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alwaysspeakshermind · 1 year

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When do you think Katniss and Peeta developing real romantic feeling toward each other?

Thank you 😊

@everlarkshipper

Well!

(gif originally saved from tenor, not mine)

In my personal opinion, I think Peeta begins falling for Katniss pretty much exactly when he says he does in the cave (aka, the first day of school when she sang, aka, "from that moment on, I was a goner"). He's not afraid of feelings/doesn't think of them as a weakness the way Katniss is/does, and while they don't officially meet until the day of the Reaping, they're not quite total strangers, either. It's sort of a running joke about small towns that "everybody knows everybody," so even when you aren't close to someone, you still kind of know things about them because you simply can't avoid crossing paths throughout your life.

[For instance: when I was in college, there was this one semester where I'd pass this same guy on my way to class every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday for three+ months. To this day, I don't know his name, I don't know his major, I don't know whether he was coming from a dorm or a class or the library, but I know he had to catch the 11:55 bus, that he liked vanilla protein drinks more than chocolate protein drinks, that he would rather trip over someone than elbow his way past them, that he really liked wearing gray, and that he could jump a bike rack if he wanted to, because I observed all those pieces of information just casually walking past him for that short amount of time even though I had no interest in him. Peeta, by comparison, was interested in Katniss from the get-go and saw her at least five days a week for about a decade, so I think it's safe to assume a lot of the knowledge he surprises her by airing during their discussion with Haymitch (the hunting skills, the good aim, etc.) are things he's picked up on because he's (as he says) "paying attention." ]

Because his dad points Katniss out and tells a story about her mother (and her father, and the baker, which in and of itself is kind of interesting as it can sort of be taken as foreshadowing since it involves two kids from one side of town who grow up together but don't end up together because one of the kids falls in love with a person from the opposite side of town which, ya know, sounds a little G/K/P but I digress), Peeta notices her. But that first notice isn't The Moment™ for him; instead, it's her volunteering (!!!) to get up in front of the class and sing the Valley song that does him in.

And to be honest, while I do understand where people who discount that first day of school thing because "they were just kids" are coming from, I personally think it has to be counted because, as Peeta himself points out, he "noticed just about every girl," but the only one who makes "a lasting impression" is Katniss meaning, in essence, that he sort of tested/examined his feelings for Katniss and realized way before the Games that they were, in fact, strong enough to make him want to try and keep her alive at his own expense in the arena. For him, the romantic feelings are already in place by the time we the readers meet him, and finally getting to know her only strengthens how he feels because a lot of the things he most admires about her (her strength, her bravery, her skill, her stubbornness, her love for her sister, etc.) are all on full display. (Also: he thinks she's funny even if no one else does, and like he tells her in Catching Fire when she's mad at him for laughing after the Johanna-Elevator incident, he basically loves the fact that she's intimidating on the outside and awkward as anything [aka, "pure"] on the inside.)

To me, it's kind of significant that for Peeta, it's emphasized at the end of THG how he's "already there" when it comes to being in love, and that he "[wants] it to be real" in CF when they're parading their fake but-maybe-not-so-fake relationship around, and I firmly believe that the main reason his MJ storyline hurts so much beyond the usual watching-a-favorite-character-be-damaged-by-the-narrative is because his inability to tell the difference between what's real and what isn't is such a perversion of his previously rock-solid love for Katniss. Up until that moment in the series, we the readers and Katniss, and basically all the rest of Panem know that Peeta's feelings for her are real; after what the Capitol does to him, his biggest point of confusion centers on what he feels for Katniss, but even when he doubts what he's seeing/hearing/thinking/feeling, reason still tells him that you don't start off risking a beating for burning bread and go back into a government-sponsored death match for someone you don't love a whole lot.

In Katniss' case I think it's more difficult to pinpoint one exact moment of origin, because she doesn't like to deal with feelings to begin with and is also too practical to take time to sit down and sort out how she feels when there are so many other things to do (and also, a lot of what causes her to fall for Peeta are the smaller, everyday parts of his personality rather than any single grand gesture or one particular moment they share together).

That being said, Katniss is one of the closest approximations to myself that I've ever come across in fiction in terms of how we think/operate, so I personally see a lot of giveaways regarding how/what she thinks of Peeta and how that shifts over time. And to me, the closest thing to an official Romantic Feels Are Sparking moment is the moment in the cave when she starts to wonder if he's a really, really, really good actor, or if what he's telling her is maybe based in truth.

One of the things I've noticed over time during HG discussions is that a lot of people seem to either not fully understand or to gloss over Katniss' practicality, which is a huge part of who she is and how she makes her decisions (including romantic ones). Like she says herself several times throughout the series, Katniss is focused predominantly on survival for most of her life. That's it. She doesn't go for things like music, ribbons, pets, etc., because they're not useful, and to her, romantic relationships also fall in that category because they carry an inherent risk with them in a world where children born outside the wealthy Capitol are in danger of starving to death or getting sent to the Games, and loving and losing someone has the potential to make you fall apart. Due to everything she's gone through in life (losing her father, being essentially forced to take his place, etc.) , she's become self-sufficient and distrustful, and also extremely good at compartmentalizing her feelings (with the sometimes exception of anger). From the second she volunteers for Prim, her focus is on how to maximize her chances of survival; while she knows her odds aren't good, she's too much of a fighter to go down without swinging, and when she sees ways in which she can improve her chances, she goes after them to the best of her ability.

Enter: Peeta, the boy she feels indebted to but has never interacted with even once, who she is now competing with for survival.

Also enter: complicated feelings Katniss very much does not want to deal with because they are a distraction from her current goal of survival.

While it's definitely tempting to make headcanons about how Katniss also maybe had feelings for Peeta prior to the Games because she "[keeps] track of the boy with the bread," I think the important takeaway is: no romantic feelings exist on Katniss' side, but the potential for feelings might...it's just complicated by the Games, because Katniss is so focused on staying alive that she's constantly on guard and keeps misinterpreting his actions as some sneaky, crafty plan when he's actually just being kind. So, even when he catches her off guard and makes her laugh/she finds herself not totally hating hanging out with him, she has to immediately nip all that in the bud because she knows that her survival will ultimately come at the cost of his death, and it's an ugly reality that's much easier to face if she doesn't like him, or at least doesn't know him, than it will be if they become friends and she has to kill him/watch him die/mourn his loss (basically, the whole insidiousness principle of the Games: it forces you into dehumanizing your competitors to save yourself, which will ultimately take a horrible toll on you no matter what).

Although Katniss is inclined to like him, she is also massively confused by him because he keeps behaving in ways that are contradictory to all sense and reason ("He's very hard to predict, which might be interesting under different circumstances, but at the moment only provides another obstacle"), so she's constantly sifting through information until basically, only three explanations for what he's doing remain:

He's trying to survive and jumping at anything that will heighten his chance of that no matter how ruthless (aka pretending to be nice so he can eliminate her later, joining the careers, etc.)

He's genuinely kind but also genuinely trying to survive and is just acting for sponsors

He's telling the truth and really does like her

The trouble is, if you run all those reasons through the logic filter, the answer that seems the most likely is #2, because in Katniss' mind, it doesn't make sense that he'd help her as much as he does if he were just trying to kill her, but it also doesn't make sense that he'd do everything he does because he loves her since she doesn't even understand why anyone outside of her mother and sister would like her. So in essence, every time Peeta sort of tips his hand about how he really feels, Katniss notices it, but is able to find a logical explanation for it/dismiss it as strategy until that one moment in the cave when she realizes he's telling her some things that have a basis in reality, which would imply that everything he's been saying about liking her but her not knowing he was alive is true. And that time when they kiss, she feels something that A) gets the blood pumping in her cut enough to make Peeta stop it all, and B) sticks in her mind enough that she mentions it again in connection with the beach kiss(es) in CF.

Anyways. This is super-duper wordy, so for purposes of succinctness, I have also provided a quick photo summary of my arguments regarding when Katniss first began having real romantic feelings toward Peeta:

Everything is then (of course) further complicated by Snow and the Capitol, plus Peeta learning that Katniss was under the impression that the Star-Crossed Lovers story was a survival strategy, but the important thing to remember in my opinion is that Katniss explicitly states at both the end of THG and the beginning of CF that she is not sure how much of what she does in the 74th Games is an act, because those little moments in the cave feel real (coughcough), while most of the rest can be written off as planned pageantry.

Thanks for the ask, and sorry for the longwinded response! 😘

#ask: thg #ask: answered #thg meta #everlark #my opinion #user: everlarkshipper

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vivitheanimaxen · 8 months

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:OOOOO kimi.. i have no idea what this means but that name bops i lov..

can i ask about zits- no uhh zis? siz? well may i ask what they are like? are they besties.. coworkers.. perhaps even already a found family who knows..? (the answer is you know ofc hehe)

also also!! does tango run across any issues while staying with zits, after the initial kerfuffle?

Skizz and Impulse have been besties since highschool, practically brothers sorta friendship. Skizz one day while they were in college on a whim decided to help out with a rescue when they were at the beach together and Impulse sorta tagged along. That's how they got involved with animal rescue and they just sorta stayed with the rescue, ending up with jobs there when they were older. Impulse has a job as a handyman and IT who works with a lot of the electronic systems, and Skizz works as a more general handyman and repairs guy, and also takes on other jobs in the off season when he's not needed at the rescue.

The rescue has a marine park attached to it, where they keep the unreleasable animals and have breeding programs for endangered species and they charge the public for entry along with taking donations. dont ask how this actually works cause i dont know that much about that sorta thing :D

Zedaph is a marine biologist/vet they met at the rescue while the three were still in college, and Zed just clicked with them. It always sorta felt like something, or someone, was missing from their group, but they get along like a house on fire and work really well together, so the missing feeling totally doesn't matter. They helped each other get through college, and are housemates. The house has it's own little private cove beach and Impulse is the one who owns it, but the other two pay 'rent' (aka they split the bills)

Other than the general boredom associated with being stuck in essentially a hospital for a long time while the other three make sure Tango is healing right, there aren't much of any big problems. There's lots of miscommunication as Tango is struggling to learn to communicate, and a lot of homesickness for the ocean and his pod. Tango doesn't tell the others about his pod tho. Cause he might trust that they aren't here to hurt him, he doesn't know what they would do with more mer. and he deosn't want to subject Etho or Bdubs to the humiliation of being cooped up and not being able to hunt for their own food and what have you.

Of course, this causes problems for him because the others don't want to let Tango out into the general ocean until he's 100% not gonna get himself killed.

There are a few incidents with them startling Tango where he'll snap at them, but Tango isn't intentionally trying to hurt them or anything.

That's sorta what I have for the AU at the moment. Again, it's super brand new and there's no planning ahead here lol.

#vivianswers #Anonymous #Anon Kimi #emberfish asks #tango tek #vivirambles about #team zits #team zits au

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yakumtsaki · 2 years

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Boy does this update have everything: births, deaths, birthdays, murder attempts. Of course when Dagmar Bertino shows up I just know things are about to go to shit, walking bad omen.

-Alright, cough up the goods, blondie! Did I say that right, Valentina? -Yes, you’re doing great, now bite her ankle! -You said this wouldn’t be violent! -I also said this relationship wouldn’t work if you remained a timid flop!

-Oh Sandy, I don’t know what to do, Valentina and I are just too different.. I like walks in the park.. She likes organized crime.. -O̵H̵ B̸O̶O̸H̵O̸O, A̵T L̸E̴A̶S̷T Y̵O̸U̷'̵R̶E N̴O̵T A̷ Z̴O̷M̵B̶I̶E D̶O̵G WA̵S̵H̴E̴R🧟

The lovely Valentina takes a break from beating up the cats to give birth, now I want to remind you guys that I specifically picked Moody so he would tone down the aggressiveness of our dogs because the pet fights are out of control-

-and this is what he gave me on ALL THREE OF THE PUPPIES. So basically the only thing that changed is that they’re doofuses and pigpens now but still aggro, amazing!

Well they’re still cute, welcome to the household Servilia, Maximus, and Calpurnia❤️

I have so many slightly different photos of this exact situation that I’m constantly getting deja vu like ‘didn’t I already post this??’

UGH, ENOUGH. While I’m needlessly documenting this bullshit..

..Alcibiades dies💔 I hate how abrupt pet deaths are in this game, you don’t even get an event window and I keep missing them without saying goodbye!!!

RIP Alcibiades, you were such a good, chill boi who singlehandedly saved our cat legacy by being the feline suitor to finally manage to knock up D’vorah. I’ll miss you, baby.

Of course no death is tragic enough to stop certain robosexuals for engaging in ungodly activities. How many times do you have to be caught cheating in one day till you’re finally satisfied, Cyneswith???

Shajar returns from work and brings Hot Downtownie with her, but HD only has eyes for Sophie.

HD: Boy, I cant wait to meet Sophie :) Sophie: Boy, I can’t wait to have some toxic interaction with Shajar :)

The kittos are here, four of them too, damn, Dobronega!

-Go big or go home.

I can’t @ all of them having your eye scar too, iconic. Now as you probably recall because I just mentioned it yesterday, my goal with the cats was the opposite than the dog one aka I wanted to make them more aggro because the dogs are bullying the hell out of them. Let’s see how we did..

FINALLY SOMEONE AROUND HERE UNDERSTOOD THEIR ASSIGNMENT, TY DOBRIE. At last I can give the cats Mortal Kombat names and they will actually fit them, so here we have Kitana, Mileena, Ermac, and Scorpion, welcome bbs!

It could be possible we have too many pets now, but as long as we’re not flashing pink I’m gonna be in denial about the lag.

-Hey Sands, whatchu doing?🌸 -S̴K̴ILLI̴N̶G̶ F̶O̵R M̶YJO̷B. E̴VE̵R H̶EAR̴D O̴F T̷H̵O̷S̶E̴?🧟

RUDE. Cyneswith might not have a job but she performs many valuable tasks around the house, such as.. uh.. oh I got it:

SETTING A FIRE IN THE KITCHEN WHILE iVAN RUNS AMOK-

-AND TRIES TO KILL HER.

Legit I don’t even know how to comment on this one, it’s already been established that when I go too long without taking Cyn out to lover-hunt she starts setting fires, but iVan electrocuting her?? I guess he was like ‘I brought you back into this world and I can take you right out of it.’

It’s another carefree night of swimming until 5am for Sugar..

..while Jojo fixes iVan’s crazy ass. Jo I don’t know how to tell you this, but when you die it might be time for iVan to.. you know, go live in a big robot farm. Called a junkyard.

-WHAT?! Don’t even think about it, he’s my biggest scientific achievement!

Your biggest scientific achievement breaks down 3 times a day, who the fuck is gonna be fixing him once you’re dead??

-I’ll commute from Hell!

Sophie returns from work, gets promoted for the third time in a row, and Shajar RUNS TO HUG HER. Do I dare even ask what on earth is going on now?

-Nothing to be alarmed about, dumbass, we made up! -Yes, I apologized for suggesting a zombie threesome.. -And I in turn apologized for being a perfect mother and wife.

Really Soph, that’s what you apologized for?

-Adopt a different tone if you want to address me. -Haha, get her babe!

Alright then, so clearly Sophie climbing up the corporate ladder is gonna be UNBEARABLE, but at least you two are happy.

Look who else is making up, man, what a day of love!

-Oh mommy, after my one-sided mortal enemy Alcibiades’ death I’ve been thinking, I’m so sorry I beat you up, you know how sometimes I have a little bit of a rage problem! -Aw it’s ok, sweetheart, I forgive you!

*1 minute later*

-FUCK YOU MOM, DON’T TELL ME HOW TO RUN MY LIFE

Uh, Valentina, now might not be the best time to argue with your mother..

-MOMMY NOOOOOOOOOOOOO -It’s alright, Valie, I will always be with you in spirit, but thankfully not in the flesh because I could tell you were gonna saddle me with the babysitting, so this is perfect timing!

ABBEY MY BELOVED CHONK. You were such a chadette, I’ll never forget how you attacked the wolf and crushed Jojo’s stupid werewolf dreams, absolutely hilarious. RIP queen💔

I barely have time to process Abbey’s loss when I am struck by a different tragedy: having to throw a Union birthday party. Mercifully no one except Wulf showed up, Daniel and Gunther decided they’ve suffered enough.

Alright Sugar, blow out those candles and let’s see the extent of that Don Oates genetic catastrophe.

-Don’t I get to make a wish first??

The only wish you should be making with those grades is wishing to graduate elementary school.

OK. That’s not so bad right??? I can definitely see some Cyn in there!

But the nose is ALL Don, thanks so much bro!

It’s time to roll for an aspiration and truly, I can’t even react anymore:

IS MY DIGITAL DIE FUCKING STUCK ON 6?!?! Like seriously is this gonna happen every goddamn generation??? Don’t even get me started on his incelitude-ensuring chemistry panel, any sims out there that are ripped but don’t work out, I have your soulmate right here. Literally we’re never gonna find anyone who has more than 1 bolt with this freak.

Let’s move on to Sophito who all my hopes are riding on. Don’t let me down, my little genius, roll knowledge and pursue your destiny!

-There comes a time in every person’s life where they stop and think.. ‘Am I living my life for others..’

-’or for myself’??

WELL CLEARLY IT’S THE LATTER IN YOUR CASE. So not only does Sophito pick my least favorite aspiration, but he decides to out-ridiculous Sugar in the chemistry department: Are you a chess grandmaster who lives in their parent’s basement? Then Sophito is here for you, but don’t even THINK of coming near him if you have ANY charisma. Good lord, his perfect spouse is literally Chester Gieke.

Predictably he grew up cute, but truly it’s such a small comfort. Now we wait for the LTWs to show up..

Look at Shajar interacting with her kid, you’re a real family woman today aren’t you?

Wulf, did you only attend this party to harass our pets?

-Of course not, I care deeply about Sophio and Sagar!

Yea I’m starting to ‘care deeply’ as well after seeing those aspirations, ok the LTWs are in:

HAHAHAHAHAHA

HAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

SUGAR EVEN FOR YOU THIS IS RIDICULOUS. I can’t even really make fun of it, the simple IDEA of you in the army kills me, and I’m sure it will kill you too via friendly fire. We move on to Sophito, let’s see what horrors await us there..

GOOD LORD WHY. WHAT HAPPENED TO YOU.

-I told you, I’m gonna live life for myself from now on!

Yea, for yourself and 50 other people apparently! You know, you didn’t even have to go through all this trouble, you could have just stabbed me in the heart instead.

-Boy do I look MAGNIFICENT OR WHAT. Those cheekbones!!!

God help me. So this is a hairstyle I associate with Jean Ralphio from Parks and Rec, and thus I was saving it for like a true HIMBO, I just never in a million years thought the ‘true himbo’ would be my ‘little genius’.

-Don’t listen to her, son, being a genius fuckboi is the best of both worlds! Now lets shittalk your mother.

Birthdays all around as Valentina’s puppies grow up! This is Servilia..

..Maximus..

..and Calpurnia! Max and Calp look HILARIOUS and normally I’d make one of them the dog heir so we could have fun genetic experiments, but I’m very emo about Abbey dying so we’re keeping Abbey-clone Servillia. Her siblings will go off to have a (clearly much better) life with Wulf and Angel.

Back to human bs, I can’t express to you guys how much trouble I’m having adjusting to New Sophito, aka Nuphito. Like the above is what he does literally ALL DAY LONG.

Oh, sorry, he also spends 8 hours a day in the hot tub. Remember when you used to autonomously play chess all day??

-Isn’t my logic skill already maxed?

Yes but-

-Am I not the most functional person in this house?

Sure-

-Then wouldn’t your time be better spent preventing some massive disaster instead of worrying about my hot tub time?

I don’t like you, I don’t like you at all, Nuphito!!!

Sandy gets demoted, gets home, and starts immediately fighting Sophie (whose face has once again glitched in that creepy perma-smile).

-I̴ WIS̶H A̸N E̷T̴E̵R̷N̴A̴L, ̵I̶NE̴S̵C̶EP̵AB̶LE W̶I̶N̵T̶E̴R O̷N̴ YO̵U🧟 -You talking to me, wormy? Have you lost your rotting brain?

Then Cyneswith shows up from the other side to admire Sophie, trapping her in a positive interaction/negative interaction loop:

-Congratulations on your amazing career progress, Sophie, you’re so smart, huhu!💗 -Aw, thanks-

-A̷R̶E Y̵O̴U SM̸A̵R̸T E̴N̴O̶UG̸H T̸O GIV̵E Y̸O̶U̷R̸S̴E̷L̵F A̶ N̷OS̶EJ̶O̵B̵, H̷A̷HA🧟 -WHAT THE FUCK YOU BROKE MY NOSE YOU BLOATED CARCASS, I WILL KILL-

-Before you kill her, Soph, let’s do our school cheer! Voooooo gerbits, huhu!🌸 -Oh, fun!

-What a crazy day, my head is still spinning.. Literally, it’s still glitched. Thankfully nothing that sleeping next to my father in law won’t fix..

Yea you do you, Soph!

Guess who became best friends with her only child after 15 years? Mom of the year, Shajar Union!

In case you were wondering, this creepy shit is still going on, I swear I’m already seeing adult Sophito’s Sandy-filled want panel, and by ‘seeing it’ I mean in my nightmares.

Speaking of nightmares, I figured Sugar is gonna need all the help he can get so I got him a teen job in the army, and this is the ensemble he’s gonna present himself in. Man, you really have a rough life ahead of you. And now, for the horrible part..

WYATT NO💔💔💔💔💔 Goddamn Sophie, she’s like one of those hospital cats that go sleep next to patients who are about to die.

-WYAT UNION, NEE MONIF, YOUR TIME- can you move a bit so I can pass? -Oui! -Thanks bro. WYATT UNION, YOUR TIME HAS COME -Quel?? Whò est toi?? -I AM DEATH

-Dethe?? Je ne ûndérstàndòix. -Oh man. Hula zombs, any of you speak French? -Tell him he is ‘mort’. -YOU ARE MORT

-Hiiii everyone, have a blessed day!

FFS BUTLER #4, MAYBE OPEN YOUR EYES AS YOU ENTER A ROOM

-Oòòòòh, mòrt! -YES. HEAVEN- I MEAN, LE PARADIS, AWAITS YOU -Tres bien, huhu! Au revoir évéryoné, je t'aime Jòjò, non be sadoix!

When I tell you guys I teared up for real. What to even say about my French-Arabian prince; he came into this legacy a randomly generated dormie with great hair and a Jojo obsession, and leaves with great hair, a Jojo obsession, and my heart. He was such a delightful presence and gave us so many great moments when he wasn’t asleep. RIP mon bebe❤️

Our Wyatt was always a giving soul and left money to absolutely everyone..

..like I’m looking around the house and EVEN iVAN has the inheritance memory..

..BUT DON DOES NOT LMAO. I CAN’T. Thanks for that final laugh, Wyatt❤️

#gen 3 #ts2

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goldensunset · 2 years

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ok ok sorry for rambling in your inbox but I have been thinking :tm: about the twewy ocs and I have thoughts

Noel's a high school student (maybe 15-16 ish) who died one day on their way to school after being hit by a speeding car. The person driving kept going, either out of fear of being arrested or just not noticing, leaving them to just lay there in agony until they finally died. They didn't have a lot of friends and had a strained relationship with their family, so they don't really have a reason to want to be revived or whatever the goal is. They're only doing it for their partner, which brings us to:

Maki. She's also a high school student (year older than Noel at most). Maki is a very fiery, takes no shit kind of person. Sarcastic girl who's very stand-off-ish but threatens to beat the shit out of anyone who hurts those she cares about. Maki was killed by two of her classmates in a prank gone wrong, and is presumed to be missing by her family bc the classmates are too scared to fess up about what happened. She wants to come back bc she has two younger siblings (younger brother, 12, and younger sister, 4).

Maki and Noel are very much like, opposites of each other. Their whole vibes are like fire and ice respectively. But you know what they say, "Opposites attract"

Once again I am. Deeply sorry for dumping this in your inbox. I am just having thoughts and you are the unfortunate target.

AAAAAUGH THAT HURTS A LOT. those are two awfully angsty deaths man 😭 trauma dot com. most twewy characters we never learn much about regarding how they died. probably bc it was a traumatic event and therefore is hard to talk about. love the opposites attract thing there that’s always perfect

ok i just have to loredump a bit more about the reapers’ game to you here. just to give you food for thought. i don’t remember if i already mentioned it but if you win the game you don’t necessarily have to be brought back to life if you don’t want to. some people feel like they have nothing to go back to and so would rather just settle in in the afterlife. aka if you win the game you can choose to become a reaper. (this is probably not something the average player knows about when going through the game for the first time but they’ll hear they have this option at least once they win)

and not even just because you have cruel evil tendencies to try to make other people suffer- if you move up through the ranks of the reapers you can eventually reach angelhood. to be an angel, a being of the higher plane, is like true heaven in this universe. it’s the highest state of spiritual existence. like this is the real end goal here. there’s a lot we don’t know- the only stuff we know about the higher plane is the stuff recorded and relayed to us by heaven’s worst angel™️ who broke the rules and got in trouble for it, so we don’t know if it’s supposed to be a chill enjoyable state of being or not. presumably so. do they ever have stuff to do? idk. (definitely none of this info is made common knowledge to players. at least some reapers probably know about it.)

but in any case it has to beat being a reaper, a being of purgatory, who has to hunt other people in order to survive. literally if you slack off as a reaper you get erased too. the reason reapers are supposed to be so hard on players is bc the sickos running this thing are trying to weed out the weak of heart and ensure only the best of the best of humanity sticks around to potentially reach reaperhood/angelhood. so you have to be a little ruthless to be a reaper, obviously. some people just have a vicious personality like that and therefore enjoy it and wanna stay there. others are only doing it to survive and eventually get past it.

so anyway all that is to say: while noel would probably not know about all this, if they somehow did catch wind of it, that could be a potential goal for them to strive for. or maybe they don’t, and they just struggle miserably through the game for maki’s sake until they win and hear about this and decide to take that offer (very similar to shoka- we don’t know how she died but she claimed she had nothing to live for so she became a reaper after winning, but even then she was just as bored with the afterlife as she was with life.)

or maybe we can just have that wholesome character arc in which maki slowly manages to convince them that their life does have meaning and that if no one else, she’ll be their friend, and they can come back to life together and meet up. so then when they hear about the option to become a reaper or to return to life, they have a choice to make. (assuming this is a normal reapers’ game and not another rigged nightmare in which the players really couldn’t come back to life whether they wanted to or not)

#thank you for sharing!!!#rosie-kairi #asks #preeeeettyy sure i’m remembering the angel-reaper lore stuff right lol someone correct me if you want #neo the world ends with you #the world ends with you #subaseka tag

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vamphunting · 3 years

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Amazing how for the entire series Dean was like: I pulled you from a fire before and now I will keep pulling you from fires for the rest of your life

#*until i know there are no more fires aka hunts you will run to #his love for sam is unquantifiable uncatorgizable and burns brighter than the fires he tries to protect sam from #op #dean winchester

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ygreczed-3 · 3 years

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The Walking Dead/Detroit Become Human AU

(so basically I was tempted to make a post to apologize about the mess my blog has become lately - feels like I’m posting AUs, artworks, sketches and comic updates in such a chaotic way… I’m really sorry about it ahaha 😅 Hopefully it will get better soon)

So this post is me drawing for hours and forgetting to eat on my break day (I finally did !!! Don’t worry ahaha) because I became obsessed with an idea again. Also I like to make concept arts and storyboards as if I was working on a professional project for a TV show/animation. I find it fascinating ! This time I don’t really have any plot or finished story, I just wanted to draw these scenes badly so… I just did.

