#and if i listen to you it ain’t gonna stay healthy for long let me tell you that | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

therealityhelix · 1 year

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By Talos, This Can’t be Happening pt 16

It’s Tamriel Tuesday! Helix is good at the things she does.

Rated PG13 for: Blood, violence, sexual situations, bad puns, and other poor life choices.

@cardwrecks @captainbaddecisions

?~?~?~?~?

He groaned into his encroaching awareness, begging it to retreat once again. Even after an admittedly amateur, yet earnest massage, he was still just so, so sore.

It made sense, of course. They'd spent the last however many days climbing mountains, running from monsters, fighting bandits and undead, sleeping outside on the ground, stressing out, and just moving nonstop.

Swag was pretty healthy nowadays, considering the circumstances, but...damn, it was a lot.

And Helix...Helix had been far too stoic about it all. It wasn't normal, not for her. How badly was she hurting, if he felt like this?

He nuzzled the back of her head, and heard the pain in her slurred mumbling. Oh yeah, he had been right. He just hadn't been listening close enough before.

“Baby? We're taking a bed day today, okay? We've both earned it, and ain't nobody gonna be out and about today.”

She moaned an affirmative and rolled over to face him, her gray eyes bleary without her glasses.

Half her sight, huh? Was there a limit to how much one could sacrifice for magic like that? The cost seemed way too high to him, but she'd had really good reasons for her decisions. He didn't like those eyes any less for it, with their marks and striations like clouds reflected off a stormy sea.

His own nearsightedness was nowhere near as severe, merely smoothing out the fine lines at the corners of her eyes, smearing the scattering of white hairs back into the milk chocolate curls.

“Cutie.” he smooched the tip of her nose, and she snorted.

“M' a mess, and you know it.”

“Me too. We can be messy today, it's no big deal. Don't know bout you, but I need like, a week of relaxation after all that.”

“Won't get it. But...today for sure. I don't wanna move at all.”

“Got anymore of that oil?”

“Yup. It's next to the water jug. You still smell nice.”

“Yeah, this stuff has some staying power. Not to mention it's all over the bedding now. This room is gonna smell like flowers forever. Oh well, could be worse.”

He stretched like a long cat, all stiff sinews and cracking joints, and she mimicked the action with a huge yawn. Purple bruises dotted them both, minor scrapes and cuts decorating their bodies in forbidden colors.

They gathered breakfast, freshened themselves up a bit, then retired to their borrowed room once more to enjoy themselves.

Swag snagged the little vial of oil, and worked the floral scent into every inch of her skin. He could feel the stiffness and tension in her legs, so much shorter than his own, and paid special attention to her rounded calves. Her bitten lip stifled soft noises, masking her pain in the way a cat might. She wasn't about to drag him all over the country while complaining about her own discomfort.

Helix was pretty used to traveling, and was clearly fairly good at living off the land as well, but she, like himself, had been mostly sedentary for the past near decade or so. They were neither of them in their twenties any longer, and some of their old activities were simply behind them. He sure as shit wasn't parkouring his ass across rooftops nowadays, and not just because he wasn't suuuuuuper fond of heights anymore. And he had long suspected that part of Helix's supernatural grace was just that-supernatural. She used her magic to lighten her steps without even thinking about it. Magic was so ingrained into her everyday life, every breathing moment...

This must really be like losing a limb. And she had barely let any of that pain and frustration show. His Starlight was fuckin' crazy sometimes but also...goddamn. Every now and then he recognized how much steel was in her bones.

“So I'm thinking,” he started, kneading into the tight muscle. “That I might look into the Fighter's Guild soon. Now I don't think I'm ever gonna be the kind of killdozer I've seen walkin' around town, but I could use a brush up on my skills anyhow. And maybe I can pick up some needlework in the downtime. If there's one thing I know we'll need wandering all over the damn place during political unrest, it's cash. Oh, and Teekie says he wants to see your potions. Might be able to get good money off them too.”

“Might, yeah.” She leaned her head against the wall. “We'll want to keep some back for ourselves though. Um, how do you feel about poison?”

“Uh...Not a way I'd like to go. Why?”

“I'm very good at making them. Narci, uh, disapproves, so I keep it all out of sight, but they're useful, and I wanted to know what your thoughts were before I started making any.”

“Oh. Well. Narci's got a really personal reason for all that, and I don't, so I guess it's not a big deal to me. You mean like food, or-?”

“Contact or injection, technically. You put them on a weapon, or throw them at the eyes. Or into food, if you've got that opportunity. I can make all kinds. Bottled bear spray. Things that can make you susceptible to certain kinds of magic. Purgatives. Things that target the vocal chords, paralyze, send you to sleep. All kinds of things.”

She'd left something out, but then, she usually did. But it was practical, wasn't it? To weaken an enemy in any possible way? To take any advantage you had? Refusing to use every resource available to you might seem noble, but just as often left you foolishly dead.

“Seems like a good idea, actually. Give us a leg up on the bears and trolls.”

She brightened up a little at his approval. So she was proud of this skill, even if multiple worlds decried it as something evil.

Poisoncraft and the art of the cane. This wasn't backsliding, was it? Surely not; Helix at least had nowhere to backslide to. She'd never been like him.

At least, he didn't think so.

He'd said that the day was for relaxing, but they were both of the type of personality that couldn't sit still for all that long. Back home, there were movies to watch, conspiracy theory videos to make fun of, video games to play. Their beautiful collaborative farming simulator wasn't gonna curate itself. Sometimes, when he was feeling especially spicy, he would throw on true crime documentaries and entertain her by bitching about how much of an idiot nearly everybody involved actually was.

She really loved it when U.S. got involved with that. Claimed she found it both hilarious and enlightening, but both he and his acidic half-self figured she just liked hearing them agree on things sometimes.

They made sure to 'coincidentally' have free time together for it occasionally. Ever-growing differences aside, they actually were almost always in accord about one thing.

He got restless just a bit before she did, but his fidgeting affected her, and soon they were up and looking for something to do. Swag had spotted what he was sure was a chess board upstairs, but that was a total no go. Helix and strategy games went together like Bligh Reef and the Exxon Valdez. She was so bad at them that it looped from endearing, to frustrating, back to endearing.

Instead, he invited her to show him how she intended to make these poisons for them, and was treated to a goddamn interactive thesis on alchemical theory, as it pertained to this world. He even got to help!

Things were extracted, crystallized, and distilled right before his eyes, and he got to squeeze juice out of mushrooms which was a new and gross experience. And finally, he got confirmation of what the little bottles actually were. Helix formed them directly out of what she called pure 'aetheric energy', which she told him was necessary to hold the magically infused final product. That was why the bottles disappeared after use; once empty, there was nothing to hold the solidified energy in place.

She pulled their misty forms right out of the air, and they sparkled like something from an eighties fantasy movie. She whispered the words of magic over them as they dripped into containment, various oils, tinctures, and decoctions taking on brilliant colors.

It was beautiful. But...

“Is there an easy way to tell these apart from the other potions?”

“Carry them on opposite sides of your belt.” she suggested. “Make sure you always know what you've got.”

“Living dangerously, I see. Okay, what's this one do?” He held up a thin, lime green vial.

“That one paralyzes you for a short time. Whole lifetime, if you're really unlucky. Wanna see? It doesn't hurt.”

She covered the opening with her fingertip and splashed it like a perfume bottle. Then she held her finger out to his lips.

Was she serious? She had that mischievous shine in her face, but he also knew she wouldn't do anything that would hurt him. He licked her fingertip.

And his body stopped moving.

She was right; it didn't hurt at all. He simply couldn't budge. It was a lot like when her natural magic enveloped him in rigidified atoms, and no amount of straining could make him move a micron. Only this was coming from inside, so no straining was even possible.

His eyes were locked on hers, tongue only partially back into his mouth in an expression he was sure must be goofy as hell, while she kept her hand outstretched. A few moments of that unblinking stare revealed that she was as frozen as he was. A few moments more, and the hold on him was broken.

“You knew it was gonna get you too.” he accused.

“Of course! It's a contact poison. But it can also be administered orally, or through the bloodstream. Really versatile. I just thought it would be funny. Consider it a show of my appreciation for your trust in me. I wouldn't do to you what I wouldn't do to myself.”

He grinned as she stoppered the bottle.

“We're both fuckin' crazy.”

“We're in good company then.”

She had her potions in a wide, shallow basket, all neatly organized-by her standards anyway. She definitely had a system, but it was clearly all her own. They hauled the basket upstairs to show their curious Guildmaster.

Teekeeus held the bottles up to the light, swirling them around, making thoughtful sounds. He handed them off to Alberic, who did the same, and then the rest, one by one.

“You have a gift for this.” Teekeeus mused. The others agreed.

“They're very clear. And very bright.” Angalmo said. “You put a lot of effort into preparing the materials, didn't you?”

Swag puffed up at the praise, even if it wasn't for him. Helix deserved it. She always put in so much work, and her results were always spectacular. He sometimes felt he couldn't provide the right kinds of compliments, since he just didn't know the minutiae of magic, and couldn't tell why something she did was great, just that it was.

Just saying 'wow that was neat', didn't seem adequate when he knew she was probably putting in all kinds of details and shit that he wasn't seeing. He should probably stuff his nose back into those philosophy of magic books upstairs. It was a good opportunity to understand her better.

“Would you, perhaps, be open to a trade?” Teekeeus asked, and a frenzy of items began changing hands. Swag saw a big chunk of crystal, some hard to come by alchemy ingredients, some jewelry, and even a few of those precious spellbooks. Everyone seemed in good spirits, which was a sight better than yesterday.

Helix divided up what was left between what she wanted to keep for them, and what she wanted sold, looking deeply satisfied. She'd said they might get a good price for them, but if the endorsement of the entire Mage's Guild was an indication, she could probably build a potion business empire that would sweep the continent. Maybe she didn't have the ruthlessness for that, but he certainly did.

That was why he was in charge of the finances.

They wandered their way into the library, but Helix declined to cuddle in one of the big overstuffed chairs.

“Need to concentrate in order to get this right.” she said, holding up her new spellbooks. She set herself up on the floor, snagging a cushion off one of the chairs instead. He grabbed a book full of magical debates and tried to understand.

He was seriously going to have to rewire his whole brain to get some of this stuff. The magic of this world had stiff rules, had been studied and recorded for thousands of years, and still...what the actual fuck did any of these words mean?

All he was really able to glean from this particular set of debates, was that Necromancy had been banned outright from the Mage's Guild, which, like, good. But wasn't actually illegal in Cyrodiil, which, bad. All that really did was drive Necromancers out of places where they might be easily watched, and out into the countryside, where they might form into groups, where the locals wouldn't be able to handle them, and where their experiments went completely unregulated.

Swag actually agreed with the orc sorceress who proposed that the basics of the school should be known to Guild mages, in order to more actively recognize and fight back against it, and he even felt betrayed when the afternote pointed out that she had been a Necromancer all along. Guess that's why he wasn't a mage. He never felt things should be so black and white, and figured mages would be more flexible, but the Guild was a government body, and had to put its foot down occasionally, it seemed.

But a Necromancy ban was something that would please Helix, and Helix was-

Helix was glowing.

He'd seen it before, the lights in her eyes, leaking from her mouth, and sometimes it evaporated from her body like sweat, but this time the glow was a mist cloud, surrounding her kneeling form, the book she was studying sublimating into it, page by page. The covers disintegrated, and the mist constricted to her body, a magical electroplating. With a burst of light, it was gone, and Helix leaned, disoriented, against the sturdy wood of the bookcase next to her.

So that was why she had chosen the floor. He put his book down and knelt beside her.

“So...was that supposed to happen?”

She mumbled something he didn't quite catch, as he righted her on her pillow, held her hand out, and a net of faint filaments formed to her.

“Take a swing at me.”

“Absolutely not.”

“It doesn't have to be hard or anything. I just want to make sure I've got this right.”

He flapped his hand in her general direction. It would have contacted her shoulder, but glanced off to the side instead. She heaved a sigh of relief.

“Oh, I can't tell you how glad I am to be able to do that again! I've felt so naked without my shields!”

The invisible armor that emboldened her to shove into the lives of such dangerous people as they. One step closer to her previous power. He hugged her, and felt the weird, wiggly magic trying to throw him off.

Helix wore those shields on most worlds, and even around most Riddlers, though she'd taken to dropping them on his world. It was a sign of precious and treasured trust, but if she'd kept up that habit, they might not even be here.

“I'm glad for you. Are there spells that can mimic all your magic?”

“Nothing perfect.” she said. “Even this shield is only temporary, and some things could still get through. It's going to be a long time before I can fly again, I'm afraid. And there's nothing that can replicate my bottomless purse. But this is a start. A good start. I really didn't want to have to wear armor. It feels so heavy and clunky on me.”

“I used to have a vest...eh, but I got rid of it a long time ago. After the first time U.S. showed up, actually. I realized it was kinda stupid to keep so much of my old stuff around where anyone...especially me...could get ahold of it.”

“Burned it?”

Swag scoffed.

“Nah, donated it all to a museum! Hell of a tax write-off.”

She laughed, retrieving her other book.

“Okay, you big brain. I'm gonna do this other one outside. It's uh...it's fire.”

Swag glanced around at all the extremely flammable things in the library.

“Yyyyuuuup! Let's go outside. I bet it's a beautiful day.”

?~?~?~?~?

#sartorial sorcery #Swag!Riddler #Riddler Family #elder scrolls

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2-cute-4-school · 3 years

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𝚗𝚌𝚝 𝚍𝚛𝚎𝚊𝚖 𝚛𝚎𝚊𝚌𝚝𝚒𝚘𝚗 𝚝𝚘 𝚊 𝚌𝚞𝚍𝚍𝚕𝚢, 𝚎𝚡𝚑𝚊𝚞𝚜𝚝𝚎𝚍 𝚜/𝚘

a/n: hiiiii so i decided to make this a 2in1 reaction; basically i just put together 2 of my requests that were *in my opinion* closely related. hope y’all don’t mind and enjoy!! ( ˊᵕˋ )♡.°⑅

requested by annonies: ‘Hey.. could you please do nct dream reaction to s/o having high fever and just wants cuddls? 🥺 like how would they take care of them.. make it fluffy please.’ & ‘nct dream reaction to their s/o being EXTREMELY tired and then like ummmmm cuddling and stuff maybe?? *uwuing in the distance*’

Mark Lee

okay but just imagine this (๑◕︵◕๑)

cuddle sessions when you’re both stretched thin and overworked

even though we all know he isn’t big on skinship i think he would throw all reticence out the window when it’s crystal clear that you both NEED each other ꒰๑˃͈꒳˂͈๑꒱ﾉ*ﾞ̥

so you just crawl under the bankets into his arms and you both just lay together in silence just enjoying each other’s presence

bonus points if he runs his hand through your hair and you trace shapes with the pads of your fingers on his skin (´,,•ω•,,)♡

it would probaby take a couple of lazy kisses and if you’re really really soft he might just hum some song lowly in your ear

just a lil heads up:

you ain’t getting out of his arms ‘til next morning so better hope you peed beforehand and have a bottle of water in reach (ಠ‿↼)

the only thing that would make him get up without a second thought?

if you’re feverish because of your exhaustion

his worry wouldn’t allow him to settle down until he’s 110% sure he made everything in his power to keep you comfortable

“cold towels, water, painkillers just in case, is there anything i’m forgetting? babe, should i make you some tea-”

“mark, you know what would make me feel SO much better?”

“huh?” ｢(ﾟ<ﾟ)ﾞ??

“CUDDLES, BABE, CUDDLES!!” (╬ Ò ‸ Ó)

you don’t have to say that twice, your man is tucking you into his side in an instant flash ain’t got nothing on mark, he’s a man on a mission

he’ll try to stay awake long enough to make sure you’ve fallen asleep properly since he knows your fever won’t go away without proper rest

might hover over you the next morning too!! ( ≧Д≦)

Huang Renjun

this boy would FRET like CONSTANTLY

especially if you develop a fever

he keeps piling up a lot of stuff in your room, anything he deems would be potentially helpful at some point is surrounding your bed

“jun, why tf is a cactus on my nightstand?” Σ(-᷅_-᷄๑)

“what if haechan walks through the door?”

“... understandable” ¯\_( ◉ 3 ◉ )_/¯

your room looks like a deposit at this point and you’ve tried to drag him to bed more times than you can count

but he’s restless ༼ ಥ ‿ ಥ ༽

until your frustration topples over and you’re on the verge of tears as you ask him for ✨cuddles ✨

he might actually feel bad for not joining you earlier so he’s gonna be EXTRA soft with you enjoy it while you can

he’s gonna pepper kisses all over you as he encases you in his lil arms and nuzzles his face into the crown of your head (っ˘з(˘⌣˘ )

he’s ready to offer free massages or head scratches!!!! LIMITED OFFER DON’T MISS OUT!!!

also he’s ready for literally anything

fever? medicine and wet towels nearby. thirst? 4 bottles of water AND gatorade. hunger? your favourite take out is waiting. any intruders? cactus is right by his hand. cuddles? CUDDLES!!!!! (۶* ‘ꆚ’)۶”

i think he’ll probably stay up even after you fell asleep, reading about how exhaustion affects one’s body and how to help i just think he’s a really wholesome person despite his all ‘don’t talk to him he angy’ character

but he’s still SO attentive to you!!

he’s down to anything that would make you feel better and if that means 20 hours of non stop cuddling so be it (๑•̀ㅂ•́)و✧

Lee Jeno

i think he’d be REALLY clingy with you even in normal circumstances kind of like how he’s with mark ya know

so your affected well-being will just give him an extra reason to evolve to his ULTIMATE LEVEL OF PHYSICAL AFFECTION◝( ′ㅂ`)و ̑̑

he won’t let you lift A FINGER

my man is cuddling you even while standing up (灬 ♡ ω ♡ 灬)

he’s also going to insist on carrying you anywhere even if it’s just from the bed to the bathroom this boi is strong you have no excuse to shy away from him he won’t let you

you have no chance at escaping him btw his arms are made of iron when it comes to cuddles good luck prying them off you

and even though he’s clearly focusing on your requested cuddles, he’ll ask you from time to time if you need anything, how you’re feeling, if you’re comfortable

lowkey uses the excuse of checking your temperature to give you endless forehead kithes cuz he can (*＾∀ﾟ)ъ

he also becomes kind of hyperaware of every little move you make

you shiver? he’s cocooning you in yet another blanket. you’re becoming restless? he adjusts your cuddling position until you’re fully comfortable.

