#i listen to hello young lovers like once a day

[tearskillstardust]

hello hello I have a genshin request!! genshin men Xiao, Neuvillette, Alhaitham, Wriothesley, (sperate) x y/n??

It's nothing special but hearing y/n sing for the first time?? She's very quiet and closed about her life but they go looking for them and hear them singing!!

(also shes singing Doria mermaid song!! I would suggest searching that up and listening to it first!! Have fun!!)

-🦇🎀

✎ GENTLE HARMONY... al haitham, xiao, wriothesley, neuvillette.

✎ they hear you singing once, but now that they've heard your mellow voice and seen your vulnerable side, they aren't letting you off the hook about it so easily.

— female reader. no trigger warning except that childe has a crush on scara which may be traumatizing lmao

✧ XIAO

serenity and peace had shaded the brilliant skies a gentler shade of grey as the trees leaned in towards each other in idle chatter.

in the eyes of the yaksha, it was an ordinary view. if the skies were grey, then all it meant was that rain would follow soon after, nothing more nothing less. but in the eyes of his lover, whose romantic nature he had begun to come to terms with and secretly adore, a grey sky meant so much.

it was rejuvenation after the bright seduction of the summer breeze— the first onset of the dance of the peacocks as they spread their wings in all their glory, and the onset of the romance of the lovers who had only recently united.

xiao had known you for as long as he could remember, you had just, sort of been there when he first began serving rex lapis. a nature spirit, rex lapis had simplified after a great struggle of trying to explain what you were. and though your discontentedness with the term was very great, because you were not just a spirit, you decided against voicing your opinions.

part of your reluctance stemmed from the fact that xiao had uncontrollably smiled then, unaware of what he was doing, not having controlled his emotions. he had blushed very harshly after that, and though he never explained the 'why' part of it, you assumed nature was simply a touching subject for him.

the yaksha stopped in his steps.

a lone bird at a distant tree took off in flight, the cranes choosing another spot for rest, complaining about the loud of a certain flute.

a flute.

in these high mountains?

he was the only one around himself he had known could play the instrument —other than a certain peculiar kid dressed in red who said he smelled like a distant past and a longing pain and xiao had to control himself from smacking him— so where did the tune originate from?

he would have moved, he certainly would have if the tune wasn't so melancholic in nature—it was like a paradox almost, bright where it was dull, buoyant where it was heavy, ephemeral where it was harsh.

suddenly, he felt like a young adeptus again, clad in green robes as he stared out into the sky, loud chatter behind him as the rest of his friends talked loudly, exchanging fruits and trinkets they'd got from villagers who thought of them as divine earthly spirits.

'c'mon xiao!', a certain rough hand pat his back, and he was so startled that he would have almost fallen down the ravine had another strong one not grabbed him right then as they dragged him back to the cavern where everyone else was and forced-fed him apples.

'haha! have some apples! especially for the most fearsome of yakshas!'. everyone around him laughed at that, and someone pinched his cheeks when he huffed, red at the teasing.

the memory was too distant for any image to properly solidify, his heart throbbing in pain of revived memories. but strangely enough, he remembered having felt so happy that day—the last day he had seen all of them smiling before everything dissolved to dust.

no, he shook his head, gritting his teeth as he held his spear tighter, ignoring the dull pain in his heart, stupid, stupid memories.

he moved slowly in the direction of the tune, spear in his grasp, agonizingly as though a snake trying to catch sight of the rabbit— and when the rabbit came to sight, his mouth fell open in slight shock.

it was you.

he almost called out to you but then realized that you would stop singing if he did. you had always been private about this side of yours, never quite revealing it to him entirely. he had always been slightly perplexed when zhongli would laugh and tell him about how skilled in the arts you were, and he would always have difficulty accepting his words for he had never even seen you reading a poem, much less sing or perform.

so when he heard you sing, he couldn't help but simply sit down behind the bushes as you completed your tune, humming peacefully, all alone, defneseless.

defenseless.

'so you hate the arts because it makes you weak?', cloud retainer asked him jokingly once when he told her he didn't like songs or arts. he wasn't entirely sure what to say to that response of hers.

'it makes you vulnerable.' he answered her back, clearing his throat.

and it was true.

the vulnerability that danced in your eyes at that moment made his heart mellow with equal parts love and nostalgia. of lost memories, lost friends, lost loves, lost happiness— everything he had lost, he had sacrificed for a single goal born out of devotion. he could not find it in himself to move away from your gentle song, nor did he have the heart to disturb you when you were so much at peace.

so he remained there until you were done, reliving old memories as he got further lost in your song, and he could have sworn your gaze flickered exactly to where he sat amongst the bushes, a smug grin on our features before you turned away, staring serenely at the sky as the downpour began.

✧ WRIOTHESLEY [modern au]

the captain of the baseball team had no business around the club rooms. especially around the music ones. and he knew it.

but when a certain ginger-haired, dumbass of a friend decided that it was best to have a crush on scaramouche, the most introverted, 'golden-kid' guy of the school, he had to decide against his better judgement to look for him around the music rooms where he would often be during afternoons.

but when he came across the rundown music room with the sign 'do not enter' hanging outside it, he was suddenly reminded of you who had been entering the room, continuously sniffing and coughing as you tried to gather the courage to enter, a broom in one hand and a mop and bucket in the other. he snickered quietly, remembering the snarl you had given him like a wounded cat when he offered help.

when he tried remembering who you were, however, his memory betrayed him. he only remembered that he had seen you receiving a reward for an inter-school musical performance you had given, but your name or class was entirely a different matter.

'childe can find out about her,' he thought, and then blushed furiously when he realized he was obsessing over a girl he had seen just yesterday. he shook his head once again, 'no i'm a confident man.'

pause.

actually, not so much.

because as soon as he slid the door open out of pure curiosity —hoping somewhat that if some of the cleaning work would be left, he would do it and act like the prince clad in white robes on a white horse— the sight in front of his eyes almost made him drop to his knees.

you sat in front of the piano, back towards him as you played a melody, your fingers working quickly as your voice filled his ears. you looked so pure and unbothered in that moment that he had to force himself not to march right up to you and ask for your number.

he could not help but stare at your fingers as they worked quickly on the keys, never staying still, and then your mellow voice as you sang the notes perfectly, the highs and lows evident in your voice. he was surprised how touching the song was, and almost complimented you when he felt a hand on his shoulder and almost screamed.

childe pressed his hand further against his mouth and pulled his back, and softly slid the door back in place before looking at wriothesley with a teasing grin.

'so?', he asked suggestively.

'so what? you absolute piece of shit i was about to get down on one knee and—

'do you even know her name?'

pause.

'w-well i will! eventually! '

childe sighed and rubbed his forehead. 'you know what actually? forget i ever said anything about that purple twink. i'll talk to him and this girl for us.'

wriothesley eyed his friend suspiciously, aware of his playboy tendencies. 'oh c'mon,' childe said, smiling smugly, 'i would never flirt with my soon-to-be friend's dearest—

'ugh, shut up.' wriothesley said, completely red in the face. he grabbed childe by the throat and began roughing him up affectionately, both of them laughing loudly in the empty corridor.

'excuse me?'

wriothesley dropped childe and straightened up immediately at the familiar voice. 'oh! hi!'

you eye him once before nodding. 'hi. i'm practising a song, please keep it low.'

he was a bit surprised with your short response but managed to smile nonetheless. 'oh, yup, we're sorry. also, your singing is amazing!'

oops.

to his surprise though, you smiled gently at him and blushed. 'thanks, i wrote it a long time back!' and he had to try not to combust with embarrassment and glee. he smiled widely, red in the face as you went back in and slid the door in place.

oh, he could marry you.

'let my shirt go, dumbass!'

'oh, go to hell ginger. i'll talk to her myself.'

✧ AL HAITHAM

al haitham liked his peace. period.

much to his annoyance, however, kaveh's best friend, you, that is, who was staying over at his place for some time to look after both, him and kaveh because both of them fell sick at the same time, hated silence.

no, not disliked. hated.

in your eyes, it was a day wasted if there wasn't an element of song and loudness in it. you always left a cd playing at the gramophone. you didn't even care about the genre, something just had to always keep playing. and you should always be able to listen to it. otherwise, you start becoming irascible.

once he had turned off the radio that you'd left on even when you were working in the balcony, hanging their clothes to dry and that night, as you placed the cloth over his heated body, you made sure it was extra cold making him hiss loudly.

it wasn't very fair, but he didn't go much against you after that.

he would not have needed your help, but tighnari had insisted that they keep you there to ensure that their viral does not get any worse. he had mentioned some botanical words al haitham was too annoyed to remember and then pushed you in the house, leaving.

still though, with his own fever which was always accompanied by chronic headaches, with his inability to read which was clawing at him, and kaveh's endless chatter about one thing or the other, even he was bound to lose his patience at one point.

today was precisely that day perhaps when he had thought of at least 101 reasons why silence was necessary right now in his house as he strided over to kaveh's study where you were working on your herbology work. or at least he thought you were.

standing right outside the room, he heard a soft tune of singing. right.

now that he actually thought about it, the entire house was quiet except for your soft singing that was infiltrating his ears right now. he had no interest in invading anyone's privacy or being rude, nor was he fond of the arts, but when he heard the softness of your voice, he couldn't help but press his ear further to listen closely.

he was so used to your loud, excited and energetic voice, which always irritated him —no offence intended— that when he heard the softer side of it, the more vulnerable one, he couldn't help but get mellow from the inside. he almost wanted to gag, but even he couldn't deny that your singing voice was beautiful.

he had always had a bit of a lonely life.

not that he was upset with it, no, he almost called it, welcomed it with open arms. he was rich, intelligent, no scratch that, genius, capable and competent. he simply didn't need anyone around.

but sometimes when he stared at kaveh moving around the house, holding a ladle one time, then a stack of books the other, he couldn't help but feel a tinge of emotion— something he couldn't quite place his finger at but something which forced him to smile nonetheless.

and then there had been you. there was nothing in you that the scribe would've liked romantically, initially anyway; you were loud and bright and energetic, always jumping from one task to the other, always had a story to tell and a joke to crack, never quite had a dull moment or a need for rest. he almost laughed every time he saw you interacting with kaveh and the way you two just clicked together—the two most annoying people on earth.

the only two people close to his heart.

wait a minute.

he suddenly realized that your song had stopped, and he immediately skipped from the door to the kitchen, or as far as he possibly, quietly could, when you opened your door and stared at him confusedly.

'scribe?'

'al haitham.'

'same thing, what are you doing here? you need a newspaper?'

he looked where he was standing and found he was in the middle of the hall in the most awkward way possible and then cooked up an excuse quickly. 'uh, yeah, kaveh's being a pain again.'

you snickered quietly and quickly came to where he was, standing on your tiptoes as he instinctively bowed down to let you press your hand against his forehead. when he realized his action, he blushed furiously.

you frowned seeing him all red, 'you still have a temperature, al haitham. go back to bed and if you need something, just call me. i'll bring today's newspaper.'

fuck the newspaper, he thought, quickly walking back to his room—confusing both of you; you, over how weird he was being all of a sudden and himself over why he cared so much for you all of a sudden.

✧ NEUVILLETTE

the chief justice of fontaine.

interesting title.

but the duties that came with the position were not so interesting. don't get the ludex wrong— he loves his people, and his job and he was completely devoted but it's simply that when he can, and wants to, spend time with a fun friend and funnier melusines, it's a bit hard to focus on your work.

it was just that time to time, it was nice having someone around who can alleviate your stress without being loud or obnoxious or landing him in more trouble. and it just so happened that you provided him the perfect gateway for that, his newly assigned guard.

he hadn't insisted on keeping one but wriothesley and clorinde had, telling him about the fragile state of fontaine in these times and how any kind of chances of attack on the ludex remained high and that even though he was the hydro dragon himself, a skilled and trustworthy mercenary was always worth keeping around.

what they never said to him though was that they had also assigned you the duty because they were aware of your jokester nature. they knew that you would entertain him with jokes and keep it light when he was getting too tense. and then there was this empathetic nature of yours, which always allowed you to comfort the hydro dragon when he felt upset.

he was genuinely amused by you. you were a nice influence to have around, with your light-hearted chatter and sweet-spoken self. what he didn't expect though, was that he would start getting so restless when you weren't around. he convinced himself for a week, then two, but when the third week passed without having you around, he wanted to visit you.

you had fallen sick, clorinde had informed him. surely, you would be better by now? where were you then? did you grow tired of being around him? he felt upset at that thought. of course. he never openly admitted to liking your jokes or witty banter, certainly, you hated him now. regardless, it was your duty now, and he didn't really ant any kind of stain on your reputation. he would gladly —well, not gladly— let you leave but with proper documents and papers.

he knocked thrice on your door, only for the door to open with a creak.

negative thoughts infiltrated his mind.

he walked in slowly, expecting anything and everything to jump at him. he looked around slowly as he closed the door behind himself, frowning deeply. then he paused.

a song.

and he was so relieved upon hearing that song that he couldn't help but follow it to its source blindly, the innermost room where you had once told him you kept all your musical instruments. you were playing the song on a lyre, and he could almost imagine your serenity as you pluck at the strings idly, staring out of a window.

you often sang it when it was dark and you were lighting all the lanterns around the place and switching the lights on. there was a certain joy, a promise of love in the sweet song that you often sang that made him love it so much. or perhaps it was not the song at all but the person singing it instead.

he stopped right at the closed door and heard your voice, putting him at peace. he thought about how peaceful you must be in this moment, so vulnerable with your closed eyes and parted lips as you addressed the wind with your gentle song—

'sir?'

the song stopped.

he turned, irritated at the interruption, only to find clorinde standing behind himself, holding a small pouch of herbs. now that the situation sank in, he realized that there was shock in her tone, as though she wasn't expecting him at all. he blushed.

'good evening, miss clorinde.'

she tried hard not to tease him and shushed him by pressing a finger against her lips and quickly hid him behind the cupboard, as he crouched, half embarrassed, half thankful as you opened the door.

'who's there clorinde?' your voice came, albeit a bit softer than its usual pitch.

'oh, it's no one.'

'but you said sir?'

'c'mon be serious, you really think i would address someone if they barged right into our house? i would crack their skull open just like that!'

neuvillette flinched slightly from his place before grimacing.

he sneaked out slowly when the door closed and moved out of the house, making sure to shut the door behind himself. and as he walked back to his quarters, he could not help but feel every emotion known to mankind— love for you, anger at clorinde, sorrow for himself, guilt at entering without thinking, then irritation for overthinking, sulking for not being able to see you and confusion at the fact that he was feeling so much all of a sudden.

one thing was sure though, the ludex had taken a liking to your voice, and when you returned, there was no way he was going to let you finish your shift for the day without singing him the song in your lovely, lovely voice.

i wanna kiss the anon who sent this request! this was so cute and fun<3 and the song was amazing my darling, love you for it! i hope i could deliver what you hoped

also, who wants to help point out what al haitham is feeling? 😌

#genshin impact #genshin #genshin headcanons #genshin imagines #genshin x reader #neuvillette genshin #neuvillette x reader #neuvillette x you #neuvillette fluff #fontaine #wriothesley x reader #wriothesley genshin #wriothesley x you #neuvillette #al haitham #kaveh #genshin alhaitham #al haitham x reader #al haitham x you #al haitham x y/n #al haitham fluff #xiao x reader #xiao genshin impact #genshin xiao #genshin fluff #fluff #anon <3

[starlightkun]

➥ word count: 28.9k ➥ warnings: cursing, side character makes one (1) kms joke (“walk into traffic”), probable overuse of the word skeeze for a couple scenes ➥ genre: angst heavy at the beginning then fluff, science fantasy au, soulmate au (red string), speculative fiction, star crossed lovers, a little mystery-ish, artist sungchan ➥ author’s note: omg i’m sooo excited for this one! had a lot of fun with the worldbuilding and such, and as always, with characterizing sungchan. unfortunately due to tumblr’s 1000 block limit (which was created to hurt me personally), i had to do some modifications to this in order to make it fit (i was like 150 blocks over and really didn’t want to split it into two parts for no reason). if you want the authentic, unadulterated experience with original formatting and one extra scene, i highly, highly recommend reading it on ao3

To your horror, the string completed itself, connecting seamlessly to the pinky of the stranger in front of you. The young man looked at you with wonderment, a wide smile coming to his features, brightness and recognition in them. He opened his mouth, presumably to say hello, or whatever soulmates did when they met, but before he could utter anything, you dropped the book and took off at a run.

Humming along to your music, you watched the city pass by, felt the bus start and stop, and were vaguely aware of the same passengers as always getting on and off. You took the same bus every day, Monday through Friday, as you had for the past two years, since you’d been promoted and moved to better accommodations that you could afford with your new pay.

There were regulars on your commute, such as the elderly couple who got on one stop after you on the first Monday every month, and got off at the stop that you knew was closest to the art museum. They sat in the row behind you, and explained to you once that they had been passholders at the museum for years, and that was when new exhibits were rotated in. Or in the front of the bus, a pair of sisters that you had inadvertently seen grow up over the years, who got on some time before your stop, and got off two stops before you in the morning, close to a nearby private school. You could sometimes hear the older one helping the younger with homework, or making last-minute fixes to her hair or uniform.

There were of course lots of office workers as well, who all rushed on and off the bus with promptness at their stops. You recalled fondly the primary school teacher who used to sit next to you, young and always dressed in fun, colorful prints. She had blurted out one morning that she was pregnant, and you were the first person she was telling, even before her husband. She didn’t know how to tell him yet, but was so excited and had to share the news with somebody, even a stranger that she only knew for a few minutes a day on the bus. You’d watched over the months as she started to show, then told you one morning she was just going on a short maternity leave to have her baby boy but would be back sooner than you’d know. She never got back on again. You hoped her son was beautiful and healthy, and still thought of them every so often when you’d look up and pass by her stop.

And then there was you. You sometimes wondered what they thought of you, if any of them did. It would be strange if they didn’t have at least a passing opinion of you. Not because you yourself did anything remarkable on your daily commute. You got on, took the same seat every day, listened to your music with your headphones in, and got off at the same stop. But no matter how normal your routine was, how quaint your occasional conversations with your fellow commuters were, there was something that set you apart.

As signified by the strawberry red jumpsuit you donned five days a week, you worked at The Soulmate Factory. It was technically called the Bureau of Interpersonal Affairs, but everyone just called it The Soulmate Factory, even the employees. Not the most popular place to work, but the work that was done there had to be done nevertheless. All Factory employees were ineligible for matching, in order to maintain the integrity of the Bureau’s image. Your family could never understand why you’d accept a position there; never getting a soulmate of your own, never getting the one person destined for you. But you didn’t see it like that. It’s not like you could never fall in love, find a partner to spend your life with, or be fulfilled in any millions of other ways.

The bus jerked to a stop again, and the doors swung open. You stood up and hurried off. You were the only passenger to depart here, as usual. A building loomed in the distance, all flashing windows and pink marble. Following in a few other coworkers in matching red jumpsuits, you hurried up the stairs, catching up to a familiar head of hair on the way up.

“Morning, Jaemin!” You chirped, nudging his arm with yours as you fell into step with him.

“Oh, hey, Y/N! Morning!” He offered you a bright smile, stepping off at the same floor as you and walking over to your neighboring desks.

“Hey, did you ever read that book I leant you?” You asked, dropping your backpack off at your desk before heading for the breakroom together. There was always a quiet buzz in the morning that you liked, when everybody was still mellow from waking up, but excited to start the day.

He hissed regretfully, a sheepish smile already coming to his face, telling you everything you needed to know, “Well...”

“You haven’t touched it since the day I gave it to you.”

“I’m going to! Promise!”

“It’s coming up on my re-read list,” you warned him, starting a fresh pot of coffee. “I only have like four books ahead of it. That gives you like, four weeks max.”

“You need to rot your brain with some TV or something.” He shook his head teasingly, reaching up into a cabinet and pulling down a box of cereal.

“Hey, isn’t that—”

“Na Jaemin, if you value your life, you’ll put that box down now.” The stern voice of Huang Renjun cracked through the air.

Jaemin turned around, hiding the box behind his back as he offered your other coworker a sickly sweet smile. “What box?”

“Come here, you son of a—”

“Hey, let’s not commit homicide before the weekly agenda meeting, maybe?” You suggested loudly over their squabbling, as Renjun had just grabbed Jaemin by the collar. “Because I’m pretty sure if you kill Jaemin, they’ll just reassign you his work, Renjun. Might want to see what your workload is like first.”

Renjun yanked the box of cereal out of Jaemin’s hand then, holding it to his chest protectively and scowling. “Fine. You better hope that you’re on data synthesis, Jaemin.”

He walked out still clutching the box to his chest.

“He’s just going to eat it dry by the fistful, isn’t he?” You sighed, starting to pour yourself a cup of coffee.

“Definitely,” Jaemin confirmed. “And I’m suddenly really wanting to do some data synthesis this week.”

After getting dismissed from the weekly agenda meeting—during which Jaemin was assigned data synthesis, and Renjun got profile compiling—you headed back to your desks. You weren’t assigned anything because your job was the same every day. You were on a very specific career trajectory at The Soulmate Factory after showing promise in the typical six months of entry-level training for new employees. Following those six months, your fellow trainees went on to start their jobs, while you went through an additional two and a half years of specialized training for your position: matchmaking.

You didn’t sit down at your computer when you got back to your desk, simply placing your nearly empty coffee cup on it before taking off down the hall to the room in which you actually did most of your work.

Swiping your badge at the access panel, the door clicked to unlock, and you pushed it open. There were a couple of other matchmakers already in there, who didn’t offer you a single glance or any indication that they were even aware of your presence. Sitting at your station, you were face-to-face with a quaintly archaic-looking computer. Compared to the newest monitors at every desk in the main bullpen, which could display images in a resolution so crisp it was hard to tell the difference between that and real life, the small, square glass and pixelated text that was in front of you seemed so out of place. But this was the system. Pressing the Enter button on your keyboard, your screen came to life, already giving you your first match.

N!#83LPd5D4ZR$PYQ^KLT6WnY##4GYVm74v^f@96#q#hheeRYgLLf3Ft9KQw

‘Matchmaker’ was a misnomer, really. You didn’t set people up to be soulmates whatsoever. The computer gave you the results, all you did was read them. Take the seemingly random string of letters, numbers, and characters, and parse out the meaning. Your training consisted of watching other matchmakers work, then trying your hand at doing some on your own, being told that you were wrong or right, with no explanation as to why either way—until you stopped getting them wrong. And whenever it would be your turn to train a matchmaker, that would be exactly how you’d train them. Because there was no way to tell them what exactly you were seeing, or how to do it. They just had to do. The longest part was looking up the profile numbers in the program, selecting them, and sending off the match results. As soon as you submitted that one, your next match came up.

jkD%NVSC3%JCacN%vWS5#k!Z4GqGW#ZfMyqGUfc@wQT5L5vK2uWU5N*5Lg&6

Your body moved as if by itself, in understanding with the machine, the program. The matchmakers often talked about entering a sort of trance when working, becoming one mind with the computer, completely unaware of their surroundings, time, or bodily needs. Only the next match. That’s why all of your screens had to be simultaneously forced into a shut-off at lunchtime, or else none of you would take a lunch break, then again at the end of the workday.

Blinking a few times to readjust from the hours spent interfacing with the program, you looked around you at the other matchmakers slowly getting up from their seats as well. With a sigh, you stood up and shuffled out after them. Jaemin was still at his desk when you got back to yours, fervently clacking away at his keyboard. You grabbed your coffee mug, went to wash it out in the breakroom and set it up to dry, then returned to your desk. Swallowing in an attempt to wet your dry throat, you asked him, “So how was your thrilling day of data synthesis?”

“Not over yet,” he groaned, scrolling down in his spreadsheet. “Hey, wait up a minute, would you?”

Checking the time on your watch, you nodded. “My bus doesn’t come for another twenty-five. They let us out early again.”

“Yeah, I heard the Director on the phone to somebody a while ago. He sounded pissed. Apparently, there’s some concerns over the Factory’s energy usage. They must be cutting you guys a few minutes early every day to try to help since you still use old hardware, right?”

“Mm,” you hummed thoughtfully. “Yeah, could be.”

“You’d think we’d be the one agency that wouldn’t be hit with budget cuts,” he scoffed, clicking a few things before his monitor displayed the login screen again. He spun around in his chair, giving you a wide smile. “Alright, ready?”

“Sure.” You grabbed your backpack from your seat. Jaemin and you headed down the stairs, awash in pinks and oranges from the sunset streaming in from outside.

“So, I already know what the answer is going to be, but I have to be able to say that I asked, alright?” Your coworker began, making you scrunch up your face in confusion. “My sister wanted me to ask if you’ve done hers yet? Na Minhee?”

You sighed, “Jaemin, you know I don’t know any of that—” “I know—” “—it’s all just… stuff. And you’ve compiled profiles, those are completely anonymous.”

“I know, I know,” he reassured you. “I just needed to be able to tell her that I asked, and that’s what you said. She wouldn’t take my word for it.”

“She’d know if hers has already been done, anyway.” You held up your hand, wiggling your pinky finger. “Why ask you?”

“Because she’s impatient.”

“Well, I can’t help her.” You shrugged. “It’ll happen when it happens.”

“I’ll tell her that. Thanks!”

“Yeah, no problem, dude.”

“When does your bus come?”

You checked the time again. “Fifteen minutes or so.”

“You want me to wait with you?” He offered, looking around the empty bus stop. “Kind of dark.”

“I’m alright, thanks. Go break your sister’s heart, champ.” You gave him a mock punch on the shoulder.

On your own again, you took your phone and headphones out, popping one earbud in your ear as you went to choose your playlist. As you scrolled, tapped, and swiped through your phone to try to pick the perfect song, some fuzz fell from your jumpsuit onto your right pinky finger, and you absentmindedly shook it off as your focus stayed on your music library. But it was stubborn, and the red fleck didn’t budge. You wiped the digit on your pants, eyes on where you had finally gotten the perfect choice, the song starting up as you lifted your now-clean hand back up.

Except it was still there. You looked at your hand for the first time, really looked at it, and felt your stomach drop. A thin, bright red string, the same color as your jumpsuit, was tied around your right pinky finger, just above the juncture where the finger met your hand. The string hung off in the air, becoming transparent and disappearing altogether less than a finger’s length away. You turned your hand over, palm to back to palm to back, and the string moved with it, the end fluttering with each of your movements. Stupidly, you tried to grab it, as if to pull it off, but when you took hold of the silken thread and gave it a yank, it didn’t budge. For a split second, amputation came to mind, but you quickly pushed those thoughts away. There were stories of people losing fingers or entire limbs and their strings reappearing on the other hand, or in new places altogether if they had no hands at all.

You looked around for any of your coworkers. Nobody else except the two people on either end of the string could see it, but you still didn’t want anybody to be observing your behavior, and then have to try to explain said behavior right now. It was easy to explain why you were doing what you were doing—you just got a red string; but not how—you weren’t supposed to get one. Ever. The area around you was empty, the majority of your coworkers driving, taking the subway, or not having left work yet. You looked over your shoulder, at the pink marble building looming in the distance.

The squeal of brakes and hiss of compressed air as the doors of a bus were flung open made you turn around. Rushing up the steps onto the bus, you then plopped into your usual seat, keeping your backpack on your lap and instinctively tucking your right hand between the bag and your body to keep the string hidden. You didn’t know who could possibly be your soulmate now, you had to be vigilant. You didn’t relax until you were safely tucked away in your apartment, door locked behind you, no plans to see any other humans for the rest of the day.

The next morning, you kept your right hand hidden away as much as possible on your commute, in your pockets, behind your bag, under your thigh. You didn’t feel remotely safe until you were in the matchmaking room, at your station. Even then, it took you longer than normal to stop from looking at your pinky and actually focus on the first match up on your screen. Once you had, everything else faded away like usual, and you could only think about reading the matches.

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At lunch, you typically would’ve taken your packed lunch to a nearby public park to eat, but that was too risky. So you took it to the breakroom, sitting at the small table and taking out one of your books from your bag. A few other coworkers came in and out to use the microwave or retrieve their own lunch from the fridge, but nobody bothered you as you read. You finished your food rather quick, and found yourself a bit too distracted to focus on your book. The red string on your finger was back in the forefront of your mind. Checking the time, you saw that you still had over half of your break left. With a sigh, you shut your book and walked back over to your desk next to Jaemin’s.

The floor was pretty empty, only a couple of your coworkers left who either took early or later lunches. You turned on the desktop computer, waiting for it to start up before quickly signing on. Opening up the program where profiles were compiled to be fed into the matchmaking system, you chewed on the inside of your cheek thoughtfully, clicking around on the controls. During the basic training you’d received over five years ago, you’d been shown how to compile and enter a profile into the database, and you obviously searched them up from your matchmaking station. But these were all profiles that hadn’t been matched yet, that didn’t have red strings. You needed to get into wherever the profiles that had been successfully matched were. If they were kept somewhere at all.

After poking around some more in the application, you determined that either you didn’t have the technical know-how to access that information, the administrative access to do so, or that information wasn’t stored in the first place. Exiting out of the program with a sigh, you dropped your chin into your palm, scrunching your eyes and nose up as you continued thinking. It felt like it was right there, right on the tip of your tongue, but you couldn’t grab it for some reason. The weekly agenda meeting, something about the weekly agenda meeting—Jaemin was assigned data synthesis. They compiled information on all kinds of stuff regarding matched soulmates: average time to meet after the strings appear, get married, have kids, how many kids, length of time they’re together prior to death, the list goes on. That couldn’t come from nowhere. They had to keep track of soulmates somehow, right?

You quickly opened the Internet browser, going to the Bureau’s website and finding the ‘Studies and Statistics’ page. All of the things you were thinking about were there, complete with fancy little graphics. It didn’t tell you anything about where this stuff was stored internally, but this meant that it had to be, somehow, somewhere. Which meant that your match had to be somewhere, and if you could just find it, then you could—

What? Undo it somehow? It had to be possible. But first you had to find out how it happened in the first place, which meant laying eyes on the match itself, at least. You needed some kind of starting point, and that felt like as good as any.

At the end of the day, the matchmakers were let out early again, and you waited up at your desk as Jaemin was still working. He looked over his shoulder at you curiously. “You need something, Y/N? I don’t have your book, sorry.”

“No, I have a question. But you can finish your work first.”

He made an interested noise, and turned back to his screen. After entering a few more things into his spreadsheet, he pressed save, then exited out with a satisfied groan. He shut down his computer and leaned back, audibly cracking his back. “Fucking finally! If I ever have to look at another number again, I’ll walk into traffic.”

You chuckled as the two of you set off. “Data synthesis that bad?”

“Yeah.” He rubbed one of his eyes. “Anyway, what’d you want to ask me?”

“It was actually about data synthesis…”

“No!” He whined, shaking his head fervently.

“One question! One question!” You begged.

“Fine…”

“The data that you use, how do you get that? Like, where do you get it from?”

He looked at you, squinting with confusion. “From soulmates that have already been matched?”

“Then the Factory keeps records of matches after the strings have been triggered.”

“Yeah, we do.”

“Where? Is it a separate database from the one that you enter new profiles into? Or is it part of the matchmaking program?”

“I mean, it’s probably its own thing? I don’t know, I get the numbers in my data synthesis project assignments. If I need more, or something different, I tell the project manager and he gets it for me.”

“Huh.” You kept the disappointment off your face, as well as curiosity. While he didn’t know a lot, what he didn’t know actually was helpful to you. “Okay, thanks.”

“That was more than one question.”

“Right, sorry.”

“What’s going on? Why the interest in data synthesis all of a sudden?”

“Just curious, since you guys seem to hate it so much.”

“It’s… mind-numbing, to say the least.”

“Here’s hoping next week you’re on profile compiling.”

“Fingers crossed,” he sighed. “Anyway, I’ll see you tomorrow, Y/N.”

The next few days passed without incident. Your intervals of snooping around on your desktop computer during your lunch breaks were fruitless in finding wherever completed matches were stored, and soon it was Friday evening, and the work week was over. Not even a crisis like this could make you work late on a Friday. You realized when you got home that you were out of groceries, and ordered delivery to your apartment. Can’t risk someone at the restaurant being your soulmate.

Saturday morning you woke up and left early to go grocery shopping, hopefully before most anybody would be out and about. Well, before one person in particular would be awake—your soulmate. Only problem was, you didn’t know who that was, so you had to avoid pretty much everybody. As you walked through the streets keeping your hands crossed and tucked under your arms, you kept your head down, eyes focused only on your feet. If you couldn’t see anybody’s hands and couldn’t possibly see a red string, hopefully they wouldn’t see yours.

Except as you rushed through the streets, you passed by your favorite small bookstore, with its doors wide open, and a sign out front on the sidewalk advertising a huge sale, 70% off a table of books right by the doorway. You couldn’t help but stop—just for a second—to check it out, spotting a title by one of your favorite authors that you’d been meaning to read but hadn’t yet. Picking up the book to look at the price and turning it over in your hands to skim the blurb on the back, you were barely aware of the sounds of some young men playing with a Frisbee at the park across the street, their yells fading into the din of the waking city.

That was, until the purple, plastic disc came skittering across the pavement to a stop right at your feet, and a tall man jogged up after it, still calling to his friend over his shoulder, “Nice aim, Anton! You almost took this poor woman’s head off!”

You missed what his friend said in response as you were already looking up from the Frisbee with the intent to tell him that you were quite alright, then your eyes got caught on a thin red loop around his pinky finger. Snapping your gaze down to your own hand, which was still holding the book, then back to his as he stood now right in front of you, your eyes widened with alarm.

To your horror, the string completed itself, connecting seamlessly to the pinky of the stranger in front of you. The young man looked at you with wonderment, a wide smile coming to his features, brightness and recognition in them. He opened his mouth, presumably to say hello, or whatever soulmates did when they met, but before he could utter anything, you dropped the book and took off at a run. You sprinted away, turning down streets at random, until your legs were burning and you had a stitch in your side. Ducking around another shop, you hid behind the building to catch your breath, sure that you had lost him. Your heartbeat was thudding loudly in your ears, and you habitually tried to shake off that stupid, pesky red string again.

“Look—” A voice suddenly registering right over your shoulder made you jump and scramble back. The man had found you, holding his hands out in front of him like he was trying to calm a wild animal or a spooked horse. His chest was heaving as he was as out of breath as you were (presumably from running after you). There was a bewildered, confused look in his wide eyes as he kept himself between you and the only way out of the alley you had unintentionally backed yourself into. “I don’t normally chase women through the streets, sorry.”

You stayed silent as you looked between him and the exit. The red string hung between you, painfully obvious.

“I just… wanted to talk, you know,” he continued, gesturing to said string. “I’m Sungchan.”

You shook your head, clenching your jaw tightly to avoid making any kind of sound.

“What?” He tilted his head. “You… won’t tell me your name?”

You stared at him, unmoving.

