#Hand Sealing Machine | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

em1i2a3 · 22 days ago

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Only He Can Heal Me

Pairing: Bob/Robert Reynolds/The Sentry/The Void x Thunderbolts!Enhanced!Fem!Reader!

Summary: After a mission gone wrong, you and Bob take refuge in one of Valentina’s safehouses to wait for an extraction.

Warnings: 18+ Minors DNI! Smut, Fluff, and a bit of Angst. We got the one bed trope in here, and we love it very much lol. Mentions of Blood and Injuries, Light Exploration of Readers Traumatic Past, Mentions of Violence, Descriptions of Wound Care. Reader has taken a Super Soldier Serum (a messed up one that didn’t truly work but gave her some benefits like healing a little faster than others and some enhanced strength).

Smut Warnings: Unprotected P in V Sex (….y’all know what I’m going to say…I don’t have to tell you lol), Fingering, Oral Sex (Female Receiving) Handjob, Messy/Sensual Sex, Spitting (but like…in a sensual way guys lol), Grinding

Authors Note: We love a good one bed trope, but I gotta say I’ve written close to like 30,000 words in the past 24 hours and my brain is like ‘HOW MUCH MORE SMUT CAN WE WRITE’ lol. Loved doing it though, it was like a marathon! Can’t wait to release the next one tomorrow :) Enjoy this one, this was a request from an anon, and I cannot find it! But ENJOY!

Word Count: 16,184

The prep bay was cold and mostly empty, except for the soft hum of wall vents and the faint rattling of gear being zipped, buckled, and secured behind locker doors.

The overhead lights buzzed faintly, too bright in places and dim in others, flickering where the panels hadn’t been replaced in months. The room smelled faintly of machine oil and static–charged with the familiar tang of adrenaline, sweat, and sterile fabric fresh from vacuum-sealed bags.

You’d just finished adjusting the last strap of your chest harness–tightening it down over the protective plating that pressed solid and reassuring against your sternum–when a flicker of gold caught your peripheral vision.

You paused, with one hand still on the cinch strap at your hip, and turned your head slightly at the colour.

Bob was standing by the far mirror, partially tucked between two lockers, half-lit by a faulty overhead beam that stuttered and blinked every few seconds like it couldn’t quite keep up with the job it was supposed to be doing. He hadn’t noticed you staring–or if he had, he was pretending not to.

He was already suited up and ready for the mission, and you couldn’t help but let your eyes roam over the sight in front of you.

The new Sentry suit clung to him like it had been built cell by cell onto his skin.

Not just worn–forged. It wrapped around every inch of him like it had been grown from starlight and gravity and expectation, molded to fit the weight of a man who could level New York with the snap of his fingers.

And for the first time, with the old bulk of his baggy sweaters and oversized sweatpants gone, you were able to see everything.

The long, sculpted lines of his legs, wrapped in dark navy plating that traced the shape of powerful quads and calves. The sweep of his hips, trim and bracketed in reinforced seamwork that flexed faintly with every shift in his stance. The gold across his chest was smooth, seamless, pressed tight to thick pectorals and sharply defined shoulders that rose and fell with each breath like rolling thunder. Even his arms–cords of lean muscle, taut and strong–were framed by the suit in a way that almost felt indecent in how much presence it gave him.

He was broad. Massive. Godly.

Everything about him in that moment was dangerous in the way the sun is dangerous: too bright, too big, and too hot…Temperature wise of course.

But instead of standing proud in the new suit, he looked uncertain. Hunched slightly, like he was trying to take up less space than he did. One hand moved across his chest in slow, flattening passes–fingers dragging across the golden seam like he was checking for cracks in a shell that didn’t quite feel like his.

His expression in the mirror was unreadable. Something between awe and fear, because the suit made him look like a god.

But the man wearing it?

He still looked like Bob.

Like someone who had spent too long convincing himself he wasn’t worthy of saving–let alone saving anyone else.

You watched him for another couple of seconds. Long enough to catch the subtle furrow of his brow, the way his breath visibly slowed like he was talking himself through the act of just existing inside all that power.

And then–your voice, calm and familiar, cut through the quiet of the room like a knife:

”You’re missing the cape.” He flinched, startled–his shoulders jolting slightly as he twisted toward the sound of your voice. His eyes found yours with the soft, wide-open look of someone who’d just been pulled out of water without realizing how long they’d been drowning. His mouth parted. The apples of his cheeks flushed pink almost instantly, Color blooming up toward the tips of his ears–embarrassed, maybe, or just vulnerable in a way he didn’t know how to guard around you.

You could see the question flicker behind his eyes: How one have you been watching me?

”…Oh.” He said, voice rough at the edges. It caught in his throat, and he cleared it with a soft, awkward cough. His gaze dropped for a second, darting to the chair behind him where the cape sat–folded with care, the weight of its symbolism too heavy for him to shoulder just yet.

”Y-Yeah. I wasn’t s-sure if I should wear it this t-time around.” He replied quietly, as he spoke, a loose strand of light brown hair slipped forward, tumbling across his brow–soft against the sharpness of the suit. He reached up with a flicker of self-consciousness, fingers pushing it back behind his ear, but the motion only emphasized the contrast: the boyish awkwardness of Bob Reynolds trying to live inside the myth of Sentry. When he looked back up at you, the light caught his eyes just right.

And you saw it.

Gold.

Faint, flickering through the deep ocean blue–the colour his irises sported when he was in a certain light–like lightning scattering across abandando seas. Not glowing outright–but present. Watching. Sentry was not lurking, not threatening; he was just awake. Quiet. Curious almost.

You started walking toward him, slow and casual. Measured in a way that wouldn’t spook him and that wouldn’t make him feel like a specimen under glass.

”You should wear it,” You said gently, “It’ll complete the look.” His lips twitched, but didn’t quite make it to a smile.

”T-The look?” You nodded.

”Y’know…The whole divine golden protector from the skies thing they have going for you.” His lashes fluttered as you approached, long and soft against the sharp angles of his face, still a little pink at the cheekbones. He blinked once–then again–as if grounding himself with your steps.

You stopped just shy of him, giving him a respectful bit of space but close enough to see the precise stitching of his suit now–not just armor, but something compared to scripture in a way. Intricate lines flowed from shoulder to elbow like veins of lightning trapped in cloth, cross-patterned over his ribs with a celestial geometry you recognized as Sentry’s sigil, though this one was subdued–etched into him instead of displayed.

The golden plating was seamless, light-warped and fluid over his chest, hugging the swell of his pectoral muscles, tapering down his waist and into the darker paneling that wrapped around his hips like a brace. There were slight grooves in the gold that shimmered as he moved, like solar flares caught in motion. Even standing still, he looked ready to fly. Seeing all the details up close almost took your breath away.

And still–he was fidgeting.

Not noticeably. Not like before.

But enough that you saw it: the flex of his fingers against his thigh. The tiniest rise of his chest like he was trying to steady his breathing.

And only you would notice.

You let the moment stretch just long enough for the tension to ease between you. Your voice stayed quiet, grounded.

“Can I help you put it on?” He didn’t answer right away, but then his eyes flicked up–searching your face, just for a moment–and he gave a single, quick nod. You turned, walking the last few steps to the chair where the cape rested. It was folded perfectly, like a sacred object waiting to be used. Your fingers brushed the fabric as you lifted it.

It was heavier than it looked–dense and thick, with layered gold threading woven through an inner lining of dark slate gray. The outer side was luminous, that same rich gold as his suit, but slightly deeper–burnished at the edges, like sunlight just before dusk. The hem shimmered subtly with kinetic microfilaments meant to stabilize it mid-flight. Even in your hands, it felt powerful.

When you turned back around with the cape in your hands, he was still standing, fingers still twitching at his sides like he was mulling over something in his head. The air between you seemed to tighten just a little–charged, but not dangerous. Not with him. Not anymore.

Then, with a soft exhale, Bob moved.

Slowly, deliberately–he began to kneel.

It wasn’t a grand gesture. Just one knee lowering to the floor with careful control, his head bowed slightly–not in deference, but out of thoughtfulness.

So the height difference wouldn’t strain you, so you wouldn’t have to reach and hurt yourself.

Your breath hitched slightly at the sight.

Because he hadn’t asked. He hadn’t said a word. He had simply given you what he knew you’d never really ask for–ease, access, and trust.

You stepped into his space without hesitation, the cape feeling heavier now in your hands–not just from the weight, but with the meaning of what you were about to do. You stood in front of him quietly, with his head still lowered, shoulders broad and solid but stilled beneath your touch, as if he didn’t want to do anything that would interrupt your rhythm. He breathed in the scent of your tactical gear–the strong smell of gun oil, burnt fabric, and a sweetness that only he could describe as hot strawberries.

You leaned over him and began fastening the clips just beneath his collar–magnetized seal points engineered to respond to manual input only, no voice command, no suit automation. It had always struck you as oddly poetic, like some designer was trying to make some sort of underhanded statement about the vulnerability of a superhero that the rest of the world missed.

Now, it made perfect sense.

Someone had to help him with this.

He couldn’t do it alone.

Maybe it was meant to encourage connection. Maybe it was just another line item under “team protocol.” But right now–with your fingers brushing the reinforced seamwork of his armor, with Bob Reynolds kneeling before you in absolute stillness–it felt sacred, like a kind of ceremony that tethered the both of you into each other.

You clicked the last clasp into place slowly, the faint metallic snap sounding louder than it should’ve in the quiet. Then, with both hands, you smoothed the cape gently across his shoulders–your palms gliding over thick, immovable muscle as you checked the weight and fall of the fabric.

It settled down his back like a mantle. Not just gear. It was the final piece that made everything feel real. He was going into the field for the first time since he Voided the majority of New York City, and he was going with you.

This wasn’t just about trying to prove himself, this was about trying to belong on a team that was continuously doubting him and trying to shield him from missions they knew he wanted to help with.

You didn’t step away from him, instead, your hands stayed on his shoulders, resting lightly–warmth against armor, skin to suit, breath to breath. His body was solid beneath your touch, unmoving. Like he didn’t dare shift and break the moment. Like he was bracing against emotion he didn’t know how to show.

For a few seconds, neither of you spoke. The room buzzed faintly around you. Somewhere a locker clicked shut. A bootstep echoed far off down the hallway. But none of it touched the space you two occupied.

Just you. Just him. Just the weight of what it meant. He looked up from the ground, bringing his shimmering eyes to yours, the cold blue being engulfed with the warmth of gold that pulsed softly beneath the surface.

His voice, when it came, was soft. Like it had to climb up his throat to get out.

“I d-didn’t get to say thank y-you,” He said, “…For what y-you did during the meeting.” You paused. The words hung there–raw and unfinished. You could feel him holding something back, unsure if he’d said too much already.

You shook your head gently.

“You don’t have to,” You murmured, “Someone had to do it.” He didn’t look away, nor did he drop his eyes or fidget. He just stayed there, kneeling, with the cape settling against him, and gold flickering under his skin like sunrise behind cloud cover.

“I still want to say i-it regardless…Because you’re the r-reason why I’m here right now.” The words landed heavy. True. Vulnerable in a way few people ever let themselves be anymore–not with the Thunderbolts. Not with everything they’d seen.

Your throat tightened–but before you could respond, you saw it in his eyes. The flicker. The shift.

He was remembering.

The meeting.

The room had been too full for comfort–one of the main ops debrief suites, repurposed last-minute because Walker had cracked the glass wall in the old briefing room again. Everyone was seated around the table, the tension so thick you could feel it in your molars.

Val stood at the head with a tablet in her hands, and a look that suggested she’d already decided the outcome before anyone spoke.

“The mission is recon only,” She said crisply. “Two agents. Remote location off the edge of Bucharest. No public visibility. Minimal risk.”

Then, like she was dropping a live grenade:

“Bob’s file is under consideration.”

You saw it immediately–the way Bucky stiffened in his seat. The way Walker leaned forward, jaw tightening. Yelena didn’t even try to hide her scoff, and Ava shot you a look across the table like she was trying to gauge how serious you were about this.

Only Alexei sat still, arms crossed, unreadable as usual–but you didn’t miss the way his eyes flicked toward Bob, who sat near the back. Silent. Hands folded in his lap. Shoulders drawn tight beneath a threadbare hoodie.

He hadn’t spoken. Not once. He didn’t need to. The silence around him was speaking volumes.

Val continued, breezing through the risk assessments. She spoke like Bob wasn’t even in the room.

“While his recovery has shown significant improvement–meditative regulation, Void suppression therapy, strength conditioning–field placement is still an unresolved variable.”

“‘Unresolved variable?’”You repeated, voice colder than you intended. “He’s been stable for eight months.”

”And we remember the last time he wasn’t stable.” Walker cut in, tone clipped, “Need I remind you of the Void turning the population into a trauma loop.” Yelena leaned back in her chair, arms folded.

”This isn’t about doubting his progress. It’s just about not wanting to see him go there again.” You rubbed your forehead.

”He won’t,” You snapped, more forcefully than you meant to–but you didn’t walk it back. Your eyes scanned the table, looking at the rest of the team, almost hoping that you would be able to convince them otherwise.

Ava sighed. “It’s not that we don’t believe he’s trying. We know he is. But try doesn’t count for much when the Void’s in play.”

That’s when you pushed your chair back and stood.

You didn’t raise your voice. You didn’t need to.

“Then what’s the point of any of it?” You asked. “The training, the meditations, the suppression chamber nights, the full neuro-synchronization sessions we’ve sat through–all of it. What is the point of putting him through hell to be better if the second he is, we decide it’s still not enough?”

The room quieted.

Bob hadn’t looked up.

He’d kept his hands together, looking down at the floor, with his shoulders hunched.

You stepped out from behind your chair, speaking not to the table anymore–but to him.

“I’ve watched him every day. I’ve seen him rebuild himself molecule by molecule while half of you still talk about him like he’s a bomb with a faulty timer. I trust him. And if no one else wants to give him that chance–fine. I will.” There was a pause as everyone exchanged glances at one another, while you looked over to where Val was standing, the tablet still perched in her hands,“Assign me the mission. Put him on it. Just us. Let’s see if all that damn therapy worked.” Val looked at you for a long moment. Then at Bob. Then back again, almost like she was questioning your sanity.

“…It’s your call…But you’re the one who’s taking the blame if anything happens.” You nodded once, steady and sure.

”I’m willing to take the chances.” The room remained quiet, the kind of quiet that wasn’t peaceful—just heavy. Charged. One wrong word and it would tip into something worse. But you didn’t waver. You didn’t even glance back at the others.

You turned.

And your eyes found him.

Bob was still seated, shoulders hunched, posture compact like he was trying to take up as little space in the world as possible. But–

He was looking at you.

For the first time that meeting, he’d lifted his head, just enough, and it wrecked you.

The stunned flicker in his expression was sharp, almost disbelieving. Like he hadn’t been expecting you to fight for him. Not like that. Not out loud. Not in a room where it would cost you something–like being sat out of missions for an unknown amount of time.

His lips parted slightly, but no words came out. His gaze dropped again almost as fast–but not before you caught it.

The look in his eyes was hope, cracking at the edges.

That’s what had brought you to this moment, with him kneeling in front of you, and your hands resting on his shoulders.

”Trust me…It’s not that big of a deal.” But you felt it in the way his muscles shifted under your touch, the slight tremble of disbelief still running through him like an aftershock. The cape settled perfectly down his spine now, catching the flickering light in soft ripples as he knelt there, grounded not by weight, but by something far more vulnerable.

You didn’t mean to reach up.

But your hand moved on instinct.

Fingers brushing along the edge of his jaw before cupping the curve of his cheek–warm beneath your palm, with the faintest prickle of stubble just starting to grow back after this morning’s shave. His skin was soft. Too soft for someone who’d been built to withstand the weight of stars.

His breath hitched.

And though he didn’t lean into the touch, he didn’t move away either. He just looked at you–really looked at you. Gold threading through ocean blue. A light that wasn’t there just a few months ago.

The intimacy of it hung between you like a string pulled too tight. It was more than friendship. More than duty. It was something you hadn’t had the space to name yet–but it was there, crackling quietly in the places words couldn’t reach.

You dropped your hand slowly, gently. Letting it linger for just a heartbeat longer than you should have.

Then you smiled–small but sure–and stepped back.

“We’ll kick ass out there.” The shift in your tone pulled something like a grin from him. Shy. Crooked. Almost boyish.

You tilted your head toward the bay doors. “Now comm up. We’ve gotta catch the quinjet before Alexei starts yelling and Walker decides to fly it himself.”

That got a soft chuckle from him–quiet and warm, like sunlight after stormclouds.

He rose slowly, with the kind of strength that didn’t show off–but couldn’t be ignored either. The cape flowed down behind him as he stood to his full height, golden and striking and real. No longer a symbol he didn’t think he deserved–but one he’d earned, inch by inch.

And now?

He was finally wearing it.

Side by side, you made your way to the hangar doors, boots echoing softly on the floor.

Two agents.

One mission.

And for the first time in a long time–

Bob Reynolds looked ready.

———————

The facility sat like a carcass at the edge of the forest, its structure sunken and half-swallowed by the wild. Tall pines clustered around the perimeter like sentries of their own, and the building��s outer shell was cracked in places, choked with ivy and moss. The quinjet’s descent had barely stirred the quiet–no birdsong, no wind, just that unnatural stillness you only ever found around dead places.

Bob landed first.

Boots hitting the ground with a muffled thud, cape fluttering faintly behind him, and you followed seconds later, crouching low in the brush before rising to your full height beside him. You exchanged a look–then a nod–and started toward the front of the facility, with your weapons lowered, and sensors scanning.

Once inside, the air changed.

It was stale. Clinical. Stripped of time. Like the place had been left in a hurry, but not by accident. You moved through the corridors slowly, your shoulder brushing his every few steps–part proximity, part habit.

The walls were lined with steel and polymer composite, scorched in some places, and still faintly etched with whiteboard residue in others. You swept through the lab chamber by chamber–clearing one door after the next in practiced silence. It was only when you reached what had once been a medbay or containment ward that Bob slowed.

A cluster of terminals flickered dimly under emergency power. Loose papers were scattered across the desk, some yellowed with age, others oddly fresh. You tilted your head and picked one up, squinting in the low light.

“…Looks like they were testing a serum variant,” You murmured, eyes scanning the page. “Modified CRSP-3. With…Anti-degeneration binding agents?”

Bob leaned in, frowning faintly as he read over your shoulder. “S-Super soldier derivative…” He said quietly, recognizing the words he had heard when he was back at the lab in Malaysia, just a the name was a bit off, “It’s close to the version t-they gave me. Just…Not I guess.”

You looked up at the comment, quirking a brow. “Wrong how?”

He shook his head slowly. “L-Like someone took the recipe and forgot the sunlight.”

Your lips quirked slightly at the phrasing, but it faded quickly as your gaze dropped to another folder. You flipped it open and scanned the contents before muttering, “It’s not that different from mine.” His eyes lifted to yours.

“Y-You got a variant?” You raised a brow at him, like you had revealed a secret that everyone knew but never spoke of.

”It was completely diluted,” You replied, sliding a page free from the file, “Got a perk or two though, I can lift heavy stuff like cars and big slabs of concrete…I don’t heal as fast as I’d like though, not as quick as Bucky or John or Alexei. Not that I mind though, it still gives me some flexibility with my skills and stuff…” Bob’s eyes stayed locked on yours for a second longer, like he wanted to say something else about your serum but couldn’t find the words. Maybe it was respect. Maybe it was concern. But it lingered in the air between you.

You stepped lightly toward another desk, fingers trailing over cracked glass and dust-laced folders as you moved. The place felt stripped of life but not memory. You could still feel the hum in the walls, like the experiments had left a stain that hadn’t faded. Bob followed you, his movements quieter now, more controlled–a kind of hyper awareness rolling off him in waves.

