#Managing Wagers

[priceperplayer]

Wager Listing Report

The Wager Listing report that gives bookies the ability to verify wagers and bets made by players. Reports on the wagers made by players is an essential part on becoming a bookie as it allows bookies to properly manage their players. In addition, it also gives agents real-time data on how the type of wager each player likes to make and how and what to expect from them. In the sports betting…

[vickozone]

what if the fear of darkness gave way to the fear of color? would you live in black and white or rest your eyes through the day?

[spacetimeaccordionfolder]

I love the ominous piano entrance Kayne has in 52 so much. Just quiet piano in the background and Arthur and John immediately know who's nearby. I want that again So Bad. We hear piano music and get to pause to listen to figure out which song it is and what does that mean. We meet Kayne with Faroe's Lullaby, which made sense with Arthur - it's a song he wrote for Faroe. It was a lure. But also... we meet Kayne with a lullaby. and in his most recent entrance in 52 we get him playing The Wager. And learn about his new wager- not waking Azathoth, no no no. He's going to kill him in his sleep! And change reality for the better! That or destroy it. It's quite the Wager.

And here's another fun thought! The Manager piano entrance? Or maybe another instrument. Flute? Or just more sudden radio. Hey you know how we all thought that the "you call it madness" in seasons 1 and 2 was the King in Yellow doing stuff? Does Kayne think that? Because I'm now thinking of a moment in which John, Arthur, Kayne, and sure lets throw Yellow and Larson in the mix as well, are all in the same area and "You Call It Madness" starts playing and Kayne's just like "Okay John. Yellow. Whichever one of you started the music, turn it off I was in the middle of a sentence that's just rude."

[phoenixwithapencil]

ok ok so- in finally at least watching the ep gladio cutscenes I finally got the damn plot (and I have my thoughts and opinions about that, but that's for a different post)... I want to focus though on the fact that Gladio's ultimate triumph is that he's no longer afraid of if or not he will be able to succeed as noct's shield. And then Gilgamesh says this: "Now, hasten forth— with mind unclouded by doubt and will unmoved by fear. The Last King of Lucis is ill fit to fight without his Shield."

Gladio really doesn't react to this line despite the fact that he totally absolutely should. Because the verbiage is not just 'king' nor even 'chosen king', but 'last king'

Gilgamesh knows something about the future and Noct's fate- that Noctis is going to die. Okay, sure. it's not necessarily that he'll die. there's wiggle room in there. But at the same time, Gilgamesh is all but a demigod, who's using 'last king' the same way everyone else in on the prophecy shenanigans use 'chosen king'. it's doubtful Gladio would take that as a sign that Noct and Luna are fated to dismantle the monarchy. He'd take it as 'noct is fated to die.'

Gladio doesn't get the context of a vision the way Ignis will during his dlc. He doesn't get to know how the man he swore to protect will die.

Gladio's job is to make sure Noct Does Not Die and Gilgamesh is looking him in the eye and saying 'glad you got over your fear that you will fail... but for the record, you will never be good enough. you are destined to fail.'

And then gladio doesn't react at all to gilgamesh's words or the massive implications. because im convinced that the writers room hated this man personally.

[betpredictiontoday]

Betting Tips: Expert Advice For Winning Wagers

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[starfieldcanvas]

this is real. the theory is called "roko's basilisk" if you want to google it and be astonished at how stupid it is

Rory Blank @BoneJail

People losing their jobs to ai is awful but I don’t think enough attention is being paid to the fact that some of the core proponents of it literally believe that one day a neopet will be so powerful it will be god and they need to build it or they’ll be sent to computer hell

Rory Blank @BoneJail

Every time you read something about what Elon is doing, or read something about Peter Thiel and the "dark enlightenment" or whatever, it's important to remember that at the core, the people at the top are afraid that they're going to be tortured by a bonzi buddy for all eternity

[bisexualblckcanary]

Work friends gave me multiple ideas to stealthily write at work, and I've settled on "keep a little legal pad at my desk and take notes as ideas hit me" only I started off with 2 storylines at once so now those are color-coded and I just added a third color for an entirely separate story with an entirely separate set of characters.

[missstaypuft]

Probably a hiatus?

For the last month and a half, I haven't been very well at all due to a number of reasons. I've not managed to sit down with my laptop and write for a long while. So I'm taking it easy on myself and not worrying about writing and updating TMW until I've figured out why I'm so ill all the time and I have the energy again. Not worrying about my story and posting has been very beneficial for my mental health, so I'm hoping when I do return, I'll be in a much better place to as well. Love you all and thank you for being so supportive about my story, I'll make sure to have a few chapters ready to post when I return. For now, feel free to reach out! I'm always happy to talk to everyone ❤️

[obeymeluv]

Being Clever with the Fae (Malleus x Reader, Lilia x Reader, Sebek x Reader)

Pre-established relationship implied. You tell the Diasomnia boys that your world planned for ways to outsmart faes. You pull your trick but you're not sure who won.

Warning: Pepaw Bat's gets a little spicy so be careful.

I'm taking liberties with Sebek's part because he's a neutral for me and I don't know that much about him.

You and Malleus had talked about fae folklore more than once. He was delighted to know fae had something of a presence in your world but was wildly horrified at the misinformation. Out of everything you told him, only a handful were correct:

Don't give your name unless you trust that fae because names have power

Iron will hurt some fae but not all. Iron is more harmful to nocturnal fae than day fae.

Being rude to fae may be the end of you altogether

Partaking in fae food means you open yourself up for a wager

Yes, fae like to play tricks. Expect them and be wary.

Stepping into a fairy circle will summon the fairy who made it.

Just about everything else was wrong. That's why he and Lilia were teaching you what not to do if you came upon the various fae in Twisted Wonderland. Thus far you'd only managed to memorize what herbs kept smaller creatures at bay and how to curry the favor of the various faeries that helped out at NRC. Your current assignment from Lilia was filling out a map of different fae territories and classifying them as 'safe' for humans or 'unsafe'. Each territory had a tree they would love to craft from or loathed to be near and you were expected to know that, too.

Strange stuff but apparently it was important.

They liked to break up the bigger chunks of information with smaller, digestible things like etiquette so it felt more manageable. Malleus was currently instructing you on how to part from a fae in a formal setting as to not incur their wrath.

"Again, Child of Man," he's bowed down until eye level with you, one hand holding yours.

"Light shake, eye contact, nod, slide foot back, squeeze the hand, turn." he's parroting your motions until you turn away. He, instead, draws himself to his full height and observes as you pretend to walk away.

"Excellent," he nods. "But ensure you don't slouch while leaving. It will make some feel as if you don't hold them in high regard."

"That's so--" you roll your eyes. He simply lifts his brow as if to question your mild frustration. You puff your cheeks out and he laughs.

"We can be a bit particular." he agrees.

"To a fault." you smirk.

"Oh?" he's intrigued, eyes twinkling.

"Yeah," you smile. "In my world the fae were known for being literal with their word so you always had to keep something clever in reserve."

"Do tell," Malleus' grin goes from practiced and polite to genuine. A hint of fang shows.

"It's kind of specific though. Depends on that old joke about fae wanting to come for the first born."

"That's not really a joke," Malleus crossed his arms. You can't tell if he's offended or not. "We like the younglings. We're always looking to bring more around to the fae ways. In fact, fae make fantastic guardians because--"

He had a lot to say and you felt the beginnings of a lecture creep up. In some way you felt like you were in trouble. To save yourself, you said, "Just pretend. Then I can show you what we do."

Malleus pretended to make a deal with you. It looked a bit intimidating and official with the magic pulsing in the rickety floorboards of Ramshackle. They were groaning. Shadows danced along his face as pieces of his signature thorned briar wove around your joined hands. "In exchange for the repairs around Ramshackle, you will give your firstborn to me."

You pull him in, his green eyes searching curiously for any hint of what's to come. "Sure! How soon do you want to start working on that? Or do you want to wait a little while?"

All at once the floorboards fell quite. The hum of magic died with a rattle that broke the briar into tiny pieces. A few fell at your feet, the others shooting off into various directions.

Oh. Did he not understand? You thought it was clever! Maybe he was too sheltered to--

His laugh is kind of a snort at first but then you hear it honest and lilting. The hand holding yours slides up your arm and snakes around your waist. You're lifted until your hands find purchase on his shoulders and your legs wrap around whatever they reach. Your heart goes from your chest to your throat when his gloved hands slide down to your thighs as he walks you to your sad couch.

"Now is fine," he's careful to hold his weight above you, silky hair spilling around you and tickling your cheeks. His eyes are bright and boyish, a deadly compliment to his kissable lips.

Well, that technically backfired but if this were a real situation you'd make out just fine because he'd chosen to make out with you instead of curse you.

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

Lilia wanted to focus on physical protection as much as written knowledge when it came to handling fae. You still couldn't wrap your head around the idea of him being a general but he had old photos, a weird mask, and a massive magearm to prove it. You'd picked up quite a few self-defense moves and practiced them regularly. He wanted them to be second nature to you. So here you are, in a designated training room within Diasomnia.

"You just want to cuddle me," you teased, in the familiar position of him being behind you with an arm around your neck. One elbow was planted in your shoulder, the other clasping it at the forearm to make a little prison for you. He gave a reprimanding squeeze, ever mindful of the pressure since you were fully human. Lilia gave a huffy laugh, trying to relax his smile into something more stern as he wove his fingers into your hair. You flinched at the tug and slapped his arm lightly.

"Focus," he couldn't deny himself the simple pleasure of whispering into your ear. If you asked him, it was to throw you off balance and distract you. "What could you do now?"

You thought about just leaning back into him, pressing against him, but you knew that wasn't what he meant. Capitalizing on this moment of closeness, the stillness, to huck him over your shoulder and into the floor crossed your mind but then you'd have to give him a back rub later.

Not that you minded that, either.

"We could make a deal," you leaned back to whisper in his ear even though it hurt your neck a little. You could tell by the way his bangs fluttered that he'd jerked in surprise. Was that a little pink on his cheeks? Before you could nip his pointed ear, Lilia leaned you forward and took his elbow off your shoulder, opting to hold you in a bearhug instead.

"Acceptable in this situation," he managed, clearing his throat when his voice cracked a little. "Although this exercise is supposed to be combat related."

"So make the terms. I can't negotiate a deal that doesn't exist." you try to break his hold, shimmying your shoulders and sliding your feet to see if you could slip away. He lifts you off the ground with an ease that doesn't seem possible with his short, lithe body. You hang there against him as he thinks.

"Your life for that of your firstborn."

A bit dark, wasn't it? Kind of rude, really, you thought. But, your train of thought continued to ramble, he did find Silver somewhere so it didn't seem too unusual that he'd want a kid. Either that, or he was messing with you because you told him that whisking away kids was something fae were known for in your world.

"You can't have a firstborn with your clothes on." you joke.

"That's not true because I found Silver with my--" Lilia drops you when he realizes what you've said. You weren't expecting him to drop you and didn't catch yourself, hissing as you land on your knees. Before you can start complaining or poke fun at him for being an old man he's locked the door. You're bowled over as he rushes over to you, pinning you on your back as he peppers kisses along your throat and collarbone.

He's several bites in and you’re halfway undressed when you think you hear a knock at the door. Lilia begrudgingly peels himself off of you, licking blood from the corner of his lips.

"Father? Are we not going to train today?"

"M'fraid not, my boy," Lilia turns his attention back to you, opening your legs to slip between them. "But you'll be getting a new sparring partner in about nine months."

His red eyes are glowing. They're absolutely beguiling.

"Do they come with therapy?” he hears Silver mumble as you look up at him through your lashes.

He pounces on you again. It was a brilliant, filthy tactic. He's not exactly mad about it. You've earned favor with one fae, at least, and he will protect you from the others.

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

Sebek is a hard worker. He's a product of his environment; he has Baur's straightforwardness, Lilia's dedicated regimens, and his mother's impressive teeth and jaw strength. Lilia thought the best way for you to learn some of the self-defense tactics was to fight someone your size.

Sort of. Sebek seemed to be the better choice since Silver was too sleepy to be a constant threat. And, in Lilia's mind, you should have an easier time fighting a half-fae versus a full fae.

You never noticed how muscular Sebek was until you were under him. He's got corded arms and you can see the muscles of his shoulders flexing under the Diasomnia shirt he chose for the exercise.

You've never seen him in casual clothes! He actually looks very nice. Not as buff as Jack but sturdy in his own way; his chest is broader than you imagined. A solid man.

More than capable of being Malleus' body guard.

You groan as he knocks the air out of you a little. He's on top of you, pressed into your back. He's got one foot braced against the floor, leaning his weight into you. Your arms are pinned at your side courtesy of the one he's snaked underneath you.

When did he flip you over? Asshole, you scrunch your nose in frustration as your cheeks begin to burn. He's an asshole that means well and won't go easy on you, though. He makes sure you learn. You try to inch out from beneath him but he angles his shoulder down and grabs his own wrist, dragging you back to him.

"You're supposed to do something in this situation!" he grumps, "You know how to break this hold!"

You do, but he's heavy and it probably wouldn't work. And he's had a literal lifetime of training versus your handful of months. You've tangled your legs together and used his half-lean to put him on his back. Your kicking like a tipped-over bug and almost free when you remember that his fae half is crocodilian and you might have triggered his death roll tendency.

Out of the corner of your eye you see Sebek's pupils change, the dark of his eye slitting and boring into you. His throat strains like he's growling but you don't hear anything. It trembles against the back of your neck and you're reminded in that moment of just how much bigger he is than you.

How he folds around you and encompasses you.

He opens his mouth, teeth glinting and sharp. "You've bested me," you admit, swallowing thickly as his teeth hover near your shoulder. "Make your deal."

You somehow turn yourself around in his unrelenting squeeze.

Sebek huffs as if he's insulted and you swear you see his teeth dull. His pupils begin to fill out. He's usually loathe to acknowledge his human side, as he'd much rather be full fae, but it serves him in this instance. "I'm not a true fae. Such a thing wouldn't work on me!"

"You have to pretend! Lilia's teaching me how to deal with the fae! You just won't hurt me as much. Maybe." you dare to flash that teasing grin at him and Sebek nearly tears into his own lip because he doesn't know what to do with that wiggly feeling you give him.

Him? Hurt you? Not on purpose. It would go against the core values his grandfather AND Lilia taught him! Any fae caught abusing their spouse would be drawn and quartered, made a public display of. Any human man who chose to do so was no man at all!

Sebek's face feels almost painfully warm. He can feel the heat spreading from his cheeks to his ears. "In an act of benevolence inspired by the great Prince Malleus, I shall spare your delicate human self in exchange for a child. Is that the cliche rubbish you desire?"

Some of his once slicked-back hair has fallen down on his forehead, between his eyes, as if it's disappointed in you too.

"You think our child would be cliche rubbish? Cliche Rubbish Zigvolt? That does NOT sound good! I'm naming the firstborn, you're just helping make it."

"Wha--but I--that's not!" Sebek doesn't know what to say and he hasn't been trained for this. He's careful not to shove you away but untangles himself like a thrown ragdoll. He rolls over sharply, totally fine with hiding his face in the floor. His green hair is in disarray and his arms are limp, stretched out to either side of him.

You laugh, climbing onto his back and raking your nails down it gently. He makes the noise. You're not sure what it is but you've heard it before. It's deep and somehow soothing. He relaxes underneath you as you continue to scratch his back, throwing in a squeeze to his muscles every now and then.

It's not until you're in what would be the small of his back (if he wasn't build so solid and thick) that he raises his head, folds his arms up, and rests his chin on his hands. "You're safe." he can't bear to turn his head and look at you right now. If he did, you'd see how...how...weak and mushy he looked. Sebek snorts through his nose, arching his back in surprise as your hands slide all the way up until you flop on his back and your arms hang off his shoulders.

"Thank you, o' kind Zigvolt!" you hug his neck. "This delicate human appreciates it!"

"And I...appreciate...you." he mumbled slowly, the words a little foreign to him. More scary than foreign, honestly. That heartwarming shyness evaporated in an instant when he pinned you and began a stern lecture about how you should NOT offer to conceive a child with ANY OTHER FAE and what YOU SHOULD HAVE DONE INSTEAD.

You weren't surprised by this. Sebek lectured Silver all the time and Lilia said he was a very informed pupil. You, too, would be informed as it didn't seem like he was letting you go anytime soon.

[alientitty]

also it's just "brave new world"...

😐

[soapcloth]

CW: soap x reader, brief mentions of past bullying, religious soap, pushy soap - dividers @/cafekitsune

The mortifying case of Soap having been one of your childhood bullies.

You spot him for the first time in years when he tugs open the door to the corner store just down the street from your parent's house—blissfully unaware of your presence as you duck away behind an aisle in hopes he won't spot you.

Despite being years older, its impossible not to recognize his face.

Last time you checked he had fucked off into the military. Why was he back in town at the same time you were? He never had been before.

