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#go up and barely utter some words through the hoarseness - make things worse and call of yhe next month if shows instead?
paperlovesadness · 10 months
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Me seeing all the comments under Glasto-themed posts blaming Alex for being sick and calling off Dublin
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I'm barely able to fold that knife though.... And I'm not trusting myself that it'll stay folded.
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louiemutton · 2 years
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Blossoms by the amazing devil, WinterHawk and set in freefall if possible (though I'm okay with any universe)
I am so sorry this is so late, I opened prompts and then real life showed up and smacked me directly in the face.
cw blood, mentions of injuries, references to dead characters
——————
The phone rings uselessly, dozens of messages pouring through as Clint ignores them. It feels closer to a tablet of stone, a useless brick in his hand. He goes to toss it away, the blood smeared across it another reminder of what had happened minutes ago. Before he does though, something flashes, catching his eye.
The name across the screen is emblazoned into Clint’s retinas. Bucky Barnes, the notorious ex-best friend, of Clint’s own doing. They’d been close once upon a time, some unspoken understanding that connected the two of them for years. Bobbi had noticed it, pushed for Clint to do something about it, but he truly was never ready.
But that had been a different era. These days they barely said a word to one another outside of mission talk. Their easy camaraderie was replaced with a tension that neither of them acknowledged, neither of them ever spoke about.
It was so like them to never talk about the things that actually mattered.
The mission was always more important.
The myriad of messages he’d received before this phone call meant nothing to Clint, but Bucky’s judgment weighs heavily on his soul. Part of him wants to know what’s going on in Bucky’s mind, if he thinks Clint is an evil assassin like everyone else. Or does Bucky truly know him, know that he’s in over his head again, a useless fuck up who got a teenager dragged into the line of fire and killed.
Clint’s not sure which is worse.
Curiosity wins over as he closes his eyes and prays this goes better than he thinks it will.
“Clint?” Bucky’s voice is hoarse, like he’s been yelling too long again. That or he’s been crying himself raw, because every time Bucky cries too much his voice gives out.
He tries not to think about which of the options it is.
“What do you want.” It’s colder than Clint intends, but he doesn’t feel much like himself to begin with. It feels like someone else’s voice, harsh and accusatory when all he wants to do is beg for Bucky's forgiveness.
“I called to make sure you’re alright.”
“I didn’t know you still cared.”
“Clint,” Bucky starts, but Clint doesn’t let him finish.
Clint doesn’t know what comes over him. “No, Bucky. You’ve spent the last five years fucking off on every mission you can get that’s as far away from me as possible, don’t pretend you suddenly care.” His chest is heavy with emotion and he’s not sure where it’s all coming from or how much of it is true, but it all comes flooding out regardless. He’s helpless to stop the pain that’s coming out of him, aiming it directly at Bucky rather than himself.
“You don’t get to lash out at me just because I asked you if you’re alright.” Bucky snaps, and it only aggravates Clint more.
“Fuck you.” Clint says, and he can feel his eyes welling up with tears because as hurtful as the words he had uttered were, he realizes that there’s so much truth in them, more than he ever let himself think about. He feels like Bucky abandoned him for years, the only time they were even in the same room together was when they went after Natasha, and even that had felt stilted.
“I called Kate.” Bucky says, his tone flat, and that stops Clint in his tracks.
“No,” he starts, but Bucky interrupts him.
“I know you won’t listen to me, I know I fucked us up, I know it’s my fault that I put work first. I won’t give you excuses, but don’t you dare start acting like I’ve stopped caring.” His voice breaks, Clint can hear it over the line, “I know you’re in over your head. I covered for you with Sam, but I never stopped believing in you. Out of everyone on this god-forsaken team, I am the only one who trusts the lengths you’ll go to not to kill people. So, don’t you dare act like I don’t care just because I’ve got my own baggage.”
“Bucky-“
“I don’t want to hear it. Kate should be there soon.” The line clicks, and despite how emotionally defeated Clint feels, there’s some small blossom of hope sitting in his chest, bubbling up amongst the pain and the hurt.
Bucky still cares, Clint thinks, and it’s something he truly didn’t think was possible anymore. He’s still got to figure out a way to defeat the hood on his own terms, but being seen by Bucky, Bucky knowing that Clint isn’t killing people, Bucky knowing Clint despite all the bullshit, makes Clint think that maybe all of this is possible.
He hears a knock on the basement door and a lilted voice calling out to see if he’s okay. He knows it’s Kate, but before he answers, all bloodied and bruised, he has a text message to send first.
Perhaps if he does, they can start to heal. Perhaps they can begin to move forward.
To Bucky: I’m sorry.
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sl-ut · 2 years
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once a cheater...
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pairing: sarah cameron x fem!kook!reader, sarah cameron x john b routledge, topper thornton x fem!kook!reader (platonic/very minorly romantic)
description: once a cheater, always a cheater; that’s what everyone told y/n when her ex-girlfriend returns from the dead, and she was a fool not to listen.
warnings: cheating, light description of sex, angst, topper being a good friend, john b being a douche, slightly ooc sarah (but not really), john b and sarah slander
words: 3.3K
date posted: 28/03/22
Y/n had been proudly calling Sarah Cameron her girlfriend for almost six months when she discovered that she had been cheating on her. The relationship prior to that had been fairly good; Sarah was sweet to Y/n, and genuinely seemed interested in her, but as the school year turned to summer, Y/n could clearly tell that Sarah was pulling away.
Of course, Y/n had noticed it. Sarah began bailing on their plans, or acting dazed when they were together, but she was always quick to dismiss her or distract her in some way. Then, after going off in search of her girlfriend at Midsummer, she discovered that her fears were not, in fact, rational as she discovered Sarah in the arms of John Booker Routledge.
She remembered how Sarah tried to defend herself, and how John B even got protective of the blonde when Y/n began spitting vicious words at her, and the pain she felt in her hand as she connected it with his cheek, though she could scarcely recall anything after that until her burning rage turned into grief.
It was all only made worse when she’d discovered that Ward had let John B move into Tannyhill. Y/n had once taken pity on the boy, and had even been relatively nice to him back when he used to work on the Cameron’s boat, but she couldn’t help but hope that he would have been sent back to the shithole he called a house, and taken by DCS, as horrible as it may make her seem.
The weeks that followed were not easy by any means. Y/n had been devastated by Sarah’s betrayal, and later on, her presumed death. She sometimes wondered if she would have never recovered from it if it hadn't been for Topper, who stood by her the entire time. By the time that the summer was coming to an end, she was finally coming to terms with it all, up until she heard the news that John B and Sarah were both alive and back in the OBX.
“So how are you doing with all of this?” Topper bumped her shoulder as he walked alongside her, a brown paper bag of takeout swinging from his hand as they headed back to the docks, “As in the whole ‘Sarah-John B’ thing.”
Y/n shrugged, crossing her arms over her chest, “I’m trying not to pay attention to it all, honestly. I feel like I’ve just come a long way since everything at Midsummers.I don’t know if he did it or not; Hell, we all know that Rafe’s a loose cannon, and maybe he doesn’t deserve it, but I just can’t bring myself to give a fuck about what happens to him, as terrible of a person as it might make me.”
“I don’t think it does,” Topper shook his head, “They put you through hell. Hey, if that were me in your situation, I don’t even know what I would have done. I probably would’ve tried to kill him, at the very least.”
Y/n sniggered quietly, “I can’t say that the thought hasn’t crossed my mind. I mean– Do you hear that? Top, it sounded like something fell in the water.”
“Uh, yeah…” Topper turned his head in the direction of the sudden splashing, “It was probably like a porpoise or a bird or something.”
Y/n shook her head, following the sound of the continuous splashing, “I’m just gonna check it out. You head back to the Malibu.”
Topper shouted her name after her, uttering a swear as he took several quick steps to catch up with her. He finally slammed into her back as she came to a sudden halt, a sharp gasp escaping her lips as she caught sight of the familiar figure of Rafe Cameron, hunched over a large tub of water as he forced someone underneath.
“Rafe–” The person shrieked, a voice hoarse as they were barely able to get a gasp of air before they were forced back under.
Goosebumps ran over Y/n’s skin as the voice reached her ears, rushing forward to grab hold of the material of Rafe’s blue shirt in her fists, pulling with all her might as she yelled for him to let go. Rafe glanced over his shoulder, swinging his elbow back to connect with her jaw, knocking her back to the hard gravel. Topper soon took her place, successfully pulling Rafe away from the tub and occupying his attention long enough for Y/n to reach into water, helping the blonde girl out.
“Sarah!” Y/n pushed her wet hair out of her face, tugging her hoodie off of her own shoulders to throw it around Sarah as tremors ran through her body, “Are you okay? Can you breathe?”
“Y/n?” She murmured, leaning into the warmth of the sweater as her bottom lip began trembling. She moved her gaze to Topper, who finally sent Rafe running off.
“Jesus, are you okay?” He asked.
“No,” Her voice shook, “Not really.”
“Come on,” Y/n hooked her arm around Sarah’s shoulders, glancing at Topper, “We can give you a ride home–”
“I can’t go home.” Sarah sneered, “I can’t be around him. He wants me dead.”
The pair shared a glance, Topper clearly arguing against the offer that he knew she was about to make, though Y/n ignored him as she turned to the blonde, “You can stay at my place for the night. You can sleep in the guest house, no one even has to know that you’re there.”
Sarah’s large brown eyes gazed over at her ex-girlfriend, curiosity and confusion swirling through her brain as she wondered why exactly the girl who she’d cheated on and abandoned was being so hospitable to her.
“Uh, yeah. That would be good. Thank you.”
Topper walked on the other side of Sarah as Y/n led her across the dock to where they had parked the Malibu. His dark stare was glued to the side of Y/n’s face, though she was intentionally avoiding his gaze. He’d been very clear about his feelings towards Sarah after she had cheated on his best friend, and he might have been angrier than Y/n was, herself. He’d even warned her before they had started dating about Sarah’s reputation, but Y/n had been charmed by the Cameron girl and couldn’t care less about her past until it came back to bite her in the ass.
Sarah curled up at the back of the boat as Topper took his place at the wheel. Y/n gave Sarah one last look before moving to stand next to Topper as the boat pulled away from the dock. He glanced over his shoulder at the blond, making sure that she was out of ear shot before he leaned closer to the girl next to him.
“Y/n…”
“Please don’t, Topper,” She stared up at him, “I know what you’re going to say. I just… it’s Sarah. No matter what she did or how she hurt me, I couldn’t just leave her there.”
“I know,” He sighed, “I just… Y/n, I was the one to put you back together after she left. I don’t wanna see you go through that again.”
“I won’t,” She reached across and placed her hand over his on the wheel, catching his gaze, “I don’t want that either. I promise, it’s just one night, and then she's gone, ‘kay?”
Topper’s eyes shifted down to their hands momentarily, loosening his grip on the wheel to lace their fingers together, “Okay, I trust you.”
She leaned her head on his shoulder, “Thank you. And I’m sorry that I’m sort of ditching you on movie night.”
“It’s okay,” Topper smirked, “Just means that you owe me. Big time.”
Y/n snorted out a laugh, “Keep dreaming, pal.”
She bid him a quiet goodbye as he parked the boat along the dock behind her house, Sarah following behind her awkwardly as Y/n led her up to the large guest house.
“Here are some extra blankets,” Y/n dropped some linens on the double bed, turning to face the frazzled girl in the doorway, “The shower’s through there if you want to take one. Is there anything else you need before I head to bed?”
“Uh, no.” Sarah shook her head, “Thank you. Really, Y/n, you didn’t have to do any of this, especially after everything that happened between us.”
“Yeah, well I wasn’t just about to leave you. Rafe’s really been off his rockers the last few weeks, so I wouldn’t trust him to not try and kill just anyone in his path.”
“I mean, after the whole deal with Peterkin–” She paused as she registered the expression on Y/n’s features, “You don’t really believe that it was John B, do you?”
“I really don’t know what to believe, Sarah. I wasn’t there, so right now it’s your word against your family’s, and it wouldn’t be the first time that you hurt someone who loved you for John B.”
The blonde clamped her lips shut, wide eyes falling to the floor at the harsh words spat at her. Y/n wasted no more time before she turned on her heel, slamming the door to the guest house quietly as she made her way up the remainder of the dock to the large main house on her property.
The next morning, Y/n stepped out of her shower, wincing as she wiped the condensation from the large round mirror to reveal her reflection, including the black, swollen bruise that marred the flesh of her jawline. She let out a quiet whimper as she poked and prodded around it with her finger, swearing in frustration as it dawned on her that no amount of makeup would successfully cover such a mark. After putting on a few layers of concealer in hopes of avoiding too much attention, allowing her hair to dry a bit, and slipping into a dark blue bikini and covering up with denim cutoffs and a large sweatshirt that probably (definitely) belonged to Topper.
“Sarah?” She called as she poked her head into the guest house, “You up?”
The house was empty, crumpled sheets messily folded at the foot of the bed, but there was no other trace of Sarah having been there. Y/n furrowed her brow at the emptiness of the house, but quickly changed the sheets to hide the fact that her ex-girlfriend had stayed the night at her house, knowing how angry her parents would be with her simply for letting her back into her life. Between Topper and her parents, Y/n wasn’t sure who hated Sarah Cameron more for what she had done to her, though both were definitely more than Y/n could bring herself to.
A few days had passed since Sarah had evaded her house, and word had quickly spread that John Booker Routledge had been released from county jail and was cleared of all charges. Topper had done his best to keep Y/n distracted from everything that had to do with it, though it only made it more difficult after the arrest of Rafe Cameron, and his father’s explosive escape from justice. It was the talk of the town, afterall, though the kooks on Figure Eight were sure to mourn the death of Ward much more than they had for John B while he had been on trial.
“I just… I don’t know. I’ve been friends with the guy for years, and now he’s a murderer?” Topper shook his head, “It’s just crazy to me. I can’t wrap my head around it.”
“Me neither,” Y/n sighed, looping her arm through his as they walked down the beach together, cool water lapping at their bare feet as the tide began to come closer to the shore, “Everything’s just so different now, you know?”
He glanced over at her, “Different how?”
“I don’t know. Ward’s dead, Sarah and John B are just gonna be a thing now, I guess, and Rafe is… I’m not even sure what to call it. Maybe it was all meant to happen, you know, it was all too good for too long,” She tightened her grip on his arm, nudging her head against him, “I’m glad I still have you, though, Top. That’s one change that I don’t think I would be able to survive.”
Topper guffawed loudly, “Yeah right. Y/n, I’m not sure if you’ve noticed or not, but you’re like, this super badass chick and no matter what happens to you, you just always kinda roll with it.”
“Well, now that you mention it,” She smirked, “Maybe I would be, like, Queen of the Kooks if I stopped hanging out with degenerates like you.”
“Oh, that’s how it is?” He raised his brows at her, “So it would probably be better for the both of us if I didn’t give you a ride home later, then.”
“No,” She pinched his bicep, “Then it’ll be wholly on you when my body washes up on the shore.”
Topper visibly shivered harshly, “Don’t even joke about that.”
“Okay, okay. Geez, I didn’t realise that you were so concerned with my health, Top.”
He didn’t answer, instead turning his head to observe the shifting sand beneath their feet. He tugged his lip between his teeth, a heaving sigh falling from his lips.
“Hey,” She turned to face him, “What’s wrong? I really didn’t mean to upset you so much.”
“No, no,” He shook his head, “It’s not your fault. It’s just…”
“What?”
A small smile crossed his features, “Nothing. Come on, I’ve got SAT prep tomorrow morning, and mom will kill me if I miss it again.”
Y/n watched him with uncertainty, but slowly nodded, “Yeah, sure.”
The sun had finally set, and after being dropped off at her house by Topper, Y/n made herself comfortable among the various plush cushions on her bed, sighing in content as the minty face mask settled into her skin. The past few days had been extremely warm, and the UV rays had been extraordinarily high, which caused the cooling sensation that spread across her cheeks to feel euphoric. Setting a ten-minute timer on her phone, her head leaned back against the wooden headboard as her eyes fluttered closed, finally relishing in a moment of peace since the return of Sarah, John B’s trial and release from prison, the arrest of Rafe, and not to mention Ward Cameron’s explosive escape from justice… There was hardly a dull moment in the Outer Banks.
A small tapping against the glass brought her back to the real world, and another had her creeping towards the window, peeling her curtains away from the glass to peer out, completely forgetting the green slime that had covered her entire face. Her brow furrowed as she easily recognised the familiar blonde girl beneath her window, waving her arms wildly to get her attention.
“Sarah?” She kept her voice low in an attempt to keep her parents from hearing, “What are you doing here?”
The Cameron girl sniffled, wiping underneath her left eye with her sleeve, “I’m sorry. I didn’t know where else to go.”
Y/n didn’t want to feel bad for her. The girl had coaxed her into falling in love with her, then cheated with the guy who she told Y/n not to worry about, only to act as if Y/n was completely irrational. She wanted to hate Sarah for how horribly she had treated her, but she simply couldn’t. Not when she was standing in her backyard, tears tracking down her cheeks and suffering from the trauma of watching her father blow himself up.
“Uh, it’s okay,” She murmured, “Just give me a minute, I’ll come down.”
Y/n wiped her face clean and pulled a white sweatshirt over her head before sneaking down the stairs, stealthily slipping her feet into her sandals and sliding out the door.
“Do you, uh, do you wanna go for a walk or something?”
“Yeah,” Sarah nodded, “That would be good.”
The two stayed quite silent as they walked down the road, both avoiding the other’s eyes. Y/n peeked over at Sarah, admiring her round features in the moonlight, highlighted by tear tracks and red-rimmed brown eyes.
“I’m sorry about your dad.”
Sarah’s eyes flickered over to her, “Thanks. At least someone is.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“I don’t know,” She shook her head, “It’s just… I know that Ward was a bad guy, and he did a lot of bad stuff; I mean, he was a murderer! But, everyone also seems to forget that at one point in my life, he was just my dad.”
Y/n nodded, “I get it. I mean, I definitely don’t, but I can at least try to understand. I don’t think anyone can blame you for mourning your dad.”
“John B did.”
Y/n rolled her eyes, not entirely surprised that she had found some way to bring him up, “Sarah–”
“We broke up.”
Sarah stepped in front of the girl, preventing him from walking any further. Her glossy eyes fought to hold contact with those of her ex-girlfriend.
“Sarah,” Y/n sighed, “I’m sorry about your dad, but you can’t really expect me to feel bad for you about John B.”
“I just–” Sarah whimpered, “He didn’t care. And then I started thinking that, maybe if I hadn’t ever gotten together with him, my dad would still be alive. And then, I thought about you, and how no matter what happened, you would have always stood by my side. I don’t expect you to forgive me, or to take me back, or anything… I just wanted to tell you how sorry I am. Really.”
Y/n wiped her eyes before any tears could fall, thinking over how to respond to Sarah’s words.
“Y/n, I don’t have anyone else. Please.”
She wanted nothing more than to tell her no; That she had hurt her too horribly and there was absolutely nothing that she could have done to convince her to take her back. She wanted to tell her no as their lips met, and again as the pair stumbled into the bedroom in their guesthouse, and again as Sarah stripped her of her clothes and brought her to climax time and time again. But Y/n had always been weak when it came to Sarah Cameron, so instead she said yes; She allowed her to kiss her, to strip her, and to touch her like she had so many times before, and she loved every moment of it. She relished in holding Sarah’s bare body in her arms once more, in her taste and smell.
Sarah stayed with her for the next week, each of their nights spent forcing pleasure onto one another incessantly. Sarah smiled at her when Y/n mumbled a declaration of love in the midst of her orgasm before repeating the words back to her.
Y/n had gone by Sarah’s house one morning, only to find it empty of nearly everything that the Cameron’s had held near and dear to their hearts. Sarah had already started to blow her off throughout the following weeks, coming up with lame excuses as to why she wasn’t answering her texts and distracting her with sex. Y/n was quick to recognise the similar pattern as the very same one from when Sarah had begun cheating on her months before, but she somehow convinced herself to believe otherwise. And then Sarah disappeared once more, and it became clear to Y/n that she had run off with John B once again.
“I’m sorry,” Topper ran his hand over her back in comforting circles and her body shook, heavy sobs wracking her body as her tears soaked through the cotton of his t-shirt, “And I hate to say that I told you so… but I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, Y/n–”
“Once a cheater, always a cheater…”
MY WORK IS, UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCE, TO BE REPOSTED OR SHARED WITHOUT MY PERMISSION. I HAVE NEVER GIVEN CONSENT TO MY WORK BEING SHARED, SO IF YOU SEE ANOTHER ACCOUNT POSTING MY CONTENT PLS LET ME KNOW.
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may-fanfic · 3 years
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After You’ve Gone pt 2
summary: Natasha is broken up, after her decision to cheat on you splits the two of you apart, unbeknownst to her, Wanda is there to comfort you 
warnings; cheating 
word count: 3,492
masterlist 
pt 1 
a/n: was honestly so conflicted on how i should end this story but i hope you guys enjoy 💕
((feel free to send in any request you may have)) 
taglist: @madamevirgo​
Natasha moved through the compound, ignoring her teammates' calls as she tugged her earphones over her ears to block out any more noise. When she made it to the training room, she was relieved to see that it was empty. Natasha honestly couldn't be bothered right now. All she wanted to do was beat the living shit out of the punching bag, anything to get you out of her head. It seemed to be a constant in her mind, the way things ended so terribly, all because of her. Even in her dreams, she sees it. She hadn't heard from you since despite how many times she tried to reach you.
She knew for your sake; she needed to leave you alone. You were going through it as much and, if not, more than her, but Natasha wanted you, no, she needed you back. Her life felt empty without you. Her days felt all mushed together into a jumble of nothingness. For the past couple of days, it's been hitting her hard. The reality of it finally settling in ultimately. For the first couple of weeks, she convinced herself that she'd be at the compound for training, but as time went on, it was apparent that this was the place she'd have to call home once again.
It was the week of your honeymoon; she was a wreck, spending most of her days cooped up in her room or training. She should've been with you having the time of your lives, but instead, she was bounded to her bed, her phone in hand as she prayed you'd call. You never did.
----- A soft knock sounded at your door, you let out a gentle whine. You didn't want to see anyone. You just wanted to sit here and hope that eventually, you'd feel better. All you could do was watch sad romantic movies and cry. It wasn't healthy, you knew that much, but you were healing.  You knew it'd take time before you felt like yourself again. You just wished you could fast forward to that.
Another much harder knock sounded, causing you to groan, forcing yourself up from your couch. When you pulled the door open, you were met with Wanda's kind features. She wore a smile, but it fell because of the frown and puffiness of your eyes. You were in worse condition than the last time she saw you. You hated that you were the cause of the pout that played on her lips, so you tried to force a smile. "hey, maxi!" you tried to sound cheerful, but your voice was hoarse from crying.
"Hey, babes." you were glad that she didn't question you. You just wanted to enjoy her presence without the reminder of Nat. you let out a gentle sigh when she tugged you into a tight hug, nuzzling your face into the nape of her neck. If you were honest, you were glad that Wanda was here. If she weren't, you'd probably be watching some sad movie, devouring another carton of ice cream.
After she settled into your home, she offered to make you some dinner, you accepted eagerly. You couldn't remember the last time you had a good homecooked meal. "um..." you began as you watched the woman stir at the pot. she looked over her shoulder at you briefly, taking in your features. She knew you well, so she expected the words to spill past your lips even before they did. "how's nat?" you questioned, leaning against your head.
Wanda hated that you were asking about her after everything, but she also couldn't help but swoon at how caring and thoughtful you always were; that was one thing she loved about you.
