#I just wish I could say any of this out loud

[euseokz]

@ sungchan — i just miss you so much baby, i can't help it . . cws : phone sex . masturbation (f + m) . oral (m) . wc : 1.0k+ . genre : smut

BOYFRIEND! SUNGCHAN who, when he goes on a week long family vacation, starts missing you a little too much by the middle of it.

he knows you're only a phone call away, so that's what he does, call you, a sweet conversation that started out about how much your boyfriend missed you quickly going south, becoming more devious without either of you even noticing it.

“i just miss you so, so much” sungchan mumbles, his voice sounding almost whiny, and that's when you realize what he wants at that moment. you're direct with it, ask him if he's hard, and when he only lets out a small moan you know he already has his hands down his shorts, probably palming himself through the fabric of his underwear. it was like he was going through withdrawal, a withdrawal of you, so needy for you he was willing to go through any lengths just to get a bit of release.

“are you alone?” you ask, your own hand moving towards your middle, fingers pressing against your clit through the fabric of your bottoms. sungchan gives you a positive hum, letting out another small groan, then telling you that he can't make too much noise though.

that's when you know there's no turning back, that now you're gonna see the end of this.

without missing a beat, and while applying a bit more strength as you touch yourself, you ask sungchan what he’s thinking, his reply more shameless than you’d expected.

“of you, laying on your bed, playing with yourself and making those pretty noises you always make for me… i wish i could just walk in and fuck you, strip you out of every single piece of clothing you’re wearing and fuck you until all you can say is my name” he told you, tone hushed but loud enough for you to catch every single word, a soft whine slipping past your lips as you finally pushed your underwear to the side, touching your clit directly, circling your fingers over it in a languid pace, hearing as lewd, wet noises spread through your room, your low whimpers mixing well with the sounds of your slick while you touched yourself.

“and what are you thinking about, pretty girl?” sungchan asked after hearing your reaction to his words, that enough for him to know he had you exactly where he needed you.

“of how much i want your cock in my mouth right now, how good it always feels when you pull at my hair and make me swallow it all even if i can barely handle it. just thinking about it drives me crazy channie, how sensitive you always get when i lick your tip, and how messy it always is when you let me play with you” sungchan groaned as you spoke, throwing his head back and pulling his hard cock out of his shorts, stroking it at a fastening pace — your filthy words, how you used the nickname you always reserved for your more intimate moments, everything about the whole situation driving his crazier than he had expected it to.

“tell me how you’re touching yourself right now baby, please” sungchan said breathlessly, his eyes closed and his mind running a million miles per hour, his fingers gripping harder around the base of his dick before moving up to his tip, spreading his pre-cum down the entire length, groaning as lowly as he could, so only you could hear him through the phone.

“i’m playing with myself like how you always do before you fuck me” you replied, sungchan immediately answering back with another question.

“does it feel as good as when it’s me?”

“no, your fingers feel so much better” you spoke through a low moan, moving to stuff two fingers inside yourself, letting out another mewl as you felt them push into you, moving them slowly, almost as if you were teasing yourself.

“i wish i was fucking your pussy right now, i’m driving myself crazy just thinking about it” sungchan said, holding back just how loudly he actually wanted to moan, moving his hand faster, desperate for more. “i want you to make yourself cum to my voice, you can do that, right?”

you hummed at sungchan’s request, bending your fingers and pressing them against that spongy spot inside your hole, biting at your bottom lip hard, pressing your lids close together and imagining sungchan was right next to you — much like how he was doing, just that he was instead thinking of you on top of him, fucking yourself on his cock, while you imagined him pushing his fingers in and out of you.

“‘m close” you mumbled, feeling warm pleasure bubble up around your lower stomach, moving your fingers faster, seeking more of that sweet sensation.

“me too, fuck-” sungchan groaned, his voice fading as you only heard him let out a low, dragged out moan, then only his breath being hearable through the phone, it’s pace quickening until he cursed one more time, his voice now strained. “i’m cumming” he grunted, his hands moving faster until strings of milky cum were dripping down his fingers, staining them and running down until it dripped to his shorts.

almost as a chain reaction, you too felt your orgasm burst inside you right after, your high crashing into you hard, making you let out a louder than expected moan before also going silent, only your ragged breath left as you slowed down the pace in which you moved your fingers.

eventually, you two calmed down, taking you a few moments before you spoke again.

“i really wish you were here” sungchan said through a laugh, looking at the mess he had made of himself.

“me too” you replied through a pout, your eyes also focused on the mess you had made.

“i miss you too much already”

“you’re going through withdrawal or something” you laughed, giving yourself a second before getting up and heading to the bathroom to clean yourself up, much like what sungchan was doing at the same time as you.

“feels like it” your boyfriend replied through a chuckle, your conversation after that going back to being lighthearted, his need for you still alive, but at least a bit tamer now.

[skzdarlings]

bodyguard: the first guard | part three | chan/reader

masterlist.

(part one of the previous story.)

part one | part two | part three | tba

( read on AO3 )

A sequel to the Bodyguard. Miroh’s daughter is assigned a bodyguard of her own. The past is confronted when old friendships and new enemies are pushed to the brink.

pairing: bang chan/reader content info: sequel to the bodyguard (felix/reader). this is a new reader perspective. the previously established story dyanmics: explicit violence, mentions of torture. mentions of past sexual abuse, detailed descriptions of needles. chapter word count: 12,525 words.

-

B E F O R E

“Happy fourteenth birthday.”

Felix looks up from his work.   He underperformed in training today and landed himself a punishment.  His good record spared him anything too painful, but he has been assigned cleaning duty.  Taking apart, cleaning, and reassembling weapons is not difficult work – he could do it in his sleep – but it is tedious.

Tedium is its own kind of torture, especially these days with his mind in a state of tumult.  He has grown closer to Chris with each passing day.  Felix knows they are not meant to think of each other as friends, just fellow soldiers, but that is the word Felix uses.

My friend.

That is who stands over Felix now.  Chris is smiling and holding something wrapped in what looks like a kitchen napkin.  Felix blinks at it, then furrows his brow.

“Huh?”  Felix says.  “It’s not my birthday.”

“Could be!” Chris says. 

Felix supposes Chris has a point.  Felix does not actually know his own birthday because he bounced around foster care before he found himself in Miroh’s program.  If his birthday was recorded anywhere, no one told him what it was.  So it could be his birthday.  The odds are not great but not impossible.

“Um,” Felix says, because no one has ever wished him a happy – or happy possible – birthday.  He guesses the best reply is, “Thanks?”

“It’s not a trick, man,” Chris says, smiling.  He laughs at Felix, though it doesn’t feel cruel, and ruffles his hair before shoving the little wrapped item at him.  “Here,” Chris says.  “Got it especially for you.”

Felix unfolds the napkin and finds a cookie.  It’s not the kind of food that is served at the regiment because their diet is so strict.  Food is a sustenance and not a pleasure.

“Wow,” Felix says.  It is a genuine surprise.  Chris had to go out of his way to get this. 

Felix feels embarrassed.  He still struggles to cope with feeling in general.  He almost yearns for a simpler, more naïve time, when he didn’t have to think or feel, just trust and follow.  Now he is a flustered knot of embarrassment because Chris is giving him presents just because Felix mentioned he had never received one.  It was an off-handed remark a few days ago, that he didn’t know his birthday and had never received a present but that it didn’t matter because he didn’t deserve it.

And he didn’t, he doesn’t, deserve any of it.  Not a birthday wish or a thoughtful gift or Chris’s friendship.  Felix has so much blood on his hands and he doesn’t how much of it is innocent.  He never counted his kills like some other agents, stupid kids bragging to seem bigger and more powerful than their circumstances.   Felix never did it for glory.  He knew his place.  Now he doesn’t count them because it doesn’t matter.  It all comes back to him when he closes his eyes.  He remembers what they were wearing, what they said before they died, the things they begged to a naïve, indifferent child.

He doesn’t count them because he doesn’t need a number to know it’s too much and he will never be able to take it back.  He doesn’t deserve birthdays and friendships and Chris.  He never will.

He doesn’t say this out loud.  He knows Chris will argue with him, belligerent in his kindness and reassurance.  Felix won’t listen in turn.  The conversation would be useless.  Rather than bother, Felix asks, “Where did you get it?” 

“Hey, I know I’m trouble,” Chris says, still smiling, “but I got connections too, you know?” 

Felix guesses he means Miroh’s daughter as she is the only agent with outside connections.  They seem to have a tenuous understanding because she and Chris get in the most trouble.  Chris, because he still bristles at commands and steps out of line.  Her, because she’s Miroh’s daughter and held to a higher standard than the rest of them.

Chris can befriend almost anyone, garnering admiration in his peers if nothing else.  His rebellious streak means no one wants visible association with him, but in the quietest of corners there is a whispered respect for the First Guard.  He is as notorious as he is skilled and he has a natural leadership.

Felix supposes it is not outside the realm of possibility that even Miroh’s daughter would consider Chris a friend – but only somewhere even quieter than most.

Felix does not consider Miroh’s daughter a friend and he doubts he ever will.  Her proximity to Miroh makes her an even bigger liability than Chris.  Felix would never get close to someone like that, born into their position and too close to power for his liking.

“Miroh’s daughter, you mean,” Felix says.

Felix might keep his musings close to his heart, but that doesn’t mean Chris can’t read them anyway.  Chris is a soldier by instinct if not choice.  He is always one step ahead.  It’s like he is inside Felix’s head.  He seems to know what Felix will do before Felix does.

“Yeah,” Chris says.  He rubs the back of his neck, breathing deeply.  He looks almost sheepish, as if admitting he knows better.  “She’s not that bad when you get to know her.  Really.”

Felix is certain he looks unconvinced.  It makes Chris laugh.

“You look worried,” Chris says. 

“I do worry about you,” Felix says.  He looks down at the cookie in his hand.  It is hard to say out loud, but he manages a weak, “You’re my friend.”

Chris is suspiciously quiet.  When Felix looks up, Chris has a determination to his countenance. 

“Find me when you’re done here,” Chris says.  “I wanna show you something.”

Felix, as usual, does as he is told.  When his punishment ends, he tracks Chris to the barracks where the older boy is patiently waiting.  He claps Felix on the shoulder but otherwise doesn’t stop to greet him.  He is a little skittish as he leads Felix to their mysterious destination.

It is not so extraordinary in the end.  Nothing around here is.  Everything is cold chrome and sleek silver, one room much like the next, branded by Miroh as surely as its occupants.

Chris knocks out a ventilation panel then leads Felix to what looks like an unused crawl space, forgotten and collecting dust.

“Welcome to my office,” Chris jokes, still with that nervous laughter.  It is putting Felix on edge.

“Is everything all right?” Felix asks.

“Well, no, Felix,” Chris says.  “It isn’t.  You know that now, don’t you?”

A couple years of shared assignments between the best and second best, the rebellious and the reluctant.  A couple years of watching Miroh bludgeon his way through the world.  A couple years of regret.

A couple years of friendship to change everything.

“Yeah,” Felix says.  It is all he needs to say.

“Sit,” Chris says.  There is a corner of the room that has been cleared of dust, this part of the hideaway evidently well-used.  “Let’s talk.” 

Whatever conversation Felix expects to have, it is not the one he gets.  He sits and watches Chris, watches him breathe and measure his words.   Chris is usually confident in what he has to say, even when staring down a barrel of a gun.  This is more than disconcerting.

“I’ve been talking to some others in the program,” Chris says.  “We’re all growing up.  I’ll be eighteen soon.  If we’re already strong, we’re just gonna get stronger.  Miroh has complete control over us.  I’m scared that if we don’t do something about it soon, then everything is going to get worse.  A lot, lot worse.”

“Do something,” Felix says, his mind going a mile a minute.  “What do you mean?  Who else have you told about this?”

“People I consider friends,” Chris says.  He puts a hand on Felix’s shoulder.  “People like you, Felix.”

He thinks of the cookie in his pocket.  His heart punches up with alarm. 

“Miroh’s daughter?”  Felix asks and this time he knows for certain his thoughts are very clear.  He says her name – not even her name, her position, the daughter and heir of the very thing Chris wants to fight – and he says it with the obvious inflection of what-the-fuck-are-you-thinking? 

“She’s a friend,” Chris says in a voice he usually reserves for an enemy.  It startles Felix into silence.  Seeing that, Chris smiles, trying to lighten the mood.  “You don’t have to trust her,” Chris says.  “Just trust me.  Felix, I want to get us out, all of us.  I don’t want that man or any other man like him to hurt anyone else.  Not kids, not adults, not anyone.  I won’t put you in more danger, I swear.  That’s the opposite of what I want.  I’m gonna protect you, okay?  I’m gonna protect all of you.  When the time comes to take a stand, I just want you to be ready.  If something happens, if it all goes wrong…”

Felix looks at him, alarm and worry plain on his young face.  Chris squeezes his shoulder again.

“If…” Chris swallows then continues, “If it is all goes wrong, I’ll pay the price alone.  But I’d rather die trying to save all of you than live another day hurting innocent people for Miroh.”

“Chris—” Felix starts, an argument on his tongue.

“Don’t,” Chris says firmly.  “If there was anything worth dying for, Felix, then it’s this.  I’m gonna get you out.  I’m gonna get you all out.  I swear.  Just be ready for when I say.  Just trust me.  Just be my friend.”

Felix spends a week after that in a state of restless turmoil.  He sleeps poorly and fights worse and even spends a night in the Cell for his mistakes. 

He doesn’t know what to think about Chris and his intentions.  It sounds like a disaster waiting to happen.   But if it worked…

It wouldn’t take the blood off Felix’s hands, but it would be a start to something better.  Felix has little thought for his own fate, undeserving as he is, but he thinks about Chris.  Chris, the First Guard, who has been here the longest, who has watched the most people die, who has been punished the worst.

Chris deserves better.

Felix believes in Chris.  He believes if Chris made an effort, then he would have what it takes to make a difference.  Felix knows Chris is capable. He could do what he sets out to do.

It is not Chris that Felix worries about.

Felix observes Miroh’s daughter, studying her more closely than ever before.  Felix trusts Chris’s general discretion but he worries Chris has a blind spot concerning her.  They are the only two in their age category and they share a small barrack, the forced proximity undoubtedly creating a semblance of intimacy.  Chris might trust her but Felix is not so biased.  All he sees is Miroh. 

Felix watches her.  She doesn’t spend much time with Chris in public, her only close relationship with Seo Changbin.  They are a bit notorious together.  Felix would not call them the best fighters but they are tricky.  He is pretty sure they throw their fights with each other and embellish more than necessary.  Both like a good skull crash, more brutal than efficient.  The trickery and brutality makes Felix more wary of her.

