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joemama-2 · 1 month ago

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𝒃𝒍𝒐𝒐𝒅 & 𝒉𝒐𝒏𝒆𝒚

・❥・ pairing: veteran! levi x fem reader

╰┈➤ synopsis: known as ‘marley’s darling’, your father, a high-ranking marleyan diplomat, introduced you as his pride and joy since you were out the womb. dazzling smiles, coy and subtly flirtatious remarks, an innocent but seductive allure that keeps you in the eyes of the public. with concerns for your safety, your father hires levi ackerman as your personal bodyguard, a war hero to some, a warm criminal to others. the same man who fought against your people.

・❥・ wc: 9k

・❥・ tags/warnings: age gap, levi is in his late thirties, reader is 26, angst, fluff, smut, alcohol, drugs, war veteran! levi, reader takes inspo from marilyn monroe, mentions of ptsd, depression, death, post! war, prejudice, guns, knives, violence, reader is marleyan, slow burn, sorta opposites attract?, dark themes, cussing, gross men, no titans! modern au, may have some canon divergent elements (e.g. levi has both legs still lol)

・❥・ series masterlist < next chapter

The sound of gravel cracks underneath Levi’s shoes, his hands stuffed into his coat pockets. It’s a sunny day in Eldia, he’s almost begun to miss this place. It’s much more different than Marley, not that he’s complaining. He’s only been here for three days, yesterday was his last. For some reason, he’s dreading the plane back. A sigh escapes his lips, shaking his head at the melancholic intrusions. He stops in his tracks when he hears a tiny hurdle of giggles and whispers. Looking over his shoulder is a small group of children around the age of five or six, looking up at him with wide, starry eyes. He can see the way their gaze flickers across his features, going from the long scar across his face to the ghostly, white eyeball of his. Some hold their smiles back, while others gasp in child-like delight.

He turns to face them fully, crouching down to the children’s height.

“H-Hi…” a timid girl greets. “Are you—”

“You’re Mr. Levi!” a much more brave young boy blurts out, his toothy grin widening. “You look cooler than the books!”

Levi’s lips twitch into the smallest of smiles at the boy’s enthusiasm, his usual stoic expression faltering for a moment. He straightens up, towering over them once again, though his gaze softens as he studies the children.

"Mr. Levi, right?" the timid girl asks again, her voice barely a whisper.

Levi’s heart skips a beat, a strange, unfamiliar warmth flooding him as he nods. “Yeah, that’s me.”

The children seem to surge forward as if they’ve all had the same unspoken idea, their eyes practically glowing with excitement. The boy in front pulls out a little notebook and a small pen from his pocket. “Can you sign it? Can you sign it for us?!” His voice is filled with such an innocent eagerness that for a moment, Levi just stares at the child, a little taken aback.

“You want my autograph?” he asks, his voice low, almost like he’s not sure what to make of this situation.

The children nod eagerly, the timid girl now clutching a scrap of paper between her tiny hands. Levi takes the paper from her, glancing over it for a brief moment before scribbling his name, his signature jagged and rough, just like everything else about him. “Here,” he hands it back to her, the girl’s eyes lighting up like she’s just been handed the most precious thing in the world.

“Thank you, Mr. Levi!” she squeaks, bouncing on her heels. “You're our hero!”

Levi straightens up again, his hand returning to his coat pocket as he glances over the group. They stare at him for a while, their eyes filled with admiration, something he hasn't seen in a long time. But it’s not the kind of admiration he’s used to—it's pure, innocent, almost reverent. He can feel the weight of their gaze, but for some reason, it doesn’t bother him. “Well, I’m not really a hero,” Levi mutters, running a hand through his hair. “But thanks.” He turns his gaze away from them, feeling that odd discomfort creeping in. “You kids should get back to playing, yeah?”

The children nod excitedly, and as the last few gremlins get their signature, they scurry away.

He shakes his head in a slight fondness, turning back around to continue his trek back to the private plane waiting for him. Seems being a veteran has pretty good perks, if he does say so himself. The hangar isn’t too far away, luckily. He’s already had his morning cup of tea from the shop he used to always frequent before moving, same owners, same tacky furniture—nothing could get better than that.

He can see a few men in the distance, seemingly getting his plane ready.

Levi continues to walk toward the hangar, his mind begins to wander. The children’s bright smiles and excited whispers echo in his head, their innocent admiration stirring something within him. He hadn’t been called a hero in years. Most people only saw the scarred, battle-worn soldier who had fought for survival. The idea of being a symbol of hope to anyone was something he'd long abandoned. But there they were—those little faces full of wonder, looking at him like he was more than just a man who’d lived through hell. His lips press into a thin line as he shakes his head. Maybe it was just the way they were raised, seeing heroes in simple things, not yet tainted by the harshness of reality.

As he gets closer to the plane, one of the men spots him and waves. “Mr. Ackerman!” the man calls out. “Everything’s ready for your departure. We’ve got a clear flight ahead.”

Levi nods, not in the mood for small talk but acknowledging the man’s efforts. He’s almost there—almost back to the place he’s tried to forget sometimes. Marley. He tenses at the thought. There’s nothing left for him here in Eldia—not really. The place is a relic of the past, and he's nothing more than a passing memory of a world that no longer exists. Besides, he has two other little rascals waiting for him back in Marley.

He stops just short of the plane, eyes narrowing as the men finish their preparations. The sound of metal clanging and the hum of engines fill the air, but his thoughts are elsewhere. It feels like a strange kind of irony, returning to Marley, where the tension between Eldia and Marley still simmers just beneath the surface, a conflict that’s far from over. But it’s not his fight anymore. Of course, things probably will never be the same, considering just how many lives were taken in the war. A war spanning over nine years that only ended five years ago.

As the men begin to board the plane, Levi lingers, staring out at the horizon. He can almost see the faint outline of the place he left behind. His throat tightens. He’d been a different man then, a soldier with a cause. Now, he was just trying to survive, trying to forget. Humanity’s strongest.

He pushes the thoughts aside, stepping onto the plane as the door closes behind him. The world outside becomes a blur as the engines roar to life. His seat is cold and uncomfortable, but it doesn’t matter. He doesn’t care about comfort. He’d long ago learned how to endure, how to keep moving forward. He settles back in the comfy chair the plane has to offer, opening the glass of whiskey that’s already been placed out on the table for him.

Giving himself a pour, he brings the rim to his lips and sips. A small hum of satisfaction sounds from him.

“Drinkin’ already?”

Levi stiffens, lips contorting into a hard-set frown. Kenny, uncaring of his niece’s animosity towards him, sits leisurely across from him. He takes his hat off and leans back with a relaxed sigh, lifting his legs onto the table between them and crossing his arms over his chest. “The hell are you doing here?”

Kenny scoffs. “Spending time with you, obviously.”

“I’d rather eat shit than be in your presence,” Levi gruffs back, eyes narrowing at his uncle. “As far as I’m concerned, this is a solo trip.”

“Was,” Kenny corrects. “Besides, got some business on the other side. Figured I’d hop a ride with you.”

Levi’s fingers tighten around his glass, the amber liquid swirling inside as his gaze locks onto Kenny, who seems entirely unfazed by the hostility radiating off Levi. The man across from him is annoyingly at ease, as always. A smirk dances across his uncle’s lips, a little too self-assured for Levi’s liking.

“Business?” Levi repeats, his voice laced with disbelief. “What kind of business? Last I checked, you didn��t exactly have a legitimate operation.”

Kenny’s eyes twinkle as if he’s relishing in the tension between them. He leans forward, and the casualness of the movement only serves to irritate Levi more. “You’re not the only one who can make deals, kid,” he drawls, the condescending tone sharp enough to cut through the stale air between them. “We’ve got some... mutual interests. Thought I’d tag along, see if you might actually get your hands dirty for once.”

Levi scowls but doesn’t respond immediately. He takes another sip of his drink, trying to swallow down the wave of frustration building in his chest. The last thing he wants is to be involved in any scheme that Kenny’s tangled up in. But, as always, Kenny knows exactly how to push his buttons, and Levi knew better than to think he’d be able to escape this.

“Not interested,” Levi mutters, leaning back in his seat, eyes flicking toward the window, though his mind is far from the view outside. “I’m not here for a job, nothing else. Keep your shady dealings to yourself.”

Kenny chuckles, the sound a low rumble that seems to settle uneasily in Levi’s stomach. “Right, forgot you’re Mr. High ‘n Mighty now. Forgive me, Your Highness.”

“You’re a fool. An old fool.” He scoots the whiskey bottle closer when he sees Kenny reaching for it.

“Oh, give me a break,” Kenny rolls his eyes, reaching forward and taking the bottle from his niece’s grip. He uncaps it and nonchalantly sips straight from the bottle. Levi doesn’t bother holding back the disgusted noise that leaves his throat, but says nothing and focuses his attention on the window as the plane begins to take off.

For a second, there’s silence.

Until Kenny opens his big mouth again.

“So…really not interested, huh?”

“No.”

“How come? Ain’t that compensated money the government lends ‘ya not that much? How the hell you even survivin’?”

Levi’s gaze sharpens at Kenny’s words, his grip tightening on the armrest. He didn’t need to explain himself, especially not to someone like Kenny. The audacity of the man still gets under his skin, even after all these years. But Levi knows better than to take the bait. “I'm surviving fine,” Levi mutters, his voice cold and clipped. He turns his head slightly, eyeing his uncle with a glare that would freeze most men in place, but Kenny only grins wider, clearly enjoying the discomfort Levi tries so hard to hide. “I have my shop, I don’t want blood money.”

“Yeah? Well, I wouldn’t be so sure of that. I mean, the way I see it, you ain’t exactly living large," Kenny says, tapping the neck of the bottle against his leg like a rhythm he’s got memorized. "Could use a little extra padding, if you catch my drift."

Levi huffs under his breath, a dry laugh escaping him. "I'm fine," he repeats, louder this time, not bothering to explain any further. The question, though, lingers in the back of his mind: how much longer can he keep doing this? How much longer can he stay out of the kind of deals Kenny’s offering?

Kenny’s eyes narrow, sizing him up, and for a moment, Levi feels the weight of his uncle’s scrutiny. The man knows Levi better than he lets on—knows his breaking points, knows what makes him tick. And that only makes Levi more defensive. The older man lets up a bit, sighing to himself and grumbling something Levi can’t quite make out. He removes his legs from the table, facing Levi head-on. “Listen, it’s not…that bloody, alright?”

“Sure,” Levi simply says, checking his watch. Two more hours to go. Dammit.

“It ain’t,” Kenny reaffirms, scooting toward the edge of his seat. He subtly looks around, as if afraid the small crew of the plane might be listening. “Just a tiny gig. Could help you out.”

“How many more times do I have to tell you no, old man?”

“As if you’re not gettin’ there your damn self, you little brat,” Kenny spits out. He huffs, taking out a crumpled-up sheet of newspaper from his back pocket and flattening it out onto the table.

Levi peers down, face indifferent. A few moments of silence pass with Levi expecting some sort of explanation. When none comes, he unfortunately takes the bait. “What?”

“See here,” Kenny taps a long finger onto the paper. “A…client of mine, you could say. Mr. Makoto Suzuki. Topshot back over there, heard of ‘im?”

Levi’s eyes flicker down to the paper, his stomach sinking at the mention of the name. He doesn’t want to show any sign of recognition, but he can feel the subtle tension rising in his chest. Makoto Suzuki. The name isn’t foreign to him, but it’s a name that brings too many memories—too many connections to things he’s tried to forget. Levi’s lips tighten into a thin line, but he says nothing, his gaze flickering back to the newspaper. “Yeah, I’ve heard of him,” Levi mutters. He’s been around long enough to know that the big players in the game—men like Makoto—always find their way into the darker corners of the world. “Anyone with a brain has.”

“Correct,” Kenny grins, his gold canine on display. “Well, Mr. Suzuki here has a very special package he holds oh so dear to his heart.” Kenny’s finger moves slightly over to the right, and Levi’s eyes follow. A young girl, maybe in her twenties. Smiling at the camera, displaying her pearly whites. Levi can make out the group that must’ve been hurdled around you and your father while the picture was taken. Makoto’s arm is around your waist in what appears to be a protective way. “His fine piece of a daughter.”

“Makoto’s daughter,” Levi says, the words coming out gruffly, like he’s testing the air. Of course, he knows who you and your father are. “Why are you showing me this?”

Kenny leans back, eyes gleaming with something Levi can’t decipher. He takes a moment, savoring the tension in the air before answering, his voice lowering to a near whisper. “Because her father’s paying a pretty penny to keep her pretty. Been buggin’ me about it for a while now, but I ain’t no babysitter.”

“Neither am I,” Levi scoffs, setting his glass down and crossing his arms over his chest. “I’m not taking anything, especially from people like them.”

Kenny’s eyes flicker with an almost predatory gleam as he leans in closer, his voice dropping to a near hiss. “You know how things work, Levi. Money talks. And Mr. Suzuki's got plenty of it. He's desperate. His daughter’s a political asset, no different than a pawn on a chessboard. But she’s got a problem—she’s too... distracting, if you catch my drift. And if you know what’s good for you, you’ll see the opportunity here.”

Levi shakes his head, his jaw tightening as he stares at the picture, your smiling face glaring back at him. The thought of being involved in any situation with Makoto Suzuki’s daughter—especially in the way Kenny’s implying—turns his stomach. He’s fought his entire life to distance himself from this kind of world, from men like Makoto, who wield their power like a weapon and treat their own flesh and blood like assets. He snorts, his voice dripping with disdain. “I’m not a damn babysitter, Kenny. And I sure as hell don’t get mixed up in that kind of business. I’m a civilian now, it’s staying that way.”

Kenny’s grin widens, as if he’s been waiting for this exact response. He leans back in his seat, his fingers tapping rhythmically on the edge of the table. “That’s the problem, Levi,” he mutters, eyes narrowing. “You think you can just walk away from all of this. You think you’re done. But the world doesn’t work that way, not for people like you. You don’t just get to put your hands up and say, ‘I’m done,’ because someone like Suzuki? He doesn’t give a damn about your past. He sees what you can do, and he’ll make sure you know it.”

Levi’s eyes darken, his lips pressing into a thin line. He’s heard it before, the way people try to pull him back into the chaos. He’s been fighting it for years, but it’s always lurking just beneath the surface, waiting for the moment to strike. “I don’t give a damn what Suzuki thinks,” Levi mutters, his voice cold as steel. “You know what kind of man I am. I’m not some hired weapon anymore. I’m happy where I’m at now.”

Kenny laughs, a low, rasping sound that seems to crawl under Levi’s skin. “And yet, here we are, aren’t we? You’re still the same guy, Levi. You’re just pretending not to be. When the world’s out to get you, you can’t just sit on your hands and pray it’ll go away. You’ll need allies, whether you want ‘em or not.”

Levi clenches his fists, his nails biting into his palms. He wants to reach across the table and throttle Kenny, but he knows that wouldn’t change a damn thing. The man’s words ring too true. The world doesn’t let people like him go so easily. It’s a cold, unforgiving reality. He shifts uncomfortably in his seat, his gaze still locked on the picture of you and your father. The idea of getting involved with Makoto Suzuki’s business makes his skin crawl. He’s been there and done that—used as a tool in someone else’s game. He refuses to go back.

“I’m not your guy for this,” Levi says, his voice unwavering, but the unease in his chest grows. “Find someone else to play your damn games.”

Kenny groans and rolls his eyes. “Stubborn lil’ thing, huh? It’s extra cash, Levi.”

“Does it look like I care?” Levi cooly replies. “I’m not doing it. He can get a clean Marleyan to do it.”

“What? Ya think that’s it? He won’t let you watch his daughter ‘cause you ain’t Marleyan?”

“Why wouldn’t it be? What smart man would employ someone who fought against his country to be up close and personal with his daughter? We’re still a devil to some, remember?”

Kenny leans forward again, his eyes gleaming with something Levi can’t quite place. The older man seems almost amused by Levi’s firm resistance, as if he’s testing a limit he already knows well. He taps the table once more, the sound cutting through the tension like a ticking clock. “You’re a real piece of work, Levi,” Kenny mutters with a smirk. “But you’re forgetting something. Mr. Suzuki’s desperate. And desperation… well, it makes people do things they wouldn’t usually consider. And in this case, what he’s offerin’ isn’t just money—it’s leverage.”

Levi freezes at the word "leverage." The hairs on the back of his neck stand on end as his gaze snaps up to meet his uncle’s, suspicion and anxiety coiling tightly in his chest. “Leverage?” Levi repeats, voice low, barely above a whisper. He knows too well what that means—Kenny’s not talking about a job offer anymore. This is something bigger, darker.

Kenny’s grin widens, but it’s not a pleasant smile. It’s the grin of someone who knows exactly how to pull the strings. He leans in, his voice low, almost conspiratorial. “You ain’t gotta choose the game, Levi. You’re already in it. Suzuki’s got dirt. Big dirt. And if you don’t play nice, that dirt’s gonna find its way to your doorstep, sooner or later.”

Levi’s heart races as he absorbs the weight of Kenny’s words. He can feel the familiar weight of the past creeping back in, like a shadow he can’t shake. He’s fought so hard to stay out of this world—this world of manipulation, of dangerous men who make deals and break lives without a second thought. But it’s all starting to feel inescapable. “You’re saying if I don’t help him, he’ll use whatever he’s got on me against me?” Levi’s voice is steady, but there’s a tightness in his chest that betrays his growing unease. He feels like he’s already caught in the web—he’s just waiting for the final tug.

Kenny nods slowly, that sinister glint in his eye never leaving. “That’s exactly what I’m saying. He’s already been planting the chip in my damn ear about you. And you know better than anyone—someone like Suzuki? He don’t care what you’ve done or where you’ve been. You’re useful to him, Levi. You’ve always been useful. And now, you’re gonna be useful to his daughter.”

Levi’s fingers twitch involuntarily, a dark, suffocating feeling building in the pit of his stomach. He wants to scream, to smash the table between them, but he stays silent. His mind races, searching for any escape, any way out of this mess. “You can’t make me do this,” Levi says, his words low but firm. “I’m not going back. I’m not going to be anyone’s pawn.”

Kenny leans back in his seat, clicking his tongue. “You’re already a pawn, Levi. You just haven’t realized it yet. You’re surrounded by players who know how to move the pieces. You just happen to be the one they’re comin’ for.”

Levi feels his throat tighten, the cold reality of Kenny’s words hitting harder than he wants to admit. He’s trapped. No matter how far he tries to run, no matter how much he wants to be out of it, the world he’s left behind has a way of finding him. And now, it’s threatening to drag him back in. He scrubs a hand down his face.

“Think about it,” Kenny continues, his voice almost soothing, as if he’s offering advice. “You ain’t have to do much. Just keep an eye on Suzuki’s little girl. Protect her. Get a few hands dirty, but nothing that’ll land ‘ya in trouble. Think about the money. Think about what you can do with that money. Think about the doors it could open.”

Levi looks down at the picture again, at your smile, at the image of a life he knows he doesn’t belong in. But he knows his uncle is right about one thing—the world doesn’t let people like him go that easily. And maybe, just maybe, this isn’t as simple as walking away. The weight of the decision presses down on him like a lead weight. He wants to punch something, to refuse, to get off this plane, never look back and stay his sorry ass in Eldia. But the words get stuck in his throat.

“So what’s it gonna be?” Kenny asks, voice heavy with expectation.

Levi doesn’t respond right away. He stares out the window, the soft hum of the plane filling his ears, as the choice looms over him like a storm waiting to break.

The second the plane has landed and the door opens, he’s striding down the ramp. Mood soured and the whiskey does nothing but make him more adept to just how much of a damn headache his forsaken uncle. Two figures in the distance momentarily ease his grumpiness. They familiarly approach him.

“Levi! How was it?” Gabi asks first, striding forward to give him a tight hug around his waist.

“Careful,” he murmurs, though his hand pats lightly at her back. “Nothing interesting. What about you two? Held up well?”

“Sure did,” Falco responds, smiling. “Shop’s doing fine, no hiccups.”

