#eraser (module)

[jce93]

art trade 🌟

[ma-mariarie243]

I've not been grinding so i have nothing to offer except this ire 🥀

Ahhhh

[whisperofthewaves]

I am saying this right now, block my mbd polish tag if you don't want to see me crying over the polish translation of murderbot diaries in a broken mix of polish and english bc four sentences down from the mentally poking the feed -> gently groping the news stream translation change I just found another either typo or mistranslation and I don't think I'll be able to shut up about it

[scootsoot]

Mwehehe will wood reference (possibly in a minor key? Perchance?)

[frownyalfred]

pining/horny Clark sneaking into the Cave and using Bruce’s voice modulator just to record Batman saying sexy things to him in the voice but forgetting to clear the transcription record and having to look Bruce in the eye the next day at Batfamily dinner (Alfred did him a solid and erased it before Bruce saw it) (Alfred will not tell Clark this and will drag out the horror just to see Clark sweat when Bruce asks him a question)

[dindjarindiaries]

Right Where You Left Me

summary: Din reunites with you many years after your whirlwind romance for a mission you begrudgingly accept to help him with.

pairing: din djarin (the mandalorian) x reader

tags: angst, injuries & blood, hurt/comfort

rating: T

word count: 15.387k

main masterlist • din djarin masterlist

As soon as you saw the flash of silver at the open doorway, you froze. Your grip on the rag pulsated, your stare assessing the silhouette that was too achingly familiar.

And immediately, you wanted it gone. Him gone.

“Get the hell out of my bar, Mando!” Your voice was a bark, as piercing as your threatening gaze. You tossed the rag over your shoulder and crossed your arms, defiant. Though you knew his real name, had even exclaimed it in private before, you still refused to out him by using it now in front of others—despite the hurt he had caused you.

Din’s amused huff wasn’t lost on you as he ignored your directive and strided into your establishment. “Nice to see you, too.”

It was only inevitable that he would show up one day, but to do so like this was simply insulting. The Din you knew was far from an asshole, but this version of him was already threatening to challenge that notion. 

“Is that beskar on your head keeping you from hearing me?” You took up the rag again and snapped it towards the doorway. Din froze and raised his gloved hands in surrender. “Get. Out.”

“I won’t stay long.” Din nodded his helmet. “Promise.” You rolled your eyes and didn’t bother hiding it from him. This was the honorable Din Djarin that you had known, and while it used to be endearing to you, it was nothing but annoying now.

“You won’t stay at all.” You narrowed your eyes at him. “I mean it.”

Din shifted his weight between his feet. You hated how it made your chest ache for him. The years hadn’t erased that tell of his. “I only need a few minutes.” His modulated voice was getting desperate. “Please.”

Of course it was working on you, but you couldn’t let it. You had spent all this time building your resolve to prepare yourself for this day, so that you could confidently turn your back on him without remorse—just like he had done to you. “You should’ve thought of that before you left.” You threw the rag at him, and he caught it without so much as flinching. “Mind wiping those tables on your way out?”

Then you did it. You turned your back on him, intent on hiding in the back room for the next standard hour or so with a glass of the galaxy’s strongest whiskey.

But the strong grasp on your wrist kept you from getting anywhere.

You spun around, your gaze a raging fire as it met Din’s cold visor. He still had the rag clutched in his free hand, and you watched his hold on it tighten in your periphery. As much as you didn’t want to admit it to yourself, the feeling of his touch still sent as many shockwaves through you now as it did years ago.

Din’s low, modulated voice broke the tense silence between you. “Please.”

Your jaw ticked as you gave him a thoughtful once-over. It was only just now that you were realizing he had an entirely new suit of armor, having exchanged the ragtag tan flight suit and mismatched red armor for brown and pure silver. Something had changed, and it was no doubt that something that had his voice so strained and desperate.

Still, you tugged your arm out of his grasp and scowled. “I never took you for the type to put your hands on someone like me without permission.”

Din’s armored shoulders deflated. “You’re right. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have done that.”

You waited for his excuse, but he didn’t give one. You raised your brow. “But?”

Din lifted the rag without looking away from you, his helmet tilting as he fumbled with the cloth between both his hands. “But what?”

You scoffed and shook your head, your gaze falling to the small amount of distance that was still between the two of you. “Fine. I’ll ask.”

Whether he was playing your own curiosity against you intentionally or not, it was a genius strategy. You couldn’t help yourself. You reached out for the rag and snatched it back from him, throwing it over your shoulder again and setting your weight on one hip.

“What brought you here?”

Din let out a soft sigh. His visor gave the room a careful stare before he leaned in closer. You nearly did the same out of habit. “I need your help with something.”

You crossed your arms and gestured with your chin to the doorway. “I’m retired. Can’t you tell?” You let out a terse laugh. “But of course the only reason why you’d show up here all these years later is for help.”

Din stiffened. The amount of pity you wanted to give him was exhausting. Old habits die hard. “I… didn’t think you’d want to see me.”

You lifted an eyebrow, unimpressed. “Well, thank you for making the decision for me.” You turned and started to walk back behind the counter. “You’ve lost my interest. Your few minutes are up.”

Din’s gloved hands all but slammed against the countertop. You jumped and looked at him with wide eyes. “Your research.” His voice was even lower, even more secretive, than before—but it had only grown even more desperate.

You blinked a few times, fighting against your shock. Your tone matched his when you finally found words to say. “What about it?”

Din relaxed once you spoke to him. “Do you still have the list?”

Your brow furrowed. “The list of what?”

“M-count targets.”

You stepped up to face him across the counter so fast that the end of it jutted into your stomach, but you didn’t care. Your face was only inches from his helmet when you spoke through gritted teeth. “You should know better than to say that out here in the open.”

Din was unfazed. “Do you still have it?”

You searched the horizontal section of his visor before letting out a heavy breath. Your gaze fell to your hands, which were splayed on the countertop right next to his. “Even if I did, I haven’t updated it in years. I have no idea if any of the targets are still active.”

Din took a steady breath, his visor looking to the side as he processed your words. Meanwhile, you were doing the same with this entire situation. His sudden interest in this was baffling, and there was only one conclusion you could think of for someone like him. It made you grimace even more harshly than you had before.

“You want exclusive access to track them down, don’t you?”

Din’s visor snapped back to your gaze. “No.” His tone got sharper, finally matching your own. “You really think so little of me?”

“Seeing as you left me for this line of work without hesitation or care, yeah, I guess I would consider it to be a pretty strong possibility.”

Din looked down at his hands. His armored body rose and fell with another deep breath before he changed the subject. “I had an M-count target.”

You scoffed. He was proving your words right, and you hated how devastating that really was for you.

“I didn’t realize it when I got assigned to the job. I was told the target was fifty years old. But…” Din paused, and when he went on, there was a new emotional strain to his words, “it was a child.”

Your brow jutted up at that. A fifty-year-old child was certainly new, but in this galaxy, it was definitely possible, especially if they were non-human.

“I saved him, took him on the run, and returned him to his own kind.” Din’s voice nearly broke on his last few words. You tried to picture it; Din Djarin, running around the galaxy in that old-ass Razor Crest, all while taking care of a child. It was a hilarious yet heartfelt image, because it was something only he would do, especially after what he went through as a child.

You hated that you knew that about him.

You pushed these thoughts aside and prioritized one of the many questions that lingered. “His own kind?”

Din’s helmet tilted at you, as if the answer should have been obvious. “The Jedi.”

You were the one to grab his wrist this time, tugging him along the edge of the countertop until he was next to you again. Then, you pushed open the swinging door to the back room, waiting until it closed to question him. “You were really running around the galaxy with a Jedi youngling?”

Din nodded. Your eyes doubled in size as you balled up your fists at your sides, now coming upon a new, frightening conclusion.

“Din, not every child with an M-count is a Jedi, especially not on that list!”

Din didn’t say anything, not for a long time. Your brow began to furrow in confusion more than anger until he gave his helmet a quick shake. “Sorry.” He shifted his weight.

You narrowed your eyes. “What was that?”

Din hesitated before he went on. “You said my name.”

You rolled your eyes and let out a curt laugh. “Get a grip.” You set your hands on your hips. “Did you even hear the rest of what I said?”

“Yes. I can multitask. You know that.” The urge to roll your eyes at him again was too strong, especially once your ears started to burn. “Don’t worry. I spoke directly with another Jedi, and she said that he was raised at ‘the Temple.’” He shrugged. “Whatever that means.”

You ran your hand over your face in disbelief. “You just casually ran into a Jedi? In this day and age, when the Jedi Order is all but nonexistent?”

“Actually, I’ve met two.”

You scoffed and closed your eyes, exhaling an annoyed breath before smiling sweetly at him. “Congratulations.” You grew more serious as you hardened your expression. “But my point still stands. If your plan is to get this list and try to return all these kids to their ‘own kind,’ then it won’t work. Most of these children were never Jedi.”

Din held his hands on his hips, just above his belt. “That’s not my plan.” Worry strained his voice as he went on. “I just want to make sure they’re all safe.”

You blinked at him. “That’s it?” Din nodded. “What about hunting? Don’t you need to work?”

Din tapped a pouch on his belt. “I’ve got enough credits to last me a while.”

You gave him a cautious once-over. “How?”

Din huffed. “That’s a long story, and I promised I wouldn’t take up too much of your time.” He nodded towards your desk in the corner of the room, where your datapad was sitting. “All I need is the list.”

You bit the inside of your check as you took a deep breath. The nobility and meaning of what he was doing meant too much for you to just hand him a list that hadn’t been checked in years. It could send him chasing inactive targets, wasting precious time that could be used to save children in need.

“You need more than that.” Your tone was decisive as you spoke, leaving no room for argument—though you were sure Din would try.

And try he did. “Is that so?”

“It is.” Your gaze flickered over to your datapad. “I told you before, I haven’t updated the list in years. If you’re really gonna be tracking down these targets, then it needs to be checked.”

Din nodded. “Okay. How long will that take you?”

You shook your head. “Time isn’t a factor. Distance is.” You walked off towards your desk and explained before Din could ask. “I have to cross-check the names at an Imperial terminal.”

Din’s voice was behind you, getting closer to where you now stood with your focus on your datapad. “Do you know where to find one?”

You threw him a look over your shoulder. “How else would I have made this list in the first place?” Din tilted his helmet, and you tried hard to fight your amused smile as you turned back to the datapad. “I’ve found a few, but I usually go to Ptelan.”

Din was right behind you, now. “Where’s that?”

“The whole other side of the Outer Rim.” You held back your sigh as you turned around to face Din, pasting on that sarcastically sweet smile again. “If your old-ass ship can actually make it that far.”

Din stiffened. Your mischievous grin started to fade even before he said the words in a low voice. “I… don’t have the Crest anymore.”

You attempted to keep the mood light as you opted for the likeliest explanation. “Did she finally die on you?”

Din sighed, but it was sadder than usual. “I guess you can say that.”

Your lips tightened at the thought of whatever you weren’t being told. You spoke as you opened your datapad to make sure you still had the list. “Let me just add that story to your ever-growing list.” Din chuckled, and you fought a relieved smile at the sound of it. “So, tell me about your new ride.” 

“I don’t have one.”

You paused, your gaze slowly peeling from the datapad’s vidscreen to Din’s visor. The implications of his words hit you all at once. “You took public transport to get here?”

Din set his hands on his belt. “That’s what I’ve been doing, and it’s what I’m gonna keep doing until my contact finds me another Razor Crest.”

You blew air sharply out of your nose. His stubbornness certainly hadn’t faded over the years. “So, let me get this straight.” You lowered the datapad and took a step closer to him. “You expect to show up here, years later, unannounced, have me hand over my most precious research, and then borrow my ship?”

Din’s helmet tilted. He was amused. “I never said anything about a ship.”

You laughed. “Well, you sure as hell aren’t getting to that Imperial base on Ptelan with public transport.” You waved the datapad in your hand. “And you don’t even know how to cross-check this with the terminal, anyway. This plan of yours is starting to look real lousy.”

“To be fair, I didn’t realize I was gonna need more than the list.”

You stared at him for a few solid seconds before you closed your eyes and lowered your head in defeat. Your grip on the datapad tightened as you came to terms with what you were about to say—and, more importantly, do. This is what you got for running as far away from your research as possible: a multi-day trip with your ex. 

Cursing under your breath, you circled your jaw and lifted your head back up to look at him. “The list is the least of our problems. I need to get the ship fueled up for us to go.”

Din’s gloved hands fell back to his sides. “Us?”

“I’ve seen your piloting.” You pulled the corners of your lips up in a smirk. “I’m not letting your recklessness destroy my ship.”

Din sounded concerned as he looked over his shoulder. “What about your bar?”

You shrugged. “I have plenty of managers who can step in while I’m gone. We shouldn’t be away for more than a few days, anyway.”

Din’s visor gave you a quick once-over before he nodded. “Okay.” He straightened his shoulders and tilted his helmet towards you in a way that, aggravatingly, made your knees weak. His voice was strained with meaning when he spoke. “Thank you.”

You avoided his visor as you returned his nod. “Let’s just make it quick.” You turned to your desk and picked up a datarod. “Take this and head to the hangar. My ship’s in bay three.”

You extended the datarod to him, and Din was gentle in reaching for it. His gloved fingers brushed yours as you made the exchange. You silently cursed yourself when the sensation sent a pleasant chill down your spine. Remember what he did to you, and don’t forget it.

You spun away from him again. “Get the ship fueled up while I pack my things. I won’t be far behind you.”

Din nodded, dutiful as ever. He set the datarod on his belt before he turned and strided out of the back room. As soon as the door swung closed, you braced your hands on your desk and closed your eyes to focus on your breathing.

All these years, you had planned on turning your back on him the moment you saw him. Now, you had just signed up for a multi-day mission with him. That meant seeing him constantly. Sharing an enclosed space with him. Reminding yourself of what you once had, both the good and the bad.

But what he wanted was too noble for you to ignore. You were willing to sacrifice your own heart for the safety of these children.

You pulled yourself together and packed your necessities. You triple-checked that you had the datapad in your satchel before you pushed your way out of the back room and tracked down today’s manager. The Twi’lek woman gave you a concerned look as you approached her.

