#But you can decide Ness later on realizes he has the same feelings and just hasn't realized it yet

[commandernachos]

[maguneedsalife]

For Aoife: 3, 6, 13 because it's funny

For you: 20

This one is also going to be long!! and since I already answered 3 on 1nky's ask I'll just do the others

6. How does your oc feel about labels? Theirs, or in general?

Ok, assuming that xiv world has sexuality and gender identity labels the way we do (havent seen evidence to suggest this is the case yet, doesnt mean it wouldnt have them, etc etc), i don't think Aoife would be too keen to slap a label on herself. Polyamorous sure, but I think she'd feel some discomfort with advertising that she's "bisexual" - not that she's uncomfortable with her wlw thoughts, but since she's such a public figure, she wouldn't want to be held up as an example of "bisexual rep" or called a "bisexual icon" when she's mostly been involved with men. She would feel nervous about taking space away from people who express their bi-ness more visibly.

(disclaimer aoife's opinion on this is not reflective of my own, i have no problem being open as a bisexual while also being married to a man and i know that being in a m/f relationship doesn't negate my bisexuality)

13. Would your oc be open to a poly relationship? Why or why not?

LOL. LMAO. i know you know the answer to this but i appreciate you asking it for the funny anyway

Aoife is a poly force of nature with 3 current boyfriends, 1 genderfluid robot partner, and 1 guy i still count as her boyfriend/actively ship her with even though he's been dead for most of my time playing this game.

Aoife decided to go the poly route after she and Aymeric both realized they were also in love with Estinien at around the same time. The two of them ended up talking it out with each other and decided to try to make it work. They both pitched the idea of a relationship to him shortly before he left Ishgard post-hw (this is part of why he left lmao, he needed time to think about it but did eventually accept). Later on she added G'raha and Omega to the pile with the others' consent. Aoife only really does threesomes with Aymeric and Estinien though (and Omega in 2 different bodies, but, shh)

ANYWAY. Aoife's reasoning for her poly r/s is that she simply has too much love in her heart to confine it to just 1 person, and she'd rather everyone just be open and honest with each other. She gets different kinds of emotional fulfillment from each of her partners and feels like she would be unsatisfied just having to pick one of them.

20. Have your ocs helped you in self discovery? How?

you also know the answer to this one lmao. Anyway Aoife was the reason I realized/was finally willing to admit I was bi myself. Like not to be like "final fantasy made me gay" but final fantasy did make me gay. I love my wol as an extension of myself but i also do very much want her to be my girlfriend. you understand

i'd always appreciated women aesthetically but didnt think i was interested romantically or sexually (despite you know making 5 different asami sato clone female love interest ocs in college and thinking this didnt say anything about me personally. god i was so obvious about it). playing as aoife and enjoying dressing her up in sexy outfits for ME was what made me realize that hey yeah i think i do like women and i can feel comfortable saying that openly now

bc i mean LOOK AT HER. LIKE JESUS CHRIST

anyway yeah. women hot

[iriswestallenn]

The final season of Ted Lasso wasn't good

Long Post Warning

In my opinion of course, it was just wasn't very good and the finale was bad.

They didn't know what to do with Keeley. Her friend, Shandy, didn't add anything. Her relationship with Jack was stupid. Jack fucking with Keeley's business didn't matter because it was resolved in one episode thanks to Rebecca. Then they decided to make the love triangle a thing again. We'll come back to that later.

Nate lmao you can forgive people. They don't need to bend the knee or buy you flowers for you to forgive them or to prove they are worthy of forgiveness. All they need to do is show they've changed, grown, and learned from their mistakes. The problem with Nate is not that they ALL forgave his slimy ass. The problem is we never see the change. He cries to his dad, he gets a gf, he realizes Rupert is an asshole. We spend no time with Nate being worthy of forgiveness to THE RICHMOND TEAM. He gets the girl and he's cured of his asshole-ness. The girl in question btw? Bland. No personality, we don't know why they like each other. The end.

Sam and Zava. Nonsense. Colin's storyline was cool. I like that he didn't want to be an out player because he didn't want to be the spokesperson for that or for that to be his main identity. A good amount of time was spent on that story and I liked it (see I can like things) but the same can't be said for Sam and Zava. They gave Sam a racism storyline which resulted in his restaurant getting vandalized and the end. No, wait, I'm sorry! Sam is gonna keep shattered glass in the restaurant as a reminder of the criminal act because... believe??? Never mind that could injure the guests, we're an inspirational show people we gotta keep inspiring! All Zava did was get Jamie to want to be better. That's it. So much of Zava should have been cut, oh my god.

Ted. Who? Barely in the final season. Apparently has had panic attacks since his father passed away and his mom knew and just ignored them? Episode 3 (I think) Ted reached for alcohol and we just skated past that. I have no idea how Ted is doing lmao if he's "obviously" doing well, I couldn't tell you how he got there. We got so many fucking shots of his therapist during the finale. More than we did the entirety of season 3. Oh well I guess hope he's happier back home

Maybe I'm being dramatic but Beard and his gfs relationship came off super toxic but they're married now so who cares I guess

Rebecca spent the whole show obsessed with Rupert and when we finally got away from that, surprise! She wants kids. Okay... sure. It's not easy to get over a man you loved who treated you like shit and who you felt robbed you of so many years. I'm not saying she should have gotten over it quicker. I just feel disappointed this was her whole story. There could have been so much more for Rebecca but instead all we got was her getting back at her ex and finding a new man on a boat and kids and blah blah blah

Roy and Jamie. My favorite part of the season. Jamie's arc was excellent and the actor did a fantastic job. Brett Goldstein is also great and has been at this acting/writing thing since 2005! I am so happy he finally got this huge show. Roy is such a cool fucking character. Too bad they went to shit in ONE EPISODE. Okay, I'm being a bit dramatic, I'm glad Roy went to therapy in the end there but that bar scene irritated me. - Actually we fucked last month. - Well that video was sent to me! What the fuck??? Gross gross gross. They put Keeley back in the love triangle and then gave no real resolution? She chose herself? Okay. Can we get a scene of her realizing both these dudes need to work on themselves and she doesn't want either of them ever again or? No? We're just gonna shut the door? Oh okay.

Overall, I'm just disappointed. I know no one will read this but Ted Lasso was a comfort show for me at one point. It premiered in 2020 when we all needed something wholesome and funny. Shame it couldn't stick the landing for me.

[browzerhistory]

anyways Personally i don't think it's possible to meaningfully separate the self from the body/world and thinking of them as independent entities can create serious issues in later lines of thinking.

i say this as someone who has several 'selves' (system) but all of us have been undeniably changed by our body and the environment it's in. we wouldn't be who we are now without the very specific conditions and events that shaped our bodies and personalities.

it can be argued whether someone is more predisposed towards certain traits and activities from birth, but even then, the way you're raised and how much access you're given to those activities, as well as how much you're allowed to express those traits, matter deeply in shaping the person you are.

it's why i struggle with "what if you were born a different sex/richer or poorer/in a different country/etc.?" type questions bc the answer you'll get from me is inevitably "the person in those circumstances would be so fundamentally different and unrecognizable when compared to me that i don't think it'd be fair to say they would still be me." you know?

take a relatively small example, like if my parents decided to enroll me in a different kindergarten than the one they did. i would never have swapped schools in elementary, which kicked off my anxiety disorder hardcore but also made me gain wonderful friends who i wouldn't trade for the world, and unique experiences that shape the way i adapt to situations today.

or say i went to physical (heavily masked) school during the 2020 school year instead of taking online courses. i probably wouldn't have fully split into a system and i wouldn't have missed my best friend's last year of attending the same school as me before moving away. but i also wouldn't have rediscovered one of my oldest, most beloved special interests, nor would i have met the short lived but wonderful community online that helped me realize i was trans.

what i'm trying to get at is that the popular concept of the Self or the Soul as this immutable, eternal force that drives a person's actions and is predetermined before they're born really doesn't line up with reality. not only in the context of how much your environment changes you, but how much you can change you. humans are creatures of habit, sure, but you can make and break habits with relative ease most of the time.

(i started crossing my z's in third grade because i thought it looked cool. i stopped listening to an artist i used to adore because he said some shit things and i've barely missed his music. lately i've been making an effort not to step on certain floor tiles in the hall just because. i know most things aren't this minor or easy to change, but it's just an example.)

as far as theories on the self go, mine is a pretty easy one to spiral on. especially since, before i started thinking harder about it, i thought there was this Special Thing that made me Me and no one could take it away, so when i considered the possibility of my me-ness not being inherent to my existence, it freaked me out.

but as i thought about it more, i found the thought really... comforting, somehow? maybe it's because i'm trans and a system but the idea that there's the True You you have to want to be (and if you're not then something is wrong with you) feels really restricting. people are always changing, even moment to moment. it's not a bad thing to be constantly changing, that's just what being alive is like.

which brings me to another point (that i probably should've made earlier but whatevs) that also lines up pretty well with my political views: nobody is doomed to be a bad person forever, even if they've done bad things in the past. (i could make a whole other essay on the ways punitive justice just Doesn't work and how annoying it is to see in leftist spaces all the time, but i'll breeze past it for the sake of this post not becoming a novella.) my point here is that while yes, vengeance and punishment for harmful actions does feel great and can very occasionally help, the sustainable and humane way to approach harm is through restorative justice and rehabilitation (for lack of a better word).

nobody is born evil and nobody is doomed to be evil and hurt everyone forever. this is true both in the sense of restorative justice, where the person who did the harmful action(s) can be trusted and expected to change their behavior, and in the more personal "you are not bound to suffering for all your life" sense. if you break your arm, do you set the bone or cut the whole limb off?

the concept of the self, when wielded as a tell-all unchanging revelation of a person's "true nature of violence/harm" can be and is used against already marginalized and oppressed groups to justify that oppression. this is a more political gripe, sure, but it's one of the reasons i think my theory holds up better. saying "people can't change if they've done bad things..." is a very good way to get people to accept "...so anyone who does a bad thing should be locked up forever/socially isolated/killed/etc."

idk. it's probably a Capitalism thing - something something making a product of yourself and products have to be consistent - but the attachment to a One True Self really grinds my gears in a way that i haven't been able to put into words until recently.

i understand the desire to have something that makes you fundamentally You no matter what, but the way i see it, it'd take one tiny change in your past to turn you into a completely different person. that doesn't mean you're not real or that nothing you do matters, it just means the world is as much a part of you as you are of it. it's worth thinking about sometimes.

(also please talk to me about this more i could go on for hours about the idea of the self and our relationships to our bodyminds and etc)

[historia-vitae-magistras]

Okay, so in order to accurately read my review: first imagine a good 15 minutes of incoherent screaming/babbling/gesticulating while I tried to calm my brain down enough to explain why it was reacting like that.

Then imagine me carefully selecting "the best lines" only to realize I'd "selected" a good 90% of the fic.

Now:

"He was quiet and still for a moment, and Matthew thought that particular enough to frown.

"'What's the matter?'

"'I forgot my question.' Jack gave a sheepish grin. 'Sorry.'"

I love them, your honor. Poor Matt's just trying to sleep off a migraine, but Jack Has A Question and will be satisfied... oh, nope, he forgot. And "Jack sitting still is weird enough that something's wrong" is just... it's this little touch of knowing his brother, and also the lead in to "he forgot his very important question," and I love it.

"'Where's Father?'

"'Drunk,' Zee chirped, and Matthew startled. She had appeared in the doorway without him even hearing when the swish of her skirts should have been as loud enough to alert him, but he really was out of it. Oh God, were both of them on the same mission? He sat up. Jack could be distracted but Zee? She was a bloodhound. And she never forgot anything."

Again, I love them. Zee's matter of fact statement (Arthur, quit getting drunk in front of your weans), and "oh shit, I can't get out of this if she's on the case." The little juxtaposition between his reaction to both of their appearances and how he thinks of them... I love it, I love it so much.

"'Oh, right! That's what I wanted to ask. Olly's head.' said Jack. 'The one that Father says he keeps up on the mantle in that fancy box,' He pointed at the carved mahogany box on the mantel, etched with what he'd bet was Uncle Rhys spell work, but they didn't talk about that."

Okay, so to insert my own question, because Jack and I are kindred spirits in that regard: if the skull was in a glass case before the house was Jack-proofed, does that mean the box was made recently? Did the previous display include any spell work, or was there a reason to add it for the box specifically? Either "it's been warded since the day it came off" or "it was added well over a century later" would be fascinating looks into Arthur's mindset around the thing. Also, the image of Arthur asking his big brother to help him with magic... I'm so obsessed with the moments when, even at the height of the Empire, Arthur leans on his brothers.

"She lifted her chin and stared right back. 'You've seen it. So if it isn't in the box, show us the box.'"

This is such a small thing - I loved Matt trying to lie to get out of it and immediately getting outsmarted by Zee. Do not lie to the small child, Matt, she can best you.

"Arthur had made him look at it. Back then, before the house had been Jack-proofed, it had been displayed behind glass. The horrible shrunken skull with tight, parchment-mummified skin and a grinning jaw that wiggled when the display cloche over its base moved at all. It was a French flag over his land back then. Arthur had only closed one hand over his neck and made him look. The implication had been clear. That's where you'll end up, too, my boy, if you're not careful."

Aaaaaaand I am immediately snapped out of the cute sibling interaction and into the fucked-up-ness of their "family" and its existence. I just... fuck. Arthur deciding to threaten the small child under his care, and Matt understanding the threat... And the way you worded it absolutely drives the terror and the... power? Control? home. I can see it happening and feel the emotional tension between Matt and Arthur in that moment. And you did it in three sentences.

"At home… the head is powerful." She said carefully, as if translating a concept she'd never spoken about into English was difficult. Perhaps it was. Matthew didn't know what to say to that.

Once again crying over Zee. She's part English, sure, and in many ways the most like Arthur - but there's this whole other side to her that she can't talk about or represent the way she wants. Something about this bit is really driving home what she, Jack, and Matt are and the inherent fucked-up-ness of their existence.

"'Then why's Father got it?', Zee asked. They drew nearer, and Matthew stood, pulling them with him, needing out of that room, away from that box and its half-forgotten contents. He walked them to the door, remembering a day when he had been the problem, the opponent, the obstacle in father's way.

"'Because he made father his enemy.'"

[Cue my brain bursting into flames trying to process the emotions]

It's a lot. Like, Zee and Jack are just after "ooh, the creepy skull!" (with some cultural hesitation on Zee's part), but Matt's thinking about "the skull the man who calls himself our father used to communicate that I need to watch my step or I WILL be removed from the equation." But at the same time - sure it hasn't been said to the other two because they've been under the English flag since birth (well... legally), but they live under that same threat. The dichotomy of them being kids after something creepy their dad has, but also colonial holdings asking about the proof that the empire is vindictive and will end an enemy no matter where he finds it... it's doing things to my brain.

This fic was both extremely entertaining and gave me a LOT to think about, thank you so much for sharing it!

My brain just screams joy at me for like two days straight every time you comment I can't even express how happy it makes me. Everything I'm trying to do comes through to someone and it... it works???? A miracle. And god, yeah, Arthur in all likelihood wouldn't have hurt Matt because generally children are the one thing that can stay his hand in most contexts but if he'd been an obstacle threatening Alfred in a way that Arthur could tangibly see, it would have been done. He's generally more interested in protecting his children even before he properly claims them but they are possessions before they're people in so, so very many ways. Collected like the stuffed birds and the contents of the green house. Zee is trying so hard to articulate these concepts that have no English translation, unite these aspects of her that are utterly at odds and Jack's still young enough his questions don't have bitter unsatisfying answers yet and Matt already knows what they'll grow up to understand someday. There's just so much bullshit that lives in my brain and I'm so happy it got out on paper!

Okay, so to insert my own question, because Jack and I are kindred spirits in that regard: if the skull was in a glass case before the house was Jack-proofed, does that mean the box was made recently? Did the previous display include any spell work, or was there a reason to add it for the box specifically?

So this is something I'm kind of adding into established works because I audited a course on the history of magic and folklore to make a reference collection for those students to use and I got drop kicked back into my teenage pagan phase so now the hard core realism I've always liked sticking too is more and more turning into a very annoying attempt at magical realism I am so sorry lmao.

So I actually had 3 versions of the Cromwell head. One where it was as somewhat recorded in history. Just dried out, spooky, and sitting on the mantel. The second was that Arthur actually fused Cromwell's soul in there and actually talked to the thing sometimes. But that felt weird so I went with the third. That the skull, as was often thought of skulls through early European history acts as a kind of conduit. Arthur needs it because of all his siblings I think might actually be the weakest in whatever kind of magical ability there may be, I haven't decided how far I want to go in that direction. But being the youngest, he learned the least from their mother and didn't much care to learn much later. So the spell-work he did on the glass and cloche started wearing off about a century or so after Cromwell lost his head. It was keeping in the bad vibes from Cromwell's skull and keeping out the curious (like Jack) so Alasdair made a box and Rhys enchanted the thing to contain Cromwell and keep the curious (Jack) out. When the weans got older and Arthur no longer has servants and what not it just sits on the mantel. Zee puts an elf hat and fairy lights on it at Christmas and bunny eared headband at Easter just for maximum disrespect.

Rhys really just put so much overtime in when the kids are young, carving and enchanting various hex traps and witch boxes to keep shit contained. Wales and Scotland were among the first victims of English imperialism but also certainly participated it in it. So while Arthur quite literally probably has skeletons in the closet, they all are a part of this fucked up imperial mess.

[causenessus]

HI LOVELY!! good morning afternoon or evening to you! how’s your day been!! i hope you’ve eaten AND REMEMBER TO EAT DURING UR LONG SHIFTS OR I WILL APPEAR ON UR SCREEN !!! (lovingly) the way i gasped when i read your response because i was just like… YOU DIDNT EAT? :( i was so distraught but i hope whatever u had for dinner was good, but still !! always remember to eat and take care of yourself or the ghost of me will scold u (lovingly again) (nothing but love for you always)

today i had banh xeo for breakfast (tbh at this point i feel like you can guess what nationality i am LMAO) but OMG YOU LIKE VIET FOOD?? WE ARE SO SOULMATES !! TWIN FLAME !! AND OMG THATS SO CUTE I HAVE A VOICE IM HHHH that’s so cute i feel so very honoured but omg yesterday while i was like doing whatever right i had a realization that im literally like mystic messenger right now with the “make sure you eat!!” “how are you!!” like IM LITERALLY A CHARACTER IN MYSTIC MESSENGER RIGHT NOW THATS CRAZY (id be so embarrassed if you didn’t know what mystic messenger is but also would not blame you) ALSO YES WE CAN YAP TOGETHER I LOVE YAPPING BUT IM DEFINITELY YAPPING TOO MUCH LIKE I WANNA REPLY TO EVERYTHING YOU SAID SO IM LIKE HHH YAP YAP YAP me and ness are literally yapper and yapper like im trying to hold back but im here like omg among us??? omg whack dreams??? i wanna know what dreams??? omg school?? i’m school soon too!!

but but one more thing omg i’m so sorry LOL BUT I FEEL LIKE WE’RE IN THE SAME TIMEZONE?? BECAUSE EVERYTIME YOU MENTION THE TIME IN YOUR POSTS i check my time and im like huh.. silly… coincidence, but it’s 4pm for me rn !!maybe im crazy maybe im not but omg when it gets to school you can 100% rant about it because i will 100% do it too HAHA school has me like like genuinely tweaking like one small thing and im like OH MY GOD YOU WILL NOTTTT BELIEVE WHAT HAPPENED TODAY

omg sorry i need to wrap this up but yes try again is amazing don’t doubt yourself and u can always yap to me whenever whenever like i’ll literally make a burner account and dm you instead so we can yap without having to flood your blog or if you don’t mind i don’t mind but mango anon loves you very much and mango anon would want ness to take care of herself forever and always and HAVE A GOOD DAY !!! xoxoxo

AAAAA OMG I AM HERE LIKE 11 HOURS LATER <33 DO NOT WORRY I AM EATING AS WE SPEAK BEFORE MY LONG SHIFT tbh i felt like so nauseous about eating anything though today idk why (i have like two suspicions lmao i def know why) but since i'm working i was like "then i'll just pick something up on the way there!!" so i went to my groccery store to get a sandwhich BUT THEY DIDN'T HAVE ANY </333 so i'm having a blazing dragon poke bowl instead??? and it's okay 😔 like i don't know how i feel yet about groccery store sushi and stuff but i've had it before!! it's just a bunch of spicy imitation crab, cucumber, carrots, and rice and i'm mainly just there for the rice. AND OMG i walked around the store bc i was trying to see if they had liquid death (caffeinated tea i think. i don't like it but i really need caffeine today </3) and they didn't have any and i decided to go back to like their little food section to get bao (you can probably guess my ethnicity too 😭) and i almost got hit bc this man WHIPPED around when i tried to pass him like i literally ducked i was so scared he was about to hit me and that man was STILL not aware of me. ANYWAY SORRY RANDOM STORY YOU AND ME AND VIET FOOD!!! TWIN FLAMES!!