Grabbing the last thing your mom needed, you wait until he's preoccupied at the fridge to sneak over to the till, ignoring the odd look from the cashier—of course John's grabbing the same old drink he used to make you steal for him. You can still remember the taunting bark of his laughter when you would sniffle and sob after delivering the beverage, absolutely sure you were going to spend the night in a jail cell if they caught you.

Bastard.

Placing the change on the counter you nod and hastily take your leave, about ready to cry tears of joy once you've made it out the shop door.

It's hard to believe he still has that much of a grip on your psyche all these years later.

Heavy breath billows from your lips as you take the crumbling road back to your parent's place, plastic bag smacking against your hip with each step—always the errand runner around here.

Even if the entire world shifted on its axis, you'd still wager that this town would manage to stay as is.

Three more days until you could go home—your real home; the spot on earth you had carved out for yourself, miles away from this unfathomably deep pit. Your scratchy childhood sheets give you a new found sense of appreciation for the set you had bought for yourself shortly after moving out; soft and well-loved atop your real bed, awaiting your return.

A large hand clamps down on your shoulder.

"Christ! Almost missed ye!" John coughs out, panting from his mad dash to catch up to you.

"Me?" you sputter out, spinning towards the towering man as you calm your racing heart.

The new angle gives you a clear look at the angry scar healing on the side of his head.

He beams, pupils a little out of sorts as he drags you in under a thick bicep. His scent is distinctly more man than you recall and his arms remind you of the sturdy branches belonging to a tree; limbs bigger than the ones you remember reaching for you when he used to chase you around the woods—you had thought them impossibly large then... what were they feeding him in the military?

"O'course! Who else but ye? That f'yer Mum?" he asks, grabbing your bag and taking a brief, distracted peek.

You don't get a chance to reply as switches his attention, nudging his nose into the top of your head to practically inhale your hair. he rumbles happily. "Thought I'd ne'er see ye' again."

you forcefully dig your heels into the gravel and wiggle out of his grip.

"Why would you want to see me? Don't you hate me?" you spit, frowning as you snatch your bag back.

You watch confusion eat away at him for a second before his thin lips press into a frown that mirrors your own, dark lashes trembling a bit as he glares a hole through you.

"Hate ye? Ye think ah hate ye?"

You weren't going to do this—not with the boy that had gleefully isolated you from everyone in your age range during the most important social years of your early life.

"Yer daft!" he suddenly laughs, slipping back into his jovial grin. "-Gave me a fright there for a second!" he pulls you back into him with embarrassing ease and begins to walk again, knuckles grinding into your head before he grabs the bag from you, a satisfied chuckle leaving his lips. "Cannae believe ye thought ah hated ye—Had the biggest crush oan ye,"

No.

"-Thought ah was makin' it obvious!"

No—not this.

"Ah was a jealous wee git, detested ye hangin' out with yer pals. Likely made a right fool o'maself." he rubs at your arm with his large, bear-like palm and sighs contentedly. "No matter, Ah'm no a teenager anymore. How long ye in town for?"

you tug your gaze away from the tight-fitting grey hoodie straining pathetically over his muscles, letting it land on your shoes. he notices your reluctance and laughs, giving you a squeeze

"-God gave me a second chance, ahm no lettin' ye slip away—Full steam oan till we’re wed this time, alright?"

[ddejavvu]

more best friend james with no boundaries headcanons please 🙏🏽🙏🏽🙏🏽 like sirius and remus definitely side eye the two of you but they don’t ever make it noticeable 🫢 they’re just waiting for the two of you to finally get together 😵‍💫 like james definitely rests his hands in between your thighs when he’s cold and remus is always muttering to sirius how that is definitely not best friend behaviour

Sirius and Remus stop in tandem, beat up shoes stomping to a halt in the middle of the floor. It would be comical if their gazes weren't so scrutinizing and judgmental towards you where you're curled up in James's bed.

"Are we interrupting something?" Remus raises a brow at you where you lay pressed to James's chest, his hands wrapped around your waist and tucked into the space between your thighs. He'd been griping about the chill of the air against his hands after realizing they wouldn't stay tucked into the sleeves of his sweater, so when he'd pried your thighs apart to slip his hands between them, you'd let him get his fill of your body heat.

"Jus' the most boring book I've ever read," James drawls, popping his head lazily off of the pillow to stare at his friends, "Don't even know why she reads this shit, anyways."

"I read it because I like it," You hum, used to James's disdain of your more 'boring' (read: not dangerous, reckless, or foolish) hobbies, "But I'm more curious as to why you read it over my shoulder, James, if it's so boring and awful."

"Not much choice," He reasons, but you both know he could shut his eyes if he wanted to be free from your novel, and you squeeze your thighs together in hopes of pressing his hands painfully together as a reprimand.

James makes a sort of stunted groan as his knuckles scrape painfully together, but when you release your grip, he doesn't pull away. He merely settles his head back against the pillow, eyes sneakily roving over the page you're reading.

"Remus, a word." Sirius grabs the man by his right scarred hand, tugging him towards the closet. They disappear inside together, and when the door shuts behind them, and Sirius manages to swat the sleeve of his leather jacket out of his face, he stares at Remus with wide, urgent eyes.

"Did you see that?" Sirius gawps, as if maybe Remus hadn't noticed James's hands resting inches from your core, "That is not normal friend behavior?"

"I bet two galleons they kiss within the month," Remus wagers with a smirk on his face, and the expression is contagious where it transfers to Sirius right away.

"Within the week," Sirius solidifies his stance, holding a hand out for Remus to shake, "You've got a deal, Moony."

--

The moment the closet door shuts behind Remus and Sirius, you crane your neck to look backwards at James.

"They're not even trying to hide it anymore," You breathe, keeping your voice low so that the two boys can't hear you, "What do you think they're doing in there?"

"Kissing, probably," James snorts, "Pulling someone into a closet by the hand is not normal friend behavior."

"When are they just gonna give it up?" You scoff, twisting back around to resume reading, "They're so obvious."

"Dunno, love." James hums, leaning forwards to press a kiss to your shoulder where your tank top has slid off of the skin there. He readjusts his hands between your thighs, nestling them imperceptibly closer to your heated core, "Some people are just oblivious."

[riricatria]

Hi, hi~

I got some comments on the last post about if I'm going to write a profile for Phainon. You better believe that I will, I'm just as big of a hoe for the blond-blue-eyes six-feet-tall-and-super-strong fuckery he has got going on as the next person, but his stupid ass isn't oUT YET RAAAHHHH. Judging from the leaks, the patch in which he's released will drop a considerable lore bomb, so we'll have to wait and suffer together until then ( ;´ n `;)

In the meantime, though, I'm going to write other profiles. Stay tuned for *drum roll*... ☀️☀️☀️ (◕‿↼)

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

CONTENT WARNINGS INCLUDE: Dark content (dead dove), cisfem!Reader, drugging (and needles along with that), the general stuff that comes with yandere content (obsessiveness, possessiveness, imprisonment, stalking...), one slap on the face, a gun is involved, gambling, threats of violence (both towards reader and their family), forced non-schmexual touching, vomit mention, NONCON, coercion, rope, fingering, oral in both directions, booty stuff, toys, overstim, brief edging, the boss form, some exhibitionism, this is 𝒻𝓇𝑒𝒶𝓀𝓎 𝒶𝓈 𝒻𝓊𝒸𝓀.

Disclaimers can be found in my pinned post. The template is heavily inspired by @/cinnamonest!

S-FW

˗ˏˋ ★ 1. General look: How are they like? How do they behave around the darling? Are there any warning signs?

The Gambler. Stay away from the gambler, they all say.

Aventurine of the Ten Stonehearts is a figure you have only heard and read about. He's something akin to a manager, you've conceived. You know of his existence and have a vague understanding of what he does, yes, but that’s where it ends. There's not that much information about him online aside from a few rumours and some fans' musings. Judging from the pictures of him on the news and whatnot, he seems like a flashy yet charming person.

However, all of the people around you, literally every single one of them, are telling you not to pursue any further information about him if your own mental well-being holds any value to you. He’s a dangerous individual — the amount of power his people hold over the entire cosmos is copious.

And, more importantly, he’s an insufferable guy — or so you've been told. One of your friends has seen him face-to-face. They scoff and tell you that the man is just like everybody that has actually been in the same room as him says he is: cocky, cunning and downright malicious. He never lets his smile fall, he never shows anything but the particularly irksome kind of confidence that people who have never been humbled tend to have. Although, to his credit, nobody seems to have been able to knock him down a peg. He's an anomaly that spends his free days travelling and indulging in the art of wagering. He has taken a particular liking to the planet you're currently on, Penacony, for that very reason.

Well, everyone but one single person has told you to stay away from him. Everyone except one of your friends who happens to have caught a tiny little crush on the guy. They're showing you pictures of him, articles, gushing about how mysterious and suave he is. The opinion is contradicting everything you have heard about him so far. Of course, your friend holds no chance of actually getting with him, they know it very well themselves, but it's harmless fun to just imagine, right? You entertain their thoughts, and in the end, the chat does manage to pique your interest a bit.

You shouldn't pry further. Even your own gut is screaming at you not to. Oh, but you just have to see him for yourself. You need to witness him with your own eyes, you need to understand what all the fuss is about. Under the watchful eye of the Family, what’s the worst thing that could happen? And besides, you’re not planning on making a scene anyway — just taking a glimpse at him is enough for you. It would be a miracle if his eyes even managed to land on you out of all the people surrounding him. You’re not worried.

It doesn’t matter if you’re a citizen or just a passing tourist; you could be a member of the Astral Express, an employee at the Reverie Hotel, it’s all the same. There’s a single reason why anybody would decide to visit a planet like Penacony, and that reason is the Dreamscape. It’s all about having fun, it’s witnessing sights beyond anyone’s imagination and experiencing things that you normally couldn’t in the waking world. Surely you have enough things to keep yourself busy with without deliberately engaging yourself with difficult people. But after having heard that the man is around, an opportunity to conduct some research has presented itself. It would be a shame to miss it.

And so, you dip your feet into the pleasantly warm bubbles of the seashell-shaped bath. The liquid is faintly fragrant, a dreamy shade of lavender in colour, and the moment it touches your skin, you feel how all of the accumulated strain is released from your muscles. The room is locked, there’s nobody but you around, and you feel safe enough to settle into the Dreampool and close your eyes.

You’ve been told that there is one single location in all of Penacony where the guy is sure to be found. Taking his infamous nickname into account, it should come as no surprise that that place is a certain casino in the Dreamscape’s Golden Hour, and it’s exactly where you’re headed.

You wander through the bustling streets, crossing the oblique intersections, making your way towards the building with hearts and clubs painted on its high windows. The atmosphere is as lively as ever, the crowds are thick, there are people all around you enjoying what the realm has to offer.

Your heart is strumming in excitement; it feels like you're doing something forbidden — which you kind of are, in a way. Nobody knows where you're at, you didn't dare tell anybody about the adventure you were about to go on. It's supposed to be a surprise for your friend, you're maybe going to snap a few pictures to show them later. That, and the rest of your social circle's opinion on the matter would most likely not be very enthusiastic. Nevertheless, you're your own person: You can do what you want, and if that is wanting to go take a glance at some weird celebrity, that's what you're going to do.

The casino is packed as full as it could possibly be. There are people everywhere, drinking, revelling, and most noticeably, gambling. There’s poker, there’s slot machines, bets, roulette, two men are even playing chess with money on the table, and they have gathered a small audience around them. The atmosphere is surreal, almost: People are yelling, chanting, egging each other on. It’s nearly intoxicating. You have never experienced anything like this before.

However, the reason you’re here is, without a doubt, hidden behind the largest wall of spectators near the back wall. It’s clearly the main attraction of the place.

The multicoloured lights dye the vast room in all the shades of the rainbow. Bass-heavy, upbeat music plays on a volume that's just on the edge of being too loud, and there are men and women alike jumping and dancing all around you. You need to push through rows and rows of people, shoving them aside until you reach the front line of the crowd. There, you’re faced with the sight of a blond, sharply dressed man sitting at a blackjack table, leisurely leaning back in his chair, legs crossed. On his side of the board, there’s a tall tower of chips that’s nearly falling over due to its height.

It's him. Aventurine. You recognize him from all the clips your friend has shown you. The fair hair, the fedora, the extravagant choice in clothing — he's hard to miss. The guy looks nothing but relaxed and sure of himself as he finishes his turn.

His opponent, on the other hand, is sweating bullets. He has a single piece on his side, and as Aventurine proceeds to turn the played cards around, it becomes apparent that even the final chip is about to switch owners. The audience erupts, both in cheers and in anger. You remain quiet, eyes fixated on the man's form.

He carries a strange energy. You’re almost mesmerized. The way he presents himself is so… exaggerated. No, that’s not quite the word. It’s ostentatious. From the hat to the numerous rings adorning his gloved fingers, he practically radiates the aura of someone who could ruin just about anyone’s life within a heartbeat. You don't recall ever being in the presence of somebody with so much sheer charisma that you can feel it seeping into your skin. It fills the entire space. It's intimidating.

He’s looking at you. He’s looking at you.

Your gaze locks with his. As he pulls away from the table, his face pauses mid-expression, leaving behind a strange mix of a smirk and what looks like bewilderment. His eyes, despite being shielded by a pair of tinted sunglasses, pierce into you like daggers. Even through the lenses, you’re able to make out the distinct, peculiar pattern of his irises.

In a split second, he composes himself. The man on the other side of the board is in actual, genuine tears. You only get to witness his outburst for a moment, though, because the casino’s personnel drag him away from his seat, just barely dodging his frantic kicks and punches. His foot hits the table leg as he protests, and the pile of chips on Aventurine’s side topples over and scatters over the cards. The man is spitting out insults, trying to claw at the numerous arms holding him down. You would fear for your own safety if the staff didn't seem to be used to this kind of behaviour.

It's the nature of places like this. People come here and either lose everything they have or leave so rich that they could as well paint a red dot on their forehead. And, the worst part is that it's all agreed upon. You don't belong in a place like this, but you realize the truth of the matter a tiny bit too late.

Aventurine is a showman, through and through. It comes very apparent to you when he turns his attention to the people surrounding him, this time with a courteous smile. You can hardly believe your ears when he opens his mouth.

”Come play with me”, he suggests, pointing a single gloved finger at your chest. He taps the nail against the tabletop, beckoning you closer.

There's a horrible, instinctual feeling boiling up in your stomach. Every single thing about him, every last inch of him, is like a blaring warning sign plastered right in front of your eyes. For perhaps the first time in your life, you experience the true weight of what people mean when they talk about the gut feeling. There is, quite literally, a cold, thick sense of imminent doom deep in your guts. Adrenaline floods into your bloodstream. You're suddenly extremely aware of what's happening in your body.

All the eyes are on you, boring holes through your back, scrutinizing the way your hands twitch, how your jaw clenches. Your vocal cords fail you, and the words that are meant to come out as resolute are reduced to a mere mumble. You try to explain to him that you can’t, that you don’t have any money with you, you don’t understand the least bit about gambling. However, he simply shakes his head and makes a come-hither motion with two of his fingers, saying that ”it’s alright, he’ll pay for you”.

You value your life enough to take the offer without further objections. You pick up the chair that has fallen over amidst all the commotion and set it back on its legs. You take a seat on the other side of the table, sitting across from him. In contrast to your ruler-straight back and clenched fists, the way he picks up one of his chips and fiddles around with it is almost humorous. He spins it between his fingers with an impressive amount of dexterity. Then, after a moment of flaunting his tricks, he slides the item over to your side.

He asks you if you know the rules to blackjack. That you do, at least to the degree of being able to play, and you give him a meek nod. He gives you an acknowledging hum in response. He gathers the cards from under the fallen mount chips and begins shuffling the deck. He doesn’t save his skills in this act either: He twiddles with the cards, twirling them around with little effort, all while wearing a somewhat complacent smirk.

He sets the deck in front of you before asking you to cut it. You do, cautiously picking up a portion of the cards and laying it beside the other half. Judging from the way the corners of his mouth tug up, he’s pleased with your performance. Then, he trails the tip of his finger along the wooden top of the table, all the way to where your singular piece lies. He asks you to place your bet. You comply, pushing the thing forth. You don’t even know how much it’s worth, not saying anything to accompany the action, but despite the bad etiquette, he gives you a pleasant smile.

”All in”, he then states. Mortified, you can only watch silently as he pushes the entire pile of his chips towards you. Some of them fall off the table, rolling onto the floor and in different directions. A few people in the audience discreetly pick them up and slip them into their pockets. You look up at him with a questioning look on your face. However, judging from his expression, it appears that he could not care less about whatever ridiculous amount of money is tied to his haul. He begins dealing the cards.

You should’ve listened to everyone. You should never have even thought about stepping foot into this hellhole, but there's very little you can do about that now. He tells you to play. After a brief moment of contemplation, you open your mouth, speaking the word ”hit” in a quiet, dry tone. He places a card on your side of the table. You ask for another one, and then one more after that.