“Hey, is everything okay?” Her green eyes gestured to the cantina’s entryway. “What was up with that Mandalorian?”

You sighed and wished that you knew as little about Din as she did. “Everything’s fine. Listen, I’m going on a quick trip. I’ll be back in a few days.” You nodded at her. “I need you and the others to keep this place running until then.” You tapped the comm on your belt. “You know how to reach me if you need me.”

The Twi’lek nodded, but her brow was still furrowed. She lowered her voice to a whisper. “Are you sure everything’s okay?”

You pasted on a reassuring smile and set your hand on her shoulder. “I’m sure.” You squeezed and lowered your hand back to your satchel. “I’ll see you all in a few days.”

You didn’t give yourself time to dwell on her worried expression. If you did, there was a good chance you would come to your senses and realize how bad of an idea this all was. Instead, you strided over to the entryway and walked through the door that had slid open for you.

The hangar was only a block away, and bay three was one of the first in the hangar’s circular structure. You walked in to see your faithful vessel sitting there, with Din easily maneuvering the fueling source away from the hull. Your mind was suddenly flooded with the many memories of this very same sight, but with him fueling up the Crest after yet another risky mission.

No. You didn’t want the warm, familiar fondness that was flooding through your chest. You swallowed hard and pushed it away, continuing your stride as you spoke to Din without looking at him. “Ready to go?”

Din huffed in amusement. “That was fast.” When you didn’t respond, he grew more serious. “Yeah, it’s all ready.”

“Good.” Your lips pulled tight as you dropped your satchel off in the hold. Your ship was only half the size of the Crest, considering the fact it was a singular deck as compared to two, but you still had plenty of room to work with. There was a closed refresher and more than one bunk, thank the stars, as well as a booth and a small table. This was all connected to the cockpit, which was conveniently fitted with two chairs.

As if he was always meant to be here.

You scoffed and all but threw yourself into your chair. It groaned with both familiarity and age when you turned and toggled around the controls, preparing for takeoff. Din’s bootsteps soon made their way onto the ship, and the sound was just as familiar as your chair had been. Like no time had passed at all.

Stop. You gave your head a small shake to snap yourself out of it. It’s been years, and he left you. Don’t get used to this again.

You tightened your hands around the joysticks and jerked the ship up. It was hard to fight the cruel yet amused smile tugging at your lips when you heard Din stumble somewhere behind you. He cursed before speaking up over the ship’s rumbling engines. “And you said I was a reckless pilot.”

You couldn’t hold back your curt chuckle, though you wanted to. Din took his place in the chair beside yours, but you kept your focus on the clouds you were currently soaring through. You still remembered the coordinates to Ptelan as you punched them in, even if it had been years since you last traveled there. It wasn’t long before the blue light of hyperspace was swirling all around you. It would continue to do so for nearly an entire day.

Suddenly, this ship was beginning to feel a lot smaller.

With the ship in autopilot, you rose from your chair and headed to your belongings in the hold. Out of the corner of your eye, you spotted two sparkling items leaning against the wall of the interior hull, a jetpack and a long, pointed spear. The former was something Din had been wanting for a long time.

So many stories left to tell, so much time spent apart, and yet so much distance now between you. It was hard to come to terms with that after you had once known him so well, and had him so close.

“I’m gonna freshen up,” you announced, rustling through your bag and the other compartments on the ship for your necessities. “We’ve got a while to go until we get there, so I recommend resting. I’ll make something to eat when I’m done.”

You turned to head to the refresher, but Din unknowingly stood in your way. His visor was trained on your gaze as he nodded. “Can I help with anything?”

You swallowed hard and shook your head. “No.” You brushed past him, your shoulder knocking against his arm as you did so. “I’ll take care of it when I’m done.”

You’ve done enough is what you wanted to say, but that wasn’t a conversation you really wanted to have in such an enclosed space—especially with such a long trip ahead of you. Instead, you focused on washing up, hoping you could wash your thoughts of him away with the water. The refresher, unfortunately, was even more enclosed than the rest of the ship, which was only making it harder to breathe with the knowledge of who was outside it.

It would all happen again. As soon as Din had what he wanted, he would leave. Only this time, you wouldn’t give yourself the chance to be attached, and you sure as hell wouldn’t let yourself miss him. Not anymore.

Not that you had ever healed from the first time.

It was only when you finished washing up and drying yourself off that you realized the grave mistake you had made. Thanks to how Din’s mere presence had flustered you, you had completely forgotten to bring your change of clothes in with you. And there was simply no way you were going out there in nothing but a towel.

You leaned close to the door of the refresher, your eyes closing as you thunked your forehead against the cool metal. The embarrassment was already warming the tips of your ears as you raised your voice enough to be heard. “Din?”

There was a pause before you heard footsteps shuffling by the door. “Yeah?”

The gentleness in his modulated voice threatened to ruin you. With a heavy sigh, you went on. “Turns out I do need your help.” Your voice was a sardonic laugh. “Can you grab the pile of clothes by my satchel?”

“Sure.” Din’s response was immediate. You could still hear his footsteps as they made their way across the hold and then back to the door. “There. I set them on the floor.” There was an awkward pause, accompanied by a shifting of weight. “I’m… not looking.”

You let out a more genuine laugh that time and spoke before you could stop yourself. “Wouldn’t be the first time you’ve seen me like this.”

Yeah, that was definitely the wrong thing to say. It stunned both of you into silence, but maybe that was a good thing. The towel was wrapped tightly around you as you opened the door and reached down to grab the clothes, shutting the door again just as quickly. For a moment, you leaned your back against the cool metal and let the material raise the hair on your skin. It was the cold reality you needed to ground yourself again.

You made quick work of dressing to save yourself from at least part of the embarrassment. Once you were decent, you stepped out into the hold, where you saw Din swinging his spear around. He turned to face you right away, setting the blunt end of the spear against the ground. It made a faint clanging sound, reminiscent of Din’s armor.

“That’s quite a weapon you’ve got there.” You spoke to him even while you stepped forward and focused on putting your belongings away. “Did you trade that for your rifle?”

Din didn’t answer right away. You stole a look at him over your shoulder in curiosity. His gloved hand was holding the spear even tighter, and his visor had fallen to focus on his boots. “Not intentionally.”

The pain in his voice struck you hard. You were caught between wanting and not wanting to know what happened. Curiosity and genuine concern for him were fighting a courageous battle, but your resolve to keep him at an arm’s length was even stronger—at least, for now.

You found something else to say into the strained silence. “Well, at least this one fits in with your armor a lot better.”

Din chuckled. “Yeah, I guess so.”

You listened to him shuffling around behind you as you started to prepare the broth and bread. The clink of metal told you he had set the spear against the hull again, and the shifting of weight that followed said even more. With a fond smile you couldn’t shake, you spoke to him again.

“If you really want to help…” you pushed two bowls and small plates out to the side, “you can set the table by the booth.”

Din was at your side in seconds to grab them. “Thank you.”

You huffed as he walked over to the booth. “You’re thanking me for letting you help?”

“I am. It’s rare that you ever ask for help.”

You gave the broth a harsher stir than necessary. “I didn’t ask. I offered.”

Din’s amused chuckle warmed your cold heart. “Right.”

It wasn’t long before the broth was steaming at just the right temperature. You brought it over to the table, and Din made room for you to distribute the broth equally between the two bowls. After setting a small loaf of bread on each plate, you sat down, wordlessly encouraging Din to do the same.

You were prepared to watch him eat the way he always used to around you. He would lift his helmet just enough to sip the broth and tear off chunks of the bread. That was all you ever got to glimpse of his face. His untrimmed jaw, the tip of his hooked nose, his warm lips that felt like home…

Used to feel like home.

But before you could even raise the first broth-soaked chunk of bread to your lips, you saw Din lift both hands to his helmet, preparing to slide it off completely.

Out of instinct, your free hand snapped around his wrist. Din froze, his visor finding your piercing stare. “What the hell are you doing?”

Din’s tense form relaxed, a soft laugh crackling through his modulator before the hand you weren’t restricting covered yours. “Relax, sweetheart.” The familiar nickname made your heart turn over in your chest. “This isn’t the first time I’ve done this.”

His words hit you with a dizzying amount of thoughts and emotions, but the most prominent of all was hurt. He had removed his helmet for someone else, that much was clear. Had you not been worthy enough to be the first?

You didn’t say anything in response, and you couldn’t even if you wanted to. You let go of his wrist and let him follow through on the action.

You couldn’t take your eyes off him, as much as you wanted to. Dark hair accompanied the dark stubble you had once felt against your own skin, falling in soft waves over his head and coating his upper law and jaw with sweet familiarity. The rest of the hook of his nose was long and gentle, leading up to a furrowed brow. You followed those lines to meet his eyes.

Time stalled, and your breath caught. His brown eyes had already met your stare, golden flecks glinting in the flashing blue light of hyperspace that illuminated the ship’s interior. Your gaze flickered between them, imagining all the different ways these same eyes might have looked upon you all those years ago.

You wondered if they had looked at you then the way they were looking at you now.

Din’s stare fell to the helmet he had set on the booth before focusing on the steaming broth and bread in front of him. You, however, continued to look at him, to study him. It was all you had ever wanted when he was yours, even if you had refused to confess that to him.

You were startled when Din’s natural voice broke the silence. “Your broth’s gonna get cold.” His amused tone was familiar, but seeing that same emotion in his eyes made your chest unravel with sweet warmth.

Then his words sank in, and you blinked a few times before looking down at your meal. Your ears burned both in embarrassment and from the tangible feeling of his eyes on you. “Sorry for staring. It’s just…” you stopped with your bowl near your lips to let out a soft chuckle, “I never really thought I’d ever get to see your face.”

Din offered the hint of a smile. “I understand.” He took a sip from his own bowl before raising his brow. “What do you think?” When you gave him a quizzical look, he clarified. “About what you’ve seen.”

You huffed and smirked at him. “Never took you for the type to fish for compliments, Djarin.”

Din’s face started to flush, though he tried to shrug it off. “It’s just unnerving to have eyes on me after so many years of not being seen. But I’m trying to get used to it.”

You finished chewing a piece of bread before freeing the simple question from your tongue. “Why?”

Din exhaled, his lips pressing into a firm line before he chuckled. “Add that to your growing list of stories that I owe you.”

You laughed and nodded. His response filled you with an odd sort of relief. He was promising an answer, and that meant it wasn’t something he wanted to keep from you.

The rest of your meal was eaten in silence, with you stealing looks at Din whenever you thought you could afford them. He was the first to finish, clearly hungrier than he would have ever let on about. You tried to suppress the natural worry that festered in your chest for him as you watched him stand from the booth.

“I’m gonna wash up, if that’s okay.” Din gestured with his head to the refresher.

You nodded. “Of course. I left my stuff in there, so feel free to use it. I’ll just be resting if you need something.”

Din bowed his head in gratitude. He took his dishes and rinsed them out first before disappearing inside the refresher. You closed your eyes and steadied yourself with a breath, but the backs of your traitorous eyelids continued to show you the image of Din’s face anyway.

If that was all you could see whenever you closed your eyes, then you didn’t have a single chance of earning rest on this trip.

You focused on your mundane tasks and lost yourself in the routine. After washing out your own dishes, you set up the bunks, hoping to at least get some sleep during the course of this lengthy journey. A few minutes spent in your bunk, however, proved that rest would be impossible right now.

You took to pacing and flipping your blade in the air, warming yourself up for any potential fight that would come should things go south on Ptelan. They hadn’t before, but there was certainly a first time for everything. There was too much on your mind that threatened to drown you, and focusing on the shifting of your blade offered an escape.

Until the refresher door opened at the same time you paced forward, and you ran straight into Din’s firm form.

Even worse, as you clutched your blade and took a step back, you realized that he was more vulnerable to you now than before. His soft waves were wet enough to leave droplets streaming onto his forehead and face, and you followed one that fell down his jaw and over his completely exposed chest. Tanned, scarred skin was shining from the refresher’s humidity, ending only where Din had the towel he was borrowing around his waist.

And you were breathless. If you couldn’t stop staring before, you sure as hell couldn’t stop now.

“I’m sorry.” Din stammered. His face was even redder than it had been before, his gaze wandering. “I was… I needed to grab my blade so I could shave, and I thought you would be asleep.”

You managed to let out a curt chuckle. “Well, I’m awake.” It was then that his words hit you. “Wait, your vibroblade? For shaving?”

Din just shrugged.

“Absolutely not.” You spun around and headed towards one of your miscellaneous cargo crates. “I think I have one somewhere around here.”

“Have what?”

You scoffed. “A blade meant for shaving.” You found what you were looking for and checked it over to make sure it was clean. Din’s brow was furrowed now as you walked over to hand it to him. “You can keep it.”

Din looked between you and the blade. “You just happened to have one of these on hand?”

You shrugged and crossed your arms. “Someone must have left it here.”

Din didn’t respond right away. You watched as his brown gaze darkened, a change barely visible in the blue light illuminating the hold. “Who?”

“Don’t know.” You raised an eyebrow at him. “Why does it matter?”

Din’s stare cut away from you, and it was the tick in his jaw that made the realization fall upon you.

You let out a scornful laugh and shook your head. “No, you do not get to be jealous.” Din’s gaze snapped back to you. You pointed an accusatory finger towards him. “May I remind you that it was you who left me, not the other way around?”

Din’s jaw circled as he kept focusing on something behind you. “You don’t have to remind me about the worst mistake I ever made.” His brown eyes found you again, both his words and his stare knocking the breath from your lungs. “I already think about it all the time.”

Your lips stretched in a heartless smile. “And yet it still took all these years for you to show up, Djarin. You’re gonna have to do better than that.”

Din stiffened, an action that was even more visible with the muscles rippling under his skin. You swallowed hard and forced yourself to change the topic, your focus going back to the blade in his hand.

“Do you know how to use one of those?”

Din’s own stare lowered to the blade in his hand as he shrugged. “I’ll figure it out.”

You snickered. “Yeah. I guess if you could use a vibroblade to shave, you can use anything.” Din let out his own huff of amusement as you studied the small scars on his face. You kept your tone amused as you gestured to what you were seeing. “I’m willing to bet half of those are from shaving.”