ALSO OMG MYSTIC MESSENGER 😭 BRO I WAS JUST THINKING ABOUT 707 LIKE TWO DAYS AGO WHEN THAT WHOLE ANON APOCALYPSE HAPPENED I WAS LIKE "i'm going to go 707 on these people and find out where they live and haunt them /hj" PLEASE I FORGOT ALL ABOUT THEIR LITTLE "remember to eat" messages and everything but it's so cute <33 and YES we will yap together!! i went in to school today although it starts tomorrow to switch up my schedule and going there was HORRIBLE i saw so many disgusting people :/// BUT i have a pretty good schedule now so it has it's pros and cons!!! i just give people dirty looks and accidentally saw "ew" aloud all the time :))) AND IK THAT SOUNDS MEAN BUT LIKE YK HOW PEOPLE ARE and the people that live in my state are all rich privileged kids and it never changes 😭 i see them everywhere AND THEY ALL LOOK THE SAME AND ACT THE SAME AND ARE GROSS

and LMAO A BURNER ACCOUNT I WOULD TOTALLY TAKE IT THOUGH!!! i'd love to talk to you whenever please please please feel free to make one and dm whenever you'd like!! <3 I LOVE SEEING YOUR ASKS THOUGH I LITERALLY WILL BE HAPPY EITHER WAY AS LONG AS I GET TO TALK TO YOU <3 I HOPE YOU HAVE A WONDERFUL DAY TODAY ANON!!

[winter-soldier-vibes]

Come Back Home (Bucky x reader)

Come back home

Bucky x reader

Word count: 3,061

Summary: You were getting worse and were afraid to hurt Bucky, but unable to hide it. Instead of talking it out, you ran away. Embarrassed and afraid, you avoid the calls and voicemails from the man you left. But one night, you can’t help but listen to them, and you need to hear his voice.

Warnings: depression, reader blames herself, Bucky blames himself, anxiety attack, lots of tears, lots of fluff and comfort

I actually got this idea from @thelifeof.jana on TikTok, she posts different scenarios with comfort characters and I wanted to make it into a fic. 

Tags: @buckfics @buckys2thicc @abitgryffindorky @stucky-on-spiderman @thatfangirl42 @thundering-barnes   

A/N: It’s nearly finals week and it is CRUNCH TIME so I’ve been writing when I can, I apologize for the sporadic-ness of it. Thanks for sticking with me! 

A/N 2: I left a few things to interpretation, such as a nightmare. Insert what you want, I know everyone has different experiences and I wanted this to be as relatable to as many people as I could. I also left out when y/n gives an address because 1) I don’t know New York and 2) It’s likely somebody’s address in real life so...interpretation. 

-----------

Your phone began ringing, piercing the otherwise silent house and startling you

Answer it.

You stared at the phone, taking a deep breath.

Ring 

You picked it up and turned it over, closing your eyes and letting a breath out.

Don’t answer it.

You looked at the screen again, seeing the name of your favorite person.

Bucky…

Ring 

Answer it

No. 

Please, I wanna hear his voice.

I can’t

Ring

Letting a breath out, you put the phone down and sat on the floor next to your bed, leaning your head back and closing your eyes. 

Ring. Ring. Ring.

Then you were left in the silence once again.

You let out a breath you didn’t know you had been holding, waiting a few more seconds for the next noise. Sure enough, your phone made a sound, notifying you of yet another voicemail.

Another addition to your library of ignored messages.

You picked up your phone, clicking to see the messages you never listened to.

25 unheard messages. All of them from Bucky. 

Your finger hovered over them for a moment, allowing yourself to ponder listening to them. But you sighed, closing your phone and placing it back on the nightstand. You couldn’t listen to them. Because if you did, you wouldn’t be able to resist calling him back. And you couldn’t take that risk. 

You’d spent this much time without him. Once you heard his voice you’d be spilling everything to him. Just like you used to. Which is why you left in the first place. 

Bucky was special to you. He always had been. Despite all the trauma he’d gone through, he was still kind and gentle. He had been the one to pull you out of the dark place you were in at the time. He was always there to talk to you, listen to you, or help you take care of yourself when you just couldn’t anymore. He’d sat through many of your panic attacks and calm you down if you had a nightmare, just as you would for him. He would drop anything for you, you always came first.

And that was the problem.

He did too much for you, and you couldn’t help but feel guilty. This man had already gone through so much pain and suffering and was finally getting better. He was going out more and the nightmares happened much less often. You were grateful for the love he gave you, and you loved him more than anything.

Which is why you couldn’t bring him down anymore. So, one day when he was out on a mission, you had packed up your few positions and left him a note.

Bucky,

I just wanted you to know that I love you so much, but I have to go now. I’m sorry. 

-Y/n

You had to keep it brief. If you said anything more you knew you’d say too much, and it would only make leaving harder. And if he knew you were leaving because you were hurting too much, he wouldn’t stop until he found you.

Not that he wasn’t looking for you know.

You had rented out a room in the cheapest hotel your could find in somewhere-New-York-City. It was small, it wasn’t the cleanest, but it was fine. You didn’t care, it was functional. Within hours of leaving, your phone started ringing. Not that you answered. You couldn’t, not when you would start crying once you heard his voice.

You got many texts and calls that night. 

What happened?

Where are you? Y/n are you okay??

Tell me where you are, we can talk this out, please.

You couldn’t bring yourself to read more than that. You silenced his messages and let the calls go to voicemail, never able to bring yourself to reject a call, instead letting it ring all the way until he got the same voicemail message every time.

Hi, it’s y/n. Leave your name and number and I’ll get back to you as soon as I can, have a nice day!

The same fake cheery message every time, giving an empty promise.

What you didn’t know was that on the other end of the line, Bucky was shattering a bit more with each voicemail he left. 

Bucky’s POV:

He couldn’t understand what could have happened. Why you had left all of a sudden. He knew you had some bad days, and the first time he had read it he was terrified that you had done something. He usually was able to see when things were getting bad again but he couldn’t think of what he could have missed. When he saw that you had read his texts that night, seeing the word read appear after a few of them, he told himself that you were okay. 

Because he didn’t know what he was going to do if you weren’t.

What you didn’t know was that you had helped Bucky just as much if not more so than he had helped you. His nightmares happened less often because you were there with him every night. He was more outgoing because you had dragged him out to those first few bars and parties. He felt happier because he was helping you, and you made him feel safe and wanted.

And then you left.

He couldn’t sleep most nights, worried about you. Most of the nights he did sleep, he dreamt about you and everything that could have happened. He called you every day, multiple times, needing desperately to hear your voice. He withdrew again, only going on one mission when the team absolutely needed him. It was his only sense of purpose anymore, but it meant nothing compared to what you had meant to him

But you didn’t know that. Because you hadn’t opened any of his messages yet. 

It was late now, and Bucky was discouraged. It had been over a week since you had left, and his texts had gone unread ever since a the first night you left. It wasn’t a long time. But it was still too long. He decided to try your phone once more. 

Ring 

Ring 

Ring 

Ring 

Bucky closed his eyes, begging you would pick up, silently knowing you wouldn’t.

Ring 

Ring 

“Hi, it’s y/n. Leave your name and number and I’ll get back to you as soon as I can, have a nice day!”

Sighing, he got ready to leave a voicemail. After the beep he said, broken.

“Please y/n. Come back home.”

Your POV:

You sighed as yet another round of rings echoed through your apartment, hearing the notification soon after, notifying you of yet another new voicemail. 

You looked at the time. 11:03 P.M.

You sighed, knowing you should get some sleep. But no matter how tired you were, you knew that once you closed your eyes, you would have nightmares again. And no one would be here this time. 

You couldn’t deny it, you weren’t doing well. Your appetite had diminished and you relied heavily on caffeine to supplement the sleep you refused to get. Not that it helped your appetite in any way.

You would go through the motions, make it to work (most days) and get through the day just to...get through the day. You weren’t living really. Just surviving. You knew it was getting bad again, some nights so dark you weren’t sure if you would see the light the next day. Yet you couldn’t let yourself call him. You didn’t want to hurt him.

But you didn’t know that you had already hurt him more by leaving than you ever could’ve by staying.

You sighed, knowing that eventually, you were going to need to sleep. Might as well try to. You didn’t know if for sure you would have a nightmare, so may as well try?

That turned out to be wishful thinking.

Major wishful thinking. 

You woke up screaming, drenched in sweat and looking around the room frantically. When you realized it was just a dream, you put your face in your hands and felt tears immediately prick your eyes.

When was this going to stop?

You felt your chest contract as you realized the truth. It wasn’t. Not like this at least.

Just over a week and you were already at your breaking point.

Call him

You looked at the time. 2:47 AM.

You couldn’t call him now.

Call him.

You opened your phone and found Bucky’s contact, finger hovering over the name once again. At the last second, you clicked your voicemail inbox instead, scrolling back down to the first one on the night you left.

“Y/n?”

Your breath hitched as you heard his voice, fresh tears pricking your eyes. Not just from his voice and how much you had missed it, but also the absolute panic in his voice.

“Where are you? Are you okay? Why- why did you leave? Please, answer the phone, I need to know you’re okay.”

You clicked on another one from a few hours later.

“Y/n, please, I saw you read the first few texts I sent. Please answer the phone. We can talk this out, whatever it is just - please call me.”

Tears were falling from your eyes, and you didn’t have it in your power or even the desire to stop them. You flicked to another one that was sent a few days later, this one was longer. 

“Please y/n,” it started, his voice soft and cracking with emotion. “Where are you? Just - just tell me where you are, please. I need you. These past few days it’s like I hear your voice and then there’s nothing. I miss you so much. I’m nothing without you please....please just come back home. I don’t care what you did or think you did or why you left. I love you. And I could never stop loving you. I can come get you, we can talk this out. Please. I can’t do this without you. I - I’m falling apart.”

You were now sobbing as you flicked over to your text messages and clicked on Bucky’s name, seeing texts upon texts from him.

One of the more recent one’s caught your attention.

“I’m sorry. Did I do something wrong?”

Never, never in your heart did you ever think Bucky would think that he had done something to drive you away. Your heart broke, realizing he could be blaming himself for your leaving. It was never his fault. It could never be his fault.

With shaking hands, you pressed the phone icon below his name, bringing the phone to your ear as you listened to it ring.

You tried to control your breathing through the tears, falling apart after a few seconds of thinking you had it together.

Ring

Ring

Ring

Please pick up, I need to hear your voice.

Ring 

I’m sorry this is all my fault.

Ring 

Please, I -

“Hello?”

Your breath hitched and your eyes flew open. Your words got caught in your mouth, having no idea what to say. Bucky, on the other side of the line, hadn’t even looked at the caller ID. He hadn’t fully fallen asleep yet, but the tiredness was evidence in his voice.

“Hello?” he said again

“I’m sorry,” you choked out.

Bucky’s eyes flew open and he pulled away his phone, seeing your name across the screen. All exhaustion was gone from his body, and he heard you trying to control your breathing on the other side of the line.

“Y/n?”

“I’m so sorry…” you said again, breaking out into sobs.

“Y/n, can you tell me what’s wrong? Where are you?” he said, panicked and getting out of bed, pulling on a shirt and shoes.

“I’m sorry, Bucky, I’m so sorry,” you said again, not being able to say much else. 

“Y/n, sweetheart, it’s okay. You’re okay. But I need you to tell me where you are, can you do that for me?”

He waited for a moment while you tried to pull yourself together enough to repeat the address of the hotel.

As you did, Bucky was already out the door and in the car, starting it and putting you on speaker, driving as fast as he could to the hotel and ignoring all traffic signals. It was the middle of the night, and you were not okay.

“I’ll be there soon, angel, can you keep talking to me?

“I’m sorry Bucky…”

“It’s okay y/n. You’re okay. We’re okay. I’ll be there in a few minutes.”

His words didn’t reach your ears, your breathing getting harder to control and your tears fell faster. You had fucked up, this was your fault. Why did you call him, now he knows where you are and you were going to burden him with all your shit again. 

He could hear your breathing become labored as he sped further towards your location. He tried talking to you more but he soon realized that he wouldn’t be of much use until he was in front of you. His heart was breaking and he was hoping nothing was seriously wrong. 

But you wouldn’t have called him like this if nothing was wrong.

Clenching his jaw, he scanned the street signs for yours, knowing the city well enough to know he was close. 

When he pulled up to the street, he couldn’t help but wince at how dingy this place was. It was run down and the smell was putrid. He was so sad that this was where you had run off to. He took his phone, saying how he was here but it fell upon deaf ears. You weren’t calm enough to hear his voice from the phone you had dropped when you had moved to cover your face instead.

Bucky took the stairs 3 at a time, getting to your room in record time. He pounded on the door, trying the knob even though he knew it would be locked. Calling out your name and getting no response, he decided to break the door in. It was barely hanging on its hinges anyway.

“Y/n? Y/n where are you?” he called out, met only with the sounds of your labored breathing. He followed it to your room, where you had curled yourself into a ball against the headboard, hands covering your face as you struggled to breathe. 

He walked over to your side, reaching out his hand but thinking better at the last moment. He needed to make sure you knew that he was there, he didn’t want to scare you.

“Y/n?” he starts softly. 

You lifted your head and looked around yourself wildly, startled when you saw the figure of a man standing in front of you, trying to push him away. He grabbed your arms and you tried to break free

How did he get in here? 

What does he want with me? 

Why- 

Your eyes settle on his. Light blue eyes, staring right back into yours. You knew them, you were safe with them. Your own eyes, red  and blotchy flash with realization and you let out a sob. 

“Bucky…”

He took you into his arms as sobs wracked your body, rubbing an arm up and down your back in efforts to calm your shaking form. He was repeating comforting words over and over again. You clung to his shirt as you kept apologizing over and over again, not knowing what else to say - or even how to say it. 

“I’m sorry”

“It’s okay.”

“I’m so sorry…”

“Shh, y/n, it’s okay.”

“I’m sorry.”

“I’m here. I got you.”

You tried to focus on his heartbeat, steady and strong, as you tried to take deep breaths. Eventually your tears slowed down as you still clung to him, tears drying on your face as you were able to deepen your breathing to match his. His hand still rubbed up and down your back as the two of you sat in silence for a few minutes.

You took a shaky breath. “I - I’m so sorry Bucky.”

Bucky took a deep breath and held her a little more tightly. He could still feel her heart racing. What could she possibly have to be sorry for?

“What happened y/n?”

You felt tears prick your eyes again. Sadness, shame, embarrassment and made you feel sick to your stomach. You opened and closed your mouth a few times before you were able to speak. 

“I - I don’t know.”

“Please y/n. Tell me why you left.”

“I just… I was… “ you swallowed and let out a shaky breath. “It was getting bad again,” you said, voice barely audible. 

Bucky clenched his jaw, angry at himself that he didn’t see it. “Why didn’t you tell me? I told you you could talk to me about anything.”

You screwed your eyes shut. “That was the problem…”

Bucky pulled you back to look at you. “What?”

Your eyes darted everywhere but Bucky’s face. You didn’t want to see the pained expression you knew he’d have right now. You took a deep breath. 

“I just… you were doing so well. And I - I just felt so bad for bringing you down all the time. You would drop anything for me, and you were always there and you were always perfect but I wasn’t.” you finally looked at him. “And I left because I realized I was never going to be.” You shook your head slightly. “I didn’t want to put you through that when you were doing so well.”

You looked away, unable to look at Bucky’s sad eyes any longer. Bucky broke the silence after a few moments. “You were the only reason I was better.”

 Now it was your turn to look at him confused. “What?”

“You brought me out to places when all I wanted was to hide. The nightmares stopped because you were there to make me feel safe. Every time I helped you, I was helping me too,” he said, voice cracking. “You were the best thing that ever happened to me. You weren’t too much for me, you never could be.” 

When you still looked unsure, he moved his hand to cup your cheek. “It’s okay to let people help you, y/n.”

Tears pooled in your eyes once again. That had been what you had said to him when he began closing himself off, be it an intense nightmare or being triggered. Back when things were bad. Like they were for you now.

“I’m sorry,” you whispered.

“It’s okay.” he whispered, hugging you again. “Let’s go home.”

[delimeful]

Helpless (2)

the next chapter in the drider virgil fic!

warnings: spiders, slight dehumanizing language, assumptions/jumping to conclusions

-

Logan was certain that he’d tracked down his quarry.

Of course, he’d also been certain the last two times he’d found promising evidence around a swath of woods, but this time was different.

He had learned plenty while traversing through the varied lands of his kingdom, and while physical evidence was ideal, word of mouth was one of the most useful tools a researcher could use to find leads.

That was part of the reason why he’d been so careful to observe typical travelers for weeks before his departure, the reason he was wearing worn, cheap fabric and staying at the second-cheapest room at this town’s inn, despite having plenty of money still hidden on his person. He didn’t want a single rumor about a suspiciously rich noble traveling alone.

The last thing he needed was for his investigative journey to be interrupted by bandits, or worse, would-be do-gooders attempting to return the missing prince to his place in line for the throne.

Logan resisted the urge to roll his eyes at the very thought, putting aside the last half of his travel rations and stopping at the edge of town to stare into the woods beyond. He checked his compass habitually, and he was pointed firmly westward, exactly towards the point of the woods that were occupied by a dangerous monster, according to the barkeep that Logan had plied for information last night at supper.

The whole town knew of it, even the younger residents, which was a point in favor of the creature really existing rather than just being another folk tale.

There was one other potential source on the creature, a town outcast going by the way others’ noses wrinkled at the mention of him, but Logan was more than ready to begin investigating for himself, and the odds that the outcast actually knew anything were low, anyhow.

Decided, he headed into the forest, prepared for the day-long trek that was sure to follow. If he was prone to less scientific notations, he might have jotted down that he had a good feeling about this particular town.

Exactly an hour and a half later, Logan had found himself almost entirely immobilized by layers and layers of gossamer threads strewn about the trees.

Needless to say, he was ecstatic.

Even the foolish manner in which he’d landed himself stuck in such an obvious trap couldn’t dampen his spirits, not when faced with undeniable proof that there was in fact a drider in these woods. He’d been too hasty in his attempt to collect some of the biological material, and by yanking too hard, had ended up pulled forwards into the thick of the intricate spider web.

His immobility was a bit concerning, but mostly frustrating, since he couldn’t reach for his journal to note down the surprising level of the webbing’s tensile strength. Still, proper scientists had to be prepared to hold onto their observations for as long as it took for them to be able to write them down.

Besides, he could hardly complain. His current predicament practically guaranteed that he would actually get to see the creature!

-

There was a person stuck in his webs, and Virgil was freaking out about it.

It had never happened before. Virgil very specifically made the webs closer to town thick and opaque so that any passerby would see them and avoid this exact situation.

Virgil peered around the cluster of bushes he had half-flattened himself behind. The stranger didn’t seem too panicked, at least, going by the way that the web barely swayed with his presence. He didn’t even seem to be breathing hard, which was… admittedly sort of strange.

Skies above, what if this was a trap? Virgil turned his head sharply to scan his surroundings, wary of human hunters suddenly popping out of the undergrowth.

Several moments of silence, and even with all his senses pushed to their farthest, he couldn’t detect anything. It seemed the only one trapped here was the human.

A pang of guilt curled unpleasantly in his first stomach. He grimaced, wishing desperately that Patton was here to mitigate the utter terror Virgil was surely about to inflict on this guy.

No point in drawing it out. He rose up to his full height, grateful that the human had gotten stuck facing the opposite direction, and quietly crept up behind him. All he needed to do was announce his presence and let the human know he wasn’t going to hurt them, but he was immediately distracted at the sight of just how tangled his webs had grown.

“How does one human manage to touch every single support thread at the same time?” he asked, voice incredulous.

The human stiffened, and he couldn’t help but tense in response, cursing his big mouth.

… Really though, he spent hours crafting these, and now this one would have to be completely reconstructed!

“Are you the monster spoken of in town?”

The measured voice snapped Virgil out of his thoughts as easy as a clap of thunder, and he shuffled a bit from side to side nervously. His many steps must have been louder than he’d thought, because the human immediately attempted to twist around and see him.

