#corruption scars steven my beloved

[romanarose]

If You Wanna Be Wild: Chapter 6

Co-written with @my-secret-shame-but-fanfiction my beloved Fen, who I could not do this without. Thank you for being my emotional sounding board, my dear friend, my wonderful cowriter and helpful beta reader. I adore you.

Javier Peña x Latina!sex worker!informant!Reader x Santiago Garcia

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Summary: Santi takes Candy out, and Javier gets jealous, but still he defends them both. Drama erupts, and Santi finds something out about himself.

Content and warnings for whole fic, not chapter by chapter unless something is added: Sex work, drug trade, some drug use/pressured used, sex workers and the mistreatment/stigma surrounding them specifically in the 70’s (my blog is sex worker positive) but ima put potential dub con depending how you look at it as a sex worker who works with dangerous men, some action surrounding reader and the guys and the drug trade, SMUT HEAVY, corruption kink (were corrupting santi here, he’s young, 25), no loss of virginity tho, threesomes, some slight m/m smut but that’s not the focus here, but as you know this blog is an lgbt blog so I’m always open to gay shit. Talk of war and some PTSD but I won't be going a whole lot into it. Covert/emotional incest in the past, Santi's mommy issues, m/m dynamics, internalized bi/homophobia

For the record, this is a fic that takes place in the drug trade and deals with the darker side of humanity, so anything from Narco's and Triple Frontier is liable to be discussed or mentioned here. This is your warning. This is not a dark fic nor is it centered around dark themes like Leather and Lace or Sunshine Starlight Sweetheart Brightside, but they are open to be talked about.

Reader has a nick name: Candy. Not her real name just what she goes by on her profession. Much of the inspo for this and for the title came from the Bruce Springsteen song “Candy’s room” so check it out for the vibes.

Reader speaks Spanish and has hair. I've decided Candy is just latina bc she's a sex worker in Colombia so this is what I'm doing. Reader also has curly hair and dark skin.

ADDITIONAL WARNINGS!: Santi's panicy trauma response. Santi's mommy issues in full swing. Javier is jealous, lots of arguments. Cumming untouched, titty sucking. We're in for it boys!

THE SMUT WAS 100% WRITTEN BY THE AMAZING @my-secret-shame-but-fanfiction i knew i needed mommy kink and he was the one to go to. If you like subby men, Fen, my dearest cowritter, writes great fics esp with Steven Grant <3 What Fen said when they wrote it "Yoooooo, what am I writing Romana? Madness? I think so."

6.7 words (I'm so fucking sorry okay A LOT WAS HAPPENING)

A/N Since I am apparently an incomprehensible writer, please know that the smut scene in the last chapter was not a threesome, it's Javi fingering Candy and Candy flashing back to her giving Santi a reach around handjob. I wanted to compare and contrast the way the two pairs care for and pleasure each other. but it came across as a threesome :(

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***************

Santiago didn’t know why he was so nervous.

“What we need is to get out into the actual field!” Javier exclaimed, setting his mug down loud enough to make Santi jump. “Sorry, Garcia.” He muttered, wiping a bit of spilled coffee with his sleeve.

Santiago rolled his shoulders, reaching back to rub his spine over the scar. The surgery saved his life, but damn did it hurt. “S’alright. Listen, I had an idea, but I don’t know if it’s going to be anything. It does get us out of the office next week.”

“I’ll take it, what do you have, Pope.”

Santi smiled. “Well, the nickname is fitting. It’s a rally for the beatification of Laura Montoya.”

A smile quirked up on Javier’s grumpy face. Unbuckling his belt after a second round of stress donuts, Javi kicked his legs up on his desk. “Of course you would know that.”

“My tia invited me.” He shoved Javi’s boots off, then wiped his hands on his pants. “We know what his family looks like now, maybe they will be there? It’s something.”

Javier agreed, it was something. Tracking Lorea had not gone as well as Escabar had. Not that that was a flawless mission itself, but at least it had traction. Martin Lorea was far less public.

The pair settled into an easy rhythm of planning the event. Santiago would have to avoid his tia’s, he thought. That may be hard, considering he had 4 and several cousins who will likely be attending the event. Colombia doesn’t have a canonized saint yet, and she was recognized as venerable so her potential beautification was a big deal for Colombia. Still, he couldn’t be recognized at the rally, his family would want to talk and talk and talk and ask why he didn’t have girlfriend and talk and ask who Javier was, and Tia Lupe would ask him if he had a ‘modern arrangement’ with Javier which would make Santi sick to his stomach with anxiety and- fuck he felt like the donut he stole from Javi was coming back up.

“Gotta go, be right back.”

“I’ll be timing you.” Javier kicked his legs back up on his desk and closed his eyes.

Over the toilet, Santi dry heaved, unsure if he was really going to puke or just felt like it. What the hell was it with Javier these days that made him so anxious? Things had been going well, their friendship repaired in the months since Javier caught him and Candy together. Other than Frankie, who would always be his number one, Javi was his best friend. He’d die for him the way he’d have died for Will, Frank or Ben… but there was something more. Since the day they met, Santiago wanted nothing more than Javier’s approval, he strived for it… maybe it was that he saw Javi as a father figure, almost 15 years older than him… that wasn’t right either. He couldn’t place it until earlier this week.

The DEA ball was coming up, Javier had asked Santi if he wanted to carpool since they both didn’t have dates and lived near-by… to which Santi said he actually had a date. She was a surprise. So was the fact Javier wanted to go.

The “Oh” that had fallen out of his mouth though Santiago off. It sounded disappointed. Santi couldn’t stand Javier disappointed in him. That’s when the thought happened. ‘I wish we could just go together’ Not arrive together. Go together. As a couple. His first thought was no, that’s illegal. His second thought was no, he’d go to hell. His third was him mami, god rest her soul, would roll over in her grave.

He shook the thoughts away, but ever since then he began noticing the way he stared at Javi, the way his body buzzed with any incidental touch… He had to shove it down.

Certainly, Javier was open-minded, but he would to spend as much time as he did with him if he was gay, right? He wouldn’t incite Santi over for futball games on the tv, he wouldn’t take him with him to get lunch… he wouldn’t even want to work with him. It would all be over.

That’s what made Santi sick.

That, and the anxiety over who his secret date was.

*

You didn’t know why you were so goddamn nervous.

You had to admit, you were very surprised when Santiago showed up for his regularly scheduled appointment, flowers in hand, asking you to join him at the ball.

“Santi… sweetie… I don’t know…”

His large eyes looked nervous. “It’s a job! I’ll pay you, I’m not expecting anything free! And I I know what you’re gonna say, I don’t care about Javi freaking out. Imean, if you care I don’t wanna pressure you of course! I’m not trying to come between you guys, but I doubt he’ll even show. He hates these things.”

“It’s not that I’m worried about…” You take the flowers, thanking him genuinely, and walking to your kitchen. Santiago anxiously paced your walls, trailing his hands over your posters. “Sweetheart, I know we have a good time, but I am a prostitute, you know this.”

“I swear, I don’t have any notions about us being in love… I just want you there.”

Placing the flowers in the vase, you turn to look at him. “I just… well…” You hesitate, unsure how to not freak the poor kid out. “oh my god, there's no polite way to say this, but, Javier is far from the only DEA agent I’ve slept with. Hell, I slept with the janitor once.”

“Mario’s a cool guy, I don’t blame you.”

“What I’m saying is,” She sighed out her words. “You’re a sweet young man, and I know you’re a lot younger than most of the guys there. I don’t want to cause you any trouble-”

“Candy-”

“And I know I’ll cause you trouble if I’m there. They are going to make fun of you for bringing a hooker to a ball.”

He shook his head. “I don’t care. There’s no one else I want there with me but you, and I don’t care what Javier says, or any of them for that matter.”

You smile softly at the young man. He was earnest, but although you believed he didn’t care about the other guys at the precinct, you didn’t believe him for one second about Javi. Santiago worshiped the ground Javier walked on, it was clear by the way he talked about his partner.

“If you really don’t care, then yes, I’d love to go.”

His youthful face lit up. “Really?!”

“Yes” You giggle. “It sounds like a great night.”

Santiago ran to you, making you squeal as he threw you over his shoulder. “I’m gonna make you cum so many fucking times on my face, Candy, you don’t even know.”

You had to admit you were a little nervous. A lot nervous. He said he didn't think Javier would be there, but you weren’t sure, and hadn’t had a chance to try and prod him for information. You’d asked around, and Javi had been spending several nights with Gabby. This was not unusual, he was known to bounce around women, but he always came back to you. Today, though, it made you jealous as all hell. Santiago made you nervous too.

You wanted to at least make a good impression for him, so you went out and bought a brand new evening gown for the occasion, something classy, showing the curves but not your tits. Your big Farrah Faucet curls that usually accompanied a night with Lorea and his men were dialed down more to a simple look, your make-up more natural that a night on the town with high rollers would see. Still you were beautiful and you knew it. Just less like a hooker.

*

Javier didn’t know why he was so fucking nervous. He never went to these stupid things, much preferring to spend a night undressed with his cock buried between a pretty woman’s legs than stuff himself into a suit that had only gotten tighter in recent years. But, Pope was gonna be there, he was gonna be dressed up in some overdone suite, Javi just knew it. And his stupid curls would be slicked back and inevitably a few would pop out and he’d spend the night trying to keep them back but they would want to be wild and he’d eventually mess with his hair too much and it’d be all every-which-way and, and, and…

So maybe he was late. So maybe he was a little tipsy. Maybe he had been taking pulls of a flask in the back of a taxi but there was coke baggie and a cum stain on the seat so was it really the worst the car had seen? He pulled up to the dance in his too-tight suit, stumbling out a bit, and attempted to find his way inside. He didn’t really want to see Santi dancing with a girl, but if he didn’t show, Santi would worry, and Javi didn’t like Santi worrying.