Din actually laughed at that, a sound that ignited a pleasant shockwave along your spine. “Surprisingly, no, I’ve never managed to nick myself badly enough to leave a scar.”

You furrowed your brow. “So, these are all from what? Taking hits to your helmet?” It was hard to understand how something as impenetrable as beskar could still leave his face vulnerable to scarring.

Din nodded. “Only in serious cases.” His gaze had fallen to the blade in his grasp again, as if he was growing shy under your observant eye.

But you couldn’t keep it from wandering. Your stare found a long scar across the bridge of his nose, one you certainly hadn’t seen before in those rare times when he would accidentally slip his helmet up a little too far. “How did you get this one?” You couldn’t keep yourself from reaching out to brush your fingertips along it.

Din drew in a quiet breath, and out of your periphery, you could see his chest stall for a moment. His brown eyes found you again, the warm depths of his gaze pooling into yours as he responded in a soft voice. “I got caught up in an explosion on Nevarro.” Your eyes widened. “I almost didn’t make it out, but…” he chuckled, “ironically, it was a droid who saved me.”

Your hand was still raised, fingers trailing over the smooth skin along his cheekbone as you grimaced. The worried question fell from your lips before you could stop it. “You almost died?”

Din’s gaze softened at the breathlessness of your words. You hated it, this constant worry and concern for one another, but you couldn’t stop it. As much as you had tried to bring yourself to despise him over the years, it had never worked, and knowing he had almost died in your absence was frighteningly unnerving.

Din tried to lighten the mood with a small smile stretched across his lips. “It’s not like I haven’t almost died before.”

You gave your head a small shake and let yourself get lost in the movement of your hand, which was now settling more firmly upon his cheek. “But I wasn’t there this time.”

Din’s hand wrapped gently around your wrist. His words were firm yet so achingly soft and genuine. “That’s my fault, darling.” He began to run his hand down your arm, his rough fingertips skimming the exposed skin that led up to the short sleeve of your casual tunic. “Not yours.”

And there it was, your ultimate undoing, the thing that had always made Din so different from anyone else. He owned up to every mistake he ever made. Usually, he would do whatever it took to make it right, which is why it stung even more that he had never bothered to come back for you over the course of all these years.

But that harsh reminder wasn’t on your mind right now. All you could think about was the electricity crackling between the two of you, the touch of your hands igniting sparks that drew you closer to one another. He was becoming dangerously irresistible, especially with the weight of such sweet familiarity sitting between the two of you.

It was worse now that you could actually see him. The longing in his eyes, the way they darkened as he mused upon whatever desires he had for you and flickered between your own eyes and lips…

Just like that, you were running back to him, back to the familiar and the home you had once made in him. He did the same and met you in the middle, his parted lips meeting yours and sealing the gap between you.

Unfortunately, it was the most complete you had felt ever since he had left you.

Your hand slid from his cheek to the damp, brown waves that fell over his ear, and the other ran over his scarred chest towards the back of his neck. You wanted him impossibly close, as if having him there would erase the years you had to spend without him. Din reciprocated the feeling with his own gestures, one of his hands also wrapped around your neck as the other held the rib cage that protected your wildly racing heart.

Before you could stop yourself, you pulled him backwards, and he followed. Two long strides with Din’s arms supporting your weight was all it took to set your back against the cold, metal hull. Your toes had been dragging against the floor with the ease of his grasp, but he helped you steady yourself on your feet without once having to separate his lips from yours.

But that stability was lost just as quickly the moment his tongue pushed through your parted lips. He could still devour you like no one else, doing so with a reverence that purified you. All the consequences of these actions were forgotten as your hand in his hair pulled him even closer, and he relented, his hips marrying yours.

It was that, and the hand that was now lowering from your neck along the curve of your spine, that forced you to break away from him with a breathless gasp of your only conceivable thought. “Din…”

Din. The man who was making you feel a way you only had years ago. The same man who had left you alone in your bed the morning he left and never came back.

What the hell am I doing?

The thought was enough to break you out of your lustful haze. Your eyes doubled in size as you lowered both hands to Din’s bare chest and pushed him back. He stumbled but easily got his footing, his own eyes widened as he held his hands up in surrender. The two of you were heaving from both the heat of the moment and your sudden outburst.

You wanted to speak, but you were thrumming with so many emotions that it was hard to choose just one. Din blinked a few times, one hand running through his damp hair as he also tried to find his voice. “I’m… I’m sorry.” He exhaled a breath and closed his eyes, leaving his hand in his hair. “I don’t know what came over me.”

You scoffed. “Yeah, that was pretty fucking bold.” The ferocity of your words made Din’s eyes fly back open as his surprised stare met yours. “In fact, all of this is.” You waved a hand to the rest of the open hold. “This stunt of yours. Convincing me to come along with you somehow.”

Din shook his head. “That’s not—.”

“No.” You held up your hand to stop him. “It’s my turn to have the final word, since you so kindly didn’t give me a chance to the day you left.”

Din deflated at the truth of your words, but his sense of honor wouldn’t win you over this time.

“If you think that you can make things right by just showing up after all this time and apologizing, you’re wrong.” You hardened your expression. “If it’s my forgiveness you’re looking for, you’re never gonna find it.” You lowered your voice as it trembled in pure rage and true hurt. “Not even after slipping off that helmet for me.”

Din flinched, but there was no anger to be found in his expression. He simply nodded, bowing his head and drawing the blade you had given him from where he had slipped it between his body and the towel that still covered him. “Thank you for this.” Din gave the blade a small wave.

You gave him no response, instead crossing your arms as your gaze avoided him.

Din turned back towards the refresher, but he stopped himself before he walked through the door. “All I want is that list. As soon as you get it, I’ll leave, and I’ll make sure you won’t ever have to see me again if that’s what you want.” His voice wasn’t full of any bitterness. Instead, it was strained by his genuine desire to fulfill your wishes.

Din waited for your answer, but you didn’t have one to offer him. What you wanted was becoming more and more difficult to decipher, and this kiss had only made things even more complex. Din took your silence as your response and stepped inside the refresher, closing you off from him.

You lifted a hand to your face and closed your eyes, exhaling and wishing all your tumultuous thoughts and emotions would go with your breath. You were consumed with waves of anger and guilt for the things you had said and done. It was easy to hate Din at a distance, but having him back reminded you of exactly how much you had lost the first time he left.

Maybe it was really just the why you had been looking for all this time.

You numbly drifted back to your bunk, laying yourself upon it even though sleep was the last thing you were capable of doing. It was easier to hide from Din that way, to avoid the devastation he had hidden within the brown depths of his eyes that you had only just seen for the first time today. You had waited all these years to hurt him the same way he had hurt you, but now that you had taken the opportunity to do so, it didn’t feel nearly as fulfilling as you had hoped.

You were on your side facing the interior hull when you heard the refresher door open again. Din wandered to somewhere in the hold before he made his way to the bunk you had made up for him. It was built into the hull just beside yours, leaving one metal barrier between you. That wasn’t nearly enough to ease the tension that suffocated the air of your already modestly-sized ship.

You closed your eyes and flopped onto your back, letting out a sigh before you spoke loud enough for him to hear. “I’m sorry for what I said.”

Din’s response was immediate. “Don’t be. You were right, and I deserved that.”

You pressed your lips into a firm line and stared too closely at the top of your bunk. There were a dozen questions floating through your mind, but only one managed to free itself onto your tongue. “Can I just know why?”

You heard a shifting in Din’s bunk before he spoke. “What do you mean?”

You closed your eyes in a vain attempt to ward off your sudden embarrassment. “Why did you leave?”

Din was silent for a long moment. After a steady exhale, he finally said the words that your every breath hung from. “I shouldn’t have.”

You huffed. “That wasn’t the question.”

Din hummed, as if he was considering chuckling and thought better of it. “Right.” He took another brief pause. “I… was scared.” Your brow jutted up at that. Those were three words you had never heard your Mandalorian utter before. “I thought that pursuing the line of work I had been training all my life for would put you at risk. So, I did what I thought was best for you.”

“And left me without even trying to talk about it.” Your words weren’t as sharp this time, but they were still truthful. “You took my agency from me with that decision, Din.”

“I know.” Din’s voice was pained. “I’ve done more cruel things in my life than I’d like to admit, but… that was my cruelest.” He took another breath. “And I’ve regretted it every day since.”

You sighed, and oddly, the ever-present knot within your chest loosened. His words brought you a clarity and closure you hadn’t realized you needed. It wasn’t anything you had done that made him leave.

You blinked a few times and found your voice. “Thank you for telling me that.” You imagined Din nodding in response, whether he actually did or not. You took his silence as an invitation to change the topic. “Now, I believe you still owe me a few more stories.”

Din chuckled. The lighthearted nature of it filled you with relief. “Which one first?”

“Let’s go in order.” You thought back to the first mystery he had mentioned. “Tell me about your M-count target.”

It took a while for Din to say something. When he did, his voice was even lower than before. “Grogu.”

You furrowed your brow. “What?”

“That’s his name. Grogu.” You smiled at the sudden fondness in his voice. “He’s tiny, and green, and he’s got these petal-shaped ears. Really big eyes, too.”

“What species is he?”

“Don’t know. Pretty damn cute, though.”

You laughed at that.

“The first Jedi I talked to said that he was raised at ‘the Temple’ and somehow escaped after the Clone Wars ended. It was about a standard year ago that I found him on Arvala-7. He was being hunted by the Empire for his blood, just like you had talked about with your research.”

You began to put the pieces together. “So, that’s why you’re doing this.”

“I don’t want any more kids to go through what he went through.”

You beamed, rolling onto your side so that you were facing the hold. “You really care about him.”

You noticed Din shift his legs to kick them out over the edge of the bunk, putting just a small sliver of his profile into view as he looked down at his hands in his lap and nodded. “I do.” He lifted his hand to run the back of his thumb over his forehead. “It wasn’t easy giving him over to the Jedi. I… still miss him.”

The corners of your mouth turned up in a soft, sad smile as you sat up on your own bunk. You mirrored his position, glancing over at him and hoping he could sense your comforting stare. He did, and this time, you were more content to let yourself drown in the warmth of his brown gaze. “I’m sure he misses you, too.” You looked down at your hands in sudden shyness. “I know the feeling.”

Silence blanketed the hold as the two of you processed your heavy words. You cleared your throat when it became too much.

“Okay, now that that’s covered… what about all those pretty little credits in your pocket?”

Din laughed. “I don’t know if you’ll believe me when I tell you.”

You raised an eyebrow at him. “Is that a challenge, Djarin?”

Din gave his head a fond shake. “No. It’s just…” he exhaled and nodded once down at his lap, “I turned Moff Gideon over to the New Republic.”

You racked your brain for a memory to match the name to. “Gideon? Isn’t he…” you trailed off, still searching.

“The Imperial who led the Purge on Mandalore.”

You looked over a Din with disbelieving eyes. “How the hell did you manage that?”

Din’s jaw tightened. “He was the same one who was after Grogu, and he had taken the kid from me. I found a way to his light cruiser and detained him.”

Your brow shot up. “By yourself?”

“Well, I had some help.”

You splayed your palms out on the bunk behind you and leaned your weight upon them. “Sounds like another story we have to add to the list.” You both chuckled, despite the small ache in your chest. Gideon had taken so much from Din and his people, and you suddenly began to wish you were there for Din when he had to face him. “What about the Crest?”

Din inhaled air through his teeth. “Yeah, that one connects to the pulse rifle story, actually.”

“Ooo, a crossover event.”

Din chuckled, but the sound wasn’t as amused as you had hoped it would be. “It was destroyed by the Empire.”

Your eyes widened at him as your heart plunged into your stomach. “Destroyed?” It was hard to imagine the home Din had made on the Razor Crest being gone, especially with such a violent fate. “How?”

“Gideon’s cruiser made a single shot. That was all it took, really. I lost everything except that spear.” Din pointed at the spear that still rested against the hull before he drew something from a pocket on his belt. “And this.”

You narrowed your eyes as you studied the spherical object in his fingers. “What is it?”

Din steadied himself before he squeezed the metal in his palm. “The shifter knob. The kid loved playing with this thing.”

You softened, smiling as you scooted yourself just a bit closer to his bunk. “I’m glad it survived, then.” You glanced down at your feet, watching as they kicked in the open air. “I’m sorry to hear about the Crest, though. I know how much that ship meant to you.”

Din shrugged. “At least no one was hurt.”

No one but you. It wasn’t hard to imagine how Din had reacted to what happened. On the outside, he put his head down and kept going, but on the inside… it was like losing another home all over again. Like Aq Vetina, the childhood that was torn away from him.

And you hadn’t been there for him.

But that had been his choice, and he had acknowledged that. He chose on your behalf, and he would have to live with that burden, not you. It still didn’t make it any easier to deal with.

Forcing all these complicated thoughts away, you focused on the story you desperately needed to hear, your gaze studying the sharp and gentle curves of his face as you prepared to say it out loud. “What about your helmet?” Your follow-up question came out quieter than you wanted it to. “Who was it for?”

Din’s stare caught yours, and the comfort you found there washed over you in a soothing wave of relief. “It was for Grogu.”

You exhaled a light, silent breath you hadn’t realized you were holding. You may have chastised Din earlier for being jealous, but the truth was you were harboring that very same feeling at the thought of another lover seeing his face before you.

“It was the only way I could find Gideon after he took the kid.” Din’s focus fell to his hands, which were fumbling together on his lap. “I needed to get the coordinates from an Imperial terminal, probably like the one you use on Ptelan, and it required a facial scan.”

“Yeah.” Your voice was a mere breath. “That’s pretty standard protocol for those things.”

“I was hoping to get it done quickly enough to not be noticed, but… an Imperial commanding officer saw me. A drink and some blaster fire later, only one other person who had seen me kept breathing.”

You lifted an eyebrow. “One of the aforementioned allies?”

The corner of Din’s mouth raised slightly as he shrugged. “I guess you could call him that.” He grew more serious as he went on. “Then, when I was saying goodbye to the kid, he wanted to see my face.” Din nodded to himself. “So, I showed him. Grogu and the Jedi both saw my face, and a few others were in the room, too.”

You waited to see if he was done, and when he didn’t continue, you blew out a heavy breath. There was only one word you could come up with. “Wow.”