"she's-" she paused for a moment, shrugging casually as Wanda looked back down at the pot. "not good." she chose to be truthful, telling you carefully how Natasha is barely even seen around the compound. You frowned lightly. You hoped that she was doing even slightly better than you. "oh..." you frowned, observing as Wanda moved with ease as if she was made to become a chef. She was such a natural. You wondered if, in some other life, that's what she'd do.
"How are you, though, baby?" you hummed lightly, sipping at your water for a moment so when you talked, it didn't come out too scratchy. "I miss her," you confessed, causing wanda's heart to pound. She knew you were compelled to miss her, but she just wished you could forget about her entirely. Wanda spun away from the stovetop, wiping her hands on a rag before she moved over to you. "I know you do, but you deserve better." she frowned when you shrugged.
"what was that?" she questioned, waving her finger around you, causing you to look up at her shyly. "what?"
"that shrug!" you let your shoulders drop in defeat as the woman leaned over the kitchen island to reach out for your hand. There was no reason for wanda to be holding your hand right now, but she'd find any excuse to touch you.  "You don't think you deserve better, hun?" her voice was so soft, the gentleness of it could make you cry.
"I don't know if anyone is better than her," you confessed. Wanda's chest tightened; she could be better. How didn't you see that? It pained Wanda in all honesty, she spent most of your friendship trying her hardest to win you over, and all you ever saw was Natasha.
"You deserve someone who won't cheat on you before your wedding." Jealousy was laced in her harsh tone, which made you look up at her, but she looked down at your intertwined hands. Her manner was always so gentle and soft when she spoke to you, and now all you could feel was anger radiate from her. she squeezed your hand gently, her thumb caressing your knuckles which let you know that she wasn't upset at you for your foolish thoughts.
"I just want you to be happy," she admitted, her voice soft as her eyes fluttered up to meet yours. "Anyone who could hurt you like that isn't worthy of your love." she was right, wanda was always right, and as much as it pained you to admit even if you ended up back with Natasha, you knew you'd never love her the same.
-------
Natasha laid in silence, her eyes trained on the ceiling. She tried her hardest to think about anything else other than you. Anything would be better than the wicked thoughts that taunted her. She knew she deserved it. She was a horrible person that deserved to be tormented for her actions. Her eyes burned with tears as she thought about you; the simple thought of your smile made her stomach hurt because now all she could imagine was the fact that she'd never be the reason for it again.
You were truthfully the best person she'd ever met, and because of her stupid decision, you were out of her life for good.  She hated that she was too stupid to see how much she wanted to commit to you. Her chest burned; she wanted nothing more than to go back in time to change everything.
She knew she'd stay home with you and spend the night showering you with nothing but love; that's all she wanted to do right now. She wanted to rush into your home and tell you a billion times that she was sorry, but she knew deep down that it wouldn't be enough, and she was emotionally ready to be turned away. She just wanted to ask to start over with you; she'd hope you'd say yes. "Nat!" Clint's voice boomed before her door swung open; she sat up in her bed, wiping frantically at her watery eyes.
"Listen, Nat! You fucked up, okay? But you can't just lay here forever." his voice was harsh, and it made a knot form in her throat. His tough love always worked before, but as she met his eyes, her lips quivered; it was clear that it wouldn't work this time, so he let out a soft sigh.
"Natty, I know you love her-" he paused to move beside her on her bed, his hand finding a place on her shoulder. She let out a soft sob, her hand coming to fly over her mouth while the other rested against her chest. He reeled her into his chest, holding her close against him. She wasn't a terrible person, she made a mistake, and Natasha needed to own it.
"You hurt her, Natasha... but you're not horrible..." he whispered, caressing her arm as she cried. She felt horrible; she felt like a monster. Her body ached as she cried, gripping onto the man's shirt in agony. Everything was so perfect between you and Natasha; there was never a reason for her to do what she had done. She wished she just spoke to you; you could make all her worries melt away.
Clint hated seeing Natasha in so much pain, he pitted her, but he couldn't help but be mad at her. He set you two up after months of Natasha pining over you; why would she ever want to mess that up? He could see how insanely flawless the relationship was; he could never justify her actions even if he tried.
"I just want to talk to her." she cried out, causing the man to sigh; he was her friend before anyone else's, so with that thought, he pulled his phone if his pocket and dialed your number. It perked her curiosity as the phone rang, and when it connected, she could hear your soft voice echo through the phone; it eased her completely.
"hey, kid," he spoke softly, causing you to hum lightly, greeting the man. You knew why he called; you didn't have the strength to hang up; you wanted to hear her. "is Natasha there?" you asked softly, your eyes fluttered closed, your heart pounded as you waited for his response.
"yeah..." he answered after some time, his gaze snapping down to the girl with tearful eyes. "she wanted to talk to you," he whispered, causing you to rub gently at the bridge of your nose. You shouldn't, you really shouldn't, but you wanted to. It scared you how much you actually wanted to speak to her; you hardly went that long without her, and now it had been nearly a month of no contact. You missed her; it was a haste decision when you uttered out, "put her on."
Natasha loved Clint at the moment; with shaky hands, she took the phone, watching as he got up and left. "hey baby," she rasped out, her eyes already watering up. "have you been crying?" you asked softly, rubbing your sweaty hand over your sweatpants. She cleared her throat, leaning back onto her bed to try and ease her nerves.
"Are you okay?" you questioned when you got no response. Natasha expected you to yell at her, tell her that she had no right to be so sad when all this mess was her fault but instead, you were the same usual soft, compassionate person that she fell in love with.
"I just miss you." her voice shook as her eyes began to flow freely once again; if she closed her eyes, she could see you, your bright smile that always managed to make her heart race. "I miss you too." it gave her hope that she shouldn't have. she tightened her hand over the phone, holding it so close to her ear so she couldn't miss out on anything you had to say.
"I know why you did it, Nat... I was scared too,"  you stated, your eyes clouded with tears, and your throat burned. "but I loved you, Natasha, and I was just so ready to be with you forever." That hurt her; hearing your voice break physically pained her more than anything ever could.
"I wish I could take it back. I only want you." this was a moment of weakness, you knew that, but Natasha's voice was so genuine and soft.
"Natty, as much as I want to tell you to come over, I can't, baby." The usual pet name rolled over your tongue too quickly; you hardly caught it until it sounded into the phone. "I know," she whispered, tugging her blanket over her body to form some comfort. "I'm sorry."
"I forgive you."
------
"I spoke to her," you whispered to your friend as she lounged in your bed, helping you find an outfit for Tony's wedding. She sat up swiftly, her eyes trained on you. "why?" she tried her best to keep her emotions at bay, but it was hard as she gazed at you.
"Clint called." you shrugged, moving to the mirror to look over the tight dress you pulled on. You could still see wanda in the mirror, roll her eyes. Your eyebrows knitted together in confusion.
"you aren't thinking about getting back with her, are you?" she questioned, her heart cracking when you shrugged. "I don't know, wanda, maybe." You ran a hand through your hair when she huffed out.
"That's the dumbest shit-"
"I thought you wanted me to be happy!" you suddenly turned, inching your way over to wanda, anger dripping from your words. Why couldn't she be a good friend and tell you that getting back with her isn't that terrible. she shot up from the bed, nearing you, causing your breathing to hitch as you looked up at her. "not with her." you huffed lightly, moving to turn away from her but she caught your wrist.
"Why do you care so much, wanda? It's my life!"
"Because I love you! I can't stand to see you get hurt again," she yelled out; she never raised her voice at you before, but tensions were so high, she couldn't control it. "I've watched you fall in love with her time after time. I can't do this anymore!" with that, the witch left you there, your breathing uneven. Your thoughts were scattered as you tried to understand it all; Wanda loved you.
How couldn't you see it before? Now that you thought about it, it was painfully obvious. The girl had been practically throwing herself at you for years; you always just figured it was friendly and innocent. You knew everything was different now, though.
You moved quickly through your home, eager to find the woman who just confessed her love for you. You managed to run down the stairs just in time for Wanda to be opening up your front door. "Wanda!" you sounded desperate as you called out for her. she let out a soft sigh, turning her head to glance over at you.
Wanda softened when she noticed the faint tears that clouded your eyes. "Don't go." you pleaded; her lips parted when you choked out a sob.
"Don't leave me, Wanda," you begged, and in an instant, she shut the door before making her way over to you with open arms. You cried out when she embraced you tightly, pressing a gentle kiss to your hairline. You wrapped your arms around her shoulders, nuzzling your face into her neck.
Wanda knew this would take some work, but she was willing to try if you were.
----- When Natasha first saw you, she was starstruck. Natasha felt the same way she did the first night she met you, like a high schooler with a crush, but then she noticed how your fingers laced with Wanda's. It was a couple of months since the breakup, she still felt broken up about it, but you looked like you were happy. The way you grinned when you embraced Pepper and congratulated her made Natasha's heart pound.
It should've been the two of you who were celebrating your marriage but instead, she was staring at you from across the bar, not daring to make a move to talk to you. She didn't want to ruin your night. She'd do anything to ensure that smile stayed on your lips. You were all that Natasha wanted; she was sure you'd be the one she let getaway.
When the music slowed, you didn't hesitate to urge Wanda to dance with you, and she agreed quickly. Her hands rested gently across your waist as she stared down at you with pure adoration. "You know..." you started, your hand coming up to rest gently against her cheek. She leaned into your palm, beaming at you.
"I want this if you can give me the time." wanda leaned forward to press a gentle kiss to your forehead; wanda could wait forever just an ounce of your love. She has waited this long; if you needed time to heal, she could give you that.  
"Take your time, baby." her voice came out so soft, and you couldn't help the smile that formed on your lips. You wanted to thank her, but you knew words wouldn't be enough; wanda had been there whenever you needed her; you felt like there was only one way you could really repay her, so you leaned forward and caught her lips in a gentle kiss. It was quick, but it proved that you were serious.
Honestly, you always had a slight crush on Wanda way before Natasha; you swept it under the rug when you met the spy, but now as you stared up at her, your heart swooned. It scared you, but you knew better than to imagine Wanda ever hurting you.
"Don't hurt me," you whispered out, leaning your head against her shoulder; she let out a gentle sigh. She knew you'd have so many underline trust issues because of Natasha, but Wanda could never imagine herself ever doing something like that. You were so sweet and precious; all Wanda wanted to do was protect and care for you.
"Never," she promised, her arms growing tight around you, as much as it frightened you, you trusted her.
------
As much as you wanted to pretend that Natasha didn't exist that night, you knew you couldn't do that. The only way you could do that was if you had closure. With a shaky breath, you followed the woman out to the balcony, noticing the way she hugged herself for warmth. "Hey," you called out, your voice wary when she turned.
She knew she lost you when you looked at her with a gentle smile, you extending your hand offering the drink you had brought for her, she took it, thanking you lightly. "so wanda?" she questioned softly, you couldn't help the smile that formed on your lips at the thought of the girl.
"yeah..." you uttered out, wrapping your arms around yourself when the breeze blew. "I always had that feeling," Natasha confessed, offering you a tiny, almost knowing smile. You wondered if that's why she grew so hesitant.
"what do you mean?" you raised your eyebrow, looking out into the view. It was calming to be so high up, looking over the city. "You never looked at me the way you did her." she shrugged; her eyes lingered on you as you stood next to her. "I did love you," you whispered, snapping your gaze over to her; she nodded. "I love you," she expressed, her smile turning sad. "but I'm happy for you." you sigh, leaping forward to embrace the woman.
She needed that; she honestly did. She felt eased as she held onto you, not quite ready to let you go, and she was glad that you hadn't moved. "we'll be okay." Natasha muttered, causing you to nod, nuzzling your face into her neck. You knew that you and Natasha could be friends; everything would work out the way it supposed to, and that thought left you content.
"you ready to go, baby?" her voice boomed, causing you to break apart from the hug, looking over at the woman in the doorway who held her jacket open for you. You smiled lightly, moving away from Natasha to greet Wanda, slipping yourself into the coat when she held it up for you.
"I'll see you later, Nat." she nodded, looking over at the both of you as wanda's hand slipped into your own. "See you." she smiled weakly at you, and then you turned with wanda and left her there. As much as her body ached, she was glad you were okay. She understood that she fucked it up; she'd have to live with that for the rest of her life.
If she was honest, she still felt a thread of hope, even if it was absurd to think. Crazier things have happened in her life; maybe she was just in denial, or perhaps she was right. After all, you always ended up back with her.
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whythinktoomuch · 3 years
Text
ii. apocalypse now & again
(pt. i)
Kara woke up and realized that she was going to die.
Too many of the drones had survived the explosions and were still closing in on her. What little strength she had left after quite literally digging her own grave was presently and painstakingly strained just from her efforts to climb onto her knees. And on top of all that—of everything that possibly could have gone wrong for her in this moment—her helmet was cracked.
The abstract red numbers warning Kara of the kryptonite levels in the area seemed redundant now, what with that unmistakable chill already flooding her bloodstream.
“… Alex,” Kara gasped out, barely able to hear herself over the ringing in her ears. “Hey, Alex… Are you there?”
Her words were met with not one whisper or even a crackle of static, and for once, Kara was inconsolably disappointed to hear no one yelling back at her. With her teeth gritted, she shoved herself off the ground as hard as she could, drifting barely a foot into the air before the first drone crashed into the back of her head.
Kara toppled back onto the ground, knees skidding across the rubble in a shower of hot sparks. The impact had her head reeling, her mouth filling with a taste that she was now idly recognizing as blood. But there was no time to consider any of that as the drone doubled back. Kara scrambled out of the way, narrowly avoiding another collision, only to be struck by a second drone smashing right against her ear.
Out of breath but swearing, Kara whirled around and snagged the fast approaching drone into a bear hug, squeezing and squeezing until it crunched in her arms with a frantic whir. Then with a burst of heat vision, she shattered the other as it came straight for her face.
Kara used her heat vision to pick off several more drones from a distance, but of course, more and more just showed up to take their place, never wavering, never slowing… and eventually, Kara just had to laugh. Because her exhaustion was catching up to her. And Alex was hundreds of miles away. And to get out of here alive, Kara would have to somehow defeat the entire horde of drones, while all they had to do was wreck her suit a little more.
Though admittedly, it’d be overkill at this point, given the crack now spiderwebbing across the glass visor of Kara’s helmet.
Either way, it was over.
--
So, Kara laughed, grabbed at her chest in a reflexive gesture only to meet the unforgiving metal of her suit, then dropped to her knees. “Alex!” she shouted herself hoarse, because maybe if said loudly enough, the words would still be lingering in the air by the time her sister arrived. “Alex, I’m sorry, okay? You were right, and I’m sorry!”
Then she just waited—chest heaving, eyes narrowed but never blinking despite the heat pricking at the corners—because she definitely had to see this through to the bitter fucking end. That much, she owed everyone, including herself.
Except the end didn’t come.
Not this time anyway.
No, instead came a silver sphere, emerging seemingly out of thin air to hover right before Kara’s face. It flashed a blinding white just once, and everything fell absolutely silent and still. Kara’s suit powered down completely, the drones collectively dropped from the air like marionettes with cut strings, and all the lights in the immediate vicinity blinked out.
Laughter welling up all over again, Kara could only collapse onto her side in something akin to sheer relief.
The first person to occur to her, of course, was Alex, who had already saved her ass from similar scrapes on many occasions. But that couldn’t be it. Alex was too far away. It’s why Kara had to take on this mission on her own in the first place.
Then she considered maybe Winn or James, which made even less sense, given how the deceased hardly ever came back to do things like save people’s lives. Not even hers. Not even in the most dire of situations. That’s, unfortunately, just not how life worked these days.
Then she considered Alex again because the kryptonite was clearly bleeding into her brain now, and it was getting rather difficult to remember why it couldn’t have been Alex who’d just saved her. Maybe Kara did shout loud enough after all…
But then, a set of footfalls drew near, metal scraping against metal at a steady pace until a heavy boot struck Kara firmly in the chest, flipping her onto her back where she settled with a grunt.
“So glad I got to you first,” came a self-assured drawl, and Kara promptly found herself face to face with a handheld cannon of sorts. “Would be a pity to come all this way and not get to kill you myself.”
And… Kara’s jaw just dropped.
Not because of the words, nor the intentions behind them—though perhaps they both merited some attention as well—but that voice.
Kara gaped up at her supposed knight in shining, lead-lined armor because her voice—that low, husky tone paired with that very specific lilting cadence—was making her reconsider some very fundamental things about how the world might work.
Namely, that people wouldn’t come back from the dead just to save her life.
Mind still reeling away, Kara tried to sit up, only to be slammed back into the ground, hard.
“Down, girl,” Lena said, grinding her boot into Kara’s chest, the weight of her entire body behind the gesture. But that was fine.
It was fine because Kara could still draw some breath into her lungs, could still use some of that breath to talk, and she could certainly still say some things that she hadn’t uttered aloud in many a year. Like her late wife’s name, for instance.
The cannon in Kara’s face wavered, but didn’t lower. “Shut up,” Lena hissed down at her. “Don’t talk. Don’t even think.”
“So… it is you…” Kara said, and she gently wrapped her fingers around Lena’s ankle—the only part of her that she could still reach from her position—and just cried.
With a startled gasp, Lena stumbled away, wrenching herself out of Kara’s grip. “What the fuck…? What is wrong with you?”
“Nothing, nothing,” Kara sobbed out, trying not to choke on her own tears and snot and the slight taste of blood still lingering on her tongue. She suddenly, irrationally, wished that she could just take off her clunky suit. Just to eliminate some of that distance between her and Lena. Just so she could touch the chain hanging around her neck without any hindrance. “Just… just wanted to say, hi.”
Lena kept her distance, studying Kara in a stony silence, and Kara started to see things that she should probably would have noticed sooner if her body weren’t actively shutting down on her. Like the green glow of Lena’s weapon and the kryptonite cartridges strapped to her belt. Or that she was clearly wearing a lexo-suit. Or how the swirly edges of her own vision were starting to darken, and how the chill of kryptonite was currently all she could feel.
“Hey,” Kara called out, sniffling only slightly now. “Am I dreaming?”
“… No.”
Kara nodded thoughtfully to herself. “Okay, cool, cool… So, I think I might be dying then.”
“Yeah,” Lena said, after a brief pause. “Probably.”
“Cool.” Kara tried to flash a thumbs up, but no part of her body wanted to cooperate anymore. Her exhaustion had eaten up all her drive. “Hey, can you tell Alex something for me?”
Lena sighed, but she finally stepped closer, practically in reach. “Okay, sure.”
Kara fumbled for some words and the correct order that one might put them in, but then Lena took off her helmet, and nothing else mattered anymore. Because Kara was perfectly content to just watch that ripple of dark hair, streaked with a light gray that was just… nice to look at.
She never got to see her Lena’s hair do that.
//
Kara’s shoulder was being shaken so violently that she had no choice but to open her eyes and see Alex’s worry-creased face peering down at her.
“Dumbass…” Alex grumbled, releasing Kara’s shoulder with a dirty scowl. “That’s the last time I let you go anywhere without me.”
“Whatever you say, director.” Kara laughed, but it hurt. She then tried to do a salute, but her everything was still too weak to move apparently. But at least she was still alive.
… Wait.
Kara repeatedly tried to sit up on her bed, and Alex repeatedly shoved her right back down until she gave up. But still, she had to check, had to know that it wasn’t all just a dream.
“Where’s Lena?” she demanded, and the look that Alex gave her in response was so deeply pained that Kara almost felt pathetic for asking.
“… Kara.”
“No, I saw her, Alex,” Kara said, shaking her head, then immediately stopping when her entire body somehow got dizzy from it. “Shit. Ow, ow… But wait, no—But seriously, I saw her, okay?”
“I’m not surprised that you did. You almost died, Kara. Actually, I’m pretty sure that you were dead for a few minutes back there. Again, I say, you fucking dumbass.”
“But I didn’t die. Because she saved me,” Kara insisted. “No, seriously! She took out all the drones with some sort of EMP device, and, and… we talked! And she had gray hair, and I think maybe laugh lines? And yeah, I almost died because my helmet got cracked and stuff. But now, I’m here and I’m fine, so… everything’s fine, right?”
Alex frowned, then somehow settled on the least important part of Kara’s briefing, “You cracked your helmet?”
“Ugh, yeah. The glass visor part. When I fell,” Kara said, waving her hand dismissively. “So sorry about that, by the way.”
“Suit looked fine when we got to you,” Alex said with a shrug, before irritably exclaiming, “Jesus christ, Kara, enough! I’ll just have a guy get the helmet for you, okay? So, just stop trying to get up already.”
Huffing, Kara fell back onto her bed with her arms folded and waited. But when someone eventually showed up with her helmet in tow, she was surprised to see that it was somewhat worse for the wear but perfectly intact. Even up close, with the helmet out the tech’s hands and in her own, Kara couldn’t detect even the slightest blemish in the glass.
Pouting ever so slightly, Kara shoved the helmet back into the tech’s arms.
“… Satisfied?” Alex asked, rolling her eyes when Kara just shrugged one shoulder. “Great. Listen… You just need to get some rest, okay? Once you’re back to full strength, we can work through your… you know, memories together. And hopefully, it’ll make more sense by then. Sound good?”
Kara just nodded, suddenly all too willing to be left to her own devices in the relative quiet and darkness. She accepted a gentle shoulder squeeze and the promise of another session with the sun lamps within the hour, and just curled up under the sheets.
It’s not like she hadn’t conjured up images of Lena before. Kara had been close to death enough times that it was only inevitable that she’d fall back onto memories of her dead wife at some point or another. But this was different. Whenever her brain was just playing tricks on her, Lena appeared to her the way Kara remembered her: warm and loving, bright green eyes, long dark hair smelling of lavender, and alive and young.
Never before had Kara encountered an appropriately aged version of Lena, with creases gathered around her eyes and forehead, hair gloriously faded into the most lovely blend of light grays and white amongst all that black… The Lena that could have been if only she had lived out all these past years alongside Kara.
And she was never in a lexo-suit, of all things. Lena was always wearing one of her classic pencil skirts or Kara’s NCU sweatshirt, or something. Oh, and of course, her wedding band.
Instinctively, the same way she always did when it occurred to her, Kara reached for the chain around her neck, seeking out the familiar weight of the rings that hung from there… only to jolt upright with a gasp that dried up her entire throat.
She ripped the necklace off her head, almost snapping the chain, which in and of itself was telling. Because her chain had been forged out of an extraterrestrial metal amalgamation that not even the Girl of Steel would have been able to break. The one now clutched in her hand, however, was just plain white gold.
Heart pounding in her ears, Kara stared down at an engagement ring fitted with a modest cut of diamond, somehow occupying the very spot where two simple wedding bands—hers and her Lena’s—should have been. Then something drove her to check for an inscription, and sure enough, engraved on the inside of the ring was a series of kryptonian characters, denoting a term of endearment that Kara had never used, but apparently could have in another world altogether: my dearest heart.
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dorimena · 3 years
Note
Hello hello! Your blog is beautifully constructed. I hope there will be more dom reader blogs like yours in the future. If you aren’t busy could I please have g/n reader brat taming Bakugou or Shinsou? I’ll leave it up to you to decide. Remember to drink water!