You need to get as close to 21 without going over the number, right? So, the total of 18 you have currently is a bit of a risky number. You end your round there. You don’t even know why you’re stressing so much; it’s not like you’re actually even playing with your own money — you’re not playing for anything, really. The singular chip can't be worth more than a few hundred credits. Besides, this is basically his other profession; a side hustle. You don't stand even the tiniest chance at winning.

You watch as he lays his cards on the table on his side, expression serene and calculated. He doesn’t look the least bit bothered, obviously, as his fingers glide over the black and gold backs of the cards in accustomed motions. Soon enough, his hand moves to hover above the upside-down one on his side. He taps the tip of his nail on it, prolonging the suspense. Then, with a smirk, he turns it over.

You can’t believe your eyes. He has gone over the limit of 21.

7, 2, 4, 10, it’s 23. You count once, twice, thrice, making sure you're not miscalculating. It's easy addition. You must be seeing things. There's no way. You’re sure that if there is a possibility of dreaming inside the Dreamscape, then this has to be it.

Aventurine spreads his arms and shakes his head in an expression of disappointment, but the gesture couldn’t be further from genuine. His smug face gives it all away; he’s not the least bit dismayed about the result. ”Oh, looks like I’ve lost”, he states in a completely unbothered tone, shrugging before he goes to push the pile of chips towards you. The pieces fall into your lap, in his lap, at your feet, under the table, everywhere. The audience erupts into yells that are just loud enough to drown out the sound of your own hammering heartbeat in your ears.

You leave the casino with heavy bewilderment and an absurd amount of credits that night. You can’t truly fathom a single thing that has happened in the past twenty minutes or so, nor do you really want to. The entire experience is comparable to an acid trip, almost — loud, intense, and completely and utterly incomprehensible.

Every single thing people said about him was true. You had planned out how you were going to tell your friend that you saw him, you had envisioned how excited they were going to be when you showed them the pictures you had taken, but all of a sudden, you don’t feel like ever speaking a word about him in a conversation ever again. Right now, you acknowledge that the correct course of action would be to refrain from visiting the entire Dreamscape for at least a month, if ever again. Your face is going to be recognized. Maybe you're already in the news somewhere. The notion fills you with horror. You can only hope that the insistent feeling of trepidation has left you alone when the morning comes.

But that’s not what is coursing through Aventurine’s mind. The sight of you is burned into his eyes like an afterimage of a bright flash. To say that he’s intrigued would be the understatement of the century. He’s amazed, he’s mesmerized, he’s completely and utterly enthralled by the maiden that happened to wander into the depths of the casino. It’s just his luck, he thinks.

He let you win the round on purpose, of course. There’s no way he could actually lose to some amateur like that. The fortune that has blessed him wouldn’t allow such a thing. It was a split second decision. Losing in front of an audience like that does sting a tiny bit, of course, but this, this is a result far better than any expectations he ever had. His wealth is practically limitless, so a few dozen million credits off his bank account is nothing compared to what he got to witness. He feels euphoric long after, even when he exits the Dreamscape and rises from the pale purple pool. Oh Aeons, he has to find you.

Aventurine doesn’t consider himself to be a person that’s easily affected by emotions and whims. Despite the amiable way he presents himself, he’s very guarded, very mindful about what he shares with others. He seems nonchalant, but inside, all of his alarms are going off at the sheer thought of you. He isn’t used to being bombarded with these kinds of sensations at all. He feels extremely vulnerable all of a sudden, and the feeling isn’t helped by the fact that you’re basically just some passer-by, a meaningless face amongst the crowd. Compared to someone like him, there's nothing that remarkable about you. However, it seems that the universe has decided otherwise.

He has experienced his fair share of fleeting crushes in his life, and he knows how those are: They’re brief, mushy, imaginary scenarios of people that you don’t truly even know, and they dissipate just as quickly as they form. This time around, however, it doesn’t feel like one of those. Whereas he daydreamt about that one person for a couple days a year or so ago, you won’t leave his mind even for a second. The quality of his work is deteriorating. He becomes more aloof, more absorbed in his thoughts. He has trouble concentrating in his own job, and for someone of his rank, anything less than perfection is unsatisfactory. His colleagues are a bit too frightened to comment on it, most likely, but he notices the effects you have on him. You’re indirectly hindering his life.

Truthfully, he’s terrified at the feelings that are growing inside of him. With all he has gone through in his life, personal relationships have always been sort of a taboo to him. His family died, he had to abandon his home, he went to hell and back just to get to where he is now. That, and he’s an especially volatile kind of a person in general. It shouldn’t come as a surprise that what started as brief fascination quickly turns into a full-blown obsession — ”quickly” meaning in a span of a couple of weeks. There’s a part of him that’s telling him to hit the brakes, to stop whatever he’s building up to doing. However, he ends up deciding that, if these emotions truly are a crime against humanity, he will gladly fall even further into depravity; further than he already has, anyway.

When it comes to you and Aventurine crossing paths, you’re under the impression that the casino was the first and last time you ever interacted with each other. That much is actually true, in a way. You see, his story, however, is just a tiny bit different to yours. The IPC has eyes all over the planet, the galaxy, the entire universe. He himself doesn’t need to be the one keeping track of where you are.

He doesn’t stalk you in the classic sense. What he does, however, is find your room number, your phone number, your social media accounts, the names of your family members, your home planet, your friends’ contacts… Nothing is too far out of his reach. Aside from the trivialities (stuff like your social security number), he starts fishing for any and all pieces of information about you that he could possibly want. Your favourite food, what you like to spend your free time doing, your pet’s name, your pet’s favourite food, your shoe size, your pet’s shoe size — nothing is off-limits for him.

There starts to be weird activity in your bank account. Money begins appearing out of nowhere, and the senders are untraceable. The amounts are not that huge, it’s only a few thousand credits at a time, but it’s still very strange. An anonymous account starts following yours. A free meal is delivered to your hotel room. It’s all alarming, and there’s a tiny suspicion in your mind about who the culprit might be. However, even the mere idea is so horrifying that goosebumps rise on your skin. You deliberately turn your back to it.

When it comes to courting, there’s one (1) proper attempt Aventurine makes at trying to woo you, and it’s in the most diabolical way imaginable. It’s a few weeks after the casino incident, and you’re making your way down the streets of Golden Hour yet again. You have managed to get over what happened in your prior visit, promising yourself that you’ll never catch yourself in a spot like that again. After a good few days of feverishly scrolling the news only to find that your face is nowhere in sight, the panic has finally worn off. Instead of engaging in the thrill of gossip, you’re going to spend your stay enjoying the Scape’s delicacies and seeing the wonders of the theme park.

Just as you're about to turn a corner, a couple of hands come up behind you and cover your eyes. ”Guess who”, a male voice whispers in your ear. Huh, you don’t remember any of your friends mentioning that they would be around today, strange. You respond to the person with a sarcastic remark and turn around on your heels, fully expecting it to be an old acquaintance.

Whatever is in your hand drops to the ground. You stare at his lilac and turquoise eyes through the pink shades, your feet frozen on the ground, completely paralysed. It’s a miracle that your stomach doesn’t empty itself on the sidewalk on the spot. Right in front of you, with an uncomfortably slim distance in between, stands none other than Aventurine.

He’s holding two bottles of SoulGlad in his hand. He’s about to open his mouth, but before he can get a single word out, you bolt in the opposite direction as fast as your feet can carry you. It’s easily the most surreal and terrifying experience of your entire life — making the previous scene drop to the second place — and you make the decision, right then and there, that you’re never going to step foot into the Dreamscape ever again. At least not while he’s on the planet, and maybe not even then. Unlike him, Lady Luck must have abandoned you completely. With how your head is spinning and the world is turning, it’s a miracle the encounter didn’t scare you right out of the slumber you're in.

Aventurine, on the other hand, is left standing in the middle of the street with one of his hands still half-extended. Despite what has just occurred, his pleasant expression hasn’t cracked the least bit. This just means that he's forced to take a detour to get what he wants; it’s no big deal, really. He has many aces up his sleeve, after all, and more than half of those are completely out of your control. It's a wicked game you've entangled yourself in.

All in all, there’s not much you can do to change the course of events that is about to follow. You didn’t respond well to his ”advances”, and you clearly won’t let him even approach you, so you leave his hands tied. You have a time frame of a couple of days to leave the whole planet if you’d like to avoid your rapidly approaching fate, but if you don’t manage to do that, it’s game over.

˗ˏˋ ★ 2. Securing: How will they abduct their darling? When, where and how?

He’s nothing if not resourceful. Aventurine, when it comes to just about everything, is used to having his way in, well, one way or another. It’s a selfish way to go about things, he knows, but considering his past, he would say that he deserves as much.

His method of choice in kidnapping you is a bit unconventional, but it works nonetheless. It's his day off, and you haven’t left the hotel yet, he sees, to his delight. It’s a bit foolish of you to assume that the only way he can reach you is via the dream world. There are so many ways he could go about abducting you, there are so many open opportunities, but ultimately, it ends up being a single meal that seals your fate.

You’re having dinner at the hotel restaurant. You have made the decision to leave Penacony — maybe it’s via the Express, maybe it’s on a random spaceship — but you only have a few hours more to spend on the planet. You have decided to indulge yourself a bit, having a nice supper all by yourself while watching people pass by, going on about their day, excited to visit the Dreamscape. You wish you still had that same enthusiasm, but in light of all that has gone down, seeing what the rest of the galaxy has to offer is for the better. You're relieved, actually.

However, not long after you’ve finished your plate, your stomach starts feeling weird. Soon enough, the sensation grows into full-on, unbearable nausea. The meal must have had something wrong with it, is your first thought. Maybe it’s food poisoning, you’re not really sure, but you do start panicking the slightest bit when your vision starts shifting not long after. Your insides are twisting and turning, your head is spinning, you’re losing feeling in your limbs. It’s like you’ve just drank an entire bottle of whiskey. You're not sure if a single sound comes out when you attempt to call for help.

Everything is hazy. You don’t understand what’s happening around you. A person appears in your field of view, at least you think that it’s a person, and they ask something. Simultaneously, you feel a weight around your shoulders. Another voice speaks. You can’t make out a word. You’re barely clinging to your awareness. Then, as the two voices continue chatting, you feel your form being lifted.

Your vision starts going in and out. You can't feel your legs or your hands. You don't know which way is up and which way is down. There's a ringing in your ears, two different tones that you suppose are words, but you can't tell anymore. It’s mere seconds after that you fall into unconsciousness.

Oh, goodness, Aventurine thinks. He knows his luck rarely turns its back on him, but this must be a new record. Not a single person questions why he’s dragging a barely breathing woman on his shoulders. Or, maybe they do question it, in their minds, but none are brave enough to intervene. It’s kind of funny, actually, how easy it would be to kidnap any of these people, and the most prominent reaction from the witnesses would be a brief eye contact. Maybe they're trying to convince themselves that you're just a black-out drunk acquaintance of his, that there's an entirely normal explanation to this. Perceived status is a wonderfully rotten thing, he thinks. Plus, he’s in the core of his element: lying, deceiving, bluffing. He would’ve made a good delinquent, no doubt.

Heaving you through the never-ending hallways and sky-high elevators, he takes you to one of Penacony’s countless suites. It’s one of the many under his name, costing millions of credits, but money like that is nothing to him. He likes his place of stay a bit extra, and besides, he would hate to hear that you’re unsatisfied with what he has to offer. You, unlike all of the luxuries, can’t exactly be bought, so he better leave a great impression in this respect, at least. Bribery in the classic sense could only get him so far, and the thing he wants is you, not the idea of you that’s been achieved by throwing some expensive stuff your way.

He sets your limp body on his bed. You have been completely out of it for the better part of the walk to his room. The drug's effects are a bit too potent, it seems, but it will wear off in a good few hours, and he has that much time to get everything ready for you. He did his fair share of preparations, needless to say, but now that he actually has you, living and breathing, in his clutches, he starts considering things that didn’t seem that important before. What will you think about the colour of the sheets? He can replace those in a heartbeat if you’re not a fan, of course. What about the suite itself? It’s really large, there are more rooms than you can count for you to roam in, but if it’s still not vast enough for you, he can just buy a few more. It’s no big deal, really.

Oh, but he can’t let his mind wander for too long. Your sleeping face is so cute. Your expression is all relaxed, unlike when you laid your eyes on him back in the Dreamscape. Oh, how miserable the past few days of waiting have been for him, but it all has become worth it. There’s a bit of drool at the corner of your ajar mouth. He hopes the food didn’t mess with your stomach too much: As much as he adores you, cleaning puke off the carpet really isn’t his thing.

The few hours it takes for you to wake up are perhaps among the longest in his entire lifetime. He lies down next to you, slipping an arm under your head in a loving manner, making sure that your neck is not straining. He scrolls around on his phone, maybe going through your social media, watching some reels, shopping for some clothes for you to wear. He knows your clothing size, obviously, and your preferred style. Oh, that one’s nice, he’s going to get it for you. That one, too, and that one. He’s just idly killing time by spending insane amounts of credits in the span of mere minutes.

And then, you start stirring. He perks up, immediately putting his phone down on the bed and turning to your form. Your eyes flutter open, glossy and exhausted, wearily staring straight ahead. It’s clear that you’re still at least a bit disoriented. He reaches for your face, softly tucking a piece of stray hair behind your ear. Your half-lidded gaze fixates on his features.

Thank god the hotel walls are thick, he thinks. It’s a miracle that the sheer volume of your scream doesn’t shatter the pink lenses of his shades that now rest on his forehead. You attempt to scramble away from him, but the drug still hasn’t completely left your system, so you only manage to twitch around a bit. Your eyes, wide with terror, are flitting around the room, anywhere but his form, unable to truly focus on anything.

He watches you with something akin to intrigue as you continue your weak flailing and screeching. It’s a survival instinct, he guesses, the way your first response is to alert as much attention as possible, even though there's nobody else around. So, unfortunately, the only attention there is to get here is from him. He's sure you'll grow to welcome it eventually.

˗ˏˋ ★ 3. Life: What is it like to live with them? How do they treat the darling?

The first few days after the initial shock are basically just getting to know Aventurine in general. While he knows just about everything there is to know about you, you can’t say the same when it comes to him. He’s just some strange man from the IPC, and on top of that, his public image is basically limited to how wealthy and flamboyant he is. Aventurine isn’t even his real name, but that’s what you learn to call him by.

You grasp the basics very quickly. The suite will be your home from now on, at least for the time being. You can wander around as much as you want, but it must happen inside the walls of his living quarters. You can do whatever you’d like — flip the entire place over if you’re feeling like it, he can afford that. Your phone? Oh yeah, he got rid of that thing, you won't be needing it. Here, have a new one! The only person you can contact through it is him, of course, but it’s better than having nothing, right? Go on, say thank you.

Furthermore, he lets you know that the two of you are in a relationship now. Alright, alright, it can only be dating for now if it really bothers you that much. He doesn’t understand why you’re so very hesitant, really, he has an entire queue of people lining up to be his partner. If anything, you should be honoured and relieved, even! He could be some ugly 55-year-old fuck that collects girls half his age to be his sex slaves. He’s not like that, and as a cherry on top, he can make your life way better than it was before this. It just comes at the cost of... a lot of things. But no matter.

The money aspect becomes very clear to you very early into your captivity. He throws credits around like they’re receipts he found at the bottom of his bag. You could do as little as mention something you like; it doesn’t even have to be a specific thing, you could say that ”wow, that flower is pretty”, and bam, a bouquet of them is in your hands in less than half an hour. You have nice clothes, as much food as you could ever want, you have electronics, TVs, basically any streaming services that exist, (he probably downloads some popular gacha on your new phone and buys you a billion of whatever the pulling currency is), and you have his attention basically whenever and wherever you want.

And, he sure likes spending time with you. Whether it’s sleeping together, cuddling, just lazing around or being on work business, he has you with him nearly at all times. It really doesn't matter what he's doing, you're most likely going to accompany him.

His one favorite thing to do is just chat with you about mundane things, life, people, whatever. Or, the correct wording would be chatting to you, because you rarely feel like entertaining him with your words. That doesn't matter, though, because he could blabber away at you for hours on end regardless of if you're answering if he didn't have responsibilities to take care of. It gets irritating pretty fast. You're not a big fan of his monologues in general: There’s always a tiny bit of condescension in the way he talks to you. He kind of treats you like you were stupid, in a way, or that’s what it feels like to you.

Aventurine's job, as inconvenient as it is at times, does require him to travel quite a bit. Leaving you behind would be bothersome for a myriad of reasons, so more often than not, you're coming with him on these trips. He can’t have you be alone for too long, you know? He trusts his security measures, don't get him wrong, and taking risks is sort of his thing, but you’re the one thing he would prefer not to mess around with when it comes to that. So, oftentimes, you’ll end up accompanying him to whatever higher-up business is to be dealt with that day or night. It’s scary, you find, to see all the people that get to pull on the strings that control the entire universe's economy, ogling at the unfamiliar person that accompanies Aventurine everywhere he goes.

Oh, and prepare to be obnoxiously dolled up to the max for all of his gigs. Even if you somehow managed to bump into someone you know, you doubt they would recognize you under all of the bling-bling and makeup. If you didn't already, you'll soon come to understand that Aventurine is very particular about appearances.