”…Do you really not remember anything from that lab in Malaysia?” You asked softly–trying to change the subject, but to also pick his brain–as you thumbed through a clipboard lined with scrawled formulas and dates. His footsteps slowed behind you.

”I r-remember how I got there…But once I was in there it’s just f-fragments. Voices I c-can’t place…A hallway that smelled like o-ozone. Apart from t-that , I really can’t remember much. I do remember waking u-up to you, Ava, John, and Yelena fighting in The Vault.” You smirked at him.

”You remember that part, huh?” Bob’s eyes flicked up toward yours–soft, sheepish. “H-Hard to forget…It’s where I-I met you guys…” You huffed out a quiet laugh through your nose, about to say something else, but the comms in your ear crackled alive before you could get a word out.

Bucky’s voice came through, clipped and alert: “We’ve got movement on the perimeter. West tree line. At least six–no uniforms, no IDs. Could be nothing. Could be a problem.”

You straightened up from the desk, your hand drifting back to the rifle slung over your shoulder, thumb flicking off the safety. “Copy that,” You said calmly, eyes scanning the windows nearest the treeline. “If they come inside, we’ll handle it.”

A pause.

Bucky’s voice came again, firmer. “It’s an unknown number coming for you. Keep sharp. If this is a setup, they waited ‘til you were deep enough to spring it.”

You glanced over your shoulder at Bob, who was already stepping closer, posture coiled, gold flickering faint behind his eyes like a warning. The air felt heavier now–more electric.

You clicked your comms again and replied, dry as ever, “I’m sure a half-assed super soldier and a sun god with an alter ego can handle it.” There was silence on the line for a beat–then a low grunt from Bucky, unmistakably unimpressed.

“You call me when you’re bleeding,” He said, “I’m not flying out to pick up pieces.”

“I won’t let it get that far,” You promised, stepping into the center of the room as your eyes swept the walls and exits. You turned slightly, voice low now–just for Bob.

”We fall back to the south corridor if anything feels off. There’s an escape path to the ravine.” Bob nodded, fingers twitching faintly at his sides, his voice a whisper of steel and concern.

“Y-You sure you’re ready for this?”

You looked at him–and didn’t hesitate. “I brought you here for a reason.”

That earned you a flicker of something in his expression. Not quite a smile. Not quite fear. Just that electric wire of belief stretching taut between you both.

The sound of distant branches cracking wasn’t the kind of snap that came from animals or wind. It was sharp. Intentional.

Followed by another. Closer.

You turned toward the sound, raising your rifle. Bob turned as well the gold now brighter in his eyes, his whole body shifting subtly, muscles tightening like a wire being pulled taut inside that suit. A pulse of heat rolled off him in the moment before everything went wrong.

A sharp ping echoed from above–the unmistakable sound of a suppressed sniper round ricocheting off a corner beam. You ducked instinctively just as the window to your left exploded inward in a shower of reinforced glass and smoke.

“Y/N!” Bob shouted, arm flying out to shield you–just as a long device was thrown into the room, and it burst in a white-hot pulse of light and heat. The impact blew you sideways. You hit the floor hard, your shoulder slamming into the edge of a metal cabinet. Your ears were ringing, disoriented. The smoke was thick, burning your eyes and nose, and something wet was crawling down your back.

You tried to push yourself up–and screamed.

Pain shot through your entire torso like fire licking your spine. You blinked hard through the smoke, fingers going to your back, and when they came away they were slick with blood.

Shrapnel.

Glass. Steel. Maybe a burn too–you couldn’t tell yet. You gasped, coughing violently, but managed to drag yourself into a half-crouch. Your limbs trembled, but your fingers were still on the trigger of your rifle.

You heard movement to your left–shadows in the smoke–and a low, furious sound that didn’t sound quite human. It was Bob.

You turned just in time to see him tear through a wall.

Not a door. A wall.

There were two men in tactical gear on the other side, and he moved like a solar flare made flesh. One got thrown back with enough force to crumple the corridor’s far end. The other screamed when Bob grabbed him and slammed him into the floor so hard the tiles shattered.

“Bob–” You croaked–but it wasn’t Bob who turned to you.

It was Sentry.

His eyes glowed molten gold through the smoke, his expression a mask of fury and panic. He surged toward you, kneeling beside you so fast it stirred the haze around you like wind. He was panting hard, trying to pull himself back under control. But when his hands reached for you, they shook.

”Y/N…You’re bleeding.” His touch was warm and careful despite the trembling fingers, and that’s when you felt it. The slow trickle of something wet sliding down your temple.

You blinked hard and reached up, fingertips smearing through blood at your hairline. You must’ve caught some shrapnel near the scalp too, and you hadn’t even noticed, but the pain in your back was louder now that you were seeing blood.

“I’m fine,” You rasped, even though your ribs ached like splintered glass was being pushed through your skin, “You need to focus. We have to get out of here, now.”

He looked like he might argue. You saw it flicker in the golden fire of his gaze. His jaw clenched, nostrils flaring with emotion he couldn’t shape into words, but then he nodded–once. Just enough. You clicked your comms with a blood-slick thumb, the static crackling as you gritted through the pain.

“Thunderbolt One, we’re compromised. Injuries sustained. South corridor breached. We’re falling back.”

Bucky’s voice came in fast, tight. “Copy that. Can you walk?”

You hesitated, then hissed through your teeth, “Not far. Took shrapnel to the back, possible burns–minimal mobility. Sentry’s with me.”

There was a beat of silence on the line.

Then Bucky again, quieter this time. “Safehouse is two klicks southeast. Hidden hydro-station in the gorge. We stocked it last month–first aid, comms, heat. We’ll extract when the sky’s clear. Maybe a couple hours. You gotta lay low.” Your head fell back slightly, breathing labored, the air still thick with smoke and the sting of ozone. You nodded more to yourself than anyone else.

“Understood.” Bob was already moving before the words left your lips. He gathered you in his arms with infinite care, like touching you wrong might undo you completely. You bit your lip hard enough to draw more blood, trying not to cry out as he shifted you against his chest.

“I’ve got you,” he murmured, almost more to himself than to you.

Outside the shattered clinical grounds, you could hear the chaos still echoing–gunfire farther off, and someone screaming in the distance. Probably one of the men Bob had already thrown halfway through the wall. But here, in his arms, the world felt steadier. He held you like you weighed nothing. Like you mattered more than everything.

“C-Can you hold on?” He asked, voice flickering somewhere between Bob and something far, far older. “I’ll go slow. Just for a bit.”

“Yeah,” You whispered. “I’m not going anywhere.”

He moved fast enough to blur the edges of the hallway but not so fast it hurt. You clutched weakly at the front of his suit, your fingers curling against the heat radiating off his chest. You tried not to close your eyes. Not yet. But the bleeding hadn’t stopped. The world kept dipping sideways and dragging you down with it.

The last thing you remembered was the forest flashing past in pieces–tree trunks like streaks of shadow, gold light blazing just beneath your lashes–and the sound of him whispering something over and over against your hair, too soft for your failing ears to catch.

——————

The first thing you felt was the cold.

Not biting–but quiet. A gentle chill that hugged the concrete floor beneath your spine, softened only by the blanket cocooned around you. It carried the scent of dust and pine sap, of old stone and something faintly metallic–like blood. Your head throbbed. Not sharp, but thick and heavy, like your skull had been packed with wet cotton. Pain bloomed somewhere low in your back, radiating through your ribs every time you tried to draw a fuller breath. Something was strapped tight across your midsection–gauze, maybe, or field wrap–and your tactical suit clung to you in places it shouldn’t have.

You blinked slowly.

The ceiling came into focus first–low, reinforced concrete with flaking paint at the corners and a single exposed beam running above you. The light was dim and dappled, filtering in through a narrow, barred window high on the wall. Golden hour–near sunset, maybe. You turned your head a fraction and winced. Something pulled at your temple. A bandage, hastily applied.

Then your eyes found Bob.

He was in the far corner, standing beside the boarded-up window, back to the wall, shoulders taut like he was trying to hold himself in place through sheer force of will. His hands were flexing at his sides, over and over again—like he couldn’t decide whether to reach for something or just keep clenching them into fists.

He was no longer in the Sentry suit.

Instead, he’d changed into something from the emergency gear cache–a faded charcoal thermal shirt that fit loosely across his shoulders and sleeves that bunched slightly at his wrists, and a pair of black utility pants that were a little worn at the knees. His light brown hair was damp at the ends, curling slightly from sweat or water–possibly from a quick rinse in the shower. He looked like he’d aged a year in an hour.

You watched him in silence, letting your eyes trail over the tension carved into his posture, the way his jaw ticked every few seconds as he stared out the narrow slats toward the tree line. He was breathing through his nose–slow, measured. Controlled. But there was nothing calm about it.

He thought someone was still coming.

And maybe they were.

“…Bob?” You rasped, barely more than a whisper.

His head jerked around instantly.

His blue eyes landed on you like they hadn’t dared hope you’d wake. For a moment, he just stared–like his brain was trying to catch up to what his heart had already registered. Then he moved. Fast. But not chaotic.

He dropped to a knee beside you, one hand planted against the floor to steady himself as the other reached for you–hovered–then settled gently at your arm when he saw the wince in your expression.

“You’re awake,” He breathed. His voice was hoarse, cracked at the edges. “Oh God–how do you feel? A-Are you okay? Are you in pain? D-Do you know where we are–”You coughed once, your ribs spasming with it, and nodded slightly.

“Safehouse. Hydro-station…Two klicks out.” You took a shaky breath. “I remember.” Relief surged across his face like a tide, washing out the panic. His shoulders slumped slightly, like the weight he’d been carrying might finally loosen its grip.

“I stopped the bleeding,” He said, quieter now. “The stuff in the med bin wasn’t great, but—I-I cleaned what I could reach. The gauze might need to be changed in a few hours, b-but you’re stable. I kept pressure on the worst part until it stopped…” You shifted slightly, groaning as your spine lit up with pain, and that was when you felt it–a heat lingering at your side, tucked between your arm and ribs. A hot pack. Probably scavenged from the safehouse supplies.

Your gaze drifted down. Bob had even folded a towel to keep it from burning your skin.

“You did good,” You whispered. “I’m still alive, aren’t I?” Bob huffed softly. Not quite a laugh, but not a sob either.

”T-That’s not enough,” He muttered, “You s-shouldn’t have gotten hurt in the first p-place.” You shook your head slowly, like every movement was wading through wet cement.

“It happens,” You rasped, voice soft but firm. “You can’t control everything.”

Bob didn’t reply back. His gaze flickered down, jaw tight again–like the words sat heavy on his tongue but wouldn’t come out right. The silence between you stretched just long enough to border on weighty before you tilted your head, a dry hint of a smile tugging at your mouth.

“But is there any reason why I’m on the floor?”

That got his attention. He blinked, startled–then rubbed the back of his neck with one hand, the gesture boyish and sheepish in a way that made you forget, just for a second, the power inside him.

“There’s only one bed,” He admitted. “I… I thought i-it would be best to put you here until you were awake. That way you could–y’know–get cleaned up before you got in. F-Figured you wouldn’t want blood in the sheets, or on your face while sleeping.” You stared at him for a second, then through cracked lips murmured,

”So that’s why you’re looking all damp.” The question took him off guard–completely. His brows rose slightly, and he actually glanced down at himself, like realizing for the first time that yes, he was still faintly glistening from the quick scrub he took in the washroom.

“Yeah,” He said after a beat, voice almost embarrassed. “It was just a quick rinse to get the grime and dirt off. Sentry was a bit…Angry so I had to settle that. But I was able to calm him down in peace at least.” You watched him carefully, noting the way he downplayed the struggle. You knew it wasn’t easy–how hard he fought to keep Sentry and Void balanced, especially after emotional spikes like the one in the lab. And he hadn’t just come down from it–he’d carried you out in the middle of it, held it all back for you. Your lips quirked, even though it hurt. A dull, dragging ache moved through your ribs, but it didn’t stop the words from coming.

“I owe both of you one,” You murmured, voice still ragged but steady enough. “You got me to safety. I’m grateful, Bob. Truly.” His gaze flicked down like he couldn’t hold it—not under the weight of your sincerity. His ears were already tinged red, but the color spread across his cheeks then, blooming with quiet embarrassment.

“I… I just did what had to be done to k-keep you safe,” He stammered. “That was my m-main goal…Just–g-getting you out. You were hurt, and I–I couldn’t let anything happen to you.”

You tilted your head slightly, biting back a soft smile as you studied him. He looked so unsure, kneeling there in that too-big thermal, his hair curling damp over his forehead, hands still trembling faintly from adrenaline and aftershock. And yet–he’d ripped through a wall for you. Carried you two kilometers and calmed a golden god that lived in his bones just to hold you still and careful.

“Have you always been this heroic on the inside?” You asked, voice low and a little teasing, your smile blooming now in earnest. “Or am I just the lucky one who gets the rescue mission treatment?” He looked up at that, wide-eyed and flustered, like you’d just hit him with a truck made of compliments. He opened his mouth, tried to speak, failed–then let out a breathy laugh that broke the tension like a warm breeze.

“I think you’re… P–Pretty special,” He said, honest and unguarded, his blue shimmering eyes meeting yours with a kind of hesitant awe, “I mean–I’d…Probably still tear a building in half for Walker if I had to. But I-I didn’t mean it like that with you. I mean–oh God–n-not that I don’t care about you–I mean, I do, but not like Walker–like, not like Walker, I–” You reached out with your good hand and caught the fabric at his wrist, giving it a soft tug, looking down at it..

“Hey,” You said gently, cutting through his verbal tailspin, “I know what you’re saying…” The moment stretched between you like something pulled too tight–fragile, golden, and trembling with meaning. Your fingers lingered on the fabric of his sleeve a second longer than they needed to, and when you looked up at him again, he was already looking at you.

Not just glancing. Not just checking, just staring.

Like there was something unspoken caught in his chest, rising toward the surface–caught somewhere between breath and belief. His eyes weren’t just blue now; they shimmered faintly, gold flickering at the edges, the way they always did when his emotions got ahead of his control. You knew that look. It was the Sentry watching through Bob’s eyes, but not interfering. Just…Witnessing. Letting him feel it.

You didn’t say anything. Neither did he.

But it sat there between you, humming like electricity on the skin.

Then, slowly, you let your hand fall back to your side, and you pulled in a breath that made your ribs ache.

“Okay,” You murmured, softer now, trying to anchor yourself. “Right now…I need to get this blood off me before I start sticking to the damn floor.”

Bob blinked like you’d broken a spell–but not in a bad way. He nodded quickly, awkwardly, as he shifted backward to give you space. “Y-Yeah, of course. The water’s warm enough, just don’t stay in too long. The heat might aggravate the swelling on your lower back, s-so keep it quick if you can.”

You gave him a sideways look, smirking faintly despite yourself. “Are you giving me medical advice now?”

He flushed. “I read the first aid kit manual twice while you were out just in case something went wrong.”

That made something flutter in your chest. Not quite laughter. Not quite tears. Just a deep, slow warmth.

You began to shift, slowly bracing against the wall to push yourself up, and he reached out instinctively. One arm looped gently around your back, the other steadied you at the elbow. He didn’t lift you completely–just made it easier, like always. Like he’d keep doing it forever, if you let him.

When you were upright and still breathing through the worst of the pain, you glanced over at him again.

“Once I’m done,” You said, voice a little steadier now, “I’ll need your help redressing everything. The wrap’s probably slipped by now, and I want you to learn how to apply it properly. You did good for field triage, but if we’re stuck here overnight–which judging by the radio silence on the comms it seems like it’s going to be the case–it needs to be clean.”

His face sobered instantly. “I-I’ll do whatever you need.”

You smiled at him again–just faintly. “I know you will.” Then, before he could overthink it, you turned and started toward the tiny half-shower tucked behind a chipped concrete partition, biting back a hiss as every step woke another pocket of pain. You didn’t look back. But you didn’t need to.

You felt him watch you the whole way, like sunlight warming your spine as you disappeared behind the partition covering. The shower was more of a pipe rigged into the wall than an actual stall—one of those industrial utility setups meant for clearing mud and sweat from boots and bodies, not exactly for comfort. The water hissed out in a narrow stream, tepid but consistent. You turned the knob carefully, bracing your weight with one hand against the damp wall, then peeled off your suit in slow, stiff movements–gritting your teeth when the fabric tugged at dried blood, as you ripped off the bandages Bob had placed.

The chill of the air gave way to the warmth of the water. It hit your shoulders first, tracking down your spine in ribbons, streaking through the grime, the smoke, the blood crusted to your skin. You let it run for a moment, eyes closed, arms braced against the wall, head bowed. The sound was steady. Soothing. White noise against the hum of aching muscles and the low throb at the base of your skull.

You let your forehead rest against the wall.

For a second, just a second, it was easy to forget where you were.

Then your ribs shifted, pain bloomed, and you remembered everything.

The fight. The explosion. The lab. Bob’s arms around you.

Bob’s voice, cracking with panic, whispering stay with me again and again like a mantra.

You ran your hands slowly down your torso, fingertips ghosting over the angry welt of bruising across your side and the tender edge of where gauze had been peeled away. The water sluiced down, carrying filth and blood with it, and you let yourself breathe into the ache of it—slow, steady, controlled.

Eventually, you turned off the stream.

The towel was scratchy, military-issued, but it was warm from where it had hung near the heat vent. You wrapped it around yourself tightly, twisting your damp hair, wringing it out, before letting it settle on your skin, and limping out from behind the partition.

The room was still dim, the air faintly humid now from the steam you’d left behind. But something had changed.

Bob had moved.

He was seated now on the edge of the narrow safehouse cot–the only bed in the room, barely wide enough for one, with a thin, patchy blanket folded neatly at the foot. The mattress dipped under his weight, creaking slightly. He’d propped the first aid kit open beside him, latex gloves already tugged onto his long fingers, and fresh gauze, antiseptic, tape, and wraps all laid out in perfect, careful order across a folded towel on his lap.

His knee was bouncing.

When he looked up and saw you, he froze.

You felt his gaze catch–not just on your face, but on the curve of your shoulders, the long stretch of leg below the hem of the towel. His eyes widened a fraction, then dropped politely to the kit again, ears flushed pink.

“I–I’ve got everything ready,” He said quickly, almost too fast. “If–uh, if you want, I can get it started.” You nodded softly, still damp and achy, the towel clinging to your skin. Each step back toward the bed was deliberate, slow. The soreness in your side hadn’t dulled, not even with the hot water, but it was manageable now. Or at least, easy enough to ignore with Bob sitting there–so tense and trying so hard to be helpful that it made something warm flutter in your chest.

You reached the edge of the bed and turned your back to him, standing for a beat before gingerly easing down beside him. The cot creaked beneath your weight, the mattress barely more than a few inches of aging foam over a thin metal frame. You could feel the heat radiating off him already.

Then, with a steady breath, you tugged the towel down just enough to bare the strip of your lower back and side where the makeshift field wrap sat crooked and half-unraveled from your shower.

“Okay,” You murmured, voice quiet in the still room. “You’re up, Doctor Reynolds.”

Bob gave a soft huff at that–something between a laugh and a nervous exhale–but his hands moved quickly. He leaned in behind you, close enough that his breath ghosted against your shoulder as he examined the wound. The old gauze peeled back with a faint pull, and he winced even more than you did.

“Sorry,” He said softly, glancing up as if expecting a flinch. “T-The edge was stuck. You okay?” You nodded.

“Keep going. It needs to be clean.” He moved with as much gentleness as he could manage. His hands weren’t shaking now, but they were tense–measured. You could feel the concentration in his touch, like he was afraid of hurting you again, even as he dabbed antiseptic over the reddened skin and pressed clean gauze into place. As he worked, your gaze drifted toward the comm unit resting useless on the bedside table, a tangled mess of wires and cables.

