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sundayswiththeilluminati · 3 years

Note

I LOVE your meta on how essek was the perfect asset and want to ask the follow-up question in your tags: how do you think it went down? The agreement between Essek and the Assembly? And I think the fandom was convinced Essek would be disposed of after the peace talks — how do you see his future if there was no intervention by the Mighty Nein in 97?

ruvi-muffin asked:

What are your specific thoughts abt how ludinus recruited essek??👀👀 oh Person who knows a surprising amount of spy stuff 🙏🙏🙏👀👀👀

Anonymous asked:

PLEASE share your specific thoughts about how Essek was recruited, I'm so intrigued!

Anonymous asked:

Hello yes i am very interested in these very specific thoughts about how Essek got recruited? All these things about how actual intelligence works/uses their assets/how that ties to Essek and the M9 is really interesting :D

Thank you all so much for asking me the specific question I wanted someone to ask. I had to write and rewrite this post a half-dozen times because I kept going off on tangents about other Cold War spy stories so trust me there’s plenty more where this came from.

For reference, my original post on what made Essek an ideal recruitment target and why the M9 were the ideal counter to it.

First off, this is all based on real-world intelligence ops and is only as relevant to the campaign as Matt Mercer cares to make it. Having said that *slams notebook on table* BUCKLE UP, KIDDOS.

There are two ways Essek may have been recruited: he approached the Assembly or the Assembly approached him. I think the Assembly approached him. Not to be too hard on the guy, but Essek said it himself: he’s kind of a coward. I can’t see him mustering up the nerve to take that first step. Plus his espionage seems to have focused specifically on the beacons rather than dunamancy as a whole; that sounds like the Assembly to me. The beacons specifically offer the prospect of immortality and the Cerberus mages are arrogant enough to assume they can figure out dunamancy themselves if they have a beacon in hand. There’s no way the Assembly haven’t been trying to beg, borrow, or steal those beacons for centuries. Essek may not have even been their first try - just the first that worked.

Chronologically, Essek would have popped up on either the Assembly or the Augen Trust’s radar quite early as I assume they keep tabs on all powerful Dynasty mages. As they followed his career, the Assembly would have ID’d Essek as a perfect target for recruitment as a spy, and then further for ego-based recruitment. Recruitment for espionage is a slow process - even slower in a fantasy world where some races reasonably expect to live 500+ years. Many intelligence agencies will do a sort of light meet-and-greet just to start a file on various people who might years later be of interest. The Assembly would have cultivated Essek as an intelligence asset with the same degree of time and care - and using some of the same methods - that Trent used to turn the Blumenthal trio into assassins.

If they followed a modern playbook, they would have made contact with Essek anywhere from 2 to 10 years before the theft - nothing underhanded. A Cerberus mage approaches him at a negotiation or conference and strikes up a conversation. Then it’s increasing “chance” encounters to get Essek familiar with the handler, play the “we’re both mages, really we’re on the same side” angle to earn enough sympathy & trust to start talking regularly. Once the channel’s open, the handler and asset meet and/or talk routinely while the handler assesses the target’s motives, weaknesses, and the possibility that they’re a double agent.

Espionage proper then starts with small favors, acts Essek can rationalize as victimless or even helpful to the Dynasty. In this stage the handler is getting the asset comfortable with engaging in espionage. They reward the asset for what feels like minimal moral trespass. For Essek that would have been praising his research, encouraging avenues of investigation they knew the Dynasty had shut down. Having meetings with Ludinus plays right into the ego trip - the Head of the Assembly himself is taking the time to meet with him! The Assembly gets how important this work is! That keeps Essek isolated from Dynasty members who might convince him to take a step back and builds loyalty to the Assembly over the Dynasty.

Once an asset settles in, espionage becomes easier. Routines get established. Moral hurdles have been overcome. Now the asks get bigger and the rewards get sparser. The handler will suggest larger acts just to get the asset thinking about them, since the more they consider “just hypothetically” how to pull it off, the more likely it is they’ll do it. This is where the idea of stealing the beacons would get introduced (though of course it’s been the goal all along.) I’ll bet the Assembly hinted at all the study that could be done if they could just get to the beacons in person, constantly bemoaning the lack of access. By now Essek sees the Assembly as colleagues in arcane pursuits, kindred minds, unlike the boring, stuffy old mages of the Dynasty. Of course he could outwit the Dynasty’s security and get the beacons to the Assembly - he’s a prodigy, a genius, everyone says so. And it’s not like he was stealing all of them. The consecuted would be fine. Everyone would be fine.

None of this is intended to absolve Essek of personal responsibility. But it provides a context for his actions, and for why he might regret them so much even though he apparently did them willingly. Asset handlers are very, very good at drawing someone willing to commit minor transgressions into far greater crimes. Look at how Trent shaped Caleb, Astrid, and Eadwulf. He didn’t order them to execute their own parents on day one. He spent years coaxing, tempting, and coercing them into darker and darker crimes, letting them rationalize their own actions at each step, preying on the same vulnerabilities as Essek: isolation (separating the three from other students, telling them their work was secret), ambition (the promise of great arcane power, of shaping the Empire’s destiny), and ego (”we were going to keep the empire safe,” telling them they were gifted, they were chosen).

So how do IRL spies rationalize their actions? Those who spy for reasons of conscience or ideology have done the rationalizing ahead of time, but everyone else has to get there somehow. Some who spy for revenge tell themselves it’s what their superiors deserve, while others tell themselves everyone’s doing it. Some just need a lie to get started (most commonly about who they’re spying for), while others have to keep up the charade all along. Let’s look at a few cases similar to Essek’s that demonstrate just how slippery the slope can be.

Aldrich Ames, a long-term CIA officer slash double agent for the KGB, got suckered in by thinking he could control the situation and wasn’t really hurting anyone. Ames had chronic financial trouble related to excessive drinking & his wife’s lavish lifestyle and in 1985 came up with a plan: he would essentially con the KGB by selling them a minor amount of classified info that he deemed “virtually worthless.” In April he set up the exchange and the KGB paid him $50,000, enough to satisfy his immediate debts. But after actually doing it Ames said he felt he’d now crossed a line he couldn’t step back from, and continued to sell information to the Soviets. By the time he was caught he had, by his own admission, compromised “virtually all Soviet agents of the CIA.”

While some assets just need a lie to get started, others require a delicate dance of self-delusion. Col. George Trofimoff was an Army officer who ran the center where would-be Soviet defectors were assessed & questioned. Trofimoff, a Russian émigré at a young age, was chronically in debt. In 1969 he renewed his acquaintance with his stepbrother back in Russia, now a bishop in the Russian Orthodox Church, and began to pass secrets in return for money - but he and his stepbrother never framed the transactions as such. Trofimoff described their meetings as, “very informal. ... First, it was just a conversation between the two of us. He would ask my opinion on this and that--then, he would maybe ask me, 'Well, what does your unit think about it?' Or, 'What does the American government think about it?’” His compensation was similarly informal: “I said I needed money. ... And he says, 'I tell you what, I'll loan it to you.' So he gave me, I think, 5,000 marks and then, it wasn't enough, because I needed more. ... Then he says, 'Well, you know, I'll tell you what. You don't owe me any money. And if you need some more, I can give you some more. Don't worry about it. You're going to have to have a few things, this and that.' And this is how it started.” Trofimoff could pretend to himself that he wasn’t really spying - just having a chat with his stepbrother - and wasn’t really getting paid for it - just borrowing a little money.

This got longer than I intended it to be and there’s still plenty to talk about, so I’ll save the rest for a second post. Next time: what happens long-term to espionage assets? And what happens if an asset regrets their actions and/or attempts to cut off contact with their handlers?

(This accidentally turned into a series on Essek & IRL espionage: Parts 1, 2, 3, 4)

#Critical Role #Essek Thelyss #tradecraft #mostly Cold-War-related tradecraft TBH #hot boi got ROLLED by the Assembly though #sounds like he didn't even get paid!#I do wonder at stealing TWO beacons though #why two? what was wrong with one?#maybe Essek was just showing off at that point #it's been a long pandemic

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utterlyinevitable · 3 years

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So umm a strange request here. Would you write an hc for the Ethan diamond scene in 1.15 where MC is virgin and it's her first time? Of course you can ignore it. Thank you 😅

ok so but let me preface with: i don’t personally think the 1.15 scene is a healthy way for a first time. yeah the sexual tension is hot af but like if i was put in that situation and never been intimate before i would have been confused and awkward and it would have killed the mood 😅

anywho here’s this!

this is nsfw. minors dni.

1.15💎 with Virgin MC

They’re strongly speaking. Staring one another down. Words cutting through the palpable tension. And his hands are on her wrists. Ethan’s pinning her subtly to the counter to stop the poking of his chest. The poking that surely would have found the rapid beating of his heart if he let it continue.

They’re both breathing heavy in the wake - the waiting for him to finish saying what he’s trying to.

She still, watching him intently. Lips parted as bated breaths pass.

“I’m not your boss anymore and that means... that means...”

His eyes flicker down her. To his hands on her. Back up to her reddened face and tongue wetting her lips.

Ethan’s grip loosens the same moment he leans in. In no time at all MC’s on the tops of her toes meeting him - wrapping her arms around his neck. They meet, passionate and urgent. His body keeping her against the counter, yet MC doesn’t care.

There are no thoughts, just hands and kisses and want. A stirring deep inside seconds from exploding.

“I want you... You have no idea how much I’ve wanted you...” he says.

And she groans. Low and full and wonton and oh my god.

He lifts her perches her at the edge of the counter, coaxing her to wrap herself around him for a better angle.

It finally sets in on MC that this is really happening. He’s placing warm distracting kisses along her neck, stretching out the collar of her dress to reach more skin. She’s aware. Overly aware of what comes next. MC needs to find a semblance of herself to make a decision. Though her entire body is telling her yes - screaming it. Falling into Ethan, legs wrapping around his waist, fingers twisting into the back of his shirt, pulling him closer until there’s no space left.

She’s never gone further than this before. Kissing in the kitchen, hands roaming, a shirt or two tossed aside is comfortable. She knows how that goes. But this.. this fire won’t be snuffed until it explodes.

There are no thoughts, only actions. Her body moving, rolling, arching in a way all its own.

His arms wrap securely around her waist and suddenly there’s nothing under her but air. Ethan using his strength to carry her through his apartment.

The kisses don’t stop. As they’re in motion she follows suit, tugging his shirt up and over his head. Her hands running over his lean muscles that take her breath away.

The way he presses himself further into her touch, as if in this position they couldn’t be any closer. The way he growls her name makes her dizzy, intoxicated in ways she hasn’t felt with anyone else.

Ethan lays her down on his large bed with expert care. Keeps his place between her legs. Implores her with glazed eyes.

It’s another out if she wanted it.

Instead she props herself up and lets him pull her shirt up and over her head.

She lets him plaster sultry wet kisses over the newly exposed skin. Makes her feel delirious, wondering if this is real or if she’s dreaming this moment.

His stubble scratches as he goes, sending pleasant shivers up her spine. Her muddled mind makes a joke about how his beard tickles.

“I should shave,” he smiles ruefully.

“Don’t you dare.”

Ethan grins and returns his scratchy kisses to a sensitive spot behind her ear she never knew existed, as his hands teases the rest of her clothes off.

Her heart is beating our of her chest. This is all new territory. She doesn’t know what to do but she wants to keep going. She’s not going to tell him. She knows Ethan well enough that if she did this whole thing will be over - his stupid moral complex would take over. He’d want her to do things right and by the books. And nothing seems more dumb than waiting for a romantic moment or marriage or anything that’s not him and now.

She’s naked on his bed. Ethan’s kissing his way down her body. His lips are nearly at her heat and she can feel his affects on her more than she can spell her own name right now.

She’s putty in his hands. He could do anything to her right about now and she’d say thank you.

She writhes as his fingers work wonders. Arches as his mouth follows. Gasps and moans as he sucks and one of his hands trails up to tease her nipple.

Right now it doesn’t matter than she’s never experienced sex before. It doesn’t matter that she’s presumably wildly inexperienced compared to Ethan. What matters is them. That they’re crossing a line. That they’re letting this happen because they both want it.

“Mmmmmm” she moans as he brings her closer and closer to the brink. She’s frantically wiggling against him chasing the high

but then Ethan rises. MC “harumps” in protest are met with a low chuckle from Ethan.

He stands before her with his hands on his hips, accentuating his build. “Good?”

“Could be better.”

His smile alone gets her closer to climax.

“Oh?”

MC lunges forward, gripping him by the loop of his jeans. Follows his lead from before and kisses down his chest, at the same time her fingers fumble with his zipper and button.

Ethan enjoys every second. Every graze of her hand against his very evident bulge is straining and heaven all in one. He’s waited so long for this.

As soon as his bottoms hit the floor he pulls her back up to meet his lips. Ethan’s arms cradle her close. They both revel in the balmy sensation of skin on skin.

“I want to remember every moment of this,” she says near breathless.

“I would say the same... but how could I ever forget?”

He easily lifts her, moving her to lie against the pillows.

Ethan’s hovering over her, eyes twinkling. They’re so close - mentally, emotionally, physically. Her heart is fluttering.

“I want this to be as special as you are.”

Those words were all it took. If she even had one fraction of a worry left about doing this, it melted away with the warmth and sincerity of his voice.

Just to hit it home in the heart, Ethan twines his fingers in hers as he proceeds to kiss every inch of her. Teasing out her pleasure and bringing her back to the brink before, finally, they connect.

Oh, god...

She’s so wet and ready there’s no pain, not like mainstream media had her believe. It doesn’t feel weird at all. It feels delightfully right. And how has she gone all this time without this? In the simple seconds she has to form a coherent thought she wonders about when this’ll happen again. She’s most certainly addicted to this sensation now.

They move together. Hearts and breaths in unison. MC grips at him tightly, claws at his back as his pace quickens.

It’s not hate sex. It’s not rage sex. It’s neither of those things that it could have been by how this started. It’s... passion. It’s lust and want and need and everything.

It’s her hips rising to meet his in time. It’s Ethan wrapping his arms around her shoulders, cradling her head as he holds his weight on his forearms. It’s his teeth grazing her shoulder, biting her earlobe as he’s to the hilt. It’s the full heady feeling on him inside her. It’s the involuntary tightening she does as she coasts closer to release. It’s the groans and grunts he makes as he feels her struggling to get there

“Come for me. You can do it. Let go, I’ve got you,” Ethan says against the shell of her ear.

And she’s undone. Right there in his arms she cries out in ecstasy.

Ethan’s thrusts become erratic as he chases his release while helping her ride out hers.

When they both regain themselves Ethan lies beside her, gathering her in his arms.

As they lie there in silence, MC really couldn’t have thought about this moment with anyone else. She let Ethan lead and he didn’t leave her astray. She guesses this is what everyone’s talking about the “perfect first time” rife with trust and understanding and a certain four letter word.

_____________

a/n: oh mymymy this is very long. i think i lost the plot at one time or another. it’s basically just 1.15 smut and i can’t be mad at that 😂 thanks for making it this far 💕

> complete masterlist <

Perma:

@lucy-268 @thegreentwin @queencarb @danijimenezv @starrystarrytrouble @terrm9 @interobanginyourmom @maurine07 @mercury84choices @schnitzelbutterfingers @the-pale-goddess @whimsicallywayward15 @mvalentine @mm2305 @rookie-ramsey @drariellevalentine @withbeautyandrage @forallthatitsworth @stateofgracious @missmiimiie @uneravine @iemcpbchoices @sophxwithers @quixoticdreamer16 @lsvdw-blog

@adiehardfan @headoverheelsforramsey @dickgraysonsscrumptiousbooty @reputaytion-xiii @jerzwriter @kachrisberry @aishwarya26

Ethan:

@udishaman @binny1985 @honeyandsunfl0wers @wingedhairstylemusicweasel @ohchoices @dulceghernandez @blossomanarchy @stygianflood @openheartthot @senseofduties @tsrookie @kalogh @aworldoffandoms @takemyopenheart @casey-v @ethanramseylover @a-crepusculo @randomperson111 @anntoldst0ries @aishaaaaaaah @estellaelysian @mysticaurathings @mayarambles

#open heart #choices open heart #open heart hc #open heart headcanon #ethan ramsey #ethan x mc #ethan ramsey x mc #nsft

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boredoverlord · 3 years

Text

Bucky X Reader - Hold the Line

I came in here to show you a good time, so here's my personal work and my very first fanfiction of all time. And because I'm a thirsty bitch, of course it's smut.

Summary : As a young and talented psychologist specializing in difficult people in prison, you believed in a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to work with the SHIELD. Turned out you were tricked to work for HYDRA.

For three years they made you do horrors in the name of an ideology you despised, but you may have found the occasion to finally make a change for the good, when they introduced you to your new patient.

The Winter Soldier.

Rating : Explicit, please kids, look away ( of course you won't because you're cute little rebels, but please do it)

Word count : 6.4k (chapter 1)

TW: Light BDSM (for now) Because Bucky is a massive Sub and it seems nobody agrees with me, so I have to do the lord's work here.

Foul language, mention of violence and murder, Masturbation, male orgasm and a tiiiny bit of choking. I started lightly

Please consider reading this on Archive of our own or read it below the cut. Lemme know what you think !

Chapter 1: A Story of Almost Everything

You never were the type to brag. But one thing you know is : you’re damn good at your job. Years and years of psychology studies, you barely got to parties, you hardly made any friends, and your sleeping schedule is still a nightmare. Those were sacrifices you did for one sole purpose : helping others. To be the last resort for people who have lost everything. You always firmly believed that you could make a change in the world, even the slightest, even for just one person. That would have been enough to make your lifetime worthy. What's more noble than just a genuine try to make it better, after all ? So you wasted your youth on studies, without a damn blink. And never one ounce of regret. You did it because it felt right. You’re not very brave, but you decided to face your fear a couple of times. You even were an intern in a high security prison, talking to broken men and women who hated your guts. Trying to lead them to another path of life. You heard stories that could break any mind. Only time could tell if you actually helped them. But that’s part of the job. Hope. And hard work.

That’s why when you started to have a growing reputation, at 26 after five years of studies and several years working in prison and rehabilitation, you were ecstatic when S.H.I.E.L.D contacted you. You quit everything, starting with your homeland in Europe, to fly to Washington DC, to visit the headquarters. The new building, the thrill of novelty, the clean rooms, the medical wing, and Alexander Pierce himself coming to shake your hand and telling you personally the wonders they have in mind for the psychology field. You could prepare people to save the world, you could have all the resources to make research, and fix minds that were supposed to be beyond repair. It was supposed to be just a quick trip, but the visit wasn’t even done when you looked at your guide with enthusiasm : you weren’t going home. Just cancel the fly. You’re taking the job immediately. It was three years ago.

Enough to understand how fucked you are.

You didn’t save anyone, you didn’t even work to make the world a better place. Oh but you did work to make a change. A change for HYDRA. They tortured you to make you swallow their ideology, but even if your body surrendered, your mind didn’t, even if it was still a perpetual work on yourself. You never believed in this masquerade, but you know it doesn’t matter. Because HYDRA knows how good you are at your job, and you’re a precious asset. So precious that they pushed all your buttons to make you obey. You tried to act and escape. Their last resort is the Damocles sword they put over your family’s head. Next act of rebellion, heads will roll. And it won’t be yours : no, no. HYDRA won’t give you this relief. It will be your loved ones. So you’re doing what you have to do. It’s the most cowardly choice, you know it. And you’re ashamed. But you’re too terrorised to make it otherwise. So you’re here to twist people's minds to swallow whatever Hydra wants. You make them understand the importance of the organization, when they can’t take it anymore, you make them understand that not only they can, but they must . You saw vulnerable people giving their life to this awful cause, and you are the person to make them understand it was the right thing to do. They gave you kind people with dreams, morals and passion, and you turn this into anger, hate and war, worshipping a crazy doctrine that spoils everything you believed and fought for. You have blood on your hands. You’re THAT good at your job.

So when they called you for a highly secret mission, you weren’t exactly surprised. Just disgusted by them, and mostly yourself. In the guts of what was called the Ideal Federal Saving Bank, you’re obediently following the chef himself : Alexander Pierce, to your next place of action. “I believe you have read your mission’s order, Y/N ?” “Yes Sir.” You said. “It did mention I will have the whole file today, though. I need to take a look at my patient so I can work in proper condition.” “Whatever you call it.” He said, opening the door of the clandestine laboratory in the now abandoned bank. If not for the machinery, we could still believe that those art deco walls filled with safes would still contain treasures of a lifetime for some people. Now there is nothing of value in here, not even the very skin of every PoS present. And you were including yourself. Making your way in the middle of the heavy set up, you slowly reach the pod in the middle, chewing secretly the interior of your cheeks. You know what’s inside, and it makes you want to puke. Mr Pierce continued “Doctor, as your mission was presented to you, your one on only assignment will be the physical and mostly the psychological perfect condition of the Winter Soldier, for the entire length of this mission on american soil.” Basically, be sure his brain is a fucking slushy. You reluctantly nodded and drew closer. “What’s his condition ?” At the top of your height, barely 5’3, you tiptoed to actually look at him by the window of the cryostasis chamber, since you never got this close of a look, not without the file and basically crumbs of info that were thrown at your face. They expected you to keep a dog on a leash, not making actual work on him, and it shows. White man, late 20s to early 30s, approx 5”7, long dark messy hair, not shaved, geez, it seemed like the poor guy was barely cleaned up before being pushed here. Good physical condition, breathing was steady. You could see the steam of his breath on the glass. He may be clinically asleep, but she highly doubted he would be in his best shape. He looked uncomfortable, and tired. It wasn’t a restorative sleep. It was a prison. You couldn’t help but notice his prosthetic arm, even if that was the only thing you knew about him. It’s a fascinating work of science, that’s for sure. And even if transhumanism and biomechanical wasn’t your forte, you wanted to have a closer look, to satisfy your curiosity. One of the scientists watching his screen responded : “He’s gently defrozing, should be half conscious in 5 minutes. You may want to take a step down.” You ignore that, and lean your hand to your superior. “May I finally have what I have been asking for ?” With the most irritating smile, he gave you the Winter Soldier’s File and you quickly opened it to have a first look at all the fuss. Basic physical information, previous missions report, date of entering and ending of cryostasis, bare minimal medical record, notes by her predecessor, fucking trigger words to make him kneel like a 12 years old in front of any boysband... nothing about his previous life, his antics, his name, actual disorders, no name, nor adresses… You glaced a bit at Pierce and threw a polite smile. He knows what he’s doing, and he knows you know. You’re extremely good with very violent patients. You have endured rapists and murderers spiting in your face and swearing to bite your head off and fucking your skull. You were traumatized and you cried yourself to sleep, but the following day you did your job again. You’re just here to handle the worst of the worst. And you’re going to do it.

Or he’s going to break your neck and fuck your skull. You’re fine with that.

“Thank you it’s going to be very helpful.” As helpful as a band-aid on a wooden leg. “What’s this device ?” You point your chin to another machine not far away from it. One of the two men finishing installing it, raised his head to look at you. “A memory suppressing machine. Usually he doesn’t need it as much as he used to, but it’s mainly for safety. He must be prepared.” “He’s in a state where he willingly takes it. So don’t hesitate if he’s starting to be annoying, or excited. That can happen. But that mean you would probably have to work more with him to make him fully ready for his mission,” “Understood, thank you for clarification gentlemen.” You smiled and they smiled back. You’re a woman, so you’re used to it. Basically this shit was supposed to hack his brain, and it must be painful. “I would strongly recommend not using it at such a time. From what I quickly read he needs stability and time. Wiping everything out will more likely create more confusion.” You took a look at the file again and took it upon yourself to not have your eyes double in size and screaming at this bunch of idiots. “... and it does seem he’s using it a lot.”

“We want the asset to be as focused as possible.”

“I understand that, but that's a temporary solution at best. He’s got a brain, not a harddrive. We still don’t know how it can store information, and if it can…” “The last time we used him was five years ago…” Started Pierce, with diplomaty, but also with a tone that wasn’t allowing any more debate on the matter. “And this mission is an absolute priority. The asset is strictly under cryostasis procedure as soon as he’s not needed anymore. The machine will be used if needed.” “I understand your point.” You absolute psychopath. “Then my request is simply to be here if it happens, and to be able to control the shocks. Also, I insist that he must be in perfect condition when you launch the procedure, I’ll personally make it happen and give you a green light.” “Thank you for your hard work.” He said, raising his hand, that you promptly and politely shook. You could feel the angry grasp. “I know you’re the perfect woman for this hard job. Your work is an inspiration for us all.” You wish you could end your life right here right now, instead of being told such atrocities. But you think about your mom and dad. At this time of year they start to prepare the pool for the summer, for the future neighborhood barbecues where they will brag to everyone about their incredible psychiatrist daughter who is doing secret stuff over sea to help save the world. You have to be strong. At least for them. At least for now.

“Hail Hydra.”

“Hail Hydra.” You responded, while your tongue feels like sandpaper.

