#what even is a marionette without someone holding the strings. its nothing. just like. a fuckign painted piece of plastic.

[irrelevantfudge]

To reach a purported destination.

-By marionettes

A child finally revving her engines to catch up to a world which had sped away a long time ago. A fledgling unknowing of how to do things on her own. A puppet despite not knowing how to dream and yet, giving the perfect performance.

In our lives, we’ve all acted as puppets, manoeuvred by someone else pulling our strings. It may sound undesirable but it was an undemanding role to slip into. One that I played, played well. It was a carefree life, without the silhouettes of consequences of choices hounding me. It was a smooth show, I moved as directed. It was an easy show, I didn’t have to make choices. My moves contingent on the puppeteers’ will. But the thing about puppets, like me; is when the strings are cut, we don’t know how to move on our own.

I lived an iridescent life as a puppet but, as it turns out, people get wet even when there are rainbows and sunshine.

The realisation hit me when I first had to set a goal. Having never learned how far I could run or how high I could fly, I let my imagination take over my goals without a tether holding me down. It was an unfortunate realisation that the tether wouldn’t have been of use. Since I never made it off the ground. What they deemed ‘unrealistic’ was what I wished to accomplish, and what they named ‘realistic’, I knew I couldn’t do forever.

“You won’t reach anywhere if you don’t know where you’re going” was the singular thing that made me accept my place on the ground.

The entire goal-setting ordeal was complicated since the world and I never found a common ground. Was it that important of a deal that every ‘How to win in life’ video I watched was built around attaining goals? How every other blogger said that a dream motivated them to get out of bed. Was setting goals really necessary? I mean, I had enough motivation to get out of bed without knowing what I’d spend the entire day working towards. Wasn’t it enough to just follow the flow? To live an unburdened life. Wasn’t that the life everyone yearned for? The happy ending in movies?

I carefully picked the silver linings and reassured myself that the lack of the overwhelming weight that would otherwise be put on my shoulders was worth it. The thought of ‘freestyling life’ initially scared me. Then I looked around and saw people who didn’t know what they wanted to be, either. All of them moving forward with no idea of what awaited them. I felt a lot less alone.

We’re often pressured into having plans for what we want our life to be. We’re strangled into defining our entire lifespan as one singular goal, with only one tag to bind our lives to. The prospect is scary. The goal is ours to set, but the fear that we might set the wrong one and live our entire life in regret makes us not make goals at all.

I believed for the longest time that goals were not for me. That I could escape its clutches and live a life without its presence. After all, not limiting yourself to goals meant you’d learn more along the way. You’d go to territories that you otherwise wouldn’t have. It made sense. Not having a destination in mind didn’t mean you wouldn’t get anywhere. It meant you could venture into fresh paths with the freedom to choose.

I assured people -who were as clueless as I was- that it was okay to not have dreams; led them to believe that a life without a dream was nothing, if not ordinary. Comparable to living with dreams.

But life is filled with irony. I had the harsh realisation that the hypocrite in me made it my goal to assure people they could live without one for themselves. 

I readily abandoned all that I had advocated for.

But the irony was a blessing, one that allowed me to understand goals better. Goals aren’t as polar as you have them or you don’t. Goals are a part of life. And like everything else, you don’t have to rush to set one for yourself. Every goal is a milestone in your life. The milestone to whatever path you steer yourself into. All you have to do is look up and pull the strings from below. Each step at a pace you set for yourself. Until the puppet is the puppet master themselves.

(bishesh dhanyabaad).

#marionnette #puppets #dreams #clueless #aimless #feelings #writing

[stuck-in-the-ghost-zone]

can we talk about autoheart. let's talk about autoheart

#dont actually talk to me about autoheart i WILL stsrt crying #idk what it is about this mans voice but like. i can feel the cells in my body actively cannibalizing themselves /pos #ive listened to sailor song like 12 times tonight but fine i prommy <3 #i dont get how like. oughghghhh like. #they lyrics dont Mean Anything but at the same time they DO and its paired with like. #somber piano and a fucking angelic voice i cant survive that ok #restraining myself by not listening to hungover in the city of dust. im being strong ronight i promise. #sailor song just. came on shuffle so i listened to it and thatwas a MISTAKE #anyway cacan we also talk about the puppet metaphor thing because. uhm. feelin it #famous last words the marrionette. marrionettes by kanaya. ouija harley poe. pretty in porcelain. puppet loosely strung. #appetite of a people pleaser. the scary jokes icicles. trophy wife. DRIFT AWAY. #NEED I GO ON. #its about having your agency stripped from you and having no self worth abd being hopelessly infatuated #and then snapping out of it years later only to look bacback and go ''wow that was fucked up'' and being ANGRY ABOUT IT #anyway. anybody else feeling like a puppet with their strings cut. anybody else feelin like. #you dont know who to be when youre on your own and nobody is telling you what to do anymoee #and on one hand thats so freeing because its something youve never experienced before #but on the other. what gives you the right to have your own agency. you were Made To Do Things For Other People. #and now there are no other people so youre just like. well now what. #what even is a marionette without someone holding the strings. its nothing. just like. a fuckign painted piece of plastic. #but like . why should it be anything else. its good enough as it is. #someone took the time to painstakingly paint on the details and show it love through creation. #but it sure doesnt feel like it when ur sitting limp on an empty stage. #sorry i ammmmmmmm goin g thru it a lil tonight shfshfbdjdshfshfbdjdb can we TALK about puppet metaphors #I WAS YOUR ARMCHAIR YOUR MATTRESS YOUR TV. YOUR EVERLASTING TALK SHOW HOST. MOUTHING BABY YOURE WONDERFUL #I FELL UNDER YOUR CONTROL SWITCH ON SWITCH OFF ROBOTIC AND I LOST EVERY OUNCE OF MYSELF #<<< listening 2 sailor song again smile #its about. mourning the piece of your soul they took. and wanting it back #and being fucking angry that they took it but also missing them because things were so much easier when they owned you. yknow. #delete later

[anfie-in-the-box]

Turns, twists, and paradoxes

Notes

If two amazing illustrations are anything to go by, people seem to especially like the ending of the first chapter. That made me think. What was up with Cross during Dream’s breakdown?

。。。

X-tra 1

Cross doesn't know what to think. His soul is frozen, and his mind is on fire, that's what it feels like. So cold, so hot, burning and hurting all the same.

He closes the portal, somewhat comforted by the familiarity of the process. It feels so natural. It's been so long since that time when he had no idea how to do that, or about the Multiverse and code.

It is not the time for reminiscing. Cross' eyes never leave Dream’s figure, so close yet so distant. His love's fighting so much more than just inner demons. That voice Nightmare so insistently warned Dream about. The negativity. The curse.

All too soon Dream breaks under the pressure — fortunately, not in a way that would matter in the long run. Just for now. Cross grits his teeth as his love falls on the knees like a marionette with its strings suddenly cut. Like there's nothing to hold on to.

Cross doesn't move. Doesn't make a sound. His soul aches and his eye-lights are fuzzy, although no tears fall. More than anything, he wants to get down beside Dream and hug him tight, hiding from the world in the embrace. Whisper reassuring words or stay silent, coax into talking his pain out or stroke the back of his skull without anything said, or everything at once, just... be there. Be close. Give solace and protection.

More than anything, Cross wants that.

Only... This isn't about him.

So, as Dream weeps and wails, tears streaming from his only good socket down the cheek, sobs and incoherent screams escaping his throat, Cross stands guard. Although they are in the void, no threat should come their way. But it's not the outside world Cross readies himself to protect Dream from. After all, the greatest danger is within.

Unsure what to do with his hands, Cross clenches both into fists. It'd be so much easier if there were someone physical to fight.

Nothing's ever been simple in their life.

Suddenly, Dream lets out a long, loud, wordless cry filled with raw pain. Cross can’t help but jerk to his side, wishing to hold him, show him he's not alone, he'll never be. Anything to share his misery, if not take it away fully.

Cross doesn't move. It's not the time, not yet. His haste could hurt Dream even more. They can't afford that.

Dream keeps screaming and soon finds his words. Quickly, abruptly he bawls about all the injustice and heartbreak the world has ever brought upon him, his soul too wretched and his mind reeling, words blending with no hope to understand any of them. Cross only catches Nightmare’s name a few times, something about the Tree, apples, and being guardians. It’s for the best, he thinks, for Dream is likely not ready to share everything he now spills into the world. Cross needs to know what’s going on, but he also respects Dream’s boundaries. He’d never overstep on purpose. He stays in his place, waiting with all the patience he’s got for Dream to pour his pain out.

For now, Dream’s the only one who can help himself. As much as this uselessness hurts, as easy as it is for Cross to deem himself worthless because of that, he’s determined enough to continue. Despite everything.

Dream needs him. As soon as he’s ready to get help, Cross will be there. For now, he lets Dream weep.

。。。

Credits:

Undertale © Toby Fox

Dreamtale © jokublog

Cross © jakei95 / xtaleunderverse

Shattered!Dream © shattereddreamsau

Dark Cream © zu-is-here

X-tra Dark Cream © me (anfie / anfie-in-the-box)

Read it on ao3

Read Russian version on ficbook or fanficus

。。。

Notes

I never intended to do anything like this. It's just what you all get for beind such a lovely audience (;

Thanks for reading, and take care!

。。。

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#anfie writes #x-tra dark cream fic #dark cream #x-tra dark cream #shattered!dream #cross!sans #undertale #utmv

[ghosthunterbuck]

fundamental pieces

buddie (1.6k) (read it on AO3)

Eddie’s knees hit the ground with a dull thud that he doesn’t feel.

He doesn’t feel anything, actually. He can’t. Because if he feels something, he’s going to feel everything, and if he feels everything, he’s going to come apart at the seams.

He can’t look away from the smoldering pile of rubble in front of him. Dimly, he’s aware that there are other people around, people who could be hurt, people who might need his help. He’s frozen, though. Stuck on his knees, might as well be fossilized in amber.

Buck.

Buck is—

Fuck, Eddie can’t even bring himself to think it. The house was standing and now it’s not. The ground was stable and then it wasn’t. Buck was—

And now he’s not.

The flashing lights from the fire engine cast strange moving shadows across the debris. Eddie tracks each one of them, unable to stop himself. It can’t have been more than a minute — the dust from the collapse still lingers heavily in the air, and no one’s started shouting orders yet — but time is stretching and folding in on itself and Eddie’s pretty sure he’s going to be stuck in this moment for the rest of his life.

And then, his radio crackles to life.

“Buckley to 118, I could use a little help down here.”

Eddie can’t help the wounded noise that falls from his lips. His entire body sags, a marionette with strings cut.

He allows himself a count of three, then stumbles to his feet. Buck needs him. He shoves the past few minutes in a box he knows he’ll never want to open again. Buck needs him.

The next half hour is a blur filled with structural engineers and thermal cameras and half hearted jokes over the radio. Buck’s okay, just trapped in a pocket beneath one of the house’s sturdier beams.

It’s maddening, knowing that Buck is less than a hundred yards away and not being able to get to him. Eddie feels trapped in his own skin. He wants to say to hell with it and just start digging, but the engineers say that any wrong move could collapse the bubble that Buck’s in. So he clenches his jaw and waits.

His radio crackles again. “Hey Eddie?”

Eddie fumbles to press the button down so he can respond. “Buck? What’s wrong?” Eddie can hear the tension in his own voice, barely covering the panic that lies beneath.

“I’m fine,” Buck answers immediately. “I just… never mind. It’s stupid.”

“Tell me what it is,” Eddie says, as soft as he can manage right now.

There’s a long pause. “Can you talk to me?” Even over the radio, Buck’s voice sounds small.

Eddie lets out a breath. “Yeah, Buck, I can do that. What do you want to talk about?”

“What, uh, what’s Christopher doing at school this week?”

Eddie knows damn well Buck already knows the answer to that question, but he indulges it anyway, telling Buck about the history fair coming up and the diorama Chris wants to build.

“I’m pretty sure he’s going to conscript you for that one,” Eddie chuckles. It’s a little forced, but it’s the best he can do under the circumstances.

“Well someone’s got to help him with the papier-mâché, and we both know it’s not going to be you,” Buck says.

“Hey!” Eddie says, mock-affronted. “I helped on the last one! With the solar system?”

“Eds, you popped the balloon before the sun was dry. It looked like a weird yellow raisin.” The amusement in Buck’s voice is good to hear.

He’s about to defend himself when Bobby claps him on the shoulder. “We’re moving in,” he says. “Let Buck know.”

Eddie swallows. “Buck? Still there?” It’s a stupid question. Nothing’s changed in the last 30 seconds, but waiting for Buck’s response still feels like standing on a precipice.

“Nowhere else to go,” Buck confirms.

“We’re on our way to you,” Eddie says roughly.

“Roger,” Buck replies. “What do you need me to do?”

“Just hang tight and keep your helmet on straight,” Bobby says.

“You got it, Cap.”

—

Digging through the rubble is delicate, and frankly terrifying, work. They’ve got airbags holding up the points that the engineers identified as load bearing, but every time something in the structure shifts, Eddie’s breath catches. Eventually, though, they’ve got a path cleared right up to where Buck should be.

“Nash to Buckley,” Bobby says into his radio.

“I read you, Cap.”

“We’re right on top of you. Keep your face covered and don’t try to help.”

Eddie swears he can hear the cheeky smile Buck must be wearing when he says, “No help from me, got it.”

It’s another agonizing ten minutes, then finally, finally, Eddie’s got one of Buck’s hands clasped in his, and he’s pulling him from the house’s crumbled remains.

“Shit,” Buck says, surveying the damage. “You must’ve thought—“

Eddie unintentionally tightens his grip on Buck’s hand. It’s the opposite of what he should be doing, but he can’t let go. Buck squeezes back.

“I’m fine, Eds,” he says softly.

And Eddie knows, he does, but he’s not going to believe it until he’s checked every inch of him over himself.

—

“Thank you,” Buck says, out of the blue.

It’s a few hours later, and they’re back at the station. As intense as the call had been, Buck had gotten out of it without a scrape, so they’re all still on duty.

“For what?” Eddie asks.

Everyone else is asleep, so it’s just the two of them sprawled out on the loft’s couch. There’s some nature documentary playing on the TV, but Eddie’s fairly certain neither of them is watching it.

“For distracting me. Earlier, I mean. I, uh. It helped.”

Eddie gives up his pretense of paying attention to the hyenas on the screen and turns to look at Buck.

“I’m just glad you’re okay,” he whispers. It gives away far too much, but he’s so far past the point of worrying about that.

Buck swallows heavily, like he’s heard everything that Eddie didn’t mean to reveal with those five words. He shifts until he’s pressed against Eddie, ankle to shoulder.

“I was scared,” Buck admits, toying with the sleeve of the LAFD hoodie he’s wearing. Eddie wants to take his hand all over again.

“I thought—“ Eddie can’t bring himself to finish the sentence. “I was scared, too,” he says instead.

Buck looks at him. He bites his lower lip and frowns. “I just kept thinking that I didn’t want to tell you over the radio,” he sighs finally.

“Tell me what?” Eddie asks.

Buck looks away again. He’s starting to hunch in on himself the way he does when he’s feeling vulnerable. Eddie gives into his earlier urge and takes Buck’s hand in his own.

“Whatever it is,” Eddie says softly, “you can tell me. I promise.”

Buck’s eyes shoot back up to Eddie’s, searching. Whatever he’s looking for, he must find.

“I love you,” he says simply.

He can’t mean it the way Eddie wants him to. The way Eddie’s wanted him to for months, years probably. He squeezes Buck’s hand tighter for want of words.

“I’m in love with you,” Buck clarifies. “I just… couldn’t not tell you.” His expression is almost resigned.

Eddie’s frozen all over again, but this time he let’s himself feel it all. Because Buck’s okay. Buck’s sitting right in front of him. Buck loves him.

“Evan,” Eddie breathes, unable to keep the name from slipping between his lips.

The resignation on Buck’s face shifts to hope, and he holds Eddie’s gaze. Lit by the blue glow of the television, he’s never looked more beautiful.

Eddie can’t wait another second. He ducks forward and brushes a feather light kiss across Buck’s lips. His intention is to lean back, to assess Buck’s reaction, but then Buck makes a strangled noise and surges forward, capturing Eddie’s mouth with his own.

The hand that isn’t otherwise occupied lifts of its own accord to cup Buck’s jaw. Buck’s free hand fists in the material of Eddie’s uniform. It’s like no kiss Eddie’s experienced before, fire and passion underlined by aching tenderness, and over all too soon.

Eddie leans his forehead against Buck’s breathing harshly.

“Fuck, you have no idea how long I’ve wanted to do that,” Buck pants.

“I think I might,” Eddie says.

Buck pulls back, just far enough to look Eddie in the eye. “You…”

Eddie wants to laugh. Even after that, of course Buck’s still not sure. Eddie’s not one for speeches, but Buck… Buck deserves to know exactly what he means to him. “Earlier, when I thought… it was like the whole world stopped. And I didn’t want it to start again, because I was terrified it’d be starting without you. I can’t do any of this without you. I don’t want to. I’ve been in love with you for so long it’s a fundamental part of who I am.”

It’s Buck’s turn to freeze.

“I love you,” Eddie says. He squeezes Buck’s hand.

The soft pressure must break him out of his stupor, because he lunges at Eddie again, this time throwing his arms around Eddie’s neck and burying his face in his shoulder. Eddie wraps his arms around Buck’s waist and buries his nose in Buck’s hair.

“I love you,” he whispers again, just because he can.

—

Bobby finds them the next morning, tangled together on the couch and snoring softly. He smiles, and resolves to make breakfast quietly.

#buddie #911 #9-1-1 #guess what! #this is neither my prompt nor one of my 13 wips! #my brain is really just Like This huh #anyway this is 90% fluff with just a little angst at the beginning #I'm physically incapable of writing an unhappy ending you will literally never have to worry about that with me #fic #abbie writes #also I'm posting this at like 1 am because I am ~wildly impatient~

[bounce-a-coin-off-your-witcher]

In the Dead of Night

Title taken from the same Judas Priest song as before, “Love Bites.”

tw: horny (duh), blood mention, consensual blood drinking, consensual mind reading, consensual mind control, dom/sub undertones but only vaguely

the mind control does not occur during the smutty bits, by the way. that shit is foreplay only and it is discussed at length by both parties (I just wanted to play with Dracula’s fun powers and also as someone said in my AO3 comments: “THRALL SEX! THRALL SEX!”).

THIS IS A SMUT, 18+ YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED

top!Jaskier, bottom!Geralt

please comment I am fucking begging you

---

“Geralt,” the silky voice called out to him. It echoed off the castle walls, pulling the lawyer deeper into a state languid, misty stupor. “Come to me, my love. Come to me, Geralt.”

The solicitor, whose mind was still half-convinced this was a dream, found his body moving of its own accord. He rose mechanically from the bed and crossed the enormous guest room, not even stopping to pull on his slippers or dressing gown as he should have. Nor did he brush his hair back into place; it hung in a loose white curtain, framing his eyes and jaw rather romantically. 

Geralt stumbled through the keep like a drunken marionette, tied and tangled in the strings of some clever puppet-master. The drawling voice told him to turn left towards the Count’s set of private rooms, so he did. His bare feet didn’t even register the usually freezing temperature of Castle Dracula’s cold stone floors. His skin was aflame with goosebumps but not a single one had resulted from the chilly temperature. 

“Geralt,” the voice purred. The sleepwalker’s pace sped up as he neared the heavy oak door that led to his employer’s bedchamber, “I am waiting for you, my pet, and I am growing impatient.”

---

“Are you completely and totally sure, Geralt?” Jaskier asked, worrying his lip between his sharp, sharp teeth. Geralt nodded and tried his best to look away from his lover’s gorgeous mouth. It wasn’t working. “Oh...Oh yes. I suppose you’re quite sure.”

“How can you tell?” the solicitor asked, quirking a curious eyebrow in Jaskier’s direction. The vampire gestured as he spoke, trying to work out some of his fizzling energy as he explained his powers. 

“Uhm, right. I should probably explain. I can read minds, you see. Telepathy was gifted to me along with the immortality, the odd sleeping hours, and the lust for drinking human blood. I am also an incredibly fast healer, I can turn into a bat, and I can walk up and down walls as easily as if they were floors.”

“Impressive,” Geralt smirked. “Care to demonstrate, Your Grace?”

“Perhaps at a later date; I’m not in the mood for party tricks just now. Not after what you just told me and what I just saw going through your pretty white lawyer-jargon-filled head.”

“So you can read my thoughts as clear as day, then?”

“Yes, but I don’t make a habit of doing it regularly. I only peeked in just now because your line of questioning had me in a bundle of nerves.”

“Going to bed with me makes you nervous?”

“I very much enjoy our tender nights of lovemaking together, Geralt,” the vampire admonished teasingly. He was trying to lighten the mood, to fully process his recently acquired lover’s peculiar request. “I just don’t want anything to happen to you. I don’t want you to suddenly change your mind or feel unsure going into things and only continue for my sake. I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if you woke up one morning and feared me for being the monster I truly am.”

“You are no monster,” Geralt asserted, catching Jaskier’s flighty hands in both of his and holding them tightly. He squeezed his fingers and smiled encouragingly when Jaskier squeezed back. “And aren’t I supposed to be the nervous one, coming to you with something of this nature and speaking of it in plain terms? I’m mortified.”

“I just don’t want you to be afraid of me, Geralt.”

The human cocked his head to the side and smiled, the deep blush that had accompanied his earlier request still darkened the apples of his cheeks. His open expression was so trusting and endearing that Jaskier’s heart would have broken if it were still beating. “I could never be afraid of you, Your Grace.”

“Do I have your permission to read through your expectations of this, should we attempt it?”

“Of course, Your Grace. Whatever pleases you best, Your Grace.”

“That’s cheating, darling. You know how it boils my blood when you call me that,” the vampire growled. 

They’d fallen back into the pillows after that but the deal had been struck: some night when Geralt wasn’t expecting it, when he was fast asleep, Jaskier would bring his lover under his thrall. He would command Geralt’s every movement, keeping careful tabs on his mind so that no wrong moves were made and no damage was done. He cared too much for the mortal’s safety to risk anything.

But the mortal had learned that it was very hard for Jaskier to deny him anything, especially when it came to adventurous and lusty bedroom games.

---

Geralt pushed the door open and approached the bed, where Jaskier was reclined comfortably against a mound of pillows. His ankles were delicately crossed and he was draped in a long, flowing white silk night shirt. His fangs were already fully extended and his irises were glowing crimson in the dim light of a few lit candles. 

“Kneel,” Jaskier ordered. Geralt dropped to his knees, unconsciously grateful for the pillow that his employer and lover had set out in preparation. The Count slid from the bed and approached his prey, breathing the heady scent of a lustful, eager human. It was a warm, earthy scent and it tickled him greatly to know that Geralt felt it all for him. Only for him. 

For Count Dracula, the terror of Redania. 

One of the immortal’s cold, calloused fingertips slid down the side of Geralt’s jaw and the solicitor shuddered instinctively, thrusting his chest forward and turning his face to the left to better reveal the pale, unmarked column of his throat. The Count released a feral growl and fisted his hands into Geralt’s hair. He tugged his head back, forcing the younger man to arch even further forward and breathe even more shallowly than before. All Jaskier could hear in the mortal’s mind, even beneath the fog of his vampiric thrall, was: Yes! Yes! More. Yes!

