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friesforfriday · 2 years ago

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There’s nothing about this that didn’t make my heart melt. It’s all so pure and oh my god don’t I wish for everything good for baby Ellie ❤️ Nothing like some wholesome supportive figures like Pin and Joel

Seams drabble: Patch

{ Part IV: Notch | Series Masterlist | Main Masterlist }

Rating: None

Summary: Ellie finds a Pride-themed sew on patch that leads to revelations.

Warnings: Pure fluff and love for this girl, some angst, coming out, total disregard of canon because I don't know how it goes in the game.

Word count: 1.3k

Notes: This idea struck me out of the blue many months ago, and I was waiting for 'the right place' in the series, until I mentioned it to a dear friend in passing conversation and then I just started writing it. Very lightly edited. Set at unspecified time frame after Part IV.

Ellie hums to herself from her spot in a cosy corner of the Outfitters, one watchful eye on the door. It’s an uncharacteristically slow Saturday, but she’s not complaining - she has her hands full.

A big canvas sack lies empty on the floor, its contents strewn haphazardly all over the wooden floor. The mess drives you up the wall, but you know better than to question her (very questionable) methods, so you’re ensconced in the safety of your studio while she sorts through the clothes and odds and ends that the patrollers brought back from their most recent outing.

Though infrequent - most settlements around Jackson have been painstakingly pilfered for anything useful over the years - it’s her favourite duty at the shop. Lucy is looser with the rules, but sometimes, you let Ellie keep little knick knacks that won’t sell.

The teenager goes through the pile thoroughly. Shirts go in one stack, jeans in another, followed by shoes, hats and scarves. Turning to the heap of smaller loose trinkets, she separates mismatched buttons, safety pins, shoelaces and zippers (as Maria always says, every little help), when something colourful piques her attention.

Plucking the piece of fabric out of the jumble, Ellie recognises it as a decorative patch that she’s seen sewn onto bags and shirts. It’s the size of her palm, cut in the shape of a rainbow, the colours still bright. Over the arches, bold white text outlined in black spells out NYC PRIDE 2003.

Tucking it into her pocket for now, she quickly finishes the rest of the sorting. Clothes go into the bin to be collected by the laundry, shoes for the cobbler’s, and accessories into a box to be priced and shelved.

Ambling into the back of the shop where you’re busy hemming a pair of jeans, Ellie plops into one of the rolling chairs, straddling the back of it, and the wheels screech as she careens across the floor to your sewing station.

Your lips quirk as you look up briefly at her. ‘Find anything interesting?’

‘Just this,’ she replies, flashing you the patch and reading aloud, ‘NYC Pride 2003. What does that mean?’

‘There used to be a big pride parade for the LGBT community every year in New York City,’ you explain. ‘They used to close down the streets and everything for it, it was a huge event.’

Ellie blinks, your answer taking her by surprise. She clears her throat, a distant buzzing at the back of her head as she turns the patch over pensively in her hand. ‘What - do you know what it was like?’

‘I’ve never been to one, but it always looked incredible. People used to line the streets in support, and everyone dressed up. There’d be rainbow flags everywhere, floats, dancing, music, and of course, it was an important way for the community to highlight and push for LGBT rights.’

‘You mean -’ she pauses, the unfamiliar feeling of stumbling over her words making her hands sweat. ‘You mean, people would just be out in public, like, being themselves?’

‘More than that - they were celebrating themselves.’

Ellie doesn’t realise she’s fallen quiet until you speak, ‘You can keep it if you want.’

Her head snaps up, disoriented. ‘Keep what?’

‘That.’ You nod towards the patch she’s clinging onto so tightly that her knuckles have gone white.

Panic prickles the back of her neck, an embarrassed heat suddenly making her want to pull at the collar of her flannel. But then you shrug and say, almost flippantly, ‘It’s pretty.’

‘Yes,’ she blurts out in hasty agreement, letting out a breath she’s been unconsciously holding. ‘It’s very pretty.’

Ellie is relieved when you turn back to the sewing machine, leaving her to retrace her steps to the front of the shop. The patch sits on the counter, where she leaves it, as she goes about her business for the rest of her shift.

Her eyes travel to the rainbow, and she thinks of how she wasn’t like the other girls at school, who fawned over dogeared photos of singers and actors long dead. She thinks of how she’s always known she’s different, but didn’t have the vocabulary to express it.

She thinks of Riley.

Riley.

For Riley.

When half three rolls around, you spot the teenager lingering by the studio doorway out of the corner of your eye, her backpack dangling from her fingers. Any other Saturday, you’d be lucky to catch the blurry shape of her shadow when she gallops out of the shop, throwing a see ya over her shoulder.

Thrown by her silence, you prompt, ‘Yes, Ellie?’

Scruffing the tips of her well-worn sneakers on the floorboards, she bites her lip in an atypical display of hesitance. ‘Pin, could you help me sew the patch onto my backpack? Please?’

You smile, eyes soft. ‘I’d love to. C’mon.’

‘You don’t have to do it now,’ she protests, feigning nonchalance, but her twitchy hands give her away. ‘Like, whatever, it’s no big deal.’

Wanting to put her at ease, you shrug. ‘No time like the present. Where do you want it?’

Putting her bag on your work surface, she points. ‘Guess right here under the wings.’

‘Perfect. Can you unzip the bag for me?’

You have Ellie hold the rainbow exactly where she wants it while you thread the needle, and you start sewing it in by hand, stitch by tidy stitch. It barely takes a couple of minutes, but time is of the essence - you haven’t heard the girl take a single breath of air since the anchor stitch.

Snipping off the thread with a flourish and giving it a once over, you grin. ‘There, all done.’

Ellie ducks her head, quiet as she takes the bag from your hands, running a thumb over the arches of the rainbow. Without a word, she suddenly throws her arms around you, hugging you tight.

‘Thanks, Pin,’ she mumbles into your hair.

Your heart swells, and you squeeze her back even tighter. ‘Anything for you, kiddo.’

On Monday morning, Ellie hovers in the hallway outside the kitchen, observing.

Joel is at the table, oblivious with his back to the door, her breakfast of two fried eggs over and easy and toast waiting at her usual spot at the table. Taking a deep breath, she bites the bullet and walks in, backpack in her hand.

‘Mornin’,’ grunts Joel, almost done with his own eggs, sunny side up.

‘Morning,’ she parrots back as she makes herself comfortable.

She usually just dumps her bag on the floor, but today, she pulls out the chair next to her and drops it into the seat. The unusual movement catches Joel’s eye, and he takes a good long look at the backpack.

Eventually, he points vaguely in what she assumes is the direction of the rainbow patch, and says, ‘That looks new.’

‘Yup, Pin helped me sew it on.’

He purses his lips, asking around a mouthful of egg. ‘You know what Pride is?’

She swallows thickly, and it takes a beat to unstick her tongue from the roof of her mouth. ‘Yeah, Pin told me.’

He nods, then turns his attention back to his plate with no fanfare.

Not entirely sure if he caught the nuance but her mind too in knots to care, Ellie picks up her fork and doesn’t think twice when he gets up to put his dish in the sink.

She nearly chokes on eggs when strong arms close around her shoulders in a vice-like grip, scratchy beard on her temple, Joel’s voice so thick that it makes her think if she turns around, she’ll see tears in his eyes.

‘Proud of you, baby girl.’

Later that afternoon, Joel finds you alone in the shop, restocking the women’s outerwear rack.

You toss him a smile over your shoulder. ‘Hey, what are you doing here?’

‘Lucy ‘round?’ he asks.

‘When is she ever?’ you quip with no bite.

Three steps and he’s spun you around by the waist, soft lips latching onto yours in a sweet kiss with just a hint of heated aftertaste that has you swaying on your feet when he pulls back.