At the same time, her obvious friendship with Changbin shows she can care about someone else.  The pair throw a mean punch but always patch each other up after.

Chris catches Felix watching them.  They are having a go in the ring, punching and flipping, grinning when they think no one is watching.  They have smiles just for each other.

“You look really deep in thought, mate,” Chris says, laughing.  He hands Felix a water bottle while toweling down his own sweaty neck.

“Huh?” Felix finally breaks his concentration.  He takes the water and smiles one of his instinctive but fake smiles – the kind he uses on a mission, when he is trying to convince an adversary that he is an innocent, unassuming kid.

Chris sees through it, of course.  He lifts an eyebrow at Felix then follows his line of sight to the ring.

“What?” Chris says, laughing again.  His own ears turn a little red as he teases, “You got a crush on her or something?”

“Ew, shut up,” Felix says, throwing his own towel at him.  He feels flushed despite the fact it is vehemently untrue.  He is not used to being provoked with that line of teasing.  “No,” he says certainly.  “I have no feelings for anyone.  But I think they might.”

“Huh?”  Chris looks between Felix and the ring.  “What do you mean?”

“I mean, look at them,” Felix says.  “They’re a little too close, don’t you think?” 

Presently, Miroh’s daughter has Changbin pinned to the mat.  She is on top of him and whispering something that makes them both snicker.

Chris stares at them.  After a beat of contemplative silence, he laughs.  Felix recognizes the fake sound, the same disarming humour Felix uses when conning someone.   

“Yeah,” Chris says.  “Hey, I’ll be right back, yeah?”  

Felix watches Chris amble over.  He says something to the duo and Changbin retaliates with some non-descript shouting and flailing.  Miroh’s daughter rolls her eyes.  She grabs Chris by the collar and yanks him into a fight. 

The rest of the day progresses without much fuss or bother.  Miroh has no jobs for them today so the schedule is just training and recuperation. 

Felix manages to avoid punishment today.  He tries expelling his anxiety in a fight but it does not fully work.  Felix has come to realize he is not very good at letting go.  Belief, emotion, the good, the bad: all of gets clutched in his fists and held to his heart.

Fighting tires him but it is not a satisfying tired, of exerted muscles and a pumping heart.  He feels weary and everything everywhere is so loud, the chrome and steel of the Miroh facilities like an echoing dome.  It cycles all that noise in an agonizing reverberation.  It feels inescapable.  He goes to the barracks which are smaller but it makes the claustrophobia worse.

Laying in his bunk, rubbing his temples, Felix dreams of a quiet room of his own.

It is then he remembers Chris’s hideaway.  Chris miraculously dodged punishment today so he retreated to the barracks a while ago.  Felix doesn’t want to disturb him but he figures Chris won’t mind him using the hideaway on his own if he’s careful.

They are permitted access to the training room for the few hours between work and mandatory repose.  The hideaway is en route so it is easy for Felix to stealthily retrace his steps without raising suspicion.  He disappears in the security blind spot the way Chris showed him.  

Felix is in the tunnel when he hears a noise.  He worries he was followed despite being so careful, but then he realizes the noise is ahead of him, not behind him. 

He freezes in the crawl tunnel, trying to discern the sound.  It doesn’t sound like talking, more like… breathing?  Heavy breathing. 

Then he hears a laugh that he recognizes as Chris.  And he is not alone.  The other noise is a sigh, a lighter, more feminine sound.

Oh.

Apparently, Chris’s hideaway is not just for talking to friends.  The sound of kissing and sighing is more friendly than his conversation with Felix, that’s for sure.

Felix is frozen for a minute, too stunned and embarrassed to think of moving.  He has to shuffle backwards to escape because he can’t turn in that part of the crawl space.  If this was a mission, he could do it, but this is personal.  He doesn’t want to get caught but it’s not because it will compromise any job; it’s because it will be awkward.

He scuffs his shoe in his backwards shuffle.  It clangs, a subtle sound, but one that makes him wince.

It goes quiet around the corner.  Felix knows he was heard and there is no time to escape.  Seconds later, a frantic looking Chris is in the tunnel, red-faced with a line of sweat on his brow.  His uniform is clearly dishevelled and Felix gets even more embarrassed.

Those feelings need somewhere to go.  It comes out of him in a burst of frustration.

“What are you doing?” Felix demands, his voice breaking. 

“Nothing!” Chris says, clearly a knee-jerk reaction.  Then he takes a breath and says, “Look, I can explain—”

“It’s not Miroh’s daughter,” Felix says.  He can’t even pose it as a question because he refuses to believe Chris could genuinely be that reckless and stupid.  Befriending her is one thing – a stupid thing – but fooling around with the daughter of the powerful man who owns them is begging for tragedy. 

“I’m not stupid,” Chris says. 

“It doesn’t matter,” Felix says.  “Whoever it is, you need to stop.” 

“Look—”

“Seriously, Chris!”

“Felix—”

“It’s not worth it!”

“That’s easy for you to say,” Chris snaps.  “You’re not normal and you don’t understand what it means to care about someone like that.”

It is obviously thoughtless, blurted in the head of the moment.  It hurts anyway. Felix wonders if Chris can see the pain on his face because Chris looks immediately remorseful. 

“Look, I didn’t mean it like that—” Chris starts.

“It’s fine,” Felix says.  “You’re right.”

“Felix—”

Felix pushes backwards and leaves without waiting for any protest.  He does not stop, marching all the way back to this bunk.  Anger and embarrassment have finally dissipated by the time he returns.  It has been replaced with determination.

Chris is the best, but he has been compromised whether he wants to acknowledge it or not. He feels too much, for everyone and everything, and it will get him in even more trouble than he is already in.  if he retaliates with thoughtless provocation when it’s just Felix confronting him, then what will he do when it’s Miroh and the stakes are even higher?

Chris said he would protect them all. He swore to succeed at any cost, including his own life.  There is no one swearing the same for him.  No one has ever protected him. 

Felix is the second best.  He has never left a job unfinished and for that he is not deserving of the protection Chris is offering.

It won’t clean the blood on his hands, but if Felix can save a life worth more than his own, then maybe it will start to justify all of this, all of him.

Chris was right.  Felix is not normal.  But he was wrong say that Felix doesn’t know what it means to care about someone.  Because of Chris, Felix knows how to care.  He knows what he has to do.

Chris can try and save them all.

Felix is going to save Chris. 

-

P R E S E N T   D A Y

Miroh’s main facility has fallen.

It sounds so dramatic for something so anticlimactic, like you are describing the collapse of a kingdom and not the shutdown of his main office operation. 

It feels like an apocalyptic demise. 

You and Chan fight your way out of the building, taking on the people who fight in your name.  Your father’s name.  Miroh.

Miroh is dead.  Irrefutably broken, little more than a heap of meat on the tarmac.  With him gone and the only named heir on the run – you – this facility will shut down to maintain security. 

Miroh ran a meticulously compartmentalized business. There is protocol for everything so even if one part of his operation fell, the rest could continue unimpeded.  Miroh tried to establish a legacy that could rival old money like his enemy, going so far as to predict his own demise.  Miroh has long braced for the eventuality of his end, so he made sure his business could fracture and run without him.

He did everything in his power to make you just like him, a little broken fracture of himself to ensure that legacy.  But then he could not actually face what he created.  He could not actually let go.  He was the only one with the perspective and power and he had to keep it that way. 

Miroh would not have accounted for your rebellion, not for the sake of someone else.  For a friend.

Flashes of the last twenty four hours play in your mind.  You can hardly pinpoint the change in yourself.  It feels like this was somehow inevitable, despite how much you would have balked at the idea before.  But now it is all that matters.  It’s all that makes sense in this chaos.

You have to find your friend.  This facility will be empty in a matter of hours, but there are others.   Changbin is in one of them.  You have no idea where to start.

One thing at a time, you tell yourself.  Before you can ruminate on anything behind or in front of you, you need to fight.  You do not have time for introspection or planning.  You need to get away.  Away from this place, away from your dead father.

Away from his soldier, the First Guard, Bang Chan, who for some reason is helping you escape.

You don’t know why.  You seriously doubt your barely coherent pleading broke the conditioning and literal torture that made him into this thing. 

You don’t have time to find out.  At the first opportunity, you break away, leaving him with a handful of operatives to fight.  It should keep them all occupied while you escape. 

You do not want to risk trapping yourself in an enclosed space, so you do not venture to the parking garage where the company vehicles are stored.  Some of them will be programmed and bugged.  You feel bad targeting a civilian, but stealing one of their cars is the safest bet.   There are some administrative employees who complete menial tasks for the company, those with next to no clearance level.  They park their personal cars around the facility.  You pick one that is easy to reconfigure without a key to boot. 

Minutes later, you are driving for an exit.  Your whole body is aching but you push through it.  There will be time to recuperate when you are in the clear. 

Sirens wail and alarms blare, every security measure in action.  Your escape is certainly not a clean one but it doesn’t matter.  You just need to get away.

If you can get off the facility grounds, you can lose any adversaries in the back country roads.  The route to the facility was intentionally designed to be a convoluted labyrinth, making it difficult for enemies to approach without giving the facility ample preparation time.  You know the paths better than anyone.  You can get away.

A soldier marches right into the middle of your escape path. 

It is too brazen for a regular agent.  They would not be so stupid to try that, knowing you would just barrel into them. 

You speed closer and recognize the First Guard.  Chan is unflinching as ever, standing in the middle of the road as if he intends to stop your car with his body.   He is strong but not that strong.  You know that.  But he looks like an inhuman phantom, looming there in his combat gear and mask, unphased and unharmed despite the hour of nonstop violence.   

But that’s not the reason you stop.  You think about him in that van.  You could only see his eyes but they were expressive, the tilt of his head inquisitive. 

You slam on the brakes.  The car stops inches from his body but he doesn’t even blink.  

Your heart is racing, breath bursting in gasps.  He strolls around the car as if he was just waiting for his ride. 

Soldiering instinct propels your hands.  You draw a gun as he opens the passenger-side door.  He bends down and looks at you, his brow quirked with a silent question.  Your hand shakes and he is too good not to notice.  You know that, but a regular person would never guess because he does not take his eyes off yours. 

He disarms you, faster than a blink.   He drops into the passenger seat, then slams the door and shoves the gun in its storage compartment.

You stare at him.  Your gaze follows the line of his stark profile.  His hairline is a little sweaty but he doesn’t look out of breath.   

You don’t know what to think. 

This is the longest you have been in his company since you were kids in training.  Your memory of him is insubstantial, having spent little to no time with him personally.   But it hardly matters what he was.   Now he’s a soldier above all soldiers, a shadow filling this small civilian car.  He’s not the biggest man in the world but he’s overwhelming all the same, partially because of his uniform and partially because of his posture.  He feels too big for this little human space.  His knee hits the gear shift, his thighs bulky in the small seat, his shoulders broad where he leans back. 

He looks across the car and meets your eyes.  You think about how many people have met this gaze, maybe in a moment just like this, sitting across from Miroh’s asset in a little civilian vehicle before he put a bullet between their eyes or snapped their neck.  You have seen the results of his missions even if you were not involved in them.  The statistics and numbers speak for themselves.  Those eyes have seen more death than life and right now they are resolutely focussed on you. 

You jump when he lifts his hand.  He says nothing but turns the rearview mirror in your direction.  You reluctantly peel your gaze away from him.  You see what he sees: a vehicle in rapid pursuit of your own.

“Shit,” you say.  You shove the mirror back into place.  Your hands collide for a split second. 

You can’t linger on the weirdness of this moment, that the First Guard is your ally, sitting in the passenger seat and helping you escape.

You drive.  The other vehicle chases you down.  You get past the easy security measures, blowing past gates and guards.  When you approach the last gate, Chan rolls down the window and twists his body.  He pulls the stashed gun and aims somewhere.  Your eyes are on the road so you don’t see exactly what he does, but the gate slams shut between you and the pursuing vehicle, trapping them on the other side.    

Then it is just you, him, and the road. 

He puts the gun away.  He sits back.  He rolls up the window.  He makes it seem like a routine, still unphased while your heart pounds with adrenaline. 

You do not look at him.  You do not speak.  You focus on escape, taking a convoluted path through the countryside just in case.  When the facility is far, far behind you, you take a back road and pull into a shadowed space between some trees. 

You slam to a stop, shift the gear to park, but keep the engine running.  You clutch the steering so hard, you imagine it cracking beneath the force of your grip. 

Chan still does not speak.  The last time he spoke was on that rooftop.  What now? 

A damn good question. 

You look at him.  He is not sitting the way you would expect a machine of a man to be sitting.  You would have thought the First Guard would sit straight-backed and braced for confrontation, but his slouch is almost insouciant. He sits with his knees apart, his body slanted where his elbow rests on the door.   One gloved hand strums the door and the other is draped over his thigh.  He looks at you without any expression you can interpret. 

You are tired.  Your body hurts.  Your father is dead and the operation is changing and your only friend is suffering and you can’t do anything about any of it.  This morning you held a modicum of control over your life – or you thought you did – and now everything has spiralled. 

You know logically that Chan is a victim of Miroh, but right now it does not matter.  He is an infuriating figure of composure, not to mention your father’s greatest weapon, and that combination snaps the elastic thread of your patience, already stretched to its limits.

“Take off the fucking mask,” you say. 

He stares at you, his expression still unreadable.  You are tempted to reach across and rip the mask off his face.  You would definitely not succeed, no match for his reflexes on a good day, but logic is inconsequential in the face of your emotions. 

He doesn’t test you.  He stares for another moment then raises one gloved hand.  He unhooks the mask and peels it off.  He runs the other hand over his face and through his hair.   

You are not sure what you were expecting.  The same brown eyes stare back at you, lined with a smudged shadow to look as dark and intimidating as possible.  His brows are thick and dark, his hair as black, sweat loosening the slick style so a single curly tuft falls over his forehead. 

You follow the slope of his nose down to his mouth.  His mouth is closed and he is not smiling.  He has full lips, almost too pretty for what he is.  Glancing at that mouth on that too-pretty face, you picture a dimple smiled.  The memory is almost a blur, a smear of an image over his face.  You blink and it’s gone, his stoic face staring back at you. 

“What is it?” he says.  His voice is like the rest of him, too big in this small space.   You swear it shakes the car and the earth under it, though that is ridiculous.  It’s just a voice.  He’s just a man. 

Except he’s not.  He’s something else, something that should not have done what he did.  You have a million questions.  You need those answers before you can continue but it all jumbles together in your head.  It’s all too much, the flashes of today, of the past, of an uncertain future full of even more violence.

You finally turn off the engine and get out of the car.  You have no intention of going anywhere, but you need space. 

