#tempered obscure glass panel | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

lovedrunkheadcanons · 2 years

Text

Chapter Contents

(Arranged Marriage Fic) Read on AO3.

Rated M

Four months ago.

“I won’t take no for an answer, child,” Lord Thames said coldly, stroking his beard between two jeweled fingers, a gold signet of a siren visible on his left pinkie.

It was unlike the Earl of Graivmor to dabble in frivolities. Looking more patrician than an Edwardian portrait, his streaky black hair and coarse beard contrasted with the red damask walls and ormolu furnishings of the drawing room. In his youth, he had been quite handsome, but years of heavy drinking and cigar smoke had altered his appearance drastically. The earl now had a protruding belly, a thick neck, and tobacco stained teeth to his aging visage. More concerning were his steely cold eyes, which were attempting to drill holes through the back of Hannah’s skull.

If looks could kill, she thought half-heartedly.

On the eve of her twentieth birthday, Hannah had the misfortune of being invited to dine at Wasserton House, the official Thames estate. Her uncle, Lord Thames, seemed cordial enough during dinner, but Hannah suspected that the hospitality had been forced and, to her dismay, she’d been right. She was now trying to process some very troubling news.

Had she understood him correctly? She was to marry the Gojo family prodigy and heir? Her? How absurd. There must be a mistake?

No, of course not, thought Hannah disbelievingly. This is nothing more than a cruel, twisted joke.

But the presence of Cardinal Xavier Wrath, who had been sitting adjacent from her, donned in his usual red cassock, proved Hannah otherwise. His Eminence would only have been invited if it was of the utmost importance. His bones creaked from old age, as he adjusted himself to speak.

“From what I understand, a union like this has never been tried before,” he said calmly, finding a comfortable position to better look at Hannah, the pectoral cross glinting from his neck. “Your uncle has gone through great pains to procure this arrangement. Jujutsu sorcerers are not easily swayed, you know?”

Hannah opened her mouth, but quickly closed it, hesitating. The air thickened. The drawing room had turned into a sauna. The fresco of sirens hovering above her seemed to laugh. Her heart was pounding as the words left her throat.

“B-But what would the Gojo clan want with a foreigner like me?” she stammered shakily. “I-I can’t even manipulate Cursed Energy…Uncle, surely there is someone more qualified. More deserving. Cressida would be a better —?”

“Silence” Lord Thames hissed vehemently, bristling at the mention of his daughter.

Though he hadn’t shouted, the hairs on the back of Hannah’s neck stood on end. Her hazel eyes began to burn.

In the opinions of her family, if one had the gall to call them family, Hannah was essentially damaged goods. Born with auburn hair, instead of black, and hazel-green eyes, instead of blue, she bore the consequences for allowing non-Sorcerer blood into the pedigree. As was the law, she was required to take the family name, but forbidden to become an exorcist, or train in the art of combat, doomed to a meager existence.

Or so she’d thought.

His mood even more dour, the earl gave a very indignant huff and rose from his chair. Smoothing the front of his suit, he sauntered towards the liquor cabinet behind the many cushioned seats, opened its mahogany panels, and dished out an ornate looking decanter. Then, with an audible “shing,” he removed the stopper from its opening and poured an amber liquid into a goblet. Bringing the glass to his lips, he turned to face his niece.

“Tell me, Hannah,” he asked, his temper easing from the whiskey. “Are you still having dreams?”

Hannah swallowed what little moisture was left in her mouth.

“Y-yes,” she replied softly.

“Are they vivid or obscure?”

Her stomach churned.

“I cannot tell, sir…Most times, I don’t remember."

A lie.

“But you have dreamt of the future, yes?” probed Cardinal Wrath, joining in the interrogation. He looked pensive with his finger tips touching. “Six months ago, it was you who warned that a Cursed Womb would manifest outside the Louvre. In all my years, I've never seen this many Curses running amok. We’re lucky no civilians were hurt in the onslaught. Took six of our best Sorcerers to subdue the wretched creature.”

“That was one time!” Hannah sputtered, a panic in her voice.

“It only takes ‘one time’ to know you have The Sight,” said her uncle darkly, taking another sip of his whiskey.

“I.. ” the girl couldn’t bring herself to say anything.

That’s what this was about?

Part of Hannah wished she’d never told The Association about the supposed vision, but the dream, or rather the nightmare, had been too real to keep secret. She could still remember the massacre as if it were last night.

Possessing no eyes, a white kabuki face reemerged from the marbled hallways, smiling evilly at her with thousands of needle-like teeth. Saliva dripped from its overextended mouth. The stench of rotting flesh mixed with ammonia, a commonality between Cursed Spirits, wafted from its breath. The Curse almost looked human, with its bipedal legs and two arms, but Hannah remembered the creature’s thoughts picking away at the corners of her mind.

Must find…Must kill…Not one shall live. Not one!

It’s only incentive had been to slaughter. To devour every last man, woman, and child, bones and all. She watched the predator tear their limbs apart. Their bodies, thrown about like playthings. Entrails covering the halls of the museum. Screams of horror. The deluge of blood. A maniacal laugh.

And those four vermilion eyes watching me from the shadows, thought Hannah warily, a shiver ran down the length of her spine. It’s always those damn eyes. Every time.

“What about the Cursed Object they recovered from the scene?” inquired Lord Thames sharply, a cautious tone in his voice. He was oblivious to his niece’s distress.

“Just as we feared,” said Cardinal Wrath, his eyes growing dim. He raised one of his bony digits. “A single finger, hidden inside the corpse. Nearly gave the Japanese a heart attack when we told them what we found.”

<p>“Where's the finger now?” demanded the earl.</p>

“We were unable to destroy it,” answered the clergyman. “So, we handed it over to the Japanese accordingly. It now resides at one of their sorcery schools…You know what this means, Jacob.”

Lord Thames said no more, appearing to have understood the gravity of these words. He sank down in his chair. A heavy silence fell upon the drawing room. Hannah had only been half listening to the conversation, still ensconced in her nightmare. She hadn’t sensed Cardinal Wrath walk over to her from his seat and grab hold of her shoulders. His grip firm. His eyes, steady.

“Please, Hannah. You are more valuable than you realize,” implored the cardinal, the close proximity outlining his many wrinkles and beady eyes. “Time is of the essence. The jujutsu world is in dire need of you.”

Hannah, feeling uneasy, looked to her uncle for what little assurance he could offer, but the earl was no longer focused on his niece. Whiskey now gone, he was brooding in his chair, deep in thought.

“We all are.”

Four months later, Hannah Elizabeth Thames was wedded to Satoru Gojo.

Although, I guess it’s Gojo Hannah now, she thought ruefully.

The nuptials had concluded for the evening and the newlywed bride was staring out the passenger seat window of a car, bound for Tokyo. Head resting on an outstretched palm. She attempted to remain awake, but the noise of the interstate was lulling her to sleep. It would be nightfall by the time they reached the Jujutsu High.

Mr. Ijichi, who had been driving the vehicle, adjusted his tie and glasses, prior to clearing his throat.

“Gojo-san would like to apologize for being unable to join you this evening,” the man said meekly. He’d been sneaking glances at the woman from his rear-view mirror. She’d been eerily quiet. “He’s been called away on a mission.”

Though relieved by this news, Hannah couldn’t resist rolling her eyes. She highly doubted that “Gojo-san” was sorry for leaving.

“When will he be back?” she asked, keeping her irritation at bay.

“A few days, or so,” replied the driver.

The car became quiet again.

Hannah sighed through her nose. It had been a taxing day.

The Shinto ceremony was so unlike its predecessor in every aspect. As a bridal gift, Hannah was adorned in the most beautiful hiki-furisode, a luxurious wedding kimono made of Tatsumura silk. It had purple wisteria blossoms embroidered on silvery branches. It was truly magnificent.

The shiny layers of fabric had been a welcomed distraction. Since that morning in the chapel, Hannah was trying her best not to avert her eyes from the floor, lest she caught traces of turquoise blue. At least, she’d been spared from having to endure the scrutiny of her “relatives” the second time.

Just when Hannah had extended the Sakaki branch for the offering, almost all The Association members vanished from the shrine, save for Cardinal Wrath. His Eminence stayed until the drinking celebration concluded, paid his respects to the Shinto priest who presided over the ceremony - apparently they knew each other - and gave one last fleeting smile to the bride before disappearing in a veil of light.

Yes, Hannah thought. She was free.

But her elation was short-lived. At once, a sea of people queued up in front of her, eager to bestow their well wishes on the bride and groom. Hannah smiled nervously and bowed to each newcomer as they stepped forward, but by the twelfth person, she had already forgotten most of their names. Also, they spoke too fast. The English-speaking bride wasn't able to catch much besides “Omedetou” and awestruck gasps of “utsukushii.”

Then, without warning, Hannah felt a pull on her sleeve and soon she’d was cajoled into an empty room, reminiscent of a sacristy, away from the eager crowd, but it wasn’t just her. For whatever reason, both newlyweds were placed in the room. The sound of a large wooden door closed behind them.

They were alone now.

Just the two of them.

“Time is of the essence,” rang Cardinal Wrath’s voice in her ears.

The butterflies in Hannah’s stomach returned with a vengeance. If it wasn’t obvious already, she had very little experience interacting with the opposite sex. She had no idea how to flirt, or what to say. Years confined to girls-only schools and convents were to thank for it. Instinctually, Hannah’s eyes returned to the floor.

She waited for him to say something.

One minute.

Two minutes.

Three minutes?

Nothing.

More seconds passed.

Experiencing an extreme case of déjà-vu, Hannah slowly lifted her head to take a peek through her eyelashes, but regretted the decision instantly.

Handsome face be damned, Satoru looked like he had bitten into a rotten lemon.

Soon as her hazel-green collided with turquoise blue, his eyes began maneuvering like clockwork, studying the woman’s every minute detail. His expression, twisted from anger, to loathing, to boredom at breakneck speed.

Hannah’s soul just about left her body when she noticed his pupils hovering a tad longer than necessary over her chest. A “tsk” of disappointment left his lips as he did so.

She was certain her face held no color. This was worse than embarrassment. In all her twenty years, the woman never felt so worthless.

The hazel eyed woman stared down at her hands, a band of polished gold glinted brightly, as if taunting her.

The pointlessness of it all.

It was a fool’s gambit really, believing she’d be accepted by this man, by these people. Even her own kin treated her as a pariah, ensuring she remained half-in and half-out, but never wanted. All because her mother made the fatal mistake of falling in love with an American from overseas and gave birth to her.

This was never going to work, thought Hannah bitterly. I’m a naive, blundering fool for believing it ever would.

Hannah clenched her fists tightly. There was a dull ache in her jaw when she pressed her teeth together. The ashen hue on her cheeks now held a slight purple tinge. She could feel the tears ready to spill.

Why!? What have I done to deserve this?! she internally screamed.

Hannah was on the precipice of having a complete and total breakdown, but just before she could release the first mournful sob, a patch of callused skin seized her chin. Her head tilted upwards, lurching forward from the contact.

Her breath hitched. In an instant, their faces had become so close that strands of his gossamer white hair brushed above her forehead. She couldn’t think of an accurate description for how she felt, her eyes absorbed into his cerulean cosmos.

He was everything and nothing.

“So, you’re the girl everybody’s been talking about, huh?” His thumb was pressed on her lips, while his fingers cradled her chin, preventing her from turning away, their noses less than a millimeter apart. Hannah could make out her own reflection in his pupils. A tremor rolled down her back. Satoru clicked his tongue again. “Yup, I think those old geezers will be pushing up daisies any day now. You’re not at all what I expected…Figures.”

He pouted.

Hannah stood there completely dumbstruck, her eyes burning from withheld tears. She wasn’t sure what startled her more; Satoru cradling her chin, his blatant disapproval of her, or the fact that he spoke in near flawless English, albeit with a slight accent that she dare not admit was attractive. (So, she’d been right about earlier).

He had yet to remove his thumb from her lips.

For a brief second, Hannah contemplated running her tongue against his skin to spite him, but feared retribution. So instead, she wisely raised her shaky fingers to pry the scar-ridden hand away. With little resistance, Satoru complied to her wordless request, straightening to his full height as he did so.

He’s so bloody tall, Hannah thought warily.

The top of her head barely reached the middle of his sternum, and she could tell by the muscular outline of his clothing that Satoru wasn’t only tall, but built solid underneath the fabric. She studied his broad shoulders, eyes following the length of his bicep towards his elbow, where they returned to the familiarity of his hands. The same star marked hands she first spotted in the chapel and cradled her chin mere seconds ago.

Like velcro brushing against silk, she could still feel the traces of static from where his fingers caressed her skin. Every hair on her body prickled with gooseflesh. Her heart sang in a strange, yet repressed delight. Though it hadn’t been loving, no one had ever studied her so intimately before, especially a man. His presence both thrilled and terrified her, and not for the first time that day, she wondered if they’d be expected to share a bed.

Breathe.

“Well…Well, you’re not what I had in mind either,” she retorted lamely, now free from his restraint.

“So she speaks!” mocked Satoru, somewhere between a snort and a laugh.

“W-What?! You were the one preventing me from talking just now! I spoke just fine during the wedd — ”

“Psch, please,” Satoru interrupted, as if wanting to gag. There was a humorless glint in his eyes as he rolled them. He pointed an accusatory finger. “Spare me that crap. You’ve been shitting bricks all freakin day. Would’ve turned into a human faucet, had I not intervened back there. Really, you should — Woah. Hey, now — Don’t give me that look, Princess. You know it’s true.”

A devilish smirk graced his lips. He was enjoying this.

Princess?! Hannah inwardly seethed. She hadn’t been prepared for this at all. She hated being teased. Her face was on fire, but the bride couldn't think of a suitable comeback. She could picture Sister Edith waging her finger about the virtue of prudence.

An awkward pause settled amongst the two.

“Look,” Satoru inwardly sighed, running his fingers through his oddly colored hair in frustration. “I don’t know what the higher-ups are playing at. Regardless of who you are, know that I don’t give two shits about this.”

He showed her his left hand, a replica of Hannah’s gold ring on his finger.

She was deeply confused by this gesture. Why consent to marriage, if he had no intention to commit? It’s not like they could divorce. The “old geezers” Satoru mentioned earlier would make sure of that. It was more probable that a Grade-4 Curse would win the Nobel Peace Prize before they’d be granted an annulment.

Some husband and wife they were turning out to be.

“You could just take it off, if it bothers you so much,” she shrugged.

“You could just take it off,” mimicked Satoru, unbecoming of his age. “You mean, you haven’t noticed? The damn thing is laced with some type of charm, so even I can’t remove it...Well, not without losing a finger, anyway.”

Wait, really? thought Hannah. She looked down at her left hand and tried sliding the ring off with her thumb. Sure enough, the gold wouldn’t budge.

The woman looked back up at the Sorcerer. Satoru gave her a bored look as if to say, “See? I told you so.”

“So, what now?” She asked feebly, attempting to hide her dismay.

“What…now?” said Satoru distractedly. He’d begun digging through his pockets, searching for something misplaced, until realization struck him. Lifting the fabric of his haori, he retrieved a single pair of black sunglasses, pitch as black, from a hidden chest pocket. Satisfied with his prize, he directed his attention back to the little bride. His brow furrowed once more. “The way I see it, I just spent the whole day playing dress up. Those vows, or whatever they had me say, didn’t mean diddly-squat. You’re not my prisoner and I'm sure as hell not your babysitter. In fact, I don’t care what you do, or where you go, so long as you do me a teensy little favor...”

He fastened the shades over his eyes and bent over her as if to scold a young child. Glacial ice peeked through the obsidian frames, and in a clipped voice he uttered.

“Stay away.”

And faster than the woman could blink, the white-haired Sorcerer vanished from sight.

Splendid.

“What an absolute nutter,” Hannah murmured under her breath, now alone for the first time in what felt like forever.

However, the silence quickly became unnerving, and soon, the bride made herself away towards the exit, her wedding kimono swishing behind her. She opened the heavy cypress doors and ventured outside to find the shrine completely deserted. The sky was blushing with hues of pink and gold. Everyone evidently returned home for the evening, except for one straggler.

Looking like a side character from Men in Black, a lanky fellow in a suit and tie was waiting in front of a sleek Lexus sedan. Introducing himself as Ijichi Kiyotaka, Assistant Director for the Tokyo Metropolitan Curse Technical College, he politely explained to Hannah that he was to escort her to the jujutsu school, which would serve as her new home. And without so much as a roar from the engine and a “thump,” of a closing passenger door, the two sped off.

Now weary from the day’s events, Hannah wanted nothing more than to soak in a long hot bath and remove her tightly wrapped obi from her waist. The comfortable leather seats felt cool on her skin and her eyelids began to droop.

Despite her nerves, the weddings had gone off without a single mishap, but the evening with Satoru greatly troubled her. The bride couldn’t help suspect that his rude behavior was somehow her fault.

“Don’t give me that look, Princess,” she remembered him saying. He looked incredibly annoyed.

Now that I think about it, I wasn’t all that polite either, she thought sleepily, remembering how she’d been too frightened to make eye contact. I’d be upset too, if someone was too afraid to look at me and nearly cried.

Headlights from oncoming traffic blurred her vision, and the car heater enveloped the cabin in a warmth. Hannah rolled onto her side and tucked her hands under head. Her eyes slowly closed, and before long, the little bride slipped into the void of sleep, knowing she’d have to face those swirling pools of blue again in a few days' time.

