#finally get away from twenty years of being scared of even thinking things

[rinhaler]

Rin Itoshi and female s/o taking each other first time

omgggggg i tried to make it romantic and sweet but i do love a slutty ass dude who's in control so apologies if this isnt exactly what u wanted hehe

warnings: 18+ MDNI, fem!reader, virgin!rin, virgin!reader, fingering, best friends to lovers, mutual pining, tit sucking, "just the tip" pfft, slight manipulation, brief condom use, premature ejaculation, creampie.

words: 2.9k

Your heart races as you watch Rin scroll through his phone and find some music to play. He looks so serious, though that’s nothing new. You don’t dare speak, worried you’ll say the wrong thing if you do. He looks up at you, briefly, offering a weak smile before looking through his phone again.

“We don’t have to do this, you know.” he tells you without even looking at you. You watch him as he starts hooking up his phone to the Bluetooth speaker in your room, and you shuffle uncomfortably on top of your bed.

“I want to… ‘m just scared.” you confess, breath shaking slightly as you exhale. “Do you still want to?” you wonder, feeling shy as you ask. You’re sure he wouldn’t be here if he didn’t want to, though.

Rin doesn’t do anything he has no interest in.

“Yeah.” he tells you, setting his phone down before looking back at you, finally. He’s so far away, it feels too formal. Though you assume he wants to set the pace and make sure everything is comfortable for you both before you proceed. “We agreed,”

“I know.” you nod, recalling the moment you decided as teenagers to give each other your virginities if you hadn’t lost them after you turned twenty. “Just checking.”

The concept of Rin being single, let alone a virgin, is something you can’t even begin to comprehend. You’ve been best friends with him since you could talk. You remember him having no interest in you until you forced your way into playing soccer games with him and his brother. You soon gave it up once you got what you wanted, but you’ve been inseparable ever since.

Girls have always thrown themselves at Rin, but he never cared. Not really. You remember him having one girlfriend and it never went anywhere. It only lasted three weeks. He told you the gory details of their sex lives, though. Only because you asked.

It didn’t go past hand stuff.

“I brought condoms.” he tells you, pulling a box from his bag and setting them down on the desk he’s sitting by.

“I- I’m on the pill.” you respond. “I heard it feels better without… those. But we should use them.”

“Okay, yeah.” he agrees.

“… but we don’t have to.”

“I’ll use one.” he assures you, not wanting to make you feel pressured to go raw for his benefit. Though you’re sure it would be for yours, too. “If you want me to take it off, I can do that.”

You nod, agreeing.

“This is so…” you think, searching around the room for any inspiration of a descriptor to use. He stares at you, intently, wondering what you might say. He’d never tell you, but he’s just as nervous as you are. Of course he has an edge of experience ahead of you, but he’s still clueless. He wants to make sure this is going to be nice for you.

Perfect, if possible.

“What?”

“Formal.” you shrug.

“Oh, I’m sorry.” he responds, scratching his neck as he thinks about what you told him. He looks around, feeling a little too awkward to make eye contact. “I just want to make sure everything’s going to be okay…”

“It’s fine, you’re right.” you smile, “I just thought my first time would be… romantic. It’s stupid, I’m sorry.” you shake your head, dismissing the idea.

You knew you’d end up here with him eventually. You had no intention of losing your virginity to anyone else, after all. You’ve been in love with him for years, and finding out he got a girlfriend almost killed you. It was hard hearing about how they became intimate, but you were so fucking relieved when they broke up.

He only decided to get a girlfriend because he thought you weren’t interested in him, though. You’ve always been a forbidden fruit he wouldn’t dare try to cross a line with. You’re his best friend, after all. He wouldn’t want the romantic feelings he has towards you to ruin that.

“It’s not stupid.” he assures you. “Here, pick some music.” he hands you his phone.

You start to scroll and realise you’re looking on a playlist he created aptly named sex playlist. It makes you giggle, but you don’t comment. And you don’t pay him any mind as he leaves the room while you continue searching for a song.

The boy has good taste, you soon realise.

He comes back a few minutes later with some candles from a nearby cupboard. He knows you too well. You hoard them, you always have. You get an abundance each year for Christmas and rarely use them. He starts lighting them and placing them around the room.

You finally look up as he turns the light on, the room dimly lit by the burning flames scattered around.

“Is this better? I should have gotten some rose petals or something…”

“N-No, this is fine.” you smile, “Thank you, Rinnie, this is nice.”

He clears his throat and sits beside you on your bed. You quickly hand him his phone, prompting him to lean over to place it back down on your desk.

Your heartbeat begins to increase rapidly as he faces you. You haven’t even so much as kissed before, let alone what else will follow. He reaches out to caress your face, and it takes all of your willpower to not flinch.

“R-Rin… do you, um, d-do you watch…”

“Porn? Yeah. Do you?”

His reply makes your face flush with heat and the thought of confessing your own truth makes you even hotter. You look away from him, twiddling your fingers in your lap and looking at those instead.

“I know it won’t be like that… it’s your first time. And mine.” he reminds you.

He’s always been so mature. And you’re glad he’s doing all he can to put you at ease. He puts a finger under your chin, forcing you to look up at him again. You gulp, nervously, before nodding. He smirks at that.

“Good, I’m glad,” he tells you, beautiful jade eyes flickering with flames as he stares at you. “Means you know what you like.” he leans into you, an attempt to kiss which you immediately back away from. And you apologise, profusely, assuring him that you’re still a little nervous.

“I— I know guys can, you know, it can be quick… s-so don’t feel bad.”

“Don’t worry about that.” he shakes his head. “If I cum quickly, I’ll make sure you finish.”

He closes the distance between the two of you, his lips planting softly on your own. His eyes close as he loses himself to it, though you keep yours open for a little while as you process what is happening.

You’re making out with your best friend!

Though when his large, dominating hands begin to fondle your chest, you pull away entirely.

“Sorry, did I hurt you?” he wonders.

“N-No, I didn’t expect you to be so confident.” you whisper, and he kisses you again, smiling into it.

Your eyes close as you allow him to continue locking lips with you. His hand entirely gropes one of your tits and his thumb casually strokes over it. Even through the layers of your crop top and bra, you find yourself mewling softly.

He smooths his hand over the curve of your waist until he reaches the bottom of your crop top. His fingers breach upwards towards your bra, roughly groping at it and the fat of your tits.

“O-Ow.” you speak, softly.

“Sorry,” he whispers back, “Can I take your top off?” he asks between continuous kisses.

“Uh-huh.” you nod, dumbly.

He breaks the kiss to quickly pull your crop top over your head. His lips attach to yours again almost instantly as he starts to fiddle with your bra. He stops kissing you, again, to look over your shoulder so that he can undo the clasp. You gasp when he finally unhooks it, keeping the pink material against your chest to preserve your modesty.

“Can I see?” he asks, his eyes moving between yours and your hands. You hum, nervously, but nod. He helps you pull down your straps as you keep the material held firmly against your chest. Sighing, slightly panic in your voice as you strip the material away. “Fuuuuck…” he mutters to himself, adjusting his hardening cock in his pants as he looks at you.

“You should take something off.” you suggest before he can kiss you again. He immediately pulls his t-shirt over his head, tousling his hair back into place right after.

You continue to moan against his lips when he kisses you again. And they only get louder as he kisses down your neck whilst flicking his thumb over your pebbled nipple. He grunts against your skin, battling on whether he should say something to you or stay silent.

He’d hate to ruin the mood.

“Are you hard yet?” you ask him, your shy demeanour leaving you as you lose yourself to the sensation of his hands caressing your body. “S-Should we do it?”

“Wanna feel?” he asks, not waiting for an answer as he pulls your hand towards the bulge in his jeans, moaning immediately from the contact. “Look what you’ve done to me.” he laughs, pulling you closer and hooking one of your legs over his own.

He scratches the back of his nails up your thigh, stopping just short of dipping under your skirt as you shiver from the touch. His eyes find yours, kissing you reassuringly.

“Can I feel you?” he wonders, and, of course, you nod. His fingers disappear under your pleated skirt, quickly cupping your panty-clad mound. He barely gasps when he comes into contact with your panties. “You’re so wet…”

“S-Stop…” you reply, shyly, “s’embarrassing…” you tell him.

“You need to be wet for me,” he responds, that big, logical, brain of his immediately putting you in your place. Reminding you that he is the one with a little more experience and you need to listen to him. “You’ll be so tight… even for a finger.”

He forces your body down, flat against the bed and flips up your skirt. The cute triangular shape of your panties makes his cock throb, and he moves them into the crease of your thigh.

“Tell me if it hurts…” he requests, staring into your eyes as deft fingers come into contact with sopping flesh. He runs them through your folds, and you jolt when a finger tip grazes your clit. He moves it towards your hole, slowly teasing around it before pushing in. He stops, quickly, when you yelp. “Sorry, I’ll go slower. Hold onto me.” he instructs, a hand wraps around his bicep and squeezes as he continues to plunge his longer finger deep inside.

“Kiss me,” you whimper, pathetically. He drops his head so that your lips can meet again. He devours the moans and cries you emit as he curls his finger in and out of you. It feels odd, but not unpleasant. It’s still painful but it begins to subside.

“Gonna add another, okay?” he asks, and you nod. You hiss, instantly, hands flying down to pull his away. “Sh, sh sh, I’ll go slow again, okay? Gotta be able to take them or we can’t fuck.”

You fight back tears as the stretch begins to sting. He sinks his head lower, taking one of your hardened nipples into his mouth. Your back arches off the bed slightly, coaxing him to look up at you. And then he remembers all of articles he’s read. All of the research he’s done.

He even thinks about his teammates talking about sex.

“You have to worship the clit.” he recalls one of them saying.

He pulls away from your tit, briefly, to line his thumb up with your clit and apply pressure. He circles it carefully, monitoring your expressions as he does. You yelp, trying to close your legs, but he opens them back up with his free hand.

“Are you gonna cum?” he wonders.

“It’s too much, Rinnie!” you gasp, skin tightening over your knuckles until they turn white as you grip the sheets. “S-Slow down, please! S’too much!” you cry, unable to hold back your tears any longer.

He doesn’t relent, however. Hoping the way your body trembles means you’re about to cream all over his fingers. It was an achievement he never reached with his ex without her assistance. She showed him how and where to touch to make her cum. But you’re not her. You’re perfect.

You gasp, breathlessly, as your pussy begins to tighten around his fingers. Your clit throbs as he teases it just right and you begin to cum hard and fast for him. He kisses between the valley of your breaths, whispering sweet nothings as you reach your peak and plummet back down to earth. He slows down his ministrations as you begin to shudder and twitch from the after shocks, looking up at you adoringly when you start to calm down.

“Good?” he asks.

“Very,” you pant, laughing lightly as you find your sense again. “Rinnie…” you speak, your confident bravado disappearing again as you feel naked and exposed.

“Yeah?”

“Promise me… promise you’re a virgin, too…” you say, looking up at the ceiling. You feel too needy and desperate as you speak. But that was too good for him to not know what’s he’s doing. He’s seriously only done that once on another girl? It’s a little hard to believe.

“I promise. Was it really that good?” he smirks. He kisses both of your nipples softly before sucking his fingers clean of your juices. “I’ve been preparing… reading about stuff. Asking advice. I’ve told you everything I’ve done, I swear.”

He stands up, unbuttoning his jeans and kicking off his shoes at the same time. He pulls of his jeans and underwear in the same movement, revealing his large, blushing cock.

“We don’t have to do this.” he assures you, picking up a condom from your desk and tearing the foil with his teeth. He rolls it down his length, the rubbery sheen covers the pretty pink colour of his dick. “Do you want to stop?”

“Um,” you think about it. He’s asking as if he isn’t already raring to go. You look between his erection and his intimidating stare as you think about what to say.

“What about just the tip?” he asks. And at that, you nod. He reaches under your skirt and pulls down your panties to ogle your drippy cunt one more time. He feels himself throb at the thought of splitting your virgin hole open on his fat cock. He’s always known he was big, and he really doesn’t want to hurt you. He can only hope his fingering was enough prep before you rob each other of your innocence for good.

He lines up his cockhead with your virgin slot as he cages you in beneath his wide frame. You wrap your arms around his neck and pull him down to kiss you, your moan semi silenced as he pushes his tip in.

Oh God this isn’t enough.

He knew he’d need more.

Just a little more.

He pushes in a bit further, and you pull your lips away from his to voice your concern.

“H-Hurts,” you tell him. “You’re really big.” you inflate his ego further, earning another inch of his cock.

He can’t help it, you’re spurring him on!

And he can only imagine how much better you’d feel wrapped around him without this stupid fucking rubber on. He stops pushing when you place your palms on his shoulders, forcing him to pull back a little. “Is it the condom, Rin? Is it t-too dry?” you wonder, batting your eyelashes up at him so innocently.

“Yes.” he replies, without hesitation. “I’ll take it off.”

He pulls out of you instantly. He hisses a little as he pulls at the condom too hard and it snaps back. He decides to push it up from the base of his cock, lining up with your cunt again right after.

And it’s like you’re made for him as he pushes in. He smothers any whimper you can make with a searing kiss. You feel his tongue slip into your mouth as he pushes in further and further until there’s nothing left to give.

You’re crying, again, not expecting to feel so much so soon.

“God, you’re beautiful.” he praises you. He moves his hips, slowly. His cockhead unintentionally nudges against your soft spot with every rut. The blinding pleasure prevents you from telling him, once again, that it hurts and it’s too much. “I know I said just the tip, jus’ feel so good, princess.” he whispers delicately against your skin.

And, as expected, he doesn’t last long.

A few pathetic strokes of his cock inside of you have him spilling thick spurts of white cream into your unprotected walls. He collapses on top of you, panting violently as he stuffs you full.

He was so backed up before this. He masturbates, of course, but not as much as the average guy. You’ve had this planned for a few weeks, now, so he decided to abstain so he could really enjoy feeling you for the first time.

“Fuck, ‘m sorry. Should have jerked off before I came over.”

“It’s okay.” you tell him, fingers mussing through his hair as you come to terms with the fact that you’ve finally lost your virginity, to your best friend of all people.

“I need to fuck you again,” he confesses, your fingers stop as you look down at him.

“W- now?”

“Soon,” he corrects you. “I want to taste you first.”

© 2023 rinhaler

#💌 — luxe mail #📨 — requests #bllk #bllk x reader #blue lock imagines #blue lock x reader #itoshi rin #rin itoshi #rin itoshi x reader #itoshi rin x reader #blue lock smut #itoshi rin smut #rin itoshi smut #bllk smut #bllk x fem!reader #tw virginity loss #tw manipulation

[wongyuuu]

crossing the line | two | kmg

pairing: mingyu x fem!reader genre: smut, angst, fluff (ish) word count: 3.7k warnings: smut (18+), minors do not interact, oral (male receiving) kissing, swearing part one

this is part of my series, seventeen as songs from lover (ts)

Mingyu ➝ Paper Rings I hate accidents, except when we went from friends to this ↳ Mingyu had always been your best friend and that line had never been crossed before, then, one day, you woke up naked ion his bed with a vivid memory of the previous night.

Ever since he was a kid, Mingyu had this sort of life motto: regret nothing and own up to the consequences of your actions. And for twenty-six entire years, he managed to do just that. Of course, there were things he wished he could have done differently. However, once something is done there is no going back. He could apologize for it, had it been a mistake, or he could just move on.  And although he didn’t regret a single moment of the night he spent with you, the owning-up part was a little trickier than he had expected.  

Mingyu was sure that your reaction would be bad, he knew that you’d get scared. But he thought that you would stay back so the two of you could talk. Or, at the very least, follow through with what you had said to him. Tomorrow morning, we go back to what we are, was what you said. But when morning came and Mingyu finally woke up, you were no longer in his bed. The only thing left of you was your perfume on his pillow.  

He figured that he should give you time. You got scared and that was normal. He had known you for four years and he knew that you weren’t the kind of person who enjoyed changes. You loved your routines and being inside your bubble. It was a surprise that you had let him get close to you at all, even more so when both of you grew attached to the other.  

Chan said that it was weird but he and Soonyoung were happy that you were finally allowing yourself to just be freer.  

Mingyu wanted to be that person for you but was it so bad that he also wanted to be more than? 

Truth be told, Mingyu had been interested in you since the moment you met. You, on the other hand, didn’t seem at all interested in him so he didn’t press you. When you opened up to him and allowed him to get closer to you, he was dating someone else.  

It was around the same time he started to let himself be touchy with you, like he always was with all his friends, that he noticed that the way he first felt about you didn’t change or disappear.   

He had been idiot enough to stay with his girlfriend, thinking that maybe he was reading too much into what you were doing. Then his girlfriend started to get uncomfortable, the fights started and they just broke up. 

Though he didn’t feel nearly as heartbroken as he made it seem, Mingyu let you nurse him through his breakup. You’d sit with him for hours, his head on your lap while you played with his hair. 

“I think you’d look great with long hair,” you said randomly one day. 

“Why?” he looked away from the tv, eyes focused solely on you.

“You’re disgustingly handsome. I think you should try”

He didn’t need to be told twice. Mingyu started to let his hair grow and he was too lazy to get a proper cut so you were the one cutting his hair for him. I don’t want to hear a single complaint about this, you told him while he sat in the middle of your bathroom. 

It was physically painful for him to hold back from touching you. Mingyu was well aware that if you got scared you’d just run away from him and there was a high chance of him never seeing you again. And that wasn’t something he wanted. 

Desperate moments call for desperate measures. He needed, God help him, Soonyoung’s help.

“So, how long will you keep avoiding Mingyu?” Soonyoung asked when you set his coffee in front of him. 

Your lifelong friend had asked to meet you once your shift was over, and you agreed. Much to your surprise, he had gotten there an hour early and was now just bothering you.

"Shut up and drink your coffee"

"Come on, there's no one here. Sit down and talk to me"

The problem with working at a café that had a homely feel was that your friends, honestly just Soonyoung, thought that they could just pretend that it was your own home. 

"I'm working"

He rolled his eyes at you.

"At your brother's café," he tugged at your shirt "Sit down, humor me for a second"

With a sigh, you dropped your body on the couch next to his. 

"He asks about you every single day, you know? He said you guys fought, so he's giving you time. But I don't think he will be able to hold himself back for much longer"

You pinched your nose, your heart suddenly aching at his works. 

Truth was, you missed Mingyu. Desperately. You regretted leaving his side the moment you closed his apartment door but you also couldn't bring yourself to go back.

You figured that you should give yourself a little time to understand what happened and maybe get it sorted out in your mind. But you couldn't stop thinking about him, about the way he kissed you — so tenderly, with so much care, as if you were something precious that he would never give himself the luxury of breaking. 

His touch was engraved in your body, just thinking about it made your skin electric. Mingyu was the first thing you thought about in the mornings, the last thing on your mind before you drifted off to sleep. He found ways to sneak up on you when you least expected it.

He texted you every day like he normally did, but you left all of his messages on read. You had been obsessed with your notification bar for the past three of weeks.

Though your actions said otherwise, you were scared of facing Mingyu, terrified that things between the two of you would change. 

"Tell me what happened" Soonyoung nudged you with his knee "Maybe I can help.  You know I always have killer advices"

There was no way you'd tell Soonyoung you slept with Mingyu.

"We just fought, it was stupid" you shook your head.

You watched in complete distress as the two working wheels inside his brain moved. Soonyoung went from furrowed eyebrows that said this fucking dumb girl to wide eyes.

"You guys fucked!"

You pressed your hands to Soonyoung's mouth, looking over your shoulder to make sure that your brother was still in the kitchen. Soonyoung kept his eyes wide open, his words muffled by your hands.

"Shut up!" 

He managed to push your hands away, looking over your shoulder before leaning on the table with his forearms, his voice barely a whisper.

"You're an adult, I'm pretty sure your brother knows you have sex from time to time"

"He doesn't need to know with whom" you pushed his head back. 

"Well, at least you're not denying it"

It would have been stupid to deny it when you felt as if you were walking around with a sign that said I slept with my best friend hanging over your head.

"Listen, I'll be as honest about this as I possibly can. You guys like each other, and have for a very long time. I mean everyone thinks you're dating" when you started to shake your head, Soonyoung rolled his eyes "I can count the amount of times I've hugged you in the past ten years. Twenty, if you're wondering. One for my birthday and one for yours, which I always have to force you to do"

"yn, you're not someone who's very into physical touch, which is fine. But with Mingyu? You guys touch each other the whole time, anywhere. The only time you guys weren't all over each other was when he was in a serious relationship, which mind you, you cried over"

Soonyoung was a fantastic friend, always. Despite his loud personality, at least around your group, he gave advice quietly. He never made a big deal of situations, he never went around screaming your secrets away. But in that moment you hated how much he was able to read you, like the only thing hiding your feelings was a thin glass wall.

"I didn’t cry" you sighed, dropping your head to the table.

"Sweetheart, you sobbed. I had no idea what I was supposed to do with you"

Soonyoung had laughter in his eyes, and at that moment he reminded you so much of the boy you met in high school. He had changed so much, from the way he dressed to the way he behaved. But still, somewhere inside, he was the same kid from ten years before.

"What are you afraid of?"

Of a life without Mingyu, was the only answer you had. 

You met Mingyu for the first time at twenty-two, fresh out of college, scared of life. You hated your major, marketing, and hated your job too. Mingyu had been a breath of fresh air, with wide eyes and a beautiful smile. 

It was always hard for you to let people close. You were just too shy and introverted but ever since Chan introduced you to Mingyu, you enjoyed his presence. He was always too much. Too tall, too large, too loud, talked too fast. But whenever he spoke to you, his voice was a little quieter, softer somehow.

Mingyu was larger than life itself and you were afraid you were too little compared to him. 

He was out there with his fancy corporate job, a financial manager, while you worked at your brother's café. It was what you wanted, yes, your shit degree had some use and you got to test out recipes with your brother. It was a much simpler life than the one Mingyu wanted.

"We're too different" you whispered, blinking away your tears.

You wanted Mingyu, not just like your best friend but in all ways one can have someone. You wanted to be able to kiss him whenever and do all the romantic shit you had seen people around you do.

"You're not and even if you were, what's so wrong about that? Don't people say that opposites attract?" he patted your hand "Won't you rather regret a decision than spend your life wishing you could have done something different?"

Soonyoung's Words still echoed through Mingyu's mind hours after they spoke on the phone. 

yn thinks she's not enough for you.

He didn't know what he was supposed to do with that information. How he was supposed to convince you that you were more than enough? Not just that, that you were the only one he wanted.

As soon as he ended the call with Soonyoung, Mingyu had gotten up from his desk, ready to call it a day and go after you. Everything else could wait. There was nothing more important than you to him. 

It didn't seem to matter to his boss though, as he not only made Mingyu stay but also work over hours. Managers make their own schedule, my ass. It was already past midnight when he got inside his car. 

It was too late to go to your place and try to talk with you.  It was almost the middle of the night and Mingyu wanted to have a clear head to speak with you. He needed to be the most eloquent version of himself so that he could lay out in front of you, all of his cards, and hopefully maybe have you back in his life. Even if you were to remain just friends. 

So he dragged himself home, feeling defeated once again. Three weeks of no contact with you had been pure torture. His messages were read the night before, which gave him a little bit of hope, but still, he didn't get an answer. His phone calls were obviously screened. 

"Fuck" he cursed turning the lights in his living room on.

Mingyu rubbed his eyes to make sure that he wasn't imagining things. Because there you were, sleeping on his couch

In complete silence, or at least trying to be as quiet as possible, Mingyu took off his shoes and locked the door behind him. He never took his eyes off of you, scared that maybe if he looked away or even blinked you'd disappear.

He kneeled on the floor by your side, his hand immediately going to your face. 

Ever since you met Mingyu, four days was the longest period of time you went without seeing each other. Six hours was the longest you went without talking. Needless to say, those three weeks had been hell, both for you and him. 

You had been stubborn and Mingyu was determined to give you space. It was a lose-lose situation. 

“yn” he whispered your name.

Slowly you opened your eyes. And god, how much had he missed those eyes. Mingyu found out, very early on, that your eyes held all of your truths. You went about your life thinking that no one had a single clue of what was going on through your mind — and for the most part, you managed to succeed. But there were moments when you allowed him to see all there was to you. 

And maybe that wasn’t your intention but your eyes gave away your truth. You missed Mingyu, desperately so, just as much as he missed you.

“Sorry I fell asleep,” you said pushing back a yawn.

Mingyu smiled at you, his hand on your head, lightly massaging your scalp.

“It’s okay, it’s really late”

You nodded, eyes closing again.

“Can you lay with me?”

You tugged a little on the sleeve of his shirt.

“Yeah, give me just a minute”

Mingyu leaned down and kissed your hair quickly before standing up. He got out of his working clothes and grabbed whichever comfortable ones were closer to him. With a blanket in his hand, he went back into the living room. 

You scooted back onto the couch, your back pressed against the couch, giving Mingyu enough space to crawl in by your side. 

As soon as you felt Mingyu’s body next to yours, you wrapped your arm around his waist, getting as close to him as you possibly could. 

With a content sigh, Mingyu nested your head against his neck, his lips never leaving your forehead. 

It didn’t take long for him do fall asleep too.

You were the kind of person who didn’t like sleeping in places that weren’t your bed, your home. In fact, you had a really hard time sleeping in unknown places. And yet, wrapped in the warmth of Mingyu, you felt as if you had slept for the first time in weeks. 

You missed Mingyu like crazy and craved his touch each waking minute of the day. 

You tilted your head back a little, to look at him. How you managed to go three weeks without him was unknown to you. But now that you were in his arms again, you would never let him go again. 

Even if that night had changed everything or nothing at all, you decided that you wanted Mingyu in your life in whichever way he was willing to be. 

Talking with Soonyoung had helped, more than you could have imagined. He walked you home that night, going over with you through everything that you felt, and why you decided to bolt in the morning. His answer was for really smart people, both of you are dumb as fuck.

During the entire day, you built up the courage to go to Mingyu and try and see if there was anything salvageable about your friendship. 

Mingyu stirred awake, his arms tightening around you, causing a small laugh to escape your lips. 

“What?” he asked, voice low and raspy. 

“You’re squeezing me”

It wasn’t a complaint, in any way, shape, or form. You liked the feeling of him all around you, almost way too much.

“It was intentional”

He squeezed you again, shifting on the couch and pulling you on top of him. His eyes were foggy with sleep but it was easy to spot the same thing you saw that night. The emotion you refused to acknowledge then. 

Longing and adoration. 

“Sorry, I left that day. I freaked out” You shook your head, pushing his hair from his forehead. You wished you could be more vocal about all of it, have prettier words for him "I thought that if I stayed our relationship would be over because I don't think I can go back to how we were before that night. I…"

You groaned and hid your face on the crock of his neck.

“I like you” you admitted quietly “I have for a really long time now”

Scared, you looked at him.

"I want it all with you, yn. I've liked you from the start. So can we, please, stop pretending that there isn't anything more than just friendship between us? We’ve had our fair share of miscommunication, missed opportunities, and unspoken feelings. Our friendship is everything to me, but I can't ignore these other feelings anymore”

His eyes never left yours. His emotions weren’t hidden in his sleeve, they were on full display for you. Everything that Mingyu was, he showed to you without any reservations.

So, instead of giving him stuttered words, you pulled his face close to yours, capturing his lips into yours.

The kiss was the same as the ones from the other night but also entirely new. That night you were friends testing the waters, entering unknown territory. In that moment, though, you were more. 

“I missed you so much” you whispered against his lips, trailing soft kisses down his neck. You felt his semi-erect cock under you, his hands on your ass “So much, Gyu”

“yn?” he asked as you moved lower on his body.

“I never got a chance to do this that night”

You kept on moving down over his body, nails lightly scratching the exposed skin of his lower stomach that was uncovered by his shirt. In one swift movement, you pulled his sweats and boxers down, revealing his cock. 

“I can never predict you,” he said with a laugh “Two seconds ago we were confessing, and now, look at you”

You ran the tip of your finger over the length of his cock while looking at him, trying your best to keep a neutral face.

“Do you want to talk some more?” you asked, voice sweet.

“Looking at you, all quiet and sweet, no one would ever… Jesus, fuck”

You didn’t wait for him to finish, taking him as deep as you could in your throat. You stood still for a second, eyes still on Mingyu watching his reaction. His head was tipped back, eyes closed, mouth slightly open. Slowly you started to bob your head up and down, one of your hands on his balls as the other held the base of his cock.

“Fuck, yn” he moaned. 

Mingyu snaked his hand on your head, fingers gripping your hair and slightly pulling it, while forcing your head down on his cock, making you moan in exchange. You pulled your head back, licking his tip and small drops of precum. You felt him twitch as you teased his tip with your lips and tongue, your hands pumping him up and down. 

Another moan left his lips, louder this time, followed by a grunt.

Abruptly he pulled you up. 

“If you keep going, I’m going to cum in your mouth”

You smiled at him, which made him moan again.

“That’s what I was going for” you complained, kissing his neck, hand going between your bodies, running down once again, until you reached him. 

“But I want to fuck you” he whispered against your ear, biting the sensitive skin.

Mingyu took your lips in his, his hand still on your hair. Without ever breaking the kiss, he stood from the couch with you in his arms, pushing his pants and underwear past his ankles. The pieces of clothes lost somewhere in the hallway.

“I’m going to stock this entire goddamn apartment in condoms, every single room” he grunted as he dropped you on the bed “Pants off”

“Aren’t we bossy” you teased with a laugh, but still complied “You too, shirt off”

He rolled his eyes at you, pulling his shirt over his head. How many times had you ogled his body over the years, watching the transformation of going to the gym every single day? And now he was in full display for you.

“I want to ride you” you whispered.

Mingyu didn’t complain, settling against the headboard of the bed.

“I’m all yours”

Something in the way he said it felt real, final. He was yours and you were his.

You climbed up his body and took his cock in your hand again, pumping him once, then again, before angling him under your wet pussy.

Slowly, painfully so, you lowered your body,  taking every inch of him in. You moaned, feeling full of him. Mingyu reached over and pulled your shirt off too.

Lazily you started to move up and down, deliberately so. 

“Baby, you have to go faster” he moaned, pulling your face close to his, nibbling on the skin of your neck. You knew he would leave a mark, and so did he, but you didn’t mind. 

Mingyu suddenly grabbed your hips with both hands, firmly holding you as he started to move his hips up and down, faster than the pace you were willing to give him. You wanted to torture him, but he could do just the same to you. He smiled when you clutched onto his shoulder, head tilted back.

“Ah, Mingyu, fuck” you cried “fuck, fuck, fuck”

He moved one of his hands, his thumb pressing over your throbbing clit, mercilessly rubbing in circles. 

“Ah… oh my god”

“Are you gonna cum, baby?” 

He pressed harder against you, hips moving faster. The sound of his skin hitting yours was loud, dirty, and enticing. 

“Cum for me, baby, all over my cock” he whispered.

With a cry, you felt your pussy clenching around his cock as your orgasms took over you. Your entire body shook as you held onto Mingyu, biting his neck while he fucked you, thrusting to the hilt, again and again, until he too found his release.

You pulled back slightly and kissed him.

“Give me two minutes and I’ll eat you out”

You laughed and pushed his face back.

“You don’t have it in you, big boy”

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[thatanimeramenchick]

Yandere Vox x Secretary Reader Pt. 2

Eh, what have you guys done to me. I swear, we Vox fangirls are the thirstiest on the internet right now. Also, officially, I’m making this a three part series, but that’s it. So much for a oneshot. I'll make a title for this series, eventually. Also, if you want to be tagged, please put your age in your bio.

Part One - Part Three

Triggers: Dubcon-y vibes in scenes. Violence and threatening. Read responsibly, stuff is gonna get a little dark this chapter.

