#like having one side of it slide in and “shrink” the other part of the screen... one day

[betty-burnout]

Rekha Shankar as Usha Rao/G13 and Izzy Roland as Paula Donvalson/Jack Manhattan in Dimension 20: Never Stop Blowing Up

Music: Femininomenon by Chappell Roan and Femininomenon (Instrumental) by Songs Without Vocals (on YouTube)

[blueberrisdove-sideblog]

Food for thought: imagine lion!mydei with a prey reader!!! Yk, toss in some dub con and predator/ prey dynamics 🤭. Oh, the way us floofy ears would twitch and his tail would wrap around your leg!!

I'm absolutely convinced mydei is 10000% mean man when it's between the sheets.

Have a good day/night <3. I rlly luv your works and what's your secret to writing rlly good smut? Teach me your ways professor!

𓈒ㅤׂ 𝜗𝜚 warnings : nsfw/smut, bunny fem!reader, creampie, multiple of rounds, spanking, size kink, breeding kink, biting, huge dubcon alert, multiple of orgasms and tit slapping and other stuff. ^.^

𓈒ㅤׂ 𝜗𝜚 note : tysm! i’m glad you enjoyed my writing sweetie. And I don’t really have a secret lmao! i’ve been writing long stories ever since I was 11. also reader is implied to be chubby and curvy! also not proof read (as always).

The forest was quiet. Too quiet.

You should have noticed it earlier—the way the birds had stopped singing, the way the wind had died down as if holding its breath. But you were a bunny, and a very stupid one at that. Soft and slow and terribly, terribly unaware.

That was why you didn’t realize you were being hunted until it was far too late.

A branch cracked. Your ears twitched, your breath hitched, and then—

A massive force slammed into you from behind, knocking you down into the dirt. Your heart pounded as you scrambled to flee, but it was useless. Large, clawed hands pinned you down, pressing your softer, squishier body into the earth. A deep, rumbling growl ghosted over the shell of your ear, and your instincts screamed.

Predator.

Your body locked up in fear, trembling beneath the sheer weight of the beast above you. You had heard the stories of the lion-king before—the ruthless ruler of the wilds, the monster who tore through his prey with teeth and claw. And yet, when he dipped his head, sniffing along the side of your neck, he didn’t bite.

He inhaled. Deeply.

And then, to your absolute horror, he groaned.

“Fuck,” the lion rumbled, his voice thick, heated, laced with something primal. His heavy tail coiled around your thigh, holding you in place. His hips rolled against yours, and you felt it—the thick, hard shape of him pressing against your ass. “You smell too sweet to eat, little rabbit.”

His tongue flicked out, running a slow, wet trail up your throat. You shuddered, trying to shrink away, but his hands only gripped you tighter, claws grazing against your skin.

“You’re lucky,” Mydei murmured, his lips brushing against your ear. “I’m hungry for something else.”

Your breath hitched when he grinded against you again, slow and deliberate, letting you feel just how big he was. Your body betrayed you, heat pooling low in your belly despite the fear still prickling at your spine. His hand moved, fingers dragging down your stomach, teasing at the plush softness there before dipping lower.

“Gonna ruin this dumb little bunny cunt,” he growled. “Make you scream for me.”

You whimpered, but there was no escape.

The lion had caught his prey. And he wasn’t letting go.

A rough hand forced your back into an arch, making you whimper as your ass lifted higher. Mydei chuckled, low and dark, his heavy tail coiling tighter around your plush thigh. The fur was deceptively soft against your skin, a contrast to the ruthless grip he had on you.

“Look at this,” he murmured, his large palm sliding over your hips, groping the softest parts of you like he was testing his prize. “Built to be fucked. You were never meant to run, little thing—just to be caught.”

A sharp smack landed across your ass. You yelped, lurching forward, but he dragged you back with ease. Another slap—harder this time—sent a hot sting rippling through your body, making your legs twitch. Your fluffy tail twitched too, betraying you, and he laughed.

“Sensitive,” he mused, palming your sore flesh before delivering another punishing slap. “You get wet from this, don’t you?”

You shook your head, ears flopping as you whimpered, but you both knew the truth. His fingers slid lower, past the heat pooling between your thighs, and—fuck—he found you already slick.

“Stupid little thing,” he purred, rubbing slow, teasing circles against your clit. “What kind of prey gets wet for their predator?”

You gasped as he slid a thick finger into you, then another, stretching you open in cruel, lazy strokes. Your walls fluttered, trying to take him deeper, trying to milk something that wasn’t even inside you yet. Mydei groaned, nosing against the base of your fluffy ears, dragging his teeth lightly along them.

“Bet you’ll take my cock just as easy,” he murmured. “Gonna make you mine. Stuff you so full, you’ll never be able to run again.”

Your thighs trembled as he pulled his fingers away, leaving you empty and aching. Then—something hotter, heavier, pressed against your entrance. You gasped at the sheer size of it, instinct screaming again, but his tail tightened around your thigh, holding you still.

“You’re made for this,” Mydei rasped, rubbing the thick head of his cock against your slick folds. “Made to take my seed, to be bred nice and full.”

He thrust in, stretching your pussy open, forcing a ragged cry from your throat. Your fingers clawed at the dirt, your ears pressing flat against your head as your walls clenched around him, trying to adjust to the sheer size of him.

"That’s it," he groaned, his grip on your hips bruising. “Gonna make you all mine, little thing.”

And with another rough thrust, he set a brutal, unrelenting pace.

Each thrust was brutal, knocking you forward only for Mydei to yank you back onto his cock, forcing you to take him deep. Your plush thighs shook, your body burning with overstimulation, but he didn’t let up.

“Ngh—too much—” you gasped, voice breaking between ragged moans. Your ears twitched wildly with each slam of his hips, your tail fluffing up in distress.

“Too much?” Mydei echoed, voice dripping with mockery. His claws dragged down your sides before settling on your tits, gripping them roughly, squeezing the soft flesh between his fingers. “You’re dripping all over my cock, little thing. You love this.”

You whined as he pinched your nipples, rolling them between his fingers before slapping your tits, making them bounce from the impact. Your body betrayed you—each slap sent a fresh pulse of heat straight to your core, making your walls clamp down even tighter around him.

"Fuck," he growled, his tail curling possessively around your thigh. “Look at you. Dumb little prey, taking my cock so well. Taking it like you were made for it.”

Your arms gave out, leaving you to slump forward onto your elbows, tits pressing into the dirt. Mydei loomed over you, his golden mane brushing against your back as he fucked you harder, deeper, his breath hot against your nape.

"You’re mine," he groaned, one clawed hand gripping the back of your neck, keeping you in place. "Say it."

You could barely think, barely breathe, pleasure crashing over you in waves. His cock was splitting you open, dragging against your walls in a way that had your stomach twisting in knots. Making your ears flattened as your tail fluffed up.

“Mydei—“ you whimpered.

His hips snapped forward, making you scream.

“Say it.”

“I—I'm yours!” you sobbed, voice breaking into a desperate wail. “Yours—your prey—your—ahhh!”

His teeth sank into the side of your throat, claiming you fully, and your vision went white as you came hard around his cock, your walls milking him greedily.

“Good fucking girl,” he snarled, his thrusts turning erratic. His hands clamped down on your hips, holding you still as he drove into you one last time, pressing himself deep.

Heat flooded your insides as he spilled inside you, thick and so much—your already-sensitive body trembled as you felt it seep even deeper. His cock throbbed, pumping more and more into you, and Mydei let out a pleased growl, licking over the fresh bite mark on your throat.

“Mine,” he murmured again, his hands smoothing over your plush body, possessive and satisfied. “And now… you're bred.”

His tail remained wrapped around your thigh, keeping you close.

You weren’t going anywhere.

Your body trembled beneath him, overstimulated and wrecked, but Mydei wasn’t done with you. His cock still twitched inside your soaked, swollen cunt, a low growl rumbling in his chest as he shifted his weight over you. His tail curled tighter around your thigh, keeping you spread open, forcing you to take every last drop of his seed.

“You look so fucked-out already,” he murmured, one large hand smoothing down your spine before gripping your hips again. “But I’m not done with you yet, little prey.”

You shivered as his hand ghosted lower, spreading your ass to watch his cum leak out of you. He groaned at the sight, his claws digging into your plush flesh. “Already dripping, and I haven’t even knotted you yet.”

Your ears twitched weakly, your breathing still ragged as you turned your head to look back at him. Your wide, dazed eyes shimmered in the dim light, glassy and unfocused—doe-eyed and utterly lost. Mydei sucked in a sharp breath, his cock throbbing at the way you gazed up at him, helpless and ruined.

“Fuck,” he growled. His hand suddenly snaked around your waist, dragging you up off the dirt. You gasped as he pulled you flush against his chest, your legs barely able to hold you up as his cock throbbed deep inside your cunt.

“You’re looking at me like you still don’t get it,” he murmured against your ear. His palm slid up your soft belly before grabbing your tits, squeezing, toying with the sensitive flesh. “You thought I’d stop after one round? Thought I’d just let you go?”

You whined, jolting as he suddenly slapped your tits, making them bounce under his grip. Your whole body jiggled from the impact, heat blooming across your skin, and Mydei “groaned” as his cock twitched inside you.

“You’re mine,” he rasped, rolling your hard nipples between his fingers before giving another sharp slap to your tits, watching them jiggle in his grasp. “Mine to fuck, mine to fill—“

His other hand suddenly slammed against your lower belly, pressing down right where his cock stretched you open. You gasped, your walls fluttering around him as he chuckled darkly.

“Feel that?” he purred. “Right here. My cock, stuffing you so full.”

You sobbed, your hips twitching as he began grinding against your overstimulated clit, pressing down on your belly with every slow, deep thrust.

“Too much—Mydei, please—”

“Please?” he mocked, nosing along your flushed cheek. “Please what, little prey? Please keep fucking you? Please breed you again?"

Your mind was fogged with pleasure, your body trembling in his grasp, but you still managed to choke out a desperate, ruined—

“Yes!”

Mydei snapped.

His tail tightened around your thigh as he slammed you back onto his cock, spearing you open, making your tits bounce wildly with each punishing thrust. You could do nothing but whimper, drool spilling from your lips as your walls spasmed around him, milking him for more.

“Fuck—you’re perfect,” he groaned, licking over your ear before biting down on your shoulder, claiming you. “Gonna fill you up again. Gonna knot you—make sure my seed takes—“

You let out a choked cry as he pressed his palm against your belly again, feeling himself inside you, knowing he was going to breed you until you couldn’t take anymore.

Until you were nothing but his.

© 2024-2025 blueberrisdove-sideblog all rights reserved. pretty please, do not steal my dividers, translate and plagiarize any of my works, or either repost my works in any other platform without asking, thank you!

[ceilidho]

fear of god

prompt: There's someone outside the spacecraft. You don't remember them being part of the crew. Part 1 masterlist

-

In the end, gazing out of the ship's portholes into the dark vastness of space proves to be less comforting than the architects must have originally anticipated. You can attest to this more than most.

Every morning, you get up an hour earlier than the rest of your crew and make your way to the galley to make your morning cup of coffee. A pack of instant crystals into your favorite mug and hot recycled water from the kettle. Sometimes you stay to have breakfast, but often you take your coffee with you to the main viewing deck for your morning sojourn. 

There, you sit curled up in the navigator’s chair and stare out of the flight deck window until your breathing levels out. Early morning meditations. With the sun only visible through the rear porthole, the Milky Way stretches out before you, immeasurably vast. Ancient cosmic entities, some already long dead. 

Stars fill your field of vision like an intricate latticework of varying brightness. The watery glass warps at the edges, bending the far off light. All things with their propensity for brightness and decay.

A deep, steady hum fills the room. It’s cathartic to be alone. Sometimes, when you look out into the depths of space, you imagine yourself as a cartographer of old, labeling everything beyond this point: “here there be dragons.” 

Farah is the first person to join you, the ship’s maintenance technician already washed and dressed, floral cumberbund cinched around her midriff and her headwrap pinned in place. She greets you with a firm nod upon her entry, never one to mince words. In the months since your ship set off on its course for Jupiter, you’ve exchanged all of ten words, most of your conversation one-sided. 

She glides in like she’s been up for hours, likely running through her routine maintenance checklist. Monitoring propulsion, life support, and all critical systems. You wouldn’t doubt if she had been, descending into the bowels of the ship and cataloging every minute difference from the day before. Nothing if not thorough. 

Graves sweeps in not twenty minutes later, his uniform pressed and ironed. When he glances your way, you shrink under his gaze, self-conscious about something unidentifiable. He is every bit the commander you met briefly back on Earth, never a hair out of place. If he were less intimidating, he’d be insufferable. 

“Morning,” you murmur, the mug still close to your lips making your voice reverberate. He doesn’t respond. You wonder if he even heard you greet him. It likely wouldn't matter.

Medic has a different connotation this far from Earth. Hierarchy out in space is typically determined by way of one’s importance to the ship, and the scope of your role does not, unfortunately, include maintaining the ship. What that means, unofficially, is that you speak when spoken to, and not for any other reason. 

In the months to come, there may be moments or days when your usefulness is acknowledged, usually much to your colleagues’ chagrin. Though it’s not likely that any of the crew will encounter foreign pathogens while on a hermetically sealed ship in the middle of space, they’re all still susceptible to falls and cuts and worse. Nikolai, the chief engineer on board, had sprained his wrist during the first week of the mission, lending you immediate purpose and validation. 

You make way for the second officer when he finally deigns to make an appearance, sliding quietly out of his seat and stepping to the back of the cockpit, back pressed to the wall closest to the door. 

“Morning, everyone,” he greets, peppier than the three of you despite his rumpled appearance. His thick mustache twitches with the force of his smile. “Ready to seize another day?”

“Jesus Christ, Keller, let’s tone it down ‘til about ten o’clock, alright?” Graves sighs. He pinches the bridge of his nose as if to ward off a headache.  

“Our clocks are off, commander,” Alex jokes, coming over to give him a little shake by the shoulder. It would be insubordination from anyone else. “I’m about ready to eat lunch.” 

“Let’s just get through formation and then you can go fill up the bottomless pit you call a stomach.”

The morning briefing never takes up too much time. It’s as much of an excuse to have coffee together as it is to go through the day’s schedule. Graves spends most of the time reviewing the flight course, charting where the ship will be by day’s end. 

“Almost through the belt,” Alex remarks, staring down at the monitor in front of him. It’s an incomprehensible jumble when you try to peer over his shoulder, but he must be able to make sense of it. 

The crew had been on high alert since entering the torus-shaped region between Mars and Jupiter a month back. For the most part, they needn’t have been so on edge—the average distance of the asteroids in the circumstellar disc between the two planets tended to be quite substantial—but a collision the previous day had reinstated their earlier anxiety. 

“Can we switch from manual yet, Farah?” Graves asks from his seat at the helm of the ship. 

She shakes her head, lips tightening with frustration. “I still have to figure out what’s going on with cruise control—it’s not responding correctly.”

“Was that from that little ding the other day?” you ask, blurting out the question without thinking.

Farah’s expression is flat when she glances over at you. “That ‘little ding’ nearly took out our communications system altogether.” 

You wince at that, staring down at your feet instead. Better to just shut your mouth than make a fool of yourself. Had you not blurted out the question, you might have even surmised the nature of the situation given the comm specialist’s notable absence from the cockpit. 

When Nikolai eventually ambles in with a thermos of coffee and deep troughs under his eyes, Farah looks up and frowns. “Where’s Hadir?”

The man shrugs, nonplussed. “Cargo?” he grunts, rolling the toothpick between his teeth around the words. 

She sighs. “I’ll go find him.”

No one says anything when she leaves, the double doors sliding open and shut automatically at her approach, and she doesn’t bother saying goodbye. 

“Dismissed, I guess,” Graves sighs, collapsing into his chair and spinning around to face the stars proliferating in front of him. 

The informality digs at you sometimes because you know you can’t indulge in it. The times you’ve attempted to, you’ve been rebuffed. Sometimes unintentionally, but often to remind you of your place.

This isn’t a crew you’ve ever worked with before. From conversations you’ve overheard, you’ve gleaned that they’ve all worked together in different capacities before, years of familiarity breeding an easy trust and companionship between them. Two of them might even be lovers—though Farah maintains a neutral facade at all times, the same can’t be said for Alex, the man always hovering nearby, eyes going soft at the sight of her. 

You’re the only odd man out. The newcomer. And though you sit with them in the mess for meals and partake in conversation and pass jokes like small stones from hand to hand, you know deep down, in the dark well of your heart, that you are not one of them. You are a passenger that they picked up along the way. A straggler. 

This wasn’t supposed to be the case. When you signed on to the mission months ago, the circumstances were wholly different. A newer ship, a different crew, some of which you’d worked with before. Then ownership changed hands and budgets were cut. Slashed to ribbons even. You had a chance to tour the ship before the launch date, and even down on Earth with all the glitz and glam available to trick the eye, you hadn’t been convinced of the vessel’s ability to withstand the extreme conditions of space.  

But by then, you were locked into a contract so iron-clad that the consequences of breaking it seemed worse than simply seeing the mission through. 

Most days, you feel like you’re waiting for something to give. You pass through halls that echo with low creaks and a deep, rhythmic thrum. Sometimes the walls of the ship groan so loud that you wait with baited breath for the hull to implode around you, to feel the metal crush the delicate eggshell of your body beneath its weight. 

It’s not any better to just stay in your room, your quarters too cramped to nurture anything other than claustrophobia. A recent, unfortunate side effect of spending months on such a small ship. You’ve become accustomed to crews numbering in the tens and hundreds, ships so colossal in size that even months spent aboard weren’t enough to explore all of its nooks and crannies. Cargo holds with excavators and backhoes for excavations on Mars and humvees for getting around the rough terrain. 

This ship barely holds six people and the payload you’ve been hauling to Europa. Pipes hiss in the corridors. Once a week, the radiator splutters or the intercom overhead crackles, kicking your heart into hyperdrive. 

You leave formation more out of sorts than ever. Vaguely aimless. With nothing to do, you grab breakfast in the galley and eat at the counter, too uncomfortable to venture over to the mess. Your days consist mainly of hovering around the ship or sitting quietly in the medbay, waiting for something to happen. A morbid preoccupation. 