Din huffed. “Yeah, the feeling’s mutual.”

You gave him a once-over. “So, what’s up with the Creed now? Can you just start showing your face more regularly?”

Din shook his head. His brown eyes were lost, missing that golden sparkle you had already come to adore, as much as you tried not to. “I don’t know. I’ve been trying to find my covert, or at least what’s left of it, but—.”

“What’s left of it?” Your eyes widened in shock.

Din looked up at you with a wrinkled brow. There was an invisible burden weighing his shoulders down even further, and a remnant of grief in his gaze that struck you like a blow to your gut.

You softened. “I’m assuming that’s another story?”

Din forced out a chuckle. “A quick one.” He closed his eyes and let his head fall again, his chin tucked towards his chest. “Most of the covert was wiped out after they revealed themselves to help me get away from Nevarro with the kid.”

Your chest caved in with the heavy weight of sorrow. The urge to reach out and touch him had never been so strong. “Din… I’m so sorry.”

He shook his head. “It was their choice. They knew the risk, and I hadn’t even asked them for help. But…”

You know me. Those were the unspoken words that floated in the tense air between the two of you, now composed of something more familiar and wholesome than the anger that had transpired before. And it was true, you did know him, which is how you recognized the guilt that was painted all over his expression even if you had never seen it on his face before.

Din was clearly ready to move past the topic. “Anyway, it’s…  yeah. It’s complicated. All this shit with the Creed.” He snorted. “Never thought I’d be in this position.”

You raised an eyebrow at him. “It has its advantages.”

Din gave you a hopeful glance. “Yeah?”

“Yeah.” You leaned close enough to playfully rap your fingers against his arm. “As pissed as I still am about it, that was a hell of a kiss, Djarin.”

Din’s face began to flush even as he gave you a once-over. “I had a lot of years I was trying to make up for.”

You twisted your lips at that. Ignoring the small spark of hope that burned inside your belly, you prepared to snuff out his own hopeful flame. “Din…”

“I know.” He sighed. “I’m a few years too late. I made that choice for both of us when I closed the door on what we had.”

You studied him for a long moment, your eyes still addicted to the sight of his face. Learning the tells in his expression was both easy and enjoyable, from the small tugs he gave the corners of his mouth to the furrow in his brow that had become almost permanently etched there. It was then that you thought back to the moment when you first saw him earlier, remembering how he had responded to your initial observation of him.

“I like it, by the way.”

Din’s brow knit together. You chuckled and set aside your pride as you continued.

“What I’m seeing.” You waved a hand over your own face for reference. Din began to flush even more as he smiled shyly down at his hands in his lap. “A lot, actually.”

Din beamed. “That means a lot coming from you, sweetheart.”

You tried, and failed, to ignore the burn that crept up your neck towards your ears. Your smile was impossible to repress as his words filled you with an intoxicating feeling that made you remember why it was so damn hard to cope with him leaving all those years ago. He was the heartbreak you could never quite get over, because he made you feel like you were his whole galaxy.

But one creeping thought broke you out of this trance and stole the smile from your lips. You watched your hands run over your thighs before you got the words out. “You had to go through all of this alone.”

Din tensed, a movement you saw in your periphery that broke your heart all over again. He steadied himself with a breath before responding. “I chose to be alone.” His tone told you everything his words hadn’t: I wish I chose differently.

You closed your eyes, overwhelmed by the tragedy of it all. “I would have stayed, you know. I would have been there with you through all of it if you let me.”

“I know.” The strain of Din’s voice drew your stare back over to him. The way his handsome features were pulled taut in guilt and regret shattered you. “But that’s my burden to bear, not yours.”

You frowned, your sympathy for him being washed away by a new, smaller wave of frustration and anger. “That’s not true, Din.” Your use of his name earned you his gaze again. “You’re not the only one who had to live with the consequences of your choice. What you’ve gone through is way more tragic, but I still had to live on my own, too.” You shook your head at him. “And I didn’t even get a say in it.”

Din blinked a few times at you before he clenched his jaw and looked away. He dug the heels of his palms into his eyes as his shoulders shook with a trembling breath. “I know you don’t want to hear this, and you don’t have to accept it, but I’m gonna say it anyway.”

Din lowered his hands and folded them together, keeping his elbows against his knees as he spoke to the open air of the hold.

“I’m sorry.” His devastated yet sincere brown gaze looked in your direction, but it couldn’t quite meet yours. “I thought I was making a selfless choice, but it was actually a selfish choice. I gave in to my own fear instead of letting you help me through it. I made a decision that we should’ve made together, and what I chose ended up hurting you worse than the alternative would’ve.” He let out a self-deprecating chuckle and ran the back of his thumb over his forehead. “And I’m so fucking sorry for that.”

You had always imagined how good it would feel to hear him try to apologize for what he did without giving him the relief of forgiving him, but as it turned out, you didn’t know him as well as you thought you did. These words were nothing but sincere, and the true remorse within his gaze was impossible to ignore. Din had been mulling over what he did the same way you had ever since he left.

It wouldn’t solve every problem, and it certainly wouldn’t erase all the pain of the last few years, but you were willing to at least absolve some of the suffering he had been subjecting himself to ever since.

You maneuvered yourself close enough to him and his bunk to set a reassuring hand on his shoulder. Din’s brown eyes finally found your gaze with a look that left you breathless for a moment. Once you had gotten your words back onto your tongue, you spoke in a soft voice. “I forgive you.”

Din’s stare flickered between your eyes, his shoulders and his brow lifting as the spark of hope returned. You pressed your lips in to a firm line to stave it off.

“I can’t do more than that, but… I hope that’s at least enough for you to start forgiving yourself, too.”

Din nodded earnestly. “It is.” He lifted a hand to cover yours on his shoulder. “Thank you.”

You returned his nod. It was hard to peel your gaze away from his, but you forced yourself to do it, just as you forced yourself to pull your hand away from him. “You should get some sleep. I can imagine you’ve been losing a lot of that lately.”

Din huffed. “Yeah, that’s an understatement.” He gave you a concerned once-over. “You’ll sleep, too. Right?”

This was another promise you weren’t going to make him, but he didn’t have to know that. He didn’t have to know how hard it was to sleep alone after getting to sleep right by his side for so long. “Right.”

Din nodded once more, clearly satisfied enough with your answer to push himself back into his bunk. The movement concealed him from your view once again. You did the same, letting out a soft breath as you laid your head against the pillow and stared at the shining metal above you again. Each revelation Din had shared swirled around in your mind like a frightful, galactic storm.

There was so much you had missed, so many new wounds and scars across Din’s skin and soul that you hadn’t been there to heal. It made you frustrated, but it also made you ache. Above all, it made you want to be there with him the next time something like that happened to him, to shield him from the galaxy itself.

You just weren’t sure if your heart could take it.

You closed your eyes and willed sleep to come. With the knowledge that Din was so close by, it did, and—of course—it was the best sleep you had gotten in a long time.

You woke to the sound of light clanging in the hold. Sitting up fast enough to nearly whack your head against the top of the bunk, you spotted Din with some of your cooking supplies and relaxed. He glanced at you with wide, apologetic eyes.

“Sorry.” Din chuckled as he lifted what he was holding to show you. “I was hoping you would wake up to the smell of breakfast, not the sound of it.”

You let out a curt laugh and gave your head a fond shake. “It’s okay.” You rubbed your eyes and stepped out of the bunk. “I’m gonna freshen up and see how much time we have left.”

Din nodded as you stepped away to the refresher. It didn’t take long to reset yourself, and you were surprised to see that you only had another hour left of the trip. Thankfully, there wouldn’t be much to brief when it came to the actual mission. You would go in while Din guarded the ship, and after a few minutes, you would come back. Simple as that.

Stars willing.

You went back to the hold, where Din was just finishing with whatever he had fixed up for breakfast. “Thanks so much for doing this, Din.”

Din spared you a smile as he finished plating the meal. “It’s the least I could do to repay you for this.” When he spotted your furrowed brow, he waved a hand to the rest of the ship. “Coming all the way out here with me to get this list.”

You chuckled as you nodded to yourself. “Right.” You kept your tone playful as you accepted the dish he passed you. “It was for the kids, Djarin, not you.”

But Din just kept smiling, his admiration of you so obvious that it made your ears burn. “I know.”

You looked down, bashful, and started to eat your meal. Din did the same, and the two of you ate in peaceful, comfortable silence. It was so nice to have the tension between the two of you resolved, as if the weight of your past had finally been lifted and set you both free. You weren’t sure yet what the future would look like, especially with this mission on the forefront of your mind, but that didn’t matter. Sharing the same space with him was enough for now.

Once you had both finished, you got down to business. “We’re just under an hour away, now.”

Din’s brow shot up. “Wow.” He gestured towards the cockpit. “She’s a hell of a lot faster than the Crest ever was.”

You laughed. “Well, that’s because she’s not an ancient gunship that has to tow massive amounts of cargo and weaponry around.”

Din chuckled and raised his hand. “You got me there.”

You smiled and shook your head, forcing yourself to focus again. “It should be a quick and easy retrieval. You’ll stay on the ship and I’ll head inside to the terminal. I’ll only need a few minutes to cross-check the list.”

Din’s brow wrinkled in concern. “Are you sure you want to go alone?”

“I have to. It’s what I used to do before.” You shrugged. “Haven’t run into any problems doing this yet.”

Din released a steady breath, leaning closer to you without invading your space. “That wasn’t the question.”

You blinked at him, musing upon the same words you had thrown at him last night. You had been avoiding the truth without even realizing it. It had been years since you retired from missions like these, and that made the likelihood of something going wrong much greater. The quiet, creeping chill of fear and dread began to snake up your spine.

Din read your hesitance just as well as he read the rest of you. His hand found your shoulder just as yours had found his last night. “I’ve gone in disguise as an Imperial before, remember? When I first took off my helmet.” He nodded at you. “I’ll do it again if you want me too.”

You wanted to melt at his selflessness and the comfort his gaze was offering you, but instead, you held onto your resolve and shook your head. “I only have one Imperial uniform.” You set a hand over his. “I’ll be fine. I’m just second guessing myself.”

Din held your gaze so intensely that you couldn’t look anywhere but at him. “If anyone can pick up exactly where they left off like this, it’s you.” He offered another reassuring nod. “And I’ll be right here, ready to provide backup if I have to.”

You smiled, gently easing his hand off of you as his words sank in. “Thank you, Din.” You let out a sigh and willed your complicated emotions to go with it. “Let’s look at the schematics.”

Din accepted your topic change with grace, and he followed you up and over to the cockpit. You were able to pull up the schematics of Ptelan’s tiny, Imperial base in blue holographic light, both the hangar and the terminal marked by red dots. You talked him through the entire process, from your disembarkation to the data retrieval and exit. So long as nothing had changed too drastically over the years, it would only take a few minutes.

“I’m gonna get changed.” You gestured with your head to the refresher.

Din nodded. “I’ll clean up and help get things ready.” His gaze cut towards the dishes that still sat out in the hold.

You offered him a smile of gratitude before standing and digging through the cargo crate that contained the dusty Imperial uniform. Brushing it off and double-checking that you had all the pieces, you stepped into the refresher and exchanged your clothes for the stiff uniform. You smoothed out all the wrinkles and straightened your posture, recalling all the things that used to be like second nature to you.

A new wave of dread overwhelmed you enough to force your eyes shut. You steadied yourself with a deep breath. Think of the kids. They need you.

Then it was Din’s words that ran through your mind next. I’ll be right here.

You relaxed. You weren’t alone anymore—at least, not right now. It was more comforting than you cared to admit.

You gained enough faith to finally reemerge from the refresher. Din had already cleaned everything up and was running more drills with his spear when he caught sight of you. He stopped, his stare leaving a warm trail over your body that you tried, and failed, to ignore. You wondered if he understood the power of his gaze without a helmet to hide it.

“What do you think?” The question slipped past your lips before you could stop it. You acted casual as you put your normal clothes away and slipped your weapons into their proper places.

“Honestly?” You glanced at him over your shoulder and nodded. “I think you make everything look good.” You beamed at that. “But seeing you in one of their uniforms is… unnerving.”

You huffed. “Yeah, you and I are in agreement on that.”

The last thing you checked for were your code cylinders, which were thankfully all aligned inside your pocket. You grabbed your datapad and headed towards the cockpit, with Din following close behind.

“We’re almost there.” You sat down and fixed your attention to the comlink on your belt, removing their earpiece and fixing it into its proper place. “Let’s get you set up on the proper comm frequency, then we’ll be ready to land.”

Din nodded, obediently following all your instructions before he slipped his helmet back on and did a test run of the comms. He kept it on as the ship dropped out of hyperspace and headed towards the rainy world of Ptelan.

You had refreshed yourself on all your codes and protocols before, but they still came easy when you were prompted by their comms tower. It was too easy getting assigned to a bay inside the hangar and landing. The hardest part was taking a deep breath and preparing to disembark.

Din stood at the same time you did, his gloved hand finding your shoulder again as he gave it a gentle squeeze. “I’ll be ready.” He nodded to affirm his words. “But you’ll be fine.”

You nodded. There had always been something about him that made you want to embrace your vulnerability, to confess every uncertain thought you had to him and let him fix it. This, however, wasn’t the time. You were more than capable of doing this before, and you would do it again.

“I’ll let you know if I need you.” You tapped your ear as you said the words. Din nodded once more, and as you stepped away to lower the hatch and set off on your small mission, you felt the warmth of his brown gaze behind his visor following you the entire way.

You didn’t want to stop feeling, not now, not ever, and certainly not after this little trip of yours was over. But there wasn’t enough time to dwell on that right now.

Your face went stone cold as you descended the ramp. The usual small group of Imperials came to greet you, a lower-ranking officer flanked by two stormtroopers. You nodded at them and stopped when they stood in your path.

“Welcome to Ptelan,” the officer greeted you. “What’s the reason for your visit?”

“A layover.” You gestured back to your ship. “I’ve spent a fortnight dealing out undercover inspections on various worlds, and Ptelan was the closest outpost for me to rest for a time.”

The officer nodded. “Understood. I don’t envy your position.”

You huffed, the dignified version of a laugh. “Nor do I yours. This planet is quite dreary.”

