#the person working didn’t seem to want to deal with me and they wouldn’t adjust the glasses to fit my face | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

sim0nril3y · 2 months

Text

Deployment

Pairing: Simon 'Ghost' Riley x Civilian!Reader Scenario: The time has come. It's his first deployment since you've become a couple. The goodbyes are difficult. Warnings: No mask Simon (It's my personal headcanon in his regular life he probably wouldn't wear it), lots of angst, talking of leaving, talking of dying, canon-typical swearing.

One more night. One more night in his arms. What if he didn’t come back? What if he got hurt? What if he went missing? Honestly, you weren’t sure that you could cope with the never knowing what happened. Please, please, let there be some type of miracle that might happen so that Simon wouldn’t have to go. Things had been going so well, it simply wasn’t fair. If only he had any other job in the world. If only he was still a butcher, or something normal like that. Why now?

“Sleep.” Even with his eyes firmly closed Simon commanded you to rest. “You have work tomorrow.” Simon sounded tired, you supposed it was 2am, he had a right to be tired. “I don’t care.” You answered with a sad and quiet tone, eyes fixed on his sleeping frame in the pitch blackness that filled the room. “The morning is going to come whether you sleep or not.”

There was silence for a moment and Simon wondered if you had actually listened and then he heard it. Sniff. Then quiet. Sniff, sniff. Then even more silence before. Hck. Sniff. Sniff. His eyes pried open, adjusting momentarily before finding your face crumbling with emotion, lips firmly frowned and trembling, eyes filling fast with tears that were trickling down your face and soaking the pillow beneath you.

“Babe.” He whispered, reaching out to gently touch your shoulder, squeezing in a comforting way. “Don’t… Don’t bloody cry.” Simon whispered, his own voice a little thicker than usual. “Oi, c’mere.” Then pulling you across the sheets into his arms, holding you to firmly in his strong arms. “You dozy bloody moo…” He whispered, soothingly rubbing your back in small circles as you hiccupped and sobbed into his throat. “I know, I know.”

Honestly, he’d never had to deal with this before. Of course, he’d been around other colleagues and watched how hard it’s been for them to be away from their loved once. For him, it had been a very long time since he’d been in this place before and it was never like he had someone waiting for him to come home. It added an entirely different layer of fear, there was that fear of exposing you to danger but there was always a fear of leaving you. It felt like it hadn’t been that long since he’d learned to love you, allowed himself to let someone new into his life and now there was the possibility it could be all ripped away in an instant. Simon wanted more time, but that wasn’t something he was going to be afforded.

Still, even as your tears flowed Simon just held you, strong and tight in his arms, shushing you and caressing you so gently until your body just succumbed to exhaustion. It brought him pain to think of you being apart from him in mere hours now, sobbing yourself to sleep without his strong arms and his kind words. Fuck, it had never been this hard before.

The following morning Simon was up bright and early to finish his checklist. It seemed that you were restless too and that early awakening lead to you following him around like a lost puppy, eyes watching the clock as if counting down the seconds. “Babe, I’m just going to put some fuel in the car. I’ll be back. I promise.” He’d assured when your eyes had filled with wayward tears as he nabbed his keys. “Sweetheart, can I take a piss in peace, please?” He’d begged as you chased him into the bathroom for the second time that morning. “I’m just going to get a loaf of bread from the other freezer, stay here.” He'd commanded as he unlocked the back door. “Babe, if you wanted to join me in the shower all you had to do was ask…” Simon had purred before you two fell into the steamy shower.

Later that morning you were munching down some toast, eyes fixed firmly on Simon as he made himself a strong tea. It was difficult thinking that tomorrow morning you would be going through this routine on your own. The thought alone was enough for a lump to stick awkwardly in your throat. “Right…” Simon began then, causing you to push down any of those awful feelings and focus. “I’ve left a list of numbers over there…” Turning he held his mug in hand and nodded in the direction of a lonely notepad, it was full of names and phone numbers and occupations. “Reckon they’ll be able to fix any problems you might run into, alright? I’m not gonna be able to be in contact all the time, so I need to know that if there is a problem here, or with you, or with the car that it’ll be covered.”

“Right.” You agreed gently, taking another solemn bite of toast. “Against my better judgement…” Simon continued, stepping across to sit opposite you at the kitchen table. “I’ve added you to my car insurance, use it when you need it, please don’t write it off.” There was almost teasing to his tone. “My driving isn’t that bad…” You grumbled and this only earned a smirk as he took another sip of his tea. “I’ve got all the utilities set up. The mortgage is on direct debit. I’m even paying that kid down the road to come a mow the garden whilst I’m gone, he’s happy to be making a little extra money and it’s one less thing for you to worry about, which means one less thing for me to worry about.” Simon explained.

A frown found your lips. “I’m capable of looking after myself and the house, you know…” Simon lets out a soft sigh then and replies. “I know, babe. I…” He seems to pause, as if taking a moment to find the right words. “I like to know that I’ve covered every possibility at home so I won’t have to worry when I’m out there…” Simon said it like out there was a very distant place, very cold, isolated and very far from you. “Okay?” Silently he was asking you to just trust him and give him these final few hours to make sure everything was set up in a way that gave him comfort, the comfort of knowing that you were safe at home. “Okay.”

The way that you watched the clock on the wall was like you were begging it for more time, making some kind of trade so that Simon wouldn’t need to go. Regardless of what you promised the time still came. There he stood loading his bags into the waiting cab, you stood a couple paces back wanting to give some space. “Let me drive you-” You attempted to persuade. “It’ll be too hard.” Simon answered with finality.

He closed the boot with a shunt and then turned to be looking at you. “It’ll be better to leave you here at home and then call you once I arrive on base. Okay?” It sounded like he was trying to convince himself too. “C’mon now…” He muttered, watching as finally the emotion broke over your face, all that strength crumbled and the tears began to trickle once again. “Oi…” Simon muttered, wrapping you into his warm strong arms. Those same arms you wouldn’t feel again for month. Your last embrace. “It’ll be easier like this. I promise. Easier for you. Easier for me.” Simon whispered, squeezing you so tight in his bulging arms. “I love you.”

It was something so rare and so emotional that you actually gasped, glancing up at him through your watery eyes. “Love you too.” Your words came out less controlled, spoken through a sob. “Love you.” You added, as if to make up for the initial emotional sentiment like Simon might have not been able to hear you over the lump in your throat. “Call me-” “I will.” There was a solid promise.

Then one final kiss. It was searing, his lips pressed against your own so hard that you thought he might bruise you. You never wanted this kiss to end. You didn’t want him to climb into the cab. You didn’t want his promises or his declarations of love and devotion. No, you just wanted him…

A second later Simon detangled you from his arms and climbed into the cab. He knew that one of you had to be strong in this moment and that you were never going to be the one to walk away, so he needed to. Even if it hurt more than being fucking shot Simon needed to step away. He had duty. He had honour. Someday maybe you’d understand, or maybe you never would, but he hoped that at least you’d find some type of normality without him around…

Once he’d arrived on base Simon got back into a routine seamlessly, everyone thought of him as the emotionless and stoic ‘Ghost’. That was all that he wanted to be to these people. The less they knew about his life the better, that way he could shield you from anyone using you against him. He’d never forgive himself… however, there was one person that needed to know. Officially, he needed to speak to Price, if the worst should happen you’d need to know.

It was late. Far too late to be doing all this, but Simon knew that his Captain would still be up. Rapping his knuckles hard against his door a voice called out and in he stepped. John sat at his desk, pouring over paperwork on his desk and gifting Simon a very tired smile as he entered. “Captain.” He kept his voice firm and professional as he entered. “Lieutenant, what do you need?”

For a moment Simon stood quietly, mouth pursed as if he racked his brains for the right words. “My next of kin…” “It’s blank – like we discussed.” About to dismiss him when Simon spoke again. “I need it changed.” John seemed shocked by these words, the argument that they had over not having one and now to have him so quickly change his mind. “What do you need from me?”

John blinked, once then twice before collecting a form from his desk. “Just jot their details down…” Passing over a pen as he watched Simon began to diligently fill in the boxes. His hand-writing was just as he expected, messy and haphazard, but his mind only went to Simon’s homelife… John wondered, did he have someone special? Who was it? What were they like? How long had they known each other? What was the relationship? All these questions that John wanted to ask, but knowing Simon wouldn’t get a single answer. “If I die, tell her.” Yanked back to reality with one simple sentence. “Not some letter. No some top brass. You tell her, Captain.” Sliding the piece of paper back in his direction. “Don’t tell her how - she won’t cope with that.” John nodded. “For fuck sake, don’t show her a body if there is one. She’d never sleep again.”

“Need you to make sure she gets access to my pension. I want every fucking penny of it going to her.” Simon placed down the pen hard on the table. “My house. My car. The shirt off my dead fucking back. I want it all going to her. Okay?” There was desperation in his tone. This was a conversation they were meant to be having 6 weeks ago, with legal and suits around to sign it all off. Not the night before he was going to be put on a plane into a warzone. “Simon-” “John, please…” He didn’t need to see the rest of his face to know that Simon was in anguish, his eyes were enough. “I’ll see that it happens.”

Masterlist | Ask | 10-04-2024

631 notes · View notes

levitiquee · 7 months

Text

𝘔𝘦𝘢𝘨𝘳𝘦 𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘴 𝘴𝘱𝘢𝘤𝘦 𝘣𝘶𝘵 𝘴𝘦𝘳𝘷𝘦𝘴 𝘶𝘴 𝘴𝘰 𝘸𝘦𝘭𝘭

𝘞𝘦 𝘤𝘰𝘮𝘳𝘢𝘥𝘦𝘴, 𝘩𝘢𝘷𝘦 𝘴𝘵𝘰𝘳𝘪𝘦𝘴 𝘵𝘰 𝘵e𝘭𝘭

Levi let out a sigh of relief the moment your silhouette appeared through the shadows, tensed shoulders relaxing. He turned his head, all focus shifting instantly to you.

“You.” He exhaled, a hint of exasperation in his tone, indicating that the little time spent without your absence had not been very fun. “Where have you been?”

“Hi. Went to scout.” You answered, reaching the little campfire to stand beside Levi. All your friends sat circling it. Levi’s subtle, not very subtle eagerness at your arrival seemed to have triggered something, making the already guffawing crowd of people laugh even harder. Concluded with Levi’s sour face, it wasn’t very hard to guess what the subject of amusement must have been.

“Oh, are we bullying Levi again?” You beamed, nudging Levi’s leg with your foot, signaling him to give you space. “Scoot over. I want to join too.”

Levi shot a glare, but shifted to let you sit beside him. As another wave of laugher sparked through your friends, you plopped down on the grass, folding your legs. It was a chilly night, and everyone wanted to stay near the fire, therefore, the circle was so tightly formed around the fire, you could barely squeeze yourself between Levi and Nifa.

“Sit on my lap, why don’t you?” Levi grumbled, scowling and squirming a little at the close contact.

“What? It’s cold. And you’re warm.” You said as you sat down. “What are you so pissy for anyways?” You pressed yourself tighter, curling yourself up against him, uncaring of the poisonous gaze. You’ve learnt a long ago, half of Levi's words didn’t mean shit, that if he actually was uncomfortable, you wouldn’t even be here right now, he would’ve broken a bone or two. Levi’s personal space wasn’t something he let anyone come through, but you’ve been an exception for that for a long time.

And he was warm. A warmth that surprisingly only the cold, cold man was capable of.

And as always, the low protest died soon and he adjusted to let you lean against him.

“Hange.” He muttered, answering your previous question. “They’re trying to convince people to marry me.”

“Wonderful.” You grinned, “I volunteer.”

“I hate you.”

Cue for a very drunk Hange cracking up again, leading the others to join in. Even Erwin, ever regal and solemn, couldn’t seem to be able to hold the small smile from forming. With Hange’s contagious laughter and Levi’s scowl, it was impossible to.

“Oh why’d you let Hange drink again?” You laughed, watching them as Moblit struggled, trying to pry the bottle out of the section commander's grasp. “They're gonna be terrible to deal with tomorrow.”

“They insisted it was one sip.” Erwin said solemnly.

“Well, that sure seems like one sip.”

“But seriously though,” Nanaba piped in, shoulders still shaking with the waves of laughter. “Levi’s got all that spunk, but no bitches.”

“Stubborn shortie-” Hange's voice was cut of as they hiccupped

“Shut up. All of you. Please.” Levi sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. “

“Point stands. In your mid-thirties, Levi. How long are you going to wait?”

“Why,” He huffed. “Are you people so insistent on analyzing my personal life every damn time? Do you not have anything better to do?”

“Only well wishers.” She gave him a smug smile. “That’s what friends do, they care for each other.”

“No. You just want to give me shit.”

“Well, that too.” She shrugged.

“Iffff—if anything,” Hange stumbled in, rubbing their eyes. She glanced at you pointedly. “You could at least date her. That’d be nice.”

“So I keep telling him.” You feigned a disappointed sigh.

“Don’t fucking egg them on.” He hissed, face heating up at the suggestion. How could they even think it’d work out? He thinks, against the thoughts tugging. Ridiculous. They were ridiculous. You were just as ridiculous. So what does he do with this ridiculous fucking feelin–

“Oh but look,” Hange leaned forward, squinting to watch the two of you, their glasses reflecting off the fire and casting shadows on their face. “ Do mine eyes deceive me or is Ackerman over there blushing?”

“No.” The denial was quick. A little too quick.

“I confirm.” Nanaba smirked. Miche grunted.

“No.”

“Oh, Levi.” Erwin’s eyes glimmered amusement.

“I will hit you. Don’t even go there.”

The roar of laughter only grew louder.

And the night rolled on, the nonsense bickerings and banters continued. Friendly faces and friendly voices, joking and teasing and laughing without a care in the world. Bottles clinked, the firelight glinting on them. At one point, you and Hange started singing some stupid song you’ve heard in the fair, rocking back and forth with the music. And you weren’t certain, but you could swear there was a hint of melody even in the wind blowing by. And it was cold, but with Levi beside you, you were okay. But that was okay, it was okay. More than okay, really. The happiness was overwhelming.

“You know,” Hange called out suddenly. They had taken to fully sprawl out on the grass. They’d been quiet a while, and you had thought they must’ve passed out, but appears not.

Everyone turned to look at them.

“This is nice isn’t it?” They mumbled, blinking up to the sky. “I mean, sure, we might die tomorrow, but this is nice. I wouldn’t really mind dying.”

“You know, what would’ve been nice, Hange?” Nanaba said, watching Hange. And despite the words itself, she was smiling. “To not mention death.”

“I know but,” Hange sat up, grinning. “This is not too bad as a last night of your life right? I wouldn’t mind.”

And for a second, no one spoke. Perhaps, it was because all were drunk more or less but that hit harder in that moment. Unsaid words were spoken in silence, the wind carrying the oaths away. And even Levi’s eyes had softened.

Only Hange could say words like that with that face, you thought. You weren’t sad, not really. Because Hange was right. Being a scout meant learning to appreciate every breath you can take, and nights like this were as good as they’d come.

“Aww Hange.” You sighed, grinning back. “Cheesy much? You’re making Levi all squirmy.”

“No, I am not—” Levi’s protests were buried as the group jumped in yet again another session of Levi leg-pulling.

But despite it all, Levi thought.

Pissheads, all of them were. But nevertheless.

He watched you with the corner of his eyes, watching you as you laughed your head off to something Eld said, shoulders shaking, the firelight making your eyes glitter. And you were so close, so close, he could hardly breathe. And the urge to wrap an arm around you, to pull you closer. To feel you against him.Would that be so wrong of him? If he leaned close, would you pull away? But it’s okay, he thinks.

Hange was right.

It’s okay if he dies tomorrow. He wouldn’t really mind.

He didn’t really mind right now either.

He finds it strange that he didn’t really mind it. Any of it.

He didn’t mind Hange or Nanaba or any of them.

He didn’t mind your stupid little jokes, clearly made with the intention to piss him off. He didn’t really mind that you were so close. He didn’t mind that your head on his shoulder. He didn’t mind a lot of things that he thinks he would’ve minded if it was anyone else but you.

He doesn’t really know how it works. He doesn’t like thinking about the strange little feelings in his heart that tugged everytime you smiled, or the way his stomach tightened whenever you flirted with him so casually.

And maybe one day he’ll tell you. Maybe he won’t

Does it matter? Is it not enough to only have you alive and close?

He’s here now. With everyone and with you.

He’s home.

821 notes · View notes

heavyhitterheaux · 6 months

Text

Call Her Daddy (NSFW)

First Lady of Private Garden Fic

AN: 🤭🤭🤭

Synopsis: Jack goes on the Call Her Daddy podcast and of course has to talk about his wife

Pairing: Husband!Jack Harlow x Wife!Reader

First Lady of Private Garden Masterlist

DO NOT ENGAGE IF UNDERAGE

Please Do Not Repost My Content Anywhere

“Jack, it's about damn time you showed up for an episode of my podcast.” Alex said after the both of them sat down and got comfortable where the podcast recording would take place.

“What can I say? I'm a busy man. And it's good to be here.”

“Definitely busy seeing as you just recently put a total of three babies in your wife, but we'll get to that later. We're focusing on you, first.”

“Look, I can't help it if my wife is fine as hell. Might as well go hard or go home.” He replied while shrugging and of course Alex laughed.

“Don't worry, you'll get to talk about how much you love your wife in due time because we know that’s a running theme with you. But first, I want to know more about Jack Harlow. Did you always want to be a rapper? And where did that drive come from?”

“Always wanted to be one and I remember selling my CD's back in middle school. My mom was a heavy influence on that and she would freestyle with me in the car when she would drive me to like soccer practice and different things like that.”

“That's so cute and adorable that your mom influenced you. Now when people think of rap, Kentucky isn't really the first place people think of.”

“Not at all and I'm from Louisville and a lot of people don't know that it is literally an entire city. When people hear Kentucky, the first thing that they think of is some back roads country ass shit when it's not.” He answered as he thought about when he first started and some people would tell him that he would never make it out Kentucky let alone Louisville.

“And did a lot of people support you? Or did they try to discourage you? How was that growing up there?”

“It was about half and half. A lot of people were confident that I was going to make something of myself, but others weren’t. But I’ve been serious about this shit from day one and it’s slowly but surely paying off. My girl wouldn’t let me quit for nothing even if sometimes I wanted to.”

“Now, what were you like in high school? Were you the popular jock, the nerd, part of the science club? Did the girls fall out over you?” Alex asked while getting comfortable in her chair and adjusting.

“I mean I always had friends and I wasn’t the one who would be stuffed into lockers or some shit. Like with certain things people knew not to mess with me. And it always seemed like girls always liked me, but when I set my eyes on one, that was it. It was a done deal. We weren’t even together yet and people knew that she was mine and they would respect it.”

“So, I want to ask you since you said that about people knowing that she was your girl and respecting it. Now we are talking about the First Lady, correct?”

“The fucking one and only. Had my eyes on her ever since I was fourteen.”

“A little birdie told me about you hiding a boy’s clothes after gym was over because he liked her and wouldn’t leave her alone? Not baby Jack getting jealous.” Alex said while laughing and Jack soon joined in along with her.

“Look, he asked for it and I didn’t have a problem with him after that. Like dude get the fuck away from my girl.”

“And what did she do when she found out?”

“She never found out until we moved to Atlanta after we graduated so she had absolutely no idea. But, she definitely got on my ass. But she’s not so innocent either, but you’ll have to ask her about that.”

“Yeah, she’s definitely the next person I need to have on here. Now what is the album that you think is your best work or the one that you are most proud of?”

“Hmm, Jackman hands down. No features, just me talking and getting my feelings out. I was able to be home in Louisville with my wife for about a year and a half and I took that time to reset and get my mind right because a lot of shit had been going on and happening around us and I felt that it was important for me to do that, but now we’re back to making the catchy shit that people can really vibe to and feel good music so I’m excited for this new era.”

“Lovin’ On Me! Now I am loving your new song and I notice that it says I don't like no whips and chains and you can’t tie me down. So no whips and chains in the Harlow household?”

“I… look I have a story about that. It’s not the fact that there’s absolutely none because at one point in time there was.”

“Damn, do I need popcorn for this because I feel like I need popcorn for this.” Alex added while busting out laughing.

“So, I tie her up, blindfold her, we got the nipple clamps, all that shit, and I handcuff myself to her to get her to stop moving and I lost the key in the process. So, she notices that I get quiet and she’s freaking out asking me what’s wrong and when I finally tell her she’s like call Urban. He’s our best friend who lived with us at the time and he has seen some wild shit and I know he’s so fucking tired of us. So with my free hand, I use my phone to call him and he comes and sees what the situation is, finds the key and leaves us there and goes to sleep because we had woken him up and he was pissed. So he just left us there until the morning.”

“I LITERALLY CANNOT! But, was it really a punishment though? Handcuffed to your wife so I can imagine a few more rounds came after that?” Alex asked while wiggling her eyebrows.

“More than a few.”

“Now talk to me about the other wild shit that he has seen.”

All Jack did was hang his head as he busted out laughing.

“I… I don’t even know where to fucking start. Urb is always getting pulled into the middle of shit that he absolutely had nothing to do with.”

“That’s what best friends are for. Now, how do you feel about choking?”

“Anything she wants, I will do it. Nothing is off limits for her. I admit that it’s not my favorite thing in the world, but if it’s going to make her orgasm faster, I’m all for it. She definitely comes first. Pun intended.”

“Oh, so you’re all about putting her needs first in the bedroom?”

“And in life, that’s my baby and her needs and wants are always going to be met. Been doing that since we were fifteen when we were officially together.”

“Now you said nothing is off limits when it comes to her, so she’s just like ‘babe, let me peg you’.”

“No, absolutely not, no one is sticking anything up my ass. I love my wife through and through, but no. That’s a little too much for me. Come on Alex, I’m not that adventurous, my lyrics literally say ‘I’m vanilla baby’.”

“Well, I might have put an idea in your head that you’ll want to try with her later.”

“Nope.”

“Favorite sex position?”

“Do you…. Do you not know what they call me?” Jack curiously asked her in disbelief.

“No, what do they call you?”

“Missionary Jack.”

“Please shut up because literally no one calls you that, you call yourself that.”

“I swear that’s what they call me!”

“And who gave you that nickname?”

“If it was someone other than my wife then that’s a problem. She’s called me that since forever.”

“What do you like about it?”

“It’s underrated on so many levels. I swear my triplets were conceived in missionary. Because here’s my thing, I’m face to face with her, at one point her ankles are going to be behind her head or on top of my shoulders and I’m going the fuck in.”

“Well damn, what’s her favorite position? I’m going to get her on here, but I want to hear it from you.”

“She likes to think that she’s in control, so she likes to ride me. But she knows who runs this shit. My kids aren’t the only ones who call me daddy.” Jack responded while smirking and all Alex did was playfully roll her eyes.

“Your wife is going to get you for that one and I’m going to let her have at it.”

“Yeah that’s how it all starts and it’ll end with me fucking her brains out like it always does.”

“You’re going to be in for it when this is over. Hmm, kinks?”

“I love praising her because I know it makes her reach her peak faster, but definitely a spit kink.”

“OH! TELL ME MORE! I am intrigued!”

“Alex, you are funny as shit.”

“I’m serious! Out with it.”

“Spitting in her mouth and watching her swallow it.”

“Are you sure you’re as vanilla as you say you are, because? Yeah I’m going to need wifey here to get her perspective. Do you think she’s ever faked an orgasm while you were in her? Would you be able to tell?”

“I know her body inside and out and she better not do that shit and have me find out about it. But, I don’t think she has.”

“Hand jobs, blow jobs?”

“Fuck yeah, I love me a good hand job or blow job.”

“Craziest place that you’ve gotten one or had sex period?”

“On a plane to Australia. We thought everyone was asleep, but of course everyone except Urb. This was what I meant when he is always getting caught in the middle of some shit that has nothing to do with him. It was difficult because I’m so tall, but we made it work.”

“What would an erotic vacation look like for you?”