Word count: 3,142

---

Vox thought you looked perfect. For once, you were wearing something decent that he bought you instead of one of the plain outfits from before you had moved in. Somehow, you had been convinced to put on actual jewelry and makeup as well. The only flaw you held was the dirty look on your face, which you refused to face towards him directly, and it only got dirtier as you downed more and more wine.

“You know, you could at least attempt to have a good time after all the effort I put into this evening,” he said, “You haven’t even touched your food.”

“Not hungry,” you said, voice ice cold. It always was nowadays.

“If you’re not in the mood for dinner, we could watch a new production I oversaw,” he said, “I think you’d enjoy it.”

You snort at that.

“I’d rather listen to Alastor’s radio program than watch any of the hot trash your production company creates,” you said.

“I’m sorry? What was that?” he said, putting a warning hint into his tone.

“You heard me,” you said, “I’ve gotta say for someone supposedly so modern, you’re still just an old man. Alastor is what? Like twenty years older than you? And you think he’s elderly? You’re practically a decrepit bygone as well. You think anyone gives a shit about cable nowadays? At least Alastor has the decency to make stuff with class and not just forgettable, cheap cash grabs.”

Against his will, he felt a circuit spurt. His hand clenched around the glass and slammed it onto the table, causing you to jump. A small noise left your mouth, as panicked as the look in your eyes was now. You looked like you knew that you had pushed a little more than you probably should have.

“You know what?” he hissed, “You think you can just talk to me like that? Fine. You wanna play rough with me? Well guess what, I’m going to fuck that bad attitude right out of you!”

“Excuse me???”

You didn’t even look scared at that just shocked and baffled, as if that had been the last thing you had expected to hear.

“You heard me!” he grabbed you by your shoulders and shoved you flat onto the couch, “I’m sick of you fighting me. Well, you’re not going to after this.”

“W-wait, Vox, stop-”

He smashed his lips to yours, purposefully being harsh, biting you when you tried to keep your mouth closed. When you attempted to turn your face away, he grabbed your chin rough enough where he knew it would leave a mark before kissing you harder. You pounded your fist against his chest, but he ignored it, straddling you. He eventually used his other hand to grab your wrist and push it into the couch.

He didn’t know when it happened, but at some point in your struggle something shifted in the air. Changed. You had finally stopped fighting, slowly wrapping your arm around his neck, kissing him back. It was heavenly, you finally submitting to him. Yes, yes, yes… He paused to look you in the eyes, to see your timid gaze and red face. There was still a look of anger glazed across your features, but it was fading. He brought his hand up to play at the buttons on your blouse. You looked at each other for a second longer before you initiated a kiss for once, using the arm around his neck to pull him close. Your tongue felt so hot, so right, as if your body was as electric as his own and-

Vox gasped, a spark running through his head. He woke up alone in bed, a literal hot mess. He felt like his head was overheating, running a million miles a minute, despite the fact that he should feel cold from sleep. Mixing this with the slick sweat and fluid he was covered in, it was an uncomfortable feeling. Groping for the robe hanging next to his bed, he climbed out. What a dream. He needed a second to wire down from that before trying to go back to sleep.

He picked up his phone and opened it to check on you. The camera in your room showed you curled up on your mattress, blanket half off your body and arms wrapped around one of your pillows. It pressed into your dozing face, which held a peaceful, relaxed look that he rarely saw now that you had decided to go to war with him. His finger absently stroked your image on the screen.

Why did you have to be so difficult? He didn’t know what had been the powder keg that had kicked off your little rebellion, but whatever it was, all his attempts to nip it in the bud had made you more temperamental. Clearly his irritation with your behavior had seeped into his mind enough to create some… darker fantasies deep in his sleeping subconscious.

He shook his head. It was just a dream. It didn’t mean anything.

Besides, he already had been thinking about what to do next, to give you that little push you needed to be more agreeable.

---

Later that day he scoffed at how ridiculous his own morbid imagination was. The idea of you dressed all pimped up like one of Valentino’s whores. You barely got out of bed nowadays. If he was being honest, your imprisonment had caused your mood to swing between defiant temper tantrums and a hopelessly depressed sloth. Today, you were in the latter mood, still in pajamas that he swore you were wearing two days ago, lying on the couch and mindlessly eating as you watched some random reality show.

“Hello there, beautiful,” he said, trying to sound pleasant, “Looks like you’ve had a relaxing day.”

You glance at him for a second before looking back at the television. The blanket is pulled tighter around you, as if you were trying to hide any inch of yourself from him. Ever since his last attempt at showing his affection had ended in you headbutting him – hard – you had been particularly prickly at even the slightest hint that he might want to touch you.

“What do you want, asshole?” you said, voice lacking emotion.

Charming as always.

“Well, dearest, I was thinking. Now that you’ve had some time to think things over, I was hoping we could finally come to an agreement that would make us both happy,” he said.

“I highly doubt that’s possible,” you said.

He sat beside you, which caused you to curl your legs in tighter. You inch up on the arm a little, as if to sit as far away from him as possible without having to actually put any effort into getting up.

“We both have something that the other person wants, something that could be easily settled with a written contract,” Vox said, “You would like to be allowed to roam around this cesspool of a city and I-”

“Let me guess, it includes a whole paragraph about me never leaving your sight as well as a clause about how often you get to stick yourself in my various orifices?” you grumbled.

“You’re so melodramatic sometimes,” he said, “You always assuming the worst about people, F/N. Makes me wonder if you were double crossed a lot in your previous life.”

You don’t even respond to this, just continue to stare ahead. He’d noticed that lately you’ve been avoiding his gaze. He wasn’t sure how much you had figured out about his abilities, but you seemed to have pieced enough together that the more you avoided his eyes, the less direct influence he had on you at the moment. He was sure that it was one of the many reasons you were so moody lately; you stubbornly refused to be soothed by him. Regardless, whether you were trying to avoid his hypnotic gaze or not, it’s no matter. It’s not like you’re going to be able to avoid the overall influence he has over this city, especially if you spend your free time watching television he’s created.

“It’s rather tame, considering the situation you’re in. Contract or not, it’s not like you’re going to be going anywhere anytime soon,” he continued, “You’re lucky I care for you as much as I do, trying to work with you like this.”

“Hooray for me,” you said.

You really were a brat sometimes. Vox at times wondered if it was because he was too soft on you, and you didn’t realize the amount of actual power he held over you. Either that or you just didn’t care anymore. Whatever. It was all big talk because at the end of the day, you both knew you couldn’t do anything about your situation.

“You already have lots of benefits, which you would retain. Nice apartment, clothes, up to date tech. Besides that, you can come and go regularly, as long as you’re back here within twenty-four from when you last left. You can do whatever you want during that time. You also would be working for me a minimum of forty hours a week, with the occasional granted vacation at my discretion. That’s pretty much it, along with you occasionally being cooperative with my… desires,” he said, “So you’d have plenty of time to yourself. I didn’t put in anything that would force you to do anything too unsavory with me.”

Though he certainly would have liked to be more pushy in that department, he knew going too far could result in the kind of hate fueled relationship Valentino and Angel Dust shared. He honestly didn’t have the energy to have that much drama in his own life. Good night, he could hardly handle the drama that was in his life now. Besides, he was sure you’d come around willingly, even if it took a few centuries.

You glared at him as he finished speaking, as if to say, how generous of you.

From inside his vest, he pulls out the contract and holds it out to you.

“So, we have a deal?” he asked.

You sit up and take the paper, still avoiding his eyes. You seem to be reading it over, though your hold on it is lazy.

“… This still says you can fuck me at least once a week if you want to, or else I’m not allowed to leave the building,” you said, “Did you really think I wasn’t going to notice shit like that?”

He laughed a bit awkwardly.

“I mean, I did say I would like you to be at least a little cooperative,” he said, crossing his legs, “We could wait a little while if you’d like. I mean, you’d still have more freedom than you do now, even with that minuscule restriction. You should know by now that I’m a patient man.”

You stare at it again, forehead wrinkled.

“You know what… I see where you’re coming from,” you said, finally making eye contact, “Tic for tac, eh?”

“That’s a crude way for you to put it,” he said.

You shrug.

“Crude or not, it’s the truth,” you said, a sardonic smirk appearing on your face, “You want me to give a little to get a little.”

Before he could say anything you hold up your hands with more energy than he’s seen you have in days.

“No, no, no! I understand. I’ve been in hell long enough to know how people like you work. I get where you’re coming from, I really do. I’m not stupid! So trust me, I’m being completely serious when I say that I think you should take this lovely contract of yours and shove it up your glowing blue ass!” you ripped it in half on the last word, your smile still present but a nasty look in your eyes.

Vox felt his eye twitch as you continued to smirk at him, tossing the paper at him like you would throw trash across the room. You then lie back down and turn back to the TV, ignoring him again as if the last few minutes hadn’t even happened at all. Though you were attempting to pull your face back into the blank expression of earlier, he could see in your eyes a mixture of emotion, rage, yes, but also a certain smugness. What, did you really think you were tough shit for mouthing off to him like that?

He felt like his head was going to explode. Before he even registered how he was reacting, he had grabbed you by the hair and was pulled you back over.

“Ow! What the hell are you doing, Vox?” you yelled, the smug look gone from your eyes, “You’re hurting me!”

“You think you’re so smart, don’t you? I’m trying to be generous to you because I actually like you, but you know what? I’ve clearly spoiled you rotten already!” he fumed.

He was practically seeing red as he dragged you over, causing you to yelp. You try to kick him, but he only grabs onto your ankle and pulls you closer to him, spinning you around so that you were pressed against the back of the couch, his arms on either side of you. His fingers are still gripping your hair, forcing you to turn your head towards him.

“You know, you’re right, who needs a contract?” he said, “I can do whatever the hell I want with you, and what are you going to do about it?”

Your voice cracked as you attempted to speak, but he didn’t pay any attention to what you were trying to say. He could feel his systems overloading with the amount of rage he was feeling, shouting over you.

“I hope you like the view from up here, because you’re staying here for the rest of your miserable eternal exist. You can work and live here 24/7,” he said, “Anything else we should change in the arrangement? You didn’t like the idea of fucking me once a week? Fine by me. Why not once a day? Twice a day? Every hour? Would you like that better? Huh? Answer me!”

As he finished speaking, he finally heard what you were saying, “-m sorry! I’m sorry, please, stop!

As he heard your pleading, he felt himself being brought back down to earth. While his rage was still present, your begging brought him back to reality, and it was finally registering how upset you were. Hysterical. Terrified. You were sobbing, more afraid of him than he had ever seen you, even on the worst days of your fighting.

“D-d-don’t hurt me. I’m s-sorry, I’m sorry! Please, don’t hurt me!”

He released your hair with a rapid exhale, and you automatically moved your head away from him, arms shielding your face. Shaking, it was sinking in just emotionally distraught you were, as well as the damage he had done to the couch. He hadn’t even noticed he had been digging his claws into the polyester, a row of gnashes beside your head. The situation was completely getting out of control. He pushed himself off of you and turned away. He didn’t even say anything, just left the room and went through the wires to his office. His head was overheating, and he was going to crash at this rate if he didn’t calm down.

Damn it! He hated how out of control you made him feel. It was pathetic. There was only one other person he could think of that made him get near as frustrated as he was feeling with you at the moment. He wasn’t the kind to act out, and here he was acting almost as ridiculous as his business partner did. The only saving grace was that Vox at least tried to keep his infatuation as quiet and private as possible.

It was more than his emotional irregularity though. The fact that he felt this way at all about you was humiliating. Affection, fondness, it was a weakness, and he knew it. Valentino got away with just having simple lust and taking what he wanted, but genuine affection demanded gentleness and tenderness. It was beyond him just not being able to do as he pleased with you, he didn’t want to. He wanted you to come to him willingly. It was the thing holding him back from just hypnotizing you into his arms or using a “love” potion, and now he had probably set any progress towards your affection back significantly.

He rubbed his forehead, which was starting to cool down a little. What was going on up there? He was going to end up doing something rash, something he regretted, if he didn’t get things under control and under control fast. Something needed to be done, but he didn’t know what. Nothing had gone how he had wanted it to. He would need to rethink his approach.

---

You spent a long time shaking on the couch, arms and blanket wrapped around you, crying. You were an idiot. Clearly your brain was turning to mush just sitting around the house all day. Did you actually think you’d be able to get away with speaking like that to an Overlord of Hell?

There had to be a way out of this place. Had to. But the more you thought about it, the more impossible it felt. Even if you did manage to get out of the building in one piece, Vox had this entire city under constant watch. Every corner of Pentagram City was crawling with his tech and media. It would take minutes if not seconds for him to find you and bring you back by force. At this point, maybe you should just sign a contract with the douchebag. Surely, he’d get bored of you eventually, right? Maybe if you got lucky he’d even get killed off one of these days in an extermination, and you’d be off the hook completely.

But how long would that take? Decades? A century or two? What if he never tired of you? Eternal death or not, you didn’t want to spend that much time living and sleeping with some psycho you hated. No. That wasn’t an option. You weren’t going to do that. But what then? You had thought he was going to literally rip your head off just a few minutes ago for telling him no. You were pretty sure things weren’t going to get less volatile around here if you kept rejecting him.

You wiped at your tear soaked face with a tissue and tossed it across the room. It’s light material just sent it floating to the ground though. It looked as pathetic as you felt.

“Damn it,” you cursed, smashing your head into a throw pillow and lying back down, “I hate this fucking place.”

#yandere x reader #vox #vox x reader #yandere vox #yandere hazbin hotel #Eh I can't believe I wrote this and actually published it for people to read.

[hunnylagoon]

Right Where You Left Me

Pt 4: The Sweetest Thing to Ever Scare You (Finale)

Ellie Williams x reader

I remember when I first saw you. I remember looking into your warm almond eyes and feeling butterflies in my stomach. But soon, when I looked into your eyes, I no longer felt the same warmth that I once knew. It felt as though you had killed all of the butterflies inside my stomach but yet, I still loved you.

Premise: You and Ellie are childhood best friends until you drift apart. Funny thing about soulmates is they tend to find their way back to each other. You and Ellie try to end the tireless war between you.

Warnings: Angst / drinking / violence / not really religious mentions in this one

Part one here!

Part two here!

Part three over here!

Guys I thought I posted this two days ago but I actually just saved it to drafts. Sorry for being an idiot lmao

I think that I have unlearned how to love.

That’s not even a word but there is no other way to tell you that I have turned myself cold.

Without partying to distract me and religion to fill in gaps of emptiness, I isolate myself and begin to write once again. I'm almost certain that my body has been telling me to write, that I need to pour myself into art as opposed to a girl I was friends with a million years ago.

I figure that I need to create rather than destroy but it might take me a while to do so.

The morning after I abandoned my faith on the church floor, I had woken up and expected Ellie to be gone, however, she was wide awake and playing subway surfers on her phone. Her hair is messy and her eyes are half-lidded. 

She turns to look at me when she feels the shuffling of the bedsheets; despite her doing nothing more than smile at me it is like an understanding passed between us, war is over.

Almost.

It's like I've forgotten how to be soft, I can't manage to get the words out that I need to, and the thought of it alone makes me cringe. "Breakfast?" I ask, unsure of what else to say.

Ellie passes on it and I awkwardly excuse myself, saying that I got called in to take a brunch shift at work. Of course, this is not true. What I do is get into my car and drive and drive until I get mad at myself for burning gas. 

The war between Ellie and I had ended but it didn't register in my head, I almost fell in love with it. Without the constant arguing and passive aggressiveness, there was nothing to put a wall between us and I wasn't ready to be vulnerable again. 

So I begin to feed Ellie the ugliest parts of me; I show her everything I'm sure she will hate but she doesn't, she's patient and shows me the kindness I have been looking everywhere for. Still, I am cold to her, I don't know what else to do. 

I try to push her away all over again but this time, she doesn't let me. Ellie comes into my room when I'm studying to sit on my bed so that she can be in proximity to me. Sometimes she'll ask me if I want to go for a walk or a late-night gas station run, all of the things we used to do.

When I'm angry at her, she lets it happen, she won't escalate the fight all she does is apologize and does what she can to fix it. Everything feels like it's in order again, Joel even starts to send me little text messages to check in on me and sends me Facebook memes that make him think of me.

As of now, we are setting up for Dina's twenty-first birthday. The living room, typically a space for casual gatherings and movie nights, had undergone a transformation. Vibrant streamers adorned the walls, and an array of balloons in assorted hues scattered themselves along the floor "Are balloons too childish?" Abby asks as she walks out of her bedroom.

"They better not be after I just spent half an hour doing all of these," Cat answers, giving her a scornful glare.

"They look great, Cat," I smile and give her a thumbs-up from where I am in the kitchen dumping bags of chips into bowls. "Should I make a veggie platter?"

Cat furrows her eyebrows "If you can finish it by yourself, sure."

"Cat, we aren't children, adults eat vegetables," Abby takes a seat on the couch behind Cat, investigating the hard work she's put into making the living room look nice for just one night "Isn't it weird that Dina is organizing her own surprise party?"

I shrug, placing a wooden cutting board down on the kitchen counter "I don't blame her, I don't think we've always been one hundred percent reliable, me specifically."

"But it's not a surprise if she knows about it."

"So?" Cat asks.

"So why are we calling it a surprise party if it isn't a surprise?"

"Why not?"

"Well, why can't we just call it a party?"

"I don't think it matters," I cut in, I begin to peel carrots and slice them up into quarters. Ellie comes out of her bedroom, she took a nap after completing her physics presentation, her hair in a messy bun, and she's in her typical pyjama uniform of sweats and a hoodie. "Hey, Ellie," I smile at her.

She rubs some sleep away from her green eyes "Hey," Ellie walks over to the kitchen island where I slice and chop vegetables and sits right in front of me. Even half asleep she looks like a statue of marble carved by a skilled hand.

Abby raises an eyebrow, asking 'When did you guys become friends?' without saying it and then it hits me like the plane in Lost. Ellie still hasn't told anyone about our history, our sixteen years of friendship is invisible to the eyes of those who think they know us well.

I'm broken from my thoughts when Abby speaks up "When are you picking up the cake?"

My heart drops "I'm not?"

Cat and Abby cast one another side glances while Ellie snatches a cucumber off my cutting board "Dina was handing out duties and you said you would take care of the cake."

I freeze, unsure of what to say "Nuh-uh." I shake my head like a child denying blame for breaking her mother's favourite dish.

"Yuh-huh," Cat shoots back. "How could you forget that?"

My mind fumbles for an excuse and somehow I land on "I forgot because I went temporarily insane from Lyme disease," What am I saying? "I got Lyme disease because I go camping in secret," I don't camp "And I never told you guys that I go camping because I'm deeply ashamed of it."

Now everyone looks perpetually confused, Ellie included "What are you talking about?" Abby asks, her eyebrows furrowed.

"Okay-well," I place my knife flat on the counter by the wooden cutting board, ignoring the odd spiel I just went on "I'm going to drive to-

"You dropped your car off for a suspension repair yesterday," Abby reminds me.

"Ellie is going to drive me to get a cake," I correct myself "I will be back to finish making my veggie plate." I quickly rinse my hands before grabbing Ellie's keys from the little jewelry dish on the island and yank the sleeve of her hoodie to pull her along.

Ellie doesn't say anything, she slips into some Crocs and we walk outside to her car. "Where are we headed?"

"Uh, hang on," In Ellie's passenger seat, I go on Google Maps to look up the closest bakeries that are still open at this hour, there are two, one a couple of streets away and the other one is across town and closing in twenty minutes. "Infectious Confections," I wrinkle my nose "That's a weird fucking name."

While Ellie tries to make conversation in the car I only speak when giving her directions to the bakery. She knows something is up and I can tell by the way she keeps glancing at me. I just can't manage to get it out of my head that she's still keeping me a secret. 

She pulls up to the bakery and I get out before she even turns her car off, she pulls the keys out of the ignition and trails behind me through the doors.

The bakery itself was rustic and clean, there were two display cases and tills one of the displays held danishes, croissants, cookies, scones and whatever those little swirly flakey things are called. The other display had a big chalk menu above it that read 'Cakery' Though what was in the display case was very sparse.  

"Hi," I walk up to the till, putting on the friendly smile and customer service voice that I usually only use at work. "This is pretty short notice but I was wondering if you had any cakes left or if I could get one made for today?"

The guy behind the counter is a scrawny teenager who looks like he has had a long enough day of dealing with annoying customers "We close in half an hour, there's not enough time to bake and decorate a cake." He explains it like he's said this to a million people, he's bored of the same phrases that his manager has scripted out for him.

"Any shot that someone didn't pick up their cake?" I ask, fingers crossed in the hope that he says yes.

"Let me talk to my manager," His voice drags on, and he turns around and disappears through a commercial kitchen door. I wait patiently, hands balled together in front of me as I rock back and forth on my heels. A minute or two later he comes back holding a bright blue cake with pink detailing of bows and mustaches, there's text on it that reads 'It's a...' gender reveal cake. "This is all we have left, they cancelled last minute.

I look back at Ellie to get her opinion, her eyebrows are furrowed slightly "Maybe we good just get some of those cupcakes and smush them together and smear the icing so it looks like a cake."

I wave her off "I'll buy it," I say this only because it is 5:41 and with each passing minute I am growing desperate, also I don't want Jesse to be disappointed that I fumbled the cake and ruined his girlfriend's birthday.

Angsty teenager puts the bright blue monstrosity into a cake box and charges me an absurd total for it, I bitterly tap my card on the machine. 

As I walk back out to Ellie's car I take a brief moment to look at the sky, it's the same hue as cotton candy and looks as if it had been projected from a watercolour painting, even after I get back into the car and Ellie begins to blast her old dad rock songs, I can't tear my eyes away from it.

After five minutes of silence from my end, Ellie finally asks the question that's been burning into the forefront of her brain "Why are you being weird?"

"Why haven't you told anyone that we met before we moved in together?"

Her dark eyebrows furrow "You haven't told anyone either-

"Yes, I have."

"Who?"

"Yara, Stacy, Kayla, Mitch, Nigel, Carmen, literally everyone from my work," I admit "I just haven't told people who know you personally so it can't make its way back to you because you clearly don't want people to know."

She falls silent, searching her mind for the right words. She clutches the steering wheel tight and looks dead ahead at the car's bumper-to-bumper ahead of us. "I just know how to slip it into conversation."

"I don't think it's that hard, you can just say that we were friends, you don't need to give an intricate play-by-play of everything that happened."

"Why is it important that people know if we're cool again?"

I turn my head to slowly look at her "You are the one who always said 'If we don't have honesty, we have nothing at all'," I point out.

Silence strings between us again, I almost want to throw up.

'We're cool again' Nope, not anymore, we are so very far from cool. Instead of Ellie casting me little glances as she had on the ride there, she ignores my presence almost completely while I glare daggers at her. Was she embarrassed by me? When we went to lunch together why did she lie to Dina about where she was? When she slept in my bed why did Cat ask me if I knew why Ellie came home at eight AM with nothing, not even a key? Did she crawl through my bedroom window to walk around to the front door and pretend she was just getting home?

AND WHY DIDN'T I CALL HER OUT?

She was keeping me a secret and that realization hurt worse than any injury I had ever suffered. She hasn't even told her dead who practically raised me that we lived together. 

God, we weren't even anything and she was keeping me under wraps like I was some disgraceful secret that she would get shamed for holding. The very second she approached our house, I got out of her car, she hadn't even stopped it completely but cake in hand, I hopped out of her car door and didn't look back.

I think I've had my fair share of partying.

After that month-long bender I had where I went to clubs every night and replaced food with vodka, I never wanted to even look at another solo cup full of liquor. Instead of drinking, smoking, or doing karaoke, I hide from Ellie.

I hide from her in conversations and sometimes sneak into my bedroom just to get a bit of breathing room from all of the strangers in my house. Wherever Ellie was, I was not. If she was outside, I was inside, if she was in the living room, I was in the kitchen enjoying my veggie platter. 

Have you ever been the only sober person around in a group of people? If the answer is no, have you ever babysat a houseful of toddlers? Because it's just about the same thing.

When I'm not hiding from the girl who wriggled her way back into my good graces just to trip herself off the podium, I'm cleaning up, protecting our furniture, holding back hair as girls I've never met sob into the toilet, and stopping the drunk from doing stupid things. 

"Hey, buddy," I take my can of hairspray that this frat-adjacent man is holding behind an ignited lighter "I don't think you would look good as a burn victim," His friends moan in disappointment as I do so, they were very excited to see a makeshift flamethrower; I wasn't in the mood to have my house burn down, or have a guy with peach fuzz waste my thirty dollar hair spray. 

Thirty dollars?

Note to self for later: Make smarter spending choices (And smarter relationship choices!).

I felt a tap on my shoulder only to turn around and see Dina, she wasn't drunk, just tipsy "Smile!" She holds up a camera to her eye and clicks the shudder button before I even have a chance to react the flash goes off. A large Polaroid begins to print out, Dina snatches it and shakes it until you can see my silhouette, my eyes are wide, my hair flying behind me from the quick turn of my head and I'm holding a can of hairspray angled to look like I'm going to spray the camera with it "Cute!" She smiles, tucking it into her pocket for later "Wait, I want a group picture of the roommates."

Dina takes my hand and pulls me to one of the couches where Ellie and Abby sit with some guy, she shoes him to get up and drags Cat over to replace him, she stands me in between Ellie and Abby and lightly pushes me down to sit wedged between the two.

"Jesse, please do not do me dirty with this picture," She hands the pink Polaroid camera to her boyfriend and quickly ushers herself to the far left of the couch where she bends over to kiss Cat on the cheek for the picture. Ellie and I are stiff and awkward when the flash goes off. 

After the picture is taken, Ellue turns to face me just the slightest "Hey, I think we should talk-

"I think it's time for cake!" I push myself off the couch and usher myself to the kitchen. 

I pull the cake out of the fridge, looking at what I had done to salvage it; Below the part that said 'It's a...' I wrote '21 year old!' in chocolate pre-made Betty Crocker icing that I had in the fridge for months, it didn't look the best, but it could've been worse.

Dina, of course, cackles when she sees it. To her, it is the funniest thing she's seen all night. I stick the candles in and light it with the light I confiscated from peach fuzz frat boy and push the cake towards Dina after tucking the light back into my pocket, she is illuminated in the glow of iPhone flash all filming her.

"Make a wish!"

Age Sixteen- Grade 11

I think back to how embarrassing it felt to be thoughtful.

How fragile I felt when I would share my feelings and how frail I seem when I do it now. Ellie was always tougher than I was, in rugby, in fights, just in general. That's why I figured she would be taking it better than me when I cut contact, once again I have been proven wrong.

"Conner, can we please just leave?" I pleaded with my then-boyfriend. The night had started fine but after a couple of drinks Ellie and I were becoming increasingly hostile to one another, it wasn't my intention to speak to her but the universe forced my hand when we were shoved into a circle of our friends and made to converse around the bonfire at the beach.

The salty breeze carried the sounds of laughter and the gentle crashing of waves, the scent of roasted marshmallows wafted through the air.

 "What, you need your boyfriend's permission or something?" Ellie held a can of berry blast Smirnoff, staring into my soul from the other side of the fire, the sparks glitter through the night like fireflies. Her words don't feel too bad but they don't feel too good either.

I cast her a glare before I looked back to my boyfriend "Please?" 

He is getting perpetually annoyed with me he shrugs away from my grasp, "Fuck off, we just got here," He mutters, Conner must think I couldn't hear it. He had already downed three Bud lights and a couple of shots of cheap vodka, now he is nursing another beer in hand. 

"Excuse me?" I say, narrowing my eyes. Everyone around the fire pauses their conversation to tune into mine. "Come on," I stand up and try to pull him along so we can have a conversation away from the prying eyes of our friends.

I can't pull the mass of the 6'2 quarterback along with me but he obliges and follows me where I yank him. As I drag him along the rest of the group giggle and makes jokes along the lines of 'Trouble in paradise' but Ellie is the only one who doesn't jump back into mindless conversation, her unnerving eyes are still on me while I chew my boyfriend out by the shoreline. 

"Why do I have to leave just because you're feeling a little bummed out?" 

I'm almost floored at out someone can lack so much empathy "Because you're my boyfriend?" I can feel myself tensing up.

"Why does that mean you can't get up and leave on your own?" He defends "You begged me to come here and now I just wanna down a couple of beers and hang out with my friends."

"You've already drank like twenty!" I retort.

"It's a fucking party!" Conner says, raising his voice "It's a party and it's summer and you're seriously trying to tell me not to have fun?"

"Fuck!" I shout in frustration "Why don't you ever call me? Why can't you ever let me in?" The argument is quickly escalating "Why didn't you tell me that you kissed Tamar and why haven't you told me that you love me?"

"Because I don't."

My words fail me. I knew he didn't, I knew that he hardly even liked me. My dad had thought so highly of him, she said he was the type of guy to rescue a baby from a burning building but as I look at him now, I figure that he eats babies.

I almost open my mouth to say something different, almost, but I don't. The rest of my life might have turned out differently if I didn't, I might've been able to salvage the rotting corpse of my relationship with Ellie but I didn't. "Fine," I say, voice calm and quiet "Let's stay."

Before that night I had never really gotten drunk but the second I got back to the bonfire, I was digging through the cooler and shotgunning canned Smirnoff. "Woah," Riley laughs "Someone's finally being a bad influence."

I got myself so shit-faced that when everyone else got up to dance to the music blaring through the Bluetooth speaker, I sat by myself at the shoreline, looking bitterly out towards to ocean while the tides crash at my feet and get sucked back into the ocean. For a moment I think about jumping in and letting my lax body get washed away and sink beneath the surface until I wash up as a water-bloated corpse that some nine-year-old will find when they're beach combing.

My mouth tastes like peroxide and blood, my lungs burn with a red-hot pain. The wind is becoming increasingly harsh and I ignore the hair that is tangled into my golden hoop earrings.

"Wow, you look awful," I don't need to turn around to know who it is.

"Can you just fuck off?" I say "I don't give a shit about you, just leave me alone."

She always had to antagonize me, Ellie went out of her way to stray from the group and bother me. It had something to do with the alcohol in her system. Despite her alleged hatred for me, she takes a seat next to me regardless.

"Fuck, you're so sensitive," She scoffs "I don't know why you're dating him, I'm not even sure why you'd want to fuck him unless you're too lazy to jerk off-

My hands think before my head and I deck Ellie right in the side of her face, getting a solid hit to her cheekbone. My hand flies over my mouth "I'm sorry, I-

Ellie doesn't waste any time in lunging back at me, she pushes me down by my shoulders until my back is in the shallow of the water that moments ago just splashed at my feet and takes a swing. The impact of her punch almost knocks me sober.

I take a sharp inhale, grabbing her elbows and pulling her down to where she was the one on her back and I was the one straddling her. I land one last blow to her nose, I hear a crunch and the panic immediately sends me scrambling to my feet. My eyes go wide at the blood dripping down, her face I turn to run but Ellie is faster, she grabs me by my hair and yanks me down further into the water with her. 

"Fucking cunt!" I cry, though my scream is drowned out by the overwhelmingly loud tides crashing on the shore "Get the fuck off me!" 

Ellie is better at fighting than I am, I had never been on this side of her before, usually, I had been the one to drag her away from fights but now I am the one who is going to stumble home numb from the devastating pain.

Frankly, I'm fucking scared.

She continues to drag me by my hair until I'm knee-deep in the water with her, she almost throws her entire weight into me, dunking me beneath the surface where her bony hands snake around my neck. My eyes have gone blurry with the salt water, they sting and burn. I can't see anything, all I can do is uselessly thrash beneath her. My hands push against her face, trying to pry her off my body. 