He failed, naturally, because Virgil’s threads weren’t exactly easy to wriggle free of, but Virgil’s nerves only grew. “I… why do you ask?”

There was a short silence, and then, “Considering my current situation, it’s only natural I would want to know, isn’t it?”

Virgil resisted the urge to wince at his own dumbassery. “Right. Well. Yeah,” he confirmed, already bracing for the fear that nearly every human bore when confronted with him. Even Patton had been afraid at first, though Virgil really thought him braver than any other human, to be so terrified of even normal spiders and befriend a Drider of all creatures.

“Oh, excellent,” the human said with clear excitement. “Would you mind coming around so that I can see you?”

Virgil blinked, befuddled. The last thing most humans wanted was for him to come closer. Maybe it was the natural fear of him being in their blind spot? The guy certainly didn’t sound very afraid, even with Virgil’s less-than-stellar first impression.

“Do you have a weapon?” he asked warily.

“I have a knife,” the stranger offered, “but I can’t exactly reach it at the moment.”

Virgil could see the glint of it, caught bladefirst at the very edge of a web as though it had been used on the threads themselves. He slowly circled around the clearing, watching the stranger closely for any sudden movements, until he stood before him, all eight legs and thorax visible.

“Fascinating,” he breathed, eyes blown wide as they skittered from point to point as though noticing every little detail. Virgil would have thought him afraid had it not been for the prideful little grin that sat on his face. “I thought maybe you were lying to me-- I hadn’t expected you to be so fluent in the common language, living in the woods and all-- but wow!”

Virgil felt his front legs rising up a little bit in an automatic defense against the unexpected reaction. He ran his tongue over his fangs nervously, trying to figure out whether or not he should be insulted about the language thing. And what exactly did this guy mean by ‘expected’?

The stranger’s hands twitched slightly, still stuck firmly in place, and irritation briefly flitted across his face as though he’d forgotten his position. He blinked, as though remembering something.

“Oh, right. Are you planning on trying to consume me, then?” he asked, the question as politely curious as an inquiry about the weather.

Virgil recoiled physically at the idea, skittering back a few strides and baring his fangs despite the difference in size and strength and trapped-ness between the two of them. “What? No!”

The stranger managed to drag his intrigued gaze away from Virgil’s fangs, his hands twitching again almost subconsciously. “In that case, would you mind helping me down? My leg has begun to go numb, and I really would like access to my journal.”

“I-- I mean, yeah, if you aren’t-- I can--,” Virgil stumbled over his words, drawing closer with his body lowered non-threateningly and waiting for the inevitable flinch or shiver of disgust.

It never came. The stranger continued to stare at him with no trace of terror in his eyes, even as Virgil grew close enough to reach out and touch him.

“Take your time,” he offered, despite being the one trapped in a monster’s web. Virgil abruptly felt a bit silly about his obvious wariness, and lifted his front legs to rub them together at the ankles. The stranger’s head tilted to the side slightly, watching the gesture intently.

“... It’s the oils that make the webs not stick,” Virgil explained. “I produce it naturally on my feet so I don’t get, y’know, stuck. I’ll have to touch the webs that are attached to you. With my feet. The spider ones.”

Virgil didn’t have any other kinds of feet, but the stranger graciously didn’t nitpick.

“A built-in solvent… I wonder if natural spiders have similar traits,” he mused instead, and then, “Do whatever you need, I don’t mind. The opposite, really, I appreciate the assistance.”

Sure enough, he didn’t shy away when Virgil began carefully plucking at the threads entangling him, sliding the sides of his legs along them to coat them in the anti-stick oils. Bit by bit, the entanglement loosened, and Virgil had just freed both arms when the human abruptly twisted around to reach for something on his person.

Of course, now that much of the webbing holding him in midair had been removed, his weight was significantly less supported. A few threads snapped, and he dropped a few inches with a startled yelp. If he continued, he’d be in for either a rough fall or getting caught in a whole new layer of webbing, and Virgil wanted neither of those things.

He quickly reached forwards with his human arms and lifted the stranger up and away from further entanglement, batting away any stray threads with his front legs. Belatedly, he realized he had forgotten to check if it was a weapon that the human had reached for. Even more belatedly, he realized that this was the second human he’d picked up in this impromptu carry.

Weird that it had happened twice.

“Perfect, thank you,” the guy said, and then he started writing furiously in a little book, occasionally glancing up at Virgil and locking onto a feature before returning to writing. It was as though he didn’t mind at all being held aloft like a human might lift up a misbehaving cat.

Virgil took the opportunity to continue cleaning any web remnants off the guy while he was distracted, his mind whirring. A stranger who had clearly never done a day of hard labor in his life, who didn’t seem at all afraid of him, and was taking notes.

... Oh, shit.

Virgil set him carefully on the ground while he was still preoccupied with scrawling out a label for a diagram of Virgil’s teeth. He backed up, softening his steps, and by the time the stranger pulled his attention away from his book, Virgil was already well out of sight and planned to keep it that way, regardless of the confused little call the stranger made.

He was not messing with what was clearly a mage out for his parts.

[narutakijune]

About ATLA Relationship Arcs

So, this is me, finally trying to write some meta after lurking in my little tumblr corner for months! Hi!

Although I’ve tried to tag properly, if you are a Kat*anger and just want to enjoy your favourite couple in peace, this might not be the post for you. I am not trying to bash characters but I do have a lot of critical stuff to say about the writing.

Anyway, you have been warned and here is my story about my personal first Atla experience: I watched the show this year for the first time, and after the end of Book 1 I decided to look up spoilers, because after what happened to Yue, I wanted to make sure that Zuko and Iroh would be ok. So I knew what was going to happen: Kat*ang endgame and absolutely no Zutara at all. Still, by the end of Book 3, I was convinced that I had read wrong - that there would be an epilogue with a different ending or at least that Aang would only get together with Katara post-show- in that Korra series or something - because anything else wouldn’t make sense- right?

….

After I got over my shock and surprise, I went online and found out about that decade-long aggressive passionate ship war and how even the showrunners got involved.

And then I really worried that I might have missed a few points. Apparently ”Aang and Katara were the DNA of the show”, according to the creators themselves, and “Zutara could never have happened”.

Another popular anti-ZK argument I found was: Why do you always go on about Katara and Zuko? Just look at Zuko and Aang! They are the hero/ anti-hero and each other’s foils, their relationship is much more meaningful!”

So I tried to find out what it was that I apparently couldn’t see.

(Another disclaimer: I love analysing stories (like many Zutarians apparently) and this will get long and rambly. If you get bored to tears when people start talking about “narrative structure” you will probably not like this.)

Talking about narrative structure, I do believe that, in order to let your story, your characters and their relationships really shine, a good basic structure is important. There should be a recognizable development and individual parts of the story that build upon each other and lead to consequences and change, until there is a completed arc - because it is all about the journey that takes you to a satisfying ending, right? So that’s what I tried to do, with my personal Kat*ang vs. Zutara take, I tried to look at the structure and development of their relationship arcs.

The argument that threw me off track for a while is that compared to Aang and Zuko, Zuko and Katara’s relationship is not supposed to be that relevant for the plot. After all, Zuko is the foil, the anti-hero, the deuteragonist to Aang, who is the hero protagonist.

This is all true of course. But then why is it that in every finale, Zuko’s main opponent (and later ally) is not Aang but Katara? Why is it that their sun/moon, red/blue, fire/water dichotomy is so obviously highlighted?

I think one reason why Zuko and Katara are paired off so frequently in the story - as opposite elements, as opponents and as allies - is that they BOTH are Aang’s deuteragonists. While Zuko also acts as antagonist and Aang’s foil/mirror, Katara takes over the more traditional deuteragonist role of confidant / best friend/ narrator.

Protagonist Aang is what connects them, although they are on opposite sides: Both need Aang because he represents their hope to save their world. Very simply put, Katara protects him, so he can make the world a safer place again, and Zuko wants to capture him, so he can go home and be safe again. That rivalry between them is already established in the first episode, even before they meet each other: Katara, who hopes that the Avatar will return (as she tells everyone in the intro), and Zuko, who seems to be obsessed with finding him for more sinister reasons.

And just to make sure, I am not talking here about the characters’ feelings and emotions! This is just about the abstract roles they have been assigned within the narrative.

When regarding Zutara’s special connection to Aang and their rivalry with each other, it makes absolute sense to stress their “same but different”ness as well, visually and metaphorically: Red and blue, fire and water, sun and moon, arguably Painted Lady/Blue Spirit, and, when you put into account their story arc, also Oma and Shu.

With this basis, which puts them together and sets them apart simultaneously, their relationship already becomes very dynamic and interesting, even before you consider any romantic potential.

And here’s another thing, Zuko and Katara also have their own story arc within the main plot. Although they don’t have many scenes together before Zuko joins the Gaang, when they do meet there is always a new shift in their relationship and in quite a few cases their interactions are important for the main plot as well. If you just look at their “end fights” at each book’s finale, there is an obvious and consequential build-up, like any decent story arc should have:

Book 1 starts with Zuko as the powered-up enemy and Katara as the weak newbie waterbender. Both are battling over Aang. At the end of Book 1, they are finally established as equally powerful fighters but still fundamentally different (You rise with the moon, I rise with the sun!)

In CoD at the end of Book 2 happens the next step: they realize that they are not different at all! But Aang still doesn’t represent the same for them and they end up on opposing sides of the war again.

In the Book 3 finale, when Zuko has completed his own (anti-) hero's journey and Aang represents the same “hope” for both of them, they do not only join forces: Their “same but different”- traits make them such a uniquely suited match that they are even able to save each other’s lives during their fight with Azula (who in turn happens to be Katara and Zuko’s antagonist/mirror/foil).

And in addition to their own story arc they even get an individual recurring theme, which also appears in every book whenever their relationship status changes: The lost mothers, especially Katara’s mother.

In Book 1, Katara’s necklace (the symbol of Kiya) plays not only a major part in two of Zuko’s capture attempts, it is the reason for their very first one-one one encounter in the story.

Their first friendly connection in COD in Book 2 happens because they start talking about their mothers. And in Book 3, their final reconciliation (sealed with a very cathartic hug) happens after their life-changing trip which is, of course, all about Katara’s mother.

Again, I am not even trying to analyse their characters and motivations within the story - there are many metas that have already done that much better, more detailed and with screenshots. This is just dry structure and tropes and themes. But I think people recognize and connect with a well-structured arc, even subconsciously, which is one of the reasons that makes Zutara such a compelling couple. They complete and contrast each other, their relationship dynamic constantly changes, builds up, falls apart, reconnects. Such a setup is the perfect playground for a lot of creative takes on what-ifs and alternative scenarios and of course, shipping them romantically is extremely tempting - think of all the possibilities! It’s no wonder that the Zutara fandom is still so active decades after the end of the show. And it’s also no wonder that the Zutarians are known for “over-analysing everything”. You can only over-analyse if there is anything that gives you enough food to analyse to begin with. Which brings me to

KAT*ANG

I just go right to the top and take the quote from Br*yke themselves:

Kata*ng was in the DNA of the thing from the start…. [Zutara] was just dark and intriguing.

If you read this quote and then start watching the show, I would (grudgingly) agree that:

Aang and Katara understand and complement each other really well. Aang gives her the chance to have fun and go on adventures and in turn, Katara is his fiercest supporter from the very beginning, something that he really needs after he lost all his people AND has to find out that the world thinks the war is sort of his fault. In turn, the journey to the North Pole is as important to Katara as it is to Aang, because it is her dream to learn waterbending properly. That’s what she literally says when Sokka & Co try to banish Aang: (Sokka: Where do you think you’re going? Katara: To find a waterbender. Aang is taking me to the North Pole.) In that way, they are friends who give and take equally and are equally taken care of. They even have the last Airbender/ last Southern Waterbender status that connects them. The few times they have a fight, Aang does something in the end to redeem himself (perform some heroic feat) and Katara sees that she is right to believe in him.

Aang has this very sweet crush on her and it will be very sweet and wholesome when Katara will return his feelings at the end of their adventure after he has hit puberty. On the other side, there is also some heavy shipbaiting with Zuko: I save you from the pirates. The betrothal necklace. June and her excellent shipping taste. But in the end they are enemies, they barely know each other and, come on, it would be too dark and intriguing! There is no real threat against friends to lovers Kat*ang, the soft heart of the story. It’s very straightforward and there are a lot of simple “the hero saves the day” scenes for Aang but that’s fine! It’s not really my kind of ship but that’s not the point, it works for the story they want to tell.

End of Book 1.

In my - probably harsh- opinion, everything you really need to know about the Kat*ang relationship has been told by this point. If you want to be really mean, already by Book 1, episode 3.

That explains maybe why many (not all! but many) pro-KA arguments sound as if their shippers have not watched Book 2 and 3 at all. The Book 1 synopsis also perfectly sums up Bry*ke’s quote above. But then Book 2 and 3 are still there and I don’t know what happened but it seems as if they somehow decided that the Kat*ang story does not need any new and lasting input. Maybe because they were afraid that too much new development and change would stray too far away from their original Kat*ang vision. But there are still 2 more books and more adventures and Kat*ang somehow has to be kept apart until the finale.

So the tension in their potential romance is based largely on the question whether or not Katara will return Aang’s feelings. In general I don’t have a problem with that will-she-won’t she-technique. It works well in books where the love interest is not a POV or in shows/ movies where the love interest is not one of the main characters. But Katara is not only the female lead but also arguably the narrative voice of the whole story! As a result, this kind of writing makes Katara look as if she doesn’t have any agency in their relationship, which is not surprisingly a very popular anti-KA criticism.

Additionally, since her dream - learning waterbending - has been fulfilled by the end of Book 1, the relationship work becomes a bit one-sided. Of course Aang is the hero and his journey is the heart of the story. But in order to highlight their special connection it would have helped to give Katara another personal agenda, which Aang could have supported in some way. She is still the last Southern Waterbender and he the Last Airbender but this is not really explored in the Kat*ang relationship. And her other personal agenda, her mother, is already reserved for the Zutara arc.

Instead, in Book 2 and 3 the Kat*ang story is somehow all over the place. Of course there is new conflict and a few romantic scenes as well. But obstacles are either introduced too late or just dropped when not needed anymore, conflict is not resolved and their flirty, romantic moments never lead anywhere- and if they do, they lead to more conflict that is not resolved (yes, I am looking at you, EIP Kiss!).

Take for example Katara’s very sudden argument that they cannot be together now because there is a war going on. We hear her saying that for the first time in the very last episode (EIP) before the 4-part finale. That is too late to have any impact! That she has these kinds of thoughts was never even alluded to before. Not once.

Or the pattern Aang runs away/ is flaky - Katara is upset - Aang comes back and does his hero thing - Katara is relieved. In regards to their relationship arc, nothing changes here between Book 1 and the finale, only the stakes for Aang’s heroic performances get higher.

Or Katara being the one who is able to calm Aang down when he cannot control the Avatar state (which, in my personal opinion, is neither romantic nor healthy). This is also connected to the problem with the seventh Chakra, that Aang needs to let go of his attachment for her. I will be angry forever with how they wasted this for a possible relationship development! That Aang has to decide to either do his duty or save his forever girl (because let’s be fair, he did try to let go and only ran when he had the vision of Katara in danger) - that’s a fantastic setup!

But no, it doesn’t have any real consequences for Kat*ang at all. Instead there were only half-baked attempts – Aang does lie about his failed practice with Guru Pathik but the ultimate reason why his chakra is blocked is Azula, not his decision to run. Aang does try to let go of Katara for a little bit but then Azula shoots him. Nothing in Book 3 shows any change in his feelings that could have been a result of his instant let-it-go. If anything, he gets weirdly obsessive - which could have been used as a side effect of his blocked chakra but – again, no, nothing happens.

I suspect the whole thing was just introduced to create temporary drama for poor Aang, but it is never explained why Katara holds him back, what aspect of the attachment is blocking him or what would happen if he did let her go. Maybe they tried to make a statement about how love is more important than Avatar rules – which would have been fine but it’s also never properly explored. Instead, as soon as that plot point becomes inconvenient it’s simply dropped like a random rock™.

Compare all that to the Zutara arc, where both characters’ feelings about each other are always very much in the open, and where every interaction causes lasting effects in their relationship. Yes, it is unfair to compare that to Kat*ang, because up to the end of Book 3, Zuko and Katara almost never meet, while Aang and Katara spend almost every episode together – of course they cannot do meaningful things all the time. But on the other side, with Kat*ang, there would have been a great chance to show a subtle, gradual build-up instead.

It also doesn’t help that the Zutara arc seems hellbent on sabotaging every romantic moment Aang is allowed to enjoy:

There is Kat*angs first maybe-kiss in the dark before the background of the Oma and Shu legend. But it does not lead anywhere. Instead, Zuko and Katara almost reenact the legend itself in the Book 2 finale as two real enemies to almost-friends, including a glowy rocks-backdrop and the right costume colours, just so nobody misses the message.

In Footloose The Headband, Aang and Katara have a really sweet dance together, and everybody can see how they almost intuitively know each other's moves. This could be a great hint on how well they will fight together in the finale. But is it plot-relevant? No, because the final tag team is Katara and Zuko! While Aang gets paired off with random rock™.

Then there is Aang’s riding off to battle- kiss in DotBS, which Katara is not even allowed to enjoy, because keeping her feelings vague is apparently more important than character development at this point. It is the only romantic moment that gets mentioned again, but in a way that sinks the former cute and wholesome ship into the deep ocean, and the reason is - Aang is jealous of Zuko!

If all of this was only done for the sake of shipbaiting, then it really went out of control at some point.

In the end, the showrunners still had their reasons to choose Kat*ang, maybe because that corresponded more to their own vision, and there are still enough people out there who agree with them. Which is absolutely fine! In the end, what matters most is how you personally connect to the characters and nobody needs to defend their personal taste. But the typical anti-ZK claim, that all the Zutarians with their crazy analysis and rambling meta essays are reaching and delusional and that they desperately try to construct something that isn’t there, is not only a very lazy argument but simply not true.

And I’d claim that in spite of the canon choice, Zutara is technically the better written relationship. By far.

[meat--grindr]

Ohh your writing is wonderful... I’ve actually never requested before so I hope get this right but: could I request Billy Lenz x Gender Neutral Reader (AFAB if it’s brought up) with Billy sucking on his partner’s fingers and discovering they are really, /really/ into it but also super embarrassed about it? Bastard-ness ensues. Hope this request is ok!

Okay? This is waaay more than okay! I’ve been so excited about this prompt since I received it! I’m so sorry for not getting to it earlier. I hope like six months later is better than never though! I’m also super excited to be your first request! I hope this lives up to your expectations, whatever they may have been!

Just a few general warnings beforehand: Billy is really rough with the reader he uses some extremely degrading language as per the canon (I’ve excluded the term ‘piggy,’ though, because I am NOT A FAN™ of that aspect of his dirty talk.) I want to specifically call to attention the liberal use of the terms ‘pussy’ and ‘cunt.’ The reader is never gendered with personal pronouns, but those words are used in reference to them and their anatomy several times. I am of the opinion that Mr. Lenz would use those terms regardless of what hole he’s using, but if they make you uncomfortable, maybe give this one a miss? Furthermore, I would like to mention that Billy is not a mentally well man (obviously) who has had a rather traumatic past with abuse, both of these are discussed within this fic, so please take care of yourselves and read this work responsibly if you want to read it at all. I don’t want anyone to be hurt by my writing because I didn’t warn them properly.

Also, this is my first time writing for Billy, so please forgive me if it takes a little while for me to get completely used to him. He’s a…unique fella, let’s say.

Editing Ripper’s Note: I was just about to post this when I realized I completely misread the prompt! I read it as the reader is really into sucking on Billy’s fingers, not the other way ‘round! I’ve been looking at this prompt, literally since December and still never caught on. I feel like a total idiot. I’m really sorry about that. I’ve decided to post this anyway because A) the kink is still there in the fic, just not exactly as requested, and B) I had already finished it by the time I noticed my mistake. So much time has passed and if the original requester is still keeping tabs on this blog, I don’t want to make them wait any longer. That being said, if you’d like me to write your request properly, please send me a message and I will do my best!

Mind Your Teeth – Billy Lenz (Gender Neutral* Reader) - NSFW

· Slick with sweat, your chest slides against the surface of your desk with each cruel snap of Billy’s hips. You can feel the laboured heaving of his chest against your back as he struggles for breath. It leaves his lips in ragged, staggering puffs, heavy and hot against your shoulder blade, accompanied every so often by the slick warmth of his saliva as it drips down onto your bare skin.

