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#I've got to come up with something clever
tyrantisterror · 1 day
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Why are Bulma and Piccolo your favorite Dragon Ball characters?
It might sound weird, but I love Bulma because of her very glaring flaws. She is loud, short-tempered, vain, self-centered, arrogant, too-clever by half, and extremely bossy, all of which are traits that are generally given to villainous women so that we hate them. But Bulma's not a villain - she's a hero, and for all her faults, she's also incredibly smart, resourceful, and resilient. Bulma never says die, never gives up, always tries to come up with a solution to whatever shit gets thrown her way, and goddamn, she manages to pull something together more often than not! In fact, most of her virtues are connected to her flaws - that arrogance pushes her to defy the odds and succeed, her tendency to overshoot when showing off her smarts will lead to situations where she can apply those smarts under pressure to more spectacular results, and you know what, she is really fucking pretty, so why shouldn't she be proud of it? Like, I've said before on a few occasions that I love it when a hero has villain coding, and Bulma has all the same villain coding as Jessie from Team Rocket - but she's a hero, she's unambiguously a hero, and a hero we need more often than not, and that's so damn cool. I love that she gets to be this loud, bossy, arrogant, vain person who's nonetheless a good friend and incredibly reliable and resourceful ally, that for all her abundant faults she's still a lovable and iconic hero. Girl characters don't get to be those things often enough! We need more Bulmas in the world.
My love for Piccolo is a bit simpler/more obvious. One, he's got a kickass character design - he and Aku from Samurai Jack cemented my love of costumes with big fucking shoulder pads/pauldrons. Two, as a person who had never seen Dragon Ball and found out about the series when they aired Dragon Ball Z on Toonami back in the 90's, Piccolo was the weirdest thing that first episode threw at me, and it threw a LOT of weird shit at me in that episode. Talking turtles, cats, and pigs, a lady with blue hair, a guy whose kid has a monkey tail, aliens, all sorts of shit. But then there's this big green guy who everyone is terrified of for reasons the episode doesn't really explain (because there's a whole series you're supposed to have watched before it) who asks the father of the monkey tail boy to team up with him against the monkey tail alien, and the green guy has these weird pink ridges on his arms and the coolest fucking outfit I had seen at that point in my life, and when he takes off his weird purple ball hat thing it turns out he has antenna under it, and his teeth are sharp like a vampire, and he blows a hole through the dad guy's chest, like holy shit what an icon, I loved him immediately.
And then Piccolo proceeds to train the monkey-tail kid, claiming he's going to use him to take over the world, but as the show goes on it's clear that Piccolo is not as evil as he claims to be, and clearly cares for this kid despite claiming to only be using him as a tool, all leading up to the big battle with Nappa where Piccolo, that ruthless green slug vampire motherfucker, takes the killing blow to save the kid he stole. Blew my goddamn mind. There were almost no other characters in the media I had consumed as a child up till that point who matched Piccolo's moral complexity- about the only ones I can think of that compare are Dinobot from Beast Wars and Hexadecimal from Reboot, and, well, I'm also obsessed with those two, so here we are.
Piccolo had a great character arc and defined so much of what made Dragon Ball Z instantly special and unique in my eyes as a kid. There was no one like him, no one who did what he did, no one who looked as cool as he did. What a fucking legend.
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pseudophan · 1 day
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Hey Nora
I've been thinking about creating a phan blog (after almost 10 years of lurking) but cannot come up with a cool username for the life of me. Any ideas? Thx
honestly i'm probably the wrong person to ask cause i chose my username at 16 and all i did was go down a list of words starting with p cause i wanted (written) alliteration and then i was like... ok pseudophan is very funny cause its like Fake Fan/Fake Phannie/Not A Phannie/But Like I Am Obviously/He He Clever/Whatever
no but i feel like my brain is still stuck in the 2014 era of urls. like i want to recommend you [adjective][phan/dan/phil/howell/lester/etc] shit. but that's probably not the vibe anymore. you could go the classic route of just some random thing they've said at some point i guess?
although! actually. one thing about urls. if you want your url to be memorable i do recommend choosing something very specific. like doing smth like one of their names with a couple of letters changed is cool cause it looks like you've got an almost "canon" url, but it doesn't make you very memorable to people. "dqnhowell" looks cool but most people won't remember it as You. but you might not even want that so that's not necessarily an issue, just something you might want to think about
i'd offer you one of my saved urls but tumblr made me delete most of them a couple of years ago so all i've got now are phannibal, vday and interactiveintroverts. if anyone wants phannibal you can have it but i'm keeping the other two, vday cause its just way too funny to me and the ii one cause lola gave it to me cause she didn't want to hoard it herself and it doesn't rly feel like it's my url to give out. i feel like i should use it for something important one day though like that's kind of a ridiculous url to just let sit there
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These two visible mends are a bit different from the others, in that I did them (well, 99% of them) on stream! We spent a good volume of time working on that triforce, which was made out of a woven picot stitch, using some dyed-yellow sashiko thread. Near the end of the stream, however, we noticed that the corner of the other pocket also needed some repair, and added a few black stitches to make a little void patch.
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After the stream, I decided the little guy needed eyes, so I threw two silver french knots on the top of the affair. Personally, it reminds me of the grue, from Zork, just two eyes flashing in the dark, but I've gotten several people mentioning the soot sprites, which, admittedly? I can see!
https://youtu.be/gLOhWEJrpeo?si=fjAfOlNdICsHMM4X want to hang out while I work on this? Like I said, I did it on stream, here's the VOD!
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thepavementsings · 2 years
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listening to the new Florence album and spiralling about Pierre what else is new :(
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makoodles · 4 months
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ミi hear you like magic? i've got a wand and a rabbit!
part one | part two
🍓 pairing: simon "ghost" riley x fem reader
🍓 tags: nsfw, size kink, inexperienced!reader, first time blow jobs, vaginal sex, rough(?) sex, riding, jealous ghost, some communication issues!
masterlist
reblogs are always enormously appreciated!
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The problem with sleeping with a man like Ghost, you’re coming to realise, is that now that you’ve experienced the reality of sex (and good sex) you can’t stop thinking about it.
In the week following the night you’d spent together, you swear you can feel his phantom touch on your hips, your thighs, your back. It feels like he’s carved a space for himself inside of you, something you’ll never get back – not that you want it back in the first place. 
Realistically, you know that the whole ‘loss of virginity’ thing doesn’t have as much to do with how you’re feeling as the fact that it was Ghost who had taken it. You had long bullied your hymen out of the way with your collection of silly dildos, but nothing could have prepared you for the scorching hot heat of Ghost’s massive cock splitting you open, or his clever tongue licking at you, or his thick calloused fingers rubbing torturous circles into your clit and fraying your nerves apart.
The worst part is, you don’t know if anything is ever going to live up to the way he made you feel again. You’ve tried to replicate his touches, his rhythm, the way he had split you open, but your fingers are too small and none of your dildos can imitate the way he had worked you stupid. To your immense dissatisfaction, you don’t even come close to coming again.
It feels like something inside of you has cracked open, and you don’t know how to stop all of this new yearning, how to stuff it all back inside and pretend that nothing has changed.
The problem is that while you feel as though you’ve been changed from the inside out, you don’t think Ghost feels the same way. Maybe the most infuriating thing is that Ghost seems entirely unaffected. Other than a couple of lingering glances and knowing stares, there’s no indication that he had done anything more intimate with you than grappling at training. 
All you can do is attempt to follow his lead, to be as casual as possible.
It’s harder than it sounds.
You find your whole body straining towards him when he’s close to you, though you try to keep cool. You fail miserably. You can’t even look in Ghost’s direction without thinking of his big fingers hooked inside you, rubbing at your clit, squeezing at your tits. You can hardly look him in the eye without thinking of the way he looked when he was squeezed between your thighs with his mouth on your cunt, the way those big brown eyes watched as you writhed on his tongue.
And yet, you can hardly tear your eyes away from him. You look at him in a completely different light now. He’s the first man to take you, the first one to touch you so intimately, the first one to make you come. He’s still your lieutenant, but it’s like all of a sudden your eyes have been opened to a new aspect of him. He’s no longer just your untouchable superior, the man who’s always so cold and distant behind that death mask – now he’s the man who was gentle with you, the man who kissed you sweetly when he took your virginity, the man who gave you the first, second, third orgasm of your life.
But despite the way you had been offered that new little glimpse into Ghost, he still remains an enigma to you. 
You can feel his eyes on you throughout the week, though it’s never at the same time as when you’re looking at him. And maybe you’re imagining it, but it seems as though he’s gotten freer with his touches, too. A big palm on the small of your back as he steps past you, a quick squeeze to the shoulder. It’s subtle, and you can’t be sure that he’s actually touching you anymore than usual.
But other than the subtle glances and the light touches, Ghost doesn’t make any genuine effort to approach you again. He still treats you like just another member of the squad, no different to Soap or Gaz. 
If anything, he gives them more attention than he gives you, delivering his deadpan jokes and exchanging quips during training. You end up standing to the side, sending infrequent glances their way in the hopes that he’ll give you something.
You’ve never been the fittest or the strongest, but your level of distraction in those few days following your night with Ghost is absolutely mortifying. You’re slow, you’re clumsy, you mess up everything. 
You don’t think you can be blamed when you’re working in the same space as Ghost. You can hardly bring yourself to look his way when he’s lifting weights, unable to handle looking at the flex and curl of his muscles under his long-sleeve black workout shirt. It clings to him, letting you see every little shift of muscle and tendon beneath that stupid top as he works, and your mind very unhelpfully provides a slideshow of memories of him between your spread thighs. 
You know it’s obvious. You glance at him, then glance away, then back again. Your eyes linger, bright and too interested, before you’re able to hide it. You wonder sometimes if your yearning is obvious on your face; you hope not.
But if Ghost sees it – any of it – he gives no indication. 
If you have to be honest with yourself, you’ll admit that you’re disappointed. You had hoped that– well. You’re not sure you can bear to admit what you’d hoped, even just to yourself. It feels silly to admit that maybe you had hoped that Ghost wouldn’t be content with just being your first, that maybe he’d want to be your second, your third. Silly. Almost blasphemous.
You don’t technically have to show up to training, so after only two days of your awkward and uncertain pining in the gym, you stop showing up. The role you fulfil as part of the 141 is a non-combat one, so you know you won’t be missed in their ongoing training. You’ve mostly been working in communications; maintaining secure communication channels and ensuring that information is transmitted accurately and securely. The boys rely on you in the field, and you feel like you owe them a certain level of physical fitness just in case things go frighteningly wrong when you’re out there with them. 
There’s just something so mortifying about the whole situation. It feels as though Ghost had peeled back the layers of you and taken a peek at your soft unprotected insides. You’d been vulnerable in front of him in a way you’d never been in front of anyone before, in a way that you can hardly stand. You had thought that you’d been okay with it being a one time thing, but you weren’t exactly doing a whole lot of thinking at the time.
So yeah, every time he glances away from you, or when he doesn’t even bother to look in your direction at all, it feels like you’re being rejected anew. It’s…. It’s not ideal. But you’re a big girl, and you’ve dealt with repressed desire and stifled yearning for years now. At least now you have a real experience to add to your reserve of imagination the next time you try to get yourself off.
It’s fine. You convince yourself that you were being ridiculous in the first place. He’s Ghost, after all. You feel a little foolish for even having the brief hope that something more might happen between the two of you. 
─── ・ 。゚☆: .☽ . :☆゚
You manage to keep to yourself for most of the week, and the rest of the squad is kind enough not to say anything about it. But when Thursday comes around, you realise it’s not going to be possible to avoid Soap and his persistent insistence that you join them all in the moderately-sized cantina for drinks that night.
Truthfully, it doesn’t take too much persuading to convince you to go. Avoiding training with the squad had resulted in a week of isolation that had left you lonely and wishing for some social interaction. Besides, you’ve never quite been able to say no to Soap, and so you’re dragged to the little cantina for the second Thursday in a row.
To your absolute bewilderment, you find yourself in the exact same position as you had been in the last time you shared drinks with the squad, exactly one week ago. 
Despite hardly speaking to you all week, Ghost had so confidently taken a seat next to you on the same fucking squishy little couch that you had shared last week. You end up partially squashed into the arm of the sofa, with Ghost’s massive hulking body brushing against you with every slight movement. 
It’s galling to admit it, but you feel like you’re on fire. He doesn’t say much other than a soft murmur of a greeting when he first settles down beside you, but then he throws his arm around the back of the couch in a move that’s unexpectedly intimate. 
You try not to read too much into it. While Ghost may be fairly aloof and menacing to those that don’t know him well, to you and the squad he’s always been subtly territorial. His eyes flick around the room semi-regularly, never at ease even in the middle of base. When Gaz goes to get drinks, Ghost’s eyes follow him until he gets back as though he’s expecting something to happen in the few minutes and couple of feet that he’s gone. He does the same when Price steps out for a smoke, and when Soap steps out to the toilet.
So the arm behind you (technically resting on the back of the couch rather than your shoulders) doesn’t actually mean anything. The curious look that Soap sends you doesn’t mean anything either, and you studiously ignore it as you force yourself to relax at Ghost’s side.
You drink the vodka soda Gaz hands you a little quicker than you mean to – maybe it’s because your nerves are already set on edge, but the alcohol goes to your head. Quickly. 
It’s a pleasant floaty feeling, and it eases some of the anxiety that’s been bubbling thanks to the heat that sinks into your skin from his side pressed up against you. By the time you drain your glass, you’re leaning against his side. He doesn’t react, for better or worse; you wish he would give you some indication of where you stand, whether he likes you bundled up by his side or if he’s just tolerating it.
When Ghost’s eyes finally slide over to you from behind the dark pits of his mask, you nearly jolt. His gaze is lazy and half-lidded, but he reaches out to take the glass from you. His gloved fingers brush over yours, and you can’t stifle the embarrassing little judder that runs down your spine.
“Slow down.” He murmurs, setting the glass aside. “It’s still early.”
You had been hoping all damn evening that he would just look at you, but now that you finally have his eyes on you it feels as though you’re pinned down by them. You try not to squirm, once again remembering the way those dark eyes had watched you so darkly as he had hunched over you, rutting into you until the tears were streaming down your cheeks.
Your mind goes blank under his attention and his closeness, the ambient noise of glasses clinking and loud voices laughing and joking and muffled old eighties tunes fading to nothing until the sound of Soap’s loud voice brings you back to yourself.
“Let the lass drink, LT.” He crows, grinning, and you realise that he already has another couple of drinks in his hands. You hadn’t even noticed him leaving for the bar. “She deserves to have fun tonight. Don’t you, bonnie?”
“Sure.” You agree easily, relieved by the distraction and already reaching for the new drink. You’re still all fidgety and distracted, eager to drown yourself in it. “I deserve fun.”
It feels as though Ghost’s gaze is burning right into the side of your head, but you fixedly ignore him. He’s so intense, you’re pretty sure that you look like a dazed idiot under the weight of his attention. It’s the most he’s looked at you all week, and you attempt to hide your face behind your glass as you take a sip of your fresh drink.
He’s drinking too, though he’s foregone his usual whiskey in favour of a dark lager that he’s barely touched. The glass is sweating with condensation, and he swipes a thick gloved thumb over the fog on it absent-mindedly as he watches you.
You watch Gaz and Soap as they joke with each other, trading jibes and jabs and stories that you hardly even hear. It feels a little as though your ears have been filled with cotton wool, as though everything around you is just distinctly muffled. You feel like you’re on another planet, awareness tethered only by the hot, hard line of Ghost’s muscular body pressed against your side. 
Over the last week, you’ve tried very hard not to be a stereotype.
You’ve heard men laughing about girls they’ve slept with who’ve become too clingy, who’ve wanted too much, and wasted their time searching for something that those guys aren’t willing to give. Maybe it’s because you’re so conscious that Ghost has taken several of your firsts, but you’re so determined to not be that person. 
Ghost isn’t exactly a big talker anyway, unless it’s the odd sarcastic comment or ribbing with Soap, so it’s not like you’ve talked about the situation. You had just awoken the morning after with a deep ache in your core and a sore back, though the pain was soothed by the warm embrace you were all wrapped up in. You had been nervous, but you needn’t have been. Ghost had given you nothing. He just rubbed your back with one shovel-sized hand and pressed a kiss to your bare shoulder (through the mask, so you don’t know what to make of that) before he rolled out of your bed to pull his trousers back on, grunting that he’d see you later.
So, you don’t talk about it. Not with him, and not with anybody. It feels like so much has changed, yet everything stays the same. The deja vu you’re experiencing from sitting on the couch drinking with him like this is overwhelming, and experiencing him staring at you like this after a full week of distance is making you feel hot and fuzzy and stupid.
While Soap is in the midst of a loud and enthusiastic retelling of a story from his basic training days, you build up the courage to glance up at Ghost. He’s already looking at you, as though anticipating your attention. 
“You’re staring at me.” You mumble, your fingers clenching compulsively around your chilled glass.
Ghost shifts, and you feel the thick muscle of his bicep roll behind your head. He grunts in quiet agreement. 
“Yeah.”
He doesn’t say anything else, uninterested in justifying or explaining himself. It’s like he thinks that he doesn’t need to; he just keeps watching you, his light blond eyelashes drawing low over his eyes as his head tilts.
Self-conscious under his intensity, you glance away again. Soap is still talking, but you can’t focus. Despite the fact that Ghost is big and warm and so frustratingly attractive beside you, it’s hard to ignore the subtle prickle of irritation that’s growing under your skin. 
After all, he had taken your virginity and then proceeded to act as though nothing at all had changed between you for the rest of the week, and now he’s sat next to you with his gaze that heated? What the fuck?
The second drink goes down even easier than the first thanks to your awkwardness. You’re not sure what to make of his attention – you’ve spent the whole week keeping a sense of distance, determined to stay cool and casual. The last thing you want to do is freak him out by seeming like an over-eager idiot that’s gone and fallen in too deep with him, unwilling to lose whatever meagre respect Ghost has developed for you since you started working with the 141.
“I’ll get the next round.” You blurt suddenly, pushing yourself up off the couch.
It’s too abrupt to be casual, and you pointedly don’t look at the half-full glasses in your squad mates’ hands as you hurry away. You probably could have played that off better, but you need a moment to collect yourself away from Ghost’s relentless stare.
You take the opportunity to breathe at the bar, rubbing at your eyes and sighing. The bartender is busy, so you just stand there for a long moment, mentally chastising yourself.
God, this is just embarrassing. You’re a grown fucking woman, and here you are getting so ridiculously flustered over your lieutenant. You never thought that you’d be the type to turn into a silly little mess over the first man you ever sleep with, but maybe it was inevitable. The little embers of that crush you had been harbouring on Ghost since you joined the team have been fanned into a full on flame and you hardly know how to handle yourself.
It takes a significant effort to keep your attention away from the table; you can’t help but want to look, to see if Ghost is still looking your way, but you keep your eyes to yourself. 
When another body appears at your side, you jolt in surprise. You hadn’t expected to be followed, and your first thought is that it must be Soap. But when you glance to your side, you find a stranger standing closer to you than you expected.
Well, he’s not a total stranger. You know him to see around the base, sandy-haired with a too wide smile. You think he might be a second lieutenant, but you’ve never actually had any dealings with him and you can’t think of a name… Daniels, maybe?
“Hello there,” He says, and even with those two words his intentions are unmistakable. His tone is suggestive, as is the way his eyes scan over your body. “How you doing?”
It’s far from the first time you’ve been hit on by men; it comes with the territory of being a woman in a male-dominated environment. They look at you like they want to eat you sometimes, in a way that sets your teeth on edge. You’ve always danced around the subject of intimacy, embarrassed about your lack of experience and too anxious to actually seek out anyone to change that. What happened with Ghost was unexpected, and just about changed your entire outlook on sex and physical pleasure for life. 
Your first reaction, as always, is to shut him down or ignore him. But something makes you pause, and glance back at him. 
He’s sort of cute. A charming smile, at least. When he sees you looking back, he only smiles wider and steps closer.
“Let me get this next one for you,” He says, gesturing at the bartender to catch his attention. “What’re you having?”
“Uh..” You hesitate a moment, biting your lip. “Vodka soda.”
He orders, then leans against the bar and turns to face you fully. His gaze is appreciative, and for once you don’t shy away from it. You so rarely return male attention that you hardly know what to do, but you manage to muster up an awkward smile.
When the bartender returns with your drink, you feel a momentary pang of guilt. You had almost forgotten that you were meant to order drinks for the table, and you send a swift glance over your shoulder. 
The boys are still engrossed in their conversation, hardly even noticing your absence. All but Ghost.
The lieutenant has half-turned, his arm still slung over the couch where you had been sitting as he stares. The realisation that his eyes are still on you has your spine straightening, self-conscious now about your posture and your body language. 
You look away swiftly, and try not to feel guilty. You’re not doing anything wrong, after all. He hasn’t spoken to you all week despite the fact that he’d nearly done your back in fucking you.
Your experience with Ghost may have been a one-time thing, no matter what you might have been hoping for, but there’s no reason that it has to be a one-time thing for you with anyone else. Even with your stupid vibrators and dildos, you haven’t been able to come close to coming in the week following your night with your lieutenant. You’re starting to wonder if maybe you’re not capable of coming without someone else’s hands on you.
“I’ve seen you around, been meaning to talk to you,” Daniels is saying, and in your distraction you almost miss it. “But it’s, uh… it’s a little difficult to catch you alone.”
You almost scoff, but you manage to swallow it back down. You know exactly what he means; the 141 sticks together and looks out for each other, but it also sometimes feels like you have a couple of overprotective guard dogs. They take watching you seriously, probably due to your non-combat role on the team, and you’ve never discouraged it because you like the way they make you feel safe. 
“Yeah, the guys can be a little protective.” You laugh a little weakly. “But don’t mind them.”
Even now, you can feel Ghost’s dark eyes burning into you from across the room. You wonder how on earth Daniels remains so unaware of it.
“Mm,” Daniels leans in, his white teeth glinting. “Can’t blame them, I suppose. Why don’t you come and join me and some of the lads at our table for a bit? Spend some time with some new people.”
You shift on the balls of your feet, thinking. Admittedly, you’ve never been big on socialising when on base, other than the usual minor exchange of pleasantries. You hardly even know what to do in the face of a man’s interest in you now.
“Oh, I’m not sure.” You demur, reaching up to scratch absently behind your ear. “I don’t think the boys would appreciate me abandoning them for the night.”
Daniels’ smile widens, and you feel your cheeks heat. You feel clumsy with your socialising, as though you’re stretching muscles you’re not used to using. Since you had joined the 141, you hadn’t done too much mingling outside of the squad; they’ve been your only friends and confidantes, ribbing and supporting you in equal measure. In the face of a stranger in the on-base cantina, you find yourself floundering.
“I think they get enough of your time,” He murmurs, leaning against the bar in such a way that his body is angled towards you. “C’mon, I’ll buy you another few drinks and we can get to know each other, huh?”
Maybe the vodka was a bad idea. It’s lowering your inhibitions, making you actually consider his offer. You’re pent up from a week of unsuccessful touching yourself, and you crave physical intimacy. 
If you can’t get a repeat performance from Ghost, then maybe it wouldn’t be so terrible if you looked elsewhere, with someone who might be interested in more than a one time thing.
You glance down at Daniel’s hands where they’re wrapped around his beer glass. They’re big, with strong slender fingers and calloused knuckles. Nice hands, you think, but you can’t help but compare to the enormous thick paws of your lieutenant. Still, you think they’d do the job.
“Well–” You start to say, your tone wavering and uncertain as you consider his officer.
But you don’t get to give him an answer before a massive hand settles on your shoulder. It makes you jolt, startled, recognising Ghost by touch alone. It feels as though it sears straight through your clothes, and your eyes widen.
For a moment, Ghost says nothing at all. He just stands at your shoulder, so close that you feel the muscle of his chest and stomach brush against your back, and stares at Daniels from over the top of your head. The glare isn’t even directed your way, and yet you find yourself wilting from it.
“On your way, Sergeant.” Ghost drawls, lifting his chin and gesturing at him dismissively.
Despite Ghost’s obvious intimidation factor, Daniels doesn’t immediately do as he’s told. He huffs out a short breathless laugh instead, as though he can hardly believe what he’s hearing.