Hello! Thank you! (´ ω `♡) I chose Bakugou, but I might do something similar for Shinsou later on huhu~ And thanks for the reminder! I hope you’re hydrated as well! ╰(*´︶`*)╯
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𝔠𝔥𝔞𝔯𝔞𝔠𝔱𝔢𝔯; bakugou katsuki
𝔴𝔬𝔯𝔡 𝔠𝔬𝔲𝔫𝔱; 1.5k
𝔴𝔞𝔯𝔫𝔦𝔫𝔤𝔰; gender neutral reader, impact play (not too hard though), brat taming, crying, mentioned overstimulation, implied edge play, paddle, dom!reader, sub!character
𝔬𝔱𝔥𝔢𝔯 𝔱𝔞𝔤𝔰; sex toy (cock ring), lowkey headcanon Bakugou being into impact play, some aftercare before round 2, mentioned safe word (cues like the traffic light colors), aged-up character, Bakugou is 18+
𝔰𝔦𝔡𝔢𝔫𝔬𝔱𝔢; I hope you enjoy it notwhatiseem. I might’ve had to do some investigation, as I was unsure if my plan on how the story was going was a correct, or as correct, portrayal. Maybe in the near future Mr. Paddle will make a comeback-
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𝕸𝖗. 𝕻𝖆𝖉𝖉𝖑𝖊
“Baby boy! What has gotten into you today?”
You scold Bakugou as he glares at you from the couch, arms crossed and body relaxed on the cushions as he tries not to show how his anger is making his body tremble.
Unlike you, because you’re quivering in anger, in utter disappointment with the stunt he decided to pull during the Bakusquad’s monthly game night.
It was a fun time, a casual time and place where everyone could leave behind their prohero responsibilities before somehow being dragged away to missions, patrols, paperwork, all the glorious hero work.
But Bakugou decided that this very night, in the very moment Kaminari ‘accidentally’ placed his hand on your thigh, that he’ll be a brat. A jealous brat, which is worse than his usual bratty behavior.
But he isn’t usually a brat? It’s confusing and a whiplash for you, not really expecting to punish him after months of him being so obedient, so nice, so docile with you and everything you wanted or needed.
“Answer me, Bakugou.”
Okay, that made him furrow his eyebrows in worry, wondering if he’s crossing a line, but that already happened the moment he began sassing back at you and insulting you. Not even playful banter, it was just outright rude and degrading.
He went against opening his mouth or talking in general, just huffing as he slouched a bit more into the couch, as if he wants the cushions to swallow him in or maybe he’s trying to keep riling up your mood.
“Sit up correctly.” You snapped, halting your pacing as you standing in front of him, hands on your hips as you take in his sitting position. He’s barely such a slouch; he’s taking this too far.
Or maybe you got too used to him being such a sweet baby boy that you forgot just how impatient you can sometimes get.
This is one of those times.
“You’re not gonna talk?”
He shakes his head. Well, at least he answered, but his posture remains the same.
Sighing, you leave the living room and head to the bedroom, rummaging through your closet to find- aha!
Bakugou, in the meantime, is trying not to let his nerves get to him, not wanting clammy palms and possibly causing more harm with his reactions. All he can hear is stuff being moved around in your shared bedroom and then hearing a small shout of victory.
But for what- wait, why the fuck did you take that out?!
“Alright, baby boy. I hope you remember Mr.Paddle. He will aid me in your punishment.”
No, no! Anything but the paddle! You’ve never used it, at all. Even if there were some close calls, you still never had it anywhere near his skin, or him. It was a gag gift you gave him out of the blue.
“No!” Bakugou yelled, getting on his feet as his arms fell on either side of him, eyes wide in shock and slight fear. How hard could you go with that? How bad will it hurt?
But your amused chuckle seems to make him even more confused. Aren’t you angry at him?
“So you speak when threatened, but not when spoken to nicely? I told you to sit correctly-”
“I will!”
“Baby boy.” Oh he’s done it. He interrupted you just as he was kind of redeeming himself.
Well, shit.
“I’m s-sorry…” He trailed off, slowly sitting down on the couch as he never loses eye contact with you, waiting to see if you’ll finally use the paddle or you’ll continue trying to talk things out.
But you made a good point: why does he only speak up when threatened with punishment instead of avoiding all of this anger?
“Baby boy. Today you’ve gotten bold with your actions and your words. But you’ve been terribly rude with Kaminari! Isn’t he your friend? What did he do wrong?”
You do know, but you wanted to hear it from him.
But Bakugou kept his silence, fidgeting on the seat as he battled his inner, mini Bakugous about the pros and cons of speaking up and answering.
The main pro is that he’ll be given attention.
The main con is that that attention will be given with the paddle.
Well, his pride be damned.
“He was touching you! I hate it when other people do!” He spoke out, voice raising in volume just a bit at the end, but he shyly whispered, “you of all people know how jealous I can get.”
“Oh~ so baby boy was jealous?”
He groaned, covering his face with his hands before taking them away in a flash, grimacing at how sweaty they are and how sweet it smells.
“Don’t make me repeat myself, goddamn it.”
“Language.”
He grumbled, pouting as he looked at you again, slowly averting his gaze to the paddle as it just stared back at him.
Why does he feel like even if he spoke, he’s going to get that touching him?
He was right after some time, his body moving forward with every hit you landed on his ass with the paddle, a cry of the number he’s on leaving his mouth as more drool lands on the bed, more tears wetting the sheets, more precum falling in stringy drips on the sheets.
He can’t even come to care about the rapidly dirty sheets, or even come to think about anything really. Not with how every smack he receives, the hornier he keeps getting. The tighter his hands grip the bed sheets, and if he were at least conscious with his actions, he would’ve heard fabric tearing up and smell a bit of burning.
Is he into this? Has he always been into this? Well, yes. But he didn’t think taking the paddle instead of your hand would be so much better.
God, please-
“H-harder! Please! H-hardeeeeer- ugh fuuuuuuuck.”
You snicker before rearing back into a serious expression.
“Excuse me? You’re not allowed to speak, baby. Keep counting.”
Bakugou groans before it ends in a sob, a weak ‘68’ coming out as you land the last spank on his bruising ass and a small ‘69’ squeaks out of his throat as he falls forward, face resting on a nearby pillow. And if you somehow catch his hips gyrate slowly against the bed and small, hoarse whines leave his body, you decide to ignore and let him come down from the high the way he usually does.
You’re quite surprised at how he hadn’t used his safe word, or any safe cues, within the spankings, and actually asked for you to go harder. But his bruises are enough to make you feel kind of bad, just a bit.
“You know,” you speak, throwing the paddle on the floor before rounding the bed, squatting to look at his tear stricken, blush decorated, sweat sticky face, “I knew you were a slut for impact play, but I didn’t think it’d be this much.”
Bakugou just mewls weakly, voice lost in his trance as he tried recollecting any thoughts of his, especially the coherent ones so he could speak. Even if they’re just curse words.
“Sh-shitty y-y/n…” He blinks a couple of times, trying to unblur his eyes with the tears that seem to stubbornly stay on his lash line.
“Th-think tha-at be ‘nough? Hah… y-yer cute.”
Blinking yourself, you stare as you shake your head. So he wants to act difficult today, huh?
“Oh baby, baby, baby. All you had to do was ask nicely instead of being mean to your friends. You know I would do anything to keep you happy, to please you.”
You reach to pet him, scratching his scalp as soothing as possible, watching as his eyes slowly come back to being sharp, the fuzz lingering leaving as his mouth twitches into a smile, a relaxed, serene smile as his once tense body slowly melts into the bed, the small shudders from the intensity of the situation for his body slowly disappearing as he lets out something close to a purr.
How cute, he thinks he’s off the hook.
“Since baby boy isn’t satisfied with what I gave him, guess I’ll just have to fuck the brattiness and attitude out of you, hm?”
You slowly lift your hand, standing up as you go back to the closet, leaving him with enough time to gather his thoughts back together and come to realize how you’ve tricked him, how you’re not even done yet, how he’s still gonna get punished.
But, he loves overstimulation? How is that punishing?
“Oh! Forgot to mention: you’ll be wearing this until I feel like taking it off, okay?”
And in his line of vision is his cock ring, the horrible toy that vibrates in teasing tempos and makes him pathetically cum, humiliating him. God he hates that fucking thing.
He growls lowly, as if he’d have a threat ready between his teeth, but then you flipped him over gently, the coolness of the sheets soothing his ass as you flick one of his nipples.
He whimpers, puffing his chest out more for you to keep playing with.
“What’s your color right now, Katsuki?”
“Green m-master.”
373 notes · View notes
sourholland · 3 years
Note
Ooooh angst “what about us?” “there is no us, there never was.” with tom plssss! Really love ur work 🌸
Last Kiss || Tom Holland
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Summary → After a fling you and Tom had started while filming a movie together, he tells you that you two can’t be together anymore. Once you get home, Tom let’s you know that he made a mistake.
AN → This was supposed to come out yesterday, I just got lazy and waited to edit it. I can’t tell if I like how this came out or hate it, either way, I hope you guys like this. Also in honor of the Fearless re-record!!
Pairing(s) → Tom Holland x Fem!Reader
Warnings → Strong Language, Suggestive, Alcohol Use
Prompt(s) → 38
Word Count → 1.9k
The ringing of your phone sounded through your apartment loudly, the sound of the rain pattering loudly against the windows out-looking New York City. You set down the remote, feet padding against the cold hardwood while you looked for your buzzing cellphone.
You didn’t bother glancing at the caller ID, picking it up bringing it to your ear all in one quick motion.
“Hello?” You said, pulling a wine glass down from the cabinet.
“Y/N?” Tom’s voice came through the phone.
Your heart dropped, a breath catching in your throat while you stood in your kitchen. He was across the country, wanting nothing to do with you. He repeated your name through the phone, asking if you were there.
“Yeah, I’m here,” you answered, pouring more wine than you’d originally intended into the glass.
“Isn’t it like one in the morning in England?” You asked, listening to the muffles coming through the speaker.
“Yeah—yeah, it’s late here. I just couldn’t sleep, and I started to think of you. Sorry, I probably shouldn’t have called.”
You sat at one of the barstools, swirling the red contents of the glass around. You wanted to yell at him, or maybe you wanted to tell him how much you loved him. You sat silently for a few moments, bare legs cold from the draft.
“Tom,” you started. “I just don’t get why we have to rehash the past, you know? I came back to New York, just like you told me I should. You’re working on whatever new movie, I’m doing the same. I don’t know—I just think we should leave whatever happened between us alone. You made it very clear that it was me that you didn’t want,” you mumbled, pulling at the sleeves of your sweater.
He audibly sighed, the ruffling of sheets coming through the phone. He was probably in bed, if he wasn’t so far away you’d have asked him if this was a sad attempt at getting you to sleep with him.
“I was fucking stupid, and I’m sorry, Y/N. I’m so fucking sorry, I’ve said that a million times,” his voice was hoarse and tired.
“I’ve already forgiven you, Tom. I just can’t keep doing this—this thing with you.”
You both went quiet for a minute, the only sound being the noise from outside in the bustling streets of the city and the rain. You knew you should hang up, block his number and forget about anything you two ever had. You’d tried a few times, unable to bring yourself to doing it.
“What about us?” He asked lowly, a twinge of hurt in his tired voice.
“There is no us, Tom,” you replied. “I’m not even sure there ever was.”
He didn’t say anything, you wanted to let out the repressed cry and tell him you didn’t mean it. That you were sorry and that you thought about him more than you’d like to admit. Something in you knew if you didn’t do your best to cut it off, you two would continue down the same everlasting cycle.
“Okay,” he said.
“Okay.”
The line went silent for a moment, and then your home screen lit up. The call had been ended. You downed the remainder of your wine, ditching the cup and just going for the bottle. You thought about calling him back, about apologizing and booking a plane ticket like some lovesick teenager.
You opened Instagram and began scrolling through your feed of posts, liking and commenting occasionally. You weren’t anywhere near drunk, merely tipsy and heartbroken. Your finger lingered on the button to go live, wondering if you really wanted thousands of people to see you in this state.
You left the kitchen and instead propped your phone against the couch, taking a seat on the white rug of your living room. You wearily pressed the go live button, raising the bottle to your chapped lips once more. You are pathetic, you thought.
“Hey guys!” You smiled at the camera and outpouring of greetings in the comments. Within a few minutes you’d racked in a few thousand viewers. You grabbed the guitar sitting against your wall and strummed the cords lightly while it sat in your lap.
userone: you are so adorable
usertwo: can you please say hi?!!!??
userthree: it’s my birthday y/n!
“I’m sorry I haven’t been very active on social media, guys. It’s been super crazy traveling back and forth from London to New York and then having to leave again in a few weeks. And now I’m sitting on my living room floor with a bottle of wine,” you laughed. A few familiar people popped into the comments of the live, some you’ve worked with and some you’ve yet to meet in person.
florencepugh: y/n!!!
gracieabrams: might just bust out the wine just for u
“Florence, I can’t wait to see you soon!” You smiled, “Gracie, I swear it’s making everything like a hundred times better.”
userfour: i’m in love with her
userfive: y/n saving 2021???!!!
“I’m not even sure what I’m supposed to be singing,” you flushed. You did sing, before getting into acting you’d post a lot on Instagram and TikTok. It’d always been more of a hobby, something you loved to do, but weren’t good enough to pursue.
“I’ve had a little too much to drink,” you added. “So don’t get upset if I’m a little pitchy, guys.”
usersix: if she’s pitchy i’m not sure what i am
userseven: sing taylor swift!!!
“Okay, okay!” You chuckled, scrolling through the hundreds of comments saying to play Taylor Swift. You’d only just been crying to like three of her albums a few hours before.
“How about the chorus—and maybe the bridge too, yeah, that’ll work,” you mumbled to yourself, fiddling with the strings. “Alright, guys, Last Kiss it is. I won’t bore you all with the whole thing, though. I could never do Taylor justice.”
“And I’ll go sit on the floor, wearing your clothes”
Getting involved with him was singlehandedly the most stupid decision you’ve ever made, you thought. Late nights in his flat after long nights on set, ordering in and just talking, you two would talk as if you’d known each other your whole lives. It was something about the way he’d let you wear his clothes, or the way he’d tuck your hair behind your ear while you told him about whatever insignificant thing that had happened that day.
“All that I know,
I don’t know how to be something you miss”
The car ride to the airport was the worst, it was grey and cold outside. There was makeup running down your face, mascara covering your eyes generously. You’d wrapped filming a week earlier, unable to bring yourself to walk away from him.
You couldn’t tell the driver to turn you around, or could you? Tom had already made it clear that you were both in different places in your career. This wasn’t what he wanted. You weren’t what he wanted.
“I never thought we’d have our last kiss”
He had held you just a little tighter, you ran your fingers through his hair for just a second longer. The taste of each other lingering on the both of your lips. Like you knew it would be the last time he’d hold you without knowing.
His stupid smiled, the way he pulled away and ran his thumb over your swollen bottom lip. You were almost wrapped around his finger, absolutely sickened with desire and infatuation for him.
“I never imagined we’d end like this,
Your name, forever the name on my lips”
The day you’d left to come home to New York started with a huge argument between the two of you. He’d basically just told you that you’d both known from the beginning you wouldn’t last together. It wasn’t a matter of how much you cared for one another, but that it was impossible, as he put it.
His eyes glossed over and bloodshot, you a complete and utter mess. Slamming the door behind you as you left was one of the most painful things you’d ever endured. Even more painful, the fact that he never came after you.
“So I’ll watch your life in pictures like I used to watch you sleep”
“I can feel you staring at me, love,” he murmured against the pillow.
Your face heated, eyes averting to the stream of light through the sheerness of the curtains. He leaned into you a moment later, his lips soft on your own. He was warm, he was always so warm. You cupped the side of his face gently, pulling him in a bit harder.
“And I feel you forget me like I used to feel you breathe”
You dropped your bags, stepping into your apartment after months of being away. It felt quieter than usual, desolate and empty from your being away. It was dark out, the illumination of the bright city lights from your windows.
You glanced down at your phone for a moment, not a missed call, not a text, not even a fucking notification. He’d simply told you to go home, nothing more nothing less.
“I keep up with our old friends just to ask them how you are,
Hope it’s nice where you are”
You’d texted Harrison a few times, regretting it almost immediately after. He was sweet, telling you that Tom would come around eventually and to just be patient. You’d relied on those kind words for some time, eventually deleting them all together.
After Tom’s first text, you’d realized he wasn’t coming around or regretting what he’d said to you. He was lonely, maybe even a bit desperate. For months you had been there to listen to him and hold him, and now you were gone.
You’d fed into it the first few times, sitting on the phone with him for hours at a time. Then you started to feel worse hearing his voice, silent sobs escaping as you’d listen to him ramble. Then your finger would linger over the decline button a little longer than usual when he’d call, until eventually you started to use it.
“And I hope the sun shines and it’s a beautiful day,
And something reminds you,
You wish you had stayed”
Once you started to go out with other guys, Tom’s ‘I miss you’ texts became more infrequent. Paparazzi would snap pictures, and the next morning they’d be plastered all over the internet.
There was no doubt he was seeing you going out with other people, watching article after article about who you were dating surface. Would he be jealous? No, you thought. Tom was probably doing the same thing as you. Hopeless hookups, meaningless blind dates.
“You can plan for a change in the weather and time”
One early morning, you found yourself in a sweatshirt you’d stolen from one of his drawers and forgotten to return. Listening to the morning rush of traffic and hugging yourself, noticing the lingering smell of his cologne.
You wondered if he knew you’d taken it, if he would think you were pathetic wearing it months after you two had broken things off. This only made you clutch yourself a little tighter, closing your eyes and trying to remember.
“But I never planned on you changing your mind”
402 notes · View notes
ghost-party · 3 years
Note
hi~ o/ for your follower event, I'd like to request *covers Gojo's eyes* Sukuna on either Office Coworkers, or Villains prompt; whichever tickles your fancy more. (look at what your AU!Sukuna has done to me, requesting him instead of Gojo... I am going to go put myself in time out now). Grats on 200 again ♥ and thanks for doing something for us on it! ♥ ♥
Aww, thanks for the request! Your secret is safe with me. 😂🤐 Gojo never has to know!
Warnings: swearing, alcohol, brief mention of losing parents/family, some spicy content A/N: Sukuna and the reader work at a company that produces corporate events. (That was my last experience working in an office, so... 🤷🏼‍♀️)
• • •
Sukuna + Office Coworkers
It’s your first day at your new job, and you’re currently hiding in a bathroom stall, certain that one of your coworkers already hates you.
When you arrived that morning, your boss walked you over to your cubicle, with its dual monitors, already-worn-out swivel chair, and short walls. She waved at the man sitting on the opposite side, hunched over his laptop.
“Sukuna! I want you to meet Y/N.” As she rattled off bland introductions, you barely heard a word, focused instead on the sharp gaze now locked onto yours.
At first glance, he was handsome, with a lean build, strong jaw, and dusty pink hair that somehow suited him. You also noticed a few empty piercing holes in his ear lobes.
But that expression... Why did he look so annoyed? You hadn’t even said anything yet. Maybe he was in the middle of something important, you reasoned, repeating the same cheerful “nice to meet you” you had given everyone else... only to be met with a soft grunt.
And it only seemed to get worse as the day went on. While you were on the phone with IT, going through the process of setting up your database login, you looked up and found Sukuna staring at you over the top of your joined cubicles, his eyes slightly narrowed.
When you tried to print your new hire forms and the paper jammed, there he was, standing behind you with a bored look on his face, uttering a simple, “Move,” before popping open the front of the machine and quickly resolving the issue.
At lunchtime, you both ended up in the kitchen, just the two of you, him microwaving something and you half-heartedly poking at your salad. Before you could even attempt benign conversation, he punched a finger at the keypad, removed his meal, and strode away without even sparing you a glance.
You stood there, feeling painfully awkward, until you managed to finish eating and retreat to the bathroom to calm your nerves.
Maybe he’s just not a people person, you think, biting your lip as you finally emerge from the stall and face yourself in the mirror. But the least he could do is be nice, right? Geez... Does he treat all the new hires like this?
After a short mental pep talk, you nod at yourself and make your way back to your desk. As you sit down, you avoid eye contact altogether, instead directing your attention to your email inbox.
Nearly half an hour passes before Sukuna asks, “Do you drink?”
You blink up at him. “I’m sorry...?”
His head is resting on his hand as he stares at you. “Do you drink? We usually take newbies to the bar across the street on the first day.”
“Uh... Yeah. That sounds nice.”
He makes a noise of acknowledgement and looks away — until you ask, “Who’s ‘we’? Everyone?”
Sukuna shrugs. “Whoever wants to come, but it’s usually the office events committee. We organize that kind of stuff.”
“You’re on the events committee?” The idea of this man planning birthday parties and fun, team-building activities is honestly baffling.
He raises an eyebrow. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“No offense, but you just... don’t seem like the type.”
“And what type do I seem like?”
Before you can think better of it, you blurt out, “Rude.” Panic quickly sets in as you watch his eyes widen. But then... he laughs. It’s a low chuckle, but even just seeing his stern mouth lift into a smile fills you with a strange sense of relief.
“You’re honest. I like it.” He leans back, crossing his arms behind his head. “Sorry if I’ve been a dick today. I’m a bartender on the weekends. Had to stay late last night and didn’t get much sleep.”
“Oh.”
“But that doesn’t mean I’m sunshine and rainbows on a good day,” he warns, sitting forward in his chair.
“Duly noted. It’s just nice to know you don’t hate me.”
“Yet.” He’s still smiling, but it’s a wicked, crooked thing that has your face heating up.
• • •
Over the next few months, as your division preps for events season, you spend more time working closely with Sukuna. You learn that there’s not a huge difference between him on a good day and him on a running-on-caffeine-and-no-sleep day. He doesn’t talk much in meetings, but his facial expressions say plenty — though you’ve learned that he sometimes looks annoyed when he’s really just... fine. It’s confusing, to say the least.
Along with his piercings, he has at least a few tattoos on his forearms. It’s hard to tell how many, since he keeps them covered while at work. But you noticed them while having dinner with the team one night. He sat beside you, sleeves rolled to his elbows, holding a frozen margarita as he argued with someone from sales about marketing list sizes. You think about the mental image more often than you care to admit.
You’ve collected small details about him. He’s been tending bar for almost eight years, mostly as a side gig. He has a bad temper, which is why he was drawn to a marketing position — not nearly as many phone calls and general human interactions as you have to deal with in event production. He lives with his younger brother, Yuuji, who’s enrolled at the local university. They’ve been on their own since Sukuna was seventeen.
“He’s a good kid,” he says. You two are taking a brief coffee break in the kitchen, leaning against opposite counters. “Decent grades, working part time... He even has a girlfriend.”
“Wow.” You sip your latte, wondering how to ask the question on your mind without being painfully direct. But what comes out instead is, “Do you have a girlfriend?” because apparently your brain hates you.
Sukuna shakes his head. “Finding someone who can put up with my shit? Easier said than done.”
“Oh, come on. You’re not that bad.”
He smirks at you. “Is that so?”
You shrug and turn around, busying yourself with pouring a refill as an excuse to hide your flustered expression. “I mean... You’re still pretty annoying.”
It’s only when you feel him standing behind you that you realize he’s moved. “Don’t mind me,” he murmurs, reaching above you to grab a plastic lid from the nearest cupboard, his chest just grazing your back. You can’t help but freeze, your heartbeat erratic as you watch his shirt sleeve slide back, giving you a glimpse of the black bands of tattoos encircling his wrist.
When he pulls away, snapping the lid onto his paper cup, you glance at him over your shoulder and he meets your gaze with a knowing smile. “Annoying, huh? I’ll take it.” And with that, he walks away, leaving you scrambling to figure out what just happened.
• • •
“So... What do you think?” You swirl the ice in your glass and nudge Sukuna with your shoulder. “Your first live event.”
“I hate it.”
You’re both sitting at the hotel bar, having finally escaped the welcome reception upstairs. Although marketers don’t usually travel to your company’s events, a team member’s sudden illness left you in a lurch. Sukuna had begrudgingly agreed to accompany you to help with on-site prep and operations.
