#I cant emphasize how fucking tired i am

[recklessmoss]

I really need to reiterate how if you little fruits make an ai image just for the sake of a funny tumblr post, you are part of the problem that so many artists are rightfully upset over.

[romantichomicide95]

DABI ~ confessions

summary: you ask dabi why he never says those three words back.

cw: toxic relationship vibes, but still kinda cute. dabi opening up in his dabi way.

a/n: bee aren’t you on a writing hiatus? -no comment, also first time i’ve ever written for him and i know his stuff is prob a dead side of tumblr but when in rome.

tagging: @i-literally-cant-with-this (i almost forgot)

“how come you never say it back?” you ask dabi, adjusting your position against him on the couch. this particular question had been on your mind for awhile. whether or not he loved you back. it was something that twisted in your gut like a knife each night that passed. his stark blue gaze flicked away from the television, finding your eyes momentarily before flicking back to the TV.

dabi’s lips twisted slightly, forming a semblance of a frown, one that made his eyes seem even colder and more distant than usual. the faint glow from the television cast unsettling shadows across his scarred face, emphasizing the harsh lines of his expression. “say what back?” he retorted.

you felt your heart beat painfully against your chest. “that you love me,” you whispered.

a low grunt escaped him as he pushes himself up to a sitting position, forcing you off his lap and creating a small distance between you. dabi’s voice drops low, his steely gaze finally settling back on you, sharp and piercing. “love doesn’t really suit me now does it?”

your heart sank at his words, but you couldn’t let it go. “okay…so you don’t love me?” your voice was rising, a mix of frustration and sadness weaving through your words.

dabi looks away again, his jaw clenched tightly. for a moment, there's a flash of vulnerability in his eyes before it disappears behind his mask of indifference. “it’s complicated," he finally says, his voice gruff.

you felt the sting of tears, trying to will them away but failing. “what does than even mean…i’m your girlfriend.”

his silence hung heavily between you, the air charged with the unspoken. he sighed, a sound heavy and filled with something that could almost be mistaken for regret. "can you just drop this and watch tv? i’m fucking tired.”

you wipe away a tear. "no dabi…you know i put up with a lot from you? for one you’re an asshole and like you’re not always nice to me. plus you use my body however you please. but despite that i love you…so i just deal with it.” you begin, the tears now rolling down your cheeks unchecked. “i just want to make you happy. and now you’re telling me you don’t love me? what’s the point?”

"fuck, " dabi cut in, his tone sharper than he intended. he saw the hurt flash across your face and it stirred something inside him. you were right, you do put up with a lot from him. always finding ways to justify his behavior, excuse his cruelty. “don’t cry i hate that shit. i’m not good with feelings and all that.” he runs a hand through his messy hair. the tv light flashes bright, casting a glow across his face illuminating his scars. “it’s not like i don’t care about you.”

“but you don’t love me? i guess i just don’t see why you’re still with me if you don’t.”

there’s a long silence as he struggles internally with the weight of the conversation. “well i am with you aren’t i? who else would put up with me?”

“oh so it’s out of convenience than? that’s real nice dabi jeeze.”

he glares at you for a second, almost like he’s insulted by the insinuation. “no. it’s not out of convenience okay! jesus christ, you’re impossible. can you just drop this please?”

“if that’s the case than why can’t you say it back?” your voice comes out exasperated, shaking and choked. laced with tears and sorrow.

frustrated beyond measure dabi’s blue eyes reflect a mix of anger and turmoil. like there’s two sides desperately clawing away at each other inside him. finally he explodes. "fuck…if you're really that desperate for meaningless words then fine…fine, I LOVE YOU, YOU STUPID IDIOT!" he screamed, his voice cracking under the intensity of his own emotions. the room fell silent, save for the faint hum of the tv in the background. he was breathing heavily, his chest rising and falling fast as he continues yelling. “i love you so much it’s fucking infuriating. why do you think i get so mad all the god damn time when guys look at you? why do you think i push back all the time? cause i’m fucking scared. i’m scared you’ll realize what a piece of shit I am and leave me. i fucking love you y/n. of course i do. fuck…are you seriously that dense that you don’t see that?”

the second those words left his mouth, there was a palpable shift in the air. the room suddenly seemed colder, and you could barely believe what you had just heard. you stare back at him in disbelief, unable to form words.

watching you struggle for a response he snorts, shaking his head. a low gritty laugh, utterly emotionless, escapes him. “of course you don’t see it you fucking moron, too busy whining and being a pain in the ass all the time.”

a feeling of relief bubbles inside you, mixed with annoyance at his utter lack of tact and disbelief at his confession. the swirling of emotions comes out of you in a laugh, one that lasts a fraction of a second too long. “how can you be such an asshole while saying something like you just said?” you continue to laugh, wiping the tears from your cheeks.

he rolls his eyes. “just because i said love you doesn’t mean ill suddenly change you moron.” he says, though the hardness in his tone has softened. he shifts uncomfortably, almost as if unsure how to handle the vulnerability he just displayed.

you smile, leaning in to kiss his cheek before settling back on his lap. he scoffs slightly but his arm wraps around you as you both settle back into your prior position. despite himself, dabi finds some comfort in having you close. there’s some peace that bubbles deep within him whenever he’s got your body pressed against his.

you look up at him, tracing the scar along his cheek. “well, i love you a lot…and i wouldn’t leave you by the way, so there’s no reason to be scared.”

“whatever,” he mutters dismissively. “just shut up and watch tv.” he shifts on the couch grabbing the remote and turning the volume up, but not before he leans down to place a small chaste kiss against your forehead.

[stayxlix]

AYY MOOTERS ON MOOTERS THEY KNOW HOW TO MOOT! TUTTER PULLING TO THE PARTY IN MY CRAZY PINK WIG!!!! BEST WRITER? BEST WRITER? BEEN A FAN SINCE PART ONE!

I was getting beaten to lunacy, depression, delusion, confusion even. I got the 1st grade knowledge beat out of me with this one, i couldnt count for a sec. My vision got all blurry, thought this was chapter 17 for a minute there👹

Bitch, out the gate you be coming in HARD. You know how to set the mood, I get scared for their asses! It feels like being on drugs or something (though i aint never been on drugs, but this is how i imagine it feels like👀) I visualize like I ain't ever visualized before, put on some music reading this at night, DAYUM🛐‼️

I reread this tasty ass story atleast once every week. It's tradition at this point.

1."The physical contact was grounding—you were grounding. A lifeline anchoring Felix to the reality he so desperately needed to return to." This fucked me up😪 So beautifully written!

2. "How he'd transformed from someone potentially willing to end your life, to someone committed to protecting it at all costs." Had to pause, take a breather, and look out my window to reflect on who I am as a person, then keep reading. Absolutely Precious.

3. "Some day," he dropped his voice, "When all of this is over, I'm going to carry you back into that palace." His lips found the curve of your jaw, trailing a heated path down. "I'm going to take my time with you, princess," he nipped at the sensitive skin on your neck, causing your core to flutter with anticipation. "And then," he whispered, "I'm going to lay the world at your feet." I was hyperventilating baby I couldn't breath for shit reading this 👀

4. "Minho sighed in annoyance, as if holding a conversation with you was some sort of burden. “I didn’t want to discuss it with the others,” he snapped." TIRED, TIRED OF THE WAY HE TREATS ME. (Jk lol I get his stress but chill out, damn.)

5. "You were always mine," Felix breathed, "before we met, before all of this, you were never their princess," he leaned in, pressing his lips to your forehead. "You were always mine.” I had to stop reading and get some water, my throat dried out.

6.“You can’t,” Felix emphasized. A distant look clouded his eyes, a flash of whatever it was that had crossed his features after the nightmare seemed to resurface. “You grew up with servants to meet your needs while the rest of us bled for every scrap of food and warmth. You can’t understand, y/n. And even if you could, it won't change who I am or what I've done. The blood on my hands will never wash away.” This is where the problem occurs. Cuz what are you implying? You ate this part so much you gotta be locked away like that one song. 🗣 IM LOCKED UP THEY WONT OUT, THEY WONT LET ME OUT IM LOCKED UP🗣

7. "Go collect your friend," the man waved a hand at the door, "I will shelter you for the night. You're young, exhausted, and it looks like you've been through quite a lot." I LOVE HIM ALREADY DAMMIT

8. You knew this would not last forever with him. Nothing ever does. And you wondered if you will ever be able to accept that, even when you no longer have a choice. But in that moment, Felix was there. You extended a hand, and he was warm. He was real, and he felt more like home than anything ever had. You loved him too, and it was a feeling you did not dare let go." MY HEART! RIPPED OUT MY CHEST! I CANT BREATH! IM SOBBING!IM DEVASTATED.

IM FEELING LIKE IM ON THE LAST BITE OF MAC AND CHEESE ON THANKSGIVING, IM GUTTED, I DONT WANT IT TO BE OVER!!

But as always, let me calm down and get a lil sensitive. I love you my pookie bear❤️✨️

Your adding some good into my world with this story that i really need. Its like the same day everyday for me, then out of the blue, you pop up and you give me something to look forward to.

Like most people, there's lots of things I need to be distracted from, and you do just that for awhile❤️ I appreciate this lil story more then you could know, and I always get SO happy seeing you posted a new chapter. I can tell how much passion and effort you put into this story, and I applaud you for that🫶❤️ Take your time, take care of yourself, and feel no pressure on when you need to put a new chapter out, YOU should always come first❤️ -👹

hihi my spicy little👹💕once again, i truly have no words for how thoughtful and sweet all of this is. im so grateful to have you with me on this journey (since part one, day ONE) and im so glad its been able to keep your interest after all these months.<3

"got the 1st grade knowledge beat out of me" literally had me CACKLING please!!😭✋ your excitement and the photos you send (which are hilarious too btw) always have me grinning from ear to ear. i swear my favorite part of reading feedback from you is that i will NEVER be able to predict whats coming next.😂 seriously though, im so glad youve been able to immerse yourself in the story like this (if we're being honest i definitely lose touch with reality a little bit when i get lost in writing it lol) but im so touched that it could evoke such a response in you too. (ps "i reread this tasty ass story atleast once every week. It's tradition at this point" might just be one of my favorite compliments ive EVER received about my writing. this is literally one of the nicest things you can tell someone who writes imo🥹).

MY HEART! RIPPED OUT MY CHEST! I CANT BREATH! IM SOBBING!IM DEVASTATED

(okay but why is this literally me reading any of your asks) this was also one of the most fun parts of the chapter to write omg. i love writing the end of a chapter so much that sometimes its the first thing i do.🤭

the detailed journey through each little part of the story that you go through in your asks always leaves me on cloud nine.!!! i love this so so much, i swear it does not get any better than when someone quotes the story back to me.<33 so thank you from the bottom of my heart for taking the time to share your thoughts on these specific moments. i loved reading every. single. one.💕

Had to pause, take a breather, and look out my window to reflect on who I am as a person I was hyperventilating baby I couldn't breath for shit reading this 👀 I had to stop reading and get some water, my throat dried out.

(also btw if it makes you feel any better i had a similar reaction to ALL of these after i typed them out. felix really does things to me, i probably need an intervention or some shit but here we are.🥹)

knowing that this story adds a touch of goodness to your world means more to me than i can ever express. :( im sorry to hear that you’ve got some challenges to face, but like you said i know we all do from time to time, so im just forever grateful that my writing can provide a little distraction for you in the midst of the everyday chaos.<3 (ps. if things ever get too rough, you know where to find me!!❤️)

okay okay i’m cutting myself off here, but i really do appreciate the little reminders to take my time and prioritize self-care too.<3 the way you express yourself is so unique, please never change. i love that you’re as insane and unhinged about this story as i am.🥹 as always thank you so much for the continued support, it is more appreciated than you could ever know.🤗💕

[michithing]

crazy chill guy needs to leave me alone

ok anyways on the brokeback mountain shortstory

(the image is related bc i was reading some of it while sitting there and little freak came upppp)

i think it was a good decision to read the short story, and not just watch the movie. it helped with me not understanding some parts of dialogue, since most are directly taken from the written story. reading that kind of american slang is way easier to understand than by just hearing it.

the movie leaves one more emotional i think. like there is a big difference between the short story telling me how alma reacts after seeing her husband make out with another man and being shown it. like she is shown to be fucking wrecked. i think the movie did a good job expanding on that.

tho the short story actually let me know that jack and ennis? they only went to brokeback mountain for that one herding job? and then never again, instead going other places away from population. (if this is something i picked up falsely please tell me) (oh wait maybe they went again on a trip later on, whenever they also have that fight...)

also now i know jack is cut. and the story surrounding that is. idk. messy? a story showing his das is an ass. there is prob more to it which i cant decipher atm.

the shortstory emphasizes that ennis truly believes jack was killed with a tire iron, bc after jacks dad told him of another -friend- he had, his death mustve been at the hand of some folk in ennis' eyes. (also wheres that friend at by the end?)

i really love it when stories let you take a moment to take in the nature it takes part in. i wished both movie and shortstory wouldve let me have more time to linger though.

and in both i struggled keeping up with how time passed. but thats probably more of a me thing.

both differ in how the story ends. the shortstory made it seem like ennis wasnt moving on yet, still hanging on. while the movie shows an attempt of his to not only move on but also to maybe change?

oh well. i am not someone who is like good at reading into stories nor putting down my thoughts. so you just read out of an amatures mind

another image of squirrel:

[kienansidhe]

god my top surgery date is in four months and youd think id be more excited but rn im actually just fucking terrified. i have so much riding on it, ive been promising myself and everyone else that ill be different after top, that ill be more functional that ill be better and less depressed and less disabled and and and

and its all lies. top will help, but it will only help some, and the rest... the rest cant be helped at all. im never going to be fully okay. top will help but its not a magical cure for how wrong my body is and how shitty and traumatized my brain is.

but ive been clinging to it as this lifeline to get thru living day to day, i dont think i could possibly have not built it up like this and still survived. but bc ive built it into this whole thing thatll save me when i know it wont. well. when i remember that im lying to myself i feel so sick and panicked.

im so scared that ill get top and then immediately get even more depressed bc ill be disappointed it didnt help more. im afraid ppl will take that as proof i was making it up and ive made a mistake. im afraid of letting down the ppl who are so excited for me, by not being happy enough. im afraid im afraid im afraid im afraid

[cloneslugs]

im intensely aware of the fact that the way i talk about myself and refer to myself/basically anything in relations to myself is annoying as fuck & i know it fucking sucks & i know it isnt fun to be around, i dont need shitty aggressive reminders or advice or whatever to know it's annoying as hell and nobody wants to hear it i know i know i know

[pallases]

going to scream

[mapleshmaple]

,.