“Ok he’s starting to wake up…” Someone warns, as Pierce leaves the room, unbothered. The pod opens before your eyes, as the asset -you hate this term- is being roughly handled and carried away by two dudes to his seat. The one dangerously close to the memory suppressing machine. You squatted in front of him, the time for him to blink several times and look around him. Confused, but it’s not exactly his first rodeo either. His eyes are quickly focused on the first thing in front of him : you. He looked like he was trying to remember who you are, but quickly realized he didn’t know you. Two blue spears digging right into your soul. That’s making you a bit uncomfortable. The same weird feeling of unease you have when a cat is watching you taking a shower. “Hi.” You started, in english, even if he could be from italy you had no freaking clue. You guessed that he was probably slavic. But the file says he’s speaking more than ten languages. And it wasn’t specified when and how the hell did he learn that. “Can you hear me?” He took a few more seconds to look at you, probably the time to finish reading every embarrassing moment of your life, right into your eyes, like your drunk 18th birthday when you finished in your panties swimming in a city fountain, but he nodded eventually. You actually know this look. But it’s the first time you have a super soldier in front of you so it’s of a rare intensity. He’s dissecting you. Gathering information. His eyes moved slightly down : a recent scar on your neck. Right : an ex piercing on the top of your ear, now unusable. Down left : he just realized you’re slightly unbalanced so he knows you have a hip issue. And down right : he’s looking at your hand, you don’t really know what he saw here, maybe calculating how to break them ? You were literally a foot in a viper’s nest. Were you terrified ? Absolutely. Will that forbid you to do your job ? Nope. “Can you follow the light ?” You asked, moving slowly your phone’s lamp from left to right in front of his eyes. He did it without questioning. “Ok good.” You tried a smile, not really knowing why. If he was at least a tenth as clever as the file said he was, he perfectly know that you’re here to fuck him up. But you couldn’t help it. Poor dude. He was visibly more or less your age. He could have been a prince, or thief, a womanizer, or a priest, whatever, HYDRA took everything from him. From his free will, of his right to grow old, to his sleep. “Can you tell me your name ?” He frowned, perplexed. “Winter Soldier.” Shitty answer but at least he was fully aware, and his tongue was working properly. “Nice to meet you, I’m doctor Y/N. We’re here to work together in preparation of your next assignment. Do you understand ?” He nodded, unimpressed. “Good, can you get up ?” He did, so you did it too. And he realized that you were… very short. His eyes literally went up and slooowly down. That was a bit mean, actually. You carefully took a glance behind you, and your eyeroll could probably trigger an earthquake. “Can you all nice gentlemen let down a bit of their weapon ?” You said at the 6 dudes with rifles literally fixed on him, ready to shoot at the wrong twitch of muscle. No wonder he wasn’t talkative. “You won’t say that when he will break your neck with two fingers, ‘mam.”

“He’s pretty stable for now. Plus he’s not fully awake, let’s give him time before threatening him, shall we ?”

Nobody moved for ten seconds before one of them complied, since you didn’t move. The rest of the bunch reluctantly followed . You looked at your patient, hoping that that would have made him a bit more relaxed. Nope, he didn’t give a shit. He wasn't even looking at them. He was looking at you. You’re the mystery of this room to him. But you didn’t need extra vision to understand that Docs treated him like a guinea pig, so he was very understandably extra careful with you. Standing on his feet, all his muscles ready for action, that’s the exact moment you realized how close you two were. Indeed, if he decided to, your jaw would fly across the room in a single move. You never had such a display of sheer raw strength, and you could feel the heat of his body radiate.

“He needs a shower, and clothings.” You said, having a look at his 5 years old combat suit still reeking the smell of his sweat. It was intoxicating. They didn’t even allow him to clean himself. Poor dude was frozen in his own filth for the last five years. And you didn’t know why you took an even deeper breath. “And I’m talking about comfy workout clothes, no combat suit. Please escort him and handle him with care, before bringing him to my office.” You actually decided to be sure he wouldn’t be mistreated, by waiting outside the man’s bathrooms. You weren’t certain of how he could react, and you didn’t trust anyone here. If one of them decided to do a piss contest with your patient, it could end badly. So you put your hands in your pockets, looking at the two armed men waiting for the most dangerous assassin in the world to finish scrubbing himself with soap. The atmosphere was heavy and the silence was loud in itself. Even the sound of the shower was stressful and menacing.

When the Soldier was escorted to your improvised office into the archive, directly linked to a storage room that will be your bedroom for the next weeks, you let him take a seat and promptly blocked the access to the room of the two escort members. “Thank you sirs, that will be all. Please wait here.” They look at you like you just told them you were dating their daughters. “Sorry Miss, but we can’t…” “Sorry Doctor , and I can’t work properly with weapons in my office.” You raised your hand, showing your device on your wrist. Something that would not only call for aid by a simple pressure, but could stun an opponent. Neither them nor you were stupid : it wouldn’t stop The Winter Soldier, maybe he would blink a second at most. But you really wanted to be alone with him. Was he dangerous ? Yes. Were you absolutely certain that you would leave this room alive if you closed this door to their face ? No. But it’s been three years since your priority wasn’t your survival anymore. So you forced a smile and slapped the door. They needed you more than you needed them, so they will obey.

“Douchebags.” You muttered to yourself while coming back to your desk. Your patient didn’t even move a muscle at your little argument. He wasn’t totally inexpressive actually, mostly terribly broody. His hair was still wet from the shower he took, wearing cargo pants, heavy boots and hoodies, generic clothes by HYDRA. You got those too, since you’re not allowed to carry anything personal for mission to mission. You had a tablet for books, music and movies, but that was it. You haven’t opened your shelves yet, but you know it’s full of ugly clothes and generic black panties of doom.

You took a large inspiration, sat on your desk in front of him, and started : “Ok ‘Winter Soldier’... how are you doing ?” He didn’t even flinch. He was staring into your soul with his eyes lost into dark circles. Depriving someone of proper sleep is a basic rule for brainwash. “You enjoyed the shower ?” Nothing. You waited for a bit to see if he would finally respond. Ten seconds. Twenty. fourty. a minute. When he gathered that you were actually looking for an answer, visibly a first one for him, he finally gave you the courtesy of one. “Yes.” “Perfect.” You didn’t hide your slight smile and tiled your head. “I’ll be sure you’re in your best condition for your next mission. If something’s on your mind, I need to know about it. Nothing will get out of this room. Both of our priorities are your goal, and your condition is the key to success. Which makes you , my high top priority. Do you understand me ?” “Yes.”

“Ok so let’s get going.” You took another file, and took a picture out, ready to handle it to him. “Is the name : Nicholas Fury, ringing some bells to you?” “Yes.” He took it inside his titanium fingers and finally moved his piercing blue eyes away from you to look at the picture. “In two weeks, you’ll be in Washington DC. An entire squad will be deployed to assassinate him. Fury is the leader of the S.H.I.E.L.D, not a mere target. He will break free and fight back. That will be when you’ll show up.” He wasn’t looking at the picture anymore. One thing for sure : at least he was paying attention to you, and what you were saying. And that made you actually kind of proud of yourself. “That was part one. I’ll personally supervise your training with the VR machine and your physical health and condition. I really need you to communicate with me all the time about anything that could be in your mind. The more focused you are, the more Hydra’s plan will succeed.” And what’s that plan ? You have not a single clue. You were a cog in the machine, disposable. Not much more than him. “Do you understand ?” “I understand.” Oh shit, two words this time!

“Good.” You smiled. He didn’t. You move your hands closer to him, to take a grip on the picture. He opened his prosthetic hand, leaving you to take it back. Nothing in his gesture seems dangerous. Just normal, somehow cordial. “I must ask : are you in any pain right now ?” His eyes significantly get from right to left. He must probably wonder why you are asking him that. Did nobody ever ask him such basic questions like : ‘are you in pain?’ This man's sole purpose was to fight, that made no damn sense for you.

“Sir ?” You insisted for an answer, even if the ‘sir’ sounded absolutely ridiculous to your ears. You didn’t know his name, and you don’t feel comfortable calling him “Winter Soldier” , “Soldier”, “Sir De Winter”, “Hey you,he soviet assassin” so it will be “Sir” for now. “Sir are you in pain right now ?” “I’m not in pain.” A complete sentence, that’s progress. You breathed a bit better “Ok good.” You got up from your desk, which was honestly barely taller that him remaining on his chair. He didn’t let go of your eyes and you decided to make a bold move. For now, he was always being responsive so you slowly moved your hands toward him. To his prosthetic hand. “May I take a look, please ?” You glanced at each other, nobody made the first move. In complete silence, if it wasn’t for both of your breaths. You’re almost sure that it has been at least 5 minutes since you decided to speak again. Slowly, and gently, with no signs of confrontation in your body language or speech. “I will not do it until you comply. And you can refuse the contact.” He didn’t answer right away but he finally nodded.

Slowly, you took his hand into yours, lifting it from his thigh where it was resting. At the beginning it was just taking a look. But he wasn’t making any moves, so you decided to take your observation a little further. You used your other hands to start to move each finger separately, taking a step closer to him. Finally, you made one of your hands slowly sliding into the hoodie, to feel the muscles, the nerves, how it feels like a real arm. It was cold, but you felt it shudder to your touch. That was the line you decided to not take it further.

“Thank you, Soldier.” You said with a smile, taking away your hands from him. You moved behind your desk, opening your notepad to take a bunch of notes, breaking the contact with him. Just a second. But when you raised your eyes again, The Winter Soldier wasn’t in sight.

You shuddered and didn’t make a single move. If it wasn’t for your fingers grasping your desk. You did your best to have a steady respiration and not start to panic. Your throat dried up immediately. You took a deep breath and say : “Please, get back to your seat.” You slowly moved your head to look right back at him. He was standing. His eyes were black, taking loud deep breaths, fixing your behind your shoulder. Tall. Dangerous. You were terrorised. And he could smell it. He didn’t move so you stood up as well, and slowly faced him. You try to remain in total control of your body and not start to fidget. You could scream for help, but for whatever reason, you still had the feeling you could handle the situation. Trying to convince yourself that it wasn’t the first time a patient was disobedient. The only difference was that this one could crush your skull in a bat of an eye,

“Get back.” You said once again, bearing his piercing eyes, but he didn’t budge. So you took out your hand and put it on his chest. You felt like an ant against a mountain, but you pushed him a bit. “We will go nowhere this way.” You resumed trying to get a step closer, even if it will be creating a proximity that could be even more lethal to you. “So please, get back to…”

Something happened. It was obvious, and clear as day : you felt the bulge between his legs. Right above your navel. Hardening even more now that he could feel your body. You decided immediately to repress the shameful feeling of your very inside warming up and tickling you. “Winter Soldier.” You growled, angry but trying your best to remain as professional as you could. Of course, of fucking course. This guy was gorged on serum and hormones, quick, violent actions, and adrenaline. Pumping in his veins, burning 24/7. His body was on the edge all the time, and he just awoke from a dreamless slumber. He was a human, whatever all these idiots were thinking, not a freakin’ cyborg. When was the last time he saw a woman that he didn’t smash the head on a wall ? You even suspected that Pierce was counting on it. Nonetheless, you were alone in an office, literally glued with the world's most dangerous assassin, who was having a massive hard-on. Throbbing against you. You had your share of very awkward situations in your short life time. But nothing, nothing prepared you for this. And you had even less of an idea of what to do because he was doing nothing . He was feeling uncomfortable, that you could say, but he wasn’t really doing any moves to attack you, or even take you. He was standing here, with heavy breathing, his eyes still piercing you. And you slowly slided your gaze to his lips, finding the vision of his hard laboured breath strangely mesmerizing.

Short of ideas, your reflexes took the best (or the worst) of you, and without you realizing it, your hand was around his neck. Your palm pressured on his glottis, and you clearly felt him swallow. As clearly as you felt him becoming even harder. Your breath was starting to shake, as you felt a not-so subtle chill coursing your spin. You drew his face and your face closer, as you finally moved forward, forcing him to move as well. Forcing was a strong word : the last time you hit a punching bag, you hurt yourself and sobbed for an hour. But for whatever reason, he did whatever you wanted. As if he was testing your resolve to make him obey. But there was nothing on his file about this behaviour. He tried to attack, kill and escape. Nothing about testing the limits of anyone.

“You. Will. Sit. Down!” you spat, through your teeth, forcing even more your grip around his neck, as your other hand was reaching for his hair. You pulled it, not too harshly, but you could definitely smell the musk, and the wetness of what stayed of his shower.

You did it. He was sitting down again. And your bodies departed for one another. For once he tried to escape your gaze, which was a strangely human reaction. You both managed to get your breath back, before you decided to call the guard to adjourn your observation.

As soon as the door closed behind them, you felt your legs giving up and you sat on the ground, back against your desk, a small wimp leaving your throat. You felt your eyes starting to wet, and your teeth rattled a bit so you tried to cuddle yourself to try to retake control on your body. Your hands were shaking uncontrollably as his intoxicating smell was still all around you. It was by far one of the most terrifying experiences you ever felt, and it was all clouded by the phantom feeling of his body against yours. You could still feel his gaze, his heat, his… well, his cock against your belly. You were still chilling, trying to repress whatever you were feeling at this instant. Because it wasn’t right, for you. Nor him. Everyone in this godforsaken organisation was treating him like a dog, just here to attack and do tricks, but you swore to yourself not to do the same. You will succeed at your mission, but you’ll do it from the crumbs of humanity and morality that HYDRA left you. You will do anything possible that the mission will be complete, the most painless possible for this broken man you just saw. Wait a second.

Painless .

You jumped on your feet, ignoring the numbness of your legs caused by the shock, and you ran at the door, screaming at the three men at the end of the corridor. “HEY !” The guards startled a bit and looked at you “I changed my mind. Bring the Winter Soldier back to my office.” They briefly exchange what seems to be a bunch of insults about you, but they comply to bring the Soldier back. Him ? He seemed absolutely unbothered.

You closed the door behind the both of you, to the face of the guards yet again. He was standing here, showing his back as you slowly got back in front of him. Hands in your pocket, not really sure of what to do nor how to do it. He was looking at you, this same feeling of unease than before. And for reasons : a small glance confirmed that he was still rock hard. You didn’t make any move for a long time, until you finally put your hand on his chest. You felt his breathing becoming slightly quicker. “You’re not in pain.” You whispered, and he shook his head, negatively. “That was the wrong question. I’m sorry... “ Without you noticing, you had the palm of your hand on his cheek, scrubing lightly his stubble with your thumb as an apology. You breathed in, just couldn’t believe what you were about to say. “Do you need help ?” His expression didn’t change, but his eyes ? They became a bit brighter, you could even see a bit of relief when you saw him nod.

You swiftly move your other index on his pillowy lips as you still lower your voice. “They cannot hear us.” He nodded again as the only feeling of your finger as close to his mouth made him shiver with anticipation. He was literally dying of anything that could relieve him. And for what you understood, as your conversation continued, he trusted you with his body, to provide him with the sweet touch he has been totally deprived of. You slowly push away your index to gently slide your thumb between his lips, and he sighed with pleasure as he took it with an eagerness you would never have believed possible. The most deadly assassin in the world, the legendary Winter Soldier that everyone wishes he wasn’t real, was purring while sucking your finger. If you weren’t the shrink, you’ll be needing one immediately. You gently moved him to make him sit in his chair, he was way too tall for you to handle this with ease. “What about the showers?” You asked him, as you removed your thumb to make it gently slide on his lips, your other hand crawling across his chest to his pants. He swallowed before whispering. “I could but... “ his well built square jaws started to tense, with a visible revulsion. “... They can watch.” Disgusting. He couldn’t even close the damn door of the shower. “You’re safe here.” You said as your hand was finally reaching the bulge behind his Hydra cargo pants. You didn’t know what you expected but… it was way beyond that. He hissed a bit at the feeling of your hand as you started to touch it gently over the fabric.

Now he was panting, looking at you as you were a single oasis after years of thirst in the desert. “Please…” You heard, barely audible when he was starting to lose it. “I got you, but you have to promise me to be good.” “Anything. Please…”

And at your very surprise, you obliged him. Using your hand to plunge into his pants, while the other fast pressed into his mouth, muffing the immediate deep moan that escaped at the very second you touched his pulsing penis. He started panting even more, as he used his flesh arm to drive you onto him. His forehead against yours. You couldn’t stop yourself from getting closer and closer. Actually you let go of his -massive- erection a second to just drop out his pants, and his breach. You stopped a second, only to watch him begging you with his eyes, as you could feel his saliva at the palm of your hand while you muzzled him. It was it. You realized what kind of power you have over this man. He has been used and abused in every single way, but for once : someone’s finally doing what he wanted. You had his pleasure in your very hands, and for once in years, you could finally help someone. So you’re gonna do it, you’re going to make him feel good. Very good. “Good boy.” You muttered, without knowing where the hell that could come from, and you reached him again. Stroking your hands up and down his shaft, nourishing yourself over the vibration of his muffled moans against your hand. His eyes weren't leaving yours, if it wasn’t for when they seemed to roll to the sky. His vision periodically blackened by the waves of forbidden pleasure he was feeling over his body, who was barely him anymore. Your eyes were gorging on the vision of his handsome muscular man, surrendering himself to your touch, sweating, trembling and panting for you. You were saluted by an utterly satisfied noise the moment you decided to lean over his manhood to drip a large amount of your own saliva moist what was already on the edge of ruin. You rolled your thumb against his tip, massage his veins with just one finger… anything to make him feel something. Anything that wasn’t pure anger, hatred or apathy. You were inclined to believe the file saying that he was nothing but a perfectly built weapon for HYDRA to command. But now, when you tickled, teased and made him shiver, and you felt all his sincere gratitude, you were certain : There is a man in here. And he was finally feeling good .

But soon, it wasn’t enough anymore. Seeing his bare thighs, powerful, thicken by years of training and super soldier serum, tensed by all the nerves and muscles deliciously answering to your call, made your inside warmed up. Your core was aching, screaming for proximity and intimacy, and before you understood what happened, you sat astride on his left thigh. The soft flesh between your legs immediately responded with delight, making you shiver. Almost instantly, you felt his grip on your hip, of the cold metal digging into your flesh with despair. It was a super soldier, with the stamina of several dozen men, but it’s been so long, and you were touching him with perfection. You felt his head on your shoulder, and slowly you started licking his temple, tasting the very fruit of your hard work : his sweat.

Galvanized by his intoxicating smell, and the thrusting he started giving to your hand, you started to move like a snake, rocking against his skin, looking for some pressure despite the fabric of your pants, mercilessly acting like a barrier of your own pleasure. You could get it off, but it was a limit that you forbid yourself to cross. But it’s true, as you were working him, you couldn’t stop yourself to think of how this would feel. Sliding inside you. You were so very short and fragile, and compared to your hand, his phallus was gigantic. He could ruin you, split you in half, using his bare hands and make you do anything. But the only person in control here, were you. And only you. You never felt anything like this before. And it’s highly probable than neither did he. You tried to vanish the thought, but the more you could feel his thigh between yours, the more you became obsessed.

The more he was approaching, the more eager the soldier became. Both of his hands firmly gripped on your behind, almost certain that it will leave bruises, but you didn’t care at this very moment. His grunts against your hands became more and more intense, and you started to feel he was about to give in. In between your fingers, small drips of salivas were started to escape. You couldn’t give up your grip now, so you made it even more tight, drawing your lips closer to your hands, you whispered as your sore wrist fastened its path “I’m here for you. Give everything to me.”

His panting became incontrolable, his eyes rolled out, his head dropped back, before he finally reached his peak. You felt the deep vibration of his ultimate cry on your hand, as your other hand was dripping of hot seed. You slowly removed your other hand from his face, and could contemplate your masterpiece : the Soldier absolutely looked like a mess, with his red face, his eyes blinking furiously, covered with his own saliva. You left his leg, both your hands dripping of his bodily fluids. You used the one that was on his lips to pick his head and forced him to look at you. You ravished your vision of this man who absolutely surrendered to your good care, deeply satisfied with your attention. You cradled his face, and you took a large lick of his spit from his chin to his mouth. Where he leaned for a wet and warm kiss. You took a good taste of him, intoxicated by whatever pheromones he could diffuse around you.

You look at him another few seconds, before recluandly moving away, to the bathroom where you not only washed your hands, but came back with a wet towel. You first cleaned with infinite care his face, and then his genitals, making sure he wouldn’t have any kind of unpleasant sensation as he had a big day ahead of him. You were his doctor and caretaker, and he had a mission to prepare. He seemed to respond well to the cleaning, not really expressive, but he made no sudden move. You could see him sighing with ease, closing his eyes as he rubbed his cheek in your palm again, when you were caressing him with the wet towel. You could still hear a loud satisfying purr. If you didn’t specifically ask him to kill someone less that an hour ago, you would actually find this absolutely adorable.

You breathed in and out, making sure he was okay. “Are you feeling better ?...” He nodded, visibly relaxed, as he was closing his pants but not much more expressive than before. He stood up, in front of you, like nothing happened. “Yes.” But to your surprise he added a second later. “Thank you, doctor.” You smiled at him as you couldn’t keep yourself from making your knuckles caressing his cheek, and finally tracking the shape of his jaws. “Good boy.” You heard yourself say, wondering what the fuck was wrong with you.He didn’t react. All the shivers, purring, sighing, and moans disappeared as soon as his pants closed. It was for the best, and you quickly took your hand back, clearing your throat. You call the guards. The Winter Soldier was fully ready for his mission preparation, and you asked them to give him some time to recover from… his cryostatic, before you would start the procedure.

In the meantime, you need a shower. A long, hot, steamy, shower.

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senju-sekhmet · 3 years

Text

The Leash (Part 11)

Summary: Your rescue was supposed to be as smooth as these missions can be. However very quickly, Tobirama faces off against an enemy that has no form, color or smell - and time is running short, very fast. Unless he figures out what truly holds you hostage, your life will be lost. Warnings (for the finished work): Blood, illness, descriptions of heavy injuries and graphic violence, torture (both depicted and implied), needles, morally grey territory, human experimentation, panic attacks, character death, angst with a happy ending ~6000 words (this chapter, finished work: 80.000) Previous: Part 1; Part 2; Part 3; Part 4; Part 5; Part 6; Part 7; Part 8; Part 9; Part 10 Read on AO3! Disclaimer below the cut!

DISCLAIMER! Part two of the finale! More to go after this though as you can tell, stay with me <3 Other than that: enjoy my very self indulgent work, filled with my own headcanons and angst galore. Let me know what you think and thank you so much for reading!!!! ________

Tobirama was nothing if not dutiful. The time for your last dose had come faster than he wanted to. And he’d be there to administer it. He made sure to look more presentable before he entered your rooming using the hiraishin seal. What for, he didn’t know anymore. It didn’t matter, did it? Failure was certain, anyway. Perhaps it was for decency. Or maybe he needed the moment to recover. He was too numb. Spent from the breakdown. The short minute he spent at your shared home - that already screamed mute guilt at him - to wash off his smeared facial paint and reapply it before teleporting to your room.

You were in your bed, perfectly still. At peace. Of course. You couldn’t take any withdrawal anymore, at all - your body was too exhausted. To think this was how you’d pass - a shadow of your former self, at the limit of what you could take, physically, in every sense. You had fought a gruesome, cruel battle, gave it your everything, and now? Now, it was all for nothing. The sorrow flared again in a most painful way.

You won’t even hear his words.

He wouldn't even get to say goodbye.

Dazedly he strode closer to your bed, silently wondering where Hashirama was. He’d surely be here in a moment, he barely left your side. Your condition wouldn’t allow it - although with the seals covering your pale skin, you were stable, at least stable enough to allow him to tend to other duties, briefly. So long as the withdrawal didn’t kick in. He seized the moment while it presented itself like this.

He wouldn’t get another.

His eyes prickled again as he shuffled closer to your side. Briefly, he sat down on the side of your bed like he always had done when nobody else was around - but soon, the ache in his chest pulled him down onto his knees on the floor, by your side. The tightness inside was yet expanding and stealing his breath viciously as he wheezed past his clenched teeth for more air. Looking at you - your content face, the way your chest moved evenly albeit too fast - weak maybe but alive - it was tearing him apart. He didn’t know how to even exist with the grief that was seizing him faster than a fire ate up dry parchment.

His shaking hands reached for your cold, slender one, enclosing it in his, slowly bringing it to his face as he nearly buckled over it. Already, his chakra expanded to cover your network gently, coating it, wrapping around it in an utmost tender way. Tears welled just as the sorrow overflowed inside of him, like a barrel that was full and kept being poured in. The moment was sheer agony and yet he didn’t want it to end - to let go - because that would be the end.

Very tenderly he increased the connection to examine you, briefly - you still wouldn’t respond, but that was normal. You hadn’t woken in a couple of days during what was your lucid interval because you simply were too strained - Tobirama wondered if you could at all, really. The exhaustion was too great. Still, his examination found you were no better nor worse than the last time he performed it - your body was heavily impacted by each time the withdrawal had wreaked havoc inside, particularly your lung and heart were affected. At the same time the seals steadily streamed their support into you to keep your blood pressure up, your airways free, your attacked organs functioning. Not to mention the many wounds from the torture that had not been healing as you had been fighting for dear life. There wasn’t a part of you that wasn’t affected in some way, damaged, dysfunctional - critical, but not so that it couldn’t be helped.

It was, just like they had judged, a narrow edge they had been teetering.

And now it would tilt. The delicate balance they had managed to uphold, all they had done-

“I’m so sorry,” Tobirama finally spoke, his voice but a broken, haunted whisper. The baritone wrecked by guilt and sorrow alike, entirely unlike him and yet with an utter tenderness, reserved for you and your ears only. “I’m so sorry, Y/n.” Tears still flowed. “I’ve given it my all, my love. I couldn’t do it. I had it - I thought I had it - but in the last moment, it eluded me,” he continued, slowly cracking more by his sobs. “My failure will cost you everything,” he was practically wheezing now. “And I will never forgive myself for it. The void inside of me won’t ever be filled.” He paused for a moment to take a few shaking breaths, stroking over your forearm as he still cradled your hand to his face, rocking back and forth on his knees now.

