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#just write a happy ending

strangersteddierthings · 1 year

Text

"Look, Steve, I don't have any bad feelings towards you," Eddie says, has been saying, talking nonsense, like he and Steve weren't anything more than fuckbuddies, like he isn't breaking Steve's heart. "I used you too, y'know?"

It's then Steve rears back like he been slapped. Or punched. It feels more like a gutting. Joke's on him, he supposes. Once again, he wants more than the other person. He wanted a boyfriend, Eddie'd wanted sex. Why does he keep trying? When Steve finds his voice to speak, it comes out flat and dead and not really like a question at all. "Used me. Like you think I've used you?"

Eddie shrugs, looking for all the world like he's not bothered by that statement. "We had fun, right? So it's all fine in the end."

"Fine," Steve repeats, hollow. They're in his house but Steve feels the need to leave, to run before the reality of how unlovable he truly is sticks inside him forever.

"But I think we should stop while we're ahead," Eddie continues and Steve wonders if Eddie is listening to him at all, or just saying his piece before he goes. Can he not hear Steve's heart breaking? "I want to... I want to find someone to love."

If Eddie's previous words felt like being gutted, these ones feel like cement. Heavy and solidifying. Trapping in the truth of Ever Unlovable Steve. He doesn't even feel heartbroken anymore. Just numb. Dead inside. He should say something encouraging. Let Eddie know that all he's wanted was for Eddie to be happy and loved. But words seem impossible, so he gives one jerky nod of his head. An understanding.

"Right," Eddie says, returning the nod before turning away, towards the door, "I'll just go now. Umm, see ya later, Harrington."

Facing the horrors of the Upside Down should feel like the scariest thing he's ever done but it doesn't. Watching Eddie walk away does. Steve should be able to hold it together long enough for Eddie to leave. He's the tough one. He can hold himself together no problem-

"Why can't you love me?"

Eddie whips back around, an expression on his face like confusion and anger mixed.

It's only then that Steve realizes he spoke. He hasn't meant to. He was going to let Eddie walk away but now his voice has been freed from the cement. His heart has shut down his brain it seems because he just keeps talking, voice flat and hollow, "why can't you love me the way I love you? What is so broken and wrong within me that no one loves me back? My parents, Nancy, now you. Why can't- I thought that we were- where did I go wrong?"

"What?" Eddie asks, and the anger is gone from his face but now he just looks horrified. Which is understandable. It's horrifying to be loved by Steve Harrington. "What did you think we were?"

Boyfriends. Together. Going steady. At the very least, dating without labels. But none of those very reasonable, normal answers come out of Steve's treacherous mouth. Because Steve can't seem to be a reasonable, normal person. He's got to be too much, too soon, too clingy. So, instead, he says, "In love."

Eddie looks like he's just received the worst news of his life. In fact, he looks a little sick. "Oh fuck. Jesus Christ. I can't- I thought- Fuck!"

Steve just nods along. He hadn't actually said I love you to Nancy that night at Tina's Halloween party, but he imagines if he had, the beginning of the bullshit conversation would have sounded much the same as Eddie does now; like anger and regret, the starts and stops. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have- if you want to go, you should go."

Eddie crosses the room back to Steve in half the steps he took when he first walked away, hands reaching to grab Steve's face between them. He speaks quickly and sounds panicked now. "No, no no no. I fucked up, misunderstood. I don't know how I got it so wrong. I don't want to go. I never did."

"What?"

"I am in love with you, sweetheart. I just- I didn't know you loved me back. I thought you didn't- that we weren't..."

"I thought we were boyfriends."

"Jesus, please let me fix this. Let me stay and make it up to you. I'll be the best fucking boyfriend you've ever had."

Steve thinks if he had any shred of self-worth he might step back, make Eddie explain himself, but as it is, he steps into Eddie's space and kisses him, hands pulling him as close as he can get. He doesn't want to think about the cruel things Eddie's said, about using each other. Maybe one day they'll have to hash that out, have that conversation, but Eddie says he loves him too, and that's all Steve's wanted.

#steddie #my fic #angst with a happy ending #or like maybe bittersweet end 'cause of Steve's headspace #i dunno #just a little ficlet as warmup writing #so i thought i'd share

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bucketsofmonsters · 2 years

Text

In the Name of Science

cw: voyeurism, mutual masturbation, vaginal penetration, non human genitalia, knotting, size difference, fainting, chronic illness, implied animal death, medical abuse of the monsters

male werewolf x afab reader

word count: 9k

“Have you lost it? Absolutely not!” You snapped at the three scientists in front of you, the anger evident in your voice.

“You will have complete privacy and it’s not like we’re asking you to sleep with him…”

You couldn’t believe what you were hearing. “Yeah, I certainly hope not! This is so absurd, I cannot believe you’re asking me this.”

You went to storm out of the room when one of the scientists who had sat you down to very gently talk to you grabbed your arm. “Listen, you are the only one he responds to. We wouldn’t ask you this if there was any other way to do it, if we want to study his reproductive system...”

“No! It’s invasive and weird and I’m not doing it! You put him through enough as it is.”

That seemed to spark their interest. “Hold on, are you saying no for his comfort or yours?”

That was a question you weren’t prepared to get into, at least not with three scientists. “It doesn’t matter. Anyways, I have shit to do, can I go now?”

They didn’t want to drop the matter but you were clearly not changing your mind so they let you storm out and go about your day.

You weren’t a scientist. Your job leaned closer to zoo keeper. Someone had to take care of all the monsters that were being studied here and the scientists certainly weren’t doing it.

They weren’t entirely wrong. Most of the creatures here responded better to you than anyone else but in all fairness, you were the one who was feeding them and talking to them, everyone else they saw on a regular basis spent most of their time poking at them and doing tests on them, of course they liked you the most.

With many of your monsters you were friends. You had developed truces of varying strengths with most of them and at the very least, you attempted to understand them. That’s more than most of the people who worked here could say.

They were all sentient, most to human levels, they deserved more respect than just being experiments and you seemed the only one inclined to give them that level of dignity.

Sometimes subjects would mysteriously drop off of your roster, nowhere to be seen. A few weeks later their room would be filled once more. You always prayed they couldn't sense that they weren't the first to live there, that creatures here didn't tend to have particularly long shelf lives. They were going through enough without that fear in them. The most you could do was give them all the dignity and companionship you could. You tried not to think about it too much but it haunted you all the same.

You had a favorite. Everyone knew it, him included. All he had was a number, subject 251. You would never call him that, call any of the subjects by their numbers. You opted instead for pet names and terms of endearment, which none of them seemed to mind.

This one in particular, subject 251, had taken a clear interest in you. That was how they saw it, a sudden and unexplainable attachment to you. You could have told them otherwise if they ever bothered to ask. But that was most of the problem you supposed, they never did.

He’d been an issue when you’d first arrived, the one monster you were warned about over and over again. ‘Be careful with 251.’ The idea of letting anyone get near him was so far from anyone’s minds. You were the newbie so you were given him on your roster.

You understood it. You too would be difficult if you were imprisoned and studied.

You’d given him what you could in terms of privacy and respect. You never tried to push, gave him as much autonomy as you were able to, despite him being a prisoner here. You spoke to him like a person, not an inconvenience or a rabid animal.

Most importantly, when he got angry or lashed out, none of that changed. Human decency was never something he had to earn, no matter how many times he threatened to slash your throat open.

Eventually, he started to talk back. At first you just thought it was because he was lonely, of course he would be when he was stuck in a room by himself, day in and day out. But after a while, it became clear that it wasn’t conversation just for the sake of it.

When more newbies came you refused to give him up, making as much space for him in your day as you could. You knew that he noticed the way you were staying longer and longer but he never called you on it. In fact, one day he asked you to stay.

After that you were inseparable. His attitude hadn’t shifted with anyone else but with you he was perfect. That became a bargaining chip, both of you swearing he’d behave better if you were allowed to give him his food in person, if you were allowed to stay longer, if he could have some little things to make his life easier.

The two of you had formed an alliance and more importantly, a friendship.

A few months ago you’d taken a vacation for a week and had been immediately called back because he’d become unmanageable. From what you’d heard, he almost ripped his temporary handler in half and managed to get halfway out of the facility before they were able to neutralize him.

When you came back you tried to explain to him that he couldn’t be doing this, that sometimes you might leave for a while and he needed to not massacre the staff. He was virulently against it, telling you he needed to keep his eye on you, to make sure you were okay.

No amount of reassurance stopped this instinct and just like that, you became vital personel. In his frenzy to get you back he gave you something else, job security.

That was why you could tell those scientist in no unclear terms to go fuck themseleves. But then again, your relationship with him was the reason they asked you about it at all.

You shook your head, trying to forget your discussion with them. You were glad you were there to shut them down, to be able to provide even a modicum of privacy to at least one of your creatures.

As you pushed the interaction out of your mind in favor of starting your day, you noticed someone you’d never seen before. She was a new keeper, one like yourself. You’d asked to be able to vet new employees but you’d been denied. Despite becoming vital personel, they still didn’t take you seriously.

She seemed nervous but in all fairness to her, it was probably her first day. Most people were a little on edge on the first day on any job, let alone one where you were caring for restless, angry creatures that could kill you in a heartbeat.

You gave her a wave before you picked up the big, metal box off the table, shifting it towards the metal door it was destined for.

“Hiya, what’s your name?” you called as you heaved the box over. Surely there was a less heavy mechanism you could use to deliver dinner, you’d have to pester the scientists about that when you got the chance. Everything in solid metal seemed like a great idea when you were planning but they didn’t have the carry the things.

“Sam,” she said, hurrying over to help you carry the box the last couple of feet before you both dropped it on the floor.

The second it touched the ground, something from inside rammed into the door, sending a crash echoing through the hall. As soon as Sam heard the noise she screamed and went running.

She wouldn’t last a week. The easily spooked ones never did.

This was why you wanted to help with finding new keepers. They never prepared them right, never asked the right questions. People got in with promises that they loved animals and that they were ever so caring as if that was in any way relevant.

What you really needed was to be good with people, really weird nonhuman people, and be very good at conflict resolution. You weren’t caring for lions and zebras, these were intelligent, terrifying creatures. It was hard to know exactly what kind of person would thrive here but it was easy to tell who wouldn’t be able to last.

You banged back on the door as you turned from the hallway Sam had gone running down. “Behave or you're not getting lunch,” you called through the wall and you hoped they’d understand.

