maybellewriting

[maybellewriting]

can you tell i rewatched the original lilo and stitch recently

[maybellewriting]

Thank you all for the 500 likes! I'm happy that you're enjoying my works. There's more to come! :)

[maybellewriting]

Full Mask! Mark x Pregnant! Reader

This blurb was inspired by @michaelmyerspersonalslut and their post that I came across. Thank you Sanex Me for requesting Full Mask/Phantom Mark! Warnings: Angst, mentions of death and violence, mentions of reader struggling with how their body has changed during pregnancy, Baby as a pet name is used, Full Mask! Mark grieving his reader. If I missed anything, I apologize. Word Count: 800 plus

If it hadn’t been for the mask? You would have wholeheartedly believed that he was yours. You were both equally surprised to see each other. For you, it was the shock from seeing one of the violent strangers on the news. For him, it was seeing you alive, well, and very pregnant. His hands were as soft as your Mark’s when he cupped your face. “Thank God.” He whispered more to himself than you. He almost got too close. Even though his suit was damp, you could smell something that made your stomach twist. There were hints of something metallic and sickeningly sweet that mixed with what you assumed was from a distant burning city. It broke the illusion of the man that was treating you so well and reminded you exactly what he was up to. His forehead nearly touched your own, but you managed to jerk your head back. “I don’t know you like that.” You don’t know what caught you off guard more: The fact that he took a step back or how he paced. “You’re right, you’re right! I just-” His hands smoothed over where his mask covered his hair. Mark stopped once he caught wind of how tense you were with him accidentally cornering you in your room. He was buzzing, riding the high of relief and excitement, then expelling it all in a sigh. “I can’t tell you how happy I am to see you, Baby.” He looked away from you and really took in the room. It isn’t exactly what he’d pictured when you had made mood boards or sent him links to furniture. His father had insisted that he was getting too comfortable despite how happy his mom had been. When Mark had been naive? He assumed Nolan meant that the two of you were young, dumb, and moving too fast. Not that Nolan had seen you as someone who was going to hold Mark back. It left him in an empty apartment that he didn’t have the heart to decorate. Not like how your decor breathed life into the same space. There was something that warmed his heart about how the Seance Dog comic collection was on a shelf next to your things, or how the room that the two of you thought would be a nerd den in his dimension was now a nursery here. Mark approached you slowly, accepting how you scooted up further along the bed. He knelt down at the edge of it. There was an awkward beat where you both looked at the other. His thumb dragged along his neck and hooked into his mask before he pulled it off. Mark’s hair was disheveled from how he'd seemingly combed it back before he’d suited up. He was pale. It contrasted the circles beneath his eyes. It was something more than being run ragged, as though he hadn’t slept well in ages. His five o’clock shadow certainly didn’t help this Mark look more rested. It took you back to how your Mark’s facial hair would scratch your neck or shoulder when he'd hug you close before he’d shave in the morning as you’d both get ready. Mark’s chin rested on the edge of the bed, looking up at you with familiar brown eyes. It was then that you learned how weak you were for your boyfriend. There was a wonder if love travelled between dimensions, or how devastated you would have been if you had truly lost Mark after the Destruction of Chicago. “Are you happy?” His voice is soft.

Despite the walls you’d initially put up, despite knowing that he was a bad person, you reached out to smooth your hands through his hair. He melted under your touch. “I’m happy, Mark.” His hand settled over yours as he breathed in the smell of you and him mixed with your laundry detergent. His favorite sweater that he’d been too scared to wear or wash didn’t smell like you anymore after he’d gotten it from your old closet.

He shuffled closer on his knees. Mark moved to hold your hand. He very nearly kissed your knuckles yet stopped himself. “Baby, you can hate me. You can never forgive me. That’s okay.” Soft brown eyes drank you in. You felt many things over the last few months. You’d felt huge, uncomfortable, sick, needed to look up your symptoms more often than you’d like to admit, and you had despised your stretch marks more than your Mark would ever know. In this moment? The man at the edge of your bed made you feel like an angel. “I wanted to see you again. I wanted to see mom.” He left out that he wanted to whisk the two of you away, to selfishly hoard you instead of playing old voice memos to get out of bed.

“Mark, I-” He’d left you speechless. “You know I can’t forgive you for hurting people.” His somber nod and smile made you feel worse. A part of you wanted him to get angry instead of going through the motions as if he’d rehearsed this. Maybe he had.

Mark straightened himself, ready to head out to fulfill his deal with Angstrom. There was a pep in his step that he hadn’t felt in too long. “Stay here where it’s safe. That’ll be enough for me.” He fidgets with his mask for a moment. “I love you.”