“Did you try contacting the team again?” You asked, voice lower now.

He paused for a moment–just long enough to tell you everything before he spoke. “Yeah,” He said, fingers brushing lightly at the curve of your side, trying his best not to linger in any of the inappropriate spots, even though with all this skin exposed to him it was making his entire body burn up. “No response. Still dead across all channels.”

You gave a soft hum. “Then I guess we really are staying overnight.”Bob didn’t respond at first. His hands moved to the wrap, carefully anchoring the new gauze with smooth precision. You felt the press of his palm through the cloth–steady, reverent, like he was reminding himself you were real and alive with every movement.

“…I can take the floor,” He said suddenly, voice quiet but certain. “After this. It’s not a big deal.” You turned slightly, wincing at the shift, and gave him a half-smile over your shoulder.

“We don’t have to fight over who gets the uncomfortable cot, Bob. We can both sleep in it.”

He hesitated. “It’s really not that big–” You arched a brow.

”You brought me here while trying to hold yourself back from exploding. I think you can survive sharing a mattress with me.” He swallowed audibly.

Then, just as he tightened the last bit of wrap at your ribs, he pressed a little too hard into a bruise that hadn’t fully surfaced yet.

You gasped—sharp, breathless.

Bob jerked back instantly, horrified. “Oh God–I-I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to–shit–are you okay? Did I hurt you?”

You shook your head quickly, even though your breath was still catching in your throat. “No, it’s okay–it just surprised me. You’re good, Bob.”

His hands hovered near your waist, trembling now, not touching you again until you nodded for him to finish.

He wrapped the last edge slowly, much lighter this time, barely more than a whisper against your skin.

Then silence.

Warm, golden, stretched between the two of you like a blanket.

You didn’t move right away. Neither did he.

You could feel the heat of him behind you, his breath steady and shallow as he stared down at the dressing he’d just finished. His hands lingered near your waist for a second longer than necessary–close, not quite touching–before his eyes drifted downward, following the dip of your spine. The gauze was clean now, neatly taped and secure. But above and around it…More marks had surfaced.

Old ones.

Bob’s breath hitched.

He hadn’t noticed them before–not with the blood and the suit and the urgency of getting you stable. But now, in the quiet aftermath, under the warm yellow flicker of the backup light and with the towel still slouched low across your hips, he could see them clearly.

A long, narrow scar just above your left hip bone. A puckered crescent near your ribs, like a burn. Two parallel lines across the back of your shoulder, faded but unmistakable.

Not field wounds. Not Thunderbolt wounds.

Older.

Hard-earned.

“…These,” He murmured, the pads of his fingers ghosting near—but never quite on—the marks. His voice was gentle. Tentative. “T-These aren’t from today.”

You didn’t turn your head at first. You just breathed–steady, quiet–your shoulders rising and falling.

“No,” You said after a moment, the word flat, then a touch wry. “I had a pretty rowdy life before the Thunderbolts.” Bob’s hand hovered at the curve of your spine, close enough that you could feel the heat of it. “You’d be surprised what a tact suit hides.” You said with a smirk on your lips. His expression was unreadable. Not pitying–he never looked at you like that–but something close to awe. Like he was seeing something sacred. The sum of your survival.

You gave a small, almost shy shift beneath his gaze, suddenly very aware of how much skin was exposed between you–how the towel had begun to loosen slightly at your chest, how his knees were still brushing the side of your thigh on the cot from how he had positioned himself…

You cleared your throat gently. “Hey… Bob?”

His eyes snapped up to the back of your head, as if you’d pulled him from deep underwater. “Y-Yeah?”

“Can you grab me a top and some shorts?” You asked, voice casual but warm. “From wherever you got your stuff? I figure you raided a cache somewhere in the utility lockers.”

“I–Yeah, yeah, of course,” He said, already moving, already grateful to have something practical to do. He rose quickly, the cot creaking under the sudden shift in weight, and crossed to the metal cabinet tucked against the wall. The key was still jammed in the lock from earlier, and he pulled it open with practiced ease.

You watched him move–awkward, careful, trying not to glance back too much. It made your smile curve softly as you tucked the towel tighter around yourself, a slow stretch of fabric across your skin.

He rifled through the stack for a second, then held up a soft, oversized long-sleeve shirt–navy, faded at the collar–and a pair of black compression shorts that looked like they hadn’t been touched in years. Not stylish. But warm. Clean.

He turned, holding them out, and then–realizing you were still wrapped in nothing but a towel–he jerked his gaze back to the floor like it had burned him.

“I’ll just, uh–I’ll give you some privacy,” He stammered, shoving the clothes into your outstretched hand without looking. “I’ll just be–right over there, by the door.” You bit back a grin as he spun on his heel and practically speed-walked to the opposite corner of the room, facing the reinforced door like he was on watch duty.

“Thanks, Bob,” You said softly.

You didn’t miss the way his ears turned pink again. “Y-You’re welcome.”

You stood slowly, wincing just slightly, and let the towel fall in silence. The fabric was still damp, cool against your toes as you stepped free of it and tugged on the shorts first, then eased the shirt over your head, careful not to strain your ribs. The hem hung past your hips like a dress, soft and lived-in, and you imagined for a second it might have belonged to him once. The sleeves still smelled faintly like cedar and clean soap. When you were dressed and back on the cot, you shifted your legs up slowly and cleared your throat again.

“All set,” You said, and Bob turned around only once he was sure you meant it. His gaze flickered briefly over you–just long enough to make your skin warm again–but he didn’t say anything. He just crossed the room in a few careful steps, and sat down slowly, careful not to jostle the cot too much as it gave another faint creak beneath their combined weight. The mattress dipped in the center, naturally drawing them closer than either probably expected, but he kept his hands firmly in his lap, fingers fidgeting with the hem of his shirt.

His voice broke the silence, tentative but laced with quiet humor. “So… how are we going to do this?” He tilted his head slightly, blue eyes flicking toward you and then away again. “I’ll probably take up the majority of the mattress. Didn’t really think that part through when I carried you in.”

You glanced at the sliver of space between you, then slowly stretched your legs out, grimacing slightly as you adjusted for your ribs. “You’ll just cushion me,” you said simply, voice soft but sure. “You’ll probably have to hold me… but that’s not too much of an issue.”

Bob choked slightly on his own breath—just a soft, startled sound that made the tips of his ears turn red again. “O-Okay,” he said, a little too fast, clearing his throat. “Okay. That’s—uh. That’s fine.”

You smiled to yourself and let your head tip back briefly against the thin pillow behind you. “What side do you sleep on?”

He glanced over at you, genuinely considering the question. “My right,” he said after a pause. “It’s easier on my shoulder. You?”

“My left.”

There was a beat. Then the realization landed, quiet but heavy.

You were going to be facing each other.

You opened your eyes again and caught the expression on his face. He looked like someone who had just realized he’d been invited to sit front row at a symphony he never thought he deserved to hear. Stunned. Honored. Slightly terrified.

“I can lie on my back if it’s weird,” you offered lightly, though you didn’t really want to.

“No,” Bob said quickly, shaking his head. “N-No, not weird. I–uh–I just don’t want to make you uncomfortable.”

“You won’t,” You murmured, your gaze softening. “You haven’t yet.”

His breath caught in his throat again, and for a moment he looked like he might say something else. Something honest. Something about the way you’d looked, bleeding and unconscious in his arms. Something about the way he’d spoken to you while carrying you through the woods, even though you couldn’t hear him–murmuring please don’t go, just hold on, I’m here.

But instead, he shifted carefully down beside you, mirroring your posture, folding himself into the thin mattress with as much grace as a man of his size could manage. His back barely brushed the wall. His knee brushed yours. His arm hovered for a second between you–then, slowly, gently, he settled it across your waist, just light enough for you to move if it hurt.

You didn’t.

Instead, you shifted closer, until your forehead nearly touched his collarbone, and your hand settled over his bicep

“Okay?” He whispered, breath warm against your temple.

You nodded.

“Okay.”

The silence that followed wasn’t empty.

It was thick with the scent of cedar and soap and antiseptic. The hum of old pipes and the faint static from the comms unit. The warmth of him, chest rising slow against yours. The weight of his hand, careful but real. And underneath it all…The quiet certainty of something inevitable taking root.

Your breath was slow now. Shallow, but not from pain anymore–just the kind of awareness that crept in like tidewater. Warm and inevitable.

Bob’s hand stayed where it was, curved lightly across your waist, unmoving except for the slight twitch of his fingers now and then, like he wasn’t quite sure if he was allowed to do more. He was being so careful with you. So still. As if any shift would snap the fragile thread holding the moment together.

But you weren’t glass.

And you were done pretending that you didn’t want more than silence and stillness from the man lying inches away from you.

Your fingers, resting gently over his bicep, began to move–slow, almost absent. Just the lightest drag of your touch over muscle, tracing the soft curve of strength hidden beneath the worn fabric of his sleeve. His breath caught. You felt it, right against your temple, like he’d forgotten how to exhale. But he didn’t stop you. Not even when your thumb made another pass, this time curling just slightly, letting the friction build.

“You’re tense,” you whispered. Voice low. Sleepy on the surface, but heavy beneath.

“I-I’m fine,” Bob murmured. It was automatic. Instinctive. But it was a lie, and he knew it the second it left his mouth.

Your other hand shifted. The one resting near his chest. You moved it slowly, palm dragging over the center of his sternum until it settled over the steady thrum of his heart. He was warm there. Unreasonably warm. The beat beneath your hand was solid and fast. Too fast.

“Doesn’t feel like it,” You murmured. Your eyes stayed half-lidded. Your body didn’t move much. But the weight of your touch… It was deliberate. Bob swallowed, hard. His head tipped a little closer to yours. You could feel the heat of his breath fan against your hairline, could feel his fingers twitch again at your waist. Your thumb swept once more across the center of his chest, slow and featherlight, resting in the space where his heartbeat thudded just beneath skin and cotton. It wasn’t racing–but it wasn’t calm either. Like a bird pacing inside its cage, fluttering at the bars.

You let your fingers still.

Then, softly–so softly it almost wasn’t a question–you whispered, “Is it always that fast…Or just when I’m touching you?”

Bob let out a quiet breath. Almost a laugh, but too fragile to be called that. His chest rose and fell once, shallow, before he replied.

“…It’s a bit h-hard to not be nervous,” He said. His voice was rough, threaded with honesty. “You’re… Y-You’re right here. A-And I’m holding you. And you’re touching me like I’m not going to break. L-Like you actually want to.”

You blinked slowly, something tight tugging behind your ribs that had nothing to do with injury.

“I do want to.” You said, clear and unshaken. The quiet cracked like an eggshell.

You felt his arm tighten around your waist just a little–not pulling, not claiming, just grounding. Confirming. Like he needed to make sure this was real. That you weren’t going to slip away.

“I’ve wanted to for a long time,” You added, almost inaudible now. Your hand was still resting over his heart, and his hand had shifted too–thumb brushing just under the curve of your ribs, the heat of him seeping into your skin. The silence between your words and his breath felt long enough to live a lifetime in. You could feel him blinking slowly, could sense the tremor just under the surface of him–the way his whole body had gone still, like he was afraid that one wrong movement would shatter the moment into something unrecognizable.

Then, so quiet it felt like it bloomed straight out of your chest, he whispered–

“M-Me too… I…I just didn’t know that you…T-Thought of me that way.”

His voice was hoarse, not from strain, but from disbelief. The kind of voice someone used when they didn’t want to ruin something beautiful by speaking too loud. His arm curled a little more firmly around your waist, just barely. Still cautious. Still asking without words if it was okay.

You didn’t answer with words this time. You didn’t need to.

Instead, you tilted your head just enough to look up at him.

He was already looking at you.

His face was open, unguarded in a way you hadn’t seen before. His eyes shimmered in the low light–blue and gold all at once, like a sky split in two. He looked at you like he was memorizing every inch of your face, and also like he was still afraid he might wake up.

And still–neither of you moved.

Not until your thumb stroked once more over his chest, and you inched a little closer. Your foreheads nearly touched now. Your breaths mingled in that thin space. The cot creaked quietly beneath you, but it felt like the world had hushed. His voice cracked like a dropped glass in the dark.

“Y-Y/N… A-Are you…” He paused, breath catching in his throat. His lips parted slightly, and when you looked up, really looked at him, you could see the fear blooming under the hope in his eyes. The kind of fear that only lives in hearts that have known too much disappointment.

He blinked once, swallowed hard.

“Are you…G-Going to kiss me?”

The question trembled out of him like it had never been spoken aloud before. Like he’d rehearsed it in a dozen imagined lifetimes but never thought he’d live the one where he actually got to ask it.

You didn’t speak. Not right away.

You just looked at him–soft, slow, and sure. There was a quiet steadiness in your eyes that seemed to strip the air from the room, and yet fill it with something heavier, sweeter. You smiled–small at first, then a little wider. It was the kind of smile that said yes without needing syllables. That said I’ve been waiting for this too.

And then you nodded.

His breath hitched, but he didn’t move.

He stayed still, wide-eyed and stunned, as you leaned in.

You didn’t rush. You didn’t dive.

You let the moment bloom.

Your forehead brushed his first. Then your nose nudged along his gently, just enough to tilt your face and let the edges of your lips graze his. You heard the smallest noise from him—a stuttered sound, half a gasp, half a plea–and then…

Then your mouth touched his.

It was barely a kiss at first.

Just breath and heat and the press of your lips against his, tender and tentative. You didn’t push forward. You didn’t open your mouth. You simply stayed there, still and close, long enough for him to register the softness of it. The reality.

Bob melted into it like he’d been holding his breath for years.

His lips moved cautiously–an echo of yours, mirroring your shape, your rhythm. The tip of his nose brushed your cheek. One of his hands, the one resting just under your ribs, tightened slightly, curling his palm around your side like he didn’t even realize he’d done it. He didn’t rush. He didn’t deepen the kiss. He just kissed you back, slow and trembling and reverent.

Like this was a prayer.

You pulled back slightly–just a breath, just enough to look at him. His eyes fluttered open, glassy with emotion, lips parted. He looked dazed. Glorious. Like he was trying to understand the feel of your mouth against his, and couldn’t quite believe it had really happened.

You cupped his face in one hand, your thumb brushing the edge of his jaw.

Then you kissed him again.

Slower this time. Deeper. Your lips moved against his with a kind of aching tenderness, like you were pouring everything into it that words couldn’t reach. Gratitude. Relief. Want. The softest kind of longing.

He made a quiet sound–barely more than a sigh–and leaned into you fully, his forehead pressing to yours again when the kiss broke. His hand moved to cradle the back of your waist, warm and strong and trembling just a little.

“Y/N…” He breathed, voice wrecked and sweet all at once. Your leg eased over his gently, thigh sliding between his as your hips pressed flush to his side. You felt him stiffen for half a second–like his brain short-circuited just trying to process the contact–then melt again beneath the heat of your body. Your chest pressed lightly to his, and his breath came out in one long, low exhale that ghosted over your cheek.

Then you kissed him again.

This time, it wasn’t slow.

It was hungry.

Your lips moved against his with quiet desperation, like the moment had snapped open and neither of you could keep holding back. You opened your mouth slightly, and when his lips parted in response, your tongue brushed his–tentative at first, then firmer. Bob made a sound in the back of his throat, deep and breathless, and his hand slid higher up your back, splaying between your shoulder blades. You moaned softly into his mouth.

It was small. Barely a sound. But the second it escaped you, he stilled.

Bob pulled back just enough to breathe, eyes wide, lips kiss-swollen, brows drawn in concern.

“W-Was that… Are you okay?” He whispered. His hand was still on your back. His other still cupped your waist, but his entire body was stiff again–like he was ready to stop everything the second you asked.

You nodded, breath catching. “Yeah,” You whispered, eyes fluttering open. “Yeah, I’m okay.”

He didn’t look convinced.

“Maybe we should stop,” He said, voice rough, hesitant. “There’s…There’s no need to rush into things.” Your heart pulled a little. Not in disappointment—but in the aching tenderness of it. You shook your head slowly, brushing your nose against his again.

“I really don’t want to wait…” You murmured. “But if you want to, we can.”

His lips parted, eyes flicking down to your mouth again. He was quiet for a long second, and you could see the war playing out in his head–desire crashing against caution.

“I-I just don’t want to m-make your injuries worse,” He admitted softly. His thumb brushed along your spine, featherlight. “I’ve been trying so hard not to touch you too much t-tonight, I–I was scared if I did I’d…Forget how careful I need to be.”

“You won’t,” You whispered. Your fingers traced the side of his ribs slowly, curling beneath the edge of his bare back. “You’ve been nothing but careful.”

He closed his eyes, jaw tightening slightly like he was bracing himself.

“I’m sure I’ll be healed in a few days if you do hurt me,” you added with a small, teasing smile, your hand dragging lightly down to his waist. “But I don’t think you will.” His breath stuttered again.

Then, slowly–like gravity had shifted beneath the cot–he shifted. Just enough to lean into you a little more, to press his forehead against yours. And in doing so, his thigh slid between your legs.

You both froze.

Not because it hurt–not because it was wrong–but because the contact burned. The heat of him, solid and broad between your thighs, pressed right against the thin stretch of your shorts. His pants were soft against your bare skin, but it didn’t mute the sensation. If anything, it made it worse–warmer. Closer. You exhaled, soft and shaky, and your hips reacted before your mind could stop them–just the smallest roll forward, seeking more of that pressure.

Bob gasped.

It punched right out of his chest like he’d been struck, and his hand–once trembling, once cautious–gripped your waist with a firmer hold. His breath was fast now, shallow. You could feel it between your bodies, ghosting over your lips as he leaned in, nose brushing yours again.

“I-I can feel you,” He whispered, wrecked. “You’re–J-Jesus, you’re warm.”

You didn’t speak. You didn’t need to. You just nodded once, slow and deliberate, your eyes never leaving his.

Then you kissed him again.

This time, there was no room for hesitation.

Your mouth met his with urgency, hunger curling in your belly like a lit match. Your tongue swept against his, and he moaned into the kiss deep and low, like he couldn’t help it. His hand traveled up your side, over the curve of your waist and into the back of your shirt, until his palm was resting against your bare spine, burning into your skin.

You rocked against his thigh again, your body seeking out friction instinctively–and this time he moved with you. The muscle pressing firmer between yours, grounding you as his hand on your back pulled you closer, guiding your hips into a slow, desperate grind.

“You feel so good,” You whispered against his mouth, breathless. “God, Bob…”

His name broke something open in him.

He pulled back just enough to see your face, his pupils blown wide, cheeks flushed. Then he kissed you again–harder this time. Still tender, still worshipful–but laced with a growing edge of need. His hand moved down again, slipping over the curve of your ass, and he guided you against his thigh with a slow, upward drag that made your breath stutter in your throat.

“Y-You’re shaking,” He murmured, lips brushing your jaw, your cheekbone, your ear.

“I know,” You gasped, forehead pressed to his temple now, your hips still moving in slow, aching circles. “I can’t stop. I don’t want to stop.”

His hand slipped under the hem of your borrowed shirt, fingers splaying across the bare skin of your lower back. You could feel him everywhere now–his leg between yours, the heat of his breath, the burn in your core growing sharper with every rock of your hips. The cot creaked beneath you with the rhythm you were building, and he let out a low, wrecked sound as your lips found his again, sloppier this time, open-mouthed and breathless.

“I’ve d-dreamed about this,” He confessed into your mouth, voice breaking. “God—I’ve thought about this. So many nights. N-Not like this–not when you were hurt, I swear, I’d never–but just…”

“I know,” you said, your voice thick, your thighs trembling. “Me too. For so long.”

He groaned again, and you felt him–hard now, pressing against your hip through the soft cotton of his sweatpants. Your body responded instinctively, heat pooling low in your stomach as you whispered,

“Do you want to stop?” His head snapped up, eyes wide.