I’d like to draw your attention to Connor’s curly hair and Hank’s design (strongly inspired by Kristoff from Frozen). I just LOVE these details.

⚠️Remember this is NOT a new series. Just me having fun with characters and a universe I like (aka The Walking Dead) !

Anyway, more ideas below 👀

*POW*

Hank open his eye again. The walker was shot in the head. Hank pushes the walker away, it falls dead on the concrete.

Looking up, he sees Connor with a gun.

Hank : Jesus… Thank you. I thought I was…

Connor : I wouldn’t have wasted a bullet for you if it wasn’t for your kid back there. Your car, does it work? Hank : … Yeah… I just… I was looking for some gas when… well… Can I drive you somewhere? Connor : Not really, I’m looking for someone.

___________________________

Hank and Cole are walking in a gas station with jerricans and pour what’s left of gas from the pump.

Cole : Dad, that mister from earlier, do you think he’s gonna be okay ? Hank : I think, pumpkin. He was the one helping us. Cole : Being alone sounds dangerous… He should have come with us. Hank : …

___________________________

It’s nighttime, Cole is sleeping in the backseats with a blanket, Hank is sleeping in the driver seat. He wakes up brutally as he hears something tapping softly against the car window : the young man from earlier. He rolls the window down.

Hank : You ? Connor : I’ve looked around the whole city. Now it’s too dark… I need a safe place to have some sleep, I was thinking you could let me in. You owe me after all. Hank : … Yeah sure. Get in.

Connor gets in the car. He takes his bag off and keeps it by his side, out of Hank’s reach. He takes his coat off but keeps a gun near him. Hank stares at him with narrowed eyes.

Hank : … You’re safe here, really. You can trust me. Connor : Sorry, but I only trust myself.

___________________________

It’s dark outside, Hank can’t really sleep with the stranger next to him. His guts dictate him to stay alert. He watches carefully as Connor turns his head to him, half-opening his eyes.

Connor: Can’t sleep ? Hank : … Well you were right… I don’t know you. What about you ? Did you sleep a little ? Connor : … No. I’m too… cautious. My brain won’t let me sleep with a stranger next to me. Hank : … My name’s Hank. You ? Connor : What the hell are you doing ? Hank : We agreed we couldn’t sleep next to strangers. I’m introducing myself. Connor : It won’t make it any better… *after a silence* I’m Connor. Hank : Nice to meet you. Connor: … Where were you before ? You… you act like a newborn in this hell… Hank : … I had a neighbor with one of those bunkers… with tons of food, water, enough to live for months. We… We were hiding there with her until… until a few weeks. Connor : What happened ? Hank : She thought she had heard a chopper. Thought someone was out there to rescue us… she opened the hatch and she was… attacked by those things… Connor: … the kid… he’s yours? Hank : Yeah… Cole. Connor: … Where’s her mom ? Hank : He’s never known her. Connor: Sorry. Hank : Don’t be.

*silence*

Hank : I think… I’m starting to relax… we should try to sleep huh ?

Connor is already sleeping.

___________________________

Connor takes his backpack as Hank and Cole take a breakfast with some fire.

Hank : You sure you don’t want to eat anything ? Connor : No thanks, I have my own stock. You should save your food for your kid. Hank : … Hey, if you ever need to find us… after you’ve found what you’re looking for, I have a police radio. Frequency 58,7 kHz. Connor: I won’t need it but- thanks. Good luck.

Connor leaves.

___________________________

Cole : What should we do now? Hank : … We need to find more food… and weapons. I’ll go downtown today. You… You’ll stay here alright? Cole : No I… I want to stay with you… Hank : I know you’re scared Cole… But it’s too dangerous. You’ll be safe hidden in the car. Cole : You’ll be quick? Hank : Back before sunset, pinky swear.

___________________________

Hank finds an axe on a bar counter.

Suddenly : *BONG BONG BONG BONG*

Hank : What the-

He runs outside and hides against a wall as walkers pass nearby, heading to the source of the ringing.

He looks up and sees Connor climbing on a ladder but a Walker is trying to grab his leg.

Hank comes and kills the monster. Connor : You..! Follow me !

On the rooftop, they see the church. It’s an automatic bell, the walkers are massively getting around the building. There is something painted on the wall that says “Find Jericho” with black paint and scribbled under it “Find 9s”

Connor : Nines… Hank : What is Jericho ? Connor : … A safe place for survivors. It’s hidden… to keep the thieves and killers away. Hank : … The church. Connor : What ? Hank : Jericho, it has to do with the bible. The message is written on a church’s wall. It’s not a coincidence, there might be… a hint in there. Connor : … But we can’t get inside with those creeps around… Hank : … Maybe they leave when the church stops ringing the bells. Connor : Or maybe we should try to lead them away with… Hank : With what ? Connor : … Your car.

___________________________

Connor : So, let me get it straight. You drive around the town honking. It will attract the creeps away from the church. I get inside the church and look for any kind of hint. When the bells start ringing I get out before the creeps come back. And what do we do with Cole ?

Hank : He’s going with you. I don’t want to have him in the car with hundreds of undeads trying to get me. Connor : … I don’t- Hank : Don’t worry. He’s a smart kid. He will do as you say. Right Cole? Cole : …Hmm. Connor: … Fine. Let’s do it.

___________________________

Connor and Cole sneak into the church. Connor kills two of the Walkers still inside the church as Cole follows him cautiously.

Cole : … Look. *he points out a book on the altar* Connor : … It’s a bible… The chapter about the Battle of Jericho… it can’t be a coincidence. *They look up and see something written with old blood on the wall behind the altar. It says “Rahab the harlot defied the King of Jericho. Here lies the key to the fortress.”* Cole : What’s a harlot? Connor : … You should… ask your father. Now… I have to read… and think. Cole : … We only have one hour left before the bells ring again… Connor : I know.

___________________________

Connor : … I don’t get it ! There must be something I’m missing ! Cole : … Connor, I found a map ! Connor : Not now Cole, I’m trying to focus… Cole : Connor, look ! Connor : Cole please I really need-…

Cole shows him the map… there is a “9s” written on it.

Connor : Nines ! Cole : Does it help ? Connor : … I don’t know-…

The bells ring suddenly.

Connor : Crap… we have to get out of here. Give me your hand, buddy.

___________________________

Hank is waiting for them : he has lit a fire and when Cole sees him, he lets go of Connor’s hand and runs to hug his dad.

Hank : I gotcha, pumpkin. *looking up at Connor* Did you find something ? Connor : I think… Hank : You think ? Connor : I have this map my brother left for me inside the church… there was some kind of riddle on the wall, and it must have something to do with this but… there is nothing noted on it. Hank : What’s the riddle ? Connor : “Rahab the harlot defied the King of Jericho, here lies the key to the fortress.” Rahab was a prostitute, she helped Joshua by hiding spies he sent inside the city… and Joshua spared her when he took the fortress. But I… I don’t see the connection. Hank : … Let me see the map.

Connor gives it. Cole sits next to his father, near the fire, and soon falls asleep. After some time thinking and overthinking it, Hank finally points to a town on the map. A city called Defiance.

Hank : Look. Connor : Defiance… Of course. The key lies in Rahab’s defiance… Defiance is a town… Fuck- You’re a genius…! Hank : Man, I was feeling like a Detective again… felt nice for a moment. Connor: You were a Detective? Hank : A police Lieutenant, to be specific. But yeah. Detective works too. Connor : … I don’t think the treasure hunt is done yet. You’re gonna need your supercop sense again ! Hank : … It’s good to see you all excited. Feels like meeting the real Connor under the survivor’s shell. Connor: It’s nice… that Cole and you don’t have that shell yet… humanity is a rare thing to find down there. Hank : … So, who is “Nines” ? Connor : My little brother. We lived together, in the same group of survivors. Our camp was attacked… we got separated. Hank : Looks like he’s smart. He solved the riddle all by himself. It took the two of us to understand the hint. Connor : He’s always been a nerd. Hank : Pffft… Well we should try to get some sleep. We should be able to reach Stoneton, then we’ll have to find more gas.

Hank gets up and carries Cole to the car seats.

Connor: … Hank…? Hank : Yup ? Connor : Can I… Can I come with you two ? I could go to Defiance by myself but… if you’re heading there too, maybe we could… Hank : What the heck ? Of course you’re coming with us. With our two half-brains we’re gonna need each other’s help to find Jericho and your brother, don’t you think ? Connor *chuckles* : Right.

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oddmawd · 2 years

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“THE HUNT” - Part 2 - a (N)SFW Kurama x OC Story

Part 1 | Part 2: “A Chase in the Dark” | Part 3

SYNOPSIS: All demons have urges. Kurama has lived as a human for years, but those urges have not faded. Fortunately his wife is willing to explore the darker side of demonic attraction — even if that means becoming Kurama's willing prey.

(AKA "Kurama and wifey go on a romp in the woods." Explicit content.)

TAGS & CONTENT WARNINGS

PAIRING: Kurama x OC (or kurama x 3rd person reader... OC appearance is left ambiguous, no name for her is given, and she is a cis woman)

RATING: Explicit, 18+, MINORS DO NOT INTERACT

Part 2 WORD COUNT: 7k (all parts = 25.7k)

FANDOM: Yu Yu Hakusho

SERIES CWs: discussion of safewords, power dynamics, praise kink, married life, PIV sex, mention of overstimulation, consent dynamics, explicit consent, predator/prey, consensual nonconsent, interspecies relationships, married characters, unsafe sex, orgasm delay/denial, multiple orgasms, rough sex, oral sex (f receiving), predator/prey roleplay, bondage, biting, blood kink, dom/sub undertones, overstimulation, exhibitionism, outdoor sex, dirty talk, fear play, vaginal fingering, squirting, edging, begging, restraints, spanking, thigh riding, aftercare THERE IS SO MUCH ORGASM DENIAL IN CHAPTER 3 IT'S NOT EVEN FUNNY (some of the above CWs only appear in a single part of this 3-part work; CWs relevant to this chapter have been bolded)

AUTHOR’S NOTE: this is PART 2; please read part 1 for the full context of this scene. the characters depicted within have discussed consent, safewords and boundaries prior to the scene (and type of play) depicted in part 2.

this is also available on AO3. the majority of the smut is in parts 2+ 3.

if you like this, i’d really appreciate a comment or reblog. it’s my first smut outing and i wanna know if i should keep writing this kind of stuff!

Part 1 | Part 2: “A Chase in the Dark” | Part 3

The moment she turned her back and bolted into the darkened woods, Kurama’s pulse quickened with the electric cold of the hunt. Vision narrowing, limbs thrumming, scent and eyesight sharpening in tandem — it was the instinct to chase, to pursue, to conquer that set his veins on fire. His most primal of urges demanded he follow her into the night and run her down with every ounce of strength he possessed.

And he wanted to heed that call. He did — but he knew he could not just yet. He had promised her time, after all. Kurama always kept his promises where she was concerned. Even though his mouth bristled with new fangs and her scent tasted sharp upon his tongue, he did not move after her. Instead he watched until she disappeared between the trees, counting down the seconds until he could move, greedily tasting the scent she left behind. And oh, what a scent it was. Even his relatively less sensitive human nose could smell the fear-spiked arousal that had flowed from her when she’d turned and showed her vulnerable nape, that simple act of deference mouthwateringly sweet. How delicious would it be to taste — ?

Kurama took a deep breath to calm himself, but that only made things worse. Despite the distance she’d put between them, he could still smell her oh so clearly. He had always loved her scent, but here? Now? Knowing what was to come? The anticipation made her perfume a thousand times more potent. And that made resisting his instincts an agonizingly pleasurable battle indeed. He wanted to savor this night, but each breath he took made it harder to not channel his demonic speed and fly after her, batter down her defenses and just take her as he saw fit. But to do so was to defeat the purpose of this exercise.

Kurama needed to earn his wife’s submission. He needed to earn her defeat. He needed to earn her compliance, not merely bully her into doing his bidding with an overwhelming show of brute force. No, that wouldn’t do at all. Instead he would extend the chase until she gasped for air, legs trembling, unable to run or even take another step before collapsing in his arms —

And then he’d give her legs another reason entirely to tremble.

His cock strained at the thought of her spread beneath him, exhausted and compliant, needy and aching; he resisted the urge to palm himself though his clothes, those wretched human trappings that kept the wind from his skin and his demonic instincts at bay. There would be time for indulgence later, Kurama reminded himself. For now, he needed to wait.

Kurama checked his watch, standing stock still as the minutes ticked by.

In silence he stared at the edge of the forest, ever the patient hunter.

Because she knew she couldn’t afford otherwise, she paced herself as she ran through the close-packed trees. Running at a breakneck pace was sure to accomplish one of two things: actually break her neck when she tripped over roots (which would literally kill the mood, not to mention her), or exhaust her before she could put up a fight (which would kill the mood metaphorically, which was also unacceptable). Tiring herself too quickly would make this easy on Kurama. But even armed with that knowledge, it was tough not to sprint like her life depended on it.

All she wanted to do was run as far and as fast as her legs could carry her and race like an Olympian into the oncoming dark… away from the beast whose eyes she swore she still felt latched like teeth onto her throat. She loved Kurama, it was true, but dammit, he was scary when he looked at her like that.

… but if he was really so scary, why had her body light up like a Christmas tree the second he told he to start running?

She tried not to think about it. Instead she thought about the plan she’d laid in place earlier that day. Mentally running over her map of the terrain, she pelted through the woods until she came upon a stream. She waded into the middle of the water and traveled upriver a few dozen meters before crossing to the other bank, after which she jogged (sodden shoes sloshing all the way) into the trees. Once she reached a certain predetermined point (and dodged the trap that waited there), she retraced her steps and reentered the stream to hike downriver. She was careful to not let the tree branches overhanging the stream touch her as she passed during her trek to her next point of interest: the spot where the creek forked.

Here she stripped off both her gloves. One she sent floating down the stream’s left branch. The other she sent floating down the right. If Kurama was tracking her by scent, hopefully this would give him at least a little pause.

Once she set her gloves afloat, she took the right fork and followed it for a time, eventually exiting the stream and making her way over land to the leftward fork of water. She crossed this bit of creek and plunged back into the woods, winding her way deep into them, dodging traps, retracing and zigzagging to confuse her scent, and even throwing her hat over the side of a tall cliff and into the trees below to serve as a scent-lure.

Eventually she reached another place where she’d set a particularly fierce trap, one that required the use of her now perspiration-soaked sweatshirt to serve as bait. She shivered when she stripped the garment off and set the bait in place, cold fingers of wind dragging claws down her trembling limbs. She couldn’t help but imagine Kurama’s hands there, instead — but because she could not afford distractions, she shoved the tempting thought from her head, climbed behind a boulder, and clutched the rope she’d planted there earlier that day to her chest.

Now, all she could do was wait.

It was her turn to be predator — if only for a little while.

The moment Kurama’s watch declared thirty minutes had passed, he strolled into the dark after his wife.

He didn’t bother running. He didn’t need to summon his demonic powers. She was easy enough to track. Her scent lured him even in his human form, beckoning him to follow with the sweet, sweet fragrance of fear… and arousal. He’d buried his face between her legs too many times not to recognize the scent of her need permeating the air.

She was, in a word, mouthwatering. And he intended to have his taste soon enough.

But she was clever as well as mouthwatering, using a nearby creek to disguise the path she’d taken through the woods. Kurama tracked her to a stream and had to concentrate top pick up her trail again, traversing both up and downriver until he found a trace of her scent north of where they’d begun their delicious game. Her scent wound off into the trees like a trail of breadcrumbs in the dark. He followed this at a steady pace with hands in his pockets, unhurried. Would she be waiting for him at the end of this path? Surely not. Surely she wouldn’t make it so easy —

His foot slipped over something on the uneven forest floor. Not wood, not leaves —

A zinging sound and a quick snap rent the quiet; a shape rocketed toward him from the dark. He dodged (it was fast, but no match for his speed), dancing backward as he spun to face the enemy.

Well. ‘Enemy’ wasn’t the right word. Instead of the face of his wife, Kurama beheld a bevy of knives quivering in the trunk of a tree just on the other side of where he’d been standing, weapons launched from the brush when he stepped on a tripwire she’d laid across her delectably scented path. The knives, when he reached out to touch them, bore only the faintest traces of her fragrance. He would’ve smelled her on the wire had it not been for the rain earlier.

She really was trying to kill him, just as she promised.

The thought summoned a groan from deep in his chest. A bolt of electricity struck a straight path to his groin, and without thinking, he changed, shedding his human form in favor of the demonic. Silver hair rippled in the starlight as her scent rose to a fever pitch, heightened demonic senses picking out the faintest traces of her aroma the way his human nose could not. This form almost would make it almost too easy for him to find her, but he couldn’t keep the urge to take this form at bay.

Prey of this caliber deserved to be chased by the same echelon of predator. She deserved nothing less.

Just as she gave him all of her, so too would he give her all of him.

The forest was quiet.

She’d noticed it earlier that day when she traveled through the woods and set her traps in place. Normally the forest around Genkai’s thrummed with life, resplendent with the sounds of everything from the croaking of frogs to the singing of birds to the distant cry of wolves in the mist-shrouded mountains. That day she’d heard only a few birds crying, and that night, not a sound but the rasp of her breath in her throat accompanied the whisper of wind in the trees. It was quiet in a way she had never heard before. Not a trace of wildlife remained. Only silence stalked the forest now.

And that meant the pound of her heart in her ears sounded loud to her, indeed.

She tried not to make noise as she waited for Kurama in the darkness. Breath rasped in her chest, tasting of tree sap and cool air; it was all she could do to muffle her breathing after her run through the woods, but she was stressed, muscles as taut as a pulled bowstring as she waited to hear his footsteps coming.

If he even let her hear them. She knew damn well he could move silently if he chose.

The thought terrified her. Part of her wanted to keep running all night, just to avoid the jump-scare moment of his face materializing from the shadows, but tiring herself too soon was not an option. He’d find her eventually. She wasn’t so arrogant as to think she could delay him all night. But growing too exhausted meant it would be harder to put up a fight once he found her, and she intended to fight like hell the second he put a hand on her. He’d be disappointed if she didn’t — she knew that in her bones, just as she knew he’d catch her eventually.

… she just didn’t think he’d find her quite so quickly, is the thing.

She didn’t wear a watch, but she guessed it couldn’t have been more than 90 minutes (and that was being generous) before she heard the unmistakable sound of a branch cracking not too far away in the darkness of the woods. An animal? No, she hadn’t seen a single one all night. They knew a predator far deadlier lurked in these woods, and they stayed away. And that meant that snapping branch could only herald the arrival of….

“I know you’re there.”

When he voiced speared the night, she almost cried out, the tension in her drawn so tightly she almost snapped beneath the feather-light weight of his velvet growl. Only her hand over her mouth kept the cry at bay, the other sweating and trembling as it clutched around the length of rope she held in it.

“Your scent clings thickly to this place,” his voice continued, just as musical and soft as before. “It’s no use hiding. Make this easier on yourself, and reveal yourself to me.”

She knew Kurama’s voice like she knew her own name, but his voice tonight was lower, deeper, almost purring — the voice of Youko Kurama, unmistakable in her ears and against her skin. He’d promised he’d use this form at some point during the night’s events, but apparently he was more eager than she realized.

The thought put a current of heat in her belly like sparks catching on dry tinder.

“You’ve put up a good fight, so far.” Kurama chuckled, sound brushing down her chest like a fingertip. “The knives, the snares, the deadfall? The gloves down separate forks of the creek? Ingenious. You had me fooled… for a moment, anyway.”

He sounded almost impressed. Prideful, even. Like the quality of her traps and tricks reflected well on him, even if they had been set to ward him off. Her heart beat faster at his tone, at the smug and almost tender tenor he used to declare that her traps were brilliant, even if they had all been futile in the end. She was doing well, then. She was pleasing him. The heat in her belly quickened, stoking hotter.

Another twig snapped, this one a little more eastward than the last — changing directions as he stalked through the trees and tried to find her hiding spot. And he was heading in the direction she wanted, which was good. She gripped her rope a little tighter. She wanted to flee, give him the chase he craved, but she couldn’t do that yet. She needed to wait for him to stand in the exact right spot…

“I thought I’d found you once before, but it was only that hat of yours you left behind, tossed over that cliff as though you’d thrown yourself in desperation into the darkness.” His velvet voice dried a tad, unamused. “Taunting me, were you? I must admit, it worked. The rage I felt when I realized my prey had eluded me once again…”

She suppressed a whimper at the way he’d said the word ‘prey,’ so slowly, like he wanted to taste it…

“But you are no match for me, in the end. I’ve found you. Or I will, soon.” Kurama’s voice coaxed and crooned, as tangible as his hand fisting in her hair. “Come out, pet. You’ve put up a good fight, just as you promised. Let me give you your reward.”

But she didn’t obey. She just grinned into the hand she kept tight over her mouth. Oh, so he was trying to seduce her, was he? That wasn’t going to work. She wasn’t that weak. He could make pretty promises all he wanted, but she wasn’t going to make this easy on him. The game wasn’t over yet. Giving in would defeat the whole point. This was for sure a test. It was definitely, definitely a test of —

“Let me bury my face in your cunt and taste you until you’re crying out for me to take you, claim you, brand you as my conquered quarry,” he growled, and each word clenched around her like a hard, hot fist. “Until this whole forest hears you screaming my name as I bury my cock inside you, mark you with my scent and teeth until you’re begging me to fill you with my cum. And then I’ll do it again, and again, until you can’t remember your own name. Only mine.”

— a test of her willpower. Goddammit. He was testing her goddamn willower. Jesus. And what a test it was! She rubber her thighs together in spite of herself, lust surging languid and bright through her core. Shit. Kurama’s typical dirty talk was hot, yeah, but usually it was rather delicate. This was comparatively more obscene… and she liked it. She liked it a lot, if the way her breathing hitched, her nipples hardened, gooseflesh dotted her nape, and her cunt suddenly throbbed between her straining thighs was any indication.

As if reading her thoughts, a chuckle reverberated through the forest. He had drifted even further east, by the sound of it. Almost there, almost there…

“You try to hide, but you give yourself away,” Kurama said in a whisper of hungry silk. “I can smell how much you want me. I can smell how wet you are.” Another twig snapped, even closer to where she wanted him to stand. “You’re utterly shameless, aren’t you?”

She almost moaned. Almost.

Kurama chuckled again—and then there came a quick rustle, a whip crack of sound as he pounced on something. Silence followed, quiet accompanied by naught but the song of the wind in the trees.

Then: “Clever little whore.”

He sounded utterly admiring and affectionate despite his crude words, sending another thrill through her aching body, but she pushed the effect of his praise aside because his voice had come from just the right place in the forest. Ignoring the way her pussy throbbed, she stood, spotting him at once over the boulder she’d used to conceal her presence. He stood a few meters off, holding her folded sweater in his fists — the sweater she’d hidden in the brush for him to find, a lure he’d been unable to resist as he traced the scent of her arousal through the trees. The thrill of victory overrode her arousal as their eyes met and his widened, the pair of them trading a split second of eye contact before he grinned, thinking he’d won —

But then she grinned, too, and she yanked the rope in her hand.

His smile vanished as two traps sprung at once, sending a net falling from the trees and another volley of knives launching from another bit of brush, but she didn’t stop to see if her two-pronged assault had any impact. She just whirled and sprinted into the trees, laughing her delight.

He had to hand it to her: She was smart.

The knives were, at first glance, more dangerous than the net, so he’d dodged them… but that put him into the path of the net. And it wasn’t an ordinary net, as he’d first assumed. Paper warding tags had been affixed to every line, burning and stinging his skin as the net settled over his form. Genkai had made those tags at some point; they bore potent spiritual energy anathema to demons, even ones as strong as Youko Kurama.

So that’s what she took from inside the temple, he realized as he fought at the net’s stinging, restrictive clutches. He’d been wondering about it ever since she’d gone inside and lingered for longer than he thought necessary, but of all things, this was not what he thought she’d been up to. For her to use wards like this on him? To go this far with him, for him? Even in the form of Youko Kurama, the wards were not easy to shrug aside, and it cost him precious minutes to burn them away with his energy and shrug free of their embrace.

She was truly, truly trying her hardest to kill him. He couldn’t help but marvel at the idea. His wife — no, his mate was trying to kill him, and all because he’d asked her to.

But the burns on his body began to heal in moments, proving what he’d told her before this all began: She could not hurt him in a way that matters.

Still. The fact that she was trying so earnestly, laughing all the while, and all because he’d asked her to… that set his blood on fire.

Kurama’s head lolled back, his pleasured groan drifting on the wind.

God, she was perfect.

Despite the itching burns on his still-healing skin, he’d never felt hungrier. He couldn’t resist bringing her discarded sweater to his nose and inhaling deeply of her scent, the aromas of fear and arousal cloying his senses, making it impossible to resist tugging at the ties of his pants and fisting his cock in one clawed hand. He already leaked from the tip, slick pre helping his hand glide from base to crown, fireworks of pleasure threading through his groin as he inhaled of her scent again and again, fist pumping furiously.

He held himself back from coming, though. Just as he reached the height of his pleasure, he stopped, forcing himself to tie back up his clothes and toss her sweater aside. It was agony, to leave himself like this, but he wouldn’t waste his spend on the ground. He’d save it for her, for her cunt, sure to wrap around him greedily once he plunged inside.

The thought of her wet and dripping, aching for him, crying out his name… he couldn’t wait to see her in such a state. So he ignored the way his groin ached and his cock strained against his clothes, and he stalked into the woods once more.

Kurama could tolerate no more delays this night.

His prey was waiting, and he would take what belonged to him.

She ran in her shirt, jeans and boots, all extra items but her scarf now lost to her. She clutched the scarf tighter around her neck with every step, knowing she couldn’t afford to let the trees’ greedy branches pluck it from her shoulders the way they plucked at her hair as she ran through them. She had plans for that scarf. Big ones. The grand finale, if you will.

She just hoped she could make it to the scene of her escape’s climax before Kurama caught up with her.

