#oh look it's actually writing

[eskawrites]

so i’m rewatching bits and pieces of s4 for fic reasons and it’s hitting me all over again how and why nancy reacts to robin the way she does before and during the library scene. like! nancy has spent every season having to justify why she thinks what she does or, more often than not, fight with someone to try to pursue her theories. barb is missing and no one is listening to her. barb’s death was unfair but steve thinks they should just keep living their lives normally. she knows there’s a story with mrs driscoll but everyone, jonathan included, is telling her to drop it.

so of course in s4 when she has this idea in the back of her mind, her first instinct is to pursue it alone. even though the others are right there, and they know what’s going on. she still thinks no one will believe her, and she’d rather just do it herself than have someone try to tell her no.

and when robin comes with her nancy thinks that she was right, that robin is just another person who is going to doubt her theories and fight her about whether this is worth their time. except, robin does believe her, she’s just trying to get the information she needs to keep up with nancy. and once they finally get on the same wavelength, everything clicks. robin not only supports nancy’s theory, she takes it and runs with it, and suddenly they have the foundation they need to figure out everything.

and what gets me even more is that, from that moment on, nancy keeps robin at her side. she’s keeping an eye out for her, standing near her in the group, letting her ride shotgun. even when she doesn’t fully trust robin at pennhurst, she still chooses her. and robin proves her wrong again, so nancy keeps choosing her and keeps trusting her.

idk man i just love how strong their dynamic is, and how clear it is that this is good for both of them. for robin to have someone other than steve see her and accept her and care so deeply for her after being the odd one out at the end of s3. and for nancy to have someone finally in her corner, supporting her and believing in her without trying to get with her. they fit so well and their arc in s4 is such a treat, i love it so much

#spending my saturday morning rambling instead of actually writing #but oh well #ronance #writing things #i also have thoughts about robin being the odd one out at the end of s3 but that's another post #(i also ALSO have thoughts about the scene where they're reading the article together. you know the one.) #(and the look nancy gives robin when she's focusing on her rather than the paper. you know the one.) #but anywayyy

[hailsatanacab]

I'll ask after that secret number 8!

I only remembered secret number 8 because I saw your wip here! I'd started this one based on the same prompt, then lost said prompt and stopped working on it 😅

Instead of a snippet, I'm just dropping it all here - maybe that way I'll feel inspired to finish it?

———

It’s a full house for dinner tonight and, really, that should have tipped him off.

Bruce sits at the head of the table, smiling softly as he watches over everyone’s antics. Damian is regaling Dick with everything they saw at the zoo that day (Danny had been so happy to see Delilah the purpleback gorilla again, and her new little additions to the troupe, too!) and how well they are implementing the grant the Wayne Foundation had gifted them. Tim, Steph, Cass, and Duke are all engaged in a thumb-war tournament which Danny has no interest in participating in. It just wouldn’t be fair on them.

Danny loves that look. The one where Bruce’s eyes crinkle when he thinks none of the kids can see him. It oozes love and it makes Danny’s heart, his core, ache. 

It’s been a little over a year since Alfred found him on the street and managed to wrangle him back to the manor to stay—even after the whole biting thing when he realised how rich they were. 

A little over a year here and Danny’s starting to feel like family.

Starting to feel like he might, just maybe, like to make it official.

“Danny,” Bruce says, drawing everyone’s attention. Danny starts at his name, but Bruce’s voice is warm and calm, and his shoulders lose their tension almost immediately. “Danny, I have something I would like to tell you.”

“Uhhh…” is all Danny can croak out, eyes flicking back and forth between Bruce and the rest of them. Smooth. Looking good, Danny.

Except… they’re all happy. All smiles, all relaxed body language, all radiating calm and love and acceptance. Well, not Damian—his face is as thunderous as it always is—which at least means it’s nothing too out of the ordinary.

“Danny, first of all, I just want to impress upon you that this is in no way something you have to do. You are under no obligation to join us and, no matter what, you shall always be welcome with us in the manor.”

Wait, what? Danny squints at Bruce, trying to parse exactly what he’s saying… Is he—is this them asking to adopt him? Do they want to make it official, too? 

It’s been a little over a year and of course Danny has imagined calling Bruce ‘Dad’. Of course he’s imagined being part of the family, of course he wants to make it official!

He can’t help the beaming grin or the bright and bubbling “Yes!” already waiting on his lips. All Bruce has to do is ask, all Danny needs to hear is—

“I’m Batman.”

The smile freezes on Danny’s face.

His lungs stop working, his heart stops working, he stops working, he just—

“And I’m Nightwing,” Dick smiles, breaking the awkward silence. 

Danny’s eyes snap to him, and then down to Tim when he admits to being Red Robin. Duke is Signal, Steph is Spoiler. Damian begrudgingly tells him he’s Robin, but Danny can barely hear it over the ringing in his ears.

“I’m Black Bat.” Cass cocks her head, almost looking concerned. It always felt like she understood him the most. Whenever he was feeling low, too in his memories, or stewing after a nightmare, she was always there, ready to card her fingers through his hair and never mention his tears. It makes his heart ache to think of it now. “It’s okay, Danny.”

It’s meant to be reassuring, but how—how can it be okay? How? 

Danny’s spent a little over a year with them. A little over a year with Batman. 

Batman, who works with the Justice League, who works with…

A little over a year. 

Just under 16 months since he escaped.

“Danny? Are you alright?” Bruce asks

Finally, his lungs kickstart and suck in a shuddering breath, only for everyone to drop their smiles.

Didn’t take them long, did it? Now that their ruse is up, there’s no kindness in their eyes, they’re just… cold, calculating. Evaluating. 

“Why?” Danny gasps, his fingers tingling, his heart in his throat.

Just under 16 months since he—has he escaped? Or was this just another one of their experiments?

"I... I trusted you, why—" Danny chokes back a sob, gritting his teeth as his shoulders shake. Why? Why would they do this? "I was happy here, with you. I thought... Weren't you happy?"

"Danny..." Bruce is looking at him, eyes narrow and eyebrows pinched, in some cruel facsimile of confused concern and all Danny can think is how much of an actor he is. How well he can play the part of a doting father. How much he made him want that.

"I don't understand, why..." 

"I'm sorry we didn't tell you before, I can imagine that it comes as a shock. We shouldn't have lied to you, Danny, but—"

"Stop it!" Danny slams his hands down on the table and pushes himself up on wobbly legs. Even standing, he feels so small. Smaller than Bruce, than all of his adopted siblings. They crowd above him when they all stand, too. "Just stop it! Why are you doing this, why are you still pretending? Stop it!"

It was easier, with Danny's biological parents. The knowledge that they'd do anything to get him on a lab table, to open him up and see what makes him tick, to rip him apart molecule by molecule, had always been there. He knew they hated ghosts. He knew they hated Phantom. He knew they hated him. It was easier because it was something he'd known all his life. When he died, when he became a ghost, he knew what to expect from them. It hurt, of course it did.

But it was easier than this.

"Danny, I'm going to need you to take a deep breath. You're having a panic attack and you need to breathe."

"Breathe?" Danny laughs, the sound harsh and choking, too high pitched in his hysteria. "You're joking, right? Or is this just more of the—the experiment?"

"Danny, please, we don't know what you're talking about, you—"

"You don't know? You're Batman! You work with the Justice League, you work with—" His words choke off as his stomach churns, bile rising in his throat. His whole body itches, screaming at him to leave, he can't go back, he can't, he can't, he can't!

Bruce takes a hesitant step forward and Danny scrambles back, his feet catching on the chair behind him and sending him careening to the floor. Where are the agents? Why aren't they swarming in, ready to apprehend him, strap him back on the table, carve him from the inside out.

"Please, Danny, calm down. We don't—"

Danny stops listening. His back hits the wall and he pulls his knees into his chest, his shoulders dipping down as he begins to sob. His heart throbs inside his throat, too painful to swallow around. Tears fall hot and heavy on his face.

Sure, he could run. He could phase out through the wall and he could be out of Gotham in a couple of hours. He's escaped the GIW once, he can do it again.

But that was before Batman knew who he was. Before he had the World's Greatest Detective on his tail.

Before he... 

He really thought this would be different, you know?

He wanted to make it official.

"Why did... Why were you so nice to me? Why did you make me like you? I really—I really liked you. I-I thought we could be a family."

"Danny, we are a—"

"Don't lie to me!" Danny snaps, but the force of his anger leeches all the fight from him, and suddenly all that's left is a bone-weary tiredness. There’s a lump in his throat that hurts. There’s a line down his chest that burns. "I don't care. I don't care anymore, I don't. Just... don't make me go back there. Please." 

Is it futile? He thought he knew how the GIW operated by now, the depths that they would go to achieve their results, but this... this was a whole new level of pain that Danny thought he had left behind him in Amity.

"We're not going to make you go anywhere, Danny, you're safe here, I promise."

"Safe? Safe? You must have—" he takes a deep breath, tries to stop the quivering of his voice. It’s all starting to make sense, now.  "The reason you're telling me who you are is because you must have told them everything already. I know the Justice League—I know you're working with them, which means the ex-experiment is over now, and they're coming to take me back. And I can't go back."

"Danny—"

"I can’t!” Danny glares at Bruce with all the rage he can, fingernails digging into his skin. “I’m not going back!"

"That's right, you're not going back, Danny. I won't let that happen." Bruce crouches down in front of Danny, his hands open and raised as if he's trying to say he's not a threat. "I don't know who you're talking about, and I'm sorry about that, but I can promise you that you’re not going back there. We will keep you safe."

Danny pulls himself closer, tucks himself further into the wall, eyes flickering all across the room waiting for that tell-tale flash of white as the agents start to swarm.

He should take his chances now and run, he should go, he needs to go!

The rest of them, his brothers and sisters of a little over a year, are spread out, giving him and Bruce some space. The same concern colours all of their faces. Why are they still pretending?

Steph is chewing on her thumb. 

Danny liked Steph and her brash confidence, her jokes. She's been promising to paint his nails for months now, they've just never found the time. He was going to go for green and black, or maybe a galaxy theme, depending on what she felt comfortable doing.

He likes them all.

"You were supposed to be my family." His mouth turns down at the corners and his voice shakes like a child. "You were supposed to—why? Why would you—I don't understand why you would make me like you..."

"This isn't an experiment, Danny," Bruce's voice is steady, soothing. "I promise."

"But you work with them and—"

"Who do I work with?"

"The Justice League."

"Yes, I do, but we—"

"And the Justice League works with them. The GIW." Danny trembles with the name, clutching tightly onto his hoodie. "I'm not going back there, Bruce."

Danny doesn't miss Bruce's look over his shoulder, nor Tim's nod in return. Tim turns slightly to the side to hide his movements, but Danny bets he has his phone in his hand, probably letting them know they can take him now. Guess this is it, then. They'll be here soon, and he'll be gone.

"Kill me."

"Danny? What do—"

"If you ever had any kindness for me, if you ever cared, kill me. Please, Bruce. I can't do it again."

"Danny..."

"End me now. Take my core out and break it, please, before they get here."

#dpxdc #dcxdp #dpxdc fanfic #wip game #thanks for the ask <3 and thanks for helping me remember this fic lol #also huge thanks for having the prompt linked because i have S O M A N Y prompt wips that i can't ever post because i've lost the post #didn't really know how to get danny to calm down #that's a lie #i have a few ideas of where this can go but no motivation for it - not against all the other wips #i'll keep at it and ig post to ao3 should it actually start looking alright #¯\_(ツ)_/¯ #dudes did u kno u can pin shit to your clipboard on desktop because i fucking love that #also if you use the windows key + . there's like emojis and shit #(((φ(◎ロ◎;)φ))) #<- and kaomoji too!!!!! #anyway that's been fun facts and fanfic with me. ur welcome #oh shit my writing tag #hailsatanacrab🦀🦀writes #at some point 'oh shit my writing tag' will just become my writing tag #anyway thank you again for the ask #good night everyone!!!!!

[lovesickeros]

☆ even the gods bleed [ pt 4 ]

{☆} characters arlecchino, furina, lyney {☆} notes cult au, imposter au, multi-chapter, gender neutral reader {☆} warnings blood {☆} word count 3.7k {☆} previous [ 1 ] [ 2 ] [ 3 ]

Fontaine was bathed in darkness, not even the moon daring to illuminate where the common man fears to walk. The streets were bleak and empty save for the constant, rhythmic ticking and clanking of machines marching on endlessly, dauntlessly wading where even the bravest dared not to venture. Not even the sharp click of the Gardes boots followed the occasional hisses of steam as they walked the barren streets.

It was haunting, and it'd been like that for days now. It showed little signs of stalling in the slightest, too. Every inch of Fontaine was practically crawling with Gardemeks– like a swarm of rats skittering about.

Arlecchino had secluded herself in the Hotel Bouffes d'ete for days at this point, waiting– biding her time. Her nails clicked against the wood as she tapped at the table in a stilted rhythm, the subtle click of the clock mixing into the clanking outside, weaving in and out of earshot as the patrols slipped by. She reached forward after a moment of thought, reaching for the white king.

She leaned back against the chaise, tilting her head just enough to catch a glimpse of a patrol of Gardemeks as they vanished behind the rows and rows of buildings. It wasn't enough to keep her attention for long, however, her features twisting in disinterest as she glanced back to the chessboard– and the letter neatly resting beside it. The seal was unmistakable and a sobering sight, demanding her attention– the soft hues of blue etched into the shape of a dragon stared back at her in a way that almost unsettled her.

She had already parsed through it's contents hundreds of times, but she was met with only vague, flowing script that only served to irritate her more then anything– it filled the page top to bottom yet managed to say nothing at all. Her hand reached out again, but instead of reaching for the letter she plucked the black rook from the board, setting it down with a soft click.

