#THEN when she was finally done and tried to put in the prepared loop earrings it turned out that she made the holes too small

[coffee-bat]

btw did i ever mention how my first ear piercing was done manually with a needle and no anesthetic and it was kinda fucked up

[alcinadimitrescuwu]

Listen hear me out. A nb reader with Alcina and one day readers gets to wear the strap and “top” our 9 foot baddie ! Maybe reader makes Alcina beg and after Alcina is super surprised and slightly embarrassed because she’s never been successfully topped before. If it’s to crazy just tell me !

Not crazy at all! I hope you enjoy!

Warning: NSFW

The carriage makes its way around the craggy mountainside. You open the window slightly and take a few grateful mouthfuls of fresh mountain air. You’d rather not have had to be in a stuffy carriage for hours on end, but you had been assigned to accompany the Lady Dimitrescu on her latest business trip for the Sanguis Viriginis Wine Company.

She sits across from you now, waving her fan in front of her beautiful face. Her carmine lips are pursed in annoyance, the current generated from her fan making a few loose curls from under her pinned hat dance. Her gaze turns to you and she gives you an uncertain smile.

“It shouldn’t be too much longer now,” she says, taking out her cigarette holder. You are already at the ready with your lighter that you had taken from your vest pocket. She inclines her dark head close to yours and you breathe in her perfume as you light her cigarette for her. From up close you can see her laugh lines and her long lashes that kiss the tip of her cheekbones. She takes a few experimental puffs before settling back in the carriage seat. Taking a long drag, she blows the smoke out the window, the smoke blending in with the clouds that surround the Romanian mountains.

You are suddenly feeling rather hot in this cramped carriage. You begin to unhook your arm bracers so you can push your shirtsleeves up to your elbows. When you look up, you see that Lady Dimitrescu’s golden eyes are staring intently at your arms as you roll up your sleeves, muscles standing out tautly under a soft down of dark hair. You meet her eyes and she quickly looks away, but not before you catch a glimpse of the high color rising in her cheeks.

“If I may, my Lady,” you posit, resting your hand on her leg. “My offer still stands.”

“No. It can wait,” she says, stiffly, but you can tell it takes her great effort. The two of you had had a few torrid nights this summer and you could tell she was stressed from the preparations for the trip. She had been spending night after night poring over ledgers and spreadsheets and by the time she was done, all she wanted to do was go to bed and sleep.

It had been a long time since you had enjoyed the pleasure of each other’s company, to say the least.

The driver breaks your train of thought as you hear her yell, “Going to be a bit bumpy on this next trek, my Lady. I’d suggest finding something to hold on to.”

Alcina sniffs in annoyance and puts out her cigarette in the ashtray next to her.

The ride does indeed start to get more bumpy. Alcina puts a hand to her hat to avoid crushing it on the roof of the carriage and you press yourself into a corner to avoid being jostled around too much.

BANG!

The carriage hits a particularly rough spot and you are sent flying. You land on something soft and when you look up you realize that you are in Alcina’s lap and your hand is cupping her breast. You make eye contact with her and you can see the want in her aureate eyes, feeling her nipple stiffen through her clothes under your touch.

You chuckle at her. “When are you going to let go of your foolish pride, my Lady?” you ask, tucking a stray curl behind her ear. You brace yourself against her by wrapping your arms around her neck. Your legs straddle her hips, and each jolt of the carriage sends a current of electricity through the both of you.

“It’ll just be for a couple more miles, pet.” Her voice is hoarse, belying the desperation in her eyes.

You grin wolfishly. “Well, then...Let’s see how I can test your limits until then. Like this.” You begin kissing the side of her neck and she leans back against the wall of the carriage, sighing. “Or this.” You draw your hand further down the front of her dress and move your thumb in a circular motion around her areola. When she inhales sharply, arching into your touch, you know you are close to breaking her. “Or-”

You don’t finish the rest of the sentence as she grabs you by your necktie and begins kissing you fiercely. Her lips move hungrily against yours as she reaches for your belt buckle.

BANG!

Another sharp bump in the road makes you bang your head painfully into hers. Alcina growls with frustration and raps her large hand on the side of the carriage to alert the driver.

The driver hops down from her seat and opens the carriage door. Her face grows bright red at seeing the two of you entangled together. Alcina ignores it, saying primly, “I do believe the horses need watering. You’ve been driving them rather hard and they need their rest.”

The driver nods, crisply. “Very good, my Lady. And uh…” She glances at the two of you again and looks away quickly. “I thought I saw an inn up a ways and I think I’ll take my lunch there.”

The carriage stops at a nearby creek and with a wave the driver heads over to the inn to take her lunch. You and Alcina are finally alone together.

Without delay, Alcina opens her reticule and takes out the strap. You can’t help it. You burst out laughing.

Alcina narrows her eyes at you. “Has something struck you as humorous, dear?”

“I’m sorry, my Lady,” you say, wiping tears from your eyes. “But you just had that in your purse the whole time?’

Alcina glares defiantly back at you, but her cheeks are burning with color. “I wasn’t sure when we’d need it.”

She takes the strap and harness and begins to move her skirt up her leg but you put out a hand to stop her. “If you don’t mind, my Lady, I would like to wear it this time.”

Alcina grins. “That sounds like a wonderful idea, pet,” she purrs. She bites down on your lower lip as she helps you secure the strap and harness around your hips. Her tongue enters your mouth as you unhook the pearl buttons running down her back. Her dress pools around her ankles and she kicks it aside. She is now only in her corset and garters, her generous bosom straining against her basque.

You lower yourself and when you peel away her panties you see her thighs are already slick with her arousal. You rasp your tongue along her inner thigh and you feel her body positively thrumming with desire.

“Please, darling,” she begs. “Please don’t tarry any longer. Take me here. Take me now. I want you inside of me.”

“Patience,” you purr against her thigh. “Good things always come to those who wait.”

Your tongue teases at her entrance, stroking her sensitive walls. She takes you by the shoulder and low, furtive moans escape her ruby lips. You dart your tongue quickly in and out, almost but not quite reaching her clit.

You know you’re being unfair, but something about Alcina begging for you is just so irresistible.

You chance a look up at her and her golden eyes are pleading. You settle yourself back on top of her and push in slowly filling her walls with your mass. You begin to ride her hard, bracing your hands on her quivering thighs.

You lean in and whisper in her ear as you’re riding her. “Do you like that, my Lady? None of the other maidens have ridden you like this, have they?”

“No,” she gasps out as you unlace her stays. “Pray, continue.” Her corset falls away and you toss it to the side of the carriage. Her breasts are now bared and you latch yourself onto one, suckling and nipping at the sensitive bud with your teeth. You find your own thighs are now wet with your arousal as the great Lady Dimitrescu becomes undone before your eyes, howling and pleading with you for more, more, more.

You see no reason to deny her. You slide one, two, three fingers in, before just deciding to put your whole hand inside her core. She cries out and yips as your fingers quest along her walls, stroking her sensitive nub at the center. Her hand flies out and hits the window, making the glass crack and splinter.

She buries her fingers in your shoulders, looping under your suspenders. “Please, darling. I’m so close! Don’t stop, I beg of you!”

You put all of your body weight into each thrust now, filling her so completely with your cock and with your fist. Your hips are screaming from the strain. But you can’t stop until she orgasms. You want her to praise you. You want her to agree that no one has treated her better than you have.

When she finally climaxes, she screams your name so loud that you're pretty sure the poor carriage driver can hear it all the way from the inn where she is taking her lunch.

Alcina leans back against the carriage walls pulling you against her as she tries to regain her composure. The cracked window is soon fogged up from the both of you gasping for air.

When she finally gets her breath back, Alcina runs a hand through your hair, weaving each strand between her fingers. “Very well done, my pet,” she cooes. You glance up at her and her cheeks are crimson. She looks away self-consciously. “You were right, my dear. No one has touched me the way you did tonight.” She gives you a sloppy kiss. “I shall have to look forward to the next time.”

You smile at her, taking her hand in yours and kissing the back of her knuckles. “Of course my Lady.”

You help her dress and once the carriage driver comes back you lay your head on her lap and quickly fall asleep as the carriage makes its way to the next town.

[fivelakesinwriting]

heyy!! love everything you write and would love to do this off anon but je suis shy 🤚 idk if you're taking requests for pope and i havent really thought this through but perhaps,, reader's kinda doing shit in school so pope offers to help (or she asks him to help idk) but she's pretty down bad since they barely get to spend time alone together so, uh, minimal studying ends up happening...

sorry for the crappy explanation but your last pop fic threw me for a loop 🙃

You are so sweet - do not have to be shy! I am always taking requests for our guy Pope. Thank you so much. You are the loveliest xoxo

Author's Notes: All characters are 18+ If I had a boyfriend like Pope I probably would have done better on my academics..maybe..If this was your request, I hope you love it !

Warnings: Sexual references - sexual innuendos *(Not full smut, but clothes are removed, and I suppose I eluded to unprotected sex - so be careful out there, your choice how!! )

Requested? YES! Requests for OBX are OPEN!

*My work is not to be transferred, copied, translated or reposted to any other sites without my permission. Please see my masterlist for all other works and warnings. Thank you! xoxo

Pope tried not to get into his own head too much, or let JJ get into his head too much, when she had asked him over that night to help her study for an upcoming test.

"Dude. You know what that means, right? Come over and 'study'?"

His best friend's words rang in his head as he pedaled his bike through the Cut towards his new girlfriend's house. He was expecting nothing, and his book-bag was full of all the necessary notebooks and textbooks to help her prepare for his English exam this coming Thursday.

Pope knocked on the door of the small house and waited for a few minutes before he let himself in. Her parents weren't home, both of them pulling double shifts that day and her being an only child gave them more than enough time to be alone and study.

"You're not gonna study, dude."

Pope shook his head as JJ's words invaded his thoughts once more, then made his way through the short hallway at the front of the house and to the back towards her bedroom. He knocked on the door frame of her bedroom when he saw her pace the floor of her room, mumbling to herself.

"Hey. I'm here." He smiled softly as he placed his bag down on the floor by the doorway and walked in slowly.

"Pope. Thank, God." She breathed out at the sight of him. She walked over to him quickly and tossed her arms around his neck, pressed up on her toes to be closer to his height.

"Nervous?" He asked while he wrapped his arms around her waist, resting his chin on her shoulder while he let her squeeze her as tightly as she could.

"Yes."

"Don't be. I have the best system for studying, and it's even helped JJ a time a two when he's actually wanted to study. So, you'll be fine. Better than fine." Pope stated firmly as he pulled out of her tight grip then reached back to grab his book bag for his study supplies that he brought with him.

"You're so sweet for helping me, Pope." She breathed out as she walked over to the edge of the bed and sat down, running her hands through her hair.

"Of course. You know I'm here for you." Pope smiled softly as he walked over to the edge of the bed, sitting next to her. He placed his notebooks on his lap and handed her his textbook, marked with sticky notes and highlighted to perfection.

They studied for a full 45 minutes before her impatience and pure frustration with the subject got the best of her. She let out a loud groan, taking the book and tossing it across the room before she flopped back on the bed.

"I'm never going to get it right." She sighed heavily as she tossed her forearms over her face. She always felt so inferior when it came to books and smarts compared to Pope. He was brilliant, and he tried to hard to help her understand her subjects.

"It's alright. You will. Sometimes you need to study in little increments as opposed to all at once. We can take a break." Pope smiled softly as he removed the books from her lap, and his own, then placed them on the floor by the edge of the bed.

Pope laid back on the bed beside her, his hands respectfully on his stomach as he looked over at his girlfriend who was still in the throes of an academic meltdown.

"You're smarter than you think you are. You put too much pressure on yourself." Pope stated softly, a small smile on his face as she finally pulled her arms off her pretty face and looked over at him.

"Not as smart as you." She whispered as she reached a hand over and began to fiddle with the buttons of his shirt. She shifted her body so she laid on her side, propped up on one arm as she began to slowly unbutton his shirt.

"I - uh - I don't know if I would say that. You're really smart, and pretty. And like, really funny. Did I mention pretty? Because you're beautiful." Pope stammered as he looked from her face to her fingers as they pulled at the final button of his shirt.

"You've mentioned it a time or two." She nodded as she turned her body to straddle his hips, her hands pressed to his chest for leverage as she sat up straight.

"What are you doing?" Pope inquired softly as he sat upright, his hands on her hips as he let her wrap her arms around his neck.

"Study break?" She smiled as she began to push his shirt off of his shoulders, down to his elbows.

Pope let go of her hips in favour of shaking his hands out behind him, his shirt sliding off arms. He groaned when his girlfriend pressed her lips to his firmly, knocking him to his back again. Pope let out a long exhale through his nostrils as she pressed a firm kiss to his lips, his hands making their way to her backside to keep her in place on top of him.

"Your parents - " Pope breathed out as she began to kiss down his neck, her fingers trailing down his abdomen towards the button of his shorts.

"Mom is on late shift at the hospital, and my dad is driving a truck to Fortworth this week." She smiled into the crease of his neck as she felt him squeeze her backside over her shorts.

"Texas?" Pope asked with a heavy breath, his fingertips creeping up the back of her shirt.

"Long-haul trucker. You know that." She replied as she sat up, pulling her shirt over head.

"So, we're alone." Pope stated with his hands firmly on her hips while his eyes scanned over her chest in a bright yellow pushup bra.