Javier hoped she was nice. A nice girl because he was a nice young man. Someone to take care of him in some ways, to let him care for her in others… Javi knew he could take care of Sant. He had when he was sick, hadn’t he? Therein lied the reason Javi was drunk. The burn of the liquor was to press down the feeling he couldn’t ignore sober. He wanted Santiago.

“Buenas noche, amigos. ¿Has visto Santiago?”

Javi asked as he stumbled on a few men from the DEA chattering in a corner

One of the men, Freddy, chuckled, taking a sip of his beer. “Oh, you haven't seen him yet?”

This caused all the men to laugh, but Javier didn’t get the joke. He got the feeling whatever it was, they were laughing at Santi. Javier knew Santi hadn’t really clicked with the men. He was too straight laced, too honest… too good.

“The fuck does that mean?” Javier asked with an obvious bit of bite. Santiago was his to protect.

“Young Garcia came here with a whore on his arm.” Another man, Josue, with a patchy mustache he should just call it quits on attempting to grow replies. “Wonder if he knows what she is, or if he’s going to wake up to a nasty bill in the morning.”

The group laughs, and Javier feels panic rising inside him. No. No way. Santiago couldn’t possibly be that stupid, could he? He was the smartest man Javier knew. He’d never risk her like this… 

Freddy continued when he saw Javi’s confused look. “Yeah, Pena, thats what I thought too!” He said with a laugh that Javier knew was not the good natured ribbing he gave Santi. “You know Candy?”

“Uh, yeah, sounds familiar.” The room was spinning, lights and smoke and colors starting to blur.

“The whore on 7th that lets you play rough? Yeah, her.”

Javier snapped to attention again. “What did you just say?”

“Yeah, I can’t believe it either!” He turns to another man Javier doesn’t have it in him to focus on. “I bet Virgin Maria thinks he’s in love.”

Grabbing him by the shoulder, Javier turned Freddy to him. “What the fuck did you say about Garcia?”

“Relaje, Pena. You call him Pope, different name, same meaning.”

But it wasn’t. Santi was Javi’s friend, Javier cared about him. Javier called him Pope to his face and if he thought it upset him, Javi wouldn’t do it. Freddy and the guys were calling him Virgin Maria behind his back, intending on being assholes. It was meant to hurt, it wasn’t true (Santi wasn’t a virgin even before Candy), it was meant to make a mockery of his good nature, his religion, and his morals. The effeminate name was meant to mock his slight build and stature as well as his passive nature. None of them knew the Santiago that Javier knew. They didn’t know the intelligent, compassionate, incredibly capable young former special opes agent who had saved his life multiple times and had given more break throughs on Lorea than he could could.

“Tell me again what you said about Candy.”

*

Despite the fact everyone was staring at them, you had never seen Santi so happy, so relaxed. He had a few drinks and for his small body it probably left him feeling warm and content. You had opted to stay mostly sober, only drinking one glass of white wine from the open bar; Santiago’s generous and soft smile to the bartender only endeared him to you more. 

He was so much fun like this. You loved the time you spent with him in bed, that was fun too, but you’d also come to genuinely enjoy the moments where he wasn’t making you orgasm on his lips again and again. You genuinely cared when you asked him about his day, and had made a mental note of all the names he mentioned at the precinct that were causing him problems that you recognized. You weren’t sure how without outting him, but you’d figure out some way to fuck with them. One who was a massive dick to him, Freddy, was also a massive dick to you too.

Santi was indulging in a cupcake, telling a story of his friend Benny hitting on a woman only to realize her husband was standing next to her.

“It took me, his brother Will, Fish and Redfly to break the fight up. He still won’t go in that neighborhood anymore!” Santi giggles, taking a bite of the vanilla.

You laugh along; he’s an entertaining story teller. “Did he learn his lesson?”

“No! No! That’s the best part!” Santi said as he waved his hands excitedly. “He immediately, and I mean as soon as we cleaned the blood off his face, went and hit on another girl! And you wanna know the worst part?”

“It worked?”

“It work- how did you know that?”

“Women are easy, Santi.” Swaying to the music, you set his cupcake down. He has frosting on his upper lip, just under where his mustache sat.. “We love our men bloodied.” You pull him in close, eyeing his upper lip for the frosting, but he looks like he’s going for a kiss, and who are you to deny such a handsome man?

“Even when they lose?” He speaks, voice soft and sultry. Santi’s eye flick to your lips, his own push pillows parting to receive you.

“Especially when they lose.” You close the gap, taking his lips in yours and licking your tongue over his sugar-covered upper lip, brushing over his mustache. Sweet, just like him. Your sweet man. 

For a moment, you are lost in him, the sounds of the Jim Croce floating in the air.

'Cause every time I tried to tell you

The words just came out wrong

So I'll have to say I love you in a song’

*

CRASH!

Immediately, at the sound of excitement, Santiago is in front of you, guarding your body with his. He doesn’t move, thinking clearly and assessing the situation; looking for where the danger is at and where the best exit points may be. Keep Candy safe. Keep Candy safe. His only goal was her, keep her away from any narcos, terrorists, freedom fighters or drunken men that might be causing a stir. When the center of the commotion was coming from the north, Santiago took Candy’s hand and began to take her to one of the south exits, a lesser used one with less potential for a second assailant, when he felt her tug away.

“JAVI!” She shouts, running towards the danger in high heels, rust colored skirt fluttering just as her flowy sleeves did.

“CANDY!” Running after her, he catches up with ease without the hindrance of heels. Santi tries to stop her, not wanting her near the drunken brawl, but she is on a single minded mission. Javier was under Freddy, who Santiago did not like, and getting the shit beat out of him. If he had a second more, if his focus wasn’t so on Candy, he would have beat her too it… but Candy was quicker

Santiago watches in surprise as she lifts her skirt, pulling a knife out of her garter, getting behind Freddy and gripping his hair hard, knife to his throat.

Everything was a deadly calm, everyone saying so, so still to not disturb the crazy woman with a knife. When Santi looked to Javier to check if he was okay, he saw Javi looking up at her with his big brown eyes, clearly fucking enamored.

“Freddy, get off of him before I tell everyone the weird shit you’re into.”

The next few minuets were a blur. As soon as Freddy was off Javier and Candy’s knife was off him, he was a big man again and the group began arguing. Santiago couldn’t quite pick up what it was about except “KEEP HIS NAME OUT YOUR FUCKING MOUTH!” From Javi.

They were all three escorted out by security; weapons weren’t allowed at the ball.

Outside the doors, a second argument erupted.

Candy tried to approach Javier. “Javi, baby, are you-” But as her hands reached for his swollen face, the older agent stepped back and turned his attention to his mentee. “Are you fucking stupid, Garcia?!”

Santi and Candy both are taken aback by this, but it’s Candy that speaks first. “Don’t talk to him like that!” 

Javier’s anger is turned back to her. “And you! You should know better than this! Than coming here!”

She rolls her eyes. “Javi. It’s literally a part of my job, I’m an escort.”

“FOR DRUG DEALERS!” Javier shouts, throwing his hands in the air and stumbling back. “Not for YOU!”

“So what, he’s too good for me to take out? Dirty whore like me belongs in dirty nightclubs and dirty crackhouses?”

“Oh for fucks sake THATS NOT WHAT I MEANT!”

Instinctively, Santi places himself slightly in front of Candy. “Tone it down, Pena.”

His icy glare turns condescending as a short, drunk, sardonic laugh escapes him. “HA! Do you think you’re in love, Santiago? Do you think you’ll be the magical man that can ‘save her’? That’s not how this works! You aren’t supposed to be bringing prostitutes to government functions, you absolute IDIOT! And you’re especially not supposed to bring HER!”

“ENOUGH!” Candy shouts at him, eyes flashing in anger. “You don’t get to tell him what he can and can’t do, Javi! And you certainly do not have possession over me! I am not yours! Just because we fuck does not mean you own me, and you don’t get to decide who I sleep with. Like you said, I am a prostitute, one of SEVERAL you frequent, so I wouldn’t be getting too high and mighty about being careful when everyone knows Helena nearly died working for you! I am not yours!”

Javier scoffs. “Oh, and he is? You think he’s your little lover boy, someone to play pretend that you are having a normal relationship with? He’s a scared child, he’s terrified of intimacy and thinks a finger in the ass will send him to hell!”

“Javier, fucking stop it right now.”

“He can’t protect you! He can’t take care of you!”

“Oh, and you can?”

“YES!”

Javier’s shouted words hung in the air, dripping with anger and venom. Santi simply watches, watches them like a scared child watching his parents fight, wishing it would just fucking stop, but it won’t. Not between them. Javier doesn’t back down and Candy isn’t scared of him.

Then, Candy starts to laugh. It’s short little laughs at first but grows louder. “Are you FUCKING KIDDING ME JAVI!” She laughs once more before shaking her head, tugging a bit at her hair as she walks a short circle. Candy shook her head, suddenly calm. “Thunder only happens when it’s raining, players only love you when they’re playing.”

Javi blinked, his voice now noticeably slurred. “What the actual fuck was that.”

Santi stepped up, sliding an arm around Candy’s waist. If she said what she wanted to say, he wanted to guide her away from Javier before he could be more hurtful to her. “It’s from Fleetwood Mac, Javi. You’d know that if you cared enough about her to look into her interests.”

Candy turned to him then, surprised, her soft eyes looking towards him; the hint of a smile on her face.

Javier, however, looked bewildered. “Her interests?You. Are not. DATING HER!”

“I still care about her!” Santiago defended himself. “Just because I’m not a sad slut who can’t emotionally attach to anyone anymore doesn’t mean I treat her like she’s not a person!”

Javier looked like he was about to speak, then shook his head. “This is fucking insane. This is not a Hollywood movie, there is no happy ending here, FUCK YOU GUYS and FUCK THE GODDAMN PRESINCT”

With that, Javier stormed off, angrily mumbling about one thing or another and his broad form shrunk down the street.