It was very encouraging. He kissed a torturously slow line of tooth-heavy kisses up and down the soft skin and refused to let the mortal give in to his urge to write. He forced Geralt to stay perfectly still as he laved his throat and Adam’s apple with his teeth and tongue.

He whined, low and long, and the Count released him to step back. 

“Greedy thing,” the vampire chuckled. The sound was low and ominous; it reverberated dangerously through Geralt’s chest and forced a whine from his throat, his eyes still trained on the Count. The solicitor could not force himself to move an inch as he awaited further instructions from his Master. Finally, after a nearly painful length of silence, Jaskier murmured, “Disrobe for me, pet.”

Geralt’s fingers flew to the collar of his nightshirt, tugging the buttons apart haphazardly in his rush to bare himself before his Count. His Jaskier. His Master. The vampire placed his hands over the mortal’s and tutted in disappointment. The sound had Geralt reeling, groaning in utter confusion as he went limp beneath his lover’s ministrations. 

“Slower, my darling. Put on a show for me. You’re so pretty, Geralt, and I’d like it if you remembered that. Unwrap yourself like a present, wouldn’t you?”

The white-haired human flushed a charming shade of pink and ducked his head. Jaskier removed his hands and sat back down on the edge of the bed. He watched with obvious arousal as Geralt slowly unhooked each shiny black button, drawing the material aside to reveal the planes of his broad, lightly-furred chest. He slowly slipped the offending article over his head and discarded it to the side. Then he paused, waiting once again for the vampire to give him a command.

“Pants off, too. I’d like you bare, my pet.”

“Yes, Your Grace.”

“What does it feel like to be enthralled by your love, Geralt? Do you regret letting me be your Master?”

“I regret nothing, Your Grace. Being yours like this...it feels as if my mind is far away and yet everything I touch is very close. If your skin brushes against mine unintentionally I fear that I shall fly apart; yet I’ve never wanted to be touched more desperately in my life.”

“Hmm. That is an interesting way to put it. Now, my love, come lay with me and let me touch you as you so desire.”

“As it pleases you, Your Grace.”

“Even bent to obey my every whim without question you are no less accommodating, my dear.”

Jaskier straddled Geralt as soon as the mortal had laid himself down. He shucked off his own silk nightshirt in the process, tossing it off into the darkness as if it wasn’t worth more than Geralt’s weight in gold. The Count ran his frigid hands down Geralt’s firm arms, clasping his hands and pulling them slowly, teasingly over his head. 

“How strange it must be to know that I will not tie you down and yet you will not be able to move from this position without my order to do so,” the vampire whispered against the shell of his lover’s ear. Geralt moaned and tossed his head back, baring his throat once again. The human was practically screaming his thoughts at Jaskier: Bite me! Feed from me! Take from me and make me yours, Your Grace. My handsome Count. My love!

The Count wrapped himself around his lovely, willing victim and eagerly acquiesced.

---

“Fuck!” Geralt cried. He was sure that every nerve ending in his body was screaming in wave after wave of unstoppable ecstasy. 

Jaskier was everywhere. The Count had released the hold of his thrall as soon as he’d bitten into the side of Geralt’s throat. Now there was nothing standing between Geralt and all of the wonderful sensations his lover was inflicting upon him. The rhythmic movements of Jaskier’s hips as the vampire fucked him firmly down into the mattress, the heaving of his breath in his slow human lungs, the little white flyaways that were stuck to his forehead with sweat; even the way his hands were buried fiercely in the vampire’s soft chestnut hair seemed to only further drive Geralt mad with lust. 

There were warring sparks of arousal and heat shooting between the spot in his neck where Jaskier’s teeth were buried and the spot in his ass where Jaskier’s glorious cock was buried. The Count was an expert at mind reading and at lovemaking. He played Geralt like Geralt had seen him once play the lute and the harp. His fingers were expert, flicking at his nipples and pulling at his hair at just the right moments.

The young solicitor was nothing more than a moaning, writhing symphony and Jaskier was his wicked, brilliant composer. He sang at his Master’s order, grunting and sighing whenever one of the Count’s expert thrusts hit his prostate. It was even better knowing that every slam of Jaskier’s hips was matched by a strong pull of blood as the vampire drank from him. To know that he was pleasuring His Grace in so many ways at once brought the human to the height of joy. He mumbled a long series of wordless, gibberish thanks and let the Count drain him of his life force. 

“I can keep going all night,” the vampire warned, removing his teeth from his quarry only long enough to speak. “I could drive you mad like this, Geralt. Would you like that? Would you enjoy spending your life under my spell, warming my bed and slaking my immortal lusts? Would you like it if I laid you out on a pretty velvet dais during the day and gave you endless books to read? Would you be content if I had you dressed and bathed for me by your own set of servants every night and delivered to my bed when the sun finally disappears?”

“Your Grace! Please!”

Geralt didn’t know if he was begging for it or trying to plead against it; perhaps both or perhaps neither. Perhaps he was merely begging for Jaskier to put his fangs back in his straining, yearning neck. But the Count wasn’t about to let him off that easily.

“Please, you say? Does that idea appeal to you, my pet? Would you like being looked after and taken care of and tenderly worshiped from now until your dying day?”

“Jaskier!” the mortal solicitor cried, clenching tightly around the vampire and forcing the immortal’s breath from his lungs. “Keep me forever, do not let me leave your side, Your Grace! Please!”

“Fuck, Geralt, I’m-” he cut himself off by sinking his canines back into his lover’s pale arteries and sucking in one last deep gulp of sparkling ruby nectar. 

“Yes! Your Grace!”

They fell over the precipice together, tumbling through empty, breathless air as they came. The feeling of Jaskier’s fangs in his neck had finally given Geralt the perfect amount of stimulation to climax, messing both his own chest and part of Jaskier’s with sticky spend. Since the Count had been monitoring Geralt’s thoughts the entire time they were coupling, hell bent on making sure he was enjoying himself, Geralt’s climax sent Jaskier headfirst into his own shuddering finish. “Fuck! My love!”

“Jaskier!” ---

“You’re a marvel, my darling,” the Count insisted, forcing Geralt to take another sip of sweet red wine. He slipped a piece of sweet bread with jam into the mortal’s mouth shortly thereafter. “I am so lucky to have had you delivered right to my doorstep, ready and willing to fall under my evil spell.”

“You’re still not frightening me,” the solicitor replied. “I went to law school; you’re almost tame.”

“For that remark you shall be severely punished.”

Geralt rolled over in Jaskier’s lap and wiggled his ass playfully. “Oh no, Your Grace. Anything but that.”

“Get back here and finish your wine, pet.”

Geralt returned to his previous position and Jaskier ran a hand through his snow-white locks. “May I get dressed yet, Your Grace?”

“Not if you keep calling me that. If you insist on flaunting my title then I may never let you see a stitch of clothing again.”

Geralt blushed and Jaskier’s eyes widened as the mortal’s thought passed through the veil into his own mind. The Count laughed and fed Geralt a bite of bread. 

“You’re an absolutely filthy little minx, pet. I’m going to keep you forever.”

#geraskier #guess what the thought was #this is filthy #blood drinking tw #consent is everything fam #geraskier smut #geraskier fic #geraskier dracula au #bouncey's sex dungeon #a very bouncey halloween seqeuel #vampire jaskier #dracula jaskier #count jaskier #noble jaskier #geralt says 'your grace' a lot #dom/sub undertones #bottom geralt #top jaskier #gentle dom jaskier #geraskier vampire fic #fluff #smut #fluff and smut #blood drinking

[bigsnzstanacct]

King’s New Allergy Part 4

This is wildly overwritten but at least I’m writing...? Here is the link to the other chapters of this story lmao. Of course it is also on le blue forum. After this chapter there is one more to conclude the story (which is already partially written!) and then there’s a chance I’ll eventually write an aggressively porn-y epilogue. okay byeeeeeeee!

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My nose. My damned nose. By all the gods old and new, my insatiable, insufferable, intolerable, insistent, itchy, tickly, twitching, torurous nose!

“So the… th-thehhhh… the harvest in the W-weehhhhh… Western… -sniff-”

I was fighting.  I was fighting as hard as I’d ever fought anything. Harder. But to do battle against a swordsman, a sorceror, a monster, a ghost… that was child’s play. For that I had tools and training. Years of training in weapons and fighting. For this meeting too: years of training in diplomacy, in leadership. But none of that training involved a struggle to the death against your own damned nose!

“In the W-wehhhh… weeeeeeehhHHHH…”

Through narrowing eyes, I saw their faces: full of disapproval, fear, hands itching to clap to their ears, legs twitching to hide under the table, as though I really were a storm unto myself, and in taking cover, they might be spared the worst. Perhaps if I simply allowed the sneeze to come, it might not be so monstrous but… I could not. I could not bring myself to succumb so easily, to give in, to be weak. I chanced putting a finger beneath my nose. It was a desperate failsafe that had served at least a few times, but in truth I could never resist for long. I could no more resist these violent eruptions than the sky, overcharged with energy, could resist the lightning arcing across the sky, or the terrible roar of the thunder in response.

“Oh gods… I’m sahhhh.. s-ssaahhhhhh… s-sorreeehhhhhHHHHHHHHAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRSSSSCCCHHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!! AnothhheeEERRRYYYYYYYYAAAASSSSSSSSSSSSSSSHHHHHHHHHHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!! hehhhh… hh-hehhhhhh… HUUUH! HHHHHHHEEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAASSSSSSSSSHHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!”

They came, thick, fast and violent. Each one felt like it took all my strength, as though I couldn’t help but through the full weight of my body—no, the full weight of the castle herself into each sneeze. And then, for a moment…

Bliss.

No itch, no tickle, no torture. As terrible as they were, as much as they terrorized my meeting, my castle, my citizens, my countryside… there was a guilty, fiendish part of me that felt such magnificent release and relief with each great roar that was loosed from my mouth and nose. Drained, too, of course. Exhausted as though I’d climbed a mountain after practically each sneeze, let alone a whole terrible fit of them like I’d done. But also, utterly and simply delighted.

And then I opened my eyes and the embarrassment flooded in, and then, barely a split-second later, the tiny, teasing, barely-perceptible blossom of the itch that presaged another sneeze. The urge to sneeze again was following closer and closer on the glorious feeling of release and relief. When this all started I could go half the day without a sneezing fit. Then hours. Now barely minutes. But perhaps if I didn’t think about it, if I just barrelled through and ignored the tickle… maybe it would leave me alone.

“My apologies again, gentlemen.” I said, and quickly, before anyone could comment upon my nose: “Now, the Western harvest is among the best we’ve had in some years, which means our levy at the current rate should be -sniff!-” the itch already was worming its way up. But I could hold out still. I could ignore it.

“At the current rate should be more than sufficient to provide for capitol needs, y-yes Minister?”

The Minister of the Exchequer tried to discreetly rub at his ears, but it was obvious what he was doing, trying to clear his head from my sneezing long enough to focus on what I was saying. I couldn’t bear it.

“Yes! It will be sufficient, I don’t need you to check my arithmetic. You may repohhh… re-re…” I gave a hard sniff, and allowed myself  a quick rub at the underside of my nose with the heel of my palm. It was an embarrassing, almost childish gesture but I was far beyond caring about small embarrassments. I had much, much larger mortifications to be concerned with.

“Youmayreportbackifneedsbe!” I barrelled out, knowing the tickle was already roused, and at any moment could turn the act of speech into feat as tricky as any in my storied questing career.

“What is the next item on the ahhh… hahhh…” my eyes swam, unfocused for a moment. Hands crept up towards ears, dread lining in every face of the council. I could feel my knights tensing behind me, as though bracing for an explosion, hoping not to be knocked off their feet. The sneeze wasn’t even ready, it would play with me for several more moment yet. It reminded me of nothing more than sparring with the quartermaster as a boy: putting up a valiant fight, certain I was on the edge of victory… only to find he was only playing a game with me. He would always win.

“The next agenda item!” I said, slamming a fist down on the table. I wasn’t angry with the council, and I hope they knew that, but. It was all so damned frustrating… I couldn’t speak without terrifying my council, not with my words but with the threat of my nose. Of all the mortifying.

“Well my lord, we have not admitted petitioners in over three weeks, owing to your condition. I was informed the Royal Physician as well as the, ah, King’s Right Hand will be pursuing some possibilities for treatment, but the peo---”

“Damn the conditiiIiiiHHHHHH… HHIIIHHHHHH!!” May noses and sneezes be damned by all the gods old and new! The urge was already prickling in my nose, fanning its way towards inevitability, as though to mock me for cursing it. By all the gods, I should be able to see my people, to hear their complaints and all because of my god’s damned lack of control, I couldn’t even do that… I felt furious as a boy, looking up at the quartermaster teary-eyed with rage at losing, at humiliation. And here I was again, losing. And to a thrice damned tickle in my thrice damned nose…!

My nose, on which the whole room hyperfocused, as intent upon it as I’d ever been on any foe on the battlefield. Every twitch garnered a flinch, every skipped breath a skipped heartbeat. My damned sneezes could be heard throughout the entire castle, throughout the entire town. I was just waiting for someone to announce they’d heard me sneeze at the furthest edges of the regions, echoing off the Black Mountains or the White Cliffs, resounding across oceans…

With all that, being so close to my sneeze must have been a form of auditory torture. And I couldn’t put my advisors through that. Not any longer. And not with the vague but unmistakable sense I felt that what was beginning to well up in me would be a fit to rival any I’d suffered since I came down with this accursed, irreparable allergy, this implacable need that seemed to be unmoved by any force physical or magical, on earth or in the realms above. I was going to sneeze, and the fit would leave me exhausted and the whole castle ringing, I knew. But the urge itself was small now, my winds gathering strength for the one man hurricane they would turn me into. What a curse, to make of a king a slave to his own body. I was disgusted with myself. And yet, I could no more stop the force building within me than I could will the rising sun to set or still the flowing tide.

This council meeting was accomplishing nothing. And dammit, I needed to sneeze.

Abruptly, I pushed back from the chair. Everyone rose with me. “Ladies and gentlemen, you must excuse me, I’m a-afraid… oh I…” I was doing my best to keep up a kingly facade but already I was faltering before the effort of damming back the torrent of sneezes that seemed to be pressing up against each other, jockeying for position, each demanding to be the first to erupt out of me. “oh gods, I have to sneeze. It’s going to be a terrible fit and I… Iahhhhhh… I m-muuhhhhh… I must r-repair to my… my chahhhhHHHHH… hAHHHHHHHHHHHH… w-with m-mehhhh…!”

I ordered my retinue to follow me, but I’m sure a number of them did so quite reluctantly, and frankly I couldn’t blame them. What I felt coming seemed like a sneeze to beat all sneezes, an itch to beat all itches, nothing which could soothed, calmed, or controlled by a little finger under the nose, a few rough rubs. I’d asked my former manservant more than once about his… powers. How he felt all the hidden powers of the earth welling up through him, the connection to the secret side of everything, how he could make it shimmer and dance. I felt the same sense  of something beyond myself intruding upon me, but it was not under my control. I was beneath its thumb, dancing like a marionette on a string in miserable abasement to, of all things, a tickle in my nose.

“Someone… someone please… huhhhh… p-put your f-finger… under…”

It was pathetic. At least I’d managed to get well out of the way of the council chambers before I succumbed. I’d only embarrassed myself like this once or twice before, but if this went on much longer, I’d have to appoint a knight to do this for me full time, to press and pinch and wrangle my nose in a way my own hands could no longer suffice. Perhaps that way I could at least forestall the sneezes long enough to do any of the duties of a king.

But for now, my only goal was fighting off the absolutely monstrous fit I felt brewing for a few more moments, until I could at least reach my chamber. At least then I could succumb in private, although such succumbing was never private. Before the curse even, I blushed to think a vigorous sneeze might echo through the castle, and I never could dam them back. But under the curse now… all of the castle, all of the city heard my every falter. The sound of my failure resounding back at me from every brick in the kingdom.

The Captain of the Guard slid a thick finger under my nose, and ever so imperceptibly the urge diminished. He pushed upward, hard. And all I could do was blink at him in acknowledgement. At this point a single word would send it all crashing down.

“Knights dismissed! I will escort the King further.” I heard his voice ringing out, and I was as grateful as I’d ever been for him. At least the knights would be spared the very worst. The captain alone would be with me to the eruptive end.

“Not much further now, sire. Please, hold out!” And there was an uncertainty or even... a fear in his voice. It wasn't as if I'd never heard such fear from the Captain of the Guard before. We had quested together, season after season. But this tone of voice ought to be reserved for a onrushing army or a sleeping dragon. Surely there was no reason to steel himself so before my nose?

“T-t-traahhHHHH… tr-trying…” I choked out, scrunching my nose as aggressively as I could, as though if my nostrils recoiled from the irritation, I might dodge the sneeze—no, sneezes—altogether.

And suddenly, unimaginably, the urge… exploded.

It was as if I had never needed to sneeze before in my life. Tears sprang to my eyes, and the simmering flame of the urge became a wild forest fire. Helplessly, I jerked away from the Captain, scrubbing desperately at my nose even as the heavy breaths ripped themselves from me…

“HHHHEEEEEEEEEEEEUUUUUUUUUUUUUUHHHHH… HUUUUUUUUUUUUHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH…”

“My King, not yet!” the Captain insisted. Not to be deterred, he came up behind me and tried to guide me, but I was surrendered to the sneeze, overpowered by the urge, defeated by the invisible twinging need. He was practically pushing me as the sneeze swelled and swelled.

“HUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH… UUUUUUUUUUUHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH…”

It swelled more and MORE, feeling more ferocious than any of my previous sneezes. I felt like a volcano on the precipice of eruption, as though my winds were swirling and turning and twisting and braiding their way towards tornadic devastation, as though I were not only a a lightning strike but indeed a whole storm set loose to wreak havoc across the land.

“Nearly there, nearly there, please sire you musn't give in…”

But it was too late.

“AAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRSSSSSSSSCHHHHHHHHHHHHUUUUUUUUHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!” I exploded, and it was as though… some sort of… power erupted from me, from my mouth and nose from… from everywhere. The sneezes had always been incredibly loud but now tapestries on the wall flapped, armor rattled, it sounded as though something fell but I couldn’t tell because before I could so much as think, the next sneeze was already erupting: “HHHHHHHHHHHHHHHOOOOOOOOOOOOO-AAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRSSSSSSCHHHHHHHHHHHHHHUUUHHHH!!!! AARRRRRRRRRRRRRSSSSSSSSSCHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHUUUUUUUUUHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!! HehHHHHHHH… HEEEEEYYYYYYYAAAAAAAAAAAAAAATTTTSSSCCCHHHHHHHHHEEEEEWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW!!! YYYYYYYYYYYYYAAAAAAAAAAATTTTTTTTTTTTSSSSSSSSSSSSCCCCCCCCCHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHEEEEEEEEEEEEWWWWWWWWWW!!!”

On and on and on the sneezes came, more and more violent, “volume” not even describing what I felt bursting from me. Somewhere, dimly, I heard the sounds of something falling over, and yet still the steady pressure of the Captain at my back, finally…

“Sir, your chamber… We must not let them see you!”

Whether I was able to exert some minimal effort even subdued by my sneeze attack, or whether the Captain just shoved me, somehow I stumbled into the chamber, still sneezing relentlessly, barely heard the door slam behind me, helpless to the urge. My whole world narrowed to my nose, and it was as though some block within me surrendered and the sneezes roared out of me, louder and more violent than ever before again and again and again…

I could not tell how long it had been when the fit finally ended. I felt… amazing. Warm and sated. Entirely itch-free, as though I’d never need to sneeze again in my life. Practically glowing. Maybe that was it? Maybe that monster of a fit had at last blown the insufferable urge away for good? But the moment of euphoria lasted barely an instant. I heard a… squeak? and I opened my eyes to find… him. The sorcerer. His robes and hair disheveled, and then, the room… The bed was without sheets. The mattress ripped, feathers piled against the stone wall, piled up with the rugs, half my clothes, my pillows, my chairs…

“Wh-what… what did I… what did I do?” I asked, panting and mortified.

He stood, mortified, as red as I’d seen him in years. His mouth agape. “I—I… I—I have to go!” He exclaimed, and rushed from the room.

Had I hurt him? Scared him? Surely he of all the denizens of the castle had no reason to fear… anyone. But as I cast my eyes across the disheveled, half-wrecked room, I began to see what he saw. Nothing to fear. But something to pity. An out-of-control freak. Certainly no King.

And even then, with a trickle of fear running down my spine… I began to feel the urge to sneeze again, sputtering back to life. I sat on my bed, feeling the weakened timbers sputter and creak with my weight, head in hands.

“By all the gods…”

#snz story #King's New Allergy #Part 4 #giant!sneeze #sorta #snz fic

[winter-soldier-vibes]

I’m dangerous (Bucky Barnes x reader)

I’m  dangerous

Bucky barnes x reader

Word count: 2278

Warnings: nightmare, Bucky doubting himself, winter soldier days

Summary: Bucky and reader are dating, and he pushes you away, afraid he’ll hurt you, especially after certain nightmares.

------------------

Bucky was remembering more and more everyday. Which, to the naked eye, could be viewed as a good thing. That’s what Steve thought, that’s what the rest of the team, that’s what his girlfriend Y/N thought. And Bucky let them all believe that. Because to some degree, it was. But for the most part, it was torture. 

The memories from before the war were great. Growing up with his family, his sister, and his friend Steve were all memories he clung to. But then there were the memories that snuck up on him, the ones that took him while he was sleeping. His Winter Soldier episodes. And unfortunately for him, he had many more memorable moments as the Winter Soldier than he did as Bucky Barnes.

The nightmares had been getting worse. Not that he would tell anyone, no, he didn’t want to relive it when he was awake too. It bothered him so much that he eventually stopped trying to go to sleep. It was one less near heart attack to worry about.

These memories, the Winter Soldier ones, were plaguing his thoughts more often as time went on. It used to just come in his dreams, but now, it was around every corner. He spent a lot of time in the gym, trying to punch out his emotions. And it would work for a while. But whenever he would stop it would creep up again on him like before. 

You noticed the change in him pretty quickly. The tired eyes, the troubled look he always had - though he tried to hide it so well. You were worried about him, and you had an idea you knew exactly what was wrong with him. You would try to talk to him about it, but he’d usually just close himself up, putting up these walls even if you couldn’t break down.

You would just softly smile at him and assure him he could talk to you about whatever, whenever. And he would mumble a half-assed thank you and the two of you would go on with the day. But not without you still worrying about him.

Little did you know that Bucky wanted to tell you. He just...couldn’t. And he would try to figure out why all the time.

She said I could tell her anything, he would think while he was punching the bag. She’s not afraid of me. So why am I afraid to be straight with her? And the more he thought about it, the more he told himself he was just trying to protect you from himself. He was so afraid of having an episode with you present, and on top of that, he was afraid you’d leave if you realized how dangerous he could be. 

So his solution was to never mention anything of the Winter Soldier. He pretended like he had moved on. But you knew he didn’t.

He walked on eggshells around everyone, especially you. As if he was afraid he’d hurt you if he got too close or said the wrong thing. Any sort of physical contact would cause him to tense up and hold his breath. And you knew it had nothing to do with you - he was just scared of something. And you figured that something had to do with what HYDRA would make him do.