"For a long time." She smiled with a nod, thumbing open the button of his shorts and then waiting. The tension between them thickened, both of them waiting for other to make the first move. They had been together before, more than a handful of times, but each time felt like the first time. That shortened breath, quick heartbeat. The excited nervousness was tangible.

"Can I?" Pope questioned as he reached his fingertips up to brush over the clasp of her bra. He sat up to be closer to her, feeling almost cold without her next to him.

"Of course you can." She nodded as she placed her hands on his shoulders, her forehead against his as he unhooked her bra and slid the straps down her shoulders.

"You're so beautiful." Pope breathed out while he pulled her bra off her arms and tossed it off the edge of the bed, his hands surging forward to cup her breasts.

"Thank you." She shivered at the feeling of his warm palms on her skin, her left hand at the nape of his neck while the other held herself steady on his shoulder.

Pope leaned forward to press a kiss to her collarbone, then began to press kiss after kiss along her chest as he gently kneaded her breasts, his breath heavy as she rocked her hips back and forth on top of him.

"Take off your pants, Pope." She whispered as she pulled her nails gently over his shoulders, not quite scratching him like she usually did, but close.

With her request ringing in his ears, Pope flipped his girlfriend onto her back on the bed and shimmied out of his shorts leaving him only in his briefs. He grabbed hold of her shorts and tugged them down her legs, along with her underwear, in one swoop. He dropped to his forearms above her again, his nose brushing over hers as he laid between her parted thighs.

"Come here, baby." She smiled as she pushed the waistband of his briefs down over his backside, pressing the heels of her feet under his backside to bring him right against her.

"You feel good." Pope groaned as he pressed his tip against her, his head dropped down to her forehead as he held himself up on his forearms.

"You're not even inside of me yet, Pope." She laughed breathlessly while she ran her hands down his back.

"Don't need to be. You're perfect." Pope whispered as he reached a hand between them to guide himself inside of her.

As Pope steadied himself, ready to settle inside of his love a loud gasp and a snicker echoed throughout the once otherwise quiet home.

"No, just leave it and go. They didn't see us. Move, JJ!"

"Wait, wait. I wanna see!"

"Guys, are you seriously here right now?" Pope groaned as his hips dropped down to his girlfriend's, his hand removed from between them to run over his face.

"I'm not looking. I just wanted to drop off an exam prep I had to help you guys out. Seriously!" Kiara yelled as she ran down the hallway with her hands over her eyes.

JJ stood in the doorway with his hands in his pockets and a wide grin on his face. He raised his eyebrows at his friend before he turned on his heel, closing the door over behind him.

"Told you that you wouldn't study, Pope!"

Hotties:

@babeyglo @starkey-babie @sodasback @fashion-fasting @barrysjumpsuit @beauvibaby @plutooryectors @rottenstyx @pogueslandia @soph0864 @whcclxr

*tag list is open, please let me know if I forgot you or you would like to be added/removed from particular posts. I've removed the people that don't pre-populate :(

Please let me know what you think if you have a moment! Thank you so much xoxo

Requests for OBX ARE OPEN!

[earthfire-75]

You Send Me Flying

Chapter Seven:

(Author’s notes: co-written with @nature-and-music, beta’d by @lady-jane-revisited. Based on The Dirt movie as I don’t yet own the book. Warnings: language and smut)

We headed down stairs and piled into her car, her driving and myself in the passenger seat with the other guys in the back. My fingers were itching to reach out for her, but I fought off the urge. No reason to give those idiots any more fuel. When we pulled into the place, I prepared myself for their antics, because where of all places does she take us? A sex shop.

They’re whooping and laughing in the back seat when they realize it and even she giggles a bit. “Alright, get it all out now. I expect you to act like adults when we get in there. Got it?” She was trying to be stern, but her unsuccessfully-stifled giggles weren’t helping. It was infectious and I cracked a smile as well.

“Good luck with that,” I commented as I got out of the car.

We went inside and she got the clerk to help us with the boots while she looked out for a few other things to pull the costumes together. It went surprisingly smoothly and we met her at the checkout where she pays for it all. I let the other guys go ahead of me, but I pulled her off to the side.

“Have you been paying for all this?”

“Yeah. I mean, Nikki put me in charge of costuming.”

I must have looked as furious as I felt, because she was suddenly standing up straighter and placed her hands on my cheeks with concern on her face. “Mick, what is it? What’s wrong?”

“You’ve been paying for everything out of your own pocket! I’m guessing without help?!”

“Wait…No. Mick, look at me. Nikki and I pooled some of our savings together. Tommy and Vince threw in some too and we opened a bank account for the band. We didn’t ask you, because you’re paying child support.”

My eyes shot to hers for a second before looking away again. I quietly replied, “They weren’t supposed to tell you about that.”

“Yeah, well they were supposed to tell you about the account. What are we going to do with our children, dad?”

Something stirred in me, hearing her call me that. It surprised me that I would react like that, but I pulled her flush against me, letting her feel how hard I was getting. “Screw the kids, say that again.”

“What? Dad?” She asks, sounding confused at first, but then her eyes lit up as the dots connected in her mind and she leaned her head a little to the side so her lips just grazed my ear. “Or would you prefer “Daddy?” She pulled back, looking up at me with innocent eyes and started to back away.

A low growl escaped me at the game she was playing and I managed to hook my fingers through her belt loops before she could turn around to escape. “Oh, no you don’t, Princess.” I tugged her back to me and she gasped when our hips met but there’s a loud honk from her car before I got the chance to kiss her. The trio of idiots were staring straight through the shop’s glass windows from outside at us.

“Get a room!” came their collective cheer.

“I’m gonna kill them.”

“No, you’re not.”

I grumbled under my breath and she shot me a look that told me it would be better for me if I didn’t. “Fine. I won’t.”

She put the bags in the trunk and we headed back to the apartment. The guys and I practiced some more while she locked herself in her unit again to tirelessly work on putting the costumes together. She came back up a little after lunch with her arms full of red and black pleather, one of the boot boxes and a small sewing kit. She handed the pleather material and boots to Nikki before shooing him off to go try it on.

***

Reader’s POV

Nikki took the pile from my arms so I could take the sewing kit. His face lit up, like a kid being given his first present on Christmas, and he ran off to his bedroom. I paced around the front room of the apartment waiting for the bassist to come out. I almost sighed in relief when he finally did with a serious look on his face.

“How does it fit?” I asked, sounding as nervous as I felt.

“Like a fuckin’ glove, man! This is awesome!” He enthused, now cracking a smile and turning for all to see the outfit, front and back before coming up to me and giving me a bear hug.

I laughed and returned the hug. “Are you sure it fits ok?

“Yes, stop worrying! I promise I love it!”

“Ok…if you’re sure. Do you want to keep it here, or do you want me to hold onto it?”

“It’s probably better if you hang on to the costumes. They might get ruined here.”

“Alright. Go change back.”

“Am I next, dude?” Tommy asked, practically bouncing on his feet.

“No. Yours is last because it’s the easiest.”

“Aww, man! Wait, shouldn’t Mick’s be the easiest? His is all black, dude!”

“It might be all black, but I had to sew a damn jacket! Sounds easy, right? It’s not.”

“Oh…damn, dude.”

I turned to the singer, “Vince you’re up.”

The man jumped up from his seat and happily grabbed the outfit, giving it a look-over before trying it on “Sweet!” He comes out looking just as excited as his fellow bassist, “This is so awesome! Check me out, man.”

“And it feels alright? It’s not too tight or too loose or anything?”

Vince was a little busy running his hands over the material at first, but then answered me nonetheless, “You kidding? It fits great. We’re gonna be so badass! The chicks are gonna love it!”

The rest of the gang could agree on that matter, giving each other high fives. I smiled and let him know that I could hold on to it all for them. I gulped as I gathered the next outfit for Mick, clearly seeing the rest of the guys lurking over him like a group of vultures. The guitarist kept his cool and said nothing, aside from a slight grunt as he got up from the couch. He gave me a quiet expression of thanks and headed over the bedroom once Vince returned with his clothing and placed it on the table. Some minutes passed while he was changing and though so far there were no complaints, l still wondered if he was alright, or if he needed any assistance. After seeing him in pain like that, I was getting a little worried.

“Hey I need a little help here,” Mick notified.

I made my way towards the room, ignoring Tommy’s repeated attempt to get under my skin by commenting not to take too long. I knocked on the door, “Mick, are you decent?”

“Yeah, come in, just shut the door.”

The man was nowhere to be found after I closed the door and looked around. However my heart started to slam against my ribcage when he stepped out of the bathroom wearing his full ensemble, a big smirk across his face. The black on black look was absolutely perfect on him. The pentagram headband, the studded boots with the intertwining chains, the belts across his chest, the pleather, and the collar. Jesus Christ. The pleather and collar were too much for me. Minus the make up, he was so close to looking the way he did in my dream, the sinister and demonic creature that put me over the makeup table and took me for a ride. I wanted him, no I wanted nothing more than to let him have me anywhere]: pressed against the wall, letting him roughly pull down my pants so that I could spread my legs and he could taste me. Then grab me by shoulders, hurl me onto the bed, and beg for him to fuck me until I couldn’t walk. Still, the costume would get ruined and of course we would never hear the end of it from the idiot patrol.

“This is really cool, you really outdid yourself with this,” he remarked, walking closer to me.

It finally hit me, “You didn’t really need any help did you?” I asked, closing in the gap by hooking my finger in the ring of his collar, biting my lip as I stared deeply into those sparkling blue eyes. That must have done something to him, his breathing becoming a little shaken, and his eyes widening when I whispered to him, “Daddy...”

His pupils were suddenly dilated, blackness engulfing the pale irises. The next thing I knew, Mick held me very close to his body, his hands grasping my back. I tried to keep my sighs quiet as he kissed my lips, however I couldn’t help but let a squeal slip out when he deliciously devoured my neck with his mouth. The heat from our bodies only increased when he pressed me against a wall, his kisses becoming hungrier by the second as my own hands tugged at his raven black locks.

“Mick, oh Mick...” I whispered.

However reality had reared its ugly head back into the frame when we heard banging from the other side, “Hey! Quit fucking around you two!” Tommy wailed. “Come on, that’s our room!”

Mick shouted back, “Fuck you, you fucking teenager! Open those legs, Princess. Daddy needs you-”

“No, no Mick. Please not now, it’s not a good time. Not with those three right outside the door.”

He was clearly frustrated but took his hands off of me, groaning ast he backed off. Still, I wanted him just as badly, so I thought of a different alternative as I clicked the door shut, lifted up my shirt, and pulled down my bra, “Mark me then, please Daddy.”

Without hesitation, Mick immediately held my breasts and pressed his lips to my skin. He was gentle at first, looking at me to see if I was enjoying the feeling of his mouth. I could feel the pulsations between my legs increasing as I whispered his name. I gasped when he took a nipple and suckled on it with ease, but I needed more from him. No sooner did I settle my hand onto the back of his head that he increased the speed of his sucking. His lips were wet, creating a very moistened sound that invaded my ears. He switched over to the other side and did the same, biting down a bit and moving his head back until my sensitive bud was released from his ivories. The sounds of Tommy’s knocking had completely drowned out as he pleasured me with his mouth and I moaned loudly. I couldn’t stop watching the way he pleased me, feeling my panties getting soaked, especially when I saw the fresh blemishes and crescent marks that were upon my chest. I was nearly there and so was he, yet he had to stop for both our sakes.

He gave each breast one gentle kiss and one little lick to my nipples, he leaned into my ear and growled, “You took that like a good girl, Princess. But Daddy doesn’t want to ruin all your hard work.”

I was in a trance as I responded back instinctively, “Thank you Daddy.”

@nature-and-music @lady-jane-revisited @mickmarstookmyheart @sophiazeppelinchick

[atinydise]

Ateez reacting to their s/o holding their hands for the 1st time

❦ Genre: Fluff.

❦ Pairing: OT8.

❦ Word count: 3k3.

❦ Requested: Yes, thank you! 🦋

HONGJOONG

You were peacefully staring at the sky from your window. You've been staring at it since the departure. It was such a beautiful view that you wouldn't be bored it even with 11 hours of flight. "What are you staring at, love?" Asked Hongjoong, finally removing his earphones. 'Love'. You will never get used to him calling you this way. It never fails to make your heart beating faster than ever. "The view with the sunset is just so relaxing." You smiled. "Look at this with..." he struggled to untangle his earphone. The short imagination of him losing his AirPods for the 823rd time, got you smiling. "Song." He finally inserted it on your ear.

A soft and calm music started to play. All of your senses were comforted by these clear notes. "Sounds like a commercial music, right?" Giggled your boyfriend. "No... it's relaxing." You claimed. "I could fall asleep in 2 seconds because of it." "Then go ahead." He patted his shoulder, telling you to rest on it. Without hesitating, you put your head on. It was comfier than what you thought. Not something pointy and hard that could bother with your earrings or piercings. "Is it comfy?" Asked Hongjoong, a tiny bit worried. Too reassure him, you simply nodded and grabbed his forearm with your hand. Just to keep him close. Hongjoong wasn't used to you, showing this kind of attention in public. He was a bit taken a back, but finally only you mattered. The song was leading you in a soft and calm mindset. Your eyes were closing at every note and your entire body felt like a feather. Your boyfriend guessed that you were falling asleep because your hand was sliding on his forearm. 5 minutes later, your head almost fell from Hongjoong's shoulder. He quickly put it back in place, but it caused your hand to rest right in his free one. The warmness and the softness of his palm made you unconsciously held his hand. Tight. Hongjoong took his time to realize what was happening. Even if you were sleeping, he was hickey flustered. He was staring at your fingers, intertwined with his. Your boyfriend couldn't help but smile and blush. More when he tried to remove your grip, but you tightened it. "Cute." He whispered. Hongjoong and you were not really tactile and clingy persons, but when these moments happen, for the first time or rarely, both of you desire that it never stops. It was your moment only.