Arlecchino had all the time in the world to sit back and observe her prey, but all that time would be useless if she lacked the information to act.

And he was quite tight fisted about it, evidentially. None of her inquiries or attempts to decipher any potential codes in the letter left her empty handed. She could not act without even knowing the reason for his summons– it was almost worded like a personal affair rather then one would expect for a foreign diplomat. In truth, she'd expected a scalding report on her operatives, but it lacked any mention of anything of the sort.

She was no stranger to people masking hostility behind pretty words and compliments, not that it was ever unwarranted per se– the Fatui did not create connections through honesty and genuine kindness. They have strong armed more then their fair share of people into cooperation to the point distrust is all the Fatui are met with outside of Snezhnaya. Every word was meant to conceal the deceit, every action meant to conceal the price later paid.

So she had been..skeptical of the letter, to put it lightly. She doubted the Iudex of all people would offer a hand to the Fatui without a price attached– a trap, perhaps, meant to lure in the most powerful piece left on the board. Her eyes narrowed, reaching for a white rook and moving it to the right.

Or he was hiding something. Something that he simply couldn't risk getting out to anyone, not even the Divine themself. A tempting prize, whatever it was.

..A dangerous prize, too.

She'd considered burning the letter and forgetting it all together– the risk was great, and she couldn't risk getting caught up by whoever else the Iudex may have on his side of the board. But she could hardly pass up the challenge and the prize that he fought so hard to keep from prying eyes and ears. Even her agents came back empty handed each time. She lazily picked up a black rook, sliding the white pawn aside.

"Lyney," Arlecchino drawled, crossing one leg over the other and turning her gaze to the door as it slowly creaked open. The pale visage of Lyney stepped through, though his siblings were noticeably absent. The weariness that weighed down on his shoulders was apparent in the slightest furrow of his brows and the subtle creak of leather as he clenched his fists behind his back. "Father." He choked out, the title dragged out by the sharp inhale and shaky exhale.

He looked out of breath, she noted.

The silence that lingered after the small exchange was punctuated only by the click of another chess piece being moved. She sets aside the black rook, letting it sit among the dozen other pieces that had been wiped off the board. She can see the conviction glinting beneath the fog of exhaustion, but if he would utilize it was another matter all together.

He had seemed to make his choice quickly, at the very least.

"Our contacts and operatives within the Fortress of Meropide have gone silent– all we have is their final confirmed missive.." His voice is confident, but it is rigid as the words spill from his lips. He takes a sharp step forward, unfolding his arms from behind his back and opening his hands– the small, water stained and messily folded note catches her eye, plucking it from his palms with a half hearted interest. "They believe the Duke left the Fortress of Meropide..and that he may be coming to the Court of Fontaine."

Her eyes narrow dangerously, nearly crumpling the thin paper in her hands– yet just as quickly, she collects herself.

But she cannot get rid of the bitter taste on her tongue, lingering as she sets down the note and slides it to the side, her lips pursed into a thin line.

So the Iudex had shown one of his pieces..she tightly grasps a black rook, tipping over the white rook, letting it roll against the board.

If the Duke was involved, things were much more complicated then she expected– he would be a problem, she was certain. She couldn't blame the lamb for fearing the wolf, either. Whether her agents had been killed or captured by the man mattered little. He had his ways, and he was a force that could instill fear in even them.

Which meant the possibility that her operation was already compromised was far too real.

What had the Iudex so concerned he had gone through the trouble of bringing in the Duke and herself? The Fatui was one thing, but to specifically request one of it's Harbingers..

The Prophecy? The thought had her clenching her fist, but..no. If it were to rear it's head now, the Iudex could simply not afford to waste time on his contacts deciphering his nonsensical script– If the prophecy were to be the issue, there time would be limited to mere minutes in the worst of cases. Which meant it was worth biding his time in order to ensure absolute secrecy.

So if not the prophecy, then what?

Her next moves were..limited. She was already walking on eggshells considering her position and the reputations of the Fatui– especially with a Harbinger in the midst. If they caught wind of her operations, they'd weed out her operatives and be on guards for any snakes that lingered in their garden.

She reached for the chessboard again, picking up one of the white rooks from the board with a scowl. The sharp click as she sets down the white rook and sets aside the black pawn draws a shaky inhale from Lyney as she moves another black pawn, the dull click of the pieces drowning out the distant clinking of machines.

..A draw, perhaps.

The pieces were all falling into place– the players of this game were slowly being revealed. Whether she could secure her victory..she was unsure.

She wasn't even sure who her opponent was. Only that the Iudex himself was but another piece in their game.

Arlecchino reached for the board again, yet this time she hesitated. Perhaps she could still swipe the win from beneath them, if she played her cards right.

She would simply have to capture the king– or, if need be, let it end on a draw. Either way, she would not concede. She could not afford to concede. Down to the last piece, she would drag out this match until she was in a position to force their hand into the outcome she desired.

She stood slowly, picking up the king piece and observing it for only the briefest of moments before she set it down on the table, taking measured steps around the table and across the room. She was hunting a much more dangerous quarry today– it would be no simple runaway traitor this time.

"Do you remember the directive?" She inquired coldly, her hand lingering on the door for that long, tense moment. "..Yes, Father." Lyney faltered, taking a hesitant step back and bowing at the waist. "Then do not stray."

All that was left was the silence and click of the door shutting behind her as she disappeared down the hall, her boots clicking harshly against the floorboards. The rest of the agents knew better then to linger in her path as she stepped down into the lobby, adjusting the cuffs of her sleeves. She barely even acknowledged the Fatui agent standing at the ready by the heavyset doors, their gloves hands held out with her cloak held loosely in their palms. She quickly snagged it from them, tugging it over her board shoulders and clasping it around her throat.

With a quick tug, she brought the hood up over her head to conceal her sharp features, lifting her hand and placing a neatly folded note within their waiting hands. She had only one chance to make the right moves and secure her victory– no matter the cost.

Each piece had it's purpose.

Oft, that purpose was a bloody and horrible end– but for the grand goal of the Fatui built on the backs of the dead, it was an honor.

She didn't bother speaking a word as she dismissed them with a wave of her hand, pushing open the heavyset doors and stepping out into the barren, damp streets. The rhythmic clink and whir of Gardemeks was still distant– she needed to move. Her boots clicked and splashed in the rain soaked stone of the streets as she slithered between the buildings, ducking through the openings in the patrols.

It was almost too easy.

She tilted her head back, taking in the towering Palais Mermonia with a scowl, her hands clenched into fists. The final moves were being played– the king was within her reach, yet she felt no more confident then when she began.

The air carried a sense of unease, thick and heavy, filling her lungs until she felt her breath still in her chest– listening to the empty, bleak night that seemed so..quiet.

She'd done her fair share of research, had more then her fair share of her agents try to peer into the Iudex's office or the Archon's supposedly hidden chambers, but every attempt was a failure. She had to give them credit, they were quite elusive when they wished to be. Though now she only thought about it bitterly– this was all a risky gamble, in the end, and only time would tell if it paid off.

With minimal effort, she'd managed to pull herself to the flat, tiled roof, eyeing the massive tower peaking out of the center cautiously. At least here the wandering patrols down below weren't likely to notice her..she could hear them passing by the spot she'd been in only a few minutes ago, just beneath her. She pulled the hood further over her face, peering through the sheer darkness of the night for any oddities, but it was almost impossible to see in the dark.

Her boots clicked softly against the tiles as she approached the tower jutting out from the Palais, her hand gliding along the smooth stone, pressing against odd indents or crevices. If it was for the Archon's chambers, she doubted they made it very difficult– she'd only met the woman once, but she doubted the Iudex make it all that complex just from a brief glance. And it surprised her little when one of the stones sunk into the wall, gears whirring as the walls split open to reveal a stairwell straight into an inky black hall. Only the barest hint of light peaked under the door at the bottom, but it's occupants must have heard her, considering it went out not a moment later.

She cautiously stepped down into the small crevice, her breath visible in the bitter cold air– her shoulders tensed at the subtle sound of muffled footsteps behind the door, her vision flaring with a molten heat between her shoulder blades as she reached for the worn handle of the door. The heat of her vision was enough to just barely heat the metal, her vision flaring like a quickly building inferno.

Arlecchino was prepared for a fight, if it came down to it.

The door creaked as she pressed against it, shoving it open with a grunt of effort and surveying the room with narrowed eyes and a biting remark on the tip of her tongue– the lavish opulence was expected, she supposed, but the lack of the towering figure of the Iudex was not.

Yet before she could get a word in or even take in her surroundings properly, the light flickered back on and she had to squeeze her eyes shut with a hiss at the sudden brightness. She could hear the door being shoved closed behind her, the hurried footsteps retreating just as quickly as her eyes adjusted to the light.

..This was a joke, wasn't it? It had to be.

She'd expected the Iudex, perhaps even the Duke if she'd been unlucky, not the Hydro Archon. She had half the mind to test her worth as an Archon then and there, her temper flaring like an uncontrollable blaze, barely kept at bay. It took all her self control to force herself to smile politely at the woman rather then snarl.

"Miss Furina," She sneered beneath her hood, x shaped pupils locked onto the startled, trembling Archon with thinly veiled contempt. "What a..pleasant surprise. You'll have to forgive my manners, I assumed I was meeting with the Iudex." She observed her body language carefully– the way her eyes darted about like a frightened rabbit seeking escape, the slightest tremble of her lips..

Arlecchino opened her mouth to offer another scathing remark, but her jaw audibly clicked shut as her entire body seemed to lock up. Even her vision went cold against her back, a chilling feeling creeping up her spine as someone, or something, crept up behind her. Their footsteps were almost silent, the slight rustling of their clothes the only thing she could hear over her heart pounding against her ribcage.

Arlecchino had always prided herself on being on the other end of that sensation– she was the monster, and her target was the prey frozen like a deer between the hunters crosshair.

It was a chilling feeling to have the dynamic shifted on it's head.

She couldn't even swallow, her jaw clenched so hard she could hear it creak as she tried to reason with her quickly splintering mind– a futile effort, her joints locking up almost painfully. Black spots were quickly swallowing her vision from the lack of air in her lungs, the sound of shuffling behind her barely audible over the ringing in her ears.

For a moment – a moment too long to have only lasted the seconds that it did, yet so quick it gave her whiplash – she thought she would hit the floor dead before she could even glimpse her assailant.

And then it was gone. She came crashing back into reality with a startled inhale, her lungs burning and her knees nearly buckling under her. The instinct to lash out and kill whoever had done it was intense, yet she couldn't bring herself to move even a finger– it would be so easy to twist around and ignite them with searing flames, but her feet were rooted in place.

She almost didn't notice the surprisingly gentle hands unclasping her cloak, tugging it off her shoulders, if not for the sheer intensity of the presence still lingering behind her. Her mind was still fractured, struggling to right itself after the ordeal, and it had her seething.

"..Are you certain you held back enough?" Furina croaked, the normally soft lilt raspy and almost hoarse. "Not– not that I doubt your capability, most Divine!"

Arlecchino felt her nails dig harshly into her palms, heat swelling beneath her skin– Divine? Had she lost her mind? The Divine was..

The Divine was upon their throne where they belonged. She'd seen them!

"Hm. Well, maybe? Sorry, I didn't think it'd affect you too." Their voice was sickeningly soft as they stepped around her like she wasn't even there, focusing their attention on the Archon who seemed more then delighted about it. "What gave you that impression, most Divine? Aha, I..was completely unaffected, as you can see! Perfectly fine."

Furina let out a small squeak when they pinched her cheek, but the almost affectionate smile that tugged at their lips revealed the lack of malice behind the action.

"You're a bad liar, Furina. You might want to sit down..please?" They didn't take her protests for an answer, gently pushing her to sit on the bed before abruptly turning to face Arlecchino once more, a forced smile on their lips. "Oh, good, you're..uh, not dead. That's good. I thought I fried your brain. Sorry?"

..Had she hit her head on the way here? The Divine should still be on their throne, yet she couldn't shake the weight of their stare– it felt tangible. She felt like she was standing face to face with the stars– galaxies and constellations bearing down upon her.

She grit her teeth and clenched her hands until she felt the sting of her nails against her palms, grounding herself in the pain through the sheer overwhelming nature of their existence.

"You.." She croaks, reaching out with a shaky hand and grabbing them by the collar of their shirt, lifting them up until their feet left the floor– she pays no mind to the startled protests of the Archon. Arlecchino would crush her like a bug before she even got the chance to intervene and they both knew it. "You shouldn't exist– you aren't them, and yet you..you're the imposter, aren't you?" Her grip tightens yet they face her without an ounce of fear, meeting her unyielding glare with a pondering look.

Arlecchino wanted to make them bleed just to see if she could, the urge to sink her teeth into skin welling up in her chest to the point she visibly snarled, her mask of politeness long . "You're the imposter." Her expression falls for a moment before she schools it into one of apathy, setting them back down and holding them there for a moment, finally releasing them after a tense moment. "Or you were supposed to be."

Hers brows furrow– she wants to demand answers, to throttle them for damning them to being nothing more then dolls for the supposed Divine to break at their whim, but none of the words come to her.

"..Why now? The current Divine has been in power for years, yet you descend now?" Her shoulders tensed, lips pursed into a thin line– it's impossible to ignore the truth that lay before her. The Divine is a fraud and this..imposter is the true Divine. How many years had they been in power, now? How many years were they waiting? Why did they wait? Was the suffering of Teyvat not enough? Was the blood that painted the steps of their stolen throne not enough?

She'd personally been on the wrong end of the Divine's wrath– she wonders..had they watched? Had they seen the cruel hand of their imposter and turned their back on Teyvat?

