“Dad why are you still here?”

“I can’t leave her, I'm all she has”

“Dad we saw you”

“What are you talking about Jug”

“The day this all happened, Pea and I came in the building behind you incase you needed back up”

“I told you to wait outside! Why didn’t you wait outside!”

“Dad…”

“Jug…”

‘‘Do you love her?”

“I do”

“It isn’t right...”

It spread like wildfire after that. News stations and newspapers littered with titles along the lines of “FP jones Sheriff of Riverdale Police station in love with a girl more than half his age” after Y/N woke up though and FP knew she was safe he left her, ignoring her all the time, thinking that is what she needed. Time away from him, time to be who she truly was. The people were getting to him. Telling him he was gross, telling him he was an endangerment to society, or all the people calling him the name that no man would ever want to be called, but he wasn’t any of that. He got scared, scared that Jelly bean would be taken from him, scared he would hurt you if people started attacking you instead. Months went by, you were still healing. You talked to FP twice in that time frame. Once when he called to check in, and once when you cornered him in a store before he pushed you to the side and walked away having Toni keep you back from trying to run after him, not that you could considering you were in a cast and on crutches. Fp Jones ignored you as much as he could, as much as his heart would let him without fully breaking. He still watched from afar, keeping you safe when anyone looked at you funny. He cared, that could never go away, but he also thought it was better for you if no one was talking about the relationship that both of you had prior. He told the press it was all a lie, told everyone that he loved you like a second daughter rather than a lover. It took another month to get people to believe him, it started with him not seeing you, keeping his distance people began to believe him, he even created a fake relationship with a woman in Greendale. People woul;d see them walk around together, people that were watching FP from afar who thought he was a danger to their young female children. He never kissed her though, never wanted his lips tainted because he always remembered yours. You heard about his new relationship, your heart breaking with every update to the story. Everyone in the serpents kept you protected. Kept the articles hidden from you after you got out of the hospital. You went into a depression when FP stopped talking to you. Your breakup having no goodbye and not being closed left a hole in your heart that no one but him could repair no matter how hard they tried. You loved him and that never stopped. You loved him, need him, craved him. But most of all you needed him to heal, he was the one that saved you, the one that found you bleeding out in that building, his lips the last thing you remember before you drifted off and the first thing you wanted to feel when you woke up but instead him being gone made you feel more pain than being shot. You needed him, so after those few months, after you found the articles and the updates you decided that enough was enough, Jug had came to you telling you the entire story, telling you his dad had started taking sips of bourbon again, not full drinks but sips here and there and he could see it slowly starting. He knew his dad needed you just as much as you needed him. So he helped you corner him, locking the office from outside so his dad couldn’t get out.

*Y/N POV*

“FP!”

“Y/N? Get out of this office you shouldn’t be here”

“What about the time you told me I could be here any time I wanted”

“Fine then stay, I'm leaving” You stepped to the side as he tried to open the door.

“You know this is my office, I should be able to come and please as I want, what did you do to the door?”

“Locked it, from the outside, figured you wouldn’t be able to run. You keep shutting me out and ignoring me, why FP I thought...”

“Leave, this is my office remember!”

“Oh get off your fucking pedestool, how many nights did we spend here otgether! You telling me this was our special place where no one could hurt us!”

“None, as far as I'm concerned and you should know that!”

“You can’t keep pretending it didn’t happen! Cause guess what? It did!!”

“Fuck Y/N I need to pretend!”

“Why!?”

“I need to keep you safe! Keep Jug and Jelly bean safe!”

“You always keep them safe”

“They won’t be unless I pretend, it’s so fucked because I fucking love you with everything I have and I shouldn’t”

“And why not!? Who says you shouldn’t?”

“The whole fucking world y/n, your 21 and I am 50. I know you saw the papers! The articles and news reports!”

“Yeah I did and fuck them, Fuck the world FP because I love you too and that is all that should matter. I fucking love you so much”

“But is that enough?”

“It damn well should be. When, when you were not there when I woke up Fp it killed me, and then you didn’t talk to me kept me at a distance I didn’t understand. You left a fucking whole in my heart FP”

“I was trying to protect you! To protect everyone”

“Yeah well in trying to protect me, you killed me just the same”

“Let me try to fix it then!, I still love you”

“I love you too Fp, but you need to learn not to care what the world thinks”

“I want you Y/N. I’m so fucking sorry”

“Good, you should be. And I’m not saying I won’t forgive you because fuck FP I love you with every piece of my being but I can’t let you in instantly, you hurt me so badly”

“I know princess, I know I did” He stepped towards you as you stepped away.

“No, you are not going to do that! It’s gonna take time FP”

“Okay” You knocked on the door with the code as they unlocked it letting you out. “I love you Y/N”

“I love you too” You left slowly out the door climbing down the stairs. Hopefully, he realized time would heal the wounds, him trying was all you wanted. You still loved him with every part of you and that would never change.

#fp jones x reader #reader x fp jones #fp x reader #reader x fp #fp jones #riverdale x reader #riverdale story #fp jones imagine #fp jones drabble #fp jones story #fp #fp jones x y/n #fp jones x you

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bahamutgames · 3 years

Text

Nier Automata: [A]fterthoughts

Game: Nier Automata: Become As Gods Edition (June 26, 2018)

Console: Xbox One (Via Xbox Game Pass)

Alright so I’m trying something a little different this time with my opinions on a game. Usually I will share this on Twitter in a thread. However, I feel like I’m having more and more to say on games I play lately. And Twitter threads just don’t feel right for sharing massive amounts of text. So I thought I’d give this a shot now. However, this isn’t meant to be a review or an indication of whether or not YOU should try the game. This is just me pouring my heart out about what I’ve played and giving my honest opinions about what I just experienced. This is just for anyone interested, and I highly recommend you try out this game and any other game I choose to talk about in the future, to get your own opinions on how you feel for it.

As such, this isn’t a very well written piece either. It’s mostly just me throwing up thoughts into a post. But, if that’s your thing or you’re just curious about what I have to say, you can read my huge info dump on my feelings about Nier Automata in the readmore!

Spoiler Warning for some parts of the game, including the finale and ending.

Opening

About 2 days ago, I sat down and beat Nier Automata for the first time. And after sitting on it for a bit, I’m ready to talk about my time with it. I wasn’t originally planning on doing a big thing for playing this game (I was saving it for a different game.) But plans got sidetracked, and by that I mean Microsoft had a sale on 3 months of Game Pass for $1. And I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to try it out. I was really excited to see they had the game on the service, as I’ve been wanting to play it since it came out. So naturally, I jumped at the chance.

Stuff I liked

Honestly, I really liked this game. I thought was cool and loved a lot of the topics it covered, as they’re things I really enjoy seeing games tackle. Evolution of life, the existence of religion and our relationships with god and death, strange surreal things, androids and robots becoming more than just androids and robots. The story has so many aspects I really loved seeing. A highlight for me was seeing the robots start to become sentient and deal with grief, family bonds, how they should live outside of what they were programmed to do. It was endlessly fascinating to me.

Game also had tons of fantastic characters. I think my favorites may have been 6O and Pascal, if I’m being honest with myself. But also also really liked all 3 of the main playable Androids, and I found myself falling totally in love with the pods too. There’s tons of other great and interesting characters you don’t even get to play as or see that much, it has a fantastic cast I really loved. Particularly, I thought the designs of the androids were really interesting. Dressed in all black with white hair is a cool aesthetic. My favorite design may have been 2B’s, obviously I thought she was really hot. But I think her outfit is actually very cool and classy in a way that understands how to make a character hot without just being in your face about it? If that makes sense. I also really loved A2′s look, being able to see her joints is a really cool underused aspect for an android design. I wasn’t super into the robots themselves at first, but I found myself really loving how they looked by the end of it. Their weird and minimalist designs really leant themselves to the sad and peculiar story they had to tell.

Nier has a fantastic gameplay style too. I was shocked to learn that it was a Bullet Hell! Bullet Hells and Shmups are my “secret favorite” genre, that I really love but rarely actually tap into. I thought the game had really fun use of Bullet Hell gameplay, with fun Shmup sections and fun action RPG sections. I was particularly impressed with how much fun the crossover of the two genres would be. Fighting back against a bullet hell in this type of gameplay style was incredibly fun and endearing. And I think it handles these two completely different genres really well in a pretty cool way. I also loved being able to get multiple weapons for the androids and pods, though I did mostly stick with the same the whole way through. Just the standard weapons and the beast slayer. Plus the laser for my pod. Hey, if it works, why fix it, right? I also really liked the chip system. I had a ton of fun figuring out which chips suited my style the most, and I liked feeling powerful because of them.

Outside of all that, the game looks and sounds AMAZING. The aesthetics particularly really got to me. I’m a huge fan of cities and buildings reclaimed by nature, and I’m a huge fan of sci-fi aesthetics mixed with modern and medieval aesthetics. And the game has both of these used in really great ways. Mix in some of the weird and creepy visuals thrown in throughout some of the game’s darker and sadder scenes? And it’s beautiful. I thought the music was really good too. I wasn’t crazy about it while playing it. But listening to it in the background while writing this makes me realize how good of an OST it is. I really love Pascal’s village theme, Treasured Times, and the credits music.

I also really adored a lot of the interested 4th wall breaks and ways they play with game mechanics and tie them into the functionality of the androids. A scene that really comes to mind is that the settings are actually your android settings. And having to go through them for the story mode, then getting to see it again as 9S. I also thought parts where your vision gets glitched out was very interesting, and things like that were really charming to me.

One of my favorite parts of the game, was absolutely the finale. Huge spoilers for this part obviously. I was teetering between not really liking the game anymore, and loving the game by the end. So the finale was really going to make or break it for me. But ultimately, I think the finale was AWESOME. Having to play as the pods fighting the credits to get a better ending was really cool and genuinely exciting to me. I had a total blast blazing through one final, tough bullet hell finale. Also, seeing all the cool little messages players left was so nice and genuinely heartwarming. I got messages from the USA, Mexico, even one from North Korea! It was so cool! And such a good idea. And getting help from everyone at the end was so awesome. Ultimately, I chose to give up my save data because the ending scene was actually pretty tough for me and I’m not that bad at bullet hells. So I figured it’d be selfish not to lend someone a hand out there in the world. (plus... to be fair, when my game pass expires, I won’t be playing this game much more lol.)

Stuff I didn’t like

With all that praise though, I don’t necessarily think the game was perfect either though. There was a lot of stuff that really rubbed me the wrong way. The gameplay had a lot of stuff that just didn’t feel right and was oddly frustrating. A big one for me was the lock on just being completely useless for some parts of the game, jumping around the enemies far off when there was something right in front of me ready to get hit. It made killing some enemies genuinely more challenging than needed. A huge issue I had with the gameplay was actually that there aren’t enough Shmup sections in the flight units. Most of them take place in hacking sections, which, in my opinion. Aren’t that fun, or at least considerably less fun than the way superior flight unit sections. And that’s the type of gameplay the ending uses. Which is a shame.

And there are some parts I sang praises about but I still have issues with. Like, I enjoy the game messing with the way you play because you’re controlling androids. But when you have to walk somewhere and the game disables your movement, or you have to kill something and the game disables your combat. It’s mostly just annoying. I really love the concept, and I think it’s not THAT bad. But it’s still annoying enough that I thought to mention it. And while I didn’t run into this issue, the really cute and touching aspects of the finale. Are you just completely locked out of them if you can’t pay for online? That really sucks and kind of kills the vibe of that ending. Same with having to delete your save data to help others. It’s cute! But why is it there? It all just feels so antagonizing for no reason.

I also had a big issue with Story B. You play through nearly the entirety of Story A again as 9S. Normally, I love stuff like this. Sonic games come to mind right away for games I enjoy that do this. But for Story B, it is the exact same game and story with minimal changes through it. Sure the opening and towards the ending, it’s different. But mostly, it’s identical. And then there’s just small snippets of way more interesting stuff with the way robots became sentient lightly peppered in to break up the monotony of doing the same thing twice. This second playthrough should’ve focuses HEAVILY on the robots. Even if it’s from 9S’ perspective, more should’ve been changed to show the robots. The part with the singing robot was BRUTAL, and I LOVED it. But you get very few new scenes like that. Perhaps Story B should’ve followed Pascal or a random enemy robot instead of 9S. Considering you also play as 9S for a lot of Story C. Imagine how gut wrenching it would be if Story B followed a random enemy robot evolving and learning about life and free will, only to get killed at the end by 9S or A2 or something. Idunno.

There’s also some gripes with the story. A big one is the fact that, and this is a HUGE spoiler. But 2B doesn’t feel like the main character. It feels like the main character is 9S, who I like, but isn’t as cool as 2B by a long shot. You barely play as 2B or even A2. SO MUCH of the game feels like it’s all about 9S and I gotta be honest, I’m not that interested in 9S. I like him, but maybe we could learn some more about the robots and their interesting problems instead of just seeing more about how 9S is so smart and awesome and genius so he has to be killed a bunch. Speaking of which, I don’t think I care for that aspect of 2B either? She has to kill 9S over and over because he keeps learning the truth about Yorha. In the end, even 2B is just a part of 9S’ story. Maybe that’s just me though. I feel like that whole concept could’ve been removed, and you could’ve had 2B and 9S having to deal with learning about the truth together. idk.

Overall, my biggest complaint is just that the game spends a little too much time on 9S and not enough time on all the interesting aspects it skims over. Again, the robots, I talked about this at length but I really would’ve loved to learn more about them. How about the existential reality that androids and robots have been fighting a meaningless war for dead masters for centuries? WHAT THE HELL WAS EMIL? There’s so much cool stuff in the world of Nier Automata that feels like it’s all skimmed over in favor of stuff that just didn’t really need to be there? I think a lot of these are relegated to sidequests, but they should’ve been a part of the main story. Maybe it’s just me.

