#How To Grow Wine Grapes

[faaun]

.

[sbcdh]

I believe the English phrase is “odd duck.” Yes. Jan Kargad was an Odd Duck. He was born in 1922, right after Georgia joined the Soviet Union, in a commune outside of Batumi. But this was not a normal commune no. His parents were strange people. A small group of Dutch fuckers, very protestant people, started a winery in the countryside where they could read their bibles. You would think they did not get along with the Marxists, but you would be wrong. They loved work. The bible loved work. There was no problem.

Well, that is not entirely true. Jan was a bit of a problem. He was born with a “weak constitution.” We do not know what that meant exactly, but farmwork would give him seizures and very high fevers. He was not a good child for farm work. So, they taught him arithmetic. Young Jan was in charge of counting grapes and bottles of wine and so on. Maybe the Apparatchik did not mind a child doing all the counting, maybe he was bribed, maybe he did not give a shit. I do not know. But Jan was in charge of all the counting and, what is the fucking word- logistics. Yes. Logistics. And he was very good at logistics. 

There are theories as to his upbringing yes. Studying the bible alongside Marx and Lenin and so on. But I do not believe this. In Chechnya in those days many studied the bible and Marx like Jan Kargad, but we did not become like Jan Kargad. I think perhaps it was the fevers. One sees things with a fever when it is bad enough, yes. 

Kargad also studied the capitalists. He was very good at this. He read Adam Smith, but also Issac Newton, the South Seas bubble, and most famously the Tulip Panic. They say his journals were filled with pressed tulips. He was a bit of a, what is the fucking English word- pervert. A pervert for organizing things and numbers and so on. Jan Kargad loves logistics like a man loves his wife, and tulips are a symbol of this for him. They became a microcosm for him. You see how the bud unfolds into many petals, its is very similar to how capitalism unfurls into its many aspects in the world. But, I am getting ahead of myself. 

One day, after all of his schooling, Kargad has a terrible fever, more terrible than any fever he has ever had. This is in the early 1940s some time. After this fever he becomes strange. Well, stranger than he already was. He speaks of men with golden dog masks, their necks chained to the sun, tulips growing from their eyes, all of that shit. He never goes outside again. He becomes fearful of the sun. He does not let it touch his skin. 

He writes intensely for the next three years. I have seen his original notebooks and they are stained with sweat. This man is not well, but he writes. He does not get help, because he is very good at analyzing agricultural output. I believe it grounded him some how, to spend days without sleep, reading spreadsheets about grapes and wheat and so on. 

He is no longer christian. He throws out all of the crosses in his home, and replaces them with grape-cutters. They are similar to a sickle, but with a long handle, for reaching up and cutting off high bunches of grapes. He becomes obsessed with this idea of the grape cutter, and he begins to paint. And this is where many first learn of him. He influences a group of artists who become famous in the southern soviet union, though they are occasionally derided as being “mystical.” I personally? I love the drawings. Many figures reaching up to pluck grapes from the sun. It becomes the central theme of his work.

Here people discover his strange writings. But first he is considered a strange mystic. His early writings are still very christian yes, and this influences how he is read in the west. Many think he is speaking of hyper-economics or whatever fetishistic bull shit the americans are calling it. But I do not think so. His work is very soviet. There are stories yes, of good soviet men drinking coffee and loving spreadsheets like a man loves his wife, and in this they become a little bit like Jan Kargad. They are –you do not have an English term for this– cutting grapes from the sun. But this is not a serious phrase you understand. These men are perverts.

[cyripticchronicler]

The Bet (18+)

Pairing: Azriel x Fem!Reader

Summary: Hidden away in the woods to celebrate the mating bond, you decide to raise the stakes on a supposedly innocent card game. If you win, he has to do whatever you want. Thank the Gods he lost; you want to make the powerful spymaster squirm.

TW: Smut, drinking wine, needy Az, teasing reader, edging kinda?

A/N: I forget how hard writing smut is lmao but I hope you enjoy it!! I think it's the best smut I've ever written ngl. Thank you to my friend (who doesn't want to be named but is awesome) for giving me feedback/editing this fic - I'll give you gum when I next see you, hun.

Masterlist Azriel Masterlist

Azriel looked like the Godly male he was born to be. His smirk was nothing short of dangerous. His eyes gleamed in the dim room, cheeks flushed a rosy pink from the wine that hazed his mind. 

With each sip from the open wine bottle between you two, he was losing his inhibitions, but who could blame him? He’s had the best week of his life; the mating bond had been successfully accepted with Azriel quickly whisking you away to a cabin in the woods to enjoy free, uninterrupted time for the mating frenzy. 

The tall, captivating, Illyrian had taken you everywhere in the small cabin in less than a week - including the floor you were sitting on now. After spending the day with no food in your stomach, you had to put your foot down and demand a break. 

Azriel suggested a game of cards and you never knew that a pair of hands shuffling a deck of playing cards could be so attractive. You have to fold your legs to stop yourself from pouncing on him - an action Azriel doesn’t fail to notice, considering the way his eyes darken.

“Don’t look at me like that,” you mutter, shoving a grape in your mouth, immediately relishing in the cold burst of flavour across your tongue. Azriel begins to hand you your deck, gaze not straying from your rosy lips for a moment. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” It’s rare to see him so relaxed. So happy. His wings are drooped by his sides, his hair mussed and his clothes wrinkled.

He looks so handsome, yet the sight that has your heart fluttering the most is the permanent smile resting on his lips. A tempting sight.

He’s been so happy this past week and you want nothing more than for him to stay that way. “Now you’re looking at me weirdly,” he mutters, a light blush blooming across his cheeks despite the undeniable cockiness that laced his voice. 

“I can’t help it. You’re just so handsome.” His smile turns shy. The red on his cheeks grows ferociously and he has to look away from your gleaming eyes. Despite your attempt to silence your laughter by chewing on your lips, joyous huffs break free and cause Azriel to slump against the front of the couch, hiding his face in his hands.

“You’re evil,” he states, eyes peeking out at you between the gap of his middle and ring finger. You ignore him, picking up your cards and ensuring they’re hidden from his gaze. “C’mon, grab your cards. Let’s make this round more interesting.”

He does as you say, grabbing his cards and propping his elbow on his knee, his other leg straight and stretched out over the plush carpet. “Interesting? And how would we do that?” 

A smirk tilts your lips. “Let’s say…” your finger taps against the back of your cards. “If you win, I do whatever you want. But if I win, you do whatever I want.”

“Be prepared to lose, honey,” Azriel utters smugly, flashing you a wink that has your heart pulsing. A lone shadow wraps around your arm and you gasp, holding your cards to your chest. “No cheating! Keep your shadows on your side.” 

He playfully mocks you, before placing down a card, effectively signalling the start to the game. 

You can’t help but laugh at the boyish action, butterflies fluttering in your stomach. Oh, it’s on, baby. You glare in return and place your own card down, taking a large gulp of wine before wiping your lips. Brown, eager eyes track the movement and you pointedly stare at the cards in the middle of the table. 

He places another card, causing you to pick up four from a separate pile. And so the games begin.

****

“You’re cheating,” Azriel said, his suspicion clear and demanding. Your mouth falls open dramatically at the accusation, your hand extending to give him a light, punishing smack. “I'm not!”

You’re not sure when it happened, or how, but the two of you have moved closer. Both of you are still sitting on the floor, but now Azriel sits on the side of the table instead of at the end, his wing resting behind you, comfortable and warm. His long legs are stretched out in front of him under the table with his large hand returning to your thigh each time it’s your turn. 

“How are you doing so well, then?” He demands, a light and playful scoff falling from his lips, though you can spy a hint of genuine annoyance in the glint in his eyes. 

“Maybe you’re the problem. Maybe, since you can’t use your shadows,” you pointedly eye the shadows that swirl around Azriels arms, “You’re just not that good.”

“I have never used my shadows to cheat.” You wouldn’t be surprised if he has cheated before. Despite his honest personality, he’s just as competitive. Yet, you know he hasn’t cheated tonight; his shadows have stayed at his side, never once trailing up to whisper something in his ear. 

“Oh?” You lean in closer, the smell of night-chilled air and cedar invading your senses. His eyes move from your lips and down your neck, landing on the inside of your shirt that hangs. He nods, gulping. You catch it, the way his Adam's apple bops, very telling of the effect you had on him. The notion sends a pleasant chill down your spine, and your lips curl up. “Then maybe you want to lose. Maybe you like the idea of being at my mercy. Of having to do whatever I say.”

“Maybe I do.” His breath fans your lips, so close but too far away for your liking. “I guess there’s only one way to find out.” He places a quick, barely there kiss on your cheek before placing down a card. You pull away and glare when you realise he’s now in the lead. 

“I’m going to find out, alright.”

****

“Oh Fuck.” Azriel’s groan has your skin heating, waves of satisfaction sending goosebumps down your spine. You smirk teasingly.  “Loser,” You menacingly whisper, voice a low drawl as you creep closer, faces a mere inch apart. “Now,” Your knees shuffle forward, yanked by an invisible force, “You have to do whatever I want.”

His hands move instinctively to rest on your hips. “And what is it that you want me to do?” You hum, tilting your head as your hair falls to one side, legs moving to straddle him. “Let’s say…” You pretend to contemplate, though you’d already known what you’d make him do hours ago. You take his hands and hold them in yours, thumb gently rubbing over the scars you love so much. You shake them gently. “These have to stay by your side.”

His eyebrows raised in interest and you watched his eyes darken, a subtle action only you could cause. “You mean…” He trails off, sucking in a sharp breath as your hands begin to wander over his chest, fingers fiddling with the buttons of his loose, white shirt.

His eyebrows crease, a shaky sigh falling from his plump, kissable lips as you begin to grind against his hard, solid body slowly. His hands raise to touch you before he quickly gathers his wits, squeezing them at his sides instead. Your lips ghost over his before you pull him in for a warm, sloppy kiss that shakes your body. You don’t think you’d ever get sick of kissing him - the way he pours so much love and passion into each movement of his mouth, the way his tongue swipes past your lips in such a gentle yet undeniably needy manner. 

Your hands fist in the collar of his shirt as the kiss grows deeper, pulling him closer into your body as you continue to roll your hips deliberately... Your skin feels like it was set on fire, a deep rumble of pleasure evoking in your core. Azriel’s hands raise to cup your cheeks, mind too blurred with your movements to remember your only rule. You force yourself to pull away and stop your movements. 

“What did I tell you?” You pant, breathing heavily in his ear as you whisper. His eyes squeeze shut, slowly dragging his hands away from your body as he groans. “I-” He gulps, voice coming out raspy. “Sorry?” You shake your head, heart beating wildly in your chest while you pepper kisses on his flushed skin, over his sharp jaw and down his neck before you find cause at his collarbone, sucking harsh enough to leave a mark. 

“You should be.” Your hips continue their movements, pulling away from his neck to admire his face. His cheeks are red, mouth hung open slightly as he sucks in sharp puffs of air. His tongue flit out quickly to wet his lips, eager brown eyes momentarily looking down to watch the way your hips move against his. 

His wings flutter behind him, spread wide. Your hand hesitates before you can touch them. “Can I?” His eyes show no sign of nervousness or hesitation as he nods. “I’m all yours.” All it takes is one swipe against the thin and leathery membrane before he’s throwing his head back as a loud, guttural moan breaks out of him and his hands find purchase at your waist, rubbing you against him with brutal force. 

You tut, removing yourself from his touch completely, choosing to stand in front of his sitting form instead. “I only have one rule, Azriel. Why aren’t you following it? Do you not want me to touch you?” He spreads his legs, veiny hands lazily resting on his thick thighs, hidden beneath thick sweatpants. His chest rises and falls, betraying his desperate need. You have to clench your thighs to stop the painful ache. 

His breath shudders, his body going pliant under your touch, completely defenseless to your ministrations as he shakes his head desperately. “I do. Gods, I do. You just make it so hard.” His voice trails off in an almost whine and you can’t help the pride that sinks into your skin. The most dangerous, hard-headed and serious male is sitting in front of you and practically begging for your touch. 

“Then listen to what I say, okay hun?” At his answering nod, a strand of hair falling over his eye, you reward him by pulling your thin shirt off and chucking it to the side. The cool air sends goosebumps over your supple skin, the only source of heat being Azriels greedy eyes as he watches your nipples perk to attention. 

Deciding you want to tease him more, you trail a lone finger up your stomach, over your breast and into your mouth, fire kindling in its wake. You swirl your tongue around your finger, eyes never straying from Azriel, saliva dripping down your chin and onto your chest. Slowly, you let your finger trail downwards, a trail of wet saliva being left behind as you bring the finger to your nipple, squeezing and pinching, quiet moans escaping your bitten lip. 

Azriel sits in his spot, fingers squeezing his thighs so tightly he’s surely leaving a mark. You hum. “Azzie?” His eyes snap to yours, eager and awaiting instruction. “Take your pants off for me.” He shoots out of his sitting position, taking a deep breath to calm his excitement, some of his control returning as he slowly pulls his pants down his legs, hard, veiny cock now visible, drops of precum budding at the tip. 

Your pants come off next, thrown to the side without a care. You take a step towards him, trying to not let it show how your breathing staggers at the way he looks at you. “Do you want to take my panties off?” Your voice is teasing, amused at how quickly he nods and falls to his knees in front of you. 

Slow but sure hands graze your hip, fingers hooking between your panties and slowly pulling them down your legs. He makes sure to look up at you through his lashes, mouth wet and slightly open. The sight has you almost losing your composure, a thick fog clouding your mind and you have to grip his long hair to make sure you don’t crumble to pieces in front of him. Not that he would have minded.

He moans when your grip gets tighter, a deep rumble against your skin. Gently pulling his head back, a wave of heat soaks your core. “Do you want to eat me out for a bit?” His eyes widened with hope, followed by a desperate nod. You almost let him. Almost.

He visibly deflates when you pull away, hands resting at your sides, glowing body on display for him to see. “Too bad. Stand up.” His knees shake yet he stands to his full height. “Take your shirt off.” It’s gone in seconds much to your delight, the deep ridges of his abs glistening with sweat that you want nothing more than to lick off. Your walls clenched around nothing, a desperate need swirling in your stomach that you attempted to ignore. You wanted to tease him more.

“Sit on the couch.” He does as you say, legs spread, erect cock pressed against his lower stomach. You stand between him, hands resting against his thighs while your nails press into his skin hard enough to invoke a pain you know he likes. His wings bristled at the feeling, bringing your attention back to them once again. You can’t resist placing a gentle kiss on the rough texture of his wing, sensitive enough to feel the light, barely there kiss. 

You watch as his abs flex, body yearning to reach you when you don’t sit on his lap like he hoped. Instead, you sit on the other side of the couch, one leg propped up on the couch, bent at the knee and showing off your glistening pussy. Azriel moans at the sight, eyes squeezing shut as he shakes his head harshly. “You’re evil,” He states roughly. You smile, a hand dipping to your soaked core, middle finger swirling around your pulsing hole and then circling your clit. You moan out an arrogant, “I know.”

Your back arches, body sinking into the sofa, breathless moans turning sinful when you press a finger into your tight, warm cunt. Your fingers aren’t as long or thick as Azriels but they still cause a sickeningly hot flash of pleasure to travel up your sweat-soaked spine. 

The sounds of your finger thrusting in and out of your warm heat fill the room, a sound that has Azriel’s breath laboured. His eyes couldn’t leave your flushed form if he tried. Your hips greedily thrust into your hand, eagerly wanting more but not letting Azriel give it to you. 

When a particularly loud, breathy moan falls from your parted lips he can’t help but moan back, the shadows wrapping around his body moving to his most sensitive part. The light friction from their tight movements as they swirl around his base is enough to have him whining; he was so hard and sensitive and wanted nothing more than to be touched. But he couldn’t break your rules and with one restrained tug, his shadows returned to the corners of the room. 

“Az,” You moan, a whine breaking free as a deep, pleasurable feeling awakens in your core, wounding tighter each time you hit the rough, fleshy spot inside you. “‘M gonna cum.” He’s left to just watch and stare like a pervert, debating whether or not to end this pesky game and fuck you into oblivion. He’s about to do just that but then you’re looking at him, eyes bright with satisfaction and mischief and he knows he wants to see those eyes staring down at him while you take control. 

It takes you a second to gather your wits, legs still shaking while you begin to crawl to Azriel on the other side of the couch, enjoying the way his eyes darken and his jaw clenches. You stop when you’re directly beside him, your knees touching his thighs. 

You don’t waste a second in pulling him in for a kiss, lips pushing against his swollen ones, a deep rumble sounding in his chest. You pull away, lips still grazing over his as you whisper. “You’ve been very good. You deserve a reward.” His eyes brighten like a kid in a candy shop and he gulps in excitement. 

A smile pulls at your lips in response to his eager reaction, looking away from his captivating eyes to look at his hard cock, flushed red due to not being touched. You bite your lip and bring your hand down to squeeze at his base. A quiet curse slips from his lips and you squeeze harder. 

You thumb at his tip, using his precum as lube as you slowly stroke his rock-hard dick. He’s so responsive, needy wines falling from his lips while he groans out your name. His hands now squeeze the sofa, his right hand squeezing the armrest so hard you’re sure it’s going to rip. 

Your pace is slow. Teasing. Your lips find their way to Azriels neck, sucking and biting, feeling his skin heat at your touch. You squeeze tighter. His breath quivered, hips thrusting into your hand like a man starved.  “Are you-” You clear your throat, voice rough with pleasure. “Are you going to let me fuck you?” 

His answering nod is desperate and hurried. “Fuck yes. Please fuck me. Please.” Goosebumps trail up your skin at his begging and you know you can’t refuse him. With a kiss to his sweat-soaked hair, your hand pulls away, back arching in protest while he cries out. 

“Shhh,” Your breath fans over his ear, legs moving to straddle him, hips perched above his waist. “I’m going to fuck you now, okay?” He grumbles incoherently and you huff a laugh, storing the moment in your mind so you can tease him about it later. 

And then you’re slowly sinking down, his large, thick cock spreading your walls in a painful rush of pleasure. He moans in your ear, the feeling of his breath against your neck has you lightly biting his shoulder.  With a shuddering breath, you pull away until the tip is barely inside of you before you slam your hips down, his dick far deeper than your fingers could ever reach. 