It was then Santi felt her begin to shake. Thinking quick, he took off his sports coat and wrapped it around her. “Hey, hey bebita,¿Estás bien?”

“Si” She shook her head a bit, then turned to him with an irritated look “He just really pisses me off sometimes, you know?”

Santi chuckled. “I know. He’s an asshole, let’s not worry about him, okay?” He wrapped his arms around her, and Candy allowed herself to sink into him. Santiago felt her relax, laying her head on him. He was angry, so fucking angry at Javier for the things he said to Candy, the way he spoke to her, it was hurting with jaw with how much he was clenching it… but it was clear Candy was upset too. His feelings didn’t matter, her’s did. He needed to be her man, be her strength, so he pushed his feelings aside.

Through the doors of the ballroom they could still here the live music playing, and he felt Candy gasp as The Eagle’s hit song, Peaceful Easy Feeling, began.

“I love this song…” She whispered, beginning to sway to the music. The stars were out, shining on her. It felt like they shined for her alone.

‘I like the way your sparkling earrings lay

Against your skin, it's so brown’

“I know.” Santi whispered against her skin. “I asked them to play it.” He sang the next line into her skin.

‘Y quiero dormir contigo en el desierto esta noche

Con mil millones de estrellas alrededor’

Candy took her head off him to look into his eyes. Fuck, she was pretty. So so pretty. He wanted her with him all the time, even though he knew it wasn’t possible. He wasn’t in love. Santi wasn’t sure he was capable of romantic love, honestly. He wasn’t sure he was capable of a love that was safe. But whatever he had with Candy right now it was good.

“You requested this song for me?”

‘'Cause I gotta peaceful easy feeling

And I know you won't let me down

'Cause I'm already standing

On the ground’

“Of course I did… wanted to make sure there was music you liked.” Santiago stroked her hair, careful to not mess it up, just enough to feel her. He began to dance with her in earnest.

“You’re the sweetest man I’ve ever met, you know that?”

“And I found out a long time ago

What a woman can do to your soul

Ah, but she can't take you anyway

You don't already know how to go”

Santiago twirled her, making Candy giggle. 

“You listen to Fleetwood Mac?” She asked him through her laughs.

‘And I gotta peaceful easy feeling

And I know you won't let me down

'Cause I'm already standing

On the ground’

He shrugged. “I didn’t until I saw you had three albums, a Fleetwood Mac poster AND a Stevie Nicks poster.”

“So you… just decided to listen?”

“They're clearly important to you.”

He sings to her once again in Spanish

‘Tengo este presentimiento de que te conozco

Como amante y como amiga’

Candy whispers in his ear. “I enjoy our time together. I hope you know that. I do consider you a lover and a friend, Santiago.”

‘But this voice keeps whispering

In my other ear, tells me

I may never see you again’

Santiago believed her, but the ever-presant anxiety inside him told him this was temperary. Don’t feel safe, don’t feel comfortable. You are expendable. You are only loved as long as you are useful. You are only loved as long as you are perfect and good and right all the time. You can never mess up. If you do, WHEN you do, she’ll walk away just like Javi did. Still, he shakes these thoughts off and tries to focus on her. Focus on Candy. 

‘Porque tengo un sentimiento tranquilo y pacifico

Y se que decepcionarás

Porque ya estoy parado

En el suelo’

As the song ended, Santi dipped a giggling Candy down low, admiring the way the dress flowed over her beautiful body.

“Hey Candy, they aren’t gonna let us back in there, wanna hop some shitty bars?”

“I’d like nothing more, Santiago.”

*

Back at his apartment, Candy and Santi giggled their way into his bedroom. A slightly tipsy Santi flopped down on his bed, sighing out a declaration that this was the best night of his life. When he opens his eyes again, he sees you smiling at him. He thinks that he wants to see you in his home more often.

“You look really pretty in that dress, you know that?” Santi says with a love-sick smile plastered all over his face. 

You can’t help but smile back, unable to hamper the little laugh that lightens your chest. He was a bit more tipsy than you’d thought. 

He pouts a little, being overly dramatic on purpose as he leans up on his elbows, his left leg half hanging off the bed as you stand watching him. 

“Don’t laugh.” He pulls a face that has the opposite effect. 

You don’t give him the chance to retort again and poke his foot with your index finger, while you school your face into a mock disapproving scowl. “Shoes on in bed?” You tut, expecting another pout and tease back from him, a shrug and a chorus of ‘Well it’s my bed, I can do whatever I want.’ 

But instead, his eyes widened a little, a small dusting of light pink blossoming over his brown cheeks and nose and highlighting his faint freckles. “S-sorry.” He mumbles quickly, scrabbling up into a sitting position to undo his laces. He’s pulled off one shoe and dropped it carefully to the floor before you even have a chance to register what he’s doing. 

“Hey, hey,” you sit down next to him, your thigh touching his, and stroke your left hand through his curls. They’re a little stiffer than usual from the product he used for the occasion; it hasn’t stopped more than a few rough strands from breaking free though. 

Santi leans into your touch instantly, instinctively closing his eyes and sighing, a weight lifting from his ribs. You wouldn’t be surprised if he started purring. 

“You okay?” You whisper, continuing to run your fingers softly through his hair. 

He nods and hums an affirmative. 

You’re about to ask again, unable to stop yourself from double-checking his well-being. That seed of affection for Santi that first settled in your heart weeks ago has now grown and rooted into your chest, its vines and leaves twisted around your rib cage, seeking out your love like sunlight. 

Just as the words form on your tongue you notice the not-so-subtle bulge in his trousers and bite back a smile. 

Ah.

Not distress. Not panic. Nothing like that at all. Not right now, anyway.

Santi can’t see your expression with his eyes closed. He’s shifted closer, his temple gently against your shoulder as you stroke his hair. He sighs happily, almost dreamily. 

It’s nice to see him like this, relaxed into your touch. He too often seems anxious, worried, worrying about his military friends, worried about Javi, worried about his family although those details remain vague. He’s mentioned his sisters lives in the US, Atlanta she thought, his tia’s he saw so often here, and every now and then a brief mention of his mom but only in passing. You place a soft kiss on his forehead, leaving a faint lipstick stain on his skin and he presses closer to you, nuzzling into the nape of your neck. 

Languidly you run your free hand up his thigh, just tracing your fingers over his crotch before you squeeze. 

The sharp, low moan that escapes his lips is more than worth it, though the gasped word that tumbles out is a bit of a surprise. 

“Mommy,” 

He freezes instantly, his eyes going wide and teeth audibly snapping shut. In less than a second he’s racking his brain, trying to work out how, why, where did that word come from? What deep, dark recess of his mind forced that word to the surface? Something was wrong with him. Something fundamentally wrong with him, deep down in the recesses of his brain. He was fucked up. He was going to hell.

Maybe you hadn’t heard it. Maybe you wouldn’t notice it. But already Santi knew those hopes were a lost cause. The way your hand had tightened momentarily in his hair the second it slipped past his tongue. He’d had a drink, a few drinks- although they’d mostly worn off throughout the night- that was a good enough excuse right? Oh god. What must you think? What would you-

“You’re my good boy, aren’t you?” Your voice was low and sweet, a caress to his very soul and he shivered in spite of himself, moaning again and squeezing his eyes shut as you stroked his painfully hard cock. 

He nodded his head rapidly, not wanting to disappoint you. He’d be good, he’d be so fucking good for you. His breath hot on your neck as he pressed closer, angling his body completely towards you with a soft whimper. 

You continued stroking him for a moment longer, pressing the heel of your palm firmly against his thick base before you unzipped his fly and flicked open his trouser buttons. You always loved this, loved how needy he got, how desperate for you.

Santi groaned loudly, his lips against your neck, half muffling his words against your skin as he squirmed into your touch. 

“Hmm?” You halted your actions teasingly, waiting for him to repeat himself. 

The small sob and bob of his throat nearly broke your resolve, but he pulled his face away from you a fraction to speak. 

“Mommy, please,” he whispered. 

You couldn’t help yourself, it wasn’t like it was the first man to call you ‘mommy’ in bed, but there was something about sweet, innocent Santi who had blushed his way through your first encounter not that long ago speaking that world that set your blood ablaze. 

“Please what?” You teased. 

He squirmed again, bucking helplessly against your hand. “Please?”

“You’re gonna have to use a few more words than that pretty boy, or I won’t be able to help you.”

Santi let out an anguished sigh, pressing his face into your neck once more.

Quickly, you moved your hand away from his weeping cock and firmly pinched his chin between your fingers, pulling him back ever so slightly so that you could look into his dark brown eyes as you title his face up. 

“If you don’t speak, Mommy won’t be able to help you.” 

Santi audibly moaned, his eyes rolling back for a split second before he shut them tight. His dick twitched uncontrollably. 

“Yes, please, sorry, I’ll be good, I’ll be a good boy.” His words were all rushed together and there was a hazy look to his gaze when he opened his eyes again, his Adam's apple bobbing as he swallowed. 

You petted his hair gently. “I know you will be, Mommy’s got you, sweetheart.”

He whimpered, rubbing his thighs together with every word. 

“Now, tell me what you want.” 

“Can I,” he swallowed again, placing his hand on the zip of your dress, “can I undo this?” 

That wasn’t what you expected him to say, and you raised an eyebrow at him lazily as you smiled and nodded. 

Santi let out a little nervous breath before hastily undoing the dress and carefully slipping it off your shoulders and down to your waist. You weren’t wearing a bra.

He held his breath as he gazed at your chest, his left hand hovering just above your skin as he stared with reverence. As if he hadn’t seen you semi-naked many, many times before. 