[maybellewriting]

[maybellewriting]

Thank you for the 250+ likes and for enjoying my work. :)

[maybellewriting]

Viltrum! Mark x Pregnant! Reader

This blurb was inspired by @michaelmyerspersonalslut and their post that I came across. Thank you angelcorus for requesting Viltrumite Mark! Warning: Contains angst, mentions of death and violence. If I missed anything, I apologize. Word Count: 900 plus

You’d seen the news, yet you couldn’t imagine this Mark destroying Chicago if you hadn’t witnessed it for yourself on TV. You stayed in the city, wanting to be as close to the hospital that you’d agreed to go to if you’d gone into labor. You were sore, your feet ached, and now you had a man with Mark’s face inspecting the nursery. You had texted your Mark. There wasn’t a doubt that everyone in the world needed him right now. More than you. The worst that had happened was this one helped you to the couch and propped you up with a pillow against your lower back. He didn’t quite hide how his face scrunched up at the book in his hand. Mark flipped through pages that were colorful, meaningless. “Not a fan of Dr. Seuss?” He perked up at your voice. His gaze was a tad softer before he snapped the book shut. “If rhyming about green foods is what a human doctor expects of a growing child, then it’s a miracle you’ve made it this far.” He doesn’t quite understand why you smile, but he’s glad to see it. Mark has seldom played the part of a fool. Only to entertain his mother’s few secret expectations of childhood in his youth and for you when you were alive in his dimension. You were beautiful. You lit up the room when you were happy. But now when you are glowing with child? He’s more than a tad weak. If you wanted something? He felt obligated to fetch it. So when you move to bend to get your cup from the coffee table, he’s there faster than you can comprehend handing you your drink. “Thank you.” He doesn’t reply with a ‘you’re welcome’. Mark merely watches you drink before setting the book on the coffee table. He seats himself beside you. His hands rest awkwardly in his lap, lost in thought about what he should do. The plan was to find you again, yet there’s the complication of your pregnancy that bogs him down.

The promise of a Viltrumite child would get him more resources to ensure you’re taken to Viltrum safely. It’s his baby, after all. “Are you going back out there?” You ask, unsure of just what you could do to keep him here, to keep this particular Mark happy. Every moment that he was with you gave others the opportunity to hide or run. It was stupid. You knew it. Though you had probably stalled him the longest out of anyone so far. Life had grown more precious for both you and your Mark once you realized that you were bringing someone into the world. You were powerless, pregnant, but one thing couldn't be denied. You were helping. Mark mulls over his words with care. “The destruction of this dimension isn’t ideal.” He murmured slowly, as gently as he could in the hopes that you’d understand why he accepted Angstrom’s offer. “However,” Mark continued, “I would have given anything to live the life that this dimension’s Mark is living. A life where you’re happy, content, and creating a life together.” The Viltrumite jerks his head towards the nursery. “My existence is to fight and conquer.” You nod. It’s odd hearing your fiance’s voice so smooth and speaking so eloquently. It’s difficult to hear him say such things. Even if he isn’t yours.

“So when the offer came with the opportunity to see you again, to do things that were as easy as breathing as a price? How could I refuse?” When his hand rests on your belly, it’s not as jarring as you thought it would be. You’re a bit used to people reaching out to feel your belly by now. As if being pregnant made you a spectacle. You swallow down your confusion and apprehension. His sincerity catches you off guard with the misguided affection and devotion he felt. “Mark,” The warm hand on your belly slows in its careful circles as he meets your gaze. “You can’t think that this is right. I live here. Those people did nothing wrong. They don’t deserve to die.” His lips purse for a moment. “You’re kind.” His tone makes you feel like he’s talking to a child. There’s an anger that blooms in your chest with that as your hormones begin to rear their ugly head. “But these people were nothing to me, and I refuse to cry over an anthill when it’s in the way of the sole person that showed me how to live instead of simply surviving.”

Just like that your anger fizzles out as a fear takes you. This man looks like your Mark, he sounds like your Mark, but his heart is so different. Or is it? When your Mark missed a date, it’s as if he’d move Heaven and Earth to fix it, or how he’d go out of his way to fulfill your pregnancy cravings despite his work running him ragged. What could push this one over the edge to see you as another ant in the anthill of your dimension?

Your eyes drift to the coffee table, silent with his confession. Tears sting your eyes. His hand lifts from your belly to your cheek in a single caress before you pull your head away. “Please don’t.”

“You can shed tears for the both of us. I think your compassion will make you an amazing mother.”

The whir of the drone that waited outside of your apartment door is loud as Mark leaves and follows him to observe the carnage he was willing to commit in your name. It leaves you in the deafening silence of your home, unable to turn on the news with the new guilt that hangs on your shoulders.

Was this your fault?