NOTHING gets past him ┌༼ σ ‸ σ ༽┐

idk why but i have a hunch that jeno sleeps like a rock

so if he happens to fall asleep too and you need to get up? pfft yeah sure better call for a crane to lift you up from the bed ૮( ᵒ̌ૢꇴᵒ̌ૢ )ა｡

he’s also going to be EXTREMELY cranky if anyone dares interrupt your extended cuddle session this is strictly ‘only y/n and jeno time’

he might also entertain you with a few pictures of his cats if you’re feeling soft or ugly pictures of his members if you need a good laugh

would totally recommend leaving yourself in jeno’s care!! ♡(.◜ω◝.)♡

Lee Haechan

he would LIVE for your cuddle sessions (●♡∀♡))

despite that, he WOULDN’T STAND you being uncomfortable for a single second if he can do something against that

i think he’s the type of person who wouldn’t leave even the smallest of papercuts untreated when it comes to his partner so exhaustion? fever? yeah no. frickin. way. ┐(;Ծ⌓Ծ;)┌

and after he’s absolutely sure he has everything you might need nearby and put a cold cloth on your forehead and made sure you were hydrated and well fed

he finally climbs into bed with you and just SMOTHERS the shite outta you i’m not even kidding ꒰๑*´ᗜ`*꒱*›◡‹꒱꒱

he’s full on *leech mode*, kisses and nuzzles and gentle caresses

and best part of the package? this man is a walking spotify premium!!

you get to choose whatever song you want and switch with no ads and he has no complaints since his payment is already made in cuddles

you thought this was the end of it?? SIKE

also an entertainment king!! ୧༼✿ ͡◕ д ◕͡ ༽୨

we all know he probably has shit on all of the members and he’s not shy to do some harmless story telling to put you in a good mood

so just imagine and try coming up with anything better

sleepy you engulfed in the sunshine himself’s arms, tightly cradled against him with his soothing honey voice murmuring and humming to you and only you ˭̡̞(◞⁎˃ᆺ˂)◞*✰

his protective side might surface too btw

no one is allowed near you and if someone somehow managed to bother you? oh hell naw 🙃

now they’re on hyuck’s black list good luck mate

his babie gets the royalty treatment in those times guaranteed

Na Jaemin

he’s a doting boyfriend either way i think we can all agree on that

but you clinging to him and asking for cuddles? you not feeling well?

yeah not on his watch mother hen in action part the sea (ﾉ･ｪ･)ﾉ

i don’t think he’d panic tho, his only struggle would be postponing the cuddles you’re asking for while he prepares something to eat and a tea and fluffs up the pillows and blankets he’s gathered (oꆤ︵ꆤo)

but once he’s done?

yeah you’re bundled in a mountain of softness and most importantly? our cuddle bug jaemin (♡ >ω< ♡)

he’ll keep you propped up against his chest while he feeds you himself, proper care is something unskippable in his agenda

but after that any cuddling position is FREE REAL ESTATE!!

anything his baby wants, his baby gets ෆ╹ .̮ ╹ෆ

but for the sake of his mental stability he’d prefer to be in a position from where he can see you

boi is too worried to let you out of his sight so he’s aiming to be the big spoon or facing you directly 三 ( ◜◡‾)っ)⁰▿⁰)

he’ll help you fall asleep in any way he can

he’ll caress your back, your arms, he’ll softly massage your neck and shoulders, he has a playlist ready for sleepy moods

he is PREPARED ٩(๑•̀ㅂ•́)و

he checks your temperature every so often and he grumbles with a pout if it doesn’t seem to be going down

but if it comes down to it he won’t hesitate to ask someone to bring some medicine and if your exhaustion and/or fever doesn’t relent he’ll insist on getting checked by a doctor

it would break his heart to see you so weak and no ammount of cuddles could repair it until he sees you up and healthy again (◕⌓◕;)

but he’ll do all the pampering in the world so don’t worry

Zhong Chenle

i think he would hesitate at first but only because he’s kinda scared he’ll only make it worse and he WOULDN’T want that ( ⚆ _ ⚆ )

eventually i guess he’d step out to call his mum for help before he pulls some bull like ‘let’s do some math it’s gonna be fun’ and you lose your shit like no thanks fam i wanna live (┛ಠДಠ)┛彡┻━┻

he’ll listen RELIGIOUSLY to his mum’s advice

makes you some chamomile exactly how you like it, probably pulls together something small to eat but won’t force you

what he will force you to take is some medicine you ain’t dying on his watch (๑･`▱´･๑)

and most importantly... DAEGAL CUDDLES!!!! imagine getting to cuddle every nctzen’s bias

he might get *a little* jelly tho if you pay too much attention to her tho

so he makes up some dumb excuse about dog hair aggravating your fever or some dubious other reason why you have to let go of his puppy and cuddle HIM!! ೕ(•̀ᴗ•́)

he’ll do that cute thing where he leans his forehead against yours to check your temperature he has to be extra until the end

and before you go to sleep he’ll try to prod at you to tell him what caused you to be so exhausted that you developed a fever might nag at you too about how unheathy it is to let it get to that point

he just wants to help okay? baby is worried in his own way ( •́ ∧ •̀ )

if there’s ANYTHING he can do to help consider it done by the time you wake up he’ll ALWAYS go an extra mile for you

and chenle wants to make sure you are aware of that and can lean on him so it never gets to this point again

but for the time being... it’s cuddles and relaxation time!! ✧(๑✪д✪)۶

better believe he’s already preparing a spa day for both of you to enjoy like the ✨spicy ✨ bitches you are

Park Jisung

his heartbeat accelerates

and unfortunately it’s not because he’s flustered shame (#ﾟﾛﾟ#)

his only thought when he sees you with bag under your eyes and a cold wet cloth on your forehead is ‘shit, they’re dying wait no censor the first part i can’t get my mouth washed with soap but... poop, they’re dying’

ONE step away from calling for an ambulance or morgue in his mind

he SWEARS he’ll let you teach him how to ride a bycicle as long as you get out of this safe and sound (╬⁽⁽ ⁰ ⁾⁾ Д ⁽⁽ ⁰ ⁾⁾)

he’s a bit of a mess, but he’s your cute mess

it would take *quite* a bit of reassurance that you’re going to be fine after a good night’s sleep and some jisung time for him to somewhat relax

his cheeks will flush once he curls himself around your form no matter how many times you’ve cuddled before

but once you sigh blissfully once he wraps his arms around you, it’s game over for him ε=(｡♡ˇд ˇ♡｡）

he MELTS against you

he’ll caress your head and gently scratch your scalp, lays kisses on your cheeks/forehead/crown of your head

but he will also fret every time you toss and turn or you make any sound that seems ‘distressed’ to him

we all know he can sleep anywhere under a frickin carpet so he won’t have any problems adjusting to whatever works for you since all that matters to him atm is that you’re comfortable (♡ >ω< ♡)

he just wants you to get better faster

he’ll talk to you in a hushed voice, encouraging and praising you and assuring you that once you’re all better he’ll help you with whatever you need and EVERYTHING will be well in the end ٩(ó｡ò۶ ♡)

he’s a senstitive person so he just wants to be there for you in any shape and form he can be

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trashcanfanfics · 3 years

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May I request a Husk before working at hazbin hotel and a (Nonbinary) reader that is a bartender at a club and everytime he comes in to get shitfaced drunk they bring home after their shift and he eventually gets attached?

(Optinonal: some creepy guy hits on reader and how husk reacts when the guy takes it to far?) Have a lovely day/night and stay healthy! 💕

My first request for Husk!! I love that kitty!

You stay healthy and enjoy your day/night!! <3

This is your favorite time of night. When a certain avian cat would come in and drink at the bar where you worked. You had developed a soft spot for the drunkard, talking with him everytime he'd come in. He'd always comment on how this was where the best alcohol was and how no other place was as good. Currently, he was sitting on a stool in front of you, and it looks like you're going to have to take him home again. That's fine, though, you don't mind, in fact you have a spare key to his apartment now because of how often you throw him in the backseat of your car and drag him up the stairs to his apartment.

"And! That bastard just smiles with a shit eating grin, tellin' me that he already did it!" Husk takes a swig of the bottle. "Fuckin' dick." You hummed in response. Truth be told, you had been only half listening to this drunken story slash rant he was slurring out. Something about an Alastor. He usually complains or vents about this guy and you have yet to meet him. Husk said that that's a good thing, though. He continues on this topic, occasionally forgetting where he left off, leaving you to remind him, and him getting fluffed up at the reminder of thie "Alastor".

"If he pisses you off that much, maybe bring him in here and I could give him a piece of my mind." You placed you chin on your hand, leaning slightly over the bar. Husk's angry rambling came to an abrupt stop and he looked at you with total seriousness.

"I would never let him come near you. Never." Those words made your dead heart beat faster. That's another thing about Husk, he'd recently become very protective of you. His excuse was that you were the only good bartender on this side of the Pentagram. You blinked slowly in shock making him look away and take another long gulp of his bottle. Before you could respond, another slightly tipsy demon slid onto the stool next to Husk.

"Hey, pretty thing, when are you off work?" You recoiled away from the disgusting individual. Noticing Husk stiffen and his tail flicking back and forth caused you to also be on alert.

"That's none of your business." Your cold reply made the unnamed man chuckle darkly. It made your skin crawl and fear to pool in your gut. The look this creep was giving you set off alarms in your head. Stay away, they said. Danger.

"I'll just wait outside for you then." That eased your anxiety a bit, you didn't need to leave the bar to get to your apartment above it. Then you looked at the drunk Husk and your blood went cold, remembering that you have to take him home. "And besides, I can continue to talk to you here 'n' now, gorgeous." The wink he sent you was uncoordinated and unsettling. Your mouth twisted into an uncomfortable frown.

"Too bad yer voice is annoying." The creep's and your attention was brought to Husk, who was sipping on his drink, looking a bit more sober than the last time you glanced at him. "Maybe you should get fuckin' lost, bub." The creep didn't like this and snarled at him.

"Maybe you should mind ya fuckin' business, shithead," the creep snarled. You felt your blood boil. People were creeps all the time to you, you could handle it, but something about him talking to Husk that way pissed you off.

"I think you talkin' like that to my significant other is my business." You watched in shock as Husk casually, yet meaningfully, took the last swig of his booze. The creep frowned and then sneered.

"A cat, babe you can do better than that." This guy was just not getting it, was he? Before you could retort with a nasty comment about his appearance, Husk takes the empty bottle and smashes it into the offender's face, knocking him off his stool. No one else even flinched at the scene, going about their conversations. It was Hell, no one gave a shit. The man got up, holding his face.

"I'll just wait outside for both of you, then! I'll bring my crew! You'll be fucked, one of you literally." He sent one last dark smile before leaving the bar. You let out a breath you didn't know you were holding and turned back to Husk.

"Thank you," You said. No other words were needed, though you wanted to say more. To say how you appreciate him being there and standing up for you, protecting you, but you kept quiet. You knew he just did it so you would be able to take him home.

"Don't mention it..." He looked down as you set another beer bottle in front of him. He took it and looked at it for a second before popping the top. "Ya need an escort home tonight?" His question surprised you. You smiled.

"Ha, no, I, uh, live upstairs, actually. But thanks." You pointed up to emphasize your sentence. Husk hummed and gulped down half the bottle. "Got too sobered up for that, huh?" Your attempt at a joke made him chuckle with a half smile.

"Yeah, maybe I shouldn't continue if I gotta walk home, though." He looked away and around the bar. You raised an eyebrow and glanced at his wings. He doesn't fly, he told you that once when you asked. Too much effort, he said.

"What makes you think you're walking home?" You asked, hand on your hip. He looked back at you in suspicious confusion.

"Ya ain't going out there with those assholes waitin' for ya." His voice was stern, like a father almost. You briefly wondered if he had kids before shaking your head.

"Then neither are you, they're waiting for you too, ya know." You crossed your arms. The both of you stared into each other's eyes for a minute before he sighed and took another swig.

"Well, then what am I gonna do? Sleep behind the bar?" The mental image of him sleeping on the floor behind the bar, clutching a bottle of whiskey brought a smile to your face.

"Wouldn't be the first time," he snorted at that, "but I was thinking that you could sleep on my couch." His eyes met yours again.

"What?"

"You heard me." You looked at the clock on the wall by the dart board. "It's closing time anyways." He followed your gaze to the clock and squinted.

"No it ain't. You don't close for another few hours." He looked back to you with an eyebrow raised. You smirked back.

"I'm the owner, I can close anytime I want." You rounded the bar and made your way over to the few occupied tables. "Help me get the drunks outta here and we'll head up." Husk gulped down the rest of the booze and stood up. You turned from him to politely tell the still sober occupants to leave as you were closing early today. They grumbled but complied.

The next table was handled by Husk, as he told the ones splayed out in their chairs that they had to leave. They blew raspberries at him, causing him to growl back. You went over and put your hand on Husk's back, between his wings. His tail started flicking at the tip.

"You heard him, guys, time to go." Your voice made them groan and get up, wobbling and stumbling to the exit. You let out a breath with a smile and shook your head. The rest of the tables seemed to understand thet they had to go too and left, leaving you and Husk alone. You walked over to the doors and locked them before heading to the employee's only door, Husk behind you.

You both walked through the kitchen to another door next to the pantry, leading to a hallway. Passing by the breakroom and bathroom, you pulled out your keys. The stairway at the end of the hall squeaked and complained as you both wallked up to the little landing where your door was. Keys jangled as you unlocked and opened the door.

"Home sweet trashy home." You moved aside to let him in. He looked around as you closed the door and locked it. His ear flicked back at the sound for a moment before turning back forwards.

"'S nicer than my place."

"I know." You smiled and made your way to the kitchen. "You hungry?" He grumbled out a ''I could eat" and plopped down on your couch. You set to work on some mac 'n' cheese.

"Ya know, this couch is pretty comfy," Husk calls from the livingroom. You snort at his attempt at a casual conversation.

"Don't force yerself, there. You know you don't have to talk if you don't want to." You chuckled again. You pulled out the milk and butter, setting them down on the counter. Husk doesn't answer back and you assume he's just taking in his surroundings.

The mac 'n' cheese is finished when you add some bacon bits to it. Smiling at your work, you pulled out two bowls and scooped out servings. The spoons made a clatter as they were placed into the bowls. Stopping by the fridge, you balanced the bowls on one arm before grabbing out a soda for you, and a can of beer for Husk.

In the livingroom, you see Husk hasn't moved from the couch but does look more relaxed and comfortable. You handed him a bowl and his beer. He took them with a mumbled "thanks" before he set the beer on a coaster and dug into the cheap pasta.

"This is really good." The comment made you smile as you dug into your own bowl. You swallowed and looked at him.

"Thanks, it's the bacon bits." You take another bite and swallow. "Makes it taste like you put effort into it." Husk smiled slightly as he continued eating.

This was perfect, you thought, just spending time with Husk, outside the bar. Aside from taking his mumbling, drunk ass home, you hadn't really ever spent time with him casually. You loved Husk, you knew that. Even with how rough his exterior is (figuratively, you had felt how soft that fur is), you couldn't get enough of his company.

"Yer starin', bud." You blinked and quickly looked away, chewing on the bite of food you put in your mouth. He huffed in amusement. swallowing hard, you noticed you didn't have any food left and set the bowl on the coffee table before picking up your drink.

"Well, can you blame me? You over here looking cute and all that." You hide your blush behind the soda can as you take a sip. Husk whipped his head towards you. You decide to roll with this. "What your significant other can't tell you that you look cute?" Your callback to what he had called you earlier made him almost choke on his beer.

"Hh-what?" His response was full of shock and confusion. You shrugged, enjoying this newfound confidence. Maybe you accidentally grabbed yourself some liquid courage.

"I wouldn't mind being your real significant other." You shifted your gaze to look at him from the corner of your eye. His pupils were blown and he looked at you like you had hung the moon. It made your heart thud harshly in your chest.

"I wouldn't mind either..." His response shocked you, you had expected to be rejected and then just blow your statement off as a joke. You blinked slowly at him in shock again. He slowly blinked back. You made a mental side note to look up cat behavior later to see what the fuck that meant but for now, you just leaned over and kissed him. He kissed back, putting down his drink and pulling you closer. A purr rumbled out of his chest as you raked your fingers through his facial fur to the bcak of his head.

This was perfect, you thought.

#hazbin hotel x reader #husk x reader #trashcan answers you

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neoheros · 4 years

Text

how would haikyuu boys react to you hitting them up at 3 am? feat. gym three squad !

tsukishima kei

listen LISTEN

i know everyone thinks he’s the punctual kid who got his shit together and has a nice bed time and stuff

but like ??? tsukki is just a lil boy who collects dinosaurs and has a crippling addiction to tiktok

this boy is awake at 3 am because he cannot for the love of god put his phone down

he’s basically bouncing back and forth from twitter to tiktok, he’s TIRED OF IT

at this time he’s got a pretty picture of you cozily asleep in bed cause it’s like almost the crack of dawn and he’s chill with the fact that you’re healthy and taking care of yourself

so imagine how betrayed he felt when you snap him a picture of yourself holding up a peace sign with a silly grin at 3:36 am captioned “wanna get ice cream w/ me? 😗✌️”

he doesn’t reply but he does leave you on opened

and you were low key hurt cause 3 am do be the time you’re on your feels

he snaps you back though after a minute or two

it’s a video of him rolling his eyes at you but then flipping the camera to show you that he’s already on his way out the door with car keys in his hand

he’s gonna pretend that he’s annoyed but cmon guys let’s be real

he wanted some ice cream too and his fyp was showing the same stuff over and over again

plus he missed seeing you ok 👉👈

once he arrives at your door, he’s all grumpy but you don’t buy it !!! nah you see right through his act !!

tsukki: we’re buying ice cream and then we’re going to sleep or so help me i’ll lose my mind and never function again 😤

you: so i’m guessing you wrecked your sleep schedule too this quarantine huh?

tsukki, on the verge of a meltdown: if i see the sunrise without sleeping again for the eight morning in a row i’ll cry

you pat his back and you enjoy your ice cream together in his car while you both scroll through tiktok again

kuroo tetsuro

ok so contrary to popular belief, kuroo is in bed by 11 pm and wakes up at 8 am

like have y’all SEEN that man !!

y’all think he’s staying up til 4 am with THAT figure ?????

he’s got the body of a 6’2 nordic god and skin that is smoother than a baby’s bum

this boy takes care of himself and it SHOOOOOOWS !!!!!!

so anyways it’s 3 am and you’re still awake because who the hell isn’t these days like please

you knew that your boyfriend was most likely asleep by now but if you knew anything and i mean anything about kuroo is that he never puts his phone on silent

so you weigh out the pros and cons on asking him to come eat out with you and it didn’t take you that much time to decide tbh

pros: he gets to see you and it’s been so long since he has

pros: think of all the hugs and forehead kisses you both are missing out on

pros: you can ask him to bring his grey sweatshirt which always smells like his cologne that you forgot to take from him

cons: bro after thinking of that last one, the cons didn’t even matter at this point, you just missed your man like damn :(

so you facetime him and it takes numerous of rings before the call got dropped

you: oh so he’s SLEEPING sleeping :/

but then like before you could ring him up again you’re already getting another call from him

you take a second or two cause your heart was just so warm like !!! that’s my baby 🥺👉👈

you answer and he’s so pretty y’all it’s unfair like how did this man just wake up

his hair was all messy and he’s rubbing his eyes and stuff but also you can clearly see his silver chain on his exposed collar bone and NGJEJDKSKZKA

you, out of breath: h-holy shit

and his bed voice !! it’s all deep and groggy like who gave you the right ??

you swear you felt your heart stop when he went “babe, it’s 3 am,”

sir we are supposed to be social distancing please do not make me act up

kuroo, half asleep: did you need anything baby 🥺

you, on the verge of tears: i wanted mcdonald’s but instead i’m getting attacked 😤

and you just watch him stifle a yawn before his face erupts in a goofy ass smile as he goes “mcdonald’s it is.”