You stroked his hair again. “You’re such a good buy, aren’t you? Asking for what you need?” You say softly, just to gently break him out of his trance. You did enjoy teasing him, but never for very long. He always listened, always did as he was told, and you were happy to reward him

He nods quickly, never taking his eyes off your breasts. The tip of his tongue pokes out and wets his bottom lip. 

Ever so slowly he leans forward, placing a light, sweet kiss to your lips, the corner of your mouth, your cheek, before trailing down to your neck and collarbone. His kisses get messier, wetter, more urgent the further down he goes and you don’t expect him to pause, panting against your skin. 

He looks up at you with large eyes that send a shudder of heat through your core. “Can I kiss your breasts… mommy?” He adds the name shyly, looking down momentarily so that his eyelashes flutter against his cheeks. 

You keep stroking his hair as you nod, hooking your fingers around the nape of his neck and guiding him towards your chest. He takes the small movement and runs with it instantly, surging forward and covering your breasts in desperate, wet kisses. Switching back and forth between them constantly as if he simply had to lavish each with the exact same amount of attention. He moans as he lightly bites and sucks, his hands digging into your skin as he holds onto you for dear life. 

You press him closer, urging him on by digging your fingers into his curls and scratching your nails along his scalp. He rewards you with another muffled groan, the vibrations reverberating along your skin and sending a shiver of pleasure down your spine. 

Santi pushes closer, the force nearly knocking you onto your back as he latches onto your left nipple. You brace your right hand on the bed behind you so that you can keep your balance. 

“Such a good boy Santi.” You whisper and he whines, looking up at you once with lazy, lust-blown eyes as he keeps his mouth against you. He sucks demandingly, the sensation almost bordering on too much, but still somehow not enough, and swirls his tongue around your nipple before lapping at it and starting the process all over again. His hips are bucking desperately, but he doesn’t dare ask for attention. He knows you’ll take care of him. You always will.

He sighs, shifting, simultaneously trying to get something and not knowing what he wants at the same time. 

You know what he needs though. 

You coo at him, soothing and sweet as you pull in closer into your arms, cradling his head as you gently ease him into your lap. He moans so loudly, the sound quickly becoming a whine in his throat as you embrace him.

For a few seconds, he seems to relax into you, all the stress of the day and previous weeks and months draining from his soul and bones as he gently sucks. But then he starts to squirm, his thighs shaking and stomach muscles tensing. He pulls his mouth off of you with a pop and low, desperate groan. His eyes shut tight and eyebrows knitted together as he whines and presses his forehead against your skin.

“Gonna cum.” At the very back of his mind he has a sense that he should be embarrassed, embarrassed that he’s this far gone and going to cum practically untouched. But he can’t fight the pleasure as it bubbles up his spine, doesn’t want to. 

“You can cum Santi,” you whisper in his ear. “You’re such a good boy, cum for Mommy.” 

He shakes his head, unsure why, tears at the very corners of his eyes, “please.”

“It’s okay,” you soothe, holding him tight and kissing his temple. “I’m here.” 

He moans loudly, latching back onto your breast and sucking for all he’s worth.

“Mommy’s here.” 

He groans again, pulling away a fraction to get his words out. His voice is breath and high. “Want Mommy to cum.” 

The pleading in his voice spikes at the throbbing arousal in your core. “Santi, it’s okay-”

His whine is muffled against your chest as he reaches down, sliding his hands between your legs to caress your body the way he knows you like. You’d taught him exactly how you want to be touched, exactly how you touch yourself. He was an eager learner.

“Santi,” you manage to breathe out through his messy desperate kisses. 

“Mommy needs to cum now please,” he murmurs, his speech slurred against your tongue, 

Your breath catches, thighs squirming as he strokes you, the movements soft but sure. It only takes an embarrassingly short time before you’re moaning into his mouth and tensing as your release overtakes you in a rush. 

When it’s clear you’ve cum, he tenses, his orgasm following through him and bursting behind his eyes. His cock throbs as he empties himself into his pants. You smile softly at his face as his forehead pinches in bliss, your hand still stroking his hair. 

There’s a pause, a small moment of quiet just before he sighs deeply, feeling weak and boneless. And then he looks up at you with his dark, dark eyes. The softness, the relief, the adoration… the sleepiness. 

“So good, Santiago… you’re so good. My perfect boy…”

Santi sighs against your skin, relishing in the tender moment as you play with his hair. “Was that weird?” He mumbles into your skin.

“Noooo, no not at all. It’s very common, actually.”

He looks up at you through heavy lids and suspicious eyes. “Really?”

“Oooooh yeah.” You chuckle. “More often than you think. I’m not here to judge anyone.”

He doesn’t seem convinced, but he seems to relax. “Okay. Yeah. Okay.”

You opt to not talk about it anymore, at least for the time being. He’s so tired right now, coming hard and untouched, and you decide it’s time to put him to bed. By the time you lay him from your lap to his pillow, he’s half asleep, so you opt with minimal dress. Gentle, you unbutton his shirt and slowly, carefully slide his shirt off. When you take off his trousers and underwear fully, you replace them with sweats. You think he’s asleep, breathing slowly and eyes closed. He looks positively angelic. When your getting ready to zip up your dress again, and make your exit, you hear his voice once more.

“Stay the night?”

You sigh. “Santi, I dunno if that’s a good idea…”

His eyes open slightly, just enough so you can see him. “Please, I’ll pay you whatever you want, I just don’t want tonight to end…”

He looks so vulnerable in this moment… and you don’t want this night to end either. Rules be damned. Santi was different. Santi was better. Santi was good. And you?  You deserved some damn good.

“Don’t pay me, I’ll stay.”

Santiago sits up ever so slightly. “No, no Candy this is your job. I don’t expect free-”

“It’s not free, honey.” You begin to strip down, Santi’s sleepy eyes drifting down your naked body, staring at the knife at your garter. “We’re going to sleep, just like I would at home. And tomorrow, you’ll make me breakfast. Sound like a fair trade?” The truth was, sleeping with Santi, actually sleeping with Santi, sounded wonderful. You didn’t want it to feel like a transaction. 

So, you slip into his clothes. You wear a tee shirt and sweats and climb into his bed where you think he’s actually asleep this time. He snores lightly. He sleeps on his stomach, so you rub his back. He feels nice. 

You want better for him. You want him to have a stable life, a loving wife who wasn’t a whore, kids if he wanted them, his family and friends surrounding him. He should have to live in danger, work a dangerous job. He should be allowed to be happy. It wasn’t a life you could give him, you knew… but you could imagine.

You kiss the scar on his spine.

******************

THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU for reading!!!!

If you're still hear, please drop a lil HI! It's 12 pm here, inching towards 1 but i promised to put this out so i will!!!

Everyone PLEASE GIVE A ROUND OF APPLOUSE FOR FEN FOR THE SMUT IN THE COMMENTS AND REBLOGS SO I CAN MAKE SURE THEY SEE ALL THE LOVE

I hope everyone is saying as safe as they can be in these temps, my heart goes out to all those struggling but especially those in war zones, poverty, homelessness, or in areas that were previously never this cold and thus unprepared for a harsh winter. I know us northerners joke about how cold we get, but I know its different when your infrastructure isnt equipped to take this on.

So tell me friends

Did Javier have a reason to be mad at Santi?

Or was he overreacting?

TELL ME YOUR THOUGHTS ON THE ARGUEMENT AND YOUR THOTS ON OUR DEAR SANTI

@runa-falls @lunar-ghoulie @campingwiththecharmings @whatthefishh @persephone-girl @criticalarchitecture @not-a-unique-snowflake-blog @beelzebeth87 @pimosworld @millerscoffee @heareball @thatwonderouswoman @poolb @meveispunk @lovable-liar @millllenniawrites @read-and-wip @missdictatorme @the-fox-den @milkymoon2483 @k-ra @ramblers-lets-get-ramblin @rosellacwrites @legendary-pink-dot @dreamingofbucky @englandsgray @starsthatwatch @fairlyang @alwaysmicado @theywhowriteandknowthings @casa-boiardi @lostfleurs @ninebluehearts @puglover12 @sub-aro @laiisleiite @itspdameronthings @heareball @comfortlessjoy @csarab615 @calaveramangonda @bit-dodgy-innit @stevngrant @kirsteng42 @mrsjavierp @nanfafnan @lovable-liar @axshadows @cookielovesbook-akie @reallyrallyauthor @solar-fics @criticalarchitecture

#javier peña x reader #javier peña #triple frontier #santiago garcia #santiago garcia reader #fem reader #santiago garcia x reader #santiago garcia x you #santiago garcia smut #santiago pope garcia #javier peña smut #narcos #pedro pascal #oscar isaac #romana writes #romana writes smut #narcos fanfiction #narcos smut #triple frontier smut #pedro pascal smut #latina reader #santiago garcia x javier pena #javier pena x santiago garcia #latina!reader #m/m fanfic

[spooksier]

happy birthday steven you mentally ill son of a bitch‼️

#art zone #fanart #steven universe #su #suf #corruption scars steven my beloved

[kendrixtermina]

Thoughts and Feelings about“Change Your Mind”

I really wish I could rewatch this motherfucker somewhere but I have to sleep and go to work 

Well on the one hand the main story lines are pretty much done for, on the other, the fallout alone could fill another season, and I’m actually glad that they’re not relegating that to the epilogue but actually going to show it

I assume season 5 will be Steven working with the Diamonds to improve homeworld, explaining things to Jasper, integrating the former corrupted gems on earth, finding out the deal with pink pearl, further developing Steven’s new fusions etc. 

Other open questions involve gem origins and peridot’s renewable energy project, but I suppose that will come up as Steven tries to make the Empire less... imperialistic. 

I understand why they wanted to air this in one piece, you couldn’t leave the younger viewers hanging with some of these creepytastic scenes and no resolution

There’s various concepts I feel reminded of. 

