d3adite666

[d3adite666]

ICARUS

ICARUS  

JOHN WALKER X READER

tags: no use of y/n, gender neutral reader, slight body description, ANGST (i swear he gets a happy ending guys), fluff, one-shot, yah this is basically just 6.2k words of john walker angst so... good luck i guess 

a/n: i DESPERATELY need happier suggestions because all my feral rat brain wishes to write about is this mans big blue eyes being filled with tears. SO PLEASE DM me any asks or suggestions for him, also if i missed any tags please let me know, happy (not really happy) reading! 

6.2k words  

John Walker does not have feelings. At least according to 90% of the population. According to the articles you will read about him, he is a heartless soldier who executed an innocent man on the steps of a statue. If you listen to the news coverage of his court case, he is a war-torn veteran who has slowly lost his mind, the process sped up by seeing his ‘battle-buddy’ killed in front of him, neck snapped as easily as one might snap a twig in their hands. According to his ex-wife, he is a man that couldn’t take care of his own son, he had too many problems that he couldn't fix after he got stripped of his title and rank. She would only ever tell her son that his dad was a hero though.  

The dust was still settling over the wreckage when the cameras could be heard. Different reporters starting their speech of “This is Channel [blank] news here live on the scene.” Acting as if lives weren't just at stake, as if the casualties were nothing but rubble on the ground. You hobbled out of a side street, an arm in front of you waving away the debris in the air out of your face. Your side bleeding, the sticky dark red substance flowing down your thigh, your hand already stained by it. You’re rushed by a group of reporters, cameras shoved in your face as a thousand different questions start to sound out from the sea of microphones, “What happened here?” “Is it true you all are calling yourselves the New Avengers?” “Is it true that Sam Wilson is suing you all-”  

You hear a solid thump then glass shattering, John Walker has pushed a camera to the ground to let you pass. He wraps his free arm around your waist, leading you through the sea of reporters, his back to them to keep you out of the cameras view. You cough, leaning on him, pain shooting up your side. You try to keep your expression neutral, but you barely make it on to the Quinjet, stumbling over to a bench and collapsing. You lean your head back onto the steel interior of the jet, swallowing the blood that threatened to come up. Walker sits across from you; his blue eyes trained on you like he's waiting for you to inevitably collapse.  

You close your eyes; hand pressed to your side to slow the bleeding down. By the time the Quinjet shakily lands at the tower, you're dizzy, vision tunneling, but you don't slow down. You walk straight to the elevator, leaning on the wall as the doors start to close, but they never do. A large, gloved hand sticks between them, keeping the two solid steel doors from closing. Walker stands at the threshold, looking at you, “You need to go to the med bay for that,” he nods to your side. You squint your eyes, already in pain, not wanting to be forced into the stark white wing of the tower, the constant beeping of the monitor already threatening to make you lose your mind.  

“I’m fine.” famous last words, you stare at each other for a minute. You swear you can see the gears turning in his head, like he's powering up to be a major pain in your ass. He sighs, “Let me look at it,” his eyes are half lidded, tired, and yet he's offering to look over your wounds. “Walker, I’m-” he cuts you off, walking into the elevator and letting the doors slide closed, “You’re not, and you're not going to the med bay, so just let me look at it.” his voice carries a weird finality, like he knows you won't go to the medical wing of the tower no matter how much he tries to convince you. Part of you wonders if he knows about your irrational fear of it. You take a breath, looking at the buttons on the wall, pressing your floor, “Fine.”  

You refuse to let him into your room, instead you grab the first aid kit from your bathroom, walking out to the small kitchen area and leaning on the counter. The dim light didn't give him much visibility, but he worked with what he had, working on the gaping wound in your side, “It’s just a graze,” you mumble. He doesn't respond, instead continuing to clean up the dried blood around the area. You cling onto the counter, hissing in pain, your head drops forward, your teeth gritting. “Easy,” his voice is quiet, softer than usual, like he knows your one bad stitch away from shoving him to the ground and bolting to your room. He can only hope you leave your door unlocked for him to check on you. 

Walker has never known why he's like this with you. Why he's so intent on making sure you're okay, that your wounds are properly taken care of, that you don't have to face the hoard of cameras on your own. He doesn't like that he's like this, doesn't like the softness that threatens to explode out of his chest whenever he's around you. He doesn't like the power you have over him that you seemingly don't know about. You could ask him to burn the entire world and truth be told, he’d never let a single flame singe a hair on your head.  

He could blame this feeling on you saving his life a month into working with him. The op was supposed to be simple, in and out, but when comms were compromised halfway into the bunker fifty stories below sea level, leaving you two alone with no communication to your team, it went sideways fast. Guards ambushed you, and while Walker tried to keep you both safe, using his bent shield to take out almost a dozen gun-wielding enemies, he got shot, the bullet grazing by his neck, taking him by shock as the blood started to pour down his chest. You took care of the last few guards, quickly making your way over to him, your hand finding its way to his neck, it was just a graze, but dammit the amount of blood made it look almost fatal. “You’re gonna be okay,” you had whispered, your eyes staying trained on the wound as you pulled your jacket off and pressed it to his neck to stop the bleeding. For once, he didn't say much, he just let you work on keeping the blood flow to a minimum.  

The bunker was silent as you two waited, your hand a steady pressure on his neck, his blue eyes just a little hazy as they looked at you. You had wondered what he was thinking, working together for only a month and he manages to almost get himself killed, just your luck you get stuck with him. He didn't acknowledge it happened, the wound, the silence, your presence grounding him and keeping him from passing out. Just gave you a croaked out “Thanks” as he was wheeled to the med bay. 

So maybe that's why Walker had chosen to pester you about your side wound, because he felt the need to repay for you saving his life all those months ago. But it doesn't seem to fit in his mind as the only reason. Truthfully, he couldn't really think straight in this moment, not with your tac shirt pulled up to your chest, revealing the smooth skin of your side, the slight pudge of your stomach over the belt of the tac pants, all of it made it increasingly difficult to focus on the gaping wound in front of him. He knelt, making his face level with your stomach as he worked, cleaning the dried blood from around the wound, making the area as clean as possible.  

“You should’ve gone to the med bay,” his voice is quiet, tentative, he's not expecting an answer from you. 

You give one anyways, “Didn't need to,” it's a lie, both of you know that. 

He shakes his head, “I’ll never understand why you don't go to the med bay; they would've been able to fix you up better and faster than I can,” he retorts, glancing up at you. 

You don't look down at him, staring at the opposite wall of the kitchen, “I don't like it,” you shrug. 

He furrows his eyebrows, “So what? You’re just a grown ass adult that can't handle getting a few shots?” 

You swallow, blinking a few times before quietly mumbling, “Reminds me of the experiments they used to do on me,” 

Silence, for once not interrupted by his snarks, or a scoff, he simply stays silent. 

After a few minutes he speaks up, “I didn't know,” he says it as though it's an apology, an apology for trying to force you to do something that might have possibly sent you spiraling.  

You nod slowly, “Yeah... most people don't,” the words leave your lips with more bitterness than you had intended.  

He finishes stitching you up, calloused palms pressing on the area around the wound, trying to convince himself that it's only to make sure none of your ribs are broken, definitely not because he loves the way your skin feels beneath his hands. Yeah... that's definitely not the reason. He doesn't say anything, just silently cleans up the bloody gauze, picking up the kit and placing it on your counter as you pull your shirt back into place, much to his hidden chagrin. You two don't speak as you hobble to your room, changing into clean clothes before emerging from the space into your kitchen. In the few minutes it took you to change, the super soldier had cleaned up after himself, wiping down the red stains off the counter, packing the first aid kit quickly and efficiently, leaving it on the counter for you to put away. The elevator doors shut as you took notice of the clean area, he left.  

John Walker does not have feelings. 

Nobody in the tower truly sleeps, not really. Unless they medicate or drink themselves to get their mind to shut off. When you had your first nightmare in the tower, you'd chosen to just wander the sleek grey halls of the tower, not wanting to wake anyone up. The first few nights of doing this, only a few months into being on the team, you had never run into anyone, aside from Bob, who was raiding the pantry. You both just stared at each other until you left the room.  

You jolt awake, the nightmare clinging to you in the same way your now sweat-soaked shirt clings to your skin. You sit up, shakily taking in breaths as you look around your dark room, the moon casting a soft light in through the windows. You lean back against the headboard trying to not close your eyes too much or you might see the horrors again. When you glance at your alarm clock you sigh at the blinking red 2:43am. You take the steps instead of the elevator, the large steel box making too much noise to be stealthy this late at night. When you cross the threshold into the communal kitchen you note the half open pantry, Bob has already raided the snacks, dammit. You pad past the area, walking to the dark living room and flicking on the tv. 

The sounds from the movie you had cut on hardly drift past the speakers, the volume so low you had to strain to hear it. You don't care; you just need the soft light it provides. You were no longer tired, afraid to close your eyes, afraid of seeing the terrors behind your eyelids again.  

Your attention drags away from the tv when you hear a door open and shut softly, your trained ears hearing every little sound. You stare at the tall figure as it stands at the entry way to the living room, it stares back at you for a moment until your eyes adjust to the dark. It’s Walker. He looks in worse shape than you do, eye bags more prominent under his usually bright blue eyes, now dimmed with horrors you've never seen. His torso bare, the steel dog tags glinting off his chest in the light of the tv. His sweatpants hanging low on his form, you try to not notice the dark blonde patch of hair that disappears under the waistband.  

He doesn't say anything, simply walking over to the couch and sitting on the opposite end away from you. You don't say anything either, trying to focus on the barely audible dialogue coming from the tv. You had tossed the remote to the cushion next to you, so when he reaches to grab it, you don't even look over. He starts flipping through channels, until he lands on INSP, the channel playing a rerun of Django. You furrow your eyebrows, looking over at him, “Really?” 

“What?” he retorts, glancing at you from the corner of his eyes 

“Django?” 

“It's a cinematic masterpiece-” 

“It's something my dad would watch.” 

He takes a moment before shrugging, “Your dad has good taste, ‘s a shame that it didn't pass on to you.” 

A smile tugs at your mouth, you shake your head, “What's so appealing about it?” 

He huffs, rolling his neck, he looks over at you, “It's an old western, cowboys, lawless land, has all the classic tropes...” he shrugs. You realize something in that very moment, the short few seconds of him speaking, his voice is oddly soothing, lulling you to sleep the way popping a few melatonin before bed would. You want him to keep talking. 

“What do you mean?” 

“I mean like, ‘the damsel in distress’, ‘The gunslinger with a hard shell’, ‘showdowns at high noon’...” He continues on and you start to feel your eyelids get heavy, you turn so your cheek can rest against the back cushion of the couch, your eyes trained on his form sitting opposite of you as he rambles about the best types of western movies and how Django is one of his favorites.  

“And not to mention each and every western movie has the same sort of plot-” he happens to look over at you. He would've scoffed, shook his head and rolled his eyes as he turned off the tv and left. But no, he stared at you, the way your hair fell into your eyes, giving him the overpowering urge to reach over and tuck the strands behind your ear. The way you looked so small tucked into the couch in a ball, your shoulders rising and falling as you breathe steadily.  

He notes how your eyebrows furrow when he stops talking, so he quickly fixes that, his voice dropping a few octaves. He’s never liked the way his voice sounds, despite how much he talks, how it seems like he loves to hear himself talk. He talks too much to cover up any insecurities anyone might see by mistake. So, the idea that you like his voice enough to fall asleep to it, the idea fills his heart with pride, his chest puffing a little as he continues to ramble on. 

Neither of you discuss how it's become routine for you to sit on the couch and watch old westerns together while he sits on the opposite end of the couch and complains about movies ‘now’ are awful. You don't talk about how soft he seems to get with you late at night, especially when you start to seek him out, wandering through the dimly lit hallways til you find the familiar broad shoulders, usually clad in a well-loved army shirt, almost always trying to keep his hands busy by cleaning his pistol or organizing some random drawer. He doesn't bring any of it up, doesn't tease you about it, because that would mean he would have to admit that he always stays in the same three places to make it easier for your tired body to find its way into his vicinity. He’d have to admit that he likes getting to talk you to sleep, he likes that you find comfort in his presence. He would have to admit that the few nights you didn't wake up and seek him out, part of him wonders if you'd finally realized how much of a loser he truly is. He’s just a guy that made a big mistake and it cost him everything, maybe you found comfort in one of the other team members, maybe Yelena, you two probably had more in common.  

No, he constantly reminds himself of the fact: John Walker doesn't have feelings. 

You had weaseled your way into his mind, whether he wanted to admit it or not, your presence was almost always wanted by him. So, when you started showing up on his floor at random times of the day, simply wandering around, he didn't question it. To you, it looked like he rolled his eyes and shook his head but to him, to him he was letting himself be okay with you being around him.  

He’s cleaning his pistol on his desk near his bed while you scroll on your phone, some random reality show plays on the tv mounted on the wall at the end of his bed. Your eyes peel away from the small screen in your hand and focus on the very few pictures hung up on the wall. His room isn't decorated fully like the rest of the team’s, more like he stopped hanging up pictures halfway through moving in, deciding he’d rather keep the room bare of a personal touch.  

Your eyes zone in on a photo of him and Lemar, both in matching military uniforms. Walker is actually smiling, something you have yet to see from him. You sit up, reaching for it. Without turning around Walker calls out, “Don't touch it.” The statement reeks of finality, it's not a question, it's an order. Your hand stills in midair, “I was just gonna-” he shakes his head, still not turning around, “Don't. Touch. It.”  

Your hand falls to your lap, you look over at his back as he's bent over his desk, the room smells like gun cleaner and a musky smell that you've come to find comforting. You stand up, walking over to the desk, his hands are covered in the cleaner, making his skin shine. He glances over at you, watching as your eyes rove over the table, the different gun parts, the bottle of cleaner half empty.  

Your eyes meet his, “Need any help?” you know his answer is no, but you still bother with asking, just in case. As expected he starts to shake his head before it seems something dawns on him, he nods to the muzzle, “Hands are slick as shit, think y’can connect the muzzle to the barrel?” you nod, grabbing the slick piece of metal, “Fucks sake what are you cleaning this with? Lube?” you shake your head, fitting the two metal pieces together and putting them back down on to the desk. You watch the corner of his mouth lift, he looks at the wall, like he's debating laughing, then he shakes his head looking down at the gun parts, satisfied with the level of cleanliness he leaves to go wash his hands.  

