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thedumpsterqueen · 4 years

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Standards of Performance

Here it is!!!!! First chapter of my first fic on my new AO3! This is a multi-chapter, slow burn work. Please let me know what you think, I welcome screaming and incoherent asks about our fave special agent in my inbox. Full text under the cut, or you can find it through the AO3 link below.

AO3 link

Summary: You're the BAU's newest intern, desperate to prove yourself amongst an established team of much more experienced profilers. Agent Hotchner, the seemingly infallible team leader, sets strict expectations for your performance. He commands your respect without even trying, but is there something more to your relationship than a simple desire to impress your stony-faced boss?

Chapter: 1, Coffee Stains and Neckties

Words: 2388

Rating: Explicit, 18+

Pairings: Hotch x Reader, Hotch x You

Warnings: Not much for this chapter specifically, but let’s just assume general gore and murder stuff, explicit language, and sexual content are fair game form here on out.

Enjoy! I’ll try to update weekly, if not more often. I’ll let you know when I have a more defined schedule!

“Fucking SHIT!”

You cursed as you felt the (very, very) hot coffee soak your new skirt. Grabbing as many paper towels as you could with one hand, you tried to sop up the mess on the floor. The stain on your outfit? A shame, but nothing compared to marring the assuredly expensive cream color of the BAU’s breakroom carpet.

A low chuckle sounded off behind you, and you froze.

For the love of god, please don’t be…

“Morgan! Please tell me you have carpet cleaner, oh my god. I don’t even know how that happened.”

Morgan grinned, as he typically did, sauntering into the breakroom with his hands in his pockets. “Don’t worry ‘bout it, the janitor's got it later. I was looking for you, team meeting in five. You all good? You look a little - ” he paused, probably searching for a descriptor that wouldn’t sting too bad, “ - rushed.”

You stood up, sighing. He was right, after all. You had stayed up late last night poring over psychology textbooks and only just woken up in time to leave your apartment. As the BAU’s newest profiling intern - whatever the hell that actually meant - the pressure of performing to seasoned profilers’ standards manifested in spending practically all your free time buried in research. Hence why your hair was coated in unbelievable amounts of dry shampoo, you were wearing your unflatteringly oversized glasses instead of your usual contacts, and why your frantic attempt at pouring yourself a cup of coffee when you got into work had resulted in the giant wet spot currently soaking your skirt.

At least the skirt was black.

“You’re right. Late night,” you said, rolling your eyes at Morgan’s suggestive eyebrow waggle.

“Not like that, I wish. Just trying to catch up. Don’t really want to repeat last week’s disaster,” you mumbled, referring to the first time you actually got to question a suspect, which had ended up with a wad of saliva hawked in your face. It was only your third week in the position, but damn, if that hadn’t let the wind out of your sails a bit.

“Hey, what did I tell you then?” Morgan asked, as you walked out of the breakroom together. “You’re not a true profiler until you get assaulted by a serial killer!”

“I’m not a true profiler until I finish the year long training program,” you pointed out, “so I think I could do without the spit in the meantime.”

Morgan laughed, opening the door of the team’s briefing room for you. “Well if we’d known you were gonna be so picky, we might have gone with someone else.”

“Who’s picky?” asked Emily, looking up from her seat.

While Morgan laughed and launched into a dramatic retelling of the event as if the entire team hadn’t already fucking seen it in real time, you took your seat at the table. Reid nodded in acknowledgment, and you returned it with a small smile. Damn if he wasn’t handsome, and ridiculously smart to boot, but you were pretty sure your chances with him withered and died when you asked him what he was doing after work last Friday and he answered with, “Reading.” Point taken.

Hotch swiveled in his chair to face the table and you suddenly became acutely aware of how much of a mess you probably looked. It’s not that you cared about his opinion regarding your general appearance beyond the basic standard of professional attire, but his always-intense gaze and stony expression had a way of making you second guess even your most confidently held opinions.

“Sit,” he said, his voice cutting through the rest of the team’s animated chatter.

It would have been hard not to notice how quickly they obliged, not out of fear, but rather a respect and deference so deeply ingrained that it almost gave you goosebumps. You’d never thought of yourself as a follower, per say, but if Hotch was what a leader looked like, you certainly didn’t fit into that category either.

He scanned the table, stopping on you. “New glasses?” he asked, with a single, slightly raised eyebrow.

“I, um, not really, just didn’t have time to put my contacts in,” you stammered.

“Hm,” Hotch said, “They look nice.”

Your cheeks suddenly felt hot, and you thanked him quickly, looking down at your shoes to conceal the pink that was probably spreading across your face. Hotch had a way of speaking that made everything he said sound like the absolute truth, which was probably why such an innocuous little compliment had disarmed you so much.

Still though, jesus christ. Get it the fuck together. You’re not Reid; you’re not smart enough to be this awkward.

Hotch, blessedly ignoring how painful you just made that interaction, addressed the team while JJ passed out files. “We have a new case. Three bodies, all found completely drained of blood in various woods, off hiking trails. Cause of death appears to be blood loss from severed carotid arteries, meaning they were likely strung up and drained before being moved to where they were discovered.”

Reid spoke up first. “Erm, what exactly do you mean by various woods?”

“That’s the unusual thing,” Hotch said, pulling up a map of the southwestern United States on the screen behind him. "Each body was found in a different state, one here, one here, and one here,” pointing to spots in California, Arizona, and Nevada. “However, local police discovered the bodies within hours of each other due to anonymous tip offs, and medical examiners estimate approximately the same time of death for all three.”

Morgan whistled lowly. “So what you’re saying is, this guy kills three victims around the same time and takes a road trip to hide their bodies in places he knows won't be discovered until he calls in.”

“That’s how it appears, yes,” Hotch confirmed.

Rossi shook his head, twirling a pen that probably cost more than your entire wardrobe. “So, how are we splitting this up?”

You whipped your head in his direction. Splitting up? Of course, you should have known it’d only make sense considering the ground to be covered, but your quick mental calculations told you that there were six of them, evenly split into three groups of two, and one odd man out, both in skill and number - you.

“So, who’s getting stuck with me?” you asked, trying to beat everyone to the punch. Not that any of them would voice it, but if you couldn’t project confidence, you figured self-awareness would do.

When you entered the internship as a recent college grad around a month ago, you knew you’d be in way over your head. Everyone else on the team was a seasoned expert, and you were a 20-something with a degree in psychology who somehow managed to charm her way through the interviews of the BAU’s flagship internship program. It’s not that you weren’t smart, you were, of course, but comparatively? You were pretty sure this was shaping up to be a glorified babysitting program, and you were the baby.

“Oh, hush,” JJ said, smiling and shaking her head. You smiled back. JJ had gone out of her way to make you feel welcome, which you were unspeakably grateful for. Between her and Morgan, you sometimes felt like maybe when this year was done, you could actually belong on this team.

Hotch interrupted your pity party. “Rossi, you’re with Reid in Phoenix. JJ and Emily, you’re going to Vegas. Morgan, you and I are going to San Diego.”

He turned to you. “You’re coming with me.”

Your stomach flipped at his words. You knew he had the most to teach you, and you could observe him coordinating the entire investigation from San Diego, but the idea of your performance being directly scrutinized by your boss in such a small group made you more nauseous than excited.

“Please be aware,” he continued, “Garcia is going to have to deal with three times the inquiries as normal. I recommend you only contact her if the information you’re searching for is genuinely too difficult to find yourself.” He gave Morgan a pointed look, to which Morgan raised his hands in mock surrender, grinning.

“We’ll drop teams off as we go,” Hotch said. “Wheels up in thirty.”

____________

As you settled into your seat on the plane, your mind spun, trying to review every piece of psychology knowledge you’d ever encountered. This wasn’t your first case, but it was the first one you got to travel for, which made it feel much more real.

The hours ticked by as the team reviewed the case. You contributed - not much, and nothing they wouldn’t have thought of without you - but it was something. Narcissist, craves attention and spotlight, physically confident enough to detain and murder three women at the same time. The method was throwing the team for a loop, however. Bleeding the victims out was clinical, relatively painless - uncharacteristic of the sexual injuries found on the corpses and the bravado with which the killer executed the rest of the crime.

When you, Hotch, and Morgan trudged off the plane in San Diego, you had been going at the potential profile for hours and even Morgan’s patience was wearing thin.

“Look, Hotch, let’s hold off on speculation until we see the crime scene in person, alright?”

Hotch nodded, and took that as a cue to head straight to the crime scene. You groaned internally - having barely showered this morning and spent half the day on a plane, your greasy hair and coffee-stained skirt would have greatly benefited from a stop at the hotel to freshen up.

It’s not like you have to look good to go stare at a patch of dirt where a dead body used to to be though, right?

____________

Turns out the aforementioned patch of dirt was actually a wooded grove off a hiking trail leading to a nude beach, much to Morgan’s delight. The site itself was uninteresting except for the way the body had been buried - covered up very securely, implying remorse, another characteristic that didn’t make sense with the initial profile.

This commonality between all three crime scenes was hotly debated on the video conference between the entire team when you got back to the hotel. Cross legged on the bed in Hotch’s hotel room, you listened to Reid and Rossi snipe back and forth on the laptop about what the burial method could mean for ten-plus minutes (“It’s clearly just a functional tool to properly hide the body, Reid.” “But you don’t know that, the significance of burial practices can tell us so much more beyond function, it can even tell us about his religious upbringing…”) before Hotch put a stop to it.

“What do you think?” Hotch asked you, turning and looking directly into your gaze. You were suddenly hyperware of the proximity between you two - sitting close enough on the edge of the bed that your thighs were almost touching. Morgan had abandoned his position on the other side of you to stretch out in the armchair by the window halfway through Rossi and Reid’s debate. Hotch’s eyes boring into yours from only a few feet away and the expectant silence of the other team members on the video call spiked your heart rate, and you took a deep breath, trying to calm yourself.

“I… agree with Dr. Reid. I think it means something. The position of the hands, they were crossed across the chest, right? He didn’t need to do that. I don’t know if it means he was remorseful, but it was on purpose. I think.”

Hotch nodded, not breaking eye contact. “Good. Let's move forward with that theory.” He turned back to the laptop. “Let me know how interviews with the loved ones go tomorrow. Let’s find the connection between the victims. Call me if you need anything.” After shutting the laptop, he turned to you and Morgan. “Let’s call it for tonight. Meet me in the lobby at 7 tomorrow.”

Having been excused, you and Morgan made your way to your hotel rooms next to Hotch’s. Morgan wished you goodnight, and you unlocked your door and practically sprinted into your shower.

After you got out, you looked around the room, towel drying your hair. It was nice, much nicer than anywhere you’d ever stayed. The abstract art on the walls and the modern, clean white lines of the furniture were lit by the soft glow of the sunset filtering through the sliding glass doors leading to the balcony overlooking the ocean. You poured yourself a glass of wine from the minibar (a reimbursable travel expense, right?) and stepped onto the balcony, breathing in the ocean air.

“Nice night, hm?”

You jumped, nearly spilling your drink down your front for the second time in less than 24 hours. Hotch was sitting in a chair on his balcony to the left of yours, reclining with his hands behind his head. Despite wearing nothing but your thin hotel robe, you felt the urge to avert your eyes from him. His suit jacket was shucked, tie undone and hanging around his neck, and the top two buttons of his white, collared shirt were unbuttoned. You felt like you were seeing something you shouldn’t have, like the cold stoniness of his exterior had shifted just slightly and allowed you a glimpse underneath.

It’s just a couple buttons, calm down. You’re the one who’s barely clothed in front of your fucking boss.

“It is. Shame we can’t go to the beach,” you replied, keeping your eyes forward.

Oh my god, three women were murdered and I just complained to my boss about not being able to go to the beach.

“You’re welcome to get up early and go tomorrow; might be a bit cold,” Hotch replied. You could tell from his voice he was smiling.

You mumbled in affirmation, continuing to avoid glancing in his direction. “Well, I just wanted to see the view, um, I’m gonna get to bed. Goodnight, Agent Hotchner!” You ducked back into your room, and you could have sworn you heard him chuckle before you slid the door shut.

After getting ready, beating yourself up mentally for your complete social incompetence, and tucking in under the plush, white duvet, you drifted off to sleep.

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candyshua · 4 years

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It’s a Long Way Home | Chapter 10 (Finale)

Pairing: Joshua x Minghao x Reader

Synopsis: It was dark, and then it was light. You’re finally lucid. After 15 years of not being conscious, you wake up in a desolate and post-apocalyptic earth where infected flesh-eating beings roam the streets. Soon enveloped into a mysterious group of survivors, you consistently wonder who they are. But most importantly, who are you?