You pace in a long line, breathing in and out, using every trick in the book to ease your racing heart.  After a minute, you hear the passenger door open.  You look over your shoulder at Chan.

You can’t help the instinctive reaction to measure him like an adversary.  It doesn’t help he has pummelled you twice in the last few months, not to mention his horrid reputation in an already horrid place.  It would be stupid not to brace yourself. 

He approaches you cautiously.  He has the gall to raise a hand like you are the wild thing and he is the tamer. 

“Easy,” he says.  His voice is not so booming out here.  Other than the dark combat uniform, he almost looks normal, his whole face open to you, eyes narrowed with intense focus. 

It makes you breathe harder, the exhale shaky.  He notices because he tries to placate you. 

He smiles. 

It is forced and unpracticed, but there are those dimples, just like you thought.  You would have been less startled if he bared his teeth like an animal.  The smile unnerves you, undoing all the calming work of your exercises. 

“It’s all right,” he says in a frighteningly gentle voice.  He tilts his head as he looks at you.  “It’s just me, yeah?”

Just him.  Like that should comfort you.  You suppose you can marginally see things from his perspective, that maybe he has proved himself.  After all, he helped you escape.  It is obvious he is not doing this for your father or he would not have let you kill him.  This is not part of a grand plan.  There is no strategy.  It’s all over. 

It’s just you and him.

It does not comfort you the way he evidently thinks it should.  Now is the time to ask those million questions, but you are beyond words.  You are a live wire and that pitiful attempt at a truce ignites a flare of angry sparks. 

You were built to fight.  It punches out of you.  Literally.

Chan is faster than you.  He dodges your swing with ease, fast as an electric current himself. 

“Hey now,” he says, holding out both hands.  “Don’t—”

You know you can’t win this fight.  You know it’s stupid to try.  But each swing flies out of you, instinctive as breathing.  He catches every blow, bats your hands out of the way, but he doesn’t swing back.  His refusal to fight infuriates you.  It makes you feel as helpless as you are. 

An aggravated cry spills out of you, a strain behind your eyes as you take another swing. 

“Stop it,” he snaps, his smile gone. 

He finally goes on the offense, catching your hands and pinning them down.  There is a moment of struggle before you feel the driver door at your backside, his body caging you in.   You rear up against him but he holds you down, hip to hip, hand to hand. 

“I said stop it,” he says.  “What are you doing?”

“What am I doing?” you ask, voice breaking.  “What the fuck are you doing?” 

Your chest is pressed against his, moving with your breath while he stands like an ungiving wall.  You glare at him and he stares back.  His brow furrows in seeming confusion.  He closes both eyes and breathes out, a steadying breath. 

You thought seeing him lose composure would make you feel better, but you feel worse, more unnerved than before. 

He looks at you, a muscle in his jaw feathering when he clenches it.  You stare at it as he releases you.

“You must know I can’t trust you,” you say. 

You make the mistake of lifting your hands to shove him away.  You do not intend to punch him again, the worst of that aggression gone, but he doesn’t know that.  You suppose you can’t blame him for his instincts after your demonstration. 

When you lift your hands, he grabs your wrists.  Swiftly and effortlessly, he pins your hands by your head.

“Oh,” he says.  His eyebrows lift and his face is far more expressive than you expected.  “I’m the one who can’t be trusted, right?” 

“Excuse me?” you snap. 

“I’m doing my job, yeah,” he says.  “Yesterday you were running jobs for Daddy and today you shot him dead.  Wanna talk about erratic behaviour?  Wanna talk about who’s unpredictable?  About who can trust who here?” 

Your mouth parts with a useless, breathless rebuttal, stammering and empty.  You didn’t expect that many words from him, not when he has been a silent shadow for so long.  Never mind the easy, casual speech, every colloquialism and the taunting hurl of daddy.  It makes you think of that scathing, troublesome boy he once was, as sharp with his tongue as everything else.  But he is not that boy.  You know for a fact he was broken.  He has done all those jobs for Miroh without causing any strife in the operation.  He is a weapon and nothing more.  He exists to follow orders. 

Until today.  Until you. 

“So?” you finally say, because what else can you say? 

“So?” he repeats. 

“So.”  You have those million questions, but there is only one that really matters.  “What are we?  Soldiers without a general? Because right now it seems like we’re two people who have no reason to trust each other and no reason to work together.” 

Your gazes are locked and you measure each other.  Not that you are much of a threat to him.  He has you pinned with very little effort.  If you were at your fighting best, you like to think it would be a little challenge, but right now you stand no chance against him.  

But he doesn’t want to hurt you or he would have done it already. 

He drops your hands.  He doesn’t step away, still regarding you with that scrutinous eye, but it is a menial demonstration of trust. 

You drop your arms.  You stare back at him, refusing to show the depth of your weakness.  You think his body might be keeping yours upright, your legs so weak.  You do everything in your power to keep your wild emotions in check, to keep the tears in the back of your eyes.  You breathe deeply. 

“I’ll help you find your friend,” Chan says, the last thing you expect him to say.  You can only watch as he sighs and speaks.  “You were my last mission,” he says. “Miroh told me to bring you in.  I did.  He wanted me to watch you.  I am.  He wanted me to be your—”  He laughs but it is not a happy sound, dry and devoid of pleasure.  “Your bodyguard, I guess.”  He shakes his head.  “Consider this me following orders,” he says.  “That’s what I do, yeah?  I follow orders.  And I don’t leave a job unfinished.  Ever.” 

“And Miroh?” you say tentatively.  “The fact I killed him?”

He shrugs dramatically, hands open in surrender. 

“Miroh didn’t make me his bodyguard,” Chan says.  “He made me yours.” 

It is such preposterously simple logic that you laugh, a disbelieving bark of a sound.  You look around at nothing, like the answer to your ridiculous circumstance is in the trees or the road.  

When you look at Chan, he is still looking at you, his brow quirked inquisitively. 

“Well?” he says.  “Is that enough?  Can we work together to finish this last job?” 

“Your job,” you say slowly.  You meet his eyes.  “So that’s what I am to you?”

It’s meant to be an easy question with a reassuring answer.  He is a soldier.  You are his job.  He will do what you ask.  It’s as simple as that. 

He tilts his head as he looks at you.  His contemplation is too heavy.  It was a simple question for a simple soldier who should speak no language outside of missions and reports. 

His gaze is searing and it makes your heart skip a startled beat. 

“Yes,” he says.  He speaks the word like it’s exhausting to say out loud.  It lands with a thud on an exhale.  “My job.”

His forearm is planted by your head.  His other hand grips your bicep.  He is keeping you in place with his hips and thighs.  You can feel the tension in his body. 

You have no idea why you do what you do.  It comes from the same place as those desperate punches.  You know it’s useless, you know nothing will come of it, but you ride the propulsion of adrenaline.  Your body, on the brink of desperation, has been pushed to its utmost capabilities in the last couple hours.  What does it want?  What do you want?

What did you ever really want?

You kiss him. 

It shocks you both.  Unlike the punch, he does not know how to retaliate.  He stands there, breathing into your mouth.  He is neither encouraging nor withdrawing. 

You stop quickly and wipe your mouth.  Mortification sets in. 

None of this is like you.  You blame stress.  Your body is confused and hurt.  You need recuperation.  Whether you like it or not, you need comfort too.  It is a deep internal call, only human.  But you won’t be getting that from the solid, inhuman wall around you. 

You push at that wall and it finally gives.  Chan steps back.  You doubt a punch would have moved him so easily as that kiss. 

“Ignore that,” you say.  “Adrenaline.  I’m still – not right.”

He just stares, once more a silent shadow.  You breathe out in a huff. 

“Okay,” you say.  “And we’re back to the staring.  At least I know you’re still working.”

You turn to open the car door, effectively ending the tense exchange.  Chan walks away.  He silently circles the car to reach the passenger door.  You look at his face, once more stoic and expressionless.  He doesn’t look at you, dropping into the vehicle without another glance or sound. 

You close your eyes.  You take another deep breath of fresh air.

Maybe this is good.  Maybe Chan is the ally you need right now.  Someone level, someone only concerned with mission parameters.  Someone who will not become compromised because of emotion. 

Because you are very compromised. 

You are not thinking clearly.  You need a plan and some water and rest. 

You get in the car.  You start the engine.  You don’t speak another word.

-

You drive for hours, wanting distance between you and the destruction.

The silence in the car is piercing, your head aching after the first hour.  The little space acts like an echo chamber for your tumultuous thoughts.  You keep replaying the day, every death and cry.  You think about your security team strewn across those stairs, just another casualty in Miroh’s game.  You think about your father, the unplanned murder but the utter lack of regret in your heart.

You think about Changbin.  Your reckless side wants to look for him right now.  You cannot stand to waste another second.  Based on your father’s words, he could be anywhere, subject to any number of horrors.  But despite the whirlwind tempest of your mind, there is a soldier inside you and she is more pragmatic.  You are in no condition to fight.  Even if you knew Changbin’s exact location, you would be no use to him.  You need to rest, formulate a legitimate plan, then attack. 

You can’t afford to make any mistakes.  Better than anyone, you know the forces you are up against. 

You pull into a highway fill-up station at dusk.  The car needs fuel and so do you.  There is a little shop near the fuel pumps, the place deserted other than the bored cashier behind the counter. 

There was some cash in the glove box, enough for necessities.  You will inevitably need to steal or manipulate, but you prefer to lay low tonight.  You were careful to avoid traffic cameras and security tv as you exited the previous city.   By the time the car is reported and Miroh’s operation works out your connection, you will be off the grid. 

You turn off the engine and reach for the wallet.  Chan snatches it first. 

“What are you doing?” is spoken in unison. 

“I’m going to buy us some fucking water and food,” you say. 

“Are you?  Really?”  He gives you a pointed up-and-down look.  “You gonna do that looking like you just played cannonball with a cement wall?” 

You have not gotten a good look at yourself, just a flash in the rearview mirror, but he is probably right.  You feel like utter shit so you must look it too. 

“Well, you can’t go in there either,” you say.  Even without the mask, he is clearly in an unusual uniform.  A bored clerk will remember a terrifying soldier in combat clothes marching through his shop. 

Chan flashes you a dimpled smile, frighteningly charming.   

“Sure I can,” he says.  “Just have to blend in.” 

Your eyes widen as he discards both gloves then opens the neck of his shirt.  You stare as he efficiently strips off his top layers. 

If he looked powerful in the uniform, he looks as just as intimidating without it.  He doesn’t boast gargantuan proportions but he doesn’t need it.  There is lethal strength to the rolling musculature of his sturdy body. 

You shouldn’t care.  Soldiers strip all the time, long assignments and shared compartments making it an inevitability.   But Chan is not just another soldier.  In your head, he is that living shadow, covered all the way up to his eyes in the Miroh black and blue.  Seeing all that skin is a startling reminder of the man under the mask. 

You find Chan watching you, amused.  That stupid eyebrow is quirked again. 

“What?” you snap. 

“Nothing,” he replies.  “Be right back.  Don’t miss me too bad.”

You roll your eyes, slumping in your seat as he gets out of the car.  You have half a mind to drive away but you are pretty sure he would find a way to manifest at your destination anyway. 

You watch as he enters the shop in a nonchalant stroll, wearing just his pants and boots.  He waves at the cashier and says something that makes him laugh. 

To his credit, Chan looks like a regular guy on a hot day, casually perusing a gas station shop.  He makes small talk with the cashier and they laugh some more. 

You knew Chan was a good soldier but you didn’t expect him to be such a good agent too.  He is probably better at the civilian act than you.  You are standoffish and opt for a quiet demeanour, blending in through invisibility rather than a persona. 

Chan walks in and out, the cashier unaware of the nature of his customer.  You return to the road with a full of tank of gas and some sustenance. 

“Are you going to put your shirt back on?” you ask. 

He gives you a side-eye as he shrugs the outermost layer back on.  He doesn’t do it up.  You refuse to act like a glimpse of his bare chest means anything to you. 

Except it does.  When he sits there with his knee against the console and his skin showing and a tuft of hair over his forehead, he looks like a person.  He is a person, one who has been subject to some of the worst horrors of Miroh’s operation. 

There is no denying Chan is a complicated figure, unwillingly complicit in atrocities.  He acts like a normal person with a fully cognizant mind, but you just witnessed for yourself how easily he can fake that.  You do not know how much of the real Bang Chan is actually inside him. 

“Chan,” you say after a long time.  The sun has almost fully set, the sky in its navy gloaming. 

“Yeah?” he says. 

There are no words that suffice.  You could give an entire speech and it would be virtually meaningless.

“I’m sorry,” you say, leaving the breadth of the apology up to his interpretation.  You keep your eyes on the endless miles of highway that stretch ahead.  There is a long journey in front of you.  There is a longer road behind you. 

The car is illuminated with golden light from passing cars and overhead lamps.  It flashes over his face in the deepening darkness. 

“Don’t be,” Chan says.  He crosses his arms in a protective position, looking out his window though there is nothing to see but the highway and passing cars.  “None of this was your fault,” he says.  

You laugh, a similar humourless sound to his earlier laughter. 

“That’s not entirely true,” you say, thinking of all the missions you deliberately ran for Miroh.  You thought you could make it mean something.  You were just like your father, believing the ends would justify the means.   You never tortured Chan yourself, but you were part of the operation that kept him in chains.  There was nothing you could do to save him, but you certainly never tried. 

He looks at you.  You hear him move, the crinkle of his clothes, the water bottle he twists in his grip. 

“I don’t blame you, you know,” he says.  “Seriously.  Today was crazy.  Everything’s crazy.  You’re not responsible for it.” 

“I’m not not responsible,” you say.  “My team is dead.  My friend is gone.  My dad – well, you can’t say I didn’t do that.”

“He had that one coming,” Chan says, his laugh a little more real.  “No offense, but your dad kinda sucked.”

You find yourself laughing more genuinely too. 

“Yeah,” you say.  “I think we can agree on that.” 

You fall into silence but it is more comfortable than before.  There has been an undeniable tension since the moment he climbed in this car, looking at you with questioning confusion as you pointed a gun at him.  You were panicking but he must have been equally bewildered.  To him, you were a mission.  He lives by his orders. 

“I should apologize to you,” he says.

You look at him with obvious surprise.  He meets your gaze, his expression sincere if not a little chagrined.  His dimples show with a faint smile but it is not very happy. 

“I’ve been an ass,” he says.  “Today was – well.”  He runs a hand through his hair. 

“Trust me,” you say.  You try to lighten the mood with your tone.  “I’m a Miroh.  You will never have to apologize to me for as long as you live.”

He doesn’t laugh or even force that pretend sound.  He stares ahead, his gaze sorrowful and faraway. 

“Sorry, that was—” you begin. 