“No,” He said, so quickly it made you bite your lip. Then, quieter–almost reverently–he added, “I want…Everything. But only if you want it too.”

“I do,” You said, and the truth of it vibrated between you like the aftershock of something cosmic. “I want you, Bob.” Bob’s mouth crashed back into yours like he couldn’t bear the distance anymore–like the ache had finally outpaced his restraint.

There was nothing tentative left in the way he kissed you now.

It was hungry. Wet and deep and breathless, like he needed the taste of you to survive. His hand slid up beneath your shirt, palm pressing flat against the small of your back like he was trying to fuse you together. You could feel the heat of his skin, the tension in his muscles, the unmistakable hardness of him against your hip–and the sheer desperation he was fighting not to lose control.

Your moan poured straight into his mouth, and he swallowed it like he’d never wanted anything more.

Then he pulled back just slightly–just enough to press his forehead against yours again, panting, his lips red and kiss-bitten, his voice wrecked.

“C-Can I—” He swallowed hard, eyes flicking over your face, “I want you to…Could you lie on your back?”

You blinked, already breathless, and gave the smallest nod. “Yeah… Yeah, of course.”

Carefully, you shifted, rolling onto your back with a quiet gasp at the slight pull in your ribs–but it didn’t matter. Not when he was looking at you like that. Like you were holy. Like he couldn’t believe he got to see you like this–flushed, sprawled out in the borrowed shirt and compression shorts, thighs still trembling from grinding against his.

Bob sat up slightly, not climbing over you, not rushing. Just moving with care—like reverence had overtaken urgency. He leaned down slowly, bracing one forearm beside your ribs so he wouldn’t hurt you, and then kissed the side of your neck.

Not once.

But again. And again. And again.

Each kiss dragged longer than the last–wet, open-mouthed, the heat of his breath ghosting over your pulse point. His other hand slid up beneath your shirt again, fingertips grazing your bare waist, your ribs, your hip, his thumb dragging a line just above the band of your shorts like it was driving him out of his mind.

And then–

He groaned into your neck, barely holding himself back, and whispered raggedly, “G-God, I want to taste you.”

The sound of his voice like that–low and wrecked and reverent–made your entire body tighten.

“I’ve–I’ve wanted to for so long,” He continued, kissing just below your ear now, his breath uneven. “I’m not–I’m not trying to rush this, I swear. I just…I’m a giver. I want to make you feel good. I want–” His voice broke. “God, I-I want to devour you.” You can hear the way he was starving for it, the desperation lacing his words. Your legs shifted without thinking, thighs parting instinctively beneath the weight of those words. Your fingers curled into the thin sheet beneath you, heart pounding in your throat like it was trying to answer for you.

“Please…” You whispered, barely more than a breath.

That one word unraveled him.

Bob moved instantly.

He kissed your neck one more time, slower this time, like sealing something sacred. Then he dragged his lips down your throat, your collarbone, the soft space above your sternum. He pushed your shirt up inch by inch, pausing to mouth at the newly exposed skin as he went–tongue tracing, lips brushing, every breath of his turning molten against your skin.

“You’re so soft,” He murmured against your ribs, his voice thick with awe. “So warm…God, you smell like heaven…”

You lifted your hips slightly to help him as his hands slid to the waistband of your shorts. His fingers curled there for just a moment–trembling slightly, like the gravity of what he was about to do had fully landed.

Then, slowly, reverently, he tugged them down.

You felt the fabric peel away from your thighs, your hips, your core–and then you were bare before him, flushed and trembling and open. Bob dropped the shorts to the floor with shaking hands. His eyes flicked up your body, and for a second, he looked like he couldn’t breathe.

Then he looked up, meeting your eyes as he settled between your semi-closed thighs. He reached for your hands first, threading his fingers through yours, grounding you together. His palms were big and warm, his grip careful but sure.

“S-Spread your legs for me,” He whispered. “Please.”

You did. Without hesitation, without fear.

You opened yourself to him, thighs falling apart slowly beneath his hands, baring the most vulnerable parts of yourself under the warmth of his gaze. You felt the air shift around you, the intimacy of the moment wrapping the two of you in a breathless cocoon.

”Oh, g-god…” Bob whispered, eyes falling to your glistening core like he was witnessing a miracle. “You’re perfect.”

Then he kissed your inner thigh.

And again. And again.

Soft, slow, open-mouthed kisses up the inside of one leg, then the other–teeth just grazing, tongue leaving hot trails in his wake. He held your hands the whole time, squeezing gently as his mouth moved higher, closer, his breath fanning over slick heat now, and it made your hips twitch helplessly.

“You’re s-so open…So ready f-for me.”

“Bob–” You breathed, already dizzy.

“I want you to fall apart for me,” He whispered, like it was a promise. “I’m gonna worship you…E-Every inch of you.”

And then his mouth was on you.

Hot, wet, and perfect.

His tongue parted you gently, slow and deliberate, tasting you like he’d been starving for it–like your pleasure was the only thing that mattered. His nose pressed against your pelvis as he licked a slow stripe from your entrance up to your clit, moaning softly into you like the taste alone was intoxicating. Then his lips wrapped around your clit, suckling gently, his tongue flicking in delicate, deliberate patterns that sent sparks up your spine.

You arched with a cry, your legs twitching around his head.

He didn’t stop.

He just groaned low in his throat, the sound vibrating through you as he dragged you deeper into the rhythm–long, slow strokes of his tongue, then tight flicks, then that perfect pressure as he sucked again, never breaking pace.

His hands squeezed yours tighter, anchoring you.

You looked down and nearly lost it.

His eyes were open, locked on you, dark and glassy with desire. His light brown lashes were damp, cheeks flushed, the lower half of his face slick with your arousal–and he looked blissful. Like he’d found his heaven right there between your thighs.

“Y-You’re shaking,” He murmured against your clit, his breath rolling hot over your slick skin. His tongue slowed for a beat, lips brushing so gently it made you ache.

Then, with his eyes locked on yours, he whispered:

“D-Don’t hold back from me… I want to feel it all.”

You whimpered, the sound breaking unbidden from your throat as he released one of your hands and dragged his palm slowly down your thigh–his touch searing. He pressed it to your inner thigh first, thumb dragging through the mess he’d made of you. The sound it made–wet and obscene–had you clenching around nothing.

“Mmm, you’re soaked,” He breathed, voice cracking like he couldn’t quite comprehend it. His fingers dipped lower, teasing your entrance but not pressing in yet. “And it’s all for me…” He whispered.

“Bob—” Your voice broke on his name.

That was all it took.

His fingers slid into you–just one at first, slow and careful. You gasped, your hips twitching as your walls fluttered around him, already pulsing from how close he had you.

“Oh, my god…” He groaned, eyes fluttering. “You’re so tight–so warm–gripping me like you don’t wanna let go.” He eased in a second finger, curling both upward until he found that spot that made your entire body jolt.

Your back arched with a choked cry.

He groaned into your thigh, and then–still pumping his fingers slowly, perfectly–he leaned back in.

You reached for him instinctively, hand finding the golden-brown mess of his hair and curling into it hard as his mouth latched back onto your clit with a heat that bordered on holy.

He moaned at the contact like it fed him, like the combination of your body trembling around his fingers and the way you were dragging his face closer made him feral.

His tongue moved in tandem with his fingers now–lavishing your clit in slow circles while his fingers fucked up into you, curling with every drag, finding that rhythm that made stars explode behind your eyes.

“Bob–oh fuck, please–” you gasped, your voice wrecked, ragged, desperate.

He growled low and hot into your cunt, the vibration making your vision blur.

“That’s it,” He murmured, breathless. “That’s it, sweetheart. Let me hear it.”

Your hand fisted tighter in his hair, your other gripping the sheet like you were going to rip it from the mattress, and your thighs began to shake again–wider now, open for him, letting him take everything.

His pace quickened.

His fingers thrust deeper, faster, curling ruthlessly against that spot that made your mouth fall open in a silent scream, and his mouth never stopped–tongue relentless, lips swollen around your clit, his entire face buried between your legs like it was the only place he ever wanted to be.

“Y-You’re gonna come for me, aren’t you?” He said, his voice hoarse and soaked in awe. “Right on my tongue–gonna let me taste it all…”

Your body answered before your voice could.

Pleasure coiled tight, seizing hot and fast in your belly before it burst all at once, crashing through you like a wave as your orgasm hit, ripping through your body with a sob of his name. Your thighs clamped around his head and your back arched completely off the mattress as you came–so hard you couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think, couldn’t do anything but feel him.

He didn’t stop.

He kept his mouth on you, drinking you down like it was divine, his fingers fucking you through every last second of the high. You trembled, sobbed out a soft curse, and he moaned as you finally collapsed back to the bed, completely undone.

He pressed one last kiss to your inner thigh, then gently slid his fingers from you and looked up–his mouth slick, his eyes dark and molten.

And he smiled.

Like he’d been reborn.

“You taste like fucking paradise,” His smile faltered, lips still glistening as your chest rose and fell–slow, shallow, trembling with the aftershocks of what he’d just done to you.

Then your voice cut through the haze, low and wrecked.

“You should give me a sample then.”

Bob blinked.

His pupils dilated instantly–his breath catching so visibly in his throat it looked like he might choke on it. But his body obeyed before his mind caught up. Slowly, he rose to his knees, moving back over you with a dazed sort of focus, licking his lips like he wasn’t ready to give you any of it back. Like the taste of you was still burning on his tongue and he didn’t want to let it go.

You reached for him–fingers sliding around the back of his neck as you pulled him in, your lips parting just as his hovered over yours. He hesitated for the barest moment, like he was about to warn you that his mouth was still slick from you–but the look in your eyes told him you already knew. That you wanted it.

So he kissed you.

Slow at first–just the soft press of his mouth against yours, lips parting slightly. Then your tongue swept into him, tasting yourself on him, sweet and slick and warm. You moaned quietly and he shuddered against you. The kiss grew hotter, messier, your mouths opening more fully as he licked into you, groaning low when you sucked on his bottom lip just to feel the way it trembled.

A thin line of spit connected your mouths when you broke apart, trailing slowly from his lips to yours–and when you let your tongue flick out to catch it, Bob visibly swayed, like his knees nearly buckled.

“Jesus Christ,” he breathed, voice wrecked and raspy.

You didn’t let him catch his breath.

Instead, you slid your hand between your bodies and found his wrist–the one that had been inside you moments ago. Still slick. Still warm. His fingers were trembling slightly in the aftermath of holding you down through your orgasm.

You raised it to your mouth.

Bob’s breath hitched audibly as you guided his hand closer—and then licked.

Your tongue dragged slowly over his fingers, savoring the taste of yourself there. You moaned softly as your lips wrapped around two of them, sucking them clean with deliberate pressure, your eyes never leaving his.

He made a sound. A raw, broken groan that sounded like it had been ripped from the base of his spine.

“O-Oh my god Y/N…Y-You can’t do that–“

“You need to take your pants off, Bob…”You said it softly. Commanding. Like it wasn’t a question.

Bob stared at you for half a second, lips parted, cheeks flushed, sweat still glistening at his temples.

Then he moved.

His hands went to his waistband so fast he almost fumbled. You sat up slightly, wincing a little as your ribs protested the sudden movement–but you ignored it, too consumed by the heat pulsing between your legs and the weight of him in front of you. He pushed his sweatpants down his hips and off in one desperate motion, leaving him naked before you.

And God.

He was beautiful.

Hard and flushed, tip wet and glistening, his cock curved slightly toward his stomach with a heavy, pulsing need that made your mouth water. You let your eyes rake over him slowly, hungrily, and when they finally landed on his face again–he was watching you. Breathless. Waiting. Completely wrecked.

Then you peeled your shirt off.

Bob made another sound the second the fabric left your skin–a strangled, reverent sort of whimper, like he was witnessing a miracle and couldn’t decide if he was worthy of it.

You tossed it to the side, bare and open before him now–your chest rising in shallow, aroused breaths, nipples tight in the cool air of the safehouse, thighs still parted.

And Bob snapped.

Not roughly. Not without control.

But like he couldn’t not touch you anymore.

He surged forward, capturing your mouth in another searing kiss as one hand slid to your breast, cupping it gently, thumbing over your nipple in a slow, teasing drag that made you whimper into his mouth. His cock was pressing hot and heavy against your thigh now, and you rocked your hips up instinctively, catching the underside of him and dragging a moan from deep in his chest.

“I-I don’t know how I’m gonna last,” He whispered, panting against your mouth. “Y-You’re so perfect–I don’t wanna mess this up–”

“You won’t,” You whispered. “You won’t.”

“Tell me w-what you want,” He begged, voice cracking.

You reached between your bodies and wrapped your hand around him–hot and thick and pulsing in your palm–and whispered against his lips:

“I want to feel every inch of you…I want you to fuck me like I’m yours…Because I’ve always been yours.” His breath stuttered hard against your mouth when you wrapped your hand around him–fingers curling delicately at first, just enough to feel the weight, the heat, the way he pulsed against your palm. You stroked once. Then again. Slow. Languid. Your grip just shy of tight, your thumb circling the head as a slick bead of precum smeared across your skin.

Bob groaned.

It was deep and low, almost like it scared him–like pleasure this sharp wasn’t something he knew how to hold. His hand curled into the mattress beside your ribs, his other squeezing your hip as you leaned in and kissed him again, your lips softer now, teasing between strokes.

“You’re so warm,” you murmured against his mouth. “So hard for me…”

“F-Fuck–Y/N–“ He gasped your name like it was a prayer and a warning all at once. His hips jolted slightly into your grip, instinct overtaking restraint. “I–I can’t–if you keep doing that, I’m gonna–”

You smiled.

Slow. Sweet. Wicked.

“Just wanted to be a bit of a tease…” You whispered, brushing your lips down along his jaw, to the shell of his ear, where your voice dropped even lower. “I’ve been dreaming of this too, you know. Thinking about how you’d sound when I touched you like this… “ He whimpered at your words, his erection twitching in your hand. Then, slowly—purposefully–you guided him down, dragging the tip of him through your soaked folds. The moment his head brushed your clit, your whole body jolted. Your back arched slightly, breath catching in your throat as the contact sent a white-hot pulse up your spine. Bob gasped, shuddering, and you felt his hands tighten around your hips like he was barely keeping himself grounded.

“Oh my god–” He whispered, his voice wrecked, trembling with restraint. “I c-can’t believe how wet you are…I-I can feel it everywhere–”

“Then don’t just feel it,” you murmured, guiding him lower, “Be inside it…” You shifted your hips–just enough to angle him right where you needed him. The blunt head of his cock pressed against your entrance, slick and swollen, and your whole body went still with anticipation.

Bob’s gaze locked on yours, dark and full of wonder. He leaned in, kissed you one more time–messy and soft and hungry–and then, with a trembling breath, he began to push forward.

You both moaned.

It was slow. Unbearably slow.

He eased inside an inch at a time, every stretch making your breath stutter, your thighs tremble. He was thick–perfectly so–and your body gave way for him inch by aching inch, clenching around the intrusion with desperate heat.

“God, y-you’re so tight,” Bob gasped, burying his face against your neck, breath hitching with every inch he sank deeper. “Y-You feel like—God, I don’t even have words…” He let out a broken sound against your throat and pushed in the rest of the way, bottoming out with a low, desperate groan. You gasped, arching again, your body seizing around the full stretch of him—full, full, so fucking full.

He didn’t move. Not at first.

He just stayed there, buried to the hilt inside you, his arms shaking as he held himself over you, forehead pressed to yours. His voice was hoarse when he spoke.

“I-I’m not gonna last long if I move—I’m sorry—I just—God, you feel so good—”

Your legs curled around his waist, drawing him in tighter.

“Then make it messy,” you whispered. “Make it yours.”

He moaned again—this time louder, hungrier—and then he began to move.

Slow thrusts, deep and aching, the kind that made your whole body roll with him. Each drag of his cock inside you made your eyes flutter, made your mouth fall open, made the air between you heavy with slick, wet sounds and broken breaths. The safehouse filled with them—your whispered gasps, his groaned praise, the sharp slap of skin against skin as he found a rhythm.

Your hands roamed his back, his shoulders, up into his damp hair again as you whispered his name over and over like it was the only thing you could remember.

“Y/N… Y/N… f-fuck, I love the way you say my name like that—”

His thrusts grew deeper. Hotter.

He kissed you again, messier this time, tongue sliding into your mouth as he fucked you in long, rolling motions. Every time his hips met yours, you felt his body tremble—like he was on the edge of unraveling. Your walls pulsed around him, already fluttering with the build of another orgasm, and you could feel him twitching inside you with every pass.

“You’re gripping me so fucking tight,” he gasped. “I-I can feel you clenching—are you gonna come again?”

“Yes—yes, I’m so close—Bob, please—” Your voice cracked, your nails dragging down his back. “Don’t stop—don’t stop—”

And he didn’t.

He fucked you harder—still careful, still reverent—but with a heat now, a desperate edge that left you both trembling. His cock drove into you deep, each thrust stroking perfectly against your inner walls, and when his hand snuck between your bodies to rub your clit in tight, aching circles, you came again with a cry.

You clenched down hard, pulsing around him, and he groaned so loud it echoed against the cement walls.

“Shit–I’m–I’m gonna come–”

“Inside,” You gasped. “Come inside me, Bob–please–” You begged.

His body seized.

He slammed into you one last time, hips grinding deep, and he came with a broken moan of your name–hot and thick and endless, filling you completely. His hips stuttered with it, his whole body trembling above you as he buried himself to the hilt and spilled everything he had inside you.

For a long moment, you just stayed like that.

Panting. Holding. Shaking.

His forehead pressed to yours again, both your bodies slick with sweat and tangled in a heat that went beyond physical. You could feel the pulse of him still throbbing inside you, the warmth of his release held deep, the silence now full only with the sound of your heartbeats trying to remember their rhythm.

Then he pulled back just enough to see you.

His eyes, still glassy and dark from everything he’d just felt, softened. And before you could say a word, he leaned in and kissed you.

Soft.

So gentle it made your throat ache.

His lips moved over yours with reverence, like he needed to prove he could still be tender after what you’d just shared–like he needed to show you the sweetness, the weight of what this was to him. The kiss lingered, not heated, not rushed. Just the kind of kiss people gave when they wanted to say thank you and I’m yours and I’ve been waiting all in one breath.

You smiled against his mouth.

He pulled back slightly, cheeks flushed, eyes flicking between yours as he gave a soft, breathless laugh.

“I-I should’ve tried to get on a mission sooner,” he whispered, still so close. “E-Evidently you’ve been waiting for this to be your key opportunity to c-confess your feelings.”

You let out a snort–delicate at first, then fuller, warmer, and suddenly you were both laughing. Quiet and exhausted and elated. The kind of laughter that bubbled up not from something funny, but from relief, from joy, from the giddy realization that you were finally here.

“I mean, come on,” You said between giggles, tilting your head back slightly against the pillow. “One cot, remote location, no backup, post-injury caretaking–it was practically begging for some sort of confession to be made…”

Bob groaned, laughing into the crook of your neck. “G-God, you’re evil.”

You ran your fingers through his sweat-damp hair, still smiling. “I’m efficient.”

He huffed a quiet laugh again, then pressed a kiss to your jaw, then one to your cheek, then finally one to the center of your chest, right above your heart. His hands were still on you—one warm and wide on your thigh, the other trailing light circles at your waist.

You could feel the smile on his lips when he spoke again, lower now, a little more serious, a little more honest.

“I’ve wanted to tell you for a long time,” He whispered. “That you…You mean more to me than anyone. I just—I didn’t think I–I was ready. Not after everything.”

You turned your head, brushing your nose against his, your voice soft.

“I knew you wanted to,” You said. “I’ve known for a while.”