There’s this idea of “tzimtsum” in kaballalistic thought, about how God created the world - In order to create a being apart from himself, he “hid” some aspects of the being, the ones that would seem - So every part of creation reflects one aspect of god, but none shows the complete pictures of it, and because everything has some aspects of god but not others, it is unique - so all humans are made in gods image, but still be different from each other.  

Maybe Pink Diamond would be something like Lucifer in this analogy, part of the creation but as far from the god as you can get while still existing, and somehow their antithesis (stretching the analogy here, of course Judaism has no counterpart to Lucifer let alone the positive-ish early modernity interpretions of him - but of course, White Diamond isn’t exactly a benevolent God either. )

First of course Star Trek, like the ep where Captain Kirk is split into what at first seems like his good and evil half but is more like his animal instincts and higher reasoning, or in Voyager, when B’Elana Torres is split into her human and Klingon halves. 

I guess Garnet wasn’t completely wrong in his being something in-between fusion and human reproduction, his gem half could be considered A Pink Diamond, but not the same one who created him - He must be fricking powerful to shrug off WD’s beams like that, like how Stevonnie still has “boosted” versions of Steven’s abilities despite Connie being human, Steven’s probably like Pink Diamond, but ‘boosted’.  

Steven’s victory certainly showcases how it comes from both sides of his heritage. It involves making WD laugh/embarassed like what Pink used to do, but unlike her, he has the communication skills from Greg - I don’t think Pink ever talked to Blue in that way, she didn’t seem aware of what the other Diamonds were thinking at all, any more than she really understood Pearl’s lingering knot of complexes. It’s just not a skill she could have picked up before Greg - when? From whom?  

His responsibility is all uniquely him and due to his upbringing with the CG’s and wanting to help him more, tho, both his parents where free spirit hippy bohemians, but it was Steven who decided “Nope, I WANT to fix it, because I can”, not because he owes it to anybody, even when no one could fault him for running. 

Also, Frankenstein (the Novel not the film) - The original Victor was a sympathetic, even admirable character, but somehow he just couldn’t bring himself to have empathy with the monster, though Adam was in many ways alike to him and initially didn’t wish to be his enemy.  Because while the gems relate to White Diamond as their goddess and the other Diamonds see her as their mother, she seems to regard them as extensions of herself. Maybe she would, as their creator. Gods are expected to smile benevolently upon their followers and solve their problems, Mothers, while they are flawed humans,  are supposed to love their kids as they are and realize that they become their own persons, but artists frequently tear up their own work if they’re dissatisfied with it, because it’s supposed to be a reflection of their existence, so they might hate it for not reflecting them well enough - 

i often regret tearing up half my teenage fanfics, but I’m able to view them different now that I’m - Back then, I felt like they reflectzed badly onto me - but if had kids and treated them like my fanfics or crumpled drawings, well, that would scar them for life. 

You could certainly see this as a metaphor for narcissism, particularly in the way WD judged everything by how much it was like her, to the point that she would ‘overwrite`’ ppl’s personalities with her ideas of how it ought to be, while lacking a solid identity of her own apart from being “perfect/the best” by default, but that only goes so far because the gems literally are her creations who take their characteristics from various aspects of her being. 

She’d have a completely different conceptual framework to anyone else, though she’s certainly not “above it” in any way. 

I don’t think she was completely unaffected by Pink’s dissapearence either, if you want to complete the Stages of Grief analogy she would be Denial or Bargaining. Most likely,  she was growing increasingly frustrated with her ability to make her empire “perfect” like she ought to and that’s why she started keeping to herself more and assuming that Pink couldn’t be dead. 

She seemed like the knowing one when she was as much in denial as anyone else - you can tell they had a complicated relationship because of how White saw herself in her, that might be why she indulged and preferred her, but then again she didn’t always like what she saw and felt that Pink represented parts of her that she didn’t want to see. 

It’s not without reason that Steven tells her to “get out of her own head” and try to see the world for what it is rather than her preconceived notions of what it is or means. You could perhaps relate that to 

When she realizes that she’s actually dead - that’s when she has her breakdown. 

You could even draw a parallel to “Romeo And Juliet”, where the older generation only realizes how much its ways were fucked up when it gets their beloved children killed for just trying to live happy lives. 

Cal Gustav Jung would certainly remind us that what irritates us about others are often things that irritate us about ourselves, that we may be liable to “see the world as we are” and never is that more apparent than when we view everything through some skewed belief system, or when we hate - people hate people who blur boundaries because they don’t want to confront the ambiguity within themselves, or act as “superior” and merciless because they’ve rejected their own mortal fragile humanity.

Another observation is that when you set up anything as the “default” you create pressure not to deviate from the norm and prevent its members from experiencing their individuality. (see societal pressure on heterosexual men, or Euro-Americans saying they ‘have no culture to celebrate’ - maybe instead of becoming a devouring plague upon your fellow men, you could actually appreciate European culture? Like, read some books, eat some cheese, learn a language, listen to some classical music, vote for worker protection laws?)

It speaks for PD that she even tried to save other aliens at some point. steven stepped completely out of her shadow the moment he was able to feel sorry for her, like “Geez, she had to live like that? No wonder she turned out the way she did!” he pretty much calls the other Diamonds out at some point, like he gets a secure sense of the differences between them when he realizes how much better off he’s been in his own life. Like, UGH. 

For my part, I don’t believe the “best of the worst” thing was true, and more of an “evil cannot comprehend good” moment from White, if not outright projection. (after all, White seems to view all other Gems as imperfect copies of herself) If anything, Pink seemed upset that she got stuck being the leader even as “Rose Quartz” (see the Beach scene in “Greg the babysitter”) - but of course Steven, not being Pink, wouldn’t know whether or not White is right. 

Other Thoughts:

In the earlier scenes you could see a lot of parallels to less than ideal family situations, and how people might end up acting as proxies of the problematic person, almost sprouting their words, in the name of keeping the peace, and how people in such an environment may have no idea of how it’s not normal

You CAN talk down such a person (I know of multiple people who made a bona fide job out of talking sense into literal nazis and clansmen, person by person - their tactic was generally to find whatever problem their rage came from), but there’s a difference between “flawed” and “awful” and I do think it came through that White is a piece of work quite unlike, say, Connie’s mother, and that Steven’s dealing with her because he wants to for the good of society, because he’s the bigger person and secure in himself,  not because he owes it to her or anything

It seems like they went for “awesome” rather than “beautiful” with Steven’s fusions. The designs are kinda gaudy, but even so, once you getpast the gaudy design, it’s kind of touching how Steven’s and Garnet’s fusion is essentially a motivational speaker who sprouts encouraging advice nonstop. Garnet was always Steven’s Mentor and  as well as the main person (besides greg) to teach him morals, as well as generally encouraging & supportive, but Steven of course encourages and supports her too, and both like doing that for others

I love Peridot’s short shorts and that she and Bismuth repaired the ships/ went a-tinkering together. It took me a bit to notice that it’s supposed to be shorts and not just her old outfit with starts instead tho

Voice of Reason!Connieis a gift that keeps on giving

#steven universe #su spoilers #change your mind

[ridleytheknight]

It’s Over, Isn’t It? (Langst Song-fic)

Here it is! An Altean Lance songfic! The song in this fic is it’s over isn’t it from the Steven Universe fandom! The verison I listen to varies between NWTB and another youtuber who I can’t find in anything but AMVs! Either way! Thank you to @angielmao-blog for being my beta on this little one-shot and I hope you all enjoy! Warnings this fic include.

Corruption

Murder

Treason

Emotional Dependence

Child Neglect

Experimentation

Non-con Body Modifications

Please Enjoy!!!

---

I was fine, with the men

Who would come into her life now and again

He watched with calm eyes as Zarkon walked out of his mother’s room once again, adjusting his military outfit with hearts in his eyes. Lance blinked with his owlish eyes and looked away, the orange marks on his cheeks and his arms flaring and glowing a little more brightly before Lance calmed the flare of magic with deep breathes. Clenching his small childish fists as if the pressure and slight pain of the tight grip would help. Lance bit his lip and ignoring the sinking feeling in his stomach.

            He always knew his mother was beautiful, that she’d find a man other than his father. He was fine with it too. She deserved to have someone, but there was something that itched at Lance, like a bad itch that you couldn’t figure out where it was or why. Something bothered him about Zarkon. Something in his soul tugged at Lance’s magic, the quintessence manipulation of water. An element that often offer shields and protection, as well as projected a dangerous drowning wave or shots of ice that could pierce the hardest shield and leave nothing behind.

Lance pushed the feeling back as his mother came out of her room, bun in perfect place, a smile directed right at him as she approached where he sat, playing with his sketchbook and the magic in his hands. Looking up and letting his mother grab him and hoist him onto her hip. Their beloved family cat traipsing at the heels of the mother and son. The brown haired Altean closed his orange-gold eyes relaxed.

Trust, he trusted her. He loved her. So he’d let her be happy and not say a word.

After all, he knew that she would always be his no matter what.

And that’s all the mattered, isn’t it?

I was fine, because I knew;

 that it didn’t really matter until you

Lance was never a jealous person per say. However, when his mother got pregnant with another child, Zarkon’s child, His new step-father's child. Lance could not help the sinking feeling in his stomach. The turning of the tides in his body, warning him that everything was going to change, and maybe not for the better. Jealousy and envy flooded his veins like a poison. But Lance fought back against it.

He loved her. He loved his mother. She was his, and he was hers.

And that’s all the mattered isn’t it?

I was fine, when you came;

And we fought like it was all some silly game

Smiling and laughing, begging to hold his new baby brother. Being met with a motherly smile as he got to hold his baby brother, Lotor, for the first time. Lance decided then that he was going to be a good big brother, lead and show his sibling the way.