Chapter Contents

#jujutsu kaisen #satoru gojo #jjk #jjk x reader #gojou satoru x you #gojo takes a wife

25 notes · View notes

the-scandalorian · 3 years

Text

Tempered Glass: Chapter 3

Pairing: Din Djarin x Female Reader Rating: M (will become explicit) Word Count: 6.3k Warnings: slow burn, canon rewrite, canon-typical violence, cursing Summary: You and Mando choose Sorgan as your place to lay low, only to get wrangled into a risky job. Notes: In my head, Cara Dune is Katy O’Brian.. Yes, I’m ignoring the fact that she plays one of Moff Gideon’s officers lol Taglist: @bbdoyouloveme @beskarhearts @dincrypt @honey-hi @just-me-and-my-obsessions00 @red-leaders @zoemariefit

Previous Chapter | Masterlist | Next Chapter

Image from The Art of Star Wars: The Mandalorian

The three of you sat in the cockpit—Mando piloting the ship, you in the copilot seat behind him, and the kid perched on the console. He had slipped out of his own seat, waddled to the front of the cockpit, and managed to grasp the edge of the console with his tiny hands and scrabble his legs against the front of it to shimmy all the way up there. Honestly, it was an impressive feat for such a small being. Mando pretended not to notice, keeping his visor trained on the viewport.

You’d been sitting in silence for a while, watching the stars streak by. It was a fairly comfortable silence, considering you were complete strangers and still trying to feel out the limits of your tenuous alliance.

Looking at the back of Mando’s helmet, the surface of which reflected the bands of hyperspace that surged around the Crest, you thought again about how challenging it was to read him: there was so little to go on. No facial expressions, no significant looks, and very few gestures—even the cadence of his breathing was largely disguised by the helmet and modulator.

That was definitely part of his appeal: the mystery. He was an almost blank canvass where others were open books. Because your survival had hinged on your ability to read people, you had gotten so good at it that the task lost its fun rather quickly. Mando was an interesting new game.

In some ways, the armor forced the Mandalorian to be much more straightforward. Because it obscured his features, he had to ask for what he wanted outright—unless it was from a bounty. He could easily communicate threat with just his stance. Anything else, though, he had to verbalize. You were interested to see how this would play out in his interactions with you. You weren’t a job or his enemy, and you were really hoping that meant he’d eventually be slightly less withholding with you.

The baby, looking around, cooed quietly and reached over to flick a random switch on the panel to his right. Mando disregarded the action, pressing a few buttons in front of him. You stifled a chuckle.

The kid, clearly testing his boundaries, leaned over to flick another switch. It turned green when he activated it, and the sound of a machine whirring kicked in.

“Stop touching things,” snapped Mando, frustrated, turning to look at him. You couldn’t help the grin that spread across your face, grateful that Mando couldn’t see you.

The child lowered his ears and trilled sadly in response to the admonishment but recovered quickly: his ears pricked back up, and keeping his eyes trained on Mando in what seemed like a purposeful act of open rebellion, he leaned over slowly to flick yet another switch. This one turned red, and the ship rattled in response. You let out a sharp bark of laughter, slapping a hand over your mouth to smother the rest of your reaction.

This time, Mando pushed one large gloved hand past the baby to deactivate the switch and picked him up to set him on his lap. You smiled again, knowing this was likely what the kid was trying to achieve anyways. He wanted attention.

“Do you know his name?” you asked. You assumed he didn’t because he always called him “the kid”...but it also wouldn’t be a surprise if Mando did know his name and just chose to call him that instead.

“No,” he replied. “You ready to pick a planet?” Mando changed the subject abruptly as he reclined to look at you over his shoulder.

“Sure,” you agreed, standing to lean over the back of his chair so you could see the screen in front of him.

After some discussion and research, toggling through the nearby planets on the nav, you decided on Sorgan as your place to lay low. It was a rural planet, sparsely inhabited and undeveloped. Mando described it as “a real backwater skughole.” But there were some small settlements, so there would be food and fuel.

Your stomach gurgled loudly.

“I’m going to go eat,” you said, standing to leave the cockpit.

Mando, still holding the baby, stood to follow.

You moved toward the door just as Mando did the same, both attempting to walk through it together. He paused and stepped back, pressing himself against the wall as far as he could to let you by, gesturing you forward with his free hand.

Without thinking, you touched his arm lightly as you slipped past him in the tight doorway, and he flinched away, wrenching his arm back. You withdrew your hand quickly and looked up at him.

“Sorry,” he explained gruffly, visor tilted down at you. “Reflex.”

“I get it.”

He twitched his hand forward like he was considering reaching for you then decided against it, clenching it into a fist by his side.

You stood in the confined space for a moment, pinned by the mesmerizing void of his visor. Inches from your chest, he was so tall and imposing, somehow equally menacing and alluring as he towered over you. It was hard to ignore his intoxicating magnetism when you were this close to him.

He cocked his head the tiniest bit, and you realized, with a rush of embarrassment, that he was waiting for you to move.

Flustered, you turned and climbed down the ladder to find your pack. Mando followed and sat across the hull from you, after settling the kid into a makeshift crib—a storage box lined with blankets—on the floor beside his feet. He busied himself adjusting something on the complicated armor that covered his forearm, as you ate one of your ration packs.

You studied him as he worked. As far as you could tell—with the glaring exception of the presence of the child—Mando was the definition of a bounty hunter. He worked alone, and all he did was work.

He was clearly not used to casual, nonthreatening human contact, aside from that of the child.

You felt a deep, cutting sadness when you really pondered the solitude of his existence. The bulk of his interactions were violent confrontations. He had the child, but for how long? He seemed a recent acquisition. Did Mando have friends? When was the last time he felt at ease around another adult person?

When was the last time someone touched him, other than a bounty during a fight?

You’d been on the run for years and, at times, it had almost killed you—not the running itself, but the loneliness. No matter how much time you had to adjust, it remained a draining existence. You maintained only loose contacts and casual, fleeting relationships. How long had his life been exactly the same? Decades? Had he ever known anything different?

You looked down at the baby. The presence of the child spoke to the possibility that he at least wanted something different for himself.

The kid seemed to feel your gaze and turned his head to train his huge eyes on you. You smiled at him. He grabbed the edge of the box with his tiny three-fingered hands to haul himself over the side and toddled his way over to where you sat. He hugged your calf, looking up at you expectantly.

Mando was busy fiddling with the controls on his vambrace and didn’t notice.

“Can I?” You gestured down at the kid. Mando’s head flicked up.

“I guess,” he acquiesced hesitantly. He watched as you reached down to pick up the kid.

The baby settled happily into your lap, looking up to reach a hand toward your face. You met his hand with your own, and he was content to latch his little fingers around your much larger one and sit back. He babbled and wiggled the tiny green toes that poked out of the bottom of his outfit, which appeared to be made out of the altered sleeve of an old beige flight jacket.

Despite the fact that the child was more than happy cuddled in your arms, Mando was visibly uncomfortable. Abandoning his task completely, he sat forward with his elbows propped on his knees and watched you tensely.

He didn’t relax until you set the baby back down, turning him toward Mando, and he toddled his way back across the floor. Mando took the kid with him into his bunk when he disappeared to eat.

***

From the ship, Sorgan looked inviting: lush greens and blues, the landscape broken up by winding rivers. Clouds swirled across the atmosphere. Mando touched the Razor Crest down in a clearing of a pristine forest.

Mando wasn’t about to leave you behind with the kid—or with the ship, for that matter—so he informed you that the two of you would set out to the nearest village to find lodging, and he would leave the child behind. You understood that he didn’t have a lot of options, but leaving a toddler alone on a ship seemed like a terrible idea. You decided not to question it for the moment.

It was abundantly clear that Mando was accustomed to running the show and operating alone. He was used to making unilateral decisions...and that was going to have to change if the two of you were ever going to get to a place of easy coexistence. As someone who was also used to making unilateral decisions, you didn’t take well to being told what to do without even being consulted. You figured you’d give him some time to adjust to your presence before bringing this to his attention. You reminded yourself that this was a temporary arrangement.

Before leaving, Mando gave the baby a very serious, very stern talking-to about not touching anything and staying put. This was another instance that made it clear that he hadn’t been in charge of this kid (or any kid) for very long. You tried your best to conceal your amusement while Mando lectured the child. When he started to wag his finger dramatically to punctuate his points, you coughed to cover a laugh that escaped your lips.

As you both gathered what you needed in the hull, you asked, “How effective are your lectures usually?”

He let out a tired sigh, shoulders dropping slightly: “Not very.”

You laughed.

Sure enough, the baby shuffled up behind the two of you as the ramp of the ship lowered.

Mando looked down and sighed heavily.

“Oh, what the hell? Come on.” He strode forward decisively without a backwards glance.

You bent down to scoop up the child, not sure how Mando expected this tiny creature to keep up with his long strides, and followed Mando into the verdant forest.

***

The village was made up of a collection of circular wooden structures with pointed roofs. You ducked after Mando into the public house, the largest building in the small cluster. Good-natured conversation and the smell of something delicious permeated the air. You set the baby down on the floor to walk beside you.

A lothcat curled underneath a table hissed loudly at him as he waddled by, and he cowered in fear. You scowled at Mando, who didn’t react besides tilting his helmet down, and picked the child back up, patting him lightly.

“It’s okay, buddy,” you murmured reassuringly. Mando paused to watch you comfort the kid. You waited for him to pull the baby from your arms or say something to discourage you, but he didn’t. When you looked up at him, he continued forward to find an empty table.

Mando scanned the room carefully as he strode between the tables. You noticed an intimidating woman surveying him as he passed. You seated yourselves, and a woman in an apron approached with a friendly smile on her face.

“Welcome, travelers. Can I interest you in anything?”

“Bone broth for the little one,” requested Mando. Then he turned to look at you.

“One for me too, please.”

“Very well,” replied the woman.

Jerking his head towards the intimidating woman, Mando asked, “That one, over there—when did she arrive?”

The woman hesitated, and then said, “Uh, I’ve seen her here for the last week or so.”

“What’s her business here?”

You studied the woman in question, noting her piecemeal armor and tattoos. She looked like a war-hardened soldier.

“Oh, well there’s not much business in Sorgan, so I can’t say,” the server responded noncommittally. “She doesn’t strike me as a log runner.”

Mando reached into his belt and threw some credits toward her on the table. She brightened.

“Well, thank you, sir. I will get those broths to you as soon as possible, and I will throw in a flagon of spotchka for good measure. I will be right back with that.”

The server left, and the unobstructed view revealed that the woman he’d been asking about had disappeared.

Mando stood quickly.

“Stay with the kid?” he asked, looking down at you.

You hummed your assent, but he watched you for a long moment, as if assessing whether or not this was a safe idea. He was weighing the risk of leaving the kid with you against the risk of not neutralizing the possible threat of this stranger.

“I’m not going anywhere. We agreed to stick together for the time being, remember? Relax,” you assured him. It wasn’t much of a commitment, but what else could you say?

He nodded decisively and turned on his heel.

You and the kid watched him leave. The baby made a small whimpering sound as Mando disappeared through the curtain that hung over the exit.

You considered the baby as you waited for your food. He looked around, curiously taking in his surroundings.

What species is he? You’d never encountered anyone like him. Despite the fact that he was clearly a toddler, he looked a bit like an old man. And a tortoise? And maybe a frog? Whatever he looked like, he was really damn cute. Those big eyes and huge, expressive ears were undeniably adorable. You’d never felt a maternal instinct in your life, but in that moment, you wanted to pick him up and snuggle him again. You resisted the urge.

The server returned with two steaming bowls of broth and a flagon of electric blue liquor. The child immediately reached out for the broth, letting out a string of gibberish.

“It’s too hot. Let’s let it cool.”

He narrowed his eyes at you and let out a disapproving huff.

Despite his protests, you waited until the broth cooled a bit before setting it in front of him. He picked up the bowl and slurped happily.

You didn’t start to worry about Mando until you’d finished your own broth and the drink—you’d figured Mando wasn’t about to drink spotchka—and he still hadn’t come back. You scooped up the kid, who was still holding his little wooden bowl of soup, and slipped out the exit to look for Mando.

The loud sounds of a brawl made it easy to locate him.

He was locked in an intense hand-to-hand fight with the woman. They were both on the ground, Mando on top of her briefly until she used her strong legs to launch him over her body onto his back. He landed with a thud.

Ouch.

You set the baby down on the ground, but neither Mando nor the woman noticed. The two of them seemed fairly equally matched. To be safe, though, you eased your blaster out of its holster and held it loosely by your side.

Before you’d decided whether or not to intervene, the fight ended in a stalemate, both of them flat on their backs, having drawn their blasters simultaneously.

They panted on the ground, until Mando lolled his head to the side and saw you and the kid watching them, the baby slurping his broth loudly.

“You want some soup?” Mando deadpanned, looking up at the woman. You let out a sharp laugh at the unexpected question.

The tension dissolved, and they both brought their blasters back down to their sides.

You sheathed your blaster and offered Mando a hand, and—to your surprise—he took it without hesitation.

“Thanks for jumping in to help,” Mando grunted as he got to his feet slowly and dropped your hand to dust himself off.

“Hey, I was ready to step in,” you held out your blaster pointedly. “I probably wouldn’t have let her kill you.”

The woman chuckled as she straightened up then turned to walk back to the public house.

“Good to know,” retorted Mando, fixing you with an exasperated head tilt.

***

The four of you sat down together and talked for a while, sipping broth. Mando introduced himself to the woman, ignoring you and the kid. His manners seemed to come and go.

The woman shared that her name was Cara Dune.

“And who is this?” Cara inquired, eyebrows raised, looking from you and the baby to Mando.

Interested to hear how he’d explain your presence, you waited to see what Mando would say before answering.

“Long story,” replied Mando. Yep, that seems about right.

You introduced yourself, offering a fake name and sticking out a hand to shake Cara’s hand.

Mando’s head snapped to you: “You didn’t tell me your name.”

“You never asked,” you shrugged.

If Cara was confused that Mando didn’t know your name, she didn’t say anything about it. She shared that she had been a shock trooper in the Alliance, but she was trying to make a new life for herself, away from all that.

When she inquired, you shared a carefully curated set of details about yourself: born on Naboo, studied on Coruscant, now a freelance programmer with a diverse set of clientele and therefore stayed off the grid as a rule, with Mando at the moment to get from one place to the next and find more work—Sorgan was a temporary stopover.

You figured Mando didn’t love the idea of being described as a glorified taxi service, but it was better than disclosing the truth.

Mando leaned forward slightly and fixed you with his unwavering gaze while you spoke but questioned nothing. You knew he likely recognized the gaping holes in your story, considering he’d witnessed firsthand how well you could hold your own in a fight.

He shared little about himself, aside from the fact that he was in the Guild but not currently in pursuit of a bounty. Cara explained that she’d thought Mando was hunting her and that was why she reacted so defensively.

Understandable. That’s a much more reasonable reaction to his attention than flirting with him from afar liked I’d done in Nevarro. Whoops.

Finally, Cara stood: “Well, this has been a real treat, but unless you want to go another round, Mando, either you or I are gonna have to move on, and I was here first.” She turned to you and added: “You, on the other hand, are welcome to stay.” She winked at you and sauntered away.

You let out a surprised laugh, and Mando swiveled his head from Cara to you so fast, he probably tweaked his neck.

You couldn’t decide if it was hilarious or frustrating (probably both) that Cara had warmed to you over the course of a twenty-minute conversation while Mando remained aloof after more than twenty-four hours together.

Mando shook his head like he was willing away an unwelcome thought and leaned an elbow on the table: “Well, looks like this planet is taken.”

“Technically, that only applies to you.”

“You want to stay here?” There was a hint of unease in his otherwise even voice.

“No, Mando. You’re stuck with me for now, remember?”

“Right.”

You leaned forward and placed both your palms on the table: “But before we leave, I would like it on the record that I watched the kid for a full ten minutes without running away or harming a single hair on his wrinkly head.” You reached over to rub one of the child’s ears briefly, and he cooed up at you. “And I am electing not to ditch you and stay here with Cara even though she seems much more fun than you.”

A sound that might have been a laugh crackled through the modulator.

“So maybe you don’t have to breathe down my neck every second when we’re on the Crest?”

“You did almost let Cara kill me.”

You leaned back and laughed. “So, you admit it—you needed help.”

“No—I...That’s not the point.” You enjoyed how easy it was to agitate Mando.

“You’re right, it’s not. The point is that if I’m going to stick around for a while, you’re going to have to give me the benefit of the doubt. Otherwise, this doesn’t make sense.”

He hummed noncommittally and rested a hand on the tabletop, gloved fingers tapping out an erratic rhythm.

“I could have abducted the kid and stolen the Crest while Cara took her time kicking your ass, but I didn’t.”

“It sounds like you considered it.”

You rolled your eyes at him. “Mando.”

You fixed him with an impatient stare, and he met your look with his impassive visor.

You huffed, and letting the levity fall away, so he knew you meant it, you asked, “Maybe it would just be easier for me to find some other way out of here?”

His fingers stilled. “No.”

“Okay... so, you’ll lighten up?”

In a well-timed interruption, the kid quirked his head at Mando and let out a string of nonsense that had the upward cadence of a question.

“He’s wondering the same thing.”

The child stretched his arms out toward Mando and wiggled his fingers. “He just wants to be picked up.” Mando scooped him up and tucked him under his arm. “But, point taken. Let’s get out of here,” he said, lifting his hand to flag down the server.

Mando seemed surprised when you reached into your bag and pulled out a small pouch of credits to pay for the food. In reality, it was one of three that you had on you at the moment.

You were a professional at disappearing. You always had a blaster at your back, a knife on your belt, another knife strapped to your ankle, and plenty of credits on your person. Plus, the roughly hewn necklace tucked under your shirt looked unassuming but was worth a small fortune—though, you’d have to be in a really tough spot to ever consider selling it. You were used to leaving places at a moment’s notice. Being prepared for anything was your default state.

Mando should understand that better than anyone.

***

When you returned to the Crest, Mando mumbled something about routine maintenance and disappeared outside with a heavy metal toolbox in hand. The kid was asleep in Mando’s bunk, and you were sitting in the hull, reading about potential planets on your datapad, when you heard strange voices approaching.