[maybellewriting]

I didn't expect my Prisoner! Mark's fanfiction to be so well received. It makes me happy because he's one of my favorite variants. <3 Also! Going back through images as I was writing the Pregnant! Reader fic, I'd forgotten how beefy this Mark is. Ah! I love him. Viltrumite! Mark is the next requested and is a WIP.

[maybellewriting]

Prisoner! Mark x Pregnant! Reader

This blurb was inspired by @michaelmyerspersonalslut and their post that I came across.

TW: Angst, scars. If I'm missing anything, I apologize. Word Count: 800+ Which Mark is next?

He’d come to this dimension full of rage. Mark had sworn that he’d burn it all down and rip this Earth apart from the roots. His dissection had been careful and cruel, like a child plucking a butterfly’s wings just because they could. Yet the wind was knocked out of his sails when he saw you. You were panicked, not quite able to get to the bathroom to try and call Mark. Your Mark. One hand clutched your phone, the other held your gravid belly. He’d come here simply on a whim. That perhaps there’d be a memento. Something he could hold to remember why he was doing this outside of the pain that shot through his temple when his heart beat furiously against his chest, or what he saw when he looked in the mirror. Mark was just as shocked as you were. His head tipped enough that you could see how he looked from your face to your pregnant belly, and then back. The dumbfoundedness evolved into elation. His marred features didn’t show his snowballing joy. Not yet. There was probably only one person in the universe that could make him raise his hands as gently as he did. “I’m not here to hurt you.” “Okay.” Your voice was soft as fear gripped your throat, nodding despite a part of you not quite believing him after what you’d seen on the news.

He took a step forward and you couldn’t press any further into the bathroom door.

“Are they mine?” The question comes out choked as you catch the more scarred side of his face redden. You pick up your fiance's cadence, his tone. It held the same joy of your Mark’s ‘Are you sure?’ when you’d flashed the pregnancy test. It had filled you with the reassurance that while you both were young and dumb, that he had you. It makes your chest ache.

You know that he isn’t yours and that this baby isn’t his, yet looking at him as he begins to crumple has you nod. “She’s yours.”

She. That’s what floors him. You were so put together in his dimension. He was ready to be a hero and had looked forward to starting a life with you. You see his lip wobble even if he would never admit it. His jaw is tight and his hands ball into tight fists at his sides before Mark slumps in one big, shaky exhale. He closes the distance one step at a time.

Maybe it’s just a love for Mark in general that has you drop your phone when he kneels in front of you. His mantras of ‘please’ are a whisper. His hands are soft, softer than your Mark’s, when he holds your belly. As if you’d break and he’d be to blame. Again. Another sick joke from the universe to rub in that he was simply too strong this time instead of not strong enough to stop his father.

Your hands smooth over his head, wondering just what could have happened to scar someone like Mark so badly. He’d looked worse for wear, sure, but he always bounced back. “Do you… have a name for her?” He asks.

An embarrassed chuckle bubbles up your throat. It’s corny, it’s lovely, and a surprise for your soon to be mother-in-law. “We were thinking about naming her Deborah.”

“That’s perfect.” His forehead meets your belly. The way Mark kneels before you is almost reverent. As if you would cleanse him, as if you would pardon him of whatever sin he’d committed before he was dragged into the white walls of the Viltrumite prison.

You both sit like that for a long moment. You, smoothing over his rough edges. Mark, attempting to compose himself. He clears his throat and stands. He looks up. You assume it’s to blink away the tears, yet you can’t see where his goggles end and where his skin begins. As if they were fused. Feeling his scars? They likely were. “Do you want a picture?” You ask a tad sheepishly.

He simply nods at first, unable to speak just yet.

You take the moment to break away, waddling over to the fridge. There’s an array of photos. You’d told yourself over and over that you’d begin scrapbooking once you simply couldn’t work anymore, but prepping for your baby had consumed your life. You pluck two pictures carefully from the fridge. One that your Mark had taken of you during the date for your first anniversary and one of the copies of your latest ultrasound.

You place both in his hand.

Mark stares for a long moment at them. Rage blooms in his heart along with a bitterness and a jealousy that he hates. This version of him has everything. You, your apartment that he’d obviously moved into, and a child. “Thank you.” He folds his new and only treasures and places them into his uniform sleeve, tucking the fabric around them tight for a makeshift pocket. “You were- are everything, you know.”

That’s the last you hear of him before he’s gone just as suddenly as he’d broken through your door.

