#just like cool your jets and maybe process some of the anger you’re feeling. and maybe nothing will change.

[yellowsubiesdance]

i think i’ve learned a lot when it comes to not applying my own values to the media i consume

for my script analysis class yesterday, we discussed two gentleman from verona, and nearly every classmate of mine was up in arms about how sexist the story is.

and i'm not saying it's not, or that it's not infuriating to read. but i'm also not putting my energy into getting upset about something written 500 or so years ago. and i'm not about to put my own beliefs onto these characters that are not me. i'm going to let their choices speak for themselves, and interpret it in the context of the story.

all that said, this now brings me to the point of alastor in episode 5, and how viscerally people are responding to it. those of you up in arms about the choices he’s making, and the violent threat he gave husk, you’re missing the entire point of his character, of this place they’re in, of the story being told. he’s an overlord, and he became an overlord by killing much bigger overlords and broadcasting their deaths over the radio.

HE IS NOT A GOOD PERSON.

if you started this show with the belief that every character working the hotel is a good person, you’re in the wrong place. watch the good place if you’re looking for a good wholesome story about getting dead sinners into heaven, because that’s not what this show is about.

you’re more than welcome to hate him after seeing the way he exerted power over a being whose soul he owns, but you’re doing the media you’re watching a disservice by writing it off so quickly. if you don’t like to be uncomfortable watching media, watch something else. this is an uncomfortable show, it handles uncomfortable topics, and it’s going to be an uncomfortable ride, and if you’re not up for something like that, then you should take a break from it and pick up something else. you don’t have to get online and defend your own ideals while you watch a show that goes against your ideals.

#hazbin hotel spoilers #that’s not even touching on the fact that husk was an overlord too #he also owned souls that he used as currency to supply his gambling addiction #he’s also not a good person!! #the majority of these characters are in hell for a reason: they’re not good people #i quite frankly love the way this show blurs the lines between good and evil #our heroes are sinners and overlords and demons. while the enemies are angels. but that doesn’t mean our heroes are good people. #you HAAAVE to come to terms with that!! you have to stop seeing the world in black and white or you’re not going to survive this world #if you’re upset because alastor was cruel to husk fine! be upset! but explore why you’re taking yourself out of that world. #in this world sinners own other people. there’s no ifs ands or buts #‘oh alastor is a poc why would he own people’ he was a serial killer when he was alive do you really think you can apply your values to that #(and this is me speaking as a poc. specifically a mixed race poc.) #i cannot speak to who vivzie is as a person. but i’m interested in the message she’s writing and thus far i’m finding it compelling #it’s a similar story as the good place but it’s going the distance to explore even worse people than those in the good place #i don’t think it’s responsible to write something off just because unsavory things happen in it. #and she’s giving us so many different types of representation that don’t involve race (although we’re also getting a lot of hispanic rep) #just like cool your jets and maybe process some of the anger you’re feeling. and maybe nothing will change. #but if you act. instead of react. if you understand why you’re feeling some type of way and then make a choice. #that’s so much stronger and more responsible than reacting and not thinking anything through #hazbin hotel #alastor #husk #hazbin alastor #hazbin husk #anyway let me get off my soapbox #long post

[laundrybiscuits]

(wait for the season to come back to me tag)

Eddie doesn’t want to tell the kids yet. Steve kind of understands, but he also knows Dustin’s never going to forgive him for holding out like this. He cancels his biweekly lunch with Dustin twice before sitting Eddie down and saying, “We gotta tell him something.”

“Fuck off,” says Eddie.

“He’s twenty-five years old. He can handle it.”

“That’s not what I’m worried about.”

“What the hell are you worried about, then?” Steve snaps. “I can’t keep lying to him, man! It’s not fucking fair! Just because you—”

“Steve,” says Robin. “Come on. Cool your jets, hotshot.”

Steve realizes he’s been kind of yelling, then. He also realizes that he’s standing over Eddie, who’s folded into a defensive crouch, and Eddie’s nails are in serious danger of ripping the couch cushions open. Eddie doesn’t look scared, exactly, but his face has gone inhumanly still and blank. It’d probably be worrying if there was any space in Steve for worry.

The anger’s still roaring full-tilt through Steve, though. He gets like this sometimes for no goddamn reason at all, and he knows it’ll pass in a minute, but right now the urge to break something is so, so strong.

“Fuck,” he snarls, and wheels around, storming into the kitchen.

He runs the tap just so there’s some noise as he tries to get his shit under control. Robin comes in after a little while.

“I’m—going to the gym,” Steve says, still gripping the sink hard.

“Okay,” says Robin. “Be safe.”

———

When he comes back, Eddie’s not in the living room.

“I told him he could hang out in my room for a while,” Robin says, before Steve can work himself up into a panic. “I think it would be good for him to have, like…his own private space. Not—I’m not talking about kicking him out, obviously. But maybe we could figure out a partition or something in the living room?”

“Yeah, sounds like a good idea,” says Steve. “God. I’m so sorry. He knows I’m sorry, right?”

Robin flicks him on the forehead. “Yeah, he gets it, dingus. I think he called you an ambulatory fountain of penitence once. Like, a perpetual apology machine.”

“Sure,” says Steve. “Got a lot to apologize for.”

“Nope, we’re not doing that,” says Robin, patting him gingerly on the shoulder. “I’d hug you but you’re all gross and sweaty. Go shower, you’ll feel like a person again.”

He does feel like a person again after a shower, but the Dustin question still hasn’t been figured out. He tries to bring it up again after a few days.

“I wouldn’t even have told you guys I was back if you hadn’t kidnapped me,” says Eddie, picking at his dinner. Vegan stuff is usually okay, weirdly enough, so Steve’s been learning to cook with tofu. He’s not sure if Eddie actually gets anything out of it on a nutritional level; he hasn’t asked.

“Yeah, I know,” says Steve. He’s trying pretty hard not to get mad again. It keeps him up sometimes, thinking about how easily Eddie could’ve wandered into a different bar that night. He hopes that they would’ve crossed paths sometime anyway, being in the same city and all, but maybe not. He just doesn’t know.

“So you get it, right?” says Eddie. “Why I don’t want to put that on the kids. They’ve all, like…processed it and everything. They’ve moved on, just like you did before I came back and fucked up your life again. And you didn’t even really know me.”

It’s not like he’s saying it in a mean way, but it’s deliberate. He’s watching Steve carefully to see how it lands. Steve takes a deep breath; he can do this right, this time.

“Eddie,” he says. “You know I’m glad you’re back, right? You’re not fucking up my life, I’m happy you’re here.”

“You seem a little stressed for a guy who’s supposed to be happy.” Eddie leans back and smiles. It doesn't reach his eyes. “Just seems sometimes like maybe it would’ve been better for you if I’d stayed, like, a story from your past.”

“No,” says Steve. “No. No. Never. It—might’ve been less complicated, maybe. But not better.”

Eddie looks down at his plate, silently fiddling with the golden-brown chunks of fried soy protein, and Steve realizes it might not just be about how the kids will react.

“Hey. You know it’s going to be fine, right? Dustin loves you. He wants you in his life, whatever that means, and you know he’s not gonna do anything to make you uncomfortable. Plus, he lives like one town away and has his own car, so if I keep putting him off like this he’s just gonna show up here one day and then we’ll really be screwed.”

It’s kind of a joke but it’s also really, really true. Eddie laughs, some of the tension finally dropping out of his shoulders, and says: “Okay. You’ve worn me down, Harrington. Alert the brat pack.”

#steddie #fic: wait for the season to come back to me #bel biv devoe voice: that boy has tra-u-ma #still struggling quite a bit with this story but here's SOMETHING ig #I also realized that both of my current active wips are vaguely angsty mid-90s Steve-POV stories set in Chicago #so like...damn. might need to write that Eddie-befriends-Robin-prior-to-Scoops fic I've been thinking about for a change of pace. #I just haven't written high schoolers in SO LONG idk!

[cicadas-epiphany]

Flower Crowns and Ice Pops - (TFA) Blitzwing x Reader

Pairing: TFA Blitzwing x Cybertronian!Reader

Word count: 1847

Rating: Teen and up

Summary: A peaceful date with Blitzwing is going well, up until you decide to get a bit frisky. A bit of punishment is in order, Blitzwing decides. 

Blitzwing sat upon a rock, watching you as you sat on the ground weaving plants together. You claimed it was called a flower crown, and had witnessed some humans doing this. He didn't quite get it, but whatever made you happy.

After a few minutes you stand and walk over to him, placing the ring of grass and flowers on his helm. He looks up at you for a moment before his face spins, landing on a face that looks like a jack-o-lantern. 

“Ooh! I’m zhe flower king now!” He lets out a cackle before his face spins again, landing on a cold blue face. “Zhank you, it is lovely. But vhat is it for?”

 “Um, I think just to look nice? You look very pretty with it.” You answer.

You hear a whirr and a click, and are met with an angry red face. “What? And I vasn't pretty before? I don’t need a dumb flower crown make me pretty!” After pulling it off and throwing it on the ground he crosses his arms and huffs, looking away.

A chuckle escapes you as you reach forward, taking his cheeks into your servos and making him look at you. “You're always pretty, Blitzwing. I just meant that the crown looked nice on you.” 

His cheeks warm up a bit and he stares up at you, still pouting, but you can tell it's just for show. He begins to protest, but you pull him forward and cut him off with a kiss.

 His face plate heats up even more, but before he can speak his face spins and is replaced with a much colder personality. Blitzwing stands and picks the crown up off the ground, placing onto your own helm. “Zhere. It fits you better zhan it fits me.” 

You are reminded how big he is, and how he towers over you as he stands there. 

“Oh, I can make a bigger one if it was too small.” you reply, looking at the ground for more flowers. 

He chuckles, and when you look back to him he is grinning wide. “Ohohh!! Maybe jou could make a crown with zhe little slimy things in the ground!” He jumps a bit from one foot to the other, clearly excited about this idea.

“W-worms? Blitzwing… I don't think that will work.” 

“You could always try!” was his response before you were met with his cooler face yet again. He stood over you as you weaved another crown, making a comment every so often as he watched you work.

Once finished, you placed it on his helm. “There! Now we can rule the flowers together.” you declared, standing back with your servos on your hips. 

“I do not need a partner to rule! I rule alone!” he angrily declared, “Though I would not mind if it was you by my side.” his icy personality finished. 

He looked so cute when his personalities spoke together, and it nearly made your spark skip a beat. 

You stared at him for a bit longer, admiring how handsome this mech was. Primus how can a mech be THIS gorgeous? It's hardly fair. No matter what face is showing he is absolutely stunning.

Hearing him clear his throat snaps you out of your thoughts, realizing that you were staring a bit too long. You look away, feeling your face plate heat up slightly. 

His face whirrs to his random personality, though he says nothing at first, opting to watch you with a knowing smirk. 

After some staring, he finally speaks. “Aww, does zhe little jet zhink I’m pretty? How cute!~” his voice sings, teasing you for staring. You can feel the heat in your face plate worsen, and you glare at the trees in defiance. 

“Zhe jet didn’t say no! Jou do zhink i'm pretty, ha!” he continues, pointing at you and laughing.

Your glare harshens, burning into the trees around you. There must be some way to get back at him, to make him eat those words…

“Ohh I’m a teeny little jet, and I zhink Blitzwing is sooooo hot!” he dances around, flashing you a wink when you peek over at him.  

Whirr and a click, and his face is nearly as red as yours. A sneer is laid across his face and he stands back, crossing his arms, challenging you to fight back. 

You glare at him. There's nothing you can do; he's much larger, you can't exactly fight him. Not that you'd want to anyway, fighting your sparkmate isn't wise.

Then an idea hits you. 

The anger in your face drops quickly and you look at him with an innocent gaze, which his icy personality returned with a raised optic ridge. Confusion displays across his face as you walk behind him, but he makes no attempt to interrupt your plans. 

Tingles shoot through his back, something poking at him. He knows you are behind it, and that you are up to something, but he can't place exactly what it is you are doing. The tingling sensation continues and soon spreads to his wings.

Once he realizes what you are up to he jolts, a gasp leaving him. 

You are standing behind him, trailing a digit down his wing. His wings are sensitive; he knows this, and he knows that you know this. 

“Zhis is a dangerous game, liebe.” he warns, though he does nothing to stop you. If you want to dig yourself into a hole, he will stand by and watch. 

“What do you mean?” you ask, hiding the smirk in your voice the best you can. You know exactly what you are doing and how sensitive his wings are. 

His wing twitches as you trail your digits down the bottom edge, rubbing small circles before trailing back up. 

“You know exactly vhat I mean. You should stop, if you know vhat's good for you.” he continues to threaten only verbally, making no action to resist. You ignore his threats, opting to continue rubbing his wings.

His frame shivers as you put your servo on his other wing, teasing both of them at once. The sound of his internal fans kicking on fills the air, and you can only imagine the colors his face is turning. 

“Aw, but Blitzy,” you tease, noticing how his posture stiffens at the nickname, “maybe I really don't know what you mean. Maybe you should show me?” You add emphasis by trailing up his wings and digging your digits into the base, curling into the sensitive wires that connect his wings to his chassis. 

A groan can be heard before a whirr and a click, and his body pulls away from you as he turns around to show off a bright red grin. “Ohh! The little jet vants to be punished? I can do zhat!” He cackles as he grabs your shoulder pads, roughly pushing you back into a nearby tree. 

Not exactly what you meant, but sure, this’ll work. “A little punishment might be just what I need Blitzy.” You brace yourself against the tree as he looks you over, grin widening. You can almost see the gears turning in his head as he thinks of a way to get back at you. 

His face brightens and his glossa rolls out of his mouth, long and wormlike. Ah, he has an idea. His eyes follow you closely, almost like a predator watching his prey as he leans his helm closer to yours. His servos slowly wander down from your shoulder pads to your hips, expression darkening as he watches your face. 

You try your best to look pitiful and ashamed, though it's hard to hide some of the smugness at getting exactly what you want. In an attempt to get more, you look down and tilt your helm to the side, exposing your neck. Oh no, I hope a big strong mech doesn't take this vulnerable opportunity to bite me.

Your attempt is ignored though, as instead he opens his mouth more and licks your cheek affectionately. “Jou taste like a car tire sandvich!” he declares. 

Before you can process whatever that was supposed to mean his face switches, his icy personality interjecting. 

A cold servo cups your cheek and turns you to face him. “Now, I am curious… vhat else do jou taste like.” 

Your helm is pulled forward as his lips crash into yours, silencing any thoughts that lingered in your processor. Eyes widening in surprise, you stand frozen for a moment before melting into him. Your servos wander up his chest and one lingers there while the other curves behind his helm, pulling him forward to deepen the kiss. 

Blitzwing complies, pushing his frame into yours and pinning you between his own chassis and the tree behind you. This doesn't bother you in the slightest, and you reach out to find his wing once again. 

A servo grabs your wrist, pulling yours back to his chest and holding it there. Instinctively you try to whine in protest, but are cut off by his glossa finding its way against yours. 

A fogginest overcomes your processor as a warmth washes over your frame, the kiss intoxicating. You can feel your own fans kick on, venting out hot air as they try to cool down your chassis. The need to pull away pops into your processor but you ignore it. You don’t care if you are overheating and need to vent the air out, you just want Blitzwing to continue. 

But then you feel something cold.

No, something freezing. Something is freezing you from the inside. 

You struggle, confused, trying to push him away but he holds firm. Cold fills your intake and his glossa is guiding it. It's too cold, this isn't right, your frame shouldn't be this cold-

Blitzwing breaks the kiss and steps back. A smug look is plastered across his face, perhaps even a bit proud. 

Cold, you still feel cold. Wait a minute… it's coming from your glossa.

He froze your glossa. 

A confused whimper leaves you as you stand there with your frozen glossa hanging out of your intake, panicking as you try to find a way to melt this. You look back at him, waiting for an answer. 

He doesn't give one. You are only met with a crazed cackle as he starts to walk away. Blitzwing is nearly doubled over in laughter, seemingly very pleased with his little prank. 

“hHHNnn?? Hehlp???” you plea, running after him.

A whirr and a click. “I am not going to help you! You asked for punishment, you will be punished!” his voice yells angrily. “Besides, did jou not hear how loudly jour fans vere working to cool jou down? This could be considered a favor.” His icy face adds on.  

Without waiting for your response he transforms and flies off, leaving you to deal with this yourself. It's faint, but you swear you can hear an icy chuckle as he’s flying off into the sky, and you watch as a ring of flowers blows off of him and lands somewhere behind you.

#mywriting #tfa #transformers animated #transformers #blitzwing #tfa blitzwing #tfa blitzwing x reader #blitzwing x reader #tfa x reader

[sopeyb23-blog]

Love Language

*not my Gif

*I do not own any CM characters

Summary: reader thinks about how their relationship with Spencer  has evolved through touch!

Warnings: talk of past drug use, crying, angst i guess, but mostly fluff

word count: 2.2 K

A/N: this was pretty fun to write, it is mostly little flashback scenes and I love doing those. I did this after seeing  @veraiconcos​‘s writers challenge and thought that was super cool, all of her things are amazing so definitely check out her blog!