Levi nods and hums in approval. Gabi removes her arms from him, just about to ask another question when Kenny’s scratchy voice breaks the atmosphere. “Oh, look at that. Forgot about these two monsters.” He approaches with a crooked smile, head tilting and leaning against Levi. “Huh, you both are smaller than I re—”

“Shut up,” Levi cuts him off, shrugging him off. “And don’t talk to them.”

Kenny lets out a bark of laughter, raising his hands in mock surrender. “Alright, alright, no need to get your panties in a twist,” he says, stepping back with an exaggerated sigh. “Just makin’ conversation.”

Levi ignores him, glancing back at Gabi and Falco, who exchange wary looks before Gabi’s nose wrinkles in annoyance. “Who’s this old man?” she asks, crossing her arms.

“Just an annoying bastard,” Levi mutters.

Kenny smirks. “You wound me, shorty.”

Levi clicks his tongue, already regretting letting Kenny tag along. “You’re not staying long, are you?”

Kenny grins, all teeth and trouble. “Nah, just for a drink or two. Maybe I’ll even stop by the shop, see what kinda scam you’re runnin’.”

Levi’s eye twitches, but Falco steps in before the argument escalates. “We should head back. You look tired, Levi.”

He is tired—tired of this, of the headache that is Kenny, of the weight pressing on his shoulders. He casts one last glance at the man before exhaling sharply. “Yeah, let’s go.”

Kenny just chuckles, watching as the trio walks ahead, hands in his pockets, eyes gleaming with something unreadable. He follows at a distance, whistling a tune that grates on Levi’s ears. But he doesn’t say anything.

“Did you bring us anything back, Levi?” Gabi asks, looking up at him.

Levi exhales through his nose, the corner of his mouth twitching slightly. “Tch. What do I look like, Santa?”

Gabi pouts, nudging his side. “Come on, not even a little souvenir?”

Falco chuckles. “I told you he wouldn’t.”

Levi rolls his eyes, but after a brief pause, he reaches into his coat pocket and pulls out a small, neatly wrapped package. He tosses it to Gabi, who catches it with a surprised blink.

Her face lights up. “Wait—you actually got me something?”

“Just open it,” Levi grumbles, ignoring the way Kenny is still whistling behind them.

Gabi rips the paper off, revealing a sleek pocketknife with an intricate engraving on the handle. She whistles, running her fingers over it. “This is so cool!”

Falco’s eyes widen. “A-A knife, Levi? Really?”

“She’s gotta learn how to defend herself,” Levi mutters. “Can’t have her relying on you all the time.”

Gabi grins, flipping the blade open and inspecting it. “I love it. Thanks, Levi.”

Levi shrugs, glancing at Falco. “And for you.” He reaches into his coat again and hands over a small box.

Falco hesitates before taking it, opening it carefully. Inside is a simple but finely crafted wristwatch. He blinks, then looks up at Levi, eyes wide. “This is… really nice.”

“Better than being late all the damn time,” Levi says, side-eyeing him.

Falco rubs the back of his neck, chuckling. “I guess I deserve that.”

Kenny lets out an exaggerated sigh behind them. “Damn, no gift for your dear ol’ uncle? That hurts, Levi.”

Levi doesn’t even turn around. “Your gift is me not punching you in the face.”

Kenny cackles, and Gabi snorts as she tucks her knife into her pocket. Falco just shakes his head, slipping the watch onto his wrist. Despite his exhaustion, Levi feels the tension in his shoulders ease just a little. The walk to the tea shop only takes about ten minutes. Falco takes the keys from his pocket and unlocks the door, allowing the group to step in. Kenny looks around, nodding slowly with a small whistle. “Cozy in here.”

Levi glances around, already feeling a sense of peace settle in the small, warmly lit space. The gentle scent of freshly brewed tea fills the air, mixing with the earthy tones of wood and herbs. The walls are lined with shelves of tea jars, some familiar, others he hasn’t seen before. A few potted plants sit near the windows, softening the atmosphere.

“Yeah, it’s nice,” Falco says, setting his bag down behind the counter and turning to face the group. “We’ve been getting a lot more regulars lately. Gabi’s been keeping things running smoothly.”

Gabi grins proudly, twirling a strand of her hair. “What can I say? I’ve got skills.” She gestures to the chairs by the window. “Feel free to make yourselves comfortable. I’ll brew some fresh tea for you.”

“Not a tea kinda man,” Kenny waves her off.

“I meant Levi,” she raises a brow, looking Kenny up and down before going back around the counter. Falco follows her. His eye twitches, huffing to himself and turning to see Levi sitting in one of the open chairs with a small grunt. “Damn kid’s a smart-ass.”

“Good thing she is.”

Kenny sits beside Levi, tapping his foot against the floor. “Alright, about the—”

“Not here,” Levi is quick to shut him down, sending the older man a certain look. “Hold on.” Gabi comes back with Levi’s desired tea, along with Falco setting down a small report of how things have been since he’s been gone. Levi nods and thanks them quietly, sipping the tea. “You two, head outside for a second.”

Gabi and Falco simultaneously tilt their heads in confusion. But Falco speaks up first. “What? But we haven’t even had time to—”

“Outside.”

Gabi opens her mouth to protest, but Falco quickly cuts in with a muttered, “We’ll be outside,” before she can say anything more. The two exchange a glance, clearly confused, but they gather their things without further questioning. Gabi gives Levi an uncertain look before following Falco out the door.

Levi waits until the door shuts behind them before turning his attention back to Kenny. The air between them tightens instantly, the tension thickening as Levi sets his tea down on the table with a soft clink. He hesitates for a few seconds, unsure if he should entertain his idiotic uncle. But he has a feeling that no matter what, he’ll be a thorn in his side. “How much?”

Kenny grins. “Confidential, of course. Until you accept the job.”

Levi’s gaze hardens. “I’m not a fucking bodyguard, Kenny. I’m not some hired muscle, and I’m definitely not interested in babysitting some spoiled brat—no offense to her, but that’s not my scene.”

Kenny’s eyes gleam with amusement, the kind that makes Levi this much closer to punching him in the face. “That’s exactly why they need you. You’re not the kind of guy who takes orders, and that’s what she needs. Someone who can think for himself, who won’t just bow to her family’s whims. You know how it is in that world, Levi. People like her, they’re walking targets.”

Levi’s eyes flicker briefly to the door, as though expecting the others to walk back in, but the room is still empty. He rubs his temple, trying to keep his frustration in check. “And what makes you think I’d give a damn about protecting some rich girl? I’m not in the business of charity, especially not for people like her.”

Kenny leans forward, his voice lowering, almost coaxing. “You’re in the business of keeping your head above water, right? Getting by. This job? It’s a chance for you to cash in. You’re good at what you do, and I think you’ll find this… lucrative. Plus, you know it’s not asking for much. Just a little loyalty to the Suzuki family.”

Levi’s fingers twitch, the temptation gnawing at him. He’s always been a pragmatist, and this… this could solve a lot of problems, not just for him but for the people he cares about. But Kenny knows that too. “You’re asking for too much.” Levi finally meets his uncle’s gaze, his voice sharp, but controlled. “And you know I don’t work on other people’s terms.”

Kenny’s smile falters for a split second, but then he leans back again, his expression returning to that smug, confident air. “You’re still thinking like the old Levi. You’ve got a chance here to step up and make a real name for yourself besides ‘the strongest.’ You don’t have to play by their rules, you just need to keep her alive and out of trouble. It’s not that hard.”

However, Levi is still finding it hard to just give in so easily. He’s never been a bodyguard, but is being a soldier that much different? Just protect, right? However, he remembers your father; how couldn’t he? The little meeting that was held after the bomb Eldia dropped on Marley that led to a cease fire not too long after. He remembers the way he regarded him and his peers with concealed mirth in his eyes, clenched hands that made it known how much he despised losing and coming to terms with ‘the devils’. He hadn’t trusted him then, and he doesn’t trust him now. So why the hell is this same man trying to employ him?

He’s never met you, of course. Levi isn’t much to delve into media or the higher-ups. Just simple bits of you here and there is what Levi is accustomed to. All he knows about you is what he’s seen in passing—brief news clips, vague mentions, a face in the crowd of the powerful, the kind of people he’d rather ignore. He doesn’t pay attention to the higher-ups or the media, and certainly not to the rich and pampered. That’s always been a world Levi keeps his distance from.

Kenny, sensing his niece’s hesitance, softens up just a tiny bit. “Listen, why don’t you come with me tonight? Supposed to be meetin’ up with the man himself at some club; maybe you can get a feel of him there?”

Levi’s expression hardens, and he mutters under his breath, “I’ve never trusted him.”

Kenny, watching him carefully, seems to understand the unspoken question. “I get it. You’ve got a history with that man, and I can’t blame you for that. But this isn’t about him, kid. It’s about you—your future. You could save up for yourself and find a better place than some shitty, one bed apartment. If you stick to what you know, you’ll always be stuck in the past.”

Levi looks up, meeting Kenny’s eyes. There’s no warmth in his stare, only cold calculation. “What’s the catch, Kenny? You want me to babysit a rich girl to what? To get closer to him?”

Kenny holds up his hands in mock surrender. “Nothing like that, Levi. I told you, this is about keeping her alive. That’s all. The rest will follow. But you’ve gotta see it for yourself. You think you can read people? Come with me tonight. We’re meeting with your old friend at a club, and you can get a feel for the man.”

Levi’s gaze flickers toward the window, the streets outside bustling with life, and the idea of stepping into that world, even for a moment, gnaws at him. He’s been out of that circle for a long time—he doesn’t want to dive back into it. He enjoys his civilian life. But Kenny’s offer is tempting. Too tempting. He could get a sense of what was really going on and see if it was worth his time or if it was just another trap. Levi stands up abruptly, his chair scraping loudly against the floor. He doesn’t say anything at first, his back to Kenny as he pulls his coat tighter around his frame. The weight of the decision is pressing down on him, but he knows that if he turns Kenny down now, the man won’t stop. He’s relentless.

“Fine,” Levi says, his voice steady. “I’ll go. But don’t expect me to walk away from this thinking it’s anything more than a job. And I’m not playing nice.”

Kenny’s grin returns, more satisfied now as he stands. “That’s all I’m asking, Levi. Just keep your head straight. We’re in for a long game here, and you’ve got a front-row seat.”

Levi doesn’t respond. He understands he’s walking into unknown territory, and he doesn’t know if he’s ready for it. But one thing is for sure—he’s going to find out what kind of man your father really is. And if he’s going to protect you, he’ll need to know exactly what—or who he’s up against.

A high-end gentlemen’s club was not what he was expecting. Tucked behind an unsuspecting bar, the neon blue cursive letters that spell out “The Silk Rose”. They flicker softly in the darkness of the not-so-early night, casting an almost dreamy-like glow onto the concrete below. The street outside is quiet, unassuming—nothing to hint at the kind of opulence that lies within. Levi eyes the sign, then glances at Kenny with mild irritation.

“This your idea of a professional meeting?” he mutters.

Kenny just smirks, hands shoved deep into the pockets of his coat. “You’d be surprised how much business gets done between overpriced scotch and soft lighting. Besides,” he adds with a wink, “Suzuki likes a certain… ambiance.”

Levi scoffs, and the scowl on his face deepens. Still, he follows Kenny inside, the brute bouncer at the door giving them a once-over before stepping aside wordlessly.

Inside, the contrast is immediate. Velvet-draped walls, soft jazz humming low over the speakers, and golden chandeliers that twinkle like stars overhead. It smells like expensive perfume and power. The kind of place meant to impress men who’ve forgotten what it’s like to hear the word no.

Women in silk dresses that barely pass for clothing drift across the room like ghosts, each movement precise, curated. But the staff aren’t the only ones dressed to kill. Men in tailored suits lounge in leather booths, cigars in hand, speaking in hushed tones. This is a playground for the elite, the dangerous, and the untouchable. Hushed conversations, soft laughs, teasing touches shared between those around aren’t what makes Levi’s nose crinkle with distaste. It’s the look in the men’s eyes that does. The way they eye every woman as if they are a toy to be played with—as if they’re the prey. No doubt the women here have caught on to the predatory nature the men wordlessly exude, yet they’re still here. In a sense, it almost begins to remind him of his mother.

Though he’d like to think she had at least a little more self-respect.

Kenny leads him toward a private room upstars and in the back, past thick velvet curtains. “Suzuki’s already here. Try not to look like you’re gonna kill someone.”

Levi’s jaw ticks. “No promises.”

Two tall men are standing, dressed in all black suits, on either side of the velvet red curtains that separate the wolves from their leader. The one on the right steps up, chest puffed out. He eyes both Kenny and Levi before speaking. “This area’s blocked off. Head back down.”

Kenny doesn’t break stride. He simply reaches into his coat, flashing something—an emblem, a card, maybe even just the weight of his name. Whatever it is, it’s enough to make the guard hesitate.

“He’s expecting us,” Kenny says, voice smooth but with an edge that suggests he’s not in the mood to repeat himself. “Now step aside.”

The guard’s jaw tightens, and he glances toward the other man, who gives a small nod. With a reluctant sigh, the first one steps back, tugging the curtain aside.

Kenny winks at him on the way in. “Atta boy.”

Levi follows his uncle, his boots nearly silent against the plush carpet. His eyes flicker over the details of the room like a sniper zeroing in. He can feel it—every inch of this place is designed to disarm, to distract. And yet, his guard is higher than ever. The private room is dimly lit, the atmosphere intimate, suffocating. A low table sits in the center, encircled by deep sapphire couches that seem to swallow anyone who sits in them. The scent of aged whiskey, cigar smoke, and some cloying cologne hits his nose instantly.

And there he is.

Makoto Suzuki sits like a man who’s owned the room since birth, legs crossed, one arm draped lazily over the back of the couch. His suit is dark navy, custom, his tie just loose enough to suggest control disguised as ease. His grey hair is styled neatly back, and his auburn eyes are trained on the swirling dark liquid in his glass. There's a woman perched next to him, draped across the couch more like decoration than companion. She doesn't even look up. There’s four more of his henchmen standing beside the couch, two more seated at the tiny table in the corner engaged in a small game of cards.

At their arrival, they all look up.

Makoto’s gaze lifts slowly, and when it lands on Levi, something in it shifts. Calculating. Amused. Maybe even mildly impressed. He doesn’t stand, of course. Men like him don’t need to.

“Kenny,” he greets smoothly, lifting his glass in a faux toast. “And the infamous Levi Ackerman.” His voice is like smoke—polished, poisonous. Makoto gestures toward the open couch across from him, entirely unfazed by the cold stare he's receiving. “You’re taller than I remember.”

Levi doesn’t blink or sit. “You’re exactly how I remember.”

Kenny stifles a chuckle, plopping himself down on the couch and pouring himself a drink. “Let’s keep it civil, boys.”

Makoto lets the jab roll off him like mist off marble. He leans forward slightly, that same damned calm expression etched across his face. “So, Kenny, how’ve you been?”

Kenny exhales like he’s just settled into his favorite recliner, legs spread, glass already swirling in his hand. “Busy. Making deals. Babysitting this one,” he jerks a thumb toward Levi without looking at him. “Same old.”

Makoto’s smile twitches—just enough to acknowledge the remark without really responding to it. His attention, however, doesn’t drift far from Levi. The kind of look a lion gives a stray dog: amused, but watchful. “And yet, you dragged him here. Which means he knows he’s not just here for the ambiance.”

Levi still hasn’t sat. He doesn’t intend to—not yet. The air in this room is thick with the kind of arrogance that turns his stomach. This man, this entire place, reeks of money and power layered like cologne over something rotting beneath.

Kenny, unbothered, tops off his glass and throws back a sip before answering. “Told you I’d find you someone. Someone you could trust to keep your girl safe.”

Makoto’s brow lifts, gaze sharpening. “My daughter is not some damsel in distress.”

Levi’s voice cut in, low and steady, “Then why does she need a bodyguard?”

Makoto’s eyes narrow just slightly. Not insulted—curious. Testing him. “Not many people speak to me like that, Mr. Ackerman.”

Levi doesn’t flinch. “Not many people interest me enough to bother speaking to at all.”

There’s a long pause, heavy but not quite tense—just enough to let the power dynamics settle. The woman beside Makoto finally shifts after he makes a subtle shrug of his shoulder, and she quietly excuses herself as she rises and disappears through a side door, unnoticed by anyone but Levi.

Kenny raises a brow and shoots Levi a warning glance that reads behave, but he doesn’t say a word.

Makoto finally leans back, the lazy smile returning to his lips. “I don’t trust easily. You know this. But your name,” he gestures vaguely in the air, “it still carries weight. Especially with them.” His eyes flicker with meaning—whether it’s to the press, politicians, or war-hardened enemies, it’s unclear. Probably all of the above. “My daughter is… unique. She’s sweet, but not stupid. Pretty, but not a pushover. She doesn’t know what’s circling her yet, and that’s exactly why she needs protection. She knows her role, and I intend to have her keep playing that.”

Levi folds his arms. “Then hire a soldier.”

“I did,” Makoto replies simply. “I hired you.”

Something sharp passes between them. Understanding, maybe. Or recognition.

Kenny sighs, slumping further into the couch. “You gonna stand all night like a coat rack, or you gonna sit and listen?”

Levi eyes the couch like it might bite, then slowly moves to perch on the edge—not relaxed, not open. Always ready. His stare stays locked on Makoto.

Makoto studies him in turn, then finally gives a small, tight smile. “You’ve killed a lot of people, haven’t you?”

“So have you.”

The smile lingers, but it doesn’t quite reach Makoto’s eyes. “Then we’ll get along just fine.”

A silence settles again. Somewhere outside the door, the jazz track shifts to something slower, more sultry. Time continues as if the world doesn’t realize two predators just agreed to circle each other, for now. Then Makoto raises his glass again, eyes gleaming. “To the devil you know.”

Kenny chuckles, clinks his glass. Levi doesn't move. He just stares. Because to him, the devils have always worn suits like this one.

“How much?” He finally asks.

Makoto leisurely sips his drink, setting the glass onto the table between them.

He leans back, fingers steepling loosely in front of him, head tilted slightly like he’s just been waiting for Levi to ask. “How much is her life worth to me?” he muses aloud, as if the question is more philosophical than transactional. “More than any sum I could ever offer. But you, Mr. Ackerman—you’re not a man who wastes time with sentiment.”

Levi’s silence confirms it.

Makoto chortles. “Ten thousand a week. A private penthouse suite. Round-the-clock access to every resource you’d need—transport, intel, weapons, contacts. And no leash. You work how you want, answer to no one but me.”

Kenny whistles low beside him. “That’s one hell of a package, even for you.”

Levi doesn’t look impressed. “Sounds like you expect a war.”

The atmosphere is a live wire—thrumming between them, sparking with old blood and new stakes. It’s broken by Makoto rising from his seat, his men following. He straightens out his suit jacket and makes a motion with his fingers. “Come, I’ll show you the prize right now.”

And Levi finds himself reluctantly following along like a dog, and Kenny too. The group of men exit from the curtains, heading back down the spiraling staircase. The music softens as they descend the staircase, like the club itself is aware something heavier just entered the room. Without a word, the other guests make way for the group, some women sending flirtatious waves or doe-eyed smiles towards Makoto. Levi’s eyes flicker across the patrons who glance up, some pretending not to stare, others openly gawking. Power like Makoto’s always draws attention, and the entourage trailing behind only confirms it. Levi hates this part—the theatrics, the display, the illusion of untouchable grandeur. But he plays along, stoic as ever, even as they cut through the low hum of conversation like a blade through silk.

Makoto slides into the center seat at the lavish round table like a king returning to his throne. The plush leather molds around him effortlessly, his posture regal but relaxed. Levi takes the seat to his right, resisting the urge to roll his eyes at the dramatics. Kenny flops down on the left like he’s done this a thousand times—which, knowing him, he probably has.

The men behind them form a wall of polished muscle and sharp gazes, stationed with silent obedience.