He forces a smile and shakes his head.

“Nah,” he says.  “Truce?”

Smiling feels awkward and your injuries probably make you a terrifying sight.  But he accepts it, nodding at you.  The car does not feel like such a claustrophobic space after that.  The air is clear as it can be, considering who you are.

Neither of you has an identity right now.  You were tethered to the same monstrosity and now it is gone.  Everything is different.

You are too tired for another late-night heart-to-heart.  It is time for rest. 

-

There is enough cash for a cheap motel room.  You find a quiet inn off the highway, sequestered beyond trees and countryside fields.  You finally look at yourself properly in the bathroom mirror.  You decide Chan’s earlier remarks were a severe understatement.  You look like a battleground more than a soldier. 

You injures will repair themselves with time, but it is a grisly sight.  You shower for now.  The soap and water helps. 

You don the same shirt and underwear.  New clothes will be a necessity.  You mentally plan tomorrow, everything you will need to accrue before you formulate an attack.  You have already mentally plotted the closest facilities, but you will need to verify their function and security protocol before striking. 

You are mentally strategize as you exit the bathroom.  You are distracted, thinking nothing of the fact you are wearing underwear and a shirt. 

Chan already showered because you insisted, knowing you would take longer with your injuries.  He is sitting on one of the single beds, sorting through his weapons. There is the gun you stole from Miroh plus his own array of armaments, things so well hidden you did not realize he even had them.  They are laid out on the bed.  He sits at the foot in his combat pants and nothing else, his dark hair damp and face bare. 

You stroll past him, feeling his eyes as they lift from a gun to your bare legs.  Now that you have scrubbed the worst of the brutality from your body, you feel like something of a person again.  His flicker of attention ignites an undeniable spark in your belly.  At first, it startles you, because the First Guard is the absolute last person you should ever think of like that.

But then you look at him.  He has turned his eyes back to his work, saying nothing as he reloads the gun with second-nature efficiency.  He is holding a weapon but, despite his conditioning, he is just a man. 

You are a grounded person.  You keep your head down and go about your tasks with confident certainty.  He is here, you are here, it has been a long day, and it is not unusual for soldiers to seek comfort before the dawn of a new fight.  Comfort is as important in healing and recuperation as anything else. 

You sit on your own bed and look at him. He is effortlessly attractive with his dark hair and dark eyes, the sloping muscle of his firm body.  You trace his chest and abdomen with your eyes.  He does not lift his gaze, his attention on the gun.

“Do you want to fuck?” you ask.

Bang Chan is the best soldier in the force.  You are pretty sure he has never fumbled a weapon quite so spectacularly.  It clatters to the floor and he kicks it under your bed.

“What!” he says.  He doesn’t look at you as he retrieves the gun, laughing a comically nervous giggle.  “Um… what?” he asks again.  Before you can answer, he shakes his head. “That’s uh, wait.  Um.  No.  Bad idea, right?  I mean—”

“It’s just a suggestion,” you say, not really offended. “It’s been a long day.  It doesn’t mean anything.  We’re both adults here.”

As you say it, you consider his circumstances.  Chan has spent his entire life in the house of Miroh.  He is not innocent but he might be inexperienced.  This man has killed dozens of people and worked dozens of dangerous operations.  His body is built for violence, not pleasure, and certainly not his own. 

You find yourself blurting, “Have you ever…?”

“Yes,” he says firmly, brow furrowing with annoyance. 

“All right, all right, just asking,” you say.  You decide not to push the topic because it clearly makes him uncomfortable.  You just cleared the air and you don’t want to muddy it again. 

You change the topic swiftly.  You make some empty remark about the weather as you turn on the small television.  It’s an old contraption, buzzing with static as it flickers to life.    

Chan resumes his work.  He puts his head down to concentrate. 

Your gaze inevitably strays to him. 

His hair dries curly.  It feels like an unusual thing to know about the First Guard.  He looks so much younger with a clean face. 

You jump when that face lifts.  He looks at you. 

“It wasn’t… you know…” There is a hunch to his shoulders, his eyes dropping to his work.  “I just did it on missions, ya know?” 

“Did it,” you say.  “On missions.”  It doesn’t register right away, partly because you are tired and partly because you did not expect him to continue this conversation.  “You mean sex?” you ask.  “You had sex on missions?” 

“I had sex for missions,” he corrects, eyes on the weapon he is disassembling.  He is acting like the conversation is meaningless, his attention divided, but you know his task does not require that degree of concentration.  He could take that thing apart in perfect darkness. 

“For missions,” you repeat.  “What, like a honeypot type scheme?  You?” 

It seems ridiculous at first.  You picture the First Guard smashing through windows and tackling you in stairwells.  There is nothing seductive about that raw violence.   But then you look at the man in front of you, young and handsome, the one who so easily charmed that cashier while pretending he was someone else.  You picture him in a suit and tie, maybe a t-shirt and jeans.  He would be devastating with the right preparation. 

Chan is the best.  Maybe it shouldn’t surprise you he would excel regardless of the scheme. 

“Something like that,” he says.  He finally loads the magazine.  “It wasn’t so bad, though.  Seriously.”  He twirls the gun with an effortless flourish.  The grip finds his palm like the pistol is a part of him.  “Trust me.  My body was used for worse things.  You get that too, yeah?” 

You suppose you relate well enough.  You were raised in the same program, put through the same grueling regimen.  You have done things and you are not proud of them all.   Your circumstances are not the same, though.   You are each uniquely situated in your positions, even if you started in the same place. 

We’re all that’s left.

Changbin’s voice in your head causes your mind to drift. 

“What about you?” Chan asks, drawing you back to the conversation. 

“Me?” you ask. 

“Yeah,” he says.  “You.”   

The First Guard is asking you about your sex life.  You woke this morning in a safe house and put on combat gear, ready for another mundane day of field work.  Somewhere in the middle of that was a cascade of violence.  Now Bang Chan is asking about your sexual proclivities.  If you weren’t so exhausted, you would laugh. 

“I mean, nothing special,” you say, sufficing for the boring truth.  “Mostly just this.  Sex doesn’t really mean anything to me.  It’s like exercise.  Long nights on a job.  You know.  Fellow soldiers on a mission.  Sometimes a civilian hook-up.” 

You can’t parse the expression on his face.  His gaze is somewhat judgemental, or maybe it is just scrutinizing, intensely focussed.  It bristles your nerves.  Your tone is more derisive when you say, “I’m not a romantic.”  You hold his intense stare in your own.  “Sex is just a bodily function to me.  Sometimes the body needs the release or the pleasure or whatever, so I satisfy it and move on.  That’s who I am.  I work.  I get the job done.  That’s what I have always done.”

What you always did.  You are not sure how to describe yourself anymore.  You nonetheless punctuate that definitive statement.  You assume that is the end of the conversation. 

Then Chan asks, “So there’s… no one… for you?” 

If he was any other soldier, you would think he was angling for flirtation, but he just turned down your very blatant offer. You do not know why he has any motivation to ask such personal and irrelevant questions. 

It is not worth the argument.  You conclude with a simple, “No.” 

He nods, rocking his whole body with the force of his too-casual gesture.  The tips of his ears are red, though your gaze does not stay there.  You are quickly distracted by his bicep.  He lifts an arm to rub the back of his neck, muscles softly rippling.  His brazen questioning coupled with his awkward shyness is incongruous. 

You think it is unlikely you will ever understand this man.  He has been taken apart and put back together too many times.  Fragments of him seem to fire all at once and in great contradiction. 

“What about Changbin?” he asks.  “He must be pretty special to you.  Ya know, for you to have done all this for him.” 

You are simultaneously struck by repulsion and sentiment.   Changbin is very special and you regret not realizing it sooner.  He has always been at your side, taking hits to protect you well before he became your bodyguard.  He is the person who kept you smiling.  You understood each other on a different level.  His friendship was a rare gift and you took it for granted.  Now you would do anything to have it back. 

But also…

It’s Changbin.  Ew.  You are an only child but you feel a brotherly affection for him.  Picturing him in any other context is nauseating.  It just feels wrong. 

You have such a visceral reaction of disgust that Chan laughs.  He puts up his hands as if in surrender. 

“Sorry, sorry, my bad,” he says.  “Just friends, then?” 

“Yes,” you say.  “Though there’s nothing just about it.” 

You have replayed that rooftop exchange a hundred times, torturing yourself with every possible outcome.   If only you did this, if only he did that.  You rearrange every second, trying to find a version with a different ending.    

You wonder how he will react when he finds out what you did.  Aha, murder princess living up to her name! he might say.  The old man should have seen it coming.  I knew you could it, but of course I did. I’m so much smarter and better looking than everyone else here. 

You smile at the idea but it fades quickly. 

Changbin was with you last night.  He was sitting within arm’s reach, his scar under your fingertips.  Now he could be anywhere and it’s all your fault.  Not just because of the rooftop mistakes, but because of every mistake you made before that.

You exhale.  Your shoulders shake.  Chan watches you close a fist around a pillow.   

“You all right?” he asks. 

“I’m ending it,” you say. 

“Sorry, what?”

“I always thought Miroh was an inevitability.”  You are speaking out loud but mostly to yourself.  Your gaze is fixed on some distant point, your mind and heart miles away.  “But he wasn’t,” you say.  “No more soldiers.  No more experiments.  No more bribes and theft and terror.  My father is dead and I am going to do what I should have done a long time ago.  I am going to make sure his work dies with him.”

You look at Chan.  A day ago, you both existed for Miroh.  Now you are two people planning to dismantle an empire from a motel room and a stolen car.     

“Do you have a problem with that?” you ask. 

A part of you is braced for the worst, that he will reject it, that he will revert to some kind of conditioned programming and drag you back to a facility for condemnation. 

Even while you think it, you know it won’t happen.  The eyes staring back at you are as clear as your own. 

“I’m just the bodyguard,” Chan says.  “I go wherever you go.  Always.”

You feel invigorated to start now, but you are tired beneath the burst of adrenaline.   You need to let your body heal.   

The room is dark and you doze in the light of the television. After a couple hours, you roll over and find Chan is still awake.  He is laying on his bed, arms crossed and eyes open.  He is watching the shopping channel, ad after ad after ad, with far more intensity than it merits.   His mind must be somewhere else.  You can only imagine what he is thinking about. 

You wonder how much he knows about himself.  He responded to your half-coherent treasonous pleading.  Does he remember hating Miroh?  Or is he truly only helping you because of mission parameters? 

It is easy to forget when he is a bare-faced, curly-haired young man slouching in a motel bed, but Bang Chan is lethally competent.  He knew all of Miroh’s innermost schemes.  It will come in handy now, but it makes him an irrevocably dark character, whether it was willing or not. 

You wonder how much Changbin would trust him. 

Wait.

You were so distracted with your plans, you did not question a moment in your conversation. 

Chan mentioned Changbin. 

You never told Chan the identity of your friend.  When you were pleading with him, you just called him a friend. 

Maybe Chan heard you talking to your father.  Maybe he knows about your relationships because that was his job.  Maybe he just guessed because Changbin volunteered himself in the ring. 

Maybe Bang Chan remembers more than he is letting on. 

-

You fall asleep to the soft drone of the television.  Your mind is walking in circles and you dream of similar rings.  Nightmares of chrome cages and steel traps, a suffocating helplessness squeezing your ribcage. 

In your dreams, the room fills with smoke, a charcoal smog that chokes you as quickly as the compression on your chest.  You look down but you can’t see your body, only feel it.  Your invisible body struggles against invisible bindings.  You gasp for breath.

Your father appears.  It is him holding you down, a heavy hand in the middle of your chest.  You cry out.  You want to move but your body is trapped.

You close your eyes.  When you open them, Changbin is there.  He is still a teenager.  His head is bleeding – why is his head bleeding? – but he wipes the blood as if it’s nothing more than sweat, all his focus on you. 

Of course it is.  He’s your friend.  He’s here to save you.  How did you not see it before?  It’s like you have been moving through the world in a fog, the same grey smoke that envelopes you now.  His face is the only clear image, gawky with youth but alive and real.

The weight is lifted off your chest.  Black spots swarm your vision as you suck in a lungful of air. 

When you look again, Changbin is grown.  He looks like he did a day ago, dark bangs in his eyes, stocky build ready for a fight. 

“I’m not leaving here without you.”

Not leaving here.

Not leaving here.

Not leaving here. 

His voices dances around you.  You are trapped in your body, a screaming, shrieking force, watching through dead eyes as the world spins.  People pass but they don’t hear you.  You try to reach for someone but your body doesn’t respond to your thoughts. 

A labyrinthine stretch of road unfurls then disappears.  You are standing in the infirmary at the main facility.  You stare at yourself, the younger version of you.  You are already dead behind the eyes, resigned to your situation.  There are masked doctors around you.  A tray full of needles.  You watch as the long point penetrates your skin.  You’re just a child, arm so small in comparison. 

Your child face contorts with pain, an expression your adult face cannot mimic because you cannot control your face. 

You remember the pain, even if you cannot cry.  It was like nothing you had ever felt.  The pain meant it was working. The medicant was only administered to you when it had been thoroughly tested.  The first injection killed every subject except one.  The second program was a success. 

The children were writhing in pain for weeks, screaming and crying, begging for parents that never came.  Yours did, looming over your bedside, touching your feverish forehead and speaking through the fog of pain. 

An investment, Miroh called it.  You’ll thank me one day. 

Changbin is there.  He is a child too.  They put a needle in his skinny arm.  He winces but he doesn’t cry.   He isn’t scared of the needles or the pain, but he isn’t eager either.  He is just there, his head down. 

You blink and he is grown.  The needle is still in his arm, only it is not an injection but an extraction.  You watch the fullness of his face wither.  They are taking too much.  He becomes a child again, screaming in pain.  

The same pain moves inside you. 

No, worse. 

Worse. 

You never could have imagined a worse pain.  It courses through your whole body, peeling apart your insides while you lay there, helpless, watching.   

Your father stands over you.  You’ll thank me one day.  

He disappears.  For a flickering moment, you see Bang Chan.  Curly-haired, dimpled cheeks.  He stutters and shakes like a bad film projection.  His face contorts, changes.  Wide dark eyes stare at you, his face covered in rain – water – tears?  Pouring down his cheeks, mouth open and a mute cry in the grey. 

You want to touch him but you cannot move.  His face flickers again.  You feel a tiny, infinitesimal twitch in your pinky. 

Then he disappears altogether.  Your father is there.  He grabs you by the shoulders and slams you down, straight through the earth, holding you there in the darkness where no one can find you and you cannot move. 

“Hey—” comes a voice, somehow reaching you in the depths of that pit.  “Hey, hey, hey, wake up.” 

In your dream, your father shoves you. 