You slid the metal box right up to the hatch at the bottom of the door, hooking them together so the room was still airtight, and slid the door of the trap upwards.

The faint sound of a bunny hopping across metal floors hit your ears and you shut both panels, unhooking the box and carrying it away as the creature was left to hunt.

That was mainly what you did, feed them with no contact allowed. They wouldn’t let you inside most of their rooms, you had to fight for the few that you did get to see. For most, you were lucky if you got to see them through a window.

Your favorite part of the day came last. It didn't previously but you’d had to push it to the end of the day lately because you were never sure when you’d be able to leave. He always tried to convince you to stay just a little longer and you rarely had the heart to shut him down, at least not the first time he asked.

Eventually you did always have to leave. You couldn’t stay in the sterile, white room lined with metal forever.

Before the decontamination chamber, there was a big observation room you had to pass through with a window facing into his cell and you could never quite help the massive smile that plastered itself across your face every day when you first laid eyes on him through the glass.

All of the blankets and pillows they’d given him were scrunched up in the corner, a little pile he was often laying on when you came in. Not today though. Today he was waiting by the door and as soon as he spotted you through that window his tail began to wag furiously.

You couldn’t help but giggle, eagerly running through the decontamination room so you could see him.

When you first laid eyes on him on your very first shift, you’d thought he was a werewolf. Most of the creatures here were hard to understand but a few were familiar concepts, things you’d seen the likes of before in movies.

The scientists had scoffed at you, told you he was nothing like a werewolf, he didn’t even have a human form. You still thought the comparison was apt.

He was undeniably wolf-like, covered in silver fur, with pointy ears and a muzzle and a big fluffy tail. There was something undeniably human about him too. He stood on two legs and spoke like a person and there was something in his eyes that felt so familiar.

“Hey buddy, how’re you doing?” you asked as you entered the room and were finally able to properly set eyes on that familiar face.

He couldn’t get too close. You both knew he couldn't or, despite the massive fit he would inevitably throw, they wouldn’t let you come back. You could see him holding himself back every time you came near him, clearly wanting to smother you in affection.

He responded quickly, eager to check in with you. “I’m fine. How are you feeling? Are you alright?”

No matter how many times you told him that you were fine he was always worried.

You brushed him off with a gentle, “I’m alright, like I always am,” while carrying his dinner in.

He mostly ate meat, although he was alright with not eating live animals, unlike many of the other creatures here. That was why you’d been allowed in here at all. No matter how well they got along with you, you were never allowed in the room with any of the active hunters.

It was probably for the best. At least that way they wouldn’t bond with you the way this one had.

You dropped the tray of raw steaks near his pile of blankets, his eyes tracking you as you moved. His head lifted and he sniffed the air.

“Still gotta take care of the others, bud,” you said, preempting the inevitable comment you knew he was going to make about your scent.

He grumbled. You knew he didn’t like it, them getting near you, the way he could smell the others on you, but there wasn’t much you could do about it. No matter how many times you decontaminated yourself, he always seemed to be able to smell it.

He dropped the issue, though you could tell he didn’t want to. Instead, his head fell to the side and he asked, “Are you upset about something?”

You were never sure how he managed to read you so well. He kept telling you it was because you were bonded but you weren’t certain what that meant. He didn’t seem capable of explaining it to you. The concept was just second nature to him and you couldn’t ask any of the scientists about it. Perhaps more accurately, you wouldn’t ask the scientists about it. You weren’t sure if they knew themselves and you’d die before giving them any more information than they already had.

“Did my scent tell you that?” you asked with a smile, trying to brush past it.

He was undeterred. “Did they do something to you?”

You waved off his concerns. “No, don’t worry about it, they just wanted me to do something weird and I can’t stop thinking about it.”

“What?”

You had no clue how to explain it to him.

You attempted to put it as tactfully as you possibly could. “They wanted me to… stimulate you. Just visually, I think, from the observation room. They want to study your reproductive system and they think that’s the best way to go about it for whatever reason. It’s super weird, I obviously said no so you don’t need to worry about it.”

“Stimulate me?”

“Like, touch myself or something. I don’t know, I didn’t give them the time of day so I’m a little foggy on the details. Not that it matters, it’s creepy either way.”

“They made you uncomfortable?” You could see him getting angrier.

“No! I meant creepy towards you! It’s invasive. I wouldn’t mind but I’m not the one being observed and documented.” That came out wrong. “Not that I wouldn’t mind!” you quickly added defensively. “That’s not what I meant! Just that I’m not the one who should be made uncomfortable by all this, you know?”

He seemed confused by your words, trying to parse their meaning. You couldn’t blame him, you’d turned into a bit of a mess for a while there. After a long deliberation he finally responded, “I don’t mind either.”

“What?”

“I’m observed either way, this way I get to see you.”

He’d always been direct but this was a bit much, even for him. “Are you saying you want me to do it?”

“Are you uncomfortable?”

“Not really.” Feeling a little shy right now, maybe, but you certainly weren’t uncomfortable.

“Then I want you to do it.”

You weren’t sure what to make of that. You had his permission now, so it was all on you. If you did do it, you certainly wouldn’t be doing it to help out the scientists. So why would you be doing it? Because he wanted you to? Or maybe you felt a tug towards saying yes for more selfish reasons.

“Your face is getting hot,” he noted, ever so helpful.

“Yup, that it is. Well, this has been a fun meeting, I will see you tomorrow bud.”

Now he was upset. “You just got here.”

“I’ll stay extra long tomorrow,” you promised. “I just got a headache and I need to go lie down for a while, I’ll see you later.”

You hadn’t completely been lying. You did have a headache, although that was more the norm these days.

You’d started to feel sick more and more frequently. You were convinced it was this place, with all the creatures and substances here that you knew little to nothing about. Being here so often couldn’t be good for you. You had no other explanation for why you felt so woozy all the time, why you couldn’t quite shake these headaches, why your legs sometimes just gave out on you.

Before you headed home and took a well earned painkiller, you stopped by one of the control rooms that always had a scientist or two milling around inside.

You poked your head in the door and just said, “I’ll do it,” not staying to witness the aftermath.

The next day you were a bundle of nerves. You probably looked like Sam had the day before. You felt like you were floating through your duties, thinking about the end of the day. That morning you’d been pulled aside by the same three scientists and told that today you’d have to slide subject 251’s meal under the door and then you were to stimulate him as best you could from behind the glass.

They’d reassured you dozens of times that there would be no record of your activities. Subject 251 got no such reassurances.

He lit up as he usually did the second he saw you but instead of decontaminating yourself and stepping inside, you slid the plate under the door.

“I can’t come in today,” you said as you walked up to the window, cursing the upset written all over his face.

“Why?” He searched your face, trying to understand. It didn’t take long before it clicked. “Oh. I won’t get near you, I know I’m not allowed to. Or hurt you, if that’s what they’re worried about.”

“I know you won’t, they just don’t trust you when your hormone levels are high. I’ll be back tomorrow.”

“So you decided to do it?”

“As long as you're alright with it, I couldn’t see why not.”

You probably should have. Somewhere in you you were aware that most people would see why not, that this would be an insane decision. But the only barrier in your way had been his comfort and he seemed more than comfortable with the idea.

As much as you knew he was the one being investigated, you could help but feel like you were being studied under his unblinking gaze. His eyes refused to move anywhere else, content to just stare at you through the glass as you tried to figure out how to proceed.

You were the one to break the silence. “I’m not really sure how to do this, there isn’t exactly a manual for this sort of thing.”

“What do they want your goal to be?” he prompted you.

“To arouse you.” Those three words were the gist of it, despite the lengthy, boring mission statements you’d been given that morning.

“And what is your goal?”

That one was harder to answer. Maybe you should start writing mission statements for yourself as well. “I’m not sure.”

“But you’re here.”

And so you were.

“What do you want me to do?” Your chest felt tight as you asked, like you couldn’t quite manage to get enough oxygen. You’d meant the question genuinely but it felt like it came out sounding suggestive.

“Can I see you?”

You understood what he meant but you paused anyways. You didn’t know what you were waiting for, you’d made your decision the second you said you’d be here and yet, you still hesitated.

You checked the room for cameras again, making sure there were none. You knew there weren’t any and it honestly felt like you were stalling, trying to give yourself more time to think. Not that you could think properly right now.

He didn’t have the same luxury of knowing that he wasn’t being watched. The cameras pointed away from the window, positioned tactically so they didn’t look through but he was being fully captured, no matter where he stood.

Once you’d taken your moment and given yourself time to think that you hadn’t used, there was nothing left to do. As you started to get undressed, you rushed to take your clothes off. Anything slower felt like teasing and that was the last thing you wanted. You looked back to him when you’d finished pulling them off, not sure what for. You know exactly what he wanted to see next but you wanted to hear him say it.

His eyes roamed over you, they couldn’t seem to get enough, darting across your body.

You felt incredibly warm, despite your lack of clothes and the cold environment.

He was much closer to the glass now, practically pressed against it. You could tell exactly how slow and belabored his breathing was as it fogged the glass in front of you. You couldn’t help but let out a little laugh at the sight, him peering through the newly frosted glass.

His head cocked to the side at the sound. “Are you having fun torturing me?” he asked, his tone playful.

“I’m not torturing you,” you insisted. “You’re the one who wanted me to do this.”

“I said I want to see you.”

You hopped up on a chair, spreading your legs for him as you did. You knew he could see exactly how wet you were.

It was almost embarrassing, all you'd done was strip for him and you were already soaking.

Your onlooker didn’t seem to agree with that assessment, instead pressing up even closer to the glass, pawing at it.

You’d believed him when he said that if you were in there with him he wouldn’t touch you but you didn’t appreciate until now just how hard that probably would have been for him. Maybe the window separating you was a small mercy, although it certainly didn’t feel like that as you dipped your hand slowly down, becoming more comfortable with putting on a show for him, until you reached your center and pressed your fingers inside yourself.

You could see his nostrils flaring, wanting to be able to smell you but unable to.

The tip of his cock poked through his fur. That’s what they’d wanted to see, you supposed the scientists would be pleased.

You couldn’t take your eyes off of it, couldn’t stop imagining it inside you, how strong he was, how effortlessly he could pick you up and thrust inside you, how he’d fill you up so completely. You couldn’t even see the whole thing, much of it hidden within his thick fur, but you could tell it was big.