“Touch me.” He’s happy to do so, hips thrusting into yours while his lips travel to your perky nipple, tongue drawing tight circles before he pulls it into his mouth completely, sucking harshly and causing your walls to clench around him. 

Your sweaty skin sticks to him, the smell of sex filling the air. Your boobs bounce with each thrust, capturing Azriel’s attention, eyes wide and pouty like he were in a trance. “I’m not going to last long,” He mutters around a moan, hands kneading at your flesh. Your hands raise to the brown strands of his hair, yanking tightly before pulling him in for a kiss. It’s messy, teeth clashing, his nose pressed into your cheek.

“I'm not going to last either.” You feel like you’re on fire, gasping for air as your back arches, legs shaking around his thighs. “You’re so beautiful,” You hear him mutter around a quiet groan, his lips leaving warm, open mouthed kisses on any part of you he could reach. His nails are digging into your skin, his hands shaky. 

The familiar sensation of tightness grows in your stomach, coiling tautly as your breath staggers. You rub your finger against your swollen clit, already sensitive from your last orgasm, as you chase the height of your pleasure. 

He throws his head back against the back of the sofa, Adams's apple bobbing as the veins in his neck throb. “Can I- Gods, can I come? Please?” Your nails scratch down his chest, his abs clenching in delight. “Cum for me baby, I’m right behind you.” 

He shouts your name, his large hands moving to your hips and controlling your thrusts, smashing your hips down on his cock. His cum drips down your thighs and the coil inside your stomach bursts at the sight, a moan leaving your lips as your heartbeat echoes in your ears. Your legs shake and you feel so good it’s almost sickening. 

After what felt like one of the longest, most intense rush of sensations, you slump against Azriel’s chest, head resting in the crook of his neck as you both attempt to catch your breaths. His nails lightly scratch down your back, causing you to shiver. His chin rests atop your sweaty hair and he kisses your head before muttering, “I’m going to be losing a lot more often if my reward is that.”

Your body shakes with laughter and you pull away slightly to look at him. “Shut up.” And then you’re kissing him, so filled with love and happiness you could burst. 

[frostyresolve]

a lottie little too much ꒰ ᝬ brant

he gets drunk and decides to battle a bunch of lottie losts for your favor. 1.2k words. suggestive, fluff.

︶꒦︶꒷︶︶꒷꒦︶︶︶꒷꒦‧

he stumbles up to you, dancing on his feet as his boots touch the wooden floorboards. he won’t deny that he’s had a few drinks too many, his vision hazy as he surveys the troupe, glasses clinking and beer sloshing in cups at the celebration of a performance well done. even through the haze, he singles out you.

he calls out to you, leaning against the tabletop for balance. “you like the little rabbit things?” BRANT huffs, words incoherent somewhat as they tumble out of his mouth. they’re adorable, you can’t deny. especially the lottie lost in front of you playing the accordion; they’re quiet and compassionate echoes, more so than the ones you’ve encountered in the wilderness.

“they’re sweethearts,” you point out with a small smile, clearly taken by their cute mannerisms, the rabbit echoes clambering for your attention as they tried to outdo each other. what’s so special about them anyway? sure they could play instruments well enough, but they weren’t prodigies. how could you find them more interesting than him when they could only say two words?

he never should have suggested having echoes perform alongside the show if it meant every single drop of your attention would be spent on them and not him.

he practically growls, envy bubbling inside him. "just rabbit echoes... but they're cute... and you're petting them...”

“pet me... i’m cute too... i’m the captain." he hiccups, a hint of petulance in his voice.

scowling, his expression morphs into a mix of drunken annoyance and wounded pride. the sight of you lavishing attention on the bunny echoes was starting to get under his skin. you’re caught off guard as he clumsily climbs onto your lap, his body heavy against yours. his legs hooked around your hips as his arms grip your waist tightly, the sweet smell of alcohol lingering on his skin. "mmm...much better..." he hums, nuzzling his face into your neck. he clumsily tries to mimic the rabbit's voice.

"lottie lost, lottie lost…" he speaks suddenly, his words coming out slightly slurred and far from cute. there’s a pause, your gaze locked onto BRANT along with the other lottie lost rabbits who freeze at his words. he’s probably saying something atrocious in their language, but he can’t be bothered to care, staggering over to you and clinging onto you as he tries to imitate the echoes. he tries his best to mimic the rabbits again, his words barely understandable.

“lottie…lottie lost…” he keeps repeating in a sloppy manner, gripping your arm in his drunken stupor. the lottie losts continue to stare at him with their button eyes, their confusion growing with each attempt. it was probably coming off more like drunken babble than cute mimicry.

“what’re you doing?” you ask in confusion as his arms wrap around your waist. you can practically smell the alcohol wafting off him, the rich scent of aged grapes clinging onto his clothes. he never settled for anything but the finest wine after all, even if it left him with a hole in his pocket.

“lottie lost.” a rabbit calls in an attempt to attract your attention back as it waves its arms at you, probably craving your applause and validation.

you can feel his grip tighten around you, drunken logic taking over. he didn't like that you were paying attention to the rabbit echoes when he was right there, and in his state, he chooses to make the irrational decision to try even harder.

the words came out as a slurred mess, anything but similar to what a lottie lost would sound like. if the rabbits could make facial expressions, they’d probably be grimacing at the foul words leaving his mouth. “lottie... lost..." he mutters, his head drooping onto your shoulder. "need hugs... from you... not them..."

you’re not sure what else to do, trying to register the sight before your eyes, so you decide to state the obvious. “you’re drunk; how many bottles did you have?”

“mmm, not drunk…” he sings against your shoulder, his fingers clutching onto you with an iron grip. “a lottie lot. always drunk on you.”

he lifts his head, amethyst eyes hazy and unfocused. BRANT sees you clearly, though, clearer than any blue sky and brighter than any gem he’s ever encountered. “you’re... pretty. prettier than the rabbits. much prettier... and tastier. you taste better.” he slurs drunkenly, his words coming out without a second thought. you know he’s too far gone by now by what he’s spewing out without a care.

“a lottie lot…” you repeat in confusion; his words are merging, every sentence leaving his lips twisted with the name of those damned rabbits.

his face crinkles in confusion as you repeat the words back to him. his mind is too fuzzy with drunkenness to grasp what he’s said, and he just stares at you for a moment before breaking into a hiccupping laugh.

"lottie... lost count..." he repeats, chuckling as he leans heavily against you. his hand continues to roam your skin aimlessly, touch warm and lazy, heat radiating off his skin with each brush of his thumb on your cheek.

that’s when his lips brush against yours briefly, giving you any time to react. you’re stunned speechless when he pulls away, about to speak up, but the only sound leaving your mouth is a shocked gasp. his tongue dips into the hollow of your throat as he nuzzles his face closer into your shoulder.

he seems to take notice of your reaction, and so he responds by peppering more kisses along your neck, whatever he’s saying becoming more of a muffled hum against your skin. his hand on your back begins to explore more, trailing up your spine, before eventually resting on the back of your head, gently tilting it to the side to give himself more access to every expanse of your skin BRANT could find. x marks the spot where his mouth and teeth sink into your neck.

“can you walk?” you whisper, feeling your cheeks heat up as you clear your throat awkwardly when he finally pauses to catch his breath. he pulls away in a daze, swaying on your lap, holding onto you for dear life like you were anchoring him.

it seems like you’ve gotten your answer as his hand slips on the edge of the table, and he faceplants onto the deck of the ship unceremoniously when he tries to get up from your lap. curse you for letting him drink himself silly, not that he wasn’t silly before. his head hits the bottom of the table, letting out a whine as he rubs the side of his forehead before he practically crawls back to you.

you’ve never wanted to jump off the plank so much in your life.

“carry lottie…cuddles…” he coos, looking at you through half-lidded eyes as his body practically drapes over yours like a cape, causing you to stagger at the sudden weight pressing against you. he’s absolutely lost it; he’ll get teased in the morning when his hangover hits like an anchor crashing down onto him. he tugs on your sleeve, warm breath ghosting your neck, moist lips stained with wine trailing sticky kisses all over your exposed skin. if he were sober, he’d probably ask politely instead of gnawing at you like a dreadwolf. his balance is totally off-kilter, stumbling with each step as you make your way to his quarters.

maybe this was what BRANT wanted all along. for you to drag him back to his room. he’s not letting you leave soon, pulling you in the direction of his quarters when you open the door along with him.

he wants you to tumble right into his bed, right where you belong, to keep your captain lottie lost company.

© FROSTYRESOLVE 2025. DO NOT PLAGIARISE, REUPLOAD OR FEED MY WORKS INTO AI

[eclairemaire]

Meeting the Missus pt. 5

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4

Pairing: Robert "Bob" Floyd x Wife! Reader

Category: Fluff

Summary: The Team finds out Bob is married and wants to meet the missus.

Warnings: Reader is described very similarly to Rhea Ripley, Reader and Bob are very much in love, No mention of Y/N used, Southern Reader (she's like all southern ladies sweet like iced tea, but can knock you on your ass if she has too), Express mentions of reader and Bob's Child, Lemme know if I missed any.

Word Count: 1.2K

Notes: This will be the final part of this series for now. I'm not sure how I want to continue the story. I hope everyone enjoys! If you have any requests, mine are open, and I will try to get to them. Enjoy!!

Everyone had started making their plates for lunch as you and Bob started to sort through what everyone brought. Nat brought hard seltzers and brownies. Payback brought a salad and a variety of dressings, and Sprite. Fanboy brought some homemade salsa and tres leches cake, along with some Mexican Cokes. Coyote brought oven-baked Mac ‘n cheese and fruit salad. Hangman brought ribs, banana pudding, and beer. Maverick, Penny, and Amelia brought a nice bottle of wine and sparkling grape juice for the girls so they wouldn’t feel left out later. Rooster brought sugar cookies from the grocery store and various snack foods.

After finishing sorting the rest of the food and drinks, Bob goes to help Riley make her plate, and you move to turn music on, the first song being Pink Floyd’s ‘Time’ from the Dark Side of the Moon album. Before moving back into the kitchen to make you a plate, grab some ribs, smoked sausage, mac and cheese, corn on the cob, chips, and ranch dip before heading out to the back patio.

Everyone had lots of food on their plates and had started eating before you had sat down. “This is some bomb food, Mrs. Floyd. I mean, I knew the food you made was good from how Bob’s always melting into his seat at lunch, but this is on a whole other level.” Fanboy said as he took a bite out of his burger.

“Thank you, Mickey,” you say as you start to eat food off your plate.

“So, I know everyone wants to know, how did you two meet?” Hangman asked as he looked between you and Bob.

“Well, it's kind of silly.” You say, making eye contact with Bob as you move to take a sip of your drink.

“It was back when I still rode broncos in rodeos. After I graduated from high school and before I enlisted in the Navy.” He said, picking at his food.

“Wait, you actually rode broncos?” Coyote asked, his face showing his disbelief.

“Hell yes he did, damn good at it too.” You exclaim as you scoop up some mac and cheese onto your fork. “That rodeo buckle I wore the first night at the hard deck was the one he got the night we met.” 

Hangman looked so surprised, “You won at a rodeo? I’ve been to many a rodeo; those broncos are brutal.” 

“I’d been riding my whole life, I was raised on a ranch, you know,” Bob said, turning to wipe some food off Riley’s face.

“Wait, what were you doing at the rodeo?” Maverick asked as he looked at you.

“I was there looking for work. I needed a job after high school, and I’d been going to and from ranches for as long as I could remember, so it was almost a no-brainer to try and get a job that dealt with livestock.” Turning to look at Bob, you continue to speak. “My grandparents had horses when my mama was growing up; she had always ridden, and even though we didn’t live in a rural area. I was taught when I was younger, and often spent time in the barns tending the animals.”

“I saw her when she was riding one of the mechanical bulls there -” “I’d never ridden a real bull, mind you.” You interjected as Bob mentioned the mechanical bull.

“Anyway, she was the only one who could stay on longer than anybody else. She was intimidating as shit back then.”

“Back then?” Nat asked incredulously, “She’s intimidating now.”

“NO, well, yes, you are still very intimidating,” Bob fumbled as he looked from Phoenix to you. He smiled at you before continuing with the story.

“I’d never seen anybody like her before. All the women in my life, while very strong in their own ways, were always soft in comparison to my wife. None of the girls I went to school with wanted to deal with hard labour, they would rather watcha movie, paint their nails, or do their hair and makeup.” He said, looking at you with adoration.

“Granted, I didn’t want to do that forever, example A, my life now,” You say, gesturing around you to your house and towards Riley.

“She was beautiful, and as she mentioned, looking for work. My dad hired her to help out on the ranch. We met her first day when I walked up on her changing into her work clothes behind our barn.” He huffed a laugh at the memory.

“We worked together for months before I worked up the nerve to ask her out. Then I enlisted in the Navy, and she went back to her hometown for college,” he said before shoveling some food into his mouth.

“We wrote letters to each other like total dorks and met up frequently while he was on leave. When we found out I was pregnant with Riley, we got married, and he took a few months off to help me with Riley after she was born, and then he got stationed at Lemoore, and we lived out there until we came here for the special detachment.” You say, looking around at everyone, and then your gaze landed on Riley. 

“Wait, so Bob, did you marry your first love?” Payback asked.

“No, I’d dated other people during high school,” Bob answered like that was obvious.

“What about you, Mrs. Floyd?” Penny asked as she spoke up.

“Me? No, actually, when we first met,” you start pointing between yourself and Bob, “I was at that rodeo with my girlfriend. We broke up shortly after I started working at the Floyd family ranch.” You say with a deadpan expression on your face. A few members of the squad looked shocked at your mentioning of a girlfriend, namely Payback and Coyote.

Rooster just huffed out through his nose, “I knew you were fruity somehow.” He said, pointing at you.

“You don’t get to call anybody fruity while you and Hangman dance around each other the way you have been, for as long as I’ve heard about you.” You point your fork at him with an eyebrow raised. Rooster raised his hands in mock surrender.

“Whoa, what did I do? I haven’t said anything.” Hangman asked, giving a brief glare in Rooster's direction, for somehow bringing the attention to their situation. You just gave him a pointed look.

“Mama?” Riley came to stand in front of you. “Can I have some dessert? And can Amelia and I go play games in the living room after?” She asks, her eyes were big, and she was giving you that look that you cannot deny.

“Sure, Bug, what do you want?” You ask as you stand and pick her up as you walk into the house. Yours and hers conversation fades out as you go inside.

Amelia went inside briefly after you and Riley. She had a vague idea as to what the team was going to start pestering Bob about and didn’t feel inclined to listen.

“So you got her pregnant before you married her?” Fanboy wiggled his eyebrows at Bob as he asked what everyone was thinking.

“Okay, do not say it like that, we were planning on having a kid, and we were both prepared for everything that could happen, plus it’s not like we had her when we were teenagers. We just so happened to have her before we got married.” Bob explained after sighing like his friends were his kids instead of his child, who was with you getting dessert inside. 

tags: @7dreambaby

[kqutie]

“You know you didn’t have to kiss her to give her your blessing, right?”

—Athena to Hermes, probably

haha! here you go, my lovely (˵ ¬ᴗ¬˵)

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Hermes giggles to himself, trying to ignore the soft blush on his cheeks. He watches you fondly from high above, laying on his stomach in a bed of clouds with his feet in the air, kicking away as his hands hold up his chin. 

“You know you didn’t have to kiss her to give her your blessing, right?” Athena materialises beside him, standing in her tall, proud height. 

“I don’t know~” Hermes sing-songs, grinning widely at the narrowed look his half-sister gives him from beneath the shadow of her helmet.

“No, you didn’t,” Athena rolls her eyes and sighs, looking down as you silently talk with some strangely coloured animals that Hermes must have allowed onto the island with you. Hermes finally laughs aloud, finding her irritation amusing. 

“Maybe so, but what’s the fun in that?~” 

“This isn’t about fun, Hermes,” Athena sighs exasperatedly, rubbing at her temples through her helmet whilst avoiding the sight of the messenger God’s cheeky smile, “Your actions could very well have endangered Odysseus and her,” 

“But she is under my protection now,” Hermes’ grin doesn’t falter, confident in his ability to protect you by warding off any enemy, “ease up, darling~” Hermes coos, flying up in his front-laying position so that his head was level with Athena’s and he could look her in the eye with just a slight tilt of his head. “And there isn’t a chance I’ll let any danger come to her,” Hermes looks down at you fondly once again as Athena huffs. 

“Don’t tell me you’ve grown fond of her to this extent already,”

“There’s no question about it!” Hermes giggles and throws his arms up in a gleeful cheer, righting himself vertically, before turning his full attention onto Athena. The goddess of wisdom is, somewhat, taken aback by the sudden shift in his demeanour, there was almost a threat hidden in his glowing eyes, “I’ve already given her my blessing, after all. Whoever dares harm her from now on will be answering to me,” 

“But why?” Athena presses, always one to ask for an explanation; her mind simply can’t comprehend how capricious Hermes’ actions are, “Because she’s a great traveller from another world? Can it only be that?”

“Why can’t it ‘only’ be that?” Hermes tilts his head coyly, playing with her reasoning. 

“Because you kissed her—” 

Hermes laughs with his full body, clutching at his stomach as his knees tuck up and curl him into a compressed ball of laughter, “You’re always so serious~” Hermes whips the tears from his eyes. 

“Answer me!” 

“Alright alright! Don’t get your subligar in a twist~” Athena gives him an unamused look, growing all the more irritated when he has to suppress a giggle once more, “I admit, the fair maiden has very kissable-looking lips, I just couldn’t resist stealing a taste~”

Athena splutters, “Wha—?!”

“She’s also very cute and very delicious,” Hermes smirks to himself as he slowly traces his lips with his tongue. His eyes look distant as he remembers the softness and sweetness of you, “My~ I’ve never tasted something so sweet before. But shush!” Athena watches in shock as Hermes puts a finger to his lips in a hushing motion, “Don’t tell Dionysus! He might get jealous when he finds out I’ve found something tastier than his grapes and wine,” 

Hermes giggles as Athena rolls her eyes. 

“Just don’t harass the poor girl,” Athena looks at you with sympathy. 

“I’m afraid I can’t make such promises, darling~” Hermes smirks to himself, “now that I’ve had a taste, I simply can’t get enough!” 