[dyketubbo]

Please infodump about Tubbo’s acting if you wanna we would love to hear more

*ascends* ok so basically tubbo is genuinely one of the best actors on the smp considering his lack of experience and young age- he has amazing control over his voice and when not doing a bit, he exaggerates just enough that you can tell hes acting, but not so much it breaks the immersion. his voice acting also just fits his character very well, being very firm and leaving no room for questioning. when he finishes, hes finished.

its also very neat to see how tubbo rolls with the punches- hes often tired during streams (especially the streams before the meetup since hed stay up to talk to ranboo) and isnt always in an acting mood, but even when he isnt exactly able to stay in character he weaves his ooc moments into his character near perfectly- and he doesnt have to spell out his reasonings either, which i think is really neat.

when he was tired and couldnt respond properly to tommys death announcement, he weaved it into an arc of denial and trying to figure out what happened without admitting What Happened, something that fits amazingly with c!tubbos tendency to think logically while still often being irrational, and tying it into when he thought tommy was dead before but was actually alive. his way of bouncing off his own tiredness by making his character be distinctly out of it, spiralling as he finds more and more, clearly unable to accept the truths he finds and even believing himself to be losing it as his voice gets more fervent and he starts rambling as he moves around and staying laser focused on his mission

through cc!tubbos acting and bouncing off of others and his own natural inclinations- c!tubbo becomes Off in-universe. a kid with a name for being kind and someone very loved by those around him- and you get to know him, and hes Off. he trails off and yet his statements sound Final, he cuts people off with cutting remarks, hes explosive in his anger, he rambles on and on about things that everyone just has to go along with, he loves bees and flowers and his friends ad family and he makes nukes and comes up with war strategies and knows about death and pain. hes a child president, and he sounds like one.

its clear in him exiling tommy as he shouts about undermined authority and doesnt give "proper" reactions to being compared to schlatt, its clear in how he puts emphasis right where he should, he shoots any statements he doesnt agree with down, sometimes frustratingly calm while doing so, hes quick on his feet and barely has to think when responding. he doesnt always say the right thing, but that only emphasizes that hes young and doesnt know what hes doing. hes a teenager told to mature too much too quickly

and when c!tubbo breaks, its devastating. his voice gets choked up, and yet his responses are as normally paced and calm as ever (until they arent, until hes breaking too much for even him to keep up with). when hes excited, its shouts of joy, bouncing around and getting fully into it. when hes scared his voice gets pained and forced, when hes teasing he sounds as if hes holding back a smile. when hes resigned, he goes completely into logical mode, calmly explaining the situation and his perspective, calmly accepting it all when the truth finally catches up and he cant ignore his problems anymore.

lines like "what am i without you?" "yourself", "wilbur said he wasnt going to hurt me", "dream, please escort tommy out of my country", "you've messed this up for no one but yourself", theyre all such good shows of his control in his voice, of how he attunes his emotions near-perfectly.

tubbo is an intensely good actor, and i didnt even touch how he controls his characters body language within a fucking 3d block game. when i say tubbo is truly up there as having some of my favorite vocal deliveries and favorite lines overall, i truly mean it. kids talented, i hope he knows how god inspiring he is because his voice acting is genuinely better than what some professional adults are able to do.

[lilacwineandthesinkingsun]

Castle of Sand ii.

N: watched Sand castle, thought of a story. writing this to my own entertainment, not aiming to offend anybody. ty

Pairing: Captain Syverson x reader

warning: war,angst,slowburn, death, injuries, weapons

Syverson didn't let you out of his room for the remainder of the week. And you were getting quite bored of laying around, reading the single book you brought with yourself.

-Sy, i appreciate your concern, but i am fine, and i need to do my job, otherwise why am i here? If you managed to get injured three times in the past week, how do the others look... Please let me do my work. - you pleaded earning a sigh.

-I ... theres a new doctor in the base for the time being. Until you get better.

-I am better...

-No you're not. - he looked at you.

-Look i get it, im a woman, we got closer, but you cant keep me from doing my job, and you can't keep me in your fucking room. - you said, heading for the door. you had enough.

When you arrived at the medbay, the substitute doctor wasn't there. The soldiers greeted you, glad that you're back. So you went and changed some bandages.

-Doc, you're an angel. That bastard took so long to take a bullet out, i thought i was shot again... - one rumbled.

-Do not worry guys, i am back and well. The substitute will be gone in a few days. - you smiled at them, putting a reassuring hand on one's shoulder, when there was a cough behind you.

-The substitute - he emphasized - will not be leaving. However Doctor (Y/L/N) will be heading for the main base for psychological evaluation. - he said behind you, voice way too familiar. You turned around and your face dropped, but you needed to collect yourself quickly.

-I do certainly not need that, i am perfectly capable of doing my job Tom. - you said turning to leave, when he agressively shoved a paper in your hands, a few of the soldiers perking up, stepping towards you if you needed help. Ocre and Harper saw this from not too far.

-What the fuck is his problem? I never saw a man treat (Y/n) like that..

-Me neither, better inform the captain before they beat him to pulp, you know how they can get if its (Y/n). - he said, turning for the captain's office.

Your room wasn't far, while Harper went to speak with the Captain, Ocre went to check on you cause you stormed in, running past them. He heard sniffling and noises from your room. You were angrily packing your duffelbag, trying to wipe away the tears with the sleeve of your scrubs.

-Doc.. what happened?

You just silently handed him the paper. He followed you. Nearly killing you wasn't enough, you leaving him wasn't enough, he had to come, and ruin your job here at the base, where you planned to stay for a long time.

-Psychological evaluation? Why on earth would a stranger... - thats when he remembered your story. - that's him out there isn't it?..

You just nodded. You were so tired of him ruining every good thing you ever had. You were exhausted from fighting.

-May i? - he asked, holding his hands out if you needed a hug. You just ran and let him hug you, crying into his chest. He was your first friend here. A good one at that. Your back was turned to the door, so you didn't realize Sy and Harper arrived, wanting to ask you about the other doc. You were crying shaking in Matt's hands, he just handed them the paper silently, mouting to Syverson - that's the ex-fiancé. Syverson saw red. He grabbed his gun, along with the paper, stomping out to the medbay, more and more soldiers following him if there's a problem or they are needed.

He cornered your ex to a table, fear clear in that bastards eyes. Gotta admit Syverson was a big bulky, scary man if you didn't know him. Traits of a Captain.

-I called the main base, telling them to assign you to a different base, since our(Y/n) here is perfectly fine now, and that i see no need for the evaluation. Then you can pack your bag and leave my base before i shoot you in the fucking head. - he fumed, face so close he didn't need to shout to be loud.

Tom scoffed and laughed when he heard your name.

-First name basis? not too professional Captain... Bet you want to keep her to fuck her some more, do ya? She's a good fuck, i admit that much. But you see, i am a better doctor, your men deserve a better doctor then her.

Before he could say anything a few soldiers lifted their guns pointing towards him, rumbling about how you are the best doctor they ever had, and how he cannot talk about you like that. A manic smirk settled on his lips now.

-Oh so you are all fucking her huh? I knew she was a whore.. but a whole military base... She overdid herself..

You heard it and you saw it all. You knew there was a tiny chance you can stop Syverson from killing him. You had to do it. Not for Tom but for Syverson.

-Noone did as much as even touch me here Tom. Even if any of them would, you have no right to judge that. - you said calmly, walking slowly towards him.

-That is where you're wrong sweetheart. I let you have your playtime out here, but it is time you come back to the states. I am still your fiancé.

A single tear left your eye at the word. You took the knife attached to Syverson's belt, holding it to Tom's neck, while spatting out the words, for everyone out here to hear.

-I stopped being your fiancé when you arranged the car wreck, nearly killing me out of spite that i was better at my job than you. I don't even give shit about that i nearly lost my leg OR my life, but i despise you for the way you have always treated me. So no i will not go back to the states, nor marry you, nor to that fucking evaluation even if they take my licence. And you know why? because these men here appreciate the work i do, how i do it, and you know what.. That is a hundred times better than having a person next to me as shitty as you.

Syverson carefully took the knife from your hands, as you nearly drew blood from Tom's neck, then put an arm around your shoulders, slowly making you step back.

-Harper, make sure Mr. Miller is out of this base in an hour, or we'll make sure that the men out there have him. - he said as he walked you to his room, offering a whiskey and a cigarette. You sat on his bed, and he sat on a chair next to you.

The silence was welcome.

He was looking at you concerned as you downed whiskey.. Probably a few glasses too much. By the time you said your first word, it was already after the base going pitch black. You two sat there in his room, in full darkness.

-You know captain... at first i ran away to Iraq. I figured if my life did not worth anything then i might as well lose it out here, helping men whose life does matter. I got countless opportunities to date. Ranks all around. And i just wasn't interested. Not even once. - if there were any light in the room, you could seen the hurt in his eyes. Perhaps a little pity too, but somewhere deep inside he hoped at least you would be interested in him. - and you know whats even more upsetting? He waltzes in here, trying to ruin everything again, and the only fucking thing that was on my mind the whole time was how fucking sexy it was that you stood up for me, and how did you do it. - you laughed, hearing him laughing a bit too.

-Please forget it.. I shouldn't have said that.. - you said hiding your face in your hands, as if he could see the blush that crept up on it.

-You know.. seeing you press a knife to his neck, talking to him like that... i had to hide the tent in my pants by helding you closer and taking you here.

-Captain.. - you said with a fake surprise - that is highly inappropriate.

He chuckled while you giggled as he took your hand, inviting you to stand between his legs.

-I just can't keep myself away from you doc. - he said, his voice is merely a low growl.

Perhaps it was the alcohol, or the feeling that nothing even matters anymore.. You scooted forward, and gave a peck to his lips. He put his hand behind your neck, urging you to kiss him more, while his other hand helped you to straddle him in the chair. And you let him.

The kisses turned more and more feverish, his hands were all over you. He got up, hand under your ass, the other behind your neck, helding you close to him, as he went to lay down on his bed, you on top of him. He wanted to give you the reins, the opportunity to stop and pull away any time you wanted. However you didn't want to. He maybe just using you, but with Syverson, you didn't mind it. Again.. maybe just the alcohol.. Time will tell. You smiled into the kiss, hand going downwards to get rid of his t-shirt. He sat up a bit to help you. You saw him once in his underwear, but damn he felt good under your hands. His hand slowly started to unbutton your shirt, again leaving time for you to tell him to stop if you wanted. You both were in your underwears when his hand caressed your back, noticing the old scars, making you stop for a second.

-It's okay sweetheart.. Noone's gonna hurt you now. - he said between kisses.

-It's.. it's just.. I'm full of scars.. i'm permanently limping.. why would you want that?...

-He made you lie on his chest, pressing a kiss to your forehead while holding you close. -Why wouldnt i want that? I want you (Y/n), i wanted you ever since you barged in hire without knocking and put me in my place, not even phased by the lack of clothes i was wearing..

-Oh i was phased by it.. - you giggled into his chest - i was afraid you'd notice me clenching my thighs together. MY fucking panties were ruined that day. I was upset at you for them.

-Oh i'll get you a new one. But does that mean that right now you...

You hide your face further into his chest as if he could see you.

-Hm.. let me see it then.. - He smirked while his hand inched towards your pants, undoing them. His movements were painfully slow. He Moved two fingers up and down your clothed core, humming as if satisfied, then he pulled your panties to the side to gather some slick and bring it to his lips, licking you off of them.

-Just as i thought.. You're the sweetest thing i ever saw. - he said kissing your neck, while his hand went back into your panties, slowly circling your aching bud.

-Tell me to stop doll.. Tell me to stop and i'll do it..

You couldn't stop the moan that crept up your throat, as your breathing became uneven. You knew you wont be able to form words, but you had to let him know somehow. You got up, and he was scared he did something wrong, but then he heard your clothes being dropped on the floor, and then there you were, laying next to him, naked. A thing he dreamt about countless times since that day. He turned to you, climbing on top, slowly kissing your lips, your neck, your collarbones, stopping to play with your nipples.. The torture was the sweetest but he was so close yet so far from where you wanted him to be. The bastard took his damn time. He just planted a kiss to the side of your pussy when you whimpered under him. A silent please leaving your lips. He smiled as he dove in like a starved man. You were trying so hard to not let any voice out, but damn it was hard when this literal god was down between your legs, eating oyu out like you were his last meal.

He added two fingers soon enough.

-C'mon sweetheart i can feel you're close.. - he whispered, pistoning in and out of your pussy. - let me hear your sweet voice..

-Bu-but the others.. - you whispered between whimpers.

-Those bastards figured you're mine by now.. let them hear just how much of that is true..

The moan that left your throat was almost sinful, and you were sure everybody in the base have heard it. But you couldn't help yourself. Him being posessive... and also just HIM... you basically flew over the edge, coming aroung his fingers, soaking his beard. He helped you ride out your high with small licks, before climbing up, and gathering you in his hands.

When you tried to get up and return the favor, he held you tighter.

-But don't you want to..? - You asked.

-Oh doll trust me i want nothing more.. But i also want to take my time with you.. I hope you know this isnt just for today... or a week.. - he said before kissing you slowly.

For the first time in your life you fell asleep in a man's arms happy and content. You only hoped this wasn't a dream.

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

The next morning he got up sooner than you. The events of yesterday possibly took a toll on you, so he didn't want to wake you up. Also, something about you, sleeping in his bed naked made him happier than he ever was.

When you woke up you were alone in your room. Panic settling in. Maybe he thought this was a mistake, you shouldn't have done this.

Suddenly the door opened, and there he was. Breakfast and coffee in hand.

He saw the panic in your eyes, so he quickly set everything down on the table before rushing towards you.

He planted a kiss on your lips.

-I hope you didn't think i left cause it was a mistake.. I got you now.. I'm not planning to let this thing go sweetheart.. - he almost whispered on your lips before kissing you again..

[introloves]

how would yaku, noya, and oikawa react to finding out their s/o doesn’t really moan, but whines and begs a lot(like they just end up chanting ‘please’ and his name a lot)?

heheh *rubs hands together* this one was rly fun to write;

—yaku: will absolutely question you while hes balls deep and make you repeat yourself, asking you things like, “who’s making you feel this good?” is a mixture of teasing and just being mean to you, will probably laugh when he realizes hes fucking you so good youre just a mess of whines and the chanting of his name.

hard and fast, thats how yaku fucks you. his back is scratched up, welting and red from the way you’ve hung off him, but it’s all you can do so you dont go banging your head against the headboard.

hes broken you, all you can do is pant out breatheless reiteration of his name, accompanied by high pitched whines. it has yaku slowing down just for a second, planting his arms on either side of you so he can look at you.

“am i really fucking you that good?” he questions, you can already see the devious nature of the question, but youre tired and fucked out so you just nod.

the way you sound has him in a dangerous headspace, it makes him want more of you, more of your body and keening lilt of your voice.

he laughs when he hears you whine for him to continue,

“greedy little slut, still begging for more when i bet you cant even say your own name when i fuck you, huh?” he emphasizes this by ramming into you, and of course you react just how he expected. you’re practically babbling out nothing but his name, in that moment you know how to do nothing more.

—noya: if hes fucking you and he sees and hears the way your mouth can only form the sylables of his name he will grab your face (not too hard, just have it so you cant do anything but look at him) and tease you.

your eyes are rolling, unable to find any anchor while yuu is basically impaling himself into you.

