#because like. yeah. i mean i lost any chance of getting to experience anything like that | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

s4lv4tions · 2 years ago

Text

numerology; nsfw

pairing; gojo satoru x reader / gojo satoru x geto suguru (past) / geto suguru x reader (past) summary; numerology — the belief in an occult, divine or mystical relationship between a number and one or more coinciding events. or: trying to move on. wc; 13.4k cw; death, angst, requited unrequited love, violence, smut (at the very end, but mentions throughout), canon divergence, spoilers for manga an; if you think you've read this before, you probably have! i posted this on my old tumblr a year or so ago, and it's still available on my ao3. this version is slightly updated and edited, but still diverges from canon as it was created at the start of the culling games arc :)

The first time you bathe with Satoru, he cries.

You don't notice at first; he's quiet — abnormally so —, and his face remains pristine, unchanged. The only hint you get is a small, barely audible sniffle that stops as quickly as it starts — and you think he wants it that way. You don't think he's ever cried in front of anyone.

That's why you don't say anything. Just continue washing the suds from his hair, and pretend that the tears rolling down his cheeks are beads of water dripping from his hair — but you take extra care to massage the conditioner in, and peck his cheek as you finger-comb through silky, cloud-white strands.

It occurs to you afterwards — as he lounges on your bed, scrolling through channels with a wayward hand planted on his stomach — that perhaps, it's the first time somebody has taken care of him. The first time ever, or just the first time since… since…

Geto Suguru's face smiles up at you from your vanity — a tiny polaroid, his face no bigger than the nail of your thumb. Beside him, Satoru grins, cheeky and bright-eyed — you don't think he's ever been any different —, and in the corner, the smudge of your thumb covers the lens. You don’t have to lift the photo and check the back to know what’s written there, in your scratchy, looping scrawl; the strongest, 2006.

"Lord of the Rings?" Satoru calls, carefree as ever. A yawn catches in his throat, and his fingers slip underneath his shirt to scratch absentmindedly at his chest. "Ooh, haven't seen this one yet…"

"Uh, yeah. Sure."

It was a better time. Less pain. Less responsibility. Less death — or maybe the same amount, just shielded by the blinding cover of childhood inexperience. Suguru was still alive and burning bright, Satoru was happy (happier. He didn't cry in the bath, at least). Shoko didn’t self-medicate as intensively as she does now. The days were spent in childish ignorance and stupid indulgence, and even when things seemed their darkest, you never lost hope.

(It probably says a lot about you that, if given the chance, you wouldn't return. Whether that's because of what you know is bound to happen, and the pain is too much to experience again, or because you're so utterly pathetic that you'll take sadness and grief and a tiny shred of affection over… whatever it is you were back then, you don't know. A smudge in the corner of a picture of the jujutsu world's greatest.)

Suguru's eyes seem to burn into you. You turn the picture over, and rejoin Satoru on your bed.

"It's been two years."

Satoru doesn't like to talk after sex. Not in any way that's really meaningful, you mean, nothing that lets you in. He loves jokes, empty small talk, work politics. Chatter that's deep enough to show he cares a little without bearing any part of himself — your injury healed up? When was the last time you had a break? There's a new teppanyaki place in Shinjuku, I'll treat you. Don't work yourself too hard, you'll put me out of business!

If you're being honest, you didn't go into this expecting anything more than a person to scratch an itch with.

You're already friends — though, you're not sure friends totally encapsulates what Satoru is to you, romantic or platonic. You've been friends since you were 12. Satoru, Suguru, you — and then Shoko, when you all met in your first year at Jujutsu Tech. That's how it's always been.

You swear sometimes you know him better than yourself. You swear sometimes it's his voice you think with. Is that what "friends" encompasses? Somehow, it doesn't seem enough.

Whatever. The point is that your relationship with Satoru is already strong; foundations tall and proud and unshakeable. You didn't start fucking Satoru in the hopes of forming a relationship — one was already there.

It's just... Satoru is young, yes, and he enjoys flirting, but (contrary to common belief) he's not all that keen to sleep with the first person who's willing. You don’t say this with the belief that you’re special. It’s just that with work, and especially with — y'know, his… romantic history, Satoru hasn’t found the time or will to just sleep around. At least, according to him.

Sheer willpower isn't enough to make those urges go away, though, and… well, you had them too, and you were willing, and he trusts you. And you'll take anything he'll give you, really, even if it's just scraps. Even if sometimes it makes you feel worse.

Today's one of those days.

You feel sick, after. Not because of him — because of yourself. Your polaroid of Getou and any other photo he's in has been turned over, anything that could remind you of him tucked away, but — but he's everywhere today, everywhere, and you'd fucked Satoru despite it. And Satoru is covered in memories of Getou, of course. Every freckle, every shifting of muscle, every jut of bone — did Getou touch him here? Caress every bit of him he could get his hands on? Tangle his hands in his snow-white hair, breathe against his collarbone?

When you came, you cried. Pretended it was just because it was so intense, but behind your eyelids, dark, cat-like eyes stared back.

"Hm?" Satoru hums as if he didn't hear you, eyes fixed on the TV. Dumb doesn't suit him — it's honestly a bit of an insult for him to even try it. Like you didn't sense the stiffness of his limbs the second he'd stepped inside, or the crumbling edge of his smile, or the way he'd forced you to love him harder — pull his hair harder, scratch his back deeper, his Infinity turned off and his skin yours for the marking.

Satoru's mannerisms are scribed into your brain. You catch yourself emulating them, sometimes; hands waving, head tilting, grin wide and posture open. You wear it like an oversized coat, an ill-fitting costume, and sometimes you wish you could stop taking on pieces of him. The more you take, the more you must throw away — and it's Suguru that your memory discards. You find yourself forgetting how he hummed when he woke up from a nap, or filled his cheeks with food like a hamster; how he scrunched his face up when he laughed, pretty all the while…

The point is that even with his incredible knowledge, his awesome strength, the sheer holiness of his existence — you know Satoru. And the fact that he came to you today isn't mere coincidence.

You decide to come out with it. You've tiptoed around it for 24 months, give or take, had a shockingly brief mourning period before the jujutsu world forced you along, and… even with what he did, Suguru deserves better. "Suguru died today."

A beat of silence. Then:

"Mm, I guess he did."

You'd spent the day staring out at the grey sky, the miserable sight of soaked pavement. Grey, grey, grey. Concrete jungle. Heavy rain clouds and an ocean of multicoloured umbrellas, bobbing and rolling to destinations unknown. You hadn't said it aloud; hadn't even thought of it, specifically. The knowledge of it had just sat over your head like a thick, sweltering fog — and if you know Satoru at all, you know that he'd done the same. Maybe he hid it better.

You don't have to look now to know that his lips are pressed thin. You find the sudden thought of looking him in the eyes daunting, anyways, so you turn onto your side, back facing him, and pick mindlessly at the sheets. You don't want to see what his reaction will be when you say—

"Did you know that I loved him — back then?"

You don't want to see the shock, or the confusion — and you'd rather not see a lack of them, either. What's worse, you wonder — him knowing and loving Suguru too, or not knowing and loving him?

"...Yes."

You screw your eyes shut and try to will away the sudden surge of cold, like a sharpened dagger to your chest.

(It turns out that knowing is much more painful.)

Suguru Geto had been the apple of your eye ever since you'd met. 11 and gangly and stupid in a way that all children were always stupid, Suguru had been a bit kinder than his white-haired counterpart. Satoru, being Satoru Gojo, had grown up with no fear of authority, no mindfulness for his less-powerful peers as anything more than people who existed around him. You and Suguru were allowed the title of friends, but very few were. Anyway — he grew out of that mindset, of course, but your fondness for Suguru stayed.

(Though they'd always seemed to be on another level than you — not even just in terms of power, but… just caught up in each other, always. Suguru had only ever wanted Satoru. And vice versa.)

And then Suguru changed. Right under your nose, he changed, and his sudden quietness made sense. His fatigue. The way his hands would always shake when swallowing an exorcised curse, always had since you were kids, and then suddenly they were ingested with a scary calm. Nobody understands the taste of curses. Not even you, not even when he’d explained it in sickening detail.

You sigh, then. Tired and lethargic and not from physically straining yourself for an hour. This is bone-deep, soul-weary. It's been held in for 730 days, or maybe more. Maybe you've carried it with you since birth. "I never apologised."

"For what?" Satoru asks — and he laughs, jolly, and the sound fits awkwardly in his throat. A clear attempt at feigning indifference, but he's a bad liar. He always has been, because he's never needed to lie. Perks of being the strongest, you guess. You can just come out and say shit — and if you can't, not saying anything technically isn’t lying.

"I hated you, after," you confess. You dig your thumbnail hard intoyour pinky finger, taking momentary refuge in the sharp shock of pain. "I couldn't stand to look at you. When I did, I saw… I saw what you did. What you had, and what you had thrown away. I blamed you for Suguru. I blamed everyone except Suguru."

Another snicker, a bit too humourless. "You can't stand to look at me now."

"I…" You don't know what to say to that.

Truth is, you don't want to see his face. Contorted in pity, or disgust, or sadness for you. You've gotten used to living in his shadow — most everyone has — but that doesn’t ease the ever-present blanket of insecurity that you carry around your shoulders. It doesn’t dull the ache of inferiority you’ve been housing in your chest from the moment you were saddled with your technique. As you aged, you got better at hiding it, and you generally prefer your self-pity to go unnoticed, but Satoru—

He could always read you like a book. And you hated it. You hated being pitied by someone who was as powerful as him — someone as close to God as one could get. It was demeaning. Patronising. It makes you feel like a child again, bowing your head as your mother makes excuses for you.

You shift over — onto your back, and then onto your other side — and you look at him. You force yourself. Blankets pooled around his waist, his skin so pale it could be translucent, eyes icy blue and framed with fluffy white.

"You were forced to do it," you murmur. Your eyes remain trained on his chin — his are much too bright, much too all-seeing for comfort. "If you hadn't, he would've gotten worse. He never would have stopped. You knew that, you always did. It… took me a while to come to terms with it."

Satoru sighs. Then, he slumps down so that — like you — his head rests flat on the pillow, and his body arcs towards yours. He's forced himself into your sights again, in a way that’s gentle, but not so much that you wouldn't be able to figure out what he's doing: forcing you to face him.

"Would it have made you feel better," Satoru begins, reaching forward to brush his fingers against your chin, "if you were there when I did it?"

Would it have?

Would it have given you closure? Would you no longer spend your nights wondering what he'd looked like, what his last words were, his last thoughts? If he had spittled and roared in anger, if he had wept in fear, if he had attempted a smile, a joke? If he thought of you, or if you were just another insignificant blip in his radar?

In your mind, Suguru exists as his 17 year old self — smiling and mischievous, polite yet humorous. He puts extra broccoli on your plate and gently berates you to eat more. He tells you that you're a precious part of the team, that none of them would be who they are without you. He calls you crybaby because you always wear your heart on your sleeve, and tells you not to worry about things you cannot change.

Change what you can. Forget the rest and leave it to me, crybaby.

The bubbling hatred that had festered inside him has no place in your head. You want him to stay as he is, your Suguru that was never yours, shining like gold in your mind.

"No. He hated me at the end, I think," you say quietly. For a second, you dare to meet his eyes — bright and pointed in how they stare at you. You know he can see the tears that have begun to burn in your waterline, the way you ball your fists so hard you dig half-moon into your skin. He doesn’t need to be blessed with the Six Eyes to see.

"I wasn't interested in changing the world like he was, even with my Technique. That made him despise me, I think."

Satoru stares for a few more seconds. You wonder what he's thinking about. A second in your time is a lifetime in Satoru's; he must be thinking hard.

But he blinks, at last; sighs so deeply that his chest caves in with it, before he winds an arm around your waist and pulls you close, bare chest to bare chest, only atomic space between you.

There's nothing sexual about it. You're nothing but bones and skin and blood, here. He moulds your head to his shoulder with one large hand and cocoons you in his embrace, warm. Protected. You're not sure who the action is meant to comfort.

And just when you think the conversation is over — just when minutes have passed with nothing but the sound of the TV between you both — he speaks.

"Suguru could never hate you. Trust me."

You don't want to know what that means. You're only beginning to get over it, two years later.

Satoru is holding three onigiri in one hand, and two Starbucks' cups in the other — extra sugar, extra cream, extra ice, extra unicorn-marketing, just the way you both like it.

"There she is!" Is the first thing he says as he meets you just outside the metro, grinning.

It's sweltering hot today — the sun had risen early and would surely set late, and Satoru seems to be taking advantage of it. Gone is his Jujutsu Tech uniform and thick blindfold, but he's stuck with the all-black theme like he usually does — black jeans, black linen shirt, black socks and shoes. Even the frames of his sunglasses are black.

(Handsome. He's handsome. He's always been handsome — years later, you'd think you'd stop feeling the effects of it.)

Lucky for him. You're not, y'know, the strongest sorcerer in the last century, so there's no leeway for you — and even in your summer uniform, the skirt and short-sleeved blouse, you're sweating. Your only respite is that the combined force of you and Satoru will mean this mission is going to be a breeze.

Satoru tsks. "Took your time. I almost ate your onigiri."

A man nearby jogs past, clearly in a rush, and Satoru has to step closer to you to avoid him. He could've stayed still. He wouldn't have touched him, anyway, with his Limitless.

"And you would've had to buy another, genius."

A pout. "You only love me for my bank account, don't you?"

(He's joking. It's a joke.

But your hand shakes — a miniscule tremor — as you reach out to take one of the cups, and you know he sees it because he's Satoru and he sees everything. You turn away as quickly as you can, setting off in the direction of whatever place it is you're here for, and pretend that the fact that he can say it so casually doesn't kinda fucking hurt.

(He could never say it like that with Suguru — so bluntly, so crassly. Not without softened eyes and softened smiles and a gentle tilt of his head — those are mannerisms reserved only for him, never to be seen again. Instead, you get snickers and digs in the arm and teasing pulls of your hair. Of course it’s a joke. That’s all you are.

Perhaps you should just be grateful for what you get. Perhaps you should try to stop comparing yourself to a man you once loved. Perhaps you should try to stop comparing yourself to a dead man. Perhaps, in the end, you just love the pain of it all.))

"Yeah," you reply, taking a large, sugary sip. "And don't you forget it, either."

Satoru catches up to you quickly, effortlessly; his arm flops around your shoulder as he tugs you in the opposite direction, chastising you for going the wrong way — but it stays there long after it needs to.

Itadori Yuuji — Sukuna's dead-but-not-really vessel — thinks your cursed technique is powerful. He thinks it’s amazing that you can use reverse cursed technique — you must be really powerful, right? Gojo-sensei says you’re special grade. He also thinks you're very pretty. He tells you this over his fourth grilled pork belly wrap — this one bursting at the seams with kimchi, garlic, and roasted sesame seeds.

He doesn't say it in a flirtatious way — it's just an observation to him, simple and blunt, and you figure he has about as much of a filter as Satoru does.

"O-oh," you say, metal tongs frozen over the sizzling meat. "Thank you, Yuuji."

You had briefly met him for the first time before his death — Nobara, too. Megumi, the third piece of the golden trio, has been something of a little brother ever since Satoru had taken him in, and you know him well enough to know that Yuuji's death (or lack thereof) is weighing on him terribly.

(There are too many parallels you could make. Suguru and Satoru. Haibara and Nanami.)

Hiding it does make you feel guilty. To experience that grief, that loss — even if it will soon go away when Yuuji rejoins jujutsu society — isn’t something to take lightly. But Yuuji needs a guide that isn’t completely off the rails. Satoru and you balance each other out, and balance seems to be something Yuuji needs.

He reminds you terribly of Satoru when he was younger. Maybe that's why you have such a fond spot for him — he's too goofy and well-meaning and genuine to dislike.

"Why are you acting surprised?" Gripes Satoru, chewing with his mouth open. "I tell you that all the time."

Your eyes narrow. You place a perfectly cooked slice of marinated beef on his plate. "You're you."

"What's that supposed to mean?" He whines. "We're best friends, crybaby!"

"You don't say I'm powerful. You say I'm helpful. There's a difference. And don’t call me that."

"Is there?" Satoru asks, turning to Yuuji for guidance. The teen boy shrugs, preoccupied by assembling his newest monstrosity. "I call you pretty, too."

"Yeah, when—"

When you're eight inches deep in me, face buried in my neck, trying to get yourself off. Your cheeks flush with warmth at the thought, and you shut your mouth. Yuuji doesn't notice your slip up, busy as he is; Satoru does completely, and fixes you with a grin so sharp that you vow to not give him any more meat until Yuuji is completely full.

"It's not the same," you say, voice final. It's a lighthearted lunch. You don't want to ruin it by getting touchy over semantics, and that's exactly what'll happen if you keep going. "You say it to reward me. Like tossing a dog a bone."

You reach for the scissors to snip the meat into little pieces — and in doing so, you miss the brief frown that presses against Satoru's brow.

Neither of you say anything more on the matter.

Satoru has known you for five years when he realises that he resents you. Not completely, and not for one particular or solid reason, either. He prefers not to think about it, in any case, because you're one of his closest friends — and even at 17, he knows that that's hard to come by. Especially as the Strongest.