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a/n : I'M JUST A HERMES SIMP, OKAY?! DON'T JUDGE ME! I DIDN'T MEAN TO WRITE 500 WORDS OF THIS!

taglist : @bluepanda08 @doodle-with-rhy @sunshinedaisy21 @jolixtreesunn @ellaprime7 @marcelemry @nishayuro @hijinkxy @kerosene-demon @windrosesrasta

[kneelingshadowsalome]

FATUM NOS IUNGEBIT 1/4

(König x F!Reader)

Summary: You have seen him in your dreams. The seer has divined his coming. But nothing has prepared you for witnessing him in the flesh. (Historical AU where König fights for the Roman Empire in an auxiliary unit, finds a cute barbarian woman and decides to keep her as his own.) Word count: 5.3 k Tags/warnings: 18+ ONLY. Spoils of war/enemies to lovers trope, graphic depictions of violence, historical gruesomeness, pining, odd banter, mixed feelings, romantic fluff, dubcon cuddling, eventual smut. Captor/captive dynamic. König is a brutal warrior... and a gentle giant. A/N: Lol what now? König dual wields 2 swords, goes Mike Tyson on his enemies, teaches his captive girl constellations in German, cuddles her and feeds her grapes, buuut mainly just tries to get into her pants (which historically did not exist at the time) A bit of a slow burn, but don't worry, they'll bang eventually ^^

AD 90, somewhere in the untamed frontiers of the Roman Empire…

The end of the world is here.

Not only have the crops failed for two years in a row, making chieftains beggars and beggars food for the fish, but now there are rumours that the god of war has arrived to destroy the land. The accursed Romans had turned their eagle gaze back to your land after years of sending their troops elsewhere, making it seem like they were not interested in your distant land after all. Untamed, they called it, harsh and barren and therefore inferior – your lush, abundant, beautiful land. No doubt they spat on it in their war councils because your roads were not paved, because your crops and villages were modest, and the women sometimes fought alongside men. Their storytellers immortalized false tales about you, calling you barbarians, but the only barbarians you could think of were the Romans themselves – crude, filthy and boorish creatures, drowning in wine and shit in their cities.

Rumours started to get fat and distressed when the troops approached your village. They said there was a giant at the head of the army, that the Romans followed a Titan's son who loved to eat men, torture women and impale children. They said he didn't accept proper food but preferred to eat his fallen enemies, washed his weapons with the blood of children, and split captured women apart with his cock, as long and sharp as his sword. They told that the Titan ordered his soldiers to poison the wells and destroy the growing crops with salt and vinegar. The rumours said that his tent was bigger than any chieftain's house and that he still struggled to stand at full height inside it. 

Even the land itself seemed to bow before him. Good weather followed his conquest wherever he went; ambushes failed, scouts got caught and tortured, exposing more villages to pillage and ruin. Your brother told you to flee the village, but how could you survive without your clansmen? You didn't know how to hunt; you barely knew how to fish. Your task in the village was to gather clams from the shore, dye wool and help the old Seer. How long could you survive on sorrels and clams alone?  

. . .

The old woman calls you to see her on the brink of war, and tells you to prepare for a ceremonial offering. Two horses, black as night if possible, brown at the very least, to appease the Great Mother of the Earth and quench her thirst for blood. If the Mother is satisfied with your offering, She will perhaps stop the approaching army or convince the Titan to leave your village alone.

She does a small rite before you, and you need to stay with her through her visions. You hate the smell of the leaves she burns, and try to cover your nose with your tunic to prevent breathing in the bitter fumes. The seer looks like she’s just lying herself down to sleep, but it’s always a burden when the spirits arrive and she starts to talk. You turn your back on her to coax them to rise: a mortal stare annoys the chthonic ones. You nearly fall asleep too as you wait, wanting nothing more than to go back to your own hut and have a good night’s sleep. Perhaps because you’re lousy tonight, and less vigilant as you should be, the spirits arrive sooner than either of you thought.

“He’s strong,” the seer croaks from the earthen bed, and you fight the urge to turn around and peek at the old woman, currently in the clutches of spirits. 

“Invincible… Hungry... The horses…won’t suffice…”

She drifts someplace else, and you try to memorize every word, every intonation, as cryptic or as simple as they are, for later interpretation.

“I see you,” she says in a slightly more cheerful tone, which is odd because the old woman is never happy or satisfied, no matter how bright the sun shines or how much food there is in the storages and pits.

“Me?” You dare to speak even though you’re not allowed to disturb the spirits. You could slap yourself for blurting out a single word, but luckily, the hungry ones don’t attack you for your insolence.

“You.. will be his downfall,” she speaks as if you are having a conversation here. “Be there. When he arrives.”

“...Be there? Why?” You dare to utter again, more concerned about what the Mother implies than the potential fury of some lowly earthen spirits. You haven’t got the faintest clue about what She might be suggesting. Why do you have to participate in the battle? How can you be there without getting killed? You’re not a warrior… The Mother has it all wrong. 

Suddenly, you curse the night, you curse the whole day, knowing your brother’s late proposal was perhaps a warning, a hint from the gods to leave, and leave quickly.

The old woman laughs dryly on the ground - the throaty, outright sick cackle makes you flinch. 

You don’t like this... You don’t like this at all.

“Mother. What must I do?” You demand to know, thinking about how all the gods, spirits, old women, and Titans should go to hell.

“Become a tree,” the old woman offers as if it’s the easiest thing to do. “A flower. Me...”

. . .

You become a marten first, then a bird. Then perhaps a tree.

You climb a spruce and wait there. You wait until the sunrise; you wait until noon. You wait until you see the glint of the Roman spearheads and hear the sound of their march.

You’ve dreamed of the Titan ever since you left the seer’s hut. You’ve dreamed of him slaying everyone in the village; you’ve dreamed of him driving a thick spear into the ground and grabbing you with an intent to raise you into the air and impale you on it. You’ve dreamed of him behind you, above you, inside you. You wake up one morning only to see that half of the people have left. You don’t know where they have gone, and you can’t follow them even if you did because the old woman waits for you in front of her hut and gives you a nod the instant you walk into another beautiful, sunny day.

That’s why you’ve turned into a branch in a tree, but for what purpose, you have no idea. You can’t understand why you must be here to witness the world’s end.

Your men scream and shout and roar as they crash into the thick forest of spears. The enemy is silent: it’s eerie, how the world burns and falls into ruin around you, people are screaming; everyone who has a soul and a heart is screaming for Mother as they die, but the men behind the Roman shields refuse to emit a sound. They don’t curse or shout or summon their gods; they simply stand their ground and pant mist into the air as wave after wave of men break on their shields and die before their feet. Somebody loses his spear because it gets stuck between your clansman’s ribs, but the Roman simply draws his sword in its stead: it’s the only sound among the pitched wails that cut through the forest – the cold, clear ring of a gladius being pulled from its sheath.

That is why you flinch at the sound of the first shout, a brutish command that sends all the shields to the side, only to present more shields: the Romans switch positions in their formation as if they’re not even human beings like the rest of you, just a single enormous creature made of iron and leather and bone, operating it's flat forest of weapons.

And then you see him: the giant of your dreams, the hungry titan everyone has told you about. He rises from the tide of helmets like a summoned god, concealed as one of the soldiers and only now revealing his true nature. He stands at least two heads taller than the rest, pushes his own soldiers to the side and breaks out of the formation these vicious Romans love so much. You knew he would be strong and big, but you didn't know he refused to show his face… You wonder what kind of a monster hides behind the black cloth with nothing but two eye holes ripped on it. As if this man needed the additional effort to stand out from other soldiers...

He's like a God of War, just like the survivors said: his armour is of Roman design, but the amount of metal that had to be scraped together to cover this man's shoulders and chest must've demanded a fortune in gold. He doesn't seem to care about the Roman ways, however: he throws his shield away as soon as he's out of the cumbersome formation as if he has carried it only as a decoration up until this point. He draws another sword in its stead – if any other man did such a stupid thing, traded his shield for a weapon, you would snort. But not now.

Standing between the Romans and your clansmen like a challenge, a threat, a deity, even the men possessed by the seer's blood spells hesitate to approach him. But when they do, the god unleashes carnage: the first warrior gets his stomach slashed open, and the two thick swords look like toothpicks when wielded by this man. A stomach wound is a gruesome, slow way to die - but just before the warrior's entrails spill to dangle between his feet, the brute grants him mercy by sweeping his head off with a single blow of his gladius. 

A roar finally rises from your enemy: they cheer Death on as the head of your neighbour meets the mud next. The soil is already soaked in blood, but the Mother is hungry still. The forest booms with Her bloodlust as the god moves around like a slow tempest of muscle, metal and darkness: he breaks every Roman rule by fighting as his own man instead of demeaning himself as one of them, a lowly part of this odd metal beast before you. He sends a limb flying in the air with a swing of a sword; he uses the same weapon as a bludgeon to bash in someone's skull. He crushes a man's chest simply by sinking down onto one knee, breaking bone, tendon and flesh to splinters as a whole ribcage gets crushed under his massive weight. 

Warriors flee before him, they fall under the combined wrath of the Mother and the Titan's sword. The dead seem to fall eternally, along with your heart, before meeting the ground with a hollow thud. 

Your chieftain is among the last men standing, meeting this unstoppable foe with admirable courage. Not having succumbed to the spells of bloodlust in years, he meets his death as a seasoned but old warrior. With his fighting years behind him, your chief doesn't have a chance against this man, but you have to grant the beast a feather's worth of honour, because he recognizes your chieftain as the veteran he is and salutes him with his sword. Then he proceeds with the bloodbath: flinging your leader's sword and axe easily to the side, he walks straight into his arms like he would into a hug, grabs him by the waist, and raises him into the air like he's nothing but a child. 

Your scream never leaves your lungs as you watch how the Titan raises the draping cloth from his face, just enough to sink his teeth into your beloved chieftain’s neck. The noise that erupts from your elder is not that of a man but a tortured animal. It’s not from this world, what you witness next: the giant tears a hunk of flesh from your chief like he’s a piece of roasted meat. Blood streams forth, his screams fade away all too slowly, and you hear your own weak wail in the air as the Titan lets go of the heap that used to be a strong male and a wise leader. 

Your chieftain is dead; his essence spills to the earth in spurts to appease the God of War, who spits blood and flesh to the ground, making you gag into the cold spring air. 

Then he raises his swords towards the sun, and the forest erupts into a roar with him: the thundering, ear-splitting cheer from his warriors makes the very earth quake beneath your tree. It seems to shake the branches of the forest, and before you know it, the giant’s howl of triumph breaks the one you’re curled around, and you fall, fall, fall into the mud beneath you. 

You're not a tree anymore. No: you’re very much a human woman there in the dirt as the sound of shouting ceases like a distant dream. 

And he turns. 

Death turns.

Mother always said you were a curious creature, which is perhaps why you search for his eyes, even though you should be running. She also said you were a smart one, which is why you know that running is futile. Your limbs wouldn’t carry you far anyway. It is a cruel joke from the gods to have what little strength you have left pour out of you into the ground and up to the feet of the enemy who is already strong, both in body and in will.

The Titan looks at you with genuine wonder, a curiosity that surpasses your own. To your odd thrill, you find that his eyes are blue: the same blue of the sea which you used to collect delicious clams from. 

The soldiers behind him shift with lust – their gear clinks as they devour you with unbridled hunger. The Titan is the only one who looks at you like you’re simply a cute little squirrel who happened to fall from a tree right there at his feet. Then his eyes drop to your breasts, and the familiar hunger that lives in men gives the ocean of his eyes a clouded look. When his stare finds yours again, he's a different man: the treacherous beast of your dreams.

You had hoped for a swift death… Violent but quick. But it’s clear that it’s not death he has in store for you as he takes a step towards you. It’s not a quick nor a slow death; it’s not death at all, because–

No.

No.

You’d rather have your arms torn off and fed to the Romans rather than have him thrust the sword between his legs, his third weapon, inside you. If you’re going to die screaming, it will not happen on your back; you will not amuse this beast with your womanhood and tears.

You scramble forward to pick up something, anything: a bronze dirk from a fallen warrior. The giant’s eyes fall on the sad excuse of a weapon, then on the sorry excuse of you. He thinks you’re planning to fight him with that thing, and the corners of his eyes crease a little from the prospect of having to subdue you. You’re proving to be quite the entertainment, and you curse those eyes, looking so kind and lively when just moments ago, the same eyes were inhuman and possessed. His are the eyes of a wayfarer, a wanderer, not a soldier: you catch a hint of sadness in them and curse again.

He’s not human, you remind yourself and show him what actual humans are made of. What women are made of. You give him another name, Giant, because you’ve always feared giants and hated the stories about them. Dumb and reckless creatures they are, stupid destroyers who always place their trust in their size. You never meant to fight him, and he only catches up on it as you turn the dagger towards yourself and guide it to point straight at your heart. 

You will be his downfall, just like the seer said.

“Nein–Warte,” the Giant speaks his first words, surprisingly soft to belong to a man like him. 

The sorrow in his stare consumes you in full now. It gushes forth like a tide, causing your breath and hands to shake when they need to be stern. You straighten your spine, jut your chin forward, and call for Mother: you don’t even know if you’re yelling for your bearer, or the Great Mother, or the earth that gives life to all. Perhaps you call them all to gather around and witness your sacrifice, higher in price than any of the Titan’s offerings combined. The blood you’re about to spill onto the soil will surely appease the land and raise it to arms to finally fight against this beast. 

He says something else just before you pull the blade back to strike it into your chest, and you curse for the third time in your mind: giants aren’t supposed to move that fast; they aren’t supposed to interfere in your last ritual. 

But the worst of it is that even when he finally subdues you, even as he wrestles the blade away from you, he ends up drawing a large gash on his forearm… As if he is trying his best to protect you from accidentally cutting yourself.

. . . 

You are brought to his tent, screaming. 

It’s not as big as a chieftain’s house; it’s barely the size of yours. But it is larger than the tents you saw when you got carried there: as a spitting, screeching, hissing package of what these brutes would no doubt consider a true barbarian woman with uncivilized manners and a fuckable cunt. They will talk about you around their campfires tonight: about you getting broken in by their true commander. It’s enough to satisfy them for now: to imagine their champion to fuck you bloody and sore. And who knows: perhaps they’ll receive the scraps if the Titan gets tired of you.

The precious dagger is somewhere in the mud, probably trampled there like it’s nothing but a piece of worthless metal. Your own trampling is only about to begin as the Giant marches into his abode and sends the men away, giving you uneasy looks in the process, perhaps checking if any of them had enough time to have a go at you. Luckily for him, you’re in the same condition as he left you: legs together, safe and pretty, because he bound them with a rope along with your hands. You are nothing but a delivery, thrown on the floor of dirt and a few animal skins. He just nods at you, happy to acknowledge that you are untouched by the others, as if it would somehow be worse for you to be raped by ten of those petite men than be raped by him: a cruel, bloodthirsty Giant with a giant cock. 

Your ankles and wrists get sore as you watch him doff his armour. He takes off the helmet, the belted straps, the segmented plates of his shoulder guards and the heavy Roman cuirass. The gods have truly favoured this man, not only gifting him tremendous height but insurmountable strength too. His muscles are large and lean and quiver with latent power as he moves; his back is so broad it almost competes with the wide mouth of the tent. He doesn’t seem to suffer from the cold either, but he keeps his mask on for whatever ghastly reason. Even if there is a monster under that mask, his body speaks of virility: he’s a man in his prime, a giant at his strongest, making you feel like an elf, a tiny little creature in the feet of this man who must be descended from titans indeed.

You continue to watch as he washes his hands in a small basin, cleans his mouth and neck, too. You reckon the water in that bowl is blood red and dark when he finally dries himself with a white cloth. He stands before you in nothing but his mask and the dark red tunic he had under the armour. He ties it from the waist with a simple leather belt, and it only now makes sense to you why Roman soldiers dye their clothes red: you’re pretty sure you can still see the darker spots on the hem of that tunic, the ones that used to be the lifeblood of your clansmen and kin.

He has the audacity to ask you - wordlessly - to clean his wound, the one you caused him. He sets you free from your bounds, and you are given fresh water and another cloth. He even opens a smallish wooden box of salve that has a familiar smell to it: pine tar and honey, used by your people to treat minor wounds and prevent bad spirits from getting into the wound. You wonder how he even knows about such a balm: is this warrior a Roman at all, or is he some odd creature hauled from the edges of the world to fight for them? You wonder if he has made the salve himself, extracted the tar from the pine and foraged the wax and honey himself, then cursed with his coarse language when he got stung by multiple bees…

You drive away the thoughts that threaten to make this brute human by snorting at his injury. The damage he gave to himself when he tried to guide the blade away from you at the price of his own blood. 

It still troubles you that he did it. Even a tiny wound like this can bring any man down if it starts to fester. The cold winds and rains of spring can easily get into the gash and make it rot. 

The idea of this giant being forced to his knees because of some filthy dagger wielded by a squirrel of a woman makes you smile inside. It would be a fitting fate for this man. But the vision also makes your heart sting. The thought of him dying of a simple flesh wound, alone and far away from his home, makes your heart grow kinder than it should. 

You decide there is nothing you can do but treat his arm, strong and scarred from previous battles. He sits down while you get to stay on the ground, and you try to ignore it that your face is now level with his groin. He sits with a wide spread in those powerful thighs, and you wonder if it's because the rumours about his cock are true. You keep your eyes everywhere else except the hem of that tunic and what's going on under there. He purrs at your touch, making it clear that it doesn't need much more than your soft fingertips to get him hard after a triumphant day on the field of battle. 

The wound is not deep, but you clean it carefully, trying to ignore the way his eyes seem to bore into you as you take care of him. Your hand is somewhat steady as you treat the damage with the nice-smelling salve, but you flinch as his hand suddenly meets your cheek. You look up at him, heart plummeting, thighs instinctively pressing together from the gentle way with which he cups your face.

“Schön,” he says, again with a tender voice and an adoring, almost worshipful stare. You don’t have a clue what he’s saying, but you know now for sure that it's not the tongue of the Romans he speaks. The scent of pines and bees lingers between you as he brushes a thumb over your lower lip. You are weak enough to give him a breath, a helpless, hot little exhale that meets his hand like a gift.

“Schön wie eine Fee,” he rumbles, sounding intoxicated or like he's under a spell of sleep.

“What the hell are you saying,” you whisper in your own tongue: just a meek little sputter, a tiny, horrified breath, but the giant’s eyes narrow with a smile.