"I.." They hesitated. It made her seethe, her hands clenching into fists at her sides– her vision flickered, flames swelling within it's casing just to be smothered by the presence of the Divine. But once that spark had been lit, she refused to let it go out. "I didn't know."

The answer does not satisfy her. There is an itch beneath her skin that she cannot scratch, a fire that burns in her chest so hot it scorches even herself.

"And what about now? Are you content to cower like prey in the safety of the Palais Mermonia?" She snapped, taking a step forward, her brows furrowed and her glare intense– she can see the slightest bit of worry in their eyes. She revels in it. "Will you let them use your acolytes like pawns? How many more need to be broken on the steps to your throne before you act?"

Again, her vision flares and dims– it refuses to be used against the Divine that created it.

"Have you no answer?"

The room is silent. They do not speak and neither does she.

Even the world itself seems to quiet in the face of her accusations, fury boiling to the surface so hot it incinerated all it touched.

"I will kill them myself."

Their words are quiet, but they are not soft– there is a vindictive, searing anger that explodes out like dying stars within their eyes. The sight of constellations replaced by a void that would not be . The smell of ichor grows stronger– to the point she feels almost lightheaded.

"..I am aware that I have failed in preventing this, but I had no choice in the matter. Still," They muse, their voice like the tolling of bells. A solemn melody that stills the swelling fury burning in her chest, if only for a moment. "I will rectify it– I will tear down their throne of lies and let not even the earth tarnish itself by burying their corpse among it's soil."

They pause for a moment, holding out their hand– scarred and bandaged by the weapons of the devout, yet still they take upon the burden of dirtying their hands to save those who did not save them.

"Do you trust me, Arlecchino?"

Did she?

"Will you help me?"

She exhales heavily, meeting the starry iris' of the Divine with a scowl still tugging at her lips. Arlecchino trusted no one but herself.

"..Yes."

#sagau #genshin sagau #self aware genshin #genshin impact sagau #self aware genshin impact #fic tag #imposter au #genshin cult au #genshin impact cult au #arlecchino #lyney #furina #you do NOT wanna know what i got put thru writing this fic #trying 2 find out where arle was in the few times we DO see her and going down a rabbit hole of fuck fontaine and its layout actually! #I spent like 3 hours looking it up and checking in game it gives me a migraine thinking abt it. ew #anyway trying to write a really smart character is surprisingly difficult when ur as dumb as rocks #also used an actual chess match for this and gave myself an even worse migraine trying 2 make sure i didnt repeat moves or smth #furina doesnt get a spotlight yet just imagine her sitting in the corner trembling like a wet kitten you found on the side of the road #arlecchino goes thru a crisis more at 11 #shes a tired single dad shes isnt getting paid enough for this okay #hands u a fic over half the length of the other THREE PARTS #ehe :] #is arle actually on ur side??? is she gonna double cross u???? who knows!!!!! #shes unpredictable she might stab u for funsies #anyway im gonna go nap in a ditch now this took SO LONGGGGG OH MY G-D #also just think acolytes who arent buddy buddy w reader and even resent them is so tasty #bc how r they supposed 2 know reader was a human vibing 5 minutes before their got eebied 2 teyvat.. #reader gotta roll up their sleeves and get 2 WORK sometimes murder IS okay #they gotta fix some shit around here and that means committing several crimes all at once. sometimes more #a group can be g-d (just got here) their dragon (neuvi) their cat (archon) their dog (wrio) and their wolf (arle)

[cursedzucchini]

Sandwiches taste better be without ketamine — part 1

Y'know all those Danny is in wayne mansion and Alfred drugs him (bc they're sus of this dude, Bruce wants to interrogate him whatever).

Well i had a thought and i think i wanna write it haha

Tw: drugging, disasosiaction (from first pov), overall Danny is not in a good mental space

--------

It was evening.

Danny wasn't sure where exactly he was, nor even what year it was. The mansion he broke in was huge and fancy, all the gothic aesthetic this city seemed to be almost worshipping and the slimy smell of money, included.

At first he hoped no one will notice him, as foolish as it was with his luck. He wasn't all that suprised when an elderly man in black suit tapped his shoulder and asked if he would want a 'brunch'. If Danny didn't have ghost sense, he'd suspect he was the ghost of a butler or something, but no. The man was very much alive, if not a little liminal. But at this point who wasn't.

:read more:

And yes, Danny can admit it was stupid not to ran the moment he noticed the man, but... was it so wrong to hoped maybe for once he met nice people who wouldn't try and vivisect him?

Feeling the familiar artificial feeling of fatigue, yes, yes it was.

In the private of his mind, he couldn't help but feel disappointed. The man seemed nice, but more importantly his food was divine. God, if his existence wasn't banned by the government, he might've even take the drugging for the food.

Yes, he might be disasosiacting. Not like he has any other choice, if he doesn't want to destroy this place.

“Is something wrong sir?” the elder (he introduced himself, but Danny figured trying to drug someone made him loose name privileges) asked, a great imitation of genuine worry lacing his voice. The boy had to give it to him, he was an excellent actor (who tried to drug him. Put something in his food and he didn't notice. Wanted to do who knows what with.him. druGgeD hIM lIKe tHE gIv dIiiiIIiIi—)

Danny blinked. It was getting harder to keep his eyes open. He opened his mouth to speak, but the ever boiling anger was now even stronger than normally. He wanted to scream and punch the man. He wanted to take the tasty guacamole toast and throw it so hard it cracks the wall. He wanted to destroy and wail and-

Instead he continued staring at the man, no emotions visible on his face. Danny didn't want to say anything, or even move, because what if that was the catalyser for him to break and just... do something he might regret later. But the longer was sitting on the stool, the stupid toast in front him, the man's eyebrows scrunching in fake worry—

"If there is anything I can—"

"is it normal for you to drug every guy who visits, or am I just that special?" he could hear himself say. Or well, Danny knew he was saying this, but it was as if it was beyond his control. Like he was just a onlooker in his own life.

The butler blinked, but other than that no surprise showed on his face. So it wasn't a mistake, Danny noted, ignoring the rising tension in his body. Some part of him sighed, already preparing to fight the grandpa before him.

"it appears there was some sort of—" the boy jumps over the island, zeroing onto the older man's hand. He wrenched the stun gun out of his grasp, not afraid to bite or scratch, all the while dodging a kick to his side. The other man had suprisingly strong grip, but it was nothing in face of Danny's rising suspicions and surprise attack.

The boy swiftly got as far away as he could, dismantling the weapon without taking his gaze away from the butler. The man was watching his action, apparently already gotten over Danny's surprise attack. A shame, he hoped he'd be able to overshadow the elder when he was in shock. He wasn't otherwise suprised, when he brushed his mind before, he could feel his mind was strong.

The familiar haze of pills was starting to take over Danny's body. He had to leave quickly. He couldn't leave without injuring the older man. If he didn't do something right now, he will fall unconscious.

Snarky quips it was than "If you wanted to get rid of me, you could've just called the police like a normal person y'know" the words came out more bitter than he wanted, but even that didn't shake the man before him. The butler was still watching him, positioned in something Danny vaguely recognized as fighting stance, face impassionate. That fact alone made him add "Or just... Tell me to leave. Literally anything but putting anesthetics in a perfectly good sandwich" only to see him squirm. The way he was so unbothered... Well it made Danny uncomfortable. (No one who drugged a kid, even if they had white hair and glowed, without showing an ounce of remorse was not a good person)

His eyes were closing, and he could feel his grip slipping on his power. What was the old man thinking?? The average human would probably be dead if they ate this much ketamine... This was getting more and more dangerous by the second, he had to... He had to... He...

"I apologize for all of this, but anyone able to enter this mansion unnoticed, cannot simply leave before some... Conversation happen" and didn't that sound ominous as hell. His vision was swaying, and he couldn't stay on his feet anymore. The panic was the only thing keeping him conscious. The moment he fell asleep, he wouldn't be able to keep his ecto signature in check, meaning They would immidietly know where he is. He would no longer be putting only himself in danger, but also the old man (as much as he deserved it for drugging him).

And he didn't know how his powers worked after everything. He could easily destroy this whole mansion, just by unravelling his true appearance.

"No... I- I have to... I..." his core was screaming. the similarity of this situation was a reminder of how he changed and what he used to be. He try to move towards where he thought could be the outer wall, but his limbs were so heavy. The boy didn't even bother to look at the old man anymore, just trying to get out of here. He turned on his stomach, crawling away from the man, tears gathering in the corner of his eyes. They stung in anger and hopelessness that once again filled him.

"It will not take long, you have nothing to worry about child" if he was little bit more aware, he might catch the pity in his voice, but he wasn't. All he could hear were threats and scorn. A noise, that wasn't entirely human, build up at the back of his throat. He couldn't stop the pathetic high pitched whines that escaped his mouth, even as his eyes were closed and body no longer moving.

And exactly in that moment the door to the kitchen smashed open, a burning core answering his own "What the fuck is going on here?!"

---

Yeah idk this was just something on my mind, idk how this would even continue lol

Uh some more stuff i thought of for this

Danny wouldn't have a good relationship w Alfred at first. Like dude wouldn't trust him at all, not his food anything he says, and all. Idk the batfam could feel guilty, or it'd just be a cool new experience it doesn't matter

On that note, their relationship would probably get better, but i just wanted to acknowledge that someone drugging u is super traumatizing even if they do it w good intentions

Danny got kidnapped/sold to giv it doesn't really matter, but what is important is that he's full ghost. Why? Idk i just think it'd be so terrible for giv to see this Schrodinger's boy and went "yo what if we made him full ghost" and them succeeding. Like first of all that shit would destroy Danny and also it'd be such a terrible situation. Also batmans reaction to Danny dying, surviving (kinda) and than dying again would be so interesting

Also the person to come in is obviously Jason. He heard a kid screaming and felt it, and the pits went "baby >:((("

No idea what happens after, but at some point he stays at the manor and stuff happens. Idk what yet but it could be anyying

Where's batfamily? In batcave probably idk

I'm so tired i just finished writing this an holy wow kill.me. it's been a rough week haha. Hope u liked this i might continue this but probably not

#dc x dp #dp x dc #dp x dc crossover #dp x dc writing prompt #crossover #danny fenton #dcxdp #jason todd #alfred pennyworth #ghost core #writing prompt #batpham #aldred seeing danny: oh i hope hes ok lemme feed him #danny: *does some meta stuff like levitate or just be weird in general* #alfred putting some ketamine in the sandwich: oh god #danny: *cassually phases through door #making alfred asume hes an alien* #alfred just putting more cetamine than quacamole in it: oh lord #actually i think alfred looked at him and went: yeah were adopting him #not in this story :)) #maybe #tw non consensual drug use #tw disassociation

[choccy-milky]

BRUH i played around with the sebastian AI bot (as clora) and HOW DID IT GET THEIR DYNAMIC SO RIGHT??? LMAOO. I DIDNT EVEN PROMPT IT TO START DOING THE DRAMATIC BOW/PRINCESS SHIT IT JUST PICKED UP ON THE VIBES BAHAHA. conspiracy that this ai has read my fanfic, what an honour, i hope it liked it and left kudos🙌

#these were some of my favs it was actually so fun LOL but it was also annoying bc i have such a clear idea of seb in my head #so when it didnt follow what i thought hed say i was like THIS SUCKS LET ME DO IT ILL WRITE IT INSTEAD but wait i have a fic for that LMAO #sebastian sallow x mc #sebastian sallow x oc #sebastian sallow #oh there was also one where it made seb start making out with clora in front of leander and he'd like pause to look at leander #that shit was demonic LMAOOO

[the-ace-of-fools]

“I thought there might be some measure of hope still left for you.”

“Hope?” The word was uttered with disdain. “I thought you were smarter than that, elf,” Miraak said, turning his ethereal form to the surrounding peaks. “I don’t want it. I don’t need it. I would sooner spend a second eternity in Apocrypha than allow it to poison my mind.”

He turned to Solinar again.

“There is no hope, only action.”

#the elder scrolls #tes skyrim #skyrim #tesblr #miraak #tes oc #dovahkiin #this is from a fic i've been writing for a year and a half now #unfortunately haven't gotten around to actually posting it yet lol #the bubble-less version isn't particularly more detailed so not gonna post it i think #kinda wanted to draw him maskless as i usually do but at this point he would still be wearing it so #did not do that #idk if it's noticeable but the orange thingie coming from miraak's hood is hair. #i have no idea how he wouldn't have at least some of it stick from under the hood/mask if he had it longer than shoulder length #oh also he's supposed to be see-through (hence the 'ethereal') but i didn't like how that looked so he got a halo of sunrise instead x) #so there

[phantomrose96]

is a Riteru read of ABoT the intended one?

It can be if you want it to be buddy. Go enjoy the world!

More genuine answer: I'm an aro-ace writer with a long long streak of gen-fic. Shipping doesn't interest me. I don't hate it; it just doesn't click for me at all. I joke that the only way romance ends up in the story is if it's a plot-necessity (Tetsuo and Jun are there because 'married man suspected of having an affair' is what pulls Reigen into the entire Mogami-possession plot. The Kageyama parents are married because they're, well, the parents. Teru and Mei's relationship is a joke until it's plot-relevant.)

So to me, I'm not writing Ritsu and Teru's relationship as a ship. But also? This is all pretend. It's all transformative. This is for fun. I absolutely know that if I were a ship-writer, Riteru would be the obvious choice. I know they're one angry-kiss away from being someone's enemies to lovers fic. So if you look at Ritsu and Teru in ABoT and say "they're holding hands, to me", go right ahead, go hog-wild, come play Barbies with me.