The smell of gun cleaner lingers in the room, it reminds you of him in a nice way, almost how a certain smell might take you back to a happier time. Your eyes drift around the room, latching on to the picture of him and Lemar again. You walk up to it, careful to not touch it, especially now that your fingers had that distinct slick of the cleaner covering them. Walker looks happy and not just the type of happy you would plaster on for a picture. No, happy as in he used to not be so grumpy, used to not be such an asshole, used to be just a soldier with a battle buddy. If you could even call Lemar that-  

“He wasn't just my battle buddy,” Walker’s voice makes you turn your head. He’s leaned on the bathroom door frame, a towel in his hands as he dries off the water. “That man was my brother.” he continues, his voice low, reverent, “Lemar got me out of a lot of trouble in high school, always saving my stupid ass from getting suspended for dumb shit. I’d get too riled up and he’d be right by me to either back me up or get me to leave it alone.” he shakes his head, throwing the towel onto the bathroom counter before turning to the desk. He starts to put together the gun with military-esque precision.  

“One time,” he starts again, sniffing the air like he was trying to clear his head, “Some racist asshole,” he shakes his head, “Started a rumor about Lemar, about his family, things he’d supposedly done. It was all a bunch of bullshit. I didn't hear about any of it.” he shrugs, leaning back on the desk, staring at the floor, “Lemar didn't let me know about any of the shit this guy was putting him through because he knew,” another pause, “He knew I'd lose it. And I still did. When I heard what that racist-ass shithead was saying about Lemar I lost it. He ended up in the ER, but it was because of Lemar that I didn't get suspended.” He laughs softly, shaking his head as he looks over at the picture, you're in front of. “He stayed the same when we went through basic, he was always so level-headed. Compared to him I felt like an uncontrollable emotional basket case.”  

The room falls silent, you don't know where to look, you opt to glance back at the photo, “You look happy here,” your voice is soft, a tone you don't usually use with the others he's noticed, his eyes stay on the photo, “I was.” 

The words from the articles you had read so long ago about him rang in your ears, ‘Walker’s Battle buddy, Walker’s friend, Captain America’s Sidekick’ they never called Lemar by name. They reduced him to some side character in Walker’s shadow, but by the way he speaks of Lemar, the pair were brothers. You look over at Walker, who’s head is now facing the ground, “You know what the sound of a spine breaking sounds like?” his voice is low, the question sounds like true curiosity, but before you can answer his head lifts up slightly so he can look at you, “Like a toothpick snapping in half, like a dead leaf being stepped on.” he pauses, you can see tears start to prick at the edges of his blue eyes, “I hear his death so much in my head. Over and over again, like a broken fucking record.” 

You don't know how to respond, you’ve never witnessed this much emotion from him. You look at him in silence, unsure as to how to reply.  

“Y’know, a part of me will always wonder if I had been faster, stronger, maybe if I had taken the serum a little earlier, if I hadn't had him come with-”  

You have to stop the cycle, the cycle of destructive thoughts, the ones that chew you up and spit you out just to do it all over again. “Walker.” You interrupt him, watching as a single tear slips out of his eye, you watch his gaze harden, as if he's just now realizing how vulnerable he is to you. “It's not your fault,” he's heard the words a thousand times, from Olivia, from support groups for grieving veterans. Olivia had forced him to attend a few meetings after Lemar died, but he stopped going as soon as she stopped asking about them. But the words coming from your lips, someone who he has been an asshole to in the past, someone who’s seen him bite like a wounded dog.  

Truthfully, he knows why he bites at people, why, when someone gets to close, he snarls and curls his lip. His blue eyes harden into sharp irises that pierce through you, “I know,” he replies, his voice losing the softness it had moments ago. You cock your head at him slightly, turning a little to face him, “Do you?” it's a simple question and yet he can't answer it. 

You push him, taking a step towards his form still leaned against the desk,” You can't blame yourself for something you couldn't have stopped. Lemar dying isn't your fault, no matter what that voice in your head is telling you-”  

“Well, everything else is! The guy I murdered, the lives I ruined, Olivia and Eli, I- it's my fault! You can't say it's not!” There it is, the teeth, the snarl, the bite, a wound opened, and you just pressed on it. You jolt at his harsh words, placing a hand out in front of you as if dealing with a feral animal, you might as well be. “Walker, you were a veteran suffering from extreme PTSD, you had just lost your best friend, your brother-” 

“I still made a mistake,” he seethes out, his jaw clenched so tight it's starting to give him a headache, “It's my fault, a good soldier wouldn't have let his emotions get in the way of the mission and that's exactly what I didn’t do.” 

You pause, staring at him for a moment before you take another step closer, only a foot away from him, “You’re not a soldier, Walker, you're a human, a human with emotions, a human with PTSD. You’re not a soldier anymore, you weren't a soldier when you watched Lemar die, you were his brother,” 

Silence envelopes the both of you, your hands still a little out in front of you, almost daring to touch his chest, ground him. He doesn't look at you, you watch his jaw clench, the pulse in his neck beating against the skin, threatening to break free. You dare to move closer, your eyes searching for his, “You do know that right? You know that you reacted how any human would have done in that situation. No, it wasn't right, but Walker... you'd be hard pressed to find someone who would've done the right thing if they were in your shoes.” Your words are soft, sincere, your hand splaying on his chest before finding his cheek. 

You feel a single tear fall on his face, gathering at your hand and sliding over the back of it. His eyes finally meet yours, “You don't understand.” he's grasping at straws, trying to make you see how bad of a man he is, how he's unredeemable, how could anyone ever think more of him than a soldier? You shake your head, “I do, I do understand and you, John Walker, you're a good man.” you assure him. He can't help but listen to your words, more tears falling as he squeezes his eyes shut. 

He hesitates before leaning forward, burying his face in your neck, you feel tears spilling down his cheeks on to your shirt and you couldn't care less. Your arms wrap around his neck, your face turning to whisper assurance in his ear, “It's okay, you're okay, I'm here,” you feel his broad arms wrap around your middle, pulling you closer, his frame bending to fit against you. You hold him as long as he needs you to. 

He forces himself to pull away, blinking away the redness in his eyes, your hands reach for his cheek, he turns away, “I'm fine.” he's not, you both know he's lying. You stare up at him for a few moments, debating on what to do. You nod, taking a step back, “Got it, just- just take care of yourself, alright?” you offer quietly, looking down at the floorboards before meeting his gaze again. His eyes get bluer when he cries, the irises now a vibrant oceanic color. “Yeah, yeah” He nods, trying to piece himself back together, you had just broken him down, broken a wall that he had spent years building up. Now you were going to just walk away, walk away like you didn't just split his heart wide open.  

And he was going to let you. Because John Walker doesn't have feelings. 

The thing about Walker, despite being 6’2’’, the super soldier can hide when he wants to. Especially in a tower as big as the one you all reside in. You check his usual spots, the gym, his floor, and the common area. Nothing. You start to wonder if maybe he was sent on an op, but there were no briefings today.  

Then you see him, at a mission briefing. He doesn't look at you, doesn't crack jokes, doesn't even snark when Bob says something like “John Thinker” after he takes a minute to respond. He seems cold and you start to worry that maybe his breakdown has something to do with it. You seek him out, like a heat-seeking missile with a target, your eyes are on his back as he tries to beeline for the elevator, you trap him, just as he had with you a few months ago.  

“Are you okay?” you ask when the steels doors chime shut. 

“I'm fine.” he responds without looking at you. 

“You don't seem fine; you seem irritated, and I haven't been able to find you-” 

“Well maybe you shouldn't be looking for me, maybe you shouldn't be so fucking clingy.” the words are out before he can stop them and dammit, he hates the way they taste so bitter.  

But he doesn't apologize, he doesn't turn to look at you because he knows if he does, he will break again. No, he just walks out of the elevator as it chimes open to his floor, leaving you and your big doe eyes watery with tears. 

Because John Walker doesn't have feelings. 

Another nightmare, another night waking up in a puddle of sweat, his chest heaving. Walker tries to get his brain to shut off, usually he can simply make his mind a blank slate and go right back to sleep. But tonight, tonight, all he can picture is your sweet face, the seconds before the elevator doors closed, eyes watery as his harsh words sunk into you. He hates himself for what he said, truly, it adds on to the long laundry list of bad shit he's done and the people he's hurt by doing and saying stupid shit.  

He sits up, no, this is gonna be different. Before he can fully register what he's doing, his feet are padding out of his room to the stairs, taking them two at a time to your level. He’s at your door, standing in front of the dark wood, fist raised to knock. He doesn't, he stands there, wondering, worrying. What if you don't want him here? What if he's making a mistake by showing up at your door? What if-  

He knocks. Just once, a firm and soft thud that makes you jolt awake. You’re a light sleeper by nature, you sit up, rubbing your eyes before throwing your legs over the side of the bed. When you open the door, you don't say anything. Your sleep-muddled mind tries to play catch-up, trying to register that Walker is in front of you, shirtless, heaving, and sweaty.  

“Walker? What do you-”  “I'm sorry” the words are quick, quiet, but you hear them anyways. 

You know what he's sorry for, you know it's killing his pride to be here. You breathe out softly, “Its fine-” 

“No, it's not. What i said to you was bullshit. I'm sorry for avoiding you and for snapping at you like that,” 

You shake your head, “Walker, I shouldn't have pried, okay? It's fine, I'm an adult, I've been called worse than clingy-” you start to close your door, his large palm splays on it, holding it open. He looks frustrated, like you're not getting what he's trying to say. “No, no, I mean, I don't want- I... I like that you're clingy, I like that I know you'll find me when you want to hang out. I like knowing that you feel safe enough to sleep around me. I like that, I like-” the next word seemingly hangs in air, his mouth not forming it. His blue eyes bore into yours, almost willing you to hear what he's saying without him actually saying anything. 

“I don't understand why you seek me out, I don't understand why you feel safe enough to fall asleep around me. I don't understand why you don't treat me like the asshole that I am. But I like it. I like being special to you and dammit all if you're not special to me.” 

His words make your stomach do flips, you blink at him, “Wal- John” you call him by his name, but he just shakes his head. “I know I'm an asshole, I know I'm fucked up, you deserve so much better than me, you do. You’re so sweet and soft, and something i can never have and just- you're better off not seeking me out.” He comes to the conclusion on his own, saying the words like they're the answer. 

You shake your head, reaching your hand out to splay on his chest, “John.” you say his name so softly it makes his eyes start to sting with tears again. He shakes his head, “You don't want me, I'm too messed up”  

You give him a soft smile, taking a step towards him, your hand sliding up to his cheek, “But I do. I do feel safe around you, I seek you out because I know if I'm around you I'm safe. Yes I can protect myself, but I like being around someone I can trust. I like listening to you ramble about your western movies, I like that you're always in the same three spots for me to find you. I like that you don't get annoyed when I follow you around. I like you, John” the words hang in the air, his eyes widening a fraction as they stare down at you.  

He starts to shake his head, “No you don't-” but your lips are already meeting his. You kiss him softly, gently, like how you always are with him he's noticed. He pulls away, searching your eyes, “I'm messed up, I've done horrific shit you don't know about-” you kiss him again, arms wrapping around his neck as you pull him into your room. His hand pushes the door closed as he kisses your back, eyebrows furrowed, a slight frown still present as he battles the internal war going on in his head.  

“John. I don't care, i don't care about the shit you've done, we all have pasts we wish would leave us alone.” you pull apart from him, your hands cupping his face as he's bent down to your level.  

“Save yourself the trouble of struggling with me,” he's pleading with you, pleading with you to just forget this ever happened, to let go of your feelings for him, because he knows if this goes much further, he’s going to break again. You simply shake your head, a small grin on your face as you cock your head, your nose brushing against his, “I can't do that.” you mutter as your lips lock with his again. 

He can't help it, his hands come up behind you, splaying on your back as he kisses you. It's gentle at first, his lips slotting against yours like they were made for you to kiss. He slowly pushes you back, walking you to the edge of your bed. Your hands on his face turn him until he's sitting on the bed. You pull away from his lips, looking down at him.  

His blue eyes stare back up at you, looking at your face as if you hung the moon. Youve never seen such adoration in his eyes, such affection present in his gaze. “I'm too messed up for you,” he whispers, the words are raw, they're real to him, it's truly what he thinks of himself. You kiss his cheek, “We can be messed up together,” you kiss his other cheek before your lips land on his nose. Your eyes flit open to look down at him, “You’re a good man John, you can try and convince me otherwise, but you are a good man. You’re not a soldier; you never have to be anyone's soldier ever again. But you are a good man.” 

Those words that you spoke infiltrate through his ears down to his heart. He feels a slow warmth start to spread in his chest, something akin to butterflies but more sincere. His eyes sting with unshed tears, his hands splayed on the outsides of your thighs as you stand in between his legs. John knew he could feel, because he could feel the affection radiating from you, the warmth he tried so hard to not bask in, despite the urges he faced to give in. How could he not have feelings? How could he be so cold when here he is basking in the sun, in the light of your adoration and praise? 

Because John Walker has feelings. 

[d3adite666]

I need Brennan Lee Mulligan and that fucking D20 to kiss

[d3adite666]

guys hear me out…parker and chance at the same time…i know a shocking revelation! never been thought of before..but if nobody will take the initiative then i sure as hell will. trust me i will rock that board game.

[d3adite666]

I need Brennan Lee Mulligan and that fucking D20 to kiss

[d3adite666]

i think, when it comes to eddie flirting, it's definitely not like, verbal flirting. and it's not as straight forward and blunt as volt's. it's physical, it's moreso him using his presence then anything. it can be hard to miss, if you aren't looking for the cues.

you'll start the conversation like any other, standing next to the bar with him next to you. he'll be his dry self like usual, but his voice more quiet. it's not his exhaustion that's getting to him, though. and you'll find yourself struggling to understand and, being the gentleman that eddie is, he'll step closer. and closer.

and eventually you'll find eddie's leg slotted in between yours, your lower back pushed up against the bar. but don't worry, he won't let you fall. because his hand is rested on the bar top, right next to your waist. he'll catch you at any time, offer you a comfortable pillow in case you want to lean back fully. and he'll drop his voice quieter and quieter until he's inches away from your face. until you can taste the cocktail on his breath, his nose almost touching yours. teasing, painfully teasing. watching your eyes dart down to his lips, he'll wonder if you'll be brave. if you'll take the chance and steal a kiss.

if you don't take the kiss, if you hold out and see how far he takes it, he will become insufferable. whispering, low and husky in your ear. maybe have one of his sharp canines tease your sensitive skin. his calloused, rough thumb running down your jaw, down your neck. maybe he'll cradle the back of your neck, ready to crane you back, tease the front of your neck. his chest pressed against yours, that hand on the bar top now pressed against the small of your back. feeling your heavy breathing against his calm and steady breathing, a chuckle in his breath as he teases.

and then. he'll go back to his cold ways, the cold ways that caught your attention, and simply walk away. leave you dizzy, pouting, heart racing. and he'll glance over his shoulder, give you a wink, and gesture to the back closet. just a test to see how desperately you want him.