“We’re only talking, Lieutenant–”
Ghost doesn’t even respond. His glower just intensifies, until Daniels trails off and his mouth snaps shut. You get the impression that if anyone else tried to intimidate him just by staring and posturing, Daniels might actually square up and fight. He seems like the type to make poor decisions while drinking – maybe you were going to be one of them. 
But as it is, Ghost has an intimidation factor unmatched by anyone else you’ve ever known. It goes beyond his giant hulking physique and skull mask and low gravelly voice that can sound like a clap of thunder when he’s angry. It’s like he has an aura, something that radiates off him in dark waves saying ‘Don’t fuck with me’. Any sensible person would back the fuck off when faced with his full, unwelcoming attention.
And sure enough, Daniels is no exception. He raises his arms to his shoulders and gives Ghost a mocking sort of smile before retreating backwards. To your mortification, he doesn’t so much as glance your way even as he turns his back on you.
Irritation settles over you like a blanket. It makes your skin itch and your teeth grind, and you turn to scowl at Ghost.
“What the hell was that?” You demand, and your voice comes out sharper than you had technically intended.
Ghost’s head tilts, and those sharp dark eyes find you from behind the mask. The eyeblack is beginning to fade in patches around the inner corners of his eyes – bizarrely, it serves as a reminder that Ghost is just a man, not just a massive wall of muscle with a terrifying glower.
“What was what?” He says. His voice has dropped a notch, deep and rumbling into you even as you step away and turn so that you’re facing him head on.
“You– I was just–” You flounder for a moment, searching for words as you gesture uselessly with your hands. 
You’re indignant over his interruption, and your frustration grows as you find yourself unable to articulate yourself. Where the hell does he get off interrupting you talking to another man? He hadn’t spoken to you all week, and now he feels confident enough to cockblock you?
“Mm.” Ghost grunts. “What were you doing?”
Your jaw clenches. “I was talking. Is that a crime now?”
Jesus, you sound like a brat. You don’t even know where this insubordination is coming from; he’s your lieutenant, regardless of that one night you had spent with him. You’re being too bold talking like this, but it’s like you just can’t help yourself.
His eyes darken, lashes blocking out his irises as his gaze narrows at you. You force yourself to maintain eye contact, to keep your spine straight and shoulders back despite your impulse to crumble.
“Watch that mouth, doll.” He warns, his voice low, and you feel your stomach tighten at both his words and his tone. 
But your self-preservation instincts are still missing.
“You can’t ignore me all week and then get annoyed at me when I–”
He cuts you off as though he’s not even listening to you. “Not here. Come on.”
And with that, he wraps one big hand around your upper arm and begins leading you out of the cantina. He’s not harsh, and he doesn’t drag you or anything, but judging by the tense set of his shoulders arguing with him would be a really bad idea right now. 
You’ve pissed him off, and you don’t want to make his mood worse so you allow your feet to move automatically as he leads you out of the room.
You can feel eyes on your back as you leave, and you feel yourself grow squirmy with embarrassment. No doubt the rest of the squad is watching you get hauled off by Ghost right now. 
Oh god, the Captain is watching you get hauled off — how mortifying. You pray they didn’t catch your little exchange with Ghost at the bar, but you have a feeling that hope is in vain. The 141 are close-knit and protective over each other, but they’re also terrible gossips.
“Let me– Sir, let me go–” You start to complain, testing his grip. His hold on you is iron-clad, and yet still somehow gentle enough to avoid bruising.
When you realise where he’s leading you to, you stop complaining very quickly. You had figured that he was just going to drag you into the corridor outside and give you a talking to, but he doesn’t stop there. He keeps going, until you realise that he’s leading you all the way back to your own damn room
“What are you doing?” You demand in a hiss. You’re so incensed that you swear your hair is standing on end. 
After all that, is Ghost seriously hauling you back to your room like you’re a bold child? Is he angry because of your insubordination at the bar? 
A cold trickle of anxiety enters your stomach, and you steal a worried glance at his face. The hard-shell mask he uses on missions has been traded for the softer black woven balaclava that he usually wears when he’s not in the field, but it doesn’t make him any easier to read.
He doesn’t answer until the two of you have crossed the threshold of your room, the door shutting behind you with a firm click.
Now that it’s the two of you, alone once again in your tiny shitty room, you find your indignant confidence waning rapidly. He’s just so big, the huge masculine frame of him making you feel more ridiculous than ever for your momentary flash of brattiness. Even worse, having him in your space like this is only making your brain go into overdrive, as though your body remembers what happened the last time he was here like this.
You decide that the best defence mechanism to prevent yourself from looking like a fool is to cling onto those last little dregs of anger.
“You’re unbelievable.” You snap, crossing your arms and narrowing your eyes. “You’ve been avoiding me all week! And then as soon as another guy speaks to me, you’re over to me like a light. I mean, what the fuck?” And then, remembering the chain of command, you add a very sullen, “Sir.” 
Throughout your mini little rant, Ghost has just watched you. There’s something in his eyes that you don’t know how to read, unable to get a feel for what he’s thinking through that inscrutable mask.
“‘S not true.” He grunts after a moment, and you realise that his eyes have creased in a way that suggests he’s frowning.
You feel like you’re going to explode. “Yes, it is! Daniels was barely speaking to me for two minutes before you scared him off–”
Bizarrely, your words make Ghost snort. You hadn’t even realised how tense his shoulders were until he relaxes, and you stare at him in confusion as he steps past you towards your bed. Your anger fizzles out, leaving behind self-conscious confusion as you watch your lieutenant settle down so that he’s sitting at the edge of your bed with his legs spread wide. 
“His name is Davidson.” He says, and his voice is missing the somewhat dangerous edge it had only moments earlier. “And that wasn’t what I was talking about.”
Embarrassment flares, though you try to stifle it. So you didn’t know the guy’s name – whatever. You would have learned it by the end of the night, you’re certain. You open your mouth, defensive and prickly, but Ghost speaks again before you get the chance to.
“I haven’t been ignoring you.” He says, watching you like he’s trying to figure you out. When you just blink at him, he sighs. “Jesus, sweetheart, just sit down for a second. Tell me what I did wrong, yeah?”
You’re left feeling a little wrong-footed, hesitating in the middle of the room. You had expected him to be a little angrier than this, to chide you for your behaviour. Or maybe you had expected him to be cold, or dismissive.
Slowly, you take a few steps towards the bed. He watches you approach, those dark eyes watchful and sharp, but says nothing as you nervously perch on the bed beside him. 
Despite the fact that this is your room, you’re stiff when you sit next to him. Your brain is in overdrive, providing you with very unhelpful memories of the last time Ghost was on your bed and flooding your body with mortifying heat.
“You’ve barely spoken to me since we–” You can’t bring yourself to finish the sentence, averting your gaze and staring at some point past his shoulder. “Since last week. If you wanted to keep it professional, that’s– that’s fine–”
Ghost’s spine straightens, but he doesn’t speak yet. He just watches you, and lets you flounder awkwardly as you struggle to articulate yourself.
“I don’t want to make things awkward, I just–” You’re tripping over your words, wincing when they come out all clumsy. “I’ve never done this before, so I’ll follow your lead, but I don’t understand the point of sending Dan– Davidson, whatever, away like that if you’re clearly trying to keep things between us professional–”
Finally, Ghost speaks, though it seems like he’s suddenly developed incredibly selective hearing.
“He’s a wanker. Chases around any woman that stands still for too long in that damn cantina every time we’re in there.” His voice is a low earnest rumble, but you’re too agitated to properly hear him. “He didn’t have anything to offer that you’d be interested in.”
“That’s not–”
“Besides,” He cuts clean across you, but so gently, so much so that it surprises you. “I think we long surpassed professionalism when you asked if you could use my cock like a dildo.”
Blood rushes to your head so fast you feel a little light-headed. Right, so he’s decided to cut straight to the chase then. You swallow, and your dry throat clicks audibly.
“Right.” You say. “Yeah, that– um… that’s made things awkward, I suppose.” A brief pause, and then you sheepishly add, “Sorry, LT.”
Ghost just watches you, his brown eyes inscrutable beneath the fan of his pale eyelashes. Under the dark fabric of the mask you see his jaw flex, as though he’s considering his next words carefully.
“C’mere.” He says.
You had been expecting him to say more, and you hesitate a moment before reluctantly shuffling over a few inches. Though he had invited you to move closer to him, you’re suddenly so conscious of crossing any possible boundaries. 
You had never slept with anyone before, and you don’t understand what’s expected of you now. How are you supposed to act, now that you’ve had a one-night stand with your lieutenant? 
“Haven’t been ignoring you,” Ghost says, and he reaches out to place a hand on your knee. The touch makes your eyes widen, gaze darting down to stare at his thick fingers where they wrap around the underside of your knee. “You jokin’? Been watching you all week. Thinkin’ about you all the time.”
That’s a bold enough statement that all you can do is stare at him in disbelief. You can’t deny that he’s been watching you – you had felt his eyes on you regularly, but always from a distance. But… 
“You never–” You start to say, before swallowing again so you don’t say something stupid. “You haven’t spoken to me.”
“Spoke to you during training, before you stopped showing up.”
That’s a little galling, and all you can do is scowl. 
“Stop that. You know what I mean.” You snap defensively. 
Maybe you’re imagining it, but you think Ghost might be confused behind that stupid mask. His head has tilted just slightly to the side in the same way as it usually does when he’s trying to figure something out.
“I was trying to give you space, doll.” He murmurs. “It was your first– I didn’t want to overwhelm you. Wanted you to make your own choices.”
The uncertainty in his voice is unexpectedly endearing, but you’re not ready to let go of your irritation with him just yet. Admittedly you’re losing steam, but you struggle to straighten your back and affect a scowl nonetheless.
“I didn’t want space.” You say, and it comes out a little more childish than you had intended it to. You try not to cringe at yourself. “You just– we never talked about anything, you just woke up the next morning and left and then all week you hardly spoke to me.”
You curse your inexperience even as you speak, feeling like a total idiot. You just wish you knew what was expected of you, what Ghost wants. Was he put off by the fact that he had to guide you, fumbling and clumsy, through an experience that was absolutely mind-blowing for you but probably sub-standard for him?
And oh, that thought makes dread curl in your belly. What if Ghost wasn’t impressed with your… performance? You had no idea what you were doing, only that the way Ghost had touched you felt so good, so much better than you’ve ever managed to make yourself feel with your fingers or toys. And when he had brought you to orgasm, you had lost yourself completely. You hadn’t made any attempt to return his attention, too lost in all the new pleasure you were experiencing.
There’s a pause, the silence between you stretching taut. Ghost doesn’t rush to reply, instead apparently thinking hard before he speaks. 
“I go for a run in the mornings.” He says at last, his voice low and rumbly. 
It takes you a moment to process that. 
“You– what?”
Ghost shifts, and the cheap standard issue mattress beneath the two of you squeaks. “That morning, I… went for a run.”
He must realise how that sounds – maybe the expression on your face tips him off – because he hurries to add on to it. “Creature of habit, love. I didn’t– I don’t do this often either. I stayed the night, we cuddled. I thought–”
He stops rather abruptly, and doesn’t finish so you don’t quite know what he thought. Your confusion has gotten the best of you, and you’re staring at him in agitated confusion. God, he’s bad at communicating.
“Should have stayed.” He says gruffly, and if you’re not mistaken he sounds a little chagrined. “Thought we were fine, until you started avoiding me. And then I thought you just needed time to yourself.” He gives a jerky shrug, clearly out of his comfort zone. “‘Cause it was your first time. Dunno.”
Oh. Well.
Now you’re the one blinking at him. That’s… not what you had been expecting. 
While you thought Ghost had been giving you the cold shoulder, he had thought that he was being considerate. Jesus. You’re not sure how to even begin processing that.
“I didn’t need time to myself.” You say, and you sound pathetic.
There’s a beat of silence during which you feel thoroughly examined. Ghost hardly even blinks as he watches you, his scrutiny making you sweat.
“No,” He rumbles after a moment. “Apparently you didn’t.”
You roll your eyes, honestly a little irritated with him. Even after it’s been made clear that your miscommunication has caused issues this whole week, he’s still so hesitant to just fucking talk to you. 
“Right, well–” You start to say, a little sharp. 
He grabs at you before you can retreat, his enormous hand comically large around your wrist. He’s not holding you harshly, his grip just loose enough that you could break out of it if you tried. But instead of pulling away, you allow him to tug you closer. His free hand reaches for your hip, and quicker than your tired mind is able to follow he’s tugged you up into his lap.
“Jesus–” You blurt, grabbing at his shoulders for balance.
Ghost is built like a brick house, all thick and sturdy with all that solid muscle. He’s broad too, and your legs are forced wide as he encourages you to settle in his lap. You try not to let your reaction show on your face, but Ghost is watching you so carefully that you’re certain he can read every micro-twitch anyway.
“Last week wasn’t enough?” He asks, and if you’re not mistaken he sounds hungry. Maybe you could even delude yourself into thinking there’s an undertone of hope, too.
But maybe that’s a step too far. This is the Ghost, after all. He’s veritably a human weapon, every inch of him battle-scarred and solid beneath the heavy clothes and thick mask. You’re pretty sure that any kind of yearning you hear has been prescribed by your own imagination. But you can’t help yourself.
You shake your head, your breath catching in your chest. No, last week wasn’t enough.
“Then why bother with that idiot at the bar?” Ghost asks, his big hands folding around your hips. “If you wanted to be fucked, you could have just asked me.”
You swallow thickly, your throat clicking audibly. For some reason, you hadn’t expected him to speak so bluntly, but it’s typical of Ghost to get straight to the point without beating around the bush. 
“I wasn’t sure you’d want to do that with me again.” You say, your voice edged with insecurity. 
There’s a long moment of silence during which Ghost just stares at you. It’s borderline uncomfortable, and you find it difficult to maintain eye contact with him. Even with the mask acting as a barrier, he’s still so intense.
“What made you think that?” He asks, his voice low.
You find yourself quite abruptly aware of the position you’re in. You’re sitting perched in your lieutenant’s lap with your legs spread wide, after a week of pining after him like an embarrassing little puppy. You’ve been craving physical contact, yearning desperately for that same kind of pleasure he had introduced to you ever since your night together. 
“You’re difficult to read.” You whisper awkwardly, shifting. You’re hyper-aware of your weight in his lap; even though you know he’s strong, the thought of being too heavy for him is a little mortifying.
But his hands tighten around your hips, keeping you securely in place across his thighs.
“You think so?” His voice is low, a little rough, and the gravel of it causes a little frisson of heat to trickle down your spine. “You been trying to read me? Can’t have been doin’ a very good job, darling, since you’ve been avoiding me all fuckin’ week.”
Your breath comes out tremulously, and you pray he can’t hear the shake in your voice when you speak. Judging by his darkening gaze, he hears it loud and clear. 
“I just– Didn’t know if you would want me again.” You whisper, feeling foolish and inexperienced and clumsy.
Ghost watches you, his dark eyes flickering over your face, before he finally hums. Then his grip tightens around your hips and he pulls you so that your clothed crotch grinds against him. You gasp, your eyes widening when you feel the thick ridge of his cock in his tac trousers, unmistakably hard as your clothed cunt slides over him.
“Feel that?” He asks, his voice dropping into that deep, hungry register that you’ve been hearing in your dreams all fucking week.
“Yeah.” You choke, fighting the urge to grind on him like a fucking slut. If your hips twitch, just a little, you think you could be excused.
You are already intimately familiar with his cock, considering how eagerly he had fucked you open on it a week ago (several times, too), but the way it fills his trousers makes it seem ridiculously big and you wonder, a little wildly, how the fuck it ever fit in you in the first place. It presses against the seam of his trousers, right between your legs, and then Ghost grinds up into you and you swear your vision sparks out for a moment.
“Oh!” You blurt out in a wavering whisper, clutching at his shoulders. “Oh, god.”
“Still think I don’t want you?” He grunts. His hands are like fucking shovels, and he takes a grip of your ass and squeezes until you squeak.
Your head is swimming. Your trousers are too tight, the crotch of them pressing into your clit, and you feel like you can't get enough air in your lungs. 
“I don’t know.” You say stupidly. 
It’s like your cunt knows that Ghost is near, because you’re fucking drenched. You can feel your underwear stick uncomfortably to you beneath your clothes, slick and wet as you feel the shape of Ghost’s cock press into you.
He sighs beneath you, his big palm stroking over your ass affectionately. 
“You think too much, doll.” He mutters, his finder squeezing into the plush flesh of your ass like it’s a stress toy. “Way too fuckin’ much.”
He’s probably right. God, you want to stop thinking. Want to return to that stupid, dazed, fucked-out state of mind he had sent you to when he had stuffed you full.
Hesitantly, you grind yourself down onto the thick bulge beneath you. It feels good, that familiar pleasant little spark jolting up your spine as you hump yourself against him.
“Yeah,” Ghost grunts, his voice thick with unmistakable want. “That’s it. You’ve been wanting this, havent’cha?”
“Yeah.” You admit, so quietly that it’s almost inaudible. “Yeah, I want it.”
But Ghost hears. Of course he does. He lets out a low sound that has your thighs squishing closed around his hips, overwhelmed and running far too hot. 
He has you on your back so quickly that your head spins, and you end up staring at the ceiling for a moment in bewilderment, trying to figure out how you’d gotten there. Ghost is already leaning over you, his dark eyes intent on your face as he settles between your thighs.
You think you should probably be embarrassed about the ease with which you spread your legs, eager to feel his bulky body between your thighs. But you’re already running hot, your chest tightening with want, and you find yourself mercifully relieved that he’s here. The miscommunication between the two of you is going to be solved, Ghost wants you, and you’re about to get what you’ve been craving all week.
He pulls your own pants off effortlessly, leaving you in the underwear that you’ve fucking ruined. You try to shut your legs, face burning hot with embarrassment as you try to hide the sight, but Ghost doesn’t have any intention of letting you hide yourself.
He pushes your legs back open, then presses his masked face to the inside of your thigh. You’re not sure what he’s doing; you remember, with a little thrill, the feeling of his red hot mouth against your pussy, but you don’t think that’s what’s happening here because he’s still got his stupid fucking balaclava on.
“Did she miss me?” He asks, his words muffled by both the mask and the pudge of your thigh.
“What?” You ask breathlessly, thinking for a moment that Ghost is talking about you in the third person.
But then he nuzzles his masked face against the sodden seat of your knickers, and you realise that he’s talking about your fucking pussy.
“Oh my god, you weirdo–” You choke out, but you don’t get any further than that before Ghost is tugging impatiently at your underwear, trying to reveal your cunt. 
He hushes you, almost absent-mindedly, and you hear him take a breath when he finally manages to get your knickers off. He tosses them aside, his dark eyes focused intently on your bare cunt now that it’s been revealed. It’s embarrassing, but you can’t bring yourself to try and hide again. He’s touching you so reverently and looking at you so hungrily that you’re not brave enough to try to deprive him of the sight.
“My fussy girl,” He mutters, low enough that you almost don’t hear him. “Have you been touching yourself? Using your toys this week?”
You shiver, a little embarrassed. You have been using your stupid toys, but they haven’t been working. No matter what you do, you can’t replicate the feelings that Ghost had managed to elicit in you with such ease, and you have a sinking feeling that he knows that.
But the mention of your toys reminds you of something else, too. A recurring thought that’s been practically haunting you, that’s had you imagining Ghost up above you and around you as you’d sucked experimentally on your dildo, sliding it into your mouth just to see how much of it you could take.
“Wait–” You say, and though your voice wavers, Ghost sits back immediately, eyes on your face. It’s like he’s just waiting for your word, an order, a direction. Something in your belly warms, and you take a breath.
“I want to try something.” You tell him before you can lose your nerve. “Sit back down.”
He sits at the edge of your bed, his bulky frame moving far more gracefully than you’d expect for his size if you hadn’t already seen him in action. He’s almost patient, until you catch the way the fingers of his right hand drum against his thigh as he waits for you to do something.
Since you’re already stripped from the waist down, you see no point in remaining clothed on top too. When you pull your top and bra off, Ghost makes a low appreciative rumble deep in his chest that you swear you can feel run down your spine. 
“Promising start.” He says, and you want to smack him.
You shoot him a little scowl, before deciding to just ignore him. You’ve fancied him for an embarrassingly long time, probably since the very first time you had laid eyes on him upon joining the task force, and now he’s sitting on your bed, willing and hard and admitting that he wants you. It takes your breath away a little, especially the way that he doesn’t seem put off by your inexperience at all.
Slowly, you sink to your knees in front of him and watch his eyes widen beneath the balaclava. It’s somewhat gratifying to see his surprise; like you’ve finally got one over on your big bad lieutenant. 
“Very promising start.” He says, and this time he sounds a little husky. “D’you know what you’re doing, sweetheart?”
The answer is, very obviously, no. You have no idea what you’re doing, you’re learning as you go along. But Ghost hasn’t judged you yet for your clumsy fumbling exploration, so you can only hope that he’s willing to put up with this too.
“Sort of.” You say evasively. “I’ve seen it in porn, and I’ve… I’ve been practicing.”
Ghost’s groan sounds like it’s been punched out of him, and it’s rough enough to have you glancing up in surprise from where you’re trying to get his stupid trousers unbuttoned. Your hands are unsteady and unsure, and it’s slow-going.
“Yeah?” He asks, sounding a little out of breath himself. “Which one?” “What?” You’re a little distracted, not paying full attention to his question as you tug at his trousers. You’ve finally got them unbuttoned, and you pull impatiently in an effort to get them off. Ghost lifts his hips to help, though your eager impatience seems to amuse him.
“Which one of your toys’ve you been practicing on?” He asks, the barest undertone of a groan in his voice. “The pretty little pink one?”
You feel embarrassed heat prickle in your face because yes, it had in fact been that one you had been practising with. You’re not quite sure what to make of the fact that you’re apparently so predictable that Ghost can guess which dildo you’ve been sucking at, imagining it was him.
“Maybe.” You mutter evasively.
Ghost lets out a low chuckle right as you manage to wrangle his cock out of his briefs, and then you have to pause for a moment because oh. You had known, of course, that he was big. You had felt him for days after that first time, like a fucking internal bruise that ached at you every time you moved. He was bigger than any toy that you owned, you know that, you’ve felt it, and yet now that it’s in front of your face it seems so much bigger than you remember.
You’ve watched porn with so-called ‘monster cocks’ and it isn’t like that. It’s just… bigger. Than average, that is. At least, as far as you can tell, because it’s not like you have enough experience with dicks in real life to have any idea of what average really is.
Ghost must recognise the momentary flash of panic that crosses your face, because he reaches out and strokes a gloved thumb over your cheek. The fabric is rough against your skin, but you relax at the feeling anyway.
“You don’t have to.” He says quietly.
“I want to.” You insist, swallowing that swell of nerves. 
Now that his cock is bobbing in front of your face, you have to fight the sinking feeling that you’re in over your head. But you’re not willing to back down; not when you’ve been thinking about this all damn week, and especially not when you’ve got the man that stars in all of your fantasies sitting on your bed with his legs spread.
You shuffle forward a little, and try not to feel intimidated at the fact that Ghost’s thick thighs twitch when you reach to take hold of his cock. He’s so big that it feels like he’s dwarfing you beneath him, his bulky form enveloping you in shadow when he leans forward to make sure he has a good view of what you’re doing.
You stroke experimentally over his cock, your fist a little clumsy. Despite your frenzied and very pleasurable tumble with him before, you had never actually gotten the chance to touch him in return. You had been too overwhelmed by the sheer onslaught of sensation he had delivered upon you to even think about returning any favours, and the fact that you’re getting the opportunity now to reciprocate and explore fills your tummy with butterflies.
“Grip it harder, love.” He grunts, shifting his hips so that he can fuck his cock into your fist. “It ain’t gonna break.”
“Shh,” You admonish him, glancing up with a frown. “Let me do it myself.”
Ghost snorts quietly, probably finding your determination silly, but he still his hips and lets you go at your own pace. His dick is big, and you stare at it with some level of wonder as you stroke your fist over him. You can’t help but compare the feel of him to your dildos, only because they’re your only real point of reference; his skin is velvety soft and hot to the touch, yielding despite how hard he is, and you admire the slide of his foreskin pulling down over the crown. 