Satoru stares up at his ceiling; stares at the miniature striations only he can see, the starburst-shaped gyrations of clay used to finish it off.

Tonight, he's thinking about it. And many other things.

He hates that you're so hesitant about everything — he hates that you believe yourself so weak that you have to tiptoe. You, with your reverse cursed technique — which is a feat in and of itself — that could transcend time and space, just like he could. A technique passed down for hundreds and hundreds of years, accumulating power all the while…

(Your technique has lots of rules and regulations, of course. A handicap, and he understands it frustrates you, but his own frustration eclipses his understanding. Why should someone so strong feel anything but their own strength?)

He hates that you curl in on yourself when you're sad, or lonely, or angry. He hates that you wear your heart on your sleeve — he's never allowed himself to, not fully. He can't, never fully, because there are people who are watching him, people who hate him, people who want him dead. He can joke. He can make his political desires clear — but he can’t love like he wants to, and God forbid he cries.

He hates that you close your eyes and bask when it's sunny, like a cat in a sunspot; hates that you remember that he doesn't like chicken wings and prefers thighs; he especially hates that you watch over Suguru like it's your job, when Suguru doesn't need it.

And some part of Satoru hates Suguru, too. It was strange for him to come to terms with it, fond of him as he is, but as he grows Satoru realises that there's no love of his that isn't closely affiliated with hate. It makes the love all the more strong.

Satoru, for one, dislikes how polite Suguru is, even when he doesn't need to be. He hates that Suguru becomes a straight-faced, unfeeling thing when he's upset, and tries to hide it — the emptiness in his eyes unsettles him like nothing else.

Most of all, above all, Satoru hates that Suguru loves you, crybaby, and is too pussy to do shit about it. Satoru doesn't understand why, anyways, because he'd made it clear that if he wanted, Suguru could have you both and Satoru wouldn't care. Usually, the thought would offend him. How can you love someone when you already love me? When you've already sworn yourself to me? You already have the strongest, who else do you need?

But… he doesn't know. He kinda understands. You're precious to him, too, after all, sunflower soaking up the sun.

Like he said: there's no love of his that isn’t closely affiliated with hate.

Six and a half hours after the hours-long meeting that followed the ruined School Goodwill Event, you find yourselves in a diner somewhere in Harajuku. It’s one of those weird fusion places, loaning ornamentation and tokens from classic American diners, serving omurice with fries, sushi with mashed potatoes, with a cute little mascot that looks like Elvis. It’s loud enough and bright enough to make you feel timeless. It's a sensation you can appreciate.

Something’s been telling you that time’s ticking, and you’re not quite sure what it is. Trauma, probably. Anxiety. The fact that curses have been banding together, learning spoken language, amassing power — planning an attack on Jujutsu Tech, gaining intelligence, gaining anger.

Satoru doesn’t say it — doesn’t want to say it — but you think it’s unnerved him, too. The last time outsiders entered school grounds was… two years ago, wasn’t it? It’s crazy. Everything always seems to lead back to Suguru.

The attack has fueled something in both of you, anyways; something that makes you both stay up instead of knocking out like you usually do; something that makes you both hungry and restless and liable to travel across Tokyo past midnight. By public transport, no less. No warping or high-speed flying for you, tonight.

But you appreciate it. And you think that Satoru is taking things slow for the same reasons you want to — to take things in, to appreciate what you never think to appreciate. To admire the mundane, even for a little while. Satoru’s less emotionally attached to the jujutsu-less aspects of life than you are — bullet trains and waiting in line and standing on the train platform, escalators and traffic — but he enjoys them all the same when he has time to. And it’s not often The Strongest gets to experience pure, genuine normality, too, so maybe sitting in this gaudy diner and watching the world pass you by is a luxury he rarely affords himself.

He orders the most complicated drink they have — a sakura-caramel milkshake topped with whipped cream, glacé cherries, and an entire slice of cheesecake. He’s down to the last dregs of melting cream within 10 minutes, swiping fries from your plate between sips, ignoring your chides of rotten teeth and high blood sugar.

Blindfold swapped for glasses. Strands of hair drifting down against his forehead.

You’re always reminded at the worst times of how handsome he is. It’s not like it’s a secret, or he’s unaware of it — and he takes pride in his looks, if his extensive skincare shelf and general attitude is anything to go by — but he puts much more stock in his strength, in his usefulness to others, his intelligence. The things he can provide for others. Not many people realise that.

Maybe you shouldn’t act so high and mighty. It’s not like you don’t appreciate his appearance as much as the next person — hell, half the time you’re trying to stop it from distracting you — but maybe you get a pass. Y’know, as a person who actually has reason to marvel over the stretch of his neck and the flush of his cheeks and how his lips go the prettiest pink when you kiss him. Or the cords of muscle along his arms; the slender-yet-thick bands of muscle of his chest and legs. The large, veiny expanse of hand — slim, delicate fingers wrapped around a paper straw…

"Are you gonna eat those?" Says Satoru, slurping obnoxiously. “Haven't eaten since dinner."

You push the basket across the table, uncharacteristically void of argument. "Go crazy."

Satoru sets his empty glass aside, but the straw remains in one hand. The other he uses to pluck up fries, 4 or 5 at a time, his gaze suddenly fixed on you as he chews nonchalantly.

"Y'know," he says, licking salt from his fingertips, jabbing the straw in your direction, "I can always tell when you're horny."

"Excuse me?"

"You squirm," Satoru continues — matter-of-fact, casual, as if he's talking about the weather. "And you get quiet.”

“I’m a quiet person,” you snap, nails pressing against your palms under the table. “Sorry I know when to shut the fuck up—”

“And then you get flustered. And when you’re flustered, or embarrassed, you get angry.” He raises his hand — signals the cute waitress for another basket of fries, and leans back with his arms splayed along the back of the booth. “Don’t look so surprised! How long have we known each other?”

If you were a better person, you’d probably admit that yes, he’s right. You do get quiet when you’re horny, and you do get angry when you’re flustered — if you were a worse person, though, you’d remark on how you're the first person he crawls to when he’s sad, or overwhelmed. How getting you into bed and losing yourselves in each other is a sort of therapy for him. How he always tries to distract you with cheeky grins and sly, flirty comments, but then afterwards he cries in the bath as you clean him up.

You don't say that, obviously. Seems like a pretty shitty thing to bring up today of all days. He'd probably deny it anyways, but you don't think it's a coincidence that the attack has left him restless and he obviously wants to take you home.

The new fries are delivered to the table, but he looks right past them. He bows his head slightly, glasses slipping a little further down his nose so that his white-framed eyes peek over the top of them.

"Let's warp home," Satoru says — and oh. There's that voice. That drop in tone, that lack of boisterous humour he always employs. It's soft enough to have goosebumps rising on the back of your arms, smooth enough to have you squirming — yes, squirming, you admit it — in your seat. "Alright?"

"Yes." And it's embarrassingly breathless, and embarrassingly quick, but Satoru doesn't tease you. Just smiles, raises a hand for the bill, and watches you all the while.

You count seven stitches in the forehead of Geto Suguru.

Count, because it's all you can do. Everything else is lost to you.

Breathing.

Standing.

It feels like even your heart has stalled. Because—

Because—

Because Geto Suguru is dead. Dead, in the ground, no longer breathing, no longer living. Satoru had killed him. Satoru had demolished him.

The lips of the Geto in front of you twist — a sickening, stomach-turning imitation of the smile you once adored. On his face it's a sneer, a mockery. Your Suguru did not smile like this when you knew him.

"Hello," he greets pleasantly. His arms are hidden within the sleeves of his yukata. Hair down. Suguru always tended to wear his hair up, unless he was fresh out of the shower. Unless he was upset. It was too much hassle to take care of. You know when he took over the Time Vessel Association and donned the gojo-kesa he began wearing it down. "_____ _____, yes?"

You can't answer. Your ears are ringing. Your stomach gives a worrying lurch that winds up your throat — you think you're going to be sick.

How? Why? Who — who is this in front of you? Because it's not Geto, not Suguru �� and you don't say that because of longing or a pathetic desire for ignorance. This thing feels wrong. Inherently, blasphemously wrong. Looking at him for too long makes your cursed energy prickle. Seeing Suguru's image painted in such slimy, rancid energy has you gasping for breath.

Satoru, your mind whispers. Satoru needs to know.

He should. He needs to. But this pseudo-Geto does not look friendly in the slightest, and you are isolated.

Looking back, it had seemed fine to go alone to exorcise curses in the belly of Tokyo's metro. Taking old service tunnels and eventually entering abandoned tracks hadn't felt scary. You're a semi-special grade sorcerer with years of experience under your belt and a powerful cursed technique that could get you out of most, if not all, pinches, restrictions and regulations be damned.

"I'm sure you're very confused. I apologise, really…"

The reality of the situation hits you. Maybe hit is the wrong word — it doesn’t come as a bloody, stinging smack in the face. It’s a trickle of ice-cold water down the nape of your neck, drawing dread from your head all the way into the pit of your stomach. You don't think this is a pinch you'll come out of — at least not battered half to death, especially when a silver-haired curse decorated with stitches steps out from behind pseudo-Geto. The curse Kento had fought. The one that he said to look out for. Patchwork.

Immediately, you know fighting isn't an option. But what else is there to do, in the face of pseudo-Geto and his silver-haired, sentient curse? Your technique may not be limitless in your possession, but in theirs? If they did to you what they did to so many others — transfiguring you past the point of recognition, stealing your body and technique, desecrating your corpse with cursed energy…

"I can feel it from here," titters the curse excitedly. "So warm… I have to have it! Her soul, I have to have it!"

Fuck.

You could try to escape, but you wouldn't have enough time to run past them and through the winding corridors of the underground, even while distracting them with your cursed technique. They'd catch you within seconds. You’re sure they have curses lurking around waiting to thwart you, too.

You could burst directly into the layers of concrete and metal above — use your technique to revert them back millions and millions and years to their very first forms, atoms and subatomic particles, and then rebuild them up as an ascending platform — but that would take too much time, and you'd be completely defenceless while you did. Not to mention the toll it'd take on you.

(Not to mention the fact that you'd be bursting into the public eye from a giant crater in the ground.)

"I'm sure you know what I'm going to do," continues pseudo-Geto, amiable. "I would ask you to join us, but I know that is impossible. Therefore, there is only one course of action."

Can't fight. Can't escape. Can't get answers. Can't stay clueless. How contradictory.

You're not dying, that's all you know. And if you have to do the one thing you never wanted to do, then so be it. Anything is better than death. Death is not an escape, in this scenario — it’s a guarantee of imprisonment.

"It's a shame," pseudo-Geto sighs, bloodlust swelling. "Such a waste of a good technique."

You make a Binding Vow with yourself within seconds.

Using a magnitude of cursed energy usually out of your reach, your entire body will be reduced to atoms — intangible, untrappable, unkillable — for as long as it takes to retreat to safety. In return, you will be unable to think, unable to move according to your own will, only a mere pawn to entropy as the rest of the galaxy is — high risk, high reward.

There are many things that could go wrong.

In reducing yourself to essentially nothing, in splitting your cursed energy into billions of particles, you could reach a state of such low cursed energy concentration that you are, for all terms and purposes, considered dead. In doing so, your Binding Vow could break, and you would be unable to return to living.

Or you could float for days, weeks, years — safety is subjective, subjective is dangerous when it comes to contracts, and you can only hope that your own understanding of it sets the standard.

It's either this, this fleeting, terrifying chance, or death. With one, you can return to your school, your students, your Satoru — you can tell them what happened. You can bring justice to whoever has disturbed Suguru from his slumber. With the other — nothing. Just plain, utter nothingness forever and ever.

(You know which you'd rather.)

The last thing you recall, in spotty haziness, is the heart-stopping sight of Suguru surging towards you, eyes bloodthirsty, face contorted in malice.

The last thing you hope is that Satoru isn't too upset about the risk you've taken.

Eight days after your solo mission, you resurface — a discombobulated, stumbling mess on the outskirts of Shibuya, eyes glazed and mouth stuttering over syllables. A nearby Window calls the college within seconds, and Gojo is there just as soon — hands shaking when he grasps your arm and turns you to face him, fingers trembling when he cups your cheeks and brushes them under your eyes.

It’s you. It’s you, it’s you, it’s you, and he can breathe, he can fucking breathe, his chest is lighter than it’s been for those entire 8 days — all the while, he burns with an anger so intense it hurts. And Satoru is no stranger to anger, of course — knows it as intimately as he knows himself — but he's not sure if he can remember the last time it had rendered him breathless, trembling. Bloodthirsty.

It's not the time to think about it. Not when you're shaking in his arms, so frail and weak everywhere except your hands — no, your hands remain strong, fingers digging into his clothes and skin. He turns off his Infinity. The sting of your touch grounds him.

Shoko is already waiting in the clinic for him — she’d been preparing ever since the call first came in. The students (the ones on campus, at least) crowd together at a distance, buzzing anxiously as Satoru disappears swiftly into the depths of the infirmary with you in his arms.

Bad things happen often. Too often. Satoru isn’t sure whether it’s a good thing or a bad thing that they haven’t gotten used to it yet.

“Gibberish,” Satoru answers when Shoko asks if you’ve said anything competent since he picked you up. “Just gibberish.”

Shoko is poking and prodding you with the usual doctor's shit — stethoscopes and thermometers and that blood pressure band that goes around your arm — and you just lay there and take it. Head rocking side to side, limbs trembling, mouth lolling open, and Satoru's trying not to lose his head because what good is taking your temperature? Do you look like you have a fucking cold? Is the way your eyes focus and unfocus normal? The way you can’t string together two syllables that make fucking sense?

But even with how he can see your cells malfunctioning all over your body, Shoko knows more about this shit than him. So he sits pretty on her swivelling chair, twisting back and forth, body the image of boredom but mind anything but. Time and time again, he’s reminded of how unprejudiced tragedy is — how it leaves no hint, no mark of itself, no time to prepare for the toll of it all.

Satoru had greeted you briefly before you’d left. Said something about getting lunch together, that you better be careful because you were treating him — the same shit he said time and time again, his real plea hidden within the folds and twists of his jokes and quips. Be careful. Don’t die. I can’t lose you. You’re precious to me.

You’ll be okay. You have to be — he won’t allow anything otherwise. But if he’d known last week that you’d end up like this, would he have said those things out loud? He doesn’t think so. He’s cowardly in that way.

A few moments later, Shoko straightens up. Immediately reaches into the pocket of her lab coat and pulls out a cigarette and a rusting lighter, and is puffing out clouds of bitter air just seconds later.

Shit. That’s not a good sign.

Shoko sighs. Rubs at her dark undereye circles and only makes them worse, taps her cigarette so that the ash falls to the floor. “I know what it is.”

Well fucking tell him instead of keeping it in!

“Oh?” Satoru says instead, leaning forward onto his knees. “What is it, then?”

“She used her technique on herself.”

“She does that all the time to heal."

“She didn’t heal herself,” Shoko snaps — and Satoru remembers that he’s not the only person you’re important to. That while he and Suguru had gotten ahead of themselves being the strongest, they’d left you and Shoko to stroll humbly along your own paths. The only girls in their year. The only person Shoko could fully confide in, really — at least in Tokyo —, the only person who had bothered to check up on her when she drank too much, smoked too much. Even if Shoko hated it.

Shoko is upset. Satoru doesn't what to do with it.

(Alcohol — she likes alcohol. Satoru reminds himself to pick up the most expensive bottle of the stuff the next time he's out.)

(No. She’s trying not to drink so much, isn’t she?)

(Whatever. Life is short.)

“She dissipated herself.”

Satoru knows about your technique intimately enough that it immediately gives him pause — but he runs over the details in his head, just in case, as if it isn’t already imprinted on the flesh of his skull.

Your cursed technique allows you to disassemble items down to their most basic units — subatomic particles — while your reverse cursed technique allows you to reassemble them. Items can be reassembled into their previous form, or to another related form, but you cannot exceed the item’s natural entropy threshold. If you do, the item cannot be reverted back to a physical state, and you will bear the brunt of the resulting shift in energy.

It's a finicky technique. Finicky and fickle and the risks tend to outweigh the rewards — but you'd always used it so elegantly, so gracefully. Even when you doubted yourself, you had a handle on it. Satoru admired that about you.

("You don't say I'm powerful. You say I'm helpful. There's a difference."

You'd said that to him once, when he brought you and Yuuji to lunch. You'd acted like it didn't bother you but he could tell it did — he didn't need his Six Eyes to notice how your nose twitched and your eyes narrowed, displeased.

But Satoru believes in two types of helpfulness.

The kind he is — powerful, needed, a force to be reckoned with. Someone that keeps things afloat, that acts as a beacon in the dark.

Then there's the other kind. The usefulness of pawns, of bait. Necessary, but not fundamental. Desired, sure, but rarely crucial.

You've always been the first. Always. You and him and Suguru and Shoko, always. Even he could admit that.)

You disassembled yourself into atoms. Into nothingness. You lost your mind, your body, your energy, everything—

Satoru sighs. He's been doing that a lot today.