Makoto signals to a woman behind the bar with a simple glance, and almost instantly, she nods and disappears into the back. Levi’s gaze tracks the interaction, narrowing slightly.

He doesn’t have to wait long.

Only moments later, the crowd parts—slow and smooth—as you step out from behind the deep red curtain, flanked by two club hostesses who clearly pale in comparison. You're wearing a purple satin number, delicate and barely-there, its shimmer catching the warm light in all the wrong—and right—ways. Your hair is styled with effortless elegance, and you walk like you’ve never tripped a day in your life. Or like someone taught you never to look like you did.

Levi doesn’t breathe for a second. Not out of awe, but surprise.

He wasn’t expecting this. Well, you surely look…different.

You don’t look at the men who part like waves for you. You don’t even glance toward Makoto until you’re at the table, offering only a faint smile that doesn’t quite reach your eyes. “Father,” you say smoothly, voice soft but clear.

Makoto gives a pleased nod. “Darling,” he murmurs, like the word itself is another performance.

You look to the man beside him—Kenny—and offer a subtle tilt of your head, polite, reserved. Then your eyes slide over to Levi. Your gaze lingers.

And Levi… feels it.

Not just the scrutiny. But the weight of expectation. Of curiosity. Maybe even challenge.

“Having a good time?” Your father asks as you lean down, turning your head slightly so he can plant a reverent kiss on your cheek. “Mingling and all that, yes?”

You chuckle, red-stained lips curling upwards in a soft way. “Oh, yes, father. Of course I’ve been. I’ve made friends with some of those you've asked me to.”

There’s a silent look in your eyes—like you and your father are telepathically communicating. Levi’s eyes barely stray from you, forcing himself to get familiar with his charge’s expressions. Your father hums in approval, nodding. “Good girl.”

You tuck a strand of hair behind your ear, head tilting. “Though…maybe some of my friends are having a bit…too much fun.”

Makoto follows your line of sight toward a semi-rowdy group of older men. Drained glasses littering their table as one they laugh boisterously at their own jokes. Your father’s jaw ticks slightly, giving three of his men a tiny nod in the group’s direction.

The command is silent but understood. The three guards move swiftly—like shadows trained in courtesy and intimidation—drifting toward the group of men without needing to speak. Their presence alone sobers the laughter, draining it from the air like a sudden draft of cold wind. The drunkest among them nearly chokes on his drink, sputtering apologies before anyone even lays a hand on him. Levi doesn’t miss the shift. The way your lips press together just slightly. Like you're both amused and weary of what your father’s influence can do.

Makoto turns back to you, eyes glittering with a sharp kind of pride. “You’ve always had a good eye.”

You shrug lightly, folding your hands in front of you like you're nothing more than an accessory at the table. “I just like keeping things...elegant.”

It’s then that Makoto gestures toward Levi with the casual air of someone introducing a pet he’s particularly fond of. “This is Mr. Levi Ackerman. He’ll be looking after you from now on.”

You finally turn to face him fully.

Levi meets your gaze, this time with intention. The color in your eyes is sharp, observant—more calculating than your painted smile suggests. It’s a quick scan, top to bottom, and Levi feels it again. The test. Like you're waiting to see what kind of man your father’s put in front of you this time. “I see,” you murmur, tone unreadable. Then, with graceful attachment, you sit at the table—choosing the empty lap of Levi himself. He stiffens in surprise, his initial instinct urging him to push you off. Your sweet scent invades his nostrils instantly. However, he withstands it, deciding he wouldn’t like to deal with the consequences as of now. “You like wine, Mr. Ackerman?” you ask lightly, pouring yourself a glass from the bottle that was already waiting.

Levi doesn’t answer right away. His eyes study you, more than the wine, more than your dress. Trying to read between your lines. Trying to decide if you’re amused by all this. “I don’t drink,” he replies flatly.

“Oh, what a shame. This is the finest liquor in all of Marley.” You pout, bringing the rim of the glass to your lips. Your eyes don’t stray from his as you indulge, licking your lips clean when you bring it away. “My father must’ve really hired such a resolute man.” You chuckle, leaning forward slightly and sending your father a subtle glance.

“As resolute as there is.” Makoto huffs in amusement.

Makoto’s pride crackles in the air like a cigar ember burning low—hot, glowing, dangerous.

Levi doesn’t respond to the praise. He just sits there, solid and unsmiling, posture stiff beneath the soft weight of you in his lap. He can feel the way you effortlessly carry yourself. You wear your charm like a silk veil—delicate and graceful.

You swirl the wine in your glass, voice lilting as you speak again. “Will he be sleeping in my room too?”

Makoto chuckles low, slow. “Only if you give him reason to.”

Now it’s Levi’s turn to give your father a look. He almost wants to blurt out the obvious question of why he’s allowing you to act like this in front of him. Why he seems completely okay with a hypothetical situation of some man you just met sleeping in his daughter’s room. But instead, he’s joking about it—going along with it, enabling it.

Do you usually act like this with men?

Kenny lets out a bark of laughter at that. You glance back at Levi, brows lifting. “Do you take orders well, Mr. Ackerman?”

He stares back at you, unflinching. “Only from the ones I respect.”

You hum, intrigued but unshaken. “I suppose we’ll see if I earn that.”

The moment hangs there—heavy, stretched taut like wire. Then you slide off him in one smooth motion, as if the whole thing was just a test. A show of dominance in velvet gloves. You cross your legs and lean back in your seat beside him, your posture still elegant. The toe of your heel nonchalantly brushes against his calf, up and down.

Makoto raises his glass in a lazy toast, gaze moving between you and Levi. “To new arrangements,” he declares.

You and Kenny echo the sentiment, a sweet giggle falling from your lips. Glasses clink. Wine swirls. The club resumes its slow, seductive pulse around them—but Levi knows something in the air has shifted.

This wasn’t just a job anymore.

This was theater. A powder keg. And he was now sitting in the front row, watching it smolder.

And the woman sitting beside him—who had moments ago treated his lap like a throne—now looks like a statue carved from something more fragile than stone. Still, poised, but not entirely present.

Levi glances at you from the corner of his eye.

You're watching the club floor now, eyes half-lidded, fingers idly tracing the rim of your wine glass. You laugh at something Makoto says, soft and sweet, but Levi hears how hollow it is. Like you’ve told that laugh to show up on cue too many times. And as he leans back in his chair, arms crossed loosely, Levi’s thoughts crawl.

Makoto didn’t hire a bodyguard for your safety. Not really.

He hired a leash.

But Levi Ackerman doesn’t do leashes—not for long.

(open) taglist: @myahfig4 @miss-dior @kouyoumarryme @chericheriladeee

@deniixlovezelda @whitenightdreams @yoriichitsugikunii @wittyjasontodd @toj1swh0re

@antiv3nus @gojowifefrfr @alt--er--love @beabamboo @jeonwiixard

@bottomlesschaps @luna-v-roiya @lovingstudenthumancookie @toji-dabi-wife @naomikozura

@kimvmarvel @elmaa127 @frrxnyw @aldebrana @koji-akeme

@bouquetoflove @reivelmin @teal-anchor @wakasaishot @silveritydreams

@starrynights23x @cherlouu @littlebabyrae

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wonyowonyo · 3 months ago

Text

Static Echoes (U. Aeri/Giselle X M! Reader)

Wc: 9.6k Tags: Angst? In a captivating city humming with static, a faded musician haunted by a lover’s ghost-voice and a photographer who blurrs every truth must choose: burn in the clarity of what they almost were, or drown in the beautiful ruin of what’s left. A/N: No scene banners for this one, just pure emotional angst. For the lad who asked for Giselle, I'll write a fluff to make up for this, trust hehe

Rain sluiced down the window of Y/N’s cramped third-floor walk-up, distorting the neon glow of the pawn shop sign across the street into a bleeding halo. Inside his dim apartment—a cramped realm of mismatched furniture, scuffed vinyl floors, and peeling posters of bands that once stirred his soul—Y/N hunched over his battered acoustic guitar. His fingers, worn from years of relentless practice and broken promises, plucked uncertainly at new strings he’d just installed. Somewhere in the background, a demo of “Moth Wing Hours” played on an aging laptop, its fragile melody looping relentlessly like a half-remembered dream.

Y/N’s apartment reeked of rosin and stale coffee, and every surface was cluttered with the detritus of a life half-lived. Amid scattered guitar picks, dog-eared notebooks of scribbled lyrics, and dusty vinyl records, the air pulsed with an undercurrent of longing—a ghost of musical glory days when his voice had burned with the reckless promise of forever. But now, that promise had faded into the static of everyday drudgery.

He had once believed his music could set the world ablaze, but time had a way of dampening even the brightest flames. Today, he was less a celebrated poet of chords and verses and more a reluctant music teacher, offering guitar lessons to disinterested teens. Their boredom was palpable, their questions laced with teenage cynicism, as if each chord he strummed was a reminder of the disconnect between his faded dreams and their insipid realities. Corporate gigs had replaced smoky dive bars; the sterile ambiance of upscale hotel lobbies and overpriced cocktail lounges left him feeling like nothing more than a ghost—a relic of a 20-something’s Spotify playlist that had long been forgotten.

As he tuned the guitar, Y/N’s eyes drifted to the rain-streaked window. Outside, the City of Seoul pulsed with neon life, a chaotic mix of transient lights and forgotten promises. The rain blurred the boundaries between past and present, and in that liminal moment, he could almost believe that the static in the background wasn’t just electronic noise but something more—a whisper from a memory he’d long tried to escape.

A sudden hiss from the ancient coffee machine in the kitchen shattered the quiet. The sound, almost spectral in its persistence, seemed to carry an echo of a laugh—low, smoky, and hauntingly familiar. For a split second, Y/N thought he heard Aeri’s laugh amid the hiss, a sound that had once lit up the darkest corners of his heart. In that instant, time fractured, and memories surged forward like a tidal wave: the clink of ice in a glass, the soft murmur of conversation on a fire escape, the reckless abandon of youth.

Distracted by the ghostly echo, his hand jerked, and the mug he’d cradled slipped from his grasp. It tumbled onto the linoleum floor, shattering into a constellation of ceramic shards that cut into his palms. He stared at the scattered pieces, each fragment a silent testament to a past filled with hope and now a present marred by regret.

Y/N’s thoughts raced. How had life reduced him to a curator of almosts? Almost-famous, almost-healed, almost-in-love. He glanced at the list on his cluttered desk—a litany of student names and dates, each entry a quiet reminder of those who had slipped away. Hannah W. flashed before his eyes, the note beside her name a sarcastic parenthesis: “nursery rhymes” from a canceled lesson. Fifteen years ago, such a cancellation might have ignited a fury worthy of a thrown phone, but now, he felt only numb resignation.

He ran a hand through his tangled hair and let his gaze fall on the cracked screen of his laptop. The demo of “Moth Wing Hours” continued unabated, its melody merging with the rhythmic patter of the rain. In that fragile moment, the past and present blurred—a bittersweet fusion of what once was and what might have been. The static in the apartment wasn’t just background noise; it was the heartbeat of his disintegrating dreams.

————————————————————

Miles away, under a different kind of light, Aeri’s world unfolded in stark contrasts. Her studio was a converted loft that doubled as a darkroom, its atmosphere thick with the smell of chemicals and the red glow of safelights. Here, she reigned as both artist and chronicler—a trauma paparazzo who captured the raw, unfiltered moments of human devastation. Images of bombed-out hospitals in Kyiv, ashen faces of wildfire survivors, and the solitary photograph of a child’s shoe half-buried in flood mud hung from the walls like spectral memorials. Each image was a frozen scream, a testament to chaos and loss.

Among these fractured narratives, one photograph stood apart with startling clarity. It was a portrait of Y/N, captured in the vulnerable quiet of sleep, bathed in the gentle glow of dawn. His face, soft and unguarded, bore the delicate lines of a man haunted by memories yet still clinging to fragments of hope. Aeri’s eyes lingered on it, her pulse quickening as she recalled that moment—a rare instance when the chaos of her world had paused, revealing a truth too intimate for her usual repertoire.

Her phone buzzed insistently on a cluttered table, its screen lighting up with a reminder of an impending deadline. Aeri’s agent was on the line, his voice crackling through the speaker with the brisk efficiency of someone used to demanding perfection.

“Look, Sash, The Times wants a quote about ‘UNSEEN.’ I need you to give them the usual—‘It’s about the elusiveness of truth’—and stop overthinking the damn artist statement,” he barked, his tone a mixture of impatience and exasperation.

Aeri pressed a thumb against her scar—a faded, jagged line from the ’16 riot in Istanbul that had nearly cost her more than just her pride. “I’m not overthinking,” she snapped, her voice low and tremulous with defiance. “I’m curating, shaping fragments of reality into something real.” She swept a hand through her ink-black hair and looked around her darkroom, where each photograph seemed to pulse with unspoken stories. “Truth isn’t elusive, it’s blinding. Sometimes it’s just too bright to face directly.”

Her agent’s voice cut through her reverie. “Just stick to the script, Aeri.”

As if in response to the mounting pressure, Aeri reached for a freshly developed print of Y/N’s photo. She held it up to the dim red light, marveling at the clarity that set it apart from the other blurred images—a moment of pure, unedited vulnerability in an otherwise chaotic portfolio. In her trembling hands, that image represented all the contradictions of her life: her success as a trauma chronicler and her inability to process the intimacy that this one shot demanded.

But as she adjusted the print, a misstep sent a splash of developer solution cascading over it. The clear lines of Y/N’s face blurred into a golden smear, the vivid detail dissolving like memories fading in the rain. For a long, heart-wrenching moment, she watched the image twist into something unrecognizable—a casualty of her own inner turmoil.

“Fuck,” she muttered, her voice barely audible over the steady hum of the chemicals. With shaking fingers, she retrieved the ruined print and, as if performing a ritual of both guilt and preservation, she tucked it away into a drawer labeled “UNDEVELOPED.” In that secret compartment of her studio, Aeri locked away not just a ruined photograph, but a piece of herself she wasn’t ready to confront—a reminder of the man whose sleep had betrayed his true self.

Outside, the rain eased into a gentle mist, and the city began to stir with a hesitant vibrancy. The blurred boundaries between past and present, reality and memory, persisted like a half-remembered dream. Aeri exhaled slowly, her mind a tangled web of creative passion and self-imposed isolation. Each ruined print, every blurred image, was a step in her journey to capture the inescapable truth—no matter how painful or beautiful it might be.

————————————————————

Later that evening, Y/N mounted his aging bicycle and pedaled into the night. The urban landscape, washed clean by the relentless rain, was transformed into a series of luminous reflections and fractured silhouettes. He navigated the slick, glistening streets with an air of weary determination, his mind heavy with the ghosts of unfinished songs and missed opportunities.

As he passed under a mural on 5th and Vine, a colossal billboard came into view. It was an arresting display—“UNSEEN: PHOTOGRAPHS BY AERI UCHINAGA’’ sprawled boldly across its surface. The image that dominated the ad was Aeri’s own, her face a study in defiance and vulnerability, half-consumed by shadow and light. Her eyes, sharp and inscrutable, seemed to challenge the viewer to uncover the secrets behind the facade. The billboard glowed with an almost otherworldly intensity, daring him to confront the specter of their shared past.

Y/N’s pulse quickened as he slowed to a stop, the chill of the evening mingling with the heat of buried emotions. Every detail of the billboard—the stark typography, the interplay of dark and luminous hues—spoke to the unresolved tension between him and Aeri. In that suspended moment, he felt the weight of every nearly-spoken word, every lost chance at redemption.

He fumbled with his phone, hesitating as he opened a new text message. His fingers hovered over the screen, a message forming—a tentative greeting, a whispered admission of his lingering feelings. “Heard you’re in town…” the message began, each word a tentative bridge between past hurts and uncertain hope. But as quickly as the words appeared, doubt flooded his mind. What if reaching out would shatter the fragile peace he’d fought so hard to build? The tension between longing and fear was as palpable as the damp chill of the night air.

In a moment of desperate indecision, he deleted the message. But the act of deletion felt like a small betrayal of his own yearning. His heart pounded in his ears as he stared at the dark screen, the silence more oppressive than the constant hum of the city. The electric tension of unsaid words and unfinished conversations surged within him, igniting a fury that he could no longer contain.

In a burst of anger and sorrow, Y/N’s hand clenched around the phone. With a swift, impulsive motion, he hurled it against the wall of a nearby building. The impact sent a shudder through the quiet street, and the sound of cracking glass echoed like a final exclamation mark to a conversation that would never be finished. For a few heartbeats, he stood motionless in the rain, the bitter taste of regret mingling with the dampness on his skin.

A bike messenger whizzed by, his whistled comment barely audible above the steady patter of rain. “Bad breakup?” the stranger teased, his tone light as if life’s hardships could be distilled into a single, offhand remark. Y/N managed a bitter smile in response, but the gesture was hollow—more a mask for the turmoil swirling inside than an expression of genuine amusement.

The billboard loomed above him, its vibrant, defiant image of Aeri a constant reminder of the unresolved chapters in their shared past. The rain continued to fall, each drop a muted percussion in the symphony of urban solitude. Y/N’s eyes traced the contours of her face on the billboard—the half-shadowed jawline, the fierce determination in her eyes—and he felt the sharp sting of memories both beautiful and painful.

In that fractured moment, as the rain softened and the city settled into a contemplative hush, Y/N realized that the static in his life—the noise of lost opportunities and unsaid apologies—was something he could no longer ignore. Whether it was the echo of Aeri’s laugh in the hiss of the coffee machine or the blurred remnants of a photograph hidden away in a dark drawer, the past had a way of intruding upon the present, demanding to be seen, acknowledged, and, ultimately, resolved.

As the neon lights danced on the wet pavement and the echoes of his shattered phone reverberated in his mind, Y/N stood at the crossroads of what had been and what might yet be. The city, drenched in rain and bathed in the fractured glow of memories, beckoned him forward. Somewhere between the static of his fading dreams and the promise of a new, uncertain dawn lay the truth he had long evaded—a truth as elusive as the fleeting smile of a ghost, yet as persistent as the rain that never ceased.

In that final, lingering moment before the night swallowed him whole, Y/N closed his eyes and listened to the symphony of his past—the haunting refrain of “Moth Wing Hours,” the whispered echoes of a love lost and found in the static, and the promise of redemption hidden within the fractured reflections of neon light. The journey was far from over, and with each beat of his determined heart, he knew that the search for truth, however painful and elusive, was one worth the risk.

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The night deepened, and as Y/N finally mounted his bike once more, the city around him seemed to pulse with a renewed urgency. Every raindrop, every flickering streetlamp, every shard of broken glass on the pavement was a reminder of both the beauty and the brutality of a life lived on the edge of memory and possibility. He pedaled on, the remnants of his anger slowly dissolving into a quiet resolve. Tonight, beneath the relentless rain and the indifferent glow of neon, Y/N would confront the static that had haunted him for so long—and perhaps, in that act of defiance, find a way to reclaim the fragments of himself he’d long thought lost.

The urban night was alive with possibility, each corner and shadow a silent promise of stories yet to be told. As Y/N disappeared into the rain-soaked maze of city streets, his heart whispered a tentative hope: that even amid the static of shattered dreams, there might yet be a spark of something real—something that could light the way forward, however uncertain the path.

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The memory of that humid summer night still burned like an old photograph in Y/N’s mind—a moment when uncertainty danced with reckless possibility. It was his first open mic at The Iris Room, a dive bar where the walls were as worn as the stories of its patrons. Y/N, just 24 and armed with a hopeful guitar and a pocketful of unsung songs, stood on a rickety stage beneath a single, sputtering spotlight. The audience, a ragtag collection of night owls and lost souls, leaned in with half-expected indifference.

As he strummed the opening chords of a song he’d never fully finished, his voice wavered between passion and apprehension. Every note carried the weight of his insecurities and the tender promise of new beginnings. Mid-performance, when he dared to let his guard down, a sharp voice cut through the din. “Stop singing like you’re scared of the mic, poet,” came a taunt from the back of the room.