Final Thoughts

Well, even after all those complaints and nitpicks. I have to say, I liked Nier Automata. I think it’s a cool game that explores things I thought most people weren’t interested in exploring. Both in its world and its gameplay. Especially not from a big triple A title. Some of these are things I’d like to explore in my own games so it’s nice to see a game with an interest in the same weird topics as me. I’m certainly interested in this series. I only own Drakengaurd, but I’d like to give it and Nier a shot sometime in the future if I can.

I like the hopeful nature of the ending and I liked the emotions I felt through the whole playthrough. Even when the game was scary and sad, I still had a good time with it, and I hope somewhere out there in the multiverse, the characters are living a much better life in peace.

Thank you so much for reading, or just skimming through. Or just scrolling to the end! I appreciate it a lot! This is my first time really writing up my feelings about a game in a huge more organized way like this, and I hope you enjoy it. I’m certainly going to try and do more stuff like this in the future, maybe I’ll still make some of them twitter threads if I’m lazy or don’t have much to say lol. But, regardless, thanks for your time! I hope you have a fantastic evening! Play a video game that makes you feel something :)

#2021 #Thoughts

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multimetaverse · 4 years

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HSMTMTS 1x05 Review

Homecoming was a historic ep that was a giant leap forwards for rep on Disney and an overall delightful ep. Let’s dig in!

I was blown away by Seblos this ep, I never expected Disney to go this far this soon but what great scenes we got. It was so refreshing to see Carlos and Seb acting like normal teens, just like any straight couple. They have good chemistry and Frankie played Carlos’ nerves when asking Seb to the dance perfectly and his celebration after Seb said yes. I liked when Seb mentioned that homecoming would mean dancing together in front of all the non theatre kids, a little reminder of how much of a safe space the theatre can be. Really powerful to see Carlos tell Mr. Mazzara that he thought he made a mistake asking him to dance with him publicly and to see Carlos be brave enough to go dance on his own. And then when Seb arrived we got the shot we see in every teen movie where the love interest arrives at the big dance and sees the main character and smiles, it’s amazing that we saw that with two guys on a Disney show. Also impressive that Seb apologizing to Carlos was done in just one take as Tim revealed on instagram

Tim Federle has done an amazing job so far and good for him for going right into text. He’s said in interviews that no one from Disney ever asked him to cut any scenes or shy away from certain topics, which doesn’t mean much since he’d be saying that regardless of how much he was being censored, but we can see with our own eyes that he really is telling the truth. Now I do want more development for Carlos and Seb as characters as well as Seblos as a ship and I do think we’ll get that especially since Joe Serafini has been promoted to a series regular for S2, which is a very good sign that Disney is all in with Tim Federle’s plans. What an exciting time, there will soon be two main gay characters on a Disney show played by openly gay actors on a show created by an openly gay man. Tim has spoken of how Disney + is in some ways an open frontier and that he’s willing to take big jumps and I can’t wait to see what the rest of S1 and S2 has in store for us

Things have changed a lot since the High School Musical movies came out. It’s well known that Ryan was meant to be gay even though he could never actually be gay. Lucas Grabeel has spoken of how Kenny Ortega told him that Ryan was a lot like his High School self. In an interview with EW, Tim Federle was asked about the censorship of Ryan’s character and he noted that he wasn’t there for the movies and doesn’t view what he’s now doing on HSMTMTS as making up for anything that the original movies weren’t able to do. Which is fair but regardless in some ways tonight's ep does make up for the censorship of the movies

While reading an article on HSMTMTS I came upon a link to a story from October 2008 about Ryan and how he was clearly being coded as gay that featured some revealing quotes from Gary Marsh, from an interview conducted in summer 2008:

Regarding the fact that there are boyfriend-girlfriend relationships in the HSM movies, Marsh interjected, “Yeah, but that’s not about sex,” as though having two boyfriends equals full-tilt boogie. And as to why there can be boyfriend and girlfriends but not two boyfriends, he could only note, “It’s just not something that we’ve ever had the opportunity to portray. It hasn’t been a place we’ve gone.”

If someone, like Gary Marsh, believes that lgbtq relationships are inherently sexual then that means they don’t believe they’re appropriate for children. It’s no surprise then that it wouldn’t be until 2014 that Disney Channel had two lesbian moms appear on Good Luck Charlie and it wouldn’t be until 2017 that Cyrus came out to Buffy. Clearly Gary has for whatever reasons evolved in his views or there wouldn’t have been any rep on Disney Channel in the past 11 years nor do I think that he would make a comment like that publicly today but he probably does still believe that to an extent and I’d imagine other senior Disney executives do as well

A few things are helping Disney + push boundaries, being more of a PG than a G rated service, not being exclusively targeted towards children, and being a curated service so parents can easily avoid showing their kids shows with lgbtq rep. And perhaps most importantly, the cold hard reality that if Disney + is to become financially viable then it has to appeal to a broad audience and provide the same quality or better than people could find on Netflix or other streaming services so the kind of censorship we see on Disney Channel just can’t fly

There’s been a lot of discourse regarding Seblos and Tyrus and HSMTMTS and Andi Mack and I’ll take the time to say my piece now. It’s not entirely fair to compare the ships and shows since they’re taking place under very different circumstances. Tyrus was a heavily censored ship that was only given permission to canon when the series finale was written whereas Seblos is already canon in the 5th ep. It’s true that TJ was written in a way to subvert gay stereotypes which was important but it’s also true that for most of the audience they didn’t know that he was gay until the bench scene itself so there wasn’t that much trope subversion going on. And who knows how he would have been written if they were actually allowed to have him be openly gay before the series finale

Carlos and Seb may fall into some stereotypes but Tim Federle has spoken of how when he was in High School he would have loved to play a character like Sharpay but wouldn’t have had the confidence to do so and he wrote Seb wanting to play a female role with his own past experiences in mind. He’s also spoken about how Carlos was based off of a close friend of his and he put some of himself into Carlos as well with Carlos telling Mr. Mazzara that he was meant to be on Broadway being something Tim told one of his own teachers in High School. Frankie and Joe have talked about how they see a lot of their own experiences in Carlos and Seb as characters and in Seblos as a relationship. Tim has spoken a lot about how important authenticity is to him and while Carlos and Seb may be stereotypical to some people it shouldn’t be discounted that others can see their lived experiences in those characters

For Andi Mack it’s important to separate Cyrus’ story from the Tyrus story line. It’s unlikely HSMTMTS could have pulled off Cyrus’ coming out story line, the shows are just too different. We’re almost certainly not going to see a One in a Minyan style ep on HSMTMTS but would we have seen such an ep on Andi Mack if they didn’t need to pack all of Cyrus’ S3 story line into one ep? We also can’t forget that 3x11 was written shortly after the cancellation and it was written as a potential end to the gay story line since they didn’t know until months later if they could go with canon Tyrus or not. Even with the limits it faced Andi Mack did a great job with Cyrus’ coming out story line and I think eps like 2x01 and 2x13 and 3x11 will be fondly remembered and will stand the test of time

When it comes to Tyrus though it’s fair to say that the bench scene was a historic and important moment but also an underwhelming one. Andi Mack didn’t live up to the promise that Cyrus was no different but it was never going to be able to with Disney’s restrictions, they were willing to focus on Cyrus as a gay character but not Cyrus as an actively gay character. One thing that will make Seblos go down a lot better than Tyrus is that we aren’t going to see Carlos bearding himself like Cyrus did. It won’t age well at all that Cyrus got to go on dates with Iris and kiss her twice and refer to her as a his girlfriend and even come up with a mashup name for them but Terri probably would have done things very differently if she had known that all Cyrus would be able to do with a boy was hold hands in the series finale. We can also tell that HSMTMTS won’t be facing an increase in censorship later on since Seb will be a main in S2 whereas Disney cracked down hard after S2 for Andi Mack, probably because the story was shifting from Cyrus having a hopeless crush on a straight guy to a reciprocated crush on a gay guy

Since Seblos is textual from the start it will be much easier to write and also much easier to fix things when the writers inevitably make mistakes. I think a lot of the defensiveness coming from certain corners of the Andi Mack fandom is because deep down people know that the bench scene wasn’t enough pay off for the long dragged out Tyrus no burn we got; especially with all of the drama and angst they had. Development is important but it doesn’t take two thirds of the series to set up a silent handhold. I think it’s very unlikely that for HSMTMTS we’ll see the drastic decline in quality that Andi Mack had for most story lines after 3x11. The bench scene would have been better if we hadn’t gotten the worst writing of the series for TJ and Cyrus as characters that did a real disservice to them and to Tyrus as a ship in the eps before the finale. The Tyrus story line was never going to get a great ending with Disney’s restrictions but it is also true that Terri’s choices made things a lot worse than they had to be

It’s insane that they introduced Kira as a homophobic character who was manipulating TJ but also was clearly into him; how do professional writers come up with that? It’s just not a mistake Tim Federle is going to make. Trying to do an external homophobia story line was an obviously bad idea but so was giving TJ an out of nowhere internalized homophobia plot in 3x13 and 3x15 before dropping it in 3x18. Cyrus’ coming out story line helped a lot of people because it showed the correct way for friends to react when someone comes out to you but for TJ they never did anything to help people dealing with internalized or external homophobia, the message was effectively ‘’deal with it on your own kids’’, which is sharp contrast with how openly his dyscalculia plot was handled. I don’t think HSMTMTS would be effectively able to deal with homophobia either but I think Tim probably realizes that and won’t attempt it

There were a lot of little things Terri could have changed that would have helped. Don’t insert Kira into their plot. Don’t have Amber kiss Jonah or say she’s love him so at least she could have pointed to another character who never got to kiss a guy or talk about feelings. Put the Jandi bracelet scene in between the Muffy and Tyrus confession scenes so we don’t go straight from a Muffy kiss and handhold and verbal confession to the bench scene. And just write the bench scene better so it’s more in line with the Tyrus dynamic like how the Muffy and Jandi scenes did a good job capturing their own dynamics. Of course, we’re not going to see Seblos end so subtly so all these problems just won’t arise

Tyrus was important because it happened and may well be the only lgbtq rep we see for middle school characters played by actual teenagers for a very long time. But it’s also true that Andi Mack’s legacy will probably rest a lot more with Cyrus specifically, especially him saying the word gay, whereas HSMTMTS will be remembered more for normalizing lgbtq relationships with Seblos. I’m glad Tyrus happened but I’m also glad that Seblos will be a much smoother story line and will break boundaries for years to come. Anyways that’s my two cents

I really liked the Gina development this ep. Her doesn’t do cash line was interesting, hinting at financial problems? Moving 5 schools in 7 years is rough and I’d like to hear more about that. I’m glad that we got confirmation that she didn’t have an actual plan and was just winging it because her actions really did not make much sense. Tim Federle had said that love triangles will become love squares and it does make more sense to have Gina be into Ricky than EJ since there’s no real drama if she’s into EJ because Nini is totally over him. I do think Gina was being sincere in the scene with Ricky in the car (which Tim said was Big Red’s car that he lent Ricky and that Joshua and Sofia did that scene in just two takes). I also think that she needs Ricky as a friend not a lover and Ricky would not be happy if he ever found out that she was the one who initially stole Nini’s phone

Miss Jenn and Mike Bowen and Benjamin Mazzara love triangle? We do know that Miss Jenn and Mr. Mazzara spend Thanksgiving trapped together which is obvious set up for feelings to develop. We also got Mr. Mazzara doing a 180 and being nice to Carlos this ep which seems like a ploy to get him on the audiences good side

Loved the friendship moments we got this ep. Big Red and Kourtney are great friends. Ricky taking Big Red to his first dance was sweet and I love that Big Red showed up in a old man suit jacket that looks like it was from the 70s. Ngl I thought Ricky was wearing pajama pants for most of the ep. Glad we got a glimpse into Kourtney and Nini’s past, they’ve been friends at least since the 7th grade. I hope Kourtney stands up to the mean costume designer senior

I liked seeing Nini grappling with her self confidence after finding out that she got the lead role at summer camp because EJ poisoned the original lead. She does have the talent but that kind of revelation would leave most people shook

Glad that Ricky and his dad had a honest convo this ep. It’s just the two of them now so they need to stick by each other

Ashlyn has been an unexpected delight so far, I liked that she was the only one to go and support Carlos and she was rocking that suit

Ricky’s office stare after Gina dumped punch on EJ’s head was too funny

Born to be brave was a great song and the choreography blew me away, such a talented cast and crew they have

All of the costumes looked great this ep, kudos to the costume designers

RIP Seb’s cow

Looking Ahead:

Miss Jenn faces her tribunal, I’m curious to see how much she faked on her resume

We get photos of Seb comforting Carlos which I think comes after he finds out that Miss Jenn is suspended. In the medley trailer there was a clip of Carlos hugging Miss Jenn at a coffee shop so maybe that’s next ep since there’s no need to meet at a coffee shop if she’s not suspended

The cast has talked about how we the audience we’ll be going back and forth on team Ricky vs team EJ all season long which at this point seems like a lie. I’m sure EJ’s redemption arc starts soon and if he’s still going to panic attacks I’d imagine that will soon be brought up but Nini is totally over him and I can’t see her being torn about her feelings for EJ in the final 5 eps of the season

With Seb being a main in S2 that will make things more difficult for the writers to juggle and I hope they are thinking about how to balance the different characters. I also wonder what the long term plan for EJ is since he’s the only senior and if S2 takes place spring semester of his senior year then what are they gonna do with him in S3?

We know that in 1x10 breaking free has EJ, Nini, and Ricky so I wonder if EJ starts off playing Troy for whatever reason before Ricky shows up. Since Ricky thinks Nini is over him I don’t think we’ll be seeing him make a move unless he gets some kind of signal from Nini

Wonder what was up with that Sharpay’s mom credit on imdb, just some random imdb troll? If so, what a coincidence that she picked what happened to be a big Seb ep

I don’t know if this will have impact on the show going forward but this marks the point that Tim Federle took over as showrunner after original showrunner Oliver Goldsmith departed. Oliver wanted to take the show in a more mature direction but Tim disagreed and Disney sided with him over Oliver

Until next week Wildcats

#HSMTMTS #Seblos #Carlos #seb mathew-smith #Ricky Bowen #Gina Porter #Nini Salazar-Roberts #Kourtney #Big Red #Ashlyn #EJ Caswell #Mike Bowen #Miss Jenn #Benjamin Mazzara #HSMTMTS Reviews

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saiilorstars · 4 years

Text

Stars Dance

Ch. 6: Vampires of Venice

Fandom: Doctor Who

Pairing: 11th Doctor x Original Female Character

– Previous chapters here –

~0~0~0~0~0~0~0~0~0~0~0~0~0~0~0~0

Chapter summary: Avalon is furious with the Doctor and Amy. And at the end of the day, when all is said and done, the Doctor has to ask himself...does Avalon actually hate him?