But the gleam of his golden eyes told her she might not. The sight of those eyes had put a cold spike in her blood even as they put a hot throb between her thighs. Seeing him in the woods, standing tall and silvery between black trees, had been a shock indeed. She’d forgotten how damn tall he was in that form, towering above her at nearly seven feet (yikes). She’d forgotten how drop-dead gorgeous he was as his former self with his waterfall of starlight hair, muscles rippling in his arms and chest, eyes like burning coals in the dark. He’d called her shameless, but he was the real shameless one in that all-white, open-throated outfit that left his chest bare from collarbones to navel.

Suddenly she was glad she’d worn cute underwear. Had to compete somehow, and those golden eyes had looked at her like he wanted devour her alive…

A shiver coursed through her, but she didn’t slow. She ran through the woods at a breakneck pace, knowing she needed every scrap of distance she could get. The net had bought her time, it was true, but it wouldn’t be much. She ran until a stitch formed in her side, not daring to look over her shoulder for fear of seeing his face materialize from the dark.

Despite the lead she had on him, it didn’t take long for her to feel him appear behind her. She was prey and her body knew it; hair rose on her sweating nape even before she heard a cruel, cold laugh echo between the trees, one accompanied by the faintest rake of claws down her clothed back, so soft she might have imagined it. Like he’d reached out to touch her and thought better of it, withdrawing his hand to a teasing, barely-there caress. But he came at a bad time, right as one of her preset traps availed itself, and she kicked out at a tripwire as she passed, ducking as a snare whipped by overhead.

His deep voice growled out a curse — her reward for a job well done — and as his voice dropped behind her, she put on a new burst of speed.

Not that she let that small victory get to her head. She knew damn well he was toying with her. He could choose to use every ounce of his demonic power to raze the landscape to the ground around her and cut her escape short. But he didn’t, because this chase, this hunt — that was the point of it. To earn the prize at the end. And if he overwhelmed her before she was ready to give up, he wasn’t really winning. He wanted her total surrender, she knew. And that was both a mental and a physical game.

Grinning into the darkness, she ran harder. Because she wasn’t done just yet, and he still had a lot more to prove to her before she would submit.

And so the night wore on: the push and the pull, the gain and the lead, all her traps sprung one by one by one, his growl chasing after her in the dark. He laughed and taunted her, telling to run, to give in, to just stop and let him have his way with her like he knew they both were hungry for. Her scent told him everything he needed to know, he said, about how badly she wanted him inside her. But she wasn’t going to give up, not even when she realized they were approaching the last of her traps. She’d known from the start that her traps would not last the night. She kept track of their remaining number in her head as they each were sprung and passed by, counting herself lucky that Kurama seemed content to dog her steps and not use his demonic speed to overwhelm her before her final gambit.

That final gambit arrived quicker than she thought it would, not long after the terrain sloped upward, steps carrying her uphill through thinning trees and thicker starlight. She burst from the trees beside the flow of a river at the height of a cliff, having run up and around the soaring landscape on her meandering way through the forest. Terrain spread out below the tall cliff face, water pouring over the ledge into a deep pool below that reflected rippling starlight and moonlight like gossamer on the wind. A stream flowed southbound out of the pool, ripples on its surface like the scales of a platinum snake winding through the woods. It would’ve taken her breath away if she wasn’t already panting, throat and lungs on fire from her haphazard, panicked dash. She skidded to a stop at the top of the falls, stumbling over the rocks and boulders that edged the stream. Wind grabbed her hair by the handful, breeze colder than expected on this fraught spring night.

“Nowhere to run, now.”

She turned. Kurama stood not a handful of meters away, not even winded, which would be pretty insulting if she wasn’t distracted by the smirk on his lips and the heated glint in his golden eye. God, he was pretty, hair as sliver as the moon overhead, skin like burnished bronze, shoulders broad and features proud. And this close up, he appeared even taller than he had during their earlier encounter by the net; she felt tiny and small before him, a rabbit compared to a hulking predator. The tail flowing behind him and his pointed fox ears completed the image of a predator matched by his claws gleaming curved and wicked in the moonlight. She could smell him, too, that ever-present aroma of evergreen and the faint hint of roses he carried wherever he went.

All of a sudden she was aware of the sweat on her brow and the mud caked up and down her legs and hands, the leaves tangled in her hair and scarf. She pulled that scarf tighter around her throat like a shield, but it didn’t do her any good. Her legs still trembled as Kurama eyed her over from toe to crown, eyes assessing — and hungry. So very hungry, for her.

It was the hunger she saw there that made her take a step back when he took a step toward her, his muscles smooth as a well-oiled machine. He paused when he saw her retreat, because her feet had carried her backward to the edge of the waterfall not a single meter away, the backs of her heels brushing the river's lapping shore. He growled again when one of her feet slid backward on the rocky shore, boot entering the water with a splash. The force of that growl shoot through her like an earthquake, coiling in her spine like a living thing, undulating in her muscles. And Kurama knew the effect he had on her, because at the sight of her shivers, he started to smirk.

“I’ve caught you,” he said, a grin curling his full lips.

She swallowed. “Looks like it.”

Kurama’s smile grew at the sound of her unsteady voice. He extended a hand, claws like polished silver in the moonlight.

“Come to me, pet,” he said in a voice of low, silken promise. “Now.”

As if dragged forward by a magnet, she took a step. His eyes glittered when she took another, smug satisfaction gleaming in his golden irises.

“That’s it,” he purred. “Come to me.”

She took another step toward him. He licked his lips, slow and lazy.

“Good girl,” he said.

She stopped moving. The indolent satisfaction in his eyes vanished, lazy smile transforming into a bare-toothed growl.

“Do not toy with me,” he snarled, all teasing promise gone. “No one keeps a hunter from their prey. Keep me from what’s mine and you will regret it. Come to me, now, or else I will make you regret your insolence.”

It was a promise, of course. Kurama wouldn’t say something like that in jest, and even the strongest of his enemies would no doubt cower in fear at the raw, bloodthirsty determination in his gaze. She knew that. So did he.

Which is why it surprised them both when he threw back her head and laughed. She laughed long and loud and heartily as his eyes narrowed, hunter’s fury making them burn like fallen stars.

“You really think this is over?” she said through her giggles. “Hate to break it to you, but I don’t give up that easy.”

Growling, he reached for her with one clawed hand.

Laughing, she took another step back, both feet now drenched in the hold of the river.

“Don’t, pet,” Kurama snarled. “Do not take another step.”

“Or what?”

He snarled her name. She laughed again.

“Sorry, Kurama,” she said. “You haven’t earned the right to give me orders just yet.”

And without another word, she danced backward into the current and threw herself over the falls.

Dimly, she heard him call her name again, but the roar of the waterfall drowned him out before she hit the pool at the fall’s distant base. The ice-cold water snatched the air from her lungs, impact jolting every limb, muscle and joint, but she did not allow her body to react to the plunge with shock. She let herself be swallowed by the pool and sank into its dark depths, disappearing under the frothing water and swimming below the churning foam toward the place where the falls hit the surface. Only once she crossed behind the pounding cascade did she surface to breathe. She only allowed her face to breach the water, however, gulping air in the scant sliver of space between the falling water and the face of the cliff above, staying hidden in the dark mists and out of sight.

Then, and only then, did she take off her scarf, bring it to float on the water's surface, and set it adrift.

She didn’t dare move after that.

Although the roaring fall drowned out most other sounds, she thought she heard the call of her name from the river’s left bank. Sucking in a breath to hold it, she watched as a pale smudge speared the darkness on the other side of the translucent torrent of water. This figure — Kurama, of course — stood on the bank for a few seconds, probably scanning the pool for signs of her. When none appeared, he turned downriver and ran, soon vanishing from sight as he no doubt pursued the scent of her scarf as it floated away.

Good. Seems her plan had worked… maybe. For a few minutes, anyway. But he’d soon be back, because once he found her scarf, he’d realize the trick she’d pulled. He’d retrace his steps when he realized her smell was still sluicing downriver toward him, a source of scent he left behind. And that meant she’d better get moving, because he was sure to figure it out fast.

Behind the falls, a lip of stone sat at the base of the cliff; she hauled herself atop it with a gasp, not liking the way her arms shook and her frigid shoulders screamed at the effort. She ignored the pain to scramble in the semidarkness for the item she’d hidden there earlier that day. Once found, she grabbed and clutch it in one hand, standing to pick her way over the slick rocks to the bank of the river. Every step was a battle, though, made harder by the slippery stones around the edge of the pool. It would be easier to move once she reached the shore, she thought. But once she stood on that shore, she realized it was mostly mud. Wet earth moved under her feet and her knees gave out; she collapsed to the rain-wet earth to pant, weight braced on one trembling fist. The cold water and chilly night air had leeched strength from her limbs, her breath hard and harsh in her chest.

She knew the cold water would be tough to handle, and swimming through it even harder, but to be this sapped of strength so fast? Not good. But she couldn’t give up. She couldn’t give in here. She had more in her. She still had more of herself to give.

For a moment — just for a moment — she closed her eyes. Breathed. Tried to calm herself. Tried to —

“It’s over, pet,” came Kurama’s tender, velvet voice.

There was no muffling the shriek that jolted from her mouth, nor was there any disguising the tremor in her limbs when she lurched to her feet and wheeled to face him. He stood a few meters down the bank, her sodden scarf hanging dripping from one fist. The sight filled her with horror. How long had she been sitting on that bank? She thought it had been no more than a few seconds, but her mind was hazy with cold, body sluggish from exertion. Had she been there longer than that? Had she — ?

Kurama stepped toward her, setting off fireworks of adrenaline in her breast. “Did you really think that trick would work?” he asked, sympathy and pity dripping from every word. “Oh, pet. Did you really?”

“It did work.” The protest sounded lame even in her reeling hearing. “Just not for as long as I wanted.”

“A valiant effort,” Kurama agreed after a time. “But it’s not enough.” His broad chest puffed out as he relished the words, “I’ve won.”

But she shook her head. “Not yet.”

Every ounce of strength she still possessed poured into her attack. She ran at him with the metal baton she’d stashed behind the pool upraised, an aggressive bellow pouring from her lungs as she struck with her only weapon. No more traps remained. There would be no more running. She could only fight, and she intended to fight until her strength ran out. But her human strength was nothing compared to Kurama’s, and when she struck at him, he parried the attack with a single, brutal swipe of his claws. Somehow she held onto her baton despite the force of Kurama’s countering blow and the way the impact radiated up the baton into her muscles. Arm on fire, she let the momentum of her strike carry her into a spin, trying to surprise him by hitting him in his blind spot—

But it was no use. He grabbed her wrist with lightning speed, his other arm snaking around her waist. Claws pricked her hip as he hauled her back against his torso, towering over her smaller frame until the curtain of his hair blotted out the burning stars with moonlit silk. She kicked and struggled against him, back of her head banging against his chest, and she struck at his nearby knee with her baton.

Claws dug into her wrist before she could make impact; she dropped the baton with a cry of pain. Hot breath ghosted over her ear, a nose trailing down her neck and over her jaw with a shiver of warmth.

“It’s over,” Kurama growled in her ear. “Give up. You are my prey, and I have caught you.”

“Not yet!” she spat, and she slammed her head toward his as hard as she could.

In a moment she was sure could be contributed to nothing but luck, her skull connected with his nose; he cursed and the arm around her waist slackened the barest fraction. Seeing her opportunity to break free, she lurched forward and away, ripping out of his arms, but the claws on her wrist held tight and sent her stumbling to the mud. She scrambled forward on all fours, but a hard, hot hand on her ankle hauled her backward with a spray of dirt, pulling her directly under Kurama, his body covering hers in an instant. His chest pressed against her back as somehow he found both her wrists and pinned them to the ground over her head with one hand, legs slotting between hers and keeping them spread, unable to kick him or find purchase against the earth. But that didn’t stop her from bucking as hard as she could, wrenching at the hand that held her arms pinned in place, trying to aim kicks in vain at his ankles as his clothed cock pressed firm against her backside…

Oh, god. In spite of the way he’d forced her facedown into the mud, a spike of pure need coaxed her core to burning, and she could not help the low moan that slipped between her ice cold lips.

As if sensing this weakness, Kurama lowered his mouth, forcing his face between her neck and shoulder, but she managed to shimmy and twist just enough to slam her head sideways, their temples connecting so hard she saw stars. The hand on her wrists stuttered; she jerked her arms away and twisted onto her side under him, managing to plant a foot on his muscular thigh and shove, gliding away from him through the mud. Sadistic glee filled her when she saw the muddy print she left on his pristine white clothes, now spattered in so much muck and grime —

A massive hand grabbed her by the nape, pushing her with a hard shove back to the ground as another arm found purchase around her waist again. Kurama hauled her back to him, ass pressing to his hips, bending to crush her back to his broad chest. Despite her struggles he managed to capture her wrists in one hand again, shoving a knee between her thighs to once more force her to lie facedown on the ground, pinned under his weight, one knee pressing up and grinding against her clothed core. For a second he just sat there, grinding her down onto his leg until she whined, stars of pleasure instead of pain shooting through her body as he somehow managed to get his knee in just the right place to press against her clit.

“Kurama!” she cried, hips jerking as he mouthed at the sensitive spot beneath her ear. “Ah — Kurama!”

A low chuckle reverberated up her spine, and he took advantage of the chaos to unwrap the arm from around her waist. She was so distracted she hardly notice, though that changed when the sound of his claws shredding her jeans and underwear rent the night like a gunshot. A cold graze of pain trailed down the back of one thigh when his claws raked her skin, sensation cutting through her pleasure like a knife. She had one, horrible moment of utter clarity when she realized he hadn't even seen her cute underwear before shredding it, but the thought was fleeting. She couldn’t focus on anything else once the shock of the cold night air on her overheated flesh rendered her frozen in place. With a gasp, she stilled, for just one second ceasing her helpless struggles.

It was one second too long. Kurama’s hand encircled her thigh from behind, forcing her down, and then he buried his face in her shoulder and sank his teeth into her flesh.

It was not a soft nibble or mere scrape of teeth, or even the harder love bites she’d received from Kurama in the past. The warmth rushing down her skin told her he’d drawn blood, the firework of pain in her flesh proclaiming his teeth had ventured deep. She cried out in agony at this assault, air like a knife in her throat — but the pain was somehow grounding, panic fading as the pain pushed it from her mind, pulling her into the moment and out of her adrenaline-fueled haze. To her complete surprise, she soon had her breathing back under control, fists clenching in the mud, no longer hyperventilating. An odd calm washed over her. She could feel the burn of her exhausted muscles as they began to lose strength, no longer fueled by adrenaline. She could feel the way the tension in her had started to abate, too exhausted to remain on edge. And she could feel the way breath returned to her lungs as Kurama pinned her in place, forcing her to calm.

But most of all, she could feel the ache growing stronger and stronger between her thighs, one stoked hotter and higher by the clothed knee grinding so deliciously against her naked sex and the hard body keeping her pinned in place. For the first time she realized how warm Kurama was amid the cold mud, colder air and the icy grip of her still-wet shirt. His chest burned inferno-bright against her spine, and all at once she realized how hard she shivered against him, trembling with a heady mixture of fear, panic, arousal, pain, and cold — and burgeoning relief.

Feeling his crushing weight on top of her, so warm and solid, was somehow comforting… even with his fangs sunk so deep in her shoulder she feared he’d touched bone.

He growled low in his throat as she calmed, and once she had relaxed to his preferences, he released the bruising grip he had on her wrists. She tensed, debating running, but then the hand gripping her thigh lifted, only to descend again and deliver a harsh spank to her ass. She yelped and stilled, expecting him to do it again when his hand raised a second time, but before he could, the teeth in her shoulder slid out of her with a flare of blinding pain. It hurt so badly she was left gasping, face in the mud, barely hearing when an odd crunching sound suddenly rent the air.

Kurama spat something to the side, and she barely had time to take in his hand as it moved past her face, the claws on his fore and middle fingers bitten into blunted tips, and then those fingers were out of sight — because he buried them in her cunt. She cried out in shock as they curled against her inner walls, pressing with cruel precision and unyielding force against a spot Kurama knew too well. One that turned her legs to jelly and set her entire body alight, pleasure thrumming in her core like liquid fire. With a cry she jerked her hips, trying to pull away from his forceful touch because it was so much, so fast, but the hand on the nape of her neck kept her helplessly in place. His hands were huge, fingers stretching her to her breaking point.

And if these were his fingers, she practically salivated at the thought of what would follow when he filled her with his enormous cock. She clenched tight at the thought of it, earning her a growl from Kurama.

“I’ve barely even touched you, and you’re already so wet.” His fingers gave a hard thrust, a carefully cruel curl of questing fingertip. Amusement dripped from his words and arousal soaked her folds in equal measure when he said, “I’m not the only one who enjoys the hunt, it seems.”

She couldn’t reply. She was too tired, too exhausted, and his unrelenting touch felt entirely too good for words. He pumped into her without giving her even a moment to adjust, fingers thrusting over and over again, a brutal pace that overwhelmed every last one of her senses with a firestorm of unrestrained pleasure. Somehow she got her knees under her, hips moving to meet his hand with every thrust, jerking and humping seemingly of their own accord, greedily seeking the pleasure he mercilessly gave her. The heel of his hand slapped her ass with every movement, and he laughed when she cried out in ecstasy, a growling sound both mocking and doting all at once. Claws pricked the back of her neck, a stroking caress so gentle, it felt like the hand must belong to someone else. He was using that hand to keep her face in the mud, after all. Surely it wasn’t Kurama who ravaged her cunt with one hand while so gently conveying love with the other…

“Needy thing.” His voice was shockingly mild, as if he wasn’t buried to the knuckles inside of her, and his ministrations didn’t so much as pause when he kept speaking. “You’re gripping me so tightly, it’s hard to believe you were just trying to run.” A tongue swiped down her bare throat and swirled over the shell in her ear before he murmured, “Clearly you want me. Isn’t that right?”

Again, she couldn’t find the strength to reply. Too overwhelmed. Body jolting, breasts bouncing, hips helplessly humping his hand. His fingers made the lewdest sounds as they thrust pumped into her aching center, squelching audible even over the sound of the roaring waterfall. Amidst her pleasure-drunk haze, her cheeks burned with embarrassment, because surely at this rate her drooling pussy was dripping arousal down his arm. It was almost perverse, the way he’d skipped to this without so much as a kiss, a caress or kind word to prepare her. She could feel his gaze on her sopping cunt, feel him studying her reactions, feel him watching every move she made and every gush of fluid from her overstimulated sex. She wanted to stop her hips, stop thrusting back against his hand like a bitch in heat, retain even a shred of her dignity and play coy a moment longer, but she couldn’t find the willpower. It was all just too fucking good, and a moan spilled from her mouth unbidden.

Kurama loosed a growl. “The sound of prey who knows she’s been hunted and brought low. I want to hear it again.”

The fingers pulled from her body, leaving her cunt to clench around nothing in a desperation so strong it had her crying out with need. Kurama chuckled at the sight, and then his arm slid beneath her waist, the world turning over in a dizzying rush as he flipped them in place so she sat between his spread legs, her back to his chest, arms around her like a vice. He was rock hard behind her, evidence of his arousal pressing against her ass, hard and hot and huge. She shimmied against it with a needy whine, but he ignored her, instead thrusting his hand with the shorn claws back between her legs. The other hand stole around her throat, cupping her jaw, tilting her face up and away so he could run his teeth over her throat and shoulder and ear, nipping and sucking at the lobe before his teeth sank home once again in her shoulder. Hot warmth slid down her chest as his fingers spread her folds and gave her clit a cruel pinch before working furiously at that swollen bud, circling it just so, just the way she liked the most. Her legs spread wide without a care, heels digging hard into the mud for purchase, not caring that she was filthy, no more resistance, only surrender as he wrung sadistic pleasure from her exhausted body.

The hand around her throat tightened at the sides, her head growing light and floaty at the pressure, but even in that frenzied moment he didn’t restrict her airway. He pressed his fingers back inside her, grinding her clit against the meat of his hand, crooning praise in her ear as every nerve ending caught fire. She was dimply aware of the way she babbled, a chorus of his name repeated over and over again, mixed with demands for more, calls for him to never stop, begging him to keep going. And he did. He pushed and pressed and rubbed, sending her pleasure climbing, circling, all the more heavenly in comparison to the hellish pain in her shoulder, pressure in her hips tightening and pulling taut until—

She took a deep breath, orgasm a single brush of his finger away —

And as if he could sense its approach, he stopped.

Completely.

Part 1 | Part 2: “A Chase in the Dark” | Part 3

NOTE: let’s just call this chapter performance art. she’s frustrated, and so are you, and art is supposed to make you ~feel something~… and that means this is art!

actually I’m just a pretentious dipshit sorry not sorry LMFAO kurama is an asshole and so am i, which is why we stopped there… because if she has to suffer, then so do weeeee. this turned into three chapters instead of 2 because it’s fun to torture you… Kurama and I are a lot alike in that sense (◡‿◡✿) see you next time to watch them fuck each other’s brains out

#kurama x oc #kurama x reader #yyh x oc #yyhsmut #(n)sfw #yu yu hakusho #kurama #shuichi minamino #minamino shuichi #youko kurama #yyh kurama #shuichi minamino x reader #shuichi minamino x oc #youko kurama x oc #youko kurama smut #youko kurama x reader #yyh x reader

165 notes · View notes

chiwhorei · 3 years

Text

𝐬𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐧 𝐝𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐥𝐲 𝐯𝐢𝐫𝐭𝐮𝐞𝐬

paring: kenny ackerman x fem!reader

genre: apocalypse!au, smut, dark content, 18+ mdni [cross-posted to Ao3]

word count: 3k

overview: kenny *i-wouldn’t-fuck-you-if-it-was-the-end-of-the-world* ackerman; but it is and you do . . . and you’ll probably do it again. or, if you read beyond the cut and wind up in hell that is legally not my fault.

tags: dymph does sacrilege once again, post-apocalypse au, blood, violence, zombies (only mentions of gore nothing specific), somnophilia, noncon, dubcon, degradation, smoking, insertion, sloppy oral, big age gap aka kenny is a nasty old man and reader is a sweet little virgin.

a.notes: happy *fucking* easter. this is for the smut pile’s apocalypse collab so go give everyone’s pieces a read, everyone has worked so incredibly hard. this is dedicated to @pleasantanathema, who was both my beta reader and emotional support while stringing this together. here’s to the old man fuckery, cheers.

hymn: the seven deadly virtues - camelot

But stay awake at all times, praying that you may have strength to escape all these things that are going to take place, and to stand before the Son of Man. -Luke 21:36

* * *

Wet.

A sticky kind of wet. Clinging on like thick clay, splattered across your neck— gore and sinew wrapped in a noose. Shades of decaying reds and browns are all you see these days.

The seeping, molding kind of wet.

The smell is suffocating, the toll of death deep in your bones. You keep moving, you have to. One foot in front of the other, fingers fretting with the cross hanging between your collarbones. Counting your Hail Mary’s distracts from the ache in your soles and the burning feeling that you’re rotting away.

It was slow at first. The end of the world, the crashing, clattering end felt like a slow decent to hell. Pieces of the modern world falling away, the promise of tomorrow, the assurance of a cure. You refused to believe the dead could walk the earth until they were stumbling straight towards you.

All of us, you think, are rotting away.

“Pick up the pace, kid. Are you trying to end up like the rest of those fuckers?” His voice rings from a few feet in front of you. The brush under your feet is dry, leaves crunching loudly with every weary step forward.

Kenny always likes to remind you of your naïveté, insults about your rose tinted glasses barked crudely from around a cigarette. Your youth, your optimism, your beliefs-- useless traits in his opinion. What good is God in a world like this.

“Friends. They were our friends.” Your words come out in a whimper, the tone further irritating the man ahead of you.

He stops, turning around to catch your eyes, gaze piercing through the night like a knife. All that’s left of your composure is used to keep from crashing right into his chest.

“Ain’t no more room for friends in this world, baby doll,” a long pointer finger lifts your chin, the slightest touch still bruising, “thinkin’ like that is what’s going to get ya killed.”

Rose tinted glasses, cracked and splattered with blood, fall off and are lost to a world that no longer exists. Kenny let’s up and turns, pulling you farther into the thick brush. You could swear you feel the lenses as they splinter under your shoe.

* * *

Kenny is a vile man. He knows his name isn’t on a reservation list at the Pearly Gates, he’s aware that a sinner lives on borrowed time.

Nowadays, everyone is living on borrowed time. Even you.

You, he thinks, looking back to where you stumble over a tree branch, far to good for a world like this.

He can’t help but laugh, the absolute absurdity of his current situation. Escaping death by the skin of his teeth, watching any familiar faces burning in the remnants of a camp he couldn’t really call home. People that fought to the bone, melting or devoured or both.

And then there was you, standing in front of the flames, tears falling down the apples of your cheeks, stiff in shock and horror. He remembers the way your lips moved, mumbling a quiet prayer instead of trying to run. Stupid little thing.

It’s not the earth the meek inherit; it’s the dirt.

Was it pity that made Kenny pull you away from an infernal gravesite all those months ago? He’s never the hero of any story. No, it must have been something else.

Maybe it was the way you looked up with teary eyes, silently begging for help. Unwittingly making a deal with the devil. His teeth grind at the memory, the vision of how beautiful you look so completely helpless.

Kenny leads and you follow, he hunts and you flitch at the sound of an arrow piercing flesh. The small squeak and proceeding thumb of meat as it hits the ground never fails to make you sick. When he’s not hunting for food, he’s hunting something else.

The sounds of death are all the same.

Some days you’re lucky, coming across abandoned hideouts or deserted cars. Snagging whatever hasn’t already been picked over; some ammo, the occasional can of peaches or pack of cigarettes. Kenny laughs dryly everytime, chucking the carton into his bag. Always the cigarettes, never the lighter. Most days, not so much.

Every night, you fall asleep to the flicker of a campfire, lulled by the steady sound of Kenny’s knife as it scrapes against a piece of wood. He’s always the last asleep. The woods are a dangerous place, the possibility of monsters circle at every moment. Under the veil of night, anything could happen. And it does.

He wipes his mouth, settling back into the harsh ground below him with a pleased hum. Your whimpers have settled back into a light snore.

Kenny is a vile man, and you’re too concerned with the lifeless villain in the shadows that you forget about the one sitting on the other side of the fire.

Three months of waking up to aching limbs and misplaced panties can’t be a coincidence, can it?

* * *

“Well ain’t this something.” Kenny pulls on the door, swinging it open with a loud creek. Your neck strains to look up at dark wood and steepled roof, the tall building hidden by dense forest, you two must be the first people to step inside in months.

“A church.” You’d find comfort within these walls if you weren’t so positive that God had abandoned this world.