He paused, heart pounding, and then spotted her—Aeri, 23, with eyes alight like flares in the dark. Her tone was mischievous and daring, a challenge that stung yet invigorated him. The remark hung in the smoky air, a spark that ignited something inside him. Instead of retreating into his shell, Y/N found himself grinning, a flush of adrenaline and defiance coloring his cheeks.

After the set, with applause mingled with playful jeers, Aeri made her way to him. “You’ve got guts,” she said with a wry smile, leaning against the peeling backdrop of a backstage door. “But you’re holding back—like you’re afraid to let the real you out.”

Her words, sharp yet tender, cut through his uncertainty. The moment crackled with the electricity of two lives colliding unexpectedly. They traded barbed compliments and earnest confessions in the haze of cheap beer and neon reflections. When the night was winding down and the band’s final chord lingered in the air, Aeri whispered, “Come on. Let’s ditch this dump and do something reckless.”

Y/N hesitated for only a heartbeat before grabbing his coat and following her out into the sticky summer night. They left The Iris Room together, laughter trailing behind them like a shared secret. The humid air was thick with promise as they hopped onto a beat-up car and sped away from the dim lights and stale smoke of the bar.

Their destination was as unconventional as their encounter—a towering, abandoned water tower on the outskirts of the city. Its rusted metal skin and precarious perch promised both danger and freedom. As they climbed the narrow, creaking stairs, the city below spread out in a patchwork of lights and shadows. At the top, the world seemed suspended in a moment of both vertigo and liberation.

Aeri pulled out her camera with practiced ease. “Hold that smile,” she urged, aiming the lens at Y/N. With the cityscape behind him and the wind whipping his hair, Y/N’s laughter echoed off the cold metal—a pure, unguarded sound. In that moment, as the shutter clicked, she captured not just his face but the raw, unfiltered joy of that reckless defiance.

Barely containing her delight, Aeri teased, “You’re like a chord that won’t resolve.” Y/N’s grin widened as he retorted, “Maybe I’m a bridge to nowhere.”

Their banter mingled with the roar of the wind and the distant hum of a city that never slept. In that dizzying height, every word, every glance, vibrated with the intensity of newfound chemistry. When Aeri’s hand brushed against his, the connection was immediate—a live wire that seemed to electrify the very air between them.

As the night deepened, the duo settled on a battered metal bench near the edge of the water tower. Aeri, ever the provocateur, pulled a worn flask from her leather satchel and offered it to him. “Here,” she said, eyes twinkling, “for the bold and the brave.” In a moment of playful rebellion, Y/N snatched it from her hand and pretended to take a swig, only to toss it back with a laugh. The flask, like their burgeoning connection, was both a challenge and a token—a symbol of defiance against a world that had too often demanded conformity.

Their conversation wove through the night like an improvisational melody—stories of past heartbreaks, dreams too wild for daylight, and confessions whispered over the hum of a forgotten city. Every word felt charged with meaning, every pause pregnant with possibility. As they descended the water tower, their fingers remained intertwined—a silent promise of adventures yet to come.

By the time they reached the ground, the horizon was a blur of deep blues and emerging hints of dawn. That night, in the raw, unfiltered glow of urban rebellion, they had forged an unspoken pact: to live as though every moment were both a beginning and an end, a snapshot of perfection in a world of nearly-there moments. Their first meeting had been a collision of contrasts—a clash of vulnerability and audacity, leaving them both forever marked by the brilliance of a summer that almost was.

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In the weeks that followed, their whirlwind romance unfolded like a montage of vivid snapshots, each moment as fleeting and fragile as moth wings in a summer breeze. Aeri dragged Y/N into her nocturnal world, a realm of abandoned factories and forgotten landscapes, where the ruins whispered secrets of a once-thriving industrial past. At 3 a.m., when the city slept under a veil of darkness, she would lead him to places that pulsed with a raw, melancholic beauty.

One such night, they arrived at an abandoned factory on the outskirts of town. The building, draped in ivy and bathed in the ghostly glow of moonlight, seemed to breathe with memories of its past. Aeri’s camera was an extension of her steady hand, capturing each decaying detail with an artist’s eye. As she framed a shot of a rusted machine half-submerged in shadow, Y/N’s presence disrupted the serene stillness of her composition. He wandered into the frame, his eyes filled with wonder and a hint of mischief, transforming the image from a static relic into a living narrative.

“You always ruin the shot,” she laughed, shaking her head as she snapped a quick picture of him. But the irritation in her tone was softened by the affectionate glimmer in her eyes. In that brief exchange, Y/N felt both exasperation and adoration—a realization that she saw the beauty in his spontaneity even when it disrupted her meticulous plans.

In quieter moments, Y/N retreated to his notebook, scribbling lines of poetry and song lyrics that seemed to capture the duality of their connection. One passage in particular resonated with him as he wrote in a cramped diner booth, the words flowing almost unconsciously:

“You’re the flash that ruins the shot I’m the darkroom, begging for light.”

The line encapsulated everything: Aeri was a burst of brilliance that threatened to overwhelm the careful, shadowed spaces within him. Her presence illuminated parts of him he’d kept hidden away, and yet, it also unraveled the fragile fabric of his carefully curated persona.

But as with all passionate affairs, the summer was not without its fractures. One rainy afternoon, a letter arrived that upended their fragile idyll. It was from Aeri’s ex—a reminder of a past that refused to be forgotten. The letter was laced with bitterness and regret, accusing her of betraying what was once real. That night, in the cramped intimacy of her apartment, Aeri’s facade cracked.

Over clattering dishes and the low hum of an old fan, she confronted Y/N. “You’re romanticizing chaos,” she accused, her voice trembling with a mixture of fury and sorrow. “Every time you spin your tales, you turn our moments into some tragic myth.”

Y/N’s eyes, usually so soft in the face of her intensity, hardened in response. “And you,” he shot back, “are nothing but an emotional tourist—riding the waves of every storm without ever letting the calm in.”

The argument reverberated through the night, punctuated by sharp words and longer silences. Their love, once a spontaneous burst of light, now flickered uncertainly in the shadow of old wounds and unresolved grief. Yet, even as anger spilled over, the undercurrent of desire remained undeniable—a magnetic pull that neither could fully resist.

After the fight, they found themselves drifting into a fragile silence. In the quiet moments that followed, Aeri’s eyes wandered back to the ruined letters and half-packed bags, and Y/N’s mind returned to the pages of his notebook stained with hastily scribbled verses. The vibrancy of their summer began to show the scars of reality—a reminder that even the most luminous moments can be marred by the ghosts of the past.

Despite the pain, there was beauty in their chaos. Each spontaneous adventure, every whispered word and stolen glance, was a piece of the mosaic that defined their summer. Their love was a collage of moments—bright, blurred, and sometimes broken—but it was entirely theirs. In the dim light of early morning, as they lay side by side on a threadbare rug in a forgotten loft, the echoes of laughter and argument blended into a haunting melody. It was a love story written in stolen snapshots and fleeting verses, as transient and unforgettable as the moth wings that fluttered in the heat of summer nights.

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Dawn crept in with an unforgiving clarity that shattered the illusions of the night. In the cold predawn light, Aeri moved silently through the narrow apartment they’d once shared, her footsteps echoing against tile and worn-out memories. Y/N lay still in a tangled heap on the bed, his eyes closed as if he could escape the painful finality of what was about to unfold.

She had always been the one to seize the moment—the wild, untamable spirit who never hesitated to break free. And now, as the first blush of morning painted the sky in pale pastels, she was leaving. The weight of their fractured summer pressed down on her with every careful step.

Y/N’s eyes fluttered open just as she paused by the door. He forced himself to remain still, feigning sleep as he watched her prepare to leave. In the quiet hush of that fateful morning, he sensed the end was near. The silence was thick, punctuated only by the distant hum of traffic and the soft clink of her keys in the lock.

Aeri lingered in the doorway for a moment longer, her silhouette framed by the weak light of dawn. Before stepping out, she pulled out her camera with a practiced precision. There was a final ritual she needed to perform—a goodbye captured in crystal-clear honesty. In a single, decisive moment, she turned the lens on Y/N, freezing him in a tableau of vulnerability. His face, relaxed and unaware of the significance of the shot, bore the deep lines of a man who had given his heart away too many times.

As the shutter clicked, Aeri’s hand trembled with the weight of what she was doing. In that silent snapshot, every unspoken word, every tear unshed, was captured in a moment of raw, unedited truth. Her eyes flickered over the image, then to the worn notebook on the bedside table where Y/N’s poetry had once spilled like secrets.

For a few agonizing moments, she fumbled with a crumpled piece of paper—a note that she had scribbled in a fit of conflicting emotions. The words were hurried and raw: “I’ll ruin us faster than art ever could.” The note, however, never found its way to him. In a sudden impulse, Aeri crumpled it into a tight fist and tore it up, scattering fragments of regret and unfulfilled promise across the cold floor.

Then, without another backward glance, she slipped out the door into the early morning haze, leaving Y/N alone with the echo of her departure. The apartment, once a sanctuary of shared dreams, now felt unbearably empty—a mausoleum of memories and lingering echoes of laughter.

Y/N remained still for a long while, the silence of the room pressing in on him like a suffocating fog. He listened to the distant sound of footsteps receding, each step marking the slow death of what had once been a blazing, uncontainable flame. In that quiet aftermath, he felt the sting of loss so acute that it seemed to tear at the very fabric of his soul.

He turned his head toward the window, where the first rays of the sun filtered through in brittle strips of light, and wondered if this was how every ending felt—both inevitable and shattering, like a masterpiece unraveled stroke by stroke. The crisp clarity of the morning betrayed no hint of the wild, transient passion that had defined their summer. Instead, it was a mirror reflecting back the broken shards of a love that had burned too fiercely to last.

For hours, Y/N lay there, caught between the desire to call out and the resignation of silence. He replayed every laugh, every heated argument, and every tender touch in his mind—each one a delicate thread in the tapestry of their brief, chaotic romance. And as the sun climbed higher, warming the cold floor beneath him, he realized that even in the midst of heartbreak, there was a strange, unyielding beauty in the truth of it all.

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Years later, the echoes of that tumultuous summer still resonated in the present, converging in a singular, charged moment. Y/N arrived at the gallery with his battered guitar strapped to his back—a silent testament to a life that had wandered far from the reckless days of youth, yet never quite escaped their shadow. The gallery buzzed with the hum of murmured conversations and the clink of glasses, the air thick with anticipation and the scent of polished wood.

Across the room, under the cool glow of strategically placed lights, Aeri stood framed by a backdrop of her photographs. Dressed in a tailored blazer that contrasted sharply with the raw, unfiltered images of pain and beauty she had captured, she exuded an air of controlled authority. For a moment, as she interviewed a particularly enthusiastic art critic, her composure faltered. Her eyes lifted and met Y/N’s across the crowded room—a silent collision of past and present that sent a jolt through both of them.

Time seemed to pause as memories cascaded between them—the fevered nights on water towers, the stolen laughter under abandoned factories, the quiet devastation of that final morning. In that suspended second, the gallery, with its pristine walls and hushed whispers, transformed into a stage for their unresolved history. Y/N’s heart pounded in his ears, the sound mingling with the ambient chatter, as he took a tentative step forward.

The critic’s questions faded into the background as Aeri’s gaze held his, raw and unspoken. For a brief, fragile moment, they were transported back to that summer of almosts—the incandescent flash of youth, the daring risk of vulnerability, and the bittersweet taste of what might have been. Aeri’s hand twitched near her side, as if reaching out to bridge the gulf of years and regrets. And Y/N, with a mixture of hope and hesitation, wondered if the unresolved chords of their past could somehow be tuned to a new melody.

In the charged silence that followed, both recognized that the distance between them was measured not in miles or years, but in the scars and memories that each carried. The gallery lights, soft and unforgiving, illuminated every wrinkle of regret, every lingering smile of nostalgia. It was a moment where the weight of their shared history pressed against the fragile present—a reminder that even as life marched forward, the past never truly let go.

As the room slowly returned to its normal rhythm, Aeri cleared her throat, regaining her professional poise, while Y/N lingered at the edge of the conversation like a ghost from a time when every note mattered. In that brief, electric encounter, the silent promise of unfinished music hung in the air—a promise that perhaps, someday, they would dare to play their old song once again.

The past and present, woven together in a delicate tapestry of memories and unspoken truths, revealed a love that was never entirely lost—only transformed into a haunting refrain that echoed through every chord and captured frame.

The evening had settled into a heavy, indigo twilight as guests filtered into the gallery. The space, a converted industrial loft with soaring ceilings and exposed brick, was filled with hushed conversations and the soft clink of wine glasses. Overhead, a single spotlight traced slow circles around Aeri’s photographs—a sprawling body of work that oscillated between raw brutality and a fragile, dreamlike beauty. It was as if every image was a confession, a whispered secret meant for those brave enough to look beyond the surface.

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Clusters of guests drifted among the images, their voices a murmur of appreciation and critique. One guest, a sharply dressed critic with a wry smile, stopped before a series of images that captured urban decay and intimate despair. He leaned in, appraising the photos with a measured gaze, then remarked loud enough for those nearby to hear, “Brave… if you like emotional voyeurism.” His tone was mocking yet laced with admiration��a dismissal that somehow validated Aeri’s work as both daring and disturbingly honest.

Y/N stood in a quieter corner of the gallery, a silent observer amid the well-heeled conversation. His gaze was fixed on a photograph titled “The Bridge to Nowhere.” It was a blurred shot of a water tower, its structure distorted by motion and shadow. The image seemed to capture something essential—a moment suspended between hope and futility, echoing the restless nights of their shared past. The photograph, much like the memory of that summer, was both haunting and achingly beautiful. Y/N’s thoughts swirled with the recollections of a time when every risk was a promise, when every misstep was a note in the symphony of youth.

The dim lighting in the gallery transformed the image into a ghostly vision. He could almost hear the echo of their laughter on that water tower, feel the electric thrill of their first encounter mingled with the uncertainty of what was to come. In that moment, every critique, every whispered appraisal in the room, faded into a background hum—insignificant compared to the relentless pull of the past.

Across the room, Aeri navigated her own storm of emotions. Dressed in a sleek, tailored blazer that belied the chaos of her inner world, she moved with a practiced grace. Yet every so often, her eyes would stray to the very photograph that haunted Y/N’s attention. It was as if, through that blurred image, both of them had found a piece of themselves they could never quite reclaim—a truth too raw to be confined to memory alone.

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As the exhibit drew on, the tension between past and present reached a fever pitch. The gallery’s polished interior gave way to a narrow, fire-escape landing behind the building, a shadowy refuge from the pretension of art critics and connoisseurs. Here, the rawness of the night reigned again. The metallic scent of rain and the chill of concrete underfoot were a stark contrast to the curated beauty of the exhibit.

Y/N found Aeri leaning against the cold railing, her gaze fixed on the city skyline—a tapestry of neon lights and distant sirens. The space between them was charged, a silent battleground for words unspoken for too long. Y/N stepped forward, his voice trembling with a mix of anger and yearning.

“You took the truth and smudged it into something safe,” he said, his tone both accusatory and desperate. His words cut through the night, raw as the wind that whipped around the fire escape.

Aeri’s eyes flashed with a storm of emotions—regret, defiance, and a deep-seated pain. “You think I didn’t try?” she shot back, her voice low and measured, though every syllable trembled with the weight of old wounds. “I’d point the lens at you, and it’d feel like… like aiming at the sun.” Her words were a confession, a brittle admission that the process of capturing truth was as dangerous and blinding as confronting it directly.

For a long, suspended moment, the only sound was the rustling of their breaths mingling with the city’s distant hum. The fire escape, lit only by the feeble glow of a streetlamp, became the stage for a collision of their two worlds—one forged in the incandescent heat of passion, the other cooled by the bitterness of memory.

Aeri’s gaze dropped to the small leather case slung over her shoulder—the one that contained all her most intimate photographs, the images she’d hidden away from prying eyes and the relentless scrutiny of the world. Slowly, almost hesitantly, she unlatched it and drew out a single print. It was an image she had never dared show anyone—a photograph captured in the darkness of a forgotten night, a moment when vulnerability and raw emotion intertwined to form something irretrievably real.

Y/N’s eyes widened as he took in the image. The photo was of him—at a moment of complete exposure. His face was lit by a soft, almost unearthly glow; his expression was one of tender anguish and hopeful defiance. It was as if every line, every shadow on his face, had been etched by a memory too painful to forget and too beautiful to ignore. The clarity of the image was in stark contrast to the blurred aesthetics of “The Bridge to Nowhere.” It was the unvarnished truth, stripped of artifice.

“I—” Y/N began, but his voice faltered. The room around him seemed to dissolve, leaving only the image and the haunting echo of a song in his mind. The static of all his past regrets, hopes, and dreams crescendoed into a familiar refrain—a melody he had long tried to bury but could never forget.

In that moment, as if summoned by the intensity of his emotions, the first notes of “Moth Wing Hours” began to swell within him. The song, raw and unpolished, rose from the depths of his memory. It was a piece Aeri had never heard, a melody woven from the threads of their shared history and the silent spaces between their words. Its strains were both a lament and a declaration, a summoning of every lost moment and every almost-forgotten promise.

The sound seemed to transform the night. The city below, the cold metal of the fire escape, even the distant hum of traffic, all receded as Y/N’s inner world surged forth. He could almost see the images of their past—flashbacks of a summer ablaze with possibility, of stolen kisses and reckless confessions. The song was more than music; it was an outpouring of every fragment of his soul that had been buried under layers of static and silence.

Aeri’s eyes shimmered with unshed tears as she watched him. For so long, she had hidden behind her camera, behind her carefully curated images, in an attempt to capture the truth without facing it. Now, faced with the raw, unfiltered emotion of the man before her, her defenses crumbled. The photograph in her hand trembled as if it, too, could sense the gravity of the moment.

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The confrontation on the fire escape marked a turning point—a precipice between what had been and what could be. With the hidden photo still clutched in her hand, Aeri took a tentative step forward. The quiet urgency in her eyes spoke of regrets and unspoken apologies, of a love that had once burned fiercely but had been dimmed by time and circumstance.

Y/N, still clutching the weight of the photograph in his mind, slowly retrieved his battered guitar from the case slung over his back. The instrument, scarred and weathered by years of neglect and forgotten melodies, was as much a part of him as the memories that haunted his every chord. He sat down on the cold, metal step of the fire escape, the city lights flickering like distant memories around him.

With deliberate care, he positioned the guitar against his knee and began to strum—a single, raw note that cut through the stillness of the night. The sound was unpolished, rough around the edges, yet it carried with it an undeniable truth. Each chord resonated with the cumulative weight of every missed chance, every whispered regret, every spark of defiant hope that had flickered in the darkness of their shared past.

As the melody built, so did the intensity of their unspoken exchange. Aeri watched, transfixed, as the notes of “Moth Wing Hours” filled the space between them. There was a vulnerability in his playing—a surrender to the truth that had long been hidden behind layers of static and distance. The song unfolded slowly, each refrain a delicate tapestry of sound that intertwined with the fragile remnants of their memories.

Tears welled in Aeri’s eyes as she absorbed the raw emotion in every note. Her camera, once a tool for capturing the fleeting beauty of the world, now hung limply by her side—a silent witness to the convergence of art and life. The layers of artifice and carefully contrived images fell away, leaving only the bare, unfiltered essence of who they once were—and perhaps, who they could still become.

For a long while, the two stood there on the fire escape, the night embracing them with its cool, indifferent arms. There was no physical contact—no desperate reach or trembling embrace. Instead, there was a communion of souls, a recognition that in the interplay of light and shadow, truth and art, they had found something worth preserving.

The music swelled, a crescendo of emotion that echoed through the empty streets below. Y/N’s fingers danced over the strings, coaxing the final notes from the guitar as if to seal the past and herald a new beginning. The song, filled with every fragment of their broken history and every glimmer of hope, hung in the air—a fragile promise that the static could finally fade.

