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stvolanis · 2 months

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Now i know you better

PAIRINGS: Alastor x Fem!Sinner!Reader

WARNINGS: ANGSTTTT, mean!Alastor, cheating w/ Lucifer, probably inaccurate time line idk, foul language,this is honestly kind of poorly written I’m sorry, manipulation, abuse, Alastor owns Readers soul, toxic relationship, possessive!Alastor, pet names, brief mention of suicide

NSFW WARNINGS: dubcon, slapping, hair pulling, choking, forced cream-pie, degradation, dacryphilia, p in v sex, knotting, humiliation, blood if you squint

SORRY IF I MISSED ANYTHING!!!

˚ ꒰ა ☆ ໒꒱ ˚

It wasn’t your fault that your grave was dug the moment you stepped foot into the fiery pits of hell.

It wasn’t your fault that it was dug by Mimzy when she introduced you to her dear friend, the Radio Demon who, oh so casually, casted peoples screams for hell to hear.

Mimzy, known to drag people into her messes when shit hits the fan, had deeply embedded you into an on-going war with one of the various overlords, simply by seeking a place to lay low for a few days. You didn’t expect Alastor to show up, that damned smile engraved onto his face.

And it most definitely wasn’t your fault that you laid in said grave.

He was charming, and charismatic. A lethal combination when a sense of confidence and dad-humor was thrown into the mix. The way you met wasn’t the most ideal, especially when he basically bombarded through you, inviting himself into your wrecked home to find Mimzy himself without a word.

His smile, then, seemed aggravated. He did little to hide the annoyance she had somehow caused him, and the way his voice grew in static when he spoke showed that. He was scary when you had watched his figure enlarge, his once normal, slim body now turning into a tall, beastly, and lanky figure with protruding antlers and dilated pupils.

Dread set into your core that day when he directed his wrath towards you. His tall frame stalking over you, a hand quickly shot to your throat. Your back hit against the wall as you were lifted from the ground, gasping for breaths of any air you could possibly get.

His breath was drug out and uneven as his chest moved up and down at a surprisingly slow pace. Even though he seemed to be filled of fury and unease—he had a sense of control over his calmness to an extent. Eerily, he had glided his mouth along your neck, inhaling your scent.

A harsh groan, almost as if he were in pain had slipped past his lips. It rumbled deep in his chest, and your eyes watered as your vision began to fade. Only then, did he release you and let your body fall to the floor. You held your throat gently as you finally got what you were begging for.

“Maybe you’ll listen, since sweet Mimzy won’t.” He began, his voice deep and contorted with static and brute. “You will fix the mess she created, and restore what was mine to begin with. Your soul will be mine until you have fulfilled your duty as said.” He finished.

Your mouth gaped. He had presented it to you like you had a choice in the devastating matter, but you knew better. You sobbed as your curled into a ball, and watched as he raised a hand towards your frame that wracked with sobs. “Hush now, girl. You will be under my care so long as I’ll have you.” He ushered with a grimace as he watched you wipe your nose with your wrist.

You longed to object. To scream and yell out that never in a million and one light years would you ever agree to such a thing. Your freedom was yours alone, and you liked to keep it that way. He’d have to drag you through hell and back for you to allow that to happen, yet as you took his sharp hand into yours, it was all said and done.

A bright light consumed you, and just for a moment, you thought maybe it was the light shower everyone talked about up in heaven. The bright beacon of a light so blinding that cleansed you of all your wrong-doings, took away all your pain and replaced the emptiness with a euphoric feeling of content.

Warmth spread throughout your body, and that moment of hope ended when you felt thick, heavy metal of chains cling around your throat and wrists. Alastors smile haunted you. It crept up on you in your dreams, and ate away at the only good things you had left to hold onto.

The life you once cherished, even in hell, soon faded away till it was nothing but a faint distant memory of someone you once knew that was yourself. It was replaced by an evil demon, in the form of a gentleman who disguised plots and alterier motives with wide smiles and laughs.

but again, you knew better.

The person you once were was stripped from you, and you were bare before him to bend and mold how he saw fit. And so, he did. You became his his underboss of sorts, a quiet and submissive being who did as told. They always said behind every powerful man, there was a woman. And it was you. Everyone got the good side of Alastor, yet it was you he took his frustrations out on when the day was said and done.

It was you who endured his aggressiveness when everyone was fast asleep in their bedrooms, dreaming of a better life you knew you’d never receive.

You were his lap dog, and his favorite toy to play with whenever and however he wanted to. It was unofficial, and confusing to others, but you somehow managed to find yourself in some sort of situationship with Alastor. You were his. body, mind, and soul.

You tried your best to please Alastor, constantly seeking his approval that he so generously bestowed upon others. You chased your tail around, and ran in laps, jumping through hoops just to earn a small nod in approval for him.

He wasn’t always bad. He cared for you, in his own fucked up way. He cared in way that he would never let something bad happen to you, and would protect you at all costs. You were his delicate little flower, how could he ever allow anyone who isn’t him to inflict any kind of harm onto you? He’s a bitch, but to an extent.

He loved you, yes, but only when he was in the mood to love you. When he loved you, he’d hold you close to him when you were perched on his lap in the hotel lounge. He’d whisper sweet nothings to you as he kissed along your neck, making giggles vibrate through your chest. He’d run his fingers through your hair till you fell asleep against him at night after a particularly hard day.

And on days when he knew he went to far, his classic water works he only had in store for you would come into play. He couldn’t bare his favorite toy hating him. He didn’t know how to deal with the colder shoulder and short-answer responses from you. It aggravated him that only you could get under his skin without doing much, so when you were heavily upset, only then would he drop down to his knees and kiss the inside of your thighs lovingly.

Tears would align his eyes, but his smile never once wavering, and beg for your forgiveness. He’d tell you how much he loved you as he rubbed your sensitive bud, and wash away your worries with so many orgasms, you forgot why you were mad at him in the first place.

Yes, he owned your soul and tended to be abusive, but he wasn’t heartless.

He’d tell you he’s sorry, and that he’d never hurt you again. It’s always a lie, and each time you allowed yourself to stupidly believe it.

But the truth was, you didn’t know what else to do. You hated to admit it, but you were nothing without him. You spent so long shaping yourself into the person he wanted and needed you to be, that you forgot how to be yourself. You forgot what your previous hobbies were, or what else made you happy besides him. Your world revolves around him, and without him, it felt like your world was coming to an exaggerated end.

So, you put up with it. Each and every time.

It wasn’t till today, the day of Charlie’s fathers arrival to the grand hotel Alastor managed to put together and run, that you’d ever seen him so genuinely with any sort of nerves.

The moment Lucifer walked in, in all his glory, Alastors personality took a flip. He went toe to toe with the ruler of Hell himself, all because he was afraid of someone who he knew had more power than him. But Alastor wasn’t a weak man, not at all, and that’s why he made it his mission to piss off Lucifer as much as he could.

You’d never seen him this way before. With you? Yes, but with other people? Never. He was cunning and every word he spat at Lucifer dripped with malice and confidence. Alastor knew he couldn’t beat him with power, so he hit him where he knew it would hurt. His family. Specifically, the only one he had left.

What Alastor didn’t expect, was for Lucifer to become completely and utterly smitten with you. From the moment he laid his eyes on you, he’s been all smiles and giggles with you.

He listened when you talked, even the little small words or sentences no one cared to listen to. His lips against the top part of your hand when you first met was the only thing that circled your mind for days. His lips were plush and warm, soft and tender. It was a contrast to the kisses Alastor left you of pity and forgiveness.

He was sweet, and undeniably handsome. He made you feel ways you’d never felt before. He made you feel like you had a choice. A voice that wouldn’t be spoken over and genuinely listened to. He was charismatic, in a way like Alastor, but it was real. His smiles were real, as were the sweet nothings he said to you.

For weeks, you snuck around with Lucifer. At night, when Alastor was fast asleep, you’d sneak out from under his watchful arm and find your way to Lucifers room. His arms were more welcoming, and warm. His kisses sweeter than honey and his love as gold and bright as they come.

His voice was soft, and vibrant as he hummed against your ear. The fingers that raked through your hair were gentle and soothing, calmed you to your slumbers that comforted you through the night. His smell was intoxicating; cider and musk, like an orchid full of ripe apples. The two rosey spots on his cheek shined in hue when you’d enter the room.

I didn’t take long for Alastor to notice. He want a dumb and oblivious man. He was a ruthless overlord who couldn’t afford to look past the little things. He noticed the stares that the two of you sent when in a room full of people. The lingering touches no one else noticed when you brushed passed each other.

And most of all, they way you’d slip from his grasp in the dark of the night like he was stupid.

He knew, of course. He knew the whole time. And he let you let yourself believe that there was any other choice besides him. He allowed you, from the goodness of his heart, to feel a speck of the freedom you longed for. He let you grasp it and cradle it with all your might, just to draw you back in by the chains that shackled you to him for eternity.

He liked knowing that he controlled you. It fueled the god complex he had, knowing that no matter what you tried to do, you’d always be his. His to love, his to fuck, his to torment.

He mocked you for it, too. Rubbing it in your face that you were chained to him for as long as you’d live in hell. Suicide crossed your mind a few times, the only way you saw yourself out of it—yet, you knew that no matter what life you had next, you’d still always belong to him in some way, shape, or form.

You should’ve known better. Should’ve known that you could never be happy. Should’ve known that Alastor knew the whole time. Yet you were naive enough to think you were smart enough to go behind his back with a person he detested the most. The one person who could easily kill him with a blink of an eye.

Alastor would never say it out loud, because he knew deep down that he would never win against Lucifer. So, he did what he does best, and he took it out on you.

Tonight wasn’t supposed to be any different from any of the other nights you left Alastors bedroom.

You lay in another man’s arms, his chest rising and falling beneath you as soft breaths slipped past his pale lips. Lucifer looked especially beautiful like this. His white skin glistening in the dull lighting of the room, and his streaky blonde hair ran through messily against the plush pillow.

You wished you could stay in this very moment forever. You’d rather spend an eternity admiring Lucifer for all his greatness, than suffering in Alastors darkness miserably.

You never told Lucifer about the way Alastor treated you behind closed doors. You knew that if you did, Alastor would be dead without a second thought. It crossed your mind a few times, obviously. How could it not? It was your only way out. The only thing that stopped you was the fact that Alastor wasn’t always like this.

He wasn’t always a bad person towards you. In the beginning, he tried to make you as comfortable as possible. He made you happy, and lively. His presence didn’t make you want to cower away in a corner, and his stare made you flush red, as bright as the color of his hair.

After all he’s put you through, you couldn’t help but feel a pang of guilt shoot through you each time you looked back at Alastor asleep in your shared bed. He never cheated on you. The one of many things he’s never done, yet here you were, every so happily cheating on him. You felt like a two-timing snake, and you knew if he found out that he’d feel betrayed.

With that thought, you slipped from under Lucifer’s heavy arm, watching with soft eyes as he muttered under his breath at the loss of your warmth against him. You kissed his cheek and whispered a goodbye as you exited his room, softly shutting the door behind you. Your finger glided along the walls of the hallway, all the way till you found yourself outside of Alastors room.

You inhaled deeply, reaching for the doorknob, twisting it ever so slowly. Your entered the dark abyss of the room, shutting the door softly behind you with a wince as it creaked lightly. Damned this old ass building.

What you didn’t expect, was for Alastor to press against you from behind.

His breathing was uneven, and sharp as his chest still moved up and down slowly. You froze. You felt your dead heart stop as if you were alive. It seemed like oxygen didn’t exist anymore as you gaped, jaw slightly fallen slack as your eyes lined with tears. Your body shook as his hand traveled to the bed of your throat, craning your neck back to meet his eyes painfully.

“A-Alastor—” you gaped. He clicked his tongue. “Hm, silly girl. You really thought I was unaware of your whore-ish activities?” He chuckled out, his breath warm against the shell of your ear. “Wait, please—” you began, but you didn’t get a chance to think of what to say next as he slammed your back onto the bed.

You tried desperately to crawl away from him, but within a second, chains tied you down to the bed frame. You wracked with sobs and please of despair. He stood silently for a moment, watching the way you crumbled so easily without him even having to really do anything.

“How dare you.” He hissed out after a moment. Climbing on top of your tense frame, he pinched your cheeks together and watched as tears ran down your cheeks pathetically. “I give you everything you could possibly need. I make sure you’re alive with a roof over your head and out of the clutches of hells streets, and this is how you repay me? By sleeping around with men?” He growled through his sharp teeth.

His smile was formed still, but more into a scowl of displeasure. His antlers were grown and prominent as he began to shift to his demon form that you hadn’t seen since the first time youd met him that fateful day. He was like a rabid animal, drool slipping through the cracks of his jagged teeth as his body became large and monstrous.

This was it. This how your soul would finally be put to rest. By the claws and bared teeth of a monster with the facade of a charming, hotel manager. Not the way you’d want to go out, but hey, at least your were gonna get out of it, right?

Or so you thought.

His claws, sharp as knives tore through your shirt, ripping it off of your figure and discarded onto the floor. Your white lace bra on display in front of him. Your pajama pants adorned with cheesy pandas torn to shreds alongside your favorite sleeping shirt. But all you could think about was the abnormally large bulge hard and prominent against your inner thigh.

God, you hated yourself. You danced along the line of lust, fear, and hatred. Hatred for him, mostly. You hated that you loved Lucifer—yet your body yearned to be used and played with at the hands of Alastor.

The sweet sex, praises and butterfly kisses Lucifer showered you was amazing, but this—this was different. The way Alastor fucked you was different. Yes, he was rough and fucked hard—but this was his way of showing you that he loved you. It was peculiar, to say the least. A man so easily able to use his words to fluster anyone couldn’t look you in the eye to tell you that he loved you.

So he fucked you like he hated you. But you knew what he meant.

His finger hooked under the middle of your bra, effectively slicing upwards to cut it in half. Your breasts sprang free, and your nipples hardened under the tense, cold air. You squirmed as his breath fanned against them, his long tongue shooting out to lick against them tenderly.

He played tricks on you. It was his favorite game. Giving you false hope. Dangling things he knew you longed for in front of you, only to yank it right back. Killing every last good thing you had left till you had absolutely nothing but him.

So you should’ve known better than to trust his soft tongue kitten licking your nipple. His sharp teeth bit down—hard enough to draw specks of blood around it. You yelped out in pain as your eyes lined with fresh tears waiting to be spilled over. The pain was dreadful, but god, did it feel good.

Alastors thumb trailed to lower, tracing down to your stomach till he reached your cotton panties, dampened with your arousal. “What a slut. Getting off on this. You should be ashamed of yourself, darling.” He mocked out with a cunning smile. He didn’t think twice before ripping your panties off.

He fumbled for second with his pants, unzipping them before letting them reach low enough just to pull his cock out. “Now, I’m gonna fuck this cunt till I’ve had enough, and after that, you’re going to go into the small-dicked-duck fanatics room with my cum dripping down your thighs and tell him just how good I fucked you.” He growled out, his hand finding it’s way back to your throat, squeezing tightly as he lined himself to your entrance.

“Alastor, please just listen—i” his cock bullied is way into you. Long, and thick. 9 inches of pure, heavy meat sat snugly inside of you, playing with your insides. He was perfectly trimmed, and his balls heavy balls slapped against the underside of your pussy with each agonizingly perfect thrust he delivered into you.

“Oh, oh fuck!” You moaned out, head thrown back as your hand clenched onto the chains that bound you to your bed post. “Tight little pussy. Tell me, does he fuck you like this, baby?” He panted out as he watched the way your eyes rolled to the back of your head.

He always thought you were the prettiest like this. Underneath him, writhing in pleasure, cock drunk and hungry for him. The only time you didn’t resent him. The only time you wanted him. He cherished this, not that he would ever say it out loud.

“I asked you a fucking question.” He said, slapping the side of your face harshly, leaving a painful sting behind. You whimpered at the familiar impact. “No, Alastor!” You all but screamed out as his cock kissed your cervix.

The sound of skin slapping against skin echoed loudly, and the smell of hot sex was in the air. A distinctive, vile smell. Your body was lined with sweat, as was his, and your breasts bounced each time his hips met flush against your ass. All you could think about was him.

He consumed your thoughts, plaguing your mind. You couldn’t escape him. And as of right now, you weren’t sure you even really wanted to all along.

Some sick part of you enjoyed this relationship you were in. The part that liked to be put in your place, and told what to do in return for praises of affirmations. A relationship that never got boring, and always kept you on your toes no matter what. Traumatic? Definitely. Toxic? 100%. But, this is what you had to endure. The least you could to was learn to like and deal with it.

You clenched down tightly onto him as his hips slammed into yours repeatedly, his dick hitting every right spot, including the little nerve of your g-spot inside of you. The angle he had your hips positioned in hit it better, and he could tell you were close when your cunt began to pulse around him.

“Please, please, I’m gonna cum!” You babbled on and on, drunk on the feeling of him inside of you. He chuckled as he pulled your head up by the root of your hair, just enough to have your lips crashing down onto his. “Fucked you stupid, honey, i know.” He cooed out against your lips.

He tasted bitter. Like whiskey and old cigars, mixed with a strange tea refreshment. It was an odd combination, but one that suited him indefinitely. His tongue swirled and glided against yours as they fought for dominance in a sloppy, and surprisingly passionate kiss. One that said what he didn’t have to out loud. ‘You’re mine’. He won the fight for dominance, and he sloppily suckled your tongue into his mouth.

The kiss was nasty, sloppy with saliva dripping down your chin and a few cuts on your lip from his sharp teeth clashing against them, but it was the least of your concerns as he rested his forehead against yours, nearing his end.

“I’m gonna fill this pussy up. Nice and full so everyone will know in dues time just who the fuck you belong to.” He growled out through clenched teeth. You shook your head back and forth, your eyes widening with fear. “No, don’t! Please don’t!” You begged, on and on, but to no avail.

His thrusts became harsher, and more demanding. Chasing his high aimlessly as you begged and moaned out his name underneath him. It was then that you felt it. His cock balls deep when you felt it began to swell up inside of you.

You gasped in shock as you were stretched painfully to your limit, the bulge in your lower stomach large and prominent as he pressed against it, triggering your orgasm. Your juices flushed out of you and all over his lower abdomen, and he groaned at the sight. You clenched down onto him impossibly tighter and he felt like he was gonna lose his mind.

“Pull out. Please pull out.” You desperately tried to reason with him, but he didn’t care as he sat snug inside of you, his knot finally emptying inside of you. It was warm, and you could feel it drip down your ass when his cock finally fell flaccid and limp, slowly pulling out of you.

“Maybe now, you’ll learn your lesson. You must be a fool to think that anyone could ever love you like i do.” He said, shaking his head. He bit his lip with a satisfied smile as he watched his mounds of cum pour out of you. “Milked my cock so well.” Was the only praise that slipped past his lips the rest of the night.

