You ever just get off of work and think about Jiang Cheng and about how random civilians yap on and on about how he’s mean and cruel. Yet for all their rumors and hissed words, Jiang Cheng has a thriving sect that cares deeply for him and is trusted greatly?
Like he was what, 16? When his parents died and he was left alone and traumatized from the Wen’s torture and his brother was missing and his sister was hidden away for her safety. And he marched across the land and was so charismatic, so capable, so full of confidence (fake or otherwise) that cultivators who had no reason to trust or give a damn about him, where willing to follow him through war.
There’s so many rumors flying around about him being this nasty cruel man, yet his sect is filled with people who go rushing after him. Who have faith in him when he says not to say anything about his claim of Mo Xuanyu being WWX. Who are trusted by Jin Ling, who adores his uncle so much, to watch Zidian and return it to him. Who willingly skip around after Jin Ling in fake Jin robes to watch for him.
That’s not a sect that’s under a cruel and harsh leader. That’s not a sect that fears their leader. Jiang Cheng couldn’t have gotten where he is, if he was half of what the rumors say he is. He can be ruthless, yes, but when he loves he loves so fucking deeply. And by the fact of the sheer number of people who joined his sect and raised their kids under his protection, it’s so clear that that love extended to his new sect.
Anyways the secret to Jiang Cheng is that he loves and loves and loves and loves.
And loves.
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Ok well i had the brief thought “what about an ER nurse Eddie au?” and then this popped fully formed into existence so fuck it Friday pt 2.. warnings for smoking and vague references to critically injured kids
“That doesn’t seem very healthy.”
Smoke curls up from the cigarette held loosely in Eddie’s hand. “It’s not, particularly.”
Buck’s hands are in his pockets as he strolls away from the glass doors out into the ambulance bay where Eddie is doing the mature, professional equivalent of playing hide and seek. He comes to a stop barely a foot or two away from where Eddie leans against grimy concrete. “Didn’t know you were a smoker.”
“I’m not,” Eddie sighs, “Particularly.” He looks over Buck’s face as he takes a drag, cataloging bruises and cuts. He hadn’t been the one to look him over before he was discharged, probably because he was out here avoiding having to do so. “Only when it’s- only after the bad shifts.” And only once a month, even if the bad shifts come again and again. He bought this pack in January, it’s stale as shit.
Buck’s eyes follow the smoke as it drifts skyward. “Rough one today?”
Eddie thinks he probably doesn’t have to explain to Buck that it’s sometimes better when a kid is dead on arrival so he doesn’t have to try his best to administer care he knows will be useless. He doesn’t have to explain a day where nothing goes right and he loses more people than he can save and he still has to walk away from someone’s parent or wife or sister, left behind forever in a waiting room on the worst day of their life, and go on to lose the next person too. Doesn’t have to explain why he’s out here, and not in there. “Mm. We’ve got this repeat customer, always hate to have him back.”
Buck’s eyes flick to his face before they settle somewhere around his elbow. “Yeah?”
“Yeah. He seems like a nice guy. I worry about him. He’s here too often.”
Buck doesn’t look up. “What was he in for this time?”
“Minor concussion. Bruising. Lacerations.” Eddie sucks cancer into his lungs. “Heard a house fell on him.” Exhales it into the night.
Buck does look up this time, eyes a darker blue out here in the shadows. “Part of a house. Just a staircase and the- like, the balcony, really.”
“Maybe he should stay away from those.”
“From houses?” Buck asks, half his mouth twitching into a smile.
Eddie rests his head on the wall behind him. “Guess that’s not really practical.”
“No.” Buck is quiet for a moment, one hand slipping out of his pocket and running through his hair. Eddie wonders what he looks like, when he’s not here. He’s more styled, sometimes, when things aren’t very bad. He wonders if he’s usually all gelled up and neat. Eddie kind of likes the loose curls. “I’m sorry.”
“For what?”
“Making your day worse.” Buck looks genuinely apologetic, and Eddie shakes his head.