In that suspended moment, the relentless noise of life—the criticisms, the ghostly echoes of mistakes, the ever-present reminder of what had been lost—began to dissolve. The collision of their worlds, so long marked by the fractures of time and regret, softened into a quiet understanding. The harsh lines of memory blurred, giving way to a tender, unspoken possibility.

Aeri’s tears fell silently as she listened, each drop a small testament to the emotions that had been held at bay for far too long. Y/N’s playing was not just a performance—it was an act of confession, a desperate attempt to reconcile the shards of a past that had been shattered by the weight of dreams deferred. The notes of “Moth Wing Hours” wove around them like a cocoon, a fragile barrier against the relentless tide of the world outside.

When the last chord finally faded, the silence that followed was profound. It was a silence filled not with emptiness, but with the unspoken promise of renewal—a moment where every raw, painful truth was met with the gentle possibility of forgiveness. Y/N’s eyes met Aeri’s, and in that exchange, both knew that the collision of their lives had not been an end, but a chance—a narrow, trembling opportunity to rebuild something honest from the ruins of what had been.

Without a word, Y/N set his guitar aside, the echo of his song lingering in the night air like a benediction. Aeri, still trembling, slowly retrieved the hidden photograph from her jacket pocket. In the weak glow of the streetlamp, she allowed herself a final, shuddering breath—a silent farewell to the ghosts of their shared past and an acceptance of the fragile, uncertain future that lay ahead.

For a long, aching moment, neither spoke. The raw, unvarnished emotion between them was palpable—a truth too heavy for words, yet light enough to bear hope. The static of all the past, the noise of regret and the clamor of what might have been, had finally begun to fade into the gentle hum of a new beginning.

As the city resumed its nocturnal rhythm, Y/N turned away, leaving the fire escape and the echoes of the past behind him. Aeri lingered a moment longer, her heart full of all the things unsaid and undone, then stepped back into the gallery. Inside, the harsh critiques and the polished facades of art awaited, but for a brief, transcendent instant on that cold fire escape, the raw pulse of truth had reawakened something long dormant.

In the days that followed, neither could entirely erase the memory of that night—the night when art and life collided, when every fractured note and blurred image spoke of a love both haunting and redemptive. Y/N continued to play his music, the unpolished notes of “Moth Wing Hours” now a permanent refrain in his heart. And Aeri, her camera now a little heavier with the weight of remembered truth, sought out new images—each one a step toward capturing not just the fleeting beauty of the world, but the unyielding truth of a love that had once dared to defy the static.

They never touched that night, never bridged the distance with a single embrace. But in the quiet resolution of their separate paths, there was a promise—a promise that though the static of their past might always echo faintly in the background, they had finally chosen to let the unvarnished truth shine through.

As dawn broke over the city one crisp morning, the remnants of the night’s collision lingered like a soft melody in the air—a reminder that even in the midst of shattered dreams and blurred memories, there existed a fragile, defiant hope. And somewhere in that hope, the truth of who they once were—and who they might yet become—was etched in every fading note and every captured image, waiting, quietly, for the day when the static would finally be silenced.

————————————————————

In that silent space between yesterday and tomorrow, the choices they made—of art, of truth, of love—resonated far beyond the confines of a single night. The exhibit had been a canvas for Aeri’s struggles, a testament to the pain and beauty that had always defined her vision. The fire escape had been their confessional, a place where raw truths were spoken in whispers against the roar of the city. And the final, tentative notes of “Moth Wing Hours” had been both an ending and a beginning—a declaration that, no matter how fractured the past, the future was theirs to create.

The collision of their lives, so vivid and violent in its intensity, had not been about reunion or reconciliation in the conventional sense. It was about confronting the ghosts of their shared history, accepting every imperfect note and blurred memory, and choosing, despite it all, to carry forward the fragile light of truth.

For Y/N, the music had always been a refuge—a sanctuary where every dissonant chord and every melancholic refrain held the promise of redemption. For Aeri, her lens was a way of seeing the world in all its painful, luminous detail. And for both of them, the choice to stand on that fire escape, to let the static fade into a quiet, unguarded melody, was a small act of defiance—a declaration that, even in a world awash with half-truths and muted regrets, there remained the possibility of something real, something unyielding.

And so, as the gallery lights dimmed and the night retreated into memory, the echoes of that fateful collision lingered—a testament to the power of truth, art, and the indomitable human spirit. In the space where music, memory, and image converged, a new chapter was written—a chapter not of perfection, but of raw, unvarnished beauty, where every note, every captured image, and every silent tear told the story of lives that dared to defy the static.

————————————————————

As the new day dawned, a subtle shift had taken place. The unresolved tension between art and truth, between the photographer and the musician, had not been erased but transformed into something more profound. The static that had once drowned out their voices now lay softened by the resonance of honesty—a reminder that, in the end, even the most fragmented hearts can create a symphony when they choose to embrace the full spectrum of light and shadow.

In that delicate balance between loss and hope, between memory and renewal, Y/N’s song continued to play—a song of truth, of love, and of the promise that the static would, at last, fade into silence.

Y/N’s world had shifted again. The past—every chord of regret, every flash of passion—had receded into a gentle hum, replaced by the steady cadence of life’s next movement. Now, he found solace in the familiar rhythms of teaching, where each imperfect note held the promise of discovery.

————————————————————

In a small community music school tucked away in a weathered building downtown, Y/N stood before a semicircle of students. The room was cluttered with worn instruments and scribbled sheet music, its windows streaked with the soft light of a fading afternoon. Today’s lesson wasn’t about scales or technical perfection; instead, Y/N introduced what he called “imperfect songs”—melodies that bore the scars of real life and the beauty of unfiltered truth.

“Music,” he began, his voice warm yet edged with a quiet intensity, “is never meant to be flawless. It’s the little mistakes, the unexpected pauses, that make it ours. Every off-key note, every stutter in your rhythm—it’s part of your story.” His gaze swept the room, catching the nervous smiles and tentative nods of his students, each clutching a guitar or keyboard as if it were their lifeline.

He led them through a simple chord progression, encouraging them to let their imperfections speak. “Play it with feeling,” he urged, “don’t try to make it perfect. Let the music breathe.” As the students hesitated at first, they slowly began to relax into the exercise. The room filled with a chorus of hesitant strums and tentative notes, and Y/N smiled, thinking of the songs that had once defined his own restless nights.

After class, a few students lingered, eager to ask questions or share fragments of their own stories. One student, a shy teen with a passion for lyrics, approached him quietly. “Mr. C,” she said, her voice soft but determined, “do you think it’s okay if my song isn’t… perfect?” Y/N knelt down to meet her eyes, his expression gentle. “Absolutely. Perfection isn’t what makes a song memorable—it’s the heart behind it. Remember, every masterpiece is born out of imperfection.”

As he walked home that evening, the city’s neon glow bathed the sidewalks in shifting hues. He thought of the moments when his own music had been raw and unguarded—a collection of fragments that somehow merged into the haunting refrain of “Moth Wing Hours.” Tonight, at a nearby dive bar, he would revisit that melody, offering it a new ending that spoke of transformation rather than despair.

————————————————————

The dive bar was a sanctuary for the misunderstood and the outcasts—a dimly lit den where the air vibrated with the sound of guitars and voices that had seen better days. Y/N took his usual spot on the small stage, his battered acoustic guitar slung over his shoulder like an old friend. The familiar murmur of the crowd wrapped around him, a living echo of his former life.

As he tuned his guitar, Y/N’s mind wandered back to the countless nights spent strumming the same chords in empty rooms, each note a testimony to his journey through loss, regret, and hope. Tonight, he would share a rendition of “Moth Wing Hours”—a song that had once captured the fleeting beauty of a love lost in the static of memory. But now, something within him had shifted. The static had faded, replaced by the warm afterglow of acceptance.

When it was his turn, Y/N stepped forward and began to play. The opening chords filled the room, gentle and unassuming at first, then building into a rich, resonant melody. As he sang, his voice carried both the weight of his past and the promise of a new beginning. When he reached the final verse, he paused, a moment of silence that hung heavy in the air.

Then, with a quiet certainty, he sang the final line: “We were the flash, Now we’re the afterglow.”

The words, simple yet profound, resonated with everyone present. For a moment, time seemed to slow as the audience absorbed the transformation encapsulated in that fleeting phrase. In that subtle shift from a burst of intensity to a lingering warmth, Y/N had captured the essence of change—the transition from the tumultuous brilliance of youth to the steady, enduring light of experience.

————————————————————

Miles away, in a quiet corner of the city, Aeri’s world was taking shape in stark, deliberate focus. Her studio was a space of creative solitude—a converted loft where sunlight filtered in through large industrial windows, illuminating rows of meticulously arranged photographs and scattered notebooks filled with handwritten thoughts. Here, amidst the controlled chaos of her artistic process, Aeri prepared for her final act of catharsis.

For weeks, she had wrestled with the decision of which image would define her upcoming exhibit. Every photograph she had taken was imbued with fragments of truth, yet one image haunted her—the clear, unblurred shot she had secretly kept, the one that captured the essence of what almost was. In that photo, Y/N’s features were rendered in sharp detail—a moment of vulnerable authenticity that had eluded her in every other frame. Now, with trembling resolve, she selected that image for submission, titling it “What Almost Was.”

Late into the night, with the exhibit deadline looming, Aeri composed a final email to the gallery curator. Her fingers moved hesitantly over the keyboard as she attached the image, her heart pounding with a mix of apprehension and exhilaration. In the message, she wrote: “This is the piece that captures the truth of our imperfection—the clarity in the chaos. It’s the one shot that reminds us that sometimes, the most honest moments are the ones we try hardest to hide.”

After sending the email, Aeri retreated to her studio’s back corner, where a small, worn mirror and a vintage camera awaited her next experiment. Tonight, she was determined to capture a self-portrait—a raw, unmediated look at herself that bore no filters, no distortions. With deliberate care, she set up the camera on its tripod, adjusting the focus until the world beyond the lens receded into a soft blur.

As she sat before the camera, Aeri allowed herself a rare moment of introspection. The image that would soon materialize on the screen was more than just a self-portrait—it was a declaration of self-acceptance, a recognition of every scar, every triumph, and every moment of vulnerability that had led her to this point. With a deep, steadying breath, she pressed the shutter.

The camera clicked, capturing a single, unadorned moment of truth. In the photograph, Aeri’s eyes met her own with a clarity that was both shocking and beautiful. There were no shadows obscuring her features, no layers of artifice to mask the raw emotion that lay within. It was simply her—unfiltered, real, and unmistakably present. For the first time in a long while, she allowed herself to see the full spectrum of her identity—the artist, the wanderer, the woman who had loved fiercely and lost deeply.

————————————————————

In the quiet aftermath of their separate acts of transformation, a subtle shift rippled through the city. Y/N’s classroom echoed with the sound of imperfect songs and tentative chords, a living reminder that beauty often emerged from the flawed and the unfinished. His dive bar gig had been more than just a performance—it was a reawakening, a reaffirmation that even the most battered heart could produce a melody that resonated with truth.

Aeri’s exhibit, bolstered by her final, unfiltered submission, garnered unexpected acclaim. Critics who had once dismissed her work as “emotional voyeurism” began to see a new depth—a vulnerability that transcended mere spectacle. The photograph titled “What Almost Was” became a focal point of the exhibit, its clarity standing as a testament to the unvarnished reality of love and loss. In the hushed reverence of gallery halls and intimate discussions, Aeri’s work spoke of both the fragility and the resilience of the human spirit.

As the days passed, the city continued its ceaseless rhythm—a blend of neon lights and whispered confessions, of dreams pursued and quietly abandoned. Yet, amidst the din, there were pockets of silence where new beginnings took root. In one such corner, a small, dusty radio in a second-hand shop began to hum with life. The static that had once obscured the truth of the world had finally faded, replaced by the clear, steady sound of a familiar melody—a song that echoed the journey from chaos to clarity.

Y/N, in his classroom, continued to inspire his students with his unconventional lessons. He often spoke of the beauty of imperfection and the strength found in vulnerability. His final line in “Moth Wing Hours”—“We were the flash / Now we’re the afterglow”—became a mantra not only for him but for every student who dared to embrace their own flawed, radiant journey. At every gig, at every lesson, the echo of that line reminded them all that even in the aftermath of brilliance, there could be a gentle, enduring light.

In her studio, Aeri hung the self-portrait next to “What Almost Was,” creating a small gallery of truths that were as clear as they were raw. Each image, each captured moment, was a step toward reclaiming her identity—not as an observer of chaos, but as a participant in the unfolding narrative of her life. With every click of her camera, she found solace in the fact that the clarity she sought was already within her, waiting to be acknowledged and celebrated.

The resonance of their separate journeys began to intertwine in subtle ways. A new student in Y/N’s class would ask him about the inspiration behind his teaching, and he’d speak of a summer long past—a summer where imperfections were not mistakes, but the very notes that composed the music of life. Meanwhile, a quiet art critic writing a review of Aeri’s exhibit remarked on the unexpected warmth and lucidity of her latest work—a testament to an artist who had finally learned to let go of the blurred boundaries between memory and reality.

On a crisp morning, as the city stirred awake under a pale sky, both Y/N and Aeri found themselves standing at the threshold of new chapters. Y/N, after another lesson filled with tentative strums and off-key harmonies, sat quietly by the window of the music school. He watched the rain wash away the remnants of yesterday’s melancholy, the droplets creating a transient mosaic on the glass. In that reflective moment, he realized that every imperfect song his students played was a promise—a promise that the beauty of life lay not in its flawless perfection, but in its raw, unedited truth.

At the same time, Aeri revisited her now-familiar studio, pausing to admire the self-portrait that had, in its unvarnished clarity, become a mirror of her own transformation. The image was a quiet revolution—a defiant declaration that she was no longer the haunted artist chasing ghosts, but a woman embracing her truth, every detail sharp and unblurred.

Somewhere in the gentle hum of the early morning, a solitary radio in a forgotten corner of the city sprang to life. Amid the soft whispers of a new day, the familiar strains of a song filled the air—a melody that had once been lost in static, now emerging with a crystalline clarity. The transformation was complete, the collision of art and life forging a new harmony in the wake of all that had come before.

Somewhere, a radio clicks on. The static is gone.

#kpop #kpop fanfic #kpop gg #kpop imagines #kpop girls #aespa imagines #aespa giselle #giselle #idol x male reader #idol x reader #aeri uchinaga #aeri x reader #uchinaga aeri #giselle x you #giselle x reader #aespa x reader #aespa x you #aespa x male reader #aespa x y/n

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hoe4hotchner · 9 months ago

Note

Hii I just started criminal minds this month and ofc I HAD to run to tumblr when I saw Aaron Hotchner and I came across your blog and I really really love your writing !!

So I wanted to ask a one shot with him about an anemic reader (fem if possible) who forgot to take her med or to eat on a case and she gets dizzy but brush it off and continue working but hotch notice 🙏🏽

(Ignore if you’re not comfortable writing it ofc)

Watchful Eyes

Pairing: Aaron Hotchner x Reader

Word count: 1.3k

Warnings: Light use of Y/N, dizziness, forgetting to take meds.

Requests can be send here

The sun was high, casting sharp shadows on the ground as the team spread out through the small town, gathering evidence and interviewing witnesses. It was the third day of their investigation, and everyone was feeling the strain, especially you. You'd been running on fumes, forgetting to eat properly, and skipping your medication a few times in the rush of trying to catch the unsub in time before his next victim was brutally murdered.

Pushing aside the foggy feeling in your head, you focused on the task at hand, sifting through piles of case files at the local police station, where the team had set up their field office. Your vision blurred for a moment as you tried to focus on the words in front of you. Shaking your head slightly, you tried to clear it away.

"You okay?" JJ asked, glancing over at you from a desk nearby.

"Yeah, just a bit tired," you replied with a forced smile. "I'll be fine."

But as you stood up to grab another file, the room seemed to rock. You reached out, gripping the edge of the desk in an attempt to steady yourself, but quickly brushed it off trying to power through it. There was no time to be weak. The team needed every set of hands, and you couldn't afford to slow down, not now.

Hotch appeared in the doorway from the chief of police's office, his presence commanding as always. "(Y/N), can you come with me to the crime scene? I could use an extra pair of eyes?"

You hesitated for a moment, the dizziness still lingering at the edges of your consciousness, but nodded not wanting him to notice. "Of course, Hotch. Just let me grab my things."

He watched you closely, noticing the slight hesitation and the way you braced yourself against the table. He was the chief after all. Hotch didn’t say anything, simply waiting for you to collect your belongings before leading the way out. As you stepped into the sunlight, the cool air hit you, and you did your best to shake off the unease, determined to keep up with your boss the best you could.

Hotch stood outside the suspected unsub's house, a deep furrow in his brow as he spoke into his earpiece. "Reid, I need you and Morgan to double-check the timelines with the victims' families. Prentiss, head back to the station and go over the CCTV footage again with the local officers. We might have missed something." He directed the team, trying to make sense of the case so far.

"Got it, Hotch," came the chorus of replies.

Hotch glanced down at his watch. Time was slipping away, and you needed a breakthrough soon. As he disconnected the call, he spotted you across the street, your figure slightly hunched over as you scribbled notes from a witness. Something about your posture made him frown. You looked pale, almost ghostly under the harsh sunlight, and there was a slight tremor in your hands as you took the notes.

His eyes narrowed. He knew the signs, he had seen them before. The stress, the exhaustion, the faint sheen of sweat on your brow despite the cool breeze. His instincts told him something was wrong.

Making his way over, he approached just as you swayed on your feet, your hand reaching out to the wall for support.

"(Y/N)," he said, his voice low but firm, drawing your attention. "Are you alright?"

You blinked up at him, trying to muster a reassuring smile. "I'm fine, Hotch. Just a little light-headed. It's nothing."

Hotch wasn't convinced. He stepped closer, his eyes scanning your face for any sign of serious distress. "When was the last time you ate?" He asked, aware of your condition from your personnel file.

"I… I don't know, this morning, maybe?" You admitted, your voice wavering. You knew it was of no use lying to him. He was far too good at his job for that to work.

"And your medication?"

You bit your lip, suddenly feeling small under his intense gaze. "I might have forgotten…"

Hotch let out a quiet sigh, concern etched in his features. "You know you can't skip those. You're not doing anyone any favors by pushing yourself like this."

Before you could protest, Hotch’s hand reached out, gently but firmly taking the files from your hands. The gesture was commanding yet tender, leaving no room for resistance. He looked down at you with a mixture of concern and resolve, his dark eyes searching yours for any sign of defiance. When he spoke, his voice was calm but laced with an authority that you knew better than to challenge.

"That's it," he said, his tone leaving no room for argument. "You're grounded to the field office until you’re feeling better. No more pushing through or pretending you're fine."

He held your gaze, making sure his words sank in as if daring you to argue and make your "punishment" even worse, potentially pulling completely off the case. You felt a wave of frustration rise in your chest, you didn’t want to be sidelined, not when the team needed you. But beneath the frustration, there was also a sense of relief. Hotch wasn’t just issuing orders; he was looking out for you, protecting you from yourself when you couldn’t see past the immediate demands of the job.

"Hotch, I—"

"No arguments," he interrupted, his tone leaving no room for debate. "I'm not risking your health. Not on my watch." He continued, softer now, almost gentle. "I can’t have you out there in this condition. Not when it’s clear you’re struggling. The case can wait; your health can’t."

As you stood there, the weight of his words settled over you, and you realized there was no point in fighting it. Hotch wasn’t just your superior; he was someone who cared enough to make sure you took care of yourself, even when you wouldn't. You opened your mouth to argue, but the world tilted for the second time today, and you found yourself grateful for his firm grip on your arm, steadying you.

"Come on," he said softly, leading you back to the car to drive you back to the field office. "You're sitting down when we get back, drinking some water, and taking your meds. We'll figure out the case, but we need you healthy to do that."

Once you were back at the field office, the busy atmosphere felt distant as Hotch guided you to a chair in a quieter spot. He kept a steady hand on your back, making sure you were okay as you sat down, feeling more tired than you'd wanted to admit.