He wasn’t even touching himself, just staring at you, watching how your lips fell open and your forehead creased when you rubbed over your clit, listening to the little noises you let out despite your attempts to be quiet. You wanted nothing more than to go to him.

“I need to touch you,” he whined, sharing your sentiment.

“We can't, this is all we get.”

He huffed as he fell back, bucking forwards into the air against nothing, his desperation clear. You should be in there, helping him, but instead you were getting off watching him rutt into nothing

“This was a bad idea,” you said, your motions slowing as guilt washed over you.

“Don’t leave,” he pleaded. “Need you, just stay.”

His hand wrapped around his dick and you sped up your motions, set on at least putting on a good show for him.

He was rutting desperately into his hand, his eyes never leaving you. You thrust three fingers inside of yourself and still it didn’t feel like enough.

You were sure he felt much the same way and yet you could see him getting closer to his release.

You watched, entranced, as he came. Thick ropes of cum shot out of him all over the wall and the glass in front of him, his hand still tight around his cock.

As soon as he came you stopped, your fingers pulling out, refusing to come, like some sort of self inflicted punishment. He pushed up against the glass once more as you stopped but there was nothing he could do.

With no better options, you wiped your fingers as best you could on your clothes as you pulled them back on, promising yourself you’d wash them as soon as you left.

You rushed out before you had the chance to talk and regretted the decision the whole night. It had seemed like the easier option at the time, to not have to talk about it when all your conflicting feelings were swirling but now you just wished you’d gotten the chance to confirm that you hadn’t messed anything up.

The end of the day couldn’t come fast enough. You did your best to not rush through your duties, knowing exactly how costly a mistake could be in this place.

Finally, the time arrived and you were back in that observation room again. This time you mercifully were able to enter, no longer stuck behind that damn window.

He seemed as composed as ever and you got the feeling that he hadn’t been worrying the way you had. The thumping of his tail behind him gave away his excitement, as it always did, but you detected no signs of nervousness.

He studied you as you came in. “Something’s wrong,” he noted.

He always understood how you were feeling, he had some sort of sixth sense about it, but this time you were fairly certain that you weren’t difficult to read. You were sure you looked as worried as you felt. “Was it weird?” you asked, needing an answer as quickly as possible. “Please tell me I didn’t mess anything up between us.”

His head fell to the side. “Why would it be weird?”

“I don’t know, I think I feel like I helped them observe you.”

“They’re already observing me, why would it ruin our bond? Did you not want to?”

“No, just wanted to make sure I didn’t break anything.”

“You’re fine, we’re still intact.” He said it so plainly, like he was stating a fact.

It all seemed to come so easily to him, his biggest problem was being locked up in this place. Much of what he did seemed like it was based on instinct. There was less thinking required that way, it seemed nice.

He did, however, seem concerned about something. “You didn’t finish.”

You couldn’t help but laugh at the sudden change in topic. “That wasn’t really the point.”

“That’s always the point, making each other feel good. That’s what mates do.”

You mulled the word over in your head. Mates. Is that what he meant when he talked about your bond? Is that what you were? It didn’t feel right, like it couldn’t be a title that belonged to you. Surely you hadn’t earned that as you kept him here, trapped against his will.

“What does that mean to you? Being mates?” you asked.

You were afraid of giving intel to the scientists running this place but you wanted so badly to understand what that word meant to him, what you meant to him.

As he spoke you started to feel woozy and your ever-present headache worsened. You leaned on the wall beside you as you tried to focus on his words. He reached out his arm to help you before quickly withdrawing it, remembering that he wasn't allowed to touch you or he could lose you.

The dizziness got worse, despite your attempt to take some of the strain on your legs and you went to sit on the floor. You went down faster than you’d intended, your legs giving way underneath you as the headache overtook you and you hit the floor hard.

When you woke up, your back was pressed to the wall and you were sitting on top of some blankets. The pile of blankets in the corner of the room, to be more specific. You were fairly sure you’d passed out across the room and you couldn’t help but wonder how you’d gotten over here.

As you cracked your eyes open, you saw subject 251 standing over you defensively. The food you’d brought him was still sitting at the end of the makeshift bed, completely untouched. That was odd, he normally ate it right after you left. Although, you supposed, you hadn’t quite managed to leave yet. Nonetheless, it did feel like a significant chunk of time had passed.

“Hey,” you said, your voice low and wavering from your bout of unconsciousness. “You keeping me safe, big guy?”

A rumble came from deep in his throat as he continued to stand over you protectively.

“What time is it,” you asked, trying to gather your bearings.

“You’ve been out for a few hours,” he informed you. “They’ve been trying to get to you.”

Shit. Of course they had. You’d passed out next to what they considered to be one of their most dangerous creatures, of course they’d been trying to get to you, to get you out of there.

As you tried to get up with a groan, he settled down next to you, pulling you back towards the blankets. You didn't try to fight him, knowing you didn’t have the strength to get up right now. You needed rest more than anything.

You quickly realized as you felt his warm fur next to you that this was the first time the two of you had ever touched one another.

He’d always been good at following your rules, even if he wasn’t particularly fond of the scientists, and thus he’s always kept his distance, just as you’d informed him he had to.

But now, after you’d collapsed, vulnerable, in front of him, you appeared to have found his limit in regards to following the rules.

The beep of the intercom sounded and you heard a monotone voice fill the room. “We understand this is a delicate situation and we trust your instincts on the matter, if you need any kind of aid we have teams ready to go. Our first priority is your safety, do you have a way out of the enclosure?”

Your safety? After a moment it hit you what they were implying.

“Don’t worry about me,” you called out. “I’m fine. If anything's going to kill me it’s whatever this damn lab has done to me, not this guy.”

The intercom beeped off but you knew they were still listening.

His gaze immediately turned to you, his face questioning. “What did you say? Is being here killing you?” he asked, his voice soft and measured.

You’d avoided mentioning it for so long, not wanting to worry him, but now you didn’t really have a choice. “I don’t think this place is good for me bud. To be honest if it weren’t for you I probably would have left ages ago but I just can’t stomach the idea of leaving you here alone.”

His head cocked to the side. “It’s… hurting you?”

A wry chuckle escaped you. “Well, something certainly is. People don’t typically faint for no reason.”

“Why are you here if it hurts you?”

“I can’t leave you behind, it’d break my heart.”

“You’re hurt because of me.”

“No!” you immediately replied, refusing to let him blame himself. “That’s not it, I want to stay.”

“But it hurts?”

“But it hurts,” you conceded.

You couldn’t stand to look at those sad eyes, opting instead to shut yours and snuggle into his warm side. “Listen, we can talk about this some other time, okay? Right now I’m just going to enjoy this.”

He nuzzled right back into you, immediately giving in to your actions. “Little mate.” he purred, curling around you protectively.

You didn’t have the heart to correct him. And maybe it wasn’t just for his sake. Maybe now, curled up, feeling safe and warm, you wanted to pretend you really were his little mate too.

You woke up to the sound of the intercom going off once again.

“He called you his mate,” it stated. “This isn’t an ideal scenario but we don’t know much about mates and you’re already in there and anything you might do would be extremely advantageous to our research.”

You groaned in annoyance as you leaned back into your warm, living blanket. His ears perked up as he tried to understand what they were saying. He looked to you for clarification. You were often the translator between them, the scientists always speaking in stilted language and hidden meanings that many of your creatures had a hard time parsing.

“They want me to have sex with you,” you clarified and immediately he hunched further over you.

“I won't let them see my little mate like that, no. Absolutely not, no no no.” The mere idea immediately worked him into a little frenzy, leaving him muttering to himself as he tried to shield you from the cameras.

Your hand rose to caress his face and he leaned into your touch, calming down again. It didn’t take long before he fell back into place, curling around you once more.

Being able to touch you seemed to bring out a whole other side to him. You’d never seen him this affectionate or possessive, something seemed to have been set off in him that hadn’t been before.

Something had changed within you as well. The idea of having to return to the way things were before made you feel sick, you wanted to be able to hold him and comfort him like this all the time. Now you knew what you were missing as you stood away from each other, unable to get close.

Even breaking the rules as you were, it couldn’t last forever. Eventually you could no longer ignore your growling stomach and you convinced him that you needed to leave, that you’d be back tomorrow.

He told you not to come.

Your heartbreak barely had the chance to set in before he was quickly elaborating, telling you again and again that he didn’t want you to stay if it was hurting you.

You brushed him off, at least that time.

A few weeks later, it was your last day of work you’d ever attend. Ever since that day when you’d fainted and subject 251 had stood guard over you, he’d been insistent upon you leaving. It was quite a change from the norm, he went from being the reason you were guaranteed a job here, why you didn’t want to leave and go home in the evenings, to being the thing pushing you out. You could tell it was eating him alive, the thought that you staying was hurting you. He was obsessively insistent that you leave and get yourself to safety.

You’d never been good at saying no to that face.

So, after agonizing over the decision, awash with guilt, you turned in your two weeks notice.

You were selfish about it. You didn’t tell him for a while, wanting to pretend that everything was fine for just a bit longer.

You let it go on longer than you should have.

It was your last day here, the last time you’d ever see him, and he had no idea.

You promised yourself you wouldn’t cry, for his sake more than yours, but you kept finding yourself tearing up no matter how hard you tried.

As you opened the door to the observation room and headed through decontamination, your stomach dropped.

He wasn’t excited this time.

He didn’t say anything. He just looked down at you, not asking if something was wrong as you’d become so accustomed to him doing. He didn’t have to

You didn’t speak for fear of immediately bursting into tears and eventually he spoke for the both of you.

“You aren’t coming back.”

You buried your face in your hands, trying to make sure he didn’t see you like this. You wanted his last memory of you to be better than this, to give him something more solid to hold onto.

The best you could manage was poorly stifled tears.

All you wanted was to hug him. To lurch forwards and wrap your arms around him and never let go.

But you couldn’t. If you did, you weren’t the one who would be punished. You couldn’t do that to him.

You spent the rest of the day just sitting there, existing in one another’s presence. Trying to soak one another in before it was too late.

You didn’t speak. There was little to say that wasn’t understood between you. You finally got it, that last day. You felt the pull of his grief on the other end of your bond, something connecting you.

You weren’t sure if it was something undefinable and otherworldly or just complete understanding of one another but either way, it was real.

As you stood up to leave you searched for something, anything you could say to make all of this right.

“You know I love you, don’t you?” you asked. It was the most important thing in the world to you right now, you just needed to make sure.