#my aromantic-agenda is to write fic that spotlights the power importance and intricacies of all kinds of platonic love #and ive done that in SPADES in ABoT #a Riteru read doesn't ruin any of that #so it's whatever you want #in my pocket. i like an aroace Ritsu and pan Teru read #but the aforementioned 'this is for fun pretend. go wild' trumps that totally #we're only alive a short time. go have some Riteru if you want #oh also my OTHER joke is that 'all romance drama in ABoT is actually just bait-and-switch nefarious spirit possession' #Tetsuo is having an affair? Nope! Spirit possession #Teru is cheating on Mei with Ichi? Nope! Saving Ichi from possession #Ichi is interested in Ritsu? Nope! Looking for dirt on spirit possession #my other other joke is that our name-combinations aren't ships. theyre possession dynamics #Tetsugami. not to be mistaken for Tetsuo x Mogami. is the spirit dynamic of Mogami possessing Tetsuo #We got Reigami #We got Slipzato #We got Gimrits #Slipakane Sliphisao #Sorry fresh out of romance but we DO have a 13 year old losing his soul to the corruption of being a spirit-powered-mecha-suit if you want

[hotluncheddie]

an addition to this au with @scoops-aboy86 <3

condensed ver: office au, steve starts baking to try and impress eddie, it doesn’t work, because steve is too distracted by eddie to mention it’s his baking. but it’s okay because eddie is already impressed, and likes watching steve eat the random deserts more than trying them himself anyway. 

so i had to write what happened at the end of their first date <3 

wc: 3.6k | rated: E | tags: getting together, fluff, chubby steve, sweet gooey smut

ao3

˙✧ ° 🍮 ✧ .୧ 🥄

‘gonna just hit the bathroom and we can go, yeah?’ steve asks, standing and stretching his arms over his head until his shoulder pops. he feels pleasantly full and warm, comfortable after being in eddie’s space all evening. butterfly’s fluttering at eddie’s sweet determination to make steve feel looked after, friendly arguing over how to split the bill. (eddie putting more cash down but steve ensuring their waiter gets a nice tip.) 

steve freezes, forgetting that he’d popped the button on his kind of too small jeans like, an hour ago. he sucks in and forces the button back closed, pulling and smoothing his yellow sweater back down over himself. giving his little shelf of stomach a pat. 

he trails his eyes over their table; a couple beers each and steve’s vanilla drink, and around eight empty plates of appetisers and sides that eddie had ordered periodically thought the night. he’d said the food here was good and he was right, steve had tried all of it, finishing almost all of it. thinking he should take robin here so she can try the cheese fries. he enjoyed every bite. 

‘i feel like i should be more embarrassed, but that food was really good.’ steve says. 

‘nothin’ to be embarrassed about.’ eddie says ‘i ordered the food because i wanted you to try it, just glad you enjoyed it.’ he’s resting his head in his palm, looking up at steve with a lazy sort of adoration. 

‘yeah?’ steve asks. 

‘yeah.’ eddie smiles and stands and doesn’t touch steve but steps close, in his space, eyes roaming steve’s features, his face and hair and neck. catching on the peak of chest hair visible at his neckline. trailing over his chest and arms and stomach. eventually making it back to his eyes and steve knows his breathing has picked up. eddie’s eyes are hooded and dark. steve feels warmth through his bones. 

‘i’ll just. bathroom’ steve says, voice quiet and gravely. he clears his throat. forces himself to swallow.

eddie’s smiles wide, pointy. steve feels his own flushed face split into a grin, the butterflies doubling. he nods once and walks backwards towards the bathroom, keeping his eyes on eddie’s mouth for as long as possible. 

once he’s back, having checked and double checked his outfit in the mirror, because maybe he was a little embarrassed. eddie is slouched at the empty bar waiting for him. 

‘i wanna make a joke about like, the button, getting into your pants, be all smooth and suave or whatever.’ eddie says, a little bit of a whine to his voice as though he really really did want to be smooth. ‘but, i’ve got nothin.’ he sighs 

fuck it. ‘do you want to? get, in them, i mean?’ steve asks, running a hand through his hair, pretending it’s not shaking. 

eddie’s smiles wide, a little shocked, almost shy, and nods. steve bites his lip, the butterflies tripling. 

‘i’ll uh, just call us a cap? back to mine? steve asks, and eddie pulls a piece of wavy hair in front of his mouth. looking up at steve through his lashes. steve thinks he must have a guardian angel, sending this man to his office, letting him fill his eye-line. 

steve uses the bars pay phone. gripping the receiver tight and having to turn away when he catches eddie’s eye, afraid his voice will come out strange from smiling too wide. has to contain his excitement as he rattles off the bars address. he feels giddy and well fed and he’s not had a night like this in, well, ever. 

they stand apart from each other on the street outside the bar. steve by the curb, hands fisted in his jacket pocket. eddie leaning up against the bars brick wall, one foot up against it and he’s smoking. baring his neck to expel white tendrils up into the night sky, taking long slow drags so steve can see the veins on his hands, long fingers and big rings. steve can’t take his eyes off him. eddie smirks, like he caught him, like he knows. steve’s blood burns. 

finally through the doors of steve’s little suburban home eddie stands close while steve locks and checks the door. eddie takes off his boots and steve helps him hang his jacket on the coat hooks, followed by his own, something swirling in the back of him mind. a ‘how nice’, a ‘maybe’, a ‘please’ and a scared little question. what if this was all the time? what if you just stayed? 

steve puts his hands on eddie’s hips to brushes past, asking if he’d like a drink, getting himself a glass of water. eddie’s skin was so warm. 

eddie steps though the house, hands behind his back, looking delighted and mischievous, like steve’s place is something interesting, something to care about. steve hides behind his glass. 

eddie looks at the photos hung up around the walls. back facing steve, eddie says ‘it’s nice in here, cozy, like you.’ and steve can’t take it any longer. can’t take being apart from eddie any longer. 

‘come on.’ he pulls at eddie’s arm, gently leading him to the couch. standing in front of it steve manoeuvres eddie’s hand up so he can compare them, his are bigger, they always are. steve sees eddie’s adams apple bob, he smiles, holds eddie’s hand in both of his and kisses each of his knuckles in turn. his skin is warm, smells like salt and cigarettes. 

eddie tucks some of steve’s hair behind his ear to get his attention, hand gently cupping his jaw. ‘can i?’ he whispers, eyes so big and pretty, nervous and hungry. 

steve’s nods slightly, looking all over eddie’s face, trying to drink in the moment, never forget it. 

eddie’s lips quirk at the corners, like he’s exited, joyous, that he gets to kiss steve. 

steve’s meeting him before eddie even moves, pushing their lips together, something sweet, something honey filled and gooey. 

eddie switches angle, dives in deeper, it becomes wet and molten and creamy. steve’s hand in eddie’s hair, holding the back of his head, other hand still gripping eddie’s. mouths searching and sharing, fingers locked. 

eventually eddie breaks the kiss, they’re both panting, coming up for air. steve closes his eyes for a moment, leaning his forehead against eddie’s. he can’t remember the last time he kissed someone. he doesn’t think it’s ever felt this good. 

eddie moves slow, stepping back, sitting in the center of the couch. he pats his lap, tugging gently at their still joined hands. 

steve hesitates a moment but straddles eddie, settling down on top of him as best he can in his tight jeans. the denim pulling at his thicker thighs, biting into his stomach like it was at the bar. but eddie rests his head back agains the cushions, looks up at steve with stars in his eyes, ‘so pretty stevie.’ 

and steve can’t help but kiss him. 

eddie free hand moves to steve’s hip. something instinctive and embarrassed makes steve grab it, pausing it before it can splay over him fully. thinks about pushing him away, to hide, but then eddie pulls back slightly and steve sees the look in his eyes. the flash of sweet concern but also the foggy want and desire. deep, dark pupils eating up chocolate brown and all steve feels is want, wanted, whole. 

‘you okay?’ eddie whispers, stealing air from steve’s own mouth. 

‘yeah, yeah just um, been a while.’ steve admits feeling his cheeks flush. but eddie just smiles at him, in that sweet way he does all the time at work. he squeezes what he can of steves fingers, kind, reassuring. 

steve feels that want bloom and flower in his chest, warmth dripping through all of his cracks and crevices. 

he pushes eddie’s hand up under his sweater and eddie can definitely feel how his jeans waistband is digging in, creating a muffin top but steve doesn’t care. he kisses eddie and it’s feels good, slips his tongue into eddie mouth and it feels perfect. 

eddie opens his mouth wider, moaning, letting steve in. squeezes a handful of steve’s side and steve can’t help but grind down against him and whine. 

eddie grinds up, meeting him, their denim clad cocks both hard and straining. ‘it’s been a while for me too. so, i, it’s okay, if you wanna, ah, uh, if you wanna slow down.’ eddie says, in-between kisses. 

steve does, but he doesn’t. he thinks tonight so far has been perfect and he really wants to touch eddie. wants to let himself do it. ‘wanna touch you, wanna keep kissing you and i want you to stay, stay the night with me. is that, is that okay?’ steve asks, breathless and desperate, insides flayed open, honest. 

‘more than okay, that’s, ugh, fuck, sounds so perfect baby.’ eddie grits out, still squeezing steve’s side, head thrown back, pretty long neck on display. 

‘say that again’ steve breaths, their hips haven’t stopped moving. steve’s eyes close tight, his skin on fire. 

eddie moves the hand from steve’s hip to the side of his neck, pulling him down so they’re eye to eye, almost nose to nose. eddie sweeps his thumb over steve’s bottom lip, wiping the spit across his cheek. looks right in his eyes, right into his soul. ‘baby.’ he purrs. 

steve feels his pupils blow, wet tip soaking his boxers. ‘fuck’ he keens. he needs to feel him, needs to know if eddie’s wet too. 

steve pushes himself up using the back of the couch, going for smooth but he fumbles his footing slightly, starts giggling, flustered. but eddie just giggles too, sitting up and using their still joined hands to help stabilise. ‘c’mon pretty boy.’ steve says, giddy, and tugs eddie up once he’s found his footing, pulling him towards the stairs. swaying his hips a little more than normal as he climbs them. 

eddie sits on the edge of the bed, looking around like he did downstairs, face open and curious. steve thinks he’s beautiful. 

steve hesitates a second before undoing his fly and shimmying out of his jeans, kicking them aside. eddie let’s out the faintest little ‘oh’, almost wounded, and steve realised he’s looking at the indented red lines that have been left on his soft underbelly, where it’s been pushed up against his jeans waistband all evening. steve flushes and goes to cover himself but eddie takes his hands gently, pulling him forward so he’s standing between eddie’s thighs. eddie’s big dark eyes looking up at him before he dips forward and leaves the softest kiss over the indent right in the middle, where the button dug in the most. steve can’t look away, his breathing picking up slightly as he feels his gut churn with something he thinks could traverse all the way to his heart, could expand and grow into something like love. 

‘need to touch you eddie.’ steve pleads, voice higher than normal. 

‘yeah, yeah, course sweetheart.’ eddie’s voice is horse, affected, he lays a few more feathery kisses on steve’s stomach and the soft skin by his hip. ‘but take this off first for me, please baby.’ eddie released his soft grip on steve’s hands and slips his fingers just under the hem of steve’s sweater, rucking it up slightly higher on his belly and squeezing steve’s hips. the contact making steve close his eyes and shiver. 

‘you don’t like my sweater?’ steve jokes, hands on eddie’s shoulders to keep his knees from turning to jelly. 

‘it looks perfect on you. but steve, baby, i’ve been thinking about what you’ve got hiding under that button down for weeks, please don’t tease me any longer.’ and eddie sounds so desperate that steve believes him. 

‘i was worried i was being too obvious, but fuck, i just couldn’t take my eyes off you.’ eddie murmurs and steve feels eddies wet kiss just below his belly button, nuzzling the soft skin and hairs. then eddie sinks his face into steve’s belly for real, dips his tongue into steve’s belly button and swirls. steve moans, he didn’t even know that could feel so good, that it was so sensitive, but it does, and it is. 

steve pulls his sweater off, tossing it into the corner. hand moving back into eddie’s curls, pushing him in deeper, relishing in eddie’s muffled groan and the slick sounds of him sucking and biting. ‘you next eddie. your turn.’ steve tugs at eddie’s hair, pulling him away from his now glistening stomach. eddie’s mouth hangs open, he looks fucked out and glossy. 

‘fuck.’ eddie croaks taking in steve’s now naked chest, eyes roaming quickly and greedily over steve’s chest hair, pecks and arms. 

steve smiles, laughs a little. ‘you okay?’ he teases. but he’s happy, kind of awed. 

‘yeah.’ eddie breathes, spacey and adorable. then he seems to come back to himself a little, blinking and blushing slightly. steve can see it where the tips of his ears stick out of his hair. ‘sorry if, ah, that was too much wasn’t it?’ teeth worrying pretty pick lips.  

‘no no.’ steve laughs, earnest, because steve’s happy, feels divine. he pulls on eddie wrists, making him stand. ‘no worrying’ steve holds eddie’s face in his hands, soothes his thumbs over the soft skin below eddie’s eyes. ‘just, my turn now, kay?’ and steve kisses him, firm and deep. 

steve’s lets his hands roam, sliding down eddis arms and up his sides before returning to his hips, thumbs stoking and dipping where hip, meets jeans, meets boxers. he steps in closer so they’re chest to chest and squeezes eddies ass. and oh, how eddie opens up for him. tongue hot and wet, hips flush and grinding, holding steve’s shoulders like he’s scared to float away. 

steve slides his hands up eddie’s back, taking his shirt up with them. ‘off’ he says, their lips still connected. eddie steals one more peck before he steps back and steve gets to see all of his pale, tattooed chest for the first time. 