Setting down your datapad, you stood and walked down the slope of the ramp at the back of the ship quietly. You peeked your head around the side, staying out of sight, and watched two men speaking to Mando’s back as he continued working at an open panel on the side of the Crest.

The men didn’t look threatening, and Mando was clearly unconcerned. You let out a breath you hadn’t realized you were holding.

“Our whole village chipped in,” explained one of the men, a touch of desperation in his voice. The other man, who had longer hair, held up a pouch of credits.

Mando turned to face them. “It’s not enough,” he answered simply.

“Are you sure? You don’t even know what the job is?” the man with short, curly hair continued.

“I know it’s not enough. Good luck.”

Rude.

The men were insistent, pleading. Mando’s harsh rebuff surprised you. He seemed to flip flop between being decidedly cold and cautiously warm with strangers, and right now he was the former. You weren’t fooled though. With a little more prodding, you were sure they’d convince him—well, you hoped they’d convince him to take the job and stay.

“This is everything we have. We’ll give you more after the next harvest,” promised the second man.

The side door of the Crest hissed loudly as it opened, and the two men jumped back in surprise. They looked at each other, resigned, when Mando walked up the ramp, ignoring them.

“Come on, let’s head back.”

No, don’t give up yet. He’s secretly soft. He adopts stray babies, protects complete strangers, and offers soup to people who have just thrown him on his ass!

They turned to leave, mumbling sadly to each other. You hurried back up the ramp to meet Mando in the hull. You stopped, settling your hands on your hips.

“What?”

“I mean... we were looking for a reason to stay, and they just gave us one. We were looking for a place to stay middle of nowhere... they just happen to live in the middle of nowhere...”

“Cara—,” he started.

“She seems like a reasonable enough person.”

He let out a long, dramatic sigh then turned to lean out the open side of the ship. “Where do you live?” Mando called after the retreating men.

One of them called, “On a farm. Weren’t you listening? We’re farmers.”

“You have lodging?” Mando clarified.

“Yeah, absolutely!”

“Come up and help,” he said to the men.

The two men paused when they saw you.

“Hi,” you greeted, turning to pull on your boots and grab your bag.

“Hello,” they both replied tentatively.

“She comes too,” Mando stated, jerking his head in your direction, as he began to pack up a chest of weaponry.

“Sure, that’s fine,” one of the men responded.

“And we have to make a stop.”

***

You waited with the two men—they introduced themselves as Caben and Stoke—at their speeder while Mando took the kid and tracked down Cara. They shared that they were krill farmers and needed help because Klatooinian raiders had been terrorizing their settlement.

Mando located Cara quickly, and they met you at the speeder, the back of which was full of weapons. You scooted over to make space for them as the speeder stuttered to life. It was cramped and when everyone was seated, your side was pressed into Mando, the kid settled on his lap.

Mando and Cara talked quietly while you laid your head back to watch the stars. You looked down when you felt something gently press on your thigh. The kid had climbed off of Mando’s lap and was looking up expectantly at you, as if asking permission to crawl into your lap.

You smiled at him and looked up at Mando, posing a silent question.

He nodded once, and you pulled the kid onto your lap. The baby cooed happily, wiggled around to get comfortable, and closed his eyes. You rested your head back again and let the movement of the speeder lull you into a light sleep.

Before you were totally out, you felt Mando adjust beside you, leaning back and stretching an arm over your head. Instinctively, you lifted your head so he could settle his arm down behind you, and you relaxed back so your cheek rested on his cold shoulder.

In a sleepy haze, you decided to capitalize on this opening and let your hand rest on the beskar plate covering his thigh.

***

You woke up when the speeder stuttered to a stop and opened your eyes, rubbing them in the brightness of the morning. You sat up and Mando did the same beside you, moving his arm from where it had been supporting your back. He hadn’t moved all night.

The scene before you was nothing if not idyllic: green and peaceful. Wind whispered through the tall grasses that lined the village, forming a natural buffer between the settlement and the forest. Circular wooden structures, the same pointed shape as the public house, were clustered at the middle of the clearing. Villagers, catching flopping blue krill in flat baskets, waded through square ponds that encircled the small community. Children giggled and called out, running toward the speeder.

“Well, looks like they’re happy to see us,” observed Mando.

“Looks like,” agreed Cara.

The children flocked toward you to see the baby in your arms, and you hopped down to greet them.

***

You spent the morning meeting people, learning the layout of the tiny village. The children took to the kid immediately, following you wherever you carried him. Apparently, Mando had accepted the fact that the child was safe with you because he didn’t object.

The gaggle of children showed you around excitedly, even demonstrating how to expertly sift krill from the ponds. They brought you to the long hall where food—stew and spotchka—was served. You sat on the ground outside, eating and enjoying the sun, with the children and the kid. They watched in enthusiastic disgust as the child caught and ate a live frog.

That afternoon, you and Mando followed the woman who introduced herself as Omera to your lodging. Though there did not seem to be an official leader of the small community, Omera clearly garnered respect. You watched as she gave easy instruction to those around her, and they complied reflexively.

She led you to one of the wooden buildings on the edges of the settlement. You noticed the way Mando stopped in the doorway to admire Omera as she raised a window covering and the afternoon light illuminated her beautiful face.

“Please, come in,” Omera invited warmly.

You set the baby on the ground, and he waddled a few steps before plopping down to lean against a crate, his eyelids heavy after a full morning of play.

“I hope this is comfortable for the three of you,” Omera continued. “Sorry that all we have is the barn. There is a spare crib for the child.” She gestured at a well-made looking crib. You wondered when the last time the child had slept in a proper bed was.

You picked him up from where he sat dozing on the floor and settled him into the crib.

You looked around the open space of the barn. It was clearly used for storage: it was lined with baskets, furniture, crates, fishing equipment, and more, but a large space in the center of the room was clear. You hadn’t considered until this moment that you might be sharing one room with Mando. Neither of you would be comfortable in these close quarters.

“Oh, we’re not—,” you started.

“This will do fine,” confirmed Mando, cutting you off mid-sentence. You looked at him out of the corner of your eye, surprised that he seemed okay with this sleeping arrangement.

“I stacked some blankets over here,” Omera pointed to a stack of quilts in the corner.

“Thank you. That’s very kind,” replied Mando as he turned to unstrap his rifle from his back.

A little girl crept up to the open doorway, looking down at her feet with her hands clasped behind her back. You recognized her from the gaggle of children. She was one of the quieter, shyer kids.

Mando, who was facing the back of the room, whipped around defensively at her movement. His hand hovered threateningly over his blaster.

The little girl gasped and jumped back, disappearing from view. Omera turned to follow her out the door.

You stepped toward Mando and put a steadying hand on his elbow in the space between his armor, drawing his arm away from his weapon. He looked down at where your hand gripped his arm.

“Are you okay?” you asked, under your breath.

He gave you a curt nod and exhaled loudly through the modulator.

You dropped your hand to your side when Omera returned, the little girl hugged tightly to her.

“This is my daughter, Winta,” she explained in her dulcet voice. “We don’t get a lot of visitors around here. She’s not used to strangers.”

Neither is Mando.

Mando stood awkwardly and said nothing.

“It’s nice to meet you, Winta,” you greeted gently. She smiled timidly against her mother’s stomach.

“These people are going to help protect us from the bad ones,” Omera said.

“Thank you,” replied Winta quietly.

“Come on, Winta. Let’s give our guests some room.” Omera took Winta’s hand and lead her away.

As soon as the two of you and the baby were alone, you turned to Mando. “How are we both going to sleep in here? You can’t sleep in your helmet.”

Mando stood frozen, staring at the doorway. He seemed not to have registered that you said anything.

“Mando?”

He turned to you. “I—uh, it’s fine. I didn’t want to inconvenience them any more.”

“But how is this going to work?”

“I can sleep in my helmet.”

“No way, that’s ridiculous. I’ll ask if I can stay with Cara.” You took a step toward the door.

He looked down at the floor. “I’d rather you stay here.”

“Ah...okay. I thought we were past the stage where you felt the need to babysit me,” you joked, hoping that wasn’t the reason for this.

“No. That’s not...” he started to explain but trailed off.

He rubbed the back of his neck uncomfortably, and, despite the prickle of irritation you felt at the confirmation of his mistrust, you felt compelled to fill the uneasy silence that followed.

Avoiding his gaze, you looked over to where the kid was snoozing in the crib. “It’s fine. I’m going to go out for a bit if you want to take it off now. I’ll let you know before I come back in.”

“Thank you.”

You dropped your bag onto a crate and slipped out of the room and into the soft sunlight that shone through the sparse clouds.

Unwittingly, Mando seemed to know how to give you just enough reassurance to keep you around and just enough doubt to keep you guessing about why you were here with him. He was holding you at arm’s length, but not letting you go.

The potential between you was as enticing as it was confusing.

The more time you spent with Mando, the more of a paradox he seemed to be. He was constantly torn between a need to be hard and his instinct to be soft. You had an inkling that at heart, he was soft through and through. How else could you explain the presence of the baby?

His literal and metaphorical armor were clearly worn out of necessity—for several reasons, you guessed: to be successful in a brutal profession, probably as a result of past trauma, and simply because life is just fucking hard. You barely knew him, but you couldn’t help but want to be someone with whom he felt comfortable letting his guard down.

You pushed these thoughts from your mind as you stepped into the dappled light that filtered through the canopy of the forest. You were happy to explore the woods on your own, enjoying the serene atmosphere and natural beauty. It had been a while since you’d been on such a lovely planet. It reminded you of home.

***

When you returned a few hours later, all the villagers were gathering around the barn where Mando and Cara stood on the porch. You walked up to join the crowd and Mando’s visor followed your movement. You smiled at him, and he looked away abruptly, turning to Cara. They exchanged a few words then Mando stepped forward to address everyone.

“Bad news. You can’t live here anymore,” Mando announced. He declared this in an infuriatingly neutral, straightforward way, the same way you’d tell someone there was going to be rain.

They must have seen the same tracks in the forest that I saw.

The villagers broke out in surprised chatter: “What?” “Why?”

Cara and Mando muttered to each other. You couldn’t hear what they were saying, but you hoped Cara was explaining how callous he’d sounded.

Cara started forward, “I know this isn’t the news you wanted to hear, but there are no other options.”

Despite her slightly better manner, the villagers broke out in angry protests again.

“You took the job!” Caben cried.

“That was before we knew about the AT-ST!” exclaimed Cara.

Your stomach dropped. You had hoped you were somehow wrong about what those tracks belonged to. It would take serious preparation to successfully take on a band of raiders and an Imperial walker.

“What is that?” asked Caben.

“The armored walker with two enormous guns that you knew about and didn’t mention,” said Cara indignantly.

That is a pretty important piece of information they had chosen to leave out.

More protests erupted. The villagers shouted pleas over one another. Mando was surveying the desperate villagers, saying nothing. You had a feeling that despite his initial refusal and these adverse circumstances, he would elect to help them anyways. Eventually one of the many heartfelt appeals was likely to sway him—listening to their pleading voices, you knew you would find it hard to refuse them.

Omera’s plaintive voice broke over the crowd, and you suspected she’d be the one to convince him.

“We have nowhere to go,” she entreated.

Mando met your gaze, where you stood silently at the back of the crowd. He cocked his head, and you knew what he was asking. You gave him an understanding smile, nodding your agreement. He bowed his head slightly in response.

You turned and walked away, not needing to hear the rest of the conversation to know that Mando had already decided to stay.

***

Chapter 4

#Tempered Glass #my writing #the mandalorian fanfiction #din djarin reader insert #the mandalorian reader insert #din djarin x female reader #the mandalorian x female reader #din djarin x f!reader #the mandalorian #the mandalorian fanfic #the mandalorian x f!reader #din djarin fanfiction

190 notes · View notes

infini-tree · 3 years

Note

Nodus Tollens?

obscure feelings drabble prompt meme | accepting

Nodus Tollens: The realization that the plot of your life doesn’t make sense to you anymore.

Comics made sense. Comics had clear good guys and bad guys. The solution-- more often than not-- was to beat the thing to next Tuesday, dust yourself off, and wait until another villain comes up or comes back.

He couldn’t exactly beat himself up-- not for lack of trying. That was literally one of the first things he did, after finding out, and all he got out of it was a tummyache.

He should have known better, but then again, he was Captain Underpants.

He also should have known better than to come back to this closet, but he kept on doing it.

Captain had initially come here to find potential evil schemes. And then he came here because it had vintage comics tucked away. Pretty soon, he was just hanging around this closet whenever it was his turn to talk. For one reason or another the man living in his head didn’t like this closet, if the layer of dust on the everything had anything to say about it. His bouts of spelunking for the mysteries within the small space flew under the radar.

Either that, or the man had decided to not say anything about it, which was unlikely from what he could glean from their interactions.

It was One Of Those Days, (aka: Raining). Principal had asked a question, which led him to remembering something he had found in the closet. Which then led him to holding this long-abandoned picture frame as gently as he could as if it would shatter. Between the cracked glass and his own super strength, the likelihood was pretty high.

The photo was old-old. It was yellowing, and in some cases fading. According to the sign, it was a class photo, if he couldn’t have figured it out by the gaggle of kids right next to the man.

And if he couldn’t have figured out that the man was the man in his head, then the sign helpfully named him.

Honestly, the second weirdest part was the hair. The hair was a surprise; it was slicked back, but it was clear from the gentle curls that refused to be tamed, that being straight wasn’t its natural state. Between his stiff posture and crooked smile, he was the picture of excited nerves. Or maybe just nerves?

Captain mirrored the smile on the man’s face. It settled more naturally on his face.

Panels, thoughts. He felt like he was getting somewhere. Panels. He traced a thumb on the edge of the frame.

Frame. It was framed. It had been important enough to be framed, and even if it was in the dust now, the man in his head had cared once, maybe. The evidence was there and was plain as, well. The smile on his face.

The dots were nearly connecting. He wasn’t built for this kind of thinking, but maybe, more importantly, more importantly--

“What kind of backstory did you have to turn up like this?” he said aloud, to the man in the picture.

The man in the picture did not answer. He figured that if he were to bring this up to the man in his head, then he would be just as silent on the matter.

In any case, he shouldn’t keep him waiting. Captain placed the photo back in the box and closed it and the door. He pushed himself off the ground into a hover before making his way back to where the cassette was.

(Benjamin Krupp woke up an hour later. It had been a simple enough question-- either the other guy was indecisive or and idiot, and frankly he wasn’t sure anymore.)

_____________

At some point in every kid’s life, their parents would feed them that whole trite ‘oh, you’re so special-- you can do anything if you put your mind to it’ speech that a good chunk of those snot-nosed brats had some delusion of grandeur. Not everyone can be an astronaut, or the president, or both and then some.

Those sorts of things needed to be tempered and quashed-- the sooner the better. Was it cruel? Maybe, but it was necessary. It had to be necessary.

The world must have some twisted sense of humor, then, to literally make him a superhero. Forced a superhero parody to pilot his body like a plaything, and bash his skull against whatever was attacking the school or Piqua at large or the world.

In one breath, Krupp was staring down pages of paperwork. In the next, his heart hammered in his chest from adrenaline. The pain shot through him a second later. A pair of footfalls were fast approaching him.

“Captain Underpants!” George yelled. “Are you alright?”

“Nope, try again.” He let out a hiss as he adjusted himself in the asphalt crater he found himself in. And failed.

The boys’ expression faltered and began to shift into something more awkward. They’ve been nothing but a terror to him his entire life, but something about the way they were wincing when they realized it was just him made his blood boil. Or crawl under a rock. One of the two.

“Oh, uh--” Harold started, unsure of how to breach the topic of switching him out again.

George was the quicker of the two and just brought his fingers together to snap.

In one breath, he was just outside the school. In the next, he was on the other side of the city. The boys were nowhere in sight, but with the way everything was quiet, it was safe to assume that whatever the other guy was fighting was defeated now. The rush that he felt when he came up last time was gone and spent, leaving him a husk with no pants.

Every little kid always dreamt of being important. To be the hero of their own story. And as someone who was shunted into that role, it was overrated. No one talked about the hours patching yourself up. No one talked about the night terrors of coming so close to dying.

There were two categories: the ones where he was gobbled up by a monster, or shot with something. Those were preferable. At least he knew what was coming in those dreams.

The alternative was the dreams where he would never wake up; the rest of the world was gone, and even without seeing it he knew that the other guy had just subsumed his role permanently.

(In some cases, was better at it than him.)

And when he was awake he still had to pay his mortgages. Run a school. Have adult responsibilities.

After what felt like hours of trudging and letting those thoughts loop into itself like a trail of wires, he was home. He was on autopilot at this point-- walk, bedroom, clothes, bed.

(Tonight there were no dreams, and he takes that small victory the next day.)

#edgewired #mellsian fanfics #captain underpants #sticky notes au #ask #me @ myself: stop thinking about teacher age krupp! stop thinking about teacher age krupp!#(took me long enough to put it into a fic proper lmao)#the second half i may retool later it feels so. scattered

28 notes · View notes

suckerforsmylex · 3 years

Text

Ripe Peach Pt. 9

Peaches was exhausted and despite her best efforts, fell fast asleep in the passenger seat of the speeding car, buckled up and naked, save for The Joker’s blazer. He had drained every last drop of energy from her and a wave unshakable sleepiness hung thick and heavy, until slumber finally enveloped her completely. It was as if he had given her a strong sedative, despite him swerving all over the road and driving with his usual, unfettered zeal. Each jerky motion felt like being rocked as she slept. Her sleep was so deep, that she eventually would only recall pieces of the night they returned to the hideout.

She heard the pop of the car door being opened as J came around to coax her out of it. She heard the clacking of his expensive dress shoes, and felt the cool marble on the pads of her feet as he led her, like a foolish girl who had drank too much, up the staircase. It smelled of summer lilac, honeyed peaches and amber in the expansive master bedroom, where Nico’s candles lay burning.