Statues of the Virgin Mary and Saint Joseph are empty behind their stone eyes, shadowed with an unsettling shade of red from the stained-glass windows. The moment is a time capsule, a vision of the congregation of saints bathed in blood.

A chill runs down your back, counting every vertebrae.

You push down the unsettling foreboding, focusing back on the instincts to survive instead of lingering on a religion that you can no longer make sense of.

“Hey kid, over here.” You pick up the pace, quickening footsteps away from holy symbolism and towards Kenny’s voice. You walk into the closest room off a dark hallway and find him leaning against the doorframe. The rooms are getting darker with the vanishing sun, but you make out shelves of cans and boxes, food, blankets, clothes.

“I bet they used this as a food pantry,” Your comment was probably an obvious assumption, but Kenny just hums in response, “there’s enough here to last up months.”

Good samaritans in the first life are a saving grace is this one. Your cynicism lifts from heavy shoulders for just a moment. The lines between luck and divine intervention are fuzzy at best.

“I saw a well right outside too. Water’s probably cold as ice but it’s better than anything we’ve come across yet.” Kenny’s voice is even, but you swear he cracks a smile.

He was right, the water is cold enough to shatter your bones like ice. You shiver and chatter, teeth threatening to crack, but the feeling of being clean has you dumping bucket after bucket over your head. The grime and grit of your reality running down to seep into the grass below.

There’s no home to run to after the world ends, but water and food is more than you could imagine in recent months. Shuffling through boxes of donated clothes, you find a shirt big enough to sleep in. The fabric smells like moth-balls and dust, but the feeling of clean cotton against your skin is heavenly.

You find Kenny in the clerical office, rummaging through the priests desk. The sun is replaced with a flight of candles, for the first time in forever, you don’t feel like death is standing right behind you.

“Would you look at that,” Kenny pulls a cigar from the desk, bringing it up to his nose for inspection, “Looks like father had his own little habit.”

Despite yourself, you laugh at his comment, rounding towards the large leather chair he’s settled into.

“Smoking kills you know.” You lean against the desk next to him. Your bare legs brush against his knee, the heat from your skin makes his mouth water.

“I think there’s more pressing concerns than tobacco, kid.”

There’s something different about tonight, even more than just the four walls and roof around you. There’s something about Kenny and the way his stare has followed you all night. You can feel a cord pulling taught, fraying in the middle before it snaps.

“Asshole.”

The plush of Kenny’s bottom lip is close enough to your cunt to be disastrous. Friendly banter becomes laughing and swatting at his chest like a teenager. Communion wine and tension pulling you into him. The loneliness of this life becomes more apparent the closer he is to touching your skin. When did the man in front of you make your heart race so fast?

Maybe you’ve always felt this way.

You feel it, the ghosts of last night, the night before. The ghosts of weeks or maybe even months. The familiarity of a touch you weren’t quite awake for.

Ass arching off from where it sticks to the cherry wood, you want to feel it again. The laving of tongue and mouth against you. The devouring of your most intimate planes of skin, places no one else has ever touched before, places you were saving for your future husband.

The kiss as hot as hell.

“Awe, c’mon now,” His nose nudges against your clit, the movement pulling another cry from your throat to bounce against the high ceiling, “that’s not my name.”

“I’ve been tracing it into this precious cunt of yours every night,” each word is more unhinged than the last, no longer worried about the doe in his sights running away, “Do I need to spell it out for you again?”

There’s nowhere to run, pressed in between his canines.

Dreams of calloused fingers and a wandering mouth are now cementing as memories. The feeling of rough facial hair. The sounds of desperate moans and how they shake against you.

The way his tongue curls like a signature.

His mouth is flush against you again, sucking at your aching clit for only a moment before moving his attention to long lashes against your clenching hole.

“You must remember. You were moaning it so sweetly,” he nips at your puffy lips before drawing back. His chin is sheened in your arousal, slick refracting off the dimly lit space between you, flickering candles outline his features with a dance of orange shadows. Kenny’s eyes hold you captive, giving you one more chance to answer.

“What’s my name, kid?”

His tongue breaches you, a set of large, familiar hands keep your legs spread wide atop the desk.

You remember— of course you do. You remember everything. The name stuck in your head like a broken record. The name you call for in a sleepy haze as your body is dragged into orgasm.

The name that’s spelled against you like a promise.

“K-Kenny please.”

That’s all that he needs, the only thing, if he’s being honest, that he’s ever needed.

“There’s my sweet little girl. Finally using your manners.” Two fingers come up to swipe against your pussy, stopping right before your clit and collecting slick to bring up to your eye line for inspection. You jump when the warm digits drag against your bottom lip, a silent prompt for your mouth to fall open.

Kenny sticks his fingers in, the intent to make you gag is clear but you take it. You’ll take anything he gives you. Your tongue swirls around the intrusion, running against each joint and suckling loudly. The sound is wet and lewd, the spit collecting at the corners of your mouth makes his head spin.

Your destruction, he decides, will be beautiful.

Kenny’s fingers release with a wet pop. He runs callouses down from your cheek, over the curve of your tits and down your abdomen. Two fingers stop at your pubic bone to trace lightly against the skin in random patterns.

“Your body is just as agreeable when you’re awake.” His words drip in sin, reminding you exactly how familiar he is with you. All of you.

Both thumbs come down to spread your lips, Kenny can’t help but take a moment-- just a beat-- to stare at your swollen, glossy clit and the quiver of your little hole. Your skin is soft, completely untouched by anyone else. He laid claim to almost every inch before you begged him to.

He sinks from the leather chair, kneeling in front of you. You’re the body and blood as far as a sinner like Kenny is concerned.

There’s a plea stuck in your throat. You want to beg him to slow down, it’s too much all at once, but you know if you cried out-- all you would do is beg him for more.

His tongue is long and flat against you, every swipe is punctuated with a growl. The rumbling from his chest is thrown against your clit like a current through cold water. Sharp, shocking, terrifying.

“Kenny, I- I want,” He sucks your throbbing clit into his mouth, rubbing the tip of his tongue against the hood. There’s no words in any language that make sense to you. There’s nothing but his name.

“Kenny ah, I need, I don’t know how t—”

Your dangling over a fire, trying desperately to jerk away from the lick of the flames.

“I know, kid, I know exactly what you need.” his breath is heavy and warm in fans across your skin. You're dripping down the sides of his face and onto the cleric’s desk. Kenny is covered in you, open mouthed kisses against the sweetest thing he’s ever had in his mouth. The tangy taste of your pussy mixing with the wine still on his tongue.

If he spent forever between your thighs, it wouldn’t be nearly long enough.

“Such a sweet little thing, you’re insatiable.” All you can do is nod dumbly, eyes glazing over with a distinct look of teary submission. It’s so new to you, but grinding upwards and catching your clit against his chin seems like second nature.

The primal need for release is much stronger than any prayer of abstinence.

“What would your little prayer circle think if they knew you spread your legs for a dirty old fucker like me?” Kenny coos against the apex of your thighs. His words knock on the hollow space behind your breastbone.

Your family and friends, the priest from St. Mary’s who baptized you, old man Jaeger from next door— all buried or burned to ash or so much worse.

Anyone you’ve ever loved is dead, maybe that’s why Kenny is still around.

There’s nothing that can hold you back anymore, the control you claw at slips from your fingers like watery silk. There’s no escaping the roughness of his stubble and an evil, serpent tongue.

“Kenny!”

You cum with a shattering cry, the sound ringing so loud in your ears you swear any enemy of the living in a 10 mile radius could hear you. In reality, what escapes is little more than a broken snivel.

It hurts, muscles aching from the exertion of trying to keep from falling apart. Your body is a hairpin trigger, the comedown feels more like withdrawal.

“There’s my girl, my good little girl.” His voice is uncharacteristically soft, doting while you fall back to earth. It’s a strange feeling, you’ve never found comfort in Kenny before, he isn’t the shoulder you go to lean on.

But tonight he’s the chin you buck into.

The aftershocks run across your naked skin, already missing the feeling of his touch as he settles back into the cracked leather chair.

His cock presses into the denim confines uncomfortably, the ache can wait though. Whether this is his last night alive or has all the time in the world-- he’s going to savor the glistening prize nestled between your thighs. Kenny’s fingers find the cigar where it lies next to your knee, bringing it up to examine while you squirm at the cold night air against your wet cunt.

“No one will ever make you feel as good as I do,” both legs kick out, falling to dangle on either side of his knees in surprise as the cigar comes down to trace your outer lips. He presses the tuck inwards, pulling out slightly so you cry out. The harsh texture of the wrapper mixes with the most minimal of stimulation, causing tears to clump in your waterline.

“Why don’t you think of a way to repay me, hmm?”

You push past the heaviness in your muscles, sitting up to meet his incredulous stare. Kenny sticks the cigar between his teeth, striking a match from the desk drawer to light the cap. The cigar is stale, cheap tobacco. But every drag now tastes like you.

“I- I could try to--” Words are left unspoken on your tongue, even now, the intonation is poison in your throat.

You expect Kenny to laugh at your bashfulness, instead, two fingers come up to curl around the Rosary around your neck. He drags you forward, exhaling smoke into your parted, quivering lips. You try your best not to choke.

He pulls the cigar away, ashing it carelessly on the floor.

“Use your words, kid, tell me what you want.” His words are sleazy but his voice is soft around the edges. Prompting you to shuffle onto his lap. His free hand rests in the small of your back to keep you steady.

“I want--” Fuck, your voice feels like it’ll fail, you take a moment to breathe, “I want you to fuck me, Kenny.”

Your plea is rushed, so quick to hit his ears he almost misses it. There’s no hiding anymore, there’s nowhere else in this world but the private quarters of a long-dead clergy member. The space between you and Kenny is foggy and tense, only inches between lips.

There’s no more penance in this world, no more time to sit and atone for his sins with prayer. The soft, syrupy feeling of your cunt wrapping around his cock is a slice of heaven, cut out and stolen right from the sky.

“I thought you’d never ask, doll face.”

✞ all writing is dymphnasprose’s original content, please do not repost or modify. do no read my content as asmr.©️

#aot x reader #aot x reader smut #aot smut #kenny ackerman x reader #kenny ackerman smut #the smut pile: apocalypse #tw: somnophilia #tw: noncon #tw: dubcon #tw: blood #tw: sacrilegious #sin.somnophilia #sin.noncon #sin.dubcon #sin.blood #sin.sacrilege

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a-small-batch-of-dragons · 3 years

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Prompt: if prompts are still open: virgil as an adventurer who keeps accidentally befriending the monsters he’s supposed to be fighting (aka the other sides)? have a wonderful day! (and don’t feel any pressure to do this at all, and if your inbox is meant to be closed absolutely delete this ask)

Thanks for the prompt, babe!

Read on Ao3

Warnings: sympathetic remus & deceit, some ptsd flashbacks but nothing super explicit

Pairings: LAMP, DLAMP, DLAMPR, can be platonic or romantic but Virgil’s definitely got some gay panic in there

Word Count: 8153

Virgil’s got a simple code when he’s not on a hunt. Don’t hurt whatever you don’t absolutely have to, and odds are, it won’t hurt you. Now and then there’s a bit of an, um, incident where that doesn’t quite work out as well as they’d hoped, but by and large they get by.

Or: 5 times Virgil helps a monster he was supposed to kill, and 1 time the monsters help him

He sighs as he walks outside, grabbing the pair of gloves from the rickety tray and tugging them over his weathered hands. The front garden isn’t nearly as overgrown as it was when he found this little cabin in the middle of nowhere, but it’s got a long way to go before he can walk through without tripping over at least one overgrown bramble.

There’s a very persistent mint plant that’s slowly and surely trying to choke the flowers. Virgil bends down and starts to toil in the dirt.

“Come on,” he mutters, because he’s allowed to talk to plants when no one else is listening, “let’s stop doing that, you don’t have to be literally everywhere…”

The mint doesn’t protest verbally, because it’s a plant and plants can’t talk, but Virgil would swear it tries to hold onto the dirt as he pulls it up, holding his hand under the roots to catch the dirt.

“Alright, come on out, then, let’s just…put you in here.”

There’s a plot of dirt in a crate resting at his knee. He pats the soil. Fresh enough. The mint plant looks almost contrite as he tucks it into the corner.

“Next time I go see the townspeople I’m sure you’ll make some tea-shop owner very happy.”

The rest of the garden goes similarly. By the end, he’s filled the crate almost halfway when his hand catches something sharp.

The blade gleams as it flashes through the air. The child screams. His eyes widen—

“No,” he grits out, flattening his hands into the dirt, “no, it’s…it’s okay. We’re okay. It’s…hhhh.”

As he exhales, his shoulders slump, head bowing almost to his chest. The sounds of blades swinging through the air fade as the breeze rustles the leaves surrounding the cabin. The faint smell of mint cleanses his nose of blood.

Virgil opens his eyes and carefully moves his hand away from the rose.

“When’d you get here,” he mutters, carefully lifting the leaves to examine the stem, “don’t remember seeing you.”

The thorns snag on the little pieces of dirt hanging from his gloves. He glances around. There aren’t any other roses nearby, not that he can see. And it’s probably not very good for it to be growing in the middle of this choked soil patch.

He stands and makes his way back for the sharper trowel.

Something hisses.

His grip on the trowel doesn’t waver but he turns his head casually to glance over his shoulder.

Something crouches in the garden, just barely visible over the crate. A tuft of hair, not dark enough to be a bear cub, not light enough to be a squirrel. His arm relaxes against his side, trowel snug against his thigh.

“Hello,” he calls, watching closely, “is someone there?”

He blinks in surprise when a cat pokes its head over the crate.

“Uh, hey, there,” he manages, “uh…what’re you doing all the way out here?”

In response, the cat leaps elegantly over the crate. It’s a slim thing, but not underweight. Its fur is bluish-gray, almost like a stormcloud. As Virgil watches, the cat sneezes and its fur turns a dappled brown.

Virgil sighs. “So you’re the mischievous sprite I’ve been told to get rid of.”

The neighboring village has tried several times to make him seek and destroy the sprite’s nest. Apparently, it’s been causing all sorts of problems. Books going missing, glasses breaking in the middle of the night, jars of preserves broken into. Now, that’s not really what Virgil calls a punishable offense, but the villagers were insistent that he find it and fight it. He’s done one of those things.

Well, technically, the sprite found him.

“There’s not much here that would interest you,” Virgil says, gesturing at the unkempt garden, “but if you want to tell me what you do want, then—hey!”

The sprite, of course, doesn’t wait for him to actually finish inviting it inside. Instead, the door creaks as the cat darts between his legs and vanishes.

“Be careful,” he warns, “there are sharp things.”

He pushes open the door to see the cat perched on a precariously high shelf, sniffing at the books. He sighs.

“I can get those down if you want, it might be easier than doing whatever the hell it is you’re doing now.”

The cat ignores him, pawing at the thick leather cover. He sighs and pulls off his gloves.

“Alright, just—wait a damn minute.”

Virgil grunts as he lifts the book of the shelf and carries it over to the table, opening it and waiting. The cat jumps up onto the table and sniffs at the pages. Its tongue laps at a word.

“You want more about that? Okay, let’s just—“

Yes, Virgil is talking to this sprite. He’s allowed to do that in his own home.

He turns the pages until the cat chirps.

“This? This what you want?”

The sprite stares at the page. It goes unnaturally still.

The hairs on the back of Virgil’s neck stand up.

Then it breaks; the cat shakes itself off and jumps down.

“That’s it? You done now?”

The cat’s tail twitches gracefully as it struts back to the door. Virgil rolls his eyes and follows it out.

“Well, I’m glad I could be of service,” he mutters as he closes the door.

Something rough touches his hand. He looks down. The sprite looks back up at him and licks his hand again.

“…you’re welcome.”

The cat sneezes, its fur changing back into the deep bluish-gray. Without another look, it takes off, leaping effortlessly over the crate and disappearing into the woods.

Well, stranger things have happened in Virgil’s life.

Shaking his head, he gets back to his garden. He glances at the rose before deciding that, eh, what the hell, it can stay another day. He finishes filling the mint crate and sets it near the front door, ready for his trip to the village tomorrow.

“Ah, thank you!” The tea shop owner beams as he hands it over. “I’m sure this’ll be plenty.”

“I’ve got more than enough, I promise.”

“Well, since that sprite disappeared, I won’t be running out nearly as often!”

Virgil blinks. “Huh?”

“Oh, the sprite you got rid of!” She smiles. “Thank you kindly for that, it was ever so pesky.”

Virgil just nods.

————————————

Virgil opens his eyes and doesn’t quite reach for the dagger he keeps in the nightstand but it’s close.

“There’s a dog in my bed,” he mutters, “standing on top of me, drooling on my face.”

The dog just barks. And changes color.

He sighs. “Are you the same one from last time? Was the book not enough for you?”

The dog barks again, jumping off the bed and trotting to the kitchen, its nail clicking on the floor. Virgil lets his eyes close for a second before getting up and following it.

“Alright, the book it—whoa.”

The dog is, um. Not a sprite.

A huge mastiff elemental sits in the middle of his kitchen. It looks up from when it was nosing at what remained of a chicken carcass and rumbles. Virgil raises his hands.

“I’m not going to hurt you,” he says lowly, “even though you did break into my house and wake me up. What do you want?”

The elemental turns and moves through the house, out toward the woods. Virgil stuffs his feet in his boots and follows, tucking a slingshot and his knife into his pockets as he goes. The elemental moves through the trees with an inhuman grace, the very edges of the leaves it passes smoldering. A thin tendril of smoke wafts past Virgil’s nose.

“She’s still inside!” The guard shouts as Virgil wrenches his arm away. “I have to go get her!”

“Sir, you’ll die!”

“She’s still—“

The top of the house crashes down as—

Virgil closes his eyes and brings his kerchief up to his nose. He breathes deeply. Freshly baked bread. Honeysuckle. The slightly tacky smell of leather oil. Breathe in, breathe out.

When he opens his eyes again, the elemental has paused, glancing back at him.

“I’m coming,” he says quickly, “I’m coming. Keep going.”

He shrugs the old ghosts off his shoulders and follows.

The elemental leads him to a clearing. Underneath a large, dead white tree, there’s a small den of moss. Virgil’s breath catches in his throat.

The villagers had sent him a warning about a curse in the area. Fires had been going out. It had been impossible to keep warmth in the houses over the long winter nights. They’d been seeing figures in the smoke, sightings of, well, a mastiff. They’d contacted him to try and get it to leave.

Well, the mastiff elemental is here, under the tree, looking back and forth between Virgil and something he can’t see, buried in the moss.

“Is there something you wanna show me,” he asks softly, coming a little further into the clearing, “in there?”

The elemental whines. He walks forward until he catches sight of a stone in the middle of the bed of moss. It’s cracked in two.

“Is this what you wanted to show me,” he calls, shifting into a crouch, “this stone?”

The elemental huffs, nudging his hand. It reaches past him and tries to pick up the stone in its mouth, only for it to drop. It puts its nose down and whines.

“…was this your favorite stone to play with?” The elemental butts its head against his shoulder. “I’m sorry it broke. How’d it happen?”

The elemental points its nose toward a jagged boulder in the corner of the clearing.

“Ah, I see.”

And you know what? Yeah, Virgil gets it. He’s dropped shit where he shouldn’t have dropped it before and it broke. What does it matter that this elemental is so upset over accidentally breaking its favorite toy that its warmth is so low the nearby villagers think it’s a curse?

“Hey,” Virgil murmurs, reaching out to cup the two halves of the rock in his hands, “it’s okay. This rock—good choice by the way, very good choice—it’s part of the Perse Mountains, right? So it’s susceptible to fire magic.”

He reaches into his slingshot bag and pulls out two small rocks. Using one on either side, he sandwiches the two halves of the broken rock together and holds it out to the elemental.

“Now breath on it.”

The elemental exhales carefully, bathing the rock in a steady stream of fire. Sure enough, in a few moments, thanks to Virgil holding it steady, the rock glows a soft yellow and reforges.

“That’s good.” He takes it carefully between the stones and rolls it around the moss, trying to cool it. “Okay. Try now.”

The elemental takes the rock gingerly between its teeth and yips.

Virgil chuckles. “I’m glad I could help.”

The elemental spins in a circle before turning back into the dog and licking Virgil’s cheek, barking excitedly.

“Okay, okay, you’re welcome, jeez.” He half-heartedly shoves the dog’s head away. “You’re getting slobber all over me!”

The dog pulls away and takes the rock into its mouth again, snuffling happily. Virgil shakes his head and gets up.

“If that’s all, then I’m gonna go home.” The dog licks his hand one more time. “Yeah, yeah, okay.”

And if a fire is already burning when he gets back home, well, that’s just a surefire way to know there was never a curse for the villagers to worry about.

Get it? Surefire?

Shut up, he’s hilarious.

————————————

“Ah, Virgil!”

Virgil turns. The blacksmith waves at him from the market stalls. Dodging fruit carts and weaving his way through passers-by, he stops in front of the man and gestures to the new wares.

“Good season, Anbel?”

“Oh, the best!” Anbel gestures to the coin chest behind him. “You know how it is, goes in and out of season.”

Absentmindedly, Virgil rubs at the scars on his arms. “I know the feeling.”

“Anyways, I got that dagger you gave me to repair.”

Anbel reaches behind him and pulls the dagger out of a leather bag. He holds it up. The deep gouges in the blade are gone, the handle isn’t tarnished anymore, and it looks…good.

“Thank you, Anbel,” he says, reaching for it, “so how much?”

“No charge.”

“Come on.”

“No charge,” Anbel repeats, “not for you.”

Unbidden, a flush rises to his cheeks as he tucks the dagger into his belt. “Anbel…”

“Alright,” the blacksmith says, holding up his hands, “I’ve got a favor to ask.”

Virgil sighs. “What’d you do?”

“Why do you assume that I did something?”

Virgil just gives him a look.

“…alright but this time it wasn’t me.”

“Uh-huh.”

Anbel smacks his chest. “I’m serious, there’s something wrong in the woods outside of town.”

Virgil sobers, taking a step closer. “What is it?”

“Dunno. But my horses won’t go past a particular stretch of land and I need to be able to make the trip next moon.”

Virgil chews on his lip, thinking. “Did they run away or just refuse to go near?”

“Refused to go near.” Anbel shakes his head. “Don’t know what’s gotten into them. They’re good mares.”

“Have any others reported anything?”

“Cindi had trouble getting through too.”

“Where is it?”

“Just before the bend in the river. Near the trees.”

Virgil sighs. “I’ll have a look.”

That’s how he finds himself wandering down the main road on the next cloudy day. He glances around to make sure there aren’t any other villagers nearby before he starts looking around. There’s a small grove of trees near the riverbank, a mound of rocks next to the bend in the road, and a rapid system rushing just out of sight.

Maybe the horses were scared of the rapids? They’ve been known to spook before. But no, Anbel makes this trip every season. If the horses were going to spook at the rapids, they’ve done it before.

Virgil frowns, coming to a stop in the middle of the grass between the road and the river. What could they’ve been startled by? There’s not enough space to hide anything here. The rocks are on the wrong side of the road. The river isn’t close or loud. And the trees aren’t close enough together to hide anything between them.

…between them.

Virgil holds very, very still.

Out of the corner of his eye, one of the trunks shifts.

He doesn’t move quickly, doesn’t draw his dagger, just lowers his eyes to the grass and turns, facing the trees, and takes a step backward. Then another. Then another. When he’s over ten yards away, he looks up.

“I mean you no harm,” he calls, “I have no wish to interfere. I was told that there was something that scared a few horses and wanted to make sure everything was alright.”

The breeze rustles through the leaves.

“I am happy to leave you here,” he continues, risking a step closer, “but I know that…this is probably not where you’d like to be. This isn’t an especially damp forest.”

The trunk shifts again.

“If there’s something I can do to help—“ he risks another step— “I’d be happy to.”

There.

The trunk shifts and seems to shrink inside as a jaculi unwinds itself from around its base. It blinks lazily at him with amber eyes, golden scales rippling in the faint light from the cloudy sky.

“Hello,” Virgil waves, “can I—will you let me come closer?”

The jaculi hisses and lays its head near the ground.

“Thank you.” Virgil walks forward carefully, stopping a few feet away and crouching down. “Now, what brings you here? You look like you’re an awful long way from home.”

The jaculi hisses again, its head swiveling toward the river. Virgil looks. Across the bank, he can see a much denser forest and what looks like a storm brewing.

“You’ll be hurt,” he realizes, “if you try and stay here…”

The jaculi coils tighter around the tree trunk.

“How’d you get over here,” Virgil mutters, “you’d’ve needed to swim across…and that also won’t go well for you.”

There’s a soft rustling as the jaculi buries its tail in a pile of leaves near the base of the tree. Virgil glances over to see it rubbing its face halfheartedly against the bark.

His eyes widen.

About a month ago there had been a terrible storm. His little cabin had barely held together. He’d heard reports from the tavern owner that it’d blown one of the old trees right over.

“That’s how you got across,” he murmurs, mostly to himself, “you climbed across the tree. And now it’s gone and you’re stuck.”

The jaculi blinks remorsefully at him.

“Okay,” Virgil mutters, “okay, we can…we can figure this out.”

They’ll have to do it at night. There’s no way the jaculi will feel safe enough to move while it’s still light out. There’s an old barn that never finished construction just over the ridge. One of those timber pieces is probably long enough to get over the river. And he can make a bridge wide enough to support the jaculi’s weight.

He explains his plan to the jaculi, feeling a little ridiculous, but he’s allowed to explain what he’s doing to help someone, it’s fine, and says that he’ll be back. Promise.

The landowner gives him a weird look when he asks to borrow the timber.

“It’s too long for you to do anything with it,” he says, still helping Virgil load it onto a sled, “and much too tough for you to cut by yourself.”

“It’s fine just the way it is,” Virgil says, “and thank you.”

He waves Virgil off. “Keep it. You’re doing better than I am with it.”

Virgil’s back at the river bend by sundown. He can’t see the jaculi anymore—it’s probably hidden itself for safety—but he calls out when he arrives.

“I’m going to use these to make a bridge for you. It shouldn’t take me too long.”

The pieces of timber are ungainly, to make a colossal understatement, but Virgil grits his teeth and slides them out of the sled. He wades a little into the river and—

The water is so cold it burns. He has to keep going. It’s gaining on him. He’ll be safe in the water.

The growls get closer and his foot slips—

“No,” he mutters, “no, it’s not that. I’m fine. I’m standing, I’m not hurt, I’m not drowning.”

He blinks down at his boots, the water swirling around his ankles. The timber in his hands shifts as he breathes. He’s fine. He’s fine.

“Okay…okay.”

He grits his teeth again and heaves, bringing the piece of timber with him. He wades further until it’s swirling around his waist. The piece of timber is just long enough to reach the other side. Onto the next one.

He gets the five of them stretched across the river just as the last of the light vanishes. Panting, he struggles back up onto the side of the river bank and splays out onto his back, eyes closed.