KENSKWNS I LOVE KUROO

bokuto koutarou

BABIE !! HE IS !! AN ACTUAL BABIE !!

i’m just gonna be flat out honest here, he’s the one who hits you up at 3 am to hang out

bc it’s quarantine and social distancing has taken so much from him already and he just wants to see his babie ok is that too much to ask

so it’s not a surprise to anyone when it’s 3 am in the morning and he finds himself in his feels cause both you and akaashi fell asleep on him and he’s just !!! 🥺

he’s nowhere near falling asleep too cause every time he tries to sleep his messed up body clock is just like nah bruh it ain’t 9 am yet 💀✌️

so he’s contemplating either going out to get starbucks alone or dragging you or akaashi out of bed

he goes with the latter cause you know what it’s what he deserves !! 😤😤

he calls you in a heartbeat after making up his mind and his heart falls to his stomach when you don’t pick up

but two minutes later you snap him a photo of you in bed rubbing your eyes with the caption “this is the earliest i’ve woken up in 3 weeks”

he laughs aloud at that and his heart is doing jumping jacks cause you’re so cute and it’s like YOU !! WERE !! MADE !! FOR !! HIM !!

he snaps you back with him in his hoodie, a wide smile and his keys brought up to his face with the text, “starbucks w/ me?”

the two of you end up falling asleep in his car on a parking lot and you wake up to see that he took off his sweatshirt to cover you from the cold 🥺👉👈

akaashi keiji

akaashi keiji is the most perfect boy in the world

so y’all can bet that the latest he’ll stay up is 11 pm with the ensured fact that he’ll wake up at 7 am

he’s a pretty light sleeper though but he never puts his phone on silent because what if he’s needed and there’s an emergency 🥺

yes he is That kind of person

he tells you everyday to try and have a better sleep schedule to train your body clock but do you listen? no 👉👈

so he’s kinda alarmed but also not really when his phone lets out a consecutive amount of notification pings

they’re all from you and at first he’s worried because woah that’s a lot of snaps and texts

but then he remembers that oh they’re all from you

anyways he wakes himself up, running his hand through his hair as he goes through the span of messages you sent him

basically ranging from “hey keiji in the tiny TINY chance you’re still awake do you wanna play imessage games with me” to “i’m so upset look how pretty that cat is,”

he had a smile on his face the whole time he read through them

he sends you a snap of his sleepy face with a soft grin and captioned it with “are you still bored and awake?”

and it takes you a minute and a second of tearing up over having the most amazing boyfriend ever before responding to him

you send him a snap of you with your hand over your chest saying, “i’m hungry now too 🥺”

akaashi, already on his way out the doorway with an extra hoodie and a bucket of ice cream: omw ❤️👍

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teacupfulofstarshine · 3 years

Text

living in the real world (ain’t it fun) CHAPTER 10

CW: panic attacks, shouting, cursing, touch starvation, threats of bodily harm, self-deprecation, self-hatred, negative thought spirals, unsympathetic actions, unhealthy handling of emotions, unhealthy work habits, unhealthy emotional coping mechanisms

are you prepared for the roman/anxiety confrontation? i promise you are not >:3

huge thank you to @flamingfawkes for beta’ing!

wordcount: ~4.6k

chapter 1 // chapter 2 // chapter 3 // chapter 4 // chapter 5 // chapter 6 // chapter 7 // chapter 8 // chapter 9 // read it on ao3!!

Anxiety stays in Logan’s lap for almost ten minutes. No one speaks while he sits there, hugging Logan tightly. Logan tries to shift, but Anxiety whines and presses closer. “Is - can we stay?” he whispers. “I feel like if you let go of me, I’m going to float away.”

“You are likely touch-starved, to a fairly extreme degree,” Logan says.

“If you don’t want to touch me, you can let me go.”

“I will do no such thing.” Logan sounds almost offended at Anxiety’s implications. “You are hurting, Anxiety. I will not allow you to continue hurting if I can alleviate your suffering in any way. You are not hurting me by touching me.”

“You hate being touched,” Roman says. Anxiety presses his face further into Logan’s shoulder, hiding, and Logan turns to stare straight through Roman.

“I have a low tolerance for touch, Roman, much lower than you and Patton. But I require it to subsist, as we all do. Thomas is a human, and all humans need touch and social connections to survive. We represent his desires, his wants, his needs - we share them. I am not opposed to providing and receiving touch, but I am easily overwhelmed.”

“Lemme know when you gotta stop,” Anxiety says.

“I assure you that I will, Anxiety. However, I am alright, so there is no reason for you to move.”

Patton slides off the bed, kneeling next to Logan. “Anxiety? Kiddo, can I touch you?”

Anxiety turns to look at him, and Patton lifts one hand. “Just your shoulder. I wanna put my hand on it, maybe squeeze it a little. Is that alright with you?”

“Yeah,” Anxiety says, pulling his face out of Logan’s shoulder. Patton gently rests his hand on Anxiety’s shoulder, squeezing, and rubbing his thumb back and forth. Patton takes a deep breath, like he’s gathering his courage for something, and then he winces. “Did I hurt you?”

“No, I’m just old,” Patton laughs. “As old as Thomas is, anyway. And that means I can’t sit on my feet for too long without them falling asleep. Gotta move around a little!” He shifts to sit cross-legged, wincing with Thomas when his knees crack audibly, and then he puts his hand back on Anxiety’s shoulder.

“Kiddo,” Patton says, and then, "Anxiety. It's my turn to apologize, okay?"

"You - you don't have to," Anxiety says. "You were trying your best, weren’t you? Just like Logan? I just misinterpreted your intentions, like I did with his, so -"

"No. I do need to apologize," Patton insists. "Is it alright if I apologize to you?"

Anxiety blinks. “You . . . if you think you need to, Patton.”

Patton looks serious, unusually so. “I do. I do need to.”

“Do you want to stay where you are?” Logan asks Anxiety. “You can move, if you like.”

“If you’re comfortable, I’m okay staying.” Logan nods, and Anxiety turns his eyes back to Patton. Thomas takes a deep breath, and Patton smiles gratefully as his chest swells with fresh air. He curls his free hand into a fist, squeezes it so Thomas can feel the indents of his nails in his palm, and then he relaxes it.

"Anxiety, I’m sorry," Patton says. "I - I'm at the core of Thomas’s emotions, and the stronger they are, the more affected I am. I experience all of them, but I try to only express the happy ones, because the negative emotions . . . I don’t really like them that much. I mean, does anyone? They make me feel all icky inside." Anxiety visibly deflates at that. "Wait - no, Anxiety, I didn’t mean - I wasn’t talking about you, I -”

Anxiety sighs, patting Logan’s shoulder before shifting out of his lap and sitting across from Patton. "You're not wrong, though. I am a negative emotion. I'm just - I bring Thomas down, I know that. And I bring everyone else down with me. I'm -"

"Stop!" Patton cries, and his face shines bright blue as tears pour down all of their faces yet again.

"Patton?"

"Anxiety, you - I - just listen, please? Listen to me? I can't - I want to tell you that the emotion you represent doesn’t have negative repercussions more often than not. I want to tell you that anxiety like Thomas’s is inherently a good thing, and negative effects are few and far between. I want to tell you that, but I can't because - because that would be a lie. But that's - that doesn’t mean - you are not a bad person, Anxiety."

Anxiety’s mouth hangs open in shock. “I’m -”

"- Not a bad person," Patton repeats. "Anxiety can be really difficult to handle sometimes. I know you know that better than any of us. But that doesn't mean that you are a bad person! When I told you that you were being silly it - it was because I - because you - I -”

Patton drags a hand down his face. “Anxiety, I was afraid to handle my own negative emotions. I pushed you away because - because - I was afraid that having you around would make it harder to conceal my negative emotions. I’ve been hiding them for so long that I’ve forgotten how to feel them in a healthy way, how to deal with them in a healthy way. I didn't want to admit that I had emotions that were anything less than the happy-pappy-Patton-pending sunshine that I project. And that was wrong of me. Just because emotions aren't happy doesn't mean that they're bad. And I never meant to make you feel invalid. I never wanted you to think that - that I don't value you or your contributions to Thomas, because you do contribute to Thomas. You’re more than the monochrome villain that we painted you as, and we - I - have done a truly abhorrent job of making you feel welcome or accepted or validated and -"

Thomas swipes the back of his hand across his eyes; Logan puts his fingers to his face and frowns when they come away wet; Anxiety scrubs his sleeve across his eyes. Patton pulls away from Anxiety’s shoulder, folding both hands in his lap before lowering his head. "I am so sorry that I tried to ignore the emotions that you bring to the table because I - I was afraid to feel them. You are not a bad person, Anxiety, and I made you feel like you were when you were just doing your job. And I - I will always hate myself for that. I'm - you don't have to, but if - if you can find it in you - I - I'm so sorry, Anxiety, I promise that I am, I -"

Anxiety surprises all of them by leaning forward and hugging Patton; Patton holds him back like he thinks Anxiety will shatter if he loosens his grip. “Pat,” Anxiety says. “You - you made mistakes, mistakes that hurt me. And it’s going to take a while for me to be okay with that. But you - you sound like you’re really sorry for hurting me.”

“I am,” Patton whispers.

“I forgive you,” Anxiety says. “I believe that you’re going to try and do better, and that’s - that means a lot, Patton. I forgive you.”

“Thank you.”

“And Pat?”

“Yeah?”

Anxiety leans back, staring directly into Patton’s eyes. "You don't have to hate yourself forever."

"What?"

"You said you would always hate yourself for making me feel like I was a bad person, but it wasn't just you. You know that, right? And I - you were doing your best, Patton. I mean, I don't know about Princey over there, but you and Logan appear to have been trying, at the very least, and I can respect that. I forgive you, Patton, and that means you don't have to hate yourself, right?" He looks anxious about the idea of Patton hating himself forever, and Patton smiles through his tears.

"Oh, kiddo." Thomas feels something warm swelling in his chest as Patton and Anxiety hug, again, and then Anxiety slides out of Patton’s lap. Patton stands up, pulling Anxiety and then Logan to their feet, and then Thomas turns to look at Roman, still sitting in the corner by the closet. There’s a strange look in his eyes, and Thomas tries to match it with the tangle of negative emotions sitting heavily in his stomach. It’s jealousy, he thinks, but there’s something else mixed up in it - sadness, he thinks.

“Roman?” Thomas asks. Roman flinches a little, looking up at him. “Are you okay?”

Roman looks away from Thomas, staring resolutely out the window. “Fine.”

“Roman, you also have to apologize to Anxiety,” Thomas says firmly.

"What's the point? I suck at it, and he's not gonna accept it anyway! He already said so. Yell at me all you want, I don't fucking care."

"Language," Patton says. Roman rolls his eyes and turns his back to them. Anxiety stands up, taking one, two, three careful steps towards him.

“Princey, I never said I wouldn’t accept your apology.”

“I tried! I already tried apologizing to you, and you rejected it!”

“It wasn’t a real apology,” Logan says calmly. “You apologized because you felt obligated to, not because you felt genuine remorse.

“Yeah,” Anxiety says, kicking the carpet. “I dunno what you think I am, Roman, but it’s - it’s probably not right.”

Roman, who has been fidgeting a little, sits perfectly, ramrod still. “What I think you are?” His voice is quiet, flat, and Thomas is a little bit scared of the sudden lack of emotion in his chest. “You want to know what I think you are, Anxiety?”

He stands up, curling his hands into fists, and when he turns around his eyes are furious. “What you are,” he spits, and Thomas is honestly surprised that fire doesn’t spew from his mouth, “is a menace. What you are is a disgrace! Every single time I come up with something beautiful, something wonderful, something amazing, every single time I push Thomas towards an opportunity that would only catapult him upwards, it is you who drags me down!”

He gestures to Patton and Logan, and the fire Thomas expected out of Roman’s mouth is now blazing through his chest. “Specs squared over there is at least capable of pretending to support my ambitions! But oh, no, not you, Anxiety! You just appear out of the shadows, like a villain, like a god damn demon, and you tear me to ribbons!”

Anxiety stands his ground as Roman gets closer, balling his fists. He’s putting on a brave face, but Thomas can feel his heart beating so fast it’s vibrating. As Roman gets closer, Thomas suddenly becomes acutely aware of the height difference between Roman, a young adult, and Anxiety, a child.

“You offer nothing!” Roman’s voice is venomous, and Anxiety isn’t the only one whose hands are shaking. “You don’t do anything useful! All you do is look for the darkness in a situation, and you refuse to see the light! Hell, you could be looking at the purest sunbeam there ever was - you could be looking at Patton himself and you would still find something wrong!”

“I’m not perfect, Roman,” Patton starts, but Roman is on a roll and he’s not stopping now.

“You’re pathetic! If you can’t find the darkness, you’ll create some just to ruin everything for everyone else! You refuse to believe in anything happy! All you do is look for flaws!”

“That’s my job!” Anxiety bites back.

“It’s a shitty job, and no one needs you to do it! We’d all be better off without you! Thomas, especially, would be better off without you! Your job is meaningless to me, and - and so are you!”

Anxiety’s whole body is shaking, but he steps closer to Roman, pushing his shoulders back. “Did you ever consider that maybe -”

“No! I don’t want to hear any more negativity out of you! Do you have any idea how happy I was when we woke up and I thought you hadn’t manifested?” Roman laughs, bitterly, dragging his hands through his hair and tugging it so tightly everyone else winces. “I thought I could finally create freely, finally help Thomas achieve his ambitions! And now here you are to ruin my life, yet again!”

“I don’t ruin your life on purpose, you know!”

“Oh, really? You coulda fooled me! We were all getting along just fine, and then you showed up, and we almost crashed the car! That could have killed Thomas, who you claim to be protecting! Then you ran away, which hurt Thomas, and then you bit me, which hurt Thomas even more! All you do is hurt Thomas! We were better off without you!”

Thomas isn’t sure when he stood up, but he’s on his feet, and so are Patton and Logan. Outrage is searing through all of them, but Anxiety stares up at Roman, face setting like flint. Before anyone else can speak, Anxiety leans forward, and sneers, “Got it all out of your system, Princey?”

Oh, this is going to be a disaster.

"Did it ever occur to you, in the midst of your little pity party, that what you wanted wasn't best for Thomas either?"

Roman bristles. "How dare you -"

"How dare I?! You think you know me? Well, I know you too, buddy! You run yourself ragged trying to come up with ideas constantly - if Thomas listened to you all the time he'd never get anything done in the real world! He'd stretch himself too thin doing too much and he'd kill himself, Roman! The only reason you haven't died yet is because you aren't fucking real!"

Anxiety lifts his chin, glaring directly into Roman’s eyes. He’s not backing down. "There's nothing wrong with being creative, Roman. But you push so hard that if I wasn't around to reign you in, Thomas would burn out! If that happened, he'd lose you completely! Do you even know what that feels like?"

"I - wh -"

"No! You don't! Do you know why you don’t? Because I keep it from happening! You like to play the big hero, the prince, the knight in shining armor, but I know the truth! You may swan around acting like you’re some grand protector of Thomas’s psyche, but the only one who actually does any protecting around here is me!"

Anxiety’s voice is starting to distort, to double and layer and twist the way it had when he’d first appeared and made Thomas pull over, and Thomas sits down, hard, nearly floored by the terror running through him.

“You think that I don’t know what you really think? I am Thomas’s anxiety! I am his negativity! I am self-loathing and hatred and fear and doubt and all the dark and dirty little secrets you hate about yourself, which means that I know EXACTLY what you think about me, because it’s what you think about YOURSELF!”

Roman’s face loses all color instantly. “Wh -”

“Roman?” Patton asks, soft and feather-light, and Thomas feels like he’s about to break.

“You HATE yourself! You think you’re not good enough for Thomas, so you consistently push yourself past your limits so that you can maybe, finally, prove yourself worthy of being his creativity! So that you can maybe, finally live up to this princely persona you’ve built for yourself to camouflage your massive insecurities! But you don’t want to DEAL with those insecurities, so you project all your fears and self-hatred onto me! It’s the perfect solution - I’m already a villain, right? Already the bad guy? Newsflash, asshole - YOU CAN’T JUST SHUNT YOUR SHIT OFF ONTO ME SO THAT YOU DON’T HAVE TO DEAL WITH YOUR PROBLEMS, ROMAN!”

Roman’s entire body is shaking. Patton has his hands pressed over his mouth; Logan is running his hands up and down his tie repeatedly, rocking back and forth. Thomas looks between them rapidly. “Roman?” Thomas whispers.

Roman drops to his knees, presses a hand over his mouth, and the freshly-ended tears spill over again.

Before anyone else can react, Anxiety kneels in front of Roman and hugs him. Roman sits perfectly still for a moment before his face breaks and his shoulders shake and he crumples against Anxiety like wet paper. Thomas’s chest heaves with his sobs.

“Roman -”

“I’m sorry!” Roman chokes. “I’m sorry, is that what you want me to say? I’m sorry, Anxiety, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry!”

“Roman, you’re panicking -”

“Oh, well spotted, Panic at the Everywhere!”

“Roman, stop!”

“Why?! I thought you wanted an apology from me? Well, here you go!” Roman pulls out of Anxiety’s hug and does a mocking bow before tugging at his hair again. “The great Prince Roman, reduced to an undignified, snivelling mess at your feet, admitting to all his faults and flaws and -”

“Jesus, Princey, BREATHE.” Roman’s chest is heaving, and he’s choking on his sobs, meaning the rest of them are as well. “Come on, you have to breathe, you’re gonna suffocate at this rate - Thomas, I need you to help me, please!”

“Wh - how can I -” Thomas is struggling to get air in, and he’s starting to get a little bit lightheaded.

“Listen to me, Thomas. Breathe in for four seconds. Logan, help him count?”

Logan nods, counting the seconds aloud and pressing two fingers against his carotid artery. Thomas, Anxiety, and Patton breathe along to Logan’s counts as Anxiety takes Roman’s hands and holds them tightly to keep them out of his hair. “You too, Princey, come on. In for four, hold for seven . . ."

They all sit and breathe together while Logan counts, in-for-four hold-for-seven out-for-eight. Eventually, Roman’s breathing evens to almost normal, and Anxiety squeezes his hands tightly.

“Prin - Roman.” Anxiety’s voice is still distorted, but it’s a little less harsh on the ears.

“What,” Roman says miserably.

“We need to talk about that."

“We really don’t.” Anxiety sighs.

“Roman -”

“Roman,” Patton says. Anxiety turns to look at Patton, whose face is shining blue and purple, and he shifts out of the way, letting Patton kneel in front of Roman. Roman flinches when Patton takes his hands, but he looks up at him anyway. "It's - it's okay to have negative feelings. And I know I’m the biggest hypocrite in the world for saying this, but you can't bottle them up or pretend that they don't exist. You have to acknowledge them and talk about them if you want to feel better. Ignoring them feels good in the moment, feels like you’re handling it, but . . . it just hurts everyone when it explodes. Because it will explode.”