“Sie redet,” he says happily, and your shoulders sink – you are on the verge of screaming from frustration alone. Whatever you do seems to only amuse this man, and you snap your mouth shut. Your cheeks heat up with recurring waves of odd fever. The ground beneath your shins is all but warm, and yet you feel warm all over: a dangerous sign, you know, and oddly tied to the peculiar bodings you have seen all week.

Because there have been many omens in the air lately. 

It’s just that none of them were portents of war. 

The cranes started to mate early this year, and you have found a lot of clams from the shore every day. Even your brother encountered a boar with nine piglets; everyone celebrated him as some holy man who had seen the Great Mother when he returned to the village that day. The wind started to blow from south soon after, and the moon has grown along with your womb: this morning, on the brink of war, you woke up wet and restless. 

All the omens speak of fertility, of growth, of a new cycle and of birth: of spring and life. There’s nothing about death and decay, nothing except what the people have told you about… him. The death himself. The war god.

“König,” he says as if he can hear your thoughts and wishes to correct them. You look up and see he’s pointing to himself, or rather, holding his hand over his heart. You fight the urge to scoff at the gesture. As if this beast had a heart…

“König,” he repeats the word and pats his chest, and you realize he’s trying to tell you his name. You wrinkle your nose in distaste, and he smiles. It’s easy to tell when he does, even with the cloth that covers his face: you can see the joy clearly from his eyes, the boyish grin that must be occurring under that mask.

“Du?” He points at you next, inquisitive. He has an odd way of pointing: with two fingers, slightly crooked, and you understand very well what he’s asking of you. You refuse to tell him your name, however, settling for pouting a lip at him next. The smile in his eyes only deepens.

“Fee,” he pokes you gently on the shoulder and leans back in his odd Roman chair, seemingly content with having now named you. 

And Mother was right: you are curious, so incredibly curious to know what this beast has chosen to call you and why. Are you a rat to him…? Some bird? Perhaps simply a girl?

He is so pleased with your conversation that he pours himself some wine and drinks the whole cup with one gulp. Great, you sigh inside your head, a beast and a drunkard. He pours another cup and tries to offer it to you, and when you don’t make a move to grab the clay mug, he brings it to your lips. You entertain him with a tiny sip: you’ve heard of wine and know that Romans are fond of it, but you have never tasted it yourself. 

The tart, bitter flavour almost makes you cough. You thought wine was supposed to be sweet: everyone always describes it as something like milk or honey or juice from an overripe apple. It very much is not, and you almost choke on it and then make a wry face at your captor. He - König - only laughs. It’s another thing that catches you off guard: first those boyish, sad eyes and now this hearty, grown man’s laugh. You have proved to be such an amusement to him that he doesn’t force you to drink any more wine and enjoys the rest of it himself. 

Then he rises and makes you shrink from him again, towers above you for a moment, and looks at you with that warm curiosity that makes your heart race.

“Müde?” 

He tilts his head, the bag of darkness shifts, the blue eyes behold you fondly, and for some reason, you whimper an answer to yet another question you can’t even understand. He takes your little squeak as a yes and falls to crouch before you, then raises a massive hand to the leather strings that keep your demure little dress up. 

To your horror, he pulls the knotted tangle open before you can stop him. Your dress falls from your shoulders and drops to pool around you, and you simply and verily stop breathing.

His eyes wash over you, he examines every little part of exposed skin like an entire treasure chest has suddenly opened before him. You pray to all the gods that he would find it in his heart to be gentle tonight. Your nipples perk up – from the cold or from his stare, you don’t know. 

The rough callous of his palm meets your breast and encloses it in warm support. He cups you, weighs you like he would a fruit, and then he squeezes you, rather hard, too: a deliberate attempt to make you squeal again. He replies to your pathetic mewl with an approving rumble, and you look up at him with all the helpless tenderness of the Mother, hoping that Her gentle pleas might persuade this man not to hurt you.

“Please don’t,” you whisper, and his eyes dart to your mouth, to your eyes, then back to your lips again. He immediately softens his touch. Then he lifts you from inside your poor dress, picks you up like you weigh nothing at all, and carries you to his broad bed, the sturdiest you have ever seen. 

This man feels like the strangest of fates, like a hopeless destiny, as he sets you on the skins and straw mattress, right next to your fluttering heart. Your insides ache as he undresses before you, entirely without shame. He’s hard under the tunic he rips off and tosses on the cold ground. Your eyes are glued to the legendary cock you’ve heard so much about, the cock that splits women apart: and it’s true that it's huge. It resembles the ones you’ve seen on horses, not on men, and your thighs are glued together as he comes next to you while that pale, monstrous cock sways long and heavy between his thighs. He moves you around a little, and you squeal from how weak you feel: weak as a mouse as he covers you with one of those rich furs he has in plenty on the bed. Then crawls under it too, right next to you.

Your heart almost wrenches itself out of your chest as a strong arm pulls you against him: the swell of your ass meets his thighs, solid and broad like treetrunks, and your lower back meets the hot, almost too hot horse cock. It starts to leak and throb against your skin the instant your flesh is pressed against his. You try not to whimper and moan as the Giant, König, curls around you like you two have always done this.

He takes a long, earnest inhale from your neck and hair, rumbles deeply and contently, and tightens his grip. Apparently, you smell and feel good… 

You wait and wait to be plundered and raped, but König only settles for holding you tightly, like you’re a children’s toy made of the softest straw and purest undyed wool. You relax slowly, and he purrs against your back, starts to fondle your breasts, ardently, until your body betrays you and you find yourself wet again; he squeezes and squishes your teats slowly, approvingly, then pinches your nipple once before finally falling into a heavy, deep sleep.

…

Please forgive your author for any historical inaccuracies and other silly things you find facepalmable <3 During this time König would've probably spoken some form of Old Saxon but since I'm not a TOLKIEN we have to settle for modern-day German here. I don't have a taglist for this fic so please check my pinned masterlist for future updates.

Translations

Nein, warte - No, wait

Schön - Beautiful 

Schön wie eine Fee - Beautiful as a fairy

Sie redet - She talks

Du? - You?

Müde? - Tired?

[blueberrypancakesworld]

I am yours and never ours

Caracalla x wife!reader

warning : Spoilers for Gladiator ii, hurt/comfort, kissing, implied mother issues, mention of violence, cuddling, no use of y/n

Summary : It was a mistake to kill the hero, to not give him the mercy he should have received. The riots a sign of overthrow and fall and entrenched in the palace the two brothers and Caracalla's wife, nerves are thin and after a forgetting of temper it seems only love can calm a frightened Caracalla to bring order to the situation.

info : omg the scene was so sad and tense, the bond between the two, i'm fully in my gladiator era. Have fun reading :)

masterlist

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It had only taken a fraction of a moment, the sun had been right over the Colosseum, giving everyone a chance to get their bearings. Shouts of cheers, boos and cries mingled with the loud voice of Rome.

The emperors sitting impatiently on their chairs, the younger one screaming for death at last, the older one seeming to grow more agitated with every breath, and in the centre the weeping princess as the arrows pierced her beloved.

Justus Acacius was dead, unjustly killed despite the surrender of both fighters, a death that had the emperors rejoicing, but a death that only a few hours later at nightfall had the people roaring.

What at first was still disbelief and shock had become a popular uprising, at the latest with the tumult, the flames raging in the streets and the numerous courageous citizens.

The two brothers also became aware of the uprising and the royal family withdrew in disbelief and indignation to avoid being drawn into it.

Even the Sun of Rome, Caracalla's wife, could not reassure the people who loved her; they seemed to hate her as much as her husband and brother-in-law.

Looking out from behind the solid walls of the palace, she saw the metre-high flames, saw the angry crowd and the few troops of the emperors who could hardly do anything.

Gods have mercy on us she thought and took another sip from her glass as she heard more screams of death and moved away from the window, going back to her family but seeing only the same tension in Geta.

Rarely had she seen him like this if he didn't burst under the pressure at any moment so she was sure he would storm out himself, ,,There may be many but they don't have the weapons and courage of our troops" she said calmly and tried to pour Geta another glass but he turned away.

His gaze had barely noticed her so absorbed he seemed to be thinking about how he could save them all, ,,Ungrateful" he hissed as he looked out and saw nothing but treachery.

The silence in the palace was interrupted only by the footsteps of Macrinus, who withdrew in her presence, she did not trust him and he did not trust her, but her concern lay more with her beloved Caracalla.

She glanced at her husband, who was sitting on a lectus and feeding Dundus his little monkey to calm himself down somehow. However, he looked just as miserable as his brother, they both looked tired, exhausted and completely overwhelmed by everything.

She gave him a smile, trying to keep him amused, ,,You'll all see blood," Caracalla said, returning the smile - it was to be expected that he wanted a whole bloodlust. A betrayal hurts deeply.

Even if it hurt inside her, helplessness and fear had a grip on her too…only Dundus the monkey seemed happy as he let out another little screech when he got a grape.

A mistake.

All of a sudden all she could see was Geta hurrying around, ,,Get that annoying monkey out of here!" shouting at his brother and slapping the wine in his brother's face.

Startled, she gasped, calling out Geta's name in warning, his eyes filled with anger and remorse, she knew it was the situation, knew the tension but nothing would help.

As she hurried over to Caracalla and gently placed her hand on his shoulder, he looked more like a weeping dog than an emperor, ,,Come my king, we should feed Dundus somewhere else" she said, helping him up slightly and telling him to go ahead into the throne room.

She walked past Geta who just looked down shaking his head and cursing himself, he had taken it too far. ,,I'll be right back why don't you get us some wine Macrinus" she said and didn't bother because his fake smile told her all she needed to know as he disappeared and she sighed and hurried on her way.

Her footsteps echoed in the empty corridors and the throne room, Dundus shrieked and she heard the sniffle, ,,Love? My King Caracalla, where are you?" she asked quietly, swallowing down the lump rising in her throat as she thought back to the episodes he had already had.

She and Geta loved him but this madness would be the downfall of them all. She continued to walk around the room, first looking behind the throne where he sometimes hid, but he wasn't sitting there.

,,Caracalla? It's your sun, do you understand?" she asked and finally saw the blond head of hair peeking out from behind one of the curtains behind which he had curled up.

She heard his crying, the sniffling as he peeked out from behind it and she got down on her knees, ,,It's-It's all right, come here to me, you know who I am, don't you?" she continued to ask calmly, hiding the slight trembling in her hands under the fabric of her clothes as she saw the man she loved so fragile.

Slowly he emerged from his ‘hiding place’ and nodded cautiously as he crawled towards her, ,,You…you're my wife," he sniffled his words barely intelligible as Dundus continued to tote on his shoulders and the chain rattled.

Nodding hastily, she smiled slightly relieved that he at least recognised her, sitting in front of her probably not quite knowing what he wanted or needed, ,,You are mine" he seemed to understand instead as he placed his hand on hers and she didn't pull it away.

Yours, mine, ours words she had heard so often, she was his wife but our joy.

It's like a coin with two sides only one can come up and the other stays in the shadow, only the balance on the edge can go but with enormous precision or trust and love…something that was all the more difficult at such a time between the two brothers.

She nodded again and pulled him close, lying in her lap like a boy with his mother, his, ,,I'm yours," she assured him, carefully using the sleeve of her dress to wipe his face.

Mostly delusional, she quickly realised that he was like a small child who simply needed her mother, a woman who had died at an early age and she filled that role.

An initial squirming soon turned into an amused laugh as she wiped the wine from his face and at least he wasn't crying, ,,Tickled" he muttered and she couldn't help but smile bitterly, the delusion was a horror and a blessing in one.

Another coin.

Dundus played with the blond curls as Caracalla's fingers, which had been playing with each other before, slid to hers, ,,He's been hurting me since we were sin the womb, you're not his or ours…you're mine…like Rome should be mine," he suddenly said, gripping her tighter.

Blue eyes showed the fire of madness and she stroked his cheek, she knew the story of the womb, but she knew just as well that madness could be transmitted by whores, was it a lie or the truth?

Trying to stifle a shaky breath, she placed a kiss on his lips, tasting the wine, tasting sage and tasting blood, ,,You two are like the creators of Rome, two sides my love. But think what Geta has done for you, for me, for all of Rome…you are the king, Geta is the god and I am the sun," she reminded him of the story she had made up during one of his episodes.

Caracalla a king of honour who could have all the blood in the world, his brother the political god and she the sun who held them all together.

A story that made him pause, his memories shrouded in mist, he needed time while she continued to hold him gently and stroke his cheek, his grip on her hand tightening and softening, ,,Yes? Yes, I think so…I think so...despite the pain, I-I still have you" he slowly realised and sanity returned to his being.

As he cuddled up to her and laid his head in the crook of her neck and held her like that for a moment, tears in her eyes as she blinked them away and thanked the gods again that nothing bad had happened.

Caracalla's hand was also on her cheek and she saw the gold tooth as she smiled, ,,Thank you my sun" she heard him say before he pulled her into a kiss, finally back to her senses as he slowly pulled away from her and helped her stand up.

Despite the riots, despite Geta and despite the madness, the Emperor was still here, gently grasping her hand and once more locking her in a kiss, even if Rome fell they would not give up trying to help him out of this doom.

From the moment she had taken him as her husband, she knew that she would always be there for him and that Caracalla would never stop loving her. Because even in madness there was nothing stronger than love.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

@potatoesenpaii , @rainbowbox , @thankyouperconte , @myromanempire81 , @k-yurieee

[gingerdusk]

Trying to figure out TP Link's diet based on his environment.

Livestock-wise, we've got cuccos and goats. That means

Eggs

Milk

Butter

Cheese

Potentially meat, but I don't think they get eaten unless they're old. Too valuable otherwise | EDIT: Oh yeah you need to breed goats every couple years to get milk. Add in cabrito veal!

And we know for a fact that Ordon Goat Cheese specifically is a thing. Stamped wheel and everything.

There's also fish

And bees/hornets(? It's called bee larva, but the enemy is a Hylian Hornet)

Useful for bait, but Link can eat them.

Did some more research, and apparently in Japan they eat wasp larvae? Specifically in Kushihara. So I'm counting it.

Then plants-wise we have pumpkins

And...corn. Somehow. I've never seen corn growing, but Link has some hanging in his house, so it exists.

I'm choosing to believe it comes from these plants that grow in patches around Ordon.

That gives us a lot. We've got

Cornstarch

Cornmeal

Corn oil

Corn shoots

Pumpkin seeds

Pumpkin seed oil

Pumpkin flour

Pumpkin blossoms

No source of sugar, but depending on how the pumpkins in Ordon taste, they could be naturally sweet. Like pie pumpkins. Also corn syrup is a thing if it's a sweet corn. So corn syrup needs cream of tartar which comes from grapes and apples and such. It's a byproduct of wine. No corn syrup.

Edit: Malt sugar, though!

Now for hypothetical foods.

Ordon is surrounded by pine trees, so that adds pine needle tea and pine nuts to the mix. I was a little worried about species, but apparently there are a lot of pine trees that make edible seeds, so on the list it goes.

Then there are frogs near Rusl and Uli's house, wild songbirds on cliffs, and a squirrel that talks to Link directly, so those are huntable sources of meat.

Is horse grass a cattail? Maybe? Initially, I thought it was—the ends look like cattail seedpuffs, but the leaves are completely different.

I want to treat them like cattails. Cattails that also are probably the main food source for Epona and the goats.

If we do that, that means, on top of all the other uses cattails have like stuffing and tinder and antiseptic, we get

Roots

Shoots

Ground seeds

Can't find a good match for hawk grass though. Concluding that that's not edible. Equivalent exchange and all.

Side note, how do you think horse grass spreads? It's almost always in groups of two or more plants, so that suggests rhizomes, but the image of Link picking one up to blow and stuffing flying out the end of the horseshoe is hilarious to me.

Up next, there are ferns, primarily near trees. After very careful and way-too-deep analysis of a pixelated fern's leaves, I think it's bracken fern.

Which is mildly poisonous.

And also edible.

On the list it goes!

Then finally, Sera has some kind of herb hanging in her shop.

I don't know what it is. I'm calling it Ordon Spice. Congratulations, Ordon Pumpkin Spice is now a thing.

[palettepainter]

Snare (Mer Ratchet x Reader)

We are back again and I offer more stuff with my fish husband, based off this ask on muletia's blog

This merformer AU belongs to @muletia, who you should all go and check out btw cuz they're really cool and their writing is delicious, Mer Ratchet's design based off this

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

It’s concerning just how quickly you adjust to the hollow ache in your stomach 

Seven days. Seven days stuck on the island. Seven days too many

Seven long, grueling days where the island continued to mock you and your inexperience in survival: from tripping over stubborn roots hiding in plain sight, or a rude wake up call from one of the dozens of exoctic arachnids that got far too close for your comfort level, to narrowly avoiding being clobbered by falling coconuts 

You’d always liked to think of yourself as adaptable

Life outside of the four, comforting walls of your family home, exposed to the ruthless nature of city life, you had grown to overcome many of the everyday perolas dangers thrown at you: traffic that moved to a painful crawl in the rush hour, rowdy drunks lurking on street corners till the stupid hours of the morning (or until some unfortunate officer was tasked with moving them), catcallers, and worst of all, the horrors of working retail

Even now, in your delirious, thirsty, near starved state, you can still oh so clearly remember the latest interaction you’d had with one of your regulars before becoming marooned. A large chap, unkempt beard and seemingly always wore socks and sandals when he decided to generously grace the store with his presence 

He’d always have something to complain about, it’d become a somewhat inside joke between you and some co-workers to guess what the new topic of interest he’d want to discuss with the cashier, and just who would be the sad sap stuck to listen to it - of course it would have been you, just another thing life wanted to throw in your face 

Thinking back on the occasion you groaned without thinking. Wine, he’d come in to complain about wine

He wanted a refund, saying it tasted “off”

Oh your wine tasted off you say? It’s grape juice that burnt how the FUCK could it taste off?!

Still, if the stars and planets aligned and washed that thick skulled yapper onto the very shoreline you’d washed up on, you’d probably kiss him. Heck, you’d probably kiss the wine bottle, and you weren’t even a big fan of alcohol

A sharp, sudden stinging sensation stabbing your midsection abruptly derails your train of thought

The whine that leaves you is entirely involuntary, and is followed by your stomach trying to further digest itself to your growing discomfort. Arms snake around your midsection where you hug yourself tightly, leaning forward on yourself with weary eyes tightly shut. Maybe if you hugged yourself tight enough, you could squeeze the pain away..