A low hiss sounds in his ear.

He just manages to avoid a scream.

“Hey,” he gasps instead, eyes flickering open to see the jaculi coiled up a few feet away, “uh…please don’t do that.”

The jaculi just blinks at him.

“Uh…why don’t you, uh…” Virgil holds a hand to his chest, trying to get his breathing back under control. “…try out the bridge?”

The jaculi slithers closer, flicking its tongue out against the timber. It looks back at Virgil.

“Go on,” he encourages, “you can do it.”

It slithers on, testing the boards against its weight.

Virgil holds his breath until the jaculi vanishes into the trees across the river banks, slipping further and further into the darkness.

Anbel leaves on his trip the next moon.

————————————

Honestly, when the kraken explodes out of Virgil’s well, he just sighs and fetches his bath so he can get the poor thing out.

“Easy,” he grumbles when the kraken squirms so much he almost drops it, “you may be a young one but you’re still heavy.”

Panting, he drops the tentacled beast into the full tub, his arms flying up to shield his face from the shower of sparkling drops. Judging by the happy trills and clicks, the kraken likes it in there. He shakes his head.

“So that’s why I’ve been asked to fight a monster in the sewers,” he muses, watching the kraken’s tentacles writhe giddily in the metal tub, “just how did you end up so far inland?”

The kraken, of course, does not deign to answer. Instead, the tentacles latch onto the side of the bath and threaten to tip the whole thing over.

“No, you idiot,” Virgil shouts, grabbing onto the other side and weighing it down. He winces when more water spills onto him, drenching him head to toe. “Now look what you’ve done.”

What the kraken has done, apparently, is get Virgil close enough so that its tentacles can haul Virgil into the tub.

“Hey!”

Virgil spits water out of his mouth, much to the kraken’s delight.

“That was rude.”

The kraken just chirps happily and wriggles around. Its tentacles stick to Virgil’s clothes and pull him through the water.

Virgil’s chest tightens.

One of the first things they teach you about krakens is never get in the water with them. The second thing they teach you about krakens is do not get in the water with them. The third thing they teach you about krakens is not to get too close to their tentacles so they don’t pull you into the water with them.

And yeah, this is Virgil’s bathtub, not a river, a tide pool, or the open sea, but you can drown in an inch of water.

Virgil presses his back up against the rim of the tub. The kraken seems to realize something’s wrong and settles, burbling softly.

“Hey, bud,” Virgil says shakily, “I, uh, what’re you doing here?”

The kraken twitches a few tentacles and more water slops over the edge.

“Right…” Virgil shakes his head. “Okay, well, uh, I would rather not sit here and soak through all of my clothes, so I’m just going to—“

As soon as he tries to move, the kraken wraps a tentacle around his leg and tugs.

“Okay, okay, not leaving, not leaving, um—“ Virgil reaches down and takes a handful of the grass. Worst comes to worst, he can tip the tub and get the kraken back in the well.

The kraken lets go as soon as he settles back in the water. Virgil looks at the creature carefully.

There’s a mark on its head. Discoloration, probably, but still obvious. As he watches, the kraken burbles to itself and starts making little ripples in the surface of the water with its tentacles. After a moment, it starts gently pushing the water towards Virgil.

The water laps at Virgil’s knees in little waves, not enough to wet him anymore—not that it would matter at this point—but enough to bounce back and make more patterns. The kraken trills softly and keeps doing it.

Does it…want to play?

Slowly, Virgil lifts his hands up and starts to push the water back. The kraken, realizing that Virgil is indeed committing to the idea that he is going to play with this kraken, trills louder and uses more of its tentacles to move the waves bigger.

“Yeah? Is that how it works?” Virgil moves his hands. “Like that?”

The kraken chirps.

He’s not really sure how long they stay there, playing with the water, but it’s long enough for the sun to go down in the sky and Virgil to get more than a little chilly in the water.

When the kraken notices that the water is rippling more around Virgil and he’s not moving his hands any faster, it wraps a tentacle around his ankle and tugs.

“What? You tired?” The kraken leans its head against the side of the tub. “Okay. Well, I don’t know how long you can stay in here—“

He cuts himself off when the kraken jabs a tentacle toward the well.

“You wanna go back in there? It’s so small and cramped, and the sewers in town aren’t much better.”

The kraken insists.

Sure. Why not.

Virgil grunts as he lifts the kraken back into the bucket, carefully lowering the creature down into the well. He hears one more trill before splashing sounds indicate that the creature is gone.

Funnily enough, reports of the sewer beast vanish overnight.

When Virgil wakes up panting from a nightmare of ropes around his neck, the glass of water on his bedside table is perfectly cold.

————————————

Virgil curses as the sole of his boot slips. He just manages to catch himself against the cliffside before splitting his knee on a harsh spire of rock. Gritting his teeth, he forces himself onward.

The cliffs frown over him as he makes his way up the pass. The rocks crumble threateningly as his boots crunch, crunch, crunch. The sword on his hip feels too heavy. He curses, tugging his glove the rest of the way onto his hand.

He never was one for dragon hunts.

The message came in a week ago. Some poor terrified soul had come screaming into the town, ranting about dragons, missing people, curses, the whole lot. Virgil had taken up the call and set off, promising to get to the bottom of it.

He never promised to hurt anything.

Thunder rolls ominously in the distance and he bites back another curse. There’s a cave up ahead, he can see it just over the next ridge, he’ll rest there.

In all honesty—and he can be honest, now there’s no one else around—he hates these kinds of missions. Finding something is one thing. Going to get something is one thing. Rescuing someone is one thing.

This feels like something else.

There’s something in his boot. There’s a wrinkle in the thinnest shirt he’s wearing. The sword belt is digging into his hip. The voices in his head won’t shut the fuck up.

The cave is right there.

He all but collapses to his knees as soon as he makes it inside, just as the first drops of rain land on the back of his armor. He breathes a sigh of relief, heading further into the cave, into the safety, out of the storm.

It’s quiet here.

He takes the knife out of its loop on his belt and sets about setting up a fire. There’s a reasonable stash of dry wood here, probably enough to keep him going throughout the night. He makes a small bundle and lights it, blowing on it until it catches and burns merrily.

Shrugging off his pack, he leans it up against the wall and starts to dig out the dried meat. He tears off a long strip with his teeth and chews slowly, staring into the flames.

There’s something nice about fire. Not all fire—he’s got the burns to prove that—but this fire. Controlled fire. He sits back on his hands, brushing aside the eggshells to lean against the cave wall.

Controlled fire is…justified chaos. It’s strange, to think of chaos as being justified. But that’s what it is. A controlled burn. Snapping and sparking amidst a small mound of wood, warm. Safe. It’s strange to think of fire as safe, too.

Virgil sits back, finishing off his meal and closing his eyes. The fire is very, very warm. Much warmer than he would expect for just a small campfire. And a little irregular, too. It comes in waves, pants, almost.

…wood, eggshells…

Okay, look.

Look.

Virgil’s tired, okay?

It’s not like this is what normally happens to him on hunts.

He knows what he’s doing.

He does!

It’s fine.

This is fine.

This is so utterly fine right now.

But…okay, yeah, maybe Virgil’s not been paying as much attention as he should be. And maybe he’s fighting down a panic attack right now. And maybe he’s frozen in fear to the floor of this cave and not sure how he’s survived this long.

Whatever.

Virgil cracks an eye open.

“…hey, there, dragon.”

Surprisingly enough, his head does not get immediately bitten off. Instead, the dragon looks at him, nostrils puffing hot air into his face. The smell of dank cavern air mixes with what Virgil really hopes isn’t decomposing human.

“Um…fancy seeing you here?”

The dragon huffs louder, still staring into Virgil’s soul. He risks a glance over its shoulder to make sure that yes, this is the only dragon in this cave, there aren’t suddenly going to be five of them. He spies the scales trailing further into the darkness, muscular legs, long, powerful tail. The dragon growls, snapping his eyes back.

“Hey, uh—didn’t mean to invade your cave.” Virgil scoots backward. “That was absolutely my fault. I can, uh—well, I can’t really promise to leave you alone, but I, uh…rain check?”

As if on cue, thunder booms from outside.

Shit.

A lower growl sounds from the dragon as its mouth curls up. Wow, those teeth are long…

“Can you, uh—so I know that this is a pretty big request, considering I just, you know, invaded your cave, but uh—maybe don’t eat me?”

Judging by the growl, that’s a no.

“Okay, I, uh—“ Virgil risks a glance around. His fire is still burning. Maybe he can at least get the dragon to back up before he—

He pauses.

Near the fire, the dragon’s leg looks…wet. Its scales are stained with a dark splotch coming from somewhere higher up. As he watches, the dragon shifts its weight and it gets wetter.

“You’re hurt,” he says softly, “you’re—oh, god, you’re hurt.”

He looks back up. The dragon’s snarl doesn’t quite soften, but its mouth relaxes a little.

“I’ve got salve and bandages in my pack,” he says cautiously, “if you let me get them, I can—I can help?”

Slowly, ever so slowly, he moves his hand to his pack, keeping the other one raised as he opens the flap and takes out the bottle and the bandages.

“Can I have a look, please? I’m just gonna…”

The dragon huffs cautiously as Virgil turns, moving around its body to crouch next to its injured leg. Now that he’s closer, he can see what’s happened.

A shard of metal is lodged in the soft space between two of the scales. Every time the dragon moves, it shifts, spilling more and more blood. Judging by how loud the dragon is breathing, it must really hurt.

“You poor thing,” he mutters, “how long has this been here?”

No response.

“We gotta get it out,” he says instead, looking for something he can use, “if we leave it in you might get infected, or…something else bad will happen.”

He pulls a pair of pliers from his pack and the dragon snorts.

“Easy, easy—“ the dragon’s eyes go wide at the glint of the flame off the metal— “hey, it’s okay, I’m gonna use these to get that metal outta you, yeah?”

It seems an hour before the dragon calms, gingerly stretching out its leg so Virgil can see the shard. Taking a deep breath, he hooks the pliers around the edge of the metal.

“Ready on three, okay?” He grits his teeth. “One…two…three!”

He yanks.

The dragon roars as the metal shard comes out in his hands, the side release almost sending him toppling back into the fire. Quickly, he discards the tools and reaches out to soothe the dragon, petting its scales and hushing it gently.

“Shh, shh, it’s out now, it’s okay, it can’t hurt you anymore.” He runs a hand over the dragon’s heaving back. “I’m gonna help you, okay? I’m here to help.”

It seems to calm the dragon, its breathing slowly but surely calming down as Virgil continues to speak softly to it. Honestly, if it were this easy to calm himself down, he would have a lot fewer problems.

“I’ve got to clean it,” he says after a minute, “just to make sure you don’t get infected. Then I’ll be done, okay?”

The dragon swivels its massive head around, looking at the wound, then back at Virgil. It heaves a great sigh and its chin comes to rest on the floor, staring at him. Guess that’s as close to permission as he’s gonna get.

“Thank you. This, uh, this may sting a bit.”

He barely gets a flinch as he starts cleaning the cut. Dragons. Once he’s wrapped the dragon’s leg as best he can, he turns to peer at the shard of metal he pulled out of the wound. He holds it up, examining it in the firelight.

It looks…wrong.

It’s too thick to be just something that happened to get in there, but too jagged to be something natural. It looks like it snapped off of something, but it’s not the right shape to be an arrowhead or a piece of a building. So what…?

He turns when the dragon starts to move.

It heaves itself to its feet, testing out its weight on all four legs. When the pain doesn’t shoot through, it lumbers off, further into the cave. Its head dips down, out of sight for a moment, before it turns and starts back toward the fire, dragging something in its mouth.

Virgil’s eyes widen when another bag is dropped in front of him.

“Is this…is this someone else’s?” He lays his fingers carefully on its surface. “Did…did you…did someone else come here before me?”

The dragon huffs.

With trembling fingers, he flips open the bag. There’s a good store of meat in here, a change of clothes, something for armor, it’s a provisions bag. One side has a little loop attached with nothing inside.

“…someone tried to stab you,” he realizes in horror, looking back up at the dragon. “Someone tried to fight you but couldn’t. So they stabbed you in the leg.”

His fists clench.

“They hurt you.”

Another huff. Then the dragon nudges the bag toward him again.

“Is there something else in here?” Virgil starts sorting through the possessions. He lays the clothes to one side, the bottles to another. When he gets to the food, the dragon leans forward and snorts, blowing hot air into his face.

“This? This is what you want me to get?” He looks at it. It’s just more dried meat. It, uh, it actually looks a little better than his. “Are you hungry?”

The dragon snorts at Virgil’s pack, then at the food in his hands.

“…are you…giving this to me because I’m still hungry?”

Another huff, longer this time, and the dragon’s head comes to rest on the floor, eyes staring up at him.

Virgil swallows around the sudden lump in his throat. “Well, that’s—thank you.”

The dragon rumbles as he starts to eat, eyes blinking lazily. Virgil tries not to mind too much.

And…honestly? It’s not that bad. He’s had worse audiences when he’s just trying to eat. The dragon switches its tail every now and then, huffing gently to keep the fire going. It’s…nice.

Virgil finishes eating as much of the food as he wants and tucks the rest away. He takes a moment to just…look.

“The other person,” he says eventually, “the one that hurt you…they—I think they wanted to kill you.”

The dragon stares at him like he just said the sky is blue.

“No, really, I—I don’t think they wanted anything else.” He shakes his head. “We’re not near enough to any villages for that to be the reason, there aren’t any traveling paths through here, there’s…there’s no other reason. I think they just wanted to kill you.”

The cave falls quiet as the rain pours outside.

“…I think they wanted me to kill you too.”

Virgil’s chest aches. Something in his right hand tingles.

“Why do they always want me to kill you?”

And he’s not just talking about the dragon now.

It’s always the same.

Fight this. Kill that. Rescue us from this. Save us from that.

What if you’re not the ones that need to be saved?

Virgil lets his chin drop to his chest and sighs. His sword hangs heavy at his hip. His hands tremble in the burning light of the fire.

“I hate to impose,” he manages through a sluggish tongue, “but…may I stay? Just until the storm passes?”

A low thud makes him look up. The dragon shifts, its tail curled in a half-circle around Virgil and the fire. It huffs softly.

“Thank you.”

————————————

Sometimes he has sleepless nights. Drifts in blackness and emptiness until it’s time to get up. Or he’ll close his eyes for what feels like an instant before he wakes up the next day.

Sometimes he has restless nights. Can’t sleep, can’t manage to get more than a few minutes of tense darkness before his eyes shoot open and he has to reassure himself that’s he can sleep.

Sometimes he has good nights. Dreams of sunshine and warmth and the safety of a hot drink between his palms. Closing his eyes and just hearing the peaceful hum of his cabin.

Most of the time he has nightmares. The good ones are just mixes of monsters he can’t see coming, kills he wishes he didn’t have to make. Losing someone he should’ve been able to save.

This one’s a bad one.

Jaws close down on his arm. The creature whips its head back and forth, shaking him like a rag doll. He grits his teeth and tries to—

His eyes widen as the burning roof collapses on top of him. A heavy beam falls onto his chest and he can’t move, he’s going to—

The cliff face collapses under him and he plummets, fingers scrabbling for a hold against the crumbling face. He can’t reach, he can’t reach—

“….shut up, you’re gonna wake him up!”

“If you stop shouting, then he won’t.”

“Shh, the both of you.”

“This is certainly working, I think we should all keep talking like this.”

“Oh, don’t you start!”

“Hey, hey, shh! He’s waking up!”

Virgil is waking up, as a matter of fact, and he also has no idea where he is or what’s going on. He does know there are at least five people in this room with him though. That’s either a good thing or a really, really bad thing.

He can feel rocks under his head. Is he still in the cave, then? How other people…here? Where’s the dragon?

“Hey,” one of the voices says, “are you okay? You kinda, uh, well, you weren’t looking very good for a little bit there.”

“Back up, you morons, you’re gonna scare him!”

“We’re not scary, shut up.”

“You’re scary.”

“All of you be quiet,” the first voice says, before it softens again. “Hey, can you open your eyes?”

Well, I’ve definitely made worse decisions.

He wholeheartedly concurs with that thought when the first thing he sees is genuinely one of the most attractive people he’s ever had the pleasure of meeting face to face.

“There you are,” the beautiful person says, “good morning. Is your head alright?”

“Uh—“ not now gay panic— “uh?”

“Back up, Logan,” another person says, “let me see.”

Logan—great name, sure, why not—moves out of the way, and oh god there’s two of them.

“Hi!” The other attractive person leans over Virgil and gods— “are you hurt? You looked a little upset while you were sleeping.”

“You—“ Virgil does not squeak— “you watched me while I was sleeping?”

“Well, you fell asleep and Roman got worried, so—“

“I’m sorry,” Virgil interrupts, “who—who are you?”

The person in front of him tilts his head. “Don’t you recognize us?”

I would absolutely fucking remember meeting you, and I do not.

“Patton,” Logan says, “he’s a mortal. He won’t—we are not as we were when he met us.”

The butterflies in Virgil’s stomach ice.

These…these are creatures. Is he—what supernatural force did he piss off?

Logan smiles at him and winks. First off, rude, but—

Virgil squints. One of the man’s eyes is a deep bluish-grey. The other one—the one he just winked with—is a dappled brown.

Oh.

“…you’re the sprite.”

“I am,” he says, “my name is Logan.”

Something nudges his shoulder. Virgil looks over to see Patton offering him a round stone.

“…the mastiff elemental?”

“Patton, actually.” Patton smiles and gestures over Virgil’s other shoulder.

Why are there five of them and why are they all so pretty?

“Can you guess who they are?”

One of them rolls his eyes. “Yes, that sounds like a perfect use of time that isn’t at all a waste.”

“Okay, so you’re the jaculi.”

He smirks. “Janus.”

The one near the entrance to the cave just cackles and bounces on the balls of his feet. Almost like…

“You made me spill the bathtub over my whole yard!”

He cackles louder. “Yes, I did!”

Virgil rolls his eyes. He’s not fond. He’s not.

“Remus,” Logan scolds, “you said you were just going into the well.”

“He took me out!”

“Yeah, because that thing is cramped as hell.”

“Aww,” Patton coos, “how sweet.”

“Well,” the last one says, smiling softly from one of the darker corners of the cave, “we knew that, didn’t we?”

Virgil turns, looking hard into the darkness. The last person stands, walking over slowly, leaning most of his weight on one leg. As he moves into the light, he sits down on the log and reaches down. Virgil’s eyes widen as he gets handed the last of the dried meat.

“You’re still hungry,” the person says softly, “I can tell.”

Virgil cannot eat right now, thank you very much. Instead, his eyes are fixed on his bandage, still tied sloppily around the person’s leg.

“You’re the dragon.”

“I am. But you can call me Roman.”

“…does it still hurt?”

“Oh, this?” He smiles and moves his leg. “A little. But it’s almost better,” he finishes, reaching over to gently bump Virgil’s shoulder, “thanks to you.”

Yes, hello? Virgil would like for someone to explain what’s going on, please.

“I’m sure you’ve got questions,” Logan says, also sitting down, “and we can do our best to answer them. But first…are you alright?”

Uh, no. “Why do you think I’m not?”

“You’re breathing faster than most mortals do at rest, your face is more flushed than it was, and you were troubled while you slept.”

…shhh…

“I, um…I was having a nightmare.”

“Ooh,” Remus says, plopping down on the floor with his chin propped up on his hands, “was it a bad one?”

“…you could say that.”

“Remus,” Patton chides, “don’t.”

Remus pouts but hushes, reaching out to toy with a stick. Patton rolls the stone between his hands.

“You did seem upset,” Janus says, “can we help?”

“H-help?”

Janus raises an eyebrow. “Yes, help. Or is that not a thing most mortals do?”

Um. Well. Uh, hang on.

“Are you just going to be mean to him,” Logan sighs, “or are we actually going to make an effort to be friendly with the person we have decided to befriend?”

“Can one of you explain what’s going on?” Patton nods to Virgil. “Before he decides we’re all mad?”

Roman sighs. “Virgil? Are you still hungry?”

“Huh? No, no, I’m…I’m okay.”

He smiles. “Good. This…this might sound a bit strange, but…try and keep up?”

“As weird as it might sound, this isn’t the weirdest thing that’s ever happened to me.”

Roman blinks in surprise, a small smile coming over his face. “Isn’t it?”

“Well, you must have some idea of what I do for a living.”

Roman’s smile only grows. “Yes, as a matter of fact, we do.”

Logan clears his throat. Virgil turns, seeing the book from his cabin appear in Logan’s hands.

“Did you—is that my—“

“I can assure you,” Logan says softly, “that I did not steal your book from you. Rather, this is a copy, generated from the information I was able to learn.”

“What did you want?”

“We were cursed.” Logan closes the book with a snap. “Cursed to take on forms that were hated or feared or simply a nuisance.”

Virgil’s stomach drops. Cursed?

“I’m sorry,” he mumbles, “that sounds…awful.”

“It was,” Janus mutters, “completely inconvenient and an utter waste of time.”

“You say like it wasn’t your fault.”

“Oh, right, it was absolutely only my fault.”

“You two,” Patton huffs, “enough.”

Virgil’s still trying to wrap his head around everything. “Wait, hang on, so—you were cursed? Were? Past tense?”

“Well,” Janus gestures to himself, “I don’t exactly look like a snake anymore, do I?”

He raises a finger when Virgil opens his mouth.

“Careful, dear.”

Virgil snaps his mouth shut.

Roman rolls his eyes and places a hand on Virgil’s shoulder. “You broke the curse, my friend. Or at least…you helped us break it.”

“But how? I didn’t—I didn’t do anything.”

He raises an eyebrow and gestures to the bandage. “You don’t consider this doing anything?”

“Or this?” Patton holds up the stone.

Logan taps the cover of the book. “You helped us. When you had no reason to, past the goodness of your heart.”

“We would’ve been hurt,” Janus says quietly, “or hunted without you. They certainly would’ve killed me.”

“And me,” Remus says.

Patton nods. “And me.”

Roman simply taps his leg. Right. They already tried to kill him.

Virgil blinks. “So…me helping broke the curse?”

“You caring broke the curse,” Logan corrects gently, “and, well, when you...when you seemed to be in need, we wanted to care for you too.”

Oh.

Oh, fuck.

“So,” Roman says, smiling up at Virgil, “how can we help?”

“Help? With—with what?”

“The nightmares.”

“Oh,” Virgil mumbles, averting his eyes, “you, uh, can’t. Not really. They’re not a curse or magical or anything. They’re just nightmares.”

“But there must be something we can do.”

He shakes his head sadly. Believe him, if there were anything five unfairly attractive people could do, he’d tell them. But there isn’t. “They come with the job. There’s not—no one can do anything.”

He can practically hear Patton frowning. “That’s not very fair. You do so much for others, don’t they—don’t they care?”

Virgil shrugs. “Life isn’t fair.”

“So take what it won’t give you.” Janus folds his arms. “They don’t care for you. Even though you care for them.”

“They do care for me,” Virgil argues, “they’re kind. They help me.”

“Not with this,” he shoots back, “not with what you really need.”

“You protect everyone,” Roman says softly when Virgil opens his mouth to argue again, “who protects you?”

Who protects the protector?

“…no one.” Virgil shakes his head. “No one but me.”

“Well, you’re right. That doesn’t seem fair at all.” Logan sets the book aside and it vanishes into the darkness of the cave. “Perhaps we should endeavor to fix that.”

“F-fix it?” Virgil’s head jerks up. “How?”

“Let us protect you.”

“Protect me?”

“Do keep up,” Janus sighs, but he’s pretty sure he can see him smiling over there, “at the very least, we have magic. That should offer you something.”

“You don’t have to decide right now,” Roman says quickly, “but…thought we’d offer. Think it over.”

…well, if ‘protection’ involves seeing them more often, Virgil can definitely work with that.

“While I think it over, will you tell me how you got cursed?”

“So it was entirely Janus’s fault—“

“It was not!”

“Yes, it was!”

As Remus and Janus start arguing, Virgil smiles and leans back against the wall of the cave. Roman waves his hand and the cave wall warms, almost cradling Virgil. Logan settles on his other side, weight solid against his arm.

Yeah, he could get used to this.

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#sanders sides #fic #dragonbabbles #virgil sanders #roman sanders #logan sanders #patton sanders #janus sanders #deceit sanders #sympathetic deceit #remus sanders #sympathetic remus

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altruistic-meme · 3 years

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AFTG fic recs

Hi all! I just wanted to share some of my all-time favorite fanfics for aftg, for no real reason other than I want more people to read them and send their love to the authors :)

Under a readmore because it got. A little long. But please enjoy!

WIPs

Dangerous Habits by LovelyLittleGrim ( @lovelylittlegrim )

Andrew has run into problems while on undercover jobs before. None of those problems were anything like the troublesome runaway that is one Nathaniel Wesninski

Aka: the fic where Andrew is undercover as a hitman for hire and Neil is the guy who hires him. Things get complicated from there.

Undercover Andrew? BAMF Neil? Hitman AU?? Absolutely. I’m in love. The story is just *chef kisses*

Chapters: 8/9

Rating: Mature

Warnings: Graphic depictions of violence, past rape/non-con, Drake Spear (who is his own warning), Butcher Neil,

Negotiations by elesary ( @elesary )

This is what Andrew Minyard knows: his brother is dead, killed by a petty Raven prince who has never learned to keep his hands off of Andrew's things. His brother's daughters are his responsibility, a job that is made infinitely harder when their shitty grandparents want custody. Nathaniel Wesninski is a liar, but he might be the only way to avenge Aaron and protect his nieces. All Andrew has to do is watch Nathaniels - Neil's- back as he carves out his own life and identity from everyone who thinks they own him.

Andrew has always been good at upholding his end of the bargain, has he finally found someone willing to uphold theirs?

This fic has got me fucked up, honestly. I’m emotional over it. It’s fantastic.

Chapters: 11/?

Rating: Explicit

Warnings: Graphic depictions of violence, attempted sexual assault, Butcher Neil,

the upper hand by plantelty ( @plantelty )

Shortly after losing his mother, Neil arrives in the small town of Palmetto, South Carolina, alone in the world and with an impossible plan to carry through.

At the age of eighteen, Andrew ends up helping a boy stage his own death.

Just two fucked up boys learning to trust each other during the course of a summer, but also: multiple references to songs, twinyard angst (Nicky tries his best), The Plotting of Neil Josten's Gruesome Demise, and shit hitting the fan in a variety of ugly ways!

The cliffhanger has got me on the edge of my seat, but it is 100% worth the read and the wait for the last chapter!!

Chapters: 10/11

Rating: Mature

Warnings: Canon typical violence,

The Butcher’s House by Fire_Bear ( @fire-bear )

Andrew thought something was odd with the house the Foxes had to move into after their Athletes' House had been burnt down. He just wasn't prepared for what was actually wrong with it.