Patton gestures to the room at large. “It did explode."

“I know,” Roman whispers miserably. He looks down at Patton’s hands around his. “I just - I hate this! I hate talking about the negative stuff. I’m the dreamy fantasy guy! I'm not supposed to feel like this! I’m not supposed to feel sad or unimportant or worthless or - or - or broken.”

"Fuck that noise," Anxiety says. "Not - not your feelings, but your feelings about your feelings. That came out weird - um - geez, I - Roman, what you feel . . . it's . . . it's not wrong. You aren't broken for having feelings that aren't good. Nobody feels good all the time."

"But - but I feel this way so much," Roman protests. "I - I should be better than that. And half the time there's nothing actually wrong with me anyway! The thoughts just show up, unwanted, and I just - I - it's stupid. I’m stupid, for feeling this way."

“Roman,” Patton and Thomas say.

"Roman," Anxiety says. "Whatever you feel isn't stupid. No matter how long you're feeling like that - hell, even if you always feel this way - it's still valid. It's not stupid or bad or wrong. You're not stupid or bad or wrong."

“But - but I don’t want to feel this way.”

“I don’t want to feel this way either, most of the time,” Anxiety admits. “I know my job is important, but that doesn’t mean that it doesn’t have its downsides. It has a lot of downsides, I’m not gonna lie. And it sucks, it sucks so much, Roman, but - but it’s - it’s okay.”

“How is any of this okay?”

“It’s okay to not be okay, Roman,” Anxiety says quietly. “It’s okay to say ‘I’m not okay right now’ out loud.” Roman stays silent, and Anxiety exhales. “Roman, you have to say it."

"Say what?" Roman mutters. He glares at Anxiety, but the words and the glare are both completely devoid of venom.

"That you're not okay. If you wanna feel better, you . . . you have to admit that you aren't feeling great right now. It's gonna suck, but you have to. It's important. And no one’s gonna think you’re stupid for saying it. I'm not gonna think you're stupid for saying it. Hell, I say it all the time. You have to say it, Roman, so you can start feeling better."

Roman looks to Thomas. “I’m not going to think you’re stupid, Roman.” Roman squeezes his eyes shut and stays silent for a long time, but Anxiety just waits, patiently. Finally, Roman breathes the words out.

"I'm - I'm not okay."

"And that's okay," Anxiety says softly. "It's okay to not be okay, Roman."

Roman looks up like Anxiety’s just grown a second head ". . . Say that again?"

"It's okay for you to not be okay right now, because you will be okay. You aren't right now, and that’s okay, because you will be."

Roman pulls his hands out of Patton’s, stands up, and offers a hand to Anxiety, Anxiety eyes it for a second before letting Roman pull him to his feet. “I am sorry,” Roman says - quiet, sincere, lacking all of the bluster and force of his earlier apology. "I - you're right. I was projecting onto you. And I said some - some truly unforgivable things, back there. Some truly ungallant things, things that any real knight or prince would never say. And I - I didn't - well, I meant them at the time, but now I recognize the error of my ways. I’m - Anxiety, I’m -”

“Virgil,” Anxiety says.

Everyone in the room does a double-take. Anxiety’s face turns from pale to pink to red, and he won’t meet anyone’s eyes. “My name. It’s Virgil. I just - you know everyone else’s, and I’m not hiding from you guys anymore, so - I figure you might as well -”

“Virgil,” Roman says, and Thomas’s heart aches at the tenderness in his voice. "Virgil, you - if you never forgave me, I would understand. But I want you to know that I am so, so sorry, Virgil. I - I tied you up, I dropped you, I told you all of the horrible things I think about myself because I hoped it would make me feel better. But now I just feel guilty, and horrible, and - and I am so, so sorry.”

"I forgive you, Princey.” Roman looks shell-shocked, but Virgil continues. “And for what it's worth . . . I’m sorry too. I know I can be harsher than I have to, sometimes, and I usually feel pretty bad about it afterwards. But I admit that I was a lot less careful with you because you always acted so above-it-all, and you so clearly hated me that it was easy to overreact and get carried away. We fueled each other’s fires, so . . . yeah. 'M sorry, too."

Roman opens his arms, and Virgil only hesitates a moment before stepping into them. They hug, Roman pressing his face into Virgil’s hair, and Thomas swears he hears Virgil’s shoulders crack with the force of Roman’s hug. Patton’s face is shining yellow, and Logan has shifted from rubbing his tie to flapping one hand.

Thomas feels his chest lighten, like some of the steel bands have snapped, but he knows that there’s one last apology that has to be made. “Virgil,” he says. Roman gives Virgil one last squeeze before letting go, and then Virgil takes a step back, looking at Thomas.

“Yes?” He still sounds hesitant, nervous, and Thomas wants to destroy that tone forever.

“Come over here, please?”

Virgil shuffles over, feet dragging against the carpet, and Thomas exhales. “It’s my turn now.” He gently takes Virgil’s hands in his own, and for the first time he notices how small and fragile they are. They’ve been building Virgil - no, not Virgil, Anxiety - up into a monster for so long, but his hands feel like bird bones in Thomas’s. He looks up at Thomas with wide eyes, and Thomas feels his heart break a little at the vulnerability he sees there.

He takes a deep breath, takes a moment to compose himself. He looks past Virgil and sees Patton smiling encouragingly, Logan nodding, Roman giving him a thumbs up. He thinks about what they’d all said, and then looks back at Virgil.

"Virgil, I'm sorry. Earlier, you said I treated you like you were something foreign, and you - you were right. People always talked about my anxiety like it was nothing more than a disorder, and I thought that way too. I was convinced that if I could just manage my anxiety, all the problems in my life would magically disappear. I . . . I think a lot of your villainization came from me. I looked at my anxiety and I saw nothing more than a flaw. But here, now, looking at you, I don't see a flaw. I see a strong, selfless person who constantly sacrifices everything to protect the people he loves - people who up until today have done a really shitty job of appreciating everything he does for them."

"Thomas . . ." Virgil whispers. His eyes are wet, but Thomas’s are finally dry.

"Virgil, you are important," Thomas says firmly. "You - you are so important to me. Sometimes you can be a little excessive, but I can see why you felt you had to be, given the way we all reacted to you. We can work on that together, we can work on all of this together. I'm sorry that I made you feel like I didn't want you here. And - and maybe I didn't want plain old anxiety, but I definitely want Virgil. You're not bad, you're just . . . you were just trying to do your job. You just wanted to keep me safe.”

“I wanted to keep you all safe,” Virgil says. “Even though you never thought of me that way, I have always considered you four to be my family. And I take the job of protecting my family very seriously.” He glances down at his body and snorts. “I mean, generally I don’t look like a fuckin’ twelve-year-old when I’m performing that job, but I’m still capable.” He looks back at Thomas. “I know I hindered you too much on more than one occasion, and I’m really sorry about that. Protecting you is all I’ve ever wanted to do.”

"I know that now," Thomas says. "We can work on being a better family together, all of us, but honestly? There’s nothing wrong with who you are. I'm sorry I made you feel unwanted just for doing your job - just for being who you are. But I promise, I do want you here. I want you here exactly the way you are, because there's nothing wrong with the way you are."

Virgil smiles at him, a shy, genuine smile. Thomas lets go of his hands and opens his arms. “You don’t have to, Virgil, but if you want to, I -”

Virgil is in his arms before he knows what’s happening. “I forgive you, Thomas, of course I do, I was never mad at you, I just wanted to keep you safe I - I’m so sorry that I hurt you, I -”

“Stop apologizing, Anx - Virgil,” Roman says. “That’s gonna take some getting used to, but I’m happy to make the adjustment.”

Virgil twists in Thomas’s embrace to look at Roman. “I mean, I should probably apologize for biting you in the woods.”

“I mean, I was behaving like a jackass at the time, and I did hogtie you in said woods. So . . . call it even?” Virgil laughs, and it’s watery and weak but it’s enough to set off everyone else.

“Yeah, Princey. Call it even.”

#starshinewrites #living in the real world (ain't it fun)#ain't it fun!au #platonic TLAMP

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redgillan · 4 years

Text

Under Pastel Skies - 3

Sugar daddy!Bucky Barnes x Reader

Summary: Modern!AU Bucky doesn’t need anyone, especially not a sugar baby. He isn’t that desperate… but she smiles so sweetly and she’s endearingly awkward, and he’s so lonely. She’s an artist, a painter, the type of person who always puts others before herself. Throwing caution to the wind Bucky offers her a place to live, a place where she can finally paint whatever her heart desires. He doesn’t need much in return; a friend, a muse.

Word Count: 2,587

Warnings: none

A/N: I wanted to give Reader a family and this is the easiest way to do it. Btw Peggy’s husband isn’t Steve, I have other plans for him ;) Enjoy!

Wannabe sugar daddies don’t interact, idc if you have money, eat it and leave me be.

The rest of the week went by, and you kept hoping Bucky would come back. You hadn’t seen him since he’d left 300 dollars under his napkin after visiting you at work. You had tucked the bills into your bra, knowing they would be safe there, and walked home at the end of your shift.

Now it was Thursday afternoon and you were craving a day off.

Natasha’s apartment was spacious and the oversized glass window bathed the living room in natural sunlight. The apartment was a gift from Sam. Obviously.

You dropped your purse on the sofa –your bed- and laid out the bills on the coffee table. It was made of marble and brass, another gift from Sam.

You didn’t know what to do with the money, so you took it wherever you went, to keep it safe. You wanted to return it to Bucky. It was too much and you weren’t used to random acts of kindness.

You sunk into the cushion and blew out a sigh as you stared at the money. The persistent vibration of your phone against your thigh pulled you out of your thoughts. Half expecting it to be Natasha, you answered without looking at the caller ID.

The operator told you that Scott Lang was calling from Saint Quentin State Prison, and asked if you would accept the charges. You agreed. You always agreed.

“Splotchy, I need your help.”

Closing your eyes, you let your head fall back against the cushion. “I told you to stop calling me that, Scott.”

It was a silly nickname.

As a child, your mother dubbed you splotchy because of the colourful doodles you painted on the living room walls, and your siblings, who were roughly a few years older than you, had loved using that nickname. Especially since they knew you disliked it.

Their support and endless enthusiasm played a big part in your artistic journey, nurturing that spark into a flame. What started out as a childlike fascination with colours and shapes became your whole life. No one was surprised when you decided to pursue a degree in fine arts.

After the death of her husband, Peggy Carter adopted five children; a little boy from San Francisco, a little girl from Wakanda, twins from Sokovia and a little girl whose birth parents were still in high school. You were the last one, the only one she adopted as a baby.

“Is it offensive to call an artist splotchy?”

“It’s irrelevant. I haven’t painted in months,” you replied. “And we’re not kids anymore, you can use my name.”

“I’ve been calling you Splotchy for so long, I forgot your actual name.”

“You’re so funny,” you deadpanned. “What do you need, Scott?”

Scott’s tone changed suddenly, his voice grew agitated. “I need you to call Maggie. She isn’t picking up when I call her.”

“Scott,” you sighed.

“I haven’t talked to Cassie since her birthday,” he cut you off, pleading. “Please, I just want to talk to my little girl.”

Maggie was Scott’s ex-wife. Six months after his incarceration, she had filed for divorce. Natasha thought it was a real dick move but you didn’t blame Maggie. She was alone, her husband was in jail –for basically being a dumbass although the official charge was embezzlement and destruction of property- and she had a kid to raise.

Maggie wasn’t a saint but she was a good mother, and Cassie was a smart and healthy kid. Now you knew what to do with Bucky’s money.

“I’ll call her,” you said. “Listen, I’m going to put 50 bucks on your book. Buy yourself a bar of soap, I can smell you from here.” Scott interrupted you with a monotone ‘har har’. You chuckled. “I’ll buy Cassie a Christmas gift on your behalf, all right? I think she wanted a bike.”

“Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you,” he chanted over the phone, his voice muffled as if he was holding the receiver too close to his mouth. “Are you sure you can afford it? I know it isn’t easy for you. Between living in New York and paying for mom’s nursing home, you don’t have to-”

“It’s fine,” you said, cutting off the conversation. “I’m not alone, Okoye helps.”

“And Wanda?”

“She sends postcards from time to time.”

The line went quiet for a moment. “I want to get out of here so bad,” Scott groaned. “Everything’s gone to shit since I went to jail.”

“Everything’s gone to shit since Pietro died, Scott.” You both remained silent, remembering your late brother. Just thinking about him made your eyes start to prickle with tears, so you cleared your throat and ended the call. “I’ll talk to Maggie. You’ll be out soon, just... stay out of trouble. Love you.”

You left your phone on the table and kicked off your shoes before you lay down on the sofa for a well-deserved nap. In your dreams your brothers weren’t either dead or in prison, your mother hadn’t been diagnosed with Alzheimer, and you weren’t a burden to your friend.

If you were lucky enough, you wouldn’t even dream at all.

The next day, Bucky arrived at the hotel at six thirty and you playfully glared at him from across the lounge. He wasn’t stupid, he knew why you were glaring at him. At least he had the decency to look a little sheepish.

“Just so you know, you bought yourself about 30 breakfasts,” you told him, referring to the far-too-generous tip he had left the other day.

“A man’s gotta eat,” he replied with a boyish cockiness that made him look stupidly attractive. You were too flustered to find a good comeback.

You brought him his cup of coffee and let him enjoy his breakfast while you attended to your other clients. It was an unusually busy day, the room was packed with families who were getting ready to explore Manhattan. You didn’t have time to chat with Bucky and he didn’t stay long. You saw him flinch a couple of times; the muscles in his shoulders pulled tight and his eyes darting left and right.

He left another ridiculously generous tip, along with a handwritten note. Breakfast is the most important meal of the day x.

Bucky came back the following week, and even though it was a quiet morning, you made sure to find him a table in a secluded spot. He didn’t notice when you slipped the 300 dollars into the pocket of his coat. You could be pretty sneaky, too.

“Mmmh,” he said, wiping his mouth with a napkin, “I looked at your Instagram.”

“Oh,” you glanced at your shoes, embarrassed. “Wait, you’re on Instagram? I have a hard time imagining you scrolling through your feed.”

He laughed a little. “I’ll admit I’m not as tech savvy as you youngsters, but I’m not a fossil. I use it to look at the pictures my sister post of my niblings.”

“Cute,” you grinned.

“Anyway,” he said, pushing a hand through his hair. “I love your work. It’s very unique; a cross between Impressionism and Post-impressionism. It’s realistic, and yet there’s something different...” his face scrunched up as he tried to look for the right word. “There’s something in your paintings, something that isn’t here in real life but perhaps should be. It’s hard to explain. It’s a feeling, a color, a pattern; it’s indiscernible but it’s there.” He looked up at you, his cheeks red with embarrassment. “I’m not making much sense, am I?”

You blinked, suddenly stunned that someone had such strong opinions about your work. There was nothing but sincerity in his ocean-blue eyes, and for a moment, you were at a loss for words.

“I, um-” you cleared your throat, “Thank you, I didn’t know that. I look up to Monet, obviously. His work is phenomenal, and I also have a soft spot for Van Gogh.” You ran a hand across your face. “Sorry, I’m a little emotional. The people who compliment my art are usually my siblings, and Nat.”

“And now me,” he said with a warm smile. “And soon a lot more people.”

Flustered, you bit your bottom lip. “That would be nice.”

Bucky nodded. He gathered his silverware and set them on his plate, trying to buy time. You watched him hesitate before he turned to you. “I noticed that your last post was from almost a year ago.”

“Yeah,” you said with a casual shrug. “I don’t really paint anymore. I’m too tired when I get home and supplies are expensive.”

“Of course,” he pursed his lips in thought. “Are you free this afternoon? I was wondering if we could meet for coffee.”

You tried not to show your surprise but his words made the sleeping butterflies in your stomach crack an eye open, their interest piqued.

Was he asking you out? He’d come to your workplace every week since your brief ‘date’. He always gave you more-than-generous tips, and he listened to you with a combination of close attention and warmth that made you weak at the knees.

He’d made it clear he wasn’t looking for anyone but maybe he had changed his mind. Agh, down girl! He just wanted a friend.

You looked into his beautiful eyes, seeing a myriad of expressions cross his face before he smiled at you.

“I ain’t gonna hurt you, angel.”

It was an honest lie, just hearing him call you angel felt like a punch to the stomach. The butterflies were dancing around, reborn, and chanting the word ‘date’.

“If you don’t like coffee, we can have tea, or ice cream,” he said, “anything as long as you can sit down with me.”

You snorted. “Okay.”

“Okay,” he repeated, smiling. “This is my number. Pick a place and I’ll meet you there.”

After breakfast, you closed the restaurant and started cleaning the Lounge. You brought everything back to the kitchen, stacked the dishes in the dishwasher and turned it on. Then you put away the unopened miniature jams, butter and whatnot, and gathered the remaining patisseries and fresh fruits in a basket that you would later bring to the reception.

You worked mechanically. It wasn’t exactly the most exciting job you’d ever had.

You couldn’t stop thinking about Bucky. It was easy to let your mind wander into the cosy and dangerous territory of this being a real date.

You decided to go to the Australian coffee shop near Natasha’s apartment. It was popular but not as crowded as Starbucks, which suited you fine.

After your shift, you removed your uniform and changed into the spare set of clothes you kept in your locker for emergencies. Emergencies being an impromptu date or a night out with Nat. You dug around in your purse for your lipstick; the nice one, the Carter Red as your mother called it.

You dabbed the lipstick on your lips, staining them. You only wore it on special occasions, and you weren’t sure Bucky deserved your full red pout.

You walked to the café with a little pep in your step and a confident smile on your face. The freezing temperature didn’t matter, you were too giddy to care. It was a date, it had to be, why else would he ask you to meet for coffee?

You smiled when you saw him through the coffee shop window. He was chatting with the waiter as the latter set two mugs on the table.

“Hi again!” You shrugged out of your jacket and took a seat.

“I hope you like hot chocolate. Carl, here, says it’s their best seller,” Bucky said, smiling kindly at the waiter.

“Enjoy, and if you need anything else don’t hesitate to call me.”

You carefully wrapped your cold hands around your mug while you watched Carl walk away. A moment of silence rose between you. Bucky watched you with an unreadable expression, making you fidget in your seat.

“I’m glad you came,” he finally said.

“Me too. I’m a little surprised you asked.”

He looked down at his mug and smiled; it didn’t reach his eyes. “I have something to ask you.” He paused. “The night we met, you said you agreed to see me because being in a... financial relationship felt like the only solution to your problems.”

Your smile faltered but he didn’t seem to notice. Oh. The butterflies in your stomach fell so suddenly that it felt like carrying a ball of lead. They went back into hibernation.

“If I had been a decent person and, I don’t know, bought you a drink, talked to you,” he paused, meeting your eyes. “Would you have been interested in this type of relationship? With me, I mean.”

You swallowed hard. “You want to be my sugar daddy.”

It wasn’t a question but a statement. You were slowly realizing that you had been wrong about his intentions. This wasn’t a date, it was a business afternoon tea.

He winced. “Do we really have to call it that? I was thinking mentorship. I can provide financial help, and in exchange you could be my friend.”

“I can be your friend for free,” you said, your throat tightening.