Eventually, I manage to claw her face with my fingernails, I dig deep enough that it breaks skin and she recoils just enough for me to knee her in the stomach and let me get out from under her. Just as I try to slip away she reaches for my hair again, but instead of tugging on my hair, she rips out my gold hoop earring. I screech out in agony, hand reaching for where the metal sliced through the lobe of my ear, I shudder in pain; my cries are now jagged and harsh.

This is the exact moment Ellie begins to regret what she's done. "Fuck, I'm so sorry, I didn't mean to." Her tone softens and she tries to approach me but I back away from her like a frightened dog.

"Get away from me!" Despite the pain surging in my body, I find the strength in me to hit her again, she staggers back tripping into the water. I hit her so hard that I feel a crack in my knuckle and I yelp out in the immediate shock of pain. 

I wasn't sure when the others had noticed this was happening probably because my vision had gone blurry from salt water and adrenaline but before Ellie could hit me again, she was being restrained by Riley and Kennedy while some guy who I had probably had two conversations with dragged my back to shore.

I keel over on my hands and knees and begin to start retching onto the sand. Laila rubs a gentle hand on my back, my hair sticking wet on my forehead. A seagull, disturbed by the commotion, took flight, its wings cutting through the charged air. 

Next to the pile of vomit I just heaved, blood drips down from my ear, pooling and then soaking into the sand. My neck swells from what is still the raw sensation of Ellie closing her hands around it. 

I look up at Ellie, there is blood that has dripped its way into her mouth, clinging to her white teeth. She has what almost looks like a cat scratch running down her cheek, blood begins to prick and spill from the lacerations.

She stares back at me and we don't say a word but we understand each other clearly, I never want to see you again.

"Let's go," Ellie grabs my arm as Dina begins to slice the cake "We're gonna fix this right now."

"Ellie, there are so many people here," I say in a hushed tone so people can't hear me.

"I don't mean here," She looks at me, face expressionless "Just get in my car."

"Excuse me?" I say, tone accusing "Did you just order me to get in your car?"

"Fuck," She sighs, dropping my wrist to rub her hands down her face "Please can you get in my car so we can work this through."

"There's nothing to work through," I retort "You're embarrassed by me or you still secretly hate me and that's fine, I meant what I said on winter break about the lease, the second it's up, I'm getting the fuck out of here."

"What? No, don't- just," She takes a breath, reevaluating what to say "I have a point to make but I can't make it unless you get in my car."

We stare at each other for a moment, I narrow my eyes and she is still unmoving. Every scenario runs through my head of what could be waiting for me in that car.

"Fine."

I sit silently in her passenger seat, my knees are pulled into my chest and I rest my chin on them. Ellie doesn't say anything either as she drives. I watch each traffic light pass me, every street name to try and make sense of where we are going.

I almost feel like I'm going to suffocate beneath the silence of everything going left unsaid.

When I spot the boardwalk up ahead, I know exactly where she's taking me "Ellie, why are we at the beach?" I give her a side glance "Do I need to take out my earrings?"

Heat rises to her cheeks when I say this, "Not yet," She jokes, getting out of her car and grabbing a tote bag from the back seat, and I follow in tow.

We walk past the boardwalk and onto the sandy beach, I'm already not feeling whatever she's doing; there is sand filling up my Converse and a slight wind chill, I'm really wishing I had a hoodie right now. "Can you tell me what we're doing yet?" I'm hugging myself in an attempt to stay warm "If we're still walking on the beach why couldn't we have just walked on the boardwalk instead? It literally has walk in the name." I'm already going off on one of my tangents.

She still walking ahead of me but she briefly turns around to face me "Can you just stop asking questions for a minute?"

"Okay, whatever," I mutter, trailing behind her still. I can hardly see in the night, the only light to guide us is the moon and the warm ceiling lamps from restaurants along the boardwalk. I can vaguely see Ellie's silhouette, she's outlined by the gentle glow radiating off the moon, I try my best not to stumble over things poking out of the sand that have been lost to sight by darkness. 

"Okay," Ellie stops, "Here we are."

"Where are we?" I ask "I can't see shit, I don't know where here is."

Ellie digs around in her pocket for her phone and turns on a flashlight and it reveals a small iron firepit that was cemented into a slab of concrete in the sand. She hands me her phone so I can keep the flash on her and she can see what she's doing. 

She pulls out some pages ripped out from her notebook "Can you hand me your lighter?"

My eyebrows furrowed, and I felt around in my pocket wondering if I even had one. I did, it had slipped my mind that I still had the bic lighter that I confiscated from Peach Fuzz. I hand the lighter to her and watch as she tucks the pages beneath logs that were in the firepit before we arrive, they are somewhat charred but still viable.

She flicks the lighter to ignite it and the paper catches immediately. The initial flicker grew into a tentative blaze, licking at the edges of the kindling. The crackling sound echoed through the night. 

Once she is sure the fire can survive without her feeding it, she steps away. "Alright, let's have it out."

"Like sex?" I scrunch up my nose.

"Oh my god, no, like let's talk this through." She pinches her nose bridge, taking a breath in before exhaling and putting her hand back down "We're gonna recreate the night of the bonfire how it should've been," Ellie reached back into her bag and pulled out two white claws "I snagged these from Dina's party, sorry this was kind of last minute."

I can't help the smile that grows on my face, I take one of the white claws and crack it open "I don't know how authentic this is gonna be if there isn't any canned Smirnoff."

I think back to exactly how that night played out and I take a seat on the sand, facing the crashing dark ocean. I sip my white claw, as expected Ellie takes a seat next to me, just what happened on the actual night.

"Wow," She says "You look really pretty and I'm an idiot for ever saying you looked awful," Ellie looks gorgeous illuminated by the orange light of the fire, and the breeze causes her flyaway hairs to drift in the wind. "I'm an asshole for pretending that I didn't know you, I was scared I would get hurt again and take it to heart like I did last time. I promise the second we get home that I'll come clean."

I don't know if I can deal with this sugary philosophy. She's being so sweet that it's rotting my teeth.

"Ellie," I say gathering my thoughts, it was so hard being honest with my feelings, it felt like I would get hospitalized if I showed any emotion. "I was so in love with you in high school that it killed me, and I was terrified that my parents would throw me out well, they did- but that's why I pushed you away and there isn't a day that goes by where I don't regret it." 

The surprise on her face morphs into a soft smile "What about now?" she asks "Do you still love me?"

I shrug, it's honest "I dunno, but I think there's room to try."

She looks from me to the ocean and the way the moonlight glitters off the surface "What happened next?" Ellie toys with the tab of her drink "Did you hit me?"

"Yeah," I say softly, following her gaze out to the waters "But if we're doing the night how it should've been, I'd rather just kiss you."

Ellie turns her head back to look at me. She shoves her white claw into the sand then takes my face into one of her hands and kisses me like it's her job, so tender and carefully like she's afraid I will break beneath pressure.

How weak have I become? My heart is so full of her that I can hardly call it my own.

A/N: Be grateful for this ending because I was very tempted to give you guys an unhappy one. Sorry that I forgot to post this lol, I’m sad this series is over but excited to show you all my next one which may be the angst-iest yet 👀

Thanks for reading!

Tag list: @elliesaturnsoftdrink @elliesaesp @melanie-watermelon @yalaysbee @laundrybag29 @readbydayana @skylerwhitwyo @lmaoo-spiderman @joliettes @kittnii @taylorgracies @sameenatruther @mikellie @belles-hell @fullmachinegirl @eveshyper @whosmica

#ellie williams #ellie williams fluff #ellie williams x you #the last of us #the last of us ellie #tlou #ellie the last of us #ellie williams x female reader #ellie williams x reader #abby anderson #ellie williams au #ellie x y/n #ellie x fem reader #ellie x reader #joel and ellie #ellie tlou #ellie x you #ellie williams x reader angst #ellie williams angst #angst #ellie williams x reader fluff #fluff #ellie fluff #dina tlou #dina woodward #ellie williams fanfic #jesse tlou

[no-droids]

Another Rough Day

gif credit @chrishemsworht

Part Twenty of the Rough Day Series

Rating: Explicit

Word Count: 13.7K

Warnings: Angst, violence, canon-typical blood and gore, language, hurt/comfort

A/N: i wanna thank yall for sticking around during my hermit era, in the time ive been gone i am now officially a junior at a university majoring in aerospace and it’s a fuckin nightmare and i hate everything and god help us all literally kill me and I will be posting INCREDIBLY slowly because of that (I’m talkin weeks or months in between updates yall, im sorry I can’t dedicate more time to this but I am going to finish this fic within the next handful of chapters idk maybe 5 or 6 so you shouldn’t have to wait too too long).  As a heads up there will be hard angst as we enter the final arc, there will be hurt and it’ll get dark but everything is gonna turn out alright so thanks for sticking with me and continuing to stick with me. im sorry if you dont like it or your expectations were subverted or if this isn’t what you’d hoped it would be after following and waiting around for so long but this was planned a long time ago and it took me a good year or two to recognize that I started writing this fic for me and now I’m going to end it writing for me and I hope yall can respect that

ALSO I asked my best BEST FRIEND in the entire world @cptnbvcks to collaborate with me for this after we both took a very long break from creating and she drew some GORGEOUS artwork for this chapter so it will be posted at the end, everyone please go follow her and say hello

ps brittany girl you’re a fuckin menace i had to use my own two ears and listen to ethan literally say the words “the mandalorian cums, hard” what the fuck was that im actually suing

anyways chapter below the cut lets get serious yall

---

You take two of them down before they even realize they’re being attacked.

Your aim is as swift and steady as if Din were behind your shoulder right now, calmly pointing out which stationary tree to hit next in rapid succession.  You’re positioned perfectly at the bottom of the ramp to take full advantage of the ambush, the only thing running through your mind is strategy and the constant calculating of angles and ricochets.  The other three troopers are trapped inside the open Crest and you’re right next to a large boulder that you can step behind for cover, but it proves unnecessary as the rumors were apparently true.

They’re… awful.

Not a single blaster is even fired in your direction—you think you see maybe one panicked red shot bounce around in the hull, but that’s it.  The troopers fumble for their guns and trip over each other at the unexpected attack—a few scream like children through the modulators, but you’re temporarily deaf to anything besides the screech of your weapon hitting its target and the crumpling of armored bodies.

Later on, if someone were to ask you to describe exactly what happened—who died first, who ran for cover, who cried out for help—you don’t think you’d be able to.  You don’t even really feel like a person right now.  The entire thing is cold, robotic survival instinct, pure ruthlessness rising in your soul for the first time in your life.  It feels sick.  Wrong in your bones.  Born from preemptive defense in fear of your life, but that doesn’t mean you stop.  Not until all of them stop moving.

You empty the entire fucking canister for a handful of stormtroopers, firing plasma and char marks across every square inch of the pristine hull even after the last one drops.  Your heart is beating too fast, your finger keeps pulling the trigger multiple times even after the blaster clicks uselessly, completely empty and beeping a warning that it must’ve begun emitting ages ago.  Being out of ammo scares you—you suddenly feel vulnerable, even though the very far away logical part of your mind reminds you that they have to all be dead at this point and no physical threat was ever able to graze you.

Regardless, you quickly spin behind the boulder and grab another canister from your belt, giving it a spare check for leaks while the empty one slides and drops to the rocky ground.  It’s the first time you’ve ever had to reload this weapon instead of just pointing and shooting, but the mechanics are relatively simple and your brain makes up for your lack of coherent thoughts with lightning fast perception.  What's difficult is that your hands are starting to shake now that you’re not aiming, you’re not breathing correctly because you’re not really breathing at all.  You can’t tell the difference between the adrenaline-fueled dissociative silence that muffles everything around you or if it really is just that quiet now.  No more clatter of armor, no modulated voices or terrified screams.  No blasters, no footsteps along the ramp, no birds singing.

You quickly pause to lift your elbow and check the enormous eyes blinking up at you, tiny claws still holding tight to the fabric of your tunic and completely unharmed, and then you force yourself to move.  The blaster is held out in front of you while you walk forward and your finger rests on the trigger, begging to be pulled again.  It’s suspenseful and terrifying in a different way than before—now it’s less about psyching yourself up for confrontation and more about the fact that any sudden movement could mean your very swift end.

Silence.  Silence.  You’re numb and raw at the same time, walking up the ramp as your eyes fly everywhere, not even registering the blood or gore, just searching for movement.  You don’t know if you feel like a predator or prey, you’re that much more brutal and inhuman because of how fucking terrified you are.  You count four stormtroopers in the hull laying crumpled and still on the metal floor, but the one in the far corner only has blood on his shoulder.  You quickly swing the blaster around to remedy that, but then—

“P-Please don’t kill me!”

His words remind you of something.  Reality, maybe.  A world outside yourself and the kid’s survival, the living beings behind the bloody armor your enemies wear.

It’s a miracle your finger stays hovering over the trigger, and you watch him throw the blaster at your feet with a clang and scramble to show you his empty hands.  “Please don’t kill me, please don’t kill me—I’m not loyal to the Empire, I don’t want to be here, please, I don’t want to die, I don’t want to die—”

Behind the mask, your expression furrows.  Stormtroopers are loyal to the bitter end, what is he saying?  They embrace their expendiality, it’s the only thing that makes them any sort of a real threat.  Kuiil told you horror stories about them during your childhood, the cloning facilities and the propaganda they’re force fed since infancy.  It’s nearly impossible to find one who hasn’t been raised from birth to serve the Empire, no matter how crumbled and trace its remaining authority may be.

No, this is a trap, it has to be.  Your expression twists with dread after hearing him speak, readjusting your aim with the blaster and preparing yourself for the years of nightmares that’ll follow—but then he cries out, “Wait!” and then removes his helmet with trembling hands.

You pause, staring down at him in shock.

It’s him, you recognize him immediately.  It’s the same face from a hologram puck you bore into your memory, spent multiple days staring at so you’d be able to spot him under any disguise or circumstances.  Oshua Ryler.  Your quarry, the fifth puck, the one Din was out Maker knows where searching for before this entire mess happened.  A stormtrooper?  His puck said nothing about the Empire, this doesn’t make any sense.  What is he doing here?  Stormtroopers don’t have pucks, they don’t have bounties or relatives or loved ones searching for them.  They’re brainwashed, replaceable, faceless soldiers in suits of armor and they don’t even have names.

“Please don’t kill me,” he begs again, staring at you with wide eyes even as he cowers.  “I have a family, I-I just want to go home, please—”

“Shut up.”  You can’t think straight with him crying like that and you’re wasting so much time just standing here trying to process when your brain had to literally shut itself down to even do the things you’ve already done.  You have to kill him and escape, you have to—you can’t trust this complication, not with the tiny claws currently digging into your back and reminding you of your purpose, but it was so much easier when he had on a helmet.  You hate looking at his face.  It’s going to haunt your dreams now, just like the man you stabbed on Corellia.

“Please don’t kill me—please don’t kill me,” he screws his eyes up and breathes over and over instead, and your stomach wrenches with disgust.  His posture and expression are so fucking pitiful, you can barely keep your eyes on him through the overwhelming nausea and aversion that climbs up your throat.  He’s with the Empire, and they’re looking for the baby.  You know what needs to be done.  Pull the trigger, just one small movement from you and it’ll be all over.  It would be the easiest thing in the world, it would be so easy.

But then instead, you ask, “Why are you a stormtrooper?”

“I’m n-not—I hate the Empire—”

“The Empire is ashes.”  You don’t know if you’re yelling or whispering with how much blood is roaring through your ears.  “They hold no power anymore.  Why are you with them?”

“Because the one thing they have left is money!”  The quarry shrills the words at you, ghostly pale to the point of turning green.  “Th-They buy troopers now—they opened up a whole new market for the smugglers, there’s a base nearby that’s used for training and…”  He stares wide eyed at you and gulps.  “C-Conditioning.”

Your brain is already going a trillion lightyears an hour and it doesn’t have the capacity to empathize or understand anything beyond the child’s survival and the relevant details right now.  “Were they expecting the baby?”

“W-What?”  He squeaks up at you.

“Was the bounty put out on you a trap set by the Empire?”  You ask him, lifting your free arm just enough to flash him the tiny child clinging to your side.  “He said they’re coming after the baby, so tell me if this was planned from the beginning.”

“Who is ‘he’?”  The stormtrooper asks, furrowing his eyebrows and looking around.  “What are you talki—”

“Tell me if the bounty on you was a trap to take this baby!”  You roar, your blaster shaking as you aim it down at him.  Your mind is acutely focused on the tiny claws hanging onto your tunic, the continued safety of the kid and the life or death situation facing him that you were given absolutely no information about.  “Now—”

“If it was I didn’t know!”  He quickly cries out, pleading with you and clamping his eyes shut in terror under the barrel sight.  “I don’t know anything about a b-baby, or a bounty!  They just put blasters in our hands and told us to search for a ship and to bring back anyone we find alive, I swear!”

You’re silent for a moment, biting your lip under the mask and caught halfway between discerning and stalling.  You could still kill him.  You should still kill him, time is ticking down and more troopers could be heading this way any second.

Shit.  “Who put the bounty out on you?”  You ask sharply.  It might not be a completely fair question, but he can’t exactly blame you for not feeling completely fair right now.

“I—I don’t know,” he gasps, clutching his bleeding shoulder.  “Could’ve been anyone—my mother, Cyra, o-or my dad, Obediah, or Thia, or Benja, or S—”

“Thia,” you interrupt his rambling, catching the slurred word and repeating it back to him.

“Yes!”  Oshua jerks his head up, tears and hope immediately filling his eyes at the sound of her name, “Yes, Thiadura Celi Ryler, that’s my sister!”

Maker, if he’s lying, then he’s fucking brilliant at it.  You look towards the cockpit of the ship, biting your lip under the mask.  Get to Nevarro, tell Karga and he’ll… something.  Din was cut off before he finished.  Help?  Know what to do?  You’re lost, but you have a clear directive and the precious seconds are sliding by.  The controls are right up there, two steps to the ladder and less than a minute until you’re rising into the atmosphere.

But then you think back to the terror in Din’s voice.  The blistering panic that made him speak faster and with more urgency than you’ve ever heard from him.  Get to Nevarro.  Tell Karga.  Get to Nevarro.  Tell Karga.

You look back at the quarry.  “How many of you are there?”

“At the base?  Around three hundred,” he immediately spills.  “Half of us are in the hole right now getting brainwashed, they do it in shifts, but they can be mobilized in a few hours.  There were a lot of bodies outside when we were ordered to split off, maybe a third of our squadron, but the rest were still shooting at whatever was—”

“So around a hundred left,”  You finish breathlessly, almost wanting him to speak faster and cut to the chase so you can calculate quicker.  “How many were dispatched on the search?”

“Uh, there were eight groups of five sent in each major direction,” he informs you, still trembling on the ground.  “Told us not to come back until we covered the entire sector.”

Of which, four you’ve already taken care of.  In other circumstances, you’d be nauseated at the thought, but right now, it’s just another number to subtract, just more panicked math in Din’s frightening absence.  That leaves at least sixty troopers left wherever the base is, minimum, and likely a couple more hours before they’ve combed the sector.  If this wasn’t a preconceived trap purposefully set for the kid, then that means reinforcements haven’t arrived yet but likely will soon.  And if this is a base meant for training and conditioning, then that also means there’s a chance not all of them will be loyal yet.

You make the decision immediately.

“Okay,” you announce, clicking the blaster’s safety switch and holstering it, sounding lightyears more certain than you feel.  “Then you’re going to help me carry out a rescue mission, and I’ll take you back to your sister.”

“You…”  He looks uncertain, blinking at your blaster and slowly lowering his hands.  “You want to rescue the men?”

Ideally?  Sure.  Realistically?  You don’t say anything in response.  Instead, you kick his regulation firearm at your feet further away from the quarry just in case your judgment is flawed, and then turn around and grab one of the bodies behind you.

Your adrenaline is still blaring so fast that you only just barely note the severity of what you’ve just done and what you’re continuing to do.  The corpses aren’t real to you right now, they’re inanimate things that you need out of your ship before you can close the doors to it.  They are, however, heavy as fuck, but the only other adult here has a wound in his arm from the gun on your hip.  Regardless, you have experience with lifting dead weight without a big, strong, capable man to do it for you.

“Help me out here, kid,” you mutter over your shoulder, and in response, you feel his claws dig in and climb up just a little bit until he can peek out in front of you.  Thankfully, the burden is suddenly lifted and you can quickly slide the dead troopers down the ramp with ease.  It takes hardly any time at all—you just yank and haul and release and all four of them tumble the rest of the way all by themselves.

When you stand back up, Oshua hasn’t moved and he’s looking at you with a pale, queasy expression.  Glancing down, you see that your white robe is now stained with streaks and patches of rusty blood.  Instead of swallowing back bile at the sight and bolting to the shower to scrub off every last remaining trace, you breeze past it, noting nothing more than a change of color.  Dirtying your white, pristine clothing with the consequences of protecting this baby—you’d rather have blood-soaked fabric with an unharmed kid clinging to you than any other combination of those things.

“Can you make it up to the cockpit?”  You ask the quarry, kicking his rifle off the ship before closing the ramp and then gesturing up the ladder.  Your voice is calm and steady but your hands are beginning to shake again.  “I need as much information as possible about the base.”  You know that’s where Din is, judging from the wall of blaster screeches that drowned him out through the comm.  Logically, you know you could be headed right into a trap, and every instinct inside you wants to find safety, but… you just cannot imagine flying the ship away from this planet without Din onboard.  It isn’t fucking happening, you’ve made your choice.

Without waiting for a response, you climb the ladder and plop down in the pilot’s seat of the Crest.  While Oshua finds some way to clamber up the steps behind you in bulky stormtrooper armor with one good arm, you hold the kid closer on your lap and begin flight checking.  Din will be fucking furious, but the scolding you’ll be sure to get is the least of your worries right now.  Following his instructions and going back to Nevarro is just making shit infinitely more dangerous for him, turning what could be a potential rescue mission into an undeniable suicide mission.  Even if Karga somehow decides to send a few guild members along to infiltrate the base, it’ll be a war you want to avoid.

Besides.  What did you always tell him about running away from him, even when he instructs you to?

It’s just… not really your thing.

---

They’re everywhere.

They crawl like flies out of the base, and for every single body that falls, three more spill from the open doors.  Rapid fire plasma beams launch from the end of Din’s blaster, melting white armor with every twitch of his gloved finger.  Their aim is terrible, as is to be expected, but the sheer number of them more than makes up for it, as is by design.

Din’s heart pounds with exertion, his breath comes in ragged huffs through the modulator as his helmet identifies and isolates which body is closest to him, which body he needs to bring down next.  His blaster is so hot it nearly burns his hand, even through the thick gloves he wears.  When he runs out of ammo, he holsters the pistol and swings his rifle from around his shoulder, spinning to catch a handful of troopers behind him in the obliterating blast.

He’s not thinking much.  He can’t think, even though your safety and that of his son is currently dangling by a thread.  If he focuses on that, he’ll be dead before he can even picture your faces.  He just reacts, he maims and kills without a single thought in his mind.  Blood splatters, screams and sirens blare as he becomes surrounded by more and more troopers.  Din can hear the sound of plasma colliding and ricocheting off his armor; every single one of them is a potential injury he could currently have but might not even be able to feel right now.

His helmet starts beeping rapidly and he turns just enough to see, highlighted in bright red on the screen, two enormous artillery turrets slowly rising up out of the roof of the imperial base.  He feels a fierce flash of anger burn in his chest, it’s like a lightning strike to his veins.

Din needs to go.

And yet… if he was another man.  If he wasn’t a father, or a husband, if he had no family and no attachments like the creed declared he should, he would go.  With just a twitch of his fingers, he could be launching into the sky and retreating as far away from this battlefield as he could reasonably get.  He’s never been the type to run from a threat, but this isn’t just a threat.  Dozens of troopers are gaining on him, they’re trampling their own dead to get within range.  Plasma pings off his shoulder, another one hits his back as they flank from behind.  He can feel the heat through the sizzling beskar, he can see them surrounding him on all sides, and the propulsion trigger for his jetpack is right there under his wrist.

Din holds his ground and continues firing, he plants his feet firmly to the dirt with only one thought in his mind.

Run, sweet girl.  Run.

---

You type in commands to scan for Din’s signal, quickly locating it through the Crest’s computer onboard.  Not far from here, three minutes or less.  The ship rumbles to life beneath you, slowly lifting off the rocky ground and rotating in place as it hovers.  It’s not on autopilot but you feel like you are, you can barely feel your hands as they move the yoke forward and the Crest takes off in the direction of Din’s blinking frequency.

“Tell me about defenses,” you instruct Oshua, restlessly bouncing your leg while the baby coos.

“Two plasma turrets on top of the base,” the quarry quickly answers.  “There’s usually guards stationed around the perimeter, but everyone who’s capable will be outside right now.”

Your mouth twists downwards under the mask.  Blasters don’t scare you much from this high up, but Din’s armor doesn’t cover every inch of his body, he’s not completely invincible.  Doubt churns in your stomach, but you have to stay focused on one task at a time so you don’t get overwhelmed.  The turrets, then.  “Are they automatic?”

“Manual,” he corrects with a shake of his head.

“Radar?”

“Old.  Only engages above fifty meters.”

You eye your altitude and dip the Crest considerably, beginning to weave through the rocky canyons and dodging crumbling cliffs while you travel.  “What about ships?”

“None,” Oshua says, “except for a passenger shuttle used for transport.  TIEs are flown in the Vesta sector, this base is remote and used for basic training only.”

“Anything else?”  You ask, stomach twisting with the knowledge that barely four questions is all you’ve got.  You’re planning to drop into an imperial base to save the man you love and you can’t think of a single other question?  

The quarry shrugs, and your heart slams, does somersaults in your chest at the mere notion that you could fucking die here.  Today, in two minutes or less, you could die here.  The child in your lap looking over the ship’s front panel with a quiet determination in his eyes could die here.  Din could already be dead—that signal broadcasts his location to this computer regardless of whether he’s still breathing or not.  He could already be gone and you’d be flying the baby right into a trap without knowing any differently.

Whelp, you think while taking a deep breath, some strangely calm existential acceptance beginning to flood your soul.  If he isn’t dead, he will be soon if you don’t make it to him on time.

You immediately lift your wrist and speak into the communicator.  “Mando?”  You have no idea if he can hear you, but you need to try anyway.  Your voice is still firm, there’s a strength to it you don’t feel in your chest, but it certainly sounds convincing.  “I’m coming to get you.  Less than a minute to your location, do everything you can to get outside.  If you can’t, I’ll just… uh.  Try to figure something else out.”

That’s it.  That’s it, improvise until you don’t have to.  Even if you’re lacking confidence, you can at least scrounge up some conviction.  Your arms gain feeling again while you veer the Crest through the stony terrain, the familiar reverberations under your feet begin to fill your body with a powerful sense of purpose.  Your breaths begin to come steady, every falling rock you see through the transparisteel feels like it drops in slow motion, allowing you to evade them easily.  It would normally be stupidly dangerous to fly this low with so many unexpected obstacles and hazards narrowly missing the ship, but considering what you’re flying into, a few boulders seems comical.

“Where’s your helmet?”  Oshua asks out of nowhere, and for a second, you don’t think you heard him correctly.

But then it strikes you all at once what he’s attempting to imply, and the sheer lunacy of the thought is enough to make you laugh while you clutch the controls.  “I’m not a Mandalorian.”

“You wear the armor of one,” he points out… rather fairly, you have to admit.  “You cover your face like one.  You have a blaster that fires Philithiorium, a rare and expensive gas native to Mandalore’s stratosphere, and you’re a bounty hunter—”

“I’m not a Mandalorian.”  Your words are short and cutting, you have a daunting task to focus on and don’t feel like having small talk right now.  “I’m not a bounty hunter, either.”

But then again, Karga made you a member of the Guild, didn’t he?  He handed you Oshua’s puck and said this one is for you to find, and you are technically part of a Mandalorian clan.  All of this seems like it happened without your knowledge.  You may be marrying a Mandalorian, you may wear his armor and mother his child and shoot a blaster with his signet branded into it, but war isn’t in your blood.  This robe was a costume when you first made it, this armor was a relic that was restored as a hobby.  In a sense, it still feels that way.  The mask covering your face lended itself to a temporary surge of bravery earlier, but beyond that, the only thing that’s keeping you moving forward now is your family.  The man you love that may or may not be alive right now, the baby holding tight to your leg while the ship sways and weaves through the stony landscape.

Your eyes quickly flick down to the child in your lap, both of his three fingered hands clutching onto the stained fabric of your knee without moving a single inch.  He’d know, you tell yourself.  If his father is gone, he’d already know somehow.  Din is still alive, and he’s counting on you.

---

There’s too many for Din to handle.

They swarmed him, overpowered his endless artillery with massive numbers and there’s nothing he can do anymore.  The backs of his knees are kicked from behind and he slams down to the ground with a clatter, his sizzling hot blasters are ripped from him, and Din folds his hands calmly behind his back even as one of the stormtroopers barks out, “Binders,” to another one, who disappears quickly in response.  In the meantime, a few of them apparently decide to just attempt holding his arms in place, and their measly combined grip is almost enough to make him roll his eyes under the helmet.  These imperial soldiers are even more pitiful than they usually are, but his silent resolve to stall to ensure your escape is enough to keep him stationary and compliant for the time being.

Eventually, a few voices call out from beyond the crowd and there’s some movement from the back.  Dozens of troopers with their blasters all pointed at him begin to shuffle to make way, careful to keep their barrels aimed at him while a path slowly forms.  The crowd of white parts and a stormtrooper with a singular red pauldron on his right shoulder saunters confidently towards Din as he kneels on the ground.

An officer, he assumes.  Conveniently missing from the firefight, the scanner inside his helmet would’ve caught the change in color and Din would’ve made sure to kill him first.

“Well now, what do we have here?”  Comes his thin metallic voice through the tinny filter.  The officer studies him curiously for a few moments, before slowly looking down by his feet, reaching out one cheap, plastic covered foot to gently nudge the body of a dead trooper on the ground with a sigh.  “What a shame.”

Coward, he thinks, his lip curling with disgust under the helmet.

“This is an imperial training base,” he turns his attention back to Din to inform him when he doesn’t immediately respond, rather stupidly he might add.  “How were you able to find us?”

Silence.  The grip on hands held behind his back is even looser now.  He just tilts his chin up slightly in defiance, the scanner inside his helmet locating each weapon strapped to the man’s body and highlighting it red.  Small text boxes blink into existence under each one with a manufacturer and classification—a BlasTech E-11 rifle, a Merr-Sonn thermal detonator, a Kolvo vibroblade—and Din is severely unimpressed with the quality.  The detonator is the only weapon that even catches his eye, and that’s only because the chamber inside that houses the explosive baradium has a release mechanism that’s completely dead.  Useless, then.  Good to know.

After a long moment of quiet tension where Din refuses to speak and the officer continues to confidently scrutinize him, in some strange sort of silent battle of egos that only one seems to have a genuine interest in, another stormtrooper makes his way to the front, shoving past his fellow soldiers to address the superior in charge.

“Commander, we’ve sent out an alert for an intruder,” he tells him, slightly out of breath from running through the crowd in the lightweight armor.  Din wants to roll his eyes, but what he says next makes him snap to immediate attention.  “The fleet informed us that Moff Gideon is currently on route.”

Gideon.  The last time someone spoke that name, it was a quarry on Coruscant and you just barely managed to stop Din from suffocating the bastard for even saying it aloud before freezing him in carbonite.  It would’ve meant half the return on a hunt that lasted nearly a month but he saw red and his hand was crushing his windpipe before he realized what happened.  But he’s dead, Din thinks with a clenched jaw and fists tightening behind his back, he watched that TIE fighter explode and slam into the ground, crushing the man inside it.  The wreck was unsurvivable, he can’t be alive.