“You know what, we got off on a bad foot, and clearly this is not a good time for you.” Sungchan stepped away from the alley entrance entirely. “Bye for now.”

Taking hesitant, shuffling steps, uncertain that he was actually going to let you leave, you kept your eyes laser focused on him until you were out of the alley, at which point you promptly booked it down the road again. You didn’t stop until you could no longer breathe, your legs shook and threatened to give out any second, and you had tears streaming down your face from the wind blowing into them.

That day you looked up how to get rid of a red string. You knew it was stupid, impossible to do at home. You literally worked at The Soulmate Factory, you were a matchmaker, for fuck’s sake, you were the one giving them out in the first place.

None of it worked, of course. Not meditating, praying, attempting to light it on fire, soaking your finger in a mixture of various oils and herbs from your spice cabinet, scrubbing really hard with the coarse side of a sponge, or crying for thirty minutes straight (that last one was just you being frustrated, no Internet listicle or sketchy guru suggested that). It was still there after everything, as pristine as when it appeared less than a week ago. Less than a week ago. Much faster than average, according to the statistics that you had just looked up the other day. The average time from getting the red string to meeting was seven months and eighteen days, with some taking several years. And yours just had to be within five days. You felt like you could cry again, if you didn’t already have a throbbing headache from how much you had done that earlier.

Now, you were sitting under the spray of your shower, holding your knees to your chest, trying not to look at it. You couldn’t look at your finger, at the red string, but if you closed your eyes, you just saw his face—Sungchan.

On Monday, you continued your investigation with renewed vigor. When you swiped into the matchmaking room, you didn’t go to your station, instead you headed for the back, where there was a short flight of stairs up to an office. Knocking on the door, you waited for the familiar voice inside to beckon you in.

“Come in.”

Pushing your way in, you nodded politely to your supervisor, “Good morning, Ms. Kwon.”

“Good morning, Y/N.” She brought her hands down from where they had been poised over her keyboard to rest in her lap. “How are you?”

“I’m well,” you lied. “How are you?”

“Fine. What brings you to my office this morning?”

“I… have sort of a weird question, if that’s alright.”

She gestured to the two chairs opposite her. “Of course.”

You sat in one, making a conscious effort to keep your knee from bouncing nervously.

“What is your question?” She prompted you.

“There’s never any mistakes, right?”

“Mistakes? No, you’re all trained right.” Ms. Kwon arched an eyebrow. “Do you think you’ve made a mistake, Y/N?”

“No, not the matchmakers. I mean… the computer does whatever it does with the information it’s given, right? That we collect?” You took a deep breath, preparing yourself for what you were about to say. “What if… it gets the wrong information? Wouldn’t it all be wrong if it’s given the wrong stuff in the first place?”

“The profiles we compile are extremely rudimentary, and that isn’t all the information it uses. The computer does more than we can ever know.”

“But what if… there’s an extra profile in there that was never supposed to be in there?”

“Like a person that doesn’t exist? How would a fake person even get created in the first place?”

“No I mean like—You know how Factory employees are taken out of the program? What if somehow, someone got missed? Like, their match happened right before their first day or something crazy. So they got matched up when they weren’t supposed to.”

“I’ve never heard of that happening.” She shook her head, leaning back in her seat and crossing her legs at the knee. “As soon as we receive someone’s application, their profile is removed from the program. If they’re not hired, their profile is put back in. If they are hired, the data is permanently destroyed.”

“Where’s it stored when it’s temporarily removed during the application process, then?”

She didn’t answer your question, her face turning concerned instead of simply confused as before. “Y/N, what’s going on? Do you know of a Factory employee who’s been matched up?”

You shook your head, trying not to deny it too quickly or with too much fervor. “No, I just—Got a brain itch about it, I don’t know. Seems too… uncertain.”

“I can assure you, no Factory employee has ever been matched up. Accidentally or otherwise,” she replied smoothly, a reassuring smile coming to her features. “You can rest easy; no mistakes are made here.”

“Can you just… answer my question? Please?” You pleaded, picking at your nails to avoid messing with your pinky. “I won’t be able to sleep tonight.”

“Alright, to soothe your brain itch,” she agreed, sounding amused. “It’s another list in the profiles database that we import into your matchmaking program, except only personnel with a certain clearance can view, add, and remove profiles from the list. Once a round of interviews has been completed, the applicants on the list are either marked as hired or not. If they’re marked as hired, their profile information is permanently destroyed upon their first day of training. If they’re marked as not, it’s returned to the main database that everyone has access to.”

“One more thing?”

“Sure.”

“Once a match is made, where does that information go? Like, the reports, the profiles, is it stored anywhere?”

“We maintain all of those records in another program. Those with higher clearance have access to it, for security purposes, since profiles are de-anonymized in it. Data synthesis uses them for reports frequently.”

“Okay, thanks.” You offered her a feigned, relieved smile, then tacked on a quick fib, “Just wanted a little refresh, in case we got any new hires anytime soon.”

“Already looking to train, Y/N?”

“Oh, maybe…” You laughed nervously, as if shy about being caught with your eye on a promotion already and not anxious from having to discretely interrogate your supervisor.

“You always were ambitious. And wanting to learn more about the program and the Bureau… I like it.” Ms. Kwon nodded her approval. “Feel free to ask about any other brain itches you get, okay?”

“Right, thanks.” You stood up, giving her a polite bow. “I should get to my station. Thank you again, ma’am.”

As you hurried down to your matchmaking station, you easily came to the realization of what you’d need to do next. There was no way you’d be able to just wait until you were promoted to a position with high enough security clearance for the post-matched program, that sounded like it would be people of Ms. Kwon’s position and above. You’d have to get into the program using one of their access points. Somehow. But you didn’t have time to brainstorm a plan for that at the moment, you had matches to read. You sank down into the comfortable, posture-saving chair, and let your mind mesh with the computer as the first one loaded up on the screen.

The next day, you waited at your bus stop, leaning against the shelter and eating your apple one-handed. Pedestrians would occasionally pass by, but your area was mainly young families, so most residents drove their children to daycare or school, then either returned home, or went to work themselves. There was the occasional parent who would jog by with a stroller, or pulling a stroller hitched to the back of a bicycle, but for the most part it was just you and your apple, which you were nearly done with. Out of the corner of your eye, you saw a lone jogger approaching, and took a step back to allow him to pass, eyes still down on your phone and apple as your bus hadn’t arrived yet. Except this jogger slowed to a stop in front of you. You followed the red string from the hand that held your apple core up to a somewhat familiar face, looking down at you in mild confusion.

He was admittedly sweatier now, pieces of hair curling and sticking to the skin at his hairline, and his t-shirt sported a damp spot starting at his collar going down the middle of his chest. But this was definitely Sungchan, as signified by the red string connecting your right pinky to his left. He lifted the hem of his shirt to quickly pat drops of sweat away from his face and took one of his earbuds out as he offered you an easygoing smile.

“Hi. Feeling better?” He asked, his tone light and teasing.

“Why are you here?” You practically snapped. You thought you’d be safe at your bus stop of all places, which you were at every day. You knew your neighborhood, the people on your bus, but he still somehow showed up. “I-I take the same bus every day, at the same time, and I’ve never seen you jogging in the morning!”

“Oh, yeah, I stayed at my sister’s place last night, she lives around here.” Sungchan casually gestured over his shoulder at the general vicinity. “So I had to take a different route than normal for my morning run. You live in this area?”

You stared at him, jaw clenched.

“Sorry, probably sounded a little weird asking you that, huh?” He laughed, rubbing the back of his neck. “Uhm, it’s just that you said you’re at this same bus stop every day at the same time, so I figured you, uhm… never mind. I’m Jung Sungchan, I realized I didn’t properly introduce myself last time. I’d offer my hand or hug you or something but I’m a bit sweaty…”

Taking a deep breath, you tried to think of how to politely phrase the everything you had to tell him, but he just kept talking.

“I’d like to uh, you know, know your name, too. Since we’re uhm, you know… soulmates? And uh—”

“Sungchan!” You cut him off, and he immediately shut his mouth. “It doesn’t matter. You don’t need to know my name.”

“What? What are you talking about? But we’re—”

“I’m not supposed to have a soulmate!” You gestured wildly to your uniform. “This was a mistake! An error! I’m sorry. This shouldn’t have ever happened. I’ll get it fixed, okay? I’ll figure out how to undo it, and make sure you get put back in.”

He frowned thoughtfully. “I thought the Factory didn’t make mistakes.”

“The computer doesn’t. But somehow, somebody must have put a paper in the wrong stack, or not deleted something when they should’ve, I don’t know! But I’ll fix it.”

The bus finally arrived then with its usual screech of brakes and hiss of the pneumatic doors, and you stepped away from Sungchan towards it.

“I have to go.” You told him with finality, tossing your apple core in a nearby trashcan and boarding the bus without waiting to hear if he had something else to say.

Without having to avoid the entire world now, you actually took your lunch today. But as soon as you stepped outside of the building and turned from the front doors, you spotted a familiar tall figure standing awkwardly off to the side, no longer in sweaty running gear. You made a beeline for Sungchan, grabbing him by the elbow and pulling him to the most secluded corner of the open space as you could, away from all your coworkers who were heading off to take their own break.

“What the fuck are you doing here?” You hissed at him, constantly glancing around to make sure nobody was close enough to hear you two.

His face did look genuinely regretful, though exasperated at the same time. “I’m sorry, I didn’t know how else to find you.”

“Why are you trying to find me?”

He held up his left pinky. You pushed it back down. “I’m working on it!”

“No, I—” He let out a frustrated groan, rubbing his face. “Can we like… I don’t know, talk, or something?”

“Why?”

“Don’t you think I should get a say in you undoing this?”

You inhaled sharply. “You’re right, Sungchan. I’m sorry. We should talk.”

“Finally, thank you.”

Checking the time for a moment, you then offered, “I have fifty-five minutes left of my lunch break. Do you want to join me?”

“Sure, sure.”

You led him away from The Soulmate Factory, along a familiar path. There was a riverside public park nearby, and on days when you packed your lunch, and it was nice out, you would eat outside.

Sungchan broke the silence, “Will you ever tell me your name?”

“Y/N. Y/L/N Y/N,” you informed him flatly. “Happy?”

“Y/N,” he repeated, as if savoring your name. “Okay, thanks.”

The park was only a couple minutes’ walk, and you had a very specific destination in mind once you two got there.

“I packed a lunch today, sorry,” you said quietly, sitting down on the wall overlooking the river, your feet swinging in the air.

Sungchan sat down next to you. “That’s fine. I can grab something later.”

Opening your lunch bag, you grabbed your sandwich and held out half to him. He accepted it gingerly. “Thank you.”

“I haven’t figured out how to undo it yet, but I can enter a profile into the program easy, so once I do undo it, don’t worry about me putting you back in. You’ll be all set,” you reassured him, taking a bite.

“You’re still talking like this is a done deal. Undoing it.”

“I’d be fixing someone’s mistake, Sungchan. That’s what you do at work. When you see a piece of paper is misfiled, or a decimal is in the wrong place, or a typo on a presentation, you fix it, even if you didn’t do it.”

“It’s just… human error?”

“Yes.”

“That’s all that’s happened here, you think?”

“Whoever was supposed to take my profile out didn’t for some reason, and the computer got it when it wasn’t supposed to,” you confirmed emphatically.

“How does it work, the program? And the profiles, and the computer? All of it?” He questioned.

You gave him as simplified of a version as you could, “Profiles and a bunch of other data points get put into the program, which imports them into the computer. The computer spits out the resulting matches, I—we, matchmakers read them and submit the match reports, triggering the red strings.”

“So it wasn’t given any incorrect information about you or me? Nobody tampered with the system to force it to match us, or falsified a match?”

“No, you can’t do that. It’s impossible.”

“The only hiccup, in your opinion, was that it was given your data at all.”

“Yes, Factory employees aren’t allowed to—”

“Whose rule is that?”

“The Bureau—”

“So, it’s literally just bureaucracy?”

“I like my job,” you huffed, frustrated that he wasn’t seeing the blatantly obvious mistake that had happened. “It’s a rule for a reason. Factory employees are taken out of the program so the public doesn’t think employees are rigging their matches.”

“Can’t rig your soulmate if you don’t get one,” he scoffed.

“You say that like it’s a bad thing.”

“You say that like having one would be the worst thing in the world!” Sungchan replied incredulously.

“It is for me! Because do you know what would happen if people at the Bureau found out this happened?” You looked at him with wide, pointed eyes. “Just losing my job would probably be the best outcome. And who knows what would happen to you!”

“But—”

“I’m sorry, Sungchan. I’m sure you had imagined all of this, your red string, and the person at the other end of it, going a lot different. And I’m sure it will, when I fix everything.” You stood up, cutting your conversation and lunch short. “Don’t come to my work again, okay? For both our sakes.”

“Yeah, okay. Sorry,” he muttered, looking out at the water.

Back at the Factory, you finished eating your lunch at your desk, then shuffled back to the matchmaking room. After swiping in, you realized that you were pretty early, the first one back. Curious, you peered up at Ms. Kwon’s office. She was in there, of course. No way would you be able to attempt to use her computer to access the higher-clearance data. You sank into the chair at your station with a deep sigh. Drumming your fingers along the desktop, you let your eyes flutter shut. You’d have to wait for the others to get back from lunch for the power to be returned to the screens. In the meantime, you could just ruminate.

“Y/N?” Ms. Kwon’s voice came from the direction of her office. “Back so soon?”

You opened your eyes back up, turning to look at her. You nodded sheepishly. “Quick eater…”

“I feel like I’ve seen you in the breakroom with a book before. Nothing today?”

“Forgot it at home.”

“Alright, well… have fun, I suppose.” She turned to go back into her office.

“There’s no way to undo a match, is there?” You blurted out, stopping her in her tracks. She turned back around to look at you curiously as you continued, “Once we press submit on the computer, that’s it?”

Ms. Kwon cocked her head, leaning against the railing at the top of the stairs. “You should’ve been told this in training… No, there isn’t a way to ‘undo’ a match. We aren’t even matching them, just reporting on what the computer says. All the reports do is trigger the strings. The two people are soulmates regardless of the computer. We just intervene so they can find each other.”

You gulped and nodded. “Of course. I knew that… I… I don’t know. Thank you, Ms. Kwon.”

“Another brain itch?”

“Yeah, I guess,” you forced out a couple of chuckles to cover up the dread you felt on the inside.

“Alright. Remember, ‘The Soulmate Factory’ isn’t very accurate. We don’t make soulmates here, they’re already out there.”

“Right, yeah. Terrible nickname, huh?”

She shrugged. “It’s cute. Good for branding. I’ve got a few things to work on, unless you have any other burning questions for me?”

“No, Ms. Kwon, that’s it. Thank you, again.”

“No problem, Y/N.” And with that, she retreated into her office once more.

Dragging your feet back out to your desk at the end of the workday, you chewed on your bottom lip, contemplating pretending to have extra work so you could stay late and try to sneak onto Ms. Kwon’s computer to access the matched profiles. But her office was behind a door with swipe access, it would log that you swiped in after hours. A digital breadcrumb trail.

“Hey,” Jaemin got your attention as you sat in your chair and stared at your screen. You spun your chair around to look at him, lifting your eyebrows in a silent question. “Who was that guy?”

Your blood turned cold. “Huh? Who? When? What guy?”

“Oh now that wasn’t suspicious,” he snorted. “The guy that was waiting for you at lunch whose ass you looked like you were about to kick.”

Oh God. Jaemin saw Sungchan. Who else saw him? You had to assume everybody. You stood up from your chair hastily, fully intent on running away. “Just—Nobody, it doesn’t matter.”

Jaemin gasped, then dropped his voice, “Y/N, you didn’t...”

“Didn’t what?” You squeaked, now ready to stick around. You had to know what he knew, which was obviously the truth.

“You totally did.” He shook his head, clicking his tongue. “Never a good idea, getting involved with people who are destined, even if they don’t have their string yet. Because one day they will.”

Of course. He thought, perfectly reasonably, that you had dated, slept with, done something with somebody who was going to get their red string someday, while you would remain without it forever. You swallowed down your sigh of relief, and instead crossed your arms over your chest, quickly switching trains of thought to follow this new cover story.

“And that’s what I told him, Jaemin, I swear,” you whispered insistently.

Your friend finished up and switched off his desktop then, giving you a frank look. “How many times, Y/N?”

“I told him like a hundred times—”

“No. You know what I mean.”

You hurried down the stairs, Jaemin right with you, rolling your eyes as you tried to think of a number that wasn’t excessive, but messy enough to possibly warrant a guy turning up at your work. “I don’t know... a few! A girl’s got needs, Jaemin!”

He chuckled and shook his head again, pushing the front door open for you. He turned suddenly, grabbing you by the shoulders and spinning you around to face the building with him, then gestured grandly up and down the entirety of The Soulmate Factory. “A whole ten floors to pick from, Y/N. No messy red strings to worry about after.”

“Yeah, just awkward encounters at work,” you scoffed.

“I heard Park Jisung on the second floor thinks you’re cute.”

“What is this? Middle school?” You elbowed him to get him off of you, ducking out from under his arm and taking off towards your bus stop at a speed walk.

He easily kept pace with you. “I’m just looking out for you. Rule Number 1 of dating with no soulmate: Stay away from people with one.”

“Uh-huh, noted,” you replied shortly. “You done?”

“Are you?”

“Yes! God!”

“Alright.” He was still grinning, clearly finding the whole scenario amusing overall. “Goodnight, Y/N.”

“Bye, Jaemin.”

A couple nights later found you rooting through the frozen section of a corner store. You’d gotten home from work after yet another day of getting nowhere with this stupid red string and had wanted nothing more than to wallow in misery with a pint of ice cream. Except you had none in your freezer, and your usual corner store was out of your favorite flavor, so you had to go to one several blocks over.

After paying for the ice cream and grabbing a plastic spoon from the available utensils, you hurried out of the shop. Turning sharply onto a side street to take a shortcut back to your apartment, you nearly tripped over somebody sitting on the sidewalk curb, their feet in the street. They were wearing a hoodie with the hood up, and you jumped back as you went to apologize. Then they looked at you over their shoulder, and you stopped your apologies, flabbergasted and a little pissed off at the universe at this point.

“Oh my god, again?” You stared at Sungchan, eyes bugging out of your head.

“Okay, ouch,” he retorted. He had his own pint of ice cream and plastic spoon in hand, about two-thirds of the way done.

“Sorry, I was just… I wanted to drown my sorrowsin ice cream alone.”

He turned away from you, resting his arms on his knees as he went back to looking down at the pavement. “Well, I’ve got dibs on this street corner for sadly eating ice cream.”

You winced. “Sungchan… I’m…”

Sorry? Was that it? Not for wanting to undo the string. Sorry that this all happened to him in the first place, and that he was now sadly eating ice cream by himself on a street corner? Absolutely. Even though you wanted to remove your red string that connected you two as soulmates, you still felt for the guy as a person, and you felt bad just leaving him here. In a different set of circumstances, you could see the two of you being friends. Against your better judgment, you sat down next to him on the curb, opening your pint of ice cream. He looked at you suspiciously out of the corner of his eye, and you caught a glimpse of his damp, bloodshot eyes in the light of the streetlamp above you two before he focused them back down on his own ice cream.

He shoveled a spoonful into his mouth before speaking again. “We’re going to keep running into each other, don’t you get that?”

“Yeah, I know, the string always gets tighter again. But I didn’t think our string would be like a fucking rubber band.” You shook your head, licking the lid of your container clean. “Honestly, this is kind of ridiculous.”

There was a moment of awkward silence as he ate another bite of ice cream.

“The computer doesn’t make mistakes.” He stated bluntly. “That’s what you said the second time we met. Do you actually think that? That what goes on in there is making soulmates? Finding them? Whatever.”

“I-I mean, yeah.” You carefully carved out your first spoonful from the pristine surface. “We do analytics and data gathering post-matching and… yeah, it works.”

He was quiet as you took your bite of ice cream into your mouth.

“Then we’re soulmates.”

You couldn’t swallow quickly enough, mind reeling at you tried to think of anything to say. “But my profile—”

“Whatever may have happened before the computer got our data doesn’t fucking matter, it still did all the same stuff that it does when giving you all the matches that you read,” Sungchan cut you off, and you saw a fresh tear catch the light as it rolled down his cheek. “And it figured that we were soulmates. But suddenly you’re doubting it? Suddenly it’s not right? What’s so fucking special about you?”

“I…”

“Has somebody’s profile even been through the computer twice? Ever? And you want to just stick me back in there. What if it rejects me because it already processed me once? What if I don’t get another match? What if it breaks the whole damn program? The whole fucking Factory?” He wasn’t yelling, but his voice was strong and hoarse at the same time, and you froze up as you felt the anger and hurt in him.

You didn’t have an answer for him. You always had an answer. You always knew, at work, when reading the matches, you just always knew, but you didn’t now. You had nothing, it was all blank, empty in your mind. You swallowed thickly, staring at him as he looked over at you furiously. White hot shame and guilt made your skin prickle.

“I don’t know,” you admitted quietly.

Sungchan put his pint down on the pavement, then covered your hands with his. Even as you held onto your ice cream, you could feel that his skin was colder than yours. “I’m trying to understand you, Y/N, but this isn’t making any sense to me.”

“I thought I’d have a choice,” you told him shakily, slowly pulling your hands away. “I thought I’d be able to choose…”

He blinked, and his face twisted up with pain as he took his hands back. He grabbed his nearly empty carton, standing up and blotting out the lamp light as he towered over you.

“Trust me, you’ve got a choice. A big one.” He sighed bitterly, tossing his container in a nearby trash can. “I’ve said my piece. Goodnight.”

“Where are you going?” You called after him as he started down the sidewalk.

“Somewhere. When you’re ready, you know how to find me.” He lifted his left arm up and waved his hand, his end of the red string fluttering back and forth in the air with the movement.

You watched him continue to walk down the street, not slowing down or looking over his shoulder once. It was only when you could no longer see him that scalding tears welled up in your vision and stung your eyes. You didn’t bother wiping them away as they streamed down your face and fell onto your shirt, leaving dark patches in their wake. Despite the ice cream being your original intent for coming out, you suddenly didn’t have an appetite, burying your face in your arms to cry alone on the curb.

What’s so fucking special about you?

Sungchan’s words were still in the squeal of the bus brakes in the morning, and the hum of strangers’ conversations, and the shuffle of leaves as the wind shook tree branches. You stared at the grooves of the hardwood floor in the breakroom, hearing his voice in the gurgle of the coffee machine as it ran on the counter behind you. You didn’t even need your usual morning cup, still wide awake, as you had been all night. Fingers snapped in front of your eyes, and you lazily dragged your gaze up to the owner of the hand, Renjun.

“You look like shit,” he deadpanned.

You took a long, deep sigh, not even having enough in you to react to the comment as you usually would. “Do you ever think about your soulmate, Renjun?”

“Uh… no?” He lifted an eyebrow. “Because I don’t have one? Remember?”

“I know, Factory employees get taken out of the program. But doesn’t that mean that the computer is really working with incomplete data or whatever? Since it doesn’t actually have every single person in there?”

He crossed his arms over his chest as he seemed to think about this for a moment. “I guess.”

“If we were all in there, we’d get matched up with somebody. Our soulmate. We’re not all in there, but whoever we would be matched with still is. So they just… get their second-best match?”

“What is it that matchmaking lady always says? ‘The computer does more than we’ll ever know?’”

“Ms. Kwon?”

“Yeah, her.” He nodded, turning around to get his cereal down from the cabinet. He answered your question over his shoulder, “No, I’ve never thought about this, Y/N. But you have clearly been doing a lot of thinking about it.”

“Too much,” you groaned. “My head hurts.”

Your coworker’s voice was a bit softer as he offered, “You, me, and Jaemin—Drinks after work?”

After work you ended up on a rooftop bar with Jaemin and Renjun, nursing your second beer of the night as you stared out at the lights of the city. The two of them were chatting about some movie that was coming out this weekend that they were interested in, and all three of you had your feet kicked up on the ledge of the rooftop.

In a lull in their conversation, a finger poked your head from the left. “What’s wrong?” Jaemin asked.

You sighed. “It’s… ugh.”

Another finger poked the right side of your head. “Come on,” Renjun insisted. “You’ve been weird all week.”

You took a swig of your drink, then let out another deep sigh. “Why did you guys start working at the Factory?”

“What?” Renjun scoffed lightly, as if he couldn’t imagine why you’d even ask that.

“Why did you start working at the Factory?” You repeated. “I mean, accepting a life without a soulmate.”

“My parents met at the Factory, actually,” Jaemin said.

“Wait, really?” You turned to him curiously. You knew that Factory employees dating each other wasn’t off-limits, and theoretically that meant they could settle down and have lives sort of like soulmates, but you’d never heard much about it actually happening.

“Yeah, they weren’t soulmates. So it was one of those things where, I don’t know, I got to grow up knowing that there was another way to live.” Jaemin shrugged casually. “I didn’t even really think about the no-soulmate thing when I applied, they just always talked about how much they loved their jobs, it sounded like a cool place to work.”

“I applied at a bunch of different places, this is the first one that called me back,” Renjun gave his own answer.

“Why did you start working here?” Jaemin turned your question back on you.

You tapped your fingernail against the side of your bottle. “Pay’s not bad… And I didn’t… hate the idea of having a say in my love life, you know? Instead of this string showing up one day and telling me who I’m supposed to be with forever. Getting to choose on my own.”

“Sounds like you don’t think the computer knows what it’s doing,” Renjun snorted.

“No, it does! It does! I just… didn’t mind the idea of never knowing.”

Jaemin furrowed his brow curiously. “What do you mean?”

“Like… I can wake up tomorrow and have cereal, or eggs, or buy breakfast on my way into work. There could be someone new on my bus in the morning. I can get a haircut, or dye my hair. It could rain tomorrow, or be sunny, or overcast. Life is always in flux, always changing, new, different.”

“Knowing who your soulmate is, would be too… certain?”

“Some people like having that constant in their life,” Renjun pointed out. “Or so I’ve heard.”

“I don’t know, like what if you get your soulmate and they kind of suck? Then you kind of have to ask yourself what did you do to deserve someone who kind of sucks? Because that’s literally the best you can do,” you ranted, gesturing around to the night sky with your bottle. “At least without a string, there’s always a chance that there’s someone better out there.”

“Ah, you’ve got the Boy Scout mindset,” Jaemin said knowingly. “Just in case. Just in case it rains, I’ll bring an umbrella. Just in case whoever you’re seeing now kind of sucks, you can always try again.”

You crossed your arms defensively. “What’s wrong with that?”

“Nothing, since you don’t have a string.”

“Very polite way to say she has commitment issues, Jaemin,” Renjun snickered.

“Rude!” You smacked his arm with the back of your hand.

He wasn’t dissuaded by your minor battery, however. Bringing his two feet back down to the ground, he leaned his elbows forward on his knees and looked over at you, “Sounds like to me, you want infinite second chances. Just in case.”

“There’s only so many of us at the Factory, really,” Jaemin pointed out. “Wouldn’t a soulmate actually be infinite second chances? Since you know you’re destined to be with them, you can kind of mess up as often as you want?”

You frowned, thinking of Sungchan walking away from you. “You really think so? I mean, they’re still a person. Wouldn’t they stop putting up with you after so long? Even if they were your soulmate, I’m sure being alone would be better than having a shit soulmate.”

“Well, then you have to ask: What is a soulmate? Just the best you can do? Or someone who’s going to make you better? Is there such a thing as a shit soulmate?”

“There has to be, right? There’s bad people, and those people have soulmates.”

“Are they bad forever? Are they bad people to their soulmates? Or do they also have shit people for soulmates? So, relative to each other, they don’t even realize that they have a shit soulmate?”

“My head hurts again…” You groaned, pressing the heels of your palms against your temples.

A long silence passed as you three each finished off your beers. Renjun shrugged and leaned back in his chair with a satisfied grunt. “Thank God we’ll never know, huh?”

Your Saturday was spent walking. Walking all over town, from your apartment to your bus stop, to the park where Sungchan had been playing Frisbee before, to the corner store where you’d last seen him, and everywhere in between. You kept your head on a swivel, straining for any sign of his tall head over the crowd. But you couldn’t see him anywhere.

When you finally gave up mid-afternoon and went back to your apartment for a late lunch, you knew that you were actually relieved that you hadn’t found him today. If you had ran into him, you didn’t even know what you’d say, where to start, where to end, what to say in the middle. Your head was a jumbled mess, simultaneously too full and too empty. There was no way you’d be able to articulate a single comprehensible word when you yourself didn’t know a shred about anything that you were thinking or feeling.

Sunday you were kept busy with Sungchan’s lingering question. What’s so special about you?

In the moment, it felt like he was asking why you thought you were special enough to be exempt from something that everyone else experienced: getting a red string and finding their soulmate. But as you went about mindless chores in your apartment, doing the dishes, folding laundry, you thought about him.

What’s so special about Sungchan? What would make him your soulmate? And you wondered if he was asking himself the same questions about you.

Monday morning you almost missed your bus. You’d been so distracted going about your morning routine that you ran straight from your apartment building onto the bus, the doors closing right after you. The elderly couple was on today, and you plopped into your seat in front of them, offering them a breathless smile and greeting.

“Tough morning, dear?” The woman asked you knowingly.

“Oh, a bit,” you laughed. “Tough couple of weeks, honestly. But I’ll make it. What’s the new exhibit for this month?”

“It’s a contemporary artist who does large-scale mixed media collages,” the husband explained.

“That sounds so cool! Is there a particular theme for the collection on display or it more eclectic?”

“Oh, we don’t read up much before,” she said with a shake of her head. “We like to go in blind, no presuppositions or expectations, good or bad.”

You continued chatting about the museum with them until their stop to get off, and watched fondly as the man helped his wife up, the both of them bidding you farewell before departing. As the bus peeled away, you were able to glimpse them starting arm-in-arm down the sidewalk together.

After dropping your backpack in your chair, you headed towards the breakroom, where you found Jaemin hunched over something at a counter, his back to the door.

“Renjun’s cereal?” You surmised immediately.

He jumped in place, turning around clutching his chest. “Fuck! You scared the shit out of me, Y/N! Don’t sneak up on a guy like that!” He did in fact have a familiar box in his hand, clearly having been pouring some into a cup.

“I wasn’t sneaking. You just flipped out because you know you’re being a little cereal thief right now.”

He quickly closed up the box and put it away. “There. Like it never happened.”

“Why don’t you just bring your own box of cereal?”

“It just tastes better if it’s free.”

“Stolen.”

“Synonyms.” He grinned slyly, shooting you a wink as he walked out.

As you were milling about, trying to gather everything to start the first pot of coffee, Renjun entered, heading straight for where his cereal was stored. You watched out of the corner of your eye as he grabbed it, froze midair, and tested the weight of it in his hand.

“Na Jaemin…” He hissed, slamming the container onto the counter.

“Suggestion—” You announced, turning around to look at him with your arms crossed over your chest. “Keep the cereal at your desk instead of leaving it here unattended where he steals it all the time.”

“I never keep food at my desk. What if it attracts ants?”

“Padlock.”

He rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “You may be onto something there…”

Renjun wandered out of the room, still musing over this with the cereal box tucked under his arm. You realized you didn’t really want a cup of coffee and put the empty coffee mug away.

The weekly agenda meeting was short and sweet, and you were slow to follow the other matchmakers down the hall after. You were the very last one to swipe in, and to take your seat at your station. Everyone else was already reading their matches, but you just stared at your blank screen, not even turning it on yet. At some point, two weeks ago, someone in this room, one of your coworkers—or maybe even you—had read a match result, looked up a bunch of numbers, and submitted a match report that had changed your life forever. You listened to them clacking away at their keyboards, dozens more strangers’ lives being irreparably altered like yours was.

“Y/N?” Your name was called from across the room, and you whipped your head around to look over at Ms. Kwon, standing in the doorway of her office. She gestured for you to come over. “A moment?”

“Oh, of course, ma’am.” You rushed to stand, hurrying up the stairs and following her into her office.

She closed the door behind you, sitting back down behind her desk, and offering the chairs across from her for you. You nervously took the one closest to the door.

“Is everything alright with you?” Your supervisor asked gently. “You’ve been sitting at your station for the past fifteen minutes and haven’t turned the screen on…”

“Sorry…” You winced, self-conscious as you pictured Ms. Kwon watching you stare at a blank screen for fifteen minutes. “I’m uhm… I…”

“Have something on your mind?”

“It’s worth it, right? Giving up your soulmate to work here?”

Ms. Kwon took your question in stride, folding her hands together over her desk as she answered, “It’s good work that we do here, Y/N, don’t get me wrong. Necessary. But choosing to live without a soulmate, that’s not a noble sacrifice on our part. We’re not any better than anybody else because we choose to work here and they don’t. I don’t know a single executive here who would talk about it like that.”

You could feel all façades slip off your face, your eyes widening slightly and your mouth parting, though no sound came out.

At your apparent speechlessness, Ms. Kwon continued, “We’re not... monks or nuns taking some holy vow, Y/N. It’s morally neutral. Neither good nor bad. It just is.”

A split-second of rage burst inside you. “Then why would any of you choose it? Why would anybody go without a soulmate?”

“Why did you?” She asked you calmly.

“I... was afraid to know,” you admitted quietly.

“Everyone here is sort of like that. They have some other reason. It’s usually not a good one, but they never have to confront it. Ever.”

“So the Factory... is the easy way out?”

“Y/N, listen to the words I’m telling you: It is neither good nor bad to choose to work here. It just is.”

“Is it good to have your soulmate, then?”

“I am not the arbiter of good or bad in your life. I’m just your boss,” she replied, sounding a bit tired now. “Look, you’re very smart. That’s why you were chosen for matchmaking. But I’m urging you to stop this line of thinking here. This is how you end up—”

“I’m resigning,” you declared, and suddenly all of the noise in your mind was quiet.

“That is what I was afraid of,” she sighed. “May I ask why?”

“I… have a soulmate.”

“Of course you do.” Ms. Kwon smiled placidly. “All of us at the Factory do. But quitting now will not put your profile back in to get matched with them.”

“No, I—I was matched. Somehow, I don’t know how, but… I have a red string, Ms. Kwon.” You held up your right hand, pointing to your pinky, even though you knew she couldn’t see it. You couldn’t help but laugh at the sudden lightness of your shoulders. “I have a soulmate, and… this is just a job. It’s a good job, and I love it. But there’s other jobs. I don’t have another soulmate.”

She was quiet for a moment, simply looking at you intensely. After a moment, she reached out to hover her hands over her keyboard. “Would you mind if I took just a moment to confirm? It’ll take less than a minute.”

“Sure, go for it.”

Ms. Kwon quickly typed away and clicked a few things on her mouse as you quite literally twiddled your thumbs over your lap. Just a few seconds later, she took her glasses off, rubbing between her brows as she let out a deep sigh. “So it seems you have been…” She sat back in her chair. “Have you… found them?”