“Of course I do.”

And then you left your mate behind.

Nothing felt real after that. You knew you couldn't stay there but the idea of there being an after hadn’t really occurred to you.

What were you supposed to do now? Just live knowing he was out there, alone? You couldn’t make sense of anything, the whole world seemed muted and suffocating.

An alarm blared suddenly overhead, making you jump. It wasn’t an uncommon experience. Most of the creatures here were difficult to hold, whether it was because of inhuman strength or an unusual viscosity or any other number of oddities they held. It wasn’t your problem anymore, you thought as you gathered your things, trying to get near an exit so as soon as the lockdown cut out you’d be able to leave.

You wanted to get home and wallow, to mourn the loss of this place, of your friend.

You were more careless than you should have been. Normally you were tactful and moved with intention but not this time, this time you just wanted to get out. That was your mistake.

Something massive and vaguely reptilian came smashing around the corner, immediately setting its sights on you. You could tell it was in a frenzy, that it was out for blood after breaking out of its hellscape of a prison.

You couldn’t blame it, even as it came barreling towards you to rip it in two. It wasn’t the creature's fault, you wouldn’t blame it.

It never made it all the way down the hallway. Instead its scaly feet came to a screeching halt as a wall of fur blocked its path, growling at the creature. It clearly didn’t want to test its luck and went barrelling down the hallway in the other direction, looking for easier prey to take out its wrath on.

Subject 251 turned and made eye contact with you, looking uncertain. He used to break out frequently, he’d taken out plenty of humans when he had, but since you’d formed your little truce he’d stayed put for you.

You wondered if his breakout this time had been because he could somehow sense you were in danger or because you were leaving and he no longer had anything to keep him where he was.

It didn’t matter. At the end of the day there he was, in front of you. You had a decision to make. One look at that big, eager face and you instantly knew it wouldn’t be a hard one.

You reached out towards him and he instantly came to you.

As many times as there were breakouts, the creatures rarely made it outside the facility but then again, they also rarely had the facility’s star employee at their side with nothing to lose.

“I think I can get you out, do you want to go?” Your words were frantic. You needed to move quickly if you wanted to have any chance to get out of there.

He didn’t even have to think about his response, nodding eagerly and trailing behind you the second you took off.

The alarms were still blaring overhead, screeching and causing your ears to ring. You knew exactly which doors would have the least guarding, especially in the middle of a breakout.

You knew all the override codes and quickly ushered him through doors that otherwise would have been deadlocked.

As you headed out the last doorway you ran straight into a scientist, one you’d seen in passing before.

He was clearly already panicked from the breakout, the sight of a massive werewolf standing behind you was probably not helping matters.

“You’re going to want to let us through,” you informed him.

Behind you, the monster that they’d kept imprisoned for so many years snarled and the man looked like he might drop dead from fear, quickly sidling up to the wall and getting as far out of your way as possible.

You’d never been so grateful that you lived a short walk from the lab. You had no idea how you would have gotten the two of you home if you’d needed to drive. Eventually it would prove to be a problem, when they inevitably came for him, but that was an issue for another day.

He ducked his head to get inside, taking in your home before quickly moving towards your bed and stripping it of all its blankets, instead opting to make a little nest out of them on your floor.

You couldn’t bring yourself to stop him. You could give up your bed for a little while, he’d more than earned some comfort after everything he’d been put through.

Before you even realized what was happening, you were being pulled into the small pile of pillows and blankets beside him.

The warm comfort of him by your side was more than welcome. You’d been dreading the idea of coming home to a cold, lonely house all day, knowing you’d lost your best friend. Your mate.

Having him here was all you could ever ask for.

“They’re going to come after you, you know,” you informed him, the thought endlessly circling your mind, refusing to die down.

He seemed to misunderstand your concern for him as worry for your own safety as he pulled you into his side protectively. “I won’t let them get you.”

You quickly succumbed to the closeness, cuddling into him in the little nest. “As long as you don’t let them get you either.”

You felt a rumble run through his chest and you couldn’t tell if it was in acknowledgement of your words or if he was amused that you thought you even had to ask.

He started rearranging the blankets around you, making sure you were comfortable before fully setting in, manhandling you around as he sorted things out. Finally, as he settled, you ended up basically in his lap.

Then you felt his tongue lap over your shoulder, him readjusting you to best be able to lick you.

“What’re you doing?” you asked with a giggle, partly at the situation and partly because he was tickling you.

“Grooming you,” he said before getting back to work, his tongue slowly lapping over your arm.

You let him carry on with his work, trying your best not to focus on it. He was just trying to clean you, it wasn’t a big deal.

Still, the endless sensation of his tongue roving your body sent sparks of arousal through you.

You heard him sniff the air and your face immediately warmed, knowing you’d been caught.

“Couldn’t smell it through the glass,” he said, nose burying itself in your hair, as if he couldn’t get close enough to you and your scent.

“Couldn’t feel you through the glass either,” you murmured, pushing back into him.

He started slowly pulling your clothes off but the grooming didn’t cease. He needed more skin to skin contact, removing the inconvenient barriers in his way. He worked slowly, drawing this out as long as possible. You could only guess he was attempting to torture you. His tongue was pressed against your bare skin, roving leisurely across your newly exposed chest and stomach. You could feel his hardening dick start to poke into you but he just kept licking.

Eventually you grew impatient, your hand wandering down to grab his cock. It was hot and bigger than you thought it would be, its size disguised by his thick fur. He thrusted into your hand, a whine escaping him.

Your impatience proved to be a success as he wrapped his hands around your waist and lifted you. His hands almost completely encircled your midsection as he moved you effortlessly over his dick.

His claws were digging into your sides as he positioned you, looking to you for permission.

You nodded and you felt the tip of his dick press against you as he pushed you down onto it. He moved slowly, giving you time to adjust as he pressed into you, stretching you open.

Finally, you felt your thighs meet his fur, straddling his waist with his hands still wrapped around you.

He was everything your fingers could never be. You’d never felt so full and beautifully stretched in your life.

You attempted to ride him, lifting up as best you could, but he was too big, it was too difficult to do. It didn’t take long for him to pull you back down anyways, his hands never straying from your sides.

“It's my turn this time. And I promise you, this time you will come.”

He lifted you once more, thrusting you swiftly back down. You could see the bump it caused in your lower stomach when he thrusted all the way in. You barely had time to look at it before you were being lifted once more.

“Touch yourself,” he said, his movements never faltering.

You shifted to rub your clit as best you could as he pumped you up and down his shaft, using you like a toy. You had no control over the pace, being moved at his whim.

The loss of control was exhilarating. The sharp movements inside you touched places you hadn’t even known existed, places you’d never be able to reach on your own.

He was dead focused on you, intent on keeping his promise. Every time he did anything that drew a pleasured cry from you he’d chase after it, finding everything that made you tick.

“Let go for me, please,” he said, thrusting incessantly into you at the perfect angle, everything rapidly becoming overwhelming. Part of you wanted to stop touching yourself to lessen some of the all consuming stimulus but more of you wanted to be good for him, to do everything he asked.

You were too far gone to respond to his plea, your head thrown back as all the pent up energy that you’d been ignoring for so long was released. He pumped you up and down his shaft as you touched yourself, guiding you through your orgasm.

As you came down from your high, your eyes opened to meet his watching your face intently.

“Can you keep going?” he asked, holding you up so only the tip of his throbbing dick was inside you.

“Please, I need you, want you to come,” you begged.

He mercilessly thrusted you down again, now only concerned with his own pleasure. He chased his orgasm and you completely surrendered control, letting him move you as he pleased, do whatever he needed to in order to come.

“You’re so soft, so tight, so perfect.” He started rambling, sounding like he barely knew he was speaking. “Wanted this for so long, to touch you. Dreamed about this.”

“Me too,” you gasped out, his pace still relentless. “I wanted you so badly.”

His breaths were coming faster and faster and he quickly asked, “Where should I…”

You didn’t even let him finish. “Inside”

He buried himself fully inside and you could feel the base of it swelling just inside your entrance, holding you two together as he filled you. He whined and grunted and held you as close as he could as the sticky fluid flooded your insides

“You’re going to be stuck like this for a while,” he said as he came down, still cradling you close to him and almost sounding sheepish.

“Good, I like how you fill me up.”

The words pulled a soft, instinctual thrust from him and you both whined at how sensitive you were.

“Stop flirting,” he hissed into your hair, hands resting on your hips, keeping the both of you from moving.

“For now,” you conceded.

“Thank you,” he said, his hands roving over your form, claws lightly being drawn over your skin, raising goosebumps in their wake.

“For what?”

“For everything. For saving me.”

“The breakout was mostly you bud, I couldn’t have done it without you.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

His grip on you tightened, like he was afraid you’d slip through his fingers despite the fact that you were tied together and you couldn’t go anywhere even if you wanted to.

But of course you didn’t want to. If you had anything to say about it, you wouldn’t be leaving him for a long long time.

You didn’t know how you were going to move forwards, where you’d take him, how any of this would play out. Maybe they wouldn’t want to chase him down, it being a hazard to try and catch a creature that had been such an issue even when they were holding him in their specialized facility. Maybe it’d take years for them to give up. Maybe they’d never stop chasing him and you’d have to keep running and fighting for the rest of your lives. Maybe they’d catch you and all this work would have been for nothing.

But it wasn’t nothing, you thought, wrapped up in his arms in the little nest of blankets he’d built for you on your floor, no looming goodbyes or rules against touching, no more being alone. Whatever happened, it was already worth it.

#terato #terato writing #monster x reader #werewolf x reader #monster bf #monster boyfriend #monster x human #werewolf x human #werewolf boyfriend #werewolf bf #I almost made this angsty but I didn't have the heart for it #my writing is guaranteed happy endings bc I'm a big sap #I keep writing werewolves that are just like perma werewolves with no human form #and I always feel weird calling them werewolves but idk what else to call them lol #werewolf-adjacent monster

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maehemthemisfit · 8 months

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How writers look when putting angst no happy ending, major character death, and hurt no comfort in their WIPs.