“Please, forgive me, for I’ll never be able to.”

He didn’t know how much time had passed when he heard the door being opened. He needn’t tune into his sensory skills to know it was Hashirama, only his brother carried the gargantuan aura about himself.

His steps froze the moment he realised Tobirama’s pose. “What are you doing?”

Tobirama didn’t move nor open his eyes. He didn’t want to break the connection with you. He’d savour every single second that he had left with you. With a numb voice, he explained the result of his last experiment to his brother, his final findings, their implications.

During it, Hashirama got on his knees by Tobirama’s side, an arm flung around him in comfort. ________

The clinking of metal armor echoed through the corridors of the interrogation and information headquarters. Two fully equipped shinobi made their way down the hall. One of them carried an odachi in front of his chest with both hands - sheathed. For now. They were given respectful nods and salutes where they passed members of the unit, but nobody questioned their purpose nor their destination. After a left turn they were greeted by a burly man with stern, pale eyes and two more members of the unit, all dressed in a black uniforms. Only curt greetings were exchanged before they descended the winding staircase down into the cell block.

Their appearance gathered attention immediately. A rumble clattered through the bleak prison, growing with each cell block they passed. They needn’t go far. It was the middle cell block where they intended to go.

The prisoner’s gaze swept up as the group of five halted in front of his cell. Recognition flashed in his gaze, followed by laughter that carried an eerie sense of finality. “It happened, finally?”

Nobody answered. The burly man unlocked the door to enter with his two subordinates. The prisoner flashed a toothy grin, aimed precisely at one of the armed shinobi, namely the one carrying the odachi. “I’ve won,” he sneered, “I’ve fucking won, I’ve told you!” - his voice was a hoarse shout in the end, strained by the pain of a broken jaw. The three interrogators made quick work of the chains that held him tightly wrapped in the middle of the cell to ready him for transportation, arms still secured and legs only allowed a minimum of movement to walk.

The two armored shinobi watched them entirely impassively, showing not even a shred of emotion.

The prisoner’s manic laughter echoed off the prison’s wall forlornly, hauntingly. An utterly broken sound of defiance only a certain kind person would have.

A shrill scream broke through the dismal setting. “You fucking idiot! I hope you rot in hell!” - the woman of the far end. Nobody paid attention to her.

The group made their way down the corridor that was only illuminated by a few candles along the way, passing the stairway they had taken down. The prisoner kept chattering. His voice carried a slight tremble now, “How did she die? Tell me, come on. I’ve never actually seen it, but I learned it’s fucking gruesome in the end,” his eyes were alight with sick pleasure.

The shinobi dressed in blue battle armor adorned with a white fur collar gripped the odachi so hard his knuckles turned white. His back was turned towards the prisoner, he couldn’t see the way his face scrunched under his happuri.

Nobody answered him.

He kept jabbering along incessantly. At some point the tone had taken on a perfectly fine frantic edge. Blubbering, almost, to himself. Eventually, they reached a door the burly man unlocked. The room beyond was dark but lit up as soon as they entered. No windows were inside, just like in the prison block, but no seals adorned these walls. This room was entirely bleak save for dark, crimson stains on the stone floor in the middle of the room.

The subordinates dragged the prisoner into that very center. With an ungraceful kick to the back of his knees, he was brought to kneel. The two shinobi stood in front of him and the man in the red armor crossed his arms. His expression was sorrowful, moved. But the taut line of his jaw and the coldness of his gaze betrayed no lightness about this situation.

“Zenji of the Stone Village,” he began somberly as the three interrogation unit members lined up behind their prisoner who now was wheezing on a low tune, his stare fixated on the harbinger of his fate. “The actions of your unit have endangered our borders, the civilians who live there and ultimately,” he paused meaningfully to take a deep breath - the stone cold tone cracked a little, pained lines wrinkled his smooth face. “Cost the life of one of our own.”

Immediately, Zenji’s mien lit up. He grinned widely, but he did not give the red-armored man another glance. Instead, his gaze was trained on the figure in blue, whose scarlet eyes were murderous as he stared him down, face framed by his happuri and finely applied facial paint. He looked spotless. Zenji cackled again.

“I do not wish for there to be more bloodshed,” the shinobi continued, entirely unperturbed by the behavior of the prisoner. “However our village can and will not condone these actions with idleness nor continue to nurture an enemy we cannot possibly ever release. Your kage,” Zenji’s head snapped back to the red-armored man momentarily. “Made clear he is not interested in an exchange of prisoners.”

The room became completely silent.

“I bear no revenge nor joy, but as the Hokage of Konoha, I’m here to tell you that you have been sentenced to death.”

The blue armored man stepped closer now, odachi still tightly clasped, but the man in the red armor raised his hand slightly, prompting him to stop and give him an irritated stare.

Zenji’s ragged breaths came wheezing so loudly they echoed off the walls as his wide eyes stared at the man, motionless besides the fight for oxygen.

Hashirama regarded the prisoner with the same cold gaze he had been wearing all the time. “Do you wish to speak one last time?”

That was his clue. Zenji threw his head back to release a long groan, each breath transforming more and more into a chuckle. A disconcerting lull settled over the room as it died down with a sense of finality and his eyes locked with Tobirama’s. “Oh, I fucking do,” he began, grinning widely. “To him. It’s my last wish.”

Tobirama’s eyes narrowed and he clenched his teeth, giving no verbal answer. Hashirama did instead. “Very well.”

Zenji cocked his head. “Tell me, how did you fail? What part of the leash didn’t you copy? I want to know.”

Tobirama’s eyes closed slowly and his jaw worked visibly. “Anjia…,” he began slowly, his deep voice so low it was barely more than a strained growl.

“Answer him, Tobirama. A dying man’s wish should not be denied.” Hashirama’s tone left no room for discussion.

Tobirama’s eyes opened again to give Zenji a glance of sheer hatred, his nostrils flared, scarlet glare ablaze. He did not even attempt to hide the fury in his voice as he spoke. If he spat the words out any more in fact, they’d be lost in the rage. “I created a leash of my own and tethered Kimi to it. However…,” he worked hard to find the next words, Zenji’s grin widened already, likely in anticipation for the best part of the story, “... it would appear my sealing technique differs from yours, if just slightly.”

The prisoner burst into laughter, Tobirama flinched. The sheathed odachi trembled slightly from the force he held it with. “I fucking knew it! Ah,” he replied when he had gained a grip on himself again. “The seal. The master’s finishing touch. Unique, really.” Zenji wriggled his eyebrow in a manner that prompted Tobirama to bare his teeth slightly. “I knew you wouldn’t be able to copy mine. Ha!”

Hashirama cleared his throat.

But Zenji was not yet finished. “I’m not a liar though, y’know? I keep my promises,” the grin now was sickening. Gloating. Zenji cherished this moment as though he was an actor on a grand stage. Living it to its fullest. “And I promised to tell you everything once Y/n croaked, so here we are.”

Tobirama exhaled a wheezing breath as he stepped closer abruptly, Hashirama’s hand shooting up instantly to lay on his shoulder guard. “Brother, please,” he whispered, turning towards him slightly. Then the cold stare was back on Zenji. “You need not besmirch your Village’s secrets now.”

“Ah, ah,” Zenji sneered, “Why the fuck should I care? I’m as good as dead anyway, and I want to teach Konoha’s best scientist how he could have saved his oh so beloved.” His voice dripped with caustic smugness and Hashirama had to grip Tobirama’s forearm lest his brother shot forward and delivered the sentence just for these words alone.

Tobirama’s expression was one of sheer murder. His teeth were bared and the scarlet gaze alone was ready to kill a man - just like the rest of himself, particularly the large weapon he carried; the same weapon he had used many times before.

Zenji continued to live his show. “Now I needn’t explain the weaving process since you kinda copied it - well fucking done, man - but my seal - ah, let’s see. My seal is relatively simple!” Hashirama’s grip on his brother tightened as he near vibrated with lethal energy still, spurring Zenji to even greater extravagance. “Of course, it was passed down to me by the one who taught me, but I made some modifications,” he drawled lazily, an adventurous glint to his gaze.

What followed was a detailed explanation about the intricacy and yet simplicity of his own sealing process Tobirama couldn’t stomach anymore - he turned away lest he drove the odachi through the prisoner’s neck on the spot, perhaps. It was impossible to tell in the dim light - the shadow looming over his face hid his expression well and with the happuri, his profile was somewhat obscured. Only the taut stance, the clenched grasp on his weapon were telltale signs of the high-strung situation - a tight coil, ready to lash out any second.

Zenji didn’t hold back on information about how exactly he performed the seal that made the disruption stick within the leash - everyone else listened quietly. Hashirama’s mien had turned stony throughout it and the three members of the interrogation unit simply watched the man with practiced nonchalance.

“And that,” Zenjia finished his grand, final play, “is what could’ve saved Y/n. Too fucking bad.” The grin he wore was nothing short of sick. “Maybe I can tell her too, when I’m dead, hm?”, he tilted his head.

Suffocating silence befell the room.

Hashirama cleared his throat. It was time for the execution of judgement, literally. He turned his head towards Tobirama, whose back was turned towards the prisoner at this point. “Very well,” he concluded with a loaded kind of finality.

A few moments of heavy silence later, Tobirama turned around.

His head was tilted downwards slightly, shadows cast over his face.

Then he looked up.

Smirking broadly.

He lowered the odachi that he had clasped so tightly throughout all of the conversation - more like, Zenji’s soliloquy, and stepped yet again closer to the prisoner.

The smirk became smug, and smugness became condescending as skin around his mouth wrinkled in an utterly arrogant way. There was a satisfied, bright glint in his scarlet gaze. “You are without a doubt the dumbest shinobi I’ve ever encountered,” finally, he bared his teeth in a wide grin. “And for that I thank you from the bottom of my heart.” His baritone voice dripped with sarcasm.

Zenji’s expression fell apart. His jaw hung open slightly and his gaze was wide as he tried to process the change of demeanour in who he deemed by now his arch nemesis. “What the fuck?”, he spat out finally when Tobirama didn’t speak again.

He simply clicked his tongue sympathetically and arched both eyebrows. “Y/n is not dead. In fact, thanks to you, she will live.” Both relief and caustic smugness were tangible in the way he worded this, no doubt basking in the moment of figuratively crushing Zenji under his heel. Who still didn’t find the words to answer yet, but Tobirama was more than happy to supply him with more fodder. “Certainly, time was running quite short - almost, imagine, almost - you could’ve won.”

Zenji’s jaw trembled beside the pain that must cause him alongside the rest of him. The man still hadn’t found his words again.

Tobirama wasn’t done with the verbal execution, however. “I truly did not know how to copy your seal after creating my own.” A slow nod, his baritone voice now came rolling smoothly, “And then it occurred to me - why not use your petty thirst for revenge for Y/n? All it’d take was make you believe she died. And here we are,” a smile spread over his lips again. “You delivered perfectly.” Then, he had the audacity to give Zenji a single pat on the head as though he was praising a dog.

The prisoner recoiled from the touch as though it was scalding hot. “Fuck you!” he screamed from the top of his lungs, nearly tipping over from his kneeling position, had it not been for Ikuro’s hand shooting out to secure him by the shoulder. “Rot in fucking hell, Senju!” he howled, but it was no more than a little bandaid for the hurt pride.

Tobirama already turned around to Hashirama, any trace of smugness or gloating gone from his expression. “I’ll get to work. Thank you, anija,” he dipped his head slightly. Zenji was still shouting profanities at him, but it was no more than a background noise.

Hashirama smiled broadly, much more like himself. “Of course.”

Tobirama turned back to Ikuro and his subordinates. Now, he actually took a slight bow. “And thank you, too. There still is little more to be done, but I’m very grateful for your support.”

Ikuro had already wrestled an unruly Zenji off of the floor, but the burly man wore a wide grin. “I - no, we will be expecting you. Right, Zenji? Come on, let’s get you back to your compatriots. They’ll be glad to see you again,” he finished with a dangerous chuckle.

The sounds already drowned out as Tobirama initiated the hiraishin seal teleport to the laboratory.

You only had a few hours left.

_______

You were suspended in sweet nothingness.

You had been for a while really, perturbed only by occasional nightmares. They were dim and far away, visions of what had been. Maybe. You weren’t sure anymore.

It hadn’t been like this before. Before, your world had been on fire. You had been on fire. Being burned from the inside out and yet too powerless to scream out your agony at the world. Something - someone - had chained you up in the nothingness with no company except your torment that you suffered through, over and over again. Until it faded, and the nightmares came. You laughed about those now. Then, all was calm. For a while.

Your reason for going through all this was becoming but an abstract concept.

Until you weren’t even sure anymore what might be happening. Dimly, you remembered your strength leaving you - waking up was getting harder, eventually it was tantamount to the one armed climbing exercises you used to steel yourself with. You actually had been able to pull off something like that?

Tobirama had been by your side every waking second. His face; you’d never forget the expression. Never before had you seen him haunted by distress of this kind while his chakra warmly embraced you, while he comforted you - telling you he was working hard. You had wanted to comfort him in turn, then. He needed it more than you - he hadn’t looked fine. Drawn, worn out.

Unwell. Sick, almost.

Things must be looking very bad, you knew then. It reminded you why you went through all this. But you all were losing the fight, it seemed?

No matter how much you fought, how badly you wanted to - during the phases in which you weren’t suffering from being burned alive nor haunted by nightmares, you couldn’t wake anymore. You wanted to. So badly. But your eyes wouldn’t open and ultimately, the darkness was your lonely repose in which you anxiously waited for the next time the fire began to light up again.

But that had been fading. The fire’s burn was becoming shorter. And your consciousness was slipping more. Sometimes, you thought you felt Tobirama’s presence, but maybe that was wishful thinking.

Eventually it was just you and forlorn nothingness with the occasional nightmare.

Had you died?

It changed. The fire returned once more - and this time, this time it felt as though you were burning away. Not like before - when it burned you out until someone snuffed out the flames - now, it consumed your very being. It became so great at some point, pain was all you were - nothing besides the scorch of the fire that ate you alive.

You realised then, this must be it - every moment more of you faded and the pain kept on roaring through every single cell of your body. But you - you were becoming duller and duller. You didn’t want to. Not yet - this wasn’t how you were going to go down, was it? Yet the promise of eternal rest after this, all of this pain - it was alluring. After all you’ve been through, was there really a point in returning?

Tobirama would choke you personally if he ever caught on to these thoughts.

But he’s not here, is he?

You were all alone.

Ready to go. You had fought, you had tried, you had walked the road to hell many times over but eventually even your stamina would forego you.

Except they didn’t let you go. Something - no, someone was holding you back. Any time you were dipping into the part of darkness you just knew there was no returning from, there was a pull. It was forceful, unpleasant - a jolt that might have spurred your heart to keep on beating, your lungs to draw air and each organ of your body to keep on functioning.

You wanted to reject it.

I don’t want to, anymore. I can’t. I just can’t. It hurts too much. Please.

They didn’t let you.

You wanted to cry.

You were suspended in nothingness by titan chains that forcefully kept you right on your very own pyre while pain was becoming you.

_______

He didn’t want to take any chances. But he didn’t have time, either. Tobirama had no choice but to follow the information Zenji had given as dutifully as possible and hope this was it - that the bottle of leash he had crafted was identical to what Zenji would have produced. Really, it was an all out move. His back was against the proverbial wall while yours lowered more and more into a coffin.

You were going into withdrawal again, and he knew what that meant.

Never before had he woven the leash this fast - frankly working with a larger quantity of base substance seemed to make the whole process easier, and yet at the same time more demanding. Not that he felt any of it, he was focusing entirely on getting this done as fast as possible. Once he was satisfied with the result - enough to give it to you that was, which was about the highest standard he could think of - he teleported straight into your room.

Where his brother was bent over your sweating, and shaking body as his palms glowed lightly.

The rattle of your breath - Tobirama knew it well. He had heard it many times before.

A dying person’s breath.

“I’ve got it,” Tobirama whispered as his heart spasmed alongside your flat rasps for air. Blood rushed in his ears and ice-cold through his veins. He struggled to keep the floor under his feet as he staggered closer swiftly. He wouldn’t lose you now. Not after all this, not with the solution to your demise in his hands.

Hashirama didn’t even answer him; his expression was wrinkled by deep concentration and a fine sheen of sweat had formed on his forehead.

Numbly, Tobirama plucked the vial with Zenji’s - his - leash from his pocket and effortlessly opened your mouth. Your skin was icy to the touch and so pale, were it not for your faint chakra signature, he’d have thought you dead already.

The image branded itself into his mind, scarring him forever.

He poured the leash in and tilted your head back so it’d run down your pharynx, giving your scalp a trembling stroke with his hand.

With prickling eyes, he moved to bend over you, place his palms on you as well to assist his brother in healing - no, in keeping you alive. As soon as he established the connection needed for examining and healing, the reality of your condition rolled over him like a boulder. Your body’s reaction to the withdrawal was as violent as ever, just like the substance that was causing it. A proverbial bushfire that had spread throughout all of you. Hashirama wasn’t just stabilizing you alongside the seals - he was taking aggressive action to keep you alive. There wasn’t a part of you he wasn’t actively pouring his own chakra in to keep on working. Were it not for him, you’d be long gone already - in his brother’s chakra’s embrace you’d stay alive, barely, so long as he forced your body to keep on going, and going. Tobirama was positive you were well beyond what you could take any more in terms of another person’s chakra.

The alternative was you dying.

It was another problem they’d deal with later. Swiftly, he began to assist his brother to split up the efforts evenly and try to keep you alive to the best of his abilities.

The next moments felt like an eternity.

Work. Work already. It was all Tobirama could think of while his chakra bolstered your failing heart to keep it on pumping, wound through your lungs into the tiniest alveoles to clear them of fluid and repair tissue damage so that you might breathe.

Just work.

Agonizingly slowly, the drug was taking effect. Already, your chakra began to clog, freeze - the muting component hit your network exactly like the leash would.

Tobirama thought time and his heart both froze in the next few moments that surely decided your fate.

The withdrawal’s flame died down and fizzled out as though water had been poured over it.

Time was starting again.

He started to breathe once more. Before he realised it, he sank to his knees at the side of your bed. He couldn’t focus any more, he barely felt the wheezes that escaped him as a few heavy sobs wrecked his torso.

He had done it. Finally.

The oppressing feeling of time running out - the rock that had been crushing him was lifted.

But the elevation did not last long.

Reality - the parts that weren’t circling around the fact you were at least not going to die due to a lack of the leash - very quickly yanked him back to the situation at hand. Already, he dragged himself up again to aid Hashirama once more, who had not once broken focus. They had stopped the destructive withdrawal, true enough; but the damages it had wrought were not gone of course. Swiftly he gathered himself to concentrate back on aiding his brother in keeping you alive, really, a task no less dire than before. Rather, it was time to tip the scales into the opposite direction now.

He couldn’t say how long the two of them sat in silence, simply forcing you to keep going by continuously pouring their chakra into you.

He wouldn’t lose you - not now, not after everything you both had gone through.

He wouldn’t let you go.

Bit by bit, your body started to function more and more on its own - requiring less of the forceful aid both brothers were providing. That wasn’t to say you were becoming stable at all - tentatively, Hashirama would nudge Tobirama to withdraw some, only to watch you relapse quickly.

As it was, your condition remained critical.

Some time later, his brother allowed himself a momentary almost-break. Hashirama hummed deeply. “She’s well into chakra overload now,” he announced somberly, gazing at your face. “However we can’t stop yet.”

Tobirama’s attention was still mostly turned inwards and towards you as he did the brunt of the work so his brother could catch a breath. There wasn’t a part of you his chakra wasn’t aiding in some way; all he managed was a brief grunt of agreement.

Effectively, chakra overload wasn’t much different than a late allergic reaction of the body to the procedures a medic nin had performed. The extend of what a patient could take and experienced varied from how well-versed the healer was - and Tobirama knew his brother’s skills to be capable of healing fatal wounds without sending the person into overload - but your system barely had been able to catch a break from the agonizingly long time of capture, torture and what effectively just served to keep you alive for more torture. And then of course, all that had followed back home, in Konoha.

But what they had been doing to you for who knew how long?

That was as good as keeping defying death itself.

Hashirama sighed deeply. “I suppose we have no other choice anyway. The next few hours will be decisive.”

An ice-cold shiver ran down Tobirama’s spine, disrupting his strained focus momentarily.

Of course. They couldn’t keep on going like this forever - and neither would you endlessly, readily respond to what they did.

Either you’d start pulling your own weight again, or…

Tobirama swallowed heavily.

Silently, Hashirama’s efforts picked up again alongside his own to stabilise you.

_________

Tobirama had thought weaving the leash was about one of the most straining things he had done. But like so often these last few days, he had been wrong - cradling your very life with his proverbial hands was wrecking him a lot more for numerous reasons - the least of which was the exhaustion setting in.

Because if one thing was keeping him going, it was his determination - he wouldn’t, he couldn’t lose you, not now, not after all this.

Slowly, they had begun to lessen the intensity of the aid they provided and watched whether you relapsed into a more severe state or not. If you did, they settled back to the previous level - and waited again. A tedious procedure, but there was no other way.

Eventually, the time you managed without any aid from him or Hashirama had increased substantially - naturally, the seals on your body still were working strongly, though.

Both were now standing next to your bed, an eerie silence had filled the room, save for your flat, strained breaths.

Hashirama spoke first. “I don’t want to say this is over, yet,” he announced somberly. His mien was drawn, tired. His brother had his limits - keeping someone alive for hours pushed even him. Something told Tobirama he still could have kept on going, though. “Though we will watch now. Her overload is very severe. If she makes the next hours well enough…” He trailed off, giving Tobirama what best could be described as a sad glance.

Tobirama didn’t know what he felt anymore. In these last hours he felt just about any kind of extreme emotion - utter heartbreak, loss, sorrow, murderous fury, followed by exhilaration, followed by despair, topped off with numbing focus.

Truth be told, he could sleep while standing at this point. And yet at the same time, he was restless. He knew - he knew, just a bit longer. Just a bit.

He swallowed heavily. “Alright.” His gaze was locked on your gaunt features still. “We should keep her sedated,” not that he believed for a second you’d be anywhere near waking anytime soon. “There will be no more withdrawal challenges. We’ll keep her chakra locked and use the seals to stabilise her until the overload fades.” Perhaps he was just convincing himself this would work, too.

Hashirama hummed in agreement. “Frankly her weak state may be advantageous. She’s too weak to have much of a too severe reaction now, I believe.”

Tobirama’s gaze flickered momentarily to his brother, then back to you. He hadn’t considered that angle. Then, he sighed deeply. “The irony,” he muttered finally.

A low chuckle was the answer, which irritated Tobirama slightly. However his brother’s gaze bore an honest kind of appreciation he always had a hard time spitting sarcasm at. “Either way, I’m hopeful she’ll make it. You’ve done it. The plan was… daring, but.” He shrugged.

He could only give a curt snort in reply. “I regret not having used my enemy’s pettiness and thirst for revenge for Y/n’s advantage sooner.” The solution had been so obvious when it revealed itself to him in what had been the darkest hour of all this fight. When he had crumbled by your bedside with his brother by his side. He frowned then. “Although it made the show most… credible.”

Hashirama’s mouth formed a thin line again as he nodded. His brother might not have fallen apart like Tobirama did, but his reaction had been just as intense. And just like Tobirama, he had been ready to protect you with any means available. Using his position for a mock execution was nothing difficult. “Now to find a cure.”

Tobirama sighed again and crossed his arms. Luckily, time wouldn’t be pressing him this time. Although he had not spent a single second on the matter, either. “I first will create the leash in such a way Y/n doesn’t need to suffer the psychotropic effects of the base substance anymore.” His baritone voice was firm. With the weight off of his chest, the protectiveness was filling him again. You were not going to suffer any more than you had. And he knew precisely how to make that happen. “It’ll just be medication she has to take regularly.”

Again, his brother hummed affirmatively. “Very well. Even so…,” he frowned then, growing quite stern. “You are going to sleep now. For about a day or three.”

Anger flashed through Tobirama faster than he had truly comprehended the words. “Anija, I will not-”

“Yes. You will.” Hashirama crossed his arms. “You’ve been awake for, what? Forty-eight hours? More? Don’t make me throw you out.”

Tobirama’s voice had risen in volume before he realised it might disturb you, but the ire stewing inside made it near impossible to keep it down. “I most certainly will not before I made the drug more bearable for-”

Something flashed in Hashirama’s eyes. One didn’t need Tobirama’s sensor skills to feel the surge in chakra that his brother emitted - but for him, it was like staring into the sun. Sometimes, it was too much. Like right now.

He yielded with no more than a curt “Alright,” before teleporting to your shared home.

Now, it didn’t feel so forlorn anymore.

#tobirama #tobirama senju #tobirama x reader #tobirama senju x reader #sekhmet writes

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plutoswrath · 3 years

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i’m sorry to annoy you with this again. i just look up to your kpop mixed with astrology content. but lucas’s neptune contact with his mc is going to annoy the shit out of me until this is fixed. the cloudiness that neptune brings to his public image is something that i think possibly fuels these situations further. false accusations and mixed perceptions based off of them is exactly what makes these scandals to continue on and on. and i’m sick of it. both sides ignore what the other is saying and it gets nowhere. neptune, the malefic bastard.

