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#DURING THE MEXICO GAME TOO
buckys-estrella · 2 years
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danny ramirez watched all my insta stories ab my spotify wrapped...I have been freaking out ab this since I noticed it
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bc of this, and my huge crush on him, i checked our birth chart compatibility and I have never been so compatible with someone, every single one of our aspects was positive and now I'm living in the delusion that we’re soulmates :)
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marciliedonato · 2 years
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I forgot there was a show today I thought the next one was on the 9th...💀💀💀 Lmk if they play volcano shake em up besties xx
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l0vergirlsw0rld · 22 days
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ravish part 3
hitchhiker!readerxperv!loganhowlett
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a/n: this is the final part of the ravish series! hope you guys enjoyed it <3 T
wc: 6k
NSFW
18+ MDNI | age gap,oral sex, p in v intercourse, and sexual themes
summary: Y/N goes to Logan's cabin in Canada while she waits for him to return from Mexico. during her stay, she finds some personal mementos that give her a deeper understanding of who he really is.
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"...I ain't gonna tell you again, kid, it's too dangerous." He grunted, smoothing down his beard with a hand in frustration. The roughness in his voice matched the irritation in his eyes.
You stood in front of the doorway, blocking him. 
"Why are you going if you're so concerned about safety? What if something happens to you?" you shot back, crossing your arms defiantly. 
You weren’t just challenging him; you were demanding an explanation, the truth, something he couldn’t dodge with huffs and empty commands.
At the crack of dawn, you had ambushed Logan, catching him off guard before he could slip away into the shadows. 
The plan was simple.
Today, you weren’t separating paths; You had decided, and you weren’t about to let him just walk out without a fight.
But Logan, true to his protective nature, instantly shot down your idea, brushing it off. And now the two of you were standing there, bickering by the front door, each trying to make the other see their perspective.
"Because I can take it. You? Not so much. Now move, I gotta be somewhere." His voice was low and raspy, carrying a weight that was hard to argue with.
 He took a heavy step forward making the boards creak underneath him. He meant business, and you could tell he wasn’t in the mood to play games.
But you weren’t about to back down. 
"Then when am I going to see you again? If I can't go with you, how do I get in touch with you? You don't have a cell phone. Is there an address I can write to you?" The words tumbled out before you could stop them.
You reached out, gently touching his chest, feeling the heavy beat of his heart beneath your fingertips. It was a small gesture, but it was enough to stop him in his tracks.
He exhaled sharply through his nose, the sound almost a sigh of resignation. For a moment, the harsh lines of his face softened, and he looked at you with hurt as if he heard you for the first time this morning. 
You both shared a look of longing before you cut the silence.
"I'm not being this adamant because I want to meet up again to fuck... I told you I liked you, Logan. If you leave for Mexico and we never see each other again, we won't get to explore this. I know you like me too." You slid your hand up to rest where his neck and shoulder meet. 
"You're right sweetheart, I do....a lot... It's just, I don't know when I'll be back," he said, his voice low and careful as if trying to choose the right words. "This type of thing... it can take a while." He looked down at you through his dark lashes.
He was leaving, without you.
The pressure in your chest subsided, and from the hand he placed on your waist you knew he was also upset.
 "Do you want to see me again?" You mumbled softly.
"Of course I do." His hands came up on your shoulders, his touch warm and reassuring. Logan pulled you in and pressed a long kiss on the top of your head. The warmth of his lips calmed every nerve in your body. 
He pulled away, steady, as always, but there was something in his eyes that told you this was just as hard for him as it was for you.
 "But I'm sorry, you can't come. I'd never forgive myself if something would happen to you." 
"Then I'll wait for you," you said, your voice calmer.
 "...Just give me a place to meet you. I don't care how long it'll take...I'll get by... I always do." You looked into his eyes, searching for some sign that he believed you, that he understood just how serious you were.
"You'll wait f'me?" His voice was softer now, almost uncertain as if he couldn't quite believe what you were saying. The gears in Logan turned as he thought of something.
"Yes, anywhere, I'll wait," you answered without hesitation.
He paused, considering your words, then nodded slowly.
"How about Canada?" 
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Two weeks of walking, drives, train rides and taxis. That's what it took you to get to Logan's place in Deer Lake, Alberta.
 The journey up north was a first for you, an adventure into a new landscape that felt almost picturesque.
The countryside was a living canvas; Gorgeous snow-tipped mountains towered In the distance, tucked behind miles and miles of lush trees and massive lakes that shimmered reflections of a deep sapphire blue.
Logan's home—a cabin—was located deep within an untamed forest. The remoteness of the location was astonishing, so far away from any civilization, you wondered how he survived the winters alone; the taxi driver had only been able to take you so far before the road disappeared into the wild grass, leaving nothing but a rough trail that was impassable for a vehicle. 
From there, it was up to you to make the final trek on foot.
As you walked, the gravel crunched beneath you, the sound was oddly comforting in the quiet of the forest. The air was crisp and clean, breathing had suddenly become easier in the forest. The scent of pine and cedar filled your nostrils, clearing your sinuses from any blockage they might've had.
Approaching the cabin, you noticed scattered logs and woodworking tools lying around the property. You pieced together that Logan had built this place with his own bare hands. The mess in the yard was evidence of the hard work that had gone into building this place. Each log and nail was a hommage to his skill and stubbornness. 
Of course, Logan built his own house, you mumbled. 
Your mouth fell open in awe as you took in the sight of the cabin. It was more than just a structure—it was the product of Logan's blood, sweat, and tears.
 There was something deeply personal about it, something that made you feel honoured to be allowed into this part of his life. This wasn’t just a cabin, it was his getaway from all the bad things in his life.
The cabin, his home, was a mirror image of him—rugged, enduring, and built to withstand the harshest elements.
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Stepping onto the front porch, your hand grazed over the smooth wooden railings of the stairs. His craftsmanship was impeccable, each detail was carefully considered, and each board was perfectly placed. Logan had picked the perfect area to carve out for himself in this remote corner of the world.
You inserted the key he had given you before he left into the doorknob and twisted. After hearing the faint clicking noise, you pushed it open to reveal the inside. 
His home was open-concept, the entrance positioned right between the kitchen and the living room. To your left, a maroon leather loveseat sat next to a matching recliner, both perfectly aligned to face a stone-built fireplace that reached up to the ceiling. 
The walls were decorated with Indigenous paintings, each one a cultural tapestry of the land. The artwork depicted vibrant scenes of nature and various animal spirits.
To your right was a modest kitchenette, equipped with all the essentials for a life lived simply but comfortably. The centrepiece was the sturdy table and chair set that appeared to be handmade, most likely by Logan himself. 
As you ventured deeper into the space, you spun slowly in a circle, trying to take it all in, it was gorgeous. You could feel him within these walls.
 The air carried a faint, lingering scent of his cigars, a comforting reminder of him. You wondered how long it had been since he was last here, sitting by the fire, drink in hand, perhaps lost in thought. 
You entered his bedroom with a gentle push of the door, revealing a space that mirrored the simple functionality of the rest of the cabin. Like the other rooms, it was decked out with only the essentials for comfort. A large bed, a handmade dresser that stood against the wall, its wood polished smooth from years of use. There was a spacious closet, probably filled with his few belongings, and a small nightstand with a simple lamp casting a soft, warm glow.
On the nightstand, you noticed an ashtray filled with grey dust.
I wonder how many lonely nights he spent in here, you thought.
Exhausted from the long journey, you decided to call it a night. You plopped down onto Logan’s bed, the mattress was firm but welcoming and pulled the blankets around you. 
The scent of the cabin wrapped around you like a comforting embrace. As your head sank into the pillow, you found yourself drifting off almost immediately, surrounded by the quiet peace of Logan’s space.
Miss you, You mumbled before closing your eyes for the night.
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Two weeks since your arrival:
Days at the cabin seemed to blend together, slipping by with an ease that was both comfortable and foreign.
 You’d been on the road for most of your short life, always on the go, always searching for the next big thing.
 But here, in this secluded corner of the world, you found yourself settling into a routine—something you hadn’t realized you craved. The mundane act of daily chores became almost therapeutic.
You had begun exploring around the cabin, finding hidden trails that led you all over the place.  One path led you to a nearby town, a small, quaint place where life moved at a slower pace. The townspeople were friendly, their lives seemingly untouched by the chaos of the world.
 You frequented the local general store for groceries, picking up a few items and some clothes to better suit this colder climate. The change in scenery was drastic for you, but you found yourself adapting, maybe even enjoying the peace that came with it.
As the days passed, the cabin began to feel like your own. The once unfamiliar space became a place of comfort, each creak of the floorboards and crackle of the fire made you unwind. 
You decided to take on some of the household chores—tasks that probably didn’t come naturally to Logan.
 Spring cleaning became your mission, tackling the tedious details he might overlook. You wiped down the insides of kitchen drawers, scrubbed the fridge, and tossed out any expired food. It felt good to take care of these small things, you were kind of being a little housewife, preparing the home for Logan's arrival.
One afternoon, while organizing the kitchen, your fingers brushed against something tucked away in the back of a drawer. 
You decided to pull it out and realized it was an old map, the paper worn and creased from what seemed years of use. 
As you unfolded it, you noticed several locations marked in red ink. The meaning of these places was a mystery, and despite studying the map for a long while, you couldn’t decipher their significance. 
Japan, Madripoor, Northern Canada, Mexico,
Puzzled, you left the map on the table. The idea was that maybe if you came back to it later, you'd see something you hadn't noticed in the first place. 
The thought occurred to you to ask Logan about it when he returned. Would he have a simple explanation or go back to shooting it down?
Over the following days, you found yourself returning to it, your fingers tracing the lines and paths, your mind wandering to what expeditions or memories these marks represented.
In these moments, you couldn't help but think, 
He’s no handyman, that’s for sure.
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Three Weeks since your arrival: 
As you prepared for bed one night, the soft glow of the lamp illuminated the room in a gentle, amber light. During your bedtime routine, something caught your eye—a glint of metal in the corner of the room, just beside the dresser on the floor.
 Curious, you approached and discovered a set of dog tags lying on the floor, half-hidden beneath a loose floorboard.
The realization struck you like a bolt of lightning. 
Logan had been in the military. 
It was a part of his past you had no clue about, a fragment of his story that added depth to the riddle that was him. You had sensed that one night there was a darkness within him, but now, seeing these tags, you began to understand the source of that shadow—his time as a soldier, the battles fought, and the scars born. 
Tears welled up in your eyes as you gently traced your thumb over the engravings on the tags. Each mark and number seemed to hold trauma, something that represented his time, far away from the peace of the cabin. You tried to imagine the weight of these tags around his neck during those times of darkness, and it filled you with sadness.
With a shaky breath, you wiped the tears from your cheeks. In this moment you were feeling an inexplicable connection to him through this small, metallic relic. A part of you wanted to honour his remarkable selflessness. You slipped the chain over your head and let the tags rest against your chest, giving them a gentle squeeze, a small gesture of comfort as you tried to steady the storm of emotions inside you.
The thought of Logan facing any dangers far away in Mexico seemed almost unbearable. The weight of the dog tags felt like a physical reminder of the challenges he faced, the unknown threats he confronted, and the loneliness that came with his life of constant danger. 
He survived in the past, he'll survive again. You told yourself.
You longed to have him next to you in bed, to offer him a comforting hug, but the miles that separated you felt like an eternity away.
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Four Weeks since your arrival: 
After a successful day of fishing at the lake, you returned home, enthusiastic and sopping wet from an unexpected stumble into the water. Your clothing clung to you and the chilly evening air covered your body in goosebumps. You hurried inside, eager to change into some dry clothes.
Logan’s wardrobe provided a relief. You rummaged through his drawers, searching for something comfortable to wear—a t-shirt, a pair of pyjama pants, and socks. The familiar feel of his clothes was oddly comforting, a small link to him while he was so far away. After all he did only own multiples of the same clothing articles. 
As you dug deeper into the drawer, your fingers brushed against something unexpected. You pulled out a Polaroid photo, slightly crumpled and tucked away behind other items. Intrigued, you examined it more closely.
The image was of a dark-haired woman with hazel eyes, seductively bound with ropes, completely nude and captured in a moment of intimacy. The rawness and vulnerability of the photo struck a jealous chord, and for a moment, you were taken aback. The woman’s identity didn't make sense to you at all, you knew Logan was single, and there was nothing left of a female in the cabin. Even though it might've been an old girlfriend, the discovery stirred a mix of emotions—curiosity, surprise, and discomfort. 
You couldn’t help but wonder about the context of the photo. 
Was this someone important to him? 
Did he hold onto the photo for special meaning or as a memory for him?
 Your mind raced with questions, each one feeling deeper and more personal. The photograph was intimate and private. It felt like a glimpse into a side of Logan you hadn’t seen before—one that was carefree, open and playful. 
Feeling a surge of conflicting emotions, you gently set the photo back to where it belonged, buried under piles of socks. The photo had given you a lot to think about, and you couldn’t shake the feeling that it was just one more piece of Logan’s past that you were uncovering from spending time in his home.
As you slipped into the dry clothes, the warmth of the t-shirt and pyjama pants was comforting, but the image lingered in your thoughts, leaving you with more questions than answers about the man whose home you now shared.
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Six Weeks since your arrival:
You were determined to light a fire inside the cabin tonight. But first thing first, you now needed to chop firewood since you had used up all of Logan's. You enjoyed the luxury of a nice warm fireplace every night and that wasn't going to end anytime soon. 
 The task was tougher than you anticipated. You huffed as you dragged some of the smaller logs onto the chopping block. You hoisted it up on it with all your might, wincing as you felt the rough bark scrape against your palms. The pain was sharp but didn't last long as you wiped the blood on your clothes, focusing on the task at hand. You had become a woman of the forest.
You picked up the axe, its weight heavy in your hands. Hoisting it above your head, you struggled to keep it steady. With a deep breath, you brought it down with all your might. The axe’s iron head split through the wood with a satisfying thunk, sending the splintered halves flying, making a metallic clang echo beneath one of the pieces as it hit the ground.
 Curious, you crouched down and peered underneath. To your astonishment, you discovered a hidden hatch covered by dirt and twigs. Your heart raced with excitement and curiosity. Dust clouded the air as you tugged the hatch open, revealing a narrow space underground.
You dropped to all fours and stuck your head down into the hatch, your breath mingling with the musty scent of hidden secrets. The space below was dimly lit by daylight filtering through the hatch, but even in the low light, you could make out the outline of a well-organized stash.
Inside, you found a collection of weapons—various blades and firearms neatly arranged and meticulously maintained. There were combat knives with polished handles, tactical pistols, and rifles of different calibres. Given Logan’s past military service, it made sense that he would keep a well-stocked arsenal on his property, even if it was hidden away for safety. Though it didn't seem completely out of the realm of expectations, the amount of weapons did make you question why he felt he needed that many. 
Had he needed to use them recently? 
Was he supplying a team or working alone? 
Even though you knew Logan was involved in violent organizations now, you still could not bring yourself to fear him. Your gut just kept on assuring you that he was a good guy and meant no harm to you. You also trusted his judgement, he had a kind heart and you were positive that if he were to hurt someone it would be for their good. 
With a final look at the hidden stash, you turned back to your woodpile, the task at hand feeling somehow more significant now. As you continued to chop the wood, your mind replayed the countless questions you now had for Logan upon his arrival. 
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Eight Weeks since your arrival:
You were rummaging through the cabin, searching for batteries for Logan's radio. The radio had become a comforting presence during your stay, its music, a soothing aid against the isolation and the creeping paranoia that sometimes cropped on you. The constant thought of being alone in the vast wilderness, with the constant worry of a wild animal breaking through the door, made the staticky tunes a necessity for your sanity.
After scouring every possible location, you were down to your last hope—the top shelf of Logan’s closet. Balancing on your tiptoes, you stretched your arm up, hoping to feel the familiar shape of a battery package. Instead, your hand brushed against something sharp. You pulled your hand back quickly, wincing as you noticed a shard of glass embedded in your fingertip.
Curiosity got the better of you. 
Determined, you grabbed a kitchen chair and carefully positioned it beneath the closet shelf. You climbed onto the chair and reached up again, this time with more caution, and found the source of the sharp sensation—a broken picture frame.
Carefully, you lifted the frame and inspected it, noticing the fragments of glass that had scattered around. You set the frame gently on the floor, making sure not to cut yourself further, and turned it over to reveal the photograph behind the glass.
The picture was old and slightly faded, but it was clear enough to see the faces of those it depicted. Logan was in the center, surrounded by  X-Men members you recognized: Jean Grey, with her vibrant red hair; Cyclops, his visor unmistakable even in this casual setting; and Storm, her white hair flowing with almost ethereal grace. They were all posed together, their faces lit with genuine smiles and laughter, capturing a good, warm moment.
As you examined the photo, a wave of realization washed over you. You had heard of the X-Men in stories and legends, but you had never imagined Logan was connected to them, let alone be one of them. The presence of these iconic figures, the heroes you had only known through tales and news reports, was a clear indication that Logan was once part of something extraordinary.
This photograph was more than just a snapshot; it was a revelation of his identity. Logan was not just a lonely man with a mysterious past—he was a mutant, a member of the X-Men, a hero with a legacy that spanned beyond what you had ever understood. The contrast between the vibrant camaraderie of the photo and the isolated, battle-worn figure you knew was striking.
What in the world had led him to such loneliness and solitude? 
Why was the picture broken, had he done that to it? 
As you held the frame, you felt sympathy and awe. This discovery added a new layer of complexity to your understanding of him. These were the people who had shaped him, and it deepened your appreciation for them.
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You were fast asleep until the bedroom door creaked open, and your eyelids flew open in response.
Logan.
You turned over to turn on the lamp.
His complexion had deepened from the sun in Mexico, and his hair had grown out a bit, curling slightly at the nape of his neck. He looked down at you with tired eyes and a soft, relieved smile. You had fulfilled your promise and waited for him. 
"Logan," you rasped, your voice thick with sleep. You had been waiting for this moment for weeks.
"Hi, baby. Sorry I woke you," he whispered, approaching you and kneeling beside the bed. His hand reached out to brush some stray hairs away from your face, a tender gesture that made your heart swell.
You didn’t care about being woken up. Without hesitation, you threw your arms around him, pulling him into a tight embrace. He returned it with equal strength, his strong arms wrapping around you, holding you as if he might never let go. 
You inhaled deeply, taking in his scent—different, altered by time and distance, yet still undeniably him. His hand slid behind your head, fingers tangling in your hair as he cradled you against him.
"I missed you so much," you mumbled into his shirt, your voice muffled by the fabric but laced with raw emotion. You couldn’t bring yourself to loosen your grip on him.
"So did I, princess," he murmured, his voice thick with emotion. He gently nudged you back, signalling for you to look at him.
You met his hazel eyes with your own, now glistening with tears. He used his thumb to gently wipe away a tear that had escaped down your cheek before pulling you into a passionate kiss, one filled with longing and love. 
His lips claimed yours hungrily, his hands cupping your face, holding you in place as if to make up for all the lost time. You melted into him, surrendering to the moment, to the feel of his lips on yours, the taste of him, the warmth of his touch.
For the past two months, he had thought of you every single day, the memory of you his constant companion amid chaos. There were moments when he had considered abandoning everything just to return to you, but he knew the importance of his mission. He had told himself that if he could endure the pain, and the heartache of being away, he would be rewarded with the sweetest reunion.
His lips left yours and began to trail down your jaw, planting soft kisses along the way. He found the sensitive spot on your neck, and you couldn’t suppress the moan that escaped your lips. Your fingers instinctively gripped the back of his neck, holding him closer, wanting more. The sensation of his touch after so long sent chills down your spine, a reminder of the connection you shared. You tilted your head back, giving him full access, and his mouth left warm, wet trails on your skin as he explored further.
But then, without warning, he suddenly pulled away. You let out a small whine at the loss of his warmth, your eyes searching for his.
His gaze had dropped to your chest, his brows furrowed in concentration.
"Lo?" you asked softly, following his gaze. Then you saw it—the dog tags.
His fingers traced the ball chain with a calloused touch, the metal cool against your skin as he followed its curve. You felt a shiver run through you, not just from the contact but from the significance of the moment.
"I found them," you said quietly, placing your hand over his, pressing it to your chest, where your heartbeat had begun to race. "I had no clue that you had served... You know, I learned a lot about you while you were gone."
He didn’t respond immediately, just kept his eyes down, focused on your hands entwined over the dog tags.
"What did you learn?" he finally asked, his voice barely above a whisper.
"I know who you are, Logan... I know what you are, and I'm not scared," you said, your voice trembling with sincerity.
 "I have an idea of what you were doing down in Mexico, and I know you have the best intentions at heart. I trust you and your judgment. So, if you had to... hurt people... there, I know it’s because they deserved it. I'm not going anywhere, Logan. I'm just happy you're back and safe."
He looked up at you, his eyes searching yours. "You sure?" he asked, his voice filled with a vulnerability that took you by surprise.
You nodded, your eyes locking onto his with unwavering determination.
 "I'm sure. You're home now, and that's all that matters to me. I'm all yours," You pulled him in for another kiss. 
Logan's fire lit within him: you were all his. 
He matched your energy once more, feeding the primal hunger that had been eating at him all this time.  Your lips locked and tongues trailed on top of each other in ecstasy. You sucked his bottom lip between your teeth before biting down on it gently as he had taught you. He groaned in your mouth, gripping your hips tightly, his nails dug into your sides. 
"Lay down baby," He mumbled against your lips. You obliged, letting your back fall on the mattress, Logan hovered over you, taking in the sight of your body. His eyes trailed up and down, savouring every inch of your body for his memory. 
"You're so fucking pretty," He cooed resuming his place on your neck. You flinched from the sudden stimulation, a surprised moan escaping your lips. 
He licked his way down to the neckline of your shirt, you gripped the sheets behind you as the excitement built in your lower abdomen. 
With a swift, almost imperceptible movement, Logan extended his arm, and you heard a metallic *snikt* as his claws slid out from between his knuckles. The room, which had been filled with the warmth of your reunion, now hummed with a different kind of energy—something raw and vulnerable.
You stared, wide-eyed, as the three gleaming metal blades emerged from his hand, each one impossibly sharp and perfectly aligned. They reflected the dim light in the room, casting slender, shimmering lines across the walls.
For a moment, you could do nothing but observe them in stunned amazement. This was the ability, the weapon that had been a part of him for so long, and he was sharing it with you; how special.
You reached out, almost instinctively, your fingers trembling as they hovered near the metal. Logan's eyes met yours, searching for any sign of fear or hesitation. But you felt none. Instead, there was a deep curiosity, a need to understand this part of him.