˗ˏˋ ★ 4. Rules: What kind of rules do they enforce? How lenient are they? How do they keep their darling in check?

You directly ask Aventurine about the rules one time. You’re sitting at the table, having whatever he guessed you were craving for breakfast. He’s been yapping your ear off for the past twenty minutes, but as you air the question, he goes quiet for a while.

Pondering his answer, he tilts his head to the side, and his smile grows. Just by his reaction, you know that whatever is about to come out of his mouth is going to, if not ruin your entire day, then make you want to punch his stupid face in. He taps the tip of his chin with his finger as if considering his response long and hard, making little clicking sounds with his tongue, resting back in his chair with a thoughtful expression.

"Don’t try to escape", is the first thing he says. Okay, yeah, that’s given with whatever fucked-up logic he’s going by. ”Do what I tell you”, is the second rule he comes up with. Sure, you have kind of been forced to obey that one, too. He goes quiet after reciting the first two, and for a moment, you think that perhaps he's actually being serious about this.

Then, then, after remaining silent for a good while, he speaks out a third rule. And it’s not even a fucking rule. ”Your left heel can’t touch the floor when you walk”, or something equally as outrageous. It’s incredibly stupid, so infuriatingly specific, such obvious bait that you wonder if you should stab the fork in your hand into his eye right then and there. Your jaw clenches with the rage you’re holding back, and judging from how his grin deepens, he got the exact reaction he wanted out of you. He’s deliberately riling you up, making you mad on purpose, pushing your buttons until your circuits overload. It's terrible.

No, but seriously, all he actually requires of you is you staying where he wants you to: by his side and preferably with at least a neutral expression on your face. Ah, and don’t talk to anybody. As much as he doesn’t think that anyone would care enough about the ramblings of some random woman, he can’t take the risk of his reputation taking a hit because of it. On the side of all his hustle, he does serious business and represents the IPC, and if you don’t respect that, he’ll have to come up with a more creative solution to keeping you quiet.

When it comes to keeping you docile, Aventurine uses the classic method of locking the door. Since he is a powerful figure, the places he stays in aren’t exactly easy to break into, or in this case, out of. The windows are bulletproof, the locks would require a jackhammer level drill to break, and bursting through the walls is an idea you wouldn’t even entertain, he trusts. All in all, he doesn't really have to take any drastic measures to make sure that you don't escape.

There’s one exception to that, though, and it is if you’re seriously being a threat to yourself or him. Like he said, you can wreck the entire place if you’re feeling like it, but don’t hurt yourself while at it. If it looks like you’re doing less demolishing and more indirectly beating yourself, he might drug you much like he did when he abducted you. He keeps a syringe ready in the locked drawer of his nightstand in case you refuse to calm down. If you're refusing to listen to his warnings, he’ll just come up to you and stick the needle into whatever body part is available. Soon after, you’ll be nice and peaceful again. Don’t worry, it’ll wear off in an hour or two — you can take a nap with him in the meantime.

Oh, and he definitely uses threats to keep you in check. With all the power he holds, he has the ability to seriously affect the lives of those you hold dear. Wouldn’t it be a shame if one of your family members were to lose their job? It would, he bets. So, behave.

˗ˏˋ ★ 5. Consequences: What kind of punishments will the darling face? How do they punish different offences?

He’s… a bit stumped when it comes to punishing you. There’s locking you up, there’s tying you down on the bed, there’s drugging you, but beyond those, he hasn’t really thought about you being disagreeable to the point of him having to step up with actually disciplining you. He’s kind of lenient in this way; you can get away with a lot of stuff without any real consequences.

A big thing about him is that he refuses to make you suffer through things that he had to do back when he was a slave. Regardless of what you do, you’ll always have food on your plate and a bed to sleep in, that kind of thing. He doesn’t know what it is about it exactly, but even thinking of exposing you to those horrors makes his stomach sink. They’re completely out of the question.

What he will do, however, is firmly remind you about who holds the authority here. If you’ve done something really bad like managing to get into his phone or trying to talk to some poor IPC employee while he was away for a minute, you can be sure that you won't get off with a mere warning. He’ll grab you by your jaw or your neck, dig his nails into your skin, squeezing your cheeks together while looking down at you, directly in your eyes. It’s one of the rare times you’ll see him show anything else but self-assurance, and for once, the smile disappears from his face. He hisses right into your ear, telling you to never do whatever you did ever again if you’d like to keep all your fingers and the ability to speak. The point gets across.

The one thing that gets the worst reaction out of him, like with most yanderes, is managing to escape. It’s not only the action itself but also the fact that it takes a considerable amount of wit to be able to pull it off. He’s pretty damn meticulous about his ways of keeping you captive, and if you somehow succeed in slipping past those, he will be livid, both at you and himself.

If you do escape, it’s while on a business trip. As much as he would like to, he can’t always get a maximum security room to stay in, so your best opportunities to flee are when you're staying in a less guarded place. They are few and far between, but they exist.

With both physical and intellectual efforts, you may be able to make it out of the room you're residing in. Maybe it's via an unlocked door, maybe through a window, it doesn't really matter. What matters is that there is an entire nine minutes in between the moment of your breakout and when an extremely nervous assistant interrupts his business meeting to bring some urgent news to Sir Aventurine. She lets him know that ”something that belongs to him has been captured in the VIP lounge”. Digesting the information, he does his absolute best to keep a straight face in front of his expectant business partner, but he can’t help the way his eye twitches. He shortly excuses himself.

The moment you have to face him after his men have caught up to you in the lobby and carried you back to his room is… terrifying. The situation itself is awkward, certainly, at least to the two agents who are holding you up by both of your arms all the while you’re flailing your limbs around and screeching like a cornered animal. The description isn't that far off from the truth, either. It doesn't matter how hard you fight, or how much noise you make, Aventurine only dismisses the two men with a wave of his hand and a blank stare, saying that he’ll take care of it. And oh, he will take care of you, alright.

The second the door locks behind the two of you, you know it’s not going to be pretty. However, whatever it is that you expected him to do, it is not for him to pull out a revolver and point it directly at your head. Your eyes fly wide open, the profanities you’ve been yelling suddenly run out, and your body freezes in place.

He tells you to get on the bed. You don’t comply. He steps over to you, grabs you by the cheeks, presses the gun’s barrel right against your temple and repeats: ”Get on the bed”. You don’t even get a chance to do as you're told before he takes you by the neck and shoves you down on the mattress. Still holding the weapon to your head, he straddles you and reaches over to the nightstand to dig through the drawer.

Knowing what is to come, you flail and make an attempt to snatch the gun from his hand. He slaps you across your face. The action stuns you for long enough for him to pull out the syringe from the drawer and jab the needle right into your neck. You convulse and whine for a moment before going completely slack under him. He closes his eyes and exhales.

Although you don’t get to see it due to being under whatever he has injected you with, his reaction to the ordeal is rough. He sits next to you on the bed, back turned to you, his face hidden in his hands. He’s sweating all over, his cheeks have gone pale, his legs are trembling. He can’t believe you almost got away with it. How many people saw you, he doesn’t know. He can only hope that your little stunt won’t bring irreversible stains to his image.

˗ˏˋ ★ 6. Emotions I: How do they show love? How do they attempt to make the darling love them?

As mentioned before, you come to find out pretty early on that Aventurine is a ridiculously materialistic person. Initially, you think his only way of showing love is through buying you stuff, which is admittedly a fair conclusion to come to. Oh, and he does compliment you pretty often, but the praises mostly sound more like barely disguised insults. He may tell you that you look pretty while looking down at you on the bed where one of your hands is tied to the frame, for example. It’s more belittling than anything.

After a couple of weeks pass, however, you will see that his love language ends up being more about touch than it is about gifts. It will start in very subtle ways like leading you through a hall with a hand slotted against the small of your back or discreetly fixing your hair for you, but it quickly evolves into activities that are borderline inappropriate to do in public. He’ll start kissing you out of nowhere, sneaking touches at your inner thighs, stuff like that. In addition, he will start cuddling you to sleep whenever the two of you share a bed (which is basically always except for the times he’s out all night). And clearly, at least a part of the reason for the aforementioned things is that they get a nice reaction out of you. You’ll become all bothered, all flustered. What, "he’s doing it on purpose"? No, no, he would never. You’re imagining it.

Being able to feel you is a big thing for him. It reassures him that you’re, in fact, a living and breathing person. He has some abandonment issues that stem from unnamed reasons (cough, his entire family dying, cough), so naturally, he wants nothing more than to make sure you’re healthy, well-fed and, most importantly, there. He can’t bear the idea of losing another person. That’s why, whenever he can, he’ll hug you, hold you, caress you, give you physical affection in amounts beyond anything you’ve ever wanted. He might become a bit whiny if you refuse his touches, telling you that come on, just for a bit and come here, let him smooch you. He doesn’t want to admit it, but you hold much more power over him in this sense than you could ever understand. Inside, he’s still an extremely sensitive soul.

If the chance presents itself, he also loves to do fun activities with you. If there’s a free slot in his packed schedule, he might take you to see sights, to eat at expensive restaurants, that kind of thing. It is, admittedly, a nice change from being caved up in a hotel room for the entire day. He won’t say it out loud, but he’s a bit desperate for you to be happy, so if you’ve been grumpy for a long period of time, the likelihood of him taking you out increases tremendously. Time to start sulking for no reason.

He often takes you to the Dreamscape, too, when he has the chance and the two of you are on the correct planet. It’s much more safe to do things there than it is to take you to places in real life since you can’t physically escape from him. Obviously, though, the same rules apply there as in the waking world: Don’t talk to people, do what he says, and so on.

Lastly, Aventurine does, in his mind, show you love by keeping you safe, even though it doesn’t appear that way to you. All the effort he puts into making sure that you’re not in harm’s way is immense, you know? This stuff costs a lot, making sure that nobody gets to hurt you. The word is out, there’s a rumour circulating about Aventurine of the Ten Stonehearts having a lover behind closed doors. Gossip like that places quite the target on your back, so he’s actually doing you a favour at this point. Though, it’s not hard to imagine how all of it looks from your point of view. You win some, you lose some, he thinks.

˗ˏˋ ★ 7. Emotions II: How do they deal with the darling’s emotions? How are outbursts handled? How do they attempt to comfort the darling?

You don’t think that Aventurine is capable of showing genuine emotion, at least anything close to sympathy. He can be happy, he can be angry, sure, but when it comes to you, you have never caught him sparing a single moment to wondering how you feel.

In reality, he has, though, more than you could imagine. His guard is just so high that he never ends up baring any more than tiny glimpses of his true self to you. It's much less risky that way, but it translates to him being pretty horrible at dealing with your sadness and comforting you.

If he catches you crying, sobbing on the bathroom floor (which is not very often since your usual reaction is lashing out in anger), he’s at a loss of what to do. At first, he genuinely thinks that you’re just trying to pull his strings, that all the tears are just some pathetic attempt at manipulating him, and because of that, he ends up just teasing you. He tells you that if you wanted something from him, if you wished to go outside, you could just tell him straight up; no need for all these theatrics. He will ruffle your hair, poke your forehead, treat the entire thing like it's a joke.

However, when you start blubbering about how you miss your old life, your friends, your family, your home, he comes to understand that perhaps this isn’t about manipulation anymore. That’s when he reaches an emotional block he didn’t even know he had. He has never really had to comfort anyone, at least not in a very long time. Suddenly, all of the chaff leaves him, the words he had so carefully planned disappear into thin air, and he’s left with the realization that you, his darling, are having a breakdown right in front of him and he doesn’t have a clue what to do.

You think he’s mocking you. There’s no other explanation for his behaviour, he must be poking fun at your distress. You're not even surprised at this point. So, through your sniffles, you scream at him to leave you the fuck alone.

He’s a bit taken aback by your sudden outburst. He's still in the middle of calculating his options, but now that you’re clearly starting to show a negative response, he knows he has to act quickly. Truthfully, he can’t bear it. He can’t bear it, seeing you in such a state feels like his heart is being torn in half. It’s a visceral sensation. Deep down, he realizes that it’s him that’s hurting you, that it’s all his fault that you are this way. His skull is about to split open from how two completely opposite sides of his psyche are contradicting each other, yanking him in different directions: One wants to keep you locked up and safe, and the other wants nothing more than for your tears to stop. It’s an impossible equation.

Ultimately, the only thing he’s able to muster is cautiously setting his hand over the crown of your head. There, he lets it rest without moving, just silently acknowledging your feelings. It’s one of the only times that you’ll get a genuine, emotional response from him. He doesn’t speak a word, he simply can’t find any, and this is also the first time you can recall that he doesn’t try to fill the void in his soul by talking your ear off. It’s a truly bizarre situation to be in, in every single aspect. You regret ever stepping foot on the same planet as this man.

Afterwards, when you’ve calmed down enough, he’ll be very quiet for the rest of the day. There’s no teasing, no cheeky remarks, nothing. He might spend an abnormal amount of time on his phone, tapping away on his laptop, taking care of ”work business” (he’s looking at an empty screen), and so on. He doesn’t want to admit how affected he is by your sadness.

When the night comes rolling around, instead of spooning you like usual when you go to bed, he turns you around in his hold and tugs your face under his chin. You might ask about it, you may complain that it’s an uncomfortable position, that you can't sleep like that, but he won’t budge. He just tells you to go to sleep and slips a secure, warm hand to your bare upper back under your pyjamas.

He stays up long after you have fallen asleep. He’s afraid that if he closes his eyes, he’ll be haunted by nightmares so tangible that he would rather not rest at all.

Even in the future, comforting you is one of those things that he doesn’t seem to get any better at, no matter how many times he has to do so. It’s always clumsy, always leaves him embarrassed at how little he’s able to do about your emotional distress. You obviously let him know about it, tell him how evil he is, how much you hate him, and truthfully speaking, it does hurt him when you do that. He just doesn’t know how to show it, and even if he did, he doubts he ever would. You would just use it against him, he thinks (you absolutely would).

˗ˏˋ ★ 8. Thing to exploit: What are the darling’s best chances at escaping? Are there things the darling can use to their advantage? How can the darling make things easier for themselves?

So there are a couple of actually viable things here. Your biggest obstacles are his wealth and, well, his luck, and those are two very prominent things to be concerned about. Still, you do have a decent chance at escaping from him.

He’s very particular about the people he allows to see you, but not so much so that there aren't any opportunities there. One of the people you will come to recognize is Jade, but she’s one you should not confide in. She won’t give a flying fuck about your situation. It’s going to be quite a cruel experience for you if you were to talk to her: She might pretend to listen to your troubles, nodding along and offering something close to sympathy, but when you’re done, she will give you a polite smile and let someone know that ”Aventurine’s plaything is acting up again”. That, and no matter what it is that you told her, she will absolutely snitch on you to Aventurine. Not a good idea.

On the other hand, if you ever manage to get into contact with Topaz, she will help you to the best of her ability. It’s a rare chance if you do since Aventurine is very aware of how soft her heart is, and that’s why he has made an effort to keep the two of you from meeting each other. Topaz might, for example, bribe the employees under Aventurine’s command to ignore your escape if you manage to pull one off. There isn’t much she can do about you being locked up, but if the opportunity presents itself, you have a better shot at fleeing than without her help.

Whatever comes after making it out of his clutches, though, is a bit trickier. The IPC has eyes everywhere, all across the universe. You would have to change your identity, your looks, your name, everything to truly be able to avoid being recaptured. You would need to be extremely careful, very clever, and truly, truly lucky to escape from him for good. That, or you need to get another powerful organization on your side. If you somehow manage to contact the Family, for example, they might extend their services to you. Be careful, though, because there’s a chance that if you get someone like, say, Sunday involved, the only things that may change are your location and your abductor.

Aside from getting help from other people, there’s one thing to take advantage of that you might not consider at first. It’s that, although being a man and in a decent shape, you could, in certain circumstances, be able to overpower him physically. You come to see it one time when he’s trying to cuddle you in the bed. You’re not having any of it, you're telling him to stop, but he just won’t give it up. So, mustering up all your power, you turn around in his grasp and manage to get on top of him, briefly being able to pin him down. You’re not sure if you’re just imagining it, but you swear that for a second, there is a fracture in his expression, an ”oh shit”-moment of sorts. He quickly composes himself, of course, grabbing you by the arms and throwing you off of him. However, he is a tiny bit shaken up by the strength you had in you.

So, if you manage to catch him by surprise, there’s a chance that you could escape via the classic means of beating the shit out of him. Especially if you have muscle, this might be the most realistic option for you.

When it comes to making things easier for yourself, the simple answer is just to entertain his whims. Talk to him, spend time with him, tell him what you like, get to know him. He might even spill secrets from his past to you if he trusts you enough. Something like that is quite a strong psychological weapon against him, so it’s recommended to get as much information out of him as possible.

˗ˏˋ ★ 9. Further notes: Is there anything that sets them apart from the other yanderes? What unique qualities do they possess?

Gambling. There’s so much gambling. Anything can be made into gambling. Everything is gambling.