enjoy!!

~~~~~~~~~~~

Spencer Reid's love language was never touch. I suppose the burden of all his knowledge is knowing exactly the amount of germs passed by a single touch, and which of those germs are alive, and which could get him sick, and which sickness could take root, and, well you get the point. When I first started at the BAU Spencer still seemed to me like a shy little kid. We were the same age, I like to tell him at least once a day, I'm actually a full month older than him. I think that's one of the many reasons that him and I became friends so fast. My first friend was of course, JJ. After all she is very close in age to me and Spencer, and is one of the first contacts I had with the BAU. She told me before I had met any of the team, that Spencer was, well, different. She made sure to warn me that he doesn't mean anything by his little actions of avoidness. It's just his way of keeping himself safe. This I understood. 

The first time I was formally introduced to the team was much before I joined. The interview process is understandably long, they need to know a person before just throwing them in. After all, these people spend more time together working cases then they do in their own homes. -

“Hi, i’m Y/N , the new agent here” I shook the hands of everyone on the team but Spencers, remembering what JJ had told me. To him I smiled and gave a little wave.

“The number of pathogens that can be passed from a-” Spencer after seeing me wave to him began to do just what I suspected. When confronted with an uncomfortable situation, he began to hide behind his wall of facts.

“It's actually much safer to kiss” I continued for him and the look on his face was priceless.

“Yeah, yes, exactly.” A rose colored blush crept up onto his cheeks as he smiled at me.

“Oh great, now there's two of them” Morgan laughed at us before JJ pulled them away for another case.

The first time I saw someone actually touch Reid was when they returned home from the Tobias Hankle case. It hurt me to see Spencer (now my friend of almost four months) so absolutely traumatized. He would never say this to me or anyone else for that matter, but even at the time he came home, he was still feeling the effects of the drugs he was given.-

“Here they come, here they come” Anderson walked over to me as the team approached the glass doors of the BAU. I was surprised to see that Spencer was with them. I had assumed they would have taken him straight home, or maybe to the hospital.

“Welcome back, I'm glad you're alive, Reid,”  he barely opened his eyes and nodded at me before sitting down in his desk chair. I waved JJ over to me.

“How bad?” she sighed and gave me the classic worried mom look we always tease her for.

“Very. I didn't think I would ever see him like this”

“Im so sorry JJ. do you think he’ll be okay?”

“Honestly, I don't know, but i'm going to drive him home, maybe if i'm lucky I can convince him to let me take him to the hospital. I'll call you, okay?”

It worried me even more to know that JJ too, was aware of how badly he was hurt. She turned her back to me and grabbed her coat from her office before going to Spencer's desk. From where I was standing I could just barely make out what she was saying.

“Spence, come on, let's get you out of here”

“JJ I have paperwork to do” he sounded dazed, like he wasn't really sure where he was.

“Its okay Spence, I’m sure Morgan wouldn't mind a few extra” 

She gingerly took the files from his hand and helped him sling his satchel over his shoulder. Then, it happened. As they walked out of the room he stumbled. Just a little. Barely enough for anyone else to notice, but I was watching the two of them so carefully as they left I couldn't help but take an involuntary step towards them. JJ took a firm hold of his arm, and put her other free hand on his back. I could see him flinch for just a second, and then, his body relaxed into her and he let her guide him from the room.

After that night I became a full member of the team. Spencer didn't take any time off. He never went to the hospital, although Penn, JJ, and I tried countless times to get him to. After that night when he let JJ help him, when he let her touch him, he never seemed to be overly bothered by a handshake every once and awhile. The first time I touched him was still a while after that, I think my 15th case in the field. -

“Spencer it wasn't your fault.” He looked at me through his black rimmed glasses with a sad and blank expression.

“Then why would he address it to me?”  this whole case I knew something was wrong. After Gideon had not shown the first time, JJ told me that he had resigned, but at that point Spence still hadn't told anyone about the letter.

“Because he knew that you needed to hear the news from him. Not from JJ, or me, or Hotch, or anyone else. There's nothing you could have done to convince him to stay Spence, he's even more stubborn than you are”

I paused to observe him in the dark silence of the jet. I brought my hand to his arm tentatively but when he relaxed and seemed comfortable with the touch, I gave it a little squeeze and smiled at him. -

Now, after Gideon had left I knew it. I had a crush on Spencer Reid. This came as no surprise at all to JJ or Penelope, but to me, it was quite the shock. He had now become comfortable with the little touches of assurance that I gave him often. More comfortable even than with JJ or Morgan. Sometimes I noticed he would even reciprocate the gesture. When he noticed I was tired or stressed or just having a bad day, he would put a hand on the crook of my elbow and give it a little squeeze. Just like I did that night on the jet. To other people this seems like nothing. But to me, and to him as well, this was everything. 

When Spencer stayed in Vegas to investigate his father, JJ left. JJ as Spence and I’s best friend, is always a source of comfort and a safe haven in the stormy darkness that is our lives. When she left she pulled me aside away from Spencer and put a hand on her swollen belly. -

“ Y/N , I need to take care of Spence for me, okay?” I chuckled.

“JJ, of course, what do you think I’m here to do?” she looked at me with a deadpan stare.

“That's not what I mean. You know what was happening with him after Tobias right?” I nodded, the memories of his mood flashes, and anger, and sadness all coming to the forefront of my mind.

“he‘s going to need you to make sure that he doesn’t do anything stupid. Not Morgan, not Rossi, not Hotch, you. You are the only person on this team- in this world-. That he trusts right now. And you are the only person that could talk him off of that ledge.”

“I promise, JJ. I’ll keep him safe” She nodded at me but the worried expression on her face remained. -

JJ was worried for good reason as it turned out. I kept a close eye on Spencer as we looked into his past. The boys were all there to focus on the case. To solve what was in front of them. I was there more to focus on Spencer. There was one night. The night after we found his father, something in my brain just told me it was not going to be a good night for him. There was something in the coloring of his face, the way his posture was collapsed and the circles around his eyes were so dark, it told me all that I needed to know. -

I walked out into the hallway of our hotel and stopped in front of Spencer's door. The others were all asleep, and it was nearing one in the morning. But something told me that he needed my help right now. JJ’s voice in the back of my head reminded me that I needed to help him, I was the only one who could help him. I knocked three times on his door softly. I waited a minute before knocking again, with a little more force, and I heard some shuffling in the room before the door opened.

“ Y/N? What are you doing?” I walked inside the room without an invitation and sat down on the foot of his bed. The sheets were undisturbed and he was still in his work clothes though the tie was draped over a chair in the corner and his shoes were by the door.

“Talk to me” I looked up from my hands and continued.

“I don't mean, about the case, or your dad. I mean about you. I need you to convince me that you are okay”

“Who says I'm not?”  I rolled my eyes at him and gestured to the chair across from me.

“I do. And as one of your best friends, your closest colleague, and someone who likes you, a lot. I think that should mean something to you” the last part slipped out a little fast and completely without me thinking of the repercussions.

“You like me?” he gave a faint smile that I could only partially see in the dimly lit hotel room.

“Yes, but that's not the point right now, we’re talking about you not me '' I brushed off his comment but I couldn't help the smile and blush that came across on my face.

“Im struggling” his voice broke a little when he said it and it broke my heart to see him in such pain. 

I walked over to the chair he was sitting in and pulled him up by the hand.

“I'm going to hug you now. Is that okay?”

His partial nod was good enough for me. -

I got him through that night. I talked him off the ledge that JJ had warned me of. And she was right. I was the only one who could have done that. When we came back from Las Vegas, although neither of us had said a word, something changed between us. We were more than just friends now, we both knew that, but beyond that, we weren't really sure what we were. He would call me when he needed someone to talk him down, I would call him when I needed someone to talk me down. I would show up at his apartment any hour of the day to help him, and I knew that he would do the same. One of those nights when it just so happened that the both of us needed a little talking down after a hard case, I drove myself over to his apartment to find him on the couch crying.

To see him crying was something that my tired, and broken heart couldn't take. I threw myself next to him on the couch and pulled him into a hug, no questions asked.

“I needed that.” I said as soon as I lifted my head from his shoulder. 

“Me too” we were both still crying, but there was something about the atmosphere that had changed. We weren’t alone anymore. We spent hours like that, sitting there, my head on his shoulder, his arm around my back, not saying a word, just collecting ourselves as best we could. At some point in the night I looked over at the clock: 2:45 am

He looked to the clock as well and then over to me, and with a single tear streaming down his face he looked at me and said,

“If I asked you to stay, would you?” I wiped the tear from his cheek.

“You don't even need to ask”  he brought both of his hands to my cheek and pulled me into what I think is the most passionate kiss I have ever received.

That night told us both what we had become. It was no longer little arm touches or calls in the middle of the night. It was waking up to him beside me, seeing his hair ruffled from sleep and his eyes clouded by exhaustion. It was the little worried kisses he gave me in the field and the little squeal of happiness that Penelope made when I told her we were moving in together. 

When I first met Spencer I wondered to myself if he would ever be comfortable with touch. But now as his sleeping body lays next to me and instinctually pulls me in closer, I know that there was never any reason to worry. Because even before, when the most contact I would get was arm touches in the midst of a panic, it was enough. It helped me learn that although not everyone wants or shows grand gestures. There are other ways, sometimes even better ways to say, I love you.

#vicficwriterchallenge #Criminal Minds #criminalminds #reader #reader insert #spencer reid #Spencerreid #spencer reid fanfiction #spencer reid angst #spencer reid fluff #spencer reid x reader #penelope #penelope garcia #jj #Jennifer Jareau #derek morgan #promt #challenge

[lucky-bucky-boy]

Cruel Summer Pt. III

Summary: Based loosely off of Cruel Summer by Taylor Swift. Things seem to be on a roller coaster, highs and lows and jumping emotions. A discussion about one of the pivotal points of their relationships that could either be the start of a new beginning or the awakening of a terrible ending.

Word Count: 1818

Warnings: Angst, fluff, manipulative-ish speech, very slight age gap, implied smut, almost ddlg elements but not quite (Please let me know if I missed anything, I will be happy to add on)

A/N: Tags are at the bottom. I am so sorry this took literally a lifetime to write and get out but its FINALLY HERE. Will be added to AO3 at some point. NO spoilers, takes place before the events of Knives out. Read Part One Here // Read Part Two Here

I do not own these characters. Do NOT repost my writing and/or fics anywhere without my written permission. Reblogs, likes, comments, and constructive criticism welcomed and highly appreciated.

Hummingbirds sang their beautiful song, fluttering through the evening sun. Wind bristling through the trees, the faint sound of wind chimes and a bird splashing in the bird bath. The outside air; light and warm, a breath of life and happiness. Almost taunting with how it didn't change from how it was left. 

It was a stark contrast to the nearly tangible heaviness that cast itself inside, sitting thick and awkward. The sound of a metal spoon clinking against glass nearly drowning out the sound of the help Ransom paid to stay and make dinner. The warmth of the cup of tea keeping thoughts from straying too far as tension begin to settle. 

Uncomfortable shifting in the dining chair, occasional, timid glances to the man next to you. Never had you ever seen him look so raw. His hair pushed back from running his hands through it so many times, instead of from the numerous products you knew he had stocked in his closet. The sweater he wore, albeit already worn, was so stretched out from him pulling on the cuffs that it naturally just rested against his palm. One hand fiddled with the fabric as he bit at his nails on the other. 

The last time he even looked remotely this nervous was after a few drinks when he showed you some writing he had done, something he hid but was proud of. And that was easily more than a year ago. But now, now was different. This almost looked like regret. 

After a quick sip of the warm liquid to calm your nerves, you cleared your throat, looking over at him. Ransom's gaze quickly snapped to focus in on you, waiting for you to speak.

"You asked me to stay, so what is it you could possibly want to talk about now?" You hadn't meant to sound so rude, but the exhaustion and irritability of the situation had settled heavily. You'd give anything to just have this over with, to be able to be alone and process everything. 

Ransom opened his mouth to speak, but closed it before letting out a sigh as he ran a hand through his hair. "I just don't understand how we're somehow on the same page and not at the same damn time. Frankly, I don't understand how we were both there and you somehow… came out feeling like, like that about it, about me."

A scoff escaped from you, shaking your head and looking at him with utter bewilderment written on your face. "Ransom, you truly don't see how I could have fallen in love with you?" His only response was a look that was somewhere between confusion and certainty, as if he was confused as to how love was even an option. 

"Okay then," you took another sip of your tea before staring back at him, determined at this point to at least make him see it your way, if not to even hurt him a little. "Tell me, how do you remember our trip to Paris?"

He huffed out a chuckle that was void of amusement, eyebrows scrunched as he shrugged, "I don't know, it was about a month after I started fucking your brains out. Woke up one morning and told you to pack a bag, which you did because at that point you did whatever I said, and we flew to Paris in my private jet. We spent a week there, having sex and eating at fancy restaurants. I bought you a bunch of clothes and jewelry. Then we came home."

Your eyes had fallen shut, shaking your head and clicking your tongue as you opened them. He looked smug, but his attitude quickly changed when he saw the anger and disbelief pouring itself out of you. "That's truly how you remember that trip?"

He shrugged, "Yeah," his voice faltered softly as he continued, "How do you remember it?"

Some part of you begged not to open that door, not to go diving in to memories that would no doubt leave you even more hurt than before. 

Delicate touches and even softer sheets, a soft breeze rustling the sheer curtains that led to the balcony overlooking the city, intricate smells - a warming mixture of coffee, baked bread, and a touch of nicotine.

Everything about it screamed Paris, the city of romance, the city of love and adventure. The city that undoubtedly shifted the emotions that flowed. 

"I know you're awake, baby girl," your eyes hadn't even opened yet, a smile creeping on your lips as your skin warmed at the sound of the pet name. 

There was that low chuckle, the one the vibrated the chest your head rested on, that made you melt and float at the same time. The delicate touches, the soft swirls he drew on your back turned to a firm squeeze on your hip. "Get your sweet ass up, I'm taking you out." 

Ransom slid out from underneath you, soft whines leaving you in protest as you finally opened your eyes to look at him. You were met with his bare backside as he made his way to the bathroom. "I'm too sore to move," you called out with a pout. 

He stopped at the door way, looking over his shoulder at you, eyes dark and a shit eating grin on his face. "Well, I suggest if you want me to kiss it better, you better get your ass in the damn shower."

-

"Where are you taking me?" The words came out as a giggle as you clung onto Ransom's arm, blindfolded and letting him lead you to God only knows as. The ground beneath gradually became flat and smooth, unlike the walkways of the streets. 

"You're not selling me off, are you?" You teased.

Ransom chuckled and you could feel his body move as he shook his head. "No, sweetheart. You're worth much more than everything you're about to see. It'd be hard finding someone willing to pay that much."

He stopped moving, reaching up to slowly pull the blindfold off. "You used to talk about visiting art museums all across the world when we were little, so I figured this'd be a nice little treat."

You squealed softly and you took in your surroundings. You were standing in the middle of the Tuileries garden at the Louvre, beautiful sculptures and flora overwhelming your senses. "God! You really do spoil me," you look at him with a bright smile. "Come on, I'm dragging you through as much as possible before you decide it's time to leave."

He smirked and shook his head, "Well, we have reservations at 6 for a restaurant not too far from here. But other than that, the day is yours, princess."

"You're letting me decide what we do for a whole day?" You raised your eyebrows at him. 

"What can I say? I'm full of surprises," that cocky tone was something you were coming to love more than tolerate, "Lead the way."

-

It was no wonder Ransom made you wear a nicer dress that day, insisting on you putting a little more effort into your appearance than usual. He never asked for anything like that. You found it odd earlier that morning as you smeared his favorite red lipstick across your lips, but as you stood outside the restaurant where meals cost easily as much as your phone bill, you understood. 

A balcony seat with a view overlooking the city. The sun was just starting to set, spreading hues of pink, purple, and gold in the sky as the lights from the Eiffel Tower could be seen glowing in the distance. People were still bustling in the streets, couples hand in hand, kids running and laughing, the occasional Parisian leaning against the stone building with a cigarette. It hit you then that there was no one else you'd want to be in Paris with. 

Already, Ransom had pulled your seat out for you and pushed you in, ordered your drinks and food for you, and as you looked back at him you caught him staring. For just a split second there was something more to the look on his face, a glisten in his eyes you'd never seen before. But, just as soon as you saw it, it was gone. A smirk spread across his lips, his eyes set back to their normal hue and you wanted nothing more than to smack it off his face. 

Not because he was being an asshole or because he was right about something (and knew damn well you were wrong), but because you knew this time that smirk was hiding something. But the time to pester and whine was neither here nor there when you were surrounded by riches, lavished in the luxury that was Paris, the upscale restaurant, and the company of Ransom. 

-

The cool metal of the railing nipped through the material of your shirt as you overlooked the now dark city from the comfort of your hotel room. A few glasses of wine you normally wouldn't drink, a shared cigarette you didn't quite like but did anyway because "it's a part of the experience"; and quite honestly, Ransom could get you to try anything at least once. 

The padding of his bare feet across the floor and onto the patio pulled you out of the replay the was looping in your head. The soft smiles, the feeling of his hand in your, the laughter and warmth that filled your chest all day quickly being pushed to the side as he reached his arms around you, quicker than you could turn around. 

Ransom clasped a necklace around your neck and when you looked down to examine it your heart swelled. A dainty, chain with a nice size diamond laid against your skin. If you didn't know any better your say it resembled a heart but… maybe that was just wishful thanking. 

"Ransom, you didn't have to ge-"

"I wanted to," he quickly cut you off, "And be a good girl for me and don't ever take it off." He looked at you expectantly as you looked back at him, eyes glossy and a slight pout to your lip as emotions overwhelmed you. "Promise?"

"Promise."

Reaching into your bag you pulled something out. Without even looking at it you tossed it at him, annoyance and hurt written on your face as you both watched the diamond necklace skitter toward him and stop by his hand that rested on on the table. 

You watched as Ransom picked it up, swallowing hard and jaw setting as he examined the piece of jewelry. A sigh and shake of his head as he eyes fell to the little "H" he had engraved on the backside of it. 

You smirked, huffing and biting the inner corner of your cheek before speaking, "Go ahead and tell me again how this was just an arrangement."

Taglis (cross through means you were unable to be tgged)   @sweetlittlegingy @star-spangled-steve @jessiejunebug @fresa-luna @thegirlwithpaperheart @jesaigne @introvertedmouse @sinner-as-saint @sp2900 @qrndevans @dammitcaswhy @livsheph @darcia22 @paranjaperiyauniverse @dramaticsassmaster @rose-k @lovemesomeavengers @steeeeverogers @hidden-behind-the-fourth-wall @bemysugarbean @dreamlesswonder86 @ambrosixx @heyiamthatbitch @daazzeey, @fresa-luna @bitchcraftandwitchery @thatoneslytherinbeater @breezyfreezey @quesadellacatburglar @renxzs @imsonick @sambucky8 @honeybabybubba @lover1307 @marvelismysafezone @bxby-kittxn @nibbles7192 @21stcenturywitchcraft @ssworldofsw @im-married-to-chris-evans

#ransom #ransom drysdale #hugh drysdale #ransom x reader #ransom drysdale x reader #hugh drysdale x reader #ransom thrombey x reader #ransom thrombey #cruel summer #cruel summer fic #ransom angst #ransom thrombey angst #ransom drysdale angst #ransom fluff #ransom thrombey fluff #ransom drysdale fluff #cs universe #cruel summer universe #knives out #knives out angst #knives out fluff #knives out x reader

[jjmaybanksblog]

Bruises- JJ Maybank

Request: hi❤ I was wondering if u could do the scene where the pogues see JJ's bruises?

Word count: 2,455

Warnings: mentions of physical and verbal abuse.

“We gotta be done before my scholarship interview in the morning.” Pope explained to you and Kie as he pulled up to the back of the Chateau. “Okay, well, we gotta focus.”

“It’s gonna be fine. We got John B and JJ inside the well, and me up top. You, Y/N, and Sarah will be outside transporting.” Pope recalled the plan, exiting the truck.

They headed to the back of his vehicle, opening the back to grab their supplies. “That tin can hold up to like, 200-300 pounds.”

“Thanks.” Kie praised him as she unlatched the hinge. 

“Uh, what for?”

“For stranding us. You know, making us make up.” Kie softly grinned as you stood next to her. 

“Seriously Pope, you’re like the super glue for this group.” You complimented. “What makes you think that was me?”

Before Kie could respond, lines full of lights turned on, confusing the trio. A loud buzzing sound leading them towards the backyard.

“What the hell?” 

You guys walked into the area, colored and festive lights hung everywhere. Inflatable palm trees chilled in the corner. JJ sat in a shiny new hot tub, popping a bottle of champagne open.

“JJ?” you asked as you walked up to the front of the hot tub. “What did you do, JJ” Pope asked in disbelief. 

“I got a jet going straight in my butt right now. Y’all should get in immediately, you hear me? Salud!” JJ cheered to no one as he poured out a glass, only to drink straight from the bottle.

“How much did this cost?” Pope asked, already knowing the answer.

“Uh… well, with the generator, the petrol, and oh, hey, express delivery… pretty much all of it, yeah.” JJ’s words were slurred, clearly intoxicated.

Pope's jaw fell open, “all of it?”

“Yeah, all of it.” JJ confirmed, pushing his sunglasses up. “You spent all the money in one day?”

“Yeah, burned a hole right through my pocket. But I mean like, come one guys, like, look at this! Finest in jet-based massage therapy, that’s what they told me.” JJ grinned at his actions. You furrowed your eyebrows at him, watching him take another drink from the bottle.

JJ noticed the look on your face, "Y/N, what? Can’t a man have a little luxury in his life? Come on,” he flung his sunglasses off, “all this scrimpin’ and scrapin’. I mean like… guys, we- you only live once, right? Enough of this emotional shit. Get in the Cat’s Ass. Come on.” 

“In the what?” Kie asked softly.

“In the Cat’s Ass. That’s what I named her.” JJ giggled to himself as he let the jets hit the back of his muscles. 

“Oh, hey, yo, I almost forgot.” He leaned over and pressed a button, a disco ball lighting up and spinning around.

“Yeah, that’s right, I know. Disco mode. That’s right baby!” He cheered in excitement.

“Are you kidding me? You could have paid for restitution!” Pope raised his voice. “Or literally given it to any charity!” Kie snapped. “Guys…” You started, seeing the pain in JJ’s eyes. 

“Or better yet you could’ve helped us buy supplies to get the rest of the gold out of the well!” Pope continued as JJ rubbed his eyes.

“Okay well you know what? I didn’t do that.” JJ yelled back as he stood up from his spot, revealing the new red and purple marks that littered his chest. You gasped, covering your mouth with your hands.

“I got a hot tub! For my friends. I got a hot tub for my friends. You know what? No, screw friends. I got a hot tub for my family!” JJ cried out, his voice wavering. “I got this for you.” He pointed to the champagne bottle that was already half empty.

Your eyes welled up with tears, noticing just how broken JJ Maybank was. “Guys, look what I did for you! Alright? Look at this!”

“JJ…” your voice cracked, “no, you, you both stop being emotional. It’s fine, okay?”

You marched up the steps of the hot tub, stopping at the first step, “come on Y/N, just get in.” You pulled the boy into your arms as you both cried against each other. His head rested on your stomach as you leaned your head down to rest on top of his.

“I just couldn’t do it.” JJ sobbed, his body shaking from the pain. He tightened his grip around your waist as you held him in your arms. One hand rubbed his shoulder while the other softly held onto the back of his head. 

“I can’t take him anymore!” He screamed into your chest, “I was gonna kill him.” 

“It’s okay baby, I got you. You’re safe with us.” you whispered, pressing a kiss to the top of his head. Kie and Pope joined you on the steps, wrapping the boy in a group hug. “I just wanna do the right thing.” He admitted, letting out a heartbreaking sob.

“We know.” Kie reassured him, “we know.”

One by one the friends let go of him, "you guys can finish up whatever you were doing, I'll take care of him." JJ refused to let go of your waist as your fingers softly rubbed his scalp.

'I got this.' You mouthed, your friends nodding their heads in acknowledgment. The two walked away to continue their plans, you slowly lifted JJ's head up to look at you.

"Hey JJ, let's get you out of here, is that okay?" You spoke softly. He nodded his head, slowly releasing you. You held his hand as you eased him out of the hot tub and down the steps.

"Stay right here, I'm gonna grab a towel." JJ muttered a gentle 'okay'. Sniffing to clear his sinuses. Running inside the house, you yanked a towel off the bathroom rack and headed back outside.

You wrapped it around his waist before leading him inside by his hand. Entering the bedroom, you picked out a pair of boxers and shorts for him to change into. "Do you think you can change into this without my help?" You asked him, holding out the clothes.

JJ nodded his head as he stumbled across the hall into the bathroom. You stood on the outside of the door, harshly biting down on your tongue. You've never seen JJ so broken, so hurt, and you wished you had known he was dealing with this.

You felt guilt and anger for not knowing about this sooner. Whenever JJ appeared with a new bruise or cut, he always told her that he got into a brawl with a Kook. He lied to you for 7 years, you never caught on which killed you on the inside.

After a few minutes, JJ opened the door with the towel in his hands, and changed into dry clothes. "Can we go lay down?" He questioned, his words still slurred. "Yeah, of course hunny."

He walked into the bedroom and sighed. Without thinking he plopped himself onto the bed, letting out a cry of pain as the bed hit his bruises.

Biting your bottom lip you asked, "do you want me to get you an ice pack?" He nodded his head, resting his hands on his eyes. Heading into the kitchen, you grabbed an ice tray, dumping some ice cubes out into a ziplock bag.

You walked back into the room, shutting the door quietly. JJ praised you as you handed him the bag of ice. He placed it on the biggest bruise he had. "Can you- can you stay with me? And play with my hair because honestly it makes me feel safe." He admitted, not even processing what he was saying.

You sat down next to him, allowing him to rest his head in your lap. Your fingers found your way to his hair, letting them run through and massage his scalp. You sat in silence before he spoke up. "I really, really like you Y/N. Like Really." He emphasized the final 'really'.

"I really, really like you too JJ." You spoke the truth. "You know, these last few days have been crazy as fuck. You know you've been there. But the amount of times I almost lost you scared the shit out of me." He confessed, his hand reaching up to place itself on your leg.

"And-and when we almost got shot at Crains, my soul nearly left my body. I want to keep you safe." Your eyebrows furrowed together as you listened to his words.

"But I'm a fuck up and I don't wanna ruin your life. I mean my own dad doesn't want me, why would you?" His voice cracked. You reached your hand down towards his face to make him look at you.

"Hey, don't say that JJ. You have made my life so much better in every single way possible. You show you care about me. You let me smoke with you so we both forget about our problems together. You taught me more shit about fishing than I knew. You can call me the worst names possible, but it doesn't bother me because I do the same to you. It scares me how much I like you because in a snap you could be gone. Hell, when you got arrested I couldn't sleep the night of." You rambled on, realizing that maybe you had more than a silly crush on him. 

"You're cute when you ramble." He muttered, grinning at the sound of your laugh, yawning loudly afterwards. "You ready to sleep hun?" You asked, a nod answering the question. You shifted a bit, laying down as he rested his head on your chest. You kissed the side of his head, feeling his arm around your waist slowly tighten its grip.

______________♡_____________

You woke up, and checked the clock reading the time, '9:36'. Turning your head, you saw JJ still passed out, his snoring filling the room. Carefully getting out of the bed, you walked outside into the backyard and headed straight to the hammock. 

You sat alone peacefully, the smell of the waters filled the air, the sounds of birds chirping softly echoed, and the feeling of a cool breeze skimmed your tan skin, sunglasses covering your eyes from the sun. Footsteps came up from behind you, a figure plopped itself down next to you.

A groan emitted from JJ's mouth, shutting his eyes from the blinding sunlight. "How's the hangover?" You asked, handing over the sun glasses. "Feels like I have forks jammed in my head. Thanks." He grabbed the sunglasses, quickly putting them on.

"Do you remember anything from last night?" You asked, fiddling with your thumbs. "Uhhh, I remember almost falling into the bathtub when I was changing. And then- oh..." he trailed off remembering parts of the conversation you had.