Instinctively, Peaches inhaled deeply as her nose grazed the inside of The Joker’s neck, his skin cool and smelling of gun powder and bergamot and musk. It was the only thing that woke her for more than a couple of seconds, her eyes darting over him and then getting heavy again as her grinned down into her soft, sweet face. She lay, seemingly lifeless, on the plush comforter beneath her, the silky pillow easing her into a peaceful and profound obscurity. And then she woke up.

Peaches eyes fluttered open to find herself in a pitch-black room. The candles that were previously burning, had been extinguished and the entire room was draped in heavy, black-out curtains. She lay in the opulent bed and stretched her entire body, starting from her toes, all the way to her outstretched fingertips and then sat up and flipped on a small lamp on the end table beside her. Immerging out of the indulgent coverlet, she found herself completely nude and illuminated by the soft light.

Rich, purple tapestries covered almost every surface, accented by gold-leaf and a perfectly polished marble floor. She tried to ascertain the time, but there were no clocks in the room. Her purse and wallet had been placed neatly on an adjacent dresser, alongside a bottle of fancy water, but she couldn’t find her phone anywhere. Peaches cracked the bottle open, chugged it greedily and then tip-toed out of the room. She wasn’t inherently sure why she was being so cautious; it just felt like the right thing to do. Now, the marble floor was bitterly cold against her bare feet as she walked softly down a dimly lit, extensive corridor, in the silky bedsheet she had slept in, to the nearest bathroom.

Unsurprisingly, the Joker had spared no expense in this in room as well, and it was a luxurious, spa-like experience once she entered. The entire hideout was an extravagant, Russian design and the bathroom not unlike the bedroom, was one of its jewels. The heated floor was a welcomed respite and led into a spacious room, complete with an enormous soaking tub and solid, gold fixtures against the marble ivory and gold covered walls.

She decided to take a long, hot shower and as she stepped inside the large compartment, she realized that it was probably half the size of her own apartment. Encased in thick tempered glass, the shower was equipped with wide, double rain shower heads, warm, wrap-around teak benches and what looked like a sound system or control panel. Every luxury soap, cleanser or moisturizer she could dream of, lined the walls and she exited, feeling fresh and smelling expensive. She wrapped herself in a fluffy “J” monogramed towel and went back into the bedroom to rummage through the drawers for something to wear.

Nico had prepared a couple of outfits just for Peaches, anticipating her stay and ensuring enough appropriate attire to not disturb the daytime help unless absolutely necessary. Peaches put on an oversized, long-sleeve, black, knit sweater, a pair of black panties and some long, black knee-high socks. She sat down and combed out her damp hair and tried to decide if she should go looking for him.

As she curled up on a sumptuous, violet chaise lounge, she started to ruminate on him, allowing her mind to wander freely and without judgment for the way he made her feel. She thought about the way his slick, chartreuse hair fell into his eyes when he got excited, and about how the dark ink of his tattoos contrasted beautifully against his near translucent skin. She thought about his long fingers, like that of a pianist, and felt overcome with hot emotion.

It was simultaneously sexy and embarrassing to think of him. Every interaction with The Joker had been lust-filled and tumultuous. He was able to completely exert his dominance and ownership over her and she couldn’t explain why. He was a criminal of the worst kind, yet it only served to turn her on even more when she thought about the things, he might have done and the crimes he might have committed.

Her whole body flushed as she thought about the previous night and how he’d ravaged her inside and on top of the car, amidst the passing cars on the highway. She thought about all of the things he said and did to her. She thought about the cane. These were things that she’d allowed and she was humiliated to admit to herself that she had enjoyed them. Not only had she enjoyed them, but she now found herself craving these things. Up until recently, her body was not a positive in her life. It was a sign of her failures or at best, a hope or an opportunity for improvement. The Joker left no room for any of those perceptions. His thoughts, words and actions took over everything he laid his stony blue eyes on, including her.

All that thinking had left her skin warm to the touch and she swallowed thickly, feeling thirsty and a little hungry. She tread softly, out of the room and downstairs, looking for the kitchen to get a glass of water and something to nibble on. The loft was enormous, quiet and dusky and she made her way through the living room gingerly, not wanting to knock over anything or walk into any walls. She peeked her head to the left noticing a glowing light, coming from beyond a closed door.

Turning the knob, she found a narrow stairwell and started to descend it, too curious to stop herself as her feet moved quickly down the glass stairs. The lights shone a bright blue as she continued down the spiral staircase and she finally stopped at the bottom to take in the enormity of the room. It was wall-to-wall steel, glass and equipped with a full sink, white countertops, rolling chairs, an examination chair and an immaculate, sparkling white floor. It was a sterile and cold environment. The table tops were filled with Bunsen burners, heavy beakers, flasks, test tubes and cylinders in various states of use. Adjacent to the tops were trays with forceps, scoopulas and stirring rods.

This was the Joker’s personal laboratory. Peaches walked around, hesitantly snooping, and reading the labels on the concoctions lining the walls. Countless injectables, pills and gasses, filled the sleek, meticulously labeled cases, penned with the names of poisons and weapons he had developed and tested himself here in the lab. She ran her fingers along the glass as she read the names to herself and walked along leisurely:

Smylex #3. Smylex Bombs. Joker Toxin. Joker Venom. Joker Gas #1. Acid Cheer. ‘Happy Gas.’

“Hello, my little peach. I see you’re busy putting your fingers in places where they don’t belong again.”

His voice was a dusky, velvety surprise and she jumped, shrieking and knocking into a wall of glass tubes, toppling them over and breaking them all over the pristine ground. “Oh my God J, I’m so sorry, I….I…was just looking for the kitchen and I…” The Joker stepped forward aggressively.

“What did you just call me?”

His eyes were cold as she stood there with her mouth agape. “Uhh...I’m sorry, Daddy? I meant to say Daddy.” He continued to stand there, glaring and breathing heavily and she quickly dropped down to her hands and knees to try to scoop up the glass. In her haste, she sliced a deep gash into her middle finger with a thick, broken shard. “Tssss…Ouch!” The blood spattered onto the floor and she quickly gripped the gash with her other hand and looked up at him with a worried look.

“Come and sit here, so Daddy can patch you up.”

He stood there, next to a leather examination chair and patted the seat firmly. Peaches gulped and scooted into the chair, drinking him in as he turned to open a first aid kit and get out the necessary bandages and antiseptic. He was dressed in his usual kind of attire, a white button down, dress pants and those expensive shoes she adored, with the usual, slicked back hair, however his gold chains were tucked and his shirt was buttoned to the top. He wore a white lab coat, thick black glasses and purple latex gloves. He rapidly turned to face her and when he caught her looking at him, he grinned wide and gave her a devilish grin until she blushed profusely.

“Give me your hand, naughty girl.”

She extended her hand reluctantly, revealing that the fresh cut was deep and still producing droplets of deep, red blood. Without a word, The Joker inserted her finger into his mouth, suckling the blood off of it slowly. She instantly gasped and squeezed her eyes shut, overwhelmed by the feeling of the pink muscle against her injured digit. Encouraged by her reaction, he ran her entire hand under the faucet of the lab sink, never taking his eyes off his task, even as Peached watched him intently. He lathered her hand up with soap and carefully rinsed it off, drying it with a hand towel.

“This is going to sting, baby,” he said, with a wide grin that reached his bright eyes.

He took a cotton ball steeped in alcohol and pressed it into her raw wound, rubbing up and down, with an aggressive motion. “Owwww!” Peaches let out a helpless whimper as her nipples hardened beneath her sweater and then he was blowing cool air on her finger; his crimson lips pursed, as his eyes bore into hers. Lastly, he rubbed an ointment onto the cut and wrapped a bandage around it.

“What do you say peaches?” The Joker chided, as he smoothed the band-aid onto her finger with his thumb. “Thank you, Daddy.” Peaches blushed again as she thanked him and as she did, he gripped her chin in his palm and places a series of kissed on her open mouth. Suddenly, J slammed his fist on a button she hadn’t seen before and her embarrassment and arousal turned to sheer terror as metal clamps rose out of the chair at the ankles and wrists and bound her to it, fastening her in, helpless and confused.

“What are you doing?!” Her eyes darted around the room and she plead for him to respond as he paced towards the case with the toxins inside of it and removed a vile of Smylex #3 and a syringe. “Daddy, please, please, please! I’m sorry! I won’t break any more of your things again. Please, I’ll do anything you ask!” The very last statement made The Joker lift his head and throw it back on his shoulders as her began laughing maniacally. The sound of his cackle reverberated against the walls as her entire life flashed before her eyes.

He began drawing a quantity of the Smylex formula in the needle, stopping to show her his metal-toothed grin, as a green bead of toxin dribbled from its tip.

Was I just a toy for him to play with? Am I just an experiment? Oh my God he’s going to kill me!

Peaches gripped the arms of the chair as he wiped her inner arm down with alcohol, and then injected the needle rapidly, drawing the plunger out and then pushing it back down, until all the Smylex was discharged.

“Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha!”

11 notes · View notes

raidbossmadi · 3 years

Text

People Like Us : Chapter 12

Chapter 12: Night Out

Previous Chapter: here

The smell of cologne and weed alerted Sloane to Troy’s presence before the door of the technical could even open. The priest who had opened the door and led her there in the first place bowed and offered her a hand as she stepped up to the technical, these vehicles, aside from Tyreen’s personal technical were not designed with shorter people in mind. She thanked stars above that the ‘fancy’ clothing Iris had delivered to her room for this outing consisted of a mint green blouse and black slacks, she could only imagine making a fool of herself trying to get in and out of Troy’s technical in a skirt.

The God-king gave a short chuckle as she clambered into the seat next to him before he took another drag of the blunt in his hand. He offered it to her as he coughed into the furred collar of his vest.

Sloane took it looking at it rather quizzically, of course she knew Troy smoked, it was hard not to know. She however, had never seen the appeal, she’d read a lot about getting stoned but never could bring herself to do it.

“Go ahead, take a drag.”

“I uh, I’ve never done this before.” She admitted sheepishly.

“What? Really!? Not even to spice up that drab little shack in the woods.”

She shook her head.

“Alright, don’t worry I can teach you Slo, I’ve got plenty of experience.”

He mimed holding the joint and brought his fingers up to his lips and winked at her. She got the hint and took the joint to her lips.

“That’s it, breathe in.”

She did, the new taste and flash of heat as the smoke sucked into her mouth startled her but Troy held up a hand.

“No no, hold it, you gotta let it get in your lungs.”

After fighting the initial desire to spit out the smoke she held it in for as a few seconds longer than she thought she would manage before she doubled over herself coughing.

“See, you did fine? First hits a bit rough yeah, but you’re over that hurdle now. Wasn’t so bad was it?” He placed the joint in the ashtray and offered her a water bottle which she drank from greedily. “Like all things, it just takes practice.”

“Where are we going tonight? The Priest who fetched me didn’t mention anything in particular.” It was peculiar for her not to be briefed on where they were going and the fact that they were dressed down despite this being a date made her wonder what Troy had up his sleeve.

“A place where the sun does not shine. You don’t have to worry about anything tonight, it’ll all stay between us.”

“Oh poetic, but not what I asked.” She snorted as she took a cursory glance out the window. The cathedral was just a small speck on the horizon now and she realized this was the farthest she had been on Pandora. The Cathedrals' ever looming shadow over Temple town seemed so comforting compared to the harsh sunlight that shone over the barren desert.

“We have a settlement in the western desert, it’s picked up the name Scrapburg. It's where the rest of the engineers live when they’re not on assignment at the cathedral or deployed at an outpost. A bunch of my people live there actually. It’s not like Temple town, or the Cathedral, you’ll see. I think you’ll like the place.” Troy explained and patted her knee before awkwardly letting his hand rest on her thigh. She let it stay there, the willing contact with him appreciated.

The rest of the ride was mostly silent save for the sounds of the wheels as they bounced over the uneven surface of the desert. It wasn’t for lack of things to talk about, Sloane was buzzing with things she could say, but given this was a date she figured it better to save that for when they got to their destination. She had however kept her eyes on him for the rest of the drive not even noticing that they’d stopped until the door opened, their driver bowing to his gods before he spoke.

“Meet you here at the arranged pick up time, my liege?”

“That’s right, and don’t make us wait. You know how much of a pain in the ass it is to get through Cathedral gate at peak hours, even for us.”

Troy hooked his arm around Sloane’s waist, he led her away from the technical and through the gate. It was then that she got her first good look at the city proper. It was different from Temple Town in every conceivable way, where Temple Town was ever changing and movable Scrapburg immediately gave off the aura of permanence.

Instead of ramshackle buildings and tent camps,there were well built almost metropolitan buildings. They still had the typical Pandora flare but she had never expected something like this compared to the CoV capital. Solar panels were affixed to roofs and dust shields were installed on the balconies she could see.

The streets were covered by colored tapestries which she presumed were also to keep the sandstorm from buffeting the people who traveled. There were no cars, only carts pulled by large Skags and the occasional Motorbike. A bell tolled in the distance and she watched as people on the street stopped, others coming out onto their balconies and the sound rang through the city. Troy however did not stop instead speeding up his stride.

“Troy you’re gonna trip me, I can’t keep up!” Sloane protested.

“I was hoping we could avoid the attention, guess I should have known better than to send word. Even if that word was explicit, I did not want to be bothered tonight.” She could hear his fangs pressing against each other as he finished speaking, his agitation palpable in the air.

“Lord-Father Troy, how honored we are to be in your presence again.” A red cowled figure stepped out from the alley way, moving far too smoothly for a normal human.

It was only once the man was standing in front of them that his strange movements made sense. In the place of legs the heavily robed figure had four insectoid robotic limbs; two facing the front, two facing back. His right hand was also replaced with a robotic prosthetic that looked more like sleek black bone than the hulking form that hung off Troy.

“High Priest Deimos, I quite remember being very clear in our communication about tonight.” Troy glowered at the man.

“Forgive me for the intrusion Lord-Father. I was hoping I could escort you and the Verdant Lady to your residence.” Deimos said his fingers nervously bounced off each other as he spoke.

“We’re a bit busy for small talk.”

“It’s a ten minute walk my God-King, I won’t be burdensome for long. You can’t deny it’s been a fair while since we’ve spoken face to face, judging mother keeps you away from us.”

The more Sloane watched Deimos the more she realized he was more machine than man, a shift of his robe revealing a pump and tank system where his digestive system ought to be. She supposed that those who worshipped Troy would be more open to body modification but she couldn’t imagine casting away her organs for mechanical replacements.

“Fine.”

Deimos reached for Sloane’s hand only for Troy to swat it away with his prosthetic. The force behind the swipe reminded her just how easily he could crush someone with a flick of his wrist, he didn’t even need a weapon.

“And Sloane stays with me.”

“My apologies Lord-Father. I did not mean any offense.”

“Don’t get me wrong Deimos. I appreciate the hard work you all do, but Sloane and I are on a tight schedule. It was hard enough to convince Tyreen to let us have the night out.”

Troy and Deimos continued their back and forth of annoyance and platitudes as they walked Sloane tuned it out for the most part. She instead watched the street as they walked. She couldn’t recall ever seeing children in Temple Town but here she caught sight of more than one child being ushered to bow their heads like their parents before them as they walked past.

The filtered sunlight gave their procession a more somber feeling, especially as smoke from freshly lit censers wafted into the street. A bell tolled as they approached the steps she assumed belonged to the city hall. Troy released his grip on her hand and took a step forward, obscuring her slightly. Her gaze moved to the crowd that gathered at the foot of the steps.

She noted that those who had gathered seemed to be more calm and relaxed than the crowds that gathered to meet them in the great wandering city. That most of them seemed to have cybernetic parts which made sense, given Troy’s own disability it would make sense that his town would be made of people like him.

So wrapped up in taking in the foreign city’s spectacle she almost didn’t notice the men had stopped walking before she felt the tug of Troy’s grasp as she walked out of range.

“Uhh Pandora to Sloane, didn’t you hear me? We’re here.” Troy said an amused smirk pulled at the corner of his cheeks.

She looked up at the skyscraper that climbed greedily for the heaves. “Wow, sure is big.”

“Only the best for a god am I right?”

She snorted and nudged his arm with his shoulder. “Oh definitely. Totally not letting anyone think you're compensating eh.”

Troy turned red around the cheeks before he turned back to Deimos. “Well go on then you bucket of bolts get out here. And tell Phobos I’m expecting his report on my desk in the morning.”

The priest tapped his mechanical legs against the asphalt nervously before nodding emphatically. “By your will be done.” The priest skittered away back the way he had come before Troy’s temper could flare.

“Compensating, really Sloane? I could have any person in the CoV if I wanted, think I need to compensate to get that?” He was back to his jovial mood like someone had flipped a switch.

“I’m just saying it’s a big tower is all.”

“I like the view. Now, you coming in or shall we spend the night looking at my big tower?”

Sloane playfully rolled her eyes before she took his hand again.

The inside of the building was fairly standard for CoV buildings, the inverted vault symbol hung over the reception desk between two graffitied eyes. On the far wall a copy of Troy’s stained glass window from the Cathedral bathed the lobby in warm tones.

Troy did not acknowledge the receptionist simply strolling on by to the elevator. He placed his hand on a bioscanner located beneath the call button and a soft hum emitted from it before the ding of the lift's arrival cut through the otherwise silent lobby. The moment they stepped into the elevator and the doors clicked shut the atmosphere tangibly changed, Troy relaxing much the way he had been in the technical.

“I’m sorry about all that, I just wanted to get you here without being mobbed by followers who would want to meet you and ask fifty questions a piece. Tonight’s about relaxing and that’s what it’ll be from this moment on.” He smiled one of his warm and genuine smiles, unlike the smirk he used when dealing with followers this one went up to his eyes and softened his features. Sloane had come to relish seeing it in her few months among the twins.

They stepped out of the lift immediately into a fancy penthouse suite. Again it had all the design choices that made it read as Troy’s space, from the organized chaos to the books left turned over to hold their place.