Gently, you let your fingers brush against the surface of one of the blades. The metal was cold and smooth, the edges impossibly sharp. You marvelled at how something so deadly could be a part of the man you loved. It was hard to wrap your mind around it—how could flesh and bone give rise to something so unnatural, so extraordinary?
"They're beautiful," You hummed in delight, looking up at him with the warmest smile. 
"You're something else, aren't you?" He sighed relieved.
With a swift movement, he cut your shirt down the middle, your breasts falling out. 
"Logan-" You gasped in surprise, his smile turned dark as he retracted the claws back inside. 
"Was in my way," He smirked, dropping his face to your chest and sucking one of your nipples in his mouth. His free hand immediately finds your other one, palming your flesh, toying with your sensitive nipples with his fingers. You moan loudly, arching your back into his skilled maneuvers. It felt amazing but you needed more. More touch. More friction. More Logan. 
With a distinctive pop, he releases your nipple from his grasp.
"Please," You breathed needily. You were feeling yourself getting wetter by the moment.
He admired you from below; how your hand was gripped in the sheets over your head, how your eyelids were just barely open with lust. He kissed his way down from your breasts to your stomach, leaving a few of his marks on your body. Gentle ones of course. 
“I'm going to make you feel good, okay sweetheart?” Logan soothes, pulling down the pyjama pants down your legs with ease. You helped him remove them frantically, knowing what was about to happen next.
 “Okay, Lo-” He tosses the bottoms to the other side of the room and spreads your legs wide open for him.
“Fuck baby," He groaned as he admired your perfectly shaped core, already dripping and aching for him. 
He brought his hands to your folds, spreading them open with his thumbs. You twitched underneath his touch eager to feel some release. 
"Been thinking about doing this for a long time," He mumbled before diving face-first into you. His tongue made contact with your sensitive bud sending your back into an aggressive arch. He started slowly, licking long fat lines. You twitched at every flick of his tongue on your clit. 
He slid both of his hands to grip your thighs roughly, pushing them further open for him. He picks up his pace, moving his jaw faster against you. Your wetness drenched his face, dripping from his chin as he lapped rhythmically with his skilled tongue, applying just the right amount of pressure to inch you closer to your breaking point. 
"You taste just as good as the first time," He praised between breaths before sucking your clit into his mouth. His warm soft lips wrapped around it tightly as he pushed against it causing the most delicious friction. Your eyes roll into the back of your head at the sensation. 
You were already close, you hadn't touched yourself during his absence and even the slightest touch was sending you near the edge. 
Logan was growing painfully hard against his jeans, every whimper and moan that escaped your lips made the pressure increase. How he adored having you in his mouth, seeing you up close like this, tasting your sweet honey on his tongue while your intoxicating smell filled his senses. 
He gave a slite bite on your clit as he recalled you enjoyed that last time. With a fuck, your hands snapped to his hair, grabbing fistfuls. He grinned against you doing it again, as he pressed a finger against your entrance, slowly pushing his fingers inside. You gasped as he stretched you out. While keeping up his momentum with his tongue he began to pump his fingers with it. Both points of friction accelerated your rise to your orgasm.
You’re a whimpering mess underneath him, you try to mask the noise by biting down on the pillow.
 “Don't hold back, I want to hear those pretty noises you're making darlin', ” Logan praises, thrusting deeper inside, all the way to his knuckles. You release the material from your teeth, letting out a 'gonna cum logan,'
"Cum for me princess," He moans, high off of the pleasure of eating you out. He’s devouring you, his face buried between your thighs, his tongue circling your clit. He bites down again, pulling back his fingers outside of you, you moan at the sensation. He pulls his face away from your swollen clit and slaps his hand down on your core. 
Your hips buck in surprise and the slight sharpness of the pain tips you over the edge, before you know it you're rolling your eyes in the back of your head. Logan rubs his rough palm on your clit, helping you ride out your orgasm, he pulls you closer by your neck and kisses you aggressively. You wrap your arms around his back, pulling his body down so that his chest is flush with yours. “Need you inside,” you beg, lips against his. “Need you inside.”
Logan gets up and pulls his shirt over his shoulders, discarding it in some corner of the room. He drinks in the sight of your post-orgasm frame, trying to catch your breath as he fiddles with his belt. With a few clinking noises and a zip, he pushed his jeans down, his cock springing out aggressively. 
He returns to his position on the bed, between your legs. His lips come crashing down on yours as he strokes it a few times to ease the tension. "Are you sure, baby? It might be a little much for you, I'm more than happy with just eating you out." He locks eyes with you, looking for your approval.
You grin. "I'm yours, Logan, I'm sure." You pull him in for another kiss as he pushes the tip of his cock past your entrance. Your body jolts in surprise by the sheer size of it, but with every inch he goes deeper, the more you get used to him. You moan into his mouth as he works his way into you.
His lips are on yours, he’s plunging into you slowly, down to the hilt. “Fuck,” he groans, his cock throbbing inside you. “You're so fucking tight,” he murmurs, buried deep inside of you. “I might not last long,” He lets out a dry laugh before thrusting in and out.
Your hands find themselves gripping Logan's back muscles, grazing your nails across his skin. He groaned as the stinging sensation began to tingle. 
“Taking me so well,” Logan praises, ducking into your neck and sucking on it. He pumps along your walls, his hips snapping against yours. His pace picks up, thrusts becoming faster. Your entrance squeezed around his girth as he pounded deep inside you. 
"Fuck," He grunts between breaths.
He rams into you. Over and over, his sensitive tip enveloped you, warm and wet.
 “I'm so happy I'm yours,” you moan. " Always gonna be yours.” His cock twitches at your words. You watch as his abs flex, his muscles tightening and releasing with every thrust.
 The kisses on your neck became sloppy, and his thrusts were irregular. 
His cock twitches inside you again, throbbing against your walls. You know he's close because he's moaning and pulls away from your neck looking for your eyes. 
His muscles flex as he finds your face, and he throws his head back mindlessly pumping his warm hot seed inside of you. His hands softly stroking your thigh as he comes back to his senses.
With a few other pumps, he pulls out dropping next to you in the bed. He pulls you close keeping your head on his chest. You hear his heart hammering against his ribcage. 
"That was so-"
"Needed." He finished
"Yes, needed." You agreed, tracing circles against his chest as he caught his breath.
A moment of silence passed, and you both comfortably enjoyed each other's company.
As the quiet stretched between you, the soft hum of the night outside filtered into the room, making the moment feel even more serene. Logan’s heartbeat began to slow, and the steady rhythm beneath your fingertips was soothing. You felt completely at peace in his arms, as if the chaotic world beyond the four walls of the bedroom didn’t exist.
He shifted slightly, adjusting to pull you even closer, his chin resting on the top of your head. His hand drifted to your back, tracing lazy lines along your spine, the touch intimate and grounding. It was moments like this where words weren’t necessary. The connection between you spoke louder than anything you could say.
"You okay?" Logan murmured, breaking the silence in a voice so low it was barely above a whisper. His tone was soft, tender, almost as if he feared disturbing the quiet that had settled between you.
You nodded against his chest. "More than okay," you whispered back, your fingers continuing their idle patterns against his skin. "I’m happy you’re here. Really here."
His arms tightened around you in response. "I’m not going anywhere," he said, his voice carrying the weight of a promise, the kind he rarely made.
A content sigh escaped your lips as you nuzzled deeper into his embrace, the scent of him—familiar and grounding—filling your senses. His warmth enveloped you, lulling you into a state of complete relaxation. The world outside felt distant and irrelevant, and all that mattered was this moment, with him by your side.
As the minutes passed, you both drifted into a comfortable stillness, your breaths synchronizing, the only sound being the soft rustle of the sheets and the steady beat of Logan’s heart beneath your ear. This was all you needed—him, right here, with you.
As you closed your eyes, drifting on the edge of sleep, Logan’s hand gently tightened on your hip, and in a low, teasing murmur, he whispered, "Next time, I’m going to ravish you all over again."
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sorry it took so long, I started uni <3 love you guys and thank you for enjoying the Ravish series. hope yall request or stick around for more.
🏷️:@babucakes@landlockedmermaid77@theoraekenslover@loreniscrying@bpmiranda @rogueinmymind @lose1tall @2fatblunt @ltristessedureratoujours @th3mrskory @angelofthorr @strawberrylore
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guppybibi · 29 days
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ᯓᡣ𐭩 | How does the TF141 love? (as food!)
John Price loves like a plate of carbonara 𓐐
It's one of the most beloved Italian pasta dishes out there, just like how he loves you the most! It's a simple dish yet it's hard to perfect, but you learn not to make the same mistakes afterwards. That's what's so nice about it, it isn't perfect. It never is, but even that is something to be cherished. Some of the choices made are questionable to say the least but he doesn't question them any further, he was one of your choices after all. (i have no idea how this connects to carbonara but do u see my vision, the choices are like ingredients..) Spaghetti is the most common pasta to be used in carbonara, outshining the less frequently used rigatoni & bucatini. And who can blame them? It's a timeless classic, a staple. (Just like you two;3) Spaghetti was notably long as well before shorter lengths gained some popularity! You know what else is long? Your prosperous relationship together! (Let's not talk about the creamy sauce.)
Simon Riley loves like a box of chocolates 🍫
It's assorted too! White, milk, dark, name it all! It's no problem-o! It's a surprise in every bite, or swallow but please chew your food. It's a whole new experience every time, it's thrilling. It could be filled with delectable chocolatey sauce, oozing out once you take the first bite! It's sweetness overload, reminding you of the sweet moments you and him have together. Then, the next chocolate has..nuts! Yum, these are a teensy weensy harder to chew especially if you have the teeth of a grandma..Like how it was just a little bit hard to get Simon to open up, to let you in. But sometimes the chocolates disappoint and have a hollow inside :C
John MacTavish loves like a bucket of popcorn🍿
Corn was domesticated in Mexico, a memorable place for Johnny to say the least. A lot happened there..During the early years, it was popped by hand but as we can see now it's popped by machines. How is that significant? Well, it shows how your relationship evolves. It's being nurtured like a little baby by the two of you after all! It gets more efficient, the both of you doing your own part in smoothing the bumps along the road. It's often eaten at movie theaters and sporting events, and what do those places have in common with this man? One word, fun! (This or he could also be pop rocks to be honest idk)
Kyle Garrick loves like a bowl of strawberries 🍓
A strawberry flower averages 5-7 petals according to a website, if you do the 'he loves me, he loves me not' game–you'll always land on the love one! (He purposely takes out the ones with 6 petals, or he plucks them off individually.) Or if he doesn't have time to do all of that, you guys resort to 'he loves me, he loves me lots' because that's just the wholehearted truth! Though strawberries don't always taste as good as they seem, no? Especially if they're out of season, yuck! Again, there's always some sour ones in the batch, but it's no use crying about it. So, you and him just fix it!
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yeyinde · 2 years
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riptide | Simon "Ghost" Riley x f!Reader
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"Thought we lost you." His voice is a crackle; sap popping as it burns in the fire. The log charring in the kindling. There was a battle in his head; artillery fire in the gaps of his eyes. "Thought we— fuck, pet. Thought you were gone, and we couldn't do a damn thing about it." His knuckles graze the mark in your temple, gentle around the tight, irritated flesh—it's proof that you lived, that despite the tragedy of the betrayal from the man you counted on the most, you survived. You made it. You won His touch is featherlight. But his eyes– His eyes are heavy with the promise of nothing but ruin.
(it's like holding a lit cigarette to your pulse.)
part ii of in undertow
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tw: gratuitous smut; unfettered filth; gendered reader; f!reader; female anatomy; near death experiences, MAJOR spoilers for the game (seriously, if you haven’t played it are saving it for later, or you haven’t finished, maybe don’t read this yet); PINING; cigarettes after sex was listened to on repreat during the making of this; also, i had “THAT’LL DO!” and “AHUEVO” on a loop, y’all. blame that.
notes: whenever someone asks what “doing the most” means, feel free to point them to this. it’s 16K. fullstop. it was only supposed to be smut. this ended up more plot than porn. but i so wanted the pining; the ambiguity, the danger, the drama. (i mean, this has none of that, but i wanted it.)
i told my very Welsh dad i was in love with an English man, and he said how could you do this to me? and that is pretty much all you need to know about Welsh culture. 
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Porthmadog hasn't changed much at all since you last washed up on the sandy shores, one hand gripping the strap of your off-duty duffle bag, and the other clenched around your passport. Wound tight. Ready to flee. A constant state of fight or flight. 
The air is heady with the scent of the sea. Algae. Seaweed. Salt. Your lungs burn with the thickness of it. The sulphur sits in your throat, sticking to your larynx. It clicks when you swallow, refusing to budge. It curls behind your teeth when you suck the air in through parted, salt-chapped lips; the taste lingers in that strange microcosm of being both achingly nostalgic, and woefully foreign in the same breath. 
The streets, too, live there: a realm of vague memories flashing by as your feet tap against the cobblestone. Boots heavy with exhaustion, and jet lag. 
You're not ready to face it. Not yet. 
Head bowed, you stare at the quasi-familiar cracks on the sandstone, and wonder how everyone else is fairing right now. An hour after takeoff. Soap would have been dropped off, wouldn't he? Safe and sound in Edinburgh. 
You're both luckier than your American counterparts—the ones who have a full nine hours left to go. 
Bouncing from the Middle East to Europe is a blink. 
Europe to America is a whole ocean. 
You and Soap played rock, paper, scissors for who got to depart first. In the end, you won. Wales was closer, anyway. 
You left them behind with a heaviness that settled in your pericardium, compunction dipping in the valley of your pinched brow. 
A strange feeling leaks from the fissures. 
Ghost didn't depart. 
They didn't stop in England at all. Right to Wales, right to Scotland. America. Mexico. 
You try not to think about your prickly Lieutenant, but he flashes behind your eyelids, anyway. A bonfire in the dead of night. Tendrils of smoke drifting into the midnight blue aether. You're too close to the crackling flame. The heat scorches your skin. 
He, too, sits heavy in your chest. A spooled cluster of questions bereft of answers. An unknown chasm gaping below. What it all means–
You woke up when the interior lights of the jet flickered on a few rows ahead, the jaundiced glow rousing you from your slumber. Your temple rested on something warm. Firm, sturdy. You blinked into existence, the ghost of a breath on your lips; a passing dream now left behind to rot. A world, forever unattainable, dissolving into nothing. Sand on your fingertips.
The world knits back into the cold clutch of reality: you're on a plane, and–
And you find yourself staring at tightly woven black thread. A balaclava. 
Your eyes dart up. 
The pad in his hands bathes him in iridescent light. It casts shadows on his face, in the pocks of his mask, and illuminates the white of the artificial bones. The paint used is tinged blue, brushed with cyan where it meets the black. 
His lidded eyes crest low as he stares at the screen—a profile open on a man named Zyani stares back. Your eyes don't linger too long, pulled, instead, to the man you're leaning against. The coal under his eyes is smudged, nearly eroded away in the inner corners. You wonder if he rubbed them earlier, eyes gritty and heavy, but refusing to close. He won't sleep on the plane. He never does. 
You don't usually, either. 
Why didn't he wake you? Why did he let you stay? 
There is no time for discussion—not on a jet that reeks of testosterone with ears everywhere. It will have to wait; shelved for another time when Gaz isn't snoring a few pews away, and Soap hasn't been glancing at you in intervals since you sat down. 
Bonnie… you can almost hear him say. What are you doin'? 
You can hear the steady breaths he takes, the sound swells through you. 
It's the first time you've seen him so relaxed since–
Where are you going? Loose-limbed, one hand still wrapped around his softening cock, the other settles on the bend where your thigh meets the crease of your hip, fingers ghosting over the knob of your bone. His eyes are half moons. I didn't say I was finished with you yet, pet.
You shudder, a quiet breath leaving your lips. It draws his attention. His shoulder tenses under you. His head tilts just enough for him to slide his gaze from the screen balanced on his thick thighs to your open stare. 
His eyes are liquid. Honeyed words over smouldering charcoal. "Alright?"
Your lungs quiver with your inhale. Outside of the acrid smell of ammunition, ozone, and gunfire, he carries something musky in his scent. Driftwood. Salt—sweat, blood, the sea. It's potent. You breathe him in again, lids lowering. You hold his scent there, nestled in the gummy webbing of your lungs, dripping down your throat. 
Your eyes feel gritty when they slip shut. Anchors pull them down. You nod your head, slow and languid, murmuring your assent in a barely coherent mumble. The drag of his rough fatigues under your cheek, the straps of his tactical vest grinding into your cheekbone. And then—awareness. It startles you back into reality. Your eyes pop open, meeting the black pools above. 
You wish you could chisel open his head, and read whatever it is that might be lingering in those unfathomable depths. His expression is shuddered, hidden by the thick of his mask. Eyes lidded and heavy and narrowed right on you. 
Intense focus. 
Sometimes, the others talk about Ghost like he's a berserker. A wild, untamed beast let loose in the shadows. Even the vilest people pale when they see him—his larger-than-life frame lingering in the background—and it's fear that dances in the cut of their brow, in their shaking glare.
You heard stories, of course. 
Those always paled in comparison to seeing him on the field. 
You got it, then, why no one mocked him. Why even the worst of the worst never bothered with leading him around by the nose. 
He asked a question, and they answered. 
For a long while, you thought it was his heigh. His size. Immense power. Expert precision. 
But no. It's just him. Those eyes. His presence. 
He doesn't just receive attention, he commands it.  
You should move. You're awake, now. There is no reason for such intimacy with your Lieutenant, for a man more distant and unreachable than the sea. 
You should. 
But you don't. 
He's warm milk under your chin. Heat bleeds into your skin from the firm bracket of his body. Ghost smells good—sweat and timbre—and feels even better. You could sleep again like this. Lashes fan down, sleep digs into the back of your eyes. You force them open. 
Your fingers are tucked into the crook of his arm, pressed tight to his chest; there's a note of domesticity in the way he breathes with you, a palpable weight that falls on you like a thick quilt. His muscles jump. Body tense. 
Eyes on you. Always. 
But then they're gone. A flutter. They cut out to the pews, and you follow his gaze. Price wades closer. 
The bubble pops. You're clinging to your Lieutenant like it's a luxury you're allowed. 
Like it's something commonplace. 
There is distance in his eyes when they flicker to you. The molasses hardened into something once again unreachable. A wall now sits between you. 
(Maybe, that conversation will never come, after all.)
You should have known better than to let yourself want.
The air is crisp when you draw it in. The chill hurts your teeth. 
You slip your fingers out from the wedge of his arm and ribs, already mourning the loss of him under your flesh—ticking muscles coiled tight; velvet draped iron. Ghost says nothing when you move, but his gaze is heavy on you when you fold yourself back into your seat. Proper, now. Lieutenant and soldier. You press yourself as far away from him as you can until your arms dig into the plastic around the window, and sit straight—as if you weren't sleeping on his shoulder. 
As if he didn't let you. 
He looks away when Price takes the bench on the opposite side, offers a nod. 
Price echoes it. Flashes a tight smile your way. 
Then his eyes linger. Not on you. Not on Ghost. He rests his pensive gaze on the sliver of space between the two of you. Where Ghost's bulky arm takes several inches of space up on your own seat, flesh glued together, parting only at the elbows. He's too big to get away from. Takes up all the space—
(—in your lungs, in your head, in your—)
Price, mercifully, isn't the type of man to pry. His brows buoy on his head, a fleeting glance sent in Ghost's direction, and then he's all business. Astute leader. Battle-ready even on a sleepy jet.
He clears his throat. "Where are you headed?" 
It's for you. 
Gaz is going to America with the men you'd picked up for this mission. His offer for you to join was swiftly rejected. The invitations from the Mexican operatives, notably Alverez, to come and enjoy the coast were also rejected. 
"Is Soap going home?" You ask, hands fisting into balls on your lap. 
Price's smile is wan. "He is. Not joining Gaz on his American adventure."
"Misadventure, more like." Ghost's dry tone makes your toes curl. 
You can still hear the way he growled out pet.
You huff. "I'm…" 
There is nowhere for you to go. 
—Well. Nowhere else. 
(Your knees ache, chafed and raw. Pebbles dig into your skin.)
"Wales," you murmur. You hear the ruffle of fabric when Ghost dips his head to look at you. "Whatever is easier. I'll take a taxi."
"Right," Price nods. "Get some rest while you're home." 
It sounds like a dismissal. 
Baleen lines fill your periphery when you turn your head. Your gaze sticks to the crease where his chin meets his neck. You can't bring yourself to look up. 
"Better go fight it out with Soap." 
He doesn't stop you when you stand, when you squeeze past him, thighs brushing his knees. 
He says nothing at all when you depart. 
(Don't think about it. Don't get your hopes up—)
The town is silent save your heavy steps on the cobblestone. In the distance, the roar of the ocean crashes along the beige shore. 
Something inside of you begins to crumble. 
(Too late.)
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    The woman by the apartment block greets you warmly, but the words are a strange amalgam of vowels and consonants that do not belong together. Her accent sounds English. The words make no sense to you. 
Your bewilderment must show on your face. Her smile dips, a touch of laughter paints her words when she says, in English: 
Sorry, dove. I thought you were Welsh.
It feels a little bit like a slap to the wrist. Naughty child… mind your manners, and speak your tongue. 
"I'm not…," you murmur, chastised despite having done nothing wrong. 
Wales isn't where you came from. Here is not the place of your birth. It's a paradoxical realm: a land where you were taken to as a child, and told welcome home; all memories erased of the other times they said the exact same thing. A taboo, now. Faux pas. A fresh start (for the nth time). Welcome home. 
It's the place you stayed the longest, though. Your developing years from a child to a teenager, to a spiteful preadolescent with too much to prove, and an ocean to live up to. 
(You wonder if the pavement is still stained red.) 
You know Welsh. Have spoken it for years. You came, fresh-faced and chubby-cheeked, and the ladies cooed while they taught you the words. 
But it's buried. They are covered in dust; a forgotten relic. You remember pieces of the greeting, but your lips are no longer used to forming them. Your tongue is too heavy, too foreign. 
You say nothing at all, trailing off into a stifling silence. 
"Right," her brows knot, rheumy eyes regard you warily. "Do you need a hotel—?"
"I live here." 
You bend down, peeling the pristine welcome mat back, and fish out the key you keep tucked away. Years of training echo in the background; a firm voice rings out, one that sounds suspiciously like Ghost's, barking out how that's trouble. You'll come home to a world of hurt if you keep doin' that, soldier.
(You already do.)
You pull your duffle bag up when it slips, and nod at the bemused woman. 
It's not much of a homecoming. 
It never is. 
The flat you own is barren. A bed that feels too comfortable at night for you to ever truly relax on is shoved into the bedroom, a wardrobe with civilian clothes, a shoe rack in the foyer. A kitchen that's always empty. 