The two sat in silence again as JJ rested his hand on your thigh. "I wish I could've stopped that from happening." You broke the silence, your voice wavering at the image in your head of his bruises.

JJ shook his head, "No, no you-you do enough for me. I feel like I don't deserve you." He whispered the last part. Your heart clenched at his confession. "JJ, you are the best part of my life." Your hand cupped his, looking at the boy who lifted up the sunglasses.

"I want to be able to take you on dates and treat you like a princess and buy you everything you could ever want. But I'm a Pogue, that could never happen." He clenched his jaw, knowing deep down you deserve someone who could give you anything you wanted.

"JJ, I'm literally a Pogue too. I don't care if you don't have money because guess what? I don't either. That doesn't change the fact that I love you. Just being with you makes me feel safe."

JJ's mouth slightly fell open, allowing those three words to sink in. You realized what you had said before it was too late. Your facial expressions matched his as you quickly looked down at your hands. They sat there, trying to process the words you just said.

Stress flooded through your body as you waited for his response, only to continue to sit in silence. "I know that was just kinda thrown at you but please just be my best friend right now and not the guy I just confessed my love to." You spoke up, killing the silence.

"I don't want to be your best friend." He started, instantly making your heart drop into your stomach. "What?" You whispered, continuing to crack your knuckles.

"I don't want to be your best friend. I want to be your boyfriend. I want to take you out on dates. I want to do those weird face masks with you. I want to do any cliché shit you want to do. I want to do anything and everything with you. I want you to be my girlfriend so whenever we go to parties I can be like, 'this is my girlfriend' and show you off. I want more than just being best friends." He said, reaching over with his hand to hold the bottom of your chin.

JJ looked down at your lips before glancing back up to your eyes. Your heart rate picked up, "kiss me." You assured him, turning to face him. Your eyes fluttered shut as you both leaned in, connecting your lips gently. JJ grinned into the passionate kiss, not being able to handle the butterflies in his stomach. 

You pulled back to catch your breaths, resting your foreheads against each other before you returned to your original position. He slung his arm around your shoulder, leaving you space to rest your head on his chest. You beamed as he used his index finger to rub up and down on your arm.

"Remember back in freshman year during homecoming, I asked you to dance with me to 'The Night We Met'?" JJ tilted his head down towards you, locking eyes. You nodded your head in response. "John B and Pope hyped me up for at least an hour to encourage me to ask you. And when you had your head on my chest and I just held you, it felt like we were the only two people alive. And I loved that feeling, I don't want it to ever go away." 

Your smile got wider, remembering the moment as if it were yesterday. "It won't." He pressed a kiss to the top of your head before falling back into a comfortable silence.

"Just making sure... we are dating right?" JJ spoke up earning a chuckle from you. "Yes. Yes we are."

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[asgardianthot]

If anything happens (sambucky)

A/N: this was supposed to be a short one-shot, but I guess I got carried away over my love for these two. Enjoy! 💕

word count:  5644

summary: their feelings for each other have been lost and found and lost again for months. Then Bucky gets injured…

“Oh, my god.” Wanda raised her eyebrows, her elbows up on the counter, “You guys are dating.”

Sam frowned, “What?”

She shook her head with a smile, the news getting her hyped in the most positive and happiest way; she backed away in a less intrusive posture.

“How long has it been going on?”

Yet her cheerful attitude had the man taken aback.

“We’re not dating!” he declared, placing down his cup of freshly-made coffee on the counter, “No, how could we-“

“Oh. I see.” Wanda squinted, however seeing how Sam was clearly waiting for an explanation of her sudden change of words, she mentally agreed to be more verbal with his very clueless co-worker, “You’re downright the stupidest person I have ever met.”

Sam raised his eyebrows with shock and offense.

“Excuse me?”

The young woman had to tone it down, “Look, when you came back from that mission, you talked it through, right?” the response being more cluelessness, she now was furiously rolling her eyes, “Your feelings, dumbass! How you left things, how you want them to continue!”

Processing the thought, Sam held his weight on the counter behind him and limited himself to biting the inside of his cheek. Wanda lowered her head, looking dead into his eyes with utter seriousness.

“You did have that conversation, right?” she pressured.

“No.” He simply replied, suddenly believing there might have been a better approach at the whole Bucky situation, “Why? Should we?”

Bucky had kissed him. Or, perhaps it was Sam who kissed him, the lines of who took the initiative were a bit blurry but the point was that there had been a kiss. A very confused, very desperate, hungry kiss, coming from two mouths that found themselves drawn to each other like they knew they were bound to happen. It had taken months of awkward stares, developing to witty comments which sounded like they held a double meaning and would turn the spokesperson ashamed of ever saying it.

It had taken months of their messy dynamic and mean jokes, months of risking their lives together, months of uneasy proximity, realizing that the other person felt that too. But eventually, Sam let something slip, an implicative comment, an unmerciful glance. Anything could have been that last drop to overflow a glass full of unspoken feelings at that point. And after that one kiss, after that frozen look of want, came another one, and then more, until they shared a three-day period of utter confusion, awkward laughs and needy escapades to get back to each other’s lips.

That was, until Sam got a mission call. It was simple, not risky nor complicated, but it needed a well-thought plan which took a very long time to execute. And so, Sam fled the compound without a word, for he didn’t exactly know what to say when saying goodbye.

Wanda shook her head again, only this time, it was with great disappointment.

“I have no words for you.” At the sound of that, Sam threw an aimless hand in the air along with a puff of air, but she cut him off before he could even start ranting, “You left for months, right after everything happened. How could you not-? What did you tell him that could possibly replace the need for a heart-to-heart?”

Sam thought hard, trying to remember with a big frown on his face what was the actual first thing he said to Bucky when he came back.

He shrugged, “I don’t know, I asked him for an update report.”

Wanda’s mouth fell open, then closed it back up as her anger surpassed her shock.

“An update report.” She repeated, her tone low and full of disbelief.

Noticing the patronizing on her voice, Wilson defended himself, “I’d been gone for months! I had no idea what was going on in the compound, I needed an update!”

“And you couldn’t have asked me?” she reminded him of that possibility, but the intention was to make him realize that he had acted willingly and for a purpose.

As a matter of fact, the more he cracked his head around it, he began to take notice of what was the only thing ringing in his stupid brain the second he set foot in the compound.

“I… wanted to talk to him.” He admitted, a truthful tone exposing a little vulnerability; yet at the sound of no reply, he threw his hands in the air again, “I didn’t know it was such a stupid thing to do!”

“Of course it was, now he thinks you’re not into him, because you avoided the subject with a report!” Maximoff scolded him.

Instead of continuing to bark at each other back and forth, Sam cooled off and showed her his hands in order to communicate that intent.

“Okay, alright, so… What if I… want to talk about it? You know, what do I do?”

The only thing Wanda was able to do was sigh, naturally gaining a smirk across her face when seeing how helpless the man looked.

“I hate being right sometimes.” She let out, a hand on her hip, and found herself needing to explain further one more time, “He thought you guys were dating. You just didn’t get the memo.”

Having pointed her finger at Sam, she walked out of that kitchen without looking back.

“What do you mean?” Wilson tried to get her attention, but it was pointless, “Hey. Wanda, what does that mean?!”

-

Bucky wasn’t one to be careless over the people in his life. He was constantly worrying about their safety, concerned over the fact that he himself tended to attract bad things and the constant fear and guilt that came with his past. He had more than once believed that the sole fact of having the Avengers close put them in harm’s way, so his concern was not only constant, but silent. Kept to himself.

Nevertheless, when Sam left abruptly for a one-man mission, sent by SHIELD, he had to ask.

“Hey, Clint?” he pointed to a screen when Barton walked in the room, where Bucky had been waiting to receive some explanatory company, “What are these?”

Clint noticed the coded numbers and replied easily, “Wilson’s coordinates.”

The archer resumed to whatever task he had come in for, sitting in front of a desk. However Barnes had his mind railing over the symbols. If his coding skills and knowledge weren’t too rusty, he was right to believe those coordinates indicated proximity. And if his memory of the actual mission wasn’t failing, proximity could only mean his steps had been completed to the point of being almost done, according to plan.

“Which means he’ll be back soon, right?” he dared to ask.

“Should be, yeah.” Barton answered, still focused on his own screen, “Why?”

“What if he’s not?” the soldier couldn’t help but ramble a little, out of pure and genuine uncertainty, “Back soon, I mean. That would be bad news, right?”

That was more than enough questions for Clint to turn his chair around and face him with an odd, suspicious look on his face.

“You growing a soft spot for him or something?” he shot rather rudely, to which Bucky frowned like he didn’t know what the hell he was talking about, “What’s got you so worried?”

It was up to him now to pretend nothing was happening nor had happened; not the kisses, the sentiment exchanges, the touches, the hand guiding into confined spaces, not the butterflies in his stomach nor the excitement in the pit of his stomach when thinking about Sam coming back and resuming where they left off.

“Jesus, I’m sorry for caring.” He forced a scoff through a sentence that had Clint squinting his eyes, for it wasn’t something anyone would expect to come from Barnes’ mouth, “You’re the one who said we needed to look after each other.”

Barton decided to simply snort out loud, mocking the man’s unusual behavior, as he was fully aware that something was going on, even if he didn’t know what that was. So he simply focused back on his task, a smirk on his face still. Bucky squinted his eyes and abandoned the room for good after that.

-

The worst part about getting a compound alert right when Sam wanted to go talk to Bucky wasn’t the bad timing; it was the lack of agents near reach. The Avengers had become skimpy after all, not truly a unit but more of a disperse team. With only Wanda and Bucky living there permanently –from lack of a better living situation– Sam had followed, merely out of feeling like he had to; like the gratitude of being allowed to be a hero could only be paid by dedicating his life to Avenging. The problem was, it was only them. And Barton, at the moment, when he wasn’t taking time off with his family. The whole ‘I need to be there’ speech quite stuck on him as well.

And they usually would get a better-thought page, one that involved more heroes for the job, or maybe less heroes but along with a proper strategy. Usually, but this this was a SHIELD raid, which meant, they didn’t need plan nor well-thought, they needed quick. So, quickly, the four heroes ran to the quinjet while receiving orders from Fury.

In there, the two men who had been more than tense and avoiding each other, shared looks. Undecipherable looks. Wanda, on her part, was expectant as one would be in a romantic drama type of movie, even shooting glances at Sam, like saying ‘well?’, and the Falcon had no proper answer, even if he could have said something out loud. Bucky, with his upset expression, was definitely not okay with the overall situation. He was focusing on his own boots with a small frown, not wanting to talk and keeping it all to himself. So the silence in the jet was painful.

“And here I thought I’d get a quiet weekend.” Barton broke the tension while flying the quinjet, although his idea of tension was explained by the upcoming mission, and not an emotional quarrel between two soldiers.

Wanda felt even more awkward after that attempt, herself fully aware of what was going on.

“Is Lang still off-radar?” she made a second attempt, asking Clint.

Yet it was Wilson who cut her off, already knowing the answer would be a hard no.

“We don’t need tic-tac, we’re fine.” He reassured them of something he believed to be absolutely true, which was why they hadn’t even bothered to call Rhodey or anyone else for that matter: it was just a raid, it should be a piece of cake, “He’d just get himself stepped on.”

Bucky was left to roll his eyes at the snarky comment. He usually would have comeback and derailed the mocking to an offense towards Sam, turning it on him like they always did jokingly, but for now everything that came out of Samuel Wilson’s mouth pissed him off.

He had, after all, pretended like nothing happened. He had, after all, not even dignify Bucky with a simple explanation, not even to say he wasn’t interested anymore. Nothing. And he had had the balls to shove the moments they’d shared under the table by coming to him first for a goddamn report. That was everything Barnes could think about; how angry he was, how humiliated and vulnerable he felt, for he had welcomed Sam with an anxious smile, and awkward smile like the one Sam had kissed through the first time, one that stated ‘I’ve been waiting for you’. He had put himself out there, only to be rejected in such a chill way.

Hopefully, a signal hit Barton’s visuals in the jet’s screens.

“All communications on.” He called for the rest of the team.

They all complied and heard Fury switch his original orders to new, shouted and hectic ones. It sounded like the situation had worsened, and Fury was not desperate but angry. It hit him differently when it came to his organization; like his work was being violated and tainted. The second they landed, they ran for all hell, both the team and Director Fury all caught up in a frenzy.

It didn’t stop Sam from reaching out to Bucky as soon as he could, though.

“Barnes, we should-“

“Hit the skies, then through the window.” The man cut him off.

He was repeating Fury’s orders to him, like the Falcon wasn’t entirely sure about them. Yet it was all fake, and they both sort of knew it. Bucky was just avoiding him.

Sam squinted his eyes nonetheless, “I know, I was trying to-“

“Your earpiece okay?” Barnes spat.

“It is, I-“

“Then hit the skies and through the window.”

That being said, and very harshly said, he strutted his way, leaving Sam to grunt as he set his wings up and flew away.

Barton led Wanda and Bucky through the subterranean ladder. The latter went in through land for recognition, always right in the line of fire. He couldn’t help it. As they reached the hallways of the occupied facilities, there was nothing but calm and quiet besides them. Only a few seconds later, the shooting broke loose from a group of enemies.

Barnes was the first one to fire back, which gave away their position but was inevitable. He hit one, two, three hostiles while Clint shot one and Wanda threw two out the window. The best sniper in the US Army, indeed. That way, as more hostiles came in the way, the three heroes attacked their way to the communications room where Fury had instructed them to rescue SHIELD agents being held hostages.

“Air’s safe.” Wilson’s word was heard in everyone’s ears through the comms.

Right in that moment, an attacker was disclosed when Bucky reached a corner, and he would have been more apt to hear him coming if he hadn’t been so damn focused on not getting railed up at Sam Wilson’s voice. Since that wasn’t the case, the bullet almost got too close to him. If he got hit, he definitely would blame the man. That one attacker turned out to be more than a dozen, and the ones Bucky didn’t hit or Maximoff didn’t knock out with her powers, ran towards Barton.

“The top floor’s all yours.” The Falcon spoke again, “They look like amateurs.”

Barton scoffed as a man got close enough to be out of reach for his arrows, “They don’t fight like amateurs.” He replied out of breath while taking out the attacker hand in hand.

As he dialogued with Wilson, the archer got punched in the ribs, hard, and felt himself a little cornered before Wanda saved him. As the hostile flew away in a magenta-colored cloud, Clint gave her a nod of gratitude. Meanwhile, Bucky was still at front.

“You have clear entrance.” Sam insisted, “Go now.”

It took one last effort to take out all attackers, resourcing to take them all out through killing. That wasn’t always their intent. Barnes usually tried to neutralize the offense by shooting their legs or shoulders, something they could recover from, instead of adding more deaths to his books. And killing for SHIELD felt even more disgusting to both him and Maximoff. Once they reached upstairs, they broke the communication room, where a few raid-responsible men were aiming their guns at the hostages as a warning.

That was when, perfectly timed, Sam burst through the window and shot two of them. Continuingly, they all four fought the remaining ones.

“See? Told you.” Wilson stated, locking his wings in, “Piece of cake.”

“You and Clint take care of the agents.” Wanda ignored his cocky attitude with more orders, “Barnes, with me.”

The appellee nodded, following behind the woman and leaving the other two to untie the agents and help them out the emergency door. It shouldn’t have to be a difficult task, given how as the agents were freed, they were in full capacity to look after themselves. The sole problem in that mission was the amount of people in that raid trying to kill the Avengers.

As soon as Bucky and Wanda walked through the door, though, they were received by more shooting. As much as Clint or Sam wanted to help, they recognized the first thing to do when facing a new threat was getting the hostages’ hands and feet loose. They fought the guns off. Maximoff was strong enough to send them away and Barnes had perfect aim, so it wasn’t a tough fight but a long one.

Suddenly, a paralyzing sentence was yelled over comms.

“Barnes is down!” the feminine voice rang on Sam’s ears.

And he needed nothing more to leave the agents on their own and run in the same direction the two enhanced had gone before. As soon as he reached them, he saw Bucky thrown on the floor, blood beginning to pool under his body while he held his ribs, grimacing.

“What the hell happened?” he asked loudly to the woman who was still fighting off offensives.

At the lack of response, he switched his sight to the machine gun facing them both. Quite the strategy those amateurs had planned. This wasn’t a machine gun, it was a bloody canon brought up as a last resource, an element of surprise to hurt them when they least expected it. He blocked the bullets with his wings while Wanda destroyed the whole thing and blasted the attackers away. Again, they were most likely dead than injured.

Being able to focus on the injured man now, Sam placed his hands on Bucky’s shoulders.

“Where?” he asked.

The man merely groaned, not even giving a proper response. Therefore, Wilson stuck to the spot that was being held out in pain. He opened his vest and saw the blood coming from right below his chest. He felt the air leave his own body at the sight of it and the possibility of the bullets flooding Bucky’s lungs.

“We need an exit!” the veteran screamed, the desperation invading him.

Maximoff broke the glass window with his powers to allow them a clear exit, letting Sam know she would be helping them out by lifting Bucky swiftly through the air. The Falcon then ran and flew out the window, followed by the floating body. Unfortunately Wanda’s concentration was derailed by the sight of another gun aimed towards her in the distance, fighting him off with one of her hands and losing control over Barnes in the process.

“Bucky!” she yelled more as a way to avert Wilson than as a genuine reaction.

So the winged soldier rushed to catch him mid-air, rather roughly, therefore getting a good cry-out from the man.

“I got you, I got you.” He reassured him as he held him by the armpits, something he thought must have hurt like a bitch, if not by simple deduction, by the sound of Bucky’s painful moan, “I’m sorry, I got you.”

He managed to fly them both to the quinjet, stopping outside and dragging him in as Bucky’s head lulled to his sides, numbed out by pain. When Sam laid him down on the table, he let out a loud groan, which, at least, let the veteran know he was still conscious.

“Tell me where you are.” He tested that consciousness while hectically removing the vest from his body, and admiring how his shirt was soaked in thick blood.

Bucky’s voice was hoarse, “Dumbass jet.”

Sam filed it as an indicative of awareness but asked another question to be sure, “Who am I?”

Barnes couldn’t help a small side smile to grow on his worn out face, his dazed eyes focusing on Sam’s blurry features.

“A fucking moron.” He pulled off.

Wilson was left to stare down at him with a big sad frown, wanting to smile at him for insulting him even on such a state, and he wanted him not to hate him. Not now, not when he was hurt and half gone. If he could go back in time, he sure as hell would, he would talk to him and tell him how he felt, so that he wouldn’t bleed out on the table thinking Sam didn’t want him back. Thinking that the man who was trying to heal his wounds had rejected him.

Suddenly, Bucky’s eyes started closing down and his pupils rolled back into his skull for a second, beginning to faint. Yet Sam grabbed his face not too gently and patted his cheek.

“Hey, hey, no. No! Stay with me!” He said in despair, forcing his eyelids open; the victim groaned as if asking to be left the hell alone, “That’s it, look at me. Can you stay awake? Do that for me?”

Just like an angel fallen to his rescue, the earpieces rang with good news. “Task Forces came in!” Wanda’s voice sounded like the best melody any of them had ever heard in that moment, “Clint, fly the boys home, now!”

“Running.” The other man replied.

“Ya heard that?” Sam asked Bucky, still holding his head, “We’re gonna go home. We’re gonna fix you up.”

He ripped the bloody shirt open and rapidly fetched the medical kit under the table. He stole a glance to count the bullet holes, one, two, three. He couldn’t turn Barnes’ body over in order to see if there were any exit wounds or if he had all three bullets inside him. All he could do for him was press some gauze on the wound. Bucky moaned in pain, loudly.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry.” He apologized frantically as he applied more pressure, and Bucky seemed to be woken up by the pain, panting while staring up at the ceiling, “You’re gonna be alright.”

He glared at Sam, “I hate you.” He spat through gritted teeth.

And he wasn’t just speaking nonsense, blindly attacking the man who caused him pain. No, he was also referring to how he was the last person he wanted to be doing that to him. He was so angry at him, he genuinely hated him, and the fact that he was making him ache so badly while doing his best to keep him alive wasn’t helping.

“I know.” Wilson agreed to both things, getting more gauze because the bleeding wasn’t stopping, “Just stay awake.”

Finally, Barton came in, and Sam didn’t even glance at him.

“Get us to the compound! Now!” he barked angrily, not wanting to sound desperate before when it was just him and Bucky, but now all he needed was to save his life.

So Clint did as commanded and soon enough the jet was flying away, the only sounds heard being the quiet hovering noise the jet produced, Bucky’s breathing and complaints, and Sam’s soothing words.

“How’s he doing?” Barton asked after a minute or two of no words being exchanged.

Wilson sighed and cooled himself down before answering, trying not to take it out on Barton, who clearly had no fault in Bucky’s state.

“I’m looking at a… definitely broken rib. Probably multiple. I’m hoping no punctured lung.”

It was the diagnose he had in his head. It explained why it hurt so badly, and he couldn’t not apply pressure or else he would effectively bleed out. No superserum could prevent that, eventually. And if it he was only bleeding out, that would mean they still had a long –although painful- time before his state worsened drastically. On the other hand, if he was also bleeding in…

Barnes chest convulsed for him to cough up, and he coughed up blood. It meant what Sam feared: punctured lung. It made him panic even more, now that it became harder and harder for Bucky to breathe.

“Sam.” He wheezed out.

“Please, please, please.” The man begged, his hands covered in blood and keeping him still while his own voice turned shaky, “Just five more minutes. Hold on just five minutes.”

“Sam…” his voice was now a whisper.

Wilson shut his eyes, teary eyed. Hopelessness kicking in.

“I don’t- I don’t know what else to do.”

Bucky’s eyes were far closed, his mouth gaped slightly as his throat did all the work of trying to pass air towards lungs that wouldn’t cooperate. He sounded less agonizing now, but by the looks of it, that was exactly the situation, with still a few minutes to get him to safety.

-

When he reopened his eyes, everything was different. The room was silent, for real, this time, no wheezing or panting or jet noises. He didn’t feel pain anymore, and he didn’t have any difficulty breathing. Instead, he felt comfortable and nursed back to health. That was when he took in his surroundings and realized he was on a hospital bed, in a sided room at the compound. Safe and sound, and patched up by the sensation of an unharmed chest.

The second thing he noticed was the company: Sam was sitting on a chair in the corner of the room, busy staring at his phone in complete silence. Bucky thought he had probably stayed there waiting for him to wake up, taking the blame for what happened. And Bucky knew it wasn’t his fault, therefore the only reason behind his concern was some sort of pity mission after basically dumping him without words.

As he accommodated himself a little, he felt a mild sting where the bullets used to be, where his ribs had cracked, but it was bearable now. Nonetheless, the sounds caused Sam to notice him.

“Great.” Barnes groaned, placing his back against the pillow, “I didn’t die.”

Wilson, on his behalf, stood up quickly, as if wanting to check on his injuries, or hug him or something. Instead, he remained standing up, awkwardly and not knowing what to do next.

He let out a nervous breath that sounded more like a laugh, “Yeah, thanks for that.”

As a matter of fact, he didn’t have much more to add. He was rather frozen in spot, staring at the man who almost died in his arms, quite dramatically, and with whom he felt he couldn’t be completely honest. The whole ‘not talking about it’ drama had expanded to the point he didn’t even know what he couldn’t talk about.

“Well, I can’t leave you guys alone.” Bucky brushed it off, “I’d be a terrible soldier if I did.”

That was how Sam understood that the former sergeant wasn’t letting anything go. He was purposely shoving their exchanged feelings under the rug so he didn’t have to verbally express how upset he was, which was diminishing both Sam’s feelings for him and how terrified he was in that quinjet.

“Bucky…” he tried, but was cut off immediately.

“Hey, thanks for pulling me out.” The man’s tone was distant but not cold; Sam gave in and nodded to his gratitude, “I’m fine, though, so you can go on with your day.”

That being said, Bucky propped himself up with his elbows, in order to be partially sitting on the bed, but the movements still caused him to groan. It hadn’t been too long after surgery, after all. To the sounds of distress, Sam rushed to give him a hand but the man rejected it harshly.

“Trust me, I’m alright.” He sighed, the pain gone by now, “I don’t need your pity.”

That shot of honesty was all Sam required to cross the unspoken line. He was going to speak and discuss everything he didn’t remember if he was allowed to discuss or not. He took one step back not to invade his privacy.

“Pity? Buck, why do you think I’m here?” he frowned.

The appellee shrugged, “Guilt.” He said easily.

The response brought a smirk to Wilson’s face, but it wasn’t a very positive one. If the term ‘sad smirk’ hadn’t been invented yet, he definitely thought that was the name of the expression he held. Lacking the need for any more proof of the man’s feelings, he moved decisively to sit next to him.

Bucky seemed startled by the gesture, “What are you-“

“Move.”

“No, it’s my bed.”

“I’m sitting with you now, move.”

And so he complied, although still confused and somewhat reminding himself that he should be upset. Sam’s hands guided him to where he could lay down comfortably, and Bucky let himself be manhandled for the sake of his ribs. He wanted to hold him. He wanted to lay next to him for hours and just stare at each other, he wanted Sam’s company. But it appeared since the moment he came back from his mission he didn’t want that back. So now, seeing Wilson lay his dumb head on that hospital bed pillow altered his perception even further.

Sam couldn’t contain a smile as they both looked at each other, not touching but closer than ever.

“You look ridiculous.” Bucky commented on the sight.

“You’re wearing a hospital gown, you don’t look so glamorous yourself.” He shot back, earning the smallest side-smirk from Barnes, who quickly concealed it, “Listen to me. You are one of the most stubborn people I’ve ever met, if not the worst of them all.”

The approach had Bucky raising an eyebrow, shocked at best.

“You’re reckless, you’re dumb-“

“Gee, thanks.” Barnes interrupted him with an offended frown.

Sam, however, ignored him and continued his speech, “You are literally the most obnoxious person when it comes to not looking after yourself and you have no regard for your own personal safety nor happiness.”

“Is there a point to all of this?” Bucky insisted, beginning to lose interest in the insult rant, “Cause fuck you too, Sam, jesus.”

Once again, Wilson saw himself forced to avoid a proper answer to seek a lineal sense of coherence in his narration. Instead, he let an amused smile escape him before raising his voice so that his message came across loud and clear.

“So I understand how you would miss what’s right before your eyes. But I’ve never known you to be naïve, Bucky.” Only then did Barnes was at a loss of words, starting to understand Sam’s intent, “You know what happened and you know what it meant. If you would just… let me make up for not talking about it right after I got back… I’d like to discuss it now.”

Bucky wanted to listen. He really did. But the possibility of it becoming a praise tale of how great he was and how much Sam liked him yet ending with ‘however’ and ‘just colleagues’, was something that weighed far more than his excitement. If that were the case, he didn’t want to be stabbed in the heart nor shot in the chest all over again.

“I’m really not interested in your explanation, Sam.” Bucky sighed, against his inner will, “You wanna forget what happened, you can just leave, no hard feelings.”

Sam shook his head and placed one gentle hand on Barnes cheek, some mild disbelief plastered on his own features.

“I don’t know which of us is the dumbest, I swear to god.”

And Bucky understood with all certainty.

“It’s you, it’s one hundred percent you.” He told Sam, not allowing himself to smile.

He meant it, keeping in mind how he hadn’t even mentioned the subject until now even though he wanted Bucky like Bucky wanted him.

“Probably, yeah.” Sam had to agree, “Cause I sure as hell wanted to say I wanted to try that kiss again, and I don’t know why I didn’t say so. Then you were literally dying on my arms and I thought… if anything happens to him, I lost my one chance at being with him, and I really want that chance.”

Bucky clacked his tongue, pensive, “You asked for a damn report.”

“I wanted to talk to you.” Sam tried to explain, “I didn’t know how.”

“You could have just said ‘hi, it’s been a while’.”

“I’ll try that next time.” The words came out instinctively, and he hoped he hadn’t screw up, so he added a stipulation, “If you forgive me.”