“Somehow I knew you’d say that.” You take a sip of your drink, already feeling pleasantly buzzed. “Is it the pushy attendees, the boring presentations, or the thrilling nightlife?” You gesture around at the exclusively 50+ clientele, along with the stuffily-ornate lobby full of classic artwork, antique carpeting, and gold everything.
“Yes.” You laugh, and when you look up at Sukuna, he’s staring at you thoughtfully. “But the company’s not too bad.”
“You should put that on the post-event survey.”
“Definitely ‘exceeds expectations.’” He drums his fingers against the bar top. “My room’s not bad, though.”
“‘Not bad’?” you tease. “I made sure you got the nicest one in the staff block.” When he looks surprised, you glance away. “It’s the least I could do — as a thank you for coming.”
Sukuna chuckles. “You’re always too nice to me. Might give me the wrong idea one of these days.”
Your grip tightens on your glass. “Or the right one...”
When you end up in his room, the both of you fumbling to unbutton and remove clothes as you kiss, his mouth soft yet insistent against yours, you tell yourself this is enough. As he pushes you down onto the bed, strong arms caging you in as he bites and sucks the tender skin between your neck and shoulder, you tell yourself this doesn’t need to be anything serious.
But afterwards, when his hard, lean body curls languidly around you, bare skin warm and smooth against your own, it’s hard not to imagine more — waking up beside him every morning, having breakfast together, straightening his usually-crooked tie while he pokes fun at you... You want all of it. 
For now, though, you settle for his deep, steady breaths and the way he sleepily pulls you closer, arms tight around you.
• • •
When you wake up the next morning, Sukuna is propped up beside you, dark eyes unreadable.
“Watching me sleep?” you ask, voice slightly hoarse as you roll over to look at the clock beside the bed. Six o’clock. Plenty of time to get ready for another day of work.
“Creepy, I know.” His tone is flat, but he looks gentler than usual, with his bed head and placid expression. In the early morning light, you can see the full extent of his tattoos, bold, wide lines that trace across his body. They suit him, but you can’t put your finger on why.
“Look, can we... talk? About last night?”
You stiffen, mentally preparing yourself for what comes next. 
“This was fun, but we’re better off as friends.” “We can do this again, but I’m not interested in anything serious.” “This was a mistake. Let’s pretend it never happened.”
But instead, what Sukuna says is, “This wasn’t just sex for me. I’m not really into that. Well, not anymore...” He runs a hand through his hair. “I, uh... Like you?” It comes out as a question, and his brow furrows, looking agitated. “I’m fucking this up.”
He must not expect your laugh, because his eyes widen at the sound. But you’re just so relieved. “I like you, too, dumbass.”
“Dumbass?” He playfully shoves at you. “So romantic.”
“What, you’re gonna change your mind?”
His hand moves from your shoulder to your face, stroking your cheek. “Nah... I knew what I was getting into. But the romantic thing... I think I can fix that.”
“Oh yeah?”
He grins. “You. Me. The huge, fancy bathtub. Room service. Does having mimosas with breakfast count as drinking on the job?”
You turn your head and press a kiss to his palm. “I won’t tell if you won’t.”
“You’re bad,” he growls, leaning over you, his breath warming your upturned lips. “When did that happen?”
“When I met this guy. He’s smart, sexy, kind of a jerk —” The rest of your words dissolve into a breathy gasp as he kisses you, teeth nipping against your bottom lip.
“Yeah, yeah... Less talking, hm? Now, how about that bath?”
253 notes · View notes
kyberphilosopher · 3 years
Text
Atonement
Requested: yes. 
Word Count: 4193 Cal must deal with the consequences of his comrades deception and injuries, while they must deal with what this means for their relationship. 
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Atonement is the concept of a person taking action to correct previous wrongdoing on their part, either through direct action to undo the consequences of that act, equivalent action to do good for others, or some other expression of feelings of remorse.
.✫*゚・゚。.★.*。・゚✫*. 
Once upon a time, Anakin wasn’t all bad. But maybe that was why he died. After that, there wouldn’t have been competition for someone that was all bad, or at least somewhat worse than Anakin was alone. 
Not that Anakin was a complete and utter angel. You knew, not better than anyone but still enough, that Anakin wasn’t all good either. And sure, most people aren’t, but your Master wasn’t most people. Far more talented and powerful was he than the other Jedi Knights, but far more unhinged was he who could not control himself. Anakin was the latter. 
The other Jedi seemed to pity you. It wasn’t as if Anakin Skywalker was always inherently kind on you. You weren’t funny like Ahsoka, or respectable like Obi-Wan. In fact, Anakin had a suspicion that there was something inside of you that reminded him of his mother. Thus, he was cold. And he rarely bothered to teach in the way that people deserved to be taught. 
He doesn’t like me, you remember thinking. He never will. 
You had been the perfect padawan. You were certain you had done everything right. And yet, Anakin’s stare was icy, when he bothered to look your way at all. Where had your Master gone after the Purge anyway?
Your eyes open slowly. 
Light peels across your vision, smeared from the art of being tired. Once your lids are widened, the back of your right hand lays across your forehead lazily. You had been dreaming, hadn’t you? But what had it been about? And why did it seem so hard to remember?
Maybe it was about your Master again, you realize as you exhale. No- ex Master now. But maybe it had been about him. It wouldn’t have been the first time. 
You’re a Clone Killer. 
Eyebrows crease with a twitch. You’ve laid in bed with too much comfort now. It’s time to get up. Stars, but the bed is warm and your legs are tangled in your comforter just right. When’s the next time you’ll get to feel this relaxed and sleepy?
Must’ve been the worst Padawan in history. 
“Shit,” you whisper with closed eyes. Yes, now you’re more than certain that it’s time to get up. Comfort doesn’t matter today. 
.✫*゚・゚。.★.*。・゚✫*.
The restroom door hisses to a close behind you. Rubbing the back of your neck, you begin your sluggish march to the ships deck. You can already smell Greez’s cooking wafting from around the corner. What is that? Sausage and... is that eggs?
Your pants scuff against each other, sweatshirt twisting with the reach of your arm. As the floor transitions from metal to stiff rug, you pull your chair out. 
“Ah, good morning sleepyhead,” you hear Greez’s voice call out to you. Your eyes remain sleepy, gazing down at the table. Doesn’t even look present, Cal observes as his eyes flick over your face. 
“Well, aren’t you a ray of sun today,” Dritus continues from the stove. One of his four hands flick the pan over the stove up with an explosive sizzle. “Be careful you don’t make me feel bad, so I don’t feel inclined to give you more of my food.”
“I slept in too late,” you mutter, half to yourself. 
At the other side of the table, Cal’s stocky form is hunched over. One of his hands is wrapped around a cup on the table, which is covered in cold perspiration. Soft ginger hair falls back as he looks over you. You could feel his pretty, kaleidoscope eyes from the other side of the universe. He doesn’t say anything, though, and you’re too tired to play the “What’s He Thinking About?” game right now. 
“You’re damn right you did,” the Latero says. “Cal here was just about to go and check in on you.”
You swallow quickly, glancing up at the man parallel to you. Cal is looking over at Greez, given you a clear view of his jaw and the scar that stretches over his neck. He’s beautiful. He always has been. You can feel your ears start to burn, and you look away almost immediately. 
“Thanks,” you say instead, finally pulling your hand away from your neck. Without even realizing it, your intelligent orbs look to Cal again. This time, however, your eyes meet. Electric pulses run through you, tickling from your neck to your pelvis. And, true to your nature, you brake gazes immediately. “I think I’ll skip out on breakfast today.”
“Seriously?” Greez whirls around, dumbfounded. “But... breakfast is the most important meal of the day!”
That’s true. Ever since you gained the privilege of having Greez Dritus the wanted Latero to cook for you, breakfast had been far more likeable. He always knows how to add the perfect amount of spice and flavor without coming off as overbearing. But there’s something in the back of your throat, crawling up to the tip of your tongue. A name of an old master, and the dream that you can’t remember. 
“I’m just not hungry,” you push yourself out of your stool and slide it back under the table. Cal watches your form jog down the steps and disappear into the cockpit, his lips parted and near pulling into a frown. 
“Wonder what her problem is,” Greez’s raspy voice calls into the air. 
“Let her be,” a mature female voice breaks as it rounds the corner. Cere emerges from the hallway by the stares, her watchful eyes also glued on the cockpit archway. “She’ll come around.”
Will you? Cal wonders. You’ve always been a bit tight lipped in the grand scheme of things, but today the anguish is peeling off of you like steam. You seem pale in the way that conveys sickness. The dark circles under your eyes are wise, but tired. Maybe you’re just ill. 
It’s not that far off. As you flip switches around on the console pointlessly, all you have to think about are these hands that disappointed your Master. Calloused, rough fingers. Raw palms from holding your saber. Clever, but never enough. 
You exhale through your nose, your shoulders sinking. 
Oh, that’s right. That’s what happened to your Master.
How could you have forgotten that?
“Rough night?”
You perk up at the sound of his voice, but don’t turn around. It’s not that you don’t want to look at Cal, it’s that you feel to ashamed of yourself to even try it. You don’t deserve to look upon him. 
“Just feeling sick,” you mutter so hoarse he can barely hear. 
“Is that the truth?”
Your eyes widen stiffly. One heel at a time, your feet turn around until you are facing your companion. 
Time slows as you look at Cal. His soft orange hair billows in the air conditioning, kaleidoscope eyes twinkling with wonder. The freckles, the jaw, the chapped pink lips. He is beautiful. The way he looks at you now makes you feel guiltier than usual. 
Why don’t you just tell him? Tell him you know the person who’s responsible for that scar on his stomach. Tell him you were trained by him. Tell him about your nightmare last night, how you woke up in cold sweats. But you can’t. You just can’t. 
“Yeah,” you say hoarsely, eyes glued to his. 
Cal steps forward suddenly, almost losing his balance. His soft, pink lips come dangerously close to yours. You can smell his scent, turning your jaw to meet him instinctively. But it was just an accident. 
He steps away to regain his balance. The only sound in the room is that of the air vents. 
He wasn’t going to kiss you. 
Cal stays still, firm. “I hope you feel better,” he says in the same tone as before, though far more sincere. 
And he turns away and walks out of the room, leaving you alone with only the air to comfort you.
.✫*゚・゚。.★.*。・゚✫*.
The leaves crunch under boots as they do. Twigs snap, pebbles crumble. Dirt scuffs against each shoe. 
Above you, the Kashyyyk trees whisper in the wind, allowing pools of sunlight to fall in between the loose spaces of green. The breeze tickles at the skin on your arms. It’s a nice day. But this is still not enough to improve the sick feeling in your stomach. 
Maybe you really were just a failure of a padawan after all. 
“Hey,” the boy beside you calls. “Look up there.”
You raise your head, squinting through the thin, rainbow rays of sun. Up ahead of you, over a steep drop that could be anything from a river to an abyss, is a great mechanical building. It’s sleek and gray, standing out against the natural beauty. This itself is enough proof of Imperial presence. 
“I thought they would’ve left by now,” you mutter, slightly in awe. Birds fly over the fort as if it didn’t bother them for a second, and the waterfall nearby doesn’t cease its babbling. “Why haven’t they left by now?”
“Only one way to find out,” Cal tells you after some seconds of silence. 
Something rushes through the air then- a gust of wind that only you seem to feel. It’s haunting and low, like it has it’s own voice or musical theme of doom. It’s almost impossible to tell whether it’s a warning, a promise, or some kind of mockery, but it feels dark. More importantly, it feels like a message. But Cal doesn’t move a muscle. Only his orange locks billow in time with his lashes, which close slowly. 
“Wait,” you break the quiet. “Maybe we shouldn’t.”
The boys eyes are furrowed when his head turns to you. His pale green eyes flash briefly in the sunlight, but the twinkle of confusion and curiosity remain after the flash disappears. “Why not?”
The rush of wind slows until you can barely feel it anymore. The words are on the tip of your dried up tongue, but you’re not even sure what they are. What can you say to explain your... your fear? It’s more than just intuition or a gut feeling. It’s something you know for a fact, and you have the evidence, but you can’t even hold it. 
“It’s dangerous,” you decide, your bottom lip shaking too quick to notice. You say it almost casually, almost as if it were obvious. And of course, it is. Thus the flaw in your attempt. 
“Most things are,” Cal replies. 
Just then, the pitter pattering of little metal feet tap against the dirt and mulch comes to life. It completely cuts away what little presence the ominous air had left, only allowing BD-1′s happy little whirs to clearly ring through. 
Cal’s hands rest on his hips as he turns his head to look at his partner. He squats to the ground with his little calm smile. “Would it make you feel better if I sent BD to scout ahead?”
It wouldn’t at all. All you can think about instead is your little scrapped friend getting his sliced clean off with a long, red blade. Cal wouldn’t even be able to fix him. 
“BD, go on ahead,” Cal tells the machine. He scratches along BD’s head for encouragement, and the creature doesn’t even seemed miffed before hopping off into the leaves and trees until he’s completely out of sight. 
“I don’t- I don’t think-” your hands ball to fists at your sides. A lump forms in your throat like an invisible bubble, or a heavy ball clogging your airway. 
“Y/N?” Cal’s brows furrow once more as he twists and stands again. “You look pale.”
Another wave of wind flows through. It’s the same as before- cold, threatening, filled with something angry and sad and warning you to never have to feel it for real. However, your partner feels it this time too. 
His eyes leave yours and drop to the ground behind him as he twists in concern, looking around for whatever could be the cause. Subconsciously, his right hand lifts from his side to the right side of his ribs. Your eyes widen in understanding, but you wish so badly it was anything but that. 
“Do you feel that?” Cal calls out to you, still trying to locate the presence that doesn’t even exist. 
Yes, you think as you watch the boys other hand slip over his saber. I feel it. 
.✫*゚・゚。.★.*。・゚✫*.
Anakin wasn’t always evil. Whether or not he’s even evil now is up for debate. But for as long as you knew him, in your eyes at least, he was your hero. Not because he helped you, which he didn’t, or because he wanted the best for you, which he didn’t care about. But because he was strong, and someone to look up to. He’s the knight in shining armor that every little boy wants to be like when they grow up, and the warrior every feminist wants to be equal to. Anakin Skywalker was, by all means, a dream. 
So then why is this the worst you’ve ever felt?
“Master?” your voice wheezes out. There’s a storm all around you, a personal tornado for the three of you that makes everything but roaring hard to hear. Rapid blinking helps to keep the dust from your eyes every few seconds, but not enough. It’s starting to sting.
“Stop,” you hear another voice say, but it’s muffled with chokes. “Stop...”
This isn’t Anakin. This is a man of metal- obsidian and iron and cooled magma. There’s not a single inch of flesh showing. The cape, whipping wildly in the wind, is the closest thing to organic. It’s tattered, and the wind gives the illusion of it bleeding away like inky smoke.
“Join me,” False Anakin calls. His fist clenched with determination, a red glow brightening up the area. “Serve your master.”
.✫*゚・゚。.★.*。・゚✫*.
And from Cal’s position, you just look plain pretty. Kind of distraught, with faded eyes and slightly knitted brows paired with a frown. Your hair is sort of billowing in time with the storm around you, along side that weapon on your belt. Really, you look sad. 
Cal’s fingers dig into the dirt and sand beneath his body. His whole form feels like it’s going to rip away into dust, like Vader doesn’t want him there. And of course, he doesn’t. He hasn’t even given Cal a glance. That being said, his whole stomach feels entirely enflamed. Especially that one special place where he’d felt Vader’s touch before. Now Cal knows that you must’ve been touched by him as well. It’s the worst feeling in the world. 
“Don’t,” he chokes. Cal gets a mouthful of dirt in the process, but he doesn’t even register it. “Y/N-”
.✫*゚・゚。.★.*。・゚✫*.
“-will come back from this.”
Your eyes open. They feel stiff and dry, like how you imagine a mummy’s would. The light over head is blinding and white, with flecks of rainbow bouncing off it at the sharper edges. You do not react in any way. 
Internal bleeding of the stomach, one impalement scar on your right side. There is a long, long series of blisters and torn skin across your shoulder from being tossed and dragged across the ground. Then there’s the slit over your left eye which makes it impossible to open. You might as well have lost it. 
Some people would’ve been happy to just be alive. Fighting Darth Vader? Fighting Anakin Skywalker? And surviving it? Well, not everyone gets that privilege. But for some reason the appreciation isn’t coming to you. Maybe you should’ve died back then as some kind of last apology. 
“I know they will.”
You hear footsteps from beyond the doorway become more and more faint, until you can’t even hear them at all. The metal door hisses open. There’s a few footsteps against the floor, then a sharp pause. 
Your head rolls to your right lazily. A young man stands before you. A cute redhead with a broad chest and wide, shocked pale green eyes. Underneath them are mauve rings- dark circles and bags- and chapped pink lips. 
Cal opens his mouth to speak, and then spins around. With the flick of your wounded fingers, the entrance to the room closes and seals itself shut with a click. The cute redhead is still, his back away from you. 
Maybe because of the loss of some other senses, your Jedi one’s have heightened. The intuition inside of you is reading his color- his entire aura- something you could’ve sworn you weren’t able to do before. There’s so much anxiety from him. Enough to make up from the lack of anxiety you have right about now. 
“You’re awake,” he speaks. You can sense his voice about to crack. “I should tell the others.”
“Don’t be stupid, Cal,” your raspy voice croaks. “Don’t be fucking stupid.”
He turns around to look at you, one foot at a time. His eyes are downturned tiredly, but mostly from sadness. The corners of his lips are annoyed from your words. “You’ve been asleep for two weeks,” Cal says. “Didn’t know if you were coming back.”
You don’t say anything.
His use of the words ‘coming back’ sting. Just two simple words, which to you feel like they mean something far more deep and sinister. Almost as sinister as yourself. 
“Are you okay?” he proceeds to question, though you both know it’s just out of politeness. 
“I can’t see out of my eye.”
“Do you know why?”
You don’t move. You’re quiet yet again. 
Cal’s voice raises frustratingly. “Do you know why? You let someone put a lightsaber to your face just so you could smash in their helmet!”
“I don’t remember that.”
“He stabbed you in your stomach!”
Cal’s never raised his voice at you before. You wish you were more upset about it. His tone alone is enough to make a sinking weight appear in the pit of your stomach. But you can’t cry. You can barely feel anything but both relief and emptiness. Not once in those two weeks did you dream about either Anakin, or Vader. 
“I watched him pick you up and slam you on the ground! I watched you die about a million times out there!”
“I’m just glad you’re okay,” you mutter hoarsely. And you mean that, too. 
“I thought that...”
Don’t. Don’t tell him. 
“I thought that I was going to hurt you.”
Silence fills the room from corner to corner. Even whatever air that once came from the vents has come to a complete halt. Maybe every system in the galaxy has stopped its turn. 
“What?” Cal asks, now much softer. He takes a gentle step towards you, his eyes desperately locked to your own.
You glance down before back to him. “I was his apprentice before the purge. Don’t ask Cere about it- he never talked about me. I doubt there was even paperwork to confirm it. I thought this was coming but... I wasn’t sure.”
Cal takes another step forward. 
“He never liked me. And then on Kashyyyk... he...” You swallow down the shame for a moment. “He told me he wanted me to be his apprentice again. For real this time.”
“So you fought him,” Cal partially pieces together. 
You swallow again and look down to your hands. 
“Cal, I fought him because I wanted to go with him. I saw my- I saw the future he was talking about. It was good for me. I was happy... sort of.”
He’s finally close enough to sit on the end of the bench that you didn’t even process lying on. There’s concern in his eyes as he listens, and he doesn’t dare take them off your face. It makes you feel like even more of a coward. 
“But I didn’t see you there, too. I didn’t see anyone there. I thought maybe I... I thought maybe I had killed you.”
Cal opens his parched lips slightly, and then closes them. 
“And I really don’t want to kill you.”
Cal looks away. From here, sitting up slightly so you didn’t choke in your sleep, you can make out freckles on his neck. They stretch over his tendons, across his jawline. They’ll no doubt stretch over that scar from his jaw down on the other side. His long lashes move as he blinks. His hair looks softer than ever. 
“After the battle I carried you away. After it was done you just... looked at me. And then you collapsed, and I had to carry you.”
Silence. 
Cal gets up. 
“Cal?” you call, louder than you meant. 
The boy turns back to look at you. 
“I...”
Is he prettier than before?
“Do you hate me?”
Cal creases his brows. 
“Do you... are you going to talk to me again?”
He opens his mouth, but you don’t let him speak. 
“Don’t say it, if you don’t mean it. I was trained by the most dangerous person in the galaxy. By your biggest enemy. I... lied to you about it. I almost killed you, Cal. You can hate me.”
“Do you think I hate you?”
Your eye squints, and finally it glosses over as it wells with tears. “Yeah.”
Cal Kestis. Man of your dreams. Hero of everything. Angel of infinity. Please, don’t hate me. You have every right to, I know. But please- please don’t. 
“I don’t think I could ever hate you,” he finally whispers, looking down at the floor. “Maybe you should’ve told me, but... I think deep down I already knew.”
A questioning look appears over your features, but Cal answers before you can ask. “You’d been acting off for weeks, Y/N. Those nightmares were about Vader, weren’t they.”
“Yeah. They were... Do you... think of me any differently?”
Please. 
“...No. I don’t know if I could ever do that to you.”
“I couldn’t think of you differently either,” you say after a moment. You throat is getting scratchy, but it’s hard to care. 
“I care about you, Y/N,” he tells you, sincere but calm. “You know that don’t you?”
“You wouldn’t have carried me if you didn’t care, Cal.”
“Y/N on the morning of this whole thing I wanted to kiss you,” he snaps, his hands limply swinging with urgency. “I should’ve kissed you.”
So many emotions in one conversation. 
“You can still kiss me now that I’m clean with you.”
Cal looks at you for a long time, his tired, bright eyes searching for something in your stillness. Then he looks down. 
“It’s okay, Cal. It’s part of my atonement.”
He looks at you for a long time again. The corner of his lips twitch upwards for just a second. It puts you at ease somewhat, with a warm feeling spreading in your stomach finally. 
“You’ve got nothing to atone for,” Cal says. “I won’t let anything happen to you, Y/N.”
You have nothing to say. No words come to your dry tongue, although your lips hang open like something will come out. Nothing does. You just look at your redhead, who’s tired and distraught, but has more clarity and love than he ever has in his entire life. He won’t raise his voice to you again. 
Your palm dances again as you look to away. The door finally opens again, and Cal forgot that you had initially even caged him in here. 
“You can go now.”
It’s quiet. You can hear shuffling, slow footsteps like maybe he doesn’t want to leave. “Can I kiss you when I get back?”
Even while looking at the wall right next to you, your face goes hot and pink. 
“Maybe,” your husky voice answers. And when you turn to look back at him, he’s already looking at you with a genuine smile like a little boy getting a big present that they can’t believe. That’s how he sees it, anyway. 
“I don’t hate you, Y/N,” he suddenly says. “I could never hate you.”
.✫*゚・゚。.★.*。・゚✫*.
Idk if I’m happy with this or not? I ran into a bunch of writers block with this I don’t know why. Sorry it took so long to put out anyway. I also might change it to better fit the request because that’s really the most important thing to me and with finishing it after literal months I might’ve lost sight of the whole point. Idk though. Cal is a cutie. 
TAGLIST: @omg-we-really-doo @chokemeanakin @anakinswhore @haztory @fanficsforheartandsoul @kit-jpg @ahsokatano-thetogruta
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Here to Misbehave (Pt. 12 | S.R.)