No, but in actual fact, Aventurine uses gambling as a method of getting under your skin just as much as he does it for the thrill. He gets very cruel with it: He might tell you to come to him at a random moment, leaning his elbow against the table while he plays with something in his hand. Look at the coin, he tells you. Heads or tails? Go on, choose. If you guess wrong, he will send a few of his men to your home planet to kill your entire family.

The colour washes away from your face in a matter of seconds. Despite the ruthlessly brutal thing he's suggesting, he has to stifle a laugh. You stammer out that ”no, you’re not going to choose”, trying to act all brave and unbothered, but he can see the way beads of sweat rise on your forehead, the way your eyes start darting around the room. You’re not fooling anyone. He knows exactly how to get you scared.

So, he tells you that if you don’t pick, he’s just going to give his men the command regardless. You look up at him with pleading eyes, wordlessly asking for him not to make you do this. He merely shakes his head in response. After silently staring at his fingers for a good ten seconds with tears threatening to spill past your waterline, you whimper out a strained ”tails”.

He flicks the coin into the air, playing around with it, rolling it over the backs of his fingers. You follow his every movement in horror, eyes going up and down, left and right along with the item. Then, he lands the thing on his forearm.

It’s tails. You don’t even attempt to silence the sigh of relief that slips past your lips as you see the result. He can barely keep himself from chuckling. Of course it’s tails, that’s what he intended for it to be. He would never (okay, almost never) put so much effort into getting rid of people you hold dear, that would simply break your heart, but it’s fun to keep you on your toes. Prick.

Aside from the obvious tricks, Aventurine has very very subtle ways of manipulating you. His methods are so cruel but so miniscule at the same time that you can’t even tell if it’s actually on purpose. The two of you might be resting in his room, you’re lying on the bed with your back turned to him while he’s on his phone. There’s music playing on the stereos. The current song is one of Robin’s; it’s a popular one right now. Soon, though, after the last few notes, the melody fades into silence before the next track starts. However, the very second you hear the first few beats of it, your head rises off the pillow to look at him.

It’s a song you know. Not just any song, though: It’s an obscure track from some band that has less than a thousand listeners on the app. Everybody has at least that one really small artist on their playlist that nobody else has ever heard about, and this is one of those for you. You’re pretty certain that you’re one of the few people in the entire universe who have ever played this song. And now it’s echoing through the room. The phone connected to the stereos is his.

He looks up from his device with a questioning look, gazing at you with the same, serene smile as always. He quirks his brow. You know he’s doing it on purpose. Or at least, you think you know. What if he actually just knows this band? But there’s no way, what are the odds? Well, the odds are in his favour, is what they are. It’s a bet on your part, to decide whether you’re going to confront him about it or not.

You want to be mad at him, want to scream at him, but simultaneously, that would be admitting that his antics have gotten under your skin. Besides, he’s definitely going to pretend that he doesn’t know what you’re talking about. The best course of action is to drop the entire thing. Despite the seething rage nearly spilling over inside of you, you let your head slump back down on the pillow. He’s horrible. (Like half of the stuff he plays through the stereos is also horrendously generic white-girl music. Whether that's a good or a bad thing is up to you to decide.)

On the nicer end, there are times with him that are actually tolerable. You wouldn't actually use the word "nice" for it since it's still against your will, but on the days when his schedule is completely empty, he may spend the time by playing cards with you.

It's one of the rare times that you don't want to bash his head in. He may call for you, beckoning you over to the table where he's shuffling a deck in his hands. He may teach you a new game, or you could play one that you already know the rules to, but the activity is surprisingly pleasant regardless. He guides you through with minimal teasing, calmly telling you when you're about to make a dumb move, sharing a few strategies with you. You listen and watch as his fingers play with the cards, spinning them around, showcasing his best tricks to you.

He might even let you win some rounds. He will place a meaningless bet on the games you win, telling you that you'll get to decide what you're going to eat for dinner today if you beat him, and when you do, the happiness and pride on your face is enough to make him swallow his remarks. The entire ordeal would actually be incredibly wholesome if it wasn't for the lock on the door and the key in his pocket.

On a completely different side of things, a very questionable encounter you will get to experience while residing in Penacony is when, by chance, you run into none other than a man called Dr. Ratio. It’s on some trip to the Dreamscape, when Aventurine has to take care of work business again, that you get to meet him. The two of them know each other, you come to find, because Aventurine immediately strikes up a conversation with him despite the guy looking less than pleased about the coincidence.

They chat for a while, but then, the Doctor lays his eyes on you. You can nearly see how the gears start turning in his mind. His expression doesn’t really change, but you still watch him go through confusion, apprehension and disbelief all in the span of, like, five seconds.

He doesn’t engage. Maybe it’s because the two are sort of like colleagues — or, rather, they both work under the same organization, but the man simply turns his gaze away from your form, continuing his discussion with Aventurine.

The situation leaves you feeling a bit agitated. You didn’t exactly think that the man would help you, of course, but he could have at least acknowledged you. He could have given you a nod, anything. He might very well have risked his position if he were to do that, you know that, but something tells you that the real reason is that he just can’t be bothered.

NS-FW

˗ˏˋ ★ 10. General look: How does their sexuality manifest? What does sex mean to them? How horny are they?

It’s… a bit multifaceted.

On one hand, Aventurine is undeniably somewhat of a sexual person. There’s a flirty undertone to his behaviour, he doesn’t shy away from showing a bit of skin (the chest window in his shirt is very deliberate), and when it comes to his history, he has had multiple encounters in his past, most likely with all kinds of people. He isn’t particularly reserved regarding sex. And he likes it that way, too. It keeps people guessing, makes it easier to catch deals with certain types of individuals. He’s a very flashy person in general, so it should come as no surprise that it extends to his sexuality.

Then, on another side, there’s a bit of a disconnect between romance and sex in his brain. He has noticed that, to him, sex isn’t necessarily something he uses to show another person that he loves them, at least not until you came into the picture. It’s more about the rush he gets from it, and it feels good, so of course he enjoys it. It’s just not something that he actively looks for or needs.

When you appear in his life, the previous statement loses credibility. He’s obviously still his normal self (at least to a degree), a bit provocative, that’s his style, but for possibly the first time in his life, he notices that he’s actually craving another person in that way. As in, he has an urge to touch you, to feel you under his fingers, to make you feel nice. Before he goes to sleep, while you rest in his arms, unaware of everything that’s going through his mind, he starts imagining what it would be like to have you under him, your hands tied to the headboard, his fingers inside of you. He hopes that you’re already in deep enough sleep not to feel his bulge pressing up against your butt.

He begins entertaining the idea of having sex with you for real pretty early into your captivity. You’re obviously not very willing towards the notion, he knows, but he’s sure that you’ll warm up to him eventually. He has certain tools at his disposal that might end up changing your mind.

˗ˏˋ ★ 11. Limit: How long does it take for them to have the darling? What is the first time like? Do they care about the darling’s willingness?

Physically, Aventurine is not a violent person. Don’t get him wrong, he can absolutely use force if need be, but when it comes to you, he would rather not. It hinders him from reaching his objective, which is ultimately getting you to like him. Forcing you to do something like having sex with him would be barbaric, even to his standards. However, when it comes to his own needs, there are compromises he’s willing to make to get you where he wants you to be.

So, he’s not going to take you by force, no. He’s going to offer you something in return that you simply can’t refuse. Say, how would you feel about getting to see what your friends are up to these days? You haven’t been able to contact them, of course, and he won’t let you do that even now, but what would you think of checking their accounts? Are you curious? He suggests all of this while pulling what you recognize to be your old phone from inside of his breast pocket.

You’re not stupid. You know there’s a catch, and it doesn’t take long for him to air it out to you. If you want to see how your friends are faring, you’ll have to give him a kiss or two. Actually, you need to make out with him and let him eat you out. All of those. It’s not that big of a deal, really, he says. Instead, he insists that he's actually doing you a favour: You’ve been awfully irritable for the past few days, so maybe this could even cheer you up a bit. But you don’t have to, of course. ”It’s your choice”, he says with a tilt of his head and a smirk so detestable that you want to slap it right off his stupid face.

You stare at him with your mouth ajar, all the while he stands in front of you, one hand on his hip while the other is dangling your old phone in your face. He’s being unfair, he’s being so infuriatingly obnoxious that throwing a fit and having to take the syringe would probably be preferable to whatever he has in mind.

But still, the proposal manages to plant the question in your mind: How are your friends faring nowadays? What about your family? You haven’t seen their faces in what feels like ages. You stare at your reflection in the black screen of your phone, looking into your own, desperate eyes. He knows exactly what he’s doing to you, and at this point, as you give in to your emotions, you have no choice but to fall for it. It’s deplorable, really; the way you suck in a determined breath before letting him know that ”okay, you’ll do it” in a tone that’s less than enthusiastic. Your lack of excitement isn't exactly ideal, but he will gladly accept the result nonetheless.

So, he takes you by your hand. However, you immediately whisk it away from him. You tell him that holding his hand is not something you agreed to while wearing a tiny, smug smile. Admittedly, he is a bit irritated by the remark: He raises his brows at you, letting out a contemplative hum, but continues his advances nonetheless. With delicate motions, he lays you on the bed on your back before climbing on top of you with a blush dancing on his features. He leans in for a kiss.

You keep your lips firmly shut. ”Touché”, he thinks, rolling his eyes before using his fingers to pinch your nose shut. It works wonders, and soon enough he gets the chance to slide his tongue down your throat. You don't dare bite him.

His hands are all over you, sliding along your sides, feeling your breasts through your top, all the while he humps his clothed dick against your thigh. Then, his lips start trailing lower, lathering your neck in open-mouthed kisses. It feels like he’s trying to eat you alive, and when he starts unbuttoning your top, you’re quick push your hands against his chest. You attempt to shove him away and point out that whatever he’s doing was not agreed upon.

You’re being difficult on purpose again, he thinks. You nearly celebrate your victory when he gets off of you for a brief moment, but then he lets out a deep huff before reaching for his belt. You don’t really get a chance to struggle before he wraps the thing around your wrists, making quick work of your hands and tying them to the bed frame.

It's when the true weight of the situation dawns upon you, and instead of trying to make the ordeal exasperating for him, you start doing your best to kick him off of you for real. As he tries to catch your legs, your heel manages to land a hit on his abdomen. He lets out a pained oof through clenched teeth, but you only get to enjoy the reaction for a second. There’s a brief change in his pleasant expression, and in the next moment, he grabs both of your ankles and forces your lower body against your chest with his entire weight. He softly tuts at you before pressing his index finger against your lips. He doesn’t even need to speak his mind out loud — a nudge of his head towards the nightstand and a suggestive smirk is enough to shut you up.

He tells you to settle down and relax. It's obviously not going to actually do anything to calm you down, but he feels the need to sort of pretend that this is something you want and need. Moreover, he twists it in his mind that what he’s about to do to you is actually a positive thing. It's for your own good, so get over it.

You’re trying to fiddle with the belt around your hands to free yourself. He watches your efforts with an amused expression. You can try to fight it all you want, he made sure that the thing holds. So, while you’re busy trying to resist him, he hooks his fingers under the waistline of your clothes and pulls your bottoms down. You hiss at his actions, badmouthing him, throwing insults at him. That’s cute, he thinks. Not much you can do about it now, so you should just try to enjoy it, no?

You only get a mere moment to prepare yourself before he starts devouring your cunt like his life depends on it. He just goes for it. And, you come to find that he’s unfortunately incredibly good at it. He starts slowly, giving some teasing licks to your clit, just above your entrance. He's biting down on your inner thighs, pinching around your most sensitive areas, riling you up like no tomorrow. You try your best to close your legs, attempting to shove him off your bits, but he just grabs you by the hips and pulls you flush against his face.

He’s awful. He somehow seems to know just where to prod to get your insides feeling all hot. When he truly gets down to it, after the gentle warm-up is over, you come to find that he's shockingly adept at trying to pleasure you. Still, with some effort, you’re able to distance yourself from the situation. You let your mind wander, thinking about anything else, how the room looks, what you ate today... You zone out and do your best to ignore whatever is happening in your lower half.

Oh no, you must have gotten the wrong idea, he thinks. He pauses his actions, getting up and on top of you from between your thighs before gently caressing your cheek. ”You do know that we’re not going to stop until you come, right?” he asks you.

You can nearly see the hearts in his eyes, the simultaneously pitying and mocking smile on his lips. Your insides flip. You try to bark back at him, telling him that he’s being unjust, that this is not what you agreed upon, but he just shakes his head and lets you know that no, you’re not the one who makes the rules. It’s him. So get comfortable.

Deep inside, he’s a bit offended that your go-to would be trying not to feel anything when he’s clearly putting his heart and soul into getting you off. Instead of disheartening him, though, it only makes him go harder. So, do what you want, nothing is going to stop him from plunging two fingers into your warm cunt. It comes with zero warning, and to his delight, you let out a whiny shriek in surprise. Good thing that the soundproofing is excellent here.

˗ˏˋ ★ 12. Preferences: What is sex with them like? What sort of stuff are they into? What kind of kinks do they have?

Oh, he’s… a freak. When it comes to his preferences, he truly is a force to be reckoned with. There’s mildly kinky stuff that he’s into, and then there are things that he would get a lot of looks for if he were to ever say them out loud. And, (un)fortunately for you, you’ll come to find out about the whole spectrum of his preferences.

There’s very little that he isn’t open to at least trying. He will lowkey go through your old phone's search history and find out all about what you’re secretly into. Nothing like that is off-limits to him. Besides, he will learn to know you even better that way! He doesn’t really understand why you’re so horribly self-conscious about something like this. It’s not like he’ll use that to his advantage or anything.

Bondage

He likes restricting your movements. The degree of it depends: Sometimes he might be satisfied with just tying your hands together, other times it’s your entire body. He’ll bind your calves against the back of your thighs, your whole arms behind your back — he’ll wrap you up like a nice little gift. Which you kind of are, actually; to him, anyway.

He tends to appreciate the aesthetic things in life, so he likes playing around with rope in the bedroom in that sense too. He’s quite skilled with it as well, he knows how to tie nice patterns around your chest, your legs, all of it. He might even install a hook in the ceiling so your entire body can hang in the air if he’s feeling extra freaky. It’s also easier to get through with the act those times, obviously, since you can’t do much struggling when you’re barely even able to wiggle your fingers.

He can basically do what he pleases with you when you’re bound. He can use you however he likes, he can finger you, eat you out, get his dick wet, stick a finger in your ass, whatever he’s feeling like. It oftentimes comes with blindfolding or gagging you, too. He’s a big fan of ball gags in particular: It makes you unable to spit vile words at him, and besides, you look super cute with it, he thinks. Covering your eyes makes you at least twice as receptive, he finds. You twitch more often, shiver, try to yank on the ropes, cry, even. He likes to see you struggle; it gives him an unexplainable, powerful feeling.

Toys, toys, even more toys, and overstimulation

Of course he likes using toys in the bedroom. What is there not to like? They spice things up, make certain things easier, and most importantly, they get you going faster than his hands or mouth ever could. And no, that’s not an insult to him, of course, he knows how to pick you apart with just what he was blessed with, but toys bring excitement. He can’t get the same effect with his hands as he can with a vibrator.

That being said, he really is a big fan of vibes, namely. Small, big, bullet, wand, gentle, industrial level, he’s all for them. He loves how your body reacts to them, especially if it’s particularly visceral.

One of his go-to foreplays is blindfolding you and tying you down like usual, but there's a bit of a twist. You’re expecting him to go down on you, stick his fingers in, whatever it is that he commonly does, but then a whirring sound fills the room. You barely get the chance to react before a vibrator is pressed right against your clit. You jerk back, naturally — the sensation is beyond intense, the thing is pressing directly on one of your most sensitive spots — but he just shushes you and follows your movements with the device. You can't get away. No matter how you struggle, the vibe is not coming off your cunt until you come on it, he lets you know, all in the infuriatingly mocking tone he uses on you when he knows you can’t clap back.

And he keeps his promise, too, and more. When you inevitably do cream on the thing, he doesn’t move it away or turn it off. You start flailing around, of course, you just came and you’re sensitive, but he doesn’t make an effort to stop. Go on, try to get him off of you — he won’t let you. He probably says something snarky like ”oops, my hand slipped”, all the while he continues tormenting you. His free hand slides next to the vibrator’s head, and he uses two fingers to spread your folds further apart. The action brings your clit out further, and he presses the vibrator even flusher against your cunt, aligning it so that it rests directly on your pearl. He notes that it gets an exquisite reaction out of you.

He keeps going, only stopping when you’ve been through a whole lot of orgasms back-to-back, and your entire lower half is almost completely numb. You lost your will to fight back somewhere in the middle, there’s drool on your cheek, your eyes are barely staying open, and most wonderfully, your cunt is fluttering and twitching around nothing. Delectable, he thinks. You really don’t understand what you do to him. It’s a good thing he snatched you away when he did because some other man would surely have taken advantage of you soon enough.