It’s not the size that really catches your attention though. No, what you really notice is how fucking perfect it is. Pretty and pink, flushed more red towards the tip, the head shiny with just a hint of smeared pre-come. It curves, slightly, to the left, and it feels nice in your hand. You feel a little light headed as your eyes dart over the pale blond downy hair that covers his thighs and the base of his cock. 
You gather your courage, then lean in and lick tentatively at the rosy pink crown of his cock. You had been a little worried about the taste, having no idea what to expect, but you needn’t have been. He‘s a little salty, but nothing inoffensive; he just tastes like skin, and you relax a little in relief.
He groans, his head tilting back to stare at the ceiling. You pause, hoping for some sort of direction, and as the moment stretches out he looks back to you and tilts his head.
“Thought you wanted to do it yourself?”
Bastard, you grumble in your head, before steeling yourself. You know that your grip on him is clumsy, that your stroking is unpracticed, and you can only pray that he doesn’t mind.
You take his cock into your mouth, jaw hinged wide as you try to avoid using your teeth, and attempt to suck with no finesse. You go too fast, try to take too much too quickly, because all of a sudden the head is tickling the back of your throat and you’re coughing, choking, and sputtering. 
You pull back, blinking rapidly as your eyes sting with tears and drool drips unattractively down your chin. You go to wipe your face, but Ghost catches your wrist before you can.
“Slow down,” He murmurs, pulling your hands away from your face so he can look at you. “You in a rush?”
“No.” You grumble, and your voice comes out a little hoarse from the choking. “I just… I don’t know what I’m doing.”
Even though you’re quite certain that Ghost already knows that, it’s a little humiliating to admit.
Ghost just hums, his eyes tracking over your petulant expression and the stringy spit that’s trickling down your chin, falling in thick globs above your tits.
“Don’t matter, love.” He rumbles, reaching out to thumb at your chin. You think for a moment that he’s wiping you clean, but then he just ends up smearing your spit all around your mouth. “Play with it as much as you want to. Don’t think too much.”
You swallow, the sound a little too loud in the quiet of your room, before nodding. This is what you wanted – the chance to touch him, to explore his mouth with your hands and mouth just like he had done with you before.
You readjust your grip on his cock; it looks so stupidly big in your hand. You can tell that he notices too, because he lets out a gruff sort of groan before he reaches out, one hand winding around the back of your neck to cup at the base of your skull.
“Yeah, that’s it.” He breathes, his eyes locked onto you.
His eyes are dark, almost completely blacked out by the thickness of his pupil, and he stares down at you with an air of such anticipation that you couldn't dream of keeping him waiting. Gripping him in your hand, you give an exploratory sort of stroke — the skin is velvety soft and smooth, and he lets out a short groan of appreciation when your fingers caress the head of his cock.
You start moving your hand again, adjusting your grip and stroking him off. You wish you were better at it, or at least more confident, but Ghost doesn’t seem to have any complaints. He just grunts quietly, flexing his hips once before apparently remembering what you had said and going still.
It takes a moment before you work up the confidence to bring it anywhere near your mouth again, but finally you lean forward and press a gentle little kiss to the head of his cock. You’re rewarded with a quiet puff of laughter, and his thumb strokes a soothing circle into the back of your neck.
Encouraged, you dip your head and lick the tip of him properly. He tastes salty on your tongue as you take him carefully into your mouth. This time you just suckle at the head, not wanting to push yourself too fast. His taste isn’t nearly as strong as you had been expecting; you hardly notice, really, enjoying the weight of his cock on your tongue and the feeling of being encircled by his big thighs.
It sounds stupid and maybe a little paradoxical, but you feel safe like this; Ghost towers over you even sitting down, and when you’re on your knees for him like this with his thick thighs bracketing you and his clean musky smell in your nose, you swear you never want to leave this moment.
You let out the most pathetic little whisper ever when you suckle at his cock, your tongue licking insistently at the underside of his glans. Ghost is always fairly stoic beneath that mask (other than his occasional bursts of humour and arrogance), so managing to pull out the soft but heavy breaths from his mouth when you suck at him makes pride swell in your chest, warm and syrupy sweet. It also makes something else twist in your belly, tight and hot enough to have your thighs squeezing tight together.
You used to have so many stupid, virginal plans for what you’d do the day you got your hands on some real, non-plastic cock, but everything you’ve ever heard about dicks and oral sex immediately flies right out of your head. You have no technique, and all you do is suck, gracelessly, trying to get as much of Ghost in your mouth as you can. You’re making loud, embarrassing slurping noises, and you’re certain that you’re drooling.
Judging by the grunts above you, Ghost has got no complaints about your technique (or lack thereof). One of his big hands reaches down to cup your face, fingers probing, testing at your jawline as it works.
“Fuck,” He snarls, tilting your chin up so he can see the way your lips are wrapped around the tip of his massive cock, “Knew you’d be good at this. Look at you, messy little thing. Fuckin’ gorgeous.”
That makes you shiver, an electric jolt that shoots right to your clit. You’re not sure what feels better; whether it’s his fat cock in your mouth or the hot wanting intensity in his eyes or the low filthy praises he’s growling.
God, you want to be good at this. You’re definitely no natural, but you fight so hard to push past your uncertainty to make this feel good for Ghost. 
You’re pretty sure he’s lying about you looking gorgeous, though. You’ve never felt less sexy than you do in this moment. Your eyes are streaming over-stimulated tears, your brow is scrunched in concentration, you’re gripping onto Ghost’s thick thighs for both balance and emotional support, and it’s taking everything you have not to choke on him again.
Who the fuck gave him the right to have a cock like this? Complaining about it feels borderline blasphemous, especially when you have first hand experience of just how good he is at using it. You’re making a mess of yourself, slobbering all over him in a way that’s definitely a little gross, but you’re surprised by just how much you’re enjoying this. 
You get a little too eager, because you take him a little too far down your throat and gag. You pull off quickly, choking lightly and still gasping for breath. Maybe your brain is a little oxygen-deprived, because you feel stupidly hazy. 
You take a moment to recover, nuzzling dazedly into the curls of his pubic hair. Blond, of course. God, that shouldn’t be cute but it is.
The thick length of his dick might be intimidating (as proven by the ache in your throat right now), but the velvety balls nestled below seem almost paradoxically vulnerable. You’re fascinated by the sight of them; you might have been amateurishly familiar with cocks from your dildos alone, but his balls are entirely new to you.
You spend some time lavishing them with tiny licks and kisses. Ghost hums in surprised pleasure, the sound swelling to a rumbling purr when you start caressing his thighs and hips with a tender, shy touch. 
Encouraged by his reaction, you return to his cock. It’s jutting proudly up, flushed a lovely pink colour, as though it’s just waiting for your attention once more. It’s already covered in a lather of foamy spit from your attention before, and when you sink your mouth down on him once again you do so with a bit more confidence.
“Like a pro, baby.” Ghost grunts appreciatively. A calloused thumb rolls over your cheek, under the fan of your lashes, and wipes away the moisture that’s gathered there. 
You most certainly are not sucking his cock like a pro, but you appreciate the encouragement all the same. It’s nice to know that you’re not doing a horrific job, at least.
You spare a glance up, half-expecting Ghost’s eyes to be closed. Instead his gaze is avid, sharp, practically electric through that thin window of his balaclava. He’s watching you closely, taking in every detail like it all might be snatched away from him. It’s too intense, and you look back down, focusing on his dick again.
An outraged, possessive noise escapes you when Ghost forcibly tugs your head back, pulling his cock out of your mouth. It twitches a little once it’s been removed from the wet heat of your mouth, all shiny wet and pink, and you lick your lips. God, you want to get back on that, and you don’t understand why he’s taken it away from you.
Ghost lets out a low, breathy chuckle, reaching out to thumb at your spit-slick lower lip before reaching for your elbows and bodily hauling you back up onto the bed.
You practically bounce, falling back on the mattress and squirming to try and get your bearings again.
“No,” You say, and to your bewilderment it comes out on a sob. “I wanted you to come on my face–”
You can tell that Ghost’s expression does something strange beneath his mask because his eye twitches and he takes a deep breath. But he doesn’t put his cock back in your mouth. Instead he reaches back and pulls his shirt off, and you take a broken little inhale because last time he had fucked you, he’d hardly gotten undressed at all. But now you’re being blessed with the sight of scarred pale skin pulled taut over the thick swell of muscles that turn to a softer belly, that pale trail of curls starting just below his belly button. 
“Next time.” He says, and it comes out on the ghost of a groan. “Fuck, love, next time.”
He’s quick to hook his hands under your thighs and haul them apart. You just about have time to spread your legs before he’s muscling his way between them. He tugs impatiently at his balaclava, tugging it askew to reveal his mouth, then he presses his nose into your humiliatingly slick pussy and starts sucking at your clit like it’s a hard candy.
You shriek, your thighs clamping shut around his ears as you writhe, but he clearly has no intention of stopping. The muffled moans he lets out into your cushiony cunt vibrate in the best way, and he’s so brazen about it that it just about takes your breath away. You don’t even know if he can see anything, considering his mask is completely lopsided and his eyes aren’t lined up with the holes anymore, but he’s working with such enthusiasm that it doesn’t even matter.
And honestly, his enthusiastic pussy-eating combined with the sheer visual stimulation he’s providing is really doing it for you. 
You’re probably going to get a crick in your neck from the way you’re craning your head just to watch him hunch over you, that tongue of his peeking out from beneath the edge of his mask just to lick you. He’s built like a fucking god; thick muscles, soft tummy, and cushiony pecs. It might just be the hottest thing you’ve ever seen in your life.
“Oh god, fuck–!” You choke out, your cunt clenching down hard as Ghost slides a finger into you.
Of course, Ghost’s fingers are also thicker than average. A single one of them feels like what would have been two of your own and you gasp a bit at the sudden stretch. You open up easily, your body welcoming him greedily and bearing down hard around his digits. Maybe it’s because you’re used to controlling the depth, speed and angle of penetration completely when you’re playing with your toys, but relying on Ghost for pleasure feels so damn exotic and exciting. Now you can only tilt your hips and go with Ghost’s pattern of movement; a bit harder, a bit deeper than what you would have done on your own.
He pushes another finger inside and it’s snug in your cunt, two fingers squished together nicely by your pulsing walls, hot and wet. It makes a sticky sound when he pushes them knuckle-deep, and then he sucks at your clit again, hard.
You’re honestly taken aback when your stomach tightens up and a wave of white-hot pleasure washes over you. Your back bows off the bed, you cover your mouth with a balled-up fist, your chest heaves. 
It’s exactly as good as you remember it being the first time, maybe even better, and the noises you make are broken and pathetic as you whine and cry.
Ghost licks you through it, big long laves of his tongue punctuated by sweet little suckles on your clit that feel almost fond. All you can do is lay there and take it, your head spinning a little as you catch your breath and try to figure out how the fuck he managed to make you come so damn quickly when you’ve been failing so spectacularly for a week.
You’ve barely finished coming, still shaking with the aftershocks, when he climbs up your body. At some point he’s shucked his trousers off, and the fact that he’s naked sends a little zing of excitement through your tired body. Or at least, as naked as Ghost tends to get. He’s still got the damn mask on.
He’s breathing heavily; his mouth is slightly ajar, mask tucked up around his crooked nose as he settles on his haunches between your thighs. He’s still staring hard at your cunt, his eyes glued to the way your clit is still twitching. He’s still so damn quiet, and you have no idea what he’s thinking.
When he reaches out to thumb at your clit again you whine. You’re sensitive, and his thumb is calloused and rough. You wiggle, lift up your leg and press your foot to his broad chest to stop him. You may as well be pushing against a brick wall for all the good it did.
Ghost just exhales a quiet laugh, capturing your ankle in his massive fist. He turns his head and kisses your ankle; the gesture is unexpectedly tender, and makes something in your chest tremble dangerously.
He uses his hold on your ankle as leverage to raise your leg, spreading your thighs out wide until your hips ache. You feel so exposed, the lips of your cunt parted ever so slightly, and he’s quick to press his cock against your still-twitching clit.
“Oh, look at her,” He breathes, low enough that you have to strain to hear. “Shite, she missed me, didn’t she?”
His hand is steady as he strokes his cock, dragging it through your sticky folds. The pretty pink head catches on your clit each time, and you let out a quiet whimper. Ghost doesn’t even notice; his eyes are zeroed in on your spread pussy, watching how you flutter around nothing.
“Fuck, she’s been waitin’ for me all week,” He coos, his cock notching at the entrance of your cunt and pressing in just enough for you to feel the stretch as his thumb rolls against your clit. “I know, baby, been waitin’ for you too.”
Jesus, you feel like you’re gonna die. You’re taking all these big deep shivering breaths, still trembling a little from your orgasm and eager for him to just fuck you already, but his filthy talk in your ear is sending you spiralling. You’re so wet it feels like you’ve sprung a leak; you can feel moisture running down your ass and under your thighs, and you burn with both mortification and desire.
Ghost presses his cock in a little further, and your back arches as you groan. Despite the orgasm and the fingering and the fact that you are so fucking aroused right now, the stretch is intense.
“Yeah, she’s beggin’ for me.” Ghost is still talking – at this point you think his words are meant just for himself, because they’re low and a little slurred, his eyes glassy as he stares at the way his cock spears through the slick folds of you. “Listen; it’s like she’s talking to me.”
For a second, you have no goddamn idea what he’s talking about. But then, in the silence, you hear the squelch of your drippy cunt as he squishes his cock against it in shallow little thrusts, barely even pressing the tip inside.
“Oh god,” You whine, high and needy. “Just– stop teasing.”
The bastard laughs, all low and gritty and a little breathless.
“It’s not teasing, lovie.” He says, leaning down and pressing a kiss to your jawline. “You’ve been avoiding me for a week straight. I’m just reacquainting myself.”
Then he presses a kiss to the corner of your mouth in a move so sweet that it honestly takes you aback. Every complaint in your head flies out the window, and you turn eagerly in an attempt to deepen the kiss. His mouth is so hot, his lips plush and hungry and a little salty. It occurs to you that you’re tasting yourself in his mouth, and your body draws up tight and tense in response. 
“Simon,” You breathe, intending to tell him to get a move on and just fuck you already, but you don’t even get as far as finishing the order.
He groans as though the sound of his given name is a signal, and before you know it you’ve got a huge wall of muscle hunched over you and around you as Ghost holds himself up by his elbows on either side of your head. You feel his cock prodding at the entrance of your cunt and your legs fall even further open, until your hip joints ache.
When he starts to push in, the stretch burns in a way that makes your mouth fall open as you choke on the air in your lungs. You’re wet and pliable and eager, your pussy sucking hungrily at Ghost’s dick in an effort to take him deep quickly, but you had almost forgotten what this felt like. You can’t stop the way your cunt tightens eagerly as he rocks in an inch.
He laughs lowly in your ear, has to swallow back a groan when you clench tight around him, “C’mon, stop pushing me out, darling.”
“Wait,” You gasp, reaching down to place your hand over his belly. “Wait, oh my god, you’re too big–”
His stomach muscles are tensed with the effort he's putting in to keep from rocking into you all in one go, and you spare a moment to admire his patience and his sheer resolve to make things good for you. But even though he’s obediently paused to let you catch your breath, he chuckles quietly at your reaction.
“It’s only the tip, baby.” He murmurs, cooing softly to you like you’re something easily spooked. “You’ve taken it before. This pretty little cunt of yours is so hungry, gotta let her have it.”
You nod, hesitantly. He’s right; he may be big, but you’d taken him before. Only last week. And you had been a virgin then. Well, technically. Not physically, maybe, since you’d long stretched out your hymen on your dildos, but mentally. Though at least last week you had stretched yourself out on your vibrator, and then Ghost had spent so long opening you up with his mouth and fingers.
Ghost rocks forward another inch, and the stretch makes you squeal like a fucking stuck pig. It’s mortifying. How the hell did he ever manage to fit that fat cock inside you?
You slap at his belly hard, writhing away. 
“No, nope, not gonna fit.” You wheeze.
Ghost pulls back, and you can read the disappointed slant of his mouth and he reaches down to grip the base of his cock. Now that you get another look at it, you take a deep breath. It’s still well-lubed with your spit and the pink cockhead is shiny with your slick. 
It’s big, but you know you can take it. You just… you need better leverage.
Your jaw clenches in determination. “I need to be on top.”
There’s a moment of silence as those words settle between you, as though Ghost’s brain is buffering. Then his lips start curving up into that semi-familiar smug smile, and he rolls the two of you over so that he’s laying on his back in your bed with you perched clumsily atop his thighs.
His cock juts up proudly, practically bobbing as it leaks prespend down his length. He settles back, folding his arms behind his head as he watches you – the position makes his biceps bulge in a way that is very appealing and also most likely unintentional.
“Go on.” He encourages, as hungry and wanting as you’ve ever heard him. “All yours, gorgeous.”
All yours, your brain repeats, the words echoing around your skull until you’re certain that your head is empty but for that. You want him so much it makes you feel dizzy.
You shuffle forward until your pussy is hovering over the blood-flushed head of his cock. The cute pink blush has started to darken into a red that looks painful, and you take a little breath at the idea of helping him out with his little problem.
You lower yourself down so that the tip of Ghost’s cock is lined up with your entrance and begins pressing in, stretching you wide and slipping in inch by inch. You gasp desperately as you’re speared open inexorably slowly, tears pricking your eyes as your mouth drops open.
Though you’re the one controlling the pace, it still seems overwhelming, all-encompassing. You can feel your cunt stretching wide and taut around the width of him, fluttering as Ghost groans in dazed appreciation.
You glance up at him, to see that his eyes are a little unfocused, missing the intensity that they’ve had all night. His gaze is flickering from the way your cunt is sliding down on his cock to your breasts to your face, so fast as if he’s trying to take it all in before it disappears.
His oversized hands come to rest on your hips, and you half expect him to pull you down impatiently on his cock. But he doesn’t, they just rest there as though he needs to ground himself. His stomach is tensed so tight you know that his abs will be sore in the morning, and to your delight you can see a lovely pink flush climbing across his lightly-haired chest.
You keep your eyes on his half-masked face as you slowly rock your way down onto the length of him, your breath occasionally hitching. Though he doesn’t rush you, you can feel the way his fingers twitch on your hips and the way his jaw grinds, and all those little tells only increase your excitement.
You’re so full you feel like you’re about to break in half, and Ghost’s gaze on you feels like a physical weight, but you don’t stop. You wiggle clumsily, trying to take him deeper and unintentionally pulling gruff groans out of him every time your body tightens.
Then, finally, you take him to the hilt. He groans, his eyes half-lidded as he watches the way your body sits perched on his lap, little tremors rocking through you as you adjust to his size inside. 
“That’s my girl.” Ghost says, and the praise comes out on the edge of a growl. “Fuck, it’s like you were made for me.”
Tingling heat is growing alarmingly quickly in your lower belly and at the apex of your thighs, and you tremble over him as you use your grip on his shoulders for leverage. The soft sounds of pleasure that are pulled out of his throat every time you roll yourself against him send sparks through your entire nervous system – you’ve never heard Ghost sound so soft and wanting.
One of his hands reaches between you, one big thumb settling right over your swollen clit. You squeal, but your noises are half-moans as you try to rock your hips against his hand even as you try to ease the feeling of his girth inside you.
“Would you have gone back to his quarters?” He asks, and the seemingly non-sequitur is too much for your dazed, cock-stupid mind to keep with.
“Huh?” You breathe, tentatively rocking your hips and moaning softly as his cock hits just right inside.
“The guy at the bar.” Ghost clarifies, his voice deep and a little irritated. “The one who was all over you. Would you have gone back with him?”
Oh, you think a little wryly. You should have known that he’d be a big possessive bastard.
“I don’t know.” You say, but you’re barely paying attention. You’ve started to rock for real now, and it feels good. Your rhythm is barely more than a slow grind – you think, distantly, that you should be lifting yourself up and down and fucking yourself properly, but grinding so that he hits deep and your clit rubs up against his pubic bone just feels so fucking intense.
“Waste of your time.” He grunts, his grip tight on your hips as he watches you hump lazily. “Jesus, look at the way you’re sucking me in. Cunt’s so fussy, she was just waiting for me.”
The worst part is, you think he might be right. You had been touching yourself every night this week, trying and failing to recreate the high he had brought you to. The touch just wasn’t the same, and no matter how close you got you just couldn’t fall over that damn ledge.
“Yeah,” You whine, hardly even aware of what you’re agreeing to. The sweet ache of the stretch has almost disappeared now, and you hump back onto his cock with abandon. Your chest is heaving as you pant, and you can feel your own body trying to suck him in further but there’s nowhere else to go because he’s filling you up so completely. 
You tip forward, grabbing clumsily at his shoulders for balance as your face smushes against the cushiony softness of his pecs. God, he’s so strong, it’s like your body weight is nothing to him – he just accepts your whole body leaning into him, humming in satisfaction.
Tentatively, you lift yourself up a few inches so you can ease back down. You repeat the movement a few more times, and then you’ve established a steady pace of fucking yourself on his cock. 
“Simon,” You gasp, and it comes out in a whimper that’s far more pathetic than you had intended. “Am I– am I doing good?”
He’s gritting his teeth – you can see the tense line of his jaw as he tilts his head back, watching your face as you bounce stumblingly on his cock.
“Like I said, lovie, you’re a natural.” He says, exhaling harshly through his nose. “Gimme a kiss.”
When you lean forward to kiss him, the angle shifts and all of a sudden he's hitting the spot that makes your knees go weak. Your thighs are already burning from the exertion of riding him, but you whine desperately.
“There.” You moan into Ghost’s mouth, the two of you sharing air as you pant against each other’s lips. “Oh god, please–”
The muscles in his thighs ripple as he lifts his hips to meet yours as you bounce down, and then all of a sudden he’s fucking into you from below. The strength in his hips almost bodily lifts you every time he fucks up, though you almost thwart his every thrust as you try to grind on him again, trying to get his cock to hit just right again.
Fuck, your legs are tired and your knees are aching, but you can feel that glorious build up in your tummy again. Ghost has taken over most of the heavy lifting now too; instead of relying on you to bounce up and down, he’s drilling into that one spot inside you that sends liquid heat shooting up your spine.
Your mouth is hanging open and you’re pretty sure that you’re drooling all over his lovely, soft chest, but it just feels so good. You don’t understand how he does this, how he makes it feel so good for you. You think, a little wildly, that maybe your cunt was made for him.
“Fuckin’ Christ, you’re so tight,” Ghost grunts, and his chest rumbles beneath your smushed cheek. “Gonna come again for me, sweetheart? Go on, cream on me.”
You didn’t actually think you were that close to another orgasm, despite how good it feels, but maybe Ghost knows you and your pussy better than you know yourself because you feel yourself go tight and gushy, nonsensical gasping and babbling spilling from your lips. The soft squelching noises your pussy makes as his cock fucks up into you is obscene, enough to make your nipples go tight and tingly.
Then his thumb rolls hard against the swollen bud of your clit and you’re gone. You think you might actually scream, but it’s muffled against the now drool-covered expanse of his thick, bulging pecs. 
You let out a choked out wail as your orgasm rips through you like an electric shock, leaving you trembling madly in its wake. You swear you come apart completely, unravelling at the edges as you writhe in his lap, grinding wildly even as he continues to fuck you through it. 
You don’t get even a moment of reprieve, because Ghost keeps going through the waves of your orgasm. He pulls you up to kiss you, sloppy and dirty, and then starts thrusting for all he’s worth. You’re put in mind of bull-riding, and your thighs clench hard as you try to stay seated as he bucks against you.
It's the most unravelled you’ve ever seen him. Ghost is always cool and in control, always meeting everything with smug, arrogant confidence. To see him glowing with sweat, his mouth lolled open under his rumpled balaclava as he snarls and grunts and fucks into you like an animal feels like a drug so heady you know you’re already addicted.
This is not the lazy rhythm of before; he’s uncoordinated and frantic, kissing you hard and messy as he shoves his cock up into you so hard that you’re sure it’s going to leave a permanent impression inside you. Maybe that’s what he’s aiming for. You take it easily, split open and pliant and soft and wet.
You’re oversensitive and shivery, breathing hard and whimpering on every other thrust, but you don’t complain. It only takes a handful of thrusts before Ghost finishes with a bitten off snarl, his jaw clenching and head tipping back as he pulls you off him just in time for his cock to spurt several thick ropes of creamy cum between you. Most of it lands on your belly, dripping down onto your pussy like icing on a cake, but some of it spurts onto Ghost’s own soft belly too.
