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rcvcgers · 4 months ago

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Rotten Apples ❦.ׂ

chapter two: coincidence, fate, or something planned?

masterlist , series masterlist , ao3 link

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18+ MINORS DNI

pairing: caleb x non!mc reader

synopsis: you run into a familiar face at work.

word count: 4.9k words

warnings: extreme loathing, kinda funny, kinda sad, a good mix of everything! a hint of foreplay! not proofread!

author's note: thank you for all the love on part one! here's part two! should there be a part three? also, enjoy a pic of caleb i grabbed from the game today!

taglist <3 : @kebarney @pinkismyfavcolor @romils @erisnxxi @rik0shii @reni502 @spacehopper27 @llamabois @likesvader @pandoras-rabbit @princessfruit @lukassafespace @jexizia

Caleb couldn’t say how long he’s been standing outside your door for. Had it been an hour? Three? Maybe it’s only been thirty minutes…time truly flies by when he’s with his love.

It doesn’t matter, though. Caleb would stand guard outside your door if it meant that you were safe.

Safe and alone inside your apartment…no other specimen in there to protect you.

Caleb wouldn’t let them come in if they came. He’d use his evol to shove them towards the side stairwell. He’d shove them down and watch as their bodies crumbled together, bones breaking, finding their screams of pain and agony satisfying.

It would all be worth it because you’re safe. All because of his much needed protection.

You’re his.

His to protect. His to look after. His to care for. His to love.

He glances to the side and notices that Skyhaven’s clouds have slightly parted. A smile spreads across his face, the man sneaking towards the hallway window, looking out at the morning sky. The weather is still undoubtedly gloomy, but the slight sight of sun is sign enough for him that you two are meant to be.

Caleb prances down the hallway, stopping by your door one last time. He slowly inhales, his eyes feeling heavy, and flattens his palm against it.

He’ll be seeing you soon.

The Colonel exits your apartment building, his phone attached to the side of his face. His voice is cheery and if you were to hear it, you’d think that his face would be all smiles and joy. It isn’t, though, and is instead a stoic expression.

“Hey, buddy. Remember that favor you owe me? Well, it’s time to cash in. I need you to get me information on someone. Yeah, yeah, I’ll send her name over to you now. Great! Thanks!” He hangs up and settles into a spot across the street.

People pass in front of him, his back pressed against the outside wall of a convenience store. Caleb barely pays attention to other woman who pause to get another look at him. He doesn’t have time to entertain their fantasies. He’d prefer to cater to your wants and needs. You deserve it after all your years of being apart.

Caleb tilts his head up and finds your window. His sick smile returns to his face, waiting for you to appear.

Except, he doesn’t know that you don’t peer out the window in the morning. Instead, you stay in bed for as long as you can, face and body covered by your sheets and obnoxious amount of blankets.

Your arm sticks out, slicing through the chilly morning air.

Shit. You think to yourself. Did the heater not kick in?

Your toes feel inexplicably cold despite being buried under a behemoth of blankets. Slowly sitting up in bed, your tired eyes look around your dark room before they float to the butterfly that hangs from your window. You love how the orange and blue hues grace the floor, softly turning the cold environment into something warm and welcoming.

It reminds you of home and most importantly, it reminds you of him.

You can’t help but laugh, slapping your forehead as you slip out of bed. Last night was a trip and a half!

Your date with George was so bad that you actually hallucinated Caleb being alive. Ha! It’s laughable, really, and you can’t even fathom who was there to witness your crazed haze. You definitely sounded like a crazy person, probably looking like the other blacked out people on the street who struggled to get home.

“Poor guy,” you say aloud, filling in your apartment’s silence, “I hope we never run into each other again.”

Oh, the irony.

You slowly get ready for your day. You take a quick shower, already running late, and stumble into your closet with your toothbrush hanging from your lips. You snatch a clean uniform jacket from the hangers, sliding it over your white blouse. You tuck your shirt into your black pencil skirt and make for sure there are no wrinkles in the fabric.

You hesitate, staring at yourself in the mirror.

Who are you trying to impress, anyways? It’s not like you’re going to find your Prince Charming at work.

Finally ready for your day, feeling rejuvenated and having shaken off your hysterics from the previous night, you step out of your apartment. You chew on a last minute attempt at making toast. The bread is dry instead of being lathered with butter, a complete oversight on your part.

You don’t even have time to stop for a coffee for a boost of energy. How the hell are you going to get through the day?

The rain stopped but the clouds still hang low in the sky. You’re used to the gloomy days, you actually welcome them with open arms. Too much sun reminds you of home and all of the misfortune you went through and, well, Linkon has a Wanderer problem that you want to avoid. Skyhaven still has them but it’s significantly less. You have the Fleet to thank for that.

And you definitely don’t have to thank a certain hunter who always seems to be at the scene of the worst attacks. As long as she stays away, you can live in peace knowing that if a Wanderer were to show up, she wouldn’t be the one to save you.

Your job as a translator stresses you out. Your boss, Darryl, is a weird, perverted dick that abuses his power. Whenever you don’t accept his daily flirts or go to HR about his behavior, you’re rewarded with horrible assignments that take years off of your life because you’re surrounded by men who are exactly like Darryl. You swear that you’ve seen a gray hair or two sprout from your head.

Being a translator under Darryl is a soul sucking job. You’ve applied to different departments in the Deepspace Aviation Administration, but Darryl has decided that you’re only good enough for translating documents and transcripts.

Your dream is to be a live translator, one that sat in a hidden room during negotiations and meetings between presidents and generals. Hell, you’d be fine with translating between the generals’ secretaries! It’s a thrill that you’ll unfortunately never be able to experience.

A big fuck you to Darryl.

You step through the shiny and clean doors of the Deepspace Aviation Administration. The building is eerily tall, shooting further into the atmosphere. You’ve managed to stay within the clouds, though, barely able to move past the fifteenth floor. Your security clearance is less than desirable, but it hasn’t stopped you from inching your way to the top.

You hope to see the secret levels soon enough but sincerely doubt it.

You smile at Abel and Remy, who work the entrance of the building, manning the security clearance that you pass through every weekday. You place your bag down on the conveyor belt, scanning your I.D. card in the little pad before stepping through the metal detector.

“Good morning you two,” you greet them with a familiar smile.

“Morning!” Remy chimes with a smile. He hands you your bag and nudges Abel’s side. He barely looks up, waving, before sinking his head back into the computer. “He slept like shit. Don’t mind him.”

“It’s all good,” you shrug, slinging your bag over your shoulder. Just as you are about to step away, Abel’s head shoots up.

“Stay here. You were flagged.” Abel waves his hand in the air. Two nicely dressed soldiers approach you, guns slung on their sides. Your eyes widen, looking around for any kind of sign that this is a prank that Remy and Abel were pulling on you.

When the soldiers approach you and take your arm, a weight forms on your shoulders.

It’s not a prank. It’s very fucking real.

Terror rips through your body. Your eyes widen as the masked soldiers stare down at you, their eyes dark and unwelcoming.

“Ma’am. Follow us,” one of the soldiers barks at you. You nod, ready to comply, but are unable to move your feet. You try to move your leg but it doesn’t budge. You awkwardly laugh to yourself, looking down at the unresponsive limb.

Move, dammit! You internally scream, cheeks heating up.

Remy gives your back a gentle tap, nudging you forward. You stumble over your feet, pushing through the gap between the soldiers.

They track you from behind and occasionally bark a direction for you to take. They guide you towards the elevator that is reserved for higher ranking officials and officers. Your gulp, heart pounding in your chest. Your ears begin to ring, heating up as nausea overtakes your body. You close your eyes and grip the railing in the elevator, clinging to the cold metal for some kind of relief.

Where did it all go wrong?

Did you translate something wrong? Is it your fault that a world war is about to erupt? You knew you should have told Darryl to not give you assignments on the language you’re weakest at! He should have given it to Miranda!

Your foot rapidly taps against the elevator floor. Each ding from a new floor heightens your anxiety, body shivering at the thought of what could happen to you.

Ding.

Goodbye cruel world!

Ding.

It was nice knowing you all!

Ding.

Don’t forget about me! Use my death as an example on what not to do!

You have heard many stories of what happened to translators that interpreted a word incorrectly. They simply disappeared off the face of the earth and were never heard from again. Or they ended up teaching languages at a community college far away from Skyhaven and the Fleet.

You’d rather disappear off the face of the earth than succumb to that fate.

The elevator doors slide open. You look up from the floor, surprised to see a normal looking work environment. One of the soldiers place their hand on your back, pushing your forward. You move with his hand, not particularly enjoying his touch. You shoot him a glare, crossing your arms over your chest.

“I’ll take her from here.”

You freeze. Goosebumps spread across your skin and chills run down your spine. You focus on the wall in front of you, a figure sliding in front of your vision. Your eyes are met with a black uniform, the typical red, white, and blue accents that the Fleet uniforms have.

Your eyes float up, taking in the figure before you. Purple eyes stare down at you, your haze focusing on the golden spot that lays on the bottom of his iris. The nausea you once felt disappears but is quickly replaced with an even worse feeling of complete and utter dread.

“Caleb?” His name rolls off your tongue like butter, melting the ice that surrounds your heart.

So last night was not a dream. Caleb was the one to save you from George, not some random stranger who was there at the time. It was your ex-childhood best friend.

A semblance of a smile flashes across his face before his gaze sharpens. He looks you up and down, hands behind his back. Your gaze drops, taking him in his entirety.

Fuck…he looks great in his uniform.

“Long time no see,” he quips, stoic expression remaining on his face. “Follow me.” Without missing a beat, he turns on his heel and begins to walk away. You look around, blinking as if it’ll snap you out of the dream you’re clearly inside of.

When you don’t follow, Caleb walks back. His fingers curl around your wrist, his touch shocking your body to life. You fumble over your words, random sounds fleeing from your lips, as Caleb guides you away from invasive eyes.

His hair is still short but is just shaggy enough to remain charming and add to his looks. Your squint your eyes, noticing a few light scars on the right side of his body. They creep up his neck from under his wrinkle-free uniform. Caleb opens a door and you step inside, swallowing whatever confusion you had left in your mouth, and turn to him.

“Caleb?” Your voice is breathy. Caleb’s eyes fix themselves on you, the man leaning against the closed door with his arms crossed over his chest. “You’re…what?”

“Take your time,” he chuckles. Your breath gets caught in your throat. His chuckle makes you want to jump for joy. “We are on a time crunch though, pipsqueak—”

“Don’t call me that,” you interrupt him, hissing as your instincts take over.

Any positive feeling you felt towards him in the past five minutes has vanished. You glare and cross your arms over your chest.

How dare Caleb call you that? That was always her nickname, alongside other ridiculous pet names that always made you gag whenever you looked back in your memories.

You made for certain that you’ll never be his pipsqueak.

You groan, rolling your eyes, and turn away from him. To him, it feels like you just drove a knife into his heart. He stares at the back of your head, his gaze falling for a brief moment, noticing the curve of your ass, before circling in front of you.

“I won’t call you that…noted,” he breathlessly chuckles. Once you tilt your chin up to show your glare, his chuckle gets caught in his throat. He covers it with a cough, suddenly feeling nervous around you.

Caleb has never felt this way with you before. In the past, everything was so easy! It was smooth sailing with you, low maintenance. He knew that you didn’t need the constant validation from him whereas she always needed it.

Maybe that’s been his foolish mistake all along. He should have paid more attention to you instead of her.

Is this what loathing feels like? Complete and utter contempt towards someone? Caleb hasn’t experienced this kind of negative feeling before, at least, not with her.

He had always felt so alive whenever she looked his way. Her beauty and innocence was so captivating. He adored playing the hero she needed.

Where was your hero? Who was there to call you pipsqueak or any other cheesy nickname? God, he’s been a fucking idiot.

“Is there…a nickname you’d like me to call you? For old time’s sake?” Caleb’s question earns him an angered scoff from you.

“You can call me by my name, thanks,” You look at him, eyes flickering down to his exposed neck.

His Adam’s apple bobs up and down. His gloved hand reaches for the collar of his shirt, wanting to loosen his restrictive tie, but falls. When your eyes meet again, his shoulders tense before relaxing.

Is he…is he nervous?

“Tell me, Colonel,” you begin. Caleb’s head perks up and he looks at you, hanging onto every word that comes from your lips. “Why am I here?”

“I heard you’re the best translator we have,” Caleb’s compliment makes you raise your eyebrow, “I only want the best. I need you to translate something for me.”

“Sure, I can do that. Not like I have much of a choice, right?” Your half-joke earns a loud laugh from Caleb. You raise an eyebrow at him.

Really? You think to yourself. That’s what made you laugh?

“I forgot how funny you are,” Caleb comments. He pokes your nose and your face scrunches up, watching as he turns on his heel, opening up the door. You stare at his back and the memories of him from your childhood come pouring in.

You sit alone on a bench. You watch as Caleb stands in line with her at an ice cream stand. You watch them with close and steady eyes, your gaze transfixed on how she plays with his fingers. They laugh and lean into each other, undoubtedly whispering secrets that only they can know to one another.

It pained you, yes, to always be pushed to the sideline. You got used to it with time. You didn’t notice it the first year of knowing them. You were all careless and innocent children. Of course there was no malcontent with their actions!

However, the constant repetition of being left out only to be covered with half-asses apologies and sorries became very old really quick.

And it definitely felt like a stab in the back when you hear their mingled laughter through your open window. You’d catch your self sitting by the window, sighing to yourself as they played knight and princess in Josephine’s backyard.

Whenever you played with them, she always made you the monstrous dragon that held her captive. Caleb had to the the one to kill you. You had to watch from the ground, covered in dirt and dust, as he brought her into his arms, swinging her around.

Her thrilled shrieks and giggles were like poison to your soul.

You were only eight.

With thicker skin and a heart beginning to protect itself with a shield of ice, you braved the final days of your friendship with them. When it grew to be too much, you left.

It was the best decision you could have made, right?

It felt so easy to leave, even as they excluded you from the ice cream line. What’s funny is that they forgot to get you your sweet treat, meaning that you had to eventually stand in the line by yourself while they relaxed on the bench.

You were always left with sticky fingers while he cleaned hers, calling her by that stupid fucking nickname while he wiped away the melted ice cream from her fingertips. They were clean and pristine while yours were left with sticky residue and bits of napkin that lingered behind.

You were almost always determined to ditch them after moments like these. You laid in bed, holding your favorite plushie to your chest, when a small pebble hit your window. You walked over, pushing the glass open, as you poked your head outside.

Caleb stood on the ground below. He smiled up at you and held up a small plastic bag. You watched as he climbed up the side of your house with ease, using the vines to reach your window.

The anger slowly left your body the closer he got to you. He’d poke his head instead and you plucked the plastic bag from his mouth, revealing a small metal butterfly you had saw in town earlier that day.

“I got it just for you,” he said, resting his elbows on the windowsill. You watched him with wide eyes, your ice heart melting from his actions and words. “A token of my appreciation.”

Maybe sticking around for a little longer isn’t a bad idea, you thought to yourself.

You always loved butterflies after that day.

“You coming?” Caleb asks, head tilted to the side.

Looking around, you realize where you are and shake away the bittersweet memories from your childhood. You let out a ragged breath. Your lungs burn and your vision blurs.

His purple orbs memorized every detail of your face. When he noticed the small amount of tears in your eyes, he reached forward, wanting to catch them before they had the chance to fall. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine.” You slap his hand away and push past him, entering the main room.

As you walk, you realize that what’s left between you two has expired.

The apple of his eye is not you. You were a Granny Smith while she was a Honeycrisp.

You were perpetually sour and she was always refreshing. Everyone always lavished in her presence while you faded into the background. You were left out in the sun while she was carried inside and taken care of.

It’s no wonder why you’re rotten to the core.

Daggers of pain stabbed into his sides, slipping between his ribs, leaving him breathless. His perfect demeanor finally reveled a crack, head lunched over. He follows you into the hallway, planting himself at your side.

Clearly, there is something wrong with you. Not in a way like there is with him, you know, having failed his psych evaluation, but something that is deeply rooted in your core. He wants to rip your chest open and to pull your heart out. He wants the slowly pull away the thorns that pierce your heart and kiss the wounds. He desperately wants to mend your internal wounds and hold you until you fall asleep in his arms.

“Where’s the file?” You ask him, the tears now gone from your eyes. A slow and ragged breath leaves his mouth, unable to look away from your remarkable face. You snap your fingers in his face, irritation blossoming inside your chest.

“Oh, right,” Caleb recovers. He lays his hand on your lower back. Warmth seeps through the thin fabric of your blouse. Despite the anger you felt a minute ago, you can feel your body relax under his touch. You can tell that he notices it too when his cocky smile returns to his face. You tear your gaze away from his, heat tingling your ears from embarrassment.

He leans down to whisper something in your ear but you turn your head away, not wanting to hear anything else from him. Thankfully, he catches on and straightens his posture.

The office is foreign to you. Many hallways lead in different directions. People in uniforms turn left and right, catching you off guard as Caleb pulls you out just in time before you collide with them. They barely look up from the papers in their hands or leave their conversation to say sorry or apologize.

Caleb swiftly guides you through the floor. The two of you weave and bob through the organized chaos. People stop and salute Caleb as he passes by. He nods in their direction, his charming smiling disappearing as he puts his Colonel mask back on.

He opens a door and reveals an almost empty interrogation room. There’s no two way mirror nor are there the usual cameras in the corner. At least, that’s what you’ve seen on your favorite television show. You step inside, flinching when the door slams closed, the faint click of a lock making goosebumps form all over your skin.

“No need to be nervous, Caleb says, sitting down into one of the chairs at the metal table. He spreads his legs open, making himself comfortable. He looks up at you, gesturing to the chair in front of him. You hesitate, having to force your eyes to look away from his legs, and sit in the chair beside him.

The table only has a few items. Caleb takes off his hat, placing it near the edge. He plucks off his gloves, taking his time since you’re watching him, and set them on top of his hat. In the center sits a neat stack of papers with a few pens and pencils on top. Beside that is an audio recorder with an attached set of earbuds.

“You know how to be discreet, right?” Caleb asks. You sneak a glance at him, throwing a bit of side eye, before picking up the audio recorder.

Ha. Do you know to be discreet…how do you think I got through high school? I was discreet with my hatred of your beloved pipsqueak

“I’ll manage,” you cooly respond.

You already know the drill.

You put on the headphones, you write down whatever it is the people on the other side are talking about, and you hand your work over to Darryl.

Except…Darryl isn’t here. Caleb is.

And you aren’t at your usual workstation using your computer to type. You’re actually writing these words down. What kind of mission is this?

“Then you know that you’ll be working directly under me for the assignment,” Caleb leans closer to you. You pay no attention to it.

“Will I?” You play coy and look at him, batting your eyelashes at him.

Caleb has to picture Josephine naked to stop the tent from forming in his pants.

“Yes…” his word comes out as a whisper.

“May I know any background on it? You know, for translation sake.” You can feel him slowly draw you in.

Those purple eyes that you quickly get lost in. The way his fragrant cologne smells. The way his canine tooth flashes whenever he smiles.

And that fucking uniform. Fuck me. You think.

“It’s classified,” he breathes back, your faces mere inches from each other. Caleb is so thankful that there are no cameras inside. If this keeps going the way he wants, he’ll have you bent over with your panties in your mouth to keep you quiet.

“Shame,” you quickly quip back. You tear yourself away from Caleb, leaving him hanging in the tension you two created. You grab the earbuds and slide them inside your ears. The first piece of paper is placed in front of you and you opt for the pen, knowing you never make mistakes.

Caleb watches you with close eyes. Your hand moves at a furious pace, swiftly scribbling down the words from the audio file.

He sits up in his chair, resting his elbow on the table beside him, placing his chin on his raised palm. The Colonel’s eyes close and he slowly inhales. That sweet yet spicy scent of apples and cinnamon fill his nostrils. He slowly exhales, hoping that your perfume lingers on his uniform long after you leave.

His eyes open when he hears you switch to a new paper. You slide him the filled one, you fingers grazing against each other, before you continue to write like you have a gun to your head.

Caleb chuckles to himself. He leans to the right. With the slight movement, he’s able to get a better look at your face.

Your brows are pushed together, no more space between the two. The skin below your bottom lip is sucked in, slowly moving back and forth. Are you…eating yourself? Your eyes flit to him for a brief second. Your face relaxes before it immediately returns to its focused state.

You are so beautiful. Even when you focus on the assignment at hand, Caleb can see the dedication you have for the things you love.

He hopes that soon, he’ll be number one on the list of things you care about. Caleb can brag about it to his already minuscule group of friends, showing off the future photos and selfies you’ll take together. He’ll be able to say that you’re his and nobody else’s.

If someone like George were to come in the way of that, well, he’ll deal with them and lock you away so you don’t have to witness it.

“What are you looking at?” You question, not even looking up from the paper. You slide it to him, drawing your hand away before he can touch your delicate skin, to feel just how soft it is even if it was for a fraction of a second.

“Are you doing anything tonight?” His question surprises the both of you. It slipped from his thoughts before he could stop it from escaping. Caleb’s face remains stoic. On the inside, though, he’s screaming at himself for coming off as too strong.

Your pen scratches to the side, destroying the perfect lines you’ve made from transcribed words. The tip of the pen pierces the paper. Black ink pools around the sharp metal tip. Your fingertips turn white from how tight you grip the pen.

Caleb reaches over you, his muscular arm passing in front of your gaze, trapping you in your chair. He grabs the audio recorder, the device looking minuscule compared to how large his hands are. Veins are prominent in his hand, leading up his wrist before disappearing under the fabric of his uniform jacket.

Your gaze starts from the tips of his fingers, gently dragging past his exposed skin and up his dark material of his uniform, sliding up his shoulder, hovering on the bare skin of his neck. The audio recording in your ear pauses. Caleb retracts his arm, hooking his finger under your chin. He eases your eyes the rest of the way up to his.

Your breath hitches. Lips barely parted, your cheeks flush from his touch and how close he is to you. His lips are mere inches from yours.

All it takes is one…gentle…push…

“I asked if you were doing anything tonight,” the raspiness in his voice makes your lower stomach purr. Your eyes fall to his lips. You gnaw the inside of your cheek, slowly leaning closer to him.

“Are you asking me as Caleb? Or as my Colonel?” You whisper.

“Which one will you say yes to dinner with?”

“Hmm…” you quietly hum. You reach out, fingers curling around his uniform’s tie. You give it a firm tug. A low groan emits from Caleb’s throat. You smirk. “Neither.”

Caleb matches your smirk. His hand snakes up your arm. His long, slender fingers wrap around the entirety of your hand. He overpowers your grip and the tie falls free from your hold. He brings your knuckles to his lips. He plants a firm kiss to them, his eyes locked onto yours.

“I’ll pick you up at seven.”

You push away from the table. Cheeks red, unable to breathe, you step away from him and to the interrogation room door. You tug on the cold door handle, the metal immediately warming due to you body heat. The lock clicks and you shove the heavy hunk of metal forward, escaping into the public eye of the office.

#caleb x reader #lads caleb #caleb x non!mc reader #love and deepspace #caleb love and deepspace #rcvcgers writings #lads caleb angst #lads angst #rotten apples ❦︎

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scrimblescromble · 5 months ago

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Hello, I'm back, with things I have noticed about Eragon that makes parts of the book very strange or funny or sad

Garrow's farm is TEN MILES OUT from Carvahall, which is already small. What the hell was he thinking??? It takes like 3.5 hours to walk that much???? And Eragon walks FURTHER THAN THAT to go hunting at 15???? Go behind you??

When hunting in the beginning, Eragon spends days just going for one doe. Which, all things considered, is not a lot of meat, especially for what's probably a 4 day hunt. For one person, it's unrealistic to carry more than that, but still.

Leading on from that, I'm led to believe that their family probably mostly ate bread and vegetables, and maybe cheese. No wonder he's pretty attached to meat.

Despite living so far away, Brom knows Eragon's knack for asking Too Many Questions, which implies this happens often.

How the hell does Brom make money? Storytelling??? There's only so much money that can get you in fifteen years, he's definitely got something on the side. He was a gardener in Morzan's estate for a while...

So far up north and isolated, Eragon DEFINITELY has a STRONG farmer's accent. Combined with his formal training with the elves, he probably has the weirdest way of talking, where it's both overly formal and casual at the same time.

Eragon is such a prodigy it's not even funny. By the time he meets Murtagh, he's a good enough swordsman after JUST A FEW MONTHS that they're literally equal. Murtagh has been doing that his WHOLE LIFE with a really good swordsman. Magic also comes pretty good to him, even if he's not always sensible with it. He learns to read well enough to read full books in a week.

Eragon and Roran are pretty similar with the dangerous stunts they pull, except Eragon's are usually with magic and Roran's are physical. They are both absurdly intelligent too, even if Eragon is known to act like a dolt sometimes. In his defence, he's stressed and like 15-17 years old. All things considered, he could be far worse.

Somehow, with his back ripped open and cursed, with his dragon crashing through the crystal ceiling which is raining on top of him, Eragon is able to not only remember to stab Durza in the heart (requiring turning around), but also shout an unnecessary spell.