“Are you hungry? Thirsty? Tonight’s about you and I and nobody else so just tell me what you want.” He said hanging his vest over a chair as he went about the steps of removing his prothesthic. If they were going to have a cozy night in he needed to be comfortable.

“Yeah I’m starving, I haven’t eaten since Juniper brought me lunch.” She agreed, they hadn’t been gone from the cathedral more than a few hours yet it felt like ages ago now.

Troy turned to head into the kitchen when something caught Sloane’s eye. A black rectangular shaped box with a pair of controllers sat on top of it.

“Is that a Flaystation?” She asked her head tilted like a curious puppy as she spied it.

“Fuck yeah it is, we can play a game once we eat.” He reassured before he continued his quest to the kitchen.

Sloane made herself at home like Troy had suggested and plopped herself down on the plush sofa in front of the television. She was slightly surprised when a helper droid came out of a hole in the wall much like the ones back at the Cathedral. It pushed her shoes back over by the front door after she took them and returned shortly with a folded blanket on its head offering it to her.

She must have dozed off as the next thing she knew Troy was prodding her side. “Hey, hey! Dinner’s ready, sleepy head.”

She blinked awake and saw him grinning far too widely as he looked down at her curled up on the sofa. The same kind of look he gave when he had something up his sleeve in their game of bunkers and badasses, a genuine Troy smile.

Troy ran through his games library while they ate, pointing out the games he thought she would like. She was pleasantly surprised when he got it right, though they had spent months hanging out, doing their jobs, and sleeping in the same bed it had always felt like something they’d done out of obligation. When Troy had broken down the night of her coronation she had been caught off guard that she was so trusted and even now on an actual date with him it was only just clicking that he saw her for who she really was.

After a few hours of gaming, during which Sloane learned that Troy had taught himself to use a Flaystation controller with his feet which she found very impressive, the nature sire found herself yawning again. She leaned into Troy’s side, her head rested against the curve of his rib cage.

“It’s been a good night.” She sighed a content smile on her face.

“It has, I’m glad you enjoyed yourself. I did too.” He paused and took a deep breath before his hand came up and caught her under the chin, he gently tilted her head up to look him in the face.

“So, you think we can uh, make it official then. I know we’re in a weird situation where like we’ve been doing stuff couples do but it’s just been professional. I’ve really come to care for you these past months Sloane, more than I have anyone else. I would be honored and humbled to call you my girlfriend.”

Sloane’s face went red with blush as he spoke. “I would love to be your girlfriend Troy.”

She stretched up to meet his lips though she only stayed for a moment. As she pulled away she blinked in surprise as a thought registered with her.

“Holy fucking shit that was my first kiss.”

“Wait really?! Well…. it won’t be your last.”

She gave him a playful shove giggling as she did so. Her time away from Eden-4 had in general felt dreamlike and unreal if she thought about it too hard. Now however she found herself hoping that if truly was a dream that she would never wake up.

“So what changes at home? Is there anything I need to avoid doing around other people or something?”

Troy’s face steeled and his eyes darkened. There was an uncomfortably long pause between them before he spoke his voice had a hard edge, the kind that came with experience behind it and frightened her a bit.

“Tyreen cannot know. Not yet. Keep your head down, act like nothing changed unless we’re in private. I’ll handle it when the time comes.”

#Borderlands 3 #Troy Calypso #Tyreen Calypso #Borderlands #Sloane the Siren #People Like Us #My writing #My Hcs

10 notes · View notes

poetryinmotion-author · 4 years

Text

Refresh: A Mandomera One-Shot

Hi, all! As promised, here’s the beach day one-shot inspired by the flashback in Chapter Seven of Sanctuary. It takes place after “Bonds” in The Journey On, if you’re wondering about timeline stuff. (This got way longer than I thought it would, lol)

If you’d prefer to read it on AO3, here’s the link! https://archiveofourown.org/works/25754674

Warnings: None!

Tags: Fluff, so much fluff, flirty mandomera, day at the beach

As Din guided the Crest to a landing, he looked over the planet below with satisfaction. So he wasn't remembering with rose-tinted glasses; the sea really was that blue, that sort of blue that hardly seemed real—the kind of blue that looked like it had been painted on a canvas with freshly-mixed pigments, a fresh, vibrant cerulean, not yet dry. It hadn't changed a shade in the years since he saw it for the first time as a child. Finally—something that stayed untouched by the wars.

From where he sat on Din's lap, the child practically vibrated with excitement, and from behind him in the passenger's seat, Winta gasped.

"That's where we're going?"

"Sure is. Unless, of course, you want to turn around and find somewhere else."

"No!" she giggled as she slid out of her seat and leaned on the control panel to get a better look at the ocean below.

This little excursion had been her idea—or, at least, she had inspired it. A day or so 0ago, she'd been struck with an episode of homesickness. The thing she fixated on, the thing she said she missed the most about Sorgan, was going swimming with her friends at a nearby lake. Din had seen it, and could hardly have even called it a lake. It was a small pond, hardly bigger than a puddle. Idyllic, quiet, save for the croaking of some frogs. Small. With a sly grin, Din asked if she had ever been swimming on a proper beach by a real sea.

And now, the sea was so close they could practically smell the salt air through the transparisteel of the window.

The view became partly obscured with sand kicked up by the Razor Crests's engines as Din set them down. The second the ship was stable, Winta whipped around and scrambled down to the hold, gone before Din even had a chance to stand. The baby only fed off of his older sister's energy, and it was all Din could do to keep him from wriggling out of his arms and tumbling down the hatchway.

Winta’s outer dress flew across the hull as she bolted toward the door in her underdress, nearly bowling over her mother in the process.

“Hey!” Omera called after her, pointing to the discarded clothes. “Where do your clothes go, young lady?”

From his vantage point, Din could have sworn he saw Winta roll her eyes, but he decided not to bring it up as she trudged back over to where her dress had landed and flung it into the designated bin.

“That’s better. Now, how about you come help me carry some of this?”

Dutifully, Winta picked up the blanket that Omera had laid out on the bed and ran back to the door. Omera, for her part, looked frazzled, balancing a basket on her hip and a bag with toys in her other hand. She cast her eyes to and fro around the hull, making sure nothing was forgotten, and listed off everything they needed under her breath:

“Food, towels, extra clothes, drinking water, toys, do I have the toys—?”

“Winta,” Din said, “take your toys from your mother.”

Din was now absolutely certain that Winta rolled her eyes—and this time, it was accompanied with a frustrated sigh. But as Omera opened her mouth to correct her, Din stepped in.

“Excuse me?”

Immediately, Winta’s face fell, and her eyes grew wide. He didn’t do it often (and he thanked the ka’ra that Winta was so well-behaved), but when he pulled That Tone—the lower, firmer tone of voice that felt far different than the one he usually reserved for his family—she always knew, without having to have it explained, that she had crossed a line.

“Come here. Now.”

Lowering her eyes, Winta put her arms behind her back and crossed to Din, who knelt to her level and set the child on the floor.

“Winta,” he said, “I know you’re excited to get out there, but you do not disrespect your mother and I like that. Ever. Understood?”

“Yes, Dad.”

“Good,” Din continued, putting a hand on Winta’s shoulder and clearing the cloud from his voice. “We’re going to have a good day, aren’t we?”

The clouds cleared from Winta’s face too as she nodded and met his eyes behind his visor.

“Now take the toys from your mother and wait. We’ll get out there in a minute.”

“Okay!” she chirped as she took the bag from her mother’s hand and bounded back to the door—albeit with a much less impatient attitude.

Omera, meanwhile, turned to Din with a mix of gratefulness and surprise.

“Nicely handled,” she said.

“Thanks. I figured—” Din eased the basket from Omera’s begrudgingly relenting grasp, “You had enough going on. Do we need anything else?”

“I don’t think so,” she said as she hoisted a bag onto her shoulder. “I’ve got the clothes here, and…”

Finally having a clear moment to think, Omera gave Din a once-over.

“Are you going to keep the armor on?”

Din sighed as he considered. Wouldn’t it be nice to sit in the sand, let the sun hit your skin, feel the breeze across your face...sneak in a kiss every now and then? And, more practically, won’t it be hot? You’ll roast in here.

But in the end, prudence won out.

“Can’t be too careful,” Din replied. “This place isn’t exactly remote. There might be other people around.”

To Din’s relief, not even a shadow of disappointment crossed Omera’s face. No matter how many times she expressed it, her acceptance still had the power to take him by surprise.

“All right, then,” she said. “Shall we?”

The little squeal that both kids let out was too good to resist.

“Hmm…” Din teased, “I think maybe we should wait for a few more minutes.”

“Nooo!”

A laugh rumbled out of Din’s chest.

“You don’t think they’re excited, do you, cya’re?”

Omera’s hand smacked genially against his chest plate as she joined in.

“Din, I think if we wait any longer, they’ll break down the door themselves.”

As if to confirm that theory, Winta pounded her feet against the floor and jumped in the air, letting out a high giggle.

“Well, we can’t have that, can we?”

The minute the hatch was flat against the sand, Winta flung herself out of the Crest as if she hadn’t seen sunlight in weeks.That enthusiasm was immediately tempered as her bare feet met the sun-heated sand. She high-stepped back to the ship, a constant stream of "hot hot hot hot hot" spilling out of her mouth. Bashful, she looked up at Din.

"Daddy? Could you maybe…"

Without even letting her finish, Din bent and scooped Winta up, flipping her upside-down over his shoulder and hooking her knees around his forearm as she shrieked with laughter.

"Like this?"

"No!"

"How about…" Din maneuvered Winta to his front, then hefted her onto his shoulders with a grunt. "This? You good?

He felt pressure on the top of his helmet and knew Winta was leaning on his head.

"Yup! Let's go!"

With that, the clan of four stepped out into the sunlight. The ground sank under Din's boots, and he was instantly reminded of how hard it was to move with any urgency in the sand. Sand drills had always been his least favorite during his training, where not only did he have to wear full gear, but he also had to carry a 200-pound weighted bag on his back. But the awed gasp that came from the girl on his shoulders pulled him back to the much-preferable present.

After a minute, they found a suitable spot to set up for the day—a tree a little further out from the line of the sparse forest bordering the beach. After setting Winta down, Din directed her to lay out the blanket, which, when the wind kicked up, required all three of the humans to do. Even the baby put his little hands on an edge, trying to help. Thinking quickly, Omera pulled a few supplies from the basket Din had placed before them and set them in the corners, weighing it down. After laying down a few ground rules, Winta was finally set loose. Din's heart lifted in his chest as he watched her dance across the sand and make her first contact with the ocean, gasping with delight and surprise at the coldness.

The baby, too, started to move toward the water, but Omera caught him in her arms—much to his adorable chagrin.

"No, no, sweetheart," she said to the baby. "Not 'til I can be with you."

Din waved her off.

"Go on. I'll sit here."

Omera fixed him with a raised eyebrow.

"Din, this was your idea. And I want you to enjoy it as much as we do."

"Cyar'ika," Din replied as he grasped one of her hands in his, "just watching you and the kids is more than enough for me."

"Well, it's not for me. I want you to take off those boots and your shin guards and come to the water with us. Surely," she added, "if someone were to attack us, they're not going to go for your knees."

As if hearing the conversation from where she stood, Winta looked back and beckoned to Din.

"Come on, Daddy!"

A knowing smirk spread across Omera's lips.

"Are you really going to say no to her?"

Din let out a sigh—a long, conceding sigh. Then he knelt and started on his bootlaces.

He imagined he looked absurd. The torso of a fully-armored Mandalorian warrior, perched on top of two legs, bare from the knee down—he was certain anyone who might come across them would do a double take. But, to be honest with himself, he really didn't care. The beaming grin from his daughter, the delicate fingers laced with his, the baby boy trying to launch himself from his mother's arms and into the sand—that was all that mattered.

Din sucked a breath through his teeth as his feet hit the water. Despite the heat streaming from the sun, the water was somehow still freezing. But Winta had already gotten used to it, and was wading even further into the increasing waves.

"Not too far, sweetheart!" Omera called after her.

Winta turned back and waved at them.

"Daddy! Come play with me!"

"Coming, ad'ika."

The crystal-blue water surged around his ankles, then around his knees, then up to his thighs. Winta stood practically waist-deep, her underdress becoming absolutely soaked. Din was hit with another memory, one from the last time he was here as a child with his father—one which he decided, with a mischievous chuckle, to recreate.

"Hey, Winta," he said, "hold your breath."

Obediently, Winta sucked in an enormous gulp of air and held it. Din watched the waves as they approached, waiting…waiting...just the right moment—

Din thrust his hands under her elbows, bodily lifted her from the water, and tossed her into the oncoming wave as it rolled by.

For a second, Winta disappeared in the surf. Then, she sprang back up, gasping and shaking the water out of her now-soaked curls.

"What was that for?"

"Was it fun?"

"Yeah!"

"That's what it was for. Want to do it again?"

Instead of waiting for Din to pick her back up again, she watched the next wave as it approached and jumped into it, letting it carry her back to her dad as she resurfaced.

"Careful, love!" Omera had appeared next to Din, a line of worry appearing between her brows. Din's hand slipped into the small of her back and rubbed small circles there.

"She'll be fine, Omera," he comforted, "We're right here, and if something happens, we can get to her."

The almost hysterical, breathless laughter as Winta surfaced once again relaxed Omera's shoulders, and released the breath she'd been holding.

A complaint from the baby on her hip—he clearly felt left out, with his face fixed in a pout. Din reached out to take the baby and held him aloft, just above the water.

"Ready, kid?"

To the baby's delight, Din lowered him, splashing his little legs in the water. He squealed like Din had never heard before, and if his ears could go any higher, Din was sure that they'd be on the top of his head.

Din glanced beside him to gauge Omera's reaction. But Omera seemed to have drifted into her own mind. Her face had slid into a blissful idyll, and her hands skimmed across the water, rising and falling as the waves did, as her breath did. And it occurred to Din that he hadn't seen Omera truly unwound in weeks. A pang of guilt struck in his gut. How long had they been traveling? How long would she have to wait before he gave her a place to not just live, but to thrive—to finally be at ease again? And for the first time, Din almost considered that it may have been better to have left her and the kids on Sorgan. At least there, they'd be safer, they'd be with friends, and they—

A hand found the gap beneath his back plate. Her hand. With knowing tenderness, she worked at a knot that had formed there, the process aided by the coolness that came from the sea around them.

"We needed this."

They would find it. Din watched as a moment of light unfolded around him, all laughter, joy, ease of mind. Wherever they went, Din vowed, he would always find his family a glint of light.

"Yes," he replied. "Yes, we did."

/////

Din groaned in relief as his helmet fell into his hands and the aircon in the Razor Crest made contact with his face. He shivered as a drop of sweat, suddenly freezing cold, trickled down his neck.

“I don't know how you do it.” Omera shook her head and took the helmet from his unresisting hands, setting it on a nearby crate.

Din peeled off his gloves and tossed them next to the helmet. The abrasive cotton of his cape scraped against his hands as he dried them off.

“Sometimes, I don't know, either.”

Omera slipped her fingers under the edge of the base plate of one of Din's pauldrons and lifted. The more surface area that emerged from under the armor, the more he realized just how thoroughly he loved the cold as it breathed against his soaked underclothes. In this moment, if he never saw another desert, or even a particularly sunny day on an otherwise temperate planet, he would be perfectly satisfied.

He reached up to remove his chestplate, but Omera had already unfastened it. In almost an instant, it fell into her hands, and she set it carefully next to the rest of his armor.

“You're getting good at this,” he quipped as he fought the urge to wink. But from the way Omera's lips tilted, he knew she detected the affection under his tone.

“Well,” she replied as she pulled Din's cape over his head, “I would prefer if you didn't get heat stroke. And the best way to prevent that is to get all these layers off—as quickly as possible.”

The flush that spread across the bridge of Din's nose was no longer just from the heat.

“Right,” she continued, “to the fresher with you.”

“No. Take care of the kids first.”

“They'll have their baths later. In case you haven't noticed, they're a bit worn out.”

A long day out in the sun had proven to be as effective as a tranquilizer for getting the baby, and even Winta, to go down for a nap without even having to be tucked in. With a chuckle, Din noticed that Winta hadn't even bothered to take off her shoes before crawling into the berth, cuddling the child in next to her.

“Maybe we should get the baby into his crib.”

“Or,” Omera insisted, gently poking a finger into his chest, “I'll get the baby to his bed while you get cleaned up.”

Din feigned offense.

“Am I really that bad?”

A sly grin tugged at Omera's mouth.

“Din, my love, I would never lie to you. So believe me when I say...yes. Yes, you are that bad.”

The giggle lying beneath her teasing intensified as Din took her hips in his hands, leaned in, and burrowed his face into her neck, kissing her just to try and earn more of that laughter.

"Stop it! Stop it!" she giggled even as she pulled at his flak vest.

Obliging and faking innocence, he pulled back and met her eyes.

"Why ever would I do that, cyar'ika?"

"Because," Omera laughed as she patted his shoulders for emphasis, "you're smelly and sweaty and—"

She couldn't continue. Din was kissing her face too much for that. Her fingers curled into his hair as she encouraged him and retaliated with a few choice kisses of her own.

His fingers hit a spot on her bare shoulder and she drew a sharp breath. For a second, Din pulled away.

"A little sunburnt, my love?" he said as he brushed a feather-light kiss against it.

"Worth it."

"You should get some bacta on it," he said, turning toward the crate with the medical supplies. But Omera stopped his arm.

"Maybe...you could help me with that."

Din felt the flush in his face, and felt sure he was glowing like the lights on the Crest in the darkness of space. And again, just as he turned toward the medical crate, Omera pulled his attention back to her.

"On one condition."

Din slipped into his negotiation voice.

"Name it."

"You." Omera planted her hands on his shoulders. "Go." She turned him toward the refresher. "Bathe."

Din had never been so fast in the refresher in his life.