He didn’t allow you to clean yourself, only letting you thrown on a pair of panties from the drawer in his bedroom. Your inner thighs were slick and sticky with his warm, salty cum. “Run along now, dear. Come back when you’re finished.” He said in a singing tone, knowingly.

A flame rose in your core of embarrassment as you waddled out of the room, the uncomfortable feeling between your thighs growing by the second. It was humiliating, doing the walk of shame down the hallway, all the way to your now past lovers room.

A soft knock was laid on his door, and after a silent, dreaded minute of standing there, his door fell open. There you stood, in nothing but panties. Bite marks around your nipples and your neck prominent with a lingering bruise from the grip he held on your neck. His eyes trailed down to the cum slick between your plush thighs.

His eyes widened.

“The fuck happened to you?”

˚ ꒰ა ☆ ໒꒱ ˚

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shiplessoceans · 8 months

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Good Omens S2 Episode 6 confession scene speculation:

Aziraphale didn't respond to the love confession from Crowley because he didn't realise it was one until Crowley mentioned the Nightingale and kissed him.

Allow me to explain.

---

Aziraphale interrupted Crowley to give him the news from Metatron, so when Crowley starts his spiel:

"We've been together a long time, I could always rely on you...we're a group....we've spent our existence pretending we aren't...if Gabriel and Beelzebub can go off together then we can...we don't need heaven/hell they're toxic...you and me whatya say?"

Aziraphale interprets everything Crowley is saying as his rebuttal to the 'good news', not a separate declaration of his feelings.

What Aziraphale just told him shaped Crowley's confession, instead of finally telling Aziraphale how he feels about him, he's now backed into a corner and trying to change Aziraphales mind. Offering to run off with him as the alternative to the Metatron's offer.

The repetition of the phrase: "go off together" from the bandstand fight in season one feels very intentional here. It would be easy for Aziraphale to think 'this is just Crowley's response when the divine plan interferes, he always wants to run away'.

Aziraphale believes that he just needs to make Crowley understand the situation and opportunity that this is and everything will be alright:

"Come with me! To heaven, I can run it, you can be my second in command. We can make a difference!"

Crowley is looking defeated already, in his mind he's bared his soul and Aziraphale is a brick wall. So if he can't tempt the angel into staying with the love he has for him (which Crowley thinks he's declared but he really hasn't), he'll get him to change his mind by evoking something else he loves:

"You can't leave this bookshop."

Aziraphale scoffs fondly. 'Silly demon, you were just suggesting we run off together and abandon it only a moment ago!' He thinks Crowley is trying to 'work' him here and the old serpent might even be selflessly trying to spare the angel the loss of his beloved bookshop in order to restore Crowley and help the world, which would be just like him to be so covertly protective. So Aziraphale reassures him, a bookshop doesn't matter to him as much as Crowley and the world. It's just a collection of objects really. Humanity is more important. Crowley is far more important.

"Oh Crowley, nothing lasts forever."

Crowley is crushed. Nothing lasts forever. Not even the two of them. So he covers his sadness with his glasses, walls back up, and he tries to leave.

Aziraphale is baffled. He just reassured Crowley that he was alright with change if it means things could be better. Why is Crowley leaving? Is he worried that they won't spend time together anymore? That he won't have time for his friend as a supreme archangel?

"Crowley come back!....we can be together, angels!...I need you!"

Crowley can't even look at him in that moment. Why would Aziraphale say that? The two of them together only if he accepts heaven again? Conditional love? That's not fair. It hurts.

Aziraphale meanwhile is hurt by Crowley's turning away, his silence and a bit incensed at what he perceives as ingratitude. Aziraphale didn't really want to go back to heaven, but he'd do it if it meant Crowley could be happy and safe and Crowley doesn't seem to appreciate that:

"I don't think you understand what I'm offering you."

Crowley went through the fall. He asked the questions. Did his best to protect humanity and it has brought him nothing but suffering. He's well aware what's on offer. He's seen heavens cruelty and capriciousness firsthand and been burned by it repeatedly. How can Aziraphale choose them over him and still think everything will work out?

"I understand. I think I understand a whole lot better than you do."

Crowley loves Aziraphale's big foolish optimism and kind heart and he thinks it's the very thing taking the angel away from him. This isn't how it was supposed to go. It's all slipping away from him.

"Listen. You hear that?"

Aziraphale can't even keep up at this point.

This is what comes of thousands of years of 'not talking about it' and living under threat of holy retribution if they are discovered. They're talking past each other, having two different conversations. Obfuscation and code has become their communication medium by necessity and it's failing them.

It's frustrating Aziraphale that he can't get a grip on this conversation:

"I don't hear anything!"

And Crowley drops the bomb.

"That's the point. No Nightingale's."

Oh. Suddenly we're on the same page. You can see from Aziraphale's face that he understands to what Crowley's referring. The Nightingale in Berkely square. Angels dining at the Ritz...

"You idiot! We could have been... us."

Crowley's talking about the big unspoken thing between them. Their relationship, thousands of years of dancing around each other like binary stars gravitationally and inexorably drawn together over and over. The thing Aziraphale was beginning to be bold about, (dancing notwithstanding) before Metatron came along and distracted him.

And it seems to Aziraphale that gut-wrenchingly, Crowley is finally acknowledging their mutual love only to point out that it's gone. Lost. They could have finally been together, an us, but Aziraphale ruined it because he's an 'idiot'.

After being quietly in love with Crowley for years, for Aziraphale to have his offer to return to heaven together and his unspoken love rejected in one fell swoop is devastating.

Overcome, he begins to cry and turns away, not wanting Crowley to see how hurt he is.

Crowley for his part is desperate. He has to do something. Maybe Aziraphale doesn't understand what Crowley is offering him! One fabulous kiss and va-voom right?

In a final desperate act, he kisses Aziraphale. Tries for passionate. Tries to show him that he loves him and show him what they could be because his words clearly aren't working.

Aziraphale is shocked and angry. He wants to kiss Crowley of course. But not like this. Not as a taunt. Crowley just told him their chance is over so what else could this be but a final insult. A kiss to punish the angel. It's a cruelty he didn't believe Crowley capable of.

And despite how mean it is. It's also what Aziraphale has wanted for so long he can't help but melt into it for a brief moment. Allow himself to feel what it would have been like to be that close before losing it forever.

Then Crowley lets go and Aziraphale breaks away on a sob, feeling wounded. Hurt beyond words that Crowley would use his feelings against him like this, gutted to be losing the man he loves and not understanding why.

The worst part is that Aziraphale doesn't have it in him to hate Crowley, even if he thinks the kiss was a cruel gesture. He still loves him. So he gathers himself and does what Aziraphale does when someone hurts him.

He forgives.

"I forgive you."

I forgive you for rejecting my attempt to restore you and make you happy, I forgive you for rejecting God and heaven yet again, I forgive you for acknowledging our love and then rejecting it. I forgive you for kissing me, giving me a fleeting glimpse of what we could have been to each other. I love you and I forgive you all that.

Crowley is done. Breath knocked out of him on a last sigh. He tried. And the Angel forgave him yet again for something he never asked or wanted forgiveness for. He doesn't want to be penitent for loving Aziraphale. Shouldn't have to apologise or regret wanting them to be together.

"Don't bother."

Aziraphale looks surprised Crowley is leaving because he genuinely is. He can't understand how it's all gone so horribly wrong. He gasps, shocked and can't even call out to him to stop, come back.

He cries, touches his lips where Crowley had kissed him. Tries to gather himself and barely has 10 seconds before Metatron is back.

At the end of that scene:

Crowley thinks he confessed his love and Aziraphale chose heaven over him because he didn't want to stop being a demon.

Aziraphale thinks Crowley rejected heaven, then rejected Aziraphale and threw their love back in his face as a final unkindness.

Aziraphale leaves and goes to heaven anyway because in his mind he's already lost Crowley and there is nothing left to stay for. If he doesn't have Crowley he needs a new purpose and it's going to be saving the world. He'll convince himself of it. And he'll push that broken heart down and the pain will fade if he just smiles through it. It will be enough, to make heaven better. It has to be. Maybe if he proves that he can make a difference Crowley might see the error of his ways and speak to him again? Surely. Hopefully.

---

Both of them are hurt and confused and lost and oh dear hell I really feel for them.

#good omens meta #good omens 2 meta #good omens s2e6 #gos2 spoilers #good omens 2 #good omens 2 analysis #gos2 meta #ineffable #ineffable husbands #aziraphale #crowley #good omens spoilers #gos2

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chatsukimi · 2 months

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ｓｃａｒｓ： "ᴛʜᴇʏ ꜱᴀʏ ɪᴛ'ꜱ ᴡʜᴇʀᴇ ʏᴏᴜ ᴡᴇʀᴇ ᴋɪʟʟᴇᴅ ɪɴ ʏᴏᴜʀ ᴘᴀꜱᴛ ʟɪꜰᴇ"

Sukuna x deceased reader. pt 1.

Sukuna whose flames are unleashed solely on special occasions. One day, when Yuji wonders aloud why he has two, he tells the brat to "shut up and get yourself your first technique before asking for seconds." Yuji winces, shutting up nevertheless.

Sukuna who quietens next to the bonfire on New Years. The open conflagration bursts and wanes. He peers at the sparkling flames, dancing before Yuji's worn out sneakers. He wills the boy to let him switch places- one minute, just as he had promised when Sukuna restored his heart. Now the Devil will restore his own.

Sukuna who appears, silent, next to a mossy pillar in the middle of a redwood forest; a trick of Cursed Technique, long lost. He only has a minute: prepare the incense, plant the prayers, spare one longing gaze at your statue. He clenches his teeth as he hears Yuji banging on inside his mind, but it's the one chance he has of being with you, alone.

Sukuna who had always been concentrated compared to the other Special Grade sorcerers, capable of miraculous devotion. Suffice to say, he likes it best when there aren't passerby's, mistaking zeal for shortcoming.

He sinks to the ground, bowing his head, pressing his palms together, before wisps of flame start drifting from between them, touching every candle and incense to life. Wisteria scents float over him.

In this forgotten corner of the world, all who remember you are the monks who tend this shrine, and the strongest of them all.

When Yuji wakes up, on the stone floor of the Fujiwara Clan's tombs, sputtering at the cold. Shocked, later on, by the violent burn in the middle of his chest he had never seen before.

"Curious..." Gojo murmurs, inspecting the wound. "Yuji, you're growing more and more like him."

This used to be his scar.

Sukuna who doesn't come out for days when Gojo informs Yuji about the Fujiwara Clan's destruction. What was he doing at the shrine? Why did he kill them all, the children, the soldiers, the wives?

Everyone assumes Sukuna's just tired of Yuji's moral clamouring. No one suspects he is drowning in the shadows of his domain, his head collapsed back onto the animal skulls, exhales spilling out in long drawn out phrases, in the nightmare he created.

Sukuna who used to hate fire because it quashed the dark, until he saw you manoeuvre flames and arrows as though they were a second skin. He was the Disgraced One, but you- you were kind.

Sukuna who was killed by you, when he killed your clan. He was promised your technique when he said he would protect you. He made a vow. He had to keep it.

So, when it came time, he had simply let you press your burning hand upon his chest and feel him recline in agony. He knew it would be the last time you touch him. He wanted to feel it burn.

"Sukuna, you told me you would try to get better. You told me you didn't care how the others saw you, about us- how could you lie to me?"

He never wanted to lie to you, of all souls. If it makes you feel better, he still thinks of you when he uses your flames, only on special occasions. Your strength, your grace, and the look you wore as you killed him, they all come wobbling, like moth to a flame. Like a lowly cast-away boy on his way, in rage, to destruction.

Sukuna who thinks to himself, "you have given your technique to me, but what if I had asked for your soul with mine forever?", looking for your voice in the flames.

It only cracks and cackles.

It is Yuji who first notices you on the street.

"Hey! Hey!"

You turn around. A boy with pink hair is jogging towards you. He waves.

"Oh. Hi, do I know you?"

"Don't think so. You just look really alike to someone I saw a while ago at a shrine."

You can't pinpoint what but the slit on his face... you can't tear your eyes from it. You shake your head. What is wrong with you today?

"I don't go to shrines," you say. Your fingers itch to reach out to graze his cheek. "... that's a cool scar you've got there. Both sides of your face. They say scars are where you were killed"

"Oh I've got many scars," he mutters sheepishly. "A big one on my chest, s'kinda lame though, 'cause I don't remember how I got it."

You laugh. "Me too." You drag your T-shirt neckline down just an inch, pointing at it with your thumb. "I was born with mine."

A scar.

A burn.

A flaming arrow.

Right above your heart.

#ryomen sukuna #sukuna #sukuna x reader #sukuna angst #heian era #jjk #jujutsu kaisen #jjk x reader #sukuna x you #sukuna jjk #jujutsu kaisen x reader #yuji itadori

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fullofbees · 4 months

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My God's Bane (Astarion x F!Tav)

Tav no longer recognizes herself while Astarion finally comes to terms with his feelings towards her.

AKA I wrote my own leadup to Astarion's confession scene :3

CW: LOTS of angst, religious conflict/crisis, mentions of past physical, emotional, and sexual abuse (Astarion), mild depictions of gore Word Count: 9,437

He liked to think that he had a talent for reading people at this point. Most wear their emotions clearer than they believe. Even when they hide behind a quiet, joyful, or indifferent mask, everyone slips, shows their hand so to speak, and that’s when he strikes.

However, when it came to the leader of their ragtag band of weirdos, she was easy. She slipped the moment they met, when he cornered her about killing one of those brain creatures outside the nautiloid crash. She all but ran to his supposed rescue, not thinking twice that the man before her could pose harm. It was as simple as breathing back then, to betray that small boundary of trust when he held his blade to her throat.

Her heart was on her sleeve, and she extended it to every wayward soul they encountered. With remarkable speed, she was able to secure new adventurers for their mission. She made vows to the tieflings and druids alike, intent on restoring order despite the limited time they had. Whether foe or ally, she sought the safety of all involved – such is the way of a valiant paladin. It was an inconvenience, honestly.

Ever since they arrived at the Shadowlands, though, Tav’s personality changed.

Their first day in the darkness brought them to battle between the Harpers and their arachnoid escort. The towering bastard had to go and cast Sanctuary constantly, leaving the rest to pick off the weaker cultists until they could find an opening past his defense.

Tav had swung the final blows, her blade illuminated in a holy light that was nearly blinding against the shadows. The drider fell, and joined his fellow Absolutists as bloody road markers.

She was an excitable kind of person, cheering and hollering with the smallest of victories, giddy with triumph whenever her enemies fell. Add Karlach into the mix, and Astarion was positive that sleep would evade the camp that night, the two warriors whooping into the night, drunk off wine and adrenaline.

But, as she had stood over the vanquished drider, Tav was silent. He could not make out the emotion that crossed her face; reverence – or perhaps mourning, as he watched Tav kneel to close each eye the spider possessed.

Astarion knew he was the only one to witness it. The others were engaged in conversation as the Harpers so graciously invited them to their little hideout, in the form of an abandoned inn. When Tav stood from the ground and turned, she froze upon seeing him standing there, eyes wide with panic as she fumbled for words to say.

All she managed was a desperate, “Please don’t tell the others.”

He didn’t understand why, at the time, he had allowed her to place such trust in him.

The same night, when everyone was gathered around the campfire, joking and sharing stories over whatever meal Gale managed to throw together, she stared into the flames until one of their companions pulled her mind back to the present.

“An actual drider,” marvels Wyll, “It would have been magnificent if it weren’t so grotesque. Wouldn’t you agree, Tav?”

“Hmm?” She hummed, eyes transfixed on the bowl in her hands.

“The drider,” Wyll tried again, almost in disbelief that she had not heard him the first time, “What did you make of it?”

Her spoon circled the bowl for the umpteenth time, the sound immensely grating to Astarion’s sensitive hearing.

“Him,” she muttered.

“I’m sorry?” Wyll asked.

“What did I make of him? He’s a person, not an ‘it’,” she corrected with a huff of offense. “That poor man...”

“I wouldn’t go so far as to pity the creature,” admonished Shadowheart, “It is only fitting that one be punished for failing their Goddess. Really, we were doing it a favor.”

There’s an unwon arrogance that Shadowheart tends to mince her words with. Usually, he would find her quips amusing, but he wished she would have read the obvious tension.

“He’s not a creature!” Tav slammed the bowl into the dirt in front of her. The metallic clang of the spoon against ceramic rang out into the stunned silence of those around the fire.

“He was hurting! Desperate to be seen after Lolth’s rejection... and all it got him was a tadpole from another cruel Goddess!” Tav’s hands clenched into fists, brow furrowed as her eyes focused once again on the flames, “He didn’t deserve to die. I could have-- I mean, we could have done more!”

“I do not understand,” said Lae’zel, “Why do you show such sympathies for the weak?”

“Let��s not get ahead of ourselves,” chimes in Karlach, and though Astarion assumed she would start on another lecture about friendship and unity, Tav did not let her finish.

“I’m afraid I lost my appetite. Good night,” she said, her meal abandoned as she stomped off to her tent.

Karlach sighed, shaking her head at Lae’zel. The githyanki had not moved, still perplexed by the situation around her. An uneasy quietness quickly descended upon the group, broken only by Wyll bidding them goodnight. A chorus of muttered ‘goodnights’ followed as they began to disperse.

Considering it an outburst of exhaustion, Astarion left Tav to stew in her tent. He wished he hadn’t, for she was no better the next day.

It was normal for her to seek their thoughts while exploring. She’d ask Karlach or Lae’zel for tips after combat, banter with Gale and Wyll, show Shadowheart every damn “pretty” flower she found, and insisted on directing as many vampire jokes as she could at Astarion. It didn’t matter how dreadfully unfunny they were, she always laughed.

Adventuring was quiet now, as she ushered them from place to place, battle to battle, without a break. They found various victims of the curse, most a century old, but some new and with unfortunately familiar faces. It did not matter how long the bodies had been there, Tav grieved each one, tears streaming from her face as she read letters of their last words. While she bawled at their corpses, Astarion brooded, wondering when he had started to miss her laughter.

She was praying more often as well, sequestering herself alone in whatever corner she could find and frantically whispering. Once, when she ceased her incessant prayer, Tav appeared to be locked in some kind of trance. She did not react to sound or touch, the whole of her eyes overtaken by a ghostly, lavender hue. She stayed that way for two hours.

Everyone saw the tears that streamed from her eyes when her mind had returned from its journey, but she refused to answer their questions.

Karlach approached him one night, nearly a tenday after Tav’s original outburst, telling him he needed to figure out what was wrong. He had scoffed at the tiefling; after all, it’s not like he cared about whatever mental issues shared rent with her tadpole. Right?

“She likes you the most, fangs. If there’s anyone she’s willing to open up to, I'm bettin’ it’s you.”

He laughed then, loud and boisterous, to hide the rising tide of excitement and anxiety that Karlach’s words had caused.