“yuu, yu- please.” you beg, its all you can do, any other thought except for him bouncing you up the bed with the force of his thrusts. he cant help but bring a hand up, forefinger and thumb catching your chin to make you look at him.

“hm? am i fucking you so good that my names the only thing you can think of?” and you just nod, because yes, youre sure you’ve forgotten your name two orgasms ago and hes still so hard inside of you, you dont know when it’ll stop.

you can hear the exhale of his breath, eyes locking with his but not really seeing because hes fucked you almost senseless.

“cmon, thats my baby, you can do it. hang on till’ i cum in you, yeah?”

—oikawa: loves it, loves the way you chant his name, it gives him a massive ego boost. will make him want to fuck you so hard that the minimal sounds you already make are almost completely silent. will also call you cute and praise you when you sound out a whine he particularly likes.

he can feel the way you’ve clamped down on him after hitting you in that angle. so he brushes against that spot once more, moving his hips so fluidly in order to make you react like that again.

but this time its better, youre squeaking out his name, begging him to give you more, more, more.

he cooes, tutting, hand coming up to pet you.

“my cute little puppies sounds so good begging for me like that.” he says, emphasizing the statement by fucking up into you once more. the whines he pulls from you just spurs him on,

“makes me wanna cum inside you when you sound like that.” he grunts, quickly barreling towards his own orgasm and you can tell- you can feel the jump of his dick everytime you lewdly cry out nothing but his name.

“is my baby gunna let me cum inside them?” he questions and of course you nod, hes fucked and praised you so well of course you’d do anything and let him do anything he asks.

[jeankirstein4ever]

hihi i hope you're doing well! can i get a matchup the gender doesnt really matter. i use he/they prns btw.

personality categories (idk what to call them) scorpio, intp 5w4, chaotic neutral, and my hogwarts house is slytherin if that matters.

Im a pretty introverted person and will only talk to ppl that i am friends with, even then if we arent really good friends i still wont talk to you unless you spark conversation because i dont like bothering ppl. My sense of humor is mostly sarcastic and dirty. Im also mean as a joke but, i only am to ppl i know who are comfortable with it bc i dont want ppl to genuinely be hurt by anything i say (making ppl uncomfortable/annoyed is my worst fear ngl). i have random burst of energy which usually makes me rant about literally any topic i can come up with. some bad things about my personality tho is i do have a lot of self doubt. its not that i hate myself i just believe that ill never live up to other ppls expectations. its also hard for me to believe someone actually enjoys my presence.

some of my hobbies are dancing, watching anime, gaming, and watching random science vids that pop up on my youtube recommended.

I look for humor and intelligence in a partner. especially humor because i dont take things seriously unless its something im interested in or its a serious issue. also intelligence because i like ranting about things and getting good feedback and thought provoking responses/questions whether the topic is serious or not, and understanding because i will admit im not the easiest person to be with.

my love language is mostly physical touch

im black, 5'3, have short ear length hair (i keep them it in mini twist), im curvy, have sharper features on my face, and have dark skin

random stuff: my fav music genres are alternative rock, rap, hyper pop, r&b, and kpop. my current favorite song is Pretty little birds by SZA and not allowed by TV girl. i also used to do ballet and i love it so much

Aot Matchups

A/n I love these so much, thank you for your ask

I match you with Levi

Levi and you are an all or nothing relationship, the second you two start dating it's all-consuming and absolutely everything

Levi was never one for affection of any kind let alone physical but when you sat down and talked about the things that made you feel loved he made sure to try and incorporate physical affection even in the smallest forms.

After a little while into your guys relationship when you started getting a bit more comfortable you started giving him little kisses on the forehead which he loved more than anything else in the world.

Before missions he would always pull you aside into his office before hugging your for dear life while muttering sweet nothings in your ear, “I love you, you know that right? You mean the world to me, if anything happens I need you to know that.”

When you got injured on a mission, he lost all self-control, this man is a killing machine on a good day but when he thought you were gone the world deserved to burn. Every titan he came across was slaughtered in a matter of seconds.

On the other hand when he found out you were fine, he fucking broke “I thought you were dead, I-I thought I lost you.”

“Baby, you're never losing me”

PET NAMES, this man will fucking die if you call him “baby” or “honey” he loves it so much.

Levi doesn't like PDA in the slightest but if someone tries to get a little too flirty like Petra (sorry Petra) he will purposely kiss you or wrap his arm around your waist In front of them as long as your comfortable with it.

He loves your dirty jokes, even if they're not the best it'll still earn a grin maybe even a chuckle.

YOUR HAIR, he loves it so much. I can't emphasize how much he loves your hair, it's one of his favorite things about you.

He adores your laugh, the first time her heard it was after his own attempt at a dirty joke causing you to spend a solid five minutes laughing your ass off.

He thought it sounded angelic

Mood board:

Playlist :

Love song - The Cure

This side of paradise - Coyote Theory

Hate Yourself - TV Girl

When Am I Gonna Lose You - Local Natives

Corduroy Dreams - Rex Orange County

July - Sir Chloe

Always Forever - Cults

Sanctuary - Joji

Alrighty Aphrodite - Peach pit

3005 - Childish Gambino

Love Letter :

Darling, I love you. I cant say enough , nor can I ever get tired of you saying the same. You loved me, I am loved. By you of all people, wonderful angelic you. In case I don't get a chance to tell you this, or in case I don't say it before we leave, you're my everything, all I've ever needed or wanted. I plan on marrying you , maybe not right now but soon. There's a ring in my office drawer, I almost proposed last night. I'm worried that I m moving to fast and somehow every time I get worried, you find a way to reassure me that I'm not. Just as I will always do for you. I don't know if you remember this but the first night you stayed in my room you fell asleep muttering "please don't leave me." Darling there is nothing in this world that could separate me from you. I am with you always and forever.

[aciid-eater]

“How Unusual.” Sam x Oc!Poc!reader

Part 2: “Apologize”

"Woman. You are going to let me kiss you."

what?

One of the men, the one with the brown hair, stood tall in front of y/n. One of his calloused hands held her chin poised up to his face, thumb pawing at her bottom lip. Out of all the emotions she was feeling right now, she couldn’t be bothered to be feel afraid or uneasy.

It was almost as if the presence of the men was calming at best. But her mind raced, thoughts spinning a mile a minute all about why they were here and what they were going to do to her. Out of the corner of her eye she saw the man with the red hair flinch as his eyes widened.

“....okay.” She physically couldn’t bring herself to refuse. There was a warm feeling in her chest and unnaturally made her want the kiss more than she actually did.

“Good.”

His lips were chapped. And as he kissed her, she began to feel tired. As if he was slowly draining her of any fight she had left in her body.

what is happening??

“Sam. That’s enough.” One of the taller men called out.

“mmm.” The one in which y/n assumed to be named sam huffed, lips still connected to hers.

“I said stop. Now.”

“Fine.”

Y/n could finally breathe again once Sam pulled back. She took a couple deep breaths, trying to figure out what just happened and why she liked it.

why did that feel good?

“Forgive my brother, he’s a bit reckless.”

“At least I feel a hell of a lot better than you right now.” Sam huffed.

“Now Sam, you’re such a brute, using your abilities on a beautiful young woman like that.” Another one of the men mumbled.

“Shut that pretty boy mouth of yours before I rip it off your pretty boy face.” Sam growled.

“Sheesh you guys can we not fight right now? We’re not in the best of state.” The one in the big jacket interjected.

“I guess you’re right Matthew.”

“I agree.”

They soon started to talk freely with each other, leaving y/n to stare confused at them.

“what...the... FUCK??” Then men flinched as she began yelling.

“Why are you in my house???? Who even are you??? Who kicked your asses??? And you—“

She looked at Sam.

“You kissed me—WHO THE FUCK ARE YOU??” She emphasized her statement with a hard punch to the gut.

“OW what the hell—“

“What’s your problem?? You can’t just go around forcing people to kiss you, what are you, some type of sex offender???” She huffed, staring him down with a hard glare.

“It was only a kiss!” He barked back into her face.

“Yeah, to you!”

“What, was it your first kiss?”

no, but it was still important.

“OW WHAT WAS THAT FOR??” He flinched when she punched him again.

“YOU SUCK. A KISS IS AN EXPRESSION OF AFFECTION, YOU CANT JUST FORCE PEOPLE TO KISS YOU.”

“Stop making such a big deal out of it.” He huffed.

“Are you asking to get punched again??”

“Well what do you want me to do??? It’s not like I can somehow take it back.”

“You could apologize. That might suffice.” Y/n mumbled, stepping back and pulling her hands behind her back. Sam sighed.

“Why do I always gotta look like the bad guy?” He mumbled to himself.

“Okay......I’m sorry.”

“For?” Y/n asked.

“I’m sorry for kissing you like that, I went too far.” He ran his hands through his hair.

“I didn’t mean for it to turn out that way, I act on impulse and it’s hard to- what am I saying?”

he had an impulse to kiss me?

She didn’t know why, but y/n felt a little sympathetic for him.

“It’s okay.” She said softly. “I get what you’re saying, thank you.”

“yeah.”

“Though if you pull something like that again, fair warning I have heavy hands.” And her glare was back.

“So uh.” She turned back to the rest of them.

“Mind explaining why you’re here?” She raised an eyebrow.

“Miss, please forgive our intrusion, we weren’t aware this abode belonged to anyone, nor did we have the time to consider that-“

“Excuse me?”

“We just escaped from a deadly fight that could have almost costed us our lives.”

This has to be a prank or something

“It’s not, he’s telling the truth.” The quite one stated.

Did I say that aloud...?

“Okay,,, but why did Sammy over here immediately start sucking on my lips when I came in?”

“Well, lovely lady, that’s because, we’re not exactly ‘normal’.” The sleazy looking one stated.

“What, are you demons or something?” she joked. The men began to look around at each other.

seriously?

“You can’t be serious right now? Do you think i’m stupid or something?” she huffed.

“We’re incubi miss, demons who consume and use sexual energy to survive.”

Y/n’s body went stiff and she took a few steps back. Whether they were lying or not, she knew she was most likely in danger.

“Yo? Did you hear him?” Sam barked.

“I think she’s still processing.” The goofy looking one said.

“Give her a second.” The sleazy one mumbled.

“.......Incubi don’t exist.” Y/n said suddenly, slowly backing up to the front door.

“Just perverse men who use mind tricks to take advantage of women.”

“I assure you we’re not tricking you. Demons are very real.” The tall one said.

“Prove it.” Y/n blurted out before her mind could register what she was saying. The tall one was quite for a moment.

“Very well, Erik go ahead.”

Y/n was on high alert as the tall sleazy looking man approached her.

“You’re so sweet with such non belief, let me ease your mind hm?” He mumbled, curling one of the tight coils of her hair on his finger.

And before she could even protest, that warm feeling in her chest was back, and she was unable to refuse. Dipping down, the Man who she assumed to be Erik captured her lips. His lips were soft.

Immediately y/n began to feel the energy draining out of her, her eyes fluttered as her hands braced on Erik’s chest, she couldn’t get them to push him off her though.

“Erik that’s enough.” At the call of his brother, Erik pulled back, smirking down at the girl as if he had just given her life.

“I feel so much better.” He mumbled.

“Ah.” Y/n blinked a couple times, trying to recuperate.

“Oh, where are our manners? I’m James, these are my brothers, Erik, Sam, Matthew, and Damien.” The tall one stated. Y/n didn’t respond.

“Miss, are you okay?”

“Yeah I just—“ Y/n’s words fell off as her knees gave out under her, Damien swooping in to catch her just before she hit the ground.

“Shit. She fainted.”

Tags: @ivoryseia @alexus4real @elvingleaf @khesi

[zuffer-weird-girl]

Kai and angel on their honeymoon and the eight precepts especially rapa call them to check in or in rappa’s mission to prevent Kai from having a good time and for them not to bring home a future mini Kai, and Kai calls pops and throws his phone breaking it and relaxes since he knows only chrono, pops, nemoto and mimic have angels phone number

Mentions of sexy times and NSFW, you were alerted.

"Kai!" You waved from the sand, near the start of the ocean as he waved nonchantly from the balcony of the room the both of you had gotten for your honeymoon.

It was indeed a beautiful place you had chosen but it was just so fucking hot. His fear was to get a tan or a sunburn due to how pale he was and how easily he could burn his skin.

You pouted and hitted your feet on the sand, reminding him of a child as he chuckled under his breath. You wanted him to go in there surely...

He could take a shower after, he was just going to walk to you, feet protect by his shoes anyway so-

He flinched at the ring tone of his cellphone and furrowed his eyebrows at the device.. he gave orders and alerted Pops to NOT bother him while on his vacation if it wasn't a emergency... Picking it up to show you, he saw your mouth turn into a "O" shape and start to walk to the cabin.

"Spill it out." He answered the phone and grimace at the voice of the last person he wanted to hear.

"Good mornin'to ya too Overjerk."

"Rappa." He growled, breathing in and out with a hand pinching the middle of his eyebrows "Just say whatever it is..."

"Yeah whatever. The thing is that Tengai is being a bitch about being partner up with me and I agree with that-"

"rAPPA STOP INVENTING THINGS AND LEAVE MASTER ALON-" he winced at the shouts of Tengai and pushed away the cellphone from his ear just at the moment you entered.

"What is going on?" You whispered as he only shaked the cellphone to his hand.

"Take your problem to Nemoto or Chronostasis and don't you dare bother me anymore." Without waiting for a reply he ended the call with a sigh, noticing your smiling at him "What?" He spatted as you giggled.

"Nothing! Nothinh!" You shaked your hands as he scoffed at your attitude "since someone is too afraid of getting his feet on the ocean how about a hot spring? I heard that is good and no one can enter if there is a newly wed couple~" you singles the words as he arched one eyebrow, letting a sigh fall from his lips after wards and grabbing a towel.

"Then come take a shower first."

"Just the shower?" You pouted mockingly as he pulled his mask down to reveal a lustful smirk to pair up with his predatory gaze.

"Your choice."

.

.

.

"Isn't it better to take your cellphone?" You asked as he was grabbing the things to go.

"Huh?"

"Asides from that one call-" you giggled as he grimaced In anger at only remebering "Might happen something important. Pops can call and all." You shaked his cellphone slightly to emphasize as he only rolled his eyes, giving you a wave as if it was a whatever sign to take with you both as well.

He cant even remember if he was ever on a hit spring, but being with your significant other along on the hot water was something entirely pleasant to be honest.

... not even comenting about how he threaten the people of the resort that if that water wasn't clean he was going to commit a genocide.

"Enjoying yourself?" He muttered with closed eyes and head tilted back as he felt you nod, but soon cracked one of his eyes open when he felt you crawling your way up to his lap "What is my angel up to now? Only one wasn't enough?" He growled, hands founding your soft hips as you giggled not so innocently.

"Was it for you big boy?" His eyes narrowed with a smirk, pulling you closer to his naked and wet chest as he hesitated for a bit to kiss you until you fulfilled that hidden desire for him.

It was all so new to him... letting someone touch him, kiss him, please him even... and the more strange was that he felt the same desire of pleasing you... maybe it was the newly wed thing going on his mind. But heck, the lust felt too good to just stop.