Rory Williams was at his stag night, trying to leave a very lovely message for his fiancee while blocking out the heavy noise of the room. "Hey...! It's me! Hello! How are you? The reason for this call is because I haven't told you for seven hours that I love you, which is a scandal, and even if we weren't getting married tomorrow, I'd ask you to marry me anyway. Yes, I would, because you are smashing."

Behind him, a large cake was being wheeled while a rather interesting song played, named 'The Stripper', in the background. One of his friends tapped him on the back, making him turn to see the cake.

"Oh... Oh. Oh, blimey. I've... I've... I-I-I... I'll see you tomorrow," Rory quickly hung up and turned to the cake.

"Out! Out! Out!" everyone began shouting and even clapping.

And out popped a head from the cake alright...with some very ginger hair...

Rory's mouth half-opened when he saw Avalon inside the cake. The woman was trying not to look as pleased as she was. "Okay, that was really cool," she admitted, allowing herself to laugh for a moment. "Can cross this off my bucket list."

"What are you..." Rory pointed, completely flabbergasted with the woman's appearance. Sometimes, she was just too much. "...how did you...I thought...you were on a date!"

"Big things have happened Rory," Avalon declared in an irritated expression when she remembered the reason she'd gotten into this mess in the first place. "Someone help me out!" she shouted and quickly two of Rory's friends came up and pulled her out of the cake. "Thank you," she waved them off and met Rory in a quick rush.

Rory's gaze was still switching between Avalon and the cake but no matter how much he thought about it, he couldn't come up with a logical answer. "What are you doing here? How did you even get inside the cake?"

"Took all the money in my bag," Avalon nodded. "I mean, it was fair since Lucy did deserve to get paid either way."

"But why-"

"We have a problem Rory," Avalon covered his mouth with her hand, "And no, I didn't do anything wrong this time. I know you blew your money on me from the last time..." she looked to the side in guilt. "I'll pay you back eventually."

"You and Mels promised me you'd stay out of trouble," Rory pushed her hand away, "Where is she?" he half expected the woman in question to turn up drunk or something. That's usually how things got started.

"I haven't done anything this time!" Avalon exclaimed at the same time she heard the doors opening, "Oh, you made it? You didn't stay behind kissing Lucy too?" she glared at the Doctor who slowly walked to them.

"What are you doing here?" the Doctor whisper-demanded from Avalon. He should've known she'd beat him to Rory. She was completely furious with him after all.

"Talking to my brother, thank you very much," she snapped.

"What's he doing here?" Rory pointed at him, already beginning to feel a headache coming along. The last time the Doctor popped in things had gone crazy.

"Well, Doctor?" Avalon crossed her arms, "Care to take that one?"

"I cannot believe you took the cake job," the alien said instead, "That was mine."

"Did I upset you?" she asked innocently.

"Yes!"

"Good," she spat.

To say she was angry was an understatement. She was fuming! She and Lena had been told, by the Doctor himself, of what had happened with Amy and while Lena was shocked...Avalon had just slapped the Doctor straight across the face...twice.

The Doctor could understand that the news was highly upsetting but he did want to point out that he had not initiated anything with Amy. He had never given Amy an indication that he was interested in her beyond friendship. He would like a chance to explain himself even if he didn't really have a fault...but Avalon wouldn't hear it. Lena had and she seemed like she wanted to help him. Thank goodness for his baby sister because...he might have been thrown out of his own TARDIS. The box once again proved that she truly liked Avalon a lot since she practically backed Avalon up after she made the threat to throw him into space.

He felt utterly betrayed by that box. It still kind of hurt, actually.

Avalon, for her part, thought she wasn't reacting angry enough. Rory was like her brother and she loved him very much (platonically of course). She knew that Rory would never hurt someone even if he was furious; it just wasn't him. But she could and she would, and she did. She was furious at Amy for what the woman had done to her fiancee, a man who earnestly loved her to bits and pieces. She couldn't even look at Amy and yet Amy seemed upset with her. Amy had the audacity to be angry with her and that only served to agitate Avalon even more. Avalon was in the middle of debating how she'd make it another hour without killing Amy or the Doctor.

"Uh, hello?" Rory waved a hand, reminding Avalon and the Doctor of his presence. They seemed like they were in a huge argument which begged the question of how long they'd even been together since the last time the Doctor was around. The man was a time traveler so...it could be far more time than Rory was thinking. "Explanation, please?"

"Right, Rory, we need to talk about your fiancee," the Doctor began, ignoring the scoff Avalon gave beside him. "She tried to kiss me." He winced when everyone in the room gasped. "Tell you what, though. You're a lucky man - she's a great kisser." Someone dropped their glass, again making the Doctor wince. Wow, he was really bad at this. He side-glanced Avalon with an expression bearing resignation. "I have another one coming, don't I?"

Avalon nodded. "Oh yeah."

Rory opened his mouth to ask once again what was going on, "Um, excuse me, what exactly-"

But Avalon slapped the Doctor again and it sounded hard. Rory, as well as his friends, all collectively winced at the loud smack.

The Doctor rubbed his newest red spot on his face and moved his jaw to wear out the pain. "You are freakishly strong, do you know that?" he looked at Avalon and swore he'd be feeling the echoes of that slap for days.

Avalon's face was straight when she nodded her head. "Yup. Usually, I reserve those slaps for lying boyfriends but I'm making a special exception just for you."

"I feel so special," the Doctor muttered to himself. She completely outranked all the angry Moms that'd slapped him before, including one special Donna Noble slap. "So, um...TARDIS?" he motioned the door to her and Rory.

"Oh we will," Avalon took Rory's hand and marched off with him, ignoring Rory's mumbles of questions.

~ 0 ~

There was an unbearable awkwardness inside the TARDIS that no matter how infinite she was, there weren't enough rooms to make the awkwardness go away. It was for that reason that the Doctor had gone under the console to 'fix' some parts of the box. He felt that maybe if his face wasn't in the same room as Amy and Rory, they would have an easier time reconnecting. But just in case they needed a bit of help, he started to ramble on and hoped that it would inspire them to actually talk to each other.

Amy was pacing about nervously, biting a few of her nails while Rory stood beside the console with his eyes scanning every last part of the box. They hadn't really said much to each other.

"Oh! The life out there, it dazzles. I mean, it blinds you to the things that are important. I've seen it devour relationships and plans..." the Doctor was saying, giving occasional glances above through the glass floor. Rory flinched at the sound of a small explosion underneath and looked below to the Doctor, "Ohhh! It's meant to do that! Because for one person to have seen all that, to taste the glory and then go back, it will tear you apart. So...I'm sending you somewhere. Together."

"Whoa! What, like a date?" Amy had stopped pacing and looked below.

"Lena chose a wonderful place for you two, actually," the Doctor shot out of the seat and rushed up to the console. She had sounded excited which meant the talking with Rory would start soon. "It's very nice, amazing, and romantic," he grinned, "My baby sister's a genius."

"Woah, hold on, did he just say Lena?" Rory looked between the two. His eyes couldn't get wider!

"Oh that's right, he doesn't know..." Amy made a face. She herself forgot that to Leadworth, Lena Reynolds had been missing for 2 years.

"Know what? What else is there now?" Rory raised an eyebrow. Not only did he just discover his fiancee and best friend were time travelers, his fiancee had kissed another man, an alien, but now they were speaking about Lena as if she was...she was...

"I'm ready!" Lena dashed out of the corridors in a 16th century pink dress. She gave a big, dramatic spin so that her dress would twirl like in the movies. "How do I look?"

"Wonderful!" the Doctor praised and she rushed to give him a hug. Lena Reynolds was the only one he could trust in right now.

"I love, love, love, love your wardrobe! It's endless!" Lena beamed as she stepped back, "Endless options to wear!"

"Lena? Lena?" Rory's mouth fell open.

Lena gasped as she saw Rory, "Oh! Hi Rory!" she quickly gave him a hug, "Oh it's been so long, I missed you!"

"But...b-b-but, you're...you're not..." Rory sputtered as he hugged back the woman, "...how are you...the police..."

"Time travel," Lena chuckled as she stepped back, "Little mix up. See, after the Doctor saved us from that whole Prisoner Zero thing, he took me into the TARDIS for a quick jump start...only our two hours was two years for you guys. For me, it's really only been a couple months since I've last seen you and the planet Earth."

"So all this time, you've been here?"

She nodded, "Aha."

"Your family has been going crazy over your disappearance! Avalon quit her job to search for you..."

Lena nodded silently, her eyes looking down as she recalled all the doings her twin had done to search for her, "I know. And I'm so sorry for that. I never meant to make anyone worry, much less lose their jobs."

"It's okay, cos you're here and you're alive," Rory half-smiled and went ahead and hugged her again, "Avalon must have been so happy to see you again."

"Mhm, she wouldn't let go of me."

"Speaking of, where's the feisty Ava?" he pulled away and searched for the missing ginger.

"I chose a dress for her," Lena giggled at her doings. She thought she found the perfect dress that her sister could wear. The TARDIS seemed to agree with all the hums she gave them after Lena pulled out the dress.

"Oh that's a sight I have to see," Rory laughed. If the wardrobe was as big as Lena mentioned, then Avalon was sure to be in paradise.

"Avalon!" Lena called.

"Come on out, Ava!"

Amy looked to the side in irritation. They had been talking about a date and now suddenly here goes her date talking about Avalon...

"I'm not doing it," Avalon emerged from the corridors with her arms crossed. Much to Lena's and Rory's disappointment, she was wearing her modern-day clothes. She wore a light brown dress that reached above her knees with brown boots to match. She wore a dark blue, long-sleeved, jean jacket with a thick hot pink scarf around her neck, both parts dangling down her chest. Her ginger locks fell freely down.

"Aww..." Lena pouted, "It was a nice dress!"

"Sorry, Lena. I'm not in the mood for it," Avalon looked at Amy and the Doctor with glare.

"Did I mention we're going to Venice?" the Doctor tried, trying not to fidget under the woman's glare. He really disliked the cold look in her eyes that he knew were meant for him...

"Oh that's lovely," she put on a sarcastic smile, "You planning on kissing anyone there?"

"It's a date for Rory and Amy," Lena clarified, moving beside the Doctor, "And you're being rude again."

"Excuse me for being upset my best friend was cheated on," Avalon moved beside Rory to show her solidarity, not that she hadn't already.

"It's okay, Ava," Rory assured her, even though it kind of wasn't. Knowing her, she had to have had a go at the Doctor and Amy. On a level, it was nice always having her support.

"No, it's not. And I know you won't say anything so I will. I'm your voice."

"Thank you, but it's okay..." he looked over at Amy and half-smiled, "So...a date?" Maybe a date, something normal, was what they all needed to go back to normal. Besides, Amy looked like she liked the idea so that had to mean something, right?

"I'm kind of done with running down corridors," she nodded and moved closer to him, pulling him away from Avalon ever-so-discreetly.

"Venice, here we come!" Lena cheered.

~ 0 ~

The TARDIS materialized in the middle of a busy market place, no one taking notice of people piling out of a small box.

The Doctor came out first with his arms open to the city, " Venice! Venezia! La Serenissima! Impossible city. Preposterous city! Founded by refugees running from Attila the Hun. It was just a collection of little wooden huts in the marsh, but became one of the most powerful cities in the world. Constantly being invaded, constantly flooding... constantly... Just beautiful! Oh, you gotta love Venice. And so many people did. Byron, Napoleon, Casanova. Oooh, that reminds me," he checked his watch in concern, "1580. That's all right. Casanova doesn't get born for 145 years. Don't want to run into him. I owe him a chicken."

"You owe Casanova a chicken?" Rory raised an eyebrow.

"Long story. We had a bet."

"This is Venice?" Lena gasped as she looked around, "Oh m god, it's beautiful!"

"Glad you like it, baby sister," the Doctor tapped her head. He looked back and saw Avalon barely coming out of the box, cautiously closing the doors and moving slowly around, "And you, Avalon? Impressed?"

She looked at him for a minute then turned to the side, "Hm."

"Bad temper," Lena whispered the reminder to him.

"I've noticed," he patted on his cheeks which were still sore.

Suddenly, an official dressed in black stepped in front of Avalon, making the ginger stumble back in surprise, "Whoa, whoa, whoa! Papers, if you please. Proof of residency, current bill of medical inspection."

Avalon blinked rapidly, still a bit surprised by his sudden approach. "Oh...um..."

"Watch me go and save your bad-tempered sis," the Doctor smirked and headed off, Lena giggling to herself and shaking her head, "There you go fella," he held up his psychic paper for the official. The man took the paper and read it, "All to your satisfaction, I think you'll find."

Avalon, in amusement, smiled as the official deeply bowed, "I am so sorry, Your Holiness. I didn't realize."

"Holiness?" Avalon repeated, swaying her head as she considered the idea. "Yeah, alright."

The Doctor took back the paper, "No worries. You were just doing your job. Sorry, what exactly is your job?"

"Checking for aliens, visitors from foreign lands what might bring the plague with them."

"Oh, that's nice," Amy shook her head, "Lena, you brought us to the plague?"

Lena raised her hands in surrender, "Oi, I gave the location, the Doctor chose the time."

"Don't worry, Viscountess," the official said to Amy. The ginger nearly nodded, taking the role, while Rory stood beside her, looking between the man and her in shock and confusion, "No, we're under quarantine here, no-one comes in, no-one goes out, and all because of the grace and wisdom of our patron, Signora Rosanna Calvierri," the official pointed to a crest on a box he carried.