You mostly sleep on the worn, old couch where the springs dig into your shoulder blades, and remind you of that night you spent in Sierra Leone, belly full of yabeh. Ghost a hair's length away from you. His gloved hand brushing yours. 
The duffle bag falls to the tiles with a heavy thud. Your passport will go in the safe along with all of your other belongings—clearance badge, certificates, your guns—until the call comes in for your next mission. 
You hope it's soon. That Shepherd and Laswell trudge up some calamity that will take you far away from this place. A long-haul mission. The kind where you go deep into the trenches, and when you surface, it feels like an aeon has passed. 
It's too quiet at night. 
Your home reeks of dust. Disuse. 
You settle on the couch, eyes fixed on the popcorn ceiling, and pretend you can't feel his shoulder under your head even now. 
A world away, and you still think of him. 
(Always, always.)
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    Shepherd calls you weeks later. A secret mission with the Shadow Company, he tells you. When you ask about the others, his voice is tight. 
Just you, soldier. Just you. 
Breaking up the Task Force isn't unheard of. Ghost does so many secretive missions on his own that meeting people he worked with in the past on a group venture isn't at all a rarity anymore. Price is the same. Soap, sometimes, too. 
There isn't much else to do. 
(You held your phone in your hand each night for those weeks, finger hovering over the CALL button. Two letters— Lt— on the contact screen. His profile picture is a dune of sand.
It never rang. You never called.)
You give your affirmative, and go to the coordinates where his operatives will be waiting for you. 
"Show me what you got," he says, a challenge in his voice. 
Your grin is sharp. "Always, Actual." 
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    Phillip Graves meets you with a wide grin on his face. The American flag on his fatigues sticks out against the green. So used to the British flag, you can't stop your eyes from sliding down to it, drawn like a beacon. 
(Maybe, in a bygone era, it, too, might have been home.)
"Welcome aboard, soldier." His eyes flash in the setting sun. Eager. Heavy. You echo it in your own smile. "Let's get these son'of'a'bitches."
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    You're back at the bottom. 
The Shadow Operatives stare at you when they think you aren't looking. Low murmurs fill the jet— princess, chick, girl— and you gazed, pointedly, out the window. 
Your hands itch; the phantom scabs prickle. 
It makes you miss 141 more than you thought possible. Gaz, Price, Soap, Ghost. They flicker in your mind, and you wonder what they'd do in this situation. 
How would they prove themselves to everyone around them?
(Answer: they wouldn't.) 
The only one who isn't pushing you in a box is Graves. 
"Heard great things about you," his smile crests over his lips. Eyes hungry. Ready for battle. "Can't wait to see what you can do." 
He worked with Ghost a month ago. You find this out when he mentions it offhand. Secret mission with your Lieutenant. Is he always that much of an asshole—?
Actual is in your ear, stay alert. Keep your eyes out, always. Never know what you might miss.
But it's Ghost you think of. 
(Always, always.)
"He's not an asshole," you say, shrugging. "Just a man who cares too much." 
Almost immediately, you want to swallow the words back down. Stupid. Stupid. You force yourself to remain still, nonchalant. 
(How presumptuous of you to think you know him.)
Military likes to gossip. It'll come back to him somehow. The little rookie who stuck up for him. Who said he cared.
Graves' eyes flicker. "That right?"
You blush. English is gone. The only language in your throat is Welsh. 
(Graves' guffaw echoes in the jet.)
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    Graves purses his lips, rolling them from side to side, as you sift through the documents in front of you. He's been pacing the room for the last ten minutes while you meticulously translate each paper in your grasp. Agitation bleeds through the usual warmth in his countenance. 
It's tense. A slaughter. 
His compatriots flank all of the exits; sounds of gunfire resound through the compound. 
The infiltration was easy. 
This—
This is not. 
"So…," he drawls, the thick accent is warm, but his voice is constricted; pinched. "Heard you were the best at sniffing things out. What do you think?"
"It's not—," you pause, eyes skimming the page, squinting at it. 
"What?"
His tone is sharp. Icy. The usual warmth dissipates into a palpable tension; a tight unease. 
The shift is strange. Focus on the mission.
"It's not just Konni in this. They're being backed." 
"That so?" 
You suck in a deep breath. "We should leave. Tell Actual what's going on–"
"Yeah," he intones, crouching down in front of you. His eyes are placid. "We'll do just that."
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    It all happens so fast. A clichè, really, but a fitting one. 
Head turned out the window of the cargo van, deadly missiles being dragged behind. Your mind is full, racing. Nothing makes sense. 
You wish Ghost was here. Price. Soap. They're the ones you use to bounce ideas off of: this is what is happening, this is the missing equation, and this is what I think. 
Good, bonnie. Now, tell us something we don't know. 
And what if the equation is wrong?
Crafty, soldier. How do we prove it? 
And then the world shatters. 
Konni Operates. A gun to your head. Graves yelling in the distance; spitting curses, threats. Actual in your ear— you'll die here, soldier. 
Chaos. Death presses cold metal to your forehead, snapped words in rapid-fire Russian, too fast for you to pick up. 
The only ones that leak through are oozing glee. I'm going to blow your head off.
A dead-end. You think of Gaz—the closest to you in age, passing jokes back and forth; playing Never Have I Ever when the missions lull, the others looking on with amusement. 
Kids these days, they scoff.
Have you seen this video? He asks, dropping into the vacant seat beside you. Ghost looks up. It's a club in London. 
Soap huffing when you ask if he wants to come. Too old for that, bonnie.
You kids have fun, Price says, lips twitching. A rare show of amusement from the man. But I'll have to pass.
What if we went to a pub instead, you geezer? You chuckle. 
Geezer? He nudges Ghost to his left, eyes dry. You've been rubbing off on the kids. 
You meet his stare over the plastic table. Smile turns shy. Wanna come with us, Lt?
He holds it. Halfmoon. Eclipse. Liquid black. Negative, soldier. 
You try not to let the sting of rejection show. It's stupid. Stupid—
Nice one, kid.
Y'did good, bonnie.
Let's show these old boys what us kids can do, yeah?
Their voices echo in your mind. One rings louder than the others. A sharp bark. Gravel shattering. Move, soldier!
You're a dutiful soldier. You never disobey a command from your superior officer. From him.
White-hot pain splits across your temple. The world turns static. You're falling down, down, down—
Waves lap at your body, tugging you out to sea. The briny water fills your throat. 
Stay alert, soldier. The General. Voices. 
"Well, shit." Graves. He sounds distant. Far away. 
You think of Sierra Leone. Your first mission. 
Hiding in a concrete house with no windows, no doors, no cover. Gunfire booming across the landscape, cloaked in the pitch black darkness of night. Flickers of yellow-red light pop in the distance. 
You don't breathe. Don't make a sound. Your hands tremble around your rifle. Eyes wavering. 
Warmth against your back. You startle. A gloved hand over your mouth. The brush of a balaclava against your neck. 
"Easy, soldier. They'll see you if you jump." 
They'll see you—
"They dead?" A boot knocks against your calf. 
You go limp. 
"Yeah," Graves. Companion. Comrade. Be careful who you trust, soldier. All you have right now is yourself. Trust your gut; you're on your own. 
Copper on your tongue. You let it pool between your teeth, keeping it held in the space between your lips. It tastes of pennies. You try not to choke.
Sir… you whisper the words against his tactical vest. Feel the shift of his body when he looks at you from over his shoulder. Let's get yabeh after this. 
We're not on holiday, soldier. 
Really? Feels like one. 
You need to get out more. 
Yeah… maybe…
C'mon, now. Stay with me, pet. 
Always… sir. Always…
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    You drag him to someplace you'd heard of through your new friends–best yabeh in all of Salone; gotta try the Jollof, too, Sesay insists–and he fits in like a sore thumb. 
You both stand out, really. Foreigners in the middle of a place visited only by locals. Him in his denim trousers, and short-sleeved shirt, tactical vest fixed on his chest; his mask stays on. A ball cap low over his brow. He exudes danger. The rippling musculature of a tiger. The stealth of a panther. 
You—nondescript and tiny beside him. 
There is something to be said about seeing your new Lieutenant in denim. In the custom facemask instead of the full balaclava. 
With the baleen lines missing over his chin and neck, he almost feels too exposed to you. Too vulnerable. Too open. 
You can't stop fixing your gaze on the scant flesh, uncovered, above the collar of his shirt. His arms, bulky, and big, fold over his massive chest. 
He barely fits inside the small booth. 
Your eyes dance. Amusement. A roseate veil shudders over you—a novice, a rookie—and high off of the success of a mission. 
"Sesay says this is the best place in town."
"Sesay says a lot of things, don't he?" 
You blink, fingers tapping against the worn wood of the table. It's hot in Sierra Leone. A wet swelter that brands your skin with white-hot intensity. It's different from the dryness of the Sahara. 
Somehow, his tone is drier than the arid desert you crawled out of. Drier than the burning heat of the massive sun. 
"That he does…," you agree, floundering. 
Was this a mistake? Maybe you shouldn't have come here. What were you thinking? Dragging your superior out for dinner. You flush. It's barely discernable from the blistering sunburn over the bridge of your nose. Unfamiliar with the intense sun that scorches the land. 
You're drowning, now. Wallowing in this limbo of uncertainty. Maybe you should have just come later with Sesay and Abdul. They asked you when you pestered for directions, but you met Ghost's stare from over their shoulders, and hadn't heard a thing of what they were saying once you met him in the middle.
He's a whole head taller than everyone he meets. Massive. The locals' baulk at him: this huge, terrifying being with a skull on his face, cutting through the throng of people like a tank. 
There was so much going on once you started the mission. After the Intel was gathered, and the forces were ready, those long nights spent inside a tent that was barely big enough for yourself let alone the behemoth bulk of your Lieutenant came to an end. It was abrupt. Sudden.
It was just you and him. 
And then it was a sea of people. 
You'd spent the better part of a year pouring over documents in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by Scorpions and sand, and him. 
The tent was deadly during the day; balmy with a humidity fit for the Amazon. At night, any complaints you might have had about the heat turned into regrets. It was freezing. You could see white clouds of condensation when you breathed out. 
You'd lie next to each other. Grains of sand is the only thing keeping you apart. He was warm—bonfire hot. 
You'll be frustrated, mad. That's normal when you spend so much time with a stranger. You might argue, bicker. But just focus on the mission. This is a test of camaraderie as much as it is endurance. 
It wasn't like that at all. It was—
Seamless. 
His ebb and flow were easy to adjust to. Maybe, it was the fact that you were a neophyte that made it so. Too afraid to let the bundle of frustration rear when this was your first mission. Your first test. 
But—
It wasn't quite like that. You found that you enjoyed his company. His barbed insults spoken in a flat, serious tone often flew over the heads of the men you had to work with, but you grew accustomed to them. Enjoyed them, even. He was—
An enigma. A year later, and you know nothing about Simon Riley, and as much as he'll allow about Ghost. There is distance still, but; 
It wanes. It cracks. Fills with the sharpness of his sarcasm, the stoic dedication to his mission; the grains of sand that stick to his sweat-slicked forehead. The deep hue of red from the mask he refuses to take off. 
You'll suffocate, you quip, eyes glued to the paper in front of you. 
Don't worry about me.
That's a silly thing to say… 
It ain't. You shouldn't. 
Mindless, stupid: well, I do. 
Silence. Brutal and stifling. Then: focus on the mission, Rookie. Not on me. 
You'd hummed noncommittally. It slipped into the back of your head, eyes fixed on the numbers in front of you. 
But it wells, now. When Sesay asks if you want to go with him for dinner, when he tells you how to get there, and what to order. 
Not on me.
Your eyes haven't left his. He holds your stare. 
The chossy wobbles, cracks. Your hand on his arm. C'mon, boss, let's eat. It stays there while you lead him through winding valleys. The heat of his arm—bare, veins ticking under your palm, too burly for you to wrap your whole hand around the thick of him—bleeds into you. You, cold-blooded, leach the warmth from his flesh.
And now—
He doesn't eat when dinner is brought out. Doesn't take his mask off. 
You watch him through the steam that wafts off the Jollof rice, his eyes roaming around the room like clockwork, looking for something that might strike. Hyper-vigilant. Wary. Cold. Distant. 
A puzzle not meant to be put together, but your fingers itch with the urge to try. 
Why did he come, you wonder. Why didn't he say no? 
As if hearing your thoughts, his eyes are on yours. Tendrils of translucent white fog the air between you. His brow pinches. Lids crest. 
It punches the air from your lungs. There is a phantom heat in your palm. Your hands shake around the fufu in your grasp, tightening around the tacky food until it bulges between your fingers. 
The syphoned heat begins to simmer in your belly. 
It bubbles over, blustering through your insides when his head pulls close, chin over the table, and says:
You did good, rookie. Might make a soldier of you, yet. 
You bow your head. "Cachu hwch."
"English, soldier." 
You shake your head. "N-nothing, sir… burnt my tongue."
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    You wake up in an empty hospital room. It was early August when you left for Al Mazrah. The calendar on your wall says it's now late September. 
The space in between is a blur. Left in the mud. Graves was taken. Was he okay–
You don't remember anything after the point of passing out in the mud, and waking up—sick from infection, burning from a fever—and finding yourself strapped down on a jet. Medics surround you. 
You'll be okay, you'll be fine–
You'd passed out again. The world slipping away until you felt the heat on your shoulder blades. The scent of yabeh thick in your nose. 
You move, sluggish and heavy, on the rough hospital bed, fingers gripping the sheets below. 
You still feel the grit of sand against your arm. 
Heat in your belly. 
(Cachu hwch, indeed.)
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    Shepherd calls you a day later on the phone in your private room. Your prison. The men outside say you're not allowed to leave. It's dangerous. 
"Did good out there, rookie."
"Thanks, Actual," you murmur, hands clenched around the receiver. "Couldn't have done it without your help. Without you." 
You want to ask about Graves. About your team. 
You remember the rapid Russian spat in your ear. And this one? You bite your tongue, body pickling with unease. 
"Rest up, now. My boys will be keeping an eye on you. They'll keep you safe."
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      You are discharged at the end of October. 
Hands pressed against the still-healing scar on your temple. They peeled the bandage off yesterday. 
The infection made it worse. It wasn't healing with the sickness you had. You're lucky some local boys found you in the mud when they did. You would have died. 
Laswell finds you outside. Hand against her throat, eyes wide.
She looks like she's seen a ghost. 
You certainly feel like one. 
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    The ride to your safehouse is punctuated by a game of catch-up. She tells you about the mission they went on, the one you were exempt from. 
The phone calls from Soap, Gaz make sense now. Straight to voicemail. 
Hey, you skimpin' out on us, yeah? Skippin' duty? Not like you at all. Kinda worried, y'know? Text me somethin'. You know I don't like callin'. Anyway… we're keepin' it together, yeah? But kinda freakin' out. Uhh… anyway—
Not like you to miss one, bonnie. Call me when you can, aye? Want to make sure you're okay. 
Price calls nine times. Leaves no voicemail. 
A single text from Ghost. Wheels up at 16:00. Expect to see you there. 
You didn't get your phone back until today. These were sent at the end of October. 
The clock on your screen reads 2nd November.
"No one knew…," you murmur, hands clenched around the metal. "Why didn't Shepherd—"
"Shepherd said you were sent on recon. Said something happened. He didn't tell the others—just me and Price. Didn't want to distract them from the job." 
"When did you find out?"
"That you were alive?" Her lips thinned, skin paling. "Yesterday." 
"Where are they now?"
"That's confidential." 
A scoff. "Sure. Now, off the record…"
"Mexico." 
Something doesn't feel right at all. It sits like an anvil in your stomach. 
"Laswell…" 
"Get some rest," she says, even. Her eyes are glossy when she stares at you. "We'll keep you updated. I'm sure everyone will be relieved to know you're alive."
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    Your phone rings two days later. 
The screen flashes. Lt.
Your hands tremble when you answer it. 
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    "It was Shepherd," he admits. 
Your head swims with the admission. Shepherd. Did good out there, rookie. Now, stay good. Stay alert. Keep your eyes out, always. Never know what you might miss.
"Is he–?"
"No," he grouses, the word a sliver short of being a growl. "He's alive. Graves is dead."
It hits you in the sternum—a punch unlike any other you'd received. Air knocked from your lungs, chest throbbing in agony, you sink down into your bed, fingers gripping the sheets until your knuckles bleach white. 
This shouldn't have happened. 
This is what you do. It's your purpose. It's your job. Your role. You were selected by Shepherd, by Laswell, Price for that, for your ability to gather information, to weed out the moles, the rats. To sniff them out, and puncture holes in their ship until they sank to the bottom, secrets leaking out. 
The words roll out of your mouth before you stop them. 
"I should have been there." 
The tremulous quiver makes you wince. Weakness. You're not weak. You're not—
Ghost won't see it as such, you know this; he doesn't really react to the harsh emotions of others. He carries an unwavering focus, rapt attention to the overarching mission, the end goal; pragmatic, astute on the battlefield, he doesn't flinch. 
It's a toss-up if he'll ever respond. If he does, it's usually with a dry, biting dismissal. Sarcasm with him often rides the line of being too sincere, and too flat. It's not just murky, but opaque. He'll say something—equal parts scathing and wise: it's already done, no sense dwelling on what you can't change. Do better next time. 
The bite in his words hurt; it was enough to make even the most impassive man irritated by the blunt, almost cruel tinge to his tone. 
But it's later when the message will unravel itself. When you're lying alone in your cot, picking over the things he said, and why he said them, and then—
Oh.
Do better next time. 
Right. 
A soft sound. The rush of air being inhaled through clenched teeth.
Then: "I'm glad you weren't." 
Silence. Your heart thunders. I'm glad you weren't.
It could mean a lot of things. A lot of bad things, but:
He thought you were either dead, or missing, or just—gone. You get it:
The last job didn't kill you—the evidence stacks in your head; one conclusion drawn: 
It should have. It was meant to. 
Your brush with death was a footnote. Nothing at all in the grand scheme of things. 
They wanted you dead. They failed. 
Soap called you last night, voice tight. You good, bonnie?
Getting there, you joked. Actual had my back. Graves, too. I'm alive because of them.
You choke. 
"You alright?"
It's on the tip of your tongue to say yeah. The usual response. Practised. Easy. Distant. But you think of his words, and your ears ring with the deep husk of his voice. He was honest with you. Open. And that's—
Your words are a rush, dipped in vulnerability. "I don't want to be alone right now." 
Too much. Too honest. 
Too open. 
You flinch. Heart thudding in your throat. 
Ghost makes you feel like an exposed wire. Dangerous. Unpredictable. Raw. 
He says your name—a low, brassy rasp that tickles the back of your neck. It's rare for him to call you by your given name. It's much too intimate. Too—
Well. It's just too much. You want to lean into it, to drape yourself in the rich utterance. Have it whispered into your ear late at night, while he fucks into you the same way he bucked into his hand. 
And in the morning when he first wakes. When he rolls over, body folding over your own. Lips against the shell of your ear. A husky rasp; the word dragged over gravel. 
You want it, want him, in ways that are unattainable. 
Domestic. 
You gasp. "I–um. Thanks," you fumble over your words, head roaring with the realisation that there is more than just attraction in the way your heart flutters in your chest; the downy soft wings of a small bird ruffling its fresh plumage. "I'll… talk later." 
Your name is barked through the phone when you pull it away. It's cut off before he can finish. 
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    They video call you from some pub. 
The sight of them together—Gaz, Soap, Price, Laswell, Ghost—makes you smile. 
"Christ, bonnie." Soap's eyes are fixed on the line near your temple. Scabbed. Plum colour. Healing, but not yet there. An inch over, and you'd have been—
You flinch, shrugging. "Could be worse–"
"What happened?" It's a command. You try not to tremble at the bark in Ghost's tone. Perhaps Laswell didn't tell them everything. 
His eyes are wide, the whites cresting over the puddles of black. You can't match his stare. You drop, darting to the clock in the corner. 
It's Laswell who tells them about the mission with the Shadow Company. Graves. Shepherd. 
"...Fuckin', aye." Gaz murmurs. He echoes Ghost's question. "What happened? No one told us anything. We thought— and then Shepherd said you were out for the mission. Not that—that you'd been— " 
It falls silent. They don't know about the mission's end aside from Shepherd's lies. Laswell knows. She was the first face you saw in the hospital. 
Let's talk… 
"We were ambushed," you start, shrugging again. Blasé. Nonchalant. You pretend you can't feel the intensity of Ghost's stare through the screen. "I… they were going to shoot me. I got away. Got a scratch—," a scoff from Soap, a murmur of more than a scratch, aye; you ignore it. "They thought I was dead, so they left me there…"
There is more to it. Graves. The whispers in your head. Them, in your final moments. Agents outside your hospital door. Two inches from death. A day away from rotting. 
You swallow it down. It doesn't matter. It happened and now it's over. 
"Bonnie…," there is something raw in Soap's voice. It pricks your pericardium. 
Left for dead. Abandoned by everyone around you. The ones you trusted the most. Your own team didn't even look. Had no time to mourn, no time to worry. 
You know what they must see; the lines they must be drawing. How they, themselves, currently feel, and what they would do if it were them instead of you. It—
It hurts. 
"I'd have joined you at the pub," you murmur, voice a shaky worble, before he can say anything else. "But–," you lift your head, eyes downcast. A facsimile of a smile flickers. You wonder if it hits the mark. "Maybe next time." 
Price nods in your periphery. "Listen—"
"I'll be ready for Makarov," you interrupt. "I'm… I gotta go, though. Am I — can I be dismissed?" 
"...Yeah, yeah you can."
You hang up without another word. 
In the silence of your flat—in a land more foreign to you than the Sahara—you break. 
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    Your night dissolves into a series of firsts in quick succession:
A knock on your door. No one knows that you live here. No one but Laswell when she dropped you off. The rheumy-eyed lady with knobby knuckles who mutters at you in warm Welsh. Words you pretend you can't understand. 
Shepherd, too, because he needed a location to put down on paper. A place to find you if they couldn't get a hold of you.
You think it might be him—back for vengeance—and you hold your pistol in your hands, back pressed flat against the wall. One hand drops the brass doorknob. 
"Who is it?" 
A beat. 
"It's me." A thick baritone—enough, you think, pulse racing, to rattle the door with his voice alone. "It's Simon." 
Simon. Not Ghost—
Right. Off-duty, now. Until you get a lead on Makarov. 
Your Lieutenant knocking on your door at—gritty eyes flicker to the stovetop in the kitchen—quarter to five in the evening is another first. Almost paradoxical, really. 
Gun shoved into the holster, you turn to face the wood. Through the little window above, covered by a paper-thin curtain, you can see the dark shape of him, unmoving, as he stands on your porch. 