“Trying to use me to pry into Tav’s life, are we?” He tsk-ed. Though he smiled, his anxiety had given way to anger. It poked and taunted his deepest fear; that he’s only useful when he can be used. It’s so painfully obvious that’s all he’d ever be, that even sweet Karlach knew it.

But something besides the tadpole lurked around in his mind; why does he feel bad about tricking Tav? That is his whole plan, is it not? Use the strong sword-wielding lady to safely travel back to Baldur’s Gate, she dices this stupid cult and Cazador into pieces, and then he dumps her, finally free from any master’s grip.

He banished the intruding thought instantly, bottled it as deep as it could go, for the looming answer to his question threatened to make him sick. He is undead, a creature of the night, an external parasite that feeds on Tav at night until he can find someone, something, better. His skin is cold as ice and his heart no longer beats. He has no heart to give; or so he tells himself.

“You know that’s not the case,” Karlach had chastised, seemingly offended he could suggest such a thing, “We’re all worried. You can pretend all you want, but I know you are too. You can help her, Astarion.”

Now that was a curious sentiment. ‘Help’ is numerous in its contexts; Cazador certainly considered himself helpful, merciful even, as he watched his new spawn vomit blood and dirt after clawing out of their tombs. The word implies a give and take, and the world is far more eager to collect than it is to provide.

To put it plainly, he had nothing to offer their melancholic leader; he is nothing and has been for a long time. Still, Karlach had come to him, apparently unaware of his obvious lack. Perhaps he should hear her out. Perhaps she saw something in him.

“And just how should I ‘help’?” Astarion asked, condescendingly drawling the question out, rolling his eyes for good measure.

He saw how the edge of Karlach’s lips twitched, how her eyes narrowed, the way her mechanical heart roared to life with a bright spark before settling back into quiet embers. In poetic irony, it seems that he burned her.

“Hells below, Astarion,” she nearly yelled, exasperated, tired, and practically begging him to cooperate. He doesn’t blame her for the outburst. Without the annoyingly bubbly attitude of Tav, the tension between party members had been amplified and pulled taut. They all may very well snap soon.

“I’ll see what I can do,” he dismissed her then, attention focused back on the tome he had in his hands. But his mind did not process the words on the page. He reread the same line damn near ten times before he gave up and went to bed instead.

His rest was anything but; it was fitful and full of sorrow.

It was times like then when he wished he could slumber like every other living creature. When his victims and fellow spawn would speak of nightmares, they told tales of distorted visions and intense fear. His waking hours were already plagued with such issues, he could easily handle the nightmares. But no, instead he was cursed to revel in his own pain during his meditative rest, reliving and experiencing his own terrifying truths on repeat.

That night, he tried searching for something he could do for Tav. Something that the others could not; something to prove his value to her. He did find it. It didn’t take him long at all.

All he had to offer his little troublesome Tav was his body.

And it broke him.

He spent that night with the realization that this is who he is and always will be. A body to be used and used and used and used and used and used and used and u s e d.......

Thankfully, Tav had asked him to stay at camp that morning. Even though he teased her with his usual, “Darling, I thought we had something special,” she could barely manage a smile, and muttered her thanks before flittering about camp in preparation.

It was probably for the best, knowing how useless he would have been with that morose epiphany swimming in his mind. Though awake, the uneasy feeling from the night did not dissipate. His emotions were all over the place, that much he was sure of, but they had always been identifiable. Agony, desperation, emptiness.

Now new and uncertain feelings – gods how he detested the word – seized his chest. Images of Tav pestered him the entire day; the bags under her eyes, the unkempt hair, the dying light of her spirit. Karlach was right, he was worried.

Still, he could not find the source of his worry. He’d spent the last 200 years surrounded by shambling corpses and their victims alike. They slept like dogs, were beaten like beasts, so really, who was he to judge for a bad hair day?

Astarion saw no use driving himself mad about it, after all, he had always warned her that her heroism couldn’t last forever. He spent that day doing what he does best when he finds himself without her company, distracting himself with enough shit wine and even shittier books. He didn’t think his tolerance would be shit too.

Words had soon blurred together, and despite the book’s distinct lack of arcane knowledge, the letters seemed to arrange themselves in puzzles. He slammed the tome shut, opting to sit in the privacy of his tent and will away his growing headache. While his thoughts were no less jumbled, the feelings from before were becoming clearer.

Worry; The presence of the undead made it impossible for him to feed on anyone other than Tav. Even though she always assured him that she did not mind, he felt like he was using her, and for the first time in a long time, he felt bad about being such a devious bastard.

Rejection; He’d never tell, but the absence of Tav returning his superficial flirtations left him feeling empty. He tries to tell himself that it isn’t him, it isn’t his fault, but that doesn’t mean it hurts any less to not have her affection.

Fear; He would give his body to her, if it would make her happy. Thousands before her had found pleasure in him, it would be easy for him to allow her the same. He wanted to believe that he’d be selfless, place her needs and comfort above his own; but he knew he could not. He is selfish. Could she want a selfish man?

It dawned on him then, what this cocktail of vulnerability and yearning was. The cause of his worry, the source of his comfort, the reason he felt like an idiot. He lov-

The party had arrived back at camp, and he had stumbled to his feet to meet them, for how would it look if their charming vampire companion was found sulking and brooding in his tent. Karlach immediately shed her armor, talking about how stuffy it felt to be metal-clad. Gale carried a sack with the night’s dinner ingredients in hand and grumbled about the pain in his knees as he knelt to light the fire. Lae’zel, despite her stoicism, appeared happy, covered head to toe in the blood of the fallen.

Tav looked no worse than she had for these last few days, and that ought to count for something. He watched as she removed the outer pieces of her armor, wincing when the harsh edges dug into new and old bruises alike. She picked up a rag and a small mirror, wiping away the blood from the cuts on her face.

The sight of the crimson spilling from her skin reminded him of his hunger. Their quid pro quo arrangement had been forgotten in her despair, and he was desperate at this point for anything she would give him. Blood, sex, shallow praise, whatever she had to offer.

Oh, right.

He had yet to offer himself again, so what reason would she have to keep up her end of the deal?

He downs the last of the wine in his goblet, swallowing the intoxicating substance just as the reality of his situation swallows his hope. With measured steps, he approached her tent, taking quiet yet deep breaths to ease the misery he felt knowing he’ll never be more than this. He opened his mouth to call her name, but Tav released the ties holding back the rainfly of her tent and shut them all out.

That should have been it, but his drunken mind reminded him of his promise to Karlach, and his predatorial hunger lurched at the idea of another night unsatiated.

Once the others were asleep, Astarion snuck into her tent, part and parcel to their routine since she first discovered his true nature. It was easier for him when she was asleep, not that the sharp pinch of his fangs left her totally undisturbed; but to approach while she was awake only guaranteed in his mind that he would end up on his back again.

Tav was facing away from him, lying on her side, a formerly white linen sheet covered her sleeping form. Nothing was amiss as he had stalked closer, brushing the strands of hair away from her neck, his mouth unbelievably dry. He knelt, the perfume of her blood wafting sweetly from beneath her skin, as he placed his hand on her shoulder to steady himself.

She awoke then, the force of her sitting so abruptly pushed him back and sent him stumbling. He had, thankfully, caught himself with his hand before falling into the dirt. Still, he was equal parts annoyed at dinner being interrupted and worried that he was caught.

“Hells, Astarion, you scared the shit out of me,” she whispered.

“And you almost broke my nose,” he chastised; not a total lie, but an exaggerated one, nonetheless.

Tav rolled her eyes at him before letting herself fall back against her bedroll again, “Oh, you poor thing, want me to kiss it better?”

At least she appeared to be feeling better, back to the self that loved teasing him.

“If you’re offering, who am I to say no to the hand that feeds?”

Upon realizing that he would not be allowed to dine and dash, Astarion straddled her thighs, ready to bargain for what he needed. He let his hand rest on her hip, soothing circles through the fabric of her nightwear.

“Yea, s’pose you can’t say you won’t bite,” she said through a drowsy laugh.

He allowed his hand to wander then, down the inside of her thigh, fingers trailing along the seam of her pants, “As if the lady would protest my bites.”

With a kiss pressed to her lips, Astarion silenced any innuendo or proposition she may have made. He did not want to hear it, could not stand the idea of her confirming all the horrid things he thought about himself.

This unspoken deal only served to remind him of how temporary freedom would be. At worst, he would return to Cazador, and the bastard would tell him how lucky he should feel, how there were other mortals dying to be in his position. He wished he could tell him that adding an ‘s’ before ‘pawn’ doesn’t make being a puppet any more lucrative.

She promised that she would not let that happen. She promised to free him from his master’s chains, but what comes after? He would still be bound to the night, doomed to prowl moonlit streets for an eternity. Killing would still be his status quo, whether mammal or mortal, in order to satiate his hunger.

Would she stay with such a monster?

Thoughts he did not want to entertain had barged to the forefront of his mind again, and he knew he needed to move this along. At least with sex, he could force those thoughts away, bottle them back up, and allow his body to numb. At least, this way, he survived another day. At least her body is warm.

At least—anything he can say to himself to justify another night on his back and to ignore the resentment building in his heart.

Her lips had parted in a moan, and his tongue quickly lay claim to her mouth, as his hand finally cupped her sex. She gasped, and as his mind had started to drift off into the numb void, he had been pulled back by the feeling of her hand pushing against his chest.

When he separated himself from her body, Astarion wanted to scream, wanted to shake her; why did she insist on taking the lead? It would be easy with him on top; he wouldn’t have to look at her, to feel her weight on top of him. Must she be so difficult?

“I don’t want to have sex tonight.”

What--

He looked down at her then, saw the flush in her face, felt how her hands fiddled with the ruffled collar of his shirt but harbored no intention to remove the clothing.

“I’m not really in the right headspace for that,” she explained, “Plus, I can taste the wine on your lips...”

“Right, well...” He didn’t know what to say.

Astarion was frozen above her, unsure of what he was supposed to do. Awkwardness had settled over them both, each one terrified of scaring the other off should they move or speak. Until, the dots connect in her head and she practically launched herself upright, almost smacking herself into him again.

“You haven’t fed since we got here, have you? Shit, I’m sorry!” She said as she pulled her hair to the side, exposing the column of her neck.

Any other time, he might have shoved her away, storming out of her tent as his hunger gave way to the embarrassment of it all, his crumbling ego unable to cope. But as she all but dragged his mouth to her skin, urging him to drink, Astarion was thankful that her care outweighed his own pride.

His fangs pierced her flesh, and she hissed at the pain, but did not complain further.

He recalled the conversation they had about what their friends would taste like, debating over who would be sweet and who would be savory. Once he had mused that she would be bland, only if to rile her up, but the depth of her lifeblood had truly surprised him.

She is a winter’s mulled wine, deceptively simple at first yet brimming with spice as she settles on his tongue. Hints of citrus tease his palate, the last taste of summer’s sweetness yielding to the zest of cinnamon and clove. It was gone as soon as it came, leaving its enjoyer to eagerly await the next mouthful.

As he drank from her, he had felt the echo of a memory in his chest, of his younger days scribbling away next to a hearth, of a man who made his heart flutter and his skin burn with want. The man’s face remains obscured, buried under years of torment, but the feeling is there; the rush of something new and exciting; the naivety of first love.

With wild hair and soft eyes that regarded him as if he held the entire world, the elf below him had unearthed a humanity he’d long since forgotten. What a wondrous feeling it was; to release all that had been brimming beneath the surface, to give names to the shadows, to feel again.

Again, her hand pushed against his chest, weaker than before as she mumbles, “O-Okay, I’m starting to get dizzy.”

His fangs retreated from her skin, and as his lips captured any wayward drops, he realized he did not wish to completely part in that moment. Gently, he laid her down against her bedroll, back on her side. He situated himself behind her, basking in the newfound heat that flowed through his veins, and allowed his breath to even out. Tav was already fast asleep when he turned, wrapping his arm around her and cuddled her to his chest.

...

Astarion had made sure to return to his own tent before dawn broke and if Tav had noticed the vampire snuggling her in the night, he was eternally grateful for her silence on it in the morning. He did not want to hear the insufferable taunts and jokes the others would make if the two of them were discovered together. Gale or Wyll, hells, probably even Karlach, would remind him that it’s only natural for two adults to seek out company between their giggles; as if he’s a little boy who's embarrassed about his crush.

But that is what he is, isn’t he? He’s tucking tail and scurrying away because he’s afraid of others seeing that he is capable of feeling. Brazen displays of emotion, especially ones of love, are signs of a weakness to be exploited. Everything he had ever loved had been taken from him, had been hurt because of him. He could love her, he wants to love her, but it would just be placing a target on her back. Another one of Cazador’s endless lessons.

She is safer this way.

For what it’s worth, Tav did appear livelier that morning, bantering with Shadowheart as the cleric healed their bloodless leader, and it earned him a thankful pat on the back from Karlach.

“Ah, I love the taste of Lesser Restoration in the morning,” Tav hummed happily, arms raised above her head as she stretched the sleep out of her body.

“I don’t know why you insist on coming to me,” said Shadowheart, “You’re the one who chose to be a walking blood bank, and I know Paladins can cast Lesser Restoration. Why don’t you heal yourself instead of making it my problem?”

“Because you’re always so charming,” Tav teased, “How do you expect me to resist?”

“Kicking and screaming, I hope,” deadpanned the cleric.

“See what I mean? Our own little ray of sunshine!”

After breakfast, Tav assembled that day’s crew. The idea of a day of physical labor after last night's mental exhaustion made Astarion less than eager to accept her invitation. Still, he had said yes, and donned his armor as he made a quiet vow to himself.

He will always keep her safe in one way or another.

The day’s mission had involved infiltrating the House of Healing to find something that could be used on this Art Cullagh fellow. Astarion had accepted, by this point, to not concern himself with the details and just assist Tav with whatever heroics she found herself agreeing to. They would happen with or without him.

The exterior yielded nothing of value, except one half of a pair of warding rings Tav found on the skeleton of another victim. She was somber as she pocketed the ring and read the lover’s note, but composed herself afterwards, and said a small prayer before pushing forward. He had felt some level of pride and admiration, watching as a new strength kindled inside her. There was inflation to his ego as well, a selfish joy in thinking that his mere cuddles could fix her woes.

He should have known better. Life had never been kind.

They had entered the House of Healing through an antechamber that reeked of decay and spoiled blood. Infirmary beds were strewn about, and of the few that weren’t outright destroyed or flipped over, they looked less than pleasing without a mattress to cover the rusted springs. Rotting towels, shattered wash basins, and an unknown film covered the floors. Voices echoed from the main chamber ahead, so each step further in was made cautiously.

They passed through a door to their right and discovered what used to be a woman as she floated before two of the beds, covered in nurses' attire that clearly didn’t know the definition of sterile. She - no, it - paid them no mind as they had approached, gazing down at the implements and bandages before it as if it couldn’t figure out what to do.

With her hand on the hilt of her sword, Tav spoke first, “Excuse me, ma’am?”

“Don’t call the doctor yet!” came the soft plea of the creature, “I’ve got potions, sutures - I know I can do this...” It turned to address their fellow nurse, yet startled when it saw the Paladin, “Oh! You’re a patient. This is the children’s ward – triage is back that way.”

“I have something else I’d like to ask you,” Tav started, but her words faded off as she looked beyond the nurse in front of her.

Two bodies laid still on the beds, clearly dead, though it was hard to tell if it was from the Shadow Curse or the nurse’s ‘treatment’.

In an instant, Tav drew her sword, resting the blade in a tail stance, voice low with anger as she asked, “What are you doing with the dead?”

The nurse regarded her with confusion as she replied, “Not dead, merely medicated. To ease the pain.”

Tav raised her sword, now bracing her weight in a plow stance, the tip of her blade dangerously close to the nurse’s abdomen, as she snarled, “I asked you a question, creature! What are you doing with the dead?”

Astarion had watched Tav face countless foes since their adventure together began. Even with the most wicked, she had never been so blatantly offensive. In hindsight, he realized that all those foes had been alive; fought them she must, but always done so reluctantly, and always ready to spare a life when able. There, in the House of Healing, did he first witness her true devotion as a Doomguide.

Of course, she had told the group of her deity; was overbearingly eager to share it, in fact. Kelemvor; Judge of the Damned; whose symbol featured a skeletal hand raising balanced scales. Tav wears it on her chest – darkened purple stitched into a solid black surcoat that she dons no matter the armor underneath. She told them the stories of her years as a lone wanderer, proselytizing Kelemvor’s wisdom, performing last rites for the dying, and destroying necromancers.

She was a protector of the living, and a slayer of the undead.

The creature did not answer her question, insisting that the patients were sleeping and to be quiet lest they wake. The last words the creature heard were Tav’s whispered, “In Kelemvor’s name,” before the blade was plunged clean through its body. It collapsed to the floor, trying to speak, but the blood pooling in its throat only allowed for senseless gurgling.

Tav placed her foot on the corpse and pushed it into the heap of flesh as she withdrew her blade. Thick, blackened blood congealed on the metal, and Tav held it in a white-knuckled grip as she stepped over the body and towards the beds.

She took one glance and immediately turned around, tripping on the creature's body as she rushed out of the vestibule, landing on her hands and knees, as her sword skidded across the floor. She did not rise, instead sinking to her elbows as her hands pulled at her hair to the point that Astarion thought she might rip it out.

Karlach rushed to her side, trying to ease the Paladin up as hushed sobs echoed off the walls.

“Hey now, soldier,” said the tiefling, taking hold of Tav’s biceps and urging her to sit up, “Don’t go getting soft on me.”

Shadowheart bypassed the two and peered into the beds before gasping, “It’s Arabella’s parents.”

Another choked cry broke out from Tav as she finally sat back on her haunches, rubbing away her tears with a grubby hand, “I fucking hate this place.”

“We all do,” assured Karlach, “But we gotta keep moving forward; don’t want to have worms forever, do we?”

“No,” came Tav’s hushed response before she stood to her feet. She picked up her sword from the floor, flicking some of the blood off, “Let’s just get this over with.”

Malleus Thorm was an abhorrent sight. Deciding to take the lead after Tav’s second outburst, Karlach interrogated the cursed doctor about his peculiar treatment plan. He spoke of Shar, of darkness, of absence. The victim strapped to the table was catatonic from the aimless carving of the nurses’ blades, though he was soon comatose after the doctor’s mechanical claws dug into his eyes.

Tav was antsy behind her, shifting on her feet, practically chomping at the bit to send the undead man back into oblivion. The battle was difficult, but well won. Tav’s anger and adrenaline combined with Divine Smite proved a lethal combo.

Shadowheart pulled a lute from the corpse of Malleus and held it out to Tav, “I think you might want this.”

Tav took the lute, strapped it to her back and made way for the exit. Despite the exhaustion they all felt and the rush of emotions Tav must have experienced, she stayed silent. No cries, no curses, not one tear to be found. Astarion felt that agonizing mix of worry and sorrow creep around him.