Still, the two of you carried on like you didn’t know what the other was thinking about. And it worked for a while, though it killed you inside to see Bucky be so hesitant. You knew he loved you, and that was why he was doing it, but you couldn’t lie to yourself. It hurt.

The two of you slept in separate rooms for two reasons. One was you hadn’t reached that level of intimacy, and the other was Bucky insisted he wasn’t ready for that kind of thing. Although he phrased it as a step in your relationship, you knew it had to do with him not wanting to hurt you. But you agreed, keeping your distance. You were in the room next door afterall, so you couldn’t complain much.

One night, both of you were asleep. Bucky hadn’t slept in a few days, so exhaustion overtook him despite his efforts to stay awake. And the nightmares he had been avoiding resurfaced tonight

‘Welcome back, Soldier.’

‘Ready to comply’

Bucky was aware of his surroundings and what was happening, but he had no control of what he was saying or of his actions. And no matter how hard he tried to snap himself out of it, how hard he tried to bring back memories of Steve and Y/n, he couldn’t. He was HYDRA’s marionette, strings attached.

His mission was to find and kill you. That's always how these nightmares went - he was the Winter Soldier and you were his mission. And no matter how hard he tried to stop himself, he simply wasn’t in control anymore. All he could do was watch.

He was on a motorcycle heading toward Stark Tower, and he let himself in. He made his way to your room, to find you asleep on your bed. He walked over and clasped his metal hand around your throat, lifting you into the air.

Immediately you were awake, and you began thrashing in his grasp, hands trying to loosen his grip on you, but it was no use. There was nothing you could do. 

“Buck - Please, stop….What’re you doing?”

He merely tilted his head and studied you, as if you were a specimen. But his eyes showed no recognition. They were stone cold. And that’s when your eyes widened as you realized he was gone. The Winter Soldier had you and you had no options. 

He brought his other hand to his gun and lifted it off its holster, holding it up to your head. You try one more time, “Bucky, It’s me, Y/n…” and a gunshot rang out

“NO!” Bucky jolted awake, breathing heavy and covered in a cold seat. He put his face in his hands and rubbed his eyes, trying to get the image of your scared eyes out of his brain. The fact that you were scared because he was hurting you. 

And that he killed you.

He got out of bed and walked into his bathroom and leaned forward, resting his hands on the sink and staring into the mirror. He shook his head. “What the fuck is wrong with you?” he spoke aloud, to himself. He brought both hands to his head and leaned back against the wall behind him, tears beginning to sting his eyes. He forced his eyes shut and bent over, resting his hands on his knees. ‘I’m a danger to everyone,’ he thought. ‘I’m dangerous just being here with everyone. As long as I’m alive, I’ll be dangerous to everyone I know.’

What he didn’t know, was you had heard him yell when he had jolted himself awake. You had gotten out of bed and made your way into his room, which was open. You saw him standing in the bathroom, keeled over and hands rubbing his face.

“Babe, you okay?”

He jolted up straight and looked at you with a look of relief which was quickly replaced by terror. “Please, go. Just leave, I’m fine. Get out of here.”

While these could be spoken from someone who was angry, Bucky sounded more desperate than anything else. You had never seen that look of fear in his eyes, and you made a decision that you weren’t going anywhere.

Instead, you closed the door behind you to give the two of you some privacy before walking over to him “What’s wrong Bucky? What - What happened to you?” you reached out from him but he stumbled backwards. He held his hands out in front of him, saying “Don’t touch me! Please, just...you shouldn’t be here.”

Again, words spoken more out of desperation than anything else. You dropped your hand and leaned against the doorframe. You could tell he was terrified now that you were closer. His hands were shaking, scratch that, his whole body was trembling. His face was white as if he’d just seen a ghost. You felt tears sting your eyes because you just wanted to help him but he wouldn’t let you in.

“Nightmare?” you ask quietly. He tilted his head and shook his head slightly. “What do you mean?”

You sigh. “Come on, Buck. I know you're not sleeping. You’re always exhausted and you always seem distracted. You’re always way too careful around me and though I love you, I know you start to push me away at times. I swear, I just want to help you, but you have to help me first and tell me what’s wrong.”

He looked at you, panic filling his eyes before closing his eyes and sighing. He sat on the edge on the bathtub and put his head in his hands again, elbows resting on his knees. “Yeah,” he croaked out. “Nightmare.”

You took that as an invitation to slowly start walking forward. “How often do you get them?” you asked.

“Whenever I close my eyes,” he responded, head still in his hands. 

You hesitated before you asked your next question. “What about?” You saw his body tense up again, and you begin to think of ways to backtrack but before you can he says two words:

“Winter Soldier.”

You pause before crouching down, now in front of him. You gently take his wrists in your hands and pull them away. It was now that you could see he was actually crying, and he wasn’t able to look at you. “Is that what this is all about?”

He looked down at the floor and nodded, still unable to meet your gaze. 

“Nothing can make sense of all of those horrible things I did,” he said.

You took a breath. “Buck, I need you to look at me while I say this. Can you do that for me?” After a few moments, he brings his gaze to meet your eyes, and you could see how much pain he harboured there. It broke your heart. “None of that was your fault, okay? You were an instrument to HYDRA, there was nothing you could do. You couldn’t help the things they made you do, okay?” You put one of your hands on the back of his neck to keep him looking at you. You now had tears in your eyes. “It’s not your fault.”

He sighed before averting his gaze. “What if it happens again? What if one day something snaps and I can’t control it? What if -” his voice cracked and he tried to regain his composure. “What if I hurt you?”

If your heart could have broken any more then it would have in that moment. “Is that what all this is about? You’re afraid you’ll - hurt me?” The new wave of tears was confirmation enough for you before he let out a shaky breath. You pulled him into his arms, but this time he didn’t tense. This time he wrapped his arms tightly around you, as if you would change your mind if he let go. 

Both of you were now crying. You were saddened by what was troubling Bucky but so relieved you had finally gotten him to talk about it. Suddenly, Bucky went on. “It’s the same every single time. They send me to kill you and there’s nothing I can do about it. I’m completely aware of what I’m doing but there’s nothing I can do to stop myself.” he shook his head. “It always ends the same way.” He pulled back, saying “I’m a monster.”

You shook your head as your eyes widened. “No, Buck -”

“Yes I am!” he exclaimed. “I’m  a danger to everyone Y/n. i just….I don’t understand sometimes. Why do you love me?”

“I know you so well. And I know that you were a part of a horrible experiment that you had no control over. You had horrible things done to you that you will probably never forget, but that’s not who you are. You are a sensitive, caring, protective man who I love and who I know loves me.” You said with a small smile. “And nothing could ever change that. Nothing You say or do will ever make me stop loving you.”

Bucky looked at you through the tears in his eyes, not wanting to ask his next question. “But what if I hurt you?”

You shrugged. “I’ve dealt with worse. Plus, I know you’ll just spend way too long trying to make up for it. You wouldn’t hurt me on purpose, Bucky. You and I both know that. And that’s enough for me.”

He searched your face, trying to look for any shred of doubt or hesitancy in what you had just said. But there wasn’t any. There was only love. He placed his right hand on your cheek. “I don’t know what I did to deserve you doll.”

You smiled at him. “You didn’t need to do anything. Do you mind if I stay for the night? I know we’ve never done it before, I just -”

You were cut off by Bucky pressing his lips onto yours. The kiss was loving and gentle, and when he pulled back, he said, “Please don’t go.”

You rested your forehead against his. “I’d never dream of it, Buck.” You smiled. “Til the end of the line, right?”

Bucky smiled back at you. “Til the end of the line.”

#bucky #buckybarnes #comfort #nightmare #avengers #mcu #marvel #bucky imagine #bucky barns imagine #bucky barns x reader #wintersoldier #nightmare comfort

[therenlover]

Five More Minutes (aka A Ten Minute Break with Imaginary Zemo)

(So uh, this is a weird little writing project I did. It’s kinda experimental and a deep dive into my messy little brain, so that’s that. I hope you guys like it, because it was just a warm up, but I decided to post it cause it didn’t turn out half bad. Sorry that it’s uber specific to me, lol)

Synopsis: A writer imagines her muse as she struggles through anxieties and self loathing. Sometimes it’s easier to pretend you’re being cared for than it is to care for yourself. 

Rating: T

Warnings; Swearing maybe? Vague references to depression and general trauma

Word Count: 2000~

------

Zemo walks through the door while I’m taking a break. 

He’s soft around the edges, watching me with a gaze that seems intent on telling me he doesn’t approve of whatever it is I had done this time. I simply regard him with a quiet nod and let my eyes drift closed once again. The bed is warm below me but a cool spring rain pours down heavy and hard outside the open window. I like to write with the breeze flowing. It helps me focus on more than wanting to sleep. This is a break, though; a small allowance of time where I can fold my hands behind my head and relax without worrying about my next deadline. I stretch my legs out further, recumbent, as he sits at the end of the bed. 

“Look who decided to come back home,” I taunt him, “How long has it been? A week? Two?” The bitterness is a farce, a facade I put up more for my own benefit than his. 

Helmut sighs before he replies, “I shall always return when you call me, Schatz,” 

“It doesn’t feel like you will.”

“Despite that, it is true,” Slowly, from behind the darkness of my still-closed eyes, I hear the soft clink of china. Interesting… I let one eye open just a sliver to peer down the bed. Helmut is sitting there, eyes full of that special adoration he holds just for me, and in his outstretched hand, he holds a steaming cup of tea. Hedging my bets, I begrudgingly set my laptop aside and reach down to take it from him. Something is better than nothing and I haven’t had water in hours, maybe days. He knows that all too well. Why else would he have brought tea?

The first sip is taken silently while Zemo simply gauges my reaction to his presence. He and I both know that I can be… picky when it comes to his affections. If they come at the wrong time I am almost certain to deny him. This time, though, he arrived at a just-right place between sleep and work that allows me to give in to his endless and thorough affections. The tea is warm and sweet, and I finish the cup less than a minute after he handed it to me. 

That makes him smile. It’s infectious. Less than a minute later I’m smiling with him. In a simple moment, all the ice that had built on my heart in the wake of his absence had melted. All it took was some good tea and his presence, strong and constant at my side, to ease the discomfort from weeks apart. 

Helmut is the one to break the silence. 

“Did you get my gift a few nights ago?”

I nod, sitting up a bit to scoot to the end of the bed. “You were the one who dropped off dinner?”

“Of course it was. I’m here to aid you, my love,” for an instant he pauses, something akin to jealousy flashing across his face, “I may be… absent sometimes, but no one else here can help you the way I do. I don’t really see why you keep them around, quite honestly. Most of them are selfish pri-”

“Helmut,” I warn him, and he backs off. He always does if I ask him to. His loyalties lie firmly in my comfort and my comfort alone. 

“The point is, you are mine and mine alone to care for. If not always, then when I can,” 

“Well, I appreciate it,” 

A practiced hand makes its way to my bare knee, exposed by my shorts. I don’t complain. Helmut is here to help, and if rubbing away the aches caused by the rain is what he wants to do, I have no objection. His digits massage it with care. The constant steady pressure is grounding. To ease the process I beckon Helmut further up onto the bed. In just a moment of shuffling, I find myself between his legs with my back to his chest as he restarts his gentle probing of my knee. I let my head rest against him and just breathe. There’s a peace to it. 

Neither of us feels the need to move. 

Somewhere outside the room, we can hear Andrea begin to practice his violin. The sweet sounds are more relaxing to me than they are to Helmut, who hates the reminder of his housemates, but he can’t deny that the boy plays well. He would like to think, though, that he plays better. I don’t pick favorites, but it’s one battle that I wouldn’t want to miss, should things come down to it. 

We stay like that for a while, him massaging my aching joints while I use his broad, soft chest as a pillow, but eventually, he speaks again. We both know what’s coming. I’m just not quite ready to acknowledge it yet. He always broaches the subject when it’s time. 

He knows I couldn’t do it if I tried. 

“You’re pushing me out again,” his voice is a low hum, “why must you always push me out just when I’ve gotten close to you?” He presses soft kisses to my hair as I sigh. It’s my turn for words but I know I can’t say them. Not to him and not to anyone else. Instead, I let myself turn cold again. 

“Maybe if you were more useful, I’d keep you around more often. Besides, you’re a grown man. You can come and go as you please. If you wanted to stay, you would,” 

“We both know that’s not true,” 

Helmut’s right. He always is. That doesn’t mean I ever listen to him, but when he softly coos in my ear about eating or resting he’s always right, I always need it. Sometimes I think it would be better if I gave in. I never do though, it’s not worth the fallout that would follow. 

Still, I let myself get a bit closer to giving in this time. Just close enough that I won’t feel so raw once he’s gone again. A modicum of extra comfort can be allowed from time to time if used sparingly, and I take the word sparingly very seriously.

“Five more minutes,” I whisper into his warm skin, “Please, I just want five more minutes,” It’s not a question, it’s a plea, and not to him. No, it’s a plea to the universe, to the cruel god that separates us…

To myself. 

Helmut removes his hand from its place rubbing out the aches in my wrists and lets his arms wrap around me, encasing me in his warmth and holding me tight to his body. He’s warm. So, so warm against the frosty chill of my own skin. 

“Of course, Schatz. I will always have five more minutes for you,” 

If Helmut had his way, he’d have every minute of my day. He doesn’t, though. He can’t. Five extra will just have to do until he finds a way to creep back through my door and into my good graces. Then we will have five more minutes again and again until there’s nothing left of us and no more minutes left to spend. Until then, the game goes on. 

Outside, the rain pick’s up its pitter-pattering into a full downpour. 

The water comes in through the opened window, but neither of us moves to close it. Water damage doesn’t matter where we are anyway. Especially not when the timer is ticking down. 

I cry when I croak out words again. 

“I don’t understand why I can’t let you stay,” I say, throat dry with angry tears, “I don’t understand why I do this to myself,”

It’s a lie, we both know exactly why I push him away, but Helmut bites his tongue. We don’t speak of those things, the things that creep deep in my mind and pull the strings of my marionette. That’s not his job. Part of me wishes it was. 

Instead of trying to explain away my reasons for doing what I do, though, Helmut simply holds me tighter. “Someday, you won’t have to. You will be happy, Schatz; happy and free to rest whenever you feel the need to. I may not be here to see it, but it will happen, and when it does you’ll know just how proud I am of you,” 

“You promise?” 

“I promise,” 

His heart thuds heavy under my ear, his weight a constant against my shoulders. If I close my eyes tight enough I can hear him humming a tune. The clock ticks down the seconds till his departure. I cling to him for every last second that I can. 

“Should I send someone else in when I leave?” He asks softly. 

I shake my head no. 

“Not even Laszlo?”

“Not even Laszlo,” I sigh. What I don’t say is that the pain of his absence will numb me of everything once he’s gone. What he doesn’t need to know can’t hurt him. Instead, I offer up some half-assed explanation from nowhere, just to make myself feel better about the lie. “He only helps me write the academic stuff. Fiction isn’t his wheelhouse,” 

“Ah,” Helmut whispers, and as he does I can feel him start to shift away. Five minutes always pass too fast in the arms of a lover. I wipe my tears as he collects my teacup. “When will you call me back to you,”

“Soon, I hope,” 

“But when?” 

He asks not for himself, but for me, because he knows what happens when I don’t call him back to me. He’s seen it in the circles rimming my eyes and the ribs that jut painfully from my skin and most of all in the wheezing coughs and winces that escape my lips when I breathe too deep. It’s my choice to make, though, and mine alone. 

I hate that I can’t give him a straight answer. 

“Maybe tonight, if I’m lucky, you can come in and hold me while I sleep,” It’s an empty promise, just short of a lie. It doesn’t matter though. It’s as close to the truth as I can bear to acknowledge for myself when my eyelids droop lower by the second. Unfortunately, I probably won’t sleep at all. 

“No dinner?” There’s no disappointment in Helmut’s voice, but I wish there was. Instead I’m met with acceptance. he knows me well enough that there is no fighting my self destruction, only easing it. 

“I’m too behind,” I explain, “It would take too much time. This break was already pushing it. I have three fics to finish by Friday and if I don’t…” The consequence went unsaid. 

Helmut nods, stoic. “I shall see you again when you call on me next, Schatz,” 

With that, he’s gone again and I’m alone. The chill from the rain sinks deep in my bones as I scrub the remaining tears and sleep from my eyes before grabbing my laptop again. Maybe if I worked a little harder, I could manage to sleep through the night or eat a whole meal. Helmut would be back then, as real as I could will him to be, to serve as a reminder and a companion through it all. 

The words on the screen seem like a foreign language. Sleep that has evaded me for days threatens to creep into my mind but I shove it out forcefully and turn up the brightness. Sleep won’t help me now, not with the aching in my heart that screams at the slightest bit of rest. The ache doesn’t have a name like the self care does, or the softness or the anger or the book-smarts. The ache is just me. 

The rest are too, but less so. They’re easier to accept that way. 

I push on.

Just a little more work… just a couple more tens of thousands of words…

Alone again and wetted by rain and tears, I weep and write.

------

a/n: Basically, Helmut is a personification of my ability to care for myself. I always want to, and I resent myself for not doing it more, but I just... can’t. Andrea and Laszlo are both also technically representative of feelings in my brain, but those feelings aren’t specified here. I hope you enjoyed that weird little ramble, though! It was nice to deep dive into my brain in a weird way and do some good, old fashioned therapy writing. I’m a slut for a good extended metaphor.

#jac rambles #jac talks about zemo #I don't blame you if you don't read this #technically its a reader insert I guess #even if its an uber specific one

[mable-stitchpunk]

What is the danger level of each of the Animatronics from Can't Go Home Again?

I’m going to break down the danger level into two factors, strength and aggression. Strength will take into account powers, weaknesses, and brute force while aggression will play into what it would take to get them into a fight and their willingness to fight. 

I’ll use this to come up with a danger level, with 1 being incapable of danger and 10 being highly dangerous. I’m going to cover the more important animatronics, but I’m willing to do a second set for the rest if anyone’s interested. I obviously won’t spoil any animatronics from Going Home in a Box.

So, here we go!

Marionette

Strength: Marionette is equipped with a slew of paranormal powers that can be used in highly dangerous ways. He has telekinesis, is capable of teleporting and hovering, and can use his strings to enwrap targets and even take control of animatronics. The downside being that he has no direct weapons and that his physical body is somewhat weak in comparison to the others. He is agile in movements and capable of springing on prey and binding them in moments, then overtaking them fully... Except-

Aggression: Marionette is a reluctant fighter. He tends to only fight when defending himself or someone else and will frequently hold himself back, if not completely ghost out of a dangerous situation. When protecting a loved one or innocent, he will go all out, but elsewise he will try to talk down a threat (in the case of animatronics) or simply not reveal himself (in the case of humans). 

Considering these factors, I would put Marionette at a 7. While he has a host of abilities that can be used to his advantage, he requires more provoking to show his full potential. His less sturdy body can also be an issue. 

Foxy

Strength: Foxy is physically stronger than a human, but only averages out in strength compared to other animatronics. He is a lot faster, however, and can use his hook to do damage. That hook- being made of actual metal- could be vicious in filleting a human. However, it would be much less impressive on an animatronic unless wiring is exposed. Strong enough to ram and knock one down, however, and surprisingly agile compared to other ‘heavy’ animatronics.

Aggression: Foxy will not attack randomly and must be provoked, but doesn’t require as much provoking as Marionette. Reluctant to attack humans- he has an image to uphold- he will go after a threatening animatronic much quicker. He also has a little bit of a temper and a good amount of pride. Very protective.

Considering these factors, I would put Foxy at a reasonable 5. He can do a good amount of damage, but he’s not as strong or versatile as other animatronics, and his need to restrain himself makes him less of a threat to humans.

Springtrap

Strength: Springtrap is strong and sturdy, with a heavy form that can deal firm blows. Not to mention that unlike some of the other animatronics, Springtrap is likely to pick up a weapon and use that to fight as well. He’s slow by nature, cautious as he enters a fray, but can be ruthless. That being said, his body can be clunky enough that he can be overtaken. He moves the most like a human, which can limit what he can do. He makes up for it with his willingness to stop and plan his next move.

Aggression: When backed into a corner, not only will Springtrap fight hard, but he is equally aggressive to humans than he would be to animatronics, though he seldom starts fights unless he wants something. He has been known to flee from the threat of a fight if injured or disinterested, but provoked enough and he will ruthlessly prolong the fight. 

Considering these factors, I would put Springtrap at a 6. Being less reckless than Foxy makes him significantly more dangerous, and his strength is impressive, but he is held back by a heavy body that he must take care to protect.

Baby

Strength: Baby’s strength is impressive and paired with her large, strong claw makes her a viable threat. She is capable of ramming into a target, knocking them down, and then grabbing their throat or a limb in her vice-like grip. Because of her roller skates, she is fast on hard flooring, which adds in to her ability to quickly overtake prey, striking them down and going in for the kill. Unfortunately, these can be a detriment on looser footing and stairs and massively slow her down. 

Aggression: Unlike some of the others who must be goaded into aggression, Baby must hold herself back. She has a fiery temper and can be provoked easily, and tends to fight with a nothing-to-lose mentality. She tends to become more irritated with humans, but doesn’t always attack them with the same aim-to-shatter goal in mind.

Considering these factors, I would put Baby at a high 7 or low 8. She’s aggressive, ruthless, and packing a lot of strength, but has a few things going against her. Including her bulkier frame, her wheels, and how defenseless she would be without her claw.

The Minireenas

Strength: They may be small, but they can be just as problematic as a larger animatronic. They swarm together and overtake their target, trying to blind and confuse them... Unfortunately, on their own they cannot do much damage, and may be knocked off easily. Working alongside another animatronic would make them much more threatening, but alone they are significantly less-so.

Aggression: But they can be aggressive. It takes a little provoking to get them to attack, but not much, and they can relentlessly dog you down. They aren’t known to pick up weapons, so their anger doesn’t lead very far.

Considering these factors, I would put the Minireenas at a 2 when in a group and at a 1 when on their own. Though if they were supporting another animatronic, I would add on a point to the other animatronics’ score.

Security Puppet

Strength: Other than general resilience, the Security Puppet’s only means of attacks currently are using outside weapons or its strings, which are less precise than Marionette’s. Currently the Security Puppet isn’t much of a direct threat, but makes up for it with her ability to strategize and work with weapons. She’s quick on her feet and can control her body well, just without many offensive abilities.

Aggression: The Security Puppet is not aggressive and pretty reluctant to fight humans. She will attack an an animatronic in self-defense, but usually tries to avoid confrontation when she can. 

Considering these factors, I would put the Security Puppet at a 3. She has the potential to be dangerous, but has a long way to go. At the moment she is at least capable of protecting herself.

Ennard

Strength: Not only is Ennard capable of impressive strength, but the makeup of his build- being made of mostly wires- allows him luxuries that other animatronics can’t afford. He can fit into tighter spaces, he can redistribute wires to temporarily mend damage, and he can forcibly assimilate animatronics if given the chance. He’s capable of electrocuting- controlled shocking- others just with his fingertips. He can mimic voices and he’s capable of feigning ignorance if it means luring something into a trap. Along with silently taking out prey one by one. It should be noted that if attacked too aggressively by another animatronic, he might run, but he won’t flee from a human. Aggression: The most threatening part about Ennard is his willingness to stalk, hunt, and purposefully strike fear into prey. While he doesn’t seem outright aggressive, being friendly most of the time, he does not take kindly to strangers, and his protective behavior shows itself in concerning ways- such as hunting down and terrorizing three men just because they scared his companion and stole a TV.  What’s worse is that, unlike the others, Ennard knows how to do this and completely get away with it. He isn’t a ruthless monster... but he’s always thinking and always hiding behind a mask.