He looked at you then, like you’d just told him the sun had always risen for him and he’d never noticed. His eyes were wide, lips parted. And for a moment, neither of you moved.

Then he smiled again. And you did too.

Because whatever waited for you tomorrow–whatever fallout or chaos or impossible mission the world had in store–right now, in this small, sweat-slicked space, wrapped in sheets and each other…

2K notes · View notes

i2rizz · 3 months ago

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Pre-relationship! Isagi who thought he was being subtle about his crush.

Until he made a PowerPoint ranking all the times you smiled at him.

Slide 7 was “smile #3 at the vending machine—possibly meant for me”

He never showed it to you (thank God), but Reo found it.

You still don't know Isagi once wrote-

“Yoichi + Y/n = Tactical Pairing” in his planner with little hearts.

Pre-relationship! Kaiser who called you annoying every time you breathed near him.

But bought two of everything in the vending machine just in case you wanted one.

When you asked why he had an extra melon soda:

“Hah? I’m not giving it to you. But like. If you took it. Whatever”

Also: tackled a guy in dodgeball for hitting you once. “It was strategy”

He’s in love. Deep. Denial level: Olympic gold.

Pre-relationship! Barou who screamed at you to stop walking alone at night.

You: “Then walk with me?”

Barou: “I’M NOT YOUR DOG”

Proceeds to follow you the entire way like a furious Rottweiler.

Buys two protein bars, then shoves one in your bag. “Don’t be weak.”

You: “Aww, thank you.”

Barou: “It’s not for you. I dropped it.”

It was still sealed.

Pre-relationship! Sae who spotted you standing at the vending machine, trying to decide between two drinks, and silently sighed.

After a few moments of you struggling to pick, he just walked over, hit the button for both, and handed them to you without saying a word.

You stared at him, baffled. “You didn’t even ask—”

“Clearly, you were having trouble,” he muttered before walking off, leaving you clutching two drinks and wondering if he’d actually done something nice.

Pre-relationship! Rin who once saw you drop your pencil case in the hallway and, without thinking, lunged to grab it before you could even bend down.

You blinked in surprise as Rin awkwardly thrust it back into your hands, face red.

“Uh... I wasn’t trying to be helpful or anything,” he mumbled, a little too defensive.

“Yeah, I figured” you said, grinning as he walked away, clearly pretending he didn’t care.

You made a mental note to thank him later. Somehow, you knew he’d do it again.

Pre-relationship! Bachira Who noticed you sketching in the back of class, completely absorbed in your own world.

One day, he decided to sit next to you, not even trying to talk, just staring at your artwork with a grin on his face.

“You’re drawing again. Wanna show me?”

You hesitated but handed over your sketchbook.

To your surprise, he started adding random little doodles and silly comments.

“Yeah, but I think it needs more monsters. Maybe a dragon? Definitely a dragon”

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novthirty · 4 months ago

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CANDID | the picture he keeps of you vs. the picture you keep of him ੈ characters: zayne, rafayel, xavier, sylus, caleb

ao3 | masterlist | requests are open!

ZAYNE

He keeps a picture of you on your most recent anniversary in his wallet, a lovely picture of you under the dim restaurant lighting, dressed in an evening gown, holding the bouquet of flowers he had just gotten you. He switches it out each year, on every anniversary.

He is also definitely the type of doctor who keeps pictures of his family in his office. On his desk, he keeps a framed photo of your wedding day, a reminder of why he works so hard and to come home early to you. It also comes with the added bonus of warding off patients wanting to matchmake him with their daughters.

Meanwhile, you have him as your wallpaper, with a widget displaying the schedule of his surgeries for that week. It’s a candid picture of him from one of your cafe dates, making you another seal with his evol.

Even on mornings or nights where the two of you can’t be together because of work, he can still be the first thing you see after you wake up and the last before you fall asleep.

RAFAYEL

He has lots of pictures of you, but what he treasures most are the detailed sketches he’s made of your likeness.

He memorized every detail of your face, can draw you from memory from all the years you had been separated. He probably has hundreds of various art pieces inspired by you in his studio, from full-on paintings to cafe napkin sketches; you can see the love he poured into every line.

You, on the other hand, have that one goofy 0.5 picture you snuck of him looking up at you from the couch, the angle making him look like a blowfish 😭

Just to mess with him, you printed and laminated it, attaching it to a small acrylic guppy keychain. He gets irritated whenever he looks at it and tries to sneak it away, but whenever he succeeds it always gets replaced by an exact copy within the day.

It slightly appeased to see that he’s your phone wallpaper; this time, a more flattering angle of him (but that won’t stop him from trying to destroy that cursed photo)

XAVIER

Being a bit more traditional, he keeps a physical picture. It’s a polaroid photo of you sitting cross-legged on the couch with the most content look on your face, during one of your movie night dinners.

It’s a candid picture, where he took you by surprise as the flash went off, you scolding him right after for wasting film when you’re not dressed up whatsoever.

But he treasures it, thinks you look gorgeous and secretly loves the fact this is the only copy of this moment to exist and no one but him gets to see it.

Your picture is one of him sleeping, a really cute one where he’s bundled up in a blanket with the plushies you guys had just won that day.

(It had been the first time he succeeded in your lessons and won at the crane machine, where you had promised to reward him with a kiss.)

You have it framed on your work desk, and he gets embarrassed every time one of your coworkers comments on it.

SYLUS

Sylus is definitely the type to have an ornate square locket (probably expensive and made from real gold) always in his pocket.

The picture on one side being the most ethereal looking picture that’s ever been taken of you, wearing an expensive gown at one of the fancy events related to Onychinus.

On the other side, it’s a picture of you pouting in your sleep, drool on your chin as you snuggle up to the crow plushie he won for you on a date.

You’ve tried numerous times to get back at him for the picture of you sleeping (and the other silly pictures he’s collected in an album on his phone), but this man just keeps evading you.

Until one day, you decide to get revenge and put an adoringly captured picture of Mephisto in a necklace, showing it off in front of him.

It’s the last straw that finally makes him give in, letting you take a picture of him in the matching set of pink dinosaur pajamas you got for the two of you, with a bunny headband to boot.

He gifted you a matching locket to his, where you now keep that picture and one of him holding flowers on your anniversary.

(But you still keep that lovely photo of Mephie on your desk 💕)

CALEB

His picture of you is a time-worn photograph from before his “death.”

The two of you were on a picnic, with you wearing a sundress, wind in your hair, a big smile on your face as you look towards the camera— towards him.

It’s one of the only things he kept after the explosion, and he always keeps it with him; in his pocket, in his bedside table, a reminder of what keeps him going.

(It’s lowkey giving an action movie protagonist and the dead wife he’s trying to avenge)

Meanwhile, you have a double-sided top loader decorated with stickers, with one side being a picture of him in his colonel uniform, and the other a shirtless picture you snuck of him while he was working out,,

You always carry it in your bag; you don’t have a lot of public pictures of him as his status (of, well, being alive 😭) hasn’t been changed in Linkon yet, so something discreet like this is a silly way for you to still have a reminder of him even when you’re apart.

inspired by the toploaders i keep of my friends, i like collecting all their 0.5 pictures and saving them into one album :> like/reblog if you enjoyed!

#novthirty-writes #love and deepspace #caleb x reader #sylus x reader #zayne x reader #xavier x reader #rafayel x reader #caleb x you #sylus x you #zayne x you #xavier x you #rafayel x you #lads caleb #lads sylus #lads zayne #lads xavier #lads rafayel

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mostlysignssomeportents · 7 months ago

Text

Bossware is unfair (in the legal sense, too)

You can get into a lot of trouble by assuming that rich people know what they're doing. For example, might assume that ad-tech works – bypassing peoples' critical faculties, reaching inside their minds and brainwashing them with Big Data insights, because if that's not what's happening, then why would rich people pour billions into those ads?

https://pluralistic.net/2020/12/06/surveillance-tulip-bulbs/#adtech-bubble

You might assume that private equity looters make their investors rich, because otherwise, why would rich people hand over trillions for them to play with?

https://thenextrecession.wordpress.com/2024/11/19/private-equity-vampire-capital/

The truth is, rich people are suckers like the rest of us. If anything, succeeding once or twice makes you an even bigger mark, with a sense of your own infallibility that inflates to fill the bubble your yes-men seal you inside of.

Rich people fall for scams just like you and me. Anyone can be a mark. I was:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/02/05/cyber-dunning-kruger/#swiss-cheese-security

But though rich people can fall for scams the same way you and I do, the way those scams play out is very different when the marks are wealthy. As Keynes had it, "The market can remain irrational longer than you can remain solvent." When the marks are rich (or worse, super-rich), they can be played for much longer before they go bust, creating the appearance of solidity.

Noted Keynesian John Kenneth Galbraith had his own thoughts on this. Galbraith coined the term "bezzle" to describe "the magic interval when a confidence trickster knows he has the money he has appropriated but the victim does not yet understand that he has lost it." In that magic interval, everyone feels better off: the mark thinks he's up, and the con artist knows he's up.

Rich marks have looong bezzles. Empirically incorrect ideas grounded in the most outrageous superstition and junk science can take over whole sections of your life, simply because a rich person – or rich people – are convinced that they're good for you.

Take "scientific management." In the early 20th century, the con artist Frederick Taylor convinced rich industrialists that he could increase their workers' productivity through a kind of caliper-and-stopwatch driven choreographry:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/08/21/great-taylors-ghost/#solidarity-or-bust

Taylor and his army of labcoated sadists perched at the elbows of factory workers (whom Taylor referred to as "stupid," "mentally sluggish," and as "an ox") and scripted their motions to a fare-the-well, transforming their work into a kind of kabuki of obedience. They weren't more efficient, but they looked smart, like obedient robots, and this made their bosses happy. The bosses shelled out fortunes for Taylor's services, even though the workers who followed his prescriptions were less efficient and generated fewer profits. Bosses were so dazzled by the spectacle of a factory floor of crisply moving people interfacing with crisply working machines that they failed to understand that they were losing money on the whole business.

To the extent they noticed that their revenues were declining after implementing Taylorism, they assumed that this was because they needed more scientific management. Taylor had a sweet con: the worse his advice performed, the more reasons their were to pay him for more advice.

Taylorism is a perfect con to run on the wealthy and powerful. It feeds into their prejudice and mistrust of their workers, and into their misplaced confidence in their own ability to understand their workers' jobs better than their workers do. There's always a long dollar to be made playing the "scientific management" con.

Today, there's an app for that. "Bossware" is a class of technology that monitors and disciplines workers, and it was supercharged by the pandemic and the rise of work-from-home. Combine bossware with work-from-home and your boss gets to control your life even when in your own place – "work from home" becomes "live at work":

https://pluralistic.net/2021/02/24/gwb-rumsfeld-monsters/#bossware

Gig workers are at the white-hot center of bossware. Gig work promises "be your own boss," but bossware puts a Taylorist caliper wielder into your phone, monitoring and disciplining you as you drive your wn car around delivering parcels or picking up passengers.

In automation terms, a worker hitched to an app this way is a "reverse centaur." Automation theorists call a human augmented by a machine a "centaur" – a human head supported by a machine's tireless and strong body. A "reverse centaur" is a machine augmented by a human – like the Amazon delivery driver whose app goads them to make inhuman delivery quotas while punishing them for looking in the "wrong" direction or even singing along with the radio:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/08/02/despotism-on-demand/#virtual-whips

Bossware pre-dates the current AI bubble, but AI mania has supercharged it. AI pumpers insist that AI can do things it positively cannot do – rolling out an "autonomous robot" that turns out to be a guy in a robot suit, say – and rich people are groomed to buy the services of "AI-powered" bossware:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/01/29/pay-no-attention/#to-the-little-man-behind-the-curtain

For an AI scammer like Elon Musk or Sam Altman, the fact that an AI can't do your job is irrelevant. From a business perspective, the only thing that matters is whether a salesperson can convince your boss that an AI can do your job – whether or not that's true:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/07/25/accountability-sinks/#work-harder-not-smarter

The fact that AI can't do your job, but that your boss can be convinced to fire you and replace you with the AI that can't do your job, is the central fact of the 21st century labor market. AI has created a world of "algorithmic management" where humans are demoted to reverse centaurs, monitored and bossed about by an app.

The techbro's overwhelming conceit is that nothing is a crime, so long as you do it with an app. Just as fintech is designed to be a bank that's exempt from banking regulations, the gig economy is meant to be a workplace that's exempt from labor law. But this wheeze is transparent, and easily pierced by enforcers, so long as those enforcers want to do their jobs. One such enforcer is Alvaro Bedoya, an FTC commissioner with a keen interest in antitrust's relationship to labor protection.

Bedoya understands that antitrust has a checkered history when it comes to labor. As he's written, the history of antitrust is a series of incidents in which Congress revised the law to make it clear that forming a union was not the same thing as forming a cartel, only to be ignored by boss-friendly judges:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/04/14/aiming-at-dollars/#not-men

Bedoya is no mere historian. He's an FTC Commissioner, one of the most powerful regulators in the world, and he's profoundly interested in using that power to help workers, especially gig workers, whose misery starts with systemic, wide-scale misclassification as contractors:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/02/02/upward-redistribution/

In a new speech to NYU's Wagner School of Public Service, Bedoya argues that the FTC's existing authority allows it to crack down on algorithmic management – that is, algorithmic management is illegal, even if you break the law with an app:

https://www.ftc.gov/system/files/ftc_gov/pdf/bedoya-remarks-unfairness-in-workplace-surveillance-and-automated-management.pdf

Bedoya starts with a delightful analogy to The Hawtch-Hawtch, a mythical town from a Dr Seuss poem. The Hawtch-Hawtch economy is based on beekeeping, and the Hawtchers develop an overwhelming obsession with their bee's laziness, and determine to wring more work (and more honey) out of him. So they appoint a "bee-watcher." But the bee doesn't produce any more honey, which leads the Hawtchers to suspect their bee-watcher might be sleeping on the job, so they hire a bee-watcher-watcher. When that doesn't work, they hire a bee-watcher-watcher-watcher, and so on and on.

For gig workers, it's bee-watchers all the way down. Call center workers are subjected to "AI" video monitoring, and "AI" voice monitoring that purports to measure their empathy. Another AI times their calls. Two more AIs analyze the "sentiment" of the calls and the success of workers in meeting arbitrary metrics. On average, a call-center worker is subjected to five forms of bossware, which stand at their shoulders, marking them down and brooking no debate.

For example, when an experienced call center operator fielded a call from a customer with a flooded house who wanted to know why no one from her boss's repair plan system had come out to address the flooding, the operator was punished by the AI for failing to try to sell the customer a repair plan. There was no way for the operator to protest that the customer had a repair plan already, and had called to complain about it.

Workers report being sickened by this kind of surveillance, literally – stressed to the point of nausea and insomnia. Ironically, one of the most pervasive sources of automation-driven sickness are the "AI wellness" apps that bosses are sold by AI hucksters:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/03/15/wellness-taylorism/#sick-of-spying

The FTC has broad authority to block "unfair trade practices," and Bedoya builds the case that this is an unfair trade practice. Proving an unfair trade practice is a three-part test: a practice is unfair if it causes "substantial injury," can't be "reasonably avoided," and isn't outweighed by a "countervailing benefit." In his speech, Bedoya makes the case that algorithmic management satisfies all three steps and is thus illegal.

On the question of "substantial injury," Bedoya describes the workday of warehouse workers working for ecommerce sites. He describes one worker who is monitored by an AI that requires him to pick and drop an object off a moving belt every 10 seconds, for ten hours per day. The worker's performance is tracked by a leaderboard, and supervisors punish and scold workers who don't make quota, and the algorithm auto-fires if you fail to meet it.

Under those conditions, it was only a matter of time until the worker experienced injuries to two of his discs and was permanently disabled, with the company being found 100% responsible for this injury. OSHA found a "direct connection" between the algorithm and the injury. No wonder warehouses sport vending machines that sell painkillers rather than sodas. It's clear that algorithmic management leads to "substantial injury."

What about "reasonably avoidable?" Can workers avoid the harms of algorithmic management? Bedoya describes the experience of NYC rideshare drivers who attended a round-table with him. The drivers describe logging tens of thousands of successful rides for the apps they work for, on promise of "being their own boss." But then the apps start randomly suspending them, telling them they aren't eligible to book a ride for hours at a time, sending them across town to serve an underserved area and still suspending them. Drivers who stop for coffee or a pee are locked out of the apps for hours as punishment, and so drive 12-hour shifts without a single break, in hopes of pleasing the inscrutable, high-handed app.

All this, as drivers' pay is falling and their credit card debts are mounting. No one will explain to drivers how their pay is determined, though the legal scholar Veena Dubal's work on "algorithmic wage discrimination" reveals that rideshare apps temporarily increase the pay of drivers who refuse rides, only to lower it again once they're back behind the wheel:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/04/12/algorithmic-wage-discrimination/#fishers-of-men

This is like the pit boss who gives a losing gambler some freebies to lure them back to the table, over and over, until they're broke. No wonder they call this a "casino mechanic." There's only two major rideshare apps, and they both use the same high-handed tactics. For Bedoya, this satisfies the second test for an "unfair practice" – it can't be reasonably avoided. If you drive rideshare, you're trapped by the harmful conduct.

The final prong of the "unfair practice" test is whether the conduct has "countervailing value" that makes up for this harm.

To address this, Bedoya goes back to the call center, where operators' performance is assessed by "Speech Emotion Recognition" algorithms, a psuedoscientific hoax that purports to be able to determine your emotions from your voice. These SERs don't work – for example, they might interpret a customer's laughter as anger. But they fail differently for different kinds of workers: workers with accents – from the American south, or the Philippines – attract more disapprobation from the AI. Half of all call center workers are monitored by SERs, and a quarter of workers have SERs scoring them "constantly."

Bossware AIs also produce transcripts of these workers' calls, but workers with accents find them "riddled with errors." These are consequential errors, since their bosses assess their performance based on the transcripts, and yet another AI produces automated work scores based on them.

In other words, algorithmic management is a procession of bee-watchers, bee-watcher-watchers, and bee-watcher-watcher-watchers, stretching to infinity. It's junk science. It's not producing better call center workers. It's producing arbitrary punishments, often against the best workers in the call center.

There is no "countervailing benefit" to offset the unavoidable substantial injury of life under algorithmic management. In other words, algorithmic management fails all three prongs of the "unfair practice" test, and it's illegal.

What should we do about it? Bedoya builds the case for the FTC acting on workers' behalf under its "unfair practice" authority, but he also points out that the lack of worker privacy is at the root of this hellscape of algorithmic management.

He's right. The last major update Congress made to US privacy law was in 1988, when they banned video-store clerks from telling the newspapers which VHS cassettes you rented. The US is long overdue for a new privacy regime, and workers under algorithmic management are part of a broad coalition that's closer than ever to making that happen:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/12/06/privacy-first/#but-not-just-privacy

Workers should have the right to know which of their data is being collected, who it's being shared by, and how it's being used. We all should have that right. That's what the actors' strike was partly motivated by: actors who were being ordered to wear mocap suits to produce data that could be used to produce a digital double of them, "training their replacement," but the replacement was a deepfake.

With a Trump administration on the horizon, the future of the FTC is in doubt. But the coalition for a new privacy law includes many of Trumpland's most powerful blocs – like Jan 6 rioters whose location was swept up by Google and handed over to the FBI. A strong privacy law would protect their Fourth Amendment rights – but also the rights of BLM protesters who experienced this far more often, and with far worse consequences, than the insurrectionists.

The "we do it with an app, so it's not illegal" ruse is wearing thinner by the day. When you have a boss for an app, your real boss gets an accountability sink, a convenient scapegoat that can be blamed for your misery.

The fact that this makes you worse at your job, that it loses your boss money, is no guarantee that you will be spared. Rich people make great marks, and they can remain irrational longer than you can remain solvent. Markets won't solve this one – but worker power can.