A breathless laugh bubbles in your throat as you palm his whiskered jawline. ‘Why, thank you for that, Mr. Miller.’

The corners of his eyes crinkle, and he brushes his nose tenderly against your cheek. ‘No, thank you, sweetheart.’

Notes: I hope I wrote Ellie's coming out as sensitively as I hoped to. As I mentioned, I have no idea how or if she comes out in the game, but despite being such a chatty teenager, I think she'd find it difficult to broach the subject with Joel in conversation. For me, this was a fun way of weaving in her part-time job at the Outfitters and Pin into her coming out story that stays true to Ellie's character. I hope you enjoyed this - comments and reblogs appreciated as always!

P.S. I am not 'back' back, so I don't know when I will next update Seams. Thank you for your patience while I try to navigate my way back to some semblence of writing regularly, whenever that may be.

Thank you @firefly-graphics for the dividers ❤️

#the last of us fanfiction #ellie william fanfiction #joel miller fanfiction #fuckyeahseams #i missed seams so fucking much

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friesforfriday · 2 years ago

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Hi dear, that’s so nice to hear. Thank you for your comment and for reblogging 🤍🤍

A real first kiss (Matt Murdock x F!Reader / College AU)

Summary: You tell Matt no one has ever kissed you out of love. He makes sure to correct that.

Wordcount: 2.5K ish

Warnings/Tags: No use of y/n, reader uses she/her pronouns (no physical descriptions aside from that), college AU, Matt and reader are both in law school, some angst, something that could be read as dissociation (reader feels disconnected to an experience), reader is not straight? (no sexual orientation specified but there's an interaction that is not heterosexual / only kissing tho), comfort at the end (bc I am a sucker for happy endings lol)

A/N: This was oddly personal, and while it’s a little short it was very therapeutic to write. Pretty much wanted to do something that related to being a late bloomer (like I have been my whole life) plus some fluff (: Please take into account that this wasn't proof read and that English isn't my first language; if you happen to see any mistakes, do let me know so I can fix them. Hope you enjoy this!

For most people, their first kiss was usually a memory of their early teenage years, maybe even a childhood one. You could recall the stories your friends have told you. On sunny days during summer camp, connections were born after swimming in a lake all afternoon. Laughter scattered in open fields or forests between games of capture the flag. That turned into late-night conversations, sneaking out from each other’s cabin after curfew to meet under the starry sky.

Or perhaps it started out as a hallway crush. The kind that you would keep between friends and hid under silly codenames. It stirred up giggling after locking eyes during the free period, and guess what maybe it turned out they’d been watching you all along. Maybe later a study date would into something more when if your knuckles brushed accidentally.

All very innocent and sweet, most likely a terrible kiss, but nevertheless a story worth remembering.

There were plenty more stories you could think of, from childhood friends turned to high school sweethearts and plenty about games of truth or dare or spin the bottle. For some, their first kiss was meaningless, sometimes an embarrassing story they liked to joke about or occasionally a heartwarming one.

Throughout the years, you had patiently waited for your turn. You didn’t have many expectations of how it would actually happen, you just held on for the moment to finally occur. It just never did.

Middle school rolled by, which was fine, right? A lot of people need more time to grow into themselves, it would eventually happen, you were sure. Maybe it wasn’t going to be one of those awkward extended pecks that your friends said seemed to last forever. They insisted it was for the best, no one really knows what they’re doing when they still haven’t even fully hit puberty. If you had your first kiss later in life, there was a higher chance it wasn’t going to be completely awful. You could deal with that; high school was supposed to be more exciting a new chance to expand your circle.

Unfortunately, once again, you stood waiting. By this point, it was possible that maybe you had watched too many rom-coms or read one too many romance novels. You’re sure now that it helped in no way to ease your expectations. How difficult could it be? You saw it all. Your best friends got into relationships, went on dates, celebrated anniversaries, and had their hearts broken, only to survive them and start all over again. Kids in your classes, the kind to never speak their minds, suddenly grew into themselves and found their people too.

During lunchtime, couples sat next to each other, holding hands in the cafeteria. Field trips meant seeing impromptu make-out sessions in the back of the school bus. Your friends received proposals for homecoming and eventually proms; always happy to invite you to come along when you didn’t receive any. At the occasional party you attended, you sat in corners watching as others were approached. Not once came anyone to strike up a conversation, to casually sweep you off your feet. You stood by wondering if you were doing something, anything, wrong.

Love was everywhere, just never in your life.

You’d be lying to say it didn’t hurt your self-esteem. How come it never happened to you? Were you really that unattractive or uninteresting or whatever it could actually be for no one to be interested in you? No matter how many times your friends, or anyone who found out really, assured you weren’t the problem, the evidence seemed to point elsewhere.

It took you approximately one year of college to decide it had been enough. Would anyone genuinely ever like you? Maybe you truly were a late bloomer, but c’mon, those “the right person will find you when you least expect it” pep talks were starting to feel like bullshit. For fucks sake, it didn’t even matter anymore if they actually liked you, you just wanted to get it over with. It turned out, it wasn’t fun winning a round of never have I ever when you had to admit, and insist, that you had never kissed anyone no, not even a small peck.

The matter was taken into your own hands on a Saturday night. The crowded spaces doing you no favors to appease your social anxiety. As you walked around, room after room was filled to the brim with strangers, your friends nowhere to be found. The floor of the frat house they had dragged you to remained particularly sticky everywhere you went, especially in the kitchen where you had stopped to refill the red plastic cup in your hands.

Pouring rum into your glass full of coke, a familiar voice called your name from across the room, “Oh my God, is that really you?”

Greetings were exchanged, as well as short debriefings of what you’d been up to since graduating. For all the time you’d been at Columbia, that was the first time you’d run into a person from your old hometown. Soon enough you were sitting in a half-empty deck, reminiscing about middle school. The green eyes that looked at you weren’t full of love or lust, one of those odd friendships that stood awkwardly close to an acquaintance, and you suddenly knew you had an opportunity laid at your feet.

It was hard to approach the subject. In all honesty, you weren’t looking for romance anymore. Looking at him, you recalled all the times you joked around in Literature class or the times his parents gave you a ride home before you inevitably grew apart in high school. There was no spark when your knees brushed in the small sofa you were sitting in; but there was no discomfort either, so against your better judgement you decided to go for it.

By all means, it was a good kiss. If you were honest, there wasn’t anything else to compare it to, but none of the complaints you’d heard before happened. There wasn’t any unnecessary clash of teeth, it didn’t feel like he was shoving his tongue down your throat, he kept his hands safely and softly cupping your cheeks and neck. According to all the standards of all of your girlfriends, this was an A+ experience.

By the time you were heading home, you found yourself finally able to check having your first kiss off your bucket list.

Unfortunately, though, when you shared the news over the phone with your best friend, you realized that while everything had seemingly gone smoothly, you still felt empty inside. Like nothing had really changed. It was hard to put into words, how your body had felt out of its own, or maybe it was your mind that was playing tricks on you. Because for some reason, you hadn’t really felt there when it happened. It just sort of seemed to occur.

“You’re kidding, right?” Matt’s face was dead serious.

Letting out a giggle you said, “Why would I be kidding about that?”

“That jerk was your first kiss?”

“He’s not a jerk,” you tried to defend yourself, but he didn’t let you continue.

“He’s a conservative, Republican-governor-wannabe, how is he not–”

“He wasn’t back then!” Raising your tone, you simply burst out laughing at the same time Matt did, because yeah – that dude did end up becoming a jerk. Except it didn’t really matter because you were never into him, and you can’t blame former middle school classmates for who they end up becoming.

“But he is now.”

You both kept laughing, shoulders brushing as you sat on the bed on his side of the dorm room. Foggy had ditched you both for tonight, opting out of your usual weekend hangout in favor of a date with someone called Marci, or so he’d said.