I think it’s no surprise that I’m putting Ennard at a 9 here. Ennard is all-around the most dangerous of the animatronics, only held back by his fear of other animatronics and his usually docile demeanor. 

So, there’s the list for now! Might tweak these later and could add more if anyone’s interested.

[chrysalispen]

futilis, pt 2 (cid/nero)

Briefly NSFW but it’s more an allusion to a scene than a scene per se.

Fic under the cut as usual.

=====

  iii.

  think how it wakes the seeds—

woke once the clays of a cold star.

 -----o-----

 “What a waste of malt,” he muttered, staring into the heavy flagon. Three pints of this overpriced swill and he was barely feeling the effects. Ala Ghiri might be a miserable heap of rocks, rebels, and sweltering heat, but at least the locals’ arak could get the job done properly without emptying his pockets overmuch for the trouble.

Welcome back to the capitol.

Nero set the mug back on the table, glanced out the nearby window, and saw precisely what he expected to see: darkness and heavy snowfall. 

The small tavern sat on the edge of the university district, near an unfashionably older part of the capitol and its outlying wards. Only a few sullen-faced stragglers occupied the establishment tonight, a few Academy upperclassmen and a table of older people dressed in the common attire of city workers. The latter were wary of his presence; he could practically feel the suspicious stares boring into the fresh and unfamiliar face in their midst. He didn’t take offense to it. Such a healthy dose of caution was only to be expected, after all- but he wasn’t here on business. Not tonight.

Someone had left a stray coin on the table. Nero plucked it from the dirty surface of the table and turned it over and over in his fingers, watching the light flicker over each side before he set it upright and began to idly spin it like a top. Naught but mindless fidgeting. Something to occupy his hands while his mind went on a journey of its own. 

He’d been debriefed upon the incident, of course, before setting out on his way to the memorial service a few days past. His superior had supplied him with a dossier that included the timeline of events as recorded by the first responders to search Bozja after the castrum’s communications signals were lost. It had been a dry and dispassionate account of the catastrophe: an emotionless timeline offered by a government that cared little for the consequences of what had transpired and even less for its (mostly non-Garlean) provincial casualties.

As Nero had assumed would be the case, the army's engineers cared only for the unexpected fruit which the incident had yielded. One of the notes that had caught his eye was “projected chances of success for anti-eikon countermeasures,” phrasing he knew full well was intended to lend credence to any future action the imperial army would take against the southern savages. 

No longer a hypothesis but an inevitability. It was cold, and it was cruel, and it was utterly unsurprising.

Much like the man-killing blizzards that so often struck the city and its surrounding mountains without any warning, the Empire was a great and driving force of progress via conquest, as soulless as the ancient machina its scholars dug from the deep reaches of the star. Nero was quite willing to acknowledge that even he and Garlond were but parts of the whole when one got right down to it.  Important parts, mind, like a ceruleum pump or an ignition switch-- but still parts. Whether or not they misliked their place was immaterial. It was what it was, and they had to learn to live with it.

He’d give Garlond the time and space necessary to do what needs must in order to set this unpleasant episode aside. Shove it in a box or a locked cabinet or whatever container might be close at hand and stow it away, along with all the other distasteful things that they had been (and, doubtlessly, would be) asked to do over the years. And if Cid still hadn’t learned what was expected of a nan by now, he would simply have to learn the hard way. 

There’s been an accident. 

That hollow expression flashed into his mind’s eye once more, unnoticed by the crowd that had gathered, clustering about that lonely silver-haired figure making for the convoy. Elegant words and inoffensive platitudes following in his wake, rattling in his ears like the empty bier that had sat atop the memorial dais- and at each offering of condolence that left their lips, the creature inhabiting Cid nan Garlond’s skin had only nodded. It could have been acknowledgment or merely the twitch of a puppeteer’s fingers, tilting at marionette strings. 

...Not a pleasant visual, that. He found himself reaching for the mug again.

“Stop following me,” a voice slurred. 

A strong wave of yeast and some other unmentionable odor assailed his senses just as his fingers had started to wrap about the mug. Projecting as much outward calm as he was able, he turned to meet its owner with a cool and expressionless stare. 

“So you live,” Nero said. “I had half a mind to search every ditch between the palace and the outer wards before I remembered the old haunts. Predictable as ever.”

“Mightn’t’ve bothered.” Cid was listing slowly from side to side like a sailor in a storm, and Nero had to wonder how much he must have already had. He brought his own drink back to his lips and took a long swallow, feigning indifference to the sight of the other man’s inebriation for the moment as he grimaced at the taste. 

“I take it you’ve decided to see if the house ale is any better than it was when we were students.”

“It’s not.”

“Of course it’s not,” he scoffed. “Like making-”

“-love in a cargo hold,” Cid finished with a short laugh that surprised Nero. His own chuckle accompanied the small answering smirk he shot the other man over his flagon, but that amusement faded quickly when one of those hands fell on his shoulder. “Need to talk.”

The vessel thumped upon the worn boards of the table where he set it down. “What we need is to set you to rights.”

“No need to worry. ‘M fine.” 

“You’re piss drunk. I’d rather not end my otherwise pleasant evening holding your head over a toilet.” Nero dug into his pockets, tossed a few coins on the tabletop, and stood. His cheeks were warm and his own head swam a touch - he’d had more than he had thought, but not nearly enough for it to be a concern. He braced his arms about Cid’s broad shoulders. “We can talk somewhere else. Let’s go.”

Ignoring the shorter man’s weak protests, Nero threw on his overcoat, flashed the narrow-eyed men at the table a grin, and all but dragged his companion out into the snow. It was a walk Nero could have easily made by himself in about half an hour or so with few complications, but dragging a drunk man along was going to make it an undertaking and it was colder than he’d expected. Beneath the false glowing warmth in his cheeks, there was a bite in the wind he could feel.

Patches of black ice shimmered beneath the sterile cast of the streetlights, the bulbs’ insectoid hum the only other sound to be heard, and he saw the drifts were already close to knee-deep in places. Cid shivered under his arm, teeth chattering. Nero looked down at the sound of it, and that was when he realized the other man wore a coat and no other protection. Nothing about the neck or head. No gloves. He cursed under his breath.

“What?”

“Have you lost your senses entirely?” He plucked his woolen scarf from his throat and all but threw it at him. “Here. Put this on and keep your hands in your pockets.”

The admonition earned him a sullen glare but Cid did as he was told nonetheless, shoving his hands into the deep pockets with a graceless resentment.

The pair walked - staggered, perhaps - back towards the campus. The snow was not heavy and the wind not so fierce as to make the undertaking particularly hazardous, but there were pitfalls beyond the weather itself. Nero took the quickest and safest route he could remember to ferry them back to the provost’s bungalow, kept his eyes and ears sharp and their limited conversation superficial. A cohort on patrol duty passed them as they entered the main grounds of the Academy, and Nero lifted a hand both to acknowledge its presence and to signal that they were no threat. The armored optio, silver trim on his tabard just barely visible, offered a brief salute in return and nothing else.

Even so, he waited until the familiar outline of the provost's residence was visible - elegant columns and precise ratios and all - before he hissed, "What in the seven hells possessed you?”

"To do what?"

"Don't be bloody obtuse, Garlond. You know better." He made a rough, annoyed gesture, a flick of his wrist. "This. Drink loosens the tongue, you know that."

“I don’t-” For a small blessing, the exertion and time had let Cid regain a measure of sobriety. He looked away from Nero’s scowl, eyes shifting from side to side and his hands visibly balled into fists in the depths of his overcoat layers. “...You’re working with Gaius in Ala Mhigo, you said?”

“...I’m a pilus prior. If I end up in his presence then something has gone wrong often as not. But my direct report is his tol, yes, so I suppose in a manner of speaking.” 

“His second.” Those eyes were as hard as slate, suddenly. “Then you’re a-”

“That is not an appropriate subject for discussion.” Or a safe one. He almost regretted his sharpness but Cid’s lips snapped shut almost immediately; it was clear he had taken Nero’s meaning. “Ask your question before we both freeze to death.”

“I guess you already know they used our patents, then. The ones from our second year.”

“What are you talking about?”

“The homing device! You should know the one; you built the bloody thing. And my levinspark pulse module too.” Cid took a deep, heavy breath. “Gaius used them to take Gyr Abania, five years ago. They were part of the advance force when the XIVth Legion sacked Ala Mhigo.”

“I’m aware,” Nero said flatly, but he wasn’t finished.

“And I’m told that's not the end of it. There's talk of a much larger operation. I don’t suppose you know aught about that.” Cid’s shoulders heaved, but not from the cold or the alcohol. All his drunken petulance had disappeared with the sobering walk, and that clouded look had returned, rolling in to shroud his eyes like a fog bank. He looked tired and old- no, not old. Despairing. “Hells, Nero, what’s happened to us?”

“Speak for yourself. I’m the same as I ever was.”

“We thought we’d change the world, the two of us,” Cid said. “Do you remember?”

All too well. “Idle boys’ chatter. We were children.”

“So we were.”

“I don’t see what this has to do with anything.” 

“You said it yourself: we were children. Children, Nero.” His words were quiet, measured, but no less vehement for their lack of volume. “They patted our backs and gave us trophies and called us the future of the Empire, right before they turned around and used our toys to subjugate nations. They killed children our age and made us complicit." "Garlond-" "In the end, we didn’t make a single ilm of difference.”

“You seem to be laboring beneath the assumption that we are deserving of pity," Nero retorted. "What of it?  No one cares to hear a couple of former child prodigies cry about their past or their lost innocence, or whatever point you think you're making. As you might have noticed, we're not children any longer.”

Open reproach lay in his stare; Nero needed no further response than that. Hastily he tilted his chin upwards to stare at the leaden sky and the snow spitting from the clouds. ‘Twas a sight he would have rather ignored altogether, truth be told, but it was easier than enduring that silent rebuke. 

“That’s it, then? Off to the assembly line and not another word spoken. That's your answer? Seven hells, Nero-”

“Yes, in point of fact,” he snapped. “What excuses have we now for the blood on our hands? That we didn't know? We did. We knew full well we would be expected to do our bit the moment they could set our hands to work. We were never going to change the world, and it’s time you accepted that you were never as important as you clearly thought we were. It's all part and parcel of the machine.”

"Machine," Cid uttered a short, hysterical bark of a laugh. "A meat grinder, more like, and you and I the poor beasts in the slaughterhouse line awaiting our turn once someone more pliable comes along.” He removed his hands from his pockets. Stared down at his cold-reddened fingers as if they belonged to someone else. “I wonder how long it’ll take for them to decide we’re no longer of use and discard us like-”

“Enough.” This sort of talk could be easily taken as seditious, and the protection of Midas’ name would only go so far were there any prying ears about to listen. “Let’s get inside before we start losing toes.”

And before he could move a pair of cold chapped hands had snagged in handfuls of his coat and pulled him forward, closing the distance, and Cid nan Garlond was kissing him for the first time in over a year. He tasted like that godsawful ale and smelled like a brewery besides, but he hadn’t realized how much he had missed that sensation until it was there again: the familiar press of lips and the sigh of a yielding mouth and the dance of a tongue as it grazed across-

But they were over. They were over, they had been over for nearly a year now. He had moved on or thought he had. Cid had made it more than clear he hadn’t wanted to see or speak to him and now this?

Hurt pride warred with indignation and culminated in a forceful shove. Cid nearly tripped over the cobblestones in an attempt to correct his shaky balance and Nero had to sit hard upon the impulse to reach for him, catch him, make sure he hadn't aggravated his still-healing injury with his push. The unwanted impulse shouldn’t have served to fuel his anger, but it did. He was infuriated by his own need, hating that this was all it had taken to forget every slight, every onze of frustration, every rejection. To make him hope again that things could be the way they once were.

“If you want a body to warm your bed for the night, you've ample funds to purchase yourself a room by the hour."

"That's not what I meant to-"

"The world hasn’t stopped turning because your father died. It owes you nothing," each word hissed from his lips with precisely enunciated rage, "and neither do I."

It would hardly be the first time he had uttered bitter words or a harsh truth, but he knew this was too far. Nero's outrage faded at the sight of that crumpling, sorrowful face, replaced by a deep-seated and reluctant remorse. He was grateful for the distance that shove had put between them; his cheeks burned and it was neither with fury nor the biting cold. At least the darkness made his shame difficult to see. 

“...Get some rest.” Nero shoved his hands in his pockets and ran the edge of his tongue over his lower lip. Still damp. Tasted like cheap ale and regret. He’d be thinking about that kiss for weeks. “Drink some water before you sleep.” 

“Aren’t you coming in?”

“I need to report in and see to my travel arrangements. I can sleep on one of the benches at the depot if it comes to that.” White clouds billowed about his lips with his resigned sigh. “You can keep the muffler.”

There was the weight of a hand on his arm. He considered shrugging it off and didn’t but the impulse was strong enough that he could feel the tension thrumming through the bunched muscle of his forearm, like exposed circuitry beneath his overcoat lining. 

“Come inside,” Cid said. “It’s cold. You can sleep on the sofa and go in the morning.”

“That isn’t the point.”

“You’re right, Nero. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have… I’m sorry. Just.” His words held an unsteady wobble and his face was still the color of old paper; the pain of Nero’s inflicted wound lurked behind his eyes but paired with it was a plea for forgiveness. The patchwork beginnings of a beard on his chin kept catching the light with each movement of his mouth. “...You’re welcome to stay.”

His personal effects were still inside where they’d been the last two days. All he had to do was shove them in his bag and go if it came to that.

“Please. Just for tonight.” Uncharacteristically soft as it was, that was the Cid he knew once again- if only for these fleeting moments: that awful, listless emptiness held at bay by his contrition. “Stay.”

“I shouldn’t,” he said.

He stayed.

iv.

  are limbs, so dear-achieved, are sides

full-nerved, still warm, too hard to stir?

 -----o-----

“The Emperor means to appoint me  primus architectus.”

The door had barely shut behind him before Cid had blurted the words aloud. He stood in the parlor half-soaked and utterly forlorn, snowmelt dripping into the nap of the Thavnairian rug from his overcoat, nose and cheeks stained scarlet from the cold. 

“A veritable family enterprise.” He felt something in his stomach freeze and a stinging heat, rising just behind his nose as his ears began to ring. “I suppose you expect me to congratulate you.”

“No! No, just… listen, there was a summons waiting for me this morning. I’m to be at the palace tomorrow but I-”

He couldn’t take it any longer. “Stop.” 

“What?”

“We can talk about anything else.” 

Cid said nothing but his eyes, feverishly overbright, glittered like mica from the hollows of their sockets. Bitterness surged from the depths of Nero’s chest in a tidal wave; how a man who possessed everything he had ever wanted for himself could be this dissatisfied with such a frankly enviable lot in life- 

He busied himself with removing his coat and shoes. He tossed the former haphazardly at the hanger by the door - the hanger which, he realized with an internal cringe, still had Midas’ heavy woolen field overcoat draped on one end, a fine layer of dust having settled upon the shoulders and collar. Shoes off, one, two, the thump dull and wet and reverberating through the floorboards.

That done, wits sufficiently gathered, he was able to turn his attention back to the issue at hand. Cid had at some point removed his own coat; it lay half on the floor and half draped over the arm of a nearby chair. He stared sightlessly out the massive parlor window where the heavy drapes had been pulled back (no wonder it’s so godsdamned frigid in here, Nero thought). On the far side of the tempered glass panes, snow and ice granules settled into the mortar patterns along the cobbled walkway until each stone was limned in glittering, crystalline white. 

“Anything else,” Nero repeated. This time it was a touch more measured. 

As he had half-expected, the concession went unacknowledged- although it did afford him the luxury of surreptitious scrutiny. Cid had no idea how handsome he truly was, had never known and never cared (another aspect of Garlond’s personality which never failed to gnaw at him, that artlessness which was so irritatingly and unfathomably genuine). The lamplights cast a warm glow against his fine platinum hair.

But that flat and empty stare was so disquieting. 

“What really happened?” he went on, quietly. “That day-”

“I already told you I don’t remember.” Cid’s mouth drew downwards into a tired bow, eyes cast askance at the window again. “It hardly matters now at any rate.” 

He had seen it before all too often: the tightly controlled terror etched like Allagan script into the faces of conscripts younger than himself. Peasants pressed into imperial service, given no more quarter by the Empire than the enemies they were made to kill in its name. Bearing witness to the desolation that grief had made of Cid’s defenses, Nero understood at last. It was precisely the same. 

And as to the whys and wherefores-- well, that was perfectly obvious in hindsight. “You think he’s going to put you on Midas’ project.”

“Yes.”

“I’ve seen the-” Nero caught himself before he could say postmortem. “...The reports. VIIth Legion’s R&D seems to think they already have all the information they need.”

Cid was shaking his head before he had even finished speaking. “You said you didn’t want to discuss it,” he said. “So we won’t.”

“Garlond.” The utterance of his name caught Cid’s attention - not the name, but the timbre with which it was spoken: for Nero, it was something almost gentle. “You’ve surely not decided to blame yourself for this, have you?”

“Father didn’t do it by himself. Not all of it.” Nero’s eyes snagged upon the dip in Cid’s throat as he swallowed. “I was one of his assistants. I knew the dangers. I should have gone to him sooner than I did. Perhaps if I had-”

“What was it he used to tell us? Hindsight vision is always perfect? It was an accident,” his voice was a rough and uneven rasp, “just an accident. That’s all. There was no rhyme nor reason. It could have happened to anyone.”

“I suppose.”

“The only opinion that should matter is His Radiance, and thus far his reaction should be provisionally encouraging.” Somewhat begrudgingly, eyes fixed at some vague point over Cid’s shoulder, Nero added: “Or so one would assume.”

The ghost of a smile flickered in Cid’s eyes then, its echo a faint twitch at the corner of his lips. They stood in awkward silence for a beat or three, listening to the hum of the hallway radiator as with considerable effort Nero dragged his gaze away from his perusal of the other man’s face.  That ship has long sailed,  he reminded himself.  And you already told him no.

“I’ll get the extra blankets,” Cid said at last. "For the sofa. I’m… The staff is supposed to change the linens daily. They would have already had them out, but I sent them on their way early tonight.”

“Why? No witnesses to watch you drink yourself into a stupor?”

His cheeks flushed with embarrassment at the pointed drawl. “...Something like that, yes,” he admitted. “I’ve been using Fath-... the guest room. I wanted to be left alone. Besides, you’ve travel ahead of you in the morning, and the bed’s already made, so I’ll take the sofa.”

“What? Don’t be ridiculous. I’m not kicking you out of your bed.”

“Who said you were kicking me out?” There it was, the annoyed jut of his lower jaw and the tight and unamused press of his lips. “I’m offering you the space.”

“And I’m telling you, Garlond,  keep it.” 

“If you weren’t so bloody stubborn- ”

“If you weren’t so godsdamned overbearing- ”

They were shallow wells, both run dry; all that remained were limbs and eyes and mouths to say the words neither could (or would) speak. Cid’s eyes were dark as twin stormclouds, the distant dullness temporarily displaced by his passing irritation, and the sight brought to mind a memory of the summer squalls which frequented Nero’s boyhood home: the thunderheads rolling like an avalanche across the sky with little warning, the deep levin-struck rumbling that shook the roots of the land and echoed through the mountain pass. Wind gusts with their sharp bites of chill, driving shepherds and their flocks into nearby caverns. All of it fueled by that violent clash of cold and heat which always presaged an oncoming storm.

Like a string pulled too taut the tension between them winnowed down to its barest fraying threads and lingered perhaps a breath too long,  inhale, exhale,  and in that beat it was Nero who closed the distance between them, making a liar of himself with two gathered handfuls of fine-woven linen and the crash of his mouth against his colleague's, rough and angry and demanding.

A renewal of hostilities, perhaps. Or simply a seized opportunity, to finish what Garlond had started outside in the freezing bloody cold.

He would not have taken it amiss had the other man pushed him away as he had done, excoriated him for his hypocrisy. Instead he found himself stumbling backward with arms twined about his neck and hands grasping for his shoulders, through the parlor and into the hallway until his back met the wall with an ungentle thump: a startling jolt that might have knocked the breath from his lungs if there had been breath to take. If that hadn’t already gone from him, stifled in the cavernous warmth of a familiar mouth, stolen alongside the hidden parts of what heart he had to give, leaving his gut on fire and his legs trembling.

“I thought you told me to buy myself a room,” the murmur reached his ear but it was one he felt as much as heard, the soft whisper of cooling breath upon damp lips, tracing the patterns of the words with the tip of his tongue.

Nero was a liar-- one lacking both the wherewithal and the patience to dissemble further. 

“Shut up, Garlond,” he growled. "Yours will suffice."

Cid laughed (or perhaps he was merely hearing things). But the way that mouth fit against his was as much like coming home as it had ever been.

 ~*~

 Sleep was an elusive creature. He laid awake into the small, still hours of early morning with sweat still drying in a fine dew upon his skin, hooded periwinkle eyes fixed upon the paneled ceiling. The warmth and surety of his lover draped dozing against his bare chest, his stubble-roughened cheek pillowed by smooth flesh and a small forest of wiry golden curls, should have been a comfort.

It felt like a millstone, weighing him into the mattress. 

Nero couldn't remember now exactly when they had ended up moving from the hallway and into the modestly furnished guest room, nor had he particularly taken mind of the moment when their clothes had come off. He did commit to memory the bits he felt worth keeping. That bracing contrast of cool air on his skin when he had finally cast aside the restriction of his smalls, the avarice in blue eyes as they beheld the sight of him, the heat and slick agility of a greedy tongue and a greedier mouth to punctuate curses and narrow thrusts. The sharp relief and the myriad tiny pinpricks of light shuttered behind his eyelids just before the aching coil of desire released its grasp upon him and he had spilled, Cid's name little more than a wrecked and wasted moan in his ears, to dwindle into memory and silence.

His fingers tangled idly in fine strands of platinum, combing through their softness while tracing with his gaze the grain of the wood above. Remarkable, he thought, to see such workmanship in a residence here now. The stone and metal structures of the city were homogenous, streamlined, and almost universally ugly in their sterility but the small imperfections and minute flecks of color made him think of the little garret he'd slept in as a boy.

Sentimentality had little place in his life now. That, too, was the way of things. 

"You're still awake," the sleep-gravelled voice muttered against his shoulder, stirring and adjusting position on the mattress. Linen and carbon-insulated weighted cotton shifted to and fro over them, beneath it all the soft creak of the bed frame, "Don't tell me after all that, you still aren't-"

The hand gentling through Cid's hair paused. Drifted downwards. Draped at last over his waist with a faint, insincere chuckle. "I never want for stamina."

"Nor obstinacy. Get some sleep."

"Are you going to meet with the Emperor tomorrow?"

He felt the slight lift and drop of shoulders. Small and uneasy. "...I reckon I should at least hear what His Radiance has to say."