Aside from vibrators, he likes nipple clamps. You, however, tend to hate those the most because of how easy it is for him to tug on the chain that connects them, and you’re already whining. They’re a nice addition to your sessions. A little pinch never hurt anyone.

Butt plugs, dildos, anal beads, whatever it is, he probably has them for you in various sizes and colours. Aside from your cunt, he does like playing around with your ass a lot, so be prepared to get a vibrator shoved up there as well. He usually starts fiddling with the rear hole while you're already under a ton of stimulation from other areas, too, so when you're done, none of your places will have been left untouched. He has very little qualms when it comes to getting you off with different tools.

He will absolutely make you wear a plug to a meeting or an event the two of you attend, too. You’re obviously heavily against the idea, the last thing you want is for others to know what a freak you’re forced to be with, but there’s no changing his mind. Besides, it’s in private when the magic really happens. The idea of you having the toy inside you had him hot and bothered all evening, so when you finally return to his room, he will be insatiable. He will stuff both of your holes full of whatever things he happens to prefer that day, make you walk around the room on a leash with the clamps on your nipples, a vibrator against your cunt, all that stuff. And he won't stop until your slick is dripping down your thighs. It never gets any better.

Going on a tangent from the overstim, edging isn't really Aventurine's thing when it comes to you. Yeah, he might sometimes partake in it, getting you as close to coming as he possibly can without tipping you over the edge before pulling away, but he can never keep it up for long. He gets the kicks out of seeing you come, not almost come. Even if he tried to do it as a punishment, he doesn't think he could actually go through with it for that very reason. Ruined orgasms are another thing, those he might do, but only because of the overstim that follows right after.

Banging you in his boss form

Did you think he would not? No, did you seriously think he wouldn’t use the stone in the bedroom? Of course he would. Having this rare of a tool in his hands would go to waste if he were not to take advantage of it in the sheets at least once.

You don’t agree with the notion in the slightest, he comes to find. You’re straddling one of his thighs while he rests back on the couch, very clearly taking in the sight of you and enjoying the show. The monstrosity isn’t even that much bigger than his usual stature, but oh, he can see it in your eyes how wary you are of him in this form. Your brows are knitted together, and you visibly flinch when he raises his hand to move a strand of your hair off your forehead with one of his talons. The way the tips of his claws brush against your cheek, he shudders at the view.

Come on, then, hop on. Yeah, come on, it’s not even that much different to his actual one. Yeah, he knows, the dick is a strange colour now, and it has a few ribs, but the size is just about the same, and you have taken him before. What are you waiting for?

He bounces his thigh up and down a few times, encouraging you to properly climb into his lap and sink onto his cock. Your bare cunt rubs against his pant leg as he does, and you have to hold back a hiss. Aside from his appearance changing drastically, it seems that his strength has received a considerable boost as well. It wouldn't be wise to make him mad in this form, you admit, so best not to have him wait for too long.

You feel his nails caressing along your spine as you prop yourself on his hips. He’s letting you feel the subtle threat that comes with his touch, his fingers are tapping rhythmically against the bone under your skin, telling you to hurry up if you don’t want him to take the initiative.

You bite into your bottom lip as you feel his cock slide into you bit by bit. You feel every single bump, every single ridge as the thing breaches your walls. He throws his head back in satisfaction, exhaling deeply. He can feel the way your cunt constricts around him, obviously not pleased with the intrusion. Your breaths become ragged as you struggle to take him, your hips are subtly trying to nudge higher and off his junk. He brings his hand down on your thigh, gently pushing you back down. You curse at him in response, but he only shakes his head. You can’t tell what his expression looks like, the mask prevents you from seeing his face, but you would bet your entire life on it being a condescending smirk.

He starts heaving you up and down on his dick. You yelp, using more force to try and get yourself off of him, but there’s no budging him. Instead, he removes his hand from your thigh and slips it in between your legs. His fingers prod around for a little until they find your clit, and he begins rolling the pearl in between his nails. He’s being careful not to poke anything with the sharp edges, of course, and judging from how you go tense and your cheeks flush, he’s doing a good job. You should really be grateful that he isn’t sticking it in your other hole, you know. He’s showing you a lot of grace here, really.

… among other things

As stated before, he has very little restrictions when it comes to sexuality. There are very few things that he is completely opposed to doing, and similarly, there aren’t many things that he hasn’t already tried. In no particular order, more of his favourites include eating your ass, putting a collar on you, tickling you, dressing you up in horrendously humiliating outfits, even gunplay… The list goes on and on and on. However, all of the mentioned things have one thing in common: The reactions he gets out of you are entertaining beyond words.

That, and he’s a big fucking fan of talking to you throughout the activities. Whether he’s in between your legs or dick-deep inside of you, he can’t close his mouth for the love of him. Every chance he gets, he speaks out, praising you, teasing you, degrading you, yap-yap-yap-yap-yap. He says things like "come on, you're taking it so well", "you're so cute when you try to fight it", "it's not going anywhere, you're just gonna have to take it" and "stupid little thing, can't even take this much?". It’s like he constantly has a knife right against his throat that will slit his artery if he stops talking even for a second.

Oh, and he gets really descriptive about his musings. He might let you know what your cunt looks like to him in very precise detail. You wish the one wearing a gag was him and not you. As the cherry on top, he also likes to moan very loudly and right in your ear, even when he's not actually receiving any physical pleasure himself. He tends to mock the sounds that you let out, singing high-pitched whines against your cheek and chuckling right after. God, you wish the chandelier would drop on his ass.

And he gets so damn mean with it. He will belittle you to his heart's content, until your pretty face is adorned by tears, until you're begging for him to just stop. That's when he knows he has you exactly where he wants you: Nice and obedient, and most importantly, so fucked-out that you can barely get a coherent word out. He could bust right then and there with zero stimulation.

One of the most atrocious things he makes you go through is dressing you up in one of those bunny outfits. You know the one, a leather leotard and thigh-highs that barely covers your bits (plus a bullet vibe in your underwear, obviously). That alone would be terrible enough, but in addition, he takes you to some obscure casino while you're wearing the outfit. There’s girls dressed similar to you everywhere, entertaining the guests, but you stay firmly slotted in his lap while he plays roulette and empties the entire table. In his pocket, he holds the remote to the device in you, and obviously, he’s not going to let you catch a break the entire evening. (He will also totally place you as a bet on some gamble. He’s always going to win, of course, but the brief look of terror on your face is admittedly very funny to him.)

˗ˏˋ ★ 13. Punishment: What do their sexual punishments look like? What methods do they prefer?

Sexual punishments are actually a fairly common thing with Aventurine since it’s both exciting to him and effective in keeping you in line.

Out of all of the things he could do to you, he has one singular favourite when it comes to getting a point across, and it’s relentless, merciless overstimulation. You thought the regular sessions were bad? Be prepared to experience the torture at a degree that’s at least tenfold as bad.

If you’ve been misbehaving or being generally difficult, he might just load you up with toys and leave you like that for the entire night. See, it is handy that he has multiple beds available. He can’t have a good night’s sleep if there’s a struggling and moaning person right next to him in the sheets.

You know exactly when you’ve crossed the line between mild consequences and a night in agony. It’s that one distinct look that he gives you, his eyes are the slightest bit squinted, and he raises his brows, urging you to "go on". At that point, you stop whatever it is that you got in trouble for, shaking your head and trying to make up an excuse to get yourself out of the situation, but it’s way too late for that now. In a heartbeat, he has you down on the bed, thrashing around, but it does very little to stop him from chaining you down. ”You brought this upon yourself”, he tells you as he starts digging for the tools in the box under the bed.

He shoves beads in your ass, a generously sized dildo in your cunt, and he finishes the piece with a wand right against your clit. He turns the thing on at maximum setting. There’s no slow build-up like usual, he doesn’t warm you up in any way, it’s from zero to a hundred in a split second. You start screaming at him, telling him to turn it off, to get it off of you, but there’s only so many words that you can get out before he shoves a gag in your mouth.

You’re going to suffer through your punishment like a good girl, he lets you know. There’s no getting out of it, and you can be prepared for at least a good few hours of relentless stimulation. It might be for as long as he’s out on business, it might be overnight, you never know. Not being certain on how far he’s going to take it is a part of the fun, obviously. You’re under his mercy, and that if anything will get you behaving.

It’s also nice how obedient you are afterwards. When he finally gets the toys out of you and unties the bindings, you can barely move. He tells you to apologize to him for whatever you did, and in fear of him continuing the torment, you mumble out a barely coherent ”sorry”. It’s that easy.

Or, he might spank you. This is only when he actually has time to reprimand you, which isn’t that often, but when he does, you despise it. He seems to get even more out of it than the usual overstim hell. Spanking is his go-to if your offence isn’t one that he’s actually that mad about, like trying (and failing) to unlock his phone, for example.

Maybe he catches you red-handed, your fingers still tapping against the screen. Quickly, you set the thing down as if that would get you out of whatever is going to follow. It’s kind of adorable, really, how your eyes go wide like you were just caught digging through a cookie jar. He just tilts his head in curiosity, giving you a soft smirk before telling you to get on his lap.

It doesn’t matter if you put up a scuffle, you’re going to end up lying down on your stomach, chest pressed against his thighs. He uses one hand to keep your arms behind your back while the other one yanks your bottom down. Then he starts landing open-palm hits on your rear. The shrieks you let out are nothing short of exhilarating to him. It’s not even a minute into the act that his clothed dick starts pressing up against your side. It’s very likely that he’ll first switch to slapping your cunt before starting to finger you instead. Whether you like it or not, stimulation down there, no matter what kind, gets you aroused, and he’s pleased to find that you’re already wet for him. He makes sure to let you know that, too, of course.

˗ˏˋ ★ 14. Aftermath: What does their aftercare look like? Is there any?

Aventurine hasn’t done his job right if he can still make out your words after he’s done. Sex with him is obviously incredibly intense from your perspective, so your will to object to his advances afterwards is in the negatives. You undeniably require some attention in the aftermath since you’re barely able to lift a finger in your hazy, post-orgasm state. Plus, he knows the significance of taking care of one's partner after a rough time, even if the act itself is terribly twisted in this context.

He usually starts the aftercare by caressing your face, gently coaxing you out of your delirious state. It’s grossly similar to what a real lover would do: It’s soft and mindful, and most noticeably, it’s a complete contrast to what has gone down just mere moments ago. The next step, if needed, is to rid you of the implements he has utilized that time. He pulls the toys out of you, pinches the clamps off your nipples, unties your arms, slides the blindfold aside. He coos at you while at it, telling you how well you did, how good you were for him. You don’t have the spirit in you to let him know just what’s going on in your mind.

After the imperative part, he usually either takes you to the bath or just goes straight to snuggling your spent body. The latter is the more likely outcome since you tend to flake out quickly after he's done. It’s only the rarest of times that you actually muster up enough willpower to resist his embrace. He’ll be a bit displeased about it if you do, but more often than not, you can’t keep it up for long anyway, so it's not that big of a hassle.

Aftercare, for him, is the most intimate part of the whole act. It’s when he can truly, even if it’s only a glimpse, show you his true emotions. He can get awfully sentimental in these moments, too. He’s very responsive to anything you might ask or wonder about, his job, his colleagues, even his past if the stars have aligned. These are also moments when you can use his lowered guard to your advantage. Get that info.

˗ˏˋ ★ 15. Further notes: Is there anything that sets them apart from the other yanderes sex-wise? Are there any unique aspects to them?

The… The gambling continues in the bedroom. It’s no joke.

It’s, like, 30% of his entire personality, so why would he not include it in the sex? You think it’s beyond ridiculous, you let him know that he could perhaps consider using the brain cells that the Aeons have blessed him with, but no. You are going to gamble in the bedroom.

Think of it like this: Pure chance gets to settle what you’re going to do that time. Look, the coin will decide whether it’s going to be his fingers or mouth, and the number on the die determines the number of rounds. And no, you’re not going to get out of this one, either. Don’t you think it’s kind of fun, too? You’re throwing your bodies in the game, what could be more thrilling than that? Or, how about this one: The coin dictates if it will be the plug or the wand, and the dice will tell you the setting. Exciting, no? So, heads or tails? ”Fuck off”? Hey, that wasn’t one of the options.

Moreover, Aventurine, perhaps a bit unexpectedly, isn’t that big of a fan of receiving. It’s a bit of a complicated matter to put into words, but from the psychological viewpoint, being on the receiving end of sexual activities does very little for him. He doesn’t know why that is, exactly. He’s aware that his head is a bit fucked up in a couple of places, but that’s where it ends. It’s not like he won’t occasionally end up having you suck on his dick or similar, but he won’t actively seek it from you. He would much rather observe how each of your barriers collapse one by one under his prying touch. Dicking you down is also more about you than it is about him, and he doesn't necessarily have to come each time himself.

The exception to this is that if you, in the very implausible scenario that it occurs, voluntarily offer yourself to him. If you, out of your own volition, come up to him and inform him that you would like to give him head, he will unquestionably agree to it. He doesn’t even let himself consider if what you’re doing is just a manipulation tactic, simply because he’s so overjoyed by it. He won’t show it, of course — he’ll act all pompous, the usual routine, but inside, he can barely contain his elation. Of course, you’re only doing this to get something out of him, but oh well. He might as well enjoy it.

One more peculiar thing about him is that, no matter what you do, he will never actually hurt you during sex. It doesn’t matter if he’s punishing you, for a serious offence, even, he will (almost) never slap you around beyond your butt or draw blood or anything like that. He just can’t get himself to even think of doing those things to you. There will be threats, sure, those keep you pliant, but you can be certain that you’ll never be hurt physically aside from what’s strictly essential. Your nerve endings in a certain few places may very well be fried, but never anything more severe.

A/N

This was a bit of a tricky write in the sense that Aventurine’s character has an incredibly rough backstory. Don’t get me wrong, obviously the topics at hand in this writing are equally as heavy in the real world, but the difference is that it’s meant to be horny content here. Aventurine’s lore isn’t meant to be hornied at all, at least not in my eyes, so avoiding those tones brought some difficulty. I sometimes find it hard to walk the line between the two moods.

That being said, I decided not to touch on the topic of his past too much for this reason. Above all, these are fictional characters we’re dealing with, and technically I could write almost whatever the fuck I want, but this is where my ethics stand. I hope you had a good read regardless!

(Off-topic but I can't believe I had to do research on gambling out of all things to write this piece. What a ride.)

Extra Special A/N

I got an inquiry if I could tag people when dropping a new profile. So, I present to you, my one-person taglist ⋆｡°✩

@yourfavouritecitizen

[peachdues]

SCALED — the teaser

Sailor!Sanemi x Mermaid!Reader • 18+

A/N: it’s Sanemi’s turn to be the monsterfucker, y’all.

CW: the tiniest bit suggestive but be warned: this story will be hella NSFW. MDNI. Sanemi gets a taste of mermussy later

There, amidst the cragged adamant, is a flash of blue. Not the blue of the ocean, with its subtle greens that shift in and out of the sun’s punishing rays. It was the blue of jewels; of precious sapphires and tourmalines like those he’d seen hanging from ropes of silver the nobles wore around their necks. Indigo, too, like the watery trail left behind by the moon when it hung fat and silver in the night sky.

The very precise shade of blue Douma had described.

Sanemi squints harder as the blue shifts and sways atop the rocks. The sun glitters off the whorls of color, blending them together just as much as it pulls them apart. A sudden wave knocks harshly up the side of the ship, spraying his face with sea water. When he finishes wiping the salt from his eyes, the ship has moved a little closer into shore, and Sanemi can finally make out the source of the blue.

A woman. No, he shakes his head as he wipes the back of his hand again across his eyes. Not a woman — not fully. True, she bears all the upper attributes of a woman: two arms, pretty hands, and human breasts bared toward the sun. Her face too, is human, even if her beauty is otherworldly. But, as Sanemi tracks his eyes down the length of her form, he sees that her humanity stops right below her navel. Where her hips should give way to two legs — and the paradise he knows, as a man, must lie between them — there are only scales. Rich, cobalt scales, untinteruppted as they stretch down down down the side of the rock.

Drifting lazily in the surf is the tip of her great tail.

A mermaid.

Sanemi’s jaw slackens. A swear creeps up his throat, but it dies on his tongue, now too dry, too swollen to force it out.

A charter could undertake a thousand different expeditions to seek out a mermaid only to return empty handed — if it returned at all. Yet, here he was, stranded on a ship that managed to come across one on her maiden voyage. Even if Sanemi had been a betting man, this is the sort of odd he’d never have the stones to wager. Not if his life depended on it.

He thinks he should count his lucky stars he doesn’t have such vices. Otherwise, he would’ve been deprived of this — of her and her enchanting beauty — if he had.

Silently, he watches the mermaid in awe until the ship has nearly passed the rock upon which she suns.

Her eyes flash to his.

Sanemi dares not blink; neither does she. Even the call seagulls fades beneath the gentle crash of the waves lapping against the ship’s hull.

A mermaid is the price to gain back what we lost, boy. Douma had boasted with his too sharp smile and too sharp teeth. Perhaps you’ll win your freedom by helping us gain ours.