Bucky took a big breath. Was hard not to forgive him after that speech.

“Well, I’m very much alive.” He said almost rolling his eyes, “You still want that chance?”

A warm smile creeped its way into Wilson’s face, “I’d like that-“

Yet Barnes didn’t let him finish, instead clashing his lips against the Falcon’s, whose hand that still stood on the soldier’s cheek cupped the entire face tenderly. Bucky’s free hand also went to find the other man, holding the back of his head for good measure, while one of their tongues slipped in softly. It wasn’t as desperate as the other kisses, it wasn’t so needy nor senseless; this kiss, instead felt like the last piece of a puzzle. It felt like it made sense.

When they disconnected their lips and stared deep into each other’s eyes, Bucky’s impulse was to smile, “Here’s an update report for you.” He said cheekily, “I’m still in love with you.”

Wilson drew his face a little back for a better sight.

“Love?”

The soldier suddenly regretted his choice of words, but didn’t want to take the truth back, so he simply went with it.

“You’re not gonna run away now, are you? Fly away in those little wings of yours?”

Of course he would mock Sam as a manner of processing his oversharing. The veteran could only chuckle and affectively place a loose strand of hair behind his ears.

“No, I won’t, love.” He mocked him back, “Gonna take much more than that for you to scare me off.”

Bucky rolled his eyes, “Yeah, don’t hold your breath.” He added before launching for another kiss.

#sambucky #sam wilson #bucky barnes #sam x bucky #fanfic #endgame #hurt/comf #avengers fanfiction #wanda maximoff #clint barton #scott lang #gay fanfiction #gay otp #sebastian stan #anthony mackie #stackie #stucky #sambucky smut #marvel fanfic #fluff #angst #fluff and angst #the falcon #tws #captain america

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safe and sound

fandom: avatar: the last airbender rating: T characters: sokka/zuko, jet words: 5.8k additional tags: alternate universe (no bending), first meeting, swordfighting, sharing a bed, light angst with a happy ending, jetko that turns into zukka description: zuko has been searching for a home for a long time. a/n: sup i posted this a While back as an ao3 link for @zukka-week 2018, day 1: swords, but i’m reposting my fics as tumblr posts. this setting is technically an au but basically it’s just like the avatar universe without the four nations/elements, bending, or spirits, and thus the characters’ backstories are somewhat different, and i imagine the city as being pretty much ba sing se

read it on ao3

—

Zuko is not above stealing. He’ll steal an apple or two from a distracted merchant. He’ll steal money from people that he knows have more than enough. He once stole some bandages and medicine after being injured in a fight—the shopkeeper had seen how little money he had and turned him away, and he thought it ridiculous to have to pay to stay alive. No, Zuko does not necessarily object to stealing on principle, not if it’s for survival, not if it won’t hurt the person being stolen from. But something about Jet’s suggestion—to go out on a “spree of liberation,” as he so eloquently (and suspiciously) called it—makes Zuko’s skin crawl.

Jet has “liberated” a lot of things in his life, but Zuko has never actually seen him do it. He’s never really allowed himself to think about it too deeply, nor has he ever asked; it’s one of those things that he’s been content to leave as a mystery. Now, though, he’s about to find out what exactly happens on one of Jet’s “expeditions,” how he gets those expensive-looking weapons and perfectly cured meats.

The night has just begun, the sun having set less than an hour ago, the sky fading from purple to dark blue to black as Zuko quietly closes the door to Jet’s apartment and steps out onto the dimly-lit street. Jet is standing a few paces to the left with his arms folded pensively, and though they both have their faces covered up to the eyes, Zuko can still see the wheels turning as Jet seems to run through an invisible list of potential victims. Finally, he turns to Zuko and beckons with one hand to follow him.

Zuko and Jet have been dating for almost a month now, but the only people who know about it are Jet’s friends. They met at a shitty tavern near the edge of the city, Zuko alone and Jet with those same friends. As it turned out, they were all in similar situations: they were all kids without families, just trying to get by. They understood each other, and that was something precious, something Zuko couldn’t pass up, even against his better judgment.

Zuko has been alone for a few years now, ever since his family died in a devastating explosion. Zuko was the only one to survive, but not without a permanent reminder on his face. He’s been living on the streets ever since then, working odd jobs and sleeping outside or in cheap little inns. Now, of course, he sleeps in Jet’s apartment, which isn’t fancy by any means but serves as the nicest place Zuko has lived in since his family’s demise.

Jet leads him down various side streets into one of the poorer, darker, more run-down areas of the city, the sort of area where one of the biggest concerns is being caught in the wrong place after dark. It’s an area Zuko has spent quite a bit of time in these past few years. In fact, it was while he was living in one of these areas that he decided to buy his dual swords (any weapons that his family had had were lost in the explosion). As Jet slows down and starts to more closely observe the area, slinking against buildings and hiding in dark spots, Zuko’s stomach drops.

“What do you expect to find here?” he whispers, trying to mask his dread. “There won’t be very many valuables.”

“You’d be surprised,” Jet replies smoothly. “And this place isn’t very heavily guarded. You can get a lot more with a lot less risk. I usually start here and work my way up.”

Zuko opens his mouth to say something else, maybe even to try talking him out of it, but before he can actually form words, Jet’s eyes lock on a target: a young woman carrying two bags of food. Zuko thinks he sees bread in one and fruit in the other—basic necessities. Her clothes are plain, and she looks tired from a long day. She is exactly the type of person Zuko would make sure not to steal from.

Reluctantly, Zuko follows Jet’s lead as the woman turns down a lonely alley with few lights and no other people around. Jet darts around the corner after her and uses the end of one of his hook swords to catch her foot and trip her, a trick Zuko has seen him use a few times. The woman falls to the ground, the bags’ contents spilling everywhere. Accompanying the food are a few articles of clothing; it looks as though she just finished buying these things from a nearby market.

The woman gasps and glances up at them, terrified. She seems like she wants to say something, anything, but she’s frozen in fear. Jet swipes one of the pieces of clothing and briefly examines it, as if to determine whether or not it would fit him or any of his friends. Then he turns to Zuko, his eyes narrowed with expectation, silently saying, You gonna help me or what?

At that, Zuko breaks out of his horrified trance—he’s been watching Jet in shock, trying to process everything; he hasn’t even unsheathed his swords. Pulling down his mouth covering, he blurts, “Jet, what the hell?”

Jet stops what he’s doing and tosses the clothing to the ground. Without looking at the woman, he points one of his hook swords at her threateningly, a wordless demand for her to stay put. “Thought you said you didn’t have a problem with stealing,” he hisses to Zuko.

“I do if it’s from people who are just as poor as we are,” Zuko snaps, “if not poorer!”

“Zuko, you of all people should know that it’s every man for himself,” Jet snaps back. He doesn’t waste any time; he’s going straight for the jugular. “You and I, we’re outcasts, remember? We don’t have any allies. We don’t have any family. We had to do everything we could to stay alive. And we still do. You know that.”

Zuko scowls at him and clenches his fists, making his anger clear. Jet’s right, and he’s persuasive, and they both know that Zuko is far from a saint, but none of that stops the feeling in his gut that this is wrong, that he’ll beat himself up for it years down the road if he doesn’t say something now.

“No,” he says firmly, narrowing his eyes at Jet, feeling something akin to disgust rise in his chest, in his throat. “Look at this woman. She can’t be much better off than we are. This isn’t harmless petty theft. You’re practically mugging her. You’re not just doing what you need to do to stay alive; you’re hurting people. People who don’t deserve it—people who didn’t do anything wrong.”

Jet stares back at Zuko, long and hard, his expression unreadable. Then he sighs and lowers his hook sword. To the woman, who is still trembling on the ground, he says, “Grab your things and get out of here. Before I change my mind.”

The woman scrambles to her feet, hastily grabbing the bags and stuffing her goods back into them haphazardly. Within ten seconds, she’s already rounded the corner, running home as fast as her legs can carry her. Zuko silently hopes that nobody else decides to prey on her tonight.

Once the woman is out of sight, Zuko turns to Jet and says, his voice a bit softer now, “Jet, you know I don’t care if you steal from merchants, from the wealthy, from people who have more than enough food and all the money in the world. But I want you to promise me you won’t do something like that again.” Deep down, he knows he won’t be able to stop Jet from continuing to do it behind his back, but he wants something.

After a long pause, Jet says, “Okay. I promise.” It’s quiet but firm.

Zuko, half-expecting Jet to refuse, doesn’t really know what to say, nor does he know what their new plan for “liberation” is.

As if sensing Zuko’s confusion, Jet answers the unspoken question. “You know what?” he says, actually sounding somewhat nonchalant. “Let’s call it a night, okay? We can go all-out some other time. The full moon’s out anyway—too much light.” He raises an eyebrow. “That cool with you?”

Pleasantly surprised, Zuko just nods and says, “Uh, yeah, okay. Lead the way.”

The quick walk back to Jet’s apartment is carefree and comfortable, almost as if nothing happened between them. On the one hand, Zuko enjoys it, feeling like everything has returned to normal. But he can’t shake the tiny, nagging voice in his head that tells him to be on his guard.

They fall right back into their regular evening routine as soon as they return to the apartment: share the same bed (both shirtless), kiss a little (or a lot), fall asleep—Jet with one arm draped around Zuko’s body. In the comfort and safety of the bedroom, the world of crime and violence and immorality feels so far away, like a distant nightmare, like a memory from long ago.

The voice in the back of his mind tells him not to believe it. So when he wakes up in the middle of the night and finds himself alone in the bed, Zuko knows exactly where Jet has gone.

He doesn’t know how late it is or how long Jet’s been out. All he knows is that it’s still dark out (despite the moonlight) and that Jet and his hook swords have mysteriously disappeared. A part of him hopes that it’s not what it looks like, that he’s wrong, that Jet’s not doing anything behind his back. It’s just that, though: a feeble hope, based only on what he wishes were the case, not on what he knows is the truth.

Zuko wastes no time—who knows how many people Jet’s already harassed and mugged? He pulls a shirt over his head and slings his swords’ sheath across his shoulder. Then he heads out into the night, running down the same side streets Jet showed him earlier, searching for any sign of life. He investigates every shadow cast, every movement glimpsed out of the corner of his eye. Just when he starts to think that maybe he was wrong, that maybe Jet isn’t out stealing from the poor, he hears a voice in the distance, yelping, “H-hey!” It’s followed by the clatter of metal hitting the ground.

Zuko bolts toward the direction of the sound. Turning a corner at the end of the street into a dark alley, the first thing he notices is the oddly dark sword lying on the ground near him, a few feet away from the struggle. The next thing he notices is that, just as he suspected, the instigator is none other than Jet, his face inches from the boy he’s antagonizing. “Gimme your money,” he says, his voice low and hostile.

The boy—darker skinned, hair pulled up into a short ponytail, pretty damn attractive—holds his hands up. “Hey, hold on a minute, I don’t have any money,” he protests.

Jet shoves his knee into the guy’s stomach, and the guy gasps in pain. “You’ve got enough for that fancy sword, don’t ya?” Jet says with a slow grin. “Gotta be more somewhere.”

The boy gulps. “And what if there isn’t?”

“Well then,” Jet replies smoothly, “I’m sure that sword’ll fetch a fine price on the market by itself anyway.”

Zuko, who has yet to be noticed by either of them, unsheathes his swords, the sound making his presence known. Jet glances over at him and promptly freezes, like an animal seconds before it’s killed, only much less innocent. “Zuko—”

“Let him go,” Zuko interrupts gravely, taking a few deliberate steps forward. “I’ll fight you if I have to.”

Jet’s eyes narrow, wild with something between disappointment and anger swimming in their dark depths. “I thought you’d understand,” he says slowly, turning away from the boy and tightening his grip on his hook swords. “But I see now that I was wrong about you.”

“I could say the same to you,” Zuko retorts. “Fucking liar.”

Without much warning, Jet lunges at him, hook swords raised, and Zuko blocks them with his own dual swords, steel against steel, the clang echoing through the alley. Zuko shoves Jet back, and as he’s reaching forward to strike with one hand, Jet uses both his hook swords to grab onto the end of Zuko’s, deflecting it to the side. Zuko manages not to lose the sword and swings at him again. Jet leaps backward, but he doesn’t completely avoid the blades; Zuko can distinctly hear and feel the cutting of fabric and flesh, though not very deep.

Jet glances down at the cut on his arm and falters slightly, taking a step backward. Zuko takes advantage of the opportunity and springs on him, making a quick slash at the wrist of his right hand. Jet hisses in pain, instinctively loosening the grip on his sword, and Zuko swings at it with all his might, successfully knocking it out of Jet’s hand. The sword lands on the ground only a foot or two away from the boy Jet was harassing, who snatches it with a clever grin and points it threateningly at Jet.

Jet seems to realize now that he’s outnumbered and lowers his lone hook sword, staring daggers at Zuko. “Traitor,” he spits.

Zuko shakes his head. “I should’ve known. I should’ve known the moment I met you. In a way, I kind of feel sorry for you—the world has been so cruel to you that you think the only way you can survive is by hurting others.” He shrugs. “You’re confused like I used to be. And maybe one day you’ll learn like I had to. But until then…” He puts his swords back into their sheath—he’ll clean the bits of blood off later. “Until then, I don’t want to see you around.” He pauses to let that sink in, and then he adds, “I’ll come back to your place tomorrow to pick up my things.”

Jet scowls wordlessly; he knows he’s been beaten. He holds his hand out toward the boy, who still has Jet’s other hook sword. “Gimme that,” Jet says.

The boy turns to Zuko, as if for permission. Zuko nods at him, and he holds the sword outward. Jet swipes it out of the boy’s hands. He gives Zuko a look of betrayal, of anger, but Zuko can see the hurt that lies beneath it.

“Goodbye, Jet,” Zuko says softly, and something in his heart hurts, too. There’s a significant part of him that wishes it didn’t have to be this way. But it does. If Zuko is going to fully move on from the mistakes of his past, it does.

“Goodbye, Zuko,” Jet replies grimly. Then he turns around and runs swiftly out of the alley, seemingly unfazed as the blood from his cuts starts to run down his arm. He doesn’t look back.

The boy breathes a sigh of relief. “Wow,” he says as he processes everything that just happened. “Thanks, dude. Zuko’s your name, right?”

“Uh, yeah,” Zuko says, suddenly feeling his boldness leave him as he looks this guy over more carefully. He’s probably around the same age as Zuko, but a little shorter and lankier, with deep blue eyes and a pretty face.

The boy seems to notice the way Zuko is looking at him (Zuko’s never been good at hiding his feelings), and he smirks knowingly, but not maliciously. “I’m Sokka,” he says smoothly, his eyes twinkling playfully.

“Sokka,” Zuko repeats as Sokka heads over to where his own sword has been lying on the ground. He picks it up and casually wipes the dirt off of it. As Zuko watches him, an opportunity for conversation strikes him. “Why’s your blade so dark?” he asks.

Sokka smiles proudly. “It’s made out of the rock from a meteorite that landed out in the woods recently.”

“I...wow,” Zuko says in genuine fascination, staring at the dark gray sword as Sokka returns it to its sheath.

Sokka stares at Zuko for a second or two, looking like he’s considering something. “Do you, um,” he says slowly, clearing his throat, “have a place to stay for the rest of the night?”

Zuko shrugs without saying anything. He could probably find a cheap hotel or a nice spot on the street to sleep on like he used to, but the truth is that, once again, he doesn’t have any reliable place to stay.

“I’ll take that as a no,” Sokka says firmly. “You could stay with us for the night, if you want.”

Zuko raises his eyebrow. “Who’s ‘us?’”

“My sister and our two friends and I,” Sokka replies casually. “We all share an apartment not too far from here.”

“Oh, uh,” Zuko stutters, somewhat flustered at the offer. “I mean, I wouldn’t want to impose…”

Sokka waves his hand nonchalantly. “Nah, you’ll be fine,” he says, already starting to walk away. He glances back over his shoulder, as if expecting Zuko to follow him. “Well? I’m sure you’d rather sleep in a warm bed than on the damn ground, and I doubt your boyfriend’ll let you back into his place.”

That catches Zuko completely off guard, and he rushes to catch up with Sokka. “H-hey, how did you—?”

Sokka shrugs, that teasing, knowing grin back on his face with no sign of disappearing anytime soon. “Call it a hunch,” he says. “That fight definitely felt like a lovers’ spat to me.” He doesn’t mention Zuko checking him out, but it hangs in the air between them, unspoken. Sokka knows that Zuko thinks he’s attractive, and Zuko knows that Sokka knows.

After a few moments of near-silence, with the only sound being the sound of their footprints as Sokka leads Zuko to his apartment, Zuko asks, “So, what made you decide to take a walk in the middle of the night, anyway?”

“Couldn’t sleep,” Sokka replies. “I had a weird dream where food started eating people.”

Zuko snorts; he can’t help it. “Talk about revenge.”

“I know!” Sokka says, his voice going up an octave, throwing his hands up in the air. “But anyway, usually eating helps me when I wake up in the middle of the night, but obviously I wasn’t gonna do that this time. So I thought I’d take a little night walk instead.”

“If you were just taking a walk, then why’d you bring your sword with you?”

Sokka just laughs at that, short and sharp. “In case I got attacked.”

Zuko laughs a little, too, something he doesn’t do very often—he didn’t even laugh all that much when he was with Jet, and yet Sokka’s gotten him to laugh within half an hour of knowing him. That’s impressive, to say the least. “Well,” he says, “it looks like it didn’t help you out that much anyway.”

“He caught me off guard, okay?” Sokka insists, but he’s still smiling. “The guy’s stealthy. I admit it. But if I’d had my boomerang, too, he would’ve been in for it, I’m tellin’ ya.”

When they reach the apartment, Sokka lowers his voice and warns Zuko to be quiet, since everyone else is likely still asleep. Zuko can’t make out much in the darkness, but the apartment has a similar layout to Jet’s, though it doesn’t have as many rare or expensive items obtained under suspicious circumstances. Most of the things that Zuko sees are things he’d expect to see in most people’s homes—rags to clean with, some pots and pans, a few articles of clothing strewn across the floor. So far, the most remarkable possession he’s seen of theirs has been Sokka’s “space sword,” as he calls it.

“So, uh, we’ve got two beds,” Sokka whispers, “for four people, but Toph always sleeps on the floor.” He gestures to a dark shape on the floor of the main room that must be Toph. “Aang and Katara usually share the one bed because both refuse to share one with me.” He points toward the open door that leads into a small bedroom area. The other bed, decently-sized, rests near the corner of the main room, which also consists of a small living area and a kitchen.

Zuko raises his eyebrow. “Why don’t they want to share with you?”

Sokka smiles sheepishly, looking embarrassed but trying to hide it. “I just toss and turn a lot. And sometimes I accidentally steal the blankets.” He clears his throat and rubs the back of his neck. “So, um...I can, uh, sleep on the floor,” he says slowly, “if...you’d be uncomfortable...you know.” Even in the darkness, Zuko can see a blush on Sokka’s cheeks.

Zuko shrugs. He genuinely doesn’t care if he sleeps in the same bed as Sokka; at least it’s a bed, and he’s slept in much stranger places with much stranger people. (And there’s also the fact that Sokka is very attractive, and Zuko would be completely fine with sharing his warmth. But that doesn’t influence his decision at all, of course not; that would be ridiculous.) “I don’t mind,” he says out loud. “Really. It’ll be fine.”

Sokka sort of smiles at that, seeming almost relieved. “Okay,” he says, making his way over to the bed. He takes his shoes off and leans them up against the wall, then pulls the sheath of his sword off his shoulder and rests it on the floor next to the bed. He lets his hair out of its ponytail and rests the tie on the nightstand, then climbs into the bed. The covers are already somewhat messy, but only on Sokka’s side.

Zuko takes his own shoes off and rests the sheath of his swords on the floor next to the bed like Sokka did. Then he awkwardly crawls under the blanket, trying to be calm and fucking normal instead of thinking about how pretty Sokka is and how close they are. He can’t blow this.

“What’ll your friends think when they wake up and see a stranger sleeping in your bed?” he asks as the thought hits him.

“My sister might freak out a little, but other than that, it should be fine once I explain what happened. Don’t worry,” Sokka replies calmly.

Zuko rolls onto his side so that his back is facing Sokka. As he’s lying there, it finally hits him, just how much everything has changed in so little time. He broke up with Jet, and he’ll be on his own again, and he’s sleeping in the bed of some guy he just met, and everything is weird, and yet it doesn’t feel bad. He thinks he might even be okay with it.

After only a few minutes, Sokka whispers, his voice barely audible, “Zuko.”

Zuko rolls over to see Sokka sitting up, looking contemplative. “Yeah?”

“I have a question,” Sokka says quietly, “and you don’t have to answer it, but I was just wondering.”

Zuko takes a deep breath. Here it comes, the inevitable question, the question everyone asks soon enough after meeting him: the scar question.

But what comes out of Sokka’s mouth isn’t what Zuko expects. Instead, Sokka asks, “What did you mean when you said to Jet—that was his name, right?—when you said he was confused like you used to be? When you said maybe he’d learn like you had to?”

Zuko sighs in relief. Strangely enough, it feels easier to him to answer this question than it does to answer the scar question. Maybe it’s because he’s made peace with his past, with his mistakes. But he still hasn’t made peace with his family’s brutal deaths, especially his mother’s; he was closest to her. He doesn’t think he’ll ever make peace with it.

Zuko sits up on his elbows. “After I...became homeless, I did a lot of things that I regret. Things like what Jet was doing. I was angry at the world, and sometimes I think I still am. I don’t rely on it anymore, but I did then. I stole food from people who were starving because I didn’t care. I thought that I was better than them, that I deserved food more than they did. I got into fights with anyone who so much as looked at me the wrong way. A lot of them were kids or teenagers. One was probably around ten or eleven, and I think I was fourteen.” He sighs, remembering all the bloody noses, bruises, deep cuts, and broken bones he’s given people over the last few years.

“It got worse before it got better, especially after I got my swords. I mugged poor, innocent people. You would’ve wondered why I never got an apartment or anything, what with all the money I stole, not to mention the odd jobs I worked sometimes. I think it was because I didn’t want to stay in the same place. I liked running around with nowhere to be and everywhere to go, and besides, it would’ve been easier for other people to trace me if I stayed in one place, instead of committing a crime and then disappearing. I think I must’ve slept in every hotel in the city, except the really high-end ones.”

Sokka watches and listens, not judging, at least not openly. His gaze is intent and sincere. “What changed?” he says softly. “What made you stop?”

Zuko sits up more, leaning the pillow up against the wall and then resting his back against it. “It happened not too long after I turned fifteen. One evening there was this awful fire in another section of the city that destroyed several houses, and that night, across the street from where the fire had been, I saw this little kid sitting on the curb, all curled up into a ball and crying. He was maybe eight or nine. I remember not wanting to care. I remember just wanting to walk away and forget about it, because it wasn’t my problem. But I had a bad feeling about why he was crying, so I went over to him.” He closes his eyes briefly, imagining it, remembering every detail.

“He didn’t notice me at first, and I didn’t know what to say, so I just kind of sat down next to him, and that’s when he looked up at me. He asked me what I was doing, and I honestly didn’t really know, so I told him that I saw him crying and felt like I couldn’t just leave him there, which was the truth. When I looked at him closer, I realized he was partially covered in soot with a couple of small burns. He told me that his parents hadn’t made it out of the fire, that his home and his family were all gone and he didn’t know what to do. That was the first time in a long time that I’d felt sympathy for anyone. I saw myself in this kid, and I realized then that I didn’t want him to grow up hating the world and everyone in it. So I turned to him, looked him right in the eye, and told him to promise me he would never hurt someone for no reason. I remember how confused he was, because to him, it didn’t seem to have anything to do with the fire. I explained to him that when you go through something hard, sometimes it makes you bitter and angry, and I told him that I didn’t want that to happen to him. So he nodded and said that he promised, and then I gave him a bunch of money that I’d stolen the night before, and I told him to find someone that would help him, like a neighbor or an uncle or a family friend or something. He said he’d try and ran away, and then I sat down on the curb where he’d been sitting and thought about everything I’d done.

“It was hard to go through all those victims and put myself in their situations, but I did it. It was like seeing that kid had opened the floodgates and made me able to care about people again. Up until then, I think I’d locked my heart up. I never allowed myself to feel anything other than hatred and anger, because anything else made me weak.”

There’s a stretch of silence after Zuko finishes as Sokka seems to process everything. Then he says, gently, his eyes soft, “Is that what happened to you? With the fire?”

Zuko bites his lip as he remembers hearing something burning, as he remembers looking through the little window in one of the doors with his left eye just seconds before the explosion. He doesn’t look at Sokka when he says it. “Something very similar. Yeah.”

“I...I’m sorry,” Sokka says, sounding genuine. “Katara and I lost our mother six years ago.” He reaches his hand out tentatively, his gaze filled not with pity but with understanding. Normally, Zuko would shy away. Normally, the scar is off-limits. But this is far from normal.

Sokka pauses right before his hand reaches Zuko’s face, as if silently asking permission. Zuko nods. “You can touch it.”

Sokka moves closer to Zuko and rests his hand on Zuko’s cheek, his fingers feeling the burned flesh. They’re so close now, only inches away, and all Zuko has to do is lean forward and bridge the gap.

“Zuko,” Sokka says, his hand never moving, “I don’t know what exactly it is about you, but I feel...close to you for some reason. Even when I first saw you fight with Jet, I was drawn to you.”

Zuko’s heart starts to beat faster. “I, uh, I could say the same to you.”

And then they’re kissing.

It’s soft and slow, gentle and tender, Sokka’s fingers lightly brushing against Zuko’s skin. Zuko drapes his arms over Sokka’s shoulders, sighing when Sokka runs his tongue across Zuko’s bottom lip. It’s bliss, but not an energized, ecstatic bliss, like the way kissing Jet felt like. It’s more of a glowing sort of bliss, a tranquil and safe sort of bliss, warm but not scorching. Whereas kissing Jet felt like fireworks, hot and wild but short-lived, kissing Sokka feels like a hearth—like coming home.

When they break away, both of them mildly out of breath, Sokka kind of laughs and says, “Well, now I know I wasn’t misreading the signals or anything.”

He’s referring to Zuko checking him out, and Zuko’s face heats up a little. “Well, yeah, I guess I’ve never really been the best at subtlety.”

Sokka just smiles and says, “Would it be okay if I...saw you again sometime?”

Now Zuko’s definitely blushing. “I, uh, yeah,” he stutters. “Of course.”

Across the room, an annoyed voice groans, “Great performance, lovebirds; now will you please go to sleep?”

Sokka and Zuko both jump. Zuko doesn’t think he’s ever been more embarrassed in his life. One of Sokka’s friends—the one who sleeps on the floor, Toph, if he remembers correctly—is awake. He doesn’t know how much she’s heard, but apparently, she’s heard enough.

“Toph!” Sokka hisses. “Way to ruin the moment!”

“Way to ruin my sleep,” Toph retorts. “Your gross kissing noises interrupted my dream. This guy better be cute.”

“I—he is!” Sokka says, his voice cracking, also clearly embarrassed. Zuko tries not to smile (and fails miserably).

“I don’t trust your opinion,” Toph replies bluntly. “I’ll ask Katara in the morning.”

Zuko looks over at Sokka quizzically. “Can’t she just decide for herself?” he whispers.

“She’s blind,” Sokka explains. “She has no idea if you’re cute or not.”

“Guys, what’s going on?” another unfamiliar voice asks. Someone steps out from the other bedroom into the main room and turns a nearby lamp on: a girl who looks a lot like Sokka, but a little bit younger—his sister, most likely. “Sokka, who’s—?”

“Sokka’s new boyfriend,” Toph interrupts from her place on the floor.

“He’s not my—we just met!” Sokka sputters, blushing.

“Yeah, but that didn’t stop either of you from pouring your hearts out to each other. And then making out.”

“We were not making out!” Sokka insists, his voice going up an octave again; Zuko thinks it’s cute. “My tongue and Zuko’s tongue didn’t meet once!”

Another person steps out of the bedroom and into the main room, a younger boy with black hair. He rubs his eyes. “Okay, guys, you know I’d prefer it if we didn’t argue at all, but if we have to, can’t we do it after sunrise?” Then he glances over at the bed and, noticing Zuko, raises an eyebrow. “Um, Sokka, I’m not judging or anything, but why is there a random guy with a scar in your bed?”

“Can we please just discuss this in the morning?” Sokka groans. “This guy saved me from his ex-boyfriend who was trying to mug me and he needed a place to stay so I told him he could sleep here for the night. And I’m probably gonna keep hanging out with him, so be nice.”

“Katara, I want your honest opinion,” Toph says to the other girl. “Is this guy cute?”

Katara seems to think for a moment, and Zuko tries to hide his self-consciousness. Finally, she says, “Um, yeah, actually, he’s not bad-looking.”

“Great. That’s all I needed to know,” Toph says. “Now can we all please go back to sleep?”

“You don’t have to tell me twice,” the boy—Aang—says, turning around and heading back into the bedroom. After giving Sokka a skeptical look, Katara turns the light back off and follows Aang.

“I’m sorry for them,” Sokka says immediately. “They’re nice, I swear, but they don’t know you and it’s the middle of the night and they’re cranky.”

“I can still hear you, you know,” Toph grumbles.

Sokka ignores her. “Anyway, um, we should...probably get some rest,” he says slowly. “It’s been a long night. I can give you a proper introduction in the morning.”