“I didn’t know she could do that,” Satoru says. His throat is covered in a layer of sawdust. He can’t remember the last time he had to actually focus on not throwing up. “Why would she do that?”

“She talked about it, before,” Shoko says. She leans against the bed you’re laying on, gazing over her shoulder — and the way she looks at you turns his stomach, the upturn of her brows, the sad downturn of her mouth. It’s as if you’re already dead. As if she’s looking at a living corpse. “Just… as a theory. A last resort to help her get away, if needed, but—”

“But what?”

“She knew she didn’t have the power for it,” Shoko mutters. Breathes another puff of cigarette smoke. “If she tried, she'd end up just… fading away. In breaking herself up, she'd negate the cursed energy that gives her the power to put herself together.

"And the side effects would be… well, you can see that for yourself. Stupid, so fucking stupid…”

“Well, obviously she has the power for it,” Satoru murmurs. “Or made the power for it.”

“A binding vow?”

Satoru shrugs. Clenches his jaw, watching as you scratch at the faux-leather underneath you. “It'd make sense. Explains how she put herself back together."

(But for what? What could have driven you to such lengths?

A curse like Jogo wouldn't be all too difficult for you to defeat.

So who…?)

Shoko hums. She stares into space for a moment, eyes unfocused, and for a moment Satoru sees her younger self — the one who just started smoking, just started drinking, who carried the weight of all the people she healed (and those she'd failed to) tucked in her pocket. The Shoko that would make sarcastic quips and humble them when they needed humbling, but humour them when she knew the outcome would be funny.

A time when they had very little responsibility. Even him, shackled with it since birth. Comparing his duty from then to now is like comparing a boulder to the weight of the world.

He feels very old, suddenly, at 28.

"There's nothing I can do for her," Shoko says, softly. Regretfully. "If she did make a binding vow, I can only assume she made a condition about returning to normal. If so…"

Satoru can’t do anything about it, basically, she explains. Your condition is one that will only heal with time, patience, and the odd boost from Shoko’s technique. Maybe, she says — she's still unsure about that last bit.

It sickens him. It festers as a deep, curdling annoyance in his bones, his uselessness. It’s a sensation he had only felt once before, standing before the slumped-over body of Geto Suguru. Nothing he could do for him except put him out of his misery, and even then that felt like a cop-out.

So… he can't go directly after the thing that had forced your hand, because they had left no trace. He can't heal you, either. He can't take care of you while your body repairs itself, while your supposed binding vow returns you to your rightful state — that duty will fall to Shoko, or one of her interns.

He can do nothing. And Satoru is nothing if he cannot be of use.

Nine months after the events of the culling games, Satoru enters your room to see you sitting up — eyes wide, eyes seeing, and it only takes you fixing him with a single look to know that you're okay.

(Subjectively. Relatively.)

Suguru Getou — Kenjaku — is finally dead — exorcised. He’s not sure which is the right word to use. All of his allies, killed or exorcised too. Nanami, murdered. Nobara, comatose. Yaga, dead. Inumaki, Maki, Okkotsu, maimed; the great houses of sorcery destroyed and rebuilt in the image of Satoru’s will.

Itadori Yuuji — dead. Sukuna Ryomen — exorcised.

Adding up the gains, subtracting the losses, carrying the ones… Both sides seem to have lost pretty evenly. And he should be happy about it, too; things could have turned out much worse. And they would have, too, if he hadn’t pushed himself out of his pouting and escaped the prison realm — a feat that was half out of spite and half concern for the outside world, and maybe a little curiosity. Rage. Longing to see the bastard who’d stolen Suguru’s face and body, who dared to reanimate him and rouse him from peace — longing to slaughter the thing that had rendered you bedridden and half-mad for months.

He had been the one to kill Kenjaku. It only felt right to be the one to do so — he’d killed Suguru, after all; had been the one to leave him defenceless and open to manipulation. If Suguru hadn’t been dead, Kenjaku wouldn’t have been able to steal his body.

Of course, Satoru ignored the fact that the very last rotten, desperate dregs of Suguru would have enjoyed Kenjaku’s plan — it was the only way he was able to keep his eyes open when he blasted his brain to bits. It was hard enough the first time.

All of these things sit on his tongue, bitter and souring and curdling — every detail of the battle, of the culling games, the colleagues and peers and students he’d held in his arms, the ones he’d comforted as they slipped away, the ones he’d reassured and promised.

(Pink, blood-covered hair; a smile that never dimmed, a nervous murmur (“It’s okay, Gojo-sensei. I know what I got into.”). The shaky laugh that had followed.)

Satoru’s hands tremble at his sides.

Your eyes are wet with tears when you look at him.

“How long has it been?” You croak — voice dry and cracked with disuse, whining in some parts, low and wheezing in others. Bone-deep, the fear in your voice, and for good reason — things had already been at a boiling point when you’d been taken down. Everything had moved past you. “Satoru—?”

Another selfish decision on his part: he doesn’t tell you. At least, not now, when the words threaten to vomit out of his mouth, when the pain is suddenly too fresh and too raw.

(For one strange, too-long second, he’s reminded of his mother — weak, presence-less, powerless as she was. Empty-eyed and unhappy. She was hardly even a mother with the amount of governesses he had.

Somehow, though, every problem would seem worse when her eyes were upon him; every cut and bruise was more painful; every slight against him a grave insult; every mistake a cause for self-pity and temper tantrums — and none of it mattered, as long as she took him into her arms.

A rarity, yes, but… maybe one of the only fond memories he has of his childhood in the Gojo household.

Satoru feels like a kid again — suddenly sniffling from a bruise he swore didn’t hurt, his mother ready to pat his head and baby him and coo his name. Satoru. Not Gojo-sama.)

He crosses the room and plants himself upon your bed and takes you into his arms for the first time in months, and—

And for the first time since Yuuji’s death, since Nanami’s, since Suguru’s, since your injuries—

He cries. Openly. Heaving, chest-wrecking sobs; red, wet nose and ugly whimpers. It’s overwhelming. It’s cathartic. It makes the pain worse, for a second, before it begins to taper out in a bruising wave; with it, he remembers his darling underclassmen who died, his colleagues that he’d wanted to live at least a few more years; he remembers that despite years of being told so, he’s not God — he couldn’t stop Yuuji’s death, or Suguru’s, or Toge losing his arms, or—

“Thirteen months,” he manages to get out. “Thirteen months — you couldn’t talk, or move properly, or—”

Satoru grabs handfuls of you — hair, waist, belly, it doesn’t matter. He can feel you beneath his skin. Rushing, pounding blood, cells, micromolecules — and he doesn’t need to, but he engages his Six Eyes for a moment — actually engages them, doesn’t let them run unconsciously in the background. It’s a comfort to let himself see each receptor interact with each signal on each plasma membrane, to let himself see the tissues that formed organs that formed organ systems forming you, breathing, living, sentient—

He kisses you — or you kiss him, he’s not sure — but it’s far more intimate, far more tender than any touch he’d delivered unto you; hands clutching the sides of your face, your fingers digging into his wrists. You’re crying, salt on his tongue — and he only knows they’re not his own tears because you give a great, shuddering sob when you part, trembling like a leaf in the wind.

“I had to,” you gasp, and he wants to tell you that he knows, he knows, he doesn’t blame you, sweet girl — did what you had to do to live, to survive— “I had to—”

“Only go where I can follow, okay?" His eyes are burning again, voice cracking with the promise, regardless of the fact that he’d rather you do it 100 times over than die. But it's the only way he can tell you he loves you without telling you he loves you, and he can't remember the last time he said the words aloud.

(He does. He remembers. And he remembers that Suguru wouldn't mind if he said it to you — that Suguru loved you as he loves you. And he remembers that Suguru is dead and doesn't have an opinion anymore, so it really doesn't matter, anyways.)

Satoru calls Shoko when he rights himself, barely pulling back from your embrace to text her something barely understandable and hurried. You don't say much while he does; still acclimating to being aware, being awake — he catches you with your eyes screwed shut and your nose buried in his jacket, fingers tight on his arms again. Grounding yourself. Reminding yourself that you're alive, and with him.

Shoko scolds you between rummaging around for a thermometer and scribbling your prescription in messy, barely legible cursive — calls you a dumb bitch for doing what you did, tells you that you owe her a bottle of wine and a trip to a fancy hot spring, and it all seems a little lighter.

(She cries a little — if the slight glassiness of her eyes can be considered crying. Satoru only teases her a bit for it, though you're quick to mention how he'd blubbered like a baby when he saw you, and he's humbled quickly.

It's the most normal he's felt in weeks.)

Shoko clears away after a few hours — gives you strict orders to rest, and sends him a knowing look that he's not all too sure of the meaning of.

"You look tired, Satoru," you finally say when you're alone again. Your smile is sad, knowing, and Satoru curses it all. You deserve a grace period, a moment of ignorance before the grief settles in. "What happened?"

But when have you ever wanted a moment of ignorance? When has he ever been able to hide the truth of things from you? When have you ever been anything but his equal, his confidant?

"Everything," Satoru says. A short, humourless laugh punctuates his single-worded sentence. "Everything, crybaby. Everything that we thought could happen, and everything we thought couldn't."

A flicker of a smile — uncomfortable, flat. Your eyes flicker down to the bland, starched sheets of the hospital bed. "Did you see him?"

He doesn't need you to elaborate. There's really only one person you both mean when you say him.

"Yes."

"Who was he?"

Satoru shifts in his seat. "An ancient sorcerer named Kenjaku. His cursed technique allowed him to transplant his brain between bodies and possess them."

"And he chose Suguru."

"Yes. And many others, too."

"And you killed him."

"Yes. For Suguru, and for you. But mostly for Suguru.”

“I’m glad,” you say, but your fingers twist the sheets tightly. “When I saw him, I was angry. So angry, I… I wanted to kill him. I knew I wasn’t strong enough, and I knew he would kill me, but for a second—”

He understands. God, does he understand. “You wanted to take the risk.” No matter the cost, no matter the damage to your own body. Anger like that consumes.

“I did.” You swallow. Your eyes meet his. “It was like… adding insult to injury. As if it’s not enough that Suguru is dead, but this — this Kenjaku has to puppeteer him too. Disturb his peace."

The wind rustles the trees outside. The late-afternoon gold of the sun settles along the horizon, a burning orange that stretches the shadows and warms the wind and turns the side of your face honey-soft and sad.

“But I realised that I was probably the first person he’d revealed himself to," you continue, "so I was the only one that could warn you."

Always thinking about the good of others. It was another thing he admired about you — Nanami, too. Satoru, for all his big talk about changing the world of jujutsu, about being better than those who came before him, is really quite selfish.

It's why his hands had trembled when he'd had to kill Yuuji. It's why he couldn't put Suguru in the ground the first time they met after he became a curse user. Even when he knows things are necessary, he tries his damnedest to hold on — just for the chance of it all. The chance that Suguru could change his mind. The chance that Sukuna could be removed from Yuuji without him needing to die.

"And…”

One snow-white brow raises. “And?”

“You’ve already lost too many people that you love,” you say simply, shrugging — like it's a simple fact, no need for experimentation, no need for an academic paper complete with its own abstract and footnotes. Like you've always known, in some little way, but you're only able to bring yourself to say it now.

And Satoru — well, it's no secret to him, is it? He's known it since he was 13, 14, 15 — had a bit of a buffering period, sure — and now here at 28, he knows it just as well. The point is that you're not supposed to know. Not while you're still healing from Suguru and… being attacked by fake-Suguru.

Regardless of what he knows and how long he's known it, Satoru feels his throat begin to close up, twisting and turning and holding his breath tight. He doesn’t like the feeling.

“Love?” He echoes. His voice has gotten a little empty. It's too soon for him to say it aloud, he thinks. It was okay when he whispered it in his head after making love to you; it was easy when he grinned at your scrunched up nose and scoffed comments and thought fuck, I love you. It was easy when he could pretend it was a simple, passing comment, a trick of the mind — but having it said as fact?

Not so simple. But you don’t need to know that. “Is that so?"

You don't seem to notice his momentary pause — a lifetime of rambling in his time, a second's hesitation in regular time — too busy staring at the space where his fingers stretch apart over the sheets. Just inches away from yours. "We're friends, aren't we?"

Oh.

"Oh." Satoru blinks back. "Oh, yeah. Best friends, you and I, crybaby."

"I know it's normal for us," you say, ploughing ahead, "to just lose and lose and keep losing, but… I'll be honest. I never fully got used to it, and I don't want to."

He wishes he could say the same, but he can't.

He understands, in some capacity. Nobody wants to see the people around them die, a continuous and vicious cycle. Nobody wants to get so used to loss that most funerals no longer hold any emotional significance. But getting used to it had saved him. Getting used to it helped him act without consequence, without remorse, and that's what the battlefield both needs and requires of him.

He could count on both hands the people he wants to save in this world — about half of them were dead, at this point. A lot of them died while he was imprisoned. Two, he had to kill himself. He swore he'd protect the rest with all Six Eyes, every non-existent boundary of his Limitless.

So Satoru doesn't care much about getting used to death and dying and loss and grief. As long as you're okay, he's okay. As long as his job as the Strongest is done, everything is as it should be.

He doesn't say that to you, of course. You'd probably curse him out and call him a heartless bastard. Instead, he nods, hums and agrees and tells you the names of those who died when you work up the courage to ask.

It's a long night. It's an even longer list.

10.

Shoko keeps you for observation for 10 days after you wake up — three days longer than necessary, but she won't hear it from him, no matter how many times he reminds her that technically she falsified her degree—

He's joking. Mostly.

Satoru volunteers himself to help you back home, taking with you the plastic bag filled with your cleaned sorcerer's garb and weapon. He carries it over his shoulder along with two teddy bears, a half-wilted bouquet of tulips and a half-eaten box of chocolates (all courtesy of the second years — except for the chocolates, which are half-eaten because of him). He winds his other arm around your waist even though you can walk perfectly fine, but — it's just in case. Purely precautionary. For once, you don’t argue about being babied.

In the midday sun outside, you tilt your head back and close your eyes and smile. For a moment, it's as if the sadness has melted away from you — the tears you shed over Yuuji, Nanami, Suguru. The tears you shed over him, and he wasn't even dead. Satoru is glad your eyes are closed — even beneath his sunglasses, it's painfully obvious that he's staring.

You decide to take the subway home — it's my first time outside in almost a year, you remind him, so he pushes down any arguments he might have and enjoys the too-cramped journey towards Akihabara. You’re both shoved standing together, between a panicked looking man holding a tray of coffee and a woman with her child hanging about her legs, your head bobbing against his chest as the train moves.

For a moment — as the train passes momentarily out of the underground and becomes encapsulated in light — it's easy to drown in the normalcy of it all. For a moment, he sees himself looking in as a stranger would. Here, he isn't the Six Eyes; just a simple man taking his girlfriend home, standing close on the train, wishing to be closer. Riding home to your shared apartment where he'll peel oranges and feed them to you, where he'll lay his head in your lap and hold your hands to his heart.

His nose wrinkles. He prefers reality, he thinks, where he can be powerful and have you by his side; where he can protect you, uphold peace, change the jujutsu world for the best — and then go home all the same, and have you to hold.

"What are you thinking about?" You mumble against his collar.

"Oranges," he replies.

"I don't have any at home," you say, "or if I did, they're rotted."

"Don't worry — we cleaned your kitchen up. Me and the kids." It was an afternoon of Yuuji attempting to shove rotting potatoes in Nobara's face. That was before Shibuya; before everything, really.

"Oh? You got your hands dirty?"

Satoru tries to not think about that same beaming, smiling Yuuji's last breaths. "Of course! This is me we're talking about, honey. I was front and centre."

You snort, soft against his neck. It's a wonder he went almost a year without you. "Housewife Satoru. I'll keep it in mind."

When you return to your apartment, you shower together for the first time in forever. He spends extra time and care massaging shampoo into your scalp, detangling each knot; spends extra time rinsing the suds out, tilting your head back with a gentle tap to your chin.

Steam clogs his mind. Almond shower oil and citrusy shampoo fog his senses. The realisation that you could have potentially been taken away from him sits heavy like a stone in his stomach — why it hadn't sunk in in the past, oh, 13 months or so, he doesn’t know. All he knows is that he's terribly bad at caring for precious things — but if he could, if it's possible, he'll remould and reshape his hands, his heart, his mind, just for the chance—

"Satoru," you breathe against his lips, "Bow your head."

(Bow your head, you say. He'd kneel if you asked him to.)

You brush your hands through his hair; rinse him free of suds and bubbles and kiss his temples as you shut off the water. What is supposed to be healing for you is quickly becoming therapy for him — muscles relaxing, mind clearing of all responsibilities, mournings, obligations. All he knows are the soft, newly washed sheets beneath him and your nose in the crook of his neck.

It's a strange sensation, the lack of tension, his brain not working overtime. But hardly unwelcome.

11.

Satoru asks you if you saw anything when you were indisposed. Memories, flashbacks, prophecies? Blurry half-truths, nonsensical babbling? You tell him that you can't really remember — and you can't, not really, but you do remember one thing.

When you were 11, you met Satoru and Suguru for the first time. It's that memory that you can remember playing in your head, over and over and over again: Satoru and Suguru, scrawny and still-faced in their yukata.