He increased his pace until he was able to fall in line with her, their other party members straggling not far behind.

“Are you alright, darling?” He asked quietly, still not quite ready for his care to be announced to the world.

She only nodded.

...

If he thought their adventures had been quiet before, they were dead silent now. Every fight with another Thorm family member pushed Tav further into despair. Any attempts by their companions to make her smile or laugh were futile. She walked and fought like a zombie, resulting in her near-death numerous times. Lectures about how she needed to mind herself went in one pointed ear and out the other, apparently.

Her silence was only broken by the fits of sobbing that occurred from her tent each night. If she managed to fall into her meditative state, it would end with her lurching forward, gasping for air as she scrambled off into the corner of camp to empty the contents of her stomach.

Karlach had to take over as temporary leader, and if she had her way, Tav would’ve stayed behind. Yet, when the Paladin appeared every morning with her armor and sword ready, the tiefling couldn’t find the strength to not let her tag along.

Astarion also insisted that he be allowed on each mission, even if his skills weren’t useful for their goal. For whatever reason, Tav listened to him more than the others, and would only accept his help when she found herself injured. He had to be there for her, even if watching her suffer wore away at his own sanity. He often found himself looking at the warding ring she had silently given him after their fight with Malleus, and wondered if he would ever hear her laugh again.

Bones, blood, and viscera decorated the entrance hall. The gore was mundane to him, no more unique than a cobblestone street or tavern lights in the dark. The dank and forebodingness of the crypt did not stop him from admiring its beauty. The ruins must have been a marvelous sight in their heyday, brimming with the Lady of Loss’s worshippers as they sought to drown out their sorrow and begged for her guidance amongst the crystalline decor.

Their group split to investigate the various rooms that surrounded the concourse, with him following behind Tav as she investigated the nook to the right. Through the towering archway, he saw that it was no more than a chamber, perhaps used as foyer for those who came to grieve the Thorm family. More bones were littered across its floor and piled in its corners. He saw nothing novel, yet Tav stopped stock still.

“Myrkul...”, she had hissed with disgust, hands clenched into fists that shook in splintering rage.

Peeking over her shoulder, he saw the triangle of femurs that had been constructed in front of the dilapidated desk, a skull perched neatly in the middle. He joined her at her side, casual when he had faced her and asked carelessly, “Who?”

Truthfully, the name and symbol were of no interest to him; a forgotten name from a bygone era, and most importantly, a deity that had ignored his prayers. She looked up to him then, and the dusty air must have been getting to him, because he swore her gaze softened when their eyes met.

“Myrkul Bey al-Kursi, a necromancer and prince who ascended to godhood when Jergal willingly parted with his title,” Gale interrupted just as Tav was about to speak.

Astarion rolled his eyes at the wizard and resisted the urge to pettily stomp his foot against the floor. His look was not enough to kill, but it did have Gale surrendering, hands up in a wordless apology as he had backed away from the two.

“Correct,” Tav said, breaking the tension she didn’t know had occurred, “He was usurped by Cyric, but the Prince of Lies was defeated by Kelemvor.”

Astarion was desperate to keep her talking. He’d listen to an entire history lecture if it meant she’d come back to sound mind. Back to him. “What use would a servant of Myrkul have with some Sharran shrine?”

“It doesn’t matter what ‘use’ they have for it,” admonished Shadowheart, “Lady Shar has decreed that Ketheric must die for his betrayal, and ridding her temple of other disgraces in the process is as much a bonus as it is an honor.”

Listening to the cleric’s devotion was uninteresting at best, and torturous at worst. He almost pitied the poor girl, blindly following a goddess out of fear of what her memories might hold.

Astarion had expected Tav to mirror Shadowheart’s enthusiasm, but instead saw her bristle, hands wringing together nervously. She was unrecognizable to him, the proud warrior now hunched in on herself as she gnawed at her bottom lip. Anxiety was radiating off her in waves; she looked like she might vomit.

His body had moved before he had realized what he was doing, hand reaching for her shoulder to comfort her. When his cool skin had made contact with her chainmail, she recoiled, eyes wide and breath unsteady. Hurt by her reaction, he let his hand fall limply to his side, and gruffly announced that the party should keep moving.

His patience wore thin as they descended into the abyss below the mausoleum. Gale and Shadowheart both wouldn’t shut up about the various magical auras they were picking up on. Sensing Shar’s presence in the Temple of Shar? Who could have guessed the dark goddess would have been there? Bloody amateurs.

Tav nearly fell in battle again against the Dark Justiciars that were forever cursed to protect the temple. She was unfocused and reckless, and the shadows had swarmed her after making quick work of the necromancer’s lackeys. To make matters worse, there was still no sign of the devil Raphael had tasked them with killing. There were hundreds of rats, though, and the sight of them left a bad taste in his mouth.

With some convincing from both he and Gale, Tav finally acquiesced and agreed to return to camp for the evening. Night had developed a new, uncomfortably familar cycle by then, with Tav disappearing to her tent before anyone could say anything to her. She would eat her dinner alone. He would pretend he didn’t hear her crying throughout the night.

They found Balthazar the next day, and it was the first time he ever saw pure hatred burning behind her eyes. They barely survived, the undead necromancer’s poison draining their strength while his ghouls beat them with decayed teeth and talons. When the bastard finally fell, Tav stood over his corpse, whispered a prayer, and then carved her blade through the fat of his neck. She stabbed her sword repeatedly into his chest, moving down his torso until he was no longer recognizable; just a pile of oozing sinew and flesh. His hulking, sewn-together abomination was the next target of her wrath, and it too was reduced to a pool of guts and blood.

It was not enough.

She destroyed the furniture, set the bookshelves ablaze, tore down everything the necromancer kept in his makeshift laboratory. The rest of the party removed themselves from the room, watching silently from the threshold as their near-death leader found the strength to take all of Balthazar’s worldly possessions with her.

It would have been sexy as hell if it weren’t so concerning.

She eventually collapsed, falling to her knees, sword clattering to the ground with a metallic clang echoing around the room. Silence followed; stares were exchanged between Astarion and his fellow compatriots, each one wordlessly asking the other what the hell had just happened.

Tired of walking on eggshells, of not doing something, Astarion walked over to Tav and kneeled in front of her. She didn’t notice him at first, eyes shut tight and chest heaving with labored breaths. He reached out again, placing his hand on her knee.

She was startled, but didn’t move away like before. Instead, her bloodied hand covered his own, fingers tracing over his knuckles, inadvertently smearing the crimson against his pale skin. When he suggested they retire to camp early, she finally, finally, met his gaze. Glimmering violet swirled in her irises, no doubt the remnants of whatever magic she called on Kelemvor for. It faded away, leaving him with the woman of his adoration, looking broken and lost.

Clinging to his armor, she staggered to her feet, yet nearly toppled again when she went to pick up her sword. It was instinct really, for him to grab her waist and to keep her upright. He certainly had held her hips in more lascivious situations, but somehow he felt more naked that time.

Vulnerable.

He doesn’t think he can keep this a secret any longer.

…

This last tenday has been punishing, and Astarion carries its weight with him as he searches the encampment for his wayward paramour.

He finds her on the staggered rock where they helped Halsin rescue Thaniel, staring out into the darkness. Her posture is relaxed as she leans back on her arms, legs dangling off the edge where the water beats on the stone below.

The silt crunches softly beneath his boots, and he knows she has heard him approach when her ear twitches. He settles himself beside her, brushing off any stray granules from his armor with a huff of disgust. She giggles.

It must look comical, how quickly his head snaps up at the sound, searching her face for signs of madness. After how despondent she’s been, he expects to find a vessel, a hollow being with the residue of what was a soul, begging to be let go.

Instead, he finds her kind smile, as she now swipes away the remaining dirt from his calf, “Not a fan of sand, I take it?”

For all his prose, there is no poetry, no song, no prayer that could mimic the joy he feels when she teases him. He’s been drowning, his mood anchored to hers, and now she has yanked him from the abyss once again. Is this the feeling all those bards crooned about? That every two-bit novelist dreamed of capturing?

He had long given up on such fantasies, convinced himself that the very notion of love made him sick.

Love.

There’s no use pretending anymore. It is love that he feels for Tav. It’s why he mopes at the end of the night if she dares to speak to him last; perhaps the tad murderous feeling he gets when he sees her acting too chummy with the wizard. It’s the comfort of knowing someone has his back, the safety of her sword shielding him from attack, the promises of freedom sleepily whispered between lips in the night. She is the first breath taken when he surfaces. The sun pales in comparison to the warmth in her touch, though she is just as apt to kiss his cheeks.

She is back and gods, how he missed her.

Gods, how he loves her.

“No, I don’t,” he responds in his bantering tone, “It’s rough... irritating... and it gets bloody everywhere.”

She hums in agreement, gaze falling to the ground before returning to the river. Silence befalls them again, and he finds himself clamoring for words. He wants to confess his love, sing her praises, ask her what the hell is wrong with her. Anything to fill the silence, he refuses to live in the saturnine hellscape that has been the last week any longer.

“Astarion,” she beats him to it, “I want to apologize for my behavior these last few days. I put everyone at risk and going forward I’ll be sure to keep everything in check. Can’t have everyone dying because of incompetency.”

A bit too diplomatic for his liking, and her laughter is much too forced. He’ll need to teach her some proper acting; it’s a miracle she’s survived as long as she has with that disaster of a performance. Aren’t paladins supposed to be charismatic, or is it the weapon that does most of the talking?

“Oh, you were in a bad mood? I hardly noticed,” he states with all the indifference he can muster.

She leans into him to playfully jab her elbow into his side, muttering expletives in an elven dialect he hasn’t heard in ages.

“Seriously, I’m sorry if I made you worry.”

“I’m just glad you’re safe,” he rushes out, hand idly scratching the back of his neck.

The tension returns, though not as overbearing as before, as questions remain unasked and feelings unshared. It’s a bitter push, as neither is used to talking about their depths, and he doesn’t want to pry; yet a sweet pull, as he remains at her side, wishing for the awkwardness to dissipate.

“It’s just...” She begins, and though she faces forward, he catches her sneaking looks at him in her peripheral, “There’s so much going on, I don’t know where to start.”

If he had any blood in his body, he’s sure it’d be racing, his heart thumping wildly in tandem. He thinks she’s ready to talk, and that is half the issue. He thinks, but he doesn’t know; it terrifies and thrills him all the same. He wants to know her – aches for it, if he’s being honest.

But he is terrified, so sure that he’s going to fuck up and ruin the one good thing he’s had in two hundred years. If she rejects him now, shuts him out for good, he’s not sure he can take it.

This was supposed to be easy; she was supposed to be easy.

“It doesn’t matter where you start, I’ll be here for the end.” Shit, shit, SHIT.

“Astarion,” she gasps, hand over her heart, his name melting into a laugh, “That was actually smooth.”

He tsks, “I take offense to that. I’ve always been smooth, you’re just too brutish to notice.”

She laughs again, shaking her head as an enamored smile graces her lips. Her hand brushes stray locks of hair behind her pointed ear and even in the dim glow of the inn’s spell, he can see a blush staining her cheeks.

But then, she sighs, slow and tired as her fingers soothe circles into her temples, “Can you keep a secret for me?”

It’s what he’s been pining for, offered on a silver platter, and how could he not say yes.

He raises his hand to his chest, drawing an ‘x’ over his armor, “Cross my heart and hope to—uh, well, you know.”

Another chuckle escapes her lips as she adjusts her position, angling herself towards him.

She swallows thickly before continuing, “Well, I uh—I talked to Kelemvor.”

“Is that not par for the course for you Doomguides?” He asks incredulously, eyebrow raised and head tilting as he chuckles.

This time, she does not grant him a smile or a laugh, focused on picking at her cuticles and the dirt under her nails.

“I haven’t spoken to him since the nautiloid, I figured the tadpole was interfering,” she says hushed, shame and guilt on the edges of her voice. “I was preparing myself for the worst, but what I got was an impossibility.”

What kind of cryptic bullsh-- She’s been hanging around Withers too much.

Hundreds of possibilities race through his mind. What he knows of Kelemvor is only from what she has shared; while he did not seem to be a vengeful god, they already have one person burdened with a suicide mission. He could live without the blabbersome wizard, but her?

He should have known the universe would only offer him misery, to dangle a sweet treat before him and rip it all away before he had the chance to savor it.

“Did he ask you to sacrifice yourself?” He wants to hear it from her, needs to hear her say those dreaded words so he can make peace before she is nothing more than bones and fading memories.

Her eyes find his, inflamed with tears she no longer has the strength to shed, “I wish he did.”

The pain, the anger, the grief of the last few days resurfaces in her voice, that flare of purple sparking in her irises. Astarion does not often find himself shocked, but the callous and tempestuous storm raging beneath her skin leaves him speechless. Instincts tell him he is witnessing only a fraction of her fury.

Then it ebbs, retreating like the tide, as she takes a deep breath to steady herself.

“I’ve been having doubts, about my purpose, about this path I chose. I expected Kelemvor to berate me for lacking faith.”

Her hands go back to tearing at her cuticles.

“He by no means praised me, but he wasn’t furious, either. He didn’t seem like himself... He didn’t even look like himself. It was as if his passion was gone. I asked him what I should do, and he told me that only I can determine my future.”

“So? What’s wrong with that?” He was genuinely confused by her demeanor. Self-determination, autonomy, freedom; all the things she promised to help him find and keep, yet she fears them for herself.

“Kelemvor has been a part of my life since I was a teenager, I’ve devoted myself to him for the better part of two centuries. I don’t-- I don’t know who I am without him.”

A kindred spirit.

She clenches her jaw, letting out a frustrated huff, “What am I supposed to do? I can’t stay a Doomguide to a god who abandoned his own principles!”

He knows she is bleeding from her nail beds, the lovely scent of spiced wine in the air.

“I took an oath of devotion, to be honorable, compassionate, and honest. I do not fear death of myself nor my loved ones, for death is not something to be afraid of. It is not something one must seek, but it is what one should embrace should it find you,” She explains, “For the last two hundred and fifty-six years, Kelemvor would remind me of these tenets, and commend me for every valiant foe I slaughtered in their image.”

As sweet as the fragrance is, he takes her hands in his; they have seen and caused enough damage for the time being.

“And Kelemvor just... doesn’t care anymore. Every time we saw some poor undead creature cursed by Shar, I was reminded of how he dismissed me, like I was a fool for ever following him in the first place. I was his valiant hero, one his most beloved Paladins, and now what? I’m nothing.”

“You are not nothing,” he replies in an instant, “You are everything. You don't need Kelemvor to be honorable or compassionate, because you already are those things. He was lucky to have someone as devoted as you, but if he wants to toss you aside, then good riddance; it’s his loss, and everyone else’s gain.”

Crimson floods her cheeks again, as she stares at him dumbfounded. He fidgets in the momentary silence, the feeling of actually sharing one's feeling still mildly uncomfortable. But then it dissipates, because she smiles at him and brings their clasped hands to rest over her heart. Its beat is comforting.

“Thanks, Astarion. I don’t know what I would have done without you these last few weeks.”

“Someone had to keep you alive. I know I said you would make a pretty corpse, but that doesn’t mean I’m eager to see it, darling.”

“I’m sure Shadowheart would let you have a nibble if I passed,” she says with a laugh.

“Perhaps, but I don’t think she could compare.”

The steady rhythm of her heart increases under his hands. She adjusts herself again, scooting closer to him so that she can lean her head against his shoulder. Her eyes close as she relaxes into him, and he feels so relieved at knowing her touch could be so intimate yet still so gentle.

“There’s just one thing I don’t understand, Tav,” He says, his thumb softly tracing along her knuckles, “Why were you having doubts in the first place?”

“Oh! Um...” She says, head lifting from his shoulder, “It’s so embarrassing, don’t worry about it.”

“Don’t you dare hold out on me now,” He pleads as he slings his arm across her back, hand resting on her hip and pulling her in close so he can whisper, “Especially when it comes to gossip!”

Sagging against his side, she groans out, “You are the wooooorst.”

He raises his hand to his face, making a dramatic show of clearing his throat before uttering a very sickly sweet, “Please?”

“Okay, fine,” she huffs before grumbling out something unintelligible.

“What was that dear? No one likes a mumbler.”

“Because of you! Because... I like you,” She says, carding her hand through her hair; her walls tumbling and every emotion she’s shouldered alone spilling forth in a maddened haze.

“I’ve seen hundreds of undead, most of whom I gladly sent back to their graves. They were merely the husks of the people they once were. Any soul left in them was but a dying echo as they pleaded for their suffering to end. I thought I was helping,” she says, voice shaking, “But what if I ended the life of someone who just wanted-- no needed-- a second chance? Was I an arbiter of divine justice, or just some glorified executioner? I started to question everything when we met.”

His mind is a whirlwind, thoughts simultaneously speeding yet slow. The half of him that yearns to be known, to be loved, is battling against his ever-present fear that he is not worthy of such. It’s a terrifying concoction, one that has him questioning just how accurate Tav’s description of the undead is. He has no idea who Astarion is; he knows who the elven magistrate once was, but who is Astarion the spawn, besides Cazador’s infernal expectations?

“By no means am I saying that you haven’t suffered, but you are not some hollow corpse, Astarion. Despite everything that’s happened, and everything that has yet to come, you have grown in unprecedented ways. You’ve broken a mold, defied all odds. You’re simply breathtaking...”

He is, isn’t he? No one has given him enough credit; no one has truly recognized the pure shit he has survived through. No one has offered him the chance or the choice to be better. He’s tired of the untrusting sideways glances, the disgusting feeling of some stranger’s eye roaming his figure. He’s always been expected to fall in line, and today he makes the promise to finally live for himself.

“When this is all over, I want to stay by your side, if you’ll have me.”

She looks at him with reverence, like he can pluck the stars from the night sky. He has seen this look before, when she would talk about Kelemvor, and he swears his undead heart nearly beats under her adoring gaze. He has no army to command, cannot turn into mist nor bat; he is practically powerless, and yet she wants him anyway. She believes in him, even though he can’t trust himself. Where he sees nothing, she has found something worth abandoning her god for.

“I don’t think I’ve heard you this quiet before... are you alright?”

He cannot find the words necessary to explain his delight. Even if he did, he doubts he’d still even be able to form them, arrange them into proper sentences. The truth has rendered him speechless.

It doesn’t erase the fact that she sounds hurt, scared even, at the prospect that his silence means rejection. He recognizes the feeling all too well, and if she can overcome its pain to tell him the truth, then dammit, he can do the same. Perhaps he will forever roam darkened streets, but that doesn’t mean all of him must remain in the shadows. He must be honest, expose his own secrets to the proverbial light, and allow her the same choice.

“Oh yes, I’m fine. I just... feel awful.”

He hopes she chooses him all the same.