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Series Masterlist | Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Finale |
Summary: A week later, Reader tries to reconnect with Spencer.  Couple: Spencer/Fem!Reader 
 Category: Smut (NSFW) 
 Content Warning: Adults w/ Age Gap (10yrs), penetrative sex, degradation, Daddy kink, unprotected sex, BDSM, choking Word Count: 8.3k
MASTERLIST
—————————————————
You might think that dating Spencer Reid would make doing your homework way easier, but you would be wrong. Turns out that dating a genius includes him lecturing you on the importance of learning things yourself.
That’s why I had been sitting at his kitchen table with him for at least two hours, struggling to finish the last five problems on my assignment while he casually read a book in a language I couldn’t even place.
“Speenceeerrr.” I called from across the table, reaching in his direction with the saddest pout I could form.
“Don’t whine,” he answered without even looking up. Jerk.
“I’m bored,” I continued to whine without any shame, “Can I come sit on your lap?”
“No.”
Biting the inside of my cheek, I realized he was in one of his stubborn moods. But that was fine.  I could deal with stubborn.
“Please?” I asked, only to receive another immediate “No.”
This time I put both of my hands in front of me, pressing my breasts together while I leaned over the table as I asked, “… Pretty please?”
That was enough to get him to finally lower his book, peeking across the table to see me staring at him with wide doe eyes and a coy smile.
“You’re very cute,” he said with an extremely brief smile, returning back to his book when he concluded, “Still no.”
“Come on!” I cried with a groan, “I promise I’ll behave.”
He laughed at that, idly flipping a page before speaking. “Oh, you do? You promise?”
“Yes!”
“Fine. Bring your homework,” he instructed, gesturing to me to come over without ever putting down his book.
I scrambled to collect everything, happily padding over to him and dumping my book, notepad, and pencils in front of him. Once I was there, though, he suddenly raised his hand to stop me.
“Take off your pants.”
With a raised eyebrow, I shifted my hip to the side to inspect his suspiciously calm, vague demeanor.
“Why?”
“Because I said so.”
Considering that response was completely unhelpful but also incredibly hot, I listened. I tried to make a little bit of a show out of it, but his eyes were glued to the page in front of him until my pants finally hit the ground.
“Take off the rest.”
It was then that he started to look at me. He sucked his bottom lip into his mouth, licking his lips as he began undoing his own pants.
The sound of his buckle coming undone was enough to spark butterflies in my stomach, and I began removing my underwear with a renewed vigor.
“Don’t look so excited, little girl,” he warned in that low register that usually accompanied his more dominant persona. I considered arguing back, but ultimately just let out a playful giggle.
After he had finally removed his bottoms enough to reveal himself, I bounced on my toes as I waited for the command I knew was coming.
“Sit down.”
There it was. Allowing him to guide my hips to turn me around so that I was facing the table, I swung my leg over him to straddle his lap, lowering down onto him slowly.
And slow was the only word for it. He didn’t allow me to move more than an inch every few seconds, his breath hitching each time until I was fully seated on him.
I could feel the blood rushing to my face, my mouth hung open with hungry breaths. When I tried to begin moving my hips, however, he halted me with a firm grip on my hips.
He clicked his tongue in my ear, digging his fingers into my sides as he held me there. “I don’t think so. You’re going to sit here and stay very still until I tell you to move.”
“But—“ I barely got a word in edgewise before he countered.
“You promised to behave. Now do your homework. I want to finish what I’m reading.”
I huffed, struggling to move one more time and ultimately failing. “You can’t be serious.”
“Do your work and be patient and maybe I’ll fuck you, or get up and get nothing. Those are your options.”
I was certain that if I could see him, he would have that clever, devilish smirk he always wore when he was fucking with me. But I forced myself to keep my eyes straight ahead, leaning forward to grab my pencil from the table to hopefully finish my work quickly. If he wasn’t going to check it, I could just bullshit it.
Of course, as soon as my pencil hit the page he shifted underneath me in a very purposeful way, forcing himself even deeper into me.
“Fuck!” I gasped, gripping my pencil tighter as I arched my back.  
“Language.”
With a deep breath, I forced a smile as I issued an extremely sarcastic apology.
“Sorry, daddy.”
After that he was much kinder, allowing me to work without any more rude interruptions. Granted, my maximum capacity to function was still very low, and it took me at least ten minutes to finish three of the five questions.
It was hard enough having him inside of me, the warm throbbing of his cock like an extension of myself at this point, but once he finished the book, it was a completely different level of impossible. Because no sooner did the book hit the table than were both of his hands on me.
One hand remained rooted on my hip, halting any attempts at movement while the other crept up to fondle my chest. I took the new ministrations to be permission to move, but he quickly cut off that train of thought as he leaned his chest against my back.
“I didn’t tell you to stop.”
“Daddy—“ I desperately whined, my hips moving with a mind of their own even as he tried to hold me down. Spencer was still dedicated to making it worse, moving my hair to one side and latching his mouth onto my neck.
“Keep going,” he mumbled into the skin.  
So I tried. I cannot stress enough how hard I tried, my mind functioning much like a toddler being told to focus on math while sitting in front of a fucking funfetti birthday cake.
“Wrong.” Spencer whispered in my ear, his eyes apparently watching my botched attempts at my homework. With a general sound of displeasure, I erased my previous answer and changed it.
“Still wrong.”
Breaking the scene for just a second, I hoarsely begged, “Please, Spencer.”
He must have sensed my mounting frustration, because soon he was palming my breast much harder, his hand finally letting my hips begin to rock.
“Tell me, is it just because my dick is in you, or are you always this clueless?”
The breath left my lungs in short bursts, his words both hurtful and hot against my ear. I didn’t let it faze me, still scribbling some answer on the sheet while I spoke. “I-I told you before I can’t... I can’t focus when you’re inside me.”
He lowered his hands, running them down my bare thighs before dragging them back up, leaving angry red marks in his wake.
“You should’ve thought about that before you asked to sit on my lap.”
This time, he lightly nibbled on my ear once he stopped talking, laughing at the way a shiver ran through my body.
“I didn’t think you would do... this,” I quietly confessed.
“So you just wanted to tease me? And now you’re mad I beat you at your own game?”
Rocking back and forth, I groaned, “It wasn’t a game, I just wanted to sit on your lap!”
“And now you are sitting on my lap and you’re still whining.” He retorted, his hands returning to their heavy petting wherever they could reach.
“Because I want you to fuck me!”
“That wasn’t part of the deal.”
If I had been sexually frustrated before, now I was essentially feral. The harder I tried to move, the more he tried to stop me until I got fed up, forcing out a few hostile words.
“Fuck you.”
His hand flew up to my face, grabbing my cheeks roughly and forcing my lips to pucker.
“Watch your mouth.”
“Why would I listen to you if you aren’t going to fuck me?” I muttered through my contorted face, now struggling to lift off his lap.
He wasn’t having that, though, and roughly tugged me back down onto him while he thrusted up into me.
“Because I said so,” he ever so kindly reminded.  
“Fuck!” I cried out at the rough intrusion, continuing with an even angrier exclamation, “Fuck you!”
“Fine.”
I’m not sure what it was about his voice when he uttered that one syllable, but dread coursed through my veins. I couldn’t tell exactly what was coming, but I knew he was going to have fun doing it.
“If you want me to fuck you, I will.”
Before I could protest, he had swept the items on the table onto the ground and lifted me off of him. He dropped me harshly against the table, standing so he could have the upper ground.
“After all, you have quite a bit of naughty behavior to answer for. And right now, I’m more than happy to administer the punishment.”
I rolled my eyes at the way he always managed to drag these things out. We both knew I was going to be a brat, so why waste our time with threats I clearly wanted him to follow through on?
“Just shut up and fuck me already.”
Spencer bitterly laughed, staring down at me with far too much amusement as his fingers brushed over my lips.
“How badly do you want it, little girl?” He said as he continued the trend of sudden, rough movements by shoving his fingers down my throat. “I should’ve warned you not to do anything to me you don’t expect me to do to you in return.”
Gagging lightly on his fingers pressing down against my tongue, I only felt my need for him to fuck me skyrocket. Through the lustful haze, I managed to remember what he had done to me in this situation… and how I had responded.
I bit down on his fingers just hard enough to leave a small indentation on them, and he jerked his hand back the same way I had.
His slap across my face was just as hard, too. The sound filled the room, and I had to bite back a moan at the way my cheek stung where his hand had hit.
When I turned my face back to him, I bit my lip before smiling.
“Do it again,” I giggled.
But he didn’t listen, because of course he didn’t. Instead, he grabbed my hips, flipping me onto my stomach on the table, my face pressed against the wood.
“I don’t take orders from you, bitch.”
Another shiver ran down my spine at his words paired with the sound of his belt slowly being removed from the loops of his pants.
“And honestly? I’m tired of hearing your voice.” He finished, his hand reaching around to open my mouth. He worked the belt between my teeth like a bit for a horse, tugging back on the material. With my head craned back, I began to rub my legs together, already missing the way it felt to be filled by him.
I tried to groan in disapproval, but it just came out as garbled noise. Spencer didn’t seem to mind.
“It’s been so long that you’ve forgotten I’m not as nice as you. That I’ve been taming brats a lot longer than you.”
For a moment I was left there just like that, laid out on his kitchen table for his consumption. I could tell from the silence that he was enjoying watching me squirm, taking in the brief image of me submitting to him without a fight.
But then the moment ended with one swift thrust into me. The force was enough to rattle the table and I grunted from the impact.
“If you’ve got a problem, don’t bother trying to tell me, because I don’t fucking care.” As he spoke, he gave a thrust after each clause, somehow becoming progressively more aggressive.
I’d felt him like this once before, although under different circumstances. This time he wasn’t just using me to get through pain. This was something else.
The freedom I could feel flowing between us was intoxicating, and for once in my life I didn’t want to fight him. I didn’t have to. He was already doing everything I could have ever asked of him.
At least, that’s what I thought until he started talking again.
“God, you’re so fucking wet,” he muttered under his breath, rolling his hips slowly to make sure he was fully entering me with each thrust. “You really love keeping your daddy’s cock warm, don’t you, little girl?”
It was always strange, to feel the duality of Spencer. The way that his words could sound so much like praise while littered with downright filthy words. Or how he used one hand to gag me with his belt and the other tenderly caressed my sides.
“You’re so good at being a pretty little slut for me. Letting me use you.”
His voice was so smooth, with a confidence I was unaccustomed to hearing from him. My fingernails scraped at the table, trying to fight against the way my entire body slid against the wood.
I could feel my muscles desperately clenching around him, my feet trying to remain on the floor. The light struggle didn’t go unnoticed, with a dark laugh coming from Spencer as he leaned over top of me, pressing me down with the weight of his body.  
“I don’t understand how a slut like you has such a tight little cunt.”
A loud moan escaped from the little space between my teeth and the leather, and I could feel the saliva dripping down my chin. Tears had already started forming in my eyes, my cheekbone still raw from his hand now burning against the table.
“What’s it going to take to break you, huh? Or have I already?” He whispered as his fingers gripped my hips with bruising force.
“No fight left in you, little girl? You gonna give up? You gonna cry?” He mocked, earning my first attempt at a response. The gag got in my way, though, and it just came out as a wrecked sob as he entered me with another rough thrust.
“Speak up.”
The next noise out of my mouth was a guttural groan, my back arching enough to lift my face from the table and loosen the belt against my lips.
“Here, I’ll make it easier for you.” He said before using his hand to wrench the accessory from my teeth, tossing it in front of me on the table. I could see my teeth marks against the leather.
“S-Spe…” I tried, but couldn’t even finish his name. My mind seemed somewhere else, some place to which only he could take me. Nothing else mattered here; nothing except pleasing him.
Which is what made his nails against my skin so exciting. But still, it wasn’t nearly as exciting as the way he continued to laugh at the mess he made of me.
“How pathetic. You can’t even say my name? Doesn’t matter anyway.” He stood back up, providing him the leverage to drive further into me once more, pulling my hips back against him with both hands now.
“A useful cunt doesn’t talk. So don’t even think about bothering with your little safe word now. I’m not stopping until I’m finished taking what’s mine.”
I’m not sure if it was from the way my lips caught on the wood, how hard I was biting down on my lip, or a mark from the belt, but I could taste blood somewhere on my lips.  
“Don’t stop.” My voice was weak and hoarse from disuse, but the words were audible, and that’s all I cared about.
I was a little surprised, though, when Spencer immediately withdrew. Then I realized that I had inadvertently given him another order, and he didn’t seem too happy about the fact it was one he wanted to follow.
With much more strength than needed, he lifted me by my arm and flipped me onto my back. My joints had given up even when the rest of me hadn’t, leaving me lolling like a rag doll under his will.
I could only imagine what he saw, my cheek only slightly less red than the blood tainted spit covering my chin as I held my body open to him.
The smirk on his face was positively feral, like a predator admiring his catch before going in for the kill.
“You’re so fucking filthy. You actually like this, don’t you?”
When I didn’t immediately answer, he brought his hand against my cheek much lighter this time. Although I knew it wasn’t a smart response, I couldn’t help but giggle at the way it caused goosebumps to ripple over my skin.
His hips snapped forward, entering me completely all at once. Spencer couldn’t stop himself from moaning, belying his stoic nature in scenes like this. He was enjoying himself so much that he couldn’t hide it anymore, and the thought just made my heart beat harder.
“Fuck me harder, daddy!” I suddenly begged, rocking my hips forward in time with his thrusts.
“God, you’re such a dirty bitch,” he responded, doing exactly what I’d asked by driving into me as the table screeched against the floor. It didn’t last long, with his hand coming up to my throat and clenching my airway within seconds. There was no warning this time.
“You’re nothing but a little toy that likes being fucked like a cheap whore.”
I would have screamed out in agreement, but I could barely manage to breathe under his unrelenting grip. Instead, my eyes began to roll to the back of my head, my mouth open in an attempt to take in any air.
“Go ahead, go to sleep, little girl. I don’t need you to be awake for this part.”
The butterflies in my stomach had migrated to my chest, filling every inch of space that used to be filled with air. The burning in my face was even hotter now, and I honestly felt I might collapse in on myself if he didn’t finish soon.
Luckily, his hips began to falter the longer he watched me scraping at his hand on my throat. With one more thrust, he threw his head back with closed eyes.
The sweat on his brow showed just how much of himself he gave to this moment, and I couldn’t have been more grateful. Seeing him come undone inside of me was one of my favorite past times.
“Fuck!” He growled through clenched teeth. His fingers twitched harder against my neck as I felt him spill his release deep inside of me, his hips still trying to push further into me. Once he opened his eyes, it’s like he suddenly remembered that I still hadn’t taken a breath, my face draining of color before he quickly lifted his hand.
I gasped, my lungs both burning and finally relaxing as they filled with air. My energy nearly drained, I hoped to god that he wasn’t planning on making me move anytime soon. For once, I was actually grateful that he hadn’t tried to get me off, too. I’m not sure I could take it.
I closed my eyes and laughed to myself about the irony of me not protesting him staying inside me now. Soon enough, he had pulled out of me, muttering another string of curse words as he tried to find the ability to walk the few feet over to the counter.
The sound of running water felt so far away and so serene. I smiled, knowing what was coming before it happened.
Sure enough, his hands were on me once more, cleaning away the evidence he’d left behind with a warm paper towel.
My face was last, with him taking extra care to be gentle. My eyes fluttered open, looking at the way he seemed to look straight into my soul, seeking any validation he could find that I was going to be alright.
“How are you, little girl?” He asked anyway, and I just sucked my bottom lip into my mouth as I smiled.
“Dirty.”
I had meant it as a joke, but I could see a flash of guilt in his eyes. Grabbing his forearm, I started to try to sit up against my body’s wishes. Something told me he needed me to be closer to him. He needed me to be okay.
“Can you stand up?” He asked, supporting my body weight with both hands on my back.
“Yeah, I think so,” I laughed.
Once I was upright, I realized that while he was still fully dressed, my legs were fucking freezing. Spencer noticed, too, and already had a plan in place for this situation.
“Let me clean you up.”
“You already did,” I responded with a nervous glance when his fingers ran through a piece of my hair hanging in my face. He just gave me that judgmental, deadpan expression that told me he knew I was trying to get out of something.
“Come on,” he said with a light pat on my ass before guiding me towards the bathroom. “We need to warm you up, anyway.”
I couldn’t argue with that; honestly, the idea of a shower sounded delightful. Still, some part of me felt strangely awkward about something so intimate. I clearly wasn’t nervous about him seeing me naked.
The thought of him taking care of me, delicately cleaning away any remaining evidence of sin, just got me much too excited. It didn’t take me long to realize that my apprehension wasn’t going to stop him.
He kept his hand wrapped around mine the whole time, even as he turned on the shower and checked the water. I didn’t mind, enjoying the glimpse into domestic life with Spencer Reid.
Although I was perfectly capable of doing it myself, I let him take off my remaining clothes before helping him remove his.
Steam filled the room that was remarkably calm. The usual suffocating sexual tension felt worlds away as Spencer helped me into the shower. My muscles immediately responded to the hot water, and I let out a happy sigh as I heard him enter behind me.
His hands were back on me, gently caressing every curve of my body under the water. Still, his touch was not sexual in the traditional sense. He pulled me closer, letting the water fall over both of us until there was nothing dry left.
Normally it would uncomfortable, for one of us to have to remain outside of the water, but Spencer didn’t seem to mind. It was like all of the focus he had in that supercharged brain could only be placed on me. Keeping me happy, safe, and warm.
And I was.
I couldn’t tell if he knew that. It felt like he didn’t.
With my back still to him, I heard him rustling with the travel-sized bottles I’d started to leave behind. I wondered to myself if I should just start leaving regular items now.
I was distracted from the thought by his fingers diligently working through my hair and on my scalp, massaging the product into a lather. For a touch I claimed to be nonsexual, I felt it all over my body.
Tilting my head further back, I nearly fell over onto him in the pleasurable haze he’d created. He just gave a small chuckle, nudging me back up so he could continue.
Before he finished, I gave a soft sigh and a mewl. When he turned me around to begin helping me wash it out, I saw the goofy smile on his face.
“I love you.” He said it like it needed to be said at all. As if he weren’t tenderly caring for me in that very moment.
A selfish part of me hated when he said it, because I still wasn’t sure when I could say it back. It seemed like there was never a right time. Before, he had been worried it would be about the suspected pregnancy, and then it had been the drugs. Now, I feared it would be swallowed into that post-coital dysphoria he always brought up.
Thankfully, he didn’t make me say anything.
“Close your eyes.” He said, tilting my chin back and maneuvering his fingers through my hair to rid it of the shampoo.
It had been a long time since I’d felt cared for like this. I didn’t know how to react. My heart was overwhelmed.
He repeated the process with the conditioner, and I remained silent once again. But Spencer didn’t seem like he missed our usual snarky repartee. I began to worry something deeper was wrong... again.
That thought was an unfortunate one to have, because it caused me to turn around. I took his hands in mine, stretching out his arms to see the remnants of bruises still peppered over his skin.
“Don’t think like that, little girl.”
His voice was harsh and crackling, filled to the brim with self loathing that I always hated to hear.
“They’re fading away, and I’m still here. There...” he paused, swallowing and trying to keep himself steady before continuing, “there won’t be any more.”
But there was still a struggle in his words. I wasn’t looking to chastise him, and it hurt to see he expected it. Which is why I began to slowly shift so that he was under the water, a weird mix of a smile masquerading as a pout.
Once he was under the water, he made a face at the way it hit him differently at his height. I ignored it, grabbing his soap from the side of the tub and pouring it into my hand.
He didn’t say anything when I started to run my hands over his chest and back. He just watched me with a quiet reverence, his eyes occasionally closing with a sigh of relief.
They stayed shut when I moved to his arms, wishing I could just wash away what was left of his scars.
“I’m not worried.” I finally spoke as I took his hands in mine, smiling at the way my fingers could be so much smaller than his and still fit so perfectly in his hands. Using the positive inertia, I wrapped my arms around him and let the water wash over both of us like a third member of our embrace.
His hands stroked my back so delicately that I barely noticed them at all. As much as I enjoyed the dramatic change of pace from our earlier activities, there was something undoubtedly off with the way he was holding me now.
I let it go for a minute longer, just so we could make out way back out of the tub. With a speed that I would never expect from someone who had exerted as much energy as he had, Spencer had wrapped me in a towel and left to fetch me his clothes for me to wear in an instant. We both knew that I’d brought my own change of clothes, but neither of us spoke about it. It was much preferable, we had each privately decided, for me to be swamped in the fabrics he loved.
Not a moment too soon we were laying in his bed, curled into a messy pile of limbs trying to convince the other that our bodies really couldn’t exist without the other. I’m not sure if it was the way his fingers still dusted over me like they would shatter me or that look in his eyes, but I couldn’t ignore the feeling any longer.
“Babe,” I cautiously began, taking his hand and pressing it fully against the cheek he so clearly wanted to touch, “Are you alright?”
“Yeah, I’m fine.” It was curt and unconvincing, so I continued.
“Are you sure? You know how I feel about you lying to me.”
He sighed, rolling onto his back and away from me. His arm covered his face, but I could still see the way his eyebrows furrowed beneath it.
“No. I’m sorry.”
“Why are you sorry?”
At this point I was just so grateful that we’d finally made it far enough into our relationship that he didn’t feel the need to lie to me more than once. Still, I was terrified by what he could possibly say next. What was he going to tell me next? That he had a secret child? A wife?
“I just… Sometimes after we have sex I feel…”
He peeked at me, probably noting the confusion and anxiety clear in my features.
“… Like I’m the worst person in the world.”
Those previous emotions were quickly replaced with an exasperated and false gasp as I pulled myself over to him.
“Well, that does wonders for my self-esteem, Dr. Reid.” I laughed, looking up at him from where my head rested against his chest. His heart even sounded troubled somehow.
“No, it’s not that. God, no. You’re amazing.”
“I know, right?” I continued to joke, hoping that it would make his vulnerability at least a little bit easier. It seemed to work, and his arms found their home around me once again.
“I spend almost all of my time, every day, trying to find and stop murderers and rapists. The worst possible people on this earth; people that everyone agrees are evil incarnate, and then I come home and…”
He trailed off, but it was obvious what he was going to say. It was hard to hear him compare himself to the men he hunted. He didn’t talk often about work, but he’d said enough for my chest to hurt at the implication.
“Spencer…”
“How can I feel like I’m a good person when I get off on hurting something as beautiful and innocent as you?”
“I am not innocent,” I scoffed, pushing at his chest to prop myself up again. Positioning myself to hang above him, I smiled when his nose twitched from the way my hair tickled his face. His eyes flickered back and forth, seeing something I’m not sure I would ever understand.
“Yes, you are. It’s one of the many things I love most about you.”
His hand on the back of my head convinced me to close the gap between us. I planted a soft yet meaningful kiss on his lips, but it wasn’t enough to stop the racing thoughts.
“Spencer, you aren’t anything like those guys.” I assured him, running my hand through his damp hair that had just started to curl.
“I’m not always so sure.” His eyes had finally met mine, unsure and petrified all at once.
“Well, I am.” I didn’t know how to explain it to him. He was always the one who had the words to explain things. All I had were quotes from people much smarter than myself.
“Look me in my eyes right now and tell me that you would still enjoy it if you honestly knew I wasn’t having fun.”
“I don’t know.”
I could recognize that he didn’t mean it. Those endorphins he was always talking about were screwing with his head. I’d seen his reactions when I was in pain. He did not like it.
“Spencer. You’re just going to have to believe me when I say that you are a good man. One of the best I’ve ever known.”
His tongue swept over his lips before he bit down on it, trying to swallow his doubts before he could give them any more life.
“I love playing with you, and I trust you with my life because I know you would never do anything to risk it. Okay?”