There are a number of reasons why he'd be here, but only one makes you yearn. 
You pull the door open, and the sight of him makes you dizzy. Hypoxia. Seasickness. Homesick. 
He's dressed as casually as Simon is capable of. Black hoodie, wet on the hood from the snow that falls in clumps outside. A black beanie on his head. Skull mask flat against the bridge of his nose. Denim. Black boots. 
The coal around his eyes is smudged. A nebula of pale skin through a black oasis. 
"What—?"
"Shepherd." Right. He could have called. Got the Intel from Laswell. His words leave no room for argument when he lets out an amalgam of a snarl, a growl; it's ground to dust when he says: "we need to talk."
"Not—," you don't want him to see the emptiness inside. The vacancy. Militaristically barren. Lonely. "Not here…" 
Shepherd was here, too. Not him, specifically—maybe. You don't know for certain. But his agents, definitely. Polluting the inside.
It's a flimsy excuse. You hear the threadbare conviction in your tone. 
"Shepherd was here," you say, and then wince. "Not now, I mean—"
The words die on your tongue. Ghost— Simon —is smart. Of course he wouldn't think Shepherd was here now. He'd fled. Went into hiding. You shift on your feet. 
He can read you like no one else. 
(You wonder if anyone at all can read him.)
You flounder. "I don't want…not here…"
"Where do you want to go?"
Somewhere stiflingly hot. "Anywhere." 
Simon doesn't press. He never does. His head rolls, tips toward the street. "C'mon, then. Get your stuff."
He reads it on your face, in the things you don't say. It reminds you of Sierra Leone— eat, rookie, you haven't all day; get some sleep, you're dead on your feet; I'll take the first watch— and the memory clots behind your ribs. 
"Okay," you murmur. 
You feel his gaze on your back when you turn around. The door is left open. He doesn't follow. 
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    There is a chill in the air when you step outside, bundled up in a knit sweater that does little to stem the frigid sea breeze from cutting through the cracks in the threaded cable. 
It's a cold night in Porthmadog. 
Snow falls in clumps from the indigo-smeared sky, sticking to the cobblestone under your feet. 
Simon says nothing as you walk out of the apartment block. He stays close to you, so close you could inch your elbow out and touch him. The heat from his body is a beacon. You're at war with yourself, struggling not to get pulled into his current, and swept out to sea. 
Despite the closeness, there is a distance in the way he paces. Eyes roaming under the hood, taking in the lights strewn overhead, lingering on the alcoves where someone might hide. 
Having him here feels a little surreal. Porthmadog is off-limits to everyone—it's a place where you come to rot. 
His presence shatters the sense that it doesn't really exist outside of those long nights when you stare up at the ceiling, and want. A metaphysical realm that laps at the cracks inside of you, eroding the thick veneer you cobbled together over the years until it withers away, and you have to patch it up when you get called in for another assignment. 
Intact soldier. Whole. Nile. 
It's a place, now. Real. Tangible. 
Seeing Simon—Ghost, Lt—walk beside you down Lombard Street, footfalls echoing through the winding road, makes something churn in your guts. It sits inside, and feels a little like finality. 
How could you possibly come back to a place you pretend doesn't exist? A place that is just en-route to wherever else you have to go? 
A place you come to because you have nowhere else. 
You can't come back here now that the streets are tainted with the nitroglycerin scent of Simon. A bonfire on the beach. The burning logs doused in kerosene. The miasma will suffocate you. 
It clots inside of your lungs, sticking to the gummy lining when you breathe him in. 
He smells of bourbon. Cigarettes. Carries the scent of everyone else with him—Gaz's cologne: thick vetiver; the sickly sweet tang of Price's cigars; thick metallic: ozone and gasoline that Soap wears after a mission—and you greedily take it in. 
You let it sit, red-hot barbed wire, against your chest. 
Your eyes slip. Illegal. Wrong. They find him, always. Bathed in the streetlight above; flushed yellow. It casts shadows on him, and makes his eyes look lighter. 
A peaking shoal in the middle of the midnight blue ocean. 
He's dangerous. Makes your fingers prickle with want; with the urge to touch.
Makes you greedy. 
Stupid. 
Despite not knowing the area, Simon cuts through the supine street like he's familiar with it already. Maybe, he is. He must have looked at the map on his phone before he got here, eyes locked on the space, the landscape. Mentally cataloguing each hiding spot. 
You follow him—a stranger in your own home—and cross your arms over your chest when the thick chatter carries from inside the shops along the street. Heavy Welsh. Warm milk and honey. 
Salt in your wounds. 
You don't belong here.
The familiar green of the carpet and flooring shop nearly makes you trip, but you steady yourself. Ball your hands into fists by your side, and drop your gaze to the cracked ground below. 
You can feel the moment his gaze shifts, sliding over to you. It bores into your temple; abrasive, and grating. 
Goosebumps erupt over your flesh. You blame it all on the cold—the stutter in your chest, the ache in your lungs, the shiver dancing down your spine. The frigid weather. The icy breeze. 
Another shiver rolls through you, different this time, when you catch sight of the park. 
Your chin hits the pavement. Palms sliding through jagged gravel. Knees splitting. 
Your blood puddles on the grey rocks. 
They crack you open. Nothing spills from the gaping hole. 
"You with me?" 
You blink. The reverie shakes, shudders. The little girl with her chin on the ground warbles. 
Simon stands there, his back to the streetlights. His presence makes the image distort, and bend to fit him inside. It doesn't belong. 
"What's a'matter with you?" 
You flinch at his voice, and peer up at him from under clumpy, wet lashes, heavy with melting snow. 
The words are harsh, but his tone is—
He steps forward, a few paces ahead. You didn't realise you stopped. 
He doesn't come to a halt until there is barely an arm's length of space between you, and seeing him this close to you, his face concealed, blank and empty, has that strange feeling pooling in the pit of your stomach again. 
His lashes are blond. It surprises you. You'd always imagined he had black hair. Black hair, black eyes. 
It's blonde. 
You don't know why it matters, why you can't stop staring at the soft wisps around his lids. They flutter shut, fanning across the smudged ink skin under his eyes. The tips are blond. The bottoms are ash. They're nice, you note, a flavour of that same something blistering through you. 
His lids slide open, the corner tightening as his gaze sharpens, focusing on you. "Y'alright?" He asks again, waiting for an answer. 
You swallow, and it tastes of sand. Gritty, and painful when it slips down your throat. Your voice is a rasp, a shiver above a whisper, when you say, "yeah. "
His eyes tighten again, deeper this time. Something flashes in those polychrome depths. Under the hat, his brow pulls taut together. 
The indent makes your fingers itch, the urge to reach out, to soothe it, is nearly overwhelming. 
"You lyin' to me?" He grumbles, an edge to his voice you can't place. 
"No," you mutter, the words dragged out of you by force. "Just a —a headache." 
He has a look in his eyes that makes you think he knows, somehow. That he can chisel inside your head, and rummage through all the secrets you try to keep. 
Your neck aches from having to tip your chin back so much to even look at him, the 90-degree angle making you feel dizzy. The opposite of vertigo where you sometimes look up at the unending sky yawning overhead and feel that tendril of fear curling around you, admixing the awe, until you feel the urge to dig your fingers into the ground, and hold on. You can't fall up, but in those moments, it almost feels like you might. 
Ghost gives you that same feeling. 
His chin dips low, eyes lidded and heavy. You could almost mistake it for bland disinterest had his jaws not been working, gnashing together in a wordless tick. He says nothing. You watch the bones move. The fabric teeth snap. 
All his focus is centred on the blood-red gash near your temple. The black sutures keeping the split skin together. 
Ghost makes a sound, and you almost mistake it for a growl. Inhumane. Animal. It's pulled from his throat, but bitten off by his teeth before it can take shape. 
You blink up at him, wide and owlish, when he reaches for you. 
His hand is warm even through the glove. The rough fabric grazes your skin when he brushes your hair away with his knuckle. His eyes are fixed on your forehead, hardened, all militaristic concentration as he looks you over. 
"It's—it's fine…" 
"It ain't." 
Gritty sandpaper. Harsh, abrading. 
It's hushed, though. 
Speaking above a whisper feels taboo. This whole thing does, honestly. Illicit, wrong. Ghost shouldn't be lasering his glare on your forehead, searching for a reason to do something about the anger that now brims in those dark depths. His knuckles on your skin feel sacrilegious. Touching you is exempt. Illegal. Off-limits. 
But he does it, anyway. Strips the barriers pitched in front of you both like tissue paper, and holds his four knuckles to your temple, his thumb brushing a hair beneath the irritated skin. Gentle. Soft. 
You didn't think these hands knew how to do something so delicate. That they were made, instead, to break. To crush. To ruin. 
He might, yet: the pad of his finger feels like a brand when it ghosts over the soft curve of your forehead, soothing the phantom hurt, and you think you might just shatter if he doesn't stop touching you like this. Gingerly. Calming. A balm over your aching flesh. 
You'd gotten so used to the pain, the constant throb in your head, that this respite from it feels like bliss. Nirvana wrapped in leather. 
His touch is magnetic. It pulls a sound from deep within your chest, something desperate and wanting, and you can't snap your jaws shut quick enough before it's loose in the atmosphere, and cresting over him. 
Ghost's gentle prods go still. With his thumb pressed into a place that makes liquid heat spume in your vein, you can feel it tremble when your tongue snakes out, gliding over your lower lip. 
Your head swims. Phosphenes dance across the back of your lids, and you struggle to remember when you shut your eyes in the first place. 
They flutter open. 
His stare is fixed on your lips in a total eclipse, honed in on the slow roll of your blood-red tongue as it peeks out from the warm cavern of your mouth. The wet trail left behind is swallowed by his gaze. It flickers up, catching the bloom of heat under your cheeks. The darkened flush makes him rumble; the soft rattle of an engine purring. A frisson passes over his expression, lashes fluttering. 
He's close. Closer than he was before. You can feel the molten heat bleeding into your skin with his proximity. Taste the gunpowder, the ash, and the ichor that clings to him; he smells of war when you breathe him in. Gasoline. Copper. A livewire scent that makes your lungs itch. 
Dangerous. Powerful. Deadly. 
Every synapse in your head misfires, sending off warning signs and sirens to run from the man that reeks of gun oil, and fire; napalm-scented demise with blood-soaked hands meant to ruin. But it only makes you lean in closer until the acrid burn of him corrodes your throat. 
His body is warm, and the heat is stifling. 
You're drunk off the fumes he exudes; reckless and wanting, and in the slurried molasses of your mind, you wonder if this is what it feels like for a gazelle to stand so close to a lion. 
Something cold pools at the base of your spine, making you shiver. A warning—distant, ancient—but the calls of your ancestors are dimmed under the bulk of his shadow. The heavy iron in his gaze rests over you, and you imagine that his body pressed into yours would carry the same heft. 
He's somehow bigger up close, you think. Wide shoulders, thick arms, a broad chest and waist; muscular thighs, firm calves. 
He's not Adonis, but you imagine he feels just like marble all the same. 
"Thought we lost you." His voice is a crackle; sap popping as it burns in the fire. The log charring in the kindling. "Thought we— fuck, pet. Thought you were gone, and we couldn't do a damn thing about it."
We. He says we, now. It's new. You shudder in his hold. 
"I'm here," you whisper the words, afraid of breaking this strange spell between you. It feels like everything else around you has melted away until only you and he exists on this lonely street that makes you ache. 
"You are…" he rasps; a low hush. Maybe he, too, is afraid of shattering it. "You did good, soldier."
His knuckles graze the mark in your temple, gentle around the tight, irritated flesh—it's proof that you lived, that despite the tragedy of the betrayal from the man you counted on the most, you survived. You made it. You won. 
His touch is featherlight. But his eyes–
His eyes are heavy with the promise of nothing but ruin.
A million thoughts run through your head, ones that taste like kerosene, and cauterise inside you like a cigarette to your skin. The heat blooms again, but it's not enough—all you can think of is how you wished you had more of him. 
(You wonder if you run your tongue along his skin, kiss that acrid mouth, if he'd taste of napalm.)
Chiselled open, exposed to the air. Ghost takes a deep breath, holding the fumes of your burning need in his lungs. When he exhales, you can taste the smoke in the air. 
His hand drops, fingers sliding down the curve of your face until he meets the plush softness where your chin and cheek meet. The hand he keeps on you is firm. 
His eyes bore into yours. He wants your attention. Demands it. Then, he holds it steady until your mouth drops in a series of short, gasping breaths. 
Your voice is featherlight when you say his name. His real one. Simon. It simmers in the air between you, and the scent of it almost makes his eyes snap shut, shoulders coiling. Tensed. Wanting. His muscles flex, bunching together in tight knots. Clench. Release. Clench. 
It's only when you hear his haggard breath through the nylon, do you realise he's holding himself back from you.
Your belly flutters at the rumble roiling out of his throat. 
Another command falls, deeper, darker, and your spine nearly snaps with how quickly you straighten up when he utters two words. 
"Later, pet." 
It's a promise. A demand. An out. 
His mind made up, decisive and sure, he's now shoving the choice in your hands. Leaving the decision with you for safekeeping.  
Like before, there is only ever one choice. As if you had any other answer for him. 
When you nod, firm and eager, his chest shudders. "Fuckin' Christ–" it's a snarl, full of tension. Excitement.
His hand slides away from your face, and presses into the base of your spine, settling heavily over the curve of your ass. There is pressure, an urgency. 
"C'mon," he rasps, jerking his chin to the end of the park. "Parked over here."
He keeps his hand on you, heavy and hot. A possessive branding as he leads you away from this place. 
When you pass, your eyes drop to the pavement. 
The gravel is clean. Your blood is nowhere to be found. 
Your muscles go lax. You get pulled into his current, shoulder brushing over his chest. 
Simon tightens his hold, and pulls you closer. 
(Dragging you out to open water until you can't see the shoreline anymore.)
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    He leads you to a black jeep with tinted windows, and grounds out that it's rental when you press the heel of your palm into your mouth, futilely trying to hide a smile. 
"It's nice," you quip, light and airy. "Very you."
"Just get your ass inside already," he says, pulling the door open for you. "Got a drive ahead of us." 
His hand settles on your waist when you step up on the first rung, heavy. Firm. You want to lean into him. Have him pressed up against you like this for an eternity. 
"Where are we going?" You breathe, shivering from the molten look in his eye. The heat in his chest. 
He tugs you back into him, chin grazing the space between your neck and shoulder. His voice is white-hot in your ear. "My safe house." 
Your eyes flutter. Heat blooms. "Simon—" his name is a whimper on your lips. 
His fingers dig into your hips. "Fuckin' hell, pretty thing. You keep saying my name like that, and we won't make it to Southport." 
There is no lie in the words that are forced out of his throat; inhumane, a growl. You don't want him here —in this town where you moulder. 
Your fingers trail over his wrist. The coarse hair on his arms tickles your skin. 
"Get me out of here."
His eyes sharpen. "Gladly." 
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    Two hours and a half hours from Porthmadog to Southport. 
A lot of time for him to reconsider. For that coldness he wears like a shield, that unbreakable distance, to pitch itself in front of him once more, locking you out. Perhaps, it'll be for good. Maybe—
Your hands ball into fists. Knuckles dig into the plush seat. 
You know what you want. Know what you've wanted since before you stupidly opened your mouth— keeping my seat warm— and he saw it through. 
But what about him? There was no time on the jet for a grand discussion, not when everyone was on top of each other already; not when Soap kept glancing at you, brow drawn tight, as if to ask really, bonnie?  
Memories of Sierra Leone have you in a chokehold. Your purgatory, your limbo, your afterlife; when you were dying, it was all of him. Of the desert. Of the town that felt so warm, so inviting. The people baulked at his size but still ushered you over, offering snacks, and treats. 
So tiny beside him, a woman laughs. You need to eat more. Your man should make you fat and happy. 
You blushed. He's not—
Yes, yes… A wink. A coy grin. He watches from the dirt path as she presses bundled cassava into your hands. He says nothing at all. Your man. You like the sound of it more than you should. 
You know what you want. What you've wanted. 
It puddles inside of you. Droplets leaking through the fissures that have been splintering for years, now. 
A man stands in front of you. Promise me, you'll get him. 
You: young, naïve, nodded. I promise. 
Ghost pulled you aside. He yells—quite often, in fact—but he's ice cold when he says, we don't make promises, rookie. Deadly. Your heart is in your throat when you apologise.
And then the scent of fire. A mission in Mesaieed left you and Gaz trapped. Helpless. Smoke clogging your lungs. Gaz wheezing under the intense blase; the noxious fumes billowing from the smoulder. 
His voice in your ear. We'll get you out of there, rookie. Hang tight. 
That a promise? You gasp, gagging from the black cloud drenching your lungs. Close to death, and cracking jokes. Confident. Assured. Nile crocodile lurking below the surface. 
He isn't there to see your hands shake. You're thankful for it. Stupid, stupid—you want nothing more to impress your Lieutenant. Match him wit-for-wit. Vile joke for vile joke.
It surprises you when his voice filters through the line, one word slurred into your ear: yes. 
Are you a man who keeps his promises? 
Always. That's why I never make them. Close to a fiery death, and his voice crackles again. Why wasn't Jesus born in Liverpool? 
Gaz coughed. Fuck's sake… Lemme die in peace. 
Why, Lt? 
There are no wise men or virgins. 
Funny. I like that one. 
Knew you would. Cover your heads. 
The window above shattered. They saved you—just like they said they would. 
(You realised then that Ghost cared for you, for all his subordinates, more than he let on.)
And now—
There is no turning back. Later, he said. He promised. A man who keeps his promises. 
You think, then, of the look on his face under the streetlamp. Snowfall trickles between you. There was a battle in his head; artillery fire in the gaps of his eyes when he said:
"Thought we—fuck, pet. Thought you were gone, and we couldn't do a damn thing about it."
The words get lodged in his throat. They're ripped out with a harshness that bludgeons through you. 
You turn to him, taking in his profile as he leans back in the seat, looking out the windshield. 
As if he feels your stare, his eyes cut from the window, and find yours. He holds it until you taste smoke in your throat, until your lip trembles. Then it sinks low to your lap. One hand peels off of the steering wheel.
It feels like an anvil when it rests on your thigh. 
"Almost there," it's a strangled rasp. A promise. 
You nod. Your smile feels flushed when it pulls on your lips. Sunkissed. Warm. Expectant.
Your hand unfurls, fingers aching from the strain of your grip, and you curl them over his wrist. His pulse thuds under your thumb. You stroke it, and wonder what he would say if he knew yours beat the same. 
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    The safehouse in Southport is not at all what you were expecting. 
The winding road he drives on leads to a small, modest cabin on the outskirts of the town. Perched away from the rest of civilisation, it sits on its own island. Cut-off from the mainland. 
The distance is something that makes a smile pull on your lips. So fittingly him —your lone wolf leader who only just learned the word we —but the sight of the house makes something gnarl inside of your chest. It's quaint. 
Somehow, you'd expected a flat in the heart of the city. London, perhaps. Somewhere close to the airport, to the UK base used when you needed the closest weapons cache or jet. 
The little abode in the middle of a farm doesn't mesh with the image you'd drawn of your prickly Lieutenant. It's too—
Wholesome. 
"It's temporary," he grouses when he catches your teeth sink into your palm, a wide grin splitting across your face. "I haven't been back here in a long time."
"Is it yours?" You ask, turning to him. The jeep hums, idling. Neither of you makes any move to get out. 
His fingers drum on the wheel. "Grew up here."
"I thought you were from East London."
"No. Moved there, then back here." He offers. 
You nod. You get it. 
"It's nice." You say instead, and it really is. A sprawling farmland with rolling hills in the distance where you know the sun hits in the morning. Where it'll bathe the boscage in ochre. "Peaceful."
"I'd have taken you to London," he grinds the words out from between his molars. "But it's too far." 
Too far. Roughly four hours. 
You've been sitting for nearly three. You shudder, eyes lidded when you turn to him. 
A slow roll of your tongue has his arms flexing, hands gripping the steering wheel until his knuckles are stained white. Bleached. 
"Maybe next time." 
A promise. A question. 
The vein in his forearm throbs. "C'mon, let's go." 
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    You barely have enough time to pace a few feet into the foyer before it starts. You turn to look at him from over your shoulder—taking in the chimney, the chaise, the distinct lack of anything personal outside of a safe, a lighter on top of the fireplace—and he's suddenly there. Boots off. Hands curled into fists by his side. Head dipped down, and eyes more dangerous than you'd ever seen them. 
That thrill pools—a warning. Run, run.  
He stalks toward you, eyes burning coal. "Are you hungry?"
"No," you shake your head, swallowing thickly. 
A step back. A step forward. They spark when you run. 
"Thirsty?"
"N—no…"
Two steps bring him closer to you. Your back presses flush to the wall next to the fireplace, and he moulds over you like a liquid shadow. Dark, imposing. He's massive. You can't see anything but him. 
Simon rests his forearm against the wall over your head, bending it at the elbow to bring him closer to you. The rough graze of his mask over your cheek has you panting. 
His hand is a brand on your thigh. It slips down, fingers crooking in the fold of your knee, wrenching it up his hip. You gasp, hands grasping the bulk of his biceps when he drags your centre flush over the growing bulge in his pants. 
Your head swims when he growls in your ear. "Is there anything you need to do before I drag you to my bed?" You shake your head slightly, pulse humming in your chest. "Because once I'm inside this pretty cunt, nothing at all will get me out. Understood?" 
Your brain short circuits. A complete whiteout. 
"A—affirmative." You choke, somehow coherent despite the absolute mess in your head. "Sir."
He rumbles. His chest pushes into yours; the sound reverberating through your bones. "Good girl."
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    He turned his back to you after he let you inside a modest bedroom, pulling the black sweater over his head. His back exposed—rippling muscles, etches of black from the tattoos—all pale skin wrapped in thick sinew. The sound you make has his shoulders coiling tight. 
"Fuck, pet… I haven't even touched you, yet." 
He turns, the mask slightly lopsided, and his beanie missing. His hair without the full balaclava sends a shock to your system. The newness of discovering something; elation bleeds in. His hair is ashen brown. Lighter than chocolate, darker than caramel. 
You want to sink your fingers into the thick of it. 
Thighs pressed tight together, your greedy eyes take him in. The way his hair—moussed from the hat—falls over his forehead; not cropped to the grain like Soap, and barely centimetres longer than Price. 
He gazes at you. Waiting, maybe. 
Your hands fall to your pants, eager to rid yourself of every barrier between your skin and his. You want him on you— in you. It itches like a sickness. Burns like a fever. 
Your trousers fall. Fingers looped into the hem of your panties. He stops you, then, with his words. 
"I took the mask off for the team."
You falter, bent down to push the panties the rest of the way off, and blink up at him. 