Hotch quickly grabbed a bottle of water from the nearby cooler. Without saying a word, he opened it and handed it to you, his eyes never leaving you. The way he watched you, so carefully, as if worried you might collapse, it made you feel both comforted and a bit embarrassed. You knew he was just being responsible, but his concern was clear.

As you took a sip of water, it helped ease the dryness in your throat, but it didn’t stop the awkwardness you felt under his watchful gaze. You looked down at the bottle, trying to avoid his eyes.

"I'm fine, really," you mumbled, your voice quiet as you tried to reassure him, though you weren't entirely sure yourself.

Hotch knelt beside you, so you were at the same level, his expression soft and understanding. "I know you are," he said gently, but with a firmness that showed he wasn’t going to let this go. "But you need to take care of yourself, (Y/N). We all need you at your best."

His words were simple, but they carried a lot of meaning. It wasn’t just about the work, they needed you to be okay. And he wasn’t going to let you ignore your health again. His concern made you realize how much he and the team cared, not just about the job, but about you as a person. You nodded, a small smile finally breaking through, feeling a bit better knowing you weren't facing this alone.

You nodded, the dizziness starting to fade now that you were sitting. "Thanks, Hotch."

He gave you a small, rare smile. "Just doing my job."

Consider linking or reblogging if you enjoy my work

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ckret2 · 10 months ago

Text

Chapter 71 of human Bill Cipher trying to debate his way out of still being the Mystery Shack's prisoner. Soos has found the stolen Journal 4 in Bill's possession and has to decide what to do about it in light of everything else he's learned about Bill lately.

[*this chapter was renumbered to squeeze in the Axolotl plot arc! If you. Haven't read it yet, go back to ch 61 and read it!]

Soos stared dumbfounded at the journal with a 4 on the cover that he'd pulled from Bill's hiding place. Ford had lost Journal 4 last fall—he'd said gnomes had stolen it. How in the world had Bill gotten it?

Soos sat in the attic window seat and flipped through it. The first few pages were Ford's journal entries—his observations of the dimensional rips they were glueing shut in Gravity Falls post-Weirdmageddon, a hand-drawn map highlighting various places around the globe he wanted to investigate, a few drawings and observations of paranormal beings he hadn't seen his first time in town, half a sketch of a gnome that ended with a jagged scribble across the page followed by a page that said "Shmebulock" over and over.

And then a page that said, in an unfamiliar handwriting of jagged, narrow gray letters: "CURSED BOOK! If your name is Mabon Mason Pines, STOP READING NOW or ENJOY YOUR HEX!"

Bill had written page after page of some weird code of gray and yellow-green dots and dashes. A few sentences in English—every one of them was a threatening message to Ford. "Everything would have been fantastic if you'd just helped me finish, Fordsy." "You'll regret not siding with me when you had the chance." "You should have known better than to let your idiot brother turn you against me." "Sixer, you're lying to yourself every time you say you never worshiped me, and you know it. You spent the first third of your life running away from the god you were raised with and the second third chasing after me. Don't waste your last third denying it. YOU'RE MINE." A small, worrying diagram of what looked like the interdimensional portal. And a sticker.

Wait, hold on.

A sticker. One of Mabel's. The rest of the page was the same as the others, the two-tone dots and dashes, except for the sticker, and an arrow drawn from one paragraph to the sticker.

A yellow smiley, its round edges filled in with black marker to make a triangle, over the words "Good job!"

Soos stared at the sticker.

####

A couple of weeks ago, Melody had texted to let Soos know that there was a mess in the upstairs bathroom, and the kids said they'd been fighting a werewolf ghost.

When Soos had gotten home the next morning, Melody had pulled him aside and quietly told him she hadn't wanted to worry him and the Stans, but she did not think it was a werewolf ghost.

When Soos saw the bathroom, he didn't think it was a werewolf ghost either.

It was a scene from a horror movie. Menacing magical sigils painted all over the walls in blood and toothpaste, Bill's zodiac painted on one mirror, the other mirror broken, glass and water all over the floor. It looked like the site of a really wet demon summoning. This contained none of the hallmarks of ghostly or werewolfish activity. Why would Bill do this?

Soos was kind of reluctant to ask Bill. Bill still sorta scared him sometimes. Sure, he looked like a lost 18-year-old, but Soos knew what teens were like in a fight. So he asked Mabel instead.

Mabel pursed her lips uncomfortably. "Ask Dipper."

So Soos asked Dipper.

Dipper winced and. "Promise you won't get mad."

Soos considered that. "Yeah, I guess that's a fair deal."

Dipper confessed that Bill got accidentally locked in the upstairs bathroom for like a whole day, because he and Mabel didn't hear him yelling. Not because they were out of the house when they shouldn't have been. They were just... somewhere else in the house. Doing something loud. For the whole day.

While Bill was trapped alone.

####

Soos had vented to Abuelita about cleaning the bathroom. Like sure, he got Bill was annoyed about being stuck, but that seemed excessive.

Abuelita had made the observation that sometimes people in profoundly bleak and oppressive situations would just... destroy whatever was around them. Like punching a hole in the wall or snapping a pencil when you were angry, but much more so. Not because they wanted their surroundings to be destroyed, but because that was the last and only thing they had power over, and they needed to feel like they were in control of something. Even if that thing was merely changing their environment from ordered to chaotic.

Bill didn't have control over very much. He probably hadn't since he died. Soos didn't know what kind of space triangle afterlife Bill had been in before he showed up as Toga Lady, but it couldn't have been great if he'd come straight back here.

Soos could remember the one time weeks ago he'd let Bill into the bathroom to shower and forgotten to come back and let him out. How Bill had screamed so all the Mystery Shack's tourists could hear; how he'd seethed in Soos's face, how he'd said he'd rather blow their collective cover and throw them all on the mercy of the town's law enforcement than remain locked in the bathroom a second longer than they'd agreed upon. Soos had thought Bill was just impatient and hotheaded.

Standing in the bathroom, looking at the material evidence of Bill's claustrophobic terror—the broken glass, the spilled blood—he wondered.

####

The same day, he had felt a breeze in the gift shop and found the trap doors to the roof left open. He'd climbed up, shut them, and in between tours he'd visited his office to check yesterday's security tapes.

He saw Wendy coming into the shack to hang out the morning before. That was fine. Soos had discovered she did that from time to time on days the shack was closed, but she wasn't doing anything bad and she hadn't brought it up yet, so Soos didn't bring it up either. Maybe she just needed a private place to hang. Teen stuff. He was just glad Wendy felt that safe at the Mystery Shack. Maybe she'd just gone up to hang out on the roof and forgot to shut the trap doors...

And then, right there on screen, Soos saw Bill letting himself into the gift shop, through the door, which he shouldn't be able to open. A chill shot up Soos's back. The door curse was their only real means of containing Bill. If he could use doors now, he was out, there was no way they could trap him without doing something crazy like locking him in the bunker and hoping he didn't kill himself.

Or could he use doors? Soos thought back to the frantic messages on the bathroom wall, written in Bill's own blood—his desperation over being unable to escape. Maybe he could use doors but not doorknobs. That was okay, maybe?

On tape, he saw Wendy run into Bill. He saw Wendy take Bill onto the roof. Out in the open air, where he could just... do whatever. But he didn't do whatever. Soos fast-forwarded the tape until Wendy and Bill came back down, and Bill simply returned to the living room.

He'd had the perfect opportunity to shove Wendy off the roof or escape. He didn't take it.

If all Bill was using his new door skills for was ducking into the gift shop and hanging out on the roof with Wendy, Soos thought maybe it would be kinda mean to take that away from him. There weren't a lot of other places Bill could go in the shack. (Soos kept seeing the blood on the bathroom wall. He kept trying to imagine what kind of helplessness would drive someone that far.) Maybe Bill needed the open air.

So Soos had put the security tape on his desk, not sure what to do about it.

####

A couple of day after that, while Soos was restocking the gift shop in between waves of tourists, he'd seen Wendy reading an oddly dull-looking booklet instead of one of her usual magazines. He tilted his head to glance at the cover. The Oregon state driving manual. "Aw dude, gonna get your learner's permit?"

"Think so," Wendy said. "Don't tell my dad."

Soos remembered Wendy groaning about her dad wrangling her into doing errands if she ever got her license. "Your secret is safe with me."

"Thanks."

"What made you change your mind? You were totally against getting a license a week ago."

"It's probably those stupid Gleeful Auto commercials that have been worming into my dreams." Wendy laughed. "I'm just waking up in the morning like, neeeed caaar."

"Oh yeah! Heh, funny coincidence, Melody says she had a dream like that too. Sometimes she gets these like, dreams about monsters watching her in bed? But one time, the monster was Bud Gleeful, whispering in her ear about a big car sale. She totally woke up laughing!"

"Ha! Annoying car commercials should be banned, man. Why do we need to be told multiple times a day to spend thousands of dollars?"

"You make a salient point."

They fell silent for a moment as Wendy read a couple more paragraphs. Then she said, "That, plus... I was talking to Goldie the other day."

Soos looked up from the t-shirt he'd been putting on a clothes hanger. "Oh. Yeah?"

"About where we wanna go when we get out of town."

"Huh." Very casually, Soos asked, "What did Goldie say?"

"He wants to go on some big vacation. Like a world cruise or something, I dunno."

"Huh." Soos wondered if that was true. He tried to imagine Bill Cipher as a tourist. Floating triangle in a Hawaiian shirt with a camera hanging from a strap and a fanny pack. What kind of places would he even visit? Soos bet he wanted to visit the pyramids. Heh. (Was that stereotyping? Maybe that was stereotyping.)

"And I told him I'm moving to Portland for college."

"Oh, hey, I didn't know you were thinking about college."

"I... actually, never told anybody else before," Wendy said. "I've been thinking about it for years, but part of me felt like it's just a fantasy? But Goldie said when he got out of high school, he did the same thing—moved to another town, made a new group of friends, all that. And... I don't know, actually talking to him out loud about it just... made it feel real, you know? So I thought, if I'm gonna move to Portland, I should probably start planning for it. Starting with how I'm getting there." She held up the driving manual.

Soos nodded slowly. "Huh. Yeah. That's a pretty mature way to look at it."

And that was what Bill was talking to Wendy about on the roof? Just... listening to a teen vent and helping her figure out her future?

And so, Soos took the security tape off his desk and put it in a drawer.

####

A few days later, Soos had heard the downstairs bathroom sink running for several minutes, assumed someone had forgotten to turn it off, and went to turn it off himself—and had caught Bill, in the dark, half undressed, washing himself in the sink.

After Soos had backed out and profusely apologized, he'd asked, "But—how come you're washing in the sink? I can let you in the upstairs bathroom if you need—"

"Worry about your own grooming habits and leave mine alone," Bill snapped. "As long as I don't smell, what do you humans care how I do it. Soap is soap and water is water."

It took Soos several days to realize he didn't think Bill had had a shower since he got locked in the bathroom. And nobody had noticed, because Bill made sure nobody noticed, because he'd been keeping himself clean in the bathroom he couldn't get locked in.

####

Dipper would go all summer without showering if he could get away with it; Stan showered like once a week and had constant old man smell; Abuelita also showered weekly and had a more refined old lady smell; Soos didn't know when Ford showered, but he'd never caught him doing it and Ford always smelled weirdly like burned hair. Soos showered almost daily during tourist season—that Mr. Mystery suit was hot—but outside that might go three days at a time. Mabel showered near daily.

From what Soos had observed, Bill was showering like, at least twice a week. He didn't know how often Bill cleaned himself in the sink in between.

That meant he was showering more often than two-thirds of the house.

Yet he was the only one in the house living under the threat of being thrown in the tub at 3 a.m. if someone decided he hadn't bathed enough for their tastes.

The reason Bill had refused to shower during his first week of imprisonment was so he could use the condition of his body as a bargaining chip—with no physical possessions in the world, his own body was the only bargaining chip he had—to try to buy a little more dignity. In return, his captors had taken more dignity away. They permitted Bill less autonomy over how to take care of his body than the household's children had.

Dipper had never gotten forced into a bathroom he couldn't let himself out of.

####

The day after the eclipse, Ford had pulled Soos aside and said quietly, "Soos, as soon as you have some time—could you repair the door to the kids' room? Before the end of the day? The latch has been broken since the tooth fairy's attack."

"Uh, sure, I can probably do that," Soos said. "How come?" The latch had been broken for a couple weeks, and the Pines hadn't been worried about it before.

"Right now, the door can swing freely with just a push," Ford said. "I think Bill's figured out how to use that to get in. Which is worrisome, since he shouldn't be able to use any doors..."

"O-oh." Soos thought about the swinging door into the gift shop. "Yeah, uh... sounds bad. Byyy the way—how'd you figure out he knows how to use the door?"

"Dipper says Bill somehow got in and out of the room last night," Ford said. "Mabel fell asleep in the living room and Bill carried her upstairs. I really don't like the thought of Bill being able to get his hands on the kids while they're asleep and defenseless."

Ford was mad at Bill for tucking a kid into bed? That was the big red flag? "No problem! I'll fix the door right after work."

The next time Soos visited his office, he took the security tape out of his drawer, rewound it, stuck it back into the tape recorder, and let that day's security camera footage overwrite and erase the evidence of Bill's visit to the gift shop.

####

And now, today, carrying Journal 4 in both hands, Soos trudged downstairs, trying to figure out what to do with it. He had to return it to Ford, obviously—but Bill and the Stans were already in the middle of a discussion that sounded a lot more like an argument. Flinging a stolen journal into the middle of the proceedings would just make it worse. Maybe he should wait until they were finished and everyone had cooled down a little—?

While Soos was upstairs, the discussion had apparently moved into the kitchen. He hovered awkwardly at the bottom of the stairs, watching.

"What do you mean, you need kitchen access," Stan was asking, "you already have kitchen access. It's never been off-limits! Even after you peed in the sink!"

"It's not kitchen access if I need to ask someone else for permission to eat anything but snacks."

"No one's making you ask for permission! You can take what you want!"

"Okay, fine. So what can I eat?" Bill gestures at the shelves. "Go on. List anything you can think of. Anything."

Stan grimaced, and glanced at Ford to see if he was willing to walk into the obvious trap first.

Ford looked at the nearby shelves. "Cereal."

"One point for Stanford Pines! Cereal! So am I supposed to eat dry cereal for every single meal, or—?"

"No, of course not."

"All right, then what else?"

"Brown meat," Stan said. "We've got plenty of brown meat. It's good for you!"

"You didn't give me can opener rights," Bill said.

"Huh."

"So no brown meat," Bill said. "No canned soup, no canned chili, no canned fruit, no canned vegetables—"

Ford cut in, "Some of the cans have pull tabs, you don't need a can opener for those."

"Terrific observation! As soon as you realized I could open those cans myself, you moved them all under the counter because you thought I'd use the sharp edges as weapons!"

"It's... possible to open cans without a can opener, I did it sometimes while roughing it in other dimensions—"

"Yeah, wearing off the metal rim with a rock, right? Lemme just go outside and grab a rock—oh wait." Bill crossed his arms.

Ford sighed, and turned to Stan to suggest something else.

Stan surveyed the available supplies, spotted the bread, and said, "You could make sandwiches!"

"With what filling?"

"Uh..." Stan kept looking.

Meats and cheeses, of course, were kept in the fridge. Along with jelly, condiments, most vegetables... tuna or spam weren't options, they were canned... "Hey, we leave out some meats that don't need refrigeration. Sausages and stuff."

"Right, right. The ones that don't need refrigeration because they're wrapped in plastic you need a knife to cut," Bill said. "Sometimes I bite the plastic open with my teeth and rip off chunks of sausage with my fingernails, that's always fun! Then you put the leftovers in the fridge, and I'm out of luck until we buy another sausage."

"You could put... peanut butter on your sandwiches?" Ford tried. "Peanut butter's nutritious."

Bill fixed him with a hard look. "For the past five weeks, every time I've gotten a meal without asking someone else to help feed me like a baby, I've had nothing but peanut butter and banana sandwiches, peanut butter and jerky sandwiches, peanut butter and raisin sandwiches, and peanut butter and potato chip sandwiches. And we're out of bananas, jerky, and raisins." He pointed at the tortillas. "Once I decided to get creative and made myself a cold peanut butter quesadilla! I can't even add spices, because guess where the breakable glass spice jars are kept?"

"Pasta," Ford tried. "We could keep the pasta out."

"Oh, wow, that'd be great! I just love pasta! But I can't open the microwave and I can't turn on the stove! How do I heat the water, Stanford?"

Ford frowned. "Hm."

"I can cook, you know—not that any of you bothered to ask! It might not suit your tastes, but it suits mine! I wouldn't need your help to eat if you didn't make me need help! I am sick to death—" his voice went thick and took on an uncharacteristic waver, "—of having to beg to... eat." He cleared his throat, squeezed his eyes shut, and rubbed his eyelids with one hand. "Sh-shouldn't even—need to eat." He clenched his jaw to keep it from trembling.

Stan and Ford exchanged a guilty look. Stan said, "You don't have to beg— I mean, we know the, uh... position you're in..."

Bill was silent for a moment as he tried to get a tough face back on. His voice came out as a rough whisper—too thick to get any louder without breaking. "I had to negotiate to get burnt eggs."

Ford winced.

Soos was dumbfounded.

When had Bill had to negotiate for food? He could all too easily understand how it might have happened—Bill was an annoying guy, sometimes they had to pull out dumb bargains to get him to do stuff. But bargaining for food should never be on that list. Meeting Bill's basic nutritional needs couldn't be dependent on whether he was annoying that day. If it was, he'd starve.

It sounded like he was starving. Right under Soos's roof. He hadn't even noticed.

He thought about the piles of junk food trash upstairs and the bag of chips Bill had hurled across the room.

Ford said, "We'll... discuss it."

"We'll figure something out," Stan said. "I mean it."

Bill nodded silently. Head down, without uncovering his eyes, he hurried out of the kitchen and toward the stairs.

He nearly bumped into Soos's chest without noticing him. Soos backed up a step, tucking Journal 4 under his arm. "Whoa, hey!"

Bill froze, head jerking up. "You." His voice was thick and his glare was watery and poisonous. "Don't you have anything better to do than eavesdrop?" He tried to elbow past Soos, smacking his leg with his umbrella. "Move."

Soos realized uneasily that Bill's face looked a little slimmer than it had when he'd arrived.

He stepped in Bill's way. "Can't go upstairs right now. Attic's being cleaned."

"I didn't ask you to clean!"

"I'm not cleaning for you, dawg. It's just gotta be cleaned."

"Fine! Whatever!" Bill veered around the staircase and stomped down the hall, muttering, "Can't decide when I eat, can't decide when I shower, why should I get to choose when my hovel's swept..."

Soos's leg hurt where Bill had smacked it. (Bill couldn't even control whether or not he cried; all he had control over was making someone else hurt.)

In the kitchen, Stan murmured, "Didn't even realize we don't keep anything decent out on the counters. They're so crowded..."

"Chip bags take up a lot of space." Ford sighed. "I assumed he'd get a serving with everyone else whenever Mrs. Ramirez cooks."

"He does, but she only does dinners. And he'll only eat it if he watched her cook it. I've seen him get lunch with Mabel, but I don't know what he does when she's not..." Stan spotted Soos on the stairs. He tiredly called, "Soos? You need something?"

"Uhhh..." Soos hid the journal behind his back. "Nope! I just thought I'd come downstairs! For no reason." He awkwardly walked up the stairs backwards, journal still tucked behind him. "And—and now I'm going up again." He stopped at the landing and scooted sideways up the next flight of stairs. "See ya."

He pressed the journal to his chest and returned to the attic.

####

When Soos and Abuelita moved into the shack, the first thing Soos had done was turn Ford's ground-floor study into a bedroom for Abuelita. Because she was a little old lady, and not quite as steady as she used to be, so Soos didn't want her constantly going up and down the stairs—because falling once, just ONCE, could send her to the hospital or worse. That was how serious it was! You don't mess around with that!

Bill tripped and fell on the stairs so often that they could use it to tell when he was awake. And nobody had thought to offer him a cane? Did anybody even ask if he was alright?