“Uhm, yes, ma’am,” you nodded awkwardly.

“This is why you were so interested in undoing matches as of late, I presume.”

“Yes… but not anymore.”

She sat there for a few more moments, eyes closed, before putting her glasses back on and sitting up straight again. “I accept your resignation, Y/N. With a heavy heart, might I add.”

“That means a lot, Ms. Kwon.”

“There will need to be an investigation.”

“I figured.”

“I expect full cooperation from both you and your soulmate.”

“Oh, uh, sure, sure.”

Ms. Kwon looked at you oddly. “Is that going to be a problem?”

“We’re not… exactly… friendly… right now…” You admitted quietly. “And it’s completely my fault…”

She let out a few soft, wistful chuckles. “He didn’t take too kindly to you attempting to ‘undo’ your string, did he?”

“No, he didn’t.” You shook your head, biting the inside of your cheek regretfully.

“The string will tighten again, Y/N,” she reassured you, her voice kind. “The computer doesn’t make mistakes.”

“Right. Thank you, Ms. Kwon.”

She cleared her throat, becoming formal and businesslike again. “Provided the investigation turns up exactly what I think it will, I’ll also write an excellent reference letter for you, if you would like.”

“What do you think the investigation will turn up?”

“A mistake. Something was misfiled. A paper was put in the wrong stack. A name left off an email. I don’t think you tampered with the program somehow to put yourself back in. Did you?”

“No, ma’am, not at all.”

“There we go.” She shrugged. “Do you have anything else for me?”

“I get my severance pay and all that, right?”

“Of course.”

You stood up, set your key card on the desk, and shook her hand before leaving her office, walking right out of the matchmaking room as the others kept at it at their stations. Making a beeline for your desk, you could see several heads of your coworkers popping up to peer at you curiously before looking back down at their computers. One remained up and focused intently on you from further down your row, Renjun.

As you stopped next to Jaemin and opened your backpack at your desk, he took his headphones off to turn to you. “Uh hey…?”

“Hi,” you replied cheerily, beginning to grab personal possessions off your desk and load them into your bag.

“What are you doing?”

At this point, Renjun had stood up from his desk and stalked over to you two, eyes wide as he took in what you were doing. “What’s going on?”

“I quit!” You informed them, not being particularly quiet about it.

“What?!” “Seriously?!”

“Seriously,” you confirmed, unplugging the receiver for your personal wireless mouse, and putting it back inside said mouse, before chucking the whole thing into your bag. “Resigned. Quit. Handed in my zero day notice.”

“Why? I thought you loved this job!” Renjun sputtered out, his hands on his hips.

“Yeah! Like, I thought you were going to be Director one day!” Jaemin nodded. “What happened?”

You looked around the wide-open bullpen, still having enough tact to not want to blab about your string in front of everybody. Zipping up your backpack and throwing one strap over your shoulder, you asked your friends innocently, “Walk me out?”

They practically dragged you down the stairs, flanking you on either side, none of you saying a word until you were outside.

“What’s going on?” Renjun demanded as soon as the front doors closed behind you. “Is it something we need to know about? Should we be looking for other jobs?”

“Did you ask for a raise or something and they wouldn’t give it to you?” Jaemin asked. “Or a promotion? Or—”

“No, it’s nothing like that. You guys are fine,” you promised them, lacing your two hands together in front of you. Taking a deep breath, you admitted, “I have a red string, and I found my soulmate.”

Their jaws dropped, and they looked at each other, flabbergasted, then at you, then each other again, then stared at you. Renjun was the first to shake himself out of his stupefied state, “How did that even—”

“I don’t know, and I don’t know how much I can even say until the Factory finishes their investigation, so…” You trailed off. “Yeah, that’s why I quit. And Ms. Kwon didn’t ask me to stay.”

Jaemin’s eyes widened comically as he pointed at you accusatorily. “The guy at lunch, was he your—”

“Yeah, that was him.” You rubbed the back of your neck nervously. “Anyway, you guys can’t say anything to anybody else at the Factory, okay? Just let management handle this however they want to. Keep your noses out of it.”

“So what are you going to do now?” Renjun asked.

“Uh… try to find him? Again?” You said sheepishly.

“You lost him?” Jaemin asked in disbelief. “Like, in a well or something? How? What?”

“We kind of had a fight… Let’s just say the ball’s in my court, and I don’t know how to play.”

He patted you on the back. “You’ve got this, Y/N.”

“Thanks,” you nodded to him gratefully. “I should let you two get back to work now. Thank you both, again, for being the best work buddies a girl could ask for.”

“Hey, don’t talk like you’re going off and dying,” Renjun scoffed, poking the right side of your head.

“Yeah, we’re your real buddies, too.” Jaemin poked the left side of your head. “I still owe you your book.”

“You two have got to make sure you don’t kill each other over cereal in the mornings on your own now. I won’t be there to referee,” you warned as you took a step back, facing them.

“As long as Jaemin keeps his grubby mitts to himself, no problem.” Renjun nodded.

Jaemin grinned. “No promises.”

You laughed, going in to give each of them a hug. “Bye, guys. I’ll see you around.”

And you proceeded to walk. From the riverside park near the Factory, to the curb where you’d eaten ice cream together, to your favorite bookstore. You walked until your feet ached and your stomach growled, and even after that. You found new parts of the city that you’d never seen, never had any reason to go to before. As you came up to a street of small shops, you peered into each window carefully as you passed by. Your feet skidded to a stop all on their own and your heart leapt to your throat as you inadvertently made eye contact with a patron right on the other side of the glass of one store. The exact person you’d been looking for.

While Sungchan froze in place, you ran for the entrance to the shop, throwing open the door and ducking around shelves and displays to find him still glued to the same spot, staring out the window at the pavement where you used to be. You grabbed his left hand with your right, watching the string complete itself, and pulled him around to face you.

“Sungchan!” You said his name breathlessly, a relieved smile on your face. “Found you!”

“Y/N…” His voice was guarded, uncertain, gaze trailing over your red jumpsuit that you were still in. “Are you… on your lunch break?”

“No, I uh, I resigned this morning,” you told him, not an ounce of remorse in your tone.

His eyes widened, and his demeanor immediately changed as he looked down at you with concern. “What? You didn’t have to—Y/N, what happened? Oh my god, what are you going to do?”

A throat was very conspicuously cleared from nearby, and you snapped your head over in the direction of it, spotting a group of several guys leaning against shelves further down the store, a few trying to look busy and not like they had just been listening to your conversation. One stood at the front of them, looking directly at Sungchan.

“Oh, sorry, guys,” Sungchan waved them off. “Go on without me, okay?”

And with that, he set down the merchandise he had been browsing—which you were now seeing was a stack of old magazines; it looked as though you were in a thrift store of some kind—and pulled you out the door by the hand. Just a little ways down the street was a bench overlooking the river, and the two of you stopped there.

“I wouldn’t have been able to keep working there with a red string, Sungchan,” you explained. “If I didn’t resign, I would’ve been fired whenever they found out. I wanted to tell them myself.”

He frowned. “When I said you had a choice…”

“I chose to keep the string, and stop looking for a way to undo it. I know that’s what you were asking me.”

“I’m almost afraid to ask…” he sighed. “What made you change your mind?”

“A lot of different things, but… I think realizing that I’m not that special.”

“Y/N, I—”

“No, I mean, I kind of had this complex about working at the Factory. Thinking that it was some sacrifice for the greater good, me giving up my soulmate so I could help other people find theirs. But like… it was just a job.” You laughed at how ridiculous that sounded now, even just a few hours after resigning.

Sungchan smiled a little at that, but still looked pensive. “So what are you going to do for work now?”

“I don’t know,” you admitted quietly, but couldn’t keep the giddy grin off your face. “That’s really scary… but it’s kind of exciting, in a weird way, right? I’ve had the same job since I got out of school, and now I can do anything.”

“We’ll find you a job. That’s like, Priority One, okay?” He reassured you. “We’ll do some brainstorming, find some job listings, we’ll figure something out.”

“We?”

“Yeah?” He said it as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. “I’m not leaving you out to dry after all this.”

“Thanks, Sungchan.” You fidgeted with your fingers, eyes gracing over the finished red string again. “And uh, if that’s Priority One, then Priority Two is probably going to have to be the investigation.”

“The what?”

“The Bureau has to investigate how this even happened, our match. Me resigning was just the beginning, not the end. They’re expecting our full cooperation.”

“What are we going to have to cooperate with, exactly?” He crossed his arms.

“They’ll probably just want to ask us some questions. Me more than you, since I’m the one who actually worked there. Ms. Kwon—my old boss—made it sound like it’d be more a formality than anything else. I’m sure they’re already auditing all my match reports for the past two years, and looking through my key card log, and going through my computer as we speak.”

“Alright, yeah. Fine.”

With his agreement, the two of you were quiet for a moment, and you felt an air of uncertainty. You’d found each other, you were soulmates, you weren’t trying to undo your string anymore, and yet you were still practically strangers. Where did you go from here?

“So… what’s your favorite color?” You asked.

“What?” He blinked, seeming confused at the sudden change in topic.

“I don’t know anything about you…” You said quietly, feeling your skin get warm with embarrassment. “I don’t know, that’s just the first thing that came to mind. Forget it, it was stupid.”

He chuckled and answered anyway, “Purple. My favorite color is purple.”

“Oh. Cool.”

“What’s yours?”

“Pink. Uh, cotton candy pink, specifically.”

“That’s good. That’s really good.” He was still laughing, more than your awkward question warranted.

“Okay, what’s so funny? Other than me being stupid.”

“No, I’m not laughing at you, it’s just…” He reassured you, trailing off as he seemed to be trying to put his thoughts together. “There’re all these books, and magazine articles and stuff, you know. 15 Things to Not Do When You Meet Your Soulmate. 10 Best Opening Lines for Meeting the One. I Met My Soulmate and It’s Awkward: Now What? How to Get Over First Meeting Flutters. And you’re nothing like that. You’ve probably never even read anything of that sort of stuff, have you?”

“No…” You shook your head, then squinted at him suspiciously. “Have you?”

He held his hands up defensively. “Well, call it morbid curiosity—”

You couldn’t help but giggle, attempting to cover it with your hand, having the perfect image of him lying on his bed on his stomach, legs kicking up behind him as he scrolled on his phone late at night reading cheesy internet columns about love.

“And that’s funny, yeah, okay. I didn’t fool you with the… yeah.” Sungchan laughed again, this time at himself, and you were quickly starting to think that it might be your favorite sound.

“It’s cute, it’s cute!” You promised. “I’m uhm, sure me running away really threw a wrench in whatever great opening line you had planned.”

“Yes and no.” He sighed, running a hand through his hair. “You were really pretty, and when I looked at you, I suddenly forgot every word I knew. And then you ran away, and I was just confused at how I had messed it up before opening my mouth.”

Your body burned on the inside and outside twofold from him simultaneously saying you were so pretty it made him speechless, and also the shame at how stupendously you had fucked up your first meeting. You squeezed your eyes shut, covered your face with both hands, and shook your head as you groaned out an apology, “Oh god, I’m sorry.”

“No, it’s fine, really— Helped snap me out of it, you know?” He chuckled, and you were glad he could at least see some humor in it now. “Looking back now, completely understandable for you to do that. Sorry again for chasing you through the streets, I’m sure that didn’t help.”

“Also understandable on your part,” you said. Before you could scramble for another thing to ask Sungchan, your stomach rumbled loudly, and you cringed, knowing full well that he had definitely been able to hear that. “Sorry…”

“I was supposed to grab food with the guys anyway.” Sungchan stood up. “Let’s get you something to eat, hm?”

You followed him to a small café a couple streets away, and after grabbing your food, you two sat at a table outside. “So what do you do? For work? Or are you a student? You know quite a bit about my old job, but…”

“Oh, I’m an artist.”

“What kind? Like, what medium? Is that the right way to ask that? I guess I’m asking what kind of stuff you make?”

“Don’t worry, those were all good questions. Different questions, but good.” He smiled warmly, taking a sip of his drink before answering. “I mostly focus on making mixed media collages. Sometimes I source my materials from other places, but sometimes I make it myself. Take my own pictures, paint it myself, put the clay on myself. Just depends. So I work with a lot of different materials and mediums, too.”

“Oh!” You immediately thought of the couple you talked to on the bus that morning. “You should totally check out the art museum on 2nd this month! I heard they have an exhibit showcasing mixed media collages. I haven’t been, but there’s this couple on my bus in the mornings who goes every month, they told me about it today.”

“Did they say the artist?” He asked mildly, picking at his food with his utensil.

“No, they don’t do any research before, they like to go in blind.”

“Yeah, uhm, that’s my exhibit,” he practically whispered the last two words behind a napkin as he wiped his mouth with it, looking down at his plate. His ears were bright red, and he grabbed his drink to take another long sip.

Your eyes widened. “Wait really?”

“I understand if you think I’m lying, it’s on the exhibit webpage on the museum website, but yeah…”

“Sungchan, that’s so cool!” You exclaimed, even as you brought out your phone to bring up the website. Not because you didn’t believe him, but just because reading the headline of how the museum was proud to feature ‘New Local Artist Jung Sungchan’ in an exclusive exhibit was practically surreal. He, however, still couldn’t seem to meet your eyes. “Why do you look like you want to die?”

“I didn’t want to use my real name, but my… manager thought it would be a good idea. And obviously I had to tell you.” He rubbed a hand over his face, making everything from his forehead to his neck pink. “I just hate people looking at my art and thinking they know me. They can look at my art all I want, project onto it, feel from it, call it stupid, say they could have done better, I don’t care, I just don’t want them to know it’s mine and think they know me because of it.”

“Who’s your manager that made you use your real name? Don’t artists use pseudonyms sometimes?”

“My sister’s husband. He’s good at his job, and he’s done a lot for me. I’m really thankful for him, honestly. It was more like when I was first starting out, he thought that using a pseudonym would make me seem sort of pretentious. People would like a regular guy a lot more.” Sungchan sighed. “I agreed, and have regretted that decision with every art show I’ve attended since.”

You nodded slowly, tapping your fingers on the tabletop in a rhythm as you thought. “So… why do you think you make art, then?”

“I have to,” he shrugged. “Not making art would be worse. People connecting with my art… I like that. But I don’t like when they try to assume things about me because of my art. Does that make sense?”

“Yeah, it does,” you assured him. “Death of the collagist.”

His face cracked into a grin. “Exactly.”

“Would you mind if I went to your exhibit sometime?” You asked. “You totally don’t have to come, I’m sure that’d be weird for you. But I’d like to go see it, and not make any assumptions about you at all.”

“It’s a public museum, I can’t stop you from going.”

“Well, yes… I don’t know, it’s still your art, and I’m not just a member of the public, am I?”

Sungchan’s eyes held a softness as he looked at you across the table, and he shook his head. “No, you’re not just a member of the public to me.”

“And you’re not just some random artist to me,” you responded.

“I wouldn’t mind if you went, on one condition.”

“Mm?” You prompted, expecting it to be something along the lines of ‘don’t tell me what you think’ or ‘don’t ever mention it to me.’ Nothing at all in the realm of what he actually requested.

“I go with you.”

Your eyebrows shot up. “Wait really?”

“Really.”

“Okay, yeah, of course!”

“Then it’s a date.”

You nodded, suddenly feeling shy at him calling it a date, turning your eyes back down to your food. “Yeah, okay. A date.”

You ended up spending the whole day with Sungchan, just getting to know each other. And browsing online job listings for you—turns out he wasn’t kidding about that being Priority One.

He used revising your résumé as an opportunity to learn more about you. Education—Oh where did you go to school? What did you study? Which devolved into you two telling stories about classes you liked, professors and teachers you loved and hated, and old school friends. Work Experience—So what actually was your official title? What were your job responsibilities? Which led to you fondly reminiscing in your times at the office with Jaemin and Renjun, talking about your training to be a Systems Analytics Specialist, and his disbelief in how exactly you even did your job. It was when you got to the Skills portion that you balked a little bit. It felt like your only skills were specific to the Factory: reading the matches from the computer, inputting match reports, keeping Renjun from killing Jaemin over a box of cereal. Sungchan helped you get a bit creative with your technological experience, creative thinking, quick learning, and conflict resolution skills.

As he walked you back to your apartment after getting dinner together, you were still asking him your never-ending stream of questions. “So what were you supposed to be doing with your friends today?”

“I was collecting.” He craned his neck up, and you followed his line of vision to look up at the few specks of light in the sky that you could see against the brightness of the city. “Gathering materials for collages. Thrift stores are pretty good for old magazines, books, newspapers, photo albums, all kinds of stuff. The guys were tagging along, they wanted to get lunch and do some shopping too.”

“Oh. Sorry for taking you away from them.”

He gave you a funny look. “No.”

“What?”

“No, you’re not going to apologize for that.”

You blinked at him in confusion. “Uh… I think I already did?”

He stopped you two in the middle of the sidewalk, devoid of other pedestrians, holding your eye contact very seriously. “Thank you for finding me today.”

“Oh,” you chuckled nervously. “You’re welcome. Thank you for… everything else about today. The look on your face when I found you—I was sort of afraid that you were going to run this time.”

He laughed, continuing to walk again. “Did I really look like that?”

“Through the window, yeah. When I came in the shop, though, it was more like… you thought you were dreaming. Like you were going to pinch yourself at any moment, just in case. Or you thought I was pranking you.”

“Well, you’ll have to understand why I didn’t want to get my hopes up too high; all our previous meetings didn’t quite have fairytale endings.”

“No, they didn’t,” you agreed.

“But this time felt different. So I let myself be a little hopeful,” he admitted with a grin, nudging your arm with his. “And I was right.”

“How’d you figure that?”

“You didn’t act like finding me was a terrible inconvenience, first.”

You winced. “Mm-mhm.”

“And the smile on your face when you ran in and grabbed my hand.”

“What about it?”

“I’d never seen you smile before that.” He then added a teasing, “I didn’t know if you could.”

“Hey! I wasn’t that bad.”

He snickered, affectionately bumping his elbow against yours again. You rolled your eyes, smiling as you elbowed him back. You arrived at the main entry to your building soon, and you stopped there to say goodbye to Sungchan. He looked between the door that you were standing in front of, and the familiar bus stop just a few meters down the road, well within view.

“Oh wow, it must have really freaked you out when I jogged by your stop, huh?” He commented, scratching the back of his head.

“Yeah, you can imagine the ‘ready to fistfight the divine universe’ energy I had in my body at that point.”

He laughed, the corners of his eyes crinkling. “Pretty sure I witnessed some of it, too.”

You looked longingly at the bus stop, holding yourself, and sighed. “It’s going to be weird not getting up and going to work tomorrow.”

“So what are you going to do tomorrow? With no work?”

You passed a bubble side to side in your mouth as you thought, then shrugged. “Sleep in?”

“Great way to start the day.”

“And then… send my résumé to some of those places we found?”

“That’s a good idea.”

“Probably read outside somewhere if it’s a nice day?”

“Ooh, sounds nice.”

You dug your toe into the ground. “I don’t know, what are you doing?”

“Sleep in, and I promised Shotaro I’d help him with this thing, but then… if you don’t mind the company, I think reading outside sounds pretty lovely?”

“What are you helping Shotaro with?”

“Taking Instagram pictures.”

You let out a short round of giggles. “I’d like to spend time with you tomorrow too, Sungchan. Just let me know when you’re done helping Shotaro with that thing.”

“It’ll be the quickest photoshoot he’s ever done in his life.”

“No, still do it right!”

“It’ll be right, just quick.”

You shook your head disapprovingly, but the fond smile on your face very obviously negated that sentiment. “Goodnight, Sungchan.”

“Goodnight, Y/N.”

And with that, you unlocked your building door and gave him one last wave over your shoulder before closing and locking it back up behind you. Alone in the stairwell, you let out a sigh of contentment.

The next morning, you slept in on a Tuesday for the first time in a while and didn’t put on your red jumpsuit after getting out of bed. Instead, you shuffled out to your kitchen and made yourself breakfast, which you slowly enjoyed with a cup of tea. After taking your sweet time in a nice hot shower, you got into a t-shirt and pants, and sat on your couch to start sending in applications to new jobs. As you typed on your laptop, you’d catch the occasional flash of the red loop around your pinky finger, but instead of filling you with you dread or apprehension, it now made you smile a bit, and push on with your task, knowing you had someone right there in your corner just on the other end of that string. After a couple hours of filling out applications, searching through more prospective job listings, and finding a few new ones that had been posted since you and Sungchan looked yesterday, you deemed that to be plenty for your first morning of job hunting. It was nearly lunchtime, and you hadn’t left your apartment yet. Looking outside, you saw that it was sunny, with a few passing clouds creating occasional patches of shadow, and breezes gently rustled the leaves on the trees. A perfectly lovely day.

Gathering up a couple books, you packed a light going-out bag, then headed out. As you passed your bus stop, you thought of the regulars on your morning commute, and wondered if they noticed your disappearance this morning, and if they thought anything of it, like you thought of the primary school teacher sometimes. You hoped the sisters got to school okay, and that the elderly couple liked Sungchan’s exhibit, and even that the office workers who you had never spoken to had good days at work—not too terribly stressful. As you had just arrived at your destination and picked out the perfect spot to read, your phone buzzed with a text.

[sungchan: done! with a satisfied customer, might i add]

[you: oh good! i’m done with my applications for the morning too! out reading right now]

You sent your location, then took your book out as there was another buzz.

[sungchan: omw :) ]

You were so caught up in the chapter you were reading that you didn’t realize Sungchan had arrived until he set his bag down next to you. You jumped a little bit, closing the book on your thumb as you clutched your hand over your heart, which was now beating wildly out of rhythm.

“Sorry, didn’t mean to give you a scare.” Sungchan didn’t look that sorry, as he had a clearly amused smirk on his face as he looked down at you. “I did call your name.”

“It’s alright, sorry I didn’t hear you.” You waved off his apology, then nodded to the spot beside you for him to sit down. “Lovely day out, huh?”

“It is,” he agreed, stretching out his long legs as he settled in against the large tree trunk. He reached into his bag, and you looked with intrigue at what book he was going to read for today.

You perked up with interest as you recognized the cover immediately. “Oh, I’ve been wanting to read that book! I love that author. Just haven’t picked it up yet.”

“Yeah it uhm—” he cleared his throat awkwardly. “It was the book you were looking at when we met. The one you dropped.”

“You…”

“I didn’t know how long it was going to be until the next time I saw you, so I went back and bought it. You know, sort of hoping I could learn something about you in the meantime.”

“And in the meantime, I was scheming to undo our string…” You muttered, eyes falling to your lap.

“Which you, no offense, failed at,” he clicked his tongue and elbowed you teasingly. “I’ll speedread so you can borrow it after me, okay?”

“No, read it right! That author’s so good, you’ll miss stuff!”

“I’ll read it carefully! Just also super fast.”

“Those are literally antonyms when it comes to reading!” You insisted.

“You’ve never seen me speedread then.”

You smacked your open book over your face, despite knowing that he was joking. “Oh my god…”

Two weeks later, and you and Sungchan were going to The Soulmate Factory for your interviews. You were sort of surprised it had taken them this long to talk to you, but at the same time, that it was happening this quickly. It felt weird going to the Factory not in your jumpsuit, but you knew that would’ve been possibly the worst choice. So you instead put on something nice, presentable, but not overly formal. After all, it wasn’t your job interview again. Sungchan was wearing a button-up shirt, a stark contrast to the rather casual attire you’d always seen him in before. As the two of you entered the lobby of the Factory, you could see him looking around at everything with an air of suspicion.

You stopped at the front desk, giving the attendant a polite smile and starting to introduce yourself, despite having just been colleagues a few weeks ago, “Hi, uhm Y/L/N Y/N and Jung Sungchan, here for a 9:00 appointment with Ms. Kwon?”

“Of course,” she nodded, looking between you and Sungchan with a strained smile of her own. “You… two can have a seat. I’ll let her know you’re here.”

Leading Sungchan over to sit on a settee nearby, you looked around, taking a few deep breaths as your knee bounced up and down nervously on its own. You had gotten the two of you here fifteen minutes early, so you already knew that you’d be waiting for some time.

“Why did she say it like that?” He hissed to you under his breath.

“Say what?” You whispered back, looking at her out of the corner of your eye to see if she was listening, but it looked like she was taking an incoming call.

“You two can have a seat.” He repeated snidely. “And the way she looked at us? Looked at you? Like we’re the weird ones for being soulmates?”

“I told you, Sungchan, there’s a reason Bureau employees don’t get soulmates. People will think I rigged it somehow. Even other employees.”

“You said it was impossible for you to have messed with it. Shouldn’t they of all people know that?”

“Well, with me being a matchmaker…” You tried to think of how to succinctly sum this up without telling Sungchan too much stuff that he wasn’t supposed to know right before his interview. “Even other Bureau employees don’t know what goes on in the matchmaking room. I’m sure there’s been rumors since I’ve left.”

“But you didn’t do anything. What’s the point of working here if you’re just as bad as the people who don’t?”

“They also probably think that when this gets out I’m going to give the Bureau and the employees here a bad rep, make the public distrust them for a while. Even the employees that don’t think I did anything will probably hate me at least a little for that.”

“Well I still don’t like it,” he huffed, resting an arm along the back of the furniture behind you.

“You’re allowed to not like it. I’m just saying there’s not much we can do about it.”

He proceeded to focus his hater energy on making comments about the décor being tacky, and you couldn’t help but giggle quietly and join in. You never really thought about it much before, but being called The Soulmate Factory and having a color palette of red, pink, and white was a bit much. You two also had a small game of how many “subtle” red lines you could find in the designs of decorative throw pillows, rugs, carpeting, and pieces of abstract art on the walls. Finally, you heard footsteps coming down the stairs, and looked up to see a somewhat familiar face. It wasn’t Ms. Kwon, as you had hoped for, but Lee Jeno, one of the executive assistants that you often saw when he was sent down from the ninth floor on important errands by his bosses.

“Jung Sungchan?” He called, looking directly at Sungchan.

“Yeah, that’s me.” He lifted his hand that had been resting on his leg between pointing out tacky décor. He ushered you up with him with the hand that was behind you on the couch. “Come on, let’s get this over with.”

“Sorry, just Mr. Jung right now,” Jeno clarified with a slight wince.

Sungchan looked like he was about to argue, but you patted his arm reassuringly. “It’ll be fine, Sungchan. I’ll see you in a bit, okay?”

He sighed, giving your shoulder a squeeze. “Alright, fine. I’ll be back soon.”

“Be good.”

“Always am.”

You watched him follow Jeno up the stairs, Sungchan casting you one last glance over his shoulder before the two of them fully disappeared from your view. It was then that you finally sat back down, and started chewing on your thumbnail.

Only fifteen minutes later Jeno came back down the stairs. Alone. “Y/N?” He addressed you more casually.

You stood up and didn’t hide the concern on your face as you looked around behind him. “Where’s Sungchan?”

“Mr. Jung has been moved to another waiting room. You’ll see him after your interview.”

Letting out a breath, you tried really hard not to shoot the messenger as you responded. “Fine. Lead the way, Jeno.”

The fact that you were going up the stairs and not to the elevator was interesting. You must not be going to his bosses’ floor, unless they wanted you to collapse on your way there.

“It’s good to see you again, by the way,” your former coworker said quietly. “I had to hand-deliver a memo to Ms. Kwon the other day and the matchmaking room was weirdly empty without you at your station.”

“Thanks.” A smile tugged at the corner of your mouth. “I wouldn’t have even noticed your presence if I was there but… it’s nice to know that someone noticed my absence.”

“Well, we did our intro training together. You don’t forget those people.”

“No, you don’t,” you agreed. “Us, Jaemin, Renjun, Donghyuck in Budgeting.”

“Is it nice? Your life now? Don’t tell me anything specific, I can’t know.”

You laughed. “I haven’t lived much of it, honestly. I’ve only been gone a few weeks.”

“That’s true. There’s just been so much that’s happened, it feels like a lifetime.”

“Yeah, it does.”

“But has it been good at least? Overall, you think?”

“Yeah, it’s good, Jeno. He’s good.”

“Of course he is. The computer never makes mistakes.” And with that, the two of you stopped in front of a conference room on the second floor. He nodded politely to you. “This is where I leave you. If I don’t see you again, I wish you the best, Y/N. With everything.”

“Thank you. Bye, Jeno.” You smiled at him, knocking on the door as he pivoted on his heel and walked down the hall.

“Come in.” Came a familiar voice from within. Opening the door, you saw two figures stand up from the small conference table. Ms. Kwon, and a man who wasn’t familiar to you at all.

“Y/N, hello,” Ms. Kwon nodded to you. She didn’t even let you open your mouth to greet her back, gesturing to the man with her. “I’m not sure if you ever had the pleasure to meet AD Yang of Risk Management while you were here.”

And in one curt sentence, she had told you everything you needed to know about the situation: This was the assistant director of the risk management department at the Bureau, aka the legal department, which meant that this was serious serious, this would not be some quick interview to check off boxes, and she had only been let in because of her job title and as a professional courtesy to her, she wouldn’t be in control of the processions. But most importantly—she was on your side, for whatever that was worth. And honestly, it was worth a lot to keeping your composure as you turned to face the man.

AD Yang was deceptively young, you wouldn’t have pinned him as being as high up in the Bureau as he was just by looking at him. He only looked to be maybe ten years older than you, not a touch of grey in his pristine black hair, and only a hint of the beginning of worry lines on his forehead. He wore a suit, as all Bureau Executives did—it was only the lower level workers like you who wore the red jumpsuits—though his looked just a little too big on him, and his red tie was a little loose and slightly crooked, as if he still hadn’t mastered tying it yet. Both these things only aided in making him look younger and inexperienced. But the air of caution Ms. Kwon had about the whole situation immediately let you know not to underestimate him. You were thinking maybe his dress choices were intentional, so people would do exactly that, let their guards down around him.

AD Yang offered you a practically boyish smile as he held out his hand across the table, which your former supervisor hadn’t even done. You gingerly shook it as he introduced himself. “Please, just Mr. Yang is fine. Ms. Kwon is always so formal, you know. And I’ll call you Ms. Y/L/N, so we’re all on the same level here.”

You nodded.

“I don’t think we ever did have the pleasure to meet, Ms. Y/L/N,” Mr. Yang kept talking, his tone conversational. He then said as if it were a joke, “People usually only see me when they’re in serious trouble, you know?” He laughed, the only one to, then reassured you, “That isn’t what’s happening here, don’t worry. We’re just going to ask you a few questions, then you and Mr. Jung can head on out and off to your new life together, okay?”

You nodded.

“So, why don’t we sit, hm?”

The three of you took your seats, the two of them on one side of the conference table, you on the other. Mr. Yang took a moment to shuffle his papers, then smacked his hand to his forehead as if he’d suddenly remembered something. “I’m sorry, would you like some water, Ms. Y/L/N?”

“No, thank you.”

“Alright, let’s get started then.” He reached for a small device in the middle of the table. “I’ll be needing to record this conversation. Is that alright, Ms. Y/L/N?”

“Sure, yeah.” Not like you could really say no.

“Great.” His boyish smile disappeared as soon as the recorder clicked on. He started by listing off the date and time, then addressed you. “This is AD Robert Yang, interviewing Ms. Y/L/N Y/N. Also present is Ms. Kwon Siyeon, Supervisor of Systems Analysis and Reporting. Ms. Y/L/N, you are aware that I’m recording this conversation, correct?”

“Yes.”

“And you’re okay with that?”

“Yes.”

“A few formalities before we begin: Since I have the recording going, I ask that you let me finish my question before you answer, even if you think you know what I’m going to ask. Cross-chatter is a bit difficult to parse out when you have to listen back to it.”

“Okay.”

“I also want you to answer everything aloud. No nodding or shaking your head, or ‘uh-huh’ or ‘nuh-unh.’” He showed the motions as he did them, and you could tell he had done this spiel many times before. “The non-verbal cues don’t translate great in an audio format.”

“Will do.”

“Thank you.” He cleared his throat, clicked his pen a couple of times, then looked up at you to begin with his first question. “Now, can you tell me how long you worked at The Bureau of Interpersonal Affairs prior to your resignation?”

“About five years.”

“Do you remember when your first day was?”

“Of training or on my own?”

“Training. After being hired.”

“Probably… spring five years ago. May, after I graduated.”

“Okay, good, good. And so you were hired, did your six months of standard training, right?”

“Right.”

“Then what happened?”

“I did more training to be a Systems Analytics Specialist.”

“How much?”

“Two and a half years.”

“So three years of training total, then you got to start on your own as a… Systems Analytics Specialist.”

“Yes.”

“I believe the other name for that position is matchmaker, correct?”

You bit down on your tongue to keep back an eyeroll. All of you in this room had to be aware that he was feigning ignorance right now. He might as well have asked if the Bureau was also sometimes called The Soulmate Factory. “Yes, we’re often called that as well.”

“More than Systems Analytics Specialist?”

“Yes.”

He jumped topics. “So why did you start working at the Bureau?”

“It sounded like a good place to work.”

“How so?”

“It seemed like the Bureau did good work. Helping people find their soulmates.”

“And you didn’t want to find yours?”

“I was willing to give that up for something bigger than me.”

“Did you join the Bureau with the intent of manipulating your soulmate match?”

“No.”

“Did you sign up to be a matchmaker with the intent of manipulating your soulmate match?”

“No. I didn’t sign up to be a matchmaker in the first place.”

“You didn’t?” He arched an eyebrow curiously.

“No.”

“How did you become a matchmaker?”

You glanced over at your former boss. “Ms. Kwon chose me at the end of my six months of basic training.”

“Why you?”

“I don’t know.” You shrugged.

“She didn’t tell you?”

“No.”

“You agreed to two and a half more years of training for a specialized position that doesn’t even recruit one new person a year without being told why you were suited for that position?”

“Yes. I was young and it paid better. I didn’t need to know.”

“When you were working as a matchmaker, were you ever asked by friends or family to manipulate their matches in any way, shape, or form?” He switched topics again. You weren’t sure if he was trying to disorient you, or if he simply decided that he was done with that line of questioning and wanted to move on with the next one.

You opened your mouth to say ‘no,’ then suddenly thought of the sisters on your bus in the mornings, recalling a day when the younger one had been crying as you got on, and her sister stopped you specifically. Tilting your head, you replied, “I once pinky promised a little girl that I wouldn’t match her with this smelly boy in her class. Does that count?”

“Yes.”

“Then yes.”

He made a show of scribbling something down on his notes, of which he had already filled up the first page of a large legal pad. AD Yang flipped to the next page as he announced, “I’m going to skip forward a little in time. When you found out you had the string, what did you do first?”

“Went home.”

“Went home?” He repeated.

“It showed up after work. So I went home.”

“Where were you?”

“The bus stop outside of the Bureau.”

“Around what time of day was this?”