The officer snickered. “That’s an understatement.”

He stepped aside, letting you through. You steadied yourself with a breath as you walked forward, charting out the path a million times inside your mind. The mess hall wasn’t too far from the hangar, and given how unpopulated this particular outpost was, it was unlikely the terminal you needed was being used. Only a few minutes stood between you and the trip back home.

The trip when you would have to come to terms with Din leaving you again. 

You gave your head a small shake and willed your thoughts to dispel from your clouded mind. It would take all your focus to cross-check this list as quickly as possible, and you weren’t intent on spending an extra second you didn’t have to inside that Imperial base.

The mess hall was quiet, aside from the sounds of the few dispersed Imperial officers and stormtroopers eating their mediocre meals. You headed straight for the terminal, never once breaking your stride as you withdrew the datarod from your pocket. Each breath you took was magnified inside your own ears, the air rushing through your lungs in thunderous waves.

The work was instinctual, mechanical. Your face was scanned, and you tapped through the information to find what you were looking for. A few sly codes later, the updated list of names was running over the vidscreen, and you synced it with your datapad to correct the information you already had.

Just like always, you were done in a few minutes. You exhaled a light sigh of relief as you withdrew your datarod and stuck it back in your pocket. It would be your backup of the data in the event something happened to your datapad, which meant that you were keeping it just as safe as the device tucked in your arm as you turned around to leave.

Before you could slip out, an officer twice your size stepped in, trailed by two stormtroopers as he smirked at you. You stopped just a few feet short of running straight into him, straightening your posture even more and forcing yourself to make direct eye contact.

“Lieutenant.” The man’s voice was arrogant and low as he gestured with his gaze to the squares on your left chest. “You look to be in a hurry.”

You bowed your head for a moment. “Just eager to get some rest, sir.”

“What brings you to Ptelan?”

You repeated what you had told the first officer before. “A layover.”

The officer tilted his head. “From where?”

You told him the first planet name that came to mind. It was near the system, but lacked a strong Imperial presence from what you knew. You held your datapad closer to keep your hands from trembling.

“Ah.” The officer took a step closer to you, and you fought the urge to take a step back. “What did you need the terminal for?”

You lifted your chin higher. “I’m afraid that’s only for my commanding officer to know, Captain.” You narrowed your eyes just enough to look arrogant rather than aggressive. “Our work is delicate.”

“Do you see my rank, Lieutenant?” The captain’s lip snarled. “I am your commanding officer.”

Your jaw tightened. “If you must know, Captain, I was merely confirming the coordinates of my next few inspections.”

The captain reached out a hand to tap your datapad. “Show me.”

You swallowed hard and assessed the room all in a quick moment. He didn’t have much backup, and the few Imperials who had been in the mess hall when you entered were gone. There were only one or two more lingering, their attention drawn to the scene the captain was creating. It would be easy to take all these men down, and as long as you could still run as fast as you used to be able to, you would get to the ship no problem.

It was a split-second decision you had to make, and you did so without hesitation.

You drew your blaster and shot at the captain’s chest, needing him to be fully out of commission due to the size advantage he had on you. The two stormtroopers lunged towards you, but you ducked and turned just in time to shoot one of them down. The other began firing shots that you had to focus on dodging before you could take cover behind a nearby bench and take him down with another shot.

Only the two others in the room were left. You drew a blade from your boot and threw it at one of them, sinking it into the center of their chest as the other received a clean blaster bolt to theirs.

You only spared enough time for a few quick breaths before rising to your feet and running towards the exit. Din had been right; you weren’t so rusty after all.

The thought of him led you to lift your hand to your ear and speak. “Din, get the ship ready for takeoff. I’m—.”

You were forced to cut yourself off and come skidding to a stop when an entire team of stormtroopers stepped out in front of you. Backtracking towards the mess hall, you barely managed to escape their rain of blasterfire, the shots echoing down the corridor. You picked up one of the fallen stormtrooper’s rifles inside the mess hall and jammed the blunt end of it into the panel, sealing the door shut for now—and trapping yourself inside.

With the imminent threat taken care of, you were able to focus on Din’s panicked voice inside your ear. “What is it? Are you okay? I’m hearing a lot of commotion.”

You sighed and closed your eyes. The longer you and Din both stayed here, the more time they would have to get backup, and the harder it would be to get out. He might have been ready to come to your rescue, but you weren’t willing to take that chance.

The children whose names were written inside your datapad and datarod had to come first.

“I’ve been compromised.” You said the words calmly as you strided back over to the terminal. “I’ve locked myself inside the mess hall.”

Din’s response was immediate. “I’m on my way.”

“No.” You practically bit the word out as you activated the terminal once again and began feverishly tapping around its controls. “I’m transmitting the list to the ship’s databank right now. Once it’s done uploading, you need to get out of here.”

Even the crackling of the comm channel failed to hide Din’s disbelieving tone. “What? Why the hell would I do that?”

“We don’t have time for this, Din. If you stay and help me fight, they’ll have enough time to get backup, and who knows if we’ll ever make it out of here after that. You have the chance to go now, and I’m giving it to you.” You huffed to yourself at the cruel irony of it all. “You need to leave me here.”

“That’s not an option.”

Your head snapped over your shoulder when you heard a slicing at the door. The Imperials were beginning to carve a way inside. You tightened your jaw and worked even faster, your desperation mounting. “Those kids need you!”

“And I need you.”

His words gave you pause, as if he had the ability to make the entire galaxy freeze. You blinked at the vidscreen, your brain mulling over his words endlessly. The rawness of them, the vulnerability, struck you all at once.

“I’m not making the same mistake twice. I’m not leaving you again.” Before you could even think of an argument, Din repeated his words from before. “I’m on my way.”

You closed your eyes in selfish relief. He was finally choosing you. Above all else, for better or for worse, he wanted you, even at the risk of his own safety.

It healed the last broken fracture of your heart.

But the pressing matter at hand was quick in disrupting your emotional moment. The Imperials were almost done slicing their way through, and you were standing completely vulnerable to their next attack. You dove towards the nearest table and kicked it over, drawing your blaster and leaning your back against it for cover. After a few breaths, you rose enough to prop your blaster on top of the table, aiming it for whatever poor soul walked in first.

As soon as you saw the first flash of white, you pulled the trigger. The stormtrooper fell, but right behind him was a second one, a trooper who had uncharacteristically decent aim.

You ducked just in time to avoid most of the blow, but part of their blaster bolt still caught your arm. You gasped and clutched the wound with your gloved hand, baring your teeth as you glanced over at it. It had been enough to tear through your uniform and singe your skin, with a small circle of it hit bad enough to bleed.

Okay, so you were still a little rusty. But now you were also pissed off.

You set both hands on your blaster and rose again, firing in precise shots to take down two more troopers. They were the only two advancing on you, with the others distracted by something else—someone else, when you remembered you weren’t here alone.

Sure enough, there were sounds of panicked shouts and gargled last breaths, all without blaster fire. You stood and rushed out with your blaster raised to get a closer look, just in time to see Din run his spear through the last stormtrooper standing there. His visor snapped up at you before the trooper’s body even hit the floor.

“Are you okay?” Din’s modulated voice was a mere breath as he hurried over to you.

You didn’t address his question. “Let’s get out of here.”

Din’s visor found the wound on your arm in record time. “You’re hurt.”

You fought the urge to roll your eyes at him. “Barely. Come on, Mando.” You took his gloved hand and began to lead the way back to the ship. “You might love a good fight, but I’m retired.”

Din huffed at that. “I don’t love it when you’re hurt.”

You scoffed at him. “Barely!”

You tugged him along the corner hard to keep him from arguing with you further. Another team waited for the two of you there, but between you and Din, you were able to make quick work of them. You focused on aiming your blaster as Din went back in with his spear, slicing through his share until the entire team had been taken care of. With a nod, the two of you pressed on.

It was a rhythm you had been missing for a long, long time.

You turned the last corner into the hangar bay, and as it turned out, Din had already taken care of the greeting party on his way to come and assist you. You both had boarded the ship before the next wave of stormtroopers even entered the hangar, leaving their useless shots to clip the exterior hull as you pulled up on the controls and piloted the ship far away from their attack.

Inputting the coordinates back to your current homeworld, you waited to relax until the blue lights of hyperspace were flickering around you again. It was only then that you released the heavy breath you’d been holding, the adrenaline pumping through you and elevating your heartbeat inside your eardrums.

You chuckled and looked over at Din, who had assumed the same leaned-back posture as yourself. “Turns out I underestimated our abilities.” Your tone was nothing but amused as you spoke. “We didn’t have a problem getting out of there before backup arrived.”

Din snorted at that. “It’s always hard to judge how skilled these remnants will be.” He removed his helmet and set it in his lap, allowing you to openly admire his face that glowed in the aftermath of the fight. “Thankfully, Ptelan is in the middle of nowhere, and they probably didn’t want to waste resources on it.”

You hummed at that. Your order for him to leave you was starting to feel embarrassing, but everything had been charged by the past that his mere presence had dug up. The panic of something actually going wrong when it never had before only added to that.

You were about to acknowledge all this when Din spoke up first. “I’m sorry.”

You shot him a confused look. His brow was furrowed, and his gaze was downcast at his helmet. “For what?” You racked your mind for even a mere idea of what he could possibly be apologizing for. “You saved my ass back there.”

Din’s gaze found yours, and the longing there was so strong that it knocked the breath from your lungs. “I went against your wishes by not leaving.” He held a cautious breath. “I just… I couldn’t bear doing exactly what I had done all those years ago, especially after spending so much time regretting it.”

You let out a soft sigh and studied him. Din’s expression was written in guilt and remorse, both of which were so genuine that you could feel those very same emotions yourself by just looking at him. He had just proven to you that he wasn’t the same man he was when he left you, that he had learned from his mistakes and changed.

That was all you had ever wanted, and you had certainly spent enough time dwelling on the what-ifs. You wanted to know what a life with him would be like, a life where you both had made a different choice the day he left.

You stood from your chair, earning Din’s rapt attention as you peeled the helmet from his hands. Half-setting and half-tossing it onto the empty chair behind you, you took its previous place, tearing off your gloves and holding his face to bring it to yours.

There wasn’t a single ounce of regret or uncertainty in this kiss. Instead, it was a shared feeling of relief, a gesture of understanding and desperation that only brought you closer together. Using the hand that had woven into his brown waves, you tilted his head back further, deepening the kiss to prove the sentiment behind your actions.

The way Din pulled your chest against his showed his own understanding.

Still, you spelled out the words on your tongue for him to feel rather than hear, your other hand running along his jaw and gently tightening along the back of his neck. Din hummed into your mouth, the tension having melted from him completely as he melted underneath your touch.

You only pulled away when you had lost your breath, but you stayed close enough for your forehead to lean against Din’s. You opened your eyes, letting your gaze meet his up close like this for the very first time. It sent a jolt of the sweetest electricity throughout your body, proving that you were making the right choice.

“Stay.” You lifted your hand back up to his jaw and ran your thumb over his lips. “If you’re waiting for me to make the choice this time, then that’s what it is.” Your nose brushed his. “I want you to stay.”

Din closed his eyes and exhaled a breath that helped every single feature of his face relax. The small smile that began to tug at the corners of his mouth was breathtaking. “I will.” His eyes reopened to depict his severity as he nodded, minding your head against his. “And I won’t ever leave you like I did before. I promise. I swear.”

“I know.” You ran a hand over Din’s head, brushing his hair back and smiling when his eyelids fluttered in content. “You've just proven that to me.”

Din returned your smile before he kissed you again, but he kept this one brief, his sparkling gaze finding yours again. “I meant what I said the night I left.” His voice was barely a whisper, though every word he said carried its own heavy weight. “And I still do.” Your eyes were beginning to get misty from pure relief as he cradled your face. “I never stopped loving you.”

You beamed at him and whispered your own words upon his lips, the truth of them shocking you. “Neither did I.”

Even amidst all your anger towards him over the years, that love still remained, the same love that seeped into this kiss that could finally take its time. He had carved a part of himself into your heart, and that’s what had made it so difficult to watch him leave. But you knew he wouldn’t do it again. You knew he would stay by your side at all costs this time.

But above all, you knew that he would protect you from the galaxy, and he would no longer doubt his own ability to do so—just like you would protect him, too. Whatever happened next, you were doing it together.

Thank the stars you hadn’t turned your back on that opportunity.

main masterlist • din djarin masterlist

din djarin tag list: @yorksgirl @zenrobbins0021 @cyaredindjarin @cw80831 @maddiedrmr @pigeonmama @violetlilly2020

[wing-ed-thing]

Late Night Study Session (Trafalgar Law x Reader)

Synopsis: You've been studying day and night all week. You can't help but goof off a little.

Word Count: 1.7k

Tags/Warnings: No Reader Pronouns, College AU, Suggestive Language

Notes: I didn't think it'd be here but it's here

“Are you an appendix? Because I have a gut feeling I should take you out.”

”Jesus Christ.”

You thought you just about broke him, your hysterical laugh turning into a wheeze as Law buried his face in his hands. You sat in the study room together. Just about the size of a large closet, the walls of the room were covered in whiteboards. A table, now littered with your laptops and hand-written papers, sat in the center with a large, fancy power strip. 

Law’s coffee sat amongst the empty take-out containers. The caffeinated drinks you had imbibed only contributed to the chaotic table. A warm light glowed overhead, glaring at Law’s scribbles on the whiteboard walls. It glowed a bit brighter than the light panels on the ceiling outside, the motion-activated sensors having dimmed when the new, expensive science building vacated long ago. 

You and Law had your last final together, which unfortunately fell on the last day of finals before move-out. A more advanced anatomy class, your test would encompass all the material you had covered since week one. Of course, this didn’t include the online modules that weren’t covered in class but would also be on the test. Even more, unfortunately, your final exam would make up forty percent of your overall grade. 

Quizzes, notes, and study guides from previous tests sat in a haphazard order across the table, over your empty seats, and pinned to the whiteboards like a detective’s evidence board. Pen ink smudged across the crinkled pages, and a patch of eraser dust lived on the table no matter how many times you tried to brush it away.

You were sure you were the only ones occupying a study room at the hour it was. You had practically been living out of it for the past week in preparation for finals. 