Zuko just smiles a little and lies back down; this time, though, he’s turned toward Sokka, not away from him. “You know,” he says, “you and your friends...almost feel like a family of sorts.”

Sokka shrugs, but he’s smiling, too. “We are.”

Zuko hasn’t had a family in so long.

“Maybe one day,” Sokka says, his voice soft, “you can be a part of it, too.”

That night, Zuko sleeps better than he has in a long time, probably since before his family died. He revels in the feeling of Sokka’s warm body next to his. When he was with Jet, it felt good. But when he’s with Sokka, it feels right, like finding something that he thought he’d lost forever.

Like coming home.

#avatar: the last airbender #atla #zuko #sokka #zukka #my fics #i wanna write more zukka aaaaa i miss them

[whenimgoodandready]

4 years ago, I heard about “Star vs. The Forces of Evil”. I didn’t think much of it, but I gave it a shot (it was like a childhood callback to my “Sailor Moon” phase when I was younger) to see how it was. I made a little review about it to let everyone know what I thought and after a couple of more episodes, I was drawn to it! A twist on the Magical Girl genre of the heroine open with her being magical and fighting villains while still going about an everyday life. Neat characters, funny dialogue, cool storylines, original music scores, plot twists and the shipping dramas! I was so obsessed I made fanart/animation, bought whatever merchandise there was of it! (Star and Marco’s Guide to Mastering Every Dimension (original and Stump Day Edition) and The Magic Book of Spells) and been having dreams of the show as well! My reviews have changed since the first season. It started out as just words, but then came frames and then later pictures and now, finally gifs! Writing is my passion. I just love writing down how I feel about things and having others see it and what I have to say about it as if I’m a voice to the people. Speaking of which, I gotta get to this finale review before I’m over my writing limit is up. Lol!

We open with what we saw in the promo for finale. Star transforms in her golden Mewberty form getting ready to enter the portal to The Realm of Magic, say The Whispering Spell there and destroy all the magic. Despite the major drawback to the aftermath (No Starco😢). She turns down Eclipsa and Moons advice on taking on Mina all together and is just single minded on her plan. Star, maybe that would’ve been a better idea. You know, like the whole Total Annihilation Spell thing that Eclipsa used! That could still work! Huh!? HUH!? HUH!? C’mon!!! (are we not gonna call her out for making a hasty decision based on her impulsive anger from her Moms betrayal!?) Before that however, she didn’t tell Marco the bad news of her plan to save him from heartbreak and Hekapoo was cool with Star going forward with her plan. Uh, seriously Hekapoo!? YOU’RE GONNA DIE! WHO’S THIS CHILL ABOUT DYING!? Guess after literally everything she thought, “Eh, I lived a long life. Besides, magic sucks a**”. Okay, I mean, if that’s how she feels then.

Marco goes with her and after getting one last back handed burning slap on the head (“Running with Scissors”), takes the wand from Moon and gives it the old “Marcos wand” look! (“Deep Dive”) Unknownst to Moon that he’s used it before. (the drawn on mole would’ve been a nice touch. I’m just sayin’). This is it! Their one last adventure before the whole things over. With that, they hold hands (Marco choosing the top arm of Stars left) and walk into the portal to destroy the magic. Oh God!

They arrive in The Realm of Magic and Star tries to do The Whispering Spell while Marco eats pudding that Glossaryck left behind for him and Star. Unfortunately, Star starts to lose her memories and Marco realizes he’s still fine. He finds out it’s the pudding! The Pudding!? OMG! You mean to tell me this is why Glossaryck kept eating pudding the whole time!? Not just because it was delicious! WOW! Marco shoves some pudding in Star which help keep her memories and then they see..............

Thomas Draconius Lucitor! Riding on the corrupted dark unicorn from “Mama Star”! Hey Tom! How you been!? Haven’t seen you since well, that episode I just mentioned! Last we checked, you were stuck in your demon form on fire and with that seatbelt still on!..............which you’re now wearing as a sash for some reason. Guess you never were sent back to Mewni, or the Underworld, or wherever else cuz no one bothered to mention what became of you. Tom, we can explain! A lot of sh*t happened in Mewni and it was all Mina (and Moons) fault! Also Starco is for finally canon and Stars gonna destroy the magic! Btw, why do you have glowing blank eyes like Stars real/fake ancestry?....................Tom, you’re scaring us............Tom, why are you charging at Starco!? Are you pissed that they forgot you!? TOM! TOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!

Back on Mewni, River and Eddie finally make it to the sanctuary to save Globgor and just before they could open it, Mina catches them and the two biggest idiots of Mewni accidentally blurt out what they’re gonna do! (face palms). No thanks to that, Mina now tries to get into the sanctuary.

Over to The Realm of Magic again, Marco fights off Tom using the wand by blasting every bit of whimsical spell Star does and some with his own while Star finally does The Whispering Spell and for the finale, we actually hear what all that whispering was! “Break the bond, tear the fabric, cleave the stone, stop the magic” again and again. And it works! HOLY SH*T IT ACTUALLY WORKS! I didn’t think her plan would work by doing that, but it’s true! It’s freakin’ true!

However, it still doesn’t work. I knew it, I mean, saying the Whispering Spell in The Realm of Magic to destroy all magic! Puh-leeze! It’s only for the wand! :P. Just then, Moon and Eclipsa w/ Meteora show up and decide to help. That’s the quickest moment of forgiving I’ve ever seen, after all what Moon did, Star just accepted her again! Marco finally stops Tom from killing him w/ the corrupted dark unicorn by feeding him pudding, but in the process, getting stabbed! Don! Don! Don! After Tom is cured, he and Marco head back to Star. 

Star, Moon, Eclipsa and Meteora Dip Down in their Mewberty forms (the fandom gets their wish on seeing Eclipsa do that) and are joined by the Past Queens of Mewni (starting from Skywynne not the 26 before her cuz that’s all the queens the book mentioned cuz the staff didn’t have enough time to come up with designs, personalities, history, etc for them and also Skywynnes mother, Lyric, didn’t save the original Magic Book of Spells :P) in spiritual form assisting them with destroying magic. They still don’t talk as they didn’t have time to that and cuz it’s the last episode and we’re about wrapping up here, so :P to that.

Mina finds The Realm of Magic and charges after Star, Moon, Eclipsa and Meteora, but gets distracted when she sees her queen, Solaria, and gets attacked by the dark corrupted unicorn. Mina calls out to her for help, but Solaria, the queen that created Mina, transformed her and thought of her as her answer to finishing off monsters, did nothing! Nada, ZIP! Sure she hated monsters, but did she hate monsters more than she loves her daughter!? Some things are just more important. 

After he was done with Mina, the dark unicorn goes after the queens, but Marco f**king flips the horse! DAMN! Well, he’s fought monsters, did a bunch of cool sh*t in the Neverzone, helped save Mewni twice and punched Toffee right through him! So yeah! He can flip a horse! 

Suddenly, the magic starts getting destroyed, the baby unicorns melt, the wand is no more and the realm prepares its destruction.

The Queens start disappearing with Moon seeing her mother, Comet, one last time, Solaria accepting of Eclipsas monster love and her hybrid granddaughter and most of all, Glossaryck goin’in bye bye. Farewell Glossaryck, you were pretty annoying, but kinda right. It was nice knowin’ ya. 

Star then tells Marco he needs to go up the waterfall to Earth, but doesn’t answer him on the bad news that they’ll never see each other again :’(. However, I think he figured it out from their tearful good-bye.

 Everyone comes out the well, but Star makes a big sacrifice and decides to go to Earth to be with Marco. Turns out, Marco stayed behind in the destruction of The Realm of Magic cuz he too thought, with or without magic, ღ they belong together! ღ STARCO FOREVER! 

With that, they hug for the very last time with their last bit of magic giving them their glowing cheek marks, unknown what will become of them during the destruction (possibly death) and then 💥BOOM!💥

The sanctuary is now gone along with the magic, well dimension traveling, (the narwhal blasting) and most of all, no more signature cheek marks on Star or anyone else who had ‘em on the show! And Star floats a drift on an alligator where Moon finds her riding on another alligator like a jet ski.

The new Solarian army falls apart and all the Monsters, like Buff Frog and his kids, are now finally safe from harm all thanks to Star. Destroying the magic actually did turn out to be the solution to fix everything (I personally didn’t think so cuz I would’ve preferred Star go with Eclipsa’s Total Annihilation Spell from the beginning) and Stars tapestry did predict the outcome of it:Magic gone, no more Glossaryck, Mina defeated, Monsters safe, Reconciled with Moon, Eclipsa and her family alive and well and the Monster Temple still standing, but still, no Starco 😢. However, Star was still happy all the monsters were okay, her family safe and even Eclipsa and her family safe.

With the magic gone, Mina Loveberry has been brought down to normal and unfortunately, still coo coo! Now, with the other villains in the show, most of ‘em got redeemed (Ludo, Tom and Meteora) and others died (Toffee), but our final “Forces of Evil”, Mina, who can no longer transform into her Hulk-like warrior self, still remains mentally ill (there’s no cure for that). Moon tries to talk some final sense into her and help her out with her diseased mind, but Mina refuses her help cuz despite the fact that she’s depowered, she runs off continuing her goal on eliminating monsters cuz it “lingers to her”. Well, she’s a lost cause and no one really gives a sh*t about her anymore (except maybe Manfred), so good-luck to ya ya psycho b*tch!

Moon apologizes to Star for working along side with Mina and making the biggest f*ck up in history, but Star easily forgives her since she (Star) always f*cks up too. I guess the apple doesn’t really fall far from the tree after all, huh!? Star says it’s cuz all families f*ck up (some more so than others), but that what they need to do is just live and learn from it all. So yeah, it’s true. Star heads back to the infirmary to check up on her friends and since the magics gone, those Solarian fatal wounds have already disappeared and everyones okay. Like Pony Head and Rich Pigeon! Star tells Pony Head that destroying the magic was the only solution there was to defeat Mina and save everyone, but despite the fact that she’s happy all is well and done, the tragedy of it is there’s no more Marco Ubaldo Diaz! NO MORE STARCO! IT DIDN’T LAST! 😭 He’s just back on Earth with Janna cuz that’s where they belong much like how Kelly went back to Woolandia and Talon at that Dragon Spit bar thing and that she can’t deal with Pony Heads sassy character trait stuff right now! 

Pony Head sees how heartbroken Star is and cheers her up by saying that Kelly is crying tears...........of joy! And happily goin’ on adventures with her “Battle Buddy” Jorby and that Talon is making up cool stories about his adventure to the bar taverns and it does in fact cheer Star up.

From the magic gone, we learn what became of the MHC and that they were reduced to just junk. Omnitraxus Prime is now a lifeless skull like the ones you see stereotypically in the desert, Rhombulus is now a lifeless crystal which was originally his head and his free will snake arms are now just regular old snakes and Idk what happened to Hekapoo, but I’m assuming since she was a demoness, she must’ve just turned to a poof of smoke or something. Omnitraxus was so close to be mature, but sadly he failed to realize what Hekapoo saw. Still disappointed in how Rhombulous turned out (sigh) oh so disappointed. Oh! And uh, Sean just overfilled himself on pizza. He was never important. Whatever. 

Just then, Tom shows up and he’s okay too! Pony Head didn’t mention that he was looking for Star after she decided to supposedly leave Mewni to live on Earth and I think it’s cuz she ships Starco now cuz we all know Tomstar failed not once, but twice! Hey! It’s the finale, so I’m tellin’ it like it so :P (third times not always the charm). Any way, Tom shows Star a portal that”s floating around in the distance and that it leads to Earth! (gasp)

Speaking of Earth, since the The Realm of Magic was located under Britta’s Tacos, and is now gone, the restaurant is too. Oh great! 😒 First we lose The Bounce Lounge, then Quest Buy and now the taco place! (as if it wasn’t bad enough we don’t have Starco!). The whole destruction to them was known as an “earthquake”. 

Marco is on a gurney, but he’s safe and healed now that the magics gone with that unicorn wound no longer there and his parents and baby sister are relived he’s okay. Sadly, much like Star, he's miserable without her. 

Janna rolls in on her gurney attached to a heart rate monitor and she cheers up Marco by saying even though he lost Star, they still have each other as friends. Despite the fact that she drove him nuts most of the time, he did in fact consider her a friend and vice versa. Janna then tells Marco about a portal from a distance that leads to Mewni! (gasp). Janna then tells Marco that he should run for it while she fakes her death in 60 seconds to distract everyone. DAMN! RUN! DIAZ! RUN!

So I’m guessing their last bit of magic together while embracing one last time was the result of that portal (no it’s not a “gas leak” from the “earthquake”), but how long is it gonna remain open!? Both our heroes run like Hell to see each again with a build up theme tune playing with Star punching her way through the Forest of Certain Death and Marco violating traffic laws cuz one thing is set on their minds, make Starco canon! 

Marco uses Jackies skateboard to head faster while Star turns down a friendly game of basketball with Ludo and Dennis. So nice that we saw more of the minor characters again. sk8er girl Jackie with her new French mate, Chloe, starter villain Ludo fully redeemed and happy, those two guys that Daron never wanted to exist, Alfonzo and Ferguson, fangirl Starfan13, mean girl Brittany (well finally! Where was she!? Still wish we saw Jeremy though even if he was a little sh*t, I’d still would've liked to have seen him) we even saw that creepy woman and her new dog, “Willoughby”! (”Fetch”). 

Okay enough about them, let’s get back to Starco! They’re getting closer!........

closer!.........

CLOSER! AND- 

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! 

WHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHY!? THIS CAN’T BE! YOU MEAN TO TELL ME I WAITED 4 YEARS, WATCHED 4 SEASONS AND WENT THROUGH 4 SHIPS (JARCO, OSTAR, TOMSTAR AND KELLCO) FOR NOTHING! Why does Daron hate us!? Huh, why!? This is it! THIS is how the story ends!? No Starco, no endgame, no HAPPILY EVER AFTER! NO NOTHING! WHAT’S IT GONNA TAKE TO MAKE STARCO HAPPEN!? WHEN DRAGONCYCLES FLY ACROSS THE EARTH SKY!?

Wait! Are those dragoncylces? Flying across the Earth sky!? Holy Sh*t! They are! 

And are those, mermaids!? Swimming in the aqueduct!? (was that a giant spider?).  

Is that Rich Pigeon getting chased up a tree by Earth dogs!? 

Did a helicopter just fly by the Cloud Kingdom over the Pony Head family!? 

Whoa! Whoa!.....WHOA! Are you telling me, that Earth and Mewni have merged into one whole dimension and that it’s now Earthni!? Was it that last bit of Starco magic from the embrace that caused that portal to open and explode to do this!? WOW! Now I get it! “Cleaved”! Good one there, good one! Okay, so it’s a little hectic what with the two worlds becoming one thing, but maybe with time, everyone will get used to it (shrugs).

So if the two worlds merged then that means.............................

STARCO AT LAST! The final unification! Better than the one from “Battle for Mewni”, not awkward like in “Lint Catcher” just pure unadulterated Starco and with their beautiful theme music playing once again to emphasize it. They meet, they smile, they walk towards each other and...............they say Hi. No big kiss or hug or even a silent stare, just plain old “Hey how ya doin’?”. It’s a little tame, but considering this is a children's show, it’s still sweet and more importantly, it was endgame ;). 

🎶 I wanna be your endgame,

I wanna be your first string,

I wanna be your A-Team,

I wanna be your endgame, endgame 🎶

Since Star Butterfly wasn’t there to do her closing inner monologue like how she did with her opening one in the pilot of the show, I’ll be doing it here. So the show ended with Starco like we all hoped for except with the unexpected twist that both their worlds, Earth and Mewni, collided together. Never in a millions years would we have thought this would happen! I’ve seen fan works of Starco either living together on Earth or living as royals in Mewni with their “Starco child(ren)”, but the fact that we got a best of both worlds finale was a huge surprise! Now the happy couple can still be with their families and friends and even have Meteora and Mariposa grow up together like they promised they would. If you ask me, this sounds more like a new beginning, like how are the Humans and Mewmens gonna adapt to their new surroundings and interactions among each other like it’s the start of a whole new season! But I guess that was left to the fans to use their imagination on how that’ll go cuz so many people already had left the show to pursue other things and that they needed to wrap it up quickly. However, we’re still left with some unanswered questions such as why we didn’t see the Septarian, Seth, and how he was the head honcho of the Septarian army cuz he was a big deal in The Magic Book of Spells and since that book was foreshadowing everything in the final season, I assumed we might’ve gotten a look at him and maybe have him make an appearance since it was last said he disappeared, but I guess like in the book, he’s history. Second, there’s Toffee, from the very beginning he wanted the magic destroyed such as having Star use The Whispering Spell in the Season 1 finale and then corrupting it in the tv movie and it wasn’t until near the end where Star realized he was right to do so after all the chaos that’s been goin’ on. Granted it wasn’t for the same reasons she wanted, but overall just doing away with it to not give anyone an advantage to use against someone. I actually thought (like some fans) that he’d come back again, cuz he was mentioned a lot and it was hinted in the final seasons episode premiere about the use of magic and that he might’ve, but after two seasons and a movie, I suppose it was enough and at least he got a cameo in one. Still, his actions were a big concern for Star. Thirdly, the rebel princesses, last we saw, Meteora blew up the whole school after finding out about her true background and we never saw what became of ‘em. Hopefully, they’re fine like Pony Head is and that our minds shouldn’t go into a dark place thinking about that. Speaking of darkness, monster arm, he looked to be hinted at coming back after his defeat, but instead he was just left as a scare gag and irrelevance to the plot. Lastly, the same goes for that mysterious sun/moon/star room in St.Olga’s. It looked to be a big plot point to bring up in a later episode, but alas, we got nothing out of it! We suspected it had something to do with The Blood Moon, but even that was all for nothing! Never did we find out what that room was supposed to mean and I guess it was never meant to have been pointed out in-universe cuz that was for us fans to see it as an up and coming big Starco moment like how the Blood Moon was never magic and that it was just a gimmick with the whole “soul binding” thing to spice up it’s appeal. The finale was good. Could’ve done it as an hour long special or tv movie to close it off, but since Daron and the staff kept goin’ through so many changes in episode plots (and believe me, I’ve seen plenty of “what-could’ve-been” plots like the original idea for the show with Star younger and non-magical annoying everyone around her with her big imagination of her being a magical girl princess), I kinda think maybe they rushed into it, but even so, it was a nice finale and it left a good memory for me. I found some nice people through this fandom and just to name a few there was that ever popular head cannon blog, @svtfoeheadcanons which than went onto @seddm. Thank you for your words and blog and answering some of my questions (even though it was kinda anon, but I think you might’ve recognized me from my writings) you are brilliant, @moringmark, your comics of the Starco/Jarco child clashing story were fun as well as your Starco Child Headquarters comic and I am now enjoying your “F.R.I.E.N.D.S” parody of the Past Queens of Mewni and also the Meteora and Mariposa comic, thank you for your comics, I always check on and comment on ‘em and last, but certainly not least, my good svtfoe friend, @agentpfangirl1997. Hey girl! I love how I found her and we chatted about what we thought about the show and checking each others reviews and fan arts of it. Her drawings are awesome! Glad I got to know such a great person. Even with the show, we still keep it alive through our love for it and will treasure it for years to come. Thank you, Daron Nefcy! @daronnefcy 

#svtfoe #cleaved #svtfoe cleaved #svtfoe finale #thank you daron #farewell svtfoe

[kevinthompsons]

Brought Her Back Alive | Discord

Summary: Kilgrave gets Daisy to the jet, and commands Phil to heal her

Trigger warnings: Blood, Kilgrave things, murder mentions, suicide mentions, violence

Written by: @agent-agent-coulson, @daisy-quaking-johnson and @kevinthompsons

COULSON: The command to guard the plane had been on Coulson and was all he could focus on as he waited, hearing gunshots from inside the Raft but, thankfully, no one came outside to find out how they'd gotten there. He craned his neck as he saw Kilgrave and Daisy exiting the building and was already trying to get out - the command to stay still on him - when Kilgrave ordered him to help.

His legs were moving already and he quickly got to Daisy and Kilgrave, pulling Daisy into his arms as Kilgrave's shook with the effort. He didn't have a moment to consider Kilgrave's physical weakness as he carried Daisy in his arms, stroking her hair and entering the plane. "Hey, hey, it's okay, you're here, I've got you." He whispered reassuringly. He didn't know what state she'd be in, if her fear of Kilgrave was affecting her. How the hell had she gotten so hurt? The noises she was making, the pain she was so obviously in, made his chest ache with sympathy and the desire to help. The wounds on her body looked like mostly bruises rather than bleeding, but that meant that damage could be internal - her wheezing and gasping breaths made him almost sure she had bruised ribs and probably would be black and blue all over.

"I'm going to need your help." Coulson called out to Kilgrave as he set Daisy down on a medical bed and went to retrieve a basic first aid kid. "How the hell did she get this injured? What did you do to her?" Coulson asked stroking Daisy's cheek before he went to clean up the blood and saw the shock collar. Angry, not understanding why it was even on her, he used his cybernetic hand and crushed the metal until he could take it off, checking her neck for more injuries.

KILGRAVE: Coulson came out of the jet, and he ran over to them. Kilgrave passed Daisy to him, relieved to let go of her, and staggered a little as Coulson took her weight. Coulson was hardly looking at him – his attention was focused completely on Daisy, and Kilgrave felt a stab of jealousy, seeing him stroke her hair and speak softly to her. As Coulson carried her into the jet, she murmured in pain, and Kilgrave felt that stab again, that sharp agony in his chest, for her, and he hated it. He followed them, and felt oddly, unsettlingly, out of control. Looking at Daisy lying on that bed, he could actually see the extent of what they’d done to her, the bruises on her face, the shiny blood on her lips, some sort of metal collar around her throat. And he curled his hands into fists at his sides. They hadn’t suffered enough, for what they had done to her. He’d been merciful.

At Coulson’s question, Kilgrave turned sharply. “I didn’t fucking do this to her!” he snapped. “You don’t honestly think I did this to her!” It was an automatic command, thoughtless, and he watched Coulson stroke her cheek gently, and felt again that possessiveness over her. Coulson was supposed to be fixing her, not bloody wasting time touching her like that. Luckily, it only lasted for a second, and Coulson started to clean the blood away from her skin, and pulled the metal collar off her neck. Kilgrave stood at the foot of the bed, staring at her.

“They did this,” he said, his voice quieter now, and he felt a familiar cool anger. Compared to the frantic rage, the uncontrollable fury, he’d felt before, this was welcoming. “The guards. But don’t worry. They paid for it.” He exhaled slowly, and walked around the bed, to Daisy’s side, opposite Coulson. His body was still aching from the effort of carrying her, his throat still raw from shouting orders at every person he’d passed, but he’d done it all for her. And, once she was healed, she would see that. He reached down and ran his hand over her hair, gently. “You’re safe now, Daisy,” he said, softly. “I rescued you. You’ll be okay.” He watched her for a few more seconds, and then looked back up at Coulson. “Come on,” he snapped, in a completely different, sharper, tone. “Get on with it!”

DAISY: She could hardly process it all, all the carnage, all the death. It was a silent horror movie, but she didn't need to be able to hear them to know how much agony they were in. If she were in a better state- if her mind could keep up with what she was seeing, she would've been horrified. She would've tried to do something, tried to stop him because this was her fault. She brought him here. She told him she loved him and then left him the next morning. She should've been in pain from knowing what damage she was causing, but she could only selfishly think about and feel the pain running through her own body.

Each step Kilgrave took hurt her, jostling her body, but she was glad for how much she wasn't aware of. She was glad for those seconds where everything was gone. Nothing existed, not even her. She would hopefully think she was finally dead, and then time would jump ahead to the pain yet again.

She didn't know how long it took to get outside. She didn't know that they were outside at first, but she  heard Kilgrave shouting something indiscernible. Then, she was being moved again. She felt the transfer of being in Kilgrave's arms into someone else's. She could only tell because it hurt more. She couldn't hear the words spoken to her, couldn't even hear her own cries of pain.

Then time passed again, and she still couldn't hear what was being said, but she heard enough. She heard the tone, the anger. That anger was so familiar to her, but she couldn't place it. She didn't know who it belonged to, but words tried to fill the tone, spoken from a face that wasn't there. They were all jumbled in her head. It has to carry weight. After everything we've been through, that carries weight! It didn't help her head concentrate on it enough. I will crush them! I'm gonna make somebody pay -- whoever the hell it is. It wasn't enough, but she felt like it was important. Something about that voice was important. She needed to know who it was, but she hurt too much to even open her eyes.

Eyes.

She felt his hand on his cheek, sucking in a breath at the pain of the bruises forming there, but the gentle touch reminded her.

Bye-bye, Angel Eyes.

He was someone who cared about her, not in the way Kilgrave did. It was more important than that, more real

His hands were on the collar, and she should've been happy that he was trying to get it off her, but all she could do was whimper. She tried to move, even though it hurt, and she winced and tensed as her hand moved from her side to his wrist, weakly holding onto him. She wanted him to stop, to let go, so he couldn't take off the collar. It might have electrocuted her almost constantly, but it at least kept her powers away. Now, she'd be more capable of hurting people. She didn't want to anymore, but she couldn't tell him not to. She couldn't speak even if her voice worked because Kilgrave had ordered her not to. Tears slipped out, knowing she was helpless to her fate of destruction as he ripped the collar off her neck.

COULSON: Coulson almost rolled his eyes when Kilgrave completely disregarded his question for help. Of course, he claimed to love Daisy but when he actually had to do a damn thing about it, he was unwilling. But Coulson was too busy to think about that as he checked her other injuries. "I need her to be able to speak and give feedback to us." He snapped at Kilgrave as he continued inspecting her.

The blood on her mouth and her rasping breath made him almost sure she had some internal bleeding. He pushed her shirt up so that it sat at the top of her stomach and inspected the black and blue marks, prodding and almost sure that she had broken ribs. Grabbing a nearby pillow, he put it in her arms so that it sat against her chest, recalling that when Mack had had bruised ribs holding soft objects had relieved some of the pain. It tore him up inside as he gingerly removed her hand from his wrist, pressing a kiss to her bloody fingertips before securing her arms to wrap tight around the pillow. "I'm right here, not going anywhere. Just need to make sure you are keeping safe." He said, even though he was sure she couldn't understand a word he said. Maybe he was just trying to reassure himself that he could help her and he wasn't going to lose her.

He took another pillow and put it under her head to prop it up and stop blood from pooling in her lungs, taking out gauze for her nose and cleaning up the area around her mouth. Next, he dug around for water and some of the bone healing pills that SHIELD kept on hand, but swore when they were out of the pain meds. "Damn it, Fitz." He muttered as he turned back to Kilgrave.

"I need you to help." He said again. "She's too weak. I need you to order her to swallow this medication so she can start healing."

KILGRAVE: Now he knew Coulson would fix her, Kilgrave allowed himself a much-earned second to marvel at his own feelings. He knew he loved Daisy – he’d known that for months – but this was something else. Just seeing her laying there as Coulson examined her, seeing the mottled bruises on her rib-cage and the blood on her lips, and hearing her laboured, rattling breaths, was making his chest ache. He felt sick, but not just from the disgusting sight of her injuries. This was sickness, pain, fury, for her. He stroked her hair gently, and felt a sense of amazement similar to the sensation he’d felt when he’d told her he loved her.

Coulson barked an order at him, and Kilgrave turned to him sharply. He wanted him to command Daisy to speak. He could see the logic in that, so Kilgrave leaned closer to her and spoke softly, wanting her to feel safe, to know he was there for her. “Daisy, darling,” he said. “You need to speak to me. Tell me how you’re feeling.” He completely ignored what Coulson was doing, and just kept his gaze on her. “It’s not difficult. You want to help us make you better.” God, he couldn’t stand it. Looking at her injuries, her blood, her pained expression, and feeling it. How did people bloody live like this? He just wanted it to stop.

Again, Coulson demanded his help, and Kilgrave gritted his teeth and tore his gaze away from Daisy. His Daisy. Kilgrave looked at Coulson hatefully. Every single worthless guard had died for the hand they’d had in her suffering. But he still held Phil Coulson personally responsible for this. If he didn’t need him alive to heal her, Coulson would be dying a very slow, very violent, and very just, death. And Kilgrave hid none of his disdain in his expression. He wanted Coulson to know he was living on borrowed time.

The silence hung, and then he addressed Daisy again, because he couldn’t stand to look at her so-called father any more. “Daisy, swallow these pills for me.” He held out his hand, still not looking at Coulson. “Give them to me,” he said in a blunt voice. When Coulson did, Kilgrave gently took Daisy’s arm and guided her into a half-sitting position. “Sit up,” he told her, softly. “You want to, come on.” And he supported her, gripped her forearm with one hand, and carefully held the pills in his other hand up to her mouth. “Open your mouth, Daisy,” he said, never looking away from her face as she obeyed and slowly parted her cracked and bloodied lips.