Image: Cryteria (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:HAL9000.svg

CC BY 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en

#pluralistic #alvaro bedoya #ftc #workers #algorithmic management #veena dubal #bossware #taylorism #neotaylorism #snake oil #dr seuss #ai #sentiment analysis #digital phrenology #speech emotion recognition #shitty technology adoption curve

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clockwayswrites · 29 days ago

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The Haunting of Danny Fenton

Chapter 5, Part 1

Masterpost (pls no editing. am still sick. *cough cough*)

Over the nexts few weeks, the team worked tirelessly. They played with the laws of science and magic and things unknown to try and bring Wally back. With every adjustment to the machine, Wally’s signal got stronger.

Danny got sicker.

His spirits stayed strong. Danny was clearly driven by getting Wally back, even at the expense of himself. Dick did what he could to help. He brought the team food, lured Danny away to rest, and carried him to bed when he fell asleep in the lab, yet again. It was hard to watch Danny destroy himself, but it wasn’t something that Dick could stop. Selfishly, he also didn’t want to; he needed Wally back.

That day, though, felt like a turning point. That day, Danny suggested himself that he take a break instead of having to be gently bullied into taking one.

“Drink this,” Dick ordered as he passed Danny a bottle of electrolyte drink.

Danny eyed the purple concoction dubiously, but eventually broke the seal and took a sip. “That’s nasty.”

“Yeah, but it’s good for you,” Dick said. He ran his fingers through Danny’s hair, knowing how much the other liked that. “Are you up to eating something?”

“Yeah, I’m fine,” Danny said with a dismissive little wave.

Wally huffed. “You are not fine!”

“Wally,” Danny sighed.

“Don’t Wally me!” Wally snapped back. “You aren’t fine! We can all see that you’re not fine!”

“Any what do you want me to do about it?! This is how we get you back!” Danny motioned, the purple drink splashing. He cussed softly and wiped at his hand with his the sleeve of the flannel shirt he wore (borrowed from Wally’s closet). When he continued, he sounded so defeated. “This is how we get you back. I wanted you back before, sure, but how I know you, Wally. I know kind and funny and caring you are. I know how much you mean to everyone. We have to get you back.”

“It’s hurting you,” Wally pleaded.

“Yeah,” Danny said with a worrying shrug. “But lots of things do. I’m broken, Walls, I have been since the first time I died when I was fourteen. And sure, at the time I could ignore most of it. I had the power of youth on my side and the drive of being a teen hero. Y’all know how it is. But I’m not a teen anymore. And I’ve died again. And I guess a third time now too.

“Going to the grocery story hurts me. Stressful classes hurt me. My stupid closet of a room hurts me! At least with this I’m doing something good. I get it. I know that this might make everything worse long term. I know that I’m risking myself, but it’s a risk I’m willing to take to get you back, okay? Can’t you just respect that? That this is my choice?”

Wally slumped into himself, rubbing at his own face. “Dick, give Danny a kiss on the forehead for me, okay?”

“Dick’s not going to—” Danny started and then promptly shut up when Dick leaned over and pressed a long, soft kiss to Danny’s temple. “Oh.”

“I’m pretty sure that I know if my boyfriend is willing to kiss the cute guy I’m crushing on,” Wally said with that smug little note to his voice that Dick was so fond of.

Danny startled. “Wait, boyfriend? Crushing on? What?”

“I think you’re cute and sweet and pretty damn wonderful, even if you’re a reckless idiot,” Wally said. He crouched down so that he could meed Danny’s eyes. “But reckless idiot is a little my type.”

“Hey!” Dick protested with a laugh.

Wally just shot him an innocent smile before he focused back on Danny. “Dick and I started date in an open relationship. We were young, he was still figuring things out and exploring. It worked. So, once I’m back and you’re feeling alright, I’d like to take you out on a date. If you want to date me, I mean.”

“Us,” Dick added. “If you’d want to date us.”

“Us?” Wally repeated hopefully.

“Us. I think that you’re pretty amazing too, Danny. And…” Dick paused for a moment as he thought of how to phrase what he was feeling. “Well, at this point of where Wally and I are, I think that I’d much rather add someone to our relationship, rather than have a separate one going on. If you’re okay with it, I’d like to try an us.”

“I, um, that’s—” Danny stopped to clear his throat. His face was flushed an adorable pink. (Dick always did like blushers.) “You two know how to make a guy feel special, don’t you? I, yeah, I’d like to try. But also I get it if once Wally’s back you two change your mind or something, like there will be no hard feel—”

Dick leaned in and shut Danny up with a kiss. His lips tasted of purple and ozone.

“Hey! No fair!” Wally whined. “I found him first, I should have gotten to kiss him first!”

The kiss dissolved into giggles and Dick cheerfully flicked Wally off as Danny buried his face against Dick’s neck. “Your kisses are toxic.”

“My—no! Okay, I mean, not me kisses specifically! Danny, don’t listen to him. As soon as I won’t cause you a seizure anymore, I’ll show you what real kissing is like,” Wally pleaded.

Danny just continued to laugh. He was leaning heavily into Dick now, who leaned back against the arm of the couch and just let Danny drape over him.

“It’s okay, Wally,” Dick said. “I know you’re a good kisser. You’re also very good at—”

“Okay! Thank you Dick!” Wally interrupted. He was still a little staticy in appearance, but Dick could tell that Wally was blushing. (Dick really did love blushers.) “We’ll save that sort of talk for after a few dates, okay?”

“Sure, if you want. I think it’s a good selling point though,” Dick said innocently.

Wally rolled his eyes and and flopped down on the couch. Parts of him were going through the couch, and he had to stay carefully away from Danny, but it was so good to see Wally sitting there in the living room relaxed and nearly solid. It gave Dick hope, and hope was a dangerously wonderful thing.

Dick played with the short hair at the base of Danny’s scalp. “So, no food right now?”

“You’re the one who laid down,” Danny pointed out through a yawn.

Dick gave a noncommittal hum. “How about I see if the others want to order in and we can all eat when it shows up. Maybe Indian?”

“Indian is good,” Danny agreed. He sounded half asleep already. “Get me… buttered chicken and naan. Lots of naan.”

“We’ll have naan for days,” Dick assured him. He kept up the light petting until Danny went lax with sleep.

#gasp more haunting!#dp x dc #danny/dick/wally #danny/dick #danny/wally #thodf

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pathologicalreid · 7 days ago

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born in a burning house | s.r.

in which an arsonist is going around and abducting children, with your daughter as their next target

who? spencer reid x fem!reader category: angst content warnings: arson, child endangerment, references the popular kids, the instincts, and amplification, girl dad!spencer, happy ending word count: 4.21k a/n: as my good friend haley would say: baby arson! happy father's day (if you didn't figure out why i was posting every day, it was because of father's day. i'm going to take a nap now.)

Tears that welled in your eyes made it impossible for you to read the papers in front of you. The descriptions of violent crimes being committed against children made your chest feel tight, and you continuously had to hold yourself back from calling your nanny. You trusted Sydney, and she’d been vetted by Penelope, who’d used the strictest scrutiny possible when conducting a background check.

Tapping on the screen of your phone to wake it up, you were met with an image of your daughter. You had fast enough reflexes to snap a photo of her very first smile. Spencer had the same photo printed out on his desk.

You took a deep breath, you returned to the case file that Hotch handed you. Someone had already skimmed through it, removing all of the photos before it landed on your desk, protecting you from your job.

It didn’t take a profiler to know why they’d done it. Someone was going around the tri-state area and abducting children, going younger each time, and each child had turned up dead less than twenty-four hours later. Your daughter was only four months old, you were fresh off of maternity leave, and despite the fact that Hotch had offered you a way out, you were determined to stay on this case. It was your first big one since coming back, and if you couldn’t handle this, you couldn’t handle your job anymore.

“Hey,” Spencer said from behind you, entering the roundtable room and taking a seat next to you. He eyed the file suspiciously, scrutinizing the details of the page before turning his attention to you. “How are you holding up?”

Refraining from taking your eyes off of the files, you hummed in response, flipping through the pages before truly answering. “If the UnSub sticks to pattern, they’ll be abducting another baby soon,” you reminded him, “and they’ll go younger.”

Spencer was quiet for a moment, acknowledging the same thing you’d been anxious about for the past day. The last child who had been abducted was seven months old, a little boy whose mother you’d comforted until you had to excuse yourself. He eyed your phone, “Did you call?”

“No,” you answered miserably, you’d been holding back. You were afraid of recognizing it as a threat. “Do you think I should?”

He sighed, pressing a kiss to the crown of your head, “I think that if worrying about Annie gets in the way of working this case, then you should probably call Sydney.”

Nodding slowly, you tapped the screen of your phone again, looking at the photo of your daughter that illuminated the screen. You picked up the phone, deciding you’d make the call out of an abundance of caution, you opened your contacts and dialed Sydney’s number, holding the phone to your ear while it rang.

And rang.

When you got her voicemail instead of a real answer, you frowned up at your husband. “Uh, Hey, Syd. Spencer and I just wanted to give you a call to check in and see how Annaliese is doing. Give me a call back.”

You hung up the phone, pursing your lips at the fact that the action intended to quell your anxiety had only made you more nervous. In the albeit short time you’d known Sydney, you’d never gotten her voicemail, the sound was so foreign to you that it’d taken you a moment to even realize you’d gotten the machine. “What’s going on?” Hotch asked, walking into the roundtable room on the other side, Kate and Derek following close behind him.

“Uh,” you said, your voice breaking a seal of emotion in your throat. “Our nanny isn’t answering the phone.” You sent her a quick text asking her how it’s going before looking back up at your boss.

Hotch took one look at you and Spencer before nodding, “Go home and check in.” You stood up from your chair at his direction. He shook his head before you could protest, “Take JJ with you.”

Just in case. He didn’t have to say the words, but you knew that was his intention of bringing the other agent along with you. It didn’t help the tightness in your chest that he didn’t suggest sending a squad car through your neighborhood before he sent you home. The acknowledgment that your daughter fit the victimology hurt almost as much as the fact itself.

After Spencer insisted that only one of you needed to go, you passed through the bullpen, grabbing JJ on your way through headquarters. You let her drive, knowing you were too unstable to do so, “What’s the over under on Hotch letting me bring her back to the office?” You asked, trying to break through the thick tension of the SUV.

JJ laughed lightly at your joke—a pity laugh, really—as she turned onto your street. “I don’t know. That little girl kind of has us all…” Her voice trailed off as she noticed something in the distance, and you followed her gaze until you saw it too.

“Call Spencer,” you said, letting yourself out of the car before it had the chance to come to a full stop. You pushed through the front door, broken off of its hinges, stepped into your home, and drew your weapon.

Your heart raced while you walked through the eerie silence of your home, clearing the main floor before going upstairs. The first room that you checked was the nursery, decorated with toys that she couldn’t play with yet and stuffed animals that she wasn’t old enough to sleep with. You knew JJ was close behind, hearing the creak of the bannister that you needed to fix while you cleared the bathroom, checking behind the curtain when you noticed the sound of the birds chirping got louder the closer you got to your bedroom.

With the sound of blood rushing to accompany you, you let yourself into the room, surprised to find the balcony doors were wide open. You rarely left it open anymore, and you definitely wouldn’t have left it like that before leaving for work. Peeking into the bassinet, your heart dropped at the sight of the bare sheets, but something nagged at you, telling you to check the balcony.

Trusting your instincts, you hesitantly approached the fence, checking out the backyard before looking down. There was Sydney, sitting in a puddle of blood that seemed to be coming from her head. Her green eyes were still open as they stared up at you, blankly pleading with you to help her, but there was no saving her.

The blood that surrounded her had coagulated, transforming your back patio into a murder scene instead of an entertainment space. “Did you find anything?” JJ asked from the doorway, moving through the room until she was standing next to you, looking down at the horrific picture painted beneath you.

Annie was gone, and her nanny was dead. The only conclusion you could find was that your daughter had been taken, defenseless at only four months old, and based on the way Sydney’s limbs laid at the end of her fall, she’d been pushed—the last line of defense, defeated.

“Spencer’s on his way,” JJ assured you. “The whole team’s on their way.”

Along with a small army, you imagined, crime scene techs and local officers and anyone else they could scrounge up on a moment's notice. You were grateful for JJ in the moment, how she stayed with you on the balcony until Spencer arrived. She didn’t tell you anything, and she didn’t try to get you to talk. JJ didn’t need anything from you except for you to keep standing.

“Reid,” you heard JJ say, overhearing the shuffling of feet before you were turned ninety degrees, positioned face to face with your husband.

His eyes were lined with red, a mixture of his current emotions and the residual exhaustion from a late night with the baby. Your body was rigid as he pulled you into his arms, your eyes burned as you resisted the need to cry. You refused to succumb to violent tears when your daughter needed you, but you felt Spencer’s silent tears drop onto your neck while he held you.

Your resolve unraveled in an instant, all of the phones around you started going off, the hauntingly familiar sound of an AMBER Alert bringing all of your emotion to the surface. The first sob wracked through your body while your legs gave out beneath you, the both of you dropping to the floor together.

Everything that happened in the interim had been a haze, friends and strangers alike walking through your home like you weren’t there. You were sat on the couch with a stuffed bunny that someone had given you to hold onto. It was the one that Annie fell asleep with every night, gripping it with her tiny fingers until you were sure she was asleep, at which point it rested on your nightstand.

Separate from you, Spencer was in the kitchen with Rossi and Kate, going through every detail of the case while you sat on the couch, unable to do anything except for catastrophize. Whoever had turned on the TV was eligible to win a Least Valuable Player award, leaving you to watch your daughter’s missing persons report flash on the bottom of the news screen.

Despite the fact that they assumed you’d tuned everyone out, you were listening into their theories about the UnSub. “What do you think he wants with the kids?” Spencer asked, a layer of hesitation blanketing his tone, as if he wasn’t sure he wanted to hear the answer.

“Well,” Rossi started his answer, “I think it’s pretty clear at this point that he’s looking for a surrogate, but there’s one thing that’s been off about his victimology.”

“Gender,” Kate filled in the blank. “He switches from boys and girls sporadically.”

While they shuffled around papers, you traced shapes with your eyes on the textured ceiling of your living room. “Is there a gender he keeps for longer periods?”

You closed your eyes while you waited for someone to answer, going over the details of the case solitarily while listening into their conversation. “The boys,” Rossi answered regretfully.

“He keeps the boys longer,” Spencer said, pulling a chair out from the kitchen table and taking a seat.

Dragging yourself up from the couch, you walked over to the kitchen at a sloth’s pace, looking at the crime scene photos that were now scattered across your home. No one spoke to you, but they all turned to face you. Expectant looks from everyone went your way, though whether or not they expected you to speak up or break down, you didn’t know.

When you did speak, your voice was hoarse, and your throat felt like you had spent the last hour swallowing shards of glass. “Do you remember Michael Bridges?”

Kate frowned, “Who’s Michael Bridges?”

“A little boy from a case we worked in Las Vegas six years ago,” Rossi clarified.

Patiently, Spencer nodded at you, “He was kidnapped by a woman who was experiencing psychosis after going off her medication while she was pregnant. Her son was taken away from her by the state, so she used the boys as surrogates for her baby.” You weren’t surprised that Spencer remembered the case so well. Aside from his eidetic memory, that case had also caused memories of another little boy to resurface—someone he had known in his childhood. “What made you think of him?”

You peered at the photos of your daughter that had made their way to the table, “Claire Bates was kidnapping young boys even though her son was only a newborn. Her psychosis was strong enough to convince her that the boys were only infants.” You swallowed thickly, your hands shaking uncontrollably until you wrapped your arms around yourself, “Men abduct kids. Women abduct infants.”

“The UnSub’s a woman,” Kate clarified immediately.

Nodding, you stepped up to the table, returning to an active role in the case. “A mother,” you continued, “Probably to a little boy, only a few months old.”

Rossi set his phone on the table, placing his hands on his hips while he waited for Penelope to answer the phone. “Please tell me you found something,” her voice chimed in, not waiting for a traditional greeting before jumping into the case.

“Garcia, compile a list of accidental deaths of infants four months old and younger within the comfort zone,” he started giving her parameters. “We’re looking for someone who lost a little boy.”

Penelope sighed on the other end of the call, “Oh, this is a sad list.”

You leaned over the table, planting your palms on the oak surface for stability, “Penelope, start with accidental deaths and then broaden out to removals from the home.”

She was quiet for a moment, likely searching for the proper thing to say while her fingers continued frantically typing. “First list, sent, Honey Bunches of Oats,” she told you, the chime of your phone signalling that you’d gotten a list in your email. “Okay, and– oh…” She said, her voice trailing off.

“What is it?” Dave asked, furrowing his brows at the phone.

The technical analyst took a deep breath, “Well, you see, two months ago there was an incident in Alexandria. A baby boy named Elijah Holmes was napping in his crib when the house went up in flames while under the care of his babysitter, Natalie. According to the fire department the fire was totally accidental and was caused by faulty wiring, but the mother of the baby has been quoted as putting all of the blame on the sitter. I was just thinking maybe there’s a connection because of how the last victim was found. Maybe. Possibly.”

You frowned at her implication of a connection, “What was the connection?” You asked generally, looking around the kitchen while you waited for someone to tell you the truth.

“The most recent victim, the little boy, he was found with burns on his left side,” Kate answered for everyone else.

Glaring at Spencer, you set your jaw while he avoided your gaze. “Penelope, where’s the mom now?”

Listing off an address, you all grabbed the things you needed before heading out of the front door, you loaded into cars. You and Spencer sat in the backseat on an SUV while Rossi and Kate sat in the front, Penelope conferenced the rest of the team in on the call while you let your anger and fear simmer. “I didn’t think it was pertinent,” Spencer admitted mournfully, telling you what you’d already assumed: he’d been the one to hide the arson aspects of the case from you.

“And what do you think now?” You said bitterly, refusing to look at him.

He sighed, “I was wrong.”

Pulling the stuffed bunny from the pocket of your jacket, you set it in between the two of you and sighed. “Yeah,” you murmured ruefully, “You were.”

Upon arrival at the mother’s new address, a rental that she’d moved into with money from an insurance settlement, Hotch met you and Spencer behind the police line. “You two can’t go in,” he insisted, despite the fact that everyone around you was currently preparing to enter the home. People that Annaliese wouldn’t know crowded the house while you and Spencer were effectively sidelined.

Derek had positioned himself in front of the both of you, ready to pull you back should you decide to make a run for it, but you resigned yourself to the idea that it would all be over soon. You tried to ignore your racing heart while JJ tried to negotiate with the mother, “Abby Holmes, we know you’re in there.”

You grew more and more impatient as the time went on, and with no response from the UnSub, your hope started to dwindle. “Spence,” you whispered.

He nodded, acknowledging that he was feeling the same way. “I know,” he muttered back, the stuffed rabbit gripped in his hands.

Chewing anxiously on your bottom lip, you waited for something to happen, and your heart seized when you heard an alarm going off. From inside the house, a smoke alarm had started going off, and instinctively, you and Spencer both took off running.

While Derek body blocked Spencer, his only option left was to grab you to pull you back, but all he got was a handful of your jacket. You left it behind, letting him pull it off while you ducked under the police tape, sprinting up the front yard while Spencer shouted your name from the street.

The front door was unlocked, and you swung it open before entering. You smelled the smoke emanating, and once you were in the house, you heard the wails of your daughter. Annie’s horrified cries signaled you to her location, with your weapon drawn, you walked to the back of the house. The UnSub was in the living room, the curtains set ablaze from behind her, but what you were really focused on was Annie.

Her face was bright red, likely from a combination of the heat and her endless screams. From what you could see, she looked free from any serious injuries, but you had to get her away from the fire.

“You had the babysitter,” the UnSub said, though it wasn’t an observation—it was an accusation. She coughed through the quickly thickening smoke, “You had the babysitter.”