Genre: Heavy angst, some fluff here and there

Warnings: Gore, bad language, physical & verbal abuse

Word Count: 2k

The world unfolded before your meek eyes. What was happening soon sunk in, and you immediately ripped your already bitten arm from "Joshua's" grasp. Looking down, you noticed a bite mark was there.

But then, like magic, it disappeared. It faded off of your skin gradually within the course of a few seconds, and you displayed no signs of turning any time soon. The moment your blood touched Joshua's tongue, a series of gargles elicited from his mouth and then he fell, clutching his chest. The Doctor watched intently, and Minghao merely rushed over to help you. "Are you okay?" He stuttered, and you just nodded emptily. You paid no mind to Minghao, your attention was on the dramatic scene happening in front of you.

The first thing you noticed about Joshua was his eyes. Soon, a familiar brown coated the white vastness, and pupils sprouted like a sudden unexpected rainstorm. Color returned to his face, and his flesh tightened and cleansed itself. The reverse transformation was surreal, along with extremely satisfying. His teeth whitened, his lips weren't a pale blue anymore; he was Joshua.

Clutching his chest with both of his hands, he fell to the ground and passed out in front of you. If somebody would've walked in at this very moment, they would've seen four humans.

Soon, your eyes widened and the tears on your cheeks dried. Your eyes wandered to the open cut on your arm, no signs of being bitten near. It was just a cut, like being sliced with a knife.

You were immune.

And you were the cure.

Time blended together in a haziness. Days felt like weeks, as your mind swam in and out on consciousness. The reality of the power you held kind of drove you mad temporarily, but any heated haziness can be replenished with a sweep of ice cold reality.

It started when Joshua would wake up in the middle of the night, in the hospital of Fort Lockwood of course, and then he'd puke up blood. You assumed it was just his body getting rid of the infection, but to be fair you had no idea how to react in this situation. Any medically experienced fellow would have been absolutely stumped. Slowly, Fort Lockwood was rebuilt and The Doctor was under constant surveillance. You helped revive the fort to what it used to be, along with taking care of the excess scientists.

You had felt heaps of guilt, knowing many people died due to their mere inconvenience. So many souls succumbed to the title of "Collateral Damage". They were executed because they were in the way - and that was that.

Truth be told, it had been four days since your attack on Fort Lockwood, but it felt like four months. Everything was so slow, worry tended to drag things out until the final show - where everything all comes crashing down. It was like you were in a play, and the end was near.

But one more plot twist was in store, just to mess with you.

Today, you would finally talk to The Doctor - face to face. Alone.

You walked into the dimly lit basement where Joshua was once constricted, that thought being enough to stimulate an anger deep inside you. You strode over to the beaten down man, who once reigned down upon his own miniature civilization. Oh, how the mighty have fallen. Now, he was under the control of somebody he used to own, somebody he used to control.

You could do whatever you wanted to him. You could torture him like he did to you, you could let him starve to death, hell - you could untie him and let him walk out a free man. You weren't foolish enough to do so, but you knew you could have.

You were powerful. This time, you were mighty and great, you were no longer the girl subject to a glory-desiring genius or her amnesic self. You were the one with the good hand, it was like showing your royal flush to fellow poker players. The prize was so close, yet so far. But, was it as glorious and magnificent as it was prophesied to be? Was power what you wanted?

You knew you wanted to make him suffer, like he did to you.

Alas, you were a living example of it - you had won.

And, The Doctor had many answers you needed. But, you wanted his name to be forever tainted - not glorified as he had wanted. So, when you walked in that room, you had a vision in your mind.

"Hello." You hissed, the pure rage burning inside of you. The Doctor scoffed, his ragged, pale skin and scruffy grey beard only adding to his pathetic and defeated nature. His icy blue eyes were no longer sparking with the evil dreams that blew inside of him, instead they were hollowed out with the harsh winds of you. You played with the gun in your waistband, until you pulled it out and pointed it directly at his head.

"I'm making it quick. Have fun rotting in Hell, buddy." You grumbled.

And then you squeezed the trigger.

The gunshot rang through out the room, but you didn't care. The incessant ring in your ears was overpowered by your triumphant smile. Victory was yours, and it tasted oh so sweet.

A week later, Joshua's puking wouldn't stop. You had talked to Seungkwan about it, but his blood loss was extremely risky and potentially fatal. You didn't have the technology nor the staff to figure out what was happening.

Yet, you didn't really need that. Joshua called you to his room one day, and he knew exactly what was happening to him. The thick quiet atmosphere spoke louder than so many things you wanted to say, the air impregnated with a poignant awkwardness. You two had talked over the course of this week, but there was something gone. He wasn't the Josh he was before, but did you expect him to be?

"He did horrible things to me." Joshua mentioned oddly, the once quiet air now drowning in those sad words. You didn't need to be told, for you knew the horrible extensiveness of The Doctor's actions. You just nodded and let him talk.

"He told me why he did it...How he created the virus, how you were immune...And then he fucking injected me with it- and you saved me." He continued, and you just nodded solemnly. "I don't think your blood cured me though, Y/N. I think your blood reversed whatever happened...I think it's poisoning me."

The cruel reality of fate was quite entertaining at times. It was obvious -- if your blood was the cure, then why didn't The Doctor have you hooked up to a machine? Of course he had tested your blood before. And, of course, it didn't work.

What were you supposed to do? Pretend to be shocked at the inevitability? You and Seungkwan had tried everything in your power to end Joshua's sickness, but it was no use. You knew - you god damn knew - that Joshua was going to die. And it was your fault.

You wanted to cry, but it was like you were dried out from the insurmountable amount of tears you have cried this week. You just sighed, and then laughed.

You laughed hysterically, to the point where tears rolled down your face endlessly. Joshua didn't react, he knew it was an odd reaction of some sort. Soon, your laughs surprisingly turned into tears, and then choking sobs. "I'm so sorry!" You wailed, and Joshua just held you like he used to, before everything went to shit.

You weren't at home when you in Joshua's arms. Joshua wasn't himself anymore, and you both knew that. "It isn't your fault." Joshua soothed. Truth be told, it really wasn't. He would've continued to be a mindless infected buffoon if you hadn't tried to save him with your blood. You had given him a little more time.

"I fucking poisoned you..." You shakily sobbed, as he stroked your hair and bit his lip. He wanted to cry, but he had accepted his fate. The pain of knowing that Joshua couldn't hold on to his love for you is what troubled him the most. For your love was a flame, but eventually it dwindled and burned out.

Now, just ashes were remaining. And here in the pile of ashes, you cried for what could have been.

"You gave me more time, Y/N."

"I shouldn't have killed The Doctor. He could've fixed this-"

"You did what was understandable." Joshua interrupted, hushing you softly. Soon, a comfortable silence engulfed you two, and all that could be heard were your quiet sobs or Josh's soft, slowing breaths.

"I want you to be happy, Y/N." Joshua mumbled, and you knew what he was getting at. You knew he knew, but you refused to believe it. Denial was a strong force after all.

"What do you mean?" You questioned dumbly.

"You know exactly what I mean. Don't guilt yourself into being alone forever. I can rest happily knowing that you'll be happy." Joshua mumbled, and you just sucked in a sharp breath.

You wanted to tell him that he was wrong, that he shouldn't give up because you loved him, but that wasn't true. You weren't at home with Joshua, there was no warmth. The love was gone, and it rekindled for the man who had been waiting for you. Joshua had still loved you, and he would die loving you. And in another life, he would be happy with you.

Just not in this one, for you would be happy with someone else. And Joshua? Well Joshua would be dead.

That night, Joshua had died beside you. And soon you learned that your blood wasn't the cure.

Not only that, you had discovered everybody from the ship you were previously on came down to Earth, and your father was no where found. And now, you lie in bed next to Minghao, a year later, still in Fort Lockwood. The world would continue on, and The Doctor's name would forever be cursed.

You and Minghao sat on top of the watch towers, looking over the forest that surrounded Fort Lockwood. It was around 2 AM, and the two of you sat in a comfortable silence. You wanted to say something, like that your period was late -- or that it had been a year since Joshua died.

But you just sat there, in silence. It was like Minghao knew the sound of the silence, he could listen to it.

During this past year, you and Seungkwan had worked endlessly with samples of your blood. No cure had surfaced.

Not only that, but no word from your father had been heard either. And as you stared into the dwindling dawn, you realized some questions would never be answered. Then, the sun rose and everything went on, like it always had.

And for a split second, you were again that girl who was confused with herself, who didn't know who she was or what she wanted, but then the feeling died. You lied in bed next to Minghao, resting after your night shift, and stared at his closed eyes.

A new passion erupted in you, a passion that was fueled from your love and experiences. It made you want to protect Minghao, it made you regret not being able to protect Joshua, and it made you you.

It was like a new reality was discovered -- a clearer more dense one. You weren't one of the good guys -- you had killed, stolen, and lied. You did all of those things because you thought you were right.

Yet looking back at it, you were so wrong. And an even harsher reality sunk in once you realized you could never make it right. You would forever be a killer, and a burglar, and a liar.

Your eyes sunk into Minghao's closed ones, and tears fell out of your eyes before you could stop them. Everyday, you would try to find a cure to help the fucked up world you lived in. You had no time to think about your happiness, because the world sat in your hands.

In another life you would be just another normal girl -- but not in this one.

THE END.

#joshua hong #joshua hong x reader #the8 x reader #the8 angst #the8 smut #the8 fluff #joshua angst #joshua fluff #joshua x reader #seventeen x reader #seventeen angst #seventeen fluff #seventeen x reader angst #seventeen x reader fluff #xu minghao #hong jisoo #minghao #jisoo

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littlepeachwhispers · 5 years

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Civilian - Chapter 3: Blood in the Cut

Previous Chapter: Chapter 2

Pairing: Negan x Fem!Reader

Series Summary: When you accidentally stumble onto Sanctuary territory, Negan takes you prisoner to ensure your arrival is purely coincidental. When no one from your group shows up, you end up becoming a citizen of the sanctuary and realizing just how dark your new leader truly is.

Chapter Warnings: light body gore & blood

Story Warnings: violence, gore, smut, slow burn, isolation, body gore, blood, dark themes

Available on AO3 if you prefer to read there. A/N: It feels like forever since I’ve updated this. I'm so sorry, guys, but to my credit, 2018 was a seriously crazy year. I lost/quit my job, had the worst heartbreak of my life, and I met Jensen and Jared. It was insane. But I promised I wouldn't abandon this fic and I mean it. My love for Negan has resurged and so has my motivation. This chapter was shorter than the rest I believe but it's a bit of a transition for me so I promise there's more angst/drama/action to come in the next chapters. I'm a bit rusty with no beta, but I'd love to hear ideas for future chapters!

During your first few days with Dr. Carson, he had familiarized you with the equipment he had in the makeshift hospital. Many machines and devices were outdated, but it made sense since the Saviors scavenged and took what was available to them. Carson had also prepared you for what the typical sanctuary patients would be like. Gunshot wounds, pregnancy tests, infections, and colds. He said that occasionally there would be something on the gorier side, but that hadn’t bothered you. You had seen your fair share of gore, all before the apocalypse was even thought about. Wounds that wouldn’t heal, people dying within seconds in front of you, insane gastrointestinal bleeds. As fucked up as it seemed, when it came to body gore, you were in your comfort zone. It was your life before the world went to shit. And patching people up came to you like second nature. Fixing people felt like home.

Despite your newfound comfort in your job, your arrival at the Sanctuary still had you reeling. Laura and another female savior whose name you had learned was Arat had accompanied you everywhere. Work breaks, the canteen, the commissary, even your shared room; each night was exactly like your first night in the old factory minus the handcuffs. You felt like you were never alone, your sense of self becoming fuzzy at times. Even Carson could be caught sneaking glances at you as you worked. You never slept well because you were always on edge. More often than you would care to admit, you found yourself wondering where your new leader spent the majority of his days. Negan had been scarce to say the least during your time at the sanctuary. It was nearly two weeks into your stay before you saw him again. He had been silently watching you alphabetize medication vials and bottles, before he left without a word. Whether it was due to his deteriorating eyesight or his lack of attention to detail, for some reason Carson hadn’t paid much mind to the organization of his tools or medicines. Within a few short days, you had fixed that. All the cabinets and floors were hand-scrubbed to perfection. They hadn’t been dirty beforehand, but thanks to you they were now pristine.

