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vilsoo · 10 months

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୨⎯ CHAPTER ONE ⎯୧

incubus!fushiguro toji x fem!reader

꒰ ✟ ꒱ GENRE: horror, demon au, nsfw 18+, porn with plot.

꒰ ✟ ꒱ SUMMARY: Sex demons are not as provocative as you think they are. Not only do they engage in sexual acts with humans, they thrive off their flesh and haunt them in their nightmares. When an incubus disguised as a Reverend turns a hungry eye on one of the parishioners, gruesome events at the cathedral slowly unfold; blasphemy, gore, and terror…

꒰ ✟ ꒱ CHAPTER WARNINGS: sacrilege, religious slander, blasphemy, WC: 2,391

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written in toji's pov, narration style similar to the Netflix show, "You." this takes place in a fictional setting; St. Reze University & Cathedral. banner art made in 2021 by chosofty!

‎ ST. REZE CATHEDRAL ‎ ֺ PRESENT TIME

‎ TOJI

I was born to be an affront to God.

A cruel infernal creature like me, born and raised in Hell, until, I made the decision to leave and never return. The regrets of leaving my past life in Hell started crawling down my spine these past few weeks. I knew I wasn't going to love my new life in the human realm either, but I had no choice. I had to be ordained as a Reverend for a Catholic University, where I sustain through dreadful church hours and its absurd practices.

From what I've witnessed in the course of religious history, the people of this church have less ethics than most witchcraft practitioners I've fucked in the past.

It was a shame for a man like me indeed. Accommodating these sheepish Catholics that devote to a religion I couldn't care less about— yet here I am personified as a Reverend fool. If my demon counterparts from Hell saw me like this months ago, the humiliation would infuriate me greatly. But now that I'm "reborn," I finally stopped giving a fuck of what humans and demons think of me.

Dark grey clouds shrouded over the cathedral as I saunter down the alleyway, stopping under an arch. Gloomy weather and heavy rain filling the campus felt oddly comforting to me. I had my cigarette, perching it between my lips as the fire of my lighter meets the end of the roll. I leaned against the roughness of the arch, watching the rain and exhaling the smoke. Then I allowed my mind to fall back to its numb state, feeling indifferent about being late for Mass.

It was annoying to find out that I wasn't alone, though. Because behind me, in this pouring alleyway, you found me.

The harsh splashes from the puddles could be heard from this distance. In need of shelter from the rain, you sprinted all the way to the arch where I was and halted right beside me, catching your breath. I must admit— I was a bit irritated of your abrupt presence. Having my peace disturbed as you scrutinize me with those mysterious, prying eyes of yours.

How the Hell did you even find me? A student like you was not supposed to be here.

My nonchalant, dead gaze remained on the cobblestone pavement as I inhaled. Part of me wanted you to leave. Gone. It's rude to stare, do you not know that? I assumed that my cold, aloof behavior from a Reverend like me was rather perverse and intimidating, especially when I'm smoking on these "sacred" church grounds without giving a damn. But you... you kept your gaze onto me like a moth to a flame.

I was a total stranger. You should've known this all along. But you still chose to stay with me here, and we stood in strained silence as the rain palpitated.

"Never seen a priest smoke before," you suddenly pondered, but your voice was loud and clear enough for me to hear amid the heavy rain.

I give a furtive glance from the corner of my eyes. A beam from the glowing streetlights nearby hovered over your face, the depths of your features visible for me to see. For a minute, I was intrigued. Piercing, beautiful eyes with a lurid gaze on me, evoking such curiosity as I have right now. I am once again met with the bitter taste of arson between my lips and exhaling the grey stench to the mist.

"Not a priest. Reverend," I deadpanned.

"Oh, sorry. Have I seen you before? I don't think I've seen you around at church. Were you just recently ordained?"

I had no desire to reply because I really don't care. It was pointless of me to since I wasn't in the first place. But something clicked in my mind once I took it to all in. You, an unsullied woman— gullible of the prospecting, flagrant danger you've now encountered. A student like you was never supposed to find me, yet here you are.

I hear a sigh fall from your lips, exasperated from how awkward our encounter was. "Nevermind, then. I'll just be heading to Mass now—"

"Don't," I retorted suddenly, completely nonplussed of the words that just slipped out of me. What the hell am I doing? "The walk to the cathedral from here is… too far. There's nowhere else for you to wait ‘til the rain dies down."

You scanned the area again, rubbing your arms as the chill from the mist crawled down your skin. "Are you sure you don't want me to go? I don't wanna bother you..."

How apologetic. Just like most of the sheepish Catholics here at St. Reze that practice a religion dedicated to forgiveness. Perhaps my hint of interest for you was enough to entertain me as the storm subsides. Encountering me while I'm slightly under the influence of drugs... Usually I have no desire to associate with pesky Catholics and students, but you...

I don't know why, but hearing your voice for the first time was like dipping into radiant honey and velvet. I felt inclined to speak my mind just so I can hear it again, tossing the worn out cigarette to a puddle and making the effort to face you completely.

The sky was now melting into darkness, shadows filling the angles of my face as I turned to you. "I think it'd be dumb of you to leave when it's raining this hard. And hopefully you're not a dumb girl, are you?"

I was expecting a more sheepish response, but you chuckled instead like it was a rhetorical question. Even the subtle grin stretching across your face somehow softened my nonchalant expression.

"How are you even a Reverend? You seem more like a layman to me."

"I wish," I mumbled. "But I wouldn't be making more money if I wasn't in the clergy."

"Just in it for the money? You're not… committed to serving the church?"

Fuck no, I replied in my head. But I decided to stay silent and stare at the sky, noticing you studying my emotionless face in the corner of my eyes. Naievety and gullibility is really in your nature, just like all the pathetic Catholics and penitents here. I fucking hated it, but your curiosity was just... delectable to me for some reason. It made a wave of questions rush in my head that I was tempted to solve myself.

"Are you?" I spoke sardonically, side-eyeing you.

“Yes. I am,” you replied confidently with a smile. “Serving God and attending the church has been a big part of my life.”

How sad. How pitiful. A lost little lamb like you, blinded by the wrong truths of an absurd religion just like everyone else here. Living by this pathetic promise of an eternity without sin, pain, and fear… But such servile mannerism from you strangely amused me; I wanted to provoke it just for the fun of it. Derisively taunt your beliefs little by little and take away that religious burden; almost like corrupting you…

I need to stop.

The heavy rain had finally subsided and the puddles on the ground were now gentle and smooth that a water lily can bathe in it. There was a soft rattling sound coming from the palm of your hand that I did not notice before. Something smooth and ivory, almost like pearl beads glimmering from the dull alleyway lamp posts.

"Anyways… Aren't you supposed to be at the church early?"

“Don’t really feel like going right now,” I prompted with a small smirk. “What’cha got there?”

“This? My rosary.”

Your hand opens to a sterling silver crucifix rested on your palm attached to luminous pearls and red beads shaped like rosebuds at the “Our Father” mysteries. I didn’t know that these “sacred” objects could be customized as decorative jewelry instead.

“We like to have our own decorated rosaries here,” you suddenly explained like you’ve read my mind. “You can tell a lot about a student’s personality with how unique they are.”

My gaze suddenly wonders to your face that was emerged from the shadows. Even though my eyes were tense and my jaw was clenched, it felt as if my expression was gradually softening. Maybe it was the cigarettes slowly easing me. Who knows? But perhaps something clicked in my mind tonight; the unexpected scenario of you rather beguiling me. A woman with shameless passion for some deity capturing my attention— that's something I'll never forgive myself for doing.

"Can I see yours?" you suddenly asked, your eyes meeting mines for the first time it felt like you eroded my senses. Such an innocent and mindless question, but yet here I am; taking in your curiosity that was just as deadly as lethal drugs were to humans.

I dig into the pockets of my cassock and open my lifeless hand without a word. This was the rosary I was given when I was ordained; acrylic resin beads of black enamel and a translucent smoke color, glassy and polished like gunmetal. You scrutinized it like you were in an endless trance. I couldn't understand what a stranger like you found so fascinating about it.

“It’s so… you,” you mused.

I frowned slightly, not really understanding what that meant either. “Well if you like it so much, have it.”

But I guess I have emerged from the shadows too. Maybe the cigarette was enough to ease my palpable mood from such a fortuitous encounter with you. I didn't want our conversation to end, though. I didn’t want any of this to end so soon. I was starting to feel some sort of amusement. But it wasn’t until you looked at me, really looked at me; your sultry eyes simmering as you met with mines.

No words. No words at all. It was just the soft rain and your fingers grazing my palm ever so gently. Those lingering wet fingertips as you unravel the beads like how a god would trace the outlines of spiritual blood vessels. I look down again when my palm meets a cooler surface. Your pearl rosary was dropped right in my hand.

"Mine for yours," you muttered with a soft smile. "I'll give it back at the end of Mass."

And just like that you head down to the cathedral, leaving me alone to contemplate everything. It makes me realize how I didn't want anything to do with you at first. How I barely cared for people like you… But it wasn't until a wondering sheep like you made its way through the darkest route, like the valley of the shadow of death, encountering your sin and fate right there…

It makes me wonder. Would a stranger like you worship me like you worship your god?

When the rain had finally cleared and the light of the monochrome moon poured over, I decided to come to Mass a few minutes later. The Saturday Communion prayer was being recited as I sauntered to the pew where the rest of the clergy sat while. As much as I hate this job and find these practices meaningless to me, I needed to get paid for this shit.

"Most glorious virgin Mary, mother of god and our mother, turn thine eyes in pity upon us miserable sinners. . ."

There were different ways Catholics receive the blood and body for the Holy Sacrament. We let the devotees take the chalice by hand at the altar, store it until they get back to their seats to drink, or let us place the chalice on their lips. But such practices were painfully unappealing to me who gets bored and impatient easily.

Drifting my attention from the service, I scrutinize the gothic architecture of St. Reze. The rays of the moonshine from the mosaic suddenly coruscated the pearl rosary you gave me. The light captures my gaze as it shimmers in the palm of my hand. My thumb grazes the glassy material and the memory of us under the rain immediately lingered in the edges of my mind. I look through the crowd of heads to find your familiar face.

There you were.

I found this all so amusing of you; that redundant devotion you display so proudly for your god. When the prayer finally finished and the devotees walked out of their pew, I watched as they kneel at the altar with their elbows pressed on the mahogany bar as they await for Holy Sacrament. Majority took the chalice by hand while others took it to their seats. After giving out the elements of consecrated bread and wine, repeating the words, it was finally your turn.

You shot a quick glance at me as you kneeled at the altar and signed the cross; the pure epitome of surrender and submission. Never in my years of this life have I met a woman with this kind of sensuousness. Both of your hands laid on your thighs and your neck was arched back, lips parted like an invitation for the wine.

Titillating. The way look at me from below with a half-lidded gaze. Your eyes have betrayed your true nature, more prurient than the last time we stared at each other.

Exhilarating. The way your lips travel to the moist spout of the gold, letting the bitter wine ravish your tongue. I watched your neck, the way how you swallowed. A small drip escaped, trailing down your chin.

It was lucky for you nobody has drank from that chalice before. But nothing about this was holy. If anything, this was sacrilege. I'm not one to crave for anyone's attention, especially from one like you; but I've finally got to taste it this very fine night. If only you knew what you were doing to me right now…

No words. Just the intense undertones of temptation we have suddenly surrendered to. Because that… that felt like worship.

That was what worship feels like from a stranger like you.

Then you were gone. I couldn't recall much after that, but I do remember, how my eyes followed you the whole night, diverting my attention to you at a distance where you could never leave my sight. Only then had I come to realization of your luscious features and a savoring body, like the essence of sweet nectar and ambrosia.

I couldn’t wait to see you again at confessionals.

TAGS: @suget @azanthys @haezen @heavenlyevil @saturniac @vampnyx @emomanswhore @divinedabi @slut-manifesto

ALL WORKS BELONG TO VILSOO/POISEUNS © 2023. originally published April 10, 2021. do not steal, plagiarize, or translate without permission. do not repost/share any of my works where minors have access.

#ཐི♰ཋྀ ⋆ 𝐆𝐎𝐃’𝐒 𝐖𝐇𝐎𝐑𝐄. ๋࣭ 𖤐 #toji fushiguro smut #toji fushiguro x you #toji fushiguro #jujutsu kaisen toji #jujutsu kaisen smut #jjk toji #toji x reader

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billybob598 · 8 months

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How Many People? (Sydney Lohmann x Reader)

I'm backkkkkk. My bad for not writing in like 2 weeks, but whatever. This was requested by an amazing anon. I hope you all enjoy it! My next fic is an Obi one so maybe I'll do that. I'm thinking of doing a part 2 to this in the near future. As always any feedback good or bad is welcomed! Have fun reading!

And shout out to @ares3460 @simp4panos @inlovewithwoso @wosofanstuff and the lovely 🧡 anon for helping me decide what kind of ending I should have

Word Count: 2.3K (Guys?!?!?!)

You watch fondly as Syndey runs around the paddock, taking pictures of everything she sees. While she had been to many races before, she just really loved Belgium for some reason. It could be that the track was nestled in the Ardennes forest or that the race was one of the most historic on the calendar. Whatever it was, Sydney was beyond excited to be there. She looked like a kid in a candy store the way her eyes darted around, taking everything in. You, on the other hand, were not that fazed by everything. Instead, you opt to stare at your girlfriend with heart eyes as you fall harder when you notice how happy she looks. Walking into the Williams garage, Sydney immediately seeks out Lily (our favourite WAG). They had become close friends as they watched you and Alex race around the track.

The weekend forecast was less than ideal. Everyone is predicting heavy rainfall on both Saturday and Sunday. Even on Friday, the dark clouds sat overhead, putting everyone on edge. Everyone knew the dangers of racing around Spa in the wet. Lando had a massive crash in 2021 and tragically, Dilano Van’t Hoff passed away at Spa, also in the wet. When you heard about Dilano your heart broke. You had raced against each other back in your karting days and become good friends. He was destined to reach Formula 1, both of you had dreamed of driving alongside each other in the pinnacle of motorsport. Now, due to the FIA’s carelessness, your friend who deserved to be where you are today was gone. Racing at Spa in the wet scared you. Not that you would admit it to anyone, although Syndey had kind of figured it out. That’s when you know something is wrong, when a driver who is usually crazy and ready to do anything, fears for their life doing something they love.

As you’re in your driver's room with your head in Syndey’s lap, her nails running softly through your hair, you can’t help but let your mind wander towards the conditions of the track. Your girlfriend notices the furrow of your eyebrows, indicating you’re in deep thought.

“So you gonna tell me?” She asks gently.

“Hm?” You hum quietly back. She rolls her eyes good-naturedly.

“You gonna tell me what you’re thinking about?” Sydney says trying to coax an answer out of you.

“Oh, nothing. Just thinking about the rain and stuff,” you speak softly as the rain patters against the window. Once the words leave your mouth Syndey knows what you’re thinking about.

“You don’t want to race do you?” She says.

“No, I mean, I don’t know. Of course I want to race, I love this track and I always want to race, but…” You trail off. Syndey stops her hand midway through your hair and raises her eyebrows in question. “But, it’s just, how many people have to die before they realize that it’s not safe in the wet?” You sigh out as tears threaten to fall out. The midfielder looks at you sympathetically before continuing her previous motion in an attempt to soothe you.

“If it’s really bad then tell them it’s not safe,” she shrugs.

“It’s not that simple, Syd. I can’t just go to the FIA and be like, ‘It’s raining too much, I’m terrified to put my foot on the accelerator, I think we should just cancel the entire weekend.’ I can’t do that.” She nods in understanding, opening her mouth to speak but is cut off when a loud knock brings the two of you out of your little world.

“Mate, let’s go! Quali is in like 20 minutes and the engineers want to go over some data,” a voice says loudly from the other side of the door. Both of you sigh as you stand up. Slipping your arms into your overalls, Sydney stands up and places her hands on either side of your waist. You freeze your movements and look at her. She places a feather-light kiss on your lips, then on your cheek, then on your forehead.

“Please, please be safe, liebe,” she mutters against your forehead. Trying your best to give her a reassuring smile you whisper against her neck,

“I will. I promise.”

Lily and Syndey cling to each other as the qualifying session progresses. Both of them praying that all twenty drivers survive the session unscathed. It doesn’t help that almost every other minute somebody new has gone for a joyride through the gravel or grass off the track. What does help is that both you and Alex Albon made it through to Q2. Your first lap in Q2 was solid, with a few moments here or there, but all together a relatively tidy lap. The lap put you P10; on the chopping block but you knew there was time to find so you weren’t necessarily worried. On the downside, the rain had only gotten heavier, opposite to what the radar suggested. Now, instead of only being on intermediates the teams and drivers had to make the switch to full wets. So, when you went back out for your second Q2 lap with four minutes left, it’s safe to say Syndey was scared shitless.

“Okay so, we have a good gap to the car in front of us so there shouldn’t be any problems with traffic. Gap to P11 is .098, again gap to the elimination zone is .098,” your engineer informs you over the radio.