Eragon probably could do magic before he bonded with Saphira. His mum wasn't a rider and had the "genes" for it, and his dad was a rider. It wouldn't be as strong, but maybe he's such a powerful spellcaster because he had some sort of baseline.

I bet that the first time Eragon wandered into the Spine, he was pretty young, and everyone kinda assumed him dead. He came out a week later with a bunch of rabbits or something

The fact that the Blood Oath Celebration made Eragon very pale implies that he's naturally the whitest boy ever and he just had a constant tan going (likely, because he's a farmer). This is just very funny to me, that in removing all injuries it took his tan.

Another point for absurdly powerful Eragon - the fact that his accidental curse had such an impact on Elva, to the point that it straight up affected her development. It wasn't even a spell! Or intentional!

I'm sorry, but Eragon casting empathy and that unintentionally killing the bad guy is so funny. He was SURRENDERING, but cut a bitch so deep that he imploded himself. Iconic.

Literally he is just so nice. Willing to run across the world, separated from Saphira, to support Orik in his campaign - when he totally could have given an excuse, or even just say the truth, which is that he's very much needed where he is. There's so many more examples, but he's just a good person.

I'm sorry, but Oramis was kinda a bitch for assigning the one hour of duelling in his training. Like, it flares up his seizures like crazy (which he ALSO SUFFERS FROM), AND he doesn't stand a chance against the elves in strength. I understand the point, but something had to give there. At the very least, reassign someone that won't actively torture him??

Adding onto that, we know that he's only able to succeed at the listening to the forest task after the transformation. I suspect that the mind is a sort of "sixth sense", and we know that elves have stronger senses; it's possible Eragon would have to have been bonded for a decent while for this to even be possible. I bet anything that human riders were usually trained by elder humans, and Oramis was struggling with a fledgeling human instead of an elf, as well as the time constraint.

Why the hell does Brom look so old? Yeah, he's old, but Galbatorix doesn't look that old? Is it something to do with his dragon being dead? The way I assumed it would be is that riders look like thirty for a verrrryyyy long time, no? Is it because Saphira died? Was he just going to perpetually age? Or does the beard age him?

Your cousin who feels like a brother goes missing, ran away, after your father's death. Soon you're leading everyone you've ever known to the rebellion in a desperate attempt to keep them safe and save the woman you love. Your cousin is wanted, even more than you are. He returns. He's different. Barely human anymore, hardly the boy you once knew. He's their last, and only hope. His war cry has been the same since he was six.

Now that I think about it, Garrow really is the odd one out in the family. His sister was the Black Hand, a highly dangerous assassin and magician. His son is Stronghammer, one of the deadliest soldiers in the country. His nephews are Eragon and Murtagh, both highly skilled swordsmen and magicians, riders, and both known as Kingkiller. Garrow is a farmer who can read.

Selena naming her son Eragon is soooo funny. "His dad - who is a secret! - is a rider, and Eragon was the first rider. It's so uncommon a name even among the elves that literally nobody will know this. My abusive husband and the evil king both know I hail from this place. He totally won't stick out in any way whatsoever!" Iconic, 10/10. It worked???

If any of these are inaccurate please remember I am going off my very deep-seated knowledge from reading the books so many times at a formative age. I haven't actually read them in years

#eragon #eragon shadeslayer #scrim rambles #inheritance cycle #the inheritance cycle #eldest #brisingr #inheritance

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awritesthings1 · 1 year ago

Text

All The Things We Don't Say

Pairing: Tommy Shelby x Female Reader

Summary: An anthology of your life with Tommy, from friends to strangers to lovers, and all the little moments in between.

Warnings: 18+, implied DV, substance abuse, childhood trauma, ptsd, overprotective tommy, swearing, brief smut, longfic oneshot, feminist themes (motherhood & being a wife in the 1920s).

ao3 link

Smash!

“Pick it up!”

Your daddy was a drunk. You remembered the fact since you could walk. He stayed home while the working men left for the factories, then disappeared in the late hours of the morning until his eventual return when the slam of the front door woke the household up. Mother used to hold you at night as she curled up in your bed. She was sick a lot. Always sniffing into the back of your neck when you were asleep. Sometimes the sleeve of your nightgown would get soaked while she muffled her hiccups.

She looked sad, too. In the morning, she kept the curtains drawn and stayed away from the outside world. She told you it was to keep nosey Mrs. Gretel away from her family affairs. But Mrs. Gretel had left Birmingham two months prior.

By seven years old, you were the 'man' of the house. You had gone to sleep one night, and when you awoke, your mother had vaporized into the air like a rabbit in a hat.

“She left because of you,” your father slurred at you.

You hated him.

She left behind her long-sleeve dresses, scarves, and wicker hats that covered nearly every inch of her skin. They were far too big for you then, but when your father came home at the end of the week with a stack of cash, you ran to your mother’s closet, which had remained untouched until then, to find only cobwebs. Gone. Every single one of her dresses. You looked out at the moon in those early hours of the morning and swore to it that when you were bigger, you would get him back so much worse.

And so you were left to clean up his smashed glass bottles and scrub the alcohol out of the gritty carpet. Your little hands struggled to pluck the glass from the floorboards. In a year’s time, they were covered in little scars.

On your tenth birthday, you decided you were grown enough to take matters into your own hands. When he was passed out on the floor from whatever he managed to fill his pipe with, you grabbed the small bottles he hid under a loose floorboard and poured them into the gutter at the back of your house.

You turned to run back to the door when the contents of the bottle were empty, but a ball almost tripped you over. You gripped your tattered skirt before you could lose your footing and snapped your head around with a fierce pout.

“That’s my ball,” pointed a young Thomas Shelby.

You put your small hands on your smaller hips. “You kicked it my way on purpose!”

You weren’t entirely sure, but you suspected it.

“Maybe I thought you were pretty,” he grinned.

You noticed his two front teeth were missing.

“Ewwww! I would never go out with you!” You squawked.

At ten years old, you knew better than that.

Seemingly unaffected by your distaste, he continued. “Do you live there?” He nodded to the house whose roof was falling apart.

“What’s it to you?” You frowned stubbornly, not wanting to admit that, yes, that was your house.

“The curtains are always drawn,” he answered, walking over to pick up his ball from your feet. He was the same height as you were at the time. “My brother Arthur said it’s haunted. He saw a ghost in the window once. He said it was a woman and that she starved to death.”

Your nose scrunched up. "Well, he’s a phony!”

You ran inside said house and slammed the door shut.

He kissed you down by the docks that winter. It was your first kiss, and a clumsy one at that, so you didn’t remember much of it.

By thirteen, you had given in and sold the rest of your mother’s belongings to support yourself. You hated yourself for it, and that nagging voice inside your head told you that you were no better than your father. Oh, and your father? Your father lost vision in his left eye from a bar fight. Too bad it wasn’t both.

Sometime later, a boy two years older than you saw your wandering hand in someone’s bag at the fair and threatened to teach you some manners ‘the hard way’. You bit anxiously on your nails and pleaded with him because he was bigger than most boys his age, when Tommy’s brother Arthur (who you’d seen hanging around the Garrison) came passing by and threatened to ‘toss him about’. The other boy, not all believing in Arthur’s temper, rushed forward, and the two ended up rolling in the dirt, but by then you were gone with a stolen pocket watch in your fist. Nearly two legs and an arm deep in poverty, some quick cash, or a hero complex? You’d take the penny.

At fourteen, a lady knocked on your door. It was a lady of the night who had come to inform your father that he had fathered a son with her. You were glad it was a boy. A girl wouldn’t have stood a chance in the slums of Birmingham. Life was hard, but Birmingham was harder. Your father had refused to listen to the young woman and shooed her off. You never saw her teary-eyed face again.

At fifteen, your father attempted to wash his hands of you by marrying you off to the highest bidder. There was no real auction, but just about anyone who suggested a handsome sum of money did the trick.

“His name is William,” you exhaled, kicking your legs over the edge of the dock.

Tommy laughed. “You won’t marry him.”

“What choice do I have, Tom?”

Your finances were getting tight, and the gloomy pressure to take up working at night like many young ladies was beginning to loom closer and closer. You hated being a woman. Boys would never have to worry about selling themselves to survive.

“I’ll put a gypsy curse on him,” he decided, squinting his eyes from the bright reflection dancing across the water.

You hit his shoulder.

“No, you won't, because then you’ll be cursing me.”

The severity of your situation began to dawn on Tommy. No amount of pestering Polly for change to spare would relieve you of your burden any longer.

“That’s it, then?” He gulped, shifting his glassy eyes to the harbor.

You sighed and followed his gaze.

“Maybe it won’t be so bad. I’ll never have to see dad again, and William promised to take care of me.”

Tommy scoffed.

You frowned at him. “What?”

He shook his head.

“What! Tom—”

“Don’t marry him.”

You rolled your eyes. “Oh, here we go, why?”

“You know why.”

You were engaged to William on the eve of your seventeenth birthday. He was a very proper man and never dared to go any further than hooking an arm around yours on formal occasions. You were never attracted to his thin mustache nor the thick lenses he wore. In fact, he was incredibly awkward at social occasions, always checking his pocket watch and avoiding eye contact with whichever circle he stood in.

Tommy began to fade out of your life around that time. Margaret—a lady who had taken you on to help with the sewing of her family’s tailoring business—told you that Tommy was spotted arm in arm with another girl that week. You expected to feel jealous, but you felt nothing. You knew love would never be your right. Love was for the more fortunate.

You spent that year learning how to be a wife. Surprisingly, it wasn’t too different from what you did as a child—cooking and cleaning up like you did when your father came home, that is. It was comforting to have a routine in place. It meant finality—no one walking in and out of your life as they pleased, and certainly no more growling stomachs. Perhaps being a wife was a skill your mother never learned. You were grateful for William’s mother, who seemed to be more than enthusiastic to show you the reigns.

After a year-long engagement, you caught your fiancé, William, locked in a compromising position with another man.

“Oh,” was all you got out before leaving his house.

You lacked the special ingredient that marriages needed: love.

You sat down at the fountain across the street. William and his lover’s silhouette were visible behind the blinds he had drawn on the second floor, which peered over the sidewalk. You watched their shadows fluster their feathers around the room like headless geese, and for a moment your head surfaced above water and laughter frothed out between your sealed lips. Perhaps Birmingham made you a little mad.

You didn’t go through with the marriage. You suspected William was relieved.

That week, your father left. You never knew whether he left on his own accord or just never made it home one night. Either way, you never really cared to find out.

With nothing left to lose, you knocked on the Shelby family’s door at Watery Lane. Finn appeared around the other side of the door a moment later.

“Is Tommy home?”

Finn nodded, spinning on his heel to alert his brother. When Tommy did appear, his shoulders were tensed. Disheveled hair never looked so stylish on him. When you saw his suspenders (which were hastily thrown on), you wanted to ask who he expected to be at the door that he planned to answer dressed in such fashion but then thought better of it. He peered down at you, then checked over his shoulder before ushering you inside and up to his bedroom.

“It’s… smaller than I thought,” you landed on, taking in his room.

After all these years, you had never stepped foot into the Shelby home. You weren’t the type of person to come door-knocking.

You turned around to face Tommy after hearing him click the lock on his door.

“Are you hurt?" were the first words he had spoken to you in a year.

“No.” You pressed your lips together, eyeing everything from the bed to the view out the window.

Silence followed closely after.

“Then why are you here?” Tommy sighed.

Your vision began to blur then. “I don’t know,” you said honestly, trying to stop your bottom lip from trembling.

Desperately, you pushed your hair back and straightened up, attempting to hold yourself together. You must have looked like a puppet being held together by a string, given how poor you looked.

Tommy’s boots pad across the wooden floor. “You love me?”

Did that word truly exist? How could you answer if you never knew what it meant to love?

You don’t meet his eyes. He licked his lips, pushing your head up to meet his with his thumb. His eyebrows rose expectantly.

“I don’t know what to do, Tom,” you breathed, avoiding his question. “I’m all alone now. No William, no father…”

His lips parted, and you watched with fascination as the cogs turned in his head. “Yes… that is a problem." His breath fanned over your face.

You gagged, a reaction you yourself had not expected, before rushing to his door, only to remember that, yes, he had locked it, before turning to the nearest silver bucket in the corner to empty your guts.

The first thing you heard when you caught your breath was, “are you pregnant?”

No, but when you stand so close to me and I can smell the cigarettes you smoke and your freshly washed skin, I can imagine a future where we are married, and I see your face growing more disappointed as we age together because you married a woman who never knew how to be a mother to your children nor a wife who knew to tend to you with affection by your bedside when you’re ill.

“No,” you choked, spitting out the vile taste in your mouth. “We never did anything.”

You wanted him to know that. You wanted him to think that you never let William touch you because you never loved him, not because William wasn’t interested in girls.

A moment later, Tommy sat beside you on the floor and quietly combed your hair away from your wobbling lips.

“So, if you’re not pregnant and you don’t love me, why are you here?”

You wiped your mouth with the back of your hand. How were you supposed to answer that? After letting your guts loose in his room, you thought he would surely have booted you out the door.

A knock came on the door: “Tommy?”

“A minute, Finn!” Tommy growled at the door, refusing to back away from your trembling frame.

You were so hungry. Margaret had to cut back your hours ever since her husband fell ill. She spent more time by his bedside than keeping the store open, which meant you were making less than usual. The imminent closing of the store hung over your head like a taunting crow, gouging your insides like you were Prometheus. Birmingham your chains, a woman your fate, and the bird your punishment for thinking you deserved more.

“I should go.” You shivered at the draft inching towards your skin from the open window.

Tommy’s intense gaze stuttered, falling to your lap, where you picked at the dead skin around your nails. He cleared his throat, fishing out the key from his pocket. Although it was dull and muted from the years, it gleaned brightly in your eyes as if it were the reward you came for. Flushed, you grabbed it out of his hands without sparing a glance. Electricity sparked in those precious seconds, igniting a deadly fire in your belly.

“You’re cold." Tommy flinched at your touch.

You retreated as soon as the key slid into the hole and unlocked with a click. In your haste, you left the most valuable thing you owned there in his room.

Your heart.

The months went by, and summer arrived. The stories your mother told you left you expecting a bright gleam of air that would wash over the streets and paint each tree and every patch of grass a frighteningly bright green that would even encourage grumpy Mrs. Gretel to come out to preen her stubborn roses that would just not grow. Birmingham left less to be desired. The summer days never came, and that persisting bitter bog thickened, albeit with slightly less rain. There were gray clouds, smoke from the factories, and a shivering north westerly, which pushed said clouds at breakneck speed as if they had somewhere to be. You looked to the sky one day and said a prayer for blue breezes and sweltering sun, but the sky was empty.

Sometime later, men marched the streets armed with guns in their ‘dashing’ uniforms. A war, they said, a great one. Queues lined the street for the post offices and grocers. Rain rivaled the bustle of the city. What did it feel like to love someone so much as to stand in the pouring rain next to the gutter? You wanted that kind of love. Not the love you could only give yourself because even you didn’t want your own love.

One of the soldiers decorated in medals stood on a crate at the port, yelling something supposedly inspiring that captured the attention of many young men. The words honorable and patriotic were tossed in there like a delectable salad, enticing them in the way farmers held a carrot to a pig’s snout.

You pitied their mothers. Their daughters were married off, and then their sons were swooning over the idea of dying. Birmingham was filthy, rotting, and disgusting. You needed to leave.

You kissed Margaret goodbye on the cheek one Tuesday morning. Ever since your pockets turned out empty, you had been working as a bedside nurse for her ill-stricken husband. They were good to you, and they were probably the only people you could consider family.

She patted your cheek and said, "you're doing good to serve this country.”

You hadn’t had the heart to tell her you were leaving because the city was marring your flesh, so you slipped her the sugarcoated lie of wanting to join the war effort so that you might help others who were bedridden, just like her husband.

At the train station, you stood with your suitcases held tightly in both arms. You had to set one down to hold onto your hat as a train full of men waving their caps out the window pulled into the station. Some children weaved between the crowd, wagging a newspaper above their heads, hoping to make a quick penny. To your side, women wept for their brothers, husbands, and lovers.

“Who are you wishing off?” asked an elderly woman who was clutching her cane.

“Oh, I’m not. I’m boarding the next train.”

She laughed, and you wondered how old your mother would be now. Would she have grown wrinkles and settled into a deeper laugh like this woman?

“My dear, you have a bright imagination if you think they will let a woman on any of these trains.”

A sudden anger filled your blood. “Why not?”

“These men are heading straight for London, where they will be shipped away to France to fight,” the woman explained as if it were any other day.

“I’ll catch the next train then.”

She shook her head, and her frail hand curled tighter around her cane. “They’ve stopped the trains so they can transport soldiers to London.”

You frowned. “Then how will I leave Birmingham?”

You’ll never forget her dismissive laughter.

“My dear, you won’t.”

Men boarded the train, clapping each other on the back with a wink and a laugh. When a line of men on the platform thinned, the train whistled, and you looked over just in time to see Polly, Ada, and little Finn standing with their hands crossed over their hearts as they waved to the train.

No. It wasn’t possible.

But it was because you caught the gleam of the razors sewn into their peaky caps. Tommy, Arthur, and John all stood aboard the train, sticking their heads out and waving to Polly and Ada with a grin that wrung your stomach like a wet cloth.

Those countless daydreams you spun, the intricate webs you wove, began breaking down to thin fibers. In one pathway, you stayed there in his room and told him the truth you always denied yourself. You loved him. In another, you stood next to Polly, close to tears, as you begged him to come home safely. There was a resounding click in that moment as your breath stuttered. You had been the person who wiped away those futures, thinking it was nothing but an annoying spiderweb. Oh, how wrong you were!

“Tommy!” You left your suitcases behind and stepped around the old woman as you ducked under hugs and tearful goodbyes.

“Tommy!” You cried again with the gusto of someone who certainly shouldn’t be as concerned as they were considering you left him in his room that day.

Thankfully, his eyes eventually found yours as you pushed through the last line of people. You stood there and stomached all your regrets head-on. It was funny how, up until that moment, you managed to squash every seed of doubt. Why was it that you only realized what you had when it was slipping out of reach?

He never called your name back. He just stared at you blankly as the train pulled away, unlike you, who clung to the image of his frame even as the train disappeared from sight and the crowd began to disperse. You stood there unblinking, hoping to soak up the last of him before you forgot the intensity of his eyes or the humming rumble of his voice. Because the idea of something you held dearly becoming a memory meant that it could as easily be forgotten, and that terrified you. Your eyes were watering now, against your best wishes.

You overheard Polly ushering Finn and Ada off. Finn rushed home without protest, but Ada stopped in her tracks when she saw you hunched over your knees in tears. She smiled weakly before chasing Finn home. It was then that Polly’s shadow approached your huddled frame. She didn’t say anything, and for a moment, you weren’t sure if she expected you to stand and apologize for being such a mess. That’s when a penny clattered to the ground beside you. She squeezed your shoulder once before disappearing.

You kissed that penny as if Tommy would feel the power of it across the country, then ran back to Margaret’s, having forgotten your suitcases.

“Oh…” She exclaimed, slapping her tea towel on the counter when you walked into the kitchen. “You missed your train?”

Dread made your stomach tender and your breath short.

“I’m enrolling in the Red Cross.”

Throughout the war, you thought of Tommy every day until your stomach lurched. Would it have worked if you had stayed? Would you both have grown old together instead of subjecting yourself to the spray of dirt when a bomb went off nearby?

A day ago, your supply rations never came. It wasn’t like hunger was anything new, but when your mind was too focused on surviving the perilous weather, it was hard to save other lives. You made work with what little supplies you had left. The morphine went stint within hours of its arrival, and the cries of pained soldiers filled the medical tent all night. You did what you could, wiped sweat from their foreheads, and wrote letters to their mothers and lovers with what supplies you could scavenge. Some were written on cardboard from shell packaging, others on torn pages from the bibles they kept over their hearts. Pens were useless—the ink ran in the rain—so you scribbled everything down in pencil.

Before you left for France, you were warned of the bullets. No one ever warned you about the shrapnel, nor the bombs or grenades. They shattered soldiers’ bones beyond repair and left bodies unrecognizable. There wasn’t much you could do when most of their flesh was missing.

Keeping faith became an impossible task. Supplies were depleted, and nurses were dejected. Sally, who had been writing home for news of her brother, recently had her letters returned with the black stamp. Death—return to sender. She spent only an hour sitting on a trunk, letting her tears fall, before she got back to work. Grief privileged those with time, something no one could afford in these conditions.

Then it came—the day Arthur Shelby was carried in on a stretcher. You were making your rounds around the beds when a truckload of yelling men pooled through the entrance of the tent.

“Nurse!” They all yelled, some limping, others setting down stretchers of men on the dirt between the filled beds.

You and two other nurses dropped everything and ran over to attend to the wounded. They were all covered head to toe in dirt, groaning and clutching limbs that were twisted the wrong way. One in particular coughed and huffed while he fought against hands, which were fruitlessly pushing him back down on the stretcher.

“Let me go!” He yelled, wrestling against an older nurse.

“It’s alright, Mary. I’ll handle this one,” you patted her shoulder as you swapped places.

You dunked a washcloth into a bucket of water to wipe away the dirt in his eyes. “Calm down; you're safe here,” you said, starting your usual script of reassurances.

When the striking blue eyes squinted up at you, your blood ran cold. You froze before taking his head in both your hands, despite his protests. “Arthur? Arthur, it’s me!”

He loosened his grip on your wrist. “Huh?”

“It’s me! Where’s Tommy and John?”

He spat blood and gritted his teeth. “Fucking hell, where’s the whiskey?”

You laughed despite the smell of blood encompassing the tent. You quickly fetched the alcohol you had been using to clean wounds and pressed it to his lips. You weren’t sure if it was whiskey or not, but you reasoned he was in too much pain to be able to tell. He drank it with a groan of pleasure. You didn’t try to snatch the bottle away as he emptied it down his palette; you just sat and grinned at the way he suckled it like a newborn baby while you cleaned away his cuts.

“I’ve never been happier to see you, Arthur.”

“Yeah, yeah,” he mumbled, his lips still wrapped around the bottle.

You tried to stay by his side for as long as you could before the second wave of patients came tumbling through the flaps of the tent. One of them lost their grip on the stretcher, and the patient went sliding into the dirt headfirst.

“Fuck!” They all swore, abandoning the stretcher to drag the limp man further into the makeshift hospital.

You rushed to help when a hand gripped the back of your neck. You yelped in pain as your hair got caught in a fingernail when they turned you to face them.

And there he was: Tommy Shelby, covered in a thick layer of dirt, heaving for air.

“Nurse! Nurse!” Voices cried for you, but between the ringing in your ears and the wrath in Tommy’s blue eyes, you were frozen in place.

“The fuck are you doing here, eh?” He yelled over the anguished men.

You suddenly felt stupid standing there in your Red Cross uniform.

“I was looking for you, I—”

His dirty hands cupped your cheeks—something you were painfully aware of from the uncomfortable itch from the mud on your flushed skin—and pulled your forehead to his.

“You think this is some fantasy?” He squinted. “You think there’s any fucking moonlight to kiss under here, eh?” He spat.

His eyes held that haunted look you had seen on many soldiers that passed through the medical tent. Your eyes watered. Perhaps it was from the humidity and dirt being kicked up as nurses and patients scuffled around, not because you could hardly recognize the man in front of you. The blood smeared above his eyebrow worried you, so you reasoned that he was mad because it had been leaking into his eyes. Dutifully, you reached to wipe it with the back of your hand. He grabbed your wrist harshly, bringing it down to your side. He was in shock; you scolded yourself.

“Where’s John and Arthur?” Tommy swallowed, flexing his hands.

You led him to Arthur, who had been left in his corner while the nurses attended to more serious cases. It hurt watching the brothers reunite after their ordeal, so you left them alone no matter how much you feared them being discharged before your return. After all, everything you ever wanted sat in that corner, but it would be selfish to coddle Tommy all to yourself. Still, you couldn’t help sparing a glance when you walked up and down the tent, attending to patients.

Later that night, he came to you under the candlelight of your tent. He cleared his throat upon entry. You were lying face-up on your cot when he cleared his throat and peeled back the entrance to enter. The candlelight painted the mountain peaks of his face in a dull amber and the valleys in a frightening shadow. You sat up, pulling the thick cover over your shift.

Tommy kneeled next to you, resting on the heels of his boots. He licked his chapped lips and itched his nose. “You don’t belong here.”

Your grip on the cover loosened. “Huh?”

Nothing prepared you for when he swung his brooding stare towards you. He exhaled loudly before running a hand over his face.

“You should have stayed in Birmingham.” He said it like a warning.

“And done what?”

Vulnerability never looked good on Tommy. His head hung and his fingers itched at the back of his head—a tick you used to love; now you weren’t so sure. Because your Tommy was never afraid, but this man in front of you was alarmingly tense despite the clear efforts to mask it.

What have they done to you, Tom?

Under the dim light of your tent, you barely recognized him. A stranger’s eyes were blown wide in a frightening state of shock, something most soldiers mirrored. War washed out the sweet blue pair you knew, refitting them for a steely weapon. You hated seeing him like this, so still, so unsteady, cocooned into the corner as if afraid to take up space.