You began to lose count of how many days you’d been a Sanctuary citizen, knowing little more than the infirmary, your room, and the canteen. Days had begun to run together, finally some sense of normality in your situation falling into place for you. It seemed safe to lay low and off of Simon and Negan’s radar. You had no specific reason to fear them, not really. The imprisonment, the handcuffs, the weapons: it was scary, sure. But wouldn’t your own community have done anything they could to protect what they had as well? The longer you turned it over and over in you mind, the easier it was to understand. Your unease around Negan hadn’t primarily emerged as a result of any specific action. An aura of power, of absolute brutality, hung over him like a cloud. His authority was palpable. Something in you - probably the self-preservation - suggested that steering clear of him would be a wise decision. At least until he’d personally made avoiding him impossible.

Startling you out of your thoughts and causing you to drop an ampule of lidocaine, someone loudly barged in behind you as you stood in the makeshift infirmary. It was an ordinary day and nothing had been unusual up until that point. Carson had stepped out for his usual lunch and you had been relabeling bottles whose lettering had begun to fade. When you turned around to face the source of the commotion, you were face to face with a bleeding Negan, his hand covered in a deep crimson. A blond man you thought was named Dwight stood behind him, a blood-soaked towel bundled under one arm.

“Didn’t mean to startle you, Darlin.” His voice was strained and you could tell he was uncomfortable. You kicked the shattered glass at your feet to the side, pulling cabinet doors open to search for what you needed.

“I’m fine, D. Tell the boys to continue with the festivities.” Even in pain, he kept his humor as he directed his voice toward Dwight.

Flinging open cabinet door after cabinet door, you managed to gather some telfa pads, gauze packets, an antibiotic cream, and some saline meant for contacts, all of which you transferred to the exam table within seconds. Dwight nodded at Negan once through stringy ashen bangs before excusing himself. Gloves were a rarity, so you had to work on the man’s wound gloveless. There were a few boxes around, but the infirmary “staff” - consisting of Carson, a man and two women who had been aides in a hospital, and yourself - had collectively decided that gloves were for extreme needs only. The chances of having hepatitis of one type or another didn’t seem unlikely for anyone at this point. You often wondered if it even mattered anymore. An infection or bloodborne illness couldn’t be any worse than dying from a biter.

Negan didn’t say anything at first, his eyes focused on you intently. It was unnerving and you busied yourself with inspecting his wound to ease your mind. After lifting up the once-white cloth he’d used to cinch the blood flow, you discovered a laceration a little over an inch in length to the web of his left hand. Not a bite and not very big. But it was considerably deep. It still oozed blood. You ripped open a pack of gauze and pressed it firmly to his wound, before lifting his hand upright.

“Keep it elevated like this.” You decided to keep your replies short and simple, concentrating on the job in front of you.

“Settling in nicely?” His voice was just as you’d remembered, his timbre gravel.

“Yes.” Your answer was quiet. You poured the saline solution over the gauze to prevent it from drying to his blood as it clotted, your hands surprisingly steady around his.

“Good…” His voice trailed off, and you waited for him to say something else, but he didn’t.

You kept applying pressure until you finally staunched the bleeding completely. It didn’t call for stitches, thankfully. While cleaning up his wound with more gauze and saline, you noticed how calloused and bruised his hands were. He’d presumably just been in a fight, but he smelled clean. Like soap. The white tee he had on wasn’t pristine - there were smudges of blood and dirt - but it was still white. His hair was inky and slicked back into perfection, just as it was the first time you’d met. The short beard adorning his face was peppery and sharply groomed, with no trace of neck-beard to be found. It never ceased to amaze you; the capacity at which Negan was worshiped and taken care of by others in the community. It was unsettling, even moreso since you’d been tasked with healing the man.

“This might sting.” You warned timidly before dabbing a small amount of alcohol over the gash.

Negan hissed lowly, muttering a quick, “Shit!”

“I’m sorry.” You apologized, beginning to dry his wound and opening the small individual packet of antibiotic cream.

As you spread the ointment over his wound, you began to speak again, doing your best to keep yourself calm and your voice even. “I’m going to wrap a dressing around your hand. Just keep it dry and clean and come see me if any drainage is visible or in about three days. Whichever comes first. If it starts to hurt worse, feels hot, or smells, come see me as soon as you notice.” It wasn’t standard practice - in a perfect world, he would change the bandage every day. But you were conserving products and three days seemed a safe amount of time to wait.

Laying a non-stick pad over the wound, you started to wrap gauze around it when Negan spoke again.

“That sounds gross as shit, but coming out of your mouth it’s kinda fucking hot.”

Eyes widening, you didn’t know how to respond to his words. Did he call you hot? No, he said your words were hot. His phrasing felt more like a threat than a compliment. Tucking the end of the gauze into place, you stepped back from your newfound leader and began to pick up the wrappers from the supplies now on Negan’s hand.

“I’m finished.” You had turned your back to clean up but heard paper crinkling as the tall man stood up and off of the exam table.

“Arat and Laura are still escorting you around the Sanctuary.” His voice was steady as he spoke, and even though he hadn’t asked you a question, you felt as if he wanted you to answer him.

“They are.” Cautiously, you threw all your trash away and turned to face him. He had his head tilted to one side, his injured hand rubbing at his beard.

“You know, those ladies are two very integral members of my security team here.” You didn’t know exactly where he was going with this, but you took a shot in the dark.

“I’m not going anywhere, Negan.” He raised his eyebrows at your words, and your stomach instantly felt like it was filled with ice. “Sir,” you amended.

“...Good girl.” He chuckled. “I’m going to trust you on that. Can I trust you, Y/N?” He stepped closer and you began to feel nauseated and stuck in place. It was a repeat of that first encounter with him all over again.

You looked up to meet his eyes, backing up until the freshly cleaned counter was biting into your lower back. “Yes, sir.” You felt your pulse pounding in the flush of your cheeks.

He held your gaze for an intense moment - long enough to make you shiver - before grinning again, as if nothing had just transpired between the two of you.

“Great.”

You continued to clean up and organize supplies as Negan stood in the middle of the room. He didn’t move to leave immediately, and that made your hands tremble as you grasped a plastic container of alcohol and replaced it in its proper cabinet.

“...You did a good job.” He grunted, inspecting his hand. Before finally turning to leave, he turned to face you again.

“Thank you. Can I do anything else for you, sir?” Your voice was stronger; it didn’t sound like you were as scared as you actually were.

He chuckled at your voice, eyes meeting yours this time. You wondered how far he was going to push the envelope with his reply, but he surprised you: his laughter was his reply. After he glanced over your body in a quick once-over, he’d turned to the doors and disappeared.

What did that even mean? You peered around the room you stood in; nothing had visibly changed save for the crinkled paper on the exam table, yet the aura in the air had grown heavy; different. Your encounter with Negan had left you tense. The mood didn’t lift all day. You continued with your usual work, bandaging a wound or two, but mostly organizing and cleaning. Was Negan kidding when he’d said your voice was hot? He was this community’s leader, would he find it disrespectful if you didn’t return his interest? Or if you did? Was he even actually flirting with you, or was it just an aspect of his personality? Negan had used pet names from the moment he’d met you, and you assumed it had been his demeanor. A part of that complex persona he embodied. Truth be told, you didn’t know anymore. And you didn’t know if figuring it out was worth your peace of mind at this point.

Taglist: @ohokaybyethen @miiraal @grayonshugs @angelicaleonamichelle @collette04 @freakior

It’s been a long time, so if I left you out or you no longer want to be on the taglist, let me know!

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neganisking · 6 years

Text

Sometimes bad things happen

A/N: Here it is! It’s taken a couple of months but the sequel for surprise gift is here! You could probably read this as a stand alone fic but there are a few references that might not ake sense. MASSIVE thank you to everyone who has left me comments likes and reblogs, you all fuel my motivation and I was completely blown away by the respose to the first part of this series. Special thanks to @noodlecupcakes @fatbutstillrad @i-am-negan-trash and @andillica who have either beta’d parts of this fic away and/or listened to me whine about it now and this now and then too.

Read surprise gift here! - Masterlist

Wordcount:9,500

Tags/ warnings: D/s , light smut, nudity, sexual content, hurt/comfort, fluff, canon typical graohic descriptions of violence and gore, injury, minor character death, blood, walkers, panic attack, praise kink, service kink, cuddles, hair stroking I’m being a bit generous with the tags but if I miss anything let me know.

—————-

“Open the fucking gate!”

The horn of the truck blares out into the air as the Saviors on guard duty rush to pull back the metal chain link fence. Your ears are still ringing with the screams of the man slumped on the floor in front of you that had now, to your horror, fallen into faint whimpers. He wasn’t going to last much longer.

The sweat was pouring from your brow, your breath coming out in harsh rags. Using what energy you had left, you clamp your hands down on the bloodied stump, using your own bodyweight to try and stem the flow of blood. God there was so much blood.

You hear Travis holler out the window. His tone sharp and irritated. “Get Carson to haul ass down here proto! Jimmy got bit.”

Your stomach lurches as the man stops whimpering, his eyes rolling back into his head. Cussing loudly you grab his shoulders and shake him hard, anything to get him to come to. It doesn’t work.

Your voice touches on hysteria as you call through the metal sheet to the front cab. “Travis I can’t keep him awake! Jim! Jim c’mon buddy wake up! We’re here now. C’mon!”

It wasn’t fair. He had gone through all that shit just to die when you finally get him back? No. He was strong. He would make it. You just had to keep him going long enough for Carson to get him.

Alderman’s voice answers, sounding just as panicked as yours does. “James motherfucking Bates if you don’t wake up right now I’ll get Negan to put your ass on the fence so help me-“

Travis interrupts his empty threat. “-Fucking drive up to the door already he’s running out of time.”

“I’m going! Move out of the fucking way!” A few more blasts of the horn later and the truck lurches forward before finally grinding to a halt. You were home.

Your body ached in relief, trembling from the exertion of the last few long hours. “Jim c’mon we made it. Don’t go giving up on me now.”

The slamming of the truck door and the muffled voices tell you that the two men are making their way around to the back with some of the others. Good. You were about to fall on your ass from exhaustion.

“Carson’s on his way.”

“He’d better fucking hustle or it’ll be too late. Someone call Negan. He’ll want to know about this shit show.”

Your body sags at the mention of Negan’s name. He’ll set things right. It would all be okay. You adjust your position slightly muscles begging for a break from your crouched stance beside him. It was almost over.

A breathy groan erupts from the man. Still pushing down on his wound you flick your eyes to his face to see if he had managed to regain consciousness only to see his eyes taking on a haunting yellow glaze, drowning out the blue that had once been there. He was gone. “Aw shit!”

As you spur yourself into action, Jim’s lifeless body lurches forward, snarling as it spots it’s first meal. It stumbles, missing you as you reel back out of the way and clumsily shuffles towards you with a sickening snarl.

You could end it. It wouldn’t take much more effort to take your knife and halt the remnants of your friend forever. It would almost be a kindness really, no one wanted to end up like that after all. The reality of it, however, was that that kindness wasn’t an option – especially on the doorstep of the sanctuary. There weren’t many things that were wasted in the new order and the wall outside the factory needed new corpses to replace those that had become rotten beyond recognition. Jim still had a purpose. Even in death he belonged to Negan.

Rapidly crossing the suddenly far too small space of the truck bed, you hammer desperately against the door. “He’s turned! Open the fucking door!”

In an instant the bolt holding the doors locked slides open and daylight streams into the space. Throwing yourself out of the truck, you quickly slam the doors shut behind you as your two companions can only look on in shock horror.

You slide the bolt across just in time as the walker throws himself against the metal, the force of the impact making your slick hands slip against the door leaving a trail of crimson in their wake.

Alderman balls his fists into his hair, turning from the truck with gritted teeth. “Oh fuck. Fucking fuck. No Jim! C’mon man!”

Travis swears loudly, kicking the truck door making the walker inside ram the opening again. You glare at your friend, blood still pounding in your ears as you struggle to hold the door closed. The world around you began to tilt as you became dizzy. When would today end? “A little help?”

Weary from exhaustion himself, Travis takes his place beside you, leaning against the truck door while snapping at the few saviours who were just standing there watching everything go down. “Could you assholes make yourself useful and take it to the fence before anyone else gets fucking bit? We’re fucking done today.”