When Bill first arrived and tried to murder everyone, naturally, he came out of it pretty banged up and bruised. That was to be expected. It was self-defense. They'd gotten used to seeing Bill with scrapes on his arms and legs, rope burns around his ankles, and the angry purple-black bruises of chain links over his arms. But in all the weeks since then, Soos hadn't seen Bill bruise-free once. Bruises on his shins and arms, scrapes on his elbows and knees. Soos had seen him with a four-inch burn on his forearm. Bill had brushed it off.

In Bill's first few days in the shack, he'd resorted to peeing in the kitchen sink because nobody had bothered to give a guy who couldn't open doors a way to use the bathroom. And they were the reason he couldn't open doors in the first place!

He threw up in the living room in the middle of the night and went upstairs to sleep on couch cushions on the floor and nobody had talked about it.

He burned off all his hair and was so upset about it that he stole Soos's zodiac blanket and hid under it for half a week, and everyone but Mabel just ignored him.

In less than a month in the Mystery Shack, Bill had lost a tooth.

He had been dragged out of the house during a weird weather phenomenon while terrified out of his mind. Soos had seen Bill cowering on the ground in fear, Ford looming over him, grabbing him by the collar and snarling in rage. Bill had been pleading with everyone in hearing range not to make him go, and had come back in such a state of shock he could hardly walk.

And yet, he'd protected the whole town from getting hurt in zero gravity—and he'd brought a pet for Soos.

They'd tried to execute Bill two days later.

####

Soos sat in the window seat, flipping through the remaining filled-in pages in Journal 4. The last few pages were packed with stickers. A cat that said PURRFECT! A smiling fish that said A REEL PAL! Bill had started a little collection of pizza slice stickers for some reason. A couple of holographic rainbows, a smiling scratch-and-sniff sun. (Apparently, the sun smelled like lemons and oranges. Astronomy facts!)

Soos reached the current page. Bill was using several pieces of paper—regular printer paper and notebook paper, folded in half—like a bookmark. Soos unfolded them. A list of animals ranked by fuzziness. (Soos was satisfied that he'd been placed under the "smooth and squishy" category, but wondered whether he should be bothered by the fact that he shared the category with pigs and slugs.) A drawing of Bill riding a looping rocket ship and waving a fishbowl helmet above him. A drawing of a blue house with a couple of kids and a pig in the window. Several drawings of shape people kinda like Bill: a pink heart person labeled "Me in Flatworld," a stern-looking red stop sign wearing sunglasses labeled "Bill's parole officer," Bill dancing, the pink heart protecting Bill from some villainous-looking shapes—all clearly Mabel's art.

Several notebook pages in someone else's handwriting detailing names, addresses, and contact information, with statements Soos couldn't make sense of—as if maybe someone had been asking somebody else questions and writing down their answers. He thought the questions might be about how some people had reacted to the end of Weirdmageddon. He got the impression the people being discussed had known that Weirdmageddon was coming. He got the impression they were disappointed it hadn't happened. There were several questions at the end: How will we rendes-vouz? (Whoever was writing didn't know how to spell rendezvous, but to be fair Soos wasn't 100% sure either.) What supplies do you need? What are your interim orders?

Soos stared at the notebook papers.

He flipped back through the journal again, looking at each page more closely.

Sometimes the two-tone dot-and-dash segments had a stray human word: a few characters he recognized from his Teach Yourself Japanese workbooks, sometimes words Soos thought might be Arabic but honestly he didn't have a clue. At one point he listed half a dozen human names that Soos didn't recognize. The most common character was a stretched-out letter M (Mabel?), followed by a 6 knocked on its side (Sixer?).

The dot-and-dash segments had occasional amateurish illustrations. Sometimes they were human stick figures; sometimes the stick figures' heads had symbols off of Bill's zodiac wheel. He saw Stan's fish symbol, Gideon's star symbol, and Mabel's shooting star symbol. Ford's stick figures were the only ones with hands; Bill consistently gave them six fingers. The doodles were like particularly esoteric cave drawings; they were so bad that Soos couldn't tell what most of them were supposed to illustrate.

Except for one featuring Bill (as a triangle) and Mabel and some other inscrutable figures in a really awesome car with flames on the side, its coolness limited only by the fact that it was all in gray and yellow-green crayon. When Soos had been in high school, there had always been a couple of kids who didn't know how to draw anything except expensive cars or name-brand sports shoes, but they drew them in extreme realistic detail. Apparently, Bill was that kind of artist. Nothing but stick figures and the sickest crayon car Soos had ever seen.

It didn't do anything to dispel Soos's impression of Bill as a lost alien 18-year-old.

On one page, in sloppy lines of handwriting that meandered drunkenly up and down the paper, Bill had written, "I don't get why you won't give me a second shot. I asked you to join my gang. I serenaded you in a pyramid. I got a fantastic makeover. I offered you godhood. I showed you my dimension. I didn't torture you until I had to. I even made you a skin couch! I know how much you've always wanted a leather furniture set! I've given you everything from chicken zombification magic to jelly beans, what does it take? What am I missing?"

Soos reread Bill's other messages to Ford. All that "you'll regret not siding with me" junk wasn't threats. It was the impotent rage of a socially inept teenager who didn't understand his own creepiness had driven his friends away. It was the whiny moan of some guy going "Why doesn't she like me anymore" about an ex-girlfriend who had told him five times she didn't like him anymore because he didn't listen to her. Like that guy Wendy dated last summer. So like, a jerk, but not a terrifying world-ending monster jerk, just an annoying creep jerk. A regular jerk. A human jerk.

Soos stood, gave one last look at this journal—clearly stolen, definitely a violation of Bill's "no writing materials" restriction, completely stuffed full of mysterious messages to outsiders and some kind of weird alien code that could say anything at all and might have been super dangerous—and he slid it back into the ripped seam in the attic seat cushion where he'd found it.

He finished vacuuming up the potato chips Bill had flung across the room, thinking about how offended Bill had been that Soos had given him any food except what he'd asked for, remembering what Abuelita had said about people who destroy the things around them when they feel like that's the last and only thing they still have power over.

Enough was enough.

####

(Hope y'all enjoyed! Next week we may interrupt our regularly-scheduled programming to post a TBOB-based chapter I'm inserting early into the fic—it depends on if I get it done by next Friday. In the meantime, I'm looking forward to hearing y'all's thoughts on this chapter!)

#bill cipher #human bill cipher #soos ramirez #gravity falls #gravity falls fic #gravity falls fanart #fanart #my art #my writing #bill goldilocks cipher #(Dec 12 edit: chapter has been renumbered)

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wolfheadghost · 1 year ago

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Little destresser drawing, finally got around to trying to 112% my save again lol

#ghostly scribbles #hollow knight #hk hornet #hk ghost #still suck at the game lol #my fixation has definitely gone away now but i still draw these funny little guys dont worry <3

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becertainlust · 2 months ago

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Lingeriemaker! Suguru who is whispered about with the kind of reverence usually reserved for legends—think Galliano meets Alexander McQueen, but darker, smoother, and infinitely more elusive.

He didn’t go to fashion school. He didn’t intern under anyone. He emerged out of nowhere—an underground gem of a debut show held in an abandoned cathedral in Florence. Ten looks. Ten models. Candlelit. Every piece hand-stitched, laced with real silver thread and monograms only visible under moonlight. People thought it was a myth until Vogue Italia dropped an exclusive feature titled:

“The Lingerie Saint Has Arrived.”

Lingeriemaker! Suguru who is more than a designer — he is an artist of intimacy, a storyteller through silk, lace, and silhouette. With every piece he creates, Suguru weaves emotion into fabric, tailoring not just to bodies, but to souls. He believes that beauty speaks many languages — and his mission is to make women feel beautiful in all of them.

From Tokyo to Paris, Lagos to São Paulo, his creations have turned runways into temples of self-love. Each design is a love letter to femininity — powerful, soft, wild, sacred. His talent quickly caught the attention of the world, landing him on magazine covers, international talk shows, and fashion panels. But despite his meteoric rise, it’s his humility and warmth that continue to captivate everyone he meets.

Lingeriemaker! Suguru who is so deep in the art medium pulling ethereal designs that catches many off guard and cause him to rise above the rest and whose inbox is flooded with an offers to take the creative directors seat by various fashion brands. He has a right to become picky but in the end decides to establish his own name.

Lingeriemaker! Suguru who attends events after event, never growing tired of meeting new faces and hearing fresh ideas and conversing with new people. Quite the extrovert in the midst of his interests. God forbid he's actually excited 'You're really a conversative person Mr. Suguru' the interviewer giggled and he would have the prettiest smile that the viewers would gush much about across the media #suguru'ssmile trending for an entire month.

Lingeremaker! Suguru who when he sees you—you, gliding effortlessly through the chaos of the room, framed by golden light—who stops dead in his sentence brows knitting in frustration, hushing up the white haired model, that never seems to learn the word silence at crucial times Gojo screws his face up as Suguru claims he can't see you properly as he yapped on. 'who is that'

With a raised brow he pushes his hand away from his line of vision, 'Marketing agent, one of the best in the fashion world' he would whip his head back to Gojo in disbelief 'not a model?' Gojo would scoff throwing his hand around the male 'what you like what you see, I can set you up"

Lingeriemaker! Suguru who rejected Gojo's help, downplaying his interest in you on the spot. But he should have known better than leave his personal sketches and scribbles around his studio unguarded mentally punching himself for not storing latest works higher and further from his lanky ass.

Lingeriemaker! Suguru who later that night, long after the champagne glasses clinked and cameras dimmed, he’d find himself at his sketch table again, candles flickering, Gold thread unraveling beside him. Your silhouette haunts him. Not in a ghostly way—but in the kind of way muses do.

Pages fill. The collection changes. The theme shifts from “Divinity” to “She Who Walks Like Daybreak.”

When asked on a French morning show what inspired the shift, Suguru simply says: “I saw someone who reminded me that beauty doesn't beg to be seen—it just arrives, and the world rearranges around it.”

Lingeriemaker! Suguru who receives a message for Gojo late at night as he is sorting his pallet for the collection, 'i told you I got your back' which Suguru responds with a question mark before concluding that he was weird for the gazillion time shaking his head then turned his attention back to his computer screen, the soft light lit hitting his face.

Lingeriemaker! Suguru who the next morning would be woken up by his blaring door bell throughout the condo and when he switches on his camera and see's your face his eyes, done pops out of his head. 'what the fuck'

thinking of making this a fully fleshed fanfic series with smut on both ao3 and here.

#jujutsu kaisen #jjk x reader #jjk smut #becertainlust #jjk fanart #jujustu kaisen #geto suguru #getou suguru x reader #jujutsu kaisen suguru #suguru smut #jjk x you #jjk x y/n #jjk suguru #suguru getou x reader

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festerjesterr · 2 months ago

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i can actually draw the movie versions now its over for you bitches

#believe it or not i actually have lore/a general lil story in mind for this au im working on #and it actually rides on whether i can draw the movie versions #bc while i have my own personal designs for them these are still important #i could kill yall for getting me re-fixated on this again /silly/pos #casper has always been a source of comfort for me since i was a kid and still had the vhs for it #so its really helping me through a lot right now #bug scribbles #my art #casper 1995 #casper the friendly ghost #casper mcfadden #stretch mcfadden #stinkie mcfadden #fatso mcfadden #the ghostly trio

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bananarrlele · 5 months ago

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"A Study in Affection"

plot: “mr. silvair attempts to unravel the complexities of human affection for his human partner. struggling to understand love, he embarks on a series of clumsy, awkward, and sometimes failed attempts to bridge the gap between his scientific nature and the intimacy his partner craves." established relationship, living in the otherworld, couple issues, unrequited love, slow burn, emotional angst, introspection, miscommunication/language barriers, unconventional romance, dark athmosphere, suggestive, but no actual sex (no smut). everything written in bold refers to the otherworld language. word count: 5k+.

The cold little room that served as Mr. Silvair's laboratory could easily be described as grotesque. The environment seemed more like an extension of his cold and methodical mind than a space dedicated to medical practice. The stained tiles on the walls, once bright, reflected the pale light from the slightly flickering overhead lamps. Chains hanging from the ceiling adorned the room's edges, standing out as silvered, rusted threats. Moreover, the ceiling resembled a web of deteriorated pipes and conspicuous marks of grime, far from ignorable to the eyes.

In the central part of the room stood a metal table, marred by scars: cuts, scratches, and stains whose origins were better left unquestioned. On that table, the instruments of the monstrous doctor reigned supreme: scalpels, too sharp like ruthless razors, tweezers and hooks in unusual shapes, and syringes ranging in size from practical to utterly questionable. The jars and flasks on his shelves were disparate in coloration and aspect. Some were nearly translucent and strangely pleasing to the eye, while others were as dark as the pitch-black of a cursed night. Some housed creatures, or fragments of them, floating in viscous liquids that emitted a ghostly glow. Moreover, faded and aged papers lay scattered across the laboratory bench, like petals fallen from a withered flower. Their yellowed, fragile edges seemed on the verge of disintegration at the slightest touch, yet the hurried scribbles in black ink remained clear, implacable in their precision. Mr. Silvair’s handwriting was fine, almost ethereal, but hasty, as though every thought had to be recorded before it vanished into the chaos of his analytical mind. Anatomical diagrams, sketches of strange tools, and the flow of liquids in organic systems followed one another, interspersed, suggesting the persistence of carefully laid plans for convoluted practices and experiments.

These convoluted experiments were far beyond your comprehension. They had always been so, and would always remain, no matter how distressed a human heart might feel. Cold, sterile, devoid of sentiment, and strangely fascinating in its functionality. The space was an exquisite portrait of his mind and his nature, so distressing in certain lights yet profoundly intriguing. Undeniably, loving him was a painful dichotomy. The brutal precision of his mind was as admirable as it was overwhelming. How many times had you admired him, standing with his back turned, his long pale hair flowing gently like veils across his back, moving majestically as he traversed the space, immersed in his experiments? His slender, weathered hands, at times healing, at others injurious, were the object of your desire, evoking an incessant yearning that transfixed your chest. Whether watching the doctor dismember pieces of a low-sentience monster or performing sutures with an almost frightening calm, sewing living tissues and intertwining remnants of life as if it were an art, there was something about him that left you in a state of near avidity. He was there, within arm’s reach, yet he seemed so distant. His touch seemed cold and nonexistent, like trying to grasp mist. His presence was a contradiction — solid and unyielding, yet intangible, as if he occupied a space you could never truly enter.

You often wondered whether he noticed the painful chasm between you, a gap carved not out of cruelty but by his very nature. The way his sharp, attentive gaze slid over you as if examining one of his experiments was a lasting reminder of his habitual coldness. Yet still, in fleeting moments like the beat of a heart, there were times when he lingered just long enough for your senses to string together his gestures as fragments of a demonstration of his love.

But Mr. Silvair did not understand the meaning of love. Perhaps love was one of the most meager concepts capable of transcending the doctor's capacity for comprehension. He could not grasp it and would likely never manage to assimilate its ephemeral and unfathomable nature, being so obsessed with cataloging results and his own experiments.

A weary and restless sigh escapes your lips. "Such selfishness of mine. To demand that a ghost like him understand the complexity of love and the relevance of physical touch to human beings. I should be content with the fact that he likes me enough to keep me around — and I wouldn’t trade that for anything in the world." That’s what you thought, your lips twisting in consternation, as you watched him meticulously suture a cut on Mr. Chopped's brow, his precise, impassive hands closing the wound without the slightest tremor.

But deep down, you yearned. You yearned for his touch, for even a single word, something to escape that clinical silence and confess that he loved you. Something to prove that he liked you, not as a domesticated experiment or a laboratory pet, but as someone real, someone who mattered.

The sigh does not go unnoticed by the doctor. His fingers, stained with dark remnants, finish the suture with an almost inhuman precision before resting Mr. Chopped on the cold examination table. The monster, inert and stitched, seems as insignificant as any of his other experiments.

Silvair straightens slowly, the subtle sound of his movements filling the sterile silence of the room. When he turns to face you, his scrutiny is calculated, as if analyzing an anomaly in a body. But this time, there’s hesitation. A minor, almost imperceptible detail suggests that he notices.

“Something wrong.”

He murmurs in his flat voice, devoid of any exceptional emotion. A simple statement, almost scientific, as if identifying a fracture or an irregular heartbeat in some random creature. Yet, for some reason, the way he says it makes your throat tighten.

It was so typical of him: noticing that something was out of place, but never understanding what it was or why.

Then, without warning, he somberly turns on his heels and picks up Mr. Chopped with indifferent ease. The sound of his footsteps echoes briefly before being lost in the silence, leaving you alone in the cold laboratory, enveloped in your own thoughts.

When he returns minutes later, the absence of the bubbly head in his arms only makes the focus of his attention more evident. Silvair stands still in a particular spot in the room, slender and upright like a somber tower of an abandoned abbey, with his hands clasped behind his back in an almost theatrical gesture, and his gaze fixed unmistakably on you, so much so that you feel your own skin burn in anticipation. His posture was clearly inquisitive, as if seeking invisible cracks he might examine and decipher.

But the uncertainties of your heart were superficial and easy to find. It was as though your chest refused to be secretive, or perhaps it was your human nature that contributed to that piercing sensation, like an unending hammer, which made you so vulnerable in relation to the doctor.

“You not well.”

He attempts to approach, his slender, angular silhouette stepping into the dim light illuminating the room.

“Something bother you.”

“Something change.”

He furrows his brow minimally. His expression remains essentially unchanged and impenetrable, but there is a shadow of discomfort there, as if being confronted with a situation beyond his control was something inexorable, distressing to him.

You don’t respond, your throat caught in a strange combination of fear and hope. The desire for him to approach and truly see you, as someone real and complex, almost hurts.

“You different. Me want know.”

The statement sounds like a challenge. An awkward silence then persists for a few seconds, long enough for him to tilt his head slightly. That was a gesture that often accompanies moments of genuine curiosity.

You try to find the right words, but the truth is you don’t know how to tell him that you want something more, something beyond the platonic and scientific care he offers. Furthermore, the language of monsters was insufficient to express what you truly felt and yearned to release. Although Silvair had learned multiple words of your natural language almost flawlessly, it was as if the vocabulary in both expressions was lacking to convey all your frustrations. You take a risk, anyway, the words spilling out like an unrestrained, dragging outpour, alternating between the two languages.

“I just wanted…” — You begin, but feel an unbearable knot in your throat, like tight vines. Silvair remains waiting for your voice, curious to dissect the cause of such profound anguish.

After a long moment, you finally let out, almost like an exasperated sigh:

“I just wanted your touch. I want your care, not just for stitching wounds or manipulating medicine. I don’t just want to be near you. Me want touch. Me want feel loved.”

The impact of the words falls like a hammer between you. Silvair recoils, a fleeting shock passing over his usually relaxed features, as if carved in marble and immortal in their imperturbable beauty. He had never heard anything like this before. For him, touching someone was merely a means to an end — a technical necessity for healing wounds or maintaining control over a specimen. Never to express anything more.

“Me confused. Me not understand love.”

His confession is almost inaudible, as if he were finally admitting his inability to understand anything beyond the boundaries of the rational.

You shrug, trying not to show how painful it is to hear those words from his mouth, even though he didn’t say them with the intent to hurt.

“I know. That’s why it hurts.” — You whisper to yourself, drawing in your lower lip in consternation in a futile attempt to maintain your composure, while those treacherous blue shards escape your eyes like tiny fragments of crystal falling from a cracked stained glass. At that moment, the fissure in your chest, opened by Silvair’s words, felt deeper than the crack slicing through one of the aged laboratory walls, where so many strange things found their way.

The doctor’s gaze drop to the ground for a moment, as if he were genuinely trying to understand, but failing. He seems lost, his hands restless before his body, and you feel a wave of compassion and frustration mixed together. He would never be able to fully understand, but that didn’t mean you couldn’t wish for something more from him.