#the mandalorian #clan djarin #clan djarin series #mandalorian #mandomera #mando x omera #din djarin x omera #din djarin #omera #winta #baby yoda #a day at the beach #star wars fanfiction #star wars

19 notes · View notes

everythingoesnk · 4 years

Text

Blockbuster

summary; john ruins your brother’s wedding by getting into a disagreement bc he’s very passionate about his ideals. cliché of getting trapped inside the elevator.

word count; 904

disclaimers; short but i hope you find it good

********

“You’re a pig”

You wriggled past John with an obvious grimace spread on your face and made your way to the lift, ignoring entirely whether he followed you in or not.

Obviously, he did. He wanted to get home as soon as possible too.

“Don’t be loud, it’s five in the morning. Our neighbours won’t be pleased”

“I can be as loud as I want” you hissed dryly, side-eyeing him while you slipped off your coat and he selected the floor.

A sly smile clutched onto his lips regardless.

That detail didn’t escape your radar even with his body looking the opposite direction towards the exit.

“It’s not funny, you cocksucker” you reprimanded, anger quickening your temper.

“To you. To me… quite hilarious”

“Great, so you aren’t sorry?”

John turned his head over the shoulder enough to lock his gaze on you.

“Stop looking at me like I’m crazy or overreacting, ‘cause I’m not. Time and place, John! Couldn’t you just keep your mouth closed?”

“I was conversing”

“You perfectly know that politics unnerve you fast. You caused a scene and now I have to call my brother and my parents in the morning to apologize for your behavi—”

“No one in there was a braindead teen agreeing about who gets to nail the chick everyone in the group jerks off to, clear?” he cut your reproach short, expression sharp. “I didn’t bring up the subject either. They know me, they knew I would speak my mind”

“Speaking your mind, and as much as you believe you’re unequivocally right, doesn’t mean you get a free pass on speaking to people like you’re superior and instilling in them your truth!”

He pursed his lips in consternation.

“You were there, (Y/N). I didn’t do any of that”

The sudden swaying of the lift made your stomach tighten and forget briefly about the argument.

“What is happening?” you asked, going white.

“I’m not sure” he uttered, fixing his stare on the flickering light and then on you. “Perhaps you want to apologize to me”

“What?”

“There’s a possibility of the lift falling, us plummeting with it and not surviving the blow”

“You’re the worst” you roasted, exasperation crossing your features. He decided to be funny when he shouldn’t. Your fist was throbbing with the desire of knocking him out.

“Are those your last words to me, really?”

“We’re not gonna fall!”

Given that an alarming jolt followed by a series of unusual resounding noises surprised and scared the both of you, the conversation was temporarily over.

Luckily it didn’t last long.

You were in complete darkness, however, you did see John pressing the call emergency button.

“You alright?” he turned on his heels to face you.

“Did you press the correct one?” you asked, stepping closer and giving a good look at the panel, your heart still in your throat.

“I’m wearing me glasses, y’know”

He could barely distinguish anything despite that, but he could hear your heavy breathing.

“The power went out, that’s it. We won’t stay here much longer” he reassured more sweetly this time, brushing his fingertips across your cheek and jawline.

Leaving him astonished, in one swift motion you pushed his hand away and yanked him down from his tie, so close that the tip of your noses were slightly pressed against each others. You didn’t speak until you differentiated his pupils through the obscurity.

“Better today be the first and last time you fuck up something important to any member of my family”

John was unsure whether to remain cautious or kiss you ruthlessly. Either way, his heart was pounding hard with adoration.

A wedding reception wasn’t possibly the most suitable place to endure a dialogue that got your brother-in-law, father-in-law and himself too heated, John reasoned.

He’d give you that, nothing else.

“I’ll always speak out whenever I have to” John concluded, smirking faintly.

“I know. Just not at weddings”

“Fine” it came as a whisper, the need to taste your lips evaporating whatever will he had left to keep talking.

You were aware of what he wanted but you weren’t up for it.

John opened his eyes when your mouth didn’t meet his and gave a half smile after noticing you weren’t any close to giving in.

“This isn’t going to end like in porn, is it? No fucking in the lift?”

“No”

Finally, fifteen minutes since it stopped, the system began to work and the lights were back on. The caretaker was waiting on the other side accompanied by someone from maintenance. They were relieved to verify that no one was hurt.

“Everything okay?” the caretaker asked anyway as you walked out with decisive steps, eager to reach your flat and call it a day.

“Yes, thank you. He’s sleeping on the sofa tonight, come tomorrow morning and ask him again”

John’s eyes sparkled.

It was the nights on which you sent him to the sofa when later at night you needed him the most because you just couldn’t cope having him away. John puffed his chest in anticipation; he couldn’t wait for you to murmur in his ear if he could join you in bed. The cuddles were more frantic then.

He bid goodbye to the caretaker and the guy from maintenance with a silly smile. They couldn’t understand why he looked like he was looking forward to it.

Not porn but a cheesy rom-com blockbuster perhaps.

#john lennon #john lennon x reader #ringo starr #paul mccartney #george harrison #the beatles #john lennon imagine #john lennon fanfic #john lennon fanfiction #tayloredstarr

70 notes · View notes

chrysalispen · 4 years

Text

locum tenens (NSFW)

In which Nero is extremely conflicted about. Um. A lot of things, but Cid and Aurelia specifically.

(Set during ARR, post-Titan MSQ. Masturbation, but it’s an implied threesome and there’s fairly overt Cid/Nero overtones in this one, so give it a pass if that isn’t your thing.)

NSFW under the cut.

===================================================

He has long since lost focus on the evening's work. For the last bell the buzz of the overhead fluorescents have proven a most effective distraction: one of the bulbs is about to die. It flickers at random, the flaring and receding patterns of light in his already sensitive eyes leaving him with both a burgeoning headache and an increasingly foul mood.

Thus, the tribunus laticlavius has instead chosen to tilt the adjustable back of his office chair as far back as it will go and stare blankly into space for some unspecified amount of time. His pale blue eyes tilt upwards and relegate the faulty bulb to his periphery, tracking some fixed point within the maze of crisscrossed steel supports that adorn the castrum ceiling like a roof strewn with bones.

It's quiet. Late night. Other than the Fifth Cohort's rookies running the graveyard shift guard duty along the castrum perimeter, everyone else has sought their bed. Everyone, that is, save one Nero tol Scaeva, currently finding his office ceiling a fascinating subject of study, and whomever else in the XIVth Legion that might at this juncture have eschewed the blood in their veins in favor of roughly equivalent amounts of caffeine.

Van Baelsar being one of them, probably.

With a slow and careful exhalation Nero stares down at the files sitting in his lap. He's long since shed his armor; it's sitting polished and neat in its compartments until he has need to don it again -- another eikon investigation, perhaps -- and he is clad only in carbonweave breeches and a loose, untucked linen undershirt. Even his boots sit by the door, and if the legatus were to enter right this moment he knows he'd get a long and piercing hazel stare and a thinly veiled lecture about the dress code.

But neither the Black Wolf nor one of his lectures appears to be forthcoming, meaning Nero will pass another sleepless night alone with naught but a pile of tomestones and paper.

More distractions from Project Ultima that he would prefer not to have. But he agreed to accept the posting, and the posting included a duty as the head of legate counterintelligence, and he might as well do something productive if he can't sleep. Old habits die hard.

At length he wrenches his gaze away from the ceiling (where it had returned while he considered putting his boots back on, at the very least). Runs a restless hand through thick platinum-blond curls. Glancing at the door one last time as if to satisfy his silent suspicion that he is the only man awake at this hour, before forcing himself to return his focus to the godsdamned reports.

He leafs slowly and thoughtfully through the copied printouts he'd selected from the raw data earlier in the day. Since Operation Quicksand's semi-successful conclusion he's had his men scouring the surrounding region for any sign of the missing adventurer who somehow managed to escape Livia's net.

Somehow. He allows himself a smirk.

He picks up the reading glasses from their perch on the lacquered edge of the table and skims a few more pages of the assembled dossier.

His man's stakeout along the Sunroad has yielded unexpected fruit: not one, but two persons of interest. A woman matching the adventurer's description was recently seen around the so-called town of Camp Drybone, little more than a rest stop with a chapel run by some religious order or other.

He'd expected that, of course. She wouldn't have strayed far from Vesper Bay.

It's the other one that catches his eye, one of the apparent clergymen at first blush. The beard throws him for a handful of minutes; it adds years to the man's face, makes him look far more like someone else Nero used to know. But the question lingers for barest moments, and then vestigial memory locks the rest into place, fills in the holes that time has eroded.

A cold and mirthless smile twitches at the edges of his lips.

So. Alive, then.

He's not sure whether to question the strange watershed sensation of relief or to let himself ruminate over that tight coil of anger already forming in his gut. The bastard should be gone , by all rights, out of everyone's lives, but especially Nero's.

He tosses that picture to the desk along with the neatly typed file clipped to it, reaches for his coffee (long since gone cold), and downs the rest of it in one sitting. It's only his iron control over his temper that keeps him from slamming the earthenware vessel onto the surface of the table in a fit of pique.

Shite and hellsfire, matters were unbearable enough when he thought he must needs merely contend with the man's ghost.

Setting the file and his glasses aside, he picks up the other: a much smaller dossier, owing largely to its subject's relative obscurity. There is surprisingly little information about her beyond army records. Highborn, but of unremarkable parentage and even less remarkable service. No different, surely, from any of the other pureblooded ladies who play chirurgeon for their requisite four year tours.

The difference, of course, being that this woman is supposed to be dead and clearly that is not the case.

The Scions of the Seventh Dawn have done remarkably well to conceal her identity; it gives one cause to wonder what other secrets they might be keeping close to the chest. No doubt Livia is now taking great pleasure in wresting that information out of them.

She has been seen in Garlond's company, he muses. 'Tis most like she is an associate of his in some capacity, most likely professional by his man's reports, unless of course Garlond has taken more of a liking to the girl than he would have assumed.

Nero unclips the photo and studies it in silence, steepling his fingers before his lips as he leans forward in the chair. Committing that face to memory.

Carefully he places the file atop the collection of paperwork and pushes back the chair, padding towards the entrance to his quarters on bare feet. As he does so, he ignores the chill of corrugated steel against his soles. He's felt far worse.

One of the few objective advantages of his lofty rank within the XIVth is the privacy it affords him. Second in command and privy to extremely sensitive information, he cannot afford a security breach. The door is soundproofed and can only be opened upon his command; locking it will alert the guards standing watch to dissuade any unexpected visitors -- and that he will brook no interruptions.

He throws the deadbolt. Behind him the dying light continues to flicker.

He stares at the switch panel, considering for a brief moment, then uses the flat of his hand to push all of them down simultaneously, and the flickering is blessedly gone. Cool blue light from the walls spills across the darkened room like water.

That done, Nero turns towards the entrance to his personal quarters. Empty office space he only uses during his visits to this particular outpost, adorned with a desk, a small console with his feeds from R&D, and two small metal armoires.

Between them, situated behind the soulless steel table, there lies a long and narrow cot with a stiff, uncomfortable mattress and a single thin blanket. Up until now, it has gone untouched. Nero has long since accustomed himself to falling asleep upon whatever surface exhaustion places him, and that's been in labs for countless weeks now, his fingers wrapped about a mug of coffee with a tomestone scrolling raw data for decryption on the screen before him.

Nero sits down on the edge of the cot, swings his legs up and over the side, and stretches his lanky frame from end to end -- he is a tall man even by Garlean standards, and his toes are only an ilm or two shy of the armoire. There is no pillow so he folds his arms behind his head and lets his eyes fall shut, listens to the soft and even whisper of air through his nose as he takes a breath, lets it out, takes another.

He's not going to fall asleep like this, though. Not with his mind defying him, still moving a malm a minute.

Sifting idly through spare bits of information for something his mind can use, his thoughts turn to the woman. Adventurer, defector, a cipher in and of herself.

The photo that now lies in Frumentarium's keeping is somewhat outdated now, but still reasonably accurate to his memory of her battles otherwise: hair the color of honey, falling in soft and loose waves to tumble past slim, proud shoulders. Dark blue eyes. An almost unreasonable air of personal composure. In the dark and quiet stillness of his sealed chambers he can paint a picture of her in his mind's eye, what he has witnessed of her, a force of nature in battle -- and there is an appeal in that strength which Nero won't deny. He has ever appreciated power in all its forms.

Idly he wonders what she would look like without the unadorned battle robes of a conjurer: a context in which there would be no cause for her soft mouth to set in that grim line, nor eyes to harden as they stare down a dangerous opponent. No crudely fashioned silver circlet to conceal that third eye, a mark of her heritage that in a just world she could display with pride.

Softly disheveled, she would appear quite different. Candlelit glow against gold and the porcelain field of flesh laid bare, indigo eyes perhaps burning with a different sort of fire. Mouth slack and soft, the lips parted ever so slightly, to admonish or to laugh or to whisper. To smile.

Perhaps even to kiss, he thinks, and for some reason that is the thought that spears itself down the core of his spine. Heat blossoms in his groin.

His hand strays to his waistband and lingers, settling over the silver clasp of the first buttons without unfastening them just yet. As a younger man he would have been impatient to seek release, but now that he has so little free time to himself these days, save stolen moments such as these, he prefers to take a more relaxed approach. He rests the flat of his palm upon his belly, giving the heat and tension time to build upon themselves. Beneath his gently curled fingers he can sense the indentation of his navel and a light mat of wiry blond curls, tapering downward in a smooth line from the broad planes of his chest.

The tribunus opens his eyes, staring sightlessly at the darkened ceiling.

She'd smiled once, after one of those battles: a quiet, shy thing that had lit up her face as she said something to the man accompanying her. Another Scion associate, or a lover? 'Tis rumored the adventuring profession attracts a certain free-spirited sort of individual. If the defector is of that bent, he imagines she has had her share of suitors, if not simply like-minded souls willing to warm her bed when the mood strikes.

Perhaps Garlond is one of them.

A sullen annoyance arises at the thought and Nero kills it swiftly, before it can put him back into the less-than-ideal state of mind he'd come in here to dispel. It isn't likely, for one. The same man who had reported their presence in Camp Drybone had also provided a rough map from his memory of the chapel interior, in case the tribunus might decide to order a raid on the premises to arrest them. The floor plan is open, spread among narrow and rough-hewn wooden pews -- no room there for trysting clerics.

Or is there? The Academy's floor plan had included a similar layout in the main lecture halls, and there had been winter nights where the snowfall had been so heavy and the gales so dangerous a student could risk their lives simply attempting to walk back to the dormitories. Sometimes they'd be shut in the school building for days at a time, bundled two to a pallet along the floors at night for warmth through body heat while the arctic wind wailed around steel eaves.

Nero knows from personal and very lived experience that one could get up to some interesting pursuits beneath those heavy blankets with one's instructors none the wiser, were one so inclined.

And the desert is quite cold at night.

Have they maintained professional distance, or have they indulged themselves? Shared more than body warmth of a cold and lonely evening?

Nimble fingers slip the silver-plated button through the first loop, loosens his breeches just enough to allay some of the growing discomfort, and his cock twitches at the sensation of touch in its general vicinity. His lower lip catches for just a split second between his teeth before his fingers move to unfasten another.

He would never admit it to a living soul but he can remember the precise location of every one of the calluses that work and long hours had worn into Cid nan Garlond's hands. Can almost feel the half-remembered sensation of roughened fingertips and broad palms tracing their circuitry patterns down his back from shoulder to waist and beyond. The memory brings no rancor with it, and that, he finds, is a surprise in itself.

His eyes fall shut again, and this time his breathing is ever so slightly uneven. Another button slips from its confines, then a fourth when he finds no relief to be had from the pressure of his own clothing. A noticeable ridge has formed beneath the carbonweave and with a light and questing touch he places his palm upon it, notes the way it stretches and strains against the coated fibers. It's warm to the touch, and acutely sensitive; his breath hisses between clenched teeth upon contact and his knees flex in response, heels drawing an ilm or two upward. The motion drags his feet away from the cold steel armoire and he exhales, a trembling gust of air.

He begins to touch himself in earnest. Slow and firm and unhurried strokes, palm gently cupped about the half-clothed shaft, heel of his palm applying just enough pressure to feel each subsequent twitch as it occurs.

Nero knows his touch intimately, but the adventurer's (defector's) is as much a mystery as the rest of her. She would be soft, he muses. Soft and smooth, the tiny hairs on the surface of her skin like the nap of fine velvet: an exquisite contrast to her partner, toned muscle and wiry silver filament strands against the rough homespun pallet.

From there it is easy to imagine the two of them entwined, concealed from prying eyes beneath their shared blankets in the cool desert night. Calloused hands upon slim and elegant shoulders, drawing the simple linen conjurer's robes along her limbs and down to pool at her waist. The heat in those ceruleum-blue eyes of hers, when those same strong fingers trace the shape of her collarbone before descending upon the soft and pliant weight of her breasts.

The final button undone, he carefully lifts his hips from the mattress so he can move his loose breeches to mid-thigh, then slides the elastic waistband of his smalls down and over the curve of his hips, just enough to expose his aching cock to the night air. The surface of his skin feels... electric, a living levin conduit. His heartbeat is a drum pounding its rhythm in his ears.

He wraps a hand about himself, a short gasp escaping his lips at the sensation, and the pace he sets is far less measured than before.

It isn't only Garlond that Nero imagines now, breathing ragged and heavy beneath the close darkness of homespun blankets, learning the adventurer’s body with the meticulous eye reserved for an engineer's schematic. It's himself as well, his curious nature making it impossible for him to refrain from conducting his own investigation - and his jealousy, the pride that leaves him unwilling to allow even a phantom Cid borne of his own fevered imaginings to possess aught that Nero tol Scaeva wants for himself.