The kiss was heated enough already with a battle of tongues which he won for the dominance, as usual the bastard, and just about when he decides to rut his hips on yours for just a little bit-

"Mister?" He froze and widened his eyes; pulling you to his chest as he glared at the poor employee whose yelped on his feet at the look he gave to him as he craddled your head on his neck and hidded your indecent alomg with the water and the steam.

"I-I'm s-s-sorry sir but is a call for y-you-!" The poor boy showed his cellphone and Chisaki snatched from his grip with a order to get the fuck out before you both sighed in annoyance.

"What now?" He growled, you still on his lap as he trailed his fingers up and down your spine as you listened along.

"So not wanting to interrupt your fucking but Tabe ate all the food-" his jaw clenched as he heard shouts from Nemoto from the background to leave him alone "I DO WHATEVER THE FUCK I WANT YOU ALL WANTED TO ME TO CALL OVERHAUL-!"

"I dont care if all of you wanted to call me, but if the issue is about Tabe eating the food is not my problem and go talk with other person because I am fucking busy." He growled the words as glared at you when he felt your lips pecking and ocassionaly giving kitten lips on his jaw line and neck.

"Yeah but we also dont want little overhauls walking here for now so let's say is for a good reason-"

"You wHAT-" he bitted his bottom lip when he felt your hand trailing down further his member as yousucked on his earlobe. "Dont call me anymore for those s-stupid reasons Kendo Rappa I swear-" he ended the call as he let out a low growl when you dolled your hips against his as you giggled.

"Ops?" You tilted your head at him as he grabbed your hips and pulled against him with more force causing you to stiffle a moan.

"Not here naughty thing." He growled before kissing and sucking on your bottom lip before he despatched with drunk lustful eyes as he helped you get up to get out.

.

.

.

He was on the 8 sleep when he listened to the cursed ring tone again... grumbling turning away and searching limbs of arms and legs to extend his arm on the nightstand. Not even greeting as he waited for the other person to speak first.

"Hello? Master?"

"Nemoto this better be important..." he grumbled, bare hand brushing his messy brow looks and rubbing his eyes, still closed and his voice still husky and sore from sleep and... other things.

"So.. master... About the calls Rappa made to you... they were all, well. Collects calls..." he cracked his golden eyes open, glaring at the window door as if he was Rappa and poor Nemoto.

"It's just that?" He growled. Before Nemoto could even answer he listened to someone else's voice shouting and snatching the phone out of Nemoto.

"About the collect calls scree it but seriously dude keep it on your pants or-"

"GO TO HELL RAPPA!" he shouted and threw his phone at the wall in anger. Causing you to joint awake.

"What happened?!" You almost shouted if it wasn't for Chisaki patting your head as a signal it wasn't anything seriously before he got up and sized his cellphone back to normal.

"The precepts, especially that low life thug Rappa just giving me a headache." He grumbled as he growled at the calls on his cellphone.

"What's new huh?" You sleepily giggled while opening your arms at him "Cmon go back to sleep.."

He stared at his phone for a bit before leaving on the nightstand and getting under the covers with a sigh, letting you cuddled up to his chest even if he was extressed out.

Your movements of your hands on his back and the humming caused him to calm down and relax for a bit... not until the cellphone ringed again.

"Kai, honey calm down-" you tried to prevent before Chisaki got up abruptly and answered the call.

"FUCKING HELL WHAT NOW?!"

"..Jesus boy I was just calling to make sure you and (Y/n) were okay, did I wake you up or interrupted something?"

It was silence for a bit before Kai sitted back down on the bed with a mortified look, you crawled your way to sit besides him as he showed the contact name as you winced.

"Chisaki? Hello? Chrono is this thing really working?"

"... Apologies Pops..." your husband muttered and it would be comical if it wasn't tragically how loud Kai's shout was this time.

.

.

.

"Thanks for letting me know my boy, we will only call at (Y/n)'s number from now on."

"You have my gratitude..." he sighed before ending the call... staring at the device on his hand.

"K-Kai?" You went to poke his shoulder before yelping at when he smashed and destroyed his cellphone in one grip with a twitching eye. "You know you didn't had to do that, right?"

"I'm just tired of listening to this shit." He whispered, still with a twitching eye before relaxed a bit at your giggles and hugging his bare shoulders.

"Well, maybe we can get a bit more of peace at least." You whispered before planting a kiss right behind his ear and cheek.

"At least." He sighed, caging you on the bed and pointing you fervently "Come on angel, round 2 to distress." He growled on your lips as you giggled but accepted.

[what-the--curtains]

In a Week

Part 3/4 - Snowballs and cigarettes

(Frankie Morales x f!reader)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Summary: The snows finally stopped and its about time you got to work unburying your car. With your friends all prompting you to move on from your toxic ex you find yourself becoming more and more aware of the kind of person you’d want to be with. And how Frankie was ticking all those boxes.

Authors notes: Ugh okay I was over the max block text so the finale is split into two parts!! But you get them both tonight💕🌻💕 .

Warnings: mentions of toxic relationships, allusions to sex (nothing depicted), PTSD, smoking, drinking, swearing

Tagged: @agingerindenial @icanbeyourjedi

Word count: 4.0k

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Day 4

It had only been three days but you had found yourself in a routine that you hoped you never fell out of. Each morning he’d wake up first and you’d be predictably wrapped around him for another 2 hours or so. He found it hard to believe you were able to wake up before 10am, let alone that you were up at 5am most days but he’d love to be around to see it happen. For the first time, he saw something he’d long given up on. A future with someone else ingrained into his and his daughters life. Maybe it was stupid feeling this way after a few days, but he was old enough to know when he felt a real connection, and he’d never felt as good as he did when he was with you. He would make his feelings known to you, one way or another, he’d regret it forever if he let you slip through his fingers. He just had to find the right time to do it. It had been a long time since you’d woken up with someone in the same bed as you and even longer since the person was someone who made you feel safe and secure. There was something calming about knowing that even if you pushed your freezing cold feet between his calves in the middle of the night he wouldn’t get angry, or push you off he’d just grumble and pull you closer.

It sounded pathetic but it was the nicest a guy had been to you in years. You knew how stupid it was to catch feelings this fast, and it definitely wasn’t like you to feel such strong emotions. Since the funeral you had actively decided to forego them although. This benefited your work, helped you in your field, made you a better doctor, but keeping all your emotions bottled up took its toll. Primarily on your love life. You’d had your fair share of flings with other residents, nurses, friends of friends, but between classes and shift work there wasn’t time. Plus what was the point when you had no idea where you’d be moved to. At least that’s what you told yourself. Then Jonathan came along and you’d let him in, let him know you and you fell for him in the process. Then he’d started dating someone else, told you he didn't realize you were exclusive, and it shattered you completely. You’d pieced yourself back together and once you were better, once you were finally over him, he’d cycle back round to you, determined to keep you on retainer. The whole ordeal had left you tired. You’d never had a real relationship and you were already done with them. You never understood how people would want to live with someone for the rest of their lives until now. Catching feelings had always happened in periphery to your life making it easy to push by a crush by simply avoiding them, but you couldn’t avoid Frankie. Each day you spent trapped inside with him he’d continued to grow on you, cementing your feelings for him tenfold. You yawn and stretch your leg out over Frankies torso propping yourself up onto your elbow so you can reach over him and grab the glass of water on the nightstand. He exhales as if your movement across him is an inconvenience to his meticulous strategy for winning whatever game he was playing on his phone. You take a sip and put the cup back down, rolling off the bed and opening the curtains.

“Hey!” you shout, causing Frankies head to shoot over to you, “It stopped snowing!” you exclaim, gazing out over the parking lot where the snow had fallen. The powder undulating overtop the cars buried beneath it. You stretch your arms up catching an unsavoury whiff coming from your armpits causing you to pull a face. Turning around just in time to see Frankie laughing from the bathroom door.

“Seriously man? Do you have to beat me to everything!” you pout, crossing your arms over your chest.

“Gotta be faster sweetheart.” he says, closing the door behind him. From anyone else the term would have driven you into a rage induced frenzy, but it was endearing not condescending coming from him. You take the time to call Stella, you’d been texting with her since you got stuck but you felt it was time to officially announce your arrival as permanently cancelled.

“Hey girl”

“Hey babe what's going on? You calling with good or bad news?” she asks, a constant bustle evident in the background.

“Don’t shoot the messenger, but only bad news on my end. I am so fucking sorry, I should have just flown down like you said” you offer, leaning back against the window allowing the chill of the outside to cool you off.

“Well this is why you should always listen to me, but i’ll forgive you just this once.” she laughs.

“God I can’t believe the one wedding I actually care about I’m going to miss!” you exasperated, shifting away from the window and flopping down onto the bed.

“Well I definitely won’t miss you, especially considering you’ve already sent a gift.” she teases.

“How, very dare you” you punctuate.

“Yup long con paid off, 10 years I pretended to like you just to get you to buy me a toaster from ebay” Stella laughs.

“You could have just stolen mine after the first year, then you could have had me gone!” you state.

“Ugh a huge mistake!!” she overemphasizes dramatically, causing you both to burst out laughing.

“So….” you say after your giggles subside leaving a gentle ache in your ribs that always occurred when you talked to Stella.

“What?” she asks, sniffling.

“ Did John make it out there?” you ask, in a painfully transparent way.

“Why?” she spits, her tone suddenly lethal. She hated the guy, she was the one who was always left dealing with you after he’d used you up, helping to piece you back together, just in time for him to get a hold on you again.

“He asked about me?” you query, once again failing to convey your intentions.

“I’m not indulging this anymore, it's bad for you. He’s bad for you, there's only so many times I can watch him emotionally manipulate you” she rants.

“Ya, but it's easy and it's so good with him.” you emphasize.

“It’s not easy, take it from someone in an easy relationship, it's not supposed to hurt that much.” she chides, determined to have you see the light.

“But..”

“Nope, I'm drawing the line for you, find someone else. You’re a gorgeous single doctor,

“Almost doctor” you interrupt, but the statement is ignored.

“Aren’t you currently shacked up with one of my stupid brothers friends?”

“Yes? And?” you say, your heart suddenly beating faster as your head turns to see Frankies hat on the nightstand.

“Frankie right? Statue like, soft curls, kind, deep brown eyes? And don’t pretend like you didn’t notice I know you like the back of my hand!”

“So what if I have, doesn't mean..” you whisper, not wanting him to hear you.

“Nope, don’t sell yourself short, I say get cozy with him and finally move on from dickhead McGee, even if it's just for a night, cleanse the palette. Besides, you know he’ll be doing whoever looks his way at my wedding.” you hear a muffled shout “alright I have to go, something about the bridesmaids fighting.”

“Your sisters? Fighting? Who could have seen that coming” you deadpan.

“I know, god I wish you were here.”

“I wish I was as well i'll call tomorrow in case you get cold feet, I have a five point plan”

“I won't” she chimes.

“ I know because you love her”

“And I also love you” she says

“And I love you” you respond before hanging up. Not even a minute after hanging up you get a call from Santiago

“Hey, I just wanted to verbally apologize for trapping you with ‘Fish, though he's definitely one of the better ones to get stuck with.” he says.

“Well that’s good to know” you laugh, rolling your eyes.

“He hasn’t tried anything has he? If he has I'll kill him, and get away with it, you'll have to help me with the body but...” Santiago starts.

“Santi, it's fine he's cool, really sweet, actually,” you offer heat rushing to your face for some unknown reason.

“Good. He touches you ill..” he warns.

“You’ll kill him ya I got it!” you snap, you understood why Santiago felt like he had to play big brother for you but sometimes he was a touch overbearing. “Is John there?” you try and ask casually, failing to head Stellas advice.

“Don’t...” Santi starts, you can practically hear his jaw clench over the phone “you know if I see him tonight i'm gonna knock him out for how he treats you”

“It wasn’t that bad.” you whisper.

“It was, still is, I heard him bragging about how if worse comes to worse he always has his plan D,” he offers, not to hurt you but to try and free you from the cycle.

“That dick. You know what Stellas right, fuck him!” you exclaim with a newfound determination to rid him from your life.

“Oh my god, are you finally seeing the light?” Santi asks “Praise the lord!” He shouts up into the sky.

“Ya I guess so” you say staring at Frankie as he dries his hair with the towel. “I gotta go, see you soon.”

“Not soon enough” he laughs as you hang up.

“Whose that?” Frankie asks, still curious about who you’d been hoping to see at the wedding and what they’d done to earn your affection.

“Pope!” you say with a smile, pushing your back off the bed and sitting up.

“Threatening to kill me?” Frankie predicts.

“Ya we have a plan” you murmur.

“We?” he asks, a twinkle in his eye and his mouth upturned at the sides.

“Well he'll kill you but, I cant have him go to jail so i'll have to hide your body.” you explain

“Good glad that got sorted” he says, his smile now in full effect.

“I'll go grab some breakfast” you say.

“No ill get it, you’re always getting it, plus gives you time to shower, I can smell you from here.” He prods, grabbing the key.

“Rude!” you yell out after him.

He's back when you exit the shower

“Oh thank you, you say grabbing the plate form him”

“Just what the doctor ordered, hey?” he asks, smiling stupidly big.

“Ouuuf that that was bad truly apologize to me” He laughs at how serious your face gets “You're laughing? I had to listen to that joke and you're laughing?” you say through a mouthful of eggs. “Here's something that'll wipe that stupid smile off your face, snow stops which means we have to clear off my car.”

“Using the royal we are we?” he asks

“Think of it as repayment for the pun,” you say waving your fork in his face

“How will we be clearing it off?” he asks, leaning over the counter.

“Brush” you say, as if it's obvious

“Where's the brush?” he asks, resting his chin on the back of his hands and smiling sweetly at you, waiting for an answer.

“In the….oh” you say, face dropping when you realize that the brush was in the car currently buried under a snow pile.

“Not so smart now” he laughs pushing back off the counter taking your empty plate with him, washing it up for you.

“Well I guess we just have to get to the door with our hands then” you say smiling.

“Once again, about this we,” he says, drying his hands on the dish towel, turning to see a dramatic pout plastered across your face.

“Fine, I'll only help because I think you may disappear in the snow if you go in alone” he responds, the truth was, he couldn't deny you.

You both get dressed into the most winter proof clothes you had, neither of you having packed for a snowy expedition. As you exit the room you see him grab a pack of cigarettes he’d been hiding, not wanting you to see his worst traits.

“Those will kill you, you know,” you say, causing him to roll his eyes dramatically.

“Okay mom” he laughs grabbing the lighter despite your disapproving glare,

“You have a daughter to think about” you say, feeling like you'd be letting your profession down by giving up so easily.

“It's why I smoke, the safest way to calm the nerves while staying clean” he murmurs with a look on his face that is enough to get you to drop it for now. You weren't about to pry into his struggle with addiction and you certainly weren’t one to judge, you’d faced similar issues after your brothers passing.

“I used to smoke,” you confess as the elevator doors close in front of you both.

“Seriously?” he remarks, not able to believe it.