In reality, you are thrashing in a motel bed. 

It takes a minute to realize you are awake, that everything was just a terrible dream.  Your adrenaline is a white hot heat in your chest, your voice a strangled shriek as you clamour around the twisting sheets. 

“Hey, it’s all right,” Chan says.  “You’re just dreaming, whoa, easy, c’mon…  It’s all good.  Easy now.  Breathe for me, okay?” 

It feels like your first breath in years.  It goes down shaky, your vision blurry.  You realize Chan is holding your wrist, lightly but carefully.  You blink up at him.  He turned on the bedside light at some point.  Half his face is lit in gold as he looks at you with concern.  It is such a strange expression to see on him.  These were the same eyes glaring at you over that uniform mask.  Now that brow is pinched with worry, his own breath a staggered thing. 

“You all right?” he asks. 

You are sitting upright.  You look at your wrist in his hand. 

“Did I try to punch you again?” you ask. 

“You missed,” he says, smiling.  Then he shakes his head and says more seriously, “It was my fault.  You were yelling in your sleep so I woke you up.  I guess it was too fast or something.  Just, you know, I don’t think the walls are very thick here.”

“Right,” you say.  Your heart is still stampeding.  “Sorry.”

“It’s all right,” he says.  “You… you good…?” 

“Yeah,” you say.  You are too weary for patience, so sarcasm spills out of you.  “Peachy.” 

He opens his mouth but you don’t wait to hear it.  You slide out of bed and land on shaky legs.  Your whole body is covered in a sheen of sweat.  You want to shower, wash away the nightmare and the terror. 

You are a light sleeper.  You never dream like that. It is a testament to your exhaustion that you fell into such a deep sleep. 

You tell yourself it was a dream, but your reassurances don’t work.  Because it wasn’t really a dream, was it? It was flashes of real moments, real faces, real pain. 

You stand under steady stream of hot water.  You watch as the heat and the torrent opens a few scrapes, the water at your feet turning red.  You think of Changbin with a needle in his arm, all that red pouring out of him.  Standing there, helpless to do anything, like you are right now. 

You have no idea where he is.  You look at the scar on your palm and think of him in the moonlight, him in the ring, him at your side.  A smile, a joke, a reassurance.  A hand in yours, a promise. 

He knew you better than you know yourself.  He predicted this exact crisis of identity. 

When it’s just you and you’re trying to decide who you want to be, not who your father wants you to be…  When you’re trying to remember everything and you can’t decide what was real and what was just training and what was Miroh…

He drew that line across his palm.  You picture a chasm of a wound, gaping and red, rushing red at your feet. 

Just remember me, he said.  I didn’t bleed because I believe in Miroh.  I’m your soldier, not his.

True to his word, a man of principle to the end, he is bleeding for you right now. 

In all your years of training, fighting, and soldiership, of missions and schemes, tricks and plots, you have always kept composure.  Now it all weighs on you at once, every single second of your life, and it’s too much.  

When was the last time you cried?  You can’t even remember.  It pours out of you now, big ugly gasping sobs that spill into the shower.  You sit down where the water is pooling in pink.  You wrap your arms around your legs and draw them up to your chest like a child. 

You do not know how long you sit there, crying until it feels like there is no more water left in your body.  It must be a long time because the water runs from hot to lukewarm.  It feels strange to heave dry sobs with the shower still pouring down on you.  

The water abruptly stops.  You lift your head.

Chan stands there.  He doesn’t look at you directly, his expression solemn, but he turns off the water and gets you a towel.  

It feels surreal.  Bang Chan is moving around a small motel bathroom, helping you like he has helped you all day.  You stare at him with scrunched, sore eyes, your throat too strained to speak.  You drop your legs and let him wrap the towel around you.  Your heart kicks with momentary fright when he scoops you up, an effortless sweep. 

No one has ever done something like this for you.  You wouldn’t have let them, even if they tried. 

You need it.  You never realized how much you needed it.  You are certain you will feel embarrassed in the morning, but right now you put your arms around his neck and cling for dear life. 

He says nothing.  He hooks an arm around your back and the other under your legs.  He carries you back into the room and lays you in your bed, adjusting the towel for your modesty before pulling the blankets over you. 

You continue to sputter and hiccup, looking at him as he moves.  You wonder if he looks like this on a mission, determined and swift. 

No.  The First Guard wouldn’t fix the pillows under your head.  He wouldn’t tuck the blankets around you. 

Bang Chan stands over you, wearing nothing but his combat pants, no weapons or masks or piercing stares.  He has curly dark hair and a soft face.  When you touch his bare shoulder, he looks at you with a heart-shattering amount of tenderness.  You didn’t know anyone could look at somebody that way, never mind him, never mind at you. 

There’s a person inside him.  There’s a person inside you.  You don’t know who either of those people are, but you want to know.  You need to know. 

You curl your hand into a fist and feel the scar on your palm.  A day ago, none of this would have mattered, but you know why it matters now. 

“We have to find him,” you say.  Your rasping voice is barely above a whisper. 

Chan slowly cups his hand over yours, his palm to your knuckles, holding your touch against his shoulder.  He squeezes your fingers.  He nods.

“We will,” he says. 

“You’ll help me?” you say. 

“Yeah.” His own voice is a rasp, skirting the edge of emotion too.  He swallows it down and smiles at you.  “Like I said.  I go wherever you go.  Always.” 

He sits with you in the soft golden light of that small bedside lamp.  You do not think you can sleep again, but then exhaustion settles over you. 

You are on the cusp of sleep when he touches your forehead.  Your eyes meet briefly.  It wakes you with a heart flutter, similar to a dream that drops you into reality.  It is the heart-racing thump of a sudden fall.  The kind that feels so real, more like a memory than a dream. 

[serialunaliver]

i feel like a sicko bc i think i have POCD (i cant get diagnosed professionally bc im so scared of therapists that i get sick when im even in the same building as a therapist's office) but it sucks bc i am afraid that a romantic relationship with someone my age is also pedophilic because they were a baby once.

i also cant look at people in swimsuits at the pool or beach bc "they were a baby/child once and you're staring at them." like. YEAH.? they were a baby like 20 years ago. my brain KNOWS how aging works it just decides that "once a baby always a baby" and then im going to hell.

i havent been in a relationship in ages and im not sad perse but jesus fuckign christ i wish it could be that way of my own volition and not... fear? sorryyyy lol. i just know you've talked about POCD before and.

i have no idea how people think it's based on secret desires i literally get so scared whenever a child walks into my workplace bc of it.

hey i'm so sorry you're dealing with this‼️ pocd made me have similar fears even involving child family members.

something to remember is these are thoughts that are hurting you alone. no one around you is aware of what you're thinking and they aren't hurt by it. you haven't committed a crime or harmed any child and you're not a bad person for intrusive thoughts--you don't even want to have them in the first place, which is why they're called intrusive.

and although pocd may seem less common, that's only because people are afraid to discuss it. it's simply a more severe form of morality ocd--I say severe because the specific topic in pocd is harder to grapple with since simply talking about it out loud is difficult.

[bloatedandalone04]

Wrapped Around Your Finger - Part 1.5

Series Masterlist | Original Fic

➪in which anakin and the guys are granted a break, but that still didn’t give him any hope that he could actually fix things between you and him - but that also didn’t stop him from trying.

PSA: strongly suggested to read the warnings before proceeding.

WC; 3.2k | Do not repost this anywhere, reblogs are fine ♡ | THANK YOU FOR 4.6K FOLLOWERS

Anakin was sitting quietly on the couch as he half listened to Theo and Helena talk at the table on the bus. 

They had been discussing something in hushed whispers for a while now, but Anakin still had no idea what they were talking about. He couldn’t focus on anything right now as he scrolled through the text thread he has with you, his expression one of misery and agony. 

He knew you were back in LA by now. You had to be. You were probably packing your things as he sits and lets his eyes flicker between his bandmate and manager. 

Anakin had left you so many messages by now, and you haven’t replied to a single one. He felt pathetic and worthless, and he hated himself. 

He dropped his phone with a huff, instead deciding to trace his index finger along your handwriting on his wrist. It can’t be over between the two of you. It just couldn’t be. You were everything to him, his entire world. How was he supposed to do this without you? 

“Helena, please, just a few weeks,” Theo begged, and Helena sighed as she rubbed her forehead harshly. “My sister just told me that our mom is getting worse. I can’t let her go through that by herself anymore. I can’t not be there for them anymore. Please.”

Anakin’s mood deteriorated further at his friend’s pleas, and he wished there was something he could do for Theo, but he can’t even fix his own mess. “I know, Theo, I know,” Helena mumbled, standing up and rummaging around in her bag. “I’ve been trying to get this thing pushed back ever since you know who decided to touch broody over there.”

The not so subtle dig had Anakin rolling his eyes and picking at the threads on the blanket he threw over his lap. “Well, can you?” Theo asked desperately. “Get it pushed back? Just a few weeks. I need to be there if my mom-” he cut himself off as he refused to say it out loud. 

Anakin felt tears prick at his eyes as he stared at the floor. His heart ached for Theo, and it ached even worse for you. How had things gotten this bad? Just to make things that much more tragic, it seems like Clara and Vinny’s relationship was on its way out, too. She had left last night on a flight back home, and Vinny hasn’t been out of bed ever since. 

Seriously, how the fuck had things gotten this bad?

Helena looked at Theo with poorly concealed pity, and she sighed as she ran her hands through her hair. “Okay, Liz’s contract will end soon, and I think I’ll be able to get the next few weeks pushed back, so she won’t be welcomed back on the tour once things go back to normal,” she started, sitting back down at the table and looking between Theo and Anakin. “So that might help fix his problem.”

She gestured over to Anakin, and he just scoffed, wondering why she was talking about him like he wasn’t sitting less than three feet from her. 

“I think I can have all of you on flights back home by the end of the week, I just need to make a few calls,” she stated and Anakin’s scowl disappeared almost instantly. 

“What?” He asked in disbelief as Theo made a beeline to his bunk to begin packing. “Really?”

Helena nodded, flipping through a notebook with various names and phone numbers in it. She was old fashioned that way, despite being not much older than Anakin. “Don’t quote me on that, but I think I can do it,” 

Anakin sprung up, the blanket falling to the floor as he pulled her out of the chair and wrapped his arms around her. “Thank you,” he rasped, aware that she might not be able to get the tour pushed back, but she was going to try, and that’s what counted. “I owe you. For everything.”

Helena huffed quietly, pulling away to look him in the eye. “We’re a team, Anakin. You guys are like my family at this point,” she murmured and Anakin felt more tears gather in his eyes. “You know I’ll try to do anything I can for you three.”

“I know,” he whispered, “Still, thank you.” 

The next morning, after Anakin got about an hour and a half of sleep, he was waiting anxiously to hear if Helena had managed to get the tour postponed. He was sure Theo had been up all night, too, if the way he couldn’t seem to get comfortable in his bunk across from Anakin’s was anything to go by. 

When she announced that she was able to push the tour back a few weeks, Anakin booked the first flight back to LA and had Theo beside him on the plane. Vinny was in no rush to go back, so he decided to stay behind for a few more days. 

Anakin had sent you a quick text before he boarded the plane, which read, 

I’m coming home. I’m going to fix everything, I promise, Princess. I love you so much. 

And when he got into an Uber after the flight, he saw that you had read his text, but didn’t reply. That was the first text of his that you had read, and as pathetic as it sounded, it gave him hope. 

Theo was in the car with him since they had decided to ride together. He lived a few minutes away from yours and Anakin’s apartment, so he would be dropped off after Anakin. He didn’t even care that Theo would involuntarily be listening to the voicemail Anakin is forced to leave you as you had once again ignored his call. “Baby, it’s me,” he started, glancing over at his friend and feeling grateful for the way Theo turned his body towards the window so Anakin could have at least a little bit of privacy in the car. “I’m ten minutes away from our place. I’m so sorry, for everything.”

He ended it after that, even though he had so much more to say. He wanted to save himself the embarrassment of pouring his heart out to you over the phone, just to have you delete it without even listening to it. 

When the car pulled up outside the apartment complex, Anakin reached over and hugged Theo. “I hope things get better for you and Mary and your mom,” he mumbled, hearing Theo sniff quietly in response as he tried to hold off tears. “Text me if you need anything, okay? I mean it.”

Theo nodded and pulled away. “Same to you,” he says with a forced smile. “Y/n will forgive you. You’ve been together for too long to just give up on it now.” 

Anakin returned a half smile, squeezing his friend’s shoulder before grabbing his bag and getting out of the car. He watched it pull away from the curb as his hand dug around in his bag for his keys, and he almost cried when he finally found them. He hadn’t used them in so long, and he was hit with the memory of the last time he was here. It was the day he left for the tour with you by his side. 

If he could go back and do it again but better, he would in a heartbeat. But he couldn’t. He just had to deal with the consequences now. 

Anakin blinked a few times as he entered the lobby and headed right over to the elevators, taking one all the way up to the fifteenth floor as he tried to think of what to say to you. 

Would you even be there? Did you read his last text and flee the second he got on that plane? God, he hoped not. 

He was a shaky, sweaty mess as he reached the floor you and he lived on, and his nerves were slowly taking over as he neared the door. Anakin couldn’t believe how nervous he was about entering his own apartment and facing you, the girl he’s loved for five years now. It had never been like that with you. Ever.

As he stuck the key in the lock and turned it, his heart felt like it was going to beat out of his chest. He hadn’t seen you since that night in the dressing room nearly four days ago. He had so much to make up for, so much to apologize for, and he could only hope that you would listen.

When he pushed the door open and stepped inside the quiet apartment, his heart fell at how dark it was. He was sure you weren’t home and hadn’t been for a while, but then he heard some movement to his left, and he dropped his bag instantly and entered the living room. “Princess,” he whispered when he saw you sitting on the couch, your old Uni hoodie covering your upper half while a blanket covered the rest of you. 

Your hair was tied back and your eyes were sad and empty, and when you looked up at him, you dropped your phone onto your lap with a quiet huff. “Oh, you actually were ten minutes away,” you mumbled. “I thought you were lying.”

Anakin shook his head as he scanned the dark living room. It looked like you had been living in here since you got home. Water bottles, your mugs he teased you about on the day you moved in, and cracker boxes were scattered on the coffee table he and Vinny put together. “Why…why would I lie about that?” He rasped, stepping further into the room. “Why would I lie to you?”

You tore your eyes away from him and shrugged. “Because you’ve done it before,” you simply answered, looking back up at him with tears in your eyes. “You said you loved me. And that I was the person you wanted forever.”

“Baby,” he gasped and made it over to you in three strides. 

“Why are you home, Anakin?” You asked, making him stop a few centimeters away from the couch. And you. “Why are you here?”