Satoru was from a great, traditional house. Suguru was not, but upon discovery of his powers, was taken into unofficial custody of the higher-ups. In most circumstances, you wouldn’t have been allowed within two feet of them — but the elders had deemed your cursed technique a great gift, and so you were warily accepted into the upper echelons of jujutsu society, a stranger, a foreigner.

Introducing you to the most powerful sorcerers your age was nothing more than political play, of course. The adults followed behind as you walked through the grand grounds of the Gojo family — (maintained by a team of 12 gardeners, according to the Lady of the house) — muttering and scheming between themselves, making sure nothing would go awry.

Nothing did, of course. Satoru picked his nose and Suguru told him it was rude and they bickered for a while — Satoru bickered, Suguru replied calmly and quickly. Satoru asked you if your technique was good or bad ("No such thing," interjected Suguru) and whether or not you think you could beat him in a fight.

(That last question was to stroke his own ego, of course. Everyone knew he was the strongest sorcerer born in the last century.)

At some point, Satoru made you cry.

You can't remember what about, all these years later — you'd think you'd remember, considering the fact that you know the amount of gardeners employed by the Gojo estate — but you know that you had tried to stop it; fists balled, teeth gritted, full-body heaves. Crying was the last thing you had wanted to do. Crying meant weakness. Weakness meant being taken advantage of.

But you were so scared. It was all so alien. You wanted to go home, but home didn’t exist anymore. You wanted your mother, but your mother was long gone. All you had left were stone-faced adults that were only interested in your abilities.

Suguru had been confused at your reaction to what he took as a harmless quip — a little callous, as most children are — but he had reassured you nonetheless.

"Don’t cry. Satoru speaks before he thinks," he'd said, nudging your shoulder. "Sometimes you have to ignore him and he'll be so bored that he has to think."

"I can hear you," Gojo huffed. "I didn't mean to."

"See?" Suguru smiled. "Works like a charm."

Yes, Suguru had always been there to protect you. Emotionally, at least. He was willing to be kinder to people. More gentle, more forgiving. He'd believed that it was his duty as a sorcerer to protect those that couldn't protect themselves, and—

Well. That had changed, by the end, but having that memory replay in your head made you see the bigger picture of it all. Suguru's place in things. Your place in things.

You'd loved Suguru, no doubt. And you’ll probably always carry a piece of him with you — you'd hate to do otherwise. You’ll carry his kindness and his jokes and his catlike smile, all tucked away in bubble wrap somewhere in your chest cavity — but you will never disregard his wrongdoings. Since his death, you'd argued against the two sides of him; felt guilty for loving him after what he did, felt guilty for hating him after loving him and knowing him for as long as you did. Two halves of a whole. Darkness in light and light in darkness.

He was both of those things. You love him, but you don’t forgive him, and you probably never will. He will never again be the boy that comforted you after Satoru made you cry; he will never again be the boy who let you braid his hair back. He won't be the boy who slaughtered innocents, either — death's funny like that. Indiscriminately doing away with both the good and the bad.

And that's okay. Kenjaku is dead, after all, and Suguru can finally rest — and with him, your warring mind.

12.

Midnight strikes and you're still awake. You don’t even seem tired, and that's after a long shower and takeout and a movie. Usually you'd be a drooling mess by now, but tonight is different. Feels different. Satoru isn’t sure if it's just a year's worth of built up sexual tension or something else, but he feels it regardless.

He's flopped on his stomach, hair still damp; you're curled up in the shape of a C, skin reflecting the light of the TV. He might visit Nobara tomorrow. Megumi usually goes on Wednesdays, too — they could make a day out of it, and you could tag along, too. He's got a craving for the pistachio macarons they sell near—

"I'm in love with you," you announce.

Satoru doesn't bother asking you to repeat yourself because he knows he didn’t mishear. It isn't the knowing that shocks him — he's not stupid, and you wear your heart on your sleeve — it's the sudden, quick verbal affirmation of it that catches him off guard. After all, haven’t you two been putting this all off? Yearning for a dead man? Being pulled from two opposing poles?

He turns his head towards you, opens his mouth to ask you just that, and—

"After Suguru, I thought I'd never be happy again," you say, and you’re smiling like you didn't just say something inherently heartbreaking. But no, you look fond — content, even, blinking slowly at him. "And I thought I'd never feel for someone as strong as I did for him. But here I am: happy, and in love, and okay."

Satoru opens his mouth — then closes it quickly. For some reason, he remembers something Suguru said to you when you were younger: "Satoru speaks before he thinks." But he wants to think about this — about what he should say. How does he respond to you quite literally baring your heart to him? How does he tell you what he wants to tell you, what you deserve to hear? He's never been good with real, genuine words — emotional shit never came easy to him out loud. His thoughts are much more concise than his mouth is, but he guesses it's because it moves so fast in comparison.

Pity you can't read his mind. It'd make things much easier.

“You don’t have to say anything,” but he wants to, don't you know? "You don't have to pretend. It’s okay. I know that… maybe you don’t love me as much as you loved Suguru, but I know you love me in some way, at least—”

Satoru frowns — strings of ideas and thoughts bunching up and stopping short as your words register. “As much as I— hey, stop putting words in my mouth—"

"The truth is," you continue on, "I feel lighter than I have in years. I don't dread life so much anymore. I don't dread you anymore."

"You… dreaded me?"

You hum. Your legs stretch down, arms forward, face scrunched up in a passing yawn. "I'm not stupid to think you didn’t know how I felt, but… I hated that I was so obvious about it. Even when I was fighting with myself about it, I was obvious. It made me hate being around you, sometimes."

You sigh, then — not as heavy and melancholy as they used to be, no. This is a sigh of relief, of cathartic release.

Satoru blinks, and attempts to wade through the seventy-or-so compulsions telling him to make a joke, to laugh, to tease you. Maybe he should actually be serious for once. Say it straight and say it firm, so you can't take anything the wrong way. If there was ever a time for him to not beat around the bush…

"I've liked you since I was 17," he confesses, finally. "Me and Suguru, we were together, y’know, and we were happy. And Suguru loved you, and somewhere along the line I… began to do the same, but we were so young and then… Everything changed so fast. Everything broke so fast.”

Your fingers brush against his, and he breathes in a sigh. Your eyes are wide and watery, low light reflecting like glitter in your eyes.

"Sometimes, it keeps me up at night," Satoru says, laughing a pained sort of laugh. "Out of everything, that's what keeps me up — that we could've been happy together, all three of us. It never would’ve been enough to make him change, but…"

At least you would’ve known what it was like. To be happy together in that way. To be content. To find your places in the world, hand and hand. To know what it was like — even if Suguru’s fall from grace was inevitable — so you wouldn’t have to keep wondering until your untimely, gruesome, sorcerer-style deaths, or whatever.

Back then, Satoru didn’t understand why Suguru never told you how he felt. He couldn't understand how he could be content watching from afar, looking but never touching. What Satoru wanted, he learned to take; the Strongest didn’t need to ask for permission, only forgiveness.

He learned quickly that some things were better left unsaid. And now, 28 years old, half of his friends, students, colleagues dead — he understands even more.

He remembers how Yuuji had tried to stave off tears when he realised he had to die; remembers how his student’s throat had felt being crushed in his hands. He loved Yuuji like a little brother. Like a son, even. He was family. He was his student, and yet his death had been necessary, and Satoru battled with it. It allowed him to succeed in the mission he was born to complete. But he had given up Yuuji in return.

There is no curse more twisted than love.

Therein lays the problem, he supposes. The second you love someone, you run the risk of having them end up like Yuuji did. Like Suguru did. Like Nanami did. When you are burdened with incredible power like Satoru is — like Suguru was — you must be able to sacrifice for it. The closer that people are, the more likely they are to be caught in the crossfire, the more likely you are to be hurt. Suguru hoped to avoid that at all costs. It was easier to watch from afar, less painful.

Satoru is a tad more selfish. Which is bad, he knows, because he's too prepared to sacrifice. Even now. Even now, he knows that if caught between saving you and saving society, he would be forced to — to—

Satoru inhales. The only thing for it is to simply stop things from getting that far.

He could explain all this to you. He could talk circles around you about it, in fact, but the truth is that it's all conjecture. Suguru isn’t here to tell him why he did what he did. He can’t speak for him, no matter how well he knew him.

"I don't know why Suguru never told you," Satoru says instead. He folds his fingers tighter, taking yours in his grip as he does so. "Guess that's something he took with him to the grave."

"I've stopped wondering," you say. “I’ll never stop regretting, but I’ve stopped wondering. I can’t stay rooted in the past any more. It was doing more harm than good."

And you raise your interlocked hands — nestle them under your chin and screw your eyes shut, like you're wishing on the evening star, like he's something precious to be treasured. All of a sudden he's 17 and confused about why he can't stop staring at you. He doesn’t have Suguru to tease him about it, now.

“I’ll never forget him,” Satoru announces — a warning, or a reassurance, he doesn’t know. All he knows is that he’s telling the truth and nothing but the truth, and whether or not you like his truth is not his concern. He respects you too much to lie about this to you.

Your lips twitch upwards, a phantom of a smile. “Neither will I. "

"I'll never forget you, either."

The smile grows, blooms, blossoms, until it stretches bright and full across your face. The first smile of yours he's seen in a while that wasn't at half-mast, or tinged with sadness, or pain, or fatigue.

"How lucky I am," you whisper, "to be known by you, Gojo Satoru."

It should be the other way around, he thinks.

(12.5.

It's the first time he makes love in years.

Satoru has always fucked you. Always. No matter how tired you both were, no matter how injured — he'd always force himself to be rougher, force his touches to not linger as much as he wanted them to.

If he felt too much, he'd crack a joke instead of drowning in it; if he felt his eyes beginning to burn he'd bury his nose in the crook of your neck and push it down. If he thought of long, dark hair and cat-like eyes, he'd tighten your grip in his hair and the shock of pain would clear his mind. He fucked quick, and when he was done he'd lay far away enough that he couldn't feel your skin against his.

Tonight, he lets himself love and be loved again.

You're on top of him, ass flush against his thighs, taking every inch he has to give you; his hands have found your jaw, thumbs brushing back and forth across your dewy, sweat-slick cheeks. One hand of yours clasps around his wrist; the other bands to his chest, nails digging red into his skin. Your cursed energy blooms, flushes, flourishes when he opens his eyes to look at you.

He sees every pore, every hair, every dimple, every broken capillary, every scratch and scrape. Every part of you, bending to him in some places, unfalteringly stubborn in others.

"Look at you," he mumbles, blinking dumbly. "So… pretty…"

You snort something like a laugh, and continue: up, down, up, down. Slow, grinding gyrations of your hips that make his head spin pleasantly; and with his Limitless nullified, he feels every inch of skin, every tensing of muscle, every scrape and press fully and completely. He’s never felt so engulfed in it before — the sensations of it all, the warmth, your scent, your weight above him.

He'd drown in you, if he could. Take you in his mouth and nose and ears and everywhere, until he's left gasping for air and grappling for something of substance. Maybe once upon a time he would keep those thoughts to himself, for whatever reason — but now he's allowed to be selfish in his affections, allowed to give more than surface-level compliments and vague declarations of love.

Between pleasure-ridden shudders and sloppy, wet kisses, he breathes:

"I want you everywhere," he says, "All the time. Over me, on me, in me—"

You raise a brow, impudent and teasing in a way that makes his abdomen tighten. "In you?"

And maybe he didn’t mean it in the way that you took it, but he plays along anyways, waggling his brows. "You heard me."

"You're terrible."

"I'm not joking," Satoru argues — but it’s hard to take him seriously when his voice quietens, when he arches up eagerly to meet your lips—

When his grip on your lower back becomes painfully tight, when his lips part in a moan and his eyes screw shut and he throws his head back, hips rutting up to meet yours, and—

His peak rises to greet him — and his heart swells all the while. He finds himself clawing for you as his orgasm builds, hands clambering against your back, your neck, your hair, until (with a great, shaking breath, may he add): "Fuck, I — mmf, I love you—"

It carries him off to a state of fuzzy, empty-minded ignorance — pleasure tightening his entire body, fizzling from the tips of his fingers to his curling toes. Your name on his tongue, slurred and mellifluous, his smile dizzy and drunk.

As you smile down at him, so unbearably fond, Satoru thinks that he doesn’t mind saying I love you aloud after all.)

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larissareadings · 1 year ago

Text

It’s okay, love.

➤ pairing: Draco Malfoy x gryff!fem!reader (house barely mentioned).

Request: None

tw: eating disorder; mentions of bullying and anxiety attack.

Note: I’ve wrote this based on personal experiences and what I needed at the time. DO NOT read this if it’s not comfortable for you. If you or someone you know is struggling with an eating disorder, please reach out for help.

English is not my native language so I’m sorry if there is any mistakes. This is my first fic ever so it might not be so good. I hope you enjoy it though.

Summary: Y/N is a keeper at the Gryffindor (barely mentioned) team, who has been developing an eating disorder and Draco Malfoy seems to be only one who noticed it.

Y/N always had problems with her body image. At her early teens at Hogwarts she used to be mocked, mostly by Pansy Parkinson and her friends, because she was too thin. When Y/N turned 14, she started gaining weight since she was eating too much due to her increased anxiety, and then she was again being mocked, except now because she was getting fat, and everyone talked about it, even when they didn’t want to be mean, saying things like “you should get on a diet”. By 16, Y/N started focusing on her weight loss journey, she was finally gonna be health, delicate and beautiful as the other girls her age.

Some months later

It was right after the quidditch match between Gryffindor and Ravenclaw. They won, of course, since you’ve let too many quaffles go through the goal hoops. You’re a keeper at the Gryffindor team, and you’re good at it. When you’re not dizzy anyway.

“It happened again, didn’t it?”

you heard the familiar voice behind you. It sounded soft, which was not a usual thing. You closed your locker and turned around to face Malfoy. The others had already left the locker room, so now it was just you and him.

"It happened what again, Malfoy?" you asked him, trying to sound indifferent, when you were all, but that. He had some power over you, it was irritating actually, how nervous you would get when he was around.

Malfoy has been acting weird these past few months, he didn't tease you anymore. When his friends said anything about you, he would either just leave or just stare at you, but never laugh with them, never contribute to their bullying. He was the only one in the group who said nothing about your recent weight loss. The others did. Pansy would never loose the chance to say you finally learnt to shut your mouth.

You hated that he hadn't said anything, you worried you hadn't lost enough weight for him to notice, and you wanted him to see that you could be pretty too.

He looked in you up and down, checking you, before focusing on your eyes again and said "Dizziness."

You didn't understand why he was saying this, why he would notice you feeling dizzy. "Yeah.. just a little. I'm bit distract that's all". A few seconds went by where he said nothing, just stood there looking at you. Was that concern in his eyes? You couldn't tell. "Look, uhmm, I don't know where this is coming from, but I have to go. If you have any jokes to make about me being a bad keeper, or an ugly, fat bad keeper or whatever" you noticed him flinch at that, as if it had hurt him. "say it now or leave it for tomorrow 'cause I'm really tired and just wanna go to my bed"

He walked towards you, enough for him to talk low and look closely into your eyes, making you even more nervous, and said "You have to stop this, Y/N, it's making you sick."

"I don't know what you talking about"

Now he let out a breath in disbelief. "Oh, you don't know what I'm talking about? Let my clarify to you, then, It's a very simple concept, really, I thought you would know it by now." He was actually getting angry. "In order to live, people have to eat. It's the only way to get nutrients into your body. Really, Y/N, that's basics"

"I know about that. It's a good thing I eat, then, right?'' You said also angry now with his sudden aggressiveness.

"Do you though? 'Cause what I'm seeing-" he said gesturing to your body "is a girl fading away, a girl who plays with food at lunch instead of actually eating it, a girl who who used to be a great keeper, but now can't barely stand in a broom because is too weak to do so." He could feel his heart in his throat. He was so nervous, so scared you would fall off that broom. More than he could ever admit. He was keeping his worry to himself for months, hoping you would stop, hoping someone would intervene, but no one did. People just kept either praising your weight loss or humiliating you. But he couldn't stop himself anymore, if you had got hurt today, he would never forgive himself.

You felt your heart skip a beat at that. He was worried. Really worried. You didn't know how to react. You felt seen, someone saw what you were going through. But you also felt good, reassured. So you WERE thinner, and he noticed. “You know what? I don’t get it. Weren’t you and your friends the ones who said I was too heavy to play quidditch? that my weight would slow me down? that I would fall? that the broomstick couldn’t take it?” you now had tears in your cheeks. Your vision was blured by the tears and, God, you were so tired.

Malfoly’s heart might’ve actually broke in that moment. He was so angry at everyone who didn’t notice you hurting yourself, when he was actually the who drove you into it.

‘‘I am so tired.” you kept talking now, tears rolling down your face. “Why is it never enough? I’m tired. I’m thin, I’m ugly. I’m fat, I’m ugly too, and disggusting. I need a diet. I do a diet. and now fading away? OH well, just let me be happy for once.and I am happy now, ok? I’m finally beautiful.” You were talking so fast and you were feeling so weak. Malfoy saw that, so he immediately hold you in a hug, preventing you from falling. Your head were now in his chest, and you were trying to stop crying, trying to make your heart go back to it’s normal rhythm.