The first thought, of course, is that Gaz saw his face before you. Gaz. The rookie rivalry (playful, carrying the flavour of siblings vying for their approval) makes you burn. 
You swallow the jealousy on your tongue. "Oh…" 
He waits, still. 
"You don't have to…" you want to see him. He's a mosaic; an incomplete piece. You have two halves but the middle is murky. You try to fit them in your head, but the image doesn't line up. 
"Lay back," he ordered, hands dropping to his belt buckle. 
The image of him tugging the leather, veins rippling under the black ink of his burly forearms, feels unholy. It douses you with a want so palpable, your belly quivers with need. 
You don't need foreplay, you think. Not when the sight of him pulling off a belt already has you melting. Has your pussy throbbing, your thighs slick.  
"Damn, Lieutenant…" you mewl, dropping down on the bed, knees pressed taut together to stem the ache. "How are you so—" 
"Simon," he rasps. The belt hangs in his hands. You wonder if he'd tie you up one day with it. Leave you quivering below him, completely at his mercy. 
Or, would he let you use it on him? Let you bind this behemoth to the bed for your pleasure. 
Your toes curl. The thoughts alone are enough to get you off, you think. 
But it's the sight of him, then, standing over you, trousers hanging low on his hips, kept in place only by the thick thigh he slots between your knees, that really makes you shudder. 
"Lay back," he orders again, hand dropping—white-hot, rough—to your shaking knee. His chin lowers, eyes staring at your pussy. "I want to taste you again, pet." 
Fuck. Fuck —
He lowers to his knees, still somehow taller than you, and gazes at you between your bent legs. Dark eyes flashing. Goosebumps prickle along your flesh as he trails his gaze down the length of your body, settling, once again, on your cunt. 
He looks as if he's going to devour you. Eyes wide, whites full, when he pries your legs apart, spreading your cunt for him once more. He hadn't seen you bare like this—beneath him for his own pleasure—and you feel the ghost of his breath on your sex when he leans in close, breathing in deeply. 
"Bloody- fuckin' -hell, pet—" it sounds like a curse when he says it. A choked snarl. "So wet for me, and I haven't even touched you."
His hands are on the outside of your thighs, rough skin grazing the sensitive flesh as he trails them down to the soft flesh beneath your knee. With his thumbs hooked in the bend, pressing sharply into the cartilage, he wrenches them apart, opening you wider for him until your pussy is bared to him completely. 
The groan he makes edges on the equinox of being absolutely filthy and wrecked when he drinks you in. 
"Missed this pretty little cunt." His masked cheek rests on your knee, head cocked as he stares down at you. When he tips his chin, gazing at you, his eyes are blacker than midnight. A pool of ink. Desire brims. 
He hooks your thighs over his broad shoulders, finger looping in the gap between his mask and the skin beside his nose. 
You don't have a chance to see it. Fucking tease —
He dips his head before he tugs it down, and you feel the molten heat of his tongue slipping between your folds. 
Your head falls back on the pillow, toes curling as that greedy mouth devours you once more. The stubble around his chin prickles the skin of your thighs. His grip is so tight, you already see blooms of blue pooling beneath the tips of his fingers. 
The first time wasn't a flute. Simon presses his mouth to your cunt like he can't get enough; lips sealing over your throbbing clit, tongue lapping at you in even, thick strokes that make you see white behind your eyelids. It's good, so good —
He's going to ruin you. 
"Simon—"
You remember those filthy groans rumbling against your slit, and your hand lifts, reaching down to tangle in his locks. A tug—sharp, pointed—makes him pant into your pussy, makes his fingers tighten until you can feel capillaries bursting under his firm hold. Until his short nails make indents in your flesh. 
"Yeah, pet," his voice is molten rock; you throb, aching, from the sound alone. "Just like that…" 
His mouth is on you again, devouring you whole. 
You lift your head, staring down at the black eyes that bore into you, the thick locks of hair spilling out between your fingers, and you break. 
You fall back with a groan, arching your cunt into his eager mouth, desperate for more. More of that liquid bliss that spools in your core, that has you leaking a puddle under his chin. 
His hands shift, sliding down the meat of your thighs until they wriggle under your ass. Your flesh spills between his fingers when he grips you tight, lifting your hips, your cunt, to him. 
Simon helps you buck against him, lets you cant your hips into his face, nearly smothering him with the sopping heat of your centre. When you're mewling, panting, with your head tossed back, and rapture in a quiver of his name spilling from your lips, he shifts. 
His hold changes, and one hand falls back. His lips seal around your aching clit as a finger—long, thick—presses against your entrance. His tongue laves over you when he slowly presses it inside, crooking it to stroke against your fluttering walls. 
The choked sob that leaves your throat is a mangled wreck of pleasure, of want. 
"More," you mewl, but the plea barely has a chance to pass your lips before he's dragging his finger out until only the tip keeps you open. "Please, sir—"
He thrusts it into the last knuckle, groaning against you at the slick, wet sound that it makes. "Fuck, pet. Always so wet for me, aren't you?" 
"Always," you gasp, fingers gripping his hair tight. "Simon, I need more—"
He pulls his finger out; another joins it when you whimper. The stretch feels good. Heat blooms in your belly. You won't last long. Your thighs quiver with each roll of his fingers pushing in as deep as they will go; with each stroke of his tongue over your clit. 
You're going to cum— 
"Simon—"
The coil snaps, pussy clenching on the thick fingers wedged inside of you, hips canting into his eager mouth as he rides you through the spasming pleasuring that ripples through your abdomen. 
"That's it… that's a good girl," he slurs against you. 
It's almost too much when he forces another finger into your throbbing cunt. You keen at the stretch, at the too-full feeling of him splitting your walls. 
"Simon, I can't—"
"Yes, you can. You're taking me so well already." 
His voice is liquid sex; the wrecked sound of him makes your toes curl, and your spine arch. You want him inside of you. You want to know if he'd make those same grunts of pleasure with your pussy wrapped around him. 
High of the sudden burst of endorphins, you look down at him—sloppy with your wetness, his face hidden by your cunt—and you tug his hair until he meets your blown-out gaze. 
"Fuck me," you try to demand, but the word comes out as a shaky plea.
"Too tight, pet," he rumbles. "Gotta get you ready for me."
Three fingers buried to the last knuckle, and he says it still isn't enough. 
You'd think him cocky had you not the pleasure of seeing him hard and aching already. Big, fat cock leaking between the seal of his palm. You shiver, head dropping to the pillow. 
It's all you can do but take whatever he gives you—long, thick fingers stretching you out, brushing the gummy walls inside that flutter when his mouth seals over your clit. It feels like an eternity since he pulled you inside the room. 
A tug of your hand makes him groan. You meet his stare, pleading. Breathless. It's too much—
And not enough. 
"I don't care," you slur, drunk and stupid on the way his hot mouth glues to your cunt. "I wanna feel you inside of me for days, sir—"
"Fuck!" 
It's a harsh snarl that makes you whimper. The sound ripped from his chest, and rubbed raw as it was scraped out. His forehead is pressed to your mound, breathing you in once more. 
His head lifts. 
It's dark in the room. You can't really make out the entirety of his features—the familiar long nose, the cut of his jaw. His lips. It's bathed in black, in shadows, but through the glimmer of the washed-out moon that spills inside, you can see the distinct wetness gleaming on his mouth, his chin. 
You whimper, eyes burning with tears of desperation. When he speaks, it's shredded rocks. Gravel. Low and dark.
"You're gonna feel me for weeks, pet." 
It's a dangerous precipice. His voice alone shatters your resolve, and seeing those full, pink lips form the words that will ruin you, it's overwhelming. Your cunt throbs, walls shuddering in pleasure ripped through your being. 
He feels it against his fingers; it makes his eyes flutter. His tongue sweeps out. Eye hooded, half-mast as they take you in. 
He sits back, hands slipping to the crease of your knees. His chin dips. 
"Hold 'em open for me, pet." 
You gasp, belly knotting tight from the command that drips from his drenched, wicked, mouth. Your hand reluctantly falls from the soft locks to do as you're told. The warmth of his skin brushes over your fingers when you take his place, keeping your legs bent, spread, for him. You're on display. Open, wanting. 
His hand, now free, reaches for the bundle of fabric pooled at the base of his neck. The mask is fixed into place again—a needless action, you think, pouting. Gaz saw his face in better lighting. 
(You hope he had the wherewithal to take a picture for you.)
But there is something to be said about how illicit he looks, mouth now concealed from your view until just his eyes are visible. The coal is rubbed off, shadows along the crease, the corner of his nose, under his eyes, but it feels dangerous like this. 
With the mask on, he's Ghost. Deadly. Dangerous. Fearsome. Men cower from him. His name alone scorches the earth, and makes the underbelly tremble. 
And he's going to be inside of you. Claiming you, taking you. It's a cigarette thrown on a sea of gasoline. Your skin, fervid, begins to blister. 
When you look up, it's ink-blot eyes in a sea of white. Red tendrils in the corners; rivers of ichor.
If he keeps looking at you like that, like you're a feast for him, you might go a little crazy, a little delirious. 
Simon stares for a moment longer, hand dipping below the bed to grasp himself in his hand. A grunt at the touch, a flutter of his lashes, and then he moves. Coiled muscle; rippling flesh. He looms above you like a Cimmerian god—drenched in tenebrose, mask soaked from your slick—his haunting eyes gazing at you like you're an offering meant to be savoured. 
His thighs—thicker than the tree trunks in the distance—slot beneath yours, and the sheer width of them makes you dizzy. The bulk is bigger than your head. Simon must notice the way you're drooling over them, knuckles white as you stare, open and hungry, wanting, as he takes a small amount of mercy on you. He shifts until the bulk of it is pressed taut to your core. 
Your back arches, legs trembling. Fuck—
You want to ride his thighs. Want him to perch you on his massive lap, and have those molten eyes fixed on you as you use him to get yourself off. 
You could do it, you think, mind blanking out; that soporific pleasure slurring all logic from taking root until a gossamer spools inside, filled with want. With greed. 
"Wanna ride you…" you slur, wrecked on the notion alone. "Your thighs. They're so big, Simon, fuck— you're so big—"
"I like that idea, pet," he rasps, thigh notching closer to your throbbing cunt, smearing slick all over the coarse hair that covers his flesh. "Wanna see you desperate for it." 
"I am…" you whine, breathless. "I want you so bad, I can't stand it…"
His hands fall, bracketing his burly arms beside your head until the absurd heft of him fills your vision. The muscles in his core pull taut; veins in his arms pulse. 
He told you to keep your legs spread, but your fingers itch with the need to touch him. To feel him against your palm. 
His cock hangs, daunting and thick, between his legs, head brushing your belly. Prespend smears over your skin; warm, tacky. You want a taste—
When you tell him as much, chin tipped backwards to whisper the words into his neck, he shudders above you. His cock twitches, spits more prespend on you. You want him to cum on your face, you gasp, words liquid, slurred. You're not entirely sure they're in English. You don't think you have the capacity to think beyond want, want, want—
"Yeah?" He rasps, elbow bending as he drops to his forearm. It brings his chest flush to yours. The dark smattering of hair rubs against your nipples. His face is a constellation: white jowls, black eyes. The look alone makes you smoulder. "Don't worry about me, pet." 
You're shaking your head, but the protests die on your tongue when his hips slip between your thighs, prying you further apart. Completely spread beneath the bulk of his body, you crumble.
He knocks your hands away, a low murmur of his approval slipping past those sinful lips for listening to him, as if there was ever a choice, and he notches your knees against his hips, pressing himself closer to your core. 
Finally free, your hands spring down to grab him, gripping his bicep in a vice just to feel the way it jumps under your fingers, and the other flat against his heated chest. His pulse thunders against your palm. 
"Gonna give it to you, now." 
You wanted it— ached for it—but as he feeds his thick cock into your pussy, you wonder if maybe you'd been a little overconfident before. That, perhaps, he was right. 
It's swallowed down, smothered with a whimper. His stupidly fat cock will not break you. 
"That's it, pet," he slurs, mask pressed tight to your ear. "Take it… C'mon, now." 
He pulls back, widening your thighs, and then pushing them up until you're nearly folding in half beneath him. The movement jostles his cock, and it nudges something inside of you that makes you spasm around him. 
"Fuckin' hell…" he groans, sinking in deeper. His eyes are fixed on the spot where he stretches you taut. Skin raw; cunt pushed to the mettle. "Almost there… look'it your pretty cunt take my cock…"
The air is punched from your lungs when he pushes in deeper, when the blunt head batters up behind your belly button. He knocks against your cervix, and the deep ache has tears leaking from the corners of your eyes. 
"Go on, pretty thing," he husks in your ear, words drenched in pleasure. Your fingers dig into the bulk of his body, crescent moons embedded into his skin.
He bludgeons into something inside of you that has you see stars—galaxies burst behind your eyelids, and heat, supernova hot, burns low in your belly. It burns at the place where his cocks ruts into you so deeply that you can feel him in your sternum, almost taste him in your throat. It liquefies your body. You melt into a conduit under him; a receptacle that leaches pleasure from the stretch of his cock inside you. 
Your body slackens. There is a give; something breaks. And he's suddenly deeper than you knew existed, than you ever thought possible. You feel him almost knocking against the cap of your womb. Each persistent jerk has your pussy clenching around him, milking him, trying to get him deeper. 
As if that was possible. As if there was any room left inside of you for him to claim. 
You're stuffed to the brim; overflowing with him. You can't take anymore. 
You sob brokenly when his hips pull back until only the mushroom head of his cock splits your aching, raw cunt open. The seam of you flutters around him, as if begging to be filled again. 
He grunts, a hoarse, low noise dredged from the depths of his chest when he shifts, his cock spearing back into you.
It nearly makes you scream. Your nails rake over his flesh, desperate to find purchase amid a crumbly chossy that threatens to send you plummeting down a precipice, hurtling you toward an unknown abyss. 
"Easy, now," he commands, the bark of his voice bitten between clenched teeth. "You're gonna make me cum before I've gotten my fill of this cunt, pet."
"Want it," you slur, babbling on the liquid bliss roaring through your veins. "Want you to fill me up, Simon."
A snarl of your name is the only warning you get before his cock is battering against your gummy walls, blunt head jarring into that little place inside of you that has phosphenes filling your vision, has your lungs aching with hypoxia. Head dizzy, chest shuddering with each breath. You can't get enough of it. Of the heady scent of him, the sun-drenched heat. 
Simon is normally so controlled, constrained, and you find yourself fracturing into pieces as his ironclad resolve seems to shatter with each squeeze of your cunt. It's a dizzying feeling to reduce your cold-hearted Lieutenant into a rutting beast, spoiling himself with each tight clench of your soft insides against his thick, hard cock. 
Your eyes open, wet lashes flutter and stick to the crease of your eyelid, and you find the way his brow is pinched tight together as he burrows himself deep within you, until the taste of salt is heavy on your tongue, absolutely breathtaking. It's enough to get you hooked. Enough to make such an utter mess of you, that you don't know how you'll recover from this. 
It's an intense feeling having him seated so deeply within you. Edging deliriously along that equinox of unfathomable bliss, and the sharp, distinct too much—too full quiver of pain. It's a pinch within your guts, a deep throb that follows the unending plume of pleasure so blistering as it batters into you, that you almost find yourself getting swept away by the sheer thrill of it all. Mindless, driven stupid by the way he takes, the way he ruins. 
(You don't ever want him to stop.)
It's one thing to have his mouth on you, but another thing entirely to see how he breaks when he's inside of you. It's addicting. A powerful high that renders everything else static. 
Pleasure, red-hot and dizzily intense, lacerates through your core, spooling at the base of your spine. It fills your limbs with molten bliss until nothing remains except the way he pounds inside of you, filling you over and over again with every inch he has to offer. You think you might just go insane if you don't have him. If you don't get to feel the delicious drag of his cockhead rubbing against your pulsating walls. 
Your hands slide over his skin. The muscles clenching under the pads of your fingers as you drag them up, over his arm, his biceps, his broad shoulders. 
The bulk of his back makes your fingers itch. You sink them into the corded muscles, clinging to him as Simon drags you to that hazy place where euphoria clots inside of your veins, and the heat you syphoned from him bubbles, frothing over. 
It's pulled taut—an elastic band that stretches well past the breaking point, and makes your fingers sting when it snaps. You convulse beneath him, sobbing out barely coherent words that sound like a quivering war cry of his name, of how good he feels, and how you're mad with the taste of him nestled so deeply within you. 
Your nails digging into his skin, his name on your lips like a gospel, the molten clench of you around—it all congeals together until he's snarling in your ear, a raspy grunt that makes your toes curl, that has you seeing nirvana once more. It's your name—somewhere in the mess of his growl, his groan—that is pulled out from him, and pierces you deep, makes your core tremble at the ragged sound of it, broken and hoarse. 
He throbs like a heartbeat, cock pulsing as he sputters out a thick pool of cum. It's almost too much; your pussy is overstuffed, forced to take both the heaviness of his cock, and molten spume that fills you to the brim. It leaks out from around the plug of him, pushed to the base until not even an inch remains, and you feel it gathering under you. 
You want a taste of it. It swells inside, fills you deep, and you wonder if he'd let you lick it off of him. 
You murmur it into his drenched chest, more slurred words that only vaguely sound English. Maybe it's the tone of your voice—ruined and raw, and drunk of the taste of him—that punctures through, but it hits the mark. Simon buries his head into your neck with another gravelled rasp of your name that sticks to his throat, breaking over the vowels. His softening cock twitches within you. 
Words, or sentiment, whispered into the crackling atmosphere that smells of sex and kerosene, and goes straight to his groin. 
"Cheeky little—," he starts, a husking grumble, but you squeeze your sore, aching sex around him, fluttering like a soft heartbeat, and it dies with a groan. 
The victory doesn't last long. Your raw, abused cunt aches from overstimulation, a throbbing sting from your tender flesh making you wince. You're too keyed up. A ragdoll against the shoreline, caught in the current that batters your body until you feel like one massive contusion. 
Fucking Simon feels like surviving a war. It feels like clawing your way out of the trenches, tasting the heavy, gunmetal tang of acrid artillery fire in the air, and standing victorious. Brutalised, dazed, and numb from the beating, but full of the banquet of victory. 
He keeps you under him, still buried to the hilt, and pants into your neck. Flushed with exertion, his chest red and drenched in sweat, you slip your hands through the mess of him, and find purchase where the knob of his spine protrudes from his flesh. 
Simon's head rises. His eyes—quivering, glossy ink—lidded and sleepy with pleasure, and that tangible post-sex haze that permeates the air, find yours. 
Sweat drips down his forehead, over his brow, his temple. It's swallowed by the fabric of his mask, lopsided on his cheeks. Red peaks over the black horizon. A deep flush the same bloodied hue as his chest.
(You wonder if it tastes like ichor.)
His eyes shudder, body trembling from the ripple of it. 
"Fuck me, pet…" 
You tip your heavy, mushy head back, and grin. Big, and wide. The smile of elation. Of success. "I already did."
He huffs, heavy and full, through his nose. "Bloody hell—" in response to your tease, he grinds his cock against your aching walls. 
Your breath is sucked in through clenched teeth; a breathy, high-pitched whimper. 
"Mae hi wedi cachi arna i…"
"English, pet."
Your ankles try to link at the base of his spine, body drawn like a bow. "Your cock ruined me." 
His eyes are rapacious, tainted with the fervour of conquest. 
"It was meant to." The smoke in his timbre makes your toes curl. Your lungs smoulder with the heat of it. 
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    Simon has you seeing nirvana again, and again before the light outside crests through the thin curtains.
He rolls you under him, ankles hooked on his shoulders, and makes you watch as his cock spears deep inside of your well-fucked cunt. 
Eyes on us, soldier. Don't you dare look away. 
On your knees, head nearly smothered by the pillow, he covers you with the entirety of his bulk until everything around you is pitch black with the shadow he casts. He looms over you, chest pressed against your back, and fucks you slow, and deep. The position almost has you blacking out from the depths he reaches like this, and the burn of the stretch as your pussy pulls taut against his cock. 
You can take it. This pretty cunt was made for my cock, pet. 
Your favourite is being lowered onto him. Chests pressed together. You bury your hand in his damp hair, your face in his neck, and sink your teeth into the column of his throat until the salt of his skin nearly drowns you. 
Fuckin' hell…
(In response, his hand brands the cheeks of your ass with the perfect impression of his massive palms.)
He lays back with you barely lucid, aching, sprawled on top of him, and runs his hands down your spine, husking in your ear about how good you've been for him, how pretty you look blissed out from his cock. 
His words are mercury in your head. 
"...wanna be good for you, Simon," you murmur into his collarbones. 
He shudders under you. 
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    His chest is slick with sweat when you rest your head on it, pulse thudding under your palm. His arm around your waist is an anchor, locking you tight to his side. 
You'd woken up to the sun bleeding through the window, the room thick with the balmy swelter of sex. Ashes in your throat, salt on your tongue. Simon's heat burrows into your marrow. 
There is a lot to be said, you think. Words that you were too cowardly to admit when in the soft, dazed atmosphere of the plane. 
Only one thing buoys to the forefront. The only things you'd been clutching at this whole time. Life on the line, and all you could think of was the dunes outside of your tent. The searing heat on your back. 
(Not on me.)
(Always, always.)
"...Since Sierra Leone," you confess into his flesh, mouth pressed against the side of his pectoral. His ashen chest hair tickles your nose. 
Simon tenses under you. The soft strokes of his fingers–bare, warm–on your hip still. 
You wonder if you misread things. If you made a mistake. Your mouth parts on his flesh. The briny taste of his skin is sharp on your tongue. 
You won't apologise. The words are there, the confession lingering in the air like opaque tendrils of smoke. It's in his hands now. This little thing that flutters within your chest, tucked away for safekeeping since he turned to you, eyes dark and narrow, and said you did good, rookie. 
His fingers coil over you, tightening against your flesh. 
"Everything…" he rasps. Everything. It's pulled out of him; rolled over barbed wire. 
Confused, you raise your head, brows knitting together. Everything—
A total eclipse. The ocean in the dead of night. Endless, unfathomable pools of black. The current threatens to drag you under to those depths that shudder in front of you. 
The words die on your tongue, ashes in the back of your throat. 
What good is a man if he has nothing to lose? So, what do you have to lose, soldier? 
A smile splits across your face; a sun dawning over the beige spalls that seem to never end. 
It tastes of the sea when you press your lips to his. You feel sand under your fingers, his pulse on your palm. 
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—Price calls it, has known since Mesaieed. He'd bet on Gaz, maybe even Soap. It never crosses his mind to think of Simon. 
—But thinking about it now, it was obvious from the start. 