“Copy. Visibility is very, very poor. So is traction. I’ll go for it, though,” you respond. Mentally you lock in. You tune out all the other distractions and prepare to give it your all for one lap. However, you can’t shake this bad feeling sitting at the bottom of your stomach. As you slam your foot down on the gas pedal, a ton of water smacks against your visor. Leaving you practically blind. At this point, you're just driving on instinct and memory. Smoothly gearing down as you approach Turn 1, you slowly apply pressure to the brake being careful to not lock up and slide through the corner. You straight-line it as quickly as possible and make the run towards your favourite corner, but also the most dangerous one, Eau Rouge. Usually, in dry conditions, you would take this flat-out, with no hesitation. The thrill of nailing it at 300kph was something you could never get enough of. As you turn left slightly to begin your climb up the hill, you feel the back end slip out. Immediately, you try to correct it, quickly switching the steering wheel to the right. This only causes the rear wheels to lose even more traction. The car starts to spin around wildly. Then, it smashes into the barrier with such force that your helmet jerks forward, threatening to rip your head off from your neck. A searing pain makes its way through your neck and your ribs rattle from the impact. It’s only when hit another solid object that you realize that you’re still moving. The second impact is a lot less painful, but you still figure that you hit the barrier at around 180kph. Everything stops shaking for a second. The rain continues to pour all around you. Yellow flashing lights can barely be made out in your peripheral. Your internal organs start to reorganize back to normal when through the sound of rain spattering on the asphalt you hear the roar of an engine getting nearer. Then, everything goes black.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Williams garage is absolute chaos. Everyone is scrambling, trying to see if you’re okay if the ambulances are on their way, or trying to watch the replay of what happened. To Sydney, everything was happening in slow motion. The second Pierre Gasly’s Alpine collided with you, tears rolled down her face. Lily was also crying at the sight of your car broken in two. Out of the corner of her watering eye, Sydney could see your race engineer frantically repeating your name into his headset, trying desperately to get you to acknowledge him. Her head feels like it’s underwater with everyone's muffled voices. Her mind directly goes to the worst possible outcomes. All the negative thoughts swim around her brain for a few minutes until the wailing of the ambulance sirens breaks her out of her trance. Desperately, she looks at the cameras on the pit wall only to see that they have lost connection. After five more agonizing minutes that felt like hours, Sydney was informed by one of the team members that you were being airlifted to the nearest hospital. She was also told that they arranged a car to take her there. Lily refused to leave her side and slipped into the car with her, holding her hand as an act of comfort. Alex’s girlfriend also had the Sky Sports live coverage playing on her phone so they saw the camera zoom in on Alex’s wide eyes as the TV replayed your accident. It was like some sick joke the way your car just snapped in two like a twig.

Finally, they arrived at the hospital, Sydney running through the rain towards the front desk.

“I’m-I’m here for Y/N Y/L/N,” she pants out, her eyes watering and her clothes drenched making her quite the sight. The receptionist nods her head as she scrolls through her computer,

“Uh huh, Ms. Y/L/N is currently in surgery. You are welcome to sit in the waiting area,” the young lady says pointing towards a room full of chairs and concerned looking family members. The Bayern player mutters out a thank you before finding a seat. Lily comes in a few seconds later and sits in the chair beside Sydney.

“I’m sure she’ll be fine,” Lily attempts to sooth your girlfriends nerves. She continues to talk about how you’re a fighter and how you’ll be fine, but this all goes in one of Syndey’s ears and out the other. After what felt like an eternity, but really closer to about an hour, a nurse comes into the waiting area saying your name. Instantaneously, Sydney shoots out of her seat and makes her way towards the nurse.

“Is she okay? What are her injuries? Oh God, please tell me she’s okay,” the young midfielder rants out quickly. Unfazed, the nurse replies,

“Relation to the patient?”

“Girlfriend.”

Sighing, the nurse looks down at her clipboard and starts to read,“Ms. Y/L/N suffered many injuries. Major trauma to the head, a collapsed lung, a broken leg, and severe damage to her spinal cord.” The tears threaten to fall once again as your girlfriend gets told the extent of your injuries.

“Is she…Is she like stable?” Her bottom lip quivers. Again, the nurse sighs,

“She is in critical condition, currently she is hooked up to a heart monitor and an artificial ventilator to help her breathe.”

“Can I go see her?” The nurse nods before motiong to follow her.

“RIght now the doctor is just finishing up, but he will tell you more about Ms. Y/L/N’s condition.” They arrive at a brightly lit room, white covering every inch of the walls. Then, Sydney sees you. Your body laying limply on the hospital bed with what seems like a thousand different tubes and cords attached to you. You seem so small, your usually bright face now covered by an oxygen mask. The smile that can make anyone’s day better no where to be found.

“Hi, I’m Dr. Khan, I’ll be overseeing Ms. Y/L/N for the next little while. Have you been briefed on her injuries yet?” Syndey tears her eyes away from you to see a tall man in a white lab coat talking to her. She nods in response to his question. “Perfect. Well, right now she is in critical condition. The next forty-eight hours or so will be crucial. If she makes it through the first couple days her chance at surviving and making a full recovery will greatly increase. I’ll give you some privacy now, but a nurse will be in to check on her every hour. If you need anything just give me a shout.” He then turns before briskly walking out of the room, leaving Sydney and your unconscious body alone. She takes a seat in a chair alongside of your bed. Her vision goes blurry as the tears flow freely,

“Y-Y/N, please d-don’t leave m-me,” she chokes out in between sobs, “I need yo-you. I don’t k-know what I’d do without you, please liebling.”

For the next fifty minutes Sydney stays silent, her mind racing as her eyes rake over your body. The only thing brining her the slightest bit of comfort being the steady beep of your heartbeat on the monitor. Soon enough, a nurse comes in to check on you, inspecting all of the machines you’re hooked onto. Sydney for the most part ignores her, that is until a small curse leaves the womans mouth.

“What? What’s wrong?” She questions the woman. All of a sudden the nurse shouts for the doctor and presses a red button near your bedside. Within seconds Dr. Khan and more nurses come flooding into the room, one or two of them pulling Syndey out of the room. She tries to fight them, desperate to see what’s happening.

“She’s gone into cardiac arrest!” Someone shouts. Her eyes widen as the words sink in. With one last tug from behind she’s taken completely out of the room. But, she sees one last thing before they slam the door shut in her face.

The line on the heart monitor going completely flat.

#woso x reader #woso imagine #sydney lohmann x reader #sydney lohmann #gerwnt x reader #woso x f1 reader

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apod · 1 month

Photo

2024 March 31

Total Solar Eclipse Below the Bottom of the World Image Credit & Copyright: Petr Horálek (ESO Photo Ambassador, Inst. of Physics in Opava) ; Acknowledgement: Xavier Jubier

Explanation: In late 2021 there was a total solar eclipse visible only at the end of the Earth. To capture the unusual phenomenon, airplanes took flight below the clouded seascape of Southern Ocean. The featured image shows one relatively spectacular capture where the bright spot is the outer corona of the Sun and the eclipsing Moon is seen as the dark spot in the center. A wing and engine of the airplane are visible across the left and bottom of the image, while another airplane observing the eclipse is visible on the far left. The dark area of the sky surrounding the eclipsed Sun is called a shadow cone. It is dark because you are looking down a long corridor of air shadowed by the Moon. A careful inspection of the eclipsed Sun will reveal the planet Mercury just to the right. You won't have to travel to the end of the Earth to see the next total solar eclipse. The total eclipse path will cross North America on 2024 April 8, just over one week from today.

∞ Source: apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap240331.html

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mostlysignssomeportents · 7 months

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The internet is not a (link)dump truck

Monday (October 2), I'll be in Boise to host an event with VE Schwab. On October 7–8, I'm in Milan to keynote Wired Nextfest.

The second decade of the 21st century is truly a bounteous time. My backyard has produced a bumper crop of an invasive species of mosquito that is genuinely innovative: rather than confining itself to biting in the dusk and dawn golden hours, these stinging clouds of flying vampires bite at every hour that God sends:

https://themagnet.substack.com/p/the-magnet-081-war-with-mosquitoes

Here in the twilight of capitalism's planet-devouring, half-century orgy of wanton destruction, there's more news every day than I can possibly write a full blog post about every day, and as with many weeks, I have arrived at Saturday with a substantial backlog of links that didn't fit into the week's "Hey look at this" linkdumps.

Thus, the eighth installment in my ongoing, semiregular series of Saturday linkdumps:

https://pluralistic.net/tag/linkdump/

This week, the miscellany begins with the first hesitant signs of an emerging, post-neoliberal order. The FTC, under direction of the force-of-nature that is Lina Khan, has brought its long-awaited case antitrust case against Amazon. I am very excited about this. Disoriented, even.

When was the last time you greeted every day with a warm feeling because high officials in the US government were working for the betterment of every person in the land? It's enough to make one giddy. Plus, the New York Times let me call Amazon "the apex predator of our platform era"! Now that it's in the "paper of record," it's official:

https://pluralistic.net/ApexPredator

Now, lefties have been predicting capitalism's imminent demise since The Communist Manifesto, but any fule kno that the capitalist word for "crisis" also translates as "opportunity." Like the bedbugs that mutated to thrive in clouds of post-war DDT, capitalism has adapted to each crisis, emerging in a new, more virulent form:

https://boingboing.net/2023/09/30/bedbugs-take-paris.html

But "anything that can't go on forever will eventually stop" (Stein's Law). Perhaps our mistake was in waiting for capitalism to give way to socialism, rather than serving as a transitional phase between feudalism and…feudalism.

What's the difference between feudalism and capitalism? According to Yanis Varoufakis, it comes down to whether we value rents (income you get from owning things) over profits (income you get from doing things):

https://pluralistic.net/2023/09/28/cloudalists/#cloud-capital

By that metric, the FTC's case against Amazon is really a case against feudalism. Through predatory pricing and acquisitions, Amazon has turned itself into a chokepoint that every merchant, writer and publisher has to pass through in order to reach their customers. Amazon charges a fortune to traverse that chokepoint (estimates range from 45% to 51% of gross revenues) and then forces sellers to raise their prices everywhere else when they hike their Amazon prices so they can afford Amazon's tolls. It's "an economy-wide hidden tax":

https://www.thebignewsletter.com/p/the-ftc-sues-to-break-up-amazon-over

Now, feudalism isn't a straightforward proposition. Like, are you sure you mean feudalism? Maybe you mean "manorialism" (they're easy to mix up):

https://locusmag.com/2021/01/cory-doctorow-neofeudalism-and-the-digital-manor/

Plus, much of what we know about the "Dark Ages" comes from grifter doofuses like Voltaire, a man who was capable of dismissing the 800 year Holy Roman Empire with a single quip ("neither holy, roman, nor an empire"). But the reality is a lot more complicated, gnarly and interesting.

That's where medievalist Eleanor Janeaga comes in, and her "Against Voltaire, or, the shortest possible introduction to the Holy Roman Empire" is a banger:

https://going-medieval.com/2023/09/29/against-voltaire-or-the-shortest-possible-introduction-to-the-holy-roman-empire/

Now, while it's true that Enlightenment thinkers gave medieval times a bum rap, it's likewise true that a key element of Enlightenment justice is transparency: justice being done, and being seen to be done. One way to distinguish "modern" justice from "medieval" trials is to ask whether the public is allowed to watch the trial, see the evidence, and understand the conclusion.

Here again, there is evidence that capitalism was a transitional phase between feudalism and feudalism. The Amazon trial has already been poisoned by farcical redactions, in which every key figure is blacked out of the public record:

https://prospect.org/power/2023-09-27-redacted-case-against-amazon/

This is part of a trend. The other gigantic antitrust case underway right now, against Google, has turned into a star chamber as well, with Judge Amit P Mehta largely deferring to Google's frequent demands to close the court and seal the exhibits:

https://usvgoogle.org/trial-update-9-22

Google's rationale for this is darkly hilarious: if the public is allowed to know what's happening in its trial, this will be converted into "clickbait," which is to say, "The public is interested in this case, and if they are informed of the evidence against us, that information will be spread widely because it is so interesting":

https://www.bigtechontrial.com/p/secrecy-is-systemic

Thankfully, this secrecy is struggling to survive the public outrage it prompted. While the court's Zoom feed has been shuttered and while Judge Mehta is still all-too-willing to clear the courtroom during key testimony, at least the DoJ's exhibits aren't being sealed at the same clip as before:

https://www.theverge.com/2023/9/27/23892215/google-search-antitrust-trial-documents-public-again-judge-mehta-rules

In 2023, the world comes at you fast. There's an epic struggle over the future of corporate dominance playing out all around us. I mean, there are French antitrust enforcers kicking down doors of giant tech companies and ransacking their offices for evidence of nefarious anticompetitive plots:

https://www.theverge.com/2023/9/28/23894863/nvidia-offices-raided-french-competition-authority

As ever, the question is "socialism or barbarism." But don't say that too loud: in America, socialism is a slur, one that dates back to the Reconstruction era, when pro-slavery factions called Black voting "socialism in South Carolina."

Ever since, white nationalists used "socialism" make Americans believe that "socialism" was an "extremist" view, so they'd stand by while everyone from Joe McCarthy to Donald Trump smeared their opponents as "Marxists":

https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/4066499-trump-paints-2024-campaign-as-righteous-crusade/

As Heather Cox Richardson puts it for The Atlantic, "There is a long-standing fight over whether support for the modern-day right is about taxes or race. The key is that it is about taxes and race at the same time":

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2023/09/american-socialism-racist-origins/675453/

The cruelty isn't the point, in other words. Cruelty is the tactic. The point is power. Remember, no war but class war. All of this is in service to paying workers less so that bosses and investors can have more.

Take "essential workers," everyone from teachers to zookeepers, nurses to librarians, EMTs to daycare workers. All of these "caring" professions are paid sub-living wages, and all of these workers are told that "they matter too much to earn a living wage":

https://www.okdoomer.io/praise-doesnt-pay/

The "you matter too much to pay" mind-zap is called "vocational awe," a crucial term introduced by Ettarh Fobazi in her 2018 paper:

https://www.inthelibrarywiththeleadpipe.org/2018/vocational-awe/

Vocational awe is how creative workers – like the writers who just won their strike and the actors who are still fighting – are conned into working at starvation wages. As the old joke goes, "What, and give up show-business?"

https://ask.metafilter.com/117904/Whats-the-joke-thas-hase-the-punchline-what-and-give-up-show-business

In this moment of Big Tech-driven, AI-based wage suppression, mass surveillance, corruption and inequality, perhaps we should take a moment to remind ourselves that cyberpunk was a warning, not a suggestion. Or, more to the point, the warning was about high-tech corporate takeover of our lives, and the suggestion was that we could seize the means of computation (a synonym for William Gibson's "the street finds its own use for things"):

http://www.seizethemeansofcomputation.org/

We are living in a lopsided cyberpunk future, long on high-tech corporate takeover, short of computation seizing. This point is made sharply in JWZ's "Dispatch From The Cyberpunk City," which is beautifully packaged as a Hypercard stack that you run on an in-browser Mac Plus emulator from the Internet Archive:

https://www.jwz.org/blog/2023/09/neuroblast-dispatch-from-the-cyberpunk-city/

Cast your gaze ahead, to the near future: Public space has all but disappeared. Corporate landlords use AI-powered robots to harass the homeless. The robots, built slick and white with an R2-D2 friendliness now most resemble giant butt plugs covered in graffiti and grime.

Science fiction doesn't have to be a warning. It can also be a wellspring of hope. That's what I tried to do with The Lost Cause, my forthcoming Green New Deal novel, which Bill McKibben called "The first great YIMBY novel":

https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250865939/the-lost-cause

Writing a hopeful novel of ecological, social and economic redemption, driven by solidarity, repair, and library socialism, was a powerful tonic against despair in this smoke-smothered, flooded, mosquito-bitten time. And while the book isn't out yet, there are early indications I succeeded, like Kim Stanley Robinson's reaction, "Along with the rush of adrenaline I felt a solid surge of hope. May it go like this."

And now, we have a concurring judgment from The Library Journal, who yesterday published their review, which concludes: "a thought-provoking story, with a message of hope in a near-future that looks increasingly bleak":

https://www.libraryjournal.com/review/the-lost-cause-2196385

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/09/30/mesclada/#melange

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leothil · 3 months

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fic recs: archive edition 17

Let's start the week off right by diving back into fall 2021! I was in a Mood all of last week, so here are some fics that are guaranteed to make you smile and feel like everything is right with the world.

Previous rec posts are here!

Until Forever by @elvensorceress The Buckley-Diaz family celebrate Eddie's birthday at the loft. The whole fic feels like being wrapped in a soft, pink cloud. 3.3k words, rated G

sunlight (in one curve) by @tawaifeddiediaz Eddie wakes up and observes all the little ways in which Buck is present in his home. Almost painfully soft domesticity, the kind of cute that makes you want to rip it to pieces because your feelings are too overwhelming. 4k words, rated G

shout if you want my heart by @hattalove Buck has filled Eddie's fridge with meals to last a week while he's on a roadtrip and Eddie is working extra shifts, and Eddie has a crisis over how much Buck takes care of both him and Christopher. This is not tagged as tooth-rotting fluff but it should be. 5.9k words, rated T

Say Anything...As Long As It's I Love You by allyasavedtheday (@littlespoonevan) In which Buck loves romcoms and Eddie thinks maybe he can take some inspiration from them to figure out how to tell Buck he loves him. Funny and sweet like a romcom ought to be! 5.7k words, rated T

all for one and one for always by lecornergirl (@clusterbuck) Buck joins Eddie at a parent-teacher night at Christopher's school, and finds out that everyone thinks they're married and that Eddie has just run with it. A true final act of idiots to lovers. 1.8k words, rated G

Happy reading!

#fic rec #buddie fic rec #911 fic rec #buddie fic #911 fic #frida's archive project #so fluffy i'm gonna die

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queen-of-the-avengers · 8 months

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Shine Bright

Pairing: Bucky Barnes x Star!Reader

Word Count: ~4k

Warnings: fluff, angst, being kidnapped and almost killed, but then fluff again

Summary: Hydra wants to reign eternally, and the best way to do that is to eat a falling star's heart. They knock you out of orbit but didn't expect the Avengers to find you first.

Squares Filled: stars (2021) for @buckybarnesbingo

Author’s Note: This takes place during or after FATWS, but I've made John evil, and everyone who died post-Endgame is alive and well.

I am absolutely in love with the movie "Stardust", so I decided to base this story on that! The picture down below DOES NOT represent the reader at all, I just wanted to showcase the movie.

The sky above is still and peaceful. There isn’t a cloud in sight that allows visibility to whoever looks up at it. John Walker looks through the telescope and positions it on the star Hydra is targeting. If he wasn’t on a mission right now, he’d appreciate the stars shining brightly for their human audience.

“John, is everything in position?”

“On my end. What about yours?”

John looks at his coworker who is in charge of the missile they plan on using for this mission. The man tweaks the numbers and aligns them with the correct star.

“We’re ready.”

All eyes turn to Valentina Allegra de Fontaine. She is in charge of this whole operation under the assumption this is for the CIA. She sits at the large desk in the middle of the room, leans back, and rests her hands in her lap.

“Fire away, gentlemen.”

John and his coworker turn the machine on and launch the missile at the star. John rushes over to the telescope and watches as it flies into the sky, breaks off into tiny pieces, and zooms straight into the heart of the star. Instead of blowing it up like most missiles do, it knocks the star off its orbit and sends it straight down to Earth. Whatever John is seeing through the telescope, everyone can see on the monitors in the room so that Valentina can see what’s going on.