“It doesn’t matter,” you said in your defense, lightly shoving his shoulder with your own. “I didn’t actually like him.”

“Wait…” Matt said scrunching his nose in disbelief, the laughter slowly dying down, “What are you talking about, why'd you kiss him then?”

With his face suddenly turned in your direction, you felt a little embarrassed to admit the truth. “I guess… I just wanted to get it over with.”

An apologetic smile was what he offered in return, with no real judgment behind it. “Well, you should’ve gotten something better... silly as it may be, you know... not just anyone.”

His words stop you in your tracks for a split second, a bittersweet feeling creeping up your chest. You’d never actually considered it, but in the years that had passed since that night, you didn’t recall that any other single kiss you’d received had actually been born from real love or any true feelings at all.

There was that one time you hit it off with someone at a friend’s birthday. The light conversation between the colorful lights had you blushing more than usual. Their body was warm against yours when their lips were pressed to your own. The taste of their lip balm was sweet, almost sugary on your tongue, but it was all a spur-of-the-moment situation. While, unlike the first time, where you’d felt disconnected from your body, this time you’d actually enjoyed it. There was a warm feeling, maybe happiness, but definitely not affection and surely not love.

Then there were some other guys, whom you had very much liked. They listened to you and talked eagerly with you every time you bumped into each other, yet never actually asked you out. They flirted with you or had their friends act as their wingmen to eventually end up making out with you during random parties, but never – you realized – not one single time had anyone ever been interested in you affectionately, with tenderness or sincerity.

As if on cue, as if he could somehow sense what you were thinking, Matt broke the sudden silence that had grown in the room. “I didn’t mean to overstep I–”

You shook your head, breaking free from your thoughts, “No, no, I just… I don’t think I’ve ever had a…” Your voice quieted down before you could finish the sentence. While you weren’t ashamed of any of your experiences anymore, you couldn’t quite seem to get rid of the lingering pain that followed all of them.

“A real connection?”

Your eyes darted up to look at Matt; red glasses were shielding his eyes from yours, but did not cover the furrow of concern between his brows. It wasn’t a secret to Matt that you’d never been in a relationship. You’d told him at some point, during one of the many late-night conversations you enjoyed having. He’d found it hard to believe, truly, how anyone would pass on the chance of earning your trust. The thing was, anyone willing to pass on your endless compassion, your particular sense of humor, the softness of your skin, or the brilliance of your mind was a jackass, and he sure as hell wasn’t one.

He’d known you all of law school, at least all year and a half you’d both taken of it, although to him it might as well be a lifetime because he couldn’t quite picture a time when he didn’t recognize the sound of your heartbeat by memory. Right from the day you sat next to him in the Civil Procedures course, it took him no time to think of an excuse to talk to you, ignoring Foggy – who was also sitting next to him – to ask you if you’d care to study together someday.

Here and now, your very same heartbeat thumped loudly mere inches away from him. The opportunity he had once longed for.

“C’mon man, you gotta tell her at some point” was what Foggy had told him a few hours prior, before he’d left you two alone on purpose. “She obviously likes you, for real. It’s time.”

“I don’t know, Foggy. I don’t want to pressure her, what if she doesn’t want to be anything more than friends? I–”

“Oh my God, Matt! Are you being serious?” He said in a mock tone, “You don’t want to pressure her? She has completely memorized the way you take your tea and somehow prepares it perfectly in the shitty dining hall microwave. She genuinely prefers spending every Saturday night holed up in our dorm or out at Josie’s or pretty much anywhere just to sit next to you. She literally looks at you with stars in her eyes.”

Chuckling, Matt did his best to play coy, “Well, I can’t know about that last part–”

“You know what I mean. You have to tell her, tonight.” Foggy insisted as he made his way out of the dorm room; he pointed his finger at Matt before he fully headed out, “God forbids you actually pursue something that might make you happy. I’ll be over at Marci’s, don’t wait up for me…”

So yeah, Matt knew what he had to do. “I think I’d like to object to that… if that’s okay with you.”

At your silence– aside from the way your heartbeat continued to pick up – he proceeded, “You don’t really think there isn’t a single soul who’d honestly care for you, do you?”

His hand slowly moved from where it rested atop his lap. His knuckles gently brushed your knee and grazed your hand, guiding themselves with the line of your arm all the way up until they reached your shoulder. A small smile grew on your face and quickly turned into laughter. “Matt, are you serious?”

“I’m sorry it took me this long to tell you.” In a second, he mirrored your laughter, nodding his head. He felt the warmth of your fingers cover his other hand. “Is it okay if I– can I kiss you?”

If you recalled correctly, no one had ever asked you that, in all of your lifetime. Surely, for you, this was a first of its kind.

As soon as you said yes, dexterous fingers slid around your waist, gently coaxing you towards him, before taking off his glasses. Your body didn’t resist complying, the warmth of Matt’s chest as inviting as the feeling of his heartbeat against yours, your legs at ease around his own.

The stubble across his neck gently brushed against your fingers, a tingling sensation that almost sent shivers down your spine. This close, there was no escaping the soft smell of soap and cinnamon from his skin or the way his breath fanned across your face. Warmth grew inside your chest as you felt the soft brush of his lips on yours, almost melting together. It was slow and languid, much like honey trickling down your tongue. You were sure it could be just as sweet too, a kind of feeling you had never felt before.

A feeling you guessed was reciprocated if the rumble that reverberated through Matt’s throat was anything to go by. He couldn’t tell why he had waited so long to do this; all of his excuses gone the second the softest skin of your mouth met his. As far as he knew, he could stay with you like this for hours. He didn’t want to pressure you– not even when your breathing got a little faster or when your lips parted oh-so-gently to let him seek out your taste– but this much he could do.

The only reason he found to pull back was to ask you, catching his breath and brushing his thumb over your lower lip, “Does this mean I can take you out tomorrow night? We can do this properly.”

You smiled to yourself, “Only if you kiss me like that again.”

If you're here, thank you so much for reading!!! Please please please let me know what you thought - all feedback is appreciated- and consider reblogging if possible (:

#matt murdock fanfic #matt murdock x you #matt murdock x reader #comment reply

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friesforfriday · 2 years ago

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holy fucking shit

EYEM #12

Pairing: Miguel O'Hara x female reader

Summary: Miguel has to face his worst nightmare, again and again.

Word count: 8,600

Content: body horror, violence, angst. please come in prepared.

Series Masterlist | Spiderverse Masterlist | Astroboot’s Masterlist | thirstworldproblemss’ Masterlist

[Previous] [Next]

Everything is gone.

It's pitch black in here, and it's the only thing he can see in this cramped and confined darkness that's pressing in on him.

There's no air in this congested space. Everything tastes of sulfur and it burns in his lungs. His heart is pounding. Alarm gripping the base of his spine.

He's afraid, but he doesn't even know why. He shouldn't be.

Miguel hasn't been afraid of the dark for a very long time.

With his optical photo-sensitivity, he's more at home here in the twilight than he is in the light.

So why is every inch of him screaming out that something isn’t right?

He moves, trying to make his way forward, but all there is to navigate him is more seemingly infinite darkness.

The only sound in here is a loud beat of a drum that crowds his ears and he can't pinpoint its source. Everything is obscured and he is trapped in this endless eclipse.

There’s no noise that accompanies his footfall in this space. With each step his feet sink into the mire of unsteady ground. If he stops to rest, it would bring him under and swallow him whole. Even a second of delay here is going to cost him.

The thumping noise is still there... It comes harder and faster now, refusing to leave him.

Taking another step, there is something from the dark that tugs at him from behind. It feels like a grip. An unseen hand that he cannot make out in the thick inky shadows trying to grab onto his limbs.