It makes a mess, but you don’t care. You feel so dreamy-floaty happy right now, your limbs floppy and rubbery as you slump down onto his chest. He catches you easily, and lays you down gently onto the bed. 
You grumble when he moves, but you remember this part from last time. You don’t bother opening your eyes; you know he’ll come back.
Sure enough, he returns within moments, and you feel a warm, wet cloth wiping at your belly and inner thighs. You part your legs, pleased with the feeling of being looked after. When you blink your eyes open again, you see that he’s pulled the mask back down to cover his lovely, talented mouth. You try not to be too disappointed over that. His eyeblack is smeared too; it gives the impression of total debauchery. 
“You alright, love?” He asks, and you realise that you’ve just been staring blankly at him.
“Yeah.” You mumble, stretching your body out like a cat. Now that you’ve been given a moment, you can feel all those little aches flare to life between your legs, around your hips, and up the base of your spine. You wince, but don’t complain.
To your delight, Ghost climbs back into bed with you. He’s a little too big for the standard issue frame, but you’re more than happy to roll on top of him and cuddle close to conserve space. He seems similarly happy to have you all laid out on his chest, because he presses his masked face to the top of your head and inhales slowly.
“Are you staying, this time?” You ask quietly. You think you know the answer after your conversation earlier, but you can’t quite help the little pulse of insecurity.
“As long as you’ll have me.” He says, low in the quiet of the room. His tone is thick with significance, like he’s talking about more than just staying the night, and his fingers are sure and steady as he traces absent-minded little patterns down the length of your spine.
You swallow, heart racing, and rest your cheek against his chest. The steady thump, thump, thump of his own heart soothes you, and you bite your lip. He’s so solid, reliable. You’d trust him with your life, with anything. 
You glance down, your eyes curiously seeking out his now softening cock. It’s laying in a bed of his blond curls at his crotch, and it looks so unthreatening when it’s flaccid. You admire the shape of it absently, feeling a little thrill of excitement at the sight of it. You can’t lie to yourself and say you don’t feel a little possessive, either.
“Are we dating now?” You ask quietly. You’re not able to look him in the eye when you ask it, so you keep your face turned down. You don’t think you could handle seeing his expression if his answer is no.
There’s a pause. His hand halts the sweet patterns he’d been drawing on your back.
“Was that a question for me, or my cock?” He asks. He seems to be aiming for his usual sort of dry humour, but his tone comes out a little guarded, as though he’s actually not sure.
You raise your head, stifling your insecurity, and make eye contact with him. Those pretty brown eyes, so warm when they’re looking at you like this.
“You,” You say.
There’s another pause, and then his hand starts tracing its way over your bare back again.
“Yeah,” Ghost says, and the corners of eyes crinkle. “Stuck with me now, lovie.”
11K notes · View notes
teaboot · 2 months
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As someone who learnt english as a second language via textbook, I have to say "flying by the seat of my pants" is a hilarious idiom xD
It's the first time I've seen/heard it.
Could you share another one you like using?
Idk about idioms specifically, but there's a bunch of phrases I learned from my mom!
Lord love a duck! (Incredulous, like 'oh my god')
Lord suffer in sheep dip! (Sheep dip meaning sheep poop. Incredulous, but for annoying things- like 'are you kidding me?')
Is there a piano tied to your ass? ('Don't be lazy, do it yourself')
Someone's cruising for a bruising. (You're picking a fight.)
I don't give a rat's rip. ('I don't care'- a rat's 'rip' is it's butt crack.)
Pull up a stump! (Get yourself a chair, sit down.)
Everybody out of the pool! (Get out of the car)
I'm flying by the seat of my pants. (I have no idea what I'm doing, but I'm doing it.)
Don't go blowing smoke up my ass. (Don't over-compliment me, don't flatter me, don't stroke my ego, don't tell me positive lies)
Looks like it's gonna rain on our parade. (A storm is coming.)
Sorry to rain on your parade. (I've given you bad news- can be used sincerely or sarcastically to denote sympathy for incurring a bad mood.)
Better button that lip. (Stop talking.)
Someone's gonna stick a boot up your ass. ('Stick a boot up your ass'- fight you, beat you, kick your ass.)
Stick that lip out any further, and a pigeon'll shit on it. (Stop whining.)
Suck it up, buttercup. (Stop whining.)
Dumber than a fence post. (Very stupid.)
The back forty. (The wild or forested area behind a rural home. The 'forty' being forty acres, or farmland.)
Don't go begging for a fat lip. (Whatever you're saying or doing is going to bother people and get you in trouble.)
What on God's green earth (What the fuck)
I'm sweating like a pig in a porta-potty (like a pig in a plastic outhouse- I'm very warm, it's hot here)
He thinks the universe flew out of his ass. (He thinks he's more impressive than he is.)
Your mouth wrote a cheque your ass couldn't cash. (You promised more than you were capable of providing.)
You've got a horseshoe up your ass. (You're very, very lucky.)
Taking a dirt nap. (Dead.)
Pushing (up) daisies. (Dead.)
Give me forty acres to turn this rig around. (I need time and space to move this large, heavy, or unwieldy thing. Usually about navigating a vehicle. Taken from a song lyric.)
Jesus take the wheel. (God help me, I can't handle this, I give up.)
Gone belly-up. (Has died.)
We've got a floater. (This one is dead.)
Herding cats. (Trying to organize chaos, managing an impossibly complicated situation.)
I've got a black thumb. (I am bad at growing plants, all my plants die- reference to having a 'green thumb', or being good at growing plants.)
Stop trackin' floor cookies. (Floor cookies are bits of animal shit that fall off your work boots- 'tracking floor cookies' means wearing your boots in the house; take your shoes off at the door.)
Running around like a headless chicken. (Frantic, disorganized, stressed out by many tasks or panicked by a big situation.)
Spinning my wheels. (Waiting around for something to happen, getting nowhere, frustrated by inactivity, not making any progress towards a goal.)
He's gonna blow a gasket. (He's going to lose his temper, he's going to be angry.)
They'll tan your hide. (They'll punish you severely; usually through violence. Specifically in reference to a spanking.)
He's a few bricks short a load. (He's not clever / he doesn't think things through / he's crazy)
Not the sharpest tool in the shed. (Not the smartest person. Very dumb, clumsy, or absent-minded.)
I'm not going to bail you out. (Not going to save your sinking boat- not going to help you out of your bad situation.)
Looks like things are going south. (The situation is growing worse.)
I'll start making tracks. (I'll leave now, I'll start working, I'll get going.)
He's fucking the dog. (He's not being productive, he's doing a bad job, he's made things worse, he's screwing around.)
He's making puppies. (Less graphic version of 'fucking the dog'.)
Plant your ass. (Sit.)
Playing grab-ass. (Procrastinating- accomplishing nothing, slowing people down.)
He couldn't find his ass in the dark. (He's stupid, ineffective, underqualified, or incompetent.)
He couldn't pour water out of a boot if the instructions were on the heel. (He is unbelievably, comically dumb or ineffective. He can't do anything right.)
One foot in the ground. (Dying, or half-dead.)
I'm kicking rocks. (I'm not doing anything productive.)
I'm hauling ass. (I'm running away.)
Madder than a wet hen. (Very, very angry.)
Like I said I'm not sure that these are all idioms but they're all the phrases and sayings from my childhood that I can remember right now
EDIT: Cannot BELIEVE I forgot my mom's favourite
52. Wish in one hand, shit in the other, see which gets filled first. (Wishes don't come true by themselves)
Plus some more I forgot:
53. You make a better door than a window. (You're in the way of my view.)
54. You can take a long walk off a short pier. (Go fuck yourself.)
55. He's about as sharp as a bowling ball. (He's stupid.)
56. Scoot your poot. (Move over.)
57. Not my first rodeo. (I know what I'm doing.)
58. He's built like a brick shithouse. (He's broad and sturdy and very strong, solid.)
59. I smell bacon. (I saw a cop nearby.)
60. I don't want to hear a peep. (Stop talking.)
61. You're thinking with the wrong head. (You're making bad decisions because you're horny.)
62. I'd lose my ass/head if it wasn't tied on. (I'm very absent-minded, forgetful.)
63. That went down like a lead balloon. (That situation was bad.)
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ghoulphile · 12 days
Text
janey's dad | c.h./the ghoul | part 01
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➥ pairing | cooper howard/the ghoul x f!reader ➥ word count | 3.7k ➥ warning(s) | 🔞 smut; age gap, hair pulling, teasing, making out, mutual pining, lipstick kink, stockings, frottage, porn w/ feelings, porn w/ plot, mild angst w/ happy ending, divorced!coop, babysitter!reader, pre-war/bomb ➥ summary | “We really, uh, shouldn’t - oh fuck, you look --” ➥ notes | i'm so sorry this is later than it should be. i am unfortunately a corporate slave and this fic just did not want to cooperate 🫠 there are a lot more things planned and this fic is turning into a bit of a beast (20+ pages and counting rip lmao) so i've decided to split it into two parts to make it more manageable for myself mostly un-beta'd atm a special thanks to @corinthianism for all her lovely help ❤️!!
feel free to send in thots, questions, requests! | masterlist
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Divorce is hard, but being a divorcé is downright hellish.
One of the ugliest things in the world, if Cooper Howard has any say. At least when he was a Marine, they told him where to point his gun, where to aim; nameless threats vanishing with a quick squeeze of the trigger.
Here, these ‘enemies’ aren’t enemies — not really.
It’d be easier if they were.
Worse still, they have names he holds as dearly as his own. There’s Barb, whip smart and always so clever. Then Janey, the light of his life and so sweet his teeth ache.
Once upon a time, life was sweeter than apple pie on Sundays.
Then came the separation.
Afterwards, he finds it hard to look at what’s left of his family without losing breath like a horse kick to the chest. Their absence rips open a hole inside him ten miles wide, its edges jagged and wrong.
And when he can’t take the silence anymore, fingers of malt liquor help dull the ache, though it’ll never be enough to mend what’s broken.
See, war’s something he understands.
But these domestic battlefields where he sits across from his ex-wife while lawyers barter this weekend and that holiday?
How he struggles to meet his daughter’s eye every time she asks if he’s coming home?
When Barb keeps the house and the money while he keeps the scrapbooks and the dog?
He doesn’t — can't — refuses to comprehend.
Because in what world can you reconcile looking down the barrel of a smoking gun only to find the woman you love staring back, finger on the trigger? Left out to hang as Vault-Tec orchestrates his downfall.
The true depth of their involvement is unknown, but it’s no coincidence his bank accounts dried up faster than the Mojave in June. The ink still wet when the media snapped up the story of his failed marriage.
Thus, his reputation (rather what’s left of it) unraveled faster than a spool of thread.
Knocked on his ass and kept there by a boot heel crushing his windpipe. Whose? He hasn’t got a fucking clue.
But whoever they are, they’re making sure he stays a washed up nobody who struggles to land a call back, much less pay his monthly alimony on time.
See what we can do? You were America’s favorite gunslinger - now look at you. Mind your place.
Hell, millions used to scream his name.
Nowadays people whisper it behind their hands like a dirty secret, “Oh, did you hear? Cooper Howard…” as they dissect pieces of his life into bite-sized Before’s and After’s. “Hah! Serves him right. Y’know, I never liked him much.”
While he grits his teeth and swallows his bitterness with a smile, he hates how he can’t protect Janey from snide reporters and nosy strangers. Juggling actor-father-divorcé with fumbling hands.
It’s only been six months; a heartbeat, a lifetime, and already he’s scraped thin like butter over too much bread.
Something’s gotta give.
After all, he’s only one man.
But just when it's bleakest, the clouds part.
A young woman moves in next door, the first bright thing that’s come his way in a long, long while.
At first, he kept his distance.
Exchanged vague hello’s and how-are-you’s. Then Janey took a shine; always so friendly and eager to talk about her latest books.
Any reservations he might’ve had died when he saw how enamored you are with her.
Only made sense that over time small pleasantries turned into playdates. Then those playdates turned into sleepovers.
Before long, you’re watching her when a gig runs late.
Rustling up grub and tucking her into bed more often than not these days. And when he slinks in through the door, knees aching and stripped to the bone, there you are with a shy smile and a warm meal.
So what if he takes himself in hand after you leave, stroking his cock to the thought of you down on your knees in that pretty little sundress?
Imagines the wide stretch of your ruby lips as you swallow him down, lipstick smeared an awful mess?
Cums hard to the fantasy of your teary eyes and hiccupy breaths as you choke?
What you don’t know can’t hurt you.
After all, he’s a gentleman... he promises to keep his hands to himself.
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“All right, Sugar Bomb, it’s bedtime.”
Bundled in navy bedding up to her nose, Janey’s wide brown eyes peer up at you from beneath a riot of frizzy curls. Roosevelt, her ever faithful companion, plasters himself to her side. The tip of his tail swishes once, twice before falling limp.
“Ah, c’mon guys. Don’t look at me like that.” You sigh with a fond shake of the head, hip popping out to rest against the doorframe. “I don’t make the rules, I just follow ‘em.”
A muffled response sounds from the lump of little girl, “Nmfhm.”
Squinting, you dip your head and tap the side of your ear, "Pardon?"
“Mnhfmmmm.”
“Ye—eah… Didn’t catch that, Mumbler.”
Janey tugs down the blanket, her mouth pursed in a moue of displeasure. “I said,” she crosses her arms with a huff, “not until Dad gets home.”
Shit.
“M’sorry, baby. He’s still gonna be a while.” Walking across the room, you stop beside the bed and motion your hand back and forth. “Scooch over.”
Gangly limbs fumble as Janey wiggles into the middle of the mattress, her feet tangling in the blankets. Roosevelt takes a toe to the nose during the transition, but flops across her knees all the same.
Together they settle with a bounce of springs.
In the open space, you slide in.
The bed sinks under your weight, a plume of rich cologne tickling your nose; mint-spiced citrus. Cooper. Your stomach swoops, and your heart trips.
“I didn’t see him at breakfast — or lunch!” A pout tugs at her mouth. “Not even dinner. I gotta go home tomorrow. So when am I gonna see him?”
“Oh, bug.” You sigh, propping yourself up on your elbow. “Your dad’s been real busy at work. And I know that’s been hard for you, but I promise to make sure he’s here for breakfast tomorrow.”
“D’you mean it?” Her cold nose digs into your skin. “Me and Roosevelt miss him so much.”
Cuddled into your chest, Janey tosses an arm around your back. Her fuzzy head rests in the crook of your arm, springy curls tickling your skin.
You squeeze her tight and trace your fingertips over her forehead.
“I can do you one better,” you say, bopping the tip of her nose just to hear her giggle - a soft sound that sits warm and gooey in your chest. “I pinkie-promise.”
Her finger loops around yours, so small and fragile.
“I’ll even make pancakes. How’s that sound for a promise?”
“Oh, yes, please! I think Dad will like that,” a wide yawn cuts her off mid-sentence. “He’s sad, but he always smiles when you make food.”
Janey’s words — unexpected as they are sudden — cut so deep it steals the breath from your lungs. You flounder, your heart a throbbing bruise in your chest.
“... Then pancakes it is.”
As if nothing happened at all, she asks, “Do I have to go to bed now?”
“Afraid so, little miss.” Your responding chuckle sounds stilted even to your own ears. “Just you wait. When you wake up, Dad’ll be home.”
“Fi—ine, but I want extra pancakes.” Janey pauses, considers you with narrow eyes, then adds, “With syrup!”
“Whatever you want,” you say with an indulgent smile. “Now... time to sleep. It’s really past your bedtime.”
She gives you one last squeeze then lets you tuck her in nice and tight, blankets pulled up to her chin. You drop a kiss on her forehead while Roosevelt re-settles on the pillow beside her after a quick scratch behind the ears. 
Everything in order, you turn to go only for a little hand to stop you.
“Yes?” you reply, glancing at her from over your shoulder.
“... can you put on one of Dad's movies?”
The tremble in her voice - like she’s about to get scolded - breaks your heart clean down the middle. Stitching on a soft smile, you nod and walk to the darkened TV set in the room's corner.
After fiddling with the nobs, static flashes to life.
“The Man from Deadhorse okay?”
The holotape sliding into the track swallows the sound of her tiny “Yeah.” Starting up with a whirl of machinery, the second-hand Radiation King flickers to life in black-and-white.
A vast plain and bright sky stretches across the screen.
Then Sugarfoot creeps into frame with the one and only Cooper Howard sitting astride the noble steed. The sheriff’s badge on his chest glints in the sun.
“Thank you,” she mumbles, already half-way to sleep.
“Anything for you, baby. Sleep tight.”
Flicking off the lights, you leave the door cracked. Walk away pretending like hearing her whisper goodnight to the TV doesn’t lance through you like lightning.
The desire to whisk her into your arms and soothe all of her ails is almost impossible to ignore.
Somehow, you distract yourself by wiping up the table, then by fixing a plate of dinner for whenever Cooper rolls in. Though all the while, how brokenhearted Janey sounded sits in the back of your mind like a leaden weight.
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When Cooper stumbles into the living room, it’s half past midnight.
You’d gotten up to greet him, curled as you were in an armchair reading, when something about the stern line of his mouth gave you pause.
Where the usual lighthearted greetings lingered, a pensive stillness trembled to life.
Tension crackles through the air; a held breath of agitation. By the faraway gaze and defeated slump of his broad shoulders, it’s plain to see the night didn’t go as intended. And no matter how much you long to soothe, you can’t.
After all, he’s not yours to touch.
Instead, you offer a sympathetic smile and ask, “Rough night, huh?”
Cooper ignores the prompt, squeezing past with a brief touch to your elbow as he makes a beeline for the dry bar. The heat of his body is there and gone in a flash, his cologne teasing your senses. He says, “Thought you’d be asleep by now.”
Your heart flutters in your throat. “Ah,” you lick your lips, “well, I was going to finish my chapter first.”
Humming, he turns his back to you and fiddles with high balls and decanters. The tink of crystal glassware fills the air as he speculates which alcohol goes best with his mood. 
“Thanks again for watching Janey.” He nods in approval and fixes his whiskey neat. “I don’t know what we’d do without you.”
“Oh, it’s no trouble, Mr. Howard.” You shrug. “She’s a sweetheart.”
He shoots you a dry look from over his shoulder, stirring the dark amber of his drink with a forefinger. When he sucks his skin clean with a soft pop - a flash of a pink tongue taunting, teasing - your stomach swoops.
God, I wonder what else his mouth can do.
Flustered, you clear your throat and stare at a spot on the wall.
“How many times do I gotta tell you to call me Coop?” he says, digging through some drawers until he finds what he’s searching for: a lighter. “It must be a million and one by now.”
Flint sparks as flames jump, eating away at the end of a cigarette. Cooper inhales in short little puffs, pulling on the filter. His cheeks hollow, the shadows enhancing the cut of his jaw before the tip catches alight.
“Well,” he exhales, his gaze catching yours through a plume of smoke as he turns, brow raised. “Anything to say for yourself?”
“Old habits die hard, I guess,” you chuckle.
The corner of his mouth lifts in a lopsided smirk. “I’ll drink to that.” He knocks back the last finger of whiskey before refilling with gin.
Springs groan in protest when he drops to the couch, settling in with an outstretched arm and wide spread thighs.
“It’s been a long fucking day,” he rasps.
Gulping, you try to ignore the space at his feet.
The stirrings of desire provoked by the urge to sink to your knees and fill it with your body, to ease tension from those shoulders with your hands, your mouth, your cunt — if he’d let you.
“You heading home?” Nursing the fresh drink, he swallows a mouthful, only to hiss low through his teeth at the chemical burn. His throat bobs, framed by the open collar of his shirt. “Whew! Goddamn, that’s strong.”
“No, I can stay for a while.” A bird on a wire, you perch on the cushion beside him. “Got nothing else planned for tonight, anyhow.”
Cooper snorts. “I doubt that very much. A sweet young thing like you,” he motions towards you with his glass, “I’m sure you’ve got plenty of fellas calling, especially on a Friday night. Don’t waste your time with me.”
“That’s not why I--” you stop yourself short.
Save for the bustling LA avenue right outside the complex, the apartment itself is stone silent for several heartbeats. Words hover on the back of your tongue, catching in the bend of your throat molasses thick.
Meanwhile, Cooper continues to swirl the alcohol in his glass.
Maybe in a different life, you wouldn’t hesitate to express yourself.
But here — with him — you shouldn’t.
Christ sake, he’s a grieving divorcé, you chastise yourself. The last thing he needs is me trying to lay one on him.
When you speak, his name glides off your lips for the first time, clementine sweet, “... Cooper, I’m not wasting my time. I enjoy spending it with Janey - and you.”
“Well,” he husks, hooded eyes dragging down your visage in a slow once-over, “you’re the first one in a long while to feel that way, sweetheart.”
Dripping like honey whiskey from Cooper’s lips, the simple phrase burns its way down-down-down until it blooms like liquid fire in your belly. Warms you all the way to your toes as your heart pounds against your ribcage.
“I mean it.” Your knuckles twist in the pleats of your sundress, bolts of blue fabric bunched around your knees. “Everything I do is because I want to.”
The flash of red nails plucking at the sheer nylon of your stockings snaps up his attention, his gaze snagging - staying as he chases the curve of your exposed leg, hungry.
He wets his lips, and tenses his jaw when he spots how the soft fat of your thigh dimples in because of your garter. “That’s awful sweet of you to say.”
You tremble beneath the intensity of his attention.
Greedy.
Little kisses of awareness spark bright along the path his eyes carve like the caress of shy fingertips.
However, before you’re able to confront him about his interest, the heat leaches from his expression, grows mute and cold like a muzzled dog. 
Readjusting the waistband of his slacks with a tug, he says, “I know you got better things to do than keep an old man company.”
Irritation sparks. “Cooper--”
“If this is about paying you for tonight,” his lips quirk into a sheepish smile, “I won’t be able to yet.” He scrubs a hand through the stubble peppered along his jaw. “The gig tonight didn’t… Well, it doesn’t matter.”
“No, that’s not what I --”
He plows on, “Anyway, the one I’ve got tomorrow should be enough. How about I stop by around seven o’clock? I’ll treat you to dinner as an apology.”
Frustration bubbles beneath the surface of your skin, antagonism thrumming through your veins. Your hands shake almost as much as your voice. “Cooper!”
“I… uh, yes?” He blinks.
Your brows furrow. “You don’t get it,” you say. “I mean, you truly don’t know?”
“I’m afraid there’s a lot I don’t get. You’re gonna have to be more particular.”
Maybe not said in so many words (or at all) but actions speak far louder.
Otherwise, why else would you spend most of your time in his apartment, fill every spare moment with Janey, and reserve evenings for his company?
Hell, you even cook and clean!
Almost scream your interest from the rooftops, and it’s obvious to everyone but him, it seems.
Here you are thinking he was preserving your dignity whenever he ignored a passing comment or lingering touch when, in fact, he’d been oblivious to their existence to begin with.
How a man can be so obtuse when you’re throwing yourself at him is beyond you.
If he wasn’t so captivating…
“Are you kidding me,” you ask, mindful of your tone, “how could you not know?” You throw your hands in the air. “I’ve been — for months!”
“Well, I don’t have a goddamn clue what you’re talking about, sweetheart,” he snarks, setting his glass on the table. “Care to enlighten me?”
Fine. If that’s how he wants to play, let’s play.
When he moves to take another drag from his cigarette, you strike, fingers locking around his wrist mid-lift. And although his glassy eyes narrow, he keeps his hand still.
Waiting to see what you'll do.
Tucking your knee under you for balance, you bend forward and watch his face from beneath your lashes. When your lips wrap around the filter, a dark hunger bleeds into his expression, his pulse a steady thud against the pad of your thumb.
Inhaling, the cherry lights up, a flashbang in the dim overhead light.
Cooper’s breath hitches, and then you’re pulling away with a lungful of smoke; the taste of ash heavy on your tongue.
He tracks your movements with greed, gaze flicking for the briefest of moments past your chin before refocusing on the ring of red lipstick staining white paper.
“If you wanted one,” he chokes, gripping the back of the couch with white knuckles, “all you had to do was ask.”