Everyone watches it fall straight to Earth to a place they don’t know. They can’t predict the crash site for something as big as a star but it won’t be hard to track it down. Once they figure out where it is, they’ll have so much fun dissecting it for what they truly need it for.

It was Tony’s idea that the entire team kick back and relax after a hard working week. Sam and Wanda brought out the board games that can account for a lot of people since everyone lives at the compound. The only one not here is Thor but that’s because he has duties to complete on Asgard.

“Okay, this time, don’t cheat,” Tony says to Sam.

“Hey, that was one time and I was trying to get Steve.”

The game they’re playing is Cards Against Humanity, something they all love to play—adult edition. What’s a good night in with alcohol and friends if not for an inappropriate game?

“Bucky, you in or not?”

“Yeah, pass me some cards.”

With everyone on board, the game can get started. The first few rounds were hilarious and the next couple was causing a lot of people to drink. Tony loves to put a spin on his games. If he can get people to drink, then a lot of people are getting drunk. By the tenth round, everyone is relaxed and willing to kick things up a notch.

Tony brings out a Truth or Dare drinking game when something bright lights up the night sky.

“What the hell is that?” Clint asks.

Everyone gets up and gathers around the window to watch it fall to the ground. It lands not far from the Avenger’s Compound but far enough to where they can’t see it.

“Tony, Sam, let’s check it out,” Steve says seriously.

Tony and Sam get suited up while Steve fetches his shield. Steve catches a ride with Tony to travel two hours from the Compound in Madison County. There is a big crater on the ground from the impact of the white light, and the three men tread carefully over to it. Steve’s shield is in front of him ready to protect him, Sam’s drone, Redwing, flies next to him cautiously, and Tony’s repulsors are ready and waiting to be fired.

Tony expected to see some kind of weapon in the middle of the crater but instead of a thing, it’s a person--you. You’re wearing a white dress that goes down to your feet, and you have a white glow about you. You groan in pain just as the light dies down and you look up at the three men staring at you.

“What the hell happened?” you ask.

You look to the sky to see your sisters shining in the night sky. How the hell did you get from up there to down here?

“Who are you?” Steve asks.

“My name is Y/N. Who are you?”

“Steve, Tony, and Sam. What happened here?”

“I don’t know. One minute I was shining in the sky and the next I’m down here and in pain.”

“Shining in the sky?”

“I’m a star. I was minding my own business and someone knocked me out of orbit.”

Steve, Tony, and Sam walk down the crater’s walls and toward you cautiously. They still don’t know if you’re good or not until you get up and reveal what’s been behind you this whole time. A shell of a missile that has the Hydra symbol on the side of it.

“We need to get her inside. If Hydra wants her, then she must be special. We can’t just leave her here.”

“Leave me here? What the hell is going on here?”

“If Hydra wants you, it’s for a reason. We should get you inside before they come looking for you.”

Going with them beats sitting here and waiting for someone bad to find you. Everyone who was left behind waits eagerly for the men’s return, and they’re shocked when they return with a gorgeous woman. You’re scared of the many unknowns of your situation: who are these people? What do they want from you? Who is after you? Are you in danger? Will these people hurt you?

“Who is this?” Natasha asks.

“The white light.”

“Here, sit,” Steve offers, and you take a seat away from everyone else. He knows you’re scared so he’s trying to make this as easy as possible for you. “She’s a star.”

“A star?” Bucky asks with two eyebrows raised.

“As I said to them earlier, I was living peacefully in the sky when something knocked me out of orbit.”

“Hydra knocked her out of the sky. They must want a star.”

“Why? What’s so significant about a star?” Bucky asks.

“There’s lore around shooting stars,” you explain. “For centuries, people have tried to get stars to fall to Earth for their hearts. If our hearts are consumed, it’ll grant the person a sort of immortality. No one can live forever, but our hearts can extend life for centuries. Many of my sisters have fallen and died because of it.”

“Hydra must want to reign for a long time,” Steve theorizes. “Listen, why don’t you stay here until we can figure out how to get you back into the sky.”

“Can we even do that?” Natasha wonders.

“There’s a way. It’s complicated but there’s always a way.”

“Bucky, why don’t you show her to the room next to yours.”

“Sure.”

“Thank you,” you sigh and follow the man with a metal arm. He’s very quiet and doesn’t talk much which you relate to. “I appreciate your kindness.”

“Sure. Let me know if you need anything.”

Bucky leaves you alone in the room and you sit on the bed in thought. You never sleep at night and allow yourself to rest during the day so you’re not tired at all. Bucky looks at you before he leaves but pauses. You look so scared and nervous that he can’t help but walk back into the room to be with you. He sits next to you on the bed and wipes both hands on his jeans.

“I was once new here. I didn't know anyone besides Steve. I’m gonna help you figure out a way to get you home.”

“Thank you,” you smile.

The rest of the night is uneventful but right before the sun rose, your eyes started to droop. All of your sisters are sleeping as you’re supposed to be, but the Avengers are so loud you can’t fathom sleeping with this noise. If Hydra wants you then they must have a base somewhere to hold the equipment to knock a star out of orbit. All that equipment will take a lot of money to acquire and a lot of space to hold, so they all come up with places that can be potential bases.

“Ah, there she is. We need your help,” Tony says and waves you into the room.

“What are you guys doing?” you sigh and slump over to them.

“We’re trying to figure out where Hydra’s base is. If we can, then we can plan an attack before they try and come for you.”

“Great,” you sit down and place your chin in your hand.

All of them start talking over one another creating a small headache to form.

“Y/N, I know you’re tired but can you remember where the missile came from? If we can get a sense of direction, we can narrow potential places significantly.”

“I’m not tired, Steve, I’m exhausted. I never stay awake during the day. I need to sleep and rest but you’re all being so loud,” you sigh.

“Come with me,” Bucky offers.

Bucky leads you past both your rooms and to a wing of the compound that rarely is used. This place is the farthest from where anyone is gonna be. There is a spare bedroom down here that Bucky takes you to, and he opens the door for you.

“You’ll be able to get some sleep here. I come here when I want to be alone. It’s quiet.”

“Thank you, Bucky,” you smile.

Your entire body shines slightly to show how happy you are but Bucky doesn’t think much of it. You’re a star. You’re supposed to be shining. All he does is give you a friendly smile and leave you alone to rest. It’s easy for you to fall asleep and you stay asleep for the whole day. When the sun goes down, your body wakes you up to start shining. Then you remember where you are and your glow dims.

You’re ready to take the night on and wander until you find the majority of the Avengers. They’ve been working hard all day to figure out where the Hydra base is and are now taking a break to watch a movie.

“Hey, sleepyhead,” Tony says when you enter the room.

“Got room for one more?”

Bucky moves over so you can sit next to him, and you blush slightly when your leg brushes up against his.

“Did you find out where Hydra is located?”

“No. They have defense walls that aren’t coming up on our radars, but we have Friday constantly looking for a way in.”

“Who’s Friday?”

“My AI,” Tony answers.

He turns the movie up so everyone can hear it, and you turn to Bucky with a shy smile.

“Thank you for letting me use your space,” you whisper.

“I don’t mind.”

“What movie are you guys watching?”

“Dumb and Dumber. They love it.”

You try to get into the movie but you’re not connecting to it as much as you hope to. Everyone laughs at the same time when something funny happens but not you. You’re not sure if you fit in well with this group. Humans have always been part of your fascination but you only know of the evolution of them, not them personally.

“Excuse me,” you whisper and get up.

Bucky watches you walk off toward our room without another word. He knows more than most what trying to fit in feels like and how bad he can feel when he doesn’t. He leaves his friends and follows you to your room. You’re sitting on the balcony and staring at the night sky where your sisters are.

“I promise I’m coming home. I’m figuring out a way to do that,” you sigh.

They twinkle to let you know they hear you.

“Mind if I join you?” Bucky knocks on the balcony doors.

“No.”

“Are you okay?”

“I’m not really a group person.” Bucky sits next to you on the lounge chair. “I’m more of a loner. I didn’t have any planets orbiting me, and the closest star to me is my sister Vega. She’s such a sweetheart.”

“Yeah, I’m more of a loner, too.”

“My sisters are the only ones I can count on, and they’re watching over me right now to make sure I’m okay.”

Bucky looks up and they twinkle so he can see where they’re located.

“When you were in the sky, could you watch over humans?”

“It was my favorite thing to do. I’ve watched humans grow since they first arrived. I see the value in human life because it ends. They’ve come a long way from where they first started.”

“I’ve never met a star before. You’re pretty nice and beautiful.”

Your body shines a bit at his compliment.

“Thank you. Stars are pure and innocent despite the violence and horrors we see on a daily basis. We represent everything good about the world. We represent beauty.”

“I can tell,” he smiles.

Your body shines a bit more the more you are happy being here with Bucky. The stars in the sky shine a bit brighter when they see their sister happy.

Hydra hasn’t made a move against the Avengers over the course of the following week because they’re not sure how they can approach the situation. Valentina knows exactly where the star is and she can’t charge in like she normally would. The Avengers are powerful that deserve careful planning and strategy to overcome.

Meanwhile, you and Bucky have grown closer. When you’re not sleeping, you’re spending as much time with Bucky as you can. There is only a short amount of time you can spend with him before one of you needs to sleep. In the beginning, you were only allowed a couple of hours to be with him, but now you’re spending half a day with him. You’re slowly starting to fall asleep later in the morning and waking up later in the night. It’s something you’re willing to change in order to be with Bucky.

“Tell me something,” Bucky says.

You two are lying on the roof of the building admiring the night sky which is sure to come soon. Your skin is glowing brightly that if whoever were to look up at the roof, they’d see nothing but a white glow.

“What?” you ask and look at him.

“I know that stars shine but do you get to choose when you get to? I’ve seen you with and without.”

“I shine when I’m happy,” you say with a bright smile, “and I’m happy right now with you.”

You and Bucky stay on the roof until there is no more sunlight left in the sky, and you yawn tiredly.

“Tired?”

“A little bit.”

“Let’s go back inside.”

You and Bucky head back inside your room to get ready for the night, and you look at your bed in thought.

“You know, I haven’t been sleeping well. I’ve been transitioning into sleeping at night so I’m still struggling a bit. I might be able to sleep better if it were next to you.”

Bucky holds his flesh hand out, too scared to use his metal hand for fear of breaking you. He takes you to his room where you two get comfortable underneath the sheets. He’s shocked he can sleep with you shining next to him but it gives him a sense of comfort knowing you feel safe enough with him to shine.

The next morning, you wake with a smile on your face and your skin glowing.

“This is the first time I slept through the night.” You look beside you but Bucky isn’t there. The brightness dims on your skin until it looks normal. “Bucky?” You get up and walk around the compound in search of Bucky, and you find him in the main room where the other Avengers are. “What’s going on?”

“We found Hydra’s base. Nat’s gonna stay here with you,” Tony declares.

Your eyes immediately find Bucky’s.

“You’re not gonna stay here with me?”

“I know Hydra like the back of my hand. I have to go with them.”

“Oh, okay.”

Tony, Steve, Bucky, Wanda, and Sam get geared up to go while you and Natasha stay behind. She’s decked in her gear just in case something happens. She has the capabilities to keep you safe since you’re not a fighter--you’re a lover. You don’t think you could fight even if you wanted to.

“So, how long have you been with the team?” you ask.

“Too long.” You look away in thought and bounce your leg nervously. “Look, I haven’t known Bucky for very long but he’s trying. He used to be one of the bad guys but he’s doing a helluva lot more good to make up for the bad. He knows how to handle Hydra. He’s going to be okay.”

“I know,” you nod with uncertainty.

You and Natasha make conversation for the next couple of hours when the alarms start blaring inside the compound.

“Stay here.”

“You’re leaving me alone?” you gasp.

“I’m sure it’s nothing. Just stay here and don’t move. I’ll be right back.”

Natasha is gone before you have a chance to question her further. You wait nervously for her to come back because you have no clue where she is, what’s going on, and who is inside the compound. After an hour of waiting around, you get up and look out the window. Everything seems normal as if there isn't an intruder inside. Footsteps near the room you’re in, ad you turn to the door waiting to see Natasha.

The door opens and you smile.

“I was beginning to worry.”

The smile is lost when you see a strange woman with four soldiers around her.

“So was I. The easy part was tracking you down. Stars have a bit of… aura about them that is easily tracked. The hard part was infiltrating this place. I had to make sure I had all my bases covered. You’re coming with us.”

“No,” you stand your ground.

“No? Emilio.” One of the men takes out a tablet from one of the pockets and flips it open. He presses a few buttons and shows you what’s on the screen. All your friends are tied with Hydra soldiers all around them. Of course, you’re worried about all of them but you can’t help but look at Bucky. “Either come with me or your friends will be killed.”

You have no choice but to go with her.

The woman, Valentina Allegra de Fontaine, leads you through the large Hydra base to a big room with a staircase leading up to a small landing. A large table is on the landing with a medical cart next to it. There is nothing but different sizes of knives--knives that will be used to cut your heart out.

“A shining star’s heart is the way to go, but I’ll settle for your scared little one any day of the year.” You’re only doing this because you’re scared of what these people are going to do to Bucky if you fight back. You’re forced onto the table where Valentina straps you down so you’re not tempted to leave. “Don’t worry, darling. I’ll make sure to make it quick and painless.”

She grabs one of the sharpest knives and walks over to you. You close your eyes and send a quick prayer to your sisters in hopes they can hear you. She raises her knife when the double doors slam open. You both look to see Bucky storming in with his deadly gun.

“Bucky!” you smile and shine brightly at the sight of him.

“Get him!” Valentina orders.

A dozen guards make their way into the room and start shooting at Bucky who is more than prepared to handle them. Bullets fly as your concern for Bucky grows. However, he seems to beat every single one of them as he makes his way closer to you.

“Emilio!” Valentina yells.

The big guy who was with her earlier steps into the room with two charged electric gloves. His metal armor makes him immune to the bullets Bucky is firing at him, and he gives him an uppercut when he reaches him. Bucky goes flying across the room and uses his vibranium arm to slow his descent down the walkway.

Emilio and Bucky meet in the middle as they fistfight for your honor. There is no way Valentina is cutting your heart out now. She wants to see how this fight is gonna end. She is pretty confident that her soldier is going to win against the Winter Soldier, but oh how wrong she is. The double doors bust open and Wanda comes in with red magic at her fingertips. Tony and Steve are behind her ready to fight whoever they need to in order to save you.

Red magic encases Emilio to hold him still while Bucky delivers a deadly punch to the bottom of his jaw. Emilio is thrown across the room and knocks into a mirror, and he slides down it unconsciously. Valentina sees the urgency of the situation and raises the knife.

“Tony, heads up.”

Steve rears his shield back and throws it in Valentina’s direction, and Tony shoots his repulsors at the shield to make it fly the rest of the way. Valentina tries to escape but is hit before she can find coverage. She falls to the ground completely knocked out. Bucky runs up the staircase and over to you with an easy smile.

“You really thought I’d let you get sacrificed?”

“I’m glad you’re okay.”

Bucky undoes your ties and helps you off the table, and the both of you run down the staircase to the other Avengers. Before you can reach them, all the doors that lead into the room slam open. Dozens upon dozens of guards come in with their weapons, weapons that can kill everyone here. There are too many guards for Wanda to control and too many for them to take on.

They might not be able to but you can. You pull Bucky into you and wrap your arms around his neck.

“Hold onto me and close your eyes.”

“Why?”

“What do stars do best?” You pull him down so that his face is nestled into the shape of your neck. “They shine.”

Your entire body shines with the intensity of a real star. Your teammates cover their eyes to protect themselves but the same thing can’t be said for the Hydra soldiers. Your light kills whoever dares look into it, and the soldiers in the very back leave as quickly as they can before they can succumb to your light. You pull away from Bucky and dim your light knowing that these soldiers aren’t going to hurt them anymore.

After Valentina is apprehended and taken back to the States for punishment through the CIA, Bucky returns back to the Compound with you by his side. There is a lot of paperwork that Nick Fury has to fill out, and Tony and Steve offered to stay behind to scour through the base and see what kinds of things Hydra has been up to.

The night sky is shining brighter than normal because your sisters are happy for your safe return.

“They say thank you for saving me,” you say to Bucky.

“No problem,” he says to the sky before looking back down at you. “She’s worth saving.”

“You know, these last two weeks with you have been amazing. If I’m being honest, I’m having second thoughts about going back. I don’t want to leave you.”

“I don’t want you to leave either.”

You wrap your arms around his neck and he pulls you in closer by your hips.

“Maybe staying here for a while longer won’t be so bad.”

He slides one hand up your body to your jaw which he cups. He leans down and kisses you with such intensity that causes butterflies to erupt in your stomach. The stars twinkle in the sky as your own light shines brightly for all to see.

Follow my library blog @aqueenslibrary where I reblog all my stories, so you can put notifications on there without the extra stuff :)

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netherfeildren · 10 months

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Someone's Wife in the Boat of Someone's Husband .Epilogue

Series Masterlist

(Joel Miller x F!Reader)

Rating: Explicit 18+

A/N: Here we find ourselves again at the end of another story, and I just need to say a quick thing to you all who have been so incredibly kind and supportive and lovely to me throughout this. It has always been difficult for me to talk about myself and the things I feel, and a large part of why I began this writing thing was that I’ve felt for a while now that my life was stagnant and myself without growth or change, and I didn’t really know how to fix it, but I knew that I wanted to do something or say something, and writing fan fiction may seem like a frivolous sort of avenue to achieve those things, but what you all have given me, and the warmth and support you all have welcomed me with, cannot be compared to anything else I’ve experienced thus. Quite simply, you all have been so fucking nice to me, and you can’t know what it means to me or how grateful I am for it. So really that’s all I want to say which is a million times thank you, and I appreciate you all so much, and I hope I can continue to write for you for a long time to come.

Artwork is Cloud Nine by Amy Beager (2021)

Word Count: 1.3K

Read on AO3

.Epilogue

A place belongs forever to whoever claims it hardest, remembers it most obsessively, wrenches it from itself, shapes it, renders it, loves it so radically that he remakes it in his own image.