Hello! I saw your recent asks and I appreciate your words regarding my content, thank you so much for the kind words! <3

I will touch on astrolgy under the cut, but before this happens, I want to leave a few words. There's a reason why I didn't answer the previous questions I received (not only yours op) regarding the Lucas situation so far. For several reasons I didn't want to feed into any sort of (perceived) sensationalism in regards to the Lucas situation, even though I'd really love to look at the situation from an astrological point of view. That people are divided on this topic is to be expected, but I think the way it has been handled by majority so far is very bad. I really want to elaborate on my reasoning why we should rethink the way we talk about/represent the Lucas situation right now, but as this topic is very kpop specific everything will be under the cut.

My reasoning for avoiding any questions about it until now:

1. People already don't take the situation seriously enough: Regardless of what your standpoint is, I'd like for people to consider looking at it from a more critical point of view for a second: The allegations are not about him being exposed as ‘just a f-boy’ as some people make it out to be, they are more serious than that. Lucas allegedly manipulated and used these women for his own emotional/sexual/financial needs and ego boost. The fact that he has money and allegedly still used other people to provide financially for him just demonstrates the power play underneath it all. He abused his position of power as an idol, the power dynamics between him and fans who idolize him are plain and simple just completely off. Please think about the fact, that he allegedly decided who to date on at fansigns. This alone gives no security to any fans that want to attend fansigns in the future. TW SV: he also talked one of these women into having sex with him + doing it unprotected, which is not only emotionally/sexually manipulative/coercive and can possibly be traumatic for them but also heightens the risk for transfering STD's as END TW he was supposedly seeing people at the same time/cheating. In general, the behavior he gets accused of leaves trauma and is abuse, to be more specific abuse of power on multiple levels and his social position makes it just easier to continue abusing that power. As you've mentioned yourself op, there is a huge back and forth about the allegations, and I know people like to take situations like the one of Taeyong as an example to justify that not every public apology is real and that allegations turn out to be false years later, but I believe it's different this time and that the allegations that came forward were real. Even his cbar closed, a fanbase that works closely with Label V (!), that alone shows that there is 'at least' some truth to the story, or else his hardcore fanbase wouldn't have decided to turn their back on him in matters of just days. Also, all the 'jokes' and the portrayal of 'juicy gossip' people make about the situation just downplays and ridicules the possible traumatic experiences of the people that were hurt by his actions. If anyone decides to not believe these allegations until SM gives a more specific statement, that's fine, but please do so without making fun of the people who were victims of his behavior, as there is already little to no sympathy for them online. It makes it just way harder for any survivors in the future to speak out on their experience. People say it's 'nothing illegal, just morally wrong' but given the fact that he is also a person in power, the line between 'just' morally wrong and illegal can be very thin in some cases. And please overthink arguments such as: 'this is typical boy behavior for someone in his 20's'/ 'he's just an f-boy' or 'boys will be boys' because they are deeply misogynistic and we shouldn't normalize behavior like that, thus making the root of the problem actually way deeper than most people think.

2. WayV's future: This mainly goes for people who are fans of WayV. I know not everyone probably likes to hear this, but another thing why wild speculations, sensationalism or even possible defence about this situation should be kept on the low is WayV's career. I want to be honest here, but I'm scared for their future, their comeback for october has been cancelled for now and they are put on a hiatus for several months as far as I know. They were on a good path of gaining more and more recognition and establishing themselves even better as a c-pop group, but now Luca's reputation in China (their target audience) is as good as gone and that pulls all of WayV down to rock bottom with him. People really need to try seeing the story out of the eyes of the korean and especially chinese fans as well, their perception of the allegations (especially after the Kris Wu situation!) are way different and more serious than the ones of i-fans and i-fans have to accept that. Also, we all know how companies (especially SM) handle these type of situations: keep the people on the low till the storm has calmed down. But will the storm ever calm down for Lucas when his public image is basically destroyed, and thus WayV as well? What I want people to understand is that this whole situation affects WayV and their career directly, actually on the biggest scale possible. All the work so far is at risk to be for good and I think a lot of fans tend to forget that, things look especially critical for HenXiaoYanKun if WayV would be to continue/redebute/fall apart. It doesn't matter if Lucas talking bad about the members/the companies/shows he works with/for was real or not in the end, because unfortunately damage is already done, WayV's image (WayV= family) is already tarnished and WayV as a group will suffer from this. You summed it up with malefic Neptune the best actually: We all don't know the full confirmed truth about the situation and will most likely never know it. (small astro insight here as well, but part of Neptune is to accept fantasy for what it is: fantasy, and thus turn to cold reality when you're in too deep)

3. What O'd advice the fandom to do right now: Regardless of your opinion on the situation, what we as a fandom can do best right now is staying on the low, wait things out, and stop adding more fire to the situation with our actions and wait how the situation actually developes, since a) we can not fasten the process and b) a lot of rumors, false information and unnecessary details get exposed to mudd the waters and to discredit the statement of the victims as well. I've seen some strong reactions from both sides, but as someone who's a big fan of nct in general I really just want to say that part of the fandom throwing a fit on the internet leads basically to nothing, it actually only reflects even worse on nctzens/weshennies and thus on WayV's (and also NCT as whole) image as well. Things right now are handled internal, not extern. Whatever gets through to the public will be half of the story anyway. A lot of people seem to forget, that we talk about SM and all they care for right now is saving themselves economically (think about the domino effect this situation has on the whole group/company), so we will have to see what their final decision is going to be, if anything will happen at all. For now, be patient, wait and see. Last words: It's okay to feel hurt/confused/angry/drained. Even though most of us are aware that we dont know any celebrity's character, it's still hard to swallow and to digest because you were a fan of that artist. Let it take time and vent. Take a break from it if it gets too much! Talking about it to process your emotions better is okay and very valid, but keep in mind that you should not worsen the situation by doing so - it's already absolute chaos.

Also: This statement is by no means a direct attack to anyone or me trying to push my opinion onto you, just my two cents in how to handle the situation best right now, because our hands are basically tied. Also: agree to disagree. If you don't like that I side with the victims (unless there is an official statement that Lucas is proven not guilty, which I doubt, unfortunately) then so be it, but don't start a war in my inbox for our opinions differing.

-------

Now, to astrology:

Disclaimer: This analysis will not be very light-hearted, but remember that it's just a theory and not me trying to confirm anything!

First of all op, sorry for just answering you know, but I neded some time to think through how to adress this without adding to the fire with my astrological analysis! Boy, does the birth time fit the shoe right now. To be fair as I did my short rising sign analysis about him recently, I cancelled out every other fire rising except for Leo, because I got stuck on the ego part a bit. Anything for me made sense, as long as it highlights his ego, which by itself doesn't have to be a bad thing automatically, but there's always two sides of the coin as we all know.

I looked into the transits the past week and added a few asteroids/mathematical points as well. An anon before pointed to the full moon happening in his tenth house, conjunct his sun, etc. (I deleted the ask because I didn't know what was going on at that time and thought it was just the 'usual' rumors that once in a while get spread around, but after looking more into it I decided this was not the right time to stirr the pot in any kind of way or treat it as funny, hot gos). But yeah a full Moon in Aquarius happening in his 10th house AND on top of that Saturn in Aquarius, conjuncting that Moon and his natal Uranus in the 10th! Talk about destrcution of any stable foundation and a change in a public image! Honestly, looking at astrologically the way his public image just got radically destroyed over night, with Saturn and the Moon having been in a conjunction (in his chart it was in the 10th house) is kinda eery even. Talk about collective consciousness - not only exposing quiet literally the feelings of the collective, but also doing so in the favor of others and gaining collective emotional consciousness. Take this with a grain of salt (!), because we're still in a tense situation, but I'm tapping into the darker, unfriendlier side of astrology now. Taking his confirmed birth time, he has Nessus in Sagittarius in his 8th house and as I saw that I could feel myself shifting into the surprised pikachu face. I am not saying that this prooves the allegations whatsoever, but as you seemed to be very interested in anaylzing the case in-depth as well, the allegations fit his Nessus - jumping from partner to partner, carelessness (regarding physical intimacy as well), making people share all their ressources with him/finacial gain, and basically the whole jist of gaining control/being in a power position in intimate connections. Keep in mind that this is only one interpretation of Nessus though, Nessus can also show the complete opposite to someone 'turning to their dark side'. On top of that, his Nessus was conjunct transit Phollus the past week, so if anything, we can see that a large event triggered him to 'open his eyes' and face anything of an 'obstacle' that hinders him from seeing the 'truth' to a larger picture and his own nature/destiny. Pholus can symbolize change that will alter your perception of the responsibility you have for yourself and others.

But my latest new interest with these two asteroids aside (asteroids just add a little more nuance to a situation after all), I want to touch on Lilith too, since you (op) have mentioned Lilith before in one of your asks!

He has his Lilith exactly conjunct his Descendant when we consider his confirmed birth time. What happened just now can be seen as 'backfiring' of his actions, either Lilith embodying the women who expose him now for his 'inappropriate' behavior, but also simply fans shaming him now for his alleged manipulative/imoral behavior, especially shaming him about who he chose to date and how. Next to that, you've mentioned Lilith opposite Moon and it just makes me think about him possibly feeling very indecisive and potentially in denial about what he actually needs to be fulfilled in order to be emotionally happy and thus leading to him appearing to have this 'second, dark side' to him now. BML is not necessarily opposite the Moon in my opinion, it's just the side of the subconscious we don't really like to deal with and all we're told not to express and desire because it can be conflicting in the eyes of others (thus BML also leading to a lot of recklessness on the negative side). I think if we take the allegations into consideration, regardless of how much of it is true of it, it can be a good example what happens, when an opposition gets out of balance, as it also manifests outwardly a lot! Lilith shows in his 'double life' aka what he allegedly did with fans. Lilith wanted an outlet and found one by working behind the scenes. If we take in his supposed Taurus rising, which his Lilith is in an exact opposition with, it's a good example of what can lurk underneath the surface.

And of course, last but not least, Neptune and Sun conjunct his MC. People are quiet literally blinded by him more than they would like to think. Also: Lucas was always known for his 'flirty & charismatic' nature, this is another reason why people think we shouldn't be surprised he 'turns out to be like that in real life'. I'm not analyzing this argument right now, but what I think is very interesting is how Sun conjunct MC literally ties a good amount of their personality to their career - they want to be accepted and shine for their personality/big part of their individuality. Idols play a role, no matter how transparent they appear to us, but it's really funny how this 'image' of him melts almost seemingly with parts of his personality (almost af if you were to quiet literally sell your self) and as you've mentioned: Neptune only adds to that, unfortunately.

#replies #anonymous #might delete later??#idk depends if the situations gets even worse

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azrielsribbon · 4 years

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I have always wanted to talk about the topic of Nesta, and how certain things led up to her clear signs of depression and ptsd, has been talked about a lot lately (as it should).

So after seeing lots of amazing discussions (from many amazing people such as @stardustsroses & @nestaarcher0n) I’ve gathered up my confidence, thought a lot, and here’s my spiel on her current situation and how her upbringing made her into the Nesta we know today. More specifically, the possible impact of her mother.

Nesta has gone through a lot. We cannot expect her to just change her attitude after she went through the events of the war and saw her own father get decapitated. She can’t even go in a bath without having horrid flashbacks for gods sake.

She isn’t going to cope the same way her sisters did. Forcing her to interact with a type of people she has feared her whole life isn’t going to help. Especially putting her in the mountains with a male that is possibly her mate.

Before I start, yes, she’s mooching off of Feyre even if she isn’t living with the Circle, yes she puts her heavy bar payment on their tab but Elain doesn’t have a job either. Let’s not forget Elain Archeron when we talk about Feyre and Nesta. Just because she’s sweet doesn’t mean she isn’t in the wrong.

The mortal worlds have always feared the fae. You know to stay away from the Faerie. Then one day, you and your sister get thrown in some thing called a cauldron and you can’t go back. You become the thing you’ve feared. The people you were once apart of now hate you.

Even before she joined the fae world, she had to gon through her mother’s lectures on how they’d grow up to marry and produce heirs. She thought Tomas Mandray was going to be her fate because of the morals implanted in her by her mother. She thought the only way to life as a woman was to marry, have children and host guests. The way her mother did it.

Yes, she didn’t step up when her mother died or when her father was in debt, but let me remind you Elain didn’t do anything either since everyone wants to forget about the sweet Archeron. I don’t see anything about her being called out??

Nesta is a person who is more action than words. She has shown her guilt, her regret for not helping Feyre by looking for her when Tamlin left with her. She helped out during the war, cut up bandages when she wasn’t asked to. She waited until she got the word that Cassian was ok after he was injuried. She has always been protective of both her sisters. Elain, however, seems to want to stay in the world where she doesn’t have to help others and see through their problems. She’d rather smile through it all then bring attention to the situation or fix it. Both Nesta and Feyre are not like this.

It’s no secret that the firstborn child has the most troubles as they are the guinea pigs (I can unfortunately attest to this), but here is an excerpt, in the narrative of Feyre, describing their late mother.

“My mother. Imperious and cold with her children, joyous and dazzling among the peerage who frequented our former estate, doting on my father—the one person whom she truly loved and respected. But she also had truly loved parties—so much so that she didn’t have time to do anything with me at all save contemplate how my budding abilities to sketch and paint might secure me a future husband. Had she lived long enough to see our wealth crumble, she would have been shattered by it—more so than my father. Perhaps it was a merciful thing that she died”. (Said in the first book of the series.)

Not the average mother, is she? Mrs Archeron does not involve herself with her children much and pays lots of attention to her status, and parties. Feyre mentions how she lectured her on how painting might secure her a husband. So if she spent the very little time she did with her daughters about husbands, we can pretty much develop a scene on how she raises her children and what she thought was “motherhood”.

For context, the age gap between each Archeron sister is around 1 to 2 years. Mrs. Archeron died of typhus when Feyre was 8. This would mean Elain was around 9/10, and Nesta was around 10/11.

If she’s talking to Feyre about husbands at that young age. she’s probably talking to Nesta and Elain about their maidenhoods, their first bleed and even children. She’d probably be expecting of Nesta to prepare herself for a prospective marriage.

She isn’t a dotting mother. She cares to spend her days showing to her friends and is said to care only for her husband.

Parents like this don’t raise children who are secure of themselves. These children have trust issues, attachment problems, overthink everything to the max and believe they will never be enough no matter what. They raise children who will do anything to get their mothers (or fathers) attention and anything they think will please them.

Her daughters (save for Feyre) are taught by the most prestigious tutors in the most prestigious subjects but this doesn’t teach them how to cook, how to sew or how to clean. It gives them the ability to marry rich and be the lady of a house, who has maids.

Mrs. Archeron is a rich and most likely a well-known woman. Her husband is the Prince of Merchants. This could lead her to engrave it in her own daughters that they need to be proper, ladylike, marry rich and to be a wife first, and even give many heirs to their husbands.

This hits the firstborn children harder than anything else. Because they are the experiments. The parents are new to things, they don’t know what is right or wrong. Nesta would’ve been expected to ready herself for any future suitors.

On her deathbed, she makes her youngest daughter promise to do everything to take care of them. Even she knows that Elain and Nesta do not have the characteristics to take control and keep the household smooth. Feyre has shown more leadership and bravery in any situation than both of her sisters and THAT IS OK!! NOT EVERYONE IS A BORN LEADER! THAT IS WHY WE HAVE LEADERS!

So please, please do not attack Nesta for being a raw person. If she was a male this would be completely different. She is trying to recover and cope in her own way.

Now, I’m not saying Nesta is flawless. Because she isn’t. And I’m saying this as a person who feels that if I were to be put in the series, I’d be the Nesta. I think about my attitude and my outside picture everyday. Don’t think Nesta probably doesn’t think about her image each day. Anyone like her, myself included, think about this every minute of the day. And while I do smile through the mental pain everyday like Elain, Nesta is the only character I can relate to in the series. Her walls, her rawness and her ability to detect the lies and the bs are also engraved in me. It’s hard to trust and form life long friendships when your mindset is like this.

Thank you for reading if you have come down here. Seriously. From the bottom of my heart. I do not expect anyone to read after the first sentence.

Stay safe, sound and healthy! 🧡

#nessian #elain archeron #nesta archeron #feyre archeron #acofas #acowar #acotar #acomaf #sarah j maas #a court of thorns and roses #amren #night court #tamlin #spring court #feysand #a court of frost and starlight #illyrian #velaris

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ymiwritesstuff · 4 years

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Corrupted King

More Dimitri, more angst lol. Seriously I had this idea ever since I remembered that Dimitri took out Imperial army forces ALONE during the five years he was in exile. Anyway I hope you guys like this even tho this isn’t really romantic.

Fire Emblem Three Houses

Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd x Fem!Reader

Summary: When you encounter the aftermath of a brutal battle you seek shelter at an abandoned barn, only to realize that you aren’t alone.

Notes: Angst, Small spoilers for Azure Moon route.

The past five years had been tough. The Holy Kingdom was almost fully invaded, its ruler was gone, and with only a small fraction of the Kingdom nobles trying to defy the Imperial influence and army. The Empire was making its presence known and spreading its forces throughout the continent, greedily attempting to overrun the weaker regions of Fódlan and bending them to its ruler’s will. The war was overwhelming and costly. People died and fled, homes were destroyed and the state of the Kingdom was enough to make anyone lose hope. However, with war, came rumors.

A mere commoner like you, who was challenged by the cruelty of reality almost every day, shouldn’t have believed such rumors. However, when the word about Imperial armies being brutally destroyed by an unknown force spread, it gave you hope. The conditions during the war had been awful, to say the least, so every time you heard of a yet another barbarous assault on the enemy by something capable of destroying an entire battalion, it ignited a flame of hope within you. The force behind the vicious attacks was unknown, but stories about a boar-like warrior carrying a mighty lance that pierced through the enemy forces with ease floated in the air, carried by the voices of the innocent civilians and brave soldiers alike. Nobody knew for sure, but the tales of this courageous warrior fighting for the Kingdom gave people hope, which was the one thing everyone needed.

The way back home was supposed to be safe. And it usually was, but the sight before you turned all feelings of safety and security into dust. The ruins of the village that was once flowing with life had been long destroyed and you usually passed them whenever you left home. They were always hauntingly empty, but it never bothered you. Until now.

The once unoccupied ruins were now bloody, filled with corpses of Imperial soldiers and their steeds. Blood spilled from their wounds, their bodies twisted in what to you looked like pain and the grim wind of death seemed to travel around the debris. Whatever happened here, it happened recently. The sight was gruesome, unbearably so. You were sure that even the most experienced general would be feeling sick for days, the same way you did. Your stomach twisted, your knees trembled as your (E/C) eyes shining in fear examined the area and tried to look for a way forward amid the decaying corpses. Your eyes couldn’t bear the sight much longer.

Just as you were about to take a careful step forward, an arrow most likely aimed at you landed beside you, mere inches away from hitting its intended target. Your eyes widened, a gasp slipped your lips and the instinct to run and hide immediately kicked in as your legs seemed to be suddenly moving on their own, heading for a destination you didn’t know, but hoped would be safe. Fear consumed your entire being as you ran, almost tripping over the limp bodies that once housed the souls of soldiers. They may have been enemies, but they were still humans. Death had always uncomfortably sunken its teeth into you.

Your trembling legs and an undying will to live eventually led you inside a barn that was miraculously still standing upon the rubble. With a careful glance, you look outside from the small hole in the wooden door to see if whoever had shot at you had followed you all the way to your little hiding place and sigh in relief as you don’t see anyone outside the empty barn. “Thank goodness…” You allow yourself to catch your breath and figure out your next course of action. Then, something sharp is pressed against your back.

“Don’t move unless you want to die quickly.” The deep male voice behind you says, causing you to let out a gasp and instinctively raise your hands as your pulse quickens again. You do not dare to look back as the feeling of the weapon on your back is still very much present. “What are you doing here?” The person asks, voice filled with anger and malice, making your blood run cold as you try to answer his question.

“I… I was being shot at… S-so I came here. To hide.” Your voice is barely audible and is more of a whimper. You tried your best to stay calm. This person was clearly being hostile towards you, but since he hadn’t yet pierced you with whatever he was holding, you had some hope. But still, you couldn’t deny the feeling of terror you felt as the person behind you looked into your very soul. He scoffs.

“You’re another Imperial spy, aren’t you? How many of you rats must I kill to get rid of you?!” The sharp point of his weapon is pressed harder against your back, not enough to pierce through anything, but enough to make you wince and promptly start defending yourself. “N-no! I’m not a spy! Please!” The volume of your voice is louder than intended, and you quickly realize this and take a few seconds to calm down, despite your mind wanting to panic. “I… I was just on my way home and… Saw the corpses around the ruins. Then suddenly, someone began shooting at me. I only came here to hide, I swear! I won’t cause any trouble…” A few, highly grueling seconds pass before he mutters something under his breath and soon you can no longer feel the threat on your back.

With the weapon removed from your back, you briefly exhale and hear him sitting down on the floor, leaning against the fragile wooden wall. Curiosity gets the best of you and you turn around, despite your mind demanding you to leave, only to see a light-haired male, covered in dark armor, whose right eye was covered with an eyepatch, a defeated look in his left one and holding… A lance, covered in blood. Your eyes widen as you come to the realization. Before you, was the warrior in all of those stories who so brutally murdered Imperial forces throughout the years. However, the man before you was also someone thought to be dead.

“P-Prince Dimitri?” He slightly flinches at your words and grips his lance tighter, avoiding your gaze. There was no doubt. This man was the Prince of the Holy Kingdom, thought to be dead, but there he was. Right in front of you, hiding in the shadows. “I am no Prince,” He spat, voice poisoned with everlasting hatred and fury. He looked drained, tired, utterly destroyed within. What on earth had happened to him?

You step closer, unsure if it’s the right action to take in this situation, considering just how hostile the once kindhearted Prince had acted mere moments ago. “Those corpses outside… You did it, right? Just like the rumors say,” You carefully say and notice him locking his remaining eye on you. His gaze holds no life in it which stabs your heart as the sight of him makes you feel sorry for the Prince. Whatever had happened, he was clearly affected by it.

“Your Highness… What happened to you?” The question leaves your mouth before you even realize, but in it is genuine worry and curiosity. The rumors depicted the one-man army as a proud warrior fighting for the Kingdom, but the man before you was lost in a deep sea of hatred and loss. But above all, he was supposed to be the leader of Faerghus and to see him like this… It was awful. To think the person responsible for the gruesome assaults on the Imperial army was the leader of the Kingdom himself.

“The only thing that matters is the death of that woman.” His voice still carried that strange feeling of acrimony you couldn’t quite comprehend. “The emperor? But Your Highness, what about the Kingdom?” You asked, determined to understand his questionable morals. The Prince had most likely unknowingly given his citizens hope from the shadows and now that he was confirmed to be alive, you couldn’t help but think what he had been doing during these years and why he had abandoned his people. He suddenly stood up, frustration twisting his features.

“Do not try to defy me!” You flinch at his words and instinctively take a few steps back. “Killing that witch is what I must do to avenge the dead!” He gripped his lance and suddenly pointed it at you, flames of aggression burning in his azure eye. “Anyone who stands in my way will be destroyed. No matter who it may be.” His voice quieted down, but held an unstable baneful tone that sent a cold shiver down your spine as he stared at you, his violent gaze digging into your soul. You look at the ground, feeling powerless against Dimitri, who begins to walk towards the entrance, heavy steps echoing around the barn.

“You gave us hope…” Your voice is once again trembling as he passes you, once again muttering something you can’t hear under his breath. All this time you thought someone was fighting for the Kingdom and its people, but it turns out, the ruler himself was only fighting for something you didn’t know or understand. You turn to him just as he is about to head out and speak once more, unwilling to let him so recklessly pursue his goal:

“Who are we going to rely on if not you?! Please Your Highness! We need you!” Dimitri stops, his eye locked on the floor beneath him. This gave you some hope that he was listening to you over whatever was troubling him eternally. “We need our King…” His head shot up at that, and the grip on his bloody lance tightened, the enemy army’s steps audible from behind the wooden door. He glances at you, his gaze entirely different from what it was before.

“No… A monster like me…” His gaze returned to the door and he opened it, allowing the sunlight to bleed into the dark barn. However, darkness still surrounded him as he stepped out, ready to take out yet another wave of enemies.

“...Could never hope to achieve anything other than death.”

#fe #fire emblem #Fire Emblem Three Houses #fe3h #fire emblem three houses dimitri #fire emblem three houses x reader #fire emblem x reader #fe x reader #dimitri #fe dimitri #fire emblem dimitri #dimitri x reader #dimitri alexandre blaiddyd #fe dimitri x reader #fire emblem dimitri x reader #reader insert #angst

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fictionplumis · 3 years

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Fuck it, I’m writing more headcanons I have about Aiden and the Cat School witchers because fuck you, that’s why.

It goes hand-in-hand with this post here where I first talked about how I see the mutagens affecting them, and I still stand by that but I’ve added more to my thoughts and made things a bit more complex.

To start with, if I relate anything to a mental illness in a wrong way, please correct me. I am not neurotypical, neither is anyone I know, and I’ve taken a few psych classes, but I’m by no means an expert and the last thing I want to do is contribute to damaging stereotypes and spread misinformation. I also want to say that I’m not necessarily saying it’s any mental illness-like thing that makes Cat witchers the way that they are, but more the lack of knowledge/support/treatment/coping methods combined with the typical shit upbringing of a witcher that makes things so difficult for them.