“Pack a week for about a year” you say, slowly nodding your head as the two of you walk through the foyer towards the parking lot.

“You quit?” He asks, impressed.

“Ya I don’t think it was long enough to form a habit. When did you start?” you offer as you move your legs through the snow, it was dense your legs would be sore tomorrow.

“What? Are you gonna assess the state of my lungs?” Frankie laughs, moving easily through the snow you were struggling so hard against.

“Yes, but i'll only tell you the results if you want to know”

“Few years back, after...” he stops himself before confessing the worst thing that ever happened in his life.

“The mission” you finish for him, remembering how Pope had picked up similar habits once he finally returned home. “You were there with Santi?” you question

“He told you about it?” he asks, sterner than you’d seen him before, he was afraid that you knew what a monster he was. You shake your head, no and he thanks the gods. “You think i'm going to?” He queries lighting up a cigarette and taking a drag, making sure not to blow it out anywhere near you.

“I don’t know, maybe. It’s the one thing he wont tell me about, figured it would be easier for you if you were talking to a stranger about it.”

“Not much of a stranger now” he laughs, but there was something behind his eyes, a similar sadness that you saw with Santi when he talked about it. Your thoughts are interrupted when something cold hits you in the face, your mouth drops open, your forehead scrunches in disbelief.

“Shit, I wasn’t aiming for your face I swear!” he looks up panicked

“I guess it's what I get for asking so many questions” you say, hand still over your face playing into it as you formulate your attack.

“No, oh my god! No! It wasn't because of that, let me see” he says, you let your hands drop and you smile wickedly up at him. Before he has time to react, you rub a handful of snow into his face.

“Oh... you're gonna pay for that.” he draws out, wiping the snow from his face.

After 15 minutes of all out war, and a brief truce that was to be officially signed once back inside you managed to get to the door handle and lean into the back seat grabbing out the brush. You offer it to Frankie, but he's already started clearing off the rest of the car with his arms.

“Hey can you grab my spare charger out of the compartment there?” you say cleaning off the trunk, the front doors now accessible.

“Ya, holy shit is this a knife?” he asks, pulling out a knife.

“Maybe.” You say staring into his eyes as his mouth hangs open in amusement. “For safety, I didn't know who I'd be driving up with! You coulda been a murderer” you explain palms up.

“And you were planning on what? shanking me?” he laughs a huge smile on his face, weirdly endeared by your thought process.

“Only if I had to.” You say chuckling between shivers, the cold now seeping through your makeshift snowsuit hitting against the sweat you’d worked up.

“You want it?” He offers.

“No i'm good, thanks”

“Because you don’t think I'm a murderer or because you have another one hidden in the room already?” he laughs, but he stops when you tilt your head slightly and raise your eyebrows, averting your eyes.

“Wait, do I need this knife?” he calls as you trudge back through the snow.

You both change into less sweaty attire and you settle into the couch turning on to watch the latest forensic files rerun. You shiver as you sit down having caught a chill. Noticing you shaking, Frankie goes to the wardrobe and grabs down a spare blanket throwing one at you so it lands directly over your head. He laughs when he sees you slowly turn towards him beneath the blanket, like someone in a makeshift ghost costume.

“Excuse me!” you laugh

“Hey you should be thanking me, can't have you freezing to death.” he says, “Are you asleep under there?” he asks, when you don't respond

“I'm not a cat! I don't fall asleep when someone throws a blanket over me!” He's not paying attention to what he's doing and the bottle in his hand shatters against the counter, a shard slicing his hand open.

“Fucking shit.” you him sigh.

“Are you okay?” You ask maneuvering out from under your blankets to see Frankie in the kitchen, glass on the floor and blood coming down his arm.

“Wow you're out of my sight for 2 seconds and you maim yourself” you say laughing, stopping when you see the panicked look in his eye, the event evidently triggering something deep in his psyche. You quickly stand up and he goes to move towards you.

“No don't move Frankie, stay where you are.” you reassure softly, watching as his eyes lay into your own, his breathing calmer now “You're in socks, can't have you cutting your dancing feet” you say.

“You’ve heard of my dancing feet,” he says, grounding himself again.

“Only bad things” you say, throwing him a pair of shoes that he carefully puts on before moving toward the closet where the broom is “No come here, let me see your hand. The mess can wait, you're more important,” you stress leading him over to the couch and sitting him down.

“Wow, first time I'll be able to afford professional health care “ he jokes as you take his hands in your own.

“Ow” he says when you press down onto the hand to assess the damage.

“It's fine, not deep enough for stitches, should heal up on its own. I still want to clean it though, to stop any infection.” You return with a small bottle of over priced vodka opening it and dabbing some onto a cotton pad. He doesn't flinch when the alcohol cleans the wound and he watches as you bandage his hand up.

“You carry a med pack with you on every trip?” he queries, but you don’t hear him you’re too focused on wrapping his hand.

“There! good as new,” you say standing up and cleaning up the glass on the floor. “Hey did you bring a swimsuit?” you ask, dumping the glass into some newspaper that was left in the room.

“Why?” He asks.

“Answer the question Frankie” you say, folding the paper around the shards before placing it into the trash.

“Yes, you wanna go hang out at the pool with the fifty families stuck here?”

“Ya. You don't? Seriously this room is wildly expensive and has a huge jacuzzi tub, I'm getting in your welcome to join, but bathing suits are mandatory.” you offer.

“I was gonna get in fully clothed,” he offers, not missing a beat.

“Perfect even better”

As per usual he beats you to the punch and settles into the tub that was more akin to a hot tub than a bath, he wanted to get in first partially to annoy you and partially so his body wouldn’t be on full display, he wasn't as jacked as he once was and he’d become insecure about certain areas that he’d let go once his kid came along. He watches as you walk in and his eyes can't help but follow your figure around the room, a beautiful person behind a beautiful personality, he thanks the universe for placing him into your orbit.

“That why they call you catfish?” you ask drawing him from his daydream back into an equally pleasing reality.

“What?” he responds, blushing at having been called out on his gawking.

“Cause your mouth hangs open like a fish out of water when you're zoned out” you smirk, lowering yourself down into the tub.

“Rude” he says splashing after you settle in.

“Alright, Frankie, what is it?” you ask, causing his face to look up to you “what's your deal, apart from smoking? You gotta have flaws”

“Wouldn’t you like to know.” he charms

“Sinister” you laugh, but he doesn't, you reach your foot up tapping his cheek with it,

“Disgusting,” he chuckles, grabbing it and rubbing the arch before pushing it back into the water.

“God, I miss the ocean” you confess, “ I hate the city sometimes.”

“You’re not planning on staying in Chicago after you're done?”

“Nope, gonna get myself out to the coast, or at least somewhere without winters.” you say stretching your arms out across the tub. “How about you, are you planning on staying?”

“ Probably, no reason to leave, plus it's close to my mom so she can take care of Arianna when I'm at work, though I wouldn't be opposed to moving if the opportunity presented itself she's young enough that it wouldn’t be too hard.” he says, wanting you to know that if you asked, hed follow you anywhere.

“Arianna, beautiful name. Did you pick it?” you ask looking up when a few minutes of silence pass. As you do you notice that the somber look from early had returned. “You okay?” you ask.

“I don't deserve her, I don’t deserve something so good.” he states, suddenly realizing he didn’t deserve someone like you either. You wouldn’t be sitting in the tub with him if you knew what he’d done.

“Frankie that's not true” you reassure

“You don't know the shit I've done. I'm not... I'm not a good person,” he says, still not looking over to you.

“Well, I…” you begin to refute.

“Seriously, I've done bad things… awful things'' he clears his throat, afraid to look at you, afraid you’d be terrified by him.

“People make bad mistakes, but that doesn't make them irredeemable, not if they are willing to change. You understand what you did was bad, that says something.” you reassure, knowing the guilt was likely left over from the military.

“Well, wise words coming from someone who's never done anything bad”

“You don't know me that well Frankie, I’ve done my fair share of stupid things, crappy things to numb the pain. It's what we do to make up for those shitty actions that count. At every turn, you’ve shown me that you're not an evil person. Everything I’ve seen is good, and funny and incredibly kind.” you finish and you continue to nudge him with your foot until he finally cracks a smile.

“Well now you're smiling again, my missions complete and it's time for bed” you say stepping out of the tub and drying off, unaware that you’d just made Frankie fall even harder for you. His eyes helplessly following you as you leave the bathroom.

“Since I'm an outpatient, does that mean I get the good side of the bed?” he calls out after you. You roll your eyes but let him have it, you preferred the sleeping situation the way it was.

[consumeconstantly]

SBGS ch 6

1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | ao3 

2:00AM | CoffeeVamp: marinette dupain cheng could step on me and i would thank her

CoffeeVamp: did you all see how bad ass that girl was

CoffeeVamp: she was just like demon spawn is robin? Well fuck you for being in paris

CoffeeVamp: and her file oml this girl does so much for paris and he classmates treat her like CRAP

Daddy: How do you know her Damian? Clearly you guys have met before. Can you really trust her with your identity?

Jesus: this girl has been keeping her own secret identitieS under wraps for years I doubt she’ll rat 

CoffeeVamp: DONT EVEN GET ME STARTED ON MDC 

CoffeeVamp: all i ever wanted was for MDC to design smth for me but u ruined ALL my chances demon spawn !!!!

2:15 AM | TheOG: I think we can trust her

TheOG: Don’t think she trusts us tho

CoffeeVamp: yea what was with the zip ties 

CoffeeVamp: do you have smth to tell us ;))) 

CoffeeVamp: have u been getting spicy in paris ;))) 

CoffeeVamp: remember to use protection we don’t need any mini yous around

LadyLady: she’s good. I can see why Ladybug trusts her

DemonSpawn: She’s a friend I met in Paris. She can keep a secret.

2:20 AM | DemonSpawn: I regret not trusting her. 

CoffeeVamp: i cant believe that u thought someone who was nice enough to spend time wu willingly could be a supervillain

Jesus: that’s pretty fucked up man

Jesus: Surprised she didn’t rail on you more for that. I would’ve given you a beat down

LadyLady: u need a game plan to get her on your side. She doesn’t have a good reason to trust u anymore and id like it if we were on good terms with the one person that can contact lb

The OG: ^^ babs is always right

TheOG: you only have two weeks

DemonSpawn: How do I get on her good side?

Jesus: you better hope and pray because girls like that do not forgive easy

TheOG: try being her friend again

Jesus: like she wants to be his friend anymore

LadyLady: Apologize to her.

#

Jason is right.

It’s clear that Marinette does not want to be involved with him any longer. Marinette comes in right as the bell rings, then faces firmly ahead and doesn’t spare him a single glance. Notes that he slips to her are ignored. She doesn’t check her phone for his texts except for once, when she texts him: anything related to last night will be discussed out of school.

Instead of going home for lunch, she willingly sits with Lila, just so she can avoid him cornering her in the bakery. Damian watches them from a distance, but he’s close enough to hear most of the conversations. Most of their other classmates are taken in by some video on Alya’s. There’s a quick exclamation from the Ladyblogger, saying something about being able to meet some American celebrity, and she and the rest of the class run off to somewhere else, though not before inviting Lila and Adrien. They’re turned down, and Marinette continues to sit with the two of them.

“We’ve got a photo shoot together later today.” Adrien sounds tired. Like he’s giving up, almost. 

“Would you like to come, Marinette?” 

Damian can’t make out Marinette’s reply, but she must say yes, because Lila’s calculated facade slips away to reveal shock and interest. Lila entwines her fingers with Adrien’s, an act Adrien clearly isn’t expecting, as he flinches. 

Marinette levels a glance at Lila, who looks surprised at Adrien’s reaction, not that Damian can blame her; she practically hangs off Adrien every day, playing up their couple relationship for the media, and Adrien never reacts like this. He inches closer. Lila reaches out to touch Adrien on the shoulder, in a gesture of soothing, but Adrien flinches again, this time gaining a distant look in his eyes and starting to breath hard. Lila goes to kneel--it’s clear that Adrien is on the verge of a full blown panic attack-- but Marinette holds Lila by her arm and shakes her head, gesturing for her to wait off to the side. 

Adrien’s reactions are trademarks of an abuse victim. His reactions are rather dramatic in comparison to the clenched jaw and distant eyes that he normally sees in kids in Gotham, which leads Damian to the conclusion that this is either a more recent thing, or when he is abused, he emphasizes his weakness in attempt to get the attacker to stop. The question of who seems rather redundant; everyone knows that Adrien Agreste is the sheltered, sunshine boy who never stepped a foot out of his mansion before turning twelve. Though he models, his actions are still highly restricted. There’s not really much of a chance for Adrien’s abuser to be anyone other than the people within his immediate vicinity, so the suspects were his father, the personal assistant, his drive, or someone he works with.

He’ll have to keep this information in mind moving forward. Though Damian ordered extensive background checks on each and every student at Francois Dupont, he only read the profiles of the people in his class, and only keeps tabs on the people that are of interest.nIn Mlle. Bustier’s class, the only people who Damian is interested in are Marinette, for obvious reasons, Lila Rossi, for the sheer number of times she was akumatized during year two of Hawkmoth’s presence, Chloe Bourgeois, who may not be Francois Dupont student, let alone in France at the moment, but has a parent who currently sits at the top of his family’s Hawkmoth suspect list and has gotten countless people akumatized, and Adrien Agreste, the only person other than Marinette who hasn’t been akumatized in the akuma class. If Adrien really is being abused-- and he doesn’t really see any reason for Adrien to fake the symptoms, given that there’s really nothing for him to gain out of this situation-- that knocks him up a space on the list of Hawkmoth suspects. Victims of abuse, especially in a high profile situation, are often likely to either lash out or coop themselves up. Since he isn’t purposely excluding himself from activities, given that he converses with Marinette, Lila, and two other classmates named Nino and Alya, it’s possible that he has adopted Hawkmoth as an alter ego to pursue revenge. 

All this, of course, is mere speculation. Before making any abrupt jumps in his logic, like he did with Marinette-- though he defends himself with the fact that his thoughts on her being Hawkmoth were mere speculation, and that it was merely coincidence or a case of extremely bad luck that Marinette… what, thought he was Hawkmoth as well and then passed the information onto Ladybug? Now that he thinks about it, the whole situation seems ridiculous, and he finds that Ladybug’s lack of tact when coming face to face with her supposed arch-nemesis doesn’t befit a hero of her caliber. She seemed oddly emotional about the whole thing, like his existence as Hawkmoth was a personal betrayal. But Ladybug and Damian never met before that. Why did Ladybug take Marinette’s personal vendetta upon herself? His head hurts.

Damian finds himself walking over to their table, where Marinette is speaking in soothing tones, careful not to touch Adrien at all. He calms down enough to start breathing regularly. Even though his eyes are still watery, he looks up at Marinette with a tentative smile. Marinette looks back at him with such pure, unadulterated love, that Damian blinks slowly to make sure he’s not seeing things. There aren’t many people who show emotions that don’t have some hidden barb underneath, or an undercurrent of a different emotion alongside it. 

Then, Marinette sends a calculating look at Damian, and a briefer one at Lila and Adrien. 