Your attempts are as effective as holding water with a siv. You groan, but press on spitefully 

The only blessing the day seemed to bring you was the weather, which for now, was calm

If it’s just down to bad luck or the whereabouts of where the island you were stuck on lied, but not only were the islands (in your opinion) far too many species of creepy crawlies plotting to give you a heart attack from how often they seemingly materialised out of nowhere, but the weather had also actively been trying to kill you

Even if you’d spent the majority of your life residing in cities, you weren’t totally unaware of how dangerous the natural elements were, how they could flip on a dime. All things considered, only dealing with torrential downpour in the city on occasion, you were privileged

Just two nights ago the wind had been raging, furiously searching for unassuming small trees to batter about, and poor unassuming you had almost gotten crushed when the wind did find a branch to unleash its fury on 

Looking back, you liked to believe you handled the situation gracefully: you’d only cursed aloud seven times and told the branch to go fuck itself once 

To say the experience had rattled you would be a gentle way of phrasing it, but you could only go so long eating papaya and french kissing rain water out of cupped leafs before your body craved for something better, anything that wasn’t fruit 

On your second day on the island you’d had a brief explore of the coastline, and thankfully the island was far from short in its collection of natural rock pools, the perfect, temporary fridge that would gift you a platter of the oceans delicacies 

If only there weren’t other residents lurking in the waters that were just as hungry as you

As the very statement crossed your mind, you went rigid, throwing your gaze to the water. It was still and peaceful, some distance for you to travel to meet it, but nothing for the colossal arms of a creature you’d half convinced yourself was a figment of dehydration to pull themselves out of 

It’s like the ocean was teasing your paranoia with how tranquilly it rests beneath the sun, glimmering and crystal clear

No finned head appears, no massive tail slaps the surface, no face of teeth growling and hissing jumps out at you. Nothing. Not even a gull flies down to settle 

It was hard to keep your persistent hunger and your urge to rush before you attracted company in check as you easily hoisted yourself up onto a horizontal slab of ashy coloured stone that stretched for miles ahead of you, covering the gap between the treeline and the gentle sea that lapped at the rocks edges 

In your state, near crazed with the craving for something made of meat, you begin pleading under your breath while carefully traversing the rock slab “Please be fish please be fish!..” 

Every tiny ripple or shimmer in the rockpools that are littered about at random have your hopes skyrocketing, but what life you find swimming in the enclosed pockets of water are too small fish and shrimps. Agile creatures you know you won’t have a hope of catching, creatures you know won’t quell your hunger 

You needed something bigger, hopefully, something big enough you could easily grab, something that couldn’t slip into a nice safe crack to hide from your grabby hands 

Maybe a crab

‘I’d eat the SHIT out of a crab right now..’

Your mouth becomes an embarrassing pool of saliva that makes you cringe only slightly before you resume your searching, periodically throwing cautious glances to the water to be sure you are alone, safe

Pool after pool after pool turns up lackluster results, only small clusters of shrimp which are eager to dart away as your shadow swallows their rockpool and a handful of fish that blend in with the sandy bottom greet you, nothing that will substitute as even a snack, nothing you want

Your stomach voiced its impatience, and you aim a harsh look down at it  “I’m working on it alright?!”

Given how you have bigger problems to tackle, you’re nowhere near as concerned as one should be at the fact it hadn’t even taken a full day for you to start talking to yourself. It was one of the few things you had left, a constant, the sound of your own voice trying to quell your own panicking. Something the island couldn’t dangle in front of you on a stick and then rip away

Being your own company was better than no company you figured 

Your not so lost to your own increasingly growing urge to feed that you’ve forgotten you don’t necessarily possess the tools to actually cook anything you catch, you are however just famished enough that the notion of consuming a fish raw right out of your bare hands no longer sounds so disgusting 

Worse case scenario, you get food poisoning, but given how the other option was dying from starvation (or dehydration, or infection from a wound, or even a bite from some exoctic, poisonous creature), you’re willing to take your chances

Ten minutes of time trickle by painfully slowly, a lone sea slug lounging in the barely submerged sandflat is the only thing you debate on eating. It doesn’t sound especially appetising, the idea of eating something with the word slug in its name, but you can’t afford to be picky…still, you note the creature down as a last resort if you find nothing else, the soles of your worn shoes softly padding on the sand as you move off the rocks

Time had lost all of it’s meaning since your phone had become a victim to the sea, so you’d been relying purely on your gut and general knowledge to wager when the tide would come in and out 

Your gut however probably looked like a shrivelled up raisin from how dehydrated you felt, so you take a pause to glance back to the line of the water drawn far back along the beach

It’s not clear if it’ll get further out, but it’s far enough out that even if it was coming in, you’d have more than enough time to move inland. Moving further away from your resting place at the lagoon doesn’t give you any peace of mind though, even if the island was small, you’d learnt it was extremely easy to get lost 

And when you were lost, it was easier to let yourself spiral, where the gravity of your situation hit you at its hardest..

Your stomach churned painfully, and not just because you were hungry

You could feel your awareness stretching to the rest of the island around you, the possibility of getting cut off because you were too distracted and having to navigate through the dense undergrowth, becoming the centre of attention to it’s deadly and venomous tennants 

Your mind fuzzed over and looped the horrific scenario till you were forced to rapidly shake your head. Your downward tumbling thoughts were dashed to the furthest corners of your mind, though not enough to entirely relieve you of your anxiety

“Just find a fish! Y-Yeah, just-...just find some food, and go back” you throw a final look up to the waterline, exactly where it was the last time you looked, before slowly moving on 

The slab of rock you’d previously been moving across gradually broke into clusters of rocks surrounded by sand, you opt to trace the sandy paths weaving around them, before climbing the rocks to inspect any rock pools. 

The results continued to disappoint, aside from one particularly large shrimp that was about the size of your thumb, your selection of meal choices were distressingly slim

You were starting to feel like you were fighting a losing battle, your fate already sealed: another evening spent gnawing the flesh off a papaya skin

“Come on! Is it so much to ask for one lousy FISH?!” you announce irritably to the island, your only reply is the soft rustle of palm leaves in the breeze

You groan

“Someone up there must really hate me..” your head slumped, tense shoulders sagging under an intense weight that had been cramped the muscles around your neck from stress. Your shoes leave dragged indents in the sand behind you, emphasising your sulkiness

“Some people might get lost trying to navigate an airport or wait at the wrong bus stop. But nooo not me! I managed to get stuck on a freaking deserted ISLAND-”

The end of your foot caught on something unexpectedly and you stumbled, your look of annoyance swapping for instant panic and regret as you clumsily wobble to catch yourself, which you manage to do with minimal grace

Turning, your expression once again swapped for a new one, confusion sweeping in to take hold of your features as you try to find what culprit tripped you

When you find it, sticking up obviously from the sand, you do a double take and blink: it’s a chain. A thick, rusted one

You’re no marine biologist, but you know that metal chains aren’t naturally occurring, which meant that if this chain was here then..something man made had to be 

Hunger and annoyance are doused in an instant and a warm, welcomed sensation blooms in the centre of your chest, a feeling that you had been longing for, a feeling you’d almost forgotten - hope. Soothing, real hope 

There’s no way it can be people, your logical side barely manages to speak above the surge that pushed you to pick up your feet and follow the chain, if it was more people surely you would have run into them by now 

But still, if the chain was here, it could lead to a boat. Maybe you could salvage something, maybe it’d have tools, or could work as a new shelter - or better yet - honest to good food 

What you would do if it meant you’d find a chocolate bar 

It’s not clear how long you run for, or when exactly it was your jog had shifted to a break neck speed, but by the time you reach the end of the chain, you have to lean against a rock to catch your breath, though you don’t once avert your focus from the vessel before you 

It’s a boat

It’s large, clearly not your average watercraft, and more notably, it’s weathered and damaged far beyond your skill set to be repaired. More so, it was made from metal, so the chances of you being able to restore it to its former glory are next to none.

Dismayed, but undeterred, once your heart settled within your ribcage you push yourself to stand and approach the broken boat 

Even at a distance the extent of the damage is obvious

There's an enormous tear in the side of the hull where a large rock has wedged itself, likely what had caused the harm to begin with. No matter where you look, every area of metal is either rusted a heavy bronze or littered with greedy clumps of barnacles, which say just how long the hunk of metal must have been rotting there. The chain guide that had led you there trailed along the sand, until it climbed up into a small hole along the side, perhaps it used to be some kind of anchor system??

It’s too small to be a cruise ship and too big to be a common purchase for the majority of people. Suppose it doesn’t matter, you reason, approaching the gaping mouth in the side of the boat to better inspect it 

The tear is as large as the boat is rusted, judging the width, it looked like you could easily stretch out your arms and touch either side of metal walls without struggle, but you don’t want to risk a puncture wound, so your arms remain locked steadily at your sides as you carefully lean through the gap 

The inside of the boat arguably looked worse than the outside, everything was covered in barnacles, sand or seaweed, and the lingering stench of salt water slugged you across the jaw with such force you almost retreated back.

Blinking away the tears that had formed in the corners of your eyes from the sting of the odor, you suck in a breath, inflating your chest, before leaning back in 

Immediately to your right is what you assume to be the shabby remains of the engine, now covered from head to toe in kelp and dustings of sand. Even someone as non educated on mechanics as you can safely say it won’t be up and running anytime soon

It’s a disheartening realisation, even if you had been silently bracing for it

Deciding you want a better look, you venture further inside the slightly lopsided vessel and brush your focus across the interior, which aside from the engine, there wasn’t a great deal you could assign a label too. Directly to your left, is some kind of container unit. It has old writing on it, but it’s too faded for you to clearly decipher, and honestly, you doubted it would be hugely helpful information anyway. You also see a ladder on the furthest side of the boat, just as rusted as everything else, but still fastened to the wall of the ship

From where you stand you can tell the ladder leads topside, a pool of golden light from the sun bathing down through the roof and spreading into a puddle at the last foot rung 

Approaching, you give it a sturdy kick, and shrink at the resounding clang that echoes around you. No retaliation in the form of metal finally giving way with a groan comes to mock you, even when you land a second, more sure kick, to its side. The ladder stays still as a rock 

You give it enough thought, enough time to build up a nervous sweat before you anxiously move your foot onto the lowest rung, lifting your other foot off the floor while your hands keep you steady

A second passes…another second…you don’t hear anything aside from the distant cry of seagulls

Every step is climbed with the utmost care, anticipating the dreaded sound of creaking and for the world to tilt sideways, where the moist, cold sand would race up harshly to greet you. Even when you reach the top of the ladder and are in the middle of pulling yourself up onto the surface of the ship, you don’t let yourself sigh in relief until you are supported steadily on both feet 

Given the way the lower deck of the ship was, you’re not surprised to see the main deck was in a similar condition, discoloured with what had to be years of corrosion and speckles of dried bird poop

Just as you did with the interior, you study your new surroundings, noting a small structure to your right which must have been where the steering wheel was located, and some sort of winch like system seated at the far end

Aside from random piles of old nets, upturned empty barrels and the still very present waft of fish, there isn’t a great deal for you to take in. Whatever event caused the ship to become marooned like you must have stolen the majority of equipment that wasn’t vassened down

Although the former details combined with the smell makes it pretty clear you were standing on the deteriorating remains of some kind of fishing boat. THAT, at least, is promising information 

“Maybe they’ll be some kind of fishing rod” you say as you turn your attention towards the steering quarters fist

You reason that, if there was to be any kind of salvageable equipment on this boat, it’d be kept with the controls. You could only pray whoever had been the captain of this ship stored his tools sensibly 

Hanging by a single hinge, the door swung with a pitiful squeak after you gently knocked it forward. You’re half surprised the thing doesn’t crumble to splinters, it looked one gentle gust of wind away from collapsing entirely

Unlike the door, protected from the onslaught of downpours and howling gails, the steering room - all things considered - looked pretty damn well off. Even the two identical seats, positioned side by side across the dozens of controls and blank monitor screens, were arguably in better shape than yourself 

The temptation to collapse into one, into something cushioned and soft, something not made of a pile of leafs you’d sulkily assembled, but something honest and real and man made, to catch just even ten minutes of undisturbed sleep was so bad you could practically clutch the wish in your hands 

But you’re smart enough to know that it wouldn’t be just ten minutes

If you fell asleep in one of the chairs, you might not ever get up, you’d simply rot there until you had molded to its very frame. So, with great restraint, you turn yourself away and start to inspect the rest of the small cabin 

You don’t even bother checking the controls, they wouldn’t do you any good if the engine was busted, so your focus shifts instead to a set of miniature cabinets secured to the wall next to the door frame. 

The wood it smooth and varnished, unlike the rotting door, and the lack of a lock securing it closed grants you a welcomed, soothing wave that decreases the knot of distress that had been lingering in your stomach for a while 

The cabinet doors swing open with ease, and it feels like you’ve hit the motherload once you recognise what the contents staring back at you are

A small first aid kit, looking completely untouched, sits in the top corner, alongside a torch and a packet of opened batteries. On the last shelf is a pair of sunglasses which won’t be useful to you, but the items besides it cause your already growing smile to beam, your face aching from the sheer intensity as it stretched from ear to ear:

To the opposite side of the storage unit was a genuine, real, unopened duo of energy bars

You weren’t even aware your body could move so fast, snatching up one of the bars with lightning speed, practically tearing into the wrapper with your bare teeth where you then snarf it down in nanoseconds. It’s dry, not bursting with flavour as you’d hoped, but there is a faint taste of honey which almost has you collapsing to your knees

God it was good to eat something that didn’t fall out of a tree!

You're left licking every crumb up from your hands, your tongue dipping into the gaps between your fingers and sucking on each one while you stuff the other bar into your pocket. The first bar had not satisfied your hunger, it had only muffled it for the time being, but it would be wiser to save the second bar for later incase you didn’t find any fish 

Two items remained in the cabinet, a spool of twine - looked like the kind you’d find on fishing rods - and a matching knife, probably a means to cut it. The knife looked professional and extremely solid, curious of its weight you wrap your hand around the handle and lift it up, mindful to not cut yourself 

It had some weight to it, but it’s not unbearably heavy. It could definitely be useful, that's for sure, that first aid kit even more so! You really wished you hadn’t lost your hand luggage in the storm, you could have carried all this easily with your backpack

To make matters more complicated, you don’t see anything on the shelves that resembled a case for the blade, so you have no idea how in the world you’re going to carry it around safely 

“....Well” you eye the first aid kit “Lets see what you have inside you huh?” you decide, tugging it down from the shelf along

A very brief look inside shows you it’s reasonably supplied, with a decent roll of bandages left, some unopened disinfectant wipes, a hand cloth, plasters and even a needle and thread, which you really hope you won’t have to use

Still, it’s something, and the peace of mind knowing you have the proper tools to dress an injury if you get a bad one is enough for you

You stuff the twine into the case, the torch goes into your other pocket and then you meticulously wrap the blade up in the cloth. It’s not the best handiwork you’ve done, and it’s not the smartest solution (calling it smart at all seemed like a stretch), but it was all you could think of as a temporary solution. Better that then you unintentionally stabbing yourself

Giving the room one last look over for anything else that might prove useful, you exit the steering room five minutes later with blade in one hand and medical kit in the other, a newfound vigor pumping through your being 

“Tide is still pretty far out”

Hand settling above your brow you squint at the blue, horizontal line drawn back across the mudflat

The sun hung high in the sky, a strong indicator it must have been the early beginnings of the afternoon, that gives you reason to believe you had, at the very least, a few hours before the sea came back in 

With the shipwreck explored, you see no further reason to linger. You hadn’t forgotten your original objective that had urged you to crawl your way out from the lagoon and to the beach, rather than fester in a depressed lump on the floor. 

Still, if you were leaving anyway, you might as well appease your curiosity of what lies at the far end of the ship. Two birds with one stone and all that 

Crossing the space between you and the end of the ship, aside from the evident winch centred in the middle and the twisted coils of rope knotted inside the feeding system, there’s not a great deal. While you are still no more knowledge on boats than you were before you’d stumbled across the wreck, you wonder if a malfunction with the winch was in anyway related to why it was beached

The immense length of netting feeding out from the winches mouth was a disorderly mess of thick, inky black string. It looked like it had gotten jammed, whoever had been steering the boat prior to its crash hadn’t even ordered for their team to draw the netting back in, leaving it to trail off down the rear of the boat and onto the sand 

Still, whatever reason caused the boat to crash, you knew it had happened a long time ago, and you could only hope that however big the crew was, that they didn’t suffer too badly

Did any of them even survive being washed up on the island, or would you stumble across their naked, skeletal remains. Or worse, did those creatures get to them before they got to the shore, you wonder morbidly-

You shake your head so quickly it practically becomes a blur, your windswept hair tossing back and forth across your shoulders

‘No no!! Lets not think about that!’

Hoping to outrace your own thoughts you make a beeline back to the ladder

The first aid kit is the first to take the descent down, you opt to let it drop to the floor and collect it later rather than risk climbing with it in hand. Thankfully, it lands with a harmlessly thud in the sand, and once your feet land on the ground you find it undamaged after inspecting it 

Exiting back through the tear you take a minute to brush yourself and the first aid kit off, before you round the side of the boat to scavenge any remaining pools. The netting from the boat has been carried over to the side from the insistent pull of the ocean, and idly, you brush your hand along the taut rope like it’s a makeshift safety railing before it droops too low for your hand to follow

If you were completely honest, you were beginning to doubt you’d find anything given your string of luck so far. But with a fresh medical kit, new tools and even an energy bar on hand, you find yourself not nearly as frustrated as you could have been

“This will make getting fruit off the papaya skins easier at least” you say while turning the knife about in your palm “Maybe even help crack open some coconuts” you add more as an afterthought through a hum 

A knife was a game changer

Not only did the idea of harvesting fruit from trees no longer bring forth as much annoyance, but potentially, you might be able to start an actual fire. 

So far, you’d been keeping warm as best you could with the very clothes on your person, your old jacket you’d had since college, and any intact palm tree leaves. It was helpful that whatever continent you’d washed up in seemed to be one of a warmer climate, so the nights weren’t terribly chilly. 