“Definitely fucking her brains out non stop in some tropical ass location. We’re not leaving our room for the entire time that we’re there.”

“Ooohh, now if you could have sex in any location in the world, where would it be?”

“Hmm, I never really thought about it. Maybe some exotic ass shit like behind a waterfall or something. But, I was also thinking the white house lawn because I don’t mind an audience.”

“NOT THE WHITE HOUSE LAWN!”

“YOU ASKED!”

“Have you ever had or thought about trying tantric sex?”

“I’ve never really thought much about it, but I would have to do my research. If wifey wants it, I’m down.”

“She really does wear the pants in your relationship, huh?”

“Alex, like I said before, you’re funny and no she doesn’t.”

“I literally do not think that anyone will agree with you. If I were to do a poll right now, everyone will probably say that she does.”

“I let her think that she does.”

“Mmm hmm, sure. Now what is your dirtiest sexual fantasy?”

“I don’t even know since I’m pretty adventurous when it comes to it and not many things are off limits.”

You had just gotten to the hotel that Jack was staying at while he was filming for his episode of the Call Her Daddy podcast when you decided to surprise him. He had been going non stop since the release of his new single and getting ready to go on The Kentucky Tour.

Of course Urban was with him and sent you a text saying that he was almost done and you promptly took a quick shower and slipped on one of Jack’s favorite lingerie sets which happened to be black and purple. You threw on your black silk robe in case you got cold and simply laid out on the bed and played on your phone waiting for your husband.

You had fallen asleep waiting for him when you felt him reach down and place a kiss on your lips and your eyes fluttered open.

“What are you doing here?” He playfully asked as he was now kneeling on the bed in front of you and playing with the ties on your black silk robe.

“I wanted to surprise my husband since he’s been working so hard and I figured you would want a little time to have me to yourself.” You answered while motioning for him to lean down so that you could kiss him which he quickly did.

As Jack deepened the kiss, he took the opportunity to undo your robe and took in the sight of you in front of him.

“A sight that I can never get tired of seeing.”

He started to kiss down your neck when you lightly pushed him away from you and flipped the two of you over as you went to undo his pants and slide down his boxer briefs.

“Last night on the phone with you wasn’t enough and I decided that I wanted you in my mouth as soon as possible.”

The night before, Jack was complaining about missing you so just like you had done many times before, you gave him a show which ended up with him cumming multiple times as he watched you.

Jack had now tossed his shirt to the other side of the room and you had gotten his boxer briefs completely off before taking him in your mouth painfully slow making him grab the back of your head and buck his hips towards you.

“Baby, do not fucking tease me right now. All I basically did was talk about how good I fuck you in that podcast and we need to get to it before I fucking bust. This shit is starting to hurt and take that lingerie off.” Jack whined as you were making yourself comfortable.

Before taking him back in your mouth, you did as you were told.

“Patience, my love. You know that I’m always going to make it worthwhile.” You answered him as you went back to pleasuring him with your mouth and your eyes began to water as you felt him reach the back of your throat.

You were taking your slow sweet time and even though Jack was getting annoyed, he was in entirely too much pleasure to say anything at the moment knowing that when he finally did cum in your mouth that it would be worth it.

“Ahh fuck. Come on baby, go a little faster than that.” Jack pleaded with you, but then you took him out of your mouth and went to the edge of the bed and laid down upside down.

“Get over here and face fuck me then.” You said while giggling and Jack wasted no time getting in front of you and sliding himself back into your mouth while throwing his head back in pleasure.

“Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit, ohhhh shiiiiit.”

Jack had now taken a hold of both sides of your face and began moving in and out of your mouth as you reached down to play with your clit knowing that if he saw you playing with yourself that he would cum faster.

“Come on baby, open that pretty mouth of yours wider for me. You can take more of me, you’re doing such a good job.”

You did as you were told and inserted two fingers while still continuing to play with your clit with the opposite hand as you felt the spit from your mouth leaking down the sides of it.

“You playing with your pussy for me? Add another finger for daddy.”

Listening to Jack, you added another finger as he reached down to spit on your clit which made you increase the pace of your fingers.

You couldn’t help but to moan while Jack was still in your mouth and knew that you were going to reach your peak soon.

And as if right on cue, you heard Jack.

“Fuck, baby.” He tightly held onto you as you hit your peak and felt the cum shooting down your throat and out the sides of your mouth, but you continued sucking him off not showing him any mercy.

“Hold on!”

You shook your head no as you continued to move him in and out of your mouth, but finally let up when you felt another load shoot into your mouth and quickly swallowed it. Jack slightly moved away from you as you sat up and turned around to face him smirking.

“Wait until I get your ass for doing that.” Was all he said as you reached up to kiss him. You caught him off guard as you reached down and slowly began to jerk him off when he broke the kiss and looked down at you.

“Get your ass to the top of the bed and spread your legs so I have enough room.”

You moved until you reached the top as Jack hovered over you and simply looked down at you to admire you.

“What, babe?” You asked as you were now beginning to shy away from him, but all he did was lightly grab your face and kiss you.

“Nothing, it’s just my wife is so gorgeous and I’m about to have her screaming at the top of her lungs with how good I’m about to make her feel.” He answered as he began to rub small circles along your clit and reached down to kiss you while slipping his tongue in your mouth.

When you least expected it, he slowly entered you making you gasp against his lips which he quickly quieted you with another kiss as he began to move.

“Look at my pretty girl taking this dick.”

Jack then lifted your legs so that they were on the top of his shoulders and began pounding into you making you gasp as he caught you in another kiss.

“Shiiiit.” Was all you could mutter as you wrapped your arms around Jack’s neck as both of your noses were touching.

As Jack continued to keep the same pace, he kept his eyes on you and simply smirked.

“Open your mouth.”

You felt warm liquid slide down the back of your throat as he continued to move and place small kisses along your breasts.

On your right breast, he placed a small kiss and bit down and continued to suck on the same spot as you were letting out a series of curses and whimpers.

That was going to leave a mark, but you would deal with that later.

Jack then reached down to play with your clit and he quickly went to suck on your other breast knowing that he would have you come undone in front of him in less than a minute.

“Fuck, baby. Don’t stop, don’t stop.”

Jack then felt a rush of warm liquid hit the bottom part of his stomach and smirked as he reached up to kiss you.

As you were slowing down your breathing, Jack continued to rub small circles along your clit while kissing down your neck.

Once you felt that you recovered enough, you reached over to the bedside table and pulled out a bottle of lube that you had brought and handed it to Jack as you moved to get on all fours.

All he did was smirk at you before opening the bottle as you were making yourself comfortable in front of him.

You had only done anal a handful of times, but you found yourself wanting it more and more lately and of course, Jack wasn’t opposed.

“Baby, remember you have to relax so I can get in easier.” You heard him say as he was getting ready behind you.

“Yes, I know.” You softly answered as you felt the tip.

Jack noticed he was meeting resistance so he added more lube and had you arch your back a little bit more before trying again.

He was moving in slowly and didn’t hear anything from you which had him concerned and he simply stopped.

“Baby, you okay? You aren’t saying anything.”

“I’m fine, just keep going.”

After a few minutes, he was fully in and gave you a minute to adjust and made sure that you were okay.

“You ready for me to move?”

All you did was nod towards him as you felt him moving in and out of you.

“You’re doing so good, you’re doing so good for me baby. Arch your back a tiny bit more.”

Complying, you slowly but surely started to notice how good it felt as Jack reached down and you felt him insert what felt like a vibrator in you.

You had no idea when he had time to get it, but you weren’t in any way, shape, or form complaining.

“Babeee, oh fuck.”

“Got a new toy to use on you.”

Between the vibrator and Jack pleasuring you, you felt your legs begin to get weak and the perfect arch that you had once had was forgotten as you were trying to hold yourself up.

Jack noticed this and instead of turning the vibrator down and decreasing his pace, he did the opposite and turned it up while increasing his pace making you scream out.

“Baby…. Mmm… fuck I can’t…”

“Yes you can and you will, arch your back for me. Such a good girl.”

Jack reached down to play with your clit and your orgasm hit you like a ton of bricks making you scream out as he slid out and released all over your back.

He then slid the vibrator out of you as you collapsed on your stomach and reached down to kiss your neck.

“You okay, down there? You were so good for me.”

You let out something of a groan letting him know that you were okay and he instantly laughed while sliding off the bed and pulling you by the ankles so that you were at the end of the bed and Jack was on his knees.

“Get on your knees for me because we are nowhere near done.”

This made you do a double take as you looked back at him in confusion.

“You didn’t think you were about to come all this way and I wasn’t going to taste my wife’s pussy, did you? Spread them damn legs.”

Taglist:

@harlowsbby

@babyharleezy

@hoodharlow

@stefansalvatoresgf

@jackiehollanderr

@primadxna-girl

@dessmxsworld

@cockslutslurper3000

@raelorns21

@variety-fangirl

@gbaabyyyy

@kamorsstuff

@harlowthot

@sinsandsuccubus

@curlyhairclub

@bootlegroach

@haylexo10

@thinkingaboutjharlow

@fluidsentiment

@charli123456789

@moody4world

@yourstrulymayah

@yana4life

@beanbagbitch

@alinaharlow

@carma-fanficaddict

@minaxcarter

@arination99

@xjup1t3r

@venusvinc

@jackharloww

@midnight-star47

@minkookie95

@inluvwithladybug

@exoticr0ses

@jharlowsangels

@jackierose902109

@knack4harlow

@cmalass

@megawhoree

@softtcurse

@sia2raw

@miniaturehideoutmentality

@hoya122

@nattinatalia

@jackslover12

@skyesthebomb

@jackharlows-world

@louisianalady

@fdl305

@automaticpeachsong

@harlowcomehome

@gassyandsassy1

@babygirlwilly

@amethyst09

@harrycanyonmoonn

@bout-mine

@tattered-tales

@sisiking99

@dessxoxsworld

@gillybear17

@jacksdaycare

@iheartharlow

@disaster-rose

@babyvinnie

@evansxchalamet

@chtkmyharlow

@itsyagirljaz

@neon-lights-and-glitter

@awhore4moree

@a-moment-captured

@jackmans-poison

@valentinqee

@lightsoutstyles

@j-worlds-blog

@middlechild404

@0elliotswhore

@iknowdatsrightbih

@w1ldthoughts

@love2loveonme

@hufflewhore128

@shawtypoison

@fantasywritersstuff

@harlowtales

#jack harlow #jack harlow x reader #jack harlow x black reader #jack harlow smut #jack harlow imagine #jack harlow fanfic #jack harlow concepts #jack harlow fluff #first lady of pg

829 notes · View notes

chelseypprimrose · 10 months

Text

Farmer Wants a Mistress / farmer!negan x richbrat!reader / 18+ / AU

Summary: Living the good life since you married into money, you’ve become desensitised to the more simple ‘live off the land’ lifestyle of your sister. Her husband Negan sets out to teach a harsh lesson for you not to be so judgemental.

Warnings: infidelity, brat!reader, smut, rough sex elements, use of “hayseed hick” which are derogatory terms for a farmer, degrading terms, outside/forest sex, spitting, choking, negan is a warning in its self, mean!negan, slapping, dumbification (slightly), oral (male receiving), slight hint of dacryphilia

A/N: i need sedating, this GIF, oh my good LORD. fyi, i do not condone anyone looking down on another person for their profession/how much they work or earn, this is purely fiction and the needed attitude for the brat character/reader! also i’m telling you now, reader is a BRAT, like ‘Wild Child’ Poppy Moore level of brat, if that isn’t your thing, this probably isn’t the fic for you! 🤍

“god, i don’t know why i even let you drag me here, we are in the middle of nowhere.” you huffed, using the inflight magazine you’d taken from the flight to fan yourself off, unaccustomed to the sweltering heat of texas this time of year. your sister’s grip of the steering wheel got tighter, trying to hold her tongue at your obvious annoyance.

“i’m so sorry it’s such a inconvenience for you to visit your only sister, which by the way, you only do once a year.” she sniped back, rolling her eyes. adjusting your sunglasses on your nose, you stared out at the crop farmlands as you drove past, a vast difference to the city skyscrapers you were used to back home. “look, i’m just not the biggest fan of farms, or farm animals. they smell and it’s just too much work! why you ever let yourself marry into this, i’ll never understand.” you quipped back, throwing the magazine down into your lap as it wasn’t doing anything to help your rising body temperature.

like she had said, you only ever made the journey from new york to texas once a year to visit your sisters side of the family, granted it was only the two of them. her and her farmer husband, Negan, born into a farmer family himself, he’d taken over the land once his parents had moved on, settling for a smaller place, unable to keep working due to age. him and your sister had married a year after you and your own husband had, the two men couldn’t have been more different if they tried.

your own husband was a banker, giving you a penthouse apartment, what seemed like a unlimited supply of money and multiple trips away every year to the most luxurious resorts and locations. growing up poor and then overnight having more money than you knew what to do with had changed you, you wouldn’t deny that.

you couldn’t remember the last time you had bought anything that wasn’t designer, having your hair done monthly and various spa weekends, keeping yourself in tip top condition. you and her led very separate and different lives, you couldn’t help but feel like she’d got the short end of the deal, slaving away on a godawful ranch seven days a week.

she finally pulled up to the front of the farm, the slightly open window forcing you to smell the various animals that were loitering around outside of the barn next to the rustic-styled house. the exposed white wood of the front porch, multi-coloured chicken wind chime made of bamboo hung off the plinth of the patio, making small clinking noises from the slight wind that gathered up the dust of the grain. all these elements together started to remind you that you were far from your own home comforts of proper electricity and pleasant smells.

you opened your door, being careful not to step in the mud that was right under your feet, your stiletto heel digging into the soft ground. walking around to the back of the car, you opened the trunk, taking out your louis vuitton suitcase, stopping in your tracks when you realised you didn’t want to put it on the muddy ground. “have you got something you can take these in on?” you questioned, your sister looking at you in disbelief.

“jesus christ doll, it’s goddamn mud! it’ll wash off, don’t get your panties in a twist.” you whipped your head around to the bellowing deep voice, eyes setting on him as he made his way over to the car. you moved one of your hands off the handle of the suitcase to your hip to jaunt it out at him. “oh i’m sorry! let me just put my bag, that’s probably worth more than your house, on the dirty ground. i take pride in my possessions Negan.” you retorted, your sister sighing in defeat, taking the bag from your hand and walking with it towards the house. you took your sunglasses off your face, Negan now stood right next to you, his arm leaning on the side of the car, looking at you. dressed in his usual brown cowboy hat, opened mustard yellow flannel shirt with a slightly off white tank top underneath, cargo trousers with a thick black belt to keep them up. the long, black leather pendant sitting just above his naval.

“i always love when the city mouse comes to visit, you ready for a week in hell, princess?” he laughed, rolling around a toothpick between his pearly white teeth. not that you had anything against the man before he married your sister but he absolutely revelled in mocking you whenever you came to stay, you imagined he saw you nothing more than a spoiled little girl, not understanding that you just preferred the finer things, even if you were a bit of a snob when it came to his way of life. not that you really cared for his opinion on you. you’d imagine that if circumstances had been different, you would have been attracted to such a handsome man, if only he’d change that usual cowboy get up for a nice three piece suit.

“if it isn’t the hayseed hick himself, how are you darling?” you threw your insults right back at him, this was just how you communicated with each other, both of you had tongues as sharp as swords. you grabbed your other bag from inside the trunk of the car, moving to take it to the house before his large hand grasped over yours that was on the leather handle. “let me take it, wouldn’t want you to break a nail, princess.” Negan laughed, before using his other hand to close the trunk firmly, causing you to jump slightly out of its way. you followed closely behind him, Negan taking wide strides, his hips moving slightly as his forearm muscles tensed from the weight of your bag in his hand.

“did you pack for the month or something? jesus christ.” he managed to huff out, even with how strong he was, it felt like you’d put rocks in your bag. “not all of us can just take a toothbrush and clean boxers on holiday with us, Negan. not that you’d know much about that, furthest you ever go is the farmers market, is it not?” you bit back, using your hands to push your hair back out of your face, having to put your sunglasses back over your eyes to avoid the harsh dust from getting into your retinas. you pushed past him, walking up the steps to enter the house, a small grimace on your face as you remembered how much your sisters place looked like Dorothy’s house from the Wizard of Oz.

it was honestly like you’d gone through a time machine back to the 1900’s, your sister didn’t even have a TV in the place, no wi-fi or good working signal. Negan followed up behind you, almost denting your case with how harshly he’d placed it near the staircase. “jeez, be careful with that would you!” you exclaimed, picking it back up off the ground, starting to make your way up the stairs, heels making it a difficult feat. Negan started to laugh at you struggling, causing you to turn around to give him a death glare. “i’m glad this is funny to you, most men would be gentlemanly and help a lady with her bags.”

“i would doll, but i don’t see a lady here.” he continued laughing at you, your mouth dropped wide at his rude statement, slightly growling you stomped the rest of the way up the stairs to your assigned room you always stayed in when you came here. god, you couldn’t wait for this week to be over but it was only the start.

“god honey, i know you don’t like the way they do things but this is your sister! she’s family, you have to respect their lifestyle. you are a guest in their house.” you rolled your eyes, your husband clearly wasn’t getting how annoyed and stressed out you were. “i’m honestly trying! you come here and get woken up by a damn cockerel at five am in the morning and see if your still saying the same thing then!” you crossed your arms over your chest with your phone held up to your ear, angrily pacing back and forth on the porch, the only place you could get one bar of signal. it was no use telling your husband the grievances as he’d only been here once and he always seemed to forget how hellish that week had been for him, how he sighed a breath of relief once you got on the plane home.

“you’ve only got a couple more days until you’ll be back here with me, i’ll set you up a appointment with the spa, give you some time to relax, okay?” you smiled, almost jumping with glee. “oh thank you! god knows i’ll need it after being around all these horrid animals.”

“goddamn it!” you turned your head towards a very angry Negan, the hosepipe he’d been using had sprayed all over the front of his clothes, causing the wet fabric to stick against his abdomen. he grabbed the bottom, whipping it over his head, using his strong hands to wring the water from the top. the veins in his arm were in full motion, you could see his muscles flexing, his toned abdomen now on display. the light of the sun caught his frame just right, the hot temperature making the light sheen of sweat mix with the water he’d just got all over his torso. you couldn’t take your eyes off his body, like a mirage in the desert. you’d never found yourself looking at him this way, his dirty mouth turning you off him from the very second he opened it but silent like this, he was a vision.

he could feel a pair of eyes on him, his gaze shooting up to look towards you. “honey? honey? are you still there?” you snapped back into reality, letting out a breath you didn’t realise you were holding in your throat. you turned your back to Negan with a quickness, heat reaching your cheeks as you realised you’d been caught gazing at him. “yeah, i’m here.” you answered your husband.

Negan softly chuckled to himself, already coming up with a rolodex of new material to tease you with.

two days, two days was all you had left to endure before you could take your leave and go back to new york. while you’d like to say you’d had a pleasant experience, that would be far from the truth. your sister had convinced you to do some grunt work while you’d been here and out of sheer boredom due to the lack of entertainment here, you’d begrudgingly agreed.

this had resulted in being bitten by a chicken when trying to retrieve its eggs, causing Negan to nearly die with laughter as you yelped out, a small trail of blood seeping from your finger. he’d took your delicate hand in his rough one to assess the damage, claiming you were being a big baby about it, giving a small kiss to it which made you freeze up at his inappropriate action. you felt it was more just to make you feel more embarrassed, knowing he loved to do things to antagonise you even further. you’d yanked your hand out of his, giving a small noise of disgust before stomping away from him to get a plaster.

you’d been given the more easy task of brushing the horses, claiming you didn’t want to get bitten again and your sister swore the horses were completely domesticated and not prone to acts of aggression.

you’d nearly finished when you saw Negan coming over to you, that small arrogance in the way he sauntered around this place. “any more injures happen today doll?” he asked, leaning on the barn doorway, that usual toothpick in his mouth. you sighed, dropping the brush back in the tack box and crossing your arms over your chest. “no, nothing for you to make fun of me today, i’m afraid.” he pushed himself off the doorframe, taking a couple steps towards you. “come on doll, let’s go for a ride. i need to go and get more firewood from the forest, live a little. i tell you, having the wind blowing past you when you are on the back of these magnificent animals, no feeling like it in the world.” your eyebrow raised a little, you were actually considering it for a good while.

you sighed, not like you had anything better to do. “okay fine! only if you do the actual work. i don’t feel like getting my hands dirty.” you agreed, letting him walk past you to get the riding saddles and strapping them to the horse. he did it with ease, stepping up with his large boot to get his foot into the stirrup, his long leg being thrown over the horses back. he put out his arm to help pull you up on the horse behind him, you’d hadn’t realised how close your groin would have been to his back with you sitting behind him, the feeling making your body betray you with how good it felt to be so close to him.

he started at a slow pace, guiding the horse out of the open stable door, setting off for the wood that you could see vaguely in the distance at the back of the farmland. you’d been holding onto the metal bar that was at the back of the saddle before Negan let out a laugh. “hold on doll!” your face contorted into confusion before Negan gently applied pressure into the horse with his leg causing it to accelerate into a fast gallop. you slightly squealed, taking your hands off the bar and threw your arms around his torso, nearly in death grip, scared of coming off the animal with how much bouncing around you were doing. your hands linked around the front of him, you could feel the hard abdomen muscles underneath his tank top, you knew he’d done this on purpose to either annoy you or try and get you to come off the horse.

the leather underneath you kept rubbing against your core, the bouncing causing your clit to keep hitting the seat, a small wetness gathering on the material of your panties underneath your flowy dress. well, at least horse riding was good for something, you thought to yourself.

you’d finally got into the wood, Negan bringing the horse to a stop, dismounting with you still on the back, tying the reign to a small stump of a tree. “can you help me get off please?” you asked, looking down at how far you were above the ground, getting a little nervous at getting off by yourself. “move your legs to the side and jump down, don’t worry doll, i’ll catch you.” he reassured you, his arms coming out, his fingers moving in a ‘come here’ motion, that stupid grin on his face at your obvious nervousness.

you brought your right leg to the other side of the horse, your palms digging into the saddle, you made no move to jump off, slightly worried about Negan actually catching you. he huffed, grabbing you by your thighs, causing you to let out a slight scream before he pulled you off the horse, his hands sliding from your thighs, trailing up your bodies sides as you slipped down from the height.

your legs were now wide open, your feet finally meeting the ground, Negan’s hands still placed on your waist as you looked up at him. you realised he was still touching you, before you pushed his hands off you, smoothing out your dress. “thank you but i was just about to jump down myself, i didn’t need you to manhandle me, farmer boy.” you snapped, walking away from him to pet the animal. he slightly chuckled, while moving to grab the axe from the satchel that was strapped to the horse.

“sure you were, princess.”

you’d been here for around half a hour, helping Negan by putting the chunks of firewood in the bag on the back of the horse. your hands were red from gripping the wood, trying to avoid getting any splinters, causing you to be quite slow at packing it away.

“you do know, you could go a bit faster doll, we’ll be out here until nightfall if not.” you rolled your eyes at his taunting. “i don’t want any further injuries thank you.”

he growled, obviously annoyed at how unwilling you were to pick up the pace. “look, you might be able to sit around doing absolutely nothing back in your fancy palace at home but i’d rather not get my ass chomped by whatever creature could be lurking in this place, so just pick up the pace, please.” you scoffed, turning around to face him, he had the axe in both hands, his hip slightly twisted to face you. “no, you look! i don’t know what kind of impression you’ve gathered in your head of me, but.. yes i don’t do much work, yes i’d rather play the pretty housewife than go out and bend over backwards for work. if that makes me lazy, then so be it. i can’t help i have a taste for a easier way of life.”

it was now his turn to scoff at you, he threw the axe down to the ground, taking large footsteps towards you, you back yourself up against a tall tree behind you, the sharp bark of it digging into your skin a little. he towered over you before bringing his face closer to yours, his arm just above and slightly to the side of your head, resting on the tree.