[d3adite666]

I don't want what you have, I want to be you.

[d3adite666]

well.....agent john babygirl walker

inspired by this post

[d3adite666]

[d3adite666]

xerox ; robert reynolds ; part four.

part one. | part two. | part three.

pairing ; robert (bob) reynolds x reader, thunderbolts & reader

synopsis ; you had one last job before you were free. no more splitting, no more deaths. unfortunately, that job seemed to rope in four other assassins and a... a man in hospital-wear?

words ; 6.6k

themes ; action, angst, slowburn, the beginnings of romance

warnings / includes ; violence, talks of mental health, mention of jacking off, human experimentation, child abuse, reader has the ability to split into multiple bodies (think dupli-kate from invincible), foul language, oh no i made the void sexy!

a/n ; sorry for the wait! this was meant to be a longer part but i honestly didn't want to wait to post HAHA, but i really hope you guys like it !!! guys i've gotten so attached to xerox as an oc you have nooo idea

main masterlist. read on ao3! xerox's face claim :)

John’s morning started off as routinely as ever. Get out of bed at six-thirty AM sharp. Brush teeth. Stretches. Jogging. Muscle training at the gym. Scroll through hate tweets as he cools down. Shower. Then, finally, breakfast. 

He made his way to the kitchen. To none of his surprise, you were already there—or a copy of you was—sitting at the farthest end of the island, completing a page of that ridiculously thick puzzle book of yours and nursing a mug of hot tea. Bob was beside you, hunched over what John spotted to be a Rubix cube. It was nearly solved.

John only grunted in response when Bob said, “Morning, Walker.”

He grabbed a box of raisin bran from the pantry (shoving aside multiple Avengers Wheaties boxes for it) and served himself a bowl. Then, when he made his way to the fridge—

“Where is the milk?” he asked, immediately turning to you two.

You didn’t bother to peer up from your book. “There was barely any left. We gave the last of it to Alpine.”

“You assholes,” John snarked. “You gave the last of my milk to the stupid cat?”

“It’s not yours,” Bob replied, defensive. “It’s for the entire team.”

“Well, what am I supposed to have with my cereal, then?” John hissed, much akin to a toddler. 

“Yogurt?” Bob volunteered. “There’s Greek on the second shelf—”

“I don’t want yogurt,” Walker bit back as if Bob had just offered him mouse droppings.

This time, you looked up from your book to shoot him an unimpressed glare. “You won’t die if you skip cereal for a day. Make some toast, or something. Besides—Bob and I are going grocery shopping in a bit. We’re low on eggs, and Ava wants cucumbers. If you ask nicely… we can get you some more milk, too.”

John muttered something under his breath.

“Sorry, what was that?” you asked with a pointed look, exaggeratingly cupping a hand behind your ear. “Couldn’t quite hear you.”

“Yes, yeah, get me some milk. Jesus.” 

“Magic word?” Bob asked, looking all too smug.

John scowled. The two of you were so annoying together. “Please,” he gritted out. 

Both you and Bob exchanged amused glances, then returned to your devices, leaving John to pour his dry cereal back into the box and grab two slices of whole wheat bread to toast, grumbling about his ruined routine all the way.

Bob felt a little swell of pride at the bottom of his chest every time you accepted one of the fruits he’d offered you. It wasn’t like he could tell which apples were better than the rest—he was honestly just picking at random—but the ones you rejected and put back onto the piles were said to be bruised, misshapen, or squishy. All things he thought were quite normal qualities for fruit, but he trusted your fruit judgment.

“What’s wrong with the squishy ones?” Bob asked, picking up an apple you tossed to the side and inspecting its waxy red peel. He felt bad for the fruits discarded for seemingly asinine reasons.

The sour face you pulled made Bob’s heart trip over itself. “Just trust me. I had to have a lot of squishy fruit during my time in Madripoor. It either means they’re rotten, rotting, or they’ve got worms wriggling around inside.”

Bob blanched. Suddenly he didn’t feel all that bad anymore.

After all the fruits, vegetables, proteins, and generally healthier options were tossed into the cart, the two of you went on a frenzy grabbing junk food to your heart’s content: chips and sweets and frozen fried foods galore. The two of you stood in front of the vast refrigerated section full to the brim with dozens of options for ice cream. 

“Raspberry s’more swirl?” Bob ventured.

You wrinkled your nose in distaste. 

“What?” he asked.

“That sounds so American. And, yes, I do mean that as an insult.”

The two of you toddled out of the aisle juggling half a dozen tubs of varying flavors, none of which being the Swirly S'mores or whatever it was.

After picking up the last of what was on the list, Bob began to unload the groceries onto the conveyor belt. The cashier asked for your autograph with a nervous grin, brandishing a pen and notepad for you to scribble on. You never really bothered to come up with an autograph—you didn’t need one for the first three decades of your life, and now all of a sudden everyone around each corner of the street was asking for one. Just the other day, you gingerly signed a sweaty guy’s forehead, and the ink was already running down his face before he could turn and jog away. Ava called him a pig, and you could only pray that he was far enough not to hear.

You haphazardly scribbled XEROX in large capitol letters across the paper, hoping it would suffice. The cashier made no complaint and pocketed the autograph with a giddy air about her.

“Sorry if this is weird to ask—can you split? I’ve always wanted to see it in person.” 

You blinked. Then, with a small, relenting smile, you duplicated, and your copy waved awkwardly. The cashier snapped a quick photo of you and your copy without even bothering to ask—you hadn’t even seen her whip out her phone—and you could feel Bob’s concerned eyes bore into you. You didn’t want to make it a big deal, so you silently paid for the groceries (with one of Valentina’s credit cards), bumped Bob’s shoulders with yours, and stuffed the goods into the reusable Avengers bags Alexei insisted you take with you. It was embarrassing using your own merch, but you tried not to think about it too much.

“Are you okay?” Bob asked once the two of you slipped back into the car, having loaded the food into the back. “That was…”

“Our new normal,” you sighed, pinching the space between your brows. “I mean—it’s fine, I guess. They’re just excited. I get it. My face is never getting scrubbed from the internet now, though.”

“Yeah,” Bob said, rubbing the back of his neck. “I feel you.”

Yesterday, Walker showed him a tiktok of the Void in the sky, crashing helicopters into buildings. Bob watched the screen with a small, shameful frown, until you tugged him away insisting that he helped you reach for a cup too high for you to reach. Of course, he knew that you were more than capable of getting it yourself, but he liked how you made him feel useful. Plus—he liked how your hand cuffed his shoulder in gratitude once he handed the cup to you.

“I love grabbing groceries with you,” he blurted out.

You glanced over at him, drumming your hands along the steering wheel. Then, you looked back at the road and smiled—the particular smile that made Bob’s insides melt like putty. “I love spending time with you too, Pal.”

Bucky Barnes didn’t care for many things. Flashy trends the new generation kept cycling through. Texting etiquette, or his lack thereof. The dozens of settings on washing machines nowadays. Ava’s propensity to phase straight through his room because it was a “short cut” to the gym. 

But one thing he did care about—a considerable amount more than anything else, honestly—was his cat, Alpine.

So it took a great amount of reluctance to hand her over to you and Bob for the weekend. He had to fly out for a last minute undercover mission, and he couldn’t leave Alpine all alone in his apartment for days in a row. Usually he would leave Alpine with Sam, but the two were in a weird funk as of late.

“I don’t give her more than three pieces of Whiskers’ Delights a day,” Bucky warned, having a nagging suspicion that you weren’t really listening to him. “I don’t want to spoil her.”

Your fingers curled beneath Alpine’s chin, cooing unintelligible noises. Bucky rolled his eyes up to the ceiling.

“Just don’t overfeed her. Make sure you leave out a bowl of water for her, okay? And if she starts scratching stuff up, just pick her up and put her in front of the scratching post. I’ve been trying to train her to stop ruining my furniture.”

“Got it,” Bob said, before joining you in your hums and coos to the purring feline. 

“See you later, Alpine,” said Bucky, a rare sort of warmth seeping into his tone. 

Alpine flicked her tail at her father, then rubbed her fuzzy white head against Bob’s sweatshirt.

Bucky grunted out something that sounded suspiciously similar to, “Traitor.” He stalked towards the elevator with a deep-set scowl. Though, once he turned to press the button, he caught sight of you tugging Alpine into your lap, pressed up right beside Bob, your head resting on his. The man beside you was as red as a beetroot. 

And Bucky wasn’t stupid. Despite his callous nature to the rest of the new “Avengers”, he found that he was rooting for the two of you. You would be good for each other. He wouldn’t be caught dead ever admitting it, though. 

“Where’s Bob? You two are usually glued to the hip.” Ava asked out of the blue, startling you so much that you immediately split into two copies. Two pairs of your shocked eyes glared at her.

“Ava!” you snapped crossly, before reabsorbing your copy. “You gotta stop phasing into our rooms without knocking first. And Bob went out with Yelena—apparently she needed him for something.”

The woman plopped down onto the couch beside you, languidly crossing her arms. “Right.”

You let the silence settle between the two of you, picking up the book you’d been reading and carrying on. Then, feeling her fidget beside you, you asked, “Is there a reason you’re here or do you just want to spend time with me? Because you could’ve just asked.”

The face she pulled was dour, but fleeting. “Well, I just—I had a question. It’s stupid.”

“Mhm.”

“You know how the both of us were… raised in labs our whole lives, y’know the entire schtick.”

“... Yes?”

Now visibly uncomfortable, Ava tugged at the collar of her suit. “I just—I wanted to know… how you deal with it. The memories of it all. It’s just that you make it look so easy. I don’t know how you do it.”

“Me?” you said in utter disbelief, bookmarking your page and setting the book aside. “I make it look easy? Are you sure about that?” You thought about your near panic attack two days ago in the training room that left you breathless and spiraling, over nothing in particular. 

This made Ava scoff. “Okay, relatively speaking. In general, you’re still pretty fucked up.”

You rolled your eyes. “Thanks.” Then, after a moment of thinking about it, you told her, “I think it helps that I can talk about it now. Not only to a therapist but to—friends.” The word felt foreign on your tongue, but it left a warm, homey feeling there, as well. “The puzzles help, too. Reminders that I’m safe and in control now.”

As she listened, Ava drew her knees up to her chest, chin resting over them. “I keep getting these memories. It’s like they attack me, and I—physically can’t breathe or move. Do you get those?”

“All the time,” you whispered.

“How do you stop it?”

You shook your head with a sad smile. “I don’t. I can’t just forget it all and push it away. I just… learn to live with it, learn to manage it. All the pain I’ve experienced.” You hesitated. “And inflicted.”

Pensive, Ava asked, “So you just—ride it out?”

“Not really. The past isn’t something that’ll just go away one day. It’s more of an acceptance, forgiveness, and moving on sort of thing. At least that’s what Janice tells me.”

“Who the hell’s Janice?”

“My therapist,” you said, giving Ava a nudge. “I can ask her if she can refer you to someone? Or we can just… talk to each other if that’s too much for now. I’m a good listener.”

With a brow raised, Ava retorted, “No, you’re not. You didn’t listen to a single thing Bucky said at last week’s meeting.”

 “It’s the same shit he says every week.”

“Doesn’t help when you and Bob are whispering and giggling in each other’s ears, too,” she deadpanned, making your cheeks flush with heat. “You two are like little schoolgirls.”

Which was funny of her to say, considering neither of you ever really went to a proper school.

You wrinkled your nose and stuck your tongue out at her, to which she only flipped you off with both her middle fingers. “You’re deflecting!”

“That something your therapist taught you, as well?”

“Yes, actually. Apparently I do it a lot, too.”

Ava grunted in irritation. Then, finally, she said with great reluctance, “I think that sounds nice. The talking thing. With you.”

You smiled an awfully wide smile. “Yeah?”

“Don’t expect it to happen all the time.”

“Sure.”

“I’m a busy woman.”

“I’m aware.”

“And I don’t want it to be a sobfest or a pity party. I just want to—talk.”

“I know, Ava. I got you.”

“And if you tell anyone, I’ll gouge your eyes out with a hot spoon.”

“Mhm. Wait—not even Bob?”

Ava glared at you. 

“I’m joking!” you exclaimed, hands raised, though the idea of not debriefing every minute detail of your day to Bob seemed less than appealing. But, as hard as it was to admit to yourself, you cared for Ava, and you wanted her to feel safe to speak to you in confidence. “We can talk whenever you want, Ava. Real casual.”

“Will you tell me about your… feelings and shit, too? So it won’t feel like—”

“A therapy session?” you finished for her, smothering a laugh. “Yeah, definitely. Trust me, I’m not qualified to be a therapist. The nurses at my facility sure liked to trauma dump on me whenever they drew my blood, though…”

And as you dove into the stories of your past, Ava could feel the weight on her chest lighten. Not completely, not even a lot—but just a little. And maybe that was enough for now.

In all honesty, Bob wasn’t even supposed to be here. Yelena could’ve brought just about any of the Avengers along with her—but now that all of them were ultra famous—save for Bob—he was simply the safest bet. Plus it helped to factor in that he was practically indestructible. It was meant to be a very quick and easy stealth mission, anyway. Bob was going to create a diversion with the scientists, who were then going to alert the guards, and Yelena would sneak into the underground lab, grab a vial or two of the poisonous drug, and high-tail back to headquarters for some nerdy guy in a labcoat to start fixing up an antidote in case someone decided to commit some casual bioterrorism. 

Of course, she should’ve known that not everything would go according to plan.