The idea of being watched by sets of hungry eyes in the shrubbery was what kept you lying awake rather than the cold . Even if you didn’t want to entertain the idea of potentially having to use the knife in self defence against an animal, an animal that was just trying to survive like you, knowing you had the means to defend yourself was as reassuring as it was uncomfortable 

At the thought of having to actually fight back against a predator, your eyes unconsciously turn to the sea, pace slowing to an anxious crawl. You’re all too aware of your own fragility all at once, your head swinging on a pivot, feeling the need to rescan your surroundings for danger 

Fidgeting to move, your walking speed shifted to something with more oomph to it, hurriedly shuffling along while being mindful of the space between the edge of the treeline, yourself, and the water

The weight of being ambushed now pushed on your mind like a sack of bricks, fueling your internal panic

Attempting to calm down, you inhaled a greedy lungful of air, sighing loudly “Easy, you're okay..nothings happened yet”

You tried to apply logic to soothe the monkey part of your brain, the part that is the reason for why you’ve lost so many hours of sleep and also the part that’s helped you adapt so far. Your attempts are only half affective, leaving you somewhat calmed, but the anxiety still bubbles within you

“You’re far away from the water, and a creature that big wouldn’t swim into shallow waters anyway unless it needed to” 

The rocks start to form a small incline, and with your hands full holding the med kit and knife, you turn to walk around it rather than scale it, practising calm breathing as you do so

“If I feel scared, I can just run into the trees. There's no way it would follow me inland!” the reminder that the treeline was less than ten feet to your side is seemingly a needed one, your shoulders hunched forward from stress beginning to gradually ease 

“I’m perfectly safe” you breathe, your voice carrying finality to it that has you nodding in agreement with yourself. 

Yes, you are safe, you’re well out of the line of danger from any giant, logic defying creatures that make you question all information humanity holds of the sea. The tide is far out and the temperature high, the further thing from ideal conditions for any animal of the sea

All evidence pointed to you being well and truly safe

You aren’t prepared for the sight that greets you once you have cleared the side of the rock 

There's a body resting against the mudflat, taller and thicker than you by bounds, a tipped up head with a face that’s about as similar to a human as you’d hoped to find on the small area of land. Netting is wrapped around and around its body, pinning its arms down sharply and twisting around it’s lower half adorned by fins, at an awkward angel that has to be uncomfortable

He’s there, trapped before you, a terrifying, unimaginable creature not of your world

Just as you begin to think what you were seeing can’t possibly be real, the damn things chest moves. It’s breathing. It’s alive

With a cry, you throw yourself backwards, tumbling clumsily into the sand where your arms and legs work overtime to propel you away, scrambling to conceal yourself behind the rocks 

Hurriedly shuffling onto your rear, you shove yourself backwards, spine pressed back against the cold surface of the rock where you get a moment to collect yourself, desperately gulping down air that was never enough to fill your lungs

It seemed however, your less than graceful announcement of your presence had stirred the beast from its slumber 

It bellows a loud, haunting croon that launched a heavy rock straight into your stomach that has it bottoming out, and in fear of alerting it further to your presence, you slap your hands tightly over your mouth 

You hear movement, the ground shaking as the gargantuan body of muscle shifted and flexed out of sight just beyond the rocks. The sound of rope stretching to its limits has you casting a cautious glance to the thick, twisted vine of netting nearby that is pulled firmly across the mineral formation supporting you

It loosens by a millimetre, then tightens with a strained snap noise. A distressing, quiet rumble sounds into the air, and then silence. You dare not breath in fear it will discover you’re still lingering, still within attacking range

You brace yourself for something, any kind of sound that would indicate the creature was going to attack you, to find the strength to rip apart its bindings and devour you whole in one bite

The treeline isn’t so far away you couldn’t make a run for it, but that would mean revealing yourself, that would mean turning your vulnerable back and nape of your neck to the creature. Two things you are NOT planning to do

In the very next second, not entirely sure if your panic made you imagine it, you hear a whuff of an exhale, and a low, lamenting croon. It almost sounded…hopeless 

Your panic subsides, just a little

It takes you a minute, to gather what scarce remains of courage you possessed to move out from your hiding spot, carefully peaking out your head to eye the limp body of the beast on the sand 

Despite the terror it’s very presence strikes into your being, its head lolled unsteadily on its shoulders, almost drunkenly. Its tail shifted weakly in the netting, before falling completely still.

Now that you were taking a moment to get a proper look, you can see how the twine had cruelly scraped away the outer layer of its thick pearly white and orange skin, rubbing parts of its sensitive stomach and sides raw from it’s fruitless struggling, revealing the soft, pink flesh underneath 

Despite your fear, you wince at the sight, a ghost of sympathy crossing your face. That looked…really painful

Its breaths are shallow, it’s chest rising only by a few inches with each laboured breath, before deflating with flared nostrils

You make the mistake of letting your eyes travel up further, and you frown at the sight of one particular part of the net that digs into the valley between the bottom of the creature's neck and shoulder blade

The area surrounding the twine already looked decently red, and you can’t begin to imagine the hot irritation it was causing

Your attention moved higher, distantly noting the jagged scratch lines dragged in the sand from the beings claws, and the imprint its head left in the damp sand…an imprint..-

Every single thought in your mind evaporates as you decide to snap your eyes towards the eldritch mers head, where you find its hazy focus angled in your direction. You freeze, ice shooting down your veins and scratching goose bumps along your back

The mer doesn’t move, so much as twitch to your presence, studying you warily, black iris’s thin, threatening lines against turquoise pupils. Lips peel back over teeth that instinctively has you recoiling with a whimper, your monkey brain ready to catapult you into the safety of the forest while a threatening growl ruptures from the mers throat

But then something peculiar happens, something which makes you blink at the mer, your brows furrowing  

His growling fizzles away, his pupils go fuzzy, unfocused, blinking just barely cracked open eyes out of sync. The fins on either side of it’s head droop simultaneously to the wheezing sound of him exhaling, he suddenly looked…exhausted

The tension lifts from your shoulders, not fully sure if the mer is completely aware of your presence or not anymore. Looking at his face, and the notably distant quality to his gaze, it was like he was peering through you. When pale lips seal back over his teeth, you curiously find yourself not feeling any peace of mind

You failed to suppress a flinch when the creature allowed it’s head to flop heavily into the sand

How long had he been beached??..

Beating down from its place hung in the sky, you squint up at the sun, throwing up your hand to try and shield your eyes from stinging too much. It’s sweltering, and despite the slim collection of layers you were wearing - that consisted of a slightly dirtied plain top and a pair of trousers - you’re sweating buckets

In the time you’ve spent on the island, you’d lost what had to have been at least a stone in weight through sweat alone 

It’s too hot out.

The direness of the situation hits you in an instant, causing you to throw your head back towards the mer who was laying unnaturally still, but then a rumbling whine wrenches you out of your thoughts with a visceral jolt 

You have to shake yourself to refocus, something that you feel is becoming second nature, before you eye the rest of the rocks just beyond the mers body. 

With the beast restrained, you could continue safely. You could slip by him, if you were careful enough, perhaps undetected

You needed to find more food

Tightening your jaw, snorting out a breath, you work fluidly to collect up your first aid kit and the knife which you had dropped in your fumble to get away, before hauling yourself up.

Your legs buzz, pins and needles tickling the bottoms of your feet and thighs from how long you had remained sitting. You ignore the pain, pushing off to meet the rest of the rocks

It’s hard to maintain a calm walking pace for your tingling legs while you keep your eyes locked onto the massive body of the mer. Even if they were restrained, you were not about to risk the chance of those rows of teeth biting through the netting and launching at you, but even so every subtle shift of it’s tail has a lump further lodging itself in your throat 

When the rocks are within five feet you practically jump for them, quickly throwing yourself behind the largest one that could hide your body, releasing a breath your body had been holding hostage

You fear you might cry from the way your body runs cold with a potent mix of weariness and immense relief of not being caught, so you clamp your eyes shut, craning your head until the back of your skull softly bumps against the rock 

Somewhere behind you, you can just about hear the frail wheezing of the creatures lungs fighting to intake air, which you promptly ignore 

You owe the beast nothing. Just find more food and go back to the lagoon

Standing to your feet you waste no time in marching ahead, eyes narrowed and intense, busy searching for more pools, maybe if you honed enough of your attention on the task 

at hand you’d forget all about the encounter that just transpired

Alas, despite the wishes of your mind, something within you compels you to turn your eyes to the far off sea still drawn out from the beach 

Unlike yourself, the tide is in no rush to gravitate back towards the soft sand that formed the surrounding beach of the island. Neither is the sun pressured to lower any faster in the sky, not even a passing cloud for it to duck behind even temporarily 

A sinking feeling that causes your stomach to bottom out returns, but for an entirely different set of reasons

Your feet grow restless with the sensation of pins and needles sparking under the flesh 

Reluctantly, knowing it's a bad idea, you turn your head over your shoulder. You can’t see the mer too well from your current position, but to your dismay, you clearly hear the sound of it’s wounded cry that carries through the air

It doesn’t want to be trapped…

…The lump returns in your throat as you peer down to the ground

You can’t believe it, that you’re even considering turning back 

It’s moronic, utterly insane! What were you expecting the mer to do once it was freed? Shake your hand and thank you and then let you walk away?! 

“It’s not my problem” you speak, pressing the ball of your hands into your eyes, muttering the mantra over and over, yet the way your voice carries doesn’t pair with the fact your fighting to re-enforce

‘Don’t turn around. Don’t turn around. DON’T get involved!..’

…..You turn your head skyward with a sigh

Placing your first aid kit back down by the rock you’d been hiding behind, shaking all the way, you retrace your steps back to the stranded mer

He’s right where he was before, body just barely shifting under the movement of his weak breathing. Your grip on your knife grows tighter, knuckles turning weight, threatening to crush the handle as you unhurriedly remove the cloth covered the blade

You have no doubt in your mind the knife would be able to cut through that netting, getting close to it was were things were going to get interesting

With every bit of caution you could muster, not daring to even blink for one second, like the mer was going to turn on you and reveal his weakened state to be a trick to play at your little human heartstrings, you begin to close the narrowing space of distance between you

You don’t even pay any mind to the fact you can’t so much as hear your heartbeat in your ears as you do feel it galloping a mile per minute, it’s the massive, tangerine dipped body of the mer, that has your full attention 

It continued to huff for air, and when you are so close you could touch him - well within the creatures throttling distance - do you see how it’s eyes have gradually closed

Must have drained itself of energy in its efforts to free itself, your chest ached in pity at the thought

Tightening your lip, swallowing painfully, the up close, personal look you get of the damage caused by the netting only makes your stomach feel hollow

The flesh of his body goes as stiff as a log with each inhale that inflates his chest, pushing back against the netting which only further worsens the pressure on his skin. A broken whimper tumbles from his mouth, face twisting despite how his eyes stay closed 

You HAD to get this netting off him

There’s a tremble to your hand which you are acutely aware of as you timidly reach your tiny little human appendage towards the mer. Without warning, he inhales sharply, and like you’ve been scorched your hand retreats to safely curl by your chest

The prominent fin atop his back tried to raise with his breathing, but only manages to pathetically twitch beneath the two lines of netting restraining it

You wait, still as a mountain - you didn’t know it was possible for the human body to become so still - before the behemoth's body deflates. Every rational cell in your body was screaming at you to bail, but one look back to the firm netting wound about the mers body, and you know backing out isn’t an option 

Cutting down on the rope wouldn’t work, you might nick more skin, and you don’t fancy having your flesh becoming acquainted with the creature's teeth if you unintentionally stab them. You’d need to cut upward 

A thin sheen of sweat along your forehead reminds you of the sun's intensity, and that time is still not on your side. The longer you hesitate, the more pain the creature would be in, you needed to act 

Forcing your body into motion, careful motion, you lay your hand onto the creature's side. His skin was smooth, and what has your worry tripling, near bone dry. The fact that the mer doesn’t seem to react to your touch is something you decide is a good thing, it’s deleria playing to your advantage, and offering you the needed push to begin cutting 

Wiggling your hand under the first line of netting that wrapped over and around the mers stomach, you manoeuvre the flat side of your blade beneath it and begin to cut. Every fibre that breaks away has you sending quick, observing glances to the mers head, which remained laying sideways in the sand 

The piece of netting you’d been sawing at cracks apart with a sharp SNAP, falling away from the beast's body. Precious little inches are returned, allowing the muscles of his lower body to expand without restraint, yet it still managed to carve an angry indent across its scales

You don’t know what it was that possessed your hand, reaching out until you softly brush your fingers over the mark in some innately human attempt at comfort

‘It’ll be a while before this mark fades’ -  you think sadly, your thumb now brushing back and forth against it -  ‘But at least there isn’t any blood, seemed it didn’t cut too far into-’

At once aware of the sensation of your hand brushing its sensitive skin, the mers eyes snap open. Enlarged pupils shrink to glinting slits, lips drawing back into a snarl with a thundering shriek 

It’s thrashing throws up wet clumps of sand and water that flicks speckles across your face and legs, yet somehow you don’t loosen your grip on your cutting knife in spite of the fear that explodes across your senses

“H-HEY HEY! Woah!- Easy! I-I’m trying to help!-” the monstrous creature reared to the best of its ability, not caring for your explanations, somehow summoning the strength to lift its upper body where it then crashed back into the sand

Panicking, you back peddle and just barely avoid getting your legs crushed

Heart attacking feeling imminent, you launch yourself to the next piece of rope before your body can overpower your mind. A startling shrill threatened to deafen you as another section of netting broke in half with a CRACK, another red line indented in its place. That time, you don’t waste a second to feel sad over it 

Each frantic smack of their tail has your heart threatening to jump out of your throat, every muscle, internal organ and blood cell itching to sprint to the safety of the trees. Each new snap of netting breaking away earns you a blood chilling roar which slices a year off your lifespan, and yet, your body move swiftly without your control 

When you get to the trail, you don’t even think about how it would have been smarter to leave the tail for last so you wouldn’t get battered, or how using your own small, delicate human body as a weight to hold it down was not your best example of improvising 

“Don’t worry!! I’m gonna get you out! J-Just a little bit longer okay?” Why you’re still speaking you don’t know, it’s clear the mer can’t understand you, though maybe you’re trying to reassure yourself more than him

Pinning the very end of his tail down with one hand, the muscle just thin enough for your palm to easily circle it, you start with the parts of netting that have coiled themselves far too tightly around its bottom fins. They’re scrunched up in a way that, if left, you’re positive will leave long lasting scarring

The down side? Given how badly tangled the rope was, you’d have to take your time to cut the netting away 

The body of the mer still thrashed even as you begin the meticulous task of slicing away the net as meticulously and quickly as you can, each gruelling snap as the material frays against the edge of your blade and every warning cry from the head of the creature has you feeling nauseous from the pressure weighing on you

Pushing more onto your knees, one leg either side of the mers tail to steady yourself, you suppress the urge to stress vomit. Barely.

More snaps and cracks of the rope free more and more skin, allowing the tail fins room to breathe and uncurl to their full glory, slapping the sand angrily at your persistent closeness “E-Easy big guy, almost done! Just gotta-”

You jerk your arms back as another piece of the netting breaks apart violently. The reaction from the mer comes sooner than you expected 

The moment it falls to the sand, the tail under you is torn from beneath you. There was still some netting tying it down, and you feel your heart plummeting when in a powerful yank, the mer recoiled and the netting broke in half with the sound of a cracking whip 

As soon as it registered its tail was free it reared upward, arms tearing downward on the last remainder of rope upon its chest that broke as though it was threading. It spasmed wildly, truly like a fish out of water, and before you can come to the sinking realisation your luck might have just run dry, you are hurled away

You were sent flying, cutting off your yelp of terror just in time before you land face first into the sand. You aren’t left laying dazed against the sand for more than a second though before your reliable instinct of flight springs you back to reality. Scrambling back on your arms you heave, searching eyes locating the beast some distance from you, swaying and huffing 

Numbly, you clench your hand, and pale when you don’t clasp around plastic. You must have lost your knife in the tumble, but you’re nowhere near confident enough to shift even a miniscule slither of your attention away from the very awake, free mer

The mer stumbles, propped upward on trembling arms as if it was a struggle to do so, head swinging unevenly, blinking owlishly as if he was trying to refocus. Strenuous breaths are gulped down into his shaking lungs through an open mouth, were just barely, you catch a peek of razor incisors 

Your breathing quickens, chest rising and falling beneath the flimsy fabric of your shirt which feels like your only means of armour protecting your flimsy human skin, and when those peacock blue pupils and thinned, wary slit eyes hone onto you - as though the mer had remembered your presence - fear crashed into you with the force of a meteorite 

This was it

Visions of a sandy grave flash across your mind as you wonder, will you be painstakingly torn limb from limb, or will this beast elect to grant you mercy and put you out of your misery before consuming your flesh. Would it use your bones as toothpicks? Keep your skull as some souvenir??

You want to yelp, to throw your arms over yourself in some meager defence, but you find yourself unable. So you sit there, paralysed from hysterical fear, eyes wide as plates, dreading the moment the mer will explode into motion and lunge at you

….Why wasn’t he moving??

You almost leap out of your skin when the creature unexpectedly clicks, observing you through narrowed eyes, the fins decorating the side of its face raising, but you don’t pay those details much mind. How could you? When the creature has its entire attention solely on you

What the hell was it doing?? Weighing the pros and cons of if you’d make a satisfactory meal??

Somehow, someway, you find the power to pull trembling words from your throat, just barely managing to speak them clearly “W-What?..” you ask, and the mers tail shifted along the sand, flicking upward once. It doesn’t avert its eyes

It moved. It’s body glided slowly yet calculatedly towards you

You panic, resuming your mad scrambling in a desperate attempt to keep yourself within a bubble of safety. For every inch you slide back, the mer covers several with ease, until your hand slips against the damp sand and you fall back onto your elbows with a grunt

The mer is practically on top of you before you can blink, lips thankfully only parted slightly, but that’s still too much, you can see the outline of their teeth

Claustrophobia and megalophobia simultaneously wrap around your chest like a great boa constrictor, pleading for the flesh of the earth to swallow you

Powerless, and utterly small against the creature caging you, you clamp your eyes shut - moisture still leaked from them regardless -  and bite on your gums, whining pathetically. If the worse was to come you didn’t want to witness it 

Sniffing

You feel strands of hair along your scalp wafting, then a blast of hot air blasts over your face, sending them back. What in the actual hell was it DOING?! Was it going to eat you or not?!