You feared you looked no better. Having worked till the point of exhaustion, you usually found yourself awakening against a wooden crate or trunk to the cries of patients who demanded your attention despite your body not having the strength to stand. Today you had been lucky and found yourself crawling distance to your private tent when your knees started wobbling and your head lulling.

The wooden reinforcing of your private tent fought in vain to shelter your bodies from the elements; it still flapped and whipped about, sometimes rocking your cot. Yet Tommy remained still like those life-size stone statues you’d find outside an important building, brooding at the dirt and locked in an internal battle. You shifted to the edge of your makeshift bed and leaned close enough that you saw how the top buttons of his dirtied uniform were missing and most of his clothes were torn.

His arm, which was breaking out in goosebumps, lay heavily across his knee so that he could rest his forehead there limply. He looked in a bad enough condition that you feared the possibility of him succumbing to the wasteland threatening him outside your tent. You wrapped your arms around the scruff of his hair and pulled his face into your stomach, where he could hide from the terrible world. On instinct, his arms wound around your waist, and you felt his warm exhale against your skin through the thin fabric of your slip.

His tin water bottle clanged against the satchel he wore, which made you wonder if he had any time to rest at all if he still had all his equipment tied to his uniform.

“I didn’t…” His voice was muffled by your slip. He cleared his throat again, shaking his head.

When he dropped the thought, you spoke up. “Have you eaten?”

He slapped your thigh haphazardly. “No, do you have a cigarette?”

You resisted the urge to roll your eyes, instead gently pushing him away so you could kneel beneath your bed and fish a cigarette from your satchel. You pinched one from its tin case, then thought better of it and tossed it on Tommy’s lap. Gratefully, he collected one from the case and lit it with a nearby candle. You watched his chest rise and fall as he took an especially deep drag. His eyes shut as the nicotine rushed to his head.

“Fuck, that’s good,” he muttered under his breath.

“How are you here, Tommy? One of the night nurses should’ve been on watch.”

“Oh,” smoke puffed out of his mouth, and he raised his eyebrows, “there is.”

“Then how—”

“I had to see you.”

The butterflies in your stomach dove. The blue in his eyes appeared translucent as they hazed over like a ghost. His shoulders were slumped dejectedly, and he had a hand pushing through his greasy, unwashed hair to relieve his neck from the weight of his thoughts.

He pointed to you then, with the cigarette nursed between his fingers. “I need to know why you changed your mind.”

“About what, Thomas?”

His voice slurred and slipped into a deeper register from the lack of sleep. "Why you came back. Why you came to France.” Tommy shook his head lazily. “You expect me to believe you had a sudden change of heart? What? You a patriot now?” An amused exhale curled out while he took another drag. “Well I don’t believe it.”

You began shivering despite the way your body flushed.

“How’s Arthur?” You tried to avert the conversation.

“Bloody drunk off his ass.”

“And you?”

Tommy held your stare and swallowed dryly. “Trying.”

“You can go join him if you wish.”

He looked at the entrance of your tent as if he were weighing his options, then shook his head and took another drag before clearing his throat. “It’s different now.”

Naïvely, you sank to the ground beside him and rested a hand on his shoulder. “It doesn’t have to be.”

He sighed.

“I wish that were true.”

The next time you saw Tommy, you were working a shift at the hospital. After the war, you received a medal for your efforts, which easily got you a job in Birmingham. You pleaded with them to send you to any other hospital—London, Manchester, Liverpool—you didn’t care. Anywhere but Birmingham.

“You should be honored to work for me!” Exclaimed the head nurse at Birmingham Hospital, who didn’t seem too pleased with your distaste for the city.

You thought the job would be the final nail in the coffin, but you surprisingly got along well with the head nurse once you had put your animosity aside. So much so, she offered to lease you a room upstairs from hers.

Then came that dreaded night where you were finishing the filing of some documents when a patient was being rushed in. Your ears perked up, and you looked through the blinds of the office to see a man being rushed by. Something small and round had fallen off the stretcher while the nurses paid no attention, pushing him around the corner and down towards the operating theater. Curious, you exited the office.

And there on the ground was one of those peaky caps Tommy and his brothers used to wear. You knew this because you picked it up and nearly cut yourself on the blade that was sewn into the seam. You spent the next hour gnawing on your nails. Your imagination sparked ideas about the beaten man who was lying in an operating room two doors down in surgery. Was it Tommy? Arthur? John? The shadows under your eyes darkened at the thought. No, it was probably some other Peaky Blinder. The Shelby brothers were too careful. Still, you knocked over your coffee in a mad dash to the bathroom, where you heaved up your dinner.

You volunteered to stay until the morning, but the head nurse on duty for the night refused and sent you home. You didn’t sleep at all that night.

The next morning, you arrived early and made a beeline for the emergency ward. You grabbed the admission form and scanned the patient list. There were only two emergency patients who were listed under the final hour of your shift, a woman and a man, which made it easier to narrow it down to the man who was admitted at quarter to midnight in ward four, room seven.

When you peaked through the crack in the door, you knew you had been worried for a reason. Tommy lay under the covers, battered and bruised, with a swollen eye and a nasty scar where he had reportedly received surgery for trauma to the head.

You slipped inside quietly and closed the door. Tommy’s eyes were closed, and his mouth hung open, stealing miniscule amounts of air into his lungs. He looked as good as a ghost.

“Tommy…” You clutched his peaky cap (which you meant to return) between your fingers.

He didn’t move an inch, so you set the cap down by his bedside table, carefully watching the rise and fall of his chest.

What have they done to you, Tom?

On the second week, he woke up while you were cleaning the windowsill. He coughed, and you whipped around in shock.

“Nurse?” He asked hoarsely, blinking away the blinding light.

You rushed to his side, tears bursting like the fountain you passed on your way to work.

“Don’t move,” you urged when he tried to sit up.

“I have to get to London,” he slurred, only half awake.

You weren’t upset that he didn’t recognize you. You weren’t upset that he didn’t recognize you.

“Tommy… it’s me.”

He shrugged your hand off his shoulder with a hiss. “Fucking hell.”

Don’t cry, don’t cry, don’t cry, don’t cry.

“Please don’t move; I don’t want you to hurt yourself.” You couldn’t hide the way your voice broke.

He looked up at you, then, through bloodshot blue eyes. You wished you knew what was going through his head. Happy or sad?

“Am I dead?”

“No,” you smiled weakly as a tear fell.

“Can I have a smoke then?”

“I don’t know how to love, Tommy!”

“Yeah? Yeah? That’s bullshit! Why do you keep coming back then?” He pinched your chin, glaring furiously into your eyes. “Eh?”

He stood so close that he blocked the light from the chandelier, which mournfully hung from the ceiling. You shivered in his shadow.

“I shouldn’t have come tonight.”

“But you did!” He accused, pointing in your face.

“It was a mista—”

“You fucking did!”

“Tommy!”

“I’ve had it! If you want to leave, then fucking leave; otherwise, don’t stand there all righteous waving empty threats over my head because I know you won’t leave.” He shook his head with a wild look in his eye. “No… You won’t leave. You won’t leave because you love me. You keep coming back,” he pointed matter-of-factly.

Tommy’s eyebrows danced between being terribly furrowed and alarmingly raised during his passionate monologue. It was rare for him to emit so much emotion these days. The war changed men, and Tommy was no exception. A chilling stillness framed his presence, which even you weren’t excused from. No more laughter, no more dreams of working with horses, because he was above all that now, wasn’t he? It was ambition that ground his teeth together and hollowed his eyes. Still, you couldn’t forget that the anger came from vulnerability, because it took a lot for someone to get under Thomas Shelby’s skin.

You moved to grab your purse, to make good on his word, but he halted your movement by grabbing your shoulders, roughly at first, before loosening his grip. You softened at his frantic demeanor. He was scared—oh, so afraid of you walking out that door again. But how could you ever explain it to him? You were never born for love. You would never know how to love him properly the way wives were supposed to because what you felt for Tommy was sickeningly deep. So much so that the mere impression of him sealed off your ribcage and ruined any chance of your heart beating for any other soul, so much so that you carried the weight of him in your bones because you could never shake him off.

When you looked back at life, all you saw was the absence of love. You used to imagine yourself growing up and falling in love with a handsome stranger, then getting married in a proper white dress to go live in your proper house. But when you looked in the mirror, you saw a ghost. The pathway of your life was laid out before your eyes once, and what you saw didn’t match the reflection. The man you were supposed to marry couldn’t even look at you, even if you cleaned and cleaned and cleaned until your fingerprints turned white and pasty.

Because what it all came down to was simple. You never got to become the person you envisioned. Instead, you were cursed to live as a blank slate and be consistently reminded of what you were supposed to be and of who you were: no one.

Tommy exhaled in a quick huff, pressing his forehead to yours so that he saw you clearer, without all the tension and bullshit in the way.

“Here it comes, Tommy.” You took a shaky breath. “I love you, but I could never be the perfect wife to you, and I would be a terrible mother.”

There, in all its ugly colors and shades, you hung yourself with the truth.

He shook his head as if he too couldn’t believe your words.

“Fuck’s sake! Forget about all that." His eyes watered out of frustration, but he was still puffing in anger. “I need you. You. Not some whore.”

You bit your lip to muffle the god-forsaken cry ready to erupt from the volcanoes you suddenly found roaring in your stomach. An earthquake overtook your hands the more you fought the inevitable eruption. You grabbed both his hands to stop yours from shaking.

“I have to be cursed; there’s no other way!”

“No!”

“My life slips through my fingers like grains of sand—”

“You’re not cursed!”

“And I can’t stop it, Tommy!”

“You’re not fucking cursed, and I’ll tell you why." Tommy cut you off. He leaned in, licking his lips, which had turned dry from all the shouting, and squeezed your hands. “Because my ancestors charmed dogs with their magic, they didn’t scare little girls with curses,” he paused. “But you… You waved a hand over my head, and now I’m no better than a dog.”

He closed the space between you, pressing his forehead against yours, and stroked both your cheeks, wiping at your tears. You held him there in a meek attempt at reciprocation.

You wished the world were ending so then you could grab Tommy’s hand and say, ‘I’m ready, Tom. The world is ending, so let’s kiss and love each other under the flames without any fear because the world is ending.’

But you were never good at expressing yourself with words, so you sealed it with a kiss, hoping he could taste the unspoken words on your lips the same way you tasted the tears. He responded in earnest, gripping you roughly by the scruff of your neck to seal the promise laden between your lips; no more running.

It was just your luck that you would bump into your ex-fiancé, William, while visiting a bar in London with Ada. You were buzzing from the warmth of three sweet liquors and whatever else Ada insisted you try, and everything was starting to seem a little funny by the time he approached you.

He engaged in pleasantries, swishing his wine around the glass and sniffing it occasionally, like many pompous older men tended to do. There was only so much smiling you could afford before you caught your reflection in the freshly wiped bar and realized how poorly your acting skills were. Ada was no help, muttering something about finding a phonebooth and then slipping into the belated and boozed crowd. It was then that the supposed nectar in your glass began to taste like the cleaning products—that nose-scrunching stench. Thankfully, William was too involved in some tangent to notice you muffle a gag into your palm.

The dazzling hum in your ears muffled out all his words. In your drunken state, William appeared to be more confident than what you remembered, but you were unable to decipher whether it was from a change of heart or if he was trying to fall back in your good graces. Otherwise, you were blinded by the roaring bustle of the bar and the delicious swell of music that seemed to reverberate across your being.

Growing a little bored with William’s story, your attention wandered over his shoulder, still being sure to nod every now and then as if you were deeply pondering his words. Not far away from his side, a man seemed to linger—a man who was careful not to reach your eye. You must have laughed a little harder than usual because William turned sharply to the man at his side, gave him a quick once-over, then returned his attention to you, but by then it was too late, and you knew exactly what William’s relationship was with this man and where William’s confidence had come from.

“You’ll make a fine wife and a finer mother someday,” William quickly added.

You cursed the witch inside you, who laughed from her stomach and used his shoulder to steady herself. Once upon a time, that was all you longed to hear, but now, with a half-spilt martini in hand, you couldn’t care less. Both of you had found happiness despite your unconventional circumstances, and there was no more to it. You could close that chapter without any loose threads.

A little drunk, you thanked him, disappeared, and never thought of him again.

“I can’t do it, Ada,” you stressed, beginning to feel uncomfortable with the baby in your arms.

Motherhood came rumbling into your life like a rusty engine spitting out oil. ‘Instinctual’, the mothers down the lane from Arrow House had said, ‘it’s like your body has been preparing for it your whole life.’ How awful, you thought, and by the time one of them finished speaking about their experience with their first, your nose was so scrunched in disgust that you would need an iron to flatten out the wrinkles. It wasn’t until now that you longed to be in their shoes, because nothing came naturally to you.

“He’ll latch eventually; he’s just a little fussy,” Ada reassured.

“Is it supposed to hurt?”

“It’s perfectly normal.”

Then, after an hour of rubbing your sons back on the verge of tears, he finally began feeding from you. Ada soothed your back the whole time and cooed softly to calm both you and your unruly boy. Sometimes she brought Karl. He would obediently sit on her lap, playing with his wooden horse, while your little Charles fussed.

One time in the early morning, when you were up attempting to feed Charles, Tommy rushed in alert with disheveled hair and sunken eyes.

“Sorry,” you mouthed, deflated your hardworking husband had been disturbed from his sleep.

He ran his hands over his face and sighed. You mistook his action for frustration and desperately tried to hush your baby. Tommy moved over to the rocking chair where you sat, trying to feed little Charles in your arms.

“Don’t be sorry,” he whispered into the crook of your neck. “How is he?”

You flushed under the moonlight, suddenly embarrassed that your husband had caught you in this vulnerable position with the top of your slip peeled down. Your exposed skin hissed when he pressed a kiss against your pulse.

“I don’t think he likes me very much.”

Tommy inhaled sharply against your neck before resting his chin on your shoulder to peer down at Charles. Charles had settled since Tommy walked into the room, acutely aware of his father as his little hands made a grabbing motion for him. Diligently, Tommy relieved your arms of Charles and cradled him close to his chest. Within minutes, the little baby was gurgling happily and blinking in a way that suggested sleep was on the horizon after all.

Your husband didn’t dare make any sudden noise as he gently set Charles in his cradle. Once he was surely asleep, Tommy guided you up from the rocking chair and into your shared bedroom.

“See?” you hissed, still maintaining a soft voice, “he only wants you.”

Tommy wouldn’t hear any of it, pulling you into his arms as he sat on the edge of the mattress. Your slip was still pooled around your hips, so he took the opportunity to plant a kiss above your breasts, where your heart was.

“He loves you,” he drawled in that husky voice of his. “I know he does because I do.”

Your head ached, but you couldn’t help the way your body reacted to his words and touch. Tommy’s wandering hands teased the silk fabric that clung to your hips as you felt his nose trail down to your breast, where he kissed one of your aching nipples delicately. Suddenly hot, you hummed in delight, the back of his shorn scalp pleasant beneath your nails. A grunt, bathed in that musk of his devours your senses. Inhaling sharply, he took the bud between his full lips, sucking, licking, and nibbling gently while his hands explored further down. Your head lulled back from the pleasure, gasping and withering under his skilled tongue.

The next thing you knew, Tommy was tugging the rest of your silk slip off and reminding you of just how much he loved you.

“Charles! Come here!” Tommy called.

Your little boy loved to play in the backyard of Arrow House. Much like his father, Charles adored horses. Big ones, small ones, black ones, white ones—but most of all, he favored his Shetland pony. Tommy had brought it for Charles before he could even walk. He said something about it being important for his son to be raised around horses from a young age. And while you didn’t necessarily disagree, it still stressed you out to hold your baby so close to such a large, muscular animal. You knew the Arabian breeds spooked easily, so you steered clear of them and were able to keep Tommy and Charles happy.

But now he had grown up so fast and was able to run around on his own two legs, climb trees, and bruise his knees on the way down. The sun beat lovingly on the apples of his cheeks as he dirtied his trousers, kneeling by the fence to feed his Shetland (affectionately named Biscuit) hand-picked grass through the gaps.

“Charles! We’re leaving!” You called when he ignored his father.

Stubbornly, Charles spun around to pout his lip and cross his arms. He glared at you as threateningly as a five-year-old could. You bit your lip to hide your smile because he really did look like a little Tommy with those big blue eyes. It would only be a matter of time before he perfected his father’s stare. With a sigh, you shifted your daughter into Tommy’s arms before approaching Charles, who was picking angrily at the grass.

You reached a hand out toward him, "let's go.”

“No!”

“All right,” you said decisively, spinning around, “Ruby will have all the fun then.”

“No!” cried your little boy.

You stuck a hand up in surrender and started walking back to Tommy. “No, it’s all right.”

“No, no no no!” Came his protest, chasing behind you as the gravel crunched beneath his boots.

You paid no attention to him, keeping your eyes trained ahead, silently relieved that your ploy worked. Tommy watched on in amusement while Ruby suckled on her thumb, curiously watching her brother storm closer.

“You hear that, Ruby? We’re going to spoil you,” a short smile played on Tommy’s face as he adjusted her so that she sat comfortably on his hip.

“And me!” Charles added and gave his best pout.

“No, Charles, you said you didn’t want to go,” you reminded him, raising your eyebrows.

“I do! I do!”

“Hmm,” you thought aloud, and held a finger to your chin while looking to the sky in exaggerated contemplation. “Very well, but only if you get in daddy’s car right this instant.”

He climbed into the backseat of the Bentley without further fuss.

When all the bags were neatly packed in the back for the day’s festivities, Tommy came around your side to sit Ruby on your lap. Quickly, he leaned in to kiss you and pinch your cheek, which swelled into a glowing grin.

He smiled back and whispered low enough for only you to hear, “got him wrapped around your finger, eh?”

You laughed. “Him and a few other Shelby’s I know of.”

The thundering sound of music could be heard from outside the theater on the corner of Old Pauls. Inside, patrons mused between champagne, dancing, and making a display of their wealth by bidding on little trinkets. It was one of the many charity galas Tommy had to attend because of his new move into politics. Usually, you enjoyed dressing for those sorts of things, but tonight you simply weren’t feeling up to it. Maybe it was the drape of your dress not sitting right or the new leather shoes that still needed breaking in.

Your shimmering smile faded into the crowd as you snuck through the back door in your satin bordeaux dress. Old Pauls sat perched above the cemetery it was named after. Conveniently across the street from the buzz of the theater, it was airily quiet and stuck out from the rest of industrial Birmingham. Your heels clacked across the pavement as you wandered up and down the garden, glimpsing at stone angels and silver plaques. All you had to light your path were the streetlights and the moon.

Your diamond wedding ring twinkled under the stars as you stopped to trace a name. It was the same as your mother's, but with a different last name. Still, you always wondered what happened to her. Had she gotten married to another man and taken his name? You expected to shiver at the idea, but you found that thinking of her no longer unnerved you. She packed up the title of mother when she left you all alone in that cramped house.

Light spilled out onto the pavement across the street when the entrance to the theater swung open. A few men flew down the steps and split off in different directions. Thinking it odd, you remained crouched until they disappeared around their respective corners. That’s when you saw Tommy exit through the same doors, throwing a cigarette and wiping at his brow while he looked up and down the street. Quickly, you stood and waved your arm to get his attention. When he noticed, he stormed down the steps and stalked across the street and through the gates of Old Pauls over to you.

“I needed some air,” you spoke up before he could get a word in.

His eyes wildly flickered back and forth from yours in a frenzy. Under the moonlight, they looked almost translucent, and, save for a ghost of blue, his pupils were wide.

“Why the bloody hell are you out here, eh?” He demanded, gently shaking your head between his hands for emphasis while his eyebrows rose expectantly.

“It’s quieter.”

When he tilted his head to the sky and exhaled, your stomach dropped at the sight of blood. Your ears, which had been tuning out the music, flinched when a shrill cry from a woman rang out the theater doors. The music was gone, now replaced with screams as all the patrons rushed out, tripping over each other like it were a race. You turned back to Tommy, now as worried as the others.

“What the hell happened? Are you hurt?” You urged, gripping his white collar, now red, to inspect where the blood was coming from.

“Not mine,” he cleared his throat, grabbing the hand on his collar to tug you down the street.

The frame of your world stretched a little wider, like light pouring in through open shutters. Car doors slammed, and drivers honked at the agitated crowd who ran this way and that across the road.

“Where’s the fucking ambulance?” Shouted a man who took no care to avoid bumping into you.

You stumbled back, your hand slipping from Tommy’s on impact. Rage flickered across his features briefly, having noticed the man push through you, but he reconnected your hands and continued walking fast. When he reached the Bentley, he urged you inside, holding your hand the whole way until you were seated in the passenger seat.

“What the hell happened, Tommy?” You repeated as he slid into the driver’s seat.

“Someone got shot.”

Your eyes widened. “Are Polly and—”

“They’re fine.”

You sank back into your seat as the engine roared to life. Peaky Blinder’s followed the frenzied crowd, moving together like a pack of wolves onto the streets. They only parted to let Tommy’s Bentley through. Out the window, people were fighting and throwing fists as they all tried to escape the mayhem.

“Why aren’t they letting people through?” You asked after witnessing a Peaky Blinder block the road and refuse to let a car pass.

“Doesn’t matter.”

He never told you anything when it came to business. And although you suspected this was much more than the doing of the Shelby brothers, Tommy’s face never betrayed him. Simply put, if he didn’t want you to know, you wouldn’t.

“Would anyone want to follow us?”

“No.” He exhaled deeply, cleared his throat, and then reached to give your thigh a squeeze.

You knew it was a lie when his eyebrows rose. He only did that when he was worried. Your tongue remained pressed to the back of your teeth the entire ride home.

The howl of the wind whistled down into the valley of the gypsy camp Tommy had brought you and the children to.

“Pack your things,” he had said one night after storming through the front door of Arrow House, “we’re going on a trip.”

Charles and Ruby cheered, but you suspected something sinister beneath his intentions.

So, there you were, picking at the grass by your feet while you perched on the bottom step of the gypsy wagon Tommy parked beneath a tree for shade. He kept quiet for most of the ride, absorbed in leading the horse around loose gravel and stones, or rather, he led you to believe he was lost in concentration. Because, when it came down to it, you knew Tommy better than to assume nothing was wrong.

The past week, he had been acting different, jumpy even. He ran into the nursery during the early hours of the morning on edge, as if expecting something to be amiss. You tried interrogating him, but he brushed it off, insisting things were fine. Fine—you began detesting that word. Fine this, fine that, but if things were really fine, then why was he on edge?

Then came the bloodshot eyes and the slamming of his desk drawer when you entered the office. Only this time he couldn’t deny the unmistakable jingle of a bullet, which rattled in the wooden compartment like some sort of airy death chime.

A black hand. One for each Shelby. And since you were now one too, that meant neither you nor the children were subjected to any special treatment. A week, he said, a week for his family to clear up the business while he stayed here watching over you like a shepherd to his flock.

And watched he did, standing next to where you sat, he found peace observing Charles and Ruby as they chased each other around the overgrown field. There he remained for an hour or so, frighteningly still, the only motion being his sharp jaw chewing on a mint leaf, somewhat reminiscent of the soldier in your tent all those years ago. Next to him, tied to the tree, the black steed filled the silence with snorts and grazed favorably on the loose roots and grass patches.

“Ruby was crying this morning. She’s scared, Tom." You sighed.

Tommy hadn’t been there when you woke up that morning in the caravan. He returned shortly after, ominous as ever, just as Ruby had begun to settle.

He tossed the stalk of his mint leaf into the grass and offered you his hand. You looked up at him in question for a moment, slightly suspicious of his intentions. Nevertheless, you slid your hand into his, and he stood you up, sat down on the higher step, and pulled you between his legs to sit on the lower step. He hugged you from behind as he slouched to rest his head on your shoulder, then exhaled deeply.

“We will be home soon,” he whispered in your ear, brushing your knuckles tenderly.

“For how long? Until we get another bullet in the post?”

Tommy’s throbbing forehead found solace in the warmth of your neck.

“You’ve never been one to run,” you continued, “what’s bothering you? We took a vow that we would share everything.”

He nuzzled his nose deeper into your pulse.

Frustrated, you tried to get up, but he held you firmly against his chest.

“Italians.”

“Italians?”

“Italians sent the black hands.”

You waited in silence for more information, but more did not come.

“Speak to me, Thomas.”

“I don’t want you any more involved than you are.”

“They’ve sent death knocking on our door; how more involved could I be?”

Tommy moved methodically, licking his lips and clearing his throat. He squinted his eyes up at the glaring sun.

“It’s nothing you should be concerned about. I’ll keep us safe.”

“Nothing I should be concerned over, Thomas? Just how many people are we at war with?”

He didn’t answer, so you turned your head away from him. Charles and Ruby had since settled by a patch of flowers. Charles was crouched over, helping his sister gather all the yellow flowers for her yellow dress.

The tension broke the surface then.