It was partially both of their fault. Bob fucked up by taking the wrong turn and swinging straight into the lab Yelena was currently swiping from, and Yelena fucked up by trying to push him out the way he came instead of helping him up the vent she had busted in with. She wasn’t very used to working with others—particularly those who had virtually no prior training in the field.

There was a loud crash as Bob careened into a metal cart with her crowding motions, and a few vials precariously wobbled in their holders, before toppling to the ground. Glass shards rained all over the floor, and a puff of green smoke filled the air between the two. Yelena danced back several steps, grabbing Bob by the shoulder and yanking him away, as well. She covered her nose and mouth with her palm, and Bob copied her motions with a slight delay.

Panic settled in Yelena’s chest. She thought, at first, that it had been the poison. She was going to die in a lab choking on her own vomit, and Bob would just be forced to watch. 

But then—Yelena smelled it before Bob did. Familiar. It was sweet, almost. Like the free peppermint candies you would get at a nice restaurant after a pricey meal, or those flavored flossing picks Yelena liked to buy from the pharmacy three blocks away from her old apartment. 

In the case file she read, it was said that the poison was gaseous and was instantaneous in its harm. But Yelena felt completely fine. She glanced over at Bob, who also looked to be alright, if not a little wide-eyed and sweaty. Which was normal for him. 

If that wasn’t poison, what was it? Yelena cautiously removed her hand from her face. 

“I don’t think we’re going to die,” she said. “Which is good, because I really don’t want to die before finishing the new season of this crappy reality show where hot people try not to mash their groins together. Seriously, I cannot believe non-asexual people are real.” 

There was a moment of silence. Yelena and Bob blinked at each other.

“Oh, wow. I did not mean to say any of that. Weird. What we broke must be some sort of gaseous version of a truth serum. No wonder it smelled familiar—we used to use a liquid version in the Red Room. Are you okay, Bob? How are you feeling? Sorry I pushed you into the cart.”

Bob glanced over at himself, as if checking to make sure he wasn’t actually impaled or stabbed or on fire. “I’m, uh—I think so? I’m feeling really thirsty.”

“You know what, if we get out of here alive, I’ll buy you whatever drink you want from K-Mart.”

“Okay. God, I knew I shouldn’t have come. I fucked it all up. Literally anyone would have been a better pick. Xerox or Ava or, hell, even Walker—”

 “Okay, well, first of all, it’s not all your fault. We both fucked up. Second, I picked you, so—nothing we can do about it now,” said Yelena matter-of-factly. She strode across the lab to grab a stool for Bob to climb on so he could shimmy into the vents. “And Walker is too busy doing Buzzfeed puppy interviews to join me, which was a shock to me—I didn’t even know they still did those. Ava claimed a break day, and Xerox had a therapy—”

At the sound of your name, Bob suddenly blurted out the first thought that came to mind, “I think I’m in love with Xerox.” 

One second. Then two. 

Bob slapped his hands over his mouth with wide eyes when he registered what he’d just said. “Oh, God. What the fuck? I didn’t want to say that! Why did I say that? Truth serum, I know! But I—Wh—? I didn’t want you to know that yet?! Please don’t tell Xerox!” With each and every word he said, the tone of his voice grew increasingly squeakier.

The blonde assassin eyed her friend with an incredulous look. “... Yeah, Bob, we all knew that. You aren’t subtle at all.” With a scoff, Yelena gestured to the stool. “Now get on, Mr. Lovebird. The guards will be here any second.”

Bob’s expression was cemented into a horrified twist. As he clambered onto the chair with wobbly legs, he began to pull himself up into the vents. “Does Xerox know?” he called out, wincing when he heard his voice echo back through the cavernous metal tunnels now encompassing him.

“I don’t think so,” Yelena said from below, following his lead and slipping into the vents. “But, honestly, you should say something as soon as possible—unless you want Alexei to blurt it out on live television to appease the fans.”

“What—?!”

Before he could finish, the lab burst open, crawling with armed guards in gas masks. The lone stool sitting just beneath an open vent was more obvious than a flashing neon sign saying: IN HERE! 

Gunfire began to ring out below. Yelena and Bob scrambled onto their hands and knees and shuffled off as quickly as they could. Honestly, Yelena wasn’t too worried for Bob—after all, he was just about invincible. She, however, wasn’t the least bit bulletproof. So when Bob tugged her to move up in front of him so he could act as shield between her and the bullets, Yelena neither complained nor protested.

“Hey, Bob?” she called over the gunfire, which was beginning to fade to faint plinks behind them as they put more distance between them and the soldiers.

Bob flinched at a particularly loud gunshot. “Yeah?”

“I’m really happy for you.”

Creased confusion. “For—for being shot at?”

“What? No! For Xerox. You deserve to be happy. Both of you.”

And Bob, even though he was quite literally being hunted and gunned down, couldn’t help but feel a small spark of happiness in his chest, even if it was accompanied with the putrid stink of shame. He would be thinking of Yelena’s words the whole way out of the lab, the brief fight with the soldiers once exiting the vents, and in the car ride back to base. When you greeted him at the door, he didn’t hesitate to return the hug you had flung at him, running his warm palms over your cold forearms. He met Yelena’s knowing eyes over your shoulder.

He wanted to tell you. He did, of course he did. But—there was fear, puppeteered by the Void. Paralyzing. Stinging. Biting. 

Time. That’s what he needed. So he wouldn’t tell you, at least not for now, when everything was so good. He didn’t want to fuck up one of the few good things he’d just got in his life yet. Even if it felt like his chest was about to cleave itself into two at the thought of not telling you the truth about his feelings.

There was hardly a night that Bob spent where he wasn’t tossing and turning when trying to go to sleep. Shirt shirked off because he was so hot, and then promptly put back on because the feeling of the silk sheets against his bare skin irked him. Pacing across his room one second, then curled up in the center of his bed the next. Hands in his hair, then balled by his sides. Tried counting sheep, but they would always end up mutilated and bleating sad noises, so he stopped doing that. Pillows, no pillows. Rain noises, lofi beats, whale sounds, complete silence. Reading, scrolling through his phone, hell—even trying to jack off. 

Nothing worked. 

And so, exhausted beyond relief and near the brink of tears, Bob swiftly left his room and without thinking, he found himself automatically heading towards yours down the hall. He stood in front of your closed door, swaying on the spot. Too tired to think straight, but still had enough sense not to barge into your room unannounced. 

He did this often. Would stand in front of your room like a forlorn dog that had been kicked out—listening for signs of life in there. He would sometimes hear music softly playing, your soft murmurs to yourself, or, his favorite tinkering peals of laughter. More often than not, he would turn right back around and go back to his room, smacking himself in the head and thinking himself a loser for needing someone else to go to sleep. Because that was exactly who Bob was—a loser.

The few times he brought himself to knock on your door, however—he didn’t exactly feel like a loser when you smiled at him, hands immediately tugging him in, excited to show him a painting you’d been working on or Alpine curled up in the corner of your room. You made him feel wanted. Like he wasn’t a complete nuisance to be bothering you this late at night. The two of you would often accidentally fall asleep together. On the bed, on the floor—once even in the kitchen when you both meandered your way there for some midnight snacks and never left.

This time, Bob felt the shame weigh extra heavy as he knocked on your door. What if you were busy? Or you were tired, and not in the mood to see him? Or you didn’t want to have company? Or that he was invading your privacy? Or you—

The door swung open, and you were rubbing one of your eyes with a fist, blinking at him with an adorable sort of grogginess that only came with—

Oh, God, you’d been sleeping, Bob realized with complete mortification and embarrassment. Ugh, he was such an idiot. 

“Palindrome,” you said, voice slightly hoarse from your rest. Despite Bob’s stiff demeanor, you pushed the door open wider. “Come in. I’m glad you came. I was having a really bad dream.”

“Oh,” he said, all soft and troubled. He stepped in, immediately hit with the jasmine-scented air. You’d bought the diffusor a few days ago and the aroma was just heavenly. Bob could immediately feel his tense shoulders loosen a smidge. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah,” you said, waving your hands dismissively. One of them fell on his arm, guiding him to the bed. 

Bob could feel his heart jump to his chest. If you noticed his eyes roaming all over you, you didn’t say anything. To that, he was grateful. He was already flustered enough. With your cheeks blown out into a sigh, you fell face-first into your pillows. 

“Lie down with me. I’m so cold,” you said once you turned back around to face him, making a show of curling in on yourself and shivering. 

Bob spied the thick blanket you were lying on top of. The easy solution would’ve been to peel it back and drape it over you. But the other solution sounded far more appealing to him. 

With a hum, Bob settled beside you, looping his arms around you, your back flush against his chest. The two of you slotted together like puzzle pieces sliding into place. 

“You’re so warm.”

“Yeah, sorry, I—”

“Run hot. I know. It’s so nice. You’re like my personal heater.” 

Bob liked the feeling of your cold nose pressing against his overheating bicep. “And you’re my personal, er, ice block? AC unit? Whichever sounds nicer, that’s what you are.”

You let out an amused huff at that. “Back in Madripoor, it’s almost always terribly hot. But when it reaches a certain hour at nighttime, it gets all windy and cold. We don’t have heaters in Southeast Asia like we do here—they’re impractical. So back then I would multiply and hold myself to get warm. Problem was that I’m always cold, so it felt like hugging—just like you said—an ice block. But I kept doing it. It felt nice to be held… even if it was just me.”

Bob squeezed you tighter. “Sorry,” he whispered into your hair. He wished he was better at comforting you. 

“Don’t be,” you replied, sounding perfectly content. “I’ve got you now, don’t I?”

Beneath his ribs, he could feel his heart swell. Of course you could make the most useless man in the world feel like he was worth something.

“When I was a kid…” Bob began, always nervous to speak about his past, “I would get so hot that I would get out of bed and take a pillow with me and sleep by the window.”

“That’s so cute,” you crooned. He could feel you smile into his arm.

“Mmh. My dad wasn’t very happy about it. Said I was wasting all the house’s heating by keeping the windows open.”

“Yeah, well, your dad’s an asshole. Fuck him.”

“Hah. Yeah… fuck h—yeah.”

There was a comfortable silence for a while. Bob could feel himself rocking in and out of the sweet realm of slumber. Your voice reeled him out like a fish being pulled on a hook.

“Hmhng?” was the strange noise he made, having not heard what you said.

“Sorry. Did you fall asleep?”

“Yeah.” Bob sounded sheepish. “But I want to hear it. What you said.”

“Sorry,” you needlessly apologized again, even though Bob would rather be awake so he could spend more time with you. “I was just… I said that I don’t remember my name. My actual one. Or if I ever had one in the first place.”

Bob blinked in confusion. “What do you mean?”

“I don’t think they—the scientists that experimented on me—ever gave me a name. I had a number. Patient 080. But I didn’t have a name.”

Now, Bob was nodding. “Xerox was just—a terrible nickname. It wasn’t your actual name.”

“Yeah.” You shifted in his hold so that your hand could intertwine with one of his, toying with his fingers. “But I do like Xerox now. It’s mine—I’ve made it mine. I just wonder if I ever had a real name before that. I don’t remember much from back then. It always feels like I’m missing a big piece of the puzzle.”

“Maybe…” Bob trailed off, muttering.

“What?”

“Nah, no—it’s probably a stupid idea.”

“Nothing you could say to me would be a stupid idea, Pal. Please tell me. I wanna hear it.”

Bob, wincing, suggested, “Maybe you could try to do some research? See if they have any databases anywhere or something?”

“I did. The lab is an illegal operation, so they’re wiped clean. If there are records, it would be encrypted, and in Madripoor.” You were silent for several moments. “I could go back, in theory. Look for something. Anything.”

Bob’s brows furrowed, a queer sort of dread settling in the pits of his stomach. “You wanna leave?”

Silence prickled the air like needles through silk. 

“I don’t. Going back has always been the last thing I’ve ever wanted to do. I’ve spent years running away. But—it would be closure, in a way. Maybe I need to do this. You know?”

Bob hugged you close to him, breathing you and the jasmine-tasting air in. “Would you come back?”

“Of course I would. I would miss you too much to stay away. Plus—the news will go insane if one of the New Avengers suddenly disappears. Or maybe they would move on in two or three days. Just another faded headline.”

The frown wouldn’t leave his face, no matter how hard he tried. He was grateful you were facing away from him. “I’ll miss you, too. A lot.”

He could hear you smile this time. “I’ll be back before you know it. I'll only need a few days. A week at most.” You made a few noises as you thought things through, and Bob felt the inexplicable, sudden urge to kiss your very soft-looking shoulder. He managed to restrain himself, albeit barely.

“I guess it’s settled, then,” you said, completely oblivious to his embarrassing thoughts of kissing you. “I’m going back to Madripoor.”

With you in his arms, Bob fell asleep in no time. The problem now, however, were the debilitating nightmares that haunted him whenever he was unconscious. Some days it wasn’t so bad—something embarrassing at his old school, or his nights high on meth… when he definitely should’ve been doing something better with his life. But most of the time, they were really bad nightmares. His father, red-faced, belt in hand. Or his mother, bleeding and crying. His friend he would do drugs with—who he couldn’t even remember the name of—foaming at the mouth and convulsing as he overdosed. 

Tonight it was a strange combination of all three. And whilst Bob could try to keep the Void controlled and at bay when he was awake—it didn’t ever occur to him that it could take advantage of his unconscious self. 

The darkness began to consume the bed as he twitched and shivered from his nightmares. You, sleeping away a very long day, didn’t notice. Typically, you were a very light sleeper—a habit you had since your hospital and mercenary days—but you’d grown accustomed to Bob’s regular movement during sleep. 

And that was how the Void came to you in your dreams, dark as night, standing a full head taller than you. You blinked up at him, wondering if he was always this… big.

“Xerox,” he greeted, turning his head about to observe your dream-world with the tiny glints of light he had for eyes. The terrain was familiar to him—he’d brought you here before. “Do you often dream of hospitals?”

“Unfortunately,” you replied, picking up one of the half-solid scalpels with a frown. There was a hoarse scream in the distance, one that you’ve had to listen to a million times before: your own. You regarded him with a cruel sort of suspicion. “Am I dreaming you or—?”

“I came of my own volition,” said the Void. “I wanted to see you.”

“Hm.” You wanted to ask why, but you had a feeling you already knew the answer. 

“You know I will never actually go away. Not for you, not for your precious Bob.”

“I know,” you said, voice cracking. With a sigh, you sat back down on the surgical operating table. “I wish you would, though. But that wouldn’t be very realistic.”