“Look, I had a plan. A nice, simple plan-”

#fullofbeeswrites #astarion x reader #astarion x tav #astarion/reader #astarion/tav #astarion #astarion bg3 #baldur's gate 3 #bg3 #bg3 tav #bg3 astarion

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vampyrsm · 4 months

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‣‣ COR UNUM: CHAPTER EIGHTEEN | KŌJIN

‣‣ Synopsis: Our tale continues with a King reunited with his Queen, a touching reunion that is painted red with the blood of their enemies. The Queen gives her first decree, and she wishes for the heads of those who had wronged her.

‣‣ Main Masterlist | AO3 ‣‣ Pairing: Sukuna x Reader ‣‣ Word Count: est. 10k ‣‣ Warnings: Blank blogs & Minors DNI. Dead Dove: Do Not Eat. Set in the Early-Heian Period, trueform!Sukuna, female reader, cannibalism, death, cursed spirits, fighting scenes, heavy blood and gore, cursed energy usage, starts with Sukuna's POV, vomit, rape mentions.

“There you are.”

Instantaneous relief. A clicking of two puzzle pieces coming together, a deep breath after being submerged in icy water. Sukuna had never known what relief truly was, not until you had been swept away in the middle of the night. He feels that part of his soul blossom when you press back into his chest in recognition of his voice.

Sukuna doesn’t want to linger too much on the state you’re in. He scented your blood before he felt the amount of cursed energy you were putting out. With the arm wrapped around your waist, he can feel the pulse of foreign cursed energy there. You’d been marked by something that would cause even Sukuna to crumble to his knees in pain… and yet here you were, standing and fighting.

The men who had surrounded you were nothing but mangled flesh and bone on the floor, the sheer pressure of his cursed energy enough to crush them. And so, Sukuna takes a second to glance around the courtyard—if you could still call it that. You had done all of this, he could see the deep lines thrown into the buildings that had managed to survive, the ground had been destroyed before he had gotten here.

He only feels a flicker of pride before he realises you still haven’t moved in his arms, he manoeuvres you easily enough with his extra arms until you’re facing him. It takes every ounce of his self-control to not roar in anger at what they did to you. The scratch marks along your face had torn deep enough into your flesh that he could see a few of your teeth through the gap in your cheek.

Your eyes are red, not like his own but rather filled with blood. You’re covered in grime, dirt and other fluids that he’s certain only belong to cursed spirits. Just what happened to you here? He doesn’t hesitate in brushing a hand along your cheek, the whitish glow that follows his fingers heals the wounds there.

Sukuna watches as your eyes flutter to a close when that same healing hand strokes over your eyes, the damage there is more than he realised. You were partially blinded—and so, Sukuna holds his hand over your eyes for a moment longer. He can feel his own eyes sting, a prickling sensation that forms at the back of his head and burrows into the backs of his eyes.

His own vision blurs, a near-transparent film covering them and he wonders how you had managed to kill so many even when you were unable to see clearly. He blinks, and his eyes are restored. As are your own. He meets your gaze then, and he can see the hurt there.

But then your face shifts, and it’s almost as if you grew sickly green at the sudden feeling that overtook you. He doesn’t fight back when you push him away, and he can only watch as you wretch and heave. Vomit wasn’t something Sukuna was particularly bothered by, he wasn’t overly fond of it either. The smell, it reminded him of the men he slaughtered on the battlefield who would throw up their breakfasts out of fear.

His eyes dart to the floor at the sound of a… wet thud. And his eyebrows raise.

“Tasted awful.” Your voice is hoarse, and Sukuna snickers.

“Men do usually taste the worst. It’s why you go for the women.” Sukuna replies as if he were talking about a choice between two articles of clothing. You glance up at him and he sees a glimmer in your eye, a spark of the woman who he had held in his arms so many nights ago.

“Noted.” Sukuna watches as you turn to glance around the courtyard, perhaps seeing it for the first time after it had died down.

“Uraume is waiting for us.”

“I’m not finished here.” You reply and Sukuna can’t help but smirk at that.

“No? You wiped out a good portion of the Zen’in clan, and you’re drained from just that.” He doesn’t mean it to come off as rude, Sukuna had always been one to state the truth. Especially with you.

“That’s why you’ll help me.” You turn to face him and Sukuna for the first time takes a good look at you.

Something was different. Something had occurred and changed a part of you forever, you hold yourself with a sense of regality. You may be drenched in blood and viscera, and you don’t seem to even notice the fact there’s a strip of human flesh hanging over your shoulder. Or perhaps you do, the finger you had rejected from your stomach seems to tell him enough.

You were just like him.

You take his moment of quiet observation to continue, “The Shogun and Sugawara are both still here, and I want them dead.”

A Queen who has made her first decree. And that makes Sukuna’s smirk grow into a knowing grin. He grabs at you, a firm yet gentle touch that has you close enough that he can smell the lingering scent of death that clings to your kimono—one he did not gift you, and that nearly has his claws sinking into your arms. He’d get his answers to what happened to you, soon. But not now… first…

One of his spare hands slides along your body until it rests against your chest, large fingers splayed out flat against your heart. “Don’t stray from my side, and you’ll be capable of fighting as if you weren’t near-catatonic from fighting.” His fingers hook under your chin, tilting your head back until you stare him in the eye. “Understood?”

You nod, and his hand presses harder against your chest. It’s so reminiscent of when he had first bestowed that vow on you, it feels like a century ago. He wished you knew just what he went through to track you down. He didn’t sleep anymore, he burned down villages that simply got in his way and he can’t recall just how many people he killed; ‘innocent’ or otherwise.

His own cursed energy greets yours like an old friend, they blend and bond within the swell of your chest and replace what had been stripped away. There’s no physical or mental toll on Sukuna to heal you, to lend you his own strength to ensure you don’t die from exhaustion.

He feels that part of him within you, that darkness that has consumed a vital part of your body and soul. It welcomes him in, curls around the energy he forces through your body and pulls him in deeper. He feels the scars left on you, the mental ones, he can feel the anguish you went through and also the rage.

Again, Sukuna knows he’ll get his answers in due time. So he ignores it, pushes past it and lets his energy sink into the vast emptiness of your body. You had to use something big and taxing to cause this amount of drainage—

“You had to use your domain?” Sukuna questions with an eyebrow raised, he knew you were aware that creating a domain was essentially the final card someone had to draw to ensure they won a battle—and to only use it when you were on the brink of dying. That, of course, didn’t apply to someone like Sukuna. He had years of expertise and a greater understanding of cursed energy as a whole.

You’re silent for a beat, and you glance at him with a look in your eye that almost makes him pause. “I had no other choice.” You offer instead, but Sukuna can see that slight gleam in your eye. You’re not telling him the whole truth as to why. In the past, he may have pushed you for an answer but tonight was not the night.

A buzz thrills itself down Sukuna’s spine, snapping his mouth closed to stop the words that were about to spill from his lips. His body grows rigid in front of you, and he doesn’t move an inch at the sound of a rushing of footsteps that flood from the ruins of the surrounding buildings.

Before you can react, he wraps two strong arms around you to secure you to the front of his body before he launches himself up into the air. The ground beneath him cracks further from the force he had thrown himself up out of the way, the wind whistles past his ears and he knows you’re watching the ground disappear further and further away.

The ground down below explodes in a flash of red, the cursed energy that billows outwards from the impact is enough to throw both Sukuna and you in his arms a few feet further into the sky before the inevitable plummet comes. His back scrapes against bare tree branches, and yet he curls his two free arms around you further until you are completely shielded from the onslaught.

His feet find the ground easily enough, and Sukuna is forced to dig his heels into the ground to stop his body from tumbling over with you in tow. You haven’t moved from his arms, still curled so close he can feel the warmth of your breath brushing against the hairs on his arms still tightly wrapped around your body… and he’s never been more thankful for someone's breathing before.

You shift in his arms and he has no choice but to release you, a part deep inside of him snarls at the prospect of letting you go. But he doesn’t stop you from taking a few steps forward through the destruction of the trees and ground from his descent, all he can do is watch as you stare in the direction you’d come from.

“Sugawara will want to kill me first.” You don’t glance over your shoulder as you speak, “He tried once already and failed. He’ll do it himself this time.”

His eyes narrow just slightly, a calculating look landing on the back of your head. Sugawara was a formidable opponent, someone even Sukuna had failed to eradicate for good. His technique had proven difficult to battle against, and Sukuna didn’t have a true firm understanding of Sugawara’s technique either. It wasn’t written in any scrolls or any books anywhere, no one else in existence had ever had such a powerful technique like it.

And yet, it’s you who had apparently gotten to Sugawara enough to set his sights on you instead of Sukuna. That alone stirs the anger deep in his gut, not because he wants to be the one to fight Sugawara but because it’s you. You’re not weak by any means, Sukuna would never stop you from fighting your own battles but Sugawara was ruthless.

“He won’t be alone.” Sukuna settles on instead, his upper arms crossing over his chest whilst his lower set rests against his hips. “The Shogun is here too. Sugawara will fight to protect the Shogun.”

“I know. That’s why we’ll fight them together.”

You finally turn back to him, and almost immediately his heart thunders in his chest. Such an odd feeling, to feel his heart batter against his ribcage beneath the layers of muscle and skin. You were devastating. With blood painted onto your cheeks, on your lips and chin. It reminds him so vividly of the time he ordered you to eat your own husband's heart.

It filled him with heat then, and it does now. Even with that look in your eye that tells him you’ll decimate the Zen’in clan before he can, Sukuna thinks he might just let you.

“Look who found her worth. Being a Queen is becoming of you.” He grins his words, one hand coming up to the side of his neck to crack the tension there before he rolls his muscles loose.

His eyes linger on your lips when they crack in a small grin of your own, the blood on your face breaks along with it. Your eyes still hold a vacant glassiness to them, a dark void of something he cannot quite put a finger on. Your lips part but then you stop, turning your head at the same time he does.

There’s a crush of broken branches and mud beneath feet, a rushing of multiple Samurai all heading directly for both you and himself. He can practically taste the blood in the air, and his stomach growls in joy at the prospect of eating something fresh. His stance shifts, a foot sliding back through the destroyed earth. The muscles in his legs tense— “Keep up.”

You watch Sukuna’s lips flatten after the grin he tossed your way, his words were to be taken literally. His body vanishes before your very eyes, but not with the use of your cursed technique or even his own energy. Sukuna was fast. A predator, a man designed to be the fastest hunter in the dark to ensure no one ever escaped.

He throws himself forward, the people who pour out from the darkness of the trees find themselves unable to react with Sukuna suddenly appearing in their faces. It’s like a tidal wave of blood, a wash of red speckles that splatter against the trees and douse the leaves in crimson. He doesn’t stop either, simply running through people as if they were nothing.

Your chest burns at the distance he puts between yourself and him. He told you to stay close and you’d feel as though you hadn’t nearly exhausted yourself to the brink of death. A binding vow of sorts, not quite as pungent as the one binding your souls together. But more of just a loan of his energy until you return home.

Home. You’d be going home.

That has your energy shooting through your body, a burst—and you’re gone. You throw your body forward much quicker than you had ever before, the bodies you pass by remain frozen in time until they fall to the ground; slashed and broken. Your blade runs through them as if they were made of wet paper. Your eyes are locked onto Sukuna’s back, so far ahead of you that he’s growing distant with each step.

You’re so focused on Sukuna that you miss the sudden approach of a man from your flank. His blade slams into your side, and it’s with enough force that you tumble out of the streamlined trajectory you had thrown yourself into. The ground comes crashing into you, dirt and leaves sticking to the fresh blood that drips from your hands and coats your face.

The blade in your hand skitters across the floor, out of your range to quickly grab it. You twist your body around, ignoring the sharp pain that blooms across your ribcage. Grasping at the loose dirt beneath you, you raise yourself off of the ground just enough to turn your attention to whoever had hit you.

“Hello, little warrior.”

Kiso. He was still alive.

“Kiso.” You hiss his name, and Kiso frowns. The wrinkles on his face deepen with the years that had passed by since you were taught by him how to wield a weapon. He should be dead, he should’ve died protecting your father—and yet here he is, serving the new Shogun.

“It should have never come to this. Your father—”

“Is dead!” You yell, pushing yourself up from the floor but not without grabbing your katana. “And you should be dead with him.”

“I tried to stop him. I told him it was wrong to kill his own daughter, his only child.” Kiso pleads, yet you don’t miss the shift of his hand to rest against the hilt of his own sword. “I saw you as my own, and when he said he was going to go through with it. I left. I abandoned my honour, my name, and he died. Because I wasn’t there to protect him.”

You don’t want to tell him that he would’ve died regardless. Sukuna was merciless as much as he was strong. Neither of them would’ve survived.

“And I see you too have abandoned your honour.” He continues, eyes drifting away from your hand on the blade and across the blood that drips from your face. “I thought I trained you to fight something like this.”

“‘Something like this?’” You grit your teeth when you repeat his words back, and then it dawns on you. He was the right-hand of the Shogun, your father, and you don’t doubt your father would’ve told Kiso what the Emperor had said. “You knew from the very start, didn’t you?”

“Yes.” Kiso drops his eyes for a second. “I trained you in hopes that you’d be strong enough to make the right choice when the time came and to stop that demon—”

“Choose your next words carefully.” Your fingers tighten around the hilt of your blade, and your chest tightens further at the distance between yourself and Sukuna. Your energy was waning with each passing second.

“—That demon bastard before he ruined you.” Kiso meets your eyes, a silent understanding that he has come to accept the fact he would fight you. Be it to the death, or worse. “Yet I sense that your cursed energy is not your own. I failed you.”

“You’re wrong.” You shift your stance, one foot just behind the other with your elbows drawn inwards. Your sword pointed directly at Kiso. “Both you and my father claimed I’m cursed, I am anything but.”

Kiso’s eyebrows draw together in confusion. “...Your father? When did you speak with him? I thought you weren’t in contact with him before he died.”

He didn’t know. He didn’t know your father was cursed and locked in the very estate he was presumably staying in to serve your uncle. Your throat tightens at the realisation, Kiso wasn’t the enemy here. He had no idea and he still came out to find you, perhaps in hopes to deter you from the obvious path you had carved for yourself.

That child he trained so many years ago within you screams when you bolster your cursed energy. No, Kiso wasn’t the enemy here. You were.

His hands are aged and wrinkled as they wrap around the hilt of his blade, drawing it from its sheath and holding it before him in a similar stance to your own. It’s you who moves first, slow and steady steps through the upturned dirt slowly turning into mud beneath your feet. You make sure to dig your toes in, to ensure you had a solid foothold before—

Kiso strikes when you’re in range. His sword clangs off of your own, enough to force your sword to the side and it’s as if age is nothing to him. He moves just as he did in his younger years training you, with violent grace. A sequence of precise strikes has you defending against his blade, enough to have you taking steps backwards to give yourself a moment to breathe—and to work out the best way to take him down.

He circles you, as you do him. His sword still pointed in your direction, and eyes that were dull with guilt are now sharpened with years of an experienced samurai. He moves first again, the same manoeuvre to force your blade and body to the side. Kiso swings his blade down this time, in hopes of burying it in the meat of your shoulder.

You’re forced to side-step out of the way and consequently out of your stance, and Kiso monopolises on it. His sword rears back and comes back down in a fluid motion to collide with your neck, you’re forced to put yourself in an uncomfortable stance. Your katana collides with his own, and he forces all of his weight down onto it in hopes of overpowering you.

Instead, it only brings you face-to-face with him. Your joined swords are a thin barrier between you and the man who pants from just a few movements. He had grown weak in his old age, slower. He knew he had only a handful of movements left before he inevitably died—you just had to beat him to it.

“I thought I would never cross swords with you again.” He huffs out, sweat beading in his hairline from the effort of holding his sword to yours. Then he pushes against you, forcing you to take a few steps backwards and your sword to lower with the tip pointed to the ground. “How I missed it.”

“I didn’t.” It sounds like a lie on your tongue but instead, it’s the bitter truth. You didn’t miss training with Kiso, you didn’t miss living with your father and you didn’t miss the person you were before you were taken by Sukuna. That woman—that girl, she was nothing compared to who you are now.

Kiso flares his nostrils, a look of disappointment flitting over his face that only a father could muster. And he rushes towards you, clumsy in his foot placement. You dig your foot into the ground and kick it out towards him, mud flies upwards and into his face.

Immediately he reels backwards, eyes forced to close and he misses when you shift the blade into one hand and drop your body low to avoid the blind swing of his sword. You slice the blade across his shins, and he falls into the dirt below. Kiso swings his blade at you once again on the floor, an undignified yell following it but you bat his sword away—it falls to the ground a few feet away from him.

You stand over him, staring down at the man who had once claimed himself as your father figure and teacher. Your chest heaves, and the burning at your rib cage pinches with each breath. Sukuna must be too far to share his cursed energy with you, the binding vow digs in deep enough to stop you from healing.

“You failed me long before now. You failed me when you let my father sell me to that wretched man.” You raise your sword just slightly, and that alone has your arm shaking with the effort. You had to move, and quickly. “I hope when you see my father in the afterlife, he will tell you of how I killed him too.”

It’s become second nature now, to raise your sword and bring it down with enough force to remove a head from someone's shoulders. Kiso’s head lands with a wet thump into the mud, rolling to rest aside his sword. His body drops too, blood bleeding out into the ground. A stain on the world to mark his failure.

You don’t wait to let the realisation of who you killed sink in, instead you twist on your feet and run in the direction of screaming and laughing. Sukuna’s laughter. With each step, you feel your body grow less lethargic. The wound at your side heals the second you’re close enough to grasp at the cursed energy loaned to you and to tug on it, to wrap it around yourself and disappear from the spot you occupy.

Bursting through the treeline, you find Sukuna in a clearing with what must be over fifty men and countless dead bodies strewn around. He’s doused in red, dripping from the tips of his brushed back hair and the tips of his fingers. A glance at the closest body shows you he hadn’t been using his cursed technique on these men, but rather he was fighting with his body instead.

As if sensing your return, Sukuna snaps his gaze from the men in front of him to lock eyes with you. His lower set of eyes dart across your hand still wrapped around your blade that drips in fresh blood, and at your side where the gash once was. There’s a flash of concern that quickly washes away when he realises the once-wound was nonexistent.

And then he grins. The look in his eye is borderline hysterical, a type of bloodlust that only he could muster and control without losing himself. A heat washes over you from head to toe, the pitter-patter of your heart is more like the rhythmic beating of a war drum with the way he looks at you; like he’s truly hungry and you’re the only thing capable of satiating his endless hunger.

A sharp booming yell and a woosh of metal has your heart seizing in your chest, but Sukuna doesn’t seem to glance in the direction of the man running at him with his sword raised. Instead, he raises to his full height with an easy roll of his shoulders. The man gains ground quickly enough that you wonder if he had used his own cursed energy to propel himself closer, but it means nothing in the end.

Sukuna raises a hand from his side, the entirety of his palm covering the man's face—fingers long enough to nearly encompass his whole head. And then… he squeezes. It’s a crunch and then a loud pop, a sound you’re familiar with now but it was as if Sukuna had put no effort into crushing an entire man's head with just one hand. All whilst staring directly at you with a grin that grows more and more salacious as the seconds pass by.