Spencer looked like he was finally starting to get it. Either that or he had just realized I wasn’t going to change my mind. Regardless, he gave a small pout as he said, “Okay.”
Shimmying further onto him, I swung my leg over his hip so I was practically sprawled over him like a blanket.
“Now tell me you love me,” I teased, settling onto him while he groaned at the sudden weight.
“I do love you.” He laughed when he said it, which was my goal in the first place.
With feigned bashfulness I cooed, “Awww, thanks.”
“You’re such a dork.”
The insult was such a ridiculous notion to me that I was convinced I had heard him wrong.
“Wow, I’m going to pretend like the man with 3 PhDs didn’t just call me a dork.”
I nestled my face to his neck, feeling the way his heartbeat was fluctuating as we began to settle into the calmness of a simple night together.
“It takes a dork to love a dork,” he opined in the dorkiest manner possible. But considering how those words in his voice brought so much joy to my heart, I chose to accept his hypothesis.
“Pffft. Go to sleep, old man.” I muttered, reaching up to loosely cover his mouth with my hand. The feel of his mouth curling into a smile before kissing my palm was all I needed to feel safe enough to sleep.
“Thank you, (y/n).”
“Anytime.”
—————————————————
The next morning felt a lot like the way the previous night had ended. I swear, it was almost like Spencer and I hadn’t moved an inch throughout the night. Maybe we really had been that tired.
Either way, I wasn’t tired anymore. I knew that if I stayed splayed out on top of Spencer while I was this restless, I would wake him up anyway. So I slowly inched off, hoping not to disturb him too much.
To my surprise, he barely stirred. Don’t get me wrong; his arms followed my body and required all of my strength to peel them off of me.
“Babe, I have to get up. I’ll be right back.” I mumbled, practically crawling out of his grip while he grumbled nonsense into the pillow.
He was so adorable that I almost felt bad about leaving him there alone. Almost.
See, Spencer had done so much for me in our relationship up to this point that it was starting to feel lopsided. I didn’t like that. There is something about owing people anything that doesn’t sit right with me.
That’s why, after sleepily brushing my teeth and trying to control the disaster of a bird’s nest on my head that resulted from sleeping on wet hair, I set out to do some good old fashioned chores.
It wasn’t hard to figure out where Spencer kept things - one of the perks of having a boyfriend with such a hatred of germs, I guess.
I don’t honestly know how long I spent topping off the cleaning around his apartment, but it couldn’t have been that long. The place was basically already spotless. Once I was satisfied, I picked up the thing I had been avoiding: my homework.
And that’s when Spencer conveniently awoke, ready to distract me from finishing the last few problems once more.
“I never thought I’d see you willingly doing your homework.”
I turned around from the couch, smiling at the state of my sleepy boyfriend still wrapped in a blanket. Adorable.
“Well, someone distracted me last night.”
“Oh, did they?” He joked as he came over to plant a kiss on the top of my head before making his normal beeline to make his morning cup of coffee. 
But after I heard the familiar clinking of mugs, I paused my work with a smile.
“... Did you... did you do the dishes?”
“Yeah, why?” I called back, hearing the loud grinding of the gears moving in his mind.
“And made coffee.”
“Yes.”
I remained looking forward because somehow it made his confusion all the better. His hand was sliding against the counter top before moving to the stovetop, where I heard him moving the grates.
“... Did you clean my entire kitchen?”
“You’re very perceptive, Dr. Reid.”
He laughed, walking back over to me from the other direction with a pleasant, if not goofy, grin. He was going to say something else, but stopped when he noticed the basket filled with clean laundry on the floor next to the couch.
“You did my laundry? How long have you been awake? How did I sleep through this?”
Although he bent over to pick up the basket and turned to carry it off to the bedroom, he kept his eyes on me, waiting for my answer.
“I don’t know,” I shrugged, “A couple hours? You must have been tired.”
His eyes narrowed in an attempt to see through me, to learn the secrets of how I had managed to out-Spencer Reid him with my particularity.
“What? It’s not a very big place, Spencer. And most of your clothes are dry cleaned.”
As he walked away, I heard him groan. Like he should be embarrassed by the state of his apartment. Honestly, his starting point was cleaner than even the best deep clean would do for my apartment. If anyone was embarrassed, it was me.
“You should’ve woken me up,” he called from the hallway.
“You looked too cute!” I shouted back when he disappeared around the corner. “I didn’t want to ruin it. You don’t get enough sleep.”
Upon his return, he stood above me with a sarcastic scrutiny. I put my pencil down, looking up at him from my cross legged position on his couch.
“Is this what domestic life with you is like?” He asked, unable to hide his admiration any longer.
“Only when you’re nice to me.” I teased, reaching forward to grab the blanket still hanging over his shoulders to pull him closer to me.
“I’m always nice to you.”
“Then I guess that’s your answer.”
Losing his balance just a bit, he awkwardly stumbled onto the couch, plopping down next to me with the total lack of grace I’d come to expect from him.
“Well, thank you. You didn’t have to do any of that.”
“I wanted to.” I admitted, brushing his unruly curls out of his face. “Because now you have nothing to distract you from paying attention to me.”
He groaned, craning his neck away from me at the words, “Should’ve known there was a catch.”
“Oh yes,” I continued, climbing onto his lap with no resistance on his part. “I was thinking you and I could go to the park and…”
“Don’t say it,” he warned, raising a finger to my lips.
I didn’t care, and shouted past the digit, anyway.
“Please, Spencer! Take me for a picnic! Just once!”
“You know how I feel about picnics.”
Now it was my turn to whine, grabbing his hand between mine and lowering it, leaning forward in the hopes it would distract him.
“You can eat before and just feed me fruit. Spoil me rotten.”
My distractions didn’t work, and he didn’t even bother trying to kiss me back. He just spoke hurriedly into my lips.
“It’s not even just the food I’m worried about! Did you see the numbers of Lyme infections in the county?”
My eyebrows popped up, and I stuck my tongue out for a second in my excitement.
“Ooh, Doctor, you can check me for ticks,” I cooed.
Closing the space between us, I gave him a light, chaste kiss. Despite returning it, he also gave back a pout.
“Please don’t make me do this.”
Conveniently, he had forgotten that I was much more experienced at pouting. What I did next wasn’t really a pout, though, it was more like puppy dog eyes and a childish grin meant to evoke the strongest sense of guilt.
He dropped his head back, closing his eyes like he didn’t have an eidetic memory that would burn my cute nonsense into his brain.
“Why does the begging only work one way?”
“Is that a yes?” The excitement was clear in my voice, which must have sealed the deal.
Because he just sighed, running his hands up and down my waist.
“Fine. But I’m going to check you for ticks after and I promise you will not like it.”
This time when his hands made their way down my body, I rocked my hips against his. I could feel his erection already straining under his pants.
And he was acting like he was actually disappointed.
“You always say that and I always like it.” I pointed out, reorienting my heat over his erection and continuing my motions back and forth against him.
“Oh, really?” He tried to act calm, but I felt the way his fingers got tighter, his hips bucking up every couple of seconds.
“Yes,” I breathily whispered into his mouth before melting into a sloppy, frenzied kiss.
It didn’t last long, with his hand threading through my hair and pulling lightly to expose my neck to him.
“Tell me what you like, little girl.”
When he uttered the words, I noticed he was placing small kisses against the same pattern of his hand that had been wrapped around my neck. The thought alone consumed me, and I dug my fingers into his shoulders, gasping at the sensation of his tongue swirling patterns over my pulse.
“You,” was the only syllable I could express.
The light chuckle he gave sent shivers down my spine, his bottom lip dragging over my skin while he savored the newly forming memories.
“I never got to spoil you last night,” he reminded, bringing a hand down to stroke my thigh.
“Oh, I wasn’t disappointed at all.” I was going to continue, telling him that he didn’t have to get me off every time. Then again, I knew that he wasn’t going to accept that answer, anyway. Regardless, he spoke quickly and with confidence when he said, “I’m still going to make up for it. Take off your pants.”
I wasted no time springing up from my position with a cheeky little taunt. “This sounds familiar.”
“But this time you were a good girl.”
The distinction was not lost on me, and I had to admit hearing him call me a good girl in this context turned me on more than I had thought it would. Apparently, I was wrong for thinking I was entirely a brat, because right now I just wanted to hear him praise me.
“Maybe I should do that more often,” I happily hummed as I began to straddle him once more, pausing for a moment for him to lay languid, open-mouthed kisses against my breasts.  
He paused just for a second to growl, “Don’t you dare.”
I didn’t bother saying ‘I told you so’ because he was already pulling my hips down so that I could sink onto his length. Biting my lip to try and stifle the full moan, my fingers returned to their place embedded in his skin.
“Fuck,” he spoke under his breath and through a clenched jaw, “I don’t think you understand what you do to me.”
He wasn’t entirely wrong. I could only guess the effect I had on him by just how stupid the bona fide genius got when I was around.
When I could look into his eyes again I pushed his hair back with both hands, trying to express my feelings with each roll of my hips.
“Tell me about it,” I purred, my mouth hanging open as he started to thrust up in slow, synchronized movements.
Through the heavy panting and strained motions of his muscles, he spoke with a clarity that demonstrated how long he’d thought about his words.
“I just… I’ve never been able to picture a future until the day I met you.”
My heart stopped for a moment before continuing its strong, hard rhythm against the inside of my rib cage. I wanted to see the look on his face, but he had buried his head into my neck and hair. Each inhale seemed so purposeful, reminding me that I smelled of his soap.
I smiled at the way his hands felt just like they had last night, holding themselves back from claiming me with the rough, greedy nature they so often did.
“I can recall any minor detail from any point in the past. I relive them so often, but the future? That was always this terrifying, suffocating concoction of unknowns until that night.”
It almost felt like I was there again, feeling the bass shaking the chair I was sitting in when I kissed him for the very first time. I thought about the compassion in his eyes when he learned the truth about our situation.
Although it had only a few months since then, it felt like a lifetime ago. I couldn’t and didn’t want to remember a life before Spencer Reid.
Once again reading my mind, he stopped laying kisses against my shoulders to hold my face in his hand, stroking my cheek while our bodies continued in their need.
“You are the best thing that’s ever happened to me.”
When he thrust up this time, his eyes shut and his mouth hung open as he pulled our foreheads together. I continued to watch him, watching how his eyebrows furrowed and he tried to focus on remembering this moment more than usual.
“A future with you, huh?” I whispered, my features softening as he struggled to look at me through his own infatuated haze. “It sounds nice.”
He smiled, and I continued before he could take my lips with his own.
“A white picket fence. Two little bratty genius babies.” My attempts to excite him were absolutely working, because with each idea I provided, the urgency with which he pulled me down increased.
“Just a normal, domestic life,” I laughed, my legs beginning to shake as he held me against him with each movement, “with Dr. and Mrs. Reid.”
“Fuck,” he muttered without providing any other answer before pressing his thumb against my puckered lips.
I took it into my mouth quickly, lavishing it with my tongue as much as I could before he removed it. His hand then shot down to where our bodies were joined, beginning to rub my clit in rough, circular strokes.
The trembling that was once contained to my legs spread throughout my entire body, the moans spilling out of my mouth without a care in the world for who might hear. As long as Spencer was enjoying my responses, that’s all that mattered to me.
I wanted him to see the things I could never say. The way I felt whenever I was with him.
“Don’t tempt me, little girl. Keeping talking like that and I’ll steal you away from whatever plans you had.” He spoke in my ear with that low register, his voice barely above a whisper.
I could hardly breathe, and I spent all my energy trying to follow his words.
“Take me.” I urged, feeling the tension in my muscles approaching their breaking point. “Take me, Spencer. Please.”
It was with those words that I felt my body give into him, my muscles gripping him and begging him to join me in my release. But he waited, giving a few more rough, deep thrusts into me.
“Just like a true daddy’s girl.” He chuckled, watching as I came undone, my body eventually going half limp in his arms. “You’re already spoiled rotten.”
My skin was sticky with sweat, and the sounds of our bodies colliding together in the dim morning light continued to overwhelm my senses. He seemed to enjoy the way he could clean me just to dirty me all over again, and I almost made a comment about it, but I couldn’t find the words in time.
Instead, I just whined, “I want more. I want it.”
He didn’t respond with words because he didn’t have to, his broken, shaky thrusts spoke for him. Using both hands to slam my body down against him one last time, he gave a guttural moan against the side of my face.
“It’s all for you, little girl.” He said between breaths. I cried out at the sensation of him filling me, my muscles clutching onto him like a vice, begging him to stay with me until he was completely spent.
He took the offer, pulling my body against his and leaning us back while we caught our breath. Eventually, I was the one to speak, my words suddenly sleepy and disoriented from the emotional toll of our encounter.
“Thank you.”
His chest still rose and fell with his deep breaths, trying to stabilize his heart before he spoke.
“For what?”
“Loving me.”
That look on his face was back; the one that begged me not to say the words back to him. I hated it. I wanted to tell him the truth, and now felt like such a perfect moment. But at the same time, I understood why he didn’t want it associated with sex.
‘Right now you just think that because your body is coursing with endorphins and adrenaline,’ I could hear him saying, ‘Once that goes away, you might find you feel differently about me.’
But it wasn’t true. I would feel this way about him forever. I already knew that with every fiber of my being. Then again, there was no point in arguing with him.
I would just continue to show him however I could, through loads of laundry and sleepy kisses. My ‘I love you’s would be subtly explaining who got what side of the bed and whether our children would look more like me or him.
At least for now. Until he decided he was ready, or until I couldn’t hold it in any longer.
I really hoped it would be the former.
—————————————————
| Part 13 |
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queerofthedagger · 3 years
Text
these quiet nights
Pairing: Merlin/Arthur Pendragon
Rating: G/A || Warnings: None || Word count: 1,500 || On AO3
Tags: Arthur Returned, Modern AU, Hurt/Comfort, Light Angst, Mild Injury, Established Relationship, Protective Arthur, Idiots in Love
Summary: The first time Arthur gets hurt after his return, Merlin doesn't take it well.
Merthur Week Day 3: “You’re hurt. Please, just let me heal it.” + Hurt/Comfort
*
The sound of the key in the front door floats to where Arthur’s standing in the kitchen, and he curses softly to himself.
“Arthur?”
Right, no time left to clean up the mess he’s made, not with the blood-soaked towel still wrapped tightly around his hand. He will just have to own up to being exactly as hopeless at cooking as Merlin always accuses him of being and deal with the endless amount of teasing.
“I’m here,” he calls, drawing up an innocent smile as he hears Merlin moving through the hallway. He has to suppress a wince at the sting of pain shooting through his hand where he’s pressing it against his chest—it’s not like he didn’t have much worse, but the knife had been rather sharp.
“Hey love, did you get my message about the dinner—”
Merlin breaks off as his gaze falls on Arthur, and all the colour drains from his face so quickly, Arthur’s afraid he might just faint. The picture is only worsened by how still Merlin’s suddenly become, except for where his chest starts to rise and fall increasingly fast.
“Merlin?” Arthur asks, not bothering to mask the worry that’s curling around his ribs, and he takes a step closer, pain all but forgotten.
“No,” Merlin presses out, choked, his hands beginning to tremble at his sides. “No, Arthur—no, not again, please I—”
“Hey,” Arthur interrupts, crossing the remaining distance in two quick strides. The sudden understanding of what Merlin must be thinking is crashing into him with the literal weight of centuries, and he’s sure his heart is struggling under the sudden strain. “Hey, I’m alright. I just cut myself while cooking.”
Merlin doesn’t seem to hear him; he’s still staring at Arthur’s chest with horror etched into every line of his face, his breathing shallow. “I can’t, Arthur, I—”
“Merlin,” Arthur repeats, louder, and he grasps Merlin’s shoulder with his uninjured hand. “Come on, look at me.”
Finally, he does, and Arthur aches at the utter panic in Merlin’s eyes. Leaning forward, he presses their foreheads together and trails his fingers along Merlin’s neck until he can card them through the nape of his hair. “I swear, I’m fine. All that happened is that 1500 years have done absolutely nothing to improve my skills in the kitchen. You may tell me that you’ve told me so.”
It takes long, agonizing seconds, but some of the tension starts bleeding off Merlin’s shoulders and he takes a few, deep breaths.
“Show me.”
Arthur’s first impulse is to protest, to keep the cause of Merlin’s stress as far away from him as possible, but he also knows Merlin well enough to be sure that it would only make it worse.
Merlin’s always been over-protective of Arthur, and—understandably—even more so after he’s had to wait centuries for Arthur’s return.
It’s the first time that blood is involved though, and Arthur wishes he would’ve considered to not soak his shirt in it, of all things.
“It’s nothing,” he says, but he draws back anyway, just far enough to unwrap the towel he’d haphazardly tied around his hand when he slipped with the knife. “It only bled a lot because I cut right into my palm.”
The wound is barely oozing blood anymore, but Merlin still takes his hand so carefully, one would think Arthur’s going to break any second.
In another time, Arthur might’ve teased him about it; now, he only watches closely as the fear slowly, finally seeps out of Merlin’s eyes.
Arthur’s heart feels too big for his chest, and he has to swallow a few times against the familiar guilt that’s crawling up his throat. “See? It’s barely a scratch,” he murmurs, and if his voice comes out hoarse, Merlin doesn’t seem to notice.
“I’ll heal it—”
“Merlin, really, it’s nothing—
“You’re hurt. Please, just let me heal it,” Merlin says, his voice teetering on the edge of panic again, and under different circumstances, it would be ridiculous how fast Arthur’s protest crumbles to dust.
“Yeah—yes, of course.”
Merlin’s fingers still tremble where they’re hovering over Arthur’s hand. He visibly swallows before his eyes turn gold, and the cut on Arthur’s hand knits itself together.
Even when there’s no sign of it left on his skin but for the remains of blood, Merlin’s staring at him as if he’s still expecting Arthur to drop dead or vanish.
Arthur bumps their heads together lightly. “See? All good.”
Exhaling in a rush, Merlin’s shoulders slump and he presses his face into the crook of Arthur’s neck. “Never scare me like that again.”
“I promise,” Arthur says, and as much as they both know that small accidents are bound to happen, he can’t help but mean it, can’t help how the naked terror on Merlin’s face is still replaying in his mind.
Can’t help but think how it was too close to the expression Merlin wore all those centuries ago, and that he’ll never touch a blade again if only it means that he’ll never have to see it again.
He turns his head to press a kiss to Merlin’s temple, his arms coming up to wrap around Merlin’s waist, tugging him closer.
Merlin makes a sound in the back of his throat that’s somewhere between a sob and a laugh, and the next second his lips are on Arthur’s in a kiss that’s just this side of desperate.
“What were you trying to do anyway?” he asks when they break apart, glancing over Arthur’s shoulder at the kitchen counter and raising a brow.
Usually, Arthur would feign offence at the obvious mocking, but all he can do is grin, the relief rushing through him so strong that it nearly makes his knees buckle.
By the goddess, they really are a bit of a mess.
“I wanted to cook for you. Because, you know, it’s been half a year since—” Arthur breaks off, turning his head away and cursing himself for the embarrassment that’s heating his cheeks despite all his resolve to not feel awkward about this.
Merlin stares at him for a second before a smile breaks out over his face, his eyes crinkling at the corners and his cheeks dimpling. He presses another kiss to Arthur’s lips and winds his arms around his neck. “Since you shoved me up against a dirty wall in some deserted back-alley, out of nowhere, and kissed me senseless for the first time?”
“Well, when you put it like that—”
“Oh, how would you put it then?”
“I’d say that after weeks of dropping hints—”
“Staring at me isn’t a hint—”
“—and it having no effect whatsoever, I simply chose a more direct approach.”
Merlin laughs softly, and the tidal wave of fondness that’s washing through Arthur at the sound is nothing new, but he still tightens his grip on Merlin.
They stand in silence for a while, wrapped around each other and only the distant sound of the city beyond the windows bearing witness.
Arthur’s not sure who’s comforting whom between the two of them, but then, it doesn’t really matter; the time where they’d pretend to not need each other is thankfully long in the past.
“Thank you,” Merlin finally whispers, a multitude of meanings wrapped into two words. Arthur can do nothing but nod, glad that his face is still hidden in Merlin’s hair.
“As much as I appreciate the thought, though,” Merlin adds, and the cheerfulness in his tone still has the faintest note of forced, “I don’t think I want to see you close to another knife today.”
When Arthur pulls back to look at him, Merlin’s smiling, but it’s brittle around the edges. Something must be showing on his face because Merlin frowns, rubbing a thumb over Arthur’s jaw. “Stop that. It’s not your fault I freaked out.”
“I could’ve—”
“No, Arthur, really. You’ve got to stop blaming yourself like this.”
He sighs, closing his eyes briefly before nodding. “Alright, but the same applies to you.”
A small huff slips past Merlin’s lips, but his smile has lost its strain. “Whatever my Lord commands.”
Arthur laughs, shaking his head and pushing him away. “Come on, let’s order some food and watch a stupid movie. I think we’ve had quite enough excitement for tonight.”
“You just want an excuse to not move for the rest of the night,” Merlin says with a grin, already grabbing his phone from the counter and moving into the living room.
Later, when they’re curled up on the sofa, Merlin’s head resting on his chest, solid and warm and familiar, Arthur thinks that Merlin is right; he’d take quiet nights between the two of them over any excitement the modern world could possibly offer him.
He makes sure to tell Merlin that, and when it finally dispels the lingering shadows in Merlin’s eyes, he vows to keep telling him for as long as it takes to vanish the fears too.
*
Thanks for reading! ❤️
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hailperseusjackson · 3 years
Text
Fanfic: hey brother
here is the hera and howzer bonding fic that nobody asked for, but refused to leave my head anyway! @milf-herasyndulla , this one is for you bestie <33
fandom: the bad batch
rating: gen
warnings: none (some minor discussions of death, but nothing explicit)
wordcount: 2k
you can also read here on ao3!
::
Hera sat with her legs tucked up to her chest, one arm across her knees, the other halfheartedly poking a stick into the fire. Hitting a spot that shifted some of the coals, she watched glowing orange sparks dance into the air, bright against the star-filled night sky.
The one good thing about this new base—the rocky outcropping had a great view.
She could hear voices and equipment being moved around in the hangar behind her, and laughter floated to her from the other side of the outcropping, where a few other Twi’leks and clones were taking a break. With her father gone on another scouting mission, she knew she should be helping her mother hand out rations and supplies inside the base. But she was sick of handing out food and blankets. She knew it was important—every little bit counted, her mother often reminded her. And it was their job to help those in need.
And Hera wanted to help. But she wanted to do it out there. She wanted to fly. Or fight, or do something besides stay in the shelter of this base.
She felt helpless. And the last time she’d felt like this—no.
She squeezed her eyes shut, blacking out the stars and the glow of Ryloth’s moons as she inhaled deeply. She wasn’t going to think about that day. But the tightness in her chest didn’t ease, and she could feel her eyes starting to burn.
In through the nose, out through the mouth, slowly. In and out, she breathed. When her shoulders felt lighter again, she opened her eyes, focusing on the first star she could pick out on the horizon.
“Hey, kid.”
Hera tried not to scowl at the familiar voice sounding behind her. Whoever said all clones sounded the same clearly hadn’t spent enough time around them. She would recognize Howzer’s low, gentle tone blindfolded.
Sure enough, when she turned her head, the clone captain was taking a seat next to her, leaning back against the wall of the outcropping. His helmet was off, and the longer curls on top of his head stirred in the slight breeze.
“Hi,” she responded, a little more sulkily than she’d meant to. She buried her chin into the crook of her arm, trying to hide her frustrated frown. Ever since the day of the attack a couple months ago, her parents were checking on her constantly. And they’d definitely told Hozwer to do the same, because he came to see how she was doing at least once a day when he wasn’t out on the front lines. And he always spoke in that gentle voice, like he was trying not to spook a wounded blurrg.