He shrugged, a small smile on his lips. “This way we’ll both get something out of it.”

You looked down at your hands, still wrapped around the mug, and pursed your lips in thought. You felt a sharp tingling sensation in your nose, a sign that you were about to cry. You closed your eyes and clenched your jaw, fighting against the flood that was coming.

You pushed all the emotion down and forced a smile to your face. “Do you mind if I use the restroom? I just took the subway, I’d like to wash my hands.”

Bucky watched you, momentarily stunned by your request. “Of course, take your time,” he quickly recovered.

“Thanks,” you croaked, pushing your chair back.

You picked up your bag and walked to the restroom, your legs feeling like cotton wool. You didn’t need to use the restroom, you had walked to the café, but you needed a moment alone to collect yourself.

A woman came out of the restroom, holding the door open for you. You picked up the pace and thanked her before closing the door behind you. You looked pretty sickly under the artificial light of the restroom. Your eyes were glassy with tears and your red lips were taunting you.

“Got your hopes up, uh?” You watched your lips move. A little humourless chuckle escaped you and you shook your head at your own idiocy.

You aggressively wiped the lipstick off your mouth with the back of your hand and sighed deeply as you looked at your reflection in the mirror. Now you felt like an idiot.

It wasn’t Bucky’s fault. He had been nothing but nice and kind, and perhaps you had mistaken his kindness for flirting. A naïve mistake. You had always been a little clueless when it came to men.

You ran your index fingers under your eyes to get rid of the makeup that had gathered there. It wasn’t the end of the world, you barely knew him anyway. It didn’t hurt any less, though.

Maybe it was time for you to do something out of character, to experience life no matter how crazy it seemed. You were dreading this conversation with Bucky, but you couldn’t hide in the restroom forever. With another sigh, you pushed yourself away from the sink and walked out of the restroom.

Part 4

#bucky barnes #bucky x reader #bucky barnes x reader #marvel #marvel fanfiction #marvel imagines #bucky barnes imagines #bucky barnes fanfiction #marvel imagine #bucky barns imagine #redgillan #redgillanwrites

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paperpocalypse · 4 years

Text

don’t trust your feelings.

50 Wordless Ways to Say “I Love You”: 46. Giving them a back massage when they flop on the couch or bed.

Pairing: Diego Hargreeves x Reader

Word Count: 1,291 words

Warning: Swearing

“Why the hell are you here?”

“Thought I’d drop by for a visit.”

“Well, you thought wrong.”

You look at the knife and then at him, and your lips twitch. Whitney Houston – hell, you used to never shut up about her – sings from the unfamiliar record player on his dresser; Diego glances at it with narrowed eyes. So that’s where the music was coming from. You must have brought it with you. Why? So that he knows that it was you who broke into his room?

I know that album, he thinks bitterly, keeping the knife firmly in line with your face. It’s your favorite.

“Aw, c’mon, Diego.” You stand up, raising one hand in surrender while the other reaches for the knife in your shoulder. It makes a dry, scraping sound as you pull it out, like a spade leaving a sandpile, and you toss it onto the desk nearby. “Don’t tell me you didn’t miss me at least a little bit. It’s been eight years.”

Yeah, eight years. Fuck you. Diego keeps his breathing steady, ignoring the twinge in his side and the thumping in his chest as he makes his way down the stairs. “And whose fault is that?” he says.

It’s a rhetorical question, of course. You both know the answer, and he expects you to defend yourself with the same kind of shit you pulled when you were part of the academy. Go ahead, he thinks. Act like nothing’s wrong. Blame your uncle’s crackpot ideas.

Leave without warning. Who gives a shit anymore?

But you do none of those things. Instead, your gaze flicks away from the quiet venom in his voice, and you stay silent for a moment. His frown deepens.

“I was scared,” you eventually reply. “Ben died and I got scared, okay? So when Uncle said it was a sign we had to leave, I convinced myself that he was right again.” Your hands clasp behind your back, a familiar gesture that makes him think of times long past, and it gets to him more than he would like to show. “I’m sorry for not saying goodbye.”

You’re sorry. Diego holds your gaze for a moment longer, jaw tight, then lowers his knife. He thinks of the day he realized you weren’t coming back. Then he thinks of Ben’s funeral, and he puts his knife away.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” he asks, less biting this time.

You smile derisively, but he can see the relief in it as well. “Uncle didn’t let me. You know how he was.”

“Was?”

“He’s dead.”

“Oh.” He pauses in the middle of removing his tactical harness to glance at you. “… My condolences.”

You shrug. “It’s fine. I didn’t realize how much of a controlling bastard he was until he kicked the bucket,” you mutter, and he hears the record player stop as you lift the needle and turn it off. “And now I’m here.”

This time, Diego really pauses. The way you say it sounds like – “What, you’re moving back here or something?”

“Yep.” You lift your hands in a celebratory gesture. “Surprise.”

—

And just like that, you’re back in Diego’s life like you had never left.

It’s ridiculous, really, how quickly you slip into the cracks and crevices of his routine again. What’s worse, it feels natural. So he resists it at first – takes the back door when you have a match at the gym, throws his knives through the crack in the door whenever he comes back from patrol and hears a record playing. Talks to you with clipped tones and cold words.

But … he never tells you to leave. And you keep visiting. And by the time January rolls by, he realizes that the bitterness he’s tried to hold onto has become something else.

“Don’t you have a shift in a few hours?”

You’re nodding along to yet another Whitney vinyl when he walks in, lounging in the beat-up chair between his dresser and the desk with a newspaper in your lap. At the mention of work, you just sink deeper into the cushions and shrug.

“Yep,” you say.

The boiler room is a lot warmer than outside. He can already feel himself start to sweat. Diego removes his patrol gear and reaches back to pull one of his sweaters off, and his muscles ache in response. Goddamn it. It’s been like that the whole day, after that match with Sinclair the night before. He peels off the grimy article of clothing and rolls his shoulders.

“Didn’t anybody ever tell you that pulling all-nighters isn’t healthy?” He tosses his sweater aside and heads to his bed, falling back onto the mattress with a grunt.

“Like you’re one to talk, Mr. Vigilante.” The chair squeaks, and he turns his head to see you approaching the bed. “Here, turn over.”

“Why?” Nevertheless, he does as you say.

“So I can massage your back.” You usher him closer to the wall and put one knee on the edge of the bed, hoisting yourself onto the mattress. He tenses when you lean over and press your hands into his shoulder blades. “Shit, man, I’m not gonna kill you. Relax.”

“You couldn’t if you tried,” he mutters, then hisses when you knead a particularly sore muscle. That felt good.

You chuckle and move downwards. “Hey, I’d get a few hits in,” you retort as you work. “But you always were the better fighter, huh?”

“I had to be –” Your knuckles dig into his lower back – “unf. God. Not everyone’s a human punching bag like you, [Y/n].”

“The best offense is a good defense.”

“It’s ‘the best defense is a good offense.’”

“Your dad told you that, right? I remember.”

… Dad did tell him that. He’d forgotten. Diego scowls and doesn’t reply.

You put your whole weight into the base of your palms, swinging one leg over his lower back to kneel above him. “Uncle always told me the other one because of my powers. Guess we grew up with different philosophies.”

“Yeah, well, both of us got screwed over either way.”

“Ain’t that the truth.” His irritation fades a little bit when your voice softens.

You spend a few more minutes massaging his back. Diego closes his eyes and keeps his mouth shut, save for a relieved exhale here and there, listening to the ancient hum of the boiler and the upbeat tune of the next song on your record. He wonders how many times you’ve done this.

He wonders who you may have done it for.

But before he can think about it too much, the record player sputters, and whatever atmosphere that had begun blooming as soon as you had touched him disappears.

“Ah, shit,” you say wryly, moving off him. Diego groans as he props himself up onto his elbows, watching you turn the record player off. The sudden absence of music brings a frown to his lips. “I guess that’s a sign I should get going.”

“Thought you didn’t believe in signs.”

His words come out in a rasp – and in the midst of sliding the record back into its sleeve, you stop, a strange expression flitting across your face. “Shit, you’re right,” you remark after a second, perplexed. Then you chuckle. “I guess that was my uncle talking.”

Ignore the bastard, then. Diego shifts slowly, unwillingly, into a sitting position, and draws his eyes over the map of your face. You stare back. The record fits snugly underneath your arm. The boiler hums.

“What?”

He doesn’t think about it for another second.

“You can stay,” he says.

You raise your eyebrows. But then, slowly, a smile spreads across your face, and Diego commits it to memory.

“If you insist.”

#wordless ways to say i love you #source: @50-item-writing-prompts #diego hargreeves #diego hargreeves x reader #diego hargreeves imagine #the umbrella academy #tua #tua diego #tua fanfic #fanfic #reader insert #fluff #mild angst #i guess #reader is basically sandman

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tundrainafrica · 3 years

Note

I just find it so unfortunate that some aggressive shippers ruin a ship and a character for so many people. A popular Erwin x Levi artist got hate comments by some Levihan shippers and so many people are bashing it now on twitter because of that. Its just so sad considering LH was one of the most beautiful and fun dynamics in such a depressing story. Even Hange is getting hated because LH is pretty much the default ship involving them and it just breaks my heart :(

Twitter has some great content and I actually hang around AOT twt for some quick content. It’s like every time I’m feeling fast food I just hang there, like a few tweets, read a few soc med AUs etc etc.

But god. It’s a mess man. Last year I was constantly on twitter to be honest and it left me in a bad mood everyday because people are just being assholes for little to no reason really but just to put themselves in what they believe is a morally higher ground from their peers. And people just like fighting and the funny part is no opinions are actually heard, no views are actually exchanged. It’s just “you dont agree with me so you’re a bad person.”

Ad hominem attacks are just everywhere.

So I like staying in my small little hole and just talking to myself there and just liking the content of the Levihan people I actually follow. I see stuff I don’t agree with but I’ve kinda accepted that a lot of people there are just there to push an agenda because really if people were that open minded, I don’t think lynching and call out culture would have gotten this far.

I’ve used this same analogy so many times but I feel like in Twitter, people are just scrambling for some sort of moral high ground. Because of that, it is completely useless to engage in discourse there because one thing I noticed is most people who are vocal there already have a set stance on something and the fact that they’re ready to just bully anyone who stands in the way of their agenda, just makes convincing them out of the agenda impossible and a complete waste of time. And there are two issues in particular among the LH community which are really unsettling for me: the ship wars and within the LH community, the gender war.

Ship wars

I find the ship wars unnecessary because really what makes a superior ship?

Probability of being canon? How much fuel they were given in canon? Healthiness of the relationship?

The truth is people ship for many reasons. But really, who are we to judge how a person goes about the way they decide to participate in the fandom and ship? As long as it is something they keep within personal spaces and do it responsibly, I don’t think it’s our business to judge someone or lynch them. The important thing is people are able to not be an asshole about it. People can ship the most questionable shit, create the most dubious content, as long as that person is respecting boundaries and putting the right tags and trigger warnings, who are we to call them out right?

Of course I prefer LH over other Levi ships personally but is there really a need to attack other people’s ships about it? I probably do poke fun at Ereri because until now I still do not get why people enjoy Ereri in the first place but why destroy the fandom experience for people just because we don’t agree with them.

My general intention behind shipping Levihan is because above anything I value the healthiness in the relationship and the things people can learn about love and relationships by analyzing Levihan’s dynamics and headcanoning them. I love Levi and Hange’s dynamics to death and I like digging deeper into them and pulling out lessons from it about love, life and relationships and just sharing them with people which is my whole point for participating in this fandom in the first place.

But in the end, ships are just preferences. Some people like getting a kick out of dubious pairings and toxic relationships. As long as they consume these responsibly and don’t emulate them in real life, I see no problem in it.

The toxic ones are the ones who actively crucify people for preferences.

The Gender War

One really disturbing thing I found about twitter is that deciding to use ‘she’ to refer to Hange can get you lynched. I found a few accounts that would reblog tweets where someone says something like “Yes, Hange, Queen” which gets retweeted by some NB Hange folk who say stuff like “Unfollow this transphobe now.”

Because apparently deciding to headcanon Hange as a woman or just preferring to use ‘she’ makes people a transphobe. Which is personally just... really disturbing. I don’t believe words like homophobic, transphobic, racist should be so easily thrown around unless there is hard evidence to believe that someone is really one of the epithets above like for example:

There are things I find completely assholish like of course, refusing to use someone’s preferred pronouns if they ask you.

But Hange is fictional and Hange is a gift to the fandom.And I don’t even think the issue about Hange’s gender should have ever reached this far. The only thing Yams ever said was that Hange is just not the type to be tied down to a single gender.

And policing Hange’s gender and saying NOPE SHE’S NON BINARY USE THEY Is just counterintuitive to the whole idea that she’s a free spirit. In the end, Hange as a character wouldn’t have given a fuck whether people called her a they, she or even a he.

And yeah, it’s frustrating really that these two issues I just discussed above are ruining Hange as a character for a lot of people and consequently, ruining Levi x Hange as a ship.

Apparently, a lot of people are closet LxH shippers or closet Hange stans because the moment they tweet something about Hange, there are people who will attack them. If people refer to Hange as they, they get attacked. If people refer to Hange as she, they get attacked. There are so many antis apparently to the LxH ship, some apparently are jealous because ‘it’s the closest to canon’ while others just apparently deem it a toxic ship because of our own internal gender war.

There’s no winning really. And to be honest, there’s nothing I can do either and I don’t want to engage in any arguments in twitter if at the end of it, I’m just gonna end up wasting my time listening to ad hominem attacks directed at me just for not agreeing with someone in a fandom related matter. .

I’ve said my piece about the Hange gender issue so many times. There are NBs who use she. There are those who use they. Being female and being NB aren’t mutually exclusive. You can be both at the same time.

But yeah, we still have people being assholes about this and pushing factually wrong agendas. I love research and I have been writing research papers and metas for a lot of things even before I started this blog in the first place. And I eventually learned that the world is so complex that no opinion is completely and absolutely correct.

And ideally, opinions shouldn’t be made so easily.

Don’t get me wrong. I believe everyone is entitled to a preference and when I say preference I mean the type of food they like, the type of wallpaper they like.

But no one is entitled to a moral judgement or opinion just for existing and when I say opinion I mean questions on morals, on what’s right or what isn’t, what is or what should be. Every single person has the responsibility to research, hear both sides of a discourse and understanding them before deciding for themselves what’s right. And this is why hearing accusations that someone is ‘transphobic,’ ‘homophobic’ blah blah over how we hc a character just really does not sit well with me.

Passing moral judgement on someone requires discernment, deep thought and lots and lots of evidence. But yeah this is a philosophical question and a political question so I ain’t going to delve into it here.

Because, in the end, fandoms are preferences. The way we choose to participate in a fandom and create content are preferences more than anything.

So what? (Btw, if you reached all the way here, thank you for listening to me ramble lol and sorry if you weren’t expecting this type of ramble)

I know I’ve just been rambling a lot up there for a lot of reasons but really what message do I wanna give?

Fandoms are preferences more than anything so I don’t even believe that there should be a discussion on moral judgement here. People can have the weirdest kinks, the most questionable preferences but as long as they aren’t going around romanticizing abuse, beating up people in real life, killing them and lying in real life, who are we to judge?

Even if someone says they have a rape kink and abuse kink when it comes to fics, as long as they acknowledge it’s something they shouldn’t emulate in real life, as long as they can keep an adult conversation about it, I think these people are generally kinder and more pleasant overall than people who force their healthy canon ship and lynch everyone for having more questionable preferences.

Ship and let ship. Live and let live. Headcanon and let headcanon. If a person has a differing opinion, listen. (Or really, if you just don’t want to deal with listening to differing opinions coz you’re just gonna get stressed, don’t lynch? Don’t send hate? And just ignore it?)

Ask yourself. Does the person acknowledge that it isn’t right in real life? Do they acknowledge if they emulate it in real life it has the potential to be harmful?

Honestly, all I wanna do is just let people stan Levi and Hange however they want to. There are obviously hcs I dont agree with. But in the LH community we just all love Levihan, let’s not ruin the fandom experience for anyone. In the AOT community, we all just love AOT, let’s not ruin it for anyone. Let’s not hurt anyone, attack them etc.

If someone doesn’t agree and they can hold an adult conversation about it and they don’t emulate these toxic opinions in real life and they recognize that there is the option to just agree to disagree, why don’t we just listen and engage in this discourse to learn more about other people and to build more perspectives?

Because really it isn’t the questionable hcs or the multiple genders which leaves such a bad taste in my mouth. It’s the people who just go straight to attacking instead of actually considering that there’s potential for discourse and there’s potential to ‘agree to disagree’ because in the end, fandom discourse is a question of preference more than moral judgement.

It’s easier said than done really. But personally for me, I just try to keep my fandom experience as non toxic as possible while at the same time as mentally fulfilling as possible. I enjoy discourse, I like hearing differing opinions and I really believe with something as light and as inconsequential as fandoms as our common ground, we can learn to peacefully co-exist despite differing opinions on what the best ship is or what Hange’s gender is.

Note: I won’t delve too much on the Hange gender issue here because I have pending asks about those which I’ll answer in one go, but I really believe that both they and she are valid pronouns for Hange.

I have a general preference for ‘she’ because it’s just easier to read. But personally I don’t think too much about the gender identity issue because it’s really just too complex for me and i like spending my time thinking of other headcanons about Hange than gender and people who push the Hange is nb agenda and people who push the Hange is a female agenda and just insult each other and lynch each other are both equally unsettling.

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longitud-de-onda · 4 years

Text

touch the impossible

pairing; ezra x female reader summary; your long journey back home after your scientific mission to the green is joined by an injured man, left behind and broken. rating; g warnings; angst, medical stuff, blood, some more angst. word count; 3.9k requested; by @rzrcrst “Here to request an Ezra fic 😭💔💕 maaaybe you’re the one who helped him get off that moon and you nurse him back to health and you have the gems and he falls in love with you” a/n; thank you for waiting this long. finally feeling ready to write some ezra! also huge thank you to zeek earl for actually responding to my question about cycles

gif by @now-this-is-living

You were on your way back to your ship when you heard the sound of thrower fire. You had dropped down into the brush where you were standing and waited.

It was all over with the blasting sound of a pod firing up and shooting into the sky.

The conical white figure rode up and out of the atmosphere and you remembered the shuttle service was ending that cycle. That pod was probably the last one to leave. Anyone left behind on this moon either had to have their own ship, like yourself, or were destined to spend the remainder of their lives breathing through a filter.

You hadn’t run into many people on your time here, trying to avoid contact as much as possible. You carried a thrower for security but weren’t sure if you had the guts to use it. Your mission here was a scientific one.

Curiosity got the better of you and you stood up to check out what had happened. You crawled out of your hiding spot and discovered that you were near a clearing in the woods, an old dig pit lay to your left, and the ring of black marks from the pod’s launch charred the grass to your left. An empty cage and a still-burning campfire were in front of you, eerie with the still-standing floodlight.

A body lay near the fire. Another in the pit. You could see the shine of fresh blood around him.

You wanted to leave.