You tried to wave the smoke away from your face, “Sydney was our nanny,” you told her, eyes burning.

She shook her head, “She was the babysitter.” You nodded at her insistence, “She wouldn’t let me take him, so I did what I had to do. I had to get him to safety.”

“You’re right,” you cajoled her, though it comforted you to know that Sydney had died trying to protect your daughter. “You had to save him. Your baby’s name is Elijah, right?” Even though there was nothing more you wanted to do than get your baby back, you had to make sure you did so safely. “My daughter’s name is Annaliese,” you told her. “She’s four months old. Her dad and I call her Annie.”

Your heart ached at the way your daughter responded to her name being called, her wails ebbing for just a moment when she finally noticed you. “He wasn’t safe with the babysitter,” Abby insisted again.

You nodded, “I know. I know,” you coughed through the smoke, “but we aren’t safe here either, Abby. We need to get away from the fire.”

“I should’ve been there,” she said mournfully, turning her head to look at the ever growing fire. Your chest ached as breathing became more and more of a chore. “I should’ve died with him,” she told you.

Finally, everything made sense to you, in a way that only an UnSubs actions could make sense. She was trying to recreate the day her son died, except now she was trying to take another baby down with her. “Abby,” you said her name as gently as you could while still being audible over the wailing and alarms, “Elijah’s gone. I’m so sorry.”

She shook her head, stepping backwards—closer to the fire—and muttering to herself, “no, no, no, no.”

“You can save her though,” you assured her, holding your hands out for Annaliese while wondering if you’d make it in time if you had to lunge for her. Her little legs kicked in protest, though you noticed she was losing steam, and you’d found yourself growing faint while the flames continued to grow.

A pop came from the couch behind her, embers flying at her, and when she flinched from the burns, her grip slipped on Annie. You took your opportunity, crouching to grab the baby before she had the chance to hit the floor.

For less than a split second, you watched Abby and considered helping her out, but the helpless baby on your hip had to take priority and you ran for the door. You had a much more sluggish pace when running outside than you had when you were on your way in. “Reid,” Someone shouted, and you slowed down slightly when you were almost at the edge of the property.

You smiled despite yourself when JJ was the first to get to you, she was scolding you about running into a burning building while your head spun.

Spencer got to you next, not far behind JJ. Together, the two of them led you to the ambulance, keeping you upright when adrenaline caused you to trip over your feet. Quietly, Spencer kept whispering the same words over and over again, “It’s okay. I’ve got you.” He repeated, kneeling in front of you once you sat down at the ambulance and the EMTs got you and Annie fitted with oxygen masks.

Frowning when Spencer tried to take the baby from you, your grip on her tightened protectively.

“I know,” he murmured gently, knowing you’d just almost died trying to get her and didn’t want to give her up so easily. “You have a burn on your arm,” he let you know, “Let me take her for a little while so they can treat it. We’ll stay right next to you.”

Reluctantly, your hold on Annie loosened while Spencer pulled her onto his lap, staying true to his word and taking a seat on the rig next to you. He cradled her, and you both sighed in relief when she finally stopped bawling.

Her little hands tugged at the mask on her face, but her father produced the small stuffed animal that you’d taken from the house, handing it to her to keep her tiny fingers occupied. Hearing shouting from the house, your hand that was holding your own oxygen mask to your face fell to your lap at the sight of Abby being carried out by the firefighters. Paramedics crowded her when they laid her on the grass, but by the looks of it, there was nothing to be done.

Using his empty hand, Spencer lifted your hand back to your face, “Keep this on, honey.” His hands shook with residual fear, and you were sure yours weren’t performing better.

You held the oxygen mask to your face, and tears fell from your smoke affected eyes while he looped the elastic bit around your head. “I thought…” your voice trailed off, garbled by the smoke inhalation and muffled by the mask.

“I know,” Spencer responded, kissing the top of your head when you leaned onto his shoulder, looking down at Annie, who giggled at the sight of you with your oxygen mask on.

“Here,” Spencer whispered, passing you the cup of water he’d gotten you when you arrived at the pediatric unit. The burn on your arm was freshly debrided and bandaged, and aside from a prescription you needed to pick up in the morning, you were fully treated.

Because her lungs were considerably smaller than yours, the doctors at the hospital decided it would be best for her to stay overnight for observation. Though they were impressed with her condition, telling you that, of all things, her crying had likely protected her. The extended wails had prevented too much smoke from entering her lungs

You sipped at the cold water gratefully, looking down at Annaliese while she slept in the hospital bassinet. You set it down next to you, glancing up at Spencer while he tapped his fingers. “What’s wrong?”

He raised his eyebrows, stilling his fingers in acknowledgement that he had been caught. “I used to have this dream,” he murmured, keeping his voice down so he didn’t disturb your sleeping daughter. “It started around the time I had first joined the BAU,” he continued, “There was a baby girl in the middle of a fire, put there by an UnSub, and no matter what I try, I’ve never been able to get to her in time.”

Taking a deep breath, you studied his expression carefully, “Well, you don’t believe in dream analysis…”

“No,” he replied, “I don’t.”

Shrugging, you rested your chin on the bassinet, “I mean. You couldn’t get to her, so I did.” He’d previously admitted to using from choice words toward Derek when he held Spencer back, but as far as you knew, all was well between the two of them.

Spencer frowned, “By running into a burning building.” His tone was chiding, and you understood why. You wouldn’t have changed your actions, but you understood why it bothered him so much. “Without thinking first,” he added.

You smiled shyly, “Yeah, it reminds me of this guy I knew who once ran into an anthrax lab without a mask. Although, he didn’t really run. His pace was pretty leisurely.”

The corner of his mouth quirked up in response, “Yeah. That probably wasn’t the best decision, but we got a good result.” His hand reached into the bassinet, dragging a knuckle down your daughter’s cheek while she shifted slightly on the sterile mattress.

“Yeah,” you hummed, reaching into the bassinet and taking his hand in yours, “I think we did.”

#criminal minds #spencer reid #spencer reid x reader #criminal minds fanfic #spencer reid fanfic #spencer reid angst #criminal minds fanfiction #criminal minds angst #spencer reid x you #spencer reid fanfiction #spencer reid fic #criminal minds fic #spencer reid x fem!reader #written by margot #spencer reid dilf agenda

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clanwarrior-tumbly · 2 months ago

Note

Could you do a ENA DREAM BBG short with Reader busting a gut at the Shaman's "go away Ena, and get a life" statement, while Ena is unamused?

"Now...go away, Ena! And get a LIFE!! That shall be your quest for today!!" The Shaman declared, his hands waving around wildly before he vanished back into the machine he came from.

You and Ena stood there for a brief moment, with her staring into the glowing pink pool surrounding the contraption, wondering what this "life" was and how she could acquire it.

But you, on the other hand, couldn't help but crack up.

Hearing the odd sound that left your lips--one that you were desperately trying yet failing to conceal--she turned her head to you, confusion and concern displayed on her face in equal measure.

"Did he just tell you to get a life??? Oh my god--that's.....I'm sorry--" You began laughing hysterically, damn near keeling over as you held your stomach. "That's INSANE. "Get a life"! God, I can't breathe--oh, man.."

"I'm not qualified in CPR training, so please continue breathing..for both our sakes." Ena muttered, unamused as she stood there awkwardly. "Tell me...what was so funny about his request?"

Once you were able to catch your breath, you looked at her, still trying to hold back your giggles. "O-Oh. I forgot..uh..."get a life" is another human idiom. I'll tell you about that one later." You coughed into your fist, finally managing to settle down and not look like a crazy person anymore. "Whew...I'm okay now. Looks like we need to find something he can use to create life. Maybe the witches know a thing or two about that practice. Let's visit them next."

"What insight you have, my friend!" Her Salesperson side grinned. "Let's go check off that box, shall we? And you can enlighten me on this idiom along the way. You're like an endless well of knowledge, and I crave more understanding!"

You weren't sure what to say to that, but it sounded like a compliment, so you just nodded and followed her out of the Seal House.

In less than ten seconds, you've explained the idiom to her. Somehow she manifested a pen and paper from her suspenders, taking long detailed notes about how and when she should appropriately use it--only to throw them away as you approached your next client.

Apparently, her Meanie side didn't like the way she was being spoken to, despite them only saying all but two words to her.

And that was enough for her to draw out the megaphone.

"AT LEAST WE'RE CONTRIBUTING SOMETHING TO SOCIETY!! STOP COMPLAINING AND GET A LIFE, MORON!!"

Once again, you find it difficult to contain your laughter, tears coming to your eyes.

You've trained her well.

#most iconic shaman line ever #joel g cooked with this one #clanask #anonymous #ena x reader #ena dream bbq x reader #dream bbq x reader #platonic

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suliigwp · 27 days ago

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It's me again!

So its readers first day on track, like total rookie up from f3. So there sitting with acouple other drivers like lewis and fernando are sitting with her and giving her tips? But like there is totaly a language barrier. Like she is max verstappen 2.0

Thanks 🫶

-🦕

VROOM VROOM?

Rookie! Reader x platonic! Paddock (Hamilton, Alonso)

SULI: Yes I started writing this right away what about it�� I should be sleeping right now☺️ but I got an idea for this and had to write it down right away(only took an hour btw)- This was actually so fun to write. Thank you dino anon! Hope you enjoy this. I actually don't know how to tag this😭

Warnings: podium in rookie year? None!

The rookie sits stiffly in the white-cushioned chair, F1 jacket a size too big, hair still a bit damp from stress-sweat and a poorly aimed espresso machine incident earlier. She’s surrounded by legends—Lewis Hamilton on her left, Fernando Alonso on her right. Both have taken it upon themselves to gently mentor her. She, however, is somewhere between a confused raccoon and an overcaffeinated toddler.

Lewis starts off, his voice smooth, professional. He leans in with a kind smile.

“So, first weekend. You’ll want to be careful with tyre degradation in the first stint. If it’s hot, you really have to watch your—”

She blinks. Blinks again. Then chews her gum slowly, like her brain is buffering.

“…What is ‘tyres’?”

Lewis stops. He stares at her like she’s asked what oxygen is.

“The… the rubber. You know? On the car? Tyres?”

She squints. “Rubber?”

Fernando makes a quiet noise—either a cough or a laugh.

“Rubber. Okay. Sexy.”

Lewis sighs. “No. Not like that.”

She leans forward, excited now.

“You teach me. I go fast. I do… vroom vroom.” She gestures wildly, mimicking a steering wheel and what can only be described as throwing invisible dice.

Lewis looks to Fernando. Fernando shrugs and calmly sips his espresso like this is just Thursday.

“There’s a bit more to it than just… vroom vroom.”

She points at Lewis. “Vroom vroom?”

He hesitates. “Sure.”

She points at Fernando. “Vroom vroom?”

He puts down his cup, solemn. “Sí. Vroom vroom.”

She claps like a seal. “Ah! Vroom vroom!”

Lewis runs a hand down his face.

“This is what mentoring is now?”

They try again. Fernando pulls out a tablet and starts showing her a track map.

“So this corner—you brake late, stay on the inside. Apex here.”

She watches, squinting like she’s trying to read a foreign language.

“Brake late. Got it.”

Fernando: “But not too late—”

“I brake never.”

Lewis: “That’s… death. You will actually die.”

She grins. “I have no fear. Only vroom.”

Fernando leans back in his seat, taking a breath, looking at Lewis.

Lewis looks back at him. “She’s going to kill someone.”

The media rep calls time. She springs up like she’s just learned how legs work.

“Okay! I do tyres. I do apex. I do vroom. Thank you, old men.”

She walks off confidently—straight into a glass door.

Lewis stares after her, deadpan.

“…Did she just call us old?”

Fernando sips his espresso again, nodding. “Yes. I respect her.”

Lewis sighs deeply, then mutters,

“God help us all.”

...

Later on in the season...Mayhem. Three DNFs.

Ger Engineers voice reached her ears again.

“Okay, that’s the last corner—just bring it home, nice and easy. P3, unbelievable job.”

There’s a pause.

Then the radio crackles with static and adrenaline:

“AAAAAAAAAAAH!! VROOM VROOOOOOM!!”

The entire garage bursts out laughing.

Engineer, through tears of laughter:

“That’s a… yes, that’s a P3 confirmed, copy. Incredible job.”

She’s already sobbing, half-laughing, half-screaming, still holding the steering wheel like it’s a joystick in Mario Kart.

“DO YOU SEE ME?! I VROOMED!! I VROOMED SO HARD!!”

She parks up and literally forgets how to get out of the car. A mechanic has to gesture like, “Lift the wheel. No, like this. There you go.”

As she stands on the podium, still stunned and soaking wet, Lewis and Fernando are already waiting at parc fermé. Both clapping. Both smiling like proud uncles.

She practically jumps into Lewis’ arms, almost knocking him over.

“You said tires! I did tires!”

Lewis hugs her back, laughing.

She turns to Fernando and opens her arms dramatically.

“My Spanish father!”

Fernando, completely deadpan, opens his arms back.

“My chaos daughter.”

He pats her helmet like she’s a weird little puppy that just won Westminster.

Fernando leans in, murmurs just for her:

“Next time… brake maybe once, sí?”

She snorts. “Never.”

Lewis shakes his head. “She’s going to be a menace for the next ten years.”

Fernando: “Yes. And I love it.”

As they walk off together, someone overhears her say to Lewis:

“So like… if I win, do I get free pizza or?”

Next Part!

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gyugraphy · 1 month ago

Text

psyche (1)

— synopsis. After the catastrophe in New York-when the Void tore through the city-the Thunderbolts know it can't happen again. Bob Reynolds doesn't need another collar or containment spell. He needs help. Enter her: a psychiatrist with an unusual gift, capable of stepping into the mind itself. No one expected her to reach him-least of all, him. "You're just going to leave me the moment it gets too hard, aren't you?" he says. She meets his gaze, steady and unshaken. "I've walked through nightmares to get to you. I won't walk away now."

— pairing. robert reynolds (sentry/the void) x reader

— warning/s. mentions of trauma, mental illness, depression

— word count. 5.1k

masterlist ⊹ part 1 ⊹ part 2 ⊹ part 3 ⊹ part 4 ⊹ part 5 ⊹ part 6

⋆˙⟡

“Strange called,” Christine Palmer said, not looking up from her tablet.

You glanced in her direction but didn’t respond. You felt like there isn't anything worth saying. Instead, you focused on the soft, familiar sounds around you—the quiet clatter of metal instruments being cleaned at the nearby sterilization station, the steady shuffle of footsteps on polished hospital floors. A monitor beeped somewhere down the hall, keeping time in the way only machines could. The hum of fluorescent lights overhead, that you never really noticed, added to the background noise.

In the corner, a few patients sat hunched in plastic chairs, wrapped in hospital blankets that offered more symbolism than warmth. Their faces were drawn, tired, a mix of exhaustion and quiet anxiety. Some waited for scans, others for pain relief, a few just for answers that might never come tonight. They all shared the same energy, that tension that lived in the bones of everyone who passed through the ER after dark. You knew it well.

You were supposed to have clocked out an hour ago—your shift technically ended at midnight—but no one really left on time in this place. The ER didn’t care about schedules. It held you in its grip until it was ready to let go, and sometimes, not even then. Not when a life could still slip through the cracks—because of a missed bleed, a bad stitch, or the wrong word spoken at the worst possible time.

Christine tapped her screen a few times, then added, “Apparently, Bucky Barnes asked him to help find a psychiatrist.”

That made you pause, your fingers hesitating on the chart you were holding. Still, you didn’t look up. The case wasn’t serious—just a minor injury with a straightforward treatment plan. You met Christine’s gaze briefly, then looked back down, eyes scanning through lines of notes more out of habit than need.

“You know I’m not practicing anymore,” you muttered. “Psychiatry, I mean.”

Christine leaned a hip against the counter beside you, folding her arms. “Since when? You’re double-boarded. And don’t give me the ‘I’m just a surgeon now’ line. I’ve heard it too many times to believe it.”

“It’s not a line. It’s a preference,” you said, your voice flat. “Organs are a lot simpler than people's minds.”

“Sure,” she said, the sarcasm thin but present. “You can cut them open, take out what’s broken, sew them back up, and call it a day. But that’s not why you switched.”

Your hands stilled mid-note. The chart blurred for a moment, your pen hovering above the page.

“Tell Barnes to find someone else.”

“Actually, he didn’t call,” Christine said quietly. “Strange didn’t either.”

You looked up, and she turned the tablet toward you.

“They just sent me this.”

Your name was there in bold, black text at the top of the screen—accompanied by layers of encrypted clearance codes, redacted fields, and a formal request for psychiatric consultation. It wasn’t just a note. It was government-level. Serious. Sealed. No fluff. No context. No diagnosis.

Just one name buried in the lines of classified language.

Robert Reynolds.

You stared at it. The name carved through you like a scalpel—sharp, precise, and deep. Your chest went tight. Not with fear exactly, though it wasn’t far off. Christine watched you too carefully now.

You said the name aloud, almost to yourself. “Reynolds. Sentry? The Void? The man who turned Manhattan into literal shadows?”

Christine’s voice softened. “He’ll could probably eat you alive,” she said. “Whoever it is. You know that.”

You didn’t answer. You glanced at the clock hanging on the wall beside you. You reached for the gloves on your hands, peeled them off one by one, and tossed them into the biohazard bin beside the counter. The silence between you stretched.

“You’re not going to do it,” Christine said, trying for a steadier voice. “Right?”

But you were already moving. You grabbed your coat, your badge, and turned toward the hallway that led to the staff exit.

“Right?!” Christine repeated, this time louder. You only waved her off by raising one hand as you continued to walk.

Christine sighed under her breath, watching you go.

“Oh, she’s in trouble,” she mumbled, more to herself than anyone else.

⋆˙⟡

The city didn’t feel real when you stepped outside.

Maybe it was the late hour. Or the way the streetlights buzzed overhead, casting everything in a dim, unnatural gold. The sidewalk gleamed with recent rain, and the night air clung to your skin—cool, damp, electric. Maybe it was just the words still echoing in your mind.

Bob Reynolds.

You heard that name before—not whispered behind closed doors, not even in passing. People avoided it deliberately, like saying it out loud might stir something sleeping. Might invite the dark back in.

He doesn’t need containment. He needs healing.

That was what the message had said.

But you knew what it really meant. You could read between the encrypted lines. Reynolds wasn’t just unstable—he was a ticking bomb they didn’t know how to disarm. He wasn’t a patient; he was a problem no one wanted to admit they couldn’t fix.

They were looking for someone to step into the fire and hope they didn’t burn.

You had no intention of being that someone.

Not anymore.

It was just past two in the morning when the elevator doors slid open on the surgical floor. Most of the hospital was asleep or pretending to be. You were still on your feet—finishing post-op notes in the nurses’ station, trying to tether yourself to something routine. The soft tap of keys, the faint smell of coffee gone cold, the distant echo of an intercom down the corridor. These were the things that kept you grounded when your hands weren’t cutting. When your mind threatened to drift.

The hallway was quiet. Empty.

And then, something shifted.

You didn’t hear him at first. You felt him. A subtle change in pressure. A ripple through the air, like the building itself had gone tense.

You looked up.

There he was.

Bucky Barnes. Standing in the middle of the hallway like a ghost. Dressed in black, that metal arm catching the flickering light overhead. Expression unreadable. Posture coiled.

Your fingers hovered over the tablet.

“Subtle,” you said dryly.

He didn’t smile.

“I’m not here to make a scene.”

“You’re five seconds from getting tackled by security.”

“I turned off the cameras on this floor.”

Of course he did.

You sighed and slid the tablet aside. “You could’ve sent a message.”

“You would’ve ignored it.”

He wasn’t wrong.

You stood, slowly. Kept a polite amount of distance between you. “You want a consult.”