“Between five and five-twenty.”

“That’s a pretty specific time frame. How do you know that?”

“It was after work ended but before my bus showed up.”

“So the Bureau was still open, then. There were still people inside that you could have reported this to, such as Ms. Kwon here?”

“I don’t know if there were people in the building, and certainly not if Ms. Kwon specifically was still in the building, since I was outside and could not see inside of the building,” you answered frankly.

“Right, of course.” He gave you a close-lipped smile that didn’t reach his eyes. “Do people usually stay after five here, at the Bureau? To your knowledge?”

“Some people, sure, on some days.”

“So, it would have been a good guess, that there would’ve been somebody inside, when you realized that you had a string?”

“Possibly.”

“Then why didn’t you go back inside?”

“Honestly, I panicked,” you admitted, closing your eyes for a moment as you thought back to that night again. “I thought it was impossible for me to get one. I thought I might’ve been able to figure something out on my own.”

“Figure something out? Like what?”

You opened your eyes and gave a half-hearted ‘I-don’t-know’ gesture with your hands that had been resting on the tabletop, despite his prior instructions to keep non-verbal cues to a minimum. “Like what happened, what went wrong.”

“And did you?” He prompted.

“No. I didn’t.” Not even a little bit.

“And is that when you told Ms. Kwon? When you gave up?”

“No.” You told her when you decided you wanted to keep the string. Not because the dead-ends had frustrated you.

“Why did you tell her? Why not continue your renegade investigation?”

“You’re asking me why I followed proper protocol?”

“I’m trying to piece together what happened. All the events that happened, and exactly in what order. What happened that caused you to tell Ms. Kwon at the time that you did? Did you even tell her? Or was it found out? I’ve been assuming, I’m sorry.”

You narrowed your eyes slightly, but consciously relaxed your face back into a pleasantly neutral expression. Ms. Kwon would have obviously had to do her own report including all of the details of your conversation with her. He should know all of those particulars. Was he trying to catch Ms. Kwon in a lie?

“Yes, I chose to report it. Because I had done some self-reflection. And I don’t think there’s anything further to be said that is of import for the Bureau to know.”

There was a moment of still air as he held eye contact with you. Out of the corner of your vision, you saw Ms. Kwon’s lips part, as if she were about to say something, then she closed her mouth again, waiting. Mr. Yang cleared his throat.

“Sorry to jump around like this, I’m sure it must be disorienting, but I’m going to go back in time now.” He was very clearly not sorry at all. “Did you know Jung Sungchan before this incident?”

“No.”

“Had you ever met, seen, or heard of him in passing?”

“Not to my recollection, no.” Sure, you could have walked by him on the street before, but you had no way to know that.

“It’s my understanding that he’s an artist, you may have seen some of his work? Heard of him that way?”

“No.”

“So there was no reason that you would have wanted to manipulate your match with him?”

“No.”

“How soon after getting your string did you meet Mr. Jung?”

Now you felt like he was messing with you. “You have that data.”

“I’m asking you.”

“The string appeared on Monday evening, we met that Saturday morning.”

“So, less than a week?”

“Yes.”

“Quick.”

“I suppose,” you replied noncommittally.

AD Yang hummed a single note in the back of his throat as he looked over one of his papers, then his sharp eyes were back on you. “How many times did you meet before reporting your string to Ms. Kwon?”

You had to take a moment to think before answering. “Four, including the first meeting.”

“I’d like to return to your job, for a moment. Now, I have Ms. Kwon here with me not only because she was your boss, but because I obviously have no clue what goes on in that room when you guys work with the computer. Really, from what I’ve heard, it’s some incredible stuff. So she’s kind of here to help me out in case I go way off the mark with what I’m asking you with some of this.” He let out an imitation of a nervous laugh, grabbing a piece of paper from his stack. He pushed it over to you, asking, “Now, can you take a look at this for me?”

It was a nearly blank piece of copy paper, except for one long string of characters printed across it.

jkD%NVSC3%JCacN%vWS5#k!Z4GqGW#ZfMyqGUfc@wQT5L5vK2uWU5N*5Lg&6

“What do you see here, Ms. Y/L/N?” Mr. Yang questioned.

You looked up from the paper, having to consciously choose not to slip back into reading it and instead focus on the conversation at hand. “It’s raw match data from the computer. This is one match.”

“Does it look familiar to you at all?”

“I mean, it looks like every other match I’ve ever read.”

“So you don’t remember reading this specific match at all?”

“No, I don’t remember reading this specific match.” You didn’t even need to look at it again. Of course you didn’t remember it, they were all just a bunch of stuff that you read practically in a trance, there was no way you’d be able to remember any of them.

He grabbed another paper from his folder to show to you, a clipping from a spreadsheet of some kind, several columns showing a date, time, and eight-digit code that was unfamiliar to you, except for the letters appended to the end of it—your initials.

“According to our audit logs, this match was read at, and the match report submitted from, your station in the matchmaking room.”

“Okay.”

“Is it safe to assume, therefore, that you submitted the match report?”

“Was it during business hours?”

“Yes.”

“Was I swiped in?”

“Yes.”

“Did Ms. Kwon see me at my station during that time?”

“Ms. Kwon?” Mr. Yang prompted her without breaking eye contact with you.

“I do not have specific recollection of this day, so I cannot say in the affirmative or the negative,” she spoke for the first time since you had entered, and you had to suppress your smile at her response.

The man lifted his arms up and then down in a sort of ‘oh well’ motion. “We don’t know.”

“The electronic data does make it seem likely that I read this match and submitted this match report,” you finally said.

“This is your match with Mr. Jung.”

You tried not to show your utter shock on your face—you knew he wanted to get some kind of reaction from you—but you couldn’t help the sudden jolt forward in your seat as you went to pull the piece of paper closer to you again, your eyes drinking in the characters once more.

jkD%NVSC3%JCacN%vWS5#k!Z4GqGW#ZfMyqGUfc@wQT5L5vK2uWU5N*5Lg&6

There was still no way for you to distinguish specifics, but just knowing that somewhere in this seemingly meaningless string of nonsense was you and Sungchan, you kept rereading it, desperately wishing for it to feel special now.

“And how do you read the matches? Walk me through the process.” AD Yang’s voice brought your focus back to the present.

You exchanged a knowing look with Ms. Kwon. “I really can’t…”

“Trade secrets?” He said humorously. “It’s alright, I work at the Bureau.”

“No, I mean, it’s impossible to describe. I can’t tell you what I’m reading or how I know. I just do.”

“Then how do you know it’s right?”

“Because it is.”

Ms. Kwon stepped in then, “Mr. Yang, I’m advising you that you are getting close to questioning the computer and the program itself, not Ms. Y/L/N.”

He held his hands up in a sort of surrender. “Well that is certainly what we are not here to do, hm? Let me just take a look at my notes, and make sure I’ve covered everything. Should only be a few more minutes of your time, Ms. Y/L/N.”

AD Yang kept you in there until you started watching the sun begin its journey downwards in the sky. At some point, you started going in circles, and you knew he was just trying to catch you in lies, or confuse you, or get you to admit more than you had before out of exhaustion, or in hopes that he’d let you out. But you gave no different answers, no contradictory or new information, and you knew he’d eventually let you out. After all, there was no proof anywhere that you had done anything wrong, because you hadn’t. The most they could really get on was not telling someone at the Bureau sooner when you’d gotten your string but what could they actually do? Fire you?

When Mr. Yang finally declared the interview over, and turned the recorder off, you had to keep in your groan of relief. Instead, you maintained your composure, standing up when they did in order to shake their hands.

“Thank you very much for your time, Ms. Y/L/N. I do apologize for taking so much of your day, that had not been my intention,” Mr. Yang once again laughed as he shook your hand. “But this was very helpful, and I promise, yours and Mr. Jung’s answers are going to help us here at Bureau improve the way we do things in the future.”

“Right. It was nice meeting you, Mr. Yang.” You nodded politely to him, then turned to your old boss, a genuine smile coming to your face. “It was good seeing you again, Ms. Kwon.”

“Jeno had something to do, so I’ll show you out, Y/N.” She informed you, gesturing to the door.

The two of you were quiet as you walked through the halls of the second floor, until you finally reached a small waiting area on the other end of the building, made up of only a few uncomfortable-looking armchairs. Sungchan was the only person there, slumped down in a chair and bouncing his leg as he cracked his knuckles. He looked up when he heard footsteps, jumping to his feet as soon as he saw you, and while you would’ve felt a little weird about running in an office, he clearly didn’t care, taking just a few long strides to reach you and wrap his arms around you.

“God, Y/N! There you are! What the hell? Why the fuck did they keep you so long? They wouldn’t tell me anything, just that you were still being interviewed and I could either leave or keep waiting. I wasn’t going to leave but—”

“I’m fine, Sungchan, I’m fine,” you reassured him, hugging him back despite the slight awkwardness you felt with Ms. Kwon still definitely being right there. “We’ll talk about it later, okay?”

He didn’t say anything else, just kept holding you as you turned around in his arms to address Ms. Kwon.

“Uhm, we’re good to leave, right? Do you need anything else from us?”

She was clearly fighting back a smile as she replied, “I ask that you wait just a little bit longer, okay?”

“Okay, sure,” you nodded. “What is it? Something for me to sign? An NDA or something?”

“Just a moment, okay?” And with that, she left.

“God, I fucking hate it here,” Sungchan grumbled into your shoulder. “Let’s just go, whatever NDA or whatever the hell they want you to sign is going to suck and be coercive as shit and not worth it. It probably won’t even be enforceable or whatever.”

“I can’t even tell how much of that is even good or bad legal advice. I think all of it was probably bad?”

“It’s definitely going to be written by that fucking skeeze who interviewed you for like seven hours straight, which means it’s going to be bad.”

“What if it’s stuff for my severance pay and benefits? Ms. Kwon also said she’d write me a letter of rec if the investigation went well—”

“Y/N!” “Y/N!” You were cut off by two familiar voices calling your name from down the hall, and whipped your head around to look, your jaw dropping in disbelief. Jaemin and Renjun were rushing towards you, waving all four of their arms wildly, as if you could miss them. You squealed, darting over to them and throwing your arms around their necks.

“Oh my god!” You laughed as they hugged you tightly. “I wasn’t expecting to see you guys today!”

“We were specifically not told when you were coming,” Renjun admitted. “I even got blocked out of the Executive calendars for the month.”

“Ms. Kwon just came and got us,” Jaemin said. “Though, word had already spread.”

“Are you sure you want to be seen with me?” You double-checked, looking around despite being in a rather empty corner of the building. “I don’t know what people have being saying, but based on the less-than-warm-welcome we got at reception, it doesn’t seem like it’s been good.”

“Do we want to be seen with our friend?” Renjun poked the right side of your head.

“Duh.” Jaemin poked the left side of your head.

“Yeah, I didn’t miss that.” You scowled at them.

“It’s so weird seeing you in normal clothes,” Jaemin commented, making you really look between their jumpsuits and your blouse and pants.

“It’s still a bit weird being in normal clothes,” you sighed.

“So… you going to introduce us?” Renjun nodded to where Sungchan was still standing awkwardly by himself in the waiting area.

“Yeah, come on!” You grabbed them by the arms to drag them over. Sungchan looked up from where he had been busying himself with a loose thread on his dress shirt, eyes landing expectantly on you. You let go of your friends to loop your arm with his. “Sungchan, this is Jaemin and Renjun, we used to work together. Jaemin’s desk was next to mine out in the bullpen, and Renjun was a few desks down from us. Guys, this is Jung Sungchan, my soulmate.”

You could hear your voice pitch up with giddiness as you introduced Sungchan in that way, and watched as his face relaxed into a smile as soon as you had called him your soulmate. He offered his free hand out to the other two.

“Nice to meet you guys,” he said sincerely. “I’ve heard good things from Y/N.”

“Then she must’ve been talking about a different Jaemin,” Renjun snorted.

“And a different Renjun,” Jaemin agreed.

“So, what are the wild theories about how I did it?” You asked. “Not the official one, I know you two don’t know that. But the breakroom gossip, the water cooler chat, the cereal death match chatter.”

“Rumor has it…” Jaemin lowered his voice and leaned in conspiratorially. “You were desperate to reunite with a long-lost childhood love and that’s why you applied to be a matchmaker.”

You snorted. “Cheesy.”

“I heard one about Ms. Kwon being in on it because you’re her secret daughter,” Renjun grinned.

“Ooh, that one’s good.”

“With someone with a string.”

You mock gasped. “Scandalous.”

Jaemin added, “I heard a version sort of like that, but you were Ms. Kwon and the Director’s secret daughter, which is obviously how you had enough pull to get it to happen.”

“Then how did I end up with my parents? Did they pay them off to adopt me?” You frowned, trying to figure out this bonkers drama plot of your fake life.

“Get this…” Jaemin paused for dramatic effect. “Your dad is the Director’s secret brother. So your parents are actually your aunt and your uncle.”

“I should’ve thought of that!” You shook your head, laughing.

“A lot of people don’t think you did anything, though,” Renjun assured you. “Seriously, most of the stuff I’m hearing is people being surprised that it hasn’t happened before.”

“That’s good to know.”

“PR is going to have a hell of a time,” Jaemin chuckled.

“Sucks to be Mark Lee right now, huh?” You grinned.

“Oh, I know that man has been sleeping under his desk for the past two weeks.”

You wrinkled your nose. “God, the seventh floor has got to be fucking rank by now. Please tell me Jeno and Donghyuck have at least been making him go home to shower.”

“Chenle did.” Your friends said in unison, making you burst into laughter at the mental image.

“God, I would’ve paid money to see that.” You chuckled. As much as you loved seeing your friends again, this wasn’t where you belonged anymore, and you had skipped lunch in that unnecessarily long interview. So with a sigh, you announced, “Anyway, it was so good to see you guys again, but we need to get going, and I’m sure you have work to finish up.”

“Unfortunately,” Renjun sighed.

“We’ll get drinks—dinner and drinks, the usual place—all four of us,” Jaemin declared as he went in to hug you goodbye. “Okay?”

“For sure,” you agreed with a grin. “You still need to give me my fucking book back, Na Jaemin.”

“He’s just a fucking thief!” Renjun complained as he went to hug you as well. “Bye, Y/N. See you again soon.”

The guys all exchanged a final wave and ‘nice to meet you,’ before your former coworkers headed back. You looked up at Sungchan, about to ask if he was ready to go, and saw him already gazing down at you thoughtfully.

“What?” You asked instead, furrowing your brow.

“Now I get how you could stand working here for five years.” He rubbed your back. “It wasn’t the Factory itself; it was the people you found here.”

“W-Well yeah. I liked my coworkers. But I also liked my job.”

“Yeah, but I like my job too, and I work alone at my studio. I like that. I prefer that. If I had to make small talk with a bunch of different people all day on top of doing my job, I think I’d start biting people,” he explained. “You didn’t just make small talk, you made friends.”

“I guess I’m a people person,” you shrugged, never really thinking about something that was so normal to you. “Is that weird?”

“No, it’s good. Just want to make sure you have people around that you like at your new job too.” He wrapped an arm around your shoulders, pulling you close to him. “Now come on, if your lunch in there was anything like mine out here, then it was approximately four saltine crackers and some water.”

“Where are we going to eat?” You asked as the two of you headed towards the stairs.

“I live nearby. I want to talk about whatever the fuck that skeeze did in there for seven hours.” His voice was tense again at the mention of the interview. After a beat, he tacked on almost nervously, “If that’s okay. We can go somewhere else if you want.”

You encircled an arm around his waist as the two of emerged into the empty courtyard. “Your place works for me. I agree, we shouldn’t talk about that out in the open.”

Despite Sungchan both picking you up and walking you home from seeing each other many times over the past couple weeks, you had yet to actually be in each other’s homes before. You hadn’t even seen the outside of his place. You knew the general area of where he lived, as he had mentioned it while giving context for some stories he’d told you. The two of you also hadn’t been this… touchy before. Whenever you saw him, it always felt sort of like you were hanging out with a friend, if you ignored the string. You didn’t hug hello or goodbye, didn’t hold hands, nothing other than the little teasing elbow digs. It never occurred to you to really bring it up to him before, that technically, according to Bureau statistics, you two were taking it slow, because that would be a fucking weird thing to say—and also, you didn’t mind. You didn’t mind doing this at whatever pace it happened at.

But now, all of this all at once, it was making you a bit dizzy. In a good way, if that was possible, but still off-kilter.

Sungchan stopped in front of the door to a townhouse in a long row of townhouses, each one with a different, colorfully painted door. His was pistachio green. When he finally opened it up and pulled you in by the hand, you immediately started looking around with eager eyes. He said he hated people looking at his art and making assumptions about him, but he said nothing about his home.

“Kitchen, living room, and laundry room are on the first floor, bedroom and bathroom are on the second,” he told you over his shoulder, taking you through a narrow entryway before emerging into the connected living room and kitchen area. You already knew his studio was at a different location from his home due to the sheer scale of the pieces he made.

His walls were all filled with art, but you immediately figured it wasn’t his. They were drawings, paintings, doodles on napkins, anything and everything. It looked like dozens, maybe even hundreds of different artists in all sorts of styles. Some professional, but most clearly not.

“Everyone who comes to my place has to pay,” he explained. “They owe me a piece of art.” Walking over to the very first wall that your eyes would see upon entering, he pointed to a piece of copy paper with random crayon scribbles on it that was displayed dead in the center. He grinned. “Not even babies are exempt. My nephew.”

“What happens when you fill up your walls?” You asked curiously, following him into the kitchen, which had even more art.

“Guess I’ll have to find a bigger place with bigger walls.” He seemed to be searching for a specific piece, then pointed to a small napkin drawing of seven cartoon heads grinning. “Sohee. Guy said he couldn’t draw then busted that out after some soju. With a pen! I know you haven’t met the other guys, but it looks just like us. Guess which one’s me.”

You hummed thoughtfully, then pointed to a face in the top left.

“Yep!” He beamed proudly, as if it had been his own drawing. He started naming all the other guys in the drawing. “Shotaro, Wonbin, Sohee, Seunghan, Anton, and Eunseok.” Then, he drew your attention to what looked like an invoice for air conditioning repair services, with a pencil sketch of an older woman in the corner of it. “A/C repair guy. Just pulled that out of nowhere. It’s his wife, they met when he went up to her in public saying she was so beautiful he had to draw her. That was before they had their strings. He said he just knew, would’ve known without the string anyway. His art didn’t take off, hence why he was my A/C repair guy.”

“So is it a piece of art every time a person comes over, or just one piece of art, and that’s the toll paid forever?”

“One piece of art per person, debt is cleared forever,” he clarified, opening his fridge to root around in it. “I’ve had some artist friends defer their pieces for future visits because they wanted to make a proper, good piece. You know, put real time into it.”

“It’s good, Sungchan,” you grinned, still looking around at more of the art on the walls. “I love it all.”

“I know, now I don’t have to worry about my furniture matching my décor.”

“Yeah, but it’s also…” You breathed in happily as you tried to figure out how to say it. “You called me a people person earlier. You are too, just in a different way.”

He looked around doubtfully. “You think so? I literally said I would bite people if I had to talk to them. I don’t know if my people skills are really up to par for being labelled a people person.”

“Your entire house is wallpapered in art from just ordinary people that you’ve met. Your friends and family, an A/C repair guy. Call me crazy, but I think you like people.”

“Huh. Never thought of it like that.” He grabbed a few more things from the fridge, then the pantry. “Anton just calls it a weird powerplay, and one time Eunseok said he thought I like ‘asserting my dominance.’”

You laughed, “Maybe you’ve just got weird friends if they think you asking them to make you art is you trying to dominate them.”

“Not going to argue with you there.”

“Can I defer my art to another visit?” You requested. “I mean… I’ll probably be over more than once, right?”

He smiled softly. “Probably. And sure, you can defer. But you’re not getting out of it just because you’re my soulmate. If anything, I think that means you definitely owe me something I can point to when people come over and say, ‘my soulmate made that one.’”

After getting a quick and simple lunch together, you and Sungchan took it to his living room to eat, as he didn’t have a dining table. You sat with your back against the arm of the couch, facing Sungchan as your legs were criss-crossed under you.

You started, “So, what did AD Yang—” “Who?”

“The guy who interviewed us? The man with Ms. Kwon?”

“Oh, the skeeze.”

“Yeah. So what did Mr. Yang—” “Who?”

You rolled your eyes, fighting to keep the amused smile off your lips. “So what did the skeeze ask you? I want to know that first, before we talk about mine. Because like, when I think about the amount of time it took Jeno to walk you up there, introductions, goodbyes, then for Jeno to take you to the waiting room, then come get me… I mean, that whole time was like fifteen minutes. So you probably only talked to them for a few minutes, right?”

“Yeah, I mean, it was just a bunch of stuff they probably already knew.” He shrugged. “When did I realize I had the string? When did you and I meet? Did I know that you worked at the Factory when we met? When did I learn that you worked at the Factory? Did I know you before the string? Did I know anybody else at the Factory who could have manipulated the match for me? Then… that was it.”

“Makes sense. You didn’t have any ties to the Factory other than me.”

“So what the fuck happened in there that the skeeze thought he needed to take seven fucking hours?”

“I don’t think it would have taken that long, except…” You scratched your head awkwardly. “I’m the one who read our match and submitted the match report.”

Sungchan’s eyes widened. “Wait, really? But how did you not— Don’t you look that stuff up?”

“Reading the matches, and looking up the profiles, it’s all anonymous. It’s not like I saw it and my brain read it as ‘Jung Sungchan and Y/L/N Y/N.’ It was just… sort of like, the impression of profile numbers, I guess? It was like any other match to me, there was nothing special about it to me.” You screwed your face up as you desperately tried to both explain the matchmaking process to someone who had never been near the process at all, and as you tried to recall anything about that specific match at all, which you of course couldn’t. “And the profile numbers when I looked them up, it didn’t show me names or pictures, or any sort of identifying data when I would do that. It’s all completely anonymous, for good reason.” When you opened your eyes again, Sungchan was still staring at you, and your stomach dropped as you realized what you had just said. “Sungchan, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean it like that. It’s not that you’re not special, of course you are, but when I would be matching, you’re sort of not yourself and—”

“Woah, woah, sorry, I didn’t mean to zone out and make you worry like that,” he apologized, setting his bowl aside and turning to fully face you. “I was just thinking… How many people get to say that their soulmate was the one who gave them their own red string? Like, that’s so cool.”

“Uh… nobody? We’re probably the only ones.”

“Exactly. It doesn’t matter if it felt special to you in that moment or not. Because it still was. I mean, did it feel special when you decided to stop and look at that book at the bookstore? In the split-second that you made the decision?”

You shook your head. “No, I just, wanted to look at the book.”

“And me running after the Frisbee when Anton missed for like the sixth time that morning didn’t feel special in that second. But both of those things were, because it took both of them happening at the same time for us to meet.”

You chewed on your bottom lip, looking down at your food, then up at Sungchan. Setting your bowl aside as well, you then asked, “Is that what a soulmate is, then?”

“What? A Frisbee nearly hitting you in the face?”

“No,” you chuckled. “I mean—Jaemin, Renjun, and I were talking one night, and we were debating about what a soulmate really was. I was in an existential spiral over our red string, they were having a fun little philosophical discussion. They didn’t know about the string yet. We couldn’t decide if a soulmate was just the best that you do, or somebody who would make you better, or infinite second chances.”

“So what do you think a soulmate is now?”

“Someone that makes all the nooks and crannies in your life special, even if they wouldn’t usually be. Just by being there.”

Sungchan absolutely beamed, nodding enthusiastically. “Yeah, yeah. I… like that.”

“What do you think a soulmate is?”

“I’ve always figured every pair of soulmates needs something different from each other,” he replied. “And I think you figured out what we need from each other. To make all the nooks and crannies of our lives special just by being there.”

“Okay…” You agreed softly, a fond smile coming to your lips as he offered his hand out, palm out. You set your hand atop his, your chest squeezing your heart at the same time Sungchan squeezed your hand.

“Now… tell me everything that fucking skeeze said. Everything you can remember.”

“Oh my god, Sungchan.”

“You were in there for seven hours, Y/N!”

“He asked me the same one and a half hours of questions like five times. I was going to start biting people by hour three.”

[sungchan: omw :) ]

[you: okey!]

[sungchan: :( ]

[you: okey! :) ]

[sungchan: :) ]

Laughing to yourself at Sungchan’s attachment to emoticons in texts, you grabbed the last few things that you’d need for your date today. It was the last week that his exhibit was available at the museum, and between your hectic schedule of interviews, and phone interviews, and callback interviews for jobs, in addition to his own schedule, this was finally the day that you two had been able to arrange to go together. A few minutes later, your phone lit up again.

[sungchan: outside :) ]

[you: omw down <3 ]

You saw him start typing, but then he stopped, presumably figuring that he’d be able to tell you whatever it was to your face in thirty seconds. Rushing down, you threw open the front door already with a smile that only grew tenfold as you looked up at Sungchan.

“Hi!” You greeted him, locking up behind you before giving him a hug.

“Good morning.” He readjusted your jacket, pulling it more snugly around your collar for you. “You going to be warm enough in that?”

A cold snap had come through last night, dropping the temperature and forcing you to get your fall wardrobe out early. You raised an eyebrow, looping your arm with his to pull him over to the bus stop to wait. “The museum is heated inside, isn’t it?”

“Well yeah…”

“Then I think my biggest problem would be having to carry a heavy jacket around the museum the whole time.”

When the bus arrived, you were just a bit disoriented by there being completely different passengers—after all, it was a different time of day than your previous daily commute, and you and Sungchan went to sit in a different row. You took the window seat, always loving to watch the passing scenery, and to give Sungchan the extra leg room of the aisle. As the bus took off, you squinted, unable to see much through the fogged-up glass. Sungchan reached a hand past you, and you watched with interest as he drew a heart in the condensation on the window. You giggled and took your own pointer finger to the empty space in the heart, carefully tracing out JSC, then your initials, then a plus in the middle, feeling very much like a preteen doodling on your math homework.

When you looked back at him, you saw that his ears were pink, and you weren’t sure if it was from the cold or not, but he grabbed your right hand with his left, both of your index fingers still a bit chilly from drawing on the window. He rested your linked hands on your lap, and though you couldn’t quite see it from this angle, you knew that the string that connected your pinkies was complete. You leaned your head on his shoulder to look out the window, through the lines made with your little heart.

At the art museum, you excitedly stuck your visitor sticker to your shirt before pulling Sungchan in further by the hand. You looked up at the huge skylight in the main atrium, providing an abundance of natural light on a large abstract sculpture in a bold orange color. “It’s beautiful in here.”

“Have you ever been to this museum?” Sungchan asked curiously as you stopped to watch a cloud pass over the skylight.

“No, I haven’t,” you replied quietly, turning your gaze down to the sculpture in front of you. “I’ve lived here my whole life and it’s one of those places that I’ve always been meaning to go to but, I don’t know, I just haven’t yet.”

“Yeah, I’ve got some places like that,” he said in understanding. “Let’s make a list, both of us. And we’ll cross them off together.”

“Okay, yeah.” You smiled at him, squeezing his hand. “Together.”

Sungchan’s exhibit was in the first gallery past the lobby atrium, and you two had gone at a pretty perfect time for it to be empty of everybody except the docents. You came to a stop as soon as you entered, unsure of where to put your eyes first. When you heard large-scale mixed media collages, you weren’t sure if you had really processed how large ‘large-scale’ was. The gallery was probably fifty meters across, the longest wall being taken up entirely by one single piece. There were only five pieces total in the gallery, one on each wall and one suspended in the middle of the room. You were sure that you could spend hours just looking at one of them.

You decided to start at the one closest to you, and work your way towards the back, where the entrance to the next gallery was. There was a plaque with information about the piece and the artist on it, which you entirely discarded. You commented on things you liked or found interesting as if you were just talking to yourself, not expecting Sungchan to respond at all. And truly, you were just talking to yourself, mostly gasping and muttering all of these things under your breath with delight—after all, you were in a museum, you had to use your inside voice. He’d sometimes chuckle or hum with interest, but that was the extent of him engaging with your commentary, just following you as you slowly trailed down the pieces, then sometimes jumped back to a place that you had already looked over as you made a connection, then went down again. Until you finally made it to the behemoth piece.

Despite being the largest, it had the most fine detail, the smallest individual parts making it up. And that almost felt intentional. Part of you wanted to ask Sungchan that, but you bit your tongue. Instead, you raked your eyes over every square centimeter, drinking in as much as you possibly could. The docent who was standing in the corner switched out while you were looking over that piece, and for a brief second, you wondered if any of the employees had recognized Sungchan. It had never occurred to you that random people on the street would, but in the art museum where he quite literally has an exhibit displaying his art, under his real name… If they did, nobody had made any indication as to such.

Then your attention was sucked back in by the collage in front of you. By the time you were finished, you weren’t sure how much time had passed, only that your feet hurt. You didn’t say anything to Sungchan, only gave his exhibit one more proud look before turning the corner into the next gallery. This one had a dark, heavy curtain dividing it from the rest of the museum, and you immediately knew why. There was a sign at the beginning, the letters lit up so you could read it: ‘The Beauty of Light’

The building’s main overhead lights were completely out, so that the only light provided was from a few along the floor so you could see your step, and the exhibit itself. There were mirrors, glass panes, and colorful lights set up all around the room, refracting all sorts of seemingly impossibly arrays of colors and designs along the surfaces.

“Woah…” You breathed out, reaching out to catch a rainbow on your palm, immediately laughing with wonder.

“It’s interactive,” Sungchan informed you, adjusting the equipment making the rainbow so that there was a whole starburst of rainbows all across you.

“Okay, that’s really fucking cool.” You could feel the huge grin on your face.

“I really didn’t want to see you reacting to my art, actually. I usually hate seeing people looking at my works.”

You looked up at him, confused. “Then why did you want to come with me?”

“I knew they had this exhibit here, and I knew I had to be there when you saw it.” He moved the glass just a bit more, and you weren’t sure where the rainbows had ended up now, but he seemed satisfied as a tender smile came to his lips. “Beautiful.”

“It’s incredible,” you gushed, looking around the room at more of the cool effects being done with lights, then back to Sungchan. You held your hand out towards him, and he walked out from behind the equipment, taking your hand again. Now that he was next to you, some of the rainbows were sticking to his skin and clothes, and you couldn’t help but smile as one caught on his nose.

“Thank you for bearing through the horror of seeing somebody see your art to experience this with me,” you half-teased, swinging your linked hands. Though your words were exaggerated, your sentiment was sincere.

“I said I usually hate seeing people look at my works, but I liked watching you in the exhibit. It didn’t feel like you were performing for me,” he said with a grin. “I could probably watch you watch paint dry.”

“You’re being hyperbolic,” you scoffed.

“I’ve got some paint at my place, want to find out?”

“As thrilling as that sounds, maybe later,” you snorted. “I’m not done with the beauty of light.”

“Hey, no complaints here.” Sungchan ran his thumb over your cheek, still looking down at you with an unbelievable tenderness in his gaze. “Hm…”

“What?” You whispered, your voices suddenly sounding too loud in the empty gallery. The docent had stepped out, and another hadn’t come back in. It was just you and Sungchan in this room.

“Tried to wipe the rainbow off your cheek…”

“Let me guess, didn’t work?”

“Well, it did, kind of.”

“Kind of?”

“Moved to your mouth.” He traced the bottom line of your bottom lip with the very tip of his thumb, and you felt like you weren’t breathing, waiting for him to do something, anything.

“Sounds like a problem.” You put your hand over his, pushing it to your face so he was cradling your cheek.

Sungchan was smiling as he kissed you, you could feel it in the sweet press of his lips to yours, the soft tilting of your chin up to meet his. You squeezed the hand down by your side even tighter. He broke the kiss as gently as he had started it, still smiling down at you. You suddenly shot up to your tiptoes and wrapped your hand around his neck to pull his head down so you could peck the bridge of his nose, giggling when you had released him and he stood back up with a confused but affectionate look on his face.

“And what was that for?” He asked with a chuckle.

“You had a rainbow on your nose.” You told him very seriously. “We’ve established that you have to kiss them off, obviously.”

“Well in that case—” He proceeded to kiss your forehead, cheek, hair, and mouth again in quick succession.

You were laughing, your entire body buzzing from head to toe as you leaned against him both in a bid just be closer, and also because you felt like your knees might just give out. When you heard footsteps enter the gallery again, you bit your lip to stop your giggles, and Sungchan left you with one more fleeting peck to your temple before standing up straight and bringing you over to the next area of the exhibit.

Groaning and sleepily rolling over onto your back, you were vaguely aware of the fact that you had rolled directly back into someone’s chest, and contentedly snuggled further into your position. An arm snaked around your waist, pulling your hips flush to theirs, and you smiled to yourself as you started drifting back off to sleep.

“Y/N?” Came a low rumble of your name from behind you.

You were nearly asleep again, and decided to just pretend you didn’t hear him.

“Baby?” He whispered, a little louder.

“Shh, Sungie,” you hummed. “Still sleeping.”

“Y/N…”

“Sungchan, my love, shut the fuck up and let me sleep.”

Deciding your discussion was finished, you rolled onto your front again and pushed your face into your pillow. He just followed you to that side of the bed, and you felt the pillow dip as he rested his head on it as well. Sungchan ran a hand up and down your spine, the covers dropping lower with his movements.

Realizing that he wasn’t going to be letting you sleep in today, you lifted your face out of your pillow and propped yourself up on your elbows to glare at him. “What is so important that I can’t sleep in on a Saturday when I don’t have to open?”

“You said you wanted to go to that breakfast place, and it closes in an hour,” he informed you quietly, face reminding you very much of a guilty puppy in that moment.

You looked at the time on his bedside clock, and flopped back down with a groan. “Well it’s too fucking late now. Next week.”

“Sorry, baby.” He squeezed your shoulder. “I would’ve woken you up sooner, but usually you’re the one who wakes me up for this kind of stuff. I just woke up a couple minutes ago.”

“Mm, it’s okay, Sungie,” you sighed and turned onto your back, offering him a sleepy smile to let him know that you weren’t mad at him at all. Now in a particularly lovely and warm patch of sunlight, you couldn’t imagine even getting up to go to the bathroom, much less a restaurant. “I think my sleep schedule from working at the Factory is finally gone. My body isn’t used to getting up for a nine to five anymore.”

“Oh, hold on.” He reached for his phone off the nightstand, and you immediately knew what was coming based on his change in demeanor. With a half-resigned, half-endeared sigh, you threw an arm over your face to hide it as he stood up to start taking pictures of you. He called for you with a slight whine in his voice, “Baby…”

“I have bedhead and morning breath, Sungie.”

“You can’t tell if you have morning breath in a picture.”

“And the bedhead?”

“So? Prettiest bedhead I’ve ever seen.”

“Subject gets to decide if you see her bedhead.”