“you mean your pretty little life of faking orgasms for your dear clueless husband? faking pleasure so you can continue to use him for his precious fucking money, that the easier way of life you are talking about?” he taunted, you screwed your face up in anger, how dare he?!

“excuse me? how dare you make your false assumptions about my marriage?! who do you think you are?!” you shouted out at him, taking your hands off the bark of the tree to try and push him away from you. not even moving him a inch due to his strong frame, he grabbed your wrists, forcing your hands above your head, digging them into the rough surface.

“oh give me a fucking break sweetheart, you think i didn’t notice the way you looked at me the other day. looked like a damn fucking dog in heat, you need a proper man like me to teach you some fucking manners. the way you look down at me from your ivory tower, i’ve kept the peace for your sisters sake but now i’m getting fucking tired of it, princess.”

“i don’t know what the hell you are talking about! like i’d ever look at your hillbilly ass like that, Negan, you must be joking!” you slowly laughed, truth not really following your words and he could tell. he gave a gravely laugh back, he moved his hand off your wrist, now applying more pressure with the remaining one so you couldn’t move. he moved his other under the skirt of your dress, fingertips brushing your inner thigh.

“let’s take a wager doll, if your panties ain’t fucking soaking for me right now, i’ll let you go. if they are? well, you’re going to get a lesson in basic southern hospitality from good ol’ Negan, let’s see shall we?” you tried to come up with some sort of smart mouth retort, the pure lust in his tone had you silent. his fingertips finally moving over the lace of your panties, his mouth moving to a wide grin when he did indeed find that the material was absolutely soaking wet.

“well, well, well? would you look at that?” he moved the lace to the side, now running his fingers up and down your folds, his fingertips now slick with your juices.

“don’t fucking flatter yourself, farmer boy. i just haven’t had any in months.”

the hand he used to hold your arms quickly pulled off, a slight slap to your cheek, the skin underneath turning red at the motion before he grasped your chin roughly.

“you still never fucking learn do you, you fucking slut. wet over your sisters husband, ain’t so prim and proper now, are you? now i think the only way to finally shut you up is to stuff that pretty fucking mouth with my dick, get on your fucking knees.”

his voice dark, you swallowed hard to be rid of the lump in your throat. he whipped you around so his back was now against the tree, pushing down on your shoulders to get you to your knees, his large frame now looking even more scary looking up at him. he unbuckled his belt, undoing the button of his cargos to pull out his impressively large and already hard cock.

you cried out, small tears leaving your eyes at his size, it was bigger than you’d had before and the thought of it being inside you, scared you to death while also causing your panties to get even wetter.

he laughed, grasping your hair roughly into a painful, makeshift ponytail. “keep those tears coming princess, just makes you even sexier, down there on your knees for me, now open that fucking slutty mouth, i’ve got a present for you.” he grasped the base of his dick, his fingers pulling your hair even more as he guided his cock towards your mouth. you reluctantly opened as wide as you could, the salty precum meeting your tastebuds.

“goddamn! ain’t that the prettiest sight i’ve ever seen!” Negan grunted out, his hips rocking forward to force more of his cock down your throat, the whimpers coming from you making him hiss in pleasure. your spit gathered at the base of him, getting caught in the soft hair there. he was enjoying the sight of you softly crying on your knees for him.

he kept himself buried at the back of your throat, keeping you struggling to breathe, coughing and gagging around his length, Negan throwing his head back at how good your mouth felt wrapped around him like he was. your mouth bobbed up and down against him, you tongue tracing the underside of his length, as he rolled his hips, looking down at you, savouring seeing you completely obedient to his control.

he pulled himself out of your mouth, finally letting you breathe, your throat and jaw burning with the force he’d had held you at.

he forced you up by your hair, moving you over to a large, jagged rock, your back forced against the cold surface.

“spread those pretty legs for me, slut. i want to see how wet you are for me.”

you moved your legs open for him, your feet coming to rest on the side of the rock, knees bent. Negan pulled your dress up to bunch around your torso, he yanked the top of it down, exposing your tits to the cold forest air. he grasped one in his hand, flicking your nipple, giving it a harsh slap afterwards. you yelped at the pleasurable pain of it, your breathing becoming ragged and unsteady. moving your panties to the side again as he had before, he gathered saliva and spat right on your core, the dirtiness of the action causing you to moan. giving a slap to your pussy, you whimpered at the pain that shot through your chest, head thrown back before he threw your leg over his shoulder, pulling your head back by your hair to meet his eyes.

“none of that doll, i want you to look at me while i stretch this pretty pussy out. look at it squeezing for me, begging for me.”

Negan hardened his grasp on your leg, holding on to it, he released your hair to run a finger up your pussy, your juices collecting on them as he bought them up to his mouth, sucking on them.

“you taste fucking divine princess, i’d eat this pretty little pussy all day but you don’t deserve that do you? you need putting in your place, this ain’t meant to be enjoyable for you, now is it?”

he lined up at your opening, letting no time go to waste before he entered you, filling you up to the hilt. you softly moaned when his hips snapped against yours, tightening yourself around his length, the pleasure nearly too much for you to handle. your back scraping against the uncomfortable rock, knowing you’d have cuts afterwards but you were too focused on the situation at hand.

“goddamn princess, absolutely squeezing me, this is what you wanted isn’t it. you may not respect my lifestyle but you couldn’t wait for me to teach you a fucking lesson could you?”

you could only moan, his hand that wasn’t on your leg coming down to wrap around your throat, thumb pressing down on your windpipe, restricting your breathing. it would have scared you, but in a funny way you trusted Negan to guide you through the experiment of a intoxicating mix of pain and pleasure.

his thrusts built up in not only speed but aggression as well, your body contorted into a curve as he pulled you to meet your lips in a rough kiss, his tongue exploring your mouth, biting on your lower lip as his hand still wrapped your throat. your arms gripping onto his broad shoulders, pressing down your nails into his tanned skin.

“i can feel how wet you are, you slut. come on princess, i want to feel you soak my fucking cock.”

your mind was hazy, absolutely cock-drunk from this man, never had you had such pleasure in your marriage, never realising how much the thought of being used would light such a unknown fire inside you.

“nega-negan i’m going to cum, please, can i cum?” you begged, your voice almost stopped as he rammed into you, the pressure on your throat causing your begging to come out as a broken set of words. the thought of something or someone coming along and seeing your sisters husband and you in such a precarious position made your mind run at a thousand miles a hour.

“go on you slut, come all over my cock, i wanna see those pretty eyes roll back into that empty fucking head of yours.”

that was all the permission you needed as you let yourself go, your body trembling, overwhelming pleasure as the shame of what you just allowed your sisters husband to do to you washed over your brain. it was the first time you’d ever squirted in your life, your juices dripping over Negan’s cock as he followed close behind you to his own release.

he came himself with a loud grunt, small whimper mixed in as well. “yeah, let me fill that tight pussy up, want myself dripping down your thighs for the rest of the day princess.”

he let go of your throat, you both trying to catch your breath, your task being harder than his as his choking had almost cut off your circulation. he leaned against your leg, watching as his seed started to slowly spill out of you, laughing at the sight.

“that is fucking gorgeous, look at that! have you learnt your lesson doll?” you weakly nodded, your eyes meeting his.

maybe you could stretch to a couple more visits a year.

272 notes · View notes

bearwriting · 1 year

Text

Mended

Start Here

Summary: Bruised and bloodied, you end up with the last person you'd thought you'd turn to, and you’ve got a delivery to make.

Word Count: 1.7k

Warnings: stitches, brief mentions of torture

Next Chapter

Blinking awake, you were acutely aware of the searing pain that felt like a blanket over your body. As your eyes adjusted to the light, you realized you had no idea where you were or how you had gotten there. You remembered the frost giants and you remembered managing to escape, but you didn’t remember this shithole motel and why was Mad fucking Sweeney asleep on the floor next to the bed?

He stitched me up, you remembered. You’d shown up at his door, half dead, and Sweeney had sewn your ruined flesh back together, but you couldn’t remember how you’d found him. Lucky guess? He usually holed up in dingy places like this. It must have been some weird combination of fate and luck that you ended up where he was.

Sliding out of bed as gingerly as possible, you moved to step around the sleeping leprechaun but found yourself gripping the nightstand in an effort to stay standing as a wave of dizziness passed over you. When you finally managed to haul yourself to the bathroom, you looked at yourself in the mirror and winced. Unsurprisingly, you looked…well, to say you looked like shit would be putting it nicely. A bruise had bloomed across your cheekbone in garish hues of purple and black, already turning a sickly yellow-green at the edges. Your lower lip had been split clean down the middle and, looking at the stitched wound across your face, you were surprised you still had two eyes.

You gently prodded the dental floss stitches, regretting it instantly as pain shot through your head. To his credit, Sweeney’s stitches were much neater than you’d expected. There would still be a scar, that was for sure and certain, but you supposed it wouldn’t be as awful as it might have been.

Probing your ribs, you winced. Once again, it seemed that luck had been on your side in that none of them felt broken, but they were most definitely bruised as all hell.

You knew you needed to assess the extensive damage to your back. You knew you did. If anything, just to get an idea of how long it would take to heal, but the idea of being faced with exactly how badly the Jötnar had rocked your shit made you want to curl into yourself. It was one thing to see the bruises and the stitches on your face, that you could deal with. Hell, the scar would honestly look kind of cool, you figured. But your stomach churned imagining what the skin of your back might look like. It wouldn’t look cool, it wouldn’t look badass. All it would do would be to serve as a reminder that you just weren’t fast enough. You weren’t good enough and you’d let them catch up to you. Fuck.

Bracing yourself, you carefully, slowly attempted to angle yourself so you could see your back in the mirror and inched your shirt up. Nausea rolled through you, an awful oily feeling at the back of your throat at the sight of the shredded skin. These stitches were tighter and cleaner than the ones on your face, and a lump formed in your throat as you remembered how careful and gentle the Irishman had been as he’d worked. You remembered the feel of his calloused hands on your face and your eyes burned with tears.

You released the hem of your shirt and let your head fall forward. With the way the stitches were catching on the fabric, you knew you’d need a bandage. Honestly, you should’ve had one anyway and you needed one for your face too. The last thing you needed was an infection, but there was no way in hell you could clean and bandage it yourself. Your face, sure, but your back? You weren’t even going to bother trying.

You padded back into the room and kicked the ginger giant’s leg. He snuffled in his sleep and rolled away from you. You huffed in annoyance and aimed another kick at his ass, this one with a little more force behind it.

One green eye cracked open and he peered up at you blearily. He was annoyed that his first reaction to seeing you out of bed and standing was to check you for torn stitches and just generally fuss over you to make sure you were okay.

“If the next words out of yer mouth are to tell me how shite my stitches are, I will pull them out and make you do it yourself,” he grumbled, sitting up and scrubbing his hands over his face.

You refused to rise to his bait. “I need you to bandage the stitches on my back. I can’t reach them and they keep catching on my shirt.”

“A please would be nice,” he muttered, but still he rose to his feet and followed you into the bathroom.

You only scowled at him as you tried to lift your shirt enough so that he would have space to work, but your back screamed in protest and your stitches pulled. A hiss escaped through your teeth as you tried not to make a sound, not wanting to give him the satisfaction of showing weakness. Before you could say anything, he had hitched your shirt up himself and was applying antiseptic and gauze, his enormous calloused hands once again displaying the impossible gentleness they had shown the night before.

The silence in the bathroom as he worked was tense and smothering, but stubbornness dictated that you absolutely could not be the one to speak first.

Eventually, he broke the silence.

“Gave me a right scare, showing up at my door like that,” he said quietly as he taped down the gauze on your back and turned his attention to the stitches on your face. “How’d you even know I was here?”

You made a noncommittal noise. “Maybe your luck’s rubbing off on me.”

His eyes met yours. “Maybe.”

The intensity of his gaze began to make you itch and you looked down at the counter and began to toy with a roll of gauze.

“What did this to you, anyway?” he asked.

“None of your business.”

His hands stilled. “You made it my business when you came to me for help. Whatever did this could show up at my door.”

You glared at him in the mirror. “I stole something for the old man.”

He looked at you expectantly.

“I stole something for the old man, and it turns out that frost giants don’t love it when people take their shit, even was the old man’s to begin with.”

He blinked. “He sent you in there alone?”

You snorted. “Like he hasn’t done it before.”

Sweeney’s lip curled. The idea of Grimnir putting you in a position where this could happen to you made him more upset than he thought it would. “What’d you take?” he asked.

“Now that’s really none of your business.”

He rolled his eyes. “So they caught up with you but didn’t get what they were looking for?”

You shook your head. “I hid it until I could shake them and circle back for it. Worked out real well for me.”

“How long did they have you?”

You shrugged. “A couple days? Maybe a week.”

He stared at you incredulously. “And the old man didn’t send anyone to look for you?”

“Why do you care?” you snapped.

“Because if I go missing, I wanna know if anyone’s coming for me or not.” Now he looked away from you, suddenly very interested in the tiled floor. “Besides, you’re my friend. I don’t want you to turn up dead.”

That took you off guard and now it was your turn to stare incredulously. “Excuse me?”

“Don’t make me say it again.”

“Since when are we friends?” you demanded.

He looked at you like he wanted to hit you. “Dunno, maybe when you showed up covered in blood and half dead because you quote, ‘didn’t have anywhere else to go.’ Besides, at some point, I figured it would be easier to be friends if the old man was gonna keep pairin’ us up.”

At this, you laughed in his face. “Was that before or after you abandoned me in Tennessee? Or the time you literally almost let me get flattened by a steamroller? Or—“

“Enough!” he snapped. “You made yer point. I don’t know when it happened and trust me, I'm no happier about it than you are, but you…you’re my best friend.”

You pointed at him. “I’m your only friend. That’s not the same thing.”

He scowled. "It’s enough for you to ask me to save your life, apparently.”

“After everything, it’s the least you could do,” you said. “If I had anyone else, I would’ve saved you the trouble.”

Hurt flashed across his face before it was replaced with another scowl. “Fine. Next time I’ll just let you bleed out.”

“Good,” you snapped, “glad we got that sorted.” You shoved past him out of the bathroom but stumbled as a wave of dizziness almost drove you to your knees. On instinct, you grabbed for Sweeney, and his arms were already encircling you, keeping you upright.

“See,” you said weakly, “you can’t even let me fall and I'm supposed to believe you’d let me bleed out?”

“Shut up,” he muttered as he hauled your arm around his shoulders and half-carried you back to the bed.

Once you felt steadier on your feet, you snatched your arm back. “Look, thank you for fixing me up, but I have a delivery to make.”

He made a disbelieving sound. “You’re not serious.”

You raised an eyebrow and you had never seen a man look so exasperated.

“The Jötnar are after you and you can barely stand!” he argued.

“And I have an obscene amount of cash waiting for me once I get the old man his trinket,” you countered.

Sweeney looked at you, your jaw set and a mean glint in your eyes, and knew he wasn’t going to get anywhere trying to argue with you.

“I’m coming with you,” he said eventually.

You scoffed. “Like hell.”

He glared at you. “I'm s’posed ta meet the old man at Jack’s anyway. And like I said, you can barely stand by yourself. No way you make it there alone.”

You opened your mouth to protest, but he had already hauled your duffel over his shoulder and was halfway out the door. When he realized you weren’t behind him, he turned back to face you.

“Well? I don’t have all day,” he drawled.

You gave him the dirtiest look you could manage, but he hadn’t left you much choice.

tagged: @imaginethatneathuhpartdos @sparklypandemonium

#hope y'all don't mind that i tagged u i tried to get the people who asked abt a part 2 lol #if you did and ur not on here lmk!#mady sweeney #american gods #mad sweeney imagine #mad sweeney x reader #mad sweeney reader insert #american gods imagine #american gods x reader #american gods reader insert #bear writes

76 notes · View notes

percywinchester27 · 1 year

Text

*Waves nervously* Hey, guys! It’s me... back again :)

Firstly, thank you so much for the kind messages. You folks are some of the sweetest peeps around, no kidding. I actually did make a long post explaining everything about a month back, but tumblr being tumblr glitched and the post was lost forever to the tumblr abys when I hit ‘post.’ I didn’t have it in me then to rewrite the whole thing. The gist of it is:

1. My grandmother passed away (That bit everyone knows because it was the last post I made)

2. Two days after that, I decided to mess up my life even more and end a ten-year-old kind-of relationship. People who have been following me for a while now would know about it.

3. College life got really, really hard all of a sudden. The academic pressure, unnecessarily severe HOD and crushing work burden basically left me with no time to write or be here.

4. This was my first time living by myself in a new city and I have no shame in admitting that I underestimated how much effort it is to keep yourself alive, pay the rent by yourself and adjust to living in a whole new city.

5. I got sick in the middle. Really sick. Lost 12 pounds kind of sick. It sucked.

Long story short, I feel like a different person from the one who posted the last chapter of ‘The New Mrs. Winchester.’ The girl who envisioned the story had fallen out of love long ago and clung to the series by making it a coping mechanism, to continue living in denial, afraid to spit out the words that would end the relationship. The reader in the series had a man who understood her trauma, and treated her the way she needed to be treated... and I didn’t have that in real life. The series had become an escape of sorts. But the more I wrote it, the more resentful I felt for what the reader had and what I didn’t. That’s never good, right? Starting to envy your own creation?

Then my grandmother passed. And you know that reckless self-destructive urge to wreck everything when even one thing goes wrong? Yeah, that’s what made me pick up the phone and end it. I did it by text because my voice wouldn’t hold and I couldn’t stop crying. I think I cried for hours in my tiny room. Then the next day I had to leave for a study trip so I didn’t even have the support of my friends... no shoulder to cry on. Back then, I thought I deserved to feel the pain, deserved to be alone and deal with it myself because I was hurting a good soul. It was a dark time. Everything seemed to be falling apart.

In the end, he was quite nice about it, and we ended it like two mature people with nothing but best wishes for one another. I hope he is happy in the country he wants to make his home.

It’s been five months since. I am doing so much better now. I have adjusted to the losses and recovered about ten pounds ;) I’ve also started seeing someone new. He’s very good to me :)

For the summer months, I’m back home. Agreed there’s a 45 hours a week internship, but I don’t have to fend for myself day in and day out. So, while there are no promises... I’ll do my best to get back to writing! I am hoping to get some of my writing inspiration back... So fingers crossed? ;)

If you’ve stuck around till here.... once again, thank you for not ditching my ass in the five months of radio silence. You guys are truly something.

Love always!

-Ana xoxo

#personal #hiatus end hopefully?#thank you so much for sticking around #y'all are awesome #about me

57 notes · View notes

filthforfriends · 1 year

Text

Chapter 12

Alpha!Damiano Omegaverse

Word Count: 8.6k

Catch up on my Masterlist!

You hadn’t realized what a gargantuan undertaking adjusting Damiano’s medications were. Now Isabella’s adherence to the standardized plan that’d been in place for years made sense. The team of doctor’s couldn’t just try a new medication. Absolutely everything had to be measured to create a control group. Some of it was blood tests, others tested behavioral responses. Stress Test had a terrifying name, but that was just Dami running on a treadmill while they monitored his body’s cardiovascular responses. Others were less harmless.

Alpha Dysregulation triggered by the following:

Strenuous physical activity: NEGATIVE

Emotional distress: NEGATIVE

(that one they’d gathered from appointments with Jay)

Omegan physical agitation: NEGATIVE

(Dami had confused the researchers by laughing. He explained privately that it wasn’t much worse than dealing with you while particularly horny.)

Beta physical agitation: NEGATIVE

Alpha physical agitation: NEGATIVE

(Barely. He’d been rigorous in mentally preparing himself to stay present, so he’d be aware that this was a test, not a threat.)

Alpha verbal provocation: NEGATIVE

(He wouldn’t tell you what they’d said, but used a punching bag until his knuckles bled, then climbed through your window in the middle of the night. Perched precariously, Damiano was already in headspace. He said four words: do you want this? Then he fucked you like you like it was breeding. He did it with a hand over your mouth, on the floor, so the headboard against the wall wouldn’t wake anyone.

Right after orgasam, Damia’s expression became homosapien. He was so visibly relieved that you now felt used. Your knees had carpet burn and his hand was way too rough on your clit because he wasn’t even trying to tune in with your body. As teenagers you were bound to be bad at sex, but you eventually found a rhythm. He didn’t even try. Sex wasn’t something Damiano was doing with you, it was something he was doing to you, and you hated it.

Your warning growl captured the intensity of your displeasure with the way he was behaving. Damiano stops thrusting and can immediately tell that something feels different, smells different even. There's no slick, at least not comparatively. You’ll be sore tomorrow, and not because you begged for intensity, but because he let fear poison the sacred thing that was making love to you.

Damiano apologizes profusely, his guilt so evident in wounded whines that it makes you choke up. He grovels, nuzzling against your scent glands with a pouting bottom lip. He needed to be close, so close that it smothered you. Now you understand the reason he can’t bear to tell you why, and you won’t make him.)

You talked about it with Jay. You spoke with Jay about almost everything together because he had more faith in you and Damiano than anyone. He was more invested in making your relationship work than all the other doctors combined. You didn’t understand why your mere existence was so polarizing one way or the other, and he dodged the question whenever you asked.

“I can tell that the other clinicians don’t like me, and don’t say it's not true because we both know it is. Why?” Seemed like a pretty bulletproof statement.

“People's opinions are not stationary, nor do they exist in a vacuum.” It sounded very wise, but after some examination, Jay was just saying that people change their minds about shit. So next time you targeted Jay with your phrasing.

“Why do you think that other clinicians like or dislike me?”

“Well, I personally think you’re a great asset to the team,” he responds warmly. You narrow your eyes.

“I’m not an alpha. Playing to my ego isn’t gonna ruin my train of thought.” Dami begins cackling underneath you. It’d been one of those days where he hauled you onto his lap before you had a chance to sit elsewhere in the room. His joyous smile does distract you.

During attempt number three, you sit on the couch, directly across from Jay and pledge not to look elsewhere until you’ve got your answer.

“I don’t understand why Dr. Hao behaves briskly around me, but warmly towards everyone else. Can you help me understand so I can communicate more effectively with her?”

“If it helps, she doesn’t like me either.”

“That doesn’t help. Stop avoiding the question.” Another alpha would scorn his omega for such behavior, but Dami is positively enthralled by the intellectual sparring. He might as well be munching on popcorn in the background.

“We’ve decided that you are going to be part of Damiano’s recovery. If you ever change your mind –”

“It hasn’t changed,” you bite.

“In that case, I can try to minimize your interaction with Dr. Hao via scheduling.”

“I don’t want to minimize it. I want to be her best friend,” you dead pan. “I want to make friendship bracelets and matching t-shirts and glue sparkly stuff to my face then go skipping down the street, holding hands, singing nursery rhymes.” Your boyfriend is laughing again, so you keep your focus forward to avoid repeat distraction. Jay is at a loss, which is sort of a victory in and of itself.

“Some people are incompatible.”

“Why?”

“Because temperance and belief systems –”

“Why are Dr. Hao and I incompatible?”

“I honestly don’t know her well enough to –”

“Take a guess.”

“I am not in the guessing game, y/n, especially about my colleagues. That would be incredibly unprofessional.” The statement is like hitting a wall, but you're dating Damiano David, so scaling walls is in the job description.

“Fine. Would you say that your colleagues have different temperaments and belief systems?”

“Absolutely, there is so much variation in the human psyche.” To Jay's credit, he can feel it's a trap.

“And how many people are on Dami’s treatment team? There's you, a psychiatrist, endocrinologist, psychologist.” Dam interrupts by tapping your shoulder and holding up two fingers. “Two psychologists, god damn. Any other -ologists?” He signs the letters, G P.

“General practitioner,” fills in Jay.

“So that’s…” god damn it, you’d lost count. “A shit ton of doctors.” Damiano holds up six fingers and points upwards. “That six or more doctors, right?” Jay nods amicably, lulled into a false sense of safety. “Six people would account for a lot of variation in temperament and belief systems. So, given what you know about me, as a psychiatric professional –”

“Y/n, please,” he holds up a hand.