“Lila, can I talk to you in private for a moment?” Although Marinette’s tone keeps to a pleasant range, Damian finds it rather familiar. Like when Alfred pulls him or one of his brothers to the side to politely tell them what they’re doing wrong and how to remedy it. But there’s a bit of genuine ferocity in Marinette’s tone, and the Italian girl steps back. 

“Adrien, I’m going to leave you here with Damian just for a second, okay? I’ll be right back, and if you need me for anything, just call.” She gives Damian a look that says if you hurt this boy, I will end you and heads off with Lila. 

“Damian,” Adrien says. He’s trying to come off as calm and cheery. He misses the mark terribly. Somehow, Damian gets the feeling that the boy isn’t very good at bottling up his emotions, odd, considering that he’s grown up partially in the limelight. “I see you’re well acquainted with our everyday Ladybug. She really is amazing.”

There’s a touch of awe, and it makes Damian uncomfortable for no good reason. 

He’s not sure how to deal with people who look like they’re about to cry. Damian doesn’t have to deal with that. Dick’s in charge of any emotional clean up that’s necessary in the public; Alfred helps his family manage their emotions in the manor. He decides that going with the flow is the best option in this situation. An everyday Ladybug. What an interesting piece of terminology.

“She is.” Damian admits,  “We’re not currently on the best of terms.” 

Damian will be surprised if Marinette even manages to civilly work with him for the rest of the week. He wasn’t expecting their subsequent interactions after last night to be the same as they were prior to her finding out that he was Robin and thinking that she was Hawkmoth, but he thought she would just interact coolly with him. Not this silent treatment. She refuses to talk to him and only looks at him with some combination of disdain and ill intent. 

He can’t manage to give her the same treatment, both because he is on a mission and because he can’t fault her for thinking that he was Hawkmoth. The situation is really, rather comical, but he spent enough time ruminating on his actions the previous night to pick up on all of the red flags that made her come to that conclusion, and even is she was a hero for a short period of time, he can’t expect someone who is, by and large, a civilian to have the same investigative capabilities his family does. If anything, he is ashamed of himself for jumping to the conclusion that she was Hawkmoth, when instead, it turned out she is working for Ladybug. 

However, the Marinette he’s seen so far doesn’t seem the type to hold grudges, especially not when it comes to any pressing issue, and he finds that all of the decisions she makes are heavily logic-based and influenced by Sabine’s values, who is definitely an upright woman if he’s ever seen one. Marinette has too strong of a work ethic to actually ignore Damian when it comes down to it, but he has to wonder why she acted so blatantly hostile to him. Her character combined with her actions just don’t match up, which means there's another reason why she’s acting this way. 

While Damian excels at extracting raw data and testimonies from people due to brute force, and is decent enough at getting people to do what he desires, determining the source of a person’s frustration, what drives a person-- he needs more work with that. He’s much better at getting people mad. And Damian doesn’t think he’s seen Marinette mad at anyone except for Celia DeVries. She has nerves made of steel and patience carved from diamond.

“I hope you figure it out.” Adrien says with such sincerity that it’s frightening. He’s surprisingly pure-hearted for a model entrenched in a mega corporation like Gabriel. The entertainment industry, particularly the fashion side of business, is a very cut throat world. Adrien doesn’t seem like a person who’s been in the public eyes for years. “Please be a better friend to her than I am. I really wanted to do more for her, but my hands are... tied.”

Lila is subdued when she and Marinette return. Her eyes dart to Adrien, and she frowns and bites her bottom lip. Then she looks away and crosses her arms. 

“Let’s get back to class. I’m excited to go to the photoshoot after school! I haven’t spent any time with you in so long, Adrien.” Marinette doesn’t sound like she’s faking it. She sounds so genuinely happy, and Damian wonders if he can make her sound like that again. If he ever made her sound like that. 

Adrien looks at Marinette, then asks Damian, “Would you like to come too?”

The look that Adrien gives him tells him to say yes, even though he can feel the cold that radiates off Marinette. Damian agrees; it’s time to try Barbara’s suggestion and apologize, and since he doubts that he’ll get a word in edgewise when they’re working together at night, he has to try apologizing sooner.

The rest of the school day slips by in a blur. 

Then, the four of them are out on the streets, and Damian finds their combination unnerving, to say the least. He’s still on bad terms with Marinette, and Marinette has never been on the best terms with Lila. She’s going to this shoot solely for the opportunity to be with Adrien, and something about that unsettles Damian. Still, regardless of how Damian feels, the photographer on the set of Adrien and Lila’s shoot loves all four of them.

“Fantastico! Adrien’s friends are rare finds. It’s true about what they say; beautiful people, they associate with beautiful people.” The photographer flits around Damian and Marinette, getting uncomfortably close. Damian shoots him a glare, but the photographer simply takes it in stride.

“Yes, yes, the most beautiful eyes, so passionate. The perfect measurements, too! Lara,” he calls to one of his assistants, “Get them all to makeup. These four are who I’ve been waiting for to fulfil my vision of envy. Gabriel will have to wait on his magazine spread. I’ve been inspired!” The photographer circles the four of them, like a hunter and his prey. 

Out of nowhere, the photographer grasps Marinette’s chin, and despite the initial flinch she gives-- he’s not sure whether she was going to kick or punch him, but the sudden spitfire in her eyes said she was going to do something-- she settles into a locked jaw and curled fingers. Damian sees a slight jump from Adrien as well, which seems unusual; on the way over, he talked about how he worked with this photographer before and was very comfortable with him. He regaled them with funny stories of how he tended to reference spaghetti in shoots that were less pleasant to make the models laugh. 

“Ah, Adrien, you have truly delivered the favor of Fortuna upon me. I cannot believe I never saw this earlier. You have brought this girl to shoots before, have you not? I never forget a beautiful face, even when I am focused on other things.” 

Marinette calmly displaces Vincent’s hand from her face. “Thank you for the kind words, Monsieur, but I think it best that we just watch the originally planned shoot. I am no model and have no interest in being one.”

Vincent gives Marinette a once over, like he’s not used to people disagreeing with whatever vision he has for the day. “From one artist to the next-- this project is important to me. I’ve had the idea for years, but have yet to come across the perfect models to portray it. What will it take to convince you? ”

At this, nearly all the tension that Marinette has coiled up in her shoulders dissipates. Vincent has said the right thing. “I see. Really, Vincent, I think it’s best that you continue with the Gabriel shoot. M. Agreste wouldn’t be happy if he found out that his spread was delayed.”

“But the Muse, Mademoiselle! She runs away so quickly. And the four of you are perfect.” Vincent turns to the other three. 

“Surely, you understand. Mlle. Rossi, M. Agreste, you must have felt an urge to do something so strongly that it pulls you in. And you,” he looks more closely at Damian. “You are an artist as well, aren’t you Monsieur? I can tell. It’s in the hands and eyes. Art, she comes, but she is fickle. If I don’t do this now, it will be gone forever. And the pursuit of true art means more than any Gabriel spread.”

Surprisingly, it is Adrien who responds first. “I might not understand art, Vincent, but I know what you’re talking about. The feeling of wanting to do something badly, to set yourself free…”

He twists his ring. Marinette looks at him sadly again, hands twitching like she wants to hold him to provide comfort. 

“Besides, I don’t really want to do a Gabriel spread today. I haven’t spent time with friends in a long time, and I don’t think anything could make me happier than doing a photoshoot with you three right now.”

This makes Lila look at Adrien in a curious sort of way. Not the sad look that Marinette is giving him, but one of a slowly dawning realization. When Adrien references her as a friend, she looks happy. Proud, almost. Then, she looks like she’s connecting dots in her head, and she doesn’t look happy with the conclusion that she’s drawn. As soon as the frown  touches her lips, Lila shifts back to an impeccably crafted mask. 

Damian doesn’t agree with the sentiment that they are friends. He has barely had a full conversation with the blond, though he will admit that Adrien does have more of a brain than the rest of his classmates. He looks at the ill-concealed shadows beneath Adrien’s eyes and sees Tim.

Lila agrees almost immediately after Adrien finishes speaking. “Inspiration is fleeting. Art waits for no one.”

Marinette purses her lips. She asks Vincent, “You won’t get in any trouble for this?”

“I can handle any backlash Gabriel throws at me. Heaven knows that man has pissed off one too many photographers before.”

“You can, but what about everybody else involved?” She looks at Adrien, specifically. He fidgets with his ring again, and sends Marinette a look so pleading that she sighs. “Fine. I don’t mind doing the shoot.”

“Fantastico!” He turns his gaze to Damian.

“I’ll do it.” He’s never been particularly fond of photographers, given that the invasiveness of the media has led his family to various unpleasant situations, but Cass went through a photography phase, and out of all of his ‘sibling’ relationships, he is the most willing to indulge her. 

“Will you tell us what the subject of the shoot is?” Marinette has inched closer to Adrien. Adrien pauses, stops fidgeting with his ring, and looks at Marinette. A world weary smile creeps onto his face, and his hand reaches out for Marinette’s like he wasn’t expecting himself to do that. He looks surprised when he finds his hand in hers, tenses for a moment. But Marinette doesn’t say anything, and rubs soothing circles on the back of his hand with her thumb. This seems to relax him more than fidgeting with his ring. He sags, and Damian can’t bring himself to feel anything but pity for Adrien. Lila looks curious, but not jealous. 

Vincent surveys the four of them again, a growing smile on his face. “No, I think the four of you are already perfetto. A little direction here and there, but yes, yes, this is very good.”

“Lara, bring them to makeup. You know what to do. I must set up! Don’t call Gabriel; we will most likely be taking this to a second location at sunset.” Then, Vincent is off, muttering something in Italian under his breath. 

“Thank you so much for agreeing to do this shoot,” Adrien rambles as soon as they get into makeup. “Vincent is such a great photographer and he’s taken really good care of me over the years. He’ll take good care of all of you as well.”

He continues, a little softer. “I really wanted to spend time with the three of you, together. I--I think it would be really nice if we could all be friends.”

Damian has his eyes closed because eyeshadow is being applied, but he can practically feel the surprise rolling off Marinette.

“Adrien, we are friends already.” 

“We are, but we’re not really close. The only person I talked to often was Nino, and recently, father has-- ” he breaks off, looking exceedingly uncomfortable, before speaking quickly in an attempt to speak up before losing his nerve. “But I don’t just mean friends with me, I mean the four of us. I want the four of us to be friends.”

The makeup artist who is working on Adrien shushes him, but Damian gets to open his eyes. Adrien is clearly nervous. He’s not shaking-- he is bred far too well for that-- but he has reverted back to fidgeting with his ring. He tries to bite his lip, but the makeup artist shakes her head and tuts.

The girls are both silent, and Adrien looks so nervous that he has to do something. He doesn’t think he’s interacted like this with anyone as nervous as Adrien before; his brothers were all big personalities, as were the Teen Titans. He may have come across nervous or anxious civilians as Robin, but those situations were more straight and cut, involving little to no talking. Damian decides to that a cross between how he interacts with Dick and how he interacts with the people he saves is the best bet for this situation, though his tone comes out more condescending than he planned.

“Why the four of us?” Damian can’t really see why Adrien has singled out the four of them. As far as he can tell, there’s no good blood between them. Adrien, Marinette, and Damian all harbor varying levels of dislike or discomfort towards Lila; Adrien, Lila, and Damian have all fucked over Marinette in various ways (or so he Damian assumes on Adrien’s part-- he is sure they would have been closer, otherwise); Lila, Marinette and Damian haven't talked to Adrien in any capacity that implies that they're more than mere acquaintances; Damian has done nothing that would put himself in the favor of the three. 

Adrien fidgets even more, and the makeup artist smacks him and says that she doesn’t want to have to redo his eyeliner. “I think we all have a lot in common. And, I might not be good at showing it, but I like the three of you.”

Marinette makes some noise in disbelief and Lila narrows her eyes. 

“Hear me out on this, guys. All of us try to help people when we can,”

“That’s basic human decency, Adrien,” Marinette says.

“Me, helping people?” Lila scoffs.

“We help people out more than most people do-- and Lila, you really do help people. Sure, you might not have been telling the truth about all of the celebrities or all of the charities you worked with, but you’ve helped a lot of charities throughout the years.”

Damian quirks an eyebrow. “And me?”

“I’ve heard about Silverstein and Company.” Adrien says, then continues on with his list of Reasons Why They Should Be Friends. 

“None of us like telling people about our problems.”

This is met with no resistance.

“And we’re also all lonely.”

Silence. 

Marinette’s makeup artist breaks up the oppressive silence, “And all good looking to boot!”

“It’s true what they say about the most beautiful,” Lila’s makeup artist says, “They’re always so troubled.”

Marinette laughs, but it’s strained. “Don’t worry Mademoiselle. We’re just being teens.”

“Loneliness isn’t a good reason to form relationships.” Lila says. Her voice is quiet. She looks off to some fixed point in the distance.

“It’s not the worst reason there ever was,” Adrien shrugs, satisfied now that he’s said his piece. His shoulders are back a little more now. Whatever happens next is up to them, not him. “And I like all of you. I think we all have very unique personalities that could work well together.”

Marinette shrugs her shoulders. “If there’s one thing that I’ve learned about relationships, it’s that initial compatibility means very little in the grand scheme of things. Relationships can work as long as you work for them. They might not be the fairy tale storyline that people chase after, but relationships that are worked on last longer. Adrien could be right. We might be able to all be good friends.”

Lila fixes Marinette with a stare. “You’re willing to be my friend? After what I did to you?”

Marinette shouldn’t be willing to be friends with Lila after what she did. In fact, after reading multiple books on healthy relationships when trying to cope with Chloe way back when, she shouldn’t be willing to be friends with any of them. It feels fucked up, but Marinette realizes that Damian, who believed she was a super villain, has the least strikes against a healthy relationship currently. 

Even though Marinette knows that circumstance doesn’t excuse any of them-- Marinette doesn’t excuse her stalkerish tendencies back when she first met Adrien, either-- she knows that the three of them are just teens who have too many responsibilities and problems on their shoulders. They’re capable of change, and as both Ladybug and Marinette, she wants to believe that someone’s past actions doesn’t mean they can’t move forward. Perhaps their current actions should be taken with a healthy dose of cynicism, and perhaps their past colors how much Marinette will be able to trust them in certain areas, but throughout her years of existence she’s seen that there is no person who has only done good in their life.

“You’ve been better lately. I respect someone who changes themselves for the better.” What Marinette doesn’t say; she’s mostly willing to try this tentative friendship out for Adrien’s sake, because Lila seems to be the only one who can get Gabriel Agreste on her side and Marinette needs her help if she and Adrien’s trust if she can ever dream of emancipating Adrien. 

Marinette is also confident that Lila is currently coming into her own, and knows that Lila didn’t have any good example to model herself after during her formative years. The fact that she’s changing now? It’s honestly pretty impressive, and even more so considering the people that are in Mme. Bustier’s class aren’t exactly cut from the most inspirational cloth. Why Lila is trying to change is something Marinette is curious about, but they’re definitely not close enough for Marinette to ask Lila that. There is also the very important fact that Lila has not been akumatized this entire year, nor has she gone out of her way to encourage someone else’s akumatization.