He tosses aside the man’s body, a dull thump on the ever-growing pile of bodies. Then he’s striding towards you, uncaring for the discarded limbs and piles of viscera he steps through to get to you. Your blood roars in anticipation of his approach, your hand growing sweaty around the hilt of your blade when he levels you with a look that promises your downfall.

With only a few feet between you, he suddenly halts. Something flies between the two of you, it’s small enough that you can’t quite see what it is exactly but the scent hits you full force. Rot and decay, a curse. Not one from the pit, you realise quite quickly. Those spirits had the scent of desperation and dampness that only came from being locked in a dark hole. These ones were fresh, and wrapped around them was the lingering subtle scent of someone’s cursed energy.

You turn your attention to the clearing, as does Sukuna. A man is standing there, his eyes locked onto you—not Sukuna. Curious. You watch him brandish a hand in front of him, and there in his palm is another small-sized curse that curls into the shape needed for him to launch them at you. Oh, you had no idea people could control cursed spirits with their own cursed energy.

Sukuna flexes his fingers at his side, lip turning up into a snarl that displays the canines he’s used to rip and tear people apart.

“Wait.” You raise your hand in Sukuna’s direction, and it must be a surprise to the man wielding curses because his eyebrows raise when Sukuna complies. “I know this one.”

The unnamed man looks horrified at your words, his nostrils flared in an obvious sign to try and regulate his breathing when you take a single step towards him. The curse in his hand writhes, waiting to be used and yet he seems to be frozen in place when you lock your eyes with his.

“They thought I was unconscious for most of the time they beat me, tortured me by ripping strips of my flesh… but I was always awake, listening.” You don’t miss the thunderous growl from Sukuna at your words. “This one visited often. Not to visit me, of course. No—he came to visit Sugawara.”

It’s the truth. This man, whilst you didn’t know his name, had shown his face many times. He was someone who always brought Sugawara his meals, even sat with him whilst they whispered in hush tones. You could never hear what they spoke of, but the general closeness of them was enough for you to latch onto the fact that this was someone dear to Sugawara.

A friend, perhaps, a childhood friend. Someone he had trained with to become a samurai, or there was always the idea that he was a lover. It mattered not though who this man was to Sugawara, instead you sank your teeth into the fact he was important to someone strong.

“Isn’t that right? Sugawara was always happier after you spoke to him. He even stopped my torture early because of the good mood you put him in.”

“No.” The man has the audacity to lie, his voice warbles just slightly and you grin like the wolf who caught the lamb.

“Liar.” Sukuna chuckles to himself at your words, a lazy tilt of his head as he watches you instead of the man who steadies his foothold in the muddy mixture of blood and guts.

The curse that had been dormant in his hand is thrown with a speed that would catch anyone off-guard—anyone who wasn’t you. As it pushes closer, the flood of cursed energy that rolls off of you slows the cursed spirit to a standstill in front of you. It’s a small bluish-green thing, with wings and small hands. A singular eye. It was hideous and you wonder just what its purpose was meant to be.

You pluck it from the air, and time crashes back into play. The man before you glares at the cursed spirit between your two fingers, watching as you appraise it like a bug you caught.

“Ugly. It’s like a fly but with a tiny human body.” You meet the eyes of the man across the clearing, and his face crumples when you burst the fly-headed cursed spirit between your fingers. Was he too weak to throw something stronger at you? A pity. A cursed technique like that could be powerful enough to tip the scales.

The man's breath stutters in his chest when you reappear directly in front of him, your hand still holding the bloodied blade tightening for a second. He’s unable to even grab at his own blade, you slice the sharpened edge of your blade along his right leg from calf to thigh. He stumbles down to one knee in front of you, a caught scream in his throat when you drag the blade upwards.

It bites into his chest, scoring his skin with a blossoming red line that bleeds into the navy of his kimono. In a fluid move, you bring the katana up and over your head. A move that is largely frowned upon by well-trained samurai, their only job is to sever a man's head from his shoulders. The man on his knee before you widens his eyes in horror, no doubt stricken with fear at the grin only Death herself could wear when gifted such a bountiful kill.

His skull cracks beneath the pressure of your blade, a burst of your energy down the length of the blade empowers the blade to bury itself down until you meet the top of his spine at the base of his neck. His eyes are wide with horror, blood spraying up and into your face. You spy his brain, sliced cleanly in half and it should make your stomach lurch uncomfortably. A man’s entire life, sliced in half by the use of your blade—but no disgust sets in.

“Seiwa!” A voice you’ve come to know so well in the days of your capture yells from somewhere to your right.

“You’re late again, Sugawara.” Sukuna snickers, you’re unsure of what he means by ‘again’ – most likely a battle in the past that had occurred between the two. “You failed at saving someone you care for—again.”

You plant your foot flat against the man’s—Seiwa’s chest, pulling on your blade at the same time with a slick sound. His body falls to the ground, lifeless, two halves of his head holding on by a thread. You turn to find Sugawara staring at you, his chest rising and falling with a pungent type of rage that taints the air with his energy.

“No longer hiding beneath the skirts of your Shogun?” Your words ignite a fury within Sugawara almost immediately, his fingers minutely tightening around the hilt of his sheathed blade. He was ready to attack at a moment's notice.

“I should’ve cut off your head the moment I saw you.” Sugawara spits the words, and in return earns a scathing glare from Sukuna who turns to face Sugawara.

“Yes, you should have.”

Sugawara’s upper lip twitches, as if he were to snarl at you. Instead, his hand slips free from his blade, and you only have a split second to recognise the stance he takes. A hand outstretched, feet planted into the ground and the buzz of the air becomes thicker almost instantaneously.

The dark clearing of the forest is bathed in a bright red light, you recognise this technique. It was the one that would’ve killed you when you resided in the first temple Sukuna had brought you to, it destroyed the bedroom you were in before you could register what was happening. And this time, Sugawara wasn’t going to miss.

It zips through the air directly at you, blinding you to Sukuna who sprints directly towards Sugawara the moment he releases his technique. You stare with wide eyes at the red ball hurtling towards you, and all you can think to do is force out every bit of your cursed energy. The ball slows before you, the energy buzzing and snapping just inches from your face.

You move your feet to the side, ready to bend your body out of the way—when suddenly, the red ball of energy vanishes from in front of you.

Time snaps back in place, and you can see Sukuna throwing his fists repeatedly at the invisible barrier that surrounds Sugawara. You can hear the buzz of the energy starting to give to the pressure from Sukuna’s own energy yet Sugawara continues to stare directly at you – his smile is like that of the cat who ate the canary.

Sukuna snaps his head in your direction suddenly, all four eyes honing in on you in a wide-eyed fashion that paints him in a rare shade of worry. Something hot and wet trickles down along your leg, soaking into the muddy and torn material of the kimono you had managed to keep intact enough to cover your modesty.

A glance down confirms that the material is turning into a deeper shade of crimson, the gathering of blood so dark it almost looks completely black. Your muscles twitch—or you think they do, your unarmed hand moves to grasp at the twitching pain in your side. Only to find your hand pressing into destroyed organs, your bones protruding from a perfect circle that had ripped through your body.

You think you hear the sound of Sukuna’s shuddering breath at the state of your body, but it’s impossible to hear anything over the roaring of your blood against your brain. Your fingers press into your partially destroyed intestines, feeling your way up until you can feel the muscles pulsing around the rhythmic beat of your heart.

How strange, to feel the beat of your own heart. It’s wetter than you thought, a thick goo that slips against your fingers when you continue to drag your hand up along your body until you find the mangled edge of where your shoulder once was.

There’s a loud snap and crackle, energy against energy. You look away from the gory mess of your own body to glance forward. Sukuna has his back to you, all muscles tensed and rippling with the effort of his punches. The invisible shield around Sugawara continues to hiss and snap against the effort of trying to bat off his attacks. You can see Sugawara throwing his own punches back, each of them batted off or dodged by Sukuna.

He moves faster than you had ever seen before, was this his natural speed or was he tapping into the portion of his soul that had forged with your own? It’s breathtaking to watch, both of them on a level far beyond your own. Yet Sukuna holds the upper hand, his moves are coated in a deep and shimmering shade of rage. Sugawara injured what was his.

Sukuna shifts slightly, a hand coming to lay flat against the surface of that shield to then explode with an immense concentration of cursed energy.

It’s enough to throw Sugawara backwards into the tree line, his body nothing but a blade that cuts through trees. Except, it takes no time for his body to reappear, instantly landing with both feet firmly on the ground in front of Sukuna with his sword raised. Your blood sings at the realisation as to what blade that is; the one that nullified your cursed energy.

You move before you can think anything of it. A warmth washes itself down from the top of your spine and through your body, curling at the edges of your frayed and destroyed organs. Flesh reforms itself in the blink of an eye and you can see the surprised look on Sugawara’s face when he spares a glance towards the sudden movement to the side of Sukuna.

The blade you had been using was obliterated in the first attack, so you improvise.

You ball your newly remade hand into a tight fist, there’s a surge of energy that blossoms at the surface of your fist before it envelops it entirely. The black and red energy is sharper than usual, like it was made to ensure it hits. Sugawara has no time to react to your speed or the reinforced punch you throw his way. It shatters the shield around him, the energy required to keep it functioning splinters off in all directions.

Your fist collides with his chest, a hard enough punch that the ground shudders beneath you and the mountains in the distance rumble. Sugawara crumbles beneath the pressure, his knees finding a home in the bloodied mud beneath him. His sword dropped next to him, the glowing inscription fading until it was nothing but a simple katana — whoever had gifted him that sword made sure only he could use it.

“H-How?” Sugawara spits the words, blood dripping from his lips and rolling free from his nose.

“You missed.” Sukuna comments from just over your shoulder, and you can feel the warmth of his energy curling itself delicately around you from the briefest of touches. A gentle hand to heal what you may have overlooked in your haste to ensure Sukuna survived. “You should’ve tried harder. It’s a shame. That, in the end, you’re nothing but a flopping fish. Waiting for mercy.”

Sugawara’s breath comes in short wheezes, each one wetter than the last. You take your place before him, staring down at him like he were nothing but a peasant bowing at your altar. His eyes are a brilliant shade of blue even in the moonlight, they swim with a presence only that a God could possess. These eyes were something else, a gift bestowed upon a man who bowed to that of a mortal human. How disappointing. Perhaps in another life, Sugawara would’ve been a great ally.

His skin is cool beneath your touch, no scars mark his skin and no blemishes. A man untouched by the harshness of the world, and yet you hold his face so delicately.

“You had a chance to stop this from happening. You could’ve helped me escape and I would’ve left you alone—” Sukuna grunts at your words, clearly displeased. “Yet you chose to be the lapdog of a man who would’ve killed you simply because he could. Sugawara Michizane, you truly were a disappointment.”

“Then kill me already. Be done with it.”

“No.” You stroke your thumbs over both of his eyebrows. “You did show me small mercies in the face of men who wanted nothing more to rape me. You kept me clothed, you protected my cell at night from men of my own blood.”

Sugawara stares up at you through his lashes, watching when you tilt your head to assess the situation once more. He looks nervous, no doubt because Sukuna is starting to growl deep in his chest at the words that continue to pour from your mouth.

“If only that were enough for me to forgive you entirely.” You smile when Sugawara jolts in your grip, your fingers curling into the side of his head and your thumbs come to rest over his eyes. “These eyes—a weapon that you could not yield. Such a waste.”

You press your thumbs inwards, and Sugawara immediately screams at the pressure. You can feel the cursed energy within his eyes, bulging beneath the crushing of your thumbs into his eyes. “These eyes will be the curse of your family. Until the end of time itself, those who are blessed with these eyes—they will die. Be it by my hand or another.”

Sugawara continues to writhe beneath your hands, your fingers squish further into his eyes until you hear—pop. They burst beneath your fingers, the flood of blood that comes after is enough to form a veil over Sugawara’s face.

“Don’t forget my words. It’s no longer a threat, nor a promise. It’s a vow.” You draw your hands back, fingers painted in the blood of a man fallen. Sugawara covers his eyes, scratching at his skin uselessly as if that would be enough to heal what had been done. But it doesn’t—his eyes, unable to reform and lost until the next generation.

“Now leave.” Sukuna growls, and one of his hands skirts along your back. “Before I change my mind on allowing the mercy that has been given.”

Sugawara scarpers to his feet, uncaring for the blade he left behind before he turns towards the direction he assumes is the correct way. He trips and falls, a tedious effort to watch until he fades into the shadows. A man gone and lost, in exile until the day he dies.

“He may return one day.” Sukuna turns his attention to you, and you glance up at him. “There’s no guarantee that he won’t still kill you.”

“He won’t.” You glance away when Sukuna frowns, instead bending down to pluck the forgotten blade from the ground. The engraved words remain dull. “He knows my word to be true.”

Sukuna pulls the blade free from your hand, and you watch him inspect it a little closer. “A cursed tool I’ve never seen before. Its energy is almost non-existent.”

“It’s the same one he used to nullify my senses, to cut me off from the part of me that’s connected to you. That's why I nearly died.” You brush a finger along the sharp edge, it cuts and yet it does nothing. “It would’ve killed you. Whoever gave him this is something entirely different from Sugawara.”

Sukuna doesn’t dispute your claim about his near-death encounter, his eyes are calculating. Dancing back and forth along the inscriptions as if he could see the very hand that engraved such a potent amount of cursed energy within a blade.

“It belonged to the Emperor.” He flips the katana over in his hand before he points the hilt in your direction, letting you take it from him. “Only he possesses cursed energy like that. It’s enough to wipe someone from existence.”

“Someone that powerful exists?” You ask, glancing up in time to see Sukuna furrow his eyebrows softly.

“You forget yourself, little one.” A finger tucks itself beneath your chin, forcing you to meet his gaze as he lowers into your space. “You’re just as powerful now. Don’t forget that, ever.”

His words warm you from the inside out, to be praised by the man who sat atop a throne made of those lesser than he. You hadn’t realised it at the time, but you yearned for that. That feeling of acceptance, of being the source of someone’s pride—it was something indescribable.

A snap of a twig in the distance has your head turning that way, peering into the darkness… yet nothing is revealed.

“The Shogun is still out there.” You comment, leaning into the warmth of the hand that cups your cheek.

“He’s been hiding in the shadows for some time,” Sukuna confirms, straightening himself up to his full height and dropping his hand from your face. You try not to mourn the loss. “A coward even moments before his death. How he came into a seat of power—”

“You did kill my father, or tried to.” You point out. It’s true—Sukuna is the reason your uncle has the title now.

“Tried?” Sukuna exclaims, eyebrows drawing together when you meet his gaze. “What did they do?”

“Cursed him. I killed him myself, for good this time.” Sukuna’s eyebrows relax the moment he registers your words, nodding his head just slightly as if the puzzle in his mind has finally come to fruition.

“I did find it strange that they didn’t spring to action when I dislodged the heart from your father's chest. They must’ve planned for it.” Sukuna glances away from you, staring into the treeline over your head. “We’ll discuss this later. The Shogun is approaching.”

“He bears the same technique as my father.” You step away from Sukuna, turning to face the direction footsteps grow louder from. You hold the katana in your hand tightly; it still does not buzz to life with that cursed energy belonging to the Emperor.

“A shame. I heard the Zen’ins harnessed the shadows, and yet I’ve never witnessed the greatness of it.” Sukuna cracks his neck with a quick roll, shifting his arms slightly to ease up the muscles. It didn’t look like he was nervous or afraid this fight would be tough—in fact, he looked like he was preparing for a grand feast.

Shadows—you’ve read the same. In fact, in your youth, you remember a young boy with hair of black. He owned two dogs, black and white and they were always by his side. At the time you had no idea they were born of shadow, but admittedly you did find it odd when they’d appear out of nowhere. They were only small and no larger than pups — if only you knew the power that boy possessed.

The clearing around you grows silent, a tension that forms just moments before the inevitable break. You can feel eyes watching you, grazing across your exposed flesh for any weaknesses… but they don’t strike. Sukuna seems to notice it too, as he runs a blood-soaked hand through his hair with a broadening grin on his face.

“They’re hesitating. I can smell their fear, what did you do to them?”

“Nothing they didn’t deserve.”

Sukuna laughs, dropping the hand from his hair to hold it just before him. Two fingers raised, and his thumb tucked close. “That Samurai spirit in you still lives I see. You give them too much mercy, they deserve to die like the dogs they are.”

Two things happen almost instantaneously; birth and death. The birth of a cursed technique that only Sukuna could muster, and the death of those surrounding you.

You can feel the sudden burst in Sukuna’s cursed energy, as if he had put a dampener on it for the sake of being close to you. It floods the area, and it’s potent enough that you can feel your knees threatening to buckle—to bow to the man and give him the respect he so clearly deserves.

The treeline before him becomes nothing but splintered bark and torn leaves, the blood that sprays from the bodies eviscerated by the long-range dismantle is like rain. It warms your skin, slinks its way into your pores and burrows itself as if the blood had found its new home. Sukuna only smiled further, all his teeth on show — he was enjoying himself.

There’s a clear path directly before you both. A deep slash through trees and the ground alike, a direct cut towards your target. The Shogun stands at the other end of it, just a dot of a figure in the distance with firelight outlining his body. You recognise his armour, a grand Kabuto helmet and layers upon layers of beautifully woven iron and tatami—it wasn’t his.

It belonged to your father, and his father before him. It was a family heirloom in the hands of a man who had overseen the torture of his niece and cursed his own brother.

“He dies tonight.”

“Then we’ll feast on his flesh and pick our teeth with his bones.” Sukuna lowers his stance just slightly, all four arms splaying out—and then he disappears in an instant.

A familiar pulse tightens behind your eyes, and you watch in fascination as Sukuna moves, unlike anything you’ve seen before. He’s fast, faster than anything you’ve ever seen. He moves as if the world was designed for him to conquer, like a predator who knows he’s at the top of the food chain.

It’s enough to cause you to spring into action. You follow his trajectory, chasing him through the mud and viscera, it squelches beneath your bare feet and sticks to your already filthy skin — but it’s not enough to stop you from pushing yourself forward with every drop of cursed energy you can use.

Naturally, it’s Sukuna who reaches the opening filled with the most elite members of the Shogunate, minus Sugawara. There’s an obvious space next to the Shogun where he should stand, and immediately Sukuna notices it. He strikes his way through the men in front of him, tearing them asunder with just his bare hands and teeth. He grins in delight when said men scream in agony when his claws sink into armour that was designed to prevent their deaths.

But nothing in this world could stop the natural disaster that is Sukuna Ryomen.

You follow after him, the katana in your hand comes second to the slicing with your own hand. You enjoy the warmth of fresh blood seeping into your skin, how it curls around your fingers and dries beneath your nails. Their screams are muted against the whooshing and roaring of your own blood, how that darkness within you sings in delight at each life you take with the bareness of your own hand.