Joan Didion, The White Album

I had a dream recently: we’re in my grandmother’s house, and I don’t know what it means, but we’re together. You’ll never be able to know my parents, and even though my grandmother passed years ago, you get to meet her here – she was always kind to me, here in this place where only I make the rules. She cooks us a meal, we say grace, and she tells you how happy she is that we've found each other. At night, tucked away into her guest bedroom together, you don’t fit in her little shower, head knocking against the spout because you’re too tall. Too big for this world. We huddle into the little double bed together in the dark afterwards, lace edged pillows scratchy and smelling faintly of moths and roses, and we laugh and press together tightly and whisper into each other’s ears.

I don't know what it means, but I know we’re together. My mother never told me to be what I wanted, but I did so anyway. I chose to live. Now I am here with you.

“I have something for you,” he says one late summer evening. The two of you are sitting on the back porch, watching Sarah run around with the new puppy he’d brought home for her earlier in the week. The air, warm and muggy, the sound of cicadas sounding like the symphony of summertime. It is a small, velvet lined black box, and when you open it, a spool of thread lies within.

Faithlessness is escaped like this: “The first time I got married, it was out of necessity, obligation, a wish for something good or right. It seemed like the right step, the right thing to do, but I think you and I– we know what we are to each other. We have always known – even when we could not yet say it. This is a conscious act, us loving one another, an act of will – out of desire or necessity, even, or perhaps – a necessity for each other – but still, we are an act of will together.”

He takes the spool then, and makes a loop of the thread around your ring finger – then ties a little knot around you. Now you are caught.

“I thought I always had to stick by my decisions until the end, but change is only natural, it’s the intent behind your decisions, I think, that’s what really counts. We’ve learned much about intent together, haven’t we? And you and I, we have always been us – from the very first moment. There was a thread that connected us.” And you cannot speak, for there are tears streaming down your face and flooding your throat, battling with your very heart that’s lodged there too, but you nod anyway.

He pulls his hand back and lets the spool unravel, when he uncurls his fingers a diamond ring slides down the thread and onto your waiting hand.

“You and I – we’re connected,” he says. “Every day we become more entwined. And I want us to stay like this for the rest of our lives. Every day more and more. Will you marry me?” And it is not so much a question, but a promise.

“Yes,” you tell him. Of course you will be his wife. “Of course, I will.” He kisses you.

You wake one lazy Sunday morning, months and months of happiness later, your head anchored over his heart. Warm and soft and surrounded by him, you open your eyes to take in the sight of your hand laying over his heart, the gleam of your engagement ring sparkling in the sun. You stretch your legs and listen to the creak in your knee, and when you shift to turn your face up to him, he’s already looking down at you.

“My love, it’s almost noon,” he murmurs, presses a kiss to your eyelid.

Your eyes are so heavy, your head drowsy, “‘M so sleepy, dunno why…” You burrow further back into his chest, yawning.

“No?” he nuzzles the crown of your head, hand creeping around to cup your breast and gently drag his thumb back and forth across your nipple

“I had a dream we had a baby,” you mumble, voice full of sleep.

“Did you?”

“Yeah,” you say through another yawn.

“Hmm…” He shifts up on his elbow over you, pressing a soft kiss to your shoulder, another over the curve of your ear. You roll into him, hiding your face under his jaw and breathing in his smell, sleep and musk and Joel. “What was it like?” he asks softly, dragging his hand down the length of your spine. “Tell me.”

“It was perfect. She was perfect.”

“She?”

You hum, “Little baby girl…”

He’s quiet for a moment, and then the tolling of the bell: “Your period’s three weeks late, sweet girl,” he whispers into your ear, shares the secret with you, nuzzles into the crook of your neck. His palm sweeps over your belly, and you freeze at his words, thinking back, trying to count days, finally snapping truly awake.

“What? Why– why didn’t you say anything?”

A deep sound hums in his chest as his hand sneaks over your hip to clutch a handful of your ass, and then to cup between your legs, pressing his growing erection into the apex of your thighs.“Thought you’d want to come to it on your own.” He kisses the tip of your breast over your soft, lace camisole.

You don’t cry anymore, or, well, at least not as often as you once did. A constant well of tears ready to spill over at any moment. No longer a weeper, in a long line of weepers. There’s just too much happiness for that now.

But you cry now, at this, you can’t help yourself. The feeling of this, the idea of the two of you coming together to make your own little person, a sibling for Sarah, it’s a call for happiness of the highest order, like nothing else that’s ever come before it. He holds you in his arms, kisses you deep and wet, and as he licks into your mouth, you feel his own tears slide along your cheeks, intertwine with your own.

He finds the two of you singing and dancing to Shania Twain in the family room, Sarah’s own special, revised version, one afternoon. Bumping hips, and then clutching hands to spin Sarah away from your body, and then twirl her back in, squeezing her tight in your arms, picking her up to spin around with her yourself as the two of you sing at each other.

His daughter catches him spying over your shoulder, “Daddy, come dance with us!” and you turn, gracing him with the sight of your gorgeous smile, as he comes over to wrap his arms around the two of you, relieving you of her weight. He anchors a hand to the small of your back to steady you, feeling the small swell of your belly press into his pelvis. Let me let you in on a secret, Shania sings.

“You wanna hear it?” you tease. How to treat a woman right.

“Don’t I know already?”

You sway in his arms and he brings his hand up to cup the back of your head, Sarah’s little palm is on his cheek, tugging at his beard, spin us, Daddy, spin us!

“Yeah, baby, you do. Like no one else.” He kisses you, and the three of you spin together, around and around. You’ll see love is gonna play its part.

Netherfeildren's Masterlist

#someone's fic #Joel miller #the last of us fic #joel miller x female reader #Joel Miller x you #joel miller fanfiction #joel miller fluff #joel miller smut #the last of us fanfiction #joel miller/you #joel miller x reader #joel miller fic

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alphabetboyluvr · 10 months

Text

throttle - jjk | four

one / two / three / four / five / six / seven / eight / nine / ten / eleven

warnings - smut, a lil dirty talk over text, titwank, lil spit, lil degradation, lots of praise <3, handjob, showers, vaginal sex, (1) reference to you up?, jungkook cums 3 times in this one, the oc.... does not. CURIOUS. jaykay is soooo smitten :( Busan is proposed!! oh how our throttle couple luv busan <3, the angst is about to go from a 2 to a 6, jk is the pied piper, jk and cc play the desperation olympics, and they both lose!! namjoon is the worst (calls the oc a sket (twice!))

word count - 10.8k

minors dni // posted to wp late 2021 // series masterlist

"Look what the cat dragged in," you smile, all big and bashful as soon as you see him.

It's been a little while; too long, you think. Different schedules and busy personal lives have kept you apart - but none of the distance ever matters. It always melts away with one flash of his pearly smile, which he often tries (and fails) to contain around you.

"I wish," he groans, flopping onto your sofa. You're on the floor, typing away on your laptop, indifferent to the way he just lets himself into your apartment. It's been this way for a while now. "Haven't been near pussy in ages."

You gag, as if he's your brother or something. "Shut the fuck up, Yoongi."

He's dressed down in a pair of jeans and a shirt two sizes too big for him, but you can smell his laundry detergent from where you're sat. He's made an effort.

"You started it," he snorts, eyes not on you, but on your television. It's playing some muted drama that neither of you care for. He knows this, even when he asks you, "Whatcha watching?"

"Dunno," you hum, as predicted. "Just had it on for company."

Yoongi nods, understanding the desire.

He does it too; leaves the television running just so that he doesn't have to be alone with his thoughts.

Things are better these days. He's not as scared as he once was. It's been a couple of weeks, and after all, time heals. Eases. Pacifies.

Yoongi asks what you're doing, and pretends to be shocked when you tell him you're stalking.

"Who is it this time?"

"Just a guy."

"It's never 'just a guy'."

It's morbid, the curiosity that Yoongi forces himself to endure. It's like your nails have a grasp around his heart, and with every beat of it, they sink further into the muscle. The more attached he becomes, the deeper the pain runs.

You don't realise quite how profoundly his blood turns green. He's good at feigning indifference; good at pretending like it is just a crush.

And so he asks questions because he wants to hurt himself a little bit more. Wants his heart to ache. Wants to feel the discomfort he so closely associates with love. It's reached a point where he thinks love has to hurt, otherwise, it's not real.

"Since when has a guy ever been more than just a guy," you toy back. None of your past lovers have ever lasted too long. You doubt Jungkook will, either. Just the way the cookie crumbles.

"Since you fall in love at the drop of a hat," Yoongi smiles. His eyes are slightly clouded, the sombre vapour of burnt-out desire smoking in them.

"I've never been in love," you retort a little too quickly.

It's not a lie, but it makes way for the admittance of something else instead: you just love the attention that comes with men fawning after you.

And so you let Yoongi think that you have the capacity within you to love, because you fear that the love he has for you is conditional; transactional.

You just have to trust that the intentions behind acts of love are pure. You have to trust.

This issue with trust is that it's earned, not owed; and nobody has ever earned your trust. Never. Serpents lie beneath roses, and you'll be damned if you pick one either way, 'cause if it ain't a fang, it's a thorn that'll get you instead.

"Anyways," you hum, not wanting to dwell on the topic. All of your searches of Jungkook's name have garnered minimal results, nothing of which you can be sure relates to him. Now, you need a distraction and Yoongi is as good as any. Your knees click as you stretch out, and Yoongi winces at the sound, before you plonk yourself down on the sofa next to him. "What shall we order for dinner?"

There's a howl of wind sneaking between the cracks in your window panes; a stark reminder that winter is still here, and it's still as bitter as ever. Like the river you walk across on a near-daily basis, your heart will take a while to thaw.

But as with all seasons, winter will mollify; and perhaps so will the ice chains that wrap themselves around your warmest muscle. Maybe. The way Jungkook hugs around your chest when he takes you from behind already has the ice weeping in the dark of night. You think it's just some kind of placebo effect. Best not to get carried away with sensation.

Yoongi says something, but you're not listening. All you can hear is the soft splatter of water dripping from the ice; right down onto the chime that's oscillating in your stomach again. Fuck.

Across the street from your apartment complex sits a black SsangYong. It lurks in the shadows; silent, sinister, stalking.

A curt snap echoes through the car, as Namjoon breaks a Pepero stick in half, much to Jungkook's annoyance.

That's literally not how you eat them, he seethes internally. His nostrils are a little flared, and his eyes are hard as they stare out the window and across to the stairs that lead up to your entryway. It has a plain end for a reason.

Namjoon knows this, obviously. Doesn't care. Can sense the way it's getting under Jungkook's skin, so he does it again.

"No point in us being here," Jungkook eventually huffs, channelling his disdain into something - anything - that isn't how fucking annoying Namjoon is. It's been nearly an hour.

"Whoever owns that heap of shit has to come out, soon," Namjoon says of the Mini parked outside of your apartment block. He mutters under his breath for what must be the millionth time, "Fuckin' Ajumma's car."

"It's a John Cooper Works," Jungkook says a little flippantly. He's not impressed, not by any means, but he knows it isn't something to turn his nose up at. Might look like the kind of thing his mother would have loved, but it packs a punch. Limited edition, factory-grade. One of only two thousand. A mean little beast that'd give his Pony a run for its money, even with the mods.

"Okay? Tell Mr John Cooper that it's still an Ajumma's car," Namjoon shrugs. He doesn't give a shit about imports. They're all weak in comparison to the homegrown beauties he likes to drive. Jungkook could argue for days that he's wrong, but Namjoon simply wouldn't bother to listen - so what was the point? "Anyways," he continues, snapping another chocolate coated stick. It's about now that Jungkook wishes Peperos would have sharp ends so that he could stick them in his ears. "Either the fucker who drives it comes out now, or he says inside and carries on railing the sket until the sun comes up. Doesn't matter which. We've got a car to keep tabs on."

"You don't know he's fucking her-"

"We've both seen her," Namjoon scoffs, mouth half full, a little biscuit dust puffing out from his plump lips. "He's screwing the absolute fuck out of her."

"What does that even mean?" Jungkook's nose really is upturned, now. "You're just being vulgar for the sake-"

"Oh, give over. What was the first thing you said about her?"

"I-"

"Prissy bitch," Namjoon imitates. "Stick up her ass - pretty good ass though."

It almost makes Jungkook laugh, because while his former self isn't wrong (he thinks your ass is a gift from the Gods), he knows that it's your tits he could worship all day long.

If it were him in your apartment, he knows he'd be doing just that. Praising you; Worshipping, devoting, revering. He's never believed in God, not really. Never prays, never looks to the sky and mumbles words of desperation; but when he's beneath you, he finds himself beseeching. Imploring the man in the sky to let him feel the way that he feels when he's inside of you forever. Sometimes he wonders if you must be what heaven feels like. Knows he'd sacrafice himself for it. For you.

In theory, at least. Fears if he tells Namjoon this, he'll have to experience it in practise. He's not ready to, not yet. Just in case he's wrong, and he really does lose the closest thing to heaven that he's ever known.

"I just think we're going to an awful lot of effort for this," he deflects. "The more we know about this girl, the more variables we have to consider, and the less likely it is that we can actually get this shit done."

"We knew less last time," Namjoon says without skipping a beat. He knows this game better than most. Knows that it's imperative that they resolve the mess they made in the gas station as quickly as possible. "And look at where that got us - beating up some fuckin' dude who didn't have a clue what was going on."

"You didn't have to go so hard on him."

"I did. You know I did."

Silence resumes, and remains that way until Namjoon whacks Jungkook on his chest with the back of his hand a few hours later. His attention is diverted from his phone, which drops to his laps as his neck almost snaps to look in the direction of your apartment.

You're laughing as you walk down the stairs from your entryway. Jungkook thinks he can hear you.

He can't. He just remembers. Know the way it almost sounds like you're hiccuping when you start struggling to draw more air into your lungs, too happy to focus on keeping yourself alive.

Your body leans into the guy you're with, and there's an ease to the way you are together, one that has Jungkook feeling all uneasy. He adjusts in his seat - earns himself a hiss from Namjoon for being 'distracting' - and tries to focus on anything but the way you pull the guy in for a hug. It's not necessarily anything more than platonic, but it's not the hug of a stranger, either.

"It's him," Namjoon's voice is low, barely a vibration between his lips. "Guy from the gas station. Sket is shitting where she eats." He laughs. "Un-fucking-believable."

Jungkook says nothing. It's a little hard to speak with the weight of the world crashing down on your lungs, though.

Instead he simply nods, and reaches for his phone.

꾹: i gotta see you.

꾹: think i'm going crazy without you.

You don't reply until you're inside, clearing up the remains of the food you'd shared with Yoongi.

You: i'm not a therapist :/

꾹: please.

You: my place or yours?

꾹: mine.

When Namjoon asks who Jungkook is texting, he lies.

"Just Jin. Says if we have a visual on the driver, we're good to go."

"Good to go?" The question is asked an octave or so higher than Namjoon's usual deep drawl, surprised at such an instruction. "Thought we had to tail?"

Jungkook shrugs. "Change of plan. Says Kang ain't around to report to, so it doesn't matter what we do."

His lies will catch up with him eventually, but not today.

Today, Jungkook gets to pretend like everything is okay for just a little while longer. He's lucky that Jin trusts him enough to get the job done. He won't ask questions, will just know that whatever reason Jungkook had to lie will be worth it in the long run. He's a good worker, part of the team. He'd never intentionally sabotage them.

Or at least, he was a good worker. Was part of the team. Was never one to sabotage. Was one to play by the rules, and always win.

But Jungkook is playing games with trick dice, now. Rolling doubles every single time. He's gonna be the first to reach the exit line, but he's gonna reach it alone.

"Alright," Namjoon sighs, starting the engine up. The lights from his headlamps flare in front of the vehicle, flooding the desolate road. It's always quiet around these parts after it hits midnight.

A little off the beaten track, your place is on the backstreets; somewhere inconspicuous. Somewhere easily hidden. Concealed. The daughter of a politician disguised in breadline poverty.

Jungkook kind of hates that he knows where you live.

Not because he doesn't want to know, but because you haven't shown him. You've always gone back to his. He wouldn't suggest anything else, for fear of being caught without reason down around your side of town. There are only so many times he can lie about late-night boxing sessions without someone catching on.

"What a waste of an evening," Namjoon huffs a little more. He's a smart guy, smarter than Jungkook and probably every other fucker who congregates at Old Kang's place, but he's credulous to an absolute fault when it comes to the fuckers he runs the streets with. Would never betray a single one of them - not even Jungkook.

"It was past your bedtime, like, three hours ago. Consider yourself lucky that you got to stay out and play for this long," Jungkook ribs.

See, Namjoon's partner doesn't like him staying out so late. They worry. Blow up his phone, not to control, but out of concern. They've seen the dark side of the business that the boys are caught up in, and don't want that darkness to stain the colours of the man they love.

It's a mean jibe, and between close friends, it would have been funny -but the pair of them haven't laughed together in weeks.

Not since Jungkook fucked Namjoon's younger sister.

He hadn't meant for it to go as far as it had, but she was keen and he was horny. What's a boy to do?

They'd been in the same year group at school, so it's not like it was the most absurd pairing in the world. Never been friends, not really, but knew each other well enough that they always managed to strike up a conversation after a few drinks.

She was always hanging around the bars the boy went to, and Jungkook had been letting his hair down; one last night of freedom before he had to knuckle down and start the job Kang was assigning them.

He'll never admit it, but your assumptions about him on the first night you met were right. The KNJ on his phone was a FWB turned far too clingy: Kim Naejeon.

Needless to say, Namjoon hasn't exactly been Jungkook's biggest fan since he found out. Such is life.

Jungkook's phone buzzes in his lap, and he's relieved to see two little c's on the screen where the message ID is.

You: time?

꾹: just on my way home.

꾹: lemme send a taxi to yours.

Sat on your floor again, laptop open with your last search - jungkook, daegu, pony - on screen, you find yourself deafened by the chime in your stomach. It rings like the theme to a studio ghibli film, all pompous and ridiculous, and warm and lovely.

You sound like a banshee, squeaking with badly handled excitement. The shrill noise that escapes your lips as you throw your phone onto the sofa is borderline psychotic.

You never get like this over a boy.

You don't actually think you've ever squealed over a boy before, but one small act of chivalry - the bare minimum - has you doing somersaults.

It's funny, because it's not like he's the first guy to ever suggest sending a taxi your way. Unlike all of Yoongi's offers, though, you accept. You play it all cool and coy by simply sending him through your address, not like he needs it.

꾹: on its way.

꾹: i can't wait to see you.