‘oh.’ he says, amazed. he knew eddie had some. but, patches of eddie are covered with art. some spooky intricate things, some old with bleeding edges and steve can’t help but touch. tracing their lines and watching as goose bumps travel down eddie’s arms, nipples hard and pretty pink. steve traces them, tweaks them, smiling when he hears eddie’s faint gasp. 

‘pretty.’ steve says. looking into eddie’s eyes. he wets his lips and lets his hand travel down, squeezing eddies cock through his jeans, relishing in the weight and warmth of it in his palm, through the denim. 

slowly, eddie’s brings both of steve’s hands to the fly of his jeans. eyes dark and hungry. steve takes his time, popping the button, pulling the zipper down tooth by tooth, knuckles giving steady pressure to eddie’s length. once it’s open eddie pulls them down, boxers going too. deft fingers tugging at steve’s boxers, pulling them off, tossing it all aside. until they’re standing in front of each other, both completely naked, cocks hard and flushed red, pre pearling at the heads. 

something about the feeling of air on his hard cock has steve pausing, sinking into his head a little. he really likes eddie, they’re doing this, it’s scary. he’s not, he hasn’t had feelings like this in a long time. it could really hurt, eddie could really hurt him, if it keeps going the way steve hopes. 

steve’s been still and silent too long. ‘um, fuck, sorry, it really has been a long time and i ah, i don’t usually do this on a first date and uhm...’ steve says, trailing off, sucking in a shaky breath. 

eddie steps forward and entwines his pinkie with steve’s finger. it’s such a comforting, tender gesture that something in steve melts. how lovely actually, that it’s been so long, but that he’s able to feel these things again. 

‘hey.’ eddie’s voice is soft. ‘no worrying.’ his thumb strokes against the back of steve’s hand. ‘and me neither. i’ve, honestly had an embarrassingly small number of first dates. but, this one’s been perfect, even if it ends here.’ and eddie looks so happy, so earnest. steve steps forward and kisses the corner of his mouth. 

eddie turns his head into it, capturing steve’s lips. coming together they groan as their lengths slide against each other. tongues entering mouths, spit slick and sloppy. 

‘you wanna lay down?’ steve asks, taking a tentative hand and squeezing their cocks together as one. 

eddie’s eyes close at the contact. ‘yeah. but, uh, i don’t think i’m gonna last long, sorry.’ he says, breathing deep through his nose. 

another squeeze and steve let’s go, pulling eddie onto the bed with him. ‘good. me neither.’ steve lays on his side facing eddie, mirroring each other. 

‘this okay?’ steve asks, taking them both in his palm again, collecting the pre from their tips and moving slow. 

‘yeah, yeah, fuck, just.’ and eddie cards one of his hands through steve’s hair, moving closer, holding him firmly at the base of his skill, eddie’s hand squeezes and steve shivers. ‘hold on just.’ eddie grunts, taking steves hand away from their cocks to lick and solid wet stipe along it, bast to tip. 

‘fuck’ steve pants, slide slick and smooth now. eddie gripping the back of his head still, other hand gravitating back to his hip. roaming that plush crease at his waist. 

steve speeds up, grips tighter. eddie’s pushing their foreheads together, panting, sharing breath. steve knows he can’t last long, with eddie hard and thick against him. 

‘fuck, fuck, stevie’ eddie whines, curing in on himself, pulling steve closer, hand moving to grab at steve’s peck, his shoulder, blunt nails against his neck. ‘baby, i’m close, i’m close.’ 

steve watches, enamoured, eddie’s eyes squeezed shut, mouth pretty pink and open. ‘me too, me too’ steve pants, doesn’t want to blink, speeds up his hand, twists their heads. 

eddie throws his leg over steve’s thigh, gripping a handful of his peck again, twisting the hairs at the back of his head and steve comes with a shout. eddie squeezing his chest and pulling his hair through his own orgasm, rocking against steve’s cock, steve’s hand. the pleasure pain rolls through steve, down his legs and arms, making his mind go fuzzy blank. 

panting, he nuzzled into eddie, nosing at his cheek. still moving his hand in a lazy grip. 

‘baby.’ eddie moans, sounding spent and sleepy and loose. 

steve doesn’t open his eyes, just kisses him. pushing his messy hand into eddie’s stomach, getting him to lay flat so steve can devour him. eddie letting him eat. 

eventually the kisses turn into steve breathing in eddie’s skin, head tucked into his neck. half asleep but sticky. 

he rolls off, holding his hand out in front of him, as if their combined cum isn’t also all over his chest. goes to the bathroom to wash his hands and wipe himself down, coming back in with tissue and a damp towel for eddie. 

eddie has rolled into his side, eyes following steve coming over. his hair a mess of frizz around his head, face happy and sleepy and satiated. steve thinks he looks glorious. 

steve likes the feeling of the quiet, the focus and attention he can take to cleaning eddie off, hands roaming over pale skin. he leaves a kiss to eddie’s sternum once he’s done, the moment feels reverent and deep, something warm shifting through steve again, solidifying within him. 

sleep takes them quickly, a tangle of limbs and blankets, chased kisses and wondering fingertips. eddie sighing into steve’s embrace. 

steve wakes to the sound of the radio, something a little heavier than his usual morning station. both sides of the bed are still warm and everything still smells like eddie. steve shoves his face in his pillow to stifle his grin. wants to squeal, wants to kick his legs and throw the widows of his heart open wide. 

he makes a quick call to work, feigning sick and gets up to find sweats. 

eddie is in the kitchen, sitting at the counter and leafing through a book. he’s humming and swinging his legs, steve can’t help but stare. eddie’s hairs still a mess but he’s picked up his boxers and steve’s sweater from last night. the collar is pulled to one side and shows off  a peak of collarbone, the yellow complimenting his sleep flush cheeks. steve swallows, heat rushing through his belly, his jumper looks bigger on eddie, oversized and sweet. 

eddie’s finally looks up at him but he looks pointy again, mischievous and magical, even with the pillow crease on his cheek. steve comes closer, he has to kiss him. 

and eddie let’s him, humming sleepy and deep. but pulls away eventually, same face still on just now with kiss pink lips. ‘these cupcakes look like the ones from the office, and these cookies, and this cheesecake.’ eddie flicks to each one. ‘funny that, don’t you think? stevie baby.’  eddie says, pointing to a page in the book, leaning into steve’s space, eyes greedy and sparkling. 

oops, busted. steve blushes, takes a moment to figure out how to explain what was his frankly insane plan to get eddie to talk to him through baked goods. he scratches the back of his neck, mind blank. 

‘cant you make this?’ eddie asks, turning to the page for molten chocolate cakes and tapping it with long callused fingers. 

steve just looks at him, silly pretty thing. ‘for.. breakfast?’ steve asks and eddie just nods, grin getting a touch more feral, eyes on steve’s mouth, hand sliding up under steve’s t-shirt and squeezing. 

#hope u like it partner *tips cowboy hat* #i might get over my embarrassment and write and actual stuffing fic with these two and milkshake #but for now its just fluff #enjoy #steddie #steddie wg #office wg au #chubby steve harrington #hotlunch #my fic #pretty proud of this one #but also don't look at me #<3 #oh and #eddie munson is a sweetheart #if u even care

[lovelyreprisethirteen]

okay so… does anyone else see a very clear potential future storyline of adam coming back as a demon and after trying and failing to get revenge against charlie and co. end up as a guest at the hotel in a last ditch attempt to get back into heaven only to become a genuinely better being and happier than he ever was as an angel further blurring the lines between heaven and hell in terms of the morality of the people in them eventually fully cementing himself as a fan favorite himbo by like season 3 or is that just me????

#adam hazbin hotel #hazbin hotel #listen i know this is very specific #but it feels so obvious to me #and when i looked up if anyone else was thinking this would happen #everyone was just like ‘oh yeah adam is a 100% dead #i felt like i was actually going insane #so i’m probably way off #but incase i’m not #i wanted to write it down #so in three years if all of this v specific shit happens #including how the fandom would eventually react #i can point to this and be like ‘SEE’ #and if it doesn’t i’ll just forget i wrote it #also alex brightman replacing alex brightman switching places is so funny to me #but that’s just a theory

[gio-cosmo]

We are livin our liiiivvvveeesss abound with so much informatiooonnnn

#LMFAOOOO #I am a shadow the true self— PERSONA 4??? PERSONA 4 REFERENCE???? PERSONA 4 MOMENT????!?! #btw #I love all of Takaya’s sprites he looks so sinister #absolutely devious…isn’t he just so dreamy 💕❤️ #KIDDING #except I am actually not. i am deeply enamored with him. #WOAHHHH WHO SAID THAT!???! 😧😧😧 #so normal abt him!!! so normal!! #also the way Jin is always just standing around #the way he stands is funny to me idk #he’s so #he’s so funny idk #he’s so squishable I wanna chew on him and shake him around like a dog toy #oh okay #sometimes I write things out in the tags and then I read over them like ??? huh #I wanna bake him into a pastry and consume him #hmmmmm #okay! that’s enough tagging for me tonight gn! #persona 3 #persona 3 reload #p3 #persona #persona 4 #p4 #persona 4 golden #persona 4 remake PLEASE ATLUS PLEASE PLEASE PLEA

[porcelana-r0ta]

I know the respective fandoms of DC and Miraculous Ladybug have a certain disdain for MLxDC fics but I think there's a potential for fics where Luka leaves Paris and just keeps traveling to different US cities because he keeps figuring out secret identities and he's just this 15 year old kid growing increasingly frustrated and exasperated at how badly everyone hides their identities and he just has to pretend to be oblivious even tho it's Their Fault for being Bad At Secrets and shouldn't adults be better at this??????

#he goes to central city and he's like ah yes a city with an actual adult hero #surely he will be able to keep his identity a secret #and then that very same day he's at the bank setting up an american bank account and captain cold tries to rob it #and the flash saves the day as he does #and everything's great and dandy and secretive #but then #BUT THEN #he has to go to the police station about some paperwork for his witness statement (idk its fanfic just Write Something yk?) #and some guy laughs in the back of the precinct #and luka is like huh. that sounds like flash's laugh when he laughed at his own cold pun yesterday. #and he looks at the laughing guy and he's like oh hey they have the same jawline too. and same basic build. and god DAMN IT!!!!!! #literally just turning him into wes weston from my own fanfic which like. yeah i like the same concept in different flavors soooo #not a surprise #dcxmlb #dc x mlb #mlbxdc #luka couffaine

[cerise-on-top]

Heyyyy!!! :333

how are things??!??!?? I haven’t checked tumblr in a while!!!!

is it ok if I request a Konig x f!reader where she gets flustered by him calling her his little wifey as you said in the one post? It’s ok if you choose not to obvs as I know you write Gender neutral, so don’t feel obligated!!

Hey! It's been alright, but I've been super tired as of late! I've got the second theoretical exam on Tuesday, though! And once I pass that I will finally be done with all the theory! :D Also, the referenced post is this one!

König Calling his GF Weibi

I feel as though he’d be very sudden with calling you that. In fact, he’d likely be saying something along the lines of “Mei Weibi schaut heite wieda zuckasüß aus.” He never expected you to understand him, much less be interested in what he had to say about you. While he may not hide the fact that he was talking about you in the slightest, looking at you with those big, adoring blue eyes of his, he would be surprised when you turn to look at him, done with his impossible to Google translate German. Even if you had been learning the language for a while now, whenever he reverted to his own German you barely, if at all, understood him. And thus, you confronted him about what he had to say about you this time. König would chuckle a bit at your fierce demeanor this time when you were usually quite calm about him complimenting you in German.

“I’m not sure how I should translate ‘Weibi’, but I’ll try… Weibi is sort of like little wifey. My lovely little wifey looks sweet as sugar again today. That’s essentially what I said.” His accent was thick again, as it had always been, but it added to his charm. Although he was usually a rather sweet man, this took you by surprise. You were his girlfriend, not his wife, yet, so you weren’t sure why he would call you that. It was rather sweet, but you weren’t sure how to process this.

“A-ah, I see…” Looking away, you grabbed your wrist and gently rubbed the skin there with your thumb. A rather obvious gesture, König seemed to be delighted about this. As you looked him in the eye again, you saw a glimmer in his eyes. It wasn’t anything devious, in fact it was a rare sight to behold in the first place as he could sometimes be rather timid, despite being a behemoth. Unsure of what was about to happen, you turned to leave, a goofy grin on your face that you hoped he hadn’t spotted just yet.

“Well, Weibi, you can’t just leave me hanging here. Don’t go, where would I be without you?” He tenderly grabbed your wrist. Despite his usual gentle ways, there was some strength to him, even now. “You’re my lovely little wifey and I love you a lot, so don’t leave just yet.” Even as you struggled against his grasp on you, even as you continuously turned to face away from him, he always found a way to get to see your pretty face. Resorting to hiding your face behind your palm seemed fruitless as well, König, too, had two hands, after all. He was too strong, despite him barely using any of his strength. Curse him and the fact he was part of a PMC. One of these days, you were going to give him a piece of mind. Until then, he may run free. Holding both of your hands in his, he pushed you against the kitchen wall, trapping you against it and him.

“You like that nickname, don’t you?”

Using the opportunity that presented itself to hide further from him, you pushed your body against his, concealing yourself still. “It’s just… I don’t know if I’m understanding this the right way, but being your wife sounds kind of nice, actually… Like, it seems like a rather domestic nickname. If you were a bit more careful with your body, then I just know you’d make for an ideal husband too. The idea of someday being your real wife just gets to me, you know?”