"You already know what he has to say," Nero said, not quite able to hold his impatience at bay. 

"Aye. I do." 

And with those three words that unspoken barrier dropped back between them just as it had been before, holding him at arm's length. Despite the shared warmth of their bodies the room no longer felt as comfortable- and then he had not even that, for Cid was already sitting up and fumbling over the edge of the bed for his smalls.

"Where are you going?"

"The sofa," Cid grunted, wriggling his hips as he dragged the fabric up his legs and over trim buttocks. He didn't even glance at Nero.

"Look, Garlond, if this is about what I said-"

"It isn't."

"Then stay," he could hear an annoyed edge creeping back into his voice; the warm and expansive mood between them was quite gone now. Nor did he expect its return- but a part of him still wanted to try. "I'll set the alarum so we're not-"

Cid was already shaking his head, a rueful tilt upon soft lips, pained and sorrowful, as he gained his feet. There was something altogether too careful about that smile and it silenced him as no angry words ever could. As infuriating as Nero all too often found his old classmate, his emotions had ever been an open book-- but like his cold apathy, this veiled, furtive look was not something he had seen before. It felt just as wrong and out of place as that numb disinterest, and he could neither read this expression nor understand what had engendered it. 

"I've got used to sleeping alone, Nero," Garlond said, with some strange and unexpected tenderness. His hand settled upon the doorknob, turned, and opened as he crossed the threshold. "As have you, I expect."

The door clicked shut without a pause and a chill as deep as winter sank into his chest. 

  v.

 was it for this the clay grew tall?

 -----o-----

  "I accept," he said. 

For all that it was a former royal residence, Nero always found himself distinctly underwhelmed by the viceroy's palace. The entire affair was a garish collection of painted purple sandstone and ill-kept mosaics from the barbarian kings that had ruled this land before it had felt the Empire's boot upon its neck, sparsely furnished to the point of seeming austerity. It had all the look of a space that saw little use beyond the viceroy's occasional desire for private discussions.

"Strictly speaking, this is not an appointment I would consider were you either only an engineer or only an officer. You came highly recommended on both counts." The room was also stiflingly warm; the climate unit that had been so hastily installed a few years ago was malfunctioning again and Nero was sweltering in his carbonweave. Regardless, he managed to remain at parade rest as the legatus addressed him. "To be clear: at this time, we have no plans for this artifact. It is to be considered merely a research opportunity, something which you had expressed interest in pursuing per your query."

"Of course."

Baelsar hesitated- just a slight hitch in the planes and slopes of broad shoulders, nothing a less observant individual would have noted - before he added:

"There are certain... additional conditions, all commensurate to this posting, which you might wish to review ere you formally accept the offer. Should you prefer to give the matter some thought-"

"No need, my lord. I find the terms quite amenable." 

Any surprise he might have expressed lay well-concealed beneath his helm but his body language was the picture of consternation - consternation which Nero ignored in favor of a long study of terrain through the dusty panel of tempered glass. The impromptu dig site was some distance away, situated very close to the edge of the salt loch, but the palace sat at the very top of the hill upon which the city had been built. Even from here, he could perceive the great hole carved into the rocky earth, its edges made jagged by ancient stone and sand and root.

Below that detritus of collected eons lay the Black Wolf's unexpected prize: a sleeping beast of Allagan steel and artifice.

"So," he continued, "this is why you requested an expert."

"Yes, though I have other matters which you are to oversee. Your primary directive, for the time being, will be to assist your fellow tribunes in seeing the Agrius and its crew made battle-ready. Once that mission is completed I would have you investigate the matter in more detail." Nero watched the man turn away with his gloved hands clasped behind his broad back. It was not a question; the legatus would have done his due diligence beforehand. "In truth, I had hoped to have Cid nan Garlond as my consult, but one must make do."

He chose to say nothing. His hands curled into fists, clenched tightly and safely at their position behind his back.

"Speaking of which, I don't suppose you've had any contact with him."

"Why would I have had contact with Garlond, my lord?"

It sounded more defensive than he would have wished and there was no hiding that, and he could see in the curious tilt of the other man's head that it had not gone unnoticed. "Perhaps you are unaware, but I fostered him for a time when he was young. Midas nan Garlond is an old friend, you see. I'm told the two of you were similarly close-"

"Something of an overstatement, I'm afraid," Nero said. "We were classmates."

"Nothing more?"

Perhaps it was folly, remaining under the command of a man who had raised the closest thing to a real friend Nero had ever had- but it was a calculated risk. The Empire looked upon defectors and deserters as the same stripe of beast: craven and treasonous, worthy of naught save the hangman's noose, and surely Garlond had not been spared that endemic disdain simply by virtue of who he was. 

Surely not. Seven hells, he had to get lucky sometime.

Besides which, any anger he felt was from the affront the man's feckless existence had proven. The boundless webs of opportunity he had taken for granted, the constant praise and acknowledgment he had clearly considered his due. It was very specifically not that cold clench in the gut Nero had felt when he had awakened at first light and discovered himself alone in the former domicile of a dead man. 

No, it was his turn now. His time had come; he felt that very keenly. Garlond was persona non grata. This was a new chapter in his own tale, yet to be written, and if he was a cog in the machine at least there was purpose to be found in ambition. In serving himself- and in future, any endeavor he chose would be for that reason alone.

There would be no more weakness. 

"Nothing more," he said.

     -----o-----

  oh, what made fatuous sunbeams toil

to break earth's sleep at all?

 -----o-----

#chrysalispen writes #cid garlond #nero tol scaeva #cid/nero

[bluejayblueskies]

eucharist

Part 5 of Whumptober 2020

Fandom: The Magnus Archives Characters: Jonathan Sims, Martin Blackwood, Jonah Magnus Tags: Whump, Graphic Depictions of Violence, Major Character Death, Suicide/Martyrdom

Read on Ao3

The knife rips a jagged line across Jonah Magnus’s shoulder, and Jon begins to bleed.

 Martin is breathing heavily, the knife clutched in his hand stained crimson red, and he’s moving toward Jonah again—like they’d agreed, standing just outside the Panopticon where the Eye began to merge with itself and its vision blurred, reviewing their plan a final time—so he doesn’t see Jon stagger, catching himself against a wall and feeling hot, sticky blood begin to soak into his shirt. “This is all a bit clumsy, don’t you think, Martin?” Jonah says, with a smile that makes Jon’s stomach turn. “Not your best work, I’m afraid. But A for effort, I suppose.”

 “Oh, I’m not finished,” Martin says, the dangerous edge to his voice accentuated by the way he holds the knife ever so slightly closer to Jonah. “You think you’re- you’re invincible, sitting up here above the rest of the world, but you’re not. You can bleed just like anyone else, so you can die just like anyone else.”

 Jonah’s smile grows a bit wider. “I’m sure. But you may want to… reevaluate your current situation before doing anything rash.”

 “No! No, you don’t get to- to distract me, or beg for your life, or whatever this is! You just don’t want to admit that- that we have you cornered.”

 Jonah eyes the knife in Martin’s hand with some contempt. “I would hardly say cornered. I do believe you’ve rather overestimated your comparative strength to mine. I simply thought you might want to know the effect any sort of… damage you cause me may have.”

 Jon’s within himself enough now to say, a bit unsteadily, “Martin, I- I think you should—”

 “No, Jon, can’t you see? He’s- he’s making excuses, trying to get in our heads, but it’s not going to work. Not this time. You don’t get to just- just end the world and expect everyone to be okay with that!”

 “Martin,” Jon says, more insistently.

 “Jon, can we just—?”

 Martin turns to look at Jon. And his words grind to a halt.

 “Wh… what?” Martin says distantly. He looks at Jon’s shoulder, then Jonah’s, then at the knife still clutched in his hand, stained with a dull crimson. His eyes are wide with agonizing fear and sharp concern. “Oh fuck. Jon, are you—?”

 “Yes, I’m- I’m okay.” Jon’s smile of reassurance turns into a bitter glare as he turns it toward Jonah. “You did this.”

 Jonah’s grin is like ice down Jon’s veins. “In part, yes. Though I can’t take all the credit, of course. The Spider has been quite useful in the past, and calling on her favor in this regard was a… surprisingly simple affair. A few threads here and there, woven between the words that made this- this kingdom we now rule—well, it’s much more straightforward than the intricacies the Spider typically employs.”

 Quietly, Jon says, “We?”

 “Of course.” Jonah extends his hands, gestures to the world around them. “For better or for worse, this is just as much your world as it is mine.”

 “Don’t,” Jon says sharply. “Don’t pretend like we’re equal. Like you didn’t use me as a tool in your- your grand plan to become the immortal ruler of a desolate wasteland. Funny that you didn’t say ‘we’ when talking about how you would be the king of a ruined world.”

 At this, Jonah looks a bit annoyed. “Necessary sacrifices, I suppose. Though the perks certainly outweigh the shackles.”

 “So what,” Martin says, his voice shaking slightly. “If- if you’re hurt, then Jon…?”

 “Then Jon will be hurt in kind,” Jonah finishes, and the hint of glee in his voice makes an angry heat rise within Jon, alongside something else that’s hard and heavy and nestles in his chest, pulsing in time with his heartbeat.

 “That’s- Christ, that’s—” Martin looks at Jon, almost pleadingly. “So we’re just supposed to let you- let you sit here and watch the entire world suffer for all eternity?”

 Eternity. No, it won’t be eternity, Jon thinks. In this world where all fears are realized, though the Eye oversees them all, the End will eventually lay its claim to all that can still fear it. Even in this place of pain and terror, all things end, and inevitability runs thick as tar beneath reality in pulsing black vines that wrap their way around every living, thrumming soul. Including Jonah Magnus.

 Including him.

 Slowly, oh so slowly, Jon begins to draw his knife.

 “Oh, come now Martin,” Jonah says. “It won’t be that bad. After all, you’ve already won, in a way. You’re free to come and go as you please. And you’ve certainly earned your place in this wonderful new world we’ve all created together.”

 No, that’s- that’s not quite right, Jon thinks. To create implies a blank slate on which to spin a thought, an idea from nothing to everything, to build layers and layers atop an infinitesimally small point until a thing has grown that’s wild and free and a product of yourself all the same. This world is not that. It did not begin from nothing. It began from something as old as time, perhaps older. It grew and spread from the cracks in reality, through which fear bled and infected all those it touched. It grounded itself in a connection, built of shining silver thread and attached to fourteen mirrored pinprick points on two bodies that are now inextricably bound to the world’s very core. Jon can feel each thread thrum in time with his heartbeat as he slips the knife free, the shine of silver winking once in the sickly red light of the Panopticon before he presses the blade against his throat, where it nestles against another mark, made so long ago, perhaps the deepest of the ones that mar his soul.

 He doesn’t want to die. He so, so badly wants to live. To see the world be born anew and begin to regrow. To visit the cows with Martin, and to wake to the smell of freshly brewed tea and buttered toast. To watch months turn into years turn into decades, and to see the grey in Martin’s hair begin to match his in intensity, and to let love and peace consume him. But he lost that chance the moment he picked up Jonah’s statement. Everything since has just been borrowed time.

 At least it had been lovely, for a while. At least he has the memory of bliss.

 Jonah’s mouth is twisted in a smirk as he says, “Oh, come now, Jon, you’re not really going to—”

 And Martin’s eyes are wide and frantic and desperate as he says, “Jon, what- what are you doing? Wait, don’t—!”

 And Jon feels hot tears run down his cheeks as he says, voice breaking, “Martin, I love you. And I’m so, so sorry.”

 It hurts a lot less than Jon had thought it would. Completing that aborted motion from so long ago. There’s a clatter from somewhere in front of him, and then there are hands cupping his face, hands pressing down tightly on the deep gash in his throat as it weeps sticky crimson, hands pulling Jon into a tight, desperate embrace as the flood of red becomes too much to contain.

 “Jon, no.” It comes through a fog, a darkness that creeps in on light feet. “Jon, please. Please don’t leave me. I- this isn’t fair, this wasn’t- this wasn’t supposed to—”

 A sob, ripped free from an unwilling throat.

 “I love you. I love you, Jon, I can’t lose you. I can’t—”

.

“—do this without you. I don’t want to—”

 Another sob tumbles free, and Martin can’t look at his eyes, because if he looks, then he’ll see the dull hazel staring back at nothing, milky and unseeing and unseen. And he can’t- he just can’t. God, everything had happened so fast. It’s not fair.

 Jon had just—

 And Martin hadn’t even gotten the chance to say goodbye.

 Jonah had crumpled, like a marionette with its strings cut, in tandem with Jon. Martin had thought, all the times that he’d imagined Jonah’s death, either by his own hand or by someone else’s or simply by some stroke of blind luck, that he’d feel relieved. Happy. Elated, even. Now, he just feels like a hand has reached through his chest and pulled out everything it could get ahold of.

 Martin holds Jon tightly to him and lets his body shake with sobs, even as the red light begins to pulse erratically around them, and the stone walls of the Panopticon begin to crumble, and the strings that had held this world together begin to unravel and snap, taking the fear along with them. He holds him as the dust clears, after what might be hours or might be weeks, and the faintest glimmer of sunlight begins to peak between the clouds of grey soot that cover the sky, illuminating patches of green grass poking through broken concrete slabs. He holds him as people, shaking and grieving and broken but not scared—never again scared—begin to stagger out under the open sky, no longer wide and unblinking.

 A pair of gentle hands fold around his, and a soft voice that calls itself Georgie murmurs an apology and an instruction, to come on, Martin. It’s… it’s time. He thinks her hands will come away sticky, but it’s been too long; the blood has dried, and the light has died, and Jon’s so cold.

 Martin thinks, distantly, that Jon’s always had terrible circulation. When he gets the time, he… he should make him a sweater, and they can curl up by the fire with blankets wrapped around their shoulders and mugs of hot chocolate clutched between their hands, and maybe they’ll get a cat.

 Jon’s so cold. Martin holds him tighter, and tries desperately not to feel at all.

#whumptober2020 #no.9 #for the greater good #the magnus archives #fic #blood tw

[yourpaceangel]

like a prayer for which no words exist

[Read here on AO3]

There are places [1] Crowley likes to go when it all gets to be a little much, like a snake seeking a hole for refuge from a storm. That Aziraphale is the storm is surprising, or maybe not surprising at all. These places are holy - lowercase h - in that they are undisturbed, protected, and treasured. A reprieve. An indrawn breath before drowning. They are places Crowley goes that Aziraphale does not visit. That’s not to say that the angel doesn’t know where they are, simply that he does not go where Crowley does not ask for him.

[1] A rooftop garden in New York City. A cozy nook inside St. Paul’s. A patch of red dirt outside Tuscon, Arizona. An old iron bench just outside Kensington Gardens. The bosom of Eden.The edge of the World. Others, dozens maybe, that Crowley knows by feel and not name.

He’s in New York two days after the Apocolypse-That-Wasn’t, high up in a humid class cage full of shivering plants that know both fear and reverence. The Orchids have become fussy in his absence refusing to stand straight out of pure defiance. The English Ivy, the oldest, grows thick and lovely in creeping vines along the ceiling and walls. It almost seems to sigh at Crowley as he brandishes a pair of shears menacingly at the disobedient Orchids.

“Not you as well,” Crowley sneers, shaking the shears at the wall, “I won’t hear it.”

In the corner a Snake Plant shakes almost fondly. Crowley hisses, terrible yellow eyes drawn into slits, and it stops moving, its tall leaves stretching skyward as if in surrender. Crowley clicks his tongue and goes back to fussing with the Orchids.

“Don’t know why I even bother. I should just bin the lot of you.”

He does not. Crowley has known these plants for a long time. He takes a seat on the floor amongst empty pots and potting soil, dirt on his hands and smudged along a sharp cheekbone because he allows it to be. There’s something satisfying about the mess. He wonders, vaguely and quite without meaning to, if that is how She feels about Her Creation. Crowley snarls and kicks out at the leg of a table. It wobbles, the pots atop it shuddering with the force, before going still.

An impossible Honeysuckle bush in the opposite corner blooms for him, sickly sweet in her smell. The orchids finally stand upright, maybe sensing the shift in their Master’s mood or maybe just tired of being contrary. Crowley is no longer looking at them, however. His eyes have drifted up, through the English Ivy curling sweetly along the ceiling, where gray skies hang fat and heavy in the sky. The rain starts first as a light pat and, as Crowley watches, works its way to a torrent. Between this and the overwhelming smell of sweet Earth, Crowley can almost fall asleep.

It’s tempting, and Crowley does love temptations. A hundred year nap after The-End-That-Almost-Was feels well deserved, but Aziraphale gets dreadfully worried if Crowley is gone for too long. He’s startled by a creeping vine tangling around his ankle. He shakes his leg. “Off with you, you annoying little bugger.”

The vine squeezes once before letting go and all at once Crowley misses Aziraphale so dearly it makes his stomach ache. In a wild fit of temper he reaches for an empty pot to throw and smashes it against the wall.

smash

Then another-

smash

And another-

smash smash smash

Until he is left empty and the wall of Ivy is bruised.

Crowley moves then, shaking, standing to shove the table aside with less care than it deserves, cutting his feet open upon broken terra cotta. He rests a hand, gently now, on the Ivy and pulls away green fingers like he’d made it bleed. He puts his hand to the wall again, burying his hand amongst the leaves and pushes . “Dreadfully sorry old chap.” Crowley says and feels the Ivy pulsate around his fingers. [2]

[2] Long ago Aziraphale had given Crowley a little cutting of Ivy from the side of his bookshoppe. “Perhaps you can take up gardening,” the angel said wryly. The Ivy had pulsed in Crowley’s hand then as well, like it was trying to hold him.

Crowley untangles his fingers from the Ivy and it shivers once before stilling. He moves the table back into place and waves a hand dismissively at the floor, clearing the pots. The storm outside rages on and he paces, leaving bloody footprints along the concrete. The garden suddenly feels stifling and Crowley leaves without a word, letting the door clap closed behind him.

His place in Mayfair is bitterly cold when he lands. The rain in America had soaked him down to his bones, and the accompanying rain here is nothing short of depressing. Crowley drops his jacket in a puddle at the door, rolling his shoulders. In his shadow, along the wall, his wings tremble from the cold.  He drapes himself over the couch and turns his space heater on with a snap. The little machine wheezes and coughs a moment before turning on. It’ll be awhile before the room is warm enough to drive the chill from him but for now this is the best he can manage.

Not even a minute later there comes a polite but insistent knocking from the front door. Crowley groans, slinging an arm over his eyes. He knows the longer he makes Aziraphale wait [3] the worse it will be, but he can’t make himself answer the door. Crowley waves his hand, instead, and hears the front door click open.

[3] Who could it be but Aziraphale? No other being would bother knocking.

There’s a shuffling from the entry hall as Crowley imagines Aziraphale hanging up his coat and then doing the same with Crowley’s. He can almost see the wrinkled nose and furrowed brow that the angel would make seeing it there on the floor.

“What do you want, angel?” Crowley asks before Aziraphale is even properly in the room.

“Hullo my dear,” Aziraphale sounds cheery but also awfully worried, “I hadn’t seen you since - well, since-” Since they’d swapped bodies back; since Crowley had turned tail and ran from St. James’s Park like the Devil himself had been on his heels. “And I thought I might pop over for a bit, yeah? I brought a bottle of Chateau Haut-Brion from the cellar.”

Crowley sniffs a little and finally drags his arm from his eyes. Aziraphale looked windswept and a little damp, standing in the doorway with a bottle of needlessly expensive wine. Aziraphale smiles [4] and holds up the bottle.

[4] It was a vulnerable and easily broken smile, something Crowley felt wholly undeserving of.

Crowley makes himself sit up. “Uh, yeah, okay.” He sounds a bit stupid.

“I’ll get some glasses,” Aziraphale says and furrows his brow, “You’re awfully soaked my dear, maybe you should change clothes.”

The little space heater must be working overtime, Crowley feels a touch too warm and tugs at his collar. “I don’t need you to mother me,” he says without heat.

“Someone has to,” Aziraphale counters, not unkindly, and goes to find the wine glasses.

They stay up too late and drink too much wine. Aziraphale says it’s a celebration, that they’d prevented the World from ending. And certainly they had. The World, but not Crowley’s world. No. That had ended when Aziraphale had put his hand in Crowley’s and squeezed. When he had held on for a touch too long afterward and Crowley felt seen . It had felt too much like a promise. Crowley had never been good with those. And yet, it was hard to feel shattered with Aziraphale at his side now even if he did feel entirely undeserving of the attention.

Aziraphale’s necktie is askew and his hair fluffed from running his fingers through it too many times. He’s got his head tilted back in a laugh, more free than Crowley has seen him in centuries. His smile, when he turns it on Crowley, is beatific and absolutely sloshed.

“My dear,” Aziraphale says, loud and merry, “whatever are you staring at?”

You , Crowley thinks, You, blessed you . What he says is, “Your hair looks ridiculous. A proper bird’s nest.”

“My hair?” Aziraphale runs a hand through it again, tugging lightly at the front. “You think my hair looks ridiculous?”

“Utterly.”

“You- your hair is ridiculous!”

“That so, angel?”

“That’s so!”

“Hm.” Crowley brings his wine glass up to hide his smile.

“Don’t laugh at me,” Aziraphale cries petulantly, shooting forward to press a finger against Crowley’s lips as if to silence him.

crash

Crowley jerks back, his wine glass on the floor in pieces, wine seeping down into the granite leaving stains like blood.

“Oh dear,” Aziraphale exclaims, “Oh my dear I’m so sorry.”

Crowley can barely hear him over the loud thump of his own heart. “That’s-” He clears his throat, “That’s quite alright.”

“I’ve ruined it, haven’t I?”

“Nothing a minor miracle can’t take care of.” Crowley’s going for nonchalant but he can’t look Aziraphale in his eyes.

“No I mean-“ Aziraphale’s weight shifts, the couch creaking below him, “Well I suppose I mean this, you and I?”

“I haven’t the faintest idea what you’re on about.”

“Crowley you won’t even look at me.”

Crowley does, just to be contrary. Aziraphale looks incredibly pained and sad. It’s reminiscent of another time, when Aziraphale had sat in the front of his Bentley and said “ you go too fast for me, Crowley.” “Honestly angel,” Crowley says and this time the lie burns , “I haven’t the foggiest what you’re going on about.”

Aziraphale’s mouth works, gaping like a fish out of water before closing. He frowns, lips pursed in a thin line, his face stony. “You’re right, of course, my dear boy,” He stands and makes a minor show of dusting off his slacks. Aziraphale is at once alarmingly sober. “I’ve got- I have business to attend to, back at the shop, so unfortunately I must take my leave.”

“Are you sure?”

“More so than you.” Aziraphale waves his hand and the mess on the floor clears itself. “Goodnight my dear.”

“Night,” Crowley echoes hollowly.

When Aziraphale leaves Crowley drops back onto his couch, like a marionette with its strings cut.

Crowley spends the next three days in the Sonoran Desert. It’s a place that feels both like birth and death, something that used to breathe life and now works so hard to sustain it. He remembers Eden [5] and can think of nothing else.

[5] At night he sits and stares upward at the stars, more than he can see even on the clearest night in London, his wings spread wide and high. The desert does not sleep around him, creeping scorpions and roaming serpents give him a wide berth but he can feel them. He feels more, here, than any other place he knows.