The Void came to sit beside you, leg pressed up against yours. He was freezing cold—a lot like you, and a stark opposite to Bob. You shifted away. 

“You will always choose him over me,” said the dark mass. “But he is me. And I, him. There is no separating us. We all have our little void.”

“Nothing little about you,” you grumbled. The Void let out something akin to a laugh—like the quiet rumbles of thunder just before the angry, rageful clap.

There was silence as the two of you watched a surgeon enter, holding the hand of a little-you, leading you back to your cell. The child’s gaunt eyes were round with shock. Blood lined tiny-you’s mouth, slickened your hands and stained deep within the crevices beneath your nails. 

“It stinks of death here,” the Void said. 

“They used to make my newer copies fight the older ones,” you whispered to him. “See if any of their genetic enhancers actually worked. Most of the time it didn’t.”

Raising his hand, the Void turned the surgeon into shadow. The sight brought a small smile to your face. Swift, the Void hovered over younger-you’s shoulders. 

“Oh, precious,” he crooned to the stricken child, who immediately leaned into the darkness’ touch. “Come.”

You watched with furrowed brows. “Where are you taking me?”

“Into my world. It’s stuffy in here. Smells antiseptic.”

His hand reached out for you to take it. And you could see it then—Bob within the Void. You softened just a little bit, though you still refused to take his hand.

“I hope in the real world you’re not taking over the city again. I’m a bit too tired to deal with my shame rooms at the moment.” 

“Really? I thought they were fun. I enjoyed making them for you.” He laughed his timbrous laugh again, to which you only rolled your eyes. “Don’t worry. It’s just us two now.” The Void looked down at younger-you. “Well—three. Soon to be four.”

“What—?”

Before you could finish asking him what he meant by that, the dreamscape around you began to shift, dissipating like ink in water. You felt the ground turn from cold tile to a fibrous brown carpet. 

There was shattering glass somewhere behind you. You whirled around to see a familiar man smashing a beer bottle against the wall, going straight for a woman and a young boy at the dinner table. The Void held his hand out, and Bob’s parents immediately turned into elongated shadows. The young boy—tiny Bob—cowered away from the growing darkness seeping into the carpet. 

“Go,” the Void said to younger you, pushing the child forward. 

With a lump in your throat, you stepped forward to take the shoulders of your younger self, kneeling down and using your sleeve to wipe away the blood from your face. Then, the child, both terrified and in awe of the Void, listened to his instructions and obediently went toddling off to young Bob. 

Tiny you prodded at Bob’s shoulder, who only shrunk into himself more. It occurred to you that your younger self likely thought that this was a new opponent for you to fight. To your relief, however, your younger copy only slumped down the wall beside the boy, and began to recite the elements of the periodic table—something you used to do to help you go to sleep. Young Bob turned and listened with wide eyes. 

“Why are you doing this?” you asked when you finally tore your gaze away from the children, both out of genuine curiosity and confusion.

“You had no friends,” he said. “I had no friends. At least in here we can pretend.”

“That’s all you do, isn’t it?” you asked him. “Pretend. That’s a sad way to live.”

“It’s the only way,” he responded. “This way, he—we won’t get hurt.”

“But what about our real friendships? What about the rest of the team?”

The Void stepped closer to you. “Is what we have not real?”

No. Yes. Either way, the answer didn’t sound quite right. 

“Whatever it is, it’s not as important as real life. I can’t be stuck in delusions forever. I… we have to live life. A real one.”

Something in the Void’s voice broke—Bob spilling through. “I don’t want you to leave me.”

“You said it yourself. You’ll never actually go away,” you whispered. Then, you spared the Void a small, sad smile. “You can come visit. But I’m afraid you can’t stay.”

“You’ll miss me.”

“Oh, I will,” you said, not bothering to deny it. “But I think I’m far happier with where I am now. I don’t need you… hovering over my shoulder anymore.”

You looked to the children, who were now chattering quietly to themselves. Younger you looked happy to be talking to someone your age who wasn’t yourself, for once.

The Void stared at you for a long moment. Then, finally, he asked, “He makes you happy?”

“Bob?” You thought of his warmth. His kindness. His constant, soft touches. His spritely laughter. His stammering. His lopsided smile. His thoughtful gestures. His excessive emoticons in his texts. His love for animals. His strange habit of ad-libbing extra notes to catchy advertisement jingles. “Yes. He does.”

“Then I guess that’s reason enough for me to keep my distance. But I’ll come back. I always come back,” he said. “See you on the other side, Xerox.”

When you flinched awake, a loud, startled gasp emitted from you. You shot upwards on the bed, ripping yourself out of Bob’s warm embrace. The sudden movement made him jerk out of sleep, as well. 

“Wha—Whuss goin’ on?” he sleepily muttered, looking juxtaposingly alarmed and ready to go back to sleep. 

It was only when his warm arms wrapped around you again, did you realize that you were shaking. Immediately, you began sobbing. It was silent as always, but it wracked through your chest and made it difficult for you to breathe. You turned into his hold and buried your face into him, clinging onto him like an ant to sticky nectar, and he let you cry damp spots into his sweatshirt. 

“Oh, no. I’m sorry,” rasped Bob, though he really didn’t know what he was apologizing for. Still, he was almost certain it was his fault. He rubbed comforting circles into your back. “I’m sorry.”

And, once you calmed down enough to regulate your breathing, you found yourself parroting the very same words to him.

[d3adite666]

cradling john walkers face with gentle hands, fingertips tracing his cheekbones and features softly as if to memorize them in entirety. brushing them through his hair, as his eyes flutter closed, eyelashes kissing his tear stained skin. as you softly sing him praises, reminding john his past doesn’t define him. peppering soft kisses to his face, as he holds your frame tightly against himself as if you might slip away.

[d3adite666]

HAPPY PRIDE MONTH!! 💕💕 featuring lyrics from my favorite bisexual icon 🙏

[d3adite666]

“You’re a nerd” I say as I look at you with heart eyes while you info dump to me

[d3adite666]

john goes utterly soft around you, to a hilarious degree—at least to yelena and ava.

he's all sharp edges, unmitigated ego, wit too dry to be anything but a little bit cruel at times. they've gotten used to his act, all the bluster that makes up u.s. agent. hell, ava and yelena have made a game out of calling his bluff in the months spent in the tower.

but with you in the room? he's hopeless, utterly and completely hopeless. it's like every wire in his brain goes crossed. it's all quiet acts of service and listening to your every word, but the moment you—or anyone else—calls him on it, those wires only get more crossed. then, he becomes a total disaster.

he flounders for excuses, looking for an out that lets him avoid actually talking about his feelings like an adult. and boy, does everyone get a kick out of that. yelena and ava's game of calling his bluff turns into a game of who can fluster walker more when you're around.

they point out that he was the one to buy your favorite cereal when you ran out—to which he replies, "i was already planning on going grocery shopping, don't read into it."

they act like teenagers when you two get paired up for missions, teasing him for getting alone time with you, until he can't do anything but storm off.

they poke fun when he stares just a bit too long at the outfit you pick for a charity gala—but, damn, it really isn't his fault you look good, okay? he's allowed to think you look good without it meaning anything. sue him for appreciating good fashion sense.

ava is quick to point out that it's abundantly clear john couldn't give less of a shit about fashion. he spends the next week trying, and failing, to prove her wrong.

but when the two of you properly start dating? it only gets worse.

it's all "hey, honey" when you walk into a room, or "i missed you" when he comes back from a mission. the john that deflected everything turns into the john whose cheeks only go slightly pink when yelena calls him out for being a sappy idiot.

that harsh military stiffness melts away when you're sitting by him, and honestly? yelena and ava are almost impressed with what you've done to him. he's lost the edge he once had, the too-quick to anger attitude he waltzed around the tower with.

but even still, they'll never pass up an opportunity to make fun of walker for nearly shoving alexei out of the seat he saved next to himself during movie night. or the time he carried you to bed when you fell asleep on his shoulder coming back from a mission. or even the time that he spent a week groveling because he accidentally shrank your favorite sweater.

[d3adite666]

I say “it’s pride month” instead of “happy pride month” because if it was a happy pride month I’d be a member of a gay biker gang that are secretly vampires and lives in a sunken hotel and also eats nazis but I’m not

[d3adite666]

if you’re comfortable writing smut for yelena, i think i might have one: reader is embarrassed about having a sexy dream about yelena—especially because despite being on the same team, they haven’t really hit it off, and reader suspects that yelena isn’t fond of her. reader tries to go about her day, ignoring both the dream she had AND yelena, but we all know how perceptive yelena is and she catches onto reader being weird and asks her what her deal is, and isn’t even the least bit shocked when she finally pries the sex dream information out of her 😂 (in fact, she’s so un-shocked and intrigued, that she proposes recreating the dream 👀)

just a lover - y.belova

yelena belova x fem!reader

・❥・summary: Though you would prefer to keep the fact that you’ve been inadvertently dreaming of your attractive Russian teammate under wraps, you overlooked one crucial fact: she’s way more perceptive than you give her credit for.

・❥・warnings: SMUT ‼️MINORS, DNI; one (1) spicy dream description (though not too descriptive, i don’t think?), R being weird and not handling her crush well in the slightest, top!yelena, more Russian petnames because i can and i want to, nipple sucking, grinding, fingering (r receiving), praise kink, two seconds of edging, lap riding, cute banter

・❥・word count: 3.9k

・❥・a/n: i’m on my period and feeling a lot of things, and writing this fic made me need Yelena biblically, but that’s neither here nor there. thanks for the request and hope you enjoy!

☾ ⋆*･ﾟ:⋆*･ﾟ

It feels like it’s 100 degrees and climbing by the minute.

Your nerve endings are tingling, your head is swimming and you can’t think straight. The gorgeous blonde below you calls out sensual instructions to keep going, to keep moving against her as her calloused fingers grip your hips for purchase. A glorious sheen of sweat gathers in the hollow of her throat that you’d like to kiss away. The heat is almost too much to bear, and you’re so close to breaking that you can almost taste it.

That’s when she pushes herself up, catching her balance on one elbow as she pulls you down on top of her, your chest flush against her own, her hot breath fanning your neck as she whispers in your ear. “What are you waiting for? Come for me, y/n…”

You gasp awake as if your very breath is being torn from your lungs. A furtive glance around your room tells you that whatever you just experienced wasn’t real. Just a product of your incredibly horny imagination. “What…what the fuck…” you whisper to yourself in the dim lighting of your bedroom. The sun wasn’t even over the horizon yet, the pinkish-purple hue of dawn barely visible through your drawn curtains.

You whisper “what the fuck,” once more because it’s all that comes to mind as you run a hand through your matted hair. “Did that really just happen?” was the perplexed question that followed. And an incredibly appropriate one it was, because did that really just happen? Did you really just have a wet dream about Yelena?

Yelena, as in Yelena Belova. Your scary Russian teammate who wouldn’t have anything to do with you.

Well…that much had never really been confirmed or denied, but you assumed she wanted nothing to do with you based on the energy you were likely to receive from her whenever you made the mistake of light conversation

Sure, Yelena wasn’t exactly a social butterfly. But you’ve seen her let her guard down with Bob, with Ava, and even with Bucky sometimes. But when it came to you, you might as well have been dog shit on the bottom of her shoes.

The first time she brushed you off, you figured that she was having a bad day. Or an off day. Things were weird right now, and she wasn’t used to being part of a ‘team’. Hell, neither were you, and you completely understood that. But the more she continued to develop friendly (or at the very least, cordial) bonds with everyone except for you, the more and more discouraged you became.

And despite all of that, you held no animosity of any kind toward her. There was something admirable about the way she carried herself despite everything she’s been through. She knew how to look out for herself and she was damn tough. You actually liked her a lot. Maybe more than you anticipated given the dream that you just had. But all this time you’ve been around her? Seems a little late to realize that you might—

No. You shook the thought from your head before it could even think about forming. That’s not what that was. Your feelings for Yelena absolutely did not stray past platonic. As for why you had that dream? You chalked it up to the fact that you probably just wanted to get laid in general. It has been a while. And your vibrator was tired.

You dismiss any and all thoughts of Yelena, your dream, and whatever other weird feelings might’ve been lingering beneath the surface as you pull yourself from your bed and grab a shower. It was still quite early by the time you finished and got dressed though. There was a bit more brightness outside than when you first awoke, but if you had to guess, it was barely seven a.m. And since there was no mission or assignment today, you figured that everyone else was sleeping in. Which meant having the kitchen to yourself for at least an hour.

That thought was motivation enough to hurry downstairs, to soak up the peace and quiet in the tower that came with early mornings off. But once you reach the kitchen’s threshold, you realize that you’re not the only one who had that idea.

Yelena stands in the kitchen, her back to you as she mixes what seems to be some sort of batter in a bowl. She hasn’t noticed you yet, and for that, you’re grateful, because you’re trying to figure out how to unstick your tongue from the roof of your mouth.

Yelena is dressed in a white tank and black lounge shorts. You’re not sure if the spicy-sweet scent that hits you is her perfume or if she simply smells that divine naturally, but you don’t mind either way. And though you fight to keep your gaze above your neck, your eyes seem to have a mind of their own, taking in her toned arms, the line of her back, the sliver of skin at her waist where her tank top stops.

You want to back out of the kitchen and pretend you were never there. You definitely want to pretend like hadn’t just been ogling Yelena, but you can’t get your stupid feet to move. And it’s too late anyway. Yelena must feel your presence because she turns around, looking right at you. Your breath hitches.

“Good mo—“ Yelena starts, but before she can even finish the casual greeting, you rush to say. “Sorry, I thought I was the only one up,”

Yelena raises a brow. Your ears burn. And so does your face. And your neck. “I’ll just go,” you add.

“Well, you’re already here and I’m going to make waffles. You might as well stay,” Yelena says.

You swallow hard. Now that Yelena is turned to face you, you notice the way her cropped tank stops right above her belly button; a patch of her skin that you’ve never had the liberty of seeing before. Your dream flashes back through your mind—Yelena beneath you, her hands on your hips, and suddenly, you have to catch yourself on the counter behind you before your legs give out.

“That’s okay, I…I’m not that hungry,” you say, studiously avoiding Yelena’s very confused gaze.