You don’t want to look, incapacitated by the overwhelming fear you’ll be annihilated if you so much as twitched. But you must, you need to see what it’s doing, need to see with your own eyes how hard it was contemplating it’s next actions, the actions that decided if you lived or became slowly digested

Shaking like a chihuahua, your eyelids peel back

The mer had leaned back considerably, but seemed shocked at the sight of your pupils staring back at him. It’s not obvious what emotion was on his face nor what he was thinking, but the wave of his fins and the trill that gurgles in the back of his throat portrayed something mildly inquisitive 

…You tilted your head, and to your perplexed shock, the creature cautiously mimicked

“Uhm-” your voice abruptly cutts itself of when you catch the mers pupils contract once again, you try to retract your head into your shoulders like a tortoise 

It leaned forward, eyes narrowed, fins pinned back to the sides of its head giving it the impression of an overly large, annoyed house cat. A house cat with predatory claws and teeth, a very scary, predatory house cat

You swallow, unable to look away

….It uttered a single, pitched chirp in your face, before quick as a flash, it jumps off you and makes a mad dash towards the retracted oceanline

As if recalling you needed air to function, you gasp, chest inflating to its fullest before you exhale, though it sounded more like a poorly disguised wheeze. Everything felt heavy, your body drained of its energy reserves leaving you running on fumes that gradually, if sluggishly, pushed you to sit up

The body of the mer bounding towards the sea on its stomach is a safe enough distance away that you felt it was fine to stand, your legs wobble beneath you, your centre of balance skewed alongside how winded you felt.

Heaving for air that never seemed to satisfy your burning lungs, you watch as the dot of the mer becomes smaller and smaller in the distance, until its shape disappeared beneath the blue of the sea and slipped out of view beneath the waves 

You’re…alive

You’re not bleeding chunks in the bottom of the creature's stomach

To double check, you press two fingers to the side of your neck, where the rapid thump of your pulse races below 

You were alive. Shaken, terrified, perhaps even traumatised, but alive

….Your legs buckled with a weak groan as you collapsed to the ground again, you needed a minute

[houseofthedragonn]

could you write one where reader is sick and cregan takes care of her I’m sick atm and It’s painful to even breathe so it would help😭

SICK FEELING

SYNOPSIS - you’re sick so cregan cancels his trip to the Wall and drops everything to take care of you, sending ravens for the best Maesters of the Citadel because he cannot bear to lose you…

WARNINGS - NO smut

WORKS

“Send ravens to the Citadel—my ladywife deserves the best Maesters! I will not lose her to this illness!” Cregan yelled, while throwing a cup at the door after a servant said Maester Kennet was busy taking stock of what the Wall needed before Stark set off farther North. “And there will be no trip to the Wall—not until my love’s health is restored again!”

He was not normally so tyrannical with Winterfell’s servants.

But the poor boy who shut the door to our chambers knew it was only because Cregan worried. He did not leave my bedside since I came down with a fever. Just days before he had to travel to the Wall, which he now canceled.

“No! You must… go, my love. Maester Kennet… can care for me, while you’re gone, at the Wall… it’s not… Bennard’s fault,” I coughed, sputtering, struggling to breathe, let alone speak as I felt sorry for the servant boy.

“I know… I’m just so angry! At this sick feeling and all the pain I cannot take away for you…” Cregan caressed my face gently with a wet towel. Its icy coldness cooled down my sweaty, fiery flesh burning as hot as the hearth in the corner, crackling. “Where is the bloody Maester?!”

Stark howled and the door swung open shortly thereafter.

A confused Kennet saw you had gotten much worse after at first appearing to be better. But the truth was I had only acted as if I were getting better for Cregan. I knew how much he worried, and with his trip to Wall so soon, I did not want to be why he could not go. Only for the fever to grow stronger overnight.

Draining me of my health and strength.

“Lady Stark will be in the best care, my Lord,” Maester Kennet began before making my husband more mad. “The Wall needs supplies, you need not stay here—”

“Need not stay? Need not stay?!” Cregan was furious. “When my dear wife could be inches away from…” He trailed off before saying what he feared most, and he was the most fearless man I ever knew. “No! That will not happen! I will not let it. Call all of the Maesters of the Citadel who will come. We will find a cure.”

“Yes, Lord Stark… I shall go make another tonic, my books say this may yet be the one to heal her. My Lady, my Lord.” Kennet obeyed.

Knowing that when Cregan got in this sort of mood it was best not to test him.

Wordlessly, he just nodded sternly at the Maester before Ken left, shutting the door behind him once more. Cregan kissed my forehead, despite my fears of getting him sick as well. I made a noise as if protesting.

Mumbling how I would never forgive myself if I got him ill.

“I don’t care,” Stark snarled, sweetly kissing my cheek, before wetting the towel in the bowl of water by my bedside once more. “Rather be ill in bed with you than at the Wall, away from you, my love…”

He ran the towel it over my dry, chapped lips.

Before bringing both a glass of water first then a cup of wine to my lips. I drank with labored effort, my throat as dry as the Dornish desert. He only left my side to get up, open the door, and shout into the hallway for a servant to bring us more water and wine. Coming back to bed, he laid beside me, snuggling into my side under the wolf’s fur blanket. I noticed in my dreamy fever haze how he grabbed a plate of grapes from the small dining table we had in our chambers. Fit for a Great Lord and his Lady, it had every kind of fruit and food he knew I liked imaginable. And even though they were my favorite, my illness stole even my appetite.

Struggling to eat, let alone keep breathing.

“Cregan, I can’t, I’m too weak…” I wheezed, the thought of having to chew alone making my head ache.

“Yes, you can, my love. Please, for me. Maester Kennet said yesterday you must eat something with the tonic…” Stark was convincing, so I struggled through the bites of grapes he fed me by hand. “Good girl… I pray to the gods that tonic takes.”

“It will… you won’t lose me, Cregan. Please, don’t worry so much, my love. It pains me to see you so worried…” I caressed his handsome face with my burning fingertips.

He gave me a weak smile, “I cannot lose you, love. I refuse to. And I cannot help but worry… I love you, my Lady. You are my everything… my winter sun, my summer snow. Need you more than the air I breathe. I don’t know what I would do if I lost you, I’d go mad! Please, please don’t leave me…”

Stark was the most vulnerable I had ever seen him.

In nothing but his tunic and trousers, he was utterly powerless for once in his life. Every opponent he ever faced not nearly as formidable as him, until he met the cursed sickness claiming his wife’s health. He stayed by my bedside praying to his old Northern gods and to the new ones of the Seven, to any gods who would listen. Begging on his knees for me to be back to myself again.

To not lose me when we had married but mere months ago.

“I’m not going anywhere, Stark. I love you too much to leave you. I will fight this illness as hard as Northerns fight, my love. For you…” I sighed, pressing a soft kiss to his lips, shaky hand on his broad shoulder.

A knock at the door alerted you both to Kennet’s return.

He came bearing the tonic in a bottle I downed fast. Cregan had thanked him, with his apology for his earlier behavior evident in his apologetic tone. The Maester nodded, understanding. He told us to tell him if my health improved within the hour, or if it kept declining. I knew it was too soon to tell, but part of me felt its wonders working, slowly, but surely. Stark’s shoulders had a weight on them that seemed to lift at this.

Seeing me regain some strength, sitting up in bed beside me.

“I think my appetite is back, my Lord. And I would love some chicken stew, if the kitchen has any…” I asked after a while of us just laying there in each other’s arms.

Feeling some color rush back into my pale face. After Cregan’s palm against my forehead felt my temperature start returning to normal within the hour.

“Of course, my Lady… I will send for some now. And if they’re out of it, I shall go hunt whatever it is you’re in the mood for,” He immediately shot out of bed, going to the door again and shouting into the hallway for my meal to be brought to bed.

I heard servants shuffling about the stone floors downstairs to the kitchen at once.

Stark, satisfied that things were in his control once again, I saw start to stress less. He came back to bed with a bigger smile now, and not treating me like a glass figurine that would shatter. Squeezing me tighter now in his strong arms under the wolf’s fur blankets, sprinkling kisses all over my face. Finding my lips, he pressed soft, firm kisses to my mouth over and over again in bed for what seemed like hours. So long that the hearth started to burn out. Only breaking apart our kiss to get up and put more tinder on it.

Before returning back to bed, back to me.

[audreyscribes]

Ω PJO DEMIGOD HEADCANONS:

🍇DIONYSUS; God of Wine making, fertility, theater, festivity, and insanity. 🎭

author's note: I had a sudden idea about writing some headcanons Camp Halfblood demigods being claimed and what it's like for each respective god and cabin, followed by a small blurb afterwards. Thank you for reading and please like and reblog! The order is not in order of the cabin numbers. [PJO DEMIGOD HEADCANONS MASTERLIST]

You get claimed in an untypical manner. You heard of demigods waiting for a sign of their godly parent claiming them, with a glowing symbol above their head. Instead, when you get introduced to the camp members, Mr. D appears carrying a can of diet coke and casually states “No need to put them in the Hermes’ cabin. They're one of mine's”

Cue the record scratch. This immediately brings a lot of confusion and gossip. Many eyes look between you and Mr. D who doesn't seem bothered at all. You saw Chiron sigh and place his hand to his face, giving your godly father a disappointed headshake. Then you hear Castor and Pollux yell that they have a new sibling that they didn't even know about?!

You get a lot of looks of sympathy and jealousy. You don't figure out why until a little bit later on. Chiron fills you in with a reassuring voice but also speaks with an exasperated tone to Dionysus 

Although you guys can't make wine or touch anything alcohol related, you did inherit Dioynsus' wine making skills. This includes also being good at making infused drinks or mixing drinks that range from mixing soda flavours together to making your tea blend. Even if the flavours shouldn't work together or whatever the drink type you're making, you just can. You are your own personal barista.

Putting this first and out of the way, you're both in a blessed and awkward situation where you are able to see and interact with your godly parent. Mr. D tries to treat you like every other demigod in Camp Halfblood, and that makes it awkward when you don't know if you should call him “Dad” or “Mr. D”, but at the same time, you know you have it better then others. 

It doesn't mean Mr. D doesn't keep an eye out. When you dedicate your offerings to the gods and look at him when you do it, you can just see Dionysus’ face soften and his eyes have a hint of affection. 

Don't ask how you or your other half-siblings came to be if Mr. D was sentenced to Camp Halfblood. You won't get an answer from but at least you know you're not alone and the twins are glad to have a baby sibling. Get ready for the youngest sibling treatment. 

Dionysus is the God of Theatre so you have a theatrical flare. Even if you're introverted, you're not exempt; this can be applied in how you do certain things or be rather convincing at times. If you're extroverted, well, you're automatically the Theatre kid. 

This turns out to be rather useful in events like Capture the Flag in a state of mania. When the heat of the battle starts to get to you, you feel your godly parent's power begin to rise in you and you can use that theaters flair to rouse your teammate's spirits up. You can also get a bit maniac and effect your teammates and enemies alike and become rather terrifying. 

You have a bit of a green thumb so you can find some solace with the Demeter kids. However, unlike the Demeter kids who can just make plants grow and flourish, your green thumb only really applies to plants you have an interest in like Dionysus with his grapes…or now strawberries. Regardless, you can keep a houseplant alive at least. 

Aside from a few very selected people within Camp, you're one of the few people who has seen Mr.D's true form. Not his godly form or the Mr. D you've seen, but the form he usually shows in front of mortals. Then it becomes very obvious how your other parent became so enamoured. You thank him silently for taking up his current form because you’re not going to be ready to hear about Mr. D being a DILF.

“Welcome to Cabin 12!” greeted Castor and Pollux as they opened the door to the cabin. You looked inside and saw how lived in the cabin was. It was clear the twins didn't expect to have another sibling and judging by the absolute shock that your shared father was supposed to be stuck in Camp, they really didn't expect him to have another mortal child.   

You also noticed on one of their nightstands there were stacks of Coke and Pepsi, each belonging to one of the beds. There were copious amounts of it, and you wonder if being a child of Dionysus was a prerequisite of having a drink as your go-to drink. Like wine fo Dionysus…though you heard he had to switch to Diet Coke due to his punishment. 

“Yeah, sorry for the whole…mess,” said Castor as he looked sheepish. “Pollux and I weren't expecting anyone else to be here, especially since it's been so long since we've first arrived. And you know, our dad, being, well-”

Pollux cleared his throat, “What Castor means, despite everything, we're thrilled to have a baby sibling. We've always been together so we're not that alone, but every now and again, we kind of get envious of the other cabins and having other siblings.”

You smiled when the door is knocked and a new bunk bed is being brought in, Castor and Pollux grinned at you. “Come on, let's get your stuff and space ready, and let's go see our dad.”

[romaniacs]

▌ㅤWANDA MAXIMOFF — AFTER A TWENTY-HOUR FLIGHT

( read more ) synopsis — wanda is tired and irritable... but your attempts to soften her mood and help her relax with a glass of wine work wonders. warnings — wanda maximoff x female reader. just stressed wanda, a bit suggestive. short, fluff.

wanda arrives at the hotel with you after your longest flight; she’s grumpy and tired, carrying all the suitcases and refusing to let you help. despite her exhaustion, she still takes care of you. you want to kiss away her frustration, but you know it wouldn't do any good. you think she needs rest, not you. wanda won't even look at you, and then you have an idea.

"what… what about some wine?" you suggest. "they have it here."

"must be expensive" she mumbles.

"it's on me" you say quietly, grabbing it from the minibar. wanda sighs, releasing all her stress as she looks at you. she can't treat you poorly, especially not because she’s mad.

"sorry. the flight’s delay pissed me off a bit."

"i know, it’s alright" you hold her hand, and she lifts it to kiss yours.

"you’re so sweet to me" wanda smiles. "my baby" you try not to laugh as you fold on the inside, but it’s impossible not to. you blush easily at that, and wanda just grins playfully.

"don't get shy now" she says, taking her jacket off. "i miss you. we barely talked on the plane."

"i miss you too."

"how much?" she teases, and you smile a bit.

"a lot" wanda takes a sip of wine as you confess, then another, and finally a whole gulp.

"how much?" her tone is more serious now. you know what she wants from you, and who are you to deny her that?

your lips meet hers softly. "too much, maximoff" you tell her through soft touches, that eventually turn into a passionate kiss.

it truly shows her how much you mean your words and how missing her is eating you up inside. wanda sighs into the kiss, tasting of grapes, and your head spins harder than the alcohol would make it. it feels heavenly, touching her freely again, and that grows into what she’s truly been wishing for: having all of you.

[luvelve]

˚ · . lucky strike - c. seungcheol

summary: your first time giving head to anybody and lucky for you, that anybody happens to be your boyfriend seungcheol. you’re kinda nervous because unlike you, this isn’t his first time.

pairing: bf!seungcheol x afab!reader

genre: smut (18+ minors dni!)

wc: 2.9k+ (got carried away again :<)

warnings/tags: making out, oral (m receiving), dirty talk, lots of praise, softdom-ish!cheol, shy & inexperienced reader, bigdick!seungcheol, mentions of food & alcohol, seungcheol & reader are a bit tipsy, use of petnames (baby, angel, pretty), throatfucking, gagging, crying, finger sucking, cum eating

a/n: this is tiktok’s fault for always showing me “he’s the type to talk u through it” type of men. and to me, that sounded like none other than choi seungcheol !! so here we are. forgive me for any warnings i may have missed :< as always, likes/reblogs/feedback are highly highly appreciated ok bye <3

it’s been bugging you for weeks now. it first crossed your mind when you and seungcheol were driving home from a night out with close friends and it just dawned on you how you and seungcheol haven’t done anything yet. well, aside from making out.

seungcheol had told you from the beginning of your relationship that he wanted to take it slow with you. he didn’t want to do anything that would make you uncomfortable. he also told you that things would fall into place eventually and that there was no need to rush. you loved that about him.

but, being the massive over-thinker that you are, you also can’t help but compare yourself to your other girlfriends who have been in longer relationships and what they have possibly already done with their boyfriends.

you feel like you’re ready to do more with seungcheol and that you’re not just pressured by the people around you. you so badly want to bring this up to him but every time you try, you end up steering away from the topic.

the wall clock reads twenty minutes past nine; it’s a friday night and you and seungcheol are in his apartment already in your pyjamas when you should be dressed for a fancy dinner, stuffing yourself with pasta and wine somewhere in hongdae.

it’s been snowing nonstop these past few days and even on the one day that you and your boyfriend reserve every week to go on a dinner date, whether it be at the fanciest restaurant seungcheol can get a reservation at or the mcdonald’s just a few blocks down from his apartment, mother nature just won’t let up.

the two of you were left with no choice but to cook the ramyeon in seungcheol’s pantry. you also thought it’d be a good idea to bust out the remaining bottles of peach and grape flavored soju that had been left over from your camping trip over a month ago.

that was all over an hour ago, soup bowls and chopsticks long forgotten on the table, soju bottles empty, with some random sitcom playing on netflix in the background. you now find yourself on the couch straddling seungcheol’s lap, with your lips heavy on his. both of his hands resting on your waist, just above the band of your his boxer shorts.

breathy moans erupt from the base of his throat and it makes you dizzy. his plump cherry lips find your ear, your jaw, and your favorite spot: your neck.

"baby..." he whispers in between kisses, his hot breath against your skin sends shivers down your spine. all you can do is look at him with heavy-lidded eyes and continue kissing him, but this time sloppier and more desperate. seungcheol notices this and matches his pace with your own, your tongues fighting for dominance.

you don't know if its just you or the alcohol that's in your system, but you know that you want to do more than just kiss seungcheol tonight. plus the fact that you can practically feel his bulge growing under you isn’t helping either.

"nng.." you groan, breaking away from his lips momentarily and resting your forehead on his. your jaw falls slightly open, trying to find the right words to say and immediately, there's worry and confusion painted on seungcheol's face.

"baby, what's wrong?" he says in a hushed manner, his right comes up to your cheek.

“angel, did i do something? hey, you can tell me. hmm?” he adds, not breaking eye contact with you. he carefully fixes his position on the couch, not wanting to bother you.

“i… i-uhh…” you cut yourself off, you’re not nervous but you do want to be careful of how you say it. seungcheol looks at you with his big wet baby cow eyes, silently telling you that you can tell him anything.

“okay… so i couldn’t be more grateful for you wanting to take things slow with the both of us. i mean, really. a-and while i love love being with you like this.. like this close to you…” you trail off, hoping he understands or at least has a bit of an idea of where this is going. you kinda hate how he’s not breaking eye contact, you can practically feel his gaze burning holes into your skin.