[maybellewriting]

We've officially hit 100 likes! Thank you all for your support. The likes, the reblogs, the follows... It really warms my heart that you like my works. My updates tend to be slow for my longer works such as The Bird and The Arrow. I have a list of songs that inspired me to write for my/our favorite variants. The slow burn, angst playlist that is just *chef's kiss*... Because they just didn't get enough time. The current list: Hayloft 2 - Mother Mother, The Bird Song - Noah Floersch & Em Beihold, Ma Meilluere Ennemie - Stromae & Pomme, Ghost of Chicago - Noah Floersch, Do I Wanna Know? - Arctic Monkeys, Time in a Bottle - Jim Croce, Seamstress - Dessa, Million Years Ago - Adele, Like Him - Tyler the Creator, Romantic Homicide - D4VD, Arsonist’s Lullaby - The Amazing Devil, The Calling - The Amazing Devil, Do It For Me - Rosenfeld, Karma - AJR, In My Room - ICP Feel free to message and geek out with me in between updates!

[maybellewriting]

The Bird and The Arrow - Part 2

The Bird and The Arrow | Viltrumite Mark x AFAB! Reader/Previous Viltrumite Mark x Viltrumite! Reader Explored WARNINGS: Canon levels of gore and violence, Viltrumite! Reader death, character death, OC death, angst, and grief. If I missed anything, I apologize.

Word Count: 2700+ words

He recognizes the sterile white halls behind his lids as he dreams. Mark used to fight it. Sleeping, that is. He learned long ago that fighting the Empire was futile, and becoming Grand Regent was so far away from his grasp that he had better luck harnessing a star with his bare hands. Viltrum lacked personality. The first pops of color in his life were pictures that Debbie had been allowed to keep. He saw the light in her eyes, how her smile made the corners of them crinkle as she clung to his father’s arm. Nolan seemed happy in those pictures, too, oddly enough. Even if he hadn’t admitted it.

The second pop of color was you. It wasn’t what you wore, like his mother’s old outfits, but how you carried yourself. There were three children that trained under the watchful eye of Kregg. Mark, Anver, and you. Anver was big for his age, even as a child, looking a few years older despite the three of you being born within the last year of each other. He’d gotten his powers nearly at birth while the two of you were delayed until you were nearly five.

Mark thinks it’s why the two of you grew close. You both looked enviously at Anver as he entered the gravity chamber before running laps as Kregg instructed as if your lives depended on it. Because they did. Mark remembers that this is where he learned to push himself. If he felt tired? He ran a bit further, attempting to be faster than yesterday, with your footfalls right behind his own. His face was indifferent when Kregg logged his progress but worry always prickled in the back of his mind. Had he been good enough?

He doesn’t know where your “illness” stems from at first. It’s what he assumes is wrong with you as you both greedily drink water. You hand him a flask before you take one most of the time unless you pushed yourself too hard and needed a drink. Kregg noted that as well. Mark knew it.

His hands shift from holding a flask as the scene changes. Mark’s palms are sweaty as he’s crumpled in the gravity chamber. The weight pushes on every muscle in his body. You aren’t doing any better with your first week. Your youthful, pudgy cheeks are red as you puff out a few breaths, struggling to even steady yourself on your hands and knees. You just want to lay flat. He does too. However, seeing Anver making slow laps around the chamber, being pushed on by the sight of how weak the two of you look? It makes Mark mirror you, bracing his body on his hands and knees despite the sweat that drips from his brow and hair, wetting the floor beneath him. “Do it, Mark.” He can still hear you gritting it out as clear as day. Your voice, as small as his own had been, trembled with the gravity three times as strong as Earth trying to push you into the floor. There’s a connection between you both as he offers a barely there nod. One. You and he prop yourselves up on one knee. Two. He feels as if his body is going to crumple as you both work up into a squat. Three. He straightens. Your gaze meets his. You smile with your triumph and he very nearly does the same. You walk like a newborn deer in the mud over to Anver who can’t believe what he’s seeing.

Mark’s sight breaks from you to the mirror that he knows Kregg and potentially his father stand behind, out of sight as his own reddened face stares back. He’s Mark Grayson, Nolan’s son, and you both accomplished what it took Anver three years to do in one week at a mere five years old. He hopes Kregg notes that too.

Mark blinks in the face of a different mirror. The one in the washroom, still dressed in combat gear. He can see as you kick your feet on the bench idly, waiting for him to finish cleaning up his face. You’d bruised his cheek pretty good now that your group had been instructed to fight each other in one-on-one combat. The trio were five years older, after all. It was as expected as breathing. He got you today, tomorrow he’d fight Anver, and then the winner would fight you the next day.

The sight of your swollen lip catches his eye. He’d knocked out one of your teeth before you forfeited. Something gnaws at him. Guilt? He walks over and moves to dab your lip with a cold washcloth, catching how your tongue smoothed over and played with the new gap between your teeth. The words sound ridiculous before he even says them. He doesn’t even know why he says them. “My mom told me about a tooth fairy when I lost my first tooth.”

There isn’t quite childlike wonder in your eyes as he continues to dab at your bloodied lip. It leaned more towards confusion and curiosity as you let Mark fuss over you. “What’s a fairy?”