“For what?  This Mandalorian?”  The trooper in charge scoffs in response, and Din remains completely mute.

“Yes, sir,” the other one confirms.  “Orders were to capture him, alive.”

“Hm.”  The officer turns his attention back to him, less analyzing and more musing while he tilts his head.  “I see,” he eventually says, and he sounds like he’s grinning, before strolling slightly closer as Din stays completely still on his knees.  “He must want the beskar.  I’m sure it’s worth more than this entire battalion combined.”

All of a sudden, a gloved hand carelessly catches the rim of his helmet and tugs, and Din’s movement is explosive.  He launches off the ground, arms easily slipping from the pathetic grip they were being held in and his fist colliding with the side of the officer’s flimsy white helmet, the plastic making a deafening crack against his face.

Multiple hands immediately rush forward to grab him and yank him back down again while the commanding trooper stumbles backwards in shock, and Din amicably drops to his knees and folds his hands behind his back once more like nothing happened at all.

“Binders!”  A trooper behind him roars loudly once more, and a few men surrounding him begin trotting away this time.

The officer in red stands a few feet away from him now, grabbing his helmet and twisting it back to its proper position on his head where it was skewed.  There’s a shattered hole near his jaw where the material splintered and busted like the cheap piece of banthashit it is, and while he might normally feel pleased with himself for being able to see his skin peeking through, it just fills him with more righteous fury.  It’s such a punchable jaw.

After a few awkward moments of silence, the other one clears his throat and continues.  “He… has inquired about the location and status of a child that should be accompanying him.”

Din inhales deeply through his nose and grinds his teeth.  He wants to snap their necks one by one for even just mentioning his son, but there are just too many, more than even his whistling birds can neutralize.  Still, he gave you as much of a head start as physically possible.  You should be rising into the atmosphere right now, making the jump into hyperspace towards safety.  Karga will know what to do—he’ll protect his family, separate you and the boy so the threat is evenly dispersed instead of collected all in one place, and arm dozens of trained hunters to keep watch over you both individually.  It’s the best Din can do, and it’s the only thing keeping his knees planted on the ground and his body completely motionless while they continue speaking.

“We are combing the sector for a ship with as many men as we can afford to lose,” the trooper in red says, but his voice filter is shattered and now sounds like a puny little droid with a broken voice box, “but our numbers are unimpressive.  Assistance may be required.”

It’s too late, Din thinks, mouth twitching under the beskar with a satisfied smirk.  They’re wasting their time, looking for a ghost.  You’re both long gone by now.  They’ve got no idea you even exist—

“He also spoke of a girl.”

And then he feels his heart stop in his chest.  Every single cell in his body turns to fire, it’s a fucking miracle he doesn’t move a muscle in response.  His sweet girl, the one so far removed from the nightmare of the Empire that she made best friends with the orphans of it.  How the fuck did he know?  He shouldn’t even be breathing, let alone gathering information about you, how did he know?

But then Din thinks back, remembering your makeshift bed on the floor, your panicked eyes and heaving chest as the quarry taunted him with a sick little smile.  Who’s this, Mando?  She’s just darling, isn’t she?  Does Gideon know your crew has a lovely new addition?

“A girl?”

The trooper nods.  “Moff Gideon insisted that if the Mandalorian did not have a child with him, then a girl would likely be protecting him instead.”

He’s going to kill them, Din decides.  Every single one of these imperial pigs, every single soldier standing right now is a dead fucking man.  The blood pumping through his body suddenly turns to acid, deadly black hate poisoning his soul.  His heartbeat morphs into a war drum, the armor strapped to his limbs is the barrel of a gun.  He’s going to fucking kill them and leave an imperial base full of bodies to greet his old nemesis upon his return, and he’s going to enjoy every single second of it.

Except, then—

“Mando?”  The sweetest voice in existence suddenly crackles through the earpiece under his helmet.  “I’m coming to get you.  Less than a minute to your location, do everything you can to get outside.  If you can’t, I’ll just… uh.  Figure something else out.”

And, as Din kneels there in surrender, surrounded by a crowd of enemies he thought he destroyed long ago, all the anger—all the fury and defiance and murder surging through his veins—suddenly morphs to fear.

The emotion is so foreign and old to him, it feels like a face he barely recognizes and a name he can’t remember.  He’s panicked before.  He’s been in situations where a threat has made him blind with rage, he knows what it’s like to look death straight in the eyes and say that he’s busy and to come back another time.  This is different.  This is ice cold that freezes over beskar.

He can’t speak out loud to warn you—he can’t move his hands to press the button on the back of his helmet and allow him to talk without detection.  There’s plasma turrets on the roof of the base, he can see them right now.  The helmet’s scanners say they’re manned and engaged, and though he is outside and this is how you retrieved him before whenever he needed a quick escape, he has fifty fucking imperial blasters trained on him and you know absolutely nothing about this threat.  You’re flying right into a war zone and if either you or his son dies, he won’t ever be able to forgive himself.

Behind the helmet, his eyes fly to each and every trooper, wondering which blaster will be the one to do it.  Which weapon is going to be the one he can’t block in time when you descend, the one that’ll kill him right in front of you.  Which turret will be the one to obliterate the Crest with you and his son inside of it.

“Maker, where are those fucking binders—” he hears someone behind him snarl, but the white noise of pure terror roaring through his ears drowns them out.  His chest starts heaving against his will, sheer panic begins to blur his vision.  For the first time in his life, his armor feels too heavy, his lungs feel like one of these boulders are sitting on them instead of beskar.

All too soon, his helmet starts making a familiar sound that signals quietly in his ear, alerting him of an incoming ship, and the only thing he can physically do is count down the seconds to prepare himself for what is to come.

Ten, nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two…

Like lightning, Din breaks the grip of multiple troopers and surges up, tackling the officer in red to the ground.  There’s a clatter as they both slam into the rocky floor, but in the ensuing scuffle, he easily snatches the thermal detonator from his side holster and holds it up for everyone to see, before pressing the red button on the front and hearing it begin to beep rapidly.

---

You’re right on time.

The Crest rises up through the rocky cliffs surrounding the base and you spot the turrets you were warned about.  Weapons controls are already engaged and you’re too low to be detected by radar—you fire once, twice, and blast both of them to smithereens from behind before they can even rotate around to target you.

Alarms start wailing but the guns are destroyed.  It’s not comforting, though; blasters won’t touch you up here, but that doesn’t mean they can’t fire at Din on the ground.  Your eyes dart across the sea of white, looking for a flash of silver anywhere, and then you spot him instantly in the chaos.

For some reason, the troopers in his vicinity all seem to be bolting away from him.  Their rifles are down, clutched in their hands while they nearly fall over each other to run away as fast as possible, and your heart soars when you spot his jetpack firing up.  Din launches into the sky while another trooper is revealed underneath him, seeming to juggle something in his hands and then throw it into the crowd of retreating soldiers, but the sight of the man you love rising into the air while a flurry of blaster shots from the far edges of the imperial structure follow him gives you the confidence to immediately turn the guns down towards the horde of troopers.

“Which ones are in charge?”  You ask Oshua breathlessly, who leans forward and points out the transparisteel.

“Red pauldrons—” he barely has time to say it before you aim and fire at one of the troopers wearing red that was closest to Din, the plasma beam launching from the Crest so powerful and devastating that it outright obliterates the surface he’s laying on.  Pieces of shattered armor fly and a smoking crater of rubble is all that’s left behind, but your mind is whirling and you’re already onto someone else wearing red at the edges of the complex, and then two more near the doors, and then another—

To their credit, you think the sixty or so soldiers in training seem to figure out that you’re not aiming into the enormous collection of them.  If you were, the damage would be catastrophic and spraying everywhere, but you’re precise and meticulous with your shots, and the only ones who are loyal enough to the cause to hold still and raise their blasters at the incoming threat tend to be the ones you need to mow down anyways.  The rest of them scatter in all directions, scrambling over each other to escape and then disappearing into the distant boulders surrounding the base—but you notice that not a single one of them runs back inside the safety of its open doors.

The hull dips with the weight of Din dropping in, and relief floods your soul even as you continue raining hell down on the superiors in charge.  Any flash of color you see is a target, your eyes lose focus of everything, your vision blurs and turns monochrome as you just search for red.

“Lift up!”  You hear Din’s voice roar from the hull.  You can hear his rifle unloading through the open door.  “Now!  We have to go now!”

You press the button to shut the hull door with Din inside and punch it, rising so fast that the shove of gravity makes it difficult to keep your head up.  Through the sudden surge of downward force, you just barely manage to raise your incredibly heavy arm to push the button that pressurizes the Crest and ignites the launch boosters, preparing the vessel for space travel.  Outside the transparisteel, the gray sky begins darkening as the atmosphere eventually disappears.  The ship’s engines roar, burning so much fuel at once that you’re actually accelerating through the climb, you’re boosting through the gradual ease of gravity as the planet’s curvature and glow becomes softer and softer below you.

As soon as the blackness of space begins to fill the windows, the slight subsiding of force allows you to plug in the coordinates for Nevarro with less difficulty, but you’re still moving, still rising, still escaping.  You can’t find it within yourself to slow down, but then something catches your attention.

Claws suddenly dig sharp into your thigh, sharp enough to sting and cause you to wince, and you look down to see that the kid has gone incredibly tense.  Deadly tense.  Your heart is still pounding even though you’re away from danger, you’ve got Din in the hull, everyone is safe, and yet—

It flickers into existence all at once.  One second it’s just space, just the endless depths of nothingness spread out for light years in front of you, and within the blink of an eye it’s suddenly there.

A star destroyer.

Your body freezes in horrified awe, having never seen a ship so fucking big in your entire life.  It looks like a massive satellite, the size of an enormous asteroid instantly appearing in your vision and dwarfing the vastness of space around it.  All the stars you used to dream about are suddenly blotted out within a fraction of a second, terror so immense seizes your soul that you stop thinking.  You stop calculating, you stop being yourself for a split second that lasts an entire lifetime.

Before you can move a single muscle, the computer beeps quickly and lurches the Crest into hyperspace.

---

The stars streak across the transparisteel like so many times before.  Utter silence nearly deafens you with how abrupt it is after so much noise, but the peace it used to bring does nothing to quell your fear.  Everything is the same as it always was, same bursts of light as you hurdle faster than it towards Nevarro, same quiet, same rumbling hum of the ship.  But now, everything has changed.

You hear the quarry next to you suddenly inhale and exhale loudly, and it shocks you a little bit, reminds you that there’s a person next to you and another is on your lap.  Other people exist outside of the vision of death that just flickered out of existence just as quickly as it appeared.  They’re breathing, Oshua is shakily unbuckling his seatbelt, life is continuing on in the quiet cockpit but you can’t seem to move like he is.  You can’t seem to breathe like he is.  It’s only when the baby slowly maneuvers himself around on your thigh and blinks up at you, placing a tiny hand on your stomach that you finally feel air enter your lungs.

After a moment, you reach down and click open your seatbelt with trembling fingers, scooping the kid up in your arms and slowly attempting to stand.  Everything feels wobbly and dreamlike, you have to brace yourself on the headrest to prevent yourself from falling back into the chair again.

“That was…” Ryler mutters, his voice sounding foggy and distant, “uh.  A close one.”

You look over at him, recognizing that he’s speaking but not quite able to understand the words right now.  Red catches in your vision, and you blink down at the way he’s clutching his left shoulder, the smear of blood darkening the white armor he’s wearing.  You blink a few more times at the sight of it, and though it feels like you normally would be sickened at the wound, somehow shocked out of your state of shock, it does nothing to you.  When you look back up at his face, his expression seems strangely grateful, even when it’s screwed up in what you know must be excruciating pain.    You did that, a quiet voice whispers in your mind, even though the rest of it seems incredibly blank.

Instead of responding, you stumble a few steps over to the ladder, spinning around and hesitating for a moment.  You’re severely lacking in coherent thought, but one thing seems to break through.  You’re not sure if you have enough coordination to do this safely right now.  However, when there’s movement in your peripheral and you look to see Oshua gently offering his right arm to you, seeming to understand you’d like to use both hands for this, you snap back to your senses just the slightest bit and hug the baby tighter to your chest.  Carefully, you begin making the slow climb down the ladder with the kid, still trembling with the aftershocks of adrenaline.  Your limbs feel extra heavy, but eventually the floor meets your feet.

Din is standing there when you slowly turn around, armor gleaming and still as a statue, but he has his back to you.  His helmet is tilted down at the ground, and when you follow his gaze, you’re met with the sight of the bloodstains of dragged bodies that leave dark red streaks all the way up the ramp.

You feel something this time.  It’s… cold.  A burning, searing cold that creeps into your skin.  Like your heart decides to pump nitrogen through your chest instead of warm blood.  You did that.

There’s a sudden urge inside of you to speak, to address him and inform him of your presence, tell him everything is okay, everything worked out, but you can’t find it in yourself to say a single word.  You can’t find a single word to say.  The kid twists as best he can in your clutch, his ears drag against your chest to greet his father, but for some reason, there’s still a strange sense of fear in your bones.  It’s enough to wake you up slightly, it’s enough to tell you it’s not over yet.  There’s a terror in your heart that hasn’t left since he first called over the comm and begged you to run, a crippling dread that you thought climaxed after seeing that star destroyer appear, but it’s somehow only increased after laying eyes on him like this.

You watch as his helmet turns, slowly meeting the pauldron on his shoulder, and for some reason, you feel yourself harden.  Your feet brace against the metal floor like this is another threat you have to face, you let its unyielding metallic strength transfer up through the souls of your boots to your heart in your chest.

But the second you hear cheap white armor clatter as the quarry steps down the ladder behind you, Din bursts into movement.  He suddenly spins and storms up to you in one single step while catching your holstered blaster on your hip.  It’s out and aimed in the blink of an eye, and it’s a miracle you remember how to speak before he remembers how to kill.

“Mando—” you warn, just in time for the quarry to land on the floor of the hull and turn around to reveal his face.

Din holds there for a second, his helmet locked on Oshua’s features.  His gloved fingers twitch wildly on the trigger of your gun held over your shoulder, like he has to remind himself multiple times not to.  You hear Oshua’s armor clack while he likely raises one good arm in surrender, but then Din’s helmet moves a fraction of a millimeter to your face and holds there.  He just stares down at you, and the air feels heavy, your body feels heavy, the feather light child in your arms feels heavy.

Slowly, he lowers his arm, lets it fall while he continues looking at you from behind the visor.  You look back at him, unblinking, unfeeling, and there’s a few seconds that last an utter eternity where nobody moves.  Nobody speaks, nothing happens, but then a soft coo comes from your arms before you can finally break eye contact, knowing there are still some things that need to be done.

You eventually turn around and lift your chin to address Oshua.

“You have to go into carbonite,” you inform him quietly.  Your voice sounds strange, like it’s coming from outside of yourself.  “We’re taking you to Nevarro, and then you’ll be transported to your home planet. When they unfreeze you, your sister will be there to collect you.”

He looks uncertain, one hand still raised while the other hangs uselessly at his side, and you don’t blame him.

But you also don’t feel like saying anymore, not unless he decides he doesn’t want to go in willingly.  Normally you might’ve tried to empathize, offer him further reassurance beyond just a couple short sentences, but you don’t.  Speaking feels difficult, thinking feels difficult.  You’re still in survival mode, not active but reactive.  There’s also no reason for you to lie to him about this, and you can see him glance at Din standing silently behind you, who hasn’t moved a muscle.

He eventually nods and you walk him over to the chamber without another word, watch him turn to face you as he backs into the opening while you reach up towards the control panel.

But then there’s a moment.  One where you hesitate slightly, one where your vision flashes back to the sight of those bloodstains on the floor, and that burning cold fills you again, so cold it feels completely numb.

“I’m… sorry,” you whisper quietly to him, though your voice sounds so empty.  There’s so much emotion that should be there but isn’t, so much regret and pain that should break through but can’t.  “I’m sorry I… killed your friends.”

Later, you’ll think about how you felt absolutely nothing saying it.  Your heart doesn’t constrict with remorse at the mere words leaving your mouth, guilt doesn’t flood into your soul, pain doesn’t wrack through your bones.  You could’ve been saying anything at all and nobody would be able to tell the difference.

He blinks at you, flicking his eyes between yours for a second or two, but then you press the proper button and watch the gas quickly freeze him where he stands.  He’ll be conscious the entire time, but Karga will send him to the correct location and you have no doubt that this elemental purgatory is leagues better than where he just escaped from.  It’s a benefit being the last quarry to be retrieved—he’ll only have to spend a few days trapped in here before being reunited with his family.

When that’s done and Oshua is a complete statue in front of you, bulky white armor now colored a dull metallic gray and frozen in time, you will yourself to finally turn around to face the enormous mountain of a presence behind you.  The baby gently reaches out for him, but Din doesn’t move from where he’s stood.  Your blaster is still clutched tightly in his hand, and he isn’t looking at you.

Slowly, you walk over and stop directly in front of him in the middle of the hull, blinking at him while the helmet subtly moves to lock onto your face.  The kid begins wiggling in your arms, making soft impatient noises while you both stand in complete silence across from each other.

After a few moments, you hear him flick your blaster’s safety on by his side and then toss it carelessly to the ground.  It skids along the floor, light enough to be mostly quiet.  Gloves reach out as he carefully takes the kid from you and settles him in the crook of one arm, and then he looks you up and down, still not saying anything.

Your eyes follow his movement, watching his arm slowly reaching out to you, and you think he’s going to cup your jaw, or brush your hair back.  Give you some sort of physical reassurance since he hasn’t spoken a single word of it.

Instead, Din suddenly grabs the armor clinging to your chest and starts ripping it off you with one hand.  It clangs to the floor so loudly in the silence of hyperspace, the kid’s ears twitch and flutter with each shattering bang.  You hold still while he does it, you barely respond except the unavoidable movement your body experiences as the pauldron is yanked from your shoulder and thrown against the ground.  The ammo belt is tugged over your head and hurled away, the thigh braces are snatched from your legs and they clang to the floor, and the pearly, opalescent fabric revealed underneath is stained in dead man’s blood, rusty and in such great quantities that it shows up as brown instead of red.

“Are you hurt?”

He sounds… dead.  So monotonic that you can’t possibly gauge his emotional state.  He doesn’t move.   His fists don’t clench, he says every single word like it means the same exact thing as the last.  If nothing at all was a person who could speak, they’d use his tone of voice.

“No,” you eventually whisper.

The helmet nods once, and then he spins around and walks away without anything else.  Without saying anything, without touching you, or double checking you for injuries in case you were lying.  You stand utterly still while Din climbs the ladder with the kid cradled in one arm, and you don’t even flinch when the door to the cockpit slides shut behind him.  You have no idea how long you stand there in the splitting silence afterwards, numb and unmoving.

You feel… nothing.  Absolutely nothing.

The hard defenses you strapped to yourself today to reconcile the things you had to do are still high and strong, guarding your soul even if he stripped away your physical armor.  Self preservation is still animating your body, and your facial expression barely changes.  Your first thought, as soon as you remember that you can have one, is that there are things that still need to be done.  Tasks to complete.

Alone, you shower the lingering traces of blood off your body, the normally clear and refreshing water running a sickly, toxic brown.  Alone, your stomach rolls and suddenly decides to empty itself of the very little that was in it as the scalding drops rain down over you—mostly liquid and bile that easily rinses down the drain.  The water is too warm, it beats down on you like blazing hot sand pelting your skin in the desert.  You feel like you did those first few months with Din, where the silence was suffocating, where you’d only interact with the baby if he was on a hunt or if you could tell he didn’t know how to calm him when he was fussy.  If you were in hyperspace, you usually spent time by yourself in the hull while he lived in the cockpit, and if he decided he needed to be in the hull for whatever reason, then you’d trade places with him.  It was… isolating.  Lonely by yourself.  The quiet used to haunt you before it became your cherished friend, but now it’s a betrayer, a ghost that whispers memories and nightmares in your ears.

When you finally finish rinsing the blood from your skin and get dressed, you see the sheets that used to make up your bed now have fried holes in them from your charred plasma marks, the inside of the hull is covered in them and the trails of dried blood where you dragged the bodies down the ramp.  Your armor is still strewn about the hull, the kid’s hovering shield lays dead in the corner.  Everything you meticulously cleaned and organized and collected and created, now the scene of a bloodbath.  One committed by your hand, your blaster still laying uselessly on the floor forever linked to this atrocity.

You spare a glance towards the ladder, but you don’t want to come face to face with Din yet.  You already knew he’d be furious, but… you had hoped that he’d at least…

What?  At least what?  Comfort you?  Coddle you after you deliberately ignored his instructions?  What exactly, in the past year or so of learning Din’s inner workings and intricacies, would ever give you the impression that he’d come give you a big hug after you purposefully defied him?  You flew the kid directly into an imperial base after being told to protect him, you ignored every order he gave to you in the moments he thought would be his last, and though you did it to save his life, you have a feeling that Din has never valued his life even a fraction of what you do.

The misery stabs at your soul, but your mind is finally beginning to process things logically.  He’s alive, the kid is alive, the quarry is secure, and you’re all onboard the safety of this ship hurtling through hyperspace where nobody, not even the Empire, can touch you.  You weighed the consequences before making your decision, you did what you had to do.  If he wants to be mad, then he can fucking well be mad and you’ll find some way to comfort yourself.  At least he’s here being mad, at least he’s alive and safe and breathing and mad, and your rare act of disobedience is to thank for that.

Somewhere in the back of your mind, you realize it’s probably easier than it should be to reconcile the punishment.  Right now, you welcome the exclusion, the negativity and sorrow beating itself into your soul.  Four innocent people died today on this ship, gunned down under your blaster while they panicked and ran for cover.  You keep hearing their screams.

So you start to clean up the hull, needing another task to focus your thoughts on.  You work to erase every inch of the evidence of your deeds, make it disappear like the pool of blood Din once cleaned up while you were sleeping and never acknowledged again.  You only allow the bloodstains to fuck with your head for a single moment, and then you swallow back the nausea until you’re a blank slate again and sink to your knees with a rag in your hand.  After that, your vision stops focusing and it just becomes red contrasting against gunmetal gray, and you work tirelessly to get rid of all remaining traces of it.

Then you start on the blaster marks, you need them gone.  After a few informed attempts at mixing cleaning chemicals, you find one concoction that allows you to wipe them away like they’re nothing more than dirt that got tracked in.  The Crest’s oxygen recycling system works overdrive to constantly purify the air so you don’t get high or pass out, but your nose still stings.  It’s fine, it’s sterile, it burns a bit but it smells sharp and metallic and keeps you hyper focused on the task at hand.

After that’s done, you pick up the charred blankets and ball them up to throw into the trash vent.  You don’t feel anything as you do it.  You don’t think about how long it took you to collect these over months and months of being stuck on this ship, how comfortable they were when everything else was industrial and rigid, how many nights you spent with Din curled up in their softness while he breathed easy and warm.  Sheets are just luxuries, they can afford to be lost.

Next, you gather your armor and wipe it down with the rag, put it away along with your blaster.  The stained robe goes in the trash, along with the sheets and the blood soaked cloth you used to clean everything.  They’re all ruined, you’ll never be able to make them right again.

The hull is sparkling clean when you decide to take another shower.  Nothing on you is dirty except your hands, but you feel filthy.  Wrong, cold, numb, cold, stained, cold.

After scrubbing your skin raw under the water and changing clothes again, since you don’t really know what to do with yourself anymore, you slowly climb the ladder to the cockpit, keeping perfectly silent.  When you reach the upper platform and come face to face with the closed door, you can just barely hear Din’s whispered voice speaking quietly to the baby beyond it.

You raise your hand for a moment, hovering your knuckles over the metal, but then it eventually falls.  Instead, you look over and spot the corner, the same corner Din bunched himself into when he snapped at you for even suggesting going on a hunt with him, blew up at you for the mere notion of something happening like what happened today.  You back yourself into it in defeat and slowly sink down on the floor, resting your head against the metal and hugging your knees to your chest since you don’t have a tiny baby to take their place.

You can’t sleep.  You don’t even try, it’s pointless.  The concept feels foreign the longer you sit here by yourself.  You don’t hear Din or the baby anymore, but you feel… so fucking awful that it’s fitting that you don’t knock or go looking.  You don’t want to hold that sweet child with hands that were covered in blood just a few hours ago.  You killed more people than you can count on your fingers today, and of the ones who had done nothing wrong…  They screamed like younglings, ducked for cover and were able to fire off one single useless shot in the mayhem before you closed their eyes forever and left their bodies to rot in armor that wasn’t ever their choice to wear.

You didn’t know they were kidnapped and smuggled and forced into that situation.  You couldn’t have known, but that isn’t the point.  In this case, knowing doesn’t make one bit of difference.

You also can’t face Din yet, not like this.  You don’t want him to see you cowering, shattered with guilt over the decisions you made under pressure.  How will you ever get him to forgive you for not listening to him when you can’t even forgive yourself for the result of your choices?  Din is a hardened man who grew up in blasterfire and bloodshed, just because you love him doesn’t mean he’s going to magically become someone he isn’t.  You’re here letting guilt sink sharp claws into your chest over four dead men when he had a good fifty or more corpses scattered on the battlefield around him.  You decided to wear that armor, you decided to fly into an imperial base with the kid on your lap, and this is now your penance.  You’ll accept it with your back straight and your chin held high.

Figuratively, of course.  Physically, you’re smaller than you’ve ever been.  Crumpled up into a ball, taking up as little space as possible, curling up as tight as you can like an animal protecting all your vulnerable parts during a brutal attack.

So, since he isn’t here to comfort you himself, you just try to think about what he would tell you.  A long time ago, what would he tell you?

Din would tell you… that you killed someone.  Multiple people, this time.  He’d also tell you that it doesn’t matter what he tells you, what you could have reasonably foreseen or what you should have done.  The end result won’t change.  You own this now.  You’ll carry their deaths with you.

You take a few deep breaths, self-soothing with the undeniable truth that would be murmured matter of factly from his quiet voice.  He wouldn’t argue with you.  He wouldn’t deny the decisions you made or the consequences of them.  It happened, and at the end of the day, you either learn how to handle that, or you don’t.

And, for the four you did shoot, you were responsible for freeing ten times that amount.  You’re responsible for reuniting Oshua Ryler with his family, even if your place in yours is momentarily shunned.  You’d rather be out here alone than in there with the kid, wondering where his dad is or if he’s even still alive.  You rescued Din and now he gets to be here to shut this door on you, hold his son, and whisper calm reassurances to him.  If you listen really hard and imagine, you can pretend they’re for you, too.

That’s it.  Focus on them both, alive and well together.  Focus on the bodies wearing white armor that were moving, the ones that were bolting away from the imperial training base as fast as they could, free from the torture of imprisonment and conditioning.

Finally, you close your eyes and slip into unconsciousness.  It’s not a testament to your exhaustion, but rather just how long you’ve been left to sit here by yourself.  Hours, maybe.  Time is strange in hyperspace.

You dream of a faceless man ringing bells.

---

When you wake up, a small baby has been placed in your arms, and you’re being dragged into a strong, secure beskar hold on the floor.

“Din,” you suddenly lift your head as soon as you’re conscious and nearly bonk it into solid metal, apologies rising in your throat before you even remember where you are.  You did what needed to be done to keep your family alive and together and you’d do it a thousand times again if necessary, but that doesn’t mean you won’t apologize anyways.  After the deeds you’ve committed today, regret feels as natural on your lips as speaking your own name.  “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, I know you’re mad at me but I—”

“Shh,” he whispers, running his gloves through your hair.  He’s still wearing his helmet, he hasn’t taken anything off yet.  “Don’t say anything.  Just… stay here, stay right here with me.”

“I tried to save you,” you croak, tears instantly flooding your eyes.  You did save him.  You saved him and the baby and yourself but you’re so physically and emotionally exhausted that all you can recall is your intent.  “I tried.  Wasn’t gonna leave you there by yourself.  I tried to be brave, like you—y-you wouldn’t have left without me.”

His arms tighten around you, cradling you in such a strong embrace that you burrow into him, you find a place for your head on the hard metal strapped to him and bury yourself there, wishing that you had shovels of dirt being piled on you to justify the death you still feel staining your soul.  Your heart is starting to pound now that you’re remembering, your body is starting to shake with tremors of shock now that you’re aware of your own skin again.

“I was so sc-scared, Din, I didn’t—didn’t know what was happening,” you lament through watery eyes, gasping it out in hopes that it’ll relieve the slightest bit of the gut wrenching guilt just mercilessly crushing you.  It caught you before you could protect yourself against it, that armor you built around yourself isn’t on when you first wake up.  “I-I didn’t want to kill them, but they were already on the ship and y-you said—you said they were coming after the kid s-so I had to, I had to—”

“Stop,” Din whispers, voice so quiet that you can barely hear him.

“I-I cleaned up the blood,” you turn your face against the cold beskar to let all the positives you listed for yourself before scrape across your throat.  They don’t sound comforting anymore, they just sound like excuses.  “It’s gone, it’s like it never happened, everything is okay now, I got the quarry, I protected the baby, I saved a bunch of people, you’re both safe—”

“Stop,” he chokes out.  The modulator cuts off before you can hear his next breath, but you feel it shudder under your body.  “St-Stop it, please.”

Your eyes clench shut so tightly you feel like the streaking stars outside are behind them, tears drop down against his pauldron and you press your face tighter to it like it’s a wound, like the pressure will somehow ease the bleeding.

“Listen to me,” he says very quietly, and you instantly brace yourself.  The walls you just let down shoot right back up, your body physically tightens in preparation for another pain, another trauma, another scar you’ll carry, and you stop shaking.  You stop breathing, even when his hand comes up to ease your face away from his armor.

“You,” he whispers, holding your chin so you’re staring right at him, and your eyes flick fearfully in between his behind the visor, “are a sweet girl.”  Din’s leather thumb brushes along your skin, dragging over the tears below your puffy eyes.  “Not,” his voice catches, “a Mandalorian.”

Your heart goes cold.  Again, everything turns numb.  It doesn’t matter that you already said this yourself out loud earlier today.  It doesn’t matter that you acknowledged this fact, verbally insisted it more than once to hammer home the truth and felt some sense of comfort in it.  For some reason, hearing the words from his mouth is a fucking knife to your chest.

“I taught you how to fight, how to shoot a blaster,” he murmurs, thumb catching every single tear that continues to fall as he speaks.  “I taught you everything I know, everything that’s been taught to me.  I taught you how to defend yourself, how to protect yourself when you’re in danger.  I gave you your blaster, I gave you my armor, I gave you everything I could give you to keep you safe.  And when I thought you were ready, I let you loose on Sanctuary II.  Do you know why I did that?”  The helmet tips forward the slightest bit at the question, probing deep into the most shattered part of your heart.  “After all those months of fighting, and shooting, and training, do you know why I told you to run?”

You blink silently at him, a shaky breath quaking through you, and your expression wants to crumple under the reprimand.  You’re so fragile right now, taking hit after hit after hit to the softest parts inside you, and you want to just give up.  Let the guilt and remorse take you, let it wash you away.  But then, instead…

There’s a flicker of something inside you.  Something strong, endlessly strong, and it makes you want to revolt against what he’s saying.  It replaces the hurt and fear and desperation for comfort with a strange sense of insurgence, like it did earlier when you were hiding behind a boulder, cowering and trembling and not wanting to die.  You’re filled with a quiet urge to defend yourself in the face of this, stand up for yourself and refuse to be beaten down any longer.

“Because you needed to know how to escape danger,” he answers himself when you don’t.  “You needed to know how to disappear, how to outsmart any pursuer and find safety, even the trained ones.  Especially the trained ones.  Anything else was meant to be your last resort.  Not your choice.  Not something you chose.”