"Hold on, the plagued died out years ago," the Doctor remarked.

"Not out there. No, Signora Calvierri has seen it with her own eyes. Streets are piled high with bodies, she said."

"Did she, now? Ever picked up a history book?"

Rory reached for the psychic paper from the Doctor while the official moved on to someone else.

"By the way, I didn't need your help," Avalon informed the Doctor before heading off.

"A simple thank you would've been nice," the Doctor mumbled as he followed after her, consequently making the rest follow.

"Or a slap!" she called and he immediately froze, letting her go on a bit farther. His cheeks could not take another slap.

Lena laughed and took his hand, "It's okay, she probably won't do it anymore."

"Probably?" he shot her a concerned look, his free hand going up to his face.

"Wouldn't count on it," Rory moved ahead, walking backwards with Amy beside him, "She once beat up a boy for an entire week because he put play-dough in her hair."

"Oh, yeah," Amy sucked in breath through her teeth at the reminder, "Poor Mark. I liked Mark."

~ 0 ~

Two lines of young women dressed in white gowns of different designs stepped onto the cobblestone ground outside the Calvierri school. An older woman, Rosanna, walked to the head of the procession, "Veils down, girls," she ordered.

The girls lowered their veils and started walking, everyone else stopping to watch them. The group stopped across the canal and also watched.

A man, Guido, ran up to the line and started lifting each girl's veil.

"What do you want?" Rosanna demanded.

"Where's my Isabella?"

"What are you doing? Get away from there," Rosanna tried shooing him off.

"Isabella! Isabella!" he finally lifted the veil off the correct girl, his daughter, but

she backed away at the sunlight, "It's me!"

One of the other girls came forwards with a hiss and showed off her mouth of two rows of fangs. Guido fell to the ground in shock as the girls re-took their positions.

"Girls, come along!" Rosanna ordered again, everything continuing like nothing.

A younger man, Francesco, pressed his boot on Guido's chest, keeping him down as the girls left, "She's gone," he informed Guido and left with a swirl of his cloak.

"Isabella! It's me!" the man cried out as two guards lifted him from the ground and dragged him away.

"What was that about?" Amy frowned as the spectacle finish.

"He's gone, Amy," Lena informed with a small sigh.

"I hate it when he does that!" Amy shook her head.

~ 0 ~

As Guido walked along a passageway, the Doctor crossed behind, leaping onto the bottom step of a stairway before calling to the man, "Who were those girls?"

Guido stopped and looked back at the Doctor, slightly confused of the man's wardrobe choice and lack of knowledge of the practically highlight of Venice, "I thought everyone knew about the Calvierri school."

"My first day here," the Doctor stepped down, "Parents do all sorts of things to get their children into good schools. They move house, they change religion. So, why are you trying to get her out?"

"Something happens in there. Something magical, something evil. My own daughter didn't recognize me. And the girl who pushed me away, her face... like an animal."

The Doctor put an arm around Guido's shoulder and thought for a minute, "I think it's time I met this Signora Calvierri."

~ 0 ~

Amy and Rory were walking through a narrow passageway, Rory still a bit confused from all the sudden news. He couldn't believe that the girls had been away for months and nobody bothered to tell him anything! "Are the twins okay, here? Lena's got her inhaler, right? Avalon knows the city rules?"

Amy, with arms crossed, rolled her eyes and heaved a small sigh, "Yes, they're alright. Would you quit worrying about them? This is our date!"

"What have you been doing, lately? Hm?" Rory shot her a small look.

"Well... running. And fighting. I've been scared. More scared than I thought was..."

"Did you miss me?"

"I... I knew I'd be coming back," Amy rubbed the side of her neck as she looked away for a minute.

"He was right. It blots out everything else," Rory started heading off. He never really got angry per say but this time he was beginning to really feel it. Amy hadn't even bothered to think about him?

"Rory... this is our date!" Amy managed to catch him by the arm. "Let's not do this, not now! Please?"

Rory took a look around as he heard the fluttering of wings overhead and half-smiled. Damn Amy got him to do whatever it was she wanted. "I guess...we are in Venice and it is 1580."

"I know!" Amy laughed.

Together, they walked off arm-in-arm and passed a stairway where Francesco was lounging above. He noticed a young flower-seller stopping by two other women to offer them poseys. One of them, a brunette, took them while the ginger walked ahead of her. Once the flower seller walked away as well, he started coming down.

~ 0 ~

Amy posed in front of a doorway while Rory knelt to take her picture with his phone, and then hey heard a piercing scream.

~ 0 ~

"Lena!" Avalon screamed and bolted back from where she had come from, bumping into Amy and Rory. She then saw a man over her sister, lifting his head to show blood on Lena's neck. Quickly, the man bared his fangs and ran off as Avalon dashed to her sister, "Lena!? Lena!? Please wake up! Lena, oh God!" Rory ran over to help and check for vitals while Amy dashed after Francesco.

"She'll be okay," Rory said Avalon who quickly cradled her twin in her arms, "Amy, where are..." he saw the second ginger gone, "Where'd she go!?"

~ 0 ~

Guido approached the guards of the school of Calvierri where two guards stood by the doors, "You have my daughter. Isabella!"

"You're not coming in, stop there! We've told you..." one of the guards began to say.

Meanwhile, the Doctor snuck on the side of the building unbeknownst to the guards.

"You have my daughter. Isabella! I demand you let me see my daughter," Guido continued.

The Doctor hopped onto small steps in front of the canal gate and used his screwdriver to open it up. He quickly made his way down stone steps and into a chamber. He noticed a mirror on a wall and sauntered up to it, "Hello, handsome," he straightened his tie out and checked his teeth.

"Who are you?" he heard several women's voices.

He turned to face a group of young girls dressed in white standing around him. He looked back and forth to see them invisible in the mirror, "How are you doing that? I... am... loving it. You're like Houdini, only five scary girls, only he was shorter - will be shorter. I'm rambling."

"I'll ask you again, signor. Who are you?" the girls questioned.

"Why don't you check this out?" he flashed his psychic paper...or his library card with a picture of his first incarnation, "Library card," he put it away as he remembered, "Of course, it's with... He's..." he mimicked once again a large nose, "I need the spare," he faced the girls again and studied them, "Pale, creepy girls who don't like sunlight and can't be seen in...," he glanced at the mirror which remained clear of their reflections, "Am I thinking what I think I'm thinking? But the city. Why shut down the city? Unless..."

"Leave now, signor, or we shall call for the steward... if you are lucky."

"Ooh!" he had a hint of a smile but it immediately vanished when the girls showed bare fangs and advanced on him. He ran to the doorway but turned back for one request, "Tell me the whole plan," he demanded but the girls ignored, "One day that'll work! Listen, I would love to stay here. This whole thing... I'm thrilled. Oh, this is Christmas!" he cheered like a boy and ran up the stairs with the hissing girls behind him.

~ 0 ~

Later that day, in the night, the Doctor and Amy met up across the canal from the school, both utterly excited for some reason.

"Doctor!" the ginger exclaimed.

"I just met some vampires!" he informed.

"We just saw a vampire!"

"And creepy girls and everything."

"Vampires!"

Together, they jumped in their excitement. Though the Doctor stopped when he saw Avalon and Rory walking slowly towards them with a groggy Lena between them, "Woah, hey, that's not good..." he ran over to them, "...baby sister?"

"There are freaking vampires here!" Avalon spat, "One of them bit her!" she motioned to the dry trail of blood on the side of Lena's neck.

"I feel okay, though," Lena informed them quietly, "Just probably sit down for a good moment would be good for me."

"Right, so we should all come to my new friend's house," the Doctor offered, "Cos we still have to figure out how to get back in there somehow," he nodded to the school then checked over Lena's 'bite' with his screwdriver.

"What?!" Rory gaped, "Back in where!?"

"How do we do that?" Avalon demanded, glaring at the school. Oh, they'd have something coming to them after what they did to her twin.

"Ava!" Rory frowned.

"No, she's right," Amy joined them.

"NO!"

"Yes," the two gingers reiterated, both crossing their arms with looks of doom.

~ 0 ~

Guido brought out a map of Venice to the table of his house where the Doctor, Avalon and Amy looked over it. Rory sat back among some barrels while Lena took rest on a small bed against the wall.

"As you saw, there's no clear way in. The House of Calvierri is like a fortress," Guido was saying, "But there's a tunnel underneath it, with a ladder and shaft that leads up into the house. I tried to get in once myself, but I hit a trapdoor."

"You need someone on the inside," Amy nodded.

"No," the Doctor immediately said as he looked over the map.

"You don't even know what I was going to say!"

"We pretend you're an applicant for the school to get you inside and tonight you come down and open the trapdoor to let us in."

"Oh," Amy looked to the side and mumbled, "So you know what I was going to say."

"Are you insane?" Rory raised an eyebrow.

"We don't have another option."

"He said no, Amy. Listen to him," and before Avalon opened her mouth he wagged a finger, "And no to your volunteering as well."

"They took my sister!" she reminded.

"Don't care," he pointed again before she opened her mouth, making her quiet down.

"There is another option," Guido spoke up and pointed in Rory's direction, "I work at the Arsenale. We build the warships for the navy."

The Doctor moved over to the barrels and sniffed them, "Gunpowder," he set a hand on Rory's shoulder, "Most people just nick stationery from where they work." Slowly, Rory slid away from the barrels and backed away into a dead rabbit hanging by the fireplace. "Look, I have a thing about guns and huge quantities of explosive," the Doctor said.

"What do you suggest, then? We wait until they turn her into an animal?"

"I want to go," Avalon declared but Amy shook her head.

"It was my idea," she reminded.

"I don't care, they hurt my sister and no one hurts my sister."

"I would like to point out that I am just fine," Lena raised her hand from her spot, "I'm not sparkling or anything and I don't want blood."

"Always the peacemaker, eh?" the Doctor sat down beside her with a small smile as she nodded.

"I don't like arguments."

"Look, in three or four hours tops I'd have the door opened," Avalon insisted.

"No, no, no, no, no, no. It can't keep happening like this. This is how they go."

"I can go," Amy reminded, shooting a small glare at Avalon. It was her idea and she was not going to let anyone take it from her! She wanted to do this!

"Avalon, I don't want you to go," Lena said quietly, "Please don't."

The Doctor took a breath and sat back on the wall, "I have to know. We go together. Say you're my daughter," he looked at Amy, respecting his baby sister's wishes.

"What?! Don't listen to him!" Rory nearly shouted.

"Your daughter? You look about nine," Amy scoffed.

"Brother, then," the Doctor shrugged.

"Too weird. Fiancé."

"I'm not having him run around telling people he's your fiancé," Rory pointed at Amy.

"No. No, you're right."

"Thank you."

"I mean, they've already seen the Doctor. You should do it."

"Me?" Rory blinked.

Avalon shook her head behind Amy, was she really going to do this?

"Yeah! You can be my brother," Amy rubbed Rory's head in a playful manner.

The Doctor smiled while Lena giggled, the only ones not amused being Rory and Avalon.

"Why is him being your brother weird, but with me, it's OK?" he demanded from Amy.

"Actually, I thought you were her fiancé," Guido spoke up as he pointed at the Doctor.

"Yeah, that's not helping," the Doctor mumbled.

"SHUT UP!" Avalon suddenly shouted, "All of you just shut up! Now-" she stepped between the group, dead serious, "-here's the thing, I'm not asking if I can go to that school, I am informing you I'm going to the school. Now, if any one would like to help me then by all means, go right ahead. I will not send a friend of mine to that school when she doesn't know how to even fight," she covered Amy's mouth before the second ginger had remarked on it, "Amy, it's been two years and you and I both know who's more qualified to be running about and smacking people. Now please," she looked between them all, "I'm really trying hard not to kill you or the Doctor and so right now your best, and possibly safest, option, is to send me into the school so I can kill the man who bit my twin. Got it?"

"You are mad, Ava," Rory sighed, shaking his head.

Avalon took her hand off Amy and turned to the Doctor, "You owe me, remember? The gun from the Angels? I'll exchange it for this."

"Don't do it," Lena said to him, "Please?"

"We don't even know if they're vampires," he quietly told Avalon as a warning.

"So?"

"It's dangerous."

"What else you got?"

"Your twin is asking you not to go."

"And I love her, but I'm in a foul mood and I'd really like to blow off some steam. Besides, I trust you'd keep her safe?"

"Of course."

"You're not actually going to let her, are you?" Amy questioned, feeling a bit hurt that her plan had just been stolen from her.

"I think I am," the Doctor nodded, "Content, Miss Reynolds?" he looked at Avalon.

"Oh I will be after I get done with them," she crossed her arms.

~ 0 ~

Avalon and Rory stood as petitioners in front of Rosanna, both wearing clothes from the period.

"So, basically, both of our parents are dead from getting the plague. I'm a gondola... driver... so... money's a bit tight... so having my sister go to your school for special people would be brilliant," Rory slowly said as he looked around, "Cheers."

Francesco showed an interest in Avalon, vaguely trying to recall her appearance as he moved in front of her, "Have we met?" he asked her.

"I have one of those faces," she spat, her eyes narrowing as she recalled this being the man over her sister with blood, "Yours is so pretty though, a shame if anything happened to it..."

"Such a tongue for such a lady," he remarked and stepped back.

"Impressed?"

"Not in the least," Rosanna informed from her chair, "Carlo, explain yourself," she looked at a servant, "Why have you brought me this imbecile?"

Rory had to grip onto Avalon's arm before she stalked over to the woman in fury.

"Signora, they have references from the King of Sweden," the servant explained.

"What?" Rosanna blinked, "Let me see," she held her hand out and Rory walked over to hand her the psychic paper. Rosanna took one look at the paper and half-smiled, "Well, now I can see what got my steward so excited," she handed the paper back to Rory, "What say you, Francesco? Do you like her?"

Francesco was circling Avalon who was trying her best to not snap right there and then and strangle him, "Oh, I do, mother. She has attitude that I like."