The stairs clunk under your feet as you make your way down towards the medbay. You’ve long grown used to the sharp sound of your boots against the metal floor. 

Rationally, you know they don’t dislike you. You might even venture to say that you get along with the majority of them, particularly the chief engineer and Farah’s brother. The big man likes that it only takes a single drink to get you plastered, often howls with laughter when you stumble out of the mess after drinking with the crew, always the first to turn in for the night. Farah herself is only frosty because she works twice as hard as anyone else, burning the midnight oil on the regular. 

You swallow half-truths like stones to help settle your stomach. 

It doesn’t replace real companionship though; it approximates, but doesn’t quite replicate it. You feel its absence most acutely in the sidelong glances you sometimes get of real affection: Alex grazing his pinkie across Farah’s when he thinks no one is looking; Farah’s eyes softening at the sight of her brother; Graves and Nikolai reminiscing about something a decade past, hardly even aware of your presence in the room. 

It’s something you’ve endured before, but never for such an extended period of time. Prolonged isolation prickles at the mind, feathering the edges. It purples space; passes through the vents. The crew rarely goes on spacewalks (hardly any need for it), but sometimes you swear the ship’s oxygen has a faint sulfuric undertone, like rotten eggs. It permeates the air wherever you go. 

Someone knocks at the window just as you walk by.

You pause mid-sip, the mug raised to your lips and just pressing into your bottom lip, not yet tilted. 

“Hello,” you hear through the thick-paned glass, the voice muffled through the layers of glass and plastic partitions. “Could you let me in, please?”

Though your reflex is to look up, you don’t for some reason. The muscles in your neck stay locked instead. Shoulders stiff, weighed down by an unnatural force. 

The thing outside the ship knocks again. “Love? Can you hear me?”

Your head turns towards the porthole, the hand holding your mug drifting away from your mouth. It tips in your hand and a drop leaks down the side. Your lips tingle, almost numb. 

There’s a man outside the porthole, clear as day. He hovers outside the window, a hand raised in a friendly wave and full lips splitting to reveal perfect, white teeth when he smiles. He’s dressed in a spacesuit, no different than any of the crew on a spacewalk. Through the helmet, you can make out dark eyes and dimples. A close cropped beard.

It’s not a face you’ve ever seen before though. You think you might’ve remembered someone so handsome working on the ship with you.

Something needles inside of you though. A sickening feeling, like something you’ve forgotten but you desperately need to remember. 

“Hi there,” the man says, voice as charming as you’ve ever heard, so velvety rich that you feel the blood heat your cheeks. “Glad you were passing by. Mind letting me in?”

[chaoticwriting]

The Summoning

It's just your normal everyday Monday. You know. The worst day of the week. And wouldn't that be cemented with these cultists that are trying to summon some eldritch beings to take over the world or something.

The Justice League goes on full force that day since the cult, Follower of Darkness, has a very wide range of followers among them. From businessmen, martial artists and even metas. So it is quite a struggle for the league to stop the summoning and just as they reach the summoning room, the magic circle has already lightened up and glowing with green light.

Flash: Uh oh. That is not good.

Hal: You think so?

Superman: Focus. We need to stop it now.

They try to stop the cultists from finishing the summoning but a green barrier is erected around the cultists.

Batman: Zatanna, Constantine. Break the barrier.

Zatanna: We can't. The barrier is too strong to break in a short period of time.

Suddenly, a green portal opens up in the middle of the circle as the cultists continue to chant in a language even Constantine barely understands.

The more they chant, the bigger the portal becomes until suddenly it stops and begins to shrink drastically. Instead of some interdimensional eldritch beings, what comes out is a teenager with a paper and pencil and a clearly not happy face.

???: Can't all of you do this on a weekend? I have some serious homework catching up that I need to do.

Cultists:????

JL:????

???: Ugghh, what do you guys want anyway? If you want some world destruction or killing someone go ask some other guy.

Cultists: Oh great destroyer, we ask you to destroy our enemy and return the world to the rightful.

???: What part of no world destruction do you not understand? Would you like me to show you a slide presentation to explain?

Cultists: But- but we summoned you. We offer sacrifice so that you may fulfil our wish.

???: YOU DID WHAT??!! You kill someone just because you want to summon me?! That's it. You are super done. I'm sending all of you to jail.

Before the cultists can react, their bodies are completely frozen except for the head. The teenager folds the paper he is holding and puts both the paper and pencil in his pocket as he walks closer towards the cultists. Suddenly, all the ice starts to move and they converge together into one big ball of ice.

The teen approaches the barrier and punches a hole through it, causing it to disperse. Seeing the Justice League on the other side of the barrier gives the teen quite the scare as he accidentally shoots out a green ray from his hand towards them.

???: What the hell! What are you all doing here?

Superman flies closer cautiously as he tries not to startle the kid.

Superman: We are trying to stop the cultists from finishing the summoning. We are sorry to have bothered you.

???: Bothered me? They killed people just to summon me. I don't even know how they managed to find a way to summon me. I am pretty sure I already destroy all records of way for people to summon me.

Flash: Ermm, I'm pretty sure they don't kill anyone. They do prepare blood though. If not for the fact they actually try to summon an interdimensional being, we wouldn't have bothered with them.

The teen turns towards the cultists and sees them nodding heavily as if to confirm Flash's words. They can see the teen turn a shade greener as he releases them from their ice prison ball but still keeps them in ice shackles.

As Wonder Woman escorts the cultists out, the teen suddenly turns towards one of the Justice League as if he just finds out something important

???: CONSTANTINE!!

[darkficsyouneveraskedfor]

Mission Control 1

Warnings: non/dubcon, violence, stalking, and other dark elements. My username actually says you never asked for any of this.

My warnings are not exhaustive but be aware this is a dark fic and may include potentially triggering topics. Please use your common sense when consuming content. I am not responsible for your decisions.

Character: Captain Hydra

Summary: a man marches into your life on a mission

As usual, I would appreciate any and all feedback. I’m happy to once more go on this adventure with all of you! Thank you in advance for your comments and for reblogging ❤️

That day, the bus is mostly empty. It's only you, an eldery couple, and the driver. The ebb and flow of traffic slows the wheels as the driver passes by vacant stops. You watch the pavement roll by between patches of grass. 

The dulcet ride lures you into a calm even as your pre-work nerves buzz. You hug your bag in your lap as the driver stops and the doors open to let in another passenger. The axel squeals as the vehicular behemoth pulls away from the curb. 

You continue to watch the city as the new rider strides between the seats. You sense their shadow loom closer and closer. You expect them to claim the empty seat across from yours. Instead, the sit right next to you. It's an odd choice given the few passengers aboard. 

You fidget and make yourself smaller. You turn your head straight as you try to see the stranger from the edge of your vision. They're big. Broad enough that their arm presses to yours even as you try to shrink into yourself. Tall too, his knees against the row in front of you. 

He sits rigidly beside you. Uneasy at his proximity, you fish into your side pocket and slide free your phone. You open it aimlessly, tapping habitually on the crossword app you play at work in the low times. 

The solutions elude you as your mind can't detach from the man crowding you into the window. Why can't he sit anywhere else? You look around at the unclaimed seats. He stays as he is, stiff, straight, unmoving. 

You close out of the came and lock your phone. You clasp your hand around the device as you hug your bag once more. Your other hand toys with the little pom pom that hangs from your zipper. 

The bright bus signs pass by. You're stop is coming up. Now is the awkward part. Getting the man to let you out. 

You pull the cord to signal your intent but he's already on his feet. You glance over and thank him softly, a brief glimpse at his face. A scar ripples from his hairline, through his temple and angles down his cheek to his jaw. His eyes are a bold blue and his nose finely cut despite the large blemish.  

He stands back as you grab your bag and sidle out. You go to the doors. He follows. 

Huh? 

He grips the yellow bar behind you, his large hand gripping as if he might crush the metal. You stare at his knuckles and the bus jerks to a stop. You nearly fall off your feet. The man catches you by your hip with his free hand. 

You set your feet and cough out another thanks. Embarrassed, you slap the doors and they open. You scurry off and the men once more trails after you. As you veer towards the mall, he waits until the bus takes off and crosses the street. With him, your suspicious leaves. 

You're frazzled as you enter work. You don't know why. You just... are. Something about that man sticks with you. Even if he never said a word, it felt like he was trying to tell you something. 

You clock in and try to shake it off. His face flashes in your mind. You can't place what seems so familiar about him. You would remember if you met him before. How could you forget? 

You go to the counter as Layton talks with a customer about the new seasonal blends. The tea shop has its peak times, especially as winter approaches, but it's one o clock on a Tuesday and that's never very busy anywhere. 

You greet the next customers. Two girls interested in the cold brew pots. You show them what you have and explain the store's points card. The buy a sampler and nothing else. Typical. 

Layton finishes at four. The traffic picks up once he's gone. You don't mind as it keeps the time moving. It peters out as the dinnertime rush fills the food court. You can hear the crowd from around the corner. 

You set to wiping down the counter and putting away the few stray canisters left out. As you turn back, you have to swallow down a shriek. You didn't hear the man over the mall's top hits playlist. 

You hesitate as your eyes meet. It's him. The man from the bus. You blink and press your lips together. 

"Hello, uh, how are you today?" You ask.  

He just stares. No answer. No sign he even heard you. 

He's in all black. Boots, jeans, cargo jacket. He stands like a soldier. You part your lips again, "are you looking for anything in particular? Today we have our apple crisp chai as the sample." 

He still doesn't react. Not more than his eyes falling to the nervous twiddle of your fingers on the counter. Your scalp prickles and your nape burns. If he keeps this up, you'll have to phone security. 

He raises his hand to reveal a familiar object. It's the fluffy pom pom from your bag. Your brows pop up, "oh? Thanks. It must have fallen off." 

You reach for it and your mind races. As nice as it is to return the key chain, you can't help but wonder. How did he know where to find you?

As you grasp the soft ball, his other hand comes up and snares your wrist. Your squeak and try to pull back. You're stuck in his grip.  

Your eyes round and flick up to meet his. His gaze bores into you and at last, his stony expression cracks. He smirks, the scar on the side of his face paling as the lines around his eyes deepen. He releases the keychain and grabs a fistful of your hair. 

"Ow!" You squeal and yank again.  

He rips your hair out at the roots and you exclaim again. Hets go of your arm and you hit the shelves behind you. He nods and spins on his heel, clutching the handful of your hair.  

You whimper and rub your head as your scalp burns. Your eyes water and your lip trembles. You just gape at the door. What just happened? 

[marauroon]

hiii i saw that u were asking for reqs and i loved reading ur best frenemies fic with remus, i was wondering if you would be open to writing about that dynamic more. like maybe they're in the same friend group so they're in close proximity but they can't stand one each other and maybe the reader got stood up or something and remus is there or really whatever you want. Anyways thank you for your work, i really enjoy it

── .⏾ 𝐒𝐭𝐚𝐧𝐝𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐑𝐨𝐨𝐦 𝐎𝐧𝐥𝐲. (𝐫.𝐥𝐮𝐩𝐢𝐧)

you didn’t even really invite him, but the fact he didn’t show up still put a damper on your mood. remus thinks it’s killing the whole room’s vibe.

remus lupin x frenemy!reader | 1.2k | h/c? | masterlist.

a/n | went back to the og og ship for this one, shout out to blackinnon

There’s something aggravating about someone who’s simultaneously the smartest in the room and also the most infuriating. Sure, maybe he’s handsome in a very I-read-sad-poetry-by-lantern-light way, but that only really makes it worse.

And, unfortunately, thanks to Marlene’s thing with Sirius (on again, off again, like the world’s most emotionally exhausting lumos charm), you are now in proximity to said infuriating boy far more often than you’d like to be.

It’s become a balancing act, really—sitting at the Three Broomsticks with your best friends on one side and the Marauders on the other, trying not to glare directly at Remus every time he says something clever. You think you’ve managed rather well. Mostly. Until now.

Because today, of all days, your maybe-date didn’t show.

You’re not even sure you’d call it a date. You’ve been talking with Michael Rossiter in Herbology for a couple of weeks, mostly about plants but sometimes—when he was feeling cheeky—about music or Quidditch or the way you looked when you were annoyed with your mandrake.

He wasn’t brilliant, but he had nice eyes and a decent laugh and said, when you told him you were going to Hogsmeade with your friends, “Maybe I’ll see you there then.”

You'd smiled. Told yourself not to get too giddy. And yet, here you are. Giddy, then deflated.

The booth you’re all crammed into is loud—Marlene is practically on Sirius’s lap, Mary and Dorcas are exchanging knowing looks, and James is loudly arguing with Peter over the latest Wimbourne Wasps game. And Remus—Remus is directly opposite you, because of course he is, because of course Sirius just had to say, “Oi, Moony, let the ladies have the bench side, be a gentleman,” and Remus just smirked and obliged, sliding in across you like he belonged there.

You’ve been waiting. Watching the door. Laughing too loudly at Mary’s jokes. Pretending to sip butterbeer just to keep your hands busy. And when Michael doesn’t show—when it becomes obvious he’s not going to—you shrink a bit. Quiet. Withdrawn.

And Remus notices.

Of course he does.

"You know, for someone who supposedly convinced a boy to change his Hogsmeade plans just for her,” he drawls, not even looking up from his drink, “you’re doing a marvellous impression of someone who’s just been stood up.”

You don’t answer. You don’t even look at him. You just keep your eyes fixed on the window, watching the steam fog up the panes.

Remus pauses.

Usually, this is the part where you snap something back—about his sad little jumpers or the way he chews the ends of quills like a stressed-out academic or how he’s basically a walking dissertation on how not to relax. But you don’t. You sit still, hands clenched in your lap.

The silence between you grows taut.

Remus frowns. He nudges you with his foot under the table—annoying. Like a brother, if your brother was your intellectual rival and also kind of handsome in a way you wish you didn’t notice.

“Oi,” he says, quieter now. “What’s wrong?”

You bite the inside of your cheek, still not looking at him. “You wouldn’t get it. And I don’t want you to.”

That gives him pause. He turns toward you fully now, leaning on one elbow. “Alright, that’s a bit harsh.”

You shrug.

Then he sighs, long-suffering and dramatic. “Who was it? The boy. No, don’t tell me— Rossiter?”

You glance at him, surprised. “How did you—?”

“Everyone saw you flirting over flobberworms in class last week,” he says, deadpan. “He told Sirius he was thinking about asking you out. Got all red-faced about it, too. It was tragic.”

You groan and bury your face in your hands. “Merlin.”

“He’s a right sod, you know.”

You lift your head just enough to glare. “That your professional opinion?”

Remus shrugs, grinning slightly. “My personal one. But it’s backed by a great deal of observational research.”

You huff. “You don’t even know him.”

“I know him better than you do,” Remus says, slumping back into the booth. “Do you know his mum still buys his underwear?”

You blink.

“I’m serious. Thomas the Tank Engine ones. We saw them last year when someone hit him with a jelly-legs jinx and his trousers fell down on the Quidditch pitch. Looked ridiculous.”

You can’t help it—you snort. It’s brief, but it’s real.

Remus perks up like a cat that’s just caught movement under a curtain. “And I once caught him picking his nose.”

You raise an eyebrow. “You’re making this up.”

“I wish,” he says, grimacing. “We were in the library and he was just mining. Like he thought no one could see him. It was vile.”

You giggle. You actually giggle.

Remus looks triumphant. “And they say I’m the wild animal.”

You shake your head, smiling despite yourself. “You’re awful.”

“Only to those who deserve it.” He pauses, then adds, more gently, “You really thought he was coming?”

You nod, shoulders drooping. “I mean… he said maybe. He was sort of flirty about it. I thought—” You cut yourself off. “Doesn’t matter.”

Remus doesn’t say anything at first. He leans his head back against the booth, watching you. “I hate that you’re sad,” he says eventually. “You’re annoying when you’re sad. It’s harder to make fun of you.”

You roll your eyes, but the smile’s still there. “I’ll be fine.”

“I know.” He nudges your arm again. “Still sucks, though.”

The warmth in your chest surprises you. You look at him again, properly this time, and there’s a softness in his eyes that doesn’t match the usual sardonic glint.

It’s disarming.

You blink, glance away. “Thanks, I guess.”

He grins. “Don’t get all emotional on me. I might have to start being nice to you regularly and that’s not good for my image.”

“Oh, the tragedy,” you say dryly.

“Unimaginable.”

Sirius leans over suddenly, draping an arm across Remus’s shoulders and nearly spilling his drink. “Oi, Moony, you pulling or pining?”

Remus doesn’t even flinch. “Trying to comfort someone after being disappointed by the tragic shallowness of her romantic prospects, actually. Something you’d know nothing about.”

Sirius pouts. “Rude.”

Marlene snorts. “Let her be. She got stood up, she’s rightfully upset,”

Sirius frowns. “Who stands you up?”

You wave him off. “Doesn’t matter.”

But Remus answers anyway. “Michael Rossiter.”

Sirius sits back like he’s been slapped. “Rossiter? No. That absolute knob?”

“You see?” Remus says, gesturing. “It’s not just me.”

“Bloody hell,” Sirius mutters. “Should’ve hexed him when I had the chance.”

“You did hex him,” Remus points out.

“Not enough, apparently.”

[tinyshyteacup]

Taglist: @jozzieblood @buckysteveloki-me @dragonoftheshadows @plaidconvers @kateawolf13 @keira-kaz2y5 @frog-fans-unite @doilooklikeagiveafrack @verynormalsstuff @nynxtea @iminyourceiling @seventeen-x @mgchaser @y0urgirl @lovely-seb @laughterafter @mysuperlaserpissnumber1fan @irasciblemogwai @svtbpbts @vivalas-vega @chonkybonky @bmyva1entine @homiesexual-or-homosexual @aoi-targaryen @bitter-semi-sweet @soflegacy @kath-666 @hiireadstuff @highhopes1008 @sineminuse @hawkinsavclub1983 @buckingforbuckybarnes @fandomsearcherforcuntymen @huang-the-geek @joewhs @witchywannabe3263 @ironenemycollective

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Tw: cussing, blood.