Anakin felt hopeless and on edge. How was he supposed to fix this when he didn’t know where to start? “Because I love you. And I want you forever. Just you,” he answered. “I never lied about that.”

You bite down onto your lip and reach up to wipe at your eyes with your sleeves. “Um, Kenneth read my short story. I finished it on the flight back to London,” you tell him and he stood still, letting you say what you needed to. “He loved it. Um, he wants to get it published.”

“Y/n,” he said quietly, feeling so proud of you even though he was also feeling terrified. “That’s awesome, baby.”

You drop your hand onto your lap and look up at him with a heartbroken expression. “It’s about you,” you confess. “About us. About…how much I love you and…it’s our story, Anakin.”

Anakin’s shoulders dropped at that. You were so sweet and kind and too fucking good for him. He never deserved you. “Then publish it,” he mumbled, his own eyes welling up with tears. 

“I can’t,” you cry, covering your face with your hands. “It’s too much. It reminds me of us too much, and I don’t even know what we are anymore.”

He squeezed his eyes shut and dropped his head, unsure of what to say to that. How does he make this better? “I’m yours,” was all he could come up with. “Even if you’re not mine anymore.” 

Those words physically pained him to say, and they only made you more upset. “Fuck, Ani,” your voice broke as you called him the name he only ever let you call him. “Why are you back?”

Anakin cleared his throat and pressed the heel of his hand against his eyes. “Theo’s mom…she got worse and they don’t know if she’ll be okay or if she’ll make it,” he whispered, knowing that his friend wouldn’t be mad he told you that. Theo was your friend, too, after all. 

Your eyes widened at that and you sat up, sniffling as you began looking for your phone. “That’s…that..” you trailed off as you lifted the blanket and grabbed your phone. “I should call him. I should..call him and..” 

You were becoming less and less in control of yourself, and Anakin could see the way you were getting yourself worked up. “Hey,” he mumbled, grabbing your wrist as you started to stand up. “Hey, it’s okay. It’s okay.”

“It’s not,” you whispered and he saw tears roll down your face again. “Why wasn’t I good enough for you? What could I have done?”

A broken gasp left his lips and Anakin fell onto the couch next to you, pulling your body into his arms as you cried against his neck. “You’re enough,” he promised, cradling the back of your head and holding you tight. “You’re more than enough. Baby, you’re…you’re everything to me. My whole world. I’m so fucking sorry for what I did, for what I allowed to happen.”

You cried harder against him, bunching up the fabric of his shirt in your fists. 

“I should’ve been there for you. I should’ve been there to support you,” he mumbled against the top of your head. “I’m so proud of you, of everything you’ve done. I’m sorry if you feel like you can’t bring yourself to get your story published because of me. I don’t want you to hold yourself back because of me.”

You cling onto him and lift your head. “I don’t know what to do, Ani,” you sobbed. “Please, tell me what I should do. Please.”

He could see just how much you needed help, and how you needed to be guided right now. And he would help you for as long as you needed, even if it ended up with you kicking him out afterwards. “What will make you feel better? Do you want me to leave? I can give you some space or time or-”

“No, I don’t want that,” you shake your head and crawl onto his lap. 

“What do you want, princess?” He desperately asked. “What can I do?”

“I want things to go back to how they were,” you cried. “I want to feel like I did before when I look at you. It hurts, Ani. I can’t do this anymore.” 

Tears fell from his eyes and landed in your hair as he held you impossibly closer. “I’m sorry,” he whispered. “I love you. I’m sorry.”

You were shaking against him and he felt terrible. This was all his fault. “I want to hurt her,” you mumbled. “I hate her. I fucking hate her, Ani. I hate her for what she did to you.” 

“I hate her, too,” he pathetically agreed and you lift your head. 

“What are we going to do, Anakin?” 

He lifted his hand and smoothed out your messy hair, trailing his thumb down to your lip afterwards. “That depends,” he murmured. “Do you still want me? Could you ever forgive me?” 

You brace your hands on his shoulders and nod. “Maybe…eventually,” you answer. “I still want you.”

A breath of relief left his mouth, but he still wasn’t happy with himself. “I’m back home for a couple weeks, and I’m going to spend every single day making this up to you,” he promised. 

“Then you’re back on tour?” You quietly asked and looked down. “With her?”

“No,” he said quickly. “Helena said something about pressing charges before I came here, and I might go through with it. She won’t be there, I promise. She’ll never be around me or you or us again.” 

“Do it,” you encourage, grabbing the hair on the back of his neck with shaky fingers. “I don’t want her near you ever again. I hate her so much.”

“Yeah, I can tell,” his lips curved upwards just slightly as he gently massaged your hips. “That was quite the nose job you gave her.”

You laugh quietly, lifting your gaze to meet his. “I need to know that it was a mistake, Anakin,” you went back to being serious. “If you felt anything for her, even a little bit at all, I’m out.”

Anakin panicked and shook his head. “Never. I never felt anything for her,” he assured you. “She means nothing to me at all. You’re my girl, the one I want to be with for the rest of my life. I’ve known that since I was seventeen years old.”

You nod, trailing your fingers through his hair. “You promise?” You asked and he nodded instantly. “Okay…okay. Ani, these next couple weeks…I need this to be okay. Maybe not completely fixed, but…okay.”

“I’ll fix everything,” he swore, pulling you against his body again. “I promise you, I’m going to make everything okay again. I love you so much. I always will, you’re it for me. My one and only.”

You give him a small smile, tracing your fingers along his cheek before leaning up and kissing his jaw. “I love you,” 

Hearing you say that had his heart skipping a beat. “I’m so sorry. I’m going to fix this,”

Anakin kisses you all over your face before letting you sit in his lap for as long as you wanted to.

It wasn’t okay, what he did. He knew that. But he was going to make damn sure that he made everything right again. He had to.

-

Three weeks later…

Being back on stage after the brief break Anakin was given felt great. 

He loved being on stage, loved the lights and the screams of fans and the feeling he got from it all.

But it wasn’t what had him feeling so happy right now. 

Theo’s mom had pulled through and was getting better by the day, and was able to stay awake for most of the day now. When she regained control of her voice, she practically forced Theo to go back and finish the tour, and told him that she would be there when it was over. 

Vinny and Clara broke up, but are still friends, and Vinny decided to focus on music and the band. He had even started writing a few songs about the experience that he couldn’t wait to get out there. 

And as for Anakin, he was getting ready for a court date that was set for a few months from now. He did press charges against Liz, and though she claimed she was going to fight it, he knew he had a whole team behind him. There was no way she was winning this thing. 

And you. His sweet, beautiful and smart girlfriend. Well, he was gaining your trust back more and more as the days went on. You allowed Kenneth to send your story to his publisher, and it would be released by the end of the year. 

He was so proud of you, and when he began singing the first verse of Wrapped Around Your Finger, he glanced over to his right and saw you standing next to Helena backstage, a smile gracing your lips and the red rose he had given you before going on stage in your hand. He knew you were proud of him, too. 

And he knew things would be okay.

-

Goodbye, my Rockstar and Booknerd. Til we meet again.

Thank you to everyone who read and followed along with this series. I loved writing it so much ! And thank you to my sweets, @everydaydreamer for the original fic idea. Who would’ve thought we’d end up here?

[eggyrocks]

80 with kenma please :3

:3

500 follower special: #80 “How can you think I’m anything but hopelessly in love with you?”

kenma x gn reader, probably ooc kenma, insecurities, hurt/comfort, very light angst, not proofread written content masterlist

It's easy to love Kenma. It's harder to be loved by him.

They've learned over the years that he's not loud with his love. He shows it in little ways, unrecognizable unless you know him. He can sit with them for hours in complete silence, preferring their quiet company to being alone. He buys them small, frequent gifts, presenting each one to them without much fanfare. He lets them wear his hoodies. He's upfront and direct about his relationship status when interested fans question him about it. Kenma's attentive. Loyal. Dedicated.

But Kenma's not the grand gesture type. He doesn't vocalize his love often. He's not generous with physical touch. He likes to sleep soundly on his own side of the bed. He prefers relaxed nights in to extravagant dates. They know he loves them. He's told them so many times, in his own way.

And most of the time, these things don't really bother them. But sometimes, they start to add up, and even though they don't doubt that Kenma loves them, they start to feel like maybe he doesn't really like them.

It's been a long day. Work was difficult and long and taxing. Little things went wrong, and they added up. Small mistakes at work. Tripping on the train. Cracking their phone case. Kenma not responded to their string of texts. Burning their dinner. Cat puke. A headache. Kenma' silence.

It adds up.

And after they had cleaned up dinner and settled back down on the couch beside Kenma, he didn't acknowledge them. He didn't look up from the game in his hands.

And that was just sort of it for them.

They pulled their knees up into their chest, knotted their hands together, and let the thoughts run wild. Because Kenma's hardly spoken to them all day, and is it really that taxing for him to talk to his partner? Do they just not matter as much to him anymore?

It sort of feeds into itself, this sort of thinking. Sour thoughts spread and they can't stop the flow of emotion that makes their chest tighten and their eyes prick.

They press their face against the tops of their knees, trying to make themselves as small as they feel. And they're so caught up in the cyclical sort of thinking they don't notice when Kenma glances up at them from his game, or how the sight of them like that makes him abandon it at once.

So they don't expect it when his arms go tight around their curled up form, pulling them into his lap. "Tell me what's wrong," he says, voice hushed, not urgent but not uncaring.

All they can offer up in response is a shrug, not quite able to form the words. They focus on holding in their breaths, and keeping their eyes dry.

"Take your time," Kenma says, and does not move. He stays there, still and steady, cheek pressed to the top of their head.

A tear spills, and now they feel so stupid. Because of course he loves them, and they shouldn't be expecting more.

They inhale sharply, and try to steady their breathing before they speak once more. "It's dumb, and I know it's not true, but sometimes I can't help but feel like you don't like me," they admit, rushing through the end of their sentence once their voice starts to waver.

Kenma stills. “How can you think I’m anything but hopelessly in love with you?” he asks, and he doesn't say it with any particular passion or intensity. He's not mad or incensed. It's just a question Kenma doesn't know the answer to.

"I dunno," they mumble. "It doesn't bother me most of the time. But you're not an overly affectionate person, you don't always want to talk, and that's okay, I just," the strop, and exhale through their nose, "get insecure without that, sometimes."

It feels wrong to say it out loud, and when the words leave their tongue they almost wish they could take them back and reshape and rearrange them. Kenma doesn't move for a moment, but once he does, he lifts their hand and uses it to smooth out the top of their. "I'm sorry I made you feel that way," he says. "I can get stuck in my own head sometimes, I don't mean to make you feel neglected."

"It's okay, Kenma," they say, and it already feels like some of the weight's been relieved from their chest.

"No it's not," he's quick to counter. "And you don't have to feel bad for wanting affection from me. Especially when it's something I want to give you."

They sniffle, and lean up against him, head resting on his shoulder. "I love you," they tell him.

"I love you," he says, voice now firmer in the declaration, and he places a kiss on the top of their head. "And I like you a lot, too."

an: THESE ARE TAKING ME FOREVER IM SORRY also this one was bad lmafo im so sorry

[stinkypeanutbutter]

‘ Tick

Tick

Tick ‘

The light sound of ticking from the clock could be heard from Aiden’s bed , which Aiden has been laying on for the past 40 minutes , or so . His parents had gotten him it quite a while ago . He wasn’t sure why , because he knew he wouldn’t be able to figure it out or have enough focus to remember , but it was something along the lines of “ Not having to use a phone or digital clock when it’s around . “ ‘ Tick

Tick

Tick ‘

He didn’t like that clock . It felt loud , felt repulsive and it bothered him so . Yes , it felt loud , he could feel it . Each time it ticked it felt like it slowly crept into his ears like a bug and started chewing at his brain .

. What time was it ?

He couldn’t remember . Maybe he should , it seems like something he should know of but he doesn’t . Not right now . .

.

Aiden didn’t really feel loved . Wow ! That was random , gotta be all edgy don’t we . .

Well , it was true . But of course he’s wrong , he has to be . His parents were there , sometimes , and showered him with gifts whenever they came back from traveling for work . .

Annoying . It’s all so irritating . His parents love him , he’ll keep telling himself that to make sure it sounds true enough to believe , even if the truth may hurt more then the lies .

. . Lies ? No no , there weren’t any lies . They never said anything to lie , did they ? He couldn’t remember . Hungry . He was hungry . or bored ? One of the two fit .

Maybe he’s lying to himself just as much as he believed they were . But he wasn’t , he was sure his friends cared for him . I thought this was about his parents ? He’s sure it was , that’s what got him thinking more in the first place , since around 2 : 33 pm . .

It was 2 : 33 . Was it ? Maybe it’s a minute before , maybe after but he couldn’t check the clock if he wanted .

‘ Tick ‘

He wanted to die . No , no he didn’t . Maybe . He hadn’t put much thought into that in a while . Maybe he does , or he’s sure he just doesn’t care if he dies or not . Risk is fun . The risk or the thrill ? The risk is what gives him the thrill . What does he like more ? Hm .

Parents , family , yada yada . He wished they had bothered to call him back once , just once anytime they were away to check in on him , make sure he’s fine . He’s always fine , he’ll always be fine , what ELSE is there to be ? Not sad , he can’t be that it would worry everyone . Would it ? He wished his parents worried more . Called more , appreciated him more , cared about him more he doesn’t care if they love him or not anymore all he wanted was they’re stupid attention , not coming back every few months with a ton of pricey , dumb gifts to make up for lost time . Lost time they barley bother to recover because it’s all just gifts he never asked , never wanted once , and yet he never bothered to speak up about it . He felt tired . Hungry ? Bored ? He went over this already .

They loved him , but he has a feeling they at least love him for being a family member more then their son .

But he can’t help but wonder what they truly cared most for . Himself , or the fortune that was brought upon them .

.

. Caring . They were caring , his friends were so caring to him . He brang them up again . How many times has he did that ?

2 ?

It was 2 : 33 . No , he’s wrong , several minutes passed already . Several hours ? No , it’s still light out . He feels cold . Deathly cold . But the fans not on . Is it ? He doesn’t want to turn his head to check , he’s tired . He feels too under - stimulated . He wants to move , draw , run , jump , dance , but he can’t . He wants to . Will he ? He doesn’t care right now . Care ? If he asked that to anyone , everyone , how many answers will he receive . . Or how many will differ from the rest . Everyone has different feelings , different reactions , different expectations towards whatever . What would his friends say ? His parents ?

‘ tick ‘

.

.

What time was it again ?

[naompspsps]

Uhhhhh, *Moonwalks into ask box* Shawty ily fr /p you and me one in the same, I literally two two very long chapters of a new fic today and having the Pomfiore boys was a cherry on top…..now I have a new idea for you….