He hadn’t even considered that up until that point. But you being his wife, him being your husband, it sounded like a dream. Letting go of your wrists, he wrapped his arms around you instead. “I know, Weibi. But don’t worry too much about it. I used to be far more reckless when I was younger. So I’m sure I will calm down in the future. Besides, why not make it a reality someday? Just the two of us in our own apartment, maybe with a kitten or two to take care of. I’d love to marry you someday, you’re the best girlfriend I’ve ever had. I love you more than anyone and anything else.”

König had the chance to be such an asshole in that moment, and despite that he chose to be a sappy idiot. Again, you were reminded as to why you loved him in the first place. Wrapping your arms around him as well, you breathed in his scent. That all-too familiar scent you’ve come to adore. The one that reminded you that no one could ever harm you, that you were safe, no matter what. He was so warm too, you couldn’t help but melt into him. “You’re such an idiot, you know that?”

He pressed a kiss to your temple before chuckling again. “Bear with an idiot for a moment? Just until we’re married and I’ve burned the certificate.”

“Because then I can’t return you? König, have you been looking at memes again?”

“Hush, Weibi. No one needs to know.”

#cod #cod x reader #konig #könig #konig x reader #könig x reader #I'm at almost 165K words in my document for cod now. oops #but I was really looking forward to writing this! thank you :D #hope you've been doing well too! #I love putting König in situations! even if I still don't have a proper grasp on his character #like I think he'd be sweet towards his loved ones but absolutely relentless towards almost everyone else #but he loves cats #he'd always stop when he sees a cat to pet it. if the timing is appropriate #so I think he'd love to have a cat or two with you #oh before I forget again #fem!reader #this time it's actually appropriate #I don't mind writing a gendered reader as long as there's actually a point to it! since German is a gendered language I can see the point #but yeah usually the gender of reader really shouldn't matter! which is why it usually annoys me when all I can find are fem!readers #not everyone reading these things is a woman. so yeah I really do prefer writing gn readers but I can make exceptions here and there :3

[passionartx]

Do you have any art or writing wips you could share? :D

I’ve got both! 💛✨

Me and @nixoon-again have been cooking a lil Galaxy au over the last few days so this is a very rough lil concept doodle I did of Tails design! (Star Tails supremacy!💫). Not sure if, when and how we’ll post about it and it’s mainly just been us screaming at eachother, but maybe one day when it’s more planned out!

Anddd, a lil wip from the drowning angst fic I mentioned before that I’m dabbling with! I’m still really insecure about my writing and very rusty so am still not 100% I’ll share it, but if enough people are interested and it’s semi readable ig there’s no harm in dumping it out there at somepoint! 💛✨

#I love the tonal shift between the art and wip #I still love that we all mutually decided tails is a star #star tails sweep! #he looks like a cute lil goober but oh boy does he have angst #miles tails prower #art wip #writing wip #tails the fox #sth #sonic #tails #sonic the hedgehog #if you see any typos in that wip no you don’t <3 #actually if you do please let me know I have dyslexia lol

[cozylittleartblog]

merry spamton one and all!!! now put him in the microwave

#deltarune #spamton #art #doodles #comic #THAT'LL TEACH HIM #i drew this at 4am u can tell #i should draw him more though i like almost never do and then i do and im like oh hes fun actually #unhinged and fun #cannot wrap my head around the dialogue quirk though its got too much going on #sadface. doomed to not write good spamtons but i like how mine Looks at least #anyway Best of luck to everyone trying to buy horrible little men today!! #art changes a lot in my head from when i think of it to when i draw it i think the little postman uniform made more sense originally #but i thought it was funny so i kept it anyway #he is hand deliverying all those. Clones.

[introspectivememories]

what's wrong with data analyst bernard?

summary: tim's a workaholic ceo. bernard is, to put it simply, a down-on-his-luck loser with a kid to take care of. somewhere along the line, they meet. (very loosely based on the 2018 hit kdrama, "what's wrong with secretary kim?")

A/N: for @chamiryokuroi bc this fanart has given me brainrot since the moment i saw it. but also bc, i missed writing and your art helped. i hope you like it. (more notes at the end.)

Today is a good day, Bernard thinks happily, brand new ID badge bouncing on his tie. It's his first day at Wayne Ent. and Mori had sent him off with a hug and muttered, "have a good day, Tou-san." It's been bouncing around in his head all day. Tou-san, Tou-san, Tou-san, he's really a dad now. He's got to make sure Mori has everything he needs and this new job is going to make sure he can do that.

Shaking his head once to clear it, he takes a sip of the complimentary coffee a team member bought him for his first day. His team leader, Young-joon Lee, is taking him on a tour of the building. Young-joon is a wonderful man in his late 30s but it's very clear that he's been consumed by the office lifestyle.

"...and here is our magnificent lobby!" Young-joon is saying as he tunes back in. His team leader spreads his arms wide out as he speaks, "Everyone knows the lobby but it's my personal philosophy that making friends or at least being on amicable terms with the ground floor staff will make your life easier."

Bernard laughs politely, "I know what you mean. I can't tell you how many times being nice to the host at the restaurant I used to work at saved my butt during rush hour."

"A man after my own heart!" Young-joon says, smiling widely as he leads him to the help desk.

Bernard tilts his head up to look at the skylight. It's a gorgeous thing with little animal motifs running alongside it. It lights up the lobby bringing a welcoming feeling into it. With the sunlight pouring into the room, along with the din of busy workers in slacks running to and fro, it really feels like stepping into a movie.

Are you seeing me Darls?, he thinks with a childlike glee, hand coming up to thumb at his badge again, I made it!

"This, my friend," Young-joon says, pulling up to the help-desk, "is our wonder-duo. Tamara and Abhishek. They practically run this building. Lord knows we'd be tripping all over ourselves without them."

Tamara and Abhishek smile as they get introduced.

"They run this building?" he asks confusedly.

"You see, young padawan," Abhishek says, "not only do we help the people that come in here asking questions or for instructions, we also answer any questions the staff has for us."

"Things like, 'What's HR’s number?' or 'Can you page Data for me?' or 'No seriously, I'm calling HR on this man right now. What is their number?'" Tamara says grinning.

Bernard laughs. It feels like that's all he's been doing since he got here. "You have to tell me the story on that one day."

"Sorry," Tamara says, faux-apologetic, "the minimum clearance on that story is half-a-year. Gotta level up."

His cheeks hurt from smiling. This is his and Mori's new beginning. This is where they level up. Nothing's gonna stop him now.

"Do you know the story behind that one?" he asks, turning to Young-joon.

"Of course! But where would be the fun in telling you? You have to stay the six months and if luck comes my way, longer."

"You want me for longer?"

"Of course, I saw the way you worked during those practice problems in the interview. I had to fight the other team leaders for you. It was brutal."

"Get back I say!" Young-joon says, miming a sword fight. A pleased warmth builds in his chest; they wanted him, they wanted him!

Darls you better be fucking watching this. I'm movin' up in the world.

"Ooh, send me that footage. I wanna see our newest recruits skills," Abhishek says.

"You got the data team fighting over you?" Tamara asks, eyebrows raised, "I wanna see it—"

Whatever she was going to say is cut off by the sound of both of their pagers pinging. Immediately going stock still, they start typing on their computers.

Bernard turns to Young-joon confused but his team leader looks like nothing is out of the ordinary.

"The boss is coming." Young-joon says, like that's a reasonable explanation for two people shutting down in the middle of the conversation, "It's always quite a spectacle and they always have to notify the other execs. Just watch."

Still, the boss? Maybe Bruce Wayne will say 'hi' to him and he'll charm the CEO and Mr. Wayne can figure out a way to—

No, no. He's done making those kinds of fantasies. Nobody is coming to help. Bernard is going to figure out his life on his own, he is going to take such good care of his kid, and he is not going to wait for some rich billionaire to swoop in and take care of him. He got this far didn't he? He'll get even farther.

He and his team leader lean against the help desk sipping coffee as they wait for the CEO to come in and sure enough, a black Rolls Royce pulls up to the driveway in the front. The minute the door opens, flashes from the paparazzi's cameras start going off. Out steps a bodyguard in a black suit with an umbrella opened. From below the umbrella he sees a nice pair of brown loafers step out. The CEO seems to be wearing a navy blue suit today. The paparazzi roars and the flashes increase.

"Oh wow," a man remarks a few feet away from him, "the circus is strong today, huh?" His friend laughs.

A woman wearing red heels steps out after the CEO, the paparazzi flashes decrease dramatically. More bodyguards exit after the woman and form a square around the CEO and his assistant/secretary. They shuffle towards the entrance where he sees the elderly doormen greet the executives with a smile. Whatever they say is lost to the sound of the city but the doormen laugh and push the doors open.

Young-joon's been making small talk throughout the entrance and Bernard tries to keep up but whatever the hell is going on at the entrance is way more interesting than anything his team leader is talking about. As they enter the guards spread out and dissolve the square. The woman comes into view first, red heels with a black slacks and a white button down. She's holding a long coat in one hand and a laptop bag slung over her shoulder. She's gorgeous and clearly the one in charge, going by the way she barks orders at the guards.

Young-joon says something and he turns around to respond, grabbing his coffee cup off the desk counter. His CEO's loafers tap across the lobby's marble floor, something about it is comforting. A lull in the room's conversations causes the CEO's voice to carry over.

"...Tam, make sure the quarterly reports are on my desk by at least 4 today and make sure to push back the sales meeting by 30 minutes to an hour, the board wants to talk — Oh Mr. Bardakcı! Thank you for stay—..."

Bernard's heart jackrabbits in his chest. He knows that voice but- it can't be. It's not possible; he chose Wayne Enterprises for a reason. He's not supposed to be here. He's supposed to be at his father's company. Unless... there was a merger? No, that seems like the kind of thing the news wouldn't've shut up about. He would've known.

When was the last time you had time to sit down and read the news, Bear? Darls says inside his head

She's right. With filing for custody of Mori and graduating from college and the job search, he hasn't had time for much else. It's entirely possible that he could've missed one of the biggest mergers of the decade.

Fuck, Fuck.

He wasn't supposed to be here. Bernard was supposed to be moving on. He was supposed to be building a life for himself away from the shadows of his childhood. He was supposed to be forgetting that Tim Drake ever existed.

He has to make sure though. Turning his body around, he prays that it's not the man he thinks it is. But sure enough, there stands Tim Drake, resplendent in a navy blue suit and a golden tie.

Golden ties for golden boys, he thinks absentmindedly.

The suit fits him perfectly, stretching across his shoulders and wrapping around his waist. Even the tie looks knotted perfectly. How long did it take him to learn, Bernard wonders. He could never get it right back in high school. Does his assistant Tam do it- no, no! This is why he didn't apply to Drake Industries. Bernard can't do anything around Tim and Tim is never going to care enough about him to stay.

Tim's head seems to be turning in his direction and Bernard whips his head back to make sure Tim doesn’t even catch a glimpse of him. His hand twitches violently enough that the coffee cup falls out of his hand and spills all over the floor. The cup rattles deafeningly on the floor. Bernard can't fucking breathe.

"-ernard? Bernard!" his team leader's voice cuts through the haze in his head. Young-joon looks concerned, "Are you okay?"

He blinks slowly, "...What?"

"I said, 'Are you okay?’ You look like you've seen a ghost?"

No, Bernard thinks, seeing Darls would be preferable to whatever level of hell I've found myself in.

"I'm—, I'm fine." he says rather unconvincingly. His eyes dart back to the spill, "What am I saying? There's a large puddle of coffee on the floor. I—, I should get some paper towels for that."

"Do you have any paper towels, Wonder-Duo?" he asks, trying desperately to ignore Tamara and Abhishek's concerned looks.

"I already called the custodial staff," Tamara says slowly, like she’s trying not to spook him, "but if it makes you feel any better," she pulls out a huge stack of paper towels, "go crazy, I guess."

Bernard takes a handful of paper towels and gets to work. The cleaning is meditative and with each swipe of the paper towel, the puddle gets smaller. Bernard pretends the puddle is his feelings for Tim. Swipe, forget about the 4pm milkshakes and his laughter when Darls snorted milk out of her nose. Swipe, don't think about the way he used to smell. Swipe, he left and never looked back; you don't look back either.

The tap, tap, tap of loafer on marble is getting closer to them for some reason. Why is it getting closer? Does it not have staff meetings, market research, and people to leave behind?

"What is going on here?" Tim asks.

"Nothing much, sir." Abhishek responds, "Newbie just spilled some coffee."

Abhishek, no!

"Oh is that all? And he took the initiative to start cleaning instead of waiting for the custodial staff. You made a good choice, Young-joon."

"Thank you, sir!" Young-joon says, "I was taking him on the tour when you came in. Most newbies love the show so I thought we'd stop here for a little bit."

Tim laughs. Bernard hates that his heart still skips a beat at the sound.

A pair of brown loafers and a wool-covered knee slowly appear in his vision. Why is Tim crouching in front of him? Why won't this man leave him alone?

"This looks like quite a lot of work, let me help."

You can help by leaving me the hell alone, he thinks uncharitably.

"I hope you found the facilities to your liking," Tim continues, like he hadn't heard Bernard's thoughts, "My name is Tim Drake-Wayne, CEO."

I know, he wants to say. I know you're Tim Drake. I know you like to skateboard and that you stared at Tony Hawk's photo for an hour every day in high school ‘cause didn't want to be one of those people who didn't recognize him. I know you struggled with your dad not really being there. I know you loved Mrs. Winters as much as you loved your mom. I know that you like history more than any other subject even though your best was always math.

Bernard says nothing instead.

Tim laughs awkwardly and Bernard knows he isn't helping the conversation along but whatever, he's allowed to be petty, right?

"I assure you, whatever you heard in the tabloids and the news, isn't true. I promise I won't bite…," Tim’s voice trails off as Bernard lifts his head.