#just be brewing up PAIN #you know who you are #angst #light angst #angst no comfort #angst no happy ending #writers #writer #writing #writeblr #writers on tumblr #genshin angst #jjk angst #writer memes

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fortheloveofexy · 4 months

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it's a pet peeve of mine when ppl frame Andrew as hating Aaron and being needlessly cruel to him... bc while yes, their relationship is fractured and strained, Andrew genuinely cares about his brother and wants the best for him, he just doesn't know how to show that in a normal way.

like he might not know how to express it in a healthy manner but Andrew LOVES Aaron, like he truly just wants Aaron to be healthy and safe. It's like, his whole Thing. Aaron is one of the most important people in his life. Andrew wants him around. He'd do anything to protect him.

I guarantee Andrew wants to be emotionally close to Aaron too, he just doesn't have the tools to do that and the thought of letting someone in terrifies him. He also has no concept of what a healthy sibling relationship looks like, so he has no frame of reference to work from.

#i love bickering twinyards as much as the next guy but sometimes ppl write andrew has if he thinks aaron is a waste of space #and that just isn't true #andrew values his brother #he wouldn't insist on keeping aaron close if he didn't #when ppl do this is just so obvious to me that they're using andrew as a mouthpiece for their own dislike of aaron #and like ok yeah you're entitled to not like a character i guess #but it's just so wildly out of character to me for andrew to treat aaron like shit for no reason beyond Being Cruel #like yeah andrew can be mean when he's feeling defensive or trying to make a point #and yeah he can treat people like shit if he's got a reason to justify it like Keeping People Safe #but he's not needlessly cruel to the people closest to him without cause #like neil says #everything andrew does #he does For A Reason #even neil isn't needlessly mean to aaron tbh #like he doesn't like aaron much at certain points but if he picks a fight with aaron it's never without cause #and he's genuinely happy for aaron when things work out with katelyn in the end #and he wants aaron to have a relationship with andrew as well! like it's important to neil that the twins have a healthy bond!!#anyway im getting off my soapbox now this is just something i was thinking about today a Lot #aftg #all for the game #the foxhole court

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lemonwrap · 1 month

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Imagine: Omegaverse AU where Ghost had his scent gland cut out by Roba.

Ghost barely survived it, and now he doesn’t have a scent of his own. He’s never tried, but it’s a logical assumption that he won’t be able to sustain a mating bond, either. He can usually pass his lack of scent off as just using the scent suppressants military members almost always use on missions, but it’s harder during downtime when there’s not such a need for them.

Ghost is close to Soap, flirting and bantering with him constantly, *likes* him, but he never outright tells him. He likes Soap’s scent, too, an odd but alluring combination of citrus and a hint of gunpowder—one would think the two scents together would be disgusting, but when it’s Soap, it’s not.

Ghost keeps the mask on to hide, and doesn’t lift it even to eat when others are around. It’s kind of a pain sometimes, really, and he’s considered being done with all the bullshit and just taking it off, but then Soap would know. He wants the bond and affection between them to last. It’s fucked up to lie to him, but Soap won’t want him when he finds out Ghost can’t actually bond with him, and Soap is the closest he’s been to someone in years.

Soap, while slightly skeptical of Ghost’s unwillingness to take off the mask, doesn’t entirely connect the dots and just thinks Ghost’s scent suppressants work amazingly.

Until the day Ghost sustains a head injury on a mission, that is. He’s losing blood fast and Soap can’t see a thing with the mask on, and he just barely convinces Ghost to take it off so he can staunch the blood flow better. Soap gets him patched up enough that he won’t bleed out on the way to exfil, but with the danger now past, he notices the deep, unmistakable scar of a botched scent gland removal on Ghost’s neck.

After Ghost is treated in medical, he makes an effort to avoid Soap, simply not wanting to bother with his pity or disgust.

He knows Soap liked him back at one point, but if they had ever gotten that far, they’d never be able to actually bond. Soap deserves a real mate.

Soap catches on by the end of the first day that Ghost is avoiding him, but Ghost is elusive if he wants to be, and Soap doesn’t catch him in the man’s favorite smoking spot on the roof until a week later.

Ghost hears him coming, but doesn’t pull his mask back down. Soap’s seen the scar anyways, so it doesn’t really matter.

“Long time no see, Lt,” Soap says.

Ghost doesn’t reply and takes a drag from his cigarette. He shouldn’t have let himself get so close to Soap, because he knew it’d go to shit once he found out about the scar. People usually date to bond. Ghost can’t do that.

Soap stands next to Ghost.

“Care to share?” Soap asks. Ghost hums and gives the cigarette to Soap, and they silently pass it back and forth until it’s a stub.

“Gonna tell me why you were avoiding me?” Soap asks, blowing out the last puff of smoke. “Kinda rude to vanish on someone like that.”

“Figured you’d know that one,” Ghost replies.

“If it’s about—“

Ghost cuts him off. “It is.”

“So you’ve been flirting with me and didn’t think to mention it? I’ve been wanting to fuck you for the past six fuckin’ months,” Soap says, sounding irritated. “Kiss would’ve been nice, too.”

“I didn’t because I knew you’d act like this,” Ghost says, pointedly ignoring the fact that Soap just admitted that he likes Ghost—or that he did at one point, anyway.

“So you like me?”

“Yes,” Ghost says, “but I think you can find someone that’ll be able to keep a bond.”

“It doesn’t make a difference,” Soap says resolutely. “I want you anyway.”

Ghost doesn’t scoff, but he sort of wants to. Of course it makes a difference.

“Just drop it, Soap,” Ghost says.

Soap does, for about ten seconds. Then he grabs Ghost by the collar and kisses him hard, smashing their lips together and biting at Ghost’s lips. Ghost kisses back just as hard, savoring how their bodies feel pressed together, hands gripping at each other’s clothes and skin.

This won’t last, but Ghost will take what he can get.

#Ghost and Soap could be any combo of alpha and/or omega tbh #I feel like it works either way #I’m imagining this as an eventual happy ending #Bonus if Ghost *can* be bonded with but Soap just has to renew the bite often ;)#simon ghost riley #john soap mactavish #ghoap #soapghost #ghostsoap #call of duty #cod #lemonwrap writes #drabble

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rosieofcorona · 7 months

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A Light To Break All Shadows

Just a fluffy little Halsin x Tav fic to keep the darkness at bay. Also on AO3, if you prefer. Thank you for reading! 💕

“How long has it been since you’ve slept?”

Tav is eyeing Halsin suspiciously from the opposite end of Art’s bedside, where he’s been keeping watch over the sick man for days. At least, Halsin thinks it’s been days– perhaps three (or maybe four?) at the most. It is difficult to keep track in the Shadowlands.

At any rate, he cannot answer her immediately, which means his answer is insufficient.

“If you have to think about it,” Tav continues, “It’s been too long.”

She has a point.

He is exhausted, as they all are, but cannot bring himself to rest. They are so close– he is so close– to finding the child that will save them, to ending the hundred-year darkness, to restoring light and balance to the land.

And Art Cullagh, ill as he is, is the key that will unlock their victory, so Halsin feels as though he must protect him every moment, must stay by his side in case he should wake, or take a turn.

For days, he has persisted, spurred on by his stamina and willpower. For days, he has waited and watched. Now the idea of sleep falls on him like a spell.

“It is my duty.” He protests. “I will see this through.” “You will,” she agrees, “When you wake. These people will need you in the days to come. And they will need you to be rested.”

She is playing to his sense of responsibility, he knows, but he is too tired to argue. Reluctantly, he nods his agreement.

When he rises from his chair, it seems that all his centuries of existence catch up to him at once, his joints and muscles burning. He feels old and sore and weary as he drags himself toward an empty bed.

“Go on,” Tav commands gently. She feels like a mother nudging a child off to sleep. “Even the greatest leaders need rest.”

“Then you ought to rest yourself.”

She laughs at that, though Halsin means it. He knows so few who are so capable, so resilient, so kind. She has already accomplished so many things that he could not, not in hundreds of years of practice.

“You flatter me,” Tav smiles, but Halsin shakes his head.

“You are extraordinary.”

His gaze is on her when he says it, on her eyes and mouth and hands, the way her armor cleaves to her, the way her weapon rests against her hip. In another place, another time, another life, he would have had her already, would have known her inside and out if she asked him to.

And she had asked him to, once, before they came here. He remembers. At the time he had denied her as gently as he could, in the knowledge that what was growing between them, if cultivated, could later prove a distraction, a weakness.

But gods, he had wanted her then. He wants her still.

Yet such urges, much like sleep, must be suppressed. At least for now.

Tav stares back at him with wide eyes until she feels a flush come over her cheeks. She turns her face away, just slightly, so that Halsin will not see.

“Well.” She clears her throat, and redirects. “I’ll rest before we go scouting tomorrow. And I’ll watch Art while you sleep.”

“As you say.”

**********

In his dreams, he is back in the Shadowfell, that sunless, cursed place.

At his feet are bodies, Harper and druid and shade alike. He knows their faces, their names, their stories. Here is Atlan, a boy from his own grove, no more than eighteen years of age. Halsin had cured him once of pox, had later mentored him in the healing arts.

And here, Jehan the Harper, who had just received word that his wife was expecting. Twins, he’d announced, over a round of drinks at Last Light.

And Moranna, the Selunite priestess who had blessed them again and again on their journey, had prayed over them and shielded them to the best of her ability.

All lost to the shadows, corrupted beyond recognition. All dead, cut down by his hand.

Halsin does his best to avoid stepping on them as he presses onward, each step a battle of its own. The weight of darkness seems to crush him, seems to drain the very life out of his body.

His god is nowhere here.

There comes a voice through the black night, distant, disembodied. Halsin, the shadows whisper, and whisper again, closer. Halsin.

Wildly he turns and swings his glaive, hitting nothing, the panic rising in his throat, and–

“Halsin!” Tav exclaims, blocking a swing of his fist with her forearm.

She is sitting at the edge of his bed looking concerned, frightened even. His skin is slicked with sweat, his breathing heavy, his body tangled in the bed linens.

Immediately, a white-hot shame rushes over him, that he should be the one to cause her fear.

That he should strike at her, even unconsciously, his savior, his ally. His friend, though that is too weak a word for the feeling that grows within him, wraps around his heart like wild ivy.

“Forgive me,” he pants, “I was–”

I was lost in the darkness, he means to say, I was frightened and alone, but the words stick in his throat like flies in honey.

Yet Tav seems to know already, a tenderness softening the furrows of her brow. Not pity, he notes. Understanding.

She has seen equivalent horrors, has seen friends fall and foes flourish and still, and still, keeps fighting toward goodness, toward light. He aches with the thought that she might have such nightmares, that she might know firsthand how he feels now.