“Doctors are supposed to be nice, even to patients that throw their own feces at them. I haven’t thrown feces at anybody, so what about me is so unlikable that two or three his doctors regularly break professional conduct to nonverbally communicate how much they dislike me?” It came out more personal than you’d intended.

“Y/n, I am genuinely sorry.” White flag raised. “I openly take issue with how certain team members have been conducting themselves to this end.” You’d been angry about information being withheld from you specifically. Damiano knew that. However, now that Jay had acknowledged it, the hurt feelings underneath finally had room to surface. Being given the cold shoulder by someone who was amicable to everyone else in the room stung. Trying to be likable and not knowing where you’ve failed is even worse.

“You represent a significant fissure in our team’s professional opinion of how we should proceed with Damiano’s treatment. An impasse, even. Physicians actually taking it out on you, loved one of the patient and a minor, is inexcusable.” Now that you have your answer, you finally look away and down at your hands. The world blurs, but you try to keep your eyes open, because blinking creates tears.

“I imagine they didn’t anticipate how perceptive you’d be of their hostile attitudes. That will change.” At some point. Damiano had realized that you were genuinely upset and sat on the couch right next to you. His arm wrapped around you, pulled you close. Once you were snuggly tucked into his side, his hand rubbed your back.

“This is so stupid, this is supposed to be Dami’s session.” You blink hard to get it over with. “What do I represent?” Instead of hiding your tears and flushed face, you allow Jay to see it, allowing his experience as a therapist to make that hurt. It’s manipulative, but honest.

“One approach is holistic and the other is very…individual.”

“They wanna just focus on Dami with no distractions?”

“Perhaps.”

“And I’m his biggest distraction?”

“That may be the opinion of some individuals.”

“Or they want her to feel unwelcome. They want to drive her away so they can do treatment their way. Stop giving nonanswers, it’s basically defending them. It's bullshit.” Jay tries not to be surprised, but it's the most Damiano’s said at one time since sessions began two weeks ago. He’d figured out that not talking was therapeutic for Dami, for whom constantly having the right thing to say on the tip of his tongue was a means for survival. So therapy included a variety of modes of communication. Apparently words came easier when he didn’t have to be the one to say them.

There were four therapy sessions a week, two of which you or his parents were a part of, to some effect. Therapy was often prefaced by testing and consultation, with the expectation that if Damiano was triggered, Jay had the best chance of bringing him back to baseline. The whole thing seemed like an overreaction, until Gia reminded you that Dami was the best case scenario, in terms of AD2. The medical system had to be thorough, because monitoring high risk alphas was the primary means of reducing alphaspian violence. A vengeful alpha could maim and torture, but there was focus. An out of control alpha with good intentions was far more deadly.

“It’s like a pistol versus a machine gun,” is how it was explained. “With so many bullets, you're guaranteed to hit something.” You struggled with that analogy, because Damia didn’t feel like a weapon to you. In fact, it seemed like he was under the duress of a weapon. AD2 forced him to act like a man with a loaded gun perpetually pointed at his skull. With you, he could get out from under that feeling, but with everyone else physical contact was a hairpin trigger away from disaster.

While sitting in the clinic’s lobby, you got through as much homework as possible before being called in for the appointment. Sometimes Jay and Dami would talk privately for a few minutes at the top of the hour. Finally, the timing felt so off that you reluctantly dug through your backpack for your phone. It was 3:17.

“Hey, um, can you check if I’m supposed to be sitting in with Damiano David today, Jay Rouche’s patient?” The secretary glanced at his computer screen for a moment.

“Yep, I see you right here,” he confirms with a professional smile.

“It’s just…it's like 20 past and I’ve never waited this long.”

“I can let them know you’re here.”

“No, they know I’m here,” you sigh with exasperation. In the back of the office, there are staff speaking in hushed tones. It wouldn’t strike you as abnormal, except they’re whispering so quietly into the ear of Dami’s behavioral psychiatrist that you couldn’t catch a single syllable from eight feet away. The nurse, testing personnel, and someone who’s uniform you didn’t recognize kept glancing in your direction. They were acutely aware of your presence and smiled anxiously upon being caught staring. That same sensation of unease you felt on the soccer field is now blooming in your chest.

“Is he okay?”

“I don’t have that information”

“What testing did he get done today?”

“I’m not a liberty to –”

“Can I speak to one of his doctors?”

“That won’t be possible without an appointment.”

“Really? Because they’re standing right behind you looking at me.” Very slowly, the front desk attendant turns around in their swivel chair.

“Dr. Clem,” you call. She turns her head in response to hearing her name and winces upon realizing that she can no longer ignore your presence.

“Hi, y/n. Why don’t you come inside and we’ll talk for a sec.” The attendant buzzes you through from the main lobby in the Alpha Behavioral Clinic, to the lobby of the south therapeutic wing from which Jay’s office was directly accessible. You haphazardly stuff your shit into your backpack and accidently rip a paper with the zipper. Dr. Clem stands there with her hands clasped in front of her and an excellent poker face. Already, your anxiety is choking you from the inside out.

“What happened to him?” you demand.

“Damiano is going to be fine.” Going (future tense). “Today’s testing was one of the more difficult ones, which we all knew going in. He had a short procedure afterwards.” You scramble to remember being provided with this information and realize that “we” did not include you.

“Nobody told me. Why didn’t anybody tell me?”

“Because that wouldn’t be appropriate.” You see red and feel sick with betrayal. Dr. Clem was supposed to be one of the supportive ones. Has that changed? Why? Was it your fault?

“Did I do something?” you bite, tone acidic. She’s unaffected, like she anticipated your reaction. The fact of your youth and predictability just makes you angrier. Not being taken seriously is a lot like being silenced and it’s your own damn fault too.

“No. As a general rule, it isn’t appropriate to keep minors up to date with the medical care of non-family.” He is family. “With omegas, especially.” Your fists are curled, arms tensed as they quiver by your sides. Jay’s office door is visible peripherally, but you can’t sense Dami’s presence. Something was wrong. He wasn’t okay and they were intentionally separating you.

“Where is he?”

“He’s right through there, with Jay,” Dr. Clem answers casually. “Given that Damiano has requested we keep you in the loop, I am not trying to withhold information.”

“Is that so? And what are your qualifications for deciding what I do and don’t get to know?”

“I am an adolescent behavioral psychologist. Please lower your voice. There are other patients in session.” For a moment you’re stunned into silence. “I am attempting to provide you with Damiano’s medical information at this moment, okay?”

“Do you condescend all patients, or is it just omegas you treat as unintelligent?” you spit, making your voice as poisonous as possible. Dr. Clem closes her eyes and takes a deep breath. No. Fuck you. You don’t get to be overwhelmed and exasperated, not when you’re keeping him from me.

“Today Damiano’s pain response was tested. Using electrical signals, we approximated the threshold where he enters a dysregulation episode. The procedure was minor, only local anesthetic. I’d like to…” Dr. Clem's voice fades into static. Everything fades: the smell of the room, the backpack strap pulling your hair, the way your shoes feel. The only thing you can perceive is your thundering heart and the way each beat is accompanied by nausea.

“Y/n? Y/n?” Dr. Clem shines a flashlight in your eyes, which turns the whole room white. The momentary blindness only makes the panic worse.

“Sorry about that. Can you describe how you’re –?”

“You tortured him! Do you know how much self-control Damiano has? To get him to break, must’ve taken…and you just electrocuted him until,” Dr. Clem puts a hand on your shoulder so you wrench away and get vertigo from moving too fast. You knew Damiano’s pain as much as any person could. No, you couldn’t feel the hurt, but so viscerally could you feel what it did to him.

He was somewhere, curled in a ball, trying to de-escalate from headspace, and he was trying to do it without you.

“He needs my help,” you implore. There’d been so much blood last time. It got under your fingernails and the only thing that cleaned it was the dishwashing brush by the kitchen sink. You had to scrub until your skin was sore. Braced against the wall, you close your eyes and try to just survive this feeling. There had to be an otherside to it.

“Y/n, how has your fluid intake been today?”

“Your tests are bullshit. And by the way, I didn’t consent to being used as a fucking tool in your assessments. What kind of population survey would lead you to believe that normal alphas wouldn’t also enter headspace after their omega was threatened? Your control group is bullshit and traumatized patients are just getting more traumatized!” The words hurt your throat. It feels like you’re suspended in the air and your whole body tingles but it doesn’t feel like a body. Because of the dissociation, it just feels like dead weight.

More muffled voices join Dr. Clem, one with urgency. It takes a moment to realize that those voices belong to people, which means there's someone else in the room. You force your eyes open and push away from the wall. Dami and Jay are both standing in the waiting room with shocked expressions. He’s fine, not in headspace, or visibly upset. While processing cognitive dissonance, that weight yanks you towards the ground. The room spins then everything goes black.

Nothing is a peaceful place. Nothing is a welcome reprieve. Nothing asks for nothing. Nothing understands that you have nothing left to give.

Damiano reacts quickly enough to stop your head from hitting the floor, but barely. He was distracted by being mortified with your behavior and figured you’d catch yourself. The gesture was too timely and convenient of a distraction. Damiano was aware you both knew that he couldn’t be frustrated with the public tantrum if you were unwell.

“Y/n, c’mon,” he mutters, setting your shoulders on the ground.

“Jay, elevate her feet,” prompts Dr. Clem. Only then does Dami realize that you hadn’t pretended to trip, you’d lost consciousness. He drops to the floor and tries to pull you into his lap.

“Leave her head on the ground, Damiano.” She takes your pulse and blood pressure. “Have there been any changes in her health?”

“Not that I know of.” He pulls the hair from your face. “Y/n?”

“How has her nutrition been the past few days?” You’d eaten multiple meals together, but Dami hadn’t paid attention or checked on you during school lunches.

“I haven’t noticed, honestly.” He’d gotten so wrapped up in his own angst and you’d let him. You’d allowed it to be all about Damiano without a drop of resentment. Fuck, when had it been otherwise?

“Fluid intake?”

“I don’t know.”

“When was the last time you saw her drink water?”

“She keeps a water bottle in her backpack,” he offers. “Y/n? Baby?” Dami roughly rubs your shoulder.

“Try not to move her head,” snaps Dr. Clem. “When was the last time you saw her drink fluids of any kind?’

“I don’t know.” She gives Dami a long, hard look.

“Do you think you’ll be able to watch over her for the next couple days?” Translation: do you think you can do your fucking job as her alpha? “Not to detract from your suffering, but this is really hard on her too.” For a couple seconds, Damiano is reeling.

“What's wrong?” he manages to ask.

“Probably a mix of things: stress, dehydration, lack of sleep. Maybe she didn’t eat anything today. Typically young people wake up almost immediately. I’m going to order IV saline. Jay, is it possible to move your next patient?” He nods and goes over to the secretary's window to reschedule. Dami crawls down to your feet and props them on his lap. How stressed does a person have to be to faint?

“Clem, she’s not waking up!” he calls out. The doctor re-enters the room immediately and squats down on the floor. That same blinding white light ruins your nothingness. Dr. Clem opens one eye and shines a flashlight directly into the pupil, causing you to startle.

“Hey, y/n do you know where you are?”

“Torture center?” Dr. Clem scoffs then visibly relaxes.

“I’ll have you know, that we weren’t sticking Damiano in an electric chair and zapping him until his self defense instincts kicked in.”

“Oh.” The pieces of your memory aren’t fitting together. There was a jump cut from arguing with Dr. Clem to laying on the carpeted floor.

“Is Damiano okay?” Your alpha notes that the first question out of your mouth wasn’t “am I okay?” Guilt is a painful sensation to swallow.

“I’m fine. I’m right here, love.” He rubs your shin, before shifting your legs off his lap. However, that hand only leaves your form for a fraction of a second as he crawls upwards. Even though you can’t see him, you can sense that Dami’s presence is constant.

“Go ahead,” murmurs Dr. Clem, newly gloved fingers pressed to your wrist. Your tailbone aches where it landed hard on the floor.

“Do I have a concussion?”

“That's very unlikely, since your head didn’t hit the ground.” As your brain comes back online, all you want to do is go home and cry into your pillow. Probably scream too, then feel really sorry for yourself. Damiano puts your head on his lap. You procrastinate looking up for as long as possible. Eventually you’re forced to face his expression. You’d embarrassed him and proved all the naysayers right. Watching Damiano, in real time, reevaluating his position on your involvement was excruciating.

You wiggle your fingers, find the carpet, and push yourself upright. Even gritting your teeth, just outright standing is impossible.

“Come here.” He demands clinically.

“I’m fine, just give me a second.” You were nobody’s burden.

“You need fluids and rest,” Dr. Clem directs sternly.

“I’ll drink water on the bus ride home and go to bed early.”

“Stop it.” Irritation instead of warmth was possibly worse. You outright ignore Dami and straighten your spine. Dr. Clem is watching your movements wearily.

“I’ve already ordered IV –”

“IV? Absolutely not, no.” With strength returning, you get a strong hold on a chair to push yourself up.

“Stop it.”

“You’re mad at me and if I make you ignore that because I’m injured, you’ll resent me. I can already feel it,” you hiss, glaring over your shoulder. “I would rather crawl home than be your burden because you’re obligated. Don’t pretend you wouldn’t prefer just to be pissed at me.” How the hell did we get here? That's the question that echoes in Damiano’s head. Despite the devotion and unconditional love, right now you’d risk anything not to need him, because you genuinely thought he’d hold it against you.

To Dami, it seems this might be one of those moments that defines a relationship. Shamefully, all that's required is fulfilling his basic role as an alpha. It’ll be nice to focus on someone else…but he should have checked in much earlier.

“Y/n, you’re not just walking away after passing out.”

“Damiano is right. There's a decent chance you’ll faint again if you just walk away. Next time there won’t be someone to catch you.” Dami gets a vision of your head cracked open on the pavement in a pool of blood. He lurches forward, wraps both arms around your middle, and pulls you down so your head is supported on his chest. You try to wiggle free, but he is determined to keep you tucked against him.

“Don’t fight, you’ll just make yourself dizzy.” You grunt in protest at having a choice made on your behalf and push at Dami’s arms. “Not even close, baby.”

“No needles or I start biting,” you bargain.

“Fair. Let's go sit in Jay’s office, unless there's something else you’d like to yell and disturb all the other appointments?” You start out with a scorching glare, but are unable to resist relaxing against his chest in relief. Damiano is angry, but he's okay. You’re so exhausted that that hard shell of defensiveness falls. For a moment, he sees how much that comment wounded and your bottom lip trembles. You bite it and scowl to control your reaction.

“I really wish I hadn’t said that. I’m in a super shitty mood today,” he professes, stroking your head. “The testing is like getting shocked by static. After a couple minutes they stop, but its fucking annoying and I just wanted to punch something afterwards.” When the words come out, Dami realizes how threatening they sound. “Fuck, I just mean…it’s alpha bullshit. I’d never –”

“I know. I wanna stand up.”

“Just hold onto me.” Damiano stands with you in his arms, then waits a moment for your feet to work. As soon as that happens, you duck out from under his embrace, which is a maneuver he wasn’t expecting. You take one step successfully. Now the decision is between becoming a patient and sitting in Jay’s office or grabbing your backpack and trying to get out of here with an ounce of your pride intact. Maybe there's a compromise.

You walk into the room of your own volition and slump in the armchair instead of the couch, so Damiano can’t sit next to you. Laying down sounds so good, but this way you have independence. He does something you don’t expect. He kneels in front of you.

“Are you okay?” You don’t need to see his expression to know this is out of duty.

“I’m sorry I embarrassed you.”

“I am a lot more embarrassed about how I just acted.” He pulls one hand from your lap and into his own. You snatch the other one back. Slowly, he coaxes it away from your body and uncurls your fist. You don’t know why you let him.

“Are you okay?”

“Yes. I’m fine,” you snap, staring out of the window.

“Look at me, y/n.”

“I. Am. Fine.” Deciding to focus on something productive, you take your water bottle from the backpack Dami had set next to you. Only then do you notice the door is closed.

“They’re going to think we’re fucking.”

“No, they’re not.” As soon as you sit back up the world spins and you whimper despite trying not to. He quickly stands between your legs so you can lean against him for stability. One hand is on the back of your head and the other is on your back.

“I’m gonna drive you home as soon as we get the all clear. Baby, are you okay?”

“You need to finish your appointment.”

“When was the last time you needed something? I wasn’t conscious of the fact that everything has revolved around me since my episode until that.” He gestures out towards the waiting room. “It’s been all about me for – what? Two or three weeks, but even before that, I was the one that got to have problems.”

“It's not like this entire relationship is about you.” Now your voice is shaking, because a completely one sided relationship is not one worth having. “Are you breaking up with me?” you whisper.

“No, absolutely not,” Dami responds with total conviction. “Fucks sake, I wouldn’t just –” His Adam’s Apple bobs and he blinks hard, forcing himself to stay on track. Damiano squats back down and squeezes your hands. Despite not meeting his gaze, the tears fall when you take a deep breath.

“I’m sorry I just scared you. Last thing I want is to make it worse.” You nod and bring a hand to your mouth. As you try to hold back the sobs your face heats and your head pounds. Where the hell had all of this emotion even come from? It was like a pot of water boiling over.

“What I meant to say is that I am a walking collection of red flags and there are few things that bring me greater peace than your unconditional acceptance. You couldn’t have been better omega these past three months. You couldn’t have been more supportive. Even that was all in my best interest, albeit very misguided.” So earnestly did you want to be good for Damiano, to be what he needed as a mate and partner, despite all the things that made you different.

You squeak and curl up, tears wetting your kneecaps. There's a quick knock on the door and it opens. From the foot falls, you can’t tell if it's Dr. Clem or Jay. Regardless, you’re glad you took a defensive position before they entered. Damiano continues to kneel. He rubs his hands up and down your arms.

“I’ve had it so good for so long that I lost perspective. So what can I do for you?”

“If you’re mad at me, just be mad at me because otherwise –” You accidentally interrupt yourself with a sob. “Just ‘cause you appreciate me doesn’t mean you’re not angry.”

“Y/n, I’d just like to acknowledge how committed you are to making sure that Damiano has all the space he needs to feel and explore his emotions. I know he appreciates it very much,” adds Jay.

“I wa – as sss – so scare – ed that someth – in was wrong with you – ou.”

“Unintentionally, I buried the lead and I can see why you’d assume Damiano was under duress.” Dr. Clem’s voice comes from your right. She gently pulls your arm from your legs and before you realize why, there’s an IV being inserted. At first you tense, but then realize you don’t have the energy to be combative. Instead you sob and feel a rush of cold fluid enter your arm.

“Y/n, it is important to me that you know I’m in full support of your partnership.” This many people observing your emotional breakdown had to be at least the third circle of hell.

“Then why?”

“You’re already here two days a week. Tracking the intricacies of Damiano’s medical care, given the complexity and volume of information, is just too much.” You remain silent, unsure how to feel about Dr. Clem’s statement. The IV stand squeaks as she rolls it beside you.

“It is not about personal maturity,” summarizes Jay. Finally, you look up.

“Exactly. Depending on age, the brain can only handle so much executive functioning. So you end up sacrificing things that are vital, life self care.” Dr. Clem is disarmingly earnest. “Being Dami’s partner is the way you contribute to his health. I swear to you, y/n, that the other stuff is being handled by qualified people who advocate for your presence.”

“Advocate for me?” What could somebody say about you and why would they? Dami was the patient.

“Yes. Our experiences are shaped by the people around us.” Dr. Clem pauses to hand you a tissue.

“That sounds like something Jay would say to dodge a question.” Damiano scoffs and his therapist chuckles good naturedly.

“I can assure you this is going somewhere.” She pauses. “The people around us make us who we are. So we can’t evaluate Damiano separately from evaluating if anyone in his life aggravates the dysregulation.” Panic tightens underneath your sternum, eyes dart around the room. Throughout this entire relationship, you’d functioned under the idea that you made things better for Damaino. He grabs the chair and jostles you around to interrupt your train of thought.

“What is it with you and assuming the worst? She’s trying to give you a compliment! She’s saying she advocates for you because she believes you’re good for me.”

“Oh.” Damiano sighs heavily.

“Okay, time to play musical chairs,” he decides with impatience. Dr. Clem moves across the room briskly and Damiano gets your other hand in and pulls upright. You look at him in confusion, with tears blurring your vision.

“We’re going to lay down until you’re feeling better.” Accepting his direction, you sit down on the couch and grip the edge of the cushions for stability. Going from upright to horizontal seemed awfully far. Dami practically sits on your lap, he’s so close. With both arms wrapped around you, it's obvious he's acting as a guide, pulling you towards him and downwards. It takes a couple seconds to realize he’s having you lay on his chest. The prospect is too comforting to oppose, despite present company.

“Lean into me. Mhm, legs up.” Dr. Clem deals with the IV tube so it doesn’t catch on anything. Once both legs are on the couch, Damiano brings you horizontal and pulls you up his chest so your head is right under his chin. You take a deep breath and relax completely on the exhale, allowing your eyes to close.

“That's better,” Damiano says more to himself than anyone else. Perhaps because of the exhaustion or presence of others, the embrace doesn’t have the typical sexual charge. Still, his hand rubbing your back is as soothing as ever. You follow the sensation of heat and pressure in order to regulate.

“I genuinely don’t know what the hell is wrong with me,” you sniff. “I just started thinking about all the blood and I felt sick.”

“Have you eaten today?” question Dr. Clem, now seated in the armchair.

“Uh…coffee.” Dami sets his jaw and shakes his head. Without a view of his face you can’t detect if he’s mad at you or himself.

“I picked you up for school, I should’ve…damn it.”

“It’s not your fault.”

“Sorry to cut in,” Jay rushes. “Y/n, you just said something about blood.”

“My last episode, I was a bit cut up. Nothing deep,” Damiano fills in, running his fingers through your hair, nails gently scratching your scalp.

“So did you get a chance to see yourself?”

“Uh, no, not this time. She cleaned me up and hid the bloody stuff before anyone got there. My mom thinks she may have saved my place on the team. Power of appearances.” Dami pecks the top of your head with his lips.

“Y/n, was that the most wounded you’ve seen someone?”

“Yes,” you answer immediately.

“Wait, really?” Damiano moves so he can see your face. “But you were so calm.”

“That sounds like it could have been traumatic,” Jay concludes with a perfectly calibrated compassionate expression. You groan in annoyance.

“I’m not traumatized. I can just shift into this different, almost invincible person, sometimes.”

“And when you shift out of that, how do you process what you experienced?” You don’t have an answer, and the room falls dead silent.

“I…you know what, this doesn’t feel right, taking Dami’s session when I’m not the patient. Obviously Dr. Clem has stuff to do.” You try to sit up, but Dami’s gentle embrace becomes a straight jacket.

“No, you are unaccustomed to adults focusing on your well being as they should. First Thalia needed the attention and then Clio.”

“Don’t Freud me,” you grumble. Dami scoffs.

“You Freud me all the time!”

“No, I – actually that’s fair,” you admit with an eye roll. Jay smiles and clasps his hands over his knee.

“I know Damiano’s perspective very well, but I’d like you to describe that day to me, y/n.” This was the first time you recounted that tumbleweed of shitty events. Dami’s health had to be kept private, which also meant he was the only person you could speak freely with.

“I could see something was wrong when I walked on the field and Star told me where to find Dami. So I went and found him. Then I calmed him down and cleaned his face.” You keep the version for Jay’s consumption as vague as possible to make questions difficult.

“When Star told you where to find him, what was that like?”

“Dami already –”

“Damiano can’t tell me your experience.” You harumph and collapse against Dami’s chest.

“A couple of alphas on the team gave me shit. Then the giant storage locker smelled like nasty sports gear so I had to go looking for Dami because I couldn’t sense where he was at. When I found him, I cleaned his face off, but initially it spooked me. I don’t know, at the time it didn’t bother me that much, but when I thought about it today I felt…panicked. And, like…” you trail off, not wanting to betray Damiano’s privacy.

“Go ahead.”