With a coquettish grin, you exhale to the side and stare at him with hooded eyes. “Is that so?” Plucking the cigarette out of his limp hold, you stub it out in the ashtray. “What if I wanted to ask for something else, Mr. Howard?”
The next moment finds you deposited in his lap, his hands shooting out to grab at your waist only to freeze before they make contact.
“Woah! I--”
“Tell me something.”
Your lips caress the shell of his ear, sharing breath - sharing space as you plaster yourself to his front, arms looped over his shoulders. He jolts, body trembling with restraint.
“Would you give me what I wanted if I said please?”
The distance between you snaps taut with anticipation. “C-Coop,” he stutters. “Call me Coop.”
You hum. “Well, Coop, would you?”
“That depends almost entirely on what you’re asking for, sweetheart.”
Red nails skate along the back of his neck, play in the downy soft hair of his nape just to feel him shiver. And then you’re leaning back with your hands braced on his knees, your legs falling open in invitation.
The hem of your dress bunches around your waist, exposing the soft cotton of your underwear, and the darkened patch of slick soaking through.
“I think you know exactly what I want,” you purr. “Because you want it too. Don’t you?”
He bites down on a strangled moan when your hips arch forward, rocking the soft plush of your ass against the heavy weight of his thickening cock. The zipper digs into your skin as he tents the front of his slacks.
Mouth dropping open, his tongue flicks out to wet his lips - a slick circle of temptation that makes you clench. “I, uh, I don’t…”
Reaching between your splayed thighs, you hook a finger beneath your panties and pull the fabric aside. He jerks forward, exhaling hard at the flash of your soaked cunt and twitching clit.
“C’mon, be honest.”
With a sigh, you gather your arousal on the tips of your fingers.
Cooper’s gaze is a heavy weight pinning you in place as you pretend it’s him dragging his knuckles over the top of your mond. Him dragging calloused fingers up along sticky folds to play with your sensitive clit, ripping soft little mewls from your lips.
“Can’t you see what you do to me, Coop?” you say, pulling your hand away to show the webs of slick stretching between your fingers. “I’m so wet. Please, I’ve wanted you for so long…”
His hips rock against your ass in an aborted thrust. “Shit - shit!” Eyes slamming shut, he grits his teeth and digs his fingers into your sides hard enough to bruise. “We really, uh, shouldn’t - oh fuck, you look --”
“Why not?” Your hand brushes over his groin. “I can feel how hard you are.”
“It isn’t right, that’s why.” He stutters, stumbles over his words, “Besides, Janey…”
“I can be quiet,” you say, lips trembling. “I promise.”
“Goddamnit, you can’t say things like that and expect me not to --” Cutting himself off, strong fingers seize your chin and tilt until you’re met with Cooper’s severe expression, his scorching gaze. “You need to tell me now: are you sure this is what you want?”
There’s no hesitation, “Yes.”
In what world would you refuse?
The words barely pass your lips before Cooper’s bowing his dark head, mouth ravenous as it captures yours in a slick glide of bruising lips and hungry tongues.
He steals your breath, licks into your mouth and traces along the sensitive inside of your lip.
Pulse jump starting, your toes curl over the edge of the cushion and your thighs squeeze the barrel of his chest, kneecaps digging into his ribs.
“Oh,” a moan punches itself out of your throat - a breathy little thing swallowed up by his lips. “That’s--”
Anticipation swells, simmers between you like a band before it snaps. A strong forearm locks around your waist, tugging you into the cradle of his chest until you’re plastered from stem to stern.
Too hungry for tenderness as his free hand slips up to cup the back of your head, fingers catching in the briar of your hair and tugging at the roots.
You claw at his shoulders while sparks of pain ricochet down your neck, sufficing into a prickly flush that heats your blood. “Hnn, Cooper,” you gasp.
He murmurs your name through languid flicks of his tongue and sharp little nips of skin that leave your mouth tender and swollen. When he pulls away to survey his handiwork, his eyes are dark. Fathomless.
"I never thought I'd get the chance to kiss you like this," he says, wicking his thumb over the pillow of your bottom lip. "You taste as good as I imagined."
Dragging your nails across his scalp, you plead, “No more teasing - I can't take it.”
"Well," he grunts, fingers twisting up in your dress, “If that’s how you feel, then you better put those hips to good use and work for it, sweetheart."
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part 2 dropping soon
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reiderwriter · 25 days
Note
hii I absolutely love your writing!! I was wondering if you could write a one shot with gun kink? maybe not really something *aggressive* but just gun kink in the plot !! and please smut with no angst, also maybe aftercare in the end? it's totally okay if you're not comfortable. im loving your kinktober one shots! have a good day :)
A/N: This being one of like... three gun kink requests I've received, we are all not seeing the pearly gates lmao. If you enjoy reading this, even 50% of how much I enjoyed writing it, then I'm happy 😚
Warnings: Undercover FBI Agent reader, gun kink, interrogation room sex, oral (f receiving), unprotected sex, creampie, some BDSM themes, Spencer has to 'rough up' the reader etc.
Masterlist
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Being rough-housed by a group of FBI agents and pushed against a wall before being handcuffed was never your idea of a fun Tuesday night. It wasn't exactly high on the list for any night of the week, really, but here you were. 
“Caitlyn Grant? You're under arrest for being an accessory to a felony and evading law enforcement, whatever you say…” You drowned out the rest of the statement. It was nothing you didn't have memorized. 
“You're not the usual drug crew, and you don't look sturdy enough to be on most of the other teams either. What part of the Bureau are you in?” You asked the lanky man currently pinning you to the wall as he made sure your handcuffs were aptly tight. 
“You have the right to an attorney, if you can't afford one-” 
“I waive my rights. It's not human trafficking. You wouldn't be working this case if you were human trafficking.” 
The man just stared at you in vague disapproval as you grinned back at him. His closeness meant you could see every detail of his face up close, the five o'clock shadow, the dark circles from lack of sleep. On most of the agents you'd encountered, it had the effect of making them look older, a little haggard, and depressed. On this man, it was honestly very hot. 
He started your pat down by spreading your legs, though honestly, if he'd asked nicely enough, you'd have done just that for him. You near enough told him just that as he reached the two pockets on the ass of your jeans. 
“Watch it, Agent, my bite is worse than my bark.” 
“Turn around.” 
You pouted at his solid resolve, wondering what it would take to get the man to crack a smile or even a frown. Something that wasn't just disinterest slapped on a face and called a day. 
You did as he asked, making sure your body pressed nicely up against his the entire way until your shoulders were resting on the wall and he was feeling along your waist. 
“Come on, what kind of weapon are you going to find there?”
“Standard protocol, please let me do my job.”
“Standard protocol is calling one of your female agents over here to maintain the boundary, Agent. This feels more like you're just trying to cop a feel.” 
Those words finally got a reaction. The subtle clench of the jaw as his hands tightened slightly on your waist had you suddenly regretting your decision to be put in handcuffs. Your hands should've been free to tuck the stray lock of hair that had fallen in his eyes behind his ear, free so your fingernails could trace a path down his face and neck and chest. 
His gaze landed on the simple silver chain you wore around your list and he delicately pulled it out of your shirt, careful not to touch you (and avoiding you even as you arched your back into him). 
With a quick tug, he pulled the necklace clean off your neck, not pausing to bother with the clasp at all. 
“Clever boy. I'll see you in the interrogation room, shall I?” He said nothing as the female agents you'd mentioned earlier stationed themselves on either side of you as you walked away. You didn't break eye contact until the doors to the police van closed behind you. 
Six months undercover on a case, and this was the first time you'd stepped foot in a police precinct since you'd ditched your real name and life. 
The interrogation rooms hadn't changed in that time, at least, still grey and depressing. Time felt void as you waited for company, and thankfully, you weren't waiting long.
“Agent Y/N, sorry about the arrest, we wanted to make it look as real as possible while pulling you out.” The woman who greeted you obviously held the authority, and while you wanted to respect that, the sight of the man trailing behind her actually caught her full attention. 
“Pleasure to meet you….?” You let the question hang open for both of them but kept your gaze fully focused on the man, who stood himself next to the door, keeping surprisingly quiet. 
“I'm Unit Chief Emily Prentiss, this is Doctor Spencer Reid, we're from the-” 
“Behavioural Analysis Unit, of course. I was close, you know, earlier. A face like yours wouldn't last five minutes in cartel land. I almost guessed cyber, but you looked a bit too bookish. Doctor Reid, hmm.” 
“This interview is taking place with Agent Prentiss. Please direct all your questions to her.”
“Oh shit, sorry, where are my manners. I didn't mean to disrespect you like that, Agent Prentiss. It's just been a long few months.”
The other woman just chuckled and shook her head, leafing through some documents to pass you over the information on the case they needed assistance on. 
“We think there's a serial killer in the drug ring you infiltrated,” the woman explained, passing over the files with the case details. You took a moment's breath before opening to the crime scene photos, steeling yourself for what you might encounter. 
“There are probably a lot of serials in the organization. It's a drug ring. What makes this one worse?” You said, just as you flipped the file open and answered your own question. 
“Shit- Okay, that's what makes this one worse. He can't be more than 15, right?” 
The answering grimace on the two agents' faces suggested you'd been generous in your estimate. “Okay, how can I help?” 
xxxxx 
A few hours passed in the interrogation room, and you'd walked them through all of your up to date information on your case and cover. The chair wasn't exactly comfortable, but you were glad to be finally seeing the light at the end of the tunnel. The interview was ending, and you could see an end to your undercover work swiftly following too with the BAU's assistance. 
You weren't looking forward to having to acclimatize back into the real world. You'd gone from pushing papers at a desk 9 hours a day to rubbing shoulders with drug dealers and junkies, a lot of whom were kids, young people like you who had no other options than the streets and crime. 
You made a mental note to give a few warnings to the younger kids on the streets to stay alert and then started getting back into character. 
“Thanks again for your help, Agent. We appreciate your time.” Prentiss nodded at you as she gathered the folders, getting ready to leave. 
Spencer Reid stood, too, stretching himself out as he rose from the chair, giving you quite the show as your eyes dragged from his face, down his chest and down further still as you appreciated the view. 
The last few hours had been strictly professional, and you'd enjoyed bouncing ideas off of him, running through theories. Now, trying to get back into your ‘lusty barmaid’ persona, you thought instead about how much you'd like to bounce on him yourself, possibly while running your hands through his hair. 
A girl could dream. 
“Hold on a second, I'm still in cover, I can't go back out there looking this pristine, it's too suspicious,” you said, the two agents turning back to you curiously. 
“What do you mean?” 
“Someone needs to throw me around a little. Rough housing, you know, a few bruises will do it.” 
Prentiss looked at you, caught halfway between impressed and amused. The good Doctor however seemed to darken slightly, covering his shock with a tensed jaw. 
“She's all yours, Spencer,” Wmily winked at the man, turning the door handle and beginning her exit.
“What? Why?” 
“I don't hit women.” 
“And I do? Emily, wha-” 
But the door to the interrogation room has already closed with a small cackle, and you're already being drawn closer to the man like a moth to a flame. 
Turning to face you, you see the shock of the situation on his face before he looks away in a flash, refusing to meet your eyes as he keeps himself close to the door. 
“Doctor Reid, I'm not actually a criminal, you know?” 
“I thought you wanted one of us to treat you like a criminal now.” 
“You make a good point, shall we begin?” 
He signed and rubbed his temples as you advanced, letting you get a little bit closer before holding his hands up in surrender. 
“Wait, wait, tell me first, what should we be doing?” 
You took a deep breath and expelled it, then took the time to think about it. 
You would need some visible marks of the FBI's unkindness - wrists red, a bruise or two on your knees, maybe, from falling. The problem was, you couldn't think about how to get the marks without driving yourself insane. 
There was a quick and easy way to get tender knees, an even easier way to mark up your neck and chest, but you couldn't figure out how to ask Spencer Reid to do those things without spreading your legs and letting him do whatever he wanted. You weren't sure you wouldn't do that eventually, anyway.
“Let's start with my wrists. You were too generous with the handcuffs earlier - just grab them really tight, pin me against the wall if it helps.”
He nodded and took a hesitant step towards you, thinking for a second, before grabbing one wrist and spinning you around. Before you could even process the action, he had you pinned, chest against the wall, arms above your head. 
“Is that okay?” He asked, his grip tight  but not bruising yet. 
“A little tighter, I want the marks to last a while. Why is my face against the wall?” 
He gripped tighter, the pain sending a jolt through your wrists that trailed all the way down to pool between your thighs. 
“I thought you'd be less uncomfortable like this.” 
“With your dick pushed up against my ass? Yes, Doctor, great decision.” 
He let out a cold, quick laugh, leaving you flushed as he pushed your upper body into the wall, too, finally getting to the grip strength he needed to get attention. 
“I'm sorry to disappoint, Y/N, but that's my gun,” the words whispered in your ear were the last straw as you shuddered in his grasp, his hands releasing your wrists as he stepped back a little. 
You shook out your hands a little, trying to momentarily relive the stiffness in your joints. 
He took a few paces to the desk and upholstered his weapon, placing it on the desk before joining you again. 
“So you don't get confused again,” he explained at seeing your raised eyebrow. 
“Oh so next time, it will be your dick?” You whispered, moving back to the desk and sitting yourself on the edge or it, picking up the gun and studying it for a few minutes. 
“Y/N, put it down.” 
“Ooh, possessive, are we?” You giggled, aiming it at him for a second before grabbing it by the barrel and holding it back out for him to grab. 
“Hold it, point it at me or whatever. Maybe it'll help you rough me up.” 
His brow furrowed, but he grabbed it anyway, not immediately slipping it into the holster as he stepped forward. 
“What now?” He asked, and you shrugged. 
“Whatever feels natural. And looks visible, I guess.”
It took him a few minutes to decide, surveying your body like it was a puzzle. Professionally, of course. You were about to speak up and urge him to get on with it when his hand shot out and wrapped around your throat. 
You tried to gasp, but the grip was firm, and boy, was it driving you crazy. Your legs had naturally parted as you sat yourself on the edge of the desk, and he walked into that space now, his free hand still holding the gun. 
Your body pushed forward into his, suddenly awash with arousal as your chest heaved with tiny breaths, lungs burning. 
“Are you enjoying this, Y/N? Or is it Caitlyn Grant that's enjoying this?” 
You felt the gun touch your thigh gently, and you moaned, just as he softened his grip on your throat. 
“Answer me, please. This is an interrogation room, after all.”
You met his eyes, checking to see how far he would take this, how far you could push back. 
“I'll admit, I'm not against mixing pain and pleasure.” 
His gaze flicked down, slowly pushing his gun up the skin of your thigh, raising your skirt with the barrel to catch a quick glimpse of your panties. 
“I can tell.” 
If it weren't for his grip on you, you'd have lunged for him right then and there. The cool metal against your thigh had you shuddering against him, growing wetter by the minute. 
“I read somewhere once that we can't pretend to be someone else without actually becoming them in some small way. You've been a cartel whore for six months, I wonder if this is a lasting effect.” 
He was so close now all he needed to do to close the gap was change the angle of his head, but he kept you in place with that gun, pointing up from your pussy, flush against your stomach. 
“I'll tell you a secret - the part of me that's aroused right now definitely predates this cover.” 
His lips drop to yours, tongue clashing with yours furiously as he grabs the back of your head to angle you better. 
Letting his hand drop back to your thigh, he gently coaxed you further open, skirt riding up. Putting down the gym momentarily, he pressed a wandering finger against your pantie-clad pussy, feeling your arousal before he used it to coat his fingers. 
A second later and the offending pair of underwear lay discarded on the floor. 
“Fuck, Spencer,” you said, gasping for breath as he again picked up the gun. 
“You wanted this so badly, didn't you? You've been needing someone to treat you like this for months now. It didn't even have to be me.” 
He traced circles on your thigh with the gun, and you twitched, years of training not letting you relax around the weapon and months of sexual frustration, making you desperate for something to touch you. 
“Yes, yes, please touch me.” 
The hand at your throat slid down to your chest and pushed gently  urging you to lie back and let him do whatever he wanted with you. The desk was cold - metal biting at your bare skin - and it only sent more shivers down your spine as he lowered himself to his knees and parted your legs for his tongue. 
The first touch was heaven, a state of bliss you'd been without in what felt like forever. His tongue danced across your folds as he tasted every inch of your exposed cunt, grip still strong on the gun pointed now to your chest, pinning you between the machine and the table. 
You tried to be as still as possible, to take the pleasure he gave calmly, but you couldn't. You writhed, moaned, chest heaving as you tried to hold off the first orgasm you'd achieved with someone else in probably a year.  
Like a man on a mission, Spencer Reid did not care. He gladly suffocated between your thighs as you squeezed them together, wrapping them around his head so you could keep feeling the insurmountable pleasure of his tongue on your pussy. 
“Spencer…Spencer, fuck-” you said as he finally pried your legs apart, lifting them just slightly so his tongue could reach further inside of you, curling with each wave of passion. Your hands fisted his hair, desperate for something to ground you to the moment as your pleasure spilt out of you, orgasm jolting through you in tiny sparks of pleasure. 
The gun moved first, coming level with your chest as you untangled your fingers from his hair. Spencer stood, wiping his face with the back of his hand as he kept the gun on you. 
“I think this turns you on even more. You've been ruined by this cover, Y/N, you're so used to being in danger that you can't even get off without someone threatening you.” 
You attempted to scoff, to brush off his words somehow, but his hand was suddenly back around your throat, picking you up off the desk and pulling you instead towards the room's one-way window. 
“Look at yourself,” he said, again twisting you around so you were pressed into the wall, wrists above your hair, raising your shirt to expose the cold skin underneath. He ran the barrel across the fresh skin, leaving a field of goosebumps along his path. 
“I don't think it would've mattered who came in to rough you up. I think you'd just as happily have convinced Emily to fuck your little pussy raw, right Y/N? As long as there was a gun…” 
Your moan was the only response as he used the weapon to spread your legs. You naturally arched your back and kept your hands in place as he holstered the weapon momentarily to unzip his pants and let his cock free. 
You couldn't see it, but you saw his reflection in the mirror as he slowly stretched you out with it, mouth dropping in a lustful ‘o’ as he fed his dick to you, hard and thick. 
As soon as it was in, the gun came back out, this time to rest against your temple. 
“Get yourself off,” his voice was so low it was practically a growl. “Use my cock, and pleasure yourself.” 
Your body listened immediately, beginning to move back and forth on his cock as he held himself in place. His moans and groans were all the encouragements you needed, the gun at your temple was just made the pleasure more profound as you approached your release. 
But he kept you pinned to the glass, your full range of motion limited, and you whimpered in frustration that you couldn't feel every inch of him. 
“If you need something, use your words, Agent.” 
“More, need more, please..please,” you gasped, breathing ragged. 
The hands at your wrists released, and he fisted a hand into the flesh at your hip, your wrists resting on the glass next to your face as he took over your thrusting. 
“Can't even do this anymore, what a spoiled little whore,” he said as his hips began snapping into you, reaching that spot deep inside you as you drooled against the glass, wondering if anyone had just happened to step into that room and what they must think about you. 
“Cum for me, Y/N. Cum on my cock,” he said it, and entranced, your body did just that, your orgasm taking the last breath of strength you had as he too plunged himself deeper and stilled there, his cum coating your walls. 
Neither of you moved for an eternity, but the first sign of clarity returning was the careful return of the gun to the holster. 
Pulling a handkerchief from his pocket, Spencer minimized the mess you made together, cleaning you up as he slipped out of you. Discarding it momentarily on the floor, he pulled your clothes back into position and led you back over to the chairs. Just as he moved to sit you down, though, you turned and wrapped your arms around his waist, pulling him into a hug. 
His arms hung suspended for a minute or two before he let them rest on your back, stroking your hair. 
“Sorry, it's been… it's been lonely, and I didn't realize how hard it had been until-” 
“It's okay. Take your time,” he said, sitting down in the chair and letting you curl up in his lap, burying your head in his neck
“We’ll catch this guy, and then you're out, okay Y/N? We'll come back and get you out soon.” 
Lifting your eyes to his, you nodded, pressing your lips to his with a smile as you again worked yourself back into character, regaining your earlier composure and lifting yourself from the man's too comfortable arms. 
“Well, Spencer, what do you say we get me back into panties and handcuffs and cut Caitlyn Grant loose?” 
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lenaellsi · 9 months
Text
on aziraphale's insecurities in S2
i'm pretty sure one of the lines in the end scene where crowley shoots himself in the foot the most is "i think i understand a whole lot better than you do," and i don't even think he realizes how badly aziraphale takes it.
it's just a fact to him: he knows better than aziraphale what heaven is like. it's also a fact to the audience, who knows that the metatron is doing this for bad reasons and that aziraphale is walking into a trap. but it's not a fact to aziraphale. and that's the moment aziraphale goes from panicky and anxious to angry.
aziraphale's self-doubts and anxieties concerning his identity as an angel are shown frequently in s2. we start 2x01 with him deeply insecure in his 'retirement': crowley mentions that aziraphale frequently calls him to "tell him about something clever he did," and aziraphale confirms that he is essentially using these conversations as a stand-in for reporting to heaven. he misses being on The Good Team and doesn't know what to do with himself now that he's not.
so aziraphale doesn't know who he is if he's not an angel, but he also knows that he's a bad angel. he was frequently mocked and condescended to in heaven (by seemingly everyone, not just the archangels; even the quartermaster in s1 called him pathetic). he lied to heaven, he lied to god, he enjoys earthly pleasures, he loves works with a demon, and he doubts the Plan. he never fit in with them. lonely, remember?
and later in the season, we learn that shax, for all that she apparently is not great with sarcasm, is remarkably perceptive when picking up on insecurities. she mocks aziraphale twice, first in the car for his relationship with crowley (which, interestingly, doesn't faze him a bit--remember the eyebrow? he's not at all insecure in his knowledge that crowley loves him. crowley has always been the thing he's most sure of, even very early on--look at how much faith he has in him with job.) the second time she hits much harder: "crowley's emotional support angel," "shall we send in the sushi?" "the softest touch" etc. it hurts him, you can see it.
and there's another tiny moment in 2x05 I don't think I've ever seen anyone talk about, where crowley has just bluffed to the demon horde and is trying to get all the humans together to leave. crowley says, "I won't leave you on your own," and aziraphale says, "I know. But I have a suggestion--" and crowley brushes him off, saying "I got this." aziraphale looks very frustrated by this exchange, which--yeah! fair!
and over and over, we just--we see crowley be right. right about job and god, right about elspeth, right about the magic trick, the nazis, the arrangement, the apocalypse. "you were right, you were right, i was wrong, you were right." crowley's never done the dance before, he says. how many times has aziraphale had to?
and crowley's not just right, he's confident in it! he moves through the world and makes choices that fly in the face of everything aziraphale knows about Good and Evil, and it seems to come so easily to him. he's loud, and he's brave, and he's full of conviction, and aziraphale often feels overshadowed by that surety, because he's so often full of doubt. "you sound jealous, angel," is what crowley says at job's mansion, and i think he's more right than he knows.
all this to say: when crowley says "I think I understand a whole lot better than you do," what aziraphale hears is you idiot and how can somebody as clever as you be so stupid and I was right, I was right, you were wrong, I was right. and he's fucking sick of it.
and so he doubles down, and he gets in the stupid elevator, and he makes the worst mistake of his life, because he's sick of being treated as heaven's lackey or crowley's sidekick. the metatron knew exactly what to say to get him there, and crowley had no idea he was playing directly into it.
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ravengards-rogue · 2 months
Text
the evening stretch | warm-up series.
ft. the prompts, nsfw / "dinner" / arthur morgan.
✧ tags : afab!reader + fem!reader outdoors sex, oral (f!recieving), reader is an outlaw, established relationship, desperate arthur morgan, 18+
✧ wc : 2.7k
✧ a/n : hello! this is part of a little warm-up series i do on my other blog where i pick three prompts and try to come up with something. i normally do them in a rut. im working on a commission and im super stuck so.
this actually landed on javier four times in a row but im being kind and sparing a friend so. here's mr. morgan.
✧ synopsis : arthur thinks the place between your legs would suit him quite nicely.
.𖥔 ݁ ˖˚☽˚。⋆
Honest to God, Arthur's never been like this before.
He ain't all that pious to start, so perhaps the sentiment doesn't stretch as far as he would like it too. But it's true, all the same - that in all the lives he's lived, he's never experienced this much bone-deep desire for another human being.