SEONGHWA

"I can't believe we are here already!" You stomped enthusiastically. Seonghwa was staring at you. You were so happy and cute. The way, you were holding your backpack straps made him melt instantly. "Disneyworld..." you sighed joyfully. "It's magic!" Seonghwa nodded, they really created a whole world and it felt unreal since he put a foot there. "Where do you want to start?" He asked, opening the map. "Space mountain!" You almost yelled, pointing at the localization pin. "Really? But we ate 2 hours ago?" He gulped, thinking at the amount of looping. "What a baby." You smirked. "Then what about... Peter Pan? Or Ratatouille?" "Okay I agree for the last one." He accepted. "Let's go!" You almost ran to the crowd, not wanting people to take your place in the queue. Seonghwa was looking at every details of the amusement park. All the shops had their own magical surfaces. He needs to come here with the members one time. They would go crazy for sure. "Fast Park Seonghwa!" You pouted. To tease you a little bit more, he started to walk slower. He deducted that it was working well because he spotted the vein on your forehead. "You are so slow!" You complained. Not thinking twice about your actions, you held his hand and led him to the attraction. The moment he felt your hand in his huge one, his stomach clenched. A thousand of butterflies were flying there. You were too focused on the board that you didn't saw the light blush on his face. But you secretly liked to hold his hand. It felt just right. "Bingo!" You pointed at the clock, "only 5 minutes of queueing." Seonghwa was barely listening to you. He was looking at your hands fitting perfectly in his. You had a moment of doubt, maybe he didn't like it and was too nice to tell you. You tried to detach your embrace slowly, but he tightened his grip on it. "Don't." He said seriously. "I like it." You smiled shyly at him. "It's the first time we are holding hands." He giggled. "A-Ah really?" You stuttered, a bit flustered. Seonghwa was about to reply when his phone buzzed in his pocket. You thought that he would let your hand free, but you were wrong. He struggled a bit to get it out of the pocket but no way he would use both of his hands. "Yeah Joong?" He rolled his eyes. "No. I told you I had a date today with Y/N. At Disneyworld." You glanced at him when you heard the word "date". Seonghwa saw your facial expression and winked cockily. You ignored what feels the most magical now; Disneyworld or a date with Seonghwa?

YUNHO

More and more you were moving forward in the queue, more you wanted to run away. Your friends advised you to go in a haunted house with Yunho, for your first date. At first, you didn't realize the situation. You only thought about a way to be close to him without being awkward. Yunho is scared of absolutely, nothing. He could play with a tarantula, then dance with a venomous snake without problem. So, a haunted house was nothing for him. But for you, it was another story. "Are you okay Y/N? You are shaking a bit." Asked Yunho thinking that you were already scared. "Even a lot." "I'm good!" You slapped his shoulder, puffing a bit. "It's just the anticipation." "Ok cool. I thought you had this kitschy idea to stay glued to me for the whole time. But I would probably be the one doing it." He laughed. "N-No. So, cliché." You laughed nervously, cursing at your friends in your mind. Not even 30 seconds later, the host led you inside. You were completely terrified. You couldn't even enjoy a single moment the proximity or the thought or having a romantic intercourse with Yunho. "Oh wow, that's well made." He pointed at the spider above you. You did your best to suppress the scream stuck in your throat. "W-Wait. You are working too fast." You tugged his shirt. "Are you scared?" He teased you. "We can go out if you-" "No." You shook your head. "Just stay close." You wrapped your arm around his. Yunho admitted that it was cute. Of course, he was aware of your plan when you invited him to the haunted house. You couldn't even walk next to a worm, without yelling. Suddenly and even Yunho shivered, a skeleton almost fell at your right. Your first reflex was to grab his hand and to hide behind his tall figure. Even though the situation wasn't the best, Yunho's heart flustered. Thanks to the darkness, you couldn't see the blush on his cheeks. His stomach clenched when your fingers placed right between his long ones. This action never had such an impact before. He was used to hold Atiny's hand during fansign. But it was nothing compared to this feeling. The rest of the way, you never let his hand go. Nor let 2 centimeters away from you. When finally, you exited the nightmare, the reality hit you. "Well done Y/N." Said Yunho. "F-For what? I've been a scared baby there." You faked to fix your clothes. "I thought you would jump on me right when we entered, but no. You had shown an amazing braveness." He giggled patting the back of your head. You grunted few words, too nervous and shy to admit your plan. "Give me your hand lady. Let's go inside again. I liked it." He smiled.

YEOSANG

["Y/N"] ["Bring ice cream."] Without hesitation you run to your kitchen and took a vanilla post in the refrigerator. You messily put your shoes and exited the college dorm. ["On my way!"] After 5 minutes of walking and avoiding bumping into every single person in the street, you arrived to Ateez' dorm. Right when you exited the elevator, you saw Wooyoung closing the door. "Wow. I want a best friend like you. In less than 15 minutes you there." Claimed Wooyoung. "How is he? Good or?" "A complete mess." He replied. You rolled your eyes, "I swear... I told him to stay away from this type of girl." "Good luck." Shrugged Wooyoung. "Wait, you are not going to comfort him?" "Why. I know that you are here." He patted your shoulder. "I'll watch a movie. See ya!" "Jung Wooyoung! I swear-" "Are you going to stay there the whole day, or you are going to enter and comfort me?" Asked Yeosang, who came out after hearing your voice in the hallway. "Be nice with me. I brought you a vanilla pot." You lifted your plastic bag. "Cool. Now I can be completely depressed and heartbroken." He whined. After that, you both sat on the couch, enjoying the calm for once. Yeosang explain that he prepared the best date for her and he even bought flowers. But she never shown up, nor replied to his texts. "You don't deserve her. I told you that already and a bunch of times." You ate another spoon of ice cream. "Are you going to eat all of this by yourself?" He slapped your hand, causing the spoon to fall. You rolled your eyes and faced him. "Yeosang, stop being sad for her. You are a real treasure and too bad for her, she lost someone really special." You grabbed both of his hands and rubbed it with your thumbs. "Even if you are a bit savage sometimes, you are such a good person." Yeosang's eyes couldn't leave the sight of your hands, holding, squeezing and rubbing his. "And she's stupid. You are probably the perfect boyfriend on this earth." You claimed. "I would be grateful to have a boyfriend like you." He raised his brow, by surprise. You instantly flickered his forehead. "Don't even think about it." He sneered, knowing that you would say something like that. "How do you feel?" You asked when you finally saw a smile on his face. Yeosang hesitated a second, but finally chose to take his sad facial expression back. "Hold my hand and tell me how amazing I am again. It might help." You rolled your eyes. "This guy... Anyway." You ordered and held his hands once again. Screw the compliment. That's what he really wanted.

SAN

You were waiting your boyfriend for 15 minutes already. He as late. Like always. But you never been mad about it. San was doing his best to spend some time with you despite having a heavy and full schedule. The last thing you could do, to just show him how grateful you are, is to be patient. "Y/N!" Shouted San, running to you. He was smiling widely and waving crazily. "Slow down, you are going to trip." You warned him when you judged he was close enough. "Sorry." He paused, catching his breath. "I'm late again." "It's okay babe." You pecked his cheek, making his heart jolt a tiny bit. "To apologize, you can choose everything you want us to do today." He said happily. Next thing he knew he was trying to walk for the first time with rollers. "Y/N, I can't do this!" He whined, holding the ramp on the wall. "Come on! I know that you can be really good at this." You encouraged your boyfriend. "How do you manage to stay still with this?!" "It's still my feet. I'm the only one controlling them." You smiled, turning around him. "Oh my god, help me." He sighed, trying to stop his legs to shake like a newborn. "Okay." You stopped at his left. "I'll help you." San gulped when you slid your hand over his forearm to gently hold his hand. He was still amazed by the softness of your palm that he didn't realize that the wall was getting far away every seconds. "I can't believe that we are holding hands." He finally said. You simply giggled, ignoring what to say. "I thought that I would need to do it first. I know how shy you are princess." "Stay focused Sanie." You replied, a smile glued on your face. "Your hand is so cute in mine. It's like it was meant to be there." "San." "I want this moment to pause forever." He claimed. "Babe." "I can’t believe!" He sang, using the same tone as Chen in Exo*. "And I can't believe, you made a whole round without falling." San finally looked around him. He was so focused on your hand that he completely forgot his main task. "I'm roller-skating!" He shouted victoriously. "I'm a grown man now." "Can the grown man detach his hand now that's he's a pro?" "Never."

MINGI

Mingi is shy. On the stage, he always looks fierce, confident and cool. But in reality, he is a cute and shy boy. It took him 20 minutes to ask you on a date. You spent your entire break from your old part time job, to listen to him, stuttering 2 words by minute. With respect, of course, you always kept your distance and understood that he was not into showing affection in public. Then you always 'stayed in your place' and be affectioned in private. But even not that much because he was still taken a back. Tonight, they all had a rough day and Seonghwa offered to walk an hour in the park below. You encouraged them, saying that it was a good idea. So here you are, leading the walk with your boyfriend. The rest of the members behind you, a bit like chaperones. Everyone could tell that this little walk was relaxing. One by one, they all found their smiles back. "Do you remember Bridgerton?" You asked. Mingi raised a brow, "the show that made you drool and fangirl about the dresses?" "Yeah!" You snapped. "The boys looks like our parents, checking that we don’t do anything wrong." You smirked. The tall boy looking behind him. The 7 other boys were minding their own business. "Not really. They totally don’t give a f about us." He sneered. "Ah really? So, it won't bother anyone if... I do something like." You removed your hand out of your pocket to held Mingi's one. As expected, he blushed and stuttered that they were just behind. "Come on...." You teased him, squeezing his hand. "We are dating for 3 months and you never held my hand. So, I do it." "Y/N!" He blushed even more. "Ooooouh Song Mingi!" Shouted the boys behind. Some of them were whistling, one by one. Few ones were clapping, and San Yunho were imitating the scene. Even though Mingi was cringing, it was not bad at all. "Song Mingi is a man now! He's holding a girl's hand." Shouted Wooyoung. All of their comment started to make you awkward too. But in a good way. Judging that you teased Mingi enough. You tried to untangle your fingers. "Finish what you started." Said Mingi, tightening his grip. "You put us in this situation, so you need to assume it too." A nervous laugh came out from your throat when he put both of your hands in his pocket. Of course, this move caused the other boys to start yelling behind both of you. But you could still live with it.

WOOYOUNG

Even if you agreed to spend the night at the dorm Wooyoung still found the situation awkward. It's been 2 weeks that you were officially dating. Everything was perfect. You both had a real great harmony. Even the other members claimed that they were jealous of your chemistry. The only problem which was not a big deal but still bothers Wooyoung, was that you were not really the 'clingy type'. You barely touched each other. He respected that you needed to hold our hand sometimes or just give you a hug or a peck randomly. "What are you thinking about?" You asked sliding under the sheets. "You keep looking at the ceiling." Wooyoung hesitated a second to tell you what was bothering him. But he finally decided to not say anything and to not put you in a awkward situation. "Nothing, just tired." He yawned. "Let's sleep." You nodded and made sure both of you were well covered. "Good night Wooyoungie." "Night Y/N." You couldn’t see his face, but he was disappointed when you turned around, showing your back to him asking if he was asleep already. He finally cracked an eye when he felt your warmness just next to him. His heart started to rush. Wooyoung even though it would stop functioning when you grabbed his hand to held yours. You slowly rested your interlaced hands on your belly. Wooyoung was burning behind you. The dozen of mini him were dancing and shouting along in his head. When you started to rub your thumb over his skin, it completely drove him crazy. Wooyoung could felly your belly on his forearm. because of that, he wanted so bad to squeeze and hug you until you couldn't breathe anymore. "I know that you are awake." You whispered, giggling a bit. Just in case this moment would stop, he preferred to stay quiet. "I feel your heart bumping, jolting and clenching in your chest." You added. "I just... love this." He finally admitted. You simply stuck your body closer to him and snuggled gently against it. "This shit drives me crazy. You seem so tiny." "Just sleep." You giggled, enjoying his presence. "I can't sleep anymore! I feel like I'm going to explode." He replied, happily. "What did I do..." you sighed, smiling a little bit.

JONGHO

You just felt your friends. You spent the whole day looking for a dress. And not a casual dress. An amazing and fancy one. Just to go with your boyfriend at a gala. You needed to get along with everyone there or to be at least presentable. Jongho told you that you could wear anything you want, but your desire was to impress everyone there. Especially the CEO, so he could stop looking at you like a trash. Just when you got out of the café, you spotted a red-haired guy, in the same alley of you. You doubted a second, but you saw him holding an Ice americano. It was your boyfriend for sure. Without hesitating, your ran to his direction. When you were at 5 meters behind him, you walked slowly and quietly. You recognized the Chanel earrings you gave him and his Louis Vuitton sport bag. "He's so expensive." You thought. Not waiting anymore, you grabbed his free hand. Jongho had the instant reflex to step away and to brush the hand off. "Hello young man, are you single?" You winked at him. His face softened, when he saw your face. "No sorry. I'm taken and take care because she's crazy." "Hey!" You pouted. Jongho sneered, proud of his own joke. When finally, he realized. "Oh." Wondering why this sudden behavior and glanced where's he was looking at. "What?" "It's the first time that you are holding my hand." He blinked. "We do this all the time." "No. You don't get it. It's incredible." "What?" "Your hand is hold mine. It's the best thing ever." You raised a brow, "you are too much." “I’m usually the one holding yours but now!” “You-” "Do not move." He kept staring at it. People walking past to you, were giving you a weird look. Jongho was looking at your hands in awe. "She's holding my hand too! And the first time!" He said to a couple passing by. "Choi Jongho." You slapped his shoulder gently, completely embarrassed. "Let's go to Hongdae!" "Why suddenly?" You asked. "So, we can walk there!" "It's 1 hour far away from here!" "Yes. Exactly. That's the point." He smiled widely, already enjoying the idea.