“I don’t know. A little creature with wings? She tried drawing me a picture.”

“It needs wings t’ fly? Sounds dumb.” You say simply. “Think it’d make a cool pet?”

“Apparently it only visits when you sleep to collect your teeth.”

This earned a huff from you. “If I can’t play with it, what good is a fairy?”He shrugs. His mind went down the same path as yours when his mom attempted to impart the wonder of the tooth fairy. It was one of the few times that sparked life in her since she’d been brought to Viltrum. Mark had slept, pretended not to wake up when his mother’s hand snuck under his pillow, and left one of his favorite snacks wrapped up neatly for when he awoke. He indulged her and said that such a thing was ‘neat’. It was high praise coming from him. He collected his discarded teeth for her often afterwards so she’d get that same joy.

The scene shifts as he blinks. It’s the same washroom but you’ve both grown into strong, young adults. It’s likely going to be the last time you both walk into here with The Moon Trial coming up. His mind is far away as you both peel off your gear and change into more comfortable uniforms. Mark didn’t think that the sight of your bare back would be so burned into his mind and yet, sometimes, that’s all he sees when he sleeps. Strong muscles and soft curves that are oh so different from his own lithe frame. He wasn’t as big as Anver or Nolan, but he was quick, and Kregg had him lean into that strength.

He hums as he can feel your eyes on his face. When did you turn around? “Hm?”“I just noticed that you shaved your mustache! Did Anver rip some out?” You admire the youthfulness that it gives back to his face. It was certainly an odd sight: A young Viltrum man without a mustache when this is typically the time that they try to find a style that suits them.

He mirrors you, wiping the sweat from his now clean-shaven face with a cloth. Mark is slow to respond. His mother hadn’t really looked at his face since his facial hair had begun to fill out. He remembered Debbie sobbing in the bathroom after learning about Mark’s impending trial. It was one of the few places in the house that she wouldn’t be bothered. She’d nearly jumped out of her skin when she’d opened the door to see him standing outside stoic and awkward. “Mark!” Debbie had exclaimed with a hand over her heart. She’d glanced at his face briefly before looking beyond him to the wall just past his head. “Sorry. You startled me. You looked like your father. How about I make dinner, hm?” It was an easy excuse to brush past him.

It was then that Mark made a decision. He wouldn’t look like his father. Not when his mother looked at him like that. As if his coming of age was going to upheave her life again. Or worse. “Yeah.” Mark lied. It was smoother than he’d like. “I wanted a clean slate for it to grow back again.”Your gaze meets his when he tosses his towel in a bin. He couldn’t quite read the smile you had then. It was different from your grins of triumph or the one that looked as though you were baring your teeth when you were fighting and determined to win. Even the soft one that seemed to come to you so casually. One corner of your mouth curved upwards in a smirk as you floated a bit aimlessly. “It’s a good look for you.” Mark had realized too little too late that he’d been an idiot. You’d fancied him and it never really sunk in until you were gone.

The confusing twists in his belly suddenly drop like lead when the white of the washroom morphs into the pitch black of space staring at him from the outside of the dome. He’s sweating, he’s bloody, and he doesn’t want to look down. As if the fabric of space would tear open and give Mark a different answer. As if the rules of The Moon Trial would change. He knows he’s going to look down and see Anver after the both of you had teamed up to kill him. He knows that beside Anver, there will be you. He can hear you wheeze through a punctured lung. His dream doesn’t grant him the mercy of seeing you as beautiful as you were before. Mark sees you for how you were in the moment: Bloody, bruised beyond recognition, and faltering as you curl in on yourself from the pain of having your arm mangled. Anver had nearly ripped your forearm off. Mark was bruised. He’s sure his ribs are broken and so is his nose. He’d spat out some teeth earlier, so he’s sure that he hardly looks better. But you look so pitiful. As if you’d expected to die in your brawl with Anver before Mark found you. Would he have felt less lost if he had been your avenger? “Do what you need to do.” Mark has always had trouble pinpointing what he’s felt, but he’s sure that he hated this. If he wasn’t the quick one? Anver would have grabbed him instead. Mark has played this day in his head over and over again. If he hadn’t gotten lost, if he’d gone right that day, would you have won instead of him? If he’d found you at the start and you both looked formidable in your battle, would your observers outside of the dome have bent the rules and let the both of you live? Instead, Mark grips the collar of your uniform as he did then. His fingers are straight as he cocks his arm back. All of this seemed predetermined. As if his arm were an arrow and the Empire was pulling it back against the string that was heavy with dutifully culling the weak. He’s surprised how soft your sternum was as it gave way to his jab. Mark is there, motionless. He’d gone from dabbing as your wounds to being your angel of mercy. He’s there until he’s sure you’re gone. His dream won’t let him move. The pitter patter of your heart is weak like a bird against his hand until it slows into nothingness. You were too weak to keep your head upright. He remembers the last puff of air as it was released towards the roof of the dome. If Viltrumites believed in souls? He’d think there was a purpose. That your exhale had set your soul free into the vast embrace of space to fly wherever you wanted. Somewhere as colorful as you had been in the backdrop of sterile white.