“Why are you still fighting, Tom? Is this,” you nod to your children and breathe in the fresh air, “not enough?”

You pictured Arrow House and its lavish garden, one to compete with all the wealthy families down the lane. You thought of Arthur, John, Polly, Ada, and all his family that lived to see his success. Everything, from the thoroughbreds in the stable to the fancy cars. The money itself was a testimony to his drive. What more could the gangster of Birmingham want when he already had everything?

You had gone and worked yourself up now because the world seemed blurrier than before.

Tommy, still on his guard, guided your chin to your shoulder so he could kiss the tears away. “It is enough.”

“Then make it enough. You’re respectable now, so stop the fighting.” Your voice broke at the end.

He hung his forehead on your shoulder. Like a flower sheltered away from the sun, Tommy wilted when he was away from his business. Usually, you were a strong enough light to keep him going, but whatever business he had gotten himself into was poisoning him, and ever the addicted flower, he kept running out to the fields, continuing to drink in the sunlight until it was too much and turned his leaves brow. Because business was what occupied his mind day and night, he was unable to turn the cogs of the engine off and let the air out of the tires.

A hand brushes your hair away to kiss the spot beneath your ear, airing out the destructive thoughts.

God, you loved him anyway. An overpowering feeling that ruled over calculating minds like Tommy’s and faint hearts like yours. You were no better than him—both addicted to a little sunlight.

The framed photographs on the wall shook as your third-eldest slammed the door to her room closed.

“I hate you!” She cried from the other side.

Your husband, Tommy, sighed to the ceiling, then stalked past you to his study, no longer interested in anything your daughter had to say. They had been at it for the last ten minutes arguing over some boy she was seeing, and your ears were just about ringing having witnessed it from the sidelines. You were left there in the hallway, an unwilling participant in the unspoken feud between father and daughter, and you understood that whoever you went to console would take it that you were siding with them, even though you just wanted to keep your family together.

Going to your daughter was the instinctive answer, but you knew she needed time to cool off. Tommy was the only reasonable choice.

You knocked on the door to his office before letting yourself in.

“Come to lick my wounds, eh?” He mused while smoking a cigarette.

Your lips wormed into a thin line. “This needs to stop, Tom.”

“Yeah,” he said, tapping the ash into his tray, “it will fucking stop.” He points with his cigarette, “I’ll make it fucking stop.”

You sighed. “You know that’s not what I meant.”

The chair screeched as he stood. “I’m her father, and if I say she can’t see that boy, she can’t. It’s only a childish fling; she’ll get over it.”

He poured a whiskey and downed it by the time you walked around his desk so that you were face-to-face with him.

“They’re in love, Tommy.”

“Yeah?” He scoffed. “Well, that can be undone.”

You held his glare, a challenge lighting in your own. “So easily, you think?”

He paused mid-drag, catching onto the underlying meaning in your words. “No,” he said, setting the cigarette down in the ash tray and grabbing your shoulders. “Don’t act like that.”

“Act like what?”

“Like you’re threatening our love over some fucking boy that’s charmed our daughter. They’re too young.”

“He’s sweet.”

“Oh, sweet and nice, I’m sure. But he’ll have no place in this house.”

“Why?”

“Why? Because I fucking said so!” He spat.

“Don’t yell at me.”

“Or what? You’ll leave me?” He huffed in amusement. “You won't; you love me too much.”

“You’re so certain?”

He paused for a moment and stared at you as if he couldn’t believe what you had said.

“Yeah, because we still fuck like two people who love each other, eh? And you’ve not told me no before, so if the day comes and your body no longer wants mine, then I’ll be worried. But until then, don’t test me with empty threats." His face hardened.

He knew you like the back of his hand. All bark, no bite. You loved him inexplicably, even after all these years, gray hairs and all. His face, body, and soul nourished you until you were satiated and full. And even if his eyebrows furrowed at times, you were willing to bet that it was for aesthetic, a shapely shadow gathered over the years from being the stoic leader the Peaky Blinders and Shelby family needed. How could you fault him for it?

Because, at the end of the day, you were a team. Even if he played the role of an overprotective father a bit too convincingly, he only ever wanted what was good for your daughter. Everything he worked for, ultimately, was for his family. A family man. And that came with its virtues and vices because, despite what Tommy thought, he wasn’t perfect; no one was.

Shrinking under his hands, you breathed a sigh and appeased him. “End this feud, Tom. Find peace with her. I don’t care what you do, but by the end of it, I expect to be able to sit down at the dinner table without having to beg my husband and daughter to look up from their plates.” You stroked his hands, which held your shoulders, and finally blinked up at him.

A haze of softness swept across his glare and melted the glaciers to a thin sheen of blue. The seams of exhaustion frayed one by one through his muscles. He nodded, licked his lips, and leaned down for a kiss of absolution. Not entirely prepared to surrender, you tilted your head so that he found the corner of your mouth instead.

“It will be done, love.” He brushed the apples of your cheeks tenderly. “And by tonight,” his voice lowered, “I promise you’ll forget all about it.”

Only then did you accept his kiss, eager to put the grievance to rest. Tommy, on the other hand, had other plans and stepped forward so that you were pinned between his desk and hips. He quickly began to gather your skirts above your waist, but you pulled away just as fast at the hiss of air against your exposed skin. An unsolicited gasp escaped his mouth when your knee brushed him there, and you sucked your bottom lip between your teeth, looking deep into his eyes.

“Promise me you won’t break her heart. She might not be old enough now, but I don’t want you to put her off love forever,” you caressed his jaw.

“No,” he agreed, breathier than usual, flexing the hands that were still caught up in the fabric of your skirt.

“And our Daisy may never say it, but I know she loves you dearly. So please, Tom, be gentle with her. I don’t want her to grow up despising you. Tell her you love her, kiss her forehead, hug her.”

He deflated, and you watched him swallow his pride. Cogs turned against the sweltering lust, threatening to deplete the clever thoughts in that powerful head of his in favor of your careful touch. Please, please, please, you begged without uttering a word; agree with me on this, Tom.

Tommy leaned back down to rest his forehead on yours; his face gave nothing away. You were sure he had found something to say, which would make you feel like a fool for asking. However, when you embraced those faint subtleties of emotion flickering across his face like candlelight, so miniscule you might blink and miss it, you found nothing of the sort to suggest any hostile nature. Because Tommy loved you.

“I will.”

A/N: Tried doing a long one shot, what does everyone think? Yay or nay? Comment to be added to the tag list!

Taglist: @maliceofwonderland , @fairytale07 , @goblinjnr , @ilovepeoplesdads , @multidimensionalslut

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hazelfoureyes · 1 year ago

Text

Alastor in Rut (one shot)

Rutting Alastor x Fem Rabbit Reader

Less than confident and lacking much in the way of assertiveness, you find hell to be scary. But, a very kind and helpful deer demon has a solution! Just in time, as an unexpected rut hits him and he feels the need to reel you in.

this is pure self indulgence. Shout out to @jazzmasternot , @lustylita , @sugoi-writes , and @minkdelovely for keeping me sane and horny (with art lol)

「Warnings/Promises: actual warning - mentions of accidental vehicular homicide and reader's death, Marathon Smut, p in v, finger almost in a?, anal is considered, knotting because fuck it, attempt at breeding, womb flooded, not dubcon but everyone in the hotel thinks it is, slightly repetitive fucking because he wont waste semen on other holes, Alastor would fuck anyone but you’re the most amusing, Alastor doesn’t think he’s the good guy which is honestly kinda cute, deadass talk about making you carry his fawns?? Why is it so hot?? Knock me up deer man bleat bleat bitch, implied previous relationship with a human man, plans to cuckold your ex, heat, blue fire isn’t hot, you’re tricked into a deal with Alastor, kinda size kink, demon Alastor, minor aftercare, a little sexual choking (as a treat)」

Hey--- we're all here for something. This is 10000 words, 5300 or so is smut. Smut starts at the bright green divider for you impatient and horny deeries.

MINORS YOU KNOW THE DRILL DNI

The line for reception was long, but that was to be expected. After the extermination ended early and Adam killed on television by a maid, the Hazbin Hotel had been busy. Or so you overheard others saying. You’d only been in hell a day, lucky enough to catch the advertisements and hear the gossip for the hotel soon after your descent.

You recognized the princess immediately, but not that tall man beside her. He wasn’t doing anything, just staring and smiling. Was he friendly? Were there friendly people in hell? Truly friendly. Not high school girl friendly. Or hungry witch friendly. He had witch vibes.

“Hiya welcome to the”, she took a deep breath in, “Hazbin Hotel! I am Charlie! This is Alastor! What did you do to bring you to hell? Gotta know so we can cater your redemption activities to your sins!”

She was staring at you so happily, pen over paper. Your eyes nervously shot to the man, who leaned down in response.

“I fell asleep driving and killed someone, and myself.”

Everything about Charlie was frozen still except the sudden glossiness forming over her eyes. “You… you… were you like, a thief or… did you…… push old ladies into traffic?”

You shook your head no.

“Gluttonous? She asked.

“No, I wasn’t a fan of overindulgence.”

“Prideful, then?”

“Unfortunately… I don’t think too highly of myself. Living or dead.” Your hand came to your down turned rabbit ears, sad and limp. Even in death you weren’t the right kind of anything.

“Uhh,” Charlie clicked her pen furiously again and again, “Lustful?”

“Just the one partner. My highschool sweetheart.”

A sweat was forming on Charlie’s brow, “Sloth?”

“I did fall asleep behind the wheel… but it was from working 25 hours of overtime this week.”

Charlie put the pen down, “I don’t think you belong in hell. You made an accident. That’s not how sins should work…”

Your eyes bore holes into the desk, avoiding eye contact, “I don’t think heaven cares much about that.”

“Poor thing. Let’s circle back, Charlie.” Alastor’s large hand rested on your head, patting twice.

She nodded, “Good call. I’ll just,” her tongue stuck out as she began to write, “make a new category just for you! Other.”

Yeah that made sense, you thought. That was fitting. This truly was hell. Finally you stood out, as the one who didn’t fit in. You supposed that’s what a wallflower deserved for murder.

“Follow me little one.” The tall Alastor instructed you as he snatched a key from the hook and walked past you.

Happily. Small tail uncontrollably swishing as you followed a foot behind him.

A hum of approval, Alastor noticing the distance you kept.

“You obey instructions well.”

You always did. “Thank you.” Tiny and soft, your response made his shadow shift and smile.

It wasn’t a compliment, but the fact you took it as one interested him. Subservient.

Fun.

“I take it that you really were a good girl in life, weren’t you?” He swiveled on his heels to face you, the sudden change causing your face to run into his lower chest.

A song of apologies fell from your mouth as you backed up, tripping over your own pathetic attempts at platitude and falling back onto your ass.

He was tall before but now he towered over your, hand outstretched to help you up. You offered a thank you before taking it.

Clawed fingers tightened around your palm. Not letting you pull away. “You’re new to hell, right?”

A glance around, no one else in the hallway, “Is it obvious?”

“Yes. But also, you mentioned work this week.”

A nod, “It’s been maybe a day.”

Delicious.

“Could I offer you some advice?” He leaned down, hand tightening further. Wide eyed and a little frightened with the change in atmosphere, you just nodded again. “It’s very dangerous out there for little prey animals like yourself.”

“Aren’t you also a prey animal?”

His hand uncurled.

A moment of tension, Alastor leaning down further.

A strange sound was coming from his microphone, the best approximation you had was a car radio going haywire skipping through the channels.

“Room 243!” His body popped up and he held the key out for you. The hallway lights seemed to be glowing brighter now.

You grabbed the key, “Thank you!”

Two fourty three was just past him. A small tremble kept you from getting the key in on your first and even second try.

You didn’t even stop to turn on the light, just pushing the door closed behind you as soon as your body was through the threshold.

The relief barely left with a sigh when you heard it, “You know…”

Frozen, your eyes adjusted to the darkness enough to see the shining of his red and pink eyes in front of you.

“I’m somewhat of a deal maker. For a small price, I could help you. Perhaps, you’d like a change of appearance?” His voice seemed to be coming from the walls, above and beside you all at once.

Something lifted a floppy ear. But his eyes were too far from you for it to have been his own hands. A small scream as you smacked at the appendage.

“What do you say? I can use a little magic to make you happier with your new form.” A dark whisper into your right ear.

Your hands flew to your head before you dropped to your knees to escape the hidden things touching you.

“What do you want?” To your left now. “Let’s make a trade. A deal.” Above your head.

His eyes were gone. Just darkness and a soft laugh echoing around you.

Your mind was reeling through possible answers, what did you want? At that moment? In general?

An answer tumbled out, too quietly.

“Hmm?” His eyes reappeared closer to you and glowing a bloody red. “Speak up, my ears are quite a bit higher than your mouth.”

A second attempt, “Safety. I wanna be safe.” The laughter got louder, mocking you without words.

“A little tougher of an ask.” The sound of something slithering near your feet made you pull your knees tighter to your chest. “But! I’m here to please. In exchange for protection from the more nefarious of hell’s citizens I’ll need something worth my while.”

Of course, that is how deals work, right? A promise with compensation.

“I don’t have any money, or possessions yet. Maybe I should try again later?” You were lost in the light of his stare and found the darkness deepening around him.

A considered hum, “Well, you’re already dead. You’ve no need for your soul. Damned as it is, give it to me instead. To keep safe. And I’ll always answer your calls for rescue when in harm's way.”

Why would…what use was a soul, you wondered. Was he right? But if he wanted it, surely it had value. You were too new to this world, scared to say yes and part with what little you had.

At the risk of angering the demon in the darkness of your room, you whispered to yourself and hoped he would hear it, “I think I shouldn’t.”

Hissing in your ear, “Disappointing.”

The lights flickered on, an empty room. A bed. A nightstand. A closet. A bathroom. No tall smiling dealmaker.

A tremor stayed in your hands through the night.

To your surprise, when you ran into Alastor the next day he was more than kind. He was eavesdropping when you asked Charlie if the hotel needed any staff. Not only did you want to be of use, you were hoping to earn some money. He quickly slid beside Charlie suggesting things you could do.

Wow, you thought. He didn’t hold a grudge at all. Maybe he had been trying to help before?

It took a few weeks, but you found a groove. You were a floater between the staff, helping Husk with the restocking of his bar, following behind Niffty with supplies her tiny arms couldn’t carry, and keeping notes for the activities Charlie held. It was vital for you to feel needed and everyone seemed happy to have you around. Hell wasn’t so bad.

“Dear,” Alastor found you holding a basket of towels in the hallway on a rather standard weekday, “I need an errand runner. Do you mind?”

You had been finding Alastor’s presence enjoyable, a little secret you held. He was always smiling, which made you smile in turn. And his manners, well, perfect. You couldn’t understand why such a sweet man was in hell, but then you considered you were also in hell. Mistakes happen, perhaps he was also damned by technicalities.

Not that you would ask him, you barely spoke a word to the deer demon. Every time he was around you your throat would close up. Oftentimes you would pull your hands behind your back to shield the wiggle of your too-honest tail.

When he would speak to you, you would get so focused on the sound of his voice and watching his mouth move you’d actually not hear a damn thing he said. You must have looked like an absolute airhead, always replying, “What?” every time he finished a statement.

“Hellooo, anyone home in there?” He knocked gently on your skull. Ah, those big hands again. He watched the pink bloom across your cheeks, your hands coming to your ears to pull them down as your mind wandered off. A snap of his fingers finally brought you back.

“Sorry, what?” Your eyes were bright as you finally made the journey all the way up to his face.

“Welcome back. I need some stuff picked up from a shop downtown. I can’t leave right now, mind hopping over for me?” The grin he offered you made you melt.

“Of course!” That damn tail shaking behind you, “What am I picking up?”

He waved his hand, “Not important, it’ll be all wrapped up and waiting.” The radio effect of his voice grew, “I’ll write down the address.”

Terrible handwriting. You could barely read it, but didn’t want to insult him so you just nodded as he followed you to the doors. Pausing, you realized it was your first time leaving the hotel alone.

“What’s wrong? Not up to it?”

You shook your head, “No! I can do it. Thank you.”

A pounding in your chest made you question if you were actually dead. But despite your concerns, no one bothered you beyond some catcalling and intense glares. Staring at the paper, you struggled to decipher the address. Was that a 7 or a 1? A 4 or a 9…? You were in the general area, the street name lined up and the first couple numbers of the address too.

You brought the paper closer to your face, maybe if you really inspected it you could figure it out.

A shriek, dropping the paper to felt a small goblin-like creature pushing at your knees. Another, then another, began to appear from the shadows of the street. Black and white little creatures pushing and pulling at your legs until you tumbled over.

“Help!” You thought it was a shout, but it came out as a soft spoken request, the tone itself adding a ‘please’ to the end.

They weren’t hurting you, just knocking you over every time you tried to stand up like grade school bullies. You managed, the creatures relenting momentarily before a stockier one materialized. A step back, what did they want? Money? You pulled out your wallet and opened it but the large one smacked it to the ground.

That quick heart skipped a beat when your back hit against something solid. As your head bent backwards, you could see those red and pink eyes looming over you.

“Oh dear. Trouble already?”

You could cry. You did cry, a little, at the sight of a familiar face. With a flourish of his hands, those previously unseen tendrils whipped from his back and flung the aimless attackers away.

Rescue! You hugged his waist, a chorus of ‘thank yous’ and ‘Oh, Alastor!’ into his chest.

“Now now, can’t even be a proper task rabbit. You really do need some safeguarding.” He peeled you off him, brushing his coat off. Your mind thought back to the offer. “And I don’t see my purchase… didn’t complete the task either?”

You shrunk, you’d entirely failed him. His smirk was one sided, eyes half lidded and expression dramatically disappointed. Alastor sighed and turned to walk away from you. You’d let him down. He’d been nothing but accommodating and gentle.

“I’m sorry! Alastor!” You grabbed his wrist, eyes shut so you didn’t see the green glow of arcane symbols floating up around him. “Can I please have that deal? Please. I’m sorry, you have my soul as payment.”

Painless, selling your soul. With a handshake, a little light show, and a whirling of magic, you had done it.

“Excellent choice!” Alastor patted your head, “I’ll come to your aid when you’re scared for your life! Aaaand in return, your soul is mine. Easy peasy, yes?”

Fine, not an issue in the slightest. “Do I need to do anything?”

“About what?” His eyes wandered to inspect his fingernails.

“My soul.”

A barking laugh, “No. You’re tied to me now, dear. As for my end, just call my name when you’re in danger and I’ll,” a flourish of his talons, “rescue you.” His smile strained as he peered down at your little face, “Why are you crying?”

“I’m so happy to have the help, thank you Alastor! You really are just, amazing. Your mother raised you right.” Your hands were holding your cheeks, grateful and feeling a little less alone.

The mention of his mother made his back straighten, a bloom in his chest he knew all too well to be pride. Finally, someone was vocalizing his better qualities. Well, other than Charlie. But impressing Charlie was like making a dog think you’d thrown a ball. Just a little quick whirl of your hands and a couple sweet words with a smile and she’d be all wagging tail as she ran to retrieve nothing.

But he supposed you were very much like Charlie, easily tricked and distracted. Had you really not noticed those goons were his? Or that the address wasn’t real? Were you stupid or naive? His head fell to the side unnaturally as he watched you talk. He wasn’t listening, though. He took in your features, slight but average. His hand came out absentmindedly and felt at one of your long and limp ears. He didn’t see you blush or caught how you stiffened.

Naive. Terribly naive.

Perfectly usable.

He dropped your ear and turned to leave. “I won’t rescue you twice in one day. Best to follow me home if you value your life.”

︶꒦꒷♡꒷꒦︶

You hadn’t told anyone about the deal, a secret for yourself to keep. Partly because you were embarrassed you needed the help, and partly because you had been warned extensively to not make a deal with the deer demon. Everyone had such a peculiar idea of Alastor, it seemed to you. Even after making a deal, he was still…Alastor. Always offering a joke, or playing something jaunty in the shared spaces. You could vent and whine and Alastor would hum as he read. Always offering a gentle pat to the head when you were sad or did something he liked.

So when Alastor suddenly left the group in a sweat, hands shaking and body rocking slightly side to side, you were quick to follow behind him. He bumped off the walls a couple of times before making it to his room and falling forward past the threshold.

You waited for the door to close before running down the hall and knocking.

“Are you alright?” You pressed your cheek against the wood and listened for any reply.

Alastor was still on the floor when you knocked, which worked out well. He leaned against the door, ears flat with his condition. He took a deep breath, voice dropping an octave and carrying easily to you, “Just— an out of season rut. Unexpected and unwelcome. Without any does nearby it’s quite odd.”

“Oh, are deer not like rabbits? Rabbit does are always in estrus! Mating actually triggers their ovulation. Neat, huh?” Silence, Alastor’s ears turned forward focusing on every other word.

Does, always, oestrus

Mating, triggers, ovulation

“I had pet rabbits when I was little. Isn’t that funny though? That they’re also called does.” You worried he thought you were weirdly interested in rabbit sex. “We had them as pets. So….,” a silence you misinterpreted as awkward.

Alastor tapped a long claw on the door before dragging it down the wood. A line was etched behind, “Is that so?”

You knelt down to get comfortable, “How long will it last?”

“Ah, hard to say. I've only suffered through a few. Alone, perhaps a week.”

“That sounds terrible.”

“With an appropriate partner, a deer demon would rut for two days. One for mating with his doe, one for guarding his doe from rivals who could still interfere with conception.”

His doe. You both found your throat running dry at the words.

You nodded, “Oh wow, I guess that’s why you always see bucks locked together in fights.”

“Precisely.”

“But...can sinners actually conceive?” You gulped, the idea was a little naughty to you. The entire conversation was actually making you uncomfortable. The kind of discomfort that made your breath pick up. The kind of discomfort that shifted to hunger with just a few words or a well placed look.

“No, but that doesn’t matter. Once fully in the hold of a rut or heat, demons aren’t motivated by logic.”

You nodded again, forgetting he couldn’t see you. “Oh okay…” the idea of Alastor rutting into his own hand desperate to fill a womb made your knees come together. “Must be hard for you. As an asexual.”

A hum, confusion breaking his creeping fog for a second, “A sexual what?”

“Nevermind.” You shook your head, shaking off the topic with the motion.

Alastor could smell your arousal wafting under the door. A feverish chill ran through him, drawing the fog back into the recesses of his mind.

“Well… I’ll let you rest. I know you can’t call me, so I’ll stop by to see if you need anything.”

His mouth opened to correct you— he could call you in a sense, and he didn’t need help as he had minions he could summon with a snap.

“That sounds lovely, what a helpful thing you are.” The words came out strained, his jaw tensing. How much longer could he hold out? The thinnest lie held in place that he’d suffer alone through the week. Already compromised by his errant shadow, flat against the carpet beneath your thighs.

︶꒦꒷♡꒷꒦︶

Within hours Alastor was lying on the floor with his limbs splayed out. The sweating was the worst, not the heat. He could feel ticklish drops dripping down his stomach. His hair was sticking to his face, adding to the mounting overstimulation. Wet, hot, clothes clinging to his body like a second skin. A clawed hand pulled off his bow tie. His fingers shook too much to handle the tiny buttons of his shirt so he gave up and ripped it open.

It fell into a pile with the bow tie and soon his pants and socks joined. Sitting up on his elbows he looked down at his underwear, he wasn’t hard yet but he knew the smallest touch could trigger what could be days of painfully swollen erections.

He fell back to the floor with a huff, hands raking through his hair and gripping his ears a little rougher than he’d meant to. A gasp, red tipped talons feeling down his ears and slipping around his already growing antlers.

Alastor’s eyes rolled back, strong hands squeezing his prongs, tugging them forward as he imagined anyone riding him. Using his appendages as a handle while he bucked up into them. His hips were already moving, lower back rising off the carpet as he rolled his body up into the imaginary mate he despised his desperation for. His mind flicked through faces. Husk’s pained but satisfied expression, Vox’s tears as he whined, Carmilla’s lusty eyes paired with surrendered sighs. He lingered briefly on Angel’s smirk as his hands roamed down his chest and his thighs in tandem.

But through the darkness of his imagination he saw two watery and timid orbs, tears welling as eyebrows rose in confusion. Pleasure making the features soften. Soft. Soft velvet ears he could tug on in turn, a little bushy tail he could grip.

A doe.

The only doe he knew of in the hotel.

The radio on the writing desk flipped through channels, piecing together the sounds to form the words he was trying to forget, a magazine ransom note cut from sound bites.

....out the windows

....always and forever,

....in yesterday.

....rusty cage

May you never....

Hating how I....

....pull the trigger

....say you love me?

....congratulations

The relevant sounds spiked in volume, mocking him.

He walked to the radio and hurled it across the room. Aggression. Already he was losing himself to hellish biology.

A minor part of him didn’t want to use you. You always looked at him with such adoration, which he’d come to look forward to when others weren’t giving him adequate attention. You also seemed to genuinely see him as a friend, as much as he didn’t directly feed that idea.

But using people was how the world worked. Everyone was using someone. You had said how much you wanted to help… Alastor leaned on the desk with both hands and watched the sweat fall onto the wood and leather writing surface.