Which is outright ridiculous, since right now you're just making supper. Dinner, you always clarify with that yankee accent. You're going to have dinner together, 'cause Arthur needs to eat. He works hard, according to you.
It's not much, but you're a better cook than Pearson. Even if that's not saying a whole lot. And you're insistent on making the man eat, always on his case about how it's hardly enough for a man his size.
Arthur can chalk it up to being that you love him, as you have told him foolishly many times. He's sure you're not gonna be happy with him in a minute since again - all you're doing is making dinner.
It's just... something. Something about you today. Dammit, he doesn't understand it neither. You've got a job together, and you and Arthur play convincing husband and wife since you practically are anyway. Arthur's been watching you today closely. You lie pretty. Smile with all your teeth, clever with a careful finesse and an honest knack for debauchery and indecency.
You love calling yourself an awful woman. Joking about dying an unweddable spinster given your crudity.
But Arthur likes it in you. Of you. Likes it so much he's done nothing but readjust his pants watching you squirm your way out of every difficult situation and sling the revolver on your hip like a tried-and-true gunslinger.
You're a fine woman to him. A fine one.
The fire crackles as you place a pot over the little flame of the faux stove. You've made a real dinner somehow - with some vegetables and creeping thyme and carefully butchery of meat. It smells good and you seem proud of it, stirring the thing with the sharp end of your knife. Careful not to scrape the pot.
Arthur watches the light glow orange on your face, carefully observing the way it shines on you. You don't look up at all when you speak.
"Gonna stare a hole into me, Morgan."
He feels something warm crawl up his cheeks. He scratches his beard instinctively, tucking his hat over his eyes.
"'m sorry," He says, unsure of how to cover for himself. "Been thinking about some things."
"Don't hurt yourself," You reply, sardonic and dry. Arthur adores you. He laughs to himself and feels warmed by the pleasant smile that seems to give you.
"I'll try. Ain't much used to thinking,"
"Penny for your thoughts, then Mr. Morgan." You reply, carefully moving the pot around so nothing burns. "Might help you clear your mind if you get some of it off your chest."
He's backed himself into a wall. Goddamn him and his big mouth. He hesitates, taking it off this time. Fidgety.
"Yanno, there ain't a lot women like you. Not that I've met at least."
You give him a look. Your lips pressed into a flat line, unimpressed by him.
"Is that so?"
He laughs to himself. "It is indeed. You're a real piece of work. 'Specially going around batting your lashes, making yourself out to be a housewife."
"Aw what, did you like seeing me all doe eyed?" You smile to yourself, teasing but not entirely insincere. "If it helps, since you're the fake husband, I'm only half-acting."
That makes him grin. Though you say it with confidence, the sincerity it makes you flush.
"It ain't that," Arthur says again, looking at your face for the second time in a few minutes. "Just that you're a fine woman to be around. What do they call it...resourceful. That's what I'm thinking of."
"Who taught you such a big word, Morgan?"
"Trelawny, I'd guess."
You laugh, loud and beautiful and Arthur smiles. You look at him from across the fire. "Well, I'm glad you like my company, Mr. Morgan."
"I do more than like it," He hums, offering a reprieve. He nods at you carefully, head tilted. "Come 'ere,"
Your eyes widen at him, but you don't deny him of what he's asking. For that he is awfully grateful. You're more than capable and much less than needy. There's victory in your deliberate desire for him, Arthur thinks. You want him enough to let him chase you.
You come sit by Arthur. You're a little awkward with him still but he don't mind. It adds to whatever he feels for you, sugar-sweet affection and all. You sit on your knees and Arthur turns his head looking at you.
Beautiful. Beautiful thing you are, really. He has a hard time finding the words to tell you.
He reaches up, hand cupping your face. You lean into the touch, palm resting on calloused hand. He adores you.
"And quit with the Mister Morgan nonsense. Drives me crazy."
"Arthur," You say, slow and deliberate. "You know you're looking at me like you wanna eat me."
'"Read my mind, then."
"Arthur," You repeat, scandalized. He would smile if he wasn't so serious. "We're supposed to be eatin' dinner. You got into a whole spat with them Leymone Riders just today. You need to recover,"
His smile widens.
"Lettin' me go down on ya will heal me just fine,"
You look at him exasperated. Arthur leans into your neck, placing chaste kisses down the line of your jaw. He kisses you just there - underneath your earlobe, knows it drives you crazy.
"Lay down, sugar. Help a poor, injured man heal."
You pull away from him with faux exasperation, fond smiling breaking your face.
"You can be such a dog some times, do you know that?"
"I'm afraid I do,"
You give him another unimpressed look, but you listen anyways. Arthur moves so you can lay down on the bedroll - his bedroll. He takes off his coat just before you lay your head, playing it underneath you to get you more comfortable.
"Dinner's gonna burn," You tell him, almost reflexively. He laughs as he looks at you, your hands folded over your stomach and flat. He laughs at you.
"Burn? You feeling warm?"
"Arthur!"
And he laughs again, catching your boot in his hand as you go to kick his chest lightly. He sets it back down as he stares at you. You're quite the sight. Adoration bubbles up into his throat, blooms out into a hum. The sound of crickets and owls and all sorts of night wanderers sound - but none are distracting enough to pry his gaze away.
"You're looking too much," You say, your voice a half tremble. He nods.
"Got too," Arthur hums, leaning forward into your space. You always smell good to him, some cross between soft earth, and sweet liquor and clothes left in the sun. Skin and salt and sweet. "Who knows how long I'll be around."
He presses his lips to yours gentle and you kiss him - but only once before pulling away. Your eyes suddenly serious, warm palm on his cheek.
"Don't say something so morbid. If you go, I go,"
"Sweetheart—"
"No buts." You affirm, pressing your thumb to his lip all serious. Your eyes meet and for a moment - just one minute, all he wants to do is stop time from moving. From stealing him from you in life at all. Even a few seconds, intolerable. "Don't feel to good to hear, does it? So don't say it."
"Alright, alright," He huffs, laughing against your neck. He kisses it again, right against your pulse - quickening under his teeth as he bites and scrapes. He mulls over how much he wants you, and how little time there is to do everything. "Jus' lemme...I dunno."
Now you're cheeky, smiling up at him. Lord above, you do something so terrible to him. "Now that's just not true, baby."
He laughs deep and raspy. It's not true, because he knows exactly what he's after.
Arthur lets his hands plane over your clothed body. He doesn't bother with the ritual of undressing you entirely - since the act doesn't deserve the intimacy. You do, maybe - but Arthur's head feels too foggy to do anything civilized. He has to settle for letting his hands grip the fabric of your skirt and push it until it bunches around your waist.
There's no real delicacy in it, save for the way your breath hitches as Arthur gives himself better access. He moves to lay on his stomach between your thighs. He wishes it were brighter to give him better view. He's seen it plenty but looking at your pretty pussy alone gets him harder than steel.
His hands go underneath every layer of fabric to undo the little tie of your undergarments. You squirm when Arthur takes them off, but you don't pull away.
It's pretty. Even with the dim light of just the moon and fire to let Arthur see it. What entices him mostly though is the scent, after a long day of riding out alone - there's something about the way you smell - sweat and all that makes the back of his mouth ache with want. Makes his teeth hurt just dreaming about it.
He doesn't let his animalistic urges take him yet. He knows you need the build up. His hand is soft as he grips onto your waist. He pulls your legs further apart and lets his lips brush the inside of your thigh. Starts at your knee and works his way up, his mouth burning hot - open kisses. You giggle at the sensation of his beard, but it's tamped down with lust Arthur knows like the back of his hand.
Slow, deliberate, sinful. He knows the way you liked to be touched so exactly, but the pace is set more by his desperation. It grows ten sizes listening to you sigh and huff, feeling your hands come down to touch his hair and play with it.
"Arthur," Your voice calls. Pleading. Wanting him. You're so good at making Arthur loose his composure with so little. It's hard to tease you as your voice clips off into a whine. "Arthur,"
"I've got you," He says, assured. He means it as much as he means anything he's ever said. He ain't a decent man, but this much he can say full ways. "I've got you, sugar. Ease up. Let me take care of you,"
And so you again, breathless - boneless and eager. You let Arthur into your space, and something about that. Something about you. His heart races, blood pumping through his body. It pulses in his ears, head swimming with nothing but praise for you.
You're a fine woman. You're a good girl. The best he knows.
Arthur can feel the way your clit pulses with want before he ever puts his mouth on you. Makes him chuckle, gloved hand resting on your navel. He uses his thumb to pull it back, before using both hands to spread you open. Then, in an act less then gentlemanly, spits on it hard. He watches it land, lewd as it drips between your fold. He laughs to himself.
Another pitchy call of his name and Arthur decides he's had enough fun to get him through the evening.
He kisses your clit first, thinks it's only gentlemanly. When your hips buck up trying to chase the feeling of his mouth - he laughs. His hands dig into your hips. You're soft, skin dimpling from just how tight he holds onto you.
When he finally gets what he wants, his own body lurches forward from want. He nearly slumps into the ground - half-way between relieved and utterly addicted. It's a sense of euphoria unmatched by the finest liquor or cigars money can be.
The taste of you fills his mouth as Arthur eats.
Arthur is not used to playing predator. Not interested in the act of devouring. You often compare him to some sort of herbivore. But there's something too hungry, too visceral, too primal for him to be anything but a coyote. A teethed thing, all screwed up from hunger.
He lets his tongue slip against the seam of your cunt, all the arousal collecting in his mouth. His senses flood with something heady, sweet but bitter and he groans shamelessly as a result. Spoiled by the taste and utterly debauched.
"Oh, god - Arthur, you're—"
Arthur is pleased by the way your words are cut off by your own moan. He slides his tongue back up, wet muscle firm as it lays flat against your clit. There's a slight twitch like it's asking for more attention.
Arthur is all to eager vtoo provide, closing his lips around the twitching bundle of nerves. He knows what you like. Learned over time just the amount of pressure he needs to suck with and the speed he needs to draw his tongue over your clit to get you right at the very edge of your orgasm.
He teases you to that pace. Slow increases in either or, until it's just at that perfect medium. Once he hits that spot, you always moan so pretty.
You shudder, your body lurching up as your hands get tighter in his hair. "Aah, fuck. Ngh, Arthur. Don't do this t'me."
You begging him not too makes him want to do it more. If Arthur were any less aroused, he would. But his brain can barely think up enough to stamina to do that. His own cock is strained against his work pants - hips instinctively rutting into the bedroll just beneath him. Silently seeking friction all while hoping he doesn't get enough to distract him.
It'd be a damn shame, he thinks - letting anything pull him from the taste of your pussy. From the smell of it, from the sight of it, from the feeling of you. Sticky, pulsing strings of arousal coating his tongue and turning all his thoughts to dust.
His cock throbs again as you rut against his mouth. Arthur pins you in place.
"Please," You say. A magic word he ain't much stronger than. "Please make me cum,"
You really are a good girl, the way you know exactly what makes him tick. Arthur moans into your cunt as he sucks and licks and eats. He'd die over it, and he does not mean it lightly. It's the only thing in the world he wants to do in the moment. He laser focuses on finding that sweet spot again.
And he knows he does when you start whimpering. Squirming and holding onto his soft brown locks and pleading for something you don't know about. He can feel how wet your getting - dripping along down his beard and face. Thick strings of your arousal stick and slide down his neck.
He's never been a messy eater, but you've been disproving many of his prior understandings of himself. He supposes it's only natural.
"Oh, baby," You say, not even his name. Arthur knows it's a warning that you're gonna cum. All he can do is encourage you. He hums into your soft, wet cunt and you groan again. "Fuck, Arthur. I'm gonna cum."
Arthur knows better. He doesn't do a thing but keep going. Lets you move and thrash and pull away but keeps you firm in his place and eats your pussy until you can barely think.
He knows the knot is untying before you do because of how much you squirm. When you cum, you cum hard. Your back arches up into a picture perfect curve, toes curling and hands tugging at his roots for purchase.
He can feel every pulse of desire as you finally do let go. You cry out, loud enough to startle any nearby critters. Your fingers grip tight at the base of his hair as the orgasm washes over you. It's just as magnetic as it was the first time.
He's sure that will always be true.
When Arthur pulls away from your pulsing, wet core - he can feel just how much of his lower face is sticky. He's sure you also know, if the way you laugh is anything to go by.
And he's not long to follow after. Not even a few seconds and he can feel something in pants tighten - a mess of white staining the front of the denim in an onset of lust damn near shameful. Is he a teenager again? Lord above.
Breathlessly, you look down at him after you've ridden your high out.
Pulling up Arthur by the collar, you look at him slowly and frown. You look impassioned and a little frustrated.
You kiss him tender after you've come too. Once, then twice, then a another time with your hand still drawn into a fist. Arthur grabs it closed, opening your palms before kissing the palm of your hands until you're no longer mad.
"Hate how good you are at that," You admit, a little drunk of the euphoria of all of it. "Make me feel so crazy."
Arthur beams at you unapologetic.
"It's good to be that with me, sweetheart." Arthur says, kissing the corner of your mouth. "Now how about you go and give me one more?"
You laugh breathlessly but don't go to stop him at all.
"Insatiable man."
"Only for you, my girl."
.𖥔 ݁ ˖˚☽˚。⋆
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ineffablyruined · 8 months
Text
I want to talk about THAT smile. The one from the elevator. The one that scares us (or maybe just me).
This one:
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It's stayed with me since the first time I saw it. Michael Sheen is an absolute master of his face, so this sinister smile means something. I don't believe that it's a forced smile that he's pasting on before he enters Heaven. It looks absolutely malevolent.
And I just couldn't figure out WHY.
Aziraphale just left everything he loves behind: humans, food, bookshop, and Crowley. Crowley most of all. He was devastated after that kiss, devastated that Crowley wouldn't just come with him so they could be together. He was hurt, shattered, unsure of himself and his decision. So why the practically evil face?
I don't subscribe to the Coffee Theory. I think it takes too much away from the emotional and character development and everything the fandom went through in those last 10 minutes for Neil to pull the rug out from under us like that.
So if he's not drugged, then what's the face?
The Metatron just dropped a bomb on him. The Second Coming. Heaven's going to restart the apocalypse. End the Earth. The place where he'd just left the love of his life and everything he holds dear. Make everything they'd fought for absolutely meaningless.
And then I remembered this face:
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See how similar they are?
I've seen a lot of people put this down to a repeat body swap theory, but I don't buy that either. I think that would be less inspired than what we've come to expect from the brilliance of Neil's and Terry's minds.
I'm going on a bit of a tangent here for a second, but I promise it will make sense in a minute. When the demons were coming for them, Nina told Aziraphale that he shouldn't wait to be saved by Crowley, that he should come up with his own plans and save himself. And he did, but it wasn't a total plan. It was the beginnings of one. He held them off, but when his plan ran out of time, it put him and the two humans (except maybe not -> looking at you, Maggie) he's come to care about at risk. Then he had to do something reckless and probably stupid, and it worked, but it was too close.
Back to the matter at hand:
These two perfectly wonderful, complete f*cking morons have spent the last 4 years together. Probably daily. And do you know what happens when you spend so much time together?
You start picking up the other person's mannerisms, mirroring speech patterns and body language.
My theory:
Aziraphale spent that elevator ride coming up with a plan. He's come up with something that he thinks will be so clever, so unexpected of him (an angel), so Crowley-esque, that the Metatron will never see it coming. And he's not about to cock it up like he did in the bookshop, show up with only a half-baked plan.
No. He's got something positively diabolical. Something inspired by Crowley. So he makes the face that he's learned from spending four years in the daily company of the original owner of that expression. The only face he could possibly make when figuring out how to save the world and get back to his demon. And thinking about how much he can't wait to tell a Crowley how clever he's been.
That face is 6000 years of togetherness in the making.
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roosterr · 3 months
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i've known war
john 'soap' mactavish x gn!reader wc: 9.3k (whoops) summary: you're alive. he can get you back, he can hold you in his arms again. warnings: established relationship, angst and sadness and depression, hurt/comfort, canon typical violence, graphic description of injury, mentions of torture, eventual happy ending, military and medical inaccuracies, pls ignore any plot holes i beg
requested here! follow up to love you from afar, but can be read as a standalone. im so sorry this took me so long to write lmao.
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it always feels like the first time when you kiss him. even now, years down the line, the sparks, the warmth, the daze that you leave him in; he truly believes it will never get old.
the way you look, standing in the open doorway of the helicopter, silhouetted against the bright blue sky, it makes his head feel so fuzzy he almost forgets why you're all here in the first place.
it's the sweet sound of his name passing your lips that pulls him back to the present, your voice sending his stomach fluttering.
"earth to johnny," you chuckle, turning to face him and resting your weight against one side of the open door, "what're you thinking so hard about?"
he can't help the smile that breaks out at the sound of your laughter. "just you." johnny replies, closing the small distance between you and snaking an arm around your waist. you smile as he leans in closer, murmuring low in your ear, "and, how i cannae wait to get ye home."
you laugh again, placing a hand on his chest but not quite pushing him back. "we've got a job to do first."
he takes your hand in his, running his thumb over your knuckles. "then we'd better get a move on, eh?"
"i'll race you," you grin at him, haloed by the light of the sun so beautifully he has to snap himself out of his reverence to respond.
"oh, you're on." 
perhaps it was slightly irresponsible the way he was rushing the others along for his own gain, but within a matter of minutes they're breaching the facility and well on their way to being done with this.
it's only when he's stalking along a dimly lit corridor that he slows down. something was bothering him, an off feeling in the back of his mind that he just can't ignore.
before he can think about it any further, a boom shakes the walls, filling the air with dust and obscuring his vision even more. it was close enough to start a faint ringing in his ears, coming from back the way he came; where he'd split up with ghost and, more importantly, you.
he should stay on target, continue with what they're here to do, his job – but what if you were in trouble? if there's a chance you need his help, he couldn't risk it. it takes less than a second for him to turn back, making the decision to check on what caused the explosion before continuing.
quietly stalking back down the corridor, it takes him slightly longer to register the fact that he hasn't heard anything over the radio; no updates, no clever remarks from ghost, nothing. they worked not fifteen minutes ago, just after you'd split up and checked them. surely nothing could've happened in such a short space of time?
he does his best to push through the sinking feeling that tries to drag him down, but it's stubborn, creeping in from the corners of his mind.
he reaches where he left you in half the time it took him to walk away, the intersection of two corridors just as empty as the rest of the halls. he points his flashlight in the direction you went, and the feeling in his gut gets worse.
something glinting in the light catches his attention. the end of the corridor is collapsed, when it definitely hadn't been before, but it's what lies in front of the rubble that he zeroes in on. partially obscured by the layer of filth and blood coating it, there's no mistaking it when he kneels down, dropping his rifle to the ground beside him, and carefully takes the metal in his trembling hand.
it's a pair of id tags.
he numbly calls your name. it bounces off the walls and echoes back to him. the blood runs through the creases of his hand, staining the flesh. the letters of your name are clear through the dirt.
no. you can't be gone.
he looks up to the rubble, shrouded in darkness, back down to your tags, back up to the rubble, and there's a hand just visible under the concrete that looks sickeningly like yours and–
he tears his gaze away, back down to your tags. the chain is snapped, like it had been ripped off in a hurry, as if you'd known you were going to die and wanted to make sure he would find them–
no, no no. you're not dead. you can't be. he just saw you fifteen minutes ago, he bumped his helmet against yours in lieu of a kiss like he always did before you parted ways. you were fine and you were smiling at him. it was only fifteen minutes, you were right here, he can still hear your voice taunting him about the race between you, it was only fifteen minutes–
a heavy hand comes down on johnny's shoulder, startling him out of his panicked daze and instinctively he jumps up and swings his arm at whoever stuck up on him.
ghost catches his forearm easily, his eyes moving between your tags clutched in johnny's fist to the wreckage behind him. when he meets johnny's watery eyes again, the coldness in his gaze seems to soften as he arrives at the same conclusion.
the ringing in johnny's ears hasn't left. in fact, it's gotten worse.
"we– we gotta find 'em," johnny's breath comes out shallow and ragged, the panic slowly rising in his chest through the initial numbness. "fucks sake, they cannae– we– we–"
"johnny." ghost interrupts his sputtering short, bracing both hands on his biceps and giving him a gentle, grounding shake. "...come on."
"no! simon we–" his breath catches in his throat, heart constricting painfully beneath his sternum as he grips the front of ghost's vest in desperation. why was ghost giving up so easily? didn't he care? didn't he want to find you?
ghost lowers his gaze, tearing away from the distraught expression on the sergeant's face. "they're gone, soap."
"shut the fuck up!" johnny growls, despair seeping into his voice with every second that passes without you. he tries to shake ghost's hands off, but he doesn't budge. "ye dinnae ken that! they're still here somewhere, we cannae leave without 'em!"
he's gripping your tags like a lifeline, the metal searing against his palm and heavier than anything else he'd ever carried. he shouldn't have them, they shouldn't be in his hand, they should be around your neck, you should be here, with him, and not…
it's too much. his knees give out from under him and, despite ghost's firm grip on his shoulders, he sinks to the floor with his head in his hands.
"simon, fuck– please…" it's a whisper, under his breath, but he knows ghost heard from how he crouches down beside him, laying an arm over his heaving shoulders as he steadily begins to sob.
it's not real. it can't be real. he wants this to be a nightmare so fucking badly, but the pain in his chest is far too real, his tears burning tracks down his face, the weight of your absence pressing down on him and crushing him under the pressure.
he barely notices when price and gaz appear in the hall ahead of them, just about registering the sound of the debris crunching under their boots as they approach. the pair don't say anything as they take in the scene, looking down with furrowed brows at where johnny and ghost are crouched on the floor.
the captain opens his mouth to ask, but ghost cuts him of with a solemn shake of his head.
words are exchanged, but johnny doesn't hear them. his head feels impossibly light, an expanding pressure beneath his temples that makes it hard to think. the ringing keeps getting worse.
the sound of gunfire makes it through the fog. gaz and ghost each take one of his arms, hauling him to his feet and essentially dragging him after the captain as they make their way back out of the building. he can't bring himself to fight them. he blinks, and finds himself strapped into his seat, the one next to him hauntingly empty.
price is talking into the radio, to laswell he assumes, but johnny doesn't register anything he says – anything except the last two words:
"...one k.i.a."
the air is thick with a kind of tension he's never felt before, a shroud of numbness that he can't seem to shake. when they land it follows them, seeping into the air on base and pushing down on whoever crosses their path. none of them have to ask to understand what happened.
johnny keeps your tags, clutches them close to his heart, and practically bites the head off of anyone who tries to take them from his white-knuckled grip, even as he gets checked out in the medical wing. his quietness puts the medics on edge, he can tell. something about the way he doesn't even flinch when they cleanse his wounds, the polar opposite to his his usual talkative nature, it tells them there's no use trying to console him. they try to convince him to let the tags go, but he doesn't acknowledge their words.
the broken chain stays firmly wrapped around his palm until he's staring down his own hollow face in the bathroom mirror. he'd turned the sink on fifteen minutes ago to wash the blood away, the water so hot it fogs up his reflection, but he can't bring himself to put his hands under the stream.
because it's your blood, not just the usual grime from missions. if he washes it off, he's washing you off, and he doesn't want to do that, no matter how disgusting it is.
there's a knock at the door, and only then does he realise how long he's been staring at the red that decorates his hands. he still makes no effort to move. 
despite his lack of response, gaz opens the door and meets his eyes in the mirror. there's a pause as he waits for johnny to say something, but when he only lets the silence go on, he takes it upon himself to approach.
"soap…" he utters, brows tilting in concern watching his friend continue to stare absently into the mirror. with a deep sigh, kyle takes his empty fist and pries his fingers from his palm. johnny's eyes gravitate to the fresh blood that wells up in the crescent indents. watching the red droplets fall, disappearing into the running water, the pain finally registering in his mind when kyle presses a cloth to his hand.
the sting of the hot water is there, a distant feeling as johnny allows him to wash the blood away, never saying a word as he watches kyle's efforts, like an observer of his own form, right there but looking in from the outside.
kyle reaches for your tags, but his fingers barely brush the metal before johnny is shoving him back with a rush of anger that happens so fast he doesn't even have time to process his own reaction.
with a thud, kyle's back hits the wall and for a moment neither of them dare move. they watch each other in silence, wide-eyed shock mirrored in both their expressions.