His dreams go through the motions just as he’d done. He sees your parents next to Anver’s. Their stoicism doesn’t hide their disgust at the sight within the dome. His back is straight as Nolan’s hand claps it, proud with a hint of relief. “You did well, Son.” When Mark merely nods, Nolan’s face softens a hair. It separates the man from his father. “I know that this is hard, but if they were weak, those two would have been no good to us.” When Nolan floats, ready to go home, Mark does as well. He’s checked out. The blood on his hand is starting to dry and he’s unsure if he wants to wash it off or keep it to remember that you existed. After today? It would be like you were never born. “Your mother’s going to be relieved.” Mark doesn’t hear the dinner plans before the both of them fly back. If there was anyone who’d notice his mood? It was Debbie. The months have gone by and he’s completed task after task. This new task is different. He doesn’t want to do it, but he’s a soldier and life wasn’t fair. Mark finds himself watching training videos with Viltrum’s lack of media. He knows it line for line, but he doesn’t pay attention. He doesn’t quite acknowledge Debbie when she joins him on the couch. His chest aches despite that his ribs had healed long ago. There’s a part of him that wants to push her hand away when she rubs his back but another wants to hold her and shed a few tears. She planted this weakness in him and now it’s blooming into something he can’t pinpoint. Something that’s pointless. “I thought you’d be more excited to go to Earth.” His jaw is tight as he swallows his sickening need to sob. “It’s just a job, Mom.” Debbie looks as if she’d been kicked and, in another show of weakness, Mark attempts to soften the blow. “I’ll get pictures for you while I’m there. I’ll try to find a girl like you.” Debbie’s hand continues to rub over his back despite how his own sit awkwardly in his lap. “But you don’t want a girl like me.” She murmured.He hates that she’s right. He wanted a girl like you. No… He wanted you. Mark balls his hands into fists. It’s getting harder to swallow down the need to cry.

“Oh, Honey…” He lets her pull him in as his eyes sting but he refuses to let his tears fall. “You loved her, didn’t you?” Mark hesitates, searching his mind for the examples that he’d been shown through Debbie and his father. He wanted to come home to you, tell you about his day, hear about your own, protect you as you protected him. He then attempts to put a name on the flutters your compliments gave him. “I don’t know.” He admits. Mark looks on numbly at the training video. Out of all of the knowledge Viltrum provided, why was there nothing about this? “I don’t know if I’ll ever know.” His eyes adjust to the pitch black of the room when his body begins to ache from the awkward position he’d slept in. Mark scrubs his eyes, frustrated by the wetness of tears that had gathered there. He stumbles into the bathroom, the backpack that he’d plucked in hand. The cool water brings him back to reality as he splashes it onto his face. He agreed to lay waste to this dimension in exchange for exploring others. Mark just hadn’t expected to find you so soon. He dons his uniform and lets the bathroom light spill in just enough to illuminate you.

Your chest rises and falls with your breathing, no doubt tired after such a stressful first day. Your shirt is colorful with drawn characters in dynamic poses, just like the sticker on the back of your car. This place suits you. He’ll dissect this world and absorb as much of it as he can before taking you back home. It’s what you deserve.

When you do wake, Mark is gone. He had been since before the sun rose. The backpack is gone and any trace that he’d been here aside from the pulled out chair.

Part 1

[maybellewriting]

Master List

Invincible:

Full Mask/Phantom! Mark: Mark x Pregnant! Reader

Prisoner! Mark Grayson: Mark x Pregnant! Reader Viltrum! Mark Grayson: The Bird and The Arrow Part 1, 2, Mark x Pregnant! Reader

[maybellewriting]

The Bird and The Arrow

The Bird and The Arrow | Viltrumite Mark x AFAB! Reader/Previous Viltrumite Mark x Viltrumite! Reader Mentioned WARNINGS: Canon levels of gore and violence.

Word Count: 2200+ words

Note: This is my first post. Enjoy!

“She was a bird, I was an arrow

Both of us sure we were sword and a sparrow

Still, when we flew, we never knew 

There in the air, I felt her feathers

First all at once, then all together

When I went through, that's when I knew…” The Bird Song - Noah Floersch/Em Beihold The grip on your wrist might as well be stone. His hand is unyielding and unflinching as the fingers on your free hand rest on his own. They don’t quite pry yet. You’re too shocked or maybe even too scared to attempt. The eyes of who would have been his comrade are as wide as moons. The face that’s haunted his dreams for two years is staring back at him. There’s a stirring in Mark’s heart. He wants to say that it’s pity but isn’t quite sure. You’re human, frail, unimpressive. You’d fallen so low from the heritage that he remembered.