How was his body leaking from every pore but his mouth was so dry?

His shadow reached for the thrown radio, the light flickering on. That dark doppelgänger using a song to offer another piece of torment for him, ‘you ain't never caught a rabbit and you ain't no friend of mine.’

︶꒦꒷♡꒷꒦︶

You had been speaking to Husk about what you could do to help prepare the bar for the weekend when a green light began to form around your neck.

“Did you— Did you make a deal with him?!” Husk dropped the dish rag, hands shooting to your shoulders, “Hold on! I’ll— fucking hell. Fuck!”

“Wait what’s wro-,” you were standing inside an unfamiliar room, just at the door, before you could figure out why Husk was panicking. Looking up, you locked eyes with Alastor. The room was dark, curtains drawn shut and ceiling lights off. A slight glow from a roaring blue fire to your left. His eyes were those familiar glowing red orbs in the darkness of his large canopy bed. “Oh, Alastor.” You finally noticed the third light source. A neon green large linked chain was wrapped around his fist. Following the squared interlocking pieces down the length of the bed, across the carpet and up as you looked down to find it ending on you.

Your hands touched your neck, feeling the cold metal of your collar.

Alastor took a deep breath in, a shaky exhale following.

Oh. You’d heard from Angel how his deal with his boss often materialized as a series of smoke rings linked and attached to him.

Before you could question it any further you were sliding across the floor, hands and feet struggling to find purchase as he reeled you toward the bed. Alastor lifted you by the glowing chain around your neck, evidence of the deal you so easily accepted.

“Can a deer breed a rabbit?” He mused, breath ragged as he struggled to remain in control of his impulses, “Doubtful. But I’ll give it my sincerest efforts, regardless.”

“Alastor-! You don’t want to do this, it’s just your rut.” You pulled back, legs kicking and piling up the blankets. It was fruitless.

He laughed, incorporeal radio studio audience joining along. You couldn’t stop from glancing at the straining fabric of his black boxers. Setting a small hand on his chest to better attempt to push away you gasped, “You’re burning up!” The fear of the moment left you entirely, replaced with deep concern.

He gripped your wrist with his free hand, not letting go of the chain in his right, “The fever is unbearable. My mind is slipping away.”

“Is this normal?!” Your hands came to his cheeks, his forehead, his neck. You remembered how your grandmother always checked your temperature, and pressed your lips to his sweat slicked brow. “You poor thing…”

When you pulled back you were met with the bright and blown out pupils of Alastor’s gaze. He was staring at your mouth, the green of his magical connection to you reflecting off his glossy eyes.

“Poor me.” He’d been sitting with loosely crossed legs but got on his knees. His face rose until he was looking down at you, hand now holding your chin, “You promised to help me.”

Your eyes were looking everywhere but his face.

His hand on you tightened, cheeks squished together as he pulled your head up, “Are you a liar?” Of course not. His hand made your head shake left to right.

The trembling of your hands was obvious to you both. A cruel laugh, “Do I scare you, little bunny rabbit?”

In life you weren’t popular. No one hated you, but, well, you never had much luck attracting the men all the women seemed to want. No one of power or consequence ever paid you any mind.

Alastor was scary. But were you scared? Someone strong wanted you. Someone people feared was saying you were good enough for them.

Tears welled in your eyes as you felt your tail wiggling side to side. Your body always betrayed you. Your own death had been the doing of your body’s inability to listen to you.

He couldn’t see the tail but the way your face screwed up in shame tipped him off. Letting go of your face, super heated finger pads slipped down your back. He slotted your tail between two fingers. There was no reason for it to be such an intimate action, but your entire body trembled.

Another deep sigh from Alastor, closing his fingers around the base and pulling gently. A test. Your head dropped to hide your reaction.

“Ah ah, eyes on me.”

He hummed happily as you did as you were told.

But the moment was cut short, you jumping when a rough knock came to the door.

“Alastor!” Vaggie was turning the knob despite knowing it was locked, “Is she in there? Open the fucking door.” A kick, a threat, “Now.”

“I’ll need your answer.” He leaned back onto the pillows piled behind him. Making a point, he lifted your chain and dropped it. It dissolved into nothingness before it could hit the bed.

“I’m here!” You said barely loud enough to be heard through the wooden door. Your eyes were drawn to Alastor’s lap as he pushed down his underwear to free his deep red cock.

His hand tenderly touched his base, hissing with the contact.

“For fuck’s sake Alastor!” Vaggie yelled, “You have three seconds to open this fucking door before I rip it off the hinges.”

Alastor’s head fell back with a moan, stifled as he bit down on his lip.

“One!”

As his fingers slid up his length and touched his leaking slit his entire body violently shook.

“Two!”

He opened his eyes just barely. You hadn’t noticed the antlers on his head were quite a few times larger than normal.

“I’m okay!” You shouted, the loudest noise you’d made since your death, but not the loudest you’d make by the end of the day.

Silence.

Mumbling.

Vaggie spoke up again, “Are you sure? Come out and talk to us first.”

His hand began stroking himself, precum spilling down. Something soft and fuzzy was settling over the front of your brain.

You scooted backwards off the bed, eyes staying on his lap. The light color of his inner thighs. The little bit of red and black tail you could see squished down under his ass.

“Hello!” You opened the door just enough to shove your head through. “Hi there gang.”

Husk’s arms were crossed and his foot tapping, “Are you really okay? No matter the deal he can’t fucking make you stay in there with him.”

While you weren’t sure that was actually true, it wasn’t an issue, “I wanna stay! He needs someone to watch his fever and-,”

A brief rush of cool air up your shirt before a hot mouth was pressing into the small of your back.

Vaggie’s eyes narrows, “and?”

“And! And. Yes.” Your eyes shut, “and take care of cleaning up after him.”

They shared a glance, “He can just make his little creatures do it.”

A surprisingly long tongue ran up your spine.

“Oh my god.”

“What?”

“Oh my god! No! I couldn’t let my friend,” you sucked your bottom lip in as his hands wrapped around your waist and undid the button of your pants, “rely on strangers.”

Husk sighed, “Alright, just… like, call us or something? If you need anything.”

You began to nod but the door was shut and locked by Alastor before you could reply.

₊✧˚﹕︶︶︶﹕૮₍ ⸝⸝´ ꒳ `⸝⸝ ₎ა﹕︶︶︶﹕ ˚✧₊

Your face hit the wall as you lost balance when he pulled down your pants and panties with one yank and buried his face into your crotch. His tongue licked at the wetness pooled at your entrance.

Any moans would probably still have been heard by the other two so you tried to keep quiet. Alastor didn’t seem to care though, growling into your skin.

The fever seemed it would spread skin to skin, but when he pulled away you found your body quickly cooling. Taking a moment to breath before turning back, you wondered if you’d made a great decision or a terrible one. When you turned, Alastor was settling back into his previous spot. “I could rip the rest off of you or you could undress yourself.” He wasn’t looking at you as he said it. You made quick work of removing your shirt and returning to the bed as you had before.

"Turn around."

You turned to face the door.

"On your hands and knees."

You paused briefly, but did so.

As you bent over, little tail high and trembling, Alastor’s clawed thumbs spread open your bottom lips. Perhaps it was embarrassment or just the nerves but you were twitching open and close.

You heard a low “Fuck” before the feeling of heat dripping onto you made you jerk forward. One of his hands came to your shoulder to hold you in place, the other kept your hole open as his seed continued to dribble down onto it.

He hadn’t been trying to cum, but his body was already responding to the opportunity before it; a breedable and submissive doe. His cock trigger-happy at the sight of your pussy, inside pink and clenching.

A tiny yelp as he fell over you, joining you in an all fours position but larger body caging yours between his limbs. He laughed again when the back of your head hit him square in the chest.

“You are uselessly small.” His body rumbled over you. “Clever girl to make a deal for protection.”

A burning stiffness slid down your folds. You could feel from even how little contact he made he was too big. Was it a bad time to tell him you’d only had the one partner on earth? A rather boring but sufficient sex life. If Alastor was hoping for a sex kitten he’d be deeply disappointed in you.

He hummed imagining dropping his weight and feeling you fruitlessly squirm under him.

“Mating triggers ovulation, I recall you said. I just need to fuck you into it, right sweetheart? Maybe if I do a good enough job,” his hands gripped the flesh of your ass, “your body will actually respond. Your belly will swell with the evidence of my virility.” Both hands slipped down your hips and came to nestle above your womb, tenderly caressing the protective layer of fat there, “could your little form handle it?” Little form? Not quite. But to him everyone was little. Claws leaving faint red marks as he dragged them up your ribs, around your sides and pressed your back down to get your chest into the bed and ass in the air.

A squeak, your legs flailing with what little motion they had as you turned your head, “Well that’s for actual rabbits not--.”

His hand came over your mouth, “Shhh, there's safety in the quiet. Don’t you know? We’re most vulnerable when we mate.” On the utterance of the word you’d been avoiding to even think about Alastor’s still hard cock squeezed its way into you. Your body was willing, but your pussy wasn’t ready to accommodate him. Not that your living partner had been small, but he wasn’t a seven foot tall rutting deer demon. And with height came a girth and length you’d not anticipated. You had seen it, yes, but that didn’t translate to much once Alastor was entering you.

His hips were snapping back as soon as he sank in. It frustrated him endlessly that he wasn’t trying to fuck you with such a lack of control. He couldn’t have been sure he’d have done it any differently had the circumstances been changed, but he liked to think he’d retained some skills over the long years alone.

The way he whined made him sound like a weak man, which he was in that moment. You wanted to call out his name, do the things you were used to doing during sex, but his hand was still over your mouth.

As if he heard your thoughts, his fingers spread open over your lips. Pinky under your chin to keep his hold on you.

“Alastor,” the tenor of your voice surprised you.

“Stick out your tongue.” He sounded far away, despite being right behind you. When you did as he instructed his hand shifted. Two long fingers went into your mouth and pressed down on your tongue. Immediately his fingers and your chin was dripping with drool. He whined again, louder, the noise growing into a growl as his speed began to pick up.

You could feel the thin flesh at the bottom of your entrance stinging as it was failing to stretch enough for him. It would have bothered you more but the way his burningly hot cock's head was pressing into your cervix was making your eyes lose focus.

Without ceremony, you felt a rush of heat deep in you. Your shins lifted from the bed as you squirmed, weak attempts to escape the deep press.

His hand left your mouth and you felt it working on the base of his cock that was not yet in you. He mumbled something, it sounded like an apology, before you felt him pop the rest of himself in. You choked on your scream, not knowing what he had put in you.

It throbbed, new and stronger spurts of his seed felt against an indescribable place.

A brave hand reached between your thighs and felt at the space between your bodies—- well, would have felt at that space. But there was none. You were flush against his lap. Your fingers slid down to feel taut balls pulled up into his body.

He shivered as you traced between them, checking neither were … inside you.

“I should have warned you, but my ability to speak wasn’t—,” he waved his hand around, “available.” You tried to pull away but found you both were locked together. “A knot. Not an accurate representation of a deer… and technically useless.”

That word meant nothing to you. “Is it normal?”

His thumb pressed at the virgin tight ring of muscle just above your pussy, you instinctively jerked away but just made yourself gasp as that large knot in you threatened to further tear you if you kept it up. “I don’t normally do it so early in a mated rut.”

You surrendered, trying to relax your upper body into the bed. “How do we get it out?”

A mocking chuckle, “It’ll deflate, so to speak, in a couple minutes. It’s just keeping my little doe in place while I finish filling her up.” He patted your ass.

It was mortifying to be suck in that position.

“Have you ever used this hole?” He rubbed some of your wetness up to your asshole.

Your tail lifted, “My boyfriend didn’t like anal.”

Alastor massaged around the puckered ring, “I didn’t ask if he used his.” Your head turned to look at him, shaking it ‘no’. You noticed his face looked less strained now, and that his finger didn’t feel like a fire was just under his skin. “Ah, well. I won’t need it today anyway.”

He didn’t see the bright blush that came over your face. He spoke so easily about the topic, a topic you’d never heard him speak on before. One you’d been told he had no interest in.

An error you made, assuming a lack of interest meant a lack of knowledge or experience.

When he finally could pull himself out of you, you felt a rush of warmth down your inner thighs. Looking under you, past your chest and between your legs, you saw the thick white semen escaping from your stretched entrance.

You’d never seen such an opaque release before. You wondered if it was a hint at his…potency. You wondered more what was happening in your body at that moment.

“Will it come out on its own or do I need to clean it?” Finally sitting up, your fingers felt the mess still dripping out of you.

Alastor leaned back onto his legs, ears turning in your direction as you asked, “Is this your first time? Your little boyfriend never finished in you?”

Crossing your arms, you turned to him, “Don’t be patronizing to him. And no, okay?”

He felt the heat rising from his gut again, cock twitching at every bit of the scene before him. Insolent body language, an attempt to scold him, and an admission. You watched him sit back up, a sudden reminder how much taller he was as darkened eyes looked down on you. The blue of the fire cast half of his face in shadows. “What’s this? My obedient doe wants to defend another man in my bed?”

Your hands nervously came to the ends of your ears, “I didn’t mean it like that.” A finger twirled, telling you to turn around. You hesitated. Did he want you to leave? He didn’t want to look at you? You hadn’t—, “I’m sorry.”

With a blink, his eyes were black. His fingers longer as parts of him seems to stretch between the joints. He twirled them again as his smile grew wicked.

Desperate to show him you hadn’t wanted to upset him, that you wanted to stay, you turned around. The fear of not knowing what he would do next was sending waves of electricity to your lap. You realized you hadn’t touched yourself yet, not that this was the time to start.

One by one, those freakishly long fingers curled around the small of your waist and lifted you off the bed. The tops of your feet were sliding across the dark maroon blankets beneath you both.

Your heart was pounding in your ears as he pulled you against him. He positioned you above his renewed erection, your legs opening a little in instinct.

Grateful now to be turned around, you let your face run the full range of feelings as they washed over you. Fear, arousal, anticipation.

“What a wasteful man.” He brought you down with a painfully slow speed, head just now meeting your sticky wet hole. “He never flooded your soft cunt?” He pressed in a little easier this time, but as you sank to take him all in you felt a sting where you’d slightly torn earlier. “When he dies, I’ll be sure to find him.” Cruel. “And make him watch me breed you.” You clenched, yet another betrayal by your body.

You were reduced to gasps as he stayed stock still and moved you on and off his cock. “Am I bigger than he is?” You could feel his breath against your back as you were lifted and brought back down again slowly.

You nodded. A terrible liar, you didn’t even try to fib.

He stopped with his head barely in you.

A squirm.

“I’m sure I just didn’t hear you. Try again.”

“Yes.” You were full again as he got his answer. A creaking sound you didn’t recognize startled you.

“Do I fuck you better than him?”

Ah you understood. Your hands held at his fingers digging into your body. “Yes.” Another creaking sound as he quickened your rise and fall.

Alastor’s antlers were wide and multi-pronged as your affirmations jostled around behind his eyes. Your ‘yes’ somehow made you tighter, wetter, hotter around him. His hips started moving again to meet yours. Perhaps he his dick grown a little during his shift to a more demonic form, or maybe you enjoyed the line of questions. All he knew was you were squeezing him like your body didn’t want him to ever pull out again.

Blood dripped from his lips as he cut his own skin, through gritted teeth a final question, “Do you want my fawns?”

Your legs pressed together, you knew there was only one answer and yet you asked yourself. Did you want that? To carry his children? A moan cut through your thinking, “Yes!”

The fire roared, a response to his own reaction.

Alastor felt his mind slip under again, noticing the wild way his shadow was dancing around the walls before his senses all dulled except touch.

The bed drifted away from under his knees and the walls melted like spent candles. Just sounds echoing off space as your moans deepened. As if learning, you began to whisper ‘yes’ to yourself as you felt a building pressure in your stomach.

Every thrust into you further separated your brain from your body. Your eyes lost focus as you watched the door bounce. No, wait, you were bouncing, right? Bouncing up and down the stiff rail of Alastor’s arousal. Your head fell forward, gasping as you felt him harden further while buried deep in you. He was going to cum again, you could feel it, you would feel it. The thought made your body shake as a pressure grew steadily in you.

Not a new sensation, but a different one.

“Louder,” another thinly veiled demand from Alastor that seemed to come from somewhere else entirely. Your eyes noticed a small light on the floor near the wall. A radio, buzzing with the same crackle as his voice.

“Yes,” you ground out, his hands were slippery with sweat as his nails dug in to ensure he didn’t lose his grip on you. “Yes, yes, yes.” He brought you down entirely and only let you off a little, an unspoken fear he would release too close to your entrance and he’d lose precious seed he needed your body to receive. “Yes! Alastor!” You weren’t sure who was talking now, as it surely couldn’t be you. You’d never —

“You’re better than him. You’re bigger and stronger and and he never —- he could never…”

He was suddenly regretting the position, unable to watch you fall apart as he so lovingly spread you open.

With a shriek, your back crashed into his chest as Alastor fell backward into his pillows. He didn’t miss a beat. He continued fucking up into you but let one hand reach your clit. When you whined, he breathed into your hair, “I need you to orgasm.” Other hand pressing down on your womb, “Many cultures believed a woman couldn’t get pregnant without finding her release first. Surely it’ll take. Cum for me my doe.”

You shook your head, “Alastor that isn’t possible.” Not that you were arguing against the way his finger was rubbing up and down on your swollen clit, you just felt the need to remind him of the obvious. Your eyes wandered up and back to see the hauntingly wide antlers now. His transformed face barely visible in the shadows.

“I thought you were a good girl.” His mouth kissed at the base of your ears, hand over your womb pressing in and exaggerating the feeling of his cock bulging from under your skin. “Darling,” he groaned, “Are you ready for my knot?”

You moaned at the words. No, of course not.

“Yes,” you got quiet, embarrassed again. Your hand snaked up and behind to hold his shoulder for stability.

“Relax,” he hissed, feeling your body tensing in anticipation.

You tried your best, but between his strumming finger and the sting still at your entrance you struggled to let things go limp.

This time you felt it growing beneath you. Alastor was ready as well, pushing it in before it was swollen so large he’d have to force it or just suffer with it outside.

Lubricated with the multiple loads already fucked into and then out of you, the knot pushed past your entrance with ease. But then you felt it expanding in you. Eyes crossing as they rolled back with the foreign sensation. It didn’t hurt, but a little alarm was going off in the back of your brain. How could something natural feel so unnatural? And how—

Your body locked up, muscles from thighs to neck tight. Alastor’s finger hadn’t stopped, and as the second knotted release flooded you with his feverish need, as his knot trapped every drop and forced it up past your cervix you tripped into your first orgasm. Different from your own hand and toys, the build up hadn’t been a slow ratcheting climb. No, you were rolling through waves of nearly pained pleasure. The spasming forced your body to feel him even more, pulling him deeper, triggering another wave to crash into you.

Alastor wanted to praise you, a rush of hormones and ego expanding his chest but the sensations had him so overwhelmed he was manually breathing. His hand didn’t want to stop, because then the way your pussy was positively sucking him in would also end. But your little cries and moans got increasingly choked and strained.

The calm briefly offered by knotting a mate during his rut came to your rescue, Alastor dragging a still barely moving finger up your body and going slack into the pillows.

Deep breaths, both of you fighting to slow them down. Alastor was experiencing another moment of clarity, only slightly upset he had doled out so much tenderness.

But for you, there was no deep fog of a heat to numb the sensations and let the more bothersome bits of consciousness turn off. Your mind was just as clear as normal. A little lusty, but nowhere near Alastor’s altered state. As you laid against his chest, waiting for him to be able to pull out, you could feel the pains and aches setting in.

Alastor summoned a minion, food set down on his desk under a silver cloche. Your eyes caught the black and white creature before it was whisked away.

Sitting up, you flinched but fought against the pain, “Alastor. What was that?”

His hands pulled you back down by the shoulders, skin on skin, “My minion. One of many.”

Exhausted, you could only sigh, “So, the errand.”

His hands went up defensively, “Oh come now, did you really think I was the good guy?” You didn’t reply. The silence began to bother him. Odd, given he usually didn’t give a fuck.

But he’d asked a lot of you, and you agreed willingly. You did as you were told. A little twinge of concern he had actually upset you wiggled between his ribs.

His hands slipped down your waist and settled over your stomach, “…Are you hungry? If you stay like this, I can help you eat.” You took a deep breath in, but didn’t even move to look at him. He squirmed ever so slightly, “I can only assume you’re… quite sore. Perhaps a bath? But I can’t guarantee we’ll make it out much cleaner than we are now.” His smile was smaller, just lips; no teeth. As his antlers withdrew and his limbs all returned to their proper places he could turn his head enough to look at your face.

Alastor felt relief wash over him to see you deeply asleep in his arms. It wasn’t a bad idea, to sleep before the next spell hit him and he was too far gone to think about baths or meals.

︶꒦꒷♡꒷꒦︶

Alastor awoke in the dark. He found his hands and ankles tied behind his back, his body naked and sweating. He was on fire, pieces of himself lifting in the hot breeze and blowing away. He could feel his body fragmenting. You were just a little ways away and he tried desperately to reach out to you but as his eyes adjusted you were suddenly too far. If he could just get you to take a single piece of him, a shard of himself, he would live still. Even when the rest of him was dead and gone, he’d be alive in your hands. A raging stress, the fire now reaching his bones. It wasn’t too late. He still had time. Just a sliver of his existence was all he needed to get to you.

When you woke up, your body was at the foot of the bed. Looking over you saw Alastor lazily stroking his painfully hard erection. His gaze downcast, vision cloudy with unmet needs.

“Alastor?” With shaky arms you lifted yourself. You were hot. Was it the fire? No, before it had no heat. A little damp outline into the comforter formed where your body had been.

“You’re awake.” He reached over and grabbed your ankle, pulling you towards him and rolling you onto your back. Hand still around your ankle, he pulled your leg against his chest.

“Alastor.”

He sunk into you without hesitation, hips rolling into you roughly. Your body was rocking against the bed, wood creaking against wood with the steady force of his thrusts.

It felt good. Better than before, your walls felt soft and puffy around him. Alastor’s head was low, groaning every time he bottomed out. You could see just enough past him to watch the bed canopy swaying above you both before he folded you in half and leaned fully over you.

His eyes were unfocused like his mind, staring into the bed. A large palm at either side of your head, his back curved as he angled his hips to reach deeper yet.

“I’m so hot.” You were struggling to get the words out. It felt so good, the deeper in you he reached the more you seemed to be melting away.

Your hips were lifted off the mattress, held up entirely by his cock as he continued to rut into you. He could feel the fever in you rising.

Bent and tangled together, his head was nearly above yours. He was sweating, hair stuck down and ears folded back. A bead fell from his cheek and hit your forehead. He was working so hard. Such a strong man. A strong buck.

Something in you snapped. Something twisted and burned in your belly. You brought the other leg up to let yourself be folded in half completely, and his eyes wandered to your face. Your frontal cortex was just static as the lights were shutting off in most parts of your more human faculties.

Everything got quiet in you, a deep seated feeling of security creeping up your legs and sinking into your bones. With Alastor in you, nothing bad could happen to you. If you were carrying his offspring you’d be guaranteed a new level of protection. You needed it. You wouldn’t survive if you weren’t fucked and bred by the overlord.

How could your body be wrong when the feeling was so natural? So intensely confident?

“Alastor!” Your nails dug into biceps, hands clamoring up his arms to cling onto him, “breed me, please.”

He was caught alight, mind on ablaze with his raging fever. Your plea was a magnifying glass concentrating the sun into him and sparking a wildlife. Alastor was defenseless against the way your words affected him.

He could feel it, he could smell it, your heat triggered finally. His lips caught yours as his hands slipped up the blanket with how he had to contort to reach your mouth. You moaned into him, teeth on teeth as neither of you had any ability to finesse things.

“On your knees,” he instructed. You scrambled to turn around as he briefly left your body. A desperate whine in the seconds that stretched on, the emptiness unbearable. It hurt to have him anywhere but balls deep in you.

His hands slipped around your tail that still tried to swish side to side. When he tugged you gasped, the closest sensation you had was having your hair pulled. Chills ran up your spine. You nearly fell forward, but a strong hand wrapped around your neck and pulled your head back. He lined up, adjusting his legs wider to get down to your level.

“Are you feeling it?” He nipped at your shoulder, “Your heat?”

You pushed your ass back and pressed his tip into you. The sound that tore through your chest was answer enough for him as you tried your best to move along his length all on your own.

“You’re okay,” he squeezed lightly around your neck, pussy twitching around him as lightning snapped through you. “I’ll take care of you.”

Words that made your head spin. His body on yours felt like security. Everywhere his skin touched yours was a gulp of cold water in a drought.

A cliche, as he began to move again and his cock hit your g-spot every couple thrusts, you couldn’t tell where you ended and he began. His fever was matched to yours, no heat exchanged as warm and wet flesh moved around warm and wet flesh. Was that your hand or his on your stomach? Both were searing, both soft and slick. One of your hands was reaching down to hold his arm for support.