You're not really sure how to deal with such a declaration. It's needy and pathetic and if it were any other boy, it would have you throwing up in your mouth - but it's not just any boy. It's him.

You: someone's a little desperate.

You don't have it in you to play nice, even if your grin is wider than the river behind your apartment block. Jungkook doesn't expect any less. In fact, he smiles when the message comes through - and quickly stiffens his cheeks again, not wanting Namjoon to make a comment.

꾹: desperate?

꾹: i'm not sure this is a game you want to play, CC.

Oh, how wrong he is.

You: i love games.

The double-entendre isn't lost on him, but any ability to not let you affect him is. Blood pumps around his body faster. Harder. It rushes, almost, with a single destination in mind. Makes him adjust ever so slightly in his seat, his spare hand coming to rest between his legs. He used to think he had self-control, but you're constantly surprising him.

He's learnt more about himself since he met you than he has in years. Realised that he isn't maybe who he thinks he is. Doesn't dwell on it, though, 'cause he enjoys the way it feels when the crotch of his trousers gets tighter.

꾹: i only like them when i win.

You: i only ever win.

꾹:we'll see about that tonight.

You: oh?

꾹: see who really is the desperate one.

You: its you :) x

The taxi arrives far faster than you expect, but Jungkook is pleased when he checks the app and sees the car en-route to his. He takes a note of the number plate and the registered driver. Doesn't trust the drivers around here. They're too fast without enough skill, he always thinks. Has lost count of the number of busses he's seen rear-end asshole taxi drivers. Luckily the roads are dead at this time of night, but he'll be damned if anything happens to you.

꾹: sure about that?

꾹: i know a few ways to get you a little desperate.

You: you don't know shit.

꾹: i know you get a little desperate when my hand is round your throat.

You: bullshit.

꾹: i know you get incredibly desperate when my fingers are in your mouth.

You: your fingers have never been in my mouth.

It's a lie. Of course it is. It's kinda become rare for the two of you to fuck without them being in your mouth at some point or another, whether it's to clean them off or just to give him a visual of just how devoted you look when he does it. He loves it and so do you.

꾹: no?

Jungkook almost ignores Namjoon as he asks, "what are you smiling at?", only to tell him that it's none of his business, lowering the brightness of his screen and clicking through into his camera roll.

He's a visual guy. Likes the things he can see. Tangible stuff. The photo that comes through to your phone has you flustered.

It's just the lower half of your face, and Jungkook's distinctive, tattooed hands in your mouth. There's a sheen to your lips. His fingers, too.

It's alarming how quickly you've become so comfortable with him. You barely know the guy. Shame that the alarm bells are always muted by the chime in your stomach.

You: must be some other girl ;)

꾹: told you already, CC.

꾹: i'm not interested in any other girls.

꾹: i only wanna see you.

When a picture of your legs, crossed and poised prettily in the back of the taxi, comes through to his phone, he's pleased. You're wearing tights. It's one of his favourite things a girl can wear - though he's not really sure why. He just loves how soft they are, how smooth they feel against his skin. Has him thinking about running his hands up and down them, and the way he knows you'll be looking all smug when he does so.

You: i'll see u soon x

You: desperate ;)

Jungkook thinks about locking his phone. Thinks about leaving you hanging. Thinks about the fact it will probably put you on edge a little if he doesn't reply - but he's weak. Knows that not replying will just put him on edge instead.

꾹: will it make you feel better if i admit it?

You: yes.

꾹: fine.

꾹: been thinking about you since the moment you left my apartment last.

꾹: impossible not to when my fucking pillows smell like you.

꾹: think about you when i smell gasoline at kangs.

꾹: think about you when i stop at red lights.

꾹: also think about how fucking wet you were the last time we stopped at one.

꾹: i'm at a red light right now.

꾹: god, i gotta fuck you.

You: told you you were desperate :)

꾹: i am.

You: how do you want me tonight?

꾹: naked.

You: that goes without saying, no?

꾹: naked and begging.

You: i don't beg.

You: not for any man.

꾹: c'mon, CC. a little reciprocation goes a long way.

꾹: you got me on my metaphorical knees.

꾹: be nice of you to get on yours.

You roll your eyes as the taxi rolls to a stop downtown, just by Jungkooks place. It parks on the wrong side of the street, but you pay it no notice. Chalk it up to a GPS error on the app.

You: i'm pulling up to yours now. you home yet?

꾹: not yet. be about 5. let yourself in. code is 0901.

There's a casual intimacy to the way in which Jungkook trusts you with his door code. It's an act of convenience, not anything to read too much into, but you're a creature of habit. Assumptions are your bread and butter. If there are conclusions to be jumped to, you're getting your pole vault out. Setting a new PB. Going for the world record.

So no, it doesn't have to mean anything. You know it probably doesn't - but you indulge in the 'what if' just for the hell of it.

His apartment is cold, the ondol off, one of the windows cracked open ever so slightly to let the air out. Winters are dry round these parts, and Jungkook has an odd paranoia around developing black mould in his apartment. It's not unwarranted - he's pretty sure his last place made him sick because of it. Knows for certain that it made his mother weaker before she passed. Refuses to let history ever repeat itself.

You're unaware of this, though, and slide the window shut. It's the height of winter, and he knows damn well if he's gonna get lucky tonight that it's gotta be a little bit warmer in his apartment.

You take a moment to refamiliarise yourself with his place. There's not much. A little furniture, some prints you recognise from the market downtown up on his wall. There are no personal artifacts, though. No more clues as to who Jungkook really is. You'll have him naked tonight, granted, but you won't have him naked. He won't be vulnerable; laid bare.

But you're not exactly gonna complain when you have him bare in the other sense.

In fact, you think you much prefer it this way. It'll be easier to let him go when the time inevitably comes.

You toss your coat on his desk chair and your shoes are kicked beneath it, not caring much for neatness. The rest of your clothes follow suit, and then you're waiting, all desperate and pliant, just like he asked for.

Though you're not one to beg, you're aware of how nicely he had requested - and how hot and bothered he had gotten you en-route to his place.

There's a thrum in your chest, and it beats to the same harmonious melody that the chime in your stomach produces.

Back straight, feathers smoothed, you're a songbird waiting for someone to hear your call. It only takes a few moments, the beep of Jungkook's keypad echoing through the door as he punches in the code adding a new layer to your song.

"Hey," he calls through, his voice muffled slightly through the sliding partition doors. The glass is frosted, but you can make out his silhouette as he kicks his shoes off by the door. "Just been on a job. Emergency at an office building downtown. Some bad wires. Tripped."

The lies roll off his tongue like butter in a hot pan. They sizzle. Spit. Burn you and scar you with the portrayal of a man who isn't who he pretends to be.

Thing is, Jungkook is exactly who he pretends to be.

He really does get too hot in the night, and genuinely does find videos of kids falling over far funnier than he knows he should. His hair sticks up on end when he wakes up, and he loves his car more than life itself. The way he winces after taking shots, and his dimples, which form in moments of contemplation beneath his cheeks, are entirely natural to him.

None of it - none of him - is a lie. At his core, Jungkook is the idea in your head; the yellow of midafternoon sun before it sets.

He's the amber light that flashes before fading into red.

That's his issue, though. Inevitably, he will always, unavoidably, turn red.

Jungkook likes to tell himself he's not a bad person. He just does bad things, occasionally. But don't we all?

Yeah, the voice in his head would rationalise. But bad things are sneakily not paying for plastic carrier bags at supermarket self-checkouts, or failing to tell a friend they have food stuck in their teeth. Not petty violent crimes and conspiracy to-

"Took your time," you flirt.

It takes him longer than he'd like to get from his kitchen and to where you are, his laces proving to be a bit of a bitch when he's in a hurry. He's dressed down, a pair of light wash jeans clinging to his thighs for dear life, a baggy grey sweater hiding that itty bitty waist of his.

You find yourself smiling, his presence bringing more than just the promise of satisfied desire.

It's dangerous how you can't hear anything other than the chime in your stomach whenever you see him. Might deafen you one day. Or maybe you'll hear it so often that it will just fade into white noise. Not a favourable outcome, not by any stretch of the imagination.

"Holy fuckin' shit."

You tilt your head and feign confusion, as if you don't know why he's salivating like a dog being offered a bone. You're on your knees, as requested, palms flat on the tops of your thighs; not naked, but you may as well be. A lace red set leaves little to the imagination, one of his flannel shirts draped over your shoulders to keep you warm - but also 'cause he seems like the kind of guy to eat that shit up.

So while you're right where he wanted you, as he struggles to form a coherent sentence, he's exactly where you wanted him.

Finally, he finds a few words.

"Desperation looks good on you, CC."

Arrogant son of a bitch, you think, but there's a grin on your lips that you just can't hide.

"Mmm," you flirt, not caring to drag things out. You want him so badly that hard to get seems like a dumb idea. "Maybe - but I think you'll find I look better on your dick."

His shoulders pull up towards his ears, head dropping as a small laugh vibrates in his throat at the boldness of such a statement.

"You're not wrong - but I like this," he says, closing the space between you. His voice is soft, as one of his hands cups your cheek and angles your jaw upwards so that you're looking directly at him. His thumb traces your bottom lip, and - almost like you've been conditioned - your lips part for it to rest on your tongue. "I like this a lot."

Your lips close around it, tongue massaging his thumb as you slowly suck on it.

It's gentle, and warm, and - fuck - he's spent so long thinking about the way your mouth feels but it never compares to actually experiencing it. Your lips vibrate as you hum, satisfied with the effect you seem to be having on him.

His lips are parted, eyes void of all thoughts, as if you've bewitched him. Maybe you have. He wouldn't put it past you. There's something dark behind your eyes, something he doesn't quite understand. Something he knows better than to let himself study for too long.

Jungkook's room is dark, the glow of his fairy lights dousing him in soft reservoirs of gold. The light from his kitchen pours in behind him, his back to the clouded screen door, a halo circling around his darling blonde waves. Your eyes must be betraying you, you think, 'cause there's no way a man this heavenly exists. It's impossible.

"Bet you're wet, aren't you?" he toys, voice low, a teasing grin on those pretty pink lips of his. He may look like an angel, but there's a pair of horns hidden beneath his curls.

There's no hesitation as you nod, vocalisations cut short thanks to his thumb remaining snug between your lips. Why lie? He wants you desperate, so he's getting exactly that. You think he deserves it. Think he always makes you feel good, so why not indulge him in this little fantasy? You can play desperate, if he really wants.

"Show me," he says so quietly it's almost a whisper; almost as if he doesn't believe he's asking you to do such a thing for him. It's not like it would be the most outlandish exchange the pair of you have had together, but the vulnerability is never easy.

Never easy to ask for, never easy to give. Especially not when Jungkook is harbouring secrets that he knows would shatter the fortress walls he's built up around the pair of you.

You're unaware of this as your hand creeps between your thighs, to where a mess is pooling in your panties.

It annoys you just how eager you are for him. You wish you weren't; wish he had to work for it. The tips of your fingers push against your entrance, but it's all just for show - you've been wet since the moment he first messaged you that evening.

You let your eyes fall to his crotch. It's strained, the pale denim doing an awful job at hiding how hard he is. He's been plump the entire journey home, but now that he's here - now that you're looking like that - he's solid.

He watches you, the way you move, the slight heave of your chest, and knows that you're down just as bad as he is. You wouldn't be on your knees if you weren't. In fact, you wouldn't be here, full stop.

You reach for his belt and set about getting to work immediately. His jeans are pushed to midway down his thighs, boxers following suit. The way his cock springs out of them, all fat and proud, has you salivating.

And so it's only fair that you take it in your mouth as soon as you can.

He reaches behind you and tweaks at the clasp of your bra. It loosens almost instantly, and you hum in approval of how easily he managed to do that. You let the straps slide down your arms, his cock still in your mouth as you toss it to the side.

"Between them," he instructs.

It's tempting to just do as he says. Irresistible, almost. You want him between your tits just as much as he wants to be there, but you want him more vocal. Want him begging. It's his own fault for getting you into such a submissive position. It's a flaw, the way you need to level the playing field, but one that he never fails to deliver on.

"C'mon, CC," he whispers, voice dulcet, trapped in his throat as he suppresses a moan. "Put my cock between your tits."

Your hands fall from the backs of his thighs to play with your breasts, your nipples hard and eager for him. Vibrating around his mouth as you moan, you're pleased with the grip he has on your hair. It tightens, and when he speaks, you're convinced his voice could make you cum alone, "I'm not gonna ask you again."

His cock takes a few more strokes of your hot mouth before you withdraw, stiff and flushed in front of you. He encourages you up so that you're sat on your knees, ass up instead of resting on your ankles as it had been. There's a string of your slick running from your heels to your pussy, the mess desperately seeping from you. Jungkook can't see it, isn't aware of it, so before you do anything, you dip two of your fingers between your folds to gather it up. He watches with laboured breaths.

You don't drop contact with his eyes, not even when they're trained on your fingers. He watches as you hold them up, glittering from the reflection of his fairy lights, before your tongue licks them clean. His cock jerks, the visual stimulation building his need to come undone by tenfold.

There's a little bit of your slickness still on your fingers when you pump his cock, once, twice, three times.

"Sorry, baby," you toy with the term of endearment, the groan he exhales when you say it confirming that you need to call him sweet nothings more often. "Where did you want your cock, again?"

He's been avoiding touching your chest, not wanting to take control of the situation, but your shoulders roll back just a little, your soft mounds his for the taking. His grip drops from your hair, the tips of his fingers ghosting your chest. He runs them delicately across your stiff nipples, his touch so minimal that you feel yourself leak, pussy throbbing, desperate for more.

Resting perfectly between his index finger and thumb, your nipples are pulled ever so slightly, before he finally indulges himself and cups your tits like he so desperately wants to. He holds them together and wobbles them, obsessed with how soft they are. He edges closer, the tip of his cock nudging against your cleavage. There's a small trail of precum leaking from his tip, the sheen now coating your skin. "Right there."

Spit gathers and pools in your mouth, lips pouting as you let it drip onto your tits. Jungkook groans, his hips pushing his cock further onto your chest. You hold your tits apart, his leaking crown kissing your sternum before you angle him upwards. The soft, pillowy cushions press around his thick shaft, keeping him firmly in place.

"That's it, baby," he mewls as you spit again, this time onto the head of his cock. You drop your gaze and lower your head, tongue flat as it licks the tip, spreading your spit. His hips are jerking against you, his foreskin nestled in place, cock tugging against itself.

"Look at me," he says quietly, as dulcet as the atmosphere in his room. Your eyes meet his, as your hands firmly jiggle your cleavage. His mouth hangs ajar, brows knotted in such a way you think he looks like his mind is all tangled up. You're not wrong - he can't think straight like this. All he can think about is how much he wants to fuck you in every single capacity he can. "That's it."

You grin, but try to hide it. "You like my tits, huh?"

Jungkook wants to roll his eyes, and almost does - but then you spit again, the pace of your jiggling hands quickening, and he finds himself doubling over.

"Fuck," he whines, completely undignified. Any strong, stable demeanour he has feigned is lost as his cock gets slippery, covered in your spit, being massaged by your tits. "Spit."

The momentum is retained, but it's getting sloppier. There's limited friction, your spit acting as the perfect lube for him to fuck your tits. He doesn't really know what to do with himself, how to withhold himself from spilling onto your chest, but he's all hot and bothered. He isn't gonna last long.

"Bed," he husks, pulling away from you, not even registering the fact he's helping you up. He just kind of does it, his mind entirely on where he wants to be. "On your back."

You do as you're told, your bare back hitting his freshly laundered duvet as your head nestles into his mountain of pillows. His legs straddle either side of your chest, movements frantic as he traps his cock between your tits once more. He's in control, the pace entirely set by him, his large hands gripping the flesh of your chest like he normally does your waist.

"Shit," he hisses. "Fuckin' love your tits."

Your hands grip his ass, encouraging his movements, before one of them roams to toy with your clit. The change in your moans is noticed by Jungkook, who glances back to check you're doing what he thinks you are. Suspicions confirmed, he laughs. "Dirty bitch," he keens. "Love being owned by my cock, don't you?"

You pause, and Jungkook notices a look in your eyes. It's one he knows well; one he enjoys. Nonetheless, one that panics him when he's in such a compromising position, because it looks like you've just been challenged.

With a pathetic, pouty mewl, you push your fingers into yourself. It's quick, your fingers pumping frantically to build enough slickness on them to wipe the smirk off Jungkooks face.

The hand that's still on his ass squeezes, your nails indenting him ever so slightly. He hisses, a lopsided grin on his lips as he continues to fuck your chest - until the feeling of your soaked fingers stroking his taint has him stuttering.

You apply a little pressure, the pump of his cock slow between your tits. His breaths are laboured. It almost sounds like he gasping for air, unable to concentrate on anything but the sensation of you.

Brows furrowed, eyes wide, you pout. "Thought I was being owned by your cock, baby?" You tease him, and are met with him cursing you out, a saccharine smile on his lips.

"Fucking hate you," he laughs, abs shuddering as your fingers trails further up. They're stroking, caressing, toying - and they don't stop. Not until they reach the tight muscle of his that you're just dying to penetrate. He's silent now. Doesn't want to tell you that he wants it, but fuck it, he does. He pulls back, eyes on yours. There's a hint of a nod, but you're not gonna do anything too daring unless he explicitly asks for it.

Your soaked finger presses against him, cautious not to take it too far. You're still learning each other; what you both like, and you aren't sure where his limits lie.

"Yes? No?" you question, eyes earnest. His ass has never been explicitly discussed between the pair of you, but he also never ruled it out, either.

He's quiet, but smiles when he shakes his head. "Not yet, C. Another time, though."

"I'll hold you to that," you tease, curious about his desires. You wanna know all the ways you can get him off, and you think you'll be willing to do almost anything. In fact, you know you will. All he has to do is say the word, and your tongue will be wherever he wants it.

His eyes roll back, and so do his hips. "And I'll hold you to the offer."

It's a rarity, he's found, for girls to be so bold. He's always had to be the one to initiate his own pleasure, or to just finish quicker than he'd like because his partner was already done. He likes this about you. Likes that you like to fuck. Likes that you apparently, for whatever reason, seem to especially like fucking him.

It's thoughts like these - something about luck, fate - that plague his mind as he pushes his cock between your tits again. It's fast, and it's sloppy, and it's wet, and soon enough, he isn't thinking at all. All he can do is feel - your warmth, your softness - and then all he can feel is how fucking good it is to be with you.