It even purrs when you use a sword that isn’t your own. It may not come back to life with the cursed energy imbued by the Emperor himself but it doesn’t need to. Your own energy wraps around it like an old friend, it slices through more than just the fabric of their clothing and the fat of their flesh. It’s as if it cuts at the very surface of the world itself; nothing can stop you.

You lose sight of both Sukuna and the Shogun amid the dance with your blade. The blood sullies your vision, it drowns out the fact you’re outnumbered ten to one — the numbers mean nothing to you when each pulse of energy that rushes through you is like that of a caress from Sukuna himself. He purrs at the back of your mind, grinning in delight at the small Angel of Death he had curated with his very own hand.

It isn’t until you realise you’ve massacred your way through a lengthy portion of the awaiting army that you’ve also made your way closer to Sukuna. He’s made his way through a much larger portion of the wall between himself and the Shogun, bodies are torn and ripped apart around him. One hand is wrapped tightly around what must be someone’s leg, a large chunk of it missing as his stomach chews thoroughly.

He notices you approaching, his lone eyebrow raising in amusement at the state of your being. You can feel blood in places it shouldn’t be, your hair is matted and flat to your head as if you’d dunked yourself in it. It soaks and settles in that dark deep place of yourself; the blood of your family and the innocents who served their Shogun blindly continues to taint your dwindling soul.

“He isn’t attacking.” You comment, noticing the Shogun still hidden behind three men who must be deemed his strongest. His sword is drawn yet he doesn’t make a move. Truly a coward until the very end. “It’s not unexpected, however. He could only hurt me when I was bound and useless.”

“I see.” Sukuna growls, a deep rumble deep in his chest and his eyes are narrowed towards the Shogun. He still doesn’t know the true extent of what you had gone through and yet he bares his teeth as if he had been the one nearly drowned on a flat table, as if he was the one stripped bare whilst they whipped at your skin with blunt wooden objects and flayed you for the world to see.

One man steps forward out of the formation they’ve created around the Shogun—and he vanishes into nothing but a pile of mush; a single flick of Sukuna’s hand had secured his death. The Shogun visibly flinches, and that’s when it dawns on you… he has never faced Sukuna.

It was your father, and the men before him. Your Uncle would’ve been hidden away in the estate, kept safe and secure beneath the cloth of his mother's dress. He was outmatched, and he knew it.

“Face your death like the Samurai you are.” Sukuna snaps, his fingers curling around the leg in his hand until it breaks with a loud crunch. “Or I will pluck you from the ground you stand upon and make you beg for death.”

You both watch in silence as the two remaining guards exchange a glance with each other, a clear look of anxiousness for what their Shogun might say or do. General Jien, the Shogun, only deepens his scowl as if Sukuna had thrown mud at him instead of offering him a chance of an honourable death.

…He does not step forward to face his death.

Sukuna all but smiles, and he vanishes in the blink of an eye. Two of his hands press against the remaining guards, and they too have only a nanosecond to realise their death has come to them. Slices appear on their skin—and then the bodies fall to the ground. Their swords sink into the mud and flesh, their armour now empty husks.

The Shogun reels back at just how quickly Sukuna moves, and he attempts to swing his blade. You can taste the sourness of his cursed energy behind the swing, it buzzes and lashes out in an attempt to fight but ultimately loses out in the battle of dominance against Sukuna’s own. Sukuna moves his hand to grab ahold of the blade, his black claws scrape loudly against the material until he has a firm grip.

Then… he simply shatters it into a million different little pieces.

“Pathetic.” Two of his hands grab ahold of the Shogun’s arms, holding them up and out of the way. Before a third arm shoots forward, his fingers all together to form a tight fist—and then it bursts through the stomach of your uncle. He screams, the wetness of his voice is something you’ve wanted to hear for a long time.

Sukuna pulls his speared arm back through the stomach of your uncle, and you can hear the rip and squelch of something before he pulls free the length of his intestines. They fall flat to the ground in a growing pile, and with each passing second your uncle grows paler and paler. His hand, now free of the intestines, shoots forward again.

His claws sink into the armour covering the Shogun’s chest, ripping apart the iron as if it were nothing to him. Perhaps it is nothing to a man-made monster like Sukuna. Your Uncle's scream is silent this time, his mouth agape and eyes threatening to close for good when Sukuna grabs ahold of his ribcage… and pulls it free from his body.

The half he snapped clean off falls to the side, dripped in flesh and thinly stretched sinew. It makes your heart pulse in your chest. His hand dips back into the opening now to the side of his body, and you watch as Sukuna takes his time to pick and choose which organs to pull free from his body… as if he knew what would prolong his death before he inevitably died from blood loss.

“Wait.”

Sukuna stops once he throws what must be the kidney to the stomach that’s waiting for more food to feast on. He glances over his shoulder at you and he looks wild. Beyond it, even. His pupils are pinpricks, the skin and second face he wears is coated in glittering crimson red and he almost looks like he may attack you out of instinct.

“I want to make him suffer too.” You say, taking a step forward to Sukuna who’s muscles bulge with tension and veins that pop along said muscles. He’s holding himself back. “Please. Allow me.”

His upper lip twitches before he relents, he releases both of the arms he was holding to hold the Shogun high enough to rip him apart tooth and nail. Immediately, Jien crumbles to his knees on the floor, sinking into his own intestines and other bodily matters. He looks like he’s dancing the fine line between life and death, but you haven’t granted him that privilege yet.

Your fingers wrap around the grand horns of the Kabuto helmet, lifting it free from your uncle’s head and wordlessly Sukuna takes it from your hands. You finally see your uncle bare in the moonlight, his face is gaunt and his eyes unfocus the longer he stares up at you.

“Do you remember what you said to me?” You ask, but no answer comes. Your uncle's tongue lays dormant on the floor next to your foot. Sukuna had torn that out with just two fingers when your uncle started to squeal like a pig.

“You called me a filthy pig and a whore. You let your men fantasize about raping me. You sold me to Sugawara like a broodmare.” You don’t focus on the growing sound of thunderous snarling behind you. “Death is too good for you, General.”

You swing the blade still in your hand, the head of the Shogun thumps to the ground and his body remains kneeled before you. His death should squash that pain within you, it should quell that rage and still… you feel nothing but anger, a raging type of storm that bubbles deep in your gut and tightens your throat.

Sukuna says nothing when you bury the tip of the blade into the ground next to your uncle's now still body, nor does he comment when you pick up his dismembered head. Only to plant it atop the hilt of the blade, his mouth agape and eyes wide with the fading image of his executioner.

“It’s done.” Sukuna softly speaks into the night, the screams of the dead die out when his hand lays against your back. “Home awaits us. A hot spring too.”

Your eyes flutter when you turn to look up at Sukuna, and he peers down at you with what might just be a flash of empathy. But then it’s gone when you blink again, the dots that fill your vision blot out his face. His hands grasp at you, two large arms holding you up against his chest when your legs can no longer hold your weight fully.

“Home.” You whisper, weakly brushing your bloodied and bruised fingers against Sukuna’s face. He visibly leans into the touch. “Take me home.”

“As you wish.” And for the first time since he had found you, he presses his lips against your forehead. It’s a lingering touch that has your mind blanking and eyes closing fully, a warmth that races down from the top of your head all the way to your toes… a welcome sleep after all that you have endured.

‣‣ Main Masterlist | Previous Chapter | Next Chapter

#dead dove do not eat #cw gore #cw dark content #cw violence #tw cannibalism #sukuna x reader #sukuna x you #jjk x reader

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wisteriaw0rld · 10 months

Note

hello! May I request a gn!reader with kamaboko squad + Muichirou with reader wearing a mask which covers their whole face and when they did a face reveal they had no glint of life or soul in their eyes, even when their expression seemed to be happy, I'd like to see their reacting first seeing their eyes :)

Feel free to ignore!

-ˋˏ ༻soulless༺ ˎˊ- kny x reader

||synopsis: even if you have a carefree attitude and an enthusiastic expression to accompany your sweet personality, it doesn’t always mean you’re really happy. With a mask you’re able to hide yourself from exposing you’re true feelings.♡

||additional tags: fluff, headcanon + short oneshot, gn! reader

||character order: kamado tanjiro, agatsuma zenitsu, hashibira inosuke, shinazugawa genya, tokito muichiro

“it all comes down to the sound of our love song.” -Lana Del Rey✰

˚ʚkamado tanjiroɞ˚

♡Tanjiro was always curious as to why you never took off your mask. He simply assumed it was important to you and left it that.

♡he never wanted to pester you into taking your mask off. So being the kind person he is, he didn’t.

♡in fact, he often defended you when others asked you to take off your mask, or tried to take it off themselves.

˚ ༘♡ ⋆｡˚ ❀ ˚ ༘♡ ⋆｡˚ ❀ ˚ ༘♡ ⋆｡˚ ❀ ˚ ༘♡ ⋆｡˚ ❀ ˚ ༘♡ ⋆｡˚ ❀ ˚

Tanjiro sat next to you on the wooden engawa of the butterfly mansion. Since the two of you had gotten injured on a mission together, you were once again forced to undergo shinobu’s painful training.

The garden of the butterfly mansion was nice and peaceful. It was quiet for once considering

Zenitsu and Inosuke had been inside the estate. The only thing being heard was Tanjiro’s soft and continuous chattering.

You listened intently to him until your eyes and mind drifted off to the plate holding onigiri.

You were starving, since you had skipped breakfast. And you had been with Tanjiro long enough to be comfortable with taking your mask off. Your hands reached up to your face, carefully taking your mask off and setting it to the side.

Tanjiro moved his head in your direction, only taking the smallest glimpse of you before turning pink and looking away, thinking you didn’t want him looking at you.

It didn’t take long until you noticed Tanjiro awkwardly looking the other way, as if waiting for you to put your mask back on.

“Tanjiro, you could look, it’s okay.” You laughed gently, grabbing the boys attention. The boy, without a second thought, looked over at you.

His heart fluttered the moment you looked at you. The small pieces of rice around your mouth and your wide smile made his cheeks turn pink. He watched as your eyes opened from the closed eyes smile.

He immediately noticed your soulless eyes. Despite the happy expression you gave mere seconds ago, your eyes held no happiness.

Tanjiro stayed quiet, making you tilt your head in confusion. “Y/n? Are you … okay?” He ask worriedly while reaching a hand out and cupping your cheek gently.

˚ʚagatsuma zenitsuɞ˚

♡he’s always so tempted to take off your mask. But he knows to respect your boundaries. Even if he’s always clingy.

♡the moment you take off your mask, it takes him a moment or two to realize your empty eyes. But when he does, he unintentionally thinks it’s scary.

♡zenitsu does everything he can do to restore life back into your eyes. He compliments you, gives you gifts, gives you words of affirmation, anything that comes to his mind.

˚ ༘♡ ⋆｡˚ ❀ ˚ ༘♡ ⋆｡˚ ❀ ˚ ༘♡ ⋆｡˚ ❀ ˚ ༘♡ ⋆｡˚ ❀ ˚ ༘♡ ⋆｡˚ ❀ ˚

Zenitsu always brought things back for you when he went on missions. You were used to it but nonetheless you still got flustered every time he did so.

This time, he managed to come back from the mission with a bouquet of your favorite flowers. A wide smile was on the boys face along with a pink blush. “They smell really nice and I know you love them!” Zenitsu cheered before handing you the flowers.

Subconsciously, your hands moved to your mask, lifting it off your face. Zenitsu’s eyes widened as he examined your face. He took note of your flushed face and the smile on your plump lips.

You brought the flowers given to you close to your nose as you sniffed the sweet aroma. Your smile widened slightly as your eyes drifted to Zenitsu, who was completely mesmerized by your looks.

“Y/N, YOU’RE SO CUTE!” Zenitsu ran up to you, pulling you into a hug while non-stop complimenting you. His hands then moved to your shoulders as he pulled away from the hug, now inspecting your features once again.

Only about a minute later he realized your empty eyes. A small but sweet smile on your lips yet your eyes held no emotion. Zenitsu stared at you longer, eyes widened slightly as he stared into your own.

Suddenly tears began brimming his eyes before he began crying loudly, clinging onto your arm. He didn’t want to alarm you by saying anything that may come off as rude.

“Y/N I’LL MAKE YOU SO SO HAPPY!” He sobbed, making you confused. You gave a sad smile before hugging him gently as he sobbed, repeatedly exclaiming that he loves you.

˚ʚhashibira inosukeɞ˚

♡Inosuke most definitely doesn’t know how to react. And when he does, I can’t guarantee he’s going to be polite or gentleman like about it.

♡unlike the others who don’t mind your mask, Inosuke is beyond curious to see your actual face.

♡but more than anything he wants to snatch your mask and tell you he’s the inventor of wearing masks. The ‘king’ of wearing masks. But hey, what did you except? This is Inosuke we’re talking about.

˚ ༘♡ ⋆｡˚ ❀ ˚ ༘♡ ⋆｡˚ ❀ ˚ ༘♡ ⋆｡˚ ❀ ˚ ༘♡ ⋆｡˚ ❀ ˚ ༘♡ ⋆｡˚ ❀ ˚

You sat peacefully by the river while Inosuke was playing in it, splashing around while you simply watched him with a smile on your face.

Today had been uneventful and you and inosuke still hadn’t received a mission from your kasugai crows. Hell, inosukes crow won’t even approach him.

Inosuke yelled out your name, gaining your attention. The moment you looked over at him you saw a wide smirk on his face and something in his hands. He raised his hand, revealing a ball of mud mixed with small pieces of sticks.

Your eyes widened as the mud ball went flying towards your face. You yelled as the mud ball hit your mask with an aggressive thud. You groaned, knowing you’d have to clean your mask now. The river was right there anyways.

You stood up, walking to the river. You reluctantly took your mask off, soon after putting it in the river water to wash it off.

Inosuke’s eyes were wide as a finger was pointed at you. He was frozen in place. You looked amazing, although he would never actually say that out loud.

“Good thing you kept your face hidden.”

“HEY!”

The two of you continued on with your bickering for a while. He doesn’t really notice your eyes. When he does, he’s definitely loud about it.

“HEY! WHATS WRONG WITH YOUR EYES!?” He yelled out of blue, inching closer to your face to inspect your eyes. A small blush covered your cheeks at the close proximity between you two.

“Nothings wrong with my eyes..!” You defended yourself although you knew that statement was a lie. Your arms made your way to his chest as you gently pushed him away from you.

“YEAH! SOMETHINGS WRONG WITH YOUR EYES!”

After he learns what it is from asking Tanjiro, he begins thinking any small gesture will make your eyes look less empty. And he definitely gets frustrated when his gifts for you don’t work. Give him time and he’ll soon understand. Hopefully.

˚ʚshinazugawa genyaɞ˚

♡genya, sadly, makes it unintentionally obvious he wants you to take off your mask and show your face.

♡he doesn’t at all make you want to make you feel pressured to take it off.

♡he simply gets really curious. He won’t judge you. He’s too nice for that. Whenever he finds himself getting too curious in taking off your mask, he always stops himself.

˚ ༘♡ ⋆｡˚ ❀ ˚ ༘♡ ⋆｡˚ ❀ ˚ ༘♡ ⋆｡˚ ❀ ˚ ༘♡ ⋆｡˚ ❀ ˚ ༘♡ ⋆｡˚ ❀ ˚

Genya had been staring at you all day. You were used to him glancing at you every once in a while. Although today he wouldn’t take his eyes off of you. Multiple times you assumed there must’ve been something on your face. But there was always nothing.

You questioned the boy multiple times although each time he’d dismiss his behavior and apologize with a bright red face.

It confused you as you knew he must want something from you. Soon enough, you put two and two together, realizing what he wanted.

While sitting with him outside on a wooden bench, you caught him staring at the straps of your mask. You then caught him looking at your mask intently.

Throughout the entire day you thought he had been glaring at you. In reality he was only looking at your mask, begging for it to come off.

It made sense. You had known Genya for a long time already. And in all your time of knowing him, you had never once taken off your mask in front of him.

“Genya?” You called out the boys name, breaking his trance.

“Yeah?”

“Do you … want me to take off my mask?” You questioned, already knowing the answer. The boys eyes widened as his cheeks turned a light shade of red. At first he nodded quickly without a second thought. Before pausing.

“O-only if you’re fine with it!” He replied with a more shy nod following his words. You smiled gently before grabbing your mask and pulling it off your face.

Genya stared shock, the small light red turning into a bright red. Why were you even hiding your face? He couldn’t begin to explain how you looked. Amazing.

You heard Genya mumble a small ‘wow’ which made you laugh softly. Genya’s eyes traveled around your face, studying every aspect. He then looked at your eyes. For a split second he saw nothing wrong with them. Only pure beauty. Until he noticed how there seemed to be a small void there.

He didn’t say anything. He opened his mouth but shut it and quickly stopped himself. He felt a sense of guilt wash over him upon seeing your emotionless eyes. Ever since that day, hugs and hand kisses were all you received from him. Unconditional love. But the guilt he felt never left.

˚ʚtokito muichiroɞ˚

♡muichiro fails to understand why you where a mask. If you tell him the reason or make an excuse, he’ll forget it in five minutes and question once more why you where it.

♡even though he pesters you about it on multiple occasions, he respects your boundaries. That being said he’s never laid a finger on your mask.

♡when you finally take off your mask, Muichiro doesn’t at all take notice of the void in your eyes. After all, he is the same. But him after the Swordsmith village arc? That’s a different story…

˚ ༘♡ ⋆｡˚ ❀ ˚ ༘♡ ⋆｡˚ ❀ ˚ ༘♡ ⋆｡˚ ❀ ˚ ༘♡ ⋆｡˚ ❀ ˚ ༘♡ ⋆｡˚ ❀ ˚

Muichiro had finally returned after his visit to the Swordsmith village. It only took a second for you to realize the happiness in his eyes. The bright spark that you had been missing from your own.

Even his attitude had changed. Once having such an attitude towards you and sometimes making snarky remarks. Now he was clingy. Clingy and loving, not willing to let you go anywhere on your own. It was different to see the once stoic Muichiro have such a carefree attitude now.

Despite regaining memories from his past, Muichiro’s memory problems slightly remained. But he did remember one thing. He had seen you without your mask once. It was on accident as he walked in on you eating. And of course being respectful, he looked away, not knowing if you were ready to show your face.

But he remembered sneaking a glance at you. It was a short-lived one. And he didn’t remember much about your facial features. However be remembered your eyes. Muichiro noticed everyone else had a certain light in there eyes. Something he didn’t have. Then he saw you and realized that your eyes had been the same. He didn’t think much of it.

He didn’t think much of it until now. He had a better understanding.

“Y/n. Can you take off your mask?” Muichiro muttered while laying his head on your shoulder as the two of you watched the clouds together. “Only if you want to, of course.”

You didn’t mind it. You replied with a simple nod before reaching for your mask and pulling it off of you. Muichiro brought his head up, wasting no time to look into your eyes.