Part 6

Words of Command - Part 7

The glass-walled conference room at the top of Stark Tower was designed for clarity and power. Wide windows framed the skyline, and sunlight spilled in at a sharp angle, catching on every surface—like the room was made of polished nerves.

The long table was already crowded.

Tony sat at the head, fingers steepled, a holographic interface flickering mid-air in front of him. Nat lounged in her chair beside him.

Steve stood, arms folded, barely containing his tension. Sam had pulled up a second chair just to lean on it backward, his stare bouncing between the projections and Bucky. Clint paced near the back beside Thor.

Even Bruce was present, eyes watchful behind his glasses.

And then there was you.

You sat nearest to the door—near Bucky—hands folded in your lap, trying not to shrink under all the attention.

Bucky had refused to sit. Instead, he stood behind your chair, silent. His flesh hand hovered near your shoulder, not quite touching, but always there.

The others noticed. How he kept his eyes on you, not the speakers. How he didn’t so much as blink unless you moved.

Tony tapped at the interface, pulling up STRIKE files, security footage, and a list of recent attempts to claim “dangerous assets.”

“We can’t just keep pretending he’s not on every watchlist known to man,” Tony said, exasperated. “They’re coming. STRIKE was the appetizer. The main course is going to be alphabet soup—CIA, NSA, maybe even S.H.I.E.L.D. if they get twitchy.”

“I’m not locking him up,” Steve said sharply.

“No one’s saying that,” Tony shot back. “I’m saying we need a plan before someone else makes a plan for us.”

From behind you, Bucky shifted—barely a noise. But you felt it that silent wind-up of tension through his spine.

Your hand rose instinctively and gently rested on his wrist. He froze. Stilled.

Only then did he speak.

“Don't cage me again” The Brooklyn was thick in his voice now. Slow. Dangerous.

“No one’s caging you, Buck,” Steve tried, stepping forward, palms up.

Bucky didn’t look at him.

He only looked at you.

“Doll.” His voice was low. “You want me to stay ?”

Your lips parted. “Yes. I… I do, Soldat.”

He gave a tight nod. “Then I stay.”

The room fell silent.

Tony leaned back, eyes wide. “Okay. That’s not terrifying at all.”

You tried to focus on the meeting, but every so often, you caught Bucky watching you—not the others.

Not the screens.

You.

When your voice wavered while explaining the STRIKE breach, he stepped closer.

When someone raised their tone—Tony, especially—his fingers twitched at his side.

When you finally leaned back in your chair, pale and drained from having to defend him only hours earlier, Bucky dropped his hand to the back of your seat.

Not protective.

Possessive.

He didn’t speak again during the meeting. But his silence was a clear message:

If they pushed too far—

He wouldn’t need your orders.

Sam, ever the realist, leaned forward. “So what—you’re her guard dog now?”

You flinched.

Bucky didn’t.

He stepped around your chair like a ghost sliding into the living, eyes narrowed.

“I ain’t a dog,” he said coldly. “But I do bite.”

Nat raised her brows. “He only listens to her?”

“He responds to her,” Bruce corrected. “That’s different from control. It’s trust. The Winter Soldier didn’t trust anyone.”

Bucky tilted his head, voice cutting in rough.

“She told me not to kill the men who tried to take me,” he said. “So I didn’t.”

A pause.

“I wouldn’t have stopped.”

That landed like thunder.

You glanced around the room, anxiety crawling under your skin. “He’s not a threat unless someone makes him one.”

Tony exhaled deeply, then pointed at you. “That right there? That’s the plan. We keep you two close. We build a safe structure around you—not him.”

Steve looked mildly horrified. “C'mon she's not a tool, Stark," Steve said, voice dangerously low. "And he's not a dog to be trained."

Nat leaned forward, her expression carefully neutral. "Steve's right about that part, but Tony's not entirely wrong either. She's our best connection to Barnes right now."

Her eyes flicked between you and Bucky sitting quietly at the edge of the room. "He's got a connection to her. We need to understand why."

Sam leaned back in his chair, arms crossed over his chest. "Look when I worked with veterans, this kind of attachment wasn't unusual. He's found something—someone—that makes him feel safe in a world that probably doesn't make a whole lota sense right now."

Bruce removed his glasses, pinching the bridge of his nose. "The psychology here is... complex. If he sees her as his handler, that relationship comes with certain expectations. Power dynamics. Conditioning."

"Which we can use," Clint interjected from where he perched on a cabinet.

"Not in the way Stark's suggesting, but strategically. The guy clearly responds to her."

He studied Bucky with the calculated gaze of a marksman assessing a target.

Thor, who had been uncharacteristically quiet, placed his hammer on the table with a gentle thud. "In Asgard, warriors who have seen too much battle sometimes lose themselves."

His eyes were thoughtful as they rested on you. "You may be his tether to humanity, Little one"

"She's not trained for this," Steve protested. "We can't put her in more danger."

"Sunshine here is already in danger," Tony countered, spinning a pen between his fingers.

"STRIKE tried to grab him today. Next time, they might not care who gets caught in the crossfire." He closed the holographic display with a flick of his wrist.

"But maybe I was... insensitive in my approach. Not that Thumbelina can't handle a little straight talk."

"That's an understatement," Nat muttered, with a roll of her eyes.

You shifted uncomfortably in your seat, acutely aware of Bucky's presence beside you, he had finally taken a seat.

His flesh hand rested on the table, fingers curled slightly inward, while his metal arm remained tucked close to his body, as if he were trying to make it disappear.

"What if," Bruce began tentatively, "we don't use her as his handler, but rather... help her become a bridge? Something familiar as he transitions back to himself?"

"You mean coaching her to help him remember who he is?" Steve asked, a glimmer of hope breaking through his concern.

Sam nodded. "Create a safe space where memories can resurface without triggering a defensive response."

"Exactly," Bruce nodded. "Not commands, but connections. Memories. Identity."

The team fell silent, considering.

"She'd have to agree," Clint said firmly, looking directly at you. "And be prepared for whatever might happen."

"She's right here, Clint" you said waving at him.

"We'd be there," Steve added, looking between you and his oldest friend. "Every step. Ready to help or ... intervene."

Tony tapped his fingers on the table. "I could create a safe environment. Monitoring systems, panic buttons, the works. Though something tells me Thumbelina here has more spine than most of my security team."

At that you rolled your eyes at your boss.

Sam leaned forward. "I can help, give you strategies for when things get... complicated. Because they will get complicated."

Nat's lips curved slightly. "So we're not using her as bait or a trainer. We're asking her to be..." she searched for the word, "...a lighthouse?."

Tony pointed a pen at Nat "exactly"

Steve's shoulders relaxed slightly. "That I can get behind."

Tony smirked. "Fine, no treats. But someone should probably ask Sunshine if she's even willing to play lighthouse keeper to Metal Arm McGee here. Not that she hasn't been doing a stellar job already, considering he follows her around like a very scary, very lethal shadow."

Seven pairs of eyes turned toward you expectantly. Beside you, Bucky sat perfectly still, his gaze fixed on the floor, but you could feel the tension radiating from him���alert, wary, ready to move at the slightest sign of threat.

"Of course, I'll do it," you said, your voice steadier than you expected. "If it helps him, and if its what Soldat wants."

Bucky's eyes flickered toward you momentarily. "Where you go I go, Doll" that same not quite warm tone.

You gave him a smile, genuine and warm.

"But I have questions," you continued, sitting up straighter and looking back to Tony "These monitoring systems and panic buttons—they'll work through JARVIS, right?" You looked directly at Tony. "And are we staying here in the Tower? Because I don't think moving him around a lot would be good right now."

Tony's eyebrows shot up, a smirk playing at his lips. "Listen to you, thinking like a tactician already." He nodded approvingly.

"Yes to JARVIS—he'll be watching 24/7. And yes to staying here. I've got a whole suite that nobody's using except for storing Cap's vintage record collection and Thor's growing Pop-Tart stash."

"I do not—" Thor began to protest, then cleared his throat. "Perhaps I have acquired a modest collection."

"You'd have everything you need," Nat added, studying your face. "And we'd all be close by."

Steve leaned forward. "You're sure about this? It won't be easy."

Your eyes drifted to Bucky, whose posture remained rigid but whose breathing had slowed since you'd agreed to help.

There was something in the way he held himself—not quite at attention, but as if waiting for instructions—that made your heart ache.

"I'm sure," you said firmly.

The door slid open silently, revealing the suite that bore Tony Stark's signature blend of luxury and technological overkill.

You stepped out first, watching as Bucky hesitated at the threshold, his eyes methodically scanning every corner, exit, and potential threat.

"This is us," you said, trying to sound casual despite the nervousness fluttering in your chest.

"Apparently Thor's Pop-Tarts used to live here."

Bucky didn't smile at your attempt at humor, you didn't expect him too.

But he did step into the room, his movements measured and precise.

His flesh hand flexed slightly at his side while his metal arm remained still, tucked close to his body.

Tony materialized from another room, tablet in hand. "Welcome to Chez Safety Protocols," he announced with his typical flourish.

"Complete with everything the well-appointed fugitive assassin and his keeper might need."

You shot Tony a warning look.

"Right, right," he backpedaled.

"Tour time. Thumbelina, you already know the kitchen common room yadda yadda." Tony said waving his hand towards the entry door.

"Reinforced furniture throughout—had to rush order that after Point Break sat on a regular couch last month." He tapped the wall, revealing a discreet red button. "Panic buttons in every room. Press once for general alert, press twice for 'Terminator is having a bad day' protocol."

Bucky's eyes locked onto the button, his posture stiffening subtly.

"JARVIS is always monitoring," Tony continued, either oblivious or deliberately ignoring Bucky's reaction. "Say the safeword—which is 'blueberry,' by the way, don't ask why—and the team comes running."

"Is all this really necessary?" you asked quietly.

"STRIKE team tried to take him, and the momentary lapse your frontal cortex had made you believe you where a tank" Tony replied, suddenly serious. "So yeah, it is." He tapped his tablet. "There's more. Windows are reinforced. Door requires biometric scan—both of yours are already programmed in."

Bucky moved further into the space, inspecting each feature with clinical detachment.

When he reached the large windows overlooking the city, he stopped, his reflection staring back at him—a ghost caught between worlds.

"The bedroom on the left is yours," Tony told you. "The one on the right is set up for Terminator here, though JARVIS tells me he's been sleeping on your floor, so..." He trailed off with a meaningful look.

"Thank you, Tony," you said firmly. "We'll be fine."

"Sure you will, Sunshine." He headed for the door, then paused. "Cap's three floors down. Wilson's next door. I'm... somewhere in the building. Probably." With a mock salute, he was gone.

The silence that followed felt heavy. Bucky hadn't moved from the window.

"Do you want to see your room?" you asked gently.

He turned to you, his expression unreadable. "Is that a order, doll?" he asked, his voice all brooklyn now and not quite as rough.

The question caught you off guard. "No, Soldat. This is..." You searched for words. "... a choice."

"Doll" Something flickered in his eyes—confusion, maybe recognition. "You stayin"

"Yea. I'm not going anywhere"

He looked at you for a long moment, then slowly, deliberately moved away from the window. He paused by another panic button, studying it.

"For if I hurt someone," he stated flatly.

"For emergencies," you corrected. "But they won't be needed."

Bucky didn't agree or disagree. Instead, he completed his circuit of the suite.

When he finished, he simply stood in the center of the living room, awaiting... something.

Orders, you realized. He was waiting for orders.

The tower was unusually quiet that morning. The coffee had brewed, the team had drifted into their own routines, and Bucky sat inside your room—calm, still, eyes locked on you like he was awaiting the next mission.

You stood near the doorway, peeking back at him nervously. “Hey, uh… Soldat?”

He turned his head immediately. “Doll?”

“I was thinking… maybe today you could try shaving. You’ve got a bit of stubble and, I mean, it looks nice! But… maybe you’d feel more like yourself if we gave you a clean start?”

A pause.

Then, a faint nod. “If you say so.”

You smiled, cheeks warm. “Okay, but I don’t really know how guys shave— I was gonna ask Steve to help show you? Is that okay?”

The shift in Bucky’s body was immediate.

Shoulders stiffened. Jaw tightened. His eyes snapped toward the door behind you, the entrance to the suite like he expected an ambush. “Show me?”

You blinked. “Yeah… like, just show you how to do it. I’ll be right there the whole time.”

He stood, slow and cautious. “He better not come near you with a blade.”

You led both men into the large bathroom in the suite. Stark had kitted it out with sleek, modern features. But the atmosphere in the room was ancient—two ghosts of the past and one woman standing between them with a nervous laugh.

Bucky stood in front of the mirror, scowling at the unfamiliar reflection. His eyes flicked to you every few seconds—like he couldn’t decide if this was a trap or some kind of test.

Steve—calm, patient, used to navigating trauma even if it was only his own—stood off to the side, holding a can of shaving cream and a fresh razor like it was a live grenade.

“All right, Buck. It’s not complicated,” Steve said gently. “You just—”

Bucky’s eyes narrowed. “You touch her with that blade, and I break your arm.”

Steve froze.

“Jesus,” he muttered. “Your really not kidding, Pal"

You waved your hands quickly. “No no no! He’s not going to touch me! Soldat, he’s just going to show you. I swear.”

That seemed to settle him—slightly.

“Okay,” Bucky grunted. “But I watch first.”

Steve, ever the responsible star spangled man, took a glob of shaving cream and smeared it across his own jaw. “See, Buck? Circular motion. Like that. And then, short strokes—careful pressure.”

He began dragging the razor down his face in smooth motions, talking the whole time.

Bucky watched like it was a combat technique.

“Do that to my own face?” he asked, skeptical.

You giggled from the sink, sitting on the counter between the two sinks with your knees drawn up, chin resting on them. “You’re in control you dont have to be suspicious, Soldat.”

“Blades belong in the field,” he muttered. “Not near your neck.”

“But you’re not gonna cut your neck,” you said, trying not to laugh.

He took the razor from Steve—too hard—and inspected it like he was checking a sniper scope.

Steve sighed, rubbing his jaw. “Just go slow, Buck.”

Bucky stared at the razor. “Why’s the blade this flimsy?”

“Because it’s not meant to decapitate anyone,” you said quietly.

Bucky applied the shaving cream like he was camouflaging for war—entire face covered in thick white foam.

“Buck, you only need a thin layer—” Steve started.

“I do it my way.”

You and Steve shared a look.

The strokes were tense. Calculated. He pressed the razor to his cheek and dragged it down slow—gritting his teeth like it was physically painful.

You tried so hard not to laugh, but the sight was too much, a deadly assassin shaving with the intensity of a sniper lining up a shot.

“Stupid,” Bucky muttered under his breath.

“You look great,” you said, smile blooming wide. “Like a grumpy snowman.”

Bucky squinted at you through the foam. “Doll ?”

You immediately burst out laughing.

Bucky suddenly hissed.

You leapt off the counter instantly. “What happened?!”

He touched the edge of his jaw and saw a pinprick of blood.

Your hand flew up to cover your mouth. “Oh shit!”

Bucky locked onto your reaction. Misread it. His expression turned cold.

“She got scared, you let me scare her” he growled, turning on Steve.

Steve backed up. “Oh come on—your holding the razor!”

“I’m fine, Soldat stop!” you jumped in between them, both hands on Bucky’s chest, trying to anchor him. “Soldat, Stand down”

His eyes were still locked on Steve, breathing heavy, protective rage simmering under the surface.

“…Say the word, Doll.”

“No, Steve is helping, everthings ok" you whispered, stroking his arm. “Just breathe.”

After a tense beat, he exhaled through his nose.

“…He’s lucky.”

Steve raised both hands. “Always fun helping.”

You shot Steve a sympathetic look.

[winxanity-ii]

READY SET?... YOU BET!!

ship: soccer player!yuji x cheerleader!fem!reader x soccer player!megumi (aged up: reader, yuji and megumi are in early 20s) warnings: non-explicit; suggestive themes word count: 4.5k A/N: Hey guys, just wanted to let you know that i'm reposting this from my alt account, lulu-4-u in case you've seen this posted before...

★·.·´🇯‌🇺‌🇯‌🇺‌🇹‌🇸‌🇺‌ 🇰‌🇦‌🇮‌🇸‌🇪‌🇳‌ 🇲‌🇦‌🇸‌🇹‌🇪‌🇷‌🇱‌🇮‌🇸‌🇹‌`·.·★

Friday afternoons weren't supposed to be like this.

You should've been back at Inkan College, practicing on your home turf, but no—the soccer team had to take over the field from Tuesday to Friday, leaving your cheer squad scrambling for a place to practice.

And now, thanks to the gym renovations at Inkan, you were all stuck at Kaisen College, borrowing their gym every Friday until further notice.

The situation wasn't ideal, but you'd take anything at this point.

As soon as you stepped into the massive space, the scent of sweat and faint cologne filled your nose.

The echo of shoes squeaking against the polished floor cut through the low hum of conversation, and you spotted Kaisen's soccer team scattered across the court.

They were warming up—stretching, chatting, completely unaware of the growing crowd of cheerleaders filtering in.

A part of you wondered if they even cared as they continued with their warm-ups and drills, seemingly unbothered by your presence.

Except for a few.

A couple of the soccer players couldn't help but glance over at your team, their eyes lingering far too long.

You caught one or two making catcalls under their breath, which only fueled the simmering annoyance you and your teammates felt.

They quickly got back to stretching when one of their coaches barked out an order, but the damage was done.

It wasn't exactly the warmest welcome.

Your manager, Momo, stood by the entrance, tapping her clipboard nervously.

You could tell she was calculating something—probably how to split the gym time without causing too much friction. She was a stickler for schedules, which, given the current chaotic situation, had saved you all a few times.

Without a word, she darted forward, straight toward two figures standing near the side of the court.

At first glance, they were just two guys, probably seniors by the look of them, but the moment Momo reached them, you realized how tiny she looked next to their towering frames.

One of them—short pink hair, a carefree smile plastered across his face—didn't seem to notice Momo's intimidation. His broad shoulders stretched the fabric of his soccer jersey, and his eyes lit up as he listened to whatever joke the other guy, standing just as tall but with dark hair that fell messily over his face, was muttering under his breath.