But she soothes him, reaches out to wipe the sweat from his brow, her touch as light and cool as an evening breeze.

“It’s alright,” she promises. “You don’t have to explain. You are safe here.”

Halsin lets out a breath he’s been holding for too long. It has been many years since he was last comforted, truly comforted. He is so accustomed to doing the comforting that he has almost forgotten what it feels like to be on the receiving end.

Tenderness is no stranger to him– many of his lovers have been gentle, have been sweet– but none have ever known his burdens, none have carried them, taken them on as their own. Here is one who has, who does, who will, if he will let her.

He takes Tav’s hand in his and guides it, flattens her palm over the rabbit-fast beat of his heart, breathing deeply, willing it to slow. He wants to say, Thank you, then, I love you, but it’s too soon, he thinks, too desperate, no matter how true.

“Thank you,” Halsin allows, and swallows the rest.

Tav smiles at him then, a soft, bright thing, like a single star in the night sky. The true last light in the Shadowlands.

“Shall I stay with you?”

“Art–,” Halsin starts, but she shakes her head calmly, knowingly. “He’s sleeping soundly. Seems his bad dreams have come to visit you.”

“I do not wish to burden you with something so trivial.”

“You could not burden me,” Tav says quietly. “But I will leave, if you prefer.”

Her thumb strokes over his chest, her hand still pressed against him. His pulse quickens again at so intimate, so innocent a touch. Halsin wonders if she can feel it.

“I prefer your presence, always. But you need your own rest.”

“Very well.”

Her palm slips from him as she rises to her feet, and he thinks for a moment that he’s made a mistake, has waved off her kindness, dismissed her.

Rather, she motions for him to move over and climbs slowly, wordlessly into the bed next to him. He finds himself lifting the sheets for her, inviting her in without hesitation.

She’s changed, he realizes as she comes close, her armor cast aside for the day. Her nightclothes make her look, make her feel smaller, softer. He wants so badly to slip his hands beneath the fabric, to see how soft she is beneath.

“Is this alright?” Tav whispers, looking earnestly into his eyes. Her fingertips flit over his cheek, brushing a lock of his hair behind his ear. “Are you alright?”

The bed is small and Halsin is not, and she is pressed against him like a flower between the pages of a book. He can only nod.

“I will rest here then, with you.”

In the gentlest act he can or will ever remember, she leans forward and kisses his eyes as if bestowing a blessing upon them, a ward against the darkness.

**********

Halsin wakes again in near-total silence, save the gentle inhale-exhale of Tav’s breathing beside him. He doesn’t know how much time has passed, and for the first time in a long time, doesn’t mind.

Instead, he is aware of how peaceful he feels in this moment, sheltered from the dangers beyond the inn, aware that at one point or another he had let go of his worry and settled deep into dreaming. The earlier tension in his muscles has melted into a tired ache, as if he is returning from a very long walk in the Grove.

And she is here, wrapped in his arms. A light to break all shadows.

He can’t be sure when it happened. The shift had been imperceptible, like the feeling of falling asleep, or falling in love.

#bg3 #baldur's gate 3 #halsin #halsin x tav #my fic #halsin x reader #halsin x fem! tav #fluff #angst with a happy ending #hurt/comfort #but mostly just so soft #like it was a delight to write something so sweet #my writing #bg3 fanfiction #halsin romance #bg3 halsin #halsin fanfic

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straight-to-the-pain · 5 months

Text

I’ve been thinking about how often we see stories about people getting out of an awful situation and being surrounded with support and care and getting to move on and recover.

But what if they don’t. They’ve spent god knows how long in their own personal hell, captivity, torture, isolation. For what felt like an eternity, they held onto the idea of finally being freed, rescued, released. And one day it just happens. Political pressure, a hostage exchange, a rescue. Whatever happens, one day they’re just free.

But they come home and everything’s different. They never had a huge network to begin with, and now the people who still care just don’t know how to deal with them and their trauma. It’s all too much. They’re not the person they used to be, the person their friends used to love.

Sure, they’ve been given medical treatment for their obvious wounds but the doctors just don’t seem to understand them when they say that there’s a pain that never quite goes away. They’ve had the mandatory counselling, but the therapist’s empty platitudes made them feel all the more disconnected from their reality.

For so long, they waited for this. But now it feels like their past is an impossible weight on their chest, never letting them move forward. People tell them that they have their future ahead of them, but they can’t help but wonder if they should have just died there.

#whump #tropes and prompts #past trauma #implied/referenced torture #emotional whump #my stuff #I’m sorry this is such a bleak one but I just felt like it wasn’t represented much in writing #but like sometimes there isn’t a happy ending for a long time #i do hope that it’ll get better for this hypothetical character but who can say for sure

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hauntedhotel · 2 years

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Kinda obsessed with the difference between Martin's perspective during the apocalypse and Jon’s.

It's the difference between "I know you might hate me right now" and "I love you, I always will, and I know you love me"

It's the difference between Jon not being able to trust anyone, not even himself, but never for a second doubting that Martin loves him and Martin never being sure Jon’s feelings for him won't change.

It's the difference between Jon not always being loved perfectly and Martin having never been loved before.

It's Jon spending the entire apocalypse telling every monster they come across that Martin is his boyfriend, have you met Martin, this is his boyfriend Martin, his anchor, his last tie to humanity, his reason to still be hoping for a better ending. It's Martin telling his Lonely-self that if it comes down to it he'll ask Jon to destroy him and not being sure whether Jon will say no.

Even the jealousy, which is slightly played for laughs, still comes down to Jon being like "aw my boyfriend's getting all possessive 🥰" whereas deep down Martin has never let go of the idea that under different circumstances Jon could do better.

They're more emotionally open with each other during the apocalypse than they are for the years leading up to it, and they still don't stop misunderstanding each other.

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koinotame · 2 days

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quick apology fic to xiao for missing his bday </3 which doubles as a character study of xiao and an exploration of how you as the player interact with the self aware characters in self aware au

it’s been a couple of weeks since you last used him.

or has it only been several days? whether it’s days or years, it all feels like the blink of an eye to him. the flow of time is somewhat of a nebulous concept for someone like him, especially since you first appeared.

it doesn’t matter. however long you take to come back, xiao will wait dutifully for you.

he spends most of his time when you’re not making use of him subjugating threats around liyue and fighting off any unwanted foes. perhaps you’ll come back faster if the area is freer of enemies. you’re kind, after all. you seem much happier when it’s peaceful.

lately, when there’s no demons for him to quell, he’s found himself returning to the same spot on wangshu inn’s upper balcony. it’s the spot you always drop him off at before disappearing. it’s not the place at the top of the inn’s roof he’d pick on his own, though you do sometimes take him up there as well.

you’re not actually there, but if he closes his eyes it almost feels like you are.

his birthday was a couple days ago. as usual, the traveller had suggested he write you a letter. as usual, he wasn’t sure what he could possibly convey to you that you would be happy to receive.

the traveller insisted anything from him would make you happy, but xiao doubts that.

it’s easier when you’re here. it’s easier when you’re here and he can submit himself entirely to you and doesn’t have to think for himself.

he’s been dreaming more lately, particularly of you. he doesn’t know what you look like, and after he wakes up he can never quite remember what you looked like in his dreams.

waking up after dreaming of you is always hard for xiao. it’s shameful how badly he wants to go back to dreaming of doing such mundane things with you, and it’s disgraceful how long it takes him to pick himself back up afterwards.

he wonders if you’d like doing dull things like that with someone like him.

he wonders if he deserves that.

probably not.

he left the letter at the railing of that same—your—spot, along with a serving of his almond tofu (he might not like dreaming, but he hopes your dreams are as sweet as his have been lately), some dream solvent (the traveller had mentioned you seemed to want more) and a small bundle of qixing (you frequently go out of your way to collect it).

you never touch it.

…after a couple days, he decided to move the offering to his room. it stays there, on his windowsill where the sun touches it in a way that reminds him of your warmth, untouched.

it doesn’t matter, he tells himself. he’ll wait for you for as long as you want. even if another thousand years pass before you appear again, he’ll continue his duty and wait.

and then he blinks and suddenly finds himself in front of the adventurer’s guild in the court of fontaine.

another blink and he’s back at wangshu inn, this time heading towards the kitchen. the familiar aura of your possession fills him with a warmth he doesn’t think exists outside of you. he zones out for what feels no longer than a couple seconds, and suddenly there’s thirty servings of almond tofu in front of him.

your mood drops.

dissatisfaction seeps through you and into him. something deep in his gut squirms.

you set a large amount of sweet flowers to boil, then seem to fuss with something he can’t quite see or grasp. smiley yanxiao gives him a curious look, but doesn’t (cannot) comment any further.

in another couple of seconds—your teleportation hardly fazed him when you first started using him, let alone now when he’s so used to your presence—he’s in front of the liyuean general goods store. you buy up the entire stock of milk, and only milk.

your mood hasn’t improved. if anything, you seem even more downcast.

the milk dissipates as soon as it’s been bought, safely held in your near infinite storage.

he’s behind mondstadt’s hotel next, jumping down the railing and towards the local general goods store. again, you buy up all the milk. next you head for the good hunter (is that what it’s called? he thinks that’s what the traveller called it some time ago) and purchase as much of their sugar as you can.

tendrils of something truly unpleasant move upwards and wrap around his neck.

he finds himself in wangshu inn’s kitchen again. barely any of the sweet flowers have been processed, but you take the two packs of sugar anyway. you put him to work immediately.

usually, he finds the process of cooking much to tedious and drawn out. with you, he doesn’t mind.

you seem a bit more satisfied this time, and xiao finds himself ashamed of having made a few more of his specialty dish instead of only regular almond tofu like you’d wanted him to.

while you seem a bit happier now, he still finds himself in front of inazuma’s goods store. again, you buy all the milk. you talk to the restaurant owner up the stairs afterwards. some confusion creeps into him through you, but it doesn’t last long.

he’s in sumeru next. more milk makes its way into your inventory, and you visit the local tavern for good measure, though this time you don’t buy anything at all.

exiting the building, you seem to notice there’s a stove just outside of it and walk over in excitement… and straight into the clay oven.

a sharp pang of panic shoots through him and he jerks backwards. it takes him a second to realise it’s your panic.

immediately, you pull the astrologer from mondstadt out and have her set down her little hydro puppet. you then walk him through it, which does absolutely nothing except soak his clothes.

your panic doesn’t subside.

i’m sorry.

he blinks and finds himself in front of dihua marsh’s statue of the seven, the fire and the tinge it brought with it disappearing in seconds.

it’s rare to be able to make out what you’re actually saying as opposed to just feeling your vague emotions and intentions. are you that worried about him not performing up to standard with this little damage?

he’s yours to use. a little singe like that would never hold him back.

you don’t bother with fontaine.

something like shame curls up his body and makes a home near his ears.

soon after, he’s back at the inn’s kitchen again. yanxiao doesn’t even look in his direction this time as he gets back to work under your guidance, making even more almond tofu. he makes sure to take greater care to avoid displeasing you again.

your mood doesn’t pick up this time, but you seem to have calmed down a little. he’s not sure why (or what use you could possibly have for so much almond tofu), but it’s a small comfort.

part of him wishes he could be there with you properly to comfort you, but he knows better.

he might be your formidable weapon, but that’s all he is. he has no false illusions about his role or purpose to you, no matter how much he wishes he could be the one you turn to for comfort. he isn’t suited to something so delicate. he’s accepted that a long time ago.

your dejection doesn’t retract, even as you move him around a bit more.

then you sit him down at a table at the inn’s terrace and pull out a plate of his specialty.

your presence lingers for a bit, envelops him like a gentle dream, then falls through the cracks of his existence and disappears.

happy birthday, xiao.

he wonders if he deserves this much effort from you for something as inconsequential as his birthday.

probably not.

he hopes he’ll dream of this next.