“Why are you being so—“

“I’ll talk to you later,” you blurt, cutting Yelena off. Then, while still avoiding her gaze, you turn and rush out of the kitchen before she can ask you why you’re acting like an absolute freak.

***

By some miracle, you managed to avoid Yelena for the rest of the day, complete with finding excuses not to be in the same room with her and using Ava and Bob as carrier pigeons should you have a message to pass along to her. And though your methods were a bit unorthodox, and you definitely earned some raised eyebrows from Ava, you seemed to have successfully avoided your Russian teammate.

Or so you thought.

Around seven in the evening, after you’ve forgone dinner with the group and chose to have takeout in your room instead, you get a knock at your door. But before you have a chance to tell whoever it is that it’s open, the door knob turns and in struts Yelena. And suddenly, your heart is in your throat.

“It is later,” she says simply, closing the door behind her. “Time to tell me why you’ve been weird all day,”

“I haven’t been weird all day,” you reply on impulse. But even now, your gaze is somewhere around Yelena’s socked feet and you can’t meet her eyes.

“You’re being weird right now!” Yelena points out. “You can’t even look up at me. And all day, you’ve been practically racing out of the room any time I walk in. I have a hard time believing that you find me that scary,”

You scoffed. “It’s nothing. Don’t worry about it,”

“Don’t tell me not to—“

“You think I’m dumb or I don’t know, annoying or something,” you cut her off. “You don’t like me and it’s so obvious, so you don’t have to concern yourself with why I act the way I do. If I told you, you’d only make fun of me anyway,”

Yelena’s brows furrow and then her features soften just the slightest bit. “You think I don’t like you?” She asks.

You shrug, picking at a loose stitch on your duvet.

Yelena lets out a heavy exhale, raking a hand through her hair. “Look, I don’t dislike you, y/n. I may not be a fan of your constant optimism and cheerfulness, but I don’t dislike you. I’ve actually been impressed by you since the time I saw you stronghold that guy at the bar,”

You smile at the memory. A “girl’s night” that Ava had organized led the three of you to a nice bar. And some guy had seemed intent on ruining your night by not by ignoring your collective disinterest and constantly asking to take you home.

When Ava told him no for the tenth time, he got in her face which prompted you to wrench his arm behind his back, advising that he fuck off if he knew what was good for him. Your protective nature and your strength has been a surprise to both Ava and Yelena. But Ava had been the only one to voice that she was impressed. Until now.

“So, is that really why you’ve been evading me all day?” Yelena’s voice pulls you from your daydreaming. “Because you thought I disliked you?”

You mull over just how much you’re willing to share. “No, not exactly,” you say. “The real reason is a lot…” you grapple around in your mind for the right word as you look up at Yelena. “…odder,”

“Odd how?” Yelena prompts.

“Well, I had this dream and…” you trail off, biting your lip. “…and it was a lot,”

“So…a dream made you act weird?” Yelena’s tone is dubious.

You nod slowly.

“I’m still not really following,” Yelena says.

“You have to promise not to laugh,”

“Why would I—“

“Just promise. Please, Yelena?” Your pleading gaze is enough to make Yelena sigh and concede.

“Alright, fine. I promise I will not laugh. Now hurry up and spit it out. The suspense is killing me,” she says.

“I had an intimate dream,” the words rush out, falling into each other as you speak. “About you. That’s why I avoided you all day,”

You wait for your confession to land. You wait for the exclamations of disgust or embarrassment. But all you get is silence. And when you can’t take it anymore, you look up at Yelena, who’s expression is carefully neutral.

“Intimate how?” She asks.

You lift your arms and let them fall back down, exasperated. “God, it was a sex dream, Yelena, okay? I was…I dunno, riding you. And you were praising me the whole time,”

Yelena’s expression belies nothing, and if it weren’t for the fact that her pupils were slightly dilated, you wouldn’t have thought your confession made any impact on her.

It’s as if you blink and she’s stood right in front of your bed, looking down at you. Now, you have to tilt your head to look up at her. “In the dream, did you…” she trails off, expecting you to pick up her thought.

You do, and it makes nerves flutter low in your abdomen as you admit, “I woke up before I could get off,”

Yelena nods, her gaze still on you. “That’s a shame,” she says it in such a low tone that you almost think you imagined it. The flutter of nerves in your stomach slowly start making their way up, the butterflies hovering right behind your belly button. Yelena is still staring at you, and she keeps her gaze trained on you as she lowers herself onto the mattress beside you. The bed dips a little with her added weight.

“What did you do?” Yelena’s gaze drops to your mouth for a brief second, but long enough to make you want to part them. Then, her eyes catch on yours again. “When you woke up from that dream, what did you do?”

“I dunno,” you’re embarrassed by the breathlessness in your voice as you respond. “Showered and then went down to get breakfast?”

“You just left yourself high and dry? You didn’t take care of yourself?” Yelena asks.

“No, I didn’t,”

Yelena hums, her eyes slipping slowly down your figure. The air between the two of you suddenly feels charged, like there’s a chance you’d get shocked if you even breathed a little too deeply. You couldn’t figure out what Yelena was thinking, and it was driving you absolutely wild in the best way.

“I feel like that’s not okay,” Yelena says, her eyes once again darting back to yours, but not before sneaking yet another peek at your lips. “I feel like it’s not okay for you to be left hanging like that,”

You feel the tips of Yelena’s fingers on the edge of your knee and suddenly, it’s so much harder to breathe.

“Yelena—“

“Y/n,” Yelena doesn’t use your name often. You know this because hearing her use it now feels like the first time, and makes you realize how fucking great your name sounds when it falls from her perfect lips. Her hand travels higher up on your knee. “Is this okay?” She asks.

You’re afraid that if you try to speak, you’ll end up whimpering, so you nod your head instead. Yelena scoots closer, bringing both her body heat and her deliciously spicy-sweet fragrance so much closer to you.

“You’re needy,” Yelena says it like a statement, not a question. “I can fix that,”

You’re so caught up in the way Yelena’s hand feels on your thigh that it takes your brain a minute to catch up, the nature of her statement slow to cut through the fog.

“You mean you want…” you trail off, searching Yelena’s eyes. She holds your gaze.

“I want to help,” She says simply. Her hand is higher now, palming softly at your thigh, and making your stubborn hips buck softly with the touch. “But only if it’s okay with you,”

Of course it was okay. It was so goddamn okay that you couldn’t breathe. So instead of answering with words, you let your body guide you forward to capture Yelena’s lips in a heated kiss.

You don’t know what you were thinking this morning—all that nonsense about only having platonic feelings for Yelena. Because the way the two of you kiss is anything but platonic. It’s dynamic. It’s passionate. It’s bruising. It’s hungry.

You’re more than happy to let Yelena dominate the kiss, her tongue sliding against your lower lip in silent permission that you didn’t even have to think about granting her. Her tongue is warm as it slides into your mouth and it’s here that you’re no longer able to keep your moans at bay.

“Yeah, you sound good,” Yelena mumbles against your lips as she guides you onto your back. She pulls back from the kiss way before you’re ready, pulling a whine of protest from you in the process. She only smiles and shushes you, kissing her way down your neck, your chest.

She lifts your arms above your head, then rids you of your shirt and bra. She utters a soft swear against your breast before taking the left one into her mouth and palming the right with her rough, warm hand.

You moan again, hips writhing beneath Yelena’s body as she works you over with her mouth. And when she grinds down against you, it only makes you moan louder. You can feel your nipple harden as Yelena lavishes the sensitive nub with her tongue. And she pulls away just long enough to grant you a devilish grin before switching over to your right breast, providing it with the same skilled suction while her left hand gets to work on the neglected breast. You buck up against her again, and she meets you, her hips grinding back into yours.

Her hand slides away from your breast to work the waistband of your sweats down your legs, leaving you in just your underwear. But before she can rid you of those too, your hands reach out, sliding under her tank top, and finally touching the warm skin of her stomach that you’d been aching to feel earlier this morning.

“You’re wearing too many clothes,” you breathe.

“Maybe you should do something about that,” she replies.

So you do.

Yelena lifts her arms as you slide her tank over her head. Her bra is next to go, and then her sweatpants. Your hands are on the waistband of her underwear when she suddenly grabs both of them and pins them to the bed, making you gasp. “Keep them here,” she whispers, her tone of voice making you want to do anything and everything she says.

“Okay,” you reply.

“Good girl,” The praise goes straight to your core, making you clench your thighs together.

Yelena keeps one hand on your pinned wrists, keeping you in place, while the other travels between your legs, spreading them open so she can cup you through the fabric of your panties.

Your body jolts and you moan Yelena’s name as you move to meet her touch. She drags a finger through your center, and the whine it makes you utter would’ve been embarrassing if you had any self awareness left. But you can’t remember having any kind of cohesive thought since the moment Yelena’s hand first landed on your knee.

“How’s this?” She asks, working at your increasingly-damp entrance through the material of your panties. Not once even teasing one of the edges. Not making any move to rid you of the stubborn barrier.

“Yelena please. Please, please, please,” you beg. You buck your hips up, but when you do, Yelena just moves her hand further away. You let out a frustrated moan along with what has to be five more pleases in a row.

“Please what, little one?” Yelena says.

“Touch me,” you panted. “Please, I’ll do anything. I’ll be so good. Just touch me. I can’t take it, this isn’t enough. Please,”

“See what happens when you ask nicely, milaya?” You don’t have a chance to respond to Yelena’s cheeky reply before she follows up with. “Lift your hips for me,”

You do as you’re told, letting Yelena slide your underwear down and off your thighs. Again, she drags a finger ever so gently through your folds before hooking two fingers inside and curling them. You’re already seeing stars and she just started and you can only pray that no one can hear your breathless moans outside your bedroom.

“Oh god, oh god,” you babble as you rock against Yelena’s fingers.

“You’re so wet,” Yelena remarks. Her fingers slide in deeper and you have to bite your lip so you don’t scream. “Who did that to you?”

You look up at Yelena through lidded eyes, but it doesn’t seem to service her as much as a verbal answer would. And she proves this by curving her fingers again, letting her thumb brush against your clit in a way that pulls another moan from you.

“I said who did this to you?” She prompts you again.

“You. All you, just you,” you gasp. “It’s all you, Yelena,”

You think you hear Yelena call you a good girl again, but it’s hard to focus on anything aside from the way her fingers feel inside you, bringing you so much higher, closer to what will likely be the most intense orgasm you’ve ever experienced. But just when you’re about to be sent hurtling over the edge, Yelena pulls her hand away.

You practically sob at the loss of contact, already aching for more. “No, please. I’m so, so close, Yelena. I just need—“

“Shh,” Yelena leans closer, pressing a kiss to one corner of your mouth and then the other. “I am not done with you yet. I just want to make you come the way you were robbed of in your dream,”

Yelena’s proposition alone is enough to make you see stars and you already feel boneless as she switches your positions, lying down on your sheets where you had been previously and pulling you down on top of her to straddle her waist. The anticipation builds back up inside of you, hot and needy, and you don’t even need to wait for a command before you take off, hips grinding into Yelena’s.

Just like in your dream, her fingers grip your waist, guiding your movements. Though Yelena is more subtle in the way she showcases her pleasure, you can tell she’s into this just as much as you are, if her parted lips and the soft furrow of her brows is anything to go on. If none of those gave her away, her soft Russian curses every time you moved, definitely did.

Your bodies move in tandem, a hypnotic rhythm that’s easy to lose yourself in. Yelena’s hands stay mostly on your hips, but she does steal a playful ass grab that makes you squeak and she laughs when you do. When her teeth sink into your neck, you’re pretty sure you’ll break then and there. But you hold out long enough to wait for her signal.

“You want me to say it, don’t you?” She whispers against your ear, her hands sliding up your hips to the curve of your waist, the outline of your ribcage, before settling on either arm. “You want me to tell you to come?”

“Yes,” you gasped. “Yes please. I need it,”

“Okay,” Yelena takes a hand and tilts your chin up to meet her eyes. “Then come for me,”

This time, you don’t have to wake up. Because this is very, very real, and so is the way that you spin out into oblivion as you chase and capture your release on top of Yelena, letting your orgasm fall over you like an avalanche.

Yelena’s climax is more understated, but not any less pleasurable—a pinch between her brows and parted lips giving away her pleasure as she guides you through your own.

Soon, you collapse forward, your head on Yelena’s chest. For a moment, you think she’s going to reject the physical contact, but just when you’re about to move away and apologize, her arms come up to wrap around you, pulling you closer. You hide your smile in the junction of her shoulder.

“Can I say something?” You’re the first to speak after a prolonged silence.

“Sure,” Yelena replies.

“I really needed that,”

Yelena laughs breathlessly, pressing a kiss to the crown of your head that surprises you. “Maybe I did too. I’m glad we cleared up the whole ‘me not liking you’ thing,’”

“And just for the record, you do? Like me, I mean?” You lift your head and look up at Yelena. She doesn’t answer immediately, but you catch a hint of a smile on her lips before she quickly schools her features.

“Hey, I saw that!” You tease.

“You saw nothing,” she deadpans.

“Yeah, you just smiled!”

“Shut up. I did not,” But Yelena can’t hold back the corners of her mouth from twitching, even if she tries.

“You’ve got it bad for me, don’t you?” Your smile matches Yelena’s as you poke a finger into the soft skin of her naked hip.

“If I kiss you, will you stop talking?”

The question only makes your grin widen. You don’t respond with words, however, leaning down and capturing Yelena’s lips in another kiss. And there’s no more talking after that. Nothing but pleasured sighs and soft breaths to fill the quiet of your bedroom as you take each other apart for the second time that night.

[d3adite666]

THE CONTAINMENT INITIATIVE ☆ B.R

chapter 4 — aggressive evolution

[bob reynolds x AFAB! reader, psychic!reader, empath?reader, slow burn, fluff, angst, slow burn, eventual smut, messy co-dependent relationships]

❱❱ WORD COUNT ﹕3800

❱❱ SUMMARY﹕ With the Void making itself known, it's time you get serious about your powers. Bucky and Yelena help you find an outlet, while Valentina closes in on you. Bob lets it be known how he feels about everything.