Momo, clipboard clutched tightly to her chest, cleared her throat.

The dark-haired guy glanced down at her, his expression a mix of boredom and curiosity, while the pink-haired one grinned wider, clearly amused by the situation.

You couldn't help but notice how Momo's usual confidence seemed to shrink as she faced them, her skittish posture a dead giveaway that she was more than a little intimidated.

Not that you could blame her—these two looked like they could flatten anyone who stood in their way if they wanted to.

As Momo continued her strained conversation with the two towering guys, one of your squadmates, Maki, spoke up softly from beside you. "Should someone go over there?" she asked, her voice hesitant but filled with concern.

Her twin sister, Mei, however, had no such reservations, cackling under her breath as she nudged Maki. "Why? Just look at her! She's about to have a full-blown panic attack," she whispered, her voice dripping with amusement. You could almost feel the smirk pulling at her lips.

The rest of the team exchanged confused glances, a mix of frustration and unease settling in.

Your cheer captain, Nobara, wasn't the type to let something like this slide, though. She crossed her arms, scowling as she muttered, "We shouldn't even have to go through this. All the coaches signed off on us using the gym today. This is such a waste of time."

You opened your mouth to agree, but before you could say anything, Nobara had already started moving.

With a huff, she stomped across the gym, grabbing you by the wrist in the process. "C'mon, ____," she grumbled, dragging you along with her.

"W-Wait!" you stammered, barely keeping up with her hurried pace.

You shot a glance over at the rest of your squad, all of them staring wide-eyed as Nobara dragged you straight into the fray.

It didn't take long before you were standing face to face with Momo and the two guys, their attention shifting from your flustered manager to Nobara's fiery glare.

Nobara wasted no time. "What's the holdup?" she snapped, her voice cutting through the awkward tension like a knife. "We have the gym reserved today, so scram."

The pink-haired guy blinked, clearly surprised by her bluntness. His grin faltered for a second before returning with full force, as if he found the entire situation amusing.

The dark-haired one, on the other hand, remained as still and impassive as ever, but Nobara held her ground. "And where the hell are all your cars?" she barked, her voice echoing in the vast gym. “There's barely anyone in the parking lot, yet here are all you idiots, taking up the entire gym like it's your own private space! We had this reserved! Our coaches agreed! But no, you're still here, screwing around like you own the place."

She wasn't holding back, her frustration pouring out with every word. And while Nobara kept tearing into them, you could feel a shift in the air.

The two guys—who had seemed so relaxed moments ago—were now focused on you. It started subtly, but soon, you felt their gazes burning into your skin.

You tried to ignore it, tried to stay focused on Nobara's rant, but the sensation was overwhelming. Heat crept up along the side of your face, crawling down your neck and across your chest as their eyes raked over you, slow and deliberate.

You shifted your weight, suddenly hyper-aware of how exposed you felt in your practice attire—short spandex shorts hugging your thighs, a cropped top barely covering the sports bra beneath it.

Normally, it wasn't an issue, just the usual cheer practice gear. But under their scrutiny, it felt like you were standing there completely bare, vulnerable.

The pink-haired guy's grin faded slightly, his gaze lingering a moment too long, while the raven-haired one's expression remained unreadable, his eyes scanning you with an intensity that sent a shiver down your spine.

They didn't say anything at first, just watching. But then, the dark-haired one moved.

"Enough," he said, cutting Nobara off mid-rant, his voice calm but commanding.

Nobara's mouth snapped shut, eyes narrowing at the interruption, but the guy didn't seem fazed. His gaze briefly flickered to you before returning to her. "The soccer team's staying on campus for a training retreat," he explained smoothly. "We were informed that we'd be sharing the facilities with the sister school, but no one mentioned the cheerleading squad had the gym booked today."

His tone wasn't exactly apologetic, but there was something almost diplomatic about the way he spoke, like he knew how to diffuse tension. "We can move our practice outside to the field. The gym's all yours."

Nobara crossed her arms, still irritated, but before she could argue, the pink-haired one chimed in. "Yeah, no problem! We didn’t mean to cause any issues," he added, flashing that grin again, though this time it felt less cocky and more… friendly. "We'll clear out."

Their quick surrender caught you off guard.

It wasn't what you expected, especially after the way they'd been eyeing you. Nobara looked ready to press further, but the raven-haired guy's unwavering stare and unexpected cooperation seemed to keep her from pushing the issue any longer.

The fire in her eyes flickered for a moment, and then she huffed, crossing her arms tighter across her chest. "Uh, fine," she muttered, clearly irritated by how easily they folded. It was like all the energy she’d built up for a full-blown argument had nowhere to go.

Without waiting for another word, she turned on her heel, clapping her hands loudly as she headed back toward the squad.

"Let's go, people!" she shouted over her shoulder. "Stretch! Stretch! Stretch! We've got nationals to prepare for!" Her voice boomed across the gym as she led the charge, her hands clapping rhythmically to emphasize her point.

The cheer team sprang into action at her command, following her lead without question, some of them already shifting into warm-up positions.

You and Momo, however, remained behind for a moment longer, standing awkwardly between the two guys who had been the focus of Nobara's wrath just seconds ago.

Momo, always the one to follow protocol, quickly thanked them once again, her voice barely above a whisper. "Uh, thanks again! We appreciate it!" she squeaked before practically darting after Nobara, clipboard still pressed tightly to her chest as if it were some kind of shield.

Then, it was just you and them.

You scratched awkwardly at the side of your face, feeling the tension of the moment settle around you like an itchy sweater. "Uh, thank you," you muttered, giving the two men a small, polite bow.

When you rose, you caught them both looking at you again, their eyes sweeping over your frame with the same intensity as before. The pink-haired one, who you now realized was taller up close, stepped forward, breaking the silence.

"Hey, no problem," he said with a bright, almost boyish grin. "I'm Itadori Yuji, by the way—team captain. This is my co-captain, Fushiguro Megumi." He gestured toward the dark-haired guy, who gave a small nod in acknowledgment, his expression unreadable as usual.

You offered a polite smile, trying to shake off the lingering awkwardness. "I'm ____," you introduced yourself. "Co-captain of our cheerleading squad... and, uh, sorry about my captain. She can get a bit fired up."

Yuji laughed, the sound warm and infectious. "Nah, it's all good! Passionate captains are the best kind." His eyes brightened with genuine interest as he tilted his head. "So, what's your position? Flyer? Base?"

"Varsity flyer."

Yuji's grin widened, and he tilted his head even further, like a curious puppy. "Oh, so you're pretty flexible, huh?" he said, his tone casual but his words heavy with innuendo.

For a second, your brain short-circuited.

You blinked, feeling heat rise to your face as your mind went straight to the gutter.

But then, you glanced at Yuji's innocent, beaming smile—and Megumi’s total lack of reaction.

Maybe it was just you?

"Y-Yeah, I guess so," you stuttered, trying to keep your voice steady.

Before you could say more, Nobara's voice pierced the air from behind you. "____! Quit messing around and help me stretch already!"

You flinched, turning back to Yuji and Megumi with an embarrassed giggle. "I, uh, I gotta go. Duty calls." You gave them a quick, nervous smile and turned to leave, feeling their eyes on you the whole way back to the squad.

You wiped sweat from your forehead, your body sore and aching as you stretched your arms overhead.

Practice had been brutal, and your muscles were screaming in protest.

With a tired sigh, you walked to the sidelines, pulling on your hoodie as the chill of the evening crept in.

It was nearing 7 p.m., the gym lights casting long shadows across the floor as practice finally came to an end.

Nobara had practically worked everyone to the bone. The longer practice went on, the fewer soccer players you noticed on the field outside.

You'd catch glimpses of them through the windows, their figures becoming less and less frequent whenever you were tossed into the air during routines.

By the time the sun had started to dip below the horizon, the field was nearly empty.

Your squadmates were just as exhausted, pulling on their jackets and finishing the last drops of water from their bottles. You could hear their quiet groans and heavy breathing as they packed up their gear, the sound of sneakers shuffling against the polished floor.

Nobara clapped her hands sharply, rounding everyone up for one last pep talk before you could all head home.

"Alright, listen up!" she barked, her tone still sharp despite the weariness in her own voice. "I know today was rough, but we've got nationals coming up, and there’s no room for slacking off!" She paused for a moment, wrinkling her nose as she glanced around the gym. "And honestly, can you believe the state of this place? Kaisen's gym is a joke. The equipment's ancient, and don't get me started on the smell."

A few of the girls chuckled tiredly, but Nobara didn't linger on the complaints for long. She quickly shifted gears, her expression hardening with determination. "That being said, we need to tighten up! That routine wasn't perfect, and we can't afford any screw-ups. We've got one shot, and we're gonna give it everything we’ve got. Understood?"

The sound of tired but enthusiastic "whoops" filled the gym, everyone too exhausted to muster anything more. Nobara clapped her hands again, signaling the end of practice. "Alright, that���s it! Get your stuff, go home, and rest up. We'll hit it harder next week."

You grabbed your things, feeling the weight of exhaustion settle over you like a blanket.

Your teammates were already filing out, chatting quietly among themselves, their bags slung over their shoulders as they made their way to the doors.

The sound of sneakers against the floor faded into the background, and soon, it was just you, your aching muscles, and the quiet hum of the empty gym.

You were shuffling your bag onto your arm when you heard footsteps behind you. Turning, you saw Momo and Nobara making their way over, both looking just as tired as you but clearly still running through their mental checklists.

"Kasumi's been solid lately," Nobara said, crossing her arms as she stopped in front of you. "I'm thinking about promoting her to backup flyer."

You nodded, adjusting the strap of your bag. "Yeah, totally agree. Kasumi's been killing it in the stunts, and she’s got the energy. She's a good choice,for sure."

Momo nodded quickly, scribbling on the clipboard before tucking it under her arm as she chimed in. "I'll make a note to talk to her next session."

A chilly breeze swept through the gym as the three of you walked toward the exit, the cool air a stark contrast to the warmth and sweat of practice.

The doors creaked as you pushed them open, stepping out into the dimly lit parking lot.

The gym behind you had become quiet, almost eerily so, with the earlier sounds of practice and drills fading into the distance.

The lot, which had been full of cars and people earlier, was now nearly empty. All that remained were the scattered vehicles of you, Nobara, and Momo, the only signs of life left after a long, grueling practice.

You could see the condensation forming on the windows of your car as the temperature dropped, the once bustling energy of the gymnasium now a distant memory.

"Well, at least the next few practices should be a little smoother," Nobara muttered, glancing over her shoulder at the now-darkened gym. "If Kaisen can get their act together, maybe we can actually get some work done."

Momo laughed softly, pulling her jacket tighter around her. "One can only hope."

You gave Nobara and Momo one final wave as you unlocked your car door, watching them head toward their own vehicles. The cool metal of your car's handle felt like a relief after the long day, and you were more than ready to head home.

Settling into your seat, you pulled the seatbelt over your chest and clicked it into place. With a tired sigh, you were just about to turn the ignition when your phone buzzed from the passenger seat.

Glancing at the screen, you saw a message from Fujinuma, one of your spotters:

Hey! I left my arm compression sleeve in the locker room. Could you grab it for me? It’s my last pair—should be near the lower lockers by the sinks.

You groaned, letting your head drop back against the seat. "Of course," you muttered to yourself, pulling your seatbelt back off with a click. "Things that come with having responsibilities..."

Shoving your phone into your pocket, you reluctantly pushed the car door open and stepped back into the brisk night air. The wind had picked up a little, sending a chill through your hoodie as you trudged back toward the gym.

The silence of the empty parking lot felt heavier now, with only your footsteps breaking the stillness as you made your way back inside.

The gym's door creaked as you pushed it open, the faint echo of your steps bouncing off the empty walls. In the short amount of time since your group had left, the gym lights had already been turned off.

The sudden darkness sent a small shiver down your spine. "Creepy," you muttered under your breath, hugging your arms close as you quickly retraced your steps to the locker room.

You'd only used the locker room once before, during the last practice, so you weren't exactly familiar with its layout.

The long, narrow hallway that led to it felt even more unnerving now, the dim emergency lights casting strange shadows on the walls. The sound of your footsteps echoed slightly, the quiet hum of the building adding to the eerie atmosphere.

As you pushed open the door to the locker room, you expected to find complete silence—just an empty space waiting for you to grab Fujinuma's sleeve. But instead, as you stepped further into the room, the sound of rushing water hit your ears.

You froze for a second, your heart skipping a beat, eyes widening as you squinted toward the steam creeping from the lit showers around the corner. Shit, you thought, panic prickling your skin. Who the hell is still here?

Your heart raced, but you shook your head, trying to focus. Get the sleeve, get out, you told yourself, forcing your mind back to the task at hand.

Pulling out your phone, you quickly skimmed over Fujinuma's message again. "Lower locker, near the sink," you mumbled under your breath, shoving your phone back into your jacket pocket.

The faint glow of the shower lights barely reached your side of the locker room, but you did your best to navigate the dark space. You crouched down next to the row of sinks, your fingers fumbling with the cold metal locker.

You tugged it open with a slight creak, your breath catching as you spotted Fujinuma's compression sleeve sitting just where she said it would be.

You grabbed it quickly, stuffing it into your pocket. Relief washed over you as you pulled your phone out again, ready to let Fujinuma know you had it and you were getting the hell out of there.

Just as your fingers hovered over the send button, a voice cut through the eerie silence.

"Hey, stranger, what brings you here?"

Your breath hitched in your throat, and before you could even process the words, the locker room flooded with bright light, illuminating the entire space.

Your pulse quickened, and you whiped around to face whoever had just spoken.

Your head snapped over, eyes wide, and your mouth dropped open at the sight in front of you.

Standing by the entrance to the shower area, his hand casually resting on the light switch, was none other than Yuji—the captain of Kaisen's soccer team.

His pink hair was plastered to his forehead, dripping with water from his recent shower.

The steam rising around him only added to the surreal atmosphere. His lean yet muscular frame glistened in the bright lights, every defined muscle on full display, water sliding down his toned chest and abs.

A towel hung loosely around his waist, dangerously low on his hips, barely covering what it needed to.

You couldn't help but stare, feeling your brain short-circuit for a second as the reality of the situation sunk in.

The heat from your earlier practice was nothing compared to the heat now rising to your face as you tried to comprehend what you were looking at.

Yuji's lips curled into a wicked smirk, amusement dancing in his eyes as he tilted his head to the side, the same playful gesture you'd seen earlier. His voice was smooth, laced with something suggestive, but his tone remained infuriatingly innocent.

"So," he drawled, his eyes flicking over you briefly, "gonna tell me what brings you here? Looking for a midnight snack... or something else?"

The words hit you like a punch.

You choked on your spit, eyes widening as Yuji's words sank in, feeling your face flush even more.

A series of coughs followed, and you quickly clasped a hand over your mouth, your face hot as fire.

You struggled to pull yourself up onto your feet, eyes darting everywhere but him—focused on the ceiling, the lockers, literally anywhere that wasn't the sight of his wet, muscular frame standing there, towel barely hanging on.

"Uh… well…" you started, fumbling over your words as you desperately tried to navigate your way out of the locker room. "One of my squadmates left her compression sleeve, and… well, I came to get it." Your voice wavered as you bumped into a locker, making your way toward the exit, not even noticing when the sound of the shower behind you turned off.

"So, yeah…" you continued, trying to fill the awkward silence. "What can I do, say no? I'm the co-captain, haha…" You gave a nervous laugh, your mind scrambling to come up with something to say, anything to escape this weirdly intimate moment.

Just as the words left your mouth, you suddenly gasped, your breath catching in your throat. Without warning, you bumped into something—someone—solid.

Before you could react, a strong, wet arm wrapped around your midsection, pulling you gently but firmly against a warm, muscular chest.

The heat radiating off the figure seeped through your hoodie, and you could feel droplets of water from their skin soaking into the fabric, sending a shiver down your spine.

You froze, the feeling of firm, veiny muscles around you making your heart race even faster.

The warmth of his body pressed so close to yours made your mind go blank. Tilting your head back just a little, you came face to face with a pair of piercing, dark blue eyes.

Megumi—the co-captain.

His expression was unreadable, but his grip on you remained steady, his arm still snug around your waist, and for a moment, you couldn't breathe, your words completely stolen by the intensity of his gaze.

"S-Sorry!" You squeaked out an apology, feeling the heat rising in your face again as you quickly stepped forward, trying to put some distance between yourself and Megumi.

But just as you freed yourself from his grasp, you bumped into something else—something solid. You froze, your body going stiff as you realized what, or rather who, you had just walked into.

Yuji.

You kept your eyes fixed straight ahead, staring at his honey-tanned chest and desperately trying not to ogle his still-dripping frame.

Every muscle in your body felt locked in place, trapped between the two of them.

When you finally managed to tilt your head up, you were met with Yuji's face—except he wasn't smirking this time. He was pouting.

"Really, Megumi?" Yuji whined dramatically, his voice filled with playful irritation. "You always get the cool, sexy entrances. It's not fair! I was just gonna offer to help, but you had to swoop in like that and steal my moment."

Megumi, still standing behind you, rolled his eyes, clearly unbothered by Yuji's theatrics. "It's not a competition," he muttered dryly, his voice low and calm, completely unfazed by Yuji's over-the-top complaint.

You blinked, completely caught off guard, your mind struggling to process what was happening.

Here you were, sandwiched between the captain and co-captain of Kaisen's soccer team, listening to them banter as if this was all totally normal.

You could only stare up at them in complete wonderment, your brain short-circuiting from the surrealness of the situation.

Gulping, you made the mistake of trying to move. Your body shifted slightly, but it only caused you to stumble forward, right into Yuji’s chest. His firm, warm body pressed against yours, and before you could react, you felt his strong arms wrap around you, keeping you in place.

"Whoa, where d'ya think you're going, babe?" Yuji teased, his voice low and playful. He tilted his head to the side, licking his lips as he looked down at you with that same mischievous glint in his eyes.

The nickname sent a shiver through you, and you felt heat rising to your face again as you tried to wiggle free, but his hold on you only tightened.