#yandere #yandere x reader #x reader #genshin impact #yandere genshin impact #self aware au #self aware genshin #sagau #xiao #'character study' i say and then worry this is perhaps too ooc #i mean. ultimately. self aware and/or yan characters are going to be a bit ooc. but like within the realm of that #this isn't super yandere but you know. tags there just in case #writing the base of this took like an hour max. editing it took me like three lol #i do think i'm actually fairly happy with the end result though for once so yay #<- jinxing myself here

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inoreuct · 2 months

Note

more sanji drinking angst plis,,, 🙏🏼😁

y’know, it’s normal when zoro drinks. he has an iron liver and a sky-high tolerance. he get mildly tipsy with the amount of alcohol sufficient to kill a regular man.

when sanji drinks, though, it’s usually… not very good.

they’re in the galley, have been since dinner. zoro’s drowsy and full and slumped over the table with his chin in his hand as he watches sanji scrub at the dishes until they squeak, divested of his suit jacket and shirtsleeves rolled up to the elbow, and the cook looks haggard. they’ve all been expecting it, really, what with Whole Cake being a fucking doozy— but sanji’s been holding it together perfectly. big smiles and neatly-pressed suits and coiffed hair and all.

zoro knows him well enough to know that he’s due to break at some point. still, tonight is the first time he’s seen sanji like this; like he’d just decided to say fuck it all and throw pretence to the wind. maybe it had been thanks to the emptiness of the galley, save the both of them. maybe sanji had considered it safe because zoro was in no place to judge.

but when sanji had picked up that bottle of rum, he hadn’t put it down until there was nothing left.

zoro had let him drink. the cook hadn’t even been smoking any more than usual— hadn’t had a single hair out of place, no sign of the pressure except the strain at the edges of his smile. everybody had been walking on eggshells for the past few days and sanji had just kept going like nothing was wrong, which zoro knows means quite a lot is wrong, because sanji’s a self-sacrificial bastard who wouldn’t be able to ask for help if his life depended on it.

didn’t mean it hadn’t hurt, though. he’s felt like he couldn’t breathe, the whole of last week; it doesn’t feel right seeing the cook with a bottle between his lips instead of a cigarette, liquor wetting the corners of his mouth instead of smoke. it makes part of zoro tighten into a dead knot. on one hand, it’s an unspoken show of trust— deliberately left alone so as to not draw attention to it, but one all the same. sanji would never let himself go in front of anyone else like this. maybe a few months earlier he’d think the cook just didn’t care enough for his opinion and get all offended, but now?

sanji knows he’s here. he’s never unaware of his surroundings, and especially now after… everything. he’s believing that zoro won’t judge him, and he won’t. he doesn’t. but enough is enough, and sanji’s grip on the edge of the plate is tight enough to turn his knuckles white.

it’s almost a relief in a really twisted way. zoro’s been hovering by the sidelines, sleeping with one eye open and waiting for sanji to crack just so he can catch all the pieces before the cook falls apart completely, and it seems like this is it.

his chair scrapes against the floor as he stands. “alright, let’s get you to bed.”

“no.” sanji doesn’t stop scrubbing. he doesn’t even bother looking up. “why?”

zoro scoffs. “because you’re fucking drunk, cook. you’ve been washing that plate for five minutes.”

“well maybe it’s just not fucking clean, yeah?” sanji spits, quiet vitriol leadening his words even with his head bowed, and his breathing is jerky as zoro walks forward.

“oi.” it doesn’t come out harshly, exactly, but he needs sanji to know that he isn’t fucking around with this. “What the hell’s going on?”

“i don’t know.”

“what do you mean you don’t—”

“i don’t know!”

zoro lurches back at the outburst as the cook whips around, seething within the span of a second, plate dropped carelessly into the water in the sink. he hears it thunk when it hits the bottom.

“i don’t know, alright?” sanji laughs, eyes wild. “nothing’s wrong. everything’s wrong. everything is fucking perfect and i feel like i’m fucking dying inside.” his voice cracks right before he takes a visible breath and turns sharply, dipping his hand under the water to grab the plate and sponge again.

zoro watches his shoulders tremble. every movement of his now is precise and carefully calculated; he’s moving like a fucking robot and zoro hates it. hates the way his spine looks rigid enough to snap with a touch. hates the way his face is a placid mask, still water with a storm roiling beneath. zoro doesn’t know how to approach this other than with barbed words and concern thinly veiled as confrontation. he doesn’t know what to do other than be here because it’s better than not being here at all.

sanji’s hands have been scrubbed pink and raw. “get out, mosshead.”

“no.”

the cook’s cuticles are peeling, his fingertips pruned. he never lets either of them get this bad. “i said get out—”

“and I said no.” zoro crosses his arms. he counts three seconds of silence before sanji snaps.

“god, for once could you fucking listen?!” the cook snarls, rounding on zoro like a cornered animal and waving his arms. “i don’t want to talk to you right now! i do not want you here! so please, fuck off and— put me down, you piece of shit!” sanji borderline screams, struggling and wiggling over zoro’s shoulder as he’s hauled up and marched out of the galley.

zoro winces as the toe of a steel-capped oxford jams into his ribs, digging in deeper as sanji grunts with the effort. he doesn’t know where he’s going but they end up outside the infirmary, and he shoulders the door open before depositing sanji on the bed without preamble. “stay,” he grunts, ignoring the noises of outrage and turning to go get water.

“you can’t tell me what to do,” sanji spits from behind him, cheeks red from more than just anger as he pushes himself unsteadily to his feet. he either doesn’t realise that he’s listing to the side or he doesn’t care.

“sit down or I’ll make you.”

the cook barks a laugh that snaps in the air like a neck in rope. “try! i fucking dare you, marimo, you—”

zoro tackles him down and he screeches like a trapped cat, trying to escape even as the swordsman pins his legs and shoves his shoulders down into the bunk. “you are drunk. stop it.”

“why?” sanji shouts in his face. the cook is straining against him, all wild eyes and bared teeth, shoulders jerking with a sardonic laugh. “don’t wanna fight anymore?”

“no. i don’t.” the air is suddenly too quiet, too heavy, with something zoro doesn’t know if he should name. he watches as the cook’s face falls and twists into something sullen as he tries one last time to jerk his way out of zoro’s hold. “not like this.”

their ship rocks gently as zoro slowly eases off, shifting his weight back and sitting on the edge of the mattress with a soundless, weary sigh. there’s still a stubborn set to sanji’s chin even as he lays there on his back, unmoving from where zoro put him— leave it to him to be contrary for the sake of being contrary. the swordsman takes a deep breath to suppress an eye roll and opens his mouth to say something—

“it hurts.”

zoro stills, turning so he can see sanji better. “what hurts, cook?”

“everything.”

the blond is staring at the ceiling, unblinking and unreadable. the fabric of his slacks is riding up and zoro swallows down the urge to curl a hand around his pale ankle for comfort. he tells himself he doesn’t know where the urge to soothe came from, but he knows, he knows— this melancholy is something that sanji buries so deep, none of them catch even a glimpse of it on a normal day. his face is a blank slate, his usual fire banked, and he looks so drained. an cracked shell of himself running on empty. “i don’t want to feel it. i don’t want to feel anything,” he continues, softly enough that zoro has to strain to hear, leaning in instinctively.

glossy blue eyes flick over. golden hair scrunches against the off-white sheets as sanji turns his face towards him and whispers, “doesn’t that make me exactly like them?”

no. zoro swallows, at the same time both too wet and too dry, feeling a little like he’s been gutted with a dull knife. he says a mental to hell with it and slowly shifts his hand to wrap his fingers around sanji’s ankle, just a gentle grip, his thumb resting beneath the notch of bone. he can hear the soft sounds of the waves outside as it melds with sanji’s breathing, as he opens his mouth and comes up dry for things to say. “…get some sleep, curls.”

“can’t.” sanji purses his lips, shrugging a shoulder as he looks away like it’s no big deal. “can’t sleep. not well, at least. not since…”

zoro feels his own heart thud against his ribs as his gaze slips over sanji’s face, the redness rimming his eyes and the dark circles beneath. “i’m sleeping with you tonight,” he decides.

the cook makes an aborted noise of indignation before apparently deciding that it isn’t worth the effort. “we can’t fit two people in a bed.”

zoro shrugs, unaffected in the face of the venomous look sanji shoots him. “we can try.”

sanji mutters something to the ceiling under his breath. the swordsman pretends not to hear it.

they end up crammed onto the infirmary bed, sanji squashed against the wall and zoro almost falling off. the blond wiggles around in discomfort for five minutes before sitting bolt upright with a hissed curse and undoing his dress shirt in a frenzy; zoro stifles a laugh as he balls it up and hurls it at the desk across the room before flopping back down with a loud huff.

the cook scrunches himself up, spine pressed against the wall and one knee pulled up between them to maintain the distance, pointed at zoro’s gut as a subtle threat. “i’m not gonna bite you, y’know,” zoro grumbles. here he is doing this out of goodwill and this is how he’s treated.