He was quiet, but his pout was deafening as he continued taking pictures of you laying in the morning sunlight.

“Actually…” There was a curl of a smile in his tone as he plopped back down on the mattress. “I like it. Reminds me of those Baroque statues of Greek goddesses.”

You dropped your arm from your face and shuffled closer to be able to peer at his screen. The similarity of the pose was uncanny, but it also reminded you of something else.

“Or Ophelia…” You snorted.

“She doesn’t have an arm over her face.”

“Yeah but like, the general vibe, you know?”

He laughed, sinking into the pillows to make a few minor edits to the color toning. You settled your head on his chest to mindlessly watch him work, knowing that at least one of these photos would be printed out and added to the wall.

When you had admitted to him one night that you felt a lot of pressure over what piece of art to make him to put on his walls as part of his house rule, he suggested that the two of you make one together. So far all of his guests’ art had been relegated to the first floor, so the walls of his bedroom were entirely blank. Starting in the middle of the largest wall, above the long side of his bed, you two had begun a collage. Adding pictures that you two took of each other, pictures other people took of you two, pictures you took of places that you went on dates together, and any miscellaneous thing from your time that had acquired fond memories and Sungchan could figure out a way to stick to the wall. It had slowly started growing, and sometimes you liked to just lay in bed and look at it. One time you’d asked Sungchan what he was going to do when he moved out of this place, and he’d said cut out that section of wall and take it with him. At the time, you had laughed, but now you weren’t so sure it was a joke. Honestly, they could just put more wall in, right?

“There,” Sungchan murmured with finality, and you heard his portable photo film printer start whirring to life from his desk in the corner.

“Put it up later,” you requested, wrapping an arm around his middle and burying your face in his neck. “Don’t want you get up…”

“Fine by me.” He hugged you to him tightly, readjusting you so you were practically on top of him. “Are you on the afternoon shift or the closing shift?”

“Ahrin had her sister’s wedding today, so I’m doing afternoon and closing.”

“God, nobody else could take her shift?”

“I needed the money,” you shrugged. “Severance pay is gone and amazingly, part-time bookstore clerk doesn’t pay as well as full-time matchmaker at the Factory did.”

You’d been having a difficult time finding a job since quitting the Factory. Despite companies and organizations seemingly tripping over themselves to want to interview you, it was crickets when it came time to actually follow through after that. Even with your immaculate letter of recommendation from Ms. Kwon. At most of the interviews, you got the distinct impression that they just wanted a chance to meet the Factory employee who “rigged it,” and not actually interview you. After all, who would want such a dishonest and untrustworthy employee at their company. The only place that had offered you a job was your favorite bookstore by the park, which you were more than grateful for.

“I told you, you can live here,” Sungchan reminded you gently.

“I already practically do,” you retorted. “But I still have a lease on my place, and have to pay whether I’m here seven days a week or not.”

“Then why don’t you cut your lease? Isn’t there an early leave payment or something? That has to be cheaper than continuing to pay for the next however many months when you don’t even live there.”

“I—” You swallowed thickly, your voice getting smaller. “You really mean that?”

“Of course I mean that.”

“Me actually moving in?”

“Yes, you actually moving in.”

“Okay.” You beamed into his shirt. “I’ll look into the early leave payment.”

“Send your lease to Jihun to look over,” he suggested, referencing his sister’s husband.

“He’s not a lawyer.”

“No, but he’s got a couple. And he’s good with contracts and haggling. Bet he can get that fee payment cut in half.” You lifted your head, about to argue with asking for favors like that, when Sungchan cupped your jaw and tilted your chin so you were looking right at him. His red string hung in the air just in the corner of your eye. He held your gaze steadily. “It’s what family does, Y/N.”

“Okay,” you murmured, nodding against his hand. “Yeah, family.”

He pulled you forward and up to crash your lips together, his fingers tangling in your hair, and your hands flew to his chest to keep yourself upright. You felt your love for him filling every nook and cranny of your body, and you knew it was something special, because it was yours.

➥ masterlist

#sungchan x reader #riize x reader #sungchan imagines #riize imagines #sungchan #sungchan imagine #riize imagine #nct x reader #nct imagine #nct imagines #jung sungchan #i: sungchan #f: tsf #writing #text #mine #bias tag #*100 #*200

[mandiemegatron]

𝕋𝕠 𝔹𝕖 𝕃𝕠𝕧𝕖𝕕

ᶜᵒʳᵃᶻᵒⁿ ˣ ᴿᵉᵃᵈᵉʳ / ᴰᵒⁿᵠᵘᶦˣᵒᵗᵉ ᴿᵒˢᶦⁿᵃⁿᵗᵉ ˣ ᴿᵉᵃᵈᵉʳ

ᴿᵃᵗᵉᵈ: ᴹ // ᴼᵛᵉʳᵗᵒᵃˢᵗᵉᵈ // ˢᵉˣ, ᶠᶦⁿᵍᵉʳᶦⁿᵍ, ˡᵒᵛᶦⁿᵍ ᵒᵘʳ ᶜˡᵘᵐˢʸ ᵐᵃⁿ ᵗʰᵉ ʷᵃʸ ʰᵉ ᵈᵉˢᵉʳᵛᵉˢ 😤

A/N : Hello once again my lovelies !!! This is a tasty lil treat for my love @kaizokuniichan who asked me to write up something for our lover, Rosinante. I think this is the LONGEST piece I've ever written, I just had so much fun, I couldn't stop writing!!! I hope you enjoy babe, he loves you so much! He's gunna smooch you so hard! 🥰🥰🤭🤭

Doflamingo had taken you in after you saved Baby 5's young life, putting yourself in harms way to save the child and coming out from the fight nearly unscathed. The small girl had clung to you like a lifeline and refused to let go when you went to hand her off. Doflamingo had laughed, the sound echoing in your ears, but it didn't frighten you, only able to give him a bright smile when he offered you a place on his ship.

When Corazon suddenly showed up, you swore the tension could have been sliced with a butterknife, watching the two brothers stare each other down until Doflamingo relented, pulling his younger brother into a tight hug while exclaiming, "My brother has returned!" There was a celebration that night, the Donquixote Pirates always finding some reason to drink and party.

You listened absent-mindedly as Diamante insulted the brother, your eyes taking the slightly shorter Donquixote, curious of the man. Your cheeks burned when his eyes met yours, smoke from his cigarette floating up and slightly obscuring his view, which gave you the chance to walk away, heading down to the kitchen to make up a snack.

You had just finished your snack when footsteps alerted you; your eyes flicking up from the book in front of you to the younger brother standing at the door, a slightly apprehensive look on his face as he took you in. You gave a small smile and a wave, which he returned after a moment, which caused you to chuckle softly.

"I'm Y/N, it's nice to meet you."

He walked over and sat scross from you pulling out a notebook and scribbling something down, sliding the notebook to you with a small grin. You were gentle with the book, fingers brushing over the page as you read the words.

You can call me Corazon, the pleasure is mine.

Your cheeks tinted pink as you slid the notebook back, unable to keep the small smile off your face as you began to sign, the movements a little clunky from disuse.

/Do you sign? It might be easier to communicate./

His eyes lit up like a light and a wide grin replaced the small one, giving you two thumbs up before responding in a flurry of signs.

/I do! I've only met one other person who could sign, this is definitely easier-/

You cut him off with a laugh, the sound causing him to falter as a light blush covered his own cheeks.

"You're going too fast, Cora-san, I can't keep up like that."

He repeated his movements but much slower this time, your head nodding slightly before you replied,

/Much better, that's much easier to follow. Thank you!/

His grin returned and you knew then that you could enjoy his company anytime.

~ A few months later ~

Walking through the newest town you'd stopped at, Baby 5 at your heels as she chattered about how excited she was to find a new dress. You smiled down at the girl and turned to your bodyguard for the day, laughing at the sour look on Corazons face.

"You know, we would have been just fine. You didn't have to come with us, Cora-san."

He sighed through his nose and signed,

/Doflamingo said I had to. Apparently you're important to him./

Your cheeks burned at the thought of your Captain calling you important, though you quickly frowned and gave Corazons arm a slap. He flinched at the feeling, giving you a matching frown and blowing smoke down at you.

"Not me, her. She's important, I'm expendable."

His face changed at your words, quickly signing out something but you turned from him, not caring what he had to say at that moment.

"I don't have a devil fruit, I'm not nobility, I'm nothing special. Doflamingo can find a child caretaker anywhere, I'm just..."

You gave a shrug, arms crossing over your chest as you keep your eyes peeled for the store you and Baby 5 looked at the day prior.

"I'm just convenient."

There was silence between the three of you until the store came into view, the small girl giving an excited shriek as she ran towards it. You shouted after her, running and catching up to her easily, snatching her up in your arms with a loud laugh that matched her own.

Corazon watched the sight with a heavy heart, knowing the Donquixote Pirates was no place for your kindness and love. Watching you care for Baby 5 hurt him, knowing his job was to keep kids from joining this ruined crew and his failure hung over him like a storm cloud. His hands jammed into his pants pockets as he strolled towards the store, following you both in and standing off to the side.

He shrugged off the whispers from surrounding people, his eyes trained on you and you only, watching as you held Baby 5 on your hip while you scoured the racks for good deals. He couldn't help but smile softly, his eyes soft and warm as yours met his. Your cheeks tinted pink, snapping your head back to the rack as the small girl pulled a cute dress from the rack.

"Great choice," he heard you respond, your voice light and happy.

Corazon's eyes moved from you two to outside, simply people watching and keeping his alert high just in case. He jumped when a heavy hand met his shoulder, ready to grab his pistol when his brother suddenly leaned into his vision, a low sigh leaving him as he shook his head. Doflamingo cackled, giving his brother a slight shake.

"Ah brother, don't be so bitter! It's not my fault you're not paying attention."

Corazon glared for a moment before clapping a hand on Doflamingos' own shoulder, giving it a slight squeeze before turning your attention back to you. Doflamingo gave a low chuckle, his attention also on you as you laughed at whatever Baby 5 had said.

"She's something else, isn't she."

Corazon was shocked at the words from his brother, eyebrows shooting up as he turned back to him. He titled his head slightly, motioning for Doflamingo to continue. The elder brother simply sighed and gave Corazons shoulder a squeeze of his own before letting it fall.

"If you have to ask, then you wouldn't understand."

Corazon turned back to you before giving his brother a nod. He did understand, but he wouldn't let his brother know that.

The two brothers watched you almost dance around the store, a small collection of dresses for the girl in your free arm as you finally went to go pay. Gathering the bag, you placed Baby 5 down and thanked the vendor, leading the girl out and smiling beautifully at the two brothers as you passed them.

There was a moment of silence between the Donquixotes, before Doflamingo finally murmured out,

"... That's what I meant."

He followed after you, leaving Corazon to lean outside the store. His heart clenched as Doflamingo laid a hand on the top of your head, your head turning to look up at him and Corazon felt something snap as you smiled lovingly up at his brother. He hated how suave his brother was and how dirty he played, watching you fall into his hands like easy prey. You didn't deserve the pain his brother would give you, treating you like a fly stuck in a spiders web.

Corazon decided then that he would do everything in his power to get you out.

That night, the crew had taken over a tavern, drinking it dry and eating everything available, the poor owner having no choice but to sit back and watch the Donquixotes rip his livelihood apart for their own amusement. You sat between the brothers, an old logbook in your hands that you'd stolen from the local bookstore, making marks and little ticks in the book to anything you thought important.

"While I admire your dedication, I really wish you'd relax."

You jumped at the sudden voice, looking up at your Captain with a wide grin and a laugh as you reply,

"This is me relaxing."

Doflamingo gave a cackle, his head tilting back as the sound echoed to the ceiling. Your cheeks burned, thinking he was making fun of you, but when he looked back to you, his hand went under your chin, forcing you to keep eye contact. His thumb ran over your lower lip as he replied lightly,

"I could show you how to really relax, if you'd like."

Your eyes stared into the rose tinted glasses, rendered mute for a moment until you laughed nervously, pulling your face from his grasp.

"Maybe next time."

You remove yourself from between the brothers as you gather your book, waving them off as you said your good nights, making your way to the rooms upstairs. You checked the kids first, sighing softly with a small smile as Baby 5, Buffalo and Dellinger rested, oblivious to the party raging downstairs.

Closing the door, you turned and jumped, fist raised and ready to attack as you took in a shadow, giving an irritated grunt as Corazon stepped out from the darkness.

/You okay?/

You gave a soft "Tsk," and lowered your fist, straightening yourself before signing back,

/You scared the shit out of me./

He immediately signed back,

/I'm so sorry./

You gave a soft sigh and nodded, rubbing a tired hand over your face.

"It's okay, I'm just... on edge."

Corazon tilted his head curiously, motioning for you to continue so you grabbed his hand, pulling him to your room and closing the door behind you after pushing him in.

You rested your forehead against the door before turning and looking at him, your eyes sad and expression nervous as you asked,

"Can I trust you?"

He sat on the edge of the bed, his hands in his lap as he threw a long leg over the other. He stared you down for a long moment before giving a solid nod, his own expression determined.

You placed your book on the small dresser and walked to him, sitting beside him and staring out the open window. You were silent for a while, gathering strength to be honest with the younger Donquixote.

"... I think I want to leave."

Your voice was so soft that Corazon wasn't sure he heard you properly. One of his hands met your back and gave it a gentle rub as your face collapsed into your palms. His heart broke as a soft sob left you, your shoulders shaking as you bit back more tears.

"I think I bit off way more than I could chew and now I'm fucked."

While you sobbed into your hands, you took no notice of his other hand moving outwards almost lazily, a soft murmur coming from him but you didn't hear, too in your emotions to pay attention to anything else.

"... calm..."

A soft blue barrier washed over you two, a feeling of a breeze washing over your skin, causing you to lift your face from your palms in confusion. You turned to Corazon as he lifted his hand from your back and signed to you,

/... can I trust you?/

You gently reached out and took his hand in both of yours, thumbs brushing over the back of his as you gave a solid nod of your own. He took a shaky breath before responding in a low voice,

"... you don't deserve this."

You froze, eyes wide as your breath hitched in your throat. He... spoke.

He spoke.

He spoke.

He spoke.

Your mind ran on that one thought for a moment, heart pounding in your chest as your eyes finally met his once again, clear anxiousness written across his face as he waited for you to say something, anything.

"You..."

Tears welled in your eyes again as you finally choked out,

"Cora-san... help me."

You're pulled into his lap, his strong arms tight around you as your face buries into his neck. One of his hands cradles the back of your head while the other rubs over your back, his own eyes prickling with tears as he holds you to him.

"I'm so sorry you got caught up in Doflamingos insanity. You are too good for him."

You clung to Corazon like a moth to an open flame, his velvety voice washing over your skin and warming you from the inside out. After a while, you pulled away, wiping at your face as you murmured,

"I'm so sorry, how embarrassing-"

Your voice faltered as he cups your face, thumbs brushing away left over tears as his eyes bored into yours.

"Never apologize for being honest."

Your eyes searched his, your hands moving to his chest and lightly gripping around his shirt. Slowly, your faces moved closer, his nose brushing against yours as your breath mingled, lips so close-

There was an explosion of light outside the window, pulling both of your attention to it. The smell of smoke met your nose and you gasped, looking back to Corazon with a worried expression. Hopping off his lap, you ran to the window and groaned at the sight, seeing the building across from the tavern now decimated and in ruins, flames licking the sky. Doflamingo stood before it, his arms raised as he cackled maliciously to the sky. There was no sound which confused you, your head turning to question Corazon when suddenly it returned, Doflamingos laugh chilling you to the bone. It mingled with the crackle of the fire, your arms wrapping around yourself as you took in the sight.

"God damn," you breathed out, stepping back from the window and jumping when your back met Corazons stomach. You looked up at him and your brows furrowed nervously as you took in his expression, his emotions screaming out of his face as he took in the sight.

"Your brother is fucking terrifying, Corazon."

He looked down at you when you spoke, a deep frown on his lip as he gave you a slow nod, raising a hand to sign,

/He is./

You frowned, confused as you whispered out,

"... Are you mute or not?"

He shook his head sadly, running a nervous hand through his hair under his hat before signing,

/I'm mute for my own safety./

You turned and wrapped your arms around him, worry eating away at your heart as his own arms caged you to him.

"... Are you in danger, Cora-san?"

There was silence between you, and you squeezed him slightly, your face pressed against his sternum as he wrote Y E S on your back with a finger. Your own fingers clenched around his shirt, giving a soft sigh of relief as silence rested over you both once more. You pulled back to look up at him and asked,

"You have a devil fruit?"

He nodded slowly, his eyes still watching the chaos outside the window.

"You have to promise me you won't say anything."

Your expression steeled as you confirmed confidently,

"I'd die before saying anything."

His eyes snapped to you, his face breaking as he looked down at you. A large hand cupped your face and you leaned into it, one of your hands moving to press against the back of his own.

"Now I need you to promise you won't die for me."

You couldn't help but laugh, eyes tearing up as you pressed a kiss to his palm before you joked back,

"No promises, Cora-san."

No longer having the strength to keep watching his brothers madness, he took you away from the window, sitting back on the bed and returning you to his lap. Your legs caged his waist, hands on his shoulders as his own brushed over your hips. You shivered under his touch, both your cheeks burning bright red as your eyes met.

You made the first move, pressing a quick but gentle kiss to the side of his lips, smiling to yourself at the small gasp that left him. His lips chased yours as you slowly pulled back, brushing your nose against his as your lips barely touched. A soft moan escaped you and his fingers twitched, digging into your flesh as he finally captured your mouth, a delicious mound growing under you which you lovingly ground against.

Corazons breath caught in his chest as he kissed you, unable to form any thought as his hands met your ass, pressing you down against him to relieve the pressure of his cock straining in his pants. You moaned again, the sound muffled by his lips as his tongue brushed against your bottom lip. You gave him entrance and a low groan reverberated in his chest, his fingers gripping your ass cheeks as you felt your panties become soaked from your warmth.

His lips left yours to trail over your neck, your head falling back as his lips and teeth teased your flesh, your hips grinding against him almost desperately as one of his hands crawled up your shirt. His massive hand took a breast into it, his deft fingers twisting and teasing a perky nipple, grinning into your skin as you moaned his name.

"I could listen to that all day," he breathed out against your neck before leaving a hickey, his tongue licking over the bruising once he was pleased with it. He took in your breathless look for a moment, pleased with himself as he murmured down to you deliciously,

"Can I be selfish? Can I have you tonight?"

Your hands immediately went to his button-up, ripping at the fabric and pushing it from his shoulders. He gave a pleased laugh, capturing your wrists to stop you as he kissed you again, a little softer than before as he murmured,

"Say yes."

You kissed him back for a moment before brushing your nose along his cheek, your lips right by his ear as you whispered with a beg,

"Please fuck me, Cora-san."

The man's brain malfunctioned, a choked sound leaving him as his hands tightened around your wrists, a desperate need snapping in him. You blinked and your back was against the bed, Corazon towering over you as his hands ripped off your clothes, your own hands tearing at his belt and pants.

Once you were naked under him, his hands teased over your skin, his eyes taking in every inch of you as if committing your body to his memory. He wanted to capture everything, every little moan, every twitch your body gave - he wanted it all.

"You're so beautiful," he murmured as his fingers danced over your soaked cunt, grinning to himself as your hips twitched towards them, a fleeting whine leaving your lips as he pulled them away.

"Please, Cora-san, please, I need you -"

Your voice cracked as he pressed a finger until you, your eyes rolling back as a filthy whimper left you. He quickly added a second, slowly beginning to stretch you as he pumped in and out, your pussy squeezing around his fingers to the point he sucked a hiss in through his teeth, his other hand gripping his massive cock through his undies for a moment before caging over you again. You almost blacked out as he added a third, stretching you more than you'd ever been before, and your hand met his wrist, tears pricking your eyes.

"Too much, love?"

His eyes were so kind, so loving as he looked down at you, tears spilling from your own as you gave a small shake of your head.

"I... I just need... a second..."

When you were ready, you gave a nod and moved against his hand, moaning deliciously as the fire returned, pleasure overtaking the pain as he finger fucked you into the mattress. You were so close, praise babbling past your lips as your eyes bored into his own. His cheeks were bright red, lipstick smeared on his face and you assumed your own, a hand cupping his cheek as you cried,

"I'm so close, I'm so close, God please Cora-san, please, I'm gunna cum, I'm-"

His lips devoured yours as he pistoned into you, your breasts bouncing slightly at the ferocity. Your hands wrapped around the back of his neck, nails digging into his back as you spilled over the edge, almost sobbing into the kiss as you gushed over his fingers, squirting over and over and staining the bedsheets. He let you ride your orgasm out entirely, leaving his fingers inside your soaked cunt until he knew you were coming down. Pulling them from you, he brought his hand to his mouth and licked them clean, moaning at how sweet you tasted.

If he died tomorrow, he knew he would die a happy man, just from your taste alone.

"... that was so beautiful," he choked out as your tired hands pulled at his boxers, fingers dipping into the waistband and brushing against his incredibly large cock. He gave a shuddering moan at the feeling, pulling his undies down and kicking them off before situating himself between your legs, precum pooling at the tip of his cock and dripping onto your mound. You shivered at the feeling, the wet slick chilling you as a breeze swept into the room.

You both stared each other down, your gazes similar as he leaned down to capture your lips once again. His tip pressed into you, and you whined with a hiss, pulling back from the kiss to look up at him. One of his hands tenderly holds your face as he slowly presses into you, guilt seeping into his skin as he watches your face scrunch in pain.

"Do you-"

You glare up at him as best you can as you bite out,

"Don't you dare stop."

Something in him snaps, and he fills you in one thrust, groaning loudly at how tight you are as your mouth falls open in a silent scream. Your eyes roll back and you arch off the bed, the tip of his cock assaulting your insides as you try to relax and adjust to his massive size.

"Such a good girl, you're so good for me," he praises you softly as he slowly pulls out and presses back into you just as slow. It takes only a moment for the pleasure to overtake the pain and you pant, giving him a begging look as you cry out,

"Harder!"

His hips immediately snap into yours, pulling a choked sound from you as he begins to fuck you, his head thrown back as he moans to the ceiling. His hands are rough on your hips, fingers digging into your skin to the point it bruises. You watch your stomach grow everytime he thrusts into you, his cock overfilling you and pushing you beyond the divides of pleasure that you've ever felt.

He suddenly cages over you, one hand moving from your hips to roughly grab your face, an almost dark look in his eyes as he watches you with blown pupils.

"You gunna cum for me?"

You moan shakily at his words, the thread inside you threatening to snap once again as he continues to rearrange your organs.

"I ask you a question."

He stops moving and you cry out, tears stinging your eyes again as your hips try to fuck against him to no avail.

"Yes baby, yes, please make me cum, make me yours, make me cum baby, please-"

Five deep and possessive thrusts is all it took for you to scream out, sobbing out his name as he fucks a second orgasm out of you, his hips stuttering and losing his rythym as he follows you over the edge, choking out your name as his forehead meets yours. You feel his cock twitch inside you, his seed spilling out and joining your stains as he lazily thrusted, chasing the butterfly kisses of pleasure as his lips press against yours.

You both hold each other, kisses and soft breaths exchanged as tears rush out of your eyes. You flinched as something wet hits your cheeks, and you can't bite back the sob that leaves you as you take in Corazons own teary-eyed face. Your hands cup his face, and you kiss him over and over, your legs still wrapped around his waist as if he'd disappear the second you let go.

"Y/N,"

His voice was so soft, his throat wrecked from his moans and sobbing.

"D-did you mean it?"

You wiped at your eyes with the back of your hand, brows furrowed slightly in confusion as he chokes on his words, his cheeks bright red as he somehow gets out,

"... make you mine?"

Your own face burned bright red and you nodded, pursing your lips into a tight line for a moment before responding,

"Y-yeah."

Tears roll down his face like a waterfall, his face scrunched as he sobs,

"Really?"

You can't help but laugh lightly, your hands taking his face as your thumbs wipe away the never-ending onslaught of tears. You gave him a genuine, loving smile as you replied,

"... If you'll have me."

His cock twitched inside you and you wince with a moan, your back arching slightly as he thrusts into you again. He cages over you again and he slowly begins to fuck you again, his lips pressing to yours hard for a moment before he pulls away to breath out,

"Mine."

His teeth nip your bottom lip.

"My beautiful girl."

They move to your neck, sucking and biting the flesh til his name was written across your entire body.

"...Mine."

He catches your chin in a rough grasp again. His eyes are half-lidded, heavy and full of obsession as he moaned out,

"Mine."

A/N : AND THERE WE HAVE IT !!! I cannot express how much fun I had writing this, i love Rosinante so much 😭😭😭😭 my mans deserved better Oda-sensei 😭😭😭😭😭 also, I had to stop and walk away from this MUTLIPLE times because i made myself blush like ???? 🙈🙈🙈🙈🙈 good lord.

Anywhore, I love you all sm !! 💖💖💖💖💖💖 Please reblog/like/comment if you enjoyed, it gives me motivation and excitement to keep writing !! Thank you so much !! Be good my lil tangerines! 💖💖💖💖💖

#mandie mumbles ; fanfics #ok to rb #Donquixote Rosinante #Corazon #corazon x reader #rosinante x reader #donquixote rosinante #corazon #reader fic #one piece #one piece reader #op corazon #smut #slight slow burn #i am actually so proud of this 😭😭😭😭

[staretes]

Hello may I request an ex husband Jing Yuan x reader?

diverging paths

synopsis: "til death do us part" were the words uttered by you and jing yuan on the happiest day of your life, promising to love and cherish each other for the rest of your long lives. but what are promises, but words to be broken? or, jing yuan sees you, decades after your separation, now a bystander to the life that once revolved around him w/c: 0.7k tags: jing yuan x reader, angst, not proofread a/n: thank you anon for sending me this!! (sorry for the angst HAHA) i think i like it?? it may be ooc but i can never tell?

jing yuan is fine. he's perfectly fine.

he's sitting by a stall in aurum alley, savouring one of the rare moments of his free time with yanqing, when suddenly you stroll past, accompanied by someone else. it's like time stops around him, and his eyes are no longer able to see anything but you. 

it's been decades since he's last seen you. you look more confident. happier. you've changed so much without him. your lips form a beaming smile, one that was once reserved for him, and your fingers are intertwined with your lover in a soft, everlasting grasp.

oh.

your hands look so strange without a wedding band on your finger. jing yuan himself had stopped wearing his ring, leaving the broken symbol of the eternal love both of you promised each other hidden in his bedside drawer. he wonders why you stopped wearing it. maybe you, like him, felt the icy guilt stabbing into his chest whenever your ring comes into sight.

but that couldn't be right. after all, you did nothing worthy of guilt.

maybe, just maybe, you left behind the ring shackling your hands to free yourself of the marriage that had kept you trapped for so long. jing yuan imagines how unrestricted you must feel, like a bird soaring out from its cage, no longer burdened by a dying marriage.

"jing yuan, this isnt working."  this was bound to happen,  jing yuan thinks.  as general of the luofu, he carries the weight of the entire ship on his shoulders. he’s seen the bitter eyes hidden by your understanding smile whenever he was whisked away to deal with the luofu’s every stain and smudge. he’s arrived late and left early on every date, anniversary and birthday you’ve tried to spend with him. when was the last time he even slept in the same bed as you? it’s almost impressive that you’ve lasted 300 years in this empty marriage. throughout these years, he’s watched as the passion and vibrance drain from you, as you poured your love into him, and he took it all, not leaving a single drop for you. “ I’ll be there, next time,” he tells both himself and you. after all, you’ve been there for him all this time. but time and time again, he shatters your trust, leaving you to pick up the pieces and glue them back together all by yourself. it would be cruel to keep you caged in this neglected marriage. so jing yuan let you go without a single question. *.·:·.✧ ✦ ✧.·:·.* jing yuan remembers the last time he sees you.  this is the crossroad, where the two of you part ways, where you'll be free to journey through your long, happy life.  "you'll be fine, right?" you ask, your eyes meeting his. "of course, " he lies through a smile. after all, you've already wasted enough of your concern on him. "i wish you well, (name)." he speaks again, but this time, his words are nothing but sincere. "alright then." you say resoundingly, but the doubtful worry does not fade from your eyes. however, it does not matter, as your gaze drops to the ground. "i wish you well too," you tell him and you leave, all the same. 

"general, aren't you at all sad?" he hears yanqing inquire curiously from behind him. “they were once your lover right? qingzu told me.”

it’s at this point that jing yuan realises that he’s been staring at you with a blank expression on his face. hurrying to recover, he faces his young apprentice. 

“you should know better than to listen to qingzu.” he chuckles half–heartedly. “but yes, they were my lover. however, we found that we worked better apart. sometimes yanqing, when you love someone, you have to learn to let them go.” 

“but don’t you miss them?” yanqing asks further, his young mind still confused. 

"i do," he admits. “ but i have wonderful memories of them, and i will cherish those memories always.” always is an understatement, jing yuan thinks, for in his long life ahead, he promises to never let the memories of you fade away.

his gaze lands back on you. you haven’t even noticed him. you’re still walking with your partner, oblivious to the rest of the world. jing yuan knows the feeling. his eyes soften as he watches you laughing and smiling, walking away from him without a glance cast his way.

he hopes you’re happy.

#[✦ - archives!] #jing yuan x reader #jing yuan angst #hsr imagines #hsr x you #hsr x reader #jing yuan x you #jing yuan x gender neutral reader #hsr x gender neutral reader #i hate tagging omg #jing yuan imagines

[grampstaxidermy87]

Tame The Beast

Pairing:Volturi Kings x Shifter!Reader

Requested by the lovely: @transient-colours

Request: Okay so like I'm obsessed with the idea of poly Volturi kings with a shifter reader. Like the idea of the reader resting at the base of their thrones in animal form while trials take place? Mmm. Or when the reader gets restless from being cooped up inside all the time, all four go for a vacation in the wilderness and just let loose? maybe they can meet because the reader is the daughter of a leader of a shifter tribe that has come to form a treaty with the Volturi?

Warning: death, extreme fluff, and slight angst.

An: I am so sorry this took so long darling; I rewrote this so many times and I finally got to a point where I felt comfortable posting. I hope you enjoy my lovelies!

Soft chuffs of bliss vibrated in the ears of the immortals as they stood in their places around the throne room, many wore an expression of adoration as they chose to listen to that instead of the pitiful pleading of those on trial throughout the day.

Once the doors shut on yet another guilty party being taken to the dungeons Marcus let out a huff to release his growing aggravation, his tense expression softened immediately when he felt a pressure on his lap.

Turning his attention to the large feline whose head laid happily on his lap, A warm smile pulled at his lips as he began to run his fingers through its fur.

"I’m alright Mia Regina, just one more and then we may retire to my chambers." The Tiger hummed as it looked up at him, ensuring his words were truthful so she wouldn’t need to worry.

To unknowing witnesses, seeing a jungle cat in Volterra Italy surrounded by bloodthirsty vampires, you'd be rightfully alarmed.

But to any who lived in the supernatural world, this was the most important creature on the planet. Protected by not only the vampire race, but any who have met her.

To say she was a well-loved queen would be a horrible understatement, The appearance of a beast she took but inside she held the heart of an angel.

And that heart belonged to the three most feared men on earth.

"My sweet, come to me." Aro called out, beaming when the tigress looked at him.

Marcus growled at him for stealing her attention, watching with a slight pout as she slowly stood and trotted over to the raven-haired king.

Aro leaned downward and took her fluffy cheeks in his hands, pressing his face into her fur as he read through her thoughts of the day.

He chuckled at the quips she had made for a few guilty parties that now were being disposed of in the dungeons furnace, feeling prideful that no one but he was able to hear his queens' witty remarks.

He always found joy in his wife's humor, finding it as a breath of fresh air during on the gloomiest of days.

"As delightful as always my beloved." Pressing a kiss to her snout he leaned back as she moved on to her final lover, who did not bother to hide his mischievous smirk as he eyed her approaching form.

Unbothered as she lifted the front half of her torso up so that her body covered his, completely hidden to those who would enter now.

"Hello Kitty." He teased, biting back his laughter when she huffed at him for the nickname.

"Don't rile her up brother, we still have one last trial to get through and can't have you sitting there with ripped clothes." Aro warned though even he knew when it came to those two, he might as well be talking to a wall.

Ignoring his brothers' words Caius leaned forward and buried his face in the fur of her chest, fingers tangling into her sides as she plopped her head atop his. Panting wildly as he scratched her sweet spots, tail swooshing faster as she tried to keep herself standing.

"You're just jealous that she loves me more." Caius teased earning a growl from his brothers.

-Reader Pov-

As the last trial commenced Caius continued to rake his skilled fingers through my fur as I laid beside his throne listening as Aro's commanding voice filled the air, "We have come to our final decision. Young Ivan for your crimes against your coven and our kind as a whole, you have been sentenced to death. Felix."

Screams of defiance echoed in the marble throne room as the guard followed his king's demand, ridding the criminal vampire of his head.

When Caius's hand left my fur I plopped onto my side, letting out a soft huff at the blissful feeling of the cold across my body. Demetri was standing guard on the other side of my ferocious king, seeing as he was one of my personal guards he was never far.

It had been a little over 5 and a half years since I met my imprints and became queen.

My father wasn't very pleased by this fact since he expected me to take over as the leader of the pack when he passed. But I didn't belong there...my rightful place was right here with my wonderful husbands.

There was only one thing I did not like about my life here in Volterra...the humans.

My tribe resided in the jungles of India it was perfect cover for our kind as we took the form of different jungle cats. But here in Italy there was no way that I could go out without causing a scene, meaning I was stuck cooped up in this castle.

There was only so many times you could run through the same halls before it drove you crazy.

"Il Mio Amore?" My head snapped up to see Marcus watching me with slight worry, leaning forward to peer at me when he noticed that I had been still for too long.

Aro's attention was now on me after hearing his brother's tone, he stood up and knelt down to my side. I looked up tiredly at him as he placed his hands on my cheeks.

His eyes grew distant as his fingers ran through my fur, a yawn rumbled from my throat as I leaned into his touch.

He looked down at me sadly, standing up he looked over at Demetri, "Why don’t you take the queen out to the gardens for some fresh air, we’ll send the twins to stand in for you if you are needed.” Demetri nodded and waited for me to lazily stand up before leading the way out.

Once the doors shut behind us Aro turned back to face his fellow kings. "What did you see brother?” Caius inquired, Worried for his queen and mate.

“It would seem that our darling (Y/n) has been growing rather restless lately.” Aro commented, his brows furrowed as he went over the thoughts of his mate again.

"I have noticed as well, brother...Her animal side craves freedom. Perhaps it is time to take a much-needed break?" Marcus hummed knowing it would be the best option for their queen, and the smiles that formed on his brother's faces assured him they would not argue against it.

“I believe I have a few calls to make.” Aro said bidding his brothers A-dew while he made preparations.