Your mind raced as you attempted to come up with a reasonable excuse, anything to escape this increasingly compromising situation. "I-I need to get back," you stammered, not quite believing the words yourself as you glanced over your shoulder at Megumi, who was watching you intently. His gaze was sharp, focused, and completely unreadable.

"Oh? But we're just getting started~" Yuji cooed, his voice dripping with amusement as one of his hands moved gently along your back, sending an involuntary shiver down your spine.

You wanted to move, wanted to push them both away, but every time you tried to pull yourself free, it felt like you were sinking deeper into their grasp, prey to their every suggestion.

Your breath hitched as Megumi finally stepped closer, his tall, imposing figure now looming behind you again. His hand brushed lightly against your arm, a subtle, almost teasing touch that sent your thoughts spiraling.

His dark blue eyes locked onto yours, and you could feel the tension building between the three of you, thick and palpable in the air.

"You're not really in a rush, are you?" Megumi asked softly, his tone smooth and laced with a hint of seduction. His gaze dropped to your lips for just a second, and before you could protest, he leaned in, capturing your mouth in a steamy kiss.

Your mind went blank as his lips moved against yours, slow and deliberate.

You hadn't expected it, but the heat and intensity of his kiss sent your heart racing.

For a moment, you forgot everything else—the locker room, the late hour, the surrealness of it all—lost in the sensation of his lips claiming yours.

Your resistance melted away as you gave in, your body leaning into his touch.

And just as you found yourself surrendering to Megumi, Yuji's soft chuckle broke through the haze. His arms were still around you, holding you close, and as Megumi pulled back slightly, Yuji tilted your chin up to meet his gaze.

"Don't forget about me," Yuji murmured, his voice a playful rumble before he pressed his lips to yours.

The kiss was different from Megumi's—softer, but no less electrifying.

You felt a jolt of desire shoot through you as Yuji's lips moved against yours, his playful nature evident in the way he kissed you, teasing and tasting like he had all the time in the world.

Megumi's lips left yours only to trail down the side of your neck, his kisses slow and deliberate, sending shivers across your skin. At the same time, Yuji deepened the kiss, his tongue teasing yours with a mix of intensity and playfulness that left you breathless.

Your mind struggled to keep up as you felt a pair of hands slip under your hoodie, splaying across your abdomen, fingers caressing the soft skin of your stomach before they slid to your hips, holding you firmly in place.

You gasped softly against Yuji's lips, pulling back to catch your breath, but the moment you did, he moved to kiss and suckle along the other side of your neck, his breath warm against your skin.

The sensation of both men kissing you, touching you, made your knees weak.

Yuji hiked up one of your legs, pulling it around his waist to bring you closer, his grip firm as he held you in place.

Your mind was growing hazy with desire, your body caught between the two of them, every nerve alight with sensation. Megumi's lips continued to work against your neck, his hands slipping under your hoodie to hold you steady, while Yuji’s lips and tongue sent waves of heat through you.

Suddenly, Megumi's hand reached up to tilt your head back onto his shoulder, his lips brushing your ear as he whispered, his voice low and filled with temptation. "Do you wanna play with us?"

Your breath hitched, heart pounding in your chest as his words sunk in. You blinked, your heavy-lidded eyes glancing through your lashes to find Yuji's face in front of you.

The pinkette's usual bright and playful expression was now flushed with desire, his eyes dark and heavy as he looked down at you. His grip on your hips tightened, a soft groan escaping his lips as he rocked his hips forward, grinding gently against you.

"Please," Yuji's voice was almost pleading, his tone husky with need. "Can we play with you?"

A/N: lololo ignore me just tryingn my hand at college aus...

[lucy-literates]

Not Like Them Pt.2

A/N: To the gorgeous @camelliaflow3r and @livelaughleclerc , thank you for your support and requests! I have continued on camelliaflow3r’s ask with this second part. I hope you like it. Inbox is open :)

Part 1

You don’t fall asleep right away. Not when his arm is wrapped so tightly around your waist and the weight of what just passed between you still lingers in the air—sweet and heavy like the afterglow of a storm. His chest rises against your back in slow, even breaths, grounding you.

“Tu es ma petite flamme,” he murmurs.

You turn your head slightly, enough to catch the curve of his smile against your skin. “What’s that mean?”

He pauses, then kisses the back of your shoulder. “My little flame. Because you’re warm. Bright. You make everything else feel cold in comparison.”

You’re too overwhelmed to answer, so you just grip his hand tighter.

He keeps going, slower this time, letting the French slip between moments like silk. Mon cœur, ma vie, mon trésor. You repeat each one, faltering over syllables, but he doesn’t laugh. He hums his approval, like you’re reciting poetry written just for him

“You’re dangerous when you talk like that,” you whisper.

He grins. “Good. I have plans to be much worse.”

The next morning, he appears in the doorway with a coffee in one hand and a suit in the other.

“You busy tonight?”

You arch an eyebrow. “Do I need to be dressed for combat?”

He laughs, sets the coffee down, and walks over to cup your jaw. “Only if looking this good is a weapon.”

“What’s happening tonight?”

“A gala,” he says casually, but you catch the flicker of intent behind his eyes. “You don’t have to go if you’re not comfortable. But I’d like to take you. Let them see.”

“See what?”

“That I’m not hiding you. That I’m the luckiest man in the room.”

Your heart jumps, and for a moment, you consider saying no. Too public. Too risky. Too many eyes that have doubted, whispered, questioned. But then you remember the way he held you last night—like you were sacred. And suddenly, letting the world see doesn’t feel like exposure. It feels like a victory.

You walk into the gala with his hand at the small of your back and his attention pinned to you like you're the only thing worth noticing. The room hushes in that artificial, well-dressed kind of way, but you don’t shrink. You stand taller.

And when someone has the audacity to smirk and murmur, “Didn’t expect him to bring anyone,” he answers without hesitation.

“She’s mine,” he says. Soft but absolute. “Speak carefully.”

You feel his thumb press a circle into your side. Reassuring. Possessive. Loving.

Later, he leans in close, lips brushing your ear. “You were made for me,” he says again. “And now they know it, too.”

———————

The car ride home is quiet, but not in an awkward way. It’s full of the kind of silence that hums with everything unsaid—how he kept your hand in his all night, how his gaze found you in every reflection, how the world shrank down to the space between your shoulders when he whispered, “You did perfect.”

At home, he doesn’t let go of you for a second. You step out of your shoes, and he’s already behind you, arms sliding around your waist as he presses his face into your hair. “Tired?”

“Exhausted,” you admit, but lean back into him anyway. “Happy.”

He guides you to the bed with slow hands, like you’re something fragile and he’s not ready to put you down. He helps you out of the dress, kisses the marks the fabric left on your skin, and hums when you shiver under his touch.

When you finally crawl into bed, he follows, wrapping around you like you’re something he needs to protect even in sleep. You rest your head on his chest, listening to his heartbeat.

“You looked breathtaking tonight,” he murmurs into the crown of your head. “I could feel everyone staring.”

“I was nervous,” you admit.

“I know. I saw your hand tremble before we walked in.” He lifts it now and kisses your fingers. “But you still held mine.”

You don’t respond—just nuzzle closer and let your fingers find the hem of his shirt.

He chuckles softly. “Want me to keep talking?”

“Always.”

So he does. Whispering French phrases against your temple, lulling you into sleep with a mix of warmth, praise, and soft promises. You don’t catch every word, but you know what they mean.

They mean you’re home

[sunbleachedfl13s]

Your Alcoholism has Summoned a Vampire

(remmick x fem reader) (part 2/5)

BIG TW + cw: very mentally unstable reader, non-glamorizing depictions of s3lf h4rm, add1ction, and depression, manipulation, remmick is a massive loser, reader is a massive bitch, no mentions of race

a/n: HOORAY PART TWO! this part is about the same length as the last one, which was totally unintentional but kinda funny. anyways, things are finally starting to get a little freaky in this chapter so get your chastity belts ready. writing dialogue is actually my albatross holy cow its so hard. i even pulled out my tarot cards to write this part so i hope yall end up liking it :)

word count: 3k

“I don’t need you to believe me. I just need 'ya to let me in.”

You noticed something had changed as he stared at you expectantly. The demonic features his face previously adopted had, for the most part, vanished. Chased back into their ever present, shadowy catwalks, leaving nothing but a presentable human man to darken your doorway.

Maybe it happened instantaneously, in a brief window of time your eyes had closed he’d returned to his prior, unassuming appearance. Or perhaps, it had happened gradually, fangs inching back to a uniform row, eyes brightening, fingers shrinking, all at an imperceptible rate.

You suck in a breath through your teeth and shoot a fat glob of spit onto his shoes with a sharp hock. 

“I do believe, I've already told ‘ya. I aint interested.” 

You unceremoniously slam the barn door in his face. And you prayed, silently, to whatever God was listening, that he couldn’t sense what you’d just spat was only a half-truth. As the door closes completely, sliding shut with a dull thunk, free of any clawed hand blocking its path, you figure he hadn’t.

You couldn’t be sure yet though. 

Hands pressed silently against the door’s wooden panels, you wait. For footsteps, knocking, more rambling pleas for an invitation inside, anything. You’re met with nothing. Just crickets, cicadas, and the hum of the moon. Slowly, as to not make any noise, you stand up on your toes and place an ear against the door. You strain through the din of typical nighttime ambiance, trying desperately to detect any noise from the thing standing just outside your door. But the only signs of life you detect is the ragged heaving of your own breath. All is quiet on the other side of the door. 

You flick your eyes down, to the thin beam of light streaming in from the crack beneath the door, illuminating the cool blue floorboards, save for two spots. The otherwise perfect golden pencil line is obstructed by the telltale shadow of a pair of boots.

He was still there.

Dead silent, still as a rail, but still there. Inches away from the unsanded planks of the door, just staring blankly into the burls and notches of the rough wood slabs. Just standing. Waiting. 

You take a slow, sickening step backward, eyes locked on the barn doors, not daring to leave them even for a second. You pause, and repeat this, till you feel your back collide against the coarse angles of a support beam, the rungs of the hayloft’s ladder digging into the curve of your spine. 

The shadow of his boots hasn't moved. They sit, unflinching, mocking you with a sick sadism. So obnoxious in their permanence, so infuriating, it's all you can do to not scream until your throat is hoarse.

But you don't. You've got the sense to keep your mouth shut. For, possibly, the first time in your life. Screaming would be futile anyways. The only soul who could possibly hear you is either passed out, blackout drunk in his bed, or wide awake in another womans'.

Well, between you and your father, at least one of you was having fun.

The walls of the barn seem to compress around you as a suffocating claustrophobia floods your veins. You didn't have to avert your gaze from the door to know it had no viable exit, besides the one currently guarded by some twisted, demonic Jehovah's witness. As long as those boots stayed planted, you were stuck in here.

You look up and blink skyward, as tears of frustration begin to well in your eyes. You bite down on your tongue, and claw your nails into your shoulders, as hard and deep as you possibly can. You close your eyes, and focus on the pain, your time-honored strategy for preventing yourself from crying. You dig in harder, slam your back into the ladder rungs behind you, bite your lip harder, harder, squeezing your eyes shut with all the force you have left.

It's not until the familiar salty taste of iron oozes from your split gums that your shallow breaths begin to deepen. Every muscle relaxes with a resounding sigh as your back slides down the rough face of the beam. Your knees buckle as you take a seat on the soil below. The tears had crawled back to where they belonged, leaving nothing but apathy in their wake. You pull your knees into your chest and straighten your position against the beam. Your eyes don't leave his boots, twin stains across your line of sight, ominous and unignorable.

You'd wait him out, that much you were sure of. If he wanted to play this game with you, you'd sooner die than see him win.

There'd been many a sleepless night you'd spent staring at the cracks in your bedroom ceiling, nights you'd once considered eternal in length. Those nights were child's play compared to this one, where a threat was looming right outside your door, the soles of his boots mocking you in their stubbornness.

Didn't he have anything better to do? Surely there were ways to occupy his time that were more entertaining than this. You could think of a few yourself, and you'd be more than happy to write them down for him and shove 'em down his cheeky fucking throat. But more than likely, doing so would end better for him than it would for you. So, you settle down bitterly in unsatisfying resolve and continue to glare at the thin beam of light emanating from beneath the door.

This resolve burns through the night, a steady, coursing flame of hatred that holds your bloodshot eyes open. So, when the daylight finally breaks over the mountains, and the soft glow of sunrise seeps between the cracks, and you are left without any resolution, an uneasy feeling settles in the pit of your stomach. The satisfying sounds of departing footsteps you'd envisioned your victory to be met with are absent, as are all other indications of the man's presence.

As the sun chases the shadows away, the crack under the door shifts from a beacon of light in the cold blue darkness, to a misty grey shade below the door, the mark of his boots no longer visible.

He couldn't possibly have left, you tell yourself, his shoes hadn't so much as budged all night. But as sunlight floods through the slats in the barn's wooden walls, you're filled with a strange confidence. Who did this man think he was, to believe his mere presence could keep you cowering behind a door, helpless as a wood mouse?

No, you think, rising to your feet with a determination that is quickly hindered by the stiffness of your sleeping legs. You wouldn't stand for this. You wouldn't lie passive before this creature. If you were going to die, so be it. You'd be buried alongside your dignity.

After a couple stomps to get the blood flowing through your arteries once more, you close the distance between yourself and the door with a few heated strides. Resigned with a resolute conviction, you swing the barn door wide open, ready to meet whatever horror awaits you on the other side.

Your eyes are met with absolutely nothing. The doorway is empty, all remaining being the usual view of the house, farmland, and forest that lay beyond. Confused, you look down to see a muddy pair of men's boots, left orphaned and unlaced before the door by their owner hours prior.

The banshee-like scream that erupts from your throat nearly shakes the rafters loose.

-

The man's boots lie smoking in front of you as you sit cross-legged before your makeshift bonfire. The leather curls like weathered paint off the quarters, peeling and cracking as the flames you've lit consume it.

You rise to your feet, towering over the blaze, and empty what's left of a half-drunk whisky bottle onto the dying flames. The embers surge once met with the alcohol, flames fiery tongues stretching to lick your knees, before once again returning to flickering embers.

You tilt your head upwards, to the darkening sky, and blow a thin plume of tobacco smoke from between your lips. You suck one last inhale from the shrunken stub of your cigarette, before flicking it too, into the fire.

You gaze across the land, and you can survey for miles in all directions. In the east, the flat, barren plain stretches infinite to the horizon. Beyond its lush Spanish moss grove, the west is lined with a backbone of dusty, silhouetted mountain ranges, crowned in gold as the daylight wanes upon them, the light dissolving into sunset behind their misty crests. Through all of this, cicadas sing, their song carrying a promise of the stranger's return. Their word is true as the sky, and you know this fact good as any.

You know this as you turn on your heel and start off towards your porch, leaving his boots to char in flames behind you.

You'd be ready when that thing came back. And sure as hell, you'd tear that fucking grin off its face.

At the thought, a thin stream of drool congeals at the corner of your mouth. As you wipe it off with the backs of your bruised knuckles, you swear you can hear someone laughing in the distance. But as you reach your front door and grip the handle, you don't look back.

-

The moon is absent from the night sky, as you gaze up at it from your kitchen window. Once your curiosity is satiated, you close the limp cloth curtains and sit back down at the table in the corner of the cramped room. The unusually strong wind outside whistles through the walls, rattling the bones of your house.

An empty glass bottle, which an hour ago was filled with rum, sits before you like a mock centerpiece. To your right, a loaded shotgun, with which you fidget, cocking the barrel and fingering the trigger with a detached sort of malice. Despite its presence, the part of you that's buried deep within your core knows it’s only for show, that your expected guest likely won’t be phased by its bullets. You were fooling yourself if you thought for a second it would give you any protection. But despite your knowledge of this, it stayed propped in the corner of your kitchen.

Another smoke hangs limply from your cracked lips, its paper end beginning to dampen with your saliva. The egregious amount of alcohol you’d consumed in the past hour had slowed your thoughts to a dull roar. Inhibition and reaction time lowered, along with the tempo of your racing fears. So when a sudden crash from somewhere deep within your home shakes its rickety floorboards, you don't even flinch. Your curiosity is piqued through, so with a grunt, you rise to your feet and venture down your darkened hallway towards the source of the noise.

Moonlight leaks into the hall from a door left ajar, the one leading to your parent’s bedroom. As you step within, you see the open window you’ve neglected to close, and the damage caused by allowing the wind inside. The wooden crate of your mother’s belongings, previously sat upon her empty bureau, are strewn haphazardly across the floor, the crate left empty and upturned. Delicate necklace chains tangle together in heaps, pages from her many open books are torn from their spines by the wind and sent like falling leaves across the room. Even the sapphire glass of her perfume bottle has shattered into bits, the jagged glinting pieces scatter everywhere, and the liquid once within seeps into the floorboards.

Most notably, the worn collection of witch cards your mother had inherited from her mother lie scattered, facedown, across the floor. “Arcana cards”, she’d called them, and regrettably, at your father’s sin-fearing insistence, you’d never been taught how to read them. Despite the strong meaning you’d always sensed emanating from their strange, heretic illustrations, their suits and markings remained unknown to you. A foreign language you could only have been taught by the woman you’d buried.

You kneel down, and pick a card at random off the floor, turning it over in your palm. Ten of swords.

The harsh knock from your front door echoes through the house like a bell toll.

You stand up, letting the card and all its unknown meaning fall back to the floor. You leave the room slowly, shutting the door behind you silently.

Another sharp knock radiates from the front door. You approach it like a prisoner does the guillotine, walking towards it armed with the same nihilistic resolve you'd had in the barn the night before.

This time, the man who awaits you on the other side is exactly the one you expect.

“Well hey there,” he says, standing in the doorway casually with his hands in the pockets of his suspenders like he’d received an invitation. “Long time no see.”

You grip the doorframe in front of you with an outstretched hand, glaring at him through your browline.

"You happen to see my boots anywhere?" He asks, with a cheery grin. "Reckon I left 'em down by yer barn last night." He smiles at his own joke, as if he was the funniest man alive. Yeah, as if.

“What do you want.”