“Are you a heart surgeon? Because I get tachycardia whenever I see you.”

”It’s probably that abomination you’ve been sipping on all night.” Law gestured to one in your small army of drinks. You conjured up a concoction that contained just too much caffeine and sugar. “That stuff will kill you someday.” 

“If it gets me a passing grade, I’ll take ten,” you sighed, perusing a stapled packet of printed questions. You stopped at a page in the middle of the thick collection, taking a moment to think. “You can fill my… caudate nucleus with dopamine anytime.” 

You grinned, looking up at Law, whose already hooded gaze appeared even more narrow. His hand ran across his face, massaging the skin around his eyes. 

“You’ve officially lost it.”

”I lost it a few hours ago; let’s be real.” 

Law paid you little mind, shuffling around his notes before rearranging them in reverse order. For as rapidly as his eyes glanced over them, you knew Law was at his limit. There were only so many times you could look at the same collection of letters scrambled together before your brain fried, and frankly, you and Law had likely overstayed your time in the study room trying to push yourselves. 

You just weren’t afraid to know when it was time to give up.

”Are you a femur? Because you’re… you’re the largest bone in the human body.”

”That one doesn’t even make sense,” Law mumbled, still not entirely focusing on his notes despite his unmoving gaze. “The brachial plexus is formed by the anterior rami of the spinal nerves C5 to T1,” Law recited, a bit of forced certainty laced in his voice. 

“Yeah,” you hummed, playing with a pen and an empty coffee cup. 

“And the median nerve innervates the flexor muscles and the thenar muscles in the hand,” Law spoke definitively, crossing off a point of your massive study guide.

”And?”

Law glanced up at you.

”What do you mean ‘and’?” 

“Forearm. It’s mostly the median nerve you’re gonna lose points if you don’t also mention—”

“Ulnar. Fuck.”

Law threw his packet on the table. He hadn’t been this sloppy when you started that afternoon. But since you took a break to eat dinner— you were sure dinners with you in the study room were the only full meals Law had since the finals crunch began— studying had been futile. 

You had about eighty percent of the material sort of under your belt, but even that was shaky, considering the doomed format of your exams. No one in your class (or any of the other sections) received a passing grade during the midterm, and you were more than sure that even the study guide was a rough basis for what would actually be on the exam. 

“Maybe it’s about time we’ve turned in for the night,” you said quietly. 

Law had thrown his head back as he slumped over the table. A hand covered his eyes. His chest heaved a deep breath. 

The final was a lot of material, almost an impossible amount. You were on your own when it came to studying— the study guide (if you could even call it that)— was a miracle in and of itself. 

You knew that no matter how much you studied, you were bound to come across some curveball question about some obscure minutia you read about once. But Law, on the other hand, Mr. 52/100 on the midterm himself, was as stressed as ever. It didn’t matter that 52 was the highest score across all three sections; he was absolutely beside himself.

“Maybe,” he affirmed. Law would never tell you outright if you were right, even as he began to gather his things. 

You also began gathering your things, discarding your trash in the can, and sweeping your written notes unceremoniously back into plopped binders in your backpack. You finished moments before Law and waited by the door.

The bags under his eyes were more severe than usual, and he carried himself like his body was heavy. Law slouched a bit under the weight of his backpack but ultimately joined you at the door, grabbing it from your grasp to head out together.

You weren’t entirely sure why Law insisted on your study sessions to begin with. As serious and studious as he was, you were sure he had some rigorous study strategy he’d want to do alone. But ultimately, Law insisted that you study together and hardly gave you a choice in the matter. Given how much he talked to himself, you assumed he just wanted a warm body to bounce things off of. 

“Are you an ulnar nerve? Because you’ve got me feeling all the right sensations in my hands and my heart.” You placed your hands over the left side of your chest as you made your way out of the building. 

As you anticipated, the halls were quiet, and your voice bounced off the tiles. The motion-activated lights took a moment to flicker as the two of you passed. The sky outside the windows you walked by was pitch black, and the paths were illuminated only by the campus street lights. 

Law shook his head as the most subtle snort of amusement left his nose. His mouth scrunched together to contain his subtle laugh, but the motion was just enough to brighten his demeanor. The energy around you rose like a breath of fresh air had just wafted through. 

“You’re terrible at those,” Law said, holding the door for you as you stepped outside. 

The night air was cool when you left the building, being just chilly enough to prickle your skin. The streetlights lit up a fair amount of campus, illuminating your path back to the dorms. The door to the science building shut behind you, officially locking you out of the building. 

“Like you could do any better!” you laughed, clutching your backpack straps as you stepped out in front of Law. You pivoted on your heel, only to notice he hadn’t moved. You met his dark eyes with a crinkle of your forehead. 

Your face fell in confusion, which only mounted as Law took two wide strides to close the gap between you. Without warning, his hand found the underside of your face, cupping it firmly to tilt toward his. His other hand was shoved in the pocket of his coat. Your breath hitched as he leaned in.

“Wanna exchange genetic material?”

“Law!” you gasped, nearly shrieking his name in surprise, as your first instinct was to roughly shove him away as heat rose under your skin. You stumbled a few steps down the path, trying desperately to hide the embarrassing expression that graced your face. And when you did turn back to look at him— in sheer astonishment— Law was proudly wearing a pursed-lipped smirk.

“You’re the one who challenged me,” Law hummed with an amused bounce of his brows. He followed as you began in the direction of the dorms. 

“I’d hardly call that an anatomy-themed pickup line!” you exclaimed, your voice a pitch higher than usual. Law reached for your sleeve, a shine in his eyes as he slowed your pace. You kept backing up down the path, playfully tugging him along. Law rolled his eyes.

“Is too. You’re just embarrassed that I made you all flustered—”

“You’re just embarrassed that I trounce you at anatomy-themed pickup lines!”

You hardly finished your sentence before Law used the grip on your hand to his advantage, twirling you around into his arms, backpack and all. The movement felt bulky and heavy to you, but Law kept control over your movements, once again trapping you in proximity.

You lost your voice in your throat as you stared into his dark irises. They appeared even darker in the dim lighting, like the glinting gaze of a leopard as nocturnal bugs chirped around you. He raised a brow, his face swiveling cockily as he delivered his line.

“You wanna learn some real anatomy?” 

“Get outta here!” 

You pressed your palm to his forehead, playfully shoving his head back as Law relinquished you as you covered your hand with your face. Law grabbed your sleeve again, moving in front of you to tug you back to the dorms. 

Maybe he won that round after all, but you’d never tell him that. 

Thank you to all who liked, reblogged, followed, and supported. Your support means so much and is greatly appreciated.

"I was pretty sure you'd sleep in and forget to meet me this morning" “Wouldn't have forgotten if I was sleeping with you" “But look at this.. Jesus.. look at this outfit" vibes

[iindex]

To roll, to crease, to fold, to store, to bend, to shorten, to twist, to dapple, to crumple, to shave, to tear, to chip, to split, to cut, to sever, to drop, to remove, to simplify, to differ, to disarrange, to open, to mix, to splash, to knot, to spill, to droop, to flow, to curve, to lift, to inlay, to impress, to fire, to flood, to smear, to rotate, to swirl, to support, to hook, to suspend, to spread, to hang, to collect, to arrange, to distribute, to pair, to bond, to hinge, to mark, to expand, to dilute, to light, to modulate, to distill, to stretch, to bounce, to erase, to spray, to systematize, to refer, to force, of mapping, of location, of context, of time, of carbonization, of layering, of felting, to continue.

Verblist / Richard Serra / 1967

[ma-mariarie243]

ok so I'm kind of allergic to drawing good things so here's a doodle

[escapismbook]

ESCAPISM CHAPTER SEVEN

Chapter Seven | Vincenzo

→ Pairing: Yoongi x reader (female)

→ AUs/Genre(s): dark romance, smut, mature, mafia

→ Trope(s): professor-student, forbidden romance, dark, sin-evil, passion, slow-burn, seductive, mafia

→ Rating: this is mature/explicit content, so you have been warned.

→ Word count: 3.1k

→ Author’s note: Escapism is a dark romance—intense, poetic, and deeply atmospheric. It explores desire, deception, and the pull of the forbidden. This story contains mature themes, including:   

This story is also written by two authors. Both working on the two couple. Please read with caution. For those who stay, welcome to a world where love and darkness intertwine.

Dedication: Reaches out to cup your cheek, "now be a good girl for me."

(Don't forget to like and comment.)

A small note: When you see the italic font, it means they are speaking in Korean.

SONGS FOR THE CHAPTER |

Nina Simone • I Put a Spell On You

Halsey • Young God

Three days passed in silence. If anyone were to look at Aalia, they would think nothing had happened between her and Yoongi in the car that night. She carried herself with the same quiet grace, the same polite indifference. She did not stumble over her words, did not flinch when she heard his voice in the lecture hall. It was as if she had erased the moment entirely, wiped it clean from her mind. The only time she spoke to him was when he called her name during registration, and even then, it was just a simple, monotone "here." Nothing more. Nothing less.

But he watched her in class, his dark eyes trailing her every movement. She was determined to keep her distance, but it only made him want her more. She was avoiding him, and yet, she was still there, still in his reach, still breathing the same air as him. He could tell she felt his gaze, the way her fingers sometimes twitched when she turned a page in her notebook, the way she adjusted her cross pendant absentmindedly when she thought no one was looking. But she never met his eyes.

And still, he had her cardigan. She had left it in his car in her hurry to escape that night, and he hadn’t given it back. He wasn’t planning to. The soft fabric still carried her scent, something warm and sweet, something purely her. It was a small piece of her, a fragment, and for now, it was enough.

That night, Vincenzo stood in the heart of Seoul, its grandeur veiled under the illusion of just another high-end restaurant. But to those who knew—those who moved in the shadows—it was a different kind of empire. Crimson red, black, gold, and jade green adorned its interiors, reflecting the wealth and power of those who owned it. The Min family’s influence lingered in every corner, though no one outside their world was aware.

The event was for the students who had passed their modules, a celebration of their achievements. Though dining was optional, most were here to drink, to socialize, to bask in their own success. It was an evening of formalities wrapped in elegance. Professors and students alike gathered in tailored suits and delicate gowns, glasses clinking, polite laughter spilling into the air

Aalia sat at an empty table, scrolling through her phone, idly fidgeting with the golden cross pendant resting against her collarbone. No one was at her table; they had all wandered off to either drink at the bar, or dance, leaving her alone. But she didn’t seem to mind. If anything, she looked relieved to be by herself, away from the noise, the laughter, the attention.

And that’s when she saw him. Aalia caught sight of Yoongi walking toward her table. His dark eyes were locked onto her.

“Don’t-“ but before she could even began to finish her sentence, he sat down next to her.

The space between them vanished in an instant, the heat of his body brushing against her own like a whispered sin. His cologne—dark spice and something deeply masculine—curled into her senses, setting her nerves alight. “It’s cute how you think you can tell me what to do, darling,” he murmured, his voice rich with amusement, a slow-burning drawl that wrapped around her like silk. There was something almost lazy in the way he spoke, but the undercurrent of control was unmistakable. His lips curved at the corners, predatory, teasing.

She ignored him. She had to. If she let herself react, she was certain she would combust right there in her seat. Her fingers twitched as she placed her phone face-down on the table, her cheeks burning with heat she couldn’t control. Her stomach twisted in something unfamiliar—something that felt dangerously close to anticipation.

oongi watched her with dark amusement, taking in every detail—the way her delicate fingers curled slightly against the surface of the table, the way her throat moved when she swallowed, the way the dim light played with the soft strands of her half-up, half-down hair. And then his gaze swept lower, taking in the black dress that clung to her frame, the elegant neckline that left the gentle slope of her collarbones exposed. She looked untouchable. Pure. A vision of something that had no place sitting next to a man like him.

"Don't you think you're a little too close?" she asked, tilting her head slightly, her voice steady despite the fire in her veins.

He exhaled a soft chuckle, dark and knowing. "No," he said simply. It was the kind of answer that left no room for argument, as if the thought itself was ridiculous to him.

His gaze flickered downward, catching the way her left thigh crossed over her right leg, the exposed skin of her calf tempting in the dim lighting. Something dark and wicked curled in his chest, and before he could think better of it, his hand slipped beneath the table. His fingertips barely grazed the back of her calf, a slow, featherlight touch that traveled up and down, barely there, yet enough to send an electric jolt through her.

“So you haven’t thought about the kiss?” he asked, his voice quiet, deliberate, each word laced with something dangerous. His fingers continued their slow, teasing path, dragging up and down the soft skin of her calf, as if daring her to lie.

Aalia forced herself to hold his gaze, refusing to let him see how much he affected her. "Not once," she answered, her voice steady, but he caught the slight tremor in her fingers as they curled into her lap.

Without warning, his fingers pressed slightly into her skin, not rough, just firm enough to remind her of his presence, of his control. A small, knowing smirk played on his lips as he watched her expression falter, just for a second.

Then, slowly, deliberately, his touch traveled lower, wrapping around her ankle. His fingers locked around the delicate bone, his grip not harsh, but unyielding, possessive. A silent warning. A silent promise.

He leaned in, his breath warm against her ear. “Liar,” he murmured. The word was soft, but it sent something sharp and electric through her, curling deep into her spine, unraveling everything she was trying to keep together.

He watched as she bit the side corner of her mouth, her teeth grazing the softness of her lower lip, a fleeting moment of hesitation he caught instantly. Aalia was trying—struggling—to keep her mouth shut, and he could see it in the way her jaw tensed, in the way her fingers curled slightly against the table as if grounding herself. He found it amusing. No, more than that. He found it intoxicating. Watching her fight against the urge to say something witty, something sharp and burning, was like watching an angel teeter on the edge of damnation. And he wanted nothing more than to push her over.

He leaned in, close enough that she could feel his breath against her skin, his voice a silken whisper. "Don’t be shy," he murmured. "Tell me what you want to say, Aalia." The way he said her name, like he was swaying her into temptation.

She exhaled sharply through her nose, as if trying to compose herself, before speaking through gritted teeth. "You're insufferable," she said, her voice laced with annoyance, yet something deeper, something she refused to acknowledge. "And I don’t want you kissing me anymore."