· Despite his gawky build, he manages to loom over you, folding you nearly in half against the desk. He’s made himself rather comfortable, sprawled over top of you. His chest presses against your back, boney ribs grinding against the knobs of your spine through the stiff, itchy fibers of his jumper. It’s sticking to your skin, soaked through in spots with sweat—yours and his—and you can feel it peeling up from your flesh with every movement he makes.

· He’s got you pinned, holding you down against the smooth wooden surface with little more than his weight. He’s surprisingly heavy, and though he doesn’t look it, Billy is a strong man—he’s more than capable both of lifting you off of the floor and pinning you down to it. He’s strong and his hands are by no means an exception to that rule. Though they may be long and thin, and they tremble whenever they hold you, his grip is nearly unbreakable. His clumsy fingers circle your wrists like iron fetters, dirty fingernails digging into the flesh of your forearms and cutting little crescents into the skin—just deep enough to sting. You can barely move beneath him—can barely breathe—and he knows this. He has you exactly where he wants you and you’re not going anywhere until he decides to let you.

· Another bruising thrust pitches you forward, and your knees bang against the desk drawers. You cry out, though whether it was for the dull ache in your legs or the sudden stab of pleasure between them, even you couldn’t say for certain. Though if there is any concern at all in Billy for your wellbeing, he’s certainly keeping it to himself. Your outburst only seems to egg him on, as his pace begins to take on a more frantic edge.

· His thrusts are shallow as he rocks into you—it’s as though he can’t bare to withdraw from the tight heat of your body for long. Dimly, through the fog of pleasure, you struggle to feel surprised. It’s all about instant gratification with Billy. Always has been—why should he tease himself or draw things out when he could just pry open your willing mouth and drag his cock against your tongue until he cums down your throat? Still, there is a force behind those thrusts—one which throws you up against the lip of the desk hard enough that you’re sure there will be a solid line of bruising along your midsection before the night is through. Every push of those hips shoves you forward a little more, until your head is nearly knocking against the wall and your toes barely touch the ground.

· Your cheek slides against a slick patch of wood and you realize you’ve been drooling across the desktop. The little puddle at the corner of your lips only grows in size as a particularly deep thrust from Billy wrings another string of wrecked whimpers from your throat. You wish you could pull away from the puddle—longing to drag the back of your hand across your cheek and wipe away the slickness, but there’s little you can do about it with Billy still holding your arms hostage. But at the same time, something about it thrills you—to be ruined like this—held still, unable to so anything but whimper, and drool, and take what you’re given. It’s…liberating.

· “C’mon, little bitch! Take my fat cock! You can t-t-take it better than that! Take it! Take-Take-Take it good for B-B-Billy!” He babbles into your shoulder, chapped lips scraping against your shoulder as he mouths at your flushed skin. His tongue flickers out, dragging a wet stripe against your skin, scorching hot, then suddenly too cool as it begins to dry in the open air.

· “Such a pretty pusssssy,” He slurs, “Pretty, pretty pusssssy. Gonna fill it up—gonna fill it with my fat ffffffucking cock!”

· You feel him jerk behind you, his muscles going taught as a violent spasm rolls through his body. When he speaks again, the voice that comes is not his own—it’s deeper, rumbling down in his chest, belonging to a man much larger than he, “Why I outta beat that boy! Beat him up good! Beat Billy bad! Beat him good! Beat him up, up, up!”

· His hips still and your heart leaps up into your throat, your pulse pounding hard in the tight space. This can’t be good. You squirm beneath him, trying and failing to turn your head. Your eyes roll wild in their sockets, desperate to get a good look at Billy, but he remains a shadow at the edge of your vision. You remember this voice. He had so many it was difficult to keep track of them sometimes—he’d mimic almost anything he heard; the children from down the road calling to one another while they played, the weatherman making predictions on the radio, even the neighbour’s cat. It was easy to forget which voices and phrases came from where once he’d picked them up and used them enough. But this is one that predates you, and you recognize it with a chilling clarity—the father’s voice: always angry, often violent.

· It frightens you when Billy uses it, though not because of the threat Billy poses to you. Of course, you know to tread carefully when he's in one of his moods—you’ve seen first hand the destruction wrought when his directionless frustration is given direction. But, you know this voice is a far more likely indicator that Billy is an imminent threat to himself. You’ve seen him pacing the floor like a caged animal, trembling hands beating about his head, tearing at his clothes and hair as he works through the frenzy, all the while babbling to himself in that deep, rumbling voice: “Rotten boy! Teach you a fucking lesson! Beat Billy! Bad Billy! Bad, Bad, Bad!” He's blackened his eyes, split his lips and knuckles, shattered countless plates and cut his hands on the shards. He loses himself in that voice, and that scares you.

· ‘Losing himself,’ that’s what you’ve come to call these episodes—those moments when his excitement and boundless energy curdle, souring into anxiety and agitation so quickly it makes you head spin. And in this moment, he’s displaying all the tell-tale sighs you’ve come to recognize—the full-body tremors, the angry voices, self-directed violence—mere threats or otherwise…

· No, this is not good. Of course, this isn’t the first time you’ve seen him do this, and you’re sure it would not be the last, but he’s never done it while you were…playing before. And that worries you. You’re both vulnerable, half-undressed and bent over a desk. Even worse, he was behind you. You’d learned very quickly never to let him out of your sight when he got like this. He was unpredictable—prone to lashing out whether he meant to or not. But he wasn’t beyond helping. If you could just turn your head and look at him—make him see you, help him to ground himself like you practiced, you might be able to talk him down, or at least ease him through the worst of it. Maybe. If you could only get a look at him.

· You flounder for your voice and struggle to keep it steady once you find it, “Hey, B-Billy? Billy, baby, you’re okay, right?” It’s an innocent question you usually begin with when he gets like this. Sometimes he’s too worked up to even begin to answer you, sometimes he tries so damn hard to answer, but can’t—not in a way you could really understand anyhow—and sometimes you can talk it through with him. Every time you try, the reaction is different. You can only cross your fingers and pray for a positive outcome.

· This time, he coughs. It’s a horrible, a horrible, racking sound that echoes in his chest—it’s almost closer to a scream than anything else. Another spasm jitters through him, the joint in his neck snapping loud in the darkness. You feel his forehead collide with your shoulder once, twice, then he stills. His flesh is clammy against yours, and the gentle brush of his hair makes your skin prickle, but he seems calmer. He barks a laugh—his own this time—and nuzzles against your back, smearing your skin with sweat and saliva. “Fuck!” He says, as though that explains everything.

· “Billy? Are you…alright?”

· He chirps like bird, three short bursts of whistling he’d picked up last spring when a robin mad made a nest on your windowsill, “Right as rain, rain, rain!”

· You’re left with a heady rush of confusion and relief as you realize he must have pulled himself out of the hole he’d almost fallen into. A little flicker of pride sparks to life in your chest. He’s come so far.

· Your concern melts away once again into pleasure as Billy jerks his hips. Keening high in the back of his throat, he fucks himself deeper into you. He drags his cock out slow, sounding for all the world as though he’d forgotten just how good it felt to fuck you—as though he hadn’t been doing just that not sixty seconds ago. He scrapes his teeth against your shoulder, the promise of a bite that will surely come and mark you for days. His fingers flex around your wrists, blunt nails biting deeper into your flesh as he falls back into that brutal rhythm.

· Your legs begin to shake as Billy’s cock bumps up against something a bit more sensitive inside of you. Your breath fogs against the surface of the desk as it heaves from your lungs, a thin mist that barely has the time to fade before the next heavy puff of air replaces it. You find yourself struggling to swallow the moans Billy’s working so hard to pull from you. You know how much he likes to hear you—how wild it makes him—and you know there’s no real need to be quiet, not with the dorm cleared out for the long weekend. Still, something—be it a force of habit from living in close quarters with thin walls, or simply your own embarrassment—keeps you quiet.

· “Fiiiilthy whore!” A growl, caught low in his throat, tears through the air between you, “Pretty pussy! Want it full! My cock, my cum…gonna fill it full!” Never at a loss for a string of vulgarities, Billy mumbles against your skin, his words slurring into one another until you can barely decipher one though from the other.

· “Fuck, fuck, fuuuuck!” Billy jerks his hips forward, and for the first time this evening, you feel the full length of his cock stretching you out. You jerk beneath him, mewling into the desktop, squirming about as you try desperately to relax around him. You’re so full—so full you can barely breathe, but it feels so good. Your muscles contract around him, unbidden, throbbing with the sudden stretch. It makes him shudder and sigh above you, a wavering rush of air than hisses out between his teeth.

· He holds you there for a moment, trembling almost as much as you are, “Tight fffucking cunt, so fucking tiiight for Billy!” His hips stutter forward in time with his ragged breathing. Desperately, he tries to fuck himself deeper into you, even though he can’t—he’s already buried to the hilt, his hips tucked snugly against your ass. But he gives it the old college try anyhow. He begins to babble nonsensically against your neck, “Ruin it, ruin it! Never take another cock! Full, full, full! I left it in the kitchen, Jan! Not after Billy’s! A low pressure system moving in and—fuck you full, fuck you full, full, full!”

· The tops of his thighs quiver as he grinds into you, and as he shifts, the head of his cock presses against something. For a moment, your vision goes white. Your legs seem to fall away beneath you, your knees drifting south as the pleasure carries away their ability to hold you upright any longer. If it weren’t for the desk, you probably would have slid down into a boneless heap on the floor.

· You gasp, mouth gaping wide, pulling in a great, deep lungful of air. To call his name? To beg him for more? To put wordless voice to your pleasure? You aren’t sure. There is little room in your brain for thought beyond the need for more. Mercifully, Billy saves you from the struggle before you can waste too much energy on it.

· Almost as soon as he realizes your mouth is open, Billy shoves his fingers into your mouth. Two boney digits slide against your tongue, pressing and prodding against the slick muscle. The taste of dust and salt floods your mouth with the intrusion. You wrinkle your nose, and try to pull your head back, but Billy leans down into you, pressing you down further beneath his weight, grinding your ribs into the desktop.

· “No, no, no,” He chides, voice soft and light—almost cheerful. He spreads his fingers apart, rubbing over the hard bumps of your bottom teeth with a tenderness you rarely see in him. “Gotta make room,” His voice rumbles through you as he presses his lips against your flesh, “Gotta stretch it out for Billy, or he won’t fit!”

· He nuzzles his cheek against your shoulder, still rocking his hips into you, pressing against that spot that makes your brain fill with television static, “Billy’s gonna fuck your throat once he’s filled that pretty pussy!”

· Your lips are pulled taught as his fingers press against the walls of your mouth, testing its limits. “Soft and warm! Wanna fuck it! Fuck it deep!”

· His hips buck hard, shoving you another inch toward the wall. You can feel yourself drooling around his fingers—your saliva dripping down your chin in great rivulets and collecting beneath your cheek.

· His knuckles bump against the roof of your mouth as the pads of his fingers find the back of your tongue. You gag around them, struggling to breathe, but Billy just laughs and presses down harder.

· “Again,” His voice comes out in a ragged puff of breath, half-whisper, half-growl, rough as rock salt, “Pussy gets tight when it chokes.”

· You try to suck in a shocked breath, but you can’t manage it around his fingers. Your throat convulses around him as you struggle to breathe.

· You feel his cock pulse inside of you and he groans his pleasure long and low into the darkness, “Yesssss!”

· He rocks into you again, “No one fucks like Billy, huh?” He pulls back, his cock nearly slipping from your body entirely, then he slams his hips home again, “No one fucks you full like Billy can! No one! No one! No one!” The phrase becomes a litany, each sentence punctuated with a bruising snap of his hips. “Know why?” He drags his teeth along the edge of your shoulder blade, “Know why?” You can hear the grin in his voice, wide and sharp, “‘Cuz Billy fills you up from both ends!”

· You sob around Billy’s fingers, your eyes rolling back as he pushes them deeper into your mouth. If he keeps on like this, it won’t be long before you fall apart around him—you want to cum so desperately, you can hardly keep another thought in your brain. Your muscles clench up around him and he laughs, giggling to himself as he hooks his chin over your shoulder. He can feel how close you are.

· His tongue slides against the side of your face, leaving a thick, wet stripe across your cheekbone. His lips scratch rough against your jaw, “Pretty pussy’s gonna cum? Gonna cum all over Billy’s fat fucking cock? Yeah?” His simpering tone makes your cheeks burn with embarrassment, but you nod. Another peal of sick laughter bubbles up in his throat, “You’re gonna cum and Billy’s not even trying! So dirty, dirty, dirty!”

· You whine around his fingers as he babbles on, “Billy could fuck you harder, but he doesn’t need to! Stupid, greedy pussy, silly fucking cunt can cum like this!” His teeth sink into your shoulder and the rest of his diatribe is lost to you. Even so, he continues to mumble filth against the skin caught between his teeth.

· The bite stings, bright and sharp, and you sob around him, clenching your jaw, your teeth digging into his fingers. Billy releases you with a hiss, dipping his head into the crook of your neck. You think for a moment you might have hurt him, but in mere seconds, he’s giggling to himself again. “Sharp, sharp teeth! No good. No, no good. Not for Billy’s cock. Gotta tear them out, make room for Billy!”

· Though you know the threat is mostly empty, the way Billy caresses your molars with the pad of his finger makes you a little nervous. You’re sure if he could get a good grip, he could easily ‘make room,’ and there was probably not much you could do to stop him. But he pulls his fingers back, retreating from the crushing press of your back teeth.

· He presses down against your tongue again, rubbing against the slick muscle fondly. “Need to practice! Greedy cunt needs to learn! Learn to suck Billy’s fat cock properly.” He snaps his hips, as though trying to remind you just how fat it really was—as though there was any change you could forget while it was rearranging your guts for you. “Gonna teach you to take it good!”

· Your eyes roll back at the thought. You can picture yourself kneeling under the desk, Billy draped over the chair, wild hair falling over his eyes as you try to take him all the way down to the base. He’d fuck your throat until your vision goes black, his fingers tangled deep in your hair, nails digging into your scalp. Your own fingers slide desperately between your thighs, chasing your release as he chases his own and god what you wouldn’t give to make the fantasy real—to feel the length of him in your mouth, the rough denim of his pants beneath your hands, the jerk and sting against your scalp as he tugs on your hair. Your cheeks hollow around Billy’s fingers, a pretty whine sitting high in the back of your throat.

· And Billy stops—stops moving, stops talking. He hovers above you, silent and still as a statue, barely breathing. A terrible moment of clarity washes over you and the embarrassment comes rolling in. There you were, still stretched out on Billy’s cock, barely moments away from an orgasm and you were already thinking about another? Were you really that desperate? Your cheeks burn hot against the cool wood of the desktop. Shame licks at the pit of your stomach—it wasn’t unlink Billy to think this way, he was always seeking the next shot of pleasure, but it wasn’t like you. As though it wasn’t bad enough to catch yourself thinking that way…for someone else to do it? It was mortifying…and maybe a little exciting too.

· Your stomach flips as Billy shifts behind you, the burgeoning stubble on his jaw scraping across your sensitive skin. Then you feel it, a smile spreading across his face—it’s a grin you’ve come to know well, all teeth and wide enough to make his jaw pop. Even without looking at him, you know you’re fucked.

· All at once, he lurches to life again, fucking his fingers hard into your mouth, in tandem with the harsh thrusts of his hips. A filthy string of gibberish falls from his lips as he pounds into you, “Greedy! Greedy cunt! Want it in your mouth too? Filthy, greedy fucking whore!”

· You whine, and choke, and sob around Billy’s fingers. Your face is wet with sweat, with spit, with tears, you can’t tell and at this point, you’re far beyond the point of caring. The world has narrowed to a single point between your legs as you teeter on the knife’s edge of your release. You rock your hips back against Billy, meeting his thrusts, desperate for more. You’re so, so close, and Billy can feel it too—the way you tighten around him spurring his pace from wild to frantic.

· His voice is broken, his words panted out between jagged breaths and garbled moans, “Gonna be good for Billy? Gonna cum?” His face is buried in the crook of your neck. He giggles against your flesh as he splits you open, slamming into you like it’s the last fuck he’ll ever have. “C’mon, take what Billy gives you! Take it, take it, t—ta—fuuuck!”

· Your hips stutter as your orgasm throbs through you. You scream around his fingers as you cum, your muscles clamping down around Billy so hard he almost has to stop moving, rolling his hips forward quick and shallow. His howl is lost in the sound of blood rushing in your ears, but you can feel it vibrating through his chest, and down into your back. Your fingers scrabble at the wood beneath you, desperate for something to latch onto—to keep you grounded here as the pleasure threatens to carry you away.

· You sob and slump limp against the desk, letting it bear the brunt of your weight. There’s just no strength left in your body anymore. Your hands and feet tingle with the lingering aftershocks of the adrenaline as you begin to come down from your high, and your breath comes hard, as though you’ve run a great distance. Billy’s hips continue to snap against yours, brutal and quick. You sob into his fingers, the as the relentless pleasure sparks through you, nearly painful to your sparking nerves.

· Slowly, as your ears stop ringing, you realize Billy is still talking, babbling away in several voices. “Like your pussy tight like this. Wanna fuck you full while you cum again and again and again and I told you, Jan, I left it in the kitchen! Make you soaked, keep you soaking wet, make you fucking cry! Where is that cat? Where’s that cat? Where’s the…WHERE’S THE BABY, BILLY?! AGNES? WHERE’S AGNES, BILLY?! Beat that kid! Teach him a lesson! BEAT HIM UP GOOD!”

· His left hand shoots up from your arm and wraps around your throat, fingers flexing around your windpipe, not quite squeezing, yet, but the pressure is far from comfortable.

· “T-T-Teach rotten old Billy a lesson.” A spike of fear shoots through you and you choke around his fingers. This seems to bring his mind back, at least in part, to the present, or at least confuse him enough to serve as a distraction—he makes a noise caught between two voices. The fear that courses through you lends new strength to your limbs as you reach up and claw at his fingers.

· As you attempt to pry him lose, his grip only tightens, fingers locking around your windpipe, “Teach that boy a FUCKING lesson!” The knobby joints of his fingers press hard against the pulse in your throat and you’re sure he can feel it hammering beneath your skin. He’s losing himself again, you’re sure.

· But again, this time was different. He hadn’t stopped fucking his cock into you like he had before, and he’d wavered for a moment, when you’d choked on him. There might be something else you could do to help him. Desperate to keep him here with you in the present moment, you flex your tongue against his fingers. His hips stutter and your heart skips a beat in turn. “Filthy fucking c-c-cunt…”

· You bob your head, hollowing your cheeks around his fingers again. C’mon, Billy!

· “F-Fuck!” It’s not quite his voice, but it’s close, perhaps a little higher, a little more strained than usual, but it’s close. “Where’s the baby, Billy? Where’s the…c-c-cat gone to now?” His fingers begin to relax around your throat, but you keep sucking on his fingers, wanting to make sure you’re well and truly out of the woods before you even think about stopping. If this is going to work, you’re going to make damn sure of it.

· “Fucking greedy little cunt!” You could have cried with relief at the sound of his voice—his real voice. You hum around his fingers, and he laughs, the sound low and rumbly, “Still so fucking eager.” His hips buck forward, pressing deep inside of you. It’s still too much, too soon, and you sob with the overstimulation. The sudden spike of pleasure punches the air from your lungs and shakes your legs from underneath you.

· Billy groans as you pulse around him. “You want Billy to cum? Wand Billy to fucking fill you?” You nod frantically, tears pricking the corners of your eyes as he grinds into that spot, filling your vision with white hot splotches of light.

· “Suck his cock, then,” he says, shoving his fingers deeper into your mouth again. He spreads them wide, nearly matching the girth of his cock where it fucks you open. Billy jitters behind you, chasing his release with quick, cruel thrusts. Impatient as always, he pushes digs his nail into the wall of your cheek, “Fucking suck Billy’s cock!”

· You jerk into motion as though startled from a deep sleep, pressing your head down against his fingers to take them as deep as you could. Your tongue laves against the digits, prodding gently against his scarred knuckles, playing in the space between them.

· Billy throws his head back, moaning to the ceiling long and loud, “Yessss! Good little pet! Pretty, pretty pet! His fingers stroke your throat as though he’s petting a cat, feeling it work up and down as you swallow around him. “Gooood pet! Suck Billy’s cock! Suck his cock! Su—NO!”

· Suddenly, he stops, his fingers stilling. For a moment, you think you’ve done something wrong. Had your teeth caught against him? Had you hurt him? Should you pull back and ask, or carry on? Before you can make a decision one way or another, Billy thrusts his fingers back into your throat, pressing them in as deep as he could. His knuckles bump against your back molars as you gag around him, trying desperately to breathe through your nose.