The shy little smile he remembers has become something approaching wicked as she presents herself to him, lounging with her back relaxed against Cid's broad chest and his arms wrapped fondly about her waist. He would enfold that slender frame in his arms, soft warm skin damp from sweat. Inhale the scent he'd caught that day in the caverns, trapped within the skeins of blonde hair that slip across his chest.

Her long legs flex when she parts them and his gaze catches upon the small cap of curls nestled at the apex of her thighs, soft and lush and inviting.

In his mind's eye he sheathes himself in one stroke: an easy and perfect slide into her cunt, slick and grasping and as hungry for him as he is for her- and then there are hands, not one set but two, hers tangled in his hair and Garlond's rough, broad ones, dragging across his back, soothing and sure and familiar.

His back arches, hips rolling into the quickening movements of his hand, taut flesh slick with his own fluids. A deep moan, urgent and frantic, threads its way from his lips and goes all but unnoticed. Wholly caught within the gossamer threads of his own fantasy, he is entwined with them, pressed into that warm closeness they share, overcome both by lust and a deep-seated desire to possess whatever undefinable quality it is that seems to draw others to them.

That draws Nero, for all his protests to the contrary.

The heat and the painful tension in his belly surge, drawing to a point as fine and white-hot as the tip of an iron. Nero's free hand finds desperate purchase in the scratchy fabric of the blanket beneath, pulls, clenches into a fist so tight it will leave crescent-shaped indents in his palm even through the cheap synthetic wool.

The phantom lovers in his head sigh. His name is a prayer on her lips as she shudders around him. Another (far more familiar) mouth presses itself against his neck, an echo of her cry rasped in hot breath and a soft male rumble, and it is his undoing.

The sound he makes when he comes is a broken and stuttering cry. Wet heat paints his bare stomach and the fingers wrapped snugly about his length. He lies on the cot for long moments without budging, staring into the darkness with unfocused fjord-blue eyes, his breathing rapid and loud and the pounding of his heart keeping time with the bright pulse still thrumming in his spent cock.

His eyes adjust, eventually, as his heartbeat slows from its breakneck pace.

He sees the same ceiling as before. Standardized castrum architecture. Soulless black steel, the neat and careful lines backlit by cool blue light, light that will turn a deep scarlet were he to switch on the fluorescents. The last vestiges of afterglow have faded. Garlond has been presumed dead for five years, his adventurer associate is a stranger with a bounty on her head for defection, and Nero is the engineer Gaius van Baelsar has rather than the one he wants. The acceptable substitute.

He is also no closer to sleep now than he was before. Too much on the mind, too much still left to do before the project is ready for a field test. Garlond and his eikon-slaying friend, wherever they are now, will have to wait upon further consideration, and Livia will have to accept what means of intelligence she has available. For now.

Nero swings his legs carefully over the side of the cot, grimacing briefly at the mess. He uses the corner of the blanket to clean what he can as he tucks himself back into place and stands, thoughtfully buttoning his breeches. First order of business: fresh smalls, and a long shower. After that he might as well get back down to his lab and put on a fresh pot of coffee. He can work out his leftover frustration on that damned servomech he's been wrestling for the past few days.

And if he finds himself distracted by an old memory, or the whisper of a scent-

Well.

He can ignore it.

#lemony meringue goodness #nero/wol #this was supposed to be pwp and turned into a study on nero's extremely complicated feelings towards his old friend #and his... maybe not quite as complicated feelings towards cid's cute adventurer lady friend #anyway don't read this at work kids #chrysalispen writes

19 notes · View notes

swisscgny · 4 years

Text

MEET NEIL ENGGIST

We recently interviewed Swiss-American painter Neil Enggist to talk about his life, work and how he is coping with self-isolation. Neil’s exhibition The Practice of the Wild was supposed to open at the Consulate General of Switzerland in New York last month as the 8th edition of Art@The Consulate but was postponed due to COVID-19.

Hi Neil, thank you for taking the time to talk to us. Where are you right now? It is my pleasure. I’m in New Jersey. I have a backyard studio near Princeton, in the old house where I grew up. I’m staying put as much as I can.

Tell us about yourself, where did you grow up? My mother is from Taiwan and my father was born and raised in Luzern, both coming for graduate studies in 1969 to Buffalo. I was born and raised in Princeton Junction in an old stone house near a small forest and the train station. My father was teaching in the Bronx and Connecticut, then trying his hand at importing Swiss Chocolate, but at some point in the 1970s, he turned to stained glass. I remember him cutting, wrapping, and soldering in the backyard. My mother worked for the state of NJ, and drew from the model in her spare time. I drew dinosaurs like a maniac, not very well I may add, but at some point around age 7, my father asked me to draw a dinosaur that he made into a stained glass panel. As a family we traveled to Luzern about every 2 years, and I still remember the smell of Birenwecken and lightning over the Vierwaldstättersee. I drew all the time but wasn’t precocious, as a youth, I was shy, quiet, hot tempered, diligent with school, perfectionist, and mostly played soccer and saxophone and you know, did my math homework.

When did you know you wanted to become an artist? I went to art school at Washington University in 2000, but it wasn’t until studying abroad in Florence in 02 that I had the feel of becoming an artist. There is a laminated portrait from first grade, age 6, where I put into writing that I wanted to be an ‘Artist.’ But in Florence my life felt like it shifted from art student to artist, 3 dear friends and I shared an apartment on Piazza Independenza, learning photography, printmaking, illustration, bookmaking, Italian and art history at a tiny art school called Santa Reparata. My future Love lived up the street and sometimes the cheap red wine would flow. Behind every door were Renaissance frescos, leaping off the walls were Donatellos, and it was the beginning of my explorations as a painter. I would paint plein-air small landscapes and cityscapes with oils, but by the end my ambition grew into a very large Kandinskyesque abstract rendition of Michelangelo’s Final Judgment fresco from the Sistine wall. A year later, back in St. Louis I declared painting as my major, and in the words of Joe Campbell, began ‘following my bliss.’

Neil Enggist, Sea on Earth, acrylic and stain on wood, 2011

How would you describe your style? Has it changed over the years? I would say it’s an Organic Abstract Expressionism, or Nature Action Painting. Over nearly 20 years, YES it has changed! Like a photon going from point A, painting the Ponte Vecchio, to B, dancing on a piece of steel with turmeric and ocean water, taking every single possible path! To say it’s moved linearly would be wrong, but there is a sequence of transformations or leaps, in the Ozarks, Mysticism, Heartbreak, Dylan, New Mexico, Traveling Europe, The Mir, snow painting, India, Brooklyn, Voice and Veil, Gardening, going cross county, yoga, India again, the dance, steel, the tides, The Tao and the Yellow Mountains, devotion. I’m very interested how Dylan’s work has transformed and shifted, beyond expectation, without calculation, yet somehow almost always in line with his poetic essence. My paintings have changed like dinosaurs and birds, from a common source, many branches, some seemingly from different worlds, some becoming bones and fossils, some soaring through the sky.

Tell us about your artistic practice, where do you paint, what inspires you? Well we can start with Highway 61.. music of the American vernacular, jazz, blues, country, rock, folk, hip hop.. from Louis Armstrong, Strange Fruit, Charlie Parker, to the early Bluesmen of the Mississippi Delta, Robert Johnson, folksingers like Woody Guthrie, onwards and outwards to Wutang and Nas. Basquiat inspires me. Ana Medieta, DeKooning, Paul Klee, David Hammons, Polke, Mel Chin, James Turrell, Richard Long, Kerry James, Doig, Ofili, Wangechi Mutu, John Akomfrah, Bonnard, Matisse, Puryear too. Gary Snyder's brilliant collection of essays 'The Practice of the Wild,' from where the title of the exhibition comes, has helped me attune to the wild systems at play in nature and within, and continues to evolve my way of thinking, seeing, and creative being. Taking a journey into nature, not just a dip into nature, but really feeling the connections, the web that runs through the forest and is woven into your own nature. The Redwoods, the Swiss Alps, the Coast of California.. I lose and become myself here. In my practice, nature is welcomed into the process of artistic creation. The imagined line between artistic intention and the creative functioning of wilderness is blurred, or more accurately, these spheres merge into a unified moment. It’s a spiritual practice, a kind of Taoist exercise, merging with the changes of the natural world, not holding, not fixing, listening to what the painting wants to become, and finding the color to enable the beholding. I paint outside and on the road, sometimes inside.. anywhere..

Neil Enggist, Odyssey III, acrylic, dye and turmeric on canvas, 2020

What role does Switzerland play in your life/art? My family has a house in Luzern, with a balcony opening to a view of Mount Pilatus that I would call perfect.. at least on the days where it’s not obscured by Nebel! Since 2012, I’ve been spending many springs / summers living there, in the bohemian remodeling of our chalet attic called the Macolette. I have painted and drawn our view of Pilatus so many times, it is ingrained in my mind’s eye. I’ve explored and hiked the mountains surrounding the Vierwaldstättersee, Grindelwald, Engadin, and Zermatt, finding places on and off the path to paint. When I am in the mountains, alone with my pack, in the quietude and breathtaking beauty, I feel something akin to being home, being one with myself, being on my true path. This feeling is fleeting and eternal. Also, during many of the summers, I have worked with my great friend and mentor, garden designer, Andre Ammann, constructing and maintaining gardens around Luzern. Working with him has taught me in so many ways, to notice the minute changes of spring, to work with contrasts of nature and culture, to understand placement of boulders and trees, how to create a riverscape, to dissolve into the consciousness of the river. When we are done with the work, all cleaned, raked, and hosed down, Andre and I look at our work, and he’ll say, ‘Now, the garden starts, try to see how this will look in 10 years, in 50 years..’ This has been a major influence in my own ‘Practice of the Wild’ and painting. It has also taught me how to shovel!

You have traveled all over the world, how has the nomad life shaped your art? As a traveler, painting becomes the act of experiencing and processing place; the painting becomes an archive of experience. Traveling serves to connect the painter with the uncomfortable and uncalculated, which forces a spontaneity and body-memory response. I aim to paint as one would do battle and dance and play jazz at once. In traveling, the painter becomes the abstraction, inhabiting transient and visionary territory. Materials from places of special significance, white gypsum sand from New Mexico, pigment from the Holi festival of India, black sand from Kanyakumari, gravel from Highway 61, layer into the topography, giving the painting a personal geographic context, while opening formal and textural possibilities. On the road, I explore the spiritual territory of color, and natural occurrences of unearthly blues.

With the COVID-19 pandemic, travel is no longer possible, in what ways has the pandemic shaped your practice / life? I just drove from California to NY in 5 days to install the Consulate show, just before the Covid situation hit the fan. I am supposed to be in India right now, doing a residency in the Himalayas! I’ve had a number of shows postponed and it just really doesn’t seem like people are buying many paintings right now.. But, really compared to people who are sick, caring for loved ones, and risking their lives to care for others, my sacrifices are minuscule. And I can most surely still paint! But I’m trying to use this time to do things I would have done in ‘normal’ times, but there are no normal times anymore. I’ve been making sculptures out of half rotten wood using an ax and a handsaw. I’ve been learning some Tai Chi from my Ma. I’ve started reading the Mahabharata. I’ve been texting whole a lot of hearts to California and writing love songs, and staying out of the bar..

Neil Enggist, That Great Mysterious Storm, acrylic, ink, oil and sand on canvas, 2010

What important lessons do you think we can learn from the impact of the pandemic? Well, first and foremost gratitude for life, health, and for the things that we used to take for granted. To be grateful for the people who are dear to us. This may sound cliché, but the pandemic has shown us how connected we are, for better and for worse. We are interdependent, and what affects one region affects the global community. I hope that people can stop and reassess their personal and collective relationship with the planet. In a profound and dire way, humans and our socio-economic systems have entered an unbalanced, virus-like relationship with this Earth. Humans seem to need wake up calls to affect changes, I hope this pandemic serves as a paradigm shift for enough of us. We are in this together. Yes when this is over, it will be great to go to a yoga class, an Indian restaurant, and to toast with friends, but we each need to use this time to reaffirm our commitments to each other and to all beings of this planet, and not go back to business as usual.

What advice do you have for people stuck at home? Can you recommend something to read, listen or watch? Well I’m a Liverpool fan, and we were just about to WIN the premier league, so I’ve had to go back and watch Liverpool highlights to cope. There’s a lovely interview with the legendary skipper Steven Gerrard in conversation with Gary Neville on youtube. I’m a very lazy television watcher, meaning I don’t really watch new things, so it’s The Sopranos, and very little else. Peaky Blinders is good, violent, but solid. Kurosawa’s ‘Dreams’ is a ravishing movie. I just saw ‘Purple Rain’ again, EPIC. When I drove across country I listened to Toni Morrison’s own reading of her novel ‘A Mercy,’ and it took my breath away, literally every sentence .. I don’t know how I even made it! She’s a true master in telling a harrowing story in pure poetry. Also reading ‘An Indigenous People’s History of the United States’ and Leonard Peltier’s ‘Prison Writings.’ Musically I needed a lil rock, so I went back to the Black Keys ‘Brothers’, Brittany Howard’s solo ‘Jaime’ is good, JS Ondara, Black Pumas, Valerie June’s ‘Love Told a Lie,’ AM!R’s ‘Parachute, ‘ and the syrupy ‘Cigarettes after Sex.’ I’ve been listening as well to Gann Brewer’s most recent ‘Absolution.’ I made the video for his ‘River Song.’ Tracy Chapman’s first album is incredible. Springsteen’s ‘The River’ is like his White Album and sometimes I need to hear the Boss sing ‘Heart and Soul’ over and over.. and hear that ‘Drive All Night’ sax solo by the late great Clarence Clemons. I am from Jersey, don’t forget. Listening to a lot of John Prine too, and with his recent passing, his music shines like a diamond ring. ‘Christmas in Prison’ is one of my favorites of many. Oh and Bob Dylan just released a 17 minute song about the assassination of JFK, and it’s .. indescribable.

Thank you Neil!

To find out more about Neil Enggist go to www.neilenggist.com, contact Neil at [email protected] and follow him @neilenggist

Scroll down for more information about the exhibition The Practice of the Wild which will open to the public as soon as it is safe to do so. Please note that all paintings depicted in this article are featured in the exhibition.

NEIL ENGGIST

THE PRACTICE OF THE WILD

8TH EDITION OF ART@THE CONSULATE

THE PRACTICE OF THE WILD by Swiss-American painter Neil Enggist is comprised of a series of abstract mixed media Nature Action Paintings, a method by which nature performs an integral part in the artistic process.

Neil Enggist, The Storm Ends, acrylic, ink, dye and sand on canvas, 2019

“My work seeks to embody the random precision through which life and spirit intersect. Within a liminal environment, I present set of conditions where the form can be born through an unfolding of natural currents. The nature of water, marks of evaporation, melting, freezing, burning, gravity, animal tracks, traces of dance, time, storms, tides and all manner of seasonal and emotional weather coincide to transform the canvas into a terrain in flux. Whether I am dripping ink into a melting tuft of snow, pouring the ocean on burning ink, or slashing the surface with a fallen pine branch, each action is composed within a system of nature. The result is a site of becoming where oceanic, emotive, and mystical stories interplay”

Raised in Princeton, New Jersey, Neil Enggist studied fine arts at Washington University in St. Louis and Santa Reparata in Florence. He earned his MFA at San Francisco Art Institute in 2016 where he made paintings on steel in the tidal zones of the Bay Area, searching for a language between art and nature, incorporating ideas of performance and sculpture imbedded in the earth art movement. Enggist has participated in a number of art residencies including the Lucid Art Foundation in Point Reyes, CA, and most recently journeyed to the land of his grandmother to paint the City of Shanghai and the Yellow Mountains of China. Through his extensive travels in Europe, the Americas, and Asia he developed a body of painting and poetry shown in New York, Milan, Mumbai, Luzern, and Paris. Enggist lives and works between New York and Luzern, Switzerland.