“i wouldn’t put it past you,” sanji snips in reply. “also, you stink.”

“no i don’t. i just showered.”

“irrelevant.”

“priss.”

“moron.”

“spoiled.”

“i have standards, you sentient piece of kelp.”

“you—” zoro grits out, before he stalls. somehow, throughout this whole exchange, they’d inched closer and closer together and now sanji’s shoulder is digging into his breastbone, his breath warm across zoro’s cheek even as a brush of his skin above the loose, low front of zoro’s shirt feels completely opposite. “why’re you so fuckin’ cold?” he mutters, briskly rubbing at sanji’s upper arms before the cook bats him away with a startled hiss.

“don’t—” he cuts off and huffs a harsh breath, sneering in the dark as he digs for the right word, “—coddle me.”

“why not?” zoro shoots back. the words are out of his mouth faster than he can process, but it’s too late to take them back. “give me one good reason and i’ll stop. just one.”

the quiet that falls into place after that is broken by the sound of sanji’s swallow and nothing else. it’s nearly pitch-black; they’d put out the lamp on the wall and the infirmary has no windows. if zoro strains his eye he can see sanji’s outline curled close to his own front, golden hair darkened to honey and arms wrapped around himself.

he recalls how it had felt to have fine bones beneath his hand. how the cook hadn’t kicked him off.

the hand he rests on sanji side is tentative. barely-there pressure, a ghost of a touch with enough space for sanji to back away. he settles his palm down more firmly after a few seconds, tracking his thumb up and down the bumps of sanji’s ribs, and he barely stops his breath from catching when the cook wiggles away from the wall and presses his spine into zoro’s hand.

sanji’s looking at him. he can see the occasional flutter of long lashes, feel the weight of the cook’s attention like sanji’s preparing to say something, but it never comes. a soft breath slips from his lips before zoro feels a hand curl around his waist, fingers curling into his shirt.

“sanji.”

the cook heaves a long-suffering sigh. it doesn’t hide how he’s affected by zoro using his real name; zoro can read him too well for that. knows him too well for that. “what.”

zoro readjusts, fingertips pressing into the small of sanji’s back to pull him closer, and wonder of wonders, the cook lets him. “you’re nothing like them.”

he pretends he doesn’t feel sanji’s arm tighten around him after a few seconds. he notices that his shirt’s damp right before he falls asleep, right where sanji has his face buried in his shoulder.

he doesn’t mention any of it.

the next morning is… interesting.

zoro had woken to an empty bed, with the sheets just barely warm and hazy recollections of a lithe body tucked to his side, a leg thrown over his and soft hair under his chin. he stretches and ambles down to the galley, scratching at his stomach beneath his shirt as he yawns, and right on cue— sanji’s disdainful little tongue click reaches his ears, and he smiles. everything’s back to normal, then.

there’s more of the usual; luffy getting yelled at to leave the eggs alone, i don’t care if you’re hungry, they are raw, and nami and robin being handed their special little tiny cups of coffee and tea respectively. the rest of the crew filters in, and zoro people-watches from his spot on the ratty corner couch before he eventually gets up and slides into his seat at the table.

but when sanji takes his spot beside him, it feels different. the cook’s made onigiri for breakfast, the plate set down just a little closer to zoro’s side than usual before he sits, and zoro pauses with his chopsticks in the air as an ankle bumps into his.

not roughly, or painfully, nowhere near, no. just a reminder. a small nudge that could say any possible number of things, but from the way sanji’s gaze meets his before darting away, he’d guess it’s the thank you that their cook always has so much trouble saying. it’s never a lack of gratitude— more of a refusal to acknowledge that he needed help in the first place, that he accepted it, but zoro will take what he can get.

the circles under sanji’s eyes aren’t quite so dark anymore.

zoro knocks back. he feels the rasp of his boot laces against the heel of sanji’s patent leather oxford, and neither of them pull away. the swordsman presses his lips together and takes a big bite to hide his smile, failing momentarily when sanji immediately starts berating his abysmal table manners, marimo, honestly, if you choke i will leave you to die, and yeah, sure. back to normal.

he catches sanji’s eye again, sky-cornflower-ocean blue, and he wonders what sanji could be seeing in his to make his face soften like that.

normal, and maybe a little something new.

(he isn’t quite sure what to do the following night. sanji’s already in his own bunk when he slips in for a quick few hours of shut-eye, but it isn’t long before he feels someone climbing in with him, and he just knows instinctively without even needing to open his eye. they’ve got limbs hanging out here and there but they fit reasonably well and zoro wakes with sanji’s sleep shirt tucked in his fist and his thin blanket pulled up around his shoulders.

it goes on like this night after night to the point where their crew knows, he thinks. even if zoro discounts the fact that most of them share a bunkroom, they’ve still got to know something’s up; sanji glows like sunlight reflecting off the ocean now, real smiles and laughs that have him tossing his head back and holding his stomach, eyes in sapphire half-moons. robin brings it up offhandedly one day and zoro hums that proper sleep’s doing their cook good— she gives him that look that she does, and he turns away with a smile that he hides in his arm.

the first time sanji finds him in the crow’s nest, he’s still asleep when zoro’s watch ends. the cook’s stretched out on the bench above as zoro sits on the floor, hand draped down against zoro’s collarbone, his face so peaceful that zoro can’t— fuck, he can’t wake him.

and it can’t be comfortable lying on his own arm like that; zoro sits down and carefully pushes him up until sanji’s leaning on his shoulder, that sharp nose tucked under his jaw, and drifts asleep.)

(he stirs awake before sanji’s gone. his eye flutters open to find the cook mid-yawn, working out a crick in his neck and bathed in early-morning light, warm and golden. the cook realises he’s watching and freezes, shoulders going tense and stiff—

he deflates a little when zoro blinks at him, sleep-warm and bleary. “gotta make breakfast, marimo,” he murmurs, reaching out after a moment’s hesitation.

the hand that cups zoro’s cheek is gently callused and somehow familiar. he turns into it like a flower to the sun and breathes in something that he never even realised he’d gotten used to, olive oil and shoe polish and orange blossom pomade. “i know,” he replies, pressing the words into sanji’s palm, and a thumb drags across his cheekbone.

“need anything before i go?” sanji asks, and they both know it’s half a joke. what could he possibly give zoro in here? a dumbbell sandwich?

that other half, though— it’s far too serious. a cold plunge of water through zoro’s muddled early-morning brain. he knows what he wants, but zoro also knows that patience is a virtue for a reason.

the cook already has a hard enough time letting people in. zoro doesn’t want to push. the hand against his cheek is enough for him, even if it is all sanji could ever want, and so he slips the blond a wry grin. “onigiri?”

“you— ugh, fine.” sanji huffs. “anything else?”

zoro frowns, growing increasingly convinced that this is some sort of trap. these are unprecedented levels of generosity. “…protein shake?”

it takes all of two seconds before sanji puts his face into his hands, taking a deep breath before zoro hears something about having to do everything myself, don’t i? the cook plants his hands on his hips, tapping his foot with one brow arched. “of all the people in the world,” he mutters through his teeth, advancing on zoro with enough of a menacing air that the swordsman leans back into the backrest, “of course it had to be you.”

“me what?” zoro says warily, eyeing sanji up and down, and opens his mouth to continue before a fist grips his collar and there’s a brush of contact at his temple— a kiss, he realises, before all the thoughts drain out of his fucking brain.)

(he’s still reeling when he stumbles his way to breakfast. still wide-eyed as he washes the plates, for once, without complaint. it’s when it’s just the two of them, when zoro twists around to ask a question that he hasn’t yet phrased, that arms lock around his waist and sanji’s forehead presses to his nape.

they’re quiet for a long, long while. “you remind me that i’m not like them, y’know,” sanji breathes, barely loud enough to be heard.

zoro turns in his hold, hands dripping all over the floor, fuck, the cook’ll make him clean that up later, he knows and he isn’t even mad about it. “what do you mean, curls?”

sanji leans into him, all sharp edges and bony joints softened by lean muscle and zoro’s fondness, fingers long and thin and laced together over zoro’s hip. “i’m pretty damn sure they’ve never felt like this.”)

(not much changes after that. franky does make them a bigger bunk to share, though, and they fight perhaps even more fiercely now; afternoons are spent toying with each other across the deck, pushing their limits, pushing each other higher until nami yells at them to stop making a racket. zoro doesn’t pretend that he can’t tell when sanji needs a little more contact, keeping him close when perfectly filed nails dig into his shirt. sanji takes care of them all like he always does, and he lets zoro take care of him— most of the time, at least. it’s still a toss-up on whether he’ll explode or break down whenever anyone tries to help him, but with zoro it’s either both in succession or neither.

sometimes he picks a fight and then cries afterwards. others, he concedes to being wrapped in a ratty old blanket and tucked into zoro’s chest where he can hide from the world.

he sleeps through every night now, though. he’s fiery and sharp-tongued and bright-eyed and when he’s had a bit too much to drink he just gets loud, fooling around with their captain and cackling with nami in a corner of the galley between conspiratorial whispers, but zoro can’t deny him anything even though he’s fairly sure they’re plotting his downfall.

he wouldn’t have it any other way.)

#THANK YOU FOR THE ASK ANONNNN #will never get tired of angsting this babygirl. i’m sorry he just has so many Issues #BUT I ALWAYS GIVE THEM HAPPY ENDINGS ALRIGHT SO IT BALANCES OUTTTT #it’s almost 4am this time this is actually horrid #GOODNIGHT ZOSAN NATIONNN #zosan #one piece #black leg sanji #zoro x sanji #roronoa zoro #one piece sanji #one piece zosan #one piece zoro #sanji #zoro #ino writes #ino’s ask box

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thorougly-melted-brains · 3 months

Text

Fully believe that Soap is a sappy drunk. Also think he’s a karoake drunk.

This does mean Gaz and Ghost have to drag him off stage after his third ABBA encore because throwing up would really ruin the ambience (Mactavish constitution be damned, no one is immune to alcohol poisoning).

Soap is surprisingly good at making a graceful exit pissed out of his face.

#he ends up just blubbering about how happy he is to know them until ghost makes him throw up #then it’s all cusses and groans #he still loves gaz tho #emetophobia #john soap mactavish #simon ghost riley #kyle gaz garrick #writing #prompt #gazghostsoap #ghostsoap #soapghost #gazsoap

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