Gritting his teeth, Miguel pushes back against the force holding him, but it’s not letting go. His claws extend, primed for a fight

The loud thrashing beats pulsing in his ears isn't stopping. He knows this panicked rhythm, will never forget it for as long as he lives. It's the sound of your heartbeat as you fell...

He turns in the darkness, and the sight that greets him makes him freeze.

It’s you.

His heart stops.

Your body is wrong, sprawled against the ground, mangled and broken as your arm reaches out trying to clutch at him.

"Don’t go,” you say.

His lungs drop to his stomach. He can’t breathe. Bile floods his throat. He doesn’t understand what is happening.

“Save me,” your voice calls out to him, this time coming somewhere from his left.

He turns towards the second voice to see another you. You are covered in blood. Dried and crusted on your bruised and ruptured skin.

All the fight bleeds out of him. His hands fall limply to his sides.

"Why didn’t you help me?" you repeat.

Your voice echoes in the blank empty space. It ricochets and bounces off the nothingness and returns back to him with a sharp strike to his ribs.

"You promised," you say and the accusation is repeated and threaded into the next, as he hears your voice again, this time from behind him.

"You let me die," a third of you says.

This you is missing an arm. The space where your right eye is supposed to be is hollowed out.

He falls to his knees, but he can’t feel the ground beneath. He doesn’t know what to do. Doesn’t know how to help or how to save you.

He can lift a 25,000 pound bus filled with school children barehanded. Can incapacitate a genetically mutated rhino-man in ten minutes flat. But he doesn’t know how to do this again. He’s already failed once and he is powerless in a way that a man gifted with superstrength shouldn’t be.

What are superpowers good for, if it doesn’t let him protect the one person he needs to.

Your voice is small and you sound terrified as you look up at him with those wide eyes of yours that will haunt him forever. "I don't want to die."

"It hurts," another you says. It's gargled and pained. Like there are bruises inside your throat.

"Please."

“Save me”

The voices come in a chorus. They swarm him in a cacophony of sobbing pleas and angry accusations. He squeezes his eyes tight, trying to hide from the black void but the only thing that greets him is more darkness. There is no escape from this.

A thick tar rises from the ground and covers him in it, sealing off his mouth and nose. It fills his lungs with a cold viscous liquid until he can no longer breathe.

This is going to drown him, collapse his lungs with the weight of it, and there’s a part of him, if he’s being honest to himself, that wants it to. At least that would make it stop.

This grief in his chest that refuses to leave him. The sound of your heartbeat that fills his every waking moment. It would all finally stop... right?

The darkness swallows him whole. But it doesn't end. It never does.

The weight eases from his chest. Instead of an end, he re-emerges through the heavy muck and grime and slimy darkness, and there is nothing.

Everything is white. A blank empty void of space where nothing else exists.

You’re gone. Every single one of you. And that is so much worse.

Panic rises in him and he calls your name. There is no response, only the echo of his own feeble voice.

He calls and he calls until his throat is sore and raw, but there’s nothing here. Slumping down, he shuts his eyes, trying to forget how he has somehow managed to fail you all over again.

Then he hears your voice calling him. Soft and singular from all the rest.

"Miggy."

He opens his eyes again, and all he sees are your familiar eyes. Warm and loving and the only comfort he’s ever known.

“Nena?” he whispers.

He reaches up until you’re within his safe reach. He holds you, wrapping his arms around you and pressing you closely to every inch of him, trying to make sure you’re real.

You’re warm in his arms. Soft and precious. He presses his face into the soft crook of your neck, and you smell like the ridiculously expensive shampoo you get from that hipster store in Tribeca and it makes the homesickness he’s buried deep inside of him all this time crawl up through his chest to the surface.

He will always know you. This you. The you imprinted in his memory for the rest of time. The you that he wakes up every morning missing. The you he misses so much it hurts him to breathe when he thinks of you.

It’s you. It’s you, it’s you, it’s you, it’s you.

“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry Nena, I’m so–”

“It’s okay,” you tell him, your arm curls around his neck as you pull him down closer to you. “Stay with me here.”

He nods into your neck where he’s buried. Because why would he ever want to be somewhere you’re not?

“I’m sorry. I was supposed to protect you. I was supposed to –”

You shush him before he can finish the rest of his sentence. “That doesn’t matter, you don’t have to do that anymore.”

Your fingers thread through his hair, and it tingles pleasantly as you press a soft kiss above his ear. “Just stay with me here. Forget about her.”

Forget?

He freezes in your arms, trying to process your words.

He can’t do that.

Miguel made a promise to you, the other you. The you that is fighting your hardest to survive and live back in New York. The absolutely mad and crazy you that jumped off the Chrysler building and fell from the sky just to lure him out. The you who makes weird sour faces while staring at excel spreadsheets all day long. The you that makes him feel something again. Who makes it feel like everything is going to be okay after all, every time you smile.

He can’t just abandon you.

“No, I can’t. I–I can’t stay here. I still need to protect her,” he murmurs into your skin.

“Stop, Miguel.” The arms around his neck squeezes down around him harder, and to his surprise he can’t get free.

This isn’t right. He tries to move away, gently prying himself off. He needs to save you. Has to help you. Needs to–

“Nena, please, I need to–”

One hard hand cups his jaw, tilting his head until he meets pitched dark eyes he doesn't recognize that are nothing like yours. “You can’t save me, Miggy. You never could. Don’t you understand? It’s your fault I keep dying.”

The voice is cold and unforgiving, and the grip tightens on him until it’s painful.

“You’re just gonna make it worse.”

Sharp nails digs into his forearm until it ruptures the skin. “How many more of me do you have to kill before you stop?”

“I didn’t, I–”

He didn't... right? Is it his fault? Is it–

"Miguel!"

He hears his name. It’s muffled and far away. Like someone is calling him from the outside.

Distracted, he looks up into the void, easing his grip. The warmth and weight pressed against him fades. He looks down to see the outline of a torso and arms crumbling in his arms. The features of your face fading before him into nothingness against the infinite blank white.

No, no. no. Tears and panic wells up in his throat and pushes against the corner of his eyes.

Why does this keep happening? He shouldn’t have let go. Shouldn’t have–

“Miguel, wake up.” It’s soft and familiar and he hears it again. There’s no anger in the voice this time. No pain.

The whiteness fades away back into darkness. It’s warm here, wherever it is.

Blinking slowly, he opens his eyes. The first thing he sees is your face. The warmth of your eyes, the soft curve of your lips.

"You looked like you were having a nightmare again," you say.

You are here right in front of him, real and solid and alive.

He shoots upright in bed, arms reaching out before he can stop himself from grabbing you as he drags you into his arms, clutching you hard to him.

"Miguel–" you yelp.

Too hard, and he knows it, he can hear the small squeak of surprise as your breath is squeezed right out of you.

He’s such an idiot.

He should let you go. At this rate he's going to crush you. He’s a big clumsy oaf that doesn’t know how to handle you carefully, but he can't make himself let go. Can't risk that you'll start to crumble into dust the moment he eases up, or that the universe won't find some way to rip you from him again.

“Are you okay?” you ask breathlessly.

Bile of anxiety pushes against the sides of his throat, but he swallows it down. Forces himself to relax his grip on you and let you out of his arms.

“Yeah,” he answers, but it doesn’t sound anything like his own voice. When has his voice ever sounded that weak? When has it ever trembled like this? Why are his hands shaking?

You observe him with worry, then you reach up, resting one hand on the crown of his head, patting gently. Warmth spreads down to his chest and lingers.

It feels good... nice.

All he wants is to lean in and linger in it.

Instead his mind refuses to let go. A thousands thoughts pushes its way to the front.

How did this happen? Did he fall asleep? He was supposed to watch over you while you slept. How did he end up being the one falling asleep?

"I won't let anything happen to you,” you say. Your hand slide down to cup his cheek, searching for his eyes.