For this was a house full of monsters.

Ghost story! Ghost story! Ghost story! I literally think about this fic every other day, it’s fantastic.

Chapters: 6/?

Rating: Teen and Up Audiences

Warnings: character death (major or minor is unclear), injuries,

Promise of an Unbroken Boy by elesary ( @elesary )

Neil is caught by the police with Mary's burning body and is sent to juvie in Oakland where he is assigned to share a cell with one Andrew Doe, who promises him Exy, if only Neil will tell him all of his secrets. With no access to tinted contacts and hair dye, he agrees, it's only a matter of time until he's killed after all. What does he have to lose?

But Andrew's found someone who knows what a promise means, and he'll be damned if he lets that go without a fight.

Ngl this is definitely in my very top favorites -- I LOVE the idea of Neil and Andrew meeting pre-series, and this fic just BLEW my expectations for that plotline out of the waters

Chapters: 14/?

Rating: Explicit

Warnings: Graphic depictions of violence, Underage, attempted rape/non-con, canon-typical violence,

~~~~~~~~~

Complete

The Nameless Monster by kanekicure ( @kanekicure )

Nathaniel Wesninski wants nothing more than to see his father dead and buried. But when his father promises him the title of The Butcher, Nathaniel quickly realizes that his destiny of following in his father's footsteps is closer than ever before.

So of course, when he gets forced to go undercover for the Baltimore police, he starts seeing what living could truly be.

Andrew Minyard is a newly recruited police officer for the worst precinct in Baltimore, who is dedicated on hunting down the notorious Butcher and his unnamed underling. But when Neil Josten is thrown into his midst as his civilian consultant; he starts to realize some things don't quite appear as they seem.

I love the story telling -- the secret identities, the plotting, everything.

Chapters: 14/14

Rating: Mature

Warnings: Graphic depictions of violence, Butcher Neil, implied/referenced rape/non-con, implied/referenced child abuse, implied/referenced slef-harm (I believe there is a scene that is somewhat detailed on this subject), some characters also get drugged at one point,

that’s just something people say by nanatsuyu ( @theoctopusnods )

Neil makes the mistake of stealing the wrong car. Andrew makes the mistake of offering a ride to a liar. They both make the mistake of turning the whole affair into a road trip ‘home.’

Gonna be honest; the summary does not give a big idea as to what is in store and i am SO GLAD I gave this one a try so i’m telling you that you will be too

Chapters: 24/24

Rating: Teen and Up Audiences

Warnings: implied/referenced child abuse, panic attacks (somewhat grahic descriptions of)

The Story After You by kanekicure ( @kanekicure )

Andrew Minyard does not understand how Riko Moriyama landed Neil Wesninski.

How the snot-nosed, small dick, rich brat, second son of the Moriyama family who also just so happened to own the largest EXY gear and merchandiser company in the world “RAVEN” - had landed smart mouthed, quick witted, stupidly blue eyed Wesninski, was beyond him. Well, unless Wesninski was a gold digger, but Andrew doubted it.

Or; how Andrew Minyard says he doesn't get into messy situations, until he meets Neil and suddenly he is in the most messiest possible situation ever imagined in his life - oh and also, he might be becoming a homewrecker.

Ok I am behind bc I haven’t read the final chapter of this but!! I love the story, it’s very emotional and moving, and I love the characterization in it.

Chapters: 10/10

Rating: Mature

Warnings: Abusive Riko/Neil, abusive relationship, implied/referenced rape/non-con, implied/reference child abuse, implied/referenced self-harm, graphic depictions of violence, some descriptions of injuries/scarring,

This Complicated Life by 5a5b5p5 ( @andrewsbutterflyknife )

“This is exactly why I don’t want you and Andrew to meet,” Aaron says grumpily. “You two would get along far too well.”

Neil grins. “I just like pissing you off,” he says, “It’s not my fault your brother does such a good job at it.”

—

Neil doesn’t expect much from his Sophomore year of college, but when he becomes a waiter at the Palmetto Bistro, his life gets a whole lot more interesting. As it turns out, maintaining friendships new and old as well as navigating an interesting relationship with the head chef of the restaurant—who just so happens to be his best friend’s twin brother—is a lot more complicated than he’d thought it would be.

A much more light-hearted fic than most of the others! Includes a secret relationship, and also chef Andrew >>

Chapters: 10/10

Rating: Mature

Warnings:

When I Fade, Keep Me in Your Memory by demesh

Neil Josten has a secret: he can flicker out of existence.

He can vanish with the turn of a thought; click his fingers, and suddenly he’s not there anymore. Invisible and untouchable, he becomes a living ghost.

Having promised his mother never to let his ability go, Neil teeters the line between faded and real, a person and an echo. He can’t risk getting hurt.

But then, one day, someone sees him when they shouldn’t be able to.

A (flower-shop) AU about how a faded and lonely Neil finds it in him to become someone real.

Another fic that I need to catch up on ;; but anyway it’s amazing and I love Neil’s ability in it, it’s so well explained and well-written about

Chapters: 12/12

Rating: Teen and Up Audiences

Warnings: mentions of past abuse, panic attacks

12 Ways to Woo a Minyard by NikNak22 ( @knickknacksandallthat )

Neil is a math nerd who, by a stroke of dumb luck, falls into a group of friends that are the closest thing to family he’s ever had. So, when he tells them about his new mysterious crush, he shouldn’t be surprised how immediately they come up with a plan to help win them over. One they insist that if Neil follows it, he’ll have them falling for him in no time. But things don’t always go to plan – or do they?

Nicky wants to set him up with someone else. Matt and Jeremy are confused but supportive. Allison and Seth offer lewd suggestions, while Dan does her best to keep everyone in line. Jean and Renee know something, Aaron doesn’t really care, and Kevin just wants Neil to join the lacrosse team.

But one thing’s for certain – whether Neil’s successful or not, everyone’s got money riding on this.

The romance-trope-filled fanfic of my dreams. Sometimes you just need a fic of pure joy -- this is that fic.

Chapters: 14/14

Rating: Mature

Warnings:

finders keepers by moonix ( @annawrites )

Andrew meets Nathaniel through a scavenger hunt app. As their team takes part in a hunt that sends each of them to creepy, abandoned places alone to solve clues and gain points, Andrew and Nathaniel begin a little treasure hunt of their own. The anonymity of getting to know each other in small increments, never meeting face-to-face, allows them a level of intimacy neither are used to. Meanwhile Renee’s friend Neil is acting weird whenever Andrew shows up…

This was one of the first fics I read for aftg!! And BOY what a great start!! All of the little pieces and parts that work together, and just the scavenger hunt itself is fantastic! (I also REALLY wanna know if there is an app like this out there because I would be down to do that)

Chapters: 8/8

Rating: Mature

Warnings: (these all come from the author:) “mentions of historical abuse in a mental asylum, mentions of suicide, mentions of murder and kidnapping, morbid facts, creepy abandoned places including a haunted house at a theme park with disturbing rooms, special appearance of a creepy clown doll, fatphobia and some introspection on body image/complicated relationship with food, mention of self harm scars”

-----

Scared to Live (But I’m Scared to Die) by Major_816 ( @major816 )

Neil Josten goes to the Nest for Andrew, but he stays for a lot more.

"I'm sorry Coach," he muttered.

"For what kid?" Wymack shifted. "You've got to give me something to work with here."

Wymack watched the thin traces of sorrow as paper exchanged hands and he was looking down at a contract with the Edgar Allan Raven's.

"I signed them Coach, I'm sorry."

The one where Neil doesn't come back from Winter Break.

It is VERY dark, and is one of very few fics that I have actually been almost unable to read one of the scenes, so DEFINITELY pay attention to the warnings -- both these, and the ones provided for each individual chapter. I did go through the fic to collect as many warnings as I could find in the chapter warnings, but be sure to take care of yourself.

Chapters: 36/36

Rating: Explicit

Warnings: rape/non-con elements, implied/referenced rape/non-con, discussions of rape/non-con, canon-typical violence, graphic descritions, physical abuse, panic attacks, descriptions of injuries (often graphic), psychological warfare, dissociating, psychological torture, physical torture, use of knives, alcoholism/alcohol abuse, pain-induced delirium, rape/non-con, emotional self-separation, suicidal ideation/thoughts of suicide, emotional distress (which sums up the whole fic and also me while reading it), handcuffs/chains used as restraints, referenced/implied abuse towards animals, vomitting, begging, excessive use of painkillers, drowning, waterboarding, physical restraint, mutilation of an animal, mild hallucinations, non-con drugging, sleep deprivation, starvation, humiliation, the Butcher,

Also one of the first fics I read and 100% my absolute favorite fic!!! Which is adfjhsd a little worrying, considering, but it is what it is. Anyway. This fic absolutely wrecked me, and while it is technically complete, there is a sequel in the works! So! But I am so so excited for the sequel, and I am working on rereading this. It’s amazing. 1000/10.

#also!! btw i would love if anyone has more fic recs >> just an fyi >>#idk if demesh doesn't have a tumblr but i couldn't find one :(#also major816 for some reason i can never tag and idk why #aftg #all for the game #andreil #the foxhole court #tfc #andrew minyard #neil josten #fic rec #rec list

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limetimo · 2 years

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RAB fics I read this week

The Horcrux Hunt by Keysie good shit, good shit good shit!!! Pricky bastard Regulus plans to survive the cave, survives the cave, realises Voldy probably didn't stop at Horcrux, and goes to Dumbles, who assigns him a research partner: Remus Lupin! Remus takes one look at the younger man and goes "haha lets push all his buttons until his explodes" and does just that. Exquisite

and he smiled (with a mouthful of bloody teeth) by justprompts after the Prank, Sirius gets expelled and goes off to Drumstrang. And starts his own secret anti-Voldy movement and so on so forth go read it his interactions with Regulus are peak siblings comedy

To Love is a Gift by silverfield Regulus showed up at James' flat bleeding the heck out aaand whoopsie we did an oopsie, he can't quite remember how he got in this situation. So they need to investigate that and uncover the details of Regulus' betrayal.

Power the Dark Lord Knows Not by Fantismal, Jormandugr I'M SCREAMING get your tissues ready I had to take a walk after I was finished because I needed a breather. The tension is MASTERFULLY done here. On his quest to destroy the Horcruxes Regulus reaches out to Sirius (and later the rest of the family too). Warning for Big Emotions ♥

Not While I’m Around by Rosencrantz95 A little Black Bros on the battlefield interaction ♥ short sweet and will punch you in the heart

For the Best by Rowanmoonlight :((((((((( Walburga being a A+ parent 10/10 would hug her... with a rope around her neck

Sibling Rivalry by eprime 📷 :D Regulus has always had a Thing for his brother's boyfriend and well, since the opportunity arose, he's not going to say no... AKA how Remus got railed by both Black Brothers.

Dark side of the moon by hauntedpoem When he's home alone, Regulus listens to some muggle music.

Drugs and surgical scrubs by anauro !!! Doctor Regulus harbours a recovering addict James in his spare bedroom in hopes James going clean will make Sirius go clean too, and that he'll have his brother back.

Rewriting Fate by The_Yellow_Pen When they die, Regulus, Sirius, Bellatrix and Narcissa get all yeeted back to their teenage bodies. They can't quite agree what their goal is, or how to achieve it, but they're all agree that the future they lived sucked and they're going to create their own.

The Fighting and Most Sensible Brothers Black by Haunted_Frost "Though Sirius was warned, repeatedly, that his little brother was smaller, that he had to be careful." Top notch siblings dynamics, and Cat Animagus Regulus! Give it a read, give it a Kudos!

The Brothers of the House of Black by kwardart Hugs are rare in Grimmauld Place.

Different Paths of the Brothers Black by NWCountrygirl17 Sirius drags Regulus out of the Slytherin common room to apologise to a girl he called a mudblood.

The Noble Brothers Of Black by SuperxPrettyxKitty Black Bros Incest if you're into that, the execution didn't phase me personally. The writing is on the nice side of the scale

The Black brothers say goodbye by who5555 what it says on the tin, Sirius runs away from home

[ART] The Black Brothers by ElyonBlackStar the brothers share a moment, with art!

The Brothers Black by museme87 again, beautiful siblings interaction. it sounds like a good bye

Across Enemy Lines by Jegulus4life could use a beta but the plot is very nice! Regulus reaches Dumbledore before he even joins DEs, and it goes from there.

when you were mine by battlehamster Regulus on domestic arrest in single dad James' house you've seen this one here more than once already xD

Chain Reaction by Chaotic_Regulus_Stan, elder_millennial_trash, fuckboyregulus, givemethearapyimawalkingtravesty, Kiwiwhore Regulus melts James' brain by being a sexy bossy bastard

Tea Before a Crackling Fire by tinyscales just??? so ??? pleasant ♥♥♥

The Life You Lose by Fishielicious Regulus is a hot mess trying his best to survive (and keep Sirius alive) with the most chaotic stunts possible I love him your honour. Sorta an open ending? I do hope there's more where that came from. Read and comment, this fic deserves some love.

For Shits and Giggles by silverfield Regulus is getting pounded by stress of his parents' expectations AND a bunch of massive digesting disorders. He has no fucks left to give he just hopes he doesn't die before the end of the Quidditch season. If everyone could leave him alone, that would be nice too (*side-eyes Sirius, Potter, Barty and Evan*

Follow In Her Paw Prints by Erica45 McGonagall accidentally overhears Regulus' mental breakdown and adopts him ♥

By Your Heart's Calm Strength by pansysnarkinson Somebody burned Grimmauld place the f down with Wally and Orion inside my money is on Kreacher or Sirius also Jegulus

As Soon As He Can by Trex_patronus Ghost Regulus hunting the Horcruxes with Marauders (and Lily and baby Harry baby Neville and baby Luna. and their parents but the babies steal the show every time)

You and I Against the World by Trex_patronus Another peak siblings interaction! ♥♥♥ It's what they deserve! ♥♥♥

After Everything, Always by Reggie4dayzz After James messes up Regulus' chance at catching the snitch, it's fight or fuck... and they choose fuck. Very lovely!

tell them i was happy (and my heart is broken) by BlueSundayCake Regulus is in a coma for a couple years after the cave and wakes up to his high school sweetheart he'd thought he'd lost forever

#regulus black #fic rec #i have a problem ♥#am i making this list instead of important things? yes #yes I am!#kill me now

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gffa · 3 years

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There was this viral tweet that went around about THE UNTAMED awhile back that was basically the cycle of every fan of the series that I have ever met: 1. Wtf, THIS is the show everyone is losing their minds over? This isn’t even good! 2. Well, I guess it’s not that bad, it’s pretty watchable and fun, it’s all right. 3. I would now die for these characters. So, when I swore this drama wasn’t going to be a big fandom for me, I was just going to watch the show and then fuck off again, I should have known better. Because here I am, crying about feelings about the entire cast and devouring fic and yelling at anyone who will spend even five minutes listening to me about how much I love the OTP, how much I love the Yunmeng Siblings and their Terrible Communications Issues, and the Tragic Sibling Duos and the Tragic Doomed Loves and The Cutest Juniors In The World and how I want to lock ALL OF THEM IN A ROOM until they sort out their feelings! THE UNTAMED/MO DAO ZU SHI RECS - EMOTIONAL CONSTIPATION RUNS IN THE FAMILY - YUNMENG SIBLINGS FIC: ✦ Still in the Water by airgeer, lan wangji/wei wuxian & jin ling & lan sizhui & jiang cheng, 45k A year after Jin Ling’s early succession to the position of Sect Leader, a letter is delivered to him under strange circumstances. A night-hunt follows. ✦ no one lights a candle to remember by asravine, wei wuxian & jiang cheng & jiang yanli (& wangxian), 7.9k “Didi,” Wei Wuxian says softly. His thumb on Jiang Cheng’s cheek is calloused and warm and burns of affection. Jiang Cheng barely stops himself from leaning in. “Didi, don’t cry because of me.” ✦ can people untie themselves, uncurling like flowers by annemari, wei wuxian & jiang cheng & jin ling & lan wangji, 19.3k Wei Wuxian gets hurt on a night hunt. Jiang Cheng is displeased to find out that he’s been wandering around on his own instead of living with Lan Wangji in Cloud Recesses. He ends up fixing it. ✦ bark, bite by chashmish, wei wuxian & jiang cheng & lan wangji & jin ling (& wangxian), modern au, 3.4k Jin Ling finds a dog and learns some new things about his uncles. ✦ before you stumble by ribena, wei wuxian & jiang cheng & jin ling & lan wangji & lan sizhui (& wangxian), 9.8k “Uncle,” Jin Ling says. “Just because Uncle Wei - I mean, Wei Wuxian - just because he’s leading the night-hunt, he’s teaching, he’s not doing anything wrong, he even notified you ahead of time -” ✦ Five Dogs, One Cat by ryfkah, wei wuxian & jiang cheng & jin ling & lan wangji & lan sizhui & lan jingyi & nie huaisang, 13.4k If you’ve ever believed me in anything, believe I want what’s best for Jin Ling, the first line of the letter reads. Jiang Cheng has to stop and take a moment before he continues on to the next line: You must come to Carp Tower as soon as you can and lavish praise on the ugliest dog I’ve ever seen. ✦ Life is Very Long by Vamillepudding, wei wuxian & jiang cheng & jin ling & lan wangji & lan sizhui & lan jingyi (& wangxian), 12.7k Wei Wuxian is a good for nothing, possibly evil, possibly fake uncle. But he’s Jin Ling’s good for nothing, possibly evil, possibly fake uncle. So it stands to reason that when Jin Ling starts to suspect that Hanguang-jun is mistreating his husband, he immediately recruits Jiang Cheng for a rescue mission. ✦ a symbol to remind you that there’s more to see by paperminds, wei wuxian & jiang cheng & jin ling & lan wangji & lan sizhui & lan jingyi & ouyang zizhen, 9.7k For as long as Jin Ling can remember, he has been immune to the majority of supernatural hauntings that plague the cultivation world. Or: what if Jin Ling had received his first-month birthday gift. ✦ plea from a cat named little plum blossom by rolameny, wei wuxian & jiang cheng & jin ling, 5.1k Jiang Cheng is trying. Jiang Cheng is having a very trying day. At least the cat likes him. ✦ JC and WWX’s Get Along Sweater by newamsterdam, wei wuxian & jiang cheng & jin ling & lan wangji & lan sizhui (& wangxian), 29.6k Convinced Jiang Cheng and Wei WuXian will never reconcile of their own accord, Jin Ling takes matters into his own hands by trapping both of his uncles alone, together, without their cultivation. ✦ passed down like folksongs, our love lasts so long by finedae, wei wuxian & jiang cheng (& background wangxian), 6k winning a drinking contest, wei wuxian finds out yunmeng has got new folklore since he’s been gone. those are the stories of the Twin Prides of Yunmeng. naturally, he has to go confront jiang cheng for doing the opposite of talking shit about the dead; this is a confession of love. ✦ sorrow waited by curiositykilled, wei wuxian & jiang cheng, 2.3k No one gets out of the Burial Mounds alive and so Wei Wuxian cannot have been in the Burial Mounds — but sometimes Jiang Cheng starts to think it might be the inverse instead. No one gets out of the Burial Mounds alive and so Wei Wuxian didn’t get out at all. Someone, something, else crawled out. ✦ the trick is to keep breathing by alessandriana, wei wuxian & jiang cheng & jin ling, 3.4k Jiang Cheng probably should have anticipated the assassination attempt. He’d spent the last three weeks in Lanling browbeating the more intractable elders into supporting Jin Ling before his nephew’s first discussion conference, and he hadn’t exactly been kind about it. Still, he was a cultivator– if someone was going to try and kill him, he expected swords, or curses. Not poison in his tea. ✦ the road in leaves no step had trodden black by Skadiseven, wei wuxian & jiang cheng & wen ning & wen qing, 1.6k Jiang Cheng gets a little therapy session from Wen Ning, learns to plant potatoes, and decides he’s not giving up on something he wants. THE UNTAMED/MO DAO ZU SHI RECS - JUST STRAIGHT UP WANGXIAN OTP FIC: ✦ Fire in the Blood by Jo Lasalle (Jo_Lasalle), lan wangji/wei wuxian, nsfw, 20.7k Wei Ying is traveling, and he gets busy. Lan Wangji knows that sometimes, Wei Ying forgets things. ✦ scapegoat by astrobandit, lan wangji/wei wuxian, 1.3k Four ridiculous things the Yiling Patriarch was blamed for, and one ridiculous thing that was positively his fault. ✦ Content Warning: Romance by Ariaste, lan wangji/wei wuxian, nsfw, 5.9k Wei Wuxian just wants a little warning before Lan Wangji says nice things. Lan Wangji just wants to love on his husband, thanks. ✦ Where the Lonely Ones Go by CSHfic, VSfic, lan wangji/wei wuxian & jiang cheng & cast, 23.9k Accidental (haunted) baby acquisition ✦ devotee by tagteamme, lan wangji/wei wuxian, NSFW, 5.8k Lan Wangji does not control Wei Wuxian. Not in the way many wish he would. But like this— ✦ nothing gold can stay by rikke, lan wangji/wei wuxian & cast, nsfw, 10.3k Before Wen Chao can throw him into Yiling Burial Mounds, Lan Wangji finds Wei Wuxian. ✦ Wait, What? by MarbleGlove, lan wangji/wei wuxian & lan xichen, time travel, 1.5k AKA, that time sixteen-year-old Wei WuXian showed up at Cloud Recesses, took one look at Lan WangJi and declared, “That’s my future husband!” … and Lan WangJi said, “Mm” ✦ Beyond All Reach by airinshaw, lan wangji/wei wuxian & jiang cheng & jin ling & nie huaisang & lan xichen, NSFW, 27.4k Wei Wuxian heads back to Cloud Recesses to find out more about a curse someone has placed on him, that appears to do nothing. Until he meets back up with Lan Wangji and finds out that what the curse really does is stop them from being able to touch. ✦ Key Differences by pupeez4eva, lan wangji/wei wuxian & cast, 5.6k Wherein Wei Wuxian ends up meeting an alternate version of himself who, much to his horror, never married Lan Wangji. Obviously he has to do something to fix this. ✦ the heart is hard to translate by vespertineflora, lan wangji/wei wuxian, NSFW, rough sex, non-con play, 10.8k The moment comes almost out of the blue when, one relaxed spring afternoon, Lan Wangji decides that he’s ready to offer Wei Wuxian an opportunity to play out that very delicious fantasy about their stolen first kiss. ✦ Pigtail Pulling by protos_metazu_ison, lan wangji/wei wuxian & jiang cheng & nie huaisang & lan xichen, 3.7k Wei Wuxian trips over Jiang Wanyin and sends both of them to the ground in a tangle of limbs and bruises. ✦ The Last Three Feet by etymologyplayground, lan wangji/wei wuxian & lan sizhui & lan wangji, 3.7k A moment of down time in the Cloud Recesses. THE UNTAMED/MO DAO ZU SHI RECS - SOMETIMES YUNMENG SIBLINGS FIC, SOMETIMES WANGXIAN FIC: ✦ put your heart where your mouth is by protos_metazu_ison, lan wangji/wei wuxian & jiang cheng, 19.9k Having lost a month’s worth of memories might have been fine if Wei Wuxian hadn’t managed to forget the part where he and Lan Wangji got engaged. If that was, actually, what happened. He hasn’t figured out that part yet. ✦ Orchids in Lotus Pier by Vamillepudding, lan wangji/wei wuxian & jiang cheng & lan xichen & jiang yanli & jin zixuan & cast, 21.6k Against all odds, Lan Wangji and Jiang Cheng become friends. It’s just Jiang Cheng’s luck that people think they’re courting. And it’s just Lan Wangji’s luck that regretfully, Wei Wuxian is also People. ✦ Deeper grows my longing by feyburner, lan wangji/wei wuxian & jiang cheng, 4.4k Jiang Cheng stared at him. “How are you this dense,” he said flatly. “Wei Wuxian. The common people aren’t scared of you, they’re scared of your husband.“ “My what,” said Wei Wuxian. ✦ A Civil Combpaign by Ariaste, lan wangji/wei wuxian & jin ling/lan sizhui & cast, 31k “And,” said one of the pompous ministers, “there’s the matter of a marriage to consider as well!” Jin Ling, who at the beginning of that sentence had expected to slam into the very last wall of his patience and lose his temper entirely, paused. “A what?” ✦ Being Known by dragongirlG, lan wangji/wei wuxian & jin zixuan/jiang yanli & jiang cheng/wen qing & nie huaisang & wen ning & lan xichen & yu ziyuan & lan qiren & cast, 36.3k wip Teenage Lan Wangji drunkenly confesses his lust for Wei Wuxian during the guest disciple lectures at the Cloud Recesses and wakes up betrothed to him by way of forehead ribbon. It all goes from there. ✦ heaven and earth as witness by scheherazade, lan wangji/wei wuxian & jiang cheng & jin ling & lan sizhui, 8.5k Jin Ling has an emotional meltdown involving Lan Sizhui. Lan Wangji predictably overreacts. Somehow, it helps Jiang Cheng and Wei Wuxian finally have a conversation that they should have had years ago. THE UNTAMED/MO DAO ZU SHI RECS - SOMETIMES CASE FIC, SOMETIMES WANGXIAN FIC: ✦ grow by cafecliche, lan wangji/wei wuxian & lan sizhui & the juniors, case fic, de-aged, 14.4k Or: Wei Wuxian is cursed on a night-hunt, and the junior quartet rapidly finds themselves in over their heads. ✦ Linger in the Sun by etymologyplayground, lan wangji/wei wuxian & jiang cheng & ocs & cast, 39.4k Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji find themselves cursed, unable to see or hear each other. They figure things out anyway. THE UNTAMED/MO DAO ZU SHI RECS - WHEN I WASN’T LOOKING, I DEVELOPED NIE BROTHERS FEELINGS FIC: ✦ Pushover by nirejseki, nie huaisang & nie mingjue & lan xichen & jin guangyao & cast, 1.9k Every once in a while, not often, people who know them well will say that Nie Mingjue lets Nie Huaisang walk all over him. That isn’t quite right. THE UNTAMED/MO DAO ZU SHI RECS - YOUR HONOR, HAVE YOU SEENA-YAO’S PRECIOUS FACE? - LAN XICHEN/JIN GUANGYAO FIC: ✦ half cloak & half dagger by Fahye, lan xichen/jin guangyao (& background wangxian), NSFW, 13.1k Jin Guangyao lifts his head and smiles. "I’m considering a problem.” “Can I be of any assistance with it?” He drops a kiss on Lan Xichen’s chest. With the nail of one finger he lightly traces the characters for irony on Lan Xichen’s side. “Not this one, er-ge.” ✦ Hindsight by clockwork_spider, lan xichen/jin guangyao, ~1k Three years after the incident at the GuanYin temple, Jin GuangYao and Nie MingJue’s coffin was unsealed and their corpses, depleted of resentful energy, were finally laid to rest, their spirits released. 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But what place does Koi Tower have for a fierce corpse? ✦ The Past Didn’t Go Anywhere by FairestCat, jiang cheng & wen qing & lan sizhui, 2.3k There are rumours going around of a woman – a healer – travelling the countryside alone. Jiang Cheng needs to know if the rumours are true. ✦ If you only knew then (the things I only know now) by Nillegible, jiang fengmian/yu ziyuan & wei wuxian & jiang cheng & nie huaisang & lan wangji & & lan xichen & jin zixuan & cast, time travel (of a sort), 34.7k wip Yu Ziyuan receives a warning, a letter in Jiang Cheng’s handwriting, familiar, though it seems to have evened out over long years of practice. This was from her child, but not. This Jiang Cheng, grown up in ways that it hurt to contemplate, had endured the death of his family, his Sect, and his soul. ✦ partly frozen, partly flowing by astrolesbian, lan wangji & lan xichen & lan qiren (& background wangxian), 4.9k To discourage Lan Wangji from this idea would be to discourage him from loving, and Lan Xichen has always known that to be impossible. All he could do was nod as his brother looked at him, and finished, calmly, “Zewu-jun, I accept any punishment you see fit.” ✦ Delight in Misery by nirejseki, lan wangji & jiang cheng & lan sizhui & jin ling & lan xichen (&background wangxian), 17.4k wip For the first time in his life, Lan Wangji didn’t want to go home. (what if he had another option?) ✦ into the light of a dark black night by dragongirlG, lan wangji & lan xichen & madam lan, 3k On a snowy night in the dead of winter, Wu Yuhua, formerly known as Madam Lan, unexpectedly spends one last night with her sons before escaping from the Cloud Recesses. FULL DETAILS + RECS HERE

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writings-of-a-hufflepuff · 3 years

Text

School House Blues

Fandom: The Mandalorian

Collection/Series: Western AU- Putting Down Roots

Pairing: Din Djarin x Female Identifying Reader

Writer: @writings-of-a-hufflepuff aka @hufflepuffing-all-day-long

Warnings: N/A

Request from Anon: Hey so I saw your post that said requests for certain characters were open and I was wondering if I could ask for a din djarin x plus size reader with this prompt please? : (19th c) I’m the town’s school teacher and you’re the gruff wanderer/traveller/cowboy/outlaw/etc. That’s come to town. You help me fix the school house and wrangle the little demons I teach. I was thinking the kid could be one of her students! Thank you so much in advance ♥️♥️

Summary: When the bounty hunter strolls into your little mining town you don’t think much of it, but with a little boy in his wake and your school house in disrepair, he becomes more than just a passing visit, but a welcome constant.

Notes: You know me too well, Western AU/historic AU Din is so good as a concept and ughhhhhh this was so wonderful to have requested and I hope desperately that it’s good!

Reader isn’t really specified as plus size just because it didn’t really come up in the story? Although she is described as being quite soft and sweet in appearance.

Archiveofourown

He comes into town with one hand clenched around his horse’s reins, guiding the bay and white creature with a bounty hogtied swearing and cursing over its rump, and the other hand holding a little boy of no older than six at his hip. It’s quite the sight, one that momentarily distracts you from your grief at the fact you’re teaching your children out of a saloon now since your schoolhouse was burnt to the ground.