“At first it was hard not to get overwhelmed because I knew I needed to make it okay, but I didn’t know how. I didn't know if I’d fail him,” you choke up.

“‘Fail me,’ baby no,” he objects.

“I hate talking about it because you’re gonna think I do shit out of obligation, but I don’t. I’m happy to and I want to and I like being around you, even if it's a rough time. You get in your own head so fucking much that I know you’re gonna go home and hate yourself and then you’re gonna be distant, which is worse than whatever happened in the first place.” You take a shaking breath and roughly wipe your face. “But at the same time, you’re the only person I can talk about this with because it needs to be confidential, but that's just another thing that makes you resent yourself. You know, as if I didn’t make all of these decisions myself, with free will, which I did! And none of this stuff is indicative of you needing to change, it’s just the way it is and again, we decided together. This isn’t something that was done to me or some bullshit.”

“This fear of Damiano’s self-loathing getting in the way of your relationship comes from where?”

“From reality,” he cuts in. “How did you put it in the beginning? ‘Emotional whiplash.’” You nod, wiping the side of your face against his shirt. “This whole time you were trying to protect me from myself.”

“Actually I was just trying to protect myself from loneliness. I’m not that noble.” You close your eyes again, as if that could make the moment less stifling.

“When a really compatible alpha and omega find each other, it's like no other feeling, right? That's why I dredge all of this up, because, y/n, I want to give you the tools to sustain a relationship with a partner who has hormonal dysregulation. That is how I help my patient.” Finally, you were being taken seriously, but it felt less like being free and more like being exposed. Yes, you wanted to spend the foreseeable future with Dami, but having adults expect it of you was intimidating as fuck.

“Even renowned clinicians struggle to evaluate the patients holistically. ‘We want Damiano to have tools to thrive independent of anyone.’ Well alpha-omegas are built for each other, so he’s not going to thrive as an island, period. That level of nuance is unpopular.” There's a softness to Dr. Clem’s voice that you’re unaccustomed to. She pats the arms of the chair with finality and stands, having said her piece.

“And we know this is a lot for a 17 year old,” adds Jay. Both adult’s expressions are emphatic.

“Agreed, Dami is –”

“I was talking about you,” Jay chuckles.

“Uh, I’m not 17.”

“Did you turn 18 recently? Well, happy birthday,” Dr. Clem beams.

“Umm…no.” You shift into a sitting position and Dami helps push you upright. He’s got a sheepish expression.

“I…that nurse hated me as soon as he saw my diagnosis. He’d been grilling me for like 40 minutes, so when they asked about her age I…” He looks to the ceiling and winces. “I told them we were the same age to get off the hook.” You’re rather amused but Jay and Dr. Clem stare at each other in alarm.

“I’m 15,” you chirp. “And I got my big girl bed last week so I don’t have to sleep in the crib anymore.”

“Y/n, why are you like this,” Dami laughs with a red face.

“Sometimes, at dinner, mommy doesn’t even put me in my highchair.”

“This entire time, we’ve been operating on the assumption that your brain was a full two years further in development,” says Dr. Clem in mortification.

“No takesy backsies on that support of our relationship or I’ll rip the Cinderella pages out of your coloring book.”

“A fearsome threat indeed,” adds Jay, feigning seriousness. You feel a hand on your stomach as Damiano wraps his arms around your torso. He leans his cheek on your shoulder, like the sweetheart he secretly is, but something stings in your forearm when you try to embrace him in return.

“Oh my god there's a needle in my skin!”

“And I will be happy to take it out.” Dr. Clem rushes out of the room, but you can’t help but stare at the IV site. The sensation of an intrusion in your arm makes everything itch.

“No, no, stop.” Dami gets a hold of your free hand. “If you yank it out yourself, the vein will spurt blood everywhere.”

“Why would you tell me that!? And what kind of word is ‘spurt?’ Never say that shit again!”

“Okay, okay, fair. I’m sorry.” He still doesn’t trust you enough to let go of your hand, which is probably a good instinct. Unable to stop, you look back at the IV site and see blood in the tube and under the plastic.

“I’m bleeding, oh my god,” you whine. Even with eyes shut, the world spins.

“Head on my lap, c’mon.” Again, he guides you down, but this time Dami covers your eyes too.

“You’re not bleeding, it's just from moving your arm too much,” answers Dr. Clem as she comes back into the room. You can see the wheels of a tray from between Damiano’s fingers as you squirm. The snapping sound of exchanging old medical gloves for fresh ones is the opening salvo to a nightmare of albeit mild sensation.

“How do you even know how to place an IV, I thought only nurses did that.”

“I actually have two degrees. Count back from five.” As soon as Dami says four she rips off the bandaging and pulls the IV out and you screech in betrayal.

“Hey, this is me holding pressure,” Damiano assures, one hand holding a cotton ball over the IV site to slow the blood flow.

“Okay,” you groan, clutching the wrist of the hand shielding your eyes. There's the sensation of adhesive on your skin and then Dr. Clem steps back with a sigh

“Well that was exciting! I’ll be right outside if you need me.” The hand Dami had over your eyes moves your back and the other is stroking your face very slowly. The sensation is so pleasant that you get goosebumps.

“Deep breath, open your eyes,” he coaches. You blink hard, but don’t sit up immediately. Jay and Dr. Clem are standing through the open doorway, conversing. They weren’t giving you privacy, but they were giving you a moment. Damiano runs the back of his pointer finger down your cheek, then along the bridge of your nose. You shiver and finally take a deep breath.

“There you go, kitten. What? What's the face?” Your reaction to the nickname must have been visible.

“I hate needles,” you whine.

“I know, baby.” When he leans down, Dami’s hair acts like a curtain. He presses his lips to your cheekbone, temple, the corner of your eye, and two more kisses on the forehead. For a beautiful moment, your world is just tan skin, statuesque features, and dark brunette waves. He rubs his thumb under your eye, then over your eyelid as it closes, and taps your cupid's bow. When he finally sits up, you follow, sans dizziness. The proximity of his scent glands would typically negate all progress towards a clear head, but that earthy musk you love wasn’t overwhelming. His pheromones were light and more towards ceder than usual.

“Oh my god, what did they do to you?” You lean forward so your nose is directly above Damiano’s scent gland and take a few really deep breaths. “What happened, where is your smell?” Dami is wincing, mouth downturned, with a pained expression.

“They took out my old device and now we’re trying birth control because the side effects are great for curbing my symptoms. I didn’t think you’d notice so soon. Fuck, I’m sorry.”

“I couldn’t smell you earlier, when I was in the lobby. I guess this is why.”

“I really am sorry.”

“I’ll get used to it. Your health is the most important thing.”

“Agreed.” Dr. Clem uses the word to announce her reentrance into the office. “Jay and I wanted to discuss one more thing before I clear you to leave.” It, in fact, did not look like Jay wanted to discuss this topic. His expression is void of the typical positivity and he constantly readjusts once seated.

“A team member,” Jay clears his throat forcefully. “Has brought up valid concerns regarding the amount of time you spend apart, or rather lack thereof.”

“Who?” demands Dami.

“I am withholding that information on the grounds that it will detract from possible therapeutic benefits.” It’s interesting to watch Damiano have a silent standoff with Jay, as you’re rarely the observer in this situation. “How many days a week do you spend socializing with friends?”

“I talk to my friends everyday at lunch and I’m in the AE club.”

“And I’m on the soccer team.”

“Outside of school hours and extracurriculars?”

“I talk to my friends before I leave school as well,” you reply, starting to see the issue.

“The beginning of any relationship can be all consuming, but especially alpha-omegas. I’d hate for you to wake up one day and realize you’d lost contact with the other people that enriched your lives.”

“Everyone isolates at the beginning. When one of my alpha friends is socially absent for a few months after finding an omega, I don’t take it personally and neither do they.”

“Plus for five weeks at the beginning I never saw Damiano outside of school because he was trying not to corrupt me or whatever.” Dami scoffs and looks at his hands. “I mean yeah, I could hang out with my friends a little more, but I’m not asocial and obsessed with my alpha.”

“And that's all I’m asking, socialize with your friends too. It doesn’t necessarily have to be separate. Try integrating your social circles, hanging out in groups, see how those dynamics work.”

“But spending time apart is important,” interjects Dr. Clem, perched on the edge of the desk. Damiano glares at her with his eyes narrowed.

“Is this coming from you?”

“No, but I do think it's a valid point, right Jay?” He clears his throat again.

“Something I see with mated couples is empathy fatigue. When one person is struggling, the compulsion to be there for comfort and support is very strong.”

“I think that's called love,” interrupts Damiano.

“Perhaps, but uh…When a person is in a sustained state of hardship, their partner grieves for their suffering. That is its own pain, which I’m sure y/n understands.” You nod reluctantly, trying to read Dr. Clem’s expression. “Spending lots of time together during a rough patch feels comforting in the short term, but there's a tradeoff. That partner comes to know their loved ones' pain so intimately that they are now carrying the sorrow of two people. Empathy makes them ache for the sufferer and empathy allows them to bear that suffering themselves.” Damiano looks so defeated. All that anger at some random doctor who didn’t even know you making crappy assumptions is gone.

“And you think that's happening here?”

“Not necessarily.”

“Well if its not necessarily happening why the fuck would you bring it up?”

“Because it’s a concern,” answers Dr. Clem.

“Is Damiano drowning in self-loathing after you’ve undermined our entire relationship, now also concerning? But hey, if he thinks he’s ruining my life, maybe you’ll get the distance you’ve been wanting, right?”

“That is not the goal,” retorts Dr. Clem. You turn your attention the other way.

“Jay, in your professional opinion, what do you think is worse for the human psyche, empathy or profound loneliness?” Dr. Clem sighs, but Jay leans forward to answer earnestly.

“Loneliness. Damiano, I am the mouthpiece for an unfortunate and often frustratingly wide range of opinions, most of whom do not have my expertise. It is still my responsibility to convey that information if the team decides its pertinent.” Dami glances up so you throw your legs over his lap and embrace him. “While I am providing you with information, it is important to know that in my very long career, I have never seen this issue outside of mated couples, since the mechanism is established with mating.

“So you don’t think I’m damaging –”

“No! You are not,” you interrupt. Dami smiles a bit and looks over.

“Well, I already knew your opinion, dear.”

“Then fuck what anybody else thinks,” you whisper, pressing your foreheads together.

“Although anything is possible, logically this won’t be an immanent worry until you are mated.”

“See? That was him saying no, but covering his ass, because Clem is watching.” Damiano snorts and you forcefully shake him while speaking theatrically. “So please don’t have an emotional crisis about whether or not you are a good influence in my life! Because if you’re distant, I will blame Jay, personally. And Jay doesn’t want that.” Damiano’s therapist pursues his lips and his wide eyes are directed towards the floor. “See? His self preservation instincts are already screaming at him to run.”

��Good instincts,” Dami chuckles, rolling his shoulders back with a deep breath. He puts his hair up, physically brushing the intrusive thoughts off. Jay and Dr. Clem shared some intensely sustained eye contact. Whether they’re on the same side or not you can’t tell, but whatever sentiments exchanged are clearly meaningful.

“We’re gonna go,” announces Dami, shifting your legs off of his lap. He grabs your backpack and puts his arm around your waist.

“Right, yes.” Apparently nervously clearing his throat was Jay’s tell. He stands cordially, obviously preoccupied in thought.

“See you tomorrow,” Damiano bids goodbye and his physicians awkwardly do so in return. “Christ, that was painful. Fucking hell,” he murmurs under his breath, wearing a fabricated smile that said “I’m okay” to anyone watching. When it came to your boyfriend, people were always watching, and you couldn’t blame them.

“I…I don’t know if I already apologized, but I’m sorry.”

“Ssh, ssh, it's okay,” he reassured, pulling you close enough to kiss your temple without breaking lockstep. “I am going to cook your dinner, if you don’t mind waiting in the car at the store for five minutes, that is.”

“Don’t want to bother unbuckling me from my car seat?” you tease. Dami holds the door open as you exit the clinic.

“Incorrigible,” he says, affectionately. Before getting in the car, you pull Damiano in for a kiss. Or rather, you stand in front of the driver's side door, making eyes at him until he captures your face in both hands and presses his mouth to yours. You slip a hand into his back pocket. Situationally inappropriate, but he allows it, nipping at your bottom lips so you know you’ve been bad.

“Get in the car,” he growls and pats your ass as you walk around the hood. “So I assume it’s not foul, then,” he prompts, while you close the door.

“What?” The engine turns over once before starting.

“My pheromones.”

“No, definitely not. Your pheromones actually smell…cleaner, I guess.” Dami visibly perks up at that description.

“Cleaner isn’t bad.”

“No…” Your tone of voice makes it sound like a question.

“Well that was convincing.”

“I love you no matter what.”

“Oh, no.”

“Not ‘oh, no!’” you laugh.

“Well then what's wrong!?”

“It’s not as sexy,” you admit.

“Fuuuuck,” he groans, features contorted.

“There’s something kind of sweaty or a little dirty in the way you normally smell. I don’t know how to describe it, it’s just…”

“Musk?”

“Yeah, exactly. Like the smell of your body, kind of. It’s very intimate.”

“And that's gone?”

“As I’m saying it, it sounds gross, but that was the thing. I couldn’t tell if it was gross or if I wanted to lick it off of you.” It’s the smell of your boxers after soccer practice if you showered beforehand. The perfect amount of ick, is what you were thinking, but not saying. He didn’t need to know about the time(s) you sniffed his dirty underwear, since you so loved teasing Damiano for doing the same.

“Ah, so I’ve lost the scent of manhood. That's great.”

“I thought this was your manhood,” you place a hand on the fly of his jeans.

“Y/n, I’m trying to drive!”

“Sorry! I wasn’t actually touching anything, it's just the denim.”

“Doesn’t matter!” After a beat, you can see him fighting a smile.

“I wonder if your pre-cum is gonna taste different.”

“Driving!” You decide to tease (or maybe torture) him a little bit. Leaning over the center console with your shoulders pushed forward for the sake of cleavage, you use a dramatized, breathy.

“I wonder if it's gonna taste different when I fall to my knees in front of you, unbuckle your belt, unbutton your fly, and —.”

“LA LA LA LA,” he sings, to drown out the commentary. You dissolve into laughter, letting Dami focus on the public roadways instead.

“This is why I can’t bring you into the store. You’re distracting!” Behind Damiano, the sun was just beginning to set. It peeked out from behind the rain clouds while making its descent towards the horizon. Despite being a bit under rested, Dami’s olive skin looked positively biblical as it reflected the rays of waning light in warm, sandy tones. He was made for the sun’s kiss…and your kiss.

Notes: Next chapter up within a week (for real). This is for the conversation lovers and world builders. Part 13 has the protective Damiano y'all have been asking for. Please let me know what you think I live for external validation.

-XOXO Eden

Taglist: @bieberhoodforever @blackberryblossom @butkutee @cuzimitaliano @elvirabelle @iamtashaquinn @icarodamiano @ilwiwbysmv @immrbrightsideeee @little-moonbeam-666 @maneslut @mortyandem @the-chaotic-cow @wasteddoubts @weareoddlydrawn @whore4damia @azertyhug @biancathecool @bohemianrainbow @daisy0gf @dustyinkpages @katyldamusic @minnietmouse @obiw4n @persona1read1ng @gr8rainbowpunk @hiraetheral @iosonoarina @l0standn0tf0und @que--sera--sera @stardustingold @teenyweenynightghost @softmullet @solacestyles @thegeminisgirl @bobfood @slavicgoddess13 @bright-shiningstar @kammerstx

#maneskin #måneskin #må #daminao #damiano david #damiano maneskin #maneskin damiano #damiano david imagine #damiano david fanfiction #damiano david x reader #damiano david x you #maneskin fanfiction #maneskin imagine #maneskin x reader #alpha omega #alpha beta omega #omega reader #alpha and omega #omegaverse

71 notes · View notes

ohjustkreat · 7 months

Text

Closing The Distance

A Shuri x Riri Fanfic

*************************************

A/N: Well hello!!!! Chapter 20 is finally here. 20 chapters and almost a year later, I truly have no words. Thank you to everyone that has read this story. I’m beyond grateful.

As always,

Enjoy,

Kreat

Table of Contents

*********************************

Chapter 20

The next day, a new energy was prominent in the air. Riri was currently configuring the last few things on the prototype, or the I-SPY as Riri had come to name it. Carefully, she made the last adjustments and looked proudly over her work. After a moment she stepped back and exhaled, "Now, for the moment of truth."

Pressing one of three buttons on the small device, she saw it flash a light purple signaling it was powered on. Next, she turned on a monitor that bad been linked to the small device. Moments later, she recognized her face as it appeared on the larger monitor. Continuing her testing, Riri picked up a sleek black, remote controller. Pushing one of the switches upwards, the small device began to roll forward. Getting lost in her creation, she didn't notice Shuri who had stopped at the top of the stairs and was watching her.

"Having fun?' Shuri questioned, startling the other woman.

Riri jumped up, almost dropping the remote controller. "Oh, uh, sorry I was just testing the device. Look at this!" Riri said as her nerves calmed and excitement replaced them.

Shuri watched as the device rolled along the floor, evenetually making it's way over to her. Soon it was her face that had been plastered among the monitor.

'If you two are done here, then it would be helpful if you could offer your services." A voice sounded from the top of the lab, at the doorway, belonging to none other than Nakia.

“Greetings, while you two were busy playing with your toys, I was actually doing real work.”

“Not. A. Toy.” Riri said through gritted teeth. “This,” Riri said as she waved one hand under the device, showing it off, “is the I-SPY. Hopefully this little guy can get us a drop.”

Nakia stopped and took a moment to examine the small device from afar.

“Cute.” Nakia said as she started to descend the stairs. “Anyways, I just came across some information I thought you might want to hear.”

Her banter filled face regretfully turned to a small frown.

“Well?” Shuri questioned , eyes wide as she awaited her answer. Her questioning, being only for the sake of details. Shuri had seen the look before, numerous times actually. And all she could do is brace herself for the dreaded news that would follow.

“ I was doing some intel last night and what I found was shocking to say the least. It’s not good to say the least.” Nakia said, with a tablet now in her hands. After a few minutes of touching the screen, numerous documents started to appear above the group’s head. The holographic images showed financial documents, messages, and a plethora of other documents.

“Tell me they aren-“ Riri’s voice questioned among the growing tension.

“Yes, it seems they’ve been secretly dealing arms, specifically small amounts of vibranium to other countries without our knowledge. Knowing Shuri wouldn’t stand for such a thing, well…” Nakia’s voice trailed off as she made eye contact with Shuri, who was standing silent. From previous experience Nakia knew this wasn’t a good thing.

“Where’s M’baku? Does he know?” Shuri questioned as she began to pace her lab’s floors. The thoughts looming in her head would have pushed any other person into a stage of panic. Yet, Shuri was only fueling her rage into a plan of action. At times like this, she couldn’t afford to be selfish and fall to her emotions.

“I spoke with him briefly. He had his suspicions something else was going on that they didn’t want him to know about. From what I can tell, Shuri, they expected him to be more passive than previous rulers.” Nakia spoke carefully, trying her best not to enrage the other woman even more.

Riri approached Shuri, attempting to pull her out of the daze she was in. Placing one hand on the small of the back, she used the other to stroke the side of the taller woman’s face. Instinctively, Shuri relaxed under Riri’s touch. Her eyes fell shut as she exhaled.

“Breathe, baby. Look at me.” Riri hallowed as she coaxed Shuri back to reality.

A few moments passed until Riri saw the ever timeless sight of Shuri’s deep chestnut eyes.

Slowly she saw the flames of rage diminish to embers.

“I’m okay.” Shuri said as she pulled the smaller girl in for a short hug.

“Ahem.” Nakia fake cleared her throat. She grinned at how attached the two had come in such a short time.

At the sound, the couple were jerked out of their world and back into reality. Shuri let Riri go as she finished composing herself. Riri could almost see the wheels turning in Shuri's head. Whatever Shuri was plotting, Riri would do nothing other than support her.

"Hm, GRIOT."

"Yes, Shuri?"

"Contact M'baku, as well as the Dora Milaje and have them meet me here immediately."

"Right away, Shuri." GRIOT responded.

"The situation just went from bad to worse." Shuri looked into the distance, as the weight of her world fell back onto her shoulders.

'Shuri, what should I do?" Nakia questioned.

Shuri looked to Riri then back to Nakia before continuing, "Riri, love, can you give us a moment?"

"Of course. I'm gonna go and tinker with something." Riri muttled off as she left them to talk. She settled in front of a monitor on the far side of the room and inserted her headphones, assuring their privacy.

"Shuri, this is much worse than I thought. They sure covered their asses with this one. There's almost no way to know who they sold them to."

"I know. We need a new plan. But first, I need a list of everyone possibly working with the elders. They aren't capable enough to carry this out themselves."

"On it. I'll be back shortly. I already had a few names, but ,ah, you can never be thorough enough." Nakia turned to leave, but stopped and looked over her shoulder at Shuri. "And before you start being too hard on yourself, you couldn't have prevented this. You did not know." With that she turned and started to ascend the staircase and exited the lab.

Shuri was left grappling with herself. Fighting the parts of her that felt she could have done more. Been more aware, more in tune with what was going on in her kingdom. She would be the first to admit her recent break had been needed, but like all things her time for self reflection and healing had come met its dilemma. The sound of the doors open and a familar voice greeting Nakia pulled Shuri from her thoughts. M'baku had arrived.

'Perfect timing.' Shuri thought to herself as she watched M'baku stalk down the stairs. His mountainous figure coming closer into their view.

A grin crept upon his face before he spoke, "Little panther," M'baku began as he landed at the bottome of the stairs, "I see we have much to talk about."

"Yes, we do. One moment." Shuri excused herself before going to retrieve Riri, who appeared to be entranced in whatever technology she was working on. Shuri lighty grabbed her shoudler and was met with soft brown eyes and a slight smile.

"Hey, you guys done already?" Riri questioned as she got up and entangled herself in Shuri's arms. As much as Riri needed to feel Shuri, she knew Shuri needed it more. No matter how well she carried herself, Riri knew what Shuri really was feeling. Which was anxious and scared. But she also knew that Shuri couldn’t be forced. More so, in Riri’s mind, Shuri was a force all in herself. PpRiri knew to wait and not push Shuri; she would come to her when she was ready.

"Yes, love, we are. Come on." Shuri ushered them back towards where M'baku had settled at the large table in the center of the room.

"So, I see Nakia has shared her findings with you?" M'baku questioned.

"Yes and as you can see it is much worse than we could have ever thought." Shuri replied.

"Any idea on where to start?" Riri chimed in.

"Not really. I've sent Nakia to go and find out more about what's been going on and who all is involved. Once we have more information, all guilty parties will answer accordingly."

"And getting the vibranium and other weapons back? How are we even going to locate them?"

"Once we get more information on the buyers, we can take the known locations of everything and see what we're left with.' Shuri took this time to look up and meet M'baku's eyes, then Riri's before contiuing, "This- this won't be easy or brief."

"I'd be concerned if things were peaceful again. It was getting a little boring. If I’m not saving everyone, what is my purpose?" M'baku sarcastically let out.

"I’m sure we’d manage." Shuri shot back.

"Aht, Aht little panther, " M'baku teased, letting his native tongue linger on the nickname, "Save your energy, you did say this was not going to be a simple task."

Shuri shot a glare at M'baku as she began to protest, but not before getting interrupted.

"Okay, you two, let it go. As you both said, we have a lot of work to do. So," Riri, paused and looked between the two, "Where do we start?"

"You can start with explaining what's going on?" A voice sounded from across the room.

The group turned to meet them. There stood Aneka and Ayo, along with Naseema and Asira.

"Ah, come over and we can get you caught up." Shuri answered.

The small group made their way over to the rest. After they were informed fully on the situation, everyone prepped for the first part of the plan. Which was placing the I-SPY technology.