He could stay here forever, unbothered by humanity or the creatures around him. Just himself and the cacti and the stars. He used to spend centuries alone- invisible -but now it only takes a few days for the familiar ache to settle.

He’d come here to be away from Aziraphale, but he misses him just as deeply as if he’d stayed in London. Crowley slumps over the arm of a small saguaro, lets the pins press into his hands like tiny daggers just to feel something other than this constant ache.

The plant is unbothered by him, resolutely silent when he wails his despair.  A group of pronghorn dart away, startled by the sudden noise. A sidewinder slips between his feet and flicks a tongue upward in irritation.

Crowley rips the needles out of his palms with his teeth, digging into flesh and drawing blood. Deep dark red, the same color as wine splashed across his granite. He wants to go home. He wants to see Aziraphale. For the first time in a long time those both seem like different goals.

Aziraphale finds him two days later in St. James’s Park, splayed under a tree and hiding from the swollen dark rain clouds hanging pregnant in the sky. “Budge up,” Aziraphale says, taking a seat on the ground next to him. The air smells charged, like it’s waiting for lightning. Crowley grunts and slithers over closer to the trunk so Aziraphale can come further under the leaves.

They say nothing for a while. Crowley is used to companionable silences but this doesn’t feel like one. [6] Finally Crowley says, “I’m sorry.”

[6] This feels like they’re both choking on words they don’t know how to say and it’s left them speechless.

Aziraphale looks down at him, eyes wide with surprise, “My dear boy, whatever are you sorry for?”

‘Whatever I’ve done to make you seem so sad’ Crowley thinks. Crowley shrugs a shoulder sending a beetle scampering. “For last week I s’pose, I must’ve done something awful to make you leave in such a rush.”

“Ah,” Aziraphale looks away, his cheeks flushing a delicious pink, “I ought apologize myself for that, leaving in such a huff was very ill mannered of me. I was quite drunk.”

“S’fine.”

Aziraphale clears his throat, “Well, I suppose that’s settled.” His eyes find Crowley’s eyes again, even through the dark glass of his Valentinos and he smiles. “Lunch?”

They end up in Soho at a tapas place called Barrafinna. Aziraphale adores the tapas, Crowley is more in favor of the sherry. Crowley feels more at ease during lunch, like he had dining with Aziraphale in the days before the Apocolypse-That-Could-Have-Been and soon enough he’s letting Aziraphale tempt him into tiny bites from his plate. Twice Aziraphale feeds him with his fingers and Crowley’s ears nearly set to flame from burning. It’s all he can do not to bolt out the door.

Aziraphale dabs at his mouth with a napkin, making a pleased noise as he does. “Utterly scrumptious. Are uh, are you going to finish that my dear?”

Crowley shakes his head and pushes his dessert plate across the table.

“Ah, thank you.”

Crowley hums, chin resting in the palm of his hand. ‘I missed you’ he thinks, and then shakes himself for being silly because he’d only been gone a few days.

Aziraphale chews with his eyes closed, face scrunched up in something close to bliss. Underneath the table, Crowley squeezes his own knee with his free hand because suddenly he’d very much like to reach across the table and touch .

“Good?” Crowley asks, just for something so say, only so he doesn’t say anything stupid.

“Marvelous,” Aziraphale says and dabs at his mouth, “my dear you do always know the best places.”

“I could take you to more, now that the world is saved and all.”

“I would like that very much.” Aziraphale’s eyes are bright and his face is warm with something, but Crowley doesn’t dare try to read into it. Can’t allow himself to hope .

Crowley coughs and curls his hand over his mouth. “Well then, home now angel?”

Aziraphale goes uncomfortably quiet. “I thought,” he says carefully, “today might be a rather nice day for a drive.”

“Angel, it’s raining.”

“Not too bad, no,” Aziraphale says, “you can drive slow.”

“Well-”

“Come on Crowley, anywhere you want to go.”

Crowley closes his eyes and bites down on his tongue. He wants - he wants - “Alright,” he says, undone, “I’ll settle up.”

Aziraphale is already in the car by the time Crowley has settled the bill and made his way outside. He has a kind of vague knowledge that he may have left an outrageous tip, despite never having ever tipped before, but he can’t quite think straight at the moment. He feels a bit dreamy, if he’s honest.

The Bentley drives for him, mostly. Crowley’s a bit preoccupied with the way Aziraphale has his hands folded in his lap, the soft curve of his mouth, the gentle swell of his chest to pay attention to the road. Aziraphale is looking out the window at the falling rain and passing buildings. Crowley’s hand twitches on the wheel. What would Aziraphale say if he tried to take his hand? Crowley forces his focus back on the road and tightens his grip on the wheel.

The steady thrum of the Bentley’s windscreen wipers and the soft croon of Freddie Mercury’s voice fill the otherwise companionable silence in the cab. Aziraphale taps his fingers along with the tune [7], humming along like he almost knows the words. He might. Aziraphale has heard these songs almost as many times as Crowley has.

[7] It is a tune that may or may not have been inspired by a certain night with a certain musician, Crowley cannot confirm nor deny this. ( I can serenade and gently play on your heart strings / Be your Valentino just for you)

Crowley likes driving. He has for a hundred years. The focus of it, the ease. It’s like flying without the fear of falling and he does it now mindlessly, easing between lanes and creating spaces where there was none before. He slows down only when he sees Aziraphale’s knuckles turn white, when his mouth gets pinched in the way that means he’s about to be cross with him.

“Alright there angel?”

“I don’t see why you have to go so fast , my dear,” Aziraphale’s hand clenches in his lap when Crowley takes a turn at a speed unsuitable for both the weather and road conditions, “why are you in such a hurry?”

Is it really a hurry when it takes six millennia to get here? The Bentley slows further, without Crowley’s say so, until they’re moving at a sedate pace with the cars next to them. “Don’t know any other way to go, angel,” Crowley says almost absently.

Aziraphale turns his head and looks , really looks, like he’s trying to see inside of Crowley. Crowley squirms, snake-like, under his stare until it becomes too much and Crowley makes himself focus on the road.

“Where are we going, Crowley?” Aziraphale asks.

“Anywhere. Wherever I stop. Anywhere is good enough as long as you’re beside me.”

Aziraphale inhales sharply. He seems tremendously far away, sitting on the other side of the cab. Crowley grips the steering wheel so tight his knuckles turn white. He shouldn’t have- He should have been more careful about saying-

“Yes,” Aziraphale says and he sounds breathless , “Yes, alright.”

Crowley’s ears feel a bit pink. He drums his fingers along the steering wheel absently just for something to do.

It’s night by the time Crowley decides to stop the Bentley, somewhere south of Edinburgh. They’d stopped for dinner in Manchester and Aziraphale didn’t complain when they’d gotten back in the car and kept driving. He turns into a field, the Bentley whispering over the grass and not leaving tire tracks. He parks and the car goes blessedly silent.

It’s dark out here with nothing but the moon and stars for light, but Crowley can see just fine. Aziraphale is breathing easy and slow beside him. Crowley is staring and Aziraphale is staring right back and he can’t bring himself to break first.

Aziraphale clears his throat, “Well…”

“Well?” Crowley prompts, the corner of his lips tilting up. He leans forward against the wheel, all long limbed and loose.

Aziraphale’s hands twist in his lap, “Yes, well…” he trails off again and sighs. Before Crowley can cut in he picks back up again. “It’s very beautiful here, and the moon is so lovely and full tonight. It’s not often we get to see the stars.”

“I know,” Crowley hums. “This is one of mine, you know? I picked it for the stars and the smell of sweet grass. The wildflowers bloom madly in late spring.”

“You will have to bring me to see them, my dear,” Aziraphale smiles, “perhaps a picnic.”

Oh, I love you, Crowley thinks, heart hammering in his chest. I do love you. He hopes he looks more put together than he feels. Demons can’t love but Crowley is sick of being told what he can and cannot do. “Yes,” Crowley says past the lump in his throat, “I’ll make deviled eggs and you can make those damned cress sandwiches you’re so fond of.”

“Of course,” Aziraphale says, “and we’ll have wine, maybe a cake as well.” He pauses for a moment. “Crowley,” He says slowly, “what did you mean this place is one of yours? You don’t mean- Crowley, my dear boy, is this one of your hiding spots?”

“I don’t use this one often but yes.”

“And you brought me here.”

“Yes.”

“With you.”

“Yes angel, do keep up.”

Aziraphale’s face softens, like it did a week again in St. James’s Park. The way he says “oh Crowley ”, his eyes misty with tears, has Crowley half out of his skin. He can’t run away this time. Where would he go? Crowley buries his shaking hands in his lap and tries to bear it.

Aziraphale reaches across the cab - inches and millennia between them - and cradles Crowley’s jaw in his hand. Crowley sucks in a wet breath and blows it out, trembling.

“Crowley,” Aziraphale says again. His other hand finds Crowley’s and grips firm, steady. “You make me ever so happy.”

“Angel I-“

“Dearest,” Aziraphale leans in, close and closer, “how I love you.” Whispered, reverent, like a prayer.

Crowley closes his eyes tight against the welling of tears. “ Aziraphale .” He feels Aziraphale’s fingers drift up to his sunglasses, freezing there in question. “Yeah.” Aziraphale takes his sunglasses off and drags a thumb tenderly under his eye. Crowley opens his eyes. His chest aches, open and raw, at the warmth in Aziraphale’s face.

“Oh love,” Aziraphale murmurs, wiping an errant tear from Crowley’s cheek, “I’m sorry it took so long.”

“No,” Crowley breathes, “ no , Aziraphale I-“ he squeezes Aziraphale’s hand hard, “Angel I’ll ruin you.”

“Nonsense,” Aziraphale presses their foreheads together. They’re sharing breath and Crowley’s barely breathing. “You couldn’t if you tried.

“I love you,” Crowley gasps and it hurts , “I love you, I love you, I love you-“ Aziraphale closes the space between them, capturing the words with his mouth.

Kissing Aziraphale is- It’s everything Crowley has been wanting since the Garden, when Aziraphale had shielded him with his wing from the first rain. It’s centuries of temptations and clandestine meetings, of lunches and wine and boxes of chocolate. Aziraphale is warm and steady and Crowley goes soft under him, opening himself to the one being in Creation he’s ever had concrete faith in.

When Aziraphale pulls away Crowley can’t help but chase after that mouth, his hand coming up to clutch at the lapel of Aziraphale’s jacket.

“I’m here love,” Aziraphale says, thumbing along his jaw, “you have me. For as long as you like.”

“Long as I like?” Crowley says thickly, his cheeks burning, “How’s eternity sound?”

“I’d like that,” Aziraphale says, eyes crinkling as he smiles.

Crowley breathes through the molten feeling in his chest. Aziraphale’s love feels like basking in the sun after spending eternity underground, blinding in its intensity. He laces their fingers together in his lap. Aziraphale presses his lips to Crowley’s temple and again to the thin skin under his eye.

They spend the night at a small hotel in Edinburgh, Crowley sprawled half across Aziraphale’s chest most of the night with Aziraphale’s hand in his hair. The drive back to London the next day is spent mostly in silence, their hands clasped securely in the narrow space between them. Aziraphale brings Crowley’s hand up to kiss his knuckles, rubbing the back of his hand with his thumb.

A month later they’re in New York City, Crowley opening the door to a rooftop greenhouse. Inside are impossible plants, flowers that quake in their pots when Crowley lets the door slam shut. There’s a handsome English Ivy that seems to wave hello from the ceiling. Aziraphale touches the creeping vines and smiles at Crowley.

“Lovely,” Aziraphale says, “Really beautiful.”

“Oh hush,” Crowley says, “you give them an inch and they’ll take a mile.”

“Nothing wrong with a little bit of positive reinforcement. You seem to enjoy it, as I recall.”

“Shut up,” Crowley whines, the tips of his ears going pink.

Aziraphale steps in to hold Crowley’s face in his hands. His fingers trace at Crowley’s ears. “Precious boy,” He says, leaning in to kiss his sharp cheekbone.

Across the room a Rose bush blooms, beautiful pink and red petals opening and releasing a sweet smell. A pot of green Carnations turn toward them. Above, that old English Ivy gently ripples.  

Crowley drops his head to Aziraphale’s collar, sighing softly. Aziraphale slides his hands up into Crowley’s hair, twirling dark red locks between his fingers. “I like this,” Aziraphale says, “I’m glad you decided to show me.”

“I like you.” Crowley says, punctuating it with a kiss to Aziraphale’s neck. He looks up to glare at his plants, “Don’t get any ideas, I’ll still bin the lot of you.”

Aziraphale laughs. “You won’t.”

He doesn’t.

End

(For those that wanted to be tagged: @jawnlawk , @the-djinn-inside)

#fic #aziraphale #crowley #ineffable husbands #mine

[seokoloqy]

Blood in the Water | pjm (m)

➳ PAIRING: waterbender!jimin x avatar!y/n

➳ GENRE: smut, angst, avatar!au

➳ WORD COUNT: 6.8k

➳ WARNINGS: bloodbending, breathplay, dirty talk, unprotected sex, fingering, oral (f receiving), overstimulation, creampie, Jimin is sorta sadistic, choking

➳ SUMMARY: all life contains water and all life can be bent to your whim.

➳ A/N: this is for my @kwritersworld spring fic exchange partner, @sopewriters! The key word was rebirth and I thought uh avatars are reborn so uhhh my logic is kinda wack but it’s okay i hope you like it!!!

—

The blood that flows through your veins is immortal. Like phoenixes rising from the ashes of their predecessor, you carry the legacy of yours.

Metallic and crimson blood drips from your bruised lips, mixing with the coarse dirt beneath your hands and knees. You spit out the blood pooling in your mouth, disgusted by the bitter taste.

“Winner!”

The crowd roars to their feet, applauding and screaming for your opponent. You’ve been defeated for the third time, leaving you with a bruised ego along with a bruised body.

You’re the avatar and you can’t even beat one measly underground fighter. It doesn’t matter how many elements you utilize during fights, you’re still brought down each time. You’re weak. Too weak to fight against one man and too weak to be the avatar and hold so much responsibility on your shoulders. You’ll never be good enough—strong enough. How can the world rely on you alone?

“I will have you all arrested if you don’t leave now!”

You squeeze your eyes shut, praying that the stern voice will go away. As you hear the scatter of footsteps and those in the audience yelling to escape the crowded arena, you open your eyes to find a pair of sleek black boots step in your line of sight.

“You’re not supposed to be here.” The smug general taps his foot, waiting for you to rise and dust yourself off.

“I won’t go back,” You sneer, taking the back of your hand to smear away the blood on your chin. “You’ll have to drag me home.”

“You have no choice. You have a duty—a responsibility—as avatar.”

You push yourself off the ground, glaring at the man before you dressed in his black armor, the Fire Nation crest engraved on his breastplate. A symbol of your home, the mighty Fire Nation, where you grew up and stayed for most of your life until you just couldn’t take any more of your responsibilities and ran away. You’ve been outrunning Yoongi for months now, evading him in every city and avoiding the rest of the Fire Nation guards looking for you.

The general, fierce and protective, holds a steady gaze with you, unafraid of your rising temper.

“Enough, Yoongi! I won’t have this weight on my shoulders!” You yell, ignoring the guards beginning to surround you. They can’t take you back.

Home is where you’re constantly reminded of who you are. Where they bring masters to teach you how to hone your skills. Four elements and you’ve barely mastered one. It’s disheartening to see yourself fail over and over, to constantly be reminded you should be better. Failure to live up to the legacy you hold is disheartening.

“We’re taking you home.” Yoongi gestures the rest of the guards to begin moving in, caging you.

As one of the armored guards reaches his hand out to grip your shoulder, you flinch back releasing a burst of fire from your outstretched hand in their direction to avoid capture. You don’t care who gets hurt. You don’t want to return home.

Yoongi throws up his hand, instantly dispelling the flame to nothing. With a smirk on his face, he says, “I won’t let you get away so easily.”

The makeshift arena is practically empty, no one but these guards and you are left. As your eyes dart for an exit, you spot a lone masked figure lingering in the stands behind Yoongi.  

It watches silently, looking on at your predicament, dressed in a fine silk robe draped over their slender shoulders. The white mask, molded to be the face of a fox rests on their face, points at you. The sharp slit of their red painted eyes watches through the opening and you can see their real eyes beneath—cold and unfeeling.

You feel a chill run down your spine as you watch the silent figure raise one arm, flicking their wrists up.

It seems like the world stops, the hands once reaching out to you freeze in the air, unable to move and trapped beneath an unseen force. The guards no longer control their own bodies, fear crawling into their eyes slowly.

“W-What? This is impossible,” Yoongi gasps, finding himself incapacitated with the same terror passing his expression.

Bloodbending should be impossible. This dark ability has been outlawed for centuries, banned for its immoral practice. To control those around you, bend them to your whim, is a power no one should possess.

You’re entranced by the masked figure as their fingers turn downward as if they were controlling a marionette, they dance in the air forcing the soldiers to stand straight, arms tight at their sides.

This is your chance to escape. This masked figure is giving you an opportunity to run, but why? What do they gain from helping you?

Your attention is drawn back to Yoongi as he snarls, “You can’t run forever, Y/N. You’ll come home eventually.”

Yoongi is sure of his words. It’s a promise. One way or another you’ll return home.

You don’t stick around to hear the rest of Yoongi’s threat, darting off to the exit, leaving behind the men with no idea of their fate with the masked figure. The breeze of nightfall hits you as you’re freed of the underground arena. The adrenaline you felt watching the masked figure control the guards is replaced by exhaustion.

Your wounds become apparent as you roll up your shirt to reveal the shallow cut as a result of a water lash slicing into you during a fight. You roll down your top, applying pressure to the wound to prevent more bleeding.

Too bad you haven’t quite mastered the skill of healing. You’ve managed to heal small cuts with your water bending, but nothing as large as the one on your side. It’s too bad Yoongi interrupted the fight before you could see the on-site water healers.

The walk back to the inn you’re staying at isn’t far. Thankfully, you can manage to hobble there on your own. Who knows how long the guards will stay frozen like that to allow you to get away once again.

As you begin to limp down the dark, secluded alleyway, an amused voice calls out to you.

“You’re nothing like I expected, avatar.”

You whip around and without thinking, form a burst of fire in the palm of your hand to throw at the stranger until you see his robes. The same cerulean silk robes draped around his slim figure, mask dangling by its thin string on his finger, swaying gently, and you’re allowed to see his face. Your breath is taken seeing his beautiful features.

“Who are you?” You call, warily eyeing the stranger.

His abilities alone tell you he’s someone you’ve never heard of. You’ve never heard of a living soul who possesses power like him. The story of bloodbending is a legend, passed down as a warning of how that type of power should never be possessed. The last bender with that ability died years ago and has been outlawed for decades.

“No one you should be afraid of, avatar,” he says, a smile creeping onto his face as his eyes follow your hand to the wound on your side. “In fact, I’m here to help you.”

The flames in your palm begin to flicker out of existence as he steps closer. You realize the wound has stained your hand with blood, cringing at the sight.

”Minor,” the stranger dismisses, unphased by the sight of your glistening red blood. “Come to me.”

Why you move into the man’s arms is a mystery. You’re just so compelled by him, drawn in like a dazed traveler looking for solace.

The stranger acts so free and confident. It’s everything you want—to not worry about others or feel so confined by your obligations.

His hand reaches into the pocket of his white pants, pulling out an opaque blue vile. It’s just the size of his finger, a good amount to heal your cut.

“Stay still for me,” he says, waving the vile between his fingers. He uncorks the vile with a pop and his finger hovers over the opening, drawing the water out into mid-air clumping together in one small droplet. His other hand works on lifting the material of your shirt up, peeling the fabric off your wound. His cold hand grazes over your skin, bringing goosebumps in its wake as the other drags water over your skin as if he were cauterizing a wound with water.

You watch in awe as a soft blue light emits from his fingertip. Before your eyes, the shallow wound closes up as his finger glides over your skin. It doesn’t even leave a scar. The throbbing pain disappears and you’re relieved you no longer have to clutch the wound.

“Thank you.”

“One day you’ll do something for me in return,” he muses, running his light eyes down the rest of your bruised body. Your split lip, black eye, and the several cuts along your arms, all catch his attention. “Allow me to heal you. It’s the least I can do for the avatar.” The stranger places his hand over his heart as a gesture of respect to you. A gesture you saw often.

“O-Okay,” you stutter, locking eyes and unable to tear your gaze away.

“Perfect,” he hums, a devious smile curling onto his lips, “Come with me then, avatar.”

He extends his hand out and you foolishly take it.

—

The finely dressed stranger leads you down a wooded path out to a steep cliff with rapid running waters below. There is a carriage with a pulling system designed to lead across the ravine to the other side where a large white home stands.

“Is that your home?” You question, stepping onto the carriage after him. It looks so secluded and lonely, no contact with others or the outside.

“I stay there, yes,” he vaguely responds, pulling down the lever that puts the carriage in action over the rapid waters. If you were to fall in, you’d surely be swept away.

The wind blows through his silver hair, reflecting beneath the moonlight.

“You never told me your name.”

How could you have blindly followed a man with unspeakable power into uncertain doom? How could he have cast such a spell over your judgment?

“Names aren’t important to me.”

“But they are to me. How can you come to respect someone without knowing their name first?”

He scoffs, leaning against the basket and folding his arms, “You’re odd, avatar. But if I must earn your respect, my name is Jimin.”

“Y/N.” You extend your hand expecting for him to return your handshake, but he stares at your outstretched hand as if he’s never seen such a foreign gesture. He does take it after a second, turning it over to press his lips to your hand. His soft, plush lips touch the valley of your knuckles and you’re reduced to a flustered mess.

It’s such a refined and delicate way of greeting that you’re not accustomed to in the Fire Nation. He moves with grace, refined and sophisticated, reminding you of the waterbending teachers brought to you back home. They all seem this way.

“I wonder, avatar,” he ponders, still playing with your hand. “What are you doing so far from home?”

The carriage comes to a lurching halt, forcing you into the basket door. Jimin effortlessly pulls you back up into his arms, holding you in a tender embrace. You hold your breath, hoping that he won’t be able to detect the rapid sounds of your heart beating in your chest.

“Are you running? From danger, from responsibility?” Jimin caresses your cheek with the back of his hand, trapping you beneath his icy gaze.

“I-I’m-”

He cocks his head, looking down at your timid posture. “Afraid,” he finishes, “afraid of yourself.”

“I don’t understand.” You shake your head trying to pretend he isn’t right about how you feel, but you’ll never voice it. Never voice your weakness.

“You’re afraid of failure—disappointing those around you. But embrace fear, avatar, and turn it into your most powerful possession,” Jimin urges, pushing his finger under your chin until you’re staring into his deep blue eyes. “Without fear, you are nothing.”

“How? How will fear make me a better avatar?”

“Harness it. Use that fear to fuel your desire. You’ll learn in due time what I mean, avatar.”

He has a charming aura that you’re unable to tear your gaze from until he releases your chin, snapping you out of your daze.

Fear is power? You wonder what he could mean as he unlatches the basket to let you off. The path leading to the looming front doors is just splintering rock, crunching beneath your feet and digging into the thin material of your slippers.

“What did you do to Yoongi?” You suddenly recall, thinking of the fear in his eyes as he was being controlled by Jimin.

“Your noble captain won’t be bothering you anymore.”