So there’s not much we actually do know about this school, not concretely anyway, and we’re also not sure how reliable the narrator is per se, because it’s very possible the stuff we do know about them is just rumors. My headcanon is that yes, most Cats are legitimately dangerous. Given that they act as assassins sometimes, I think their school teaches them to prioritize survival and money over all else, whereas I think School of the Wolf teaches their witchers that their duty is to protect.

I was RPing with someone once who had this brilliant idea of Cats being taught to take contracts for monster nests, and then killing the monsters but leaving the nests so that when they passed through the next year, they would have another contract. In my version of the Cat School, that would absolutely be in line with their philosophy. In a lot of ways, they’re taught that humans are just another type of monster sometimes. They’re good when they’re paying you, but if they start doing the same shit monsters do, what’s the difference? With their heightened emotions, it means they’re capable of really deep empathy and connection to others, but their school teaches them to use that to manipulate people. Find out what motivates them, what words and phrasing you can use to convince an Alderman out of more coin, what emotions you need to appeal to in order to get a free room for the night, stuff like that.

So let’s take a look at Karadin real quick. If we’re believing that Aiden is who Lambert says he is, then Karadin is obviously lying about why Aiden died. So what else is he lying about?

Here’s a guy who was taught to survive above all else, to use his emotions and the emotions of others to manipulate them, who is good at gathering information. Him and his rag-tag group of assassins just took out this guy--reason doesn’t matter, it happened--and now they have a renegade Wolf after them. I doubt Lambert keeps quiet, you know? He wants information on what happened to Aiden, he’s going around pounding on doors and taking names, he’s making a scene. Karadin hears about it, we know that because he expected Lambert to show up. So how can he best protect himself?

Firstly, cut all ties with his crew. Disband them. Become the guy who was into some bad shit but is now trying to clean up his life. Second, find out about the Wolf hunting them. Again, Lambert’s not exactly quiet. At the very least it wouldn’t be hard to find out that Lambert’s bitter about his life being a witcher, that he feels like his humanity was stolen was from. Why he feels that way doesn’t matter, it’s something Karadin can appeal to. Now he can become something that Lambert can sympathize with. Become the witcher that’s trying to leave the Path, start a family, and find his humanity again. You know about being a slaver, assassin, and wealthy merchant on the side, he has bank. So he pays a widowed mother to live with him, provides her and her kids food and shelter and safety, and all she has to do is pretend to be his lover for a little bit. After the heat cools down and he no longer has a Wolf looming over his shoulder, he can go back to his old life. What’s a couple years of laying low to a witcher, right? Karadin’s mistake is not realizing that Lambert valued Aiden over any half-assed attempt to get his “humanity” back, and that he trusted and knew Aiden well enough to see through the lie.

Anyway, that right there is the kind of shit the Cat school teaches.

This, of course, makes Cats very hard to trust. And in turn, it makes Cats very suspicious of everyone else. If they can lie and manipulate like that, what’s stopping everyone else from doing it? It’s always possible. They don’t trust humans because humans have the tendency to be pretty shit (re: the attack on Stygga), they don’t trust the people in their school because all of those people know how to lie and manipulate just as easily as they do, and they don’t trust other schools look down on them. The one school they reluctantly get along with are the Vipers, because Vipers don’t look down on them. The others, especially the Wolves up in their mountain home? Oh, they’re up on their high horse, believing their way is the only moral way, banning anyone who doesn’t agree with them from the only safe place witchers have left, so fuck them.

Then you pair this with the emotional instability. They have a hard time keeping their feelings consistent, which means they have a hard time keeping their opinions consistent. So maybe they set up camp somewhere they feel safe and an hour later they’re on edge and uncomfortable, and they can’t imagine how they ever felt safe there, and did they even feel safe there? They can remember they did, but they can’t emotionally connect to that memory now, maybe what they remember was back when they felt safe in a very similar camp, and not this one, they just mistook that memory to be this one. Or they take a contract and they decide, yeah, that’s a fair amount for this, this will be easy, even fun!. And then they do the contract and halfway through they’re like no, this is not fun, how the fuck did I think this would be fun, of course it’s not fun, and by the time they get to collect they’re reward, they’re demanding more but that was not worth the price they originally agreed on, I would never agree to do that for such a low amount.

So essentially, the emotionally instability makes it very easy for them to gaslight themselves.

Can’t trust others. Can’t trust themselves. Can’t trust their memories, or their feelings, or the decisions they make because they never know when all those things might change.

Now let’s throw in paranoia, because the lack of trust is definitely a breeding ground for paranoia. It doesn’t help that people already whisper about and spit at witchers that pass by, but for a Cat on edge, everyone is doing that. That person laughing? Laughing at them. Those people talking? Plotting against them. Make eye contact with someone? What do they want? Is that a weapon? Are they planning something?

And that right there is why so many Cats snap and go insane. It’s not just them lashing out because their emotions got the best of them, that’s would actually be a very small issue compared to this. This is why the rumor is a Cat that’s gone “feral” as to be killed. They work themselves into psychosis and even if you calm them down from the one instance, it’s nearly impossible to fix the way they now view the world.

So enter Aiden.

My headcanon is that he started out like any other Cat from his school. He did a lot of fucked up things because that’s what he was taught and he didn’t realize there was really anything wrong with it. He had no reason to question it, no reason to think his elders had taught him wrong, no reason to focus on anything but making money and staying alive. And then that changed.

Why that changed is flexible, it could be anything, from something small that his ever-changing emotions conflated into something important that he fixated on, to something that is legitimately pretty life changing. I firmly believe that this thing doesn’t have anything to do with Lambert, though. This is before Lambert. Because the important part about Aiden being a good man, is that it’s something he decided to do on his own first. Then later, when he meets Lambert, Lambert helps him, helps him a lot, but the stuff that Aiden had already taught himself is the stuff that Lambert still needs to learn too, so they help each other.

In my headcanon, the thing that sparked this for Aiden was the whole “leave the nest so you can come back next year” thing. He didn’t think much of doing it besides job security of sorts, and there was one town with a nekker problem that he popped through a few years straight to rid them of the nests that kept popping up. The people liked him because he was friendly and he took care of their problem every year. Aiden figured he could milk it until another witcher came along and destroyed the nests completely, but until then, their gratitude earned him a bit more coin than a monster nest usually would. And there was the carpenter’s son, who really liked him. Just a this spunky little kid who wasn’t afraid of a witcher, and who babbled to Aiden about being just like his dad when he got older, and who carved Aiden a little wooden sword one year as a thank you. And then Aiden came back through one year and the kid was gone. One of the first victims of the hatched nekkers that year.

All at once it hit Aiden that his actions and nonactions had consequences. He had no kid babbling at him. The carpenter gave him a smile and a nod, but there was an emptiness to it. He had a mother sobbing into her hands thanking him for getting rid of the monsters that killed her son, unaware that it was his fault for leaving the nest in the first place.

That gets Aiden to not only look at his own actions, but the actions of his school. At what motivates his brothers and sisters. How accountable they are for their actions. How aware they are of the damage it sometimes does. Whether or not they even care. And by looking at that, he sees the downward spiral that so many other Cats take, and he uses his high emotional intelligence and empathy to figure out why that happens, because he doesn’t want it to happen to him. So he has these coping mechanisms. Some are for the strong flashes of emotions that spark up and overwhelm him, but others are things for every day maintenance. He journals a lot. Writes down his circumstances, his feelings towards his circumstances, why he feels that way, the things he’s noticing, he writes down as much as he can so that if his feelings change and he has a hard time grasping how he felt differently before, he can go back and read it. It’s physical proof, right there, that his memories aren’t wrong. He did feel that way. Doesn’t now, but he did, and he can trust that he did because it’s right there. Then he can write down how his feelings have changed, and why they changed, and everything he can think of so he has another record of the situation if he needs to reference it.

It helps a lot, especially when he reads back over everything from months ago. It helps him become more comfortable with just letting himself feel his emotions without getting as frustrated by all the changes, or stressed out at the idea that they will change. Because they always do, and it’s not always bad, he’s been through it before and he’s gotten on pretty well despite it. The fear he’s feeling at that time will change too, the frustration will change, he won’t always feel bad and yes, he’ll eventually stop feeling good but he’ll also always return to feeling good again eventually.

Lambert helps him find some consistency, because out of everything, Lambert’s the one thing Aiden has never changed his mind about. Even when he’s angry and frustrated at Lambert, he still cares so fucking much. And the Wolf is always worth it. It’s this one point of consistency that Aiden doesn’t really need to function but holy fuck does it help.

Meanwhile Lambert will start in about something, be keyed up and ranting while Aiden just calmly hums and watches him pace until Lambert tosses up his hands like, “I don’t even know why this pisses me off so much!”

And Aiden blinks and goes, “Maybe it’s not just this issue that’s pissing you off. Maybe you’re also upset about other things. Does this remind you something similar that upset you, or has anything happened recently that this is adding to?”

And Lambert doesn’t fucking know. How is he supposed to know what else he might be upset about? Lots of things upset him! And this is just like a million other situations, how is he supposed to know if one of those is similar enough to also be upsetting him right now? “Well... Have you tried writing it down?” “Have I tried what now?” “Writing it down. You know. With a quill, in a book. A record of sorts, if you will. Of times you feel upset. So you can go back and read it to help you figure out what might be contributing to how upset you are currently.”

The fact that Aiden says it with all the patience of someone talking to a child makes Lambert immediately dismiss the idea until the next time he gets pissed and he’s like fuck it, whatever, I’m buying a damn journal or whatever. And he does. And he writes down what he’s feeling, and is reluctant to admit that it makes him feel a little bit better, so maybe he does it a few more times, and then something else pisses him off and he writes that down too and then decides to flick back to the other pages and what do you fucking know, it’s kind of like that other time he was pissed. Not exactly, but he reads this one little detail that matches with his current situation that just agitates him to even read it and he’s like huh. I guess I really don’t like it when people say that. Yeah, you know what? I absolutely fucking hate it when people say that. The entire situation pisses me off, sure, but I wouldn’t be nearly as pissed if that guy didn’t say what he did!

Anyway.

I don’t know a good way to end this but yeah there’s more of my thoughts on Aiden and the Cat School. Maybe I’ll write about headcanons regarding how I see school traits matching with the animal the school is based off of, because I see those headcanons often and while I agree with some, I’m picky and I do it differently.

#aiden #lambert #the witcher #lambden #laiden #catch me on the street corner ranting about aiden everyday #like some kind of guy with a sign proclaiming the end of the world #but its just I REALLY LOVE AIDEN #and i yell all of this while ringing a bell

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streets-in-paradise · 4 years

Text

Battle Scars

Troy 2004 fanfiction

Characters: Hector, sister oc ( it can also be read as a reader insert since i haven’t named her yet and there are no mayor descriptions)

Word Count: 2101

Genre: Angst Comfort - Fluff

Relationships : Platonic - Family.

Summary: Paris is determined to fight Menelaus. His siblings are concerned with the high chances of his death and his younger sister wants to take his place. Hector comforts her and warns her about some less discussed consecuences of battle. ( I suck at writing summaries.)

Triggers: Mentions of war and typical war involved violence. (not much. Don’t worry because it is not gory)

Disclaimers: This is my first attempt of writing fanfict to post. English is not my native language, i translated it to english with the help of an online translator.

Tags: @hrisity12 (tag you because i think you will want to see this)

I hope you enjoy this and thanks for reading

The night after the start of the war had already fallen. The palace was quiet, a silent atmosphere that was nothing more than the mix of grief and exhaustion surrounded the entire place. Pacing around the hallways, Hector seemed to be the only person around, unable to allow himself to have some rest. He was looking for Paris, after the scandal created by his proposition of fighting against Menelaus and the lethal risks involved for him in that reckless idea he felt the need of having a serious conversation with him.

Unfortunately, his brother was not the only one who needed his words and company that time. In his way he crossed ways first with Helen, stopping a grief induced attempt of scaping in a desperate try to stop the war. After comforting his sister in law, he was approached by his younger sister. The young lady was rageful and worried in the same amount. Without hesitation, she let go all the thoughts that were troubling her and vented to her brother.

“Paris is the worst swordsman I have ever seen. How can you allow this? He can’t do that, i will not allow it. Why can’t I fight in his place?” she snapped.

Seeing her state, Hector decided to stop his search for Paris and have a talk with her. The last time they had a few words was that morning in the armory when she begged him to let her fight and stumbled across his refusal. He thought that,after that short altercate in which no one had the time to explain themselves and with the news about Paris worrying both to the core, they needed some time alone.

“You know you can’t do that. It would hurt his honour. He can’t let his sister fight his own battles “ he tried to explain.

“Do you really think Paris cares for his honour? He is doing it out of guilt. I can’t let him die.“ she asserted

“ It is his choice” he stated.

“ What about my choice of fighting this morning? I am the little girl so it is correct to take away my will to choose? “ she replied, her tone getting progressively more enraged.” Helen is a trojan princess now, let a trojan woman defend her freedom to choose her own fate. She is not a fighter but she has a sister willing to do it for her. I will be defending her freedom, not Paris’s right to possess her.”

“ I will not let you get involved in actual combat for the first time against the King of Sparta. That man fought all his life.”

“ But it is fine to send Paris to his death? It would be his first combat as well but with half of my training as backup. He never cared for this sort of thing, the only weapon he handles with a considerable talent is the bow. He can’t show up to a single combat with bow and arrows and he is terrible with swords.”

“Don’t put me in the situation of being the one who has to choose between you two which one of my siblings will be sacrificed.”

“ Of course, because you already decided it.”

That thoughtless reply was more of what the man could handle. Abandoning his conciliatory tone, Hector allowed himself to let his own concernings go and said exactly what was going through his mind.

“Do you think i want to burn our brother’s body?? I love him as much as i love you. I can’t allow you to fight, it is not your right to die in his place.”

“ How can you be so sure i’m going to die? Is your trust in me so small and weak?”she asked, confused by the switch in her brother’s approach.

“Real life is not like training in the safe space provided by the security of our walls. Battle is screams, blood,sweat, excrements and desperation. Nothing more. Your skills are worthy of trust but you are still very young and naive. You think you will go out there and end up crowned as trojan champion after doing some heroic act. That sort of attitude can get you killed.” he explained in the most honest and realistic way he could use without upsetting her more.

“Menelaus is a slow old beast. I’m young, fast and flexible. I’m a better choice than Paris for that combat and you know it.” she insisted.

“I may be aware of it but i don’t care. “ Hector replied. The only way to go with this sort of conversation, especially considering the stubbornness of his sister on the topic, was through full honesty.

He decided he was going to give her a complete explanation of his reasons on that choice.

“Since the first time you picked a sword i told myself i would let you have your fun but i would also protect you from what would be waiting outside if you actually tried to pursue that path.”

The princess listened carefully and, imagining the route the conversation was heading, spoke her mind.

“Death? That 's all? Your greatest fear is for me to end up dead in the battlefield? I am not afraid of it. I will die with glory if it saves our brother. Stories of my sacrifice will be tell all around our country and i will live in them. “

Hector was visibly angry this time. He wasn’t able to let himself believe what he was hearing.

“That is nonsense. Stories? You are asking me to let you die with stories as consolation? The songs of the bards are party entertainment, they aren’t worth your life “

“Even with the result of my death the outcome is good. If i leave my mark in history men will notice they need to change their ways. My death will save Paris and inspire more shieldmaidens.” she explained

“Had you realized who you are sounding like? That is exactly the sort of pointless nonsense i heard from Achilles. It is not what i taught you.” he warned her

“You taught me about sacrifice for my family and my country. That is your moral code, and it is the exact thing you don’t let me practice.” she complained, hurt by feelings of injustice.

Becoming desperate witnessing how nothing seemed to make her understand, he tried to show her understandment of her point of view and spoke from his own feelings and fears.

“I don’t want to lose you! I’m not even talking about death when i say it. That is indeed a big fear of mine regarding you but it is not the only one. I will not be talking about death now.” he said, lowering his tone trying to sound more calm to show her that his anger was not related to a misunderstandment of her point. “ Real combat, a battle in the middle of a war unleashed at our gates ... It is a terrible event to witness. I would not wish that to my worst enemy. It changes you, leaves scars on you that you would have to carry your whole life. Not just the physical ones, in your inside. Your mind and your heart are not the same after you survive your first battle. I hate to fight, it consumes you. Why would i want you to go through my same suffering? I don’t forbid you to fight because you are a girl and i am some traditionalist who can’t come across to understand your will to challenge our ways. You know i am not like that, i wouldn’t had let you get involved in combat training sessions in the first place.”

The girl seemed less upset in her approach after hearing him.

“You said it was a good way to wake some sort of interest in Paris and it was part of his formal education. We were very hard to separate back then.”

“And you still are. Menelaus would find you both sticked to each other in combat if i wouldn’t interfere in your choices.” he teased . She smiled briefly while hearing him.

“ Combat has a terrible effect on people.I don’t wish such a terrible fate for you.” Hector stated, going back to his point. “As long as i live i will protect you from it. I love your sweet enthusiasm, your kindness and concern for our people. I already know you sneaked out to help in the expedition I sent to look for people in the camps. I should be mad about it but i am not because in that action you showed who you are. You are caring, you are full of hope and life. I love you as you are, Troy loves you as you are. Don’t ask me to take that away from you.”

The words of her brother had a clear effect, she was on the edge of tears.

“ But i want to help you!! I want to share the weight of the war with you.” she yelled. “It is not fair for you to carry it all on your own and you know well Paris will not help”

“He is trying” he said, trying to comfort her

“He will kill himself!!” she shouted while tears started falling through her cheeks

“ I promise i will help him as much as i can.” he reassured her

“It is not enough, i want to help you”

“Your cheerful welcomes after every battle are more helpful to me than the strength of your arm.”

With her feelings overwhelming her, the young lady hugged her brother tightly

“I want to fight for you and for our people. I love you so much, it hurts me to see how you work so hard on your own for all of us.”

Hector caressed her cheeks to clean her tears.

“Do you want to know why it’s said that Achilles is a better warrior than me?” he asked in a trivial tone

“ Because it is said that he is the son of a sea goddess?” she answered in a slightly doubtful way.

“ That is what people who have never stepped into combat believe. What i saw in him today, he is so good because he doesn’t care about anything. It’s clear that the scars war left on him took over and at some point he stopped caring. He has no mercy, no respect. He talks of war like it’s a game. When he is fighting he stops existing as a man and becomes only the tool war requires him to be. He became desensitized to all the death surrounding him. His only concern is to win glory because, once this lifestyle takes everything from you, that’s all what’s left for you to collect. He is a broken man, an extreme example of what war makes on soldiers.” he explained

“ You are my moral guide, my example of behaviour. I would never allow myself to get lost like that because i have you.”

“ And i am not the almighty hero you see in me. I am another man changed by war. I fight hard to stay in my path, to remain as myself. I don’t want to look at you one day and see just a shade of the kind, lifeful girl you are now.” he confessed.

“ I have to assume you are protecting me from myself then?” she asked, without the connotations of assertiveness in her ways previously displayed. She felt regret for the rude ways in which her anger made her judge him

“I am, even when you don’t notice it.”

“ I don’t want our countrymen to die protecting my spirits.”

“I love you and i can’t allow it. Call me selfish if you want but even i have the right to a bit of selfishness on occasions.”

After hearing her usually selfless brother admitting he was incapable of an impartial view of the issue when she was involved she was done with the talking. There was nothing more left to say that could mean as much as that. Hector’s life was full of sacrifices, she felt unable to question him. She wasn’t going to complain about the first time she ever heard him thinking of himself to make a choice.

Instead, she thanked him for his concern and told him once more about how much she loved him. Hector kissed her forehead, wished her goodnight, and went to see their brother. He had brief thoughts about the very little time of sleep that was left for him but it didn’t matter. His siblings needed him that night and, as always, he was going to be there for them.

#troy 2004 #troy fanfiction #troy 2004 fanfiction #hector of troy #eric bana #hector fanfiction #eric bana fanfiction

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captainjimothycarter · 4 years

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She knows of her, sure. But Natasha’s never met the woman. There were horror stories about this woman in some countries. Her reputation was not something to fuck with. Natasha got her chance though. When she was her most devious. Because let’s face it—there are but a select few who are better at what she does, or is capable of. Has done. There’s even a shorter list of special people Natasha won’t touch. Peggy Carter is one of them.

OP are you SURE you trust me with this amazing prompt? [I took it under my own interpretation, if this isn’t what you intended, I apologize.]

She was being followed.

Being Director of Shield – excuse me newly appointment Director, as Howard is not to let her get over that quite anytime soon, she is used to it.

She’s always being followed, rather it's by security that’s supposed to tag her at all times, even when she is home alone.

By her husband whose now, as she last checked in before he went radio silent had just landed in Quebec.

By people who want her dead.

That was nothing new.

Peggy knew she was being followed, she just couldn’t prove it. Not yet.

The person didn’t want to be found, instead, she wanted Peggy to know that she was following her. Peggy knew that the stranger knew, because why else would she allow a misstep here or there when she’s been careful beforehand?

No, she wanted her to know that she’s being watched.

Watched for what? Evaluated? Studied? Locked away in some system they had yet to crack to find a full analysis of her? The possibilities were unknown but Peggy was very much used to the near-impossible when it came to Shield and her enemies.

Fieldwork was no longer in the photo for Peggy. She had agents for that, good agents that she trusted. Yet there comes a time when she’s forced to play her hand, to make her own play in the field or she’s forced to defend herself after some diplomatic meeting has gone wrong.

And crikey, has this one gone wrong.

She knew it was a set up from the start and had warned her men, but they were preoccupied with outside forces, leaving Peggy to handle the three inside.

Two were down for the count, one dead with his own bullet through his skull, the other most likely paralyzed for life thanks to Peggy twisting his neck just enough to make him collapse. The last before her was barely standing, bloodied with pale, white eyes.

There were no words needed to be said. Peggy was tired of talking. Talking go nowhere. Actions did. She’s proven that time and time again. The final swing of the make-shift weapon that once was the leg of a chair bashed into the man’s head and dropped him to the floor like a sack of potatoes. He was dead. Just another on her list of reasons why she’s a horrible person. A necessary decision to protect others, so Peggy likes to think she did the right thing. But that’s not her judgment to make when she dies.

That’s no one to make.

Her ears are ringing, trying to recount in her head the last few events, the men in the room. She’s suffered some blood loss, her shoulder is bleeding. There’s a bullet lodged in there that’s gonna play hell to get out. Most likely she will pass out soon, her vision was already spotty.

Every agent knew when they were being followed.

There was a noise. A heavy crashing, the sound of glass shattering. Peggy whirled around and caught the wall to see the chandelier had fallen on a masked man she hadn’t seen in the room before. He had a knife in hand, no doubt poised to stab her in the back. How poetic.

Yet how had such a secure piece had fallen? The wire looked cut. Her eyes flew to the ceiling and spotted just out the window a flash of red hair. So it was her, her mysterious stalker.

Well, she should get her a thank you basket, now shouldn’t she?

“He’s not going to be happy about that, is he?”

Peggy doesn’t look up from the folder she’s reading, flipping the page of the report over. Her left shoulder is stinging, refusing to take any pain meds. Without looking up, she knows who it is. Her stalker. She’s somewhere in her office, meaning she was followed in here, like many times before. Meaning she wants to discuss. Not harm. Why save her if not just to harm her?

Peggy shrugged her wounded shoulder and regrets that choice.

“Possibly, but it's not his place to worry, despite how I know he will.” She’s talking about Steve or perhaps Michael, either way, she’s right. “He will get over it and I’ll heal quite fine.” Finally, she looks up to see the redhead sitting in front of her with emerald green eyes that stare right into her soul. “I should thank you for saving my life this afternoon. I hadn’t seen him come in.”

“And nor should you. He didn’t wish to be seen.” She plopped in the chair and put her feet up on Peggy’s desk, balancing on two legs. “You don’t deserve to die.”

Peggy snorted. “Some disagree.”

“Certainly, but not in that manner. No one deserves to die stabbed in the back.”

She can’t help but wonder who hurt her? Whose hurt the redhead before her? “Agreed.” A pause, they’re regarding one another. “You’re making yourself known. If I was to be dead, it would’ve been beforehand. You don’t kill people when they’re at their weakest. There’s no fun in that, so why are you here?”

Natasha smirks because she’s serious. Genuine serious. Good. She’s never met someone who could match her skill set so easily. She’s read her record, the woman was dangerous across several countries, her diplomacy within Shield is what keeps her from being locked away or killed. She’s good. Too good. “To offer you my hand.”

Peggy’s red lips twitch before she flinches as she leans back, kicking her heels off and tucking them under her chair. Even relaxed, she looks dangerous. “I’m afraid I’m already married.”

Natasha laughs. Even that sound alone would send chills down someone’s spine, but not her. She’s steady, hard as a rock. “I wouldn’t’ dare to take you from him or vise versa. No, you two keep each other stable. You’re a solid force.” She clicks her tongue on the roof of her mouth and hums for a moment. “You and I both know that I am not the only one trailing you. You don’t mind this easy and that’s how you’ve survived so far. You willingly walked into a situation you knew that was dangerous. That will betray you, but how many more of those do you possess? How many more of those lucky moments do you have? A cat only has nine lives.”

Peggy is silent, watching her lean back in the chair, until it threatens to fall before she slams it back down.