As you turned around something caught your eye in the forest that stretched out a few meters higher in elevation than the clearing. A light. Definitely a helmet light. And it was moving, ever so slightly.

Someone still alive was out there and the sensible thing to do would be to run back to your pod and launch back into your ship. But a voice in your head said they might have been hurt in the fight. Might be injured. Might have meant to be on that ship. You couldn’t leave them behind.

You swallowed your fears and plunged into the dark of the forest towards the dim light, your hand gripping tight on the thrower that hung at your side.

As you neared, it was clear you had found someone. The light wasn’t the thing moving, but rather its reflection on the helmet of a man, blood pouring out of his stomach, eyes closed, chest barely rising and falling. Beside him lay the light source: a woman, dead and neck bloodied.

You prodded at the man, willing him to wake up. He came to life with a distant cough, the sound of which was enough for you to know he didn’t have a working air filter. Scrambling, you pulled his hose towards your own filter and plugged it in, the clean air doing little to help his breathing. However, his eyes blinked open, lids still heavy, but blinking, staring at the ground below him.

“Cee,” he said. You could hear it through the panes of glass separating yourselves. “I thought I instructed you to leave me behind. I ain’t gonna make it. Your soul is worth much more than my own.”

“Who the hell is Cee?”

He looked up at you. “I find myself mistaken. You. Are not Cee.”

“That is correct,” you smiled. You rotated the dial on his radio to the channel you were using.

“Are you with Karoclan? If that is my fate, it’s best to kill me now. Please lend me at the very least that mercy and not delay.” His voice, now clear in your ear, was shallow. His accent was difficult to place. Maybe Muir? Or Gandre? You couldn’t tell, but that was typical of drifters. Was he a drifter?

“I am not with Karoclan. I am here alone,” you said. Maybe not the best of words, placing you in potential risk, but you couldn’t bring yourself to care. You had just noticed the limp sleeve of his suit, tied near the elbow. He had just lost an arm. He couldn’t have been a threat if he wanted to.

“What is a woman doing here in the Green all alone? You prospecting? Because you are too late, miss. The last pod has taken leave and we will die here. If not killed by the villager, we shall be reclaimed by this moon’s floor.”

“I’m here on a scientific mission. From Belda, near Central,” you explained.

“That scientific knowledge may only go so far now that we are here for our shortened lives.”

“I have a ship.”

“And is there the possibility of your ship having space sufficient for two travelers?”

“It does,” you said. You were going to regret this, but what could you do? The man was a charmer.

“I presume since you are traveling alone, that your second spot remains unoccupied?”

“It is.”

“Well then, may I humbly request passage off of this godforsaken moon?”

“Depends. What’s your name?”

“Ezra.”

“Well Ezra, do you care to join me? We take off in an hour.”

Your ship had more than enough room for two people. It was big enough for a whole crew. The research institute had given you a large endowment to seek out the aurelac gems that were selling at high prices across the galaxy with little information on any of their properties, let alone where they had come from. Along with the money, you were provided a fully outfitted ship.

It was at least thirty stands ago that the first murmurs of aurelac had swirled around. Within a fraction of a cycle, everyone had left work, disappearing to the few planets where they could try to make a fortune. Ten stands later and things were back to normal and since then the price for aurelac only skyrocketed as the supply dwindled. It might not have been a hot commodity anymore, but it had a forceful grip on the intergalactic economy.

You peaked into the medical bay where Ezra lay asleep. Prospectors were few these days, most of them having struck big and retired to remote locations or given up the search and either returned home or continued drifting. But Ezra hadn’t. And you had no idea why.

He had passed out as soon as you made it to the pod, and you had to drag him into the medical bay when you reached your ship. You didn’t sleep for longer than was healthy, patching him up. He had several wounds that should have been fatal, and the amputated arm needed to be covered up. You might have been a doctor, however, medicine was not your specialty. It wasn’t pretty, but it did the job.

“What have you done with my arm?”

“Skin graft,” you shrugged. It had been a while since you left orbit of the green moon, and Ezra had just woken up. You sat beside his bed in a chair.

“Skin graft?”

“Yes. I had to take some skin from your abdominal region. Used it to cover your arm. Whoever cut that off did a good job. Clean. That’s good.”

“Cee.” Ezra breathed out. This was the third time you’d heard the name.

“Who is Cee? She must have been very important to you.”

“Only knew her for a couple of cycles. She and her father came seeking the Queen’s Lair. Cee and I ended up wandering the Green. She may be a young girl but she has a mind the size of a star.”

“Where’s her father?”

“I killed him,” he said.

Your stomach dropped. You opened your mouth to ask why but no sound came out.

“Ma’am, you cannot be a stranger to murder. Out this far from Central? We live solely for ourselves, you cannot get attached because people will betray you. Best to stay five steps ahead.”

“I—” you cut yourself off before claiming to have never killed anyone. While true, it would not have boded well for you. Ezra would see you as weak. That was not an outcome you wanted to entertain.

“Cee’s father was attempting to steal the fruits of my own work. You do not do that without running the risk of death out here.”

“Where is Cee now?” You prayed she wasn’t dead. You knew little, but Ezra seemed to care for her.

“If she listened to me, she has long since left that moon in the last pod to depart. She is now left to the mercy of the Drift.”

Ezra swung his legs down and pushed his torso upright with his one arm.

“I wouldn’t do that—” you spluttered out, placing a hand on his chest to stop him from standing. But he was too determined, pushing forward and up.

It took less than a second for Ezra’s knees to sway and he crumpled into a pile on the floor.

“...the drugs haven’t worn off yet.” You mumbled to the ship.

Ezra had learned his lesson when he woke up. He remained on the bed until he had fully recovered. You had work to do: testing the gems you had collected, ship maintenance, navigation. But the downtime was spent by Ezra’s side.

Given Ezra’s penchant for words, you had thought he would never exhaust in tales of his life and questions about yours, but you were both private people and the stories of your lives were not often easy to say.

Together, you had come up with a game. One of you would name a place you had been or wished to go and an unrelated item. The other would have to come up with a story about it. When that got boring, you added in another element, where you had to include three preset words.

It kept you entertained for a while, but you knew Ezra was growing bored again.

“Who are you?” Ezra asked when you walked into the medical bay one day.

You hadn’t been asked a question like that in a long time. He knew your name. Your job. Where you worked. This wasn’t a question of your information and identity. This was a question about something deeper. You stood by his bed, staring at him for a while as you thought of an answer.

“I’m... I’m a scientist.”

“No. Scientists work in labs and do field research. They work together and for companies and write papers. You do not seem the type to seek that strain of employment.”

“You yourself said that one has to do what they must to make a living. I enjoy my work.” You weren’t sure what to make of Ezra. He was truly an enigma, one that you were struggling to decode.

“You are lonely.” It was a bold claim coming from him, one that gave you pause.

“And are you not?”

Your lab on the ship was small, meaning the number of aurelac gems you had extracted, along with the biological material in which they grew, were littered across every available surface. They were fascinating. And as you walked into the lab, you could tell someone else found them just as intriguing.

Ezra had been walking for some time now. The artificial cycles had come and gone, and he still had no answer as to where he would like to go. You still had a half-stand until you reached Belda, giving him plenty of time to make a decision.

He now stood in the center of your lab, staring at the number of gems you had collected. They would fetch a high price on the market, and the shine of a needy man could be seen in Ezra’s eyes.

“Thinking about stealing it?” you said.

He startled and looked up at you guiltily. “I—”

“It’s fine,” you waved your hand. “You’re a prospector. I get it.”

“You do not understand a thing,” he drawled. “You have an occupation that will sustain you for the rest of your life. I have none of that. What you carry in this ship would buoy my existence for many stands. It is worth more than I have ever had cross my hands. And you are here acting like it is little more than a scientific endeavor.”

“Is a scientific endeavor so worthless to you?”

“It is not worthless to me except when it is deleterious to the lifestyle of others,” he said, his voice rising in volume.

“You think the gems are a lifestyle? Their value will drop. And the harvesting? You may not have noticed, but every time you harvest a gem, an entire organism dies. All of this here? Only killed two and harvested every part of them. An average case is harvested from nine different colonies. Nine deaths. And you don’t even obtain half as much as you see here. Your lifestyle harms too.”

“My lifestyle, at the very least, does not rely on a predilection for the attention of the corporations that cause the ruin of our very society. Mine relies on labor and equanimity and acumen, and I will gladly kill a few to ensure my future. One that is not so secure as yours.” When angry, Ezra’s face warps into something sinister and aggressive, a far cry from the pained and softened appearance of him while he was injured.

You close your eyes for a brief moment, taking a deep breath to center yourself. You had no interest in fighting Ezra more on this. It was clear you were the villain in his eyes, or at least the figure he wanted to project his frustrations on, and you were not going to continue with the fight. It was not worth it when you had many more cycles left with him.

“If you care so deeply about them, wait until you are leaving to take them. It does you no good to steal from those you are still living with.”

The days following your argument the conversation had died down, only to pick up again once you were both fed up with not speaking to the other.

“You still haven’t told me where you want to be dropped off,” you told him. Ezra had been recovering steadily, and you knew within another couple of your ship-generated light cycles he would be ready to leave.

“I have never been given the option,” he said.

You blinked. There was still so much you didn’t know about Ezra. And over the time you had spent with him you had grown so accustomed to his presence that this very conversation was one you had been putting off.

“Do you have family? Friends? Anyone that you would stay with?”

“I am alone.”

It was a raw admission that you might have seen coming, but nevertheless hit you like a stray bullet. Before you could even think of the consequences of your words, you said, “Do you want to come with me? To the lab? There’s plenty of work at the institute? And around the rest of Belda.”

“Not for a drifter like me. My lifestyle is indubitably incompatible with a planet like yours,” he said, shaking his head.

“Sure there is, Ezra,” you said. “There’s plenty to do, and you don’t have anything else.”

He stepped back and you regretted that sentence more than anything you had ever said. “I suppose I do not.”

He walked away that night. Into the cabin that he had claimed. You didn’t see him for another two artificial cycles. When he did show up again, he was no longer the same man. He didn’t smile all the way to his eyes, and his sentences were cut short.

You didn’t want to admit it, even to yourself, but you cried yourself to sleep often after that day. Partly because of the loneliness, but that wasn’t where the shame was rooted. That spot was reserved for the love you felt for Ezra which was no longer returned, if it ever was.

You stepped out onto the solid ground of Belda, happy for the fresh, clean air that filled the skies. Ezra’s first steps out of the landing pod were shaky, and you wondered how long it had been since he had set foot on a fully terraformed planet.

“You go down that road,” you told him, gesturing towards your left, “About a kilometer down you’ll find the shuttle hangar. There’s plenty of people there that need workers for off-planet stuff. Once you sign on they’ll take you to the docking station up in orbit where you’ll transfer to their ships. And you get to return to your life. Win-win.”

“That is quite the deal,” he said, staring off at the point he would be headed.

“So this is it?” you asked, facing him.

“I am afraid so,” he looked over at you. Part of you wanted to embrace him. If you weren’t able to keep him, at least you could hold him in your arms for a moment. Pretend that you could have a life where you were not so lonely. But before you could come to a conclusion, he was walking away. And he took your heart with him.

Your trip to Bakhroma Green might have been work, but it felt like a vacation. Ten cycles had passed since you returned, and life had, unfortunately, returned to normal. Wake up, eat, go to work, a meeting, labs, write papers, lunch, teach university students, another meeting, clean, more writing, return home, sleep. Ezra was right. You might have had a job that offered more social interaction than most, but you were so lonely.

You were in your office, responding to some communications with a scientist on Kamrea who had found an organism similar to that of the aurelac gems on their home planet when you received a call from reception.

“Excuse me, ma’am, but there is a man down here. He says he will not leave until he sees you.”

“Who is he?”

“He won’t say.”

You sighed. Work would have to wait. You closed up your screen and got into the elevator, riding down to the lobby. The doors slid open and you saw a familiar face, hunched over in a chair in the corner. Ezra.

He was out of place wearing regular clothing and sitting in a waiting room as if he were the sort to wait for a doctor or a lawyer rather than do it himself. He didn’t notice you until you were standing in front of him. He looked up, took a sharp inhale. His exhale was shaky as he stood, his singular arm reaching out to touch your shoulder. Maybe it was for stability, but part of you knew him well enough to know he just wanted to touch someone.

“You’re here.” He said.

You nodded.

“I did not know where to go. I am afraid I do not have anyone else,” he said. Your words from your argument flashed before your eyes. You hated that he had internalized them. Then he looked at you in the eye in a way that you felt much deeper than just your face. “I do hope that I have you?”

His absence had torn you apart so much and seeing him again was a confusion you had never felt. It seemed this man was one who would not stop surprising you. “Of course you have me, Ezra.”

“Of that, I am eternally thankful. Your companionship is unparagoned.”

You swallowed. You were not ready to see him again. To hear him say words like these.

“What do you want?” you asked.

“I do not know, only that I am desperate for assistance,” he said, voice low and strained. And you noticed the slight tremor to his body. You nodded again.

“Wait here. I need to clean up upstairs, then I can return,” you said, reaching out to his arm, squeezing gently on his forearm for assurance.

An hour later you sat on one end of the couch in your small apartment, Ezra at the other end, mugs of tea in both your hands. His was to mollify the anxiety, yours was to bring a sense of normalcy back when you had just been confronted with a face you spent nights trying to forget.

“...lost. I do not know where in this wide galaxy I can ever belong. I do not know where Cee is, if I did I may have attempted to find her. But I know little more than her first name and her favorite book. She and her father were drifters, like me. You never encounter another drifter twice.” He stopped to take a sip and you felt your heart sink. There was nothing more heartbreaking than to lose a friend.

“And now without my arm, while I am forever in your debt for the prodigious work, I do not have anything. I cannot do the work I have previously been trained to do. I cannot make a living. I do not have anyone. I do not even know if I have you,” he said, voice breaking. “I am sorry, I should not be putting you in the position to take me in. We hardly know one another, this was a bad—”

“Ezra!” You sat your mug down on the side table and crawled over to him on the couch. You placed one arm on his own, the other on the top of his shoulder, brushing lightly up and down. “It’s okay. I don’t mind you coming here. You have me.”

There were tears in his eyes as he opened his mouth again. “I missed you.”

“As did I,” you confessed. You sank back onto your heels, arms dropped as you knelt beside him. “My offer still stands. You can stay here. There’s work, plenty of it. And you can train in new skills that don’t require two upper appendages. It’s a big city.”

“I cannot request such a sacrifice of your generosity,” he protested.

“It is not a sacrifice, Ezra,” you assured. “I’d actually like it very much if you stayed. I am very alone here. The time I spent with you? You made me feel a little less alone.”

“What can I offer to you in exchange? I have nothing,” he said. “You have already rescued me once.”

“And I do not require anything.” You shook your head, “Don’t you understand? You’ve given me so much already. Your presence would be more than enough.”

“I cannot acce—”

“There is one thing,” you said. You were thinking selfishly at this moment, and had it not resulted in a success, you might have regretted such actions, but the triumph was enough for you to think back often to your words and thank yourself for saying exactly the ones you did. “You can kiss me.”

He blinked and you felt your stomach flip in place. The seconds that lasted before he spoke again felt stretched out, a whole cycle could have elapsed and not felt as long at the wait for Ezra’s response. Then he grinned.

“That is a skill I do possess,” he said. “And may be able to provide.”

And then he raised his hand to your cheek, brushing it gently before reaching around to the base of your neck, pulling you closer to capture your lips in his. You wrapped one arm around his torso and snaked the other up into his hair as you tasted the sweet remains of the tea on his tongue. He pulled off enough to smile against your lips.

“Would this arrangement be a one-time event? Or do I perhaps need to comply a few more times to fully pay off the debt I owe to you.”

“Ezra? You can kiss me whenever you wish,” you laughed.

taglists; (let me know if you want to be added, removed, or moved around)

perm taglist; @turquiosenights @el-lizzie @sparrows-books @dxxkxx @opheliaelysia @trashbin2 @rzrcrst @arcadianempress @stevieharrrr @peterparkers-tingle @blushingwueen @coredrive @lokiaddicted @mserynlarsen @badassbaker @1-800-fandomtrashqueen @flower-petal-blooming @talesfromtheguild @eupphoriaaa

pedro taglist; @pascalisthepunkest @behindmyeyes-insidemyhead

#ezra #prospect #ezra prospect #prospect movie #ezra x reader #camila writes #rated g #under 5 #reader #angst #pedro fics #prospect fics #ez x reader

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ddixons-angel · 4 years

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Safe

Requested by Anonymous

Gosh, I am SO SO SORRY that this took so long for me to post! Writer’s block hit me hard when the quarantine started and I couldn’t come up with anything that I felt was worth while... I hope this is up to par! I’ll be trying to work on the other requests too! Hopefully they don’t take that long?? Please let me know what you think of this!

Prompts: 24. “You can’t just come and go whenever you feel like it, that’s not how this works!” 25. “You wanna know the biggest difference between you and me? I actually care what happens to you!

Mid-Season 6, Pre-Negan, Alexandria

Reader feels suffocated surrounded by the walls of Alexandria and decides to leave for a few days making a worried and pissed off Daryl chase after her.

Trapped. That’s all you felt when you were in the walls of Alexandria. Trapped and suffocated. It was supposed to be a safe zone for you and your family but from what happened just a few weeks ago, you couldn’t see it as a safe place anymore. Not if people didn’t bother to change. The walls had collapsed and let in a huge herd of walkers. Luckily, your family was safe, but that was because they knew what they were doing. They knew how to survive. The others that were in Alexandria at the start though? They didn’t know anything, and even when they lost people, even after they saw the dangers of the outside wander into their home, they were still able to be ignorant and pretend life was still fine as long as they repaired the walls. It was bullshit.

And so, with that mindset you left Alexandria. You knew that you weren’t going to be gone for good, you just needed a couple of days outside otherwise you’d go crazy. The last thing anyone needed was for you to lash out. You left a note on the pillow of your bed for whoever to find so no one would actually worry too much. Of course, you knew that there was one person who would still freak out after finding out you were gone and would rush out to find you. Luckily, Daryl was on a run with Aaron so you had a few days before you would have to come back to prevent him from losing his mind.

Now, here you were in the middle of the woods surrounded by trees, nature, and foliage. You set up your camp and have been outside the walls for two days now and you were loving it. You finally felt free and yourself again. Although you knew that you would have to return to the place you forced yourself to call home so that the others wouldn’t worry. You were starting to regret not writing that you would be back in a few weeks rather than just a few days.

Rustling and snapping of branches caught your attention as your ears perk up, alert and aware that you weren’t alone anymore. You turn to look behind you with your hand unbuckling the holster of your gun that was equipped to your belt. Anything could be out in the woods, if you were lucky it was an animal or just a stray walker. If you weren’t so lucky, it could be a herd of walkers or a person with ill intentions. You stay completely still, eagerly and intently listening to try and figure out whatever was lurking around your temporary campsite. You didn’t hear any snarling or growling, which meant it wasn’t a walker. That could either be really good or really bad, and you weren’t going to let your guard down. You quickly pull out your gun from its holster and hold it up as you step out to see what was lurking in the woods. You let out a breath when you come face to face with Daryl wielding his crossbow, his icy blue eyes glaring at you.