Avalon winced at the tone, even Rory wanting to take a good punch at the man for his implication.

"Then we would be delighted to accept her," Rosanna looked at Rory, "Say goodbye to your sister."

Rory gave Avalon a hug, "Be careful of him," he whispered as he was pulled away.

"Tell my lovely aunt Amy and uncle Doctor I'll see them very soon," Avalon called, no fear in her tone, "And our sister, please. I'll be just fine."

Rory glanced back from the doorway and saw the fangs Francesco bared behind his best friend, "A-Ava!"

~ 0 ~

Carlo led Avalon up the stairs of the school and into a large room she shared with other girls, "There are clothes on the bed. Get changed and wait here."

Avalon nodded and looked up at the opulent, domed room, "Sure."

All the other girls left the room with Carlo except for one who remained sat on her bed. Cautiously, she moved over to the girl and spoke quietly, "Hello, I'm Avalon. What's your name?"

"Isabella," the girl remained looking ahead.

"Right, so, um, listen, we're going to get you out of here, but I need you to tell me what's going on. What is this place? What are they doing?"

"They, um... they come at night. They gather around my bed and they take me to a room... with this green light and a chair with... with straps, as if for a surgeon."

"And what happens in there?"

Isabella's eyes half-widen as she realized, "I wake up here. And the sunlight burns my skin like candle wax."

"Right, best stay away from green light, then," Avalon stood back up and looked around, hearing a bell tolling above.

~ 0 ~

The Doctor, Rory Guido (who was dressed in Rory's clothes) were inside a gondola that went along a canal driven by Guido. Much to Amy's irritation, she'd been tasked with looking after Lena back at Guido's house, the brunette still a tad weak from earlier. The Doctor had even suggested Rory stay back with them but the man was adamant he'd go and help get his best friend back. It was clear Rory despised the plan of Avalon being inside that school as much as he would've been if Amy had gone in instead.

He knew Avalon was more than capable of taking care of herself, apparently, since she was some future human as explained by Lena before leaving them. But, Avalon was always like a little sister to him or an equal aged sister that he loved dearly, platonic of course. He had always shared a special relationship with Avalon, ever since they were kids. They'd met as kids when he thought Avalon was being bullied by some boys and he was about to go help when all of a sudden the small ginger haired girl started shouting at the boys, driving them off with threats only a child could make. Afterwards, Avalon simply brushed the boys off like nothing happened and noticed Rory staring at her. Rory was intrigued by the girl, she had just driven away a group of boys with the foulest of moods but now she was practically a ray of sunshine. The ginger girl was just so excited to have "made a new friend on her own" that they actually spent that whole day together, playing any game Rory wanted. So, from there, he'd actually met Amy, Lena and Mels. He had his friends and his love because of Avalon, and he would never finish thanking her for that.

"She'll be fine, you know," the Doctor spoke quietly and brought Rory out of his thoughts.

"You can promise me that, can you?" Rory shot him a small look, "Avalon can do all the talking she wants but I know when she's afraid and right now she is afraid."

"Well, I wouldn't know how she feels because most of them time she's yelling at me," the Doctor informed, trying not to sound as hurt as he actually was about that fact. It seemed like no matter what he did or said, it was always the wrong thing.

"What? She doesn't hate you," Rory made a loud scoff, "If you only knew."

"Know what?"

"We're here," Guido declared as he stopped the gondola stopped in beside a small gate with a narrow passage of stairs up to another door.

The Doctor and Rory got out of the gondola and stepped onto the ground. The Doctor carried a lit torch and warned Guido to wait for them on the gondola.

They stopped at the stairs where the Doctor took a breath, "Right. OK, I'll go first. If anything happens to me, go back..."

"What happened? Between you and Amy?" Rory blurted, "You said she kissed you."

"NOW?! You want to do this NOW?!" the Doctor went up the steps towards the door

"I have a right to know," Rory went after him, "I'm getting married in 430 years."

~ 0 ~

Avalon, carrying a lamp and dressed in a white school dress, had entered a courtyard and hurried up to the well in the center. She set her lamp down and released the bars locking the grate. Once done, she picked up the lamp and turned to see Carlo.

"Oh no you don't!" she used her lamp and whacked it over the man's head before making a break for it.

However, she only made it a few feet into a corridor when she bumped into Francesco and two more guards.

"I knew I recognized you from somewhere," Francesco smiled wickedly.

"Oh I hate you!" the ginger declared and slapped him across the face with all her might, "That was for my sister!"

The man put a hand on his face and glared. Without a word he bared his fangs and lunged on the ginger girl who immediately screamed.

~ 0 ~

The Doctor and Rory walked through the narrow passage with only the torch lighting up their way.

"She was frightened, I was frightened, but we survived," the Doctor was carefuly explaining to Rory, "And the relief of it... and so she kissed me."

"The twins were there," Rory reminded, "Didn't hear anything of Lena or Avalon kissing you."

"Well, um, well, Lena's my baby sister...so ew?" the Doctor crinkled his face. He didn't want that image in his head, like ever. "And Avalon shouts, remember? Poor Amy was left."

"And you kissed her back?"

"No. I kissed her mouth."

"Funny," Rory rolled his eyes.

"Rory..." the Doctor stopped and liked back, "Rory, she kissed me because I was there. It would have been you," he tapped Rory on the chest," It should have been you."

"Yeah..."

"Exactly. That's why I brought you here," the Doctor had just faced ahead in time to feel a gust of wind blow against them and end their only source of life from the torch, "Can we go and see the vampires now, please?" he fearfully whispered in the dark.

~ 0 ~

Half fighting and half awake, Avalon struggled against the two guards forcing her down the stairs into a chamber bathed in green light. "Get your hands off me!" she shouted.

"Psychic paper. Did you really think that would work on me?" Rosanna questioned in amusement, until she saw the trail of blood oozing down on the ginger's neck, "Francesco?"

"She slapped me!" the man cried.

"You bit my sister!" Avalon snapped, "Did you really think I was gonna let that slide?"

"Enough, sit her down," Rosanna ordered.

~ 0 ~

The Doctor pushed open the grate Avalon had opened earlier and climbed out, using poor Rory as a ladder, "Push..." he got out then reached down to pull Rory up, "There we are," he turned to the room, "Avalon?" he whispered, "Where's Avalon? I can't see a thing."

"Just as well I brought this, then," Rory pulled out a small pencil torch from his pocket.

The Doctor pulled out a longer torch from under his jacket, "Ultraviolet. Portable sunlight."

Rory frowned, "Yours is bigger than mine."

"Let's not go there," the Doctor countered and walked about.

~ 0 ~

Rosanna circled around Avalon who was now sat down in the wooden chairs with tough wrist straps locking her down, "Where are you from?" she demanded from the ginger, "Did you fall through the chasm?"

"Mother this is pointless. Let's just start the process," Francesco sighed.

"Hold your tongue, Francesco! I need to know what this girl is doing in a world of savages with psychic paper," Rosanna looked down at Avalon, "Who are you with? I scarcely believe your idiot brother sent you," Francesco set a hook into an eye socket above the chair, "What are you doing in my school?" one of the girls attached an IV bag to the hook.

"Mm, how about you fix this," Avalon tilted her head to show them her blood on her neck, "And then we'll talk."

Rosanna laughed at the girl, "You're funny. I don't like funny."

"And I don't like you so we're good" Avalon snapped. Francesco held her head from behind, "Get your hands off me!"

"Oh, make sport of me, will you? Tease me as if I were your dog? Well, this dog has a bite, girl," Rosanna showed her fangs.

"You think you scare me? Ha," Avalon breathed rapidly in and out, "I'm Avalon Reynolds and I don't get scared of some silly vampire."

"You think we're vampires? Oh, now that is amusing," Rosanna chuckled.

"You let me go right now!" Avalon tried twisting her head but remained locked in the position as Rosanna made her way over, "No!" she screamed as the woman bit her neck.

~ 0 ~

The Doctor opened up a chest on the ground to reveal skeletal remains, making Rory stare in horror, "What happened to them?"

"They've had all the moisture taken out of them," the Doctor took a feel of a...fingertip?

~ 0 ~

Rosanna pulled away from Avalon and stood straight, licking her lips with satisfaction. Meanwhile, the rest of the girls left the chamber. Avalon blinked slowly as she tried to push through the icky, weakness spreading across her body.

Francesco leaned down beside Avalon and ran a finger along her neck where the puncture wounds were located. Avalon flinched at the contact and made the attempt to lean away from him, her face scrunching with disgust.

"Mother... where you drink from her, may we share? I'm so thirsty."

"Of course, darling," Rosanna motioned for him to go ahead.

"N-n-no-" Avalon gasped when she felt the same disgusting teeth plunge her skin.

~ 0 ~

"That's what vampires do, right? They drink your blood and replace it with their own," Rory was saying, really trying not to freak out as much as he really was at the moment.

"Yeah, except they haven't just had their blood taken, but all the water in their bodies,"the Doctor clarified.

"Why did they die? Why aren't they like the girls in the school?"

"Maybe not everyone survives the process."

Rory walked away in frustration then stopped and pointed at the Doctor, "You out of all people should not put Avalon in danger! You make her even more dangerous to herself!"

"Let me remind you that she volunteered to go here," the Doctor stood up, frowning, "She doesn't listen to me, I don't have control over her!"

"You have far more influence on her than you think!" Rory snapped, "And if testing her temper isn't enough, you bring Lena into danger she has no business being in. The girl is ill for god's sake! And let's not forget Amy, you make her want to impress you. and risk her own life just so she doesn't let you down. You have no idea how dangerous you make people to themselves when you're around."

But before the Doctor had time to comeback the girls of the school had gathered again under each archway and spoke in unison, "Who are you?"

The Doctor held the ultraviolet light up to them as they got closer," We should run. Run!"

The two ran from the courtyard with the girls right behind them.

~ 0 ~

Rosanna stood in front of Avalon in the chair, "This is how it works. First, we drink you until you're dry. Then... we fill you with our blood. It rages through you like a fire, changing you, until one morning you awake and your humanity is a dream... now faded."

Francesco chuckled, "Or you die," he moved a lock of her away from her neck, "That can happen."

"And if I survive?" Avalon weakly asked as she looked between the two.

"Then there are 10,000 husbands waiting for you in the water," Rosanna opened her arms.

"Yeah, sorry, I don't do marriage with vampires," Avalon kicked Rosanna on her side, making Francesco restrain her back.

Rosanna stumbled back and gasped as she felt the electric hum of her technology strapped onto her. She flipped back part of her dress to the device clipped to her dress. Avalon watched with wide eyes as Rosanna's human image flipped to one of an insectoid creature and then back to human. Suddenly, they all heard the running and voices from above and Rosanna and Francesco quickly ran off to go see about it, leaving Avalon alone. She groaned and tried to make her escape from the stupid chair.

~ 0 ~

The Doctor and Rory ran along a corridor and stopped when they encountered Rosanna, Francesco and even Carlo (the servant). The Doctor looked around nervously, "Cab for Avalon Reynolds?"

~ 0 ~

Avalon screamed again of terror when another hand reached onto her straps.

"It's okay! It's okay! It's just me!" Isabella exclaimed.

"Sh-she-she - they bit me!" Avalon cried as she looked around, swallowing hard.

The girls of the school appeared from the other end of the corridor, blocking the Doctor and Rory's escape. Rosanna, with a smirk, and looked back at her son and servant, "This rescue plan, not exactly watertight, is it?"

The Doctor brandished the ultraviolet light to hold off the girls, "Ha-ha!"

Avalon and Isabella ran in from an intersecting hall, "Rory!" Avalon rushed straight to him, clinging onto him in terror.

"Oh, Ava," Rory stumbled back with her.

"Quickly, through here!" Isabella ran back from the way they'd come in and the rest followed her.

"Seal the house," Rosanna ordered.

~ 0 ~

"They're not vampires!" Avalon exclaimed as they made their way down the underground stairs.

"What?" the Doctor used the sonic on the door for their freedom.

"I saw the, that woman. She's not a vampire, they're not vampires they're aliens!"

"Classic," the Doctor chuckled.

"That's good news?!" Rory cried and looked at Avalon, "She has blood dripping down her neck and this is good news!?"

"I'll be fine," Avalon swallowed.

"Oh don't lie to me, Ava," Rory shook his head. He could see the fear she was desperately trying to push away.

The Doctor quickly pushed them forwards into a new passageway, "Come on, move!" Francesco led the way with a torch and the Doctor used his own as a weapon and made them lash back, "Keep moving! Come on, guys!"

Once at the door of the canal, Isabella opened it up and ushered them out, "Quickly. Get out. Quick!" once she tried stepping out she hissed at the sunlight and shielded her eyes.

"Oh..." the Doctor hurried back to help her out, "Come on, run!"

"I can't!" Isabella cried as she was dragged back inside by the rest of the girls.

The door was shut and when the Doctor pounded on it he was electrified. He fell to the ground, stumbling down the steps and flat on his back on thee ground. Rory and Avalon ranj back to him where Rory checked him.

"Is he alright?" Avalon gasped.

"He's breathing," Rory said.

Avalon looked back at Guido who stood near the lower gate, sorrowful for the man as his daughter would probably not be coming back...

~ 0 ~

Rosanna walked into her throne room to find the Doctor sitting on her throne.

The Doctor tapped his fingers on the chair's armrest, giving a small wolf whistle, "Long way from Saturnyne, aren't you... Sister of the Water?"

Rosanna studied the man of confidence and lightly gasped, "No, let me guess. The owner of the psychic paper. Then I take it you're a refugee, like me?"

"I'll make you a deal. An answer for an answer. You're using a perception filter. It doesn't change your features, but manipulates the brainwaves of the person looking at you. But seeing one of you for the first time in, say, a mirror, the brain doesn't know what to fill the gap with, so leaves it blank... hence no reflection."

"Your question?"

"Why can we see your big teeth?"

Rosanna laughed, "Self-preservation over-rides the mirage. The subconscious perceives the threat and tries to alert the conscious brain."

"Where's Isabella?"

"My turn," she reminded, "Where are you from?"