He’s imposing or he would be if the little boy wasn’t smiling up at him with big brown eyes. It’s hard to be imposing when you’re clearly the world of a small child and it makes you smile from the porch of the saloon. You’d been organising the boxes of donations the townsfolk had put together, since all your books, slates, chalk, paper, pencils, and the like had burnt in the fire, when he strolls past. He glances over at you and tips his head, hat dipping over his chestnut eyes and it flusters you for a second when you finally see his face.

He’s handsome, incredibly so, too handsome to be in your small mining town you think. Deep brown eyes, a prominent nose and plump lips set in a perpetual pout. His jaw is sharp and his beard and moustache are trimmed neatly, despite the bruising on his face and the layer of dirt from the road he’s truly beautiful, a thought that flusters you further. The small boy sat comfortably at his hip and playing with the fabric of his suspenders is adorable, soft round cheeks and large brown eyes, but he doesn’t look much like the man and you’re curious what the story is there.

The boy is old enough to be in school with you, to sit and learn his letters and to read while the older kids move on to learning about science, history, mathematics and poetry. There are a couple of children his age in your class, Timmy and Mary-Beth, both just getting the hang of gripping a pencil correctly. You wonder if he won’t be joining your class soon or if he and his guardian will be out of town before you can even consider preparing for a new student.

You watch the man hitch the horse outside the Sheriff’s office, the one that’s not got a sheriff at the moment. You hope he’s not looking for quick pay, the lawman that resided in the Sheriff’s office at the moment was just there until they could find a new sheriff. He’d have to telegram out to get the bounty money. Your last sheriff had up and left after being shot at by a couple of drunk miners, he’d decided that was enough and quite the same day. The town had been a little more unruly since and it was beginning to make you and some of the other townsfolk uneasy without someone to keep the peace. The temporary lawman had been lazy and uninvolved thus far. It was after the sheriff quit that your schoolhouse burnt down and you weren’t sure it was coincidence.

You watch the man place the boy on his feet and say something quietly to him before brushing his hair fondly. He grabs the bounty off of the horse, and slings the man over his shoulder. It’s impressive that he doesn’t struggle up the steps to the office even with a fully grown man thrown over his shoulder, the little boy follows after him as he goes inside.

You return to your organisation. There aren’t that many books, not like you used to have. But, while you wait for some of your teaching associates across the country to send you items, they will do. There’s enough paper and some slates for all your students to practice their writing and get their work written down which is a relief and even a globe that the general store owner, Mr Hewitt, had found in a back cupboard for you to have.

You’re trying to lift one of the boxes of books when he comes back out again, the little boy still trailing behind him, but this time something shiny is pinned to the man’s blue shirt. You don’t think too much about it as you struggle to lift the box, your heavy skirts not helping you move much, hindering your progress and causing you to trip each step forward you take.

You hear his boots on the wooden stairs before you see him, he towers over you, as he takes his hat off, more polite than most men in town. You get a better look at the shiny thing pinned to his shirt and realise it’s a sheriff’s badge. The same one the old sheriff used to wear, you look from it to him and then down when you hear a little giggle. The little boy is still following after him, a sweet smile turned on you this time as he leans around the man’s legs to watch you.

“Miss, I can take that.” He gestures to the box in your hand, it’s not a question, and it’s straight and to the point. But, you’re grateful for the offer and hand it off to him without complaint. He’s stronger than you, that’s clear to see, his arms thick from years of hard work.

“Thank you…” You wait for him to tell you his name, trailing off as you lead him into the saloon that has been set out for the school day. There is a black board at the front, tables and chairs littered around the room, the liquor shelves have been emptied for books to replace them.

The fact that Mr Karga had offered the saloon for the school was a miracle and while many in town grumbled about their favourite place of vice no longer admitting them during the day time, most were supportive of the decision to help the kids continue their school. Nevarro wasn’t a large town and mining was its main source of income, but the children deserved a chance to do more than just become miners and the school helped them do that. You helped them get into colleges on scholarships, to find jobs as clerks and apprentices in other parts of the country.

“Din Djarin.” It’s a nice name, rolls of his tongue like honey. He doesn’t smile, not really, not properly, but there’s a little crinkle at the corners of his eyes that soften his face and make him seem warmer somehow.

“And this little one?” You smile at the little boy as he begins to bravely step out from behind his guardian to greet you with a smile. He is a quiet boy, not the usual talkative sort you find with a six year old, but who knows what he’s been through even at this young age.

“Grogu, he’s my…” He furrows his brow, clearly thinking hard on the right word. That alone tells you he is not his son by blood, a small fact that makes him even more interesting. Not many bounty hunters would take in a small child. “Son.” he finally says. Deciding it is the best term. Grogu isn’t his by blood, Din knows this, but the little boy he’d found all alone surrounded by death, was slowly becoming like a son to him. Aliit ori'shya tal'din. Family is more than blood.

“Will he be joining my class? I run the school, currently we’re based here...in the saloon. Not my ideal place to teach but needs must.” You gesture around you to the makeshift classroom. You don’t like that the place still stinks of liquor or that at night it goes back to being a saloon where people drink, gamble, and fight. But, you don’t have a better place right now and the children need somewhere to learn. You can teach in any building, even if you dislike this one.

You fit the image of a school teacher he thinks. You look like a respectable young woman, dressed appropriately, all neat and proper. Your hair pulled up and pinned away like it’s supposed to be. Everything about you is proper. Part of him wants to see you become ruffled, stop being so demure. It’s a thought that makes him frown at himself, the thoughts inappropriate especially towards a lady like yourself.

“Yes. We’ll be staying for awhile. What happened to the school house, Miss…?” He took on the job as sheriff the moment the lawman offered it, the pay was good, gave him his own accommodation and it meant he could settle down for a bit, give the kid an actual childhood. Bounty hunting was something he was good at but it wasn’t exactly safe to do with a six year old in tow. At least this job used his skills catching lawbreakers and put them to use in a place the kid could grow up. It helps that the teacher of the town is pretty too, he thinks.

You give him your name before answering his question, “Well, after the last sheriff quit, the schoolhouse burnt down and along with all the things we had in it. Luckily it was at night and none of us were in the building. Burnt right down to the ground, nothing left…” You say it with a heavy sigh, thinking of that sweet little schoolhouse. The white painted wood, the familiar rows of desks with names carved in them, your favourite collection of university level texts at the back for the older and more advanced kids to explore. You had been teaching in that schoolhouse for the last five years and in a way it had become a second home for you, if you weren’t at your own little home, then you were in the schoolhouse marking work or planning lessons for the coming days.

“Anyone know what caused it?”

“No. We didn’t exactly have the mind to investigate and if it wasn’t an accident it was probably just some drunk who didn’t know any better. But, we make do and Grogu,” You crouch down next to the small child, moving your skirts to do so comfortably, “will fit right in, I think, don’t you?” The little boy smiles at you and giggles, before hiding behind his father’s leg again.

“Have any plans been made to rebuild the schoolhouse?” Sheriff Djarin it seems is very straight and to the point, his tone isn’t unkind or aggressive, but his words are clipped, short, brusque as if he’s not quite used to being more flowery or saying much. You supposed a bounty hunter didn’t typically need to say much, but you hope he’ll become more comfortable with talking, at least to you, as time goes on.

“No...i’ve been trying to put some pressure on the mayor to get it done but...he just doesn’t seem to care all that much now there’s a temporary solution.” You say as you begin unpacking the box that he brought inside, exercise books are brought out and sorted into piles, ready for the children to write their names on the covers and start afresh.

He frowns, brow furrowing deep, lips turned down at the thought of the schoolhouse just never being rebuilt. It’s clear to him that saloon isn’t the place for a school and it’s even clearer that you are distressed with your new working arrangement, that you miss having a building that is entirely your own and entirely dedicated to teaching young minds.

“I’ll sort something out. Is class starting soon?”

“Yes, not...not long now.” You double check the clock realising the kids will begin arriving in less than an hour and you feel wholly unprepared for the first day of school since the schoolhouse burnt down.

You watch him crouch in front of Grogu, hand ruffling his hair fondly, “You’re going to stay here today, get some learnin’ in ya. I’ve got things to do, but I'll be back later, promise.” You’re surprised and warmed when he puts out his pinky finger for the kid to grab, a little promise that seems to you like something more. You wonder if the boy was scared of being left again, if this was Din’s way of reassuring his new son that he wasn’t going to leave him. The little boy wraps his whole hand around Din’s pinkie not quite understanding how the promises work yet.

“Have a good day of teaching, Miss Y/N.” He nods his head at you, grabbing his hat as he walks out the saloon with a purpose. The hat is placed on his head the moment he’s out of the doors and it’s that little element of politeness that surprises you. He carries himself like a gentleman but looks like any other rough and tumble man wandering the west. But it’s his treatment of Grogu that confirms the sort of man that he is.

I’ll sort something out. You smiled to yourself realising that perhaps the new sheriff would be the best thing to happen to this town in a while. Someone who actually got things done for once.

“Do you want to find your seat? Maybe do some drawing before class starts, Grogu?” You ask the little boy smiling at him as he nervously shifts from foot to foot, looking back out the doors as if hoping his father would walk back in. It’s clear he hasn’t had to do this before, be separated from him and left with a stranger, but you put on your softest smile and gentlest voice and wait patiently for him to nod his head before offering him your hand.

He takes your hand and you help him get settled into his seat, you decide to put him near the front so you can help him easily and get him settled near you. He only knows you after all, and you think being around all the kids and far away from familiarity might be too much. You give him some paper, scrap bits that you don’t need anymore and a pencil leaving him to draw while you get ready for class.

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

The school day goes...well, it’s hectic and your hair is frizzy and falling out of the updo you styled it in that morning by the end. The children are unsettled in this new environment, the older kids, those nearing adulthood frustrated by the younger kids who can’t seem to focus or be quiet. Your brain feels too large for your skull and you sigh out a goodbye to your students as they leave out the saloon doors, one or two shoving through the swinging shutters much faster than needed.

Grogu is the quietest of your students, sweet and attentive, he doesn’t speak a word, but follows your instructions well. He is behind on his writing letters and reading, that much you know from working with him, but he’s a quick learner and applies himself with a determination you rarely see. He doesn’t always play well with others. At lunch time you’d noticed him stealing food from the other children. It continued despite giving him your own lunch knowing his father hadn’t had time to prepare him something after coming straight into town and getting to work. He doesn’t share well either, but seemed to understand when you sat him down and talked to him about it. You suppose that being away from other children and only travelling with your father figure who would share his food with you without a thought, it must be confusing. The manners that he now has to observe, the rules of society that he’s never had to worry about until now. He looks suitably admonished despite the gentle way you chose to talk about it with him, that alone makes you think he’ll likely stop stealing the children’s cookies and be more willing to share.

“David, careful!” You call out when one of your older students nearly gets trampled underneath the sheriff’s horses’ hooves as he runs across the thoroughfare without looking.

“Sorry, miss!” David calls back over his shoulder, still storming ahead your warning lost on him.

You sigh heavily and rub at your temples, stress enveloping you. A tug, swift and sharp on your skirt has you looking down. Grogu has a hand fisted in the fabric, pulling to get your attention. Once he has it, his arms open, hands up towards you, opening and closing, a universal gesture to be lifted.

It surprises you, he is...quiet and reserved. You expected time to be needed before he was comfortable with you in any respect, especially after having to tell the boy off. Instead, he lets you lift him to your hip, hands reaching for strands of your hair and twisting them, surprisingly gently between his chubby little fingers.

You watch your students run in different directions through town, their books and lunch pails in tow. Some stop on the open green, playing games together before their parents demand them back home for dinner. The warm little body in your arms is a soothing presence and the boy almost looks like he wants to say something, but just makes a soft cooing sound instead.

“Not much of a talker are you, little one?” He almost shrugs his little shoulders before looking up at the sound of heavy footsteps and clinking spurs. The sheriff leads his horse up to you, eyes following David with a shake of his head. Clearly, just as bemused as you at his lack of common sense.

Grogu smiles and giggles happily at the sight of his father, arms reaching out for him. You pass him over to Din, trying to ignore how close you get to the man to do it. He radiates warmth and smells woodsy mixed with some sort of soap he must use. This close you can see little birthmarks dotted across his neck.

You step back once the boy is settled in his arms and smile, soft but tired. “Sheriff, how was your first day on the job?”

He gives you a humoured smirk, one you’re not expecting, it takes you aback slightly. He looks...charming, approachable. Little dimples at his cheeks that soften his features in a way that makes you want to step closer. With a huff, not quite a laugh, he says, “Eventful.”

“That makes two of us, sheriff.” He notices the tired creases beneath your eyes, the once unrumpled appearance now dishevelled, hair coming out of its updo and blouse and skirt wrinkled and creased. You look like you’d had a rough day and he hopes Grogu wasn’t part of the cause. He still hadn’t figured out how to discipline the kid, he always turned those big brown eyes on him and he just couldn’t tell him no.

“Din. Call me Din.”

“Then you should call me Y/N.” There’s a moment of silence. You stare at him, at the way his hat casts shadows over his face, at the gentle hold he has on Grogu, the open top buttons of his work shirt and the dig of suspenders into his shoulders. He stares back at you. The gentle softness of your cheek, the marks that make your skin your skin and not someone else's.

“We’re going to start building the schoolhouse as soon as the wood shipment gets here, I sent a telegram off today to get some good lumber in.” It surprises you in the most delightful way. When you said the mayor had been dragging his heels you meant it, but you hadn’t expected this new face to come in and make a start on what the mayor had been reluctant to do.

“We’re?”

“I’ve convinced some of the men around town to pitch in and I know a thing or two about building.” In truth he’d intimidated more than persuaded. Most of the men were lazy, and had more concern for their own vices than for helping out. But, a mixture of convincing them they’d get their saloon back and reminding them that he was now the town’s sheriff seemed to get a few of the stronger and more skilled townsfolk to agree to help.

“You’re the sheriff. You shouldn’t be building the schoolhouse, Din. You’ve got more important things to do.” You feel bad that he’s doing this, being quite so involved, when he’s starting a new job, one that takes up most of his time. Being a sheriff is a full time job, almost 24 hours a day 7 days a week. He has people to keep in line, criminals to catch, laws to enforce, and building a schoolhouse wasn’t on his list of priorities. It’s sweet and makes your heart ache oddly, but you feel guilty for adding another thing to his plate.

“This is important, Miss...Y/N. The kid can’t learn in a saloon forever and you can’t work here forever neither.” He can see how desperately you want your schoolhouse back and something in him wants to provide that for you, to care for you. He tells himself it’s also for the kid, that his son deserves a proper schoolhouse to learn in. That all foundlings, all little children deserved a place to learn, like he had growing up in the covert.

“At least...at least let me and the children bring food and water down once you get started. I...you’ve not even been here a whole day and you’re already doing more than anyone else ever has...Thank you, Din.”

“It’s my pleasure, meg ba'jurir” You do not understand what he calls you, but you recognise that cadence, the rhythm of the language. Can almost see the symbolic nature of the alphabet. It surprises you that he knows what you’re sure is Mando’a, having only heard one other person in your life ever speak it. Mandalorian family groups were uncommon, but where they were they seemed to keep people in order, to value community. It made sense that he would take on the job of sheriff, adopt a child not of his own blood, if that were the case.

You bite your tongue and don’t ask, you don’t know him and it is too personal to ask about his upbringing, culture or heritage. Perhaps, after you know him better you can ask, but you can almost hear your headmistress at school reminding you about manners and decorum even in a little mining town.

“He didn’t...he didn’t cause any trouble today did he? He’s not used to being around others or...we’ve been on the road for a long time now.” He looks down at the little boy sitting at his hip, who’s playing with the metal star on his shirt. He knew that Grogu could be difficult, sweet, adorable, hard to say no to, but undisciplined and not used to the rules that people usually abided by.

“I...I did have to have a word with him today…” You can already tell Din’s disappointed. He clearly loves the boy, but part of loving a child is wanting better for them and getting in trouble isn’t part of that.

Din sighs heavily before catching the boy’s eye, “Ad’ika…”The boy clearly knows what’s going on and hides his face in his father’s shirt, suitably embarrassed about his behaviour. You think that’s enough to probably deter him from stealing from other kids in the future. You also think you might bake him some treats and use them as an incentive to work hard. You suspect bribery would work well with Grogu.

“He paid attention beautifully and he’s already doing so well with learning his letters, but he’s...he’s quite…” You try to think of the best way to say that the boy just can’t resist taking other children’s food.

“You don’t have to spare my feelings, Y/N. You can tell me.” You look Din in the eyes, deep brown meeting your own and sigh out before speaking.

“He likes to steal the other children’s food. I gave him my lunch and he still tried to steal Charlie’s cookies and Mary Beth’s macarons. I know he’s probably used to food being a thing he can just have since you’ve been travelling as a family unit…”

“Osik... I forgot to give him lunch. I am a terrible father…” Din looks at his feet, free hand rubbing over the scruff on his jaw. You feel the instant need to reassure him.

“You’re not a terrible father. You just came into town this morning, immediately took on a job, and instantly went to work. You’re not a terrible father.” You hesitate, but reach forward anyway, a hand on his arm giving a quick reassuring squeeze.

“Vor entye, Y/N. Thank you. Have you eaten?”

“Oh…” You hadn’t really thought about it, that you’d given your food to Grogu to stop him going hungry and that you’d spent all day teaching with little more than the porridge you’d made yourself that morning to keep you going.

“Don’t even think about lying to the sheriff.” You did in fact consider lying to him, but the look he gave you reminded you of an overbearing mother hen who wouldn’t let you get away with it. Combined with the fact he was indeed the new sheriff, you felt it best to stick to the truth for now.

“No...I haven’t.” You admit, feeling suitably admonished by him and a little guilty for even considering lying about.

Din adjusts Grogu on his hip and nods his head behind him towards the street, “Come, I’ll buy you dinner at the café.”

“You don’t have to, Din. I can make dinner at home.” You think back to the soup you were going to make that night, and even though you haven’t the energy in truth to make dinner, you can’t ask him to buy you it. It is too much and unnecessary. Any good teacher would have made sure their students were fed.

“You kept my ad fed in place of yourself. I’m buying you dinner.” His voice left no room for argument and so you found yourself following after him across the street towards Reeva’s Café.

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

Din’s presence in town becomes apparent very quickly. He does not allow the men to wander drunk through the streets, start fights, or harass women. He does not suffer law breakers or those who cause the peace to break. He is swift, effective, and there isn’t a member of town who doesn’t respect his authority even if some don’t particularly like having to listen to him.

For you it is a refreshing change. You don’t worry about the children wandering around town in the evenings or about walking out of your home at night. You don’t worry about your meager belongings being stolen or a fight breaking out in the saloon on an evening and ruining the few bits you have for the school.

He is quiet and polite, not much of a talker, but everything he does shows a man of honour and good morals. He is sweet with the children as well.

It had become common place for him, while waiting for the lumber to begin the schoolhouse, to come into the saloon while you were teaching. He said it was because the day time left little for him to do as sheriff, but you think he just enjoys helping with the children. They make him smile. A real smile.

Sometimes he just sits with his son on his lap and helps him with his letters, other times he wanders between tables helping those who need it or using his presence to quiet the children after an exciting lunch break. Reminding them to respect you, their teacher, and listen.

Your favourite, and the childrens’ favourite times were when he’d sit down and tell them stories of his travels. For a man who didn’t speak much, Din Djarin was a natural born storyteller.

That’s how you found yourself taking a step back, sitting on one of the saloon bar stools off to the side as Din took your place at the front of the class. He had an ability with the little ones that amazed you, none were ever scared of him despite his height, posturing or the guns holstered at his side and slung over his back. He always managed to make them smile and laugh, always got their curiosity going and inspired them equally. He made it a point whenever he talked to your class to share stories of both men and women he’d met who’d done amazing things, you could tell he was trying to get the girls in your class to see they could be more than housewives or washerwomen and you appreciated it.

“So there I am standing toe to toe with the biggest grizzly you’ve ever seen…” He gestures with his hands, standing at the front, arms out front to show just how large this grizzly bear was. His voice took on a different, more dramatic quality then normal. Grogu clapped his hands from his seat on your lap, the little boy having grown increasingly comfortable around you.

“Now this grizzly has to be 8ft standin’, and he’s the angriest bear you’ve ever seen and i’m sure that’s the end of me. I’m about to become a grizzly bear’s dinner, Sheriff Djarin stew!” You laugh along with the kids at the prospect of Din becoming stew for a grizzly bear, you’re never sure how much is fiction or truth in his stories, although part of you wouldn’t be surprised if they were all completely true. He was...he always seemed larger than life despite being so quiet. Like some sort of figure out of a western story.

“When out of nowhere, charging between me and this mean grizzly, comes the largest bull moose I've ever seen…”

“What’d you do?” Mary Beth pipes up, big blue eyes open wide.

“Well, I got the he-” He stops himself looking at you, you raise an eyebrow reminding him that cussing around the children would not do well for him, “-out of there as quickly as I could! One thing you should never do is stay around to fight a grizzly, never ends well to go toe to toe with one. That moose was being kind and giving me a chance to get away.” It amuses you that he always manages to twist a moral into the story. This time about kindness and helping those weaker than yourself, along with a healthy dose of not getting into situations with angry grizzly bears of course.

“Well, I think it’s time I let Miss Y/N, get on with her mathematics lesson.” Groans and grumbling rises up from your students as you place Grogu in his seat and begin making your way to the front. You watch Din frown at them, hands on his belt, leaning into one hip more than the other. He is the perfect picture of a disappointed father. Lips twisting downwards, pulling on his moustache.

“Hey, now! Miss Y/N always makes your lessons fun so don’t you start giving her trouble or else i’ll have to stop coming in for story time.” It’s a threat that promptly has them settling quietly in their chairs and getting their books and pencils out.

You rest a gentle hand on his arm when you reach him, quietly telling him thank you. It’s heavy with meaning. Thank you for being there for the children. Thank you for providing them with stories. Thank you for always settling them and reminding them to respect me. Thank you for thinking about the schoolhouse. Thank you for settling the town and keeping the peace.

He just nods at you with the smallest hint of a smile, enough to make you feel the tiniest bit flustered as you watch him walk to the chair where he’d left his hat, holsters, and lasso.

“Say goodbye to the sheriff, children.” You tell them as all of you watch him make his way to the doors. He stops before them and tips his hat at you all with a smile, but the moment he’s out the doors it drops and in his place is the hard sheriff who won’t stand for trouble.

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

Once the lumber comes in and the plans have been drawn up and approved by yourself, at Din’s insistence, the work begins. The schoolhouse design had been run past you because Din didn’t want to miss anything that was needed or that would help you teach. He had told you not to worry about size, scale or cost, that the community was pitching in and that the mayor had found a fund tucked away somewhere for the school. The fund miraculously appeared after Din had a long meaningful chat with him.

He wouldn’t tell you that he’d made threats against the mayor about digging up some of his dirty laundry, but he had. The mayor had a lot of skeletons in his closet and also a nice stack of credits he was sitting on in his own personal mayoral vault. The fact that the mayor had been so reluctant to rebuild the schoolhouse when he easily could have almost made Din see red, but he didn’t think it would look good if he beat the man to the curb as sheriff. He was supposed to be upstanding and law abiding, if he wasn’t why would any of the townsfolk be?

A few days into the project you decided it was time you made good on your promise to come to the site during lunch time with the children to bring water and some food. You and the children collect pails of water and the baked goods you’d made the night before, trudging through the streets. You held Grogu on one hip, the small child the slowest of his classmates, and carried a heavy pail of water in the other, so heavy your shoulder slumped down on that side to accommodate the weight.

The children were happy to help, after all, many of their fathers and older brothers were working on the school site and it was a chance in the school day to see people they cared about. You were also sure they wanted to ask the sheriff a multitude of questions and beg for a story, but you’d reminded them that they weren’t there to get in the way or interrupt the work, just to offer food and water.

You’d reluctantly admitted to Reeva that you found the sheriff attractive, after the older woman badgered you day in and day out about the time you spent with him. You could admit he was handsome. His eyes were deep brown and spoke more words then he often did. He had both a look that could intimidate and also soften into something warm and safe. The beard and moustache he sported made him look ruggedly handsome and his shoulders were broad and wide. He looked like he’d stepped out of a story book or from an illustrated newspaper short story. Rugged but clean, dangerous but kind.

You had to admit though that this was your favourite look on him. As you came upon the building site he was busy sawing a plank of pine in two. His shirt sleeves rolled up to the elbow exposing his strong forearms and thick wrists. His suspenders had been flung off his shoulders, resting at sides no longer covering the strong back that was tensed as he worked. The top few buttons of his shirt had come undone, almost indecently so to show a pronounced collar bone, strong neck, and dark chest hair and the brown hair on his head had begun to curl from the sweat he was working up. It shouldn’t have been attractive. He should have looked like any other man working up a sweat, you shouldn’t have wanted to wipe his brow and brush your fingers through the curls of his hair. But you did.