“I couldn’t leave you,” you admit to him quietly, voice shaky and tears still coming even as you try to speak up for yourself.  The regret you carry has nothing to do with this, and you decide right now that you won’t feel bad for saving him.  Your hurt comes from the meaningless things, the ones without any need whatsoever, not the necessary ones, and you tried.  You repeated his words to yourself over and over again, told yourself to run, told yourself to get to Nevarro, and it wasn’t going to happen.  “I couldn’t do it.  It wasn’t a choice.”

“It was,” he tells you.  He says it softly, whispers it like it’s the gentlest thing in the world, but the power and inherent distance of the armor strapped to his body finds its way into the words.  “And it was the wrong one.”

“What was I supposed to do?”  You ask, just a hint of that rebellion swimming to the surface now, rising out of the waves of self doubt, the one that feels like a spine growing in your back, an energy coursing through your veins that makes your heart start to beat faster.  Din’s hand slowly drops from your cheek but you don’t care.  “Was I supposed to run away and just let you die?”

“Yes.”  It’s quick and blunt and completely emotionless.  Delivered like a punch to the vulnerable parts of yourself he taught you how to protect, and the utter silence following this single word is comparable to the physical pain you learned to defend against.  It jabs hard against everything good and sweet and tender inside of you, and you’re left speechless even as he continues impassively.  “That’s exactly what you were supposed to do.”

It takes a second, but then that unfamiliar feeling suddenly surges up, breaches with the power of an entire ocean.  Your voices may be nothing more than whispers in the dark, you may be clinging to each other, holding each other with the softest, gentlest love in your hearts, but the strength of your conviction on this would rip metal apart.

“No.”  The word holds the might of your entire being, and it stands alone and defiant in the face of everything you fear, everything that threatens you, him, and this child.  Never.  You’ll die before that happens.  “I love you, and there’s nothing in this galaxy that would ever make me do that.  Not fear, not danger, not the Empire, nothing.  Not even you.”

Din stares at you.  His visor reflects your hardened expression back to you, the force in your soul and the purpose in your eyes, and you don’t even realize the gravity of what you just said because like your love for him, gravity is a constant.  It’s a fundamental truth cemented into the rules that govern your actions and it stays true no matter where you are, no matter what terror you face, or how scared you become.  You have him, you have this little boy in your arms, and if that’s all you have, then you have everything.

After an eternity of this, of feeling his eyes pierce deep into you from behind the helmet while you refuse to wither under his stare, you watch him slowly turn and look down, landing on the sleepy child tucked between you both.  He holds there for a long time, before finally whispering, so quiet that the modulator barely picks it up, “It was the wrong choice.”

You stay quiet.  It happened.  What’s done is done, you can’t change the past.  He can scold and reprimand you about this as much as he wants, but you did the right thing and that decision is the only reason he’s even here to be able to do so.  This exhausted child was reunited with his father because of your choices, and this exhausted father was reunited with his child.  You won’t argue anymore, but it’s a certitude that lives deep in your heart now, builds a home there right alongside the both of them.  Din eventually looks up, his eyes find yours again behind the visor, and his hand rises once more to gently cup your jaw.

“I… thought I’d enjoy seeing you in my armor,” Din finally whispers.  It’s not what you expected, but his voice sounds… weak.  Broken.  “You wore mine once before, and it was…”  He brushes his thumb along your cheek, and then his head shakes slightly, pushing the thought away.  “It wasn’t real.  It didn’t fit.  It dwarfed you, it made you look out of place, it made everything soft and innocent about you stand out.  I liked it because it wasn’t real.”

“Was it… really that bad?”  You whisper back, partially to ease the tension just slightly but quickly breaking eye contact with him when you realize it doesn’t land correctly, it just sounds self conscious and sad.  You try to find that conviction again, that strength and assurance that propped you up so sturdily before, but…  Not a Mandalorian, he’d said.  Of course not.  Of course not.

“It wasn’t the armor.”  Din gently tugs up on your face so that you look at him again.  “It was you covered in blood.  It was you purposefully putting yourself in danger.  You killed multiple armed soldiers of the Empire, you dragged their bodies off the ship.  And then you flew into an imperial base, where you killed the officers, too.  You…”  He shakes his head slowly at you while speaking, and although you can’t see his face, you don’t need to in order to hear the horror in his voice.   “You… collected a quarry… in the middle of a massacre, sweet girl.”

Not a Mandalorian.

“You don’t chase down bounties,” he tells you.  “You don’t fly into war zones.  You don’t kill imperials, you don’t collect quarries, you don’t sacrifice yourself, or our son, to save me.  You said you tried to be brave… like me.”  His fingers tighten against your cheek, he dips his helmet to make sure you understand.  “I’ll never ask you to be brave.  I’ll ask you to survive.”

“I’m… sorry,” you finally whisper, and his arm drops from your cheek to join the other in wrapping around you and holding tight.  They hug you and squeeze, encasing you and the baby in a beskar shield and staying there for a long time.  Long enough for you to tuck your head back into its proper place under his helmet, long enough to start to feel okay with the silence again.  It brutalized you the last time you were surrounded by it, it made you feel alone and desolate and barren inside.  You greet it warily now, settling into it for an unknown amount of time until it’s forgiven once more.

After a while, Din quietly breaks it.

“How many?”  He murmurs to you.  You already know exactly what he’s asking, there's no more clarification necessary on his behalf.

You slowly close your eyes and think back to the smoldering craters, the blood soaked ramp, the fear in Oshua Ryler’s eyes as he begged you not to kill him.

“That didn’t deserve it?”  You ask, clenching your eyes tighter at the memory.  “Four.”

And maybe, maybe six or eight months ago, you would’ve begged for some guidance on how to reconcile that.  Hell, maybe a few hours ago, you could’ve used his arms around you exactly like this, his low voice repeating the same things he’s already told you before, over and over again, if only for some semblance of stability when everything feels turbulent and uncertain.  You’ll never be able to change it, though.  This belongs to you now.

This time, all Din says is, “I’m sorry, too.”

And that covers everything.

The silence envelops you both again, but… there’s something else.  Something that still sits deep in your worries, an image that isn’t a scar of what’s happened but a dread of what’s to come.  You need to tell him.  You don’t feel like saying it, you don’t want to speak it aloud for fear of bringing it into existence, but you need to tell him.

“Din?”  You breathe out, and he makes a soft noise in his throat while cuddling you on the floor.  “I saw…,” you whisper, every word sitting tight and reluctant in your throat.  “Right when we made the jump, I was looking through the window and I-I saw…”

“A star destroyer.”  He says it like… like it’s the worst thing in the world and also completely expected at the same time.  He says it like he already knew, yet can’t even imagine.  You lean every bit of your weight against him since you can’t hold him in return, squish him as best you can against the small corner and curl up even tighter in his arms for comfort.

He takes a deep breath, a shuddery sound you don’t think you’ve ever heard him make before.  It holds untold anxiety, unsaid conflict, uncertain action, an unknown path forward.

“I don’t know what to do,” Din eventually whispers to himself, to you, to the baby in your arms.  His voice is barely a breath through the modulator, his fingers digging into your skin with how many emotions he’s repressing.  “What do I do?”

He sounds so distressed that you automatically feel your soul find the floor—instantly, you become steady and calm and you locate all that rationality that kept you going today.  All your worries still twist deep down, all the guilt and the turmoil wrestles with your soft, easy nature until you can only find bits and pieces of it in the most vulnerable places inside you, but if he’s struggling this terribly, then the least you can do is offer some good, true, unwavering faith in times of uncertainty.  You’re in hyperspace, everything worked out, and it’s going to stay that way for right now.  If he doesn’t know how to talk about it yet, then you trust him enough to wait for him.

“It’ll be okay,” you tell him with a newfound confidence and purpose, carefully easing the baby into one arm so that the other can find its way to the other side of his helmet and pull him closer.  Din tucks his head and allows you to brush your lips against the metal, whisper the words soft and steady to him.  “We’ll figure it out together.”

---

@cptnbvcks thank you so much for the incredible art!

#the mandalorian #the mandalorian x you #the mandalorian x reader #din djarin #din djarin x you #din djarin x reader #mando x reader #mando x you #reader insert #fanfic #star wars #rough day #no-droids

[cowgurrrl]

Going to The Chapel

Pairing: Joel Miller x fem!reader (plus platonic Ellie Williams x fem!reader)

Author’s note: the wedding day fic is coming but this was the first idea that presented herself so enjoy

Summary: “Where did love begin? What human looked at another and saw in their face the forests and the sea? Was there a day, exhausted and weary, dragging home food, arms cut and scarred, that you saw yellow flowers and, not knowing what you did, picked them because I loved you?” — Jeanette Winterson, Lighthousekeeping [2.2k]

Warnings: quick canonical type of violence, grief, idiots in love, domestic Joel and Ellie

Let the record reflect that despite twenty years of an apocalypse and an insane amount of loss, Joel Miller is still a romantic. It just took him a little longer to find that part of himself again. 

The first time he thinks about it, you're sitting on the floor with Ellie, helping to adjust her hold on her guitar. "It's not going anywhere. You can relax," you tell her. You gently move her hands and ensure she has a pillow under her so she can be comfortable while you teach her chords. The sun slips behind the mountains and makes the light hit your eyes as you watch her gain confidence in her strumming. Ellie looks to you for guidance when she gets stuck or needs reassurance, and you never flinch. By the end of the night, Ellie's fingers are raw, and you tell her how proud you are of her. "You'll be playing circles around us in no time." You say, and Ellie's smile makes you light up. Maybe, he thinks. Maybe here. Maybe now.

It's not that he had never thought about marrying you. He dreamt about it all the time but figured that's all it could be; a dream. He made excuses for why he never proposed. He was too old, too broken, and too scared. The world had already taken so much from both of you that it seemed cruel to even think about creating a family like that. And then Ellie happened. Suddenly, you had this little girl you loved and cared for more than anyone else, and you found a safe home thousands of miles away from Boston. Everything had changed. Why couldn't this change too?

The next time the thought crosses his mind, you're holding Tommy and Maria's daughter. Camille Sarah Miller came into the world and immediately captured both your hearts, but you aren't focused on Camille when he thinks about it. Sure, she's sleeping in your arms, but you're looking at Maria and asking how she's feeling, how much she's sleeping, and what she's been eating. When someone has a new baby, it's easy to get caught up in the latest family addition but not you. You care about Tommy and Maria's well-being as much as Camille's, and tell them never to hesitate to ask you for help. That night, you go home and make two freezer meals for the new parents. That's the night Joel asks Ellie what she would think if he asked you to marry him. Her answer encaptured everyone else's feelings: "Fucking finally."

He asks Tommy where he got Maria's ring the next day. Tommy smiles and claps his big brother on the shoulder before directing him to the local blacksmith. He usually only works with artillery, but he makes special exceptions for things like this. Joel designs the ring himself with some help from Ellie—a simple gold band with wildflowers etched into the sides. They look exactly like the ones you and Ellie would pick while on the way across the country. Joel used to complain about wasting time and asked you about it one night after Ellie had gone to bed. "Ellie's fourteen years old, and the closest thing she's seen to a flower is probably a Cordyceps," you said. "Just… let her be a kid, okay?" He could tell you were waiting for a fight, but he just nodded. That was the first time he realized you were starting to love Ellie too.

"What's this?" Ellie asks, pointing to the year etched on the inner part of the ring. 

"It's the year we met," He says. Ellie smiles and mumbles something that sounds like "you fucking sap" as she hands him the ring back. "So, d'you think she'll like it?"

"I think she'll love it." She says. It's all the confirmation Joel needs. 

He had something planned, he really did, but in true Miller fashion, it didn't work out that way. He planned on taking you to the meadow where you've gone on a few family picnics together, delivering a long, emotional speech where he'd probably cry and then pull out the ring. What actually ended up happening was much less wholesome. You two were out on patrol when a group of raiders attacked you. You managed to take them all down, but not before Joel got shot in the shoulder. You were frantically trying to slow the bleeding enough to get him back on a horse when he asked. "Can we talk about it when you're not bleeding out?" You yelled as you pulled him off the ground.

So, that's why you're holding his hand in the hospital as his drugs slowly start to wear off. You tell him everything the doctors did and that you can take him home in the morning. Ellie gets to sleepover at the Other Miller's (as Ellie affectionately calls them) house and is relieved that he caught a bullet in the shoulder, not somewhere more severe. "And I won't hold you to the bleeding-out proposal, so we're good." You laugh, but he looks serious.

"Check the front pocket of my backpack," He says. You furrow your brows but open the pocket to find the gold ring at the bottom. Your hand flies to cover your mouth as tears fill your eyes, and you look at him. "I was goin' to propose in the meadow. I planned a whole thing, but somehow this feels more like us." He smiles and reaches for you. You let him hold your hand as you stand beside his hospital bed, tears streaming down your face. 

"Does Ellie know?" You ask, and he laughs. 

"She helped pick the ring out." 

"Oh, my god." You cry. He squeezes your hand and takes the ring from you. Tears fill his eyes as he stares at you like you hung the stars.

"Will you marry me?" He finally asks, and you nod. 

"Of course I will." 

"You sure? 'Cause, there's no backin' out after this."

"Yes, I'm sure," You laugh as you bend down and kiss him. Joel's arm isn't strong enough to hold you, and you can't stop crying, but it's perfect. You break the kiss with giddy laughter, still incapable of wrapping your mind around the fact that Joel just proposed to you in a hospital room. "How long have you been planning this?"

"I mean, the gettin' shot part wasn't the original plan." 

"No, I meant, how long have you been planning to propose?"

"Baby, I always thought about marrying you," The gentleness of his voice is enough to make you tear up again. He grabs your left hand and carefully slides the ring on your finger. It's the tiniest bit too big, and you can't help but laugh as he groans defeatedly. "This was supposed to go so much better!" He says. You kiss him again and feel him smile against your lips.

"It's perfect. Thank you." 

You climb into the hospital bed with him, avoiding his injured shoulder, and listen as he points out all the details. He tells you about the engraving on the inside of the year you met and the flowers that were copied exactly from a drawing. He explains the original plan further and then apologizes for getting shot. "As long as you don't get hurt every time we try to make a life-altering change, I think we'll be fine." You say, and he laughs. You stay up talking for a long time even though the nurses urged Joel to get some rest. 

You wonder aloud what Sarah would think about her dad getting married, what all your dead loved ones would think about this. Your parents would've loved Joel, but they would've loved Ellie more. They'd probably listen to her tell shitty jokes all day if they could. You miss them, especially now. You laugh, trying to imagine Tess throwing you a bachelorette party that would inevitably be insane. You talk about what Bill and Frank would say and decide that Frank would definitely cry while Bill would insist on cooking on the wedding day. You'd have Henry stand at the front and sign the entire ceremony to Sam. Eventually, you end up falling asleep listening to Joel's heartbeat, and for the first time in a long, long time, you don't have a nightmare. Instead, you dream of a wedding day full of all your favorite people. 

You were never one to believe in signs from beyond, but you take the peaceful dream as one big group hug from those you've lost.

You're exhausted when you leave the hospital in the morning, but you still make the walk to the Other Miller's house. You can hear Ellie talking to Tommy about her favorite comic book when you walk through the door, not even bothering to knock. "Hello?" You call as you walk into the kitchen with Joel close behind you. Ellie and Maria have a stack of pancakes in front of them as Tommy mans the stove with a sleeping Camille strapped to his chest. 

"Hey! How are you feeling?" Maria asks. You walk over to Ellie and smooth her hair back before kissing her forehead. She scrunches her nose at you but doesn't protest when you wrap your arms around her. You're sure Joel is answering Maria's question, but Ellie catches the glint of your ring before he can finish his sentence.

"Holy shit! He actually did it?" She asks loudly, and you shoot Joel a look. He shrugs, a smile pulling at his lips, as Maria and Tommy give each other confused looks. Ellie grabs your left hand to look at the ring, and it finally connects in Maria's head.

"Holy shit!" She yells, shooting out of her chair and covering her open mouth with her hands. You laugh as she leans over to look at your ring, a happy noise leaving her.

"It only took him getting shot, but he proposed." You say, and the room erupts into cheers. Tommy turns off the stove before walking over to Joel and wrapping him in as big of a hug as he can give him with Camille in the sling. Maria hugs you and rocks you back and forth, practically screeching about how excited she is. When she's done congratulating you, the couple switch, and Tommy hugs you tightly.

"Welcome to the family, officially." He says as he kisses your temple. Your chest could burst from all the love filling the room, and you feel your eyes getting wet again.

"Thank you, Tommy," You say. Tommy declares to make more celebratory pancakes, this time in the shape of a ring, but he barely gets a response as Maria asks Joel for all the details about the proposal. You look down to see Ellie staring at you with a big smile. You crouch down to look her in the eyes and put a hand on her knee. "What do you think about all this, kiddo?" 

"I'm just glad he finally got the balls to ask you. I thought it'd be forever before you guys made it official," she jokes. You smile but stay silent, waiting for her honest answer. She takes a deep breath, glancing between you and Joel before landing on you again. You squeeze her knee to encourage her to talk and see tears brimming in her big, brown eyes. "I'm really, really happy you guys are getting married." 

"You're sure? 'Cause I'll give this ring right back to him if you say the word."

"Hey! I worked hard on that ring!"

"I heard," you say, holding your left hand up to spin the band. "They're the wildflowers we used to pick, right?"

"It was Joel's idea. I just drew it." She says, and your heart skips a beat. You look at your ring again and notice the tiny pencil markings on the petals. A tear falls from your eye as you look at her again, grabbing her hand.

"Your drawings are on my ring?" 

"Do you like them?" She asks nervously, and you pull her into a tight hug. 

"Oh, baby girl," you whisper. "They're perfect." Joel doesn't miss your interaction with Ellie, there's rarely a time when he isn't watching his girls, and he smiles. Maria runs into the other room and comes back with a Polaroid camera in her hands.

"Okay, okay, you love birds! Let's get a picture!" She says, waving her hands for Joel to stand with you. Joel pretends to be annoyed, but you catch the sparkle in his eyes as he walks over to you and Ellie. He wraps an arm around your waist, and you put a hand on Ellie's shoulder to keep her from trying to escape the picture as the camera flashes. You eat pancakes and laugh with your family as the picture develops safely on the counter. Before you can leave, now with Ellie in tow, Maria hands you the picture with her handwriting under it. The Millers, she wrote, even though you haven't decided on whether you want to change your name and Ellie will forever have her mother's surname. 

Names don't mean anything when it comes to family, and you've always been family. You and Ellie have always been Millers, even if you didn't know it.

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Tag list: @evyiione

#joel and ellie #the last of us #joel miller #ellie williams #joel miller fic #joel miller x reader #joel tlou #the last of us x reader #joel miller the last of us #joel miller fluff #domestic Joel Miller #joel miller x female reader #i wrote this for me but you can read it too i guess

[ddejavvu]

hi! i'd like to ask a one shot on bradley bradshaw in which y/n is a girl in her early/mid 20's who's maverick's daughter and her and bradley are secretly dating. one day mav finds something belonging to rooster in her bedroom and realises what her daughter has been up to, but isn't pleased at all.

thanks x

Bradley's aviators are the last thing Pete wants to find when he washes your sheets. You've insisted a thousand times that you're a big girl now, you don't need your dad to do your laundry for you, but he likes it. He likes taking care of you, even if he doesn't need to.

He doesn't like it now, though. Not when he spies a pair of muted sunglasses, a familiar chip in their bridge. He'd made that chip, more years ago than he's come to terms with, when he'd elbowed Goose and sent the man ramming face-first into a pole. Knowing who they belong to now unsettles him greatly, because they should not have been anywhere near your bed.

He pockets them, refraining from the urge to crush them just for the memories they hold.

Bradley stops by twenty minutes later, before Pete's had enough time to process what he's assuming is the situation. He's fuming, not only that his baby is having sex, but that she's having sex with Bradley.

"Hey, Mav." Bradley nods to the man, and Pete reconsiders the key he's given to Bradley for emergencies, seeing as he's been waltzing in to canoodle with his daughter.

"Hello, Bradley." His tone is icy, but Bradley's used to Pete having bad days sometimes. It's practically part of the job description.

Bradley pokes his head into the kitchen, then the bathroom, before finally exploring the living room where Maverick sits.

"I can't find my glasses," He offers up an explanation where it isn't requested, desperate to make conversation instead of suffering in silence, "I just don't know where I left 'em, they're not in my car, they're not in my apartment, they're- they're in your hands..." Bradley frowns at the aviators he can see in Maverick's grip, "Where were they?"

Maverick doesn't bother looking at him, glaring at the glasses instead, "In my daughter's bed."

"Oh, shit."

"Oh, shit? Oh, shit? Yeah, 'oh shit'! Bradley, how could you?" Pete shoots out of his seat, fist squeezing around the glasses, "I've spent her entire life telling her not to get involved with pilots, warning her off from men I know spend their time in testosterone-filled locker rooms of pure filth, who see women at bars like conquests, who get so crazed on deployment that they'll fuck anything in a skirt. Because I was that pilot, Bradley. She deserves better than someone like me, and I'm trying to make sure she gest that! And you know that, you were her bodyguard at bars! You were supposed to help me protect her, how long have you been going behind my back like this? When I trusted you?"

"Mav, slow down," Bradley keeps his voice calm, "I know a lot of pilots are like that, okay? Trust me I know, I work with Hangman. But that's fucked up, and I know that. You think I cheer him on in the locker room? You think I bet him he can't bone a lady in the bathroom? He's gross, and that's not how I act. You know that, I know you do. I know you know I care about her. And I don't blame you for being scared, but you're not gonna chase me away. That's- that's because I care about her. I care about her, so I'm not gonna leave just 'cause you tell me to. You can be mad all you want, but I'm not gonna dump her for it."

"How long?" Maverick repeats, face flushed in anger, "I said, how long?"

"Eight months." Bradley admits, voice strong. "It's been long enough to know I care about her. And I- I love her."

Pete's eyes flutter shut, then squeeze. He looks like he's in physical pain, and he's barely able to stop himself from crushing the glasses. Bradley doesn't dare speak, doesn't add fuel to whatever fire is burning in Pete's chest. He just stands there, strong and silent.

"I'm not happy about this." Pete finally grunts, keeping his eyes shut as he shoves his fist forwards, jamming the aviators into Bradley's chest. The younger pilot catches them, tucking them into the front of his shirt before Mav can change his mind and stomp on them.

"I'm sorry. I hope you see things differently when you see us together. All you know now is the, uh, undesirable stuff. But I treat her well."

"You'd better." Pete threatens, his voice barely above a whisper, "Go home. When I open my eyes I don't want to see you here. And no sneaking in tonight, or- or ever again. I'm installing cameras."

"Deal," Bradley promises, already on his way to the door in case Pete changes his mind and charges, "And- um, is it alright if I take her to dinner tonight?"

"Only if you take her somewhere nice," Pete decides, "And have her home by nine."

"Yes, sir."

When the door shuts behind Bradley, Pete lets out a monumental sigh. He feels like his lungs collapse with the breath, and all he can do is pray that you're actually treated to dinner, and that you two don't sneak off to some motel somewhere to pass the time.

#bradley bradshaw #bradley bradshaw x reader #bradley bradshaw x you #bradley bradshaw x y/n #bradley bradshaw imagine #bradley bradshaw oneshot #bradley bradshaw fanfiction #bradley bradshaw fluff #bradley bradshaw x reader fanfiction #bradley bradshaw blurb #bradley bradshaw drabble #rooster #rooster x reader #rooster imagine #rooster x you #rooster x y/n #rooster oneshot #rooster fluff #rooster blurb #rooster drabble #rooster fanfiction #rooster x reader fanfiction #bradley rooster bradshaw #bradley rooster bradshaw x reader #bradley rooster bradshaw x you #bradley rooster bradshaw x y/n #bradley rooster bradshaw fanfiction #bradley rooster bradshaw imagine #bradley rooster bradshaw oneshot #bradley rooster bradshaw fluff

[lemony-and-zesty]

Your au has hit me with the hyper-fixation stick. If I became annoying, I’m sorry.

How does everyone react/feel about JD being a hitman and him being so different from the brother they knew

And how does JD feel about himself being so different

I am sorry for taking a while to get to this but man I am so devastated by this question - especially the last part. And I wanna do right by it so I’ve been thinkin about it really hard.

I’m putting it under the read more, not just cause it got long, but it also got kinda,,, sad haha.

I’m thinkin they all have that initial reaction of “You’re a WHAT” ofc but it’s what comes directly before and after that that i really wanna nail down right.

Honestly I don’t even know which brother to start with 😭,,

I guess Floyd.

He’s shocked, of course, when he sees JD for the first time. Why’s he covered in so many scars? What could’ve possibly happened to him?

Why does Floyd feel like he’s seen him like this before

The main thing is trying to speak with him beyond just hellos. JD always seems to find some excuse to run off when Floyd’s involved.

It’s almost like he has to treat his oldest brother like a scared animal that’ll flee if he moves too quickly.

Floyd doesn’t know how he feels about that.

Once he finds out about it, he’s horrified. Both of and for John Dory. They’ve all been through so much, but this feels like something else entirely. He can see how affected he is and he’s devastated.

—

Next up is Clay.

He’d be the most,, angry,, about it all I think.

When he first sees John he’s quick to brush him off (like in canon) and that’s about the extent of it for a while. He honestly barely notices cause he’s too focused on his other brothers - especially Floyd.

It takes a long while for him to warm up to JD, and it doesn’t help that a lot of that bossiness JD had is still there. But he can tell he’s trying. Hell, they’re both trying. But Clay can’t help this feeling of unease that he gets around JD.

When he finds out,, god I can’t imagine anything but him getting furious and screaming at him. I feel like he’d storm off before even hearing JD out. He’d probably only be able to be calmed by one of his other brothers or Viva.

—

Bruce is mostly shocked at how quiet his older brother is. JD was a lot of things, but quiet was never one of them.

Honestly, much like Clay, a lot of things fly over Bruce’s head cause JD tends to just,, fade into the background when they’re all together.

And, y’know, it’s not easy to talk it out when he deflects and runs away from anything that gets anywhere close to what he got up to the past 20 years.

Bruce doesn’t want to pry, but he’s worried. The man before him is so unlike his older brother and it makes him nervous.

Once he finds out he’s devastated for his brother. Especially once JD explains the situation with the boss. And though it sounds kind of awful, Bruce can’t help but feel happy when JD finally cracks and explains it all to them, cause that’s the most like himself he’s seemed in a long time.

—

Branch is a bit of a tough one. Especially since she finds out well before the others,, what with JD being hired to target Poppy and all.

She’s furious when he first shows up, and even more so when she finds out who he is. Cause how could he do this? How could he leave her for twenty years only to come back and threaten to take away the one person she cared for most?

But, she needs him to help save Floyd, so she buries it and moves on. Still never letting herself be comfortable around him.

During the journey she finds herself noticing little things about John Dory. The way he carries himself, the way he tends to get lost in his thoughts. How he always seemed to be on guard.

She can’t help but feel a twinge of,, something.

He seems so much like she did back before she got her colors back.

She really doesn’t know how to feel about that.

When the truth comes out she’s horrified, but she can’t find it in her to blame JD too much. Not with how he describes the boss.

—

Overall, they’re just,, worried about him.

As for the target of all their worries? How does he feel about it all? Honestly, it’s pretty simple.

John Dory hates himself.

He hates every single thing about himself.

He tore his family apart, and almost like that wasn’t enough he just had to tear everyone else’s families apart too.

That’s the worst part, he thinks.

Every target, every hit, every kill. They had families. And all because of John’s mistakes, those families are ripped to shreds.

He can’t even stand to look at his own reflection cause every part of him just serves to remind him of everything he’s done.

Sometimes, especially after fleeing his boss and saving Floyd, he considers running again.

He considers just,, leaving and going back to the Neverglades and just letting the beasts tear him to pieces. At least like that he couldn’t hurt anyone else.

—

But yeah. That’s the gist of it :]

It’s a rough situation but I like to think they manage to navigate it.

Eventually,,

#zesty posts #hitman!john dory #trolls band together #john dory #bruce #clay #branch #floyd #i love them all so much actually

[arece]

Late Arrival

♤ John Wick x platonic!f!reader (father/daughter duo???) series masterlist

(𝟷)

♤ Summary: You accidentally kill a man after he attacks you, only to discover he's the son of a very dangerous and powerful gang leader. Your safety is now entrusted in the hands of John Wick. (2.6k)

♤ Warnings: Attempted assault (not successful or too detailed), John Wick violence and death, descriptions of injuries and blood.

♤ a/n: This is possibly one part of many. I roughly have a whole series planned out but would like to see if others are interested in it before I fully commit to it. If you have any thoughts or requests of what you'd like to see with these two, request away!

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The bright crimson leaked a trail down the alley towards you and you threw yourself back in a last ditch effort to keep it away from you. There was already enough blood on your hands which you desperately tried to wipe away, it was too late they were already stained.

What you did finally hit you as you caught sight of the bloodied pipe tossed to the side of the now mangled body. “Fuck.” You almost start heaving as your breathing begins to pick up. Where did he even come from?

You were on your latest job for Aurelio, stealing whatever parts he needed for his latest design. He came upon you when you naively tried to steal from him months ago, when he caught you he seemed the furthest thing from pissed.

Highly amused he thought a crafty thief of a fourteen year old was good for his business. He took you in dubbing you the ‘street rat’ and you ran his errands. It was better than living on the streets, surviving off of scraps like you’d been for the last two years. Although weary of the man and his definitely not-so-legal work, you agreed to join.

Being discreet was your biggest ally, being so young you were mistaken for just a regular kid which made it easier to hide away in plain sight, stealing from the unsuspecting. After living on the streets for so long you liked to think you knew the city inside out.

Twisting through alleyways was the perfect way to remain out of sight, it was also the perfect way to get attacked. You were leaning against the wall, catching your breath after almost getting caught from your latest heist.

You may have laughed at the guy when he walked right past you, pissed off, clueing him on who stole from him. You could only think about how annoyed Aurelio was gonna be with you as you ran two extra blocks.

You noticed a shadow moving closer to you from the corner of your eye, before you could move one arm wrapped around your midsection yanking you to a chest and another covering your mouth.

You jab your elbow straight into your attackers ribs, causing them to release you but not before tossing you further back into the alley near a dumpster. You scrambled up and managed to catch sight of the person.

It was a guy, roughly in his twenties. He was tall but lanky and dressed in a way that screamed ‘douchey-rich’. The type of kids who thought they were the shit before getting robbed by the small group of street kids.

“What the fuck do you want? I didn’t take shit.” You had assumed he was one of the guys' lackeys. You realized you were wrong when a sickly smirk grew on his face, his eyes slightly crazed.

He walked closer to you and you backed up until you bumped into the dumpster. He seemed to only get more excited when he saw how scared you grew which only increased the sick feeling you felt festering. “I’m only here for some fun.”

He lunged at you, knocking you to the ground and your head slammed against the concrete. Vision blurred as you watched his wandering hands reach for you. No, no, no. You couldn’t tell if you were screaming but he still covered your mouth with one hand.

Your head turned to the side and by the corner of the dumpster you saw a lone metal pipe. Slowly, your left hand reaches for it, fingertips brushing against the cold metal before you fully have it in your grasp.

You move your hold to the middle of it and use all your strength to hit the end against the side of his head. He falls against you and you cry out, shoving him off you in a panic. Everything feels hazy and faraway.

You stand on unsteady feet now holding onto the pipe with both hands, raising it above your head you let out a sob and smash it down on his head. Again. Again. Over and over till you lose your strength and your lungs give out from your wails.