"So, if everyone is ready, these" Riri, holding one of the small spheres up, " will be placed in every council member's room tonight." She proceeded to hand two to each of the members of the Dora Milaje that were present. "Remember, while they can be operated remotely, you must turn them on first, inputting the password key before starting. Our team of scientists, here, will be monitoring the activity. In shifts, 24/7. Any questions?" Riri looked at the group of warriors, and not to her surprise, no questions.

"Okay, that's it for now. I'll see you all tonight." Shuri said, relieving everyone, watching as the group dispersed.

Riri waited until the room was empty and the last lab assistant had left to approach Shuri. Walking up softly behind her, she placed her hand on Shuri's back and began softly rubbing it. "Hey, you sure you okay? I feel like your mind's been everywhere lately. Even if you don't want to talk, I'm here when you're ready."

Shuri turned to face Riri, as she took her in her arms and olaced her head atop the shorter woman's. "Thank you. And I know. This is just-" Shuri let out a heavy sigh, "Way more than I was expecting."

Riri heard the tears fighting to stay behind the walls of leadership Shuri had built. "Hey, it's okay."

She coaxed as she continued to rub the small of her back.

"It's just," Shuri paused as she collected herself, "I just wish they were here. They'd know what to do."

Riri knew who they were. And it killed her that this was a problem she couldn't fix. "Babe, look at me." Riri pleaded as she pulle away from Shuri, so she could look directly at her. "You're doing everything right. They would have been so proud of you. You're honoring them the best way you know how. By fighting for their memory and their legacy, by using what they taught you."

Shuri only nodded in response, a small smile growing on her face. “I’ve been thinking.” Shuri looked up before continuing. The small smile faded. “There’s still one person I need to talk to.”

Riri’s eyebrows quirked as she waited for Shuri to continue.

“Namor.”

*************************************

S/N: Happy belated birthday TISHHHH!!

#closing the distance #shuri x riri #shuri fanfiction #shuriri fanfic #black panther #shuriri #letitia wright #wakanda forever #princess shuri #dominique thorne

17 notes · View notes

crestfallencrest · 6 months

Text

Freezing

Summary: Yuri never minded the cold. He was usually the type to get through a harsh and cold winter day without much issue. Today, however, was not one of those days.

Prompt: No prompt, just some Duke/Yuri conversations in the discord that left me INSPIRED. Modern AU (Other oneshots can be read here on Ao3! [x] ) Pairings: Duke/Yuri Genre: Fluff Warnings: N/A Word Count: 1,998

Been hit with a tiny writing slump (too many ideas grabbing my attention) but I really really started liking Duke/Yuri lately and I really REALLY wanted to write a winter themed one shot for the Holidays so here I am. Short but sweet! Also, a present for my fellow Yuri/Duke lovers in the discord server I'm in <3

Yuri wasn’t the type of person who got cold easily.

He had always been that way growing up. While Flynn would be bundled up with multiple layers from head to toe, Yuri could usually get by with a simple jacket and gloves. Maybe a scarf if it was a particularly windy day. But regardless, he would usually get through the day without a single complaint. ( “That’s rare, coming from you.” Flynn had said once, to which Yuri promptly told him to shove it and stop being jealous. )

His resistance to the cold seemed to shock his friends whenever it was brought up. Usually the topic would come up whenever one of his more ‘motherly hen’ friends ( coughEstellecough) would exclaim in shock over how little layers Yuri had decided to wear that day and every time, he would have to explain that he simply didn’t mind the cold weather. He moved around too much for it to bother him too much and a lot of his time on the job was usually spent indoors. Plus, growing up in a shoddy apartment without a heating system did wonders in helping Yuri adjust to the wonders of freezing temperatures.

Today, however, was not one of those days where he could simply just shrug off the harsh and bitter winds of that winter afternoon.

He worked as a cook at a small little restaurant on the other side of town and unfortunately, whatever otherworldly being that watched over him had decided that he was looking just a tad too dry when he was working on washing the dishes at the end of his shift. A pipe had burst and Yuri was quickly and completely soaked within seconds. It turned out that his simple afternoon shift had quickly turned into a closing shift as the restaurant had to be shut down early so the plumber could come in and fix the issue.

Unfortunately for Yuri, it wasn’t like he had any spare clothes to change into at the restaurant. He was starting to wonder if maybe some extra layers wasn’t such a bad idea after all but he also couldn’t give his partner and certain other people leverage to say ‘I told you so.’

Not that they could right now, even if they wanted to. The water jet from Hell decided that soaking him to the bone wasn’t enough and that it also had to completely destroy his phone in the process. So calling someone to come and pick him up or bring him some spare clothes was unfortunately out of the question.

So, Yuri decided to just fucking deal with it.

It wasn’t that long of a walk to the bus stop and he’s endured worse before. So all he had to do was make it onto the bus, ignore the sting of his freezing fingers and the shivering of his body, get home, strip and take a very warm shower and hopefully no one would be any the wiser. Gods forbid the scolding he would get if his partner caught him out in freezing temperatures, soaked from head to toe. He could definitely hear his voice now if he saw Yuri at this moment, all huddled over and shivering as if seconds away from freezing to death at any given moment. He’d be concerned, of course, but his deep voice would also have that slight hint of disapproval as he would say–

“You wouldn’t be so cold if you had taken the extra coat like I had asked.”

Yeah, he would say it exactly like that.

Wait.

Aw, fuck.

Yuri momentarily forgot about the winter’s frozen touch slowly creeping through his body just long enough for his body to jolt into a more straightened standing position. He whipped his head around, following the voice’s source and he wasn’t sure if he was cursed or blessed to see the familiar red eyes piercing into his soul with what he could only assume was his stare of judgment that he could only work to perfect the longer they lived together.

Long white strands poked from the red wool knit cap that he wore over his head, with the rest of it being held down by the black and white checkered scarf that was, in Yuri’s opinion, quite horrendous but it had been a gift from Judith when she was last in town so, of course, his partner saw no reason to not use it. Sure enough, Yuri could tell that the man was wearing at least two layers of clothing to combat the cold weather and for once in his life, Yuri was a bit jealous.

“Oh, h-hey Duke.” Yuri greeted with a tiny grin, trying to bite back the shiver in his voice. “What’re you doin’ here?”

Duke quietly moved to stand by him at the bus stop, letting his arm raise a bit to show off the small grocery bag in his hand. “Groceries.” He answered simply before turning his head a bit to face him. “You mentioned needing to make cookies later this week for the holidays, did you not? We were out of sugar and butter.”

“A-Ah…” Yuri nodded quickly, letting his arms wrap around himself. “G-Good catch–”

The words barely left Yuri’s mouth before he realized that Duke was staring him down, eyes narrowed slightly before his free hand reached over to brush against Yuri’s shoulder. Duke was generally a hard person to surprise. In fact, despite Yuri’s life mission to try and startle this man at literally every given opportunity, he was ashamed to admit that he’s only managed to pull it off a handful of times and instead, it seemed to be Duke that would catch Yuri off guard, most days.

(For example, how in the hell was he supposed to expect that Duke Pantarei of all fucking people would confess first?! No one could have possibly expected that! Of course Yuri would be surprised by that!)

However, upon letting his fingers brush against the jacket that was undoubtedly carrying more water than warmth, Yuri was surprised to see Duke’s hand jerk back in surprise. Yuri watched as his eyes widened and his serious expression tightened, frown stretching across his face. He didn’t say anything and instead just stared at Yuri and… ah, yeah, Yuri was fully familiar with that look. He was definitely in trouble.

“I’ve had one hell of a day.” Was all Yuri could offer and that definitely did not seem to quell Duke’s concerns.

“Why are you standing outside in this weather as wet as you are?”

“Man, and it’s not even the fun kind of wet–”

“Yuri.”

Man, he kept hoping that that joke would land. Maybe one day.

Yuri shoved his hands into his pockets, though it didn’t seem to help the impending chill that was quickly returning to his body. “A pipe busted at work and unfortunately, I was right in the line of fire. And I didn’t have a change of clothes.”

Duke’s eyebrows furrowed. “You could have called me.”

“Oh yeah. Might need a new phone. Water got into my current one.” Yuri would have laughed had he not lost maybe two years worth of pictures on that damn brick. Thankfully he shared a lot of the pictures with his friend group and Duke but it would be such a pain to get those pictures back. Ugh.

Duke quietly placed the grocery bag onto the bench and began to pull off his jacket and scarf. “I see…” He mused quietly as he finally looked back at his lover. “Take off your jacket and put this on over your clothes. Along with the scarf.”

“I’m not going to steal your jacket and scarf. Then you’ll be cold!” And the last thing he wanted was Duke to be freezing too.

“Between you and myself, are you really going to argue that I will be the cold one here?” Duke asked, once again holding out the jacket and scarf and… okay, yeah, he maybe had a point.

Slipping out of the soaked jacket was almost torture for Yuri because while he wore a long sleeve shirt to work today, it sure as hell wasn’t built for this weather but sometimes you had to get colder in order to get warmer. He quickly shoved the jacket on and buttoned it up in record time and the warmth of the jacket having been on Duke’s body seemed to creep through Yuri’s body.

Yuri shivered in relief as Duke took his wet jacket and placed it to the side for now before moving to wrap the scarf around Yuri’s neck. Feeling Duke’s warm, gloved fingers brush against the freezing skin of his neck and cheeks had Yuri nearly move to chase after the warmth of his partner as he gently reached behind him to pull his hair out from underneath the scarf. He was still wet underneath the jacket but the warmth of his jacket and scarf was already a major improvement.

“Mm…Feels nice…” Yuri hummed slowly, letting his eyes close as Duke’s fingers once again brushed against his cheek and this time, he couldn’t help himself as he stepped closer.

This seemed to give Duke pause and Yuri cracked an eye open to see those soft red eyes staring down at his own. Duke was hard to read at times and it was a miracle that Yuri had managed to pin down the ability on how to read Duke’s expressions. Which is why he felt his chest light up when he saw his lover staring down at him oh-so-softly.

Yuri was never a big romantic but even that was enough to have his heart doing flips. “You know, that’s usually when you, the boyfriend, would respond with some sort of sappy remark about always keeping me warm or something and then you’d like… do that.” He quickly added in, that teasing smirk making its way onto his face.

“Do that?”

“Yeah. Keeping me warm.”

“Hm. I didn’t realize that I was being held up to a certain standard.” Duke responded as he let his fingers stroke Yuri’s cheek once more before finally allowing himself to cup Yuri’s cold face into his impossibly warm hands.

The shiver of warm relief shot through Yuri once more as he pressed his cheek further into Duke’s touch with a content smile. “We’ll work on it. Should I go jump in the lake down the street so we can try again?”

“I’d much rather we just get you home and warm you up.”

“You’re no fun.” Yuri answered with a click of the tongue.

And then he looked back at Duke, who had the faintest smile on his face as he stared down at Yuri. Yuri could hear the bus make its way down the street, preparing to come and pick them up to take them back to the apartment they shared but before Duke pulled away to prepare to climb onto the bus, he let his thumb brush gently against Yuri’s lip.

“I see the meaning was lost on you.” Duke replied before he finally pulled away (and Yuri will swear to his dying days that he did not whine when the warmth left with him.) “I suppose I’ll have to do better next time.”

As Duke grabbed Yuri’s discarded wet lump of a jacket and the grocery bag, Yuri was left wondering what Duke could have possibly been talking about regarding lost meanings and doing better next time as the bus pulled up next to them, opening the doors to offer them entry. Duke spared him one glance before climbing the steps onto the vehicle, the amused smile still clear as day and Yuri couldn’t help but feel like he had missed a joke somewhere along the way–

Oh.

Oh. That’s what he meant by warming him up.

Cheeks burning from the cold weather and absolutely positively nothing else , Yuri was certain that he had never hopped onto a bus so fast in his life

---

And then they went home and 'warmed up' and Yuri absolutely did not catch the worst case of the sniffles right before the holidays! Thank you for reading!

#tales of vesperia #dukeyuri #yuri lowell #duke pantarei #oneshots #crest fics #holds them in my hand #i think that they're cute #they should kiss

9 notes · View notes

nekoannie-chan · 1 year

Text

A special Valentine’s

Pairing: Steve Rogers X Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D.!Reader

Word count: 719 words.

Summary: You used to hate Valentine’s, until you met Steve.

Warnings: Grumpy reader.

A/N: This is my Valentine’s special 2023.

You can read it on Wattpad and Ao3 too.

@saiyanprincessswanie

My native language is Spanish so I wanna improve my writing skills in English if you notice any mistakes, please let me know and I will correct them.

I don’t give any kind of permission that my fics to be posted on other platforms or languages (I translate myself my work) or the use of my graphics (my dividers are included in this), I did them exclusively for my fics, please respect my work and don't steal it. There are some people here who make dividers that anyone can use, mine is not this type, please look for the other's people. The only exception is the ones I gifted 'cuz now belong to someone else. If you find any of my works on a different platform and are not one of my accounts, please let me know. Reblogs and comments are always welcome.

DISCLAIMER: I don't own Marvel's characters (unfortunately), except for the original characters and the story.

Add yourself to my taglist here.

My other media where I publish: Ao3, Wattpad, ffnet, TikTok, Instagram, Twitter.

If you like it, please vote, comment, and give me feedback to improve my skills and reblog.

Tags: @sinceimetyou @unnuevosoltransformalarealidad @navybrat817 @angrythingstarlight @shield-agent78 @charmed-asylum @pandaxnienke @real-fbi @smokeandnailz @white-wolf1940 @tenaciousperfectionunknown @xoxonotme @bluemusickid @leyannrae @harrysthiccthighss @marvelatthisone @caplanbuckybarnes @sapphire-rogers @lizzieolseniskinda @notyourtypicalrose @hallecarey1 @nana1000night @talia-rumlow @writingshae @alexxavicry @azulatodoryuga @daemonslittlebitch @chaoticcollectivenightmare

Four days before Valentine's Day

You forced a smile when you went out and your neighbor greeted you. It seemed that she loved all kinds of festivities; she always had her apartment decorated, even outside. However, every time you went out or saw her, it was a feeling you didn't like, especially now that it was Valentine's Day and everything was completely pink, almost too pink when you opened your door.

Perhaps what made you angry was that you had no one to celebrate the day with, and no matter how hard you tried to make it just another day, a normal day, something reminded you of what day it was.

Two days before Valentine's Day

You had to hold your laughter when some people started complaining about the mission since you were not going to be able to celebrate it; at least you were going to have something to do that day, but you were speechless when they assigned you to your mission partner.

"Agent Y/L/N, your partner will be Captain Rogers," you were told.

You hoped you wouldn't have to teach him how to use anything you needed; you didn't doubt that he was kind and a good person, but you despaired that he still didn't fit in or that he thought things were still the way they were in his time.

"Y/N": "Steve greeted you; you nodded your head in return, and you began to walk towards the ship that would take them to the place." It's been a long time since we talked.

"I've... been busy, you know, with missions, among other things," you answered, trying not to make a big deal out of it; you didn't want to have a conversation either, because you knew he was going to ask you about your plans.

"I guess the mission ruined your Valentine's Day plans," Steve said as he sat next to you on the ship.

"No, I was planning to stay at home, watching movies," you answered, adjusting your seat belt. It wasn't a lie; you were planning to stay cooped up all day to avoid seeing so many happy couples.

"Maybe we should go to the movies?"

"Cap, we have the mission.

"Of course, but after...

"The mission first, then we worry about other things," you answered.

You were sick of bad dates, and you knew a date with Steve would be a disaster.

You started to draw your plan; even though it was a simple and common mission, it would take you at least five days to carry it out. Five days that you would be sharing with Steve

Again, that strange feeling invaded you; very few times in your life had you had it, and it was always related to Steve, although you also realized that he was smiling and happier when you were near him or he talked to you.

However, it was not the time to think about trifles; you had to focus on the mission. You learned that if you didn’t have a plan, many things could go wrong.

Valentine’s day

The mission had become a little complicated; it was taking a course that you didn’t foresee, and now you and Steve were pretending to be a couple celebrating the day, so you would have the chance to be close to the enemy.

You found Steve's attitude a little strange; he was playing his part too well. You sat down in the restaurant and had absolutely no idea what to order; all the food was date-themed.

Suddenly, you began to suspect you had been spotted. As you kept looking at them, suddenly the enemies stood up and were heading towards you when Steve noticed and quickly pulled you towards him and kissed you.

It was the first time in your life that with a kiss you seemed to "see" fireworks; you reciprocated the kiss, you didn’t stop kissing him, and it even seemed that you had forgotten the mission and ignored the rest of the team, who obviously took care of the rest.

"So, do you have something to do on Saturday?" Steve asked when you stopped kissing.

"I'll go to the movies with you," you replied.

He nodded with a big smile; after all, you didn't spend Valentine's Day alone and you already had a boyfriend.

#valentine's day #steve rogers x reader #steve rogers x agent of shield!reader #steve rogers x you #steve rogers x y/n

60 notes · View notes

writersblockisdead · 1 year

Text

Lightyear* ˚ 💕

Steven Universe x PTSD! Gem! Reader

Commission: Steven x PTSD Reader? I’m a sucker for hurt/comfort fics, so maybe a story about Steven comforting the reader through a nightmare, panic attack, or trigger in the field? I feel like his own trauma would be perfect for comforting/understanding what another persons trauma feels like. :3

@kitxel-draws

Steven was your friend, someone you hung out with quite a lot, the gems at first didn’t take a liking to you, at first because you were one of the gems found in the kindergarten poofed. But with Steven’s enthusiasm in allowing you to be reformatted the gems allowed you to join them.

It was hard at first trying to fit in an otherwise strange world with new faces and new gems. Before you were poofed you had been with another gem named Hassonite she was a gem that was one of your “owners” basically an aristocrat that was given to her. Hassie was everything to you, she even on numerous occasions allowed you to come with her to earth.

Unfortunately for you, the gem war was far from over when you both arrived there. She immediately got shattered and left you alone. As you weren’t a high ranking or any other gem you couldn’t fight back and instead was poofed yourself. This left you with trauma, as your only friend was brutally murdered, you were spared, but that didn’t excuse the lifelong trauma you were facing.

Back to the present you woke up screaming, normally gems don’t need to sleep, but you found yourself becoming more and more human, adapting to Steven’s weird human lifestyle, you find it amazing and interesting. But besides that… Screaming all night and day became a part of your life. It has been a hard few weeks adjusting to life with the gems and Steven and often awoken to Hassie being hurt and all you could do is watch.

The screaming was alerted by a tired Steven who heard it, you slept on the couch at the beach house, it wasn’t an issue, but Steven offered to sleep on the couch while they worked on a place for you in the Beach House but you rejected not wanting to intrude on Steven. He wandered to the couch only to see you shaking and mumbling Hassie’s name over and over.

Trauma.

Steven knew that. He understood that. He had mother issues as people will label it, but his issues were far beyond that. He suffered from a lot of things, he could almost never really get help for, he always believed that other people needed help, and he was just being a burden.

Trauma.

He’s seen it in a lot of gems. Lapis’ abuse, Amethyst's Defectiveness, Pearl’s Longing for his mother, and of course, Spinel’s Abandonment, out of all the gems, Spinel had the worst so far. Pearl is alongside her, but he could’ve seen himself in Spinel. His mom up and abandoned him instead of sticking by, because he knew it was possible for her to stay. But instead he had to clean up every single issue that his mom left behind in her wake. The pain and suffering of many gems that was caused because of a conflict she could handle. Steven was annoyed he never got a childhood. But he forgotten he was excited to join the gems on battling. As he was the one with the Rose Quartz gem, if only he knew it was a lie…

What was Steven thinking about again?

Oh right, (G/n). He cautiously walked down his loft and into the living room with concern written on his face. He never heard you act like this. He needed to approach you with caution, dealing with Spinel taught him he needed to approach delicately in situations and make sure the person wouldn’t lash out. Steven made his way up to you and sat down next to you. You yelped and smacked Steven by accident.

“It’s just me, (G/n) no need to worry.” He said.

“Steven?” You question.

“Yup, that’s me.” He noticed your shaking stopped slightly and you seemed to calm around him. He began to take that as a sign.

“So…” Steven began, “What got you yelling like that?” He asked. Your face paled.

“You… Heard that?” You asked.

“Yes.” He said.

“...Well, I don’t know… It’s just… Well. I am scared.” You admitted.

“Of what?” Steven asked.

You took a deep breath.

“That wasn’t the same (G/n) you heard before, I-” You began, your voice beginning to get shaky. Steven grabbed both your hands in his and looked at your eyes.

“Slow down and tell me slowly.” He said.

You nodded and continued. “What you heard was one of my many PTSD Nightmares. I… I was known as (G/n)-1A3L. I was given to a Hassonite lovingly referred to as Hassie…” You looked longingly at whatever you were trying to look at.

“But then she died. She was shattered in front of me when we arrived on Earth for a mission by Yellow Diamond. I was spared, I don’t know why they didn’t kill me right there and now, I lost my purpose the day Hassie died.” You said, your lip trembled.

“Ah, so you have survivors guilt. I know that feeling… I one time shattered Jasper by accident, and I tried to fix her. I was scared I killed her, but I managed to save her. There’s many other gems that weren’t lucky and I couldn’t save them. I can understand how you feel. But you know the best part?” He asked.

“What?” You asked.

“It happened, and it’s over, you may have lost someone close to you. But just because they died doesn’t mean it’s over for you. As long as you fight for them and show them in the gem afterlife that you are happy. You can do anything. But we all got to understand most of it isn’t our fault, and we cannot help them. They wouldn’t want us to suffer. They would be happy to see us move on…” Steven said.

You sniffled. “Is that the case, how would you know what’s best for me?” You asked.

“I don’t. It’s up to you, I just give advice. I normally don’t look after myself until I corrupt myself or have the gems worry.” Steven said, you sighed.

“Why would you have others worry for you like that?” You asked.

“It’s something I don’t understand myself either, I was overwhelmed by the amount of things said by my mother at first, it was all positive and I wanted to be her, so I genuinely began to help others and then… Years passed and I found out all that was said was a lie sort of, and I began to frantically help people and involuntarily corrupt myself. Which I didn’t even know was possible.” Steven admits.

“Sounds like you and I have different trauma but similar issues. We push ourselves and beat ourselves up. Sometimes we think that it’s not enough and that we need to do more, but… Sometimes what we’re looking for after all comes years later.” you said, looking at Steven.

“What are you saying, (G/n)?” Steven asked.

“I’m saying, the thing I was looking for was you. After Hassie’s death, I looked for something to try and fix me. Something I wanted to help with. Then… I became friends with you. I realized what you were… I was looking for my miracle my angel, Hassie sent me you.” You said, Steven smiled and hugged you as the two of you cuddled. The next morning Pearl found the two of you cuddled on the couch and she covered the both of you with a blanket.

#steven universe #commission #writing commission #steven universe x reader #steven universe x gem! reader #hurt and comfort #fanfiction #writeblr

71 notes · View notes

kalpasio · 2 years

Text

Heart of a Previous Era

You?

A Kalpas x reader fic, chapter 1 below!

Going through the Remembrance vessels was always depressing. Mei felt like she was invading the Flame Chaser’s privacy every time. She had been told on multiple occasions that they didn’t mind, but it was still odd reading what was essentially a person’s diary from fifty thousand years ago and then turning around and asking them about it. Sakura had told her that they wouldn’t have left the knowledge there if they didn’t want successors to know, but when Mei read things like this….

The Herrscher of binding took countless lives, both MOTHs and civilians. None of the Flame Chasers spoke of it fondly. Mei knew Kalpas had nearly died during the attack, and even if he wasn’t close to very many people, there was no way he left the event without losing someone. She had never asked him about it—the man was touchy enough as it is—but one of his memories answered the question for her.

Kalpas’ partner had been one of the first MANTISes sent to the scene of the impact. Before they fully understood the effects of the field. Before they really knew what they were dealing with. The first wave was comprised of several top-tier MOTHs. None of them made it back.

Memories in the vessels didn’t always have images, but this one did. There was a picture of Kalpas and Sakura with his partner sandwiched between the two of them. The two not wearing masks had wide grins, the three had clearly known each other for a while. At the bottom there was a caption mentioning how now all three of them had received the Meta-Morph surgery.