❱❱ WARNINGS ﹕ profanity, violence, trauma, eventual smut, psychological horror, mentions of: needles, injections, torture, and human testing

❱❱ NOTES ﹕ sentry is so UUURGGHH. i can fix him. i like fixing broken men. ill fix him!!!!! no beta read, i apologize for any errors i was half asleep while writing this

(divider from uzmacchiato)

★ chapters ﹒﹒ masterlist

★ tags - @coutureisart @jenneric2003 @tfamidoingwithmylife @disillusioniary @sadslasher13 @chimchoom @lewispullsman @articel1967 @jj-ma26 @hiraethmae @dark-silhouette

(ask to be tagged!) ࿐

“I let it in.” 

The silence lasts too long.

Bucky doesn't move. Doesn’t speak. Just watches you–watches the tremble in your fingers, the shallow drag of your breath, the way your shoulders curl in like you’re trying to make yourself small.

“I didn’t mean to,” you say eventually, barely above a whisper. “I didn’t call to it. It just… came.”

He nods. Once. But his jaw is tight.

“Did it hurt you?”

You shake your head once. 

“No… no. I– I think it likes me.”

That finally gives him pause. After a few seconds, his eyes narrow. Not in disbelief or concern, but because he understands. He knows what it means when something awful decides you’re useful.

He takes a careful step foreward, gently taking your arm in his hand. 

“We’re not waiting until Val finds out,” he says. “Tomorrow, we start. My way.”

“You’re doing it again.” Bucky’s voice is grating. You’ve heard it far too many times in the past hour. He dragged you out of the tower before the sun even came up, didn’t even tell you where you were going. Some construction site in the middle of bum-fuck nowhere. 

You thought it was another training session with him. The kind where you sit on the ground and hold hands for half an hour. But no, Bucky has been whooping your ass and knocking your feet out from underneath you, over and over and over. 

“Doing what, exactly?”

He circles you like you’re prey–not in a cruel way, but the way someone does when they refuse to let you keep lying to yourself.

“You’re not controlling it. You’re containing it. Big difference.”

You cross your arms. “So what, I’m supposed to let it explode out of me?”

“That’s exactly what you’re supposed to do,” he says, voice flat. “You’re not gonna learn how to use it until you stop being scared of it.”

He comes at you fast– not to hurt, just to pressure. You block. You swing. You fail. He knocks your legs out from under you like Yelena does.

You land hard, breath knocked from your lungs.

And that’s what does it.

The frustration. The weight of everything you’re feeling. The exhaustion, the guilt, the Void’s presence still coiled in your chest.

Your hands twitch.

You reach for the closest thing you can find– a long metal pole, sitting pretty in the dirt. You wrap your fingers around it, sit up quickly, and you swing. Hard. 

Something buzzes under your skin, the pole cracking loudly against Bucky’s kneecap. 

It all happens so fast you nearly miss it.

A jolt in your spine like lightning, a faint glow in your veins, then sparks shooting up the pole. 

Bucky stumbles back, not from the force of the hit–but from the shock. His eyes are wide, one hand gripping his knee, the other lifted like he’s half-expecting you to strike again.

“What the hell was that?” 

He breaks the silence first, gesturing at you as you drop the metal pole and move to your feet.

“I– How am I supposed to know?”

“You’re the one that did it!”

Your hands are still trembling.

The glow is gone now, but your fingers feel like live wires–like something ancient and aching just woke up inside you and isn’t ready to sleep again.

“I didn’t mean to do it!” you bark back, a little too sharp, voice cracking on the edges. “It just… it happened.”

Bucky stares at the dropped pole for a beat, then at you. The breeze kicks up some dust between you, but neither of you move to break the tension.

“Okay, okay. Just… walk me through it. What happened?” 

You rub at your forearm, heart still hammering against your ribs.

“I was mad,” you mutter. “At you. At everything. And then I grabbed the pole, and it felt… different. Like I was holding a lightning rod.”

“You channeled it,” Bucky murmurs, thinking out loud. “The energy–your power. Through something else instead of your body.”

Oh.

Oh…

Bucky finally relaxes his stance, shoulders still tense but no longer on edge. He steps closer, eyes scanning your face.

“You weren’t just holding that thing,” he says. “You were channeling through it. Like a conductor. And the second you got pissed off enough to stop thinking? It snapped into place.”

You look down at the pole in the dirt like it’s a cursed artifact. “So what? I’m supposed to carry a staff around like some kind of… fucked-up Jedi?”

“If it works, yeah. I don’t care if you swing around a glow stick,” he shrugs. “If it gives your power shape, it’s worth it.”

You let out a breathy laugh. Shaky. Almost manic.

This changes everything.

Because maybe–just maybe–you’re not just some broken empath caught in the crossfire of everyone else’s chaos. Maybe you’ve got a weapon of your own.

Maybe you are one.

Bucky watches you for a long moment. Then:

“We train with it tomorrow,” he says. “Same time. Don’t be late.”

Then he turns on his heel and limps off toward the rusted truck parked a few yards away–still rubbing his knee and muttering under his breath about a “psycho chick with a lightning stick.”

You smile.

And you pick the pole back up.

The gym is quiet–too quiet for how often Yelena curses during sparring.

You’re already on your back again, panting, one wrist pinned beneath Yelena’s knee.

“Again,” she says, voice low, irritated. “You’re pulling your punches.”

“No,” you wheeze. “You just have a vendetta.”

Yelena’s lip curls. She stands, offers her hand. “Get up and hit me like you mean it.”

You take her hand and let her pull you up, but your muscles are screaming. You’ve been at it for nearly an hour, sweat dripping down your temple, the weight of the metal staff in your hand getting heavier by the second.

You lunge.

She sidesteps.

You spin with the pole–clumsy, wide–but Yelena still blocks you with ease, catching the pole with her forearm and landing a sharp jab to your ribs.

Your frustration boils over.

Not just with her. With everything.

With the Void whispering in the dark. With Valentina’s eyes always on you. With this gnawing ache inside you that wants to break free.

You shove her back.

Yelena blinks–just for a second–but that’s all it takes.

Your hands spark again. The pole lights up like a fuse. The air around you cracks.

A pulse of energy blasts off the metal, like a shockwave made of light and raw feeling,and Yelena goes flying back a full ten feet.

She rolls, lands hard on her elbow, grunting.

Silence.

You stand frozen, the pole still crackling in your grip.

The observation window at the far end of the gym lights up.

One-way glass.

You know who’s behind it.

Yelena groans and pushes herself up, eyes locking on you with something close to awe. “You’re going to give me a heart attack one day,” she mutters, breathless.

You don’t answer. You’re looking at the glass.

You can feel her.

Valentina.

Then you remember where you are and wander over to Yelena, offering a hand to help her up.

“I’m sorry.” You mutter, eyes scanning her carefully as she pulls herself onto her feet. She laughs it off and rolls her shoulders back.

“Don’t be. That was good. Hurt like hell.” 

That doesn’t make you feel any better. 

Yelena notices. Of course she does.

She narrows her eyes at you, brushing dust off her elbow with a grunt. “Don’t do that.”

You blink. “Do what?”

“That face. Like you kicked a puppy. You didn’t hurt me–you surprised me. That’s different.”

You open your mouth to argue, but the gym doors hiss open before you get the chance.

Both your heads turn.

Valentina walks in, heels echoing against the floor like gunshots.

Her expression is unreadable–sharp eyes fixed on you, hands folded neatly behind her back. Too calm. Too calculated.

“Well,” she says, voice light but poisonous, “wasn’t that fun?”

You step back instinctively. Yelena moves in closer to your side.

Val stops a few paces from you both, gaze flicking to the scorched edge of the pole you dropped. “I’d say you’re improving,” she continues. “Though I doubt you even realize what you just did.”

You stiffen.

“I didn’t mean to–”

“That much is obvious,” Val says, smile thinning. “But we’re well past the point of hiding behind excuses, aren’t we?”

She glances at Yelena. “You can go.”

Yelena doesn’t move. She squares her shoulders, jaw flexing.

“I said go.”

There’s a beat. Then another.

Finally, Yelena steps away, brushing her knuckles gently against yours as she passes. You feel the weight of her glance over your shoulder–protective, warning.

Then she’s gone.

Valentina waits until the doors slide shut again before circling you. Slowly. Like a hawk.

“You’ve been holding back,” she says.

You flinch. “I’m trying to learn how to control it–”

“No,” she interrupts, voice cool. “You’re trying not to lose control. That’s not the same thing.”

She stops in front of you. “What I just saw? That was the real thing. That was instinct. Power without chains. You should lean into it.”

You shake your head. “It’s not safe.”

Her voice lowers. “It is if we teach you how to own it. Not fear it.”

Your stomach twists. The Void stirs–interested. Hungry.

Valentina smiles like she knows.

“You’re more than an empath. You’re a weapon. It’s time you start acting like one.”

The air feels stale the moment you walk in. Everyone's already seated in the boardroom. Yelena, with her arms crossed, Walker slouched in his chair, Ava flipping a pen between her fingers. Bob sits the way he always does: hunched over, polite, like someone still pretending he’s not a god under the skin.

Valentina enters last.

She doesn’t sit. Doesn’t need to. Her heels click once as she stops in front of the projection wall, and the lights dim automatically.

She clears her throat.

“We’re changing protocol. Effective immediately, she’s a part of the team. She’ll be field-ready in three weeks.”

You blink.

“What?” Bucky’s voice cuts first, sharp as a knife.

Valentina doesn’t flinch. “We’ve wasted enough time with training wheels. You’ve all seen what she can do now. This team needs something stronger. Sentry can’t always be our first line of defense.”

Yelena slams a palm flat against the table. “No. Absolutely not. We’re not letting you do this again.”

Val raises a brow, the barest hint of annoyance slipping through her practiced calm. “And what exactly do you think I’m doing, Yelena?”

“You’re weaponizing her. Just like you did with him.”

Everyone knows who she means.

You can feel it then–Bob stiffens beside you. Doesn't look up, just clasps his hands tighter in front of him. His shoulders curve in just slightly, like he’s bracing for impact.

Ava looks between you and Valentina like she’s watching a slow-motion car crash. Even Walker straightens in his seat.

Bucky pushes back his chair with a screech of metal. “We agreed,” he growls. “Training, not conditioning. Support, not programming.”

“She’s already stronger than most of you,” Val says. “I’m simply allowing her to prove it.”

“To whom?” Bob’s voice cuts through the room like a wire pulled too tight.

He still isn’t looking at her. He’s looking at you.

“To herself?” he continues, his voice quiet, almost flat. “To you? To the people she’ll tear through if something goes wrong?”

Valentina only tilts her head. “You turned out fine.”

“No, I didn’t,” he hisses.

The word lands harder than anything else that’s been said. Everyone falls silent again.

Bob finally looks up at her.

“I turned out useful.”

The room stills.

“I turned out good at following orders, at destroying what you asked me to destroy. I was useful until I stopped following orders and turned New York into a shadow.” 

There’s no venom in his voice. Just the truth.

Then he looks at you again–really looks at you. Like he's begging you to read between the lines. Like he’s asking you to see what he became, and run the other way.

You want to puke. You want to cry. This whole briefing is about you, but you feel completely and utterly powerless. Like nothing you have to say matters. 

But you say it anyway.

“I just want to help.” Valentina doesn’t flinch. She never does.

“Then do as you’re told,” she says, smooth and sharp like ice over steel.

It’s meant to be a final word. A dismissal.

But something’s shifted in the room.

You can feel it in Yelena’s stare, in the way Bucky’s jaw ticks like he’s clenching every word he wants to scream. In the quiet ache that lives in Bob’s eyes now, flickering gold at the edges like something just beneath the surface is threatening to break.

The silence stretches until Valentina turns, heels clicking, and the doors close with a hiss behind her.

Nobody speaks after she leaves.

Eventually, Walker mutters, “Jesus,” under his breath, and Ava throws her pen across the table. Yelena storms out.

You stay seated.

Bob’s still next to you. Still hunched, knuckles pale where they grip the edge of the table.

“Bob–” you start.

But he’s already pushing his chair back, already standing.

“Bob?”

You’re moving before you can stop yourself, nearly tripping over the wheels on your chair as you follow him into the hallway.

You’ve never seen him move so quickly, and it’s honestly irritating.

“Damnit, Bob, stop!”

He does–but only after another five strides down the hall. He stops so suddenly that you almost collide with his back.

He doesn’t look at you.

You circle around him, frustrated and breathless. “Hey. Talk to me.”

His jaw is tight. Eyes distant. There’s a flicker of gold at the edge of his irises, faint and fading.

“I told them this would happen,” he says finally. Quiet. Like the words weigh too much. “I told them the second she figured out what you could do, she’d find a way to use it.”

You blink, your heart pounding. “It’s not your fault, Bob.”

“Isn’t it?” 

His voice comes out harsh, gold flaring in his irises as he steps forward, sudden and sharp.

You flinch– not because you're afraid of him, but because it’s the first time Bob’s ever raised his voice at you.

He sees it. Sees the way you tense, the way your fingers twitch like they might call your powers without you meaning to.

“You’re only here because of me. Because I needed something, someone to ground me. Now what?” 

You know he’s starting to fade even before he straightens up, backing you up against the wall, nostrils flared and jaw clenched. 

His voice stays low and controlled, but fraying around the edges. “Now she thinks she can use you the way she used me. Like we’re weapons waiting to be loaded.”

The gold in his eyes burns brighter, and the hallway seems narrower now.

Your back hits the wall. Not hard. Just enough for the tension to crack through your body like a taut wire.

“You think I don’t see it?” he hisses. “The way they look at you in briefings. The way she smiles when you do something new. That smile means you’re already halfway gone.”

“Bob.” Your voice is barely above a whisper. But it lands.

“No,” He replies, face inches away from yours as he holds your gaze. “You don’t get to suppress me right now.” 

He takes a shaky breath, like he’s teetering on the edge.

“It’s not just her,” He whispers, a bit steadier now. “It’s Bucky and Yelena, too.”

You stare at him, stunned.

“What are you talking about?” you ask, but the words feel hollow. Because somewhere deep down, you already know.

“They’re watching you,” Bob says. “Every move you make. Every spark of power. Not because they’re worried you’ll get hurt, but because they’re afraid of what you’ll become.”

You want to argue. Want to say they care. That Bucky’s helping and Yelena’s training you to survive, not to cage you. But your throat closes around the words.

Because part of you has seen it, too. In the way Bucky's grip tightens when you lose focus. In the way Yelena’s teasing has turned sharp. In the way they look at you like you’re not fully you anymore.

You glance away. Bob doesn’t let you.

He grabs your chin, redirecting your gaze back to his.