He leaned back a little on his soles, a cheeky grin pulling at his mouth as he pointed a finger toward your chest. “Now see, I thought I’d made that perfectly clear with ‘ya.”

“Must’ve forgotten. Why don’t ‘cha tell me again.” You rasp bitterly, taking your cigarette from between your lips and extinguishing it on the wooden doorframe, eyes not leaving his for a second.

He flashes his crooked teeth at you, before straightening back up again. “See, I’ve been watchin’ you fer some time now, long enough to know you’re not happy cooped up here in this fuckin’ shack,” He says, slapping a hand against the side of your house for emphasis. “And listen, I don’t blame ya’ one bit. I’d go a little nuts too if I was all alone out here in the middle of mutherfuckin’ nowhere.”

“I don’t live alone.”

“Well yer daddy hasn’t really been present from what I’ve seen. This here ’s more of his pitstop between women. No real kinship in this place.”

Your mouth drops open, your first instinct being to defend your father against this strange man, but despite all reason, you realize, you agree with him. Your hatred for your father was a slow growing beast. It’d been festering within you since your mother’s passing, and you hadn’t even realized it.

Unable to argue against his point, you default to another strategy.

“How long ‘ya been spying on me for?” You say slowly. “Sure must’ve been a while, if you ‘sposedly know more about me than my own damn self.” You spit, your voice dripping with sarcasm as you glare at him.

“Oh,” He says, with a deep snickering laugh, “For a good while now. Enough to know a helluva lot about ‘cha, thats fer sure.”

“Yea?” You snap, your sarcastic skepticism horribly apparent in every way you held yourself. “Like what.”

“Oh I know lots o’ things. What kinda liquor you fancy, the way ya’ sit, the way ya’ sleep, the records ‘ya keep replayin’,” He looks at you with that stupid, smart ass grin playing on his face. “The way ya’ like to touch yourself.”

Your eyes widen in horror instinctually, and it takes every fraction of willpower to shove down the bubbling embarrassment prickling through you. You knew that was exactly what he wanted, to get a rise out of you, the piece of shit. Maybe you’d like the way he looked a little more if you crushed his skull in with the hilt of that shotgun. You imagine grabbing him by the roots of his hair, and slamming his face into your wall, over and over, till whatever substance left to fill his empty veins coated your porch. This calmed you down a little, settling the choking burn of your anger.

He rubs a hand over his stubbled jawline in a mocking sort of way, as he grins, eyes darkening beneath his brows. For a moment, the mask of humanity slips, red pinpricks glowing within his shadowed eye sockets. But only for a moment, and then the usual dimpled, foolish smile is back in place. “So trust me when I say, that I know, I know I can give you exactly what you’ve been lookin' for. Family, happiness, a freedom like nothin’ else you’ve ever known, all of it, It’s yours.” He’s closed the little distance you’d had between each other, standing close as his law would let him. “So long as ya’, y’know, let me in.” His grotesque, razor jagged fangs glint under the humming glow of your porchlight as he grins, staring into your soul, searching for any semblance of an invitation. "I can even throw in a few other things to…sweeten the deal.” His voice takes on a husky rasp as he says this, a clawed hand digging into the doorframe beside you.

Your stomach, and something else you couldn’t quite pinpoint, churn beneath you, your body tensing in anticipation as you lean away from his face. His teeth are slick with dripping saliva, congealing with a viscosity you’d never seen in any human’s mouth. That brazen, shameless look smeared across his face has stayed just the same though, itching with anticipation he knew he couldn’t act on. At least, not yet.

Everything about his presence screamed danger, kicked your fight or flight instincts into gear with a ferocity like no other. But something intangible, either the sparkling allure of his offer, or something…different… held your arm from slamming the door on him again. It was ridiculous, for all you knew he was a nothing but a brass faced liar, his promises pure fantasy. Yet despite this, despite your mind flooding with doubt from every corner, despite your gut cursing you for your stupidity, you hesitate.

You don’t realize your mouth had dampened until you’re bringing your knuckles to them once again, wiping the spit thats welled in the crevices.

He chuckles again, as he looks at you from the other side of the threshold, darkening your doorway like something ancient you’d ought to be scared of. And last night, though you didn’t dare show it, you absolutely were.

But tonight, as he stands before you once again, you find, strangely, that you aren’t.

pt 3 coming soon

[revelboo]

Heya~ hope your doing well! And I hope you had a swell bday!! 🎉

It's been a bit since you've done anything for Prowl, are you still writing for him? Have you seen the new Earthspark season? 🥺🥺

I haven’t seen the new season, just yet, but will. I don’t really track these, just writing whatever as it occurs to me so my posting schedule can be a bit… weird

Stand Too Close Pt 4

IDW Prowl x Reader

• Sitting in his palm, clinging to a servo since he’s not holding you in his hand like normal and you don’t want to fall, you try to gauge his mood from his blank expression. And to figure out why he’s not yelling, yet. As much as the rest of them seem to think the tactician is always in control, always calm- you’ve seen the other side. That anger he tries so hard to hide from the other Autobots, but not you. “Do you hate me?” He asks, tone almost bored as he walks to his quarters.

• “You locked me in a drawer,” you retort, shifting so your back is to him so he can’t try to analyze your expression. “Remember?” You sound more tired than angry to him. And by some miracle you don’t feel the need to point out that he’d ruined your life, your favorite jab. Venting, he mulls over that and wonders if maybe he should have left you with Bumblebee or any other Bot. Someone you could relax around and not constantly fight with. Why does that thought bother him so much? Because some twisted part of him enjoys the verbal sparring and the challenge of someone as poisonous as he is. As angry.

• “Then behave,” he says and despite your decision to ignore him, you glare up over your shoulder at him. “You ran out in front of me that day. You didn’t watch where you were going,” he adds and you’d almost swear one corner of his mouth is twitching like he’s trying not to smile. Like it’s funny to him as your face reddens. You don’t even realize you’re already back to his quarters until he tilts his palm and you’re forced to slide off onto his desk as he pulls out his chair. And the reaction is immediate and unthinking. Yanking off one of your sneakers and beaning him in the face with it.

• “Excuse me?!” You screech, face redder than he’s ever seen it as he just stares. You’d dared to hit him one of your little feet coverings? Challenge him? “I was in a crosswalk,” you yell, throwing out an arm and your level of fury is almost endearing, because you don’t have to play nice. You can scream all you like and what must that be like? To not bottle everything up all the time? You’re pulling off the other covering to throw when he places his palms on the desk and mass shifts, vaulting up onto the surface with you as he shrinks. And you scramble backwards, tripping and going sprawling on his data pad. Mouth falling open in shock, but still managing to throw that stupid covering at his him.

• Swearing as your shoe bounces off his chassis, you scramble to get away as he stalks your way, optics pale and angry. Your mind clawing for sense of the fact that he can apparently shrink, that fact second to that he’s angry and you don’t want those big hands on you when he’s this livid. A hand grabs your ankle to drag you back and you kick him in the jaw with the other leg without thinking, catching him by surprise as his head snaps back. And you freeze as he reaches up to slide a thumb over his lip, growling as it comes away wet with energon and oh, no. You really shouldn’t have done that. His glossa slides over his thumb, door wings trembling. “Come here,” he snarls.

• Little brat. You try to crawl away and he drags you back again, flipping you into your back and straddling your hips this time so you can’t kick him in the face again. And you go ballistic, screaming profanity in his face, your own face scarlet as you try to hit him and he bares his denta, capturing your wrists and pinning them above your head when you slap him, squirming under him like a wild thing. “You only landed a blow because you caught me by surprise,” he growls as your eyes flash with hate and you bare your little teeth at him, hips bucking under him. “Clearly no one’s ever taught you how to defend yourself.”

• Swearing, you try to wriggle your hands loose and give up when he tightens his grip in a subtle warning. Your anger faltering when he slaps a palm against the desk by your head and leans over you. Too close, you can feel him venting against your throat, his face right above yours. Suddenly very aware of the way he has you pinned and the heat of him. “Next time, put up more of a fight. Make it last,” he whispers, one corner of his mouth curling and it’s like a punch to the gut, the shock of that rueful little smile overwhelming you until you can’t breathe. Too aware of him and the fact that you like that cocky smile as much as you hate him. Panic claws at you, because you’re not sure this is anger anymore just that you want him off of you. Can’t get free of his grip, but he’s so close and he freezes, optics narrowing when you lift your head. And bite his already bleeding bottom lip as hard as you can.

Previous

Next

[engineersamuel]

A Note On Laios's armour.

One thing i noticed that I found interesting

the Collar piece, Something about it When looking at His armour felt interesting. and It finaly hit me. one thing about it always felt Interesting was how safe it looked, with how it protects his neck more. like, It feel Almost like a turtleneck

Its interesting, and it didn't jump out at me in the begining. it was just normal. Another thing with the Collar piece, it looks like there is enough space for Laios to Almost Shrink into the space a little, Like when you end up making a mistake and You pull back a little, and your head moves a little lower and compresses your neck. Most other armor Just does not have that extra detail most of the time, at least I havent noticed that much of a detail

Like this guy, the area where his armour meets his neck feels way too tight, How is he meant to put it on? (and Im assuming its just a solid metal piece when its most likely not) If this guy got punched in the face His neck is going to Hurt like hell from the armor Digging into The base of it. From what Bits of armor I have seen Online and such, they mostly have the Protective layer around the neck be made of several segmented plates that can slide on one another,

Like in this image, the first piece of armor, there is a Clear chunk of space made for the neck armor itself to be able to move.

or this Set of armor, where the protection for the neck is a Part of the helmet itself.

going back to Laios, Look at his neck Protection, its Like a little wall, Sure if you get knocked around you Will have the side of your head or your cheeks dig into the armor when your head hits it, but at the same time Laios never really uses a helmet. And Why would he want a Tight Restrictive armor Collar? its more than Large Enough for him to move his head around without feeling the base of his neck being restricted. its just interesting in my Opinion, How With laios His armor Shows In his personality. Bland looking at first, but with small details that show deeper things once you Look past the surface.

[gothushi]

ignorance is bliss

pairing: seb x f!virgin!reader

warning: first time, reader is basically absolutely clueless about sexual stuff, nothin too cray cray

note: publicly shame me. this took too long.

word count: 4.0k

“So, you’ve seriously never done.. anything?” Seb’s clarifying question has your cheeks burning hot, keeping your head ducked against his chest.

“Shut up!”

“I’m just asking! Like- absolutely nothing? Never even to yourself?” Seb’s staying the night, cuddled in bed with you and the title screen of a movie already finished lighting up the room. You two have been talking about life experiences, and somehow landed on the fact that you’ve never even touched yourself.

“...no. So what?” You grumble. You’re definitely embarrassed, trying to shrink down a little more beneath the covers as your hand rests on his chest. “I never had the privacy to do so or-.. like.. I dunno..”

Those urges come and go ever since you moved out a year ago, but it’s just never been a priority, and you’re so embarrassed by not knowing what to do that you just ignore them. The two of you have only gone as far as making out, not wanting to rush things, so it just never came up until now.

“Hey.. don’t feel weird about it, yeah?” Seb murmurs softly, tilting your chin up with gentle fingers to meet his warm gaze. His other arm is wrapped around you, tracing gentle patterns along your back through the thin fabric of your shirt.

“It ain’t some crime. We all start somewhere.” A playful smirk curls on his lips. “Just means I get to show you allll sorts of new things though, huh? It’d be my good deed for the day.” A kiss is planted on your forehead, his tone soft, “Doesn’t that sound nice? Just.. exploring?”

You tilt up, secretly craving a kiss, which he grants you. Blinking slow, you lean closer despite the mild humiliation. “I guess so.. yeah..”

“That’s my girl.” He purrs approvingly, leaning in to capture your lips again in a slower, more sensual kiss. A gentle press of mouths, savoring the contact, before parting your lips to lick over your tongue, shifting to press a bit of his weight into you now. One big hand slides down to rest possessively on your hip, thumbing over the plush there. The other cradles your head, laying you back as he kisses you like a man starved.

Almost immediately, your poor, untouched pussy aches. It’s instant, a throb that you’re used to ignoring. Gasping into his mouth, you sloppily follow his lead, letting him control the pace as your hands press onto his chest. He groans, only breaking away when you’re both panting and a bit flush, a few strands of honey hair fallen from his little ponytail.

“You’ve got no idea what you do to me, do you?” He nuzzles at your jaw, trailing open mouthed kisses along the column of your throat.

“Mh!” You whimper, tilting your head back instinctively as you grab onto his arm. “N-no.. I don’t ah-”

Seb breathes in your sweet perfume, the hint of shampoo behind your ear. His free hand skates down your side, fingers tracing the curve of your hip before down to your ass to grope over the plush there.

“We’ll go as slow as you need,” he promises, “just stop me if you want, okay? No pressure, I swear it.”

Your answering nod almost bumps into his head as he moves down, lapping over your collarbone, then moving his mouth to find your nipple overtop of your shirt. Even through the fabric, it feels extremely sensitive, a new sensation that you couldn’t have conjured up in your brain even if your tried.

Whimpering, you squirm beneath him, remembering to answer him, “Uh huh- promise- I’ll- I’ll stop you if I gotta..”

A pleased grin spreads on his lips, taking your words as an open invitation. Shifting to hover over you more, his fingers find the hem of your shirt, peeling the garment up to expose inch after inch of smooth skin, all the way until it’s above your tits.

“Oh.. look at you..” The appreciation comes out softly, blue eyes gazing over new skin. He leans down, dragging his tongue over a hardening peak with a moan, matching the yelp you let out at the contact. He suckles delicately, sending shocks of pleasure down your spine. “I could get addicted to these.”

His tongue is hot, wet, and you’re shocked at just how sensitive your nipples are. It makes that throb worse, clit aching for a friction you’ve never felt before. Pausing the worship with his tongue, he brings a hand up to massage over your tits, squeezing as if they were stress toys, pinching a little before he deems his needs satisfied, moving down.

His hand twists, fingertips delving beneath the waistband of your pajama bottoms, exploring over your thighs. When he finds the apex of them, he swears under his breath, discovering that your panties are plastered to your aching cunt with slick.

“Christ, Y/N-”

You whine loudly, cheeks flaring with an unbearable heat as he pulls the soaked fabric aside, the pad of his middle fingers finding slick folds. You toss your head back, gasping, “Ah- mmh!”

A groan sounds in his chest as he collects some slick on his finger, giving you the very first touches onto your puffy clit. He rushes to get your pants off, tossing the unneeded garments aside. “Fuck, y’r soaked.. all for me, huh, love?” He plays softly, circling around your clit for a moment before that finger dips down to gently slip into your fluttering hole, just knuckle deep.

Your face is hot, most certainly flushed down your neck as you squirm. His hand moves so.. expertly, knowing exactly what he’s doing.

“Oh-! Ff-” You whimper, overwhelmed just from his finger alone. You had never imagined yours, let along his, inside of you. Your eyes roll, your velvety walls clamping down a few times onto the invading digit. “Slow-”

“Shh, I’ve got you..” He coos reassuringly, slowing his movements to a maddeningly gentle pace. He pumps his finger shallowly, letting you adjust to the foreign sensation of being filled. “Thaaat’s it, just relax..”

Leaning down, he swallows the whimper you let out as he kisses you, swallowing down your breathy moans. It only lasts a few moments before he tugs away reluctantly, trailing some kisses onto your jaw, nipping lightly. “How’s this?” He slightly curls his finger, huffing a pleased noise.

“Ho- ahn!” Your legs jerk, hips rutting up. The tip of his finger rubs against something, some spot that makes electricity run up your spine and through your veins, makes something deep inside your clit throb.

“Mh- what-” You whine lowly, feeling your chest rise and fall faster with pants, “Wha’ was that..?”

A smug smile curves Seb’s lips as he hears your awed question, thinking you’re just adorable. “That, gorgeous, was your g-spot. Dead center and begging for attention.”

He emphasizes his point by firmly stroking over that bundle of nerves again, timing it with a swirl of his thumb over your neglected clit. Pleasure sparks through your system, setting your nerves alight.

You yelp, a cry of a moan as your hips rut down, chasing the intense pleasure. “Mh-!” One of your hands finds his shoulder, curling against his shirt as he coos.

“Mmm, I think she likes that, yeah?”

“Ah- nnnhah-”

With a chuckle, he slows his ministrations, gentling his touch to keep the pleasure barely simmering. His free hand slides up to one of your tits, groping and squeezing, rolling the stiffening peak between skilled fingers.

“Think you can handle another finger, gorgeous? Wanna feel this pretty cunt stretch.”

“Mmh- another..?” You whimper quietly, tilting your head so you can look at him through dazed eyes. “Won’t it.. hurt..?”

He abandons your boob to cradle your cheek, blues locking eyes with you. “I’ve got you.. it might sting a bit but I’ll go slow, hm? And if you don’t like it you can stop me, I promise.”

As your hesitant nod, he leans in to give you a slow kiss, tangling his tongue with yours languidly, a dance meant to distract as he pulls his finger out almost all the way so he can join another into the mix.

The stretch burns slightly, but in a way that the pain makes your toes curl, a short squeal into his mouth as he pushes in slow. Your hole is greedy, sucks his digits in with a way of ease provided by your copious slick.

“Good?”

“Mh- hmm!” You nod quickly, eyes fluttering as you move both hands to the sheets beside you. “Feels- nnh- hur’s a little- y’r fingers are big,” you whimper, looking down between you both.

Seb follows your gaze, admiring the erotic sight of his fingers sinking in and out of your sweet, soppy folds. The obscene squelch as he works them deeper fills the room, along with his coo, “She’s takin’ them so good though, love.” The sultry praise rolls off his tongue, finding a careful rhythm, “Greedy pussy jus’ takin’ them in, so soaked.”

His curls his thumb up over your clit again, giving attention to the puffy bud, making your vision blur. Your back bends, gripping hard at the sheets once he curves his fingers up again, before you relax and melt into the pleasure. Your legs squirm around, toes curling. “Seb..”

“I’m right here, gorgeous,” he purrs, letting his free hand pet over your tummy in an affectionate manner. “This filthy little pussy was just made to be fucked, huh? ‘m gonna ruin you for anyone else, have you stuffed full of cum till you’re addicted to it.”