"Gallifrey."

"You should be in a museum," she sarcastically gasped, "Or in a mausoleum," she smirked.

The Doctor shot her a small glare, "Why are you here?"

"We ran from the Silence. Why are you here?"

"Wedding present..." he thought for a minute, "...and impression," he added, "The Silence?"

"There were cracks. Some were tiny... some were as big as the sky. Through some we saw worlds and people and through others we saw silence... and the end of all things. We fled to an ocean like ours and the crack snapped shut behind us... and Saturnyne was lost."

"So Earth is to become Saturnyne Mark II?"

"And you can help me. We can build a new society here, as others have," Rosanna took a step forwards, "What do you say?"

"Hmm," the Doctor stood up and walked up to her, whispering, "Where's Isabella?"

"Isabella?" the woman blinked, completely clueless.

"The girl who saved my er-friend," he really did not know what to call Avalon at this point. When she wasn't angry with him, she was in danger and vice versa. For now, and for Rosanna, Avalon was a friend...yeah.

"Oh, deserters must be executed. Any general will tell you that," Rosanna casually informed, seeing irrelevant of the matter, "I need an answer, Doctor. A partnership. Any which way you choose," she stepped closer to him.

"I don't think that's such a good idea, do you? I'm a Time Lord. You're a big fish," the Doctor whispered, crinkling his nose, "Think of the children."

Rosanna frowned, "Carlo! she called and the servant came forwards, "You're right. We're nothing alike. I will bend the heavens to save my race, while you philosophize."

"This ends today. I'll tear down the House of Calvierri, stone by stone," the Doctor warned when Carlo placed a hand on his chest to get him moving, "Take your hands off me, Carlo," he snapped and walked for the door, stopping only to look back, "And you know why? You didn't know Isabella's name. You didn't know Isabella's name!"

~ 0 ~

Avalon, now changed back to her modern day clothes, sat on a chair inside Guido's house with the Doctor beside her, examining her bites with his screwdriver. She tried her best to not to flinch whenever the Doctor's fingers accidentally touched her skin. It just felt too similar to the...no, she didn't want to think about it.

"Can I kill them?" she muttered to him.

"Um, no."

"But they bit me...several times," she swallowed at the reminder, growing silent as she remembered the awful moments.

"You okay?" Lena knelt down beside her, taking her sister's hand.

Avalon quickly blinked and smiled, "Yup, just fine," she looked up at the Doctor, "How are those readings?"

He nodded, "Fine," although he could tell it was the complete opposite of what she was feeling, "Here, open wide," he slipped a candy into her mouth, managing to get a small smile out of her.

"So...what now, exactly?" Lena stood up though remained by her twin's side.

The Doctor, frustrated, paced, "I need to think. Come on brain, think, think. Think!" he plopped down at the table, "Think!"

"Well, if they're fish people it would explain why they hate the sun," Amy offered as she took a seat beside him.

He covered her mouth with his hand, "Stop talking, brain thinking. Hush."

"It's the school thing I don't understand," Rory said.

The Doctor placed his hand over Rory's mouth as well, "Stop talking, brain thinking. Hush."

"I say we take the fight to them," Guido shrugged.

"I'm with him," Avalon frowned.

"Ah!" the Doctor shot them both a look.

"I got it," Lena said before covering her twin's and Guido's mouths.

"Thank you baby sister," the Doctor nodded at her, "So, Rosanna's planet dies, so they flee through a crack in space and time, and end up here, then she closes off the city and, one by one, changes people into creatures like her to start a new gene pool. Got it. Then what? They come from the sea, they can't survive forever on land, so what's she going to do? Unless she's going to do something to the environment to make the city habitable... She said, "I shall bend the heavens to save my race," he moved Rory's and Amy's heads in a nod as he spoke, "Bend the heavens... Bend... the heavens... She's going to sink Venice."

Guido removed Lena's hand from his mouth and blinked, "She's...she's going to sink Venice?"

"And repopulate it with the girls she's transformed."

"You can't repopulate somewhere with just women," Rory reminded, "You need... blokes."

Avalon took Lena's hand from her mouth and sighed, "Which she's got...and lots of them."

"Where?" the Doctor asked her.

"In the canal. She said to me, "There are 10,000 husbands waiting in the water."

"Only the male offspring survived the journey here. She's got 10,000 children swimming in the canals, waiting for Mum to make them some compatible girlfriends," he crinkled his noise at the thought, "Ew. I mean, I've been around a bit, but, really, that's... that's... Ew."

Suddenly, there was a loud clattering from the floor above which made everyone look up at the ceiling.

"The people upstairs are very noisy..." the Doctor remarked slowly.

"There aren't any people upstairs," Guido informed.

"I knew you were going to say that. Did anyone else know he was going to say that?"

The wood creaked if someone walked across the floor.

"Is it the vampires?" Lena questioned.

"Like I said, they're not vampires. Fish from space," the Doctor said.

"Yup, makes that a whole lot better," Avalon shook her head.

A loud thump and glass breaking made everyone jump to their feet as the converted girls entered the room, more of them outside the windows. The Doctor brandished the ultraviolet light on them as Guido crossed himself.

"Aren't we on the second floor?" Rory asked, vaguely remembering that.

The girls at the window broke the glass and the Doctor continued using the light to keep them back. He used his screwdriver next to show their true form.

"Oh my god, what's happened to them?" Amy blinked with wide eyes.

"Get them out!" Avalon shuddered a breath, already backing away.

"Ava..." Rory looked back, never seeing her best friend actually showing some fear.

"There's nothing left of them," the Doctor answered Amy's question, "They've been fully converted. Blimey, fish from space have never been so... buxom. OK..." he switched off his screwdriver, "Move. Come on."

They quickly ran down the stairs where Guido lingered behind, "Give me the lamp," he took the ultraviolet from the Doctor and used it on the girls.

The group burst from the entrance doors and rushed out, the Doctor being the last one, "Go, go, go, guys! Keep moving, go, go, go!"

Guido stopped at the door before closing it and locking the others out, "Stay away from the door, Doctor."

The Doctor turned back and rushed to the door, pounding on it, "No! Guido! What are you doing?! I'm not leaving you! What are you doing?!" he took out his screwdriver and used it on the lock but to no avail.

~ 0 ~

Guido lured the girls into his rooms where more barrels were, "Come on. That's it... Come on."

~ 0 ~

"Guido!" the Doctor yelled but received no answer.

~ 0 ~

Guido pocked up a candle with his free hand and grew closer to the barrels, "Come on. Come on. Come on!"

~ 0 ~

The Doctor, now realizing what Guido's plan was, backed away and started running from the house.

~ 0 ~

"We are Venetians!" Guido raised the flame and set it on one of the barrels.

~ 0 ~

The Doctor was thrown to the ground as the house exploded. Upon hearing the explosion, the rest of the group ran back to see the destroyed house.

"Oh my stars..." Lena breathed.

Lightening struck across the sky as the sun was suddenly blocked off and a storm was began.

"Rosanna's initiating the final phase," the Doctor said as they heard the commotion from the other Venetians

"We need to stop her. Come on!" Amy exclaimed.

"No, no. Get back to the TARDIS. All of you," he eyed every last girl and Rory.

"You can't stop her on your own," Avalon reminded, "And I don't follow orders from anyone."

"We don't discuss this! I tell you to do something, and you do it," the Doctor shouted, both gingers flinching, "I've had enough of that! Now go!"

Avalon angrily stormed off.

"Good going," Amy muttered and followed after her friend, much in the same angry manner.

The Doctor sighed and looked at the remaining girl, "Baby sister..."

She raised her hands in surrender, "I know, I know, go back to the TARDIS," she gave a small smile and walked away.

"Thank you, really," Rory nodded and followed after Lena.

"Yeah... You're welcome," the Doctor mumbled. He heard the screams of people and quickly ran off.

~ 0 ~

The human group stopped across the canal from the Calvierri school, Amy looking up at the sky, "Oh, my God! What is going on?"

Francesco, standing across the canal in front of the school, recognized Avalon Rory.

"The sky, it's like it's boiling," Lena remarked, "We should get out of here."

Francesco removed his bat and cape as he watched the group move on before diving into the canal.

~ 0 ~

The Doctor had walked directly up to Rosanna's throne chair to examine it. He pulled opened the back of it and saw the circuitry and took out the screwdriver.

Unbeknownst, Rosanna had walked in quietly, "You're too late. Such determination... just to save one city. Hard to believe it's the same man that let an entire race turn to cinders and ash. Now you can watch as my people take their new kingdom."

"The girls have gone, Rosanna," the Doctor informed her calmly.

"You're lying," her smile faltered.

"Shouldn't I be dead? Hmm?" he gestured to his very alive self. He sighed when the woman walked away from him, "Rosanna, please, help me. There are 200,000 people in this city."

"So save them," Rosanna waved him off, dearly hoping every last one of them died.

~ 0 ~

Amy, Rory the twins were walking through the streets when suddenly they found their way blocked by a soaking wet Francesco. Avalon gasped and jumped back, the mental images of the biting and the blood and...

She shook her head and pulled back, for once she was actually, truly afraid.

Rory picked up some candlesticks and held them up in the form of a cross, "Run!" he ordered the girls as Francesco swiped the candlesticks away and moved towards the girls, specifically Avalon.

"Stay back!" Amy ordered, moving in front of the twins as the man grew closer to them.

"This way, you freak!" Rory also called from his spot, "Don't! This...this... this way, you big, stupid, great... SpongeBob! The only thing I've seen uglier than you is... your mum!" and then Francesco stopped and turned back, "No..."

"Did you just say something about Mummy?" Francesco raised an eyebrow.

Rory picked up a broom and brandished it like a sword...and then Francesco pulled out an actual sword making poor Rory question his choice of weapon. Francesco used the moment to attack but Rory blocked him with the broom's handle.

"Careful, Rory!" Lena gasped and looked back at Avalon who actually stood behind her, "Avalon?"

But the ginger watched in terror as her best friend fought the big fish from space.

"Rory, this way, bring him this way!" Amy pulled the twins to a small passage and gestured to Rory to follow.

Francesco sliced Rory's broom's handle and thrusts his sword through a hanging drape. Rory used the opportunity to wrap the man in the drape and backed away.

"Ew! You stink of fish," Rory crinkled his noise and backed away into the next courtyard where the girls had run to.

Francesco rolled his eyes as he followed, "Well, I'm hardly going to smell of cheese and biscuits."

Rory tripped and fell backwards on the ground, even hitting his head. Francesco leaped and changed to his original form, landing on top of Rory.

"Hey! Mummy's boy," Amy called from the stairs. She held a compact mirror in her hand and used it to reflect light onto the alien, making him explode.

"Ha!" Lena cheered as she and Avalon poked their head from under a passageway under the stairs, "Good going, Amy!"

Rory groaned as he wiped the dust of the alien off him, "Oh...oh that's gross."

"That was lucky," Avalon remarked, clearing her throat as she gathered herself up.

"Why did you make the sign of the cross, you numpty?" Amy questioned Rory as he made his way up the stairs to meet he.

Rory rolled his eyes, "Oh, oh, right! I'm being reviewed now, am I?"

Amy shook her head and pulled him to her for a passionate kiss, the twins looking away.

"Ahem, now we go help my big brother?" Lena coughed awkwardly, keeping her eyes away.

Rory, hazed after the kiss had stopped, looked around, "Rightio."

~ 0 ~

As the Doctor entered the throne room from the bell tower, the human group ran inside, "No, get out! I need to stabilize the storm," the Doctor waved them off as he ran up to the throne.

"We're not leaving you," Rory shook his head.

"Right," the Doctor walked back to them, 'So one minute it's, 'You make people a danger to themselves,' the next it's, 'We're not leaving you!' But if one of you gets squashed or blown up or eaten, who gets..."

But the ground shook violently and cut him off as it sent everyone to the floor, bits of the ceiling falling down around them.

"What the hell was that?" Avalon coughed as she lifted her head up.

"Nothing. Bit of an earthquake," the Doctor jumped to his feet.

"And earthquake?" Lena stood up and helped her twin.

"Manipulate the elements, it can trigger earthquakes. But don't worry about them."

"And why not?" Amy looked around, really seeing lots of things to worry about.

"Because you should worry about the tidal waves caused by the earthquake," the Doctor faced the throne again.

"Big brother you always know exactly what to say," Lena sighed.

"Anyways, Rosanna's throne is the control hub but she's locked the program, so tear out every single wire and circuit in the throne. Go crazy. Hit it with a stick, anything," he headed up to the throne and checked the wires, "We need it to shut down and re-route control to the secondary hub, which I'm guessing will also be the generator."

~ 0 ~

The Doctor worked on wires in the bell tower, the wires connecting the control of the throne's device which created the storm. He ran closer to the tolling bells and held his hands over his ears with such a loud noise.

~ 0 ~

Meanwhile, the human group were pulling all the wires from the throne, causing sparks to fly here and there.

~ 0 ~

The Doctor held the clapper on one of the bells, "Shut up! Shut up!" when it became still he jumped down and sighed in relief, "That's better."

He then went on to tug one of the cables only to see it didn't budge. He climbed onto the rail, gripping the column and nearly slipping from it due to the rain pouring down. He regained his balance and began his climb up.

~ 0 ~

The human group ran back out and looked up, "There he is!" Lena pointed, horrified to see the Doctor climbing up the bell tower, "He's mad!"

~ 0 ~

The Doctor climbed to the top reached a giant sphere at the pinnacle, currently whirring about. He stopped the sphere and saw the actual device causing the storm. He began checking it over and over for some type of clue of how to turn it off...and then he saw a simple toggle switch.

Upon flipping it the rain stopped and the clouds cleared, giving Venice the bright sun and the chirps of birds.

He closed the sphere and looked down at the joyful crowd in the street, giving a little happy wave.

~ 0 ~

Rosanna walked the quay to the large pool-like room, trying to turn off her perception filter but instead the device just died. She pulled off her gloves and stripped down to her chemise. As she grew nearer to the water, it bubbled with all the male Saturnyne creatures sensing the 'human'. She started walking along the plank just as the Doctor came to find her.