“Did you hurt him?” You failed to think of anyone but yourself in the arena, only hoping for a chance to escape, not the lives of Yoongi and his men. It was selfish—not the traits of the avatar. Guilt begins to consume you.

Jimin absentmindedly bends the fresh dewdrops in the grass, pulling water off the stems. As the droplets of water trail behind him, he hums, “never. What do I gain by killing the captain?”

“Killing?” You whisper to yourself, holding your breath.

“I didn’t harm a soul in that arena, avatar, you have my word,” he promises.

“I trust you.” You nod, shifting your eyes behind him as the greenery he stole water from has become nothing but yellowed and shriveled grass.

The foyer of his home is immaculately pristine, glittering white tiles and marble columns supporting the roof. You’re in awe, never having seen so much luxury in one room. The Fire Nation never cared about looks the way waterbenders do, focusing mostly on military strength instead.

“Beautiful,” you breathe, inspecting the porcelain sculptures.

“Oh, avatar,” Jimin calls and you turn to him. The wicked grin on his face startles you and suddenly you feel frozen. Every muscle in your body is rigid, blood running cold in fear as he forces you to your knees with just a flick of his finger.  

“Jimin, what-”

“Are you afraid?”

The cerulean, gold trimmed robe that pools around his feet drags against the marble floor as he steadily approaches you with a sultry, dangerous smile. One finger brushes the underside of your chin, tipping your head up to face his lowered gaze.

Something tells you to turn away, to run from the enigmatic stranger who claims to know secrets beyond your comprehension. There is a power that radiates from his fingertips, something sinister and foul.

“Would you like to learn from me, avatar?” The tilt of his head brings stray silver strands of hair to fall over one eye. He is alluring and poised, standing tall over your kneeling figure.

You gape, unable to conjure the proper words. He is one of the best teachers you will ever find, but there is an unspoken price to his knowledge.

“I can offer you so much more than knowledge. If power is what you truly desire I can give it all to you.”

“I want-”

A part of you is afraid to accept, but another says yes. What secrets does this man hold? You want to be better. To show those who doubted you, mocked you, how good you really are. Here he is giving you an opportunity to learn, you’d be foolish to pass up such

He does things with such grace compared to your other mentors. It puts you in awe, hypnotized by him and his every subtle movement.

“I want to learn from you. I want to be a better avatar.”

The moment he hears the timid words fall from your mouth, he releases you from his hold. His hand unclenches and you collapse to the floor, gasping for a breath you didn’t know you were holding. As you kneel with your palms pressed flat against the cold marble floors, Jimin offers you a lending hand.

You gingerly slip your hand into his, being pulled to your feet swiftly.

“Shall we begin then? The moon is full tonight and there is so much I want to teach you, avatar.”

Jimin guides you back towards a glass door leading out into the garden where there is a rippling pool of water. The glittering waters reflecting beneath the pale moonlight move gently. He’s right, the moon is full tonight, which means peak bending abilities for waterbenders. It’s the perfect time to start practicing.

Outside chilly winds meet your bare skin, causing you to shiver. He guides you to the reflecting pool and in it, you can see yourself, disheveled and tired.

“Are you still hurt?”

You haven’t even thought about the bruises or cuts you sustained earlier, too distracted by Jimin to realize. The injuries are minor but noticeable. The bruising around your rib begins to throb once you’re reminded. You hiss, clutching the side of your chest, “a little.”

Jimin eases you down on the grass, allowing you to sit up and relax. “Remove your shirt for me,” he orders, bending a handful of water from the pool into the palm of his hand.

You don’t think twice, pulling off your shirt and discarding it on the grass beside your crossed legs. You aren’t shy about exposing yourself to him. It’s not the first time you’ve been with a man intimately.

“It’ll be easier if you remove this,” he brushes the wrapping around your chest, “as well.”

“If you think so,” you nod, pulling the pin out of your binding and unravel the cloth.

Jimin is unmoved by the sight your bare chest, laying his hand on the bruise running over your ribs below your breasts.

His touch is cold and the water begins to glow once again. The healing takes seconds, but with his hand so close to your breasts, it feels too pleasurable.

You bite your lip, suppressing a small moan, slightly disappointed when Jimin pulls away.

“How does that feel?”

“Fine.” You mumble, turning your head to the side.

You’re afraid to say anymore, afraid you’ll give away how much his touch affected you. Instead, Jimin stands back, allowing you space to wrap the bindings around your chest again.

“We have a lot of work to do.”

Jimin spends the night teaching you the basics of waterbending as if you hadn’t already been taught before. You’ve heard it all and done it all before with your teachers. The draining and meticulous task tires you with each slow, rhythmic motion of your hands.

You concentrate on the slowly rising water you’re pulling from the pool, steady hands focusing all your energy. The water only makes it about a foot out before splashing back in and you groan, throwing your hands out, “Fuck!”

“You just need to breathe,” Jimin calmly instructs, “you need to relax.”

“Relax,” You mutter under your breath. Jimin’s presence alone puts you under an intense amount of scrutiny. He has to be one of the best waterbenders if he possesses abilities such as bloodbending. To be watched by him feels worse than being at home with your teachers. You’re starting to regret your decisions, wanting to run back to the village and disappear into the crowd and away from judgmental eyes.

Jimin comes behind you, resting his hand on your shoulder, breath ghosting over the shell of your ear as he murmurs, “you have no one to criticize you.” His hand slides down your arm, creating goosebumps in its wake and reaches your balled up fist. “Take a deep breath, avatar.”

You do as he says, taking a deep shaky breath and exhaling through your mouth. Jimin presses himself behind you, the curve of your back fitting in with him.

Despite him touching you, you manage to ignore the feeling and focus again on the gentle movements of water. A deep breath in and out, calmer and releasing your anxieties. You focus again, guiding your hand intertwined with his up slowly and feeling a weight press against your hand as it slowly raises. You watch the water rise as power flows through your fingertips. The higher the water goes, the more weight you feel pushing against your hand and you struggle to keep it up.

“You’re doing so well,” Jimin praises, “just like that.”

The water stays in the air for a couple more seconds and is almost as tall as Jimin until you release it, falling back down with a splash, droplets flying onto both of you.

“I-I did it!” You gasp, jumping from his embrace. “I’ve never been able to get it that high before!” You’re simply amazed. You’ve never felt so proud of such a small achievement before.

“Perfect. Truly,” Jimin smirks down at you, pulling you in for a hug. “I’m proud of you.”

You duck your head down, blushing at his words. Usually, all you receive is snide comments of how you should’ve been able to do that a long time ago.

“My,” he hums, taking your chin and tilting your head back up, “you act as if no one has ever told you that before. You’re extraordinary, avatar.”

You’re not used to hearing those words of approval—simple, impactful words. Everyone expects you to pick up on bending so easily because you’re the avatar, but you’re only as good as their praise.

“No. Never.”

“I understand why you want to run now,” he says, a sad look in his eyes, an expression that looks so foreign on his face. “I know what it’s like to never be good enough. That’s why I want to help you.”

You can’t stand the look on his face, heart almost wrenching at the sight. You slip your hand over his cheek, stroking the smooth skin. Tonight you don’t feel alone suffering in silence over the praise you never received.

“I see a lot of myself in you. The drive to be the best—to be better than what those around you expect. Desperately trying to meet the expectations of others.”

You wonder how he knows what you feel, what his past was. You’re coming to realize that you know nothing about this man—this stranger—with incredible, dark power.

“Really?”

“I was born in the Northern Water Tribe and cast out like nothing because they were scared of my potential. They were afraid,” he sneers, the sadness in his features contorting into resentment. “afraid of me. I was a disgrace to my family.”

“What,” you lick your lips, “what would they be afraid of?”

“You know what I’m capable of, avatar,” he bitterly chuckles, “you know how easily I can just snap my fingers and end an innocent life. Aren’t you afraid too?”

“No.” He’s the one person that can relate to the feeling of neglect.

There must be some good in him. He hasn’t done anything besides teach and validate you. Validation being the one thing you can truly appreciate from his lessons. To hear those simple words means more to you than he knows. All your life being told you should’ve been better, that you’ll never live up to your predecessors, broke you. Now you’re running from it all and who’s blame besides the ones that tore you down for years?

“You’re naive, avatar,” he chuckles lowly, casting a side glance to the rippling waters.   

His attitude is so much different from when you first met him, no longer promising power and control. Instead, he’s broken, helpless, and tired.

You unconsciously lean forward with trembling lips hesitating to finish what you started. Jimin stares down at you with curiosity lingering in his blue eyes. Your fingers curl around the lining of his robe, tugging him down to meet you fully.

His plush lips meet yours and you feel a thrill run through you, pulling him closer. Jimin seems to freeze, standing rigid and unmoving.

You pull away almost immediately, realizing how foolish you must be, “sorry, I-“

Looking down at you, something sparks in him. Before you can finish apologizing, he wraps his arms around your waist, pulling you closer and kissing you once again.

You moan against his hungry lips, trying to cling onto him as he runs his hands down your spine and digs his fingers into your thighs to hike them up around his waist.

“J-Jimin,” you gasp between breaths as he steadily walks back to the house. He moves fluidly into the expansive home towards his bedroom. Each step he takes moves your core against his hardening cock and you whimper.

“Don’t speak, doll.” His reply comes muffled between your lips. The pet name is unexpected and new but has you melting. He lets you down, quickly pulling your shirt over your head, undressing you until you’re completely bare before him.

He pushes you down onto the mattress. Surrounded by fine silks and plush pillows, you run your fingers against the fabric as Jimin pulls back to eye his prize.

“You’re mine now, avatar,” he smirks, a single finger raising to touch your swollen, red bottom lip. His piercing eyes follow the digit as it lazily trails from your lips and down the column of your throat. “Aren’t you?”

“Mhm,” you nod, trying to relax against the sheets despite your pounding heart.

“I want to hear you say it,” Jimin demands, eyes flickering back up to meet yours, stern and cold. His hands meanwhile pry apart your legs, spreading you out on display.

You squirm under his intense gaze, unable to look him in the eye any longer. You avert your eyes down to the rising bulge in his pants, dragging your foot up his thigh to his clothed erection.

“Focus on me, doll,” Jimin snaps, raising his hand the same way he did in the arena. The downturned position of his fingers forces your body rigid, leg coming off his thigh to return to its original position spread apart. He bends you into submission, no longer giving you control over anything, not even your own body.

With no other option, you look into his eyes, stomach clenching as his clouded expression stares down at your dripping hole.

“I’m yours, Jimin.”

Satisfied by your response, he swirls his index finger over your opening, ghosting your clit slightly. You want to buck your hips badly and meet his teasing finger, but he still has a powerful hold over you. Kept frozen in place, you cry, “let me go, please.”

“I don’t think so,” Jimin tsks, returning his finger back to your glistening folds. You would shudder if you could. The unbearable force holding you down on the bed, not even letting you relax your body sends new waves of pleasure through you. You’re bent at his mercy and completely vulnerable to his wandering hands. He can do whatever he wants to you and you’re ready to receive it eagerly.

Jimin loves this power, this show of submission. He loves your willingness, how easily you give in to him. He thrives off it, yet he still wants more. The finger running down your folds eases into your tight cunt and Jimin groans as your heat willingly envelopes him.

Curling the first finger inside your walls, elicits a moan from you, “A-Ah, Jimin.”

He pumps his finger a few times, watching your face contort with pleasure, brows furrowed and lips parted with shallow breaths between. You call his name in a mantra of desperate pleas but he wants to hear you scream it until that voice disappears.

“You look like a mess beneath my fingers, doll. Do you like my fingers in your pussy?” He purrs, adding a second finger and scissoring your clenching walls.

You helplessly whimper, feeling the build up in your stomach begin to coil. He still does not release your body, leaving your legs to stay spread apart and unable to bend or shake as you reach your breaking point. You can’t take it. The drilling and stretch of his fingers bruising your walls and the way your stomach knots up with each thrust forces a broken cry from your throat. “J-Jimin,” You sob, unable to curl your legs or even grip the sheets before your release.

“If you want to come, then come, but I won’t release you,” Jimin growls, dropping to his knees before your heat. He presses teasing kisses around your thighs, nipping and lightly scraping his teeth against the flesh.

His assault on your pussy doesn’t stop even as his plump lips move closer to your drenched folds. His tongue darts out to lap against your swollen clit, roughly attacking the sensitive bud and listening to you scream his name.

“Be a good little doll for me and come. I know you want to. I can feel how badly you’re trembling in my hold if I release you now you’d be writhing,” he hums between your thighs.

His sinful words are enough to make you come undone on his fingers, wishing you could buck your hips to chase it as white liquid leaks out of you and onto the sheets.

Jimin replaces his fingers with his tongue, licking up your arousal, tasting every drop.

“Now, will you release me?” You pant, wanting nothing more than to relax your legs from being spread for so long and lie limply against the bed. Your chest rises and falls as you struggle to regain breath.

His eyes dart to yours, still feasting between your thighs, silver hair fallen over his forehead. All it takes is a look for you to feel yourself suffocating. Your throat slowly constructing without the presence of his hand.

“Why so eager to be free, doll? I’m not done with you yet.”

You’re unable to speak, just gasping for breath and choking as he suddenly pushes two fingers back in you. Your eyes flutter shut, seeing nothing but stars as he begins to pleasure your sensitive core once again.

He relaxes his hold on your neck, preferring to hear your whimpers and pleas instead. You gasp for air, vision still littered with black and white spots.

“Let me touch you,” you whimper, blinking away the burning tears in your eyes from the sensitivity.

Jimin rises to watch a tear streak down your cheek with curious eyes and gingerly brushes it aside, finally releasing your body, and your legs instantly fall limp against the sweat-soaked sheets. Your hands tangle in his hair, feeling the soft strands run through your fingers.

You squirm away from his touch, unable to handle the overstimulation. Jimin, however, doesn’t let you go, taking his other hand to grip your thigh as his fingers continue to move inside you.

“You’re not going anywhere,” he growls, thumb ghosting over your clit, barely grazing.

“I can’t… not again…” you whimper uncomfortably, uncertain you can handle another, trembling as he presses down on your swollen bud and jolts of intense pleasure run through you.

“Yes you can and I want you around my cock this time.” Jimin pulls himself off the bed, pushing his blue robe off his shoulders to fall gracefully at his feet. You can already see the hardened outline of his erection pressing against his pants. Once he discards the rest of his clothing, your eyes focusing on his impressively thick length as he crawls onto the bed again to hover over you. “Won’t you scream for me, doll?” He wickedly grins giving you no time to prepare before ramming his cock into you, burying himself deep inside your pulsating walls.

You cry out, hands moving to grip his shoulders instead, nails digging red lines down his back as you struggle to find stability as he rabidly thrusts into you. It doesn’t take much for you to feel another orgasm build up, as you wrap your legs around his waist, allowing him to thrust into you from another angle.

“Are you enjoying this? Do you like falling apart around my cock like this, doll?”

“Y-Yes,” you mewl, back arching off the sticky sheets when he finds your g-spot, repeatedly hitting it over and over until you’re writhing against him. “You feel so good, Jimin. D-Don’t stop.”

His hand moves between your connect bodies, finding your clit. The brush of his fingers against your clit makes your breath hitch, legs tightening around his waist, and your entire body trembles as you approach another climax rapidly.

Jimin grunts as his own orgasm approaches, the rhythm of his thrusts becoming sloppy and desperate. With another flick of his finger on your clit, you feel yourself unravel beneath him. Your second orgasm comes just as powerful as the first, leaking around his cock and walls clenching.

“Fuck,” he hisses, quickly coming soon after you, hips stuttering and eyes squeezing shut. He eases out of you, letting the mix of juices leak from your pussy onto the bed. Jimin falls by your side, breathing deeply.

“My, my, avatar,” Jimin sighs, running a hand down your chest and caressing your stomach, “I might just keep you.”

—

You’re content with Jimin, spending the days wrapped in his arms and training under the moonlight. You’ve noticed a pattern with him. The days when the moon is just a sliver, he seems more human, calmer than nights of a full moon.  

The days pass in a blur of new methods and skills. For once you feel confident about your bending. The rate at which you’re learning under him is alarmingly better than before with your other mentors. And at night he ravishes you with all the same vigor and desire as the first. But you haven’t left his home for almost a month. The walls of his lavish home have begun to get tired and old. You miss the arena, the adrenaline rush you’d get when your opponent darts towards you.

He’s been a lot colder whenever you mention anything about leaving. Something in his aura has changed, you know that for sure.

It’s a full moon once again when waterbending is at its peak, and Jimin guides you out to the pond again.

“I want to go back to the arena. I want to fight.”

“No,” Jimin curtly responds, not bothering to turn around. “Why would you want to go back there, avatar? So you can get hurt all over again?”

You’re taken aback by his harsh words, faltering a few steps behind. “I just want to see how much I’ve improved in a fight.”

“You just want to leave me. Is that it, avatar?”

“What? No,” you shake your head, “what are you talking about?”

Why is he becoming so agitated? You aren’t asking to leave him, just the house.

“I thought you were mine. Isn’t that what you said to me? Why do you want to leave, avatar?” He sounds broken, hurt by the thought of your absence. “Just like them.”

“Just like who, Jimin?”

“Them… my family, my brother. You just want to be rid of me, don’t you?” Jimin sneers, grabbing onto your shoulders tightly, digging into delicate flesh. He holds onto you desperately as if you’ll slip through his fingers like water.

“You’re not right, Jimin,” you hiss, crying out as his nails dig into your skin, leaving crescent marks. “Something is wrong.”

“Something wrong? Something wrong?” He scoffs becoming more and more agitated. “There isn’t anything wrong with me! Maybe it’s you, avatar, maybe you’re the one with something wrong!”

You begin to panic the stronger his hold becomes. You focus energy on your shoulders where he’s gripping you, raising the temperature of your body to burn him, a technique you used to use growing up to slip through your teacher's fingers.

Jimin unlatches his hands, pushing you away, slowly blinking and coming back to reality. “Look at me. Pitiful.” He shakes his head.

You try reaching out for him, desperate to comfort the man who’s taught you so much. “Jimin…”

“Don’t touch me,” he yells, moving his hand up instinctively to bend you to your knees.

Forced to the damp ground, unable to move, you plead, “I know this isn’t who you truly are.”

“My soul is wicked to the core and with each full moon, I become even more wretched,” he hisses, hand trembling as he holds you down, visibly in pain. “Like a piece of me is chipping away. Look at what this power has done to me. I don’t know how to stop it or if I even want to.”

The desperation in his voice and the way his whole body shakes with tears threatening to fall crushes you. This is over your head. You have no way of helping him, no way of easing his pain. This is what you’re supposed to do as the avatar but you have no idea.

“I-I don’t know how… I don’t know how to help.”

“Then you’re nothing to me,” he seethes, “I should have known this was pointless. I thought you could fix me, but I was wrong. So, leave.”

“No.”

“I said go! Why would I want to keep you around? You’re a useless bender! I should just kill you now to put you out of your misery. Maybe the next avatar will have a better chance of mastering the elements.”

“You don’t mean that.”

Jimin slowly curls his fingers inward, constricting your airway. “If you won’t leave I’ll make you.”

You can feel the ghost of fingers around your neck, tightening. Crying is futile, screaming for help is useless.

“S-Stop, Jimin,” you gasp, eyes welling up with tears as your vision begins to blur, fading in and out of darkness.

When Jimin watches your eyes flutter shut, light almost draining from your face, he realizes he can’t do it. He’s never taken a life—not once—even with the dark powers he possesses. It’s not who he is or what he wants to become. Despite his mind telling him to continue on and watch the life slip away from you, his heart says otherwise.

Jimin’s hand falls limply to his side as his tearful eyes watch you crumble to the floor, gasping for air.

“Just go,” he croaks, turning his head away, unable to look at you any longer without feeling sick.

Your fingers dig into the grass as you cough, building the strength in your legs to stand. You hear his faint footsteps begin to recede and by the time you find the will to look up again, he’s gone.

It’s just you beneath the glowing full moon, broken and confused. Did he really believe you were useless or did he say that as a way to get rid of you? You don’t want to believe his venomous words, terrified that what he said was the truth. You didn’t want to leave him, not when you knew that his family had abandoned him. It’s clear now that that abandonment had taken an incredibly drastic toll on him and now he’s gone before you could even explain.

Left all alone, you’ll do what you do best—run. Running away from all the heartache and problems you encounter is all you’ve ever known. If he wants you to leave, then you’ll leave.

You bitterly wipe away the tears in your eyes, gritting your teeth. “Fine,” you spit, “I’ll go.”

After a dizzying journey through the woods, blinded by tears, you find yourself back in the city. You’re stumbling through the darkened streets remembering the night you met Jimin. It’s such a stinging memory now.

As the blur of faces passes you in the crowd, your feet find their way to the arena, hoping to find some sort of relief in a fight—to expel some of your frustration and hurt. As the roar of cheering crowds deafen your ears outside the arena, you spot a familiar face lingering outside the eager line of guests.

“Y-Yoongi?” You call out into the street of bustling people. He’s somewhere in the crowd of neutral toned clothing and street vendors, lingering outside the arena entrance. You wonder what he’s still doing in the city after a month. “Yoongi?” You push through the crowd of citizens, not bothering to apologize if they stumble, you’re in a rush to see the captain again.

When you call out to him once more, he finally turns around, tired eyes and a frown stuck to his lips. “There you are Y/N.”

“What are you still doing here?” You ask, looking up and down at the disheveled captain with tousled brown hair and rumpled clothing. It’s unlike him to look so unkempt.

“I never left,” Yoongi seethes, striding up to you. “I’ve been here looking for you ever since that masked figure took away my bending.”

—

~to be continued~

#kwritersworldnet #kwspringexchange #bts smut #jimin smut #btssmutclub #bts #bts fanfiction #jimin fanfiction #bts scenario #btsguild #bangtanarmynet #jimin x reader

[ourcrazym]

Hero Killer Stain vs Special Officer Kamogawa

BNHA stuff. Trying to adapt S Class Rank 15 Metal Bat from OPM into BNHA. I had this on my mind for a while. Don’t have a name in my mind so I’ll use a placeholder for now. Should be longer, but Eh.

Special Officer Kamogawa slides to a stop when he catches the glint of metal by the corner of his eyes. It was exactly where he expected the escaped fugitive to be.

Hero Killer stain had escaped. Barely. But he had escaped and he was on the run. Kamogawa’s unit had been notified the moment the criminal had escaped, and he hadn’t even bothered to take a cop car. His mind was going way too fast for that. Where could Stain be? Should he look for heroes in distress?

But apparently he needed to answer none of those questions.

“Chizome Akaguro.” He says, loud enough only for the intended recipient to hear it. “You are under arrest.”

He watches Stain carefully. The villain’s back was to him, but he could see the tension in his shoulders. Stain was ready to fight.

Kamogawa accepts his fate. So will it be, then. He takes a more aggresive stance.

“You better come without a fight.” Kamogawa says. “I will use force if necessary.”

“You are one of those ‘Special Cops’, aren’t you?” Stain growls. Kamogawa feels a chill run down his spine. “Cops with quirks?”

Kamogawa says nothing, watching carefully for a move.

“You are heroes too, in a sense. Aren’t you.”

Stain knows this man. Special Officer Kamogawa. He’s the captain of the Villain Control Unit, tasked with controlling and arresting villains.