A small smile settles on Lila’s face. “Thank you. For what it’s worth, I am … sorry for what I did to you back then.”

Marinette hums with her eyes closed as a light layer of shadows placed on her crease. “I accept your apology. While we’re on this topic, I’d like to apologize to Adrien. I’m sorry that I haven’t been a very good friend to you. You’re an amazing person, and I want you to know that. Your self-worth should never be degraded by other people, and I really hope that you can come to rely on me.”

A watery, affectionate smile from Adrien. “Marinette, you’ve always been one of my best friends.”

“I regret what I said to you yesterday,” Damian cannot muster an apology-- he does not apologize, certainly not for doing his job, but Marinette is… useful. He needs her to accomplish her mission, and she’s kind. 

There is no verbal response from Marinette, but she’s looking at him, at least. She hasn’t looked at him all day besides the one glare she gave him that told him to take care of Adrien. 

Lila looks between the two of them. “What are you sorry for? I was under the impression that the two of you were great friends.”

He is sorry, if only slightly, but it takes a lot for him to get an apology. If anything, Marinette should be apologizing to him, for mistaking him as Hawkmoth, right? “Last night was--”

Marinette cuts him off with a sharp laugh. “Damian here thought I was Hawkmoth.”

Adrien bursts out laughing. “Oh my god, you thought Marinette was Hawkmoth? Out of all the Parisians you could choose! You know she goes around the city saving random people, right? She’s our everyday Ladybug. Doesn’t sound very supervillainy to me.”

Lila laughs too, and the tension in the preparation room finally breaks. “Please, if Marinette were Hawkmoth, she would have gotten Ladybug and Chat Noir’s Miraculous already. Have you seen what a planner she is?”

This gets Adrien to fake shudder. “It’s true. If Marinette really were Hawkmoth, she’d be so powerful. She knows everybody’s deepest fears, can kick ass and take names, and can come up with the weirdest plans that solve everybody’s problems in an instant. Imagine if she went to the dark side.”

“She would make an awful akuma.” Lila agrees. “How powerful you are as an akuma is linked to how strong you are mentally and how strong your emotions are when the butterfly lands on you. Whatever makes Marinette upset enough to have an akuma after her would probably be the result of some very strong emotions.”

“She’d be strong enough to level the entire city.”

Marinette is bright red, and if it were not for the fact that mascara is being applied to her lashes, she’d probably have her face buried in her hands. “Okay, okay, I would be an awful akuma. But I won’t ever be akumatized, so it’s fine.”

Adrien thinks of Marinette being an akuma more, and his face goes pale. “She really would be able to steal Ladybug and Chat Noir’s Miraculouses successfully.”

“No, she’s too morally righteous to do that. She’d probably go after Hawkmoth and win while she was akumatized.” Lila looks pensive. “All akumas retain most of their original personality traits, just exaggerated. Some even have some semblance of control over their actions.”

“If that wouldn’t be one of Anime’s top 10 betrayals, I don’t know what is. Hawkmoth akumatizes Marinette and then she rightfully kicks his ass.”

“Guys,” Marinette hisses. “I won’t ever become an akuma. Never.”

“You say that like you can refuse Hawkmoth,” Lila laughs. “You can certainly go after akumas, but refuse them? No way.”

Adrien zeroes in on Marinette’s hesitance. “Have you?”

Marinette shifts in her seat, her mouth set into a grim line.

“You have,” Adrien says with a touch of awe. Damian is impressed too; no reports of people being able to refuse an akuma have passed through the many hours of research he’s spent scouring the internet. He understands why Ladybug put so much trust in Marinette. “When?”

This sets Marinette on edge. Her back straightens into a board. 

Lila picks at her fingernails in shame. “Did I?”

Marinette doesn’t respond, but the tremble of her mouth and her silence answers the question well enough. 

Damian doubts he’ll ever get the full story of what happened that first year when Lila arrived. Marinette isn’t one to snitch, and Lila is both unwilling and tentatively ashamed of the past. Adrien won’t answer out of courtesy. Damian will never go to any of the other classmates to hear a bastardized version of what went down. He supposes he’ll never find out the whole truth.

Marinette’s stylist claps her hand. “Okay, enough teenage angst for today. All of your makeup is done, so it’s time to get into your outfits. Let’s go, kids.”

They’re silent as they dress.

#

The shoot is a flurry of excitement. There are many whispered conversations, but Marinette can’t keep track of half of them. Whenever she isn’t in a shot-- which is fairly rare as she seems to be the main subject of whatever Vincent is shooting for-- Marinette focuses on what needs to happen next. Though she’s still not currently the biggest fan of Damian or the Justice League, she will give them a fair chance, because as much as she hates to admit it, she needs the help. Batman is right. Even though she wasn’t actively working on the case for the first year, she still had plenty of time to gather evidence to back up her main suspects. Her lack of expertise in technology hinders progress greatly.

Not to mention that because Marinette was so wary about hurting Adrien and so swamped trying to keep a balanced schedule, she wasn’t able to find enough evidence to feel safe in her convictions. Master Fu warned her of incorrectly accusing Gabriel in the eye of the public, and he hasn’t come out to fight since the Scarlet Moth incident. She’s tried to investigate Gabriel in his own house, but any evidence slips through her fingers. He’s a very careful man.

 Now that the promise of college is coming up, Marinette needs to take Hawkmoth down. Marinette doesn’t want to continue her schooling in France. Not anymore. She wants to go to a foreign college, where dreams of akumas won’t plague her at every step. Half the reason she finds herself on the streets as a civilian constantly is to erase the gory imagery of death and blood that linger in her mind eye from akuma battles. Seeing happy and alive citizens in all of the areas where Hawkmoth attacked make her feel better, but aren’t enough to chase away her nightmares entirely.

Marinette moves through the rest of the photoshoot in a haze. When she is in shot, she focuses on whoever she’s shooting with. Lila, with sharp green eyes, barely begins to lower her guard when Marinette directs the conversation towards past modelling shoots she’s been involved with. They interact unnaturally at first, but after starting to talk about Dior’s Spring/Summer ready to wear line, they find that they have similar tastes in silhouettes, though not in color. 

She forces herself to ignore the fiasco that was last night, and talks to Damian about small nothings that don’t touch on anything important. When she runs out of topics, she begins to talk about Renee, and his gaze shifts to something resembling regret and some other emotion she can’t read. Dealing with whatever issues Damian has is not ideal. He’ll have to sort out his feelings on his own.

Adrien’s expressions are the easiest to read. Whenever he’s in a shot with Marinette, he is happy, plain and simple. There is less weight on his shoulders, and as Marinette attempts to cheer him up with poorly thought out puns, he looks like a kid again. He even starts punning back, and Marinette can’t believe how much she missed that. Chat Noir stopped punning a while ago, and it hurt in unexpected ways. 

Really, Marinette just wants Adrien to be happy. Adrien is Chat Noir. Her best friend. Her partner. Marinette thinks Adrien deserves the world. She wants to pave a path for him so that his entrance into the adult world is easier, because the facade Gabriel has built of a picture perfect family attempting to cope with the loss of a mother and wife isn’t what Adrien needs.

Maybe Marinette wants him to have the childhood he wasn’t afforded. Marinette clings to warm memories of her own childhood, where Maman trained her in self defense and Papa taught her how to bake when things get particularly hard nowadays. Her heart warms when she sees Adrien give shy smiles to Damian and Lila. She’s proud when he strikes up conversations with them.

In all honesty, the only part of the shoot Marinette remembers is the last section of group photos they take when they move to a second location. It’s a cold day in Spring, which means Parisian tourists are more likely to be found inside an art museum, rather than on the beach. Adrien convinces them all that they should run around the beach, and somehow, they end up playing some extremely difficult version of capture the flag, but without the flags. 

Somehow, Marinette ends up on a team of her own, for the sole reason that she’s the only one wearing white, and the person who holds the opposing team’s flag is Damian. She tackles him onto the sand, but not before both Lila and Adrien are hot on her tail. They end up in a pile, and Adrien’s laughter rings so sweet and true, that Marinette’s heart fills with love. She shifts, so her body is facing skywards instead of into Damian’s arm, and she reaches one arm across Damian’s body to grab Lila’s hand, who flinches at first touch, but relaxes. Marinette’s other hand finds itself tangled in Adrien’s hair, and despite the cold weather, Marinette is content. 

She looks towards the horizon, where the sun is setting in a million different colors, and finds herself longing for a time where every day can be just like this moment.Where there is nothing filling her head except thoughts of the people who make her happy. Her eyes shift straight up.

Where morning fades into night, the sky is so very, very, blue.

#

Marinette’s room turns into an organized warzone at night.

The area of her room that was previously used to hold up various sketches and mood boards for designs in progress turns out not to be an upholstered wall, but a curtain that hides two whiteboards and a small library of books on the psychology of emotional manipulation, manuals of martial arts, and various books on strategy. The shelf above her desk space holds a projector that Marinette uses to project images from her computer onto the left white board. 

“I’ll catch you up on my previous attempts and what you have to know in order for this partnership to work.” She takes her tablet out, flips through several screens, then uses her fingerprint to unlock a folder of notes. “This is a chronological list of things that Ladybug and I have attempted in order to find Hawkmoth’s location. There is a separate folder with suspects for identity that’s alphabetized. If you’re interested in more in depth analyses of past akumas, I can send that to you and your team’s emails now, as most of the information is readily available online. I’m assuming that you have a team, correct?”

“Yes, I can send their email addresses to your number.”

“No, for any information regarding Hawkmoth or superheroes in Paris, you can contact me through this number and email address. Ladybug and I both check it regularly; it’s a safer, more encrypted way of communication.” Marinettte taps her Miraculous communicator and connects it to her computer, so she can work on a bigger screen. “Which person is your main point of contact?”

“Oracle.” 

Marinette contacts Oracle through video call. She doesn’t want to have to explain everything twice even if their partnership turns out to be nonviable. It takes a few moments to get through, but a woman’s face pops up on the screen. She’s a redhead and doesn’t wear a mask. Her coloring is obviously different from the rest of Batman’s affiliates, and despite her initial grievances with the white films over the vigilante’s eyes, she understand why it’s necessary; their suits aren’t magic, and there’s nothing stopping people from running facial recognition software and matching them up to people who reside in Gotham. 

“How did you get this number?” Oracle asks warily. 

Marinette moves her chair slightly so that Oracle can see Damian, who's currently looking at her tablet on her chaise. “I’m Marinette Dupain-Cheng, your point of contact in Paris and the one who will be working with you for the next week. As you can see, Damian’s already viewing some information that Ladybug and I have compiled over the years. Please get the rest of your team on this call. I’d like to get all of the basic information out of the way now.”

“Damian?” The girl on her screen is a dead ringer for the girl they compiled multiple files on yesterday, but she can’t get a trace on where they’re calling from, which makes her suspicious.

Damian shoots her a text, confirming that it is actually him in the room, then goes back to scrolling through the tablet.

Nightwing, Red Robin, Red Hood, and Batman all appear on the screen shortly. 

“Great, the gang's all here,” Marinette says unenthusiastically. “I’ll say it one more time. I’m Marinette Dupain-Cheng and I will be your primary point of contact during your two weeks trial period here in Paris. I’m assuming that your team has been brought up on the events that occurred last night. In order for this attempted partnership to go more smoothly, I will provide you lists of suspects, past attempts at revealing Hawkmoth’s location, and more detailed information about all of the past akumas that have appeared. These files will only be available to you for the week unless the collaboration goes successfully. Damian has already given me your contact information.”

As an afterthought, Marinette adds, “Don’t bother trying to copy any of the files. You won’t be able to. You also won’t be able to pick up on my location through this video call; I’m using a Miraculous Communicator. The magic makes it so that any technology other than another Miraculous will be unable to find any identifying location.”

Marinette knows about this thanks to Max’s brief stint as Pegasus. Though Marinette had not yet learned spells that would allow her to materialize her communicator outside of the time that she was suited up, she had Max try to find Ladybug’s location after sending him a text. He and Markov were both unable to. 

“Since the Justice League insists on sticking their nose where it does not belong,” Marinette can’t help but be bitter about this whole situation, despite the fact that her frustration with Damian has decreased. “Ladybug and I have created a plan to make full use of your resources while you’re still butting in. I’ve sent a list of which organizations need monetary support. Most are affiliated with mental health.”

“Let’s move onto how you guys as a team can help us. As far as I understand, Batman’s team is proficient in technology and investigation. For the past two years that we’ve actively been on the case, nobody has had those skill sets and been in the long term possession of a Miraculous. The police attempted investigation for the first year, but their evidence and information was largely unhelpful. I will give Damian the Miraculous Communicator that I am in possession of to use his skills with so long as he tells me what he’s doing with it and he uses it while I’m in his immediate vicinity. He can try to find out Hawkmoth’s location on it, perhaps with a greater degree of success that we have been able to.”

She goes through the checklist she made one more time, just to make sure that she didn’t miss anything. She doesn’t really expect anything much to come out of this collaboration, except for the reassurance that the Justice League won’t interfere at the end of the week. Speaking of: “One more thing. I want a notarized agreement that the Justice League will not interfere in Paris, nor will any of their agents of affiliates be sent here if this collaboration doesn’t yield information that is already known.”

“Got a lotta spark in you, don’t you, little mouse?” The vigilante called Red Hood-- the one with a helmet instead of a stupid domino mask-- laughs. 

Marinette scowls. So far, the Justice League-- particularly the vigilantes of Gotham-- have not left her with a stunning first impression. Maybe she’s a little biased,  but they certainly don’t seem to have any respect for her. Still, she only has to work with them for two weeks. “My name is Marinette, but clearly your helmet hasn’t shielded you from the memory loss that frequent concussions have clearly given you.”

“She got you there, dumb ass,” says Red Robin, a grin a mile wide on his face.

“Hood,” sighs Oracle, sounding highly stressed. Marinette decides that she is the most likeable. “Like I said earlier, we want to be on good terms with Marinette.”

“I’ll get you the documents and funds by tomorrow.” Batman’s voice is just as gravelly as the first time she contacted him. She finds that the more she hears him speak, the more pleasant she finds his voice. An acquired taste. “Even if this week is unsuccessful, the Justice League will be more than happy to continue to fund these organizations. Is there anything that Ladybug, Chat Noir, or you need personally?”

“None of us are going to use the Justice League’s funds for personal gain, Batman.” The accusations grates on her. 

“Batman means,” Nightwing shoots a look to the side of his screen. Interesting, Marinette thinks. All of Gotham’s vigilantes are in one location, judging by their backgrounds and the location tags that her communicator provides her. Perhaps they have a headquarters of some sort. Back when there were extra heroes on the Miraculous team, Marinette sometimes wished that they had a location that they could all reliably gather at without revealing someone’s identity. It certainly would have made strategy easier. “That being a hero without any support is difficult. It must have taken a toll on your personal lives. If we can aid in any way, we will. We can excuse absences or hire tutors as necessary.”