You dropped the metal beside his caved in head and fell back to the ground. Wiping the blood away desperately you scooch back from the swirling crimson puddle coming from him. Something catches the light momentarily.

A silver pin was on his jacket now tainted with his blood. You choked on your breath when you caught sight of the symbol on it - a card spade. Now you were really in for it, you just killed the son of one of the most influential gangs. Aurelio said they were second to The High Table. You didn’t know much about either but the fear in his eyes spoke volumes.

Pocketing the pin, you stumble up still in a daze. You smear trickles of blood over your face when you roughly shove your hair back. You had a lot to explain to Aurelio, maybe he’ll decide you weren’t worth the risk. Afterall, you’re as good as dead now.

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You stood in front of the garage shop, the definition of a mess. Clothes ripped, hair knotted, drenched in blood, and you were pretty sure your head was busted open from the earlier fall. Aurelio rushed out, pushing past the others to reach you.

“What the fuck happened?” He eyed you over, his worry breaking through his angered demeanor. You numbly reached into your pocket and held out the bloodied spade pin, “I didn’t mean to.”

He did a once over of the pin and you before shoving one of the chairs beside him, “fuck.” You slightly flinch back but remain unaffected otherwise as you stared blankly ahead. He rubs a hand over his face, catching sight of a gold coin atop his desk.

“I have a favor to call in.” He walks off into his office quickly, muttering to one of the guys about getting you something to clean up with as he reaches for his phone. You're handed a damp rag but just hold it as you listen in to bits and pieces of Aurelio’s phone call.

You mostly make out rough grumbling but catch some words. “Favor…come and see… accident -  he tried to…” You stop listening in after that, shutting your eyes tightly in an attempt to block out everything that just happened.

You don’t know how long you stood there but were interrupted by Aurelio clearing his throat. Your eyes snap open to see him awkwardly gesturing to the rag you held in your grasp. “Not gonna clean up?”

You shake your head and toss it to the side, it didn’t matter no matter how much you scrubbed the blood would remain, hands forever tainted with a reddish hue. “Who were you talking to?”

He pulled up the chair he pushed to the side earlier and brushed your question off. 

His hands clasped together, his leg bouncing up and down in an anxious frenzy, “do you wanna talk about-”

“No.” You snapped firmly. You shocked yourself with the aggression you showed towards him. You shrunk back in guilt. Aurelio seemed to understand as he changed back to the question you asked earlier.

“I called in a favor. Who you killed, you’re gonna need someone to keep you safe and he can.” Your heart dropped in realization, you were right, Aurelio thought you were too much of a risk and was pawning you off to some stranger.

In the end you couldn’t really blame him, you had severely fucked up yet you couldn’t help but feel the burning sting of betrayal and hurt.  He had taken you in, fed you, housed you, and taught you. Now you were being thrown out so easily. “If the Spade’s are so powerful, how is some guy supposed to protect me?”

It felt like a childish jab, like you were one step away from pouting your bottom lip out. Aurelio sighed and brushed a hand over the top of his head. “He’s John Wick,” he slightly scoffed, a ghost of a grin on his face like he’s on some inside joke.

Your brows furrowed, now frustrated by how amused he seemed at the prospect of your imminent death. Your hands formed fists, the now dried blood flaking off at your knuckles reminding you of the state you were in. “Who the fuck is John Wick?” 

“Him.” You looked behind you to see a tall man standing at the entrance in an all black suit. You hadn’t even heard him come in - you really needed to work on people being able to sneak up on you so easily.

He was older, late forties to mid fifties. Shoulder length hair and a full beard that had odd patches dipping near his mouth. The man was stoic, a displeased frown that you could tell sat permanently on his face from the way it suited him.

His displeasure seemed to grow as he observed you before turning back to Aurelio, “she’s a kid.” You huffed out, not liking how he brushed off your presence, “yeah, real observant asshole.” Aurelio glared at you while John continued to ignore you.

“She is. Look, they're going to come after her and we both know I can’t do shit - but you.” John surveyed you again. You felt uncomfortable under his gaze but refused to back down, standing tall. You weren’t gonna let him intimidate you, not after what happened today.

He seemed to find what he was looking for, nodding at Aurelio. “Let’s go,” he grabs the coin from Aurelio before heading out the garage, waiting for you to follow. You began to feel panic crawling up your throat at the idea of leaving with this guy.

You turned to Aurelio, begging with your eyes as you felt your eyes burning, a threat to possible tears. You were scared, god were you scared. Aurelio shook his head, muttering a small, “go” before heading back into his office.

You sniffed, grabbing the stupid part you stole for him and threw it at one of the windows, shattering it. You were hoping for a reaction but was met with complete silence. He gave up on you. 

You followed after John in defeat. He got you into the passenger seat of his Boss 429. While he pulled out he reached into the center console and tossed you some wipes to clean off the blood. You had a feeling it was something he frequently experienced.  

You roughly wiped at the dried blood, you wouldn’t be able to clean all of it off but this will do for now. “Where are you taking me?”

He stared at the road ahead, only sparing you a small glance through the rearview mirror, “the Continental.” His answer was short and blunt, getting information out of him will be hard but you’re persistent.

“What’s the Continental.” Without a moment passing, “a hotel.” You frowned and carelessly let the blood stained wipes fall to the bottom of the car. If he was bothered by it he didn’t say anything. “How’s a hotel supposed to protect me?”

“It’s discreet.” The way he answered in riddles further annoyed you. Your trust in him was short, you don’t know what Aurelio gave him, just the gold coin? Either way it seemed small considering the gang he’d have to go up against and just for you.

“You don’t talk much, do you?” He shook his head. You leaned back in your seat and lifted your legs to rest on the console. No point in fighting this now, you were trapped in the car with him.

Without looking he pushed your legs back down, paying no mind to your glare. “Not safe.” You scoffed, yet listened to him and kept your feet down. “I’m being hunted down after killing some asshole and have to rely on you. I think the car is the least of my worries.”

He lightly snorted at your jab but was cut off by a car slamming into you guys from the back. His arm shot out in front of you, holding you back from flying forward. “You alright?” You breathlessly nodded, watching as he looked back.

He reached back into the console, this time pulling out a gun. He unbuckled you and pushed you down below the window view. “Stay down,” he orders you before getting out of the car, the sounds of gunshots firing immediately. 

You weren’t able to follow his orders for long when the cracked back windshield was shattered. You flinched back down, covering your head with your arms. One of the men in all black tactical gear crawled in towards you.

Your eyes widened, frantically you reach blindly behind you until your hand manages to grab ahold of the door handle. You yank on it just as the man reaches to pull you by your leg, falling out of the car backwards and hitting your already injured head.

You kick at his wrist in an attempt to break free though it was little use. With blurred vision he reached for your arms and pulled you upright. You punched at his shoulders, arms, ribs, anything you could reach as panic filled you at the all too familiar scene playing out.

John turned back from cutting one of the men down with their own knife at the sound of your scream. He was met with you in a mercenary's grip, trying to escape while he tried to search you over.

He flipped the knife around, tightening his grip around it as he strode back over to the car. His steps were silent enough that the mercenary didn’t look up until it was too late. He pulled at the arm wrapped around yours, bending until he heard a satisfying snap.

The man yelled out and you were released from his grip. You fell to the ground and John grabbed the man by his now broken arm until he was close enough to plunge the blade straight through his throat.

Blood sprayed over the both of you as you frantically crawled backwards. John let the body drop and turned to see you looking at the bodies all around with a crazed look in your eye. He knelt down to your level and reached for your shoulder. 

You began to thrash around wildly, shrieking for him to let you go. “Stop- hey, hey,” He tried to call out to you as he wrapped you tightly in his grip, preventing the possibility of you accidentally hurting yourself. 

He held on as you sobbed. You gripped onto him as you came to, not wanting him to let go. “I got you, kid. I got you now.” You heaved into his chest and he clutched the back of your sore head in a soft hold.

After you had settled he cautiously released you and looked you over to make sure you weren’t physically hurt. He gently moved your face to the side, wiping the fresh blood away to take a closer look at the back of your head.

“We’ll get the Doctor to look at that,” he stood up, pulling you with him. He wrapped his arm around you to guide you back to the car that was now severely damaged. You didn’t have the energy to question him, you just let him buckle you in and place his jacket over you.

You curled up in your seat and let yourself fall asleep under his watchful eye. You don’t know how the Spade’s have found you so quickly. All you did know was that trusting him was all you had left.

#john wick x reader #john wick x you #john wick x fem!reader #keanu reeves x reader #john wick #keanu reeves #platonic #fem reader #john wick father figure #fanfic #one-shot #imagine #imagines #arece writes #keanu reeves one shot #keanu reeves imagine #john wick imagine

[mysteria157]

Chapter 1

Word Count: ~ 2.3k

CW: Mentions of pregnancy, profanity

Summary: Your life comes to a startling halt when you realize the abrasive and dismissive man you shared a passionate but drunken night with is now the father of your child.

Notes: Hello! First chapter for you all. Let me know in the comments, chat or messages on what you think. A like or reblog is great too if that’s what you want. <3 I hope you enjoy reading!

Divider: @cafekitsune

Ao3 | Next Chapter

It Had To Be You Masterlist

How?

You had taken every precaution and painstakingly logged your cycle every single day. An IUD, sex during a low fertile week, and a condom to seal the deal.

And yet.

After five tests with the same result, you held onto the denial for as long as you could. The phone call from the gynecologist to confirm that yes you are pregnant, was enough to seal the earth shattering deal.

Pregnant.

This had to be a mistake. Even with your occasional trysts and short lived relationships, you didn’t have one slip up or scare. But a drunken night five weeks ago so blurry that you could barely remember seemed to have been the final straw in your streak of good luck.

The steering wheel suddenly felt incredibly hot as you gripped the leather tighter. You pressed your forehead to wheel, squeezing your eyes tight and forcing a slow breath from your lungs. The morning sun beaming into the car window was too bright, the air conditioning blowing through the vents too cold against your skin, your thoughts too incessant, too anxious, too loud.

 It wasn’t that you were against having children. At twenty-nine years old, you were coasting steady in life. Magna Cum Laude in marketing from one of the best universities in Sendai, an internship that blossomed into a full-time job, and after years of overtime and grasping every opportunity you could, you’re now a Marketing Specialist of one of the best firms in the city. You had a sizeable income from years of working hard and saving, a small but cozy house that you fixed yourself, and the freedom to actually do the things you wanted.

But this was a big step. A step that you wanted to follow a certain way if you could help it. A serious relationship, marriage, and maybe a kid or two.

Now? When you were this close to a promotion, when your mother was finally showing a modicum of pride in you, and you had your vacation planned?

It was too much, everything was too much, too intense, too fucking loud.

The sharp vibration of your cellphone the cup holder jolted you from your thoughts and back into cold, hard reality. Work. You can deal with this later.

Omelia: I got the latte you wanted and its sitting neglected on your desk. Where are you.

You're being dramatic.

Omelia: I wont be dramatic when I say no the next time you ask me for coffee.

I just parked. I’ll be right up. Keep calm until I get there.

Omelia: 🙄 

You shook out another breath, pushing away from the steering wheel and smoothing a hand down your white button up blouse.

“You can do this. It’s going to be just fine.”

By the time the elevator dinged on the thirtieth floor of the skyrise building in the middle of downtown Sendai, your nerves weren’t as frayed. The anxiety still buzzed against your skin as you walked past various cubicles, smiling kindly to your coworkers before hitting the stretch of office doors that led to your own. There were days when you wished you were in a cubicle again. It was easier to meet others and socialize, forming a small family of the same people year after year. But the more you volunteered to stay after hours to assist for projects and the more your boss recommended you for opportunities you had only dreamed of, the less you saw your coworkers. But you tried to stay engage as much as you could, eating lunch with them, going out for dinner and drinks.

But you guess that would have to change soon.

“I used my rage to reheat it for you.”

Omelia’s low and raspy voice was a welcome distraction to the current thoughts in your head as you closed the office door behind you. Perched in an office chair across from your desk, the usual silver-eyed glower from your best friend stared holes into your skin. Even petite in nature, she was the most intimidating but also the most beautiful person you had ever met. You couldn’t be envious of her. Since meeting her in second grade, she was often chased by boys. When they pulled her thick kinky hair as a means of flirting, she responded with a punch to the gut that always ended her in the office and her mother’s usual response was to take her out for ice cream instead because she shouldn’t be punished for stopping boys using violence as a means to show affection. But as you both got older, her violence morphed into carefully calculated sarcasm capable of cutting anyone down before they could do the same to her. But you were never afraid of her mean words, because when you’re the only two black females in your second grade class, you naturally gravitated to each other. And being able to gauge her emotions behind her words always helped you understand her more.

You reached for the cup and hesitated, the anxious thoughts of the effects of caffeine and fetal development flashing through your mind before you ultimately gave up.

Her eyes narrowed, silver orbs laser focused and analyzing body language as you sipped the latte, the usual caramel flavor hitting your tongue.

“Ah yes, I can still feel the rage. Thank you.”

“It’s rare when you’re late and you usually text me if you’re gonna be.”

You shrug, setting your Michael Khors purse on your desk before sagging into the ergonomic chair.

“Forgive me for my transgressions.” She rolled her eyes at your attempt of a joke, crossing elegant skirt clad legs before sighing slowly. “I know you hate mornings Ome, but this level of disappointment is rarely directed at me. What’s wrong?”

She didn’t speak for a moment, opening her mouth and closing repeatedly, full lipgloss covered lips puckering to form words before she shook out another disappointed sigh.

“I’m sorry. Just boyfriend troubles and I’m taking it out on everyone I see. I’m so close to just dumping the fucker.”

“Then do it?”

It was no lie that Ome had more than had it with her three year on again-off again relationship. Years of short lived jobs, lack of interest in her or her family, and the latest cheating stint, she was ready to call it quits. But why she hasn’t, you’ll never know.

Maybe she doesn’t want to be alone. Having stone walls around you for most of your life will do that you imagine.

You hesitated again before taking another sip.

How much caffeine is too much? 50 mg? 200?? Your stomach lurched painfully, the sharp pang of nausea making your mouth water. You’ve been drinking three cups of coffee every day for the past five weeks.

Oh God.

“Y/n.” Ome’s voice rang in you ear, cutting through the loud echo of thoughts. Her gaze was less harsh this time, concern softening her ethereal features. “You good?”

You smiled at her, pushing the coffee away.

“I’m good.”

***

It turns out that you in fact were not good. Because every little thing seemed to send your mind into a frenzy. You spaced out at every meeting as you thought about just all you needed to prepare for.

College fund. Daycare. Medical care. Baby clothes. Furniture (baby furniture?). Telling your fucking mother.

You couldn’t eat your salad because you were curled over your phone instead, googling every ingredient to make sure nothing was toxic.

You couldn’t look your coworkers in the eye because you could feel the waves of irrationality in your mind as you imagined their disgusted filled stares as they looked at your stomach.

No matter where you went or what you did, everything seemed to set your mind off.

How much do babies even cost?

The thought made you groan softly, your stomach taking what felt like the millionth backflip of the day.

“Are you alright?”

You blinked, face heating instantly in embarrassment as you looked up at your boss. Jin Itadori’s glasses sat perched on his nose as he looked at you curiously, dark brown eyes soft but filled with concern.

“I-I’m. Yes, I’m alright. Sorry it’s been a weird day. I meant no disrespect, Itadori-san.”

He chuckled in reply, hands folding on his desk as he smiled softly at you. Jin was probably the nicest boss ever. He was always soft smiles, an even softer voice, and a demeanor that made others relax instead of stiffening in his presence. But despite his demeanor, he had revamped the entire marketing department fresh out of college, brought in triple the revenue the company had ever seen, and usurped the previous boss’ position in less than three years to become Director of Marketing Operations for the Sendai branch. He was serious about his work and refused to let anyone walk over him or his colleagues. And he was one of the few people who didn’t judge you by how you looked and instead admired your work ethic, your personality, and your goals.

So to zone out in the middle of a one on one with him was completely out of character.

“You’re not disrespecting me. You’re always so formal, please relax. I can tell you have a lot on your mind. Do you need to take a few days off?”

You shook your head. “No sir. Or at least I’m not sure yet. I’ll let you know.”

He pursed his lips before looking down at his planner. “Well, what I was saying is that our latest project will be our heaviest yet. It’s going to take a lot of work, a lot of attention to detail and therefore collaboration with others outside of our company. The branch in Tokyo that held the annual summit a few weeks ago has reached out and would like to be included.”

Ice cold water felt like it had been doused down your back, your nerves jolting in shock. Of all the branches, why Tokyo? Niigata’s branch was good. Albeit, not as big and popular and well known as Tokyo, but still good.

“We’ve projected about a year from start to finish. I wanted to visit Tokyo next week to begin initial talks, create a plan, statements of work, you know the whole spiel. I want you there.”

The anxiety washed away for just a second, your heart pumping at yet another opportunity to get your foot in the door.

“Of course. I would be honored to be apart of this sir.”

“Yaga was especially impressed with your work ethic last month and insists on your presence.” He smiled again at you, his kindness radiating off his skin and made your shoulders relax slightly. “You’re a great person on this team and I wouldn’t have anyone else. I’ll have details to you by end of day.”

***                                              

Your happiness had slowly melted away by the time you made if back to your office and sagged into your chair.

It was a great opportunity. The assistant to the leader of a large multiple branch project? The best thing to come into your lap in a while.

You’ve worked so hard for this. Another step closer.

But the fear of your future, the anxiety of something you had no contingency plan for, the frustration and sadness of having to do this alone was just too palpable to ignore.

Meetings that you would have to reschedule because of OB appointments. Money that you would have to rearrange to plan for a life you didn’t intend to nourish this soon. Disappointment that you would have to swallow from Jin when you told him that you would have to take maternity leave and someone else would have to fill your place.

It was too much. You’re not ready. You’re not fucking ready.

The door to your office opened before you could have another thought.

“Oh my god, if he texts me again I’m going to fucking scream y/n—” Ome paused, her hand on the doorknob as she looked at you softly. “Why are you crying?”

You reached for your face quickly, fingers touching the wetness on your cheeks before you pulled them away to look at the tears on your fingertips. Ome closed the door softly and walked to you, her hand resting on the side of your neck.

“Tell me.”

You should have said something as soon as you walked in the office this morning. You could never go long without telling her your thoughts. But from the moment you hung up the phone with the gynecologist in your car until right now, you’ve been on auto pilot. So much turbulence, but on auto-pilot all the same.

Your vision blurred as you looked up at her, her face distorted through your tears.

“I’m pregnant.”

Finally saying it out loud seemed to be the final nail in the coffin as you hiccupped harshly and broke down in front of her. She knelt down immediately, pulling you into her embrace and pressing your face into her blouse as you sobbed loudly into the soft fabric.

Accidents happen and you can never truly be prepared for a pregnancy. You wouldn’t get rid of it. While you weren’t against that choice, the thought of doing so only made you feel worse. But you thought you would at least be with someone when the surprise came.

But that one drunken night five weeks ago changed everything. His glares during a night out with coworkers were dulled by the many shots of sake you took and started the course of a path you didn’t even want to imagine him being the catalyst of.

Because the first day you met him, he was quick to judge and cut you down with words that made you swear you would never foster a stupid work crush again.

Of all the men it could have been.

It had to be Nanami fucking Kento.

#Nanami kento #Kento nanami #Nanami Kento x reader #Nanami Kento x black reader #Nanami Kento x black fem reader #nanami x you #Nanami Kento x y/n #jujutsu kaisen #jjk #jjk x reader #jujutsu kaisen x reader #It Had To Be You #mysteria157 #anime x black reader #Nanami Kento fanfic #jjk fanfic #jjk x black reader #Nanami Kento smut #jjk au #masterlist #It Had To Be You masterlist

[iggy5055]

Yandere Emperor Darth Vader x Reader Part 1

Suitless Vader, Vader uncrispy

Summary: (Y/N) is taken away from her remote home planet and forced to spend the rest of her life with the new emperor.

Warnings: death, fear, yandere, obsessed, manipulation, gore

Peace, peace was a hard thing to come by now-a-days , close to non-existent and it was an even harder think to keep. The empire had completely taken over in just a few month, completely and total control over the inner rim and quickly making their way out to the mid rim. No one was safe and no one had hope, not anymore, but who could really blame them.

First the clone wars, long, tiresome, painful, always to risk to be caught in a battle, be killed by a droid or even taken as a slave in the aftermath. Then the final battle, all seemed to go well, hope started to swell in everyone who was apart of the Republic, Only for things to crumble horribly, first the rumours of the Jedi trying to assassinate the Chancellor Palpatine, a man beloved by many, then the rise of the Empire ruled by the newly anointed Emperor Palpatine. 

The thing is that my planet was as back water as you could get, if you wanted to hide then this was the place to do it, a down side to this though was that news as slow as heck so it was almost a month till we learned of the final battle that ended Count Dooku and the end of the war. It didn't take us long till we where told about the rise of the Empire with the rise of our Emperor and his right hand who no one had ever heard of. 

It was a good thing we had a lot of pirates, bounty hunters, and even just some travellers come here to relax and re-fuel their ships because without them we wouldn't get a majority of our information. But what shocked us all the most was when we heard that the emperors right hand had killed Emperor Palpatine and taken his title. 

Some where relived, some where scared. The former Emperor had been kind, not doing anything to warrant such hate but some though that he would have turned out to be a horrible man after a few years, many thought his right hand couldn't be any better.

I didn't really feel much regarding the constant changing of plans, I wasn't directly effected by it, none of us were really. We just whet about our days like normal, do our jobs, take care of our familys, on the days we heard about a a new innocent planet being taken over all we would just thought ‘oh, well that's to bad.’ and just moved on.

In my case I worked with my family in our little tavern/inn. we where always the first ones to get news, mostly by bounty hunters, they would come here and stay a night or two, usually waiting to get payed. Being the one;y daughter to my mum and dad I was the waitress and I would lead the people staying at the inn to their rooms, witch meant I was the first to ever get any information. Me or the man who owns the fuel depo. 

It was peaceful, but like I said peace is the hardest thing to keep.

It started like any other day, I woke up before anyone else, cleaned the tavern and started to get food ready for the hungry bounty hunters and travellers who stayed at the inn that night and that I could already hear getting up and walking on the wooden planks that make up my roof and their floor. 

One of our regulars in the tavern, but never the inn, Cad Bane was alway one to enjoy a good meal. 

After a few minutes the food was warm and drinks where cold and tables where clean when my first customer came in, but not one I was expecting.

Really high up bounty hunter like him came around a lot since the rise of the Empire, being hired by said Empire to hunt their enemies and the Jedi, most of whom hid in the outer rim, so our planet just at the edge of the mid rim was a good place to stop, rest and fuel up. 

Bane was the best of the best but never took work from the empire, but his work did seem to move more to the outer rim now that wanted people needed to hide even more.

“Mornin’ kiddo.”

Despite me being twenty years old he always called me ‘kiddo’ but to be far he was in his mid fifties... I think.

His voice was modulated and gruff, definitely the voice of a bounty hunter in his fifties but regardless of how harsh and gruff he sounded his tone was still friendly, probably because I gave him alcohol. 

“Hi Bane. Usual?”

He sat down at the bar I was currently working at and nodded sighing deeply and leaning back into the chair, happy to be off his feet. 

I turned to the kitchen right behind the bar and grabbed a plate of nuna and water. He usually liked hard liquor but I imagine he never drinks water and even Duros need water.

I set down the plate and cup in front of him, He took a bite of his meat and when he reached for his drink he realized what it was and looked up at me un-impressed. 

“I would bet you never drink anything but hard liquor, hard liquor dosen't keep an old man like you at his top game.”

He barded his teeth, more like fangs at me, but took a sip none-the-less. 

Bane was harsh, I never would have done something or said something like that before when I first met him during the clone wars. I knew who he was, a bounty hunting Duros with two custom blasters and a hat with the biggest rim in the entire galaxy was easy to recognize. 

He came in the evening, luckily my parents where in the tavern with me. since I turned seventeen I was the one who took care of the inn and the tavern being a much warmer person then my mother and an extraordinary cook. Mum mostly cleaned and prepped the inns rooms, she was always a neat freak, a hard women who had a 'no one can do it better than me' kind of attitude. But despite her hard exterior she was very warm on the inside. My dad was also just like my mum, harsh outside sweet inside, he had a nack for hunting and growing, he would grow all our vegetables and fruits himself. You'd never think it to look at him but he had quite the green thumb.

It had already gotten dark, a few customers where still around when he came in, every conversation when silent and everyone shifted at the change of mood in the air. He came in, sat in one of the booths in the corners and waited for me to come over and take his order. For a solid five minutes of me shaking in fear once I realized who he was till my mum gave me a harsh shove in his direction forcing me to go over and take his order.

I fumbled over my own feet and my words, by the time I had gotten everything out, welcoming him and asking if he wanted anything to eat or drink I had already made a huge fool of myself. My cheeks red as a tomato.

He stared at me for a minute making me all the more scared. I shifted on my feet a little, never looking him in the eye. 

Finally he said something, well, he chuckled at me. Low and quiet but still plenty amused. 

“Don't worry girly’ I won't bite ya’.”

I relaxed a little, his tone was light and playful, besides he had no reason to hurt me.

I nodded but still didn't say anything.

“Get me some nuna and the hardest liquor you have.”

I nodded and when to get what he wanted. We had plenty on nuna but we didn't really have hard liquor. Most of the townsmen liked beer or ale but every bounty hunter seemed to like a wider variety of alcohol mostly different kinds of hard liquor. 

I got his meat and a mug of our hardest ale, I gave it to him, but before he could comment on his drink I spoke first, rather meekly but still loud enough he could hear.

“I’m sorry about the drink, we don't have any hard liquor, this ale is the hardest thing we have.”

I keep my head down, not wanting to piss him off in any way. to my surprise however he took sip and didn't hate it.

‘Not what I normally get but still good.”

I lifted my head and smiled out of relief, glad I wasn't going to get shot. I nod at him in silent thanks.

‘Thank you sir, we are getting a shipment of hard liquor soon because of all the bounty hunters like yourself who come here now-a-days, if you ever had to come back we will have a much wider variety for you.”

He nods and I turn to leave. He left after he was done eating and we didn't see him for another two months. When he came back again I was the only one in the tavern, mum prepping the rooms upstairs and dad out on a hunt. 

This time he came over to the bar. I turned around for the hot table we had just bought to replace a broken stove, it was much better then the stove and much bigger. Instead of just four elements to cook on now I had a whole table, it was awesome. I gasped a little when I saw him again but I wasn't scared or frozen in place, more just shocked, I didn't think I would see him again. 

He gave me a nod in greeting.

“Kiddo’.”

I nodded back.

“Same thing as last time, but with some real hard liquor.”

He gave me a smirk and I laughed a bit and turned around to cook him his meat and grab some hard liquor I think he might like, I got out a brandy, whisky and rum placing the bottles in front of him.

“Any preference?”

He pointed at the whisky.

“Straight.”

I nodded turn to finish up his order.

After that he came in every other month till the rise of the Empire, know I saw him about three times a month.

I was polishing some cups, having nothing else to do, the food done being prepped ahead of time, i just needed to wait for it to heat up and having no one else in the tavern to serve I had to busy my hands with something.

“Empires getting’ ballsy.”

I look up at him and tilt my head to the side, he didn't normally chat with me aside from some important news and rumours, which if he was telling me weren't rumours but truths, Bane wasn't the kind of man to waist words on rumours or things he deemed unimportant.

“Oh?”

He nodded again, swallowing some nuna.

“Yeah, some say the new Emperor going from planet to planet trying to find a women for himself.”

He looked up at me, I knew what he was getting at but I just laugh a little and shook my head head down and eyes closed, thinking what he was insinuating was ridiculous. 

“Bane, come on, if he is looking for a woman he's looking a noble girl or princess, do I look like either?”

My tone was playful and light, dramatically flipping my hair like I was some royal brat. 

He rolled his red eyes at my antics.

“No chance.”

He said gruffly. I laughed again going back to polishing the cups. 

“Even so, he won't come here, we don't have anyone royal, just a bunch of small farming and mining villages littered all over the planet, come to think of it, I don't think we even have a senator.”

He looked up at me again,

“You sure talk like a royal brat, just missing the royal part.”

I laughed again, this little banter with him was always fun.

“Mum made sure I had an education, learned lots of fancy words.”

He rolled his eyes again. I never know from his eyes, having a lack of pupils made it a little hard but his eyelids gave it away. Moving up a little every time.

He didn't say anything after that, just finishing his meal, a few more people started to make they're way down to grab some breakfast.

After I served a few people I went to go do some newly made dishes. Just before I made my way to the other side of the bar a big cold hand grabbed my upper arm. I looked up to see Bane staring at me silently.

“Be carful, kiddo. Girls like you are few and far between.”

I smirked and put my free hand up to my chest, face gasping in shock.

“Is that an actual compliment Mr. Bane?”

He rolled his eyes again and handed me some credits.

“Later, little lady. I expect to see you here the next time I'm back.”

Rolling my eyes for the umpteenth time I scoff at him.

“I don't have anywhere else to be.”

And with that he left. 

The rest of the day when on like normal, flirty customers and funny regulars, nothing out of the ordinary and nothing wrong. 

Most my age hated our lifestyle, alway wanting more, never having enough but I was happy. No one on this planet was ever hungry and we where always safe and we knew how to do hard work, that was more than most of the galaxy had had in hundreds of years. 

Little did I know my life would crumble in a matter of days.

I woke up early, just like everyday but today was different, Once a month we got a shipment of foreign food and alcohol. We didn't have a capital but our biggest city did have a port that we got our delivery's from. I had to go pick up our delivery today.

I got our our old speeder bike that wasn't all that speedy anymore and hooked our little trailer to it. But in all honesty I didn't really need to go very fast, and once I had my cargo if I went to fast it would spill all over the place. 

My parents where still in bed, they both had me late in their marriage so while I was just twenty they where in there sixties and loved to sleep in, besides I did most of the work in the tavern, they needed the extra sleep, besides most oir patrons wouldn't be up till the afternoon so why wake them up?

I left a note and grabbed a sandwich for lunch later and hung a sign saying no food till the evening when I would be back. I wasn't too worried there was another food place in our small little village me and the cook there often shared recipes so we where always on good terms.

As I get closer and closer to the ‘capital’ something felt odd. nothing looked wrong, it was probably going to rain tonight, the sky was a light grey and you couldn't see the blue sky anymore but it wasn't the grey clouds that felt foreboding.

The trip to the ‘capital’ was scenic. lush trees and plant life, sun light coming down in beautiful rays making it seem like a fairy-tail. I loved the forest. Our planet was covered in them, that and our tall mountains to the north that we mined from. No dura steel or anything like that, but beautiful crystals and some coal. Nothing of real interest however. 

I ignored it and kept going, I was probably just being paranoid with the now darker grey sky dampening my mode, but I should hurry and get my cargo so that my mood is the only damp think.

I make my way over to the port, my shipping order in hand to give to the pilot. I was really early, people just starting to start working here, usually I stayed longer but with rain I should probably get back soon, guess the guests at the inn may get lunch after all,

Being so early I arrived at the port just as the cargo ship landed. I went over to the pilot Anthony, we never were able to talk long but he always knew who I was.

I smiled brightly and waved but he lacked his usual pep. He was always pretty playful and joking but this time he seemed, almost anxious.

“Mornin’ Anthony.”

He nodded but didn't say anything, I handed him my shipping order so he new what crate of stuff was mine. As we waited for the droids to bring out the crate I couldn't help but get more worried.

“Whats wro-”

Before I could finish my sentence I was interrupted by a scream and the sound of... an ion engine.

I look up, my face dropping completely. Right above us emerging from the clouds was three of the biggest ships I had ever seen. Clearly owned by the Empire the one in the middle much bigger than the others, I bet its shadow covered the entire town.