“Anyone messes with you, you let me know. I'll beat them up for you.”

He blinks down at you dumbfounded. The absurd image of you, with balled up fist trying to fight a supervillain flashes before his eyes. Then he bursts into laughter. It's so sudden he surprises even himself and the tremor in his hand stops somehow.

You pull your lips into a soft and playful smile.

“What? You don’t think I can?” you lean in closer to his face, as you continue. “Yeah, maybe you’re right, but I know this spider-guy, he'll beat them up for you. He's really grouchy and mean and he bites.”

The smile on your face is so bright it’s radiant even in this dimly lit room. You’re beaming from it and his heart starts to swell, chest feeling full and warm at the sight of you.

He wishes he could hold onto this moment and make it last forever. You look like a polaroid picture the way you’re bent over in front of him, framed by the window behind you and the pink glow of light around you like a halo.

Pink sky.

His smile freezes. He turns his head to look back at the eerie sky behind you. The fractured cityscape of cracked purple and pink, with its warped gravity and jagged skyscrapers that signals the end of the world. The universe is calling time up and it’s going to try to take you with it.

It wasn’t just a dream.

Shit! He’s not gonna let this happen to you. He can’t lose this. He’s not going to fail you. Not again. Never again.

The smile on your face falters. “Where did you go?” you ask and your eyes track his, trying to re-establish contact. “Did I lose you again?”

He shakes his head, putting on a smile to reassure you.

“I’m fine. Just groggy. Slept too long.” His eyes flicker away from the window, and glances at the clock: 7 A.M. the two of you better get going.

There is no more time to lose. He was never supposed to fall asleep in the first place. He’d only wanted for you to get some sleep last night after the broken sky appeared to calm your nerves. The plan was for you to rest for an hour, max two, while he watched over you, before the two of you would check out of this hotel and be gone for good. He hadn’t counted on his streak of sleepless nights finally catching up to him.

“Go pack, Cielito. We better get going soon.”

You hop onto your feet, shoving the handful of your surviving clothes into your backpack in minutes.

His eyes roam over the hotel suite. As pompous and luxuriously decorated as it is, it’s altogether temporary. It’s just a showroom, nothing in here is lived in. It’s nothing like your tiny cramped little apartment in the Heights that is now just a pile of rubble.

He misses your apartment.

The place you call your home, and in another time and another place, it is near identical to the one he used to come home to every night.

The one with janky second hand furniture you picked up from Craigslist adverts. With a table that has uneven legs that you have to prop up with books so things don’t slide off its tilted surface. Or the surprisingly nice sofa you found on the side of the street one summer which led to the infamous bedbugs wars you so dramatically retell.

In front of him, he sees you stop and scan the room and Miguel knows damned well it’s because you’re considering pilfering any free stuff you can fit inside that tiny bag. A smile tugs at the corner of his lips as he sees you duck into the bathroom.

Then he can hear the clang and clutter of you shoveling everything that isn’t attached to the wall into the backpack.

Miguel doesn’t have anything to pack. There’s no point, he’s been doing this for years now by himself without hoarding belongings. If he needs clothes or personal hygiene products, Lyla always takes care of it for him. Easier than lugging things around with him from dimension to dimension.

The only thing he’s ever kept is his wedding ring that hangs around his neck.

He eyes the small crumpled up ball of paper, that is your poor attempt at practicing origami, perched on the bedside table.

God, the thing looks messed up and ugly.

Reaching out to pick it up in his palms, he stares at it for a long suspended moment, at its warped folded lines and squashed head. Doesn’t understand how you manage to still be so bad at this even with all the time you spend at it. Origami isn’t hard.

He smiles as he continues to stare at it, before pocketing the sad looking Frankenstein-frog.

It’ll be okay to keep one more thing won’t it? A piece of paper doesn’t weigh much.

From beyond the windows, the sky has cracked open, with a menacing glowing splinter positioned right above the hotel. It’s like a billboard sign, pointing right at your location. It feels purposeful.

“You ready?” you ask, as you pop out of the bathroom with an expectant look on your face. “We better hurry up. We don’t want to stick around when the Avengers come by.”

You say it lightheartedly as a joke, but he can see the unease in your smile, the way your eyes flicker towards the window with traces of fear.

His hands curl into fists at his side against the sheets, and whatever smile was on his face slips away at the sight of you like this.

His fangs itch. Screw the Avengers. They are not going to come close to you. He won’t let them.

"Cielo, it's okay. You have nothing to worry about. If they become a threat to you, I'll take care of them," Miguel says.

You scoff with a small laugh, as you try to zip up the overfull backpack, but the fancy complimentary soaps keep spilling from the top.

"What do you mean "take care" of them? What are you Michael Corleone, what're you going to–" You stop mid sentence.

The playful smile drops from your face. Your hands come to a halt above the flap of your bag, and Miguel watches the realization sink into your eyes.

“No. Don’t be silly,” you say empathetically, shaking your head. “You can’t fight the Avengers.”

“I’ll eliminate them if I have to.”

You drop your bag to the floor, where it lands with a thud and you stare at him in disbelief.

"No. No you're not. We're not killing any Avengers. Jesus! That’s some textbook supervillain shit, Miguel. They’re earth’s mightiest heroes!”

Your fingers wrap around your wrist, fiddling with the smooth surface of the device, as you turn back around and look out over the sky.

"I don’t understand. Why aren’t we just using the watch? You said you were done fixing it. Why do we need to be on the run? I thought that so long as I leave this dimension that will solve everything right?"

A flash of endless white invades his mind. The blank infinite void and your face crumbling underneath his fingers.

Fear grips his spine, and he feels sick at the thought. Has to grind down on his jaw to swallow the bile pressing up against his throat.

"No," he grits out.

"Miguel, what do you mean ‘no’?"

He shakes his head, and his lips itch with irritation, “We can’t use it, Not until we know it’s safe. It’s still untested.”

“Well, yeah? But the only way to test if it works, is to actually use it.”

“Not on you,” he grits out.

“Okay,” you sigh, clearly frustrated with him. “What do you suggest then?”

“We need to test it on someone.”

You tilt your head, brows drawn together in deep thought. “What, like… animal testing? Are we going to find a rabbit or something?”

“No, not a rabbit. Their physiological and genetic make-up is too different. Even if they make it through, it doesn’t give us an indication it’s safe for you. We’d need to test it on someone human.”

Your eyes widen at his answer, and he can see the moment it clicks for you. You take a step back away from him, seemingly without conscious thought, as if some remnant survival instinct is telling you to keep your distance.

“We can’t just grab an innocent person off the street.”

Miguel snaps, veins flashing with heat as his hands curl into fists at his sides, and a blinding white crowds his vision. “You wanna go back to the void!? Is that what you want?”

“No, but what if it doesn’t work? What if they get hurt? Or worse, what if they die and disappear?”

Something cold drips through his chest and he feels strangely numb and devoid of empathy for the thought of those other people.

“Better them than you,” he says.

Your mouth drops with an expression of disbelief as you run up to him.

“No, that’s not right, and you know it! Let’s just use the watch Miguel, we’re running out of time.”

There is a faint phantom sound of a beating pulse burrowed in his brain that won’t stop. He tries to bite down against his teeth to make it stop but it does nothing to mute it.

Fuck, fuck. His head hurts, streaks of white pain lashing against his temple. “We’re not taking any risks,” he grits out.

Something touches his cheek, and the suddenness of it makes him flinch until he realizes it’s you.

You and your soft hand splayed across his face as you tilt him down to meet your gaze.

“The world is literally ending outside because of me. People are going to die if I don’t do this. It’s not up for debate.”

He doesn’t understand.

Why don't you see that none of that is important. That's not where your focus should be. After everything that’s happened. After everything you’ve been through, you need to be prioritizing yourself. It’s the only way you’ll make it out of this alive. Why can’t you see that?