“You don’t need my help but I am offering it. I know the lists of those against you. I know the people. I know the intel. The world needs a strong woman like you leading them. We cannot risk losing you. You are what stands in their way from destroying innocent lives.” She’s a killer, yes, but she has morals, every killer does when you kill for the right reason. You kill a pedophile so you save children’s lives. You kill a murderer who does this for fun to save countless lives. You kill a politician who will see his citizens will die rather than help them. She can’t say she’s for hire, but she knows a good choice when she sees it.

She won’t say protect, Peggy’s notice, and for good reason. Protection. That’s what you tell little kids at night when they have dreams. Protection. Safe. That’s an illusion she’s long lost. She is no longer safe and perhaps has never been safe, the more she uncovers of her family and its history. She’s been prepared her entire life and she’s ready to face the challenges.

Peggy’s hand curls around her tumble of bourbon and sips on it before passing it over to the redhead who drinks it down in one gulp. “This cat has a handful of lives left,” she purrs, looking at the empty glass and turning it over in her hand. “Your assistance will be most welcome. Your price, perhaps not.”

“Since when is the price ever a good one?” Natasha purred, her head cocking to the side. She won’t ask a name. She won’t remember her face. These ones are good, valuable. She sees why many want her dead. “Only one. You will be visited by the one they call the Asset. Perhaps the Winter Soldier is another name you know.” She pauses, she regards Peggy’s eyes. They’re hard. She knows him and not on good terms. “Your first instinct will be to kill him and why not? He has killed so many of your friends, your family. I ask that you do not. What Captain Rogers is to you is what he is to me. He is in no control of his actions as a puppet is on strings.” Peggy’s head barely nods. She understands. Out of everyone, she would.

“We will keep him safe,” Peggy muses, picking her head up to meet those eyes. “I can promise you that. Everyone should be in control of their own actions. This does not leave the room beyond my husband.”

“As expected. He will need to be with you to subdue him. You’ll find out behind the man is a familiar face.” Standing up, Natasha regards the woman called Director Carter before that, Agent Carter, and before that, just Marge. Now she’s a force of nature that no one knows any bounds to stop. Everything will be destroyed in her wreckage to shape the future she wishes to have, regardless of who wants it or not.

Peggy Carter is a dangerous woman and Natasha intends to keep it that way.

#Peggy Carter #natasha romonova #Black Widow #More of post Black Widow and doing her own thing #She has a [good] obsession with Peggy #Kinda?#Its complicated #But OP this is AMAZZZZING #Thank you #1.6k #I hope you like it???#Steggy #Just mentions #Steggy Prompt #Peggy Prompt #Nonny Prompt

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ranposlittle · 4 years

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Hi there! Can I have a BSD Matchup? I’m a bisexual, ambiverted, ENFJ, 2w3, Leo female with a melancholic temperament and a Hufflepuff. I’m a kind, smart, compassionate, patient, loyal and open minded person for all kinds of people. While I may seem shy sometimes, I’m actually very social and outgoing if I’m with good people. My hobbies include drawing, painting, bellydancing, yoga, and working out. I love and appreciate many cultures, mainly Asian and I love to travel and read up about it. (1/2)

anonymous asked: While I can be sweet, I can be really sassy too. I’m very stubborn if something close to my morals are violated. I do have autism, anxiety, ssd (somatic symptom disorder), and RSD (rejection sensitive dysphoria) and I tend to take things too much to heart sometimes. I do have confidence, but I also have self doubt and low self esteem sometimes. Sometimes I lash out and have a temper, but I instantly apologize afterwards cuz I love others so much. I love shy people too. Thank you! (2/2) 🌹🍷✨💕💖

I ship you with:

──────〔 ATSUSHI NAKAJIMA 〕──────

Being a true people person; a strong extrovert, you have met and befriended countless of people. Atsushi wasn’t any different from all the strangers-turned-friends you’ve had in the past, however, he somehow captured your attention and eventually, your heart.

It might be because of your fondness for shy people that initially started your adoration for the light-haired boy, but later on, you were able to see more of yourself on him.

To be an ENFJ entails that you highly value other people and have a genuine concern for their well-being to the point of possibly neglecting your own at times: a trait that also reflects why you must belong to Hufflepuff. Similarly, Atsushi is willing to compromise his own security for the sake of another without a second thought or hesitation. In the most extreme cases, he would sacrifice his own life if it means saving many more. It’s simply an equal case of give and take between the two of you; you look out for him, he looks out for you. Atsushi will not be stingy in giving you all the care he could provide in any way, no matter how busy he is. Like how it could be in your case, it might come a bit overbearing sometimes, but his concern is pure and genuine. Another mirroring trait you and Atsushi share is being empathetic to the feelings of others, considering yourself happy so as long as your partner is happy. Hence, you both seek hundreds of ways to make sure you’re being the best counterpart the other could have. For all these efforts, both of you only asked to be properly appreciated by reciprocating the same amount of care that you put out. Which, in your relationship with Atsushi, would come off as natural as the sun setting.

This extends to your Leo attributes, being proud and majestic on the surface but conceals a hidden sensitivity inside: this time, a reflection of your 2w3 Enneagram. Deep down, a Leo needs to be needed and admiration is the key to win their affection. Although, however energetic and openhearted a Leo can be, they could also strike back with force when they, their morals, or the people they consider as part of their “kingdom” is crossed. Impressively enough though, Leos don’t hold a grudge. This is similar as to how Atsushi fights for what he believes is right and for the people he holds dear in his life, all the while being able to forgive wrong-doings wholeheartedly. You are both, according to your own words, sweet but sassy. Truly, neither of you should be underestimated for the goodness of your heart given that a Leo is represented by the mighty lion and Atsushi- well, he can transform into a tiger.

Overall, I think you and Atsushi is just a perfect match for each other because either of you are very generous in giving support, love and care. Every long-lasting relationship requires this kind of selflessness that ultimately creates a strong foundation. Although we cannot determine what Atsushi’s temperament is for certain, your melancholic temperament shadows him as a deep thinker and feeler. Because of this inner understanding to be what it’s like to be in each other’s shoes, you will be able to create an environment where you both make tireless efforts to lift the other up even without the other making an obvious demand for help. Being with Atsushi, the various things that you tend to be extremely worried about due to your disorders might start to lessen and fade. In whatever way your Autism affects you, you can bet he will support you along the way. He will never get tired of reassuring you of just how proud he is of how far you’ve come through in this life and how everyday he falls in love with you even more, might ease your anxiety and RSD. You just don’t have his words to rely on because his actions will speak volumes as well. You’d truly feel like you’ve found your “other self” with Atsushi. He will make your already bright life even brighter by exploring this world with you. He’ll teach you more about the culture he grew up in and perhaps, he’ll learn even more when you stumble upon an informative book about travelling. He’ll be willing to be your muse in every painting or drawing you please to create, and he’ll work out with you even if he’s not really fond of it before. It’s just now he found another reason to strive and live longer, and that is to spend more time with you in this lifetime. He can’t belly-dance for his life, though. Please forgive him.

────── ･｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ──────

Helloooo, anon~ thank you for dropping by! Hopefully, this matchup was worth your wait. Take care of yourself! Stay wonderful! 🥰

#bungou stray dogs #bungo stray dogs #bsd hcs #bsd imagines #bsd scenarios #bungou stray dogs imagines #bungou stray dogs scenarios #bsd headcanons #matchups #matchup #bsd matchup #bsd matchups #bungou stray dogs matchup #atsushi nakajima x reader #atsushi nakajima #nakajima atsushi #bsd atsushi

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findingtheperfectcharacter · 4 years

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Logan’s Lowdown’s Typed

A complete collection of Logan’s Lowdowns from the episode. Now in a format that I tried to make readable, but since I threw it all on one post it’s probably still not great.

(13:26) "It would be" directly after Patton says that it'd be unethical to buy frogger when he could be giving money to the homeless

(13:30, said aloud) "It's just me, Logan. I have taken this form because I did not want to be too invasive. (Thomas asks what he's doing) "Well determining what feels right or wrong for you isn't really my area of expertise. Seeing as how there's not much left at stake at this juncture and that regret is unfortunately not an experience that can be expedited. I decided that I need need not expend too much energy on this matter.

(13:50 cont from 13:30) However I felt like it would behoove all parties if I provided relevant information to serve as supporting evidence to any of the arguments that are made during today's discussion

(14:08, after Patton suggested his 'factoids' were optional.) *Facts, factoid was a term coined by Norman Miller to describe false facts invented by magazines in order to manipulate the readers And yes I suppose they could be viewed as optional, those two options being informed or ignorant (14:35) "Thank you Thomas It-

(14:49-14-50 cont from 14:08) It would be an estimated annual cost of 20 billion dollars to eliminate homelessness in the United States according to Mark Johnston, the acting assistant housing secretary for community planning and development. Americans spend more than 20 billion dollars on Christmas decorations and flowers every year. So it would seem that many Americans do have the currency to spare to end homelessness in America forever

(15:16 cont from 14:50) Similarly if every US household were to give up just 1% of their wealth, than that would be enough to end homelessness in the United States for the next 50 years

(17:18, Roman talking about saving Leslie Odom Jr from the Scute bellied beast) Scutes are the short, wide, rung-like scales on the underside of a snake

(18:38, The difference between helping people out for the sake of it and saving people for a reward.) A study was conducted at Berkeley that looked at the correlation between an individual's happiness and the amount of selfless acts they preformed. This was done by comparing three groups.

Group A was not instructed to preform any acts of kindness, while group B was instructed to meet the quota of 5 acts of kindness within a week. Group C, however was required to preform all 5 acts of kindness within one day. It was found that groups B and C (both of which preformed acts of kindness) saw an increase in how they rated their own happiness. But the most significant increase was in group C (5 acts of kindness in 1 day.)

(20:43 After the trolley problem scene) That scenario was an illustration of the classic philosophy dilemma, the trolley problem. "Trolly problem" is a term coined by Judith Thompson, who also devised its two most famous variants. The "Footbridge" and the "Switch " (the latter being the version that was just demonstrated.)

(20:55 cont of Trolley problem) The Trolley problem is intended to raise questions about our moral priorities: is it more important to minimize causalities or is it more important to strictly adhere to ethical rules? (The notion that it is wrong to kill another human being in particular).

(21:06 cont of Trolley problem) Furthermore the Trolley Problem asks us to examine the distinction between actively killing someone, and passively letting someone die.

(21:57 Patton says the ‘how’ and the ‘why’ of flipping the switch matters) What Patton is saying here ties into the principle of Deontology. Deontological ethics prioritizes specific duties above anything and everything else. A value system that is perfectly summed up in expressions such as, "duties for duties sake" and "let justice be done through the heaven's fall."

One of the duties that Patton's appealing to (which I already mentioned earlier as it is the most common argument leveled against redirecting the train in the trolley problem) is the aforementioned ethical rule that one should not murder another human being, even if one finds oneself in a n extremely specific set of circumstances in which homicide preserves more lives than terminated.

There is a natural tension between deontology and consequentialism, as deontology determines whether an action is right or wrong without much consideration of the ends of said action. Furthermore, the deontologically inclined might concern themselves with the intention behind a given action a given action. (a factor that would be completely disregarded by a consequentialist)

Deontological perspectives were first defined by 18th century German -

(23:08 Patton asks what real Philosophers would have to say about his viewpoints. Said aloud) Well, Freidrich Niezsche really wouldn't have been thrilled with anything you've had to say. Primarily because Pity seems to be at the center of your idea of "putting good into the world". Niezsche famously rejected the idea notion that pity was a virtue. He once claimed that pity 'runs counter to the instincts that preserve and enhance the value of life.' So Thomas is-

{Everything under this point is Janus disguised as Logan.}

(26:54 After Patton suggests that Thomas shouldn’t dedicate too much of his time to frivolity. Said aloud) I have a difference of opinion on this one, Patton. I’m sure we’re all somewhat familiar with the tired metaphor for self care you must put on your own oxygen mask before helping fellow passengers. An analogy that warns against the practice of helping others with their personal issues when you yourself are in need of help.

It is ironic that that illustration’s so overused at this point because it has almost become as easy to tune out that advice as it is to tune out the actual safety instructions on a flight. Easy, and very dangerous. In the event that a plane cabin becomes depressurized, you do not have long to secure your oxygen mask before you risk your oxygen saturation levels dropping too much leading to hypoxia (which is just insufficient oxygen for life functions.)

Hypoxia’s symptoms can include: an inability to communicate, confusion, unconsciousness and possible death. Having heard a piece of information before does not give you licence to ignore it in the future. Especially when the consequences of forgetting are so perilous.

(28:16, Patton talking about how he’d totally let Thomas self-care in that sort of extreme situation. Said aloud) And just like all of the moral dilemmas we’ve been discussing, it can seem easy to confidently state what you would do in a difficult situation, without knowing how you’d legitimately behave when your instincts take over.

In theory you believe Thomas can and should take some time to care for himself, but every point you’ve made in this discussion has contradicted that sentiment.

(28:44 after Roman asks how Patton’s points have been contradictory to Thomas taking care of himself. Said aloud) Nearly every answer Patton has given to moral questions throughout this discussion has suggested that a moral life is a life without spending surplus capital and time on leisure activities.

Dr. Robert A. Stebbins defined leisure as “... activity engaged in during free time which people want to do and... actually do in either a satisfying or fulfilling way (or both).” Leisure means freedom, its your time and you do what you want with it, which in turn contributes to a feeling of control and improved self-esteem.

A lack of control, and self esteem are two factors that you all now understand can worsen Thomas’s relationship with intrusive thoughts-- and they have. Additionally, doctors Iwasaki Messina and Hopper wrote that leisure time promotes a joyful life, and if that wasn’t enough pleasurable activities stimulate the production of neurotransmitters which can than improve one’s physical health.

Leisure is something Thomas needs more of in his life in order to feel like he has a life and Patton is essentially suggesting that Thomas isn’t being as good of a person as he’d like him to be if he doesn’t sacrifice himself for others.

(29:56, after Patton says that isn’t true. Said aloud) Oh, is it not? Please correct me if I’m wrong (Patton says that he’s wrong) So if it was between Thomas’s life or another’s you don’t think Thomas should give his life up? Oh and this other person is an innocent little lamb. Or how about a group of innocents?

(30:40 Patton’s breakdown about not knowing in that kind of scenario what’s right or wrong. Said aloud) You don’t know? Earlier you said that all people naturally understand right and wrong. So? Should Thomas die so that others may live?

(31:32 while Patton’s offering a new Trolley problem with Thomas on one track and Lee and Mary Lee on the other. Said aloud) ENOUGH! This isn’t working. This entire conversation has become so muddled due to a constant misleading, misues of “conscientious” language. You’ll need a sharp side to cut through all this conscientious bull-frog.

{Logan’s back in these lines}

(36:24, Logan’s back! Said aloud) Not that any of you care, but I’m unharmed, and I don’t want to talk about it. I’m just here to deliver you one last fact than I will do you all a favor and spare you my company.

Peter Singer is an Australian Philosopher and activist who champions the movement known as ‘effective altruism.’ The primary feature that differentiates effective altruism from other moral philosophies is its practicality. It employs the heart AND the mind so that effective altruism can earn its namesake and actually... Be effective.

The aim is to help as many people as possible while maintaining a ‘perfectly adequate standard of living.’ So a poor, sick person giving 5 of their last 15 cents to an aid organization, while incredibly altruistic is not effective altruism because that money won’t go very far. And the act would only harm that person’s already unacceptable standard of living.

Fellow effective altruist Williams Macaskill recommends people who can and are inclined to should go into fields like banking or finance because more money earned means more money to give. (After Thomas adds that he needs to give himself a buff) And you need to maintain an adequate standard of living. You can’t forget that part. If the variety of generosity in your life is leaving you depressed, or like your life isn’t your own than you need to reevaluate things.

#ts spoilers #SVS redux #Patton sanders #Logan Sanders #Janus Sanders #Roman Sanders #Selfishness Vs Selflessness redux #long post

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seismicsight · 4 years

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On Cop Toph

nobody can convince me that toph didn’t actively and openly refuse to enforce any laws/ordinances set by the Council that she felt were either (1) unjust, (2) discriminatory, or (3) served some underlying political agenda.

this definitely made her unpopular among the later iterations of the Council, but who was gonna suggest ousting toph?? toph, the famously talented inventor of metalbending, well-connected noblewoman, venerated war hero, and best friend of the Avatar? yeah, thought so.

(things got even better when she ascended to the Board of Directors and became a non-voting member of the Council herself. then she was gleefully allowed to call out every single lily-livered politico as she pleased to their faces and on the record.)

and you bet your ass that in the short time she spent running the RCPD, she encouraged every single goddamn member of the force to question institutionalization and practice personal discretion with every case/call. and because she’s got that lie detector status, nobody could get away with misconduct or abuse of power under her watch thank you very much.

i bet between her and aang and zuko, the systemic support of rehabilitation instead of punitive incarceration as a means to curb crime was written into the founding documentation of the republic. i mean, between toph, who’s been on the receiving end of unjust incarceration, zuko, who was given a chance at rehabilitation and came out the better for it, and aang, whose core moral beliefs hinge on respect for all life... yeah i’m gonna say that this was a thing.

being someone who’s experienced for herself the ways that corruption can manifest in institutionalized settings, she set out from day one not to let the place go to the dogs like every other powerful body out in the EK. it’s why the department is so small. they ONLY handle crime. not mental health issues, not social services, not homelessness, not private security, etc. and it’s also why the officers only have restraining metal cables on their person.

while we’re at it, i wanna address fandom discussions around toph being anything else besides a cop in her adulthood. and i generally agree. if i were to run with my own original ideas, i would have never pegged her to be law enforcement as an adult.

but to be fair to LoK blogs i wanna interact with, i’m keeping toph’s affiliation with the RCPD in my headcanons. and to be fair to all of us working around canon, toph is nothing if not a pragmatist at heart.

while the idea of toph becoming a staunch anarchist or vigilante are appealing, realistically i don’t see her deciding on maintaining these ideologies/lifestyles to their logical conclusions.

anarchist: for one, while i think toph’s particular sentiments fall in line with social anarchism, she’s not nearly politically-motivated enough to try and start her own movement (katara is more the group’s activist personality), nor is she keen on dismantling whole existing systems... because then as the inciting agitator she’d be left with either the responsibility to institute a whole new societal structure through widespread political ground-work, or shoulder the blame if her actions created a power vacuum that could be exploited (side-eyes at Zaheer, the idiot who thought that killing a single monarch would solve the problem of corruption in the EK without major social momentum and collaboration.) toph is not a politician. she’s just NOT, sorry.

would she join an anarchist community if she found one? oh, for sure. that i can concede.

vigilante: i can definitely see her dabbling in vigilante work in her youth. i really can. it’s good outside-the-law fun that serves a morally-justifiable purpose. in the wake of corrupt or unjust institutions, she would definitely find appeal in taking up a mantle and taking things into her own capable hands.

however, i imagine this lifestyle can’t be maintained indefinitely. for one, toph likes recognition and praise, and vigilantism requires an amount of secrecy that would start to grate on her after a while. not only because of her desire to be seen by others, but also because it might remind her too much of her own trauma and the years she spent sneaking away to participate in Earth Rumble as a child. and two, vigilantism doesn’t solve the problem of corruption or incompetence in existing institutions. after a while on this schtick, she would definitely get frustrated at the relatively tiny impact she can make as a lone actor (especially because she can’t like...write politically powerful messages at the scenes of her vigilante work to incite a social movement.)

as such, i think a more pragmatic approach is toph working for herself as a bounty hunter or earthbending master or even being a self-sustaining homesteader (and then moonlighting as a vigilante). i doubt her dad would willingly bankroll her without some strings attached, or even that she’d be happy to take money from him because doing so suggests that she can’t sustain herself without assistance. note: vigilantism alone doesn’t pay. at all. it’s why famed vigilantes in fiction are often secret millionaires or work well-paying day jobs.

now... getting the opportunity to establish a brand new institution? one she can mold into anything she wants? one she can lead and thereby use as a vaulting point to have the ear of the powers that be in an entirely new society? bruh. definitely an upgrade from working under an alias on the fringes. which is why i think she agreed to do it in the first place.

establishing the RCPD started out as a favor to her closest friends...but i hold that it then became her opportunity to create something better.

given this conclusion, i do take issue with the way the RCPD is characterized in LoK, as well as her life story around the job, but this post is long enough already. /rant

#toph #headcanon v: esteemed #headcanon au: esteemed #yeah i know the idea of someone working on the institution from the inside is futile #but this is a fantasy world #where toph had the opportunity to FOUND AND RUN the entire institution in a NEW society #let me have my HC that she was a revolutionary and controversial figure in the city #and that the police force SHE created could be actually progressive and useful

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skeletonsloverockcandy · 4 years

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A Hitchhiker’s Guide For Androids

Summary: Logan the Android goes to his interview with Dr. Picani. Afterwards he meets some familiar faces from the day before.

Warnings: Lying, food tw, eating tw, Logan tricks out his rad robot bod, and it seems like it might be gorey, but he’s a robot so it’s fine.

Fandom: Thomas Sanders, Sanders Sides, Cartoon Therapy, TS Shorts

Characters: Logan/Logic Sanders, Patton/Morality Sanders, Roman/Creativity “Princey” Sanders, Virgil/Anxiety Sanders, Dr. Emile Picani, Remy/Sleep Sanders.

Pairings: Background Romantic Remile, Platonic LAMP/CALM

Word Count: 8,370

Chapter One Chapter Two Ao3 Link

Chapter Three: New Neighbors

The next morning Logan put on his blue button up shirt and solid color tie. He was preparing for his interview later that morning with Dr. Emile Picani, and he wanted to look presentable. He was also up unreasonably early. In part because he didn’t need to sleep, but also because he wanted to avoid his neighbors for the time being. Due to his actions saving Patton yesterday, they were sure to want to speak with him, and he’d rather avoid messy, complicated, emotional interactions for now. He slipped out of the café before they had the chance to approach him yesterday, and he would prefer to delay that interaction while he still could. He was unsure if his circuits could handle more than one person at a time.

The application he filled out had the phone number of the Cartoon Café on it, and he had taken the liberty to text the number and ask when his interview had been scheduled. Dr. Picani had quickly texted back and informed him of the time, but also that the café was closed that day because of the attempted robbery the day before, and that he would be there personally to check up on the shop. He informed Logan that he was more than welcome to come by and conduct his interview though, that it wouldn’t be a problem at all.

Logan took that as permission to prepare himself for their meeting. Then, since he had some time, he ran through several scenarios focused on the interview. He figured if the typical interview questions were asked, assuming this job required few prerequisite skills, and if he maintained a pleasant demeanor, he had a decent chance of landing the job. A 82.6% chance to be more precise, but since certain things relied on the unpredictability of human behavior, he was willing to put some leeway on the odds depending on what came up.

Finally, he looked through the peephole of his apartment and did a thermal scan to locate the heat signatures of his new neighbors. He wanted to be certain they were not in the hallway when he left for his interview. From what he could tell, Patton seemed to be in his apartment, and Virgil and Roman did not appear to be in the building, so the two of them likely went to their respective workplaces while Logan was getting dressed.

Satisfied that he would not be seen, he set off to leave his apartment building. It would be close, but if he walked at the right pace, he’d only be an hour early to his interview instead of much much earlier. He walked very fast. However, he hoped that showing up early would ensure a good impression. Logan would say first impression if it weren’t for yesterday, and now that he thought of it, he’d rather avoid the possibility of the emotions that might come with them being in close quarters. Well, Patton said Dr. Picani had a PhD, Logan trusted he would remain professional.

“Wow, it’s really you!” the pink and brown clad psychologist practically squealed. “You saved Patton’s life yesterday, I cannot tell you how grateful I am. I was going to find you to thank you yesterday after I checked on my husband, Remy, but I couldn’t find you anywhere. Then next thing I know Patton’s telling me you applied to work here! Whaaaaaaaaaat?! Like, what are the chances?”

“Actually quite high, given that was my intended reason to enter the establishment in the first place.” Logan interrupted, “And, deepest apologies, but would you mind relinquishing me from your embrace? I’m not a very, what is the phrase? Ah yes, ‘touchy-feely’ person.”

“Oh yeah, sure. Anything for our hero over here, ey!” Dr. Picani stepped back and stopped hugging Logan. “I just want you to know grateful I am that you saved the lives, not only of my employee, but of everyone else in the cafe, including my husband. I don’t know what I would have done if I had lost any of them, and I have you to thank.” Emile pushed up his glasses and smiled warmly at Logan.

Ugh! These were the exact kind of emotional reactions Logan had been trying to avoid! Not that he didn’t appreciate the recognition, it was just something he didn’t understand that well, and thus, was unfamiliar dealing with, especially when such affections were directed towards himself. He had barely walked in the pink and blue building with the bell chiming over the door when Dr. Picani had stepped out of the back room and immediately came up to embrace him. How did humans deal with this attention?

“Urm, well, you are, uh, very kind. But if I may interject, I came here to interview for the open position?” Logan stumbled out awkwardly. He wished he could have more tact, but this was becoming a bit too much.

“Oh! Yeah, let’s go on ahead to the back room, I’ve already read over your application so you can come right in here.” Dr. Picani responded jubilantly.