“Hungry?” Howzer asked, offering her a ration bar.
“Nope.”
“Suit yourself.” His armor creaked as he shrugged his shoulders. “More for me then.”
They sat in silence for a few moments, Howzer chewing quietly beside her.
Hera sighed.
Relenting, because she actually was hungry, she said, “What kind do you have?”
“Just the boring regular ones, unfortunately. But I do have half a chocolate bar left, if you’d rather have that.”
Hera turned her eyes on him. “Really?”
Howzer gave her a little smile, the motion tugging at the scars on his jaw and chin. “Won it off Skipper in a game of Sabaac. Already took a couple bites out of it, so I hope you don’t mind.”
She shook her head and took the chocolate from Howzer’s outstretched hand. She took a bite, humming as the sweetness coated her tongue. “Thanks,” she mumbled.
“Sure thing, kid.”
“Don’t call me that.” When he called her kid it made her feel like he was trying to be her brother. But she didn’t need another brother. She had a brother, and he was perfect, and he was—
Gone. He was gone.
The chocolate suddenly tasted bitter in her mouth.
“Sorry, Hera,” Howzer replied, in that same, stupid quiet tone. Like if he spoke any louder he would scare her or break her or something. “Say, where’s that droid of yours? Some of the boys were saying he ran over their toes earlier for calling Y-Wings shitty ships—oh, kriff—oh, no, I mean—shoot. Uh. I meant bad ships…”
She barely heard Howzer stumble over his words. It was automatic as she said, “Needed his power cells recharged.”
“Ah, gotcha.” A pause. Then, “Hera? You all right?”
She shot to her feet, dropping the chocolate and glaring at the captain. “Stop talking to me like that! I’m so sick of everyone treating me like I’m just a little kid who can’t handle anything!”
A few nearby Twi’leks paused what they were doing to stare, but Hera didn’t care.
Howzer raised his hands in surrender, but didn’t get to his feet. “Hera—”
She pressed on, cheeks hot. “I’m sure my mom sent you up here to talk to me and make me feel better or whatever, well guess what. I’m a big girl and I can forget about what happened just like they did. No more dead brother if we don’t talk about him, right?”
Silence.
She vaguely saw Howzer wave off any onlookers, barely heard the crackling of the fire or bustle of the camp past the roaring of blood in her ears.
It was suddenly hard to breathe, which reminded her all too much of that dusty caved in cavern after her father’s last base of operation had been shelled by Seperatists. She still remembered how hoarse her voice had gotten as she’d screamed for help, screamed for her brother when she spotted one of his shoes next to a giant pile of boulders blocking an exit tunnel. Her brother had been nowhere in sight.
Hours later, after Commander Ponds’ and Captain Howzer’s units had rescued the survivors and gone through all the rubble, she’d seen the limp body of her little brother cradled in her father’s arms. When she’d heard her mother scream—a wailing, broken sound Hera had heard before on Ryloth during the war, but never from her own mother—that’s when she’d known.
Since that day, maybe four months ago now, her parents had barely uttered a word about it. It was like her brother had never existed.
“Hera.” Howzer’s voice floated to her through the haze of memories. It was that same gentle tone, but it was—clearer, somehow.
It worked. Her anger flowed away like water down a mountainside. In its place—an aching sadness.
Tears sprang to her eyes, hot and burning. She slumped back down to the ground, once again tucking her knees up and crossing her arms on top. Forehead falling against her folded arms, she started to cry.
For a moment, there was nothing except the echo of her sobs down into the canyon.
Then, Howzer placed a hand on her shoulder. He gave a comforting squeeze before letting go. “I’m not trying to replace your brother, you know,” he said quietly. “I know it might feel like it, me checking in on you and all. But I’m doing it because I care. Not because your parents are making me.”
She sniffled, wiping the back of her hand across her nose and lifting her head. “They didn’t ask you to come check on me?”
Howzer shook his head. “Nope. I’m just checking in on my friend. We are friends, right?”
Hera wiped at her tears some more, and smiled. “Yeah. We’re friends.”
“Then here.” Howzer reached over and picked up the remainder of the chocolate bar she’d dropped. He dusted it off as best he could, before giving up and breaking off the part with dirt on it. “The last little bit was inside the wrapper, so it should be fine.”
She took it gratefully, popping the last bite in her mouth, and giving Howzer a quizzical look as he opened his own mouth to eat the rest.
“What?” he shrugged. “A little dirt never hurt anyone.”
She giggled. He grinned back at her, eating the chocolate with only a slight grimace on his face.
For a few minutes, they sat in comfortable silence. Hera started poking at the fire with her stick again, trying to get rid of the sadness in her body through sheer force of will.
Suddenly, Howzer said, “I’ve lost brothers, too.”
Hera turned her head to look at him. He suddenly looked much older than he ever had before. The sadness on his face seemed to match the sadness she felt on the inside. She scooted back, copying his posture and leaning against the wall.
“You have a lot of brothers, though.”
One corner of his mouth twitched, like he wanted to smile. But his eyes stayed fixed on the sky. “I do have a lot of brothers, yeah. But losing one doesn’t mean he’s replaced with another. We’re all different. So when I lose a brother, it hurts just as bad every time. Worse, sometimes, because I’m their captain. I’m supposed to protect them, and it hurts when I can’t.”
Hera looked up at the sky like Howzer, thinking about that. She only had one brother, and it hurt more than anything ever had before to lose him. She couldn’t imagine having to feel that kind of hurt and sorrow the way Howzer did every time one of his brothers died.
Digging into the inside pocket of her jacket, she pulled out a multicolored bracelet made of woven leather. She studied it in her palm for a moment, blinking away the memory of her mother gingerly taking it off her brother’s wrist so Hera could have it.
“Here,” she whispered, tapping his arm. “I want you to have this.”
He reached for the bracelet, then hesitated. “What is it?”
“It was my brother’s. I made it for him.”
“I—I can’t take that, Hera. It’s too important to you.”
“But you’re important to me, too,” she insisted. “My brother will live forever on our Kalikori, so I want you to have this.”
Still, Howzer hesitated. “But—why?”
Hera grabbed his hand and dropped the leather bracelet into his palm. “Because we both know what it’s like to lose a brother. This is a reminder that we still have each other. Right?”
Howzer stared at the bracelet, then at her. She swore she saw tears shining in his eyes as he smiled at her. “Right.”
She helped him secure the bracelet below the armor plate on his forearm, where it would stay safe.
Hera leaned her head against Howzer’s shoulder. “Sorry for yelling at you.”
“Apology accepted. And I’m sorry, too—I need to be better about reminding myself that just because you’re a kid doesn’t mean you can’t handle yourself.”
“You know what would really make it up to me?”
“Hm?”
She tilted her chin up at him, grinning. “Taking me flying.”
Howzer chuckled. “Oh, absolutely not. Your parents didn’t send me to come talk to you, but they would most certainly have my shebs for that.”
“Ugh, fine.” She jutted out her bottom lip in a pout.
“Maybe one day, vod’ika,” he promised. Hera wasn’t sure what that last word meant, but it sounded nice.
“I’m gonna be the best pilot in the whole galaxy one day,” she told him earnestly, leaning her head back against his shoulder.
“I bet you will, kid.”
This time, she didn’t bother correcting him when he called her kid.
Maybe, if Howzer could have more than one brother, she could too.
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iphoenixrising · 3 years
Note
If it's not a problem I would like to see what happens when omega Tim safe words out?
I just so in love with how you wrote him and I know you've a thing with Dr Tim and safe words but I would really appreciate if you'll give me this with omega Tim
Have a great day/night
Babe asked for O!Tim safe wording out. Taking into account how much he’s been able to take so far in my fics, then it’s apparently going to be truly something for him to safe word, right?
….or is this just another excuse to have AAANNNNNGGGGGGSSSSSSSTTTTTT.
(I regret nothing, but, well, you might, babe :D :D)
**
It was just supposed to be Pack support. Just the Bats realizing they had an Omega in their ranks, an Omega who had been more on the outskirts than part of the inner circle, an Omega who had been walking a long road alone. Just the Dick and Jay trying to be good Alphas and take care of him. Just giving in to those crazy instincts.
It was never supposed to hurt. It was never supposed to break him. Not like the first time when he was essentially kicked out of the Pack, when his cape was pulled out from under him, and his place became a question mark instead of a given. (Falling from Wayne Towers because Ra’s is such a douce canoe, he’d been beaten to fuck, blood loss and a real concussion to blame when he wondered if they’d bother putting up a case with his suit, if he even mattered that much to Dick, if he ever really did…)
When he presented, when he didn’t have a hint of a Pack scent, It had taken an embarrassingly long time to feel like he could get anywhere near the city. Long after he’d sent Bruce back home, telling him everything with sparse details, why there wasn’t an R on his shoulder, why he couldn’t be Batman’s sidekick anymore. He’d left all the pain locked in his chest, keeping himself as impartial as possible to deliver the hard facts, ignoring the whimpering, cowering Omega in the depths of him crying out for someone, anyone to want him, need him, keep him.
Working his way back in hadn’t been easy. Keeping his presentation under wraps with scent blockers and suppressants hadn’t been either, but there was no way in hell he was going to let something like the fact he was an Omega be the reason they wanted him back. Fuck, no.
But it happened anyway. Slowly but surely, O called him more often about cases, wanted to know if he had any helpful intel. B dropped by the Tower, more than once, to seek him out, told him how buggy the Batcomputer must be this point, but he wouldn’t really know, Tim, because you always handled that, didn’t you? Dick tentatively showed up in one of his safe houses while he riding an undercover stint, pizza and terrible B sci-fi flicks, looked crushed when Tim closed the door on him by sheer self-preservation instinct.  Jason Todd showed up to fish him out of the middle of the Atlantic when a case of crimefighting gone hilariously awry ended up with a thwarted world-domination plot and his ass landed in the middle of, you know, the ocean and shit. Damian of all people demanded his presence in Gotham for the upcoming anniversary of Batcow’s induction into the family.
(When he’d blurted out, “why would you want me back? Aren’t you the one that wanted me gone in the first place? Well, I mean, got what you asked for, right? How about we pretend this conversation never happened.” 
He had been in no way prepared for the demon himself to come hunt him down with a vengeance. Robin seeking him out no matter where he hopped next on the fight crime, kick ass, and take names train.)
(That kid? Seriously.)
And as much as Dick had apologized after he finally made his way back to Gotham, had said no Omega in his Pack should have been alone, without a Bat safety net (reads as: mother hen), he had seemed genuinely upset Tim had presented outside of Gotham, on his own.
Worse, he hadn’t told anyone. Hadn’t come back.
(Like he thought that was an option at the time.)
It wasn’t until later, after they found out he presented, and were…upset he’d been on his own for so long afterwards, that he’d laughed at Dick’s angry expression, shaking his head.
“Come back? Why? To what? I didn’t have any Pack scent by then, and I sure as fuck wasn’t welcome, so why bother? I did what I had to do. We got Bruce back, didn’t we?”
He hadn’t been prepared for how strongly Dick’s musk flared, how the Alpha went deadly serious, had stepped back and palmed some pellets on instinct when facing something potentially dangerous – like a pissed off, feral Alpha male.
It had taken visible effort for Dick to get a hold of his Alpha instincts, which had absolutely perplexed him at the time because really? They hadn’t been partners, allies, friends for almost two years by then.
“It was…I tried to….Tim –“
He’d just waved off the helpless sputtering because by then, it hadn’t really mattered.
“It all worked out in the end. Don’t think about it all too hard, Dick. I don’t.” Which had been an obvious lie, but had at least appeased the Alpha enough not to viciously scent him or use the dreaded octopus hold until he was cuddled within an inch of his life.
So coming back was…different. Unexpected.
Being the official Pack Omega came with Bats all over his everything. Bats coming out of the woodwork when he was starting to run down, when his Heat was approaching, when he’d been out of the city for too long.
(It was all for nothing in the end. Because they’re only after the Omega now, not the boy that used to wear the R…)
“Heat’s easier with an A, Timmers,” Jay had started that ball rolling. “Ya ever gotta need fer the real thing, betcha I know a few Alphas what might help ya out.”
“I can call some Alphas I trust if that becomes the case.” Had been off-handed in his mind, but it had been something else to see Jason’s expression smooth out, to catch the soft noise of leather when the Red Hood’s hands had clenched into fists.
But against his better judgement, he’d let them into his Heat safehouse. At first just to let them deliver Alfred goodies. Later because they wanted to stay, to spend his Heat together.
It was fine as long as they would just leave afterwards. It was fine as long as it stayed just instincts, just Alphas and an Omega. It was fine because they still treated him like Red Robin on the streets and left him alone when he went blackout on cases outside the city.
It was fine until it suddenly wasn’t.
“Gawd, sweetheart,” Jay moans against the nape of his neck, noses against the base, “ya feel s’ good. My sweet lil’ ‘Mega. My purty ‘Mega, lettin’ me in, givin’ it up ta yer Alpha. Gonna lemme be good ta ya, yeah? That’s right. Perfect fer me, ain’t cha?”
It’s his second day, so he’s with it enough to realize what Jason said.
“Yeah he is,” Dick’s fingers in his hair, nails scratching at his scalp. “He’s such a good Omega for us, isn’t he Jay? He fits so nicely between us. Our cute O–“
“Red.” Tim croaks out from under Jay’s bigger body, the wet sounds of skin slapping fast and furious. He bucks up against Jay with real strength, his eyes already getting ridiculously hot and full.
“Red, dammit! Get the hell off me!”
He yells loud enough to make Jay flinch and jerk up abruptly from where he’d been laying over Tim’s back.
Dick’s hand pauses before untangling from his hair.
And even if the Heat is still burning, his body desperate for the knot that was just seconds ago opening him up for it, Tim pulls off Jason’s Alpha cock wetly, doing it himself while both Alphas seem frozen in their spots, not sure why he would safe word out at all. He seemed to be enjoying them!
Tim’s already clawing and scrambling off the bed, careful not to touch either of them, legs wobbly, messy ass and thighs on display, feeling open and raw and needy, but his chest too tight, his lungs seemingly unable to get enough air.
The bathroom door has a lock. Not that it was much of a deterrent if the Alphas really wanted to get to him, but there’s always the window big enough for him to fit through, too small for Dick or Jay. It would give him enough of a head start anyway.
At one point, he’d pulled a towel off the rack, wrapping it around himself, sitting against the bathroom door to literally block it with his body without being consciously aware of it.
He didn’t move, stayed bare ass on the cold tile floor, concentrated on getting enough air back in his lungs, biting down on his lower lip until his eyes stop spilling over, hot and full, until his chest stops stuttering with half-sobs. Until the Omega in him calms it the utter fuck down.
Soft tapping filters through when the door vibrates against his back.
Dick’s voice filters in while the inside of his head is an utter mess. “… got some pajamas for you, and-and a sandwich. Jay made coffee. Can you let me in, sweetheart?”
“Don’t call me that,” is out of his mouth before he can stop it. “I’m not your fucking Omega. I wasn’t enough to be your partner, your brother, and I’m sure as fuck not going to be your bitch either.”
“What the fuck didja just say ta ‘im?” Jay barks from outside the door.
“It’s just instincts,” he tries to snarl but his voice is hoarse, “that’s all this is. You think I don’t know that?” The laugh is scarily unhinged, “it’s not like anyone chose me, right?”
Because honestly, that hasn��t happened his whole vigilante career.
There’s silence outside the door. Stillness. The Omega writhes inside him, still needs a knot, still wants the Alphas even though Tim knows better than to think they want anything other than a warm hole, another vigilante to share the burden, an Omega’s influence in the Pack.
(He fucking gets it.)
“Apparently, we should talk.” Dick’s voice is flat, something like anger or disappointment.
“Get out,” is what Tim says instead. “Get dressed and get the fuck out. I’ll take care of myself.”
Like I’ve always done. Even back when I wore the tunic.
“Tim, we shouldn’t–“
“No,” and his own scent had changed from candy sweet to alarmingly bitter to his own nose. “You are going to get your clothes on and leave. You two don’t see me through anymore Heats. I find someone else or take care of it myself.”
“What?!” Jay sounds floored, “what the shit is this alla sudden? Ya can’t be serious right now.”
“I’m not fucking around, Jason. You leave, or I will.”
“You can’t go out smelling like Heat!”
“I dunno what the hell’s goin’ on wit’ ya but–“
He stands up on wobbly legs, moves to push the window open, knows they’ll hear the squealing because he’s not trying to be quiet about it.
“Whoa, whoa! All right, all right, fer fuck’s sake!”
“We’re getting dressed and leaving,” Dick is right up against the door. “Don’t go out the window, Tim. We’re…we’re going to go, okay?”
“Then go. Now.” He says from the window without turning around. He can’t chance his inner Omega will push him to whine at the door, to smell like open for business, take me, love me, make me yours because that is not at all where any of them are right now.
He hears them talking, their voices getting more muted as they go back to the bedroom to apparently do as he asked.
Tim climbs out of the tub, window still up, and turns on the shower without getting in, just using the noise as a deterrent.
“Don’t like it, Dickie,” he vaguely catches as the Alphas pass by the door again. “We try ta take care a’ ‘im and that’s what the fuck he says?”
“He safe worded, Jay. What does that mean to you?”
And Tim’s throat gets tight when he thinks about the implications Dick is suggesting.
“Dunno. How ‘bout ya gimme yer theories, Detective.”
“Later. I want to make sure there’s water and Alfred meals left in the feezer.”
“Fine, them let ‘im take care of his own ass. I ain’t never took advantage of a ‘Mega in my fucking life.”
Tim doesn’t leave the bathroom until he hears the front door slam closed. He darts out long enough to reconfigure the security system, makes sure no Bats are getting in without a hell of a shock.
The rest of his Heat is utterly fucking miserable, natch.
He feels wrung out and hurt by the time it’s done and he’s ready to put on the suit again.
He doesn’t put in the Batcomm, for the first time in months, and it goes back in a drawer before he takes off out the window.
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hookedonapirate · 3 years
Text
Book Sneak Peek
A/N: For those of you who don’t know, I’ve been converting A Helping Hand to an original novel. After months of frustration from not knowing what to leave and what to take out because of the ridiculous length of this story, I’m finally close to being finished with it. It’s currently in the process of being edited and polished. This is a sneak peek of my new book. Unlike my first novel, this one is set in "The Big Apple” just like AHH. It features Harper and Audrey (Emma and Elsa in AHH) from Follow My Lead, and Derrick, Elisa and their daughter, Gracie, make an appearance at the end. 
I also wanted to let everyone know I will most likely be taking A Helping Hand down, even though I’ll be self-publishing. I know I said I wouldn’t, and actually I’m really sad about it, but after going through it, I realized it’s completely full of errors, misspellings and whatnot. Plus, I didn’t just change the names of characters and remove ouat elements; even though it’s the same story and the scenes pretty much follow the same sequence, apart from what I took out or added, I’ve made A LOT of changes to it, and I don't really want another version of my book out there. I encourage you to download A Helping Hand while you still can. But I will definitely let everyone know before that happens.
Anyway, I hope you enjoy another sneak peek!
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I groan into the fluffy pillow my face is burrowed in. My head’s pounding, I feel like someone drilled a hole through my skull, my throat is dry and nausea lingers in my stomach. Slowly dragging my arm away from under my face, I open my eyes to a dim room, the curtains shielding any sunlight trying to burst through.
I take a minute to roll over, my eyes adjusting to the room as I lift my head slowly, taking in my surroundings. 
Nothing seems familiar. 
Granted, the guest room in my brother’s apartment is not very familiar either, but at least it reminds me of Brady. This room does not. It’s too pink and girly.
“Where the hell am I?” I grumble hoarsely.
I’m surrounded by pale pink walls and white furniture—a chair decorated with pink, frilly pillows, a bookcase lined with romance novels, a vanity and a nightstand with a pink, furry lamp. The curtains are made of white lace and there’s a large wall hanging that reads in large, cursive writing, Be your own kind of beautiful. 
My eyes scan the comforter, which is also pink, along with more frilly pillows.
This is definitely not my brother’s guestroom.
This is definitely a chick’s room.
My eyes widen in horror at the revelation.
This cannot be happening.
Gathering further evidence to solve the mystery as to how I ended up in some woman’s bed, I sharply lift the covers and peer underneath them, seeing that, yep, I’m bare-ass naked.
“Fuck.”
I let my head sink back into the pillow as I drag my hands over my face. I can’t believe my first night in New York, I hooked up with some random woman.
I went to the bar with those intentions in my dispirited condition, but I don’t recall picking up anyone. In fact, I have no recollection of last night beyond the bar. Which means I was way too smashed to hook up with anyone.
I need to leave. I’m not the type of guy to fuck someone and run off the next morning without at least buying her coffee or getting her phone number. To be honest, I’m not the type of guy who does one-night stands, but I’m in no shape to be involved in anything resembling a relationship. 
 Judging by the breakfast she’s making, this woman has other plans. The door is closed but I can hear dishes clanking around in the kitchen. And as I spot my clothes across the room, I doubt a woman expecting nothing more than a one-night stand would go to the trouble of picking up my clothes from the floor, folding them neatly and setting them in the chair. She certainly wouldn’t be making me breakfast.
I sit up slowly and place my feet on the floor, hoping this will stop the room from spinning around me. I drop my face in my hands and groan. I haven’t felt this hungover in years. I eventually stand up and grab the knitted blanket I’ve been sleeping on, securing it around my waist. I go to the window and pull back the curtain.
I’m on the third floor, judging by the number of windows beneath her unit. I remember little about the surroundings, but I do remember seeing the pancake house directly across the street and I remember thinking about how much I missed my mom’s chocolate chip pancakes. I also remember the bar I went to last night and seeing the barbershop next to it and thinking how badly I need a haircut. The names of the establishments are all the same. Which means only one thing. 
The woman I slept with last night lives in the same building and floor as my brother. 
Fuck.
I have a feeling this won’t end well. I let the curtain fall into place and turn around when I hear a gentle knock on the door.
Shit. 
I swallow thickly as the door opens. Panic flares inside me as I try to think up a way to get out of the pickle I’m in. I scramble toward the chair which holds my clothes.
“Owen, you awake?” 
I whirl around until I’m face to face with the most beautiful green eyes and golden hair I’ve ever seen in my life. I drag a hand through my disheveled hair, my eyes traveling down her body. She’s wearing a thin, pink bathrobe, exposing a pair of long, sexy legs that go on for days.
Legs I can definitely imagine wrapped around me.
Damn, I hit the jackpot last night. 
She’s beautiful, which is either a relief or extremely dangerous; I can’t decide which one.
She strides over to me, bearing a glass of water and a cheerful smile. I’m still stunned by how beautiful she is. “Morning, sunshine. Sleep well?” 
She’s teasing me and I like it.
How in the hell did I forget a night with a woman like her? I must’ve been out of it. “I have a splitting headache and the room is still spinning.” I press my fingertips against my temples, feeling them pounding underneath my touch, “Other than that, I’m perfect.”
“I can imagine,” she says with a giggle. 
Her giggle is the most delightful sound I’ve ever heard in my entire life, even with a splitting headache. 
“Here, I got you something that might help with that.” She offers me a glass of water and some aspirin.
“Thank you.” I graciously accept the aspirin and water, deciding this isn’t so bad. 
“What, no ‘thank you, beautiful’? Guess you’re really not feeling well,” she says playfully. 