As the saviours come to life, Travis takes you over to the side and sits you down on one of the large stone barriers. Gulping in lungfuls of air that isn’t suffocated with the stench of blood and death, you try to relax your body. Sparing Travis a look you wonder if he’s alright. He looks worried for some reason. Before you have the chance to ask he beats you to it. “You okay?”

Were you? You were still alive obviously so that was a plus. Better than Jim at least. You felt like you were about to throw up whatever was left in your stomach but that wasn’t exactly surprising. Now that the immediate danger was gone and there was no one to try to save, things were catching up to you rather quickly.

Carson’s arrival saves you from having to answer. He runs through the door, his large medical bag in hand, looking rightfully flustered as his eyes lock onto you. “Who was bitten?”

Travis sighs, easing to his feet with a little difficulty. “It’s too late doc. It was a long shot anyway, we cut his arm off but he bled out in the truck on the way back.”

The doctor frowned, looking genuinely distraught. He was a good man, or at least he was from what you had seen of him. “Is anyone else hurt?”

Sparing a glance behind him to where you were sitting and another to where Alderman was pacing on his own in an empty corner of the lot, he rubbed the back of his neck. You cast your eyes to the floor, the blood on your skin and covering your clothes doing nothing to help your nausea. “Yeah, nothing life threatening though I just think-“

You don’t find out what Travis thinks because in that moment the main fire door opens with such force that it hits the outside wall with a resounding bang. Heavy footsteps approached you as the familiar voice that belonged to them demanded attention. “What in the ever loving fuck happened?”

“Negan.” At the sound of Travis’ voice you squint up at the men in front of you from your place on the stone bench, blinking slowly. Travis had nervously fixed his posture to stand upright and the doctor still had that same look of concern etched into his features.

Unsatisfied with his answer, Negan narrowed his eyes, sparing a beat to frown in your direction. “I repeat. What in the ever loving fuck happened?”

Travis adopted a professional tone, speaking as quickly and matter-of-factly as possible. It was the best way to deal with Negan when he was pissed. “Pretty sure it was the Wolves. We were checking out sector 7 again and we must have set off one of their old traps. It was bad. Jimmy got bit. We cut off his arm and tried to get him back to the doc but he didn’t make it.”

You supress a shudder, remembering the way the rotters poured in from every exit, the way your stomach had dropped through the floor, how hopeless you felt. It was a miracle you made it out alive. Jim of course, hadn’t been so lucky.

Negan growled. “I thought we fucking cleared those shit eating psychos out last month.”

Travis sighed. He shrugged as he tried to work it out for himself. “As far as I can tell we did sir. It was just an active trap. None of them came to check it after the alarm went off. It took us long enough to get out, they would have been there.

“Motherfuckers.” The venom in Negan’s voice is palatable and for good reason. The vigilante group had picked off a serious amount of saviours until you had all went out together to hunt them all down. Even now after they were long gone they were still managing to cause shit. You couldn’t help but share Negan’s sentiment.

For a long moment, Negan looks about ready to take Lucile to some poor asshole’s melon out of sheer frustration. No one says anything, you and Travis being too exhausted to offer any kind of support and Carson, who most likely didn’t have a clue, opting for the safety of silence instead. A couple of long moments later, Negan runs a gloved hand down his face with a sigh. “Anyone else hurt?”

Travis shrugs, having given up on hiding just how tired he was. “Nothing serious.”

Negan nods to himself. “Good. Check ‘em all out anyway Carson. Y’all look like shit.”

You hear the dismissal in his tone and you imagine him strutting away back to whatever he had been doing. It had been a few weeks since your encounter with him in the privacy of your room and true to his word he hadn’t held it over you. In fact, he hadn’t mentioned it at all. You had mixed feelings on the matter really, though right now you were in no state to examine them.

You wonder how long it would take to get to bed. You supposed you would need to clean yourself up before Carson could check you over. And the man was thorough so it would probably take a while. Shit. Maybe you could just nap for a bit first.

Suddenly you become aware of someone snapping their fingers in front of your face. Furrowing your brow you blink at the hand, the realisation slowly dawning on you that it belongs to Negan. Didn’t he leave?

You squint at the man who seems to have been saying something if his perplexed expression is anything to go by. “What?”

Negan huffs, no trace of amusement in his unreadable face. “I said are you fucking hurt?”

You frown slightly, trying to catalogue anything that could be considered and injury. Mostly you were just tired. “I – I don’t think so.”

“So this shit isn’t your blood?” He clarifies, gesturing to the sticky mess that was beginning to harden pretty much everywhere on your body making you want to itch.

“No.” You grumble flippantly, completely exhausted. Didn’t not being hurt give that away already? Negan was a smart guy he could figure it out.

Negan purses his lips together, a stern look on his face. You wonder what his problem is, just wanting to be alone. Apparently Negan doesn’t get the hint as in one swooping motion, he takes you by the crook of your arm and hoists you to your feet, leaving no room for argument. “Right. C’mon.”

It’s mostly out of surprise that you let yourself be pulled along the corridors and up the stairwells. His grip was firm but it wouldn’t be difficult to get out of it, you just didn’t have enough fight in you to make a fuss. Besides, Negan usually got what he wanted anyway. The sooner he did what he wanted the sooner you could sleep.

Along the way people dropped to their knees as they caught sight of the tall man. Seeing it from his perspective made it seem even more bizarre. Like he was some kind of god, parting the ocean or some shit like that.

It’s then that you realise where he’s leading you to. Slowing your pace you pull gently at the hand wrapped around your wrist. You didn’t want to go up to his room, you just wanted to sleep. “Negan-“

Negan looks at you with an almost pained expression. “Don’t fight me on this doll face. Just don’t.”

When the only reply he gets is a withering sigh, Negan continues onward, not stopping even after he leads you through the doorway to his room going instead straight to the bathroom.

As bathrooms go, the room was hardly the dream that they used to sell you in commercials or in fancy catalogues with payment plans and polished marble surfaces. That being said, the fact that the man had a working bathroom at all was a luxury that was almost unheard of in this day and age. The small, clean room had probably once only been equipped with a toilet and a sink but now it had a mismatched bath with an overhead shower too, the yellow duck patterned shower curtain drawing your amusement as it catches your eye.

Flipping the lid of the toilet seat down he finally lets go of your wrist, your skin feeling noticeably colder as his hand leaves you. He inclines his head to the porcelain. “Take a seat.”

Not needing to be told twice you sit down, all too aware that you’re most likely getting blood on everything but you can’t bring yourself to care. It wasn’t like Negan was particularly squeamish anyway.

Running a basin full of water Negan shrugs his jacket off, hanging it on the hook on the back of the door. It crosses your mind that maybe you ought to do something, say something even but you have no idea what. Instead you just watch him move about in the space, your face slack and weary as he dampens a cloth with the water.

Turning to you, Negan picks your hand up from your lap and begins to wipe your arm down. He frowns at the offending limb in concentration, something clearly working it’s way through his mind. “Is what Travis said true? Is that what happened?”

You blink slowly, trying to remember exactly what Travis had said. Negan wrings the cloth out in the basin and has almost completely cleaned your arm by the time you reply. His answer had been vague, but unfortunately it was all true. “Yeah.”

Negan grunts in reply, he doesn’t say anything else which is more than okay with you. Methodically, he moves onto your other arm, rinsing the cloth out again and again until it’s clean. At some point in the process, his movements begin to soothe your frazzled nerves, it would feel almost comforting if it wasn’t for how overwhelmed you were.

Once your arms are done he pauses, taking in your face with a grimace. Rude. You didn’t look that bad. Besides if he was so offended by your face then why had he been trying so hard to get into your pants all this time?

He rinses out the cloth once again before squatting down in front of you. Wetting his lips, Negan presses the material to your face and you hiss at the uncomfortable feeling, the cold water irritating you much more than before. Negan pulls the corner of his mouth down in the closest thing you’ve ever seen to an apology from the man and for a moment your irritable mood subsides. He is trying to help after all.

That is until he opens his mouth. “Think you can manage a shower?”

Your eyes roll as you huff in exasperation. You had just been through hell and lived to tell the tale, a mere shower in comparison was a walk in the park. Unable to keep the annoyance from your voice you grumble, too wired to give a damn. “I think I’m capable of taking a fucking shower Negan. Honestly you don’t need to make such a fuss.”

Negan presses his lips into a thin line, his antagonised persona darkening the already strange atmosphere in the small room. “Yeah well seeing as you rolled up here covered in fucking blood and shaking so fucking bad it looked like you were going to go join old Jimbo on the motherfucking fence I’ve decided that I’m more than entitled to give a shit if you can make it through a good damn shower without keeling over. Thank you very fucking much.”

You’re taken aback by his biting tone, not used to your words having that affect on the man. Usually he bounced off your bickering and griping with a gleeful smile and a sarcastic remark. You hadn’t really given much thought to how you must have looked to other people. It explained why Travis had looked to worried too. The last thing you wanted to do was to get into an argument so in the hope it would diffuse the situation you decide to back down. “Sorry.”

Negan shakes his head, exasperated. “Don’t be sorry just quit busting my god damn balls. You’re in shock. You can’t even fucking tell that you’ve got a fucking gash on the side of your god damn face.”

“What?” You squawk indignantly, not entirely sure he isn’t fucking with you as you quickly stand up and turn to the mirror on the wall. Ignoring how the sudden movement makes your head spin you squint to examine your apparent injury.

Most of your face is clean now, with the odd bit of blood in the creases of your nose and your eyebrows. What catches most of your attention however is the long graze around your left temple that was still steadily oozing a small amount of blood. It looked worse than it probably was, and you were almost certain it wasn’t serious but the fact that you hadn’t even realised made your chest tighten. You couldn’t even remember banging your head but then given how chaotic it had all been it was hardly surprising. What else had you missed? No wonder Negan was concerned.

Noting the way your face falls and your breathing picks up, Negan moves to stand behind you so you can see his face in the mirror. He gently rests his hand on your shoulder his voice a little strained but much more comforting. “Exactly my fucking point. Take a deep breath for me now. Nice and slow.”

Taking in a shaky breath you fill your lungs with air before turning around to face the man behind you and leaning back against the counter, not wanting to look at your face anymore. Now that you were aware of your injury it suddenly comes to life, making your head throb painfully.

Negan slips one hand around your waist this time to steady you, watching you closely in concern. “Easy does it butternut.”

For a few long moment you just focus on breathing. Your eyes close and you try to relax your body, letting Negan’s close proximity make you feel safer than you had all day – not that that was difficult. Relaxing doesn’t exactly work, you’re too tired, too sore and your mind just won’t stop reeling with white noise. You suppose at least you’re not alone.

When you open your eyes you meet Negan’s soft gaze. You quirk your lip in acknowledgement trying to reassure him somehow. He doesn’t wait for you to speak gesturing instead to your stained clothes. “Can I help you out of these? No funny business I swear.”

You huff a laugh, finding it amusing that Negan was so bold and so ridiculous to try and get your clothes off. Your initial thought was that no, you were capable of dealing with the rest yourself and that you were in no mood to allow yourself to be naked in front of him. The more you thought about it though the more you realised that it wouldn’t be anything he hadn’t already seen. You doubted that he would try anything while you were in a state anyway. Between that and how heavy your limbs feel a little help didn’t seem like such a bad idea but you didn’t want to make it that easy for him.

With a sly quirk of your eyebrow you ask him. “Scouts honour?”

He blinks, not expecting you to be making a joke in this particular situation and scrunches his face in amusement before falling into right into your trap. “Scouts honour.”

Narrowing your eyes in mock scrutiny, you wag a finger in his direction, recalling a previous conversation. “I thought we already established that you weren’t a boy scout.”

Apparently your joke falls flat although you still think it’s pretty funny. Negan blinks a couple of times before pinching the bridge of his nose as though he’s the one with a hole in the side of his head. “Fucking – honestly butternut. You’re killing me here. Would you just me help you already?”

Rolling your eyes you concede to him and gesture for him to do his thing. With a nod Negan’s hand leaves your side and his fingers find the hem of your tank top. To your surprise, Negan systematically strips you of your clothes without a single remark and even without the faintest trace of a suggestive taunt on his face. He’s all business, not even letting his eyes linger as he unclips your bra and your bare skin meets the cool air. You can’t help but feel out of sorts with how uncharacteristic Negan is acting. If you’re honest you’re not sure how to handle him when he isn’t being crude.