What if the dark mirror picked up a child reader, like 8-10 y/o…how would the staff and students react? 🤭

Their reaction to 8 years old you.

Summary: You're an 8 year old kid who was always left out with your friend group, So while you watch them have fun, you just decide to sleep on a nearby bench.

Then you wake up in a strange.. Large room. Where are your parents? You don't know, and you don't remember for some reason. You remember the part where you felt left out, but you don't remember who were the people that pushed you out of the group.

You just appeared out of the dark mirror, leaving you to wander around the school with students looking at you. But then, they come to help you.

Ft. Divus Crewel, Dire Crowley, Mozus Trein and Ashton Vargas.

A/n: This was so fun to do lmao, now i wanna see Heartslabyul's reaction next. Anyways hi shawty, how r u.

Taglist bcs I wanna do it for fun: @frootloopscos

! do not repost or translate my works anywhere. do not copy or use my works in any site, Reblogs are appreciated alot though !

Ashton Vargas

He gives out the vibes of being a babysitter that you never plan to let go. Ever. Like, he made your whole life better just with one single idea that he pulled the whole student army for. That's a memory you never want to forget.

Vargas definitely made the students play with you, easily. With one command, They're already following. Obviously, He becomes the usual supportive audience with the other students, like it's some football team game.

Vargas was surprised into seeing a little kid, but who wouldn't be surprised? It took him only seconds to smile brightly and take the opportunity to babysit you. He looks like someone you could trust so, Here you are, with Vargas in the field.

You sit beside Vargas during class Comfortably, wow.. So many students on brooms! Your eyes sparkle. Oh.. How you wish to get to have fun like that. You look down on the grass.

Students look at you, Like they've heard of the rumours about you appearing out of nowhere without any memories of who were the people you knew back there. You play with your hands, bored.

You can't really have fun. It's like, forbidden for you. Maybe, it isn't.. As Vargas looks at you. "Heyy, Champ, What's wrong?" He kneels down beside you, a hand on your shoulder.

You look at the students on the broom, then back to your hands. "I'm just.. Bored." You whisper out.

Vargas thinks for a moment, then looking down at you, noticing the way you looked at the students and embarrassedly looking away. "Hmm.. Say, You wanna play?" You quickly look at him. Did you just hear that right? Play? You nod eagerly yet, excitedly.

He laughs out loud, "Alright! Students! We have a playmate!" Vargas cracks his knuckles on his hand, before lifting you up in the air and yelling. "GET THEM!!"

One of the students quickly fly down to you, grabbing you in a protective hold infront of him, just so that you won't fall. You look down. "Woooah!" You hold onto the broom. "Fun?" The student asks, You look up at them with a bright smile plastered on your face. "Mhm! Mhm!"

You can hear Vargas shouting from down there, cheering you on. "Here, throw this in that hoop." The student hands you a ball. You look at the hoop. "But it's too far!"

"It doesn't matter, go ahead and try." You use all your kiddie strength to throw the ball. To your surprise, It actually hit. You could hear Vargas and the rest of the students shouting and cheering. So did the student behind you also laugh and praise you.

"GOOD JOB CHAMP!!!" Vargas jumps and raises his fist up in the air. The other students offer Vargas chest bumps. How could he refuse to those in such a worldwide champion?! "...Look away, Kid." The student behind you whispers, covering your eyes with his hand. "Huh?" You question.

Mozus Trein

Trein wants to treat you like you're his other grandchild, you're just so adorable that he wants to take you. So, He does! Even if he thinks you would bother the class, Well, You didn't. You were just playing with Lucius under the desk.

He would realize so quick that you might be sweating in there, so he just brings you out to sit on his chair while he teaches, Lucius on your lap and letting you pat and caress him.

You walk with Trein inside of the classroom, The whole class filling with 'aw' and 'so cute''s, But, Does it bother you? No, Does it bother Trein? No. Does it bother Lucius? Yes. Lucius meows loudly at the students, telling them to shut up.

You look up at Lucius, who was getting held by Trein. Trein looks at you, as you make grabby hands. "Carry??" He asks. Damn, He's too old for this. You shake your head. "No? What is it?-- Oh, Lucius? You want to hold Lucius?"

You nod. Trein walks up to his desk and places Lucius on the desk. You walk at the side of the desk, hiding from the students so you aren't much of a bother in their class. Lucius jumps off the desk and lands on the ground, walking closer to you.

You watch Lucius get comfy on your lap. He wouldn't mind right?.. You gently rest your hand on his fur, and he doesn't resist. Then you slowly caress him, and he still doesn't meow or scratch you. It might take a while.. You mutter to yourself.

It's been, How long.. 40 minutes? You've been hugging and playing with Lucius for a while now. It's bit hot in your spot.. But you also don't want to disrupt Trein's class. So you just, continue running your fingers through Lucius' fur.

You don't even notice Trein looking at you. "[Name], Child, You're sweating. Go ahead and take a seat here." Trein pats on his chair. But isn't he..- Oh- He's teaching. Oh well. You stand up, carrying Lucius in your arms as you plop on the seat like a slime.

That causing everyone to let out giggles of how cute you were. You cover yourself embarrassedly, Looking down at the cat and pretending you're busy. But even if you don't understand, You still try to by listening to his lectures.

Yeah, Okay. You don't Understand a thing with the lesson. You sigh softly. The thoughts of your friends' blurred faces in your head. You remember the situation.. But you can't remember their faces and their names. It's like they're just. Unknown to you now.

You kick your feet on the Chair, playfully pointing at the ceiling and closing one eye, Just doing random things by boredom taking over. At this point, Everyone can't focus with you acting so adorable. It's making them forget what part of lesson they're in right now.

"And that's the-" Trein looks at everyone in the class, seeing that they all had their focus on you. He lets out a frustrated sigh. "Oh dear. My child. Could you tell them to focus in my lesson?" You look at the class, trying to look tough.

"Go back to studying!" You yell, which everyone starts giggling more. "Uhh.. It didn't work.." You look up, only to see Trein holding his laugh. "Goodness, You are such an adorable child." He mumbles before announcing the most heart dropping, air losing, oxygen needing in a bad way news ever.

"Also, Homeworks about today's lesson. It's due tomorrow."

Divus Crewel

He is skeptical of the issue at first, He doesn't even know what to do with you. But as time goes by, he starts to get comfortable with you, and ends up wanting to stay hanging out with you.

He brought you everywhere, Class, Lunch, Breaktime and even in his office. Everyone just isn't used to seeing the strict and cold teacher so warm around you.

You stare at Crewel. He stares back. While the rest of the teachers watch you both intesely stare, He takes a deep breath. "..Want a beer?" Crewel asks. "THEY'RE 8." Crowley shouts. "I DON'T KNOW WHAT I'M SUPPOSED TO DO."

"Oh dear.." Trein sighs. You walk closer to Crewel, tugging on his coat and giving him your dog plushie. Crewel just looks at you blankly. "I'm keeping the kid." He picks you up with ease and walks out of Crowley's office. "So.. We won the argument?" Crowley turns to Trein, who just nods. "We did."

You stayed with Crewel the entire day, not a single moment of you staying away from Crewel. In class, You just sit on a chair, taking a nap. Hugging the plushie that was in your arms. The students couldn't focus, nor could he. Not to mention, one of Crewel's dogs were on the desk, allowing you to use them as a pillow.

A few minutes later, You slowly open your eyes and yawn. You had a good nap.. You look at Everyone, who looked dead serious of getting a good grade. You get off your seat and rush towards Crewel. "Nice dream?" He asks, picking you up again. You look down.

You see the cauldron filled with magic. "Woah.." You gasp, seeing the liquid turn to a different color. "Cool?"

"Yeah!"

With your cuteness, it makes most of the students clench on their chest with tears in their eyes. How could you be so adorable?!

"Wanna mix, pup?" Crewel gives you the big stirring stick, and you take it, slowly stirring. The liquid is a bit thick.. So you struggle to stir it. But who says that's something you can't handle? You see the liquid turn purple. "Oooh.." You lean in closer.

"Is it interesting to see? Well watch this." Crewel puts a drop of another chemical, making it explode glitters. "WOOOAH!!" You yell. Crewel sighs. "Don't adopt the kid.. Don't adopt the kid.." He mumbles to himself.

Staying with him during his lunchbreak wasn't that bad at all, He just brought you in the courtyard to go to the flowers, And while you do that, you pick a red rose, run to Crewel and hand him the flower with your cheeky little grin.

Crewel has officially lost it. In a good way, He feels like his heart's been shot millions of times.

Dire Crowley

Yall heard of the theories that Crowley might be Malleus' dad? Imagine that /j Nah, He'd have absolutely no idea what to do. But he just makes you stay in his office, Bring you to special lessons with his own hat on you instead.

Students may think him without a hat is weird because they've never seen him without it (cough cough book4 crowley cough), but looking at you makes them forget everything.

Coming out of the dark mirror was.. Confusing for Crowley, He had to blankly have a staring contest with the dark mirror. But he feels like he needs to find out why you don't remember your parents but you remember what happened back there.

Not even that, You weren't even crying at the fact that you literally do not know where you are or who were the people around you. You were just.. Nonchalant. Maybe still sleepy, but nonchalant. Crowley made you stay with him until he figures out what to do with you.

Should he adopt you? He doesn't want to send you to an orphanage, He thinks you're too special to be there.

Watching over you isn't that hard. All you did was sleep on him while he wrote his paperworks, play around and not bother him. Atleast you didn't give him a hard time.. But because of that, After he was done with his paperworks he asks you if you wanted to play with him.

How could you say no to that? You both ran around the office, putting on hats and random stuff. It was fun, you had to admit.

So, Now you're with Crowley on the rooftop, right under a classroom. "Okay, so what I want you to do is hold on to me and we'll be alright." Crowley whispers to you. You nod, holding onto him tightly.

Crowley jumps in the classroom from above, landing perfectly. Oh! You're still wearing his hat.. And his coat! "SPECIAL LESSONS!" He yells. Everyone looks at him weirdly. "Headmage.. Why do you look like th- OH MY GOODNESS!" A student points at you.

"AWWWW" Is all you hear in the classroom. "Special lessons!" You shout excitedly. You don't know what special lessons are, but just follow Crowley's lead. Cro- Crowley??

He's on the floor.. "THAT IS THE CUTEST KID I'VE EVER SEEN." Crowley sobs. You're just too cute that you even had the headmage tear up.

"But- Special lessons.." You mumble. He clears his throat and quickly gets up. "Ahem, Right. Right, Thank you, Little Assistant." Crowley takes his hat off your head and gives you little pat before putting the hat back on you again.

Author's End Note: I'm putting Sam in the next part along with Heartslabyul, I can't 🗿🗿

! do not repost or translate my works anywhere. do not copy or use my works in any site, Reblogs are appreciated alot though !

[oldtvandcomics]

I just wish death wasn't such an absolute taboo in our society.

My grandmother died unexpectedly. But, really? Did she really??

Once upon a time, a passer-by helped Death up when he'd fallen down alongside the road. To thank him, Death promised not to come unannounced, but to send a messenger ahead of him. Death sent illness, and fewer, and old age and grey hairs and aching joints. The man didn't recognize any of these as the promised messenger, and was genuinely shocked when Death showed up at his doorstep.

My grandmother died unexpectedly. She was old, and getting noticeably weaker for years now. The last two weeks, she could barely move her arms for pain in her shoulders. Eventually, she had to call a relative for help, who called a doctor, who called an ambulance to take her to the emergency. The next day, she died of heart failure. Unexpectedly.

She was, by a complete coincidence that we definitely won't need to worry about, almost exactly the same age as her father, when he died of sudden heart failure. Funny thing, these coincidences.

My grandfather also died unexpectedly. He had Parkinson's, and wasn't able to move much those last years. Just before his death, my mother took him to the hospital for a check-up, and left him there, then came back here where we live. According to my sister, she cried when she left my grandparents' city. At that time, we visited three times a year, so she knew perfectly well that she would be back in three months' time. Why would she cry? But no, my grandfather died unexpectedly.

The next one to go will be my aunt. It is pretty clear, has been pretty clear since she was diagnosed with cancer last year. We could, theoretically, like, prepare for it. But no, because you can't talk about death, so we can't even mention it unless I'm alone with my father.

"Thank you for helping me," said Death. "As a thanks, I will not come unannounced, but will send a messenger."

"That is a fine thing," said the man. "That way, I won't have to worry about you hiding behind every tree."

And if I say any of this out loud, then I'm an unforgivable asshole.

[soshinee]

i really have loved being in japan in general so far but most of my students are so fucking mean to me 😭😭 like they’re just so so sooo mean they parrot and mock me when i call someone’s name and laugh when i talk in general and it’s like how am i supposed to curry their favor or gain their respect when they are openly making fun of me from the second i walk into their classroom for the first time💀

[craycraybluejay]

Hey, anything we could to to try and help you settle in the meantime before tomorrow? :((

Honestly, I have no idea, but I really appreciate the care. I think I will just daydream and maybe do terrible things to that person and their loved ones in the daydream, lol. If you cannot get over shock and other insanity, you can definitely turn it into enjoyment with a little bit of overdramatic violence and other things.

[squishied]

sometimes its so hard

[sharingresourcesforpalestine]

you know, I feel like, as little money as I have, I still haven’t put into perspective how much I have that could still be of use. I’m not so poor that I can’t make a difference. I can still buy a meal if I go out. I can buy a trinket. I’m not so poor or struggling with life that I don’t have food in my stomach and a place to sleep. Donating like I have this week has me wanting to do something that I hope many others are already doing. For every cent I would have spent for myself, on groceries, deliveries, gifts, etcetera (beyond the strikes where I am not spending money on anything but Palestinian causes) I will donate equal or greater that amount to Palestine. Because if I have money for me, I should have money for others. This is not me setting myself on fire to keep others warm, I know I would be of no use long term if I destroyed myself by going entirely broke with no way to survive myself. This is considering things beyond medical bills and life expenses that I need to keep going. When I count groceries, it’s things like when I use Instacart bc I can’t go out, because even though I don’t have a means of transportation, delivery is a luxury and if I can afford to pay for that, I can afford to donate. If I buy something non-essential like some snacks or the like, I have to match it with a donation. Because if I can afford to buy that, I can afford to donate. And just due to the nature of being a reminder, every time I get my period I’m going to donate to sanitary products for Palestine, because while pads are an essential product, donating even a little bit towards helping others get even the opportunity to get the same access as I do is an important reminder. There’s $5 donations available for those, and that’s about the cost of an average subscription I would be able to afford— it won’t buy a whole kit, but it will still put money towards that goal. I may not be able to do all the good the world needs, but the world needs all the good that I can do. As much as I can spare, I will donate. I only wish I could do more.