“I’m no hero.” But Nightwing’s proposal may actually be helpful. Even though Marinette is making the grades necessary to go to the colleges that she wants, her continual absence and tardies aren’t very flattering. 

Then her mind flashes to Adrien. Can she use this offer to get him out from underneath Gabriel’s thumb? Marinette doesn’t know if she can do that. He’s already in a delicate position-- and already at risk, thanks to the photoshoot earlier today-- and she’s not sure that Gabriel won’t move towards drastic measures if anything changes on Adrien’s end. If she wants to get him away from Gabriel, she may have to reveal his secret identity.

“Ladybug will make the decision for herself; she has access to everything that is said during our meetings. Chat Noir isn’t in the loop about our communications or any of the investigations that Ladybug and I have done. Ladybug says that he’s stressed in his civilian life, which is why his appearances have been decreasing,” Marinette admits. “I’ll leave it up to Ladybug to give your offer to Chat Noir. If I can get a reliable excuse to get out of class or get to class late, that would be greatly appreciated.”

“Chat Noir doesn’t know?” Red Robin sounds horrified. 

“He’s currently a high risk for being akumatized. Ladybug didn’t want to risk it.” 

Red Hood crosses his arms. “So you have more of a job than Chat Noir does in all of these Paris heroics, huh?”

Even if Chat Noir did know, Marinette would have her hand in the pie at least twice as much as him. 

“I wouldn’t say that. I’m just more available than he is.”

“And more trusted than he is,” Red Hood insists. 

It’s not that Ladybug trusts Marinette more than she trusts Chat Noir, it’s that Ladybug is Marinette. But she’s not going to admit that. Not to them, and certainly not until Hawkmoth is taken down. Maybe not even then. She can only imagine the looks of devastation that she’ll get if she does admit that she’s been Ladybug all these years. Her parents will freak out, Adrien will probably feel heart broken and betrayed, and Alya and the rest of her classmates will inevitably rail on either her or Lila or both of them. It just doesn’t sound appealing to her anymore, though she can certainly remember a time not so long ago where she so desperately wanted to expose her identity. 

“You’d have to ask Ladybug that,”  Marinette settles on. She copies and pastes one of the many messages that she has pre drafted and schedules it to send a few minutes later, so Batman’s team receives a communication from Ladybug while Marinette is at the white board. She spent all of last night preparing for this meeting, imagining so many scenarios that she barely slept. The email she’s sending will suggest what Damian should attempt to do with the Miraculous communicator that Marinette has. She adds in an extra comment that she trusts Chat Noir with her life, and that she’ll talk to him about offering him help in his civilian life, but won’t mention anything about the Justice League. 

“Why doesn’t Ladybug just use her own communicator to join in on these calls?” Red Robin asks after receiving her email.

Marinette turns from the white board, where she is listing the past three akuma attacks and where her top three suspects were at each of the times. “There may be magic surrounding her identity, but that doesn’t mean Ladybug wants more time for all of you to try to figure out her identity.”

“Sounds irresponsible of her,” says Red Hood. “Leaving a civilian to do all of the dirty work. Who are those people you have listed on the board?”

Marinette decides to let the comment about Ladybug slide. Red Hood is currently her least favorite out of all of Gotham’s vigilantes, but she has to remind herself that respect is mutual, and Ladybug hasn’t really given them much to go on.

“The top three suspects for Hawkmoth. Gabriel Agreste, the CEO and head designer of Gabriel. Nathalie Sancouer, Gabriel Agreste’s personal assistant of over twenty years. Mikael Bordeaux, CFO of Silverstein and Company's French holdings.”

Oracle takes off her glasses and wipes them. “Sounds like your top candidates are all people in pretty high positions.”

“Agreste,” repeats Nightwing. “Agreste, as in Adrien Agreste? The boy that’s in Damian’s class?”

“The same,” Marinette says, not sure she likes where he’s taking this conversation.

“Hold up,” Red Robin says after a few moments. “Why is it that Gabriel Agreste and Nathalie Sancouer are on your list? Both Gabriel and Nathalie have been akumatized before. That should automatically take them out of the running.”

Marinette shakes her head. “That’s what I thought in the beginning, while the police were still in charge of the case. But based on my understanding of akumas, it’s very possible that Hawkmoth can transform, send out an akuma, then detransform and let themself be akumatized.”

The whole Collector incident was a deliberate ploy to throw her off. She spent at least half a year convinced that Gabriel and Hawkmoth couldn’t possibly be one in the same, despite the fact that he had the Miraculous Tome.

“What about Adrien, then? He’s the only one in your class that hasn’t been akumatized, sans yourselves, he hangs out with the people most likely to cause and become akumas, and has caused a fair number of akumas himself. Besides, he must know it if his dad’s Hawkmoth, which means he could be Mayura or even Hawkmoth himself.” Even if Red Robin presented her this theory before Marinette knew Adrien was Chat Noir, she wouldn’t have believed it. 

“Adrien is not Hawkmoth.” Marinette isn’t sure how to explain how she knows without revealing his alter ego. She can’t tell them that he wielded the snake Miraculous either, because that contradicts her earlier statement that she didn’t know any of the other holders.

“Demon Spawn,” Red Hood says. “What do you think about Adrien? You’ve been in a class with him for the past month.”

Damian finally looks up from Marinette’s tablet, blinking to bring himself back into the situation at hand. “What?”

Marinette scoffs, remembering that he thought that she was Hawkmoth. She’s not upset about it, but she doesn’t trust his ability to discern alter egos-- at least not magical alter egos. “I wouldn’t trust Damian’s ability to read people as reliable evidence to tell whether someone is Hawkmoth or not.

This causes a myriad of reactions from Batman’s team and most of them are surprisingly loud. Red Hood whoops, “Roasted,” while Red Robin laughs and pounds the desk in front of them. Oracle smiles wide, her eyes crinkling. Even Batman manages to draw a smile to his face. 

This makes Damian put down her tablet on the chaise and flush slightly. “I said I was sorry for that.”

Marinette thinks about brushing him off in annoyance but decides against it. Just based on the evidence that he gathered, it wasn't an awful assumption, and the Miraculous magic probably prevented him from even thinking about the possibility that she could be Ladybug, leading him to the next most possible conclusion. “It’s fine.”

In fact, even if Marinette can’t trust Batman and his affiliates with Chat Noir’s civilian identity, she should still try to maneuver Adrien away from his current situation. She can call it in as a personal favor to Marinette, and as long as they have human decency, they should agree to her request. She’s been gathering receipts that detail Gabriel’s systemic abuse of Adrien for years. This is a good opportunity to begin Adrien’s emancipation process. She’s currently on her way to a better friendship with Adrien, and since Batman insists the Justice League has all the resources that she wants, there’s no reason not to take advantage of them. She turns back to the camera. 

“Adrien is not Hawkmoth and wouldn’t know whether his father or personal assistant are. In fact, it would be preferable to remove Adrien from Gabriel’s care; Adrien is in danger of being akumatized because of how awfully Gabriel treats him, and I have the evidence necessary to take him to court. I just need a legal team that’s good enough to go against a billion dollar company.” And time to convince Adrien that he needs to leave. That may be a more difficult task, considering the unending love and forgiveness he’s displayed for matters concerning his father so far. Honestly, sometimes Marinette thinks that he never learned how to hold a grudge. 

“Noted. Let’s come back to that later, though. I want to talk about some other suspects you have on this list you gave us.” Oracle readjusts her headpiece and shoots a glare over her shoulder, presumably to tell the rest of her team to quiet down and get back on task. They certainly have an interesting team dynamic. They’re much warmer to each other than Marinette first expected them to be. They’re certainly closer than she and the Miraculous Team had been, when there still was a team, at least.

Oracle shares her screen. On it is a picture of Andre Bourgeois. “If Hawkmoth is able to be akumatized, then Mayor Bourgeois is one of our top suspects. The Justice League has compiled multiple lists of suspects before we sent Damian to Paris. He stopped a lot of international press for akuma attacks and has caused multiple akumas.”

Marinette frowns. Mayor Bourgeois being Hawkmoth crossed her mind a few times, but she always decided that he was largely incapable and had little motivation. “What are your criteria for deciding who might be Hawkmoth? I highly doubt Mayor Bourgeois is Hawkmoth, despite him stopping the press.”

“We determine how many akumas a person has caused, how much damage the akuma caused to the person’s primary residence and workplace, and how well they’re connected to the people being akumatized. Andre Bourgeois has been involved in the akumatization of slightly more than half of all the akumas that have occurred, so long as we include his relation to his daughter and wife and there has been extraordinary little damage done to the arrondissements that he frequents.”

“Interesting. Share the list with the contact information I sent you earlier. You share some of the same criteria as we have come up with, but you’re drawing the wrong information from what you have. Akumas caused is also one of our criteria, as well as the damage that has been done to the person’s residence. I don’t think that a person’s personal relations play much into who ends up being akumatized, however, there’s good reason to believe that Hawkmoth is in a position of power, or at least well connected. They seem to know what’s happening in the city before it ever hits the news.” Marinette opens a program on her computer, then turns on the projector to display a map with pins. 

“We’ve been interested in the location of primary suspects at the time of akumatization; Ladybug believes that Hawkmoth’s Miraculous power is restricted to Paris. Which means that Hawkmoth needs to be in or close to Paris at the times of all akumas, which crossed Mayor Bourgeois of my list a while ago. He’s been absent for multiple akumas when he needed to go to conferences outside of Paris. The purple dots are Gabriel, the red ones are Nathalie, and the blue ones are Michael. You can see that they’ve all been in Paris every time an akuma occurred and within a ten mile radius of where the akuma was first spotted. That’s quite unusual, considering they’re all in high positions of companies that should typically have them travelling.”

 There is also the little detail that Marinette found the Miraculous Tome in the hands of Gabriel Agreste, but Marinette doesn’t feel safe indulging them with that information yet. If she tells them, they will want to see pictures of the book. 

“How haven’t you cracked this case wide open yet?” Red Robin looks at the screen appreciatively. It’s clear that Marinette spent a lot of time on this.

Marinette bristles. She may have a good amount of information, but her proficiency with technology leaves much to be desired. It took her an unnecessarily long time in order to get the map up and running. “Well, Red Robin, that might have something to do with the fact that neither Ladybug nor I knew anything about how to use technology in the way that was necessary to track him once the police handed over the case in the second year. Or maybe it has something to do with the fact that falsely accusing someone as Hawkmoth could ruin their entire life.”

Master Fu warned her against direct actions against anyone on her suspect list. In fact, he outright forbade her from doing anything, and although she no longer takes his words at face value after the many bumps in their relationship, she’s not going to try to ruin any of these people without evidence. Especially not Gabriel, not when he’s Adrien’s father. 

Red Robin frowns. 

Marinette takes a deep breath. She’s too tense. She’s been taking every word that these vigilantes say as something they don’t actually mean. Marinette needs to relax. Jumping to conclusions helps no one. 

Damian’s eyes are on her, and she’s sure he’s passing judgment. She needs to get out of this situation, get out of this headspace. It’s not productive or healthy. 

“I think we should end this meeting now,” Damian says, and Marinette begrudgingly agrees with him. She knows this is his olive branch.

“You were the one who was upset at the lack of time,” Oracle points out. “We don’t have much time. We need every minute we can get.” 

“Marinette has given us plenty of information to digest for one night. We’ll regroup tomorrow and start on coding the programs to determine Hawkmoth’s location.” Damian reaches over Marinette to end the call. 

Obstinately, Marinette refuses to look him in the eyes. She’s been flip-flopping this entire day, and it’s not doing any great wonders for her mental health. Everything’s been coming to a head in these past few days, and it isn’t a good feeling. She can feel the pressure on her shoulders, the expectant gazes of all of Paris to do her duty and expose Hawkmoth, but she feels the weight of the inevitable backlash Adrien will face if her theories are true. 

The past few days feel like three years compressed. People she’s never interacted with have inserted themselves into the fray, and the big leagues have pulled out all the stops. She just talked to Batman and his team. He’s been in the hero game for decades, and she’s in the room with his son, Robin. 

Everything is just too much.

Marinette feels like she’s been a bad Ladybug. Like she hasn’t done enough to find concrete evidence of her primary suspects because she is afraid of what will happen after. She’s half surprised she hasn’t gone into hysterics yet, but then again, she’s gotten very good at holding herself together when everything around her falls apart. The added touch of an outsider makes the fragile balance she’s achieved teeter.

Damian takes her distressed appearance personally and heaves a sigh. “Look, I --I didn’t think that you were Hawkmoth all along, only for a day before everything went down. I don’t know what I wanted out of you, but your friendship was nice. I did genuinely want to be friends with you, and I still do.”

This makes Marinette feel even worse. She’s trying so hard to find fault with Damian-- which is surprisingly easy-- in order to distance herself. She can’t afford to get attached to someone who can hurt her and is likely to hurt her, because an akumatized Ladybug is the last thing Paris needs. But hearing him apologize so genuinely means that Marinette can’t summon up a negative response. She may not be able to say that she truly knows Damian, but she knows that he is a very prideful person. It can’t have been easy for him to apologize to her so openly. An acidic response rests on her tongue for a moment before she pushes it back.

“You were just trying to follow up on a lead. I shouldn't blame you.” 

“But you do.”

He hit the nail on the head. Marinette grimaces, letting her eyes flick over Damian’s hunched shoulders and set jaw. She doesn’t blame him for thinking that she’s Hawkmoth, but she does blame him for getting the Justice League more involved, which makes exactly zero sense if she evaluates the situation logically. Her heart feels like Damian is the element of change; if he never arrived in Paris, Marinette would still have everything under a better semblance of control. It doesn’t matter that Batman said the JLA had been looking into Paris for half a year, and that even if Damian weren’t sent, there would have been someone else.

It’s fitting that in order to move forward, they must break down whatever security that Marinette has built into her life, because life is just cruel enough to mess her up like that. Right now, she’s a wreck mentally, emotionally, and even physically. Marinette can feel her throat closing up. 

“It’s not your fault,” she offers. “And maybe if we get out of our current situation, we can try being friends again. But right now? I-- there’s just too much stress on me, right now.”

Damian understands this, but as he descends the steps of her ladder, Damian can’t help but wish that she felt otherwise.

Omake

“How is it that Mayor Bourgeois is not in your top three suspects for Hawkmoth? He’s stopped a lot of international press about the akuma for the first year!”

Marintte deadpans. “Honestly? The man is way too stupid to ever be Hawkmoth.”

“Haven’t we come to the conclusion that Hawkmoth is stupid though? He couldn’t steal jewelry from two untrained teenagers for years!”

Marinette decides not to take offense at that, and concedes. “Fine, maybe he should be on the list. I’d certainly akumatize Chloe and Audrey Bourgeois if I had to interact with them on a daily basis.”

_______________________________________________________

will these be regularly scheduled? absolutely not, even though i have the whole thing finished because i get the feeling that i am going to Change Things sooner or later (somebody please smack some sense into me everything in this story goes awfully very soon and the plot goes wonky and AHHHH)