“Mark?” It’s certainly his face if Mark was stoic. Your chest aches from your heart hammering against it. When you’d heard the break in the sound barrier, you had hope that Mark would be here, helping people evacuate. You’d been late in gathering your things with such short notice. Your keys, your wallet, the knife you’d gotten comfortable having in your pocket due to work, and a wad of cash tucked away in your closet… Those few moments of scrambling had separated you from the others who’d rushed blindly and clogged the streets in their cars ahead. You didn’t have time to process exactly what you’d seen moments earlier as a figure in white cleaved through cars and people alike as if they were softened butter. It was when the roof of a car landed next to you that reality settled in. You hadn’t meant to scream. The impact startled you as the thing whizzed past your head. A little lower… A little lower and you would have been like the occupants of that car. His head turned and you held that stare a second too long before you ducked. It’s where he’d found you. Shocked by the gore that coated the interior of the car roof and trying to will your body to stop shaking so you could move.

“Please don’t hurt me.” His brow furrowed just enough that you were sure that his face could form some basic expression.

“Do what you need to do.” Those final words of his comrade swam in the forefront of his mind. He hadn’t realized that his hand tightened with the frustration that pooled in his belly until he saw your face shift in terror, in mounting pain. Your wrist was as fragile as a bird’s wing in between his fingers. “You’ll never cease to be passive, will you?” “I-” Your head shook, unsure of what to say to keep Mark from breaking your wrist. There’s relief when he does let you go. You flinch when he offers you a wave of his hand and there’s something akin to relief that fills him that you at least have some basic survival instincts. “Go.” Mark floats, crossing his arms. “Flee, hide, or wait for a savior. I’m curious what you’ll do to live.”

You don’t need to be told twice. Adrenaline has you ignoring the bruise blooming along your wrist as you hop in your car. Mark doesn’t move to stop you. He watches you peel out of your parking space like a bat out of hell, away from the carnage he’d caused. Mark watches a moment more before he continues his mission. The boom that alerted you to his arrival now has you white knuckling your steering wheel. It doesn’t ease up. Even as the white of his outfit becomes a speck and then nothing in your rearview mirror.

_____ The evacuation center is full. People are hurt, misplaced, and scared. The motel you’ve taken refuge in isn’t the best. There’s a tree outside that keeps you on your toes as the swaying branches clack against your window. “The GDA has issued an evacuation order for all major cities. If you require assistance with your evacuation or need shelter, call 555-2131 or your local hero agency.” That message on the TV had been playing on a loop with any station that didn’t actively cover the events unfolding. You change the channel. The news anchor covers her mouth at the live footage being fed to the station, to the world on the screen behind her. “Every available hero is being called to resist these invaders. If you can’t help: Stay away from the conflict, stay safe.” The banner beneath her held a different number each time it ran. An estimated count of injured or dead that only seemed to tick higher. You flick to a different channel. Another news anchor is red in the face as his hand slams against his desk. “If villains had any dignity, you’d be out there fighting too! Get up! Someone, anyone, has to stop Invincible!” Each time you see your friend’s face on these strangers, it’s a punch in the gut. They weren’t your Mark. He’d never enjoy any of this. He’d never consider any of this. You knew that he was more like Atlas than whatever these people are supposed to be, carrying the weight of the world on his shoulders and nearly buckling with the responsibility each day.

You look at his contact in your phone and then flick to the group chat between Mark, William, Amber, and yourself. It hadn’t been touched since he’d been back from Thraxa. 7:38 PM I’m okay. Are you? The motel bed is stiffer than your own as you rest against it. You want to go home. There’s a wonder if it will even be there when this is all over. You aren’t graced with even a knock as the lock on your motel room door clicks. You bolt upright and grasp the knife in your pocket. The thought of fellow survivors turning on each other so soon catches you off guard. There would always be someone who would take advantage of the world burning to explore the thoughts of could they get away with this. 

Mark’s face disarms you once you see it behind the brim of a baseball cap. “Mark! Thank God!” Relief makes tears well up in your eyes and you very nearly hug him. That is until you see his stiff posture and the logo of the cap. He’d never been a White Sox fan, he was a Cubs fan. Then you see that his clothes are one size too big in a style that doesn't match the sweaters or khakis in his closet as the door clicks shut behind him. “That is the most pitiful blade I’ve ever seen.” He stares at the pocketknife in your hand before his gaze settles on your face. “How did you get in my room?!” You point the blade accusingly at him. He’s still, observing you like some cornered animal. A part of you knows that that is exactly what you are with him blocking your only exit.