Eyes slipping shut, you imagined this was what being high felt like. You were out of your body entirely, feeling his dick slipping in and out of you from a different plane of existence. There was a sense your mouth was moving but no awareness of what you were saying. Truly just babbling as Alastor’s speed hitched. A clawed hand on your hip cut into you as he pressed deeper with every thrust.

He guided you down onto your stomach, hand now resting on your right shoulder to keep you in place. You were entirely flat, his knees parting your legs so he could get flush against your core.

His knot was in place as he began to swell. You felt it again, him flooding your womb as he released directly into your twitching cervix. A euphoria filled you so totally you were sure you could feel the cells of your body humming.

Like a cool breeze had blown down, your fevers broke nearly immediately.

“Oh,” you squeaked, Alastor’s hand releasing you as he lied on top of you. The weight of him was oddly arousing as it gave a clear comparison of your smaller size. “I think you’re right. Estrus.”

He nodded, rolling you both onto your sides, “Would you like the good news or bad news first?”

Resting your head on his extended arm, you tried getting comfortable despite the sticky feeling of your skin and the burning in your thighs, “bad news.”

“You won’t be walking straight for days.” He said it with a heavy tone of pride.

“Oh geez…,” you could feel his knot still throbbing between your hips, “The good news?”

“Your heat is going to make me even more desperate to fill you,” his free hand ran down your sides and slipped between your legs to feel where you two were connected.

You turned your head the best you could, “That’s not good news, Alastor!”

He laughed, “I lied. Oh well!”

While the good news had been a lie, the way your body’s shift into meeting Alastor’s instincts upped his feral responses was not. You nibbled on fruit and bread and cured meats in the small windows the clouds around your humanity parted.

But when they’d roll back in, a tempest of feral wants crashing into you both, you’d find yourself clinging to the deer demon.

You could have had an apple in one hand and be mid bite when his musk would reach you and your grip would loosen. With just a moan and a lifting of your hips Alastor would be dragging you closer, crawling over your body, mounting you wherever you two happened to be.

It wasn’t that you’d become confident by the end of the day, but that you’d lost all semblance of shame and embarrassment.

When Alastor pulled you onto his lap and placed your hands on his peach fuzz covered antlers, you didn’t need verbal instructions. It took all of your arm span to reach them, so you held tightly as he thrust up into you. None of his noises had been as intoxicating as the ones he made when you were leaning over him and squeezing his prongs with every jostle of your womb. Perhaps he’d lost his shame too, loud and long moans the other residents had to have heard spilling from his open mouth.

The wet slap of your ass coming back down onto his thighs as he bounced you was barely registered. Head hung low to meet his black engulfed eyes, you didn’t notice his smile was gone for the first time since you’d met him. Pinhole red pupils were locked on your face and imperceptibly roamed around your lust filled expression.

One hand reached up and rubbed the soft skin of your downturn rabbit’s ears between his thumb and index finger. Soft. Velvet.

A sensation that was wholly pleasant, not sexual in any nature but feeding the comfort provided by Alastor’s cock buried to the hilt. He wanted to enjoy the smile it gave you but he could feel his orgasm climbing exponentially.

There it was again, the darkness of your combined heat and rut slinking in. Body to body, your own sounds harmonizing with his and losing distinction. “Alastor–,” eyes drifting shut, “Please. I feel empty.” His previous loads dripping down your thighs, then down his own, and soaking into the carpet. “Fill me up. Please, can you breed me?”

His hand pulled down on your ear, “That was never in question.”

You let go of his extended prongs, arching your back to take a kiss. More. His tongue in your mouth, another hole full of Alastor. His hands both reunited on your ass and used the flesh there like handles. He fucked up into you, withholding the growing at his base, until he felt you cumming around him again. As your body sucked him in with rolling spasms, he pressed you down on his upthrust. A pained moan as it was pushed in a little late.

Lightning behind your eyelids, your mouths hanging open and pressed together.

Both of you a pile on the floor, a cold blue flame and soft music playing from the still broken radio. Uncharacteristically, Alastor’s arms wrapped around your smaller form and clung to you. The sensations were popping up one by one. Sticky skin, sweat rolling down your face, hair sticking to your neck and forehead. You’d have to peel each other apart. Which you did, eventually. When Alastor could pull out, he followed through on the bath he’d been thinking about.

You protested, reminding him you’d be soaking the floor with displaced bath water as soon as the next urge to mate came around. But he laughed, smile back in place as if it had never left, “Sweetheart if I do my job right you won’t even realize you’re not in bed until you’re knotted and knocked up.”

︶꒦꒷♡꒷꒦︶

He hadn’t been lying about the protective second day. But what he hadn’t anticipated was just how long that aggressive desire to keep others at a distance from you would last. While your deal had been in place for a little while before his rut, it wasn’t until after your time together in his room that it seemed to ever be used.

But you didn’t need to call out for him, like he had said. No, anytime someone even looked at you with a nasty thought, you were graced with his presence. Most people figured it out quickly enough, but occasionally new and brave idiots would approach you with trouble.

So when a tall and imposing creature cornered you in a shop, hand holding something sharp and shiny and asked, “Scared, little hare?", you could only smile as your face was lit up by a green glow and offer a little advice, “No, but you should be.”

deleted scene ˗ˏˋ Masterlist ˎˊ˗

˖ ݁𖥔.Summoning the Horny Little Deer Cult.𖥔 ݁ ˖

@cxrsedwxrlds , @nonetheartist , @tsunaki , @janchei , @moonmark98 , @hoebihoeshi , @pansexual-opera-house , @polytheatrix , @lorddiabigmommymilkers , @backinthefkingbuildingagain , @harley2223-blog , @poinappel , @midnightnoiserose , @spookieroz , @ivebeenthearchersstuff , @downbadforfictionalppl , @xx-all-purpose-nerd-xx , @sleepylittledemon , @aether-th3-enby , @dontfuckbutimfab , @breathlessaura , @aperfectidiot , @certainlygay , @jth12 , @star-kujo-platinum @ivebeenthearchersstuff , @rubyninja1 , @simphornies

, @readergirlstuff , @berry-demon , @chirimeimei , @fairyv-ice , , @tiredkiwiii @ilikemyteawithmilk @whateverlololo , @psipies , @howabouticallyou , @roxxie-wolf , , @fizzled-phoenix , @phobophobular , @mariaclarade-la-cruz1 , @roxxie-wolf , @a-case-of-attachment , @multifandomfanatic02 @watereddownmilk

#alastor x reader smut #alastor smut #alastor #hazbin hotel #alastor x reader #hazbin hotel smut #hazbin hotel fanfiction #hazbin alastor #hazbin hotel fandom #hazbin hotel x reader #fanfiction #the radio demon #hazbin hotel fic

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tremordusk · 7 months ago

Text

Rio: *pulls Señor Scratchy out of the bath* it’s okay baby, you’ll be nice and clean now

Alice: *watching what is unfolding outside the bathroom*

Lilia and Jen, walking toward Alice

Lilia: What’s going on here?

Alice: I think it’s missing their dead son hours…

Jen: Them?

Lilia: Dear god what is she doing to the poor rabbit?

Alice: Agatha and Rio have been like this since this morning

Jen: Really?

Alice: I saw Agatha put a diaper on Señor Scratchy…

Jen: Okay then…

Lilia: How long do you think this is going to go??

Alice: I was going to comfort them

24 hours later…

Alice, leaving the house with Jen: Move fast—

Rio, waiting by the door: Look both ways before crossing the street, mija 😉

Agatha, literally behind Jen and Alice: Don’t forget to use protection ✨

*Jen and Alice give each other horrified looks*

Jen, whispering to Alice: What. Did. You. Do?

Alice: I’m sorry they were sad—

#alice trying to save senor scratchy only to be adopted by agathario—#agatha all along #agatha harkness #rio vidal #agathario #agatha x rio #kathryn hahn #agatha all along spoilers #aubrey plaza #marvel #jennifer kale #lilia calderu #alice wu gulliver #agatha all along incorrect quotes #marvel incorrect quotes #incorrect quotes

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ghost-recs · 1 year ago

Note

CAN I ASK FOR A SUNA REC? (preferably timeskip)

YES YOU SURE CAN !! i may have gone down a small rabbit hole but most of them are oneshots. hopefully you'll find something that fits your fancy :)

Suna Timeskip Recs

love sick by @idlerin

synopsis: you are the campus "cupid" and give out love advice to the other students on campus as a hobby. but what happens when suna asks you to fake date him as a way to fend off the girls you're encouraging?

smau, college au - fun dynamics between characters and i'm obsessed with seeing where this goes [ongoing...]

bet on stones by @animatedrapture

synopsis: suna lost a bet, but for you he'd do it all over again.

a pure fluff oneshot with your pro-player boyfriend!

once in a lifetime by @moonswolfie

synopsis: this may be your once in a lifetime opportunity to talk with ejp raijin's suna rintaro, who could blame you for indulging in your small celebrity crush?

cute oneshot, flirting, i love this scenario

Lame Jokes by hurtbycanonthoughts [ao3]

synopsis: the same grumpy customer comes in every morning. you swear you'll get him to smile somehow.

oneshot! full of bad puns and fluff

clair de lune by MyAUIsAMess [ao3]

synopsis: it's been years since you've seen suna, since he made his promise. you're not sure if seeing him again was worth it.

angsty oneshot, right person wrong time that put me in my sad hours.

untitled scenario by @emmyrosee

synopsis: suna misses you while away for volleyball...

it's just cute, okay? he deserves it!

cameral roll by @haijmei

synopsis: suna is known for not being super expressive with his emotions. so how can you tell if he loves something? easy! look through his camera roll

short little oneshot of suna going through his camera roll

don't smile at me by @atzuums

synopsis: model suna is a real jerk, a hot one, but a jerk nonetheless. you just had to fall for him anyways.

smau, this is a bit cheesy, started off with a lot of good potential, but felt rushed at the end

it's a match! by shittyshima [ao3]

synopsis: matching on tinder with suna made your day. him messaging you was the cherry on top!

college au; i'm not gonna lie i feel like this is ooc, but the idea is cute!

i'm just gonna leave this one here again tho - you're not the one (ik it's not a timeskip but it's so good)

2K notes · View notes

jenscx · 8 months ago

Text

HIT ME UP — uchinaga aeri

aeri’s never had much luck with love. countless blind dates, dating apps, mutual friends, nothing came out of those. but wait, who is that girl in her best friend’s instagram and why is she so pretty?

tags fluff, no angst, non-idol au, open your eyes to see jiminjeong, mutual pining (for literally a sec), cursing, aeri pov centric

wordcount 6.0k

🎙️ author’s note: happy aeri day! lots of love to our favourite hot girl gigi 🤍 can’t express how much i love aeri and her contribution to aespa as a member >< i hope that everyone enjoys reading this fic and for aeri to enjoy her birthday!

uchinaga aeri, half-japanese and half-korean, age twenty three, has never dated anyone before in her life. well, not officially. she doesn’t really count the situationships or talking stages she’s had. aeri would say that the lack of love in her life would be due to her bougie choices in character. her taste is just a little more refined, detailed, specialised, whatever you want to call it. jimin calls it picky while yizhuo applauds her for knowing what she wants in a partner.

something that definitely attracted her would be a strong personality, a little bold and courageous but also sweet and caring. isn’t that a nice criteria to have? aeri doesn’t think she’s asking for much here. yet, her simple standards seem a reach too far compared to the personalities she’s met lately. even jimin can’t help but wince at the blind dates aeri has gone on.

because aeri loves everyone, as long as they’re pretty, she’s been on dates with many, regardless of gender. and well, she can’t really say that one outweighs the other. this one guy she met at the gym had told her she needed more tips on weightlifting and had gone into a rant about protein shakes.

needless to say, as much as she loves the gym, aeri could not really stand an hour long conversation about protein shakes of all things.

and that girl who seemed way more interested in the oat milk in aeri’s latte than her. that was a strange date. aeri scrunches her nose in distaste at the reminder. another date she’d been on, helpfully supplied by yizhuo, the girl was gorgeous and incredibly sweet. but the moment aeri had said she was a scorpio, her date started acting like aeri killed her dog. which, by the way, she never would. she loves dogs and even has two cute ones herself! and then her date had the nerve to storm out of the restaurant too. what a shitshow.

(“oh… maybe i shouldn’t be friends with her either,” yizhuo comments after aeri recites the incident to her.

“do you think she’ll burst into flames if you tell her you’re a scorpio as well?” jimin asks, so genuinely that aeri almost chokes to death while laughing.)

anyway, so what if aeri’s luck with dating is trash? her life has been fine for twenty three years and it’s not like having a partner will drastically change her for the good. she’s been enjoying this single life. she never has to update anyone about her whereabouts, she doesn’t have to reply to texts immediately, everything she buys is for herself. what a wonderful life. some call it miserable, others call it unhealthy. she calls it being free.

okay, maybe it is a little sad coming home to an empty apartment with no one to greet her. aeri does feel envious when her friends meet up and they talk about their own significant others. but that envy isn’t enough for her to throw herself down into that torturous rabbit hole of dating again. if only she had a friend that she could fall in love with or something. like a cute friends to lovers situation. or if she tripped and fell over the love of her life. the stars aligned, ‘we’re soulmates’ type.

not to mention that ever since moving back to korea from the states, her parents have been pressuring her to find someone. while korea and japan aren’t aeons apart, aeri doesn’t really have the comfort of family. her friends do offer some semblance of home but it just doesn’t feel the same. after confiding in her mother, aeri was told that a partner would fill in the gap her parents left.

she’s getting a little delirious and the idea of falling in love has become more of a chore than blessing. aeri slumps against her bedframe, scowling at her phone blowing up. if she were still on a dating app, the notifications could be due to matches or dates that were too clingy. but she’s sworn off dating apps for good and that chain of messages could only be sent by yu jimin.

jimin [6.19pm]:

omg guys

i think i just met the loml

holy shit shes so cute

im in love

can sm1 find her @

yizhuo [6.20pm]:

who

jimin [6.20pm]:

uhmmmmm

minjeong?

her cup says that

yizhuo [6.20pm]:

are you serious 😐

jimin [6.21pm]:

STOP SHES LOOKING AT ME

AAAAAAA

aeri [6.22pm]:

girl shut up

she throws her phone aside as jimin’s cries for help go unanswered. jimin breaking down would be cute if aeri wasn’t going through an existential crisis right now. the thought of never finding someone truly for her looms over her head. her whole ‘i don’t need a man’ (or woman) persona crumbles instantly the moment she reaches her bedroom. the facade falls immediately, only leaving behind a lonely girl who just has bad luck.

jimin continues to flounder around and seemingly the pings stop (aeri lets out a sigh of relief), before they come back in full force in the form of a video call.

aeri reaches for her phone and waits a few seconds just to torture jimin before picking up.

“uhm, hello?”

“oh my goodness— what is wrong with you two? have you not read my messages!” jimin whispers harshly. a grainy, pixelated version of her friend appears on screen. the only recognisable feature of jimin is her pale, glowy skin shining in the moonlight as her dark hair wisps around behind her.

staring blankly, aeri repeats, “hello?”

“hi, yes! okay, so i just met this girl and—”

yizhuo’s voice cuts through, “does it really count as meeting her though?”

aeri sees jimin rolling her eyes before she reluctantly pouts, “no, but that’s not the point. the point is that she’s really cute, like marriage-worthy cute. and i need her instagram now.”

“you think we can find it?” yizhuo asks, unamused.

“well, she was wearing our old high school jacket and you guys know a lot of people!” jimin’s logic, sometimes flawed, did make sense to aeri this time. she and yizhuo were like social butterflies back in high school and jimin’s assumption would be right.

“what was her name again?” aeri asks, just to get jimin to shut up. for a girl that was so elegant and graceful, jimin really was a loser sometimes. it was difficult at first to adjust from the girl crush jimin to the loser jimin but after being friends for so long, aeri has learnt to accept both sides of her personality.

jimin perks up, her forehead gleaming on the screen, “minjeong! isn’t it such a cute name? cute name for a cute girl… heh. she looked like a puppy too, like a tint maltese. she has short blonde hair too. almost shoulder length?”

aeri isn’t too sure on how the description of her looking like a maltese helps in their investigation but whatever floats jimin’s boat, she guesses. she watches as yizhuo disappears from the frame and jimin walks home, humming to herself.

a few minutes later, while she and jimin are discussing new hair colours, yizhuo pops back into frame, exclaiming with glee, “i found her!”

and aeri can only watch as jimin trips over air, almost in slow motion, and face plants into the ground.

“c’mon, ningie! please!” aeri widens her eyes while jimin almost gets on her knees, her hands pleading. who knew jimin would get so desperate for some girl’s instagram? definitely not aeri.

yizhuo only huffs, “i want something in return.”

“anything! really!” the older girl is so close to downright begging that aeri considers stepping in for a second before yizhuo inevitably reads out loud, “mj underscore zero one zero one and i want free lunch for the rest of the week. aeri unnie included.”

aeri grins brightly as jimin scrambles to type the username into her search bar. she fist bumps yizhuo, smiling at the thought of free food.

“oh my gosh, thank you!” jimin squeals, planting a wet kiss on yizhuo’s cheek.

“how’d you find her instagram?” aeri asks curiously. yizhuo shrugs, wiping the lipstick mark left behind coolly, “my friend follows her. asked around for a bit and now people think she owes me money or something.”

aeri stifles a giggle at that and turns her attention back to jimin, who’s still staring at her phone in awe. her fingers are fervently scrolling and swiping, tapping away on the screen. jimin’s devotion to find this mystery girl’s instagram is insane and it brings out the slightest bit of curiosity in aeri.

hence, she peeks over jimin’s shoulder and for her lacklustre description of minjeong, it’s well-fitting, surprisingly.

“she does look like a maltese,” are aeri’s first words. jimin swerves her head back, smiling widely, “i know right!”

“oh, she’s really cute,” aeri notes. minjeong is pretty, like a doll. jimin sends her a withering glare but she just ignores it. the girl is pretty, but not her type. and she definitely isn’t planning on competing in some competition for minjeong’s love alongside her own best friend.

“she’s friends with a lot of unnies,” yizhuo says, listing them off her fingers, “nayeon unnie, jeongyeon unnie, momo unnie— well, that whole friend group. jennie unnie too. and you know mijoo unnie? she’s friends with her too.”

jimin visibly deflates while aeri tries to cheer her up, “but they’re all friends only though, right?”

yizhuo nods, “yup, i haven’t heard of minjeong ever dating anyone either.”

her comment resonates with aeri and a small part of her commends minjeong for not succumbing to the horrors of dating.

with aeri’s words of encouragement, jimin continues to scroll, albeit slower now and not as enthusiastic. she eventually reaches the end of all of minjeong’s posts and hastily scrolls back up.

“check her highlights too,” aeri demands, terribly invested. jimin follows suit, clicking on the first story highlight. it’s full of food that has aeri salivating and jimin swallowing her saliva. yizhuo only watches on, uninterested.

then, jimin clicks on one that’s named ‘solos’ and aeri hears her choke up. the highlight is filled with selfies and photos of minjeong. all very cute and adorable. she internally rolls her eyes and begs jimin to hurry through the stories instead of staring intently at each one. minjeong’s feed is nice, aeri thinks. it’s clean and simple but it still shows enough of her personality.

when jimin finally swipes to the last highlight, aeri’s jaw visibly drops.

“oh my god,” she gapes, snatching jimin’s phone away into her own hands, “who is that?”

“hey! give it back!”

“stop it!” aeri swats jimin’s hand away and with miraculous strength, evades all of her reaches and manages to zoom into the story. minjeong, her face propped up by her palm, and next to her, aeri believes is aphrodite reincarnated. bright doe eyes, pouty lips— oh, aeri might be in love.

she was about to discover if it was possible to lose her voice solely from screaming inside her head.

“oh shit, do you think that’s her girlfriend?” jimin gasps as soon as she sees the story as well and the fight for her phone goes forgotten. they both stare in bewilderment at the photo.

yizhuo eventually pries their fingers off jimin’s phone, sneering, “close your mouth, both of you. she’s y/n.”

aeri jumps into action at her words, “you know this girl? who is she? what’s her name?”

“calm down, damn.”

“sorry— this is the literal love of my life?”

jimin frowns, “that’s what i said about minjeong and you called me deluded.”

ignoring jimin.

“i don’t know her, i know of her,” yizhuo rolls her eyes again. aeri purses her lips at the brattiness of the youngest. since when was their baby so sassy? maybe jimin was too irritating. aeri would understand if that were the case.

“just stalk her account. minjeong definitely tagged her somewhere or she’s in the comments,” jimin suggests.

aeri hollers, “you’re a genius!” it’s her first time saying that to jimin.

through sheer determination and will (yizhuo calls it stupidity), she manages to find minjeong replying to a certain commenter.

mj_0101 been away

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1eeyn i see how it is.. no creds at all

↳ mj_0101 photo creds to my bae

“bae?! jimin— oh my fucking god!” aeri screeches and thank god they’re in jimin’s room and not in public. yizhuo has the gall to cover her ears even though aeri’s been on the receiving end of her dolphin shrieks before.

equally distressed, jimin lets out a choked sob, “of course the pretty girls are dating!”

“guys, i just said they’re only friends.”

“and how do you know that?!”

yizhuo shoots a glare and jimin immediately cowers beside aeri.

“because i know them, duh. y’all are stupid. the moment you two see pretty girls it’s like your ability to think disappears.”

well that, aeri can’t disagree. her brain had no thoughts when she first saw minjeong’s story. just sunshine and rainbows. maybe the distant chiming of wedding bells. or a white, sparkly dress with a long train.

as she gets lost in her thoughts, jimin pries her fingers away from the phone, detaching them carefully. when aeri frowns at her action, the older one merely shrugs, “stalk her on your own phone.”

begrudgingly, she does so, searching up this mystery girl’s instagram. it’s pretty empty, mostly just pictures of nature and food. sometimes she throws in a selfie that makes aeri’s heart clench.

“fuck,” she groans, feeling her throat choke up, “she’s so my type.”

jimin nods in agreement even though aeri’s sure she didn’t hear a word she said. yizhuo rolls her eyes (how many times has she done that?).

“you think she’s into girls?” aeri asks, showing yizhuo a story highlight of some vinyls with clairo’s one right at the front.

“maybe. i don’t know her too well. i heard she’s kind of scary though, like cold and intimidating. she punched someone for picking on minjeong once.”

aeri lets out a huff, one of sheer amazement. lord knows she needs a woman who can fight.

“aeri-ah,” jimin suddenly calls out from her bed.

“yes?”

she gulps, swallowing harshly, “if you text her, i’ll text minjeong.”

yizhuo hums, “you two do that.”

she mulls it over. texting this pretty girl? who’s insanely her type? maybe. what if you were an asshole though? she’s not too sure about whether minjeong would be friends with you if you were mean but she thinks back to your face.

god, she needs you biblically.

“okay, let’s get girlfriends!”

she doesn’t text you at all. it’s a little embarrassing to admit but aeri’s scared! what if she just gets ignored? she couldn’t get her ego bruised like that. and jimin’s no help either! constantly texting her to dm you first even though aeri knows that jimin stares at the empty private chat with minjeong every night.

what she does do is first of all, create another account that’s completely blank, void of any recognition for aeri. then she watches your stories. on repeat. and on one uneventful tuesday, your profile lights up with a ring around it. aeri can’t help herself from viewing it immediately.

and maybe she shouldn’t have, since she’s seething by the time yizhuo texts her.

yizhuo [1.43pm]:

hey guys…

has any1 seen y/n’s story?

jimin [1.44pm]:

minjeong’s account is burned into my screen

but no ☺️

aeri [1.44pm]:

i’m gonna kill myself

jimin [1.46pm]:

😨⁉️

she almost actually throws her phone this time. aeri wants to die. she wants to puke.

what the actual fuck.

her phone rings— she picks up on the first ring.

“so…” yizhuo starts awkwardly.

“what’s going on?! aeri, don’t kill yourself?! you’re my best friend and i might also die without you! i love you, aeri—”

aeri cries out, “she has a girlfriend!”

the other side of the phone goes eerily quiet before jimin’s forehead pops up on screen and her eyebrows are nearly touching her hairline.

“WHAT?!”

“she just posted a photo of her kissing some girl’s cheek!” aeri screeches.

yizhuo winces before adding unhelpfully, “her girlfriend’s pretty though.”

“not the point— also yeah, agreed. but still! what am i gonna do now?!”

jimin frowns, “you can still be friends with her, right?”

“well… i was going to try to hit her up first,” aeri pouts, feeling devastated. she hadn’t even gotten a chance to woo you, and no way was she going to get in the way of a happy relationship! aeri was many things, but she wasn’t a homewrecker.

“maybe you can salvage a friendship out of this,” yizhuo suggests thoughtfully. aeri nods. maybe she should at least try to be friends rather than pursue a romantic relationship. she needed to expand her social circle anyway from just jimin and yizhuo.

“jimin, this means you have to text minjeong now.”

“what?! i’m not ready!”

“it’s just a text! like her story or something!”

jimin stares at her through the screen, affronted. aeri connects the dots quickly enough, “wait, don’t tell me you have been liking all her stories?”