"Rosanna!"

Rosanna looked back with teary eyes, "One city to save an entire species. Was that so much to ask?"

The Doctor slowly walked towards her, cautiously, "I told you, you can't go back and change time. You mourn but you live. I know, Rosanna, I did it."

She looked back at the water and shuddered a breath, "Tell me, Doctor... can your conscience carry the weight of another dead race? Remember us. Dream of us," she took the final step and fell into the water.

"No! No!" the Doctor ran up the remainder of the plank but the water had stopped its bubbling. He sighed and slowly stood up, certainly feeling that weight of a brand new species lost because of him.

"I don't think it was your fault," he heard Lena's voice from behind. He looked back to see her standing at the threshold, "She did that by her own choice. You had already given her a choice before this."

He gave a faint smile and walked back to his 'baby sister', "Look at you being so wise."

"It comes and it goes," she nodded and the two walked off to find their friends.

~ 0 ~

Near the TARDIS, the townspeople were busy cleaning up after the storm. The group emerged from a turn of a corner and were heading towards the box.

"Now, then, what about you two, eh?" the Doctor looked at Amy and Rory, "Next stop Leadworth Register Office? Maybe I can give you away."

"It's fine. Drop me back where you found me," Rory sighed, knowing Amy wouldn't want to return back to Earth for a long time, "I'll just say you've..."

"Stay..." Amy moved beside him, linking her arm with his, "...with us. Please. Just for a bit. I want you to stay."

Rory opened his mouth but looked at the Doctor for his words, "Fine with me," the alien shrugged happily.

"Yeah? Yes, I would like that," Rory nodded.

"Look what I've got?" Lena came with Avalon, the brunette waving a small posey in her hands, "And I did not get bitten this time."

"What's going on?" Avalon noticed the sudden happy looks of everyone.

"Your best friend is coming along...apparently," Rory declared with a grin.

"Really?" she gasped. Immediately, she encased him in a tight hug, "Oh that's great!"

Amy's smile faltered slightly at the action and headed for the TARDIS doors instead, "So, I'll pop the kettle on, then?"

Lena chuckled, "Look at us, the little friends who were neighbors now traveling in a blue box. All we need is Mels and we're set."

"Oh that'd be interesting," Rory laughed as Amy went inside, him tugging Avalon behind him.

"Do I even want to know?" the Doctor asked Lena as they followed.

"No, don't think so," Lena stepped inside.

Just as the Doctor was about to go in he stopped as he looked back, "Lena? Do you hear that?'

"Hear what?" she frowned, "All I hear is...silence," she shrugged and went inside.

The Doctor remained in place and looked out at the now-silent city, recalling Rosanna's words...

~ 0 ~

Avalon gasped and sat upright, breathing heavily as she looked around with rapid blinking eyes. She saw she was in her TARDIS room on her bed, just the place she had excused herself to earlier. She was still dressed in her day clothes as she rarely got sleep nowadays, but somehow this night she'd managed to sleep...only to have an awful nightmare.

She jumped out of her bed and pressed her dress down, tugging her jacket closer as she walked towards her door and opened it up. She could still feel her heart beating quite fast from the nightmare but decided to push away those memories and simply try and find her twin's room. Lena was never the one to have a bad night, despite her condition. She slept like a baby nearly every night. Perhaps, being in the same room with her twin would help her calm down and actually try and sleep a little again.

But as she walked endlessly through the corridors, she couldn't find Lena's room. She recalled the Doctor saying that when the TARDIS liked someone, it would keep the person walking and walking through its infinite corridors and rooms to entertain.

Avalon sighed, "Please, TARDIS, I really need help. I feel awful, won't you please give me the room with the one person who can help me?" she looked around, hearing the hums of the box in response. She sighed again and began walking, "Okay, I'm just going to translate that as 'yes Avalon I'll give you the room'," she nodded.

This time, however, no doors appeared on either side, only agitating her even more, "C'mon, box. Please show me the dang room..." she frowned as she entered the console room, "This isn't funny!" she stomped her foot.

"What's not?" she heard the Doctor's voice call, a bit distant.

"Um...nothing, where are you?" she walked forwards.

"Down here - AH!"

Avalon winced as she heard sparks underneath, "Right, now I get why the TARDIS can't help me. She's busy prying you off her wires."

"I would like to point out that I am indeed okay," the Doctor, sulking almost, walked up the small stairs to meet her, "In case you were wondering."

She shrugged and turned to face him, "Actually I was wondering why your box won't help me find Lena's room?"

"Is she okay?" he quickly asked. He learned quick that sometimes Lena would wake up having an asthma attack. But, Avalon nodded and eased his worries, "So why do you need her room?"

"Um...I'm...I wanted to...check up on her?" Avalon quickly nodded again, "Plus I asked for some help and Lena's always the one that helps me...but your box doesn't want to aid me..." she sent a small glare at the rotor.

"You asked her nicely to give you the room?" he wondered genuinely, "You have a very..." he tried wording his sentence carefully. He was always on her bad side and perhaps telling her of her bad attitude would put him even farther down her friend list, "...intriguing attitude..."

"That's just a lame way of telling me you think I have a bad attitude," she crossed her arms, making him wince, "You're right, I do," she shrugged casually, "But yes, I did ask nicely. I asked for help in a polite manner."

"Well maybe she sent you the place she thought you'd get help," half-smiled, "What do you need help with exactly?"

"It's nothing," she quickly turned away, her hand reaching up to her neck as she remained quiet for a minute. Suddenly, she turned to face him, "Can I go home?"

He raised his eyebrows, taken aback by the sudden question. Had he finally angered her so much she actually wanted to leave her twin? "Avalon, I'm...I'm sorry," he sighed.

She frowned, "For what?"

"Look, it's no secret you don't like me but I don't think leaving your sister is a good idea for either of you."

Avalon tilted her head, replaying his words in her mind, "Hold on, you think I don't like you?"

He nodded, "It's pretty obvious. I know hate when I see it."

She opened her mouth and raised a finger...when she thought of a better idea. She crossed her arms, "Can you take me home, please?"

"But Avalon-"

"Doctor, take me home please," she gave him a sharp look.

With no other option, the Doctor went to the console and started putting in the coordinations.

"And can you make sure it's not too long after you first picked me up?" she moved beside him, "Like an hour or two later? Don't want my Dad or brother popping in just as I'm coming out of this box."

The Doctor silently nodded, "Hang on," he mumbled and pulled down the lever.

Avalon did as told and clung to the console as the box shook in its violent ways. Once the box stopped she scampered over to the door and opened them up, poking her head out to see the dark living room of her home, even glancing at the clock on the wall striking twelve, "Perfect," she looked back at the Doctor, seeing him dejectedly flipping about some controls over the console, "Oi? Fairy tale man, you coming?"

"For what?" he gave her a small glance.

"Cos I need to show you something," she stepped out to the living room, always facing his direction, "So c'mon."

"It's not a wedding dress is it?" he asked as he started walking towards her, already looking weary.

"Nope," she shook her head, "Or..." he immediately froze in place, "Just kidding! It's only my maid of honor dress. But don't worry, I won't kiss you or anything. Promise," she raised her hands in surrender, "But there really is something I need to show you."

"What is it? It's not another slap is it?" he stepped out and closed the TARDIS doors.

"Nope," she put her hands behind her back and started walking into the hallway, flicking on a light as she walked by.

"Or a scream?"

"..no," she said as she headed up the stairs.

"Or a threat?"

"No," she silently stopped by her bedroom door and looked back at him, "Do you think I hate you?"

"No...kind of - er, well..." he rubbed the side of his neck.

"Doctor, do you think I hate you?" she questioned again, dead serious.

He sighed and nodded, "Yes."

"Right," she looked away and grabbed the doorknob, feeling awful. Of course he would think that considering she had the worst attitude. Normally, she could care less if people assumed things about her...but she couldn't deal with it if it was the Doctor. She admired him and she needed for him to know what she truly thought about him.

She turned the knob and opened the door to her bedroom, walking inside first, "Fourteen years ago I once told a man who dropped from the sky that I loved fairy tales but that I only loved the modern ones. He said I should go back and read the classics because he was sure I would love them," she turned the light switch of her room and headed for a wall with three large bookshelves, all stacked with books to the brim. She turned to face the Doctor and smiled softly, "He was so right. They're incredible."

The Doctor looked from one bookshelf to another, a pointing finger at them as he spoke, "Are those all..." she nodded to his unfinished question, but he was so stunned that he didn't see it and went ahead and finished asking, "...they're all...fairy tales?"

"I love them, I absolutely adore them!" she spun around like a true princess and motioned to all her perfectly kept books. It took her a while to have this vast type of collection, but it was so worth it. "But it all started with this one," she walked up to a specific bookshelf and got on her toes to reach up to the highest shelf. She pulled out a thin, pink book and turned back to the Doctor. "La Belle au bois dormant," she pronounced the French title perfectly, contrary to the last time she'd attempted to say it as a child. "Like my French?"

He smiled and took the book from her. It seemed well kept for a book a child had gotten, but Avalon probably took great care of it and all the other books in her possession. "You took my advice," he commented, sounding a bit surprised that the ginger who did not follow orders had actually listened to him.

"I loved the story and I figured if that princess had to wait a hundred years for her prince to come, then I could wait a couple years for the fairy tale man to come back and take us aboard his ship. Although, I didn't expect you to take twelve years but..." she pretended to still be upset over the matter but shot him a smile in the end.

"Explains the not-hitting-me-with-a-cricket-bat greeting," he made a face as he remembered Amy's greeting when he'd returned.

"Oh give her some credit, you were late! Plus, no one really believed her that you were real. Lena and I were lucky, our parents were from New Earth where you saved their ancestors. Of course they believed us, but we couldn't very well backup Amy in her stories. We'd out ourselves in the process."

"So...you don't hate me...?" he asked cautiously, as if there was something else that was coming.

"I'm sorry," she began, heaving a small sigh, "You're right, I have a very bad attitude. I'm snappy, I'm rude, and I do and say things I don't mean...most of the time. I haven't been very nice to you and I'm really sorry for that. But I've never hated you. Yes, you've irritated and angered me in the past but I can't hate you. You saved my grandparents, you saved my sister, you saved this planet, and you've saved me. Plus, you made this," she pointed back at her bookshelves.

"Me?" he frowned.

"Yes, you! I was content with the modern fairy tales but then you came along and told me to go back and read the older, original versions. Look what you did," she gestured to the several piles of books on the floor beside the book shelves.

"I'm gonna let that blame slip because you told me you don't hate me," he handed her back the book.

Avalon laughed. "Your my fairy tale man! How could I ever hate you!?" she moved over and encased him in a hug. The Doctor smiled so widely it could have possibly cracked his face. He hugged her back and put away any doubts he'd ever had about her. "You better soak this moment up because I'm terrible at words so you won't be getting another moment like this."

The Doctor laughed and pulled away to gesture to her bookshelves. "Oh, I think you are very good with words. I am stunned by this room."

"I shocked the Doctor? Okay, now I've accomplished everything," Avalon stepped back and allowed him to take another look at his room. "See, all this time you've been trying to impress me but in the end, I impressed you!"

"Yeah, try again," the Doctor rolled his eyes distractedly. His eyes were still roaming over her bookshelves. He wouldn't be surprised if he opened the closet and an avalanche of books fell on him. Still, her room was pretty nice. It was definitely Avalon.

She had a soft pink colored canopy bed with cream colored drapes. There were star string lights at the top, all turned off for the moment. Her light brown duvets were neatly made, a sign that she had never come back to sleep. There was a medium-sized Tinkerbell cushion placed in the middle of her two white pillows propped against the headboard. She had one bed stand with a small lamp, an alarm clock, and a picture of herself and Lena. On the opposite end of the room was a vanity desk only a few feet away from her closet. The desk was sprawled with all types of make up. It looked like she'd been in a rush for something.

She had a date, the Doctor remembered soon and crinkled his nose. He didn't quite like the guy. He made Avalon cry and that just wasn't nice. Despite her challenging personality, she didn't deserve to cry for somebody who didn't understand her need to find her sister.

There was a bigger, solid, white wooden desk set near the bedroom door. It had a few drawers below and a hutch that had one glass vase of poseys in the middle and two frames on either side of it. The Doctor could spot Amy and Rory in few of them, along with a dark-skinned woman. There was a laptop sitting on the writing surface and a few papers threatening to fall at the corners. There was a small bucket - which the Doctor assumed she'd made as a child due to all the fairy and princess stickers on it, as well as the doodles only a child could make - full of colorful pens. Save Me the Waltz was left over the laptop with a bright green bookmark sticking out.

"Oh that's a book I definitely have to take with me," Avalon said once she saw where the Doctor's gaze had gone to. She moved to her writing desk and picked up her book. "I was almost finished with it."

"You like Zelda Fitzgerald?"

"Mhm, I love her! I think she had such a tragic ending when she had this beautiful, complex mind that her husband just...sucked dry," Avalon frowned. "Makes me madder cos his writing was really good too. I guess I just identify with Zelda. She liked doing things her own way, like me, and people didn't like her because of it...just like me. And when she wrote this-" she waved the book, "-her husband made her revise it because it was too much like his. He plagiarized her and he had the audacity to make her change all her words." Her gaze only softened when she looked over the cover. "You know she wrote this while she was at a psychiatric ward? They called it a hospital back then. Writing was part of her treatment and her husband didn't support her until she had changed it to the way he wanted it. Only then he approved."

The Doctor only listened to her passionate argument in favor of Zelda Fitzgerald. Part of him sympathized with Avalon because he'd gone through something similar in regards to being unliked by people. "I didn't know you liked her work so much, considering she only wrote one book."

"Well that's just the thing!" she exclaimed. "She had all these other drafts, short stories, that were lost. Who knows what else she could have written if her work hadn't been lost and she hadn't died. And you know, I admire her too because despite everything that happened to her, she kept writing. I may never know what she wrote besides this-" she gave Save Me the Waltz a gentle smile, "-but I know that it had to be amazing."