“Thought hunters were supposed to be quiet,” you remark as you lower your gun and put it back in its holster.

“Thought ya were supposed to be inside them walls,” Daryl retorts, lowering his crossbow but still glaring at you; judging by the tone of his voice, yep, he was pissed.

You couldn’t help but roll your eyes at his words. He knew how much you hated being inside those walls, how suffocating they were for both of you. You knew that he knew that too, yet here he was, scolding you for being outside.

“I can handle myself,” you say before turning around and returning back to your campsite.

You hear shuffling behind you but you didn’t bother looking back, you knew that Daryl would be following closely behind you. Instead, you sit back in your spot before you heard his footsteps.

“So, ya jus’ packed up and ran away, ‘s that it?” Daryl says after a few moments of silence, he took a good look at the camp and figured it out rather quickly.

“What makes you say that I ran away?” you ask; stubbornness was always your strong point.

“Sure as hell don’t seem like ya on no run,” he says, taking a seat on the ground beside you, “also saw yer note ya left...”

You glance at him with a confused frown, that means he went back to Alexandria before he found you, “weren’t you on a five day run or something?”

“Came back early, Aaron wanted to.” Daryl answers simply, his expression told you clearly that he had something on his mind, “I wanted to...”

This confused you even more, “but you like it out here more, why would you want to come back so quick?”

“‘Cause I like bein’ with ya more!” Daryl snaps as he looks at you, you stay silent, not knowing what to say to that and Daryl takes your silence as a sign to keep yelling at you, “I didn’ wanna come back when Aaron said it first but then I thought o’ ya ‘n’ tha’s when I realized how much I missed ya.”

You stare at him, completely dumbfounded at his confession. You and Daryl always had something unspoken, you both cared deeply for each other and you would certainly die for the man. Daryl was never someone who poured his heart out in words. The fact that he was sitting with you, straightforwardly telling you that he wanted to come back to a place that suffocated him just because he missed you brought back the butterflies in your stomach that you tried so hard to suppress.

“But when I got back... ya weren’t there! All I got was some stupid note sayin’ that ya left!” he says, frustrated, angry, and hurt.

“Daryl, I-” he doesn’t let you speak.

“Ya can’t jus’ come and go whenever ya feel like it, that ain’t how this works!” he seethes, standing up and looking down at you.

You sigh and get up as well, your eyes not leaving his, “can I explain myself?”

You wait for Daryl to give you permission to keep talking and you take his silence as that, “it’s suffocating behind those walls, you know that better than anyone, that’s why you go on those runs with Aaron. I feel the same, Daryl, I feel trapped and suffocated and it doesn’t help that I have Deanna’s kid bothering me every chance he gets.”

“It’s safer for ya to be behind those walls, ya know that.” he stands his ground.

“If I stayed in there for another day I would have lost my mind!” it was your turn to snap.

“I’d rather have ya lose yer mind than be hurt or dead! I know you’re pissed that I get to be out here and ya gotta be locked up inside that place, but ya wanna know why? ‘Cause ya ‘n’ me are different! And ya wanna know the biggest difference between ya and me? I actually care what happens to ya! What the hell am I supposed to do if somethin’ happens to ya out here?!” Daryl shouts, heaving heavily.

Quickly, you take a few steps towards Daryl and wrap your arms around him. You hold him tightly as you feel him freeze under your touch. Slowly but surely, he eases into your embrace, wrapping his arms around you, letting you feel safe and protected.

“I’m sorry I worried you, I didn’t know you cared that much about me.” you say softly.

“Well, I do...” he sighs, “I know ya don’ like being trapped in Alexandria, but I just want ya safe.”

“I know...” you say, then a thought occurs to you and you pull away from the hug to look up at Daryl, “what if I came out here with you?”

He furrows his brows together at your suggestion, “whaddya mean?”

“Talk Deanna into letting me go on runs with you and Aaron, that way you can keep your eye on me and I can keep you safe.” you say with a cheeky grin.

Daryl rolls his eyes and scoffs with a smirk, “ya wanna keep me safe?”

“Yeah, to be fair, that’s what i’ve been doing since the farm.” you say, your grin not faltering.

“Ya sure it ain’t the other way around?” he eyes you playfully.

“I’m very sure,” you giggle as he ruffles your hair and sits by the burnt wood you would light as a fire, you watch him as he assembles sticks of wood with burnt ones, “what are you doing?”

“Gonna be dark soon, we need some kinda light.” he says, not looking at you.

“Aren’t we going back to Alexandria?” you ask.

He glances up at you then back at the unlit campfire, “Nah, didn’ really wanna be back yet, I got all I need right here.”

Your heart flutters at his words and you knew he knew the effect his words had on you as his lips curled into a smirk. You aren’t able to help your smile as you sit down beside him. You and Daryl both knew that you would have to go back to Alexandria soon, but at this moment, you didn’t want to think about that. Anywhere with Daryl was the safest place on Earth, it didn’t matter that you didn’t have walls surrounding you. He would keep you safe, and you would definitely do the same for him.

---

I hope everyone stays safe and healthy, please don’t panic, we will get through this!

And as always, I would really appreciate any comments left for me! I’ll be replying to any comments in a new post because this is a sideblog!

Taglist (please let me know if you’d list to be added/removed!):

#Daryl Dixon #Daryl Dixon Fanfic #Daryl Dixon Fanfiction #Daryl Dixon Imagine #Daryl Dixon X Reader #Daryl Dixon/Reader #TWD #TWD Fanfic #TWD Fanfiction #TWD Imagine #The Walking Dead #The Walking Dead Fanfic #The Walking Dead Fanfiction #The Walking Dead Imagine #Daryl Dixon & Reader

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georgiaswarr · 3 years

Text

lister bird - part 2 (part 1)

beautiful faces - declan mckenna

i’m very much many thoughts head full can’t put it into concise words when it comes to beautiful faces as an iwbft song but suffice it to say, this song looks at celebrity, influencer and consumerism culture through a certain lens of doom, which hits close to home for lister. it also addresses excessive partying and drinking, for example in the “lift your hands up and lead us back home” lyric

beige - yoke lore

“i don't wanna see you smile / i want you in the morning / before you go performing” *whispers* bicci song

9 to 5 - smallpools

lister grew up poor and we mustn’t forget that part 3. also themes of losing innocence and doing what you must to survive in this cruel world.

when the party’s over - billie eilish

more themes of loneliness, self-hate and partying ! yay ! /s

hallucinogenics - matt maeson

i mean.... “pushing past the limit, trippin' on hallucinogenics / my cigarette burnt my finger 'cause i forgot i lit it / rippin' with my sinners 'cause fuck it, man, i ain't no beginner / and then i crawled back to the life that i said i wouldn't live in // cause i just couldn't open up, i'm always shiftin' / go find yourself a man who's strong and tall and christian” NEED I SAY MORE, THIS IS THE MOST LISTER SONG IN EXISTENCE

okay okay - alessia cara

a song about trying to fake self-confidence until you “make it” even though you don’t believe that you’re - to quote - a “million trick pony” yourself which is very true for lister john self-deprecation bird

nights - neon trees

here we have lister at least thinking that his crush on jimmy is unrequited, plus themes of insomnia

be an astronaut - declan mckenna

this raises the question of how much agency lister has and how much he’s just pushed around by his circumstances and by society, even though he might dream, or has dreamt of being bigger than that

clouds - børns

this song makes me think of Yearning(TM) while being high - yknow, something that lister does

liability - lorde

“the truth is i am a toy that people enjoy / till all of the tricks don't work anymore / and then they are bored of me” - growing up in the world of fame, constantly being sexualised, nobody knowing how you truly feel, all while feeling distant from your two closest friends has taken a huge toll on lister’s self worth

icarus - bastille

“out on the front doorstep, drinking from a paper cup / you won't remember this / living beyond your years, acting out all their fears / you feel it in your chest” lister “grew up too fast and has been on the verge of death multiple times” bird

hurricane - lord huron

something something lister getting a certain thrill out of living on the edge something something

i swear - exes

more themes of falling apart and getting drunk :(

white wine - walwin

kinda vibes but also comparing somebody you’re attracted to to alcohol....... i mean it’s not the most healthy thing to do especially for lister but he’s trying

saint - vérité

this is about how lister appears to the outside world and how that doesn’t reflect who he is inside - everyone sees him as a cheeky golden boys, as a “saint”, even though he has many issues and hates who he actually is

preacher man - the driver era

shoutout to @listerswift for reccing this song to me. remember when lister said that maybe he should try becoming religious too in the wednesday chapters??? in iana, when he’s gonna try to get better and find something other than alcohol to turn to i feel like there will be a phase where he feels lost and might even entertain the thought of religion. either way, he’s looking for something or someone who will help him “get away from this life of sin”

everything i wanted - gengahr version

(yes this is a cover of the billie eilish song I JUST LOVE THIS VERSION A LOT OKAY) anyway, lister feeling like what he wanted isn’t actually what he needs? feeling alone, like nobody cares about him or is listening to him? feeling the pressures of fame and everyone wanting something from him? themes of insomnia? but still eventually (hopefully) finding comfort in his friends? this song’s got you covered

half the night - couchsleepers

y’know, the fact that jimmy and lister are gonna sleep in the same bed long before they start hooking up to help each other

bravado - yoke lore

bicci song - “little bits of my own little mistakes” (they’ve both fucked up in the past) and “you put songs inside my cells” (because they’re musicians) and also “are there really angels in southern california” (southern california standing for the world of fame, could there be good things there?)

la la - kids in america

“don’t need this attention not another mention / just wanna stay high” a song about just wanting to let go of the world and all its problems

85 - andy grammer

here we explore lister’s relationship with money and wealth - while he grew up poor, after getting money he started splashing out on expensive cars and the like. however, there’s plenty of evidence that points towards the fact that he’ll go back to appreciating the little things in iana and rethink his priorities, which this song expresses

like i love you - lost frequencies

lister wants to know if jimmy loves him the way he loves jimmy

holy ghost - børns

a sexy song with religious symbolism??? that’s very bicci of you børns

run away with me - carly rae jepsen

“do you ever imagine what would happen if we just... ran away?” let the ark run away in iana challenge

bad habits - delaney jane

i do think it’s a sign of progress and improvement when the “bad habit” in question is a passionate but confusing friends-with-benefits affair with your fellow band mate instead of like.... alcohol and smoking and shit

pink lemonade - james bay

i mean my personal theory is that jimmy and lister won’t want to talk about what hooking up means for their relationship/properly define their relationship for quite a while, due to personal issues and also what it means for the band. this song embodies that.

could you love me - kygo

we all know lister’s got some self-esteem and mental health issues, and even though he’s trying to change, he’s unsure if rowan and jimmy could still love him

killer whales - smallpools

a song about a relationship where both parties have difficulties opening up and being completely vulnerable, but eventually being able to get through to each other. it also expresses a great admiration for the person that is sung about which i think is beautiful

pink in the night - mitski

aaaaand one more bicci song for good measure - “and i know i've kissed you before, but / i didn't do it right // can i try again, try again, try again / try again, and again, and again / and again, and again, and again?” - to quote alice, there will be MANY bicci kisses in iana and i, for one, can’t wait

i wanna get better - bleachers

“and i've trained myself to give up on the past 'cause / i froze in time between hearses and caskets / lost control when i panicked at the acid test / i wanna get better” it’s hard to put into words quite the amount of catharsis and a defiant push for self-improvement that is in this song but i like to think lister very much wants that

glitter & gloss - skott

i could honestly analyse each line and how it relates to lister here but here’s a collection of themes: fame, dressing yourself up and almost getting lost in so-called “glitter & gloss” for the public, but still, at your core, finding your true self and knowing that only very few people can truly know you and understand you. i think this is perfect for the end of this playlist because it seems hopeful to me, like lister’s gonna realise that even though most people will never see his true face, that doesn’t matter because he and his loved ones do.

#...........i just realised just how fucking miserable most of the songs on here are IM SORRY #our boy's gonna be happy in iana we're manifesting #iwbft #lister bird #playlist #osemanverse playlist #em’s fuckery #death tw #alcohol tw #addiction tw #drugs tw

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ts-unpopular-opinions · 4 years

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Side Tracks opinions part 1: Janus

(Yes I’m staring with Janus and going backwards, I just need to talk about this snake man right now!)

Alright, I’ve seen lots of people give their takes on each of the sides playlists, and honestly... I feel like they’re not all that similar to my interpretations. I mean yes anyone can interpret the songs how they’d like, but some people just flat out ignore canon to see the songs as their ship instead of what I believe they are actually meant to be seen as. Anyways... Janus! Yes let’s go through each song one by one 💛

1) Black Hole Sun: I’ll admit this one was hard for me. The song is obviously so Janus, with plenty of references to snakes and lying, but I can’t seem to put a finger on the exact meaning. If I had to guess, it’s showing Janus’ fist instance of fearing society. He’s realized that the world is not a safe place for Thomas and no one can be trusted (“Times are gone for honest men” “no one sings like you anymore”). He longs for the ignorance of childhood when society didn’t seem to pose a threat and Thomas wasn’t aware of the dangers and lies it held, but he knows that someone has to protect him from it, and that is Janus (“my youth I pray to keep” “hang my head, drown my fear”).

2) Seemed the Better Way: To me, this is a song about Janus knowing his place as a dark side and knowing that the others will not listen to him (“I better hold my tongue” “better take my place”). He initially trusts the core sides to do what needs to be done and take care of Thomas adequately, but when he realizes that it isnt enough, he finds it hard to keep in hiding (“Seemed the better way” “now it’s much too late to turn the other cheek”).

3) Anywhere: A BIG middle finger to society (“It’s a beautiful world, if youve been lied to” “No no no, nothing in this world is beautiful”). Janus basically trusts no one in society, not even the people closest to Thomas because he believes that everyone will do whatever it takes to get what they want (“Every man standing on another man’s back”). He also believes that society has been a huge detriment to Thomas and, AGAIN, is very dangerous (“It’s the world’s excuse for being disfigured and lying to you”).

4) Talking at the same time: This song is about Virgil. The song begins with explaining that a hard time for one person can be a triumph for another in multiple different metaphors (“Umbrellas cost more in the rain” “hard times for some, for others its sweet” “someone makes money when theres blood in the street”). The next part of the song practically shoves it in your face that it’s about virgil leaving (“Well she told me she would leave me, I ignored all the signs” “I know you're leaving and there's no more next time”). Janus was clearly hurt by Virgil leaving and it seems like he was almost in denial about it happening. A line near the end of the song that I found particularly interesting was “Well we bailed out all the millionaires, They've got the fruit, We've got the rind”. This line to me shows that Janus and the other dark sides let Virgil go, possibly in an attempt to get all of the dark sides accepted. Virgil capitalized on this opportunity and of course, got accepted, however, he left the others behind. Despite wanting Virgil to get accepted by the light sides, Janus remains bitter that Virgil was the only one. Virgil got the fruit, and the rest of the dark sides got the rind.

5) All the Good Girls go to Hell: Janus believes that Thomas needs to listen to him if he is going to stay safe and healthy. He thinks that his assistance, above all other sides, expecially Patton, is crucial for survival in this messed up world. (“And once the water starts to rise, And heaven's out of sight, She'll want the devil on her team” “Look at you needing me”). You’ll find it a common theme in this playlist that Janus refers to himself as the devil or an evil entity of some sort... Just thought I’d point that out.

6) Denial: Well, its in the title folks! Thomas is (or was) in denial. Janus is aware of the moments when Thomas thinks about consulting him or using one of his functions, but almost as soon as he gets the idea, he drops it and acts like the thought never happened (“Don't just shut your eyes closed” “You know that I can hear you thinking, I've heard you all the way from here, But if I look you in the eye though, It's like your thoughts all disappear”). Thomas is struggling for answers to questions that only Janus can answer, but he refuses to listen to consult him and Janus desperately wants this to stop (“I know you're looking for direction, I know where you wanna go” “Please don't turn the light out, I don't think the conversation's over”).

7) Trust in Me: Obviously, the original song has much more sinister undertones, but when listening to the song from Janus’ perspective, I get a different vibe. Basically, Janus just wants Thomas to trust him and give him more reign over decision making. Not much for this one.

8) Razzle Dazzle: JANUS IS EXTRA! Is anyone shocked? Also a HUGE showman. But again, no one’s surprised. Janus believes that the only way to get the light sides to listen to him is to practically put on a show to cover up whatever his true intentions are (“How can they see with sequins in their eyes?” “Razzle dazzle 'em And theyll never catch wise!” “How can they hear the truth above the roar?”) I could keep listing lines but theyre literally all just different versions of the same sentiment.

9) When the Chips are Down: The title right off the bat shows that, again, Janus believes that Thomas needs to look to him when important decisions are on the line. There are also a lump sum of jabs at patton in this song, lines like “Aim for the heart, shoot to kill” and “Cast your eyes to heaven, You get a knife in the back”. Theres also a lot of lines, yet again, of Janus practically begging Thomas to trust him and no one else (“Ain't nobody but yourself to trust” “Help yourself, To hell with the rest, Even the one who loves you best”).

10) Mandy goes to Med School: Soooo this one... Honestly, I don’t really have a lot. The original meaning of the song is not very applicable to Janus, so its a bit hard to pinpoint its meaning. The only thing I can think of is that Janus is again hating on society and the crazy things that people have to go through in it. If you weren’t aware, this song is about coat-hanger abortions.

11) I put a Spell on You: This one seems pretty striaghtforward to me. Janus knows that Thomas doesn’t want him, and it drives him up the wall, but he does what a snake boi does and slithers his way in anyways (“And I don't care if you don't want me, I'm yours right now” “I can't stand it 'cause you put me down”). I suppose you could argue that you could replace Thomas with Patton (mostly because daddy is used like 10 times in the song 😂) but a later song covers their realtionship extremely well.

12) Evil Night Together: Another toughie. My gut feeling is that this is a song about Remus and Janus just going out and having a wild night together. As I read into the lyrics more, though, it seems almost like Janus is doing this for Remus. Like he wants Remus to feel accepted and loved by him (something that can’t be said by Thomas). I just can’t read some of these lines without getting big Momceit vibes... i mean... theyre so supportive! “I'll hold your hand while they drag the river” “I'll cuddle you in the undertow” “I'll hold you close while they dust for prints”. Then theres of course this line... “Who's gonna make you a hero?” And to me, that is Janus saying that, if Thomas only sees Roman as his hero and not Remus, then it is Janus’ job to make Remus feel like a hero. Janus also saying “No need for cake or flowers” also feels like him reassuring Remus that he doesn’t need to be like his brother to be perfect and loved.

13) Don’t tell Mama: I think I’ve seen some people interpreting “mama” as Thomas in this song, but to me Patton seems like a better fit, especially after their interactions in the most recent episode. Basically this song is all about how Janus doesn’t mind people knowing about the bad things he does, but he can absolutely not have one person know. Janus seems to have grown a soft spot for Patton in the new episode and if you ask me, he would definately not want patton finding out about some of immoral things he’s wanted Thomas to do. I mean he literally waits for Patton to sink out and then the second he’s gone he starts scheming about pushing people down stairs and sabotage.