When he comes, he comes hard. It hits your throat, coating you in everything he is. A moan catches in his throat, eyes closed, hands pushing your tits so tight together that it fucking hurts - but he's shaking, and you know that his orgasm has him unable to realise just how strong his grip is.

It's not till he looks down at you, all breathless and blushed that he realises. There's a sheen on your chest, and he knows better than to dirty you all over again - but he's a creature of habit. His grip loosens, chest heaving as his hands begin to stroke at your tits. They fill his palms, overspill blooming between his spread fingers as he gently remedies them of his strength. It's unintentional, though not minded, how he spreads his cum as he does so.

You try and keep a straight face, but it's impossible, and then you're both laughing. It echoes around his room like the missing instrument to the song in your stomach. You aren't really sure why you're laughing. Nor is he. You're just happy. The pair of you remain this way for a moment or so, casually enamoured with how easy things are; how easy they could be.

"C'mon, CC," he speaks fondly, but spanks your titty for the fun of it regardless. "Let's get you cleaned up."

There's a tender nature to the way Jungkook moves your body. So docile, he's a world away from the version of himself that you'd just had in his bed.

This Jungkook - the one gently pulling your hair back so it doesn't get too wet while you wait for the shower to fully heat up - is so well mannered that you couldn't imagine him cursing, let alone calling you a bitch during sex.

Something about it, about him, has you feeling far more infatuated than you should be at this stage.

You're not ready for all this. Not prepared for the way you're feeling. It scares you. Gets you wanting to grab the towel and make a swift exit - but then he kisses your neck, hands on your hips, chest pressed into your back, and you realise that there's no place you'd rather be.

He reaches out to check the temperature of the water that's steaming into his bathroom, and decides it's just right. It's not that the water is particularly hot, just that his bathroom is bloody freezing.

Your reflection in his mirror is a vision of beauty; eyes trained on him, skin tainted by what would have been his legacy. Part of him doesn't want to wash it away. Just wants to marvel at you. Study the way your skin dimples and bumps when you're cold; then remembers that you can't cum when you're cold, so you probably aren't enjoying this as much as he is. He lifts the showerhead from its holder, and lets the water pour over you, and you alone.

The warmth has your shoulders easing almost instantly, and Jungkook feels a little guilty for having kept you cold so selfishly.

He's quiet as he rinses himself from you, contemplative dimples perching themselves beneath his cheeks. He barely utters a word for the entire shower; just peppers your shoulders in kisses.

It's not till you turn to face him, taking the showerhead from his hand and begin rinsing his body that he finally speaks up.

He takes a moment to study you first; watch the way your eyes glaze over his body, following the trajectory of the water, making sure you don't miss a single inch of his skin. Your lashes are dark, hiding your eyes from him, and he doesn't like it. Instinctively, his hands cup your jaw, bringing your eyes to his.

"Thank you."

His lips are on yours, soft, no pressure - and then they're not. They're trailing down your neck instead, as if he can't decide which part of you he wants to devour.

'All of you' is the correct answer, but he eats for pleasure, not for sustenance.

Easily, he could have you for everything that you are within a few seconds - but he wants to savour you. Wants to hear the way your breath hitches as his tongue flicks against your earlobe; feel your fingers dig into his scalp as he paws at your round ass. He wants the memory of your body in his hands, 'cause he fears you're like sand, and that his grasp won't be able to keep hold of you forever.

His bathroom is cramped, more like a wetroom, and the same grey tiles are on the walls that are on the floor. Shower attached to the sink, it's the standard for one-room apartments around these parts.

Yours is the same - but you do have the added luxury of boujie conditioners and loofas to soften the blow.

Jungkook has a 2-in-1 body wash and shampoo combo, and doesn't see the point in fancy scrubs when the labour of his job leaves his hands all rough anyway.

In your right mind, you'd moan about it. Tell him that he's such a boy, or that next time, he's coming to yours for a shower - but you're distracted by the hardness of his cock against your stomach and his hands cupping at your chest while he kisses you. The stream of water makes it borderline impossible to open your eyes, so you revel in the way it feels to be overwhelmed by everything he is.

"Again?" You mumble into his lips, to which you're met with a nod.

You slip your rings off and hear them clink against the porcelain of his sink, praying that your aim is correct and they won't end up down the drain. He hums a small purr of confusion, questioning your actions, and then groans an 'oh' into your mouth when your hand clasps around the base of his cock.

"Gentle," he reminds you, still sensitive but desperate for you once more.

His lips leave yours, head tilting back as he revels in your touch. Neither of you speak, but there's really not much to say. You'd just be making noise for the sake of it.

Regardless, there's a weight in your chest, clamping down on your lungs, that makes talking seem impossible. Might be trepidation. Might be nothing at all - but it sure does feel like something.

You marvel at the column of his thick neck as it stretches back, and think how pretty it would look covered in purple and pink, the bruise of your intimacy staining his skin just like it has done your heart.

Your movements pause when you realise you're thinking about your fucking heart. You're not sappy. You don't attribute sex to love, and the idea of even falling in love has you wanting to run for the hills.

It's been said before that the heart is just a muscle. It has no real bearing on your emotions, nor your amatory exploits.

But when the thoughts of your feelings cloud your mind with dainty pink vapours, all sparkly and strawberry scented, you can't help but feel like you're in danger.

In your chest, you can feel your heart ache.

So yeah, it is just a muscle, but muscles get worn out.

Jungkook notices your hesitation. He casts his eyes down to check you're okay. His crown rests against the wet tiles, water-saturated hair stuck to his face, lashes damp and lips all pouty. The man is a vision. Naked, bare, vulnerable. Yours for the taking, or so it seems. His eyes are heavy-lidded, deep brown; sweet as chocolate, sinful as straight whisky.

"You good?" He asks quietly, only for you to nod and pick the pace up again. His eyes stay on yours as a laboured grunt escapes his lips, brows pinching together. The way you feel around him is so good. Not too tight, just the way he likes it. Fingers all dainty, nails painted red, it's a sight he thinks about when he's alone more than he cares to admit. He's thick and hot in your grasp, working his foreskin up and down his shaft.

There are goosebumps on your skin, body positioned just out of the shower stream because you wanted to look at him; watch as you wound him up, just to make him unravel again. He pulls you closer, hands cupping your jaw as he kisses you, until you're beneath the water again.

His tongue is in your mouth as his hand drops to meet yours. So much larger than your own, his fingers clasp around yours and joins the effort, speeding up. He doesn't say anything else, but he's struggling to kiss you, now. His lips are ajar, resting against yours, little purrs of satisfaction finding a home on your tongue.

"Yeah?" You encourage a little breathlessly, as if you're the one moments away from ruin. "That's it, Kook."

He nods, as the hand that isn't on yours tangles in the back of your hair to keep you close. His hand works to increase the pace, making it a little rougher. There's a wetness between your legs that isn't from the shower, but you're too focused on him - on making him feel good, on being what he needs - to bother doing anything about it. He'll return the favour later, you're sure. He always does.

His grip on your hand loosens, leaving it up to you to finish the job. It only takes a second or two, and then you're milking him, thick white cum desecrating your hand and spurting into your stomach. There's not much, most of it spent on your chest earlier. He shudders, one of his legs a little more so than the other, his moans lost in the pitter-patter of the shower until they become nothing more than hot, heavy breaths.

And then, because quite frankly he doesn't know how to articulate how good, how fucking precious, how god damn infuriatingly beautiful you are, he kisses you again. Though his tongue is soft as it strokes against yours, his piercing is hard - much like his cock which is still firm against your stomach. He encourages your arms up and around his neck, hugging tightly. Your chest presses to his, nipples hard, tits pillowy and soft, and Jungkook swears he'll risk it all for you.

Thinks it would be worth it.

He'd do this wherever with you; in his crappy apartment, in a hotel he'll pay far too much for, in a derelict motel that hides you both when it inevitably becomes time to run.

Thing is, he knows you now. Knows you'll never run with him. Knows that when you find out, he'll never get to do this ever again. It makes him want to cry. Makes him wanna get on his knees and beg for forgiveness before you even know you're mad at him.

You don't forgive. You don't forget, either. You wouldn't be working in a shitty GS25 if you did. He knows this. Knows that as soon as the truth is out, so is he.

And so Jungkook lies. "Come to Busan with me."

Your noses are nestled together, and you can feel his words against your lips. The shower keeps on pouring, but it won't cleanse him of his sins. The water still runs red, even if you can't see it.

"Busan?"

He nods, steals a kiss, and begins to build upon the weak foundations he's formed. "I gotta go visit home. Been putting it off. Think it'll be more bearable with you there."

You kiss him back. Partially because you want to, but mainly because you don't know what the fuck to say. Your heart rate has doubled. Trebled. In fact, you're not sure it's beating anymore.

Family isn't a subject either of you has divulged in, not really. You fear that him opening up requires reciprocation, and that's just not something you're willing to give. Not to him, nor anyone else for that matter.

"When?" You finally murmur, pressing a kiss to his cheek before pulling away to slip your rings back onto your fingers.

He doesn't want you to meet his family. Doesn't want you anywhere near them - but when the time comes, he needs you to know why he ended up here. Needs you to know that everything he's done, rightfully or wrongfully, has been for them.

Doing right by them means doing wrong by you, but he didn't know you when all this started.

Didn't know that you're the type to point out every trash cat you see, or that you make up little songs to soundtrack almost everything you do (regardless of the fact you're tone-deaf). He didn't know that you drank peach tea like it's water, or that you'd somehow taste a little bit like it too. He didn't know that you'd become his favourite flavour, or that the scent of your perfume would have him hugging his fucking pillows for days after you slept over.

He didn't know.

Didn't fuckin' know.

And now he does. And it's tearing him apart.

He's a good liar, though, so you don't notice just how cut up he is when he shrugs and twists the shower tap off. He reaches around for the towel and begins to wrap you up when he says, "Next weekend?"

When he's like this - voice soft, skin bare, tucking the top of the towel over against your chest - it's like you've got the upper hand. There's no battle being fought between the pair of you, and yet you don't feel like equals. Feels like the balls in your court. You just don't realise you're playing different games.

There's pitter-patter beneath your feet and a chime in your stomach. You shuffle between his feet, his arms wrapped around you, lips pressing a kiss against your hair.

"I'll have to check the rota," you say, but you know you'll just ask Yoongi to swap shifts if you are scheduled on. "But I haven't been to Busan in a while. I'd like to come."

His eyes are hot as he presses them shut, chin resting on your head. You think the stutter in his chest is just a hiccup, so you smile. Without the sound of the shower, he can hear his phone buzzing, vibrating on his desk in the next room over.

"Gotta get that," he says, squeezing you before loosening his grip and reaching for a small towel that barely covers his ass. The air is cold against his skin as he opens the bathroom door. Steam gushes out of the room, and so does the hazy, cum-drunk atmosphere the pair of you had created. You miss it the second your skin begins to pebble, goosebumps chilling you, the hair on your arms stood up on end. Almost like someone's walking over your grave.

Maybe just leading you to an early one. Either, or.

You hear him as he mumbles on the phone - "Jin. Yeah? What's up? Cool, can do." - but ignore it. Steam has fogged up the mirror, creating a cloudy canvas for you to do your worst upon. It's childish, yes, but nothing stops you from drawing a little something on there to remind him of you next time he showers.

An uneasy weight sits on your chest when you look at what you've done. It's nothing bad, but part of you thinks you'll regret it - but that part of you is silent when he calls through for you.

When you emerge a few moments later, you're casual as you ask him who was on the other end of the line. He says 'a friend,' and then clarifies that it's 'one of the boys' because he doesn't want you to think the worst. It's an answer you accept.

Dropping the towel, you're unbothered by his eyes as you spend a few moments naked. You're just reaching for his shirt, but the way you move, how your muscles flex above your bones, but the soft flesh of your curves moves without your control has him feeling all kinds of fucked up. He's never wanted anyone more; never known that it was possible to feel such a way.

He tells himself it's just hormones. He's fucking empty, entirely spent on you. That's gotta be the reason. Some kind of primal desire type thing.

Even he's shocked when he begins to talk.

"You can't ever leave."

It's barely a whisper, his voice small, though the weight of his words is so incredibly large.

"Need you here forever."

It's the way that Jungkook talks in such certain terms that has the chime in your stomach ringing again.

You're sure he must have broken a thousand hearts with words like that. You wonder if there are still girls across the city pining after him, thinking about the way his breath feels on their skin as he fucks himself into them. Wonder if the fondness in his eyes is because of you, or because he's just riding a post-climax endorphin high.

"You don't mean that," you tell him, because you don't believe he does.

He shakes his head. Senses the challenge in your voice, and smiles. "You think I'm lying?"

"Think you haven't reached post-nut clarity, yet."

"You'll have to fuck me again, then. Third time lucky."

The third time comes in the morning.

It's still dark outside, Jungkook waking you with dainty kisses along your shoulders, his hands pawing at your tits.

"Morning," he husks into your neck when your hand goes to join his on your chest. "Dreamt about you."

"You are so full of shit," you laugh.

Truth be told, he didn't really sleep. Looked at you for far too long. It's borderline creepy, he thinks, how utterly obsessed he is. Part of him doesn't understand it, but the rest of him does.

You're forbidden.

He can't help but want you.

Jungkook may be Adam, but you're no Eve. You're that damn snake. Or maybe you're the fruit. He doesn't know at this point; just knows that he's eaten it, and he's pretty sure it's poisonous.

"Am not," he grins, riding that poison high. "What did you dream about?"

He's repulsed he's even asking such a thing.

"Can't remember," you pout, turning to face him. Dreams always elude you. It's frustrating, but at least you're not having nightmares. "What about you? What were we doing? Where did we go?"

Just like him, the fact you're asking him questions like that has you wanting to die.

"Busan."

It's not a lie this time. He isn't looking at you, though, so you half think it is.

He's just focused on the hand of his that's toying with your hair, pushing strands away from your face. The only reason he isn't looking at you is because he's embarrassed.

"Busan?" You ask, reminded of his proposition from the night before.

"Mhmm," he nods, his hair no doubt tangling against the pillow. "You 'n' me."

Again, you don't know if it's a lie, but oh what a beautiful one it would be.

"We were on the beach," he continues. "Not really doing much. Just sort of existing."

You laugh, eyes fond but away from his. You're looking at his hair now, too, playing with it. Mirroring his actions. Reciprocating. "Existing?"

"Existing," he says, refusing to clarify. You're distracted when you notice the way his smile brightens. No longer contemplative, he's got a dimple that only comes out when he's beaming all big and bashfully. "I like existing with you."

And so exist you do, in his bed for the next hour and a half. There's no talk of any substance and yet you're chattering for the entire time. He barely even kisses you. Just wants to hear you talk. Wants to hear your perspective on the world, and all the assumptions you make about it.

Jungkook's duvet is shitty quality. The heat it traps is minimal, but you'd take a morning beneath his sheets in the height of winter over being back at your place any day.

It's thoughts like these that make your feet itchy. Makes you wanna run. Bolt. Head for the hills and never look back - but you're locked in place by his arm over your torso. Faint light pours in through the clouded glass of his window panes, curtains apparently too much of a luxury despite the holes in the wall where a rail once sat, and you study the dark ink marking his skin.

There's a story to be told from reading his arms, but you haven't figured that out yet. No google search of his name could ever match the lore embedded in his skin. The tips of your glossy red nails trace the lines in awe, wondering how many people have had this luxury before you.

You wonder who sat by his side during the tattoo appointments, and who laughed with fondness as he winced in pain. Whose hand did he hold? Whose suggestions did he listen to for placements? It plagues your mind like a disease, turning the rubies in your veins to emeralds.

Who are you, you think to yourself. And why am I feeling like this?

It's only a matter of a time - a few languid movements and a couple affirmations later - until he's fucking himself into you again. Predictable, really. Money would be wasted on a fortune teller, and yet you want to go and see one anyway just to confirm whether or not you get to keep him forever.

Lazy and slow, the sex is just an accompaniment to the way he's kissing you. His cock is thick and deep as it fills you, but his hips are sluggish and tepid.

It's almost laughable that the sex is an afterthought.

By its basic definition Jungkook is fucking you - but he's fucked you enough times for you to know how likes to conduct his lays. Quick, fast, to the point. Finish line in his sights.

This doesn't feel like that.

It doesn't feel like that at all.

Even the way his kisses you as his cock stiffens and pulses, unloading itself into you isn't familiar. It's short, his stamina not back up to his usual performance, but it's so deep you think it might be fatal. Any chance you had of getting your heart out of this alive? Yeah. Good luck.

He groans into your mouth, tells you how good you feel, and presses his lips so tightly shut that it's almost as if he's scared he'll never kiss you again.

It's interesting, the way that Jungkook doesn't make you cum. Sure, the sex is good. You've enjoyed it all - but you're currently on 3-0. You chalk it up to a lack of realisation. Innocent inconsideration.

See, his words may betray him, but he's trying to be better. Trying not to drag you further into the web of lies he's woven around the pair of you. Issue is, you've mistaken it for silk. You're comfortable. Enjoy where you are.

He thinks it doesn't count; thinks that if he's the only one who finishes, then you won't be falling for him in the way that he hears girls do. Jimin had ribbed him for it after he'd fucked Naejeon; told him that the reason she was so into him was to do with the oxytocin cocktail that had flooded her bloodstream. It's not like it was news to Jungkook. He'd always known it was a thing, he'd just never really seen the impact of it quite so severely.

The way he see's it, the less you cum, the less you care. It's flawed logic, and it leaves him feeling guilty, which is why he blurts out dumb shit about wanting you around forever. Might be true, might not be. Maybe he's the one confusing hormones for heartfelt honesty.

But as you watch him tear himself away from the bed and head towards the shower, you realise that none of it matters.

You've been hearing bells since the moment you met him.

They're so loud they drown out the bullshit.

"You coming, C?" He calls through, as the shower begins to splutter into action in the next room over. He appears in the doorway, a tattooed hand cupping his balls and covering his modesty. His eyes are soft, grin lopsided as the sun rises.

It's beyond your choice as you move towards the sound of his voice, like he's some kind of pied piper.

You know he's taken over you.

Yet still, you follow the sound of the pipe.

And whether you like it or not, you know you'll let him drag you to the river, just for him to watch you drown.