“People are always going to die,” he tells you. “I can’t save them all. But I can save you. You’re the only one I care about.”

Your hand slips from his face and he walks across the room, picking up your discarded backpack from the floor and stretches out his hand towards you.

“Come on, let’s get going,” he says.

You don’t take his hand. Your eyes are glued to the floor, and he can’t read your expression. The jarring beating noise in his head is getting louder now. It aches and threatens to split his skull apart with it.

“I’m not going to leave,” you say, without moving.

A bitter sound crawls out of his throat and it tastes like mud. “I thought you said you wanted to live. You asked me to protect you, remember?”

“I know, but not like this. Not at the expense of other people’s lives.”

God this is ridiculous.

“Let them die! This world would turn on you in a second!” he snaps.

It already did once, and he doesn’t know why you would care about the lives of people who never did the same for you.

You bite down on your lower lip as if gathering courage before you meet his eyes again.

“Thank you for everything you’ve done for me so far,” you say.

Miguel can feel his own brows draw tight in confusion. You sound so formal and unlike you, like he’s a stranger to you. You’ve never spoken to him like that, even back when he first met you and you didn’t even know him.

“What are you talking about?” he sneers. Some part of him doesn’t want to understand what he’s hearing even as you’re saying the words.

You smile, sad and disingenuous and it breaks his heart all over again, cause he’s seen this smile on you before and it nearly killed him.

“You only promised me three months until the universe collapsed. It’s happening now, so our time is up.”

His heart sinks at your words. So this is how it ends up again huh? You’re not going to let him save you.

He can’t even imagine it. Or rather, he can. Can imagine all too well the myriad of ways you could die. All the ways that he could fail to save you again. Knows he wouldn’t survive holding your broken body in his arms a second time.

“Cielito,” he says quietly, tipping your face up to his with his fingers on your jaw. “Please.”

The unease in your eyes is still there and he has to look away. Drop his own eyes, and just stand there feeling like his chest is caving in and taking the universe with it because…. because….

“I can’t… do this.” The words come out in a hoarse whisper. “I can’t lose you again”.

“Then let’s use the watch. Now. No test bunnies,” you try again, eyes sparking with something like a glimpse of hope.

Your fingers curl into his shirt, and he knows you’re doing your best to convince him. Because up until now, everytime you’ve asked him something he’s always said yes.

He's never known how to say no to you.

“You might die.”

You give him a strained smile, as you look up at him and his chest aches at the sight of how sad and scared this one is compared to every other one you’ve thrown his way up until now.

“That’s a risk we’ll just have to take,” you say.

Images of you flash before his eyes, crowding his vision. Of your body, broken and mangled and wrong. Your lip split open and blood trickling down your nose. Of your broken bones and missing eye.

No.

Not this time.

Sadness gives into anger. It burns and simmers in his veins until it roars with an unquenchable flame.

“I’m not gonna let that happen.”

He steps forward towards you and at his advance, you retreat, walking backwards until your back hits the wall. You jolt in surprise at the contact, too focused on him that you’re not paying attention to your surroundings.

You have no survival instincts. You wouldn’t survive two minutes out there alone without him.

“Wait! Wait. Miguel, what are you–”

Your arms raise in self defense to fend him off before he so much as touches you. But it’s no use. It doesn’t matter that you’re using everything in you to try to push him away. Doesn’t matter that you’re summoning every ounce of force against him. It doesn’t make any difference.

He barely exerts any effort, circling one hand around both your wrists, and locks them there against the wall to hold you in place.

If you refuse to let him protect you, he’ll have no other choice but to make you. He parts his mouth, holding you firm against him as he bares your throat to him.

One bite. That’s all it’d take. He could keep you safe while he does what’s necessary, you wouldn’t even know what happened by the time you fully wake. It’d be so simple.

Would be.

But there's a familiar sound that invades his ears. The rhythm of your heart pounding painfully hard and fast. The very same sound that haunts him when he's awake and into his sleep.

He looks down at you, your eyes are wide, brimming with tears. There’s fear there.

You’re scared... of him.

His stomach sinks. This wasn’t supposed to be the way it goes.

He just wanted you safe. Happy. Alive. Why won’t the universe let him keep you alive.

“Miguel, please.” Your voice is small, trembling on the words as you barely get them out. “Don’t do this.”

He stops.

Releasing his hold on you, he lets your hand slide back down against the wall.

Fuck, what was he thinking? What was he doing?

“I’m sorry,” he murmurs. “I–”

He stands in front of you, unsure of what to do or what to say as he gazes down on your frightened expression.

There’s a tremor in your shoulder and the wet sheen of tears threatening to spill from your eyes. All he wants is to draw you into his arms, to hold and comfort you to make it better. But how can he do that when he’s the cause of it.

He keeps his distance, staring down at you. He doesn't know what to do.

"Miguel–" you start.

Before he hears the rest of your sentence, there’s a strange sound that Miguel picks up from a distance breaking his attention.

A low hum of an engine, that makes his entire back tense. It’s the sound of something flying through the air. Not large enough to be another helicopter. But whatever it is, it’s moving at the speed of a fighter jet and approaching your hotel.

Everything in him roars to attention as he tears his eyes towards the window.

There is a small silhouette that grows larger as it approaches in the distance against the broken skyline.

Then it's here.

A plated armor of shiny gold and metallic red that hovers in the middle of the sky against your city view of 62 floors up.

A man covered in alloyed iron from head to toe.

Guess that’s why he calls himself Iron Man. Not very imaginative is he.

Miguel can feel you tense up next to him. Before you have a chance to get any funny ideas (like give yourself up) he puts a hand on your shoulder, cautiously nudging you back to stand behind him. He steps forward until his body blocks you entirely from view.

In front of him, Stark enters through the open balcony door moving forward until he’s standing some 10 feet away from you. It is entirely too close for Miguel’s liking.

There’s a crackle in the air as a distorted voice sounds through the speakers of the armor. “Step away from the lady, Big Blue,” the quippy voice that is unmistakably Stark’s says.

Miguel throws a glance at the Iron Man, the way he’s tracking dirt and scraping his clanky metal feet across your hotel room floors.

“I’ve been told by an old friend that these strange occurrences and the looming end of the world are related to our lovely Disney princess over here. So we’re gonna have to take her in.”

“Miguel,” you start from behind him, nudging at his wrist. “It’s okay, I should–”

He cuts you off. “And what are you planning on doing to her if I did?”

Even behind an expressionless steel mask, Stark averts his gaze. A reflexive gesture of guilt.

Yeah, that’s what Miguel thought.

At least the man has the decency to feel ashamed.

Adrenaline buzzes through Miguel’s veins, and he feels the heady rush of it as he unsheaths his claws, primed for a fight. “You’re not laying a fucking finger on her.”

“Wait,” you shout trying to push your way past him, but Miguel blocks and drags you back behind him.

“Don’t hurt him,” you shout above his shoulder.

Christ!Miguel can’t believe you’re still trying to argue Stark’s case when the man admitted he's planning on executing you.

“We’ve built a device that lets us leave this dimension. Things will go back to normal when I’m gone,” you continue trying desperately to negotiate with the bastard.

Stark shakes his head. He takes another step closer, and Miguel feels fire and brimstone crackle in his chest.

“I’m afraid we’re out of time” Stark says, taking yet another step. “We can’t take the risk. We have no reassurance the universe will just reset when you leave.”

You finally stop struggling against Miguel at those words.

“Sorry, Sparkles. No hard feelings. But it’s you versus the fate of the entire universe. I hope you understand.”

Miguel wants to laugh. He's heard that sentiment before.

There is a hellish whirring sound of an engine gearing up in warning, Stark raises his hand as the reactor in the metal armor goes glaringly bright. Aimed in your direction.