“okay, maybe i have! that’s not a crime. and she liked one of my stories back! the one i posted when we went to eat hotpot! i’m way farther in this than you are—”

aeri hangs up. she can’t deal with a gloating jimin right now.

she needs a clear mind. she needs to think about her next course of action. all that was occupying her mind during the past few days was a wedding with you, but now aeri has a few adjustments to make.

swiping back to your story, aeri frowns. she clicks to the previous one. it’s a photo of you playing with a dog, an adorable samoyed. the background has a few other dogs, so you were probably at a dog cafe.

with your girlfriend, aeri sighs.

she types out, ‘omg where is this?’ it feels friendly and innocent enough. and aeri totally knows which dog cafe you’re at. it’s a rather popular one that she has visited herself.

before aeri can even think again, she sends the message.

god, she should really stop letting jimin get to her head.

within seconds, there’s a reply that makes aeri’s heart soar.

[aerichandesu] 1eeyn

it’s winters village in hongdae!

you’re really pretty btw

score! aeri’s got this in the bag!

she enters the chat and replies with a speed that makes the flash quiver.

aerichandesu [2.10pm]:

omg thankuu 💗

you’re super cute too

you don’t reply but aeri spots the tiny green circle next to your name. you’re online. but why aren’t you replying? was there nothing to reply to? aeri feels her heart sink a little lower. the chat doesn’t pop up with another message and aeri throws her phone aside.

she can’t let a girl plague her mind! aeri’s better than this! puffing her chest out, aeri gathers all the grit and willpower she has in herself and leaves the app.

aeri continues this pattern for the next few days; every time you posted a story, she would slide up. it only started to feel a bit one-sided when you started replying with short and curt responses. maybe you got weirded out by aeri, and she wouldn’t even blame you. sometimes she would send messages at midnight and wake up in the morning, cursing the vulnerability she had previously. she would read back at the chat, cringing at her overeager attitude. even jimin called her out on it! and if even jimin found it weird, aeri must have seemed absolutely psychotic.

“girl, i think you have to stop,” yizhuo says one day.

“stop with what?” aeri asks but she knows damn well what yizhuo’s talking about. jimin’s head perks up, her cheeks stuffed with ramen that aeri so graciously cooked for her when the older had complained about her hunger.

after swallowing, jimin giggles, “your little thing with your girl.”

“uhm, what?”

“i think you’re creeping her out,” yizhuo shakes her head, “if i had this stranger, no matter how cute they are, constantly texting me first, i would be a little scared.”

aeri pouts, feeling admonished, “i haven’t texted her in two days. she isn’t interested.”

“oh thank goodness,” the chinese girl sighs in relief, “i thought you went all joe goldberg on her.”

“i’m not joe! and i would never do that to someone!”

“well, i was worried anyway.”

jimin nudges her shoulder, “there’s a lot of fish in the ocean, right?”

rolling her eyes, aeri pinches at jimin’s side, “imagine if i said that about minjeong.”

“why would you ever say that about minjeong?” jimin furrows her brows, “and i actually texted her.”

aeri shoots up, the thought of her disastrous love life long forgotten as jimin reveals this new information.

“you did?! holy shit, congrats dude!”

jimin looks away, sheepish, “i replied to her story and she said that she remembers me from school. i don’t know how i missed seeing someone like her around. she said she really likes bowling, so i’m thinking of bringing her to bowl.”

genuinely happy for her friend, aeri pats her on the back while yizhuo gives a pleased nod. aeri kind of wishes her endeavour with you could go this smoothly. she certainly doesn’t remember you from school, nor does it seem you remember her. maybe you just weren’t in the same classes.

“guess it’s just me now, huh?” aeri laughs, despite the slight embarrassment she feels from being ignored.

jimin pouts, “you’ll find someone better.”

aeri thinks of the way her heart flutters when you reply or post something new, and she thinks that she’s never felt this strongly attracted to someone before without even knowing them.

yeah, she doesn’t think she will.

aeri’s totally fine. she’s gone two weeks without even glancing at your profile and she’s okay. there were some withdrawal symptoms at first, like the increasing urge to reply to your story or like it, but aeri’s determination outweighs her adoration. thus, she lives life without ever thinking about you again.

(that was a lie. she still wonders about it at night.)

yizhuo had applauded her ‘getting over’ you and so had jimin, who was barely online nowadays because she was hanging out with minjeong. aeri’s glad her best friend has found someone she likes. and she’s over the moon that jimin has found a new victim for her teasing. apparently, minjeong had better reactions, so yizhuo and aeri cheered knowing minjeong would suffer now.

jimin had been bugging them to finally meet minjeong and hang out as a group for the longest time. aeri doesn’t know if she actually brought her to that bowling date but the restaurant they picked out is expensive and jimin’s paying. so naturally, she agrees instantly.

what jimin doesn’t say is that minjeong would be bringing someone along.

coincidentally, you.

hence, aeri’s sitting right across from you, not daring to lift her head up in fear that she might make eye contact. after acting so desperate in your dms, aeri would rather die than face you directly.

you stare at her bizarrely as minjeong introduces you to jimin’s friends.

“this is yizhuo and aeri, we all went to the same high school together,” minjeong informs you, “but i don’t think we ever crossed paths before.”

“no, we haven’t,” you confirm. aeri glances at you meekly before darting her gaze to the menu.

“nice to meet you, y/n,” yizhuo smiles sweetly, making up for the silence that aeri provided. you’re still a little confused as to why aeri wasn’t talking right now.

maybe she thinks you don’t recognise her? but you do. she’s the pretty girl that randomly popped up one day and started replying to your stories.

“nice to meet you too,” you grin, “nice to see you in person as well, aeri-ssi.”

you watch, surprised, as aeri barely acknowledges your words, only nodding slightly. wasn’t she quite bold online? why was she acting like this now?

“shall we order?” jimin asks, snapping the menu shut. after calling over the waiter, you shift your eyes back to aeri, staring appreciatively at her outfit. one thing you noticed from her instagram feed was that she dressed well. you wanted to ask her where she shops but she seemed a second away from exploding.

you whip out your phone, earning a flinch from aeri.

y/n bae [7.24pm]:

is smth wrong w aeri?

mindoongie [7.24pm]:

uhmm idk 😓

idt she’s usually like this

jiminie said she’s quite sociable

awesome. so that meant you were the problem.

resting your head on your palm, you turn your attention to yizhuo, asking, “what are you currently studying?”

“oh, i’m doing fashion design,” she answers, twirling the knife.

“that’s interesting. could you ever design something for me one day?”

yizhuo chuckles, “i’ll cast you as my model if i get big. what about you?”

“i’ll definitely pursue something in modelling but i’m studying medicine right now.”

engrossed in your conversation, you barely notice aeri’s pout. the girl seemed a little too timid and shy as to what you’ve seen online. and minjeong and jimin seemed to be talking about something else.

“y/n, are you dating anyone right now?” yizhuo asks suddenly. you falter, recalling the girl you had just broken up with a few days ago, “ah, no. not currently.”

in your haste to recover, you miss the nudge yizhuo gives go aeri.

spurred on, aeri asks, “do you have time to date while studying?”

“hm, it was manageable,” you reply, “it got tiring when she needed a lot of my time though.”

aeri stares at you wistfully before coughing.

you wonder why she asked that.

[aerichandesu] 1eeyn

hi, can u help me say thanku to jimin?

for taking care of my best friend

aeri blinks at the message. it’s the first time you’ve texted her first.

aerichandesu [10.43pm]:

sure

she still feels awkward for acting so desperate previously. it doesn’t feel right to act like that anymore. and aeri does feel a little bad for how cold she was during dinner.

1eeyn [10.44pm]:

thank u aeri chan

aeri-chan? where did that come from? suddenly, she feels the stutter in her heart resurfacing after she had tried to bury it.

1eeyn [10.45pm]:

we didn’t get to talk much, huh?

aerichandesu [10.45pm]:

no sorry

i wasn’t feeling well

it feels like the safest lie she can tell.

1eeyn [10.46pm]:

that’s a shame

are you feeling better now?

aerichandesu [10.46pm]

yes, i am

1eeyn [10.46pm]:

that’s good

rest well aeri-chan 💗

oh my god, aeri needs to text the group chat!

over the next few days, you were relentless with your texts. it felt like you and aeri had swapped roles. she didn’t know to adapt to this new side of you without seeming like a bumbling fool. you would send selfies! selfies! asking aeri for her opinion. the first time you sent one, aeri’s nose started bleeding and she scared jimin half to death, thinking aeri was dying.

(“she sent me a selfie! of her face!” aeri wails, covering her nose with bloody tissues.

jimin grimaces at the blood, “well, yes. selfies are usually of someone’s face.”)

then, you would send your outfits, or whatever you ate that day. slowly, aeri started warming up to you too and would begin to send her own photos. normally she would send photos of her dogs or jimin and yizhuo being silly. then they evolved into selfies.

aeri likes what she has with you right now. you were building up a friendship that aeri appreciated. she liked your humour and personality as well, complementing her own rather nicely. minjeong and jimin begin dating as well, making your proximity even closer as the two would constantly drag everyone to hangouts. to be frank, aeri can’t believe that this all started because jimin saw a cute girl at a cafe, but somehow, it makes sense too.

how an insignificant moment such as minjeong deciding to buy coffee that day helped aeri gain two new best friends, she would never know. but she liked it. it felt like fate. leaning on your shoulder, aeri shoves a handful of popcorn into her mouth.

“no scary movies please,” jimin begs, tugging at minjeong’s shirt. yizhuo laughs and eggs minjeong on to pick a horror film while aeri stares at her best friends affectionately.

“you like scary movies?” you whisper to aeri.

she shakes her head, already feeling shivers run down her spine at the thought of being jumpscared countless times. jimin’s reaction would be funny as hell. but no way was she sacrificing her own sanity for something like that. if she wanted jimin to go insane, she had ten other ways to do that.

“nooo not the conjuring please!”

aeri cowers into herself, dreading the night already. this was a weekly occurrence, having a movie night at jimin’s apartment. it started with just the three of them and then minjeong and you got invited soon after. the honour of picking a movie was passed down every week and aeri detests it when it’s minjeong’s turn. that girl would pick scary films just to annoy jimin and aeri always gets caught in the crossfire somehow.

“don’t worry, minjeongie wants to watch despicable me tonight. she’s just playing with jimin,” you comfort. aeri nods as minjeong hovers exceptionally long on the nun before finally moving to despicable me. jimin cheers in exhilaration and yizhuo boos.

“oh my gosh, babe! i love the minions!”

“minions and despicable me are two different movies!” yizhuo sneers. just as the movie starts, jimin, minjeong and yizhuo begin bickering. aeri knows how the argument will end— with jimin apologising and minjeong and yizhuo emerging victorious.

a gush of hot air beside her ear makes her jump, “they’re cute, aren’t they?”

aeri follows your gaze to where jimin and minjeong’s fingers are interwoven even though they’re arguing.

“yeah, silly but cute.”

you chuckle, slipping your hand into aeri’s under the blanket, “we can’t lose to them, right?”

she gets caught off guard for just a second before bouncing back.

“no, i’ll never lose to jimin.”

your laugh makes aeri’s cheeks heat up slightly. as you ramble on about the movie, she listens to every word attentively, wanting to savour the smoothness and richness of your voice. her smaller hand stays tight in your bigger one, feeling the warmth emitting from your palm.

aeri’s heart feels content.

she’s happy here, being friends with you.

unfortunately (or fortunately), the friendship doesn’t last for long.

after that particular movie night, aeri has noticed a change in your behaviour. you’ve become touchier, for lack of a better term. more lingering touches around her shoulder, hands, waist, wrists, wherever her skin was. you would gaze into her eyes before smiling shyly and looking away. you would offer to bring her lunch even though she knows you’re busy with your internship. not to mention the influx of messages. if aeri thought your selfies were bad for her heart before, it resembled a tsunami drowning her heart now.

photos, of every kind, most of them in your scrubs and uniform, smiling at the camera gleefully, as if you weren’t working an all-nighter. and on your off-days, aeri finds you staying up to talk to her. she’s busy during the day, so she doesn’t really check her phone often. when she finally does, she’s welcomed by your chat. the once intimidating girl that she admired online had turned into the girl that camped in her dms.

she had asked before, why you would text her so much. your response had been equally confusing, asking her back if she wanted you to stop. of course not. the aeri a few months ago wished for days that you would reply with more than four words. now, it seemed like you constantly had paragraphs of stories to tell her. not that she was complaining.

then, one day, the messages stop. aeri’s a little bewildered when she checks her phone and nothing’s there but she goes to bed anyway. maybe you were working a really long shift? sometimes she would catch you at four in the morning, so perhaps you were catching up on some much needed sleep.

but when she wakes up the next day, there’s only a lone message asking for her to meet you.

aeri agrees, yet she can’t help but wonder about the spontaneous nature of the message. it was sent in the morning, so it seemed like you had been thinking about it all night.

after dressing herself, she left her apartment, nervous but excited at the prospect of seeing you again. the last time you met face to face was over a week ago and aeri’s suffering from y/n drought.

you had requested to meet at lunchtime and when aeri arrives at the restaurant, you’re already there, seated and deep in thought.

“hey,” she greets, “slept well?”

you didn’t, but you nod anyway.

“did you have a shift yesterday?” aeri asks as you order your regulars.

“uhm, no. sorry i didn’t text you, i was busy doing something else.”

“nah, it’s fine. i was helping ning with her designs anyway.”

you nod stiffly and aeri reaches out a hand to cover yours, “are you good? you seem a little off.”

“i’m fine!” your voice comes out squeakier than usual but aeri brushes it off.

“so, what’s up?” she finally asks.

you tap your fingernails on the table, gulping harshly, “i just wanted to talk.”

“mhm, sure.”

“i wanted to know… well… uhm, if you were still interested in me,” you ask, eyes flickering to aeri hesitantly. aeri gapes at you before stammering, “wh-why? what— what do you mean?”

you inhale sharply, “i know you were interested in me at the start, but are you still interested now?”

aeri withdraws her hand, “uh, why?”

furrowing your eyebrows, you grit your teeth, “please just tell me.”

“uhm. well… yes? but why—”

“because i’m interested. and i want to find out if the feeling’s the same,” you blurt out. aeri’s eyes widen considerably and if your heart wasn’t racing a mile, you would coo at her cuteness.

“if you were interested before… why didn’t you say anything?” aeri asks, her voice trailing off at the end. you sigh, pinching your nose bridge, “i was dating someone at the time. it wasn’t right for me to encourage someone who liked me that much.”

aeri nods, already feeling guilty for her desperation before.

“i’m sorry for my coldness but i could already tell you were interested in me and as someone who had a girlfriend then, i couldn’t message back with the same eagerness,” you explain.

“no, it’s fine. that was a stupid question but uhm, i thought you didn’t like me back.”

“we became friends first, then i started to have feelings for you. as i learnt more about you, i started to like you more.”

aeri feels a little silly with her immediate infatuation. huh. maybe she got her ‘friends to lovers’ trope after all.

“i hope that now, i can take you on a date?” you ask and how can aeri refuse that? your bright, gleaming, expectant eyes? aeri felt her heart crushed with adoration.

“yes, obviously. you’re my ideal type and everything. you know i had thoughts about our wedding when i first met you—”

“oh, is that why you were so quiet that night?”

“yeah, you just looked really pretty under the lighting and i already started to imagine how you would look like dressed in all white and how our wedding would seem, maybe i would pick yizhuo as my maid of honour and minjeong could be yours but jimin would totally throw a fuss and—”

you smile widely as aeri babbles on, chiming in every once in a while to insert your own thoughts.

when she finally finishes, the expression on your face makes her whole being ascend.

maybe all those useless blind dates with shitty luck amounted to her finding the love of her life.

thank you! aeri would later exclaim to that horoscope-obsessed girl and the gym rat. who knew that those catastrophic dates would finally gift her you, her first girlfriend (and last!).

#aespa #aespa x fem reader #aespa x reader #giselle x reader #uchinaga aeri x reader #aeri x reader

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suzukiblu · 7 days ago

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okay so i was kinda confused about the apiary thing and saw the powerpoint and fell into a rabbit hole and i now i wanna know are lois and bruce both have the queen role in clarks head

So Bruce is DEFINITELY a Queen in Clark's bee-brain, yes, Bruce is the QUEENEST of queens. Probably in Clark's brain he is the JL's or Gotham's queen. LOIS, however, he probably thinks of in the role of either an Arcadia or an Ivanhoe, because he thinks of her as an investigator--i.e., a hunter/gatherer of necessary resources ( a.k.a. information ) for the community that is Metropolis, so that Metropolis is operating with all the relevant information as often as possible--OR as someone who is defending Metropolis by exposing the truth of things, and therefore a warrior/worker who is part of the mechanisms of keeping corruption and crime at bay. Maaaaaybe he could parse her as a Kloka because investigation to article COULD be seen as a "resource management" thing, but I feel like Arcadia or Ivanhoe are likelier.

Not that Clark KNOWS any of these words, but yeah. Like, those are just the things he is feeling on an instinctive level, basically.

I kinda think Clark parses his "hive" as being Metropolis, and therefore himself and Lois and Jon as members of that specific hive. Smallville is the hive he came from originally and is still very attached to and cares about but couldn't have been what he's SUPPOSED to be in, and Gotham is a hive of its own.

Just while he does not consider himself or Lois as Metropolis's queen, he DEFINITELY considers BRUCE as Gotham's.

. . . come to think, probably part of Clark thinks of LEX as being Metropolis's queen and he is SO TETCHY about how BAD he thinks Lex is at it, and that is probably a not-insignificant part of why they both get under each other's skin so much, hahahaha.

Lex: how DARE people think Superman is more important to Metropolis/the world/humanity than ME, I am SO much more important than Superman, he is an INTERLOPER here ANYWAY. Clark: YOU ARE LITERALLY IN CHARGE OF THIS WHOLE DAMN PLACE, OH MY GOD, WHY ARE YOU SO INSECURE ABOUT IT, I'M JUST HERE TO HELP OUT. you know what, I am not even gonna GIVE you a baby, you don't DESERVE a baby from me!! you can have a baby when you get OVER yourself, MAYBE. Lois, taking more notes in red pen: uh-huh, honey. wanna expand on that thought process, maybe? Clark: /TEN-HOUR RANT/ Lois: . . . I think I'm gonna need a bigger notepad.

But yeah, Clark both considers Metropolis one giant hive and therefore a place with MANY smaller groups/factions/sectors having kids for the hive to thrive via, and he is also really, REALLY a Wife Guy for whom "acts of service" are SO very much his love language, so Lois is not a queen in his brain but he very much DID still want to get her a baby, haha. The reason he's so extra about getting specifically BRUCE a baby is that it's been, like, a decade-plus of Bruce repeatedly getting babies from OTHER PEOPLE and not asking HIM for any, but Lois married him and was in the process at least TALKING to him about the possibility of them having kids someday and therefore letting off some of his weird-about-it steam, because in his mind she was asking him FOR a kid and telling him what kind of kid she'd like. And then they had Jon, and she LOVES Jon, so Clark's all good there; Clark's the BEST . . . thing-he-doesn't-know there is!! THE BEST. HE LOVES HIS WIFE SO MUCH YOU GUYS, SHE'S SO GOOD AT COMMUNICATING WHAT SHE WANTS IN A BABY.

Meanwhile, BRUCE'S communication skills . . .

Bruce: I work alone and I want no dependents or significant others or partners or children in my life ever. I will deign to allow an occasional co-worker once a blue moon and that is it. Clark, Sad Bee Eyes but probably also currently parsing Bruce as Ivanhoe anyway: okay . . . I guess . . . . . . if you're super super SUPER sure . . . Bruce: I'm sure, yes. Bruce, five minutes later, holding a tiny acrobat made of rage and vengeance who is trying to gnaw his arm off so he can go murder a grown man in cold blood: I only met Dick Grayson five minutes ago but if anything ever happens to him I'm killing everyone in this reality and then myself. Clark: . . . so like HE'S-- Bruce: my ward and partner. that's all. he kept trying to go out on his own, so I'm just keeping him from getting himself killed running off after mobsters and giving him an outlet for his grief and anger that he can direct into something productive while also being mentored and protected by a more experienced vigilante. Clark, his bee-brain reorienting and thinking "wait, Godiva?? is this Godiva, maybe??": . . . okay, I GUESS that makes-- Bruce, five minutes later, holding a grumbly homeless preteen who he may or may not have technically kidnapped off the street: I only met Jason Todd five minutes ago but if anything ever happens to him I'm going to have a major shift in my crimefighting methods and paranoia levels and my ethics in regards to how I treat my partners and allies and maybe try to commit a murder you'll have to personally prevent me from committing and never ever ever EVER go to therapy about it. Clark: . . . . . . . . . Bruce: also I adopted him. he likes reading and cooking and one time he hit me in the gut with a tire iron. it bruised. :) Clark, with AGONIZED BUZZING all up in his bee-brain: OH COME ON--

#anonymous #apiary dynamics #meta ecetera #long post #like reasonably long at least?

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sweetestberryofthebunch · 6 months ago

Text

The Wandavision Double Feature Show (Agatha Harkness x f!reader)

Part I: And … Action!

Part II: Slice Of Life

In this Episode it is the 60s and the more you settle into the idyllic housewife lifestyle, the more tension between you and Agatha rises. You finally get a taste of what you crave.

Content/Warnings: Imbalanced power dynamic, Agatha has a dubious moral compass, Alcohol consumption, Smut, Hair Pulling, Mommy kink, Praise kink, Corruption Kink low key, Oral fixation, Dom/Sub Dynamic, Dom!Agatha (for now), does the Hex count as Housewife Roleplay? This whole thing is housewife roleplay.

Tags: @chiar4anna <3

I was gonna give you angst this week, but then the Big Sad slapped me across the face, so you’re getting soft lovely smutty fantasies first and angst when I stop being a sensitive baby! Until then, enjoy your stay at Sin City! Once again big big big smooch to @msharkness who beta reads for me without complaining, you speed my process up so much you have no idea!

To both yours and Agatha’s delight, you turned out to be quite the natural around the house. Within just a few days, you’d settled into a comfortable routine.

Breakfast always was on Agatha, who was always up before you, slipping past the guest room quietly so as to not wake you up.

When you came downstairs an hour later, hair curled and lips painted what you assumed to be red, the exact way she’d taught you, there were always eggs and bacon, slices of toast and coffee steaming hot already waiting for you. Agatha scrunched her nose up at the amount of sweetener you put into your coffee, and you rolled her eyes at her every time. And maybe you started putting even more sweetener into your coffee just to watch her do that face again, little wrinkles around her eyes as she squinted, upper lips curling as she shook her head. But that was a secret you’d take to the grave.

After you ate, you brought a plate of breakfast down into the dungeon.

It was still … odd to know Ralph was just down there, and if you thought about it too long, a cold shudder went down your spine. But, you brought him fresh food twice a day, and every time you came downstairs you could hear his Xbox running. You never lingered around too long, always rushed back upstairs, where the place smelled of lavender, roses and something simmering on the stove. Wanda had a whole town under mind control, including everyone you knew. A single guy in Agatha’s basement really wasn’t that bad in comparison. Right?

Next off, you fed the bunny. Señor Scratchy seemed to just move around the house freely, although his favourite room was the one deep down in the dungeon, where the Darkhold levitated in the middle of the seven-cornered room with its sculptures of creatures, people and abstract shapes on the walls. And, most days at least, the little furball was munching on kale or carrots in one corner or another. You could only assume the rabbit was also some type of magick, or maybe it was just oblivious to the unsettling energy surrounding the book levitating right in the same room.

By the time you had fed the bunny, Agatha had either left the house to show up wherever Wanda was that day, or she sat in the living room, nose buried in one of her heavy, centuries old books. You shuffled around the house, kept the place clean, made tea for the two of you, and sometimes you tried to focus on one of the books she’d assigned you to read. However, especially when you were in the living room together, focusing on old, handwritten letters on yellow paper proved quite difficult. And it had less to do with the difficulties of outdated language and everything with the entire situation: Agatha lounging on the couch with her feet kicked up on the coffee table, wide skirts pooling around her, dark hair pinned back behind her ears, brows always slightly furrowed when she was focussing.

Why read about ages old legends when you could be looking at her instead?

There hadn’t been a conversation about the other night, but … something was different ever since you returned from your first little stake out. She kept you on your toes, made you jump when she suddenly brushed up against you, let her hands linger on your hip, or your lower back, and sometimes even your cheek or neck.

When she left the house she always called „See you later, honey!“, towards wherever in the house you were bustling around. And every night when she returned, she announced herself with a wholehearted „Honey, I‘m home!“

While the housewife role wasn’t something you had ever planned for in your future, you proved to be quite the natural. Or at least, Agatha made you feel like you were. She never missed a chance to comment on how nice it was that someone kept the place clean, how much she enjoyed dinner, how lovely it was to see your face when Wanda had dragged her to meet with the other wives again. That one almost made you drop the fork of food halfway to your mouth already, and you quickly feigned a coughing fit, face burning hot as you stared down at your plate, anywhere but right at her. In hindsight, you couldn’t tell whether the foot grazing up your calf was real or pure imagination.