────────────

minors dni // posted to wp late 2021 // series masterlist

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leviathan-supersystem · 1 year

Text

Mike DeWine, the Ohio governor, recently lamented the toll taken on the residents of East Palestine after the toxic train derailment there, saying “no other community should have to go through this”.

But such accidents are happening with striking regularity. A Guardian analysis of data collected by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and by non-profit groups that track chemical accidents in the US shows that accidental releases – be they through train derailments, truck crashes, pipeline ruptures or industrial plant leaks and spills – are happening consistently across the country.

By one estimate these incidents are occurring, on average, every two days.

“These kinds of hidden disasters happen far too frequently,” Mathy Stanislaus, who served as assistant administrator of the EPA’s office of land and emergency management during the Obama administration, told the Guardian. Stanislaus led programs focused on the cleanup of contaminated hazardous waste sites, chemical plant safety, oil spill prevention and emergency response.

In the first seven weeks of 2023 alone, there were more than 30 incidents recorded by the Coalition to Prevent Chemical Disasters, roughly one every day and a half. Last year the coalition recorded 188, up from 177 in 2021. The group has tallied more than 470 incidents since it started counting in April 2020.

The incidents logged by the coalition range widely in severity but each involves the accidental release of chemicals deemed to pose potential threats to human and environmental health.

In September, for instance, nine people were hospitalized and 300 evacuated in California after a spill of caustic materials at a recycling facility. In October, officials ordered residents to shelter in place after an explosion and fire at a petrochemical plant in Louisiana. In November, more than 100 residents of Atchinson, Kansas, were treated for respiratory problems and schools were evacuated after an accident at a beverage manufacturing facility created a chemical cloud over the town.

Among multiple incidents in December, a large pipeline ruptured in rural northern Kansas, smothering the surrounding land and waterways in 588,000 gallons of diluted bitumen crude oil. Hundreds of workers are still trying to clean up the pipeline mess, at a cost pegged at around $488m.

The precise number of hazardous chemical incidents is hard to determine because the US has multiple agencies involved in response, but the EPA told the Guardian that over the past 10 years, the agency has “performed an average of 235 emergency response actions per year, including responses to discharges of hazardous chemicals or oil”. The agency said it employs roughly 250 people devoted to the EPA’s emergency response and removal program.

[...]

The EPA itself says that by several measurements, accidents at facilities are becoming worse: evacuations, sheltering and the average annual rate of people seeking medical treatment stemming from chemical accidents are on the rise. Total annual costs are approximately $477m, including costs related to injuries and deaths.

“Accidental releases remain a significant concern,” the EPA said.

In August, the EPA proposed several changes to the Risk Management Program (RMP) regulations that apply to plants dealing with hazardous chemicals. The rule changes reflect the recognition by EPA that many chemical facilities are located in areas that are vulnerable to the impacts of the climate crisis, including power outages, flooding, hurricanes and other weather events.

The proposed changes include enhanced emergency preparedness, increased public access to information about hazardous chemicals risks communities face and new accident prevention requirements.

The US Chamber of Commerce has pushed back on stronger regulations, arguing that most facilities operate safely, accidents are declining and that the facilities impacted by any rule changes are supplying “essential products and services that help drive our economy and provide jobs in our communities”. Other opponents to strengthening safety rules include the American Chemistry Council, American Forest & Paper Association, American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers and the American Petroleum Institute.

The changes are “unnecessary” and will not improve safety, according to the American Chemistry Council.

Many worker and community advocates, such as the International Union, United Automobile, Aerospace & Agricultural Implement Workers of America, (UAW), which represents roughly a million laborers, say the proposed rule changes don’t go far enough.

#longpost

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sayruq · 14 days

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Google has fired more than 50 staffers in the wake of in-office protests over the company's cloud computing deals with Israel, according to an activist group representing the former employees. No Tech for Apartheid has protested the cloud computing contracts Google and Amazon have with the Israeli government since 2021. The group said that Google fired more than 20 employees Monday night, bringing the number of total firings to more than 50 since last week, the group said in a statement posted on Medium. The firings came after nine employees were arrested on April 16 during sit-in protests at Google offices in New York City and Sunnyvale, California, The Washington Post reported.

#yemen #jerusalem #tel aviv #current events #palestine #free palestine #gaza #free gaza #news on gaza #palestine news #news update #war news #war on gaza #google #boycott google #no tech for apartheid #no tech for genocide #apartheid

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mrchiipchrome · 1 year

Text

The Olive Theory

W.C.- 2,5 k

Frida Leonhardsen Maanum. That’s the name of the person you love the most in this universe, and your teammate at Arsenal. The two of you had met at a very unclear point in your lives, as two teenagers going through the hardships of feeling misunderstood you found your clarity in each other.

You two completed each other in a way people never understood and that’s what made you two so perfect for eachother. You didn’t have the need for people to understand what made your relationship work, because it just did. You were like night and day, sun and moon, good and bad, push and pull, love and hate, for and against. It was inexplicable, but that’s what makes it so much more fun.

You had met this ray of sunshine when you were 14 years old, it was at an U17 friendly against Norway and she had caught your eye as soon as she shot you one of her signature shining smiles. Your older national teammates shot you knowing looks as you sent one back, though this was an unusual sight for them only having seen it a handful of times.

They often joked that your face didn’t encompass the muscles needed for smiling as you always sat there stone faced. This would later be proven untrue when they saw you engaging with the ‘enemy’, who never failed to exercise the 43 muscles that make you smile.

They could always notice when you were thinking about the Norwegian, as the corners of your mouth were upturned more than usual while Frida’s teammates knew through the dreamy and unaware look that appeared in her eyes the second thoughts of your stone cold expression crossed her mind.

After two long years of pining after the other, the two of you finally fessed up after a hard fought draw between the U19 squads of Sweden and Norway. The both of you were now 16 and pursuing a long distance relationship, with you living in your native Sweden and her in Norway. But no matter where you lived you both knew that home wasn’t a place rather a person, your other half.

You were the first person she called when she got called up to the senior team at the age of 17, and she was the first person you called when you got the same news a week later. No one cheered louder than you when she entered the pitch in her debut match against the hosts Netherlands, and her shouts of delight as you scored the goal that sent your team to the quarter finals where you sadly lost bounced around the hotel room she was in and out into the corridors.

You were over the moon when it was announced that Frida would join you at Lindköpings FC, and the two of you moved into a small one bedroom apartment 5 minutes from the training grounds. Your club teammates finally got to witness the loved up version they had heard so much about from your national teammates, so much that they thought it was a fable as they never got to see you without the hard frown situated on your face.

They saw how utterly complete your soul was when you were with her, how in a strange way her optimistic and delightful personality made your ruthless and hard one full. She was your soulmate and no one could argue anything else, though they were slightly jealous at how you had found your person at such a young age.

When the two of you got a call from your shared agent at the beginning of summer 2021 telling you that you had offers from Arsenal in the WSL, the two of you didn’t hesitate and you began looking for apartments near the London Colney. You bid your longtime teammates goodbye before starting the new chapter in your life.

Now after nearly 2 years at Arsenal, you can proudly say that you hadn’t regretted your decision to move to England. People would think that after 8 years together you would fall out of love but that’s the opposite of what happened, the two of you only falling deeper in love with every second that passes. Everyone around you saw it, how you pulled her back to the ground when her head was too far up in the clouds and how only she could calm you down in your many moments of incredible rage on the pitch.

They could see it in your interactions with each other, how your eyes would follow her every move before she was close enough for you to grab her and pull her onto your lap and how she would look at you with eyes full of adoration whenever you brutally tackle someone on the field. It could be seen in your instagram bio spelling out ‘God is a woman, and her name is Frida Maanum’, while hers was the date when you had confessed to your obvious feelings. The two of you even shared a ‘son’ together, a border collie named Rutger ‘Gus’ Maanum-L/n who you posted about all the time.

And yet the thing people (your teammates) obsessed over most in your relationship was olives, surprisingly. You utterly ‘despised’ olives, but she loved them. ‘The olive theory’ they call it, having explained it every time they saw you give the olives found in your salad to her. They talk about it like it’s the rule that makes every relationship work, not that you believe them in the slightest.

Like everything else regarding your relationship, it was perfectly balanced. She dislikes raisins, while you basically inhale them. You despise the bitter taste of morning coffee, but as she sits curled up on the couch with a steaming cup of joe every morning you find yourself not wanting to gag as the stark smell of coffee invades your every sense. You perfectly balanced out each other, that’s what made your relationship so great, or so you’ve been told by your overenthusiastically curious teammates.

—

Sitting in your cubicle in the locker room at the Colney, the voices of your loud teammates surrounding your every move. Suddenly, the room goes quiet and you get tunnel vision when your eyes lay upon your ethereal girlfriend. Even with flyaways appearing from her ponytail and a thin layer of sweat covering her face, your girlfriend's beauty could still rival that of Aphrodite.

Feeling eyes on her, Frida turns her gaze upon the usual culprit and she finds herself staring directly into your eyes. She brings her hand up and into a wave directed at you, a wave you replicate before your line of sight is invaded by the aggressive movement of an arm not connected to your girlfriend's body.

Your gaze changes from love filled to murderous in the span of a millisecond, turning towards the body in which the arm is connected to and seeing Jen Beattie and Katie McCabe. Raising an eyebrow in an unamused expression you see how their larger than life smiles falter slightly before continuing with whatever they were supposed to say.

“We lost you there for a sec, don’t forget that we’re having dinner tonight at that new restaurant.” Jen says after a second of silence.

You stand up, picking your kitbag off the floor before nodding in agreement. You muster up the meanest expression possible before telling them that you would not hesitate to contact their girlfriends if they ever did that again.

Walking over to Frida who had finished her shower and had changed into her everyday clothes, you take her bag from her grasp and sling it over your shoulder while slipping your large hand into hers. You lead her out of the room while she bids everyone a quick goodbye and see you later. As soon as you reach your car and you settle behind the wheel she pulls you in for a sweet kiss by the sides of your unzipped hoodie.

Returning home, you lay down on the couch being exhausted from training and as Frida lays down on top of you with her head perched on your chest right above the placement of your heart, you realize that you’ve reached peak euphoria. If something were to happen to you, you realize that you’d be happy with everything you’ve achieved up to this point in your life and that you would take your last breath feeling complete and happy with the life well spent.

You relax into the couch and the added weight of your girlfriend makes it much easier for your eyes to fall closed. Speaking up you ask her;

“Raring, could you-”

“I put an alarm on as soon as we walked in the door”

The sweetest of smiles takes over the usual barrenness of your face and you press a kiss to the crown of her head before resting your head back on the couch without a care in the world.

The loud chirping of the alarm ringing for the ninth time has you finally opening your eyes. Frida has now cuddled into your side and you have an arm slung around her shoulders, her eyes closed and her breaths coming out in regular puffs. The sight has you enchanted and you forget about the alarm for a moment, before it brings you back to reality with rude beeps and you turn towards it with a sleepy kind of charm. You fully intend on snoozing it, but as you see the time displayed at the top of the screen you realize that you’d slept through the alarm more than once.

The harsh movement of you sitting up has Frida waking from her seemingly deep sleep, a confused frown on her face as you rush around the living room with your shirt pulled halfway from your torso and pants halfway down your thighs.

“Min kjæreste, what are you doing?” Turning around, you tell her your reasoning for your rush.

“Älskling we have 20 minutes left until we’re supposed to be at dinner with the girls, that's how long the drive there is.”

You watch as her eyes widen in realization and she scrambles up from her place on the couch like you had just moments before, you both thankful for your thinking in advance as you already had matching outfits prepared. You throw on the muted green trousers on before moving onto the off white button up, leaving the top buttons unbuttoned and putting on the matching green blazer. Turning towards your girlfriend once again, you take in the sight of her standing in a light green sundress that just about reaches down to the bottom of her knees.

You’re frozen in the moment, just staring at her with your jaw fully slack and hanging open slightly. When she sees your expression in the mirror as she’s finishing the last touches to her hair she giggles softly to herself before strutting over to you and pushing your jaw up with her index finger.

“Come on kjæreste, we have to go” You follow her out of your house akin to a lost puppy would its owner. You put the key in the ignition and start driving towards the restaurant on the outskirts of the town. You see her going into her makeup bag out of the corner of your eye and you make a face of disagreement.

“You don’t need any makeup, hjärtat.”

“I’m just putting on some mascara my love”

You nod before turning your attention back onto the road fully. You pull into the parking lot and you put the car in an open parking space before you turn off the engine and get out of the car. Rounding the car you pull on the door handle as you open the car door for her, holding out your hand she puts her own in yours as you assist her out of the car.

You enter the restaurant hand in hand with your girlfriend hearing the whistles and suggestive comments coming from the team at the time when you arrived, being fashionably late. Separating, you sit on opposite sides of the tables but still parallel to each other. You start to engage in conversation with your teammates sitting to the side of you after having ordered your food. As it arrives you notice the olives apparent in the dish and you’re too focused on picking them out of your food to give to your girlfriend to realize Jen pulling up her phone sneakily and filming you as you give them to her.

You eat with your teammates and talk to them simultaneously which means that you are more distracted than usual. You don’t realize that you missed an olive when you had given them all to your girlfriend, but Katie does. She’s just about to warn you but you manage to stuff it into your mouth before she could. Katie watches on, waiting for the visceral reaction but it never comes. She leans in to whisper softly in your ear.

“I thought you hated olives.”

You turn your face towards her with a questioning look on your face before she gestures towards your fork and you realize your mistake. Your face feels warm as you stare back at her and you start to explain in a hushed whisper so that the girl opposite you can’t hear a word of what you say to the Irish woman.

“I don’t hate olives, I never have. I actually love them, but I love her more. Love is all about sacrifices, and this is an easy sacrifice to make for her.”

Finishing your dinner you stay and mingle for a while before you meet your girlfriend's eyes and

you see the prominent exhaustion in them. Slapping your thighs, you stand up and catch the attention of the team and you tell them it’s time for you and Frida to return to your homestead. A few of them let out protests but you don’t listen to them, instead taking her hand and walking out to the car and beginning to drive home.

As soon as you return home you notice the incoming flood of notifications from TikTok, most of them tagging you. Taking a seat at the table, under the overhead lamp you pull her to sit on your lap as you press the notification of the video you’ve been tagged in hundreds of times, wanting to watch the video with her. Both your and Fridas eyes are fixated on the screen as you see a video of you giving your olives to her during your rendezvous at the restaurant, it being posted on Jen’s account. Pressing play you are met with soft plucking of a guitar and Ted Mosbys voice flooding out the speaker,

“The olive theory is based on my friends, Marshall and Lily-”

Got an idea, here you go!

#woso x reader #woso imagines #frida maanum #frida maanum x reader #awfc x reader

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dayseternal-blog · 5 months

Text

Summary: Dates at home solidify their love.

Initially drafted for NH Week 2021 Day 1 Prompts: First Time / Blank Period / Innocent. Completed and posted for NaruHina Fair, NH Month 2023 Day 3 Prompt: Cuddles.

Rated E for smut.

"Cuddles" - Short One-shot

Everything in the entire world is quiet and fluffy, as if the clouds of dusk stole through his window, surrounding him while he slept.

His fiancée is cuddled up into his side, molded perfectly to him…

Through sleep-worn, bleary eyes, he manages to regard her dozing form, defenseless and without care. Her eyes closed to the worries outside of his room, her smaller hand curled on his chest, her soft breasts squishing up against his side.

His focus caresses the outlines of her body, visible along her clothing, and…

She was bathed in light and wearing next to nothing.

Heaviness clutches at his groin, memories of something that never happened flash beneath his eyelids.

A dream? His dream from just now?

He grimaces as blood rushes low, and he can remember how she stood in his room wearing something white and very sheer, who cares that he’s never seen her wear anything like that before, but she was, the roundness of every part of her--deep cleavage, dark nipples, flaring hips, soft thighs--teasing him, pleasing him, and she shyly smiled with her lips parted just so .

Tingles scritch along his fingers, his toes, his dick, and he fidgets as he realizes he’s quickly sporting a problem. Instinctively, his arm wraps over her shoulder to hold her body closer to his, his pelvis tilting sideways to rub against her. Restless hands smooth over the dip of her waist to the slope of her lower back, and he closes his eyes as a kind of bliss washes through him.

They’ve been getting sort of...really excited around each other recently, like this afternoon before they fell asleep, but it doesn’t feel like he’s been “holding himself back” or “rushing things.” They have been taking each step of their relationship in stride together, treating the meeting of lips and air and tongues as something new and different, the emotions running thick through their bodies as something to be enjoyed and explored.

He hasn’t had a perverted dream like this since he was maybe 14.

And back then, it wasn’t Hinata.

Back then, his dreams were raunchier, his clothes suddenly disappearing, dark rooms, tangled bodies with a face he couldn’t remember and all that.

Nothing so...angelic? Innocent? Leaving him wanting more? So...Hinata?

He squeezes her to him, inhaling deeply, carefully and slowly humping at her stomach, and his breath turns heavy with desire. His mouth feels dry as he imagines hugging her like that, naked beneath a little slip of silky cloth, her eyes inviting him to touch and know .

“Naruto-kun?” Her drowsy voice halts his movement, but his piece strains out for more of her comfort, and he knows she feels it twitching.

“Hinata...,” he answers lowly, and he can’t stop his body from twisting a bit against her, his senses desperate for any tiny bit of relief.

Her face buries into his shoulder, her arm tightening over his width, her boobs and stomach and legs rubbing on him.

Abs contracting, he stiffens against her snuggling, and now he’s awake enough to finally realize that he’s full-on horny, ready to continue what they were doing almost an hour ago now that she’s awake.

“You’re hard,” she murmurs.

At her vocal noticing, he doesn’t stop himself from humping a little against her, encouraging her to understand exactly how hard he is. “Yeah.”

She leans away to peek up at him through long lashes, a blush spreading above her shy smile, a good sign. “How come?”

“How come?” he repeats, just to see her blush darken to a satisfying rose.

“Yeah, I was just sleeping here...we weren’t doing anything,” she quietly explains.

“I have you in my bed, sleeping on me!” He repeats her words with a squeezing cuddle, and she giggles, everything about her curvy form and happy voice easily turning him on, keeping him excited.

He looks down, she looks up, her dazy eyes meeting his own, her lips parting into that perfect invitation.