[arolesbianism]

Upon further examination, I am leaning more and more into Otto being a nonbinary egg opposed to a nonbinary person who uses he/him pronouns. Thanks for the help Mi-ma <3

[oreoluvskento]

gojo being dangerously loud

a/n: i know this is supposed to be a nanami focused account but hear me out... whiny gojo. that's it.

cw: cunnilingus, riding, ummm gojo being drunk and loud and his baby girl moans, semi-public sex (they're in a bathroom), i am so horny and i just need him so bad

you love the sounds your boyfriend makes during sex. he's never been shameful about it either, always loud and proud about the way your pussy makes him feel. this time, however, you wish he'd shut up.

you two are currently in your friends bathroom during a drunk movie night. you were both pretty tipsy, gojo more drunk than you and you were having a great time. all of a sudden, he doubled over, making it obvious to everyone that there was something wrong and he needed a bathroom fast.

except, when you follow him in and he locks the door behind you, there is nothing wrong with him at all, besides the raging boner he was currently sporting. your eyes widened when you saw it, but the casamigos in your bloodstream was stopping you from thinking clearly and the next thing you knew, you were getting eaten out on your friends bathroom floor.

"'toru, fuck, i'm close!" you whisper, holding his head harder and he speeds up, his tongue flicking your clit constantly as his two middle fingers are going to work. when you cum, you cover your mouth with your hand as your back arches off the floor and gojo doesn't pull away. you have to manually drag him away from you and he immediately goes for your lips, making your mouth just as messy as his own.

as the two of you kiss, he sits up and pulls you against his body sitting against the bathtub. you make quick work of his pants and without wasting any time you lower yourself on him. the last thing you expected was for him to throw his head back and let out one of the sluttiest moans you had ever heard. "ahhh fuckkk!"

you quickly slap your hand against his mouth and pray to god that no one heard that. he lifts his head and looks at you with furrowed eyebrows and low eyes, whimpering quietly against your hand at your pussy pulsing around him. "satoru, you've got to be quiet, baby, okay?" you ask and he nods, his cheeks red.

you finally lift your hips and before you could even go back down, a deep groan comes from his throat and you stop again. he gets impatient and pulls you down himself, dropping his forehead against yours as he moves you faster.

"mmph feels too good, can't stop," he says breathlessly against your palm, and you have to drop your head on his shoulder at the speed he was going. he truly was trying his best, but as the two of you went on, his whines got louder and louder until they were hoarse moans.

"im close, im close, please, please, please!" he cries against your skin and you take over, pressing your lips against his in the process. he moans into the kiss, his body going weak when you trade the fast movement for slow, deeper movements.

"you like it, 'toru?" you ask, your lips moving against his. he nods quickly, tears beginning to form in his eyes at the sensitivity of his dick but you don't stop.

"baby please- haaa fuckkk!" he begs squeezing your hips and you shake your head.

"promise me you'll be quiet when you cum," you instruct and he nods furiously, just wanting to feel his orgasm. you take his word for it, partly because you were ready to cum too, but you cover his mouth for safe measures.

you go faster now, grinding your hips down on his, and almost as soon as you start, you feel him start to shake and thrust into you himself. "ah, ah ahhhh fuck, fuck, fuck, cummingggg!"

before you could say anything, he holds you down, his head buried in your neck as he moans in your ear and your orgasm hits as well, spurring him on. "ohh shitshitshit too much too much fuuuck!" he cries, holding your body against his as you ride your orgasm out. right when you finish, you hear a knock on the door and your friend's concerned voice.

"hey, is he okay in there, do you guys need help?" her voice rings out and your eyes widen.

"yeah, he's okay, just drank a bit too much!" you shout back and turn back to look at your boyfriend. "cough," you instruct and he does just that. you reach to the side and flush the toilet and pretend to pat his back. "that's okay, get it all out."

"okay, there's some water in the kitchen for him when he's done," she says and leaves. you let out a sigh of relief and drop your head on a slightly sobered up gojo's chest.

"my bad," he whispers and you roll your eyes as you stand up.

"shut up."

[alastorss]

Hi! I hope you're having a good day! I've been thinking, how would Alastor react to the reader casually saying stuff like "I like your laugh, it's nice," and "You voice is really soothing," out of the blue.

a/n: oh i loooooved writing this ^ ^ he would 100% be the type to try and hide that he actually likes the compliments but fail miserably. thank you and i hope you like this!

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You'd like to say you know everything about Alastor, but that's far from the truth.

You know his mother's jambalaya recipe, sure, and that he takes his coffee black. You've memorized the intro of his morning broadcast, and learned the feeling of his chin propped on your shoulder.

There are pieces of Alastor you know like the back of your hand, but somehow you've never even scratched the surface of deciphering him. He was just like that, you suppose—an enigma wrapped in another mystery that would take a lifetime to unravel.

The only thing he liked more than his secrets was keeping them, after all.

And he especially enjoyed toying with you—dangling little tidbits of trivia about him in front of your face and snatching it away when you inevitably took the bait. He'd laugh about it, too, saying you were so adorable for trying.

For some time you had hypothesized that his ears were a good way of gauging his real thoughts about matters, but he was irritatingly good at controlling those as well. Not even the slightest twitch to give away his inner monologue.

"You are so annoying, you know that?" You once told him while brushing your teeth, words coming out muffled from your toothbrush. Minty foam gathered at your mouth while you glared at him through the reflection in the mirror.

He only laughed, as he always did, and propped his chin on your shoulder.

"How rude!" He chastised you playfully.

You leaned down to rinse your mouth. "I'm just saying," you muttered after standing tall again, "I wish I knew what was going through that head of yours sometimes."

Unsurprisingly, Alastor's expression was unreadable.

He opted to bite your cheek and walk away from the conversation after that, not bothering to enlighten you even slightly.

You watched him from across the bathroom, eyeing the way his shadow danced around him with a mind of its own before it disappeared into the darkness.

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His downfall began with a comment you made after you ended up falling asleep with your head on his shoulder.

He had been reading the latest article about the Vees to you out loud, practically singing his amusement with how terrible this column had painted out Vox to be. With fame came criticism, of course, and Alastor would happily sit there and criticize Vox all day if he could.

Your head hit his shoulder quick and he sighed, ears perking at the familiar sound of your slowing breaths. (He didn't bother waking you. It's not like he had much else to do at the time.)

"Your voice is so soothing," you shrugged when you finally awoke. "The static is like... comforting white noise for me, or something."

'Or something?' he wanted to ask.

He didn't, because he didn't really care for an explanation further than that. (He definitely didn't avoid prying because he felt something warm in his chest knowing you thought that way about him.)

It kept happening after that, as much as he wishes it didn't.

Little comments you slid into conversation so casually—tiny compliments and teases that drove him up the wall. They were softening him up, flattering him in dangerous ways.

The demon felt his sanity wearing thin with each passing day, making tremendous efforts to hide the way your slips made him warm.

He's sure he is about to crack. At any moment, his ears will flick or his cheeks will cherub with genuine joy because you can't keep your words to yourself. But he's done well for himself thus far, pat on the back, for not gratifying you.

He mentally groans when you join him at the bar, eyeing his drink. "It's the middle of the day," you point out.

"And you've come to scold me?" He tuts.

"I've come to join you, actually."

Alastor chuckles, voice missing it's usual static filter. He reaches over to pour you a glass when you smile at him.

"You have a nice laugh."

He nearly shatters the glass in his hands.

You snicker quietly, leaning over the bar to creep under his face which is scrunched up in concentration.

"What's wrong? I like your laugh, you should do it more!"

Taking a deep breath, the Radio Demon reaches over to pinch your nose. You yelp and jerk away from him, glaring.

"Flattery will get you nowhere~" he sings.

Your head tilts to the side in confusion. There's a smugness to your gaze that makes him feel like a trapped animal, and he realizes that you've known all along what you've done to him.

"Oh, but I think it does," you laugh, nodding to his shadow burned into the floor.

Its smile is uncharacteristically soft, missing all semblance of its usual fangs and sharp edges. Howling in embarrassment, the shadow dives away, abandoning its owner to confront you alone.

All this time, his shadow had been the one betraying him. Through all the times he had forced his ears to stay rigid, with all the effort to maintain his mask of indifference, you'd seen where he had overlooked.

His jaw clenches so hard he can feel his teeth grinding into each other. "You are perceptive, my dear."

"No," you giggle. "You're just bad at hiding how you feel. I think it's cute."

Alastor glowers at you, but his ears flop back and forth atop his head at your praise anyway.

~

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[yanderenightmare]

TW: yandere, noncon, size/strength difference

gn reader

Thinking about breaking things off with your fuck friend 'cause you feel he's been catching feelings you have no intention of pitching...

“Why.” He asked, and the cross you’d made on your fingers in a wish to avoid the entire conversation untangled with a sigh.

“Please, don’t act dumb.” You groaned, exasperated and slightly irked. “You know why….” 

“No. Tell me.” He argued, and you sighed again in regret of your own common decency – wishing you’d taken the entire break-off over text instead, or at the very least taken the time to think about what you would say or do if and when he got this way. 

“You...”

You hesitated, taking a second to decide whether or not you really ought to voice it out loud – not because you had any doubts of it being true – but because the man in front of you was still very much a large brawny beefcake with temper issues no matter your sneaking suspicion that he saw you as something more than just a fuck friend.

“You’re getting too...” You continued, still scrambling for better words. Coming up short. “Clingy.”

He paused, his expression going from searching to a mix of offended and scrutinous.

“Clingy?” He repeated, forced disbelief a present factor in his tone. “If I remember correctly, you’re the one who clings to me- screaming my name- begging me to cum inside you and-”

You cut his rant off with yet another sigh accompanied by a shake of your head. “That’s not what I mean by clingy. I’m sorry, I should have said emotional, and your comment just proved that.”

You folded your arms across your chest, watching him reel.

“Anyway, it doesn’t really matter. We’re done.” 

You left him on the sofa to go put your shoes back on – admonishing yourself for coming inside in the first place when you could have just as quickly done this on the doorstep and walked away.

“You're not going anywhere until we talk this through.” He followed, his stronger hand latching onto your upper arm in a grip that was unnecessarily harsh.

You didn’t really mind, though – it was his lack of charm that had charmed you to begin with – you only wished he’d remained that same savage he was and not gone all lovey-dovey soft on you.

“There's nothing to discuss.” You felt as though you were repeating yourself, getting more annoyed by the fact. “It was fun; now it isn't.” You underlined, looking back into his eyes, cringing when seeing the gloss of something that you really hoped wouldn’t amount to tears while you were still there.

“I'm gonna need more than that.” He said, the grip on your arm still kept firm with no inclination of letting up.

You didn’t really want things to get more awkward by asking him to let you go – feeling as though maintaining the position of strength was important so he not mistake your resolution.

He had a nasty habit of never taking you seriously.

“You’re being childish.” You stated.

“Childish?!”

His grip tightened with his outburst, and you’d be lying if you said it didn’t have your heart jump to your throat.

"Let go of me." Your voice had significantly diminished.

"You think you can tease me like this and then tell me to piss off?” He seethed, your arm aching in the bruising grip he had on it as he pulled you close until your face was an inch from his. “Think again."

Your breath thinned under his glare, and you felt nearly too stiff to do anything except stare back up at him in wait.

“Calm down.” You tried, but it seemed choice words were too little too late to save you.

“I am calm.” He hissed back into your face before pulling you back to the sofa.

Throwing you down on your back – you didn’t even have the time to gasp before he was on top of you.

“Get off me-” You whined, your hands shooting forth – trying with all your might to heave him off, but ultimately amounting to nothing more than a slight annoyance to the much larger man on top.

“It's all about sex with you, right? You want to have fun, right?” He said in a craze, and you cringed while he leaned down to graze your chest with chin-stubble and lips, whispering at your peachfuzz until goosebumps rose. “So let's have some fun.”

“Stop it – I said I don't want to anymore – I’m being serious.” You tried, once again – appealing to his reason.

But it would seem he was beyond reason…

“Oh? You're being serious?” He mocked with a sneer and a laugh. “You don't look it. If you want me to stop so badly, then stop me. Come on~ try a little harder. Show me how serious you are.”

You’re not sure why you took him up on the challenge, as you’d long known of your differences in build – how you posed as much of a threat as a bug in a mason jar...

But even a bug will try to escape still after the lid has been sealed.

“Come on~ you're not even trying~” He grossly crooned, smiling at your pitiful attempt at twisting him off with the useless help of your silly hands – how your much smaller body writhed beneath his weight and tried wriggling free.

Laughing dryly, he took your hands by the wrists and pinned them to the cushion beneath you. Sagging over you, his breath fanned your lips.

“What was I to you, huh?” He asked in a murmur, his face blank but his eyes swirling. “Just a toy?”

You were afraid to breathe, only keeping your gaze terror-wide of what he might do – still grasping to fathom how he’d even felt possessed enough to do this much – confused as to how you’d missed the signs while having not a single clue what more he was capable of.

“Guess now you're my toy, huh...” He muttered coldly.

And you just couldn’t help the whimper that it tore from you – finally understanding exactly what position you were in.

The disorienting knowing of what was soon to happen dawned on you mercilessly – and you completely broke under the hefty weight it had. 

“Oh? You’ gonna cry now?” He scoffed before hissing. “That's cute, seeing as I’m the one who’s had his heart stepped on.”

“S-stop it, get off me-” You cried, whole body shaking where you squirmed to no use nor end.

“Not so cold-hearted now, are yah, fuckin' bitch?” Was all he had to say while leaning into where thick streams of tears rapidly ran down your cheeks in stingy streaks. “You scared?” He whispered in licks at your ear. “Gonna start begging, hm?”

You only shook – eyes squeezed tightly to a close.

“Nah…” His tone scraped, similar to how the shaven stubble on his chin scratched lightly against your neck as he started placing small kisses there despite your whines. “'Cause you want this too. I know you do.” He insisted. “You're just scared I'll break your little heart at some point.”

You’re breath hitched as his hands parted with its twin – leaving it to keep your wrists pinned by itself as the other one traveled down between your bodies to undo your zipper.

You wanted to say something, but you were too scared to – listening to him and his lovesick speech – full of so many things you feared could trigger much sicker things.

“But I promise you that no one’s heart is gonna break here.” He vowed, still with his lips pressed wetly against your throat. “Not yours or mine.”

BNHA – Bakugou, Shinso, Kirishima

JJK – Sukuna, Gojo

HQ – Kageyama, Kuro, Oikawa, Sakusa, Miya twins

BLLK – Reo, Isagi

AOT – Eren