———

“My queen, you can shift back now. I have ensured no one will disturb you.” Demetri stated, placing a black silk slip dress on the stone bench he turned his back to give me privacy while I transformed back.

“Thank you, Demetri. You’re safe to look now.” I spoke smoothly after I pulled the dress over my curves before laying back on the bench.

“Are you alright madame?” The blonde asked walking closer and blocking the sun from blinding me as I looked up at him.

“Just tired darling, nothing to worry about.” He didn't seem convinced but let it be as he looked up at the sky. "It's nice out, wouldn't you rather run around the garden?"

Letting out a hum I covered my face with my arm, "I’m not feeling it today dear; I think I’m just going to sunbathe for a while.”

His brows furrowed in concern, clearly worried by his queens sudden change of character from my usual energetic self.

From the corner of his eye, he spotted Felix signaling him, "Excuse me for one moment my queen.” Not waiting for a reply he sped over to his friends side.

“What happened? Do the kings need me?” Felix shook his head gave him a look before making sure their queen wasn’t listening.

“The kings have an island just outside of Rio, the kings plan on bringing her there for a vacation.” Demetri caught himself before he could gasp, "Oh she is going to love that! Perhaps this is just what she needs to get back to her old self again?”

Felix hummed in agreement, "Let us hope, my friend. For her sake as well as all of ours.”

After another hour I decided to retire to my bedroom, I was surprised however to see my blonde king running around my room throwing my things into suitcases.

"Caius why are you packing my things? Is there a mission?" His head snapped up when I entered the room, a smile that he showed only when we were alone appeared. "No Dearest, not a mission. Come sit."

Motioning to the bed he watched as I walked deeper into the room and sat on the edge.

Appearing in front of me he knelt down and took my hands, Eyes soft as he saw the tiredness in mine.

"We have noticed how restless you've become being stuck in the castle for so long." My smile fell and before I could open my mouth, he sent me a look. "Don't argue because everyone has noticed it, you feel trapped...confined. Something we never wanted you to feel."

He lifted my hands up to his lips, kissing each knuckle with utter worship. "We wish to take you to one of our islands by Rio. The plan is to stay there for a month, to which you will be able to run free and without worry as much as you want."

My eyes widened in awe as his words processed in my mind.

"Oh Caius..." He smiled as tears filled my eyes, pulling me into his tight embrace as he stood up. "I've been so tired..." He hugged me tighter, "I know my love, just know that the next time you feel like this...tell us. We are your mates, your lovers, your husbands. We wish to be there for you as you are for us."

Wiping away my tears he cupped my cheeks and brought me in for a kiss, "We love you more than anything kitty, and I cannot wait to see you in your element."

---

The ocean air hit me like a wave the moment I stepped out of the private jet, shutting my eyes as I soaked in the warmth.

"Darling, would you prefer to go directly to the house or run around a bit first?" Marcus asked as he appeared at my side, happy to see a hint of his wife's true self finally coming back.

"You already know which one I'll pick don't you?" His only answer was a smirk, holding out his hand I quickly shed my jewelry and cape and handed them to him.

"Go wild my love." Placing a kiss on his lips I laughed happily before running.

Rips and tears filled the air as I shifted, falling to all fours as I ran faster. Time seemed to slow as the wind slipped through my fur, a feeling of bliss that I haven't felt in a long time.

This sense of relief...not having to fear being seen by humans.

God had I missed this feeling.

----

"I suppose we do not need to fear if we made the right choice or not." Aro hummed as he and Caius joined their brothers side.

"I doubt we do, Look at her..." Caius stated watching their wife in awe.

Marcus hummed in agreement, "She is finally herself again, our beautiful (Y/n)."

#Volturi #volturi x reader #Poly!volturi kings x reader #aro volturi #caius volturi #marcus volturi #volturi imagine #twilight imagine #twilight x reader #twilight saga #shifter!reader

[mybworlds]

Bittersweet

CHAPTER 1

status: ongoing

pairing: joel miller x f!reader

summary: your life is full of 'must'. You live with your overprotective mother who controls every aspect of your life. You have a dream, to write romance novels, but love - real love - you haven't found yet. Your mother has even decided what you must do in your free time: play music. One day, however, when you go to your music teacher's house, you will have an unexpected encounter and from that day on things change…

rating: 18+ explicit (minors, DNI)

Before to start... Hello people, I know there are other two ff that I already started, but I dreamt this new idea for my new ff. So I decided to write it down it. So here we are. If you want to let me know what you think about it I'd be glad to read you.

No offence pls, if you dislike it go away :)

Thanks @vase-of-lilies for the banner

You always dreamed of doing something special, of being the person who would make a difference in the world….

So you hoped.

You hoped to become a great writer of romance novels, and you hoped to instill hope in the hearts of young people not to give up in the face of love and the possible obstacles that may arise.

But not all dreams come true.

In fact, you ended up working in a small bar on the outskirts of your town, surrounded by the many stories of the many diners who populate the place during the daytime or evening hours--depending on the shifts. These stories are the most different, and cannot help but feed your wild imagination.

In the evening, when you are not on shift, you write dozens and dozens of stories on your computer: some are shorts, some are very long and have happy endings, some less. It depends on your mood and how you imagine certain events you've witnessed or heard will end.

"I'm home!"

Your mother has just returned from a nearly seventy-two-hour shift at the hospital, she works in emergency medicine, and - since your father died (or at least she always said) - when she's not at home, you have to do everything, housework and bar work, grocery shopping, paying bills.

"Hi, Mom."

You absentmindedly greet her by putting down your computer glasses and crinkling your eyes in exhaustion.

"Did you buy groceries?"

The usual string of questions starts, to which you always answer with a distracted yes. You are almost 30 years old, but sometimes you feel like you are 40s or even 50s. Sometimes you think you would just like to enjoy youth, to be carefree, light-hearted, you would like to be free even to make mistakes, and instead you feel caged in this life. In a life where the only rule is you must.

"So you're okay with that?" your mother suddenly asks, making you get your feet back on the ground.

"What?" you ask confused.

"You might even listen to me for once!" blurts out Mom.

"I just got distracted for a second!" you exclaim trying to catch up.

Mom snorts, "I asked you if you were free tomorrow for your guitar lesson."

Ah yes, the exhilarating guitar lessons!

Mom, ever since Dad left (but she always said it was as if he was dead), has demanded that you take piano lessons first and guitar lessons later, like your father. You can't understand your mother, sometimes she seems to hate your father, sometimes she doesn't.

About love, you've always wanted it to be forever. Maybe it's just some romantic bullshit you always watched in movies or read in books, but you want to believe that there really exists out there for you, someone who is willing to love you for a lifetime. Too bad you haven't found anyone so far who is willing to love you the same way you love, to want you the way you want!

Going back to your guitar lessons, your teacher is a bit of a peculiar guy, a bit of a loner, a lover of many things and one opposed to the other. He's -- you don't know exactly how to define him. You've never been able to decipher him. He seems gruff, but at the same time he has a good side and probably deep down sweet.

Very deep down.

"Yes, don't worry." Mom, ever since he left, has become overprotective in some ways with you, has demanded to control you even though you are not so young anymore, wants to know what you read, what you see, what you do. It may seem normal, perhaps, for a mom to try to get to know what her child does, but not the way she does. If you are evasive for one reason for another, she becomes a hound, suffocating almost. Once she even demanded to read a chat you created with friends fearing that you might be in touch with a man much older than you, and instead she found herself a chat where you were exchanging sometimes funny and sometimes even private messages with some of your close friends from school, which even embarrassed you, but mom justified herself by saying she was doing it for you. She even banned you from driving for fear that you might have a car accident! You have a driver's license, but your mother won't even let you drive around town. She always has to be the one to drive you. These manias of hers are suffocating!

"Good. Do you have money to pay for it?" she asks you.

"Yes, don't worry," you reply, going to prepare dinner.

"We have to be very punctual or I'll be late for the hospital," she informs you.

"Do you have another night?" you ask her "It will be the fifth time in a month! But didn't there used to be shifts once even in the hospital?" you ask again as you prepare some pasta.

"Yes, but -- you know, there are only a few of us and then there are even more emergencies than usual."

You follow your mother with your eyes as you see her typing on her cell phone. Your mother sometimes looks like the young woman and you look like the mom.

What an unfair life!

The next day your life flows as usual, you get up very early, make coffee bringing it also to your mother, go to shower, get dressed and go to work.

At the café there is the usual hustle and bustle, who wants coffee, who wants a croissant, who wants a slice of pizza, who wants something else. You don't have a moment to yourself. Only when it's almost lunchtime now, you stop and go to the back of the store to eat your sandwich and smoke. Yes, you smoke. The only real transgression in your life. If your mother found out she would probably kill you, but you don't care smoking makes you feel good and maybe it makes you feel good because it's a decision you made, not because it was forced on you.

You rub one temple and look toward the road covered with a hint of snow. You wonder what you would have been doing by now if you had not been there with your mother, if maybe you were busy in college or maybe in pursuing some master's degree, you wonder who you might have been if you had dared to live your life to the fullest.

In the afternoon, your mother - after making sure you are dressed appropriately, that you have sheet music and whatnot - drops you off in front of your teacher's building.

The latter lives on the top of seven floors, it's practically a penthouse, it's beautiful place. Being with him -- a little less so.

When you knock, you are about to greet him, but a completely different man from your teacher appears in front of you. He is tall, much taller than your teacher and you, curly brown hair, dark eyes, a look that is at first grim, then curious, defined jaw line and curved nose. He is perhaps 40 years old.

You stand open-mouthed, thinking you had the wrong house for a moment, then realizing it's the right address.

"I was looking for Mr. Miller," you say.

"In person." he replies.

"Tommy Miller," you say.

"I'm his brother." he says again.

You are about to say something, but he is the one who interrupts you by asking if you are his student and calling your name, you nod in confusion.

"My brother had to leave yesterday morning. He told me you were coming and to wait for you to let you know." he clarifies by placing his hands on his hips.

He is incredibly muscular; you have never seen a man like him. He hits you right away.

"I see. Then -- I'll go." ready to leave.

You make to turn your back to him "Did Mommy tell you not to talk to strangers?" he asks making you turn back to him "I saw you get out of your mother's car." he adds noticing your confused look.

"What did you say?" you ask in annoyance.

You see him smirking and cross his arms "Are you afraid the big bad wolf will eat you?"

You wrinkle your forehead "First, I don't even know who you are." you say moving a couple of steps closer to him "And second…"

"Joel." he introduces himself by extending his hand.

"You're creepy -- Joel," you say looking first at his hand and then at his face.

"You, on the other hand, are shy." he notes looking at you and running his gaze over your figure. No one has ever looked at you like this. Making your skin warmed. "Yes, you are a shy little one." he adds, smiling and making wrinkles appear on the sides of his eyes.

"Your brother is definitely nicer," you say.

Lie. Tommy has always been very much on his own.

He just bends his head to the side, "Funny, people always told me I'm the nice one of the Miller brothers."

Gotcha.

"Well, maybe they never really knew you!"

"And you in less than a minute figured out who am I?" he asks, leaving you speechless.

No, you know very well that you cannot judge anyone in less than a minute. If someone had judged you in less than a minute they probably would have dismissed you as an ordinary young woman, lacking dreams of her own, trivial.

Perhaps the same thing applies to the man in front of you, Joel Miller.

#joel miller #joel miller fanfiction #joel miller x f!reader #joel miller x reader #joel miller x female reader #joel x reader #joel miller x you #joel miller smut #joel tlou #joel miller hbo #tlou fanfiction #tlou fic #the last of us hbo #joel miller self insert #the last of us #joel fic #the last of us fanfiction #joel the last of us #pedro pascal #pedro pascal as joel miller #smut #joel x f!reader #joel x female reader #joel x you #dom!joel #dom!joel miller #joel miller fic #joel miller angst #bittersweet ff

[cyberrose2001]

HELLO, I really like u fanfics and the way you write, seems so canonical xd idk how to explain I like it, SO I DECIDED TO REQUEST THIS IDEA THAT IS NSFW, THE COMEBACK OF TFP OP BREEDINF KINK x reader but...it's Orion, let's say a scenario of the orion pax arc where he find a way to remember the reader when he somehow got into base without choosing that thing of vector sigma yet, he's memories kinda appearing there and so then when he looks looks the reader that shock happens again, suprised by he's desires...or something like that because I think it would be confusing to make a breeding kink with orion.sorry it's just basically just orion with the reader I am so sorrh for the large text that u need to read

TFP Orion Pax x human!fem!reader

I don't think I've ever seen an Orion breeding kink yet so this was really sweet to write!! Thanks for requesting ❤️

This is kind of an AU where the autobots managed to retrieve Orion before the key to vector sigma is used to restore the matrix.

Also essentially part 2 of my other Optimus x Reader breeding fic... read here!

Warnings: Breeding kink, reader is soft-dom, slight angst in beginning.

Word count: 3204

The Autobot base was on edge after the defeat of Unicron. Not only did you have to come to terms with your own planet being a host for a god-like being, but you had to witness Optimus Prime be taken hostage by Megatron. Your screams and begs for him still echoing in your own mind. The feelings of hopelessness and despair as Arcee held you back from running after him weighed heavily on your heart. He had looked at your tear-filled eyes, not even trying to escape. He did not recognise his own lover but instead turned his back to you to follow Megatron. He abandoned you.

Curled up on the couch, you sobbed. The other members of the team tried to comfort you, but you ignored them. That was not the Optimus Prime you fell in love with. That was not the Optimus Prime that would greet you every morning when you wake up with a soft kiss upon your lips. It had only been a day since he was taken, but every hour feels longer without him. So, you bottled yourself up from everyone to cope while the whole team discussed possibilities of what had happened to their leader.

After your sobbing had turned to hiccups, Ratchet decided that this would be the best time to tell you their plan. And to tell you what exactly happened to Optimus. He walks over to the human area and rests a servo on the guard rail, think over what to say. He softly calls out your name.

“(Y/n), I’m not sure if you are listening, but we have reason to believe that Optimus did not recognise you because he has lost his memories,” Ratchet says, waiting for any reaction from you, “due to the sacrifice of the Matrix.”

You say nothing and only listen to his words, thoughts plaguing the back of your mind. You turn your head just slightly to show him that you are interested.

“He has reverted to his pre-prime state, Orion Pax.” Ratchets says. Your ears perk up at his words. Optimus had told you once that before he was a Prime, he was an archivist on Cyberton, working at the Iacon Hall of Records. It shocked you that Optimus Prime was not always a leader or had wanted to lead, but a quiet and nerdy Cybertronian who got mixed up in the mess of their politics.

“But I have hope that even though in his mind he is Orion,” Ratchet voice softens, “He has the spark of Optimus. And we will get him back, I promise.”

You watched with puffy eyes as Ratchet and the rest of the team go through the ground bridge, curling back into yourself to grieve. Ratchet’s words help you, but it did not help the pain that still tugged at your heart.

-

Night-time had fell and you had eventually fallen asleep on the couch, exhausted from crying. The base was empty, and the only sounds were your soft snores. In your sleeping state, you couldn’t hear the ground bridge portal and the clanging of pedes echoing in the base.

“This is… your base of operations?” A young Orion Pax looks around in wonder at his new surroundings, optics wide.

“Our base of operations, Orion.” Ratchet nods and places a servo on his shoulder, “We don’t expect you to remember anything yet, but this is the place on Earth that we call home, for now at least. Take your time to explore.”

Orion nods at the medic, walking around the consoles that control the ground bridge and the large computer, softly grazing a servo across the keyboards. Something that he was familiar with in this confusing time. He moves his optics over to the raised platforms and the small couch that resided there.

Orion turns to look at Ratchet, “The native lifeforms of earth, humans, are occupying this base as well?”

Ratchet glances to the couch then back to Orion, he was not sure if this was the best time to introduce him to you. But he knows that you would want to at least see that ‘Optimus’ is still alive and well, “M’yes, they can be rather… mundane at times. But they have proven themselves to be great allies to us.”

Ratchet watches as Orion moves closer to the human area, glancing around at the strange earthly artifacts and wondering what they might be used for. Orions optics then fall onto a small figure resting on the couch, they look to be in a stasis of some kind. Orion turns to Ratchet, “Who is this?”

“That is (Y/n), she’s asleep at the moment.” Ratchet looks down at the floor before turning around to return to the med bay, deciding that soon enough he will need some privacy with you, “She’s… been through a lot the last few days.”

Orion turns to look back at you, optics softening. He decides to get a closer look and peers over the guard rails to look at your face. He could not deny that you looked rather peaceful, and somehow familiar to him. Orion raises an optic ridge in thought. He had met the other humans and they were great but looking at you made him feel different in a way.

Unexpectedly, a flash of memories run through his processor. They were of you and him, spending time together, kissing, laughing together and… interfacing. A shock of electricity zaps at his spark and Orion had to stabilise himself to prevent him from falling over. His spark is humming and energon flushes to his faceplate, overcome by an urge in his spark that indicates that he needs to breed.

 Interfacing… with this human? I haven’t even met her, why do I have these impure thoughts of marking her? He thinks to himself. His processor is spinning with confusion.

Orion didn’t notice that you were stirring awake while deep in his thoughts. You yawn and stretch out on the couch, opening your eyes to find yourself face-to-face with who you thought was your love. In an instant you jump up and run over to him in excitement and desperation.

“Optimus!” You cry out, tears welling in your eyes, “I thought I’d lost you! Are you ok, baby? Did the cons hurt you? Why did you ignore me?”

Orion is brought back to reality and leans back slightly, unsure of what to say. However, he decides to be reasonable and begin with greeting you, ignoring the erotic memories of you he had moments ago, “Hello, (Y/n), is it? It is a pleasure to meet you.”

You stop in your tracks, your heart drops to your stomach at his words. In just seconds the unimaginable feeling of relief you had erased into shock. You look up into his optics with furrowed eyebrows, “What… what do you mean? It’s me, don’t you recognise your lover?”

It felt like his spark had stopped functioning. These memories were not a figment of his imagination, you really were his conjunx. He looks at the tears running down your face and feels a tug at his spark. He needs to say something.

“I am… unsure.” Orion bites his bottom derma, he lowers a servo to you as an invitation, “Perhaps we can talk about his, human.”

Blinking away your tears, you nod and climb into his servo. You didn’t notice Orions small gasp as he feels how warm you are as you settle. He holds you close to his chassis as he wanders down the large hallway leading to one of the many berthrooms the base has to offer. It gives him time to think about what to say to you. He finds one that is far enough away from the main area and settles down to sit on the floor with you in his grasp, preparing for a conversation that will most certainly change his life.

-

“And ever since then, we’ve been inseparable since.” You finished explaining to Optimus, or Orion now. You told him how you both met, the things you used to talk about and your favourite dates that you liked to go on. Orion had been intensely listening to you the entire time, optics never leaving your frame.

Admittedly, it was strange that the bot you were talking about was him. However, he cannot deny the memory of him on top of you intertwined in a tangle of metal and flesh, gently thrusting into your heat and filling you with his transfluids. His engines were running hot at the thought, but he had to remain composed in front of you. Orion felt so unlike himself and a part of him feels like he is violating you in a way, but he understands that it is not just his own urges to mate with you, but the remnants of the Matrix that was once inside him.

“I understand now, I apologise for making you feel abandoned.” Orion says, hesitating to bring up the memory, “But there is something else that has been on my mind.”

“Yes, Orion?” You looked up at him and tilted your head in curiosity, it felt strange to call him that, “You can tell me anything.”

Orion took a shaky intake, “When I first saw you, I had a memory of us. We were… interfacing. That is something we used to often partake in, is it not?”

Your eyes sprung wide, you had no idea that Orion was having memories of you and him having sex. It did pique your interest though and you had wondered if the reason he was so nervous and felt hot to the touch was because he was having dirty thoughts about you. Your face flushed and suddenly your own memories of Optimus ploughing into you floated into your own mind.

“Y…Yes, very often.” You say, looking away. The weight of the room has just shifted from light-hearted to one that you could cut a knife through. You can hear Orions spark humming, it sounds just as loud as it used to be when Optimus wanted to mate with you. You bite your bottom lip wondering if you should really be taking this step with him, “Orion, do you… want me to show you?”

Another jolt of electricity shoots through his spark and a rush of energon flows straight to his interfacing array at your words. His face is flushed blue, and his optics are wide in disbelief. That fact that a wonderful and beautiful human like you is willing to mate with him is beyond him. He slowly nods.

You give him a genuine smile and beckon him closer with a finger. He lifts you so you are closer to his face plates, he can finally see how flushed your own face is, finding it rather cute. He watches as you lean closer and place a gentle kiss to his dermas. Orion is surprised at first, having never kissed anyone else before but eventually leans into the kiss, his glossa licking at your lower lip.

Unconsciously, you had took the lead in order to guide a flustered Orion. You lead a small trail of kisses across his face and down towards his jaw to his neck cables. You did the things that you knew Optimus liked, kissing, licking, and nipping at the sensitive wiring. You were pleased when you heard small gasps and hitches of his vents letting you know that you were doing the right thing.

Orion tilted his head to the side to allow you more access. His dermas parted ever so slightly as he enjoys the new sensations. It pleasantly surprised him that you knew where his sensitive spots were. He feels you bite at one of the more sensitive cables and lets an embarrassingly loud moan out, making you attack that spot more. Satisfied, you venture further and kiss his chassis and above where his spark is, making him shiver. You look up at his face to gauge how he was feeling, and by the looks of it he was already a mess.

“You ok, Orion?” You gently ask, fingers lightly tracing the grooves and edges of his chassis. You couldn’t help but admire his half-lidded optics and flushed face. He gives you another nod, hardly able to form a sentence. You smile at him once more and give him a wink, “Open your panel, honey.”

Orion shakily lowers you to the ground in-between his thighs and shyly opens his interfacing array to reveal his very erect spike. You admire it for a while, taking in the red and blue detailing along the top. The tip was already leaking in anticipation, and you reach out a hand to drag your fingertips up the length of his spike. You can feel him throbbing at your light touch and his vents shuttering.

If Orion wasn’t worked up before, he sure was now. The feeling of your small fingers delicately grazing over his tip and teasing him was sending his processor for a spin. He watches as you withdraw your hand to strip everything of your body. His optics are positively wide as he gawks at your now completely bare natural beauty, plump breasts and oh so beautiful thighs, just like the memory. It’s taking all Orions strength and dignity to not touch you and kiss every inch of your soft skin.

You decide to give him a little show, dragging a hand down your stomach and to your sensitive mound of flesh between your legs. It’s not something that you would usually do, as it was Optimus’s job to prep you. But you did not want to put pressure on Orion yet, unsure if he knew how to eat you out. So, you do it yourself, gently inserting your fingers inside your already wet pussy. You moan softly as you touch and stretch yourself, feeling Orions gaze as you do so.

Orion is gobsmacked as he watches your fingers disappear inside you, desperately wishing that it were his own digits toying around with you. After a while though, he has had enough and reaches a servo down to pull your hand away, totally soaked in your arousal. His spark is aching with the need to breed you.

“P…Please…” Orion gasps, spike twitching. He gently tugs at your arm to guide you towards his spike, “I need…”

You smile up at him and nod, climbing up to straddle his lap with his spike in-between your thighs, “Any thing for you, my love.”

Optics watch with astonishment as you lifted yourself up to hover over his spike, he knows that you can take it, but witnessing you firsthand sinking down on his spike is astonishing to him. You’ve only sunk halfway, and Orion is already seeing stars. He throws his helm back as your tight walls squeeze down on him. It feels like nothing he has ever felt before, so soft and warm, like a thousand hot tongues caressing every inch of his spike. He gasps as he feels you bottom out, completely engulfed in your pussy.

It had been a while since you last been fucked by him due to the business of the team lately and you moan a sigh of relief, finally able to feel full again. Even though he was not Optimus in his mind, his spike felt the same and you felt the same love radiating off him for you. And you sat still there for a moment, taking in all Orions moans and pleads for him to breed you. You eventually give in and begin to move your hips in a slow pace.

“Primus…” Orion groans as jolts of pleasure shoot up from his spike to his back strut. He shakily places his servos on your thighs, squeezing them and kneading them as you begin to bounce up and down faster. You fill his servos so nicely and he never fully recognised how soft humans were until now. Your breasts also bounced lovely as you pleasure yourself on him, optics focused on the soft mounds of flesh. They were as lovely as the noises you were making. Your soft gasps and moans make his spark hum in delight.

“Orion… fuck…” You whimpered out. Orion began to meet your hips to thrust into you and it made you feel euphoric. The way he hits all your sweet spots inside you without fail as if he already knew how to fuck you is making you scream. You lean down to rest your body on his abdomen, giving him full control to completely ravish your insides with his upward thrusts.

His processor is flooded with thoughts of you filled to the brim with his transfluids and hopefully, if it is even biologically possible, you will birth his sparkling’s. This is what motivates him now, this was his purpose, to bring new life to the universe through you. He grips your hips hard and fucks you deeply with this intention, optics narrowed and focused. He can feel you gripping the seams of his abdomen to stabilise yourself, softly swearing and praising him through your moans.

“M…May I please release in you… please…” Orion stutters out, vocaliser malfunctioning as he begins to feel the charge of his overload brewing. You laugh softly, you found it endearing that even though he is Orion, he never stopped being a gentleman and always asks before he fills you.

“Yes, Orion! Fuck!” You scream as you come hard around his spike, your walls tight around him. Orion lets out a guttural moan at the feeling and continues to fuck you letting you ride out your orgasm. His continuous and desperate thrusts make your eyes roll to the back of your head and makes your thighs quiver. If he doesn’t overload soon, you were positive that you would be severely overstimulated.

Orion gives you a few stunted thrusts and pushes into you completely, he can feel the tip of his spike right on your precious cervix as an overload overcomes him. He whispers sweet nothings to you in Cybertronian in between his heavy venting as he holds your hips in place, pumping his transfluids into you. His spike throbs as he feels you clenching around him, and he whines at the wonderful feeling. His optics gaze over your body, your hair a mess, skin flushed and beaded with sweat. His spark is full of new adoration and love for you, and he gives you a soft smile.

He does not want to pull out of you, he needs to keep his fluids inside you for as long as possible to be sure that is sparkmate is bred, to ensure that none leaks out and is wasted. This is what his spark requires. This is what Orion desires.

You come down from your high and reward him with kisses to his armour plating, smiling at his shivers as you do so, “You did wonderful, Orion.”

Soft optics peer into your own and he rubs his thumbs over your hips in small circles. He could honestly cry at your praises, thankful that he had met you and allowing you to satisfy his needs. With your permission of course, he could breed you for the rest of his life.

#transformers #transformers prime #tfp #tfp orion pax x reader #tfp optimus x reader #tfp optimus x human reader #valveplug

[cupoftaae]

Heyy! Love your work💜 Could you maybe write something fluffy, where tae is y/n’s comfort and she goes to him after a bad day🫶🏻

Hello there! AW, thank you for reading!

Fluffy taehyung is my weakness, I hope you enjoy anon :)

warnings- mentions of weed, swearing. Soft taehyung needs his own warnings tbh. also this takes place as if they were both like, 19-20 ish ....KIND OF FRIENDS TO LOVERS LOWKEY

wanna build a pillow fort? -KTH drabble

you werent sure how you had landed in this position in the first place, but here you were, sitting in the living room while your parents explained to you that...well...the college you had been praying to get into one day had declined you.

"are you sure?" you whispered, watching your dad show you the letter. You sighed, trying to hold back any signs of emotion. You had taken a gap year between graduating high school to now, just to grasp your bearings. You put all your energy into working and getting into school, but the universe had other plans.

"I know you wanted this so badly, y/n, im sorry" your mother sat down next to you. "What am I gonna do? I had no backup plan..." your face falls into your hands. "your so young, you have time. you can also sign up to take classes, you dont need to be a student" your mom adds.

"but I wanna be a student, thats the whole point."

"listen, I know this is stressful, but just go get some rest and maybe we can figure out a new plan tomorrow? ok?" your father stands up, looking at you sadly.

You shrugged, knowing that they were just trying to help, but there was no way out of this, you were fucking upset.

Once you had gotten into your room, slamming your door shut, you collapsed onto your bed and took 5 deep breathes, you didnt want to cry. You were a big girl now and crying over school was dumb. You just wanted to be with someone right now, and your best friend was 3 streets over, making things difficult.

You could invite him over, but your father wasnt too pleased to see him late at night the last time he was here. He had walked in and alerted your dog, making him bark until your parents came downstairs, freaked out. They also just dont like the idea of a boy being in your room, despite the fact you are 19, and have been friends with taehyung since you were little....there were absolutely no feelings like that showing up... at least thats what you chose to believe.

You quickly texted him just to see if he was even up to hang.

You: wyd

Tae: making ramen, wbu?

you smiled and chose to ignore his message, making the quick decision to grab your jacket and sneak out your window. Youve only done this one other time, and it was when you had covid and your friend Vanessa dropped off chipotle outside on your side of the house for you.

You prayed to God that your parents had no installed cameras, because one, you didnt want to get caught, and two, you fell on your ass on the way out. "Jesus christ" you scoff, getting up and making a dash to taehyungs house in the dark.

-

Taehyung was standing in the kitchen and dancing to music with his dog, making his little paws move according to the choreography. "Why are you making food so late?" Taehyungs mother spoke, coming into the room to fill up her tea. "because its friday.." he mumbled, mouth full of noodles.

"Okay" she laughed and shook her head, "just clean up, yeah? oh, an-"

his mother was cut off by the front door being knocked on, "who is here at this hour?" she whispered, walking over to look through the peep hole. She sarcastically looked back at taehyung, "why is y/n on my front step?" she smirked.

"she is??" he walked over to the door.

"you know if you wanted to plan a date, I could have made real food for you guys"

"mom stop" he shyly shushed her before opening the door.

"hello" you mumble, bowing at the presence of his mother.

"Hey, y/n...is everything alright?" he asks, his mother gently pulling you inside. "its almost 11 dear" she spoke.

"Im ok, Im just needing some time out of my house, I hope im not intruding?"

"oh no, no, sweetie youre good" she smiled and closed the door.

Taehyung hugged you and glanced at his mom

"i'll be upstairs if you need anything" she spoke, grabbing her tea and walking upstairs before yelling "Be good, just not too good"

He laughed and pulled away to look at you. "Not that I mind your presence, but...why are you here?"

you giggled as he took your coat and hung it up. "well....I uhm" you looked around before sitting on the edge of the couch. "I didnt get in" you shrugged, forced smile on your face.

"hm? what are you talking about?" he stands in front of you

"I received a letter in the mail today from HUFS, and it was declining my application" you speak softly, watching him frown.

"y/n...Im so sorry"

"its okay, its just a lot, but i'll be fine."

He kneeled in front of you and held your hands, "you know...its okay to be sad, right?" he whispers, "that was your dream school.."

you nodded, wanting to sink into the floor the moment you felt tears prickling your eyes. "I know, but...something new will come. I just really wanted to be like you, in school and working towards my degree already, you know?" you shrug.

he nods, "I know, but.." he squeezed your hands, "life isnt a competition, we all do things when the universe pulls us in that direction. Its ok this didnt work out, maybe it was for the best. I know you, y/n, and whatever you do in life is going to be fucking amazing, no doubt about it. So be sad, mourn what you will miss, but dont let it hold you back."

you nodded as tears escaped your eyes, small cries falling from your lips as he immediately held you up and wrapped you into his arms. "Its okay....I promise" he coo'd, hand brushing your hair as you finally let yourself feel upset.

"thank you" you sniff, wiping your eyes as you hold him.

"cmon, lets go eat junkfood and build a fort" he squeezed your waist, making you blush slightly as you followed him to the kitchen. "a fort?" you asked, eyes still wet.

"mhm, with like the pillows and stuff" he spoke, taking another bite of noodles.

you giggle, "ok"

-

You two sat under a giant pillow fort, with a blanket over the head for the roof. "I have to say, your pillow fort making skills have improved. Remember when we were little and it would always collapse on us?" you snorted, nudging him.

"I have improved and grown in many ways, trust the process of time" he joked, taking a bite of the chip in his hand.

He definitely had grown and improved, taking a moment to look over his face proves the fact that Taehyung had matured quite nicely at that.

"dont stare its rude" he teased, finding something to watch on youtube.

You shake your head, "sorry" you lean over to lay beside him so you can see the screen of his laptop.

"Your parents wont like...kill me...if they find out you spent the night, right?"

you giggle, "am I spending the night?"

"well, you dont have to, I just assumed because its already 1am and its not safe for you to be out and about"

you shook your head, "what? so I dont have what it takes to fight off street hagglers?"

"oh you do, Im keeping you off the street for their safety" he spoke seriously, making you laugh.

"mm, and no, my parents arent gonna do anything, I dont think....maybe.....you know what? I dont know"

"oh that makes me feel good" he fake pouts

"Im teasing, im 19 and they need to get over keeping me locked up all the time..." you play with the fabric of the blanket.

"I think your dad hates me, dude" he sighed, shutting his laptop and leaving you both to lay in the dark as you looked up at the green blanket roof.

"shut up, he does not"

"He told me that he didnt want me showing up there anymore"

"thats because it was 4am and you scared the dog, I told you to come in through the window you fucking dumbass" you joked, "he also caught you with weed, so there you go"

"hm, fair I guess" he sighed

"he doesnt hate you I promise" you turned on your side to face him, not realizing how close your faces were.

He turned his head, noses barley touching as you both looked over each others faces in the dark.

"are you feeling better?" he whispered

"yeah...yeah I am" you mumbled, wanting to pull away but also choosing to stay put.

"good" he smiled and turned his body so it was also laying on his side, facing you.

"Y/n?" he asked

"yeah?"

"is it ok if I kiss you?"

you felt your hear stop in your chest, what did he just ask you?

"w-what?" you look at him, eyes wide

"I asked if I could kiss you?" he repeated, voice so soft and quiet. "its ok to say no" he added.

you took a breath, realizing that in moments like this, you really have to be honest with yourself and stop saying you aren't attracted to him, because here he is, in front of you, asking to kiss after taking his time to make you feel better. You can only hold on to your discipline so much before you fold.

"yeah...yeah you can kiss me, tae" you exhale, shocked the words even came from your mouth.

His large hand came up to hold your face delicately, thumb brushing your skin as you both leaned in slowly until each others lips clashed. The feeling felt a lot more natural than you anticipated, it wasn't weird, or awkward or cringe, it felt....right?

If tae's plan was to make you fully forget about that college letter, than goal achieved.

You knew you both would have to talk about this later, at some other time when your mouths weren't attached to each other, but for now all you wanted to do was be thankful for him.

you gently pulled back and giggled like a little girl, a blush creeping over your face as he pulled you against his chest. There were no words or jokes, you both simply laid together before eventually falling asleep in each others embrace.

Maybe he was right about better things coming, and maybe this was it.

A/N- this was so cute I was kicking my feet and giggling while writing, we all need our own taehyung.