*Exo - Tempo: it’s a song which had been praised by many (I do recommend to watch Ateez covering this because it’s a m a z i n g) and Chen’s lyrics intro (0:02) really had his impact.

[katzkinder]

Tarte Tatin

[Here's the follow up to "Strawberry Madeleine" I said I'd do! 🥳 Feat: Tsurugi getting all the presents. All of them. And a very special gift from Freya.]

Tsurugi can’t remember the last time he was so excited for his birthday.

Actually, that’s a lie. He absolutely can. The last time was when he turned twenty and had gone out, ID in hand and stupid grin on his face, to buy as much beer as Yumikage’s credit card could handle as the first official adult of their little trio (or as much as the clerk would let him purchase). Two bikes, three idiots, and three cases of cheap beer, all pedaling towards the ocean on a beautiful, moonlit night, not a cloud in the sky.

The only thing that had dampened his mood then was the heat of Yumikage’s back against his as he stared up at the sky, at the moon, and recalled the promise he had asked his friend to make, and the offer of freedom he had turned down.

Neither of those things were a problem anymore.

Never again would Hod have to worry over killing Baldr to save him from himself.

~~~

The venue is, of course, Yumikage’s apartment. The walls are thick, the living room is large, and there’s no one there but him to bother if they get rowdy (aside from the neighbors, but Tsurugi never cared much for what they thought).

Most importantly, though, it’s a familiar place. Every year, ever since Yumikage started living in the high end apartments, each of them would have their birthday there. It was also the place Tsurugi went to when he no longer had a home, his best friend opening his own to him, and Tsurugi had felt so guilty, had been so worried, about what that change would mean for them.

As it turned out... It didn’t mean much at all.

Of course, with his weird sense of boundaries and how touchy he can get with people he likes, other people might not agree. --Especially when he and Yumikage still shared a bed.

~~~

All the guests had arrived. First, of course, were Jun, Takuto, and surprisingly, Jun’s parents. Tsurugi had hefted Takuto onto his hip, chirping at them all to come in, and led them to the living room where they had prepared snacks, drinks, big, big bowls of pretty much everything you would need for a party. Chips and dips and little trays of veggies, big two liters of soda and a store bought cake chilling in the fridge, hard candies and caramels, even a crummy cheese platter with little tiny sausages and crackers.

Next had been Freya, Iduna, and the two subclasses Takuto had taken to calling his uncles, much to their delight. Opening the door, he’d been met with three party poppers being set off in his face, Iduna, Gil, and Ray shouting their congratulations at him while he had stood there, stunned, trying to process the colorful streamers and confetti now decorating his head, shoulders, and the entry hall. Soon, though, he was laughing, dragging them all in by the arms while Freya shook her head and tried not to look too fond, a gentle scolding on her lips while C3’s ace inventor promised to clean up the mess herself.

Four presents joined the pile, and four more members of his family joined the festivities.

Finally came the Sloth pair, Kuro and Mahiru, and the gift he had been told to open immediately. The one that almost made him cry. So small, so little, so… Perfect.

Turning to bring them back to the group, Tsurugi thought to himself, All these people… Are happy I was born.

At that point, the tears he had been holding back started to overflow, quickly dripping down his face and onto the floor, much to the Sloth pair’s worry. Even Kuro, as blank faced as he normally kept himself, was clearly startled. Clearly worried. About him.

It only made the tears come faster.

“Uwah! Tsurugi-san?! Why are you crying!”

A watery laugh, quickly wiping his face on the back of his hand while Mahiru crowded closer to fuss. “I’m just glad you’re all here is all…!”