For the first time, his smirk faltered, only for a fraction of a second, but it was there. The very thought was inconceivable. He could not imagine a reality where his lips never claimed hers again, where he never got to taste the warmth of her, the soft gasp she made when he took control. It was impossible.

His fingers, which had been tracing up and down the back of her calf beneath the table, now pressed in slightly, just enough to make her breath hitch. "You need a lesson in submission," he said lowly, his voice nothing but a sinful promise.

Her jaw clenched. "I said it before," she said, her eyes burning into his. "You fuck all your students, sir?"

His lips curled into something dark and amused. "No," he said simply, staring straight into her soul. "Just you."

"You didn't."

"Not yet," he murmured, his voice thick with certainty. "But I will."

The air between them was molten, charged with something dangerous and inescapable. He was the devil himself, whispering sweet, dark things into her ear, offering her the apple with a knowing smirk. And she—his angel, his pure and untarnished little saint—was fighting a losing battle.

Aalia tilted her head slightly, something almost taunting in her gaze, though the innocence in her eyes betrayed her. It was like she was trying to be something she wasn’t, and he found it both arousing and endearing. "What happened to when you said you would be patient?" she asked, her voice laced with quiet challenge.

He chuckled, deep and smooth, shaking his head slightly. "I am being patient," he admitted. "I just don’t like the thought of not being able to touch you." His words dripped into her veins like honeyed poison, slow and intoxicating.

Aalia inahled, like she was trying to calm herself and she turned her head, looking away.

His mind drifted for a moment, thoughts slipping into forbidden places. He knew she had never been with anyone. He was the only man who had ever touched her, kissed her, made her feel this way. And yet, all he could think about was what she would sound like moaning his name, her voice trembling as she gasped beneath him. .

"What?" Aalia's sharp voice snapped him from his thoughts.

His gaze refocused, the corner of his lips twitching. "Nothing," he said smoothly, voice deep and teasing. "Just admiring the view."

She exhaled a short, disbelieving laugh. "I shall bid you goodnight," she said and stood up.

He didn’t stop her. He simply watched as she moved through the restaurant, her dress swaying with each step, her golden cross pendant catching the light as she approached the other students and professors, offering her goodbyes. A symbol of purity, of righteousness, wrapped in the dark and dangerous world he inhabited.

And then, his phone rang.

Yoongi barely glanced at the screen before answering, his attention still tethered to Aalia’s retreating figure as she wove through the restaurant, bidding her goodbyes with that quiet grace that both irked and fascinated him. “Yeah?” His voice was a low drawl, detached yet laced with something distant, something lingering.

“Hyun.” Jimin’s voice crackled through the speaker, the unmistakable bass of Kitty Gang’s music thrumming in the background. “Are you coming tonight?”

Yoongi exhaled, pressing his tongue against the inside of his cheek. He hadn’t planned on going tonight, but when Jimin needed him, he was there. “Yeah, I’ll be there.”

“It’s Game Night,” Jimin reminded him, his tone playful. “Oh, and bring that girl you told me about.”

Yoongi’s brows twitched. “I don’t know—”

“Come on,” Jimin’s voice carried that familiar, teasing pout. “I’ll see you soon.”

The call ended before Yoongi could say another word. He clicked his tongue, slipping his phone back into his pocket as his gaze followed Aalia’s exit. With a quiet sigh, he rose from his seat, slipping through the restaurant doors and into the cool night air.

Aalia walked ahead, her frame illuminated by the glow of passing streetlights. She was heading toward the subway station.

She turned a corner, and Yoongi followed. His pace was unhurried, his hands tucked into his pockets as the alleyway narrowed, empty save for the distant hum of city life. The parking lot stretched out on the other side.

She halted to a stop and turned around to face him. “Article 18 of the Anti-Stalking Act punishes stalking with up to three years in prison or a thirty million won fine.”

Yoongi blinked. Then, an amused smirk ghosted his lips. She’s unbelievable. “That so?” His voice was low, lazy, like he was indulging in something sweet on his tongue. “Damn. And here I was thinking I was just walking.”

She exhaled, ready to leave, but before she could, he reached out, catching her wrist. Not tight. Not forceful. Just enough to make her pause.

“Hey.” For the first time, she heard something different in his voice. Not teasing. Not commanding. Just—something softer. Something real.

Her gaze flickered to him, searching.

“Look,” he said, his thumb brushing absentmindedly against the inside of her wrist. “Jimin asked me to bring you to Kitty Gang tonight.”

Aalia stared at him for a moment before, unexpectedly—she laughed. It was the same laugh from that first night. The one that had caught him off guard. A contagious kind of laughter—the kind that made her almond-shaped eyes almost close, her nose scrunch slightly, and her cheekbones lift. It wasn’t the demure, careful giggle that most women gave him. It was unfiltered, real, ringing into the night air like music.

“You—ahhahah…” she tried to compose herself, wiping beneath her eyes. “You’re insane if you think I’m going anywhere with you.”

Yoongi chuckled, the sound deep and slow. “And why is that?”

“I am not going to the nine circles of hell,” she said, still laughing.

If only she knew that beneath the polished façade of neon-lit streets and glistening skyscrapers, there was a Korea few spoke of—a world stitched together by whispered deals and untraceable power. The country prided itself on order, discipline, and prestige, but beneath its surface, a labyrinth of corruption thrived in the shadows.

Money was the real justice here, the invisible hand that dictated who rose and who was buried. The rich played their games behind locked doors, their sins rinsed clean with influence, while the desperate clawed for survival in alleyways no cameras dared to watch.

Kitty Gang was merely an entry point, a playground of temptation laced with something far more insidious. It was a place where the city’s elite indulged in vice, where pleasure and danger bled together under dim, flickering lights. But beyond its velvet ropes and dimly lit corridors, there were darker places still—places where the rules no longer applied, where names were erased with a whisper, and where the devil didn’t bargain, only took what he was owed.

If only she knew that Yoongi was not just a professor or a businessman, but a man living between two lives—one dictated by society’s expectations and another by blood, by legacy, by something far older and far more binding than contracts or degrees. Within the world of crime, his name carried weight, spoken in equal parts reverence and fear. He was not the boss—not yet. His grandfather, the last of the old kings, still sat on that throne, ruling with an iron fist wrapped in silk. But Yoongi was more than just an heir; he had carved his own name into the underworld, praised for his unwavering determination, his unyielding courage, his ability to make decisions that others flinched away from. He was a leader among men, respected for his brilliance, feared for his resolve.

And yet, the stories that surrounded him were never just one-sided. Some spoke of his compassion, the rare moments where his actions were not driven by power but by something human—by a desire to protect, to provide, to ensure the safety of those who belonged to him. Others, however, painted him in an entirely different light. They called him cruel, an oppressor cloaked in wealth and influence, a tyrant who did not rule with words but with fear. A man who did not hesitate to crush anything—or anyone—that threatened what was his.

His smirk widened, but the amusement didn’t quite reach his eyes. “There’s a darker side to the underbelly of Korea, Aalia,” he murmured, stepping closer, his voice dropping to a whisper. “Kitty Gang is just the tip of the iceberg.”

She stilled, her expression unreadable. And then, she did something he hadn’t expected. She stepped even closer. “I,” she said, her voice unwavering. “Am not going anywhere with you.”

She turned, ready to leave, but Yoongi shifted, blocking her path with the ease of someone who had spent years maneuvering shadows.

“You can either walk with me to my car,” he said smoothly, “or I can carry you there. But you’re coming with me, like it or not.”

She scoffed, laughing once more. But when he bent slightly—just enough to reach for her—her laughter cut short.

“Fine!!” she snapped. “I’ll walk.”

Yoongi smirked, stepping back with a small nod of approval. “Good girl.”

With a roll of her eyes, she followed him to his car.

Once inside, she exhaled, staring out of the window. “But I have to be home by eleven.” Yoongi glanced at his silver Rolex, the glow of the dashboard illuminating its face. 7:45 PM. “I’m serious,” she said, turning to him.

He tilted his head, a lazy smirk tugging at his lips. “Alright, alright. You’ll be home by eleven.”

Aalia finally leaned back in the passenger seat, her fingers brushing against the hem of her dress. “Thank you,” she murmured softly.

Yoongi’s fingers tightened briefly on the steering wheel before he glanced at her. His voice was just as soft. “You’re welcome.”

For a few minutes, they drove in silence, the hum of the city passing them by. And then— “Why did you need me to go with you?” she asked, her voice quieter now, less sharp.

Yoongi’s eyes stayed on the road, his expression unreadable. “Once a month, on the last Saturday, Kitty Gang holds a game night.”

Aalia arched a brow. “Game night?”

He nodded. “Every month, it’s a different game.”

She hesitated. “And the game this time?”

He didn’t miss the way her fingers curled slightly on her lap. “Spin the Bottle: Truth or Dare.”

Aalia tensed. Her heartbeat picked up, her throat tightening. “I don’t have to play, right?” she asked, her voice lighter than she felt.

For a moment, Yoongi said nothing. Then, he turned his gaze from the road, looking at her properly. Her expression was different now—guarded. Uneasy. “No,” he said, his voice genuine. “You don’t have to play.”

She nodded slowly, the tension in her shoulders easing. Yoongi returned his attention to the road, but his mind lingered

(you can read ESCAPISM on AO3)

https://archiveofourown.org/works/64009903/chapters/164201557

[roditsch]

My very first oc of signalis... Behold, Swallow!(Even with replika icon)

SBLR-Unit, dexterous replika, sharpshooter and bodyguard

200 cm tall

Loyal defenders of the Nation's leaders, these replicas serve for the benefit of the community, their bioresonance module allows them to detect and assassinate enemies of the people long before they attempt to cause discord or feel if their gestalt wards need protection. Their advanced joint design gives them amazing agility, even with heavy armor, they are able to quickly chase traitors of the Nation.

Schwalbe's personality is characterized by high stability, however, a strong trigger factor for personality degradation is long-term work with regular murders, it is noticed that Schwalbe begins to behave more apathetically, and nervous system overloads often occur. To prevent such conditions, they should be sent to "rehabilitation" every few years, where memories of eliminated gestalts are erased or replaced.

In general, the Schwalbe look harsh, but in everyday contact they show peace and even a sense of humor, which they skillfully select for the interlocutor. They prefer board games as fetishes.

In the foreground is Schwalbe Juwel (German: treasure), one of the oldest swallows, who has been escorting the family [space intentionally left blank] on the Rotfront for more than one generation. A mature woman, principled and stubborn

Barn swallows were always my favourite birds since childhood, I admired their elegance and speed in the flight

[mightyflamethrower]

“Name me a single objective we’ve ever set out to accomplish that we’ve failed on. Name me one, in all of our history. Not one!”

-President Joe Biden, August 16, 2023 

Joe Biden in one of his now accustomed angry “get off my grass” moods dared the press to find just one of his policies/objectives that has not worked. Silence followed.

Perhaps it was polite to say nothing, given even the media knows almost every enacted Biden policy has failed.

Here is a summation of what he should instead apologize for.

Biden in late summer 2021 sought a 20th anniversary celebration of 9/11 and the 2001 subsequent invasion of Afghanistan. He wished to be the landmark president that yanked everyone out of Afghanistan after 20 years in country. But the result was the greatest military humiliation of the United States since the flight from Vietnam in 1975.

Consider the ripples of Biden’s disaster. U.S. deterrence was crippled worldwide. China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea almost immediately began to bluster or return to their chronic harassment of U.S. and allied ships and planes. We left thousands of allied Afghans to face Taliban retribution, along with some Western contractors.

Biden abandoned a $1 billion embassy, and a $300 million remodeled Bagram airbase strategically located not far from China and Russia, and easily defensible. Perhaps $50 billion in U.S. weaponry and supplies were abandoned and now find their way into the international terrorist mart.

All our pride flags, our multimillion gender studies programs at Kabul University, and our George Floyd murals did not just come to naught, but were replaced by the Taliban’s anti-homosexual campaigns, burkas, and detestation of any trace of American popular culture.

Vladimir Putin sized up the skedaddle. He collated it with Biden’s unhinged quip that he would not get too excited if Putin just staged a “minor” invasion of Ukraine. He remembered Biden’s earlier request to Putin to modulate Russian hacking to exempt a few humanitarian American institutions. Then Russia concluded of our shaky Commander-in-Chief that he either did not care or could do nothing about another Russian invasion.

The result so far is more than 500,000 dead and wounded in the war, a Verdun-stand-off along with fortified lines, the steady depletion of our munitions and weapon stocks, and a new China/Russia/Iran/North Korean axis, with wink and nod assistance from NATO Turkey.

Biden blew up the Abraham accords, nudged Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States over to the dark side of Iran, China, and Russia. He humiliated the U.S. on the eve of the midterms by callously begging the likes of Iran, Venezuela, Russia, and Saudi Arabia to pump more oil that he had damned as unclean at home and cut back its production. In Bidenomics, instead of producing oil, the president begs autocracies to export it to us at high prices while he drains the nation’s strategic petroleum reserve for short-term political advantage.

Biden deliberately alienated Israel by openly interfering in its domestic politics. He pursued the crackpot Iran Deal while his special Iranian envoy was removed for disclosing classified information.

No one can explain why Biden ignored the Chinese balloon espionage caper, kept mum about the engineered Covid virus that escaped the Wuhan lab, said not a word about a Chinese biolab discovered in rural California, and had his envoys either bow before Chinese leaders or take their insults in silence—other than he is either cognitively challenged or leveraged by his decade-long grifting partnership with his son Hunter.

Yet another Biden’s legacy will be erasing the southern border and with it, U.S. immigration law. Over seven million aliens simply crossed into the U.S. illegally with Biden’s tacit sanction—without audits, background checks, vaccinations, and COVID testing, much less English fluency, skills, or high-school diplomas.

Biden’s only immigration accomplishment was to render the entire illegal sanctuary city movement a cruel joke. Given the flood, mostly rich urban and vacation home dwellers made it very clear that while they fully support millions swarming into poor Latino communities of southern Texas and Arizona, they do not want any illegal aliens fouling their carefully cultivated nests.

Biden is mum about the 100,000 fentanyl deaths from cartel-imported and Chinese-supplied drugs across his open border. He seems to like the idea that Mexican President Obrador periodically mouths off, ordering his vast expatriate community to vote Democratic and against Trump.