("Sierra Leone. Wanna take Gaz with you–"
"No. I'll take the rookie.")
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judysxnd · 9 months
Text
Dating Lando Norris includes
• playing video games a lot: during the season, on weekends, to chill during the evening, also during the week a bit too, it doesn’t matter if you’re away or with him
• watching him play when you’re too tired: he also plays a lot with Max, Bankai, Matt and others. It’s not your kind of games but you love watching him play. If he’s streaming, you’re generally in his bed watching from your computer, but if he’s not, you’re sitting next to him
• playing board games too: those are goods too! Cards, monopoly, uno or whatever. It keeps the both of you away from the phone, computer and all, while still having fun. It feels good sometimes
• late night drives/ talks: you both have a tendency to sleep late, being night owls, and sometimes you don’t want to go out, but also don’t want to stay in, so the perfect compromise is to go for a late night drive. Music in the background, you usually stop to a drive through to get some food, and then you park somewhere, eating, talking, joking, whatever. It also happens when none of you are tired, you’re seeking for sleep, and you noticed that it was tiring the both of you. But either way, it’s your favorite thing, sharing some quality time together
• parties: Lando is a huge partier, not so much for you, but you grew to like them too. You were usually uncomfortable, not feeling safe, but Lando changed that. He showed a way of partying that was different than what you knew and you liked it. So you joined him every time he went out. You also love dancing with him, because none of you exes did that, and it made you fall in love with him even more
• travelling a lot (not only for the races): obviously you travel a lot for the races. You tried to join him and see him every time you could. But Lando is also a good traveller on his personal time, and you are too! So it was natural to go on vacation with him once the season was over
• golf dates (more like golf competitions): you got introduced to golf when you were a teenager, and you liked it! But as you grew up, you never really kept going. But it was until you met Lando. He loves golf, and loves competing against anyone. He tries to practice a bit to beat Carlos, but since you beat him on the first time you went golfing with him, now he has another rival. So you go a lot on golf dates, mini-golf or real golf, anything that is golf is enough. Whoever wins, doesn’t pay for the date
• lots of dates in general: he started to know the cities he is in thanks to the races, so, if you travel with him, he knows where to take you out): Lando loves to take you out. He wants to spoil you, to show you the beautiful places he knows. It’s also an excuse for the both of you to dress fancy, and he loves to see you get even more prettier each time. Also, after travelling a lot to the same cities for F1, he started to know many places where to take you out, so if you’re with him, you will find yourself on a date in Mexico, in Abu Dhabi, in Las Vegas, etc.
• him making you try new things you’ve never done before: you always wanted to do extreme things but never got the courage to do them. Then Lando arrived, and you’ve seen him do all the things you wanted to do just like that. So you did. For example, karting! You did it when you were a kid, but you don’t remember it so it was like a first time for you. You’ve never went jet skiing, so it was normal to do it when you were in Abu Dhabi during the last race of the season. You also flew in an helicopter with him, you tried paddle for the first time, just many things like that
• lots of physical touch: it’s his love language, more than you. Wherever you are, you have to touch. If you are at a restaurant, he will either have his hand on your thigh or your legs will be touching. Holding hands when you walk, random hugs, kisses, when one of you is driving, the hand on the thigh is mandatory. You are always near each other. One of you is never far from the other
• rituals when you’re away from each other: unfortunately you cannot always be with him for the races, or even off the season. You have your own life too and cannot stop it just for him. So when you’re away, you have settled little rituals. Like sending each other’s good night and good morning texts, also sending each other your outfits for the day. You also try to call each other at least once a day, but it’s not always possible with the time difference. You also text throughout the entire day, you may not be able to call, but you can text, even if you read it later
• sometimes you’re both tired but don’t want to go to bed: yeah like I said previously, you both have a tendency to have bad sleeping schedules, so you usually sleep late. Sometimes you’re tired, but not enough to actually sleep, but, also too much to actually do something, like playing or something. So, that’s usually the nights where you catch up on your tv shows and movies, going on Netflix or whatever and binge watch what you missed (you usually both fall asleep an hour or two after)
• trying to work out with him: Lando has to work out for F1, a lot. He usually trains a lot off season because he doesn’t have time in between races, so it takes a lot of his time, which is time away from you. As an excuse to spend more time with him, and actually get in shape a little too, you tried to follow a bit of his work out routine. But.. it’s a lot, it’s hard and it hurts so much that you didn’t go far. It makes him laugh to see you try, still appreciating the efforts. You do work out with him sometimes, but not a lot and not the same exercices as him
• ordering food at the most random time of the day: neither of you are great cooks. You burnt too much stuff to even call yourselves cooks. So you order a lot. But you also order at random moments, because you do not always eat at like twelve for lunch or 7/8pm for dinner. It’s more like 1/2pm for lunch (you even did a 3pm one time), and more like 9/10pm for dinner (it happened more than once to order at 11pm or even midnight). It depends if you go out at night, because if you do, you’ll both crave something in the middle of the night. So yeah you order at the most random times
• stealing his hoodies: this one is very obvious. You love his hoodies. They smell like him, they are beautiful, they are large just enough, they are comfy, etc. The list is long of excuses to still his hoodies. He doesn’t mind, he actually loves it, you’re always so cute in his clothes. Okay sometimes he might not like it because he actually wants to wear the hoodie you just stole, but it’s very rare
• pictures, you take so many pictures of each other, together: you are both amateur photographers. You both have your own cameras, so it is quite obvious that you both have your own .jpg accounts. Lando is quite behind posting his pics, oh but you’re not (the fans thank you for it). Therefore you take lots of pictures. You love taking the landscapes, sunsets, but what you love the most is Lando. You take a lot of candid photos of him as well as some pics of the two of you together. He does take lots of pictures of you too but he keeps them to himself (you don’t even know about most of them)
• shopping together: you both have money, you both love buying stuff for yourselves and each other, so yeah, you find yourselves shopping together. Online or not, you shop. Clothes, jewelry, food, whatever can be bought. The perks of having money
• him teaching you how to drive a F1 car: the more you went to the races, the more you started to understand it. You knew you could never actually drive a F1, but oh boy how bad you wanted to try. You got lucky enough to sit in Lando’s car, making him drool over it (he took so many pics), but you wanted to try and drive. So he made you try his simulator. And after crashing thousands of times, and laughing at you, he decided to teach you. So now you both spend hours on it, Lando sitting next to you, explaining you every details, strategies. He loves it so much, seeing you taking interest in what he does
• exchanging music: it’s both your love language. You love music so much, it makes you feel so many things, letting out your emotions that you both cannot live without it. So, quickly after you started dating, you started to exchange your music. That’s how you both noticed that you have the same tastes, and usually listen to the same musics. Every time you both think about it, your heart flutters, you are so in love with each other
• singing together: you’re always listening to music, in the car, at your places, so you’re both singing to it, sometimes even pretending you’re performing. You’re both in your own little world
• also dancing together: and you’re not always singing, you are also dancing, goofing around, having the times of your lives together. Poor neighbors, they not only hear the music loud, they can also hear your footsteps. But you don’t care. You’re together, having fun, almost falling because you’re both being crazy, exhausting yourselves, but you’re with each other, that’s all that matters
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AITA for wanting a material thing rather than an experience for my college graduation gift, and being upset I still don't have it?
I skimmed through some other AITA posts to prepare me to write this one properly, and saw someone use the term "validation bait." I bring that up because I fear this post may read like that once all is said and done, but I genuinely am worried my perspective might be skewed. I encourage you to enter "Reddit Mode" if you decide to reply after your judgement with additional context and feel the need to be blunt.
Background context: I have an older sibling who graduated before me during the beginning of COVID. While his gift was delayed as a result, we as a family (three children one father) ended up going to Disney World, NASA, and Universal Orlando in 2021 to celebrate his accomplishment. It was a great trip, aside from the horrific humidity and the hurricane that just barely missed us. Later on, I asked my sibling if that was what he actually wanted to do, and he said our father proposed some ideas because he didn't really have any and Florida sounded like a good idea to him. My asking this will make sense later, but putting it here seems the most logical.
Additionally, it may be important to know that my father goes on a lot of trips. At least, more than anyone I've personally known. I'm not gonna try to calculate the exact number, but I will say in the span of less than a year (after the family Florida trip), he went to both Canada and Mexico for a week each, on top of additional excursions to Florida and Vegas-- almost all also including bringing his girlfriend. At the same time, he claimed assistance with college tuition was out of his budget, started having me pay rent on a part time job, and told my younger sibling fixing the AC in their car would cost too much as well. Even I know something doesn't add up here, but maybe I'm taking it too personally. End background context.
Fast forward to spring of 2023, and it's my turn to graduate college. Here's the thing: my brother was asked at least a year in advance to his graduation what he would like to do. I wasn't asked; I had to bring it up myself, and I waited until my graduation was only two months out. It was also over a phone call, because my father was out of town for at least the fifth time that year already. I dropped the hint that, for my graduation present, I would really like to get a nice gaming desktop. My father's response was, "... We'll see." Later on, he elaborated through text stating, "I took everybody to florida because i think graduations should be more about memories than what material thing you can get out of your dad."
Here's the thing: it's no secret to my dad that I'm a gamer, and I like video games. Additionally, it's no secret that a gaming desktop is something I have wanted for a decade. Even since middle school I've talked about gaming desktops and how much I wanted one. Even so, I happily played games like Saints Row III on a laptop that chugged along at 12 frames per second and took every crash in stride. I also thought that this kind of gift would be a relief to my dad, as my thought process was it would be far less expensive than taking an entire family somewhere out of the state for a week. Not only that, but there wasn't really anywhere I wanted to go. I don't have the desire to travel like he does; I don't mind taking my time off at home or locally, and relaxing with the things I have rather than spending a ton on a fancy dinner or hotel or concert.
So, naturally, I was confused, dismayed, and heartbroken. While I started crafting a text response explaining why a gaming desktop would not just be for personal use, but would also be advantageous for my career (my degree was in animation and I learned surface level coding for making video games), I also wondered why it was wrong for me to want a "material thing" even if it wasn't something necessarily "useful." Because while, yes, a gaming desktop would have the power I needed for more intensive animation projects, that wasn't really why I wanted one. But I figured explaining as such would help convince my dad why it was a good idea.
My dad ended up calling me before I could finish crafting my text, so I did my best to explain my standpoint, as well as pointing out how the specs for a gaming desktop are pretty much parallel with the specs for a desktop for things like 3D rendering and animation. He stood his ground on "making memories" as well, and also hinted that I was acting entitled for asking about my graduation present. I think I pointed out to him how he asked my older brother far in advance what he wanted for his graduation, but those details of the conversation are a little faded with time. I did end up sending my text after that phone call anyway, as I felt it better explained what I was thinking and feeling than I could say in verbal conversation (I've always gotten a little flustered talking to my dad about things I want that he doesn't approve of).
Fortunately, after reading my text, my father seemed to come around, and invited me to put together a list of parts for my computer, since I wanted to build it. I got really excited and got the help of my computer-savvy friend to put together something I thought was reasonable-- it had a really good graphics card and processor, and I made compromises on some of the other parts to lower the cost. I haven't looked at the list in a while, but the total cost-- tower, two mid-range monitors, basic keyboard and mouse-- was something like 2.5k approaching 3k. Mid range (at least, it is these days) I think, but it would be enough for the things I wanted to do.
I put the list together, and emailed it to my dad. The assumption I had, was he would purchase the parts, and then we would build it together (or I would build it alone). However, later on I went to ask him if he had gotten my email, and while he said yes, he also said, "I'm not paying for the whole thing. I can't afford it, and it's not fair to spend more on you as an individual than what I spent on your brother as an individual for the Florida trip."
I find the latter point somewhat fair considering I'm the only person who benefits from this gift, but the first point, given the background context on my father's habits, I'm not sure how much I believe. But arguing with him would have been pointless. I definitely would have liked to have had that information beforehand, but it ultimately didn't change much.
This is getting long, so I'll try to summarize the rest. This was just the first instance of my father changing the goal posts for my graduation gift. First, he tried to convince me that getting a prebuilt tower would be just as good. I did the research, and a tower with the graphics card I wanted would have cost as much as building my own tower and buying a monitor, keyboard, and mouse, and still not have been as good in other specs anyways. Then, he tried to tell me he was only going to give me $1000 towards the computer. I pointed out paying for my older sibling for the Florida trip would have cost at least $1500-- if I hadn't done the research, I wouldn't have known any better and just blindly agreed. Then, two days after my graduation, he stated that he wasn't going to give me the money for the computer until I had secured a full time job.
At that point, I just gave up, and agreed.
Fast forward to now. I'm still working the part time job, I barely make enough to put a couple dollars into savings, no one is hiring me full time, and my dad hinted that, instead of doing presents for Christmas this year, we all agree to go on vacation somewhere. Not only that, but his family in Canada just told him they're going to Mexico in November. Not only is my dad implying we should go too and I should pay a portion of my own way, I have a further feeling he may say that this will be our Christmas as well. I still don't have the computer, even though my dad has noticed how much I'm struggling.
If I had the computer, I wouldn't have minded the vacation-- but I feel like my wants and feelings have been completely pushed aside in favor of what my dad thinks is good and/or right, and the wind has been taken out of my sails regarding my graduation entirely. On the other hand, maybe he's right that I focus too much on a material thing and should redirect my attention to an experience and go somewhere to relax/get away from daily life.
Am I a materialistic asshole?
What are these acronyms?
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barcaatthemoon · 4 months
Text
works in progress
lucy bronze
cat and mouse: the back and forth flirting between you and lucy comes to a head after your first derby against each other.
separate ways: you and lucy celebrate winning your last champion's league title together.
lia walti
closer: you seek out some comfort with lia after a hard day.
perfect girl: you just want to do everything lia tells you to.
alexia putellas
eleven: you surprise alexia by wearing her jersey after a game.
your father's daughter: alexia checks on you after your dad dies.*
familia iii: your first year with alexia and your two kids.
just a kid iv: you and olga convince alexia to go on a double date.
perfect: alexia reassures you that you're perfect in her eyes.
invisible: you act out so alexia will pay attention to you.
fireball: alexia takes care of you when you drink too much.
your best girl: you help alexia after the olympics.
movie moment: alexia gets upset when your picnic date gets ruined, but the two of you find yourselves having an even better time.
paths not taken: you and alexia reminisce about what could have been.
picture in my pocket: you give alexia a polaroid of you at an event.
stand by me: alexia thanks you for being by her side after she retires.
punctual: after years of teasing from your wife, she's finally late.
little one ii: you get lost at the madrid game.
leah williamson
dark: leah helps soothe your youngest when she has nightmares.
complicate me: leah proves that your breakup wasn't as clean as you told everyone.
mascot: you realize during a game that you're ready for the next step with leah.
soaked: leah proves a point.
barcelona
translators: you have a bit of trouble during your first interview in english.*
open arms: the team learns about your girlfriend.
mariona caldentey
something new: mariona tops you with a strap-on for the first time.
jenni hermoso
casual ii: you come back from mexico for your first national camp after leaving barcelona.
role reversal: you find yourself in control for once, sort of.
katie mccabe
big mistakes: katie explains to you why she has to leave.*
emily engstler
what u need: emily spends a night taking care of you.
our song: you convince emily to play guitar for you.
new sensation: emily tops you with the strap for the first time.
paige bueckers
study date: paige distracts you while you try to help her study.
goody two shoes: paige shows you a few things in the bedroom.
little buck: your first year at college with your big sister, paige.
lena oberdorf
time killer: lena asks to try something new to help her pass her injury time.
american beauty: lena doesn't realize that you're german.
dodgy: lena distances herself, and you think the worst.
kelsey plum
baller: kelsey takes you on a date after you come to one of her games.
mary earps
housewife ii: you and mary try to talk things out.
kim little
always: for as long as you and kim can remember, you've always been around each other.
pressed: kim gets upset when you get close to a new teammate.
ruesha littlejohn:
obvious: you and ruesha are forced to confront your feelings about each other.
diana turasi
big mouth: your rookie season breeds an interesting rivalry with a vet on your team.
sneaky: you and diana hook up the morning before your game against each other at the olympics.
alana kennedy
cuddlebug: alanna has trouble keeping her hands to herself.
patri guijarro
quiet time: you and patri spend a night in together when she gets back from paris.
chills: you take care of patri when she catches a cold after not listening to you.
selfless: patri gets you off.
laia codina
drives me crazy: you and laia have a somewhat toxic back and forth.
decadent ambitions: laia decides to try something new with you.
katrina gorry
separation anxiety: katrina's first night alone at your apartment comes with a couple complications.
latchkey: katrina accidentally neglects you a bit with everything else going on.
leila ouahabi
about last night: you and leila try to avoid each other after hooking up.
kyra cooney-cross
big man: kyra accidentally embarrasses you trying to prove herself around your ex.
scary dog privilege: you and kyra get close when you transfer to arsenal.
caitlin foord
when the sun rises: the morning after you and caitlin hook up.
keira walsh
trojan horse: how some of your england teammates deduce you're keira's girlfriend.
arsenal
sleepy girl: the team finds your ability to nap anywhere amusing.
on par: you get frustrated at your lack of progress after coming back from an ankle injury.
mapi leon
crash: mapi gets a call that you've been in an accident.
gio quieroz
addicted: no matter how many times she breaks you heart, you can't get enough of gio.
ewa pajor
wrecking ball: you find it hard to keep your walls up around ewa.
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lunarw0rks · 1 year
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Through The Ashes | Chapter Five
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Summary: You've been given an offer to join the 141 Task Force. Upon taking it, you find yourself ensnared with the mysterious masked man who won't take his eyes off you.
Warning(s): my attempt at slow-burn, canon-typical violence, mild language, mentions of violence, injuries, blood, hurt/comfort kinda??
A/N: I've been using dialogue from the campaign for these chapters, so hopefully it translates well enough. Thank you for all the support :) | Word Count: 3.5k
꒦꒷ MAIN MASTERLIST ꒷꒦ GHOST MASTERLIST ⋆ ⚘ 🕊 ˚✧ ₊˚ʚ prev. chapter | next chapter // requests | ao3 | playlist
Kiss Of Judas
Valeria remained completely silent during the entire helicopter ride, refusing to look anyone around her in the eyes. She never expected to be caught, at least not by foreign forces. She was a complicated woman in your eyes, always nearly impossible to read.
You still felt jumpy and wired from the whole operation as the adrenaline began to dwindle, which was not helping your impatience. Valeria was the reason for your condition, but also the reason you didn’t get the life squeezed out of you. And yet, here she was, not giving your Task Force any reach on where to find the missiles.
You opened the door with your keycard and stepped inside, seeing her sitting in the middle of the room—surrounded by your team and the allies.
Her eyes flicked up at you when she heard the motion, mirroring the look she had in her eyes when you were the one in the interrogation chair. You ran your tongue over the cut on your lip, keeping a blank expression.
“Las Almas needs me,” she purrs, giving Alejandro and you a glance. She was searching for any sign of emotion in your eyes as if testing you. You weren’t going to give it to her, or anyone else in this room who tried the same.
Alejandro bends down closer to her, hovering his face in front of hers. “Las Almas needs soldiers, not sicarios… And you,” he begins, looking back at you before he speaks, as if referencing what she let happen to you. “You disgrace the Army, Valeria.”
She wasn’t like Hassan.
He was too emotional when backed into a corner—he was cruel. She always kept a cool attitude about her, always steps ahead of her enemies. And she harbored one skill you hadn’t mastered yet—keeping your enemies close.
Ghost remains posed against the wall, only keeping his eyes trained on the target. “You’re a narco harboring a terrorist.”
Valeria maintains a grimace, carelessly leaning against the back of her chair. “Terrorism is good for business, it’s insurance.”
“Innocent civilians turned to ash, all to protect your drug game?” You finally spoke up, crossing your arms to your chest. When law enforcement is more focused on maimed civilians, they turn a blind eye to the war on drugs.
She ignores what you’re implying, too intelligent to admit that out loud. “To find your terrorist and your missiles, you need me.” Valeria tilts her head, observing the tightness you were carrying in your posture.
Graves approaches her from behind, gripping one of her shoulders with a gloved hand. “I want the missiles, I want the targets, and I want Hassan. You’ve got ten seconds or I’m gonna show you the difference between the military and me.” For once, his combativeness might get you the answers you needed.
To get to Valeria, you needed to mirror her. Ladylike interrogation was not the way she did things, so the opposite was all she knew.
“I can tell you where to find the missiles. When you return, I’ll tell you where Hassan is.” She never meets Graves’ eyes. “In exchange, you will let me go. And get the fuck out of Las Almas.”
“Deal.” Graves loosens his grip and nods his head to the rest of you.
Making a deal with her was not in the team’s best interest, not in the slightest.
Graves only saw the big picture ahead of him, and he didn’t pay any mind to the people he would trample to get to that goal.
The intel Valeria grave led your team to an oil rig miles out on the Gulf Of Mexico. Considering how horribly wrong your last mission involving water went, you were hesitant to see the team going along with it, even if it did lead to the missiles.
How could you be sure Valeria was being honest? She had no reason to. She had the entirety of your unit wrapped around her fingers, and that’s exactly how she wanted it.
Perhaps you were lucky you nearly died the previous night because you were going to sit the mission out.
You’re sat on your bunk, cleaning your pistol with a rag, being the only person left in the quarters. Your eyes flick up toward Ghost as he approaches. Usually you would ignore him, or have some snarky remark, but there were bigger problems everyone was facing.
“Do you think the missiles will be where she said they would?” You questioned, setting the rag on the mattress beside you.
“She knows if she gives us this, we’ll have no choice but to set her free.” He keeps his eyes on the ground, still refusing to look you in the eyes. “We’ve been through situations like this before. Terrorists are all the same—only out for themselves.”
You nodded and dropped down from the top bunk to face him. He turned around hesitantly, his face contorting in confusion.
You looked around the room, making sure it was clear before you spoke. “What about Graves? Is he only out for himself?” You muttered, leaning close to him.
“He’s an ally of ours, until we know otherwise, you need to act like it, Sergeant.” He grumbled while reaching for his pack. The truth was, Ghost didn’t trust any of them either. The way Graves forced you into the operation yesterday made him seethe.
Ghost blinked away the emotions that filled him. The flashbacks he had, hearing you struggle for yourself in his ear, the gunshot that followed with silence—all while all he could do was stay put on the hillside.
He grabbed his bag and looped it around his shoulder. “Just say put here, and don’t make any more enemies while you’re at it. Think you can handle that?” He added, looking down at you as if you were dirt on his shoes.
You knew you were right. The most spiteful people have their weaknesses, and Graves had one for sure. Even if no one believed you now, they would soon. You just hoped no one had to die for it to become clear.