Ah. How embarrassing.

~~~

As it turned out, they didn’t need that second, store bought cake at all. The one Mahiru had brought with him, had made himself from scratch, was more than enough. There were even leftovers, sitting happily in Yumikage’s fridge and waiting to be devoured the next day.

And, of course, after cake came presents.

Jun’s parents had given him a new set of chopsticks, glossy black ones patterned with colorful paper cranes, and a matching paper crane shaped ceramic rest to go with them. From Gil and Ray, he’d received a new wallet, smelling of leather and, frankly, making him too nervous to ask if it was genuine or not. Such an expensive gift was… Not something he deserved, he felt, but he’d accept it gratefully nonetheless. From Takuto, he’d gotten the most adorable little wolf themed coin purse, as well as a handmade card. Jun gave him a new to go mug. Yumikage had grinned, sliding him a little box containing earrings that sparkled and showe and Tsurugi very nearly leapt at him if it weren’t for his idiot friend clarifying “They’re fake, dumbass. You like sparkly stuff though, right?”

“Don’t scare me like that!” he had complained, swatting Yumikage on the chest while the other man had snickered to himself. Really, he should have known better.

And now, he is here, with Iduna thrusting a misshapen gift into his arms with the biggest, most excited grin.

… He hopes it doesn’t blow up.

Tearing the bright, shiny paper away reveals a pillow shaped like a strawberry, red fading into pink and green leaves at the top. The smell immediately slaps him in the face and he wastes no time burying himself in it, a reverent, “It’s so soft…!” on his lips that make the people around him giggle. “Jun-chan, feel how soft it is!”

“I modified a pillow I bought for you!” Iduna gushes, and Tsurugi’s attention snaps to her, her cheeks just as rosy as his no doubt are with elation. “Freya helped me add a little pocket with velcro so I could put a scent pack inside! Also it’s made with memory foam so you can squish it as much as you want and it’ll always go back to it’s proper shape! Oh, and, here’s the remote, cuz I added a temperature change feature, too, so it’s never too hot or too cold and…” A hand on her shoulder has her chattering trailing off and she peeks at Ray, who seems to be holding back laughter. “Ah, oops! Sorry...” A sheepish chuckle, the girl wilting ever so slightly. “I just got so excited from your reaction…”

“I love it,” Tsurugi assures her, squeezing the gift tight. “Iduna-chan’s so smart! I’d be excited to give this to somebody, too!”

Iduna perks up once more, back to her beaming smile, and Freya… Nudges her present forward. For some reason, she looks nervous, and Tsurugi reaches for it curiously.

“Lately, I’ve been… Looking into making jewelry,” she explains, arms folded across her chest and black gloved fingers digging into her skin, awaiting Tsurugi’s response as he slides back the cover on the box. “Iduna showed me how to work with some of her tools, like things for cutting metal…”

“Freya…” Tsurugi breathes, cutting what he now realizes are anxious ramblings over having an overlapping gift short, “You made these?” In that little aqua colored box, with its white ribbon and bow so cutely done on top, are a set of earrings. Where Yumikage’s had been studs, these would dangle, little seashells carefully connected to ribbon by a simple loop of gold and a single bead, the same yellow as his eyes. Picking one up, the deep, navy colored ribbons, satin finish, flutter delicately. “They’re beautiful…”

He glances away from his gift just in time to see Freya start to turn pink. He swallows, wets his lips, and carefully, carefully, brings the box closer to his chest. “I can really have this? Like, really really?”

“Of course you can,” Freya answers, relaxing ever so slightly. “I made them for you.”

Right. That’s right. These were… Made especially for him. Him, Kamiya Tsurugi, twenty seven years old today. This gift… Is his. It’s his alone.

… Oh. That’s right. Back then… Freya had asked for…

I don’t have anything I can give to you…

You have two of these. Maybe you can give me one.

We… Except this body… Have nothing else to call our own. Aside from that… There is nothing I can offer.

In this world… Exists things that you should share and bear the burden of with other people, as well as things you yourself must treasure. You must… Understand which is which.

A… Are you angry...?

I am.

Back then, he had told her… That he had given up. Back then, what she had wanted… Was for him to take her hand. In the end... He hadn't. But they were happy.

“... Freya. Are you proud of me? I finally… Grew up!” I finally got angry. I finally fought back.

“... I am. Very, very, proud.”

[svnflowervol666]

Crisp Trepidation (Harry Styles x fem!Reader)

Word Count: 5.2k

Warnings: angst, mentions of smut, pregnancy

Author’s Note: Here she is! The promised “Y/N is pregnant again before she’s ready” fic. I ended up liking this a lot more than I thought I would, so I hope you all do as well! Take care and TPWK. 

“Well, well, well. If it isn’t my favorite tiny human,” the pediatrician chimed as she kicked the door to the small examination room shut with her sneaker.

“You must say that to all of the parents that you see,” Y/N blushed, unable to hide the smile that tugged on the corners of her lips.

“I don’t, actually. I’m being honest when I tell you she is the cutest baby I have ever seen in my life. Those curls! Are you kidding me?”

She padded over to the miniature exam table to get a better look at the infant that was lying contently on her back and chewing on her pudgy albeit still tiny fingers. 

“Let’s take a look at how you’re doing, sweet pea.”

The doctor, Lisa, lifted the stethoscope that was looped around her neck and placed it correctly into her ears. Listening to the baby’s heartbeat to check for any abnormalities, she couldn’t help but give a sympathetic frown when the tiny girl under her tensed up from the cool touch of the metal.

“Nurse’s notes say she’s put on quite a bit. She’s finally caught up to her age group in weight. I’m assuming breastfeeding is going better for you both now?”

She lovingly squeezed the extra chub around her thighs.

“Yeah. We don’t really use bottles anymore. Finally got her to latch on and now it seems like all she wants to do it eat,” Y/N chuckled.

“Good! That’s good. There’s nothing wrong with formula like we talked about, but it’s even better to breastfeed when you can. Is she hitting the milestones? Rolling over? Propping her head up? Babbling a bit?”

“Babbling, definitely. She keeps us up sometimes because we can hear her talking to herself through the monitor at night,” Y/N poked her tongue out at her daughter in an attempt to get her to smile.

“Having a bit of trouble propping herself up though. She can only do it for a little bit and then she’ll give up. She’s got Harry’s giant head, though, so I’m sure it’s a bit of a struggle.”

Lisa laughed loudly at the mention of her patient’s father, knowing good and well what Y/N meant. She scribbled notes onto the file attached to her clipboard, checking off the baby’s progress and coinciding what the nurse that came in before her documented about her length and weight.

“She’ll get to it eventually. All babies are different. She seems to be coming along quite nicely, though. Nothing abnormal or anything to fuss about. A perfectly healthy six-month-old in my book.”

Y/N sighed in relief, though she knew there was nothing to worry over to begin with.

“How’s mum doing? You taking care of yourself, too? You’re just as important as baby.”

“When I can. Harry’s really good with her. He’ll take over when he sees me struggling, but it seems like she only wants me these days. Think I might be coming down with something, though. I’ve been feeling awful for a few weeks. Like I got hit by a train. I keep reminding myself to go get checked out, but I always get distracted taking care of her,” Y/N gestured to her daughter that was now drooling onto the parchment liner and staring up at the ceiling as if there was something ornately interesting about the popcorn texture that had been stippled onto it.

“When you say, ‘hit by a train,’ what do you mean? I can examine you here if you’d like. As long as it’s nothing serious, I can send you something off to the pharmacy.”

Lisa re-fastened the snaps on the infant’s onesie, making sure not to pinch her chunky legs and placed her back into her mother’s lap.

“Ummm,” Y/N began, “Just extra drained, I guess? Kinda nauseous. I’ve been getting migraines a lot and even when I do get a good night’s rest, I still feel like I could go back to bed for the rest of the day. Maybe I’m just exhausted, I don’t really know. But it just feels a bit different than being worn out like I have been before.”

She could see the wheels in Lisa’s head turning, noting each of her symptoms and trying to align them in a path that would lead her to the root of the problem.

“Can I ask you something that might be a bit personal?”

Y/N nodded, rubbing her fingers absentmindedly along the bridge of her daughter’s socked foot.

“Have you and Harry been intimate since she was born?”

She was taken aback by the question, not understanding where Lisa was going with this or why it was relevant.

“Umm,” Y/N stuttered, feeling a static-y surge of embarrassment travel up her neck and onto the sides of her face, “Yeah. We have.”

A whole fucking lot ever since I’ve been cleared for it, she thought, but kept to herself.

“And can you tell me when your last menstrual cycle ended?”

Then it clicked. She genuinely couldn’t recall her most recent period and even the thought of what Lisa was alluding to made her stomach twist into thousands of tiny knots.

“I- I don’t know. I’ve been so busy with her I don’t even really think about what’s going on with me half of the time.”

Y/N tried to make excuses, anything to avoid the obvious, but judging from the quizzical look on her daughter’s pediatrician’s face, she knew exactly where this was going.

“There’s no way,” she whispered, “I can’t be.”

Lisa’s face dropped, now tender and apologetic when she realized that this was news Y/N was not ecstatic to hear.

“I know I’m a pediatrician, so that’s obviously the first thing my mind goes to, but can we at least get you to take a test? That way we’ll know for sure?”

//

Harry came home to a quiet house. It wasn’t unusual, but seeing as it was well after six o’clock in the evening and his wife wasn’t in the kitchen making the curry that she’d been oh-so so excited about earlier in the week and swaying along to the playlist they’d curated together as she stirred a pot filled with vegetables was. Their grocery store had been out of coconut milk for several weeks and she’d nearly tackled him to the ground out of excitement when he’d come home from the grocery store with it the night before, so he found it awfully strange that she’d yet to start cooking it. Had he not seen her car in the driveway, he probably wouldn’t have even suspected her to be home.

He checked the living room first, and it was desolate apart from the playmat on the floor that was littered with a few of his daughter’s favorite rattles and teethers. Her coat and purse were abandoned haphazardly on the couch, almost as if she tossed it aside in a hurry to get somewhere.

“Baby?”

Nothing.

His head peaked into the nursery, stealthily and quietly in preparation to walk in on his daughter taking her scheduled nap before her actual bedtime. He’d gotten good at hushing his footfalls to almost complete silence as to not wake her, having made that mistake more than a handful of times. 

And he was right. There she was, sprawled out in her crib with her arms outstretched over her head like a tiny starfish. Her chubby cheeks were smushed against her bicep, drawing her lips open the tiniest bit so that Harry could see the tops of her fleshy, pink gums and the barely-there nub of her first tooth peeking through. More than anything, he wanted to wake her up - lift her from the plush mattress and cuddle her close, shower her with kisses and tickle her with his scruff that was teetering on the line of becoming a full blown beard to hear those baby squeals he adored so much, but he needed to find Y/N first.

She had to be in their bedroom, he thought to himself. Maybe she was taking advantage of their baby girl napping to also get some rest. She had been rather exhausted lately. Maybe she’d had a rough day and was relaxing in the clawfoot, porcelain bathtub that had been the selling point of the home they now lived in. Or maybe she was keeping to herself peacefully somewhere else in the house and she was being so quiet that he just couldn’t hear her.

Turns out he was right again. Like he had done with the nursery, he held the wooden door tightly in his grip to keep the hinges from creeking and pressed it open gently. The room was completely dark, but he could make out the lump underneath the duvet on their king-sized bed as his wife. 

Good. She was sleeping. 

He padded across the hardwood floor, still being as quiet as he could until he crossed the threshold of the bathroom. There, he rid himself of the uncomfortable clothes he’d been wearing all day. Curse these professional business meetings about his tour schedule that forced him to dress nicely. 

All throughout the meetings, he wanted nothing more than to be home with his wife and baby, cuddling the afternoon away and watching shitty reality television while his daughter cooed and grunted and gurgled in her baby voice that he loved so much and could listen to all day. Maybe it was the fact that he’d been having to partake in these boring work meetings a lot more lately, which caused him to miss even the smallest aspects about his everyday life with his family like changing diapers or checking the baby monitor eight hundred times throughout the day to make sure his daughter was still breathing. Or maybe it was the understanding that by this time next year, he’d be halfway across the globe and physically unable to hold her in his arms. Perhaps he’d just been getting sentimental, but it was an unpleasant feeling nonetheless.

His thoughts were interrupted when he deposited his rings into the dish he kept on the counter and he heard a quite yet still prominent sniffle among the clattering of metal against the glass dish.

“Honey? ‘S that you?” Harry peaked his head out from beyond the bathroom door. 

He saw her body shift under the covers, but she gave no response. So he called out again.

“Ye’ sick? Can hear ye’ snifflin’.”

Nothing.

Pivoting back around to the inside of the bathroom, he quickly shut off the light and carried himself over to her side of the bed where he could see her properly. Her face was tucked into her chin and all that was visible to him was the top of her head.

“Hey,” Harry cooed, petting what he could reach of her hair and speaking even gentler than he had been, “What’s wrong?”

And that’s when he heard it - an almost inaudible choking sound of Y/N trying to catch her breath that immediately let him know she wasn’t sick. She had been crying.

“Whoa, baby,” he was already pulling the covers back with force, honestly not caring whether or not she minded the intrusion.

“Tell me what’s going on.”

She was emotionless when he saw her face, her puffy, bloodshot eyes and swollen lips the only indicator that she was upset. She didn’t even react to Harry tugging her head out from where it had been buried in the covers, simply rolling onto her back to stare idly at the ceiling.

“Y/N,” he called for her again, this time much more stern, “You’ve got to talk t’ me.”

She took several deep breaths through her nose, allowing her lungs to fill to their maximum capacity before exhaling with a sigh. Harry could have sworn she was sucking all of the oxygen out of the room along with his patience each time she did so. 

After what felt like ages, she parted her lips to speak.

“I went to the doctor today.” 

“Yeah? For the six-month check up, right?” Harry asked, not seeing why that was important but his mind quickly went to the worst scenario possible despite having just seen his daughter sleeping peacefully in her crib.

“‘S she alright?” his voice now demanding urgency in the delivery of her response.

“She’s fine,” she quickly dismissed him, internally kicking herself for making Harry worry.

“I was telling Lisa about how sick I’ve been lately and she -,” Y/N gulped and rubbed her knuckles against her tired eyes, bracing herself for whatever events unfolded after she said what she was about to say.

“She, umm. She made me take a pregnancy test.”

Now it was Harry’s turn to be speechless. He stared at her with furrowed brows and his mouth slightly agape. His palms suddenly felt clammy against the white sheets that they rested on and his stomach felt like it had turned in on itself from how badly it was churning. Of all of the things he had expected to be wrong with her, this was certainly the last on the list. 

“And?” he asked after a solid sixty seconds of staring at her and saying absolutely nothing, though he already knew the answer.

“Ten weeks.”

Silent tears now spilled over her eyes and down past her temples. She couldn’t even be bothered to wipe them, instead letting them dampen a small patch of hair on either side of her head. Pregnancies weren’t supposed to be sad, but somehow, she had barely been able to stop crying since she left the pediatrician’s office.

“How,” Harry whispered, moreso to himself than to her.

“I think you know how babies are made, H,” Y/N quipped.

“‘S not what I meant,” Harry fired back just as quickly, “It’s just...She’s still so little.”

He thought of his daughter asleep in the next room. She was the most perfect thing he’s ever seen and on the day that she was born, he knew he wanted nothing more than to fill his and Y/N’s house with as many curly-headed babies as he could fit beds in each room. He just hadn’t expected that his only child’s first birthday present was going to be the gift of being a big sister. 

It was all too sudden.

“I just don’t know how I didn’t see it sooner. I mean,” Y/N raised her arms above her head before huffing and letting them fall to her sides, “I guess I was just so caught up with the baby that I hadn’t even had a second to think about what’s going on with me. It’s like I don’t even matter anymore and I-”

“Hey, hey now. None of tha’,” Harry shushed her and curled up next to her frame as she began to sob.

He tucked her head into his neck, hugging her shoulders tightly as if he was trying to hold the pieces of her together before she shattered. His mind was running a mile per minute. It killed him to see her like this, killed him to be in this situation. The last time they had found out this news, there were happy tears - tears of joy and celebration and relief after having tried for what felt like years. Never had he imagined that the next time they were presented with the very same news, that there would be tears of sadness.