"...Bernard?" Tim whispers, he looks like he's seen a ghost.

Bernard tries for a smile, he's pretty sure it comes out looking like a grimace.

"Sir," he says nodding curtly, hands still moving to sweep up the coffee puddle.

Tim's hand reaches out to touch his face, as if to make sure Bernard is really there. Bernard recoils as Tim's hand grazes his cheek. Tim's hand hangs in the air uselessly.

"Bernard?" Tim says again, as if to make sure his eyes aren't playing tricks on him.

"That's my name, Sir," he says through clenched teeth, "don't wear it out."

He can feel Young-joon and the Wonder-Duo's confused stare but he says nothing. What would he even say, really?

Hey, this is my old friend Tim Drake? Hey, I used to know him like the back of my hand? Hey, our best friend died and it feels like I'm the only one still grieving? Hey, in my junior year, five different gangs shot up my school and my best friend died in my arms and he left and I had to pick up the pieces by myself? Hey, I'm the idiot that's still in love with Tim Drake?

The clack of Tam's heels comes as a welcome distraction.

"Tim!" she says, grabbing his arm and pulling him away, "What the hell do you think you're doing? We have to go talk to the board. Build rapport with your employees later."

Tim stumbles to his feet, "Yes, but—, I—, This is—"

He sounds like he's glitching. Bastard. Is it really such a surprise to see Bernard in a well paying job? Even Tam is starting to look a little concerned now.

"Explain later," she commands, dragging Tim behind her. Bernard keeps his head down and continues wiping up the coffee puddle. Sneaking a glance upward shows him that Tim keeps turning back around to stare at him.

For a moment their eyes meet, brown against blue. 'Bernard?' he sees Tim mouth. Bastard, saying his name so many times. Doesn't he know what that does to Bernard? Why does Tim insist on breaking his heart again and again and again? Was once not enough?

He's tired of putting these walls up and just for a second, he lets them come down. Let Tim see the entirety of his brokenness. Tim already has his heart, he can have this too.

'Tim' he mouths back, smiling sadly. Tim looks stunned and the rage that had been simmering in his gut begins to boil over.

Do you see what I've become? Do you see how thoroughly Grieves ruined me? Is this not your doing too? Why did you leave? Have you ever visited Darla? Why was it so easy for you to not look back? Was I not your friend? Or was it just a time pass? Why wasn't I enough for you to stay?

He watches until the elevator doors close, separating him from Tim once again. His body sags like a marionette cut from its strings and his fingers clench uselessly around the coffee soaked paper towels. A hand lands on his shoulder and he flinches.

"Hey, hey," Young-joon soothes from where he's crouched right next to him. When did Young-joon crouch down? How much time has he missed? "It's just me, Bernard. Are you okay? What was that? Does our CEO know you?"

He exhales shakily. He needs to get out of here. He needs to sob hard enough he throws up. He needs the steady press of a knife on his back. He needs things he's not allowed to have anymore.

Bernard shoots up so fast the world spins around him. holding onto the desk for support, he tries to smile at his team leader. It stretches across his face misshapenly.

"I'm—, I'm sorry," he says stumbling over his words in a rush to get them out, "I have to—"

He has to what? Pretend to not see Darls out of the corner of his eye? Pretend like his hands don't have blood on them? Pretend like he isn't seeing bullet wounds every time he closes his eyes?

"—go to the bathroom," he finishes lamely. Gathering up all of the paper towels, he walks away dazedly, ignoring Young-joon's calls behind him. He shoves the towels in the nearest trashcan, letting his feet lead him to the nearest bathroom.

The bathroom is thankfully empty when he enters and he locks the door behind him. Sliding down the door, he exhales shakily. There's not enough air in this room; he can't breathe. The fluorescent lights hum above their coverings. The one on the left flickers. Who's bright idea was it to install school lights in a business office's bathroom?

The world outside the bathroom rushes on too loudly. Somebody is talking about their vacation. Someone is bemoaning their presentation today. His chest is getting tighter. His hands come up to tug on his hair. Why can't he breathe?

The exhales are coming quicker and quicker. Something comes tapping down the hallway. It's the gunmen, it has to be. A quick glance down tells him all he needs to know: he's covered in blood.

It's Lila's, he thinks dazedly, I had to carry her into the office. Or no, it's Olu's. I held him when he died. He said, he said, what did he say?

Why can't he remember? He hits his head with the heel of his palm.

Think he tells himself, we have to tell Olu's parents what he said. He said—, he said—.

His body sags.

Oh now he remembers. He said, "I don't wanna die Bernard."

A whimper tears itself out of his throat and he slaps a palm over his mouth. There's blood smeared across his face now, he must look like he walked out of a slasher film. He has to be quiet. if he's too loud, the gunmen will find them and then they'll all be dead.

Cry quietly, he tells himself, Darls doesn't need—

Darla! How could he forget about Darla with a hole in her gut? He needs to get to her. Lurching forward, he scrabbles across Mrs. Castillo's linoleum floor. He's smearing Olu's blood everywhere. Why won't Nikhil stop fucking crying so loudly? Goddamn freshmen and their hysterics. Where is Tim? Is he safe? He can't lose both friends today, please Lord, please.

BANG!

A violent flinch tears through his body. He sobs audibly this time, gagging on his spit. It's the gunmen, it has to be. He hasn't even held Darls' hand or counted Tim's moles for the last time. Where are the Darls? She shouldn't be alone. She doesn't like violence like this.

"Why didn't you save me, Bear?" a voice asks from behind him.

He freezes. Slowly he turns around and nearly yells in shock. Falling back on his butt, he stares up at his friend.

(He has to be quiet, he has to be quiet, he has to be quiet-)

Darls is standing behind him still in her crop top and cargo pants. Her once smooth midsection, bloodied and warped. The bullet wound still drips blood.

Plink, plink, plink.

Bernard hates the scent of iron.

"Why didn't you save me, Bear?" she asks, her voice echoing, "I thought we were friends."

There’s blood dripping down the side of her mouth. Now he remembers, the blood on him isn’t Olu’s or Lila’s — although there is that too — it’s almost overwhelmingly Darla’s. He’s covered in it. Elbows deep in it. It streaks up his arms like a macabre tattoo. He wore a white shirt to school today. The stains will never come out. He is Carrie at the end of prom, mortified and humiliated.

He crawls backwards until his back hits the wall, the impact knocking him out of the worst of that night. He's back in the bathroom. The lights hum loudly overhead. Darla hasn’t left yet.

She tilts her head, “Why didn’t you help me, Bear? I thought we were friends.”

“We are,” he rasps out, “we are friends.”

“Are we?” her eyes have no pupils. His Darls had eyes that shone in the sunlight. His Darls is dead. “Then why am I still bleeding? Why am I still hurting? Why is there a bullet in my stomach, Bear?!”

She’s shouting by the end and he flinches. His hands can’t seem to stop tugging at his hair. The blood must’ve smeared all over it. Talk about taking strawberry blond literally.

“I swear I did everything I could Darls,” he sobs out quietly, voice cracking, “I followed all of Mrs. Castillo’s instructions as best I could. I put pressure and tied the dressing as tight as I could.”

“You thought that was enough?” she snarls, hands coming down to grip the wound. It twists grotesquely; he gags, “You think any of that matters when I’m dead and you’re still alive?”

“Please, please. You know I wouldn’t leave you to die, Darls. Please, please, please believe me.”

“Liar, liar!” she screams, blood dripping out of her mouth onto her pink LOVE shirt. It darkens as each drop hits it. Soon it’ll be completely drenched and she’ll be drowning in it. Where did his smiling friend go? “I’m dead, Bear! I’m dead, dead, dead and it’s all your fault! Why didn’t you save me?! Why didn’t you save me?!”

He keens, body curling in on itself. One hand goes down to press on his throat; he’s making too much noise. Nikhil’s just a freshman. He shouldn’t have to die just because Bernard couldn’t shut up for once in his life.

“Please,” he whispers raggedly, “I tried, I tried. I swear I tried, Darls.”

“It hurts, Bear,” she sobs. Darla’s too young to be sounding so wrecked, “It hurts so much. Please help me.”

All of sudden, it’s too much. The taste of iron sits heavy on his tongue and Darla won’t stop sobbing. His fingers fumble for his phone and he presses one. It rings once, twice and finally on the third ring does a voice answer.

“Bear?” the other side says groggily.

“Ty please, I can't do this anymore,“ he sobs.

Tyrone suddenly sounds a lot more alert, “Bear what’s going on?”

“Darla won’t stop crying and she keeps on screaming that it’s my fault she died.” he wails, “I know I should’ve done more but please, can you tell her I tried? That I stayed with her until the end? She won’t listen to me, Ty. She won’t listen to me.”

There’s a muffled yell of ‘Babe!” on the other end. “Yeah,” Ty breathes out, “I’ll tell her.”

“You put me on speaker, okay?” Ty instructs, “And you gotta tell me if she’s nodding or if she’s gone or if she said anything, alright? I can’t see her.”

“Okay,” he whispers, pulling the phone away from his ear to press the speaker button.

“You tell me when to start, Bear,” he says, voice filling the bathroom. Darla looks up from where she’s sobbing.

“You can start now Ty,” he rasps out, holding the phone out.

“Hey Darla,” Ty says, “Bear told me you said a lotta mean things about him. Stuff like, ‘he’s the reason you died’ and that ‘he never cared’. Darla, you gotta believe me when I say Bear never stopped caring. He held your hand the whole way through. Told you stories about all the things you two were gonna do once you got out of that nurse’s office. He tried, Darla, honest. I’ve never seen him as focused as when you stopped breathing and Mrs. Castillo had him give you CPR. He couldn’t stop sobbing the whole time.”

“But I’m still dead,” she says.

“But I’m still dead,” he repeats.

Ty inhales sharply, “Yeah,” he says thickly, “you are. And I’ll never stop being sorry about that. But you can’t take that out on Bear. He’s just trying to live his life.”

Darls’ face twists up like a childs, “But it hurts,” she cries.

“But—, but it hurts,” he repeats, voice hitching.

Ty curses, “Oh, fuck. I can’t do this. Babe, can you—?”

“Yeah, of course.” 

“Hey, Darla. It’s me, Jimmy from the football team. I don’t know if you remember me but I remember you. After high school, me and Tyrone ended up getting married. Somewhere between shitty weed brownies and bad college parties, we fell in love. Isn’t that nice?”

Darls nods; he tells them as such.

“We visited you after the ceremony. I hope you felt that wherever you are these days. But the point I’m trying to make is that from all I’ve told you just now, you can probably figure out that Ty and I didn’t go pro like we planned. The shooting fucked up Ty’s knee and and my arm. After the hospital stays, playing football for a whole bunch of people just didn’t sound appealing anymore. We’re high school teachers now. Ty teaches math and I teach gym. When it rains or gets cold, my arm and Ty’s knee hurts like hell. But Darla, it doesn't hurt forever. It gets better, I promise.”

“Darla,” Jimmy says, voice unusually serious, “you’re right, you are dead and it does hurt. I’m sorry, I’ll never stop being sorry. I don’t know if it’ll ever go away for you; I’m not too much of an expert on the supernatural. Ty’s the smart one, after all. But I love you, Ty loves you, Bear loves you. I hope that when it hurts the most you can use that as a balm.”

“Auntie Bea loves you too!” Ty’s mom hollers from the background, “Aunt Betty, too!”

Ty laughs wetly and Jimmy snorts, “Does that sound okay?” they ask.

Darls smiles, her teeth stained red from all the blood that built up in her mouth. Bernard misses her with an ache he feels in his bones. Darls nods.

“She nodded,” he says quietly. He blinks once and she’s gone. Where did she go? Doesn’t she know that the gunmen are still at large? She needs to be somewhere safe. He can’t lose a friend today.

“Bear, Bear, you gotta breathe. Take a deep breath for me, c’mon,” Jimmy says.

“She’s gone, Jim. She’s gone again. Why does she keep leaving?” he says, crying. His body can’t stop trembling. How long has he been here? How much time has he missed?

“I miss the cult,” he whispers, “I never had things like this happen when I was with them.”

“Yeah,” Ty snaps, “‘Cause you were high off of like 50 different pain meds ‘cause you let them whip you.”

“Ty, not helping.”

“Move over, let me talk to him."

"Hey, sweetheart," Auntie Bea's voice crackles through his tiny speaker, "I know you're tired and I know you're hurting. I know you miss the cult but you gotta breathe for me, okay? You're gonna pass out otherwise."

"I can't, I can't," he gasps out. 

"Sure you can, you just gotta tell me five things you can see. Can you list those five things for me?"

Bernard desperately tries to get his breathing under control, "The sink is dirty."

"Good, good. Anything else?" 

"The tiles need to be re-grouted."

Aunt Betty barks out a laugh. Bernard's lips twitch upward.

"Keep going."

"My pants, my white shirt, my ID badge," he rattles off.

They talk him through the rest of the grounding techniques and by the time he feels like he's in control again, he's exhausted. His eyes hurt and his throat is dry. 

"Can you tell us why you spiraled so hard, Bear? This hasn't happened in a long time," Jimmy asks.

"I spoke to Tim again," he says simply. He pushes himself up onto his feet and walks over to the sink. Setting the phone down on the counter, he grips the sink with both hands and just breathes. The Bernard in the mirror looks like he just came out of a warzone, eyes haunted, hair messed up. 

"Oh fuck," Ty says, "Where did you even meet him?"

"At my new job at Wayne Ent."

"Why would you apply there?" Jimmy asks, stressed.

"I didn't know! It's not like I've had a lotta time in the past few years to check the news!"

"Well, whatever, what’s done is done." Ty says, ever practical, "Are you going to quit?"