Kamogawa’s face hardens. It wasn’t a question. It was a statement.

“You think you can kill anyone that doesn’t fit your view of a hero?” Kamogawa says, his voice low, deep, and full of bubbling hatred. He reaches behind his back and pulls out a metal baton. He was terrified, but he was a cop, the last line of defense for the citizens. He either protects or dies trying.

“Come, let me educate you.” is the last thing Kamogawa says, beckoning him.

Stain and Kamogawa roar as they charge towards each other. Stain launches himself into the air, and watches Kamogawa. Kamogawa doesn’t swing, so stain swings instead.

But in one instant, the baton is by Kamogawa’s side, and in the other, it has made contact with stain’s jaw. It was a clean hit, square across the face, and it sends the villain crashing into the concrete.

“Who...gave you permission...to attack me?” Kamogawa growls. He swings again, and Stain manages to dodge just in time. The impact creates a crater in the concrete, ringing out like a gunshot in the night.

He’s far stronger than the heroes I’ve met, Stain thinks. I can’t let him land another hit, or I’m dead.

“You fucking coward.” Kamogawa seethes. “Running around like a hamster.”

Another swing, and it nearly lands. Its just a graze, but has enough force to tear his flesh open. Stain bites down a gasp.

He knows my quirk. He’s trying to keep distance. But what is his quirk? Speed? Strength?

“What’s the matter, Chizome? You finally realized you’re weak?” Kamogawa continues to berate the villain. “You finally realized you aren’t going to last seconds in a head to head fight against someone your match? YOU AREN’T EVEN A MAN, FORGET CALLING YOURSELF A HERO KILLER!”

This changes something in the Villain. Stain suddenly changes his course. In a matter of split seconds, Kamogawa has a knife buried in his shoulder, but the Villain is finally in his most lethal range.

Chizome can’t dodge the fist. If Kamogawa’s baton felt like a baton, the fist felt like a sledgehammer. He blacks out momentarily, but is woken up again when he feels Kamogawa’s arm wrapping around the knife arm. Kamogawa twists his arm, forcing the villain to double over. Stain knew what was about to happen, but the fight was finally in his favor.

He licks at the droplet of blood that had managed to reach him, and feels Kamogawa go stiff. Stain extracts the jagged sword from its hilt.

“A false hero doesn’t GET TO TEACH ME THE IDEALS OF BRAVERY!” Stain screams this time, and swings his katana. The feedback is delicious, and he hears the sound of flesh being cut.

The sword went clean through one side of Kamogawa’s midriff, out the other, but Kamogawa shows no pain. Only grit teeth and blazing brown eyes.

“Is that all you got?” he rasps.

Stain twists the sword to get a reaction, to break this psychological dominance, but for the first time he feels unsure, when Kamogawa starts moving. Its minimal, almost like spasms, but its surely movement.

He should be paralyzed! How is he moving?!

“Chizome Akaguro, Quirk: Bloodcurdle. Ingesting someone’s blood paralyzes them, but the strength depends on the blood group. Weakest is O. The weakest, however, is O negative“

Stain’s eyes widen, which is the only thing he’s able to do before Kamogawa’s head turns to him, slowly, jerkily. Stain’s quirk hadn’t completely stopped him, but wasn’t completely useless either. Kamogawa must be pushing his body to its breaking point to be able to move just that much

Stain does a few more attacks as Kamogawa slowly regains motor function, but none of them seem to draw a gasp, or any evidence of pain. Stain creates distance the moment he feels the fingers nearly scratch his face off.

“You think I’m a hero? A pillar of good? A hero just serves up villains for us to arrest. They can’t kill, they can’t cripple, they can’t show you what they can do.”

Stain knows he’s picked the worst match to go against. He’s slashed at the man’s legs, and he stands up slowly more out of rage than pain.

“I, have no such obligations.” He says.

Kamogawa straightens up. If Stain carried unshakeable strength in his eyes, Kamogawa carried death in his.

*

KAMOGAWA

QUIRK: ATTRITION

DESCRIPTION: The longer the fight goes, the stronger Kamogawa gets. With increasing anger combined with fighting spirit, Kamogawa’s strength, speed, agility, reflexes, durability, and resistance increases.

Theoretically, if a fight goes on long enough, it is possible for his power to approach infinity.

The biggest weakness is that Kamogawa is virtually quirkless until his quirk brings him up to a strong enough power level. His quirk is passive and untrainable.

*

“Come.” Kamogawa says, and its Stain’s turn to feel a chill run down his spine. “I’ll show you what being on the business end of a state-sanctioned killer feels like.”

Chizome intercepts Kamogawa’s punch with his sword, but the police officer just opens his palm and catches the sword. The sword definitely does damage, but Stain is convinced it hadn’t done anything to Kamogawa. The cop twists the blade and it breaks.

Stain gives it his all, and for a handful of minutes, he pushes himself as hard as he can, trying to go as fast as he can, swinging his sword as much as he can, using his quirk as much as he can, but Kamogawa only seems to get stronger.

Stain doesn’t want to admit it, but it also seemed to be getting easier for him.

He uses his quirk and puts all of his body in a strike that should surely knock the cop out, but Kamogawa doesn’t even move.

“WHY WOULDN’T YOU JUST DIE!?” Stain roars in frustration. “WHAT IS YOUR QUIRK?”

The moment stain’s foot slides off the cop’s face, he makes eye contact with what he can describe as pure hatred.

“TAKE A WILD FUCKING GUESS!” Kamogawa shouts in response and swings the baton Stain thought he didn’t have in reach. Stain puts up his arms to defend himself but the baton strikes his arm like nothing else. His bones snap in three clean pieces, bending unnaturally.

kinetic energy is half times mass times velocity squared, Kamogawa thinks. If you double the mass, you double the damage, but if you double the speed-

For the first time, Stain cries out in pain. He falls on his back. His arms are useless, completely useless. They can’t even hold themselves up, dangling like a marionette with its strings cut.

-you quadruple the damage.

“I’ll break you in a way that can’t be put back together.” Kamogawa’s voice sounds like the fires of hell.

But Stain fights back, using his legs, somehow. It takes Kamogawa one strike to shatter his right kneecap. That is when he knows he’s lost.

But his body knows the truth.

For the first time since he became Stain, he screams out in fear. He thought his training would give him an edge. He never thought he would be killed in a dark alley by a cop with a baton.

But Kamogawa wasn’t just any cop. His unit was trained to be strong enough to handle villains with quirks. He was trained to be fast.

Strange way fate works.

“HAVE MERCY!” He howls. “PLEASE!”

Kamogawa doesn’t even stop to consider the words.

“No.” He says, his voice still and all kinds of scary.

Stain screams.

#bnha #one punch man #original character #bnha au #hero killer stain #mha oc #mha quirks #quirks

[voemae582]

The Truth Changes

Chapter 3: Fragile

I have an idea of how this’ll all end but I’m stuck at the moment so if anyone has any thoughts or suggestion I’m open for requests! Thanks for reading!

Porcelain landed in the street stopping traffic. Looking to the right she saw the group of traitors standing on the side walk. Porcelain walked toward them and stopped in front of former best friend, Alya. She held up her wooden control and Alya followed the red thread with her eyes only to realize it was attached to her own finger. She lifted her hand slowly noticing the string tied to her not knowing how it got there. At first she tried to untie it but she couldn't even touch it.

"What is this?" She questioned.

"Alya Cesaire, you will be the first. You are my example of my power." Porcelain told her.

Alya balled her hand in a fist. "What are you talking about?"

Without warning more threads sprung out of the handle and attached to Alya's arms, legs and head. She began to panic looking at them sticking to her and she tried to wipe them off. At this point Nino was the only one left standing next to her trying to defend her from the thread but they went straight through him to get to her. He couldn't touch them either.

"Now, change."

The red strings began to glow and Alya's arms turned shiny and hard. She got stiff and her face glossed over. Before Nino could make sense of anything Alya was already turned into a fragile China doll. She bent her elbow which was connect by a ball that helped all her joints move. She felt her face and how hard and cold it was. Nino grabbed her hand hesitantly and looked at her, she tried to talk to him but words didn't come out.

"She can't talk unless spoken too." Porcelain smirked.

Alya looked at Nino and mouthed 'Run'. At first he refused but she pushed him away so he started to run toward the others. He didn't get far before the red threads of fate rapped themselves around him as well and transformed him into a puppet too. Next was Ivan, then Mylene and Max.

A crowd formed near the comosition including Nadia Chamackh with the news. Porcelain took control of her puppets movements prohibiting them to even lift a finger and they walked next to her forming a wall behind her in front of the cameras. "Ladies and gentleman, I introduce you to my Marionette dolls. Puppets of my own design, flawless in everyway as long as they don't lie." Porcelain announced to the news cameras and gestured her arms to her creations.

"Can you tell me why you're doing this? You know you were akumatized by Hawkmoth, correct?" Nadia asked holding a mic out.

Porcelain ignored the question and stood next to Alya. "Alya, who is your best friend?" She snapped her fingers and Alya's face relaxed as she got control of her muscles again. 

She took a deep breath and said, "Marinette Dupain-Cheng."

"Wrong answer. That's a lie."

"I'm not-"

Porcelain snapped her fingers again and Alya went back into position like a soldier. Her face then cracked a little on the cheek. "That my friends is what happens when you lie. You see, Alya stopped being Miss Dupain-Cheng's friend when she abandoned the poor girl for a fake." She stepped forward and continued asking questions she knew Alya wouldn't know or would try and stretch the truth too. Soon cracks on her fragile body chipped until she was on the edge of completely braking and falling apart. "Next question, Alya, If you had to choose between Ladybug and Marinette, who would you rather see?"

She was silent for a second. Naturally she'd say Marinette so she'd be a good friend. "Ladybug..." Porcelain looked at her in surprise, because it was the truth. "I'd honestly choose ladybug... Not because I like her more then Marinette though, its because I know Marinette would tell me to do it too."

"No she wouldn't." She hissed.

"Yes she would, because that's the kind of person she is. That's why she's my best friend. She'd never make me choose!" Alya figured it out. "This isn't you!"

Porcelain got tired of being told who she was, that's how she ended up in this situation. "You don't know me at all, do you. I don't care." She squeezed the wooden handle in her hand and Alya shattered revealing a wooden under skin. Alya's wooden body slumped over with rough edges and cracks and  chips covering her body.

"Alya!"

Porcelain was caught off guard from the shout, it came from Nino, he was able to break free from the trance for only a moment. It was impressive, but he used all his energy and will power to say that one thing. "No use, she no longer has a mind of her own. She's nothing but an empty wooden toy, a shell of a girl, not even worthy of being called my marionette. I'll keep her as an example though." She turned to the camera and spoke to Paris. "Now, Chat Noir, give me your miraculous, unless you want all of Paris to end up like this poor Cesaire girl."

Hawkmoth spoke in her ear to remind her, "Don't forget Ladybugs as well!".

Porcelain chuckled and told him, "Don't worry about that for now."

Porcelain looked around in the crowd of people that started to run as fast as they could and spotted Lila taking cover behind innocent people as she escaped. She'd have no problem finding Lila later so she focused on gathering more people for her army, transforming all those in her path.

By the time she had a few hand fulls of people including everyone in her class, except Adrien, Chat Noir had shown up. Porcelain looked down at her army from a rooftop where Chat Noir met up with her.

"I saw your broadcast and wondered how they made your skin so clear on screen, whenever I'm on screen they edit my blemishes, but looking up close I guess you're just puurrrfect?" Chat joked as if they were friends. "Tell my Marinette, what happened?" He asked in a more serious tone.

"My names poupée de porcelain." She told him without taking her gaze off her army.

"So you're made of fine China?"

"You're annoying."

"Just stalling until my Lady shows up." He winked.

Knowing Ladybug wont show up Porcelain decided to amuse him. "My mask is Porcelain, because it's harder to shape then fine china and made strong under hotter and higher temperature. I'm to be strong. And like me, my Marionette's body's are made of bone china, not fine china. Bone china is made of a mixture with bones. The bone they are made of is their own. So believe me when I tell you, when they crack of break, it's ten times worse then breaking a bone. Their lies will not only hurt the people they lie too, but themselves more."

Chat became increasingly concerned hearing that the puppets were breaking their bones when they lied. "That's a terrible th-"

"As long as they don't lie to me or anyone, they'll continue to be perfect and unharmed. Attack me if you'd like, but they'll protect me, and are you willing to fight them knowing you could break their fragile armor? Can you imagine the pain Alya felt? The betrayal and the brokenness? She's not in pain anymore, because she's now nothing but a mindless puppet, but still..."

"The pain she felt? Or the pain your feeling? Because the way I see it, your hurt and you're Hawkmoth's puppet." He argued. She glared at him making him nervous but he continued. "Marinette, this isn't you." He tried to reason with her.

"You're going to tell me I'm a good kind person, someone who wouldn't hurt anyone. Someone like, Ladybug, right?" He looked at her flawless face and for a moment he saw a glint of her blue sapphire eyes behind the mask.

"Yes. Because you are."

"No, she used to be, that girl, but now I'm someone else. In order to set my plan into motion, this is how it has to be." A red string strayed from the path of the others and made it's way around Chat Noir. Hawkmoth was in her ear telling her to get him now and his miraculous, but she ignored him and the string never attached to him. Chat Noir just watched It cautiously.

"Lila." Chat said, making Porcelain retract her thread. "Your after Lila Rossi, right? Then why go after your friends!?"

Porcelain scoffed and faced her whole body toward him. "Some friends they were, they hung on her every word." She then mocked their voices, "'Marinette you're the best!' or 'Marinette, your an everyday Ladybug!', what a bunch of crap. Because one word from that Girl turned all those pretty words into, 'Marinette how could you do that?' and 'Marinette why would you lie?'."

"As soon as I saw you akumatized on TV I went to find Lila, but when I did you were still taking control of innocent civilians, so why not go straight to the source?"

"Of course you would think like that. You can't even begin to comprehend my great plan and how this'll all turn out in the end. I'm not going after her, yet. I want her to know what I can do, I want her to be scared. I want her to know what's coming for her." She threw her arms out to her Marionettes in celebration of her success.

"That's it, I can't wait any longer." Chat Noir got in a ready to fight stance.

"Are you sure about that? You're precious bug isn't here yet." She said in a sour sweet voice.

"She'll be here soon enough, but I can't sit back and let you continue this."

Porcelain let out a cackle of a laugh. "What if I were to tell you that Ladybug is one of the many among my army!?"

Chat didn't waver knowing there was no way she could know that. "Now look who's lying."

Porcelain made her way closer to him making him more on guard and she kept a cheeky smirk on her face. "I don't lie Chat Noir. Watch what happens when I do." She cleared her throat. "I'm in love with Chat Noir." Chat took an emotional blow from that but brushed it off. She gently grabbed her mask and pulled it off only enough for him to see. He observed a crack under her eye. "I'll let you in on a secret." She got closer to him and whispered in his ear. "Ladybug isn't coming."

Chat Noir took a step back. "You're lying!"

She tapped on her mask revealing no new cracks. "I don't think so."

Out of anger Chat Noir lunged at her and pulled out his weapon. The Marionettes were far away enough that she couldn't use them as shields so he had a chance and an opening. Before he could really strike her she jumped over him and he didn't attack again. "Marinette! Stop this."

She looked down at her puppets again. "Hmmm... Looks like everyone who has been entrusted a miraculous have been akumatized by yours truly." She giggled and closed her eyes thinking of how she should continue her chat with Chat. "Well if you want to continue fighting, I don't really mind, I have to take your miraculous anyw-" She looked towards him and noticed he was gone. Out of sight.

"You let him escape!?" Hawkmoth yelled. "And you know who Ladybug is, and where the other miraculous are!? Porcelain, retrieve them for me this instance!"

Porcelain made a face as if an annoying bug was buzzing by her ear. "No."

"Remember, I gave you you're power and I can-"

"-Take it away. I know. But I can give you all the miraculous together, in a box, like a present. Trust me, I have a plan. Everything will be alright."

"You better get them to me as fast as you can, or else." He demanded.

"Yes Hawkmoth."

Meanwhile Chat Noir made his way across town and hid in an alley way to transform back. Plagg flew out of his ring in a panic. 

"Plagg calm down, we need think of a plan, maybe she was bluffing and Ladybug is fine."

Plagg shook his head, "Kid this is serious, I can honestly tell you, she was telling the truth. We need to find Master. I have a feeling Tikki's with him, which is good."

"Tikki?" Adrien asked.

"No time to explain, lets go!" Plagg flew in the direction of Master Fu's massage place with Adrien close behind him.

To be Continued... Hope you like it....

#miraculous ladybug #miraculous ladybug au #Marinette Dupain-Cheng #akuma!marinette #akumatized marinette #chat noir #adrien agreste #hawkmoth #lila rossi #my fanfiction #tia #the truth changes #chapter 3 #fragile #broken #miraculous #miraculers #Marinette #ladybug #marichat #lukanette #alya cesaire

[stained-glass-fragments]

[ Stained Glass (Fragments): The Only Path (pt 1) ]

How she managed to fall asleep in his arms after everything he had done, Farona didn't even understand, herself.

But she had.

Perhaps utter exhaustion had gotten the better of her. After all, in a single night's time, she had been burdened with a truth that nothing could have possibly prepared her for. The revelation in its entirety was a heavy weight to bear on both her mind and her heart. Her emotions and body were equally drained.

Yune Hiraze. The name alone made her feel too many conflicting things, some of which she couldn't even pin-point or categorize properly anymore.

In truth, she didn't know what to think. And moreso, she didn't know what to do.

How was anyone to react upon discovering that someone they trusted implicitly was carrying out a terrifying revenge plot that they knew nothing about? How did you look someone in the eye who could murder innocent people in cold blood? How did you even begin to accept that someone you considered a close friend was capable of such utter malice and acts of hatred?

And at the same time, she knew what had pained him. She understood the things that he felt---the despair, the fear, the constant feeling of never belonging anywhere or with anyone. And the knowledge that deep down, no matter how you may try to hide or mask it, you were different---you were potentially dangerous---you were infected with something beyond your control that could ruin your entire life in an instant if exposed.

You were a creation. You were a monster.

Your humanity was forever tainted.

Yune knew exactly what that felt like. They shared a bond that no one else could truly fathom the depths or origins of. And it made sense now, what had drawn her to him so much over the time they spent traveling together. She didn't know the truth then, but it was as if something beyond her understanding and control was reaching for that likeness, that kindred spirit. She felt a warmth in his presence that was often times as bewildering as it was comforting.

But the truth was, Yune was dangerous. There was no denying that fact.

He had power and he knew how to use it. He could kill and had killed---countless times already. He was calculating and ruthless. He pulled strings effortlessly, like everyone around him were mere marionettes.

Including her. She had never guessed even once that Yune was hiding any dark secrets or putting on a show and wearing a mask. How many times must she have played right into his hands without realizing it?

Even now, as she laid with eyes half-open, somewhere between sleeping and waking, her emotions were a torrent of unadulterated chaos.

Why... did he tell her truth?

Why did he seek her out the night prior?

Yune knew her well, no matter how little she truly knew about him. He must have known that she would never go along with his plans or join him after exposing his true intentions.

So why did he want her to stay? Why was his arm draped so securely around her form? What did he gain from this? Was it some attempt to coax her into not going to the authorities?

He could have killed her. She knew that. Her mind had even tried to prepare her for it during their confrontation right here in the church, mere hours ago. And if he had wanted to stop her from seeking the guard or others to apprehend him, it wouldn't have been difficult.

Was it because he realized that no one would listen to her anymore? Was that... why he told her the truth?

An invisible vice clenched around her heart. From what she knew of this Yune---the Yune that was capable of terrible things and becoming an entirely different person of his own making---it was uncomfortably probable. He spent nearly his entire life lying---and lying so well that it fooled her and everyone he'd met. Yune had clearly mastered that art.

But something still didn't add up. There was still some part of her heart that refused to acknowledge that everything was a lie and a setup. If his infatuation with her was just due to a need to possess and control and nothing more, there was no reason for him not to turn her into the walking dead as he had so many others.

She was alive. She could feel the rise and fall of his chest against her back, and light breaths tickling the back of her neck.

There was a reality in the lie somewhere. But like a needle in a haystack, she didn't even know where to begin searching for it.

The path forward from here was shrouded in shadow and dense mist as far as the eyes could see. Over the course of one day, the road she once traveled had been torn apart and the brightness that guided her footsteps to a better tomorrow had been covered in darkness.

Where did she go from here?

Her aqua eyes blinked once, twice. The steadily breathing body wound around her continued to slumber peacefully within the church.

At least one of them was unconcerned, she thought sourly. Did this all fit into his plans too? Was this all going right down the path he intended, which he'd now unceremoniously collided into her already-broken one?

One thing was clear to her, though. Whatever happened from hereon out, she couldn't let him do as he pleased.

Turning him in to the authorities of Rune-Midgard would accomplish nothing. After all, she couldn't overpower him if it came down to it and the idea of tricking this mastermind into turning himself in was laughable.

All that would accomplish was essentially throwing herself into their hands. A part of her had almost done that the prior day after her origins had been discovered. Thinking back on it, she was disgusted by how easily she had fallen apart and been prepared to give up.

There was still good in this world. There were still good people. Perhaps a lot of her former comrades were swayed by fear and uncertainty after the revelation of what she was, but she couldn't let that stop her. She was still a lord knight. And even if that path had been wrenched from her, she could still hold on to those morals and values that she held dear.

No one could take those from her -- not the alchemists, not Yune, not anyone.

More fully awake now, she twisted slightly in the loose grasp of the high priest. The arms around her instantly constricted and she gasped.

Had he been awake all this time?

"We still have a few minutes to relax," he voiced up against one of her ears, which twitched involuntarily in response. "No need to rush things."

The first shreds of dawn were alighting the cracked stained glass window above.

And suddenly, looking at the contorted image in the interlocking pattern of colored glass, it fell into place in her mind.

It was clear what she had to do now.

"I won't let you," she suddenly declared in a tone that was resolute.

"Hmmm?" He nuzzled the side of her neck, which made her ears stand on-end. "Won't let me what, pray tell?"

Her lips pursed. "Kill."

Yune stilled against her back briefly. Then, he chuckled. "A little late for that, don't you think?"

Her eyes narrowed, once again settling on the tall, cracked window. A few of the colored tiles had lit up with the morning gaze of the sun, spreading multi-colored polygon patterns on the floor. There was no way to recover the lost lives up to this point, as much as she regretted that fact. There was nothing she could do about it. But for the future, she would do that all that she could to prevent - to protect.

"I won't let you do it again," she swore, clenching her hands together.

He was unnervingly quiet for next few seconds, making her heart rate begin to pick up. That was a bold claim to make, but... it was the truth. She would do everything within her power---human or not---to make sure he wouldn't take another life. This was the only path for her now. The only path that she felt was right.

"Do you really think you could stop me?"

It sounded like a challenge---a threat, almost. She could all but feel the smirk of his lips against her left ear. Farona hesitated. She wasn't confident that she could, when it came down to it.

But that didn't matter. It wasn't about whether she could or couldn't.

She had to.

"I will," she promised softly, unwinding herself from his arms.

#ragnarok online #lord knight #high priest #ro high priest #ro lord knight #stained glass writing #farona #yune hiraze #tw: mentions of murder #hope you guys are enjoying the story parts so far~