“mhmm…” he hums in agreement, biting down on his lower lip as he tries to suppress a smile. he does know where this conversation is going but he wants to hear it from you. his hand falls to the small of your back and he caresses gently, you can feel the callouses of his hands through the thin fabric of your sleeping shirt.

“i feel like i’m ready to… you know… do more with you.” you add, feeling your cheeks and ears heat up. you slouch so you can hide in the crook of seungcheol’s neck but he stops you from doing so. “hey hey, i wanna see your face.”

“so is that what my pretty girl really wants, hmm?" he exhales, the sweet look on his face now wiped away. he sits a bit upright, looking at you with dark eyes. you've never seen him this enamored by you, almost like he's hypnotized, and you haven't even done anything yet.

you only give him a slight nod, your breathing getting heavier, feeling like your heart's about to jump out your chest. again, you don't know what's gotten into you but downing soju in such little time definitely fuels what you're about to do next.

you move your hands from seungcheol's chest and onto his shoulders for stability as you rock your hips back and forth. you start slow and then pick up the pace when you see him lean back onto the couch and close his eyes for a few seconds with his jaw slightly open. you can feel his length get harder each passing second and it sends a pool down your panties.

you lean in to kiss him on the spot near his ears and on his neck and this sends shockwaves through his entire body. he feels like his dick is about to explode and all he wants to do right now is pick you up and lay you onto your stomach so he can have his way with you. but, for now he wants to savor this moment with you.

“mmh, just like that, angel.” he says softly, draping one arm over the couch and the other still holding on to your hips to help keep you stable. his words make you feel good, reassuring you that you’re doing something right despite never having done this before.

your right hand then leaves his shoulder and reaches down to massage the growing bulge under his sweatpants. you look down at him with hooded eyes, hand palming over his cock that’s dying to be sprung free.

“baby, can i put it in my mouth?” you ask. seungcheol’s turned on but also completely thrown off because if anything, he wanted to taste you first. aside from wanting to throw you around and bully his length into you, he’s always dreamt of being in between your thighs and tasting your sweet juices all while you tug at his hair as his name rolls of your tongue.

"i-uhh, baby are you sure you wanna do this? he replies, pushing his own fantasies aside first because he only wants to do more with you only if you're sure you want to. "yeah, i know i wanna do this. i've thought about it for quite some time now." you clarify. and that’s enough for seungcheol.

“okay, angel. i just wanted to hear it from you again." he claims, eyes fixated on yours. he quickly catches your lips for a deep kiss, you can feel the want that radiates off of him. he then interrupts, "although i was hoping that i'd be the first to... go down on you."

while his offer does sound nice and tempting, the thought of you being naked for the first time in front of seungcheol does intimidate you a little bit. not to mention that he's your first boyfriend. you think that it'll help ease your nerves and make you more comfortable if he goes first. a win-win situation, you tell yourself.

"well, i really like how that sounds... but i'm just super a little shy to.. y'know. be naked and all." you admit, struggling to maintain eye contact with him. seungcheol doesn't know whether to be mad, disappointed, or annoyed at himself because you feel this way. he thinks that he may have failed at being your boyfriend because you don't feel entirely comfortable around him. you immediately notice the shift in his face and quickly say something, "and it has nothing to do with you, i promise! it's just... i-i've never done this before." you run your thumb over the pout that's slowly forming on his lips.

you further explain the win-win situation that you came up with and seungcheol quickly processes your words and doesn't feel too bad about it anymore.

"so... will you let me?" you add, referring to your question earlier. he doesn't even have to think about it, and immediately agrees. "baby, i'd be stupid to not say yes."

"i'm gonna need a little bit of help though..." you whisper, looking at him with dark eyes and once again reaching down to continue palming his clothed cock as if nothing happened. "don't worry angel, i got you. we can go slow, yeah?" his voice breathy, and at this point he's already putty in your hands.

you're quick to get off seungcheol's lap and get on your knees in front of him. you're feeling nervous but also excited at the same time and so you reach for the band of his sweatpants to pull them down. he sees this and helps you, his hands hovering over yours as you do so.

despite this being your first time, there's still desperation in your actions. the way your dainty little fingers grab hold of his sweatpants and the way you look at seungcheol. as you pull his sweatpants down, you fail to muffle a gasp. fuck, he's bigger and thicker than you imagined. you already know that it's going to be a struggle holding him and putting him in your mouth. you feel your panties getting soaked at the sight of his throbbing cock in front of you.

seungcheol sits and watches you eagerly, his thick thighs spread out for you and his length already coated with precum. you sit on your heels, still admiring how heavy his cock is. "something wrong, baby?" he furrows his eyebrows, his eyes locked on yours. you don't know how else to put it so you tell him straight, "nothing, you're just... big."

he grins and even laughs a little, "i know you can take it." and so you do, you take the base of his cock into your hand and attach your lips onto his tip. you lower your head to get more of him into your mouth but you struggle to do so. you’re not entirely sure that what you’re doing is correct but you continue your actions. you come back up to swirl your tongue around his tip and seungcheol closes his eyes, "mmh, fuck. just like that, angel. slowly." he's so turned on by the sight in front of him that he can't even bring himself to close his eyes for too long.

he leans forward to gather your hair to one side and to press a quick kiss to your lips, practically tasting himself. you don't stop pumping his cock and so he moans into the kiss, feeling the vibrations erupt from his throat. he leans back onto the couch, and your mouth is wrapped around him again. your hand is settled at the base of his cock, stimulating him as much as you can while you cover his tip in spit. "use both hands, baby." he suggests, and so you do.

seungcheol watches as your hands and mouth move up and down in harmony and it's taking everything in him not to cum right now with your mouth so pretty around his throbbing cock. you take more of him into your mouth and your eyes are welling up trying to do so. his tip hits the base of your throat and he feels it when you gag. he expects you to stop but instead you keep him there for a few seconds until you have to gasp for air and you feel his body shudder at your actions. "angel, you're sure this is your first time?" he asks, gathering just enough breath.

"mhmm.." you swallow, looking up at him with sweet and not so innocent eyes, shooting him a shy smile. you're hit with a wave of confidence by seungcheol's words. he quickly lifts his left hand to push his thumb into your mouth, wanting to feel your tongue. he feels selfish, as if you sucking him off isn't already enough, but he just has to. you follow him by sucking on his finger without hesitation, doing the same things that you were doing to his cock a few moments ago. "fuuck, you're so pretty like this." he thanks his lucky stars because he has absolutely no idea what he's done to deserve you and what you’re doing to him right now.

your mouth returns to his cock, where your hands are still stroking him up and down. you make it your mission to make him cum tonight, wanting to see him all breathy and speechless. your hands and mouth increase their speed, and so does seungcheol's breaths. you can tell he’s close because his chest is rising and falling faster and you’re pretty sure the neighbors can hear the lewd noises spilling from his mouth. you wrap your mouth around him again and again, your head bobbing up and down while you look at him through your long lashes, slowing down your pace for a few seconds to tease him just a bit. where the hell did she learn to do that? he thinks to himself.

all seungcheol wants to do now is pick you up and throw you onto the couch so he can return the favor, but he wants to give this to you. he wants you to finish what you started, because he knows it’ll make you feel good. “taking me so well, baby. doing so good f’me.” the praises rolling off his tongue as he runs one hand through his hair.

seungcheol can feel himself getting closer and closer to his high and so your hands work double time twisting his cock. you spit on his tip and sink your head down, his cock bottoming in your throat again. as you come back up for air, he quickly bucks his hips up to chase the feeling as he’s on the brink of his orgasm. you can’t help but let out a small choke with tears falling from your eyes. “-m sorry, angel. couldn’t help it.” he quicky apologizes. “s’okay…” you reply with a sweet smile.

“hmm fuck, i’m gonna cum. you ready for me, angel?” he trails off, taking control as he strokes himself and his length just inches from your face. you watch him as his big hand goes up and down his cock at an erratic pace. you lift your hands up to rest them on his knees but seungcheol has other plans in mind. “uh-uh, hands on your sides.” he says firmly, and you comply. he wishes he could take a picture of you right now, obeying him and being his good girl.

“open your mouth.” seungcheol adds, his demeanor now completely different but you love that he has two different sides to him when it’s just the two of you behind closed doors. your jaw quickly falls into an ‘o’ and soon after, seungcheol reaches his high. he feels his orgasm throughout his entire body, fireworks shooting down all the way to his ankles. his vision goes white and his body writhes in pleasure. white ribbons of his cum shoot out from his tip and onto your face and in your mouth. you feel the warm liquid on your tongue and you don’t know whether to spit or swallow.

you close your mouth just enough that your lips don’t touch, the salty liquid resting on your tongue. you wait for seungcheol to come down from his high, his breathing getting slower as his hand moves from his cock and onto his thigh. your chest swells with pride because you couldn’t believe what you just did to him. your eyes are focused on him as he leans forward, “you can spit or swallow baby, it’s up to you.” he says, and you feel his breath fan over your face as he brings his hand up and uses the pad of his thumb to wipe off the cum that’s on your cheek and just below your lip.

you finally close your mouth and swallow his salty release, completely tasting him. he watches as your adam’s apple bobs up and down as you do so. “good girl.” he comments, ultimately sending butterflies to your stomach. seungcheol then wastes no time to connect his lips with yours, tasting a little bit of himself. this time around, you’re the one moaning into the kiss and biting his lower lip. he deepens the kiss, holding your cheek to get better access. it’s not rushed though, it’s one that says ‘thank you’ for giving me the best head of my life.

he pulls away and you feel his arms at your sides, pulling you up. he slots you between his thighs, your knees sinking down onto the couch and he looks up at you. “your turn?”

© luvelve — please avoid copying, reposting, revising and/or translating my work on any platform.

[winterspellsfrozenkit]

Theory as to Why Disney's Hades Wanted to Overthrow Zeus

So, I was thinking recently about why Hades tries to overthrow Zeus in Disney's Hercules. The reason that the Muses give us is because he "thought the dead were dull and uncouth", but that feels super flimsy to me as an excuse. Especially when we see Hades say this:

He points out the scheme's been around for 18 years, which means that Hades had set up the hostile takeover scheme right around Hercules's birth, but he hadn't checked with the Fates until the day Zeus had that party for Hercules on Olympus. How do we know he hadn't checked before? Clotho tells Lachesis they are not supposed to tell anyone the future. I doubt she'd argue if they'd already told Hades the future of his plans before.

Also, while Hades may not like his job, his job makes him the most powerful king because EVERYONE will eventually become his subject. Why would he even want to rule over the living if he thinks the dead are so dull and uncouth? It's not like being dead robs you of intelligence or good manners... So why then would he want to rule Olympus and overthrow Zeus?

Well, I noticed this in the song "One Last Hope".

The song has Fall and Winter. If you've studied Greek Mythology, you know that means Hades is married because Fall and Winter happen in Greek mythology when Persephone is in the Underworld. We actually do see Persephone and Demeter in several shots on Olympus in the movie.

On top of that, Hades says this when he's offering his deal to Hercules.

I think that Hades decided to overthrow Zeus because he was angry that Persephone had to spend Spring and Summer with her mother, rather than being his wife and Queen all the time AND on top of that, he had to take the rap for Demeter causing a mass famine over her daughter's marriage to him. Here's why I think this.

When Hades shows up, he tries to break the ice with a joke, but we see the party glaring at him. You know who we don't see? Demeter, who by all accounts, SHOULD be there and the ANGRIEST with him. After all, in Greek myth, he kidnapped his wife. But she's noticeably ABSENT.

The ones glaring at him are Ares, Athena, Poseidon, Dionysus/Bacchus, and Aphrodite. All people who were likely massively affected by the massive famine Demeter put in place. Wars and tactical strategies don't go well if the people are starving to the point of death, repopulation drops if there's not enough food, if there's no grapes growing, there's no wine or drunken madness, and besides the ocean, Poseidon is also over horses and many horses likely died due to lack of plant growth. But they don't seem to be mad at Demeter, given Poseidon is chatting with her earlier in the scene.

Instead, all the ire seems to be directed at Hades, who, as far as we know, hasn't DONE anything to warrant that reaction. All he did was tell a poor joke, but everyone is looking at him like he caused a major problem by being there. Hades brushes their reactions off and starts trying to play nice and then Zeus grabs him and says, "You finally made it!" And notice Hades's face here:

Hades looks so uncomfortable with Zeus trying to make small talk, but he's trying to hide his negative emotions. He's forcing a smile and when Zeus asks how things are in the Underworld, he responds with this:

Hades, then focuses on Hercules, and doesn't seem to have a problem with him until he crushes his finger, but the point where Hades drops the mask and shows his ire is when Zeus says "Join the celebration!"

He says, "Hey! Love to, babe, but unlike you gods lounging about up here, I, regrettably, have a full-time gig, that you, by the way, so charitably bestowed on me, Zeus. So, can't. Love to but can't." He then quickly leaves.

I hear this as Hades subtly reminding Zeus that he has a taxing job that he can't be away from too long, especially now that the one person who SHOULD, by all means, be there to help him with the load of running the Underworld, can't be there half the time to help him get the excess work under control. Persephone, unlike the rest of the wives in the Greek Pantheon, has EQUAL power to Hades, which means that if she'd been able to be with him all year, they'd likely get the work done faster and could do things other than work.

Zeus makes a joke about Hades working himself to death, a few of the Olympians laugh, but again, Demeter and Persephone are missing from the scene.

Hades, however, is very upset at the joke at his expense and he mutters, "If only... If only..." when Zeus says he kills himself. Back in the Underworld, Hades says this about Zeus.

Now, we just saw Zeus be super welcoming to Hades at the party for Hercules. Why on Earth would Hades call Zeus "Mr. High and Mighty, Mr. "Hey, you, get off of my cloud"? I think Zeus behaved this way when Hades argued against the summons for Persephone to return to Demeter. Persephone is the Queen of the Underworld, and in myth, the reason Hades kidnapped Persephone? Her father, ZEUS, told him to do so.

Zeus is the reason for Persephone's kidnapping and marriage. Hades was following the law of Ancient Greece at the time. Ancient Greece was cool about many things, but women's rights? Not one of them. Greek men, if they wanted to get married, arranged it with the father of the bride. The mother and the bride herself had little to no say. So, in actuality, the one at fault when Demeter caused a mass famine? Zeus. The famine was actually targeting Zeus, because if all humans died, he'd get no more sacrifices, and all the dead become Hades and Persephone's subjects.

So I think that Zeus realized how ENRAGED Demeter was and made Persephone return to her mother, but Hades tried to argue against it because Persephone was his partner is a very demanding job and he'd gotten Zeus's permission, but Zeus used his title as King to force Hades to comply. As in, "I already decided, so we're done talking about it. Now, leave and go home." That would explain also why Hades says this:

Another thing I see as a hint to Hades attempting to overthrow Zeus because he's mad about the Persephone situation? When he's in the mortal world, Hades only destroys a few things. One is the statue of lovers that he uses as a throne when he's questioning Meg about Hercules's weakness, another is the vases of Hercules because he's mad that he can't beat him, but the other two? Plant life.

In the Homeric Hymn to Demeter, the main source for the Hades and Persephone myth, it's Demeter who brings back spring and plant life because she's happy about Persephone's return to her, not Persephone herself making the plants grow. While this could just be Hades taking out his frustrations on his surroundings, I find it interesting that he DECIMATES a grove of trees because Hercules is alive and could muck up his plans and that he burns a flower when he figures Hercules's weakness, which are often a sign of Springtime. It's almost like he's taking out his anger at Demeter's famine costing him his wife by destroying the plant life that Demeter creates as some small way to vent his frustrations. And speaking of Hercules's weakness, once Meg points out that monsters haven't been working against Hercules, Hades says this:

Now, given by this point, we KNOW due to "One Last Hope" that Hades and Persephone are married. I think this played into him figuring out to use Meg against Hercules. On top of that, Hades says this when Hercules is worried about innocent people getting hurt because of the deal:

I think Hades might have the same mentality about overthrowing Olympus. Having his wife back is more important to him than the ire of the rest of Olympus. Having his wife back is more important than keeping the Titans locked away. Having his wife back is worth being hated by all of Greece. Given the short time frame of his plot and all these other little things in his behavior, I really do think the reason that Hades decided to overthrow Zeus was so he could reverse the order for Persephone to spend half the year with him and half the year with her mother. But that's just my little theory/headcanon.

TLDR: I think the reason Hades tried to overthrow Zeus in Disney's Hercules was because he was angry he could only be with Persephone half the year.

[polysprachig]

Polyglot Checklist for Setting Reasonable Language-Learning Goals for 2025:

List out your languages (main(s), target(s), side(s), etc.).

Write 1-3 main areas of focus, project ideas, books to read, films to watch, studies to complete for each language. If you have more than 3, you might list 3 main and 1-3 side aspects you would like to focus on. If you are unsure what to focus on, consider your strengths, weaknesses and as of yet unexplored topics related to the language or culture in specific, then choose 1-3 aspects which speak to your interests the most (regardless of whether they are connected to your strenths, weaknesses or the unexplored).

After making your list, view the points you've listed en masse. Rank the activities in order of most-to-least intersting or most-to-least crucial to your studies and long-term aims.

Now, look at each point again. Ask yourself: how long would it take me to complete this task if it were in my native language? How long if I had C2 level? B2 level? A2? Ask yourself: given my current knowledge base/level, usage (vocabulary + grammar + accuracy with or without resources), and access to the materials required to engage with these points/aspects, how long would it take me to prepare, collect resources, study, and practise/learn the skills/vocabulary/grammar required to engage with each of these points?

Ask yourself: Is my focus something that requires time in order to achieve? Is this skill a grape on a vine to be ripened? Is it a bottle to be cracked open? (For example: If, say, your goal is to write a short story in your target language and you already have a working knowledge of sentence structure and the tenses most required to write fiction in that language, you may be working with a bottle. Expanding your vocabulary/range of expression in order to improve your writing in that case is simply adding spice to mull the wine. But if you are still in the growing phase, your skills hang as grapes you must cultivate in a rich soil. Tend to them first.)

Use this reflection to help you reconsider your list, but do not do away with it entirely. These are interests which you may return to at a later time or in a future level.

Ask yourself (whether you like to focus on one task/language or more at a given time): what are reasonable expectations for me to have for myself, my time, my learning and my output at my current level and considering all my other interests and obligations?