His nasty words make your face burn impossibly brighter, whimpering pathetically as you wriggle around. “Mm-” It’s embarrassing how you feel yourself clench onto his words, your body seemingly liking the dirty talk. “Hah-”

If only you could see the view. His long fingers, disappearing into your poor little hole, absolutely soaked in fresh slick. It drips all along your folds, a trail leaking down over your ass and definitely leaving a spot on the bed.

He groans at another fresh gush, his mouth watering, “That’s it, drench my hand, dirty girl.”

You yelp and a hand jerks down to grab onto his wrist when he starts to torment that spot again, fingers rubbing just right as his thumb expertly circles over your clit. There’s a slight tightness, an odd sensation, making your brows furrow.

“Fuh- feels funny,” you whimper, hips trembling, “why-”

“‘s okay, gorgeous, just means y’r gonna cum. It’s gonna feel real good, I’m right here,” the soft assurances are so sweet, makes your chest and head feel fuzzy. You tug on his arm, almost a little distressed as your squirming around intensifies.

“Nh- Seb, Seb-” You whine, breathing picking up slightly as your eyes flutter. The confusion is so cute, makes him realize just how hard he is as his cock throbs in his boxers, aching for some attention as he slightly increasing the pace of his fingers.

“Don’t fight it, let it happen,” he urges, flattening his hand onto your navel with a bit of pressure.

You tense up, and then quiver. Your first orgasm crashes over you like a tidal wave, or maybe a freight train as you writhe against the bed with a whiny sob. It starts at your head and then curls down through your gut as your pussy flutters, hips rocking instinctively as it shakes all the way down to your toes.

The peak fades, leaving you panting as if you just ran a marathon, eyes teary and dripping as your vision clears up.

Watching you unravel is absolutely intoxicating for Seb, little coos falling from his lips as he slowly works you through your orgasm. He gentles his pace, slowing down once you start to twitch with sensitivity, pulling his fingers out. The emptiness leaves an odd ache, tiredness settling over you. A glob of cum leaks from your hole, making you whine and press your legs together sheepishly.

His blues are fond as he admires you, the delicate flush on your skin, the dazed look, he thinks he could devour you whole.

“Well, aren’t you just the prettiest thing after a good orgasm?” Seb smiles, lifting his soaked fingers to his mouth for a taste, groaning. “And delicious.”

A whimper falls from your lips at the sight, a few stray tears dripping down to your hairline, heart rate slowly coming back down. You feel like jelly, muscles weak and wobbly. “That’s-” your cheeks darken as he sucks your cum from his digits.

“Relax,” he lowers his mostly clean hand to swipe through the slickness on your inner thigh, trailing along the path. “Just enjoying the fruits of my labor. You made quite the mess, huh?” His thumb dips, parting your soppy folds to allow his fingers to collect more. Instead of lapping it up himself, he leans over you with his hand near your face.

You nearly go cross eyed looking at his head, flushed as the sight of creamy slick covering his finger. “Isn’t that-.. nasty?”

A huff of laughter escapes Seb at your distaste for the idea, grinning big. He presses his middle finger to your lip, encouraging you to part them and taste.

“Nasty?” He inquires, “this is the most delectable thing you could ever put in your mouth.”

His insistence is definitely fueled by his own perversions, and you.. you give in so easily.

Your lips part before your tongue laps out, allowing his finger into your mouth for you to suckle. The slick and cum is salty, slightly tangy, and it makes your face scrunch up with a little muffled noise.

“There.. isn’t that good?” He grins smugly, the exploratory licks on his finger making him wish it were his cock. One day. “Good girl, all of it.” His hand moves, finger delving deeper into your mouth as he stares intently.

You whimper lowly, something in the naughty act making your spent pussy throb, legs squirming around with your thighs pressed tightly together. You suckle, licking the skin clean before swallowing.

“Fuck.. look at you, so cute.” With deliberate slowness, he withdraws his finger, letting it trail across your lower lip before tucking it into his mouth afterwards. His tongue sweeps over the tip, tasting the remnants of your cum along with your own spit with a low groan of approval.

The tent in his pajama pants catches your eye as you squirm, his body knelt over you. Obviously, you know what a dick is, you aren’t that stupid, so you stammer out.

“Can I-..” Embarrassment swells in your throat. “Can I watch you..?”

Seb can’t believe his luck. Not only did he give you your very first orgasm, but now you’re asking to watch him jerk off? Maybe you’re naturally perverted, but his makes his heart ache with fondness at how shy you still are.

“Oh, I think that can be arranged,” he croons, reaching down to toy with his cock. One hand eagerly pushes his waistbands down before he flops against the headboard, shedding them fully as he speaks.

“In fact, why don’t you come sit on my lap while I take care of this, hm?” He pats a hand on his thigh, signaling for you to come sit on him.

You turn over on wobbly legs, crawling closer as your shirt falls back down to your waist. Heat curls in your belly as you straddle his lap, sat back mostly onto his slightly spread thighs.

Despite being embarrassed, you can’t stop staring at his naked lap, at his aching cock as he curls his fingers around the shaft, near the base where it disappears into a mess of honeyed curls. “That’s.. supposed t’fit inside me..?”

He giggles, his other hand mindlessly finding your thigh in a contrastingly gentle touch. “Uh huh, once we get there, we’ll go slow, of course.” He drags his hand up, swiping the pad of his thumb over to collect his pre with a huff. You watch as he slowly jerks himself off, the way his fingers squeeze, his ring glinting in the low light of your room.

Innocently so, your mind races with thoughts, curiosity and confusion. He’s.. big, right? Long, no way he’d fit up inside me.. wouldn’t that really hurt?

Seb on the other hand is much more occupied with nastier thoughts, choosing to voice them with a huffy moan, his other hand squeezing on your thigh. “God, I bet stretchin’ you would feel incredible.. so tight ‘nd warm,” he lets out a breathless groan, instead shifting his hand to your hip. “Probably eat you out too, take all the time in th’ world t’make sure you’re ready-“ His strokes quicken, a bit more desperate for pleasure. Pre dribbles over his flared head, coating the palm of his fist as he twists his hand just the way he likes.

The grunted noise he gives has you squirming, just watching him being enough to realize your poor pussy is throbbing again.

“Seb..” You whimper, hands curling lightly against the hem of your shirt as if to shyly pull it down, hips rutting forward instinctively into nothing.

“Fuck, lookit you.. already worked up again?” He thinks it’s cute, you just came and you’re already ready again? He slows his hand before the other curls onto your back, allowing him to haul you forward with ease.

You yelp, hips grinding down at the contact. It’s an odd sensation, your bare cunt pressed against the underside of his shaft. He’s hot, firm, rock hard and if you move forward, he fits just right. A pathetic whimper falls from your lips, burying your face into his neck.

“Oh-!”

A long moan spills from his lips, urging your hips forward. The slick evidence of your arousal coats his shaft, an intoxicating slide that has both of you whining. His arms curl around you, hands sliding up under your shirt to rub over your back as he praises.

“There- just like that, you- move like that, gorgeous.” His encouragement is a low, filthy rasp as his wandering hands settle for your ass now, groping hard, the underside of his tip catching on your clit with the upwards grind.

Your own arms curl around his shoulders, whining noisily, not even recognizing your own voice as you babble. “Se- ah! Feels- feels good,” the drag of your puffy clit, the rivulets of arousal leaking onto his shaft, his cock parting through your folds deliciously, it’s maddening.

Seb lavishes kisses onto your neck, suckling lightly as to not leave a mark, but enough to let the sensation course down your spine. He’s drunk on the power of guiding you, of allowing you all these new feelings. His fingertips press into your ass harder, urging you into a faster rhythm.

“Such a good girl, so responsive,” he pants, nipping over your jaw before nosing at your cheek, “Bet you can’t wait to feel my cock in your greedy little hole, stuffing you full-”

You whine, “Shut- shut up!” The consistent rub on your clit is other wordly, vision swimming with stars as that odd coil tightens up into your tummy again.

He chuckles, the vibrations felt against your chest through your shirts. He loves this, thinks he might be addicted to grinding with you like a pair of horny teenagers.

“What? It embarrass you to hear the truth?” He taunts playfully, “Doesn’t change the fact that you desperate little pussy is practically sobbing for my cock.” As if to emphasize, he swipes a hand down, just enough to slicken his fingers up, before bringing them to stuff into your mouth.

You garble when his fingers are forced into your mouth, the feeling enough to make you sit up a little straighter, in turn pushing onto his cock more.

God, the sight of you.

Face flushed, hair mused up. Your tongue flattens onto his fingers, body only able to focus on grinding or sucking, one at a time. Your eyes are a bit teary, wet, brows furrowing together. The rhythm of your hips falters, a whimper muffled onto his fingers at the taste of yourself.

Seb is enraptured, spreading his fingers over your tongue, making sure not to push too far back.

“Y’r so pretty like this. Always pretty- but, extra.” He breathes, “wanna ruin this body, be the only one who knows how you taste- how you sound. Bet when I first fuck you I’ll reach all the way to your tummy, hm?”

“Mhm!” You whimper, his affections and crude words sparking something in your gut, a pleasurable swirl that makes your thighs shake.

You’re really going to have to be taught how to understand your body better, because your second orgasm crashes into you without even realizing until it’s too late.

You squeal around his fingers, trembling atop his lap with sloppy rhythm, pushing down onto his cock, soaked folds flush to his shaft as you cum. His groan mingles with your whines, seeing you succumb to ecstasy again is enough for his hips to rut up.

“Oh, fuck-” His fingers hook down, knocking into your cheek as his eyes roll. “I’m gonna-” Thick ropes of pearly cum splatter onto his tummy, on the hem of his rumpled shirt, stomach taut with the effort. Wave after wave, until you’re both panting, slumped against the headboard together. He wipes his wet fingers onto your shirt so that way he can pet over your head, lightly scratching on your scalp.

Fuck. He can’t remember the last time he came that hard. The uncomfortably wet glide of his softening cock through your folds draws another groan from him, a jerking whine from you, whimpering his name.

A surge of tenderness washes over him as he cradles your cheek, lifting your head to pepper a few kisses onto your cheeks, nose, lips. Your eyes are lidded, brimmed with tears, leaning into his palm. Giggling breathlessly, “Mmh.. wa-” you still have to catch your breath, panting, “that felt.. good..”

He leans in to capture your slack mouth in a gentle kiss, humming in agreement. “You okay, gorgeous?”

“Mh..” You sigh out, eyes fluttering as his hand scritches on your jaw, petting over your neck. “My legs feel funny.. like jelly.. ‘nd ‘m sticky..” The complaint makes his heart swell, post-orgasmic bliss fading away to overheated skin and slick sex.

“Oh, I know,” Seb coos, sitting up some. After a moment of shifting, he cradles you in his arms, carrying you to the bathroom and setting you down on the toilet. “Go to the bathroom,” the soft order makes your brows furrow, staring at him as he gets into the small closet for some towels, preparing to take a shower together.

“Aren’t-.. you gonna step out..?”

He turns, blues amused as he looks down at you. “I just fingered you. You’re shy about pissing in front of me? You have to go after sex.”

“Well, we didn’t-”

“Doesn’t matter, even if i didn’t fuck you.”

“Oh.”

Guess pee shy doesn’t matter when you just came on someone, right? You go as he gathers some towels to shower together, turning on the faucet to let the water heat up.

Once done, you both step in. Seb discovers quickly that you’re very clingy after an orgasm, wanting to hug on him rather than actually clean up.

“C’mon, gorgeous, let go and let me clean you up. You’re all wobbly.” He laughs, lathering soap into the washcloth. It smells of vanilla and honey.

You whine, “I don’ wanna.. y’r warm..”

“Cold? Here-“ He adjusts you slightly, “under the water. There, is that better?”

Hot water runs down your back, dampening your hair and warming your skin. A pleased hum leaves you, shifting slightly to allow him to start washing up your arms.

“Silly girl,” he mumbles, smiling. It doesn’t take long to wash up, he isn’t completely thorough, just doing a quick job to get the tacky sweat and cum off of your bodies before helping you step out.

Towel dried and back in your room, he dresses you both, huffing at your tired, heavy limbs.

“Alright, here,” he tucks you under the covers, handing you the remote to the TV, along with your teddy bear. “He’ll keep you company. I’ll go get us a snack. You want some soda?”

“Mh,” you pout for a moment, staring up at him. The pleasure has left you dazed, sleepy, definitely a little hungry, and oh so cared for. “Can I have a kiss?”

Oh, his heart just melts.

“‘course you can, gorgeous.” He leans in, planting a kiss to your lips, a careful one.

“Don’t fall asleep, you still need to eat something.”

“Aawwwhhhh.”

[peri-helia]

Ichor

A ficlet that's been in my drafts for...anyway a fic about love, immortality and soup.

Nile shatters when the bowl does.

She’s clearing the plates from lunch, some gorgeous paella Nicky had whipped up to capture the sun drenched streets of Madrid, when it falls off the countertop and shatters on the tiles. It’s her own stupid fault, she’d been trying to get lost in her headphones, imagining she was at the heart of the crowd and feeling like she was a part of something again, instead of standing fifteen feet away from every other person in existence.

She’s seen the cavalier way the others handle historical artefacts for the simple fact that they’re not artefacts or priceless antiquities when they’re something you’ve used and bought for years, no matter how long ago that was.

Andy kept a Rodin in a cave for Christ’s sake.

And Nile’s spilling hot tears over a fucking bowl that is clearly 21st century.

It’s probably from IKEA for fucks sake. God, now she’s having visions of Andy, Joe and Nicky strolling round IKEA picking dishes and sitting on the floor trying to work out if they’ve got all the screws to build a dresser, which is just fucking surreal.

Christ.

It makes her snort laughing, which only makes her cry harder because there’s no one to tell. There’s no-one she can side-eye as if to say ‘do you see this?’ Like Jay. Or Dizzy. Or her brother. There’s no-one her age around or with her life experience or –or – no-one she’ll ever really –

The world shrinks to the desolate breadth of Nile’s ribs as she tries to catch her breath, as she tries to settle, one of her earbuds still blaring music, the blue bowl in jigsaw pieces around her. God it’s scattered so far, she can see pieces across the floor by the doorway to the tiny bathroom that never heats up and under the fridge, shards still rocking gently with the force of the fall.

“Nile?”

“Nile!”

Joe and Nicky call down the corridor, casual and then cautious. Because all they’d heard was a bowl drop and then gasping. It could be anything, given the way they live. It could be Goussainville.

Oh God, right.  The world rushes in, judgemental and disrupted and Nile slips to her knees, starts gingerly trying to pick the pieces. She keeps her face to the floor when she hears Joe and Nicky stop, hears the guns go away.

“I’m sorry – I dropped a bowl, it was stupid”

A teardrop falls traitorously onto the tile, as if Nile’s voice, thick and stilting wasn’t enough of a giveaway.

“Nile?��� Joe asks, stepping closer. Out of the corner of her eye, Nile sees his boot nudge a piece of ceramic.

“It’s fine” she waves a frantic hand at them, “I can do this”

They all know she’s not talking about the goddamned bowl.

“Nile” Nicky’s gentle lilt steps in, his hand sliding into her vision, palm up. There’s the odd scar there, knicks and scrapes from a thousand years ago. The lines of his palm heavy. She’d done some palm reading one night, with a girlfriend years ago. Heart line. Line of life. Nicky’s curves from his thumb to the beginning of his wrist, starting off almost delicate and spidery and then thickening. She can’t see the end. Her ex hadn’t been able to find the end of hers either.  

Another tear falls. Nicky catches it in his palm.

“Ah, cara,” And Nile jumps. Her Italian is still rudimentary but when you have two people talking to you in it all day you start to get it and she knows what that means. She can feel the warmth of him, Nicky’s always so warm, they both are. “You do not have to do this alone”

Nile takes his hands, fingers grasping his wrists, letting him take the weight as they stand up, “Careful, here” Nicky gently directs her steps, until he’s led her back to the doorway. Joe’s hands replace his husband’s, reaching out for her.

Nile clings to him blindly, the need to not feel alone burning through the distant haze of shame that she has shattered so easily. Joe says something to Nicky, but Nile doesn’t catch it, too exhausted and burnt through to care.

There’s the couch, and then the hot sweet tea Joe buys for Nicky being pressed into her hands. She tries to quiet her sobs but that just makes them more obvious, ripping through the room loud and shuddering. Maybe it’s the shock, at long last. Nicky is the one who sits beside her in the end. He doesn’t say anything, mercifully, just sits beside her. Joe gently squeezes her shoulder and retreats to somewhere unknown.

“Fuck – sorry” she coughs, sipping at the tea and resolutely trying to stop thinking about it, about this pain that’s suddenly clawing at her chest, at her heart, that her knowledge of what she’d thought the world was had shattered as readily as that bowl, that this can’t be fixed, that it’ll never be the same again, never, never.

The tears flow faster. Nile cries. She cries for her family, for her friends, for Joe and Nicky who as far as she can see love life and people still after a thousand years, who still go out into the darkness even though it might cost them the one thing they cannot live without. For Booker and all that he’s lost, for Andy whose had the one thing that’s stayed constant finally ripped away from her and then had Booker be the one to put them all in their worst nightmare, and Quynh, God, poor fucking Quynh…and she cries for herself. 

She’s kind of forgotten Nicky’s there, in all honesty. Like there’s the weight of him next to her on the sofa, but that’s about as much as she registers. She lifts the cup to her lips and then realises there’s nothing left in it to drink.

“Oh”

“Finished?” and Nicky, God bless him, his voice is as it was in Goussainville when he’d shown here where to sleep, and given her a toothbrush and a towel of all things. Quiet, that lilt that’s light but not bright, just conversational. As if her heart breaking all over the sofa is normal. He takes the cup away, just stretches to deposit it on the carpet and Nile reaches out a hand to steady him, even though the worst thing would be he might accidentally overbalance and slip onto the floor.

His smile widens and when he shuffles back onto the sofa proper, he gently covers her hand with his on his bicep, squeezing gently once. “Thank you, Nile.”

Nile kind of blinks, because all she’d done was – not that much at all, really, but she smiles back and then wipes at her eyes, the tears lingering there. Nicky squeezes her hand again.