“It’s okay. It’s okay, love.” He said stroking your hair. “I’m sorry” he said almost inaudible.

After a few minutes you heart and breathing were finally stable again. You detached yourself from his harms, although his hands were still in both sides of your arms. You looked up to him with watery eyes. You hated crying in front of people. "I'm sorry" you said.

"It's okay." He said again, looking back at you. Taking his hesitant hand, like he was afraid to actually break you, to clean your cheeks from the tears. "I promise".

"Why are you doing this?" you were really confused. You had never seen Malfoy this gentle and.. scared?

He caressed you cheeks while looking from your eyes to your mouth. He then joined your foreheads and spoke really low, like a whisper. “I need you, Y/N.”

“what?” you said also in a whisper. you couldn't believe what you were hearing.

“I need you, and I need you to get better. This is making me crazy. I’m scared all the time. I’m scared you’re gonna fall off the stairs, or the broom. I’m scared of you getting hurt. Please.. just- just let me help, ok? Tell me what to do, and I’ll do it. Anything.”

“Can you.. uhmm. eat? with me, I mean” you asked detaching your heads to look in his eyes.

“Sure” He said immediately. “Is that all?”

“No.” you let out a breath in relief with his answer and smile a little. “But it may be a start. I think”

“Ok.” He returned your smile. “You should probably talk with someone else, though. Someone who could help more. A professor, maybe. I’ll go with you, if you want me to.”

“Yeah.. ok. Can we go to McGonagall, then? Not now, please. When I’m ready.”

“Of course. Anyone you want, love.” He said looking back at you before you hugging him again. Letting your head rest in his chest while he stroke your hair again. This felt like home to both of you. You were so scared, but he was hopeful. He would do anything for you to feel better.

This whole not eating thing made you so tired, but it was also so addictive. You didn’t know if you could ever get better, but maybe this was a start. Having someone to lean on, someone who cared.. it certainly helped.

#draco malfoy x reader #draco malfoy angst #angst with a happy ending #draco malfoy x you #draco malfoy #draco x y/n #draco x you #draco malfoy imagine

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crispyanonartnsfw · 4 months ago

Note

Crispy do you have any 🔞 Sambastian head-canons or us?

HEY THANK YOU ANON I LOVE THESE TYPE OF ASKS 🖤 sorry for the wait!!

In random order but I guess I saved the cute one for last:

Sebastian is very kinky and Sam is very vanilla*, and they meet somewhere in the middle in their happy place

They are both switch, Sam tops the most and Sebastian bottoms the most

When Seb tops he's such a mean dom and usually goes full power, he knows Sam is a big man and can take whatever he gives him. It's definitely cathartic for him, sometimes he really needs to just let it all out (and Sam is very happy to help). When he bottoms, he goes from being extremely bratty to pretty much melting right into Sam's arms and attentions - he's not very used to being cherished and Sam's especially good at cherishing him. He however also enjoys pain and being thrown around a little - but it has to be exactly the way he wants, so he learned to be pretty bossy about it with his partners after some not great experiences (with Sam however he doesn't need to do it anymore, the man knows exactly what he's working with)

When Sam tops he's sweet and devoted, but sometimes gets a bit possessive, a bit primal. In the past he grew aware of getting easily flustered and lost in his pleasure, so he became super attentive to his partners responses, often checking in with them to avoid accidentally hurting or displeasing them. Seb however, while appreciating the care, actually really loves when Sam's overwhelmed and doesn't restrain himself (When they first got together, Seb had to tell him not to worry and just enjoy the ride at least a billion times. After maybe a thousand more, Sam decided to trust him). When Sam bottoms for Seb he mostly just...braces himself (And finally enjoys the ride!! lol) He likes the overstimulation and going into subspace, even more if Seb is praising him and talking him through it. He really gets off to Seb's voice.

Sam will suck Seb off at any chance he gets, he likes the response he gets and he's very proud of his skill. He just loooves giving blowjobs. Seb not so much, especially because Sam is very well endowed so it's kinda hard on him. When Seb actually gives head he makes a whole performance out of it though (he will never admit it but he likes being admired)

Seb likes to scratch, Sam likes to bite

Seb likes to be grabbed (hair, neck, wrists...), Sam likes to be tied.

They both love to fuck after a good smoke sesh🍃

To get in the mood - Seb likes massages, Sam likes back and head scratches

For all the kinky-related stuff I talked about, I actually think they enjoy tons of just purely sweet intimacy with each other. Sebastian found out he likes to be worshiped and Sam is still in disbelief for being allowed to do so, Seb's high hard walls long since breached. After many years together Sam definitely turned him into a serial cuddler like himself, and sometimes they just make slow lazy love in the morning, half awake and still entangled from the night sleep

* I wasn't going to elaborate too much but I will say this: I describe Sam as initially vanilla not because he doesn't like kinky stuff, but simply because he never felt compelled to explore until he got with Seb (My idea is that Penny was his first partner, and she doesn't strike me as a kinky girlie + Sam was afraid of breaking her in two so only gentle sex was allowed lol). He doesn't have any particular fantasies - at least that he was aware of before being with Seb - so in whatever role/position he's in he likes to mirror his partners desires. He's the face of enthusiastic consent ("I don't know what that is but hell yeah let's try it" Type of response)- except for anything extremely violent or humiliating ...for Seb

another sexy hc for Sam can be found here

AND if you want to read a perfect rendition of their dynamic how I imagine it after many years together, you should go and read Lonely Dancers by @lily-alphonse - she got it absolutely flawlessly and I didn't even elaborate anything with her beforehand, so much brain power fr

#sambastian #sambastian smut #sebsam #samseb #suggestive #older!sambastian #mdni #sdv smut #ask #request #headcanon

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shenzaibird-art · 1 year ago

Text

A Discussion of Soulmagic

Verloren presented his research notes to his latest visitor as he described the process of pulling magic directly from a creature's soul instead of just the physical body, a concept that none had attempted before him. He had been explaining the exact same thing to several different people lately and more often than not he was met with disdain and skepticism. He was so tired of all these mages who seemingly couldn't embrace new ideas telling him that this was too complicated and irregular to be worth it. But he did not mind what they thought about his work and continued to discuss it with others when he had the chance, trying to find more folks who could have interesting ideas for his consideration. Verloren had heard about Hyden's impressive magic skills, and how he was particularly interested in darker magics. Would he be able to see the true potential of soulmagic?

Hyden belongs to @chocodile! Just borrowing him for a sec haha

Long stupid excessive ramblings below :'D

I was working on this for a long time. Kinda had it planned for a few years actually, before I even redesigned Verloren and got obsessed with him! They're both evil mages who caused chaotic historical events and then eventually faced The Consequences and lost their powers, so I felt like there was a lot of room for crossovers hehe. I started actually working on this in December and totally thought I'd finish in January but... oh well I guess that didn't happen xD

Unfortunately, all this time spent working on this pic has allowed me to come up with a fuckton of headcanon about it, and I could not rest without spilling all of it in an obnoxiously long wall of text.

So, if I were to steal Hyden and adapt him into my setting, I think he would be a Grand Augur of Necromagic from a kingdom neighbor to Houndsdagger. Augur is a word I stole because it looks cool, but in my setting it basically means a mage that works for the kingdom and does magic research. A Grand Augur is a higher rank than an augur, typically has earned the title through their experience, but also usually they're nobles or important people. They get a seat at the royal council of magic and stuff. So yeah I think that would fit him kinda. And necromagic because it allows for some of the most powerful crafts... and because it's typically the most potentially evil of the magics lol

This probably would take place when Verloren's work with soulmagic was starting to attract private clients looking for dark powerful magics, so Hyden might have heard the rumors about a mage in Houndsdagger who could make magic from souls (of animals but also of people obviously). At first, he might have thought it was nonsense like witchcraft (non-standard magic that a lot of people consider superstition) but maybe he might have grown a bit interested once he learned that this was apparently some extremely powerful form of magic. So on the next opportunity he had to visit Houndsdagger, Hyden decided to check it out and meet this Augur Verloren.

I think this interaction could go well, but it could also go really bad.

Verloren is known for being difficult to work with and straight up hostile at times. He's very quick to judge and will not work with you if he decides that he dislikes you for any reason, so the way that Hyden approaches him would matter a lot. Some things about Verloren that I think would influence Hyden's opinions of him:

- Verloren is just an augur, and augurs typically serve under Grand Augurs, so Hyden is technically above him, although he doesn't exactly have any authority over him since he's from a different kingdom. - Verloren is also not noble or anything like that, AND he's from Vykrest. The Vykrest are a bit more animal-like in some of their ways (like growling, biting, running on all fours at times), which makes people from outside think they're somewhat uncivilized or primitive. Doesn't help their image that they're typically wary of outsiders, with some of their cities restricted to their kind alone. - Verloren also usually appears kinda arrogant, like in a "I don't have time for you" sorta way, which pisses off a lot of people who think that he should bow down to them.

But I think if Hyden is interested in what he has to offer, he would be wise enough to treat him well no matter what he actually thinks of him. And unless the other person is being actually rude to him, Verloren enjoys talking about his work and showing what he's capable of even if he doesn't like them. (It's the part of working with/for someone he hates that he won't do.)

Verloren's work is very complex and his notes and diagrams might seem to make no sense, so Hyden might be skeptical at first, but he'd probably change his mind after some demonstrations of soulmagic's power. I think he would be especially interested when Verloren gets to the part about the Triangle Workyn of Ravenbone, a craft that could permanently increase one's magic ability.

So at this point, if the conversation was going well, they might try to make a deal. Verloren offered his soulmagic services for a cost, but he was very picky about what that cost would be. He was not interested in wealth and instead he would ask his potential client what they could offer that would be really worth his time. Hyden probably would have some interesting magic knowledge to share... or maybe he would offer Ambroys' blood. I have some thoughts about what this would mean in my setting but I guess I can spare you of those ramblings and leave for some other time since it's not directly related to this pic anyway.

Aside from that payment, there would be the materials required for the craft, and for the Triangle Workyn of Ravenbone that included three victims, with their souls bound to their skulls (the process that allows you to use a soul in magic), who should be made to kill each other in order. Verloren would provide the soul-bind spells but Hyden would have to find victims and handle the killings on his own (which I think he'd be pretty capable of doing.) So once Hyden had all the required materials, they'd meet again to do the Triangle Workyn of Ravenbone on him. If everything went right, congratulations! Hyden can now output a lot more magic at once, making all of his spells stronger. Also, his bones are black now (that's what the Ravenbone in the name is about), and possibly a bit stronger too.

Overall, I think they would get along ok, but not exactly amazingly. More of a "I guess I can deal with this guy" sort of thing despite obviously having some shared interests. They'd probably have pretty good conversations about magic, but that alone.

But what if their conversation actually didn't go so nice? If Verloren refused to work with Hyden, how would he react? How would he feel about this random lowly wild-dog of a person having some unbelievably powerful magic rivaling his own and not being able to get it for himself? During Verloren's time as an augur, he gathered several enemies who'd plot his demise and attempt to have him killed and steal his work, and I think maybe Hyden might have been one of those. Eventually, some of his most influential enemies end up convincing the king of Houndsdagger to have Verloren exiled, and maybe Hyden could have been involved. It turned out to be a terrible idea however.

Ahhhh there would be more, but I think it might already be enough and maybe I should shut up...

Sorry I guess I fanfic'd too hard about our evil mages coexisting :'D

#oc.Verloren #stt.Houndsdagger #why can't i ever write a normal amount #furry #furryart #sfw furry #furry sfw #the background was the hardest part that kept me not-working on this pic #I'd open the file and see the bg and be like NOPE i'll finish this some other time #And then there was me nitpicking about Verloren's face (as usual) and fixing it over and over even when the pic was nearly done #And this file is so heavy and it has 95 layers so it would lag sometimes #Anyway yeah that's why it took so long :'D #Shenzairealm

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eccentricgrace · 4 months ago

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Considerations of an Iron-Spider || IronDad

summary: okay, so maybe peter lost a little too much blood. that's fine! that's what they have med bays for!

tags: iron infusions (needles, hospital, iv), banter, good mentor tony stark, the may-tony coparenting agenda, peter parker cannot sit still, star wars trivia, these fckin nerds

wc: 2,744

cross-posted on wattpad under the same name!

It started, technically, a two weeks ago. He'd gotten injured. Like, more so than usual.

Peter's pretty good at skimming past knives and bullets and all kinds of projectiles, all things considered. Compared to Thee Average Joe, he's basically got a 99% better chance at survival, and it showed, because at the end of the night he still managed to crawl out of whatever dumpster he landed in.

There was, though, the remaining 1%. Which was less fun. Times where for whatever reason he wasn't able to dodge in time, just barely missed the window, and— well. Well.

Those ended with a frankly traumatic phonecall to Tony, bleary memories of blue fingertips, and being bodily hauled across the floor.

But that was two weeks ago. So long it was practically forever— he's still bruised, but there's no gaping wounds, no need for any bandages anymore, nothing serious. Which is why it was alarming that, for whatever reason, he still felt waves of dizziness every time he stood up. He still felt weak, and he still felt like he couldn't get that last breath in his lungs.

He called Tony.

"You answered fast," Peter said, blinking widely at his homework in front of him. His phone crushed between his ear and his shoulder while he tapped away on his laptop.

"Wanted to make sure you weren't in another abandoned building," Tony said shortly, his tone clipped. "You just seem to like them so much."

Peter winced. So clearly Tony was still on edge about it all...

It's not like he didn't care that he almost died two weeks ago. He actually cared quite a bit. It wasn't fun. It hurt really bad, added a new pink scar to the collection of other near-death experiences on his body, and he wasn't keen on doing anything like it again soon. He had a strict "one near-death experience per month" limit.

But he also prided himself on his ability to bounce back from anything. If nothing else, he was always good at getting back up.

Peter cleared his throat. "About that. I don't want to stress you out or anything but—"

"Peter," Tony warned.

"I'm fine," Peter prefaced quickly. "I mean— I'm not fine, butlike, I'm not on death's door. Relax."

"Why, pray tell, are you not fine?" Tony asked, and Peter could hear the smile in his voice, tense and fake with the threat of an eye twitch. "You aren't in your suit."

It wasn't a question.

"No," Peter said, and took the phone in his hand. "I'm just doing homework, but I—"

He trailed off awkwardly, trying to find a way to phrase what he needed to say that wouldn't immediately cause alarm bells.

"You...?" Tony pressured.

"I feel like I need my inhaler," Peter said, scratching at the back of his neck.

A long silence commenced, before Tony's baffled response cackled through the receiver. "Then use it?"

"I haven't needed my inhaler since I got bit," Peter continued, speeding through his explanation. "And like, also, I'm super cold, and everytime I stand up the room starts spinning."

Another beat of silence. Then a swear.

"So," Peter blew out the breath from his cheeks and looked around aimlessly at his room. "I dunno, I think I'm like, low on—"

"—blood," Tony finished. "Yeah. Alright. The nurses warned me about that, they told me to keep an ear out if you complained about anything. Alright. I'm sending Happy to come get you."

Peter shot up in his chair. "What? But I've got—"

His face went numb and his knees buckled, and he fell back into his chair, going silent while the dizziness swam through him.

"Kid?" Tony said rapidly in his ear. "Peter? You okay?"

"Mgh." Peter covered his eyes with his hand, trying to will the vertigo away. "I meant, pick me up tomorrow morning instead. I'll be okay until then."

"I don't like that," Tony said finally.

"Please?" Peter tried. "It's late, I'm really tired. It'll give me a second to talk to May, too. You know. My legal guardian."

Tony sighed. "There you go again, being reasonable. Swore I taught you better than that. Alright, I'll pick you up tomorrow. Get some sleep, kid."

So, he talked to May. Sat her down when she got home from work, explained to her as casually as he could that he's a little low on that good ol' hemoglobin— but that it's cool, because Tony already told him to come in the next morning for an infusion.

"Why not tonight?" May frowned, her eyebrows furrowed as she sipped at her tea. Green, with half a spoon of honey, sweet but still a little bitter how she liked it. Peter set it out the second she got home to soften the blow.

Peter bit back a tired laugh. "Because I thought you'd want to do it tomorrow. Less last minute."

"Well, it's your health, baby," May said immediately. She shrugged, setting the mug down. "You could have called me on the way there, I would have understood. I mean, blood is pretty darn important."

"I can call Tony tonight, tell him I changed my mind," Peter suggested with a half-hearted shrug. "I mean, he'll probably think I'm at death's door, but I'll do it."

"Sooner the better," May folded her hands together, leaning forward with a serious expression. "Do you need me to go with you? I can shower really quick, I'll grab a granola bar—"

"No, no, no—" Peter took her hands. He gave a reassuring grin. "You just got home from work, and it's not that big of a deal. I'm not in like, critical condition—"

(May's frown deepened.)

"—and Tony will be with me the whole time, you know that," Peter promised.