"i…" i'm sorry. the words catch in his chest, falling into the void there and never escaping for gaz to hear. he can't let him touch your tags. it's the only part of you he has left. "...don't touch 'em."
kyle squeezes his eyes shut, breathing a deep sigh through his nose. "alright, i'm sorry, i won't touch them." his tone is low and careful as he steps closer again, hands open so johnny can see them. he feels like a feral animal, being coaxed to let kyle approach. "but you need to rest, mate."
the weeks blend together after that day. some days johnny feels like the shock will never wear off, like he's living on autopilot. others, it all comes crashing down on him and even dragging himself out of bed becomes a challenge.
his dreams are plagued with images of you, lifeless and cold. it stops him from sleeping most nights, but others are filled with memories of your life together playing on loop, a constant reminder of what he can never have again.
the room you used to share is always filled with flowers; gardenias, gladioli, forget-me-nots, and anything else he sees that he thinks you'd like. when they wilt, and eventually die, he presses the petals in the pages of his sketchbook, keeping them in a box next to the very first flowers he ever got you, the memories preserved forever under your – his bed.
that same sketchbook that's filled with page after page of your image, some from the multitude of pictures he keeps of you, and when he inevitably runs out of references, he draws you from memory. it gets to the point where he can't pick up a pencil without your face haunting him; you always did love his art, even if he didn't think it was any good.
he knows he's not the only one taking it hard. the others are different too; gaz is quieter, something more serious in his eyes now. the captain doesn't appear moved on the surface, and neither does ghost, but when they look at the empty seat where you used to sit, the memory of you is evident in the way their shoulders deflate ever so slightly.
once word spreads about what exactly happened, the never-ending condolences and pitying looks from the people around base gets old very quickly. they tell him how they're so sorry for his loss and what happened to you was so tragic, and it shouldn't annoy him as much as it does, but he can't help the anger that bubbles up in his chest when they talk about you.
he doesn't want to hear it, and every time he has to listen to their pitying comments it only makes him resent them more. they didn't know you, they didn’t care, they probably didn't even know who you were before you died. they could never hope to understand what you meant to him, to the taskforce, the gap in their team that you left behind.
it's when someone suggests moving on from you that it all finally bubbles over.
six months later, a long time since that day but somehow no time at all. he'd gone out for drinks for the first time in a while, after some gentle coercion from simon, along with another group of soldiers staying on base.
he didn't even want to go, not really, but something in him knew he couldn't carry on like he had been. he needed some form of normalcy, one night where he can pretend everything is fine and you're just waiting for him back home, to just forget.
it didn't take him long to realise going out with them was a mistake. almost immediately he was dragged into a conversation with a few guys from another unit, and despite his many attempts they just wouldn't leave him be.
somehow, after about an hour of mindless chatter, they land on the topic of their love lives and recent conquests, and johnny immediately felt the hair on the back of his neck stand up. he wanted to slip away, avoid what he knew was coming at any cost, but he couldn't get away fast enough.
one of them brings up your name, they all look to him with a sort of curiosity that makes his skin crawl. they ask him if he's planning on staying hung up on you forever. johnny says it's only been six months. one of them laughs and tells him it's just sad, and from the looks of it you weren't anything special.
johnny smashes a glass over his head. price benches him for a few weeks after that.
it's hell, being left behind, alone, while the others went on like usual, and truthfully he starts to resent them all, bit by bit from the first time he's left on the tarmac. it felt like they didn't care, that johnny's heart, his life, his soul has changed but they carried on without looking back once. he isolates and shuts them out in a fit of misplaced anger, building the walls around his heart higher and higher and letting that resentment fester.
the day of your funeral brings it all crashing down. after all those months of waiting, johnny didn't even make it more than five lines into the speech he'd prepared before he's breaking down and stumbling out the side door in a hyperventilating mess. simon follows behind like his shadow, sitting down with him when he slides down the wall with a hand clutching his chest. he cries into simon's shoulder for rest of the service, releasing all the pent up anguish he'd been trying to keep inside in a catharsis he didn't realise he needed. 
when they get back to base the next morning, johnny’s practically begging to be allowed back in the field. he found himself missing the chaos, the unpredictability of the battlefield was where he was in his element. this job was how you met, how you got together, how you lived. he never felt closer to you than when he was out in the field with adrenaline pumping through his veins.
it takes some convincing, but price gives in and everything feels like it's back to normal. missions are quieter than they'd ever been, but johnny finds it doesn't bother him anymore. he feels your presence by his side like the sun on his back, always with him, like his guardian angel.
it's six more months before anything changes.
in the back of the helicopter, a few minutes out from the landing site, an oddly comforting sense of déjà vu washes over him. the bright blue expanse of the sky, the warmth of the sun on his skin, he almost feels that if he turned to his left, he'd see you sitting there with that same smile lighting up your face.
his fingers tighten around your tags.
"you watchin', bonnie?" he presses his lips to the cool metal, feeling your name under his skin as he mumbles to himself. his gaze finds the roof of the helicopter, and even without looking he knows the others are watching him, that familiar solemn look on their faces.
they were doing this for you. everything johnny did was for you. he puts your tags safely away in the pocket if his vest closest to his heart.
the helicopter jolts as it lands, and with no more than a second's hesitation he's shooting up from his seat, a renewed energy flooding his body to the tips of his fingers. they step out into the biting air, a chill than not even the afternoon sun could stave off, and quickly begin their march into the small facility.
"you two, take that side. gaz, with me." price commands, and with a sharp nod from the three of them, they split up and begin their canvassing. they were here for intel, but there was no guarantee they were alone, despite the emptiness of the halls they move through.
their footsteps echo off the walls, only the distant howling of the wind outside to accompany them. the hairs on the back of johnny's neck were on end, an unease setting off alarm bells in the back of his mind following behind ghost.
the déjà vu from earlier isn't comforting anymore. he doesn't feel you watching over him, and the feeling only gets stronger as they approach a doorway ahead, bathed in a red light.
ghost pauses in the entrance, looking back at johnny and waiting for his affirming nod before pushing forward. the room is empty, the same as the rest of the building, save for the table sitting against the far wall.
there's something else there, he notices as he creeps closer to get a better look. a frown darkens his expression. it's a laptop, untouched and central on the table, a strange contrast to the almost methodical emptiness around it.
"oi, check this." johnny calls, turning around as ghost stalks over with a similar confusion on his face.
"that what we're here for?" he asks, examining the laptop with a deep frown casting shadow over his eyes.
"looks like it." johnny replies, slowly and carefully picking it up as his frown deepens. he was half expecting it to somehow blow up, but when he lifts the screen it lights up to the desktop with no issue. "that's convenient."
"very convenient..." ghost grunts, jerking his head in the direction of the door and speaking into the radio as he walks ahead of johnny. "price, we've got it. headin' to exfil now."
back on base a few hours later, the four of them with the addition of laswell sit around the table in a meeting room with the doors firmly shut, eyes locked onto the laptop with rapt tension as gaz opens the only file they could recover from the device.
the video starts abruptly with 'the mask' – the pretentious alias of man that heads the organisation they've been steadily eliminating all this time – in front of the camera, the dingy room behind him barely lit, the walls splattered with what johnny could only assume was blood.
"i trust that my message has found you well, task force one-four-one." his voice comes through the speakers, crackly and distorted by the low quality recording. "you have been relentless in your pursuit of us, and i applaud you for your efforts, but it's time to put an end to this."
johnny looks back at price, watching as his expression hardens and his fingers dig into his arms where they're crossed over his chest. it's obvious they've been set up, but it's too late to be concerned with that now. the problem now is how they're going to continue knowing the enemy has information on them that they shouldn't have.
the sound of something being dragged brings his attention back to the video, facing the screen again to see another masked man dumping a person with a bag over their head onto a chair in the centre of the room.
"i have something i believe you will be interested in." the chuckle is audible in his voice even beneath the mask and through the screen.
their wrists and ankles are tied together, and if it weren't for the laboured rise and fall of their chest, johnny wouldn't be sure if they were even alive.
"fuck– a hostage?" price spits, and even without looking he knows laswell is already working on finding a location, if the sound of her rapidly typing is any indication.
"something very… precious to you."
the figure moves to stand behind the person in the chair and yanks the bag from their head. he grabs their jaw and forces them to look up, a sickening laugh meeting johnny's ears as they make eye contact with the camera. 
it's…
it's you.
you're beaten and bruised and covered head to toe in blood, but it's undoubtedly you when the faceless man yanks your head up.
johnny's sure his heart stops.
you're alive. you've been alive all this time. in the hands of a terrorist, and within an inch of your life, but…
you're alive.
"drop your investigation of us, and i will let them live." the masked man stalks back around to your side, still holding your jaw in a vice grip. the way you cower, as much as you can with that man's filthy hands on you, it breaks something in johnny. how long have you been in their hands, how long have you been abused by them?
how long have you been waiting for him?
he feels sick to his stomach, but he can't tear his eyes away. the lacerations on your face, the endless bruises littering your skin – when he spots the ones around your neck, he has to swallow down the bile – and how you just seem so tired, barely even fighting to keep your eyes open.
the masked man looks down to you again, pausing as he directs you to look at him through what seems like a black eye. the five of them watch, frozen by shock or anger or both, as the man rears his hand back and slaps you across the face so hard your head whips in the other direction. a pained, defeated sound escapes you, and johnny’s sure a knife to the chest would hurt less.
"do not disappoint me, captain price, or your sergeant will regret it."
the video cuts to black.
the sight of your face is burned into johnny's retinas, every time he blinks your features are there, dripping in your own blood, the only thing he can see.
"kate, tell me you can find this." price growls behind him, his words sounding distant to johnny's ears.
she hums distractedly. "working on it."
their conversation doesn't register, floating in one ear and straight out the other. you're alive. he can get you back, he can hold you in his arms again. it's like his prayers have been answered for once in his life, and it may be some cruel trick from god to find you like this but johnny finds himself praying his thanks anyway.
"johnny…?" simon lays a hand on his shoulder, turning him in his chair to make worried eye contact with his shell-shocked expression. it jolts him out of his thoughts, the energy of the room a controlled kind of frantic as he comes back down to earth.
"that's– it's them, they're–" johnny sputters, gripping ghost's forearm with an absent desperation in his glassy eyes, "simon, they're alive."
he can't stop thinking about how empty your expression looked, the way you didn't have any fight left, and the gravity of what's been happening to you since the moment he lost you slowly creeps up on him.
have you given up hope of them finding you?
"we'll get 'em back, soap, listen to me," price drops a heavy, grounding hand on his other shoulder, halting his spiralling train of thought, "they're comin' home." his voice is resolute, no room for argument where he speaks it almost like a command.
johnny can only nod. 
his head is still light as more rushed conversation happens around him. simon's hand is still on his shoulder, and that might be the only reason he hasn't completely fallen apart yet, but the thread is pulling taught enough to snap. his nails carve dents into his palms but he doesn't have the mind to unfurl them.
"sir, we've got a hit." gaz speaks up from where he's leaned over kate's shoulder, a determined glint in his eye when he meets the captain's gaze. johnny’s head snaps in his direction, his pulse quickening with every word that sparks new hope in his chest. "two hundred klicks northeast of where we found the laptop."
"good work, you two," price is pacing back and forth, scratching his beard with a calculating look on his face. they watch him for a moment, waiting for his command on what their next move will be, but johnny finds his patience wearing incredibly thin.
"the fuck we waitin' for? let's get out there'n go after the wee bastards!" he growls, his narrowed gaze darting between price and the others as he steadily grows more and more restless.
simon shakes his head from beside him, "hold your horses."
"this is delicate, we have to do this one right." price pauses, his eyes losing their hardness as he meets johnny's desperate face. "i know how much this means to you, but you're too close to this, soap."
the pause that follows that is so thick with tension it makes it hard to breath. a boiling type of rage bubbles up in his chest, extending to every trembling limb and turning his vision red. there was no way in hell he wasn't going to be there for you every step of the way when – not if – they rescued you.
"ye can get yersel' right tae fuck!" he spits, his face contorted with anger as he shoots up from his chair and points an accusatory finger at the captain. "that's too far, price, ye cannae keep me outta this!"
"johnny, sit down." simon warns, using the hand still on his shoulder to put some space between him and price, but johnny doesn't budge; this was far too important.
"yer aff yer heid, both of ye's! if ye won't let me come, i'll go mysel', ye fuckin' hear?" he growls, shaking free of simon's hand. his glare travels between him and price, hands wound into fists at his sides.
the air turns heavy as they stare each other down. if price thinks he'll back down on this, johnny would love nothing more than to prove him wrong.
he's moments away from meeting his fist to price's face when gaz stands up and gets between them. "that's his other half, sir. respectfully, he deserves to be part of this." he reasons, giving price a firm look and a small nod to johnny. "you'd be the same in his position."
the tension is palpable. he watches  over gaz's shoulder as the captain deliberates, clearly having an internal battle over the decision, but eventually he sighs and fixes johnny with a stern look.
price closes the distance between them, patting gaz on the arm as he passes. "screw your head on, mactavish. we only get one shot at this, i need to know i can trust you not to fuck it up."
a spark of hope makes johnny's heart race, and he gives price a single resolute nod of confirmation. "i won't, sir."
laswell stands and walks around the table to stand beside price, a similarly firm expression. "we have to play this carefully. they wanted us to find that laptop, i have no doubt they wanted us to find where they are too."
"so what's our angle?" gaz asks.
laswell and price share a look.
"this has to be off the books, there's no way we'll get clearance for this." laswell answers, her expression turning noticeably darker, looking over to price as she continues, "if we want them back alive, we'll have to act fast. that means we're on our own."
the captain nods with no hesitation. "we are getting my sergeant back. i don't care how we have to do it."
they're loading into the back of a helo not even an hour later. the five of them, along with two field medics and the pilot, with the strict instructions in johnny's head to bring you home or to not come back at all.
there's only one coherent thought racing through his mind for the entire; you. getting you back, taking you home, finding the man that took you away from him – and hurt you – and making him pay.
he fishes your tags out of his pocket and presses them to his lips in a lingering kiss, just like he always does. soon, he thinks, it would be you he'd be kissing, not just a remnant of you.
the flight passes by so quickly it's almost as if he'd blinked and they were landing again.
the air is glacial as they ready themselves, preparing for the mask to put up a fight that they fully intend to win. the plan was decided on during the journey; kate and ghost would provide support from a distance while price, gaz, and johnny would confront the bastard head on. his focus is razor sharp, marching through the trees and underbrush, blood rushing in his ears and jaw clenched painfully tight.
the sky is just as strikingly blue as the day he lost you.
bring you home, or don't come back.
they reach a break in the trees, surrounding the small facility they tracked the video to that looked more like a derelict warehouse than a base. either way, the dark figure of their target is visible against the brick wall, surrounded by a number of his own soldiers – johnny counts six as he, price, and gaz make themselves known coming through the treeline. they share a quick look; they know how this will end.
"well met, captain," the mask calls, slowing to a stop and leaving a few metres of space between himself and the three of them, "will you make the right choice, or will your sergeant suffer for your pride, i wond–"
his monologue is cut short by a shot from the darkness of the treeline and lodging mercilessly into the base of his throat. his deadweight hits the ground with a thud that echoes, and in less than a second bullets are flying.
soap tightens his grip on his gun, raising it to glare down the sights and firing at the soldier nearest to him and dropping him with one well placed bullet to the leg and another to the face once he was on the floor.
another shot from the treeline drops one more; four left.
gaz and price take out another two between them in a similar fashion to soap, leaving two still standing – one of whom was advancing fast with the barrel of his gun pointed at soap while the other backed away.
one more shot rings out from the trees and one more body falls, but the last hostile was far too close for comfort now, johnny had no choice but to tackle him to the ground, narrowly avoiding being shot himself on the way down.
a few seconds pass as they wrestle on the ground, both trying desperately to gain the upper hand but falling just short because of the other. from his peripheral soap can see price running to his aid, but his momentary distraction allowed his assailant to take the upper hand and roll on top of him.
hands constrict around his neck, cutting off his airflow, but a well timed shot from price sends him falling over sideways, sputtering blood from the wound in his side.
soap heaves and cough, pulling air back into his lungs and glaring at the body of the man who almost got the better of him. this only meant they were one step closer to getting you back; he was one step closer to having you in his arms again. it didn't matter if he got hurt in the process.
price's outstretched hand suddenly appears in his vision, "get up soap, we've got a job to do."
his daze melts away and he takes the captain's hand, allowing himself to be pulled upright with an affirming nod shared between them.
"good aim, ma'am." gaz calls over the radio, looking down his nose at the steadily declining state of the mask; his infamous facade now cracked and broken, revealing the agonised face beneath.
"bring 'em home, boys." kate replies, and though he can't see her face johnny can imagine the commanding look she's undoubtedly wearing.
gaz backs away as johnny crosses the mess of crimson and dirt to where the mask lays, sprawled out and immobilised by his injuries but still very much alive, giving the fellow sergeant a respectful nod as he goes. "he's all yours, mate."
johnny stands over his fading form, watching with a detached look in his eye as the blood spills from the gaping wound in his neck with every struggled breath, his disjointed intake of air and the pathetic sputters as he inhales his own viscera. there's not a shred of mercy in him as he gazes down at the man, every bit of agony was completely deserved for what he did to you. the death that claws at him would be a blessing.
he gurgles to johnny, raising a weak arm to brush the hem of his trousers as he attempts to expel the words, "pl–ea– plea-se–"
johnny scoffs, dry and venomous. he has half a mind to leave him to suffer until the life finally bleeds from him, but the pure rage he feels listening to this bastard plead for help after putting you through hell for a year is far too strong for him to restrain.
it's unconscious, the way johnny's arm raises to point the barrel of his pistol squarely at the centre of his forehead. he pauses for a moment, if only to see the fear creep into the bastard's expression before his fingers squeeze the trigger and the light is gone from his eyes.
his chest stops heaving and his hand drops back to the mud,  leaving nothing but a few bloody fingerprints in his wake.
johnny pulls the trigger again.
and again, and again, and again, until his face is nothing more than a cavity of gore and lead and the ringing in his ears blocks out everything else around him.
a firm hand comes down on his shoulder and it’s only then does he notice the tension in his muscles and the fierce sneer pulling at his features. his eyes snap to the dark figure in the corner of his vision, meeting the bone white of simon's mask and the frown underneath.
"that'll do, johnny." simon murmurs, his own darkened eyes glaring down at the mangled corpse laying at their feet. he nods, somewhat absently, and turns away from the offending body.
there were more important things he needed to keep his head on straight for.
neither him or simon spare the remains of the mask another glance as they leave him behind. price and gaz are waiting by the entrance for them, and as soon as they're close enough they head together into the dark corridors of the building.
as the creep through the abandoned building, now deep in the cold basement, weapons poised and on high alert, there's a new sense of dread that forms in the back of his mind; what if you're not here after all? what if the mask was bluffing and you're already dead?
johnny grits his teeth and shakes his head to rid himself of that damning train of thought. he couldn't afford to think like that, he wouldn't, but another corridor of empty rooms has his heart sinking like an anchor to his stomach. he's trying to stay hopeful, but every dead end only makes him feel worse.
price grips his shoulder, firm and comforting, with a look in his eye to match as he catches johnny's gaze. "we'll find 'em, soap." 
"i know." he replies, but there's a waver in his voice despite the certainty of his words. price doesn't release his gaze or his shoulder until he moves to follow the others.
he doesn't say much else as the search continues. the ringing in his ears is back, amplified by the eerie silence of the halls. he can feel the air getting colder after each empty room the clear.
the time passes arbitrarily, until there's one last room to check. johnny watches gaz and ghost pry it open, the sound of the lock breaking only just reaching him through the fog over his senses.
gaz pauses once the door swings open, his eyes locked onto something in the room as they widen dramatically. he still doesn't tear his gaze away as his jaw falls open, something frantic in the way he yells, "soap!"
a spark of hope strikes his heart and travels to the very ends of his limbs, a new burst of energy filling him as he shoves past his teammates to stand in the doorway and look into the room himself.
it's you.
curled into yourself in the corner of the damp cell, shivering with your face buried in your knees with your hands clamped over your ears. it's almost uncanny, how small you look. the tremble in your limbs, the fear in your quickened breaths, it was the exact opposite of how you should be, but despite it all…
it's really you.
johnny feels his heart swell painfully with relief, and without another second of hesitation he's skidding to his knees beside you and gripping the cold skin of your wrists. you let out a muffled sob at the contact, and johnny feels his blood turn cold when it meets his ears.
"don't!" you cry, weak and desperate. johnny's caught off guard with how you try to rip yourself away from him, the shakes that wrack your body only increasing when he keeps his hold on you. "get off! please– please don't!"
his heart cracks anew at the distress in your hoarse voice. he feels his eyes well up with hot tears that he has to fight to keep from falling.
"hey, it's me! it's johnny, it's your johnny! look at me, sweetheart, i'm here!" he tries to calm you with his words, keeping his voice low between you both, but you keep your eyes screwed tightly shut.
johnny lets go of your wrists to cup your face in his hands instead, gently turning your head towards him and using his thumbs to stroke soft shapes into your cheeks. the gesture makes your breath hitch audibly, and your eyes slowly open to meet his. "that's it, I'm here, i got ye, yer alright."
"don't– i don't– i can't…" whatever you're trying to say is broken up by the effort it takes you to keep breathing through your sobs. you still try to lean away from his touch, but johnny doesn't let you move far. he has to bite the inside of his cheek to hold back his own breakdown.
"no-one's gonna hurt you again, darlin', i promise ye." he murmurs, searching your glassy eyes while he continues to smooth his thumbs over the skin of your face, wet with your tears. "c'mere, i've got ye…"
with little more resistance from you, johnny gathers you into his arms and presses you close to his chest, they way he'd been dreaming off all the time you'd been apart. he pays no mind to the way the hard ground digs into his knees, and instead focuses on feeling the rise and fall of your ribcage against his own, your heartbeat under his fingertips, and the very real sound of your voice.
"you– j-johnny…" you stutter, your hiccuping sobs gradually fading away as you grip the bulk of his vest like a lifeline. "are you… real?"
"i'm real, darlin'," his voice cracks despite his efforts to stay strong for you. he presses his lips to the tip of your head in a lingering kiss, partly so you won't see the glossy tears in his eyes as he tries to stamp them down. "i'm here. i swear, i'm never lettin' you out of my sight again."
the simple feeling of your weight leaning against him is so overwhelming he's worried he might faint. he lets you calm down, rubbing soothing patterns up and down your arms and back and wherever he can reach, even when the position becomes uncomfortable and the dampness from the floor has seeped into his bones.
eventually though, he does pull back, softly shush you when you protest in the thought that he's leaving you, and cups your head in his warm hands.
"let's get you home, eh?" he smiles. your uncertain eyes dart between his for a moment, searching, before you nod. it's weak and hesitant, but the gesture makes his grin stretch a little wider all the same. "c'mon then, think ye can walk?"
johnny sighs when you shake your head, looking down and seeming almost embarrassed by your frail condition as if any of this was your fault. if he could kill that bastard again, he wouldn't even hesitate.
it's no bother to him to haul you up with him, holding you carefully against his chest with an arm under your knees and the other around your back. you still gingerly grip the top of his vest, your free arm looping itself around his neck and pulling yourself as close to him as you can muster. he gives a concise nod to the others, crowded in the doorway, and they begin the trek back to the helo.
the sunlight causes you to bury your face in the crook of johnny's neck, shielding your eyes from the blindingly bright rays. he allows himself a moment of distraction as they cross the clearing to revel in the feeling. he'd feel the sun on his face again, but he'd never again take for granted a single moment he spends with you.
they're almost to the edge of the clearing, almost departed from that haunted place with a graveyard of mangled bodies in their wake, but he doesn't quite make it to the treeline.
a single gunshot echoes through the clearing and before any of them can react, the shell has found its mark in johnny's leg. the force and shock of it sends him tumbling to the floor, scrambling through the blossoming pain to brace his fall on his arms so he won't land on top of you.
there's yelling, returning fire, but johnny can only focus on covering your body with his own, shielding you from any harm that might find you. even through the agony travelling up his thigh, even when the air is still again, and even when his own eyes are threatening to follow yours in falling shut and succumbing to the weakness that drags him down.
when did you shut your eyes? johnny slips his hand under your hand, grunting in his chest as his weight shifts, and to his horror his fingers come back red.
no, no no. he only just got you back, he cannot lose you again.
he doesn't even register that he's shouting – for help, a medic, something – until his weight is being heaved over ghost's shoulder and you're being taken by price, the cracks in his stony expression only fuel the sick dread making its way up johnny's throat.
back in the helo, in no time but he doesn't remember the journey, he tries to push the medic away who starts working on his leg, slurring for them to help you first. they ignore him, obviously, and if he had any energy left he would've berated them for not listening. ghost holds him down as they secure the tourniquet, and as his vision finally begins to fade, he turns his head to the side so you can be the last thing he sees as he slips into unconsciousness.
for once, he doesn't dream of you.
there are no images of your body, laying motionless under the rubble. he sleeps in blissful oblivion, his head completely silent, and wakes a day and a half later feeling more rested than he ever has despite the wound in his leg.
simon is by his bedside when he finally opens his eyes. it's late, the room dark apart from the fluorescent light bleeding in from the gap under the door and simon's phone highlighting his balaclava. he notices the moment johnny turns his head to watch him, because of course he does, and reaches over to turn on the lamp on the side table without a word.