 The brown haired boy still clung to that thought years later as Lotor waddled from him to his mother with a wide smile and running to his mother. Who grinned at the sight of the toddler, lifting him into her arms and nuzzling his hair like she’d done to Lance once upon a time. Causing that burning feeling to rise up and threaten to eat and chew at his morals and personality again. Chewing as if it were trying to turn him into the monster it was, but he pressed it back again. Smiling with burning eyes as his mother barely blinked at him, preoccupied with Lotor who demanded the all attention his three year old body could muster.

She was happy.

And that’s all that mattered, isn’t it?

Over her, who’d she choose;

After all those years I never thought I’d lose.

Lance watched with misty eyes from a distance as his mother showed his baby brother around the empire, to the lions and the labs, showing him all that would be under his watchful eye one day. He was her pick for filling in her spot. He was her favorite.

It wasn't Lance. Not anymore.

Closing his eyes, memories of when his mother smiled at him like that washed over him. Her proud eyes and bright smile, gentle hands cradling him close, cuddling him. The happiness in her eyes when she looked at him.

Now, she still smiled, still kissed his head, but her eyes were on Lotor the whole time. As if she pictured showing affection to his brother rather than him. His brother basking in the attention with a smug smile. Showing that he would always be the favorite of both their ‘parents’. That he was no one’s favorite. He was no longer the perfect son. He wasn’t the idol big brother now. He wasn’t anything in the eyes of King Alfor. He wasn’t anything to anyone.

Not even his own father had wanted him. He left Lance.

But, she was happy, smiling with a new husband and a better son. One that didn’t remind her of what she’d lost. Grinning as she showed him the beautiful sights that she and Lance had once shared. They were probably still beautiful to her, but now as Lance walked to thise same sights, alone, going to draw them with his sketchbook. They only looked dull and dead.

Was this life without her?

Oh well, she was in love. She was happy.

Lance wasn’t happy, but the embrace of loneliness and depression kept him company.

She was happy.

And that’s all that mattered, isn’t it?

It’s over, isn’t it? Isn’t it?

Isn’t it, over?

The memories of family dinners and happiness washed over Lance as he now sat at the age of twelve, In a dim dark hallway of a ship. Dark black and grey with harsh purple lighting, not like the warm and light of his home.

Altea was gone. Dead. His step-father had destroyed it as he watched. Able to help, but doing nothing. As helpless as a child as he watched everything he had ever known and loved get blown to dust and die. Everything he had ever seen.

The dull but familiar sights. His house on the corner.

What did it matter anymore?

You won, and she chose you;

And she loved you, now she’s gone.

Now she was gone. His mother. Replaced with a husk that Lance couldn’t even recognize, he didn’t even know her anymore. Not after what Zarkon had done to keep her alive. Now her hair hung in white shambles, her marks running down her face like blood red tears. It made Lance’s own marks glow in slight pain. Those marks that used to match his were now only a show of her suffering. His heart ached and the storm of the ocean raged in him. She disregarded him. She still favored Lotor and the man who ruined her.

Gone. His mother was truly gone. Not happy. Gone.

He didn’t know how to feel, because now he was truly and completely alone.

It made suffering so much worse.

What did any of this matter anymore?

War and Glory,

Reinvention,

The war raged on for years, thousands of them. And yet, Lance never grew old. His mother had changed and was gone, but there was some part of her that still held on. He guessed. Why else would he wake up strapped to a metal table so often, Pure quintessence shot up, burning and eating him alive like the jealousy of so long ago. The only difference being this pain was real and his mother listened to him scream with a sick grin and a gleam in her eyes.

Not a flash of the woman she had once been.

The woman he’d loved fiercely.

            Now, was his fear.

            Yet, he still loved her.

 Lance couldn’t talk much, he guessed, he’d changed as well. His marks were dull against his skin, the magic in his veins was heavy, but he refused to use it. He grew quiet and cynical. No longer the one to joke, smile, and be happy. The only way that Lance recognized himself was in old photographs and the sketches he would make of planets before Zarkon and his mother would leave them in ruin.

 Blood strew over the grounds that Lance would walk, Glory of the Galran empire to every planet. He received the glares of pity, curiousity, or disgust as he’d walk without blinking at the gore. He’d seen to much of it to care. He was the only Altean left that was not a druid. He was the one they blamed. A traitor to the people he loved. Defecting to the people who killed his planet.

They didn’t understand who he was.

They didn’t care.

No one did. Not even himself anymore.

He was a husk now too.

Nothing mattered.

Fusion, Freedom

Her attention.

            Soon, Lance started welcoming the pain of the metal table. His mind twisting the pain to pleasure. After all, when he was being cut open, stabbed and prodded, he had her attention at last. Even as his body convulsed and screamed in pain. When his vision would swim and his marks would flash colors that were not his own to the curiosity and amusement of the witch that had once been his mother.

            Finally, he felt free of the confusion. He knew who he was now. He was her son again.

The pain did not matter.

She was pleased with him.

            And that’s all the mattered, isn’t it?

Out in daylight, my potential

Bold; Precise. Experimental.

He was her experiment now, was that close to be a son? Lance didn’t know anymore, he didn’t recognize anything anymore. The honey gold and orange of his eyes and marks replaced with a glaring red that bled into purples and indigos, turning fully black at times. The gentle waves and tides of the sea in his being turned from the moods of the ocean to a poison filled lake. Burning acidic toxin flooding his vein. Burning away any feeling of guilty of sick turning of his stomach as his magic would shoot down so many locals. Sins splayed out in the plain day light as his magic boldly shoot from his skin. Contrasting his tan skin and scars. Precise edges and lifts to his magic. Shots of quintessence.

Now his magic was not water, it was heavy like liquid metal in his veins. Dark black. Forming harsh edges that cut and stabbed through beauty without hesitation. 

Dark. Dirty. Heavy. Angry. Black. Hatred. 

The magic rejected its new form. Spilling out of control. It wasn’t his magic. This wasn’t him. He knew this. His mind tried to steer him to her, but his heart knew this was not the ocean. He had failed.

Shocking hands and electric currents as an experiment failed. Losing control and killing so many people out of his mind. Up. Down. Left. Right. Who was he? Who was he? Where was Lance? The magic burned. He screamed. It was pain. Who was he? Where was the boy who was Honerva’s son? Where was the Altean boy he once was? Where was the calming ocean that once surrounded his broken soul with comfort?

            What could the ocean do for his heavy dirty soul now?

He was only Haggar’s experiment now.

That’s all he mattered to her.

Even as she forced him to take a human form, hiding his marks, his ears, telling him to gain information. Infiltrate into the planet, and abandoning him on the planet’s surface. No way to call home. He was useless to her, a failed experiment now that his magic was so frazzled with confusion and sick thoughts, tainted and unyielding. Out of control.

He was alone again. No attention. No love.

Who am I now in this world without her?

Petty and dull, with the nerve to doubt her.

Had he ever been meant to report information back to her? Or had this been a set up? Had she just abandoned him? Her useless experiment. A failure that she didn’t think was worthy of her time to even kill. What was he anymore? Who was he?

The thoughts felt sick in his mind. Was this who he was anymore? Without his original mother. 

Petty. Angry. Negative. Cynical. 

With the gall to doubt her, his mother, the one that had been his idol. He was supposed to always love her. He was supposed to never leave her. He was supposed to not be like his father. Now, she was the one who left.

Why him?

Why does it matter?

What does it matter? It’s already done.

Now I’ve got to be there, for her son.

That question entered his mind a lot now, as he sat alone on an Earthen beach. The waves lapped at his ankles of his new ‘home’ the earthen family happy to take him in. It had surprised him. That the humans were so warm. So eager to take him in. So loving to a person they had never met.

It made Lance feel sick. He was a shitty excuse for a son. He was worthless. Yet this family. They wanted to call him their son. They wanted to give him their family name, and to show him love. The love that the old version of him, the one that still hid from the poison, craved. Lance felt weak to it. Too weak to fight it, too done.

            Accepting it felt so much better. Sitting in the love of a family. In the ocean tides. Lance was surprised as his eyes finally faded from purple when he experimentally released the lock on his magic. No. His eyes were not the honey gold color anymore. They were blue instead. Like the earth’s ocean, and Lance could feel the sea of his home roaring in his veins once again. Love attacking the sickness in him. The poison bleeding out like blood and killing the evil person within.

Honerva’s son was back. 

Honerva was gone now. Ruined and changed by hatred. No matter what Lance’s old illusions had been. She was gone. Now, he had to be strong for her memory. He had to be there for himself. He had to be the son she loved when she still lived.

He had to be Lance.

Loving. Caring. Child of the sea.

            And that’s what mattered now.

It’s over, isn’t it?

Why can’t I move on?

Accepting it was easy on earth. But now that he’d left those safe ocean waves. Lance feared. Feared being corrupted by quintessence once more without the earth to ground him. Feared that his family would change their minds about him in his absence. Yet, the other humans aboard the ship always soothed him. Lance, he smiled with Hunk, joked with Pidge, fought with Keith, stood proud for Shiro, and spoke with Coran. Yet, Lance hid from Allura. Hid who he was once he found out they were fighting the people he’d once been a part of. The experiment of. This was both his redemption and his hell. Lance didn’t know what he’d do if he were faced with the choice.

His mother. Or his family.

Why would the universe make him choose?

He was just a boy. Just an Altean boy. He wasn’t anything special.

That’s why the ocean in him stirred in this battle. The feeling of a foreboding doom rushing over him in waves. His magic was restrained, he refused to show or use it with his friends. They could not know. They could not fear him. He vowed to protect the planet that had returned the sea to him. Protect the family that returned him to himself.

But here he was now. She loomed in front of them, and he was the only one even slightly coherent. Standing with a gun to her. Perfect for vengeance. For Shiro. For his team. For his planet. More selfishly.

For abandoning him. For hurting him. For using him.

Yet, He still loved her.

That’s why, he couldn’t pull the trigger. That's why he only stood still frozen in shock as his teammates screamed at him to duck. That's why he only stood still as his magic pierced through him. Ocean waves rolling in anguish. His magic was to protect and to harm whatever threatened him or his loved ones.