Fuck. I even called her beautiful, which means I was laying on the charm pretty thick last night. I offer a frail smile, despite feeling terrible. Not only because of the alcohol. I feel terrible for getting her into bed while I was inebriated and miserable from my breakup. And she was probably drunk too, which makes me feel even worse. Although, she doesn’t appear to have a hangover. Maybe she’s one of those people who doesn’t get hangovers after they get drunk. If she is, she’s pretty lucky.
I swallow the pills, and as I wash them down with water, I know the right thing to do is tell her I’m not ready for a relationship or a woman in my life, but how can I? I don’t really want to see her smile dissipate, especially since she turned out to be so nice and sweet and beautiful.
I lower the glass and close my eyes briefly, the coolness of the liquid feeling quite soothing against my cracked lips and dry throat. Damn, if only I could remember exactly what I did to this woman with my mouth as my tongue slashes along my lips. If only I could remember what she did to me with that lush mouth of hers. A shiver skates down my spine. I try to shake the thoughts from my mind and try to speak but struggle to find the words. It’s difficult when this woman is staring at me with those intense green eyes. I desperately want to scoop her into my arms and kiss her senselessly, creating new memories of having her in bed, but I know that would only end very badly. Even more so than it’s already going to. The last thing I want to do is lead her on.
Somehow, I manage to refrain from kissing her. “Listen...I don’t remember much about last night and you’re…” My hand makes a grand, sweeping gesture down her form, “drop-dead gorgeous...and I’m sure last night was incredible...but my girlfriend just dumped me and my head’s a mess right now, so, I...” she eyeballs me in confusion as I will myself to continue, “I think we should just be friends.” At the same time, I reason with myself that we’ve already done God knows what, so there’s no harm in a quick kiss on the cheek, right? Besides, I may not be ready for a relationship, but I’m still a gentleman.
I step into her space and casually lean in to kiss her cheek. She smells like strawberries and cream and I can hear her breath hitch as my lips brush along her skin.
“Whoa, what are you doing?” She places her hands on my chest to push me away.
I quickly pull back to give her space, apologies leaving my lips. “Sorry, I just figured since we had sex—”
Her eyes practically pop out of her head. “Wait, you think we had sex?!” 
Well, duh. I shrug. Why else would I have slept naked in her bed and why else wouldn’t she be fazed by my nakedness underneath the blanket? “Didn’t we?”
She dissolves into laughter, to my complete and utter humiliation. “Oh no, no, no, no! We did not have sex.”
Please let me know if you would like to be added or removed from the tag list for future updates and sneak peeks.
@onceuponaprincessworld @teamhook @artistic-writer@ilovemesomekillianjones @hollyethecurious @gingerchangeling@ultraluckycatnd @kmomof4 @searchingwardrobes @snowbellewells @let-it-raines @wellhellotragic @itsfabianadocarmo @lfh1226-linda @sophiaaz @becausetheyrehappythisway @thislassishooked @hookedmom @resident-of-storybrooke @kateroselin @kday426 @sals86 @lawgeeks @yasbio2015 @xsajx @delightfully-difficult-pirate @snowbellewells @wanderingjpg @squidvisious @tenaciouskittynight @biefaless @animatedshorts @lassluna @melsbels @meat-pie-with-sauce @roseyflush @tiganasummertree @nowforruin @qualitycoffeethings @nikkiemms @oncechicagolove @theonewiththeory @lostinwonderland314 @darkcolinodonorgasm @carpedzem @maguilar1028 @mayquita @courtorderedcake @shady-swan-jones @timeless-love-story @laschatzi @officerrogers @spartanguard @andiirivera @ouatpost @jarienn972 @winterbythesea @winterbaby89 @distant-rose @xhookswenchx @tiganasummertree​
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jinxfirebolt18902 · 4 years
Text
Ohana Part 2 - (Ben Hardy!Warren Worthington III Serie)
Words: 1.824
Summary: Warren accidentally made a family of his own and he’s determined to do anything in his will to protect them, but maybe that won’t be enough and a little help may be needed.
A/N: I don’t like this that much but for now it will do, sorry. And sorry for the delay, Uni is killing me.
Part 1
[GIF NOT MINE]
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Hours turned to days, days turned to weeks, weeks turned to months and the only thing that had changed was the little family’s life expectations and health deteriorating. Every other mutant had catched up with the news. Not only Angel had been re-captured but also Mockingbird… and their brood. It had caused quite a reaction around the place. First of all, an offspring coming out of both of them was obviously unplanned, and revolutionary somehow. On the other hand, everyone knew humans were capable of committing terrible atrocities against mutants, no news there. But taking a child who had so far showed no abnormality at all into an illegal, unsanitary, fight club was beyond what every mutant could expect. It was clear a few workers felt uncomfortable with the situation as well but they only followed rules and got paid, so the best they could do was sneak Warren’s cage next to hers for a few minutes. Yet it was extremely risky and had only happened twice in over seventy days.
Their bodies had changed. Warren’s torso had now new scars striping his white skin. She was thinner and looked pretty sick. She always gave most of her food to Charlie to make sure he wasn’t hungry. The food quality alone was pretty bad. Dehydration and malnutrition were slowly but surely making their way within their organisms, not to mention the exposure to viruses and infections. The walls were rotten with moisture as well as the remaining wooden doors. The metal ones were rusty and the place had no heating except for the showroom. Clouds of cigarette smoke hung in the rooms as the ventilation wasn’t great either. There was no possible way of not getting sick, especially if you weren’t eating well, or if you had a four-year-old’s immune system.
Charlie’s spirits were of general concern. The other women in her room tried their best to cheer him up and keep him entertained. It wasn’t really difficult as he was so young and creative games easily got him focused. The problem was Mockingbird was losing her life, in every sense. The red-headed lady had warned her, she had to be strong for her son, but even if she tried her body was collapsing gradually. Her mind had tricked her as well. She’d convinced herself she wasn’t the strong lonely winged girl she was years ago. That rough girl had disappeared and the new Mockingbird couldn’t find the strength within herself to keep going. Everyday was a new battle against life, and each one that passed was making her wonder when she would finally lose. She had been put to fight mutants a few times and each had ended with her barely conscious, Charlie being forced to stay with a stranger in another cage and forbidden to look at her injured mother till the next day. The first time they took her a lot of shouting happened.
Two men came in the room unexpectedly, wasting no time in opening her cage. She couldn’t even understand what was going on until a third man ripped Charlie off her arms and handed him over the next cage, the other two grabbing her by one of her arms each. Her brain couldn’t process the fact they had taken her son away from her for the first time since they were there, a guttural scream stuck in her throat as her eyes explored everywhere around her in desperation. The female mutant known as Birdy held Charlie’s hand in concern as the little boy was terrified watching his mom being drawn through the door, tears falling down his pink cheeks and cries escaping his mouth.
As soon as she was being carried down the hall her voice suddenly screeched at the top of her lungs. Warren’s head, which was blankly staring at an invisible point on the floor, shot up at the recognition of the scream. He stood up at a speed he hadn’t thought he could and shouted back, trying to put his head between the bars in a failed attempt to catch a glimpse of something, anything. Apparently she heard him, managing to stop the men from walking further.
—Warren?!
He called back but the men had already moved again, pulling her towards the big cage. Warren was beyond mad. He pushed so hard against the lock of the cage the motion sent it completely over itself. The commotion caused a crew to come check what Warren had done. As they began lifting his cage Warren grasped the collar of one of them pulling him against the bars, the nose of the guy bent against the cold material. He could feel Warren’s breath all over his face.
—Where the fuck are you taking her? —the question filled with menace. — Where is my son?! —this time he shouted it, spitting mini droplets onto his skin.
The other men helped the hostage and took a few feet away from Angel as they feared his unpredictable behaviour, taking his rapid breaths and visible neck veins as a warning. They told him. His expression became instantly one of worry. No… No, she can’t…
After twenty minutes of show, Mockingbird was being dragged back to her cage, a sight which, although Warren didn’t see, Edgar made sure to detail only to enjoy the frustration and helplessness in his eyes.
Charlie hadn’t stopped crying till one of the girls with vocal powers sang him a lullaby. When the door opened and they brought her in several gasps were heard. Though Birdy had the toddler asleep in her arms, she turned in case he would open his sterling grey eyes and see the decrepit state of his mom.
The other times she was recruited were pretty similar. Lots of shouting, crying and useless anger. Now it had been weeks since the last time she fought yet her body was no better. Bruises still lingered in her skin, which was grey not only due to the dirt but also to illness. Her mouth was dry with her lips all cracked and her eyes half open. She couldn’t say if her muscles didn’t hurt or if they hurt so bad that she could no longer tell the difference.
—Mommy…? —the little boy left the made up toys given by the red-headed lady and approached her, making himself comfortable on her lap. A sneeze interrupted his unstarted sentence. He’d been sneezing and coughing a lot the last three days. —I miss daddy. —her head barely moved to look at him. She couldn't contain her own tears. With a movement that took a tremendous energy out of her, she held her hand up to caress the boy’s hair. She grunted in pain as she kissed his forehead.
—I know baby… me too. —her voice was hoarse and low. Every breath was an exertion.
A few hours later things were silently getting worse. It was the coldest day they had spent there. A thick snow cape covered Germany’s streets and buildings. Tonight a big fight featuring Angel and a really fat mutant had the air filled with excitement. It was the red-headed mutant the one who noticed it. Firmly setting her sight on Mockingbird she noticed she was breathing shallowly. She sensed something was wrong.
—Hey! Chs... You! —her voice got the attention of some other mutants. —Mockingbird!
No response. Her eyes drifted to the baby boy shivering in his sleep. He was covered in sweat and snot fell from his little nose. He was probably running a fever. They had to do something. She sent a look at her partners and they secretly set to work in order to do what they had to do first: let Warren know what was going on.
—Holy shit… —a young boy muttered when he got the news. He didn’t want to be the one telling Angel his girlfriend was dying right then and there, a few rooms away with his son suffering from fever on her lap. He swallowed forcibly.
 —Uhm… A-Angel?
Warren slowly turned his head in his direction. When the boy faced those empty cold eyes he muted, taking a few seconds to gain his composure and carry on with his task. —Women say your-your g-she. Women say she—Warren furrowed his eyebrows and stood up at a low pace, grabbing the bars for help. Panicking the mutant didn’t know how to say it and only got himself tangled in an unintelligible utterance. —Spit it out at once!
—They say she’s dying! —the boy shouted, closing his eyes as if trying to hide himself. When he opened them tho, he saw the blonde falling in shock. No anger, no eruption like a volcano, no tears, no breaths, only a blink as his body collapsed against the bars once more, the freezing material embracing him.
—There 's more. Your son. He 's very sick. —another mutant added.
He didn’t respond. Instead he turned his head towards the door and started shouting non-stop at the top of his lungs.
A third of an hour later, men came to carry his cage to the show but left him in the corridor that led to the electrified gate, not inside yet.
—YOU MOTHER FUCKERS LET ME OUT! —Warren’s cheeks and ears were pink. The veins in his neck and forehead stood out. His hair couldn't be more tangled and greasy. His breathings were rapid and he was sweating all over. His throat was already burning from so much shouting. He had to save her. He had to save them.
—Well well well… It’s my champ number one, isn’t it? —Warren’s face contorted with rage at Edgar’s appearance on the other side of his cage.
—They are dying. Get them help right now... and you can keep me for the rest of my life. —his tone was firm but somewhat pleading at the same time.
Edgar’s face stretched with a sardonic smile. And Warren lost any hope he had, leaving a deep hollow in his soul. There was nothing left, he’d lose them, maybe not Charlie, but… Everything he had got to know about love, about having a family that cares for you, about life actually not being that bad… It wasn’t fair. Why couldn’t he be happy? Why couldn’t people live and let live? He and his little family hadn’t done anything to anyone…
Half an hour later the crowd was full. He heard noises, shouts, voices, but not words. The blinding white light fell on him on one side and on the other mutant opposite him.
—Ladies and gentlemen! Weeeeeelcome to this exciting night with our champion number one, Angeeeeeel!!!
The front side of his cage opened allowing him to step in. He had decided to hate life. From now on, not a heart would keep beating if they came in his way. His opponent was about to pay for all the damage Angel had gone through, and boy it wasn’t going to be pretty.
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the--highlanders · 3 years
Text
Trapped
Trapped in a cell, Jamie has to decide whether to trust someone he would usually consider an enemy. 
on ao3.
He tumbled into the cell to land on his knees, though the cold masked most of the sting of the stone floor scraping against his skin. There was nothing but darkness around him, so thick and viscous it could have been liquid, like the inky depths of a loch in winter. Full of nasty, teethy things with greedy eyes. It was so dark, he realised with a shudder, that he had no way of telling where the walls were. For all he knew, they were right by his sides, pressing in on him, and he wrapped his arms around himself. If he did not reach out, then he could not touch the walls and have all his fears confirmed.
But the clang of the door closing behind him echoed too long and too loud for the cell to be so small. Stumbling to his feet, he reached down to brush at his knees, wincing when the raw skin burned at his touch and his fingers came back sticky and wet. Not the worst thing that could have happened, he supposed. He had put up with far worse than this before. And the Doctor would come soon, he told himself with as much conviction as he could muster – which was not particularly much, if he was honest with himself. Even so, the Doctor had to come. As soon as he heard Jamie had been locked up, he would be storming into the place, demanding to know why.
That was a question Jamie himself was quite keen to know the answer to. There had been no warning, nothing out of the ordinary. He had simply bent to help up a child that had been knocked to the ground – a perfectly ordinary gesture, he would have imagined. Perhaps shouting at the man who had pushed her over had been unwise. But the next thing he had known, guards had been swarming around him, dragging him off to the prison without so much as a chance to speak with the Doctor. And the Doctor himself had been terribly cagey about just why the Time Lords had sent them here in the first place, vanishing almost as soon as he had managed to convince the Emperor’s attendants that he was some important diplomat. Whatever he was planning, he had given Jamie no clues that might help him work out exactly why he had been arrested.
His eyes were adjusting to the darkness now, and he took a careful step forward. No rough stone wall shot out of the darkness for him to hit his head against, so he took another step, leaning forward like it might help him see better. He could just make out the seam where the floor met the walls, a blacker line against the shades of grey that marked out the dips and cracks on every surface. The cell was not as small as he had feared, but not as large as he might have wished, either, and for the first time he was glad of the dark. If he tilted his head and half-closed his eyes, he could pretend that it was bigger than it really was, and fend off that nasty lump in his throat a little better.
Which worked quite well until he heard it.
A great, rattling, gasping sound, wheezing out from the other side of the cell.
And then, if he looked closely, there was a shape, too, an enormous mound perched on a little shelf carved out of the wall. He squinted at it, bobbing his head from side to side as he tried to get the measure of it. Whoever – whatever – was there, it would have been twice his height if it stood up like a human. Some kind of trap? he wondered, his heart thundering in his throat with such determination that he was almost sickened by it. A way of getting rid of him? Or another prisoner?
Well, it looked calm enough, and he had already given it ample opportunity to strike. Stretching out one hand, he crept forward. “Hello?” His voice was more hoarse than he would have liked, barely more than a whisper. “Is someone there?”
The thing was still for a moment, and he wondered if it was not a living thing after all, just some strange outcrop of rock. But then it shifted, as slowly and jerkily as if it was breaking itself away from the wall – and sat up, revealing a hulking silhouette that was somehow both human and inhuman in all the worst ways.
“Yes.” Its voice was less of a whisper and more of a long, drawn-out hiss, and Jamie’s blood ran cold. Colder even than whatever liquid ran through the veins of the creature itself, he was sure. “I am here.”
Ice Warrior, Jamie thought, every inch of his skin prickling with terror. It had been a trap after all. And there he was, a complete and utter fool, waking the thing up. Wheeling around, he fumbled first for the door, then its handle, intending to shake it and scream at the top of his lungs and hope that the Doctor would come soon enough to save him. But there was no handle on the inside, no bars to seize hold of, and he was left scrabbling against it instead, his nails scraping horribly on the door’s smooth metal surface. The Doctor will come, he told himself, with more desperation than ever. The Doctor will come, the Doctor will come.
“It’s no use trying to escape,” the Ice Warrior hissed. “If I couldn’t break the door down, I doubt your small body could.”
Gritting his teeth, Jamie fought the urge to spin back around and snap out some clever retort. But none sprung to mind – and exactly what the Ice Warrior had said was settling into his mind, anyway. If I couldn’t break the door down. Turning around more slowly, he stared over at where the thing still sat. It was quite peaceful, as far as he could see, just sitting there with its strange hands clasped in its lap.
“Ice Warrior,” he gasped out, like everything in his mind had been drained away and replaced with those two words.
“Yes,” it said again. Had it been human, he would have said that there was something like amusement in its voice. But it was not human – was about as far as it could get from being human while still being roughly shaped like one – and he did not even know if Ice Warriors could be amused. For all he knew, it could have been hatred. “You are human.”
“Yes.” Well, whatever the thing was planning on doing to him, it was taking its time. He might as well relax while he waited for it to kill him. The shelf poking out of the wall was bumping against the side of his leg, and he perched himself on the edge of it, hands clasped in his lap to mirror the Ice Warrior. “I didnae know there were any of you – of your people here.”
“There are but few.” The Ice Warrior hung its head. “I am -” It dropped its voice, like it was unsure whether it should be telling him this. “Songar.”
“Songar, aye.” Jamie nodded just a little too emphatically. “Well, I’m Jamie.”
“Ja-mie.” It drawled out his name, batting it around like a cat would a mouse, and a shiver ran through Jamie. Briefly, he wondered whether they were really called Ice Warriors for their love of the cold, or whether it had more to do with the chills they could send through someone’s spine.
“That’s right,” he said cautiously. “What’re you in here for, then?”
A deep, guttural sound emanated out from the other side of the room, all but rumbling the floors in its intensity, and Jamie reached out instinctively to steady himself against the wall. Only after a moment did he realise that it was not an earthquake, but Songar, growling out its disappointment. Their disappointment. “For pointing out injustice,” they said. “My brethren are here to keep the peace at the ambassadors’ meeting. When my peacekeeping required me to criticise an Imperial guard, I was arrested.”
“So...” Jamie frowed. “You’re no’ here tae – conquer the planet or somethin’, then?”
“No.”
Songar ought to have been lying, Jamie thought. It ought to have been some elaborate trick, or another layer to the backstabbing that was going on around them. A crumbling empire trying to shore up its own power, all to be usurped by another empire, one with far greater might. But the note in Songar’s voice could not be anything but genuine disdain. Whatever else was going on, they were telling the truth.
“What happened?” he asked slowly. “When ye were arrested, I mean?”
Another wordless hiss, this time surely in displeasure rather than amusement. “The guards took it upon themselves to disperse the people of the town before the ambassadors arrived. I was not aware that keeping peace meant only forbidding violence to those the empire wishes to keep quiet.”
The town had seemed odd, Jamie thought. He had expected it to be full of life and colour, with banners strung from every window and people leaning out from balconies and rooftops to catch a glimpse of the alien visitors. But it had been quiet, deserted even, and it had been there that the Doctor had first started acting funny. Whatever he had realised, he had realised it in those empty streets.
And then -
The child. The one he had helped up. How had the soldiers been so close at hand? Why had they taken the side of the man who had shoved her down, the one he had shouted at? And why should they have stopped him from making sure she was alright?
There was only one answer to that. The girl had wandered away from home, perhaps – and the guards had come first for her, not for him. Which meant, he supposed, that he and Songar had been thrown into the cell together because they had been arrested for the same reason.
He let himself relax a little, his shoulders dropping. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I’ve just never met a – well, I’ve never met an Ice Warrior that didn’t want to kill me.”
Songar spat out a laugh. “Not all humans are the same. Why should we be?”
Jamie was quiet for a moment. “Aye,” he said slowly. “’Spose you’re right.”
“My brethren and I have turned our minds to peace. Our empire has grown enough.”
“Ri-ight.” Jamie bit his lip. Songar’s brute strength might be enough to break them out, he could not deny that. Given time and encouragement, at least. But what then? He still had no idea what the Doctor was planning, even if he thought he knew the wrongs he was trying to fix. What if the Ice Warriors decided that whatever he was doing was against their so-called peacekeeping, too?
But then – the Doctor may not yet know that the Ice Warriors were there, either. Someone would have to warn him.
“If ye broke out,” Jamie began, then faltered. There was nothing to stop Songar from lying through their teeth. “What would ye do then?”
“Return to my people.”
“An’ what would they do?”
“Imperial law prevents our mission. We cannot allow this obstacle to stand.”
No, Jamie thought. It would not be the Ice Warriors trying to stop the Doctor from being too extreme in his measures. It would be the Doctor who would not approve of the Ice Warriors and their undoubtedly brutal methods. “So ye destroy the empire, is that it?”
He had spoken under his breath, and the tilt of Songar’s head was just slight enough that it could almost have been an accident. A pure coincidence of movement, not an admission that Jamie was right. But they both knew what Jamie had said, and both knew what Songar had meant by the motion, and that shared knowledge sat between them, a heavy and oppressive silence.
There was every possibility, of course, that the Doctor had the same objective. In fact, Jamie was almost sure of it. The Time Lords had asked them to oversee the conference, most likely, and then the Doctor had seen the way the Emperor treated the townspeople. Jamie could not imagine that he would be content to leave things the way they were. But whatever he had in mind, it would be nowhere near as violent as the Ice Warriorst. Having the Ice Warriors on their side might be of some use to him. And having the Doctor around to see that the Ice Warriors did not cause too much damage might save a few lives, at least. So perhaps the thing to do was to let Songar try and break them out, to let them rile up the Ice Warriors a bit, and then warn the Doctor what would happen.
And yet there was still the matter of whether or not he could trust an Ice Warrior. Of all the creatures he could have been stuck with, it had to have been one of them. One of the most ruthless species he knew. To trust an Ice Warrior – it was impossible. No matter what Songar said, there was always the possibility that they would kill him as soon as their people had no further use for him. Worse still, there was an even larger possibility that they would do the same to the Doctor, if they found him. Every muscle in his body screaming out its wish to turn away. To wait for the Doctor, and do nothing until he had arrived, and had explained everything.
But the Doctor had not come.
Besides, what would the Doctor do, if he were in the same position? The answer was an obvious one. He would be first in line to imagine that the Ice Warriors were not entirely evil. Perhaps Jamie was close-minded, not to share his optimism.
And whatever else he thought, Songar had been right about one thing. Humans were not all the same. Maybe there was the tiniest of chances that there really were good Ice Warriors.
Slapping his hands against his thighs, he pushed himself to his feet. If the Doctor really was on his way, then he could meet him in the middle. “Come on, then,” he said, as bracingly as he could. “Give us a hand.”
Songar whistled to themselves, something that might have been confusion or amusement or thoughtfulness. “What are you doing?”
Running his fingertips over the door, Jamie paused when he felt a small dip in the metal. It was tiny, invisible to anything but close investigation. Had it been there all along, or had Songar made the dent without noticing? Either way, he thought, it was a weak point. A way out.
“I’m gonnae break out of here,” he said, pounding his fist against his other palm absently. “An’ you’re gonnae help me. Look here.” Heaving themselves to their feet, Songar ambled over, bending down to see what he was pointing at. “I want ye tae hit that dent as hard as ye can, alright?”
Songar nodded, one brief, firm bend of their head before they swung their arm out behind them. The wide arc of their hand narrowly missed Jamie, and he took a hurried step back, waiting with bated breath for the first blow. When it came, it came with a thud, a great hammering of scaly armour against metal. The impact sent sparks skittering out to fade away into the darkness, and Jamie dodged between them to kneel by the door and inspect Songar’s work, his breath catching in his throat when he found the dent again.
A tiny piece of metal had been knocked through to the other side, leaving in its place a gap that was so small he almost missed it – and a single pinprick of light.
4 notes · View notes