He tipped the pills into her mouth, letting them roll off his palm slowly. Careful not to let her choke, he murmured encouragingly, “Dry swallow now, Daisy. Good. That’s good.” He smiled a little, so she could hear it in his voice. “Okay, now you can lie down. There you go.” He held onto her arm as she obeyed, and lay back down on the bed. And, for a moment, he just looked at her fondly before turning to Coulson. “What was that?” he asked. “Tell me what you gave her.”

DAISY: She was still fading in and out of consciousness, still half aware and half lost in the back of her mind where there was only black emptiness and the sound of silence. Sometimes she heard words, voices pulling at her, trying to drag her back awake. I need her... someone was saying that. I need you. . .

I just need you to be my friend right now.

I need you to lead.

Daisy, darling, you need to speak to me. Tell me how you're feeling. She knew that one was Kilgrave's voice. It pulled at her in a way that the other voice didn't, forcing her to focus again, forcing her out of the safety of that silent room of shadows in her head. She had to do what he said. She always did. His soft tone didn't change the fact that he was making her do this, ripping her words out of her painfully. "I- I-" her breathing hitched at every word, sending shockwaves of pain throughout her. "want- let me. . . die. . . please. Let- let me die. . . .I don't want to- to hurt. Please." She let out a small whimper. At least now she wasn't being contained by that order and wasn't forced into silence. He said she wanted them to make her better, but better to her meant what she said. It meant what she'd said. It meant letting her die. That had to be better than this. "Please. Please."

His words were fading in and out of her head now. She heard her name and something about pills and giving, but she couldn't make sense of all the fragmented words. His hand was on her arm, forcing her to sit up, and she sucked in a breath, choking on the lack of air and abundance of blood in her throat. Her mouth was open just because she was having a hard time breathing, but then pills were being put into it. She didn't have the energy to stop it. Swallow. She tried to. It took so much effort, but she did. Lie down. Maybe she could rest now. Maybe they'd be nice and let her rest permanently. "Please," she muttered again. "Jus-just  let me die."

COULSON: Coulson almost rolled his eyes at Kilgrave for asking about the pills only after he'd given them to Daisy. Of course Phil wasn't going to hurt her, but Kilgrave hated him just about all the time and thought very little of him - when he could have easily given Daisy something to hurt her, this was when he didn't act like Coulson was a festering waste of flesh?

Kilgrave wasn't just an asshole - he was stupid.

"Bone regrowth pills." He explained, stroking her hair and giving her some water. "Daisy has taken them before so her body shouldn't have trouble breaking them down. They'll help with her ribs - not much else can be done about them past the pills and plenty of rest." He explained.

Coulson's heart broke in his chest and he felt as if he was falling, collapsing back into his memories as Daisy screamed at him. As she told him everything that was bad about her was born of him. She was saying the exact words he'd said. Please, let me die, please! She was begging for death, just like he had, and he felt a sick and twisted feeling in his stomach as he recalled those moments. She didn't even scream, as he had. She didn't even have the energy for that. He wanted to gather her into his arms and push his energy into hers - the opposite of what Jiaying had tried. Whereas Jiaying had tried to take the life of her daughter and take her energy, Coulson just wanted to give his to Daisy, to let her take everything she needed from him so she could stand again. Just like he had done with the first cure.

"I'm sorry. We can't do that." He said hollowly. It wasn't as if he was going to, and he knew Kilgrave wouldn't allow that even if he would try to. He turned to Kilgrave again. "There are icepacks in that fridge." He said, pointing towards a fridge in the lab. "She'll need them. And don't touch her cheese sticks." He added.

KILGRAVE: Kilgrave had heard people beg before. It was rare – usually they were silent – but sometimes, if they were able to talk, they begged for their lives, or for the lives of their families. He usually just told them to shut up, because it was bloody annoying, and, hearing Daisy gasp in pain, hearing her say she wanted to die, felt like that. It was pointless, and it tugged at his lungs the way her pain did now, and he hated it. He clenched his jaw and felt the fury at the guards who had done to this to her rush through him. I don’t want to hurt, she said. “Shhh, Daisy,” he murmured gently. “It won’t hurt for much longer. You’re fine. I’ve got you.”

Now he’d given her the pills, and she was lying down again, he could tear his attention away from her. Bone regrowth pills? Bloody hell. Coulson sidled up next to her and poured water into her mouth, and stroked her hair in an all too familiar way. Kilgrave stared at his hand on her hair. He hated Coulon’s condescending tone – he hated that he had any tone at all. They usually sounded flat, empty. He wanted that, from Phil Coulson. But there was an expression in Coulson’s eyes that Kilgrave couldn’t place, something he’d never seen before. And he didn’t like that Coulson was touching her. He wasn’t there to comfort her. He didn’t need to bloody comfort her.

“Stop touching her,” he snapped, protectively. “Let go of her.” Coulson was there to ease her pain and now, it seemed, he’d done everything he could. Which was sod-all. He hadn’t even given her the pills, Kilgrave had. And he was a shitty pilot. So much for being a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent. Coulson was still looking down at Daisy, and he apologised to her. As if not letting her die was something he needed to be sorry for. What the hell was wrong with him? Kilgrave frowned. “Too bloody right we can’t do that,” he said. “She doesn’t want to die. She doesn’t mean it.” He was sure of it. She was lost in the pain of what they’d done to her. Daisy didn’t want to die. She just wanted her suffering to stop. That was all.

Coulson pointed to the fridge, and Kilgrave looked at it. There was a pause. “So, go and get them,” he said pointedly, not moving from where he was standing by Daisy’s side. “You said she needs them. You’re supposed to be helping her, for God’s sake.” He wasn’t going to leave her side. Not for anything. If Coulson wanted ice packs, he could bloody get them himself. Kilgrave turned away from him, not bothering to watch the order being carried out.

He looked back at Daisy, and brushed some of her hair away from her face. “He was right, you know,” he said. “As much as I don’t want to admit it. I can’t let you die. But you didn’t mean it.” He felt that pain again, that pain for her, the pain at seeing blood on her beautiful face, and bruises on her skin. “You don’t want to die, Daisy. You want to live. You know you do.”

DAISY: Sorry, the other voice said, the softer voice, the safer voice, the voice that didn't want to make her curl in on herself but instead curl up against someone and wrap them both in a blanket, drinking hot chocolate and eating grilled cheese sandwiches. Only the word itself, separated from whatever else he might've said along with it, broke her heart and stole her hope of peace away from her. He wouldn't let her die, and neither would Kilgrave.

Her hearing seemed to be returning to her more now as time went on, though she doubted that it was because of the pills she was given or even how much faster she healed than normal people. It was probably because those sirens from within the raft were no longer pounding in her ears as loudly. It didn't help her breathe any easier, metaphorically or physically. She would've preferred that she couldn't hear, because at least then she wouldn't have to follow Kilgrave's orders.

He was right, you know. The order didn't cut out at all, and she did know. He was right. She didn't know what he was right about. She hadn't heard that much. She'd barely heard anything besides an apology.

She'd known what she said though. She'd believed it until he told her not to. You didn't mean it. It was like a crack in the foundation of her beliefs. You don't want to die, Daisy. Crack. You want to live. Crack. You know you do. CRACK. Just like that, part of her was gone. He was right. She didn't want to die. She wanted to live. It wasn't for him. She'd come here to get away from him, to get away from how he could seem to make her stay so dark and malicious for longer periods of time, but she didn't really want to die. She had just thought that was the best option to keep people safe from her. She didn't have to die for that. She needed to live through it to find a better option. She'd hurt Jessica if she died, but there were other ways. Other ways. She needed to stay alive to find them.

Her body resonated with that need to live. She vibrated rapidly, making a soft hum that sounded very similar to purring, and maybe the reasoning was similar. After all, many cats purr when they're in pain because the low frequency of purrs causes a series of related vibrations within their body that can heal bones and wounds, build muscle and repair tendons, ease breathing, and lessen pain and swelling. For Daisy, it worked similarly, though her reaction wasn't intentional. Her body just seemed to know what to do with the order to live.

COULSON: His hands jumped off of Daisy as if she'd burned him, Coulson pushing back so he was a good distance from Daisy even as he ached to hold her and console her. To reassure her she'd be good as new.

Coulson directed all of his anger and rage at Kilgrave. It was one thing to ignore how Daisy felt about him - to ignore Daisy's real desires, to think that the person who had taken control of her was anything like Daisy Louise Johnson, a hero. Kilgrave could live in his little fantasy world and believe that his little fantasy Daisy loved him, or whatever approximation of love he could ever feel.

But this wasn't purely Kilgrave grasping at what he thought was love and who he thought he loved. This was Kilgrave ignoring everything Daisy felt, and not giving her the choice to feel her pain. Not allowing her to accept that she hurt. He felt that his own pain, that whatever empathy he felt for Daisy, was far worse than whatever Daisy was going through right now as she bled inside out and her skin was patterned with the colors of the sky? Any ounce of Kilgrave's miserable life couldn't be half as worse as what Daisy was going through, or even what any member of his team -- his family -- had gone through. If Phil wasn't so disgusted, he'd be filled with pity. But Kilgrave wasn't even worthy of that.

Phil stood abruptly, going to the fridge in the lab and finding the ice packs, bringing several back with him as he watched Kilgrave forcing Daisy to heal. Forcing her to use her powers (and to only exhaust herself further) to heal herself. "Is this the first time you've ever felt empathy for another person? You must hate it." He sneered at Kilgrave as he put the ice packs down. "I have to touch her to put these on, since clearly you have no idea how to care for a person other than yourself."

KILGRAVE: Daisy’s body started to hum like a machine, and Kilgrave smiled to himself. “Well, that’s new,” he said to her. He stroked her cheek gently. “You really are full of surprises.” He thought he’d explored the extent of her powers when they were first together, but she’d revealed so much more to him when she had come back. And now, whatever she was doing to herself, was clearly another layer of her abilities. When she was awake, he would have to ask her about it.

He watched her rest, equally fascinated and loving, and tilted his head to the side. She really was more pretty than Jessica. Jessica had always been too bloody pale, even with makeup. She looked sick all the time. Even underneath the blood and bruises, Daisy was more attractive than her. Jessica had looked like utter shit after Coulson had beaten her up. But even the sight of Jessica like that hadn’t made his chest hurt the way Daisy’s pain did. Even now she was quiet, and lying still, he still felt it. He’d hoped it would go away when she wasn’t suffering, but it hadn’t. He still felt sick.

He didn’t realise Coulson had come back until the other man spoke, and he looked up sharply, his attention pulled from Daisy. There was something unfamiliar in Coulson’s tone – he sounded like Jessica. Like he was taking the piss. Kilgrave glared at him. “I don’t know how you bloody stand it,” he said. “It feels shit.” Coulson was obviously testing boundaries, seeing how much he could get away with. But his opinion didn’t matter. He was there to help Daisy. “Just get on with it,” he said, the order vague and careless. And he turned his attention back to her again. “Rest, Daisy. You’ll be alright now. You’ll be like you were.”

Suddenly, a wave of exhaustion hit him. It was so sudden and overwhelming that he almost staggered, but he stayed standing. He let go of Daisy and turned away from her, because he needed to sit down. Ever since he’d woken up to find her gone, he’d been moving, restless, terrified for her, desperate to save her. And now he’d rescued her from that place, she was finally with him again, it was catching up to him. He walked over to the wall and sat down, leaning his back against it and sighing. He didn’t tell Coulson to join him. He just closed his eyes and put his head against the wall. And he remembered the sight of her being beaten, being held against the wall and hit, and, when they had let her go, she’d collapsed in a heap. His Daisy.

“You wanted to leave her in that sodding place,” he murmured, not opening his eyes to address Coulson. “You wanted to leave her there, and they almost killed her. Your own daughter.” He opened his eyes then, and looked at the other man hatefully. “You must really fucking hate yourself, Coulson. I can’t even imagine. You and Jessica go on about being heroes, but if I hadn’t saved her, they would have beaten her to death.”

DAISY: Her breathing was starting to ease as the vibrations worked through her body. It took energy, but she had to stay alive, both for her own reasons and for Kilgrave's order. She didn't care about being full of surprises, even if what she was doing was a surprise even to herself. There were other things he still didn't know about her, like the fact that she could create a sound barrier, but she wasn't going to tell him that. It was still her advantage. She still had that at least.

Her eyes were still closed, but she was listening now. Everything about his tone was soft and caring. Just like it had been for the past week with her. It was so different compared to how he spoke to everyone, and it reminded her of Ward. She hadn't forgiven Ward, but even with him, she'd seen a potential for good. Kilgrave thought he was helping her at least. Daisy knew that, and she could almost bring herself to respect it if she didn't feel so trapped. She wanted to live, but she didn't want to need him for that.

Then, she heard his voice again, the other person who was with them, the other person who was actually caring about her, and it clicked. It was the person she actually needed, the one person who there was nothing without. She didn't know why he was here. Kilgrave certainly wasn't aware of just how important he was to her right now, and she could tell that he was jealous of him just trying to care for her as Kilgrave had ordered him to do. She hated that Kilgrave pulled him into this. He was using him again even though Daisy snapped at him before for ordering him. She wanted to snap at him again. She wanted him to be as far away from Kilgrave as possible, but she was still too weak to do anything about it.

Instead, she weakly moved her hand in the direction of his voice, trying to reach for him, but he wasn't near enough to her. Kilgrave had ordered him away from her. A tear slipped out as she croaked out one word to him, one word before Kilgrave spoke his next command, one word before she felt the heaviness of sleep, one word before she lost herself to who she really was.

"Dad?"

She wouldn't be herself when she awoke.

COULSON: Coulson grit his teeth, endeavoring to ignore Kilgrave's words both to Daisy and to him as he gently placed ice packs on her head, ribs, and a spot on her thigh, hoping they'd help. At best, they'd speed up her healing and alleviate some pain. If not, at least they could calm down the swelling from the bruises and other injuries.

He sat back on his heels, watching Daisy and glancing again at Kilgrave who spoke. "You think I knew this was happening to her?" He asked, gesturing at Daisy. Each injury made him furious, and he did understand Kilgrave for a moment, who had surely killed each and every guard doing this. Only, Kilgrave's actions would only effect a few guards. He'd make a difference with only a few people - if Coulson had known and handled it, they'd have been punished for their crimes and people would know that they couldn't abuse prisoners like this. Instead, those spaces would be free to be taken by another person willing to abuse them.

He swallowed at the sudden dryness in his throat. Yes. He hated himself. Coulson couldn't tell if that was a command or himself, but suddenly a deep feeling of worthlessness, of self hate and pity, filled him from head to toe. He wanted to throw himself off this very plane and if Daisy didn't need him he might have tried. This felt so different to any order - it felt like Phil wanted to tear himself inside out and he couldn't and he just wanted it to stop. Loathing filled him for himself - and for Kilgrave, for making him feel that way.

His attention was directed from his hatred and from his attention on Kilgrave to focus on Daisy as her hand moved. He clutched it immediately, trying to help her, squeezing her hand reassuringly.

Dad.

Phil's entire world lurched when Daisy called him that, thinking of what she'd said before, of that he wasn't her father. Everything become lighter and although the order to hate himself still weighed on his shoulders, he couldn't hate himself that much if Daisy didn't hate him. When she fell asleep, he stroked her palm with his thumb, sighing. "I might hate you. But I have to thank you for bringing her back alive." He said through gritted teeth. "But she'll never forgive you for it."

KILGRAVE: It was only now the immediate threat had passed, and Daisy was safe, that Kilgrave could let himself rest. He put his head back on the wall, and let the tension roll off his shoulders. He'd been so furious for her, so worried, so desperate to get her back. But she was here. He'd rescued her. Bloody hell, had he ever felt like that before? That righteously angry, that overwhelmingly furious? And it was all for Daisy. Because he loved her. He loved her. He looked at the table where she was lying, and felt it again -- that sharp pain. And he had no outlet for it except Coulson, the man who'd had a hand in putting her in that sodding place.

Even from where he was sitting, Kilgrave could see Coulson holding her hand, stroking her skin. And he hated it. He hated seeing Coulson touching her. She was his, for God's sake. He'd rescued her. He'd carried her there and saved her goddamn life, and Coulson thought he had any fucking right at all to touch her? He recalled, vaguely, the rants Daisy had given about S.H.I.E.L.D. and how they'd used her, and how much she hated them. What the hell was Phil Coulson if not the bloody embodiment of S.H.I.E.L.D.?

"I thought I told you," he snapped, "To let go of her!" But then Coulson spoke, even before the order was obeyed. I have to thank you. And he remembered the look in that woman's eyes, that woman he'd saved, with Jessica. She'd thanked him, and looked at it him with an expression he'd only seen on TV. Gratitude. Genuine awe and gratitude. The only other time something that had happened had been with Daisy herself, when he'd saved that receptionist, and Daisy had been sobbing and covered in blood, and she'd hugged him of her own volition. Kilgrave didn't know what to say. It was rare he was speechless -- he relied so heavily on his voice -- but, for a moment, he was just silent. Coulson had thanked him. For rescuing Daisy.

"Of course I brought her back alive," he said, trying to deflect from the odd gratitude. "I had to save her." It came out rougher than he'd thought, and he surprised himself. His voice caught in his throat, and he looked away from Coulson and readjusted his position, resting his elbows on his knees and trying to distract himself from the memory of seeing his Daisy being beaten to within an inch of her life, blood and bruises and the crack of every hit, and the way she'd fallen as soon as he'd told them to kill themselves.

Coulson said she would never forgive him, and Kilgrave's gaze turned sharply back to him. "Oh, shut up," he snapped. "Of course she will. She doesn't want to die. She was just in pain." His Daisy wouldn't be so bloody weak, so fucking suicidal. That was Jessica's territory. Apparently. He was quiet for a moment, and then, because he couldn't bear to have nothing to do except stew in that odd, empathetic, pain, he said, "Tell me, why did you let them take her? You knew where she was. But you let them imprison her like a fucking criminal." He looked at Coulson. "How the hell could you do that to your own daughter?"

COULSON: "You actually ordered me to help her and do what I must. According to me, I must comfort her since you're so horrible at it." He growled, holding onto Daisy as long as Kilgrave didn't order him to stop. He watched Kilgrave's face - had the man even done enough good in his life to be thanked? - and raised his eyebrows.

Had to save her. Oh, that was rich. When had what was normal and what was supposed to be done stopped Kilgrave from doing anything? There was a dead agent now and many dead guards because Kilgrave didn't give a damn about the lives of and loves of other people. He clenched his fist, glancing down at Daisy. He thought of how when she'd been in training to be an agent, she'd stressed about taking someone out. How it had been difficult for her, though she'd done it. The complete opposite of Kilgrave, who was so trigger happy and so completely oblivious to death that he killed without thought.

Coulson bowed his head. He was no stranger to suicidal tendencies, no stranger to Daisy begging for death. Being an agent meant that you didn't try to throw yourself off of a building or slit your wrists. That wasn't the way SHIELD did things - agents who threw themselves into a battle with little to no regard for themselves, those were the suicide risks. He knew because he had been scared Melinda would do the same thing, and relieved when she went into Administration and didn't do anything that would cause him to lose her for good. He knew because every day after Daisy disappeared he would comb through newspapers terrified he'd find a story about Quake, the legendary hero, having allowed herself to get killed through some misguided attempt to make up for the loss of Lincoln.

It had never been a fear for Coulson. Oh, he'd begged for death. But he feared everyone else choosing to leave him before he feared leaving himself.

"She wants to die. And you don't have to let her - but you have to accept that she feels that way. Loving someone means accepting them, flaws and all." He snapped. "She was in a lot of pain, physically. But she was in more emotional pain than you could ever grasp. The Daisy you thought you knew killed people and hurt the people she loved. She made people suffer. That is a different person to this one, and now she's back to herself and she hates herself. A narcissistic son of a bitch like you will never even hope to comprehend how she's feeling." Coulson said.

His hand clenched and unclenched, trying to find the right words to explain to Kilgrave how he'd felt. "I wanted to get her out of there. But you can't truly believe I knew what they were doing to her." He said, gesturing at Daisy's injuries. "But that kid you killed, the one you don't even know the name of? He was right. Daisy did try to turn herself in - only, she asked them to kill her. Luckily they didn't listen or she wouldn't be here with us now. Lucky for us, at least - not for her, since she's still forced to be your captive." Coulson shook his head, glancing down at Daisy's bruised and beaten face again and pulling in a deep breath. What was going to happen next? Where would Kilgrave take her?

And what would he do to her there?

#d #coulsonsshield #daisycjohnson #blood tw #suicide mentions tw #mind control tw #murder mentions tw #violence tw

[fierypen37]

The Oasis: Chapter 7

Another chapter up!

Oh gods. Daenerys bit her lower lip, her heartbeat thudding against her ribs. Jon, poised over her, flushed and tousled and sexy . . . oh gods. A scratch and canine whine at the door popped their bubble. Jon froze, dark eyes flying wide.

“Shit. Ghost!” he said. Reddened lips formed a rueful smile. His fingers raked through his mussed black curls in what she realized was an endearing tick.

“We overslept. It’s been an eternity since he’s been out. I got to take care of him really quick. I’m sorry to break the mood.”

Daenerys murmured something consoling, hiding her disappointment. The build-up was getting a little ridiculous. Jon pecked a kiss on the back of her hand, like a courtier, before slipping from bed. He folded the pistol into her hands, all levity gone.

“I’ll be back in ten minutes, tops, but in the off chance there’s a bad guy, just point and shoot. The safety’s off. Be sure to keep your wrist locked for the kick,” Jon said, his face serious and scowling. Daenerys gulped. The bright, vivid feeling she woke up with drained away. The world outside was fanged and hungry, waiting to rend her to pieces. When Jon was close, all else was forgotten. Jon noticed the shift and pecked a kiss on her lips.

“Hey, it’s ok. I’ll be back in a flash.”

Jon wedged open the door, warding off Ghost’s excited circling with a knee.

“Down, you lout! C’mon we’re going!”

The front door slammed shut behind him with a reassuring clonk of the deadbolt. Daenerys rolled over, burying her face in Jon’s pillow. Mm, that deep masculine smell with a tang of woodsy aftershave. It steadied her. The service pistol was heavier than she thought it would be, cold and reassuring in her hands. Rolling out of bed, she hurried to the bathroom. Simple things like combing her hair and brushing her teeth made her feel normal.

The central air hummed, the walls creaked and settled. Warm wedges of sunlight poured in from the windows. Gods, had she ever slept this late in her life? She tiptoed through his apartment, eager to soak up hints about him. Crushing like a teenager. Tidy, almost utilitarian. No wall art or decorations. The kitchen was clean, for a guy’s place, a couple dishes soaking in the sink. Daenerys put the battered kettle on for tea. The tea tin on the counter was a full-bodied variety from the Summer Islands. The living room was sparsely furnished with a comfy suede couch and an older model flatscreen. The end tables, desk, and tea table were made by hand, she noticed the loving detail in the carving and polish. He said he worked construction. But he seemed to have a particular talent as a woodworker.

A framed picture showed Jon with his arm around a slender dark-haired girl. His sister Arya, if she could guess. Both had the same wide, square-toothed smile. Behind them was the windswept coniferous beauty of the North district. Maybe Winterfell, where he grew up. A flat buzz and generic droning startled her. Daenerys blinked at the square flip phone Jory bought her. The only ones who had this number were her security team and her brother. Daenerys flicked it open and stabbed TALK.

“Hello?”

“Daenerys? What happened?” Her joints turned to water at the sound of Vis’s familiar, querulous voice.

“Vis, thank the gods. Barry said he talked--”

“Yes, yes, Selmy filled me in on the attack. Working with undesirables always leads to this. I’ve always told you nothing profitable will come of it, but you insisted. Such disgusting underworld tactics. Brutes. What happened with Daario?” Daenerys took a steadying breath. She paced the length of Jon’s living room, the worn carpet tickling the soles of her feet. Barry’s pistol felt heavy in her hand.

“Um, we broke up.”

“You can’t be serious, Daenerys! Stormcrow is our foremost partner! I’m on the jet right now, flying home. Our stocks dipped three points this morning.” Her stomach plummeted. He went to the press, that spiteful worm! Gods, she could see it already, her face plastered on every tabloid. A CEO dumped, the icy Dragon Queen spurned. All that sexist shit she loathed.

“That’s barely a dip. We’ll be fine. Give it a news cycle, people will get over it,” she said soothingly. Dragon was safe in Tyrion’s hands. His spin team was unrivaled.

“No, you’re going to patch things up with Daario. Now!” The beginnings of anger blew on all those convoluted betrayed embers from the night before. The dragon pin she bought Daario for an anniversary present gleaming on his lapel. Daario’s handsome face slack in bliss. Jeyne’s black pencil skirt rucked up--

“He was cheating on me, Viserys. I caught him, red-handed. I’m not going back.”

“You will or I’ll--” There it was: Vis’s forte of bluster and threats. When that didn’t work, cruel words or blows, when he was drunk enough.

“I. Am. Not. Going. Back,” she hissed. The phone was silent save for Vis’s sawing breathing for a long while. Daenerys humored him because he was her only family and he had sacrificed a great deal to give her an education, but he had nothing to stand on when it came down to it. She was Dragon’s CEO and controlling interest on the board.  

“Where are you? Maybe once we can have a civilized conversation in person, you’ll be more reasonable,” Vis said sulkily.

“I’m staying at a friend’s. Call me at this number when you land,” Daenerys said, snapping the phone shut before he could get another word in. Sweat dewed on her face, her pulse loud in her ears. Vis’s bullying had been played out when she was ten and Mother was dying, but it never failed to get under her skin.

In the kitchen, the kettle warbled. Daenerys moved it off the burner and added the tea in two neat scoops, setting it aside to steep. A breath of tea-scented air calmed her. Motes of dust lazed in a sunbeam. The phone rang again.

“Hello?”

“Hello? May I speak to Daenerys Targaryen?” the voice held a thick Flea Bottom accent, but was cautiously friendly. He stumbled a bit over her impossible Valyrian name.

“Who may I ask is calling?”

“This is Detective Davos Seaworth with the City Watch. I’ve been assigned to your case.” Her shoulders relaxed. Daenerys resumed her pacing, albeit a bit slower. It was a strange tick of hers, but she could never sit still on the phone.

“This is Daenerys, how can I help you, Detective?”

“Yes, m’lady, erm, there is no easy way to say this, but when the goldcoats arrived at the scene of the assault, the suspect had fled.”

“What?” Daenerys asked, clutching the phone tight in one hand, the pistol in the other.

“The suspect fled the scene,” the detective repeated, “The officers recovered your cellphone and wallet. The crime techs found evidence of the suspect’s DNA as well as yours and a third party--”

“Yes, Jon Snow. He’s a friend. How . . . how is possible he fled? The attacker was knocked out cold.” The hand holding the phone shook.

“In your statement, you mentioned the suspect was affiliated with some sort of a group?”

“The Harpy Triumvirate, yes. They’ve been sending me death threats.” Good. Her voice was still steady.

“Are you in safe place, m’lady?” Daenerys cast a glance around Jon’s apartment. Though unfamiliar, it felt warm and sturdy, much like Jon himself. The gun had an encouraging heft in her hand.

“Yes,” she said.

“A video message was found on your laptop, apparently from this Triumvirate.”

Hot and cold washed over her in sickening waves. The threats had always been repetitive, obnoxious, poorly spelled. It led her to believe that no matter how widespread, the harpies were petty thugs. They never sent a media file. Even a hint of sophistication was enough to rattle her at this point.

“Send it to me.”

“M’lady, I don’t think--”

“Send it to me.”

“It’s . . . disturbing.” Her stomach lurched.

“I understand,” she said.

“Maybe you could give us your insights. If you recognize anything. Watch at your own discretion. I’ll be in touch,” Seaworth said gently. Daenerys traded information with the detective and hung up. A moment later, the phone pinged with a media file. Daenerys swallowed hard and pressed PLAY.

The playback was grainy, glitchy, on the minuscule screen. Through the blaring of the speaker processing, Daenerys made out the familiar walls of her apartment. A block of ice congealed in her belly, the cold creeping up her chest, her throat. The apartment was destroyed, much like she’d last seen it. But on the bed . . . Fine hairs rose on the back of her neck. On the bed was the body of a woman. Something about the positioning, her shredded clothing, the dark stain on the bedding . . . oh gods, they’d raped her.