But now, the one woman he loved. Was going to kill him.

The ocean could do nothing but grieve.

It was so fast. Her magic shot through him. A hole through his abdomen, and he stumbled. Her magic shot to try and grab Shiro, who was running to Lance’s fallen form. And his magic exploded, reacted immediately. Without permission. Bursting from him with a shot. Stabbing icicles. And she screamed. Falling to the floor with a wail as Lance himself was tackled, too late, to the floor by Shiro. Shiro immediately hovering over him in shock as Lance’s form settled in its natural skin. He felt the tingling of his glowing marks.

Shiro called out to him. Shouted his name, pressed a hand on the wound his magic was already working to clot and restore. Whispering reassurances as the team ran, either to support him, or to get a med pod ready. Allura standing over him, a hand over her mouth as she stared at him in shock. Lance caught a glimpse of himself in Shiro’s visor and stared for a second in shock.

Right there, was Honerva’s son. Honey gold eyes, orange and gold like the sun. Markings and tan skin glowing with pride, magic, potential, and happiness. Lance gave a wobbly grin and his eyes started streaming tears. He recognized himself again, but at what price, the grief of killing his mother? The blood on his hands?

Lance closed his eyes, his happy tears turning into tears of grief as the pain of both his injury and the death of his mother, and the realization that Allura now knew. Orange marking were rare. She knew who he was. She knew what he had done.

But he was not Haggar’s son.

He was Honerva’s son. Haggar killed Honerva. Now he killed Haggar.

It was over. Wasn’t it?

Isn’t it over finally?

Yet, the memories don’t stop. Lance still misses home. Lance still had a new home. Lance was Lance again. He was her son. And she was alive in him again. And yet the pain of a once closed wound was open again with the death of her body ripping open the closure he’d fought so hard for the first time she died of soul.

It hurt, but that didn’t matter.

He was cradled in the arms of his family. Any scorn they could throw at him. He could take with the memory of their warmth. Her warmth. Their rejection and hers was something he’d never accept, but they weren’t rejecting him. They were holding him. Begging for him to hold on.

She rejected him. She didn’t love him. Not like Honerva. Because she wasn’t her.

Why does it still hurt?

It’s over, isn’t it?

Why can’t I move on?

#Lance #lance whump #langst #lance centric #songfic #experimentation #manipulation #corruption #murder #altean Lance #starling archive

[victoriagloverstuff]

40 of the Best Villains in Literature

Villains are the best. We may not love them in our lives, but they’re often the best part of our literature—on account of their clear power, their refusal of social norms, and most importantly, their ability to make stories happen. After all, if everyone was always nice and good and honest all the time, literature probably wouldn’t even exist.

To that end, below are a few of my favorites from the wide world of literary villainy. But what exactly does “best” mean when it comes to bad guys (and gals)? Well, it might mean any number of things here: most actually terrifying, or most compelling, or most well-written, or most secretly beloved by readers who know they are supposed to be rooting for the white hats but just can’t help it. It simply depends on the villain. Think of these as noteworthy villains, if it clarifies things.

This is not an exhaustive list, of course, and you are more than invited to nominate your own favorite evildoers in the comments section. By the way, for those of you who think that great books can be spoiled—some of them might be below. After all, the most villainous often take quite a few pages to fully reveal themselves.

Mitsuko, Quicksand, Junichiro Tanizaki

The brilliance of Mitsuko (and the brilliance of this novel) is such that, even by the end, you’re not sure how much to despise her. She is such an expert manipulator, such a re-threader of the truth, that she is able to seduce everyone in her path (read: not only Sonoko but Sonoko’s husband) and get them to like it. Including the reader, of course. In the end, Sonoko is still so devoted to her that the grand tragedy of her life is the fact that Mitsu did not allow her to die alongside her.

Mr. Hyde, The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Robert Louis Stevenson

Because the very worst villain is . . . get this . . . actually inside you. Also, you just fell asleep one time and when you woke up it was your evil id and not you? We’ve heard that one before. (So has Buffy.)

Infertility, The Children of Men, P. D. James

Sure, Xan is also a villain in this novel. But the real, big-picture villain, the thing that causes everything to dissolve, and people to start christening their kittens and pushing them around in prams, has to be the global disease that left all the men on earth infertile.

The shark, Jaws, Peter Benchley

A villain so villainous that (with the help of Steven Spielberg) it spawned a wave of shark paranoia among beach-goers. In fact, Benchley, who also wrote the screenplay for the film, was so horrified at the cultural response to his work that he became a shark conservationist later in life.

The kid, The Giving Tree, Shel Silverstein

Take, take, take. This kid is the actual worst.

Professor Moriarty, “The Final Problem,” Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

A criminal mastermind— “the Napoleon of Crime,” as Holmes puts it—and the only person to ever give the good consulting detective any real trouble (other than himself). Though after countless adaptations, we now think of Moriarty as Holmes’s main enemy, Doyle really only invented him as a means to kill his hero, and he isn’t otherwise prominent in the series. Moriarty has become bigger than Moriarty.

Mrs. Danvers, Rebecca, Daphne du Maurier

The housekeeper so devoted to her dead ex-mistress that she’s determined to keep her memory alive—by goading her boss’s new wife to jump out of the window to her death. That’s one way to do it, I suppose.

Vanity, The Picture of Dorian Gray, Oscar Wilde

You could argue that it’s Harry who corrupts Dorian, and James who stalks and tries to murder him, but the real source of all this young hedonist’s problems is his own self-obsession. Sometimes I like to think about what this novel would be like if someone wrote it today, with Dorian as a social media star. . .

Uriah Heep, David Copperfield, Charles Dickens

Few villains are quite so aggressively ugly as Uriah Heep (even the name! Dickens did not go in much for subtlety). When we first meet him, he is described as a “cadaverous” man, “who had hardly any eyebrows, and no eyelashes, and eyes of a red-brown, so unsheltered and unshaded, that I remember wondering how he went to sleep. He was high-shouldered and bony; dressed in decent black, with a white wisp of a neckcloth; buttoned up to the throat; and had a long, lank, skeleton hand.” Some Dickens scholars apparently think that Heep was based on Hans Christian Andersen, in which case, mega burn—unless Andersen was into heavy metal.

The Grand Witch, The Witches, Roald Dahl

As “the most evil woman in creation,” she is on a mission to torture and kill as many children as possible, and often uses murder as a focusing device in meetings. She’s also kind of brilliant—I mean, murdering children by turning them into animals their parents want to exterminate? I have to say, that’s smart.

Cathy Ames, East of Eden, John Steinbeck

Cathy Ames is cold as ice—a sociopath who had to learn as a child how to mimic feelings to get by—but soon also learns how easy it is to manipulate, destroy lives, and murder people to amuse herself. Apparently all this is available to her because of her remarkable beauty. In the end, she has a single feeling of remorse and promptly kills herself.

Mr. Rochester, Jane Eyre, Charlotte Brontë

That’s right, I said it. Mired in self-pity! Sullen and annoying! Dresses up as a gypsy to mess with Jane’s mind! Keeps his first wife locked in the attic! Thinks he can marry a nice girl like Jane anyway! Gaslights her constantly! Whatever.

Zenia, The Robber Bride, Margaret Atwood

In Atwood’s retelling of the Grimm fairy tale “The Robber Bridegroom,” an evil temptress named Zenia steals the partners of three women (among many, one presumes). Roz, Charis, and Tony, however, use their mutual hurt and hatred to form a friendship—and unpack the many lies and revisions of herself Zenia has offered to each of them. But I can’t really put it better than Lorrie Moore did in a 1993 review of the novel:

Oddly, for all her inscrutable evil, Zenia is what drives this book: she is impossibly, fantastically bad. She is pure theater, pure plot. She is Richard III with breast implants. She is Iago in a miniskirt. She manipulates and exploits all the vanities and childhood scars of her friends (wounds left by neglectful mothers, an abusive uncle, absent dads); she grabs at intimacies and worms her way into their comfortable lives, then starts swinging a pickax. She mobilizes all the wily and beguiling art of seduction and ingratiation, which she has been able to use on men, and she directs it at women as well. She is an autoimmune disorder. She is viral, self-mutating, opportunistic (the narrative discusses her in conjunction with AIDS, salmonella and warts). She is a “man-eater” run amok. Roz thinks: “Women don’t want all the men eaten up by man-eaters; they want a few left over so they can eat some themselves.”

Becky Sharp, Vanity Fair, William Makepeace Thackeray

A cynical, manipulative, intelligent beauty with many artistic talents and a premium can-do attitude at her disposal. You’ve never met a more dedicated hustler. By the end, the novel seems to judge her pretty harshly—but I’ve always loved her.

Henry, The Secret History, Donna Tartt

Oh, Henry—brooding, brilliant, bone-tired Henry. Some in the Lit Hub office argued that it was Julian who was the real villain in Donna Tartt’s classic novel of murder and declension, but I give Henry more credit than that. His villainy is in his carefulness, his coldness, his self-preservation at all costs. He is terrifying because we all know him—or someone who could oh-so-easily slide into his long overcoat, one winter’s night.

Hubris, almost all of literature but let’s go with Jurassic Park, Michael Crichton

Isn’t it awesome? We can just make dinosaurs! There is no foreseeable problem with this. We can totally handle it.

Arturo, Geek Love, Katherine Dunn

Here’s another novel with multiple candidates for Supreme Villain—should it be the Binewski parents, who purposefully poison themselves and their children in order to populate their freak show? Or should it be Mary Lick, a sort of modern millionaire version of Snow White’s Evil Queen, who pays pretty women to disfigure themselves? I think we have to go with Arturo the Aqua Boy, the beflippered narcissist who grows into a cult leader, encouraging his followers to slowly pare away their body parts in a search for “purity.” (But for the record, it’s all of the above.)