#taehyung smut #taehyung #kim taehyung #taehyung fluff #taehyung fanfic #kim taehyung fanfic #bangtan #bts fluff #bts fanfic #bts #bts x reader #bts smut #tae fic #tae smut #tae fluff #tae drabble #tae x reader #taehyung drabble

[thelonelyme]

♡ʏᴀɴᴅᴇʀᴇ ᴅᴏʀᴍ ʟᴇᴀᴅᴇʀs x ʀᴇᴀᴅᴇʀ [ʜᴇᴀᴅᴄᴀɴᴏɴs]1♡

.

𝐆𝐚𝐦𝐞: ディズニー ツイステッドワンダーランド[Twisted Wonderland]

𝐏𝐞𝐫𝐬𝐨𝐧𝐚𝐠𝐠𝐢𝐨/𝐢: Riddle Rosehearts, Leona Kingscholar, Azul Ashengrotto.

𝐏𝐫𝐨𝐦𝐩𝐭: The yanderes finds out mc is now a fallen angel due to them.

𝐑𝐞𝐪𝐮𝐞𝐬𝐭: Hello honey, this is my first time asking you but please listen to me.. What do you think the reaction of the yandere house leader's reaction to their lover who is an angel has now fallen and become a demon's. especially the reason why they become a fallen angel is because they want to continue to be with the leaders of the dormitory even though their God forbids them, and to the point of plucking out their wings. Pretty pleaseee 🥺🥺

𝐀𝐕𝐕𝐄𝐑𝐓𝐄𝐍𝐙𝐄: GN READER, Since there's more than five characters, I decided to divide the post into two parts, in this there will be only three, while in the other there will be the remaining four leaders. Although there will be yandere behaviors, mention of explicit self harm, misogyny, blasphemy and description of mutilation and implies of non-con.

-𝐑𝐢𝐝𝐝𝐥𝐞 𝐑𝐨𝐬𝐞𝐡𝐞𝐚𝐫𝐭𝐬-

For the young and promising scarlet-haired magician, your arrival could not have been described as less than a coming from hell. Probably your very first encounter would have been through the iconic duo of Ace and Deuce, which, breaking a slightly more relevant rule than the others, would have caused their execution.

Perhaps they had been secretly drinking coffee and Riddle was immediately informed by his beloved deputy dormitory, or perhaps Ace had categorically refused to feed the flamingos wearing a pink onesie after seeing Deuce. After all, they’ve only been in that crazy dorm for a week, and as much as they didn’t want to conflict with the hot-tempered boss, it was like they were attracting trouble. Unfortunately, because of the universal law, what happens to your friends is likely to fall on you, too.

Riddle had already had a bad day trying to straighten out the mistakes of some of his fellow dorm bosses and prevent every member of his perfect dorm from breaking one of his rules. And their stunt was the last straw that broke the pot of rage in the honor student’s head. At that moment he could just scream until his throat hurt, he could just end their idiocy once and for all with a series of spells, but no. The moment his mind recorded that there was another unknown person with them, it was enough to make him back from his rash thoughts. After all, he would never have wanted his reputation to be burned because of a foolish error of self-control.

At first, he wouldn’t even try to figure out who you were. He had enough problems to deal with and certainly a simple person could not have completely blown his priorities. He thought something like trying to socialize with too many people was pointless, especially with people who seemed to be less than promising.

But of course he heard about you. The student without magic who, despite lacking the basic requirements required for frequently attending a school of magic, somehow managed to be part of the regular students. And what left him even more suspicious was your immediate appointment as head dormitory for that dilapidated Onboro dorm. As far as he could possibly have known about you, you might have been a rich man’s kid so you could afford to go to a prestigious school and, what’s more, make yourself chief on the first day. He knew that crow only cared about money and reputation. As far as he knew, he knew nothing.

His annoyance would grow as you found friends in Deuce and Ace. And with your calm, kind presence combined with your sweet behavior, it wasn’t that hard not to have a bunch of guys who are just blessed by you. Your alone presence could calm the entire class, or dormitory in which you were, and any restless person could simply cry more for your words of comfort and so warm. You definitely had something otherworldly, as Ace jokingly described it as you were walking and lazing at the entrance of the gigantic maze of brambles without noticing the angry person watching you from afar.

For him you did not exist. A person so charitable, so benevolent, so... Perfect existed only in fairy tales where everyone lives happily ever after. In a world left in the hands of hatred and envy, such a person could not exist. I’m sure you were using your pretty face to have a bunch of simps hovering around. No one can be good without having anything else. Surely you’re hiding your deepest, most unpronounceable secrets no matter how despicable and disgusting they were. You weren’t possible, the whole world had constants, and being imperfect was normal for everyone.

And you were that variable.

The fact of your very existence was driving him crazy from the inside. There wasn’t a single moment when he couldn’t help but hear your laugh, even when he was alone. He couldn’t help emulating your little mannerisms, any more than he could completely ignore you.

After all, every God wants all of their beloved children to be happy.

As hard as it was to do the opposite, Riddle couldn’t help but want to remain independent of your angelic voice, from your adorable lips that at each movement only invited him to violate them over and over again until they were closed forever. It had to withstand your eyes, which reflected only warmth and comfort.

"It’s a trap Riddle, don’t you see?!"

You weren’t like his mother. Or like everyone in his family. And that made him frown more deeply. You weren’t normal. You didn’t yell at anyone who wronged you or did something wrong, you never punished anyone as they did all the others- no, you just smiled at them and gently, like a godsend, you started listing all the reasons why their actions were wrong. And as if that were not enough, you were able to find solutions to their irremediable and stupid damages! Don’t you understand how surreal it sounds? But it was precisely at those moments, in the moments when the crimson-haired boy did not readily turn to avoid you, that he ardently desired your comfort and warmth. He also wanted to be secretly devoured by the burning flames of your love. And as it was repeated that those two newbies good for nothing could do nothing but damage and that could only bring you to an end to say the least until proven otherwise were his eyes piercing your temple in moments where there was no one to see it.

He felt absolutely pathetic. Like a flower that in vain tries to color itself in a different way than all the others. He did not want to have your pity, from his overblot too many people who did not know anything about him had given him sad eyes and an empty excuse. He knew that no one was truly sorry for him, not even his closest friends, no one else besides himself knew what he had felt, no one cared what had brought him to his ways, no one had ever deigned to even try to understand him.

And then you showed up.

And honestly, he was definitely better off without you.

You were driving him crazy.

You weren’t possible, you weren’t normal.

Every person who ever saw you started calling you "angel". The first to start this ridiculous chain was that hunter in Pomefiore. Every single time he saw you, he would immediately approach your figure to call you with some pretty cheesy French nicknames."Comment allez-vous mon Ange? I only want what’s best for you, my dear." You couldn’t even suspect people like that Frenchman clearly stalking you? How could you trust every person you met so blindly? Even those sea sweepers who were scamming all the weaklings who were desperate enough to go to them? At first he didn’t think you would really get close to them, but surely he was wrong in the exact moment when he saw you on the arm with that freak who is Floyd, laughing as if there were no Riddle to say the least disgusted by your skit. And not only that, as a icing on the cake, even that other twin was now taking an interest in you. How could you possibly miss the people you date? The only logical explanation he could come up with was your innate stupidity. He couldn’t conceive all of this."Hey little Killy¹, how about you come with us later? I’m bored by myself" "Now, now, don’t scare the student this way Floyd. But, if I have to admit it, I’ll be glad you’re here, too, Angelfish." Or the two annoying first years with Ace who now no longer made cheeky jokes about you being an angel, preferring to use that nickname for sentimental moments alone. It made him sick to his stomach about it.. Or how Deuce was much more silent in your presence, always surrounded by fluttering invisible hearts. "A-h, of course, I’ll accompany you! Don’t worry, you’re safe with me!"

He couldn’t help but be captivated by you. But he wouldn’t admit that he was sick and obsessed with your abnormality. Every time he looked at you with a slight increase in his heart, it was just a little anxiety about the test he was supposed to take next. After all he had to prove to all that he was excellent in everything. Every time he had a slight twitch of his fingers when some filthy worm crawled by your side to touch you, it was only because of his severity. He cares about his dorm mates. Every time he blushed at the sight of your slightly more exposed thighs than usual, it was only because of the heat of the room. He was human, wasn’t he? And every time he ordered Trey to drug your lunch? It was to make you normal.

He was beginning to hate others much more than before. Hating others and you. You were definitely lying about who you were, maybe you were a magician so skilled that you could hide all traces of your magic so that you would appear weaker to others? Or perhaps you were one of those creatures created only to bring hatred and despair into the hearts and minds of those who did not want to be near you? Surely you were lying. And the most important rule of all was, "No one is allowed to lie to the Queen. This will be punished with immediate execution in front of all the people of the kingdom."

And finally now it was clear. You were not normal. That's why you were abnormal.

And if the others found out about you, you’d probably be feeling a lot worse than what you’re going through right now. Wouldn’t you want to be chained to a lab bed while they cut and tear apart your beautiful wings? Be thankful he hasn’t touched them yet. Don’t mind the collar around your neck. It’s just to make you stay. Otherwise you’ll fly away. And would you like to leave after leading a young man to his destruction? It is an even worse pain than your cries of pain.

You couldn’t come back now.

Now you can indulge in your escapes. You can do everything you want now. You were dirty. Impure. You could not categorically enter. And now you had fallen into the rabbit hole.

You should have known that if you took a rose, you’d soon be pierced by her thorns.

-𝐋𝐞𝐨𝐧𝐚 𝐊𝐢𝐧𝐠𝐬𝐜𝐡𝐨𝐥𝐚𝐫-

Now, Leona- in very simple and basic terms- he wouldn’t give a shit about you. You should not blame anyone, the lion man is one of the most difficult people to attract because of his somewhat intimidating and egocentric personality.

The lion man usually spent his days doing much more important things than what a small and incapable herbivore would do. Leona would be forced to approach you and your group before there could be a struggle that could potentially end in some unwanted death. Honestly, the only thing he thought about his dorm mates was that those empty heads were just muscles and no brains, he found ridiculous the way they had always tried to attack someone who clearly was not a problem. He just didn’t think it was even important to think about you. After all, what could a weak herbivore do to a lion like him? Nothing, simple.

The only thing he could think about the first time he saw you was how weak you might seem. Compared to those loud idiots and that parrot with a cell phone, you didn’t seem to be able to defend yourself against anyone. His posture would reassemble so that he could look even bigger and more massive than before and he could almost feel a small shiver slip down his spine at the sight of your faltering expression. Surely you had never met such an intimidating being like him, you had never seen a strong and cunning man like him, in fact, you looked like someone who had never seen something slightly uglier than usual "they lived happily ever after".

He was ready to show you otherwise.

Your first encounter would have left him with a bitter taste, but nothing to worry about for a guy like him. At least he hoped you’d have the good sense to never return to his territory. I mean, who the hell would want to get into trouble with Leona Kingscholar, second prince of Afterglow Savannah and dorm chief of Savanaclaw? Exactly.

He didn’t really think you’d come back, this time even alone- he doesn't even care to mention that weird pet cat-, there. Most likely you had some kind of death wish, otherwise it doesn’t explain. He would just be more annoyed when he heard your voice talking calmly to that puppy Jack; and unfortunately the ledge on which he had decided to keep his well-deserved rest was close enough for your voice to reach his ears, causing them to contract several times, occasionally grunting and growling trying to make you understand to lower your tone. As you kept talking, all he could think about was how you two could be so annoying, and at the end of your little chat, He could not help but swirl his eyes to the heavens, thinking that your little conversation was closed, and whisper faintly before finally finding rest.

If you had stopped there, you would have spared yourself everything, but as a loyal subject, you are tested to redeem your destiny.

Tell him that he is your king, the one and only. Just tell him that he was the one who was essential to your existence.

Live for him, and only him.

Every single day you’d come back to his dorm room just to ask the freshman and the hyena if they were okay and if something happened to them. You must have been investigating the mysterious incidents, which clearly pissed him off.

He would have finally shown that giant lizard his place and his true king, and this victory would have been denied to him only for some stupid herbivores?

He wouldn't lose this time.

He would instruct those dorks in the dorm not to interact with anyone outside of their dormitory, but at the same time he would simply release Ruggie to injure the others of Diasomnia and company. It was the perfect plan because, as unlikely as it might seem, he could always pass for the kind and caring dorm-leader who cared about the health of his comrades and who for them well became a little more reserved, and then no one would ever leak anything. In the light of these reliefs, he spent his days resting under tall trees, allowing the lazy but intriguing lion to bask in the rays of the hot sun. The moment he heard your voice, he couldn’t believe your tenacity to want to bother him. Your sincere spheres shone with kindness as you knelt before him with a concerned expression on your face. " Are you feeling weak? I can call someone to take you to the infirmary if you feel sick."

Up to that point he was also willing to forget your presence and erase you from his life, but it seemed like you wanted to be a part of it by force.

And because he respected humans so much that he considered them his equals, he didn’t mind returning the favor.

You were a human no doubt, but one that smelled absolutely delicious, causing his tail to rustle and his ears to twitch. Your final meeting would have definitely been enough to trigger that instinct in Leona.

He loved the fact that you were so weak and small compared to his powerful figure, it gave him a sick confirmation that he was once again superior in something. He loved the way in a few minutes he could easily overpower you and finally make vanish once and for all that annoying gleam of hope in his eyes, he hated how you could be so hopeful in people, always stating that in every being there was always a part of justice, and defending even the indefensible after having created only damage. You reminded him too much of his happy, carefree, annoying nephew, and he didn’t like it.

And he wondered if you would forgive him after what he did to you.

He wondered what your limitations were.

Everyone has a certain threshold beyond which you no longer act rationally, and he wanted to be the cause of your breakup. He wanted to see how fast he could get you on the hook. To pretend not to hear you and not to react at all in your presence and to see you go mad with concern for him was divine.

Yeah, just focus on him.

It just seemed to him that little game of cat and mouse before the finally get to the main course. And this almost made him purr, he loved these foreplay, they made his catch even more delicious and tasty than it normally was.

He wanted to hear your sweet, warm voice tell him that he was the only living being who could hear your praise and your acts of docile submission, he wanted to possess you in every possible way, he wanted to have control over your soul, body and mind. He wanted you to never walk or fly again. He wanted to be your first and only person to go to to solve your relatively small problems. But apparently he needed his help to figure out your real place.

You reminded him of a tiny little crane, so beautiful but at the same time so easy to devour, so delicate but at the same time so damn stubborn. That was one of the traits he hated deeply about you. No matter how much he brutalized you over and over again a day, sharing his pleasure with all those beasts in his dorm room, all you did was forgive him and talk to him gently.

"I know you’re not really like that, Leona, I forgive you."

But you did not know that there was no point of return for your beast. By now he had been completely overwhelmed by his obsession with you. If he "wasn’t really like that," then guess what you should have seen was that he was, in fact, an even more cruel and charming demon than the one you learned to stand up to.

So he had kindly decided to prevent a possible escape in an even more effective way than those he had already adopted. He wanted to rant about your bloody body even more.

Yes, tell him how you hated him, tell him you missed your beautiful wings.

Tell him how much you hate him with every drop of your blood.

In the end, even angels can hate. Finally he managed to break you. But now you don't need to use your little mouth to scream, it's better if you kneel and start worshipping your new god.

Now drown in that sweet poison that you have for him.

-𝐀𝐳𝐮𝐥 𝐀𝐬𝐡𝐞𝐧𝐠𝐫𝐨𝐭𝐭𝐨-

The clever, cunning and extremely charismatic silver-haired magician had never done anything else in his brilliant career as a model student and young entrepreneur besides helping all those poor souls who desperately needed help.

In the eyes of many, he was nothing but perfect: magnificent exterior appearance, impeccable marks and a charming language ability, not to mention the fact of having two large and threatening eels that always followed him, making it clear that any kind of problems that would result in a physical situation, it would not be him to have to worry about his health.

Helping people was what he did, every day, despite many in the school had been warned not to trust the young but already so analytical magician, who, as was expected from every excellent service, was always ready with a golden contract in his pockets. And when he felt for the first time that a new student without magic had started attending a school full of uncultivated barbarians, he couldn’t help but start taking an extra look at you.

But not him, for goodness sake! He was a very busy man, he had many clients a day to help with his abilities. Therefore he would have entrusted the task to his two business partners, knowing certainly that they would not disappoint him at all.

Which he was absolutely right about.

During the short period of time required to have all the information necessary and important to carry out his work, he would try to create a certain type of debt towards him. Maybe you lost the only pen you had? What a delightful coincidence! Just then he had one more, but everything came at a cost. And of course he had intentionally hidden that last part, answering your generous thanks with as many sweet words and saying that there was no problem, and that, on the contrary, you could have kept the pen with you for as long as you wanted.

Such a generous offer, isn’t it?

Obviously all those fairly repetitive coincidences would not have been done for nothing, no- he wanted first to lull you with sweet gestures and seemingly small and harmless favors in his room before drafting a contract with you. Simple and clean.

"So, dear, I’m sure you’re wondering why I asked you to meet me in the VIP room, and the answer will be immediately provided. Since I’ve noticed an obvious problem with subjects that require magical abilities, I wanted to give you a chance to decide if I could help you with your problems. Of course, you would get, not only that, many other advantages, like the protection of Jade and Floyd, the two people standing next to us, and a possible job in my restaurant, since I know that affording food in these conditions of yours can’t be that easy. Surely a student without magic like you would benefit enormously from a contract with me. All you have to do is just sign here your name and allow me to take care of your problems while you’re here at the NRC, and in return all I ask is that you get to know yourself better."

The only thing he didn’t expect was your imminent rejection, his gloved hand that was still in the air, while his large grin that characterized him and his bright eyes were sharpened for a second, before returning to their original position. Of course, to others Azul seemed perfect, but in the end, perfection is not something that the human being or tritons or faes can simply achieve. It can never be so. Perfection concerns only every Gods and theirs nearest creations. You could see through all his flattery, and in the end you managed not to get dragged into something you didn't want to do.

"I’m sorry, Azul-san, but I don’t think I want to make a contract right now. While my situation may not be the best, I think I can manage on my own. If you don’t mind now, I’ll leave so I don’t bother you again, goodbye."

Azul, with a movement of his hand, had to stop the swinging figure of Floyd before he could even utter a single word, deciding that with brute force he would not go anywhere with you. He did not want to tarnish those two impeccable years for ordering to mistreat an innocent young student, while it was different for those who had not respected his terms of contract.

Strangely, he had not considered your perspicacity and your possible instinct, which had left him at times puzzled and at times angry with you, for having ridiculed him resoundingly rejecting an opportunity that only on very few occasions are proposed, and with him, for not calculating that part of you, causing a flaw in his otherwise perfect plan. He couldn’t find a single moment when he was distracted from his original task, but maybe it was just your calm, sweet, and so charming, but at the same time so intriguing personality that accidentally led him to think that I was completely innocent, while instead you had an intellect like his.

He needed to find out more about this new side of you.

Until that time he had been accustomed to your usual I seemingly blessed by the seven. He swears that for a moment he also had the courage to imagine your figure in the other school by principles, and for some reason that thought made him feel weak at the knees, causing him to stagger for a moment. He hated feeling weak for you, he hated how he wanted with all his heart to hear all those praises, unfortunately addressed to that freshman Deuce for passing a test by Professor. Trein, addressed to him.

He was selfish, but all those years he was forced to hide and hide his talents, why shouldn’t he be now?

After all, he deserved to be after helping so many troubled souls.

He also deserved to be blessed by your coming, he wanted to be blessed by your presence.

Finally he had found someone like him, someone who was not as severe as Riddle but also not as obsessed with beauty as Vil, perspicacious as Leona and so trusting and kind but not as exacerbating as Kalim. In a way, you were the perfect definition of soul mate for the promising young man. In light of these rather strange thoughts, Azul could not help but continue and continue to deny all the obvious evidence of his infatuation. Something was wrong with him, he felt it. He felt that there was something in you that simply could not be compatible with him. Maybe the fact that you were a human being and he was a sea's creature? He didn’t believe that, he would just create a potion that could turn you into a mermaid forever, and he would stop even dwelling on it. He could not understand why he continued to have paranoia, which was disturbing him from the success of his contracts, and which was consuming him from within.

The days that passed turned into months, months in which Azul had radically changed his attitude towards you: he kept trying to remain indifferent to your actions, but every time he saw your kind smiles and when he saw the way your hand moved when I comforted your friends by hugging them, he felt warm and fuzzy inside as he admired you, unable to tear his gaze away from your praiseworthy figure. Unfortunately his loyal business partners were there and they knew him so well to notice the change inside him.

They always noticed everything.

And instead of stopping their dear friend’s collection of personal items, they only encouraged him, laughing and commenting crudely on how exhilarating it was to see the usual charismatic and bewitching dormitory head Octavinelle pining completely for the little prefect that he could never have for himself.

After all, doves do not breathe underwater.

Azul’s patience would be thinning more and more, leading him to several hysterics and moments of deep depression, all so that you were not with him.

What would he have to do to be even in your sight?

He would have done anything, cut all eight of those embarrassing tentacles and offered them to you in exchange for just a little peek. He didn’t understand why he wanted to be with you so badly in the first place, but maybe that wasn’t even the biggest problem at the time.

Maybe it was time to cage the wings of his adorable angelfish.

He was literally shocked and he was about to scowl at the bigger twin before he looked at the title of the big, heavy book that had slammed in front of him.

"That’s why you were so.. magnetic.."

"You're a creature born to love."

"Maybe you came down for him?"

"Maybe someone sent a wonderful being like you to love him?"

"You should have been! That’s why he couldn’t hate you!"

"But now, my loved angelfish, there’s no need to get so upset, we still have to draw up a contract dear~"

¹= KilliFish, according to Wikipedia, a killifish is any of various oviparous (egg-laying) cyprinodontiform fish. All together, there are 1,270 species of killifish. Many of the species rely on such a diapause, since the eggs would not survive more than a few weeks if entirely submerged in water. Most killies are small fish, from 2.5 to 5 centimetres, with the largest species growing to just under 15 centimetres. The word killifish is of uncertain origin, but is likely to have come from the Dutch kil for a kill.

Part one

Part two

#male yandere #anime #fanfic #my fic #x reader #yandere #yande.re #yandere x reader #twised wonderland #yandere malleus draconia #yandere twisted wonderland #yandere malleus x reader #yandere love #yandere riddle x reader #yandere riddle rosehearts #yandere leona x reader #yandere leona kingscholar #yandere azul x reader #yandere azul ashengrotto #yandere kalim al asim #yandere kalim x reader #yandere vil schoenheit #yandere vil x reader #yandere idia shroud #yandere idia x reader #yandere malleus draconia x reader #yandere twst #yandere dorm leaders

[short-skirt-longjackett]

Renewal Isn't A Lie Anymore pt. 9

(i'm back from the dead- and I think it's appreciated and appropriate if I started off with my most popular series lol)

-Edward Nashton x gn! reader

-warnings: canonical violence, some talk of nsfw, something a little hurtful ;)

While Bruce ran around Gotham looking for clues that would bring him closer to The Riddler, he was also looking for you. He knew he fucked up with you, but maybe he can salvage this relationship...Or would you just end up as brainwashed as The Riddler?

While Batman chased his own tail, Edward kept with carrying his plan. Though you two were now unlikely lovers and not exactly in a relationship, he didn't share any of his plans with you. He didn't want you involved. But you very much were since you were now his fuck buddy.

You laid in an empty bed. You just woke up from an exciting night with The Riddler. You sat up and looked out the window, viewing the gloomy and depressing city below. You looked around the messy room, clearly Edward left for work.

Getting up out of his bed, you shuffle around the cold apartment. Making your way to the kitchen, you noticed a small note.

'Gone to work, have a good day love'

You smiled, placing the sticky note on his fridge. From the top of your brain, you had nothing to do today expect go to pay your respects to now deceased Don Mitchell Jr. Though you never liked him, you felt for his family. He left behind a wife and a son, you only could imagine how hard it is for them. You obviously know Edward caused this...Though you liked Edward...You could only imagine what he could do to you if you ever went back to Bruce...or even talked back to him once. Edward was more than capable to kill you and make an example out of you, and you knew he would if he didn't like what you were doing or saying.

As you dressed, you think about the previous night. How he touched you, how he fucked you...You blush as you dressed in your all-black attire. You check yourself in the bathroom before you exit his apartment and make your way to the church.

When you got the church, immediately the press took photos of you. How you showed up with Bruce, how you kept your head down as you walked pass...You knew they would make this funeral an article on how you're no longer going out or being seen with Bruce. As you walked through the door, all eyes were on you. But you only kept your eyes forward, seeing the large flower arrangements on both sides of the casket.

As you made your way, you saw Bruce being spoke to by the new Mayor, who won by default. Though he stayed silent, you could tell by his body language he did not want to be there or spoken to.

'He looks skinner...He isn't eating' you thought. He turned and noticed you, freezing at your presence. You also didn't know how to feel seeing him. He awkwardly pushes through people to get to you, making your mouth go dry with anxiousness.

"Hi..."

"Hello Bruce.."

Was that all you could muster up? After all this time that's all you could say? You nervously look up him. He looked depressed, he always looked that way but this time it was different. "Y/n...Could we talk after this...? I don't want you to run off..." he said quietly, just above a whisper.

"Fine, we can..." you said, struggling to make eye contact. "I got a video of you last night...A certain video of you with..." God he couldn't even finish that sentence. Your eyes grew in shock. Oh god, he sent that to him? Maybe because you were in a horny daze you couldn't process anything he was saying, you didn't know that he was going to send it to him.

"I don't know...how he got with you or got to you...But I need to make sure you're okay," he said, soon looking up to make eye contact with a young boy that was the mayor's son. As you spoke, he then turned to look up at the floor above him. Though he wanted to listen to you, something felt off. He saw a silhouette of a man..but who?

You notice him not paying attention, "Bruce, did you just hear anything I said,,?" you said quietly, but clearly annoyed. You noticed where his eyes were, so you follow...But see nothing. "Bruce, what's wrong?" You whispered again.

As the gospel music played, a crash was soon heard. A car managed to crash into the building. Everyone screamed and moved out the way. As you saw Bruce run to protect the child. You felt a presence snatch you from the back, place something large, cold, heavy, and metal around your neck. What the hell? As you tried to look down, your hands roaming what was just put on you, your eyes widen. There was a bomb now attached to you by the said metal device. Start to freak out, people that were around you now ran away from you as quickly as they can. As you scramble to look who was the culprit and who could help, your mind only went to one person...Edward. Only someone of his genius could make something like this.

You started to tear up, trying to get the device off of you. "Is this a fucking saw trap?!" You yelled, tears now flowing from your face. Was this how you were going to die? Was this your resting place?

Was everything with Edward a ploy for this exact moment?

As you cried, Bruce looked over at your now crying figure. He internally freaked out as he saw you crying. As everyone ran out, some staying to see what was in the car. A man soon stepped out with the same device around his neck, only he looked more beat up. he had a card stepped to his chest and a phone taped to his hand, an unknown number calling the phone. The man looked just as panicked as you did. Soon police escorted everyone out, leaving you and this man alone with a casket in an empty church.

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

You and the man sat there in silence for what seemed to be hours. You tried to hold back your tears, you felt so many emotions that you couldn't even let out. The police sent in a small device to keep an eye on both of you as police stood at the entrance, guns and shield held up.

The man who sat across from you stay silent, tape over his mouth that simply read "No more lies". To the police chiefs and investigators, they were confused on why you were brought into the situations. You never took up bribes, you never lied on your promises. Hell, you made everything better. Was he just using you as an example on no matter good or bad, the rich must be taken out? Or were you hiding something? Soon, the phone rang again...and again.

Out of the shadows, Batman came out and approached you both. You both felt relief, more of him than you. Bruce looked down at you, looking at your face stained with tears. Even with your tears, you still look at beautiful as the day he met you. Bruce wanted to caress your face, tell you it would be okay and bring you home. But he knew he couldn't.

He took the tape off the mans face, soon answering the phone. You heard the Riddler talking to Batman, heard him talking about chances and how he was never given one. But now Batman has a chance to make everything right. As he spoke to your husband, he then spoke to Colson about riddles and how they were his retreat.

"Now...place the phone to my sweet angel...Y/n.." he demanded, the man showing the screen to reveal your disheveled look. You could barely look up at the screen to face him...

He betrayed you, used you as a pawn to make a statement...

"My darling, loving, caring angel...You are always so kind. You never lie...yet here you are in this predicament. Now, my sweet...I want you to answer three riddles. Three riddles and I'll set you free. You have two minutes...Are you ready?" he asked, trying to come off as a sweet and caring guy.

You simply nodded, taking in a sharp breath as you hear the beeping of the bomb go off. You had to make this count, even though you knew Edward loved you...he wouldn't hold back.

"What can you break of mine even if you never pick it up or touch it?"

"Your heart..."

"Good job! Now...What can fill a room...but takes up no space?" he asked, almost seeming he was giving you easy ones on purposes. You knew deep down he didn't want you to die.

"..Love.." you answered, seeming more agitated at the fact of why you are here. He wanted to use you to make a statement. As you answered, Bruce felt his jaw clench. He knew the Riddler fucked you, even had feelings for you. But at this point he was openly flirting and professing his love to you right Infront of him. Bruce knows he messed up with you. But maybe this could bring you together once he saves you both.

"You're so good at this Y/n! And they say public schools doesn't teach people anything..." he joked, but you weren't having it. You were beyond pissed.

"Now, 1 minute and 1 more riddle...I can be offered. A very important part of a relationship, I survive when it is true. What am I?" he asked, this one crawling underneath your skin.

"Loyalty.." you said, clearly pissed off. You were loyal to Bruce, then he slept with his crime partner, Selina, behind your back...Then you gave it to Edward, who was now sitting here, asking you riddles while your life depends on it.

You knew nothing of true loyalty.

As he congratulated you, the contraption fell off. It was freeing. You shot up, your hands feeling your neck area. It was so light now...As you felt tears of happiness and fear come up, your instincts lead you to hug Bruce. As you cried, spewing nonsense of 'thank god' and 'holy shit', you held tightly onto Batman.

Bruce instantly held you back, rubbing your back as you cried into his chest. He didn't want to let you go, and you clearly weren't going to let go anytime soon. He viewed you neck, it was read and bloody from the metal rubbing against your neck all he could give you right now was a small "it's okay".

You heard Bruce help the man answer his tougher riddles. You saw as he tried denying taking brides. Bruce set you aside as he stepped closer to him. Your breath was short as you listened to the bomb tick more and more. Before you knew it, Bruce used his body as a human shield to block you from the explosion. Bruce took the brunt of the explosion for you, protecting your body. Was this way to say sorry?

As you groaned in pain, Bruce whispering in your ear

"It's okay baby, I'm here..."

"You're safe, I'll bring you home.."

All you could do was just listen, you felt so weak. Your eyes closed as police ran in, only hearing yelling for a few faint seconds but nothing.

#danonation #paul dano #edward nashton x gn reader #edward nashton x gn!reader #edward nashton x reader #edward nashton #the riddler x reader #the riddler #batman 2022

[captain-aralias]

9 books that are my favourites

tagged by @arenee1999 a few days ago, thank you <3 as i was writing this list in my head last night, i thought - this could be read as a list of my favourite fandoms and television/film adaptations, but hey ho. i did a degree in english lit or something.

harry potter and the prisoner of azkaban by JKR - no book has been so important to my life and i also just think it's a really fun mystery and i still like it, so - it's here, it's staying.

carry on by rainbow rowell - but of course. this one was quite important too.

pride and prejudice by jane austen - i don't think this has ever made a fav book list before, i think because i thought it was too basic, but damnit - this book is great, it influences the way i write enemies to lovers, i love the 1995 adaptation and all of austen's novels are bangers except mansfield park, which i keep trying to like but it sucks.

the once and future king by TH white - all my life i loved the movie 'camelot' and it's depiction of arthur. i only learned as an adult that it was TH white's gentle, earnest, thwarted arthur that they'd used <3 he's perfect. 'ill-made knight' is the best of the series, IMO

lieutenant hornblower by cs forester - i haven't read the books in ages, so maybe it's time for a re-read. the ioan grufford adaptation is great, i wish they'd do the later/earlier books too! BUT this early (in hornblower's life) book is my fav - the only one told from bush's POV as he struggles with how he loves hornblower but worries the guy wants to do a mutiny (which he totally does)

the folk of the air by holly black - a new entrant even though i've loved it for years, but i've decided i don't just think it's really good, it's so good that it's one of my favs. maybe the best of the trilogy is the middle book, 'wicked king' where jude is in power with limited support and they fall in love (or do they???). how the king of elfham learned to hate stories is also brilliant.

'the emperor mage' by tamora pierce. i've been waiting my whole life for the numair book and it was terrible, but her first three trilogies are my absolute crack, and this is the best book of those series IMO. the bit where numair tries to hit the emperor for implying he loves his student daine (which he does) while she's listening but disguised as a bird - and then he fakes his own death, and daine goes crazy... that bit has stayed with me for decades, i love it so much.

'night watch' by terry pratchett. i still feel late to properly loving pterry, but i've always liked this one and now i love it - vimes is my guy, i love the time travel, that he trains himself, that he resists both passively and when required actively. v good. my next fav is probably ... 'monstrous regiment', which i think is a bit more of a weird choice (unlike this one which is mega popular and also about all the things i like), but it just does everything right! oh, 'and 'going postal'.

'the princess bride' by s morgenstern william goldman. i haven't read this for ages either so maybe it shouldn't make the list, but i expect it's still pretty great. a mindfuck for a young child who has only seen the film and thinks all of the frame narrative must therefore be real... also, the film is like one of the best films ever and i have seen that super recently. if you haven't seen the home movie, do yourself a favour and watch it because it's a great way to enjoy the movie a-new.

no idea where this meme has been already. so just saying hello to some folks and if you'd like to do this meme and haven't done it already, please do! @giishu @orange-peony @you-remind-me-of-the-babe @carryonvisinata @alleycat0306 @fight-surrender @cows4247 @messofthejess @mysterioussheep

#my content

[twoidiotwriters1]

Congrats on the 800! I would like to request Taylor Swift's "Lover" (the song, not the album obsvly) with Remus Lupin, pretty please? They're in their twenties and he and the reader are finally able to build a life together🥺🥺

This month is so sad for us HP old fans specially when we think about Lupin so I thought I’d give us some fluff to get by -Danny

All’s well that ends well —(Remus LupinxGN!reader)

Listen to ‘Lover’ -by Taylor Swift

“I’m home!”

“I’m in the bathtub!”

Remus makes his way through the hall and stops at the door, he knocks softly before hearing you gently say “come in”, and his head peers through with a smile.

“Hi, pretty.”

“Hello,” you sigh, leaning your head against the edge of the tub.

“’Tis a odd time to get a bath,” he teases you, looking down at his wrist. “It’s the middle of the afternoon.”