Mei usually spent a few minutes turning the stories over in her head, but this time she just stood staring at the picture. She knew that stranger in the photo.

Her first year at St. Freya had been your last before you graduated. To help new students grow accustomed to the campus, they were paired with upperclassmen; Mei had been paired with you. She was shocked to find that you were also a senior member of World Serpent when she joined.

“Shicksal isn’t getting shit done, and Otto gives me the creeps,” you explained when she first joined. Raven had told Mei that most of the higher-ups in World Serpent had been to the Elysian Realm, with the exception of you. When asked why, Raven shrugged and said Kevin never sent you down, and you never asked.

Now it made sense, you didn’t know Kalpas, or any of the Flame Chasers other than Kevin and Fu Hua in the current era, but they knew you. Given Kalpas’…tendencies towards violence, it seemed like a good idea to avoid dredging up memories associated with you.

That being said.

If Mei had always done what seemed like the best idea, she wouldn’t be where she was today. There was a chance that Kalpas would trust you, even if you didn’t know who he was, and you’d be able to get answers to questions that Kalpas would never give her.

The next time she left the realm, Mei contacted you and asked you to meet her outside. She specified that you shouldn’t tell Kevin and you responded that you’d be there, and that Kevin could suck your dick.

A few weeks later, you were blindly following Mei down a poorly lit hallway. You trusted she wasn’t trying to get you killed, but you kept a tight grip on your weapon anyway. The hallway ended in a set of doors that lead to a brightly lit room, causing you to squint while your eyes adjusted. Mei seemed unbothered in the change, but it was clear she’d been here before.

“Hi~ Mei!” The voice that greeted her sounded almost artificially sweet and you didn’t plan on trusting it any time soon. Mei, however, just rolled her eyes and returned the greeting.

“Elysia. This is my friend,” Mei introduced you and Elysia just smiled.

“Mei~ I know! That’s my friend too!” Now you were confused. You’d never met this woman in your life, you’d remember meeting a…pink elf. Yet she was extremely confident in her claim of knowing you. “Or at least we were friends in a different life.” Your brows came down, now you were more confused.

Subconsciously, your hand drifted towards the greatsword on your back. Without looking, Mei grabbed your wrist and stopped it from moving any further. Elysia giggled at this exchange, and you nearly growled in response. Mei tightened her grip on your wrist so it was nearly painful, causing you to snatch it away and send them both glares.

“I guess you don’t remember me,” Elysia spoke with a finger to her chin, though she hardly seemed surprised. “It’s still good to see you again! You should come meet the others!” Elysia turned with a cheeky grin and lead you further into the realm. There were two people in the room you entered.

The person to your right, you didn’t recognize. A woman with pink hair and what looked like bunny ears leaned against a table. The area she stood in was dark in contrast to the bright area on the other side of the room. It looked similar to one of the strategy rooms in World Serpent, though the technology seemed much more futuristic than what you had, and certainly didn’t match the decor in the lounge across the room..

The other person, you unfortunately recognized. Kevin stood to the left, in a golden-tinted lounge with a long wraparound couch. He was leaning against a bar, glowering as usual, so you chose to ignore him for as long as possible. There was a bookshelf built into the wall above the couch, and a beautiful portrait of a woman hung above that. Soft music played from the record player behind the bar, in complete contrast to the depressing feeling Kevin brought.

“What happened to ‘don’t tell Kevin’?” you turned to Mei who sighed.

“This is not the same Kevin we work with,” she held up a hand to stop you from asking before she finished. “Everyone here is a simulation. Data of people from the previous Era. Their personalities and memories have all been preserved to help the current era combat Honkai.”

Trying to process what you had just been told, you closed your mouth and sent a slightly confused look towards the ground as though it could help. “So…this Kevin doesn’t know who I am?”

“Well…” Mei looked away almost guiltily.

“We don’t know you,” Elysia suddenly spoke up. “But in our era, there was someone who looked, acted and sounded exactly like you.”

“You’ve known me for five minutes,” you frowned at the elf.

“Yes!” she giggled, “but in our era, I knew you for years. We fought side by side and everything about you, down to the smallest mannerism is the same.”

“That’s why you brought me here.” You were speaking to Mei now, though you refused to look at her. If you had laser vision, you’d have burned a hole in the wall by the time she confirmed your suspicion. She wasn’t shy about it, a calm ‘yes’ being her response, but you could hear a hint of guilt slipping through.

“I’m surprised I sent you down here,” Sim-Kevin had walked over while you were mentally deconstructing the wall. In the real world, you and Kevin had never gotten along. He let you join World Serpent because you were a damn good fighter, and he didn’t want you as an enemy. You stayed because he got results, and you were given more free will than you would’ve gotten fighting elsewhere.

“You don’t know I’m here,” you crossed your arms, immediately defensive, even if this Kevin didn’t know you. He said nothing for a moment, that—for a normal person—would have been a sigh.

“Why am I not surprised.”

“Oh, come oooon Kevin. Don’t be such a spoil sport!” Elysia whined. All you could do was stare when she latched on to your arm. “I for one am happy to see our friend again. And I’m sure the others will be too!”

“Kalpas included?”

For the first time since you met her, Elysia was quiet, and you could feel the tension, though that was near constant around Kevin.

“Let’s go,” Mei held your wrist that was free from Elysia’s grip, and you were pulled away towards what looked like a holographic door. To the right of the platform holding the door was a screen that said something about “difficulty,” but you couldn’t read any more before Mei began fiddling with it. You took the chance to consider your options, World Serpent more than owed you a vacation, but this was not at all as relaxing as you had hoped.

Should you bail and go actually take a vacation for once? Grey Serpent would probably find you and give you an earful for “abandoning duties” or whatever. Grey Serpent could kiss your ass. He may outrank you, but your sword has cut clean through his body enough times to earn you some respect.

More annoyingly, Mei would come back asking you for more favors because you ditched this one. Owing Mei was never a good thing, and hardly worth a few days of peace. So long as Kevin stays out of my way, I’ll be fine, you decided just before being pulled out of your thoughts.

Mei was still typing away at the screen, but there was the distinct feeling of a set of eyes on your back. It was hard to hide the apprehension crawling up your back, but you squared your shoulders and spun around the face the unwanted observer. Unsurprisingly, it was the only person in the room you hadn’t met. Her pink ears were low on her head, and she maintained eye contact with you despite the challenging glare you sent. Mei was the one to interrupt your silent battle, pulling you away once again, this time taking you through the odd-looking door.

I hate Kevin with a passion if you couldn't tell (so many people are going to hate me at the end of this story, whoops)

#kalpas x reader #honkai x reader #azaryawrites #tamalethebear #cross posted on ao3 #one day i'll learn how to properly format on tumbr

17 notes · View notes

callivich · 2 years

Note

Hi Calli. Gonna go ahead and give you a question as well because I love reading people’s responses to stuff like this lol.

What would have been your dream Ian x Mickey centered storyline that didn’t happen on the show? Could be a storyline that exists but wasn’t explored as much as you wanted, or something entirely new.

For me personally, I look at S10 a little bitterly because I feel like their storyline in that season could have been amazing if certain things didn’t happen/were expanded on more or tweaked.

Hi Danielle! Thank you so much for asking me a question! 💖

This is a very tough question! My answer is I have 1 million different storylines I wish where written 🙈😂

Leaving aside the fact that Shameless is an ensemble and there are many different characters and storylines to be explored, here’s some I’d loved to have seen if there was time on the show:

Early seasons - it’s clear they had a sort of friendship as well as a sexual relationship, so more of them having fun and getting to know each other.

Anything canon divergent after s3. Either the dreaded episode didn’t happen or they ran away together, or they just talked. (At the same time, I think the aftermath of what we actually saw was painful and difficult and horrible but probably quite realistic to two teenage boys dealing with such a trauma.)

It’s obvious Mickey shouldn’t have been arrested for what happened with Sammi. So anything canon divergent from this point where he and Ian are broken up but then reunite (because, they would) - totally slow burn and not something we’d see on Shameless because there wouldn’t be time but I’d love to see them slowly but surely coming together.

Tbh, in terms of the show which did seem to focus more on Ian and Mickey in s10 and s11, I have to agree that a totally different storyline from s10 onwards would have been amazing. (I mean, essentially the writers were creating a new show - no Fiona, Ian and Mickey back together, Carl and Debbie really growing up etc, it’s a turning point for the show in a way, it kinda changes.)

I think a really interesting storyline, post- prison, would have been to cut Paula and have Larry be the parole officer for both of them. I’d love it if we’d see them working at the same place - trying to adjust to a world outside prison and a world where they’re absolutely openly together outside of their families/the Southside neighbourhood. They’ve gone from a tiny prison cell to the same workplace and things are very different but also very much the same. It would be a nice exploration of them as a couple in workplace and in a post-prison world where they are still finding their identities after lockup. Lots of bickering and humour but some emotional moments too (especially a better proposal!!)

I’d also love to have seen a s11 storyline where they were really planning the business together as well as planning on moving out. I wouldn’t expect them to be entirely on the same page - I would imagine there would be misunderstandings and arguments (but no exceptionally harsh words or violence because I think by this point they might not be great at communicating but I think they would at least try not to do those things)- but ultimately it would have been nice to have a season where they really, truly are trying to build their future together. I get the writers were trying to show them figuring out marriage but it sometimes felt that there past was ignored or that they had regressed as characters or that they were there to be funny despite their past storylines. So, it would have been nice to see them working together as a team, as lovers, husbands, best friends, as they planned or explored their future.

I will stop here because I could go on forever, there’s really so many storylines I’d wish we had seen! Thanks for the great question! 💖💖💖

#calli talks #gallavich #ask #as always with any of my posts please feel to add to things however you like!#but at the same time #these are just my opinions and I’m always open to discussion and new ideas

16 notes · View notes

savage-rhi · 2 years

Text

Immortal Shield Chapter 10: Rakshasa

**DM or comment if you want to be tagged in updates on tumblr

**To read previous chapters, hit this link

Tagging: @seradyn

“How could you not know you had the powers of a healer?” Ardyn’s sighed begrudgingly as he walked alongside Caelan, the two exiting the Scepter and heading to the house where their next job was located. He felt a compulsion to want to grab Caelan by the shoulder and stop her so they could discuss the situation more privately, but he relented.

“Like I told you the last half hour, it just--happened. It’s not like I intended to keep a secret from you.” Caelan said recalling the night Ardyn nearly died. He had been at it for most of the day with her, asking a plethora of questions. Most going over her head.

“I had this presence tell me to keep my hand over your heart and let whatever was happening do the work.”

“And you haven’t heard anything since then?” Ardyn asked. He knew he was coming across as interrogating, but it couldn’t be helped as far as he was concerned.

“Ardyn, if there was anything else I would’ve shared it with you.” Caelan sighed.

“I still don’t understand why you didn’t tell me this the night I woke.” He said bitterly.

“You were hurt, and I was emotionally compromised. I didn’t think we needed another layer of what the hell added onto it.” Caelan was sincere with her words, and it seemed to have taken Ardyn down a peg with the intensity of his questions. He stopped talking soon after. It was only when they arrived in front of the clients residence did Ardyn pipe up.

“Wait,”

Caelan felt one of Ardyn’s hands gently touch her shoulder, stopping her from continuing as he furrowed his brows. She didn’t anticipate the news of what transpired after the Behemoth attack would shake him so much. The concern in his golden eyes seemed to grow with each passing second as he spoke.

“Cahl, if anything peculiar like this happens again, you need to tell me. No matter what circumstances we are dealing with.” Ardyn firmly began. “Persons with healing powers are rare. Aside from Oracles, and the royal bloodline, you shouldn’t have been able to heal me. People who are beyond help, or suffering from disease can’t be saved with magic. Not unless it’s from one of the two I mentioned.”

“Last I checked, no one in my family is connected to Lucis Caelum nor anyone from Lady Aera’s bloodline. Knowing Julian, I wouldn’t have heard the end of it if we had that kind of ancestry.” Caelan said with a huff. She could only imagine how much of an ego boost such information would’ve given her father. Her eyes traveled over Ardyn's features. Though he appeared composed, his eyes gave away what he was truly feeling.

“You’re scared and you’re not telling me why.” Caelan spoke softly as she could see Ardyn processing the fact she rightfully called him out. She watched him rub the back of his neck, adjusting some strands of his long hair before speaking his peace.

“An Astral could be attempting to forge a covenant with you. That’s the only alternative I can think of. The gods should be silenced for many eternities after what I and the king did all those years ago.”

“I don’t think they’re going to descend from the heavens and get you. Otherwise, why didn’t they prevent you from being resurrected? You were powerful enough to stop Bahamut with the ring of the Lucii, and from what you shared this past month, threw one too many screws into their plans. I don’t think any Astrals would want to mess with you again.” Caelan remarked, trying to ease the obvious tension Ardyn was experiencing. Her words didn’t seem to reach him as she watched him sigh.

“Even a god eater fears its prey,” Ardyn said with conviction as he met Caelan’s eyes. His features softened up as he prepared to admit a certain defeat. “Nevertheless, It’s not I that I fear for. In this case, it's you.”

“Red,” Caelan breathed, shaking her head as she rest a hand on his shoulder, nearly mirroring what Ardyn had did before. A few pats and she let him go.

“If gods are after me, they’re at the bottom of my list of things I need to run away from.”

“You don’t know how much suffering I undergone because of them playing a hand in my affairs,” Ardyn said angrily, though he held no malice towards Caelan for what she said. He knew she was right to an extent. Given her history, she had bigger problems than ancient Astrals using humans as puppets for their own entertainment. It didn’t stop the crushing dread from creeping into his psyche, remembering his fall from grace on account of Bahamut seeing him, Somnus and the entire Lucis Caelum bloodline as tainted flowers in a garden.

“You’re 2,000 years old and I need to take it one day at a time. I’m only human as you are too.”

Caelan’s words grew on Ardyn as he realized it was futile to make his case. Especially when it dawned on him that even if the Astrals were attempting to use Caelan for whatever selfish desires they might have, he didn’t have a clue on how to stop that from occurring. Dragging Caelan into his paranoia wouldn’t help the situation.

“I’d hate for you to suffer as I did.” Ardyn finished. He had to get that off his chest at the very least.

“Are you saying you care about me?” Caelan teased, watching as he rolled his eyes.

“What of it?” He muttered begrudgingly, crossing his arms as Caelan smiled.

“I didn’t think you had it in you.” Caelan jabbed, causing Ardyn to make a disgruntled face at her.

“Maybe you’ve rubbed off on me,” Ardyn mused. The memory of Caelan helping him clean his wound before their trip ran across his mind. How careful she had been as if he were made of glass. It was foolish of her given he was slowly regenerating, but he was appreciative. A thought occurred to him as he cleared his throat.

“Why did you bother trying to save my life when I’m just going to rise again?”

Ardyn tilted his head curiously, watching the subtle changes in Caelan's features as she seemed to be having a debate with herself at his question. Then she smiled and shrugged, as if her conclusion was the most obvious answer.

“I’m your shield,” Caelan began. The conviction in her voice had Ardyn taken back for a moment, assuming she was referring to being paid to keep him protected until the rest of her words came forth.

“And that’s what friends do for each other, right?”

“Right.” Ardyn murmured. He couldn’t help but smile at what she said, about to say something else until Caelan was already knocking on the door.

Not long after, an elderly woman greeted them and ushered the two inside once Caelan introduced their made up aliases. She closed the door, making sure to lock it which didn’t go unnoticed be either Caelan or Ardyn. They both looked at each other with uncertainty before following the old woman into her kitchen. The place was rather small. Not much to be accounted for, but it was filled with personal treasures and belongings. Most of the objects were simple, yet held some great importance based on the natural aura the elderly woman gave off.

“You wouldn’t believe how happy I felt when I got your text message you’d be willing to help,” The old woman spoke jovially as she went to the fridge and grabbed a couple cans of Ebony for her guests.

Ardyn’s eyes immediately perked up upon seeing the can. He hadn’t had one of those in years and he could feel his mouth salivate. His reaction didn’t go unnoticed by Caelan as she laughed quietly, focusing on the gal as she handed both Caelan and Ardyn a can.

“Well, we happened to be in the area and could use the money.” Caelan spoke as the old woman gestured for Ardyn and her to take a seat at the table which she promptly did, Ardyn following suit.

“Our car is doing well, but we travel a lot. Upkeep on vehicles is expensive these days.”

Our car? Ardyn could scarcely believe such a statement would fall from Caelan's mouth. He quickly glanced at Caelan from the corner of his eye, opened the can and started drinking. The earthly flavor had him smiling from ear to ear. Though he remembered it well, the experience of trying Ebony again felt like the first time. He had to give Altissa credit, the beverage was one of the few trades they had going well for themselves. Everything else the country had to offer, Ardyn couldn't in good conscience vouch for. He didn’t miss negotiating with their economic teams when he was chancellor of Niflheim.

“I don’t envy you young people,” The woman gave a sympathetic smile, shaking her head as she opened her own beverage and slurped some of the coffee as it pooled to the surface.

“I gave up driving two years ago when my sight started to get worse. Kurt loved driving more than me, so I always got around with him.”

“Your husband?” Caelan asked.

“Yes,” She sighed. “I forgot my manners, Florens is my name.”

Ardyn studied Florens, seeing how time had cast its spell on her flesh. The thick wrinkles that covered her eyes, how her hands looked like they had seen so much in what would be a blink of an eye for him had Ardyn wondering if he truly missed out on having the experience of growing old. The conflict resonated not only in mind but in his gaze. He quickly averted when he sensed Caelan catching on, and decided to nurse from the can of Ebony every once in a while as he adjusted to the residence. He was content with Caelan taking the reigns of the conversation.

“Can you tell us what happened to him, to Kurt?” Caelan gestured for Florens to sit down across from them, which she did so. Caelan saw Floren’s fingers tremble as she sat her can of Ebony down. Brows in a tight knit as she recollected the day Kurt had been taken.

“It’s as I said on the paper, he was taken by Lucian troops. Kurt and I were traveling with Niflheim refugees. We lived near Boral Bay in the Galahd region during the Dark Decade, and were hoping to return to our home here in Duscae. Kurt was a former imperial. Grew up in Niflheim.”

“What part of Niflheim did he hail from?” Ardyn spoke up. Taking both Caelan and Florens by surprise.

Florens smiled his way. “Kurt was raised near the capital, Gralea. Are you also a refugee?”

“You can say that.” Ardyn answered simply, giving a shrug as Florens nodded.

“You have my deepest empathy. Even though the war is over, there’s so many angry people out there.” Florens furrowed her brows taking in a deep breath as she continued with her tale.

“We stopped at a check point in Versperpool to collect rations. The Lucian troops accosted us, him in particular. Even with our travel papers and me being a natural born Insomnian, they decided to hold Kurt for questioning. No rights were read, they didn’t even say he was being arrested. Kurt wanted no trouble, so he had me go on to the rest point. I thought he’d be gone for a few hours and he’d return, but hours turned into days and when I asked the whereabouts of my husband, I was simply told I was crazy. That Kurt never was with me.”

Caelan could feel her blood boil hearing the sorrow in Floren’s voice. She could tell it took much will power on the woman's end to keep herself from falling apart. Her dark blue eyes gave away her feelings, tears threatening to leave them at any second as she took another sip of her Ebony. A crutch to keep her mind at bay.

“You said over the phone you knew where they had taken him, how did you come across that information?” Caelan asked as Florens blinked a few times. Her fingers wiping away at her eyes as she sniffled.

“Some fellow refugees passing in Duscae mentioned rumors that an old Niflheim stronghold in the Leide region had been refurbished as a camp of sorts. Allegedly, a few prisoners escaped and shared horrific tales. The families also lost members. Like Kurt, they were suddenly detained and never seen again. Kurt has been missing for over a year. I’m sure he is gone, but I need closure. I need to know if he ended up in that godawful place.”

“So you don’t know for certain if he’s there or not?” Ardyn asked for clarification to which Florens nodded solemnly.

“I know my advertisement may have been misleading that he’s alive, and for that I apologize.” She began. “I’m desperate. I want answers. I’ve tried so damn hard to find anything, and that’s all I have to show for. I need something. Anything to let me know what’s become of him.”

“Don’t worry, I got this.” Caelan reassured Florens as she reached across the table, her hand covering the elderly woman’s as she smiled towards her. “Even if I don’t find anything, if Lucians are holding a camp like this, it needs to be stopped. I’m confident with my experience, I can scout and report back whatever I find.”

“Cahl, a word.” Ardyn murmured. He then offered a smile towards Florens. “Forgive us, but we must speak alone.”

“Of course. I need to tidy up anyhow. Please take your time.” Florens nodded and smiled back sincerely.

Ardyn and Caelan watched as Florens went down the hallway of her residence, turning to make a left into the living room. As soon as she was out of range, Ardyn rubbed his forehead, taking in a deep breath before his attention fell upon his shield. A slight glare formed as Ardyn let out a worried breath.

“I’m not mishearing things, am I? That you’re planning on going to Leide by yourself to find this so-called camp.”

“You heard correctly,” Caelan said as a matter of fact. “Even if nothing turns up, she needs closure and if we can provide that, its worth it.”

“It’s not that,” Ardyn shook his head. “As much as I believe this is a waste of time, I know there is no stopping you once you’re set on a decision. However, what concerns me is you’re going alone. Without me. I can’t allow it.”

“Ardyn, you’re still recovering from the Behemoth attack. Your bandages need redressing everyday. You're regenerating yes, but it's too slow.” Caelan protested as Ardyn shrugged nonchalantly, as if he couldn’t be bothered by the experience that nearly put him in the grave.

“I can hold my own, Cahl. If worse comes to worse, I can summon the royal arms and eviscerate anyone who gets in the way.”

“Ardyn, we still don’t know the extent to which the royal arms drain your life force. You struggled with conjuring three of the blades when we killed the Behemoth if I recall. Let me handle this, I can easily--”

“What happened to us sticking together? You said so yourself, the Einherjar are after you, along with Accordo and Lucian troops. Even if you dodge them and find this alleged stronghold, what’s to say you won’t be in over your head?”

“Ardyn,” Caelan let out an exasperated groan, shaking her head as she looked over him. Though he was glaring and looked rather stern, she knew it was a façade. His amber eyes gave away that he was scared for her when the words weren’t strong enough to leave him.

“I’m only going to scout. Maybe get photo evidence so I can anonymously tip authorities. I’m not going to do anything stupid. You have my word. The only old Niflheim stronghold I’m aware of in Leide is near Keycatrich. At most I’ll be gone for a few days and back before the end of the week. This isn’t my first rodeo performing espionage. Besides, resting here in an actual bed will be good for you. I already have the arrangements made with Florens, we texted about you staying here. Maybe you’ll heal faster if you’re not out in the woods like we’ve been for the last month and how many days. With all respect and honor, I don’t want to watch you nearly die again. Not after what went down. Please, just stay here and rest. I can make it up to you when I come back.”

Ardyn once more rubbed his forehead. There were many counter arguments he could make, so many insults he could throw to get Caelan to think twice before going through with her plans, but Ardyn knew from experience making Caelan hit her breaking point would result in her stubbornly going through with the thing he was against. A memory from when they last argued weeks ago came to his mind, and how it didn’t work in his favor. Reluctantly, Ardyn nodded and watched as Caelan left to go talk about the plan with Florens. He sighed through his nostrils, downing the rest of the can of Ebony. The taste he thoroughly enjoyed seemed to no longer be present.

A few hours rolled by while Caelan and Florens discussed what was to come. They settled outside on the patio, talking about the risks and pay. Ardyn only joined the conversation after he had a period of time to cool off. He still didn’t like how risky the move was, yet he already thought of a way to meet in the middle with Caelan so they would both have peace of mind.

At some point, Florens got up from the outside patio and went back into the house to get Caelan a camera. While doing so, Ardyn cleared his throat.

“My offer still stands that I go with you.” Ardyn attempted a final time, and like he assumed, was met with Caelan shaking her head at him.