"He does get clingy when you're not feeling well," May acknowledged, and pushed her glasses back up on her face. She studied her tea for a moment longer and quirked her lip unsurely. "You sure you don't need me there? Say the word, and I'll—"

"I know you will. I'll be okay, I swear it," Peter promised. "I'll text you updates if anything happens, but— come on, it's not the first time I've needed an IV. That kinda stuff just comes with the territory, you know?"

May pulled a hand away and scrubbed at her eyes, dry mascara blearing across her eyelids. She seemed so, so tired, exhausted to the bone— but amused. "If you'd have told me years ago that I was raising an Avenger, I genuinely wouldn't know what to say."

"Sorry," Peter said faintly, smiling nonetheless. "If anyone could do it, it'd be you."

May grinned into her tea. "Damn straight."

Peter stood up from the table, he's dizzy again, because of course. He stilled for a moment until his head felt steady, and then went to his room. He rummaged around for some essentials while he dialed Tony one-handed.

He'll probably be sitting for a while, much to his chagrin, so he pulled out some comfortable clothes. Baggy sweatshirt with a faded Japanese Empire Strikes Back print on the front, sweatpants that he's 80% sure he stole from MJ last time he was over. Vines are messily embroidered at the loose seams. He's admiring Em's handiwork when the phone immediately picks up, again.

"Mr. Parker," Tony answered stiffly.

"Mr. Stark," Peter mocked back. "I'm not passed out on the floor, I swear. I just talked to May."

"And?"

"She wants me to go in tonight, if it's still an option. Something about blood being important," Peter trailed off, tugging his D.S. from the charger and tossing that on the bed to bring, too.

"Such an intelligent lady, your aunt. I'm gonna buy her a very expensive bottle of wine."

"I mean, I won't say no to you giving my aunt nice things," Peter quirked his eyebrow. "But I can't help but feel like this is at my expense. Like you're making fun of me or something. I don't know."

"Don't know where you're getting that vibe, bugbite. Happy'll pick you up in ten minutes. I don't know how long it'll take, so expect to spend the night."

"I know," Peter huffed. "See you soon."

"Bye, kid."

The line clicked off, and Peter spent the next ten minutes sitting down and feeling generally unwell. He changed his clothes, wrangled his taped-up USB-C, and begrudgingly his USG-002 because he knew Tony would give him flack for using something so outdated.

When May called out that the door buzzed, Peter pushed himself off the bed and said his goodnights and goodbyes. He's out of the apartment before he could catch Happy flirting with his aunt again.

Peter drifted through most of the car ride, caught between being half-asleep and scrolling thoughtlessly through his phone. Ned was sending him a dozen videos a minute and talking back and forth with MJ in their groupchat.

A knock on the window startled him, and he jerked his head up to catch Tony's eyes through the dim glass. Peter opened the door up, unclicking his seatbelt.

"Hey, Mr. Stark. Feels like it's been forever since we've talked, amirite?" Peter smiled pleasantly, climbing out of the car.

Tony's answering stare was resolutely unimpressed.

Peter's puffed out his cheeks awkwardly and leaned back and forth on his feet. After a second, he raised his hands to his mouth and made fangs with his index fingers. "I've come for blood? Bleh bleh bleh?"

"I think you age me at least a century everytime I see you," Tony said blankly. Peter's smile grew.

He sighed and started towards the medbay, waving for Peter to follow him.

"They're gonna take a blood sample first," Tony said shortly. "Just to see how low it is. You're gonna be on saline and fluids while they're running the tests."

"So, same as usual?"

"Yep." Tony held the door open for him.

The medbay was quiet, only a small team of late night nurses were working, and Peter had a sudden sinking feeling that they were called in specifically because of him.

He furrowed his eyebrows, turning to Tony. "Did—"

"No. We've got some people out on a mission. This is procedure, and a happy accident. Aren't you lucky?" Tony cocked his head to the side, his eyes glinting with sarcasm.

Peter rolled his eyes, but let his shoulders relax. He liked the medbay nurses. It would really suck to inconvenience them when he seriously could have waited until morning.

They set up the IV, they take his blood— when they walk away with the vial, Peter turned to Tony and gave him an amused look. "It's kinda weird, isn't it? You'd think they'd wanna do the opposite of blood-theft. Considering."

"You know, I've told them that before," Tony leaned back in his chair, crossing his arms. "They did not seem to enjoy it. Gave me a real big customer service laugh."

"They probably hear it a lot."

"Yeah. But I said it. Which makes it funnier."

"Oh, right," Peter facepalmed. "Duh."

"Duh," Tony agreed with a sage nod.

They wait for the labs to come back, Peter keeping himself entertained by watching the IV's steady drip.

"I can already taste the saline," Peter noted, the familiar cold-copper-salt sitting at the back of his throat.

Tony made a face, looking up from his phone. "You can taste that?"

"You can't?"

"No, and the needle goes in your arm. Why would anyone be able to taste it?"

"I don't know," Peter shrugged. "I always do though. It's weird. Tastes like metal."

Tony gave him a look of mild disgust, his lip curled in displeasure, his nose pulled up.

"Like brushing your teeth with penny water," Peter continued.

Tony's disgusted expression grew more severe, and then he flashed his teeth in a grimacing smile. "Delightful."

Peter hummed in agreement, and then shivered. The saline was really coursing through him now, successfully chilling his veins.

A nurse came back in, gave a bright smile, her eyes sympathetic. "Alright, Peter. We've got your results back—"

"That's where they get you," Peter remarked solemnly.

"—your ferritin levels are at an eight."

Peter and Tony both wince.

"So, we're going to start you on an iron drip right away," the nurse said, her voice light and calm. "And have you come back in two weeks for a retest of your blood."

"Aye-aye," Peter said, still grimacing. "Hey, what happens when your ferritin gets to zero?"

"Let's not find out," Tony cut in, shifting in his chair with his arms crossed. He gave another tight smile, all lip and no teeth.

So they hook up the iron bag, which is dark red— almost orangey, and Peter narrowed his eyes as the stuff sank down the tube and into his arm. It looked like blood, but he's like, eighty-eight percent sure it isn't. Either way, it didn't matter. He kinda needed the stuff.

"I'm bored."

"It's not even been ten minutes," Tony said, with all the exhaustion of a single mother of five hyperactive children.

Peter tilted his head back on the clinic seat. "Yeah. It's been a very long not-even-ten-minutes."

"You brought a whole bag of goodies," Tony reminded him, gesturing lamely. "I'm sure you've got something in there."

Peter gave a long put-on sigh and wrestled his phone out of his pocket. It was nearing one in the morning, miserably, and the IV wouldn't finish until probably three if he's lucky.

"I'm tired," he complained, just because he can.

"Then sleep."

"Do you just have a solution for everything?"

"Sure do."

Peter sighed again. Turned his phone off, stared at the wall for a few moments. Turned his phone back on. He played a few rounds of Sudoku, expert level. Turned his phone off, stared at the—

"How many parsecs did Han Solo make the Kessel Run in?" Tony asked, not looking up from his phone.

"Less than twelve," Peter answered. "Why—"

"First character to speak in A New Hope?"

Peter blinked, once, twice. "Uh. Threepio."

"Who was Luke Skywalker's gunner in the Battle of Hoth?"

"Dak," Peter furrowed his eyebrows. "Are you quizzing me on Star Wars to keep me busy? Is that what this is?"

"Something's gotta keep your brain occupied, and clearly your Sudoku games aren't cutting it," Tony said flatly. "So, yeah. Buzzfeed article— 170 Star Wars Trivia Questions That Are Seriously Tricky. What's the main stormtrooper's designation in The Force Awakens?"

"Finn? FN-2187."

"What's Jabba's full name?"

"... the Hutt?" Peter guessed.

Tony made a loud buzzer sound, waving his phone. "Jabba Desilijic Tiure. So close, though."

"This game sucks."

"You're just saying that because you don't know Jabba the Hutt's full name. Fake fan," Tony clicked his tongue, putting his phone back into his pocket.

Peter rolled his eyes.

Another long stretch of quiet. The nurses talk quietly amongst themselves, gossip about their personal lives that didn't interest him enough to eavesdrop. He's tired, and bored— and he's comfortable.

He's thinking about how he's lucky they didn't pinch his vein this time, and how he's lucky Tony was able to sit with him so he wasn't alone, how nice it was to be certain that he had people looking out for him.

"I think I'm going to take a nap," Peter said finally.

"Good idea." Tony scratched idly at his cheek. "You want anything? Blanket? Extra pillow?"

Peter shook his head, curling carefully on his side so as to not disturb the IV. "Nah," he mumbled. Then, "can you keep talkin', though?"

"Why, my voice make you snooze?"

The corner of Peter's mouth curled up. "Maybe."

Not really. He just liked listening to Tony talk. He was interesting, always. Peter's been hanging off every last word since he was a kid watching him on television. It made him sleep the same way a mom singing lullabies would make a baby sleep. Or something. Whatever. Don't look too much into it.

What they had worked for them, was what he meant. Tony wasn't his dad. May wasn't his mom, either, technically— but she was the closest damned thing he had, and he loved her down to blood. May wasn't his mom, but she was there. Tony wasn't his dad, but he was there, too.

It was kind of funny, how well they operated in the grey areas.

"Yeah, kid," Tony said, lowering his voice to a rumble. An old engine humming. A lullaby. "I'll keep talking."

#irondad and spiderson #irondad fanfiction #peter parker #peter parker fic #writers on tumblr #tony stark #fluff #tumblr fanfic #originally written in 2025

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maddsmallow · 1 year ago

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i'm so sorry to ONCE AGAIN complain out loud about people who see hank and connor as father/son but. oh my god. tell me you don't understand hank's character at all without telling me you don't understand hank's character at all (or even connor's), or you just truly don't care to actually acknowledge the canon of the game because you don't like the ship, which by the way is FINE.

hank's entire story in the game is being unable to cope with the death of his very human and very irreplaceable son. to even insinuate that cole is someone whose position in hank's life could be replaced would likely get you fucking shot in the head and then hank taking himself out too because that idea is just TOO painful and he finally just completely snaps. the idea that no one understands what cole meant to him, the absolute disrespect towards hank's son to think he could just be replaced as if he were a trinket and not his child that he raised and loved more than anything in the world—it would just be too much for hank. you don't just replace a child. it's not the having-a-child/being-a-father that hank wants, it's cole. it's being the father to an alive, happy, and healthy cole. not fucking connor, an android he met like a week ago. who is an ageless robot programmed to both look and act like a late 20s/early 30s man and NOT a child, and has the entire world's information in his brain, and who kills people and goes to a sex club. to think hank would replace his son with connor is straight up just delusional. hank would be so genuinely mentally fucked to do that—like i'm talking some dead dove do not eat level delusional shit where hank is truly convinced connor is his son or could pretend to be his son to ease the pain of having lost cole. that he can just force this robot who just gained his freedom to play pretend that he's his son and everything will be hunky dory. connor is not "hank's chance to be a dad again." connor is his own person who is NOT a child or even childlike, hank IS a dad to a dead son, and the fact that it seems like some people think you can just replace your dead child is just truly fucking wild and absurd to me.

and don't even get me STARTED on the whole "but hank calls connor son!!" thing. no the fuck he does not. i call people bro all the time. they are not my brother. i say "oh my god!" all the time. i'm not even religious LMAO. it's just a thing you say, it's just a cultural thing. and yeah, maybe it doesn't make sense for hank, a millennial, to say that, seeing as it's much more of an older generation type thing to call a younger person, but david cage is a fucking idiot and didn't actually care to make hank very millennial-like at all, so like. no, he does not call connor his actual fucking son. there is nothing here to argue that this is proof of a father/son relationship. hank's just an old guy being portrayed by and written by older-than-a-millennial guys.

that all being said !!! i'm not even coming at this from the perspective of a shipper. canonically, the very most they ever are is like, trauma bonded besties. i think people who are like "hankcon is SO ACTUALLY CANON" are also way up their asses and incorrect LMAO. at the very very most, they are just. close, trusted friends. there is so little or even nothing to point to anything romantic or father/son. hank may be a slight mentor to connor just having been a human for a long time and has lots of experience, but that in no way makes connor a child in comparison, nor does it mean it makes hank his dad. and hank even being a mentor-like figure is also debatable lmao, hank asks questions that make connor question cyberlife, but he's not even the one to make him deviate.

also if connor is a child, why is reed900 okay? why is ANY android ship acceptable? (no hate for the ship, i'm just making a point that what's applied to connor/hank for some reason doesn't apply anywhere else and it's so hypocritical.)

anyways. i can't stop anyone from believing what they wanna believe. literally made a post yesterday about how me not tagging my posts with ship names isn't the win people think it is cuz i'm still over here considering it ship art just cuz that's how i like to see them lmao, so that absolutely also applies to people with different views. this was just. me ranting about how fundamentally flawed the argument that they are father/son is. again, they aren't anything more than friends canonically. there is NO evidence to point to anything more than that or enemies, and to stand there and say the game CLEARLY portrays them as father/son is just literally factually incorrect.

david cage saying he based them off of his relationship with his dad is straight up bullshit and he only said it after the game came out and he became aware of the ship because he's a homophobic jackass. bryan dechart, if you pay attention, is SO careful during dbh streams to never say anything to imply anything other than just friendship between hank and connor because that's all there is, and to say that father/son or romantic implications were there would be to shake a jar of killer bees and split the fandom even further when all he wants to do is enjoy the goddamn character he acted lmao. clancy brown is on record saying NO they do not have a father/son relationship. there is NO EVIDENCE. to support it. or even anything more than just. friends. it is not canonical. stop calling father/son canonical. it is not canonical. you just don't like the ship, and that's FINE.

basically. even as a shipper, platoniconk is where it's at LMAO

that's my rant bye

#the blogger says words

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sapphic-circles · 10 days ago

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In the Savage Night (Chapter 34)

Read on AO3

The days passed in a blur. It wasn’t enough that Elphaba was tired and in pain and somewhat regularly being sent to sleep after coming a bit too close to transforming, but she was bored. And lonely. Nessarose and Fiyero would come every once in a while to talk or, after a period of begging, to bring her classwork to study, but she still spent the majority of her bed-bound time alone.

Save for Madame Morrible, of course. Even when she wasn’t in the room, she seemed to have a sixth sense for Elphaba’s emotions, and she always swooped in when they got the better of her—which was happening more frequently the longer she went without a reply from Glinda.

“I’m just worried about her,” Elphaba said to Fiyero, who sat with his chin propped up in his arms at the edge of her bed. Her schoolwork was splayed out in front of her, while he hadn’t opened any of his books, but neither of them were getting anything done regardless. “It’s okay if she doesn’t want to talk to me—” that was a lie, and she knew Fiyero knew it— “but I just need to know she’s okay. What if she’s not writing back because she’s in trouble?”

“I’m sure she’s all right,” Fiyero said. “She’s with her parents, right? Maybe she’s just, you know…grounded.”

Elphaba snorted. “Grounded from writing letters?”

“I don’t know, okay? I’m trying to help.” Fiyero sighed. “Maybe you should just write her another one? The first one could have gotten lost on its way there.”

“Maybe,” Elphaba murmured. “But if she did get it, another one might stress her out. I don’t want to make this situation any worse for her.”

“You’re overthinking it. She loves you.”

“That doesn’t mean I’m good for her.”

Fiyero rolled his eyes. “Write the letter, Elphaba. She’s not going to keel over and die if she gets more than one.”

“Okay. Yeah.” Elphaba shook her head. “You’re right; I’m being ridiculous.”

She spent the next few hours studying with Fiyero, then penned another letter as soon as he left. She handed the envelope to Madame Morrible, then returned to her new default state of waiting. Waiting for a letter, waiting to heal, waiting for the full moon.

As slowly as time felt like it was passing, the full moon was approaching at an alarming pace. It hung over Elphaba’s head like a bomb, ticking down the weeks, then the days, and finally the hours, until all she could do was think about her impending transformation.

Madame Morrible would be there. She planned to put Elphaba to sleep after the transformation finished if she didn’t have control of herself, but encouraged her to try her best to stay lucid. She would never learn to keep control, Madame said, if she never had the chance to try.

She didn’t want to do it. It made her feel like a petulant child to dread something so much, to hope that she can’t control herself just so that she wouldn’t need to be awake to experience the entire length of the full moon after the pain of the transformation, but she couldn’t help it.

With her wounds almost completely healed, the ache of Elphaba’s failed transformations felt even worse against the baseline of a healthy body. Anything that shifted out of place even a little bit spent days throbbing deep in her bones, and on the rare occasion that it took Madame Morrible longer than a few seconds to knock her out, the changes in her body sent black spots through her vision and burned so badly that all she could do for hours after waking was curl up and cry.

She wondered again how Glinda had managed this. Maybe she’d get used to it with time, but somehow she got the feeling that constant pain wasn’t something one could simply get used to, at least not in the sense that it wouldn’t feel as bad. But maybe she’d develop a numbness to it, a way of blocking it out.

She’d have to ask Glinda if they ever got back in touch.

Elphaba had spent the last three weeks wishing Glinda were there, of course, but she felt it even more today. She hadn’t ever discounted the possibility that she may one day contract lycanthropy from her girlfriend, not since their first close call, but she’d imagined they would be together if it did happen. She’d thought Glinda would coach her through this, that they would transform and spend the night wrapped around each other.