He wants to kiss her so badly, but he also wants to see her reaction to the fact that… “I also had a dream.”

Her eyes widen. “...a dream...?”

“Yeah, about you,” he murmurs, humping at her in emphasis.

“Naruto-kuun…” she quietly whines, her face pushing once more against his shoulder.

He could’ve guessed that she’d be really embarrassed, and he feels just the teensiest smidgen of guilt. “It wasn’t that bad. I didn’t even touch you in the dream.”

She untucks her face, confusion apparent in the slope of her brows.

Unconsciously, his hand squeezes at her hip, his voice dropping lower. “You were wearing a dress that was whitish...and see-through.”

She squirms in embarrassment against him, her arm over him tightening, and another rush of attraction jolts through his cock.

“You were standing right there, by my bed.”

She hums a kind of sound, squeezing and pushing her pink face into his shoulder as if to hide.

Shifting up more onto his side, his chest receives her embarrassment instead, and he embraces her into him, eyes closing, senses honing in on the soft swells of her body. “You’re so sexy, Hinata,” he mumbles.

One moment he feels her face turning up to him, the next, her plush kisses are blanking out his brain. Her tongue gently caresses his own, and he can taste every little whimper and gasp of affection, warm and sweet.

She likes kissing him. It’s obvious in the way she sounds and feels, enticing him to relish her soft solidity and find that deeper part of her that calls him in.

To come closer.

To discover more.

To massage, pinch, and taste when her blouse and bra drop to the floor, when she’s arching up for him as airy vowels leave her lips.

She sounds like sex. Or what he at least imagines sex sounding like. He remembers earlier last week, when she first bared her boobs for him, and when he first sucked on her nipple, he thought he hurt her.

She had to tell him that she felt good.

That piece of knowledge blew his mind.

Reading her scrunching up brows, the flush of her cheeks, the strange sounds that now ignite his libido. Every “date” they’ve had at his place to avoid the crowds of fans, they’ve grown undeniably closer, physically closer, and for the past week, she’s been letting him play with her jiggly shapes and make out with her for who knows how long until she gets tired and his erection starts to calm.

Just like earlier today.

But his lust is back with a vengeance, totally recharged from their afternoon nap.

Leaving one hand to sink into her tit, he sucks kisses back up the sensitive path of her neck, along the smooth curve of her chin, back to her lips.

“Mmm…” Her hips roll up toward him, and it’s instinctual to push down, for their groins to grind together. “Na..ru...to...kun,” she breathes, her tone so needy that he rubs himself against her as heavily as he can, shots of pleasure making his jaw drop with an answering groan.

His hand slides down to cup her ass, his palm filling with the chiffon of her skirt and squishy flesh. Eagerly, he rolls his hips against her pelvis, the length of him thrilling with the attention. “Ugh, Hinata…”

“Mm...can you...take off..your clothes?”

He freezes.

Pale, misty eyes plead with him, and he needs no more convincing.

Sitting up, he pulls his shirt off. It’s a huge stroke to his ego to see her expression get even hornier, her lips fall open a little more, her lidded eyes trained on his body. He hooks his thumbs into his pants, pausing there in case she wants to stop him.

But she doesn’t. Instead, her hands mirror his, her thumbs sliding into her own waistband, and there his focus stays, raptly watching her raise her hips to pull the skirt over her rear.

He doesn’t even care where his pants and boxers land, the only thing that matters is bare skin sloping to the space between her tightly closed thighs, that quick glimpse he got imprinting on his mind.

Unthinkingly, his hands land on her knees and slide up her thighs, softer than he could have predicted. Dazed, he watches her legs open for him, the secrets of her womanhood revealed for his leisure.

For all his peeping at the public baths in his youth, he never knew what this part of a girl really looked like. Curious thumbs circle at the junction of her inner thighs and pelvis, caressing down and up, her butt shifting invitingly.

“Naruto-kun,” she whimpers.

“You’re so soft, Hinata…” He glances up to see her biting her bottom lip, her eyes still lidded in sensual intimacy. A stirring grips his core, and his thumbs venture further inwards, pushing upon even softer flesh.

“Ah..mm..ah…” Her expression contorts, her eyes closing.

His jaw drops, desire surging fast and hard through his dick, his thumbs meeting in her center, dampness covering the pads of his thumbs. His heart rate accelerates with the view of his thumbs opening her up, shockingly pink flesh glistening, arousal coating her skin as he rubs all over her down there.

“You’re so wet.”

That place, where he, his masculinity, goes, is wet.

She’s soft and wet, just for him. She’s ready, squirming and panting, and he’s ready, and…

He pushes a finger between her folds, her slippery flesh hugging around the digit. Every time he tries to pull out a bit, he can see her pussy resisting, tugging back with him.

She’s tight.

He’s subtly humping air as he buries his pointer finger to the second knuckle, twisting it this way and that.

“Mm..nnn..mm…”

“You’re so tight... I don’t think I can fit...” There’s just no way his cock can fit. His finger barely fits. But soon enough, the whole digit sinks into her.

“Hahh..hahh…” Her chest rises and falls rapidly, the pink stain on her cheeks down her neck vibrant.

Missing her warmth and taste, he leans back over to drink her breaths in, his finger turning and moving, attempting to loosen her more. He muffles her whimpers and moans, shoving his tongue into her mouth, seeking out more of her kiss.

Warm liquid leaks around his finger as he rubs moist walls, and he imagines his cock buried in her heated flesh, as wet as his finger and tongue.

“I’m going to try two fingers,” he mumbles into their kiss.

Feeling her nod, he sits up again, draws his finger out, and examines the shine over his skin. He rubs the arousal against his middle finger, idly noting how it’s longer than his pointer, how he’ll be tunneling even deeper than the first time, how when it’s finally his cock, how much deeper he’ll get…

His other hand at her hip, thumb rubbing circles over the smooth skin, he pushes both fingers in, marveling at how her hole stretches to accommodate the larger intrusion. He wiggles them further in, testing the silky walls intent on suffocating his digits.

The softness is different from her boobs.

His free hand reaches up to remind himself how they jiggle like water balloons, well, except for her nipples. He pinches one dusky peak, rolling it between his thumb and forefinger, delighting in the clenching around his fingers, the new arousal coating them, easing his intrusion.

Quicker than the first time, the two digits slide in, and he nudges back and forth like that, in time with his useless humping and the pinching of her nipple.

“Na..Na-...Naru...to-kun..” Her head is shaking back and forth, the blush even more furious across her face, and it’s a real wonder to him how such easy, little motions of his hands make her look like she’s coming apart.

Leaning down, he manages to suck her nipple in, his tongue rolling it around, and then pressing on it like a button.

A magic button. One that has her hole soaking his fingers in arousal.

He does the same to her other boob, ensuring both nipples are hard and pointy, making her gasps fill the air, and making his knuckles get wetter and wetter.

Pulling his fingers out, he climbs between her legs to flatten out and kiss her.

Her small hands smoothe over his shoulders to the back of his neck, into his hair, holding him close for each delirious lick and suck of her lips. She pushes up toward him, pebbled nipples sliding and pushing into his chest, the cushion of her breasts taking his weight.

His hips jerk frantically against her, his length rubbing up and down her wet pussy, hot arousal coating the top of his dick. “Hinata…”

“Naruto-kun…”

“Mm...ugh...” Impatience boils over, and he shifts his hips, his dick poking at her, jabbing for entrance. Blindly, he thrusts against her for relief, not caring that he’s missing her tiny hole, the bottom or top of his cock catching and sliding on the wet heat of her womanhood several times.

“Naruto-kun…” Her eyes squeeze shut. Her hand slides down between them, her fingertips lightly taking a hold of his girth.

With hazy eyes, he watches her give him the cutest expression yet.

She’s wide-eyed and pink-cheeked, the shimmer in her gaze flitting among uncertainty, shock, and adoration. “You’re so big,” she murmurs, and he kisses her plump lips once, twice, before nodding.

“Because of you. You’re so sexy.”

She shakes her head slightly.

“What do you mean, ‘no’?” he huffs out in almost a chuckle. His hips shift, his arousal-coated cock slipping slightly forward in her fingertips, his tip sliding down her moist heat.

Suddenly, her fingers lift and direct his cock at a certain angle, and his tip pushes up at softness.

Looking into her eyes, he searches for fear or hesitation, but it’s her usual, gentle shine, calm and trusting, and she gives the smallest nod.

Exhaling slowly, he places his weight forward with his pelvis, and instead of slipping, his piece nudges into hot flesh.

His jaw drops, breath catching in his throat. “Hinata…”

Her eyes fall closed.

With clearer intention than before, he presses forward, more of his dick finding its way into her body. “Augh…” Short groans leave his throat as he pushes forward again, wet pussy wrapping entirely around more than just the head. He leans more weight onto his forearms, his erection sliding deeper than he expected, almost a third of his cock sheathed in warmth.

“Oh!” Her eyes pinch shut, and he freezes.

“Does it hurt?!”

She breathes several times, unable to answer his question, so he leans his weight onto one arm, and uses his other to grope her breast in hopes of making her feel good.

He massages it, then plucks at her nipple, her whole body immediately reacting to the stimulation, his cock nudging in deeper. Lust flipping back on, he repeatedly pulls at her nipple, and she comes alive.

Her head tosses back and forth, her chest rising up, her ass wiggling, encouraging him to move with her.

Pulling out slightly first, he then shifts in deeper, lodging half his piece in her dripping clutch.

A moan falls from her kiss-swollen lips, and he leans back over to twirl his tongue with hers, his hips lightly thrusting back and forth, nudging himself deeper and deeper into squishy, tight flesh.

“Ahn, ahn, ahn, ahn,…” Her repeated cries on his tongue urge him on, encourage him to snuggle the rest of the way in until his groin presses against hers.

He feels like he’s as hard as a steel rod, piercing straight through incredible silkiness, comfort pillowing around his heavy desire, accepting all of him…and happily, he hugs her close, cuddling her to his full heart.

“Naruto-kun,” she breathes, trembling beneath him, and he turns to suck kisses at her neck.

“I love you, Hinata.”

“Mm...I love you, Naruto-kun…”

He stays at her neck for a few more seconds, kissing and sucking in appreciative worship, enjoying the realization that he’s as close as possible to the love of his life, enjoying the reassuring feeling of her small hands squeezing at his back, enjoying the intimacy of her tight hold around the hard embodiment of all his adoration for her.

Twitching uncontrollably inside of her, his dick begs to reach even further in her, but he wants to see her face, to know if she’s alright, or better than alright. So pushing his weight back up on his forearms, he catches her cloudy gaze.

She turns on a cute, little smile at him, one that lights up her lidded eyes and pools pink at her cheeks.

Unbidden, he’s smiling back, and lost in her gentle expression, fulfilled and affectionate contentment heavy in his chest, relief relaxing his fisted hands and tense arms,... he accidentally thrusts.

Shivers skate up his spine, new lust rigid in his cock, and he presses hard into her, grinding himself deep, watching her mouth fall open and a moan cry out. He pulls out a bit and pushes back in, the unbelievable ecstasy catching him off-guard, the electricity in his veins just as loud as her gasp, and again, then again he humps into her warmth, bliss buzzing along his skin with each push of his hips.

A vague voice at the back of his mind tells him to slow down, and with every bit of his control, he manages to stop, a shudder fighting through with a heavy exhale.

Blearily, she finds his gaze, her hands sliding onto his cheeks. “Naruto-kun,” she murmurs, and he knows she wants a kiss.

He tongues her mouth lovingly, wet lips meeting softly, her sweet taste making him strain into her, and he can’t stop himself from grinding against her, pushing up without pulling out, circling his hips in small movements, his piece desperately trying to snuggle deeper into the plush give of her body.

“I love you,” she murmurs against his lips, and he mumbles his love back, his thrusts starting to gain an urgency once more, his control slipping with the feeling of her soft form fitting so perfectly to his need.

“Hahh...Hinata…”

“Ahh...mm...ahn...Naru..to..kun…oh…”

Eyes closed, face buried in her hair, he loses himself in the tug and glide of his stiff dick into her soothing flesh, the shift of her soft body with each thrust, her breasts squishing repeatedly into his chest, her breathy moans caressing his ears. “Hinata…” Hot arousal bathes his cock, easing each piercing thrust, each pull-out to the tip before pushing his length smoothly into her. “Oh! Na, ru, to, kun, oh! Oh!”

“Hah..ugh…” He shoves himself into her and lifts up onto his hands to watch her. “You feel...so good, Hinata...”

Her eyes gleam happily for a second before his thrust melts it away. Her facial expression changes with each pump of his hips, a slight drop of her jaw, a quiver of her brows, a little tongue reaching out, her eyes squeezing shut. Her small hands squeeze at his forearms, her fingers tightening into his muscles whenever he sinks home. And her boobs.

He’s been aware of how big they are for awhile now.

And this week, he’s become aware of exactly how soft they are.

But nothing could have prepared him for how they move on her chest, jumping and jiggling, and he finds himself tunneling into her creamy folds faster, harder, his hips slapping at the backs of her thighs just to see them react. Her swollen nipples nod at him in enticing circles, and further arousal sparks hot and bright in his mind.

Sitting up, he palms the teasing shapes, squeezing so her nipples rise and skin spills between his fingers, and his gaze drags down the sweet taper of her waist, down her smooth tummy, down to their joining.

The rigid base of his cock gleams whenever he pulls out of her heat, then so easily disappears into pussy lips sucking around his thick girth. Hovering his hands just above her nipples, he pulls out a little farther and glides in, her breasts jiggling, her nipples brushing gently at his palms, a breathy whine rising from her lips. He pulls out even farther, attention rapt on how her pussy follows the curve of his dick, holding the head warm inside, and he glides back in, bumping his groin to hers, hard nipples tickling his palms, an “Ahh~” floating up from his flushed love.

Holding her lidded gaze, he breathes out, “Hinata,” and he’s pulling out, sliding back in, popping himself in and out of her soft body, enjoying the sight of her scrunching eyes and sound of her moaning in stimulated bliss. Her swollen nipples dance lightly under his palms until she arches, squishing her own boobs up into his hands with an impatient whine.

Heightening, clawing need has him thrusting more insistently, has him indulging in squeezing her boobs, tracing the curves of her waist, and gripping the smooth slopes of her hips. “So, sexy, Hinata…”

She shakes her head slightly. “Naruto-kun!” She reaches up, her hands running over his arms to his shoulders, and she looks at him pleadingly, a slight pressure on his shoulders inviting him to her.

“Ugh!” He gladly collapses forward, pleasure forcing his eyes shut and overwhelming him. “Hahh, ugh!” Ecstasy burns hot in his veins, his piece swelling longer in her silky clutch. He’s not going to last much longer.

“Mmm!...ahh...Nna..ruto..I..love…you…”

“I love you, Hinata,” he breathes out in a rush, teeth clenching, eyes squeezed shut. Shivers seize his frame and blossom low. “Loveyousomuch…” Muscles tensing, he heaves himself against her, and staticy delight shoots up his cock, through his spine, clouding his mind.

Her arms and legs hold him close, her embrace warm and tight, and happily, he lunges against her, working the base of his cock in the grip of her entrance, urging his tip deep in her folds.

Heart swollen, breath locked, he squeezes her to him. Sparks streak bright and burning, clenching through heady pressure, collecting and building from his head, to his chest, to his core, amassing in his groin. He shoves forward with one last stroke, and with any scraps of remaining discipline, pulls out onto her stomach.

Desperate elation releases out in a sharp stream. “Agh, ha, mm…” Acute pleasure thrills out in pulsing shots, and relief washes through.

Floaty exhaustion untenses his arms and legs, and he watches how her belly button puddles white.

Fuzzy pleasure exerts through his cock again, delight twitching out in random intervals. “Ugh. Heh. Still coming…”

His gaze trails up, and Hinata’s staring at the growing mess. “You pulled out…”

“Yeah… Oh!”

The puddle overflows, drops racing down her side, and Hinata brings a hand up to catch it. She sucks her stomach in, holding his cum from dripping. She blinks up at him slowly, a dazed look in her expression, and he presses kisses to her cheeks and to her responding smile.

“Sorry about that.”

She hums a disagreement.

Unwillingly, he gets up. “I’ll get a tissue.”

She nods, and her gaze returns to her stomach.

They clean up, and as she helps him collect his cum, she murmurs, “There’s so much…”

“...Sorry, haha.”

She hums another disagreement. “I’m happy.”

He leans into her, pressing more kisses to her lips. “Mmm, me, too.”

After throwing everything away, he climbs back into bed, and she snuggles into his side.

“We’re back to where we started.”

She giggles.

“Round two.”

“Whaat?” she gasps out, and he turns to smooch her giggling face. “Naruto-kun!”

He can’t help grinning. He levels a smile at her, taking in her shy gaze and rosy cheeks. His body’s never felt so content, he can’t remember ever feeling so relaxed and satisfied. He cuddles his fiancée, grateful for the millionth time. “I love you so much, Hinata.”

“I love you, Naruto-kun. Sooo much.” She smiles at him, and he works her lips, her tongue slowly tasting him.

“Hinata…” If he didn’t just come, he’d gladly do it all over again. “If we don’t get up, we’ll never leave.”

“Mhm.” She sounds satisfied to just stay in his arms, stay in his bed.

“Is this what we’re doing tonight then?”

“Hmmm…” She’s totally relaxing into him, and he thinks she might be trying to go back to sleep.

“You’re having Naruto for dinner?”

Giggles.

“Alright then.” He peppers kisses into her neck, his hand eagerly seeking a breast, and she twists, shudders, and laughs.

“Naruto-kun!”

He pauses to smile at her.

She looks just as happy, still dazed. “I don’t want to go out.”

“I know.” The fans, people of all ages and nations, after they saved the planet for a second time just blew out of control, and for the past two months, it’s been difficult to have a proper date. “Instant ramen?”

“Okay.”

“Okay,” he repeats, and he brushes stray hairs off her shoulder. Unbidden, his eyes trail down the rest of her naked form, and his hand follows, landing with a pat on her waist. “Hinata…”

“Mm.” Her eyes have closed again, and she’s cuddling into him.

Dinner can wait. He lays down more comfortably to hold her better and closes his eyes, letting the remnant bliss of their union hush him into dozing.

#thank you for reading!#nhmonth2023 #naruhina fanfiction #they couldn't write or televise blank period naruhina because they were too lovey-dovey flirty right?

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