Neil Enggist, The Schreckhorn, acrylic, ink, pigment and oil on canvas, 2007

THE PRACTICE OF THE WILD is the eighth edition of Art @ The Consulate, a curatorial initiative by the Consulate General of Switzerland in New York to showcase the work of Swiss artists living in the United States. Follow Art @ The Consulate on Social media #SwissArtNYC

Neil Enggist, A Candle Burns at Night, Acrylic and ink on canvas, 2008

#SwissArtNYC

2 notes · View notes

dememarquette · 5 years

Text

Office Raid

I heard a knock on the door, flaring my temper. I'm not usually this impatient, it's just that time of the year. Tax Season. My primary line of work is in Greed. Meaning, I pitch businesses, get them started, and hand over the keys. I do accounting in the background, ensuring my clients maintain their wealth so they can enjoy it. That, unfortunately, includes managing their accounts. I know every tax break in the book. It's all a matter of playing Tetris with finances to keep them happy- for, say...hundreds of people. If not thousands. Because of this, everything between January to April is a nightmare. I have hateful quotas, and my free time is sank into inane questions like 'How can I claim my employees as dependents?' The batshit accounting of my multi-million dollar clients doesn't happen overnight. My schedule is clean of new patronage until April 12th, but lot of good it does when they still arrive at my door. I wanted to put up a sign, 'Come back in May.' "Come on in." I say instead. Julia would kill me if I turned down anyone, regardless if I was up to my eyeballs in W-2's and Form SS-4's. "But make it snappy." I said snappy- I know I did- but I think he heard 'blast my goddamn door open.' The seven foot panel blew off its hinges, sailing across the room at an flawless horizontal angle. I stared as it smacked against the wall, cracking the already-unstable structure. I gave the curious incident the benefit of doubt. This is Hell, after all. I couldn't jump to conclusions to accuse my guest- But the moment one armored boot stepped into the room, it became a safe assumption. The forth circle isn't known for its sturdy craftsmanship but he was still pleased with himself. He sauntered in like he'd receive an ovation. I did stand, but it was scantly out of reverence. "Hello." I said, at a loss. "Why don't you make yourself at home?" "Demetrius Marquette," He announced, standing grandiose just inside the entry way. Decked out in red and gold, the familiar uniform took such majestic inspiration from the Romans that it'd be impressive if it wasn’t set off by a swampy water cooler in the background. "I am Arodeus, and I have orders bestowed upon me by the 6th Choir to terminate you immediately." I don't know how one is normally supposed to oppose a declaration like that, so I did my best. "...Not guilty," I reasoned. "Of which part, exactly?" "...All of it." His head canted. One arm eminently held a thick document to his chest like he was here to strongarm a petition on climate change. "The dozens of counts of violating your celibacy vows? Sacrilege? Fraud? The hundreds of documented instances of simony during your time as a member of the clergy? And all of the Hellish transactions that succeeded it?" He posed. "All of that?" I considered carefully. Yeah. Checks out. "Hey, uh- listen. It sounds awful when you word it like that, but my application was fifty pages for a reason. By the way, who let you in-?" "Consider it rejected." With practiced dispassion, his wrist flicked. The ream of pages scattered across my office floor in a manner about half as cool as he pictured it. I recognized my giant letterhead anywhere. Alone, it presented a very large problem but in the category of 'will kill me now' versus 'will get me killed later,' the angel was in the former. "You know what?" I took a generous step backward. "Totally understood. Thanks for stopping by." "Not that easy." His wings snapped, and he shot across the floor. I had a split second's notice to move. That manifested as a genius two foot teleport to the side. His reflexes were faster. My tail was yanked a sharp pull to the left. All 200lbs of my weight was shifted off center, rocking my balance. I fell forward straight into his fist as he lobbed an uppercut at my ribs, working with gravity to double-team me. 'Fuck-' I folded as the air was forcibly vented from my lungs. Retaliating in that instant, I wrenched my elbow to his gut, but he was prepared. Agile, he suspended himself to take the force out of the blow. My hit simply guided him in the air of where he'd float next. I stumbled with his weight gone suddenly, while he touched ground for a graceful landing. "Did you even read it?!" "Oh I read it. We all did." "It wasn't your mail!" "No-" He pondered. "No it wasn't. Not until your name was flagged as a repeat offender. At which point, yeah. It was ours. Good read though." "Thanks?" I combusted to appear at his side. I learned that the hard way what his answer to that was. My hand connected, and if I had taken Tak's punching class I was sure it would have cracked. The moment he lost sight of me for the barest of seconds he threw up a shield. My knuckles skinned where it graze off the surface. I had no time to re-evaluate before the wall disappeared, priming him to deliver another kick. This one rocketed me into my bookshelves. They tipped, threatening to crush me with the likes of the Intradimensional Exchange Rates and the Necroeconomicon, but held steady. Arodeus was already closing in for a second round, but I could already feel the air tense for a second shield. Knowing better than to go on the offense close range, I lifted my hand to fake out a hook. It worked, long enough for him to to summon a defense just for me to spark a fire inside it. It flared bright, a globe of flames that ignited him like a goddamn lava lamp. He howled out a sharp note of agony before it popped. The blaze released, and the forcefield burst in a wave of Holy heat. His wings flared wide, putting out the unassuming fires in one pump of his wings. His feathers were left dusted with ash, frayed so thin it looked like he hadn't used conditioner in two years. Still, even if he looked like a BP oil spill duckling, he was more humored by my counter than threatened. As someone who was actually proud of that maneuver, that was actually very concerning. I threw my hands up, making it clear I never intended to cause the damage I didn't actually reap. "Listen guy, I don't want to fight!" "Ah, great! You don't have to!" He grabbed my client chair. I reared back into the wall behind my desk. A moment too late I realized that it happened to be against the most priceless fixture of my office. I couldn't tell if it was out of spite or sudden inspiration, but he held the chair over his head. My eyes widened- "NO! No! N-NOT-" And hurled it into the glass. "-the fish tank!" I cried. "You ASShole!" A torrent jetted from the top, breaching my office with an aggravated geyser of mineral treated water and glass. Katy perry's Last Friday Night sputtered into distorted gargling as the damage claimed everything. The atmosphere of Hell turned my desk into a grill; my gobies and angelfish fried instantly. The rest erupted into a veil of steam, obscuring me long enough to crawl under my desk. I yanked open the drawer, hand blindingly reaching for anything of use. Scissors, letter opener- I'll take a Montblanc if it meant not being defenseless. The angel rounded the corner, tearing shit up as he passed. He couldn't see clearly so anything vaguely smart and stylish was destroyed in his warpath. My lamp shattered against the wall, and my accent table overturned, with my artisanly selected selfies lost to the destruction. I very much doubt his memo for my extermination today included office renovation. He was being a dick, and my neighbors on either side were complacent jackasses too. They throw a fit if Lady Gaga was belting it too hard but you bet my asskicking was music to their ears. And because my intuition stops short of fisticuffs, he found me too soon. Cornered, I blasted him in the face. The inferno lasted all of two seconds as the shower behind him put it out and doused me in turn. He reeled back, leaving my hand to fizzle out in a thin line of smoke. "Shit-!" Arodeus drew a reedy breath through his teeth. He cradled his face, one palm to a shiny, fleshy cheek. It healed in a glow of white, alighting the skin until there was no trace of trauma at all. His grimace of pain turned into a cheerful 'ta-da,' showmanship for my benefit. I hadn't ruined even one of his perfect eyebrows. On my very short list of lines of defense, that was it. "Oh come on!" I angled to take a shot at his kneecaps but he got me first. One kick to the spine of my seat, and he tipped it on its wheels. It bashed into me one, two, three times in rapid succession. Defending myself meant getting a hand caught in the metal bars and slammed into my face. The collateral damage from my elbows alone drew blood. I was crushed up against the wall of my desk like a 1980's nuculear drill. An attempt for freedom put me in the perfect spot for a forth blow knocked my knee into my jaw. I slid to the ground, favoring my side. My world blurred- a smear of reds and oranges- as he snagged my collar, and fished me out to the open to be salt-waterboarded. "You do realize I'm just an accountant right?" I croaked. A stream was still cascading over the jagged glass, spilling directly onto my face and the nape of his neck. His charred wings were being weighed down, but he made up for it in the delighted posture of a man about to finish the job. Borrowing his words, it would not be that easy. "389 hostage souls say differently." "What? Hostage-?!" I squinted through the burn. "They're not hostages. They're legally attained!" "Gee, I hope you kept the receipts." (For the record: I did, but he wasn't here for semantics.) The heat of a holy fist charging up was unmistakable. My vision was still flickering through static but his power presented itself as a flare of white in my retinas that'd be debilitating had I not had protection. Just before the hit would land, I was reminded of a prior engagement. My office phone beeped- the antiquated hunk of plastic, too ancient and powerful to be bothered by the sizzling fish carcasses and water damage. "Mr.Marquette, your 2PM?" "Yeah!" My head lolled. "Send them in!" My attacker snapped toward the door, and I disappeared under his weight. - - - Cross-planar, and thousands of miles away, I hit the sidewalk in a limp. I had moved without thinking, landing in a pleasant suburb bathed in spring's afternoon sunlight. It served as a delightful contrast to how I was feeling- which was shit. I was screwed. I was so fucked. If the angel was worth his salt, I'd be tracked right after he dealt with whoever walked into my office, no matter what corner of the globe I popped to. I was running on borrowed time, and with all my options exhausted, I turned to my phone. My contact list spun like a rotary. Demon, demon, demon- Why am I friends with so many demons? The thought was counter-intuitive to me before 2013, now they made up half my friendslist and are completely useless in the face of celestial opposition. I slumped against a tree as I searched for alternatives. I recognized the neighborhood as upstate Washington, a personal spot for me. It shouldn't be the first go-to in an emergency, but I was concussed and apparently craving foie gras. Down the block, surrounded by a beautiful lot of imported cars, Chez Tzaz stood tall. No other spots were coming to my bruised brain when I needed them most. But it was as safe of a spot as any when it came down to it. At least there I had a bouncer. Not only that, but it sparked a sudden moment of clarity. I jerked the scrollbar back up to the top. Adria. I shot off a text. It was unfortunately less than polite. [2:03 PM] do u mind calling rock me amadeus off my back!! Her response was instantaneous. [2:03 PM] WHAT?? WHO?? [2:03 PM] the angel sent to my office!! said he was there to kill me?? i thought you said you'd warn me!! [2:04 PM] ARE YOU SERIOUS?? WHERE ARE YOU?? I twitched my thumbs volley a text back but arguing in the distance caught my attention. Someone without a reservation had made it to the door and was causing a scene. Sure, I was still seeing stars, but it was hard to miss the glaring refraction of light off their heels. That damn uniform again. My heart fell to the pit of my stomach. [2:05 PM] they are at my restaurant too??? That has to mean my apartment has already been raided. And my vacation home. And who knows what else. I'm not modest with my brand. Anything that has my involvement is emblazoned with my logo- I've plastered it everywhere I could make my mark because nuance isn't my strong suit. The unsaid consequences of this made my head pound. [2:06 PM] IF YOU ARE CLOSE ENOUGH TO SEE THEM, YOU ARE CLOSE ENOUGH FOR THEM TO SENSE YOU. GET. OUT OF THERE. I wanted to. I truly did. But all of the locations I could visualize in my mind belonged to that of other demons. Archer's apartment just thirty minutes away, Niko's office who already suffered a remodeling this year, my favorite cafe- I didn't want to drag my trouble to them. Especially not when it was looking inevitable. Meanwhile, in the distance my dutiful hostess was patiently and condescendingly explaining the dress code policy just like I taught her (armor is NOT formal-wear post the 1700's, please see the handbook). The distraught angel launched into full riposte about her obstruction of justice, so much so that I ignored my phone for ten whole seconds. By then, Adria already had an essay, surmised with a frantic, 'What are you going to do? I'm serious, where are you?' rephrased a spectacular three different ways with various usage of caps lock. [2:08 PM] im at chez tzaz. washington [2:08 PM] WHAT? WHY? WHY ARE YOU STILL THERE? [2:08 PM] why are THEY here??? The text bubble popped. The three ellipses disappeared with her abandoned thought, and I was left on read. I couldn't tell if it was a bust. Not until I heard the timely flapping of wings behind me, noticeably less toasty than Mr.Arodeus. The sound should have made me panic, but I had no doubt who it was. "What did I say? Are you an idiot?!" She hissed. As a cordial 'hello,' she shoved me into a tree. "Go!" "Ow?!" "You can 'ow' when you're safe!!" "Well?? Where do you want me to go, huh? They can find me!" I thought about jumping to whatever I could think of. Maybe to the first thing Google maps would suggest, but for it to work I had to seriously think about my location before going. At that moment, I wasn't sure if it was possible. It felt like my mind was jumbled to the point where if I tried again, I'd end up in the exact same spot. Did I also mention I felt safer by her? Because that too. She combed her bangs back, stressing as she craned around me and the tree to view the angel at the door. Looking between the two of them, they matched. How narrow was the chance that she'd be on my execution team? "Friend of yours?" "I told you to stop pushing it! They definitely have a kill order on you now." "What fantastic information that would have been earlier." "I. TOLD. YOU!" She shot back, barely restrained. Scratch that- her voice was kept low so she had dibs on killing me first. "I told you this would happen! You have friends right? Go to them!" "And endanger them too?" "Go to someone, I don't know, capable!" "You?" "Not me!! I have to deal with this." My hostess was now calling security. And in the face of one haughty college student, the angel apparently felt the need to as well. Now there was two of them, and the arrival of the second seemed to register on Adria's radar. She turned around at the same time- -And looked like she was about to blow a gasket. "Oh my God- you need to go NOW." "And what are you going to do?" "This isn't about me Mr.Sends-My-Lifestory-to-the-people-who-want-to-murder-me! LEAVE! Now!!" "I can't-" "NO! No more talking! LEAVE!" I couldn't argue any more. Our bickering caused two heads across the way to snap up. She gave me one final, violent shove, and I disappeared to the last place muscle memory remembered her pissed at me. The cowboy strip club was a start. - - - Six hours later, I was across the United States and checked into a motel. After my headache faded, I broke up my trail into pieces, ranging from teleports, taxis, and one distressing trip aboard public transport. Under the assumption that no angel would dare subject themselves to the general populace on such intimate terms (see: wedged between the lunch rush and earlybird boozers), I felt safe. Adria did not. "This is my fault." She said, for a third time, pacing the floor. I looked up from the pages of a Better Homes and Gardens magazine, spoon in mouth. The first time we had this conversation, I was covertly panicked. By the second, I wore myself out. And by the third? I have more productive things to talk about. "I knew it was a bad idea. I knew they were doing raids-" "Do you always do this?" It couldn't just be me noticing it, that there was something egregiously wrong with this picture. She was an angel- a Power, a soldier of Heaven's prestigious battalion- worrying this hard over a demon she met two months ago. Don't get me wrong. I get it, I'm charming, I'm suave, and maybe in the right light my atoning adds a tragic depth to my character that may drive the angels wild- But I was still just that. A player on the opposite team, who made a huge mistake that got me booked in the first motel who'd take cash instead of card, until I was sure I wasn't being followed and I looked presentable enough to see my friends again. And she was here with me, inexplicably, trying to make my screw-ups her own. Why? I had no idea. "Do what?" "Overthink." "This is not overthinking!" She said, denial in gusto. I began worrying a lot less when her catastrophic thinking began siphoning all the energy in the room. That left her fretting on her own, while I examined Martha Stewart's upcoming Spring line. I much preferred being told how to pick the perfect counter-top than conduct my own life. "I should have been the adult. I shouldn't have sent the letter knowing what was going on upstairs." I snorted, flipping a page idly. "Don't take credit for my plan." "I'm not taking credit, I'm taking responsibility!" "And why would you do a thing like that?" She rolled her eyes. "What are you going to do now? Tell me." "Easy. I get Dr.Nikolai to write me a doctor's note." "Really?" She stopped, sudden. Her tensely folded arms fell loose. Taken off-step of our normal rhythm, I almost didn't have the heart to issue a reality check. She caught up to me in the next beat though, defeated with a heavy sigh. "Aren't you afraid..?" "Yes and no." I shrugged. "I need this to wrap up. I already miss my shower and my kitchen, I mean look at that-" I waved a hand at the sad, sad kitchenette through the door. One half-wall was fencing it off from the living room. It sounds trendy in theory, but the execution here had bar stools doubling as coffee tables, and the bite-size microwave trying to hop the border. The whole layout was claustrophobic, and pretending that this was the biggest of my problems worked for me. Not her. She plunged onto the edge of the bed, her head in her hands. Her bangs fell over her eyes in a tousled mess that matched her fringing braid. My busted up face didn't hold a candle- looking at the two of us, you would have thought her life was the one turned upside down. "You aren't taking this seriously." "I'm taking it seriously, Adria. Are you just trying to admit you are afraid?" "Yeah! Yeah, I am actually! It's like every time I try to help I only make things worse!" "Well that's funny because I refuse to do anything but believe you helped me." I shut the magazine, scooting to her side, with Ben & Jerry's in tow. "I wanted my name up there. Guess what? Now it's there. What's a little clout?" "Clout," She spurned, tired. "Would you call what he did to your face clout too?" Her hand delicately lifted to assess the damage but I ducked away. Not today, ma'am. I shifted my shades like it'd cover the bruise bleeding down into my cheek bone. It wasn't the worst of it. I imagined my chest to be a blotchy bovine pattern by now, but I sensed her concern for what it was: another way for her to feel worse about herself. Another way to be a failure. "No touching." "Yeah, well. Here's the rest of your things." She tossed me a bag. They were necessities I requested. The woman had yet to get herself an iPhone but had no problem grabbing my shopping list of moisturizers and specific detergents. The Green Giant wasn't on my list (it was her own addition to my list of demands, which she loving refereed to as 'shit you ACTUALLY need') but she grabbed that. Punching the bag into submission seemed to give her reprieve when just saying she helped didn't. I watched her pulverize the frozen vegetables, under the guise of breaking them up for me, until it was just sad and vaguely terrifying. The Quick And Easy Dinnertime Medley didn't deserve this, nor did she. Something bad was going on in that head of hers- guilt. I didn't understand it, but I know I didn't need to because it was ridiculous to begin with. "Hey. Heeeey," I leaned into her shoulder. "I don't know why you're so broken up about this but it's fine. I'm the one who should be worrying right?" "But you're NOT. I am! And I can't help it, okay." "You helped me, alright? You did," I rescued the bag, putting it against my sore ribs like she originally intended. "You did something for me no one else could. And for some reason that wasn't enough, and now you're here!" "Yes." She admitted, biting her lip. "Doing nothing." "Nope- nope. You're leaving out the cool part. You're here breaking three heavenly laws in the process." "Definitely." "Like a rebel. Like a spy. And my hero~" "And getting you putted on a most wanted list by mail, and delivering frozen peas? They should make me a saint, too." "Yup. Saint Kyriakoloupoulos, Patron of unconventional assistance." I said, mocking prayer. "And fists. If only I invoked you then." You could tell she wanted to answer something else melodramatic and guilt ridden, but her gaze fell to my hands.

The beginnings of a smile tried to set in, trickling in through the recesses of her totalitarian 'No Fun Allowed' conscious. "...Did you even get a hit in?" I grinned, quickly concealing my bare knuckles behind my back. The worst of it was healed to superficial scrapes, which regrettably looked a lot less cool when trying to impress a girl with non-existent fighting prowess. "Depends. Are you rooting for my side?" I pretended like I wasn't expecting a specific response. That the wrong one wouldn't disappoint me, and that this bag of groceries may be the last piece of divine intervention I get out of this woman who already followed me down to the strip clubs of 2nd, and was now tagging along my fugitive romp across America. But she didn't. She pulled her legs up onto the bed, trying to mull over my question as if the answer wasn't clear on her face. She always was a bad liar. "Maybe." "Thought so. Ice cream?"

#office raid #towns #adria #story

3 notes · View notes