You’re awoken by what sounds like a disturbance outside, and the voices are familiar. The team must be back from disarming the missiles. You look at the clock, seeing it’s early in the morning.
You sit up straight and gather your composure, curious about what’s going on. Whatever it was didn’t sound good at all.
“This is my base.” You press your ear to the wall, hearing Alejandro’s voice first.
“It’s not a base. This is a sizable covert facility, and I admire it.” Graves speaks next. “So, I’m taking it.”
You feel like your jaw dropped to the floor. You were right all along, and things were about to go very bad very fast. You climb off your bunk and put on your backpack, grabbing all of your gear. 
“Nobody needs to get hurt here.”
“Are you threatening us?” Ghost asks. You can practically feel the tension building, even if all you’re hearing is bits and pieces.
You peer out the window, seeing them standing at the gate. Alejandro is inches from Graves’ face; Soap is in the middle of it; and Ghost preemptively has a hand on his knife, searching for any excuse to use it.
Where are the rest of Los Vaqueros? The realization came that you hadn’t seen any of them since the team left.
A burst of gunfire filled your ears, making you jump. You didn’t have time to sit around and watch, and you weren’t going to be the next person sent home in a box. You grab your pistol and make sure it’s loaded and ready.
The compound will be swarmed with Shadows any minute now—and there was no time to regroup with your team.
You hear Graves’ voice again, but this time through a nearby radio, followed by the stomping of boots. “2-0, cordon the compound. If you find Ghost and Soap, keep them contained. Find the other one, she won't get far.”
You kneel behind the large structural pillar, watching as one of the Shadows patrols the sleeping quarters. He turns his back to respond, “Sleeping quarters are clear, Sir. No sign of her.” You crept behind him, jamming your knife into his jugular.
He goes down quietly, only suffering for a matter of seconds. The Shadow didn’t deserve your brutality. He couldn’t have known what hand Graves was going to play up until now. Still, it was better for them to be dead than you. And there was no time for a moral dilemma.
You jog to the armory, finding it cleared out. Graves was thinking way ahead of just taking the building, he was taking the inventory too, leaving your team with nothing. “Goddammit,” you muttered to yourself, before dashing back to the Shadow’s body. You winced as you ripped the rifle from the corpse’s stiff fingers.
You need to keep moving.
You advance to the upper level, wagering that it would be less noticeable to take one of the side exits up top. You do just that, finding a window in one of the offices to squeeze yourself through. Your feet prowl down the metal steps, keeping your eyes peeled for any hostiles. Lucky for you, the backend of the base isn’t well protected.
Your boots crunch the gravel below you, even when acting at your stealthiest. You reach one of the tall chainlinks bordering the perimeter, and loop one foot through it, taking each ascendant one foot at a time.
You reach the top, using the fabric of your shirt to protect your hands from the barbed wire. You carefully swing your leg over, and follow with the other, now descending down the other side. You drop down once the distance is close enough, taking only a second to catch your breath.
The easy part's over—now you needed to find an area that wasn’t crawling with Shadows on the lookout for your face.
The previous night's injuries didn’t make the ordeal any easier. You found yourself having to rest quicker than usual, almost letting out pained grunts when you extended your limbs. You needed to push through it, just like you did when you survived the tunnels.
You removed one of the backpack straps off your shoulders, leaving it to rest on one side, while the weapon rested on the other. You need to get out of here before another Shadow patrol rotates your way again.
The only sound in the distance was chirping insects, and faint traffic pollution from the city and the base behind you. Things were too quiet.
“Commander, possible sighting by the North Tower, engaging now.” You heard faintly, making your eyes bulge. Your feet carried you before your mind could decide to, making some distance between yourself and the noise.
You felt the rush of the bullets whizzing around you as you bolted until eventually you were knocked down by a lucky one. Your body tumbled down, rolling into one of the ditches. You felt a fiery sting on the fatty part of your hip, flinching as you pulled down the part of your waistband atop the wound. It was a deep slice, bloody and jagged torn skin.
Mercifully, the backpack slowed down the force of the bullet when it zipped through. It grazed your skin instead of being buried inside it.
“Approaching to confirm the hit, Sir.” The voice from before carries, as it echoes through the vastness of the humid air.
“Don’t confirm it—Finish it.” Graves chirps through, sending a rush through your veins. Once the Shadow finds you, it wouldn’t be a graze. If there was any chance of making it out of here, you needed to either choose fight or flight.
You muffled the sounds of agony escaping through your lips, biting into them instead. You scrambled to your feet, reaching for your pistol.
The soldier’s radio static grew louder as he examined the ditch, expecting you to still be laying there. In reality, you were behind one of the concrete dividers lining the path. Before he noticed you, you fired off one shot, dropping the Shadow. You followed the lights of the city in the distance, getting yourself as far away from where you fired as possible.
When you made it several yards away from the compound, finding yourself on a sidestreet, you finally utilized the radio clipped to your collar.
You turned the knob, finding the correct channel so it would go straight to anyone in 141 and not the Shadows. “This is 7-1, how copy? Anyone?” You grew frustrated at the lack of answer. “I repeat, this is 7-1. Anyone copy?”
The voice glitched at first, before it finally came through. He says your name, his tone filled with defeat and worry.
“How copy, Sergeant? You injured?” The reception finally cleared, allowing you to hear it clearly.
You sighed and cleared your throat. “I’m hit, but solid. I got a dozen Shadows chasing my tail. What the hell happened?”
Ghost doesn’t answer your question, but deflects. You sense it has to do with what he spat your way before they left. He knew you were right about Graves, and he wasn’t, and he couldn’t handle admitting that right now.
“There’s a church near the plaza. I’m heading there now. Any sign of Johnny?”
“No. You’re the first I’ve come in contact with. Was he hit? I heard shots before I got out of there.” You continue down the backroad, approaching the main district of Las Almas.
“Affirmative. Keep your eyes peeled for him. And watch your back, Sergeant.” The line cuts after he finishes his sentence, leaving you to stay alive on your own. Soap must be somewhere in the shops in the same prickly situation you are.
There was no time to search for Soap, especially if he’s left a trail of Shadow bodies through the city. You���re of no use out here when you’re bleeding all over yourself.
You needed to find Ghost.
Each time a gun fired in the distance, you had to double check you weren’t hit again, even though it felt foolish.
You finally reached the outskirts of the plaza, where the Church was sitting on the top of a hill. It looked almost ancient, tilting to one side. You hovered your finger over the pistol trigger as you crept to the door. You pushed it open, hearing it creak loudly as you did so. There was no light inside, except for where the night sky peaked through the holes in the walls, and one large gap in the roof.
Finally, you spotted his figure near the altar, knelt beside it. You limped up to it, meeting his eyes, which were all you could see given the dark clothing he was wearing.
You slowly dropped to your knees next to him, placing your pistol in the holster. “No sign of Soap while I was out there. Goddamn city is infested with Shadows.”
He nodded at your update, grabbing one of the stray candles off the altar. He fishes out his lighter and puts it to the wick, illuminating your battered appearance, while allowing you to view him.
You stare at him blankly for a few seconds, studying him as he takes the backpack off your shoulders, and begins to dig through it.
“I didn’t have time to pack supplies. There’s nothing whole in there.” You comment, watching as his brow tightens in concentration.
He still hasn’t uttered a word this entire time, simply returning deep glances through the warm candle fire. You flinch when he reaches toward you, but his hands are gentle and slow. He pulls up the fabric of your shirt only slightly, and pulls down the side of your waistband now turned a deep maroon.
You keep still as he examines the graze. He grips the sleeve of his jacket, and rips off a square of fabric with ease, beginning to pack the wound. You snuff out your struggles when he touches the tender parts, clenching your jaw instead.
For the first time, it wasn’t him saving you because he had to; he was because wanted to. He was showing an inkling of the tenderness buried deep within him.
He finished packing the wound with the tear of fabric, before carefully covering your bare hip with your waistband again.
You rise to your feet again, making sure not to put pressure on that side of you. You’re expecting hours of silence between you and him—hours of agonizing silence.
He finally speaks once his back is turned to you, as if he can’t look you in the eye. “You were right about Graves.” He sounded apologetic, like if he had just believed you before, none of this would’ve happened to you.
You tilted your head delicately, stepping closer to him. “Ghost… This isn’t on you. You couldn’t have known Graves would flip.”
He was looking down at the wood floor below him in disappointment, looking as if he wanted to curse himself. You reached out your hand, placing your fingertips on his forearm.
“Ghost,” you whispered. He shook his head and gathered himself before facing you, flinching away from your hand. His eyes had gone glossy, filled with angst.
“If this is about what I said, Ghost—It’s not a concern of mine anymore… We clearly have bigger problems.” You finished your sentence with a light smile, trying your best to lighten the mood. Your attempt to add comedy did nothing to ease him tearing himself apart inside.
“Did you hear me, Simon?” The first time you’ve said his name. He casted a look you’d never seen before. Not hardness, not anger, just torment.
“People like me don’t belong with people like you, Sergeant.” His exterior ran cold again, and he straightened his posture. “Everything that we did, everything you went through because of it, that was all me. Got it?”
You were stunned, completely stunned. You spent so long being angry at him, that you were blind to the truth of it. It wasn’t arrogance he used as a shield, it was his scars.
“Simon-” You repeat, feeling like you have been sucker-punched in the gut.
“Don’t say my name like it means something to you. None of it meant anything to me.” He snaps, stepping closer to you, using his frame to tower over you. The vulnerability he showed only last seconds before it quickly became a thorn in your side.
He lowered his voice to give his last blow. “I break everything I touch… I’ll break your heart, Love.”
You felt tears sting at the corner of your eyes. You tried to be stronger than this, but paired with everything you’d been through to get you to this spot, it was too much.
You quickly wiped them away and ripped your backpack from his grasp, slinging it back on your shoulder. You hurried toward the church doors, painting your face void of the emotions you were feeling.
Once you were outside, you radioed the frequency again. “Soap, how copy?”
He replied almost instantly. “Copy. I’m by the shopping district.”
Instead of following behind Ghost like usual, you led him. You ducked through alleyways, avoiding the Shadows rather than taking them out. There were still too many left to count. When you reached the shopping district, you and Ghost split off to take out each hostile one by one. With each kill, you followed the bloody trail that would lead you to Soap.
When you laid eyes on him, you let out a breath of relief. He was only hit on his arm, and it went through.
“Forgive me, Lass.” He was slumped against a brick wall, holding his injury. “But you look horrible.” At least you knew there wasn’t anything seriously wrong with him now. Focusing on him made you forget about your troubles with Ghost, even for just a minute.
“Well, it’s clear there’s no brain damage.” You said backhandedly, reaching out your hand to him.
You helped him to his feet and found an empty vehicle that was left behind, allowing him to climb inside. Ghost took the driver’s seat, you in the passenger seat. You kept your eyes trained on the passing views as Ghost sped out of the city, showing no signs of slowing down for anything.
Las Almas was soon to be a distant memory—a memory that lingered within you nonetheless.
You craned your neck up at the aquamarine sky, your attention locked to it. You had to find the beauty of this place somewhere, even if the experience was only filled with violence and heartache.
The rest of your team was finishing up business with Valeria. You decided to sit it out. The closer you stood to the plane, the faster you would be climbing inside of it when they finished their business here.
Price and the rest of the Task Force approached the cargo plane you were standing by, making you break your gaze with the sky.
“Good work here, Private.” He patted your back and then returned his hands to the collar of his tactical vest.
“It’s not over yet. Valeria was privy to a third missile, somewhere in Chicago. Might be another long flight.” You acknowledged the update, following him onto the plane. It never truly ends, does it?
There are only moves and countermoves until there’s no one left standing to shoot at or bomb.
TAGLIST: @neoarchipelago @ghostlythots @gothgirl6-6-6 @cloudyyjanee @ladyelissarose @almightywdm @glitterypirateduck
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i-am-vita · 5 months
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Oc or Self Insert/Reader Headcanons Game: Your blorbo with a wife/husband/partner from a different culture
👉 Masterlist
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Mihawk x Ghost Rose Headcanons
I'm trying to get a grip on Mihawk again after a week of Bogard writing so I came with a silly game of how would be Mihawk and Ghost Rose knowing each other as a couple after he managed to find her again.
I don't know if it's been obvious, but I want my Ghost Rose Oc to be mexican coded. I'm headcanoning that she spent all the years with her niece hidding in her birthtown at the Red Line region equivalent to LATAM (and you can't change my mind, half the Red Line is LATAM and Mexico is on the East Blue side).
Meanwhile, Mihawk is so spaniard coded it's not even subtle. That flamenco theme they came up for OPLA just cemented it. Plus, all the gloomy Dracula aesthetic... I'm headcanoning he had a spaniard-coded mother and a romanian-coded father if we take Kuraigana Island as a fantasy reimagining of Bram Stoker's Transylvania and Nightmare Before Christmas.
So this is a half-spaniard Mihawk with mexican Ghost Rose:
Everything happened so fast after Mihawk found you again, seduced you and convinced you to go away with him that it came as a surprise when, during your trip back to your hometown to retrieve your belongings, you made a comment in spanish and he answered in return.
You were still knowing each other so you had yet to talk about your respective past and families.
Hearing you speaking the language of his mother for the first time, even with a different accent, made Mihawk extra passionate and romantic towards you that day.
You tried to be as discrete as you can when arriving to your village to inform your noisy extended family (strong emphasis on extended, your father's sister took way to seriously her mother and wifely dutties having eight children) about your niece going away to her new life and you going away with someone you met.
Like that's going to keep them satisfied.
You ended staying for dinner and subjected to your father's relatives meddling.
No, you're not running away to elope, you just met and are knowing each other. No, you're NOT pregnant!
Mihawk takes it like a champ, his stoic countenance and menacing aura not enough to relent your tías from their noisy ways. In a way, they remind him of his own mother and how carefree and meddling she could be too sometimes, when his father would spent enough time away for her to feel safe again...
His ears may be ringing and his brows lightly frowned, but you can detect the smallest of smirks at the corner of his lips.
The food is like nothing Mihawk had ever taste. He do recognizes most of the ingredients, though half of the spices and definetely not any of the types of chiles he's presented with. You warn him to not believe any of your cousins anctics about the intensity of the salsas, all of them are spicy. He still takes a taste of the most spicy one. His force of will to not react to it is astonishing, but his face does turns an alarming shade of red and he drinks the tallest glass of cold water in a go.
And talking about water... There's no such thing as regular water on all the table. There're several pitchers with colorful fruity liquids that everybody insist on calling "fresh water of *fruit name*". He gives you a knowing smirk when you take a glass from the berries water. His mother had a preference for some milky like beverage that he recognizes and have a taste. The flavor is not exactly the same but its close enough to give him a bit of homesickness.
And don't make him start with the language. He was pretty sure he had a good grip of his mother's language and learnt it well enough to be fluent in it, except now he have to ask for clarification one of every ten words he hears, five if the relative in question has a fast speak.
You stay seated by his side all the time, giving him reassurance and advice, a hand on his knee, his arm on your shoulders. You take the fact he hasn't insult someone as a good sign, some of your cousins can be a pest and you have no remorse in calling them out, rudely if you have to.
As the night goes by, somebody gets a guitar out of somewhere and starts playing, followed by other instruments. You drag him to the yard to dance. The rythms are familiar and yet have their own uniqueness, so the steps, more hips' movements and closeness, that he has absolutely no qualms to follow.
You're giving your good byes when you're invited by one of your cousins to visit the vineyards he works at tomorrow. His boss would totally give you a special discount for the tour. The mention of wine is enough to hook Mihawk and he's accepting before he realizes it.
And then one of your aunts mention the festivities for the local saint start in three days. A night of loud music, fireworks and street food... Mihawk can't help to remember his mother mentioning the festivitiews of her own birthtown and he say yes again without realizing it.
It's later than he anticipates when you finally retire to the small home you lived for the past years. It's fresh and cozy, with tall ceilings and almost floor to ceiling windows to deal with the suffocating heat, wood furniture and hand embroidered fabrics.
You both were too mentally exhausted to do anything more than cuddling in bed with the minimum of cloth. You talked for hours about your families.
How you were raised in the village until after the death of your marine father at sea, your mother remarring barely a year after with a stuffy and wealthy high officer who took her and her daughters to live at the fanciest part of Loguetown. How you couldn't stand the new society you were draged to and longed for a life of your own.
How he was raised mostly by his mother at Shikkearu Kingdom (main city of Kuraigana Island before its fall), and his absent father, a soldier of the local lord.
There were still much to learn from each other, but Mihawk was set more than ever that you were it for him, and you could feel your guarded heart warming more and more towards the swordman.
And now I have to write a part 2 of them living in his castle with her new partner and her mexican quirks... and then the children arrive (aka Perona and Zoro, that will be fun). And how the Phantom Pirates react with Ghost Rose romantically entangling with the same Warlord she had to divert from the party a year ago and she had definitely not fell for.
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.
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@cinnbar-bun you have a beautiful culture and amazing writing, I refuse to accept idiot anons going after you for sharing it, they can come after me too if they dare!!! I won't leave you alone in this.
Moots and interested people I remember. You can participate too if you want, I would love to read your exploration of your cultures adapted to One Piece: @fanaticsnail @jintaka-hane @gingernut1314 @writingmysanity @feral-artistry
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sanasanakun · 1 year
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The tragedy that is Corpo!V and Jackie's relationship lies in Jackie's consistency for saving V, while V's big onscreen attempt to save Jackie falls short. Jackie rescues V on three distinct occasions: during the mysterious Mexico job, when he offers his home after V's expulsion from Arasaka, and by using his last bit of strength to slot the relic into V's head. From a purely headcanon perspective too, you could speculate that Jackie's influence prevented Arasaka from “corrupting” V, keeping them from turning into just another soulless corpo that we see populate Night City.
Jackie remains a steadfast presence in V's life, reliably coming to their aid whenever needed, even unknowingly (like by slotting in the relic). However, when Jackie desperately needs V's support, V fails. Despite V’s impressive strength and training from Arasaka, the heist claims Jackie’s life. Now burdened with an impending death sentence due to the relic in their head, V is left without that shoulder to lean on. The man who consistently "saved" them is gone, leaving V to grapple with their fate.
I even kind of view Jackie's final act of saving V with the chip as a symbol that if Jackie dies, V's own destiny is sealed. But that’s a little pessimistic for the games overall narrative (imo). I just think it's interesting how Jackie always offers an out to V, while V fails to do the same. It’s extremely bittersweet and definitely adds to the tragedy of their stories.
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plethoraworldatlas · 8 months
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Avocados have exploded in popularity across the United States. And every year Super Bowl Sunday is the biggest day for avocado consumption nationwide, as millions of football fans gobble delicious guacamole during the game. But to produce all that guac, the avocado industry is gobbling, too — scarfing up vast swaths of Mexican forest, where millions of monarch butterflies migrate to spend the winter and other imperiled wildlife struggle to survive. Most avocados sold in the United States come from a single region in Mexico, where the industry burns forests and uses an enormous amount of water — 18.5 gallons to produce one avocado — in a region already suffering from extreme drought. Avocado production also brings land grabs, pollution, and violence to Indigenous and other local communities. Research from Climate Rights International has linked this devastation to importers that supply major U.S. grocery stores with avocados. Tell U.S. grocery stores to adopt avocado-sourcing policies that protect human rights and monarch habitat. ... Every day more than 10 football fields' worth of Mexican forest are cleared for avocado production. If the United States keeps consuming avocados at this rate, by 2050 the land destroyed to grow them will have increased by more than 70% — at the expense of even more forests, including those of the world-famous Monarch Butterfly Biosphere Reserve. Imperiled monarchs are plunging toward extinction already. Losing their winter home in Mexico could be the final blow.
sign with the link to urge Top US grocery Chains to adopt avocado sourcing policies
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workingclasshistory · 2 years
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On this day, 16 October 1968, Black sprinters Tommie Smith and John Carlos raised their gloved fists in a Black power salute during the playing of the US national anthem as they were awarded gold and bronze medals at the Olympics. Smith would later clarify: “I wore a black glove to represent social power or Black power; I wore socks, not shoes, to represent poverty; I wore a black scarf around my neck to symbolise the lynching, the hangings that Black folks went through while building this country.” Following the protest, they were largely ostracised by the US sporting establishment. While Time magazine now considers their picture of the event as the most iconic photograph of all time, back then they wrote: "'Faster, Higher, Stronger' is the motto of the Olympic Games. 'Angrier, nastier, uglier' better describes the scene in Mexico City last week." Back home, both Smith and Carlos were subject to abuse and they and their families received death threats. The Australian athlete Peter Norman, the other man on the podium, also showed solidarity with the protest wearing an 'Olympic Project for Human Rights' badge in protest of his government's 'White Australia' policy. He too would also be reprimanded by his nation's Olympic authorities and was not picked for the following Olympic games — although it is disputed whether this was as a consequence of his stand in Mexico. After Norman’s sudden death in 2006, Smith and Carlos helped carry his coffin and delivered eulogies at his funeral. Pic: Angelo Cozzi/Wikimedia Commons For this and hundreds of other stories for everyday of the year check out our book: https://shop.workingclasshistory.com/products/working-class-history-everyday-acts-resistance-rebellion-book https://www.facebook.com/workingclasshistory/photos/a.1819457841572691/2111037789081360/?type=3
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outsideratheart · 2 years
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I Need More (Jenni Hermoso x reader)
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A/N: I apologise in advance for any errors, it’s late and my bed i called me.
P.S Jorge is a prick!
2022 showed so much promise but then Barcelona lost in the champions league final, your girlfriend moved to Pachuca then she got injured, your best friend got injured and Spain got knocked out of the euros in the quarter final.
You wanted to go to Mexico straight from England but Jenni told you that she needed time to settle in and get to know her team mates before you came to visit. You hadn’t seen her since the game against Italy and now you wouldn’t see her until the national camp in September. 
As soon you entered the facility in Las Rojas you have an extra pep in your step as you all but ignore your team mates who are in the lobby in favour on going to your room one that, like always, you would be sharing with Jenni. 
“Baby, I have missed you” you say as you swipe the key to your room. 
You don’t see her but you see a bag on the bed closest to the door, the one you always keep empty. 
“I saw you yesterday but I missed you to, I guess” Irene replies as she exits the bathroom. 
You loved Irene like a sister. The two of you really bonded at the euros with you been room mates for the tournament. 
“You’re not Jenni” the look of disappointment on you face could no be hidden. 
“I overheard Lola swapping the rooms around when I arrived. You should be happy that I was there, they had you sharing with Esther” 
You fall back onto the bed. The tensions were high in the team at the minute and the relationship between you and Esther was rocky to say the least with the two of you constantly butting heads during the summer. 
“This camp is going to be bad Irene, really bad. I don’t know how much more I can take” 
She takes a seat next to you on the bed. 