Then, as if an internal switch had been flipped, Silvair withdraws, the sound of his heavy steps echoing through the room. The door creaks as it closes behind him, leaving you alone with your thoughts and an unexpected emptiness. For a moment, you feel a deep sadness, as if he had taken a part of you with him — something you had never known you expected to receive from someone like Silvair.

The rest of the day was irredeemably dull and dragged on. You sat on the sofa in the small antechamber outside Mr. Silvair's medical inspection laboratory, absentmindedly fiddling with a Rubik's cube that Mr. Masque had given to Mr. Crawling, the latter having generously offered the artifact to you, the one he affectionately called his "favorite human." But nothing could lift your sullen mood.

You turned the cube between your fingers, rotating its colorful faces without focus, as if it were a meaningless distraction. Your mind wandered between the pain of your conversation with Silvair and the endless hours during which he vanished into the vast, gloomy corridors and pathways of the ghosts' apartment. Where might he be now, with his measured steps, the smell of formalin clinging to him, and the crimson metallic richness of blood lingering on his skin, his long locks streaked with dried, vital fluid? His scent, mannerisms, and even his voice were like precious gems in your memory — existent but not within your grasp. It was disturbing how he seemed to occupy every inch, every corner of your mind.

You tried to imagine: had he completely ignored your complaints, shrugged them off, and returned to his pragmatic experiments elsewhere? Was he perhaps even more focused than usual, desperately trying to understand what love truly meant? Or was he simply sitting, lost in some thought you couldn’t conceive?

Your gaze swept across the room, now empty and shadowy, lingering on the shelves filled with jars, scalpels, and preserved specimens. Each one seemed to carry a story, a small piece of the enigma that Silvair was. At the same time, however, the ache in your chest only grew. You had never met anyone like him — so complex, yet so incomprehensible. Silvair was the embodiment of mystery, a cold enigma you longed to unravel but always seemed just out of your understanding.

You sighed, clutching the Rubik's cube in your hands more tightly until the colors began to blur. And once again, you asked yourself: What was he doing now?

While you were engulfed in creeping melancholy for hours and hours, in another dim and desolate room, its walls as cold as a stone embrace, Mr. Silvair idly sifted through a pile of abandoned objects. It was a tolerated habit for the doctor, even though he considered most of these items irrelevant. Among organic samples and scribbled notes, he stumbled upon something unusual: a worn magazine cover with vibrant colors and an eye-catching illustration of two humans in what he vaguely recognized as a kiss.

He approached it, his pale, elongated hands reaching for the booklet with a mix of curiosity and reluctance. It was obvious who had left it there — Mr. Gap. The fissure monster was a sporadic but unforgettable presence. Gap had a habit of appearing with all sorts of items: newspaper fragments, festival pamphlets from non-existent events, and now, a human magazine titled The Secrets of Passion.

There was a small note scrawled in the corner of the cover in messy handwriting, as if Gap had struggled considerably to hold the pen:

“Kiss seems to say heart. I want heart. Give me heart. Kiss like.”

Silvair read Gap's words in silence. The figure of the fissure monster, who would occasionally appear with clippings and fragments of newspapers on the most varied subjects — ranging from trivialities like cookie recipes to stories of a serial killer wreaking havoc — was now immortalized in a curious observation about kisses and human desire. Silvair frowned. What was a kiss, after all, to someone like Mr. Gap? What did the other monster know that he didn’t? Silvair knew his studies had not prepared him for such a question. He had studied anatomy, human behavior on a physical level, hormonal responses, everything that could be analyzed and understood. But love?

He closed the magazine, his rigid hands gripping the cover tightly, trying to make sense of what was stirring inside him. Something moved within his being. Mr. Gap had once again managed to plant a seed of discomfort — or curiosity — in the doctor’s essence. For a moment, he found himself wondering if he could learn the art of kissing, or at least understand why humans seemed to find this gesture so important. And more than that: if the kiss was the key, could it be the gateway to love?

Suddenly, with a faint, restless twist of his lips, Silvair shut the magazine, holding the piece of paper in his hands as though it were a precious object of study. Deep down, he felt that something was about to change. Drastically.

Silvair had isolated himself in recent days, immersing himself in meticulous studies and attempts to understand human gestures of affection. He spent hours poring over those magazines and fragments brought by Mr. Gap, consumed by an unrelenting search for something beyond the physical, something that could truly touch the complexity of love and human relationships.

The magazine he had found held much more than scientific explanations about kisses and touches. As he delved into its pages, something else captivated him: the images. There, on the yellowed paper, he found photographs and illustrations of couples in moments of such intense affection that they seemed to transcend simple physical contact. Bodies intertwined in a way that felt almost mystical, as though they were on the verge of merging into a single entity. It was more than just a kiss, more than a loving embrace. It was an intimacy so profound, so visceral, that he could hardly comprehend it.

The images left him stunned. He observed them, analyzed every detail, every touch, every curve of skin and movement, but he could not grasp the reason behind that energy. He stared at the figures repeatedly, as if trying to decode them.

"Strong contact. Not medicine explain. Me not understand..." he muttered, running his pale fingers through his light hair, visibly frustrated.

Dr. Silvair’s Attempts

PROCEDURE I: “The Mannequin”

The mannequin stood before him, its cold and rigid structure serving as a substitute for human flesh. His sharp gaze scanned every detail of the object, with his fingers firmly positioned to replicate the gestures described in the magazine. His lips slowly approached the mannequin’s face. He pressed them gently against the plastic surface, attempting to emulate the act of a kiss. There was no warmth, no response. The chill of the plastic was a stark reminder of the distance he still had to traverse.

Observations: "Objective: Simulate a kiss on a non-living object to observe physical responses. Result: No emotional reaction observed. Conclusion: As suspected, reciprocity seems to be a crucial factor in human interaction, something that cannot be reproduced without an active second party."

PROCEDURE II: “Self-Imitation”

After failing with the mannequin, Silvair decided to try a different approach: he would be his own test subject. Sitting in front of a mirror, he repeated the motions he had seen in the magazines. His lips touched his own with almost scientific precision. He observed every micro-expression in the mirror, analyzing his own eyes, the way his facial muscles reacted, trying to detect some emotional response in his body. But again, all he felt was the absence of something. The touch generated no internal reaction, no change.

Observations: "Objective: Attempt to experience the act of a kiss in a self-conscious context, observing facial and bodily reactions. Result: No observable changes in physical or emotional responses. Conclusion: The emotional response to the action is not triggered by the mere repetition of the act. The emotional factor appears crucial to eliciting a genuine reaction. Reactions cannot be replicated without a real connection."

PROCEDURE III: “The Monstrous Rose”

Inspired by the magazine’s mention of simple yet symbolic gestures of affection, Mr. Silvair recalled his collection of monstrous flowers — his own creation, with black petals and iridescent edges, exuding a sweet and peculiar aroma that was almost hypnotic. He believed that the symbolic gesture of offering a flower could elicit a stronger emotional reaction, as humans often associated gestures like this with affection.

When he finally entered the little room where you were, half-asleep on the sofa, he observed your figure curled up like a bird with battered wings. The Rubik's cube had already rolled to the floor, having slipped from your hands. When he approached, you looked up at him, surprised.

“Me offer gesture.” — He said, his voice tinged with an unusual softness, extending the flower to you.

You raised your eyes, somewhat startled, but accepted the flower. The fragility of the gesture made your heart leap slightly, and for a moment, the smile on your lips seemed genuine.

“Thank you, Silvair.” — You murmured in your native tongue, bringing the flower close to your face, inhaling its scent of burnt caramel and polished copper. — “Beautiful. But why you bring this to me?”

He watched your reaction carefully, registering every micro-expression. He stood poised and expectant, like someone awaiting immediate validation.

“Me test affection.”

You furrowed your brow slightly, nodding. “Of course, you test. Gestures like this need come from heart, not through testing, Silvair.” You spoke in a tone of gentle reprimand, your voice tinged with lingering frailty. He captured a considerable part of your message, his expression tightening slightly.

He blinked slowly, as though processing your words. “Heart… not functional in this context. Me try again.”

You sighed as he retreated, taking the flowers with him, which now seemed like a failed experiment.

Observations: “Positive reaction observed: increased heart rate, pupil dilation. Receptiveness to symbolic offering generates some level of emotional bond but is insufficient for deep or intimate engagement.

Additional Consideration: “The symbolic significance of a gift may generate an emotional response, but it does not equate to a deeper or more intimate interaction. The flower functioned as a marker of interest but not as a gesture of complete emotional surrender.”

After the episode with the monstrous flowers, the night dragged on in silence, filled with a quiet tension that lingered in the air. The laboratory was illuminated only by a soft light that fell over the notes scattered across the tables and the flasks containing mysterious substances. Silvair was engrossed in his thoughts, the tip of his pen furiously scratching paper, his focus fixed on his observations. You watched him while lounging carelessly in a chair, your legs hanging over its arms. You bit the tip of your thumb absentmindedly as something churned within you, responding to his dissociated behavior. The silence had become nearly unbearable, as had his repeated absences. If before it was agonizing to witness him steadfastly preserving his immutable exteriority, never attempting any kind of affection, seeing him obsessively conducting literal and absurd experiments to determine love and turn affection into a performative, perfectly calculated act was an even more tormenting experience. You felt excluded — and more than that, you felt an ever-growing need for something more between you two, something beyond studies, the clinic, and his cold behavior.

The suffocating silence between you was unbearable, and the impulse overcame reason. You approached him cautiously, positioning yourself behind him and wrapping your arms around his waist. Your fingers, hesitant at first, slid across his cold torso. Your touch was gentle, a silent invitation for something more intimate.

He finally stopped writing but did not move. His body remained rigid, motionless like a statue.

“Why so distant?” — You asked, pressing your face against his shoulder, seeking some sign of reciprocity.

“Me busy.” — He replied, his voice as cold as ever, but there was something else there — perhaps a note of uncertainty that didn’t escape your notice.

Your frustration grew heavier. You slid your hand lower, attempting to draw his attention, but he caught your wrist, halting any further progress. He wasn’t harsh, but his grip was firm enough to make it clear he didn’t want this.

“Not now.” — He said, releasing your hand and returning his focus to his notes.

You stepped back, hurt. The words were simple, but they carried a devastating impact. He didn’t lift his eyes to you, didn’t notice the gleam of tears threatening to escape as you walked away.

“Alright." — You murmured, your voice trembling. — “Sorry.”

When you left the room, the sound of the door closing echoed louder than it should have, as if sealing an abyss between you two.

Mr. Silvair remained still for a few moments after your departure, the pencil suspended in midair. His mind, normally so focused, seemed scattered.

“Intimacy…” — He murmured to himself, recalling the figures from Mr. Gap’s magazine he had examined days earlier. Images of intertwined hands, deep kisses, and bodies so close they seemed symbiotic. He remembered a note written in Gap’s erratic handwriting:

“Love strange. Bodies together, mind too. Sex? Kiss? Very strange. But good?”

Intimacy and sexuality echoed in his cloudy mind, interweaving uncomfortably. At the time, he had dismissed Gap’s erratic scrawlings as a disconnected ramble, but now, recalling your pained expression, something inside him began to shift.

“They try. Me fail?”

He shut the notebook forcefully, the sound reverberating through the empty room. For the first time in a long while, he felt something that could be described as regret.

A few days had passed since Silvair’s initial, frustrating attempts to comprehend the complexities of human nature. The tension between you had reached a silent breaking point, like a rope stretched beyond its limit. He spoke little, and you even less. But his silence always felt calculated, while yours was laden with emotions that could not be translated into words.

That morning, an unexpected accident occurred during what seemed like an innocent game with Mr. Machete — a friendly duel of blades and laughter, a competition of skill, escalated beyond what it should have. The playful match resulted in a deep cut on your left thigh, far more severe than anything reasonable for a mere game. Mr. Machete’s blade had slid more smoothly than anticipated, slicing through the skin and leaving a wound that stretched across a considerable portion of your leg.

Silvair acted quickly, faster than usual. He did not show panic, but his movements were swifter and more precise than normal. With you seated on the inspection table, he brought his tools and began cleaning the wound. Despite the pain, you noticed something different about him. His hands, which always moved with unwavering firmness and methodical precision, trembled slightly.

“You scare me.” — He murmured as he applied antiseptic, his eyes fixed on the wound as if avoiding your face. There was an irritation in his tone that you couldn’t quite define, a discomfort that spilled into his voice. — “You not should play like that.”

He sighed softly, the sound barely audible in his reprimand. “You stop this need. Not do again, not with them.” — He seemed to hesitate before adding. — “Not with machete man. Careful you must be. Should.”

“Don’t worry so much!” — You said, offering him a soft smile to ease his indignation. — “Me know you try care for me.”

“Not just about the cut.” — He murmured, more to himself than to you.

His fingers, in an involuntary movement, touched the edge of your thigh, the skin around the wound. The sensitivity of the area, paired with his gentle touch, made your body flinch slightly — but not from pain. It was his proximity, the way he seemed to feel the suffering you were enduring without truly knowing how to handle it.

Suddenly, Silvair’s hands moved up to your face, touching your cheeks with an unexpected delicacy. His fingers, cold and trembling, traced the lines of your face as if trying to understand every contour, every expression you offered, like an impossible equation to solve.

His closeness made your heart race in anticipation. His presence was intense, as though he were on the verge of doing something even he didn’t know how to accomplish. You felt the tension between you rise, charged with something ready to reveal itself, though neither of you knew how to act.

He hesitated, perhaps unsure, but his focus never wavered from you. Silvair seemed unable to withdraw, unable to let go of you, and this was unexpected. It was a fine line between desire and hesitation, between human impulse and his incapacity to comprehend it. When he finally leaned in closer, his face coming dangerously near yours, his touch against your skin seemed to dissolve the barriers between you.

The air was thick with hesitation, but without warning, he leaned in further, his lips brushing against yours softly, as though trying to understand something he still could not define. The kiss was uncertain, hesitant, reminiscent of the first time he had tried to mimic the gesture with the mannequin. Yet there was something profoundly human about it, something he, perhaps unknowingly, longed to grasp.

But this time, there was something more. A shiver ran down your spine as he deepened the kiss, his lips moving with increasing firmness, as if trying to unravel the mechanics of a gesture that had now become part of him. He explored the softness of your lips with the tip of his tongue, touching them with unusual gentleness, yet also with an impulse that spoke louder than words. Silvair tasted you, and something stirred within his chest, something he could neither name nor explain. He pulled you closer, his touch assertive, strong, commanding — yet his hands moved to cradle your face delicately, soothingly, as though he feared breaking you. One hand traveled further, gripping your waist firmly, as if to show you the depth of his desire, which he could barely comprehend himself.

The kiss grew more desperate, less measured, almost voracious, with the caresses reaching a peak of urgency. He felt your breath, ragged against his skin, quickened to match his, and with slow, deliberate movements, he lifted you effortlessly, placing you on the cold surface of his inspection table. His hands never left you, lingering near, almost possessive, as he leaned over you, his features focused and intense. His hand traveled over your skin with more confidence, touching places where he felt the vibration of your body beneath his fingers.

His tongue intertwined with yours, now bolder, yet retaining the same careful attention as if deciphering the meaning of every touch, every movement. His fingers glided smoothly, exploring the curves of your body with reverent silence but an intensity that grew, as though trying to absorb every fragment of warmth you emitted. He touched you with a tenderness that concealed a quiet hunger, as though it were his first time allowing himself to feel the warmth of affection, the discovery of care, and the growing desire for something deeper, something genuine.

As your lips parted momentarily, just long enough for him to catch his breath, Silvair kept his forehead pressed against yours, his manner captivated and almost possessive. His breath was heavy as he whispered, more to himself than to you:

“Fascinating...”

He lifted his gaze, the movement delicate, almost attentive, as if he were trying to decipher the rhythm of your breath, the scent of the air around you, every minute detail in his surroundings. The blindfold that covered his eyes was no impediment; on the contrary, it seemed to heighten his perception, creating a sharper sense of closeness, as if he could feel every beat of your heart, every soft sigh you let out. His hand slid to your waist, the touch firm yet purposeful, as though mapping your presence through the sensation of your skin.

With a slow but resolute motion, he tilted his face, planting a kiss along the line of your jaw, then down the curve of your neck, with the same curious care as before. Yet this time, there was something more deliberate in every touch.

“You make me curious. Me want… discover more.”

And without saying anything further, he leaned in again, his lips capturing yours once more, this time with an intensity that promised he was far from finished with his exploration. The promise of something more lingered in the air, carried in his touch, in the force of a desire he seemed to still be struggling to name — a desire he now seemed determined to unravel, piece by piece, like an enigma he was unwilling to abandon.

“Tell me, is this… what you wanted? What you have been waiting for?” — He asked quietly, brushing his thumb over your lips gently in an electrifying motion. “This human desire mean, yes?” — His voice, hoarse and intense, reverberated like a promise of a lost paradise, echoing in your ears as he struggled to murmur the words in your language.

You arched an eyebrow, letting out a soft, provocative laugh.

“If you have to ask, perhaps something is still missing from your research, doctor.” — Your voice was low and measured, careful to ensure he caught every meaning and syllable, but tinged with mischief, as your fingers slid to his neck, tracing short, almost electric touches. It was a gentle but daring gesture as you pulled him closer. — “Me demonstrate, yes?”

Silvair’s lips curled into a faint smile, despite being unable to see, as though he already knew exactly what you meant. He tightened his grip on your waist, his fingers firm but still containing an unexpected gentleness.

“Demonstrate?” — He repeated slowly, as if savoring the idea, his tone deeper now. — “Me think good. But you not expect me gentle all the time.”

Before you could respond, he acted. His hands, which had rested on your waist, slid to the middle of your back, pulling you against him with determination. His lips, previously hesitant, now gave themselves fully. With an almost cruel tenderness, he traced the outline of your mouth with his tongue, as if issuing a silent invitation. Each touch was a promise, a wordless request for entry. His fingers traced a slow, suggestive path along your thigh, gradually climbing toward the center of your body. Each touch, every subtle caress, sent shivers throughout your entire being, and you felt as though you might melt under his dissecting hands, arching gently like a flower unfurling in the sun on his inspection table.

Between kisses, you drew a deep breath, a faint whimper, and a slightly tense laugh escaping against his lips.

“Not bad for someone who’s learning. Fast learner.”

He paused, the laugh escaping his lips a small victory.

“Then, teach me.” The command was clear, but the accompanying promise was even more enticing. With a firm motion, he leaned you back, your body becoming an instrument in his hands. The intensity of the moment overwhelmed everything, and you realized, with a mix of surprise and satisfaction, that he had finally let himself go.

Thin, translucent tears of joy adorned the corners of your eyes, inevitably. In that moment, you finally understood that what he sought wasn’t merely understanding but surrender. And in that moment, you knew: he was learning how to love.

phew. this was laborious, but so much fun to write. giggling, kicking my feet, and twirling my hair for this man, no lie. it's really interesting to write for silvair, and I've been wanting to do so for weeks. he’s so complex, and his inscrutability and unusual gentleness are captivating. i’m sure these traits would leave anyone confused in a relationship. mr. silvair would be kind in terms of care and service, but terrible when it comes to communication and effective displays of affection, so I wanted to explore this issue in this long text. the ending is suggestive because I think that learning would inevitably lead to situations like the one narrated. who knows... maybe I’ll write more. my thirst for mr. silvair never ends :) it's christmas eve in my homeland (brazil), and for those who are reading and are in the same territory as mine, or at least on a similar rhythm/time zone, merry christmas eve! to the fans of mr. silvair out there, consider this text a gift. we urgently need more stories about this man, like, ASAP. thank you so much if you read all of this, and have a lovely day or night! ♡ (this text is open to corrections and edits. english is not my native language, and the original was entirely written in portuguese. time for some sleep, finally.)

#mr silvair x you #mr silvair x reader #homicipher #mr silvair x mc #homicipher x reader #homicipher x you #mr silver #mr silver x reader #mr silver x you #suggestive cw #other characters #mentions #i want to shag silvair so bad #the doctor is mine #thirst so unhinged got me writing 5k words for this man

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