· “Lick Billy’s cunt,” For a moment, you’re still, confusion slicing through the pleasure. Billy tries to press his hand forward, his fingertips brushing against the back of your throat, “Lick it! Lick Billy’s cunt! Lick it! Lick it! Tongue his fffffucking clit!” You think about it for a moment, your exhausted, lust-fogged brain struggling to put two and two together, and then suddenly you think you understand. As gingerly as you can, while Billy continues to rock you forward over the desk, you press your tongue against the soft spot between his knuckles.

· This must have been what he’d wanted because the sound he makes is like nothing you’ve ever heard before—a wail caught somewhere between human and animal. You’ve never heard a human sound like that before. Like so many things about Billy, it’s frightening, and yet it fascinates you, attracts you, arouses you. You press your tongue harder against that spot, and the frantic rocking of his hips picks up again—but this time there’s no rhythm to it. He’s close.

· “Fucking lick Billy’s clit, make him cum! Make him cum in your pretty pussy!” You lap at his flesh with quick, deliberate swipes of your tongue. He howls against your flesh, his forehead thudding against your shoulder heavy and hard. “Fuck, f-f-f-fuck, make Billy fucking cum! Billy’s gonna, he’s-he’s-he’s gonna—!”

· In the moment before he cums everything is calm. He stills, and his voice is soft and steady in your ear; “I’m going to ruin you.”

· Then the world falls back into chaos.

· His whole body shudders above you, a bag of jangling bones he couldn’t keep control of if his life had depended on it. His teeth fix themselves deep into your shoulder, slotting into the indentations they’d left not long before. You cry out around his fingers, sure he’s drawn blood this time. You can see it when you close your eyes, visions of thick red blood splattered against his dark incisors floating against the dark inside of your eyelids.

· He shudders, momentarily stilling, then kicking back into motion, seemingly unable to deicide if he’d rather pound you through his orgasm or remain still, buried to the hilt in your tight heat. You feel the heat of him inside of you pulsing against your walls as he cums. His cheek is pressed tight against your shoulder gibbering a collection nonsensical sounds and snatches of obscenities into your flesh, “Pretty pink cunt! ah, ahhhh, fuuh—fuuuh—fuck! Dripping now! Where did you leave it? Left it fucking dripping!"

· You’re sore beyond belief from the pounding you’ve taken, but there’s still a throbbing want underneath. He’d dragged you most of the way to a second orgasm, now all you needed was a little push. Before you were completely at is mercy, able only to receive the pleasure he decided to give you. But now, your hands were free and with them you could do as you pleased. You wriggle beneath him, slipping your hands down between your thighs.

· Your fingers find their prize, and you sob, your whole body jerking forward. Even though you’d cum mere moments ago, you can’t believe how sensitive you are. You’re on the verge of orgasm almost immediately. You press harder the slide of your fingers aided both Billy’s cum and your own. You shudder, whimpering around his fingers. Your muscles clamp down on him once again, throbbing and pulsing as your orgasm builds.

· He hooks his finger inside of your cheek and pulls, “Wanna cum again. Wanna cum in your mouth,” He pulls harder exposing the sides of your teeth, “Billy wants to feel them! Feel them on his cock! Sharp and hard.” He laughs, “But Billy likes it hard.” The harsh snap of his hips that follows has you seeing spots. He opens his mouth as though to gloat, as you clench around him, he loses his words. Whimpering, soft and broken sounds against your neck, he grinds into you.

· Seconds later, you clamp down around him, a second orgasm shooting through you. The sound he makes as you cum on his oversensitive cock is nothing short of feral. He bucks wildly into you, seeking more of a pleasure that sounds almost painful as he sobs into your shoulder. His cock pulses inside of you again, throbbing as he fucks his cum deeper inside of you, as though intent on giving you more.

· And you’re sure he would. Or he would have, if you hadn’t reached back and pushed against his shoulder. He was insatiable—he’d keep going for hours unless you stop him now.

· He pulls his fingers out first, a pearly string of saliva connecting your lips to his fingertips. You cough, scratchy and wet, but when you speak, there’s no pain. “I…I just need a little break, Bills. Okay?” Your chest is heaving as you struggle for air. Billy hums above you, hesitating for a moment. He’s reluctant to give up the tight heat of your body. But at last, after nearly a full minute of grumbling and mumbling to himself, he pulls out.

· There's a sticky gush of fluids against your thigh as his cum beings to leak out of you. You rest there for a moment, the pair of you breathing hard in the darkness, the comfortable weight of his body pressing down above you, the solid plane of the desktop below. Then all of a sudden, you’re being lifted up. You squeal in shock as your flipped about and placed atop the desk. The surface is still cool against your heated flesh. The difference in temperature is a shock to your system and goosebumps break out across your arms and legs.

· Before you have a moment to process what’s happening, Billy’s head is between your thighs, his tongue lapping at mess he’d made. Your eyes go wide, and you head knocks against a wall as it falls back, “Fuuuuck, Billy!” Your hips cant up against his face, thighs squeezing tight around his ears.

· “Pretty pussy came twice already,” You can feel him smirking against your inner thigh. “Still wants more? Greedy, greedy, greedy.” You catch a glimpse of his eyes, wide and wild, shining in the darkness beneath is tangled hair, “It’s okay, Billy likes you greedy.”

[glowstar826]

@falle-ness @cesar-hoe

So in regards to Red being Ressler’s dad, it’s decided: he’s gonna be his bio dad.

It would be really interesting to incorporate in the AU I have where Ilya and Kat are Liz’s parents and Red is Liz’s godfather. For this, I’ll set Lisa Ressler’s birthday to be sometime in late 1958, since Red would have been 19 the year Donald Ressler is born (basing this off of Diego Klattenhoff’s real birthday, Nov. 30, 1979, and the birthday provided for Red on his Most Wanted Poster, Feb. 7, 1960).

Perhaps Red is away somewhere, away from Kat and Ilya, because he needs time to grieve his mother’s death alone. He could somehow find Ressler’s mother, Lisa, and sleep with her in a moment of grief and need for someone’s company. I imagine that they’d be in New York, and that Lisa could be sort of like an Anne to Red. They could be together for a while after that because Ressler’s mother, I feel, is the sort to understand things other women like her don’t seem to.

Just before Red leaves New York to return to wherever Ilya and Kat are, however, Lisa can reveal that she’s married and has a son. This can break Red’s heart into a million pieces, so he demands why she didn’t say that before, stating how he wouldn’t have ever slept with her had he known she was already with someone. She could say that it’s because she’s having a troubled marriage with her husband, Robert, and needed to get away for a while. She tells Red that she does love him, and she’ll find a way to get to him. A naïve Red agrees, and they part on good terms.

When Lisa never contacts Red after that, he feels even more heartbroken, and he grows bitter because he can’t believe how stupid he was to believe her. Ilya and Kat have no idea that Red is upset over a lost love, and Red never intends to tell them. Many years later, when Red ends up saving Ressler using a blood transfusion, he wonders how that could be since there aren’t many of them in the world. Maybe, out of curiosity, he could look into Ressler’s birth records, and he’s shocked when he sees who his mother is.

“No…not her,” Red thinks when he sees the name, his eyes widening in shock. He’s even more shocked when he sees Ressler’s birthdate, for Red knows that’s not long after the time he slept with Lisa.

Putting two and two together, Red could go to Cooper’s office and have him conduct a paternity test on Ressler. Cooper could be confused as to why Red would want anything to do with the agent the criminal seems to hate most, so he asks. Red is his usual cryptic self and says, “I have my reasons, Harold. Even a man such as I is entitled to his privacy. When you get the results, you’ll hopefully see why I asked.”

When the DNA results come back, Cooper can be shocked out of his mind. He quickly asks Reddington to come to his office after the task force throws another Blacklister behind bars. Behind closed doors, Cooper can say shakily, “Agent Ressler…is your son.” I imagine if this were an episode it would end there and go to the credits.

Even though Red had a hunch, he still takes the news as though the thought never crossed his mind. He realizes he needs to contact Lisa and tell her they have a son together, but he doesn’t know how because he has no idea that Lisa’s husband is dead.

Without that knowledge, he decides to be nicer to Ressler first and slowly gain his trust. The Mako Tanida episode where Audrey dies will have new meaning, for now Red is giving Ressler the advice to not go to the dark side as a father, not as a colleague. He still delivers Tanida’s severed head to Ressler because that’s just how Red is, and the note is the same but with more emotional thought.

After the Mako Tanida episode, I think Red would start to seriously consider revealing himself to Ressler. Out of options, he’d ask Dembe for advice. Dembe would tell him, “Talk to Lisa. That’s the best thing you can do for Agent Ressler now.”

Sighing, Red decides that Dembe is right and talking to Lisa is in order. So, he uses his contacts to find that a lady named Lisa Ressler is living alone in Detroit. Red is shocked to find that her husband that Lisa had spoken of is dead. That fact makes Red decide once and for all to travel to Detroit and talk to Lisa.

When in Detroit, he contacts her landline. When Lisa picks up, Red says, “Hello, Lisa.”

Some crashing noise can occur in the background as Lisa demands, “Who am I speaking to?”

Letting out a long breath, Red says, “It’s me, Ray. I haven’t heard your lovely voice in years, and I still remember it as if it was only yesterday we said goodbye.”

“No…is this a prank call? That’s the only thing it can be.”

“I assure you, Lisa, it’s not. There’s something important I need to discuss with you, something regarding your second son.”

After a long silence, Lisa asks with a quaver, “How can I be sure? How do I know you’re not some hacker?”

“I’ll send proof through a letter. You haven’t forgotten my handwriting, I hope?”

“No…I don’t think so.”

“Good. We’ll speak again soon.”

At this point, Red is panicking inside, not believing he had just been speaking to Lisa after so many years, and he haphazardly places the pay phone back on its hanger before Lisa can say anything back.

Later, after flying back to D.C., he asks Kat if he can take Ilya out to dinner, saying he needs to speak to his friend—alone. It’s because he isn’t comfortable telling Kat about his discovery that Ressler is his son yet, for he doesn’t know how she’ll react. However, he knows that Ilya would be willing to listen as he’s his oldest friend.

When they get to the restaurant, Ilya jokes, “So, you’ve finally taken an interest in me after all?” as he throws an arm around Red’s shoulders.

“Absolutely not,” Red replies. “You are married, first of all. Second, you’re not my type.”

“Well, that hurt,” Ilya says back.

“Says the man who was head over heels for Katarina Smirnoff and nearly ended his friendship with Raymond Reddington because he thought Ray and Kat were into each other,” Red counters swiftly with a smirk as they head inside.

“I did not nearly end our friendship!” Ilya fires back with a laugh as Red states his reservation under the alias Richard Walters.

Red doesn’t say anything back, bringing his mind back to the reason he took Ilya here. After they find their seats and place their order, Red says, “I’m going to tell you a story. Whether you want to or not, you’ll hear it.”

Ilya raises an eyebrow. “Ray, I don’t like where this is going.”

Red throws his hands up. “I only said I’m going to tell you a story. Now listen carefully, for I won’t tell it again.”

Ilya leans forward and places his elbows on the table.

“Go on, then.”

Closing his eyes, Red tells the story.

“Once, there was an ordinary man who lived an extraordinary life. He had everything, but at the same time, he had nothing. Though there were two people in his life who wanted the very best for him, he still felt desolation and emptiness inside his very soul. He felt lonely and lost. That is, until he met a woman. A beautiful, kind, simple woman who knew more than most. Her intelligence was unmatched. Her grace? Unforgettable. The man was drawn to her instantly, introducing himself and striking conversation.”

“What happened?” asks Ilya, intrigued.

“They connected—in mind and in body. In the days following, they grew closer and closer until one day, the man had to leave and return to his companions. It was then that the woman revealed there was another man she was tethered to and a boy she needed to look after. The man’s heart broke, but the woman assured him he was hers, always.”

“And then?”

“It was never meant to be. Many, many years later, however, he found that a child had been borne of his connection with that woman.“

At this point, Ilya has sat back in his seat. He says, “And how exactly does this relate to why we came here?”

Red smiles a watery smile.

“That man is me, Ilya. And the child? None other than Special Agent Donald Ressler.”

If feels as though the entire room goes silent as Ilya registers Red’s words.

“Wh-what?”

“I asked Harold to conduct a paternity test on Donald after seeing who his mother was. I couldn’t believe it when the results came back, though I had a strong feeling.” Adjusting his fedora, he says, “I’m telling you because I know you, as my oldest friend, will listen to me.”

At this point, the server could give them their food. After saying their customary thank-you’s, Ilya asks while knitting his eyebrows, “Have you done anything about it?”

“I contacted his mother today,” Red replies. “I’ve also been trying to be nicer to Donald.” Sighing, he asks, “Should I reveal myself to him?”

Ilya is shocked that Red is asking him advice like this, for Red never usually asks for advice.

“You know my answer, Ray. The only thing is, how will Agent Ressler take it? You do realize he was obsessed with hunting you down and throwing you in jail before you turned yourself in? He hates you. You need to gain his full, unconditional trust before you drop this on him, no? Spend some time with him. Open yourself up. There’s nothing unsavory for you to hide. The only thing you’re hiding from him is your humanity.”

The last sentence strikes a deep chord within Red, who takes a bite of his food as he contemplates Ilya’s advice. At this point, he has only recently revealed his connection with Elizabeth to her. He needs to get everything settled regarding his goddaughter first before he can do anything about his newfound son. With that thought in mind, Red says, “All right, then. I’ll wait.”

Some days later, after Red has sent a letter to Lisa, she calls on the number he’s provided.

“I can’t believe I’m actually speaking to you, Ray,” Lisa says when Red picks up. “It’s been so long.”

“It has,” Red replies. “Please understand that I have no ill intentions when I say I have your address, but the matter is extremely urgent.”

“Wait—how did you get it?”

“That’s for me to know and for you to wonder, my dear,” he says cryptically. “I’ll be coming to your house sometime tomorrow morning, so I ask that you be prepared. But for now, I bid you goodnight.”

For the second time, Red hangs up before she can say anything back. This time, it’s out of bitterness that she never contacted him when she said he would. But now isn’t the time to stew in his anger, he resolves.

When he tells Lisa the next day that Donald Ressler is their son, she is surprisingly not very shocked.

“I had a feeling it was you, Ray,” she says, elaborating that her son had none of her husband’s features, that he looked almost like a clone of herself. “Though he didn’t look much like you,” she adds, “I knew.”

Red goes on to ask that she keep it a secret for now and that he wants to be the one to tell him.

Lisa understands and agrees, saying that’s the best course of action.

They end their meeting when Red says, “You never called like you said you would. I’ll never forget that.”

Lisa can look down and say, “I don’t know what came over me when I said that back then. I had no money, no job. I was supported completely by Robert. But when he was killed, my two boys were all I had left. I couldn’t uproot them.”

“I understand, Lisa,” Red replies, meaning every word, shocked that Robert Ressler was killed. “Perhaps we can be friends?”

Lisa smiles. “I’d like that very much.” Then, she sends him off with a friendly peck on his cheek, and they part, once again, on good terms.

Fast forward to when Ressler asks for Henry Prescott/Mitchell Hatley’s services after accidentally killing Laurel Hitchin, the relationship between Red and Ressler has improved significantly. It’s been very hard for Red to keep the secret, but he has tried revealing himself through bits and pieces by praising him, commending his hard work, and teasing him less.

However, when he learns that Ressler has backed himself into a corner by contacting Prescott to fix the problem, he grows very angry at his son’s foolishness. This makes Red realize that now is the time he must reveal himself as Donald’s father, for his son has now crossed the line and he needs to pull him out before anything worse happens to him.

He visits Ressler’s apartment after retrieving the paternity test results from five years before. He’s very apprehensive at this point, for he still doesn’t know how his son will take the news.

When Ressler returns, he’s confused as to why Reddington is sitting in his apartment, uninvited, with only the kitchen light on. The illumination makes Red look pretty menacing, showcasing his true power as a criminal mastermind.

“What are you doing in my apartment, Reddington?” asks Ressler.

“There is something of utmost urgency that I need to discuss with you, Donald. Please, sit down.”

He gestures to the empty seat and pushes a glass of whiskey to him. Ressler raises an eyebrow.

“You’ll need it, I think, once you’ve heard what I have to say,” Red elaborates.

Red immediately gets to business by opening the files. As he does so, he begins telling one of his signature stories.

“Many years ago, I met a lovely woman named Lisa. She was…perfect. In every sense of the word. At least, that’s what I thought at the time. I was a young man. Very young. Too young to even be thinking of sex. But I was also a grieving man.”

Ressler isn’t impressed. “I can see where this is going, Red.”

“Good,” Red replies, which momentarily catches Ressler off guard. “That is my intention.”

Red continues, “I met her in the Metropolitan Museum. She was looking at one of my favorite paintings, Autumn Rhythm (Number 30). I walked over and struck a conversation, commenting on her good taste. I must admit I was surprised when I asked for her interpretation of the painting, for it was strikingly similar to my own. We began spending lots of time together, and it led to a night I’d never forget.”

At this point, Ressler is half-captivated, half-impatient. “Why are you giving me a romance novel?”

Red, ignoring him, pushes the files towards him.

“Look at these,” Red implores, standing up from his chair. “I’ll be waiting in the living room once you’ve finished.”

He gives an uncharacteristic fatherly pat on Ressler’s shoulder and leaves the room. Donald, now nervous, registers the odd, warm feeling that passes through before opening up the files.

When he’s done, his emotions are a mixture of anger at his mother, shock at Reddington, and confusion at his identity. He thinks that perhaps this is why he has to try so hard to live by-the-book: he has criminal blood coursing through his veins.

Suddenly, Donald wants to throw something, break something. How the hell did Reddington run into his mother? Why didn’t his mother ever tell his father that she cheated on him? Does this mean that Robby is…his half-brother?

He bursts out of the kitchen and says in his red anger, “I hate you. I fucking hate you!”

Then, he slams the door on his way out.

Red sighs, seeing that he failed colossally in revealing himself as Donald’s father. Now, he won’t be able to pull him out. Now, it’ll be so much harder to.

I’ll end this portion here and write another to complete this arc. Tell me what you think so far!

[truglori]

Homebody (Ch.4)

Summary: Amiyah is the younger sister of local drug dealer (Durkio). Shy and reserved she keeps to herself and stays out the way. But lately she began to find interest in his right hand man/ best friend (Erik Stevens). Wanting to get him to notice her she discovers that he already had her wrapped around his finger without even trying! There was only a few problems that kept her away from her fantasies , her brother that controlled almost every single breath she took and would kill anyone who looked at her that way and lastly Eriks girlfriend, Alexis , who they called the queen of the hood according to her lavish lifestyle as well as being with the next newest top boy in the making. While Alexis was his girl to the streets all Amiyah wanted to do was be his Homebody...

Pairing: Erik Stevens x Thick OC

Warning: Language, teasing

Her Spotify playlist resonated through her speakers in her room. Going back and forth between baking her face with a setting powder and checking the time on her Alexa, Amiyah prayed that she still had plenty of time to get dressed.

“Why the hell is time moving by so fast today?” She stressed walking to her closet. It was now 6:34pm which gave her lest than half an hour to finish.

Taking in consideration to what Erik asked her, she made sure to go out her way to put together a bomb outfit for the night. Amiyah didn’t want to be extra but she wasn’t trying to look boring either. After taking almost two hours to decide, with her ranksacking her wardrobe and overthinking she settled for a chocolate off the shoulder jumpsuit and paired them with a clear short heel.

Walking to her body length mirror Amiyah checked both side profiles before standing in the middle.She tried her best stretching out the fabric just a bit to prevent it from making it seem like she had no breathing room. Then going to her breast she pulled it up to not show so much cleavage but contradicted her actions when she slipped it down trying to even it out.

“I want him to see them but not SEE them.” Slapping her hands on the side of her thighs she sighed.

She was overthinking again and her insecurities was starting to show. Reminding herself about the meditation tips she once read on she copied some of the steps that she could remember. Inhaling for three seconds and exhaling for five. She calmed her nerves.

The ringer from her phone echoed in the room. Looking at the caller Id it was Kelley FaceTiming her.

“Okay sis you look cute. Where we going?” Kelley asked as, from what it looked like from Amiyah’s view, she was getting into her car.

Unable to hold back her cheesy smile Amiyah informed her best friend ,with details, about what she was going to look forward to for the night. She felt like she was on cloud nine and she couldn’t come down.

“Wait so he’s taking you on a date?” Kelley asked genuinely happy that her friend was finally starting to put herself out there in the dating world.