It’s after you toe off your boots and you unbutton your jeans that you decide to break the silence. As Negan stoops down, fingers hooking into the belt loops to ease the fabric down your legs you tease him lightly. “This wasn’t exactly how I envisioned you getting my clothes off again.”

It does the trick. With a low chuckle Negan grins, looking up from his crouched position at your feet with a gleam in his eyes that starts a certain kind of churning in your stomach. This you were familiar with. It must show somehow because Negan let’s out a satisfied hum and reaches to pull your panties down so you can step out of both at the same time.

Stark naked now you’re all too aware of just how exposed you are and just how close his face is to your nether region. In different circumstances you would be more than willing to push those invisible boundaries to see what might happen but you knew yourself well enough to know it wasn’t a good idea right now. He did look positively sinful though. Unable to help yourself you press your thighs together and of course Negan notices.

With a sigh, Negan gathers up your dirty clothes and eases to his feet smiling softly. “There’s always next time sugar. It’s nice to know you’ve been thinking about it though.”

His added afterthought makes you frown. You thought it would be obvious that he had been on your mind especially after the display you had made of yourself for him. It was hard not to think of it all really. You weren’t about to tell him anytime soon but nothing you had done to yourself since had felt half as good as the day he had watched you unravel and beg for him. “Of course I have.”

Negan scoffs bitterly. Turning from you to dump the clothes in the hamper. “Could’ve fooled me.”

The beginnings of what could have been a good mood instantly vanish as a scowl takes over your features. What the fuck did he expect? You were pretty sure you had made it clear you weren’t about to compromise your place amongst the saviours for him. That should have spelled out to him that public declarations vying for his attention not to mention his dick were off the table. Did the fact that you had already gone as far as you had with him – the fact that you were currently standing in front of the man butt fucking naked for crying out loud – mean nothing?

Narrowing your eyes, a flare of anger comes over you. Without even considering the consequences you open your mouth with a scathing tone. “Oh I’m so very sorry Negan. I’ll remember to swoon and faint every time you walk into the god damn room from now on – make it real fucking easy for you to tell.”

Negan’s nostrils flare, not one for being spoken to like that. It sometimes amused you how he could always give it out but whenever it came to taking it he spat out his dummy. Today however, you didn’t give a shit. He was out of line and you didn’t have enough fucks left to give to cater to his ego – and you weren’t done yet either.

Looking him square in the eye you launch into another tirade. “I get that you’re so used to having multiple women waiting on your beck and call who you can fuck or do whatever the fuck you want with so maybe you didn’t manage to catch on but what happened the other week was a pretty big fucking deal for me. So don’t go acting all butt hurt just because I’m not fucking grovelling for your attention. You’ve already had a metric fuck ton of mine.”

So much for not getting into an argument. The silence surrounding you both in the aftermath of your outburst feels deafening and you struggle to hold your composure feeling far to vulnerable and strung out to stay still.

A different kind of fear begins to trickle through your mind as you process exactly what you just said and exactly who you just said it to. Without a doubt you meant every word but Negan commanded a certain amount of respect and you couldn’t say for sure exactly where your boundary was. He wouldn’t hurt you, you knew that for a fact but it didn’t stop you from worrying that maybe you had gone too far this time. Your horrid mood wasn’t completely his fault after all.

Negan breaks the silence with a huff, shaking his head as he narrows his gaze on you. “Don’t be a bitch for fuck’s sake. It doesn’t fucking suit you.”

At his anti climatic reaction, you mirror his expression. You’re not sure exactly what he’s playing at but you really can’t muster up the mental capacity to deal to his mood swings too - your own were difficult enough. “I’m not in the mood for games Negan.”

Negan considers you for a moment before deciding on a reply, pressing his lips together in frustration. “What the fuck happened out there huh?”

The question hangs in the air and as soon as you open your mouth to tell him exactly what happened you close it again. The words vanish from your mind as the white noise of fear, death and blood distract your train of thought. There were so many of them. It was so loud. So much blood.

“Stay here.”

You register Negan leaving the room, the door still slightly ajar and you find yourself immediately wishing he hadn’t left. Was he mad? Was he coming back? He wouldn’t have just left you to stay in his bathroom that was for sure so you reason that he can’t be that mad. Jesus you need to get a grip.

You manage to compose yourself in the short amount of time it takes Negan to return. Without a word he all but thrusts a pile of fabric into your hands, scowling. Oh that’s right. You were mad at him.

“Take a fucking shower. Whatever you do don’t pass out. Yell if you need me I’ll just be outside.” He doesn’t wait for you to reply turning on his heel and marching out of the small room. The door slams shut behind him and you can’t help but think how absolutely ridiculous he’s being.

‘I’ll manage.” You grumble out loud, out of spite more than anything.

Looking down at the fabric in your hand you realise Negan had given you a change of clothes to wear. For a sickening moment you think he’s completely lost it and left you a set of old prisoner’s clothes but on closer inspection you realise that these clothes belong to Negan himself.

You’ve never seen him dressed in anything other than his signature jeans, t-shirt and leather jacket combination but with the soft grey sweatpants in your hand you can’t help but imagine some scenario of him indulging in comfort on a rainy day. It’s ridiculous you know but it diffuses the anger that had been steadily building in your stomach and you realise that maybe that isn’t the only thing that is ridiculous about the whole thing.

Stepping into the tub, you draw the duck patterned curtain around you and begin to systematically scrub every ounce of blood and grime from your body, helping yourself to Negan’s shampoo as you go. You supposed that letting your mind go blank would be the hardest thing to do after today but focusing on the trivial tasks at hand allows you to do exactly that. By the time you step out onto the cool floor and reach for the towel on the counter, you feel lighter in more ways than one.

You ignore the way your head throbs as you quickly towel dry your skin before pulling the sweatpants over your legs and pulling the drawstring until it rests comfortably around your waist. It’s a little long in the leg so you easily roll the cuffs up, deciding that you need to catch Negan wearing these at some point in the future, for science. Forgoing your bra, because honestly if it wasn’t one of the last in your size you would gladly burn it rather than try to clean it, you pull his black t-shirt over your head and start to towel dry your hair, psyching yourself up to face the man waiting for you behind the door.

You were hoping that he wasn’t still mad at you. Quite frankly you were more than ready to sleep the rest of the week away if you could get away with it. Another argument was the last thing you wanted to get into. Besides, even though he was an asshole about it, he still seemed to have been genuinely worried.

The last of the adrenaline seemed to have washed away in the shower, leaving you feeling empty and heavy. With another sigh, you pull open the door and hesitantly make your way through the threshold.

Having probably heard the door open, you find Negan standing by his desk watching you carefully. It was practically impossible to decipher his mood from that alone so you decide to offer an olive branch and be the bigger person. “I’m sorry for snapping. But it- I was just-“

Your explanation gets stuck in your mouth, words failing you as you try to express exactly how you feel. Cutting you off with a firm tone, much softer than before, he gestures to the chair beside him. “Come over here.”

Unable to help feeling like a chastised child, you nervously pad your way over the rug on the floor to him. Eventually meeting his gaze he gently takes your elbow and guides you to sit in the leather chair. Hopefully you could sleep soon.

Watching him in silence, you look on as Negan opens a small wooden box to reveal some kind of first aid kit. He breaks the silence as he takes out cotton swabs and another couple of bits. “Travis said you were the one who lobbed off Jim’s arm.”

For a moment you just blink at the man. How did he know that? You were absolutely certain that Travis hadn’t mentioned it earlier. Unless it was when you were in the shower? How long were you in there for?

Your eyes land on the radio sitting on the desk beside you and suddenly it all makes sense. There’s no sense in denying it and clearly you weren’t allowed to ignore it so instead you reply in a cautious huff of breath. “Yeah.”

“You did the right thing.” He states it so matter-of-factly that he might has well have been passing comment on the weather rather than the fact that a man died. He gently dabs some antiseptic concoction on your cut and you forget to supress the hiss of pain that follows. He carries on regardless determined to clean out your cut.

“But he died.” It wasn’t so obvious to you. If you hadn’t have cut his arm off then he would still be alive. Not for long sure but at least he would have gotten to spend his last moments doing something other than screaming in agony.

Negan shrugs, sizing up a couple if different band aids before deciding on one to use. “He would have died anyway.”

You shake your head lightly unconvinced. It wasn’t the point. He didn’t get it.

Negan sighs, having finished whatever he had been doing to your head and cleans up the used and discarded bits from the table before putting the box away. Maybe he senses it’s a lost cause but he draws himself up and changes the subject. “I need to go over some paperwork. You, are gonna sit right here.”

Taking you gently by the elbow he firmly guides you up out of the chair and swaps sides with you before inclining to the spot on the floor. It takes you a moment to realise that you did in fact hear him correctly before squawking indignantly. “What? I’m not sitting at your feet like a dog Negan.”

As though expecting your reaction, an amused smirk pulls at his lip, his eyebrow raised in a challenge. “Oh I’m sorry. Do you have somewhere else you’d rather fucking be?”

You gape at him for a moment. Yes was your immediate spiteful answer. You would much rather be in bed asleep. Sleeping felt like such a good idea but you couldn’t quite bring yourself to voice it. His unusual request had piqued your curiosity and if you were honest you didn’t really want to leave just yet. Something about his presence comforted you and given he wasn’t mad at you anymore you felt reluctant to rob yourself it just to prove a point.

Negan scoffs, taking your stunned silence as an answer. “Thought not. Now sit Fido.”

“Woof.” You pout, taking a seat on the threadbare rug beside the drawers of the desk, ignoring the way that being put in this position at his feet sends a certain shiver of excitement through you. You’d come back to that later.

Making himself comfortable in the chair beside you Negan barks a laugh. “Very fucking funny.”

You wait, watching Negan as he pulls a pair of glasses out of the drawer by your head and true to his word starts going through what looks like the outpost reports. The gently flicking of paper is the only noise in the room for a few long moments and while it isn’t an uncomfortable silence, you still feel the need to ask. “Why am I sitting on the floor?”

Negan pauses, pulling the glasses off his face and setting them down on the desk. He regards you for a moment, something softening in his expression before reaching out to take the tip of your chin in his fingers, stroking his thumb along your jaw gently. “Because princess you need a time out.”

Brows furrowing, you squint up at the man despite the way his touch warms you. It didn’t make any sense. “I thought you said I did the right thing?”

Negan smiles, it doesn’t quite reach his eyes and you wonder if it’s sadness or pity you see in his expression. “You did. Now shush.” He adds as an afterthought, returning back to his task.

His confirmation only managed to confuse you even more. If you did the right thing then – was this a punishment? Why would it be if you didn’t do anything wrong? God you were tired. You wondered if you could nap on the floor. Sure Negan would probably be telling dog jokes for the rest of the month at least but at this point you didn’t give a shit. You were so strung out that it wasn’t difficult for you to consider resting your head against Negan’s leg instead. It was right there after all and touching him felt so comforting before. Would he mind? Maybe you could doze off too.

You don’t worry yourself for long, taking the initiative you shuffle slightly over and gently wind your arm around his calf, hugging it before slowly slumping against his leg, resting your cheek against the top of his knee. For a moment as Negan stills, you wonder if maybe he didn’t want you to but as he drops a hand down and gently scratches against your scalp you let out a soft sigh of relief.

Half lidded, your gaze wanders along the patterns of the rug beneath you and along the creases and folds of his sweatpants. In your boredom you focus on your own breathing and slowly start to relax, forcing your muscles to unlock one by one as you slump further into his leg.

That is until you see it.

It’s only blood. You’ve spent more time covered in blood than you have clean at this point but the small amount under the corner of your nail, somehow missed by both you and Negan reminds you of exactly why you’re here - exactly who’s blood it is.

The sound of the shutter blocking your only exit was secondary to the snarl of a small army of roamers that seemed to pour in from the cracks in the walls. You’re still not entirely sure how you managed to escape, killing rotter after rotter seemed endless until you found yourself being dragged towards the fresh air.

It almost didn’t end the way it did. A few more yards and it would have been a different story, but the walker that lunged for you at the last second had other plans. There wasn’t many times in the past few years that you had genuinely thought you were going to die but today was most certainly one of them.

It would have been, if it hadn’t been for Jim. Knocking you out of harms way just in time left no time for the man to save himself. He yelped as the monster tried to knock him down, kicking it away before swiftly stabbing it in the head but the damage had been done. It was only after you had put enough distance between you and the dead that he revealed exactly what had happened.

You hardly had to deliberate it. He saved your life so you had to save his.