Miguel leaps, grabbing you by the waist with one arm and curling his other behind your head for protection. The first blast hits the wall not two inches from where your face would have been.

He pivots midair, crashing into the nearest wall of glass, making sure his shoulder connects with the window for impact to make your escape. Glass shatters around you both as he leaps from the 62nd floor.

The cold evening air lashes punishingly against his face at the descent. Your arms tighten around his neck, and the two of you fall through the sky, in the way you two have twice before.

Miguel cuts through air and gravity, soaring downwards.

He has to get you out of here. Has to throw them off and lose them.

Something sharp whizzes through his side, with a whiny little noise.

Arrows, he realizes. His fangs practically itch with annoyance.

What kind of idiot brings arrows to a superhero fight?

He tears through the air, intending to dodge them, but an invisible force wraps around his limbs with a punishing force.

The only thing he can see is a thin red fog infiltrating the nearby air surrounding him. Some kind of weird, dark magic. Miguel doesn’t linger on the thought for long.

There’s more of them, the stupid arrows. One after another, all aimed with uncanny precision despite the increasing velocity the two of you are falling with.

Miguel should be able to easily dodge them, but with his restrained mobility he can’t guarantee it wouldn’t leave you exposed. At this angle and trajectory, they’d pierce right through your femur.

Shit! He can't risk it.

Twisting in the air, it’s all Miguel can do to press you closer and cover every exposed inch of you that he can. One arrow pierces right through his ankle, another his side between his sixth and seventh ribs.

Fuck!

Kicking out his feet, against the cladding of the building, he tries to break his fall as best as he can as he sinks his claws into the concrete for leverage to climb upwards.

But he misjudges the angle. Miscalculates the weight. Gets everything wrong.

Sharp pain streaks through his leg as he tries to gain traction one last time, gripping with the claws of his feet. It doesn’t work. He falls.

All he can do is brace your fall with his body so you don’t get hurt.

He lands with a nauseating thud against the hard roof below. Back first, absorbing all the impact, and the white blinding pain spears through the length of his entire spine.

Fuck, everything hurts.

He tries to get up, but his shoulder is fucked. The muscles burn, and he can’t seem to move properly, must’ve dislocated it on his way down.

“Miguel, are you–”

“I'm fine,” he interrupts, biting down hard to stem the agonized groan that wants to erupt. “It's fine. We’re okay.”

He takes hold of the sloping roof tiles beneath his claws, the building seems tilted at an impossible angle. It must be the after effects of this dimension warping.

Gripping tight, he uses it to leverage himself upright, ignoring the painful sensation shooting through the nerves of his back.

He hooks his claws into the crevice of the cement and begins to climb. It's excruciating, but he manages it, laboriously dragging the both of you up the short length of wall to settle you on a ledge, where you at least have the questionable safety of steady ground beneath your feet.

Fuck, you’re shaking, obviously terrified. He pulls you to him until he can cradle you in his arms and between his legs, and wrap himself around you, hoping to comfort you.

This is so stupid. He should’ve just listened to you from the start. Should have had Lyla transport you out of here.

Shouldn’t have let it go this far. He just couldn’t do it. Wasn’t willing to take the risk. Couldn’t live with himself if his miscalculation would be what took your life.

He didn’t want to risk it.

But he’s running out of options.

Because he needs you to live. This version of you. This you who drives him mad and makes him smile and makes him want to live again. Singular and unique, and he’s going to love you until his dying breath. Just as surely as he loves the other you.

“Lyla,” he calls out and from your wrist, the familiar amber glow springs up and Lyla appears. “Calculate the location for a dimension jump.”

“What destination?” she asks, simple and straight to the point. For once there’s no sass. Even Lyla must understand the severity of their situation. That more than everything else that preceded this moment makes Miguel worry about just how fucked the two of you are.

He takes a second to think about it. Where could he safely bring you? Somewhere you could be safe without a doubt. A dimension without Avengers or interlopers or mad crazy shit like this that would put you at risk. A place that he knows like the back of his hand.

“Earth 928-C,” Miguel orders.

He watches you, tucked to his side, eyes wide and afraid and guilt grips at his lungs. How has he managed to fuck it up this badly.

“I’m sorry,” he murmurs, gripping firmer around your shoulders. “You were right. I’m sorry. We should’ve just done it your way from the start.”

“Mig.” Your eyes soften, the worry and alarm melting from your eyes.

It doesn’t last for very long. The scent of sulfur singes the evening air. Then there's a bright flash of red lightning against the sky.

Miguel only gets a split second to catch it in the corner of his eyes, then it’s already flying towards you.

He leaps in front of you, pushing you back and out of the way.

Whatever it is, hits him with the force of a tank, catapulting him into the air. He doesn’t have time to react but his latent survival instinct reacts for him, webbing shoots out of his wrist by reflex, sticking to a nearby wall. It’s the only thing that holds him suspended in the air so he doesn’t drop some several hundred feet below.

There’s a high pitched whistle echoing between his ear drums. He feels discombobulated. Like he doesn’t know left from right and when Miguel pulls himself upright, everything spins. He is sure that he is going to be sick and vomit.

Reaching down to his stomach, it’s strangely wet. Must be the fucking rain, which is… odd, because the material of the suit is supposed to be hydrophobic.

He brings up his fingers into view, and instead of the shin gray of water, his hand is soaked in red.

Well fuck.

There’s gashes in his suit. Deep cuts that’s broken through the skin. He’s bleeding. Heavily.

Shit, he doesn’t have time for this.

Where are you?

He grits his teeth, ignoring the sharp and searing pain as he grabs hold of the cold metal of a nearby banister and pulls himself back up to the rooftop. A groan escapes him before he can swallow it back down.

It’s fine. It hurts. But it’ll heal.

It doesn’t matter. He scans his surroundings, searching for you. What matters is you.

On the far side of the next building, he spots your colorful bright shirt. You’re sitting upright, which means you’re still conscious.

Still alive. Thank god.

Relief floods him until he spots the looming shape of shiny metal above you. Stark.

Your mouth is moving as you look up at the man and even with his super hearing Miguel can barely make out the words you’re saying above the chaotic noises surrounding him.

“Promise me you won’t hurt him, please.”

A cold sliver runs up his spine when he hears you. The realization lances through him painfully. You weren’t arguing for Stark’s case before.

Why is he always such an idiot?

Stark extends one hand towards you, raising the repulsor gauntlet. The blazing reactor in his palm blinds Miguel’s retinas with a sharp pain.

“I won’t,” Stark promises.

No. nononono.

Miguel leaps before he can think. There is no thought or tactics. His brain is wiped blank, driven by pure impulse and instincts: to protect you. Keep you safe. Keep you alive.

He tears through the air, feet stomping down on the hard iron torso and Miguel grabs the hard metallic throat under his hand, putting his entire body-weight into it as he slams down until there’s a satisfying crunch beneath. Can feel the hard alloy skull hit the concrete with a heavy and unforgiving thud.

A blast goes off, and there’s sharp and bright searing pain that burns along his entire side, but he ignores it.

He slams down again, blindly and without aim. Until the force pushing back against him from underneath stops and goes slack.

The light on the eye sockets flicker. Then the robot suit slumps and powers down in his grip. Miguel lets go, letting the heavy suit fall to the ground, before pulling away.

His feet wobble on the ground beneath as he takes a step back. His line of vision askew and tilted. He can feel his consciousness slipping, and he has to shake his head hard, to snap himself out of it.

He needs to find you and get you out of here.

Everything spins. The skyline seems to swim in swirly lines, and he can’t tell if it’s his consciousness failing him or the reality around him is warping.

From a distance he sees your small silhouette, running up towards him, and all he feels is relief spreading through his chest.