"mornin', lt…" johnny mumbles, voice hoarse and eyes heavy as he pushes through the tiredness clinging to his senses to sit up in his bed. the light is abrasive to his eyes, but he blinks through the sting and manages a lazy smile towards simon.
"evenin', more like." he replies, a trace of humour in the way his eyes lift at the corners. "been asleep nearly thirty-eight hours."
johnny baulks at that, suddenly feeling a lot more awake from the cold shock that passes through him. "thirty–? jesus wept, i need'ta–" he sputters, wide-eyed as he throws the blankets from his legs and starts to get up, "i need'ta see 'em, how–"
before he can get his feet on the ground however, he's pushed back by simon's hand on his chest, forcing him to sit back and acknowledge the pain radiating from his thigh.
"they're fine, johnny." simon tells him, punctuated with a roll of his eyes before he continues, "been in and out of consciousness, but they're stable."
johnny sighs deeply, relief flooding through his body as he slumps back against his pillows. you're okay, you're alive, you're here, and you're home and safe. his thoughts have already begun racing and despite how much his wounds are aching, he's already set his mind to how he's going to see you as soon as possible.
as if sensing his plotting, simon leans forward to catch his gaze and even through the mask johnny can see the look he's sending him.
"i'm goin' back to bed, so don't do anythin' stupid." simon begins, pushing himself to stand using the arms of his chair and narrowing his eyes as he leans even closer. "if you rip these stitches, i'll put 'em back in myself, clear?"
"crystal, lt." johnny nods, and simon holds his stare as one last warning before he turns to leave – but not without giving him a firm pat just below his bandages that makes him wince, feeling the silent threat behind the gesture as he watches simon exit silently out into the hall.
johnny swings his legs over the side of the bed the second the door swings shut again, a sharp intake of breath following the movement as his weight shifts. surely he could get to where you are without making his wound any worse, he hard could it be?
he makes it two doors down before he realises that this might've been a bad idea. the muscles of his thigh burn and his breath comes out in heavy, stuttered huffs, but despite the strain on his injured body he refuses to give up before he's seen that you're okay with his own two eyes.
the fourth door he peeks through is where he finds you, the sight of your sleeping form instantly overpowering the pain in his leg. he shoulders open the door and beelines in a limp to your bedside, his gaze never once leaving your face until he's close enough to grasp your hand in a slow, featherlight touch like you'd disappear if he made a wrong move. you don't react as he strokes your knuckles, but johnny is more than content to just sit with you, perched on the edge of your bed and taking in the way your breath fills your lungs, the gentle thrum of your pulse under his fingertips on your wrist.
time passes easily like this, until the minutes have gone by and he can find the strength to lift himself into the bed beside you, snaking his arm around your neck and shoulder to hold you close as he settles in, careful not to agitate any of your own injuries.
"i missed you, my love," johnny whispers, dragging his fingers up and down your arm, pressing his lips to the crown of your head, "i missed you so much…"
your fingers twitch in his hold, the steady rhythm of your breathing hitching as a shaky sigh leaves you. johnny freezes, his hand stilling on your bicep and his eyes growing wide.
"john–" the sound of his name passing your lips pulls him out of his shock, and he pulls back to watch your eyes twitch and flutter open. your voice is raspy and still weak, but not even an angel choir could sound sweeter to him. "johnny…?"
"i'm here–" his voice breaks, but he continues anyway, "i'm here, i got ye." he murmurs, careful to keep his voice low despite how much he wants to cry from joy. "how ye feelin'? you comfy, sweetheart? any pain?" he asks, shifting the both of you to sit against the pillows and keep you nestled against his side.
"i'm okay–" your hoarse response is interrupted by a cough that devolves into wet hiccups, your hands curling tightly into his shirt as you look up at him, "it– am i– it's–"
"shushsh, i'm here darlin', i've got ye." he coos, his eyes welling up to match yours, resuming his soothing touch over your arm. you stay like that, for minutes that could've been hours, gazing into each other's eyes while you softly cry and johnny comforts you.
it aches him to see you cry, but he can't help but awe at how beautiful you still manage to be, with cuts and bruises and tears littering your face. his heart swells in his chest with the love he holds for you.
your hand finds its place on johnny's cheek, your staggered breaths calming down at last. he covers it with his own to feel more of your skin on his. a wince crosses your expression as you try to lean up towards him, but he stops you before you hurt yourself any further and leans his forehead against yours.
you pull his face even closer, digging your fingertips into his cheek in an almost uncomfortable sensation, before brushing your lips against his in something like disbelief. "am i dreaming?"
"no, my love," he utters against your skin, taking your bottom lip between his teeth, nudging your cheek with his nose, "this is real."
your breath hitches again when he closes the little space left between you and presses his lips to yours, encapsulating you in a kiss that holds every ounce of desperation he's been holding on to. it's passionate, all-encompassing, and it reminds him of the first time he kissed you all those years ago. your free hand travels up to his hair, tangling the longer strands around your fingers and drawing a groan from deep in his chest.
he's reluctant to let you when you pull away for air, tasting the salt from your last stray tears as he chases your lips.
"say it again…?" you ask in a murmur, your eyes fluttering open again. the look you give him, one of pure hope that you won't suddenly wake up alone, it makes johnny's heart miss a beat.
he squeezes your hand, turning slightly to leave a kiss on your palm. "it's real, bonnie. i'll die before i ever let you go again."
your mouth opens to say something, but you stop yourself just before you can choke the words out, fresh tears building in your eyes again. johnny gives you an encouraging nod, holding your gaze while you muster the courage to voice what you're thinking.
"i–" you begin, your words catching on a lump in your throat, "i watched you leave without me, i had to watch the helicopter disappear and, and you…" your voice fades, eyes darting between his while they gloss with unshed tears once again.
"sweetheart…" he frowns, his heart breaking anew from the anguish that he never wants to hear in your voice.
you swallow thickly, your hold on his hair tightening ever so slightly. "i thought– i didn't think you'd ever find me…"
"i'd always find you." johnny replies, his resolute tone leaving no room for argument. he touches his forehead to yours again and lowers his voice to continue, "even if i had to go tae the ends of the earth, i'd never stop lookin' fer you."
his words release the fresh tears you've been holding back, and with a quiet sob you drop your face to the crook of his neck, gripping his hair and face tighter still. johnny softly shushes you, rocking the two of you back and forth as much as he can with you held close in his arms.
"you're staying with me tonight…" your voice is muffled, spoken into his neck and sending goosebumps rippling across his skin. a comforting nostalgia follows your words, one he can't help but chuckle at.
"would'nae have it any other way, darlin'."
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dailyadventureprompts · 3 months
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I've got a new d&d group and they're almost all new players, with some of them having played with me before in oneshots/ gotten a couple sessions into campaigns that fizzled.
There's the usual learning pains: No one's quite got a handle on the rules yet and is relying on me for which dice to roll ( it's a D20 friends, it's always going to be a D20 unless it's damage I don't know how many times I have to say that). Person A is nervous and over-talkative , person B is nervous and withdraws from conversation, Person C is always running a little late...
But what really surprises me is the difference between them and the group I've had going for 2 years now:
Newgroup THEORIZES in a way that I don't think I've ever seen despite playing this game for two decades. I'll ask them what they're doing and they'll have a multi-minute chat weighing the value of different options. They don't turn to ME, or ask me if things are possible ( which is what new players tend to do), they turn to eachother and ask if they think it's a good idea that they do X or Y and then what could happen from there. I'm trying to be a good DM and let them learn the ropes but it's FASCINATING response. For example; the barbarian says "I'll use my shield to pin the monster in place so we can question them about the villain" and before I can even get into my response another player will say "but what if I used my rope instead to tie them up?", meanwhile none of them have confirmed if the monster is in any way related to the villain or is capable of speech (it wasn't, it was a mimic fyi)
Newgroup is LASER targeted on their goal, which was a surprise as someone who was DMing for a party that purposefully jumped ship on the A plot ASAP and is actively resentful of anything resembling a main quest. Newgroup passes through a mining village that's been deserted after a recent attack by monsters which drove people up into the hills, a Classic rescue mission with a bit of a dungeon delve on top, intended to give the party some XP and magic items before they leave the early game and I stop pulling my punches. Newgroup stays just long enough to confirm that the monsters have nothing to do with the A plot and unanimously decide to leave the village post haste. Meanwhile I have to be careful about what information I drop to oldgroup, as if they catch a single whiff of villanious wrongdoing they'll drop what they're doing and divert their attention to wiping that threat off the map. I've now had to have multiple villains make peace treaties in all but name with this party because of their habit of knocking out rivals/threats/governments.
Because oldgroup know the game really well they're less experimental with what they want to accomplish. They know that things can be solved through class features/dice rolls/damage, and so those are their default solutions to most problems. Meanwhile newgroup has no IDEA what the limits of the game system are so they're trying clever stuff left and right. " Can I hit it in the eye with my arrow? Can I use this spell to find out if _____, Can we use the flying boots to _____?" They're asking genuinely good questions so often that it's made me want to play around with the d20 resolution system to get something more closed to the " drawback/mixed success" sorts of results you get in apocalypse world style games. ( I think I found a neat fix, more on that to come)
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paper-mario-wiki · 5 months
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Shangri-La Frontier mid-season review
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This is by far the best fake video game I've ever seen written in fiction.
Most MMO-centric isekai stories have trouble with providing accurate and realistic depictions of the complexities and minutia that give MMOs the allure they have. I've seen so much handwavey bullshit tacked onto fake-games that introduce unrealistically overlooked mechanics for reasons like giving the protag immense power just because they're the protag and the story is about them. A good example of this is another MMO Isekai airing this season, "A Playthrough of a Certain Dude's VRMMO Life", wherein the main character becomes extremely rich, powerful, and famous by episode 2 because he stumbled into a stealth archer playstyle, a build which apparently no human in that universe had ever conceived of before, and then making a fortune by selling basic potions to everyone after NPCs stopped selling them (another thing he was uniquely able to do because not a single other player had the forethought to spec into alchemy). These lesser, dime-a-dozen isekai add up to be boring fantasy strories with gaming elements clumsily put in so that the author can demonstrate how powerful the world's inhabitants are by showing their stat allocation screen instead of, say, explaining anything about what they do that's so uniquely powerful and how they figured it out. Ya know, stuff you'd hope to hear about from any competent story.
Shangri-La Frontier is a breath of fresh air for anyone who, like me, is sick of authors ignoring the things that actually make video games compelling in service of creating a stock-standard narratives in fantasy worlds because it allows them to get away with bullshit. I've always found it very convenient that many isekai narratives indulge in things like chattel slavery, because it's societally normal enough for the protag to purchase a beautiful, vulnerable girl to add to his harem (dont worry, she is always inexplicably in love with him no matter what because he's SUCH a kind master). And it never really seems to go anywhere. Because the Video Game Isekai, while an interesting premise in theory, is more often than not used exclusively as a means to simplify the structure of a world's power scaling to abide by an arbitrary set of omnipresent universal rules (e.g. what people who have never cared to look into game development think of video games). This anime, by comparison, is VERY clearly authored by someone who plays a LOT of games.
Every piece of logic used to drive the plot forward, so far, is congruent to a real-world example of video game conventions, and I'm not just talking about levelling up and selling monster parts. Story elements that I've rarely (if ever) seen explored in other isekai are ever-present and genuinely clever and amusingly introduced. My favorite example of this so far has been the way the protagonist has been able to go head to head with so many overlevelled foes in the first 9 episodes. The story of course makes note of how good of a gamer Sanraku (our hero) is, but much like in real life games, being super duper good at dodging attacks doesn't really make up for a 70 level gap in items and learned skills. For that reason, he gets his ass whooped more often than he actually outsmarts others (so far he hasn't beaten a single player in pvp). So how is he getting out of these situations without dying so frequently? Simple: he got access to a later area too early relative to his level (sequence break) and got access to a high level follower NPC that's been carrying him. This is something he acknowledges directly several times, specifically using words like "Emul has been hard-carrying me for a while." This, to me, is extraordinarily meaningful. That's something you can exploit in Skyrim, man. That's REALISTIC CHEESE STRATS. The excitement and wonder I find in this show doesn't come from watching the protag do something unexpected, but by watching him do something that I would think to do.
This knowledge the author has demonstrated regarding modern gaming culture extends further into the actual realistic nature of game design and community. The story exists in a reality where full-dive VRMMOs are the be-all-end-all of gaming, and given the prohibitively expensive nature of developing and designing expansive, immersive worlds, most games are pretty shit. It's been hinted at so far that this is due to a monopolistic megacorp which is one of the only entities rich and powerful enough to make a good game (the game in question being the one that shares the title of the anime), but so far the strife of the characters have been pretty centralized to the happenings of the game world and its politics. By the way, lets talk about the game world's player base politics, which I'm also quite pleased with. It exists in the form of guilds and clans who struggle for power not by participating in seemingly random pvp with other powerful players to see who is the most epic and badass warrior (again, like many contemporary isekai typically opt for), but by gaining actual realistic support from a fictional playerbase with realistic desires and playstyles. Some guilds are interested in lore, some gather for alliance and boss raids, some for things like animal husbandry, and (naturally) at least one is dedicated to trolling and PKing. Each of these factions, through the very little that we've seen of them so far, communicate on forums and only know as much as is reasonable for them to know. The only reason they give a shit about the protagonist at all is because he gained access to a high-level unique scenario quest that they want information on how to access, and the only reason word of that got out in the first place was because someone posted a screenshot of him with a unique NPC onto a forum, asking about it as "where can i find this pet summon, its super cute!" That's real. That's video games, baby.
I like this show a lot so far. I like that it cares about video games, but I also like its writing. I like the main character and how hes less of an ultra badass super cool guy, and more of an earnest challenge-run lets player. Like, a lot of his dialogue straight up sounds strikingly similar to Japanese youtubers. And he's naturally always quick to point out inconsistencies in the game world's logic. I ALSO really like his community of pals from a janky old fighting game, and I ADORE the girl from his school who has a crush on him and also just so happens to be an exceptionally high level player from a top clan, and how she had to spend 9 episodes working up the courage to send him a friend request. I love that so, so much, dude.
I highly recommend this show if you're into a single thing I've mentioned. The animation is great. The world is beautiful. The character design is immaculate. And I'm looking forward to watching it continue.
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mintys-playarea · 7 months
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RUGGIE B. W A DUNCE! PLAYING! LOVER!
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You had no idea how you were able to get a man such as him to fall in love with you. He was clever, sweet, a great cook, and an absolute cutie... Ruggie was yours and you were his!
You had many flaws. You weren't very smart, you had tendencies to mess with people... The list could go on. Yet he still loved you.
It was a cool, autumn day. Warm colored leaves fell from trees, leaving the courtyard a blend of reds, browns and oranges. There were plenty students walking and talking happily along with one another, the smell of pumpkin spice wafting in the air. Though you were relatively uninterested before... A particular student has caught your eyes. It was none other than the Azul Ashengrotto walking around, promoting his most recent sale for the Mostro Lounge... This was the perfect opportunity.
The leaves crunched beneath your shoes as you tapped his leg, your icy cold hands sneaking up his pant leg and touching his warm calf. He shivered with a loud yelp, immediately turning around to find no one there. You were hiding behind a nearby tree. You weren't hidden well of course, but Azul couldn't see you. He shook his head, sighing and brushing it off as the wind. As he continued to promote the sale, you snuck up on him again. You tapped his leg the same way as before, except... You weren't fast enough this time. He kicked you and hoisted you up with stern eyes.
"Do you understand how disrespectful you are?!" Azul screeched. He clearly disliked getting his legs touched like that.
You sputtered trying to come up with an excuse, panicking as you see the Leech twins starting to come into view. You squirmed as Azul held still and started walking.
"Excuse me boys, but may you help hand out flyers for me as i return this rascal to their owner? They were very disrupting to me, we wouldn't want that happening with to another," Azul had a slight pout as he continued walking. He muttered something to himself quietly before going into the Savannaclaw mirror.
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Leona sighed as he saw Azul waltz up to him. "And how am i responsible for the herbivore??" He said with a tired look.
"Well, aren't they always over here? I'd assume it's because they have something with you?" Azul responded, almost annoyed with the fact he had to speak with Leona.
"No... You'd have to find Ruggie. He's— Right here," Leona groaned before returning to his room.
"Oh, hey there Az! Whatcha doin' here? And why do ya got lovebug there?" Ruggie commented on you being carried by Azul like a critter he finds dirty.
"I found.. er.. Lovebug messing with me during my promotion for the new Mostro Lounge sale... So you're the one taking care of.. this thing?"
"Aye, they're person, you know! Not just a 'thing.' But yes, i am in charge of taking care of Lovebug."
"I'll just hand them over already... You should really keep a watch on them. They're probably going to cause a big problem if you dont." Azul shook his head before leaving Savannaclaw finally.
"So... Lovebug, what was that about?"
You pulled out a to-go box of fresh food. Food you stole from Azul. A goofy smile spread across your face.
"Ahh... I see! I've trained you well... You deserve a treat for that!" Ruggie smiled along with you, bringing you into the kitchen.
"I know ya may not be tha brightest sometimes, but you're a sneaky lil' thang fo'sho! Here, ya wanna help bake some cookies to go with that meal?"
ᶻ 𝗓 𐰁
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TAGS!!: @cheezy-moon
A little note on how the tagging system works:
If I know you like a character and I end up writing for it, I'll tag you in it (⁠*⁠´⁠ω⁠`⁠*⁠)
Also, I have no clue what to put for name replacements so... I'll just do pet names! :D also I wanted to keep this in second person, but I kept it gn when I had to use the pronouns (*⁠´⁠∀⁠`*⁠)
I also forgot how the mirrors work (⁠•⁠ ⁠▽⁠ ⁠•⁠;⁠) and I gave ruggie a special way of talking! I like writing him speak like that :3
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fuckyeahgoodomens · 10 months
Text
David Tennant and Michael Sheen on The One Show 10.7.2023 ❤ :)
(also there Zoe Saldana and Nicole Kidman, and Alex Jones and Jermaine Jenas as interviewers :))
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Int1: Well, this is lovely for Wednesday, isn't it?
David: It's a lovely way to spend a Monday night, innit?
Zoe: I was excited to see you both.Likewise.
Int1: Now, Good Omens. I mean, people love the first series. It's back for a second. If there's anybody watching who didn't see the first one, they don't know what we're talking about. Go on, Michael. Fill them in.
Michael: I play an angel on Earth to do angel things.
David: I play a demon. I'm Hell's emissary on Earth.
Michael: And we decide that it's a lot easier if we team up because it saves on shoe leather. So we come to an arrangement, and then we realize that we actually quite like it on Earth, and we don't really want to deal with our respective head offices. And in season one, we save the world from the apocalypse. Season two...
David: And get excommunicated by our respective...
Michael: Yes. Exactly. So season two picks up. We're now...
David: We're at liberty.
Michael: Yeah. I'm in my bookshop, having lovely meals and watching lovely shows and hanging out with my best buddy here.
David: I'm living in my car, unfortunately, becausemy apartment came with a job.
Michael: And then John Ham turns up naked at mybookshop in Soho one day with no memory. And so the mystery begins. Int2: The plot twist. We know we've got a clip.
Nicole: I don't understand why he's [Jon Hamm] not on the couch.
Michael: Well, exactly. Nor me. I think everyone's asking the same thing.
David: Apparently it's a BBC rule you have to be clothed, so he was having none of it.
Int1: Yeah, that would push Monday over the edge. Let's see the clip.
Int2: Let's see the clip.
[familiar trailer plays, nothing new there]
Michael: When I said that line in the scene [I think I may have just started a war.], I knew it would be in the trailer. Do you know when you sometimes go, yeah, this is a trailer, and I got really nervous .I couldn't do it. Doing it over and over again.
Nicole: Well, I'm looking for something to watch. I'm watching that.
Zoe: Yes.
Int2: I like how you were like, yeah, that's the one.
Michael: On 28th.
Zoe: Okay, you watch ours and we watch yours.
Michael: Deal. We're in. We're in.
David: Yes, very good, very good.
Int1: Beautiful. This is the thing, at the heart of Good Omens is this unlikely friendship between you two, but in real life so you filmed it, you didn't know each other, and then they clicked. Look at them. They joined at the hip. They do everything...
Michael: It's true.
Int1: You even had babies at the same time.
Michael: We did.
Int1 [to David]: Your wife posted this picture of you two leaving the hospital.
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David: Look how in tune we are with each other.
Michael: And now those two little babies are nearly four, and they send each other little video messages. Yeah.
David: Well, they're babies of the pandemic, so that's how they think everyone communicates.
Michael: Exactly.
Int1: Is then when you went on to do Staged together?
Michael: Yeah.
Int1 [to Zoe and Nicole]: Have you seen that?
Zoe: No.Wait a minute. What are you guys doing on stage right now? Like a tour or something?
David: No, no it's a show .
Michael: It was a TV series called Staged that we did over Zoom. So we could work from our own houses.
David: Yeah.
Michael: We've done three series.
Nicole: They're extremely clever.
Zoe: That's insane. I have to watch it.
Int2: Now, Michael, apparently you turned down the opportunity to play David's character. Arguably got a better wardrobe. Is it something that you're regretting right now?
Michael: He gets all the best clothes. No. Neil Gaiman, who wrote the book that it's based on with Terry Pratchett. I've been friends with Neil for years, and so when we first started talking about the project yeah. We sort of both kind of, for some reason, assumed that I would play this one character, and then as he started writing the scripts, I was like, that's not the character. I'm not going to play that. So I felt kind of bad about saying that to Neil, and Neil was sort of feeling, because he was thinking thesame thing, feeling bad about saying it to me. So it all came out and then eventually it made way for the Tennant to emerge.
Int1: And he came in his lovely outfit.
Michael: Yeah. And his slinky hips.
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...
Int2: David.You're returning to Doctor Who. We had Catherine Tate on a couple of weeks ago.
David: Oh, yes.
Int2: o we spoke to her about it all. Now, she said it was like slipping back into a comfy pair of slippers. Was it the same for you?
David: Yeah. I mean, 15 years is quite a long time. And you do worry you won't be able to runf ast enough anymore, but...
Int1: Is it 15 years ago?
David: 15 years.
Int1: It's not, David, it can't be.
David: You're a lot older than you think you are.
Michael: I was only five when... I remember the David Tennant. I was just a little nipper.
Int2: On the Doctor Who subject. Watching... that's what inspired yo uas a child, wasn't it? Watching Doctor Who.
David: Yeah.
...
Int2: Good Omens Series Two on the 28 July on Prime Video and you can catch all three series of stage on IPlayer.
...
Int1: Let's say Nadoli Llawen.
Nicole: Yeah. [Tries]
Int1: Nadoli Llawen. Merry Christmas in Welsh.
Michael: Very good.
Int1: Michael, you can verify this. I mean, even the both of us are from South Wales, and even within 20 minutes car Journey, there'll be different dialects...
Michael: Within streets! Streets! Yeah, you can tell where someone comes from, which end of town people come from. [to Int1] I know which end of town you come from.
Int1: Say no more.
Michael: It's always been very clear, Alex.
Int1: Always very clear.
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