After the introductions, they conducted the interview mostly professionally, though Dr. Picani kept making pop culture and cartoon references that Logan only barely got because of his general knowledge of human culture. It went fairly smoothly though. The position required no prerequisite skills, and the skills it did require, Logan could easily be taught. It was a sort of catch-all position because of how short-staffed Dr. Picani and Patton were. They were the only two employees, though they were occasionally helped out by Dr. Picani’s husband, Remy, who Logan gathered was the hipster-esque person in sunglasses from yesterday, if the photos of him and Dr. Picani on the desk in the back room were anything to go by. The back room appeared to be more of an office than anything else, though it did have doors to the food storage and break rooms, so ‘back room’ was the most accurate description from what Logan could tell.

Anyway, for the job, Logan would need to learn how to man the register, cook up the items on the menu, and clean the store. It seemed simple enough, though the job would require him to occasionally step outside his comfort zone. He understood he would have to acquire a “customer service” demeanor, which he figured he could manage. He was already lying to people as it was, what’s a little more? The thing he was looking forward to most was taking inventory and counting the money at the end of the day, most people’s least favorite parts of customer service jobs. It would really give Logan the opportunity to show his prowess with numbers, and, regardless, it was easier than dealing with large swarms of people.

At the end of the interview, Dr. Picani told Logan he did an excellent job and that he’d be happy to see him by the next work day. The general dress code seemed to be just a polo shirt (of which Logan already owned) and a name tag, which Dr. Picani said he would have made for Logan shortly, that he was so happy to have a new member on the team, especially someone who saved Patton’s life. It occurred to Logan that that incident might have helped his prospects of getting the job, but he wasn’t one to complain about fortunate circumstances.

He shook Dr. Picani’s hand at the end of the interview, “Thank you, Dr. Picani, I look forward to working with you.”

“Oh please, call me Emile, it’s the least I could do to conduct this interview after yesterday. Thank you again, truly.” Emile said, unable to keep the bright smile off his face. Logan smiled softly in return as a sign of gratitude.

“Yesterday was no problem, I was just trying to help how I could.” Logan responded. “I’ll see you at work.”

“You sure will!” Emile said warmly, “You’re gonna do great.”

Logan’s journey back to his apartment was pleasant. The sun was out and the buildings looked even more charming than the day before. It was if the world was rejoicing his new found income security. Now with a job position guaranteed, Logan felt he had become truly independent and separated from his previous terms of existence. He could exist for himself now, and do with his abilities what he wanted. It was...refreshing. Quite a relief from the idiotic frustrations of the scientists. For once, he was perfectly happy to go slow and enjoy his walk home.

Walking up the stairs to his apartment, and feeling quite relaxed from how positive the day was turning, Logan failed to run a diagnostic the potential threat of his neighbors being home. And this was brought to his attention by him turning the corner on the stairwell and running straight into Patton.

“Oof!” Patton exclaimed as they collided, his glasses getting knocked off his face and items he was holding now being strewn on the floor (some papers, an envelope, and a ceramic mug with paw-prints that thankfully didn’t break).

“Oh! I’m so sorry, I wasn’t watching where I was going,” Patton said as he squinted at the floor. “...If I could just find my glasses,” he muttered, “then I’d be a real sight for sore eyes, because of my sore eye-sight, heyo!”. He laughed as he crouched to the ground searching for his glasses and the other dropped items. Logan stood incredibly still, torn between slipping up to his room while Patton couldn’t see his face, and bending down to help Patton with his things. It was a fight with his programming to evaluate the more pressing need. If he helped Patton, then the person he saved would know he was living in the same building as him. On the other hand, he desired to be helpful to humans, and Patton would likely discover his living situation eventually anyway. Deciding it was better to figuratively rip that band aid off sooner rather than later, Logan bent down and handed Patton his glasses from off the floor.

“Oh, thanks kiddo! Don’t know what I would have done if these had broken. Really sorry about running into- WOAH! Hey! It’s you!” Patton exclaimed as he placed his glasses on his face, beaming up at him. “What’re you doing here, Logan?”

“Ah, of course. Well, you should know that I live here now. I moved in yesterday, though I was unaware of the complex’s current inhabitants when I rented the apartment,” Logan explained in a monotonous tone, “I apologise for disrupting your stairway travel, I will get out of your way.”

“Woah, hey there kiddo. I wasn’t watching where I was going, so if anything, the blame is on me. And secondly, you live here now? My savior, in this apartment? Wow,” Patton said with an astonished half chuckle, “I can’t believe you live here! That’s awesome! Which apartment?”

“That would be apartment 4A on the fourth floor,” Logan answered. Patton gasped excitedly.

“Oh my goodness! That’s the same floor I live on! What a coincidence!” Oh, didn’t Logan know it. Patton inhaled sharply, “Do you know what this means?!” Logan resisted the urge to either roll his eyes or detail exactly what it did indeed mean in literal terms and settled for thinking: I can certainly guess.

“We’re Apartment Buddies! Yay!” Patton practically shouted as he jumped up excitedly, nearly knocking his glasses off yet again.

“Otherwise known as neighbors, I presume. But yes, we will be living on the same floor and in close proximity, though whether we become ‘buddies’ as you phrased it, will depend on the advancement of a mutual bond over time that some might call friendship. However, that has yet to be seen and will take time.” Logan rambled off.

As Logan was speaking, Patton slowly brought up his hands up in loose fists lightly squishing the sides of his face while his eyes squinted behind his glasses and seemed to sparkle with excitement in an almost universal ‘Aww’ gesture, before saying, “Dawww, Logan...Are you implying you want to be my friend?” One hand flew down to his chest and clutched his heart, “That is so sweet, aww..Logan. First you save my life, then you save my heart.”

Oh no, emotions, yet again, Logan thought. He just couldn’t seem to escape them today.

“You know what,” Patton continued, “Why don’t you come over to dinner tonight. It’ll be like a ‘thank you’ and a welcome party all rolled into one! And! I can introduce you to my best friends Virgil and Roman. They’re also our neighbors and they were at the café yesterday too!”

Oh I am all too familiar, Logan thought, and fantastic, more people expressing their emotions at me, this is utterly exhausting.

However, it would be incredibly rude to refuse a gesture of kindness such as this, and he would be living next to these people for who knew how long, so it was impractical to try to avoid interacting with them forever. Besides, this is what humans did. They interacted with other humans. How was Logan supposed to be a convincing human if he intentionally avoided interacting with them?

“That would be...lovely, Patton. I look forward to getting to know who I live next to. Though, I must tell you, I am not the best at dealing with multiple people. I...sometimes struggle to react appropriately to emotional...things, so I apologise in advance.” His only references for dealing with multiple people at once were the scientists after all, and they weren’t the best example despite his programming.

“Oh kiddo, that’s okay. Virgil and Roman are really great and super understanding of all sorts of things. And heck, yesterday, before we got home, Roman couldn’t stop talking about how impressed he was with your maneuvers and bravery. I even think he was a little starstruck, because he kept cursing himself for not saying anything to you after you pinned the guy on the floor. And while Virgil did say you were being a liiiiiittle bit stupid for putting yourself in danger, he did complement you on your quick thinking, and it’s tough for Virgil to complement strangers, so that really means something! I really think they’re grateful for you saving me kiddo, so I know they’ll be super nice about any sensitivities you have about being around them.” Patton concluded.

“Well that is a relief to hear, Patton. I certainly do not want to leave a bad impression. I feel that would be unbecoming of a new neighbor, so it’s comforting to know I have your support.”

“Aw shucks Logan, after what you did for me, the least I can give is my support,” Patton said bashfully while adjusting his glasses.

“Ah, well in that case, I look forward to dinner. At what time would it be appropriate to come over?” Logan inquired.

“Oh! Well I’ll text Roman and Virgil and tell them we’re having a guest over for dinner, then..hmm, is five o’clock okay? I know they’ll both be home from work by then, so it’ll be the perfect time to introduce you,” Patton said thoughtfully.

“That sounds adequate, I will be at your apartment at five. Which apartment number is yours?”

“4C! And Roman’s is 4D and Virgil’s is 4B, just in case you wanted to know!” he said brightly, then he gasped, “I have to get everything ready!”

Logan looked on at him and determined that Patton’s heart rate spiked along with a touch of adrenaline being released into his veins as well as an influx in dopamine levels. He could tell Patton was genuinely excited about him coming over. Logan hoped it would go well given he had never actually eaten food before. It was within his capabilities to pass as a convincing human, but he had never done a trial run to see how he would actually react to having food in his false stomach. Could he even taste? He wasn’t sure. He escaped before they could troubleshoot that part of his programming. He knows that he’d be able to identify the exact components of whatever he was ingesting, but all he could assume he would be able to get out of eating food at his current level of advancement, would be the texture of it in his mouth, and the mess he’d to clean out of his chest cavity later. The thought of the uncleanliness made him internally cringe a bit, but he stayed in check on the outside, keeping his face impassive at his thoughts.

Patton was no longer paying much attention to him either way, instead mumbling excitedly under his breath all he would have to do to prepare while shuffling his picked-up items in his arms.

“Ah, uh, see you later Logan! Got to drop this paperwork off to Sandra, the landlady, then I have to prepare for guests! Ooooo this is going to be so fun! Buh-bye!” Patton said he stepped by Logan, turning to give him a half-wave with the hand holding the mug.

“Be careful going down the stairs, Patton. And I’m sure whatever you prepare will be adequate, see you then.” Logan called out as Patton turned the corner going down the stairs. He sighed to himself as he climbed the last few flights to his floor and entered apartment 4A. What had he gotten himself into?

Now, not only would he be interacting with multiple humans at once, he would also be expected to eat. He had never eaten before, not even in practice. He knew humans needed to do it to survive, but the thought of taking something and having to mash it into little slimy bits in his mouth, then swallow it? Not to mention, his experience with eating would be different than a normal human’s because he had to manually clean up whatever ended up in his false stomach tonight, and the experience couldn’t be made more enjoyable because he was pretty sure he didn’t have a sense of taste as of yet.

Wait, was he getting worked up? Is this what performance anxiety felt like? Regular lying was fine, but this felt like an entirely different ordeal. Snap out of it Logan! He was an android, he didn’t have feelings. So stop acting illogically and prepare for the dinner. He would get through it, further integrate and adapt to human customs, and survive. This was fine. Everything is fine.

Realizing he had just been standing in the entrance of his apartment while leaning against the closed door, Logan walked further into his apartment. This shouldn’t be bothering him. He was a highly advanced, incredibly valuable, and state of the art espionage machine, so something so trivial shouldn’t be bothering him. However, it was bothering him, and he couldn’t seem to get it to stop. So...he was a state of the art, highly advanced, incredibly valuable espionage machine, how could he change the situation so it was less bothersome to him so he could be at his optimum level of performance?

Well, the problem was his concern over the sensation of eating, and that it will be uncomfortable or disturbing to him. He would have to eat regardless, because he could not see a way out of that situation without being incredibly rude. So if he had to do it regardless, how could he make the instance more enjoyable, or at least bearable, to himself? The obvious answer would be to taste the food so he would at least get the same level of enjoyment out of it that the humans did, but that was unrealistic.

...Or was it?

Logan suddenly got an idea, and walked into the bathroom where he knew there was a mirror. Then he rolled up the sleeve on his left arm and peeled back some of the false skin again. Unlike his right arm that had a combination printer and data transferrer for forging necessary documentation and identification, his left arm had some minor tools and resources meant for repairs, as well as access to his wiring when feature updates and small performance tweaks needed to be done. Logan also rolled up his pant leg and opened the panel where his extension cord was, pulling it out and plugging it into the outlet by the sink so he would have a constant supply of power while he did this, should he accidentally make a mistake.

Then Logan reached with two fingers under his jawline and pressed three very particular spots while grasping one of the tools from his left arm, something slender and metal, and lightly pressing it to his temple. The next thing that occurred was a slight hissing noise of pressure being released as his jaw slowly popped open, causing as widening gap between the flesh of his lower face and upper face, revealing, besides his false teeth and cheeks and tongue, a mass of wiring and blinking lights now visible below the line of his top lip. Now with ample room, he slowly reached behind his jaw and grasped an exposed wire connected to his tongue, then reaching up with his tool, gently disconnecting it. He then lowered it to the wiring exposed on his left arm, and inserted it in a place where coding and tweaking that particular piece of hardware would be easier. Taste was simply the body analyzing different chemical compounds, something Logan could do via data analysis anyway, so changing some of his coding to associate a physical sensation along with that wasn’t too far of a reach, at least by his standards. Logan checked the time. Seven hours, seven hours until the dinner party. He would have to be quick, but it was doable. He’d better get to work.

At 4:48 P.M., Logan was finishing putting all of his parts back into place. His tongue felt strange and a little tingly, but he still didn’t know for sure if his tinkering had worked. He opened and closed his mouth a few times, sticking out his tongue and rolling it into a tube like a child might. Everything seemed to be functional and his motor skills seemed to be fine. He unplugged himself from the outlet, actually feeling somewhat rejuvenated from the extra power, and rolled down his pant leg. He assumed what he was wearing would be fine for the dinner, he would just brush some of the wrinkles out of his shirt sleeves and pants. He hoped tonight would go well, and even if his attempt to give himself the ability to taste did not work, it alleviated most of his anxieties and gave him something to do while he waited for the inevitable.

Looking over himself in the mirror one last time, he decided he looked suitable for however this dinner went. Checking the time, he had about 3 minutes until five o’clock, so it would be wise to head over to apartment 4C already.

Logan crossed the hall to Patton’s apartment and knocked on the door.

“Just a minute!” He heard from inside. He only had to wait a moment before the door was flung open and Patton was there grinning brightly up at him.

“Logan, you came! I’m so glad you made it. Virgil and Roman will be here in a sec, I haven’t told them it was you who was coming, only that we were entertaining a guest. They’re going to be so surprised! Come in! Come in!” Patton rambled off as he ushered Logan inside.

The walls of Patton’s apartment were a pleasant shade of light blue, though they could hardly be seen through the litany of photographs and crayon pictures both framed and taped to them. Apartment 4C was larger than 4A and had a small kitchen area that was visible from every angle of the main foyer. It had bar-style seating that separated it from the rest of the apartment and helped cement it in people’s minds as a separate space. The kitchen seemed well stocked for an apartment of its size, even if it was slightly larger than Logan’s, because it had an oven and stove-top combo, a dishwasher, a refrigerator, a toaster, and a countertop microwave. On the counter tops were several covered dishes wafting food-smells from underneath glass containers and aluminum foil, and in the sink were several gray, cat-themed silicone utensils covered in food stains—presumably what Patton had used to cook tonight’s dinner with.

Across from the kitchen area there was an L-shaped couch with the shorter side pushed against a wall and facing a small coffee table and T.V., both of which looked second hand but attributed to the cozy atmosphere. Next to the T.V. was a shelf stocked with DVD cases holding a variety of different shows and movies. And behind the couch and diagonal from the kitchen there was a round dining table already set out with plates, napkins, and silverware arranged in line with the four chairs about the table. And behind the table on the wall were two closed doors. One Logan assumed lead to the bedroom, and the other he assumed lead to the bathroom. Overall, it was a very friendly-looking, if a bit crowded, apartment.

“Welcome to my home! Make yourself comfortable, or should I say at home, wink,” Did he seriously just say ‘wink’ out loud? “And feel free to look at whatever you like! Me casa es su casa.” Patton said with an excited gesture, as if to point at the entire apartment.

“Thank you Patton, that is much appreciated. However, it does seem strange that you want me to ‘make myself at home’ when your home does not have adequate resources to make one such as me.” Patton stared at Logan for a second and blinked before his face split into a delighted grin.

“Oh my goodness Logan! You didn’t tell me you liked dad jokes?” he said with a half laugh.

“What? That wasn’t a joke, and I would hardly make a ‘dad joke’, as you called it, intentionally. I was simply bringing up the impracticality of trying to collect and then assemble all the components that make up my body in your apartment.” Perhaps if he conveyed a confused look his point would be understood. Patton held his mouth and tried to keep himself from snickering.

“Oh yeah, that would mean bringing a whole bunch of body parts here, but you don’t need me to ex-spleen it to you, get it?” Logan sighed deeply. Oh.

“What, you didn’t find that humerus?”

“Humorous? Oh goodness, do you mean the arm bone connected to the radius and ulna?”

“Sorry, am I getting ulna nerves? You might want to say ‘are ya kidney-ing me’. Ha ha!” Logan brought his hand up to his face and rubbed underneath his glasses.

“In fact Patton, the temptation right now is very strong to exclaim ‘are you kidding me’, but it’s fine. I would just prefer we kept the puns to a minimum, thank you.”

“Aw, sorry for teasing, Logan, but I start punning and I can’t stop punning, I was fed to the rules and I hit the ground running.” He laughed at the look Logan gave him before looking down more bashfully and slightly embarrassed, “But, uh, I’ll stop now. I do want to be a good host after all!” Logan adjusted his body language to express relief so his gratitude would be understood.

“I appreciate your considerate nature Patton, and thank you again for hosting me.”

“Aw, you’re welcome. Now you can sit down while I set the food out, Virgil and Roman should be here any second.” Patton said while grabbing a couple of the covered trays. “Roman likes to take his time getting ready and show up ‘fashionably late’, but Virgil is always anxious to be early, so with the two of them scrambling to get ready at a combined pace, they show up more or less on time.”

Logan pulled out a chair while he was listening and took a seat at the dining table.

“That’s very interesting, Patton.”

As if on cue, there was a knock at the door.

“Oh, that’ll be them now! Just a second guys!” Patton shouted as he put down the dishes he was holding on the table. He brushed off his hands on his pants and went to open the door.

Patton opened the door just enough for his head to poke through so that neither side could see beyond the doorway before speaking.

“Hey guys! So glad you showed up!”

“You know we wouldn’t miss your dinners for the world, Padre!” A dramatic voice proclaimed.

“Yeah, if Cinderella here didn’t spend so much time getting spend so much time getting ready.” A snide voice replied.

“Well if I had a fairy godmother, it wouldn’t take so long would it? We can’t all just ‘poof’ and look beautiful, it takes work to look this good!”

Patton interjected, “Kiddos, come on now. The important thing is that you’re here and we’re going to have a lovely dinner. And don’t forget! We have a guest! I think you’re really gonna be surprised.”

“Uh, yeah Pat, I’ve been meaning to ask you about that. You know I’m not the best with meeting new people,” the softer voice said.

“Hey, it’s okay Virge, our guest has told me he doesn’t have the best people skills either, so I think you two will get along just fine.” Patton replied with a sympathetic smile. “Now it’s time to introduce all of you! Oh I’m so excited!”

With that Patton opened the door fully to let in the other two residents on the fourth floor, at the same time revealing Logan to be their mystery guest.

“Roman and Virgil meet—”

“It’s you!” the man wearing a white leather jacket and red T-shirt said, while the man with dyed purple hair just stared wide-eyed, looking at Logan with a shocked expression.

Logan stood up from his chair and walked toward the doorway.

“Hello, I am Logan, it’s nice to meet you.” He was nothing if not one for decorum.

“You’re the nerd who saved Patton yesterday!” the one he assumed to be Roman said delightedly before he was sharply elbowed in the side by the one he assumed was Virgil.

“Ow! Hey! What was that for?”

Virgil glared at Roman for a second before addressing Logan, “Would you excuse us for a second?” and without waiting for a reply, he dragged Roman into the hallway.

Patton laughed awkwardly, rubbing the back of his neck, “Sorry about that…”

“It’s quite alright Patton.”

As Logan said that, he turned up his sound sensitivity so he could hear what the other two were whispering in the hallway. He heard Roman speak first.

“What the heck, Dark and Gloomy? What was that for?”

“You dumbass, you saw what this guy did yesterday. He could beat the hell out of you! Not saying that he would but-. And the first thing you do to the guy who saved Pat is insult him!? He could fold you like a lawn chair, God you’re an idiot.” Virgil hissed under his breath. Roman made an offended scoffing sound.

“Hey! I- well, I- Ugh! I am not an idiot. He caught me by surprise! You have to admit he does look like a nerd though, just a bit?” There was another noise of Roman being elbowed in the gut. “Oof! Would you quit that?!”

“Maybe when you don’t try to piss off the guy who took down someone waving a knife in Patton’s face?” Virgil said, pushing the last words through his teeth. It was quiet for a moment before Roman spoke up again.

“...It was really amazing how he took that guy down. Gah! I wish I could have been of more use yesterday. He was just so swift and composed, I was shocked silent--which is a first for me!”

“You can say that again.”

“Anyway, the point is I am grateful he saved our little ball of sunshine in there. I just didn’t know what to say.”

“Well you can start by apologising and then...I don’t know, tell him how impressed you were with him or something. Look, I’m about as emotionally constipated as you are, so I’m not really great at advice on this.”

“Ugh! I will have you know I am great at expressing my emotions, I am an Actor after all.” Virgil sighed upon hearing this.

“Whatever, let’s just go back in there, and be nice, okay?” there was a rasp to his voice that made his suggestion more akin to a threat.

With that the door opened back up, Virgil being the first to speak.

“Sorry about this idiot, won’t happen again.” Roman shot Virgil a glare before speaking up and addressing Logan.

“My sincerest apologies, Logan, was it? I regret my rude behavior in calling you a nerd, (even though you kinda look like one), and would like to introduce myself. I am the one, the only, Roman Prince, at your service,” he said with a deep bow and a wink while Virgil facepalmed, “I hope you humbly accept my gratitude for saving our dearest Patton, without you he would surely be lost to us yet. Truly, your combat skills are unmatched, and you showed great valor and poise. It is an honor to be in your presence.” he finished with a dramatic flourish and a tinge of pride in his voice from his performance. Logan didn’t even need to run any scans on Roman’s vitals to tell he was being overly dramatic, no spike in heart rate could top that. Still, a first impression was a first impression, so he extended his hand to shake as a greeting.

“...You’re welcome...It’s nice to meet you. As I said previously, my name is Logan Smith, and I am the new resident of apartment 4A.” Logan spoke as he and Roman grasped hands and he gave a firm shake. However, at this point Virgil spoke up.

“Woah wait, you’re gonna be living here? On the same floor as us? Right next to me?” Virgil looked a little shaken for a moment.

“Yes..? Is there a problem? I’m not following.” Logan could tell he seemed on edge but he couldn’t tell why.

“No..It’s cool…” Virgil replied as the tiniest bit of blush crept on his face in embarrassment. Patton piped up.

“Don’t worry about it too much Logan, Virgil just takes time adjusting to change.” he glanced at Virgil as he spoke and gave him a sympathetic look. Virgil looked off to the side, cheeks growing even darker with blush.

“Yeah! Charlie Frown over here just doesn’t realise how frickin’ cool it’ll be to live next to a personal bodyguard, though,” Roman interjected, “he does already have a knight in shining armor protecting him from harm’s way (me of course), but I suppose I could learn a thing or two from Mister Jedi Master over here, what with the stunt you pulled yesterday.” Logan gave Roman a confused look.

“Bodyguard? My knowledge of self defense does not make me a bodyguard. But, I suppose I could teach you how I performed that maneuver yesterday at some point, as long as it didn’t harm anything.” Logan conceded with some trepidation, at the possible offer of spending more time with them, which was a risky move. And based on the shocked but delighted look on Roman’s face, apparently offering to teach self defence, in any small way, was the wrong move if he didn’t want more interaction.

“Also, why would Virgil even need a bodyguard? He seems perfectly capable of taking care of himself.” Logan decided to shift the topic back onto the other, much to Virgil’s chagrin if the spike in adrenaline was any indicator.

“...Can we please sit down and eat? I’m kinda hungry.” Virgil pulled up the hood of his patched hoodie and buried his face in it, refusing to make eye contact with anyone. Though Logan could see his face growing dark from embarrassment underneath the hood.

“Oh yeah guys! I made lasagna, with a little surprise for dessert, you’re going to love it!” Patton said, coming to Virgil’s rescue.

“Ooo! I love lasagna! You know just what to make Padre!” Roman exclaimed as he pulled out a chair and sat down at the dining table, Logan and Virgil soon following suit.

Patton leaned over the table where he sat down the dish earlier and removed the aluminum foil he had placed over the top. A burst of smell escaped its confinement and filled the apartment, steam coming off the cheese and sauce in whispy ribbons. He cut the meal into squares and put a piece on each of the four plates at the table.

Roman immediately began digging in despite Patton’s warning that it was hot, and as anticipated, he soon began fanning his mouth and saying, “Ah!hothothot!”, then ran over to the sink and filled a glass with water before downing it in a few gulps. Virgil smacked his hand into his face while saying “idiot”, but nonetheless could still be seen smiling under his hood at Roman’s shenanigans.

Logan picked up his fork and twirled it between his fingers for a second, a bit apprehensively, before plunging it into the corner of the lasagna, tearing a bit off of the stubborn pasta and cheese. Then, as naturally as he could muster, while everyone else was distracted and giggling about Roman’s mishap, he slipped the piece of food into his mouth, pulling back the fork clean.

The first thing he noted was the temperature, the lasagna being approximately 151*F, indeed a little too hot for comfort on the human tongue. He felt Roman should have been more cautious. The next thing was the texture, the cheese being stringy and slightly chewy, while the sauce was liquidy and a little chunky from the tomatoes, and finally the pasta was soft and a little stubbornly chewy. Logan felt apathetic to these textures, more focused on how thoroughly he was going to have to clean his mouth from the red sauce now coating his insides. Finally after a tingling sensation on his tongue that felt similar to numbing mouthwash, he experienced the taste.