He thinks of his mother; of his sisters and their frightened faces and rigid shoulders as Douma’s men leered and taunted them; of the gash his brother now bears across his cheek.

He thinks of the beautiful creature watching him warily from her sanctuary among the lodestone, her tail dragging slowly through the water.

Fuck ‘em. He won’t say a damn word.

“Boy!”

On reflex, Sanemi whips around. Scanning the deck, he finds the irritated mug of Kyogai, snarling and sneering at him from the quarter deck. A quick glance overboard and Sanemi holds up two fingers; two meters between the rocks and the ship’s starboard side.

Kyogai scoffs and turns away. The rest of the crew ignore him, too busy throwing rope and drawing in the sails as they prepare to anchor. For a long moment he remains frozen, feet cemented to the forecastle with no memory of how to move. Only when he feels the familiar shudder shake below the keel is he able to move his tight limbs.

He does not hear the faint splash of water over the pounding of his heart in his ears.

Breathe, idiot. He commands himself. In, one, two, three through his nose; let the salt ignite his blood, creep up the back of his tongue, before he lets it out in the same count. Repeat. Repeat again, until his errant pulse calms. Then he will look.

When Sanemi finally turns back, the mermaid is gone.

[entitled-fangirl]

I promise everything.

Cregan Stark x Targaryen!wife!reader

Summary: the two have been married for months. When attending Aegon and Helaena’s wedding, the reader becomes self conscious on why they don’t have children yet.

Warnings: talks of sex

Masterlist

………………………………

Cregan cracked open the door slowly as he walked in, "My love, are you…"

His question died off from his lips as his eyes took in what laid in the room.

His wife, the younger twin of Aegon II, stood tall as her handmaiden finished tying the dress she wore. A noble blue hue to it, a perfect symbol of house Stark at a Targaryen wedding. The color did something to him inside.

She managed eye contact with him through the mirror and frowned, "Am I what?"

He bit his lip for a moment with a furrowed brow before doing a small shrug, "Uh. It's alright. Take your time."

She smiled and let out a soft laugh.

The handmaiden was soon finished and excused herself.

Y/n turned around to finally look fully at Cregan. Her eyes moved up and down his body, "You look rather dashing."

Now far from the north, Cregan had to abandon his fur cloak, leaving him in his dark tunic, blue surcoat and the Wolf sigil embroidered across the chest. Now his broad shoulders were quite displayed, as well as his fit physique that was usually up to imagination. He smiled at her, "And you…"

Her brows pulled together for just a moment, "What?" She turned to the mirror, "Is something amiss?"

He quickly held his hands up to reassure her, "No, my dear. I only meant that… I… I am utterly speechless is all."

She looked back to him with a grin, "Ah. And here I thought you wouldn't like it."

"You believed I wouldn't?" He asked as he rested his hands on her hips. "How could I not enjoy the sight of my wife dressed as a wolf in the midst of dragons?"

She chuckled as her hands moved to his chest, "I am entirely a wolf now, Cregan."

He grinned widely, "That's the best part." He leaned in a trailed kisses down her jaw, "Perhaps I'll get to enjoy you dressed in nothing by the end of the night."

…

Due to the convenience of having the two Targaryen siblings marrying themselves, the entire family fit at the high table, Y/n and Cregan towards the end.

Next to her younger brother Aemond, the two quiet siblings whispered to one another in discussion, including Cregan when he wasn't distracted by the over-the-top atmosphere.

Aemond was a fair brother to her, closer now during this age than her own twin or sister had ever been. "I suppose you're now stuck horse-riding without me around?"

The two had once shared in their lack of dragon. When Aemond claimed Vhagar, he made a vow to not abandon his sister so quickly in her endeavors, letting her ride Vhagar with him when she had needed outside of the keep.

The North had nothing of the sort, and leaving had been hard.

She nodded, "Yes, but Cregan gifted me the most wonderful horse. We ride quite often, weather permitting."

Aemond hummed, "You'll have to take a break from riding soon, I'd wager."

She frowned, "Why ever would I do that?"

"It's not healthy to do while with child."

"Well," she bit back sarcasm, "I am not with child. I have time."

"You've been married for nearly eleven moons. Most are with child by the third."

"I am not most, am I, brother?"

Noticing her bitter tone, he hummed and changed topics. He leaned over to look to Cregan, "My lord, do tell me what horse you've gifted my sister."

Cregan's expression immediately brightened at the topic of something he knew quite well, "A fjord horse. Not a runner by any means but a reliable one when…"

She zoned out from there, staring absent-mindedly at the dance floor.

Perhaps Aemond was right. Should she be with child by now?

Had she done something wrong? What if she was unable to have children? Would Cregan abandon her?

She looked to Aegon and Helaena dancing. Smiling at one another.

What if her own siblings had children before she did? How weak of a Targaryen does that make her?

"Admiring the dancing?" Cregan's voice suddenly murmured near her.

She turned her head to him, seeing his worried expression studying her.

How long had their conversation been over and she'd just been staring off in the distance?

"Is everything alright, my girl?"

She smoothed a hair back behind her ear, "I'm only lost in thought is all."

He grunted in acknowledgement. "A dangerous place to be." He tilted his head, "Wanna talk about it?'

"Not really."

He nodded but made no motion to move. He knew her quite well by now and knew she would soon-

"Why am I not with child?"

He knew she'd state her thoughts, but he didn't consider it to be that one. He frowned, "I don't suppose I have an answer."

She leaned back as the next song started, "Do you think less of me for it?"

His head tilted again like a dog hearing an uncomfortable tone, "Do I… No. No, I do not."

"I just don't understand why then."

"Darling, the gods will grant a child to us when they deem the time fit. Please do not let a thought like this ruin the celebration."

She nodded and sniffled lightly, pushing back the tears in her waterline. "You're right. What a foolish thing to stress over."

He let out a content sigh, happy with her answer. When silence loomed over the two, he watched Aegon and Helaena dance. A thought popped into the Northerner's head, and he leaned towards her again, "Perhaps we can imagine no time has passed at all."

Her face turned contemplative, "How so?"

"Perhaps," he whispered, "Tonight can be just like our wedding night."

"I'm listening."

But Cregan Stark is a man of action. He stood abruptly and held out his hand. "May I have the honor of a dance with my perfect wife?"

She grinned, trying to ignore the stares of her family and the people. She whispered, "You hate to dance."

"Aye, but I love to please you more."

Her cheeks flushed, but she took his hand and let him lead her to the floor as the next song started.

As a high lord, Cregan had been taught all of the dances. But he was no real dancer. He preferred the dance of battle than one in a ballroom. How he managed to get by for one and twenty years with only a single dance with his wife, he's unsure of. He only hoped not to embarrass her this second time.

His steps were heavy compared to her light ones. His moves, though carefully calculated, were clumsy compared to her precise ones done without a second thought. His eyes had to double check every step and move. He was sure she did it with her eyes closed.

Though nervous, a smile was plain and broad across his features.

She could feel his nerves radiate off of him in comforting waves, a reassurance to her that he would face his greatest fears for her. Not dragon fire. A dance floor. And he did so happily.

When the dance finished, he couldn't stop himself and planted a heavy kiss to her lips. He didn't care who saw. This was his wife. She was his, and he was hers.

"Let us retire," she panted against his lips.

His grin continued. "Yes, my lady."

…

Once away from the crowd, their lips moved in tandem, pausing against various pillars and walls to breathe each other in.

"Please put a child in me, Cregan."

He let out a loud groan against her lips at her words. "I will," he whispered.

He tried to move his mouth back to hers and she pulled hers away, making him chase hers. He let out a breathy plea, "I will."

Her fingers came up, her thumb brushing over his bottom lip, "Promise me?"

"I promise. I'll do whatever it takes, my girl. I'll give you a baby, I promise." He leaned in, only to be denied her again. His voice softened, "I promise everything."

She leaned in just a bit, "Take me like you did on our wedding night."

He picked her up, slamming their chamber door behind him.

…

Needless to say, about nine months later, a babe laid in Cregan's arms as he sat next to his exhausted wife.

There never was a Stark who forgot an oath.

………………………………….

Cregan Stark taglist: @misswynters, @cosmosnkaz, @sithapprentice, @kaniromi, @lovemesomevesey, @its-jackie-bb, @callsignwidow, @8812-342, @nyxbranwenn, @thorins-queen-of-erebor

[vivalas-vega]

like real people do / bucky barnes x reader

yay first bucky one shot !! this literally started as me wanting to write some quick and dirty one-bed trope nonsense... and then it got real lol. i just love him your honor, i got angsty and fluffy real fast. as always, please let me know what you think!!

like real people do / bucky barnes x reader

I do not have a taglist--if you'd like to be notified, please follow @vegaslibrary and turn on post notifications!

summary: a brush with death on a mission leads to you and bucky confronting your feelings.

word count: 5.6k

warnings: canon level violence/scary situations, language, angst, minor suggestiveness (this takes place in some reality where bucky & reader work for fury lmao & a very minor reference to this happening after endgame but none of that really matters it was just the vibe that ended up happening)

The air felt hot and sticky around you, laced with danger and the edge of fear you were keeping at arm's length… but it was harder to do so as you went crashing down a full flight of stairs… assailant in tow and doing nothing to break your fall.

“Princess? Could use a little help out here,” you heard Bucky grunt in your ear and the familiar surge of worry filled your chest as you rolled to your feet, not wasting a second in launching an attack on the man in front of you.

“Little busy, Buck,” you managed to get out, dodging a hit before landing one of your own, but your thoughts weren’t here. Each step you took backwards was goading your attacker, but it was also leading you closer to Bucky. “How bad?” you followed up, a kick sharp to your ribs knocking the breath out of you but the feeling was secondary to everything else going on in your mind.

“Don’t worry about me,” he replied. The words eased your anxiety–marginally–and let you be more present in the fight at your feet, not the one down the hall.

Everything in your body ached, and you didn’t know if the blood sliding down your temple was from where you’d collided with every sharp edge of the staircase, or from one of the hits your opponent had managed to land.

If you had to wager, you’d probably say it was from both.

You tasted blood against your teeth, and you finally landed a combo that brought the man to his knees… but before you could finish the job he was back on his feet, grabbing you by the throat and pinning you to the wall. Your legs kicked several feet off the ground as he lifted you, the force cutting off your airflow.

He knocked your head against the concrete hard enough to make your ears ring, and you brought your fists down with everything you had against his elbows–trying to break them down, give you some kind of opening, but they were locked and rigid.

“Bucky!” you choked out, praying to a god you didn’t really believe in that he heard you. When the gloved hand tightened around the column of your throat you felt the lack of oxygen clouding your brain, vision darkening around the edges.

You fell to the floor suddenly, knees colliding painfully with the concrete as you sucked in a desperate breath. Your lungs burned as you coughed, trying to force the air down around the panic that had begun to settle deep in your bones.

A gunshot fell on your muffled ears, but you didn’t flinch. Somewhere in the back of your mind you instinctively knew it was Bucky, and you pressed your palms flat against the cool floor to try and ground yourself… but Bucky’s slid over them, gripping and trying to get you to focus on him.

“Hey,” he said softly, reaching out and tilting your chin up. As soon as you looked into those stormy blue eyes you felt some of the anxiety ease, and he made quick work looking you over. “Talk to me, are you okay?” His gaze was holding yours with a little too much weight and you swore he might have flinched when he saw the outline of the man’s hands already appearing around your neck… but maybe you’d been deprived of air for too long.

You nodded, trying to hide your wince as he helped you to your feet. “Never better,” you replied, taking a step back and trying to put some distance between you. “Did you get it?”

He gave you a slightly deadpan look, holding a flash drive between his thumb and index finger that you quickly snatched to zip safely into a pocket inside your suit.

“Then let’s get the hell out of here,” you sighed.

You slid Bucky’s spare helmet on your head with practiced ease and took your spot behind him on the bike… a routine done so many times neither of you even thought as your limbs moved.

He reached back and tapped twice against your calf, you tapped twice against his chest, and his bike roared into action.

You let yourself relax, just slightly, as you held onto Bucky and weaved through the busy streets of the foreign city. The cool night air felt like pure relief as it kissed your skin, and if you knew he wouldn’t yell at you, you’d have taken the helmet off to let it wash over you fully.

Your chin rested lightly on his shoulder, watching the way the streetlights blurred around you, as the weight of the night crashed heavy over your frame. His arm moved down to your leg, metal stretching down the length of it and gripping your calf, holding you firm as he took a tight turn, bike tilting closer to the pavement. He let it linger for a moment as it straightened out, knowing you were momentarily rattled by the mission even if you wouldn’t say it, and he gave you a soft squeeze that said more than he could in that moment.

You shifted, cheek pressing against his back, eyes fluttering closed and arms still tight around his torso. You thought to yourself that you loved these moments with Bucky maybe more than anything. Just you and him, the stretch of road, and the air whipping around you. You both were always outrunning danger, outrunning death, but on this bike it felt like it couldn’t catch you. Like nothing could… and Bucky was thinking the same thing.

He didn’t need to look back at you to know you’d shut your eyes, and his grip on the handlebars tightened. The feeling of you wrapped around him, placing your trust right in the palm of his hands did something to him that he didn’t want to think about too much. You shot through the night, barely a blur to stationary eyes, and you had relaxed into him and closed your eyes. The weight of that had clawed its way into Bucky’s chest, made a home somewhere under his ribs, and he hated how much he liked it.

You hopped off the bike with ease, looking up at the motel that would have been unappealing on its best day like it was a beacon of comfort and sanctuary, and he couldn’t help but chuckle softly at the way your heavy footsteps trudged all the way to the door.

You stood there for a moment, staring at it like it might open itself… and so did he.

“Aren’t you gonna open it?” you asked, brow furrowing.

“Was gonna ask you the same thing, princess.”

You just looked at each other for a moment, trying to process.

“I don’t have the key,” you said and his eyes widened.

“Well, I don’t have it either,” he replied and you pinched the bridge of your nose.

“I saw Fury give you the key.”

“Then you took it after we dropped our shit off.”

“Unbelievable,” you muttered. “World’s best assassin.” You patted along your suit, trying to feel for a key you knew you didn’t have. “Can’t keep track of a fucking motel key.”

“You talking about me or you?” He wasn’t able to keep the smirk off his face, despite his exhaustion.

“You know what?” you asked and he raised his eyebrows expectantly, but his expression dropped almost as fast as you did to your knees right in front of him.

“What the hell are you-” he stopped short, watching you pull a bobby pin from your hair to stick into the door handle.

“Oh,” he murmured, a sheepish hand landing on the back of his neck, and you huffed a soft laugh, turning back to give him an amused glance as you jimmied the door open. He was grateful you couldn’t see the heat in his cheeks under the cover of night, or the way he locked his gaze on the door rather than you beneath him.

You took his hand when he offered it, and pushed into the sparse room with a sigh. You were ready to sink into your post-mission routine when you caught a glimpse of the key resting on the dresser, just beside his things, and you turned to look at him triumphantly.

“Aha!” you said, pointing. “I knew I didn’t take it.”

“You can be so petulant sometimes,” he muttered. “At least you’re consistent. Like a common criminal.”

You scoffed. “And thank god for it.”

“You want first shower?” He was already pulling a change of clothes out and you shook your head, busying yourself with propping your tablet up beside him.

“Go ahead, gonna get this to Fury.”

His gaze on you lingered for a moment, but you didn’t notice, and he disappeared into the bathroom like it hadn’t happened.

Your fingers traced the spot where your opponent had grabbed you, wincing at how tender it felt. You waited for the intel to load, mind drifting to what could have happened if Bucky hadn’t made it in time.

You shook off the thought.

Bucky always got to you. 

It wasn’t just your easy dynamic, or deep-seated feelings you refused to acknowledge that kept you from asking Fury to reassign you… it was that he never left you behind.

There were moments where he could have, where you nor anyone else would have blamed him. When it was too dangerous to go back for you, when it would have compromised him as much as you were… he always showed up.

And you did the same for him.

Countless missions, countless brushes with death. You’d both die before leaving the other behind.

You walked out together, or you didn’t walk out at all.

The tablet dinged and you pulled out the flash drive, tucking into your bag and pulling out your pajamas just as Bucky opened the bathroom door.

He was towel drying his hair, white tee and low-slung grey sweats hugging him in a way you tried really hard not to focus on.

“Don’t get mad that there’s no hot water,” he said, almost sheepishly. “There wasn’t any when I got in.”

You huffed an unamused laugh, meeting his eye for just a moment. “Only the best for Fury’s top agents,” you joked before shutting the door behind you.

You didn’t linger under the icy stream, not wanting to spend any more time than you had to. Each movement tugged and pulled at your muscles in a way that made you fight a groan–you didn’t want to make a peep. Not with Bucky and his super soldier hearing on the other side of the door. It’d only make him worry, and all you wanted was sleep.