Her voice was muffled against his now wrinkled blouse, but he could still make out what she was saying beneath her blubbers.

“I can’t do this.”

“Wha’ do yeh mean, pretty? Of course yeh can. I’ll move some things around and we’ll make it work. We’ll be alright,” he ran his hand up and down her back in attempt to soothe her.

“That’s the problem, Harry.”

He lifted his chin from here it was resting on the top of her head to look down at her.

“What?”

“You have to move everything around. You’ve already been gone for almost two years. This sets you back at least another. You can’t keep pushing shit back.”

“Erm,” Harry paused to break away from her and sit up straight against the headboard, “Yes I can? I couldn’t care less about tour...Did yeh think I was gonna leave yeh here on your own with a fuckin’ newborn?”

“No. I didn’t think you were just going to leave,” she almost sounded annoyed, which didn’t sit quite right with Harry.

“But do you see what’s happening? Everything is fucked.”

His voice wasn’t so calm anymore.

“No, Y/N. I honestly don’t. I mean I know this is all happening much earlier than we expected, but what else is there t’ do? Tour can wait.”

“People are counting on you, Harry. Millions of them. We’re not the only ones that matter in this situation.”

“Will you please tell me what yeh gettin’ at, because I’m starting t’ get upset.” 

Harry’s lips were pressed in a thin, straight line and his nostrils flared with every breath. Why was she being like this? 

“I don’t know what I’m fucking getting at. I’m just overwhelmed."

“And yeh think I’m not? ‘M tryin’ my best to keep it together for your sake if yeh haven’t noticed,” it almost condescending how the words rolled off his tongue.

“Oh, excuse me,” Y/N laughed sarcastically.

“Didn’t realize you were the one carrying our fucking child. Didn’t realize you’re the one that has to grow all big and gross and swollen and be in pain every fucking day to the point where walking to the bathroom feels like a fucking marathon. Didn’t realize you’re the one that has to push a football-sized human out of your vagina and just lay there while a doctor you’ve never seen before stitches you up because it literally tore your insides. Didn’t realize you-”

“For fuck’s sake, I get it!” Harry was yelling now.

“It’s not the same and I’m sorry for suggesting tha’ it was. ‘M not sure what it is that yeh want me t’ say though. I’m sorry? ‘S that it? Sorry for gettin’ yeh pregnant? Sorry for havin’ a job that were well fuckin’ aware of when yeh met me? Sorry that I do everything I possibly can to keep you and the baby and everyone else on the fuckin’ planet happy?”

“You’re being an asshole, Harry,” she was just as angry as he was, scowl evident on her face even in their dimly lit bedroom.

“And you’re not makin’ any fuckin’ sense! Are yeh tellin’ me yeh don’t want t’ keep it? ‘Cos I never fuckin’ said that yeh have to.”

The thought had crossed her mind on the drive home from the doctor’s office, but the feeling left as quickly as it approached. She’d taken one look at her daughter in her car seat through the rear view mirror happily sucking on her teether and knew without a doubt that she couldn’t.

She felt a tidal wave of fresh, salty tears peaking and about to crash over her.

“I don’t want - fuck,” she put her head in her hands. 

“I just-,” and then she broke.

Sobs wracked her body, making her shoulders shake up and down. She wasn’t even sure how she had any more left to get out, but it just kept coming. Over and over and over again until it felt like she was being suffocated and that no one was going to save her. She felt Harry’s hands move to rest on her shoulder blades and heard gentle, cooing-like sounds coming out of his mouth, but she couldn’t make out what he had said over the sounds of her own wailing.

“Baby, it’s okay. Just breathe f’ me. It’s alri-”

His attempt at subduing her was cut short by shrill cries coming from the digital monitor that sat on their nightstand. Harry peeked over his shoulder at the screen, seeing that their daughter had woken from her nap and was now demanding the attention of her parents. He couldn’t help but wince as he watched her socked feet flail around in the crib; it was without a doubt that the screaming match they’d just encountered had stirred her from her sleep, and that hurt him just as much as it did to see his wife crying right in front of him.

Y/N heard it too, somehow. Perhaps it was because she’d been trained to react to every minute sound that she made and could recognize her cries from a mile away in the paralyzing fear that something was wrong with her or maybe it was because she looking for any and every excuse to get Harry’s hands off of her so she could get away from him and escape the argument they’d just had without making the situation any worse than it already was. Regardless, she turned her own neck to peer at the monitor and sighed heavily.

“I’ll go, Y/N. Just stay here.”

“No. I got it. It’s after seven. She’s probably hungry.”

She shrugged Harry’s hands away from her shoulders like his touch physically pained her and climbed over his body and off the bed without another word, not even giving Harry the chance to take her hand and help her over the edge of the mattress. He knew she wasn’t going anywhere but down the hall and into the nursery, but he couldn’t help but feel like she was walking away from everything.

//

Y/N stared her daughter while she nursed. She started from the top of her head that was riddled with chocolate brown curls and worked her way down to the tips of her toes that would occasionally flex themselves out of habit. Her hair? Undoubtedly Harry’s. Her nose? A perfect, narrow line down her face that led to a button-shaped tip akin to Harry’s. Her lips? The same almost inhuman shade of bubblegum pink as Harry’s. Surprisingly, the only physical trait she’d inherited from her mother were the color of her eyes, which was funny considering that was the one thing she’d wanted Harry to pass down to their daughter; Y/N had always hated hers.

She was content, suckling away at Y/N’s breast - her cries of hunger long forgotten. The infant hadn’t even flinched when a few more of Y/N’s silent, cold tears spilled over and left small wet spots where her onesie rested over her belly. She had no idea that her parents were upset with each other and she had no idea that in a little more than six months time, she’d be a big sister and there would be two babies fighting for their attention. Y/N was also clueless, but only as to how she was going to take care of a newborn and a one-year-old simultaneously. She’d always thought she’d have more time than this - more time to spend with just her daughter and Harry before they decided to have another, but just like her eyes, things always had a funny way of never working out in her favor.

Three soft knocks on the wall withdrew her from her thoughts and she was greeted by her husband idling in the doorway like he needed permission before entering a room in his own house. He had changed out of his dress clothes and was now clad in his favorite pair of joggers that were permanently stained with spit-up. Y/N had tried everything under the sun to get the spots out, but he’d been persistant on not throwing them out.

“Can I come in?”

His voice was barely above a whisper and much calmer than when he’d been yelling at her about twenty minutes ago. He still hesitated crossing the threshold even after Y/N had given him a skeptical nod, but allowed his bare feet to pad over the plush carpet as he joined her on the loveseat in the far corner of the nursery.

He watched their daughter just as Y/N had, taking in her tranquil state as her fingers brushed reflexively against the underside of Y/N’s breast. He’d never been able to pry his eyes away every time he watched her nurse. There were no ulterior motives behind it, nothing sexual or erotic whatsoever. It amazed him each and every time, how Y/N was able to provide their child with everything that they needed to grow with only her body. At first, Y/N hated that Harry loved sitting in on her feedings, feeling exposed and unattractive despite Harry’s continuous affirmations that it was the most beautiful thing he’d ever had the privilege of witnessing, but over time she’d grown fond of it.

“‘M sorry for yelling at yeh,” Harry started.

“It was uncalled for.”

Y/N sniffled, rubbing her swollen eyes with the back of her free hand that wasn’t supporting her daughter’s back as she held her.

“It’s okay. It was a lot to take in. I’m sorry for yelling at you too.”

She couldn’t quite look him in the eye just yet, but she was slowy but surely getting there.

“’S not okay, actually. You’re right. I’m not the one havin’ the baby. It’s you that’s got t’ do all the hard stuff. Should’ve listened to you more.”

He shifted towards her on the cushions, afraid to touch her just yet but still yearning to be closer to her.

The best Y/N could muster was a quiet, “Thank you,” before she busied herself by attempting to run her fingers through her baby’s hair and untangle the mess she’d created while she was sleeping.

“Can I hold you? Please?”

Now was when she turned to face him and she was met with eyes that were just as red-rimmed as hers. She had heard the bathroom sink running for an abnormally long amount of time and a hard, frustrated pounding against the wall shortly after she’d gone off in the nursery to feed the baby, which meant he must have been trying to muffle the sounds of his own crying when she left their bedroom.

Y/N didn’t say anything, only shifting her weight onto one side so Harry could easily lift her onto his lap in one swift movement without disturbing their daughter. He tucked her shoulder into his neck and softly kissed her skin and his hands moved to mimic hers so they were both holding the baby that was nodding off again in their arms. She found herself relaxing into his loose grip, her head tilting to the side to rest against his. 

“I love you so much. Yeh know that? I know it’s difficult always having t’ think about everyone else, but you’re what’s important t’ me. I’d drop everything for you if I had to. End it all today.”

“No, you wouldn’t,” she refuted, but there was no malice in her tone.

“I wouldn’t let you.”

“Well, just know that I would if yeh wanted me to. I’ve thought about it a thousand times. I want t’ be here f’ you. For her. Don’t want t’ miss anything. I finally got my shot at bein’ normal when I met you and I hate myself for even thinkin’ about going back on the road and leavin’ yeh.”

“Don’t,” Y/N paused to press a chaste kiss to Harry’s cheek.

“You’re a good person, Harry. A good dad. A good husband. Please don’t ever think that you’re not.”

She felt moisture pool in the dips of her collarbones where Harry’s chin lied, but she didn’t acknowledge it.

“I’ll be okay. Sorry if I freaked you out earlier. Think I just need some time to get used to it all. Just wasn’t expecting Lisa to drop the ball that I was pregnant when all I was expecting was for her to tell me that our kid is in the 99th percentile for weight and then send me on my way.”

This got a chuckle out of him, almost causing him to choke on his tears. He quickly rubbed the sleeves of his jumper against his eyes to dry up any remaining wet spots on his face. 

“She is pretty chunky, isn’t she?” Harry jested while thumbing over his daughter’s rounded tummy.

After a moment of admiring their little chunk of a baby, with her milk-drunk eyes and puckered lips, Harry spoke again.

“Two babies,” he huffed.

“Two babies,” she repeated.

His hands moved to caress Y/N’s stomach. She clearly wasn’t showing yet considering that neither of them had even known she was pregnant up until today, but he still held her like her belly was the size of a watermelon and he was waiting anxiously to feel a hand or a foot press up against his palm.

“Might be kinda nice. They can share everything and we’ll only have t’ have one birthday party ‘cos they’ll be born around the same time. They’ll go t’ the same school and probably have the same friends. Kinda like twins.”

“Based on the fact that you’ve already picked out the outfit this one is wearing on her first birthday that’s still six months away, I highly doubt you’ll stay keen on them sharing a party.”

Harry pursed his lips and blushed, recalling the garment he’d spotted during one his fittings with Gucci that he vowed to have for his daughter.

“Guess you’re right about tha’.”

Their banter was interrupted by a grueling rumbling sound coming from Y/N’s stomach that Harry could feel throughout his entire body.

“Jesus, Y/N. You hungry too? When’s the last time you ate?”

“Uhh...this morning I think?” Y/N sighed.

“Couldn’t stomach anything when I got home.”

Harry’s heart dropped when he thought of how distraught she’d been all day while he was gone and with everything in him, he’d wished he would have postponed his meetings to go to check up with her and they could have found out together, but it’s possible that the topic might not have even come up if he had been in the room with her and the pediatrician.

“Found coconut milk at the store the other day, remember? Want me t’ make that curry for yeh?”

“Ohh, yes please,” she immediately purked up at the thought of warm spices and rice.

“Starting to wonder if curry was a craving now that I think about it. Didn’t we have it, what? Three nights in a row a while back?”

Harry giggled as he reluctantly removed Y/N from his lap and stood up from the sofa.

“Thought tha’ was a bit weird that yeh wanted it so badly, but I didn’t dwell on it too much.”

“She’s going back down. If you give me a minute, I’ll come downstairs and help you,” Y/N said, pulling up the straps of her tank top after realizing her daughter had long since forgotten about her breast and was conked out in her arms.

“‘Ve got it, mama” Harry quickly refuted.

“Take a bath or somethin’ and I’ll bring it up t’ yeh when it’s done.”

“Okay.”

Y/N couldn’t fight the grin growing on her face at the nickname Harry used that she still hadn’t gotten used to.

When she placed their daughter soundly in her crib, Y/N’s fingers stayed put from where they sat on the railing as she caught herself staring at the sleeping infant once more. Though she’d felt like her world was caving in on her just a handful of hours ago, the pieces were all coming back together now. 

Of course, she wanted more children with Harry. And now she was getting what she wanted. Just like he’d told her back in the bedroom, it wasn’t ideal, but they’d make it work. They always did. 

With two babies.

[slashbitch2]

A Snippet of Life with Agatha Harkness

I have no idea how to use tumblr so I hope this works

--- Salem 1693 ----

Chaos reigned in the forest that night. Even before you had any inkling as to what had transpired between Agatha and the elder half of the Coven you could feel the imbalance in the air. It came in the form of an ominous pressure weighing down on you, a heightened sense of urgency that had you rushing toward shelter.

The forest had never scared you, not until that night. Shadowy figures seemed to move in your peripheral, gradually drawing nearer as you grew closer to your house, to your sanctuary. For once, you were cursing the remote location in the depth of the woods as upon arrival, you'd find yourself completely isolated, yet trapped by the thick rows of trees.

Although, as the heavy wooden door slammed behind you, the tension dissipated ever so slightly. Despite what your intuition was telling you, there was still a sense of safety to be found here. You exhaled, calming your erratic breathing and turning to lock the door.

"You know that flimsy lock wouldn't work, right?" A voice called from the back of your house, hidden in darkness but revealed by the person's tone.

Without turning, you answered. "It would against humans."

This wasn't the first time Agatha had sought refuge in your house. When she was younger, and would argue with her mother, she'd come running to your door begging for a bed for the night. Your own mother, a much kinder woman, would never turn her away. It was how you became such close friends.

She chuckled in response, though there was no real humour behind it. In spite of how tired Agatha sounded, she commanded a certain amount of fear. You could feel the dark power radiating round the room that was accustom to her presence. The other witches were not attuned to her malevolent abilities, but you'd always known.

The energy was almost audible, crackling as it came into contact with your own powers. Most would be threatened by it, but as her closest friend, the magic welcomed you into its obscurity. Tonight, however, there was a certain hostile hesitance to it.

You gulped, refusing to turn around in fear of facing the truth. "Are you staying for the night?"

"No." You heard movement, imagining that Agatha was gradually walking towards you. Your suspicion was confirmed as her breath hit the back of your neck. "I need you to come with me."

A chill travelled throughout your body at the notion. She'd always hated living as part of the Coven and used to share her dreams of running away with you. Now, for some unknown reason this fantasy had become a possibility. You remained quiet, trying to put two and two together.

At your silence, she sighed. There was more movement, and then her hand was outstretched in your line of vision, palm flat presenting a broach. Her mother's broach. Your breath hitched. If the broach was in her possession, than that could only mean one thing.

"They held a trial against me." Her voice barely breached a whisper. "Tried to have me killed." Her other hand rested against your shoulder, causing you to flinch. "I couldn't have done anything else."

You inhaled a shaky breath, tears welling up in the corner of your eyes. Years ago when your own mother had died, you blamed yourself, but Agatha had been there for you. She saved you from spiralling further into depression, dragged you out of the bleak captivity and promised to never leave.

You owed her everything, and had promised to do the same if anything ever happened to her. Now was the chance to repay for her loyalty.

Without another word, you turned, wrapping your arms around her form and tugging her closer. She was taken aback by the sudden contact, but soon reciprocated the embrace. She leant into the crook of your neck for a moment, then placed a kiss along your jaw. It served as an unspoken agreement, sealing your pledge of loyalty.

You knew in that moment that Agatha Harkness would probably be the death of you, which was something you were more than willing to accept so long as you could spend eternity in her arms.

--- London 1852 ---