“Well...” Amiyah hesitated.

“Oh God! What is that pause for?”

“I mean he asked me to hangout...isn’t that the same thing? Right?” Amiyah, completely oblivious of anything that had to do with dating or relationships.

“I don’t know honestly..but if he wants to see you then he HAS to be interested.” Kelley wanted to make sure that Amiyah would take in her friendly words of affirmation, not wanting to her to stress and end up renigging.

“Okay you’re right. But he should be on his way now so I’ll talk to you later and let you know how it went.” She blew air kisses to her.

“Alright babes have fun.”

Their call ended and it was a minute later she got a text from Erik letting her know that he was ten minutes away. She walked to her dresser and picked up her Carolina Herrera Good Girl perfume and sprayed on all of her pulse points so that the fragrance would emanate from her skin and into the air.

Throwing on her black waterfall duster coat she got one last glance at herself before walking into the livingroom. As she waited on the couch while taking pictures on Snapchat she heard a set of keys. Snapping for head towards the door she watched the bolt lock turn with the handle of the door and in came her brother.

He had his phone squished between his shoulder and ear showing that he was listening to someone on the other end of the call. His hand holding a Versace bag while the other closed the door locking it behind him. Eventually he glanced at her for a good three seconds and then looked away as he walked to his bedroom.

Amiyah sat confused as for the very first time her older brother didn’t bombard her with one hundred questions. But even though this was a first she still kept her guard up.

Hearing his footsteps again he appeared in back into the living. Phone still up to his ear, this time with him holding it. She studied as the expression on his face change from how he looked earlier which was, heedless to now showing curiosity. He stood there staring at her.

Maybe she spoke to soon.

“Hold on..hold on. I gotta call you right back.”

Without even waiting for a response Durk ended his phone call. Placing the phone back into his jeans front pocket he cocked his head to the side taking in the view of his little sister.

“What?” Amiyah spoke nervously as she kept her eyes on her phone and every now and then she would glance at him.

“I’m just trying to figure out where you think you going, and who you think you going with? That’s all?” He sat on the love seat across from her waiting on an reply.

Knowing that there was no way that she was going to tell her brother the truth about her going on a date with his right hand man/best friend, Amiyah had to make up a lie. That was essentially committing suicide for the both of them. Aside from that she wasn’t even sure if it was worth the risk to even tell him about was going on between her and Erik. She didn’t know if this would be something that could turn into a serious situation or ended up to be nothing at all.

“I’m going to dinner with Kelley.” The lie slipped easily through her lips.

“Dress like that?”

“What’s wrong with how I’m dressed?” She questioned really wanting to know from a mans perspective?

“Like you bout to go out to eat just to end up at some random ass nigga place to get fucked.”

Her mouth dropped opened. Tightening the belt on her jacket to close it she stared at her brother, shocked from his words. Taking a couch decorating pillow she threw it at him.

“Don’t talk to me like that Derrick.”

Whenever she would call him by his real name she was upset with him for real.

“Why you hitting me..you the one with ya tittes all out and now you sitting here lying talking about you going with yo friend.” He waved her off.

“I am. We planned this about a week ago.” Amiyah didn’t like to lie to her brother but she had to make it seem believable.

The familiar IPhone ringtone went off and she looked down and saw that it was Erik calling her. Being so occupied with her brother insulting her she didn’t realize that he sent her two text messages letting her know he was there.

Erik 💕: I’m here..ready when you are.

Erik 💕: I see your brother car out here. You good?

‘Oh my gosh not now Erik.’

She quickly declined his call. Amiyah looked at her brother with guilt written all over her face.

“Why you ain’t answer the phone? That’s yo nigga waiting for you? Pick it up!” Durk relaxed against the couch eyeing her.

“I don’t have a nigga and I already told you that I’m going to dinner with Kelley. That was her and she’s waiting for me now. Bye!”

Picking up her purse she walked to the front door. Before she even got a chance to unlock it, Durk was right next to her with his hand against it as he blocked the exit.

“Aight so I’ll walk you down.” He shrugged his shoulders.

Amiyah’s face scrunched up into a scowl.

“No! I don’t need you walking me down like I’m some child. I can handle myself. You’re always trying to control me-“

He cut her off. “Miyah don’t even start that shit. Just because I look out for you doesn’t mean I’m controlling you. I know how these niggas are around here and seen how they treat they shorties. So my bad if I’m helping you.”

“Okay and I understand but you have to trust me too. I’m very responsible and you know this. If I tell you I’m going one place than believe it...damn Durk sometimes I feel like you treat me like I’m your property instead of your younger sister.”

Amiyah expressed her true feelings. She felt as if she had no breathing room. Deep down she knew that her brother just wanted to protect her but she was getting older and due to his overprotective-ness it was causing her missed opportunities.

“Durk I never go anywhere. You know this. All I want to do is just hang out with my friend without you hounding me.” She gave him her best pout.

“I don’t hound you.” Shaking his head he sat back down on the couch.

“You’re right you don’t.” Amiyah stated sarcastically but agreeing just to get his approval.

There was a silent pause for one minute.

“You taking yo ass to dinner and coming right back?”

Nodding her head rapidly. “Yes.”

“Miyah let me find out you lying to me I’ma get my homeboy Erik to follow yo ass and find out who you fucking around with.” Durk scolded her.

“Okay, gotta go!”

‘Boy only if you knew.’

She thought to herself as she bit her lip to refrain from smiling. Unlocking the front door and opening it she wave a quick goodbye and began a fast pace walk to the elevator pressing on the down button. Not taking any chances she wanted to get out of the building as quickly as possible. The doors opened and she walked inside. Picking up her phone she called Erik. It only rung two times before he answered.

“Hey you still alive.” He gave a soft chuckle.

“Whatever. I’m coming now. I’m in the elevator. Can you do me a favor?” She asked with a soft tone.

“Wassup?”

“I need you to park a little bit further down. I’ll walk to you.” The elevator doors opened and she stepped out strolling to the entrance.

“Yeah. I got you. I’ll be two houses down to the right.”

“Okay thank you.” She ended the call.

While in his car Erik reconnected his phone back to the USB charging cord. He sighed as he took his car out of park and moved up to the location where he told her he was going to be. Shaking his head with the realization the he really had to sneak around with this girl. He was a grown man hiding from another grown man the fact that he wanted to take his younger sister out. Never in all his years of dealing with the opposite sex, he had to be this discreet. This was a new level.

Finding a place to park he left his car running and got out. Walking to the passenger side he leaned on the hood and waited for her to reach him. She came into view a minute later. Checking her out he noticed that she had make up on. This was the first time he saw her with it. It wasn’t a need for her though because she was already stunning with her natural features.

“Look who made it out alive!” He grinned poking at her.

Rolling her eyes but still blessing him with the sight of her beautiful smile she hit him playfully.

“Shut up.” Her laughed echoed through his ears.

“C’mere.” He clasped her hand bringing her body into his. His arms embrace her as they found their way around her waist.

Amiyah welcomed the act of affection swaddling her arms around his torso. He chuckled removing her arms. Lightly grasping her wrists with both of his hands he brought them around his neck before returning back to his previous position. It was his way of teaching her how to hug him correctly for next time.

Leaning in her neck Erik whispered against her supple skin.

“Hold me like this mama.” His body rocked them side to side.

Amiyah almost felt her eyes rolled to the back of her head when she felt his lips touch her neck. He was the epitome of being a tease and knowing what he was doing to her body. If this man was to tell her to jump she was going to take off her heels then asked him how high. Erik was the walking definition of having a sex appeal without even trying.

Their movements ceased and came face to face with one another again. Erik’s hands now relaxed on her hips. He leaned against his car to give himself room to fixate his eyes over her body. Her black coat covered her outfit. Taking his hand he began to untie the jacket belt.

Amiyah grabbed his hands halting his actions. She looked around before bringing her eyes back to his.

“What are you doing?” Her voice shaked.

“Let me see you.” His hand went up to her chin tapping it gently.

Being successful this time, he unfastened the waistband and revealed her wardrobe. Erik’s eyes gazed at her figure. Her tittes sat up flawlessly. The way her cleavage showed had Erik tempted to pull the fabric down and suck on the pillowy like flesh.

“You look too good right now.” His dimples appeared as he spoke. He closed her jacket and tied her belt.

Amiyah bashfully looked away. Butterflies being introduced to her stomach.

“Thank you...it was just something I threw on.” She nonchalantly responded pretending to be unbothered from him practically eye fucking her.

Erik’s eyebrows raised. “ Oh just like that make up too, huh?”

“Whatever Erik can we go before my brother come chasing after me?” She slipped her hand into her jacket pocket to make it warm as she waited for his next move.

“My bad mama. Here you go.” Erik opened the car door for her. Waiting until she was inside safely he closed it after her and strode to the drivers side.

“I like your outfit by the way.” Amiyah chose to make conversation once he got settled in.

“Thank you. I can’t even lie I was tryna look good for you.” Speaking honestly as he observed his outfit. His head then relaxed against the seat. “What you think?”

“You look really nice to me Erik.” She shyly retorted but giving a sincere opinion.

Prior to getting acquainted with Erik, Amiyah always found herself intrigued with his sense of style. Making that another reason for her to be attracted to him.

“Damn just nice..I was going for fine but fuck it I’ll take it” He fastened his seatbelt, drove off and en route to the movie theater.

“Oh my God. You are so extra.” Laughing she made herself busy with her phone, going back and forth between scrolling and taking small glimpses of the road.

“Can I ask you a question?”

His deep voice had her melting right in the front seat.

“Yeah but you just asked one.”

He snickered. “What’s your favorite color?”

“Purple, why?”

“ I’m trying get to know you that’s all.”

“Oh okay well it’s purple. What’s yours?” Pressing down on the power button of her phone she place it in her purse.

“Black.”

“Black? Really?” She stated questionably.

“Amiyah don’t start no shit with me.” Erik laughed as he looked at her.

“ Erik, me and you both know that black is the most basic color you can think of-“

“And purples not?”

“No it’s not and it’s actually the color of royalty thank you very much.” She fluttered her eyelashes sarcastically.

“Okay princess, you got it...It’s still ass.”

Amiyah grew warm from the new nickname in spite of the insult he made about her favorite color.

Erik laughed as she rolled her eyes for the umpteen time that night. He wasn’t actually making fun of her color, he just wanted to help her calm her nerves with some light play. She looked tensed to him just sitting there on her phone. If he didn’t know any better he would have thought that she wasn’t feeling him at all but he knew it was just her introverted ways.

Turning on the radio to break the silence, he went to the local hip hop station. Juicy by Biggie Smalls resonated through the vehicle. Bobbing his head to the beat with a little bounce of his shoulders Erik started rapping the lyrics.

“This my shit. You don’t know nothing about this, huh?”

“Whatever yes I do. This a classic.” Amiyah bobbed her head as well grinning.

“Nah you too young.”

He rapped a bit more before Amiyah jumped in and joined him.

“I'm blowin' up like you thought I would

Call the crib, same number, same hood

It's all good

And if you don't know, now you know, nigga”

Erik’s eyes lit up surprised she knew the words. Most of the ladies he been out with in the past always pretended to have the same interest in music as him but would never be able to recite one line from the song. His lips curved into a smile.

“Okay you valid. But that don’t count because everybody know that song.” He joked

“Why you always trying to play me Erik.” Amiyah sighed playfully.

They finally arrived at the movies. It was Saturday night so of course the parking lot was overfilled with cars. Finding a parking spot close to the entrance, Erik turned his car off and hopped out strolling to Amiyah’s side and opened her door. He held out his hand to assist her.

“Thank you.” Her eyes gleamed.

He drew his lower lip between his teeth. “I got you.”

Closing the door behind her, he clicked the lock button on his key fob. Amiyah started to walk to the building. She was stopped in her tracks. Erik grasped her hand intertwining their fingers and began to walk next to her. She peered down at them and beamed.

“What movie you want to watch?”

They were now standing in front of the movie display booth where you could purchase a ticket without waiting in line. Erik kept scrolling until she spoke up.

“I want to watch that one. Monster Hunter.”

He gave her a blank stare.

“What?”

“Do you even know what it’s about?” He chuckled.

“Yes a little bit. All I know is that it has T.I and Megan Good in it, so I want to see it.”

“Wait you said Megan Good. Bet.” His lips formed into a smirk.

Erik’s fingers tapped on the movie icon. Purchasing two tickets he waited for them to print before separating them and handing her one. Amiyah received the ticket as she gave him a dirty look. Jealous about his comment she walked to the concession stand to wait in line without him. Erik felt the feeling of jealousy radiating off her body language. She had a little attitude on her. Following her footsteps he stood behind her invading her space. His chest to her back. Erik’s head dipped down between the area of her neck and shoulder that was exposed laying a soft kiss on it.

“What you mad about....Hm?” The breath from his words bounced off of her skin.

Amiyah felt her pussy jump. Crossing her right leg over the left she clenched her thighs. Too afraid to even speak she bit her inner jaw and shook her head instead. Not long after she felt his strong hand travel around her waist to her front slipping in the inside of her jacket. He gripped her pudge. Amiyah’s small hand quickly wrapped around his forearm bringing it down.

“Erik!” She gasped out loud. Looking around and hoping she didn’t draw any unnecessary attention.

Her head tilted up due to the height difference to stare in his eyes. She was surprised she could even make contact after that stunt.

“I asked you a question so answer me.” His low voice demanded her.

“Nothing.” Hers barely coming out as a whisper.

He knew she wasn’t telling the truth but he didn’t want to push it out of her. Erik wanted her to be the one to make a decision about being honest with him. She had to make that step. But along with that he knew that she would have to trust him first. His hand roamed up to her exposed neck and lightly clenched it forcing her to move closer to his body as if was anymore capable. Amiyah felt the chill of his ice pinky ring as it laid against her skin. The sticky lipgloss that she wore created a tiny saliva string as her lips parted. Erik eyed the full plump flesh feeling enticed to suck on them.

“Chill, aight.” He waited for her to nod before he removed his hand as the line moved forward.

Fuck me. Were the words she wish she could tell him if she had the confidence to. At this moment she felt her natural sticky lubricant attach to her panties. She created a wedged with her underwear between her lower lips from all of the thigh clenching. None of it helped at all, it only generated a small amount of friction leaving her wanting more. She felt the walls of her vagina contract around nothing.

‘Did this nigga just grab my throat in the movie theater?’

She thought to herself touching the area where his hand left. Amiyah kept her eyes fixed on him as he ordered the drinks and snacks for the movie. She watched the way he would point at an item whenever he wanted the employee to get it for him. The way his jaw would tighten every now and then. Not in an angry way but out of habit. She took note of all these things.

“You ready?” Erik wandered back to her handing her some candy and a medium lemonade.

“Yeah. Thanks for buying the ticket and this other stuff.” She moved a piece of hair behind her ear looking away sheepishly. Her mood switched from a few minutes ago.

Erik sipping from the straw of his Powerade observed it.

“Told you I got you.”

_______________________________________

Bendix Diner was one of Amiyah’s top five hidden restaurants in the city where she loved to eat. It was and old fashioned style restaurant that always gave her an aesthetic vibe every time she went there. Currently seated at their table she flipped over the menu searching to see what she might have a taste for. Their family made apple cider donuts were her favorite item from the desert section. It’s been a few months since she had one and now being here she craved it.

Looking up at Erik she monitored his activity. He was checking out the art hanging on the walls seeming to be amused by it. His eyes shifted back to her. Wanting to pretend she wasn’t staring at him like a creep she informed him about a dish on the menu.

“Their Turn Me Loose meal is really good. It comes with catfish and jalapeño hush puppies. You should try it.” She gave him her recommendation.

Erik made a face. “I don’t fuck with seafoood.”

“Oh I’m sorry.” Amiyah apologized feeling embarrassed from assuming.

Erik picked up on. “Don’t stress it. How were you supposed to know I don’t like seafood? Don’t be to hard on yourself mama.” His hand reached across the table and caressed hers lightly offering his reassurance.

She sent a half smile. “What do you like then?”

Erik paused and bit his bottom lip. Deep dimples showing themselves from the action.

“You.”

Her eyes shifted towards the window seeing that it became fogged up due to the pouring rain that was coming down relentlessly. With nothing but the barely audible music coming from the intercom through the restaurant, Amiyah felt as if he can hear her heart beating through her chest.

“I meant food Erik.”

“You can be that too. Ain’t never have nobody eat you like you was a full-course meal before?” He asked her on the spot.

“You..are..” She shook her head. “Ridiculous. You know that.” Not having a comeback, those were the only words she could produce without stuttering.

Sighing and smirking he leaned back. “I’ve been called worst. But how you find out about this place. It’s low key as fuck. I like it.” He changed the subject.

Pleased with the compliment she responded. “I used to come here with my dad when I was younger. That was before he went to-“

“Prison.” He finished her sentence.

The look of confusion approached her face.

“Durk told me about him a few years ago.” He informed not meaning to alarm her.

“Did he tell you he was doing life without parole as well?”

Erik nodded his head.

She scoffed. “They said that he was the head of a drug ring but I don’t believe it. I mean I never remembered him being away from us long enough to even have the time to do that.”

“Sometimes we hide certain things from the people we love so that they won’t get hurt. And I’m not trying to insinuate anything when I say that.” He spoke honestly.

“No you’re right. But the last time we were here together I was thirteen. He took me here after picking me up early from school. It just sucks that I can’t even remember anything about that day but I want to so bad.”

Erik nodded his head totally understanding what she went through. He dealt with his own lost at a young age as well.

“I lost my father too. I was eleven when it happened. He was murdered. So when I tell you I know what you been through I’m not just saying that shit.”

“I’m sorry to hear that.” Her face soften when she seen his eyes sparked with hurt.

“You gotta learn how to live and heal right?”

Nodding her head in agreement she used her thumb to tenderly stroke his fingers. They were still holding hands the whole time as they shared a moment to be vulnerable with each other. It was intimate. That’s when she realized she had more in common with him than she thought.

“What about your mom? If you don’t mind me asking?” She desired to know more about him.

“I never got to know her. She passed away while giving birth to me.”

Erik felt his mood change with the thought of never being able to experience a true mother’s love. After the death of his father he was tossed back and forth from home to home in foster care. None of the caretakers genuinely cared for him, all they thought about was a paycheck.

“My mom overdosed when I was in high school. That’s why I live with Durk now. He’s been taking care of me ever since. I guess with everything that happened he had to find a way to survive for the both of us which lead him to the streets. Durk had his run in with the law but after our mom he became someone different.”

Amiyah spilled everything out on the table not holding back. She never had someone who she could vent to that would actually listen. Kelley was her best friend but she even kept some secrets from her. Amiyah was always afraid that one day the same person she trusted with everything would turn around and hurt her. From the moment she laid eyes on Erik she never thought that. In her eyes he looked as if he was a walking journal that she could expose all of her deepest darkest secrets to and not have to worry about one of them getting leaked.

“Now I see why your brother protects you the way he do. He just don’t want to see you hurt anymore.” His eyes gazed into hers making her feel small.

“Well, sorry If I ruined the mood. It’s been a minute since I’ve talked to someone for real.”

“I’m here for whenever. Only a phone call away.”

The waitress came around and sat a vanilla milkshake with whip cream in front of her and a water with lemon in front of Erik. Amiyah recognized her from the many times she been there.

“Are y’all ready to order.”

“Yeah, let me get your Turkey wrap heated up with a side of french fries.” Erik picked up his menu handing it to her.

Writing it down she took his menu and smiled.

“Okay and for you miss Amiyah.”

Her lips curled up bashfully.

“I’m going to get the honey dipped chicken with French fries as well. Thanks Stephanie.”

Going back to her pad she marked it down. “None of our famous donuts today?”

Erik looked over and read the hesitation over her face so he answered for her.

“We’ll take four of whatever they are.”

“Alrighty. I’ll be back with your meal in fifteen.”

The waitress disappeared into the kitchen.

“You didn’t have to do that, Erik.”

“What? I wanted to try their famous donuts. Oh you thought I ordered them for you?” He laughed.

Rolling her eyes she heard her phone buzzed. Reaching inside the pocket of her coat that was laying next to her she got a text from her brother.

Durk 🤬: When you comin home?

She sighed and text back.

Amiyah ☔️: I’ve only been gone for two hours..I’ll be back soon.

Placing the phone back in her pocket she put her attention on her milkshake taking her first sip of the night. Erik watched the way her lips wrapped around the straw as her cheeks sunk in whenever she sucked to taste some of the creamy treat. His tongue swiped over his top lip lightly.