Dr. Frankenstein, Frankenstein, Mary Shelley

It’s true that the monster is the murderer in Shelley’s classic novel—and also, you know, a monster—but it’s Dr. Frankenstein who decided he had to play God and build a creature in his own image without thought to the possible ramifications! Shelley treats him as a tragic figure, but that only makes him a much more interesting villain.

Hannibal Lecter, Red Dragon, The Silence of the Lambs, etc., Thomas Harris

Made iconic by Anthony Hopkins, of course, but made brilliant and terrifying—a serial killing psychiatrist cannibal, come on—by Thomas Harris. “They don’t have a name for what he is.” Also, he has six fingers—though they’re on his left hand, so it couldn’t have been him who killed Mr. Montoya. Still, it puts him in rare company.

Captain Ahab, Moby-Dick, Herman Melville

Did you think the villain was the whale? The villain is not the whale—it’s the megalomaniac at the helm.

Lady Macbeth, Macbeth, William Shakespeare

The villainess of choice for every man who has ever claimed his wife made him do it. But I’ve always found Lady Macbeth more interesting than Macbeth himself—she’s the brains behind the operation, not to mention the ambition. Her sleepwalking scene is one of the best and most famous of all of Shakespeare’s plays. Even this makes me shiver:

Out, damned spot! out, I say!—One: two: why, then, ’tis time to do’t.—Hell is murky!—Fie, my lord, fie! a soldier, and afeard? What need we fear who knows it, when none can call our power to account?—Yet who would have thought the old man to have had so much blood in him.

Sand, The Woman in the Dunes, Kobo Abe

It may be the devious villagers who trick the poor etymologist into the sand pit, but it is the sand itself that is the main antagonist in this slim and wonderful novel. The sand that keeps coming, and must be shoveled back. The sand that constantly threatens to swallow everything: first the man, then the woman, then the village—though one assumes the villagers would replace him before that happened. Sand.

Suburban Ennui, Revolutionary Road, Richard Yates

In everyone’s favorite horror novel about America in the ’50s, onetime bohemians Frank and April Wheeler move to the ‘burbs, and find it. . . extremely stifling. But it’s not the suburbs exactly but the Wheelers’ inability to understand one another, their fear, their creeping, cumulative despair, that are the forces of destruction here.

“The book was widely read as an antisuburban novel, and that disappointed me,” Yates said in a 1972 interview.

The Wheelers may have thought the suburbs were to blame for all their problems, but I meant it to be implicit in the text that that was their delusion, their problem, not mine. . . I meant it more as an indictment of American life in the 1950s. Because during the fifties there was a general lust for conformity all over this country, by no means only in the suburbs—a kind of blind, desperate clinging to safety and security at any price, as exemplified politically in the Eisenhower administration and the Joe McCarthy witch-hunts. Anyway, a great many Americans were deeply disturbed by all that—felt it to be an outright betrayal of our best and bravest revolutionary spirit—and that was the spirit I tried to embody in the character of April Wheeler. I meant the title to suggest that the revolutionary road of 1776 had come to something very much like a dead end in the fifties.

David Melrose, Never Mind, Edward St. Aubyn

Fathers don’t get much worse than David Melrose: cruel, brutal, and snobbish, a man who enjoyed humiliating his wife, who raped his young son, and who seemed to doom all those close to him to a life of pain. You could also argue that the British Aristocracy is the villain in the Patrick Melrose books, but . . . David is definitely worse (if slightly less all-encompassing).

Tom Ripley, The Talented Mr. Ripley, Patricia Highsmith

Here’s a villain you can’t help but root for—I mean, sort of. You feel his pain as he tries to insinuate himself into the life of the man he so admires (and perhaps loves), and as he is first welcomed and then pushed away. Less so when he murders his beloved and assumes his identity—but somehow, as you read, you find yourself holding your breath around every corner, hoping he will escape yet again.

Rufus Weylin, Kindred, Octavia Butler

As slaveowners go, Rufus isn’t the worst (his father might rank) but he isn’t the best, either. He’s selfish and ignorant, and (like most men of the time) a brutal racist and misogynist, who doesn’t mind raping women as long as they act like they like it. Actually, the fact that he thinks he’s better than his father actually makes him worse. That said, the real antagonist in this novel might actually be the unknown and unexplained force that keeps transporting Dana from her good life in 1976 California to a Maryland slave plantation in 1815. What’s that about?

Nurse Ratched, One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest, Ken Kesey

Big Nurse rules the patients of the asylum ward with an iron fist. She is addicted to order and power, and can be quite cruel in commanding it. In comes McMurphy, our hero, who wants to undercut her. He does undercut her, in fact, a number of times—but when he goes too far, she has him lobotomized. The end! I know Ratched is meant to be evil, and it’s supposed to be depressing that she wins, but I can’t help but sort of like the fact that after a man chokes her half to death and rips off her shirt in an attempt to humiliate her (because no one with breasts can have power, you see!), she simply has him put down.

The Prison-industrial complex, The Mars Room, Rachel Kushner

Who is really the villain in Rachel Kushner’s most recent novel? It can’t be Romy; serving a life sentence for killing a man who was stalking her. It can’t be the man himself, who didn’t quite understand what he was doing. It can’t be any of the prisoners, nor any of the guards in particular. Nor is this a book with no villain, because the pulsing sense of injustice is too great. It is the whole thing, every aspect, of the American prison system—meant to catch you and bleed you and keep you and bring you back—that is the true villain in this novel (and often, in real life).

Big Brother, 1984, George Orwell

Of course it’s O’Brien who does most of the dirty work—but it’s Big Brother (be he actual person or nebulous invented concept) that really, um, oversees the evil here.

Patrick Bateman, American Psycho, Bret Easton Ellis

He’s a shallow, narcissistic, greedy investment banker, and also a racist, a misogynist, an anti-Semite and a homophobe, and also a sadist and a murderer and a cannibal and Huey Lewis devotee. He’s also weirdly pathetic. Can’t really get any worse than that as a person—but as a character, he’s endlessly entertaining.

The General, The Autumn of the Patriarch, Gabriel García Márquez

It’s José Ignacio Saenz de la Barra who is the most bloodthirsty, but the unnamed General (of the Universe) who is the most compelling villain in this novel: an impossibly long-lived tyrant who has borderline-magical control over the populace, and even the landscape, whose roses open early because, tired of darkness, he has declared the time changed; who sells away the sea to the Americans. He is desperately unhappy; he considers himself a god. Luckily, we get to spend almost the entire novel within his twisting brain.

Humbert Humbert, Lolita, Vladimir Nabokov

The genius of old Hum is how compelling he is—that is, despite the horrible thing he spends the entire novel doing (kidnapping a young girl whose mother he has murdered, driving her around the country and coaxing her into sexual acts, self-flagellating and self-congratulating in equal measure), you are charmed by him, half-convinced, even, by his grand old speeches about Eros and the power of language. In the end, of course, no amount of fancy prose style is enough to make you forget that he’s a murderer and worse, but for this reader, it’s pure pleasure getting there.

Ridgeway, The Underground Railroad, Colson Whitehead

The slave-hunting Ridgeway, Whitehead writes, “was six and a half feet tall, with the square face and thick neck of a hammer. He maintained a serene comportment at all times but generated a threatening atmosphere, like a thunderhead that seems far away but then is suddenly overhead with a loud violence.” He’s a little more interesting and intelligent than a simple brute—in part due to that sidekick of his—which only makes him more frightening as a character. Tom Hardy is a shoo-in for the adaptation.

Annie Wilkes, Misery, Stephen King

Listen: Annie Wilkes is a fan. She’s a big fan. She loves Paul Sheldon’s novels about Misery Chastain, and she is devastated to discover—after rescuing Sheldon from a car wreck—that he has killed off her beloved character. Things do not then go well for Paul, because as it turns out, Annie is already a seasoned serial killer who is very handy (read: murderous) with household objects.

The Republic of Gilead, The Handmaid’s Tale, Margaret Atwood

The government that has taken control of America in the world of Atwood’s classic dystopia is a fundamentalist theocracy whose leaders have eliminated the boundary between church and state—and worse, have twisted religious principles and political power in an attempt to utterly subjugate all women, erasing their identities and allowing them to exist only so far as they may be of use to the state. It is super fucked up and exactly what I worry about in a country where fundamentalists have any among of political power.

The Earth, The Broken Earth series, N. K. Jemisin

It’s pretty hard to fight back when the thing you’re fighting is the earth itself, which punishes those who walk upon it with extreme, years-long “seasons” of dramatic and deadly climate change. Ah, Evil Earth!

Iago, Othello, William Shakespeare

The worst villain is the one who knows you best—the one you might even love. The scariest motive is the lack of one—what Coleridge called Iago’s “motiveless malignity.” The most interesting villain is the one who has even more lines than the titular hero. He is a fantastic villain, a dangerous trickster, whose character has stumped (and intrigued) critics for centuries.

Judge Holden, Blood Meridian, Cormac McCarthy

Possibly the most terrifying character in modern literature (or any literature?), Glanton’s deputy is over six feet tall and completely hairless. More importantly, despite the fact that he might be a genius, he inflicts senseless and remorseless violence wherever he goes. The man murders (and, it is suggested, rapes) children and throws puppies to their doom. He might actually be the devil—or simply evil itself. He never sleeps, the judge. He is dancing, dancing. He says that he will never die.

Slavery, Beloved, Toni Morrison

This entire novel is based on a single idea: that a loving mother might murder her baby daughter to save her from life as a slave. Sure, the slavers are bad (and the schoolteacher is particularly chilling). Sure, you could make an argument that the vengeful spirit Beloved’s presence is destructive, splintering further an already fractured family. But these are only symptoms, in this the Great American Novel, of the Great American Sin.

Satan, The Divine Comedy, Dante Alighieri

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