“We are doing what is best for the team, remember that. Now let’s go downstairs so you can see your girl. I’m not having another camp with moody sexually frustrated Y/N” 
You can only laugh at her comment. 
When you enter the lounge area you feel your body relax when you she Jenni. She is sat with some of your Barcelona team mates. It frustrated you a little bit, the fact that she didn’t come see you after she unpacked but you choose to let it go knowing that you are probably overthinking it. 
You reach for her shoulders placing a quick kiss on her hairline. You take a seat next to her and the pressure you were feelings minutes ago vanish. You had Jenni back even if it was only for just over a week.  
“Hey that’s my seat” Lola says as she approached the table, two coffees in hand. 
“Take another one Lola. I haven’t seen Jenni in months” you plead. 
“Neither have I, I have missed my best friend” Lola replies clearly not wanting to back down. 
This is one of the things you were dreading about this camp. You knew that you would have limited spare time and you wanted to spend every minute of that with Jenni however you knew you wouldn’t be the only one wanted this. Jenni moving to Mexico means that it isn’t only you she is reunited with but all her friends too. 
“Y/N! Irene! Jorge wants to speak to you”
The whole table looks at the you. During the time between the Euros and the start of the Liga F season, the two of you as well as some of the other players voiced your opinion on Jorge’s coaching methods and the way he treats the team. You had the teams best interest at heart but he along with some of the higher ups did not see it this way this leading to a rather tense national camp. 
You don’t see the team again until the afternoon training session. The Spanish sun is beaming down on the pitch and even though the team is used to the heat, you are all dripping in sweat.
“Y/N! go again! Those shots are sloppy” Jorge shouts from the sidelines.
Jenni watches from where her and are the other girls are taking their drinks break. Time and time again your shots hit the back of the net, Sandra doesn’t stand a chance of stopping any of them. She can tell that you are getting more frustrated with every strike as she sees the power of your shots increase.
“Is this what it was like during the summer?” Jenni asks the group.
“He was worse. After Alexia’s injury he put all the pressure on the Y/N. If we performed well, she could have done better and when we performed badly or lost then he blamed Y/N’s lack of leadership on the pitch. They had a huge argument after the England game but she didn’t talk to any of us about it. What did she say to you Irene? You were the one that shared a room with her” Leila tells her former team mate.
“It was hard for her but you know this” Irene looks at Jenni, keeping her response short but she get her point across.
She saw a different side of you throughout the Euros. She saw what you were like without Jenni which is something she hasn’t seen for a while. She saw your change in mood when you couldn’t talk to your girlfriend because of the timezones. 
After training you stay out on the pitch of your own volition. Jorge’s words of discouragement rang through you head on a loop. Jenni on the other pulls Irene aside as they make their way back inside.
“What did you mean earlier? Y/N hasn’t talked to me about any of this” Jenni asks slightly confused by the defenders choice on words.
“She missed you Jenni. I was there when she tried to call you and you said you didn’t have the time, it hurt her. She went through a lot, she didn’t have you, she didn’t have Alexia and none of us could fill the void that you two left” 
“How is Alexia?” 
“Really? I tell you that and you don’t care about your girlfriend. Unbelievable” 
Jenni knew that it wasn’t the best thing to ask but things haven’t been the best as of late, the distance between you has taken it’s toll on your relationship and she feared that if she were to ask about you then she wouldn’t like the answer.
“Talk to her Jenni, she needs you” those are Irene’s last words.
Deep down Jenni knew that Irene was right but she wasn’t ready for the outcome of that conversation. In her head she feels it would only end one way and she wasn’t ready for that.
That night you are the last one down for the team meal. The table Jenni was seated at had no empty chairs so you sat with some of the Real Madrid players. You are talking to Misa about possibly doing some extra sessions with her when you feel a presence behind you.
You don’t need to turn around to know who it is, your increase in heart rate lets you know who it is.
“Hi” Jenni says as you turn to face her.
“Hi” you mimic her greeting and you feel uneasy at the tension that had grown between you.
“Can I talk to you?” She asks.
You stand, telling Misa you that will catch up with her later before leaving with Jenni.
Nervousness radiates from her as you walk the halls of the facility. 
“What’s wrong?” You ask at you take a seat in the outdoor area.
“I haven’t been a very good girlfriend and I want to apologise” 
You are caught off guard by her apology but remain quiet. Jenni was right but you didn’t want her to feel any worse than she already did.
“I think I made a mistake” Jenni confesses.
“We both did” you mumble under your breathe.
“Que?”
“Nothing, forget I said anything. It isn’t important” You spoke truthfully. You had so much going on right now, an argument with Jenni was the last thing you needed.
“Y/N I know you are going through some things right now but you can talk to me” Jenni moves closer to you but as she reaches for your hand you recoil from her touch, something that hasn’t happened before.
“No Jenni I can’t. I tried to talk to you last month and you dismissed me. When I needed you the most you wasn’t there for me and you had only been in Mexico for a few weeks. Do you know how stressful these past few months have been? I have been drowning in the pressure that Jorge has put on me”
“Y/N I was injured, it isn’t my fault I wasn’t in England with you”
“Alexia wasn’t in England, her injury was ten times worse than yours but she still checked in with me everyday even though she was going through hell. You cannot use that as an excuse for turning your back on me, on us!” 
“I didn’t—“ 
“Yes you did. Take today for example, I have been looking forward to this day since we said goodbye. Do you know how it felt walking into the hotel room to find Irene instead of you. To hear that you are staying with Lola instead of me?”
“That wasn’t my choice. Lola asked if I wanted to room with her and I couldn’t say no, she is my best friend”
“And I am your girlfriend Jenni! Does than mean nothing to you?”
You outburst leaves Jenni at a loss for words. She can see the hurt on your face and she hates that she is the reason for it.
“Moving to Mexico was a mistake” it is all she can say.
You can only laugh at her response. You told her that she would regret the decision but that you would support her regardless.
“Yes it was. You turned your back on your team, on your friends, your family, on me and for what a bigger pay check? That’s right, I know Barcelona made you an offer but you wanted more so you chose to move over 5,000 miles away just to spite them”
“How did you know that?” Jenni is shocked to learn of your knowledge.
“Because unlike you I wanted to fight for us. I had an event and Joan was there so I asked him what the situation was. Imagine my surprise when I learnt my girlfriend is a sell out”
“It’s easy for you to say. You have just signed a 5 year extension, that is unheard of”
“I guess loyalty is rewarded” you are aware of how petty your response is but you don’t have the energy to care.
“Like I said, we both made mistakes. Your mistake was moving to Mexico and mine was thinking this would work”
“Y/N, No! What are you saying?” 
The seriousness of the conversation hits you like a ton of bricks. You eyes prick with tears whilst Jenni has tears rolling down her face.
“I don’t know Jen, I can’t be in a one side relationship. I want this, I want you but it feels like your feelings have changed. It doesn’t feel like you love me anymore” your heart breaks as you say the last words.
“Y/N” You can hear the defeat in her tone “Is this it? Is this how we end?”
“No. I think we need a break. I need to focus on well, everything else and you need to think about what you want”
You leave without giving her the chance to respond deciding it is best to give her space. You are drained physically, mentally and emotionally. When you reach into your pocket for your phone you realise that you must have left it on the table along with your room key.
When you enter the food hall you try your best to go unnoticed, you could feel the tightness around you eyes and you could only imagine how red they must be.
“Y/N are you ok?” Patri asks.
“No, I’m not” you don’t have the energy to lie “Have you seen my phone, I think I left it on that table but it isn’t there”
 “Misa gave it to Sandra, who is” Patri scans the room “Over there by the pool table”
“Thanks P” 
You get you belongings from the Barca goalkeeper then leave for your room but Jenni stops you by the door.
“You deserve better Y/N” her voice is quiet as not to bring attention to the two of you.
“Then be better Jenni because I want you” you place a gentle kiss on her cheek before leaving.
Jenni watches you walk away. She knows that this is right thing for the two of you. She knows that she wants you but things are more difficult now and she isn’t sure if the your relationship will survive the distance.
Days pass, you and Jenni barely speak unless you have to and the sadness you both are clearly feelings is picked up by the players around you. Lola has taken it upon herself to cheer Jenni up the best she can whilst Irene and Sandra rarely leave your side.
“I told her that we need a break. I have so much going on at the minute, I don’t have time to worry about my relationship”
You and Irene are in your room getting ready for training. Your co captain has starting to worry about you even though you reassure her time and time again that you are fine.
“I know that are getting tense at the minute, we all feel it and you seem to be his punching bag which isn’t fair but you can’t let him ruin your relationship Y/N”
You ignore her words even though you know she is right but you cannot bring yourself to focus on anything other than the team. As if knowing what you are thinking Irene stares are you, it’s the look you imagine her giving her son when he is being naughty. The thought alone causes you to crack up.
“So you do know how to smile?”
“Shut up!” You though a pillow at her. She is about to throw it back but you her someone banging at your door.
You open it to find Parti, Leila, Sandra, Lola and Jenni. All of them have concerned looks of their faces which causes an uneasy feeling to settle in your gut.
“What is it?” You ask not caring for pleasantries.
“It’s leaked” you look at Patri hoping that she will elaborate “The meeting we have had with Jorge and the staff. They are saying we want him fired”
You go to you bedside table getting your iPad so you can see the report for yourself. Just as Patri said, it is all over twitter but they have got it completely wrong. This is what you feared, you never asked for Jorge to be fired, you just wanted the teams health and wellbeing to be considered a priority which during the euros it wasn’t.
Would you mind if Jorge was fired, no but you never demanded it like some of twitter is saying.
“He is going to think one of us leaked it” Lola says.
“No” Irene says looking at you.
“He is going to think I leaked it” and as if he heard his name been mentioned you phone goes off, you receive a message saying that Jorge wanted to speak to you. “I have been summoned” 
“Just you” Jenni asks and you nods your head “Let one us come with you” you shake your head.
As asked you meet with Jorge and some of the media team in a conference room. They let you know that as a captain you will be in the pre match press conference where you will back the team and show your support for the coach in question. When you tell them that you won’t do it, that you won’t lie to the world, you all but get threatened to be removed from the team. They give you a list of questions that you will be asked by news outlets close to the team such as Marca. You roll you eyes are the type of questions, you are known as an honest person who never shies away from the truth yet now this is exactly what you are been asked to do.
A couple of days later and it is the night before the press conference. Since finding out about it you haven’t been able to sleep but you know you have to be camera ready in the morning so you skip dinner and team bonding in favour of getting a good nights sleep, 
“Y/N Please let me in” Jenni says from the other side of your door. You hope that if you ignore her she will go away. “Irene gave me a key but I won’t use it if you don’t want me to. It’s just that I’m worried about you, we all are. I know I am probably the last person you want to see”
That’s the thing, she isn’t. She is the person that you know will be able to be to calm you down but you also know she wont be able to do that without bringing out different emotions. 
“I will wait out here for 5 minutes, I will set my phone’s timer and if you don’t come to the door by the timer ends then I will leave”
You rolls you eyes, letting out a small chuckle at your girlfriends resilience and although you are tempted to call her bluff you choose to let her in.
“You wouldn’t have left after five minutes” you open the door moving aside so she can come in.
“No, I wouldn’t” she confirms your suspicions.
You get back in your bed while Jenni stands near the TV not knowing where the two of you stand.
“What are you doing? We can still share a bed Jenni” you pat the place next you and Jenni lifts up the sheet getting in next to you.
“I wasn’t sure if that was ok”
“We are still dating Jenni, you are still my girlfriend” you try your best to reassure her given that the two of you haven’t talked about your argument since it happened.
“I want you to know that I have thought about what you said and I want to talk to you about it but not now. Right now I want to watch a movie and cuddle” 
“I would like that” 
Needing no more encouragement she holds her arm out and you snuggle in her side. You feel your shoulders relax when your in her hold.
You don’t remember falling asleep but you wake up the next morning on your side with Jenni’s arms wrapped around you. You look at the time to see that you have several hours before you are needed in the media room so you allow yourself to go back to sleep.
Your alarm goes off waking both you and Jenni up and for a split second things seem normal. With your eyes closed it is like you are in your apartment in Barcelona, the two are you getting up so you can go to training. The two of you get ready and go for breakfast before you have to leave for the press conference.
During the meal the press officer, the one that seems to be on your side, comes over to help you prepare. After finishing your breakfast you and her head to the conference room. You take your seat ready to be probed by the media but just before it starts the entire team comes in and sits down. You immediately feel the anvil size weight lift off your chest.
The questions are tough and as predicted Marca are doing their best to paint Jorge as a hero and you as the bad guy but your media training pays off as you keep a level head and answer the questions the best you can. It is when the other journalists start asking you questions that it becomes difficult, these weren’t pre approved and they a clearly asking the questions that the rest of the world want to know. You can tell that you don’t answer them like your coach or the RFEF would have wanted but you try your best, still you know that your weren’t very convincing.
Your press conference last 10 minutes but you feel like you barely got to speak and you know that you just lied to the fans, this alone is enough to feel like a let down and as soon as you are out of the door Jorge is in your face.
“What was that? You did not do what we asked!”
“I answered the Marca questions like we agreed. As for the other ones, I did my best. I lied to the entire world so that you wouldn’t look like an incompetent coach. You should be thanking me!” 
“You don’t care for this team. I won’t have players on my team with your attitude!”
At the this point the rest of the team stand by and watch the back and forth between you and Jorge. Nobody knows that to do, do they stop it? If so, how do they stop it.
“You talk a big game Jorge but we both know the importance of public perception. Now correct me if I am wrong but now it is your turn to lie to the world, enjoy your press conference, you never know it might be your last”
You know you shouldn’t have said that but the man was on your last nerve. 
“Y/N” The press officer warns you.
“I know, I know. Will you let me know how the public reacts?” You ask her.
“Of course, I’ll come and find you later. I suggest you find a way to calm down before you do something that you will regret”
“What about a movie night?” Lola suggests.
“Who’s room?” You ask.
“Ours” Jenni answers.
“Give me ten minutes and I’ll be there. Leila, you’re not picking the movie” you joke in attempt to lighten the mood which in a matter of minutes became very heavy.
Most of them team spends the day in Jenni and Lola’s room before going to bed so that they can get a good nights sleep before the game against Hungary the next day.
The game against Hungary ends in a Spain win, with both you and Irene scoring the first half. The crowd erupted when the balls hit the back of the net and you swear you have never felt more support during a match than in that moment. You aren’t surprised when Jorge brings you both off at half time, you know it is a power move but you proved your point in the first half, he was well aware of this.
Between the first and second game things take a turn for the worse for Jorge and RFEF as the fans publicly support you and the rest of the players, they call the press conference staged and say that you were told what to say as you would never talk about the team the way you did which is what you tried to tell the media team when they came up with your answers. Irene did the second press conference which went went just as well as yours and it seemed to had fuel to the fire.
Jorge’s ego took at hit during those days and he proved this much when he benched you and Irene for the game against the Ukraine and kept you there for the duration of the game. It was a breaking point for you though, you couldn’t take anymore.
“I’m done” you throw your bag across the room and slam the door. 
Inside your room stood Irene, Jenni, Patri and Sandra.
“I will tell them that I will not be returning to the national team until these issues are resolved”
“Y/N calm down. I know you are mad but don’t do anything hasty”
“Patri, I love you but you have no idea what this last week has been like. I am going to lose my spot on the national team, I am losing my girl. It’s all too much” 
You bury your head in your hands. All of the emotions that you have buried down come to the surface and you burst into tears.
“Can you give us the room?” Jenni asks. The other three are shocked by your confession. They knew about the issues with the team but they had no idea that things hadn’t gotten that bad between you so they happily give the two of you space.
Jenni pulls you into her arms which somehow makes it worse. She holds you and whispers words of comfort whilst you body racks with sobs.
“You’re not losing me” 
“Yes, I am. I lost you the minute you moved to Mexico. This summer was shit then I went back to Barcelona and for a split second I forgot you moved then when I remembered I starting crying in the middle of our apartment. It’s just me and Andi”
“At least you have him” Jenni doesn’t know what to say or how to fix the situation.
“But I need you Jenni” 
“Y/N I—“ 
You sit up, wiping your eyes with the sleeves of your hoodie. You take a deep breath before turning to look at your girlfriend.
“I need you” you repeat yourself “I know that I cant have you the way I want you and I will learn to be ok with that but I need you to be there. I can’t be in this relationship alone”
“This past month has been tough and I know I haven’t been the best girlfriend but I will be better, I  promise”
“Good and I know I haven’t been great either but we survived your move to Paris, we can survive this”
“We will” Jenni says not knowing whether it is a statement or a question.
“We will” your tone is full of certainty. 
You know that it will be hard but as long as you both are willing to put in the effort to make it work  then there is hope for your relationship.
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themarkofoxin · 3 months
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still time to delete your post. you were uninformed, that’s fine, but now you know that there is a pattern of racist behavior on dan’s end and we are right to be upset. him outright saying that he won’t tour in ‘third world countries’ like mx and brasil during a WAD show is racist. calling my home a third world country is racist. this is not in the past, you can say logistics all you want but dan outright said that he will not tour in our ‘third world countries’. it is not logistics. it is racism.
if i'm remembering correctly, dan did not "outright" say he just wouldn't tour in mexico & brasil. he made a tasteless, dismissive joke, sure, with the fans as the butt of the joke in the same way fans were the butt of the joke in many wad segments; it was insensitive and dismissive because the fans he was poking fun at weren't actually there and, obviously, have real frustrations with his behavior. but the meaning and implication of the joke was never that he actively avoided those places and would never go there--hell, they have been to brasil, to show a recorded version of ii and do a q&a. they had a mexico date for ii but it fell through, right? claiming he "outright [said] that he won't tour in 'third world countries'" is a mischaracterization as much as it would be to say "he outright said he hates phil" because he's said it in competitive gaming videos before. the key difference is he has failed to build a rapport with latam fans so it was insensitive and hurtful.
also, it is very much influenced by logistics. as much as it sucks, we absolutely cannot dismiss that. i was too sarcastic and dismissive in my additions to the post, and i've deleted those, but i stand by the original paragraph. regardless their (but especially dan's) racist comments, booking venues in countries where
1) english is not the predominant language,
2) they are not widely known,
3) once the venue learns about them they figure out they may be well past their peak in popularity and,
4) in some cases, it is relevant that they're gay and much more open about it than ii,
DOES actually make it significantly more difficult to convince a venue that it will be profitable for the venue to put on your show. most of the time, that is all venues are worried about. will people actually show up, or will these two faggots who peaked ten years ago draw in an audience of like, 20 people, and the venue will lose money when they could have booked a more profitable show? if the venue manager had to google them, are they really that popular anyways? the venue managers don't care unless they are certain they will not only break even but profit from dnp more than they would profit from literally anyone else they could book that night. why do you think they were able to do locations in asia for ii, but don't have them now (yet)? in 2018, they could reasonably argue their profitability, and even that wasn't enough in manila.
i am hoping, genuinely and from the bottom of my soul, that they will use the speed at which most of their shows sold out when the tickets went up to prove to venue managers in places other than the US and europe and commonwealth oceania that it is worth it. i hope they try very hard, and that they're able to add more dates. it certainly seems like they want to. i think it's also likely--whether it's right of them or not--that their experiences in MX & manila have led them to believe it's better to stay entirely quiet before they're absolutely sure they can announce a date and it will work, which makes it look like they're not communicating at all, but they may see it as them saving people from getting their hopes up if it doesn't work out. idk which is better, honestly. it at least seems to me like they're telegraphing that they're trying to book in other regions
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remy2fang · 2 months
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The timeline of M. Bison between SFV and SF6
SFV
- Ryu defeated M. Bison
- M. Bison died (???)
SF6
- Fast forward to SF6, M. Bison woke up in an alley in Metro City and have no memories.
- He beat the crap out of some street punks and stole their clothes.
- During his search for power, he revived a horse in Mexico and named him Rosinante. He rode him around the world.
- He eventually enters the Neo Shadaloo Ruined Lab because the powers there drew him in.
- He eventually gained some of his memories back by absorbing the Phantom Bison from the psycho power memory generator.
What happened between SFV and SF6? Some clues were found both in-game and from an interview.
- M. Bison wasn’t sure himself, but he conjectured that he must’ve been a rogue spare body and that’s why he’s where he is now.
- According to devs, this is the same M. Bison body from SFV because the cracks and scar from his hand came from his ultimate showdown with Ryu. The fight rendered him as an amnesiac. I’ll take the words from the devs over Bison’s fuzzy memory lol.
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- When talking to F.A.N.G aka Fang Fei, he mentioned that Bison’s return was “too soon.” He even mentioned the possibility that a spare body might’ve been activated by mistake, but he wasn’t too sure himself. He then said this Bison is a fake and is imperfect because he doesn’t remember him (but this Bison IS the real deal).
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What do I think from all of this?
Bison’s time between SFV and SF6 is a mystery, but the last person that saw Bison’s demise was F.A.N.G. As Bison seemingly “deteriorated” in A Shadow Falls, his body was obscured by both the debris and a distraught F.A.N.G, making his “death” ambiguous. Sometime later, we found out that F.A.N.G believes that Bison is “not truly dead” in the three-part side story TOXICITY.
But then what happened between SFV and Toxicity then? Based on what F.A.N.G said of Bison coming back “too soon” in World Tour mode, that indicates that he knew the estimated timing of when Bison should be fully resurrected (or recovered). If that’s the case, it is possible that F.A.N.G had a hand in “reviving” Bison (the scarred body version from the end of SFV), at least for the initial process. He even mentioned about spare bodies, so that means F.A.N.G might have been present in a lab during the early period. But because the process would take years, F.A.N.G decided to let the reawakening do its thing and have people he employed to look after Bison’s body. From then on, F.A.N.G probably didn’t pay Bison a visit and would assume Bison would come to him when he’s fully awaken. Either F.A.N.G is delusional or there might have been an actual odd camaraderie between him and Bison. I don’t know lol.
If Bison returned too soon, who woke him up in the first place and dumped him off at Metro City? It could be JP because he wanted to do something with him and Ed. But if JP wanted to do something with them, he would have kept Bison close by then, which he didn’t. It’s still possible that JP activated Bison’s body early, but someone else could possibly had their own motives and dropped an amnesiac Bison in a dark Metro City alley. Who could this person be then? That might be revealed in a later update…or not lol. Nevertheless, Bison now resides in the Neo Shadaloo ruined lab…perhaps the pieces are settling in place for JP’s plans afterall…
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These are just my thoughts based on what the lore from the game, interview, and side story from the official SFV website provided. It doesn’t confirm anything, but it’s something to get off from my chest. Hopefully the next update will continue on with the Shadaloo story through sub missions.
Anyway, thanks for reading!
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