Cutting someone’s arm off was nothing like they had made it look in the horror movies. There were no clean cuts or smooth follow through. Bringing your machete down against his arm hardly made a dent in the scheme of it all. You had wanted to stop then, to run and cry and beg him for forgiveness but your decision had been made and you forced yourself to carry on.

You knew you would never forget the look of sickening horror on their faces, the blood curdling scream that erupted from Jim as you hacked away at his arm. Over and over. God it never seemed to end. There was so much blood.

Maybe it was a bad call.

Maybe Carson could have done something else.

You should have probably used a belt. Or asked the guy first at least. Something.

Anything.

Maybe he would still be alive.

“It’s okay honey.”

His voice brings you out of your own thoughts and you’re surprised to find your breath catching in your throat and hot tears tracking down your face. God it was so fucked up. It wasn’t for the first time but you wished the world could go back to the way it was where you could just worry about getting the rent paid on time instead of getting mixed up in the ethics of cutting someone’s arm off.

You hastily unwind yourself from Negan’s leg to scrub the tears away from your face, trying to suck in a breath to steady yourself with. You needed to get a grip.

Smoothing his hand over your shoulder blade he gently coaxes you up into his arms. “C’mere kitten.”

This wasn’t how you wanted the next time you sat in his lap to go either but you’d be damned if you weren’t going to take the support he was so willingly offering you. Slipping up onto his lap he gently rearranges your legs as you bury your face against the crook of his neck, ignoring an irritated throb from the graze on your head.

A deep breath. Then another. You needed to calm down. He smelled good. How did he always manage to smell good? You focused on it to try and distract your own mind and chase away the crushing guilt.

Negan however had a different idea. Pulling you closer against him he methodically began to rub the lines of your back with a smooth palm. “Just let go darlin’ I got you.”

Like a damn breaking inside of you an uncontrollable surge of grief overwhelmed your mind and with Negan holding the pieces of you together you sobbed against him.

It wasn’t fair. It really wasn’t.

God you were so afraid.

He died saving your life.

Your friend was dead because of you and maybe you could have stopped it from happening.

You cling to him, mortified somewhere in the back of your mind at the state you’re in but the need for the comfort and safety that was Negan outweighed it all. If he was at all bothered by it he didn’t show it in the slightest. He keeps a tight hold on you, stroking along your back as he lightly rocks you back and forth, letting you get everything out. It’s cathartic in a way.

He stays like that with you for as long as it takes your crying to subside and the tremor in your frame to ease. Pulling in steadying breaths you start to calm down and come back to reality. It strikes you as odd just how much you needed that just as it dawns on you that Negan knew you needed it too. No one had ever done anything like that for you before and it makes you swell with admiration for the man. He really did care.

Pushing away from him lightly you lean back grimacing at the wet patch on his shirt but you know he doesn’t care about that given the soft smile on his face. You’re not sure how to let him know that you know he knew and that you’re grateful – even thinking it is confusing enough after all but in the end you decide to lighten the mood a little.

With a light huff and a small grin, you tease him. “Now I’m a cat? C’mon dude. Make up your mind.”

His face splitting into a wide smile, Negan ruffles your hair playfully. “Always such a smart ass.”

You sniff, still recovering but manage to scrunch your nose at him in good humour. “You love it when I sass you.”

“Indeed I fucking do butternut.” His voice drops to something more intimate and as he swipes his thumbs underneath your eyes you can’t help but lean into his touch.

Both of you revel in the quiet moment until Negan draws a breath clearly having something to say. “You listening?”

He waits until you nod before beginning, his tone making you avoid interrupting. “You did the right thing. Sure it sucks that he fucking died. But you gave him a chance. A good one. It isn’t your fault alright? There’s a million maybes and what if’s but the fact is you did something that could have saved his life instead of waiting around for him to keel over anyway. He would be fucking grateful. And shit, now that I know there are still active traps out there I can make sure we’re more fucking careful so this shit doesn’t happen again. You want to blame someone for this today you blame those dead fucking mongrels who set the traps in the first place. Not yourself. You did the right thing.”

You listen with furrowed brow, turning yourself to rest your head against his chest. Negan’s arms circle around you again and with a shuddering sigh you let his words sink in. It just wasn’t fair.

“It was just awful.” You decide to say, hearing the slight waver in your voice. Awful was an understatement.

“You’re safe now alright? It’s okay butternut.”

Fighting against your own stubborn pride, you let him make you feel safe and warm inside. It wasn’t okay really but what else could you do about it? You couldn’t bring him back now. At least you had tried right? For a long while you just sink into his warm embrace but eventually you feel yourself start to droop and you know it’s time to go.

Sitting up again Negan’s hands fall to your hips. The words get stuck in your mouth again but you power through your nerves anyway. “Thank you. For helping me. I mean – I could have dealt with this on my own – you didn’t have to – y’know – but thanks.”

Huffing a laugh, Negan raises a sceptical eyebrow at you. “You think I don’t know that I didn’t have to? Honey I didn’t bring you up here because I didn’t think you could cope without me or some shit. You’re a motherfucking badass – I know that better than anyone. You don’t need me. Hell, most of the time I don’t think you even want me.”

You could tell by the way his voice drops to a low mumble that he didn’t really mean to say that last part. He pauses frowning at something before continuing, guarded, almost nervous.

“I did it because I wanted to fucking help you. I did it because I didn’t want you to have to deal with it alone. I did it because all anyone fucking told me was that some fucker got bit and the first thing I see is you fucking drenched in blood and I fucking thought – I though I was going to fucking lose you.”

He reaches up to tuck a strand of hair behind your ear and before he can pull away you gently catch his wrist holding him in place and lean intro his touch. If he really did mean that, and you couldn’t fathom a reason why he would have said it otherwise, then it would explain why he was being so stubborn and persistent. It explained a lot actually. You realise it was no small thing for him to tell you that either, hopefully conveying the sentiment of how much you appreciate it in your expression.

He smiles, stroking his thumb over your cheek. “I also did it because you were acting like such a stubborn bitch when I know how much of a good girl you can be for me.”

Just like that the mood shifts again to something a lot less innocent. If you weren’t so tired you would totally try something. You wanted this man. An undercurrent of lust washes over you and you find yourself wishing the circumstances were different. Maybe next time.

Stroking your thumb over the bare skin of his wrist you try again to make amends for earlier. “I’m sorry for snapping at you.”

Negan nods. “I know you are it’s okay princess. As it happens you were right about a couple of things though.”

You sit a little straighter then out of curiosity. “Oh?”

He drops his hand and draws in a breath to explain. “I owe you an apology too doll. It would seem that I’ve made some pretty fucking big assumptions about you and – well it isn’t fair. I want you to know that I’m man enough to know when I fuck up. So I’m sorry.”

He’s talking of course about that offhanded comment that got you so riled up. You had thought that maybe you had overreacted but there was a lot of truth to his words. He had asked you to be a wife at one point, it makes sense to you that he expected you to behave a certain way. Not that that was your problem really. In fact, if it wasn’t for your rapidly evolving feelings that seemed to be erupting for the man you know you would tell him exactly where he could shove those ideas. He was right to apologise.

But does that mean you’re not good enough? You didn’t want to be a wife but there was something nagging at you that wondered if you had disappointed him somehow. It would be easier to be unapologetic about it all but your insecurities get the better of you. “I guess you have some expectations when it comes to certain women. So it makes sense that when I don’t meet them-“

He cuts you off with a resolute shake of his head, concern etching his features. “-Fuck no. Sweetheart please don’t do that. Don’t compare yourself to them. That was my mistake.”

“Well they are your wives.” You shrug, dropping your gaze into your lap. It’s not as though those women were some unobtainable goal. You didn’t even know them in all honesty to pass comment. It was that subtle part of you that wanted to please him that made it difficult for you not to wonder how you measured up to them.

He covers your hand with one of his own. Making you look up to see the sincerity in his expression. “You’re nothing like them butternut. I wouldn’t fucking like you nearly as much if you were trust me. I’m just glad you called me out on it.”

That was a pretty loaded statement to make, one you were sure you would spend a while dissecting later but for now, you just let his reassurance comfort you and reaffirm that you shouldn’t change who you are, even if Negan didn’t like it. Damn you needed a nap.

Not wanting the conversation to get too serious – or more serious than it already had, you squeeze his hand lightly and smirk. “You realise you just said sorry, please and told me you were glad I cussed you out all in one conversation?”

Negan snorts with laughter. “Must be coming down with something.

You chuckle, both knowing that you really ought to go but neither one of you willing to call it quits just yet. It’s your turn to break the comfortable silence when you recall something Negan had said in his rather uncharacteristic outburst.

“I do y’know.”

“What?” With the smile still lingering on his face Negan looks puzzled.

You choose your words carefully, speaking slowly so they don’t get caught in your mouth. “You said before that you didn’t know if I even want you. I just wanted to let you know that I do. Want you that is.”

Slowly, Negan lights up into one of those proud and private smiles that makes you feel a sense of accomplishment. He picks your hand up, turning it to softly kiss your palm in what is somehow the most intimate thing he’s done to date. His drawl is light and playful as he teases you. “Shit princess that’s the nicest thing you’ve ever said to me.”

With a roll of your eyes you gently shove at his chest. “You’re such a drama queen.”

“Well I must be doing something right because if I heard correctly you just said that you fucking want me.” He boops your nose for added effect making you giggle.

“Can I kiss you?” The words rush out of your mouth in a hushed whisper, surprising even yourself. He catches it though, eyebrows raising lightly in surprise. Wetting his lips as though to start on some new line of teasing or taunting he pauses for a moment just looking at you. Time seems to slow down when he just nods softly instead, his persona as steady and comfortable as ever.

Your stomach churns pleasurably in anticipation. How long have you fantasised about touching him the way that you want to? Sliding one palm around his neck and the other slowly up his chest you try not to rush yourself as arousal begins to build somewhere in the pit of your stomach.

Negan on the other hand seems content to let you go at your own pace, curious to see what you might do. His eyes never stray from you, not missing the way you swallow thickly or the quirk of your lip in a nervous grin. His grip slowly tightens on your hip pulling you in closer as your eyes flutter shut and you lean up to meet him.

A small whimper of relief escapes you as you press your lips against his. For some reason you just knew he’d be good at this and he doesn’t disappoint. With a low groan of his own that does a whole bunch of things to your insides, he pulls you in closer by the small of your back, effortlessly rearranging you to straddle his lap all whilst taking control and moving his mouth against yours in a way that you can only describe as full of raw desire.

Your stomach flips of its own accord, your fingers moving up to rake against his scalp pulling Negan closer and your body presses flush against him flooded with a sudden warmth that takes your breath away. Want and need take over and all pretence is thrown aside as you moan into his mouth, keeping up with Negan’s enthusiasm.

Apparently that’s Negan cue to pull away from you, gently holding you in place when you try to follow him in a lust filled daze. Your brow furrows as you blink at the man wondering why he stopped. Why on earth would he stop? Wasn’t this what you both wanted?

With an appreciative sigh Negan brushes his thumb against your lip, answering your unspoken question with a nod towards your head. “You need to get that bump checked out butternut.”

“Tis but a scratch.” You protest, already feeling the desire beginning to give way to exhaustion. He was right of course but you didn’t want to stop.

With a dejected grumble you slump, rest your head on his shoulder “Fine.”

Negan snorts a laugh, kissing the top of your head. “You’re cute when you’re frustrated kitten.”

“Uh huh.” You grumble about ready to cuss him out.

“Breathe doll face.”

Taking in a deep, shaky breath you try to calm your hormone-addled nerves, lightly fisting the fabric of his t-shirt. If the deep chuckle coming from the man is anything to go by he seems quite amused by the whole thing. Asshole.

“Good girl.” His words send a shiver of satisfaction through you, happy to please him.Tapping your thigh Negan motions for you to stand up, helping you up. You’re not sure if it’s the excitement or the exhaustion or the way you feel dizzy all of a sudden but your stiff and slightly unsteady on your feet at first. Probably another telling sign that it’s not a good time to be over exerting yourself.

You run your fingers through your damp hair not being able to bring yourself to feel disappointed – especially with the way Negan looks at you with pride and admiration, like you’re something precious.

Reaching out to squeeze your hand one final time Negan gives you your marching orders, the dismissal clear from his tone. “Now you’re gonna go and walk that sweet Lil ass to Doc Carson and get checked out then you’re gonna get to bed and have a good long nap. Don’t worry about work for the rest of the week I’ll take care of it okay?”