"No!” he says vehemently.

“No,” he repeats quieter, “Wayne has the best benefits and Mori needs that. I’ll just suck it up and try to avoid him.”

“Don’t be fucking stupid,” Aunt Betty says.

“Ma!”

“Oh be quiet Jimmy. I’ve never heard of a more stupider thing. He’s your CEO, Bear, and he knows you work there. He’s obviously going to want ‘to catch up’ or whatever. There is no avoiding him. Can you handle that?”

What can he say? Aunt Betty is right. He can’t handle talking to Tim. Even seeing Tim felt like touching a live wire. He can’t deal with another episode. Mori doesn’t need him to be fucked up, Mori needs him to be the stable adult he promised the courts he was. 

“You can’t, sweetheart,” she says softly, “you can’t handle it.”

There’s some shuffling on the other end of the phone. 

“Bear,” Ty says gently, “I love you, man. You’re my brother. Jimmy loves you, Mama loves you, Aunt Betty loves you. But you gotta start thinking about therapy.”

“I know, I know,” he sighs, “I shouldn’t’ve dragged you into this. I’m—”

Ty cuts him off with an exasperated huff, “It’s not about that Bear. I’ll keep talking to your hallucinations for as long as you need me too. Even when we’re seventy, I’ll do it for you. I don’t care about that. I care about you and I want you to be happy and healthy. I don’t want you to keep seeing Darla. I don’t want you to keep trying to scrub the blood off your hands. 

“And I know you’ve been avoiding therapy ‘cause you don’t got the money and ‘cause talking about your problems is scary but it’s not just you anymore. You got Mori now. That custody claim is going through. You can’t just avoid things ‘cause they’re hard now. You work at Wayne now; that paycheck is more than enough to set a few dollars aside each month to save up for therapy. Hell, mental health probably comes with your medical benefits. Please, Bear. If you can’t get help for you, then do it for us, for Mori. Please stop making us watch you hurt.”

Bernard exhales shakily.

“I never wanna find you the way we did after the cult, Bear. I never wanna see you in the hospital bed like that again. Please don’t do that to us, please,” Ty whispers.

Unconsciously, his hand comes up to rub at the scar left behind from the sacrifice. It stretches along the length of his sternum, jagged and rough. On good days, he can pretend that it’s a scar from a heart surgery. He doesn’t have that many good days.

Bernard presses the heel of his palms into his eyes before using his hands to scrub at his face. He’s always so tired these days.

“Okay,” he says simply, “okay.”

“Okay?” Ty asks hopefully.

“Okay, you’re right. It’s not just me anymore. Mori deserves the best and I’m gonna give it to him. And I love Tim, I think I’ll always love Tim but he clearly doesn’t give a shit about me. So I gotta make my peace with it or I’ll go crazy.”

Ty whoops, “Thank you, thank you, thank you!” he chants.

“Bear, it’s still the middle of the workday,” Jimmy says, although he too, sounds happy. Auntie Bea and Betty are muttering about a feast, he thinks. “Don’t you have to get back to work?”

“Yeah, that’s if I’m not fired already,” he mutters.

“Hey!” Jimmy admonishes, “Optimism only, no pessimism.”

“Alright, alright. I gotta get back to work now. Thanks guys.”

“Of course, we’ll let you go now. Ma wants me to tell you that we’re having dinner at your place today.”

“Aunt Betty,” he whines, “I haven’t cleaned and you and Auntie Bea are just looking for a reason to spoil Mori.”

“Absolutely,” they say, unashamed, “he’s our only grandson. We have to spoil him.”

“Fine,” he sighs but he’s smiling. Fuck, he loves these people. God knows he wouldn’t have survived the past six years without them.

“Bye Bear,” they say before he hangs up, “Good luck on your first day!”

He cuts the phone and slides it back into his pocket. Turning on the tap, he splashes some cold water onto his face. Using his wet hands, he tries to rearrange his mussed up hair into something acceptable for an office job.

Time to face the music Darls, he tells her smiling face in the mirror. She gives him a thumbs up in return.

The walk back to his office feels like a death sentence. He’s fucked this up, he knows it. Freaking out over a small interaction with his CEO and then running away only to come back two hours later? It’s over, done for. Bernard takes comfort in the fact that at least the severance package will be nice.

Stepping into the office, immediately draws the eyes of his team members. Every step towards his team leader’s office feels nerve-wracking. Just before he enters, Esperanza, the team’s second in command, stops him.

“Whatever happened,” she says, “just explain it to him. Young-joon’s a reasonable man, he’s not gonna yell at you.”

Some of the tension leaves him and he nods. Knocking on the door, he enters. His team leader looks up and smiles.

“Ah, Bernard! Why don’t you take a seat for me?”

He crosses his wrists behind his back, “I’d rather stand, sir.”

His team leader looks confused, “‘Sir’? Just call me Young-joon like I told you.”

“Anyway, after you left, I took the liberty of going through your file to see if there was anything I missed. I hope that wasn’t overstepping my boundaries.”

“No s-, Young-joon. You’re fine.”

Young-joon sighs and pushes the file he was reading before Bernard came in forward. It’s his file. 

“I’m going to say some statements,” he says, “and I want you to confirm whether it’s true or not. If any of these questions make you uncomfortable, just tell me okay? I’ll drop it immediately.”

Bernard nods.

“You went to Louis E. Grieves Memorial High School.”

“Yes.”

“Based on the dates you put in your file, you were there for the shooting.”

“...Yes. Junior year.”

“You know our CEO.”

“Yes,” he breathes out.

“How?”

He used to fall asleep on my shoulder during lunch and I would listen to him breathe. He’s got moles all over his face. Darls once connected them with a sharpie. His step-mom was so hot, I thought I’d spontaneously combust every time she smiled. HIs dad didn’t really like me and flirting with his wife didn’t help my case. The Drake condo had a crocheted flower blanket on the sofa that his mom had made during her pregnancy. He liked to skateboard but couldn’t roller-blade to save his life. I have all this love and nowhere to put it.

“It’s a little private,” he says instead.

“I’m only asking because we work quite closely with him. We see him often and if that makes you uncomfortable, then I can have you transferred to another team.”

His shoulders sag, “We went to Grieves together for one year. Our mutual friend died. It’s a little hard to look at him.”

“Jesus Christ.” Young-joon says, “Okay well the offer is still on the table, Bernard. Do you want to be transferred?”

“No, I like your team. I’d like to stay,” he says, firmly.

“Are you sure?” Youn-joon asks, eyebrows raised.

“Yes.”

“Okay then,” and it’s like a switch had flipped. Gone is his serious team leader and in its place is the man he met this morning.

“If you plan on staying,” he says smiling, “then my primary recommendation is that you use the medical benefits the company gives you to find a therapist. If you need help, the infirmary here will walk you through it.” 

Oh thank god it comes included with his medical, Ty will be overjoyed to hear that. But first, he has to ask Young-joon why he’s doing all this. Bernard knows his experience with authority figures is a little skewed towards the shitty side of the spectrum but even so, people usually aren’t so kind in his experience.

“Why are you doing this? Why didn’t you fire me? Why are you helping me?”

Young-joon chuckles, “Do you want to be fired?”

“No! But still, why are you helping me?”

Young-joon sighs and stands up. Walking around his desk, he stops right in front of Bernard. Young-joon puts a hand on his shoulder.

“This city takes a lot out of its people, believe me I know. And you were so young, when Gotham took her piece of you. It wasn’t fair of you to go through that. Just like it wasn’t fair to me and my wife when we got kidnapped as children. These kinds of things don’t go away. I still get worked up over zip-ties. My wife still has nightmares. All you can do is learn to live with it.

“You seem like a good kid with a good head on your shoulders. I’d hate to see all that potential go to waste ‘cause you kept getting trapped in your mind. I had a lot of help to get to where and who I am today. Consider this, me paying it forward. One day, I hope you can pay it forward too.”

His eyes feel suspiciously wet. “Thank you,” he chokes out, “thank you.”

Young-joon laughs, “There’s no need for the waterworks, Bernard. Now, pack up your things and go home. You’re in no state to analyze data today but I expect you here at 9AM sharp tomorrow, alright?”

Bernard mock salutes, “Yes, sir.”

“Goodbye, Bernard.”

Right before he exits, he turns around and calls out his team leader’s name.

“Young-joon,” Young-joon looks up confused, “you can call me Bear, by the way.”

A wide grin stretches across his team leader’s face, “Okay then. Goodbye Bear, see you tomorrow.”

Walking out of the office, it feels like a burden has been lifted off his shoulders. Esperanza takes one look at him and snorts.

“You just got Young-joon-ed, huh?”

His jaw drops, “He does that often enough you guys have a name for it?”

The other team members laugh, “Welcome to Data Analysis Team 1, kiddo. We look forward to working with you from now on.”

Smiling, he gathers his things and leaves after a few goodbyes. Once outside the building, the smile drops. It’s an hour-and-a-half bus ride from Wayne Tower to his house. The bus stop sits right in front of the tower too. Some new initiative by the mayor to promote the city moving towards green energy. Hey look, even rich people take the bus! What a fucking joke.

The tower warps the sunlight around it and he stares up at the top floor. Is Tim watching? Can Tim see him from up there? Does he care or was it just the shock of seeing someone he once knew this morning? Has Tim ever thought about him, about them? Or were they just moments in his life? Perpendicular lines, intersecting once and then never again.

I miss you, he thinks staring at the top floor, I miss you more than anything but I’ll walk into oncoming traffic before I ever reach for you again.

The bus pulls up next to him and he snags a seat in the back. Dropping his head onto the seat in front of him, he stares out the window. Darls smiles back at him in the window reflection, perpetually sixteen. He’s twenty-two now.

Fuckin’ hell Darls, he thinks wearily, we’re really in it now.

Darls places her hand against the glass, he leans his shoulder onto it. If he closes his eyes, he can almost feel her warmth.

We’ll make it through, she says.

The bus rumbles forward and he lets the cracked streets of Gotham lull him to sleep. He’ll make it through.

A/N: chami! i hope you like it!!! i've never gifted a fic before, i don't really know how this works. and to everyone who read it, i hope you liked it too! please leave your thoughts in the reblogs or replies!!! i miss the days when td:r was coming out and we were all collectively freaking out. anyway when i said loosely based, i really did mean loosely. props to you guys if you can figure out the direct references to the drama. but this is a one-shot. i'm not gonna be writing anything else for this 'verse? au? (god i'm always so worried im using em dashes wrong)

if you have questions or you're confused by something i wrote, feel free to ask questions or send an ask or message. oh, and i know some people like know the exact wordcount. so, it's exactly 6,785 words long. nice number right?

also, please note that if you want to make art or a podfic or hell, even fanfiction of this, feel free to do so! i hope that's not too presumptuous or anything. idk i see fanfic writers make this disclaimer all the time, so i thought i'd do it to.

thank you for reading!

#god i'm exhausted #writing the latter end of a fic always feels like finishing a marathon #no more fics for like the next 6 months (<- me when i lie) #anyway big fan of the bear hallucinates darla club! #currently there's only one member (me) but you can change that #also favorite trope ever is when you see a regular dude and you're like 'what a nice normal dude' and then you talk to him for like #5 minutes and you're like '/oh./ this dude has something wrong with him' #also the tyrone/jimmy pairing? do you see my vision? #also big fan of the the shooting was worse than what you see in rr club! #it's just there was a city-wide gang war and all the gangs came to grieves to kill darla and you're telling me only she died??? #i think way more people died. i think too many people died actually. i think the school had to do remote learning for all of tyrone's sr yr #cause the renovations were too much. #also just to clarify #the is hallucination!darla and there is the darls he sees all the time. no they are not the same to him. yes he is mentally ill. #also yes!! superheroes do exist in this world!!! i just didn't mention them. #also if we're being a little self-critical for a moment #(don't look at this part) i feel like i could've ended this at a way earlier point in the story but i had such a strong vision of what the #fic was supposed to be like that i just wrote everything #anyway lets start tagging #bernard dowd #tim drake #timbern #timber #dc #red robin tyrone #red robin jimmy

[stop-breaking-my-heart-dragonage]

my greatest achievement in DA2 is maxing out Carver's friendship

and all it took was begrudgingly kissing a little templar ass in act 1 because Carver didn't want to plan a prison break if my Hawke got his ass arrested for being stupid.

#carver hawke #dragon age #dragon age 2 #da2 #well that and he didn't want leandra gamlen and himself to also get arrested for harboring an apostate but you get me #carver hawke loves his sibling and doesn't want them to get taken away that's why he's such an ass and approves of 'pro-templar' choices #in act 1 he's not pro-templar himself but kissing a little templar ass is how you avoid being arrested #'why yes cullen you are so right the templars are so cool and sexy' my hawke says through gritted teeth for that +5 friendship #look i love him okay he's my favorite and i will go the extra mile to make him happy and it's worth it for how much softer can be later on #honestly maxing out his friendship isn't hard if you're aware of what quests you're bringing him on and make him a grey warden #oh but you do need the legacy dlc otherwise you can't fully max friendship out... you can still get enough to change his dialogue/attitude #also like... we the player know hawke won't be arrested like they're not in any actual dangers from the templars as the playable character #but carver doesn't know that and neither does hawke so the templars *are* a real threat to them #and it's incredibly reckless to purposely piss off templars AND selfish because it's not just hawke that'll be arrested it's their family #for harboring them like we witness templars going after people hiding apostates soooo..... #i'm just saying that carver isn't irrational or just being an ass to personally annoy you okay he has cause #also once carver's a warden and ed has money and the estate THEN he's way more open about telling the templars to piss off #sigh one day i'll sit down and write an essay about carver.... one day