Despite all the pseudo-blue collar dissimulation about Old Joe Biden from Scranton, he has little empathy for the working classes. Indeed, he derides them as chumps and dregs, urges miners to learn coding as the world covets their coal, and studiously avoids getting anywhere near the toxic mess in East Palestine, Ohio, or so far the moonscape on Maui.

Bidenomics is a synonym for printing up to $6 billion dollars at precisely the time post-Covid consumer demand was soaring, while previously dormant supply chains were months behind rebooting production and transportation. Biden is on track to increase the national debt more than any one-term president.

In Biden’s weird logic, if he raised the price of energy, gasoline, and key food staples 20-30 percent since his inauguration without a commensurate rise in wages, and then saw the worst inflation in 40 years occasionally decline from record highs one month to the next, then he “beat inflation.”

But the reason why more than 60 percent of the nation has no confidence in Bidenomics is because it destroyed their household budgets. Gas is nearly twice what it was in January 2021. Interest rates have about tripled. Key staple foods are often twice as costly—meat, vegetables, and fruits especially.

Biden has ended through his weaponized Attorney General Merrick Garland the age-old American commitment to equal justice under the law. The FBI, DOJ, CIA, and IRS are hopelessly politically compromised. Many of their bureaucrats serve as retrieval agents for lost Biden family incriminating laptops, diaries, and guns. In sum, Biden criminalized opposing political views.

Biden has unleashed the administrative state for the first time in history to destroy the Republican primary front runner and his likely opponent. His legacy will be the corruption of U.S. jurisprudence and the obliteration of the American reputation for transparent permanent government that should be always above politics, bribery, and corruption.

If in the future, an on-the-make conservative prosecutor in West Virginia, Utah, or Mississippi wishes to make a national name, then he has ample precedent to indict a Democrat President for receiving bad legal advice, questioning the integrity of an election, or using social media to express doubt that the new non-Election-Day balloting was on the up-and-up, or supposedly overvaluing his real estate.

The Biden family’s decade-long family grifting will likely expose Joe Biden as the first president in U.S. history who fitted precisely the Constitution’s definition of impeachment and removal—given his “high crimes and misdemeanors” appear “bribery”-related. If further evidence shows he altered U.S. foreign policy in accordance with the wishes from his benefactors in Ukraine, China, or Romania, then he committed constitutionally-defined “treason” as well.

Defunding the police, and pandemics of exempted looting, shoplifting, smashing, and grabbing, and carjacking merit no administrative attention. Nor does the ongoing systematic destruction of our blue bicoastal cities, Los Angeles, New York, Portland, San Francisco, Seattle, and Washington, D.C. All that, along with the disasters in East Palestine or Maui are out of sight, out of mind from a day at the beach at Biden’s mysteriously purchased nearly 6,000 square-foot beachfront mansion.

Biden ran on Barack Obama-like 2004 rhetoric (“Well, I say to them tonight, there is not a liberal America and a conservative America — there is the United States of America).”

And like Obama, he used that ecumenical sophistry to gain office only to divide further the U.S. No sooner than he was elected, we began hearing from the great unifier eerie screaming harangues about “semi-fascists” and “ultra-MAGA” dangerous zealots, replete with red-and black Phantom of the Opera backdrops.

What followed the unifying rhetoric was often amnesties and exemptions for violent offenders during the 120 days of rioting, looting, killing, and attacks on police officers in summer 2020.  In contrast, his administration lied when it alleged that numerous officers had died at the hands of the January 6 rioters. In addition, the Biden administration mandated long-term incarceration of many who committed no illegal act other than acting like buffoons and “illegally parading.”

The message was exemptions for torching a federal courthouse, a police precinct, or historic church or attempting to break into the White House grounds to get a president and his family—but long prison terms for wearing cow horns, a fur vest, and trespassing peacefully like a lost fool in the Capitol.

Finally, Biden’s most glaring failure was simply being unpresidential. He snaps at reporters, and shouts at importune times. He can no longer read off a big-print teleprompter. Even before a global audience, he cannot kick his lifelong creepy habit of turkey-gobbling on children necks, blowing into their ears and hair of young girls, and squeezing women far too long and far too hard.

His frailty redefined American presidential campaigning as basement seclusion and outsourcing propaganda to the media. And his disabilities only intensified during his presidency. Biden begins his day late and quits early. He has recalibrated the presidency as a 5-hour, 3-day a week job.

If Trump was the great exaggerator, Biden is our foremost liar. Little in his biography can be fully believed. He lies about everything from his train rides to the death of his son to his relationship with Biden-family foreign collaborators, to vaccinations to the economy. Anytime Biden mentions places visited, miles flown, or rails ridden, he is likely lying.

Biden continues with impunity because the media feels that a mentally challenged fabulist is preferable to Donald Trump and so contextualizes or ignores his falsehoods. Never has a U.S. president fallen and stumbled or gotten lost on stage so frequently—or been a single small trip away from incapacity.

So, yes, Biden’s initiatives have succeeded only in the sense of becoming successfully enacted—and therefore nearly destroying the country.

[anastasia-queen]

What Will Happen to the DCFDTL if they were decommissioned or caramelization?

If Delightful Children from Down the Lane became decommissioned, they likely became new people with no sense of any memories related to the KND and their forceful alignment with Father. However, considering the Delightfulization that affects Sector Z appears as a weird radiation effect, which seems to grow stronger over time (via its ability to override recommissioning), indicating the Delight Children will shortly become new people only to be forceful and delightfulized again.

However, this time, they will become a blank slate with no personality because there are no remnants of Sector Z's influence to draw from an origin. (Remember, Decommissioning removes all memories)

The main reason the Delightfuls have so much free will is that when Sector Z was being delightfulized, a fuse occurred, causing the machine to increase its power, which caused side effects that otherwise would not exist, so instead of imagining a complete blocking between Sector Z and The Delightfuls. There is now a rift for some elements of Sector Z qualities to sweep through. The only element that Decommissioning would do is likely to erase all traces of Sector Z permanently (and the delightful temporarily) because of that rift.

In the best of words- Yeah, no Decommissioning, The DCFDTL will be significantly worse in every way.

As for Caramelization. Caramelization removes the primary personality that is cherished and reduces them to opposite counterparts. There are so many implications to this because it depends on what the Delightfuls consider their primary personality that is cherished assuming the Caramelization only affects their delightful side this will cause new incarnations of them to be similar to the original counterparts of Sector Z of rebellious kids but they lack any sense of order and loyalty, but they may be morally good because they the opposite of the DCFDTL.

However, assuming the Caramelization of both Sector Z internally and DCFDTL because that set link between the two does exist it could be something similar to Sector Z by being rebellious but not necessarily being good because rebellious is not only aligned with being good, which likely means they would be morally inconsistent or neutral because the morality and loyalty of Sector Z and DCFDTL are taken away.

They also might be massively fearful and shameful because they lack the honor and pride of both Sector Z and The Delighfuls.

The only other effect of Caramelization would be on the DCFDTL will likely restore some partly or alter their physical appearance, and it would restore all of Sector Z's memories because if the delightful consider their obedient and loyalness as their cherished personality which naturally from Delightfulization means they will be undelightfulaztion thus restore their memories. However, they still would be under the influence of Caramelization regardless.

The problem with this situation of potentially bringing back Sector Z is that Caramelization is a difficult process to achieve properly and only occurs every five years on June 5th.

Also, we have to take into account whether or not Caramelization is more powerful enough to override delightfulization. We comparing an ancient rituals of unbeknownst powers to horrifically almost incalculable scientific experiments gone wrong. It's hard to say which would win.

I know Monty/Numbuh Zero say from Operation Z.E.R.O that Delightfulization is permanent and a transformation like this is only temporality at best. However, we have to remember he only says this because he only accounts for the current power recommissioning module. He didn't account for various possibilities outside the recommissioning module.

Personally, for me, the best solution for Sector Z's return is either Caramelization and seeing if they can learn and behave like their original counterparts from their now-restored memories, increasing the power of the recommissioning module to eleven billion-fold for permanently overriding effects of delightfulization, or Caramelization them first and then using the recommissioning module assuming to restore them to normal assuming Caramelization can fully removed delightfulization.

However, one relative undiscussed way to temporarily save Sector Z is by a high voltage of light which directly hits their eyes causing a transformation considering how Sector V (Numbuh 2-5) got undelightfulized from Operation D.A.T.E from a very strong camera flash.

Obviously, you probably need a huge sense of power to cause a massive fuse of light exposure to combat eleven billion power of delightfulization, like maybe a conveniently placed Master Fuse Box in a room can do the job. Who Knows. I let you think about that.

Sorry if my grammar is bad, I pretty much rushed this.

New Edit:

Sidenote about caramelization. Did anyone else find it interesting that caramelization has all properties and attributes similar to recommissioning, decommissioning, and delightfulization? Think about it.

Caramelization can restore the physical and mental properties of a person after consuming the cameral candy, just like recommissioning. Evidence for this is Henrietta because after losing her original physical beauty and compassion from caramelization she became an overweight masculine figure with overall selfish desires. However, after consuming the cameral candy, not only was her physical restored, but her mental capacity of kindness was restored.

Numbuh 2 and Numbuh 5 are great examples of caramelization effects similar to decommissioning. Think about it. After Numbuh 2 got caramelized losing his intelligence he became utterly clueless around his surroundings like Monty was utterly incapable of acknowledging KND activity near his vicinity or actual home. (There is a massively huge KND facility treehouse growing inside (not outside) in his home and he doesn't acknowledge it.)

As for the Numbuh 5 example, after she got caramelized, she became utterly incapable of using any learned skills and coordination. It is very similar to how Sector V lost its ability to coordinate after decommissioning.

As for delightfulized comparison, although very slim does exist via interesting Numbuh 1 and Numbuh 5 transformation via having a very dork-inspired design with Numbuh 1 clothing and Numbuh 5 nerdy look of pigtails and rectangular glasses. Also, there is a bit of a weird side effect of caramelization which seems to be that people often tend to mess up their teeth via comically large overbite, underbites, crooked teeth, or gap teeth.

It is very similar to Lenny in how he only is the main delightful who has weird side effects about a helmet that is there to protect his headgear for his teeth. How very interesting and similar it is to caramelization.

[republicsecurity]

Collar with Reason

“Go on,” the second Enforcer said, his tone mockingly encouraging. “Stand up. Walk around. Tell us how it feels to be on the receiving end of the system you love so much.”

D3X19’s face flushed red, his movements stiff and unnatural as the collar guided him to his feet. The two armored Enforcers watched with barely concealed amusement as he stumbled forward, his posture rigid, his head lowering involuntarily as the collar took control.

“See?” the first Enforcer said, his voice dripping with sarcasm. “Perfect unity. Just like you said.”

The second Enforcer chuckled. “Maybe next time you’ll think twice before lecturing us about empathy.”

D3X19 glared at them, his jaw clenched, but he didn’t say a word. The collar wouldn’t let him.

The buzz of the collar stopped abruptly as the first Enforcer tapped a command on his wrist panel. With a soft click, the device unlocked and fell away, leaving a faint red mark on D3X19’s neck. He exhaled sharply, his hand immediately going to his throat, rubbing it as if trying to erase the sensation.

“Why did you—” he started, but his voice cracked, raw from the suppression.

The first Enforcer rose from his seat, his armor towering over D3X19’s much smaller frame. The sheer bulk of the suit made him seem almost otherworldly, a sharp contrast to the younger conscript’s crisp black overall and slight, almost frail build.

“Because we like you,” the armored Enforcer said, his voice surprisingly soft as it resonated through the modulator. He reached out with his gloved hand, placing it firmly but gently on D3X19’s shoulder. The gesture, though meant to be comforting, made D3X19 flinch slightly under the sheer weight of the gauntlet.

The second Enforcer stood as well, his visor depolarizing to reveal a faint grin on his face. “Exactly,” he added. “You’re one of us, D3X19. We’re on the same side. Always will be.”

Before D3X19 could reply, the first Enforcer pulled him into a sudden hug. His gloved arms wrapped around the smaller conscript with surprising care, though the sheer size difference made D3X19 look like a child caught in the embrace of a steel giant. The younger conscript stiffened at first, unsure how to respond, but the gesture’s sincerity began to sink in.

The second Enforcer joined in, his armored arms enveloping both of them. “We had to give you a taste,” he said, his tone almost apologetic. “Not to humiliate you, but to help you understand. Sometimes, it’s good to see things from the other side.”

D3X19’s head barely reached their chests, his shaved scalp brushing against the cold plating of their armor. He let out a shaky breath, his arms awkwardly rising to return the hug. His small hands pressed against the hard surfaces of their suits, a stark reminder of how different their roles—and their experiences—were.

“You’re good at what you do,” the first Enforcer said, pulling back slightly but keeping his hands on D3X19’s shoulders. “Better than most. But don’t lose sight of the people on the other end of this system. They’re not just problems to be solved. They’re human, just like you.”

[iglok]

A very rough storyboard-ish thing I’ve done (I may finish it one day, for now it is what it is lol)

By the way, I need to know your opinion, I’m having some thoughts on some cast choices.

I’m wondering if Agent Stone wouldn’t be a good choice for Sevika, since we kinda got his in-game module (and if he were Sevika, Rouge would most likely just be Grayson or someone else). Also, I feel like Infinite’s storyline is kinda similar to Victor’s (don’t ask me, I just feel like they resonate with each other, the whole „I want to erase my imperfect self and create a better version of me” thing and the mask and all). However, I really feel like Espio should be Victor, for the sake of his close friendship with Silver (Jayce).

I feel like Infinite could be Maddie-ish (Scourge doesn’t work as Maddie at all), while some points of his storyline could be transferred to Espio’s character. I would need a lot of modifications for this to work but I’m sure it would. On the other hand Mephiles as both Ambessa and Maddie would work too ig

Please, just let me know your thoughts, I need to think!

[projectmeiko]

𝐍𝐨𝐰 𝐥𝐨𝐚𝐝𝐢𝐧𝐠. . .

☆彡彡 DAY 113 ミミ☆

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Module: Border Break Operator, Nagisa Replica

Hairstyle: Scarlet, Default

Accessories: None

Song: Erase or Zero