A full week? For a bump on the head he was being more than generous but then again maybe he was bringing other factors into consideration. With a grin you nod in acknowledgement before turning to go. It occurs to you that you should probably put on some shoes but you don’t feel like salvaging the pair in the bathroom just yet and besides, you have another in your room. The walk to the good doctor isn’t too far anyway. “Thanks Negan.”

“Feel free to stop by anytime butternut.” He adds as you reach the door, leaving an opening for a ‘next time’ wide open once again.

Glancing behind you to see him still sitting in the chair, you nod silently, the smile still evident on your face. It lingers all the way to Carson’s office and warms your insides long after too. For a day filled with horror and pain, you were glad that Negan had been there to keep you company through the aftermath.

#negan imagine #twd negan #negan smut #negan's thirst squad #negan #mine

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cafenzie · 7 years

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oh look, me again regarding things in fanfic that bug me --

/ This will be concerning menstruation and menstrual cycles/periods as it relates in general and it’s misconceptions found in descriptions of writing.

So.......sometimes I feel like the people who write fanfiction and scenes or areas regarding periods...don’t have periods??? Given that I know the number of female to male writers can be equal, I also know a ton more girls that happen to write and so it’s really confusing how misleading some may periods sound in fanfic when....they would, theoretically, have experience of periods themselves.

And it’s not the weird un-experienced “sex scene - esque” thing that I see a lot of in fanfiction either, because it’s a natural and obvious thing, my friend. Periods are a thing and so if you don’t like the talk about it you can turn back now but honestly this shouldn’t be “disgusting” in any way what I’m about to unleash on you because it’s just natural so get over it, really. ( unless you have a fear of blood, that’s different ).

What I’m talking about is writers who dramatize or don’t realistically portray periods and menstrual cycles. Whether it’s the “bright red blood” or, you know, like blood everywhere ( like....on the wall kind of everywhere because then it sound like more like a homicide case instead ) or just the general points people can miss so I’ll just start in no particular order of how to properly go about writing about periods and people on their periods :

01. Please, for the love of the stars, don’t always go describe the blood as bright red. I see this so many times that I wonder if some of these people really don’t have periods or understand how they work ?? Let’s make this easy: menstrual blood comes in all variety of colors from that light crimson ( especially during a lighter cycle ) all the way to a dark brown that, yeah, sounds like it’s from the wrong place, but it’s not. Actually, the darker your blood is, the more likely it’s “leftover” as I call it, meaning it’s the blood left over from last month’s lining and never got disposed of out of your lady bits and because it’s been so long, the color darkens and only gets disposed of when your new cycle starts. Usually, I start with darker blood because of that exact reason -- it’s one of the first things to come out along with all that fresh blood that, yes, may look a little brighter. But the rest of the point is: not everyone has bright red blood on their menstrual cycle. Actually, I don’t think I’ve ever talked to anyone who did, besides in small, sparse amounts..!

02. Do NOT cover up shitty actions with PMS reasoning. Do not validate someone shitting all over a person just because “they are on their period”. I hear this one so often, of how women are portrayed as literal devils while on their periods because of “PMS”. Yeah, okay, I get pretty annoyed more so when I’m on my period, but that’s due to three main reasons: (1) Hormones are the secret behind “PMS” as everyone dubs it. Estrogen and Progesterone levels in your body may heighten or serious decrease, causing imbalance, which affects your Serotonin, which is a neurotransmitter responsible for your mood balance, pain perception, and the sleep-wake cycle your body is used to. (2) I put in a trusty tampon but came back realizing my cycle is too heavy and I bled through. Maybe I was out and about. Maybe I was wearing nice underwear. Maybe I put the tampon in wrong or I should have brought a pad to put with it. Whatever the case is, every woman deals with her period a different way, personality-wise included. The myth about grumpy women who get super cheery is just waay too cliche for one thing, and it’s just ea fact that some women perceive their periods in different ways: I know girls that perk up during their cycle and we hang out and laugh and shit. I know women that may bite you if you try and grab her pizza slice, but who wouldn’t normally?? Fact is that variety is a thing with so called “PMS” and while it’s a handy term, it’s also become very desensitized to just mean that cliche stereotype of a she-devil or dragon lady who’s simultaneously bleeding out.

I’ll add on another common stereotypical misconception ( or, a least, how it’s treated to seem like ) with eating habits of a girl fighting through her cycle. Yeah, we get hungry. We eat, probably a lot more than normal, and yeah we probably eat a lot more greasy or starchy food than normal. And yeah...we fucking eat chocolate man, because it’s delicious and we deserve it. However, we do this for a reason and -- like everything else there -- it varies between each person. When we are on our periods, we are continuously losing blood ( on average 40 milliliters a day for approximately 5 days give or take ). Generally, we try and make up for everything lost during that time by drinking lots of water, but also eating more -- also as a side-effect of our Serotonin as well as the initial phase before bleeding in which our body is thinning we may have a child ( in which case it makes us think we should be eating for two ). So yeah, food is good. On another note, caffeine can actually heighten your irritability and pain during a menstrual cycle and it’s usually advised to avoid it for that time, unless you’re like me and can’t live without that first sip of morning coffee so just be wary.

03. Believe or not, those who don’t have periods, it smells. Vaginas have an odor and let me tell you that odor just come to life with that discharge. Again, everyone differs, but smells that can come from below deck are caused by bacteria mostly and the fact that you’ve been retaining moisture down there all this time by wearing underwear ( on a side note, it’s actually very good to go without the knickers every so often, even just to bed! Air that sucker out, she needs it ). Take into mind you’re losing blood and mucus and tissue that’s literally shedding from your uterus. Vaginas also can smell on a regular basis because that’s how the cookie crumbles, folks. Same thing, minus the blood and gore. It’s only different or “bad” if it’s because of an infection like yeast or your pH levels are off ( like using douches / body washes up in there. Trust me -- DON’T ). Otherwise, it’s normal!

04. Cramping and pain is normal, yes, but please remember the other sides of your cycle from fevers, headaches ( the worst ), migraines, heartburn, aching muscles, dizziness, vomiting / nausea, and the list goes on ! Period pain is not just defined by those cramps that we feel all the way from right above our uterus all the up into our belly because there is so much more. Not only that, but people experience cramping differently -- some don’t even notice it at all! Take into mind that lots of people ( like me ) commonly take medications like Midol or Pamprin to suppress or relieve these symptoms along with others. Some take it religiously as soon as they see the blood coming, but there’s also light-takers who only take a dosage when the feel it. Me, personally -- I’ll use a hot pad if it feels really bad and drink lots of cranberry juice to make sure I’m still peeing well and I may find that laying in that strange position that took me 30 minutes to find is also helpful. Point is, you can surely relieve that pain with medication and most smart girls do if they know they need it, so it really just doesn't make much sense to constantly write about your girl writhing on the floor in pain every month now does it?

05. Okay, now we’re really gonna get personal so fair warning of possible/slight NSFW below. ....For my girls out there who get really heated during their period, I feel you. Honestly, I think this is one of my personal main indicators of my oncoming cycle since I’ll notice that “ hey, I’ve been fantasizing about Bucky Barnes way more than I normally do ”. Yeah, given I love Bucky Barnes, I think of myself somewhat humble for not thinking about what else that metal arm could be put to good use for every single night, okay? I guess this segment will also just be informative for those of you unfamiliar with sex during your period or masturbation during a cycle, so be prepared if you’re wondering. For this, my main concern with fanfic writers is that they write how blood get everywhere, and I mean like on the ceiling kind of everywhere or like soaks through to the mattress and I’ll sit here so confused. So let Abby here inform you all about the basic 101 of the menstrual nsfw news.

First thing’s first is that it really does not get everywhere. I’ll be brutally honest in saying that when I do the deed, the aftermath and cleanup is not as bad as you think. Maybe just a quick rinse off or brush off, quick dab of a cool cloth with water on it -- you’re good. ( obviously do take care of your toys though, please: I just mean this in general ). And if you really are worried about the mess you might make, like I was the very first time, lay out a towel !! ( other option is the shower, just don’t slip friends ). Second thing: will it hurt? In my experience, it shouldn’t?? I hope it doesn’t and if you do feel pain, just stop. For me, personally, it tends to relieve a lot of my pain while, ultimately, satisfying my crave so I’m happy. Lastly, the oral implied in a lot of fanfic can be...excessive? And while this isn’t bad, it can also leave about a big chunk of the previous information and description from the color, smell, texture, even taste! ( for some reason there’s the popular cliche of the person raising their head after giving them head and they just see like the blood dripping down their chin and I’m like ??? not very realistic guys tbh ). Since we’ve covered the first two already we’ll jump into texture and taste: remember that the discharge during a cycle isn’t just blood. It’s a mixture of loose blood, bits of tissue from the lining that was shed, and your cervical mucus ( which mostly determines the texture as a whole ). Cervical mucus can change and differ but is mostly known for these main descriptions: tacky/sticky, creamy, milky, watery, etc. It’s mostly a matter of how dense it is whether it’s like a thick cream, a lotion, or water. Take into mind how the person giving oral will perceive this along with taste! Those little balls of flesh from your uterus lining the wall? Yeah, they’ll get some of that, and it will look black and that may be freaky but it’s honest. Despite the common mistake that period discharge tastes like the blood that comes from your arm or mouth, it does not. It will not have a super metallic-y taste and, overall, may not be pleasant ( also given how old it could be ). That doesn’t mean it can’t be good, to a degree, but don’t expect Dracula to be lusting after you.

I think that’s all I can currently think of, please add on if you can any more side-notes or comments, questions, etc. For you fanfic writers, please TAKE NOTE OF THIS. And to my girls out there, you keep rocking it, gorgeous.

#fanfiction tips #fanfic tip #fanfic tips #writer tips #writer tip #trigger warning blood #menstrual cycle #menstruation #periods #period writing #period smut #writing tips #writing tip

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flava-proelium · 7 years

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“Reno you idiot, fly the fucking helicopter!”

Status: Semi-Hiatus

Welcome! I just want to make sure we all have fun here, so let’s begin! My name is Flare. We’ll just go over some basic stuff to get you out and on your way with me, okay? Fast fun and easy before you know it!

Basics: No God-Mod, and No Hate. I don’t tolerate either. Give me space for Elena to respond, and I will do the same for you. And if you are an OC, please be sure to have a constructed bio and good means of rules. I don’t like receiving or seeing hate, and I will defend for those who are hated on. Do not blame me for things. If you just up and block me, I likely won’t understand why you got irritated by me. Please do not hesitate to talk to me if I made a mistake; I likely didn’t know!

This blog can and will have NSFW themes; which involves violence, gore, blood, asides from smut, and will have pokes at medical drama as well. I used to have cancer myself, though now spend a lot of time making sure people know about the effects of cancer in particular and positive posts on them, and occasionally my own that are always positive. You are more than welcome to block these triggers and more, with most posted as tw: ____.

Besides triggers, I do post ooc quite a bit. I am a rp blog but can be very slow. I post some updates, can are more than welcome to block the tag ;; For The Shredder (To Be Deleted) ;; for updates that are not important, and will be eventually cleaned away. My ooc is ;; Cluttered Thoughts (ooc) ;; and my important posts are ;; Marked Of Importance (psa) ;;. Finally, you are more than welcome to block the last: FeelGoodFriday. I post cute animals and funny notes each Friday that averages on 10 posts a week. You are also welcome to request things for the next week if you are not bothered by the amount of posts. I know many like it, so I love doing these each week.

I’m slow! I can be fast here at first, but I will eventually tumble up and about and gather several replies at a time and take my time with them! I usually try to queue them when I cannot be online, but please do not bother me for them! You may ask once if it has been over a week or so, but badgering will only get you blocked. Fair warning! I am a two year community college student that is 21+, so I will not be on all of the time. You do not need to by any means format like I do, nor match length. And if you have a hard time reading my smaller text, please let me know! With updates, I will not use any colored text at any point in time.

Most images used here are not mine. I will always mark as mine, though credit to images on Elena is either reblogs, or noted. Elena sidebar image: Chalkori aka Meiyo-chan. My Face claim for BC Elena is Misa Amane from Death Note, taken and edited from here and here. My RL faceclaims are Sienna Miller for and adult faceclaim, and Duffy for my teenage faceclaims. These have been made by capping, and would ask not to be reproduced. My ooc fc is Mitsukuni “Honey” Haninozuka from Ouran Host Club, and my childhood Elena icons are Haruka Kotoura from Kotoura-san and are not mine unless noted. All icons seen have either been made for me or found and lightly edited.