“Ya amar? Nile, habibti? Will you come here, please?”

They turn together at Joe’s voice and drift outside to the weed-filled yard, with its brass water tap and assortment of several lifetimes junk. There’s a little potting shed of sorts filled with firewood and Booker’s inks and plastic explosive. Leaning against the old sandstone wall is a worn table, where Nile can see Joe’s laid the shattered pieces of her bowl.

There’s tubes and brushes laid out, with a battered dining chair and a low stool.

Nile’s just forming the words to ask, when Joe smiles, and says “Kintsugi”

It’s so not what she was expecting that Nile laughs aloud, “Really?” she brushes a hand over the shattered ceramic.

“Really, really” he grins back, pleased to have made her laugh.

Over the next hour, they walk her through how to repair through kintsugi; gently applying the urushi lacquer, dusting the gold powder over it and she watches raptly as the bowl comes back to life, threaded through with veins of gold.

We may not have all the answers, but we do have purpose.

Joe slides the bowl, reformed back over the smooth, worn wood of the tabletop towards her. Nicky comes striding out with dinner and doesn’t even hesitate, pouring minestrone soup straight into it in one smooth motion.

It holds. The dishes are scraped clean. The soup is perfect – hot and tomatoey, with crunchy celery and just a bit too much pepper, exactly as she likes.

Thank you,” she breathes out, the tension having seeped from her shoulders long since, her face tight with dried tears. She’s not talking about the bowl.

And Joe and Nicky just smile, warm and golden.

“It’s what we’re here for”

Yeah. Yeah it is.

[distinctlywhumpthing]

idk about you but i would literally sell my firstborn for a future/more-recovered-aiden-chapter 👀

~ 🍯

Once upon a time, the scene of Aiden waking up in the back of Leo's van full of painting tools, thinking for a second he was seeing in monochrome would not leave me alone. Three years ago today, I posted the first part of Unintentional to start telling that story <3

As a postiversary present to everyone from the beginning (seriously, this ask is from 2022), here's a timeline jump. (Don't tell Leo, he's a real stickler for order.) Thanks for sticking with me and the boys <3

More Than This

Previous — Masterlist — Next

Snap. 

Aiden huffs, twisting and grinding the broken pencil tip through the last stroke even as it threatens to tear the paper under his force. 

He should be able to do this. It’s all he ever does now. Practice speaking, practice reading, practice writing. Follow the plans for eating, for exercising, for sleeping. He shouldn’t complain, he finally knows what to be. There was a time he’d let this routine support him like his spine. He was given a role to play but all he does is just that: pretend. He hasn’t made progress in weeks. The only thing he knows is how precisely he is failing. 

Across the room, Leo stops typing. “Why don’t you take a break? You’ve been at it for a while.” 

He doesn’t need to look to know that Leo will have that concerned crease between his brows, mouth turned down at the corners as he tries to assess what the problem is this time. Aiden is nothing but problems. 

“I’m fine,” he mutters but of course Leo is coming over. Would have no matter what he said. 

Leo fills a glass at the sink and turns to lean against the counter across the island as he sips it. Aiden doesn’t want to see whatever look Leo is giving him that will just crumble his resolve. The triangles and circles on the page blur in and out of focus as he blinks back tears. Tears from the strain of making his damaged, useless brain process not-even-fucking-letters for the last few hours. Nothing else.

When Leo finishes his water, he fills a glass for Aiden, slides it in front of him. “I’ll do some work with you then.” 

“No.” He definitely can’t look at Leo now. 

Leo takes a measured pause.

The apology is on the tip of Aiden’s tongue but he keeps his jaw locked. Harder to stave off are the physical reactions. His body wants to shrink away, to flinch and hide and beg and be hurt and held. He tightens his fist around the pencil, pulling it into his lap to hide his shaking. 

“I know you want to make progress but it’s okay to take breaks.” Leo makes his voice gentle, tiptoeing through the minefield between them. "It’s not going to set you back, you’ve been working hard.”

“Nnnno. I…mmm—” He shakes his head as if he could shake off the rising frustration coming up to tighten around his temples, his throat, his chest. He’s been trying to avoid the stuttered conjunction between every word, always made worse by times like this. Harrison guaranteed he would never get out of a painful situation too quickly. 

Leo steps up to the other side of the island, leaning onto his elbows to lower himself into Aiden’s line of sight. “C’mon…”

He shakes his head, can’t trust himself to speak coherently. He’s being stubborn and stupid. Harrison would have threatened him by now if he hadn’t already backhanded him. He never dreamed of pulling something like this back with Archer or the Songs.

 “Alright, hon.” Leo gives him one last long-suffering smile and turns back to the sink. 

Aiden swallows a sob, furiously blinking away the hot tears prickling his eyes. Leo was never going to push him more than a little. Lead him to whatever line he’d drawn or found, offer to help him step over it, but be the first to abandon the idea if it was too much. 

“Why?”

Leo shut off the tap. “Pardon?” He dries his hands on the bright salmon-pink tea towel threaded through the pull for the dishwasher. Delia says I shouldn’t be so allergic to real colors, he explained when Aiden pulled it out from the perfectly folded stack of muted earth-toned cotton in the cabinet.  

“Why?” Aiden repeats, voice strained by the tightening in his chest. “I…don’t…mmm—” He squeezes his eyes shut, pushes past the stupid mumbling. “Why?”

“Why what, hon?” Frustratingly calm and earnest, so eager to help in whatever way he can. 

Aiden wants to scream. It’s not fair, this isn’t Leo’s fault, but whatever has been sparked rages inside him beyond his control. “Why…do…mmm…mmm—” He mashes his lips together, forcing his lungs to fill with air. He will not start crying. 

Leo tilts his head to the side. “Why do I…help?” Aiden shakes his head, huffing out a breath that is perilously close to a sob. “Why do I…care?” 

It puts a rock right in the middle of his throat. He lifts his chin a fraction. 

Defiant despite having literally no ground to stand on, Harrison used to taunt when Aiden was strung up on his table. 

“Because I do. I do care about you…” 

Aiden’s heart skitters in his chest. He looks away, all the wind gone from his sails because he’s as easily swayed as a feather. No. He won’t be weak, pathetic, and needy. He’s angry right now. Frustrated and bitter. 

“There’s no one reason—”

“I…don’t—mmm—mmm—” He clenches his teeth together until they creak in the back of his jaw, blinking away more of the hot tears that refuse to fucking stop pooling in his eyes. 

Leo stands there calmly, crease between his brows confirming that he doesn’t like what he’s seeing. He’s worried. Always so worried and concerned and caring. 

Because he cares. 

Aiden stands, pushing away from the island and Leo. “I-I-I-I—” God, he wants to break something when it's like this. A wall he is just banging his head against, all the while becoming less coherent.

“Breathe,” Leo says, slowly rounding the end of the island toward him. “It will come. Just—”

“No. I…mmm…don’t…w-w-mmm—Fuck!” He slams his fist down on the counter. 

Leo doesn’t even flinch. 

Why should he? Of course he wouldn’t flinch. 

Aiden moves away from him, starts pacing back and forth. He wishes he could run, pound his feet into pavement until it dulls whatever is going on inside his head. 

“Aiden—“

“Not…mmm’my name.”

Leo’s expression falters. 

It’s a low blow. Aiden knows it, they both know it. All it does is deepen the disparity between them. Making him all the more desperate as Leo regains his composure. 

“If you want a different name—if you want me to stop calling you that, all you have to do is tell me.”

How can Leo be even calmer than before?

A sob escapes Aiden’s throat before he can swallow it. He turns away, circling the island to put it between them again. He doesn’t want Leo trying to comfort him. He doesn’t want it and he doesn’t deserve it. 

“I don’t want you to keep the name just because at the time you thought it was my place to give it. That’s not how I saw it then and that’s certainly not how I see things now.” 

Shame is oil on the fire, it only burns hotter. “Doesn’t…mmm’matter…”

“It does to me. I’ve never seen you as a Companion or treated you like one. I don’t expect anything, you know that.” 

“Fuck…you.” He surprises himself but pushes on anyway. Even steps forward so they’re closer, eye-to-eye, bold with the slab of stone between them. “That…doesn’t—doesn’t mmm’make a…difference. Doesn’t mmm’make..mmm’me…different—”

“Wait, that’s not what I’m saying—” 

“You—”

“I didn’t mean—”

He raises his voice to speak over Leo. “I’m’mmm…that’s…what-what…I am…” 

Leo waits to make sure he’s finished this time. The stretching silence makes his shouting seem ridiculous and Aiden burns under the unearned patience, the undeserved consideration. 

“I know,” Leo finally says.

“If you…don’t…mmm’w-w-want…this…why?”

Leo’s face falls and Aiden almost goes with it. He backs away from the gaping hole in his resolve. One misstep and he’ll be at the bottom of it, down on his knees. Putting a chink in Leo’s composure is no kind of feat. It only makes him feel that much closer to coming apart entirely. 

“Please,” Leo moves around the island, trying to get onto the same side as Aiden again. “It’s not that black and white—”

“Mmm…yes…it-is.” 

“But—”

“You-you…mmm…hate…it—” He points at Leo. Anyone else would have broken his accusatory finger. “You…hate…this…mmm’what…I am’mmm—” He backs away shaking his head. 

“Wait, no. Aiden, that’s not what I meant. You misunderstood—”

“No!” He wants to hit the ceiling. Better yet, put his whole body through a wall and get the fuck away from here. From these feelings. Leo wouldn’t follow if he went up to his room. Not even if he slammed the door and started breaking things. But he can’t. He’s only acting brave enough to set this fire, he could never leave the blaze unattended. Just like he’s only acting like he’s recovering into a real person.

It’s all just acting. None of it is real. 

Why?

He’s trapped and boiling, glaring at the charcoal-grey cabinets. He once put his fist through another one. A honeyed pine varnish with dark grain, an arched frame around the flimsy middle panel of each one. Hardly took any force to slam through it but he put his whole weight behind his fist anyway. 

Of course, Leo’s damn cabinets are solid wood. 

He cries out, turning away from Leo to slide down the cabinet he hasn’t so much as dented, cradling his hand against his chest. No point holding anything back now. He’s sobbing by the time he hits the floor, curling up tightly. 

When Leo comes over, Aiden’s reaction slips out before he can catch it. He shrinks back, sobs turning to whimpers. “Please…mmm’sorry, mmm’sorry…mmm’good—” He can almost see himself from above, staring up at Leo with those distrustful, unblinking eyes. Lips still moving through the shapes of pleas he’s crying too hard to vocalize. 

He hates that less-than-person. How little it controls and how much power it still holds. His shameless meltdown only puts him back exactly where he belongs. He’ll never be anything different. 

“I know, I know. You are good.” Leo kneels carefully, holding his hand out, palm up, between them.  “You don’t have to be sorry, it’s all good.” 

Aiden shakes his head, gulping in air between sobs, knuckles throbbing. “I didn’t—didn’t mmm’mean…” He doesn’t know if the apology is for trying to ruin Leo’s kitchen or for exploding or for falling back on old habits. 

“I know, it’s okay. We’re good. Come on, let me give you a hand?” 

He swallows and tries to take a deep breath. Tries to compose himself, tries to get his mind to stop spinning through replaying and catastrophizing. He just wants—He needs—

“I—I used…t’be mmm’more than…this,” he blurts. 

Leo stops waiting for Aiden to take his hand and slides in next to him against the cabinets instead. They sit in silence long enough that Aiden starts to wonder if Leo even heard him but Leo finally says, “I know.”

Aiden bites his lip, afraid to look at Leo but he can’t look too closely at his hand or he’ll draw unwarranted concern. 

“You don’t have to defend yourself to me,” Leo says after another long pause. “I care about you. I’m here for all of it and I’m not going anywhere. I think maybe you know that or we wouldn’t be having this conversation.” 

“Sorry,” he mumbles. 

“It's okay, hon. We're figuring things out as we go."  

Leo always means what he says so when Aiden looks up, it’s for a different kind of reassurance. Leo gives him his half-smile, reaching out to squeeze the back of his neck. Goosebumps run down Aiden’s spine and he drops his head onto his knees, hiding his face. Leo wraps an arm around his back. 

By the time Leo speaks, Aiden has long since stopped preparing for Leo to pull away before he’s ready. “So, how about that break?” 

He lifts his head from Leo’s shoulder, trying to gauge what he means.

Leo pulls him to his feet. “Come on, let’s go for a drive.” 

And his heart falls.

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@octopus-reactivated @maracujatangerine @nicolepascaline @whumpy-writings @cracked-porcelain-princess

@meetmeinhellcroutons @briars7 @thingsthatgo-whump-inthenight @jo-doe-seeking-inspo @neuro-whump

@painsandconfusion @wolfeyedwitch @skyhawkwolf @haro-whumps @onlybadendings

@peachy-panic @fillthedarkvoid @rabass @crystalquartzwhump @dont-touch-my-soup

@mylifeisonthebookshelf @hold-him-down @guachipongo @creetchure @leyswhumpdump

@aseasonwithclarasblog @catawhumpus @magziemakeswhatever @espresso-depresso-system @pigeonwhumps

@batfacedliar-yetagain @whumpinthepot @dustypinetree @whump-in-progress @pirefyrelight

@whumps-and-bumps @i-eat-worlds @hellodecisionparalysis @heartfullofhoney (og asker?)

[valas-illyn]

When I come to, I'm laying on some kind of hospital bed. My hands are cuffed to the sides. I don't immediately remember where I was before this, how did I get here? Where is here?

The lights in here are low, but still bright enough. The now opening door reveals a comparatively blinding hallway, and a silhouetted figure composed of writhing vines. Something about the perspective seems off, but I can't make it make sense.

Someone, somewhere, in another room is scared, terrified even. Angry too. Bursting with emotions, they want to scream and sob and thrash and rage. It sounds like a lot.

I just feel tired.

The thing moves into the room, and the door slides blessedly shut.

Affini. That's the word. Suddenly the perspective clicks into focus and the room makes sense. Affini are 10ft tall alien plants with a penchant for keeping other sapients as pets, the room is sized for them which is why everything feels wrong. I'm tall for a human but I'm not that tall, the bed is human sized though so it must be on some kind of raised platform.

My mind drifts off again, lost in visualising the technical specifications for a 5ft high hospital bed. Extra trains of thought spinning off into imaging what other situations one would even be needed, or in the comical image of a human nurse trying to wheel one about. Yknow, they're always complaining that they don't have enough space on the wards, with a 5ft high one you could have modular bunk beds that just roll over each other, you could double the capacity of a hospital. You'd have to add teeth to each leg and an electric winder to hoist it up and down though. Maybe some kind of quick release mechanism for emergencies? You could-

"Petal?" The affini is standing over me, the voice is... Soft. Not quite feminine, but maybe feminine by their standards, what do I know? Do affini even have male and female? Well, it'll do for now. Her voice is a gentle rustling rasp that I can barely believe is capable of human speech. "Petal, it's time to wake up."

I roll my head towards her. The someone is getting loud again. "I'm awake." My voice is flat, lifeless. Too deep. It sounds wrong.

She seems to shrink, like she's slumped. Relief? Despair? Maybe she's just tired too. How do you read the body language of a bush? "Good, I am Luminara Verdis, fourth bloom. Pronouns she/her. What should I call you?"

I was right, feminine. I try to answer, but instead I just yawn. Long and deep.

"still a little sleepy? Let's give you something to clear those sedatives out of your system." *She leans over and a loop of vine extends towards my neck. A light glints off the end of a sharp, needle-like point dripping with something viscous.

Sudden and visceral. An emotion floods through me, but I couldn't put a name to it. I yell "No!" far louder than I intended as I throw myself away from her, straining against my bonds. I realise my legs are bound too.

The bed wobbles and she holds it steady with a vine, preventing me from tipping it over in my... Panic? Panic. That's what it is. Somewhere deep inside, a part of me sees the absurdly tall bed again and wants to chuckle, another part of me notes the axis of the tilt and the centre of gravity, and mentally confirms the platform hypothesis.

"ok, its ok petal. Calm down." She makes a show of taking the needle away but I keep my eyes in her. My breathing is ragged now. My ribcage feels like it's shuddering.

"No needles." My voice is as shaky as the rest of me, but I say it with some force. I would be pleased by that if only I knew why I seemed to be so upset.

I settle back into the bed and try to rub my face with my hand, only I can't because it's still cuffed to the bedframe.

"No needle." She agrees. Her voice is full of pity, sorrow. She's making an effort to be gentle with me, I can tell that much.

A voice in the back of my mind whispers "needle. Singular. No promises past now." I tell it to be quiet.

"i- I'm awake now." My voice is steadier now, my body more controlled. The panic has faded, gone off to that other room. I can ignore it now.

"I can see that, I'm so sorry for startling you petal but I promise you I'm here to help. What's your name?"

"I'm- i-" my voice falters as my mind scrabbles for answers. "I don't know. I can't remember, there- there was more than one I think?" I know I should be frightened, or concerned.by this. But I'm not. I dont have the energy for it now the adrenaline has worn off, instead I'm just... A bit perplexed.

If I could read plant faces... I'm assuming she is showing the concern that I'm not feeling. I had best stop that before it becomes something, like another needle. "I-it'll come back to me, it always does. I'm sorry, what was your name again?"

She shows me a smile and says "Luminara. Lumi, if you like."

I smile back and tug at my restraint again. I really want to rub my face and it's bothering me that I can't. "Why am I chained to the bed?" I try to hide the frustration from my voice, transmuting it into concern instead.

"it's for your own safety, flower. Do you remember what happened?"

I raise an eyebrow at her. She chuckles.

"I guess not. You were in an accident before we rescued you. You were badly hurt and terribly confused, and you kept trying to attack the vets. They didn't know if you would still be violent when you woke up."

That makes sense. I have brief flashes of pseudo-memory; fear, anger, terrible terrible pain. I dont think it was an accident though. It feels like it was going on for a long time...

I shiver, and shake the sensation from my head. I'm still tugging on the cuff gently, I'm not sure I can stop, the feel of it is keeping me calm.

"I don't think I want to remember... Could you untie me please? I just need to rub my eyes."