The Doctor's smile had also turned gentle as Avalon got lost in her thoughts of Zelda Fitzgerald. He hadn't really seen Avalon being her and now that he had, he wanted to see more of it. She was a whole other person when she wasn't constantly bickering with him or trying to keep Lena safe or running from the danger they bumped into.

Maybe she had a beautiful, complex mind too.

#11th doctor #doctor who #dw imagines #ocappreciation #ocapp #11th doctor imagines #11th doctor fics #11th doctor x oc #doctor who imagines #doctor who fics #amy pond #rory williams #oc: Avalon Reynolds #oc: Lena Reynolds #fic: stars dance #noblecrescentedit

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carryonmywaywardwriters · 5 years

Text

Heathens - Soulless Reader x Demon Dean (Short Series)

A/N: Yes, I’m alive. I just don’t particularly want to discuss it in depth. For now? Have this. I have some stuff lined up to be posted, already. So, there’ll be some more over this next week that way. As always, feedback is incredible. And, I hope you all enjoy <3

PSA: I am NOT a minor friendly blog. If you are below 18, please come back when you’re older. I don’t want to lose my blog because you were too eager to grow up. If I discover you, I WILL block.

Warnings: Harley/Joker kinda relationship. Unhealthy. Power driven. Implied/Upcoming smut. Etc. Each chapter will have individual warnings.

Word Count: Roughly 2,800

“Y/N?” Dean Winchester. A deep, gravelly voice you hadn't heard since Bobby died echoed around you. A voice that should have meant something. Instead, it made you turn slowly, a brow raised. Waiting for the consequences with a blank face.

He hadn't been sure it was you. Darkness covered you. But, that wasn't enough. The actions he'd witnessed too fundamentally wrong to be from the woman he'd known. Y/N wouldn't ever kill in cold blood. Wouldn't off someone simply for attempting to mug her.

But you had. Without even blinking. You simply took out your gun from the back of your jeans. Shot twice, causing the kid to fall to the ground. Picking up the bag, you slung it over your shoulders. Another bullet was slung, this time to the skull, before you walked away. Tucking the gun away. Only to find yourself stopped by Dean in the alley.

The Y/N he knew always cried after a hunt. After any kind of kill. His lifestyle had been necessary to you at the time, but taking a life had never come natural. If anyone had known that, it was Dean. You'd turned to him from the beginning. All the way until the day he'd shoved you away. Trying to protect you. Failing miserably from the look of things.

“Well, well, well.” Your head tilted to the side. Inspecting him as though he were a bug. “And to what do I owe the pleasure?” Your lips kicked up humorlessly. “One of the great Winchester Duo paying little ole me mind again. What an honor.” The sarcasm might have made him flinch in his original state, but he was able to withhold in his newer form- barely.

“Happened to be walking this way, on a job.” He wasn't lying. Not completely, anyway.

Crowley had directed him that way. Promising that he'd have a kill ready for Dean. A means to keep the Mark under control. Even as a demon, the need to shed blood was fixed into his very being thanks to the raised scar etched into this forearm.

Once, you'd been repulsed, and even scared, of how easily Dean had lifted the gun and fired. He had gotten to the point where he barely blinked as a human, much less as a Knight of Hell. And yet, he couldn't help but to wonder what had taken the light out of your eyes. The guilt out of your head. What had turned you into him.

“I see you found her.” Crowley's low voice called out, in a way that should have sent chills up your spine. Instead, your lips pulled up even wider.

“You're working with the King of Hell?” You chuckled darkly. Losing what bit of tension there'd been in your shoulders. “Man, I've missed out on a lot. When did you become his bitch, Dean?”

“I'm not his bitch,” He bit out. His eyes flashing black under the alley light. Expecting you to shiver in revulsion.

“Even better.” Your smile fell a bit, but your face didn't lose that off feel to it. As if you were possessed. Or, maybe even under a spell. “You became his slave, instead.”

“I'm no one's slave, Y/N.” His words echoed another past memory.

“I'm scared, Dean.” You'd swallowed tightly, looking into his green eyes. Scared wasn't enough to cover it. You were petrified. A dead man could see it.

“Why?” If he was able, he'd fight off every one of your fears. Kill them before they could even begin to form.

“Because you're changing.” You whispered brokenly. The sound ripped at his chest. “You're becoming a...a slave. To this life. The guilt. Your fear... And I can't do anything...just sit by and watch.”

“I'm not a slave to anyone.” He'd bit out. Pride winning out against the urge to protect. “Or, anything. We'll be fine, Y/N. We always are.”

“Funny.” You snorted. Drawing him back to the present. “I've heard that before,” Your mind had traveled to the same place. “And, yet, here we are.”

“Yes,” Crowley had been watching the exchange curiously, “here we are. Eloquent words, darling.”

“I try,” Tilting your head mockingly, you got to the meat of the situation. Clearly not wanting to be bothered. Particularly by them. “What do you want with me?”

“It would seem that you're part of a contract that went wrong-”

“Oh, yeah.” A false, heavy sigh left your lips. “I almost forgot about that.” Dean's gaze turned back to his fellow demon for a moment. Attempting to piece together what was happening. “Thanks, by the way. Really loved having a hell hound come after me.” You pinched your index finger to your thumb in an approving gesture. “It only got better with the small hoard of demons you sent on my ass.”

“Such sass-”

“I was nicer before I lost my soul. Forgive me for my lack of manners. I seem to have trouble feeling these days.” Coldness seeped from your lips. A weapon honed by the attacks.

“You're soulless?” Understanding swam through him. Why, although you were so different, you were still so familiar.

The way you moved. How you detached. An empty eeriness clung to your features. It was completely unnatural. As if you were his brother when he'd come back from hell. Broken. Missing a large part of what made you, you.

“It's not as awful as it sounds.” You ran your tongue over your teeth as you glared at the superior demon in front of you. “Actually, I like it. A lot.” Your fingers twitched back to your weapon, “which is why I don't want it back. The only thing I want is to be left alone.”

“The contract isn't complete-”

“It wasn't my contract.” You cut him off, sneering. The tension lining your body. Prepared to fight to keep yourself destitute. “So, not my problem.”

“But, it is ours.” The shorter man hissed while snapping his fingers. Sending your body flying through the air until it connected against the brick. Your skull cracked with enough force to knock you out. But, you'd live. After all, you were there for a reason. “All yours.” Crowley motioned at Dean. Signaling that you'd be his kill.

“Why her?” Dean narrowed his eyes. Taking in the shameless king in front of him. Resisting the desire to step between him and your lifeless body.

When he'd turned, he hadn't become the usual demon. Bits that hadn't quite died off when Metatron stabbed a blade into Dean's body made themselves known on a regular basis. Killing Lester rather than the wife had only been the most recent offense.

The king of the underworld not only needed the job finished, but he needed that almost human part of Dean gone. Wanted the obstinate side of him to crumble. If Dean killed you? The woman he'd loved at one point- if not always...the problematic demon would morph. He'd be the perfect side kick.

“I believe that you already know the answer to that question, Dean-o.” Crowley quipped, following the movement of the green that had reappeared. Seeing the hesitation, and the connection being made. “You're almost to your full potential. There's just a smidge that needs fixed to get you there. This will make everything right.” His eyes were slightly crazed, as if he needed this. “It feels good, right? To continue to be a demon. To not be riddled with those pesky emotions. Fear. Guilt. Love. To do what you want, when you want, without being held back. Without consequence.”

“You're right.” Dean's jaw clenched lightly. The first blade came out of his denim jacket, and into his hand. “I am a demon.” His lips pulled up into a twisted smile of his own. Growing confident in his decision. “I feel nothing. I can do what I want, when I want.” Crowley backed away as Dean stepped between you two. His back facing your body. “And, I'll kill you before I kill her.”

–

“Dean?” Your head should have hurt far worse than the dull ache given the amount of blood you could see smeared onto the pillow and sheets in the mirror above the bed as you squinted up. But, that was nothing new. You'd been that way for weeks. “Where the hell are we?”

He'd been pacing by the window when you'd woken up. Completely ignorant to your eyes opening. You turned his way, watching the way he moved.

His hand wrecked his hair over and over again. The jacket was gone, thrown onto the table with a blade made from a large jaw bone resting atop of it. Red flannel was tossed over a black t-shirt. Even as a demon, he had to layer up. If you could have felt amused, you would have.

“I'm not telling you.” His eyes flashed back in warning. As if that would matter to you. “You're a problem for me, Y/N. Always have been. Now? You fucked this up, too.”

“Oh, yes... Let's blame the soulless girl who's been back into the equation for five minutes.” Your eyes rolled heavily as you got to your feet to stretch. “Your problems came from your own hands, Winchester. The minute you sold yourself for Sam, it was over. I was the one unwillingly pulled into the fray.”

“Watch it.” The green was gone for a longer period this time. His anger showing in another snarl. “Go too far? That blade will land in your throat.”

“If you were going to do it, you would have already.” That devilish smirk crossed your lips. So certain now that emotion didn't rule you. “I've been out of your life for years, Dean. It should have been simple. Especially since you're sporting the Mark of Caine.” Your eyes landed on the reddened flesh. Too well versed to not recognize the symbol. “Take it this is the first blade?” You walked over to the weapon. Dried blood coated the yellowed, aged, bone. “You actually cut Crowley with this? To get me out of there?” Your brows rose as the weapon twisted in your hands. Mind churning as you inspected the rusted flakes clinging to it. “How sweet... I suppose you want paid back... the usual good enough?” Dean liked sex. That was no secret. He'd accepted more than his fair share from women he'd saved back in the day. His full lips pulled down into a deadly frown at your words. No doubt second guessing the decision to keep you alive. “Oh, lighten up.” Your eyes rolled at his grumpiness.

He'd be lying if he said that the offer wasn't appealing. Demonhood hadn't diminished his sexual appetites. If anything, they'd only grown stronger. Everything carnal expanding inside of him. However, he had bigger things to focus on. He'd nearly offed the King of Hell. Other demons would be on his ass sooner than later.

“You have any idea how you ended up in a contract?” Finding out who'd asked for your soul to get collected was the first step. That was about as far as he'd gotten.

“No clue.” Your finger was pricked by the point of the knife before you set it down. You sucked at the irony liquid out of habit. Grinning lightly at the way Dean's eyes followed the action. “I don't even really think one exists.” You finally stated, licking your lip clean of the rust flavored spot that had landed on it.

“You think he was trying to manipulate me?” He didn't seem surprised. Furious enough to have ignored the dart of your tongue.

It should have seemed odd to you. Dean with black eyes. The Winchester embracing the bad rather than the good. Not attempting to fight it anymore. But, you took it in stride. It was amazing how simple of a task it was when you didn't have any worries left.

“Tell me it doesn't make sense.” He couldn't. You knew it. “And you're just going to take that laying down?”

“He has an army of demons at his disposal. I just have me.” You looked at him expectantly while pointing to yourself. A grunt of acknowledgment left him. “And, you. But, that'll only last as long as he holds onto your soul.”

“Good point.” You pursed your lips. It was your turn to pace. Self preservation being the only thing you had left. “So, what're you planning to do about it?”

“You think I'm going to run.” He heard it in your voice. His pride hadn't been damaged by death. It rose its venomous head as you shrugged, pretending that wasn't what you were thinking. “So, what do you think I should do? After all, you seem to have it all figured out..” He plopped to the bed, looking at you expectantly. Daring you to come up with a better idea. Mocking you with his words. Still so similar to the man he'd been.

A low hum left you. Your eyes turned out to the window. Gazing at the world beyond as you moved. When it finally came together, you turned your head his way.

“You stopped the Apocalypse. You destroyed the Leviathans. And who knows what else since I've been gone.” Your pacing turned into more of a prowl until your hands rested on his shoulder. His eyes turned black immediately, again. You weren't sure if it was in response to your touch, or out of distrust. But, neither stopped you. “That was as a human. As a demon? I think you could take over Hell, and take all of the power for yourself.”

That caught his interest, “Yeah?”

“Let's face it, Dean.” Your lips brushed against his ear as you sat down on his lap. Drawing forth a low shiver. Wrapping your arms around his neck, you got to work. “Most demons know your name. They fear it.” Your hand brushed over the hair by his ear as you leaned back to look into his eyes. Staring into the bleakness. “You could have killed Crowley today. Easily.” He was too well trained not to be able to. “I know it. You know it. And, I'm sure he does.” Your lips curled up deviously. Setting the bait. “You've earned the crown, already.”

“And what's in it for you?” His eyes narrowed distrustfully. Knowing there was a catch. That no one, even those without a soul, came without a price.

“Besides you? And protection?” You shrugged nonchalantly. As if it meant nothing, “I rule by your side.”

“And here I thought demons were the power hungry ones.” His blackened eyes searched yours as you leaned forward.

“We soulless people have drives, too.” Your lips brushed against his lightly as you talked, making his breath hitch. “I want to live. I want to be safe. Unchallenged. I want to feel powerful for once in my pathetic life.” Your tongue wet your lips, grazing against his in the process. “And, this? This is how I can get all of that. You and your body are just a hell of a perk.”

“And your soul?” The million dollar question.

“I want it locked away.” There wasn't a moment of hesitation. “I meant what I said earlier. I don't want it back.” The almost empty E/C eyes searched his warily. The next question would determine everything. “And, your demonism?”

“It's me.” He answered gruffly. As if it was insulting you'd bothered to ask. “I don't want cured. I don't want to go back.” His dark smile made your lips kick back up. “I love this disease.”

“So, we have a deal?” Your grin grew. It was oddly chilling to Dean, even in his form. But, that didn't stop him from nodding. “Where you're a demon, does that mean we kiss on it?”

“Something this big, it takes a lot more than a kiss to seal it.” His raspy tone made your body break out in goosebumps. Your emotions may not have been there, but his words alone felt like a caress to your skin. As if your senses were amplified in those regards.

“Better get to work then,” Your lips met his as he pulled you down onto the bed. Signing over everything to you.

Forever: @dean-winchesters-bacon @supernaturalginger

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