14) You’re a Cad: Another Virgil one, but this time it’s after Virgil’s acceptance. I think Janus has little faith in the beginning that Virgil would get far in his journey to the light side. Whether that is because of envy or just plain pessimism, I’m not sure, but he definately doubted Virgil would ever be able to escape his past (“So now you want the whole world to notice that you've come around, Now you expect, We'll see how you're really so much better now, But I know the truth” “What's the point pretending that you could be a better man, Just give in, since you always end up right back where you began”). Despite his reluctance to support Virgil’s endevors, Janus shows a softer side for Virgil that has gone completely untalked about in canon (“You're a rascal and a rogue, a villain and a crook, Still I tug at your line, I'm a fish on your hook” “Still I know the truth, but I have a sweet tooth for a Cad and a bounder, a dog and a cheap”). Janus really misses Virgil and I would go as far as to say that he regrets the things that he’s done to make Virgil want to leave (“I should be better, but I'm worse” “You're reckless with my heart, still I wait by the phone”).

15) As far as I can See: A sadie but a goodie. Janus doesn’t really understand love, but he’s sure that no one loves him (“As far as I can see Nobody loves me”). No one listens to him, no matter how much he shouts and cries. He doesn’t believe that anyone could love him if they are unwilling to hear him out and communicate with him (“As far as I can see, Nobody's listening” “And when I'm crying out, Nobody cries back for me”).

16) Criminal: AH MY FAVORITE SONG ON THE PLAYLIST! I LEGIT CRIED MY GUYS! Anyway. Janus LOVES Thomas. I would go as far to say that Janus loves Thomas more than any other side. Despite his lacking knowledge of love and what it feels like, he knows for a fact that what he feels for Thomas is the closest thing he will feel to love (“Because he's all I ever knew of love”). Now that thats out of the way, lets get to the juicy stuff... Janus feels like a criminal as he’s been taught over and over again that his opinions and thoughts are bad and harmful (“Cause I'm feelin' like a criminal” “I've done wrong and I wanna suffer for my sins”) This song is ultimately about Janus wanting to improve for Thomas, the one he loves the most. He knows that Thomas needs him, and the only way to get Thomas to listen is to get some help. Whose that help you might ask? Patton. Janus wants to be more helpful, but he doesnt know how. He’s envious of Patton’s ability to be accepted so easily, so he goes to him for advice (“I've come to you cause I need guidance to be true, And I just don't know where I can begin”). Janus wants to be redeemed in Thomas’ eyes, he wan’ts to escape the criminal appearance he’s been doomed to (“And I need to be redeemed, To the one I've sinned against”). He HATES some of the things he does to Thomas and some of the things he makes him think, but he doesn’t want to be forgiven, he believes that he deserves to be punished, but he still wants to get better for Thomas. He just doesn’t know how to do that (“Oh help me, but don't tell me to deny it, I've got to cleanse myself Of all these lies til I'm good enough for him”). Also, Janus sees Patton in a very very high place. He goes as far in this song to liken him to an angel while comparing himself, again, to the devil (“So what would an angel say, The devil wants to know”).

17) Change: The song is about, you guessed it, change! This to me is a continuation of the last song. Janus finally feels like things are changing in his favor (likely after the most recent episode). He was beginning to feel like there was no point in caring or trying, but now that he’s begining to see the light, he’s grown a bit hopeful (“Lately I've been thinking it's just someone else's job to care, Who am I to sympathize when no one gave a damn?” “Trying to find the power in me to be faithful” “Change is a powerful thing, I feel it coming in me”). With Patton’s help and acceptance, Janus is begining to feel worthy of Thomas again and begining to see the he has a voice (“Maybe by the time this song is done I’ll be able to be honest, capable, Of holding you in my arms without letting you fall when I don't feel beautiful Or stable”).

18) Devil in the Details: Janus worries again about his ability to help Thomas. He doesn’t believe that he can tell the difference between good and bad and he looks to Patton for that differentiation (“There was love I meant, there were accidents, So tell me which is which. 'Cause I just can't work it out” “I have, no way, of knowing,…”). There’s also an odd underlying message about doing something that he doesn’t want to do, but continues to do despite this and I’m not quite sure what that could be referring to (“And I know the cost, and I want to stop. But I can't do it, I just can't do it.”). It could simply be referring to him lying or deceiving others, but that seems too simple. I wish I had a better answer.

19) Come Little Children: ALSO MY FAVORITE SONG ON THE PLAYLIST! This is really big guys. This song practically confirms the fact that Janus was in charge of taking in and hiding the dark sides from Thomas (“Come little children, I'll take thee away Into a land of enchantment”). The song literally uses the phrase “My garden of shadows”, a clear metaphor for the hidden parts of Thomas’ mind where Janus keeps the dark sides. But it gets better... Janus pities these poor sides. He hates the way that society has forced them away from the light and into the shadows (“Follow sweet children, I'll show thee the way Through all the pain And the sorrows”). Not only does Janus feel bad for these sides and longs to protect them from the cruelness of the real world, but he LOVES them. He values every aspect of them and thinks they are beautiful and perfect. He cannot fathom why society wouldn’t also love see them this way and it frustrates him to hide such amazing traits from the world (“Weep not poor children For life is this way, Murdering beauty and passions”). Despite this sadness and dissapointment, Janus does his job and keeps the dark sides hidden away, knowing that society would never accept them for what they are (“Hush now dear children, It must be this way”).

20) Into the Unknown (no not the Frozen song): This song is VERY IMPORTANT. I have seen so many misinterpretations of this song, and granted mine could also be wrong, but please hear me out. This song comes right after the last song for a reason. The sides that Janus had once hidden away are now being shown to Thomas. He is literally going into the unknown (“Led through the mist, By the milk-light of moon, All that was lost, is revealed.” “Somewhere lost in the clouded annals of history, Lies a place that few have seen. A mysterious place, called The Unknown. Where long-forgotten stories are revealed to those who travel through the wood.”) Thomas is figuratively traveling through the wood by learning more about himself and traveling deeper into Janus’ previously mentioned Garden of Shadows. The song ends, beautifully framing Janus’ love for the sides he’s raised and hidden away, calling them “ The loveliest lies of all”....

(Ahhh! I’m sorry that was so long guys 😅 Thank you if you read the whole thing or evern part! I’d like to hear your opinions, so let me know 💛💛💛)

#sanders sides #thomas sanders #ts sanders sides #ts unpopular opinions #ts janus #janus sanders #janus playlist #ts side tracks #janus’ playlist #sanders sides playlist #long post #ts sidetracks

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deejadabbles · 3 years

Text

A Thousand Songs (Atem/Yami x Reader)

Chapter Two: Leave Out All The Rest

One /// Two /// Three /// Four /// [Five Coming Soon]

Summary: You knew that you and your band could make it big. Not only that, but stay together while doing it; the five of you were family, after all. The only problem was that despite all your musical talents...none of you were particularly good at lyrics. After years of struggling to put out your first full album, the solution finally made himself know in chance meeting on an empty stage.

Rock Band AU, Atem x Reader, gender neutral reader.

A.N. In case they weren't gay enough in the last chapter, Yugi and Jonouchi are boyfriends in this series <3 Is it a bit unrealistic to think they could be in a band and remain happy n healthy in their relationship? Probably. Do I care? No.

"This ain't working at all- and I told you it wouldn't!"

Yugi sighed as his beloved boyfriend tossed his phone on the table and leaned back in his metal folding chair.

Immediately, Yugi picked up the phone and handed it back to Jonouchi. "You can't dismiss them on looks alone," he scolded in a light tone.

Jou looked aghast, "He looks like he sacrifices cats on Sundays!" He waved the screen at Yugi, which displayed a bearded man who cast a purposeful scowl at the camera. He had lots of tattoos and piercings on top of the studded leather clothes, but that just made Yugi more annoyed with his boyfriend.

"People can say the exact same thing about me!" He waved a hand, encompassing his leather pants, studded belt, collar-style choker, and the tattoo on his arm.

Honda let out an unsure hum as he scrolled through his own phone, "But you're still a cinnamon roll under all that leather, Yugi, I'm not sure this guy is. Don't think he's a bad dude or anything, but I don't think he's the right fit for us," he turned his phone so everyone else sitting at the table could see, "just look at the titles of the songs he sent."

Okay, Yugi would concede that the examples the applicant had sent were a little...extreme, the title "bled like a pig" stood out in particular, but he still thought the boys were being a bit judgy.

"I think I'm gonna agree," you mumbled, "these are pretty heavy."

"You wrote a song called "we are broken" that sounds pretty heavy," Yugi countered, not unkindly though still trying to play the middleman.

"Okay, heavy isn’t the right word,” you conceded with a frown as you looked over some rather grotesque lyrics, “yup, “ edge lord ” is more fitting. Just look at the contents of the songs."

At the suggestion, Yugi scrolled down the application on his own phone, passed the profile pic and down to the bottom of the "examples of my work" section. ….okay, you guys had a point. Yugi doubted that the guy actually performed blood sacrifices, but his song style was definitely a little too demonic.

"Alright, I'll send him a thanks but no thanks note."

As Yugi brought up his email app to do just that, Anzu let out a frustrated sigh and scrubbed her hands over her face. "That was, what, the sixtieth-something application we've gone through?" she groaned, setting her phone down too, “It’s been over a month, and we haven’t gotten anywhere.”

"I still can't believe we got so many responses to our ads," Jonouchi grunted.

You set your head on your hand, expression dropping and making the dark circles under your eyes look more pronounced, "Everyone's pretty eager to join a band, now if only getting fans was as easy as getting people who wanted in on the fame prospect."

"All this work would actually be worth it if we found someone who even remotely appealed to us," Honda commented, "But everyone's just a little too…"

"Hardcore?" Anzu offered, then looked over at you, "Nah, you’re right, edge lord-y seem to fit most of them. I think that's the real thing, our band name probably makes people think we're more broody and grim than we actually are. We have plenty of darker themes in our stuff but everyone else seems to take it just a bit too far than our tastes go."

You ran a hand over your eyes, “Anyone else feel like we’ve wasted five weeks looking these applications over?”

"Hey, I'm sure we'll find someone soon though!" Yugi chimed in, a valiant attempt to elevate the mood. You and Jonouchi were always saying (much to his embarrassment) that he was everyone’s ray of sunshine, so surely he could salvage the night’s mood. “We just have to keep trying, I’m sure the right person is just around the corner!”

Anzu threw him an appreciative smile, “You’re probably right, Yugi, but I think I’m done looking for the night, it’s pretty exhausting.” She leaned back in her chair more, stretching her arms over her head.

“It’s probably a good time to call it quits now anyways,” you offered after glancing at the time, “If I hurry home now I can catch a shower before my shift starts.”

Everyone mumbled and nodded their agreements at that, followed by the five of you meandering around the room to get your stuff together. Honda offered to drive you back to your apartment like usual and everyone waved goodbye to each other in the tiny parking lot of the studio, Jou and Yugi climbing into Jou’s truck, Anzu into her beat-up car, and you and Honda zipping away on his motorbike.

It wasn’t until Yugi and Jonouchi were back at their place and Jou was cooking their dinner that Yugi realized something with great annoyance. After dumping the content of his backpack out on their bed, rifling through his desk drawer, and scouring the floor, Yugi wandered into the living room/kitchen area with a frown.

“Hey, sweetie, have you seen my adapters?”

Jonouchi looked thoughtful as he stirred the contents of the pan, “Uh, you mean the ones you use for your turntables? Haven’t seen them since the last time we rehearsed, that was what, three days ago?”

Yugi mumbled a curse under his breath, double-checking the tables and other spots he might have absentmindedly set them. Nothing. “Darn, I must have left them at the theatre yesterday.”

“Sure they aren’t in the studio?”

“No, I looked to make sure I’d have them when we rehearse tomorrow, but they weren’t there, that’s why I had it on my mind to find them when we got home.” Yugi shrugged and checked the time, thinking. After making up his mind, he grabbed his purple jacket from the armchair, “It’s okay though, if I hurry I should be able to sneak back into the theatre to get it. I think some members of the orchestra practice together tonight, and even if they aren’t the janitor should still be there.”

Yugi bounded across the tile floor as he slipped his jacket on, jumping up to place a kiss on his boyfriend’s cheek before turning to the door.

“I won’t be long, be back before dinner’s done!”

“You better,” Jonouchi called as he grabbed some spices from the cabinet, “I ain’t fixing this masterpiece for one!”

Yugi chuckled and closed the door behind him, as if he’d miss a chance to taste his boyfriend’s amazing cooking.

There was barely any need for a jacket as he walked down the sidewalk, but the vanishing sun assured that it would probably get colder by the time he was walking back home. Although their apartment was a bit far from the band’s studio, the location at least allowed Yugi easy access to his other work place: Domino City’s “Pegasus Theatre”. It was a popular spot for the upper crust of Domino, since they not only hosted ballets, but a talented orchestra as well. Yugi and Anzu both worked there, Anzu as a dancer in the ballet, and Yugi in the sound department, providing tech aid for the shows. Well, for the ballets at least, the natural design of the theatre meant that he wasn’t usually needed when the orchestra played.

Yugi's assumption proved right and he found the door of the employee entrance unlocked. The sound of chatter greeted him as he approached the stage area, signaling that the orchestra was packing it in for the night. He took a brief glance at the stage as he walked up the rows of seats- he had to be quick, as there were only three lingerers, two chatting as they headed for the door and one quietly packing away his violin.

Yugi bounded up the narrow staircase to the sound booth, opening the door and crossing the room to the little employee cubbies. He found what he was looking for quick enough, after pushing aside his spare jacket and snack bag. The beat-up altoids case rattled, but Yugi made sure to double-check that the adapters were actually in there. They were and he sighed in relief, pushing the other contents back into the cubby before turning.

He peered out the booth's window to see if the violinist was still there, and to Yugi's surprise he was not only still in sight, but the man had actually lingered after packing away his instrument. Standing in the very center of the stage, the man was looking out at the empty seats, then trailing his eyes up to the magnificent red curtains.

Yugi smiled to himself, figuring the man was just having a moment of wonder or taking in a daydream during his moment alone, and Yugi couldn't blame him in the slightest. Yugi was slower when taking the steps down, letting the man have his moment before he ruined it by walking by.

Again though, Yugi found himself surprised. His pace slowed, the sound of a melodic voice carrying through the theatre like a wave that had Yugi stopping dead in his tracks.

I dreamed I was missing

You were so scared

But no one would listen

Cause no one else cared

After my dreaming

I woke with this fear

What am I leaving

When I'm done here?

The voice was deep, the rumble of a serene storm, almost haunting in a way.

So, if you're asking me, I want you to know

Yugi’s feet were moving before he even noticed and he soon stood on the red carpets leading to the stage.

When my time comes

Forget the wrong that I've done

Help me leave behind some reasons to be missed

And don't resent me

And when you're feeling empty

Keep me in your memory

Leave out all the rest

The violinist stood there, lost in his own world- or rather the words of his song. His eyes were closed, listening to a chorus of instruments only he could hear as his hands moved in short but meaningful gestures.

Don't be afraid

I've taken my beating

I've shared what I've made

I'm strong on the surface

Not all the way through

I've never been perfect

But neither have you

So, if you're asking me, I want you to know

The chorus of the song came again and Yugi finally snapped out of his reverie long enough to pull out his phone. With quick thumbs he searched the beautiful lyrics he had never heard before, wondering why he didn’t know the song.

No results came up, the song was unknown.

That only got Yugi’s attention more, and he gazed back up at the man, whose voice was filling with more and more emotion with every lyric. His fist clenched at the front of his shirt, over where his heart was, eyes screwed shut as he continued to pour his heart out to the empty theatre.

Forgetting

All the hurt inside you've learned to hide so well

Pretending

Someone else can come and save me from myself

A pause, an intake of breath, and Yugi found himself hanging on to every second the man gave.

I can't be who you are...

...I can’t be who you are

The singer drew out the last lyric in a prolonged, sorrowful note; breathy as he bowed his head, the song- his raw expression, finished.

Instantly Yugi found himself clapping, bounding down the red aisle between the seats to the stage. He only felt slightly guilty when the other man jumped in fright.

“That was amazing! Your voice is amazing- that song too!”

The man (who Yugi only now noticed has a similar hairstyle to his own) stared back at him with wide eyes, body stiff. “Uh- oh I- thank you. I...didn’t realize anyone else was here.”

The man’s speaking voice was deep too, and anyone could guess that he’d have a powerful set of pipes. Yugi was still too excited to pay the man’s nervousness much mind as he practically hopped to the foot of the stage.

“I didn’t mean to startle you- but I couldn’t help it, that was awesome! Did you write that song yourself? I googled some of the lyrics and nothing came up.”

The man took a while to respond and Yugi wondered if his dark complexion was hiding a blush. Eventually, though, the violinist/singer cleared his throat.

“Y-yes, I wrote it. I’ve never sung it in front of anyone though.”

“Do you write a lot of songs?” Yugi pressed and again it took his new friend a moment to respond.

“...Sometimes. I suppose it’s a bit of a hobby. Listen I-”

Finally, Yugi actually realized just how rude he was being with his aggressive ramblings, “Oh, gosh I’m sorry! I’m bombarding you with questions like some weirdo.” He gave a nervous laugh and to his relief, the man’s posture seemed to relax a little- though he still seemed a bit embarrassed. “My name’s Yugi, by the way, I’m one of the sound techs.”

The man gave a nod of his head, “Atem, I’m a violinist in the orchestra.”

“And a totally awesome singer, you’ve got some real talent,” Yugi reiterated, but pressed on before the man could get too bashful again, “The reason I asked you so many questions is because I think it’s fate that we met like this! See I’m in a band, we’re trying to put out our first full-length album but- honestly, we’re aren’t very fast at pumping out new songs. We’re great with coming up with the music, but the lyrics always get us stuck. We’ve actually been looking to hire a ghostwriter for our songs, but none of the people we’ve found seem right- but that song was amazing, just the kind of stuff we like!” Ignoring the unreadable expression on Atem’s face, Yugi dug out his cardholder and passed one of them up to Atem. “I don’t wanna blindside you more than I already have tonight- sorry about that again, but, I really think you’d be a perfect fit for us. Think about it, and if it seems interesting to you, come talk to me.”

Atem looked the card over for a second, before peering back at Yugi, “I’ve never really put my songs out there, it’s just a private hobby, I don’t want you and your bandmates to get your hopes up.”

Yugi waved off his concern, “Don’t worry about that. Like I said, just think about it, okay?” He didn’t move, nor look away from Atem until the man finally nodded in agreement. “Awesome! Take your time and come talk to me once you’ve thought about it some.” His outgoing steam was starting to run out, his bold and somewhat rude actions finally starting to catch up to him. In a sudden burst of embarrassment, Yugi brought his hand up to scratch at the back of his head. “Anyway, I’ll let you go now, I’m sure you want to get home or get on with your night. It was nice meeting you, Atem!”

And with a wave, Yugi was heading for the door, leaving a rather bewildered Atem in his wake.

#atem x reader #yami x reader #yugioh x reader #yugioh #Atem #yami yugi #band AU #Yugioh Band AU #series: a thousand songs

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