But Elphaba was alone in Madame Morrible’s guest bedroom, stripped down to nothing with the sorceress waiting outside the door. It felt as if her body knew what was coming even before the moon hit its apex, and the ache rolled through her in waves as she waited for the transformation to start in earnest.

She felt it in her spine first. It popped and cracked through her ears, and she cried out as it began to shift. Her pelvis, her ribs…the changes weren’t visible yet, but the bones ground against each other and pinched her flesh as they moved.

The changes in her limbs were more pronounced. Her fingers and toes cramped up, her palms stretched and bent into new positions, her thumbs traveled up her forearms. She’d seen it happen to Glinda, and her girlfriend’s discomfort had been bad enough, but watching her own body move this way was viscerally horrifying even through the distracting haze of pain.

There came a point, and Elphaba couldn’t be sure when, that something in her mind snapped with the agony, and she couldn’t remember the rest of the transformation. She may have even lost consciousness, considering the way she came to her senses later sprawled out on the bedroom floor, but she couldn’t be certain.

She couldn’t will herself to open her eyes. She still felt like a person, like her, like Elphaba Thropp, but only barely. She felt distant, as if in a dream, with smells and sounds she’d never experienced before already overwhelming her. If she added any more sensory input, what little cognizance she still clung to might entirely slip out of her grasp.

What was that sound? The humming, so loud that her ear could have been right up against a radiator? What about the smell of blood? Was that coming from her? Maybe the transformation had popped some stitches, but she couldn’t feel anything out of the ordinary through the rest of the pain.

And then there was a light skittering across the floor, and a buzzing above her, and a creak to her left, and was she hearing insects? It was hard to tell over the sound of her labored breath and the blood rushing through her ears.

Elphaba could hear Madame Morrible in the other room long before she came in. She could track the click of heels on hardwood, could tell when they stepped across a rug. Even the faint clinking of jewelry and the scent of the sorceress’s perfume reached Elphaba through the door.

She still refused to open her eyes as Madame Morrible entered, and didn’t move even when her mentor crouched in front of her.

“Oh, Miss Elphaba,” Madame Morrible said. “You are a stunning one.”

The sound of her voice grated on Elphaba’s nerves, and her body reacted in ways she had never experienced before. The beginnings of a growl rumbled deep in her chest, and her ears lay flat against her head. It came naturally, without even a modicum of thought, and that frightened her enough that the growl caught abruptly in her throat.

She needed control. She needed to stay in control. How much did she even have to begin with?

“It’s all right, dear,” Madame said. “I’m not here to hurt you. Can you open your eyes for me?”

Elphaba swallowed. She’d said something very similar to Glinda before, and she’d been so proud when she listened. She wanted someone to feel that kind of pride for her, too.

So, she opened her eyes.

Madame Morrible watched her with a smile, her extravagant robes showing to Elphaba’s eyes in muted browns and blues. A glance down and Elphaba caught sight of her own legs stretched in front of her, coated in dark fur and ending in big paws tipped with sharp black claws. She flexed one of her paws out of curiosity and felt sick to her stomach when it moved.

“Exceptional,” Madame murmured. “I had faith in you, my dear, but I would not have been surprised if you’d lost control. I am quite impressed.”

The praise didn’t feel as good Elphaba had hoped. For some reason, it sank straight into her gut at sat there like a lead ball.

“When—”

When will I change back was what Elphaba meant to ask, but she’d forgotten she couldn’t speak. Her attempt came out strangled in her throat, followed by a whine.

“I know,” Madame Morrible said with a sympathetic frown. “It must feel horrible.” She reached out to stroke Elphaba’s cheek, which may have felt nice if she weren’t so overwhelmed, but she yanked her head away with another growl.

Madame Morrible hummed and stood up. “Not to worry, dove. I don’t frighten easily. Now, feel free to explore this new avenue of yourself—but do be careful with those claws, please. I would rather not replace my fine linens.”

She swept out of the room, and Elphaba heaved a sigh of relief. The only person she wanted near her right now couldn’t be, so the next best thing was to be alone.

Elphaba knew she should do something. Stand up, stretch her legs, see how different things would be every time this happened at least once a month. But everything hurt so badly, and she felt more exhausted than she ever had in her life, and she couldn’t bring herself to move. It was all too easy to stay exactly where she was and hope the time would pass quickly.

As much as she wanted to, she couldn’t fall asleep. She stared at the wall for hours until, just before dawn, she felt another transformation coming on.

It didn’t hurt any less than the first one, but it did seem to happen faster, perhaps because her body was returning to a state it was more accustomed to. Regardless, she continued to lie on the floor until well past sunup, when Madame Morrible returned to check on her.

“Oh, Elphaba,” Madame Morrible murmured. “Have you been lying there all night? Let’s get you back into bed, dear.”

Elphaba shook her head and pushed herself up into a sitting position, keeping her bare back turned to Madame Morrible. “No,” Elphaba said. “That’s okay. I want some fresh air; just let me get dressed.”

“Fresh air?” Madame Morrible hummed. “You will only be going out to the balcony, yes?”

“No. I want to go for a walk.” Elphaba could hear the terse tone of her own voice as she spoke, and she felt bad to inadvertently direct it toward her mentor, but she wasn’t in the mood to be coddled. “I can handle it. I just really need a change in scenery.”

“Very well,” Madame Morrible said after a long pause. “I will be here when you return. Be careful.”

“I will be,” Elphaba agreed. “Thank you.”

She waited until Madame Morrible closed the door, then dragged herself back to the wardrobe where some of her clothing had been stored. It was almost embarrassing, even with no witnesses, how difficult it was to haul herself to her feet. She even thought for a brief, awkward moment that her legs wouldn’t support her weight, but a few minutes of stretching out the stiffness seemed to help.

Elphaba hoped getting out of the tower would do her some good—mentally, in any case. As much as she knew she might regret pushing through the pain later, she couldn’t stand the sight of this room anymore.

Clothing herself was an unforeseen challenge. She should have known it would be difficult too, but she still grimaced as she pulled the fabric on over her wounds—which had bled a bit around stitches that snapped at some point in the night. It wasn’t much, though, and it had already begun to scab over again. And then there was the challenge of buttoning her blazer with a half-deadened hand, which was slow and frustrating, but successful in the end.

Small victories, Elphaba thought bitterly.

But she did feel marginally better after stepping back onto the campus walkways after so many weeks. She’d wanted to do this a long time ago, considering how much she felt like a cooped bird in Madame’s guest room, but the sorceress had insisted that she stay relatively isolated until she’d entirely healed and proven that she could prevent unwanted transformations.

She hadn’t argued before. She was living proof of how catastrophic a lapse in control could be, but she couldn’t bring herself to care. The open space and fresh air soothed her, and at this point she felt that it would be easier to control herself with some semblance of normalcy in her life, anyway.

Elphaba considered visiting Nessa or Fiyero, but she was still overstimulated enough that she couldn’t stand the thought of holding a conversation with either of them. She could slip into her law class, but then she risked questions about Glinda that may set her off. She needed to find a way to field her peers’ curiosity without breaking into tears—or worse—before she could return to class.

All she really needed was to hear from Glinda. Just one letter, just a few sentences assuring her that she was all right, would do wonders. Elphaba couldn’t shake the feeling in her gut that something was very wrong, and while she knew it was probably just anxiety, it would sure be nice to be able to silence her fears.

Well, Elphaba thought, there was one way she could avoid endless waiting. The Shiz post office employed a number of messenger Birds who would relay information faster than the post, if one was comfortable with a third party hearing it. Elphaba knew from the local mail clerk in Munchkinland that the Birds were paid well below standard wages, and she’d hate to support that business, but Glinda was just too important.

Madame Morrible would probably be upset if she learned Elphaba left campus to go into town, but hopefully she’d be back soon enough that her mentor wouldn’t question her whereabouts, anyway. The post office was close to the docks, at least, and she offered the Crow who took her message a generous tip.

“I need a message sent to Glinda Upland in Frottica—Pertha Hills,” Elphaba told him. “Ask her if she received my letters, and whether she’s okay. I’m worried about her. And tell her I love her, please.”

The Crow nodded. “Will do, Miss…?”

“Elphaba Thropp. You can find me at the school.”

“Copy that,” the Crow said. “It’s about half a day’s flight. I’ll have a reply for you by overmorrow.”

“Thank you so much,” Elphaba said. Her chest felt a bit lighter as she returned to the school, knowing she’d have some sort of answer within two days: a solid limit to her waiting.

And, when she caught sight of the Crow’s familiar plumage outside the window that day, she hoped for good news. She hoped that the letters had gotten lost and Glinda had been waiting all this time for her to reach out. There was also the possibility that her letters had gone ignored, and Glinda was all right but avoiding her, which wasn’t ideal, but at least she’d know that Glinda was okay.

The last thing Elphaba expected was for the Crow to regard her with a sad, piteous look in his eye, and say, “I’m sorry, Miss Elphaba; I’m afraid it’s bad news. I met Madame and Mister Upland, and they were quite beside themselves when they learned that Miss Glinda was meant to have come home. They haven’t seen or heard from her at all.”

#wicked #gelphie #gelphie fanfic #my writing

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privateanxieties · 2 years ago

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forget my mercy, take my blame (chapter 6)

Summary: David has a conversation with you that Frank most definitely did not approve of. But, what Frank doesn't know won't hurt him. Right?

Words: 2.3K

PREVIOUS CHAPTER | SERIES MASTERLIST

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David needs to tread carefully. The last time he did something like this was when he talked to Madani behind Frank's back, and Castle let him know what he thought of him in no uncertain terms. It nearly ended their friendship. A repeat experience might actually entice Frank to drive back to New York just to communicate his feelings about this second subtle betrayal.

Okay— so maybe he's being a snake in the grass. But if being a snake means he gets to avoid Frank walking into a silent trap and prevent her from getting herself killed, then David will slither right along with a clean conscience. It doesn't mean he won't be a little nervous when he has to break the news to his friend, but he'll cross that bridge when he gets to it.

In the meantime, he repeats the information he wants to relay in his head as the phone rings, much like he would for a doctor's appointment.

After the fifth ring, a whooshing crackle floods the speakers, and a quick glance at his third monitor reveals the phone is still on the ground. He's getting clear blue skies and tree branches through the frontal camera he surreptitiously activated.

"Hello?" he says, and if his voice wobbles just a bit, he chalks it up to not having done this in a while. Truth be told, he was almost as nervous to do it to Frank for the first time, back when he was trying to get them to team up. He suspects nothing of the sort will be happening here.

"Hellooo? Are y—"

"Let me see you or I hang up."

He freezes at the sudden command. Shit. No. No, absolutely not. He's not turning on the camera. Play dumb.

"This isn't that kind of call—"

"You have ten seconds."

Fuck.

"How did you—"

"I changed my mind. Five seconds."

Fuck! Jesus Christ, Sarah was going to murder him herself. Time runs out and he resigns himself to his fate, granting permission to his video feed at the last second and instantly cringing at the mustard-stained shirt staring back at him in high definition. For a while, things are silent. Then, a full-blown sigh is released through the speakers as the woman comes into view, having finally picked up the phone. She looks a little worse for wear with the sun beating down upon her, but David can't make out too much detail in her face. It's a poor connection on her end and a shitty camera, mostly because the phone was built for durability more than anything else.

Silence ensues again as they stare each other down for a few long moments. David blinks first.

"Are you going to say anything? Because—" he begins, but is interrupted yet again.

"Are you his sidekick? You look like a sidekick. The nerdy type, obviously," the woman says. David takes immediate offense, yet he finds that in this instance, he kind of fits the role she assumes of him. He's got monitors for days both in front and behind him, and the newly acquired pair of glasses he hasn't gotten used to rests uncomfortably on the bridge of his nose. He has to admit he looks the picture. Still, he protests.

"Frank doesn't do sidekicks. And anyway, I'm more of a guidance system. He'd be lost without me. So, not a sidekick," he chides. Even with the shitty connection he can tell she isn't impressed.

"Yeah…" she says, sounding pretty bored to David's ears. "…To be honest with you, I don't care. I want you both to leave me the hell alone. Figure you can use your guidance system to get lost?"

David resists the urge to roll his eyes, though a snort does escape him.

"Trust me, this wasn't my idea. I think you might want to listen though, before you make any more wise choices, yeah? Because right now, I'm your only chance of avoiding a bullet," he warns.

"Is your friend looking to return the favor?" she asks. David balks at the misunderstanding.

"What? No! Not from Frank. You know, I don't think you've realized yet that he's actually trying to help you. I mean, okay— He's not the most friendly-looking guy, but he means well. And I don't think he blames you for shooting him, if you were worried about that."

"I wasn't." She moves some hair away from her face, seeming to gaze at something in the distance. "As for helping me, nobody asked him to. If he gets involved again—"

David takes the chance to interrupt her this time.

"Did you kill Collins?"

An amused smile subtly lights up her face.

"I'm sorry, who?"

"Come on, we both know what I'm talking about."

"You expect me to admit to murder over FaceTime?"

"You think I'm recording this?"

"No, no. I trust you, stranger who knows my name and location."

David's eyes roll back until they hurt. And he thought talking to Frank was like herding cats. He decides he's fine with being accused of having no patience; he has to break through her unbothered exterior somehow, and letting her know the depth of the pile of shit she's in might be a good start.

"There's an APB out for your arrest in Apolline County."

It feels like entire minutes pass as he studies her features, though in reality it can't be more than a few seconds. David thinks he sees a hint of the emotions she ought to be feeling, but they disappear as soon as they come. She reverts to impassivity, but at least now he knows it's a carefully constructed façade. This isn't unlike someone else he knows, and he dreads to think what other points of congruence might be found between them. To his trained eye, she and Frank are pretty similar.

"Hm. Well that's handy. I was just about to turn myself in."

Morbidly similar.

"You're going to the police?!" David sputters, incredulous.

"The police went to my house. I'm just paying it forward," she replies, and it's at this point that David wonders if he shouldn't just let her and Frank figure it out themselves, because this kind of stubbornness will never be reasoned with.

"You're walking into a trap, is what you're doing," he mutters, watching his screen for any pending alerts. He needs a new approach to this entire conversation. He needs to stop wasting time.

"Not anymore, now that you've told me they're looking for me."

David thinks talking to a wall might actually result in a more fruitful exchange. Jesus Christ. He slams a hand down on his desk in frustration.

"No, you don't understand. The arrest isn't based on a warrant. No judge issued one. It means the police are trying to find you without anyone knowing it if they do. That's why they didn't broadcast it beyond county lines. They don't want anyone asking questions. They're luring you and you're giving them exactly what they want."

"And why exactly are they luring me, if you're so knowledgeable?" she drawls, leaning against a tree.

"Personally, I think it might be because you did exactly what Frank warned you not to do," David snarks.

"What's that?" she asks with a sigh.

"Uhh… Starting a war with a drug cartel because you killed their boss' little brother?"

Silence.

Prolonged, extended silence. Laborious. Heavy. Poignant, if David may say so himself.

"He did tell you that, didn't he?"

Extremely poignant, apparently.

In retrospect, you did hear something about a war coming out of Frank's mouth right before you shot him. The information had not been this concise, unfortunately. Perhaps his nerdy friend should've been the one relaying all the details from the beginning. Perhaps you shouldn't have shot him like a spaz just because he blocked the door , your conscience objects. Eyes rolling back into your skull, you ponder the inconvenience-turned-potential-disaster while the phone waits inside the van, urgency be damned. With your head leaned against the tree bark, you quietly wish for that clarity you had just hours ago to return. Could things be better? Maybe, but that's neither here nor there. Could they be worse? Definitely. Regardless, the future is the only thing you control.

A bird's eye view from an omniscient being would be nice to have. Instead, you're weighed down with hindsight and nothing else, much like the never-ending video loop of past events. You know what happened and in what order, but you can't intervene. The what-ifs begging to be factored into your reasoning are harshly buried. You've been down this road before, and those questions only serve as a distraction. You're not very interested in avoiding reality at the moment, particularly when your mouth is parched and you're showering in your own sweat under the Utah sun.

A few more hours to go until dusk and you're stuck in a random patch of woods, theoretically armed to the teeth but realistically fucked in more than one capacity. Fresh off a murder. An APB for your arrest that only a couple of police stations know about, both under the Sheriff's jurisdiction and command. A home that was broken into by that very Sheriff. Location and name known to a very talkative and weird stranger, who appears to be friends with a not very talkative, even weirder stranger. Micro and Frank , a perfect comedy duo.

So here you are, realizing how complicated the situation is and immediately resentful of the fact that you agreed to work with someone who has clear leverage over you. Around you, the woods are pretty quiet, not that you're very deep inside the tree line. You can still spot the road ahead if you peer around Frank's van, and it's still just as empty as you knew it would be on a Sunday afternoon. The occasional supply truck traveling between towns doesn't really amount to much traffic. There are no birds chirping or leaves rustling, because everything is either dead or dying here. You don't intend to become one with the scenery of godforsaken Utah, so just this once, you ate your pride. It went down worse than a dry-swallowed pill. Well, at least now you know what Sam meant by 'my brother's going to kill you'. Actually, you think he might've said 'fucking kill you'. A small chuckle tickles your parched lips. Sometimes you just have to learn to find these things funny.