Taking a deep breath to compose yourself you look down at the little boy at your hip, “Should we go say hello to your father?”

“Papa!” He clapped his hands at you in confirmation. You’d slowly learnt that papa was one of the only words he said, you weren’t sure if he chose not to speak or simply couldn’t. But, given his increasing aptitude with writing his letters, you thought it likely that he simply chose not to speak.

The call instantly has Din’s head popping up from his work like a startled deer and you watch as his eyes roam across the children until he catches sight of his son at your hip. The smile that lights his face is so bright that it’s almost blinding, there is a longing you feel whenever you see his happiness to see Grogu. Some deep part of you that desires that sort of family bond. He loves his son so deeply, it doesn’t matter to him that their blood isn’t the same and part of you wants desperately to be part of that love and happiness.

“Children, hand out the food and water, will you? But be careful!” You remind them as they run towards familiar faces, it is still a building site after all, and the last thing you need is a child getting hurt in any way.

Din finishes sawing the plank before striding over to you, hand pulling a rag from his back pocket to wipe the sweat from his brow. You look...radiant. The summer sun shining over you, causing your skin to glow, your hair to shine. Your smile is as soft as your eyes and you're gentle in the way you hold his son to your hip, like he belonged there. Like the two of you belonged together. Din can admit that he enjoys your company more than he probably should, he can even admit that a part of him deeply desires you, wants you to join his family unit, become part of his aliit. You’re tender and kind to all the children you teach, your children as you often call them, and you’re incredibly kind to Grogu who you treat with more understanding than most school teachers ever would. You keep order in your classroom through kindness and mutual respect, not through fear or punishment. The maternal shine to you draws him to you in a way that, had he not been Mandalorian, he might be ashamed of. But, family is everything to him, Grogu is everything to him and if he is to put down roots here, he can’t help but consider putting down roots with you.

It’s a silly thought though, you’ve not known each other long and he isn’t well to do or gentlemanly. You’re far better educated than him, kinder than him, and it is a pipe dream that he doubts will ever come to fruition. It doesn’t help that he struggles at times to even talk to you, let alone make his feelings known.

“Miss me, Ad’ika?” He calls to the little boy, carefully pulling him from your arms when you offer him. If you allow yourself to, you can almost imagine he’s taking your own child from you, that the two of you have formed some sort of family. But, you are just his son’s teacher and he is just the sheriff of your small town.

The boy babbles at him, not real words, nonsense, or attempts at words that don’t translate, but you can see that improving. Can almost imagine what settling down here can do for the boy, give him a chance to learn, grow, make friends, and find some stability and safety.

“He’s been itching to come over all day, they all have. I was struggling to get them to focus on their history lesson.” You had 15 children all desperate to get out of the saloon and visit their fathers for lunch. It had been a...very difficult lesson to say the least and you still felt a little frazzled.

“History?” The boy tugs at his father’s hair and you watch him wince as he speaks, pulling little chubby hands from brown curls.

“The fall of the empire and the rise of the republic. Not the most riveting subject for them I'm sure, they much prefer when I tell them about different societies rather than politics.” You want to say like Mandalore and the Mandalorians because you want to draw him in, desperate to have more of his time even when he’s already doing so much for you. You enjoy the odd hour here and there when he takes over your class and becomes the teacher, where you can just sit and listen, learn yourself.

“Mandalorians believe that our history is our future. We learn it as soon as we can walk.”

“So it is Mando’a you’ve been speaking?” It warms you to see him open up to you like this. He is a private man, quiet, and insular. While he can yell with the best, and demand attention, can intimidate and even persuade, it’s all part of his job. The face he puts on as sheriff. He is quiet about himself, sharing little and not so often. You revel in the trust placed in you wherever he tells you a little something more about himself.

“You noticed?” Most people don’t even know Mando’a exists, let alone recognise that the words he slips into his speech are such. He finds they slip out more around you, than with others. He’s comfortable with, he is happy to share himself, his culture with you and it...it is a startling discovery about himself. He has been insular and closed off for longer than he would like to admit.

“I can’t speak it and I..I don’t know it well, but, I recognise the cadence. I grew up in Naboo and there was a Mandalorian there, she used to speak it when I would sit and practice my letters with her.” Atin’a Caivass was a kind woman to you even if she could be hard. She had been one of your teachers, always pushing you harder, to do better. Yet, it had never felt frustrating or like a chore, the Mandalorian had always made it a desire to impress her, but also to prove to yourself that you could. She had always been kind to you and the other children, gentle but firm, like you were one of her own. You saw similarities with how Din treated the children. He was kind and gentle, but never overlooked an opportunity to firmly correct their behaviour or mistakes. A perfect balance. Not too soft and not too harsh.

“You never learnt?”

“She was very protective of it and I...I was always too afraid to ask.” You confess. You had always been fascinated with it, like any young child when faced with a new language, but you had always believed it something sacred, and had worried that you would offend her if you asked to learn. “Ad’ika? What does it mean?”

He can’t help but laugh at your pronunciation and sounds it out for you, “Ah-Dee-Kah, it means little one.”

“Ah-dee-kuh?” You are even more beautiful, he thinks when you butcher his language, trying so hard to get it right that your eyebrows scrunch together and your eyes crinkle at the corners.

“Ah-Dee-Kah” The little one squirms in his arms and he places him on the ground, only to watch him plunk himself on his bottom and play with the dirt. He had always had a fascination with dirt and rocks, more so than any of the toys he had actually brought or made him.

“Ah-Dee-Kah”

“Perfect.” You smile blindingly at his praise and he wonders if he can forgo his job as sheriff and simply teach you Mando’a every minute of every day. “You can always ask. If you want to learn. It’s nice to hear it from another person’s lips, not just mine.”

“I would like that very much...maybe when you’re less busy? You’re rather booked up at the moment, what with being sheriff, storytime for the children, and building a schoolhouse. You’re a busy man, Din Djarin.”

“I like to keep my hands busy.” You look down at your feet before looking back up at him, unsure how to respond to what you were sure was meant as a perfectly innocent comment. Din almost swears, osik, once he realises how that sounds, lifting hand to the back of his neck to rub it.

The silence that you fall into isn’t uncomfortable necessarily, but feels almost solid, like a physical thing and not just the quiet that comes with two people not talking for a moment. There’s a tension there that is not wholly unpleasant but hard to describe or pin down.

Seeming to remember the pail of water you’re carrying you place it in front of him, “Water, so you can clean off or if you’re thirsty. There’s some pastries somewhere as well, to keep you all fed...Can’t have you keeling over on us or else we’d never get our schoolhouse.”

You take a step back and cast your gaze around, making note of where each of your 15 kids are. You’re caught watching Jerome splash water on Annie, about to go and tell him off when you hear splashing much closer to you.

You thought he couldn’t excite you more than he already had. Thought that Din Djarin couldn’t possibly tempt you more, cause your well-mannered sensibilities to crumble further. You were utterly, terribly, ridiculously wrong.

There’s something to be said about the man pouring half a pail of water over his head to rub away the sweat and dirt from a hard day working in the summer sun. He flicks his head back, long neck outstretched as water droplets fall like mirror glass over his tanned skin. His hair sticks to his skin, kissing it in a way you realise you desperately want to and his shirt clings to broad shoulders with the familiarity of a lover.

You spin back around away from him flustered, determined not to look as you march towards Jerome. You decide in that moment that perhaps it’s best not to bring pails of water at lunch time. You might just not survive to see the school built.

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

For the next two months your routine features lunch time trips with the children to bring water and sometimes food to the men building the schoolhouse, and the odd afternoon story time hour when Din feels confident enough to leave the others to continue working without his guidance. Each day the schoolhouse comes together more and more and each day you fall a little bit more in...in whatever these feelings for the sheriff were.

You also have the startling realisation that Grogu has wormed his little way into your heart in a way that none of your other students have. You have a soft spot for the little boy, especially as he becomes more vocal, begins to say more little words, including the delightful name ‘Miss Y/N’.

Din is a temptation in himself, each time he teaches you another word or phrase in Mando’a and his lips wrap around syllables or every time he works hard to build the schoolhouse muscles pulling taut underneath the weight of wood. He tempts you in a way that no one ever has and you can’t quite explain what it is about this man that makes you desire to be in his presence, to kiss him, to hold him, to be close to him both physically and emotionally. You want to know everything about him, to understand him better than you understand yourself.

In some ways it is a relief when the schoolhouse is finished and in other ways it feels like a loss. Part of your routine, part of the day where you always see Din was no longer needed or necessary.

When you bring the children over at lunch time, it’s to show them the finished building, the one they’ll be in come Monday morning once you have the time to move all the books and other odds and ends into it. They’re all excited as are you, to see it...it strikes you in the heart so badly that you can’t move your feet, can only stare at the building with tears in your eyes.

It’s beautiful. Not large, but larger than the old one. Freshly painted white, with a school bell hanging out front. It strikes you that this isn’t just a schoolhouse, but it’s your schoolhouse. Din had been adamant about building it for you.

“Children, why don’t you go inside and take a look? You’ll be here on Monday!” You wave them all off as they run ahead and up the wooden steps, throwing the door open none too gently. “Careful! We only just got it!” You call out and receive a series of sorries back.

“Shall we go find your buir?” You look down at Grogu, who’s hand is holding the heavy fabric of your skirt. He smiles up at you and nods his head with a quick little ‘papa’ that has your heart warming.

You hear him before you see him, “Now don’t go breaking the tables when we’ve only just put them together, girls!” Already laying down the law to 3 of your children as you enter the schoolhouse. They had seemingly been swinging on tables in a most ill-mannered fashion that has you putting on your teacher-face and raising an eyebrow at them from behind Din. They promptly stop and return their feet to the floor with an abashed look.

“Sorry, Sheriff. Sorry Miss.” They call to you both before scurrying away in hopes of avoiding punishment, leaving you, Din and Grogu alone in the main room for the building. You let it go. It isn’t an issue, they need to learn to respect things, and not damage them, but that does not have to come at the cost of punishment when a quick look and a reminder does enough.

Din spins at them calling out to you, faster than he seems to have expected, looking decidedly dizzy for a second before the mask of sheriff falls right back into place.

“Y/N, how do you like it?” He opens his arms wide and gestures to the main room of the schoolhouse. A large blackboard already nailed to the wall at the back, rows of tables and chairs set up so every child could see you. A desk at the front for your things. It is sweet and fits your needs infinitely better than a saloon ever would. You even note the bookcases along the walls, enough space to place many of your books for the children to have easy access for when they wish to learn something more than you could teach them.

“It’s...it’s wonderful, Din. It’s beautiful. I...I can’t thank you enough...I...I’m a little lost for words.” You can feel the happy tears starting to pool in your eyes again, the gratitude making you a little bit emotional. “I don’t think I can ever repay you for this.”

“You...you don’t need to repay me, Mesh’la. This...you and the children deserve a school, a place to teach and learn. You don’t have to thank me or repay me for doing what the damn mayor should have done in the first place.”

You nearly don’t do it. Nearly let that fear that wells up inside you and the proper manners, the belief that you were about to be far too forward than was ladylike, stop you. But, you think back to his kindness, his gentle nature, the calm and order he’s brought to town. The son of his that you have a large soft spot for. The handsomeness of his features, the sharpness of his profile. The gentle hand he always places on your back as he helps escort you somewhere. The respect he shows you at every turn and his willingness to share his culture and upbringing with you. You think of all the things that make up the Din Djarin you know and you think of what he has come to mean to you.

With a silent prayer and an apology to your late headmistress for being more forward than is ladylike, you push yourself forward and into him. Lips soft and chaste lifting to meet his, only briefly. You do not push for more than a second of contact, but it is enough, you hope, to get the thought and intent across. That he is someone you would like to get to know more, that he is someone you could happily be courted by, even marry one day.

He doesn’t even have time to blink, it happens so fast. One minute you are standing a few steps away from him thanking him, the next your lips are pressed to his in the shortest sweetest kiss he’s ever had the pleasure of being on the receiving end of. It takes another second for him to realise what’s happened before he’s reaching a hand out to cup the nape of your neck and drag your lips back to his for a significantly more substantial kiss that leaves you a little breathless.

When you pull away from each other you don’t go far. Din presses his forehead to yours, hawkish nose pressing into your cheek, a soft touch that grounds you with his presence. The hand at your neck, rubs a soothing thumb across your skin. Your own have chosen to grasp at the suspenders over his shoulders, to keep in close proximity.

“I’d very much like to court you, Miss Y/N.”

“I think i’d like that, sheriff.”

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

Mando’a Translations

Meg Ba'jurir - roughest way I could get to someone who educates or a teacher with meg being who and ba’jurir being educate

Osik - Shit

Vor entye - Thank You

Ad - son

Ad’ika - Little one, term of endearment for small children

Buir - Father also Mother basically parent.

Mesh’la - Beautiful

Aliit - Family (Clan)

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Taglist for this fic:

@lex-ham

#din djarin x reader #din djarin / reader #din djarin #the mandalorian #the mandalorian reader insert #reader insert #readerinsert #western au #putting down roots #din djarinxreader #din djarin/reader #female reader #female identifying reader

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claybrownie7566 · 3 years

Text

Hide and Seek

As requested by @secretlysheikah

Aka when your bird asks you for breadcrumbs. haha I was nervous about posting this one, but I had fun writing it, so I hope you enjoy!

Hyrule gets grazed by a poison arrow and runs off.

On top of everything else happening it was pitch black. The sun had gone down fascinatingly quick, and now the group was stuck in a poorly lit fight for their lives.

Thankfully for a few of them, their eyes adjusted quickly to the darkness. For others however...

Well. Hyrule just hoped he'd shoot straight.

The traveler, along with Wild and Legend, was perched in a tree, using fire arrows to see, take aim, and shoot any monster he could find. His two companions did the same, taking caution not to shoot their friends on the ground.

Other than the clanging of swords and the direction of shouts, there was nothing to aim for. The fire arrows lit the battlefield minutely, but it was better than nothing.

Wild had told Hyrule and Legend to stay silent. If they fired an arrow, they needed to be quick and hide from the monsters view. They were easy targets up here, and a bright orange arrow was basically a target with "shoot here" written on it.

Hyrule knew that wouldn't really matter. This was his Hyrule, and monsters could see in the dark here.

There was a shout below on Hyrule's left. Warriors cried out and Hyrule saw the glint of metal, barely visible in the night. He squinted, making sure his keen eyes were focused enough to make the shot.

There!

A hulking silhouette across from a thinner, shorter one. Hyrule took a deep breath to steady himself, then quickly drew and fired.

There was a deep bellow, then a loud boom as the monster fell.

"Good shot whoever that was!" Warriors called out.

Hyrule felt Legend pat his shoulder quickly before drawing a shot himself. He saw his friend grin wickedly before firing, the satisfaction of sniping monsters clear as day in his eyes. Hyrule followed the arrows path. It hit it's mark, just like it always did.

But Legend wasn't the only sharp shooter in the night.

A whistle screeched toward them, and Hyrule's blood went cold. His body moved on instinct and adrenaline, and in one swift movement he threw himself to the next branch, reaching across Legend.

Wild screamed as Hyrule dropped out of the tree, and landed with a soft thud.

A horn sounded in the darkness.

More arrows blazed across the sky.

Metal scraped against metal.

Hyrule's body was screaming. He felt something white hot and aching on his left shoulder, feeling dizzy and dull. He lay at the base of the tree, his head pounding with effort as he tried to refocus his eyes.

Legend shouted from above, "HYRULE! Hyrule answer me! Are you okay?"

Hyrule rubbed his head, "Yeah" he called, "I'm ok." He heard two sighs of relief from the canopy, and let his head fall back to the dirt.

Minutes or hours went by when Hyrule felt a gentle hand on the back of his head. He opened his eyes wearily, and was surprised at how bright it was. Someone had made a fire.

Twilight's worried expression appeared in front of him, hands already coaxing Hyrule into a sitting position.

"What happened up there Cub?" Time's voice was rougher than usual, demanding an answer.

Legend pointed to the tree, "Hyrule saved my life that's what happened."

Wild nodded, "If he had been a split second slower, Legend would've been reduced to his namesake."

The group fell silent as the possibility of that outcome floated darkly across their minds. After a moment the chatter continued. Twilight helped prop Hyrule against a tree, the movement causing a wave of nausea to flare in his stomach.

No, not nausea. Something else...

Why was everything so loud?

"Looks like you got sliced by an arrow there Hyrule. Here let me see" Warriors kneeled down next to his friend, gently lifting Hyrule's injured arm.

Hyrule cried out and yanked it away, the sound startling the group. He crawled backwards away from Warriors. The captain snapped his head around, and the group followed his gaze, searching for what Hyrule was afraid of with swords drawn and ready.

Hyrule leaned against the tree and hauled himself up. When everyone turned around, they looked at him curiously.

But they were no longer his friends. They were strangers.

Hyrule panicked, eyes darting across the unfamiliar faces. Where had his friends gone? Or perhaps they weren't there to begin with. He wasn't sure.

One of the strangers took a step towards him, an arm outstretched. Hyrule gasped and took quick steps backward.

"No! S-stay back!"

Goddesses above, he was surrounded.

The strange men looked at each other, lips moving but no sound coming out. They were preparing to strike, he knew it.

Who were they? Where was he?

Who was he?

He knew the answers to those questions. He knew them all too well. He laughed pathetically, hopelessly. How foolish he had been to think the new life he'd found wouldn't bring him back here.

Here. Where there was only one response to the answers he had.

The dark is where they get you.

He bolted.

Hyrule ran as fast as he could, darting through the trees, careful not to trip in the night. He pushed his legs as fast as they would go, and he never looked back. He knew these woods, this sky, this land.

It had been his saving grace before.

It would hide him from his fate now.

As he ran, he wondered if his new adventure had been real. Was it all just a dream? It must have been. In his heart he knew it was too good to be true didn't he?

After all...even the best dreams aren't exempt from the inevitability of the sleeper waking.

But now was not the time to mourn his good dream. He had to focus and stay alive, so that is what he was going to do.

The burning cut on his shoulder was deep, and cried out with every movement, but he never stopped. He couldn't. This was something he knew, his reality, and if he was going to live in it he was going to make it work.

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

"Twilight! Stay on him! Don't spook him, but don't let him get too far" Legend barked. The rancher nodded, sprinting off into the woods. They would catch up with him later.

Sky bent down and picked up the arrow that had pierced their friend, looking it over methodically. His face screwed into an uncharacteristic sneer, anger pouring from his eyes.

The arrow was covered in sickly purple liquid, sluggishly dripping onto the dirt. The ground sizzled where the drops landed.

"Poison" Sky spat.

Time took the arrow from his fellow hero and gave it a glare that could rival Sky's.

Almost.

"Is it deadly? Does anyone recognize it?"

The others gathered around to take a closer look, and Legend cursed.

"Yeah. I recognize it," he paused, his face suddenly turning sadder than the others had ever seen it, "We're lucky it was just a scratch. This is a powerful poison that affects the brain....causing it to hallucinate and create vivid illusions...knowing Hyrule...well, let's just say he's running from us for a good reason. At least until the effects wear off."

"You think you might know what he's seeing?" Four asked.

"His Hyrule isn't a welcome place, or it wasn't for a long time. Hyrule never told me why, but a lot of people tried to hunt him down and kill him. People he knew, even."

Four's face fell, and in the firelight Legend could see his amber eyes burn with sympathy.

"We have to find him" the smithy said.

Wild clenched his jaw, and kicked something in the dirt "I don't think we are going to be the only ones looking."

He picked it up so the others could see.

A silver monster horn. The one blown just as Hyrule fell.

Whatever the monsters had been looking for, they had let the others know they'd found it.

Seven furious faces stared down at the horn.

Wild crushed it with his fist.

"Let's go get Hyrule before they do."

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

Hyrule continued to run until his lungs couldn't take it anymore. He had run miles and miles, panic providing him with impressive endurance.

I'll be okay. I just have to-

"Awoooo"

A wolf howled in the distance. Hyrule's heart stopped. Something was definitely looking for him. His energy was spent, and he knew he stood a better chance if he rested. There was only one thing he could do now.

Hide.

He searched in the darkness for some sort of cover. Some small cove he could curl up and take refuge in. He wandered, growing more and more nervous the longer he looked. Nothing.

Then, up ahead he spotted a dead tree trunk, a large rock blocking a hole in the side. He ran to it, shoving to boulder aside and peeking into the space. It was just wide enough for him to fit.

It took a while for him to get through the opening, but once he did it was quite roomy inside. It was almost comfortable. With some effort he scooted the stone back over the hole, and tried to calm his breathing so he wasn't so loud.

Goddesses above if you ever cared for me, even once don't let them find me. Please.

He sat unmoving and almost perfectly silent. It was so quiet he could hear his pulse. Patience was a virtue Hyrule was grateful he had. He didn't take risks in situations like this. if he had to sit here for days, he would. Exhausted, heartbroken, and alone, he drifted into a shallow sleep.

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

Legend led the others toward wolfie's call. The vet hoped the sound wouldn't draw any unwanted attention to their position. There were other wolves in these woods he wagered, so the monsters nearby would probably just ignore it.

He hoped.

Time jogged over to their canine companion and gave him a pat on the head, "good boy wolfie. Is Twi nearby?" He baited.

Despite the circumstances Legend smirked. Time was always prepared to cover for Twilight wasn't he?

Just like he was with Hyrule.

Legend's heart sank. Hyrule was so quick to take a hit to the shoulder for Legend.

Why?

He hated to think about where he might be right now if Hyrule hadn't saved him. He would be grateful for that sacrifice for the rest of his life. One of so many other things to be grateful to Hyrule for.

Light began to creep up the horizon, the dawn a welcome sight after such a long night of darkness.

They followed wolfie through the wooded, winding path, trying to keep as quiet as possible. The wolf stopped, and the others did the same. Legend didn't know how, but he knew Hyrule was close. There was a bit of a downward slope, and a small cliffside that they were standing on. The area spread out before them was littered with trees. Legend scanned the space carefully. Soft yellow light began to filter through the trees, warming the chilly, dew soaked grass beneath their feet.

The group stayed silent, but every pair of eyes searched for signs of their friend. Legend thought he might be wrong about Hyrule's closeness until Four tapped his shoulder. The smith pointed to a large rock propped against a tree. Legend knit his eyebrows in confusion.

"What?" he whispered. Wind looked at Four and nodded, "I see it" he mouthed, then locked eyes with Legend. The sailor whispered, "the rock's been moved."

O H

Legend literally facepalmed. It was so obvious now that he saw it. A small scratch in the Earth beneath the rock. Signs it had been moved and replaced. Not only that, but the hiding spot was so very Hyrule. Inconspicuous, smart, and well protected.

Twilight, now back as himself, began to climb down the small cliff. Sky went after, then Four, then Warriors, Wild, Wind, Time, and Legend last.

Once all eight of them were on the ground Legend motioned for them to stay put, but close in case Hyrule got out. Then he slowly and carefully approached the tree trunk.

Hyrule heard footsteps. Light, but close.

He held his breath.

Legend ran his hand over the rough wood, desperately hoping his friend was alright. He knocked on the bark.

"Hyrule? Hyrule, it's me Legend. Can you hear me? Are you in there?"

That voice. He knew it. it wasn't a stranger, but was it real? He had to find out. Besides, someone obviously knew he was in here.

"L-legend?" He asked skeptically.

"Hyrule! Thank Hylia you're okay! Do you recognize my voice? I promise I'm real" Legend was so relieved he could cry. Hyrule was safe.

There was no way it could be anyone else. He knew it.

Hyrule shoved at the rock covering the hole. His strength was depleted, and his arm screamed. Legend gave it a good push and the trunk was opened. The others jogged over, concerned and relieved beyond belief that he had been found. He also appeared to have stopped hallucinating.

Legend reached for Hyrule's hand and pulled him out of his hiding place. Hyrule squinted in the early light and drank in the sight of his friends.

"You're all here? So that means-"

"You were grazed by a poison arrow. If it was more than a scratch you'd probably be attacking us right now, but it looks like the effects have worn off" Warriors said.

"Poison?" Hyrule's voice was small and far away. All of a sudden his eyes shot open, and he gripped his hair, "Poison! The arrow! The battle! Did I fall out of a tree? Was that real?"

"Yeah" Wind admitted, "that was real."

Hyrule smiled tiredly, "I'm glad you guys found me. I might've stayed in there forever."

"We would never let that happen" Sky said, "but speaking of staying, there are monsters out looking for us, so we should probably get moving."

"I agree" Wild said, "isn't there a town nearby?"

Hyrule nodded, "It's not too far. We can find safety there. It used to be hard to find that, but ever since I defeated Ganon people are more....agreeable."

"It's settled then. Let's get you out of here Hyrule, you've had a long night."

"Yeah" he said with a sigh, "yeah it was....I can't believe the lies and terror one drop of poison can do. It was so horrible I-.....I thought you were all going to kill me. You were all strangers and I-" his voice broke. He was tired and sick, and he had been so afraid.

Legend couldn't stand it any longer. He pulled his protégé into a hug, careful not to aggravate his injured arm.

"I can't believe you took an arrow for me you idiot."

Hyrule smiled, "love you too jerk."

"Let's never play hide and seek again" Legend said, vowing to never let Hyrule go again.

"Agreed"

#Linkeduniverse #lu fic #ask #aldjsfhdslu I don't know how I feel about it #but here

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