This Mark held up his hand. “A key.” He says as if it were the most obvious thing in the world, showing you said key that rested with the ring looped around his finger. The room number on the tag was wrong so each door had the same lock.

Your confidence wavers. “Did you follow me?” You’re in disbelief. You’d watched him fly off in a different direction.

“No.” He said simply. Mark mulls over his words with care. “However, it wasn't difficult to track you. I followed the flow of people. Your vehicle wasn’t in the cluster at that... station,” He isn’t sure what to call it. A camp? “So I just went a little further. The ridiculous decoration on your car gave you away.” He refers to the sticker on the back. Some portrait of a humanoid animal in a cape that was cut off at the shoulders to better sit in the corner of the window. If he tilted his head just right, the image changed to have odd stars reflecting in the light that weren’t there when Mark viewed it head on.

“It’s Seance Dog!” You argue as if that would change how he viewed the sticker. His head tipped a fraction at the name before he stepped further into the room. You stepped back. The sweat in your palm makes you grip your knife differently.

“I’m not here to be educated about the culture of this dimension.” Mark said flatly. He looks at your weapon. “If you manage to kill me with that then I didn’t deserve to be born. Put it away. Sit.” His kindness wanes. But that isn’t quite right, is it? This Mark is practically saintly towards you considering what he could do. Then you see it. He hides the tiredness along his eyes well. This Mark doesn’t yawn or stretch openly, nor does he slouch until he’s had his coffee. You sit uncomfortably at the edge of the bed and tuck your knife back into your pocket. He doesn’t join you. He seems to read your body language well enough that he grabs a chair and drags it near to where you sit. “What do you do?” He lets the backpack that he no doubt stripped another man of from his shoulders and lets it fall to the floor with a soft thump.

The question knocks you for a loop. “What do you mean?”

He waves hand in a small gesture. “Here. What is your function? Do you do peace keeping with that blade? Are you an officer of sorts?” He struggles to try and find a role you’d fit in with your appearance. You looked so… casual, so soft compared to how he remembered you. Not unlike pictures of his mother before she was taken to Viltrum. She’d been an agent of sorts. Perhaps you, too, were an agent.

“I’m a bartender.” Mark looks on, attempting to fill in gaps to words he’s unfamiliar with. Tender. Tending the fields? “A farmer?” You can’t quite tell if he’s confused or disappointed with the question. You’re too terrified to laugh despite how badly a nervous giggle wants to bubble up at how silly and genuine the question is.

You shake your head, still rigid on the bed. As if your spine rested against an invisible plank of wood. “I make drinks.”

His stoic face now shifts. His hand drags along his features, grasping his chin. Mark gazes at the carpet. “You’re a servant.” You conclude that he’s disappointed with the sigh that escapes him.

“You like the drinks I make you! You’re spoiled.” Your tongue slips. He’s not Mark. Not the one who’d swing by your apartment and drink the new cocktails you’d try your hand at as you watched baseball or vent to you about work.

Mark’s eyes lift from the floor then to you. He doesn’t say a word. You’re his servant? It doesn’t really outweigh his disappointment, but the two of you were still close in a way. He wonders if the Mark of this dimension cares for you well. You look comfortable, fed, and, if it weren’t for the chaos outside, happy. You’re happy enough to see his face, you’d walked towards it as if it were a beacon of hope.

He deduces that the Mark of this dimension did something right if you’re alive and glad to see him.

Your hands wring together nervously. You felt as if you’d said all the wrong things, but he hadn’t killed you yet. “What am I to you?”

He leans back in his chair. “You were something more. Something better than a drink servant, that’s for sure.” Mark’s answer left you with more questions. Ones that he won’t answer because his eyes are closed, and his breath had steadied into an even pace. His head tipped back. You had a better view of the face of the boy you used to like and the young man he grew into.

You flick off the TV but sleep doesn’t take you as easily as it takes him. His figure stands out against the pale wallpaper. He grew less rigid as his form relaxed. His crossed arms had slumped a hair and his weight shifted to his now spread legs as his body attempted to find something more comfortable in the chair he’d assigned himself. You knew Mark well enough to picture this one’s face. Soon he’d be slack jawed and snoring softly. Just like when he’d pass out on your couch.

The door called to you, but you were sure that it was a trap. That he was testing you in some capacity. Would his amusement or whatever pushed him to spare you end if you attempted to slip away? You pulled out your phone and clicked the messages between yourself and your Mark.

8:59 PM Where are you? I need help.

8:59 PM Please.

You and every other person on this planet did. You watched as a wheel cycled beneath your messages before red text flitted up beneath the texts. Not Delivered ! Not Delivered !

You flipped the phone face down against the blanket and stared at the ceiling as Mark’s snores filled the gaps between your breaths. What were you going to do? What could you do? Part 2