You quickly learned that Agatha had a sweet tooth. Whenever you had the time to bake, whole trays of cookies or pies would disappear at a rapid pace, never surviving much more than three days. On Saturday night, after Wanda had kept her busy especially late with some dinner plans Agatha refused to explain to you, you came downstairs to find Agatha sat on the floor in front of the open fridge, rollers in her hair, a silk robe over her nightdress, eating a plum pie you‘d made right from the tray. There was an open bottle of red wine behind her on the kitchen counter.

„I was saving that for tomorrow you know“, you commented, and her head shot up in surprise, eyes wide for a millisecond before she realized it was just you, and her signature smirk returned to her lips.

„I guess you’ll have to make more tomorrow then“, her bottom lip pushed forward in a mocking pout, „That’s too bad!“ For a moment you just held her eye contact, watching the act slowly leave her face, until she was smirking

With a roll of your eyes you walked over, sitting down cross legged on the cool kitchen floor beside her.

„Good girl“, she hummed, and it was fleeting, rolling off her tongue as casually as a greeting. But you felt your heart do a leap in your chest, biting down on your bottom lip hard.

Agatha handed you the wine bottle, her thigh brushing up against yours, and as you took a large sip, she filled her fork up with whipped cream and pie crust. When she turned to you instead of eating it herself, you almost choked on the bitter liquor on your tongue. Pressing your lips together to suppress a cough, you swallowed, wide eyes staring at the fork in front of you and then at her.

Her brows wandered up, tilting her head to the sight ever so slightly. „Come on, honey“, she purred, and you felt her voice echo through your entire body, „Open up.“

For a moment, you just stared at her, wide eyed, your heart fluttering in your chest. You‘d never been more grateful that your thoughts were completely unavailable to her, because the ideas flashing through your mind were way too intimate, way too inappropriate. But then again, you were far from normal circumstances.

Your lips parted and she pushed the fork past them, never once tearing her eyes from your lips as you closed them around the metal, tasting cream and cinnamon and plum on your tongue. She pulled the fork out of your mouth way slower than necessary, watching every inch of it, her own lips parting. You felt her breath on your face, surprised by how hot the gentle gush of air hit your cheek. And when you swallowed, you felt her eyes on your throat, watching the exposed skin move, dipping lower to where nothing but flimsy fabric covered you up.

„A-“

“Shhh“, a hand on your cheek, fingers hooking underneath your chin to force you to look up at her. As if you wanted to look anywhere else right now.

„Silence, honey“, she breathed, tilting your head to one side, and then to the other. You weren’t sure if she was actually scanning your face or just seeing if you would let her. Which, of course, you did. You melted like soft butter under her touch, letting her shape you in any way she pleased. The realisation almost scared you.

A soft little sound left Agatha’s lips, a hum so quiet, if you hadn’t felt it against your skin, you probably would have missed it. She was so, so close, her face almost blurred before you. Her eyes were dark and unreadable, but there was a little twinkle in her gaze, the idea of something wicked. If only you‘d lean in one more inch—

Her lips were on yours. She was soft, so endlessly soft, and she fit perfectly against the curve of your own lips. A surprised gasp left your mouth, slipping right into hers. The world was spinning, one blur of black, white and endless shades of grey. If it wasn’t for your hand finding her shoulder, you would have lost any sense of direction. Up, down, left, right, none of it mattered. Not right now. Not with her lips on yours, with the taste of plum on your tongue, your fingers digging into the thin fabric of her nightgown, pulling her closer.

A low moan left her lips, you felt the sound vibrate against your lips. You gasped, and Agatha took the opportunity to slide her tongue between your lips, prodding gently, as if asking for permission. Your hand tightened on her shoulders, lips parting wider. The whine that left your throat when her tongue licked over yours was high and came from deep inside your stomach. Her hand found your chest, and before you knew it, she pushed you down firmly. Your back hit the cool tiled floor and you squeaked at the feeling. Her lips broke from yours, leaning away enough to look at you through heavy lashes. Agatha was on top of you, one hand pinning you firmly to the ground, the other supporting herself, propped up just beside your head. A few strands of hair had freed themselves from her rollers, falling around her face like a picture frame and her eyes, oh her eyes. They were dark with lust, glinting in the half darkness of the kitchen. Her cheeks were flushed, you could tell even in the color drained world you were caught in. Whether it was from the wine or the kiss, you couldn’t tell. But God, you hoped it was the latter.

„Agatha“, you gasped. The hand that wasn’t fisting the silk of her nightgown found her arm, and you ran your fingers down her bare skin, delighted to feel goosebumps on your trail. You reached her wrist, fingers curling around it. „Agatha“, you repeated, holding eye contact as you dragged her hand slowly up your chest, past your collarbones, toward your throat. „I .. I want you-“

She was gone just as fast as she’d been on you. Her absence left a longing so much more urgent than before. You suddenly felt very cold on the floor. The silk of her nightgown slipped from your grip, and before you knew it she was back on her feet, snagging the half empty wine bottle from the kitchen island. She stared at it for a moment, and you caught a shake of her head as you wrapped your gown around you tighter. Suddenly, you felt very naked in the flimsy fabric.

„Agatha!“, you pushed yourself up, right behind her as she paced the tiled floor towards the door.

To your surprise, she turned around immediately. And to your relief, there was a smile on her face, even if it was small. But it was better than anything else.

Her free hand came up to cup your face, and you leaned into her touch before you even realised it.

„You should try to get some sleep, honey“, she said, her voice low and raw, none of the melodic singsong she put on when she talked to Wanda. This was Agatha, a centuries old witch with powers beyond your comprehension. Who had just made out with you on the kitchen floor.

„You work so hard around the house, you need some rest. And I have to prepare for the stupid meeting tomorrow. I‘ll see you for dinner tomorrow.“ In the half dark it was hard to tell, but you swore you saw her wink at you, before turning around on her heel, nightgown swishing through the air. You stood in the dark kitchen for a moment longer, fingers rubbing over the spot where her palm had pinned you down, still feeling the ghost of her touch lingering.

Something had changed tonight, and you knew there was no going back from this now. It was exhilarating.

…

Not even 24 hours later you were putting away freshly cleaned dishes. You’d made falafel bowls for dinner, and while Agatha had scolded you for not sticking to era accurate food, she had dug in and hummed with content, pointing out how much she missed the bigger variety of food the present day offered.

You did too. And music, you missed listening to something that wasn’t the same ten songs on the one single vinyl you’d found in the house.

While stacking freshly dried plates over each other, you couldn’t help but hum a tune that definitely wasn’t from the 60s. Neither of you had mentioned the prior night, and Agatha had left even earlier than usual this morning. In her absence, you had made another, identical pie like she‘d requested, that was cooling down on the kitchen island as you cleaned up. A part, no, every part of you hoped she’d comment on it, and then you could talk about it, and maybe you could kiss her again, longer this time, and maybe —

Suddenly, you felt a hand sneak around your waist. A palm came to rest on your stomach, pulling you back into the warm body behind you just slightly. The plates you held clinked together dangerously, and you put them down quickly, before you could drop them. On your heel, you spun around, and now the two of you were flush against each other, front to front, the kitchen counter pressed into your back. She’d been quiet all day, still frustrated with Wanda randomly changing the era of TV you were in, but you knew better than to ask too many questions. Now, you could basically feel the frustration cling to her, tension in the body pressed up against yours. It was exhilarating.

„Go sit“, Agatha told you, voice low while glancing from your wide eyes to your slightly parted lips and back. There was that twinkle in her eyes again, the same one from last night, when you two ate pie on the kitchen floor at 2 am. „I'll clean up tonight.“

„I don’t mind…“ you started, but the words got stuck in your throat when suddenly, a single index finger brushed over your bottom lip. Goosebumps rose on your arms, your neck, your entire skin. Agatha tilted her head, her other hand running over your exposed arm, chuckling at the goose skin.

„Just sit down," she repeated, more firmly. There was a smirk on her painted lips, eyes unreadable. „You deserve it.“

„But-“, this time, she shut your protest down by pushing her finger right past your lips the moment you parted them.

Your breath hitched, eyes widening, a high pitched sound leaving you from the back of your throat.

Agatha’s other hand slid around to the small of your back, tightening its grip, fabric of your dress creasing under her touch. Her stare never left yours, tip of her finger pressing down on your tongue, brows raised in silent expectation. A flash of heat shot up your spine, and if it wasn’t for the furniture right behind you, you might have melted into a puddle on the ground right now.

Once your initial surprise had worn off, your lips closed around her finger, tongue licking up against the pad of her finger. Agatha’s bright eyes were focused on your mouth, watching every microscopic movement, pupils wide and dark as you slowly, shakily began to suck her finger.

You couldn’t breathe, too scared to change even the smallest thing about the moment to do so. You could feel yourself trembling, and knew she could too, as another little whine left your throat, starting to bob your head back and forth, once, twice, settling into a rhythm.

Agatha watched you the entire time, her body pressed flush against you, hips pinning you to the kitchen counter. Her own lips were parted slightly, her breath hot on your face. She pulled her finger away, the curve of her mouth forming a subtle smirk as you gasped, sucking in a deep breath.

„You forgot to breathe“, she pointed out, a low chuckle before her finger came up, gently tapping the tip of your nose.

Your shoulders slumped, leaning against the counter to stay upright. You could feel the little wet spot of your own saliva on the tip of your nose. With the back of your hand, you wiped it off.

„Agatha-“

The witch let out a groan, her hands coming to rest on the counter on either side of you. She was leaning against the surface, so close to you without touching, and her forehead was wrinkled when her eyes found you after a long, exasperated sigh.

„Do you ever turn that pretty head of yours off for one second?“ Her lips quirked up into a knowing little smile, and she leaned forwards, her lips so close to yours, you could feel her breath ghost over your skin. Memories of how they felt against yours flooded your mind, her tongue dragging over yours, the taste of plums and jam. You swallowed hard, and Agatha watched your throat move without shame. Her pupils were dark, dragging up your neck, over your lips before holding eye contact again. The familiar twinkle in her bright eyes was a clear challenge.

„Do I make you nervous?“, she drawled and you felt one of her hands find the fabric of your dress, running over the little buttons holding it together in the front. Her index and middle finger ran up your front, all the way to the first open button right over your cleavage, where they hooked underneath the cotton. You gasped.

Agatha smirked as her eyes never left your heaving chest, watching the goosebumps on your skin rise.

„I bet you’ve done a lot of thinking today, huh?“ Her nail dug underneath the next button on your dress. Just one flick of her finger, and it came undone, the top of your bra peeking out. Delicate lace, one of the most revealing ones you‘d found in your period accurate closet. The wire was incredibly uncomfortable, but the way her lips parted just the smallest bit, tip of her tongue darting out as she undid another button, revealing more of the undergarment was worth the discomfort at least ten times.

„Naughty“, she commented, head tilting to the side. „Last night really hasn’t left your mind.“

All you could do was shake your head.

„Good.“ With a swift motion, she’d grabbed your undone collar with both hands, tugging the dress open and down your shoulders. Cold air touched your skin, skin that you desperately wanted her hands on. The high, breathy moan that left your mouth told her as much.

One of Agatha‘s brows raised in amusement. She was looking at you like a lioness ready to pounce. God, you hoped she would.

Her hands found your shoulders, palms running over your skin, smirk widening at your eyes fluttering shut as you sucked in the air sharply.

„So responsive“, Agatha purred, fingers running over your collarbones. Your chest pushed forward into her touch as if on instinct and she complied without hesitation. Her palms cupped the swell of your breasts, fingertips pressing into the silky fabric covering them, thumbs running over where your nipples hardened against lace.

You wanted to say something, tell her to just shut up and kiss you, beg her to touch you, to tear the last pieces of fabric off your body and take everything from you right now on the counter. But the words wouldn’t travel from your brain to your lips, so instead, you reached behind yourself, finding the clasps holding your bra together. A few moments of fumbling and then you had done it, the straps on your shoulders loosening, the fabric falling away from your body like a shell you‘d outgrown.

Agatha’s mouth fell open in a surprised „Oh!“, and the sound made your heart attempt to leap out of your chest. Her fingers pulled the fabric away from you, exposing bare skin, and the piece dropped to the ground somewhere besides you carelessly. Dark pupils were fixed on your bare chest and her hands returned to their original position, squeezing the soft flesh. Her thumbs running in featherlight circles over your bare nipples had your head roll back, and you let the low moan escape your throat without holding back. Agatha caught your gaze holding eye contact as she leaned down.

„Hold yourself up“, she purred, and you had just enough time to grasp the counter behind you with both hands before her lips were on you.

She planted a soft kiss to the rounded flesh of your breast, and then grazed her teeth over the same spot dragging just a little lower. Soft, wet lips closed around your nipple, sucking the sensitive skin in, where she then ran her tongue around it in little circles.

Your breath hitched, eyes fluttering shut and one of your hands found her dark hair, nails grazing over her scalp as she snickered against your nipple, the vibrations shooting right through your spine.

„Ag- Ah!“, your voice was weaved with desire and she was right, if you weren’t holding yourself up with your other arm, your knees would have given out.

Agatha released your nipple with a wet pop, saliva coating your breast and her lips, a sight that made your stomach curl into a tight, burning hot knot. Bright eyes found yours and she held eye contact as her teeth slowly sank into the soft skin just above your nipple. The pain was sharp and hot, not enough to draw blood, but enough to fuel the fire she‘d started within you. Your hand in her hair gripped tighter, pulling her up towards you. She chuckled against your skin, not letting your urgency rush her in the slightest.

Instead, she placed a trail of wet, open mouthed kisses from your chest over your collarbone all the way up your neck. Her tongue darted out right at the spot just underneath your earlobe, and you mewled at the feeling. One hand came up to cup your jaw and she held you in place, taking her sweet time as her lips continued their journey along your jawline, up your chin. When she finally reached your lips, you leaned forwards expectantly, but her hold tightened, keeping you just out of reach.

„Agathaaa“, you whined, and genuinely had to resist the urge to stomp your foot. Of course, that only made her laugh, brows raised as she held you less than an inch away from her lips.

„You can have what you want“, she murmured, tongue darting out to wet her own bottom lip. And, you were sure of that, to taunt you further. It worked. „If you can tell me exactly what that is.“

A long, exasperated sigh left your mouth, fingers running through her dark curls.

„I‘ve wanted you to kiss me for the past ten minutes“, you mumbled, but that wasn’t quite true. You took a deep breath. „I‘ve wanted you to kiss me since the moment I stepped into this house.“

„That‘s my good girl“, she purred, finger running along your jaw, „I knew you had it in you.“

Finally, instead of keeping you just out of reach, she pulled you in. Your lips crashed together and it was nothing like last night.

Last night was too careful, almost anxious. You’d dipped a single finger into the waters to test the temperature, and if you weren’t in the position you were in right now, a part of you would have wondered if it had all just been a dream.

But now you were on fire. You‘d tested the waters, and now you were jumping right in. Agatha pushed her tongue past your lips with intent, and a moan slipped out as you granted her entry. Her arms wrapped tightly around you, pulling you flush against her as your fingers dug into her hair, no care for the pins holding her curls in place.

Teeth clashed against teeth and you felt her groan against you, kicking your legs open before slotting a knee up between them.

You squealed, stomach twisting with desire, pulling away just enough to look her in the eyes. They were tainted with pure, unadulterated lust.

„Take me“, you panted against her lips, barely breaking contact enough to speak properly. „Take me now, Agatha. Please."

Her hands found your hips, giving the dress that had gathered there one last firm tug. It all fell to the ground, fabric pooling around your feet, easy to step out of.

„Such a quick learner“, she murmured, eyes raking down your body, over the garters holding your stockings up, the thin nylon covering your legs, the ruffles of your underwear. „You really are quite something, honey.“

Her forehead rested against yours for a moment, hot skin against skin as her fingers dug into the soft flesh right over your hips. „Turn around“, she commanded, voice low and heavy, more of a groan than anything else, a movement right against your own lips that left you breathless.

With one swift motion, you were flipped around, her hips pinning yours against the marble counter. A hand ran up your bare back, fingertips teasingly tracing the edge of your garterbelt before trailing up your spine, until her palm was right between your shoulder blades, pressing you down against the cool marble. You sucked in a sharp breath, and the sound made her chuckle. She enjoyed the power she had over you. Always had, since the moment she offered you a deal. But back then, you hadn’t realised just how much you wanted her in control, how much you craved it.

And yet here you were, her hand holding you firmly in place, knees pushed apart as her fingers slowly traced over the edges of your undergarments. Since you‘d moved on from the 50s style to a decade later, you had been able to drop the corset from your everyday wear, but still, as her nails dragged over the curve of your ass, digging underneath the elastic just to let it snap back against your skin, you wished there was still a little less fabric keeping you from her.

Hell, you‘d probably have to throw this pair of underwear out after this anyway. You were absolutely drenched.

Agatha’s fingers dug into the soft flesh of your ass. Simultaneously, you felt her lips ghost over your ear, her body leaning over yours, pushing you further into the countertop. Her nails poked into your skin, leaving little crescent marks in their place.

„A part of me wants to spank that pretty ass of yours raw“, her voice dripped with sweetness, you swallowed hard.

„But how could I, when you’ve been nothing but good for me since you got here.“

She let go of your butt, gently rubbing over the little marks her nails left behind before dipping lower. Her tongue darted out, running over the shell of your ear. You whined, pushing back into her touch. You could feel her gentle hum vibrate against your ear. Her fingers found your clothed core, three fingers dragging slowly up and down the soaked fabric. You felt her breath hitch.

„So, so good“, Agatha purred, poking just over where nothing but white ruffles kept her from sliding right inside your drenched cunt.

„Tell me you want me.“

Your head was spinning, legs shaking, and the tight knot that had formed on your stomach wanted nothing more but to finally explode, so you almost didn’t catch her words. When you responded, your voice was weak, a mere whimper, and under any other circumstances you would have been embarrassed. But the more pathetic you sounded, the more you melted under her, the more Agatha seemed to delight in you. And right now, the only thing you could ever want was to please her, to hear her purr sweet praises in your ear, to finally have her way with you. Good God.

„I need you“, you rasped, and your needy plea was rewarded with a lingering kiss on your shoulder. Her fingers ran over your clothed centre one more time, and feeling her graze over your clit made your entire body shudder.

„I need you so bad“, you mewled, „Agatha please, I- Please just fuck me already.“

„Hm, mouthy“, she chuckled, teeth grazing over your skin one more time before she leaned back up. Her absence over you left your shoulders cold, but it was worth it when you felt her hand guide yours to the edge of the counter besides you.

„Hold tight honey. Yes, exactly like that.“ Two fingers hooked under the elastic of your underwear and you gasped.

„You‘re doing so well for me“, Agatha purred. Her free hand ran up your spine again, this time she wandered over the back of your neck, right to where her fingers could dig into your hair, that hadn’t been the intricate style you‘d pinned it into that morning for a hot minute then.

Her fist closed around the strands, twisting them in her grip until you felt a tug, back arching in response. You heard Agatha moan at the sight and you instinctively pushed your shoulders back even further back arched, ass pushed back, her fingers ghosting over the soft skin on your thigh.

„Gorgeous“, she hummed, grip on your roots tightening, „So good for Mommy, aren’t you?“

And then, at last, her fingers pushed past the fabric of your underwear, right between your folds, slick with arousal. She slid right through you, fingertips pressing down right onto your swollen clit. Desire pulsated through your veins.

„Agatha!“, you cried out, knuckles white as you held onto the countertop for dear life.

„What was that?“, she lulled, teasing, fingers staying right where they were. Your hips stuttered, trying to push down into the touch, but her grip on your hair kept you in position.

„Ah!“, your breath hitched, your mind was mush. „M.. Mommy please!“

Her fingers circled around the bundle of nerves they were pushing up against and you moaned with relief. That was exactly what you needed right now.

„You didn’t think I missed the way that makes you tick, did you honey?“ The low laugh behind you sounded almost evil, and it shot through your body right to your core. You were sure she could feel your pulse through your throbbing clit, swollen under her circular motions.

“You’re so easy“, she purred right by your ear, giving your clit one more swirl of her fingertips, „You‘re an open book to me honey.“

Her index finger slowly wandered downwards, collecting your liquid arousal on its way. Her lips found the back of your neck, pulling you up into her by your hair.

„And this is a spell I can do with the flick of a finger.“

Her finger slipped into you with no warning. You gasped, eyes pressed shut at the sudden intrusion.

Agatha hummed, holding her finger still for a moment, giving you the chance to adjust. „You‘re doing so well honey.“ Slowly, she dragged it back out, before pushing right back inside, all the way to the knuckle. „Taking it so well for Mommy.“

Her thumb grazed over your clit, and if she hadn’t such a tight grip in your hair, your head would have fallen forward.

Again, she thrust her finger, settling for a gentle, slow rhythm. You pushed back into her touch on instinct. You needed more. More of her inside of you, more sweet words dripping down your back like honey, more of her lips on your skin.

The latter was granted without even having to say anything. Agatha pressed her lips to the spot just behind your earlobe and the moan you let out in response was guttural.

„That‘s right“, you could feel her lips move against your neck, teeth grazing your skin. „Let me hear you.“

Her hand slowed down and you almost let out a frustrated mewl. But then, you felt a second finger prodding at your entrance, and the stretch made you hiss instead.

Slowly, she began to pick up a rhythm with two fingers this time, her back pressed to yours as she held you tight in place. The slight pain of her tugging on your hair mixed beautifully with the slow, steady motion of her fingers thrusting in and out of you, until all you felt was hot, white pleasure like stars dancing before your eyes.

Agatha’s lips trailed a line of kisses down your neck, her fingers speeding up with every time her lips met your bare skin.

Heat pooled in your stomach, the knot tightening. You were on a rollercoaster, rapidly approaching the very top of the ride, bracing yourself for the fall.

„Agatha“, you gasped, and then immediately corrected, „Mommy.“

She stopped her trail of kisses on your shoulder. „Let go honey“, she hummed, tongue running over the little mark she’d sucked into your skin, „Let yourself go for Mommy.“

Again, her thumb found your clit, fingers twisting inside of you. Her rhythm picked up, tips of her fingers grazing over your insides with every thrust. You felt every muscle in your body tighten, cunt clenching down on her hand,your knuckles white as they were gripping the countertop in a vice like grip. .

„Just like that“, Agatha’s voice was low, merely a whisper. And then her teeth found your skin, brushing over your shoulder for a moment before sinking into the flesh. You cried out, head falling back into the fist that held your hair tight.

The knot in your stomach exploded. A shiver ran down your spine, over your back and arms and your entire body as release washed over you like a cool tidal wave, drowning out everything else in its way.

Your hips bucked into her once, twice, and then it was over, and suddenly you felt drained, exhaustion tugging on every part of your body.

Agatha‘s fingers pulled out in one smooth motion, and when you dropped forward onto the counter, her hand gently untangled from your hair.

„Fuck“, you whispered, chest heaving, legs feeling jelly.

A pair of arms wrapped around your waist, pulling you upwards. „Come here“, Agatha’s voice was very soft all of a sudden, steadying your shaky stance against her. You noticed a wet stench on the counter but chose to ignore it for now, instead using your energy to turn around in her grasp.

„Can you stand?“, she asked when your weight leaned into her, arms wrapped around you almost protectively. It felt nice.

Ignoring her question, you leaned forward after turning around and caught her lips in a quick kiss, tasting the salty stench of sweat and sex on her lips.

„I‘m fine, Agatha“, you promised, unable to stop laughing at your own words. „I‘m fucking fantastic, actually.“

Still, she held you at just an arms length, eyeing you up and down.

There were bruises already blooming where your hips had pushed into the hard edge of the counter over and over. Agatha‘s fingers ran over the irritated skin.

„See, we could have done this on the couch if you’d just listen to me.“ Agatha panted, arms wrapped tightly around your shivering form, holding you close. You felt her lips ghost over the crown of your head, placing a featherlight kiss there.

„We could have done this last night in your bed like normal people if you’d just made up your mind then“, you teased back, arms wrapping around her neck as you leaned against her. If it wasn’t for her support, there was no way you‘d still be standing up straight.

Agatha‘s eyes hardened. „If you don’t watch your manners you’re not seeing that bed at all.“

But the kiss she caught your lips in gave her empty threat away immediately. You smiled against her lips, tugging her closer by her neck. A quick peck was placed at the corner of her mouth. Pulling away just enough to catch her eyes, you smirked.

„I don‘t have to be able to read your mind to know that’s not true. But alright“, your hands found hers, tugging her with you as you took a step towards the living room. Your dress lay forgotten on the floor. That was a task for tomorrow, like sanitising the entire kitchen counter.

Right now, you were too busy feeling delighted when Agatha let you tug her towards the living room, unable to tear her eyes off you even for a moment.

„We can have a turn on the couch before we go to bed!“ You chuckled, grabbing her face with both hands, kissing her firmly as you fell backwards onto the couch, pulling Agatha down with you.

#agatha harkness x reader #agatha all along #agatha harkness #wandavision #wanda maximoff #scarlet witch #marvel #mcu #berry writes things

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