You had a happy expression but your eyes were clearly saying otherwise.

“I’ll make you happy.” You heard him mumble before going back to looking at the clouds, a sad smile on his face. You only tilted your head, having no clue what he was talking about.

But his voice was sweet when he spoke. And that warmed your heart in a nice way.

Taisho Rumor with Tanjiro: you became prone to the Tanjiro affect. After your face reveal, your empty eyes only lasted for a day before becoming bright and loving. That’s Tanjiro working his magic!

Taisho Rumor with Zenitsu: Even though Zenitsu only wants whats best for you and is only trying to make you feel true happiness, he accidentally begins to overwhelm you instead…

Taisho Rumor with Inosuke: He gets really frustrated whenever he see’s your eyes. He doesn’t hate them. He loves them. But he’ll love them even more when “they’ll just cooperate and be happy.”

Taisho Rumor with Genya: Genya has a bad habit of being overly sensitive. And he’s even worse when it comes to you. He worries about your well being too much. So when he saw your eyes, he felt like crying. He was able to hold himself back!

Taisho Rumor with Muichiro: Muichiro most definitely made it his goal to make you happy like how tanjiro made him happy. He won’t give up. So when it comes to making you happy, he’s the fastest to restore you light. Second to Tanjiro, of course.

A/n: you really thought i’d forget my Taisho Rumors🤨 they’re too fun to write. I mentally cant forget abt them…even if no one prob reads them

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vxntagedior · 2 years

Text

well oiled machine

summary | you can’t seem to face bucky after crashing one of his cars

pairing | beefy!mechanic!bucky barnes x fem!reader

warning | angst, car accidents, fluff ending

word count | 1.0k

The shock blanket that was wrapped around you, wasn’t helping with your shock.

You kept muttering curses under your breath, your eyes wide, the adrenaline still rushing through your body.

The entire intersection was blocked off, numbers of officers and paramedics were at the scene. The one ambulance held you, one of the paramedics, patching up the gash on your forehead from the impact causing you to hit your head against the steering wheel.

The other was for the man who crashed into you. Your light had just turned green and as you started to cross the intersection to keep going straight, a truck tried to pass his light before it turned red, not getting in time, running the red, and driving straight into the side of your car.

Well Bucky’s car, not yours.

Your car had been leaking, and Bucky brought it into his shop to figure out the problem and let you borrow his car for the day, his Camaro that he worked so hard to restore. And you finally realized you hadn’t called him.

Trying to grab your bag, you were pulled back, the paramedic scolding you for moving while they tried to get the stitches in.

Still not seeing the car, being surrounded by paramedics and police you never saw the damage. A tow truck came onto the scene, and you prayed it was the other car that was going to get wheeled on.

Fear struck your face when you saw the Camaro being wheeled on, the entire passenger’s side destroyed, the mirror just gone and the door barely hanging onto the hinges.

You felt tears cascade down your cheeks finally seeing the damage that happened, Bucky poured his heart and soul into the car and you wrecked it within a second.

The medic was still tending to your wounds when you heard the shouting.

“Where is she, Y/n! Y/n!”

Your heart flared, hearing the familiar through the crowd of people, looking over the shoulder of the paramedic to see your boyfriend flow through the way of officers and firefighters.

He had been held back by two police officers, seeing the three of them argue before they let go under the tap, watching him run closer and closer towards you.

“Thank god.” Bucky muttered when he saw you sitting in the back of the rig. The medic had just finished with you, placing another piece of gaze over your forehead before going off in a different direction.

His eyes were frantic, his eyes searching over your body for any more injuries. “You were just going out to the bank and you were gone too long so I went to check and I saw the accident and the car.”

The moment he mentioned the car, your eyes started to water and your bottom lip started to quiver.

“Hey it’s okay.” Bucky thinking you were hurt, holding you gently.

“I’m sorry.” You sobbed, resting the side of your head on his shoulder. “I should have been looking more carefully, I could have seen you coming before I drove across and now your car is destroyed and you put some much work into it.”

Bucky furrowed his brows, looking back at the car then towards you again, opening his mouth to speak before you cut him off.

“I’ll pay you back.” You gasped. “I a few hundred dollars saved up, I know it’s not enough but-”

“Baby.”

“I’ll put my paychecks towards it-”

“Doll.”

“And hopefully maybe-”

“Y/n, stop talking.” He finally got his word across. “I don’t care about the car, I don’t care about you paying you back.”

“But-”

“Stop.” He said loudly. “I thought I almost lost you.”

His voice started to quiver. “I saw the car, and everything flashed before my eyes and no one was telling me anything so I had to go out and figure it out myself. You don’t understand how happy I am that you are right in front of me in one piece. You’re okay. I can replace the car, I can look for more parts, I can’t do that with you, I can’t replace you.”

Bucky didn’t know he was crying, until you used the edge of your sleeve to wipe the tears that were on his cheeks.

“I’m-”

“You better not say you’re sorry.”

“I love you.” You said instead, smiling softly.

“I love you too, so much.” He sighed.

Standing in the garage of Bucky’s shop, the two of you stood in front of the car.

Bucky was able to get the camaro back from the tow truck, happy that the two were close enough for him to get it back so easily.

You didn’t understand why he was restoring it, he had endless cars, another camaro but he just said it was okay.

“Should be good, test it out baby.” Bucky smiled through the window. Turning the key, hearing the sound of the engine start, he smiled. Turning the engine back off you got out of the car seeing how giddy he was.

“Why are you so happy?” You teased.

“Because I got your birthday gift.” He smiled, “Surprise.”

You didn’t understand at first looking around before you turned back to the car.

“Your car.” You said in awe. “B, I can’t take this.”

“You will.” He insisted. “Registered in your name and everything, it’s all yours.”

Squealing, you wrapped your hands around his neck, hugging him tightly. His arms naturally wrapped around your waist, pulling you closer into his stomach.

“Thank you, thank you, thank you!” You smiled ear to ear.

Bucky returned the gesture, turning you around so both of you were facing the car, his arm still wrapped around your waist.

“What do you say about taking it out for a little test drive?” He smirked. “Test out the waters.”

“I don’t know.” You muttered, you were still cautious since the accident a few months ago, Bucky kept explaining to you how it wasn’t your fault and you were a good driver.

“Hey, I’m right here.” He reassured. “We’ll be okay.”

Your hands gripped on the steering wheel as you continued to get closer and closer to the accident sight, Bucky noticed the distress, wrapping one of his hands around your thigh, squeezing it lightly..

“See.” He said. “We’re good.”

You smiled, giving me a quick look before turning back to the road, the two of you riding downtown together.

fin.

#bucky barnes x reader #beefy!bucky barnes x reader #beefy!mechanic!bucky barnes x reader #bucky barnes #beefy!bucky #bucky barnes x fem!reader #bucky barnes x girlfriend!reader #bucky barnes au

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buryustogether · 8 months

Text

the end of forever (god’s day)

aziraphale x reader x crowley

summary: the end of forever comes on god’s day.

word count: 2.6k

warnings/tags: angst, mentions of blood

author’s note: dedicated to @avocado-writing , with whom i did a fic trade and this was my piece!! this fic is part of their good omens original timeline, and i highly recommend reading it!!! <333

The end of forever started on a Saturday evening.

Granted, it was not the Saturday evening that dominates the beginning to every weekend, fitted with gentle rainfall pattering against the windows, and a book propped in your lap, and the comfortable ambiance of your lovers on either side as you let yourself be lulled into peace. Instead it was a dark, thrashing kind of Saturday, filled with panicked whispers over dances, and demons busting down the bookshop windows in hails of twinkling glass. It was blinding, seared into the forefront of your mind with traces of a halo detached from its angel and a pair of souls running away, bound for opposite sides of the universe and forever vanished into one corner together.

And, of course, it was snapped up in the jaws of the Metatron. He had taken Aziraphale for a stroll around the block once or twice, leaving you and Crowley to stare down the mess of what had become the bookshop and wonder if perhaps this had all been a dream.

“Fancy breakfast at the Ritz, love?” Crowley had said as the pair of you began to pluck cracked books from the floor and stack them to be restored and reshelved. With a wave of his slender fingers, he had sent the shards of glass cascading through the air like a silent breeze back to where they belonged in the window frames. “Reckon we deserve it, after a night like that.”

“Sure you’ll be able to handle the drive?” you had said and handed him the empty fire extinguisher, which had fallen down the winding iron staircase. “I’m sure you’re exhausted, Crowley. Spending all that time in Heaven? Must have been awfully straining on you.”

Though he would never admit it, Crowley rather enjoyed it when you fussed over him. He relished in the worry threading your voice together, craved the inevitable babying that accompanied your measures of protection. His chest had puffed slightly, and if you could have seen them, you were sure his wings had ruffled a bit.

“I’ll be alright,” he’d assured, then dropped into the chair he had long ago claimed as his beside Aziraphale’s desk. “Wouldn’t say no to a nap when we come back, though. Could sleep for a few decades, I think. Skip all the garish drama that’s sure to follow something like this. Care to join, nightingale?”

You had smiled at him, eyes full of exhaustion and yet at the same time, the restlessness that came with the knowledge part of your trio was still missing from the picture. “Afraid I can only keep you company a few hours,” you mused. “Immortal as I am, I don’t think I can lie still long enough until you decide to wake up.” Despite your teasing, you reached out your hand to caress his jaw, and he leaned into your warm touch. He knew it like he knew his own breath in his throat at this point, but he still nuzzled into your palm like an animal seeking warmth. Funny enough creature as he was, he was still, deep down, a demon searching your soul for any glimpse of love you might spare him. “I’m glad you’re okay, Crowley,” you said, letting your voice lower in volume so he understood you had dropped your jokes and cracks. “I don’t think I could bear losing you. Either of you.”

He had leaned up to kiss you then, lips and tongue seeking yours like, in spite of your words, one side or the other might tear you away from him. He tasted like cinnamon - an odd enough musk for him, but he had just returned from Heaven, after all. You were sure he hated it. But you had drank it in like it was the last thing you’d taste before you fell.

You found yourself some time later amongst the back shelves of the shop, knees and the heels of your hands aching as you painstakingly wiped away and polished the spots on the floor upon which unholy blood had been spilt and spattered. Aziraphale would not care to have those on his tile, thank you. A voice in the back of your head told you that one of your boys could simply miracle the mess away, but this seemed a bit more intimate - cleaning up the mess for your lover. This was your shop, too, in a way. And you wanted to rid it of any trace of what had happened here last night.

You only realized it was Sunday morning - God’s day - when you heard the bell above the front door jingle with its familiar chime, and the low rumble of your lover’s voices filled the empty space between the air. You couldn’t hear what they were saying, not over the sound of your brush against the floor and the dull ache in your lower back. After a long few minutes, you sat back and inspected your work.

Like the demon invasion of Fell and Co. had never even happened.

You were just about to call out to your boys when you heard a sharp hiss to Crowley’s voice that caused your heart to skip a beat. You twisted your head around to face the front of the store. Crowley only ever hissed when he let his disguise slip and his tongue split. And he only ever let his tongue split when he was so distraught not even a raging thunderstorm could comfort him.

Wiping your hands on your legs, you cautiously made your way through the organized maze of shelves toward the front entrance of the bookshop. There stood your lovers, the angel and the demon, staring one another down like they had never met, like their love had vaporized, like they had never met in that garden at the beginning.

“What’s happened?” you said and made your presence known as you stepped down into the threshold. “What’s wrong?”

Aziraphale turned to face you, obviously making an effort to brighten his features, but it was Crowley who faced away. Dropped his weight onto his arm against the desk. Reached up to tug off his shades, toss them aside hard enough that the lens cracked in its frame. The air crackled with a kind of tension that reared its head so rarely it was almost foreign to you. Or, perhaps, was that divine energy rippling the air, stirred and upset by the creatures standing before you?

“Darling,” said Aziraphale, then reached out to take your hands and placed kisses upon your knuckles. His lips were plump and soft, and when they made contact with the skin of your hand, a tiny sense of ease washed over your veins. “You needn’t worry about this. Just a… little dispute.”

“Oh, don’t lie to her like a child,” seethed Crowley from across the room, and whatever ease had settled your nerves disappeared in the blink of an eye. You felt your blood turn to ice beneath your skin when you heard a wobble, a shake, in his voice. Was your demon… holding back tears? He bared his teeth, which he’d allowed to sharpen like blades, and jutted out an accusatory finger toward his husband. “Tell them, or I bloody will,” he snapped, then lifted a deadly brow. “And you won’t like the way I phrase things, angel.”

Alarm blared like a siren in your head, flashed like lights that burned your eyes even through your lids. You knew at once this surely had something to do with last night, with the Metatron, and you were unable to stop yourself from snapping around to stare at Aziraphale expectantly. Where you searched for comfort and reassurance, you found only irritation and exasperation.

“Aziraphale,” you said, gripping his hands tighter as you gently shook your head with confusion. You only barely managed to keep your voice from shaking; something was very, very wrong. This was not like the time two hundred years ago when they had stopped talking to one another for a decade. This was far more serious, far more dangerous. “Aziraphale, what’s happening?”

Your angel stared into your eyes - or, perhaps, he was staring at his own reflection in your irises - and he let out a breath you had not heard him take in. “The Metatron,” he began slowly, softly, like you were a spooked animal who would run if he talked too loud, “has given me a generous, generous offer.”

From across the room, Crowley scoffed over his shoulder and gave another hiss from between his teeth.

“Based on a few of the…” Aziraphale seemed to struggle with the words. “Good deeds that have been performed the last six thousand years, Heaven has agreed to allow me back into its order - as the Supreme Archangel, now that Gab… Jim has vacated his position.” Despite the slow, sinking feeling growing like a black hole in your gut as he went on, the beginnings of an excited smile played upon the corners of his lips. “And they’ve even offered to redeem Crowley - as an angel again!”

The bookshop was a deadly kind of quiet, the kind that filled empty spaces with fear, and dread, and horror until there was nothing left but a rotting mess. Your mouth hung agape as you tried to process your angel’s words, tried to swallow down what he’s just said. Heaven wanted him back - would take Crowley back. That would be it. Their time on Earth would come to a close, a thunderous applause, a devastating end.

Yet there was a single question that hung tight in the air, one that waited like a dagger above each of your heads, waiting to see who would speak of it first.

Could you handle the sting when it planted itself in your back? “Aziraphale,” you heard yourself whisper as your brows knitted together and tears puddled in the corners of your eyes, “what about me?”

Though you could not see it, Crowley shut his eyes and pursed his lips, still attempting to stop the tears from falling down the gaunt planes of his cheeks. He knew the answer already, knew his angel far too well to pretend it could be anything different. He wanted to protect you from it, clasp his hands over your ears and snarl and snap at the world until he’d frightened everything that could hurt you far, far away. But you had to hear this.

Aziraphale swallows thick, holding your hands a bit tighter, like you might bolt from his grasp any moment. Even when you shift, he grips you in an iron grasp. “Well,” he drawls slowly, hesitation creeping into the corners of his voice, “of course, Heaven can’t grant holy status to… ah… humans. Immortal or not, I’m afraid, my love. But do you know angels hold the ability to possess human souls within themselves? Keep them safe and sound - isn’t that lovely? Why, I’m not the first angel in history to find a human they can’t let go of.” His hold tightens again, turning your skin pale where he grips you. “I - we could bring you with us. Your soul, darling.”

Every ounce of curiosity, of worry and fear, has morphed into a single sickening, dripping, venomous sensation that floods your systems, encases your body like a cocoon swallowing you whole; horror.

“You want to take my soul to Heaven,” you said quietly, so terribly softly that it was barely above a whisper. “Like a pet.” With this, you yanked your hands from Aziraphale’s and forced yourself to take three steps back. It stung like knives between your ribs to do so, to bear the expression painting itself across your husband’s face, but there was no other choice. “Aziraphale, you would trade us - trade this - to go back to them? After what they’ve done to you?” You took another step back, and you felt yourself bump into the chest of your demon. “After what they did to Crowley?”

You had always heard betrayal hurt worse from a lover than anyone else. Was this what betrayal felt like? Like stones in your pocket with a river pulling you under? Like venom slowly sucking your life from your very veins.

“No, of course not,” your angel tried, raising his hands. He opened his mouth to go on, then threw up a palm and sniffed out an exasperated huff. “If you both would just try and understand…”

“Oh, we understand plenty.” There came no term of endearment at the end of Crowley’s statement, no playful lilt or head nod. Only the cold, piercing gaze of those yellow eyes, and the slow wrapping of his hands around your arms, pulling you closer against him.

The movement caught Aziraphale’s eye, and hellfire flashed within them. “Oh, I should have known it would go this way,” he chided, pacing forward. “Here I thought you could, for once, Crowley, suppress your demonic ways of swaying her to your side. For once! Are you satisfied, you old serpent? Are you content with what’s happening?”

“How dare you!” The shout came from deep within your chest, an explosive rage nothing short of a scream that leaves the angel frozen where he stands. Those ocean eyes flicker to yours as you at last allow yourself to cry, to feel the sobs wrack your body like earthquakes and feel the tears gathering at the point of your chin. “How dare you let them come between us, Aziraphale! Between us!” You choked a bit and your angel visibly fought a battle within himself, wanting to pull away and surge forward all at once. “After everything… after everything we’ve been through, everything we’ve built, and you want to leave it to play God.”

“Of course I’m not leaving us,” your angel murmured, the crows feet against his eyes making themselves known as he knits his brows. Tears brim the edges of his vision. “I - I would be taking us with me. To somewhere safe… for all of us.”

“No,” you exhaled shakily, feeling Crowley’s fingers tighten around your upper arms. You shook your head at Aziraphale, your ears ringing and heart shattered. “Not safe for us. Better for you.” You peered into his eyes, into those watery blue eyes you could have drowned in, and saw your reflection staring back as he searched for something he could not find. “You miss Heaven, Aziraphale. You always have - and we know that. We all do.” There came a terrible, horrible, dreadful pause. “But we can’t go with you. We won’t.”

Your angel seemed at a loss for words. He simply stood there, staring you and his husband down. He gaped. Tried to form words. Took a step back.

Above you, his fingers now digging so tightly, so fiercely, so protectively, into your skin that his nails left marks, Crowley sneered and hissed in a voice filled with the desolation of a fallen angel, “You idiot.” You turned your face and tucked it into his shirt. “We could have been… us.”

Aziraphale said nothing for a very, very long time. Then he murmured, “I forgive you both.”

The bell over the door jingled, and he was gone, without leaving so much as a feather behind.

You sobbed loudly, awfully, horribly into Crowley’s chest, and you felt his own unholy, burning tears fall against your hairline as he stroked your tresses and kept you standing.

The end of forever started on a Saturday evening, and ended on a Sunday morning.

It was God’s day, after all.

#good omens #good omens crowley #good omens aziraphale #crowley x aziraphale #aziraphale x reader #crowley x reader #good omens x reader #the light the dark and the spaces in between fic

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