Since the turn of 17th century, you'd been inseparable. On the very same night Agatha had grown fully into her potential powers, you'd run away together. It fulfilled childhood ambitions while simultaneously throwing you into independence earlier than you'd been prepared for, meaning that Agatha was all you had, not that you were complaining.

Had your mother been alive, you liked to believe she would've approved, although, sometimes you missed your home amongst the forest. The house and Coven had been your last true connection to her, severed that night as you left without a proper goodbye. Even now, over a hundred years later, the loss still caused you grief.

Agatha had never related to your attachment to Salem, or to family. From her perspective, you were all she needed. As long as you were by her side, anywhere could be home. Which is how you found yourself living in London, of all places, trapped amidst the seemingly endless industrial revolution. The houses were crammed close together, the streets overcrowded with miserable people.

Out of all the places you'd resided, this was by far your least favourite. Though, you'd never mention your misery to Agatha, who you could tell secretly loved the chaos of the city.

Your house was one among an identical row, so undifferentiated from the others that there had been several occasions when you'd accidentally entered the wrong one. Though thankfully, this evening you did not repeat that particular incident. After a long day of work, which you insisted on doing to maintain some sense of normality, your feet were aching, and your lungs filled with the smog that encompassed the city.

As the door shut behind you, the bustling noise was slightly subdued. You sighed in relief, taking a moment to observe the current layout of your home. While you spent the day working, Agatha would practice spells, and often you'd arrive to find the house either in disarray, or in a state of luxury that didn't match the appearance of the building. Today was the latter.

The living room had been transformed into something you'd expect to find in a manor house, featuring a rich wooden floor and furniture that looked to be the most comfortable you'd ever seen. New exotic decoration was scattered throughout, though you didn't take the time to appreciate it upon noticing the lit fireplace, instead collapsing in the armchair in front of the crackling fire. You basked in its warmth while savouring the comfort the chair provided.

You closed your eyes, appreciating the silence until it was inevitably interrupted. "Evening, dear." Agatha's enthusiastic voice called out as you heard her walking upstairs, most likely leaving the basement. She spent most her time down there, pouring herself into the books she'd accumulated over the years, dedicating effort to gaining more power.

"Evening. " You greeted upon hearing her footsteps grow nearer. "I like what you've done with the place." Opening your eyes, you were met with the unexpected image of Agatha wearing one of her usual dresses, only it was now an intense purple. "Nice dress."

"Oh, this old thing. Just an experiment." She dismissed with a wave. "Now, come with me." She stepped forward to grab your hand, impatiently trying to pull you up.

You groaned, reluctant to move from exhaustion. "Let me sit for a minute." The complaint didn't deter her, and you finally relented as her magic began to surround you, lifting your body as though you were weightless. "This better be worth it." You mumbled, being lead down to the basement.

It in fact was worthwhile. She'd spent the day working on a counter to a binding spell, and required you to be the test subject.

First, she walked you through how it worked, explaining in great detail that you shouldn't immediately oppose the spell, but rather let yourself fall deeper into the trap. And then she, without warning, bound your hands together, assuming you were willing to participate.

Unfortunately, her guidance hadn't been as clear as she intended, leaving you stuck for the following half hour.

"Please, Aggie, can we just give up?" You shifted around, seeking room to stretch your cramped limbs. "I obviously can't do it."

"Well, not with that attitude you can't." She clapped her hands, seemingly reinvigorated by your surrender. Then she began to amble around you in a circle as though observing from every angle.

You rolled your eyes, ensuring that she saw the display of impatience. "Why don't we pick this up tomorrow? Or when I haven't just had a full day at work, at least."

"It's your choice to work." She reminded you. "We have no need for the money." Agatha halted behind you, concluding that a new approach was necessary. She stepped closer, starting to rub soothing circles on your back. "You're overcomplicating it. Just- think about the disadvantage you're at right now. All the things I could do from this position."

You could practically hear the smirk in her voice, so decided to play along. "And why would I want to stop you?"

She laughed loudly, or rather, incredulously at that. "Oh baby, you sure you could handle it?"

Finding yourself at a loss for words, you simply nodded. Agatha usually flirted at any given opportunity, which was initially for her entertainment, simply to make you blush. But as you spent more time together, you became immune to her words. You'd quickly learnt that they carried no real weight.

Except now her tone was insinuating some sincerity behind the claim, which left you speechless.

"Can't even get out these binds." She murmured, her breath hot against your ear, her body pressing against your own.

"That's- unfair." You faltered, distracted by the close proximity.

"Then prove me wrong."

Tearing your mind away from Agatha's annoyingly smug insinuations, you focused on the binds in front of you. Purple magic looped around your wrists, erratically swerving around, but firmly holding your hands in place. Taking her advice, you almost entirely cleared your mind, concentrating only on the feeling of confinement. Slowly, the purple was overtaken by a sea of blue, replaced by your own magic.

"Atta girl." She praised, watching as your magic began to work. In encouragement, her mouth brushed against your neck, trailing up to behind your ear.

The binds suddenly snapped. Your mind overwhelmed by her teasing touch. You were grateful for the freedom nonetheless, sighing in relief as you massaged your wrists. Agatha backed away.

You turned to face her, already missing the contact. She was being unusually quiet, and only smiled awkwardly at the eye contact before busying herself with something else.

So much for being serious.

--- London May 8th 1945 ---

Despite living rather detached from the events of everyday, the World Wars had been rather hard to avoid, especially now, as millions of people flooded the streets to celebrate victory. The party had really begun the night before, requiring a noise cancelling incantation to be placed upon the house. Although it only resulted in a restless night spent lying in bed imagining what was happening outside. You had sworn to yourself that you'd join the celebrations the following day, regardless of whether or not Agatha wanted to join.

Living for such a long time, you'd come to realise that events truly were once in a lifetime, so you certainly weren't going to miss out on this one. Throughout your unnaturally long life, you'd grown wiser in some aspects, while with others you remained equally clueless. Dealing with your emotions, for one.

Almost three centuries of life spent with Agatha, yet you still hadn't confessed how you felt. The feeling had crept up on you slowly, strategically taking root deep within you. At first, you'd reasoned that perhaps it was the endless amount of flirting, or the shared experiences that made you care so deeply for her. But as you were currently walking through the city, passing couples sharing in their jubilation, you admitted that it was entirely her.

You loved everything about Agatha. You loved her at her best, and at her worst. Stuck by her side through prosperity and calamity. From the time she accidently transmuted you both to the middle of a jungle (which was then proceeded by a long hike and a tense week in which neither of you spoke to the other) to moments like these.

Through a gap in the crowd, you'd spotted her a few paces ahead, frantically looking around for you.

Sometimes the most memorable moments with her were when she was oblivious to you, in a world of her own. One of her weaknesses had always been her inability to truly relax with other people, and despite having spent so long together, you were no exception. Though the scarcity of these moments only made them more special, which is one of the reasons you loved to watch her work. There would inevitably come a point when she was so lost in her thoughts that she'd completely unwind, and the rare but real Agatha would take over.

Carefully pushing past the hoards of people, you caught up with her. Admittedly, the 40s were serving her well. Somehow she was able to perfectly blend in, styling her hair to be shorter and donning a deep purple dress, while simultaneously being eye-catching. You were certain that you'd be able to find her in a crowd of any size.

You reached out to tap her shoulder and were almost knocked over by the pace at which she swung round. At first glance she appeared concerned.

"There you are." She exclaimed, smoothing her expression into one of disinterest.

For all Agatha may try to act nonchalant, you'd learnt to recognize when she was uncomfortable. In this instance, it was the slight disdain in her voice that gave it away. "Behind you the entire time." You lied.

She looked sceptical, but dropped the subject in place of grabbing hold of your hand. "I hate crowds." She half whispered, half shouted, shooting an exasperated glare in the direction of a group that had just bumped into her. "Don't wander off again." She scolded, switching her focus back to you.

"Lighten up, Aggie." You tugged her forwards, re-joining the pace of the procession. She followed obediently, keeping her eyes down. "Don't ya know," You mimicked your worst American accent. "wars over doll!" The attempt at cheering her up earned a small smile, but she remained otherwise distracted.

A few more minutes of walking in a rather solemn silence and you relented. "What's on your mind?" Pulling her to a stop, your hand automatically slid to her waist. "If you don't want to be here, we can go home. I don't mind."

She shook her head, opening her mouth to speak, but never got the chance.

Behind you, someone from within a group began yelling out a countdown. You turned to see what the commotion was just as they reached the end, then watched as everyone in the group grabbed a partner and kissed them. The display was followed by cheering, and a round of applause as several other couples followed suit around you.

Perhaps it was the celebratory atmosphere, or the continually increasing intensity of your feelings toward Agatha, but you only had one goal in mind as you turned back to her.

But she must've been thinking the same as she beat you to it.

Her hands found their way to your face, yanking you closer. In the split second before your eyes fluttered closed, you caught sight of the abnormally vulnerable way she was looking at you, and quickly sought to reassure her by reciprocating the embrace. As soon as your lips met, everything faded around you. Agatha was all you could feel. She became everything.

Neither of you wasted any time in deepening the kiss. Soon your lips were parting, her tongue brushing against your own causing a rush of heat to suffuse across your body. Her hand shifted to caress your jaw, the softness of the action contrasting to the insatiable desperation with which she was pressing herself as close as possible.

You reluctantly pull away for a second. "We should-" You're trying to speak between kisses as Agatha refuses to stop. "go home now?"

There's no need to elaborate any further as she, without halting her path down to your neck, teleports you both home in a cloud of purple smoke.

You've never been more pleased with her improved accuracy in transmutation.

--- 1986 ---

Somewhere in the distance an awfully cheesy song was playing, one from one of Agatha's mixtapes no doubt. She loved the recent music style, stating that this would be the peak, though she'd said the same during the 60s and 70s. You had to agree, listening to trashy ballads with her had been the highlight of every decade.

"What are you thinking about?" Agatha's voice was low and husky, almost a whisper. You turned to see how she was staring at you, eyes roaming across your face as though for the first time. You were undoubtedly doing the same, but who could blame you when she only grew more bewitching everyday.

"Nothing." You sighed, sinking further into the pillow behind you. The room was faintly glowing, illuminated by both blue and purple strands of magic floating through the air. It was strangely comforting, like watching lightning crackling from afar. Lazily, you reached up, swirling a strand of blue round your finger.

"Your magic is darker." She commented, admiring the sapphire colour. She was right, while her power had taken on its purple colour earlier, yours had gradually darkened from the conventional light blue to a deep sapphire.

"Probably from spending too much time with you."

She chuckled, drawing your body closer to her chest and resting her head against your shoulder. "You love it." Smirking, she pressed her lips on your collarbone, then lightly bit down on the flesh. She shifted impossibly closer, her mouth tracing a path across your neck.

You revelled in the attention she was indulging you in, the sensations that accompanied her affection. Having Agatha's complete devotion was something you'd never get used to. During your friendship, she'd strived to be as close to you as possible, but being in a relationship with her provoked a whole new level of dedication.

"I love you." Though not the first time you'd told her, the repeated phrase still carried the same weight.

However, perhaps it was even more meaningful on this occasion, because as soon as the words left your mouth, Agatha froze. An anxious minute followed in which neither of you spoke, let alone moved. You didn't dare say anything else, rather lay there in silence, wondering what had warranted the sudden change in atmosphere.

Then she, without lifting her head, murmured against your skin. "Marry me."

Initially you believed your hearing had deceived you, that in reality she had said something else entirely. But judging by the way her whole body tensed, the way her magic pulsed dangerously as if it were guarding her, you knew, or rather could feel that it wasn't a deception. She had just proposed.

As another minute passed, you could almost feel her retreating into herself, insecurities inducing regret. You snapped back into reality, already loathing yourself for delaying the obvious response. "Yes. Of course I will."

Finally, Agatha dared to look up, tearful eyes meeting your own. She smiled shakily, then leant back down into a demanding kiss. "I love you, so much." She practically purred against your lips, before continuing to pepper any available skin with kisses.

Being loved by Agatha Harkness was bliss.

--- The Battle of New York 2012 ---

Another devastatingly loud crash shook your apartment, the gradually increasing volume indicating that the conflict was drawing nearer. Unlike the rest of the building's inhabitants, neither you nor Agatha had fled yet. But with each deafening rumble, or ear-piercing scream, you found yourself a step closer to ignoring her demand and leaving to help.

Upon waking up that morning, you'd sensed something was wrong, or rather, would be wrong very soon. The inkling had nagged strongly enough at the back of your mind to prompt you to wake Agatha up, who was quick to confirm your suspicion. However, neither or you could pinpoint specifics, leaving you to continue as though it were a normal day.

At some point, Agatha, being the ever vigilant wife, had gone behind your back and decided to place a protection spell upon the apartment for any worst case scenario that might've occurred. Although not an inherently bad thing, with the eventual discovery of this, you'd come to a couple rather upsetting revelations.

First, the obvious fact that she hadn't told you her plan, and second, the realisation that she'd somehow learnt to hide her magic from you. Of course her actions had annoyed you, but the battle raging outside kept you too distracted to process anything beyond basic surveillance.

Instead of arguing with Agatha, you'd suggested that you ought to help in any possible way. She'd replied with strong discrepancy, stating that it'd be too dangerous, then later admitting that she was afraid of losing you. Under any other circumstances, the confession would've been sufficient to cool your temper, to resign to hiding with your over-protective wife, but not this time.

You'd grown weary of watching people suffer, of the city being destroyed all around you. The large windows surveying the streets below had portrayed nothing but constant violence for the past hour. You were unable to look away, yet hated to watch helplessly. Only you weren't helpless. Unlike the majority of people, you were able to defend yourself, to fight back. The only thing stopping you was the reluctant promise made to your wife.

Avoiding the battle was becoming unbearable, and with no end in sight, you decided it was time to take action. Jumping up from the chair, you set a determined pace toward the kitchen. Agatha had her back turned, nonchalantly making tea while ignoring the chaos surrounding your home. Her indifference only motivated you.

"Agatha."

"Yup." She replied, casually popping the p.

"I'm going out." You tried to copy her apathetic tone, though there was still anger behind your words.

She tensed at the declaration, her grip on the counter visibly tightening, yet was remarkably quiet. Despite being unable to see her face, you could perfectly picture her grimacing. Nonetheless, her silent seething only encouraged you to continue. "Sitting here and doing nothing is driving me insane. I can't just-"

"No. You're not." She slowly turned round, peering at you both challengingly, and curiously. You hadn't seen her like this for centuries, not since the night before you'd runaway together. She had the same demeanour, was harnessing the same barely contained power. It filled the room like a shadow, engulfing you in a sense of dread. She shook her head, an eerily disbelieving smile stretching across her face. "You're not going anywhere."

The statement was commanding, it should've had you at her feet begging for mercy. But you'd spent so much of your life with her that you could see the lie in her eyes, notice the lack of meaning behind the words. She wasn't going to stop you.

"I'm going to help, Aggie." You took a step forward, a pleading attempt to convince her to let you go, maybe even to join you. Instead, she flinched. "Please..."