“No,” he said. “I want you.”

That gave you pause. He saw it.

“I read your work,” he continued. “The old stuff. Before you scrubbed it. Neural pathway immersion. Psychogenic structure mapping. Entering the subconscious. Rewriting trauma loops from the inside.”

You kept your expression still. “That research was never meant for clinical application.”

“It saved people.”

“No, it delayed their collapse. That’s not the same thing.”

He took a step closer. “You walked into the mind of a patient mid-psychotic break and helped him walk back out.”

“That patient relapsed two weeks later. Nearly took out his care team with him.”

“But he lived,” Bucky said. “That’s more than Reynolds has right now.”

Your chest tightened, but you didn’t let it show. Not much, anyway.

“So let me get this straight,” you said, voice cool. “You want me to crawl into the mind of the most powerful bipolar the world’s ever known? A man who once turned half of Manhattan into literal shadows? You want me to walk into that and—what? Talk him down?”

“He’s not just the Void.”

“No. But the Void is part of him. You don’t separate the two.”

Bucky’s jaw clenched. His voice dropped.

“He’s trying, okay? He’s lucid. Or close to it. He’s afraid of what he’s done. He wants to be better—but no one can reach him. They’ve all stopped trying. Except me.”

You studied him then. Not just his words, but everything else—the tight set of his shoulders, the wear in his eyes, the quiet tremor under all that steel. This wasn’t just a mission for him.

“You care about him.”

His breath hitched. “I know what it’s like to be controlled by something inside you. Something you didn’t choose. Something you hate.” His voice cracked just a little. “So yeah. I care.”

You looked away. The floor felt suddenly distant under your feet.

“I’m not a miracle worker, Barnes. I’m not some psychic surgeon. I can’t promise I won’t make things worse.”

He hesitated. “Would you try… if he asked you himself?”

That stopped you.

Your throat went dry.

“You think he wants me?”

“I think he’s afraid of you,” Bucky said. “Which is exactly why I think he needs you the most.”

You exhaled slowly. The kind of breath that emptied your lungs and still didn’t feel like enough.

The name echoed again in your mind like a wound reopening.

Robert Reynolds.

You crossed your arms instinctively, bracing against the words. Against everything they meant. You weren’t ready to say yes—but you couldn’t walk away yet. Not when the puzzle Bucky had thrown at you was already rattling around in your mind like a loose coin.

"Tell me more about him," you said, before you could second-guess yourself.

Bucky blinked, clearly expecting you to brush him off, maybe even shut him down. But you hadn’t done that. Not yet.

He stepped a little closer, lowering his voice as if the air itself might carry his words further than he wanted. "Bob... he's not what you think."

You could feel the weight in the silence between you, the hum of fluorescent lights and distant beeping from another part of the Tower, but it felt miles away. The shift in Bucky’s voice wasn’t a demand. It was a plea—one you weren’t sure you could ignore.

"He's always been complicated," you said, trying to keep your tone neutral. "Sentry and the Void aren’t easy to separate."

Bucky nodded slowly. “I know. But right now? He’s more fractured than ever. The Void doesn’t just come out and take over anymore. It’s... it’s slipping into him, little pieces at a time. He doesn’t know where the man ends and the monster begins.”

You stared at him, thinking of everything you’d heard about Bob over the past few months—the whispers, the rumors, the stories that came with living in a world of meta-humans. The Sentry, a hero with the power of a god, the man who’d nearly torn apart the world itself in a breakdown. The Void, a primal force of destruction that had no regard for morality or life.

But hearing the weight of that confusion in Bucky’s voice was new. And it unsettled you more than it should have.

"Where is he?" you asked, voice quieter now.

"He’s here, in New York," Bucky said, his eyes flicking away. "Living on the same floor as the rest of the Thunderbolts— or the new Avengers. We’re all on the top level of Avengers Tower, trying to keep him from... from himself."

You blinked. Here? With the Thunderbolts? In Avengers Tower? That was... an entirely new layer to the situation. You weren’t sure what was more surreal: the fact that Bob Reynolds was living under the same roof as some of the most dangerous people on the planet or the fact that you’d just been asked to walk into his mind.

“How is that even... manageable?” You asked the question, but you weren’t sure if you were asking Bucky or yourself.

Bucky’s jaw clenched. "We try to keep him grounded. When he’s not... when he’s lucid, he’s like any other person. He talks about everything—sports, movies, some of the stuff that made him happy before everything broke down." He exhaled sharply, clearly frustrated. "But the minute he starts spiraling, it all goes wrong. The Void starts leaking through the cracks. And it’s not just him anymore. He reflects everyone else’s fears. He mirrors them. It’s like we’re all living in his nightmare when that happens."

The implications hit you like a truck. A man who could turn his fear into destructive power was now having his own breakdown while everyone around him became collateral damage.

You closed your eyes for a moment, feeling the weight of Bucky’s words settle deep in your chest. “Is anyone else in danger?”

Bucky hesitated. “Not unless we provoke him. But... it’s getting harder to contain. We don’t know what he might do when he finally snaps, and we can’t keep him isolated forever. Not without breaking him completely.”

You shook your head, barely processing the words. Living with the Thunderbolts? This wasn’t just a clinical case anymore. This was a man in desperate need of help who could bring the whole team down with him if things went sideways. And you were being asked to wade into the heart of it.

“I don’t even know where to begin,” you muttered, more to yourself than to Bucky. “You want me to just walk into his mind, face whatever twisted version of reality he’s experiencing, and fix it? I’m not a magician.”

“You’re the only one who’s ever been able to do something like that,” Bucky pressed, voice low but insistent. “You helped people when it seemed like no one else could. Even when it wasn’t perfect, they stayed alive. And you’re the only person who can actually get in there, see it from the inside. No one else has that ability. No one else can.”

You pressed your palms against your face, exhaling sharply. Your mind spun. This wasn’t just about fixing someone. This was about getting close to a raw, broken mind—an unstable mind that could tear apart everything around it if pushed too far. You’d been in this position before. You’d seen minds crumble and break. You’d been the one to pull them back—but not without a price.

“Why me, Bucky?” you said, the question finally spilling out. “You know this isn’t going to be easy. I’m not some miracle worker. I can’t promise I won’t make it worse.”

Bucky’s expression softened. “Because you’re the one who never gave up on the people everyone else walked away from. You see them. Really see them—without the fear, without the labels. You don’t treat people like they’re lost causes. You treat them like they’re still worth saving.”

You took a step back, your chest tightening. You’d made it clear years ago that you wouldn’t practice psychiatry anymore. You weren’t the kind of person who specialized in people’s mental health, not when it carried so much emotional weight, not when the cost was too high.

"He's afraid of himself," Bucky said, almost as if he were reading your thoughts. "He’s terrified that he’s going to lose himself again, that the Void is going to take him completely. But there’s still some part of Bob in there. He wants to be better. He wants to make it stop. I know he does."

You swallowed. “So where does that leave me?”

Bucky stepped closer again, lowering his voice. “I need you to help him. Not fix him. Just help him understand he’s still in control—if he is. If there’s still a way to reach him before it’s too late.”

You closed your eyes again, the pressure in your chest rising. But when you opened them, Bucky was still there, his gaze steady, waiting for something.

And you knew, despite everything, you were already halfway in. Even if you didn’t want to be.

⋆˙⟡

The Avengers Tower loomed like a monument against the night sky, its gleaming windows reflecting the city lights below. As you stepped inside, the difference hit you immediately. It wasn’t the usual cold, sterile atmosphere of hospitals or military facilities. No, this place was warmer—not in temperature, but in feel. It had a kind of lived-in quality you weren’t expecting. The faint smell of coffee lingered in the air, mixed with the scent of old books and worn leather furniture. Shoes were scattered by the door, someone’s guitar leaned against the wall in the corner, and someone had scratched “Yelena was here, losers” into the corner of the counter.

"This is the Thunderbolts' floor," Bucky said as he swiped the access panel, letting you both pass through. There was a strange undertone to his voice, a quiet sort of pride—or maybe wariness. "It’s... a work in progress."

You raised an eyebrow. “A rehab wing for ticking time bombs?”

Bucky gave a small, tight smile. “Something like that.”

The elevator doors opened to a wide living area that was surprisingly quiet, dimly lit. The hum of music thudded faintly from another room, but the space itself was calm—almost peaceful. You noticed how the walls weren’t bare and cold like the rest of the building had been. Bookshelves lined the walls, mismatched furniture sat comfortably in corners, and discarded snack wrappers sat on the coffee table. It didn’t feel like a headquarters for elite soldiers and heroes; it felt more like... home.

Before you could take it all in, a voice rang out, piercing through the quiet.

“Bucky!” The voice was sharp, teasing. “Who’s the new blood?”

You turned to see Yelena Belova striding toward you. Barefoot, dressed in sweatpants, her braid half undone, and a crooked grin on her face, she looked like she didn’t have a care in the world. She took a long look at you, her grin widening.

“She’s not mine,” Bucky said quickly, as if almost to assure you—or himself.

Yelena shot him a knowing glance. "Pity," she said, her grin only growing wider. Then, her eyes shifted to you. “I’m guessing you’re here to meet Bob?”

Bob. That nickname.

You nodded, but you could feel the weight of Yelena’s gaze. Her expression shifted slightly, and you didn’t miss the subtle change. It wasn’t fear, but something much more calculated—like someone who knew the danger that came with being in close proximity to a ticking time bomb, and what could happen if that bomb ever went off. There was wariness in her eyes now, something you hadn’t expected after the teasing remark.

Bucky didn’t miss it either. “I’m bringing her to meet him.”

At the mention of Bob Reynolds, Yelena’s expression changed again. Her playful smile slipped just a fraction, and the playful tone in her voice dimmed. She didn’t say anything for a moment, just looked at you with a kind of guarded understanding, before finally speaking.

“Be careful,” she said, her tone softer now, though still carrying an edge. “He’s a bit sweet. Until he’s not.”

You paused, the weight of her words sinking in. Sweet. Until he’s not. That one sentence sent a chill down your spine. You’d heard the name Bob Reynolds before, the Sentry, the Void—the rumors about his mind and his power were legendary. But this? This was a whole different level of complication. Sweet until he’s not. You couldn’t ignore the warning, not when you were about to walk into that very storm.

Bucky stepped forward, breaking the moment of quiet tension. His voice was quiet but firm. “I’ll be with you. You’re not going in alone.”

You didn’t say anything right away, your mind already racing. You weren’t sure if you were relieved or more uneasy now that you had confirmation Bucky would be there. It didn’t make it less dangerous.

“Thanks,” you finally said, though you weren’t entirely sure what you were thanking him for yet. Maybe it was just for getting you this far.

Yelena took a step back, a small smirk still tugging at the corner of her lips. “I’m just saying,” she added casually, “you don’t have to rush in. No one will blame you if you need a minute to run.”

You chuckled lightly, though the humor didn’t quite reach your eyes. “Right,” you said, your voice tight, “I’m sure that’ll be helpful.”

Bucky didn’t linger, turning toward a door at the far end of the room. It was heavy, imposing. You could tell this wasn’t just any door; it was the kind that kept the more... unpredictable things behind it. Bob Reynolds, the man who had lived through the collapse of his own mind, who carried the weight of the Void in him. You had an idea of what kind of danger he represented, but standing in this place, it felt much closer than you had ever imagined.

“Ready?” Bucky asked, looking over his shoulder. There was a glimmer of something in his eyes—maybe it was concern, maybe it was just routine. Either way, it didn’t settle your nerves.

You took a deep breath. “As I’ll ever be,” you said, but even as the words left your mouth, you felt the truth of them slip through your fingers. This wasn’t about being ready. This was about what you could handle when everything fell apart. You didn’t have any illusions about how this might go.

With a quiet hum, Bucky led the way to the door. You followed, feeling a kind of coldness creep into your limbs despite the warmth of the room around you. Whatever was waiting behind that door wasn’t just about Bob Reynolds. It was about everything that had led him to this moment. The Sentry. The Void. The man who had been both savior and destroyer. And now you were about to walk into that darkness.

The door to Bob’s room was slightly ajar when you arrived, and Bucky didn’t hesitate. He knocked once, then pushed the door open.

Inside, Bob sat at the edge of the bed, his posture tense, hands clasped tightly between his knees. His blonde hair was a little too long, and his shirt was wrinkled, like he hadn’t bothered to care about his appearance in the last few hours—or days. He was staring at the floor as though it might somehow provide answers to whatever was going on in his head.

When you stepped inside, his eyes flickered up to you. The movement was slow, almost as if it took him effort to pull himself away from whatever was haunting him in the depths of his mind. And then—he blinked.

“Oh,” he said, the word soft and distant, like it didn’t quite belong to him.

Bucky stepped forward, giving you a glance before offering the introduction. “This is her,” he said, his voice gentle but firm. “The one we talked about.”

Bob stood, his movements awkward, like he wasn’t sure what to do with himself. He was tall—broad in the shoulders, built like a man who could break cities—but he moved like someone terrified of knocking something over, of breaking something fragile.

“You’re… the mind walker,” he said quietly, his voice low, tentative.

You nodded, crossing the room slowly to close the distance. “And you’re the man with the monster inside him.”

Bob’s lips twitched—a ghost of a smile, fleeting and uncertain. “Guess we both come with warnings,” he muttered, the humor in his voice strained but there all the same.

The air in the room felt thicker now, the weight of his words hanging in the space between you. You studied him for a moment longer, the tension building like an unspoken agreement that neither of you could escape. You stepped closer. Without saying anything more, you both sank into the floor, sitting cross-legged across from each other. The distance between you was minimal, just your knees nearly brushing. But it was enough to feel the tension crackling in the air between you.

“I need your permission,” you said softly. “To go in.”

Bob didn’t hesitate, though his eyes were dark with uncertainty. He nodded once, the smallest motion.

You closed your eyes.

At first, there was nothing. Calm. His mind opened before you like a gate, as if it was letting you in—but something was wrong. Behind that gate, you could feel a storm building, growing, ready to unleash.

And then—

You were in.

It was worse than you had expected. The space around you was dark, twisting. The architecture was impossible—floating staircases, walls that screamed, mirrors that bled shadows. It felt like a mind split in two: one side terrified, the other hunting. The chaos was dizzying, the sensation of being swallowed whole by something far larger than you.

And then you felt it.

Something massive, coiling around the core of his mind. It was there, lurking. Watching you.

The Void.

It turned its head, and you felt its eyes on you—it smiled.

“You’re not supposed to be here,” it whispered, its voice like shards of glass scraping against your skull.

Pain bloomed instantly. A searing throb behind your eyes. Your nose started to bleed, the pressure inside your head unbearable.

“Get out,” Bob’s voice said, faint, distant—not the Void’s. “Get out now!”

And before you could even process the command, your body snapped back. Your eyes flew open, and you gasped for air, choking on it as blood dripped from your nose. You blinked, disoriented, and found yourself back in the room with Bob.

He stumbled backward, pale, his breath ragged, eyes wide with fear. “You saw it,” he said, his voice trembling.

You wiped the blood from your face and sat back, trying to catch your breath. “I felt it,” you said quietly, the weight of the experience still heavy in your chest.

Bob’s eyes searched your face, his expression torn. “Did it… did it touch you?”

You shook your head slowly. “No. But it came close. Too close.”

He let out a shaky breath, running a hand through his hair. “I’m sorry,” he whispered. “I didn’t know it would go after you.”

You exhaled, trying to shake off the lingering feeling of the Void’s presence. “We’re not ready,” you said, your voice a little steadier now. “We need to know each other first. Establish a connection before diving into something like that.”

Bob didn’t say anything for a long moment. He just stared at you, like you had said something that didn’t quite register in his mind. His expression was still unreadable, but there was something there—a glimmer of hope, perhaps, that you could give him something he’d lost. Something he didn’t think he could ever get back.

“Okay,” he said softly, as if testing the words. “We can… get coffee or something.”

You gave him a small, understanding smile. “Let’s start with daylight.”

Later, back in the common room, you nursed a pounding headache and a steaming cup of tea. Yelena was sprawled across the couch, her feet resting on the armrest, eyes half-closed. Her gaze flickered over to Bob, who lingered just inside the doorway, watching you like he was afraid you’d vanish if he looked away.

Yelena’s lips curled into a mischievous smile. She lowered her voice, but you could still hear the teasing note in it. “Someone’s got a crush.”

Bob’s face flushed instantly, his eyes widening in embarrassment. “I do not,” he muttered, like a kid caught in the act.

Yelena raised an eyebrow, her smirk turning smug.

For the first time all day, you couldn’t help but laugh. It was the kind of lightheartedness you hadn’t felt since stepping into this mess, and it felt like a small, precious thing in the middle of all the chaos.

You finished your tea, Yelena stretched across the couch like she owned the place, eyes flicking between you and Bob with far too much interest. Bob hovered by the doorway, visibly trying to gather the nerve to speak, shifting his weight from one foot to the other like a schoolboy.

You stood, brushing off your hands. The day had been long, and you were more than ready to go.

Just as you stepped toward the elevator, Bob moved quickly, blurting, “Uh—wait!”

You turned to him, surprised.

He looked like he instantly regretted speaking so loud. “I just—uh, I think we should talk again. Tomorrow. If you want. About… you know. Everything.”

You raised an eyebrow. “Alright. Where?”

Bob blinked. “I—uh, I don’t actually know where you work…”

You let out a breath. “Metro-General Hospital”

His eyes lit with recognition. “Right, yeah. That makes sense. I’ll be there. I’ll wait until your shift’s over.”

You studied him for a second. He was tall and intimidating by most standards, but right now he looked like someone nervously asking their crush to prom.

“Okay,” you said, biting back a smile. “I’ll see you then.”

Bob nodded too many times. “Cool. Good. Great. Okay.”

You stepped into the elevator. As the doors started to slide shut, you heard Yelena’s voice behind you—lazy and far too entertained.

“She said yes, Romeo,” she drawled. “You can breathe now.”

Bob muttered something unintelligible.

Yelena’s laughter echoed down the hall just before the elevator doors closed. You shook your head, grinning to yourself.

Tomorrow was going to be something.

⋆˙⟡

The Sanctum-like glow of protective wards hummed low along the ceiling as Stephen Strange poured tea into two mismatched cups. The room they were in wasn’t grand — no spell-casting library or mystical relic chamber — just a quiet observation lounge. It had a clear view of the city below, and right now, the skyline looked distant and unbothered by the storm they were preparing for.

Wanda Maximoff stood by the window, arms crossed. Her reflection in the glass looked tired.

“You didn’t tell them everything,” she said without looking back.

Strange let out a quiet sigh as he set the teapot down. “I told them what they needed to hear.”

“No,” she said, turning slowly. “You told them just enough to believe this was still safe.”

Strange didn’t flinch under her stare. He simply raised his cup and sipped.

“She’s walking into a fractured mind with something ancient wrapped around its spine. The Void doesn’t just destroy—he consumes. She’s not just risking injury. She’s risking... unmaking.”

He nodded, gently. “I know.”

Wanda stepped closer. “So why send her?”

“She’s not like us,” Strange said.

Wanda frowned. “That’s not a reason.”

He looked up at her, finally setting the cup down. “It is. You, me, even Charles—we bring power, force, structure. She brings something else. She listens. She understands how to walk with someone in their madness, not just force them out of it.”

Wanda studied him for a moment, then said, quieter, “What’s the best-case scenario?”

“She reaches Reynolds. Helps him stabilize. Creates a bridge between him and the monster he’s trying to cage. If she succeeds… the Void stays dormant.”

“And the worst?”

Strange was quiet for a long moment.

“If the Void latches onto her,” he said finally, “we lose both of them.”

Wanda looked down.

“She doesn’t know how dangerous she really is, does she?” she asked.

Strange gave a faint, unreadable smile.

⋆˙⟡

A/N: :)

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