Gagged and snuffling, tears leaking from green eyes. Her hair was silver-blond, like Dany’s own. Nausea roiled in her belly. Disembodied black-gloved hands hovered over the stubby ponytail, gave it a sharp yank. Her yelp was muffled. The duct tape covering her mouth had ‘Daenerys’ written in crude black lettering. A knife appeared in the intruder’s grip, its silver point tracing the woman’s throat. Hopping against the hammer-beat of the woman’s pulse.

“Once King Joffery shed a tear/From a woman’s smile spread ear to ear/The bleeding smile all will fear . . .” the sing-songy rhyme sang in a rough, accented voice. The video cut out as the knife bit in and the woman began to scream.                

                                                   ~

 The string between he and Dany was stretched taut. He could feel it somewhere between his shoulder blades. An itch. Ghost seemed to sense his urgency and finished his business in the empty lot two blocks down without complaint. Jon peered up the street toward Visenya’s Hill and The Oasis. His old glasses felt too heavy on his ears. The heavy black frames pinched the bridge of his nose. The goldcoats had been patrolling thicker, he noticed. Good.

The air was cool after the drenching storm, but the sun shone warm on his shoulders. More clouds brewed out toward the Blackwater, a tang of ozone in the air. Jon dragged in the scent of wet pavement, the greasy food from the pub down the street, and the brine blowing in from the sea. The street felt quiet and industrious.

Jon tried not to think about the half-naked woman in his apartment, or her clearly expressed wishes to fuck him. It made his mouth water, just to think about it.  

“Come on, Ghost! Let’s go home,” Jon said, picking up the pace.

Jon scanned his building with fresh eyes. The keypad at the lobby was a good start, but anyone could buzz anyone else in: takeout guy, friend of a friend, whatever. Anonymity was their best protection, fifteen floors of apartments to comb through. That plus the one hundred fifty-pound dog, thirty rounds of ammunition, and Jon himself. Enough for a scumbag ex, but a multinational evil crime syndicate? Gods help him.

Jon and Ghost clattered up the stairs to his floor. Sam met him on landing. Relief lightened his face.

“Jon! I’m so glad you’re ok! Gilly and I were calling you all night!” Sam grabbed him an awkward one-armed hug.

“Sorry, Sam. I had a rough night after work. A friend called needing help and my phone took a dunk in a puddle,” Jon said, with an abashed smile.

“Oh my. Is everything all right?” Sam asked. Jon shrugged, feeling uncomfortable and underdressed in his sweats.

“It will be. I better get in and check on her.”

“Oh, she’s staying with you?” Sam said in a stage-whisper. Jon nodded.

“I’ll leave you to it, then! Give her my best. I’m on my way to pick up Little Sam from school.”

“See you later. Give Little Sam a hug for me.”

Jon rapped softly on the door, then twisted the key in the lock. Ghost shoved the door open with his nose, shaggy tail wagging madly.

“Jon?” Dany’s water-logged voice sent adrenaline singing through him. Jon slammed the door shut and twisted the lock. In a flash, the door was barricaded and Jon cast a frantic glance around.

“Dany?” He heard the sharp note of fear in his own voice, but couldn’t help it.

The living room was empty, the homey scent of tea wafted from the kitchen. Ghost was way ahead of him, padding across the carpet and jumping up on the bed to slobber Dany. Jon elbowed the dog out of the way, scrubbing his fuzzy ears in apology. Huddled in the bed, Daenerys looked at him with haunted, tear-stained eyes. His mouth dry as dust, Jon knelt beside her. The look on her face gave his heart a sharp twist. He scanned her, searching for injuries.

“What is it? What happened?” He plucked the gun up and set it on the bedside table. Dany dragged him close, nestling into him as if he were her lighthouse in the storm. Reflexively, he hugged her. Tight, protective. The combat energy still hammered away inside him, and seeing her cry made him want to kill something.

“They killed her! They killed her because of me!” Oh gods. His face went numb. His gut clenched.

“Who? What happened?”

Daenerys sobered with some effort, sucking in shaky, whistling breaths. Peeling back to look at him, her eyes shut briefly. Tears flashed down unchecked in silver streaks. Jon petted her cheeks, smoothing away the tears. It hurt to see them.

“A detective from the Watch called. The guy who attacked us was gone by the time they got there.” Jon frowned.

“How is that possible? The only way he was getting up was on a stretcher. You’ve got a wicked right cross, if I remember right,” Jon said. The feeble joke did its job; she gave him a little travesty of a smile.

“He got away somehow. They . . . they left a message on my laptop. Of . . . oh gods. They . . . they raped and killed a woman with my coloring in my apartment. An innocent woman is dead because of me.”

“Shit,” Jon said. There weren’t words for that. The mind boggled. Sick bastards. Jon’s fists clenched, fingernails digging into his palms. Pain helped contain this gushing well of feeling.

“Did . . . did the goldcoats find her there?” he asked. Horror upon horrors. I’d burn the bed and move to a different city if I were her. Dany shook her head.

“No. They covered their tracks.”

“I’m sorry, Dany,” Jon said, because he couldn’t think of anything else.

Jon wrapped his arms around her as the storm of tears blew through her. He rubbed her back, petted her hair, crooning nonsense, feeling like a useless lump. Dany breathed a harsh, heart-breaking little sigh, leaning into his touch like a kitten. After a time, her reddened eyes met his.

The kiss bloomed fully-formed. He tasted the salt of her tears and the sweetness of her beneath. Joy and pain. Jon stayed perfectly still as she kissed him, though everything inside surged toward her in answer to the unspoken question. Yes. Yes, I’m here. Yes, I’m yours.

“Jon, make love to me.”

#jonerys #snowstorm #fp37fic #The Oasis #Masseur!Jon #CEO!Daenerys #don't throw things

[avengers-nextgen]

Prometheus XVII

Silence stretched between Chloe and Alex until the blonde finally noticed the other’s presence. Whatever trance she’d been in had broken as Chloe shuffled through the pages of her notebook.

“You look like you’re going to pass out.” Alex remarked.

“Stayed up writing,” Chloe replied bluntly.

“Cool.” Alex nodded.

“Yep.”

“You’re the most awkward individual on the planet,” Sage snorted.

“Who?” Chloe asked.

“I was going to say you, but I think it’s both of you actually.”

“Thanks?”

Sage simply nodded in response. She remained standing with her hands tucked into her pockets eyes staring up at the sky. Chloe cast her gaze on the sky as well and that old nostalgic feeling came back. She used to love the night time.

“Well, it’s been a long day. See you around guys.” Chloe collected her notebook and dusted her hands on her shorts. She slunk off with hunched shoulders and a hurried stride.

Alex watched the other girl go hoping she was okay but at the same time knowing there was little she could do to help. Memories were hard to wrestle with.

“You have that expression again.” Sage noted without glancing down where Alex sat.

“What do you mean?”

“Your eyebrows get scrunched and your eyes grow tired. You always have that expression with me. You feel sorry for her.”

“Not sorry,” Alex sighed, “just...sad. The only one here who still has their childish innocence is Enzo. It’s only because his brain’s blocked out the grotesque details of his mother’s death and his dog’s death. He’ll remember when he’s older. They always do.”

“You know, a long time ago you made a promise to me.” Sage crossed her arms. “I think you’ve broken it.”

“What?” Alex frowned.

“You said you weren’t going to change.”

“I haven’t.”

“You have. You’re different. Closed off, reserved, distant, and worst of all you’ve lost your hope.” Sage finally looked to Alex trying to judge the other girl’s reaction. “I’m not saying it’s a horrible thing. Change is good. It’s necessary and inevitable, but I’m going to do what no one did for me.”

“And what exactly is that?”

“I’m going to listen.” Sage set her jaw, “and you’re going to talk. That’s all.”

Alex sighed in defeat. “You’re stubborn.”

“So you say.”

The blonde sat silently for a handful of minutes trying to pinpoint the source of her feelings, the melancholy, the slight emptiness, the bitterness, and the soft anger. “How do I know this is worth it? All of this? Fighting and almost dying. Nothing changes. Ever since the ship-I can’t help but feel I’m wasting my life fighting an endless battle. I’m Sisyphus pushing a boulder up a hill only for it to roll down again. I don’t want to be afraid that each day I could die or James could or Piper or-or anyone. That’s not something worth living.”

Sage waited for Alex to continue but the blonde merely took a few shaky breaths.

“You’re wrong you know. Things do change.”

“Right,” Alex snorted, “and how do you know this? What evidence do you have?”

“Plenty.” Sage shrugged. “I can show you too.”

“How?” Alex frowned, tucking her knees up to her chest. Sage rolled her eyes and plopped down onto the ground next to the other girl.

“It’s a trick my father has. We can access memories. It allows us to morph illusions from them.”

“You’re not altering any-“ Alex began to move away but Sage caught her hand.

“I’m not. Swear it. Besides, I’m not experienced enough to do that.” Alex regarded the sorceress cautiously before relaxing. “Close your eyes.”

Alex did as she was told and images began to flick on the backs of her eyelids like movies. Each of them were brief flashes of conversations Alex had had with Sage. From the very firsts to the very lasts.

“One day, one decision, is all it takes for you to find yourself in a little place like this. If those puny people ever feel threatened by the likes of you-you won’t be their hero anymore. All it takes is for me to do one deed that benefits them and I will be the hero.”

“There is no difference between villain and hero but their ideologies.”

“You should have killed me.”

“I am never going to change.”

“I can’t be you.”

“I am exactly like him.”

“I don’t want to be me. I hate me.”

“I’ll be fine. I always am.”

“I wanted to do it on my own.”

“I didn’t ask you to worry over me!”

“No one has wanted me. Not from the minute I was conceived. I am something you throw away.”

“What if I can’t be fixed?”

“I’m doing what’s best for him.”

“Some of us find it hard to love something we’ve never been apart of.”

“Have you ever sat and watched the sunset?”

“Are you hurt?”

“I’m not bad but I’m not sure I’m good either.”

“How do you forgive someone?”

The images disappeared as quickly as they came and soon Alex was watching Bianca. Someone so angry slowly learn to smile and love and be happy. Someone who was learning and growing and prospering.

“People change. No matter how hard we try to fight it.” Sage shrugged, letting go of Alex’s hand. “Even bad people. You have to ask yourself, is one person worth all of the pain?”

Alex sat quietly processing the information. “Yes.”

“Then that’s all you need to know.” Sage shrugged. “When things get tough just remind yourself of the people you’ve helped.”

“You know it’s odd getting a pep talk from you.” Alex smiled thinly.

“I have a gem of advice every once in a while. Don’t get too used it.” Sage smirked. “I’m still the same.”

“Really?” Alex arched a brow. “You realize how stupid that sounds after that speech you just made?”

“Like I said, an occasional gem.” Sage held her hands up in defense.

“Well I think you need to listen to yourself more often.” Alex decided.

“Why is that?”

“Because whether you like it or not you’ve definitely changed,” Alex smiled smugly throwing what Sage had said back in her face.

“Oh yeah? Do tell. I’m curious now.” But Sage knew the blonde was right-she just wanted to hear Alex say it.

“You’re nicer.”

“Wow. Good start.”

“You take better care of yourself, you’re bonding with Enzo and Thalia too, you’ve fought with the good guys more than once, you aren’t set on killing Thor, you’re not stuck in a cell anymore, and you’ve actually learned to forgive.” Alex rattled off a few more points before coming to an end.

“Very astute.”

“Do you not believe me?” Alex asked.

“I will hardly ever believe what I’m told. It takes a lot of convincing. There’s a wall there.” Sage was both joking and serious, despite her laugh.

“So even if I told you that despite what you think some people care about you-and that I’m one of them- you wouldn’t believe me?” Alex asked.

“Well, I’ve had a bit more persuasion as far as that goes. From Enzo and Thalia at least. So yes, maybe some people care.”

“Good to know you’ve had that change of heart.” Alex snorted cautiously taking Sage’s hand again. “But I’m not on that list.”

“Not yet.”

“Really? I mean-you did save me. I thought I’d be a bit higher up.”

“You haven’t done as much convincing.” Sage remarked.

“But I was told I’m good at persuasion.”

“By who? Piper? She believes almost anything you know. It’s not hard to convince her of stupid shit. I told her the ceiling had the word orange on it and if she read it out loud it sounded like the word gullible. I mean for someone supposedly so smart-“ Sage’s sarcastic rant regarding Alex’s best fiend was cut short by the blonde herself.

Alex gently pressed her lips against the other girl’s giving Sage the option to back out if she wished. When the sorceress didn’t, Alex took the liberty of tackling Sage in a hug. “You pick on them but you like them.”

Sage’s eyes were wide in surprise from the kiss and it took her a moment to realize what had just happened. “You-you just-“

“I did.”

“Disgusting.” Sage made a face. “...do it again.”

“What the hell?” Alex laughed hysterically, drawing the attention of her family and everyone else. Then, to make matters worse, the sprinkler timer went off sending jets of water to blast the two girls.

“No! No!” Sage yelled scrambling as quickly as possible away from the water. “I changed once already!”

“So....if she kissed your sister does that mean she’s staying forever now?” Fox asked glumly.

“Unfortunately that’s probably the case.” James replied.

“Fuck me.”

#avengers #avengers next gen #marvel #black widow #captain america #mcu #natasha romanoff #pepper potts #romanogers #scarlet witch

[itsa-lie]

Birth Of a Liar Part Five

||Part One||Part Two||Part Three||Part Four||Part Five||

Final part, might make an epilogue too. Will contain spoilers. Also second best boy is in this, guess who it is (it’s Kiibo)

Trigger Warnings: Implied Torture, memory manipulation.

Darkness... ...quiet cold darkness. Kokichi had no idea where he was or what he was even doing here in the first place. First those weird grey guys capture him, then put him to sleep, and now he was just in and out of consciousness, only hearing faint sounds of voices around him.

“All systems go, checking the reaction to physical stimuli...”

He feels a slight pinch in his leg making him twitch what he believed to be his foot. There were sounds of someone writing something with a pen on a piece of paper before three beeps. “Left leg is a success. Now try left arm, raise the pain stimuli a little.” Whoever it was raising the stimuli or whatever must have raised it too high since it felt like his arm was on fire! He yelped and screamed, opening his eyes to total darkness while still hearing whoever that was with the pen scribbling down more things. 

“Pain stimuli a success. Going to right leg now...”

Whatever the hell “stimuli” meant he didn’t like it. He felt real hot out of no where, then real cold, then really comfortable to really uncomfortable, it was not a fun experience. He could even hear himself screaming! It was a nightmare! Maybe he’ll wake up from it soon...

The sounds slowly faded away and now it was only back to darkness. He could feel something cold and metal as he leaned back. Was he standing? Wait...he could move again and his body felt completely fine even after the whole stimuli thing. Kokichi leaned forward a little bit to feel even more cold steel in front of him, only this time he could see a few bars of light in front of him. Freedom? With all his weight he rammed forward on the steel only to fall forward and end up on the grassy ground. At least there was light now...was he outside? This was definitely grass he fell in. Upon closer inspection it turned out it was...the inside of an abandoned school? 

Being the inquisitive teen he was, Kokichi got up and started looking around for a way out and some sort of weapon for protection. Man if only he had his bat then no one would even be able to come near him. Though still he wasn’t going to kill them but...he didn’t want to be killed himself! Maybe he could knock them out then run away? That’s when he saw another locker. It seemed to still be closed but if the locker he was in was so easy to open then this one must be too. Perhaps there was something in here he could use to knock someone out with if they threaten him. Kokichi wiggled the handle a few times trying to open it. A metallic squeak and a sudden bang was heard. Good news: he opened the locker. Bad news: there was something pushing on the other side! Curse having such a small body! Whatever it was had opened the locker door entirely before landing on him, causing Kokichi to lose the air out of his lungs like a deflated balloon. 

What the hell did they put in this locker? A steamroller? However as he opens his eyes and finally processes the figure on top of him, it was human shaped. In fact it was very human shaped. Pale skin, silvery shiny white hair, a hat placed atop it’s head, and what seemed to be really a normal school uniform. Though shoot was he heavy! And he was so skinny too! How??

Soon enough the being’s blue eyes began to...glow? Wait a moment...was this guy even a human? Whatever he was he finally noticed Kokichi and BEGAN SCREAMING! This also startled the leader who scoots backwards and tries to hide back in the locker. There was a reason he was so heavy! He was a killer robot!

The robot blinked for a few moments and looks around the room slowly, catching his breath. Wait could robots even breathe? Finally his shiny blue eyes meet with Kokichi’s frightened ones. He gives a relieved sigh.

“You’re a high school student exactly like me, correct?” The robot finally asks giving a friendly smile. Kokichi just nods. Just give the robot what he wanted and maybe he will let you out of this place. Standing up suddenly, the other walked up to the cowering boy and offered a hand. “There is no need to be afraid. I was captured as well.” Kokichi just examines the hand in front of him hesitantly. They apparently wore gloves as well. Maybe it wasn’t warranted, and maybe it was a bit rude, but instead of his hand, he takes off the glove to inspect underneath. Wires, metal, screws and bolts. That means he really was-

“R-R-ROBOT!” the teen exclaims as he tries his best to hide back in the locker again. All the robot did was shush him angrily and look around. “Shh! Not so loud please! And do not touch my glove without permission!” The robot lectures placing the glove back on his robot arm. His angered features get a bit softer as if he was empathizing with the scared boy. “Anyway, since we have both ended up in the same situation, the best course of action would be for us to stick together. My name is K1-b0. But please, call me Kiibo. I am indeed a robot but I was created to learn and act like a human. I want to keep my true identity a secret so I can fit in a bit more with others.”

That sounded like something out of a cartoon...a robot going to school with humans to learn how to be like them. However Kiibo didn’t seem like an evil robot so maybe he should trust him? Actually now that he thought about it, having a robot best friend would be the coolest thing ever! Kokichi would steal movies about robots or watch anime about fighting robots all the time. They were so cool! For a second or two you could almost see the sparks of excitement and the glittering of Kokichi’s eyes. He had so much to ask him! 

Without even taking his hand Kokichi instead moves in front of Kiibo’s face, his hands in front of him excitedly. “That’s so cool! I always wanted to meet a robot! Hey, I got a few questions if you don’t mind? Do robots sleep? Do robots eat? Do they go to the bathroom? Do they have d-”

KABOOM! In came a gigantic robotic creature! Well it wouldn’t be so bad if it was a robot like Kiibo but this thing looked like something out of Star Wars! The boys stare at it in horror before Kiibo quickly took a hold of Kokichi’s hand. “Hurry! We have to run!”

He didn’t have to tell him twice! He’s dashing right behind the robot, doing his best to outrun whatever it was that was on their trail. But wait...Kiibo’s a robot, right?

“Why don’t you use your rocket powered jet-pack feet and shoot it in the head with your lazer?” Kokichi questioned between breaths. The robot looks a bit embarassed and turns away. “I don’t have those...but I will protect you to the best of my ability.” Kokichi looks shocked and appalled by this revelation, his nose turning up slightly in disgust. “Who creates a robot and makes them not able to figh-EEK!” The gigantic metal machine had almost stepped on him if it wasn’t for Kiibo slightly pulling Kokichi’s arm to make him lean forward. Okay, that was a pretty good trick. “You were saying...?”

The hallway to this school was like a maze! It was as if they were going around in circles! At the end of one hallway there seemed to be a large door that could lead to a gymnasium or something along those lines. Kokichi pulls forward this time leading them to the place. Oddly enough Kiibo wasn’t so heavy to pull than he was to pick up off of you. Upon reaching the safe zone the boys closed the door behind them before collapsing onto the polished wooden floor. It took them a minute to catch their breath but once they finally did they began laughing. That was a close one but...it was rather fun! It reminded Kokichi of his DICE days. 

“Oh that’s right. I didn’t ask you what your name was. I apologize.” Kiibo states with a polite bow. For a robot he could move as swiftly as a human could. That was really impressive. “May I ask who you are?”

Honestly he didn’t know whether to be honest with the robot or not, but he did save his life from being a pancake so he did owe him at least that much. “Uh...Kokichi Ouma...of Tokyo Japan.” Kiibo’s eyes widened for a moment. “My databases say that you had disappeared for years and somehow ended up running your own orphanage! That is very humble and amazing of you. You must be a very good person.” Oh man, that was too many compliments in one sentence. His face got flushed immediately. 

“It wasn’t just an orphanage, it was an evil organization! We caused trouble and stole things, and once held the mayor hostage for ransom money!” He didn’t like his organization being known as some sort of orphanage, it was a lot more cooler to call it an evil organization...just like Maki once said. “Oh. My mistake.” Kiibo apologies again softly. Though as Kokichi looked up, his eyes met a dark haired girl with red eyes and her hair pulled into pigtails that ran down her back. It couldn’t be... “Maki?”

She was a lot older than when they last met but this girl was indeed Maki. “Hold on, Kiiboy I’ll be right back.” He tries to say hello to her before she looks away. She didn’t want to even look at him. “Maki come on, we haven’t seen each other for years and you’ve already forgotten me?”

She says nothing, just glancing at the wooden floor. “I haven’t forgotten about you, Kokichi...” Maki replies in a dull voice. “Then why won’t you talk to me?”

Finally Maki turns around, tears starting to form slowly. “Because I want nothing to do with you anymore...because of your stupid idea, my brothers found me and brought me and Goro back home! People know me as a murderer there, I can’t even get one friend!” Kokichi looks sadly at her, starting to feel guilt. “But what about Hana? Is she okay?” Maki’s tears began to roll down her face. “She’s in an orphanage. I want to adopt her but I’m too young and Goro’s in collage and is already knee deep in debt! That’s why I signed up for Daganronpa! I could use the money to bring Hanako back!” Kokichi looks to the ground for a moment in sadness. He didn’t want Hanako to get taken...he didn’t want Maki and Goro to go back to that family. They were a family. They were DICE! They were supposed to stick together through thick and thin.

“I’m already known as a murderer so...even if I kill it won’t make a difference.” Those words hit Kokichi like a bow’s arrow to the chest. “But DICE doesn’t kill-”

“I’m not a part of your stupid club anymore, Kokichi. You don’t think out plans, you just boss people around and hope they listen to you. You need to stop only thinking of the end result and instead of what the consequences are. You can do as you wish but leave me out of it...”

“Hey is this guy bothering you?” A tall guy with pinkish purple hair asked Maki, coming out of nowhere and cracking his knuckles. Maki looks back at Kokichi for a second before turning back to the man. “No. I was just leaving.” Kokichi watched sadly as the two went to another part of the gymnasium, the tall guy comforting Maki softly. She was right...it was all his fault...all his fault that DICE is split up...all his fault that they were forced into orphanages, all his fault Maki couldn’t see Hanako anymore. He could already fill the tears well up in his eyes. Suddenly a gloved hand had touched Kokichi’s shoulder making him jump a bit. “Was that the human ritual that they call a ‘brake-up’? My databases say that’s very hard for a human heart. I offer my greatest sympathies.” He doesn’t say anything for a second before he glares at Maki angrily. “As if I’d ever be with a vampire looking murder girl.”

“I-Is...that a yes or a no?”

Robots apparently don’t understand sarcasm.

Soon enough more people had found there way into this gym. He didn’t have time to introduce himself to them and honestly? The guilt and the worry of everything happening at once made him feel uneasy. Right now he’d rather be in that dark place he was with the stimuli than here. Soon the last two had come in, a girl and boy, before more shaking and rattling. He hated it here...but he was still a leader. Maybe he could find a way out of here with everyone in tow.

Apparently those giant robots were piloted by these odd little bear cub things, each with a different voice and personality. They also confirmed his suspicion. He was chosen for the games after all. A wave of fear had hit him but he tries not to show it. If he was in the killing game he was going to make sure everyone gets out alive no matter what. Soon they threw some close everywhere and told everyone to get changed. Kokichi blushes a tiny bit. Get undressed? In front of all these girls? And then THEY’D get undressed in front of him? Not for a perverted reason, but he looks around to see if everyone else was going to a dressing room or something. Oddly...they weren’t. The girl that came in last was in the sky getting a Sailor Moon styled transformation sequence, Kiibo had this weird Voltron like sequence, and that girl with the red hair that doesn’t even look like a high schooler had this sort of Tokyo Mew Mew vibe. Don’t ask him how he knows so much, he DID watch anime with the others in DICE you know.

So he cautiously walks to the only clothes left, a white suit with mixed matched buttons and a checkered scarf complete with boots. He had to admit, it was his style. In fact it suited him to a tee. It even matched with DICE too. Holding out a hand to pick it up, he was suddenly engulfed by a purple light. Fair organ music filled his ears as he watches himself get dressed without even moving a single finger. It was odd...he felt like a character in a video game when you change their look and they automatically look that way without doing a thing. He lands perfectly on his feet, everyone looking different than they did before. And now that bear said they were going to give their ultimates? What did that mean? Oooh like in the show when the characters have tale-

Suddenly light had flashed in his eyes! His brain felt dizzy, his stomach feeling woozy. 

Whatever happens you will NOT kill! Whatever happens you will NOT kill! Whatever happens you will NOT kill!

The light continued to shine, he could feel everything he knows in his life flashing before his eyes, like a PowerPoint of every single thing he’s ever experienced. It hurt for a second, until he was engulfed in darkness once again. What on earth happened? This wasn’t...right? Well one thing is for sure he might as well try to think of who he is...

.... ................... ...................................................... ..................................................................

My name is Kokichi Ouma, the ultimate supreme leader!  I lead an evil organization of ten...no...over a thousand people! And it’s known throughout the world! I’m also a liar. .... ................... ...................................................... .................................................................. And no MATTER WHAT, I will not kill a soul.

#kokichi oma #kokichi ouma #Headcanons #drv3 #daganronpa killing harmony

[asteverogersfan]

Steve Wins (Y/N) Back PART 2!

HELLLOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Omg I’m soooooo freaking sorry that it’s taken me this long to write the second part to “Steve wins (Y/N) Back”!!!!!!!!!!!! I’m literal trash and I’ll take all the hate you guys probably have for me. But I think it’s been a long enough time that everyone’s forgotten about me and doesn’t care :(

(omg my macbook was at an extremely low battery amount and I had such a hard time untangling my charger and getting it plugged in... Ugh, could you imagine)

Anyway! Here it finally is! I really do not have any good excuses, or any cool exaggerated stories my (obviously inconsistent) writer self could come up with as to why it’s taken me this long to post it… I pretty much completely forgot about it after the few times I actually took to sit down and write this. It’s weird that it’s finally written. It’s not just a vague concept I have in my head. That’s the cool part of putting in hard work into something you’re passionate about…. 

Says the person who legit just took, what like two years to write a second part?

 I like to think of this as a novel series in which this is the second instalment to…. ahem

Anyway, TRY to enjoy. I know there’s no way I can make up for how long this one has taken me. I should really call this “ASTEVEROGERSFAN Wins Readers Back” because that’s what I’ll need to do probably :( haha

Really, the only abbreviations you’ll need to decode in here are (Y/N) = Your Name

and (Y/L/N) = Your Last Name

READ THE FIRST PART BEFORE YOU READ THIS ONE!!! or don’t if you want some confusion in your life I guess…? k

—————————————————————————————————-

“Tony, what’s even going on?”

You complained while you were still carrying your briefcase and work files that Tony didn’t even bother helping you with in the first place.

“Don’t you worry, you’ll just want to see this as soon as possible, follow me!”

You struggled to keep up with Tony when he immediately jetted off in his Iron Man suit down the corridor and disappeared into a distant turn off.

“Yup, this is just some GREAT following going on.” You mumbled sarcastically.

You lost track of how many doors down the hallway it took for Tony disappear into one. You contemplated turning around and just giving him a call after you’ve settled into your dorm. You’d have a much easier time keeping up with Tony once you’ve packed everything away and washed up. It was a nuisance to haul your bag of S.H.I.E.L.D. reports and files down the hallway when the long days never ceased to exist in your life as of late.

You passed intersection after intersection of hallways to no avail. But as soon as you were about to turn around and give up looking for wherever Tony went, the in-the-flesh original man of the hour jumped out in regular attire.

“I thought you’d never catch me!” He exclaimed in your face.

You felt your heart jump out of your chest in your frightened state.

“Seriously, Tony! I’m surprised I haven’t ripped your eyeballs out yet!” You say, embarrassed that you fell for one of his unintentional jump scares yet again.

“I would just assign Banner and JARVIS to help me invent some mechanical super-sight vibranium eyeballs for me, anyway.” Tony replied, almost too casually.

“Yeah, and maybe THEN you’d be able to see how annoyed I’m getting at all of the heart palpitations you’ve caused me thus far!”

“Well, you won’t be saying that after l’ve shown you the surprise of the century.” Tony happily stated while stretching his arm out, gesturing you to walk ahead into the elevator he led you to.

“After you.” Tony said politely.

You just gave him a nod, not wanting to spit out anymore retorts in your current annoyance. You decided it best to just keep quiet and civil since you had no idea what Tony had in store for you. Or where such inspiration had come from for him to even do something of this supposed greatness for you. But Tony said it was good, and you trusted his judgement.