Agreeing to follow Micro's instructions is most definitely funny, considering your general inability to do as you're told. The contents of his plan are also hilarious in and of themselves: leave Apolline and never look back, keep the phone with you so he knows when you've left the state entirely, and in exchange he'll pretend he lost your trail when his friend asks about you.

In all honesty, you're not sure what their deal is. Why Frank is eager to get in your way and his friend is willing to lie to ensure that he doesn't is just another one of life's little mysteries. One thing, however, is no mystery: you don't want to cross paths with the man you shot, grudge or no grudge. Leaving suits you just fine from this perspective, but from another, doing as Micro said is completely at odds with your whole life philosophy. You're not looking over your shoulder for the rest of your life, and that's exactly what you would be doing if you cut your losses and left. You could've done that back in the desert, but you didn't. You came back for a reason.

O'Hare was inside your house. It doesn't matter that you were never going to live in it again after what happened. He invaded your space. He was looking for something — apparently, that something was indeed you. An inelegant snort falls from your lips. He wants to arrest you? You can only imagine his line of thought: someone murdered an old woman on your porch, so naturally you're the only suspect. He's probably under pressure from the mayor to find a culprit, what with elections coming up. Nobody's been murdered in Apolline since the late 2000's. You know. You've checked.

So what’s a girl to do in this mess? Could you run and never be found? Probably.

Are you going to?

…

Another chuckle, much fonder this time, really accentuates your thirst. It’s stupid to even pretend you could ever follow along with Micro’s plan, no matter how eager you are to never see his worse half again. You don’t run before business is wrapped up. It’s not something you even know how to do. If you’ve stepped on a little cartel’s tail, you’ll deal with that as it develops. And if the Sheriff is really looking for you due to misguided reasons, well… who are you to deny him discovery?

Pushing away from the tree, you wince as your skin protests from the harsh imprint left by the bark even through clothing. You need to change, a thing you’d be able to do if you’d had the wherewithal to grab your duffel from the car before hijacking Frank’s van last night. Your house is too risky to go back to, but maybe a detour to the bakery wouldn’t hurt. After all, you can’t show up to the police station in your murder outfit, confident as you are that it won’t incriminate you.

Before you do anything at all, though, you need to find a way around the agreement you just entered into. In order to get back into town, you need to lose the phone so Micro can’t track it and figure out your steps. It’s a problem that really gets your gears turning for a few good minutes, until you remember exactly where you are and what time it is. Sunday evening is precisely when two shipping trucks make their way into town with supplies for three different stores, and the road you inelegantly capsized by is the only one into and out of Apolline.

A small smile finally curls the edges of your lips, and the invigorating effect of a good idea isn’t far behind. At the very least, there’s an upside to this whole thing. You really aren’t bored anymore.

-to be continued-

A/N: A very late update because life stuff has been happening quite a lot lately. So, here we are. This really is the last chapter before a whole lot of chaos and before we meet Frank again. Trust me, he's gonna have a lot to say about these two scheming without his knowledge.👀 And he's definitely gonna rip David a new one for getting duped by her hehe. We'll get there, don't worry. I don't want to spoil anything, but I am excited to get to next chapter's events!

#frank castle x you #frank castle x reader #frank castle imagine #frank castle #the punisher x reader #frank castle smut #frank castle fanfic

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wrenwinchester · 1 year ago

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Happy birthday to Millie Wren Winchester, she’s 43 today, and she truly deserves the world. Also, this is fairly raw writing, haven’t had a chance to edit or anything, just a heads up. But without further ado, here is the

Fourth of July 1996

Dean went out for a bit, I honestly had no idea what he was doing, Dad was off hunting who knows what in southern Michigan, hadn't heard from him in like a week. And Sam was being a bratty 13 year old. Dean and I had tried everything, taking him to the local pool, taking him shopping, finding his favorite anything really, and nothing helped. He was mad at Dad because he missed his birthday, and mad at Dad for about 1,000 other reasons. And now. I was dealing with it alone. "Great."

Sam looks up from whatever book he was reading, Oliver Twist maybe. "What's wrong?" He asks, sitting up on the bed. And I mentally curse. I hadn't meant to say that out loud.

"Nothing, I'm just tired and frustrated about stuff at the convenience store." I say, not entirely inaccurate, but definitely not what had me going.

"I can't believe you've already made assistant manager. I mean you just started what, a month ago?" He asks. Even though he knows the answer.

"Yeah, but think of all the different experience I have, and the fact that I actually have a work ethic." I say, and he nods looking over at me.

"That's true. Still, I'm proud of you." He smiles at me, and it feels like the first time he's smiled in weeks.

"Thanks, Sammy." I look at the time, it's 7:30. "Hey have you eaten yet?" I ask him.

"No, I wasn't really hungry earlier," his stomach growls. "Apparently that's not so true now."

"What do you want to eat?" Sam's not necessarily picky, but he is particular.

"Whatever you want is fine. I don't care." Ahh, there's the attitude I was expecting.

"Okay, well, I'm just doing cereal because it's easier, and right now cheaper." I say and Sam just shrugs. "By the way, do you know where Dean ran off to earlier? He didn't say anything to me." I say, and Sam shrugs again, putting his headphones on for the Walkman Dean and I pulled money together for his birthday, and goes back to reading. "Okay then."

Sam and I eat our cereal, basically ignoring each other, though it's more like he's ignoring me. I'm just respecting that.

Sam continues his reading when we're done, and I clean up our bowls and add milk to the shopping list. When that's done, I look over the newspaper for any possible cases.

Then, I pick up one of my books, something about protective sigils from the library in town, and I get to work on cleaning the weapons. Granted, all the ones that are here have already been cleaned, but I can engrave protective sigils into the handles, anything to help keep my family safe. When I look up it's 9:30, and I glance over towards the bed Sam's been reading on, and notice he's fast asleep. Book closed on his chest, headphones still playing whatever music he chose. (It's probably one of Dean's cassettes, but I'm not supposed to know that Sam likes Dean's music.)

I walk over to the bed and pick the book up, careful not to lose his spot, and place a bookmark in it before setting it on the nightstand. Dean's been gone for hours at this point, and I'm starting to worry. He should have called or something.

I move across the room, grabbing one of the spare blankets off the couch, and bring it over to lay across Sam. He shifts like he's going to wake up, but doesn't. "Nice to know I haven't lost my touch." I whisper to myself with a smile across my face.

I glance at the door, worrying about Dean again, and I shake my head. He's seventeen, he can handle himself. I repeat the thought over and over again trying to find some comfort in it, but the truth is it ends up making me pissed at Dad. Dean and I have been able to "handle" ourselves since we were 7 years old. We shouldn't have had to.

"Great. Now I'm thinking about Dad and what might have gone wrong on the hunt. And now I'm worried about two Winchesters. I pick up another one of my knives, it's one I don't use often, but it was a gift from an older lady, couldn't tell you much more than she was a redhead, I got it, oh it had to be 6 years ago now. She was nice, saw that I liked knives, and offered it to me. I haven't seen her since. Bobby said that this one was just a normal dagger, but I'm not sure I believe him. So, I keep it in the bag he and I made when I was really in my sewing phase, before I was constantly sewing up skin instead of cloth. Bobby helped me put some sigils on it to keep whatever mystical knives somehow ended up in my possession. (After a witch hunt, dad would let me go through the witches belongings for things that seemed useful. I almost always grabbed at least one knife, but occasionally, they were gifts, that later turned out to be from witches, but more knives meant more ways and more things I could protect my family from.) I set the knife down, not needing protection sigils on it since I never use it, and continue going through everything. A couple hours later, I decide to practice my knife throwing. Not that I really needed practice, I'd been throwing knives since before I started school, and they're my favorite weapon.

I don't leave the room, leaving Sammy alone never ends well. I already know something will happen, and we won't get our deposit back, so it might as well be this, I find a spot on the wall, and make a little x, that's my target. I decide to only use this specific knife, I don't know why, but it just feels right, and as a hunter, I've learned to trust my gut. Just as I'm about to through it, get out some of my frustration and worry about my family, the door swings open, I guess someone else is my target tonight.

My arms already poised to throw the knife before it registers who is at the door, I miss hitting Dean by a fraction of an inch, almost cutting his ear off.

"You nicked me!" He yells, his hand coming away from his ear, and looking at me bewilderedly.

"Dude, you're lucky it didn't go through your eyeball." I reply, going to grab the knife from where it stuck in the wall. It was meant to be funny, but it comes off snarkier than I meant it to, and Dean looks a little taken aback. I don't really have words for why or any idea what to say, really, I just shrug, and say, "Keep it down would you, Sam's sleeping."

Dean looks apologetically towards the bed where Sam is sleeping, he's moved since I closed his book, he's now curled up, practically in the fetal position curling in on himself. "Sorry. And Sorry I was gone so long. My errand had me running around for a while to find the stuff." He smiles gleefully, "but I did find it."

"What is "it", Dean?" I ask perturbed. Walking to put my knife away, obviously I didn't mean to hit my brother, but I figured he was an intruder or monster. "Oh, and sorry about your ear, want me to patch it up?" I ask, it's as good an apology as he's gonna get, besides he knows my frustrations aren't with him. Entirely.

"'It' is a surprise." He smiles, but it fades when I don't smile back. "How's Sam doing?" He asks, probably hoping that's all that's bothering me.

"Moody as ever. One minute he's telling me how proud he is of me for being promoted at the convenience store, and the next he's not talking to me again, and ignoring me." I sigh, as Dean nods along. "We were never that bad." I pause. "Were we?" It comes out quieter than I meant it to. But it's all just hitting me right now.

Dean just gives a wry laugh. "We never had the opportunity. Dad kept us moving, and we were taking turns taking care of Sammy." He says, and he's right. I'm surprised he said it, but he's right.

"So, what you're saying is if Dad had been a better parent, we would have been as bad as Sam?" I ask, mostly because u feel like pushing his buttons.

"Dad's not a bad parent, he just has a lot going on, just leave him alone will you." Dean says, and I realize that nerve is tighter than it usually is.

"I know, I'm just worried that we haven't heard from him. Usually he calls by now." Dean nods. "Not to mention we don't even know what or exactly where he's hunting. How're we supposed to help him if something comes up?"

Dean just shakes his head. "It's Dad. He'll be fine. He's always fine." I nod, still not reassured. And Dean shakes his head. "You know what, we need to get out of here. We need to just relax a little, have fun. It's the Fourth of July after all." He says and goes to put his coat back on.

"Dean, we can't just leave Sam, especially not to galavant around town—"

"We're not," He says pointing at Sam as he continues. "Wake him up, I have a surprise." I stare at him.

"We're not waking up Sam, we can do the surprise in the morning." I say, trying to put my foot down. And then I laugh a little, you'd think we were grown adults parenting our kid, and reality is we're 17 and 15.

"Come on, Wrennie, let's just go have some fun, act our ages for once. I promise it'll be worth it. Besides, it has to happen tonight." Dean would never know, but he has puppy dog eyes just like Sam. And for once. I agree.

"Okay, fine. But you're waking him up, it's almost midnight, and I'm not gonna be at the receiving end of a Winchester cold shoulder right now." I point at him, and go to put shoes on.

"Fine by me." He says recrossing the room to get to Sam's bed. He always sleeps on the bed furthest from the door. Old habits and all that.

Dean starts shaking him. "Sam.Sammy.Sam. Wake up!" Dean practically yells, and I through a pillow at him. We aren't the only ones in the motel.

Of course, the pillow misses and hits Sam in the face, he groans.

"What's wrong." He says, throwing the pillow off his face.

"Get up, I've got a surprise for you." Dean says and I roll my eyes. It shouldn't really surprise me anymore the leeway Sam has for Dean. I mean. I have it too, but still it irks me that I'm not granted the same courtesy by Sam. But because of it, Sam gets up looking for where his book fell, and finding it placed neatly on the side table.

I sit in the back of the impala on the drive to wherever we're going. It's supposed to be special for Sam, and frankly, Sam is mad at me for hitting him with a pillow, and for whatever else he convinced himself to be mad about. I should have just stayed at the motel, let them have a boys night doing whatever it is Dean has planned, but Dean's right. We should just act our age for once.

After 20 minutes of driving, where Sam and Dean are talking and anytime I try to say something Sam gives the cold shoulder, and Dean gives an apologetic look, before they continue talking, we finally arrived wherever Dean wanted to take us, and...

It was an empty field. "Dean, what are we doing here?" I ask, as we get out of the car and he pops the trunk.

"Sam, you wanna see what I've got in the trunk?" He says, and Sam eagerly goes to see what we're doing. I hear his excited squeals, and I'm already getting confused about it, but then Sam comes around the corner, a crate of fireworks in hand.

"Seriously, Dee?" I ask incredulously, but I can't help the smile spreading across my face.

"Yeah, like I said, it's the Fourth of July." He smiles back and I just shake my head.

"Come on! Let's go," Sam says, the biggest smile he's worn in a while across his face. And Dean and I follow closely behind as he brings them along.

Sam sets the crate down in the middle of the field, far enough away from any trees, and the car, but still close enough to the car just in case, we are still a hunter's kids.

Dean gestures to a couple of thinner fireworks for Sammy to grab, and pass between the three of us.

"You got your lighter, Dean?" I ask and he pats his pockets checking for it. It takes him a minute, before he pulls it out with a winning grin on his face.

"Always." The smug bastard. But I smile anyway. And Sam looks at me with glee.

"Light 'em up!" He says, and so Dean lights all three of our fireworks, and we hold them up into the air. Watching as they go off. And Sam looks at Dean, "Dad would never let us do anything like this. Thanks, Dean. This is great." And hugs Dean.

When they're done hugging, Dean slips Sam his lighter, and gives him a nod, letting him light all the other fireworks. Sam comes running back, the biggest smile on his face as he yells, "FIRE IN THE HOLE!" And stands by Dean turning around to watch the fireworks go off.

As they continue going off, all of us laughing and smiling, Sam turns to dance under the sparks, and I turn to Dean. "You're right Dean, we really needed this. To act our own age for once." I smile up at him, before resting my head on his shoulder, and we continue watching Sam dance under the sparks and he gives both of us a smile. And of course, we smile back. And just enjoy our time just the three of us as the fireworks continue going off.

After the last of the fireworks explodes, and the sparks die down, we clean up most of our mess, and bring it back to the Impala. Sam sits in between Dean and I in the front, as he's still a little shorter than me. And the three of us ride back to our motel in a comfortable silence.

Sam falls asleep on my shoulder, and I revel in it, he's my baby brother, and I'd die right now if it meant getting could get out of this life, get Dean out. When I look over at Dean, he's got the biggest smile I've seen in a while on his face, just pure unfiltered joy.

"Dee," I whisper and he turns to look at me. I nod my head towards Sam, his body slumped over in a way that seems like it'd be uncomfortable, but he needs the sleep, and he's out cold.

Dean's smile grows soft, full of love, and admiration for our little brother, before his gaze slides back up to me. And he shrugs.

"I swear, you'd better be the one to carry him in, his getting too big for me to carry." I say jokingly as my left arm clutches Sammy closer to me, as if somehow I could just keep him this small, and protect him from all the pain in the world.

"I didn't say anything!" Dean whisper yells, and I just eyeball him. "Fine. I'll carry him in, but you know he's getting old enough where we could start waking him up when we get places." Dean says and I smack his arm. "I'm just saying, you and I were getting woken up when we arrived somewhere years before we hit double digits."

Of course, Dean is right. Sam is getting to be too big for either of us to carry, but the longer we do, the longer we can keep him little and safe. Even if it's not what Sam wants. It just means we have to work out more, build our muscles so we can carry him, especially if he's gonna be hunting more than just helping with the research.

I ignore the thought, because the truth is it terrifies me, ever since that wendigo incident a few years ago, the idea of Sam hunting isn't a comfortable one. I switch my focus back to tonight and look back at Dean.

"Hey, Dee?" I say, voice still quite so as not to wake Sam. He glances over at me in acknowledgement, "thank you, for tonight. I know it was mostly for Sam, but I really needed it too. The reminder that we are just kids." I smile at him. "And, I really needed to get out of the motel room, I think I'd been in there too long." I say, "and I know Sam needed it, to get his mind of off of Dad, and the fact he missed his birthday. I think you made up for it." Dean just shrugs me off, he's never been great at receiving praise, and I let him minimize what it meant to Sam and I, it's just easier. "I do mean it." Is all I say, and he just silently nods.

When we get to the motel, I help Dean get Sam, who turns into Dean and just holds onto his neck as he carries him up to our room. And I get the fireworks garbage out of the trunk, and toss it in the dumpster. Let someone else deal with the mess. When I make it into the room, Sam is still asleep, and Dean is being held down by him on the bed.

I lock the door as I glance between them, and I just shake my head before crawling into the bed and squishing Sam in the middle of us. It's a little small, but the three of us still fit, and we still need each other.

For the first time since we last saw Dad, I sleep completely peacefully without any nightmares. Because even if something does happen to Dad, I'll always have my brothers.

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