My hand covered my mouth, this was crazy, three giant ships? here? why would there need to be three? such a unpopulated planet like this, one of those ships would be enough to bring enough solders to cover the planets populated areas three times over. the solders would probably outnumber out whole planets population five to one. But three ships, the number would probably more like for every one person there would be fifteen solders.

The port was at the edge of the city, only having forest for hundreds miles, the closet other village being mine. We watched as the biggest of the ships landed onto the forest. Completely decimating it. Destroying it for generations to come.

I couldn't stop shaking. Why three ships? Why here? And for makers sake what would we have to offer the Empire?

I as frozen in place till Anthony shook me. I turned to look at him as the ginormous ramp to the ship started to lower.

“You need to leave. NOW.”

His words where hard. He was right whatever this was I needed to warn my parents. we might even have to leave. By the time I am able to move my feet again the ramp had already lowered to the ground with huge groups of stormtroopers marching down it, but that wasn't what scared me.

The storm troopers all wore white, but in front of them all was one man. he was impossible to not notice and impossible to not know who he was. pitch black armour, a mask that seemed to cut through your very soul, foot steps that seemed to shake the planet itself to its core and breathing as foreboding as you could get.

It was the Emperor, a man who possessed a demanded attention. Impossible to ignore, even more impossible to not be afraid. only a crazy man wouldn't be scared of him.

I was almost in tears, so scared and so confused, Why would he come here. Bane mentioned finding a women, maybe he was here for slaves.

Just before I could speed off I felt eyes on me. I looked over my shoulder to him. It was impossible to tell with his helmet and mask covering him, but I swear he was looking at me, burning a hole in me with his eyes. 

Before I could even think I was racing away as fast as the bike would let me, terrified.

The second I got home a few hours later I was still in tears, I couldn't stop them. I had never felt fear like this. the fear I felt now made the fear I felt for Bane when I first met him seemed like nothing. 

I rushed inside, not even bothering to hold in my fear. No one was in the tavern, most gone to their next bounty or finding food elsewhere .

“MUM, DAD!!!”

“(Y/N)?!”

My voice was breaking, so scared I was just a sobbing mess, not knowing what else to do. I collapse on the floor shaking like a leaf when my mum came rushing in. 

She was worried, scared seeing me like this. She rushed over taking my trembling form in her arms and holding me close to her chest. Her heart as beating fast, but not as fast as mine. I thought it would explode from the stress and kill me before I could even warn her.

“Shhh, sweetheart, what's wrong, who hurt you?”

She started to look all over my body for any injuries but got confused when she didn't see any.

“H-he is he-here.”

My voice was hoarse from all my sobbing, I couldn't help my fearful stutter. 

“Who, sweetheart, who?”

I griped onto her shirt so hard I probably left holes in it my knuckles and most of my hand white, probably as pale as my face.

“The Emperor.”

Her eyes widened. She probably would have thought I was joking if I wasn't on the ground sobbing and shaking. thinking I was just playing some kind of sick joke.

Just before she could say something my dad came rushing into the room.

“The Empire Is here.”

Dads face was almost as pale as mine was, the colour slowly draining out of my mums face as it dawned on her.

“We need to leave.”

Dad started to run around grabbing things we might need.

“How, with what ship?”

“I don't know but it doesn't matter, we need to leave before more come, them being here is already to much, we need to leave, NOW.”

Moms face dropped even more, she must have known what that meant while I was still a scared shaking mess on the floor.

“You don't think that there isn't already a blockade of some kind around the planet they won't let anyone leave, and leaving right when the emperor gets here is much too suspicious.

“Well we have to try something!”

I couldn't make out their yelling after that, the ringing in my ears getting far to loud now. I have no idea how long it was till I felt my dad strong arms and calloused hands pick me up and walk out of our tavern only to freeze and go stiff as a rock, becoming as cold as one to. 

I look up confused, why were we just standing in the doorway. I look over at mum and she was just like dad, stiff and cold, frozen in place like she was ice, her eye unmoving but focused. I look up to dad again seeing his eyes the exact same way. I look ahead and almost screamed. Right in front of us was a battalion of black armoured stormtroopers and the Emperor himself, starting right back.

Still in my dads arms I could feel my breath catch in my throat. My eyes wide.

Why? Why here. This planet was absurd enough for him to come to, but our small little village, only full of farmers or bounty hunters and travellers passing through. No one had moved here in the past almost thirty years so they wouldn't be hunting someone. 

The only possible reason would be he was looking for slaves. A weak planet, an even weaker village, we where a perfect target. Meek and docile and hard working. Perfect slaves. 

At the realization fresh tears slid down my pale cheeks. I would be separated from my parents and probable tortured. I felt my dad put me down to the ground. If he didn't hold onto my upper arms my knees would have buckled under me and i'd fall to the floor in tears. Dad handed me over to mum, her moving me behind my father holding me up, pressing me into her side.

Staring back at me was the Emperor. I didn't know how I knew but I just did. The mask made it impossible to truly tell but while the black stormtroopers where staring at my dad ready to take aim at the giant of a man in front of them.

My dad was huge. About six foot three and very wide. Years of work hardening his muscles. To look at he was very intimidating but in reality he was a gentle giant who get uncomfortable with the sight of blood. Feeling a little safer and a little brave I peered past him a little only to freeze in place again all that bravery disappearing in a second. 

Slowly the Emperor came closer, I felt like throwing up only to remember I never ate my sandwich so there was nothing to throw up aside from stomach acid. As he got closer I realized how tall he was Just a foot shorter them my dad, also a giant of a man in his own right, at least to me. I only came up to the bottom of my dads chest with the emperor I was the same height as his chest. 

The hight difference only made me more scared. He was also wide, ripped with muscles. Despite what looked like ridiculously heavy armour you could tell how strong he was. He was right in front of my dad now, it was all the more obvious he was looking at me now, his head tilted downward and to the side to peer around my dad to look at me. As we stared at each other I became aware of his loud breathing through his helmet.

I tried to back away a little, both wanting to put some distance between myself and the most powerful man in the galaxy, lowering my head in the process realizing it was probably rude to stare and not wanting to piss him off.

But as I try to move I found the second I moved one foot back and started to move my head down an invisible force seemed to wrap around me. It wasn't painful but it was uncomfortably tight. It forced me to stay in place, looking up at him. 

“Name.”

I almost didn't register he was talking, so distracted by the invisible think keeping me in place. 

Everyone knew what a Jedi was and what the force was and that the Jedi are force sensitive and had a special connection to it. Being able to do extraordinary things. I had no doubt in my mind that this was the force, which only made me all the more scared. He could snap my neck with just his mind. 

His voice was so deep but not gravely like Bane’s, it was very smooth.

Realizing silence wasn't the best option with my new revelation I opened my mouth to speak only for dad to bet me to it. 

“My name is Dex, this is my wife Luma and our daughter (Y/N).”

For the first time he broke away from my gaze, opting instead to look at my dad but the force didn't pull away, it only seemed to get tighter when his gaze lingered on dad making me squeak in pain a little. 

The second the unwilling sound came out of my chapped lips the feeling loosened immediately. The Emperors eyes on my once more. Suddenly I felt a hand? Nothing was there but it felt like a hand was stroking my cheek lovingly, like mum would do when I got sick as a kid, I couldn't help but relax a little. 

“May I ask why you honour us with your presence my lord?”

Dad sounded so formal, clearly knowing not to piss him off and show him the respect a man of his station demanded. However the second he spoke a black stormtrooper came closer, his trigger finger clearly itching. 

“Do not speak to the Emperor unless spoken to.”

Their voice was hard, seething with entitlement and power. I realized I still couldn't move when I tried to grab the back of my dads shirt wanting to feel some semblance of safety. 

The Trooper had his gun against my dads head, all my dad did was stare at him. I tried to move to hug him, still unable to move, I cried out.

“NO! Please... pl-please don't hurt h-him... please.”

My voice was pathetic, pleading to whomever would listen to have mercy.

“Oh, (Y/N).”

I turned my head as much as I could to see my mum with her hand to her mouth and tears on her face. I hadn't even realized she was still here. It only made me more scared knowing someone else I loved was here and in possible danger.

I turned back to the Emperor and the trooper holding his gun up to my dads temple. If It wasn't too scary it would have been funny, the trooper being shorter than my dad so he had to reach up pretty far to have the barrel of the gun pressed to dads head. 

“Please.”

My voice was pathetic, broken from crying and fear, begging the emperor for mercy.

The Emperor raised his hand, signalling to the trooper to lower his weapon. Without hesitation the trooper did. Clearly loyal to his Emperor. I breathed a sigh of relief as he fell back into formation with the other troopers only for my breath to stop when the emperor pushed past my dad and towered over me.

Dad didn't dare make a move but mum tired to come close to me again to hold me, fearing for her only child's life. But before she could get too close the Emperor shot his left hand out using the force to hold her in place, much like he was doing to me.

I still couldn't move but I could still turn my head to see her. She wasn't completely forced in place like me. She was holding her neck, she was breathing but it was clear the grip of the force was pretty tight. Tight enough to keep her in place. 

I turned back to the Emperor, eyes brimming with even more tears I didn't even now I had, scared for my mums life. 

I opened my mouth to beg again only for him to raise his right hand to my face. I thought he was going to slap me, put me in my place for daring to speak to him again without permission. But instead I felt his pointer finger press gently to my lips silencing any cry or pleas for mercy. 

My eyes shot open, not expecting the gentle touch from the man I assumed would make me a slave. I gazed up at his helmet. The place where his eyes would be are covered by a very dark red, almost black visor. It would be impossible to tell if I wasn't so close to his face.

After a second he pulled away. His left hand still raised keeping mum in place and turned to dad, straightening a little. I didn't even realized he had to bend down to look at me. it only made me more scared. Everything about this man screamed power and intimidation. His heigh, his strength, his men, his ships and especially is ability to use the force. He was a man to fear.

“How much?”

My dad blinked, having been more focused more on his scared daughter and distressed close to choking wife.

“M-my lord?”

“Your daughter, I want her, but I will not leave you with nothing. How much do you want for her.”

I left out a sob, I didn't mean to, it just slipped out. If the force wasn't holding me up I would have colapsed onto the ground, my hands covering my face. 

My dads looks over at me, fear plain as day in his eye. He would never give me away, but at the same time this was the Emperor of the entire galaxy, who was he to say no.

It was silent for a while the only sound being that of the Emperors breathing, me trying to hold back my sobs and mum trying not to choke as my dad was forced to make an impossible decision.

He could give me away and get a good pay out, giving us all a chance to live or he could say no and have all of us killed for defying the Emperor.

I understood. If he gave me away I would never hold it against him, never hate him. How could I. We are only human. It hurt but I would be happy knowing that they had survived this terrifying ordeal and got enough credits to live lavishly for one hundred life times. 

“Dex... Dex no.”

Mums voice was hoarse from the force choking her, barely getting out the words.

Dad looked so scared, so conflicted and so mad at himself probably for entertaining the idea of giving away his only child for credits, ashamed he ever considered it in the first place. 

He looked over at me, my eyes pleading with him to just do it. To stay alive and too have plenty of credits to live happily and easily the rest of their lives, tears brimming in my eyes. 

“No.”

The words rocked me to my core, my heart stopping for just a second as I almost screamed at him. Begging him not to do anything stupid.

Before the Emperor could even do anything the trooper from before came back over. Kicking the back of dads knees forcing him down to the ground. Shoving his face into the ground with his boot. 

I struggled against the force, trying to break free and run to my dad, wanting to shield him from the trooper ready to shoot him at a moments notice. Only to be held still, my effort pointless.

The man keeping me in place turned to me, staring at my tear stranded cheeks, not having anymore tears to even cry. Staring at my drained and withering body and I tried to break free. 

“How dare you, you dare deny the Emperor, even after he offered you more credit than a skug like you ever deserved”

I pleaded for the trooper to stop to have mercy even directly begging the Emperor saying I would do anything he wanted if he just let my family go.

He never stoped looking at me, just staring. I felt naked under his gaze, exposed and weak. Pathetic.

Finally he turned away, looking back at my dad who's face was so close to his boot dad was practically kissing it. 

“I’ll say it again, give me your daughter willingly and I will pay you handsomely, resist and I will kill your wife and make you watch, then kill you and take your daughter anyway.”

Dads eyes widened, even more scared now.

“No, no plea-.”

Mum begged again, only to be cut off by the force squeezing around her neck to tighten lifting her slightly off the ground, really choking her now.

“No, no please, please my lord have mercy on them, please. I’ll do anything... please.”

The last please was almost inaudible. Barely even a whisper. 

Clearly tired of the silence from my dad his left hand that was still extended towards my mum went from a pincer shape to a closed fist, followed by a sickening snap.

Everything when silent, my eyes wide and my mind blank.

I looked over to my dad. His hand where tied behind his back with binders as he screamed and struggled, three more troopers having to come over and help hold him down. I saw he was screaming but I couldn't hear any sound as he fought tooth and nail to get out of the troopers grasp.

Suddenly I felt very light, the force had released me, Contrary to my thoughts I didn't fall, I just stood there. My brain had completely stoped working, not registering anything but the need to turn around. Something had happened and I needed to see. 

I turned slowly I kept my eyes level but when I didn't see anything behind me I looked down. 

There, about a foot away from me lay the body of my mother.

Suddenly all the noise hit my at once, my dad shouting profanity's at the Emperor who had just killed his beloved wife and at the troopers holding him down.

Her neck was twisted at a sick angle. Her once beautiful blue eyes open and dull. Lifeless. 

I felt to my knees, crying out as I crawled over to my mum. I reached out for her, cradling her body in my arms, holding her close to my chest. Begging for this to be a bad dream. That I could wake up any second and be in my bed, my parents still safe and sound,

It took me a second to realize but I couldn't hear dad screaming anymore and I was cooler, like I was in a shadow, The only sound being that of my soft hiccups and loud breathing that didn't belong to me. 

I look up at the Emperor. He was looming over me and my mums lifeless body, staring at me again.

I didn't dare say anything, just stared back, getting ready to beg for mercy again but the Emperor spoke up before I could.

“One last chance. Give me your daughter, I pay you and let you live or I kill you in front of my poor girls eyes and take her away anyway.”

He clearly wasn't talking to me but he never took his eyes off my trembling figure still wrapped in his shadow.

I look past him to see my dad completely restrained, unable to move with a gag in him mouth making it impossible to get any words out. How was he supposed answer?

Unable to answer, dad fought against the troopers and his binders with all his strength, a fury in his eyes I had never seem before. 

The Emperor crouched down on one knee in front of me. Without a word he pried my cold hands away from my mums body. I struggled against him as much as I could, not ready to leave her. But my fight was pathetic, I was frail and weak from all the crying and fear, exhaustion hitting me all at once. 

My weak attempts to get away from him and back to my mum was nothing to him. 

He pulled me away from my mum. Lifting me in his arms like I weighed nothing. Hoisting me up to his hight with one arm. I grip onto his shoulders holding tightly onto his black cape, my hands shaking uncontrollably. 

He lifted his free hand up to my cheek, stroking it lightly with his gloved thumb.

“You had your chance.”

I look at him in utter fear, snapping my head over to my dad trying to push away from the evil man holding me trying to run to my dad only for the hand under my thighs to tighten and the hand that was once on my cheek to wrap around me tightly keeping me pressed to his chest. Before I could do anything the sound of a blaster bolt rang through the air and my fathers body went limp with a burning hole in his skull.

I scream as loud as I possibly could. pushing as hard as I physically could trying to get to my dads limp body.

“Shhhhhh, little one, I have you... relax.”

And with that everything went black.

When I woke up I was surrounded by warm blankets, I breathed a sigh of relief, a bad bream, it was all just a bad dream. I almost let out a cry in relief, but I hold back, not wanting to wake up mum or dad. I curl up a little more, enjoying the feeling of my bed a bit more till I got up and had to work for the day. I move my head further into the pillow snuggling close only to freeze.

I started to shake, this wasn't my bed. My bed was comfortable, but not this comfortable.

I refused to open my eyes. I didn't want to admit where I probably was, and how my life had been shattered. I kept my eyes shut like they where vaults holding the most precious treasure, because if I opened them it felt like I was really saying goodbye.

Even with my eyes closed so tightly it didn't stop my tears of mourning slipping past my eye lids, my thoughts couldn't help going to my parents, I think of all the good times and the bad, all leading up to their brutal and cruel deaths by a mad man. I was all alone now and to make matters worse I have no idea where I am and I wasn't brave enough to open my eyes to find out.

I herd the whooshing of a door open behind me. I wanted to curl up even tighter in the foreign soft blankets, the atmosphere seemingly getting cooler. Not freezing, but enough to rase a few goosebumps.

I heard heavy foot steps coming over to me. I tried to calm my breathing to make it look as if I was peacefully sleeping but it must have been a pretty poor try considering I had tear stains on my cheeks. Once they left I would open my eyes and look around, figure out where I was and collect myself but I didn't want anyone in the Empire to see me like this, weakness wasn't something I wanted to show right now.

It was so quiet, too quiet, it had only been a few second but it was so quiet I almost forget he was there. How could someone be so quiet. The only reason I knew he was still there was because I didn't hear his heavy footsteps leave or the opening and closing of the door.

I lay as still as I could, not daring to move as the figure made its way towards me, standing right in front of my 'sleeping' body and just stood there, unmoving and still as stone.

The silence blanketed us, I started to break out in a cold sweat. If this kept up pretending to sleep was going to fail me if the look of me didn't already the stains on my cheeks and I was probably too stiff looking to seem peacefully asleep.

After what felt like several minutes of unbearable stillness -but was probably just a few seconds- I finally heard the shuffling of fabric followed by a heavy weight placed beside me. The stranger had sat down beside me.

I was still laying in a kind of fetal position, my knees where bend and tucked a little but not touching my stomach with my hands resting beside my head on the pillow. The stranger was right beside my stomach almost pressing against it

I stiffen a little as he sits not expecting him to do that, but I immediately relax as much as I can and try to get my breathing under control, hoping the stranger just thought that it was his siting down on the bed that jostled me a little.

After a few more moments of silence, what felt like a hard gloved hand finds its way into my hair. His hand lightly brushed through my hair, stroking my head gently. But despite the gentle calm touch I still flinched. Bad.

I had no Idea where exactly I was but I did know I was with the Empire after Emperor Vader had murdered both my parents in front of me. That was enough to want to gather my bearings alone and try not to freak out with someone from the Empire in the damn room.

A deep chuckle came from the man, It was powerful and even sexy, sending an unwilling pleasant shiver up my spine. His hand was clearly gloved, feeling leather like and hard, almost like the hand of a droid. It was a gentle and kind touch but hard none-the-less.

"I'd suggest you stop pretending, little one. Pretending to sleep won't work with me."

The voice was light in tone almost playful but his voice itself was deep, it sounded vaguely familiar yet so different at the same time.

I slowly open my eyes, know that I had been figured out. I rub my eyes a little trying to prevent any tears from falling. The mans fingers were still wrapped in my hair, I brushed my fingers on his arm a little accidentally. I bring my hand back down to my chest as quickly as I could. I shoot my eyes over to the man who sat beside me and I freeze.

My eyes where met with a strong torso, and the pitch black armour of the Emperor who killed my family. This couldn't be worse, I was in a room with the Emperor himself. This wasn't some random imperial officer it was the Emperor of the entire galaxy who ruined my life.

I couldn't help my shaking, a sob coming from my dry lips as salty tears wet my cheeks. I look further up, seeing his right arm extended to me, his hand in my hair to his broad chest to his face.

He didn't have his helmet on, that's why his voice was different, his vocalizer wasn't twisting his voice. Thats why it sounded vaguely familiar.

He had curly hair that went close to his shoulders, and amber eyes with red around the rim of his irises. He had a scar going down his right eye. He was very tall and clearly strong but he was also very young looking, close to my age, probably just a few year older.

He tilted his head to the side a little, a grin on his face. It wasn't mocking or insulting, more like looking at a scared kitten, which to be fair probably is what I looked like right now. He tsked at me, still running his fingers through my hair.

"No need to be so scared, little one. You are safe with me I swear."

His comforting words where lost on me. I only saw red. I grit my teeth and steel myself. All my fear disappearing. This man killed my parents in front of me and he calmed I was safe with him?

In a fit of anger and temporary bravery I hit his hand away as hard as I could ready to scream at him, but the back of my wrist was met with a ridiculously hard surface as I try to swipe him hand away.

I yelp and cradle my wrist in my right hand, holding it to my chest.

He tsk's as me again. I try to move away from this evil man only for him to grab me by the waist and yank me into his lap. I keep my hurt wrist close but I pound on his armoured chest with my uninjured hand. In hind sight, not a good idea. him being so well armoured, not like without his armour I could do anything to him but in all my grief I could think of nothing else to do.

"Le-t me go, you b-bastard let me g-go."

My voice was shaky from my tears but still clear.

You would expect someone so powerful like him to hit me back, yell and tell me to be quiet but he didn't. He held me close, wrapping his large arms around me holding me to his chest.

After a minute or two of beating on his chest he seemed to realize that I was hurting myself. I didn't care I didn't even notice the pain. Too angry to even realize.

He grasped my hand, his completely covering mine and my wrist.

"Come now, little one. You're hurting yourself."

He brought my hand up to his lips, kissing it lightly all over. My hand was in a hard fist and was covered in little bruises from hitting his armour.

"Your only hurting yourself, calm down, little one."

I didn't want to, maker I didn't but the second he spoke his words I felt something wash over me, a feeling that wasn't mine but controlled me regardless.

I relaxed completely, the Emperor kissed my bruised hand a few more times till I slipped it out of his grasp. It wasn't a hard hold, it was actually very light. I cradled both my hands to my chest and let silent tears fall.

'What's happening to me?"

I wasn't stuttering in sobs anymore, now I was just very quiet, quiet and pathetic.

The Emperor moved his hand to stroke my hair again, rocking back and forth lightly making sure not to make any sudden movements.

"You know of the force, yes, little one?"

I nod silently, I didn't want to give in, I really didn't, but what choice did I really have. I had no idea where I was or how to get away and my parents where know dead. I didn't have any other family so I had no where to go. Best to just play along till I could escape by myself.

"I am a force user, I can do many things with it, including coxing my beloved little one to calm down a little bit."

I felt calm, yes, but I was shaking like crazy. I was a scared lamb in a lions claws. I cling to my clothes only to realize they weren't even mine. I wasn't wearing my usual work clothes I was earlier, old and tattered from years of work but still as comfortable as ever. Now I was wearing a black gown. it was also very comfortable and very fancy but if felt so wrong.

It was long, going down to my ankles with a slit going up to my upper thigh. It had an open back, I could feel the cool leather of his arm on my back. It had thin straps and a dip in the chest that didn't leave much to the imagination. The straps almost looked like they would snap if I moved my shoulder too much.

I curled in on myself a little, feeling much more exposed than I wanted to, feeling all the more vulnerable. The gown wasn't very thick, it was very thin and flowy. It didn't hug my body tightly but being curled up in the Emperors lap made the fabric fold around me more then it would have.

I could feel my eyes well with tears but they wouldn't fall, no matter how much I wanted them too, like the force wasn't letting me cry, forcing me to feel 'calm'. But these emotions are not mine, it felt wrong, but it was too hard to resist. It was like a hand had wrapped around me, controlling everything I felt.

"Please... stop."

My voice was still so small, but in his presence it was hard to not feel pathetic and weak.

He hummed down at me in question, his lips resting in my hair as he continued to rub my back. I would be lying if I said it didn't feel good, it became harder and harder to remember what he did to my parents and feel the anger and sadness that accompanied it. Now I just felt odd, I was scared to be with the damn Emperor of the whole galaxy but It was like I was slowly forgetting them. I figured it must be his use of the force, the thought sent a wave of fresh naked pure fear through me. I didn't want to forget, it felt like a betrayal to forget them by the hands of their murderer. I wouldn't let that happen.

"Stop."

I forced myself to seem more confident in my words, Pressing on his chest trying to get up, to put some distance between us, hoping that it would weaken his hold on my mind with some distance or even just my resistance. I didn't know much of anything about the force, just that force sensitives could do things with it like put words in your mind and lift things.

I pushed a little harder. If it came to a fight I would clearly lose but he may be willing to give me a little space.

My poor little one, I could feel her fear, her resistance even her confusion rolling off her in waves. She was so scared, scared of me, the force, she didn't want to give in and by no means was she weak minded but she didn't understand the force nor did she know how to fight it.

She was pushing away from me, I could feel how stressed she was, she felt so many emotions none of them the ones she should feel in my arms, just fear. She needed her space, but I didn't want to give it to her.

From the moment I saw her I knew she had to be mine, she looked so vulnerable, so weak and so scared with confusion, having no idea why we had come to such a small insignificant planet. But from that first moment I saw her I knew I would have her, no matter what, she was mine.

I knew killing her parents would have a negative effect on our relationship, but I wouldn't let something as insignificant as them get in the way of having what was rightfully mine.

I was broken out of my thoughts when I felt another push on my armoured chest by her small hand, calloused from all her days of hard work, She would never have to work again, I didn't want to let her go, but giving her some space would be beneficial to gain her trust.

I let her go reluctantly. She stood up, a little wobbly after taking a few steps away from our bed. The second I saw her shake as if her knees where about to give out made me want to rush to her, pull her in my arms and never let go again.

She pulled her hand up to her head, her head down and eyes closed. She knew I was using the force to keep her calm and I could see she suspected that I was easing her parents out of her mind. She was smart, my sweet little girl, but she didn't know the force well, and while she wasn't weak minded her thoughts where loud and very clear to a master of the force.

Her voice was so weak, she really was so scared. Again, I wanted to hold her to my chest and never let go, make sure she knew that she was safe with me, but all good things come to those who wait and she was a sweet thing I would wait for and give her her space, within reason, of course.

"Stop."

"What do you mean, little one?"

I knew what she meant, but step one of making her mine would be coxing her to tell me what she wanted, what she needed, even if I knew

"My mind... s-stop toying with I-it."

I could practically hear the tears in her voice, but with my use of the force they wouldn't fall. She must have felt so pent up, unable to get her emotions out, cry like she needed to.

I loosened my hold on her mind slowly, enough to let her feel her fear but not enough to let her truly focus on the memory of her parents.

The second I did fresh tears spilled from her face, I hated it. Hated seeing my little one cry and hiccup softly, her hands unable to keep up with all her tears, some one them falling to the cold floor.

All I could think of was how much I wanted to hold her shaking form, how much I wanted to comfort her. But she would only push me away.

I reach into her mind again, not to control her emotions but to see what she was thinking. But she wasn't even really thinking anymore, she was just scared and confused. Not knowing what would happen to her next. I realized she didn't even take the time to look around, see where she was.

She kept shaking, she was mostly shaking because she was scared, she didn't even notice how cold she was. Space was a cold place, and in a metal ship with bare feet and a thin gown that showed so much of her skin it must have felt that much colder, my poor little one.

I wanted to pick her up, tuck her back into our warm blankets, take off my armour pull her into my warm chest and watch as she slowly drifted off into sleep.

Instead I walked over to the fireplace. It was a few meters away from the foot of the bed with two couches and a table between them where I often did work when my office was no longer suitable.

I start a fire and strip away some of my armour leaving me in a pair of pants and a lose black tunic. it felt good to be rid of the heavy armour, It worked well for intimidation and making me seem inhuman, it made people fear me all the more, but my dear little one is not someone that should fear me.

Once the armour is put away and the fire is large and burning brightly I move towards my little one. She was still crying, her hands still trying to wipe away all her tears that just kept on coming.

I was much taller than her, she only came up to my chest, if that. she was so small and frail and in need of protection, my protection.

I stand close to her, I wanted touching her, my hands where outstretched to her. her head was held down as she tried to cry as silently as she could, my poor baby girl.

'Come little one, you must be so cold, come sit by the fire."

She looks up at me with puffy cheeks and red eyes and swollen lips, she must have been biting them trying to keep quiet.

She was very hesitant, backing away a little, albeit shakily.

Despite wanting to grab and hold her close, I resist the urge, it would only scare her more. I hated having to take things slow, but she would give in eventually, with a little assistance.

I slipped into her mind again, she was trying desperately to think of her parents, any memory at all, scared to lose them. it was sweet how much she cared for them but now they where gone, I would have to teach her how to rely on me now.

I use the force to project some of my feelings, making her feel that I wouldn't hurt her, that she was safe and that I only had her best interests at heart.

She was so tense, it hurt me to see her this way.

I step closer, she tensed even more, her hands now at her chest clutching the hem of the gown with shaky hands. I place my hands on her upper arms, rubbing lightly, smiling lovingly at her.

She jumped a little but not out of fear, She looked down to where my right hand was placed then over to my left and my right again. I chuckled lowly at her realization, she didn't seem to notice before that I had a fake arm. For a moment all her fear washed away, replaced by her curiosity.

I loved the look on her face, not scared, not confused, nothing but a good healthy curiosity and the want to ask questions.

She kept staring at my mechanical hand, wide curious eyes that I longed to get lost in, but first things first.

I rub my right thumb grabbing her attention again. her head whips up to me so fast, I think she might have gotten whiplash, but then looks down again with red cheeks, ears and shoulders, embraced at her staring.

"I'm sorry."

Again, her voice was soft, but this time she wasn't scared. I chuckled at her.

"No need to apologies, little one. Its quite the interesting thing to see. I assume it's safe to say you've never seem anyone with a missing limb before?"

In her more calm state I was able to slowly lead her to the couches on the edge closet to the fire, she slight shaking stoping completely now that she was warming up by the fire.

Once she is sat down, I sit beside her. Her back faces the fire and her front faces me but her knees as tucked into her chest, her arms wrapped around them.

To my surprise she shakes her head.

"There was an old traveler that came to the tavern once, he had lost his left arm in some freak accident when he was young."

I tilt my head a little, a silent suggestion for her to continue.

"I had just never seem anyone with a working moving prosthesis before... I-I didn't mean to be rude."

At her last statement she turned her head away, not wanting to look at me with her embarrassment.

This was perfect, I got her talking, I just had to keep her that way. it was the perfect distraction for the time being. That and my slight use of the force helped keep her parents out of the forefront of her brain, she was much more calm now.

She curled up into herself more, hugging her knees to her chest tighter than before, I knew I couldn't expect everything to be prefect from the get go but I hated seeing her like this, too scared to even sit openly with me. It broke my heart.

"Ohhh no, little one~ it wasn't rude."

I moved a little bit closer to her, she didn't seem to notice with her head down. I wished she would look me in the eye so that I could see hers. The most beautiful eyes I had ever seen.

"Its quite the engineering marvel, It was custom made from me during the clone wars but I added modifications and designed the gold and black design it has now. I can even feel with it a little, not like a real limb but if I wasn't looking and someone touched my hand I would know."

I hold my right hand out to her for inspection, hoping she would grab it. Giving her the option to do or not do something was a good first step in making her feel more safe and secure.

I hold my hand palm up, a clear invitation to hold it. She lifts her head up to get a better look at it, clearly interested. I could feel her curiosity with the force but I could also feel her fear. She just needed a little nudge.

I was already manipulating her mind a little, keeping my force signature weak, she may not be force sensitive but she knew I was and a random unknown feeling in he brain that one had never felt before is a pretty big give away.

I strengthen my hold on her mind a little, just making a wash of calm run over her, Making sure she always felt calm and safe around me would be important and with a little help from the force it made the process that much quicker.

After a few moments she slowly reached out, she wasn't as hesitant but her hands moved at a snails pace.

I almost grabbed her and pulled her in my lap when her soft hands grabbed mine. I couldn't feel it very much but I could feel a light buzzing, the hands sensors going off. I wish she was holding my real hand, I could feel my fingers twitch at the thought as it rests on my thigh.