“I’m afraid I can’t accept that.”

“You’re as stubborn as they come. No wonder you’re built for the life of a shield.” Ardyn muttered, causing Caelan to snort. He briefly smiled at that and let out a breath. Standing up, he gestured for Caelan to approach. He could see the hesitation that fell upon her features as she stood in front of him, her eyes glancing down as he held out his hands, palms up. A flash of light had Caelan jump as the Rakshasa blade conjured into reality. Ardyn chuckled at the reaction as he presented the dark crimson sword to her.

“Take the Rakshasa with you.” Ardyn gave a nod towards Caelan, beckoning her to pick the weapon up from his hands.

Caelan was beyond surprised. Recalling some time ago how Ardyn shared the history of this weapon with her. How he and his brother Somnus were gifted with sibling blades forged from the same material, in the hopes that they would rule the Lucian kingdom together. How their parents spent every fortune they had to make certain these weapons would hold up to the will of the Astrals, and guarantee their sons would be protected. The aura the blade held was strong. Caelan could imagine that merely touching such a weapon would bestow knowledge she wasn’t sure she should be lurking into.

“Ardyn, I can’t take this from you.” Caelan protested, shaking her head as he let out a laugh.

“You’re not taking it from me if I’m giving it to you,” Ardyn began only for Caelan to interject.

“Yeah, but don’t you need protection just in case someone attacks you?”

“I have the royal arms if worse comes to worse. You’ve done a swell job knocking me down several pegs regarding what happened with the Behemoth. Allow me to return the courtesy, you’ll fair much better with this blade at your side than that damned spear of yours. Go on, try it for yourself.”

Caelan had held many powerful weapons in her time, but nothing could compare to this. Goosebumps traveled down her arm as she cautiously took the blade by its hilt, examining the fine details towards it’s base before Ardyn backed up and allowed her to swing it out to test it’s balance. There was a heaviness the weapon had that she wasn’t accustomed to, nevertheless when the blade struck down, it held a strength that would work with the way she attacked. Though Caelan felt a bit more at ease, she was still quite uncomfortable with what Ardyn had in mind.

“I thought the Raksasha didn’t serve anyone but its master,” Caelan mused although this was a final attempt to get Ardyn to relinquish his offer. She still felt uncertain about taking something so powerful that held ancient history with her. Caelan doubted she could break it, but the intrusive thought made itself known regardless.

“And as it’s master, you’re allowed to carry it. If I didn’t will it so, the blade would be back in my possession as we speak.” Ardyn said as a matter of fact, giving a faint smirk before he decided to explain himself further for why he was doing this.

“This will give me peace of mind while you travel to Leide. If anything happens to you, I’ll know. The blade is as much a part of myself as I am of it. And should anything happen to me here, you’ll definitely know because it will leave you to be at my side. Don’t get any bright ideas to pull off a risky stunt, I’d encourage you not. You have been trained in sword fighting, yes?”

“Of course,” Caelan scoffed. Feeling a confidence take over as she playfully gestured at the tip of the Raksasha. “Pointy end goes into the other guy, right? Simple.”

“Your sarcasm is unbecoming.” Ardyn sighed, nevertheless he laughed at her playful demeanor.

“You’re one to talk considering you don’t ever stop trying to push my buttons.” Caelan shrugged, then tossed the blade into the air to see what would happen. The Raksasha disappeared, and when Caelan reached her hand out, it reappeared. Furrowing her brows she shook her head in disbelief.

“What’s wrong, are you having second thoughts?” Ardyn spoke gently as he could see whatever resolve Caelan had begun to falter.

“No,” Caelan murmured. Her eyes couldn’t help but linger on Ardyn’s chest, seeing there was some fresh blood seeping through the bandages and his dress shirt. Her grip on the handle of the blade shook, yet again wondering if it was right to leave him a sitting duck without Rakshasa. Ardyn seemed to read her thoughts as she felt his right hand upon her shoulder, causing her to meet his gaze.

“I’ll be fine,” He reassured. “And I’ll be waiting for your return. I have no doubts you’ll be alright now.”

“You’re sure being sentimental. That or you’ve lost so much blood you’re losing your mind.” Caelan teased as Ardyn shook his head albeit playfully.

“I can’t lose a mind if it’s already been lost before,” Ardyn let go of her. “and I do care about your safety. Though you’re a pest at worst. While you’re gone, is there anything I should focus my energy towards?”

Caelan smiled, then her mind traveled to the supplies they currently had on hand. Though she didn’t feel quite comfortable with Ardyn going out on his own for shopping, she knew they needed to stock up on things. She wouldn't have time to do it herself.

“We’re going to need more food, nonperishables since we ate the last of the stock. And the Scepter is going to need an oil change, but I need a certain brand. It’s on the expensive side--”

“Money isn’t anything you need to worry about. I have that covered.” Ardyn said as Caelan rubbed the back of her head shyly. The Rakshasa blade disappearing for now until she would need to call upon it.

“I appreciate that, but I’ll pay you back when I return. Just keep out of trouble. Rest up, and--” Caelan made a face, looking over Ardyn’s features as he had a look of confusion cross him.

“You ever thought about cutting your hair?” Caelan jibed.

“No,” Ardyn said firmly. “I like my hair long.”

“I’m not saying hack it all off, but maybe tame it some?”

“Why do you care about my looks all of a sudden?”

“You have notoriety. Don’t want people questioning that you might be Ardyn Lucis Caelum while I can’t defend you.” Caelan said in her defense as Ardyn huffed.

“And here I thought you were worried I may attract private company you wouldn’t approve of while you’re gone. ” Ardyn snickered at Caelan’s expense, taking notice how her face turned red as she lowkey gave him the bird.

“At the very least grow out some facial hair or--nevermind.”

“You get riled up so easily.”

“You bring out the worst in people.” Caelan muttered. “Especially me cause you’re such a--”

“Cahl,”

Caelan didn’t expect Ardyn to walk up and embrace her. Much like how he froze the night she had hugged him when he woke up, she too felt petrified to a degree. Whatever comeback she had in mind to his antics had long left her. There was a tightness in Ardyn’s grasp that seemed to convey more than what he had the courage to tell aloud, and after the initial shock, Caelan returned the hug. Her arms enveloping around his waist as they stood still for a time. Each feeling the weight of the other.

“Be safe,” Ardyn sighed his head pulling back so he could look upon her. “And come back.”

Caelan offered a shrug, nodding as she grinned. “I got this in the bag. Don’t worry.”

“I’m sure you do.” Ardyn murmured.

Neither of them wanted to let go of the other. Both feeling the pull of the lingering fear this may as well be the last time they were in each others company. Not until they could hear Floren’s footsteps coming their way, did they retreat back into their respective worlds.

Caelan was missing every second of it.

#ardyn #ardyn izunia #ardyn lucis caelum #fanfic #fanfiction #story #original characters #takes place after dawn of the future cause to me that shits canon #needed some happy

6 notes · View notes

dollythesheepp · 2 years

Text

Endless Forms Most Beautiful, chapter 4.

You can read it on AO3 here: https://archiveofourown.org/works/39467289/chapters/101197869

Janis adjusts herself on the uncomfortable seat. She crosses her leg, unable to stop her feet from bouncing. Seated next to her, Heather glances at Janis for a split second, with an inquisitive and perhaps a little annoyed, expression on her face, but doesn't utter a word.

Both women sit in awkward silence for what feels like forever. While Heather reads -or pretends to read- a fashion magazine, Janis stares blankly at the painting that hangs on the wall in front of them. It's pretty, some of the shadows are in the wrong place and there are way too many flowers but at least it gives a colorful touch to the otherwise dull waiting room.

Janis bites her lips; the awful taste of lavender soap and vomit still lingering in her mouth. She opens and closes her mouth a few times, unsure if she should say something or stay silent, she doesn't know which one will make things worse. Chandler flips another page of the magazine.

"I panicked, what do you want me to say?" Janis decides to put an end to the excruciating silence.

"Pretty much anything other than I panicked," is Heather's harsh response.

Janis exhales through her nose. Heather puts down the magazine with a sigh and looks at Janis.

"Don't be such a pillowcase, you know I'm kidding," she says, clicking her tongue. "Where's your wit gone? You haven't called me a mega bitch all day."

"I don't need a babysitter, you mega bitch," Janis says. She has a tiny box inside her brain where keeps all of the information she's learned about Detective Veronica Sawyer over these days and it keeps getting fuller; she puts called Heather a mega bitch inside of it.

"I know. But if I don't look after you who else will?" says the mega bitch, nudging Janis gently with her elbow.

After the puke incident, Janis was prepared to deal with Chandler's rage. She met the woman today but based on their first interaction -when Heather got out of her car yelling at Janis in the middle of the street- Heather didn't seem like a very pleasant person. So Janis was surprised when, after she left the board room, Heather rubbed her arm gently and said she was going to drive her to her psychiatric appointment so she wouldn't be alone.

"You have to forgive yourself," Heather continues to speak, her voice so soft Janis can barely hear. "Shootings happen to whoever is there with a gun in their hand."

Janis replies with a nod, not able to find the words for a proper response. Heather gets back to her magazine and the silence, aside from the receptionist constantly typing things on the computer, reigns once more.

Janis takes in a breath, her feet still shaking anxiously. She wishes she was wearing a coat to wrap it around herself tightly, she always feels calmer when she does that. In a few minutes, the receptionist will call her name -well, Veronica's name- and Janis will have to spend an hour talking to a psychiatrist about things that she doesn't know, questions that she doesn't have an answer to. Veronica did. But Veronica is kind of busy lying in a morgue right now.

"Dr. Bowers will see you now!" the perky receptionist announces and Janis gets up.

***

The appointment goes as bad as Janis expected. Under the stern gaze of Dr. Bowers, Janis gives vague answers to the older woman, refusing to comment on topics she doesn't know anything about, with the excuse that she is not comfortable discussing it; she does that when Bowers asks about Jason, and then again when she mentions Veronica's parents.

On the bright side, Janis learns a lot of new information about Sawyer and the shooting that she was involved in. According to Dr. Bowers, Dawn Schweitzer was a single, 44-year-old woman, and she was holding a cellphone in her hand the night she was killed, which Veronica mistook for a gun. The whole thing lead to Sawyer getting suspended.

After the appointment, Heather Chandler drives Janis to Veronica's house, and to Janis' relief, she doesn't ask any questions during the whole car ride.

"Do you think your twin killed that poor woman because she was hopped up on all of those pills that we found?" Damian asks Janis. After making sure Chandler was gone, Janis called her younger brother and asked him to meet her at Veronica's place.

"I don't know," Janis says. "I'm not even sure if her partner knows the whole story, I feel like she was hiding something."

"With 75k on a new bank account? She's sure dodgy."

Damian saunters around the living room as he surveys the place with childlike curiosity -oh, he is 100% judging the decoration- occasionally picking up a random object to look at it closely. Janis sits on the couch, the blue-cased cellphone in her hand as she reads the new messages that were sent during her appointment.

Unknown number: What's going on?

Unknown number: I'm back at the hotel.

Unknown number: Can we meet later, please?

"Whatever she was hiding drove her fucking nuts," Janis mutters, turning off the cellphone screen and putting the device away from her. With every text message, Janis grows more and more uneasy. She feels bad for whoever is texting Veronica, they're clearly desperate and the person who was supposed to help them is dead and they don't even know. But Janis puts those thoughts aside as she tells herself they're none of her business, she can't help whoever is hiding behind the unknown number, she's only going to be Veronica for another day.

"Yeah," says Damian. "Now, can we please get the elephant out of the room?"

"What do you mean?" Janis asks.

"Look at her!" he says exasperatedly, practically shoving a framed picture of Veronica on Janis' face. "There's no way you two aren't related. This could be your story"

"It's not."

"Every foster kid dreams of their lost family," he says, mocking her. "Deep down we all hope we're special."

"The last thing I am is special."

Janis looks at the picture still in Damian's hand. Veronica and Jason stare back at her; Veronica smiles brightly with a slushie in her hand, her lips are tinted a bright red color thanks to the drink; Jason has his arm wrapped around her shoulder and a crooked smile on his face. The resemblance between Janis and Veronica is actually kind of creepy now that she thinks about it. They're not just similar, they are identical.

"If this was my boyfriend I'd jump in front of a train too," she says to her brother, tapping Jason's face with her index finger. "He looks like a dick."

"What are you talking about? He's hot," Damian looks at her like she's grown another head," And even if he's a dick, I bet he's better than your psycho girlfriend."

"Ugh, don't remind me." Just thinking about Caitlyn is enough to give Janis a headache.

Their relationship has always been a mess. Well, they have always been a mess. Two colliding trainwrecks, destroying everything including each other. They met when they were 19, two young women angry at the world and everyone else in it. Then, when Janis was 20 she left her house after a fight with her foster mom, Sharon Norbury, with nothing but her suitcase in hand and moved to Caitlyn's place. They have been on and off ever since, the disagreements and jealousy fits getting more frequent and aggressive as the years go by. Now, at 27, Janis doesn't think she's ever loved Caitlyn. Maybe she was in love with the idea of her, just a way to rebel against her mom. Not even because Caitlyn is a woman, more so because she's a drug dealer who has been arrested several times. So now Janis wants out, she's fucking done. But for some reason, Caitlyn doesn't seem to get the memo.

"She stormed into my house looking for you again," Damian tells her, by the tone of his voice is evident he's just as tired of Caitylin as Janis is. "I showed her the death certificate and now she wants a funeral."

"You can't have a funeral," Janis tells him. "The whole point of this is that no one would care if I died."

"I would," Damian says batting his lashes at her, mockingly. Janis pushes his face away from her with her hands, rolling her eyes in a playful gesture. Damian laughs.

"What is this?" Damian takes notice of the yellow envelope peeking out of Janis' purse. Quicker than Janis can react, he grabs the envelope and opens it, skimming through the papers that were inside of it. "Veronica Sawyer, Denise Sadler, Edith Becker..."

"They're birth certificates," Janis answers.

"Yeah, I can see that now," Damian says. His eyes move repetitively from one piece of paper to another. "Did you notice that their birthdays are all within a month of yours?"

Janis frowns. She hadn't noticed that. She gets up from the couch and takes the papers out of Damian's hand and sees that he's right, the birth certificates are all from the same year and less than a month apart. "I don't care, It's just a coincidence," she says.

***

After Damian leaves, Janis decides to take a cold shower to wash off the long day.

She walks out of the bathroom with her hair wet, dripping water onto her comfy shirt; it's a worn-out t-shirt full of paint stains, Damian likes to tease her by saying it belongs in the trash but Janis doesn't have the courage to throw it away because she loves wearing it to sleep. She walks down the stairs for a glass of water just in time to hear the sound of keys jingling on the other side of the living room door. Janis' eyes widen in panic as she stands in the kitchen with no idea of what to do. The door opens swiftly and Jason Dean walks into the house with a suitcase in hand. He spots Janis in the kitchen right away and smiles.

"Hi," he says approaching her, a pearly white smile still on his face. He wraps his arms around Janis with a tight hug and then kisses her quickly on the lips.

Ew, ew, ew, ew she shivers mentally.

"Hi, Jason" Janis manages to wave off her panic and say.

Jason casts a look at her shirt with a weird expression on his face. "What are you wearing?"

"Just an old shirt I found," Janis says, waving him off. "Hm, what are you doing here? Weren't you coming back on the weekend?" she tries to sound nonchalant.

Jason takes off his coat and puts it on the coat hanger. "I wanted to be here for you," he says. He looks at her expectantly, his hazel eyes gleaming. "So, how was it?"

Janis blinks. "How was what?"

"How was the hearing?" he says as if the answer is obvious. Well, it kind of is but in Janis' defense it's been a very exhausting day.

"Oh!" she exclaims. "I couldn't do it. I got sick to my stomach and pretty much puked on them." she chuckles nervously.

"Seriously?" Jason seems disappointed.

"Yeah," she shrugs. "It's fine, Jason, don't worry."

"Why do you keep calling me Jason?" he questions. "You only do that when you're mad or something."

Janis thinks about the note still glued to the fridge. See you Saturday, Ronnie —JD.

"Right, JD," she says. "Sorry, I'm just tired."

"What's going on, Vee?" he asks in a husky voice. Jesus, Janis feels like she's being interrogated.

"A lot," Janis says. She swallows, trying to force down the wad of anxiety against her throat.

JD moves closer to her; with every step forward, Janis takes another step back. He scrutinizes her face closely and for a frightening second Janis thinks he is going to see right through her. He'll catch her red-handed and Janis will end up in jail. Dammit, she's so close to getting the money.

"Did you do something to your hair?" he asks, narrowing his eyes into a glare.

"I got it cut," she says. JD furrows his eyebrows.

"Really? It looks longer."

Janis scrambles to hammer out a response. "It's just wet."

"Are you-"

Eager to get out of the conversation before she says something that will ruin her whole plan, Janis doesn't let him finish.

"Listen, I'm going to bed, ok? I'm exhausted," she says, and reluctantly gives JD a peck on the lips. She walks away, feeling JD's eyes boring into the back of her hair. "Goodnight."

The next morning, she wakes up early to go to the bank. She gets out of bed quietly to not wake JD up, then gets dressed. She almost succeeds in avoiding him altogether but he wakes up when she's about to leave the house.

"Where are you going so early?" he asks.

"The gym."

"Good morning," he says, hugging her from behind and kissing her neck. Janis' body stiffens but she remembers Damian saying that if you want to be a good actor you have to learn how to stay in character so she hides her discomfort with a smile. "Do you want to tell me what happened at the hearing?"

"I choked," she says. "They'll reconvene in a couple of days."

At least they think they will. But Janis will be gone as soon as she gets her hands on the cash; she figures it will be hard to get the statement if Veronica —even if it's the fake one— doesn't show up.

"Are you back on your meds?" JD inquires. His voice cold, he sounds like a parent discovering their kids got a bad grade.

"N-no," Janis says, she hopes that's the right answer. Based on JD's relieved expression, she assumes it is.

"Then you didn't choke," he says with a kind smile, cupping the left side of her face with his hand. "You're finally starting to feel something. You're feeling like yourself again."

"I have to go, JD," Janis says, taking his hand away from her face. "Hey, can I borrow the keys to your car?"

"Why don't you use your own car?" he knits his brows. Janis knows Veronica knew how to drive because she saw her driver's license but she had no idea if Veronica had a car or not until now.

"I can't find my keys," she says.

"Did you check the thing where they always are?"

"Yeah, I checked the thing where they always are."

JD throws her a skeptical look, walks over to the sideboard near the door, and opens a little box on top of it, taking out the car key.

"Thanks," Janis says, grabbing the key from his hand and leaving the house before he can reach out for another kiss.

***

Janis can't contain the smile on her face after she leaves the bank. She did it. She got the money, her and her brother's ticket to a better life, and now she can drop all of this. No more Caitlyn, no more selling coke to try to pay rent as she fails to make a living out of her art, and no more pretending to be a dead woman.

She's so happy that she doesn't even notice a black Porsche following her.

She parks the car in front of Damian's apartment —well, if you can call an old art studio on top of a sketchy steam bath place an apartment— and gets in, leaving the bag with the money in the car. She calls his name but doesn't receive an answer so she opens the door with the key he gave her.

She scans the studio —which doesn't take long, the place isn't big— but there's no sign of Damian. But since she's here, she might as well steal some of his food. She heads towards the kitchen for a candy bar, and that's when she notices the flyers laying on the kitchen counter. She takes one and reads it.

"Damian, you little shit," she whispers incredulously as she stares at the tacky funeral invitation.

***

"Funny, I vividly remember telling you I didn't want a funeral," Janis says when Damian picks up the phone.

"You can't do much about that when you're dead, can you?" Damian teases. Janis watches as he moves away from the other people so they cant hear their conversation.

"Wow, you're wearing your nice suit for me, I feel honored," she says to him. From afar, she sees Damian looking around, confused.

"How do you know that?"

"I'm watching you," she explains, trying not to sound creepy.

The address written on the invite had taken Janis to the old lake where Ms. Norbury used to take her and Damian when they were younger. The place is deserted, it's been like this since Janis can remember, nothing but grass, a few old trees, and the lake, which is more trash than water.

Janis stands near a tree —Veronica's fancy car parked far away so it doesn't draw too much attention—and observes the people on the other side of the lake. She watches the shit show unfold with amusement. Damian, Caitlyn, and some of Janis' friends —she's not sure she can call them that, most of them didn't like her and the feeling is mutual— are gathered around a fire; in her arms Caitlyn holds an urn, clutching it like her life depends on it.

"Jesus, is Sherry crying?" Janis snickers.

"Yes, it's hilarious," Damian says laughing. "She thinks Caitlyn pushed you in front of the train."

"They're all pathetic," she can't stop her eyes from rolling. "I got the money, by the way."

"I can't believe you pulled that off."

"I know. I'm gonna let you be the thespian in the family, ok? This acting thing is not for me."

"Good. Hey, I have to go, Caitlyn is complaining because I'm making too much noise during her speech."

"Bye, have fun at my funeral," she says and hangs up the phone.

Janis walks back to the car. She plops on the leather seat with a sigh. Janis figures she has some time to kill, she wants to wait for Damian so they can start planning what to do with the money together but he will be busy fake mourning her death for a least a couple of hours.

Before Janis can start the car, the passenger's door opens with a swift movement and someone gets in. From the rearview mirror, Janis catches a glance of the person and the shock sucks the breath from her mouth.

"Veronica, why didn't you answer my texts?" says the unknown woman. Suddenly, Janis feels like she's at the train station again, looking at her herself in the form of Veronica Sawyer as she jumps to her death. The same feeling of panic rushes over her as she stares at another woman with a face exactly like hers.

Janis gets out of the car. Her entire body shakes and she fails to take a deep breath as panic overtakes her. She must be loosing her mind.

"Veronica!" the woman follows her.

"Stay away from me!" Janis yells.

"It's me, Edith. What happened? I got the briefcase," Edith Becker says. "I was careful just like you told me to, I-" Edith stops mid-sentence to cough. Her body heaves as she covers her mouth with a handkerchief and continues to wheeze aggressively. When she's done, Janis notices the blood staining the previously white piece of fabric.

"It's getting worse," she says, her voice hoarse, agony written all over her face. "I need to see your scientist friend."

"Sorry, I can't help you," Janis tells her. She gets inside the car again, in an attempt to get away from her. But that doesn't work, because Edith follows her.

"Your partner was following you, did you notice that?" Edith says when she enters the car.

"Heather?" Janis asks and Edith nods yes with her head. "I don't care, just get out, please!"

"You can't walk away from this," Edith says. "You're a cop, we need you."

"Get out!" Janis yells. The blue phone starts ringing, the annoying sound echoing through the vehicle, but Janis ignores it. She has bigger things to worry about.

"Why are you acting like this all of a sudden? You were the one who wanted to meet me," Edith hisses. Then, something in her changes. Her exasperated expression disappears and she squints her eyes, serious. Like she's suspecting something. "Just one. I'm a few. No family too. Who am I?" she says, her voice just above a whisper.

The seconds that takes for Janis to form a response are enough for Edith to perceive the truth.

"You're not Veronica," Edith says.

That's when a bullet passes through the windshield, broken glass flying everywhere like sharp droplets of rain, and lands on Lizzie's forehead. Her dead body collapses on the passenger's seat with a heavy thud.

"Holy shit!" Janis screams. She is forced to duck her head as other bullets ricochet, breaking what was left of the windshield. Janis grabs the steering wheel and starts to drive without looking at where she's going, the car tires screeching behind her. The blue phone starts ringing again. Janis takes in a shaky breath, grabs it with trembling hands and places it against her ear.

"Hello?" she says to the unkown person on the other line.

#janis sarkisian #Veronica Sawyer #heather duke #Heather Chandler #heather mcnamara #heathers #heathers the musical #cady heron #cady x janis #cadnis #chansaw #jason dean #Mean Girls the musical #mean girls on broadway #gretchen wieners #karen smith #Regina George #damian hubbard

4 notes · View notes