You shrug. “I was bored and had time to spare. Wanna join?”

He shook his head but approached nonetheless. Remus crouched next to you and kissed your forehead. 

“You want something?”

“Like what?”

“Anything,” he said with a loving gaze. “A glass of wine, chocolate, book?”

You look at him with amusement. “Did you do something?”

He laughs. “No, I’m just in the mood to spoil you.”

You reach for his hand and kiss the back of it, then his knuckles, one by one.

“I’m almost done here, how about a movie?”

“You wanna go out?”

“No, let’s watch it here,” you retorted. “Turn on the tv, make some popcorn— i bet there must be some spooky marathon going on, it’s October...”

“Go it,” he squeezed your hand in his and leaned closer, giving you a short peck. 

You walk into the living room wearing one of Remus’ old flannel shirts and your underwear, it’s starting to get cold, but considering you’re about to spend the rest of the day cuddling with your boyfriend you don’t worry much about the lack of clothing in your body.

When Remus sees you he stops to look at you, again that softness in his eyes. He opens his arms without saying a word and you quickly make your way toward the young man.

“How was your morning?” He asks against your cheek.

“Okay, though I missed you when I woke up,” you reply.

“I got up early and got hungry, then I realized we didn’t have any milk and went to get some— and then I just lost track of time looking at the Halloween decorations across town, we have some creative neighbors, darling.”

You laugh. “You saw that one with the witch’s legs sticking out of a tombstone?”

Remus laughs as well. “One of my favorites, the amount of inaccuracies intrigues me.”

“Hey, wait a second,” you move away from his frowning. “Did you just say you’ve been out the whole morning and half of the day?”

“Yeah?”

“Did you eat anything at all?”

Remus grimaced. “I got so distracted the hunger kind of just... went away.”

“Moony,” you scowl. “You promised you’d stop doing that!”

“Sorry, sorry— but I’m eating now.”

“Popcorn and soda are not a proper meal.”

“Fine, I’ll cook something,” he shakes his head, still smiling. “You had breakfast?”

“Obviously.”

“What about lunch?”

“Well, no. I was in the bathtub, but I’m not hungry, I had a good breakfast. Come, sit at the counter and keep me company while I make you something.”

“You don’t have to...”

“I want to,” you cup his face. “Let me, please.”

Remus sighs. “Okay...”

Once you make sure Remus has had enough to eat, you go to the living and turn on the tv, one of your favorite movies shows up and you squirm with excitement.

“See? I told you! Oh man, that one’s such a classic...”

Remus sits next to you and puts an arm around your shoulders, he pulls a blanket over the two of you with his free hand. 

“Hey.” The young man nudged your shoulder.

You look up at him with a curious gaze. “What?”

“Are you happy?”

The question catches you off guard, you’d think the answer is pretty obvious.

“I’m spending the weekend at home, with my boyfriend keeping me warm and watching my favorite movie— why wouldn’t I be happy?”

He shakes his head a little, eyes gleaming adoringly. “Sometimes it scares me... that I’m dreaming this or something— that maybe I’m at my parents’ house, in the basement going through one of my transformations... and this is just something I imagine to stay alive.”

You wrap your arms around him and kiss his neck, all the way up to his cheek, and then give him a soft peck on the lips. 

“I’m here, Moony.”

He cups your face again, leaning his forehead against yours. “I love you so much...”

“I love you too,” you reply, kissing him again.

He suddenly laughs against your lips, it’s short and it takes you by surprise, he moves away covering his mouth in embarrassment.

“Sorry— I just realized how cheesy I am—”

“A little, but I like it,” you confess with a grin.

“I never thought I’d be the kind to blurt out love speeches at random,” he snorts. “If Padfoot could see me now, after all those years looking down on them because I felt so mature...”

“Hey, being affectionate has nothing to do with how mature you are, and it’s nothing to be ashamed of,” you frown. “Padfoot squirms out of my hugs and he’s a manchild, is he not?”

“A little,” he admits with amusement.

“There you have it, then,” you conclude with a pleased expression. “So be as cheesy as you want, in here no one can judge you but me— and I’ll never do that. This is a safe space for lovebirds.”

Remus wraps his arms around you and squeezes you playfully, kissing all over your face.

“You’re choking me!” You chortle.

“Can’t help it, you’re too lovely—”

“I take it back, this is not a safe space for lovebirds— you’re about to smother me to death!”

“What a good way to go, don’t you think?” He teases you.

Your only reply is laughter, Remus pulls you closer and continues though at least now he’s being more gentle about it. Without really saying it out loud, you conclude that your boyfriend is quite right, this is a great way to go.

Taglist.

@siriuslysirius1107 @aleksosoto @aconfusedslytherin @valnunu @talksoprettyjjx @23victoria @moonhoonie @raajali @espressopatronum454 @tokkishouse @j-cat @greengarsstuff @i-am-scared-and-useless-bisexual​

#twoidiots writing #Remus Lupin #remus lupin x reader #hp fanfic #Harry Potter #harry potter fanfiction

[vera-deville]

I read this requested fanfic; Malleus and Azul receiving roses from the reader, and was wondering if you can play Leona? (English is not my first language, (it's awful I know) and it's still the first time I've placed an order :^)

Hello! Thank you for requesting! From what I understood, you requested Leona receiving roses from the reader, right? I sincerely apologize if that is not what you meant, and you are more than welcome to request once more if this fic is not what you had in mind!

07/26/2022

Pairing: Leona Kingscholar x Reader

Word Count: 329

Warnings: None that I can think of!

Gender: Gender neutral as it was not specified in the request.

Notes: So, my previous request of Malleus and Azul receiving roses from the Reader got 90+ notes in less than a day and I feel so cool? Like I am so happy that people liked that fic! Anywho, I'm excited to try this idea for Leona (because I do love him so). Also, listening to "Pacify Her" by Melanie Martinez; just putting that out there-

In which Leona Kingscholar receives roses from Y/N.

This was certainly worth waking up for~

The Prefect of Ramshackle timidly stood in front of him, arms outstretched, offering him a rose. A rose of a deep afternoon gold hue. Leona supposed it to be fitting for him.

The way Y/N clenched the rose with their hands was rather adorable. Were they that nervous to present to him a mere rose?

With the smirk that always seemed to be there when Ramshackle's Prefect was around, Leona teased, "Oh? Have you fallen for me Herbivore? It wouldn't be surprising, seeing as it is me in question after all. I wonder what reaction would emerge from you if I were to..."

Y/N felt a warm pair of arms drag them down and suffocate them in the most satisfying of manners. They were sure that Leona could see them as flustered as they were and tried to hide in his chest. But perhaps they had underestimated Leona's strength.

His arms only tightened around them, something akin to a boa strangling it's prey. The only difference was that when a boa strangled it's prey, it wouldn't seem so comforting to the prey.

"My, you seem rather skittish Herbivore. Do my actions fluster you that much?" Leona asked after chuckling to himself.

"It's only because you're too comforting for your own good Leona," replied Y/N.

Most wouldn't be able to tell how Leona felt upon hearing those words, but those who knew him well enough would be able to tell how flustered Leona was, what with his tail not so subtly swishing around.

No words needed to be spoken. It was a moment of silence. The kind that makes you feel fuzzy inside, lightheaded while your thoughts run around at an insane speed. And all because the one you love is in your arms, safe and secure.

Somewhere off to the side of the young lovers, a dusk-colored rose lay forgotten, seemingly stained with the colors of an evening sky.

#twisted wonderland #twst wonderland #twst #twisted wonderland imagines #twst imagines #imagines #twisted wonderland fluff #twst fluff #fluff #romance #roses #leona kingscholar #leona kingscholar x reader #leona x reader #reader #y/n #vera deville #the marchioness

[inukag-archive]

hello there, hope you are doing well, can you recommend an inukag story where inuyasha is human, AU please, like soul therapy, thank you in advance

Hello @fmrinukag !

Thank you so much for reaching out to the Archive, we absolutely can get a list of Human Inuyasha stories together for you. However, in the course of making this list the team noticed an interesting quirk: Inuyasha is not always explicitly stated as being human or not in all AUs. He is sometimes given his hanyou coloring but with no mention of his ears, claws, or demonic heritage are featured in the plot. For organizational purposes, we chose to split this list into STATED HUMAN and IMPLIED HUMAN.

Happy reading!

STATED HUMAN

Oh, But You're Good To Me @witchygirl99 (M)

It’s a terrible photo, really. The action figure takes up the entire bottom of the screen and part of both of their faces. Shippo’s giggling though, eyes shut and crinkled in his mirth while Inuyasha looks at him. His expression is clearly fond. It’s the softest Inuyasha has ever, ever seen himself.

This is fatherhood, he thinks a little wildly.

He sends the photo to Kagome.

Inuyasha is a single father. Shippo is his adopted son. Kagome isn't supposed to be in the picture, but somehow, she returns anyways. A story about family, love, and all of its obstacles.

--

Shot Week IV: Lovey Dovey Edition (Chapter 7: You May Be Right) by TheMondayChild (E)

Kagome has been pining for Hojo who no longer pays her attention and brings her gifts as he once did. To try and get him to notice her again, she enlists the help of a known bad boy, Inuyasha, and they concoct a plan: bully her and let Hojo white knight his way back into her life. But will she still want him when all is said and done?

--

One Night Stand by doggieearlover (X)

A chance of fate throws two souls together.

--

The Jilted Lover by basya88 (T)

“You were very young, marrying you felt like clipping your wings before you took your first dive”, he said, looking at her like he still had the right to do so.

She huffed, her haughtiness apparent, “So you’re saying, you had to make a choice for me? Who gave you the right to do that, huh? Excuses, excuses, but yeah, you made a choice, and you choose to break my heart by leaving me.”

Those we’re the longest spoken sentences he heard from her in years and now she’s walking away from him, and if he didn’t stop her, she’d be gone for good. He can’t have that. He had to do something.

“Please, don’t walk away,” he pleaded.

Without looking back she replied, “You taught me how. You walked out on me once. Now, we’re even.”

Both of them forgot, that hundreds of listeners are witnessing their exchange thru the radiowaves.

--

A Late Loving by LittleDarkStar (M)

8 years ago Kagome ran away from her cheating husband, Now 8 years on Kagome lives with her Cousin Miroku and her son. But Inuyasha has found her again and wants his revenge.

--

all night long I feel his presence hover by @doginabirdcage (E)

It is when Kagome turns forty-five, living in a small apartment in Tokyo, with her child and husband long gone, that she inherits a fortune. She’s got a gray streak in her hair that she didn’t fight when it started coming in years ago. There are crows feet by her eyes. But suddenly, she is an heiress.

--

Skinny Love by emaniem5 (T)

"This was no love letter. This was a threat."

Flunking math, bad hair days, inheriting a family business she doesn't want, falling in love with her sister's boyfriend...If Kagome thought she had problems before, they had just been multiplied a hundredfold. And having to dress up like her sister to confuse a stalking pyromaniac was only one of them.

Slow burn. No pun intended.

--

I Do by Shirahime Shou95 (M)

A.U. "I hate you." She whispered in a low voice, tears brimming in her brown orbs. But the young boy before her just grinned smugly. "The feeling's mutual." When seven-year-old Kagome Higurashi met Inuyasha Takahashi on the elementary school for the first time, she would've never guess that fifteen years later, she would say those two words to him; "I do."

--

Hallway Shenanigans by toesalignedarch (T)

AU: When Inuyasha delivers flowers to Sango on Miroku's behalf, he runs into one of Sango's friends and unwillingly develops a little crush. He thinks he's just going to get over it. But when Sango finds out, she decides to play matchmaker. Told in snippets of 250 words or less.

--

Bad Influence by ji-an (Y)

Meet the bad boy.

--

9 Months by DeletedAccoutnNotChangingMind (M)

Kagome is given the weirdest offer by top business man Inuyasha Takahashi. With a few simple words he changes her whole life: "Will you bare my child?"

---

IMPLIED HUMAN

Soul Therapy by dolphingirl0113 (T)

{Alternate Universe Plot} Kagome is a young, aspiring physical therapist who receives more than she bargained for with Inuyasha, a victim of a car accident trying to walk again. She soon discovers reasons why you don't fall in love with patients...

--

Dog Tags by @lemonlushff (E)

On the worst day of his life, an old WWII dog tag washed ashore. Now, being a Navy man himself, he feels like tracking this soldier down is the right thing to do. It's amazing how sometimes random twists of fate can help your heart heal in ways you didn't know were possible. M for language and lemon content. Inu/Kag

--

Memento Mori by LuxKen27 (E)

She was the embodiment of virtue. He was her forbidden temptation.

--

Shy by @ninmenkaspeaches (E)

Shy (Alternatively: What Inuyasha Most Certainly Is Not)

Sometimes love is the best thing to break you out of your shy little shell.

--

The Shogun's Daughter by @shnuggletea (E)

Kagome's father passed away when she was just a child but his Shogun status still makes her a valuable bride to a Lord of lands that border their village. Lord Inuyasha Tashio is pushed by the council into marriage, assured his new bride was an excellent choice. All their fears and anxiety are amplified when they meet.

--

Feel free to add your own recs in the comments or reblogs!

Check our Masterlist of previous lists to see which topics we've covered.

Send us an ask (here).

#inukag archive #inukag fanfiction #human!inuyasha #human!au #inuyasha fanfiction

[writertitan]

Confinements - Pt. 3

pairing: soldier!levi x f!medic!reader

themes: war themes + war crimes, enemies to lovers, mature and heavy content (minors dni), medic!reader, reader is a tough cookie due to wartimes, levi is a prisoner of war, reader and levi are snarky lil fellas, afab reader, swearing, heavy themes regarding acts of war, mentions of death, dark content, finding warmth in each other during cruel and cold-blooded times, unconditioning of propaganda, slight mentions of torture tactics/aggressive interrogations, reader finally breaking out of survival mode in this chap

chapters: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5 updated weekly chapter word count: 3.2k a/n: hello sweet cherubs and welcome to pt. 3! if you haven’t read the first two parts, they are linked above in the chapters section. have a wonderful start to the week, and please enjoy. :) 

It was another two days before you saw Captain Levi again. 

A new hoard of wounded soldiers had been brought in and many needed complex surgery, to which you assisted. Even in the thick of the hardest one, your mind kept pulling you away to a certain captain hidden away beneath your feet, which was dangerous. You could never lose focus, not even for a moment, during such difficult medical procedures. 

There were rumors going around that the enemy was planning a blitz attack, though you were a little amused that they could even call it a blitz if people suspected it was coming. Because of that, however, the general was ordering for more ruthless attacks from some squads, resulting in many more casualties than your team could take on. 

But, as always, you made do and powered through, and in those two days you accomplished nearly all of the most serious cases that were brought to you. 

You were exhausted, to say the least, and all you wanted was to slump into your comfy chair at your dwelling and fall asleep listening to the pitter-patter of rain outside, maybe a crackling fire going in the fireplace. Once you’d gotten cleaned up from your final surgery, that was the plan, but of course, Dr. Muller had other plans. 

He was waiting for you outside the women’s washroom, his face apologetic - an expression you’d gotten used to from him as of recently. 

“What is it?” you asked, suddenly a little more alert and a little less lethargic. “Did more come in?” 

“No, it’s nothing like that,” he said, waving a hand dismissively. Then, he lowered his voice to a whisper, making sure nobody else could hear though it was basically only the two of you. “I need you to go check on the captain. Just a quick visit, then you’re free to take off. I won’t call you in for the next couple of days unless it’s urgent. We need the rest.” 

At the mention of the captain, you felt yourself grow groggy again. Still, it was an improvement that you weren’t feeling totally annoyed, and you nodded along to the doctor’s request with a small sigh and a wave of your own hand. 

“Sure, I’ll do it now,” you muttered, then waited for the doctor to disappear out of sight before sliding down the wall and resting your head back against it. 

The night of the “bath incident” - as you liked to call it - had brought forth a lot of unusual feelings and behaviors from you. While it was true that you’d fetched some clean clothes for the captain and that had been out of the norm for you, you’d also mentally made a promise to yourself to remember to bring him some decent food as well. 

There was really no logic to this sudden change of yours. Since when did you care so much about a patient, much less a prisoner of war that didn’t seem to be keen on you? 

You tried to get your bearings sitting on the floor like that for a solid minute before eventually groaning and standing up, doing your best to ignore the full body aches as you snuck your way into the kitchen. 

It was evening and supper had already been served out, so most of the staff were busy cleaning up. One of them, a young girl named Vel, noticed you come in. If anyone else did, they didn’t show it. 

She greeted you meekly, her big, round eyes trained on you as you stopped in your tracks. 

“Need something to eat?” she asked, tilting her head. “I heard about the work you and Dr. Muller have been doing these past couple of days. Doesn’t sound like you’ve been able to take a break at all, or even eat. Wait right there.” 

Though she had made a demand of you to wait, the demand, like Vel herself, was very meek. Still, you did as you were told, grateful for her generosity and for her exceptional observation. You could definitely sneak off with the food and give it to Captain Levi instead, and it wouldn’t look suspicious at all. 

Vel took her time filling up a tray for you but you didn’t mind the few minutes to yourself. 

“Here,” she whispered, offering up the small tray. 

Steamed vegetables, hot porridge, and buttered bread greeted you from the tray, alongside a small jug of water. It normally wouldn’t look like much for the average person, but for a person entrenched in war, it was a king’s feast. More importantly, none of the food was rotten or moldy. 

Relief and gratitude poured out of you and the quiet, “Thank you,” that you managed to get out dripped with the emotions and made Vel smile a little. 

“Eat up,” she instructed, then was off again to get back to whatever she’d been doing before. 

You hurried off and waited until the coast was clear before sneaking into the cellar, making the now familiar trek to the room Captain Levi occupied. 

You couldn’t lie and say that the food in front of you didn’t make your mouth water. Vel had guessed correctly - it had been days since you had had a real meal. The last thing you could remember eating was a handful of stale raisins aside from your mandatory hydration times during operations. Still, you did your best to ignore the food, wanting to save it for the captain, who no doubt hadn’t had real food for a very long time. Much longer than a measly two days. 

When you entered his room, it was eerily quiet. He lay there, motionless but rigid, clearly in pain. You briefly noted that he was no longer wearing his grimy uniform and had donned the clean clothes you’d left for him. However, he barely acknowledged that you’d come in, didn’t even open his eyes, and only did when you called to him. 

“Captain Levi?” 

His eyes snapped open and he turned his head to look at you, and then his gaze focused on the tray you held, grey eyes showcasing a hunger you’d never seen from him before. The black bruises that had adorned his eyes were nearly completely gone, replaced with dark circles due to restlessness. 

“I noticed last time I was here you weren’t being properly fed,” you explained, trying your very best not to stutter through your words. “I thought I’d bring you some actual food for once.” 

You made your way over to his bed and watched him wince as he sat up, but he at least looked eager for food. You set the tray down closer to him on the bed, a silent gesture for him to help himself. 

“Who brings your meals normally?” you asked him as he tore into the buttered bread. You couldn’t imagine that it would be anyone in the kitchen staff. With how much of a secret the captain’s capture was, you doubted the general was allowing anyone except a select few to come through here. 

Captain Levi didn’t answer for a few moments, more focused on devouring the bread, but eventually he found his voice. 

“That stupidly annoying nurse slides a tray of food in here once a day. Food, if you can even call it that,” he scoffed. Then, as if it was nothing, he added, “She hasn’t been here for two days.” 

That made you freeze. 

So, not only was he only being fed barely edible food only once a day, but he also hadn’t even been fed at all the past two days. 

“That’s unacceptable,” you choked out, in mild disbelief. Yes, Nurse Gatha had been quite busy herself with all the incoming soldiers, but that was no excuse. She wasn’t in the high trauma group and you knew for a fact she’d had plenty of breaks, unlike your group. “I’m so sorry, Captain Levi. We’ve all been running around the past couple of days due to an influx of patients, but she should have made the time to come down here.” 

A fleeting reminder that that influx was due to the captain’s own soldiers attacking yours flitted through your head, but you quickly shook it away. He’d had nothing to do with it, so it would be unfair to blame him. 

“She’s annoying anyway. I hate that she’s even around me for any amount of time at all. I’d rather starve,” he said, voice dull. Then, in a much quieter and calmer voice, he continued with, “I’d much rather have you do it. You’re much less irritating.” 

The admission left you stunned. 

Captain Levi shifted uncomfortably, his eyes pointedly avoiding yours as he said, “And thank you for the clean clothes. Even though they’re colors I’d rather not wear.” 

It clearly made him uncomfortable to express gratitude, or any sort of emotion at all, but you were secretly pleased that he would bear it just to tell you something so simple. 

“You’re welcome,” you said with a smile. 

It was then that your body betrayed you and a grumble sounded from your stomach. Instantly, you felt your face grow hot. It was loud enough for Captain Levi to hear it as well, which was mortifying.

“You said it’s been busy the past couple of days. Have you eaten?” he asked. He looked genuinely concerned. 

“Yeah, don’t worry about me,” you said dismissively, your gaze avoiding his. In truth, you were definitely hungry, but that was something you could rectify later on when you were in the privacy of your little living space. 

Still, Captain Levi scoffed and pushed the tray back towards you. 

“Don’t let yourself starve,” he said gruffly. “Isn’t that medically frowned upon, Doc?”

You rolled your eyes, about to retort, but the captain wouldn’t let you and handed over the bowl of steamed vegetables. The smell was truly delicious, especially for someone who hadn’t eaten, but you still couldn’t bear the thought of sharing even a morsel.

“I’ve had something to eat. You haven’t,” you said firmly, pushing it back to him. He didn’t have to know that your “something to eat” had hardly counted as real food. 

Captain Levi looked ready to keep fighting you on this but when his stomach growled, the argument was over. He begrudgingly grabbed a fork and ate up the vegetables, though he seemed to genuinely be grateful. 

It was strange to see him sitting there, wearing your country’s uniform as if he were one of your own soldiers. He could have maybe passed for one, but you doubted it. There was something about his demeanor and the way he presented himself that gave him away. He didn’t belong in a place like this. He was resolute, confident, a little blunt, and just different from the other men here. No, he didn’t didn’t belong here. 

Did you, though? 

“How are your pain levels? Anything in particular I should look at today?” you asked, letting him swallow before answering. 

“Ribs are still bothering me but that’s it. Everything else is bearable. Should be able to release me any day now, Doc.” The last part was said a little condescendingly. You definitely felt yourself bristle. 

“I’m not a doctor and I’ve never appreciated that nickname,” you huffed, turning back to the kit you’d almost forgotten about. You’d taken to leaving it in the cellar these days, tucked away, and had hauled it in while carefully balancing the tray with one hand. 

“You’ve never told me your real name, so I don’t have anything else to call you,” Captain Levi pointed out. 

That surprised you. Had you really never told him your name? 

You blurted it out as a very belated introduction, a little embarrassed that you’d never done it the other times you’d come to tend to him, but Captain Levi didn’t seem too miffed. 

“I think I’ll still call you Doc, but it’s nice to meet you,” he said, then added, with a smirk twitching at his lips, “I’m Levi.” 

“Nice to meet, Captain Levi,” you snorted, but then you grew quiet when the captain shook his head and gave you a look you couldn’t quite discern. 

“Just Levi is fine.” 

“Okay,” you whispered, “Levi.” 

Some sort of wall between the two of you broke then. When getting rid of titles like that, a wall always tends to break between two people. There was less formality and more camaraderie. Maybe even friendship. 

You let Levi finish eating before getting to work. He unbuttoned his shirt and let you inspect his aching ribs, and that’s when you realized that he’d gotten thinner. He seemed naturally slim but when you’d first seen him he was sturdy and clearly held a lot of strength. Looking at him now, you could see he was weakening. Some ribs even slightly poked through his bruised skin. Something heavy stirred in your chest at the sight. 

Still, despite his complaints of pain, you were sure everything was healing nicely. The bruising on his chest concerned you, because they didn’t look as faded as you wanted them to, but rib injuries were tough to heal if the patient wasn’t careful. The bruise you’d been worried about on his abdomen seemed to be fading the way you expected, though, alleviating your concerns of something internal at play. The ankle was no longer swollen, just tender per Levi’s assessment, so you were confident that just a little more food and some proper rest would get him healing faster. 

As you worked to put a salve on his ankle, you were so concentrated on that that his voice startled you.

“Why did you choose to become a medic?” he asked suddenly. 

The question came as a surprise. You didn’t even really know how to answer it. For a moment, you thought hard on the story you were willing to tell. 

“The medical field has always interested me,” you started hesitantly, unsure of how much you should divulge. But then, when you saw those genuinely curious steel-colored eyes, you continued, voice a little softer. “I had a brother who enlisted as a soldier and he died. When we were told of his death, the captain of his squad alluded to my brother being unsalvageable. I don’t know why that hit me so hard. I hate the thought of me, as a medic, not doing everything in my power to save someone’s life. I already had a bit of experience and enlisted as a volunteer and here I am. Once I learned the circumstances of my brother’s death rather than getting a polite and vague answer on my doorstep, I was a little more understanding - he was apparently blown to bits and all. But it still bothers me to think he was left out to die. If someone like me had been around to try and help, maybe he would be back home.” 

Levi’s face was uncharacteristically soft as you finished speaking. 

“I’m sorry about your brother,” he said finally, and you shrugged it off. It was during times of recalling your brother that you could feel the cracks in your icy exterior, and the cracks in your heart. 

You gave Levi a small smile, noticing a look akin to that of confusion as you placed bandages over his ankle, mostly to let the salve stay and absorb into his skin better. Even so, you didn’t probe him. 

After finishing up with this ankle, you moved to the part that would be more uncomfortable for Levi - his ribs.

You had some numbing cream handy that you felt might work to relieve some of his discomfort. Taking it from your medical kit, you dabbed your fingertips with it and began gingerly rubbing it onto his chest and sides. You could feel him wince under your touch. 

“You should be more careful,” you quietly scolded. “I don’t know what you’re doing in here when I’m not around, but it’s certainly not helping your healing process. These ribs are taking longer than I’d like to heal.” 

Levi scoffed then, his entire body rigid suddenly.

“Tell that to your scumbag general,” he snapped, eyes hard as he looked at you. “He’s the one throwing me around.” 

It was as if someone had dumped ice cold water on your body. 

“The general is…being violent with you?” you asked, throat dry as the question left your mouth. 

Levi seemed surprised at your reaction. 

“Yes? During his interrogations.” He spoke slowly, a bit confused, but your initial shock was giving way to extreme anger. 

You had no idea. Sure, you were vaguely aware and understanding that with being a prisoner of war came the expectation of interrogations for information, but for some reason, you hadn’t expected to hear this from Levi. Was he being tortured for information? Was the general’s tactic to rough him up and beat the information out of him? 

All the other comments from Levi were weighing on you again. The fact that he was being treated like a feral animal was glaringly obvious all of a sudden. And that sinking feeling that something wasn’t right hadn’t wavered these last few days. 

Day by day, you’d started to accept your belief that this war was…odd. That your country was somehow not doing things right. That you were being lied to. 

“I didn’t know that you were being…,” you trailed off, unsure of what to even say. 

“Doc…how did you say your brother died again?”

The question seemed out of place but you answered anyway. 

“Some of your soldiers managed to get onto our territory and my brother and his squad caught them. This happened at a front line encampment that used to exist a few miles from here. Your soldiers planted landmines and threw grenades at my brother and his squad in order to herd them to the mines. They fell for it and got caught up in all the blasts. There were just…pieces of him left,” you said absently. You weren’t looking at Levi, but more like looking through him. 

Levi scowled at your answer, looking troubled. It was silent between you as he clearly was trying to put together what to say. When he did, you felt that icy wave wash over you once more. 

“We don’t do blitz strikes like that. And we don’t really use landmines. That’s a resource that your country has, not us.” 

He looked like he had more to say, but it was obvious that you were slowly breaking down. That coldness inside you, that emptiness, that disconnect you’d built up…it was all suddenly fragile and about to tumble down. Levi had, somehow, in such a short span of time, shown you how you’d basically been sleepwalking through your life these last few years. Levi had blitzed you, made you step on some sort of mental landmine you’d been sidestepping all this time. Things were blowing up in front of you, metaphorically speaking. 

“What are you trying to say?” you asked, tears pricking at your eyes. When was the last time you’d cried, or had even come close to it?

“There’s a lot you don’t know. I don’t know if you’ll believe me,” Levi sighed. 

But you already knew you would believe him, and you had an inkling of what he was about to say. He was about to prove your suspicions correct. 

A heavy silence fell over you but it didn’t last long. As you stared at each other, you with desperate and wild eyes and Levi with solemn and knowing ones, the bomb sirens started wailing. 

____________________________

read pt. 4 here

#levi x reader #levi ackerman x reader #levi ackerman x you #Levi fic #Levi fanfiction #levi ackerman fic #levi ackerman fanfiction #Levi x You #levi x y/n #attack on titan fanfiction #aot fanfiction #snk fanfiction

[chocodollxren]

hello! can i order a number 15 honey lemon tea drabble with kalim, for the teahouse event?

also congrats on your milestone o(≧▽≦)o

-> 𝙛𝙤𝙧 𝙖𝙣𝙤𝙣𝙮𝙢𝙤𝙪𝙨 ,, 𝙤𝙧𝙙𝙚𝙧 𝙪𝙥 ,, 𝙡𝙞𝙢𝙞𝙩𝙚𝙙 𝙚𝙫𝙚𝙣𝙩” ! ꒱·˚ ,, #O5.28.22🍵 ˖˚˳⊹ 'ּ໋݊◵

prompt 15: “before it’s too late, can we get married?” + Kalim Al-Asim

no tws, gn!reader, established relationship, time set a bit after the original plot.

“huh?!” you yelled on the phone as your parent tried to reason with you. your boyfriend, who also knew the gist of the conversation after you put it on speaker, tried to calm you down. “i’m not marrying someone i don’t know because of your dumb promise! tell your friend to find a different partner for their kid i’ve never met! i’m already taken.” you yelled, ready to throw the phone.

Kalim was definitely unhappy to hear your parent trying to tell you to at least meet up once, and how they’d planned your marriage since young. your parent was insisting on getting the two of you engaged after their friend returned from overseas traveling, and that you would make a great couple. you weren’t even given an opportunity to say who you were dating, nor that you were happy. your parent simply insisted that you had to meet them, they had engagement rings and all.

“no! and that’s final. ask me one more time and i’m never returning!” you yelled, hanging up and throwing your phone across the room, hearing it crack against the window. you could not listen to anyone who supported that idea right now. that may of been cute when you were a child but you’re not two. you had someone you loved.

your boyfriend looked awkwardly between you and the phone before quickly throwing his arms around you. “you aren’t going to leave me, right?” he asked as he finally broke down into tears. you two had been dating for over a year but your family always blew it off when you brought him up. he’d figured he did something wrong, as he once tried to say hello on the phone but your parent cut him off and said their goodbye. frustrated, you sigh and decide not to let them eat at you. “no, Kalim.” you embraced him back, running your fingers threw his hair.

“they’re being crazy thinking that making us engaged will convince me to meet with them. you’re the only one i love.” you said, cuddling into him as you both tried to think over the explosive conversation. they were being ridiculous, but it’s not like you could actually avoid them forever, you’d thought. but the second you return, you’d know as long as there was no ring on your finger, they would pressure you until you obliged regardless of you and Kalim being together.

you sat in silence as Kalim said he would do anything to help you. you really couldn’t help but smile at how amazing of a lover he was, and how understanding he could be. he didn’t blame you nor get mad at you, but rather chose to worry for you. “there’s not much we can do at the moment, other than hope they stop.”

he didn’t really like this answer, choosing to spend the night with you in case anything happened or you needed him. the next day, he told you he’d be back as soon as he figured something out, making you raise your brow. he gave you a kiss and ran to find Jamil, his hope. “Jamil!” he yelled, almost jumping on the poor boy as he groaned, not ready to deal with Kalim that early in the morning.

“wh,” Jamil tried to speak but Kalim had begun to ask for help. “what do i do?” he explained the situation regarding your parent, the planned engagement, and how they probably hated him. Jamil couldn’t deny he felt smug knowing not everyone liked him, but you were the only one who kept him away for a long period of time. “if they won’t give in, why not get married?”

although he pointed out the obvious, the lightbulb went off in Kalim’s head. the two of you were young, but you were the one he wanted to spend his life with. he was sure you’d also agree, even if this was a little rushed. he would do his best to give you whatever you wanted, and stop your family from pressuring you if they weren’t going to listen. “i’m going to ask my father for his blessing!” Kalim yelled and ran off, presumably to make a phone call. Jamil wanted to facepalm as he didn’t even ask you yet, but decided to just let things play out.

after a few days, you were worried if Kalim left you but decided to trust in him. a few hours after reading to distract yourself, you hear the door burst open so hard you would assume the hinges went flying. out of breath, Kalim was dressed in the finest attire he had, his magic carpet beside him. “please,” he wheezed, out of breath. “please, take a carpet ride with me.” you were obviously confused and concerned, but he took your hand and led you out, helping you onto the carpet. the two of you flew in the sky for a few minutes until you heard fireworks in a distance, all in your favorite color. finally, one by one they popped, will you marry me?” your eyes widened as he took your hand, staring at you as he opened a small box from his pocket.

“before it’s too late, can we get married?” he asked. you freeze and your mouth goes agape, hand over your mouth. you knew Kalim took things extreme but you didn’t expect this outcome. the longer you took, the more you saw doubt creep onto his face before you wrap your arms around his neck, giving him a kiss and extending your hand out. “Kalim…” you muttered as happy tears strolled down your face. your parent wouldn’t stop until you had a ring on your finger, and he decided to do exactly that, you were truly lucky to have a partner that would go that far for you.

slipping a ring on your finger, he kissed you again. “my parents have given us their blessing, so even if your’s don’t, they would be happy to be your parents!” he said cheerfully, your face fully flustered and tear struck due to the kindness of your soon to be husband. you couldn’t believe how your parent’s pressure ended up giving you the best future you could imagine.

✎ ˎˊ- "chocodollxren" [choco - doll - rhen] ˖˚˳⊹ 'ּ໋݊◵ dn repost.

thank you!! <33 hope you enjoy your order. this makes 7/32+ orders done! ended up rewriting the entire thing because didn’t like the entire draft so that’s a big thumbs up moment aha that’s why this was uploaded so late

#twst wonderland #twisted wonderland #disney twisted wonderland #twst drabble #twisted wonderland drabble #twst x reader #twisted wonderland x reader #kalim al asim x reader #twst kalim al asim #twisted wonderland kalim #＃—;❝ 𝘩𝘰𝘯𝘦𝘺 𝘭𝘦𝘮𝘰𝘯 𝘵𝘦𝘢 + 𝘤𝘳𝘦𝘱𝘦𝘴 [🍵] ❞ #＃—; ❝ 𝘰𝘳𝘥𝘦𝘳 𝘶𝘱 [🍵] ❞