“Miguel,” You reach for him, pulling off your cardigan and shoving the fabric of it onto him, pressing it up against his stomach to slow down the bleeding.

“It’s fine. Leave it.”

“No, it’s not fine! Nothing is fine! You’re hurt, bleeding and–” your voice is trembling, and he can hear the tears pushing up against the surface as your shaking hands fumble in your attempt to try to keep the pressure on him to stem the bleeding.

You’re in tears over worry for him.

You care too much. Always did, and he doesn’t deserve it.

To his left the arc reactor engine whirrs as it reboots and starts back up.

Stark is conscious again.

From a distance, Miguel can hear the faint sound of more jet engines whizzing through the air.

From the corner of his eyes, he can see the silhouette of a woman rising in the sky, bathed in a menacing crimson halo of an aura.

Bastard is calling for backup. The two of you have only a handful of seconds left at best.

You're surrounded.

There isn’t enough time. Lyla is probably not even done with the calculations. There may still be errors. God knows where the two of you will end up this time.

But it’s now or never.

“Cielito.”

At the nickname your eyes dart up to his. The fear in your eyes calms when you hear his voice, and he can’t help the faint smile tugging on his lips despite the situation the two of you are in.

Even though he hasn’t earned it after everything he’s put you through tonight, there’s still trust left in there for him. It is more than he would have dared to wish for.

Miguel cups your cheeks, cradling it in his hands. They're damp, stained with tears that he wipes away with his thumb.

He wished he had some perfect words that could make them stop. Wished he could have done something that prevented them from happening in the first place.

"I'm not going to let you die." He leans down until his forehead rests on yours.

"I love you," he says, and he just wished he'd said it to you sooner. Wished he'd gotten to say it more than once.

There's a lot that Miguel wishes he could have done differently.

“Lyla.” His hand finds your wrist and the familiar cool metal of the device. Then he presses the button and all he can do is hope for the best.

“Get us out,” he commands.

A burst of light erupts all around him. Bright and blinding.

Please let it work this time.

You wake to darkness. Everything is washed in a hue of moody blue.

There’s no one here besides you. Miguel isn’t here.

Your gaze darts to your left and to your right, but you can’t make out anything.

You can’t find him anywhere. Didn’t you two go through the portal together? Why isn’t he here?

Panic climbs up your chest and claws into your lungs, you feel like your chest is collapsing in on itself and you can’t breathe. Did something happen to Miguel?

Miguel was hurt. He was bleeding a lot. It comes to you in scattered fragments. The sharp smell of iron filling your nostrils. Slick viscous liquid, sticky on your fingers. The sound of his choked and bitten off pain as he tried to protect you.

You can’t do this. Can’t sit here and wallow in your fear when there is so little time. You bite down on your tongue, stifling the pathetic sob that wants to climb out of your throat. You make yourself swallow it back down as you force yourself to stand up on wobbly legs, and observe your surroundings.

There’s nothing here. Just this dim muted darkness. Just more empty space. There’s no wind here. You’re not exposed to the environment, which means you’re definitely inside a building somewhere. Craning your head upwards, the ceiling stretches high over 20 feet at least and you can barely see where the walls begin or end.

Where the hell are you?

Bringing your wrist up, you press the power button of the watch. “Lyla?”

Nothing.

Oh fuck, you’re all by yourself.

You mash the button with your thumb, pressing a little bit too hard, as you call for her again.

There’s a pinging sound, as the holographic image floats above your wrist.

“Sorry, sorry! That was a rough ride,” she says as she straightens her heart shaped glasses that are crooked on her nose.

Immediate relief fills you at her familiar face. “Lyla, where are we?”

She makes a face. “I’m not entirely sure. I didn’t have time to finish my calculations before Miggy had me pull you through.”

“Where’s Miguel,” you ask, and your voice is sharp and shrill even to your own ears.

Lyla peers up at you, eyes filled with something that looks like concern. “Your heart rate is very elevated. You might be in shock. Do you want me to show you edited photos of Miguel in a bunny suit to make you feel better?”

From a distance you can see a door left slanted. There’s a flicker of blue and amber light from beyond it, and you start to walk towards it.

“Is that a door?”

“Uhm, boss-girl I don’t think that’s a good idea. We don’t know where we are.”

Despite Lyla’s warnings, you keep going, because whatever danger waits behind that door, it’s still better than the alternative of sitting like a lame duck, wasting precious time when Miguel is hurt and in need of help.

You reach the door and peer into the next room. There are holographic screens in the middle of the space raised on a podium.

In the center of it you see him. His familiar broad back hunched over the screens. Dark-blue fabric that stretches wide over his shoulders. You’d recognize him anywhere.

Miguel.

He’s here. He’s okay.

You run up towards him, nearly skidding on your unsteady feet as you begin to full on sprint. “Miguel!”

At your voice, the whole of his back stiffens and straightens up until he slowly turns towards you.

You run up the podium and you feel like you can finally breathe again as you reach him, flinging your arms around his neck as soon as he is within reach. You want to cry with the overwhelming relief that fills up the whole of your chest as his arms come up and wrap around you like a protective cocoon.

“I woke up and you weren’t here, and I thought, I thought…” you’re rambling, words clogged up with the tears you had held back before. Now though, in his arms, the floodgates have opened and there's no stopping them.

“I’m here,” he says.

One hand soothingly strokes the small of your back while his other gently stroke your face, fingers sliding down your throat and shoulder, assessing you.

“You’re bleeding,” he says.

His voice turns cold, gritted out with anger between his teeth that makes your spine breaks out in shivers. “Who did this to you?”

You raise your head from his embrace, looking up at him in confusion.

No, you’re not the one bleeding, the blood is his. What does he mean who did this to you?

“What do you mean?” you sniffle. “I’m not– The Avengers they– It’s your bloo–” your words come out stuttering and scrambled. You can barely think. Your heart is beating so hard you think it’s going to burst out of your chest.

Lyla said this didn’t she? You’re in shock.

His eyes soften at your distress, and he gently shushes you as he strokes your cheeks, guiding you back to his chest. His hand rests on the top of your head as he keeps you there pressed up against him, locked in the protective space of his embrace.

“It’s okay, it’s okay,” he says quietly into your ear. His voice is so soft and gentle, in complete contrast to the iron grip of his arms locked around your chest and back.

It feels different.

You stiffen in his arms, and his hold on you tightens. Your blood freezes in your veins. Something is wrong.

“It’s okay, I’m not gonna let anything hurt you, Nena.”

Huh?

No, you’re not–

Miguel doesn’t call you that.

He buries his face into your collarbone, mouth pressing to your skin.

You try to resist, try to anchor your hand that’s trapped between your bodies to wedge and push him away, but he only holds you to him firmer.

“You’re safe,” he murmurs into your neck, and you can feel his warm breath gust over the goosebumped skin. The hint of his sharp fangs scraping across your flesh.

Wait, wait–

“You’re not Mig–”

The rest of it is lost in a pained gasp. His teeth sink into your neck. Bright sharp whiteness blinds your vision and excruciating pain sears through your nervous system. Every ounce of strength in you goes with it, your muscles turn slack as you lose control over your own body.

Everything goes dark again.

~ Next Issue

Dedication & Credits: To my most beloved and bestest of clown @thirstworldproblemss. I love you dearly and I am running out of ways to tell you just how much. You're so special to me and I'm so grateful to have you as a friend and collaborator and muse and everything in between.

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#miguel o'hara x reader #miguel o'hara x you #miguel o'hara fic #miguel o'hara fanfic #miguel o'hara #miguel o'hara fanfiction

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friesforfriday · 2 years ago

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Hi dear, I really want to thank you for reading and reposting ❤️ This was very personal for me and it brings me a lot of joy to know someone else has seen themselves as the reader. Especially with this, I know it can feel isolating, but it warms my heart to know you enjoyed it!