“Let me get some..” His eyes darted between the milkshake and her lips.

Laughing she shook her head. “No, why didn’t you order one?”

“Because I was thirsty and I needed some water. But that looks good as fuck.”

“So then just order one Erik.”

He smacked his lips. “I don’t want a whole one I just want some.”

Giggling she pulled her beverage away hiding it from his view.

Erik’s eyes glinted before he got out on his side and slid next to her in her part of the dining booth. His right thigh hitting her left plush one causing it to ripple from the sudden movement. Having one arm behind her and the other reaching for her drink he leaned in.

“Stop playing and give me a sip.”

Now being backed into the corner she was trapped. Still firm with her answer she shook her head sipping once more.

“You not gon give me nun.” Biting that bottom lip Amiyah felt that came out as a double meaning.

Tired of going back and forth she gave in and slid her drink to him.

“Just a sip. That’s all!”

Erik nodded but not really listening, took the straw into his mouth and sucked the liquid. He didn’t have a big sweet tooth but he had to admit that the milkshake was fire. Taking more than what he was told he sat it down after gulping more than half of it. He leaned against the booth. One arm still around her.

Her mouth dropped as she studied that half her drink was already gone.

Smacking her lips she pushed at his chest. “Erik I told you not to drink that much...now look.” She whined picking up her cup to show him.

“Damn you can’t be hitting me like that on the first date, Amiyah.” His free hand rubbed the area pretending that it hurt.

She caught his words that slipped from his mouth. “I thought you asked me to hang out? You didn’t say nothing about a date.”

“What you want it to be?” Erik sized her up with his deep throaty voice close to her ear. Her scent filled his nose making his dick twitch.

She gave him a once-over before looking a way.

He grabbed her chin gently bringing her face millimeters away from his. “What you want it to be baby girl?” His eyes drawing her in with a lustfull gaze.

“I want a date.” Her lower lip quivered and skin apprearing flustered.

“Then let it be that.”

Erik couldn’t hold back anymore as his lips connected with hers. He gave her two soft pecks at first just to warm her up before giving a full lingering kiss. He tilted his head going to left making hers do the same. The taste of the vanilla coming off of her mouth drove him crazy. She was tasting as sweet as she looked. Her kissing compared to his were lighter and didn’t apply enough pressure like they should have.Letting his free hand travel up to her neck for the second time that night, he lightly squeezed before pulling away from her lips.

“Kiss me for real...” He bit her bottom lip and tugged it while watching her reaction. Her body shuddered.

Amiyah’s toes curled. Her stomach filled up with butterflies as she felt his hand around her throat. Her mind at the moment felt high. She didn’t really know what she was doing, just trying her best to keep up with the man in front of her. Mocking his actions she pressed more into the kiss and brought her hand to his cheek to give herself leverage.

Breaking them apart was the sound of a phone ringing. Erik reached in his pocket and pulled it out. Reading the caller ID he threw his head back blowing out air.

“Fuck..” He stated agitated.

Wiping her lips she looked at him. “What’s wrong?”

“It’s your brother, Durk.”

_______________________________

Please excuse any mistakes!

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[shirtlesssammy]

7x19: Of Grave Importance

Then:

Sam and Dean Winchester lost everyone and everything that mattered to them this season. #notapositiveseragambleblog

Now:

Sam and Dean enjoy a car hood dinner when Dean gets a call from Annie, an old hunter friend. They agree to meet for lunch the next day.

That night, at an abandoned creepy house, two teens are making out.

Annie arrives outside.

The two teens get nervous and start running through the house. A man appears. “You shouldn’t have come here,” he says as he races towards them. He disappears, and so do the teens. The camera fades to Annie walking into the house. 

Before her flashlight flickers out and the front door slams behind her, Annie finds the two teens dead in a pool of blood. 

Dean and Sam wait for a late Annie the next day. Sam tells Dean that Bobby and her had “a thing.” Dean looks surprised but tells Sam that he knew that. Dean admits to hooking up with her too. Then Sam admits to hooking up with her. AND BUCKLEMING ARE THE GROSSEST TO EVER GROSS. What is the fucking POINT? Just. Stop.

Dean tries calling Annie but has no luck reaching her. He then toasts “to ghosts that aren’t there.” And pours one out of Bobby’s flask. (Side-eye emoji) They soon realize that Annie isn’t going to show so they head to her motel room to see what she’s been up to. 

Her notes indicate the Old Van Ness House is where she’s been concentrating her work. Nothing has ever really come of the place though. 

Bobby is there, unable to communicate with the brothers, but he is starting to be able to move things. The brothers decide to go check the place out, and almost leave Bobby’s flask, and thus Bobby, behind. 

The brothers (and Bobby) arrive at the house.Sam and Dean see nothing, but Bobby sees a house full of ghosts. Dean tries calling Annie again. They hear her phone ringing down a hallway.

Bobby sees a ghost yell at another ghost, and then Annie is there. Bobby tells her she’s a ghost. He asks if she ran away from her reaper like he did. She didn’t even see a reaper, and is shocked that Bobby ran from his. They talk ghost stuff. 

Sam and Dean continue to look for Annie. Their EMF reader is off the charts. 

Bobby and Annie see another ghost move a chair and start talking to him. Bobby wants to know why there are so many dead people in the house. Annie wants to know how to move things. The ghost tells them they have two options: be calm about it or rage about it. (And then Bobby says he hated Ghost and Dean lost a second father, again.) Just as Bobby’s about to try and move a candlestick, a ghost starts screaming and runs at him, bursting into dust at the last second. The other ghost explains that all ghosts deteriorate, just at different speeds, but they’re all on the same path. 

Sam and Dean come back to the room with Bobby and Annie. They didn’t find anything and decide to head back and look at her research closer. And another ghost approaches Annie and Bobby. She had previously tried reaching out to Annie. Bobby suddenly disappears. 

He ends up in the car with Sam and Dean --because of the flask. They all head to a museum to learn more about the Van Ness house. They learn more about Whitman Van Ness, the owner, and Dexter O’Connell, the man convicted of killing Van Ness’s fiance on the eve of their wedding. The museum dude tells the brothers to stay away from the place. 

Sam learns more about Dexter O’Connell, namely, he escaped prison and was found in the house shot to death. Sam wants to know why he’d go back to the same house he was arrested at? 

Two teens arrive at the house, ready to...apparently...hold an in memoriam ghost hunt for their deceased friends. It’s so touching :/

Meanwhile, Dean just got out of the shower. 

For Post-Shower Science:

He discovers a message written on the mirror that reads “Annie trapped in house.” Thanks, Bobby! Dean demands to know who’s in the bathroom. Bobby scrawls his name on the fogged up mirror. 

The teens get confronted by Dexter, who rushes at them. Whitman stops him and then brutally murders the two teens. Because SEE, he’s the REAL monster here. Dexter pleas for Whitman to stop, but Whitman jabs his hand into Dexter’s chest and sucks him right up. 

In case you’re wondering what just happened to Dexter’s ghost, Annie gets everything spelled out to her by Victoria (the ghost who tried to call her cell phone). See, Whitman feeds on other ghosts. He absorbs their energy or delights in their torture - and that’s why Whitman keeps his robust ghost collection trapped in the house. 

Annie orders Victoria to grab the camera from the teens’ bodies and then watches as Whitman hauls the bodies into a secret room. 

Sam and Dean head inside, salt-round shotguns in hand and Bobby close behind. Bobby yoinks his own flask and heads off to do some investigating of his own. Annie and Victoria shove the teens’ camera towards Dean. The Winchesters watch the footage. 

They find a trace of Annie on the footage. As they call for her, Victoria appears to them instead. Buckleming tries to make a joke out of sex workers for the SECOND time in about five minutes and I flip them my middle finger. Victoria explains to the Winchesters that the house is dangerous to humans AND ghosts, and quickly proves it by getting torched by Whitman. Sam and Dean head out to burn Whitman’s bones. Meanwhile, Whitman sneaks a key into Sam’s pocket. I’m sure it’s just a lovely gift!

Bobby curses his poor choices to Annie, wishing he’d left his flask with Dean so he could help fight Whitman. Annie hauls Bobby out of his well of manly self-pity and tells him to help her look for where Whitman stashed the bodies. They find Victoria’s body torched in a fireplace, and start exploring the room for hidden hatches. Bobby mojos the secret latch and the bookcase door swings open. We find the bodies, and Annie contemplates her own. 

Annie ponders what happens to ghosts. Do they go to Heaven? Hell? Bobby comments that ghosts just...bloop out. BOBBY did those boys of yours never explain to you how they actually WENT TO HEAVEN a few seasons ago? SMH! Annie asks for a hunter’s funeral so she can get a little peace. 

As Sam and Dean are driving to the cemetery, the accelerator goes haywire. Whitman appears and tries to take the wheel. Sam fishes the key from his pocket and Dean shoots it, sending Whitman’s spirit barreling back home. 

Back at the house, Bobby and Annie prepare to burn bodies when Whitman returns. They give him the slip at first. At the cemetery, Sam and Dean find the crypt and get to smashing. As Dean taps away at the stone, Bobby and Annie get cornered by Whitman. 

Whitman plunges his hand into Bobby and starts to suck away his mojo. In good timing news, Sam and Dean burn Whitman’s bones at the crypt, and he flames out. 

Bobby comes to on the floor, apparently as whole and hale as a ghost can be. Sam and Dean burst in and come face to face with...Bobby! That’s right, friends. They can now see him with their own regular eyes!

Sam realizes why his talking board experiments never worked - Dean always had Bobby’s flask in his pocket whenever he went out. BRB, crying.

Bobby explains that he chose to stay behind as a ghost. He orders them to help him burn the bodies (but not his flask), and Sam and Dean follow obediently. 

Later, the Winchesters and Bobby mourn Annie. Sort of. Mostly, Dean wants to know why Bobby would be so foolish as to stay behind when he could be rocking out in Heaven with a beer at Harvelle’s (hissing noise). Insulted, Bobby zaps out. 

As they drive in the car of feelings, Sam and Dean explore their options. They could be a merry trio of hunters! OR Bobby could go vengeful. Bobby listens moodily in the backseat. 

What’ll You Have on Your Quotestone?

I just made that curtain shimmy

Every village has its idiots

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[iamanartichoke]

[please blacklist spoiler tags: #loki tv series spoilers, #loki series spoilers, #loki spoilers]

Yes, I did just watch episode 2 at 5:30 in the morning.

No, I am not sorry. Not at the moment, although when I inevitably crash later this afternoon, I will be.

Just some very, very quick - and scattered and messy - thoughts: That is a straight up lie; they’re definitely scattered and messy but not very quick at all.

Under the cut for spoilers and length.

I’m going to start with Loki’s characterization. My honest opinion is that Loki’s overall characterization feels like a fic characterization. He definitely is not Avengers Loki, like, at all. I don't know if Tom just, like, forgot how to play that Loki or ...?? That, or Loki was so much more mind-controlled than we realized and getting hulk-smashed just completely reset him back to zero but also fucked him up a little bit and affected his personality, kind of like how some people completely develop weird new personality quirks after a traumatic brain injury.

… yeah, I think that’s where I’m gonna land for now. TV series!Loki feels like a more-or-less canon version of Loki, but if that Loki got hit in the head really hard and now he’s just a little bit fucked up but overall no worse for the wear. Which - it may be that it’s so early in the morning, but that’s actually really fucking funny to me, lmao. God, I kill me. It’s not funny.

No, but, that’s pretty much how I feel. He’s ooc but he’s also ic, and the reason I’m not particularly bothered by the inconsistency, for lack of a better word, is because that’s what pretty much every fic Loki already feels like to me? (Including my own, so I’m not, like, saying that in a derogatory way.) Which is why I say Loki feels like a fic!Loki and to try to explain it better - there is always, for me, a little suspension of disbelief that I employ when I read fic. The reason for that is because the context, the plot, and the dynamics of the fic are usually pretty different than what we ever get in canon, so it becomes a matter of taking film!Loki and, like, bending him a bit in order to fit him into the perimeters of the fic.

The result ends up being that I don’t see the exact Avengers!Loki or TDW!Loki, and thus by definition the portrayal is ooc, but the version that I do see feels like a genuine extension of the canon version, possessing enough of Loki’s overall traits and characteristics that he feels authentic, albeit a bit pretzeled for the new context.

I honestly think that’s something that’s unavoidable, just due to the fact that in fic - and now, in this series - there are a lot more variables at play than there are in the films, wherein Loki is not just a supporting character but also the villain/antagonist and is therefore very limited in what he does/what the narrative allows him to do. When those limitations are taken away, what are we going to see? Probably a lot of different things, and yeah, a lot of them are going to feel a little ooc. And, like in fic, even if the characterization mostly lands, there are definitely bits and pieces (some fics more than others lean this way) where the author didn’t stick the landing or got carried away or otherwise probably forgot for a while that they were writing Loki, not their own OC.

That’s the point where it strays into cringe territory for me (and where the ‘heh, he’s Loki but with a brain injury’ aspect comes in), but while I had to consciously decide to just ignore those moments, overall the tone in this episode felt a bit more balanced between the new, the old, and the cringe, and less whiplash-y from the beginning of the episode to the end.

… I have no idea if that makes sense, but what I’m basically saying is that while I am enjoying this version of Loki, I do recognize all of the ways he’s ooc but, unlike how I feel about Ragnarok!Loki, the ooc-ness feels genuine and unavoidable rather than just a fundamental and careless misunderstanding of the character altogether. In other words, I feel like any ooc-ness here is happening despite the writers taking care to do their best, and isn’t just a result of Loki being lazily written by a person or persons who just doesn’t want to bother with him at all.

Again, I don’t know if that makes sense, but fuck it, there we are and I’m moving on.

I liked all of the little details, including again, things that felt straight out of fic, like Loki asking Mobius why he has the jetski magazine. (Also, if any of my thorki friends read this, was I the only one who noticed that when we see Loki reading the magazine, it just happens to be open to a page with a picture featuring a jet skier who looks like Thor? l.m.a.o.)

Loki interrupting things to explain the difference between illusions vs the other power (I can’t remember which one, off hand, and if I stop writing to go look it up I will lose my train of thought and not finish this) was great, but his overall input and contributions to the missions inspired very mixed feelings for me. On the one hand, I loved that the narrative, via Loki, is reminding us of all these things that he’s capable of that the films generally left out or brushed aside or ignored - but, every time he spoke, he was met with eye rolls and sighs and just a general feeling of “someone please shut this guy up” and I didn’t like the narrative treating him that way.

But also, it’s understandable bc none of the people on his team are actually on his team. None of them want him there (story of Loki’s fucking life), none of them trust him, and none of them are particularly interested in hearing what he has to say. So it’s like, I understand why they reacted the way they did, and I don’t think their reactions are meant to support an overall narrative undermining of Loki’s skills and input - but, the tone is hard to read for me bc I am very defensive and protective of Loki. I can’t quite determine the line between the TVA agents being unreliable narrators (ie, they’re annoyed by Loki bc of who he is to them, but that doesn’t mean the audience is supposed to feel the same) and the TVA agents validating that Loki is just being a nuisance (and, thus, the audience is supposed to feel the same).

That is, I know how I am consuming the narrative (that they’re unreliable narrators), but I’m not sure if that’s how tptb are intending for me to consume the narrative - and I guess it doesn’t really matter, but it’s worth mentioning.

In general, I really liked, again, Loki existing in his own space and watching the way he carried himself. I especially found it interesting that his hands were almost always in his pockets - for one thing it's a stance I tend to imagine him taking often in fic, but also it’s kind of a weird choice bc pockets don’t seem to be a thing in Asgardian clothing. It makes me feel like Loki is the kind of person who never knows what to do with his hands but is always conscious of them, as is common among anxious and self-conscious people, and I just find that relatable on a weird level.

I am really kinda torn on Mobius in this episode; when not interrogating Loki, he’s much less antagonistic toward Loki and therefore I’m more inclined to take-him-or-leave-him but I’ll go ahead and take him I guess. Yet at the same time, bc he’s not interrogating Loki he’s also not trying to put on a show for Loki and when you take that away, he really doesn’t seem to like Loki at all. It supports that Mobius only wants what Loki can do for him and doesn’t actually particularly care about him as a person, which is fine and more or less what I figured, but it contributes to me not really being able to decide how I feel about him in general. Idk, though, I kinda like their dynamic? Like I want them to end up friends?

Regardless, Tom and Owen have amazing chemistry and it’s really funny to me bc (not to be a jerk) I honestly didn’t know Owen Wilson could act. Like, I’ve never seen him in a role where he wasn’t just playing Owen Wilson. So for him to not only be playing Mobius so well but also having such chemistry and a sense of holding-his-own against Tom Hiddleston is like, color me surprised but pleasantly so.

I like B-15 a lot, even though she obviously hates Loki, so idk why I like her but I do. I like Renslayer less, but meh. (Side note - when I was in undergrad in Syracuse, I took the Amtrak from Syracuse to Boston and back more than a few times, for reasons that aren’t relevant, and that route always had a layover at Albany-Rensselaer and every single time I see Renslayer’s name, I want to call her Rensselaer instead.) Shout out to the guest appearance by Casey, sorry Loki stole your juice lmfao.

The moments from the trailer that were very cringe were less so in context (though still kinda cringe, tbh). I think we’ve seen most of the content from the trailers in the first two episodes now, though, which means going forward, it’s going to be like 95% previously unseen material (aside from the brief apocalyptic shots and so forth).

One thing I fucking loved was how Loki, reading about Ragnarok, was visibly affected and even teared up a bit, and you could tell he was in his feels about it, but then later when Mobius expresses sympathy, Loki is just like, “Uh huh, very sad, but anyway.” It was a subtle (well maybe not that subtle) but effective way to remind us that what Loki presents to other people is more often than not a mask and he keeps his true feelings close to the chest. It makes last week’s breakdown have even more of an impact, I think, bc clearly Loki was at the end of his rope to allow himself to show that much raw emotion and vulnerability, but also - for me - there’s a niggling little doubt there that wasn’t there before, in that there was probably more performance in it than I thought.

By which I mean, I think his reaction to the film of his life when he was alone was genuine but, while I previously thought his admission to Mobius later was also genuine, I now think was probably half genuine and half performative. I know others already figured that out, but I’m a little slow and, also, I don’t mind changing my opinion and interpretation from week to week.

Along the same lines, I wasn’t exactly surprised to see that Loki is “undercover” in the TVA, but it was nice to see it acknowledged fairly quickly. Not sure I buy that Loki wants to overthrow and rule the TVA - it’s still a little too “Loki only wants a throne” for me, but again, just because that’s what he told the variant doesn’t mean that’s actually what he’s after.

And, finally, I like the variant, I love Loki’s reaction to seeing her, and while I realize that the show has acknowledged Loki’s gender fluidity and we’re meant to assume that Lady Loki (I guess? Not sure if we’re going with that or not here) is Loki, I saw a theory somewhere about how this is actually not Loki-Loki, but - I wanna say her name Sophie but that’s the actress, again I can’t go look it up bc I will lose my train of thought - but it’s a character who is similar to Amora and who was created by Loki and models herself as Loki but she’s actually someone else.

Ugh I can’t remember the details of the theory, but I am kinda going with it bc I don’t think that Loki would look so - not surprised but just kind of “oh, well, I wasn’t expecting that” if he were seeing the female version of himself. Like, he doesn’t seem to recognize her the way I assume he would recognize himself, male or female. Not only does that make me feel like she’s actually someone else, but also not recognizing her as the female version of himself doesn’t necessarily mean Loki doesn’t recognize her at all. He may very well recognize her as this other Amora-similar character and, if so, I really want to see how that character fits with MCU Loki (as I think she’s a comic book character but, again, I’d have to go back and find that theory).

Edit: I found a version of it here.

Overall score, B-. Mostly solid, but needs moar Loki breakdowns and tears. (That's just me, don't fucking judge me.) Also, I really hate that we have to wait a week between episodes. I wish they were following Netflix’s method of dropping the entire season at once but, then again, if they did that, I’m not sure any of us would survive.

I gotta get ready for work and I deleted and rewrote so much of this and it still seems nonsensical to me, lmfao fml. Anyway feel free to interact/send me asks/whatever, it’s going to be a long fucking day with all of this on my mind. I’ll be working my way through my dash as best as I can.

Oh, also! Loki is so fucking pretty in this episode! The TVA suit is ugly, but he makes it work, and his hair's combed nicely and he looks like he finally got an opportunity to sleep and shower and eat something and, yknow, it's working for him.

[booksforevermore13]

Sherry Lips and Crystal Stars (Part IV)

Summary: 'So, when they break away, and he looks at her, green to brown, she knows that he's the one. That in the end, he had always been the one.'