“The guy made it out okay this time.” Buck is just close enough that Eddie can kick at his boot with his sensible orthopedic sneaker. “You didn’t even need stitches.”
“That’s good.” Eddie’s left foot is pressed along the inside of Buck’s right, and Buck is staring down at them. “His favorite nurse was on break. I would have missed you if someone else had to do them.”
Eddie laughs, just a few bursts of soundless oxygen. “You gotta find new ways to see me before something happens that I can’t fix.”
Buck moves, taking the few steps necessary to lean against the wall beside him. Carefully, he takes the cigarette from Eddie’s hand, holds it between two of his own fingers, and takes a drag. Eddie watches it happen like he’s monitoring somebody’s pulse ox, and when Buck coughs he laughs again, louder this time. “Fuck,” Buck says, laughing too. “Thought that would be cooler than it was.”
“Smoking isn’t cool, firefighter Buckley,” Eddie says, taking the cigarette back and pulling from it again between smiling lips.
“Hm,” Buck says, grinning out into the night. Then he sighs, and rolls his head along the concrete to look at Eddie. “I think there’s nothing you can’t fix.”
They’re very close. “There’s lots I can’t fix.”
Buck shrugs like he disagrees. “I also think I’d like to find other ways to see you.”
Buck’s eyes are even more in shadow at this angle, and they’re the color of the lake back in El Paso that he and a bunch of kids went to after graduation, drunk off beer somebody’s cousin got for them, skinny dipping with breathless terrified delight under bright constellations. “Then ask me.”
Buck inhales as Eddie exhales. “What time’s your shift end?”
“5:30 AM. So, probably 6:15.”
Buck traces the two fingers he’d used to hold the cigarette down Eddie’s arm. “You wanna get breakfast with me?”
“Yes. I would.”
Buck smiles, and Eddie snubs out the cigarette on the wall between them. “I’ll meet you here?”
“Alright.” He takes a step forward, then a step to the right so he’s standing in front of Buck. “Two hours.”
“Uh huh.”
He should really get back inside. They’re understaffed, as always, and there are too many patients, as always, and not enough beds, as always. “See you then.” He doesn’t make any move to leave.
“See you then,” Buck almost whispers. He leans forward, and Eddie still doesn’t move, so he presses a tiny kiss to the corner of his mouth for just a moment. His lips are warm. Eddie hadn’t noticed it was cold outside.
Buck pulls back and leans against the wall again. Eddie smiles, puts a hand in his pocket, and walks back toward the doors.
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I just came back from watching A Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes; and Yes, Coryo is actually the fucking worst, and yes, him and Lucy are toxic and fundamentally incompatible due to their idealogical differences. But, AND FOLLOW ME HERE what if I wrote an arranged marriage AU?
THIS IS A RLY ROUGH OUTLINE BECAUSE THIS ALL JUST CAME TO ME TODAY, BUT WALK WITH ME:
Newly graduated from University, with the prestige of Doctor Gaul’s apprenticeship under his belt, Coriolanus Snow has been handpicked by Plinth to ascend to the Presidency of Panem. However, because he spent the entirely of his young adulthood garnering power through fear, he is immensely unpopular in the Capitol.
So, in order to make his new appointment more secure, his advisors have suggested that Coriolanus marries by the end of the year, before the next reaping.
Guess whose suddenly reappeared out of the blue and become a bit of a Capitol Darling - Lucy Gray Baird, back from the dead. She’s been a ghost, haunting Coryo’s mind, her voice ever present in every thought he’s had for the past five years.
But, she’s got a reasoning behind her sudden reappearance. Lucy’s got no love for the Capitol or the rich patrons that fund her celebrity, and even less for Coriolanus. She’s back in Panem for one reason and one reason only - to work with the rebels of district 13 to free the children of Panem from the Games, and she’ll do anything to obtain that goal.
Even if it means marrying the man whose the reason she ran from everything she’s ever known.
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