“Okay but seriously, you might even be tempted to actually let a smile creep up on that scowl you’ve got going on there.” Tony said with a lot more confidence than you thought was necessary.

“I wouldn’t hold your breath there, tin man.”

Okay, you tried to hold in the insults, but it’s TONY you’re dealing with so you had to let one out.

“OUCH! Right in the Arc Reactor!” Tony dramatically exclaimed while he placed a hand over the power core in his chest. You loudly scoffed in replacement for the giggles you were trying to hold in. You could try to be angry at Tony all you wanted, but he had a tendency to say the most ridiculous of things.

The elevator came to a halt as the two of you reached your destination a few floors up.

“After you, Mrs. Ray of Sunshine and Rainbows.” Tony jokingly said at your hostile attitude.

You would’ve uttered a retort because of your supposed anger at Tony, but decided to stay silent in compliance with holding in your laughter. You couldn’t let Tony know you found his insults funny.

————

Tony had taken (Y/N) away with him in order for Steve to hide a spa reservation package in the extra Stark Tower dorm she’d been staying in. He flew into a hidden closet to change out of his Iron Man suit and into regular attire. He used this bought time to over-ride some of (Y/N)’s S.H.I.E.L.D. business duties after he ran his plan over with Fury, who was willing to co-operate in operation “scatter all of (Y/N)’s tasks around to the other agents so they can complete them instead of (Y/N) so (Y/N) can have a break from work and have time to herself”. Since everyone at the tower knew the extent of the Steve and (Y/N) breakup, they were all willing to pitch in their help. As soon as Tony reached Fury’s office, he paged Steve the clear so he could get out of (Y/N)’s dorm room without getting caught.

————-

“Okie dokie, agent… Smoky…?” Tony trailed off, visibly not confident in his rhyming skills.

“Smoky?” You asked. “That’s the best you could do?”

Tony gladly changed the subject, “I’ll show you the best I could do! Here’s your schedule for the week.” he said as he slapped the tablet that showed the calendar week in your hand.

You initially thought this was just Tony being a smart-ass and re-iterating his rank above you. You expected a full schedule with an overwhelming amount of Avengers tasks and assignments.

“There’s nothing on it…” You suspiciously observed.

Tony waited for your reaction and a sudden realization came over you.

“What did I do?! Am I fired!?” You asked, worried.

“No, of course not, agent Smoky! You’re taking the week off! Well, I’m MAKING you take the week off.” You just continued staring at the empty schedule, not saying a word. This caused Tony to explain further. “You said you couldn’t function with all of those petty human emotions while having to deal with all of this S.H.I.E.L.D. crap. Now you don’t have to! Well, this week you won’t.”

You couldn’t even speak. You just stood there not even beginning to successfully process this unexpected event.

“Is that… Okay?” Now Tony was the one who was worried.

You suddenly ran up to Tony in excitement and hugged him as tight as you could.

“I’ll take that as a ‘yes’!” He painfully grunted, audibly struggling to speak under your death grip.

“Tony you don’t even know how much of a genius you are!” You said all too gratefully.

“Trust me kiddo, I do. Every day.” He said whilst admiring his face in a hand-held mirror. You didn’t even know where he randomly GOT the mirror from. But you didn’t care because your relief at this great news was the only thing you could focus on.

After thanking Tony before he took off to deal with his own Iron Man business, you decided to call it a day. You made your way down to your new dorm to officially begin your week off. Settling in without a care in the world, knowing that you had no other business to take care of or attend to was the best feeling to ever exist in your life in a while. You had begun your break by hauling out some snacks to accompany your upcoming afternoon Netflix session. In which you had fallen asleep to after the first 3 hours. Upon checking the clock that read 4:27am, you realized that you had finally awaken to a well-rested state of being that you hadn’t experienced in what felt like ages. You thought it an odd time to be awake, but since you didn’t have anywhere urgent to be anytime soon, you figured you’d just lay there. Thinking…

To yourself.

The inevitable soon took place and every memory of Steve came flooding back in. And with them, the conflicts you both faced when it came to his attempts at trying to prevent your participation in S.H.I.E.L.D.’s dangerous missions. You felt your chest become heavy as the reality of your situation sunk in. Steve was gone from your life. At your own doing, nonetheless. He had been gone for over a week solid, and you suddenly became fully aware of your loneliness. The love you once thought would never leave your life was now absent. You were no longer able to feel his presence, to hold his hands, to kiss his lips, or to cuddle up to him whenever you so desired. All you could think about was Steve. Everything about him. But the anger and betrayal you felt from him going behind your back and getting Fury to over-ride your placement on the last mission was also pushing it’s way up to the surface. This was a pain you had never felt before. You were angry at Steve, yet you knew deep down that you still loved every fibre of his being. You figured that was the worst way to have it. Being hurt was the worst way to feel love. And being in love was the worst way to feel pain. This time, you didn’t have anything to occupy your mind and to distract you from the situation at hand. All you had was yourself and your thoughts. You did not complain once about the overload of work S.H.I.E.L.D. had assigned to you since the breakup because you were always busy. You always had something to do. The last thing you wanted was to be free of distractions from the pain you tried so hard to escape from. Now you weren’t so sure if you even wanted a break anymore. But you couldn’t hide forever. Now the real hardships began.

After what felt like the entire morning that had passed before your eyes, you checked the time to read 7:12 am. That was when you had cried your last tear for the time being. You were getting a little hungry and decided you should at least balance out the torture of heartbreak you let yourself feel by recharging with some fuel. You dragged yourself out of the living room area’s couch and began walking towards the kitchen behind it. That’s when you noticed an elegant gift basket on the granite countertop. A confused smile crept itself up on your face as you took hold of the card reading “(Y/N)”, which prompted you to open it up.

“Hey there, agent (Y/L/N)!

I hope this isn’t too much to ask of you after the long week you’ve experienced, but I would like to invite you to the prestigious Cornelia Spa at The Surrey this Friday morning! Among other amenities, I have booked a full day of opulent services to indulge in with yours truly. By the way, I won’t take ‘no’ for answer. However, I will take a ‘Tony Stark will make your life a living hell if you don’t get off your agent butt and attend this well-deserved treat from the both of us!’ I am expecting to hear from you soon. And I expect to hear a big, fat, YES.

P.S. Please just let yourself enjoy some girl time and treat yourself to this to-die-for facility. We’re all very worried about you and love you dearly!

Love, Pepper.”

She even ended it off with an elegant heart drawn beside her name. How sweet.

Even though there was nothing in you that wanted to leave your dorm room, you made a mental note of getting back to Pepper and accepting her invitation at a more acceptable time of day. You figured you needed some girl time just like she’d said, even though it was much to your own dismay.

——————

Four lonely days had passed and all of the post-breakup emotions and more had been a stinging rage of molten lava flowing through your body since. Now it was time for you to relax and undergo some soothing physical and mental therapy. You were dressed and ready to meet Pepper to take off to the luxurious facility by 8:00am sharp. Commuting to the destination, checking in, and getting set up for the services had taken almost an hour anyway.

“You’re going to do fine, (Y/N).” Pepper told you with a soft smile as the both of you were about the enter the building. This was her subtle attempt at comforting the nervous aura you’d been emitting all morning. You didn’t really want to reciprocate her eye contact and let her know she had successfully recognized your current mood that you’d tried so hard to hide.

After the first 15 minutes of the Cornelia Signature Massage, you’d already melted away into a puddle of relaxed bliss. You thought you could’ve stayed in this session for the rest of your week off but knew that Pepper wanted to treat you to almost everything else that the spa offered when the massage finished. This included The Purist: A Dual Detoxification Treatment, an Iridescent Pearl Manicure With Stem Cell Stimulator, and a Champagne Shimmer Pedicure With Stem Cell Stimulator. You were certain that Pepper enjoyed you accepting her and Tony’s eager help more than she enjoyed the spa herself. At the end of the day, it dawned on you that you’d never be able to pay them back in a way that was even 1/10th of that spa day’s greatness. Although, Pepper assured you that your acceptance of their offer was more than enough to even out the tally.

That was the best way you could’ve ended your week off and began your weekend. You thanked yourself for accepting Pepper’s invitation and getting some much needed rest and alone time on top of that. Of course you thanked Pepper and Tony a hundred times more for their unbeatable courtesy in selflessly treating you so prestigiously. You were back to your regular S.H.I.E.L.D. operations schedule that was nothing short of hectic on the following Monday. Within the first two days, you were already hungrily shoving your tasks and assignments into your hypothetical mouth of adrenaline. You realized that you actually missed the fast-paced hustle and bustle of the Stark Tower and the rest of the agents/Avengers. #BackToReality.

Come Wednesday morning, you’d woken up bright and early to gain a proper start to your day. You expected the usual meet up with other agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. to combine your efforts in tracking a lead that could potentially be a threat some of Stark’s resources. You’d been assigned to check out suspicious activity at the abandoned Essex/Delancey station by the Williamsburg Bridge. You were to be discreet and sneaky. You were to blend in with the rest of the civilians.

The identity of the six suspects that lingered around the abandoned underground station was still a mystery. However, their every move had been closely monitored for over three weeks. Illegal trading was taking place and some agents had entertained the suggestion of one of those men being a friend of Stark’s. You were assigned to get up close and personal, that is, without being detected, to the supposed Stark “ally”. You had never seen any of the men wearing anything other than a lot of black clothing to cover their identity. It came as a surprise to you that this guy in particular had a bright red leather jacket that stuck out like a sore thumb. He had his face and head covered in a large, black hood. At least it was easier for you to keep an eye on him.

At first, he was exchanging words, money, and hidden substances with the other suspects. That made it easy to confirm his status in this entire operation. Then he began maneuvering away from the crowd and you noticed he might be on his way out of the abandoned station. That’s when you spontaneously decided to direct your focus exclusively to the red-jacket guy. This was a slightly easy mission, considering there weren’t any other public passerbyes that you could blend in with. You managed to keep yourself unseen and unheard in the echoey underground.

Your main goal was to follow your current suspect, to see where he was going, and what his next move was.

Your target quickly headed up onto Delancey street while you kept a short distance behind him. You followed him out onto the sidewalk to find him putting on a black, tinted helmet and getting onto a motorcycle. As he was speeding away, you noticed 3 other motorbikes parked 10 meters behind his.

“Well…” You thought. “I do like a good chase.”

As you ran up to the parked bikes, you relayed in your head how Steve had taught you to hotwire one. Luckily you got it going in 3 tries.

This entire ordeal happened in a matter of twenty-seven seconds, and you were soon turning right on the corner down Essex street and you began following your suspect. You were right behind him all the way down to where Essex turned into Rutgers Street at the the corner of Essex and Canal Street. A thought randomly popped in your head of why he’s not urgently jetting out of your sight and grasp, but you dismissed it as him not wanting to cause a scene. Surprisingly, some of your past suspects and culprits have avoided drawing other attention to themselves when they knew you were on the hunt for them. It could only be because they’d rather have individual private agents on their tail as opposed to a huge swarm of feds and swats.

As the-guy-in-the-red-jacket was approaching Madison Street, he made a left turn onto it, without a signal, no less. He made another left onto St James Pl which came as a shock to you because you could’ve sworn he would’ve kept going down Madison to make it onto the Brooklyn Bridge and then make his escape into downtown Brooklyn. You thought you’d have to follow him for a long time to find out where he’s sourced. At this point, the two of you were approaching Robert F Wagner Sr Pl and he you were positive he would’ve made a left turn to go up the road and somehow get onto the Bridge to confuse you. Yet again, he made a right turn onto it and that had confused you even more. He was slowly approaching South St and turned his right blinkers that signalled his approach into a random parking space. Which, yet again, made it clear that this guy was full of surprises and you weren’t sure if you were following the right lead anymore.

Reluctantly, you followed him into the parking space. As you turned into it, you couldn’t see where his motorbike had gone but you had seen all the other parked vehicles. You stopped yourself dead in your tracks in utter confusion, not caring if you weren’t being discreet at all. Out of no where, his motorbike sped towards you and before you could react and get out of the way, he abruptly stopped about 6 feet in front of you. You couldn’t see through his helmet, but knew he was staring directly into your unshielded eyes. The first thing you analyzed was his body language in search of any threats. But he just stood there on his bike, unarmed. Finally he shut off the engine and propped it in park. You were about to draw your handgun that was hidden inside your coat, until he held up both of his hands in protest to show you he meant no harm.

You didn’t know where this was headed or what to expect. You had never had a lead literally lead you to a destination so peacefully. Maybe he wanted to talk business? Maybe he wanted to discuss a few bribes to get you to keep your mouth shut? You wouldn’t have known until he began to take off his helmet and his hood and you immediately noticed the shiny blonde hair that had remained perfectly styled.

You heart skipped a beat and your mouth dropped wide open.

You froze for a good 5 seconds or so.

“Steve…”

He just stood there, but neither of you were able to produce any words or advance in any actions.

“Tony helped set this up.” He finally said.

“Set what up…?” You still didn’t know how to react or behave in this situation.

“Baby, I’m so sorry. I just—“ You noticed Steve was trying to hold back tears and you could feel the lump in your chest increasing. “I didn’t know any way to talk to you.”

You still didn’t say anything.

“Please just hear me out—“

“Oh, so now you’re finally allowing me to be included in a mission? Is this the only way? You as the fake ‘suspect’? Are we just playing a little childish game of ‘Cops and Robbers’? Is that all this is to you?!” You angrily spat out at him.

“Baby, that’s not the point. I’ve missed you soooo much and I’ll do anything for you to take me back. Just trust me on this!” He desperately pleaded. He started taking a few steps toward you and that’s when you drove your motorcycle— well it wasn’t your motorcycle per se, but… You hit the gas and moved it a few inches over to show him that you weren’t afraid to speed off and get away if he over-stepped his boundaries.

“I’m sorry (Y/N)! Please don’t leave.” Steve pleaded again. The hurt in his eyes and on his face tugged at your heart. “Can we at least talk about everything first?”

He desperately searched your face for any sign of forgiveness or compliance.

“…Here?” You asked him, not pleased at all with your surroundings or the circumstances.

“No. Not here.” Steve said. “I have a place I want to take you to. I thought bringing you here would be a nice little preview.” He gestured at the Brooklyn Bridge.

You nodded and began to get into position on the motorcycle you had… uh, borrowed.

“Didn’t your parents tell you that stealing is wrong?” Steve said with a sarcastic grin.

You scoffed a little.

“Well, that certainly isn’t your Harley Softail, now is it?” You chimed back at him.

He laughed.

“I’ve missed that quick-witted sassiness.” Steve said with a warm smile that you willingly returned. “This is a new one that Tony got for me… He knew you’d recognize mine.”

“That Tony thinks of everything.” You said silently to yourself.

“Where would we be without him?” Steve had said, knowing that that was both a true and sarcastic statement at the same time. “I think if I owe you anything, the least of it is a ride to the place I’m taking you.”

“Nah…” You said dramatically. “I think I’ll just call an Uber.”

The both of you laughed and you hopped onto the back of his new motorcycle. As you had wrapped your arms around him, you felt him place his hand on yours for a moment before he started his bike.

Steve had set you two on your way to the North Cove Marina.

—————————————————————————————————-

OMG I HATE TO DO THIS TO EVERYONE, BUT THERE WILL BE A THIRD PART THAT ACTUALLY HAS THE BEAUTIFUL SAPPY ISHHHH!!!

Another reason why it took me so long is that I had to research a few things… Which I realize isn’t a good enough excuse, because it doesn’t take two years to research spa stuff and boat stuff… but that definitely did take up some time whilst writing this.

Please don’t hate me and don’t worry, once this one settles down a bit on my blog (or if I get inspired anytime sooner than that) I’ll get to writing PART 3, that I definitely have the concept to in my head ;)

Anyway, thank you for reading this one and the first part. It means a lot to me, especially with the overwhelming and unexpected response I got from Part 1. It makes me sooooo happy that you guys enjoyed it so much and Part 2 was highly requested :)

ENJOY YOUR LIVES AND DON’T HATE ME (again)

PART 3 WITH FOR SURE BE POSTED. IF MY TUMBLR PAGE WAS STONE, I’D WRITE THAT ON IT AND IT WILL BE SET IN STONE. BUT IT’S STILL SET IN STONE SO YOU’LL JUST HAVE TO ACCEPT THIS MEDIOCRE PROMISE FROM ME PLSSSS

#Steve Rogers #captain america #steve rogers imagine #captain america imagine #steve rogers x reader #steve rogers x readers #chris evans #marvel #avengers imagine #Avengers #avengers fanfic #avengers imagines #steve rogers fanfic #captain america fanfic #tony stark imagine #tony stark #tony stark imagines #pepper potts #steve rogers fan fiction #captain america fan fiction #marvel fan fiction #marvel imagine #asteverogersfan #steve wins (y/N) back #im sorry again #dont hate me #again

[jasoningram]

Premature Ejaculation Refers To A Males Inability To Quizlet Jaw-Dropping Cool Tips

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Premature Ejaculation Ayurvedic Remedy

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Yoga Asanas For Early Ejaculation

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#Premature Ejaculation Refers To A Males Inability To Quizlet Jaw-Dropping Cool Tips #Premature Ejacul

[doodle--writes]

Jackass to Want That Ass- (Peter Maximoff X Reader)

Word Count: 2424

Warnings: Cursing, death, injury, torture

Summary: Y/N and Peter go out on a mission together, bringing back dark memories of how they met.

You sat there sitting behind concrete, hoping that a bullet wouldn’t graze you while you were waiting for backup. The only silver haired loser you knew had gotten you into the situation. You hung your head and gave out an exasperated sigh, knowing every single mistake you made to get into that situation.

Earlier that day you had been having a conversation with Charles, he was consulting you to figure out which book would be best for his English class, To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee or Little Women by Louisa May Alcott. “Charles, I love Little Women, I have since I was a child and it’s a classic but To Kill a Mockingbird would resonate with the students much better. With all of the controversial issues and the racism and prejudice, most of your students would understand it and know that there’s always been persecution against races other than them.” Charles silently nodded, you were trying your hardest to adapt to his bald head. Then you heard a voice which made you sigh immediately.

“Hey there professor. Oh and McCurvy’s here too? Wow I am lucky today.”

You scoffed. “Like hell you are,” you turned to Charles, “I truly hope that you choose Harper Lee’s book. I’ll be taking my leave now.” Without another word you gathered up all of your belongings and began to walk out of the room, hearing Charles’ voice being directed towards Peter.

“Why do you always bombard the poor girl with comments like that?”

“It’s fun to see her get mad, also no one else is hitting on her and she’s cool so I made it my job.” You just heard Charles sigh and then a second later all of your belongings were on the floor and you wrists were behind you, but tied up. There was also a decent weight pulling them down. You craned your neck to see the straps of your messenger bag tied around your wrists. The name of the culprit who had made it happen flew out of your lips.

“Peter!” Within a second the silver haired twenty seven year old had shown up in front of you, a smirk tugging at his lips, his dimples showing, and his goggles pulled over his deep brown eyes. He chuckled.

“Yes Y/N McCurvy?” You groaned in annoyance. He was such a jackass it gave you a headache. You closed your eyes for a second, took in a deep breath, opened your eyes and forced a smile.

“Peter, can you pretty please untie me? I won’t say anything mean to you for half an hour. I promise.” He sat there tapping his foot, his hand under his chin, and for once in his life a look of concentration. He finally smiled.

“Yeah, no.”

You felt some anger swelling inside of you and began to speak up. “Peter, you bastard, untie me this instance.” He just calmly shook his head no. Then you felt something around your ankles and you were falling back only to be caught in someone’s arms. Although you weren’t too fond of who it was. You were thrown over a shoulder and then he began to walk. You were silently pouting until you saw a certain blue skinned girl walking around.

“Raven! Help me! I’m being held hostage by him!” Suddenly she turned yours’ and Peter’s direction.

“Oh, I was just searching for you guys. We have a mission, suit up. And Peter, put her down.”

Without another word Raven had left the corridor, the last part of her to be seen was her hair, and Peter put you down. You were agitated to say the least. “A little help would be nice.” He began to laugh.

“I don’t know. I’m enjoying you being tied up too much.” You felt your face begin to heat up with something other than anger and a few images flashed in your mind. You gulped and struggled for an answer.

“J-just shut up and untie me!” With a laugh he finally knelt down on the floor right next to you and began to undo your binds. He first untied the messenger bag from your wrists and then he began to unwrap a whole bunch of tape from the ankles of your jeans. You sighed and said, “maybe if you were less of a jackass someone would want to date you,” then you mumbled and added, “I know I would.” Luckily, he didn’t hear that part.

“Maybe, but I don’t think so because you’re the only person I’m a jackass to.” You immediately began to make a list of how many times he was a jackass to others because of pranks and such. “I’m excluding pranks from that list. I usually do those with someone else.” You paused.

“Since when did you become telepathic?”

“Since never. So how about you go suit up and I’ll meet you on the jet?” Of course you didn’t get to respond because he was already gone. With a silent sigh you stood up and grabbed your bag before walking back to your room. You opened up the door and just dropped your bag.

Like you had done about ten times before, you had walked to your closet and sitting there in the center was your suit. With a sigh you pulled it off of the hanger and suited up. It was so strange how Hank had designed the suit so easily. You couldn’t imagine how long it took to find a material that could even interact with your mutation.

While shaking the idea out of your mind, you made your way under the basketball court which of course was connected to the lab. You walked in to see Peter, Scott, Raven, Hank, Kurt, and Jubilee there so far. You sighed and joined their little circle, if you could call it that, and waited for Jean.

About two minutes later she ran in. She stopped and was leaning over with her hands on her knees trying to catch her breath. “Sorry, the professor needed my assistance.” Raven waved it off and you all looked at her to get the briefing of your mission.

“So for this mission we have limited information. All we know is that this place is holding mutants captive and torturing them. We’re expecting the facility to be heavily guarded so you best be on high alert. Peter, Y/N, you two will take care of the main entrance. Scott, Jean, you will take the south side. We’ll cover the rest on the jet, we have to get going.”

Without another word of instruction we loaded onto the jet and Peter sat next across from you. A smirk was plastered on his face, showing his dimples, and he spoke up.

“Hey Y/N, don’t you remember the first time you were on one of these?” You scoffed.

“Of course I do.”

“So you remember who saved you and brought you back to the manor?”

You sighed. “Yes Peter. I remember the day you saved me. I need to save your ass to make it even.”

“You don’t have to make it even. You could always just deal with me annoying you forever.”

“You’re going to annoy me for forever whether or not I save your ass. I don’t mind that you annoy me either, I just don’t like feeling like I owe you.”

Peter looked shocked to say the least. There was a smile on his face, but the look in his eyes was a bit incredulous. He let out a surprised laugh.

“You actually like it when I tease you? And when I’m around in general?”

You could feel your face trying to change to a hue of red and you broke his stare. “Of course I don’t mind. I mean, you were my first, dare I say, friend here. You’re still the person here who’s closest to me, even if you are a jackass in the process.”

He smirked and had a look on his face that showed that he couldn’t argue. You giggled at the sight and began to think back to when Peter had saved your life.

It was seemingly normal day, you sat in your cell, rubbing the chain of the cuffs on your wrists against the bars. The sound coming from the rusty metal usually would’ve made anyone cover their ears to not listen to the noise, but for you it was a distraction. A distraction from the cruel reality you faced each day.

In the world there was far too much hate and prejudice, and that stayed true. For being a mutant, you were locked up in a cage and treated miserably, the physical scars were easy proof. You found yourself laughing anytime you were harmed. If you didn’t laugh, you’d die. Not physically but that last shred of you that you still had, would be gone.

A guard was sitting nearby, maybe fifteen feet away, on a stool and they were polishing their gun, one that ended every mutant that decided to step too far over the line. That’s why most of the cells around you were vacant.

You didn’t realize that you were even crying until the cries were loud enough for anyone in the hall to hear. That’s when you heard footsteps thundering towards you and you only increased your volume. The guard’s hand reached between the metal bars, grabbed your hair, and pulled your head to hit the bars. You whimpered and saw his hand go towards the gun. You began to let screams tear themselves from deep within your throat.

“Please! No! Don’t do it! I don’t wanna die!”

The pleads were racked with sobs so some of the words were unable to be understood. He then put the barrel up against your head and you held my eyes shut, as if that would make things easier. Then you heard a click, but nothing happened. Then the grip on your hair was gone and you heard the sound of a cell door slamming shut.

You fell to the ground trying to calm down and then a second later your cell door slowly swung open. You didn’t dare look up. You just sat slumped against the cold concrete floor and waited to be hit or something. Instead you felt yourself being picked up and looking into deep, dark chocolate colored eyes. The eyes belonged to a boy, his hair was peculiar, like he dyed it silver which was a hair color you had never seen.

You tried to say something but his hand went over your mouth.

“Shush McCurvy, I’m getting you outta this shithole.”

You raised an eyebrow at him and he only gave me a smirk but you remembered the situation you were in. You began to have different ideas run through your mind until the man stood you up in front of him, held your waist and braced your neck. “Hold on tight.”

Within a second you were somewhere else entirely that you didn’t look around at where you were, but you fell to the floor with your head spinning and with the nothing in your stomach trying to come up. You felt a hand on your back and heard the man’s voice again but this time it was lower and quiet. “It’s alright, it always takes a moment to recover from.”

After about two minutes of catching your breath you looked up and around. It looked like an empty helicarrier until your eyes landed on the man. “Who the hell are you?”

He smirked. “Well McCurvy, I am Peter, aka the best loser you’ll ever meet. And from what I’ve been told your name is Y/N, you’re 28, and you have a mutant ability.”

You wiped your mouth and sat down properly to look at him. “What do you want with me.”

“Well Y/N, I personally want you to be in debt to me for saving your life, but Xavier wants you to become an X-Men.”

That marked the very moment that your life changed for the better. And then you were drawn out of the memory by the sound of Peter.

“Y/N, come on you and I gotta go to our sector.” Your head shot up.

“Oh, um, yeah.”

You pulled yourself off of the seat and followed Peter out of the grounded jet and he ran you both inside. For a solid five seconds everything was good but then you heard gunfire and Peter was already speeding around messing with the guards, he succeeded without trouble but of course things turned too sour for your taste.

Peter found himself back by your side and you watched as guards of the warehouse you were in look around. You two were behind a little cement barricade that couldn’t be more than three feet tall. Too busy focusing on the gunmen you didn’t even notice the guy with a bat behind you and Peter. With a swing Peter was unconscious on the ground and you were hit in the back. You quickly turned around and knocked the guy off of his feet and put him in a choke hold until he quietly passed out.

You shook Peter but there was no response. “Dammit!” You quickly tugged his jacket off of him and shrugged it onto your own shoulders. Lord knows why Peter had decided to wear his silver jacket on that day but it would help you. You began to focus on altering the light in the room to create an illusion. The rest of the room thought you were Peter when you stood up and you began to take them out one by one. Luckily there weren’t more than fifteen guards but when you thought you were done, you felt a bullet collide into your shoulder.

“Ah!” You fell to the ground holding it while it bled. Suddenly there was a strong breeze and the guy shouted in agony. You looked up to see Peter. His eyes widened and he picked you up.

“Y/N, come on, I’ll get you back to the manor. Just stay awake.”

As the words came from his mouth your eyes began to shut. You felt kind of dizzy. “Heh, I guess I don’t owe you anymore. And Peter, I don’t think I can keep my eyes open.”

“No, Y/N, don’t close your eyes. I love you okay? Don’t close your eyes Y/N. Please don’t close your eyes.”

And right before you closed your eyes, you said, “I love you too.”

#peter maximoff #peter maximoff x reader #peter maximoff x you #peter maximoff imagine