At this time I will note that I do not normally follow Personal blogs. You are free to like my posts at free will, but this is not a personal blog. If you have a sideblog linked to your personal, please let me know, to avoid confusion. You are also free to ask as anons about anything to Elena, however.

I also want to note that I am multi-lingual friendly! I love learning languages, and a fast way I learn is though RP. I will use Google Translate much of the time, but I will be all means try something new. I know the most in romanji Japanese, but am not too limited on others. So please, if English is not your first language, let me know, and I may be able to go to your first dialect rather than struggling with English overly. There are over a million words in English, so I know it is not easy.

Finally, I will likely unfollow you after a year of inactivity, unless I happen to know you well enough and know that you are unable to be on tumblr for some reason. This is nothing personal; I just need to clear things now and again. If I unfollow you suddenly and we have interacted recently, please feel free to message me. This was likely tumblr being stupid.

** To be edited as required! **

#mobilerules

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reds-self-ships · 3 years

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🔎 The Adventure of the Detection Club

Chapter 10: The Case of the Familiar Coroner

Table of Contents & Trigger Warnings

⚠ CHAPTER SPECIFIC WARNINGS: Contains major spoilers for the ending of The Great Ace Attorney 2,—viewer discretion is severely advised unless you either know the ending or if you don't mind being spoiled. Warning for references to blood & gore made in passing.

“Er, Redford, are you coming?” asked Ryunosuke, standing outside the entrance to the coroner’s laboratory.

“Yeah. Just a second,” said Redford, furiously scribbling into his notebook.

Ryunosuke was ready to admit that, perhaps taking a crime fiction author with a habit for scribbling down notes to Scotland Yard, the headquarters of London’s Metropolitan Police, might not have been the best idea he’d ever had.

After the red-headed writer had taken more than his fill of descriptions of working police officers and layout of their offices and certain procedures, he joined Ryunosuke and Susato in descending down the staircase towards the coroner’s lab.

Ryunosuke gagged. “What’s that…awful smell?”

Susato sniffed the air. “It smells like formaldehyde. If I recall correctly from one of my father’s medical textbooks, it’s often used to sterilize medical tools before an operation. And it can also be used to preserve the human body to make sure that the body doesn’t decompose before its time.”

“So could it be used to stop aging? So I could stay 23 forever?” asked Ryunosuke.

“Well if you wanted to die in order to stop yourself aging, then yes, I suppose you could.” replied Redford. “The stuff, besides smelling as though it’s going to burn the inner hairs of your nostrils off, also happens to be very poisonous. The smell of it’s fine though, as long as the place is kept well ventilated or in a small amount.”

“Fair enough,” said Ryunosuke nasally as he pinched the bridge of his nose.

The three continued to descend down the stairs before pausing at the front door of Dr. Gulloyne’s office as they heard something.

“What’s that noise, Mr. Naruhodo?”

“It sounds like someone humming and mumbling to themselves, but it’s not a song I’d recognise.”

“It sounds familiar to me…” said Redford, picking up the tune himself. “It sounds like ‘Frère Jacques’.”

“Eh?”

“It’s a French song. It means ‘Brother John’ in English though.”

“Ah. That’s probably why I’ve never heard of it before. It was only last week that Kazuma and I learned what the label on a bottle of French sparkling water said.”

“Which was?”

“‘Sparkling Water – Product of France’ or as it said in French: ‘Eau pétillante - Produit de France’.”

“Your pronunciation is rather excellent, Ryunosuke.”

“Oh, er…th-thank you…Mr. Sholmes taught me the pronunciation…” Ryunosuke stuttered, his face turning so red that he was glad that there wasn’t much light down at this depth of the building.

“Wait a second! I think I know whose voice that is…” said Susato, hurriedly opening the door and entering the coroner’s office.

Redford and Ryunosuke followed quickly after as the voice continued singing quietly to themselves:

“Sonnez les matines Sonnez les matines Ding dang dong Ding dang…Oh! Hello Susato!”

Ryunosuke exclaimed: “P-Professor Mikotoba!”

Professor Yujin Mikotoba, dressed in his shirt sleeves and a clean white apron, stood over an examination table, wearing a pair of dark red rubber gloves that seemed to go all the way up towards his elbows.

“Oh hello…Mr. Naruhodo, wasn’t it? And I see you’ve brought a friend. Good afternoon, I am Dr. Yujin Mikotoba.” He bowed his head. “I would shake your hand but I’m currently scrubbed up at the moment.”

“Oh why thank you. My name’s Redford Ninate. I’m a writer, President of the Detection Club and, well, a murder suspect at the moment.”

“Ah, so you must be working Mr. Ninate’s case, Mr. Naruhodo?”

“That’s correct, Professor.”

“Well I happen to be working this case as well, but as the coroner, not the lawyer. Dr. Gulloyne is away at the moment and they managed to catch my boat before it left Calais for the Mediterranean to ask me to step in on her behalf.”

“Well Mr. Sholmes did say that the coroner working the case was one of the best in the world, father…” said Susato with a smile.

“Did he now? He always did try too hard to upsell me, especially in that matter involving ‘The Giant Rat of Sumatra’…”

“Sorry – ‘always did’?” asked Redford.

“Yes. I’m Sholmes’s old investigative partner. The real life ‘Dr. Wilson’ as it were, but that’s a far more complicated matter than I’d care to explain at present. Not for a while in the very least.”

Ryunosuke could tell from the way that Redford had his teeth gritted and the way that he had his fist wrapped around his pen that he was resisting the urge to ask a hundred thousand and one questions.

“You mentioned that you were the coroner working on this case, Father. But a police constable mentioned to Mr. Sholmes that the murder weapon was in your custody for the time being…?”

“Why yes, that’s right. That’s what I’m working on at the moment actually.”

Dr. Mikotoba stood to one side to show the yellowy-white skull sitting on his desk, a large dark red streak splattered across its surface from the unfortunate victim’s blood. Both Ryunosuke and Susato seemed rather taken-aback.

“So…this is…”

“Norman!” exclaimed Redford.

“Is that his name? To me, he looks more like a ‘Takumi’ more than a ‘Norman’.”

“Maybe that could be his full name. If or when I get out of this mess, I’ll need to propose that as a potential surname, doctor.”

“Well I’m glad to be of service in that regard,” said Professor Mikotoba with a smile. “As for a more professional opinion, I can confirm that this was used to inflict quite a few blows to the head of the victim. In fact I think in my entire time working as a trainee coroner-turned-amateur detective-turned-general practitioner-turned-biology professor-turned-professional coroner again that I’ve never seen a body quite…what's the English word for it again...?”

Professor Mikotoba tapped his feet in what appeared to be a small tap-dance routine before he flicked the top of his greying hair and pointed. “Mutilated! That’s the word. Mutilated. I’ve not seen a corpse as mutilated as this one before.”

“You’re telling me! When I saw a photograph that was taken of the crime scene, I truly thought I was going to die myself,” said Ryunosuke with a wince.

“I feel the same sometimes, but I find the smell of formaldehyde actually rather helps keep me focused. As does singing. I learned that song you heard me singing, ‘Frère Jacques’, from a French chap with a top hat, monocle and tuxedo on-board my boat last month. Horace Velmont, he said his name was. Rather annoyingly catchy, I must say…

“…By the way,” added the professor, “If you’re fighting for Mr. Ninate’s innocence in court tomorrow then I might have an ace for you to use up your sleeve. Well, two of them, actually.”

“Go on…” said Redford, notebook and pen already well-prepared in advance.

“The first is that the prosecution have requested my testimony tomorrow, in lieu of Detective Jones’s, you’ll be pleased to hear, seeing as I can tell already that you absolutely loath the man.”

“Wh-What?! How did you know that?” asked Ryunosuke.

“You mumbled ‘彼ではない…’ under your breath as soon as I mentioned his name. That means ‘Not him…’, by the way, Mr. Ninate. If you want I can write out the romaji form of it for you later on for your own records?”

“If you could, that would be appreciated, Dr. Mikotoba.”

“Happy to be of service. But yes, I’ll be testifying with regards to the autopsy report and the state that the victim’s body was found in. I unfortunately can’t say any more, because if the prosecutor found out I was talking to you like this alone he’d have me out of the country again before I could translate Mr. Ninate’s notes into Japanese and back again.”

“I see,” said Ryunosuke. “And what’s the second part?”

“The second is that I have a reason to believe that this skull, Takumi Norman-kun, it may not be the murder weapon that you or the police are looking for.”

“Is that so?”

“Yes. I’m not sure why I think that at the moment, so we’ll just call it a doctor’s intuition. But I am still yet to conduct the further tests required for me to be able to say that as a certainty. I’m sure I’ll have everything figured out in time for tomorrow morning though.”

“We’ll keep that in mind, Professor Mikotoba. But thank you very much for this information, I’m sure it’ll come in use at some point in court tomorrow.”

Professor Mikotoba bowed his head. “That is exactly what I’m here for, young Naruhodo. I’ll still be cheering you on though, don’t worry about that. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I must continue my work.”

“We’ll leave you to it then, father. But thank you very much for your assistance.”

“My pleasure, Susato. But just remember, it’s usually the most obvious facts that we end up missing at times. You should do well to remember that, the three of you.”

“Well Redford already has it written down, so I’m sure he can remember it for me if I forget it,” said Ryunosuke.

Professor Mikotoba smiled. “Alright, I shall see you in court tomorrow morning.”

——————————

As Susato had decided to stay behind for a moment, and Redford had decided to wander about asking more policemen more questions, Ryunosuke decided to wait for them in the lobby.

For a building such as Scotland Yard, it was a decidedly unimpressive lobby. A police constable on a high lectern-like desk continued to sift his way through paperwork. He was occasionally interrupted by police officers dragging in criminals to prepare them to be detained in a gaol cell or to meet with a prosecutor to discuss criminal charges.

Other than that, there were the occasional civilian visitors sitting in the lobby waiting their turn to make arrangements for bail or to visit those who had been remanded into police custody, or to provide evidence and statements to officers and detectives for all kinds of other cases.

As he read through the faded anti-crime slogans on the notice board, a young woman with short blonde hair walked in, wearing a long lilac-grey coloured dress and holding a thick leatherbound notebook underarm.

She approached the constable on the high lectern-desk and stood for a few moments, clearing her throat after the constable, too busy wondering whether it was an I or an E in the last part of “antidisestablishmentarianism,” failed to notice her.

“Oh, sorry miss. Er, can I take your name please for our visitor’s book?”

“Christina Agatha.”

“‘Christina Agatha’, lovely. Nice and easy enough one for me to spell.”

(It’s not my fault you can’t spell ‘Ryunosuke Naruhodo’ very well, constable—even though it’s spelt exactly as it sounds…Still…why does that name sound familiar to me…)

“Now then, Miss Agatha. How can I help you today?”

“I was wondering if it were possible to speak to Detective Athelney Jones about the Harris Thomas case?”

“I’d certainly say so—he shouldbe in his office at the moment, and his next meeting’s not for another while yet. Here, I’ll write you a visitor’s pass. Now where did I put that pen of mine…?”

After a minute or so, the constable had the lady’s pass written out and sent her on the way in the direction of the Criminal Investigations Department, Homicide Division. And after that, he didn’t really think much of the entire thing.

“Alright!” cried a Scottish voice. “Tha’s enough o’ that! Out with ye! Go on, git! Git!”

A particularly burly-looking Scottish detective practically threw Redford Ninate into the lobby. “But Detective Superintendent MacDonald—!”

“Ah dinnae care! Now git tha hell outta here befurr ah tayke ye intae custady!”

“Well next time I’m writing a police procedural, you certainly won’t get a good portrayal, you great big Scottish red-faced eegit.”

“Mr. Naruhodo, I think Redford has asked more than enough questions of the police for one day, don’t you agree?”

“Yes. I think now’d be a good time to get out—”

Before Ryunosuke could finish the rest of his sentence, D.S MacDonald threw Redford’s notebook in his face, as well as his pen, followed by a bottle of ink that he only just managed to catch, a wad of blank forms – much to the chagrin of the constable manning the desk – and a full mug of coffee that ended up decorating the wall beside the front door.

“Get out and stay out ya wee bawbag of a—!” roared MacDonald as Ryunosuke, Susato and Redford made their escape whilst the constable despaired over his misplaced paperwork.

#OTP: Red Dragon #story #fic #the adventure of the detection club #fanfiction #self insert

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