“They're afraid because of what I became,” he says, voice shaking. “They think the same thing’s happening to you. But you’re not going to let them hold you back. Don’t let them hold you back.”

There’s something in his eyes– not cruel, not dark– but bright. Burning.

The golden shimmer behind his irises sharpens, flickers hotter. Like Sentry is rising, not to take over, but to defend.

Because he feels cornered. Because you feel cornered.

Because when Bob is too overwhelmed, Sentry steps in.

You realize it then– it’s still Bob. But it’s the part of him that’s all power and instinct, the part Valentina weaponized before he ever had the chance to choose.

You could stop him, you know that now. You could reach into the space between you and pull. You could say his name like a prayer or a plea. You could break the moment like glass.

But you don’t.

Because some part of you– the part they all keep trying to box in, muzzle, monitor– understands this version of him.

Not the broken soldier. Not the cautionary tale.

The storm.

The shimmer in his eyes deepens as he reads your silence not as fear, but permission. His hand, still at your chin, shifts and slides along your jaw, thumb ghosting your cheek.

He’s not smiling. Not leering.

He just looks.

Like he’s cataloging every crack in your armor and memorizing how to slip through.

“You’re not stopping me,” Sentry murmurs.

His voice is lower now. Steady. Like he’s not just talking to you, but to the echo of Bob inside him…the man who flinches and runs and wants too much.

“I don’t want to.” 

The words hang there, heavier than they should be. They sound smaller when you say them. Like a confession. Like you’re scared of how much you mean it.

A flicker of gold catches in the light. Not a threat. Just a reaction. His pupils dilate, soaking you in.

He steps closer.

Your shoulders are still pressed to the wall, heart loud in your chest. But you don’t move, you don’t flinch.

“Stop letting everyone control you.” He whispers. It’s not sinister like the Void, it’s genuine guidance. Like he’s trying to mentor you.

“They’re trying to train you to be safe,” he whispers. “I want you to be free.”

A pause.

And then:

“I’ll never tell you to hold back.”

You should push him away.

You should pull Bob back to the surface, reach for the steadier version of him you know best– the one who whispers comfort into your hair, who makes you coffee when your hands won’t stop shaking. The one who tries so hard to be good.

But this?

This doesn’t feel bad.

Sentry steps in closer, and this time, your fingers twitch toward his. The contact is light, barely there, but it sparks something all the same. The same pulse you felt when your powers flared through the metal pole. That rush of something ancient and electric.

You let your eyes close. Just for a second.

It’s enough.

He breathes you in again, but it’s different this time. Slower. Like he’s grounding himself, not consuming you. Like he wants to feel tethered too.

“I feel you,” he whispers, so soft it almost breaks you. “Even when I’m buried. I feel you.”

Your lips part. But no sound comes out. Your voice isn’t working. Your brain’s too full of static and gold and want and fear.

“I don’t want to scare you,” he says.

“You don’t,” you breathe.

Then he leans forward. Not to kiss you, not quite. 

His forehead presses to yours, and for the first time, he doesn’t feel like a weapon. Or a God, or a hero. 

He just feels real.

Warmth builds between you, slow and steady this time, not like a flare but a current. The lights in the hallway hum louder. Your palms glow faintly where they touch. It’s not volatile. It’s steady.

Safe, even if it shouldn’t be.

You don’t know how long you stand there, forehead to forehead, tethered by something neither of you fully understand. But it’s quiet now. Charged, yes–but quiet. You can hear his breathing. Feel the tremble still lingering in his fingertips where they rest against your ribs.

Sentry… or Bob… or whatever blend of them this is now–he’s watching you like he’s memorizing you. Every flicker in your expression. Every uneven breath.

“You ground me,” he says, barely a whisper.

It’s not a declaration. It’s a confession. The kind that aches with truth.

You nod slowly, your hand lifting to cup his cheek.

Something flickers in his throat, like he wants to say your name but it might undo him. He leans in–not to press closer, but like he wants to share the same breath. As if you’re the last thread keeping him tethered to this version of himself. Not the monster. Not the myth. Just the man.

“You feel like…” he trails off, then laughs under his breath. It’s soft. Self-deprecating. “I don’t know what you feel like.”

“Then stop talking,” you whisper. “Just feel.”

You guide his hand up slightly, over your collarbone. He doesn't grip, doesn’t take, doesn’t claim. He asks without a word, and when your breath hitches just enough to answer him, he lets his hand settle there–gentle, reverent.

When he speaks again, it’s not Bob. It’s not Sentry. It’s the space between.

“You make me feel human.”

It punches the air right out of your lungs. Not because it’s dramatic, but because it’s honest. And there’s nothing more dangerous than a man with the power of a god who wants, more than anything, to be held.

Your hand curls into the front of his shirt. The fabric is still warm from the briefing room, from the rage he was trying to bury. And now he’s giving you all of it.

Slowly, you tug him forward. He comes willingly. No tension in his shoulders now. Just ache.

And when your lips meet, it’s not hot or heavy–it’s steady. Like something earned.

Like permission.

His hands tremble just slightly against your skin, like he’s not sure he’s allowed to want you. But you stay close enough to remind him he doesn’t have to be sure… he just has to feel.

And he does.

Every second of it.

[d3adite666]

hiii i saw you wanted to get some requests <333 i dunno if this is good but it’s been stuck in my head: reader is bobs older sister that served in the military with walker then left to find her brother and got involved with valentina (idk if to include this but like maybe there was an “antithesis” to the sentry serum with light and while looking she stole that vial and mel remembers her but doesn’t know from where since yk they burned everything. Then she gets intel from a former colleague (describes the odd incident of the man falling from the sky then not dying from the bullets) and immediately goes looking. Crashes in the place bucky has them tied up and fights him demanding information- the john goes “reynolds?”whatttt

think about it idk if you want to i’d love to read it although i haven’t YET read anything by you <333333

knuckle velvet — j. walker

And nothing hurts like you do, like the way you say “I love you.”

As you seek out your lost brother, you find a familiar face and a painful surprise.

warnings: female reader, referred to as “reynolds” (bob’s sister) [1.7k words]

notes: thank u so much everyone for the requests, i will try my best to get to as many as i can! i wrote this in a few hours and it is unfortunately not proofread, so its not my best work Lol let me know if i need to edit anything (P.S. is the small text easier or harder to read? i thought i cared for it but making each paragraph smaller is so tedious)

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Your nails dug harder into the faded leather of the steering wheel, the arch of your foot easing deeper into the accelerator.

A sheen of sand darkened your visage, clothes tattered and worn from the rush of your travel, hem shredded and brittle with the sere of the desert.

The sound of your car’s stereo reverberated around you, “Following a wave of congressional scandals surrounding ex C.I.A. director, Valentina Allegra de Fontaine, civilians are reporting a ‘flying man’ over her Nevada compound. The man has been identified as Robert Reynolds. More details to come after this break.”

The words cut into you, bleeding silence as you gripped the radio’s silver dial.

“Fuck you, Bobby.”

You were supposed to be retired.

Ever since your honourable discharge from your military service, you’d been enveloping yourself in the exhales of cabin smoke and entoiling yourself in domesticity.

You ached to protect your brother, but since you were teenagers, he always got the darkest of your father’s scorn.

Bobby never took it well—always too attached, never leaving well enough alone—but, somehow, he drew up the courage to disappear, stuffing cheap linens into careworn duffel bags and vanishing.

You drowned in work after he left, moving your whole world to Fort Benning in order to devote your life to serving the country you’d since lost all faith in.

Your car pulled behind an abandoned petrol station, watching scraps of metal dangle by loose screws as you dug your keys out of the ignition.

A clammy perspiration clung to your skin, a thin veil of sweat, not nearly enough to prevent your shuddering body from overheating.

Your shadow passed over the mahogany the floorboards aching as you pressed your boots into the doorframe, the sound echoing too loudly.

You drew your gun from its sheath, light darting and flickering in the dark hallway as someone paced in the room beside you.

You dropped your gaze as you soundlessly turned towards the cast of light—twilight’s fresh orange bleeding through the sun-bleached windows.

Bucky Barnes stared back at you, neither flinching nor reacting as you aimed your pistol towards his skull, like he knew that you would come.

Your fingertips pressed into the trigger harder, the pads of your fingers tight with pressure, as if you were about to shoot.

The stretch of silence sunk into your skin your eyes flickered over a familiar head of blonde tresses.

Captain Johnathan Walker.

The two of you had served together in the 75th Ranger Regiment, steadily beside him as he blossomed into America’s golden boy.

You hadn’t seen him in person since before the serum—and the difference was beyond striking.

Sweat clung to his hair, pale curls falling to the nape of his neck—longer. His back stretched wider, defined muscles framing his sharp shoulder-blades—stronger.

He was still unaware of you— superhuman instincts late to kick in, it seemed—with his hands knotted against the arch of his back.

You couldn’t help but notice the shadow around his eyes, a dark melancholy you didn’t recognise.

You had always kept him clean and fed, even under strict rations and military conditions.

He was handsome like this, but his expression was dark and cold, incongruous with the assortment of his features.

He wasn’t supposed to look like this—you didn’t know him like this.

It was chilling—the sickening unfamiliarity of it all—like a hallucination of a man you once knew, an echo of a body you had once traversed, the reminder of lips you’d traced.

You paid no attention to him as Captain America, not after he disappeared from the ivory of your sheets with no trace of parting.

The gun was heavy in your hands, your calloused palms wrapped around the body.

You felt a storm brewing in your core, wrapping around your pounding heart and empty lungs.

It was fury.

The safety on your gun clicked, the echo of the noise in the empty room nearly as piercing as the stabbing pain in your chest.

Even with his arms constricted, tangled in thick rope, his muscles tightened, biceps flexing.

The silence was thick enough to drown in, and you could nearly feel it wrapping around the warm flesh of your neck.

The cerulean of his eyes sunk into yours, pupils that narrowed and dilated with the trace of every emotion.

His eyes were maybe the one thing the serum left untouched—pale blue, soft—tangible proof that you knew him, a remnant that proved he had once been yours.

“What the fuck is this?” Yelena asked, looking between you and John, voice dripping with a Russian inflection.

The rest of Bucky’s ragtag team was silent, eyes boring into you as you raised the barrel of your gun to John’s temple.

“Reynolds,” he breathed, a call of recognition, of relief.

It made you sick.

His pouting lips parted as if he was to say more, but the words dissolved on his tongue, leaving as swiftly as they formed.

“Why is he here?” you asked Bucky, your voice fighting the rough grating in your throat.

The words were softer than you meant them, closer to a question than a demand.

An ostentation of weakness.

“What are you doing here?” John’s voice sounded in your ear like a melody; his words were soft, an intonation adjacent to wonder.

The tender words falling from his lips were nearly enough to shatter your stupor, but you kept your gun steady, just barely trembling.

“Bucky?” you repeated through gritted teeth.

Bucky’s explanation faded into the background as John’s eyes flashed over your body; your palms were firm against your roughened piston, new faded scars he never got the chance to tend to, your head-strong demeanour almost faltering.

You didn’t pay John any attention, he noted, hardly even shooting him a glance as you burrowed yourself in a heated conversation with Bucky.

You shook your head, heat blooming across your skin, blushing deep red, as your mind spiralled, “Valentina ran tests on him, didn’t she?”

Bob. Bobby. Of course that’s who you were here for.

He hadn’t been sure if Bob was your Bob, the one you swore so solemnly to protect.

John had seen a glimpse of his eyes—as his fingers tensed around the curve of Bob’s wrist—a flicker of your irises.

The memories could have choked him in that moment—the shape of your body, the stretch of your skin, the pressure of your kiss—it all echoed in the eyes of the boy closest to you.

“Who is that?” Ava asked earnestly, turning to John.

The tension in the room was palpable, and John continued to stare like he was starved, twitching against his restraints as he watched tears well in your eyes and spill onto the flush of your cheeks.

“That’s my girlfriend,” he gritted, voice raising now, “Bucky, let me go.”

You were calculated as you spoke—devoid of any real emotion, “Keep him down, Buck.”

John nearly flinched at the words, a crater piercing his heart.

You spoke down to him—just shy of demeaning—as if you were talking to a mutt, like an owner barking “heel”—and he tried not to release the soft cry pent up in his throat.

Hungry for acceptance and desperate for glory, John had left you drowning in the pool of sorrow your brother’s absence abandoned you with. Always aching for the next best thing, Johnathan Walker became Captain America and abandoned his military post, leaving you anchorless once more.

You were here, now—wrapped in leather and animosity—and he couldn’t even touch you, watched intently by restless eyes, he couldn’t even console you.

It was all his fault—all your right to be bitter—and he felt the temper well in his throat.

The guilt constricted him, a thick cord tightening around his neck as his resolve faded, all the feelings he fought so hard against now floating to the surface.

He was bent toward you, an orchid to the sun.

“Ex-girlfriend,” John corrected himself, swallowing, then clearing his throat.

John, even in his agony, could feel Yelena bite her tongue beside him.

It made him feel pathetic.

Bucky spoke softly, tensing for your explosion, “I’m going to let him up, Reynolds.”

You just turned away, away from Bucky, away from John, your hair pooling down the small of your back as your body shook. Your cries grating against your throat as you shook your head in disbelief.

John’s jaw twitched as Bucky released him from his harness.

He really did feel like a dog now, but his worn leash lead straight to your open palm.

It hardly took a second before John was wrapping his arms around you, biceps firmer now, super-human serum darting through his pulse.

Your body had an almost natural reaction to him, the flesh of your cheeks digging into his chest, weight falling against him as you sobbed.

“I’m sorry,” he nearly cooed, guilt-stricken. “I’m so fucking sorry.”

An amalgamation of confusion and fury melted out of you, nails digging into his forearms in an attempt to hurt him, free yourself, you didn’t know, but John didn’t relent.

He continued to whisper tender assurances in your ear, the warmth of his breath splaying over the stretch of your neck; old dog-tags still hung there, yours and old scratches against the back of the worn metal where yours and his would collide.

John wanted to cry with you, get lost in your warmth, and trace the new-ness of you, but he stayed painfully aware of the audience collected behind you, all awkwardly shifting in the weight of the emotion.

It was vulnerable for him—for them to see it, for them to see him clawing desperately at the woman he loved—the woman who had once loved him.

Bruises could have bloomed around his knees, a maroon flush of praying at his altar; those were the lengths he would go to beg.