Ginny Weasley works on a strict owe-to-owe basis, but it's one person she can never fully repay. And she's always running from him. Always. Until Kaz Brekker needs her to recruit him for a highly coveted kidnapping.

Again, no knowledge of Shadow and Bone is required to read this :)

Part I is here.

Part II is here.

Part III is here.

Read it on Fanfiction or AO3 if you prefer!

...

PART IV

...

xiii.

They follow the plan. They go where they are supposed to meet. She's glad that when they reach there, Kaz and Inej are waiting for them, and with a boy she feels Kaz has told her about, but she can't bring herself to remember his name.

"You set us up?" Ginny asks angrily as she reaches them, and she's glad when the other boy takes Harry's weight off her, so she's not the only one carrying it.

"I did."

Ginny's struggling to keep her anger in check, holding herself back from planting a dagger in Kaz's throat. They'd only waste time, anyhow.

"Where's the Sun Summoner?"

"In the carriage."

"Good." And then they're off again, her and Harry stumbling to get into the seat. The boy helps her up, and she nods at him, to which he smiles. It's a nervous smile, but she acknowledges it anyway.

"I'm Jesper."

"Ginny."

He nods, and they don't bother to add that they 'know' before the carriage jerk-starts and she's thrown back.

"He didn't tell you about me, did he?" she asks him as they start moving.

"No, he didn't. I got to know who you were, like, a minute ago."

There's disappointment laced in his voice, and it isn't very hard to see that this boy looks up to him, to Kaz, and considers him closer than probably the boy in question does.

"Compartmentalization," she says, speaking to Kaz who's driving. "Neat trick."

He's full of them.

xiv.

"Harry?"

They're travelling for about two hours, when she notices he's breathing much faster than usual. He's sweating too, even though it's cold inside the carriage, and when she checks his forehead, it's just on the brink of clammy.

"Kaz, stop the car," she barks out as she shifts to stand over Harry. "Kaz!"

"Why?"

"I don't know! He's getting worse."

"We can't stop now, they're after us."

"I don't care! Stop the goddamn car!"

Jesper looks at Harry in concern, and then back at Kaz, and she's prepared to go over and whack him on the head, just so he'd let go of the wheel. Inej turns in her seat, and she has the same expression on as Jesper.

"Kaz!" she warns again, and even she can hear the desperation in her voice. She'd expected this, even though she'd hoped it wouldn't happen. When the shrapnel had entered his body, so had all the chemicals that had come along with it. The grenade had been, after all, made by the best. She knew the chemicals in it, and she knew that even a few ounces of it in one's system could kill them.

With the way Harry was, he had an hour. Tops.

Ginny feels the carriage slowing down, before she's throwing open the door, and leaping outside. She knows this path, she's studied this path before coming there, and she knows there's an inn nearby, but there's no way the carriage can go there.

She pulls Harry out, groaning at the added weight on her thigh, and once again, it's Jesper holding him up by his legs.

"Wake up," she says, "Wake up Harry, goddamn it."

He's unresponsive, and Ginny's panicking, searching her coat for anything that could help, because bloody hell, she has no idea what to do.

"Jurda," she says, "I need jurda. Kaz," she looks up at him, and her eyes are pleading him to help, because he's the only one right now who can.

"I have a sprig left," he admits, "it's not enough."

"It'll do."

Ginny grabs it, and her hands shake as she rips open the outer layer, opening his mouth and pushing the sprig in. She places it between his teeth, and snaps his mouth shut, his teeth crushing the leaves.

A tiny drop of juice rolls down his chin, and she wipes it off, palms against his face; and she's silently begging him to wake up, because turns out, now's a good time for her to realize that she wouldn't know what to do without him.

His silent glances, the hand on her arm when she's about to do something reckless, the wild glint in his eyes when he's about to do something so incredibly stupid that it might even rival her, and his sweet sherry lips against hers, pleading for her to not let go.

And then he's coughing and she's laughing and crying and gasping, and as his eyes snap open and he looks at her, his green eyes unfocused, she's glad she gets to see them again. He opens his mouth to speak, but he's too weak to do so.

"Help me get him up," she says, and her voice wobbles from holding back too many tears.

Ginny chokes back tears as Jesper and Kaz haul him up with each arm, and as if a silent agreement has passed between them, they start walking, Harry's gait slow, but he's still managing it. She knows Kaz is struggling too, for he is after all, walking without his cane, but she'll be sure to pay him back for this.

For everything's he has done.

And then she's left behind, with Inej. The latter had locked up the carriage while everything that had happened, but Ginny's preoccupied when she joins her, her eyes on the three boys as they walk on the muddy path, seeing Harry slow down and then Jesper barking at him to walk faster again. She knows Inej is looking at her, but she can't bring herself to look back.

"He needs a Healer," Inej finally says and Ginny looks at her, slightly disheartened.

"I know."

"Someone who's not him."

"Inej, I know."

She nods, and she waits until Ginny starts walking before she follows.

And when she feels the silence being too unbearable to handle, Ginny speaks up again.

"I'm sorry," she nods at the knife that's back in Inej's holster. "I wasn't meaning to cause any distress."

"Well, you did."

Ginny bites her lips, turns away. She's surprised when Inej nudges her, just slightly and starts talking.

"Kaz told me," she said, "about you."

She looks back again at Inej, and then because she can't afford to take her eyes off Harry, she looks away again.

"I don't suppose it's all very nice things."

"In fact, it is," she says. "As much as he can manage, at least."

"Thanks."

Inej suddenly moves in front of her, and Ginny nearly yells in surprise, taking a step back. For a moment, she considers making a witty remark on her evident Wraith-ness, but then decides against it.

"Why then," the girl asks, "do I get a feeling I don't know the whole story?" It's the seriousness in her voice which makes Ginny stop and think about it.

"I…." Ginny sighs. "I don't think it's my place to tell."

Inej is still looking at her, and Ginny takes a moment to look over her shoulder. They're slowing down, round a corner, and she guesses that that's where the inn was. She looks at Inej, then seeing that she's still thinking, she looks at their figures hobbling away.

"Fair enough," Inej finally says and then steps away, letting her pass. Ginny sets into a run, her boots squelching in the mud, and it's before she rights herself from skidding, Inej speaks again.

"You…." she pauses, "you love him, don't you?"

Bloody hell.

Of all the questions to ask, and of all the places to answer, she's not glad that they'd found this to be the one. But she knows the answer, in fact, she feels she's known the answer for a while now.

"I think I might," she finally says. She doesn't hesitate.

It's the first time Ginny sees her smile.

xv.

When she goes inside, the inn turns out to be a dingy building, the type where there's more cobwebs than cement. But she goes inside anyway, not surprised to not see anyone standing at the counter for it's no wonder really, that they're the only human life there.

"Harry? Kaz?" she calls. "Jesper?"

"In here," she hears Jesper's voice, and turns to a room that seems to be the cleanest. Harry's lying on the floor there, and his back is facing her, while his hand flicks by his side.

"Hey, hey," she bends down beside him, navigating his hand to where he was struggling to reach. "Hang on a moment – "

"It's fine Gin," Harry grits out. The jurda that had brought back the slightest tinges of colour back to his face was losing its effect. Ginny looks at his back in concern, taking note of the purple blisters in the places the cuts were.

"Harry, tell me what to do," she says. She's well aware of the fact that he needs a Healer, well aware that he's a Heartrender and the one injured, but he's the only one right now who can save himself for his sake. For hers.

"The situation….is…..under control," he grunts. "Tell….. them to go."

"Harry."

"It's okay, Gin, they've done enough."

So she looks at them, slightly worried for Kaz, because his face is contorted in pain. She looks at him in apology, and even though his face is impassive, he slightly nods, and she knows it's code for 'it's fine." Or perhaps it was his way of telling her that he'd bring her in for his favour later.

Either way, she was fine with it.

"You heard him," she says.

Kaz nods again, and heads out, and Jesper hovers around slightly, before following.

"Be careful," he says, before he walks out the door, and Ginny smiles at him, for it's hard not to.

"Likewise."

xvi.

"I found water," she declares. "In a jug, which was filled with I suspect, black widows, but aah, what's a bit of venom?"

Harry smiles wearily at her, and she figures it's been an hour or so, since he'd finished with his back. It had been gruelling, to say the least, and she'd had to navigate his hand most of the time, pop the blisters, gather the pus before they fell on his skin and then dispose.

Pop, gather, dispose.

And then after she'd done that, he'd wave his hand over them, and they'll dry up into a purplish-brown scab. If he had been better equipped perhaps, or more conscious, he might have been able to remove the scab altogether, but luckily, note the sarcasm, he wasn't.

They'd passed out soon after that, coming and going out of consciousness. In the span of an hour, she'd woken up every ten minutes or so, to check up on him, make sure he was still breathing. In the span of an hour, she'd managed to not completely break down.

So now, even though she's depressed, sleep deprived, angry, tired, and aching all over, she's glad they're still alive.

Ginny doesn't speak as she settles down beside him, resting her head against the wall, closing her eyes. She passes the jug over to him, and he takes a great big gulp, before passing it back.

"Hey," Harry nudges her, and she turns her head towards him, a huge gulp in her throat. "What's wrong?"

"You shouldn't have done that," she says immediately, "you can't keep doing that." Ginny blinks back burning tears, feeling her chest pain in a way it had never pained before.

"I can't keep doing what?"

"You took the grenade for me," she says, and when she finally looks at him, eye to eye, she can't stop the tear falling down her cheek. "You shouldn't have done that."

"I did, Gin."

"For Merlin's sake, Harry – "

"No, Gin, I don't think you realize exactly how much I care about you." He looks at her now, eyes blazing, and she can't help it as hers well up again. It's pouring out now, all her emotions at once. She can't stop them, but god, she's trying.

"I will take that grenade for you, even when I'm bleeding, even when I'm dying, and even when I can barely walk, but each time, every time, I'll make sure I take that grenade."

"Why?" she asks, angry tears rolling down her cheeks and it's the thought of him doing this that scares her, because she knows he most certainly will.

"Because I'm allowed to protect you, and-and love you till my dying breath."

And then he's kissing her, his hands on either side of her face, wiping away her tears. She's a human trainwreck, she's aware, but she's kissing him, and she wants his lips against hers again, and again, and again, and she knows she'll never tire of it.

His lips are salty now, the ghost of sherry a mere memory, but they're still rough against her own, and they feel like….like magic.

When they come up for breath, he's smiling, and she's smiling too, and in the end, when they start laughing like two drunken maniacs, she knows they're crazy for laughing in a broken excuse for an inn, when their lives are in danger, and when their lives will continue to be in danger for the next few hours, when he'd almost died in the past couple hours, when she'd nearly bled to death, but there they are, kissing and laughing on the cold floor of the said inn.

But then, she thinks, it's probably why they're them.

[spencer-reid-in-a-pool]

It Was You All Along (Part 6)

Author’s note: I want to thank @ayyyyitswednesdaymydoods for helping me and listening to me ramble constantly about this series. I know I am probably annoying, but she inspired much of this fic just through our conversations and I am so thankful every day that I met her and that she is my friend. This chapter is Jaskier’s POV, so hopefully you will learn more about that night that (Y/N) eavesdropped! Enjoy~

Tags: @ayyyyitswednesdaymydoods @blackjay04 @mxsmwndr @bravelittlesunflower

-----------------------------

If the gods could have blessed me with some other talent besides music, it should have been the ability to figure out where the hell I was in this forsaken forest. I wish I knew how to map out these routes in my head like Geralt seems to do, but I simply can’t. I guess you could say it was my own fault for running off after the attack, but I couldn’t risk getting punched again. Gods know that I am the one bringing in the most money, what with my music and all. Witchering be damned. 

I mean, what can I say? I’m irresistible. 

The trees in front of me seemed to stretch out infinitely, and I sighed as I came to a stop. I knew Geralt would be alright, of course. My thoughts were mainly focused on (Y/N) and where she might have ended up. I couldn’t help but think us getting separated was my fault. But I only did what I thought was right in the moment, and that was getting her as far away from the danger as possible.

She has been acting a bit strange lately, and that consumed my thoughts going forward. Was it... girl problems? Those happen monthly, right? Wait- what month is it?

A snapping sound drew me from my thoughts and brought me to another abrupt stop. It sounded far away, so I decided not being around to find out what made the noise was the best course of action. 

~

It was starting to drop dark now, and I had found a fallen log to sit on and rest. It was so quiet. I hated the quiet. My thoughts and fears were always loudest then, so I decided to pull out my lute and strum mindlessly to bring about some comfort. Without meaning to, I started playing the song I was writing for (Y/N). It just kind of happened. I thought she was onto me and knew about the song when we arrived at that town the other day, but luckily she didn’t seem to pay any mind to it. If only she didn’t make me so nervous and loose-lipped, maybe she wouldn’t have even realized the song was new and unfinished. 

My heart sped up the tiniest bit as I played, just like it always did when I thought about her. Which was quite often, to be honest. I simply couldn’t help it. She was my muse, even if she didn’t know. 

Of course, thinking about her made me think about the other night in the tavern with the other woman. A stab of guilt made my chest hurt, and I cursed myself for that night. (Y/N) didn’t seem to be catching on to anything I was doing, so I had wanted so badly to be distracted. How stupid was I to let that woman be my distraction? Incredibly. And I would regret it for the rest of my days.

Obviously, thinking about that night and that woman made me think of the conversation Geralt and I had after. I remembered the whole thing, surprisingly, considering how drunk I was. I think- no, I know- the cause of me remembering was how much I was thinking about (Y/N) then. How badly I had wanted that woman to be her, in my arms and safe and loved. 

I told Geralt everything. But I’m sure he already knew with his Witchery-ness...I swear he could read minds sometimes. 

I went to the woman’s room- I don’t even know her name, now that I think about it. I don’t think I asked. It didn’t really matter, because it wasn’t (Y/N). Instantly, I had regretted my actions. I didn’t want to be there. I didn’t want this woman on me, touching me. So as soon as I had come back to reality, I pushed her off, probably a bit too hard, and winced as I realized how purple my neck would be soon.  

Of course she was hurt, and I felt awful. But a second later, she smiled at me with what looked like understanding on her face. 

“It’s that girl down there, isn’t it? You’re thinking about her.”

I didn’t answer her, and she took my silence as a yes. And that was that. I spent the rest of the night getting drunk to try and drown away this feeling I had. It didn’t work, of course. I suppose karma was being her usual bitchy self. Although, I knew in my heart that I deserved it. 

As I strummed her song over and over, I replayed the conversation Geralt and I had that night in my head. 

~

“You couldn’t have been any quieter when coming in?”

I pulled out a chair and sat in it heavily, the drink and regret weighing me down. 

“Shut up, Geralt,” I groaned. 

“What the hell is wrong with you?”

I was silent for a moment, and decided to just come out with it. 

“You wouldn’t understand. I- I so desperately want (Y/N)...What do I do?”

If he expected something else from me, he made no mention of it. He simply stared at me with that same stupid expression he always had.

“You want advice? You need to grow a pair, Jaskier, and stop whining. Watching you be like this is incredibly exhausting.”

I sighed once more, like I had so many times previously tonight.

“That woman...seeing her was a bad idea. (Y/N) can’t know how I feel. At least, not yet. I don’t want her to know.”

He glanced at the wall for a split second, but I thought nothing of it. He was probably just tired of listening to me talk. 

“You truly are an idiot. Both of you are.”

And without another word, he left for the washroom. 

~

I played until it was pitch black outside, and even after for a little bit. I didn’t need light to see where the strings for her song were. I knew them by heart, even if it wasn’t quite finished yet. Only when my fingers started to ache did I stop, and I didn’t really want to. Playing her song made it feel as if she was right next to me. 

I sighed and placed my lute down gently before laying myself down next to it. There probably wasn’t a really comfortable spot around here, so I balled up my doublet and used it as a makeshift pillow. Before long, I fell asleep and dreamed of (Y/N) all night, as I so often had since meeting her for the first time. 

When I woke in the morning, it was just after dusk, and a bit cold out. I put my doublet back on quickly and grabbed my lute, ignoring the ache in my back and the growl coming from my stomach. There wasn’t really much else to do besides start walking and hope for the best. 

Eventually, I made it to a small, run-down cottage near a stream. It was as good a place as any to rest and catch my breath. There didn’t seem to be anyone home, but I knocked nonetheless. What can I say? I’m a gentleman. 

No one answered, so I let myself in. But what I didn’t realize was that the door was on its last limb, so as soon as I opened it, it collapsed onto the floor, sending up a cloud of dust and dirt directly into my lungs. 

“Melitele’s tits,” I croaked. 

After I recovered from my little ordeal, I dug around the place to see what it had to offer. Was it too much to hope for food?

I came across a plant potted in the corner. Underneath the cobwebs and dust, it almost looked edible. Almost. 

“Should I?” I thought out loud. 

I stared at it for a good while, heavily considering eating it, before realizing it was probably not a good idea.

“I should not.”

Defeated, I sat down on one of the rickety chairs, thanking the gods that it didn’t fall out from underneath me. Maybe I’ll eat my own arm off. Wait, then I can’t play the lute anymore...

“Bollocks...”

~

I hadn’t realized that I had fallen asleep in the chair until I heard rustling and voices outside, which startled me awake. It looked to be later in the day, probably the afternoon. So I couldn’t really take off running- they would definitely see me. 

The voices and footsteps got closer and closer. In a panic, I scanned the room looking for something- anything I could use to defend myself if need be. There really wasn’t much. The place has probably been ransacked more times than I can count. 

Unfortunately, all I had was my lute. How horribly tragic. 

I hunkered down in the corner farthest away from the door, and waited until they were right against the house before shouting, “I’ve got a very large- very hard sword! And I’m not afraid to use it. You had best leave- right now. Please.”

Idiot, why did you say please at the end? You sounded like an insufferable p-

“Jaskier!” 

I don’t know what I was expecting, but it wasn’t my name. And it definitely wasn’t (Y/N) stepping over the fallen door. 

Time felt frozen for a second. A bit annoying really, considering how all I wanted to do was run to her and hug her. But she made it to me first, and before she threw her arms around me, I looked at her like it was the first time. 

She was disheveled of course. Scratches and bruises decorating her skin. A particularly large bruise was right in the middle of her forehead. Wonder what caused that monstrosity. 

Twigs and leaves and grass were twisted into her messy hair, and for a split second all I could think about doing was getting it all out for her and washing her hair. She’d like that, I think. 

Even in her condition, I had never seen such a beautiful woman. And I realized that even looking at another for the rest of my days would simply be a sin. 

Her arms finally fell around my neck, bringing me closer to her and back to the present. I took a deep breath, telling myself that this was actually real. She was actually here and she was okay, and I wrapped my arms tightly around her waist. I simply could not have her close enough to me. 

I sighed her name, relaxing against her, and hoping against hope she couldn’t feel how hard my heart was beating right now. 

Geralt stood in the doorway, his arms crossed. But there was a gleam in his eye. 

“Shut up,” I mouthed silently to him, turning slightly with (Y/N) still in my arms as if I was hiding a sweet I refused to share. 

He simply shook his head, and stepped back through the doorway from where they came.

~

Geralt and I sat around the fire now. (Y/N) was asleep a few feet away, curled up on a ratty old blanket laid out on the forest floor. I couldn’t help but watch her sleep. She was so peaceful. So beautiful. There wasn’t a single thing I would not do for her.

I had spent the better part of an hour picking out all the offensive bits of nature in her hair, and combed it out as best as I could. 

“Don’t take this the wrong way, darling,” I had said to her after finishing with her hair, “But what in the gods’  holy names happened to your forehead?”

Her expression fell instantly, and she grumbled something under her breath. I leaned in closer to hear what she had said, ignoring the weird expression on Geralt’s face. 

“I ran into a branch while I was escaping on Lily.”

If she hadn’t had such a pitiful look on her face, I would have lost my shit then and there, laughing until I felt sick. But I managed to stifle it, if only to laugh about it later. 

“What a special girl you are,” I said instead. 

She turned away from me for a moment before telling me to shut up. 

Geralt’s words startled me from my recounting of the events in my head. 

“If you don’t tell her, I will. You’re ridiculous.” 

I felt the heat rise in my cheeks, and quickly turned away from (Y/N)’s sleeping form. 

“I’ll tell her. Just...not yet. When the time is right. She deserves to know, even if she doesn’t feel the same.” 

His only response was a sigh. Then he laid down on the other side of the fire, facing away from me. 

That was fine. I’ll be up a while, and I preferred it that way right now. Perhaps I’ll finish her song...