Her hand moved mine around, feeling much more confident now or maybe she was just distracted now that she had something to fiddle with.

Her fingers gently prodded at mine, curling them and un-curling them. She moves to my palm, tracing the design of it for a second then moving up to my wrist to my forearm. Finally after what felt like an eternity her fingers made to where my fake arm meets my real one right underneath my elbow.

I closed my eyes in bliss when her fingertips gently brushed my skin. I loved being able to really feel her, If only for a few moments at a time.

I opened my eyes again to stare at her lovingly. Her eyes where full of curiosity, being able to explore something she had never seen before. It just made me all the more obsessed.

My fingers kept twitching with ever touch she gave me, feeling the need to hold her more. Keeping her still with the force earlier was good, the feeling of holding her like that felt amazing but it wasn't enough.

Even while caring her back to the ship my heavy thick armour was in the way, not allowing me to really hold her. I only wore the armour for intimidation proposes. No one alive had seen me without it now that Sidious was dead. The anonymity and emotionless feel that suit gave me made me all the more intimidating.

As I take in her features I was brought back to reality when I heard a grumble.

(Y/N)'s hand slipped away from mine and wrapped around her knees again, her head to the side trying to his how red her face had gotten but her ears and bare shoulders gave her away.

"Hungry, little one?"

She nods embarrassed. I couldn't help chuckling at her, my outside appearance playful but on the inside I was seething. On her planet it would be around ten at night, of course she was hungry, how could I have been so neglectful to not take care of her needs.

I get up, brushing my fingers lightly on her knee. She didn't flinch this time, instead looking up at me shyly, this was improvement.

"Ill be back with some food, till then feel free to roam about, this is your room so you have a right to everything in it, alright little one?"

I felt the need to tell her that everything in here was hers. I didn't want her to be shy about her exploring, the more she got used to her new surroundings the better. One problem however was that our rooms on my ship was different to the rooms on Coruscant. That would be a whole new place to get use to, but I would cross that bridge when I get there. We still had time before we jumped into hyper space and several hours in hyper space so I had plenty of time to think on it. That is, If I can keep my mind off my little one.

The second the Emperor left to get food I fell forward shoving my face into the cushions of the couch, I felt so embarrassed. First I blatantly touch and explore his hand but then my stomach growls.

After a few seconds of not being able to breath with my face shoved in the cushions I decide to get up and explore.

The room was very large, a king sized bed with now unmade blankets was right by the fireplace, the fireplace facing the foot of the bed with couches and and a coffee table on a carpet then went under both couches as well.

To the left of the fireplace was the door the Emperor left out of, it was very big but I guess it had to be considering how tall he was but the door was also really wide, about the width of two doors. to the right of the fireplace was another door, just as tall but only the width of one door.

I walk over, getting goosebumps immediately once my bare feet touch the cold metal. I walk over to the door and open it with the button panel on the side. It was a refresher with a door to the left. the fresher was pretty standard. It looked very clean and fancy. Like the main room it was mostly black. I assume that it was just his colour of choice but both rooms did have come colour. The sheets, pillows, carpet and towels in the freshen are a dark bloody red.

I go to the door on the left, it was a wardrobe, filled with all black clothes. the room wasn't very big but it didn't really need to be either, what scared me was the full set of armour at the end of the room. In my head it solidified the fact I was with the Emperor, without his suit it was easy to forget, seeing a living face and not an emotionless mask. the only clue that it was a person and not a droid being the sound of his breathing.

I could feel my tears well up, thinking about my parents again. The second I think fo their dead body's I feel like a fog has been lifted from my brain, Like I was remembering something I had forgotten for years.

I start to dry heave, not having anything in my stomach at the time, especially because I never got a chance to eat my lunch I packed. I feel my knees shake under me, threatening to give out any second.

I look up from the floor while I leaned against the door frame of the fresher. I feel my stomach drop. I never noticed it before. I don't know how I didn't, now that I see it its painful obvious its there. To the right of the bed it a window. The whole wall was the window but it was pitch black until I cared to actually look at it.

I slowly make my away out of the refresher, my hand over my mouth trying to ground myself and not throw up stomach acid.

before It just seemed like all the other black walls in the room, but now that I take a closer look it was a window. The sky was pitch black, like it was in the dead of night but now I could see little dots in random order all over. I walk closer, placing my hand on the window just to conform it was one.

I fall to my knees for the umpteenth time, fear racking thought my body as the realization hit me. I knew I wasn't home that much was obvious but know seeing the large never-ending expanse of stars that was space really hit me.

I wasn't home, I was with the emperor on a giant ship in the middle of space going maker knows where. I wasn't home, and I would probably never be able to go home again.

I crumple up into myself and sob uncontrollably. The tears seeming never ending as I cry my heart out.

As I walk down the hall to my little ones room I find myself more rushed then I normally would have.

I could feel my little ones distress, I pulled away for a few minutes getting distracted by my chefs incompetency and when I realize I had pulled away I gently eased myself back into her mind only to find her in pain.

She wasn't physically in pain, but her head was a mess of sorrow and trauma. I was a fool to leave her when she was still so emotanally fragile. Even more of a fool to be so carless as to pull away from her mind.

I couldn't get to our room fast enough, opening the door only for my heart to break a little. There on the floor leaning against the window was my poor little (Y/N) crying her little heart out.

She looked as broken as her mind felt. Huddled close to herself, her hand clenched tightly to her chest as her sobbed uncontrollably. Her cheeks and eyes red and puffy, her eyes shut so tightly that it looked like she would not open them again.

She didn't even seem to notice my presence yet, I quickly set her food down on the coffee table and rush over to her. I fall to my knees and wrap her in my arms pulling her into my lap. She was cold as ice despite the fire burning. She didn't even acknowledge my holding her, just sobbing in my chest as I hold her as close as I possibly could, slipping back into her mind in an attempt to ease her pain and her parents from her mind. It would be much harder now, she was focus on them, their faces, how they died.

My force signature was heavy in her mind, she seemed to notice what I was doing. Her parents slipping from her mind regardless of how hard she tried to hold on. Finally acknowledging me she pushed against me, her hands shoving on my chest trying to get out of my hold only for me to hold on to her tighter.

"Shhhhhh, little one. Relax, let me help you. I will make it stop hurting."

My voice was quiet and calm, my lips brushing her ear a little. I was happy to have her in my arms but this wasn't how I wanted it to happen.

Her hands where shaking, all of her was shaking really, trying to get away. She seemed to think that if she got out of my hold my hold on her mind would also leave.

"No- no let me go."

"Shhhhh, (Y/N) I need you to calm down. Let me help"

She pushes harder but I wouldn't let her go, not when my little one was in so much distress whether she wanted me to or not.

"No."

She was clearly adamant about not letting me hold her or help her so I guess I have to do this the hard way. It would be easier to work with her mind without any resistance anyway.

I sigh deeply, I didn't want to have to do this but it was my best option.

Before she could push on me again I grabbed both her wrists in one of my hands, she was so much smaller then me, her wrists where so small that my fingers overlapped as I held her.

My other hand shoved her face into my neck, holding her by the top of her neck and the bace of her skull. She struggled as hard as her little body could still shaking uncontrollably.

"Shhhhhhh, little one~. I promise by the time you wake up everything will be ok."

With that I force her to sleep with he force. She would wake up with a hell of a headache, her mind was so active and in distress, being forced to sleep wouldn't be pleasant.

I pick her up and tuck her back into bed. I look over at her forgotten food. She will be starving by the time she wakes up, I'll make sure some food is waiting for her when she wakes up.

I walk over to the fresher, It had been a long day for us all.

I figured have a few minutes to let her mind calm down and relax fully would be good before I go rooting around in there. I strip and have a shower. Enjoying the feeling of the water wash over me I allow myself to relax knowing my love was waiting for me in our bed.

I never thought I would love anyone the way I loved Padmé but my love for (Y/N) put all out time together to shame, I knew the second I saw her she would be mine. I had to have her and this time I would make sure nothing ever happened to her.

Once I was all dried off I put on some loose fitting pants and made my way to bed. I make my way under the blankets for behind her and pull her close to my chest. With the open back on her dress I could feel her skin pressed up against mine. It felt so good having her so close. My arms wrapped around her stomach holding her close.

I slowly reach my hand up to her forehead pressing it into my neck. I slowly start to work her parents from her mind, sealing away her thoughts and memory of her parents, making the memory of my taking her very foggy. I couldn't give her memory's that weren't hers but I could make sure she wouldn't think about them.

I take my time, if I went to fast her headache would be ten times worse when she wakes up, but already its going to be pretty bad. Messing with someones mind was never a comfortable thing for the victim.

I would give her some pain meds when she woke up too.

Once I was done and was sure she wouldn't remember anything I make sure the blanket was pulled up to her shoulders and tuck her close to my chest, intertwining our hands As I breath her in, finally able to relax with my little one safe in my arms.

Soon we would be home, and our new life would begin.

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[disillusioneddanny]

Hi not sure this is the right place for requests so feel free to ignore it. My idea was Omega Jason about to go into heat in near future talking to Danny about boundaries and what he is and isn't okay with. Trusting Danny not to hurt him when he's vulnerable. Could be nice and fluffy with a hint of past sa/Jason's experiences on the street/maybe the whole Talia thing I personaly really hate, for just a smidgen of angst. But you can obviously do anything you like with it.

Hope you have fun writing again soon. ❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️

OOh that sounds fun! And the DPxDC Omegaverse event just happened so perfect timing :3

Also, this one got a bit away from me. It's not quite talking about his boundaries with Danny but more so Jason thinking about how Danny has always respected his boundaries and why Jason trusts him enough to allow him into his nest for his heat.

I hope you enjoy it nonetheless!!

....

Jason was nervous. This was his first ever heat since he started courting Danny and he was hoping to have his boyfriend heat share with him. It was a big step in their relationship and part of Jason worried that it was too soon to ask something like that of Danny. Especially since Danny was a beta and didn’t get the same instincts that an alpha or an omega did when an omega went into heat. Sure, betas still had some instinct to cuddle and protect an omega but it wasn’t quite the same. 

Omegas in heat were at their most vulnerable and Jason had been hurt plenty of times before. On the streets as an omega pup, Jason had learned to keep his scent glands hidden at all times, made sure to take any illegal suppressant that he could just to make sure no one tried to get one over on him.

When he was living with Bruce, he had finally felt safe. With an alpha father and an omega brother, Jason felt safer than he had ever felt in his life and Dick and Bruce had done everything they could to have a sense of security the entire time. 

Then Jason had died. And he had come back only to be thrust into the world of the League of Assassins where it was dangerous to be an omega. The majority of the League were betas, Ra’s himself even saying that betas were far superior due to the fact that they were not influenced by or slaves to their instincts the same way that omegas and alphas were. It had made his time with them hard, forced to take supplements and forced to ignore the instinct inside of him that seemed to constantly scream at the former vigilante.

The years with the League of Assassins had not been kind to the omega and he had been left with a sense of loneliness and feeling completely unwanted in a way he hadn’t felt since he was on the streets as a child. 

Years later at just twenty-two, though, Jason had found someone who loved him and his omega. Danny had grown up in a family of betas, both of his friends being betas and not really being close to alphas or omegas his entire life but it didn’t seem to matter. 

He did everything properly, he courted Jason better than he had ever been courted before. He gave Jason gifts, beautiful notebooks and classic novels with the fancy covers that Jason always saw in bookstores but could never bring himself to buy despite finally being able to afford them. He gave Jason soft blankets with his faint beta scent attached to them, pillows for Jason’s nest, Jason’s favorite brands of tea and all the weapons Jason could ever want! He gave Jason guns from other dimensions, swords from the Dark Ages that he had specially made just for the omega. Danny showered Jason in gifts, he took Jason on the most spectacular and wonderful dates, and he never questioned him. 

That was the most important part in Jason’s opinion. 

Because after everything he had been through between living on the streets and training in the League of Assassin, Jason wasn’t what most would consider a normal omega. He was scared of letting people in, scared of letting others see those vulnerable parts of himself and Danny handled that so well. 

Danny came with his own baggage, with trauma that could match Jason’s–not like it was a competition–and because of it he was so utterly patient and understanding. He was more than happy to go at a snail’s pace. He took everything Jason’s speed as the vigilante worked to figure out their dynamic together and Jason found himself falling more and more in love with the beta because of it. 

So as nervous as Jason was, inviting Danny into his nest during his heat was probably the easiest decision Jason could ever make. He trusted Danny to be there for him, to respect his boundaries and make sure that he was safe. Danny would never in a million years hurt Jason, especially not when he was as vulnerable as he was during his heat. 

Which was why when the beta knocked on the door of his most secure safe house, Jason ignored the pounding of his heart and swung the door wide open, a smile stretched across his face. 

Danny gave him a bashful smile as he looked up at the Crime Lord, his cheeks just a bit flushed. “Hey gorgeous,” he said, his eyes twinkled with mischief and the anxiety in Jason practically disappeared as he grabbed the front of Danny’s shirt and yanked him into his apartment. He pulled his boyfriend into a hug reminiscent of Dick Grayson’s octopus holds and scented the beta thoroughly. 

The halfa simply laughed from underneath him, wrapping his arms around Jason’s shoulders. “I missed you too,” he said, tangling his fingers in Jason’s dark black locks, tugging at his hair lightly as Jason nuzzled the scent gland on Danny’s neck. 

Danny’s scent reminded Jason of all of his favorite things. Of brand new books, the sharp scent of coffee brewing, and a soft flowery smell that Jason could never quite discern. The scents were quite as strong as they would be on an alpha or an omega but Jason didn’t mind, he found himself drawn to the lovely smell every time Danny was close. It was like a warm blanket wrapped around his shoulders holding him tight and lovingly. 

“I brought those nasty ass protein bars you like, some wonton soup from that shop on eight street that you like a lot, and a bunch of easy snacks that i know you like,” Danny said, running his wrist along the scent gland on Jason’s neck, not minding one bit as Jason thoroughly scented the beta. “I’ve also got a case of Dr. Pepper since it’s your favorite, some cherry garcia ice cream because you’re a madman who doesn’t realize that half-baked is obviously superior, and a bunch of those electrolyte packets that we can mix with water. I also brought a bunch of my blankets and pillows and clothes,” he said with a sly smile that had Jason pulling away quickly. 

His eyes immediately zeroed in on the duffel bags that sat at Danny’s feet and grinned. “Danny Fenton, have I ever mentioned just how much I adore you?” He breathed out and Danny just gave him a small hint of a smile. 

“You could stand to say it more often,” he teased as Jason hefted the bag full of Danny’s clothes and blankets and pillows and hurried into his room to start adding them to his nest, Danny not far behind with everything else they would need for the next five days of Jason’s heat. 

Yes, Jason was nervous about showing this side of himself to Danny. If he was being honest, though, it was the best decision he could ever make.

did you enjoy this one shot? Send me a request here and I'll try to get to it asap <3

#Jason Todd/Danny Fenton #Dead on main ship #DPxDC #omegaverse #Danny Phantom #batman comics #dp x dc crossover #dis dreams #dis asks #dis writes

[lost-girl-2021]

Imagine part of why Neytiri is so insistent on Spider 'being with his own kind' is because Spider almost died in her arms when he was younger and it scared her so much that she closed herself off from him entirely. ik this doesn't super make sense canon-wise, but . . . idk, deal w it y'all.

Spider was maybe six or seven, barely old enough to go outside with the smallest size mask they had. He was with Lo'ak, Kiri, and Neteyam by the creek, Neytiri supervising from the treeline as she foraged. He was finally getting used to this whole outdoors thing, taking to it all quickly. His spare mask was glinting in the sunlight from the branch he'd hung it off of before joining his friends in the water. It was knee-deep for them, but nearly to his waist. Even though he was the oldest, the other three had already outgrown him.

It didn't feel like they were much bigger, though. After months spent together in the forest, it felt like the Na'vi kids had nearly forgotten he was human. Kiri had started helping him paint stripes on himself and Neteyam had promised to show him how to use a bow for his birthday that year. After a lifetime surrounded by adults in the lab, he was happy to be with his friends.

And then, he fell.

Neteyam had faked a lunge towards him and he'd tripped over a log in the water, falling head over heels into the currant. It wasn't bad at all standing up, but he was disoriented and the water was murky from all the mud they'd kicked up in their playing. His body was being sent further down the creek and it was suddenly too deep and Spider couldn't stand up and he didn't know how to swim. His mask hit something hard and came flying off, whisked away into the water. The sting of whatever hit his head was enough to make him gasp and then he was maskless and underwater—

It only took twenty seconds for a human to pass out in Pandoran air. Four minutes to die. That was for a grown-up and Spider was small for his age, Norm said so just the other day.

So, he shouldn't have been surprised when black dots filled his vision and he was just . . . gone.

—

Neytiri's children had been playing in the creek with the Sky People boy all morning. She was foraging for a specific herb, at her mother's request, and all four children were blessedly entertained splashing each other. She'd agreed to take Spider with them when she left the village that morning, Norm and Max looking beyond tired. Apparently, the boy had been staying up late to stargaze, meaning that they had to stay up late making sure he didn't decide to play with any of the lab equipment (again).

She looked over at the four of them, smiling softly as Lo'ak tried to climb up his big brother, slipping and sliding all over. A glint of yellow flashed in her peripheral and she turned away from them, smiling when she found the herb she'd been looking for all morning. It was perfect timing, too, right before they would head back to the village for lunch. She'd settle Lo'ak down for a nap, but Kiri and Neteyam would probably insist on trying to help her prepare their midday meal. She'd have to leave out some seasonings if she was going to feed Spider, but—

Kiri screamed. It wasn't the high-pitched squealing thing she'd been doing a few minutes before, when Spider and Neteyam had splashed her simultaneously. It was one of fear.

She whipped around, looking for an animal or injury or something. Her three children seemed uninjured, but they were splashing around wildly, looking for something.

For someone.

She was in the water before she could think, practically diving downstream. The water reached her knees at it's deeper point, too tall for the Sky Child. She should've known the current would pull him, that he was too small still, too young.

She caught a flash of pink skin and blond hair and reached down, pulling the limp boy from the water. His lips were turning blue and his mask was gone. She must've shouted for Neteyam to grab the spare hanging from the tree, because in the ten steps in took her to get back to her children, he'd climbed up and grabbed it, flipping switches on the battery back she didn't know he knew how to use.

She didn't let him go as she reached for the mask, able to hold him in one arm as she pressed the device to his face.

Please, please, she silently begged, praying. Her children were watching, the boy was . . . he was too fragile to be in such a place. She was foolish to bring him out of the safety of the lab.

Spider took in a sudden choking gasp of air, turning on his side. He coughed once, twice, water and spit hitting the inside of hie mask. He grimaced, before sinking into Neytiri's arms, falling back asleep instantly. She let out a sigh of relief, rocking back on his heels.

"He's alright, he's alright." She promised, looking at each of her children. Kiri was crying and her boys didn't look far behind.

She led the home without complaint from anyone, something that would be unusual under other circumstances. She went straight to the shack, meeting Norm inside the airlock. She handed him over easily, clenching her fists to hide how her hands shook.

She remembered Jake, nearly dying in his human body. Frail and desperate for air. Spider was a child, barely more than a baby. She could barely stand watching her mate suffer through humanity. It would be cruel to make her children grow up along someone bound to die painfully. (It would be unbearable for her to take in the human as her own, like Jake had been hinting at for years now, if she would just lose him).

Idk what this is, it's like 4 am and I had an idea. Please forgive any typos, I'm too tired to proofread atm.

#avatar #atwow spider #spider avatar #avatar way of water #atwow fanfiction #miles spider socorro #spider #avatar fanfiction #atwow

[deakyjoe]

The Liquor On Your Lips

Pairing: Joel Miller x Reader (no pronouns but “pretty” is used to describe reader)

Category: age gap, dark(ish)

Summary: You’re a vice too good to resist.

Warnings: age gap (unspecified but legal), dark(ish), possessive Joel, jealous Joel, Joel’s just kind of… scary (??), but not, kissing

Word count: 900ish (short, sorry)

A/N: My thing for older men really pops out in this one. Title comes from You Can Be the Boss by Lana Del Rey. Also, this is kind of shit. I’m sorry. As usual, I imagined Pedro Pascal’s Joel when writing this but please feel free to envision Joel from the game!

Consider buying me a coffee :)

The day you arrived in Jackson, Joel knew he was fucked. So utterly and completely fucked.

He hadn't noticed you immediately but once you'd interacted properly for the first time he knew he was screwed for the rest of eternity.

You'd just asked him about something and sent him an innocent smile, clearly not knowing that he really wasn't the person to be asking questions, and Joel felt his stomach twist.

You were young but so, so sweet, and Joel knew he should have kept his distance. In the normal world, twenty years prior, he wouldn't have looked twice at you. But it had been a long, lonely two decades and he'd lost his ability to resist the simplest of vices a while ago.

He ignored the fact that you were closer in age to Ellie than him, ignored the fact that you'd be younger than Sarah if she were still alive. He didn't care. He didn't have time to care anymore.

So, yeah. He was fucked.

It definitely didn't help that Joel never missed the fleeting glances you sent him, enjoying the way you always looked away in embarrassment when he caught you. He knew you liked him too, probably spurred on by the age difference. That only motivated him more. He wanted- no, needed to have you.

He was older and the silent, stoic type. It was alluring. And despite every warning bell in your head telling you he wouldn't be interested so it wouldn't even be worth trying, you couldn't help but attempt to get closer to him.

Joel was everything your head could possibly ever conjure up, mixed together into one man. Since moving to Jackson you'd only had your eyes set on one thing. Him. He didn't seem real at first and you'd considered that maybe you'd died at some point and this was your brain's final effort at giving you some inner peace and happiness before your demise.

But no. He was real.

And just out of reach.

Joel burned with anger when you started avoiding him, paying more attention to the guys closer to your age in the community. He wasn't jealous, he knew he didn't need to be as you clearly weren't actually interested in them, but he was angry that you appeared to be giving up on him. His possessive streak started to take a hold on him. Despite not actually having you, no claim on you whatsoever, he felt as if you were his. And his only. It was unspoken.

So he decided to show you.

He found you one day, in a storage locker for building equipment at the edge of the community, searching for something.

You jumped when you saw him, quickly relaxing when you realised who it was.

“Joel, you scared me.” You sighed and went back to looking.

“What do you need?” His voice was low, gruff. And like melted chocolate to your ears.

“Wood.” You called over your shoulder, not paying much attention to how you were bent over in front of him and he was taking full advantage of the opportunity to stare at you.

A quick glance around confirmed what he was already thinking. “You’re surrounded by wood.”

“Need specific piece.” You replied and huffed, not finding what you wanted and giving up. “I’ll look elsewhere. Why’re you here?”

He watched you with a careful gaze, gauging your reaction to his presence. Your breathing was heavy, but could’ve been explained by your vigorous searching, and your pupils were dilated, however it was dark in the room. Joel decided to throw out logical arguments and put the blame on him being there. He liked that explanation a lot more.

He walked towards you slowly. “Came looking for you.”

You blinked in surprise. “Really?”

He only nodded, stopping just a pace away from you.

“Why?” You squeaked, averting your eyes to the floor between you.

“You know why.” He stated and there was no protest from you.

His hand reached up to curl around your jaw and chin, tilting your head up to face him better. You were so… pretty. Especially up close and he felt himself get a little bit more screwed when you let out a soft noise, almost a whimper.

And you didn’t resist when he leaned in to kiss you. In fact, as expected, you invited him in and pushed up to meet him halfway, letting out a sigh of relief when your lips finally met. When he squeezed his fingers against your cheek, you opened up for him with a gasp and allowed him to lap his tongue into your mouth.

"Taste as sweet as I expected." He growled into you, grip around your chin tightening.

You didn’t reply, just let him kiss you again and curled your fists into the front of his shirt. This was finally happening. Joel was kissing you. You! And it was wonderful. He tasted faintly of alcohol and something inherently… Joel. And you never wanted to stop tasting.

All Joel could think about was how fucking sweet you tasted and the way you gripped onto him like you never wanted to let go. Because you didn’t. And neither did he. He was so fucked.

A/N: Available and willing to be Joel’s nineteen year old girlfriend. Goodnight.

#joel miller x reader #joel miller x you #joel miller fanfiction #joel miller #hbo the last of us #the last of us hbo #the last of us #tlou #tlou hbo #ej’s fics #ej’s writing #deakyjoe’s fics #deakyjoe’s writing

[soapppp]

CW: past homophobia and transphobia, 141 x soap, mentions of smut

Soap grew up with a loving family. They all acted for each other, all have love languages of words of affirmation and gift giving, something Soap thrived in doing for others. He was praised for his skills in the military and, while he never cared, they were happy to show all his medals on display inside their living room. When he first got sent home for an injury they pampered him to the point he had to make a lock for his room just to get some peace. He was sure he was going to get a permanent dent in his forehead from all the kisses his mother would give him.

They supported him in everyone way but one.

When Soap came out as gay they didn’t care, happy he was finally out of denial, but when he mentioned going to a queen club they warned him of drag queens and woman who ‘pretend’ to be men.

Soap had sobbed that night, cutting up the pink skirt he had bought for himself a few weeks back. He didn’t care for drag, but the outfits he adored. But that was the one thing his family wouldn’t support. So, soap just gave up on those dreams and forced himself to stop staring at the pretty dresses in shop windows. He was scared of being hated by his family, and more terrified when he learnt how some people only let men wear skirts because it was a kink or fetish of theirs.

He felt alone, trapped in his body with no way to express himself without hate or depravity taking over.

Then he meet his partners.

It was Gaz who figured it out first, seeing his best friend and new lover stare at girls in skirts and mannequins in thrills skirts and realising what his partner wanted. He didn’t pretend that it didn’t arouse him at first, but that quickly changed when he saw the longing in his partners eyes shift to a bitter self-hate. He talked to Ghost and Price, making sure to clarify he was only speculating, and together the three of them began to casually mention how they liked drag race and thought skirts would be more comfortable than pants in the heat. Natural things that didn’t fetishise or make the other think they knew something, but it was worth it when Soap eventually cracked after Price made the final push.

Soap had looked at his lover with awe, shocked and amazed as he saw Price wearing a long brown sun dress in his office as he spoke to Laswel like it was nothing. He didn’t make a fuss about it, didn’t ask for attention or anything, he just wore it. The long puffy sleeves half rolled up on his hairy arms made Soap feel so seen despite the fact he wasn’t even the one wearing it.

Price called the others in and the three of them held onto Soap as he sobbed about how he thought it was wrong and illegal but Price, captain and bear of the 141 was doing it.

Price admitted he wasn’t big on the dress, seeing it as just simple clothes and a bit too vulnerable for his paranoid mind, but that he would be happy to wear it again if it would make Soap feel safer.

Not long after they took Soap for his first ever shopping spree, buying him over twenty skirts and seventeen dresses for him to try, all different styles so he could mix and match till he found something fitting. They stayed by him the first time he tried one on and kisses away his tears as he cried in joy. They sat next to him when he first went to the mess hall with a green skirt on, that only just went to his knees, ready to fight of anyone for their lover and they held his hand tightly when a private gave him a big smile and said he was pretty so he wouldn’t burst into tears.

Most importantly, they waited for him to initiate sex while he was dolled up so he wouldn’t feel sexualised. It took a full year for him to feel ready for that and Ghost made sure it was the most attentive sex he had ever experienced.

#modern warfare #john soap mactavish #ghost x soap #soap x price #soap x gaz #captain price #kyle gaz garrick #simon ghost riley #soap x everyone #poly 141

[wrenreid]

Off Limits (Spencer Reid)

series masterlist | ongoing

series content warnings: 6.5 year age gap, loss of virginity, talk of death, some trauma discussed, NSFW 18+

Spencer Reid x female OC

Aaron Hotchner has never failed at scaring all the boys away from his daughter. In fact, he treats it as his second job. Jade thought she could finally get away from her father’s overbearing protectiveness and tendency to be a workaholic when she moved off to New York a short time after turning 18. But it’s not that easy.

On top of starting her last year of undergrad and dealing with the stress of that and her parent’s pending divorce, her mother dies, crashing down her entire world.

Things finally become somewhat normal when she’s back home for spring break, and a certain older guy has caught her attention once more. But Jade is off limits to him, demanded so by her father, his boss. (spencer is about 28 and jade is 21).

Part One | Jade reflects on her mother’s death before settling into the party she’s at. She goes home to find someone in her father’s kitchen.

Part Two | Jade gets to talking to her father’s genius employee, Spencer Reid.

Part Three | Spencer and Jade begin to bond a little while they’re both there to take care of Jack.

Part Four | Spencer and Jade take Jack to the park, and the both of them become closer.

Part Five | Jade and Spencer get more comfortable with each other. They watch a movie together, then the next day Dr. Reid reflects on his role model abilities.

Part Six | Spencer takes care of Jade after she comes back wasted from a party. Jade deals with a hangover and her father coming back home.

Part Seven | Father-daughter bonding between Hotch and Jade is ruined when he once again voices his judgmental opinion on her life style.

Part Eight | Hotch and Jade move past their spute. A thank-you-dinner night turns flirty when Jade talks to Spencer alone.

Part Nine | Spencer comes to Jade’s rescue after she’s in an uncomfortable situation.

Part Ten | Spencer cheers up Jade after picking her up from the situation.

Part Eleven | Jade and Spencer play a game of chess. Somehow, she’s able to convince him to go to a party with her.

Part Twelve | The party is an overall success, and the night ends with Spencer and Jade finally acting on their chemistry.

Part Thirteen | Spencer and Jade deal with the awkward after effects of their actions. They come to a resolution.

Part Fourteen | Things between the two get heated when Jade pays Spencer a visit.

Part Fifteen | Jade and Spencer finally resolve things between themselves and come to a consensus.

Part Sixteen | The two figure out what to call the relationship they have and decide to take things slow.

Part Seventeen | Spencer asks Jade to accompany him to a bookstore, the two make a date out of it and spend the whole day together.

Part Eighteen | After spending a lot of time together, Spencer acts on his thoughts about Jade, but he feels guilty. Jade occupies herself while he’s gone.

Part Nineteen | Things get even more heated between the two until Spencer stops it. Jade can’t help but think it’s her fault.

Part Twenty | Jade and Spencer have a brief period of normalcy before an argument leaves both of them upset.

Part Twenty-One | The argument evolves until finally the truth comes out.

Part Twenty-Two | After some time of being a somewhat normal couple, the two have their first sexual experience together.

Part Twenty-Three | The couple has some fun while they’re miles apart.

Part Twenty-Four | A case takes Spencer away for a week, but when they’re reconnected it’s even sweeter. After being teased and pushed by his friends, Spencer makes a decision.

Part Twenty-Five | Spencer and Jade have sex for the first time after he realizes he doesn’t care about what anyone but Jade or himself thinks.

Part Twenty-Six | The couple begin a sort of routine of being boyfriend and girlfriend while still keeping it from Hotch.

Part Twenty-Seven | The end of this story

#criminal minds #criminal minds fanfiction #spencer reid fanfiction #mgg x you #spencer reid #spencer reid angst #spencer reid smut #mgg angst #mgg fic #spencer reid and reader #dilf spencerreid #spencer reid blurb #spencer reid self insert #spencer reid x oc #spencer reid x you #spencer reid series #spencer reid x fanfiction #spencer reid x fem!readr #spencer reid x fem!oc #criminal minds smut #criminal minds x oc #matthew gray gubler x fem!readr #matthew gray gubler x fem!reader #matthew gray gubler angst #matthew gray gubler x oc #spencer reid imagine #spencer reid is daddy #spencer reid x y/n #spencer reid x self insert #spencer reid criminal minds