It...was far more underwhelming than he expected. It didn’t taste bad, but he just didn’t experience a particularly strong way one way or the other. It tasted like food. Like the chemical compositions that made up cheese and sauce and pasta. Though it could be said that it was a miracle that he was able to experience taste at all, he did feel a bit proud of himself for that.

This analysis happened in a matter of seconds after taking his first bite and he chose to release a gentle ‘hmm’ to indicate to Patton he was enjoying the meal. It was polite after all.

A comfortable chatter started to buzz around the table as the other three settled into eating their meals. As Logan continued to take small bites, he noticed the three had a distinct chemistry. He wasn’t sure how this sentiment could be expressed except for the idea that they played off one another well. Each had something that added to the interactions of the others, and Logan found himself occasionally weighing in on the conversation whenever he was addressed, feeling like he added to that chemistry. The atmosphere began to loosen some and he could tell they were becoming less tense, Virgil especially. It seemed the more he talked and interacted with him at the table, the less awkward he seemed when addressing the others, even Logan.

Eventually, over the clatter of forks and light chewing, the conversation topic cycled onto himself.

“So, Logan,” Patton said with a soft cheesy grin, propping his face up with one arm, “tell us about yourself.” Logan cocked an eyebrow.

“What would you like to know?”

Roman cut in, “What brings you to Cardinal Valley? It’s not exactly a well-known locale.”

“Yeah, it’s basically No-where City, nothing happens here.” Virgil added, eyeing Logan a bit suspiciously now that he considered it.

“I disagree, it is far more populated than where I used to live.”

“Where did you used to live?” Patton asked, curious.

“The middle of nowhere.” Logan deadpanned.

“Ha ha, we made that joke already, Courage the Cowardly Dog.” Roman snided. Logan rolled his eyes.

“I don’t make jokes. I lived out in the woods, south of here.”

“Wow, all alone?” Patton said with sympathy in his eyes.

“That sounds like a crazy horror cabin scenario to me,” said Virgil, stabbing the remainder of his lasagna with his fork, “kinda metal though.”

“No, I didn’t live alone, it used to be my...parent’s house, I...don’t interact with them anymore,” Logan said, looking down and fiddling with his fork.

“Oh, I’m sorry kiddo, I didn’t mean to bring up bad memories,” Patton said with a frown and reached for Logan’s hand to console him, patting it gently where it rested on the table.

“That’s quite alright Patton, you didn’t mean to. And the past is the past, it does little good to dwell on it.”

“Oh, right.” Patton finished lamely, looking down. There was a bit of an awkward lull in the conversation before Roman perked up.

“Hey, Padre, you said there was something special after lasagna?”

“Oh yeah, kiddo, how silly of me, I almost forgot. Now who’s ready for desert?” Patton asked cheerfully, getting up from the table. There was a general consensus of agreement as Roman and Virgil said various “I am’s” excitedly while Logan just nodded slightly.

Patton went behind the kitchen area and opened the freezer, pulling out a large sealed container. Roman gasped before exclaiming, “Patton, does this mean what I think it means?”

Patton gave a singular nod at him before Roman squealed excitedly and bolted to the door. Logan gave a dumbfounded look to Patton and Virgil, confused as to what was going on. To his surprise, even Virgil was giving a mischievous smirk, flicking his eyes to the doorway that Roman left swung open and listening to the jostling and rustling that could be heard next door from Roman’s apartment. As this was happening Patton was unscrewing the lid of the container to reveal a tub full of ice cream.

“Homemade Vanilla Ice Cream! Bone-Apple-Teeth kiddos!”

Roman then rushed back into the room at that moment.

“Got it!” he said panting, a little out of breath, holding up a small jar.

“You know what to do Ro!”

Roman grinned, popping off the lid of the jar and sticking it in the microwave. None of this cleared up Logan’s confusion in any way whatsoever.

Patton pulled out a clean ice cream scoop and some bowls before delicately scooping out a portion for everyone. Meanwhile the microwave beeped signifying whatever was in the jar was done being heated. Roman pulled the jar out, then, taking a spoon, doled out generous helpings of what looked like liquefied, warm, strawberry jelly on top of each scoop.

“Crofter’s, the berry best jelly around!” Roman declared.

“Yeah, it’s my jam.” Virgil chimed in.

Logan groaned at the apparently infectious use of puns, but he had to admit that he was intrigued about all the fuss. Roman and Patton helped pass out the bowls and handed Virgil and Logan spoons to enjoy their ice cream with.

“Have you ever had Crofter’s jelly before Logan?” Roman asked.

“I don’t believe I have.” Before tonight he had never had any food in general, but he wasn’t going to mention that.

“Well you are going to love it. I convinced Patton and Virgil to try it a few years back, and now it’s our thing to basically top every desert with it any time we all have dinner together.”

Logan was skeptical about his potential ‘love’ for this fruit spread product given how disappointing the lasagna experience was, but again, politeness. And, at the very least, he was curious.

“Alright kiddos, dig in!” Patton announced, plunging his spoon into the ice cream and taking a bite, humming in pleasure when he pulled the spoon from his lips. Roman and Virgil followed suit, though Virgil was much quieter when eating than Roman, who kept making ‘Mmmm’ sounds a bit obnoxiously.

Logan spun his spoon between a couple of fingers before dipping it into the ice cream and jelly. Well, it can’t be any more disappointing than the lasagna he thought.

He brought the spoon up to his lips, placing it in his mouth and...and...it was the most delicious thing he had ever tasted. His eyes went wide in shock as the sweet chemicals washed over his now sensitized tongue. It was...it was...invigorating. He began taking more spoonfuls and putting them in his mouth. Who knew jelly could be so good?

Logan didn’t notice the others were staring at him. Patton was covering his mouth trying to keep himself from giggling, while Roman had a proud look about himself and kept glancing between Virgil and Patton while he ate. Virgil on the other hand kept looking down and pursing his lip to keep himself from smiling.

Logan didn’t look up until his spoon scraped the bottom of the bowl and the last of the ice cream and jelly was in his mouth. He sucked off the remainder of the jelly from the spoon and smacked his lips, only then realizing he was being watched.

Oh no, his lips were sticky and covered in jelly and vanilla ice cream, and there was some dribbling down his chin. He didn’t have any blood to cause a blush, but he did feel his face begin the heat. He put down the spoon and covered his mouth with his hand to hide the mess.

The three others were grinning at him with varying degrees of humor.

“Wow Specs, you had been kind of stiff all night, who knew you just needed some Crofter’s to loosen you up?”

Logan averted his gaze from Roman, instead choosing to stare at the woodgrain on the table.

“I apologise, that was berry- I mean very unprofessional of me.” What was wrong with him? Did the sugar cross some wires or something?

Patton gasped delightedly.

“Oh my goodness Logan, you punned! You did an almost-on-purpose dad joke!”

Logan felt like disconnecting his head from his body and burying it under a pile of rubble, but he settled for taking his napkin and wiping his mouth clean from the food stains.

“I did not pun, not on purpose, so it doesn’t count.”

“Oh, I think it counts,” Roman said.

“Anyway,” Logan cut him off, “you were right Roman, that fruit spread was enjoyable. ...More so than I expected, apparently. I might go so far as to say it was the best thing I have ever tasted, which would not be an exaggeration.”

Roman looked as if he had just gotten praise from Gordon Ramsey himself, before getting a slight jab in the arm from Virgil’s elbow.

“Don’t look so surprised Princey, everyone loves that stuff.”

Roman made an offended noise.

“Well, it was still a good idea on my part, and Logan seems to like it so I say that was a 100% success.” He stuck out his tongue to Virgil, and in response Virgil flicked him on the forehead.

“Ow! Hey! Have at ye, foul fiend!” Roman yelped as he grabbed his spoon and started making sword fighting gestures at Virgil, who grabbed his spoon as well, a smirk creeping onto his face.

“You’re on.” before inevitably,

“Kiddos,” Patton said giving them a look, “we do not fight at the dinner table, it’s rude!” Roman crossed his arms, muttering under his breath something that sounded suspiciously like ‘whatever dad’, before he and Virgil sheepishly put down their spoons. Logan spoke up.

“Well, Patton this dinner has been lovely. Thank you for having me. And you two,” he addressed Roman and Virgil, “It was wonderful to meet you officially, thank you for trying to make me feel welcome.”

“Woah, leaving so soon Specs?” Roman said. Virgil rolled his eyes.

“We live on the same floor as him now, we’ll probably see him all the time.”

Patton beamed at the compliment he’d been given and piped up,

“Aw, thanks Logan. I love getting to know new people, and I sure do hope I’ll be seeing more of you soon.”

“You will Patton. Before we ran into one another earlier, I had just gotten back from my interview with Dr. Picani, and he said I’d been accepted into the vacant position.”

“You got the job?!” Patton squealed excitedly, “That’s awesome Logan! That means we get to work together!” He jumped up and hugged Logan, who stiffened, but softly pat his now co-worker’s arm in gratitude.

“Congratulations man,” Virgil said, waving a small salute.

“Erm, yes, I got the job. I assume you’ll figuratively ‘show me the ropes’ (if that’s the correct phrase) on my first day?”

“‘Course Logan, anything! Just ask,” Patton answered with a smile, releasing Logan from their hug.

“I’ll be sure to take you up on that offer Patton,” he said looking him in the eye, before turning to all three of them.

“Farewell, I will see you all again soon.” Logan said, walking up to the door and opening it before turning slightly to administer a brief wave. Patton and Virgil waved back, Patton very enthusiastically. Roman, meanwhile, gave a deep bow as Logan opened the door and replied, “‘Till we meet again,” with a wink.

Logan rolled his eyes, smiling slightly, and closed the door, walking over to his apartment. He had a lot of cleaning to do on his insides, which would not be fun, but, he had to admit, the night had not been awful. It was actually pleasant, if somewhat entertaining. Logan was looking forward to recharging, though. It had been a long day. However, he was reassured by the fact that he might actually come to like his new neighbors after all.

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lov3nerdstuff · 4 years

Text

I Found {Part 2}

*Loki x reader*

Part: 2/8

Words: 3.4k

Summary: Loki finds himself stranded in Underworld, a kingdom hidden deep inside a desolate planet. In order to survive, he puts himself in the service of the tyrant king, who promises to give Loki his freedom back if he fulfills one simple task. Loki is to set out and bring the mad king his newest toy: You.

~A dangerous forbidden love. Abduction. Slavery. Tortured conscience. A mad tyrant... Escape?~

Request: A song fic based on 'I found' by Amber Run, requested by @strawberrysandcream

A.N.: So... This might get a little longer than expected 😅 already have written four parts and there's still more to come. But it's gonna be a ride for sure 😁💗

All Parts can be found on my Masterlist!

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With the panting guards trailing vaguely behind him, Loki strode into the throne room without awaiting as much as an announcement. He wanted to stay on the king's good side, but he was done pretending to enjoy it.

"My king, I bring you your selected girl." He spoke loudly, with determination but without smiles. Doing this was difficult, even for someone as practiced in ignoring his own conscience as Loki was.

"You return sooner than expected, my friend!" The king laughed and heaved himself out of his jeweled throne to take the few steps down towards Loki. Once both men stood facing each other, with your unconscious form still resting securely in Loki's arms, the king gazed down at you with a vicious smirk.

"Oh, how I have longed for this one…" He sighed almost affectionately and reached one podgy finger out towards your bruised cheek. Loki's stomach flipped almost violently and he had to bite down the prominent sickness arising from the very bottom of it.

"My king…" He spoke quickly, before the man would lay his hands upon you. Somehow he found the thought impossibly hard to bear. Indeed the king withdrew his hand and glared at Loki instead. "...what am I to do with her now?"

"Hand her over to the guards and you're free to go." The king sighed heavily, moving back towards his throne with one last disgustingly hungry gaze at your small form in Loki's arms.

"I… Eh, your highness, I think the guards have exhausted themselves quite enough for the day and I would feel most miserable imposing this task on them. Let me take her where she needs to be, let me see this done. Correctly. To… to prove to you my unyielding loyalty." Loki practically disgorged the words, bowing a little just to emphasize his point.

"You really are serious about completing your task to my fullest contentment, aren't you, little god?" The king chuckled and Loki had to smile to keep his jaw from clenching in anger. He didn't know where this protectiveness over you was coming from so suddenly, so maddeningly intense, but he was not ready to surrender you to these people just yet. The faint warmth of your body had started seeping through the thick fabric of his garments a good while back, mingling with your sweet scent to wrap around his senses, and it had something so incredibly calming, so alluring…

"Absolutely, your majesty." Loki replied with a dashing smile, tightening his grip on you ever so slightly. Obviously his entire being was working against his reason now, lovely… He had agreed with himself that he needed to get rid of you, and yet here he was begging to keep you a little while longer if only to make sure you weren't violated. Things weren't going well for either of you.

"So it be, then. You may take her there yourself, as you have thus far not disappoint me. To the baths in the East wing. Someone will meet you there to see things through."

"Thank you, your majesty." Loki replied politely, but as soon as he turned to leave, he was kept from leaving yet again.

"I assume you understand what happens to those who try to take what is mine? Who lay hand on what it not for them to touch?" The croaky tenor voice made the hairs in Loki's neck stand up in an instant.

"Yes, your majesty." He replied ever so calmly, even though it cost him quite a lot to keep his calm indeed, to keep his voice from dropping an octave in grave severity. With every word and every action he got himself deeper into this mess, but he couldn't help it. He couldn't hand you over, couldn't bring himself to be this cruel even if it would be to his own advantage. But he could shut up for now, and that's what he did.

Without another word Loki made his way out of the hall and down the tunnels towards the baths. This time it was only two guards following him with every step he took, and Loki almost laughed at their faces for seriously believing that they could keep him from doing as he pleased. He didn't feel like laughing though, not even like lifting the corner of his lips out of the grim line they were presently forming.

After a few sharp turns and almost getting lost once, he finally reached the medium sized hall that served as a bath for the inhabitants of the palace. A few natural pools lined the room, along with a couple hot springs and a very cold and very shallow lake. Loki had never liked the place, he prefered not to be exposed to the eyes of others. Maybe his physique being compared to Thor's more often than not in their youth had made him rather self-conscious when it came to nudity. The people of Underworld didn't seem to mind naked skin though, and Loki constantly had to remind himself not to wrinkle his nose in mild disgust.

Now, as he walked into the hall with your additional weight making his footsteps more audible than he was used to, his eyes scanned the room for whoever should be waiting for him here. He almost believed the cavern to be empty, until his gaze fell upon an elderly woman, stout and red-faced, but less vile looking than most other inhabitants of the palace.

She approached Loki with slightly skipping steps.

"My goodness, did you carry her all the way here?" She shrieked as she motioned for Loki to put you down on a flat surface laid out with various furs of a size that had Loki wondering which animals would be large enough to have called this skin their own. After a second of hesitation he obliged, and gently put you down, soft furs brushing against the freezing skin on his knuckles while his fingertips fanned across your soft skin. He shouldn't touch you, and even less enjoy doing it.

"I did indeed." He replied quietly, looking down at your crouched form being illuminated by the many torches attached to the walls. The caverns were brighter than the tunnels at least, making him feel less in touch with the darkness within him.

"Such a lucky girl… The guards usually aren't that gentle with them." The woman sighed as she dug out a bottle with a deep red liquid from her bag, before she looked straight at Loki. "Is there anything else I can do for you?"

"Hm? Oh, no…" He mused, offering her a half smile and taking a few steps backwards. Behind him the guards turned to leave as well, he heard them retreating without even bothering to look. He couldn't tear his eyes off you, couldn't bring himself to leave. Leaving would've felt like a betrayal, for he knew that if he left now, a little piece of his morality would wilt and die alongside you in these crude caves. Maybe even a huge part. Being here still gave him the illusion that he hadn't completed the evil that had been asked of him, that he still could redeem himself. That you weren't lost just yet.

"Isn't she a pretty one indeed?" The old woman asked suddenly, sensing Loki's presence even though he had retreated all the way into the shadows on the other end of the empty cave.

"Maybe. I haven't noticed." Loki lied easy enough, in a more sincere calm. Being alone with only you and the old woman somehow made him feel more secure than with the guards around.

"You shouldn't lie to an old woman. We elderly folks hear enough lies from our friends, don't need any more from our fiends." She chuckled as she moved about your motionless body, making you drink the red liquid carefully. Loki found himself sauntering closer again before he could bring up the will to stop himself.

"I'm not your enemy." He replied in honest interested to make her believe his words. The way she cared for you made him certain that she might be the closest thing to an actual decent person in this godforsaken place. Well, not godforsaken enough, as the one god who currently resided here was trying to escape. But that wasn't the point.

"You brought another innocent soul for our king to devour, didn't you?" She asked calmly, looking at Loki only long enough for him to see that she didn't judge him. Not really.

"I did." He replied more quietly than he wanted to. But the weight of admitting it out loud added another boulder to his heart, another arrow to his back. "And it makes me no better than the devourer of souls himself."

"But you are still here, aren't you?" She smiled, making you drink the last of the red liquid.

"Was that the antidote?" He asked curiously, coming to stand almost directly next to you once more.

"It was indeed. Should be very few minutes until she wakes up, now." She turned around to Loki with the kindest expression he had been given in a long time. "What's your name, dear?"

For a moment Loki debated with his reason if he really should stay here, and if he should be talking to the old woman. People back at home would have considered her a witch most likely, and that alone made Loki like her a little more already. "My name is Loki of Asgard."

"Well, Loki of Asgard, since you are not going to leave anyway, you may as well help me with her." She said easily, sitting down on a large rock with a small groan, and Loki found himself inclined to agree. He hadn't left when he was supposed to, so now he was certain that he wouldn't leave at all. Before long, the woman continued. "They usually either cry once they realize what is happening or they go for the run. And in the latter case I'm not of much use. Usually the guards will bring them back here within minutes, but therefore with more bruised skin than I could possibly heal. Yet, I am under the impression that you might not want said harm to come to this girl, so it would be quite lovely if you could keep her from running when she wakes up. Do you know her name?"

"Y/n." He replied while his eyes were fixed on your chest rising and falling in a steady rhythm. Somehow, the sight had something deeply calming. "What will happen to her now, after she's awake?"

"She will be kept in confinement until her spirits are broken, so she won't try to flee anymore or hurt herself or other. And she will be trained until she has mastered her art." The elder sighed sadly, following Loki's gaze to your fluttering lashes.

"Her art?"

"She needs to learn how to please a man, how to please the king before she may be of service to him."

Loki's jaw clenched and his brows furrowed into a deep frown, but he didn't word his disgust nor his refusal to see this plan put into action. He should be working on his plan to escape… not on a plan to save you. If he kept on thinking like this, if he kept on actually seeing all the horrible things happening around him currently, he would really lose his mind.

Ignorance and denial had kept him wrapped in a blissful fog, but then you had literally fallen into his arms… and you had become his focal point to navigate through the haze, so he wouldn't lose sight of what he truly wanted. To escape from this living hell.

Short moments later you stirred, breath hitching as your eyes flew open with a start. You gasped, then turned your head to stare at Loki and the old lady with a shocked gaze.

And Loki almost would've gasped as well, for he had never seen eyes quite like yours, so deep and full of the universe's greatest mysteries. Of joys and tragedies unfathomable to anyone but you. He was drawn in immediately, immensely, impossibly…

"Hello Y/n, dear…" The old woman said with a soft smile.

"No…" You breathed, eyes widening even more as you looked around in the cave. "No no no…"

And with a start, you jumped to your feet and bolted towards the exit so quickly that your movements became blurred to the eye. Yet, Loki was quicker both in reaction and running and caught up with you after half the distance, wrapping his arms around your small form tightly.

"Let me go!" You screamed and thrashed wildly into the open air, actually managing to get one or two decent hits against Loki. He was impressed, but not surprised.

"We won't harm you, dear, please stop fighting." The older woman spoke calmly as Loki carried you back towards her. He couldn't help but feel even more intrigued by you now that you were awake, even if you were currently struggling against him with every power possible. Still, holding you with your back pressed to his chest and your arms pinned to your sides was not even close to a real challenge. But he was fairly certain though that you would pose a serious threat to anyone who didn't possess godly strength.

"Who are you? Where am I?" You asked defensively as Loki dropped you off on the thick furs yet again.

"Calm down, dear… You are safe with us. You're in the palace. The king chose you as his newest companion." The old woman stated calmly, sitting up a little straighter on her rock. She also seemed to have done this more than a couple times… And she didn't need to say any more, for you understood the situation you were in as if it was the most familiar idea to wrap your mind around.

"I'm his newest plaything? That means I'll be dead in a couple weeks, doesn't it?" You asked gravely as you hugged your arms to your chest in an attempt to keep in the little warmth left in your body.

"Of course not!" The old woman said with risen eyebrows.

"Yes it does." Loki replied a second later, opting for honesty at least once and earning himself a side glance from the lady on the rock.

"Let me guess, if I try to run, you'll catch me before I ever reach that exit?" You asked sadly, looking directly at Loki and causing his heart to skip a beat. He cursed his body for betraying him, but at least it didn't show.

"Unfortunately, yes." He replied as stoically as possible, averting his gaze after a moment, for he couldn't bear the sadness in your eyes, the knowledge that you were doomed. And that he was the reason for it.

"Running has no use, and neither has fighting. I'm sorry, dear, that this had to happen to you." The old lady spoke in a sigh as she rose to her feet and walked the two steps over to you to pat your shoulder in what probably should've been a comforting gesture. Loki didn't think it comforted you at all, and thus he decided to stay back where he was, silent.

"Can I at least know your names?" You requested quite calmly for someone who had just learned that their life had basically found a very stretched out ending. But an ending nonetheless. "You seem to know that my name is Y/n… And I would like to know the names of the people who greeted me here with kindness."

Yet again Loki frowned, wondering why you would say such thing, without sarcasm. He wasn't being kind, he was helping a tyrant get his way for the mere skimpy promise of freedom. No, Loki didn't feel kind at all, he only felt cold.

"I'm Agatha, your lady's maid and keeper. And that tall fellow is Loki. He brought you here." The old lady said easily and Loki immediately wished she hadn't, for your eyes snapped to his in an instant, filled with irritation and confused anger.

"YOU brought me here?!" You asked incredulously, frowning at him deeply but luckily without trying to fight this time. "But… why are you still here then? You must be one of the king's friends if he assigned you a task like this, or rather a chess piece he's not sacrificed yet, and that means you most likely were promised a reward for bringing me here. Won't you go and collect it already? Turn your back to the misery that you caused, like everyone else living in the palace? Let me ask… what is your reward? Gems? A girl for yourself? Or power maybe? I hope it's at least something that weighs up to my life's value."

Loki's words died on his lips as they dropped open a little, until his mind caught up with the questions and he had found the capability to suppress the emotions your words had stirred up within him. He shouldn't let himself get dragged into this… he should just leave and forget indeed. But he couldn't. "You know my name, that's more than enough power you hold over me. You needn't know my reasons in addition." Yes, that surely was the most imprecise answer he could've given, and Loki felt relieved. He didn't want you to know about his immense internal turmoil, hoping that things would just untangle themselves eventually if he kept ignoring them long enough.

"Don't be so hard on him, dear… He kept you safe for all the long way here, and that's more than the girls before you had. They arrived here in the worst conditions, believe me… Loki is a decent man." The old woman, Agatha, said gently as she kept patting your arm.

"You know nothing about me." Loki snapped defensively, crossing his arms in front of his chest and glaring at her. She couldn't possibly know anything about him, right? But he had kept you safe indeed, and he intended to continue to do so as long as he could.

"Yeah, he's lovely." You snorted sarcastically, looking at Loki with a risen eyebrow and then turning to Agatha. "But I must agree, I would not have expected to arrive here unharmed."

"I would hardly call those bruises on your face and shoulders 'unharmed'..." Loki commented, cringing at his utter inability to keep his mouth shut for once.

"But you didn't cause them, did you?" You asked in a surprisingly steady voice as a violent shiver made your entire form shake.

"Of course not." He replied in an instant, frowning deeply. Maybe he was a horrid person by character, but never one to cause harm to the innocent.

Agatha ordered you to wash yourself then, in that freezing shallow puddle in the middle of the cave, while she herself went to retrieve some garments for you. She also spoke the carefully worded reminder to you not to come close to the natural pools, for it was forbidden for anyone of the servant status to take a bath in those. Loki only frowned at that yet again, for he saw absolutely no reason behind such a silly rule. He didn't see much sense behind most rules, actually, and that's precisely why he usually didn't follow them.

"You shouldn't listen to her." He said to you out of impulse as you rose to your feet and made your way over to the edge of the water. Small ice crystals floated on the surface of the deep blackness, dancing slowly in the small waves your movements caused. Loki continued before he became completely mesmerized by the sight. "You're freezing anyway, and this water will make it far worse. Then you will fall ill, and as I was informed prior to this instance, the king does not hesitate to get rid of… broken toys."

"Well, all the better for me." You shrugged easily as you turned your back towards him and started peeling your clothes off, upon which Loki averted his gaze immediately, focusing very intently on a spot on the opposite wall. "I'll die in these caverns anyway, sooner rather than later. And if I freeze to death now, at least I won't have to bear the king's hands on my body. I'd rather die, honestly."

And for once, Loki didn't know what to respond as his eloquence was finally lost on him.

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#loki x reader #loki x you #loki imagine #Loki #loki fanfic #tom hiddleston imagine #tom hiddleston x reader #tom hiddleston fanfiction #tom hiddleston #loki (marvel)#loki odinson #loki #loki of asgard #loki friggason #loki x y/n #tom hiddleston x you #i found

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