When you re-emerged he was already laying on his side of the bed, closest to the door like always, and you finally noticed the fact that there was in fact only one–and you breathed a light sigh of relief. You should have been annoyed, you had a suspicion Fury actually kept doing this to you both for his own amusement, but you didn’t care. Even with the firm boundary of six inches between you, you always slept better beside Bucky. You felt safe, and you were more rested after a long mission than you were on a normal night in the compound.

He watched you carefully as you tucked your suit into your bag and went through your usual routine of getting ready for bed. Each new bruise he spotted made him shift upright, concern darkening his expression, and he was quickly in motion when he saw the cut above your eyebrow he’d missed before.

“Jesus Christ,” he muttered and your eyebrow pinched at his sudden movement.

“What are you doing?” you asked, hovering in the center of the room, and you almost thought he looked mad for a second.

“Would you sit down?” he huffed, grabbing the med kit from his bag and you followed his orders despite your resigned sigh.

“It’s fine, Bucky.”

“No,” he said, voice firm as he moved in between your legs. “It’s really not.” He tilted your chin up to get a better look at it, disapproval settling deep in his features.

“It’s just a scratch.”

He gave you a deadpan look, running an alcohol swab across it. You hissed, hand shooting out to grab the hem of his shirt. You bunched it in your fist, fingers grazing the skin just above the waistband of his sweats and you felt him tense under your touch. You dropped your hand like he’d burned you, keeping your eyes on your own lap to avoid his gaze.

“Should have called for me sooner,” he muttered, carefully applying butterfly bandages like he was scared you’d shatter if he pressed too hard.

“Was a little preoccupied,” you replied and you could see just how unamused he was with you. “I had him,” you added. “Until he decided choking me out was a good plan.”

He was quiet as his hand settled on the side of your neck, thumb lightly tracing along the bruise that was growing angrier as it settled deep in your skin. You hated the warmth that flooded through you at the small contact, and the way his concerned eyes seemed to be burning right into your soul. 

“You could have died.”

“But I didn’t,” you whispered, voice barely audible through the silence. “You always show up.”

“Almost didn’t,” he muttered. “I was pinned. Thought I wouldn’t make it in time…” he trailed off, giving you another once over to make sure he didn’t miss anything. 

“He had you-” he hesitated, jaw tight. “By the throat, doll.” His voice was tight, stretching like it was about to break and your expression softened.

“I know.” You gave him your best reassuring look. “But I’m alright. Always am.”

He nodded once, unconvinced, and you sank back into the mattress as he put the kit away.

Something tense had settled over the room as you pulled the covers higher, but you didn’t know how to address it. Bucky always worried, you joked it was his inner old man coming out, but something in the way he’d held your gaze felt different. Something churned beneath the surface of his gaze, something you couldn’t name. You didn’t want to read into it–to let your mind wander into forbidden territory but the more the silence lingered the harder it was.

This wasn’t the first time you’d nearly died, wasn’t even the worst brush with it. You wanted to ask why this time had seemingly lodged itself under his skin but you couldn’t force the words past your lips.

The bed dipped under his weight as he slid in beside you, leaving a few inches of space like he always did but it didn’t matter. You could feel the warmth of him immediately, the pull to sink into it was almost gravitational but you resisted and leaned over to turn off the lamp.

You both laid silently, staring up at the shadows on the ceiling, waiting to see if the other would say something but neither of you seemed willing to break.

His vibranium hand twitched on his chest and he exhaled softly, the weight finally pressing down hard enough.

“I’m going to say something.”

Your head tilted slightly towards him, but you didn’t move your eyes from the ceiling.

“Okay.”

“I didn’t have to kill that guy.” He paused, considering his next words. “I wanted to, because he was trying to kill you.”

Your breath caught somewhere in your throat. You knew the relationship he had with taking a life. No matter how justified, it always stirred old feelings and you never wanted him to do that for you unless he had to. “Bucky-”

“That doesn’t bother me,” he cut you off. “Maybe it should, but it doesn’t. What bothers me is how indifferent you are to dying.”

You sighed softly. “I’m not indifferent to dying.”

“Could have fooled me.” The words were sharp, but there was no edge to them.

“I didn’t mean to scare you,” you said, voice quiet.

“You always scare me,” he exhaled. “Everything you do scares the hell out of me.”

You didn’t respond, couldn’t find any words to say as your heart started to thump unevenly in your chest.

“I try not to worry because I know you can handle yourself,” he continued. “But in those moments when you can’t…” he trailed off, not wanting to finish his sentence.

You finally turned to look at him, eyes settling on his profile and you felt something clench deep behind your ribs at the emotion he was trying to keep off his face. 

“You’re important to me,” he said after a few moments, and this caught you off guard. You knew that… at least in theory. He’d never said it so explicitly, but he never had to. He said it through actions, in his own way.

“I know,” you whispered.

“No, I don’t think you do, doll.” he replied, erring on a sigh. You rolled over onto your side to face him fully, delicately, like if you moved too fast you’d break the moment. “I tried not to care about you, thought it would be too hard. You almost remind me of Steve, if he had a mouth like yours and a habit of driving me crazy.”

You breathed a short laugh.

“I didn’t want to care because I knew if I did, it’d be too much when you left.”

“I haven’t gone anywhere, have I?” You hadn’t been able to find any words until now, but those ones flowed out easily.

“Not yet,” he said, turning his head towards you and you felt your breath catch when he finally met your eyes.

You hesitated, just long enough for the silence to stretch. “Not ever.”

“You can’t say things like that,” he muttered and your brows pinched together.

“Why not?”

“Because you can’t mean it.”

You fixed him with a firm look, something close to irritation tugging in your chest. “I do mean it.”

He looked back at the ceiling. “Maybe I don’t want you to.”

“What does that mean?”

“You’ve… changed since we started working together. You’re harsher, quicker to the trigger. I don’t want to rub off on you more than I already have.” You could see it clearly even if he was fighting to hide it–guilt. “You’re too good for me to be dragging you down, doll.”

You let out a sigh, not annoyed, just hurt. “You think you’re the big bad wolf corrupting little red riding hood?” 

“Well-”

“Fury paired you with me because my heart got in the way too much. I gave second chances to people that used them to try and kill me, and I almost fucked up missions looking for good in people that wasn’t there.”

He didn’t respond.

“I was a great agent before I met you, but I made bad calls because I thought I could give people the same second chance that was given to me. I found a balance… because of you. I’m alive because of you, Bucky.”

You could see the confusion flicker behind his eyes, like he knew he’d said something wrong but wasn’t sure what. “I didn’t mean to upset you.”

“Of course you didn’t.” You rolled back over and stared at the ceiling, feeling the crack of your heart as you did. “You just said you’re not good enough to be around. How is that not upsetting?”

“I’m not. And I don’t care if you think being my partner has helped you–all I can see is you becoming more like me and I can’t stand it.”

“Because being like you is such a bad thing?” Your eyes darted back to him again, but he wasn’t looking at you anymore. He was worrying his cheek between his teeth, gaze hard as he stared above him.

“Yes.”

That hit low and stayed there, stubborn and sore. You could feel something dancing on your tongue that you wanted to bury… so you did.

“You’re a fucking idiot,” you huffed, shuffling out from under the covers and standing.

He propped himself up on his elbows, shocked by your sudden movement, and watched as you grabbed a pair of pants from your bag.

“What the hell are you doing?”

“I don’t–” you stopped, searching for the answer yourself. “I don’t know.” He sighed when your shorts hit the floor, then quickly crossed the room, catching your wrist. Not rough, but firm–enough to make you pause.

“You’re not going anywhere.”

“What happened to knowing I could handle myself?” Your hands were shaking and Bucky was having a hard time figuring out what had made you snap like this, why you were refusing to look him in the eye.

“That’s not–fuck,” he muttered. “You’re not going anywhere because you’re angry and I can’t let you walk away like this. Can we just-” he stopped himself and ran a hand through his hair. “Can we just rewind? Go back and start this conversation over?”

“I don’t know how to pretend this conversation never happened.”

He looked lost, like he was searching for what he’d said wrong… and you weren’t stopping, so he grabbed the pants you were trying to step into and threw them somewhere behind you.

You stared at him, exasperation evident, the heat rising in your chest.

“Are you serious?”

“What the hell just happened?” He stared down at you but you wouldn’t look up. “One minute we’re having a conversation and the next you’re trying to storm out into a bad part of town in the middle of the night.”

You finally tilted your head up, and his face softened. Your eyes burned, throat tightening as you fought to keep your face blank, but he noticed… he always did. 

“Talk to me,” he pleaded, voice gentler than it had just been. “Please just tell me what I said wrong.”

“You know, I was actually proud of myself for the way I’ve learned from you?” you asked, not really expecting an answer. You turned around and bent over to pick up your pants, and Bucky’s eyes darted away, jaw tight.

“Then I find out you actually think less of me for-”

“I do not think less of you-”

“That’s not even why I’m mad!” you yelled, throwing your jeans back onto the floor with a frustrated huff after stumbling trying to pull them on.

“Why are you mad? Make me understand here, sweetheart, because I’m having a real hard time figuring out how to fix this.”

Hearing him say sweetheart in that low tone made you falter, and he caught it.

He took a step closer and hooked your chin to keep your eyes on him when you tried to look away. 

“Come on, sweetheart,” he said, voice dropping to nearly a whisper, trying to coax it out of you. “Please just talk to me.”

“Don’t,” you warned, pushing his arm away and taking a step back. “You don’t get to say you’re not good enough and then use the fact that I care to make me talk.”

“Is that really what this is about?”

“Of course it is!” you snapped. “I fucking love you, Bucky. And I am so tired of you acting like you’re unlovable. Like you don’t deserve something good.”

“I’m not,” he shot back, not even registering what you’d just said. “Not from you. Do you really think I could let myself–let you–get closer to me than you already are?”

“You don’t get to decide how I feel!” You were at the end of your rope, hands still shaking. “I love you, and you’re just going to have to figure out how to deal with that.”

The first time hadn’t sunk in, but the second made Bucky’s heart stop in his chest with a painful clench that nearly winded him. You loved him… but you weren’t done.

“I thought- fuck,” you shook your head, trying to organize your thoughts. “I have never expected you to feel the same way about me, but I can’t take you acting like I’m some delicate flower you’re bound to poison. I can’t listen to it and not tell you that I’m unbearably fucking in love with you.”

He didn’t say anything. He just stared at you with a look that you couldn’t read and you felt like you’d ripped your heart out and handed it to him just to watch him step on it.

The more the silence dragged, the more you itched to run… so you did.

You managed to tug your jeans up your legs as you said, “so to answer your question, yeah. I’m trying to storm out in the middle of the night because I can’t do whatever this is anymore. I’ll ask Fury to reassign me.”

You walked past him, each step laced with uncertainty and heartbreak, but you never made it to the door.

He caught your wrist and spun you around. You stumbled, colliding with his chest, hands braced on the firm muscle. You lifted your head to look up at him, eyes wide and scared of what he might say, but his mouth was on yours before you could even get a word out.

His lips were hungry, demanding and possessive as if he could etch his response into your skin… and then they were gone as soon as they’d appeared, leaving you reeling and breathless as he stepped back with a huff.

“Fuck, sweetheart,” he said, voice rough with conflict. “I can’t–I’m only going to hurt you. You deserve better. Better than me.”

You just blinked for a moment, one hand coming up to touch your lips like you were trying to convince yourself it was real.

“Are you being serious right now?” you asked, and his head snapped up.

“What?” 

“Do you need me to lay it all out? Is that it?”

“I don’t-”

“You never let me walk on the outside of the sidewalk. You’ve seen me kill people with my bare hands, but god forbid I walk too close to the street,” you started, letting out an unamused chuckle. “You keep an extra knife in your boot just for me, because you know I like to throw mine and then get mad when I don’t have it. Sometimes in the middle of the night you jolt awake, just to look at me. To make sure I’m still there. You think I don’t notice, but I do… it’s the only way I can sleep, and I sleep like shit at the compound because I don’t feel safe unless you’re near me.”

“Sweetheart-” he tried, but you just cut him off again, unable to stop now that you’d started.

“When I manage to make you laugh in the middle of a mission it actually feels like my heart is glowing and it’s disgusting,” you huffed, laughing despite yourself. You weren’t even making an effort to hide the tears that managed to slip down your cheeks. “I could listen to you laugh for the rest of my life and it still probably wouldn’t be enough. I’ve never cared about impressing anyone in the gym, but god–when you give me that infuriating little smirk of yours when I manage to catch you off guard, it makes me feel like I can do anything. You make me feel like I can do anything.”

You took a step forward and closed the distance. “You’re scared of hurting me. But I don’t think you realize–this, right now, is hurting me. You thinking you’re not good enough. That you’re not deserving of something good.”

His hands twitched at his sides, desperately wanting to reach out and grab you, but he held himself back.

“You deserve it more than anyone. And I’m not scared of you, Bucky. You’re not broken, not some ruined thing that needs fixed. I don’t even care if it’s not me, if you don’t want this or if you don’t feel the same, I just need you to stop acting like you don’t deserve it.”

“I’m sorry, sweetheart,” he sighed, small and broken, finally reaching out to grab your waist and pull you closer.

He brushed a strand of hair behind your ear, thumb brushing along your cheek as he looked down at you like you were something holy–sent to save and curse him all at once.

“I take the outside of the sidewalk, and bring an extra knife, and wake up just to check up on you because I love you.” he said, letting it hang for a moment as his hand on your waist tightened. “I love you so much, it scares the hell out of me… and I didn’t know how else to show you that. It didn’t feel fair to give it to you straight because this isn’t normal or easy, and I didn’t want to drag you into it.”

He took a deep breath. “You think I’m not damaged, but I am. I’ve got some serious shit I’m still working through, and I didn’t want to put you through that.”

“You’re putting me through it anyway,” you said. “Might as well let me hold your hand because I hate watching you do it alone.”

He just looked you over for a moment, searching for any trace of uncertainty in your eyes but all he found was an unwavering love that rattled him to his core.

He leaned down and kissed you–not fiery and desperate like the first time. Properly, slowly, like it should have been.

“Our lives were never meant to be normal and easy, Bucky,” you said when he pulled back, a hint of your usual mischief in your eyes that he loved so much. “I met you fighting weird alien robots that looked like bugs.”

He laughed, handing you that favorite sound of yours that made you flush, before giving you another slow, deep kiss.

“I wanna take you out,” he mumbled against your lips. “Something normal, like real people do.”

The ghost of a smirk tugged at your features. “You gonna ask me to go steady at the end of it, Sergeant Barnes?”

He fought a groan at hearing you pull out his long-forgotten rank. “Don’t call me that before date three–and I might.”

You laughed and wrapped your arms around his shoulders, nose brushing his.

“You think you’re making it to date three?” you teased and a slow, satisfied grin tugged at his lips.

“You did just scream at me over the fact that you’re in love with me,” he said, bringing his hands down to the top button of your jeans, slowly undoing it without breaking eye contact. “I think I can get a lot more out of you than three dates.”

Your breath hitched, but you didn’t deny it.

He caught the way your eyes tracked him as he sank onto the floor, tugging your jeans down your legs and holding your calves to help you step out of them. “Don’t look at me like that,” he said, mildly scolding.

His hands slid up to the backs of your thighs and you couldn’t help but thread your fingers through his hair when he gently kissed below the hem of your shirt, a soft breath escaping… but he was back at your lips before you could even blink.

“Come on, off to bed,” he ordered, and you huffed a small laugh of disbelief.

“You’re a tease, Sergeant.”

“Shouldn’t have told you I liked that,” he muttered, sliding in beside you. “Call me old-fashioned, but I want to do this right–earn the privilege to have you like that.”

Your cheeks flushed and you bit back a smile as you settled beneath the covers.

“You’re very old fashioned,” you teased and he gave you a deadpan look. “But I think it’s perfect.” You leaned over to press a kiss to his cheek, lingering for just a moment. “I’d wait as long as you wanted.”

You eyed the space between you. “Is the invisible boundary still in effect until date three?”

He chuckled and reached out, pulling you flush against him and you laid your head against his chest, listening to the steady thud of his heart as you wrapped an arm around his torso.

You lay like that for a few minutes, letting what had just happened wash over you as your eyes fluttered shut at the feeling of his arms holding you so securely, and the way he kept pressing kisses to the top of your head.

He reached down, gently tilting your chin towards him and your breath stalled when you caught those blue eyes you loved so much, holding yours just as intensely as they always did, but with something else in them now–completely unguarded.

“I need you to know I’ll never do anything to intentionally hurt you.”

You nodded, “I already knew that, Bucky.”

He leaned down to press his lips to yours, short and sweet before either of you let it turn into something heated.

“And I sleep better next to you, too,” he said, letting his thumb trail along your bottom lip. “Never have nightmares when you’re next to me.”

You smiled softly, cupping his cheek and tracing your thumb across his cheekbone. “I’ll be here if you ever do.”

He kissed you again, like he was trying to tell you something he didn’t have the words for, and you felt every one deep in your chest.

You chased his lips when he pulled away and he smirked against you, giving you one, then two, then three more quick kisses that made you giggle.

“Goodnight, sweetheart.”

“Goodnight, Sergeant.”