She was warily watching you in silence, her stubbornness shining through. The lack of compassion she was demonstrating reignited your resentment, had you nearly shaking with apprehension. There was no way she'd join you, but she definitely wouldn't stop you either.

"Here." With unsteady hands, you fumbled around for different valuables about your person, first throwing a watch onto the table, then a phone, and finally your ring. "Look after these."

Without another glance at Agatha, you strode out of the kitchen, flung open the door and descended onto the chaotic streets of New York.

It soon became apparent that your effort would best be spent helping any citizens, while, with much difficulty, staying out of sight. Under no circumstances did you want to be recognised for your endeavour, honoured for something that was general human decency. Besides, there was plenty gratification to be found in the battle. You couldn't recall ever having the opportunity to unleash your powers like this, out in the open with no holding back. It was therapeutic, though draining.

The eventual end to the conflict was a relief, but walking home seemed to require more energy than the entirety of the fighting had. As the adrenaline faded, you struggled to climb the endless flights of stairs, cursing the out of order elevator. However, the journey did give you a chance to think back over the past few hours, which were mostly a blur. Although one thing remained painfully clear; the argument with Agatha.

Pushing open the apartment door, you decided that your first priority was to apologise to her. You didn't regret your decision, but hadn't intended to upset her either. Then, only after could you relax, treat the few injuries sustained.

Strolling into the entrance, a palpable silence followed. You certainly hadn't expected to be welcomed back with open arms, but the lack of any greeting was concerning. The sound of your footsteps continued to be the only noise, echoing round the apparently empty flat. Your pace quickened as you explored the last few rooms, finding them all to be empty also.

At first glance, everything appeared to be exactly where you'd left it (except Agatha herself). It wasn't until your third walkthrough that you noticed something else was clearly missing. Your ring. The pile of valuables remained where you'd left them on the kitchen counter, save for the small silver band, which was no longer there.

Dropping to your hands and knees, you frantically began to search the floor, checking it hadn't fallen anywhere. Even at the lower vantage point, the ring was still no where to be seen. Upon giving up, you then searched through the apartment in greater detail, basically tearing the place apart. It didn't take long until you noticed that more was missing. Specifically, most of Agatha's things.

She had left you.

--- Westview 2023 ---

The red wall crackled ominously before you, the noise it emitted strangely similar to that of TV static. There was something inherently terrifying about the large structure engulfing the town. You could almost hear it transmitting a warning to stay away, not to venture past the boundary, but you'd come too far to surrender now.

Stretching forth a hand, you were met with little resistance. You'd dedicated the last ten years to improving on your magic ability and finally the progress was paying off. However, a large majority of that time had also been spent trying to track down Agatha, who's disappearance had caused nothing but pain. Out of all your mistakes, that one was the worst, and inconveniently, the hardest to fix. Despite your best efforts, there had been no sign of her for the last decade, though you hoped today would be the end to this separation.

Thousands of spells all cast at once, it would be impossible for Agatha to stay away. You could practically feel her presence nearby.

Propelling yourself forward slightly, you were pulled through the wall by an unknown force. While the boundary seemed to intimidate and reject most people, you were clearly an exception. The strength with which you were immersed into the town sent you spiralling toward the ground.

Grunting upon impact, you allowed a few seconds to remain on the ground and recover, only looking up when you heard a distinct but unforeseen sound. Children's laughter resonated from a distance, perfectly wholesome and entirely unexpected. Even more surprising was the completely ordinary suburban town in front of you.

Undeterred by the unanticipated scenario, you stood and observed the town in closer detail. You were situated towards the edge, on a patch of grass facing the last row of houses along the perimeter road. It was night, but the street was illuminated by what looked to be Halloween decorations. A pumpkin was placed outside every house, yet there was no one in sight. Carefully, you approached the signpost reading Ellis Ave and paused for a moment to think of a plan.

You knew Agatha was lurking somewhere in the town. The question was, how could you find her while being inconspicuous enough to avoid whoever had cast this town entrapment? Clearly they were incredibly powerful, perhaps more so than Agatha.

The eerie silence was broken by an advancing car, which parked in front of the crossroads. The entire situation was bizarre, but the uncanny feeling didn't stop you from walking over to the vehicle. Hopefully whoever was inside could shine a light on what was happening here.

You kept out of the beaming headlights, sticking to the shadows as you hesitantly approached. The person sitting at the drivers seat was obscured by the darkness so you hid from them while moving closer, therefore gaining the high ground in case they were someone worth avoiding. It wasn't until you were adjacent from the window that you halted to peer inside.

She was turned away from you, but that didn't stop you from immediately recognising her. Agatha still hadn't seen you, busy adjusting her witches hat, ironic, and seemingly setting a scene.

You had imagined this reunion many times, but not like this. It felt unreal to see her sat barely a few metres away from you, obliviously going about her business. The last decade without her had been the longest of your life, yet you felt like nothing had changed, like you could hop into the passenger seat and continue as normal.

Droning out your anxiety, you stepped onto the road, moving as silently as possible toward the car. Clearly Agatha was completely at ease as she paid no attention to the figure drawing nearer.

You knocked on the window, not daring to analyse her reaction. "Good evening, can I take your order please?" You joked, having no idea how else to handle the situation. For all you knew, she could still be upset, and would order you to leave her alone. Or she could've forgotten the grudge entirely, and welcome you back.

Instead, she sat there motionless, mouth slightly agape. Her lack of response prompted you to continue. "I came to apologise- well actually I tried to ten years ago but you left before I got the chance." Glancing up at Agatha, you noticed she was frowning now. "But if this is a bad time I guess I can come back later?"

She said nothing, but appeared to be fighting her own internal battle. You fought the urge to say anything else, desperate to hear her voice.

The car door swung open abruptly, causing you to stagger back. By the time you'd regained your balance, Agatha had flung herself at you, her hat falling off in the process. You wrapped your arms around her tightly, reluctant to ever let go. Hugging her felt so familiar, yet each time was as memorable as the last.

You felt tears begin to form in the corner of your eyes and let out a watery laugh. Agatha invoked so many different emotions, you couldn't keep up. Simply being in her presence pacified any worries you'd had, quelled the betrayal you'd felt after she'd left.

"This is a bad time," She muttered. "but it doesn't matter." At her dismissal, you separated, seeing how her expression matched your own. "And I'm the one that should be asking for forgiveness." She smiled sadly, brushing back a strand of your hair.

"How about we both take the blame and move on?" You suggested, eager to move past this stage of your relationship.

"Sounds good to me," She nodded, her hands slipping onto your arms as she backed away. "and I will catch you up on everything that's happening, but right now I need you to hide in the trunk."

"God I've missed you." Sighing contently, you looked over to the car, accepting your imminent fate. "And fortunately I do still trust you."

You went to leave, but were stopped by her grip on your arm. "Hold on." She reached into a pocket, producing a silver band. Your ring.

"You've been carrying that round the entire time?"

"Just in case." She winked, grabbing hold of your hand and slipping the ring back on.

A warmth travelled through you, starting from the tip of you finger and diffusing across your entire body. She held onto your hand, bringing it up to meet her lips while maintaining eye contact. At the gesture, you tugged her into a kiss, the contact saying what you currently were unable to.

You knew there was a lot you'd have to work thought together, but right now, all that mattered was the feeling of her lips against your own.

"Next time you want a break, please tell me instead of vanishing."

She chuckled. "There won't be a next time." Then pulled you into another chaste kiss. "You're not getting rid of me that easily, dear."

[w-k-smith]

Do Not Break Faith with Us Who Die, or We Shall Not Sleep

So I heard through the grapevine Din is being haunted by the darksaber or something?

Well here’s my contribution.

I wrote and edited it all in one sitting...somehow. I actually really like it! And I hate everything I write!

Bonus points if you know what inspired the title. (The poem “In Flanders Fields.”)

Summary: Din is possessed by the manda of slain warriors that resides in the darksaber. He is unable to distinguish between enemy and ally. The only way to heal him is to figure out how put Mandalore’s unquiet dead at peace.

Rating: T (violence, blood, possession, loss of bodily control)

Words: 1091

Half of the planet Mandalore is barren. Some people live there, in settlements and cities that have been dragged from more fertile places, but nothing grows from the grit and bedrock. Half of the planet Mandalore is a battle scar. Some of the bombs that tore away the soil and stripped the forests were dropped centuries ago. Some, less than 20 years. To most ears, silence sits where there were once marching songs and explosions.

But Din hears them. They started as whispers when he held the darksaber, now it is a constant noise, and he can’t unwrap his fingers from the hilt, and the black blade overshadows any light around it. An outside force drags Din through Keldabe. He can’t stop. He has tried. When he has channeled all his will toward regaining power over his own body, the noise has quieted. His own thoughts become clear.

He crossed paths with Bo-Katan. She sensed the danger, but was wrong about the source.

“Why are you moving like that? Are you injured? Talk to me, Mand’alor,” she said, and for once she didn’t say it sarcastically.

“Bo...” Din rasped. Forming the words he wanted to say was like pushing a starship up a hill. “Run.”

And then he slid beneath the darkness, and and the darkness slashed at her with the darksaber. Bo-Katan deflected with her vambraces just in time, She couldn’t stop Din’s free hand from grabbing her by the throat, and tossing her against the wall with the strength of more than one warrior. With the strength of dead armies who don’t know their battles are over.

Din can’t let go of the darksaber.

He knows it has nothing to do with the boxy hilt, which is just a convenient container for the energy that really makes up the weapon. He is haunted, possessed by the souls inside the blade, the manda of all the Mandalorians who died violent deaths on this planet since the darksaber became the symbol of its leadership.

“You’re our Mand’alor,” the ghosts tell him. “Direct our campaigns. Find our enemies. Lead our souls.”

Din tries to tell them he can’t, that this isn’t what Mandalore needs, that they have more undying passion and fury than one human’s body can contain. He struggles to unclench his fingers, to relax a single muscle. But his role here is not a choice.

“Rally our soldiers. Stoke our glory. Ready the warships. Sharpen the knives. Prepare our children. Avenge our dead.“

Din hears distant sounds through the cacophony. Their meaning doesn’t register until a few seconds after he hears them. He is a passenger in his own body. His feet don’t touch the ground. Blood as warm as life flows out of his nose and turns cold on his lips. When he speaks, he doesn’t know what he’s saying, but he feels his throat getting raw.

“Dank ferrik, what happened to the Mand’alor?”

“Be careful! He’s stronger than he used to be! Don’t try to face him one-on-one!”

“Where is he bleeding from?”

“He doesn’t know you, he doesn’t know who you are. I don’t think he even realizes he’s hurting anyone. Help me pin him down or stay out of the way!”

“How long has he been like this, Bo-Katan?”

“Too long, obviously. Can your Jedi magic help him or what? It’s a yes or no, Skywalker.”

“I can try. But just because this came from a lightsaber doesn’t mean it’s not Mandalorian in origin.”

Weight. Struggle. Trying to rise from the ground only for something to pound him back down again. He can’t let go of the darksaber.

“Bo, and Mr. Skywalker, sir, he’s been saying some things, and though he sounds like roaring rancor when he does -”

“Not now, Koska!”

“Please, let her speak.”

“Haven’t you heard what he’s saying, Bo? He shouted something about advancing on Cin Cerar by daybreak. Cin Cerar was an old colony that was burned to the ground 200 years ago! And then he said, follow Tarre Vizla, and then avenge the Purge. Some of the bloodiest moments in our people’s history!”

“I understand what you’re saying, but how the hell does that tell us what to do?”

Din’s eyes throb as they roll back in his skull. The world becomes darkness. The souls in the darksaber get even louder.

“The darksaber was made by a Jedi who was long, long before my time, or even my masters’. And it has been wielded mostly by Mandalorians. But it is still a lightsaber. The Force flows through it, as the Force flows through all living things, and things that were once living. Does your culture have ghost stories, Bo-Katan?”

“I - not exactly...”

“Or anything that would explain why your dead would be so restless?”

“Good grief, Skywalker, we’re Mandalorians! Do you think we give up a fight just because we’re dead? What it takes to make an army of Mandalorians -“

Din’s body bucks, and his spine folds in half. No matter what the darksaber wants him to do, he can’t go on like this. The last part of him that is still him thinks of his son. If Din dies, he knows Luke will take care of him, do his best to protect him, though the idea of never seeing his child again hurts Din’s heart in a way his own impending death doesn’t. Mandalore itself will be in Bo-Katan’s irritable but capable hands. If he has to let go to keep others safe, he can let go.

And then he hears something that lets him know he’s truly lost touch with reality. Bo-Katan is close, like she’s kneeling next to his head, and she’s singing.

Her voice is low and hesitant, but he recognizes the song. It’s a lullaby. A Mandalorian lullaby, half Mando’a and half Basic, meant to soothe an upset child back to sleep.

You can rest, verd’ika, because the battle is won. You can dream, verd’ika, because your enemies have gone away.

Verd’ika. Little soldier. A soft but ironic song, meant for a child too small to hold a blaster, much less go to war.

Koska is the first to join Bo-Katan. Then a few more pick up the song, the other Night Owls, their voices echoing in their helmets. Soon Din hears a whole crowd of people singing. Even Luke picks up the song, stumbling a little over the Mando’a pronunciation. When they reach the end, they start right over, in an unyielding loop.

Soon, the voices are louder than the souls in the darksaber. Din’s strained muscles relax. He can see out his visor again, and he’s looking up at the twilight sky over Keldabe, Concordia waxing overhead. He gasps, and stops speaking, his strained vocal chords finally getting a break. His hand trembles, then springs open all at once. The hilt of the darksaber falls away. He coughs and shakes, like his body is trying to clear itself of what invaded it. But he’s free.

The music stops.

“Din,” Bo-Katan says. Not “Mand’alor.” If he didn’t know better, he’d guess her concern was genuine. “Give us a sign, Din. Anything. You don’t even have to speak. Just let us know you’re you.”

“My son?” he croaks. It hurts to talk.

“He’s with Axe, safe and far, far away from here. He didn’t see a thing.”

“Did I - is anyone hurt?”

“A few nasty bruises here and there and one broken wrist, but that’s all. Give us a little credit.”

“Oh.” He breathes in and out, relishing the control. “I have to -”

The gentlest pressure on his shoulder. “No,” Bo-Katan says. “Lie back. You’ve done your part. Rest. You’re no use dead, Mand’alor.”

He wants to sit up, to apologize, to try to fix what damage he’s done. But the urge to collapse into himself is too great. He slips into darkness, but it’s comforting darkness, full of the dreams you dream when your enemy has gone away.

[thenerdywriter]

i came in from the outside, burnt out from the joyride (ii)

this was born out of a conversation with @akinosakiya, so all credits go to her >.<

chapter 1 | chapter 2 | coming soon

ao3

(A/N: so... i am extremely sorry for not updating,,, uni and life has been generally kicking my ass pretty horribly (im in my final semester lol) and while i am not generally very happy with this chapter, it is important because it sets up a lot of things in the future yeeet)

word count: 4955

Attorney Park wishes her good luck as she leaves for the courthouse the next day, and Sol can’t help but feel as though he was laughing at her for some reason, and frantically checks for food stuck in her teeth on the way to the courthouse. There isn’t any, so she’s left to wonder exactly what the hell he meant when he had sent her off with a very cryptic “see you soon, Kang Sol.”

“What did he even mean?” she mutters to herself, calling her sister, “Ah, Byeol, remember to go to your academy today, all right?”

“Okay, eonni,” her sister replies, “you’re at the courthouse, aren’t you?”

“Hmm, I have a case to win,” she replies, and Byeol wishes her good luck before the call goes silent, and she allows herself a rare moment of self-reflection, taking in the image of the Courthouse. It’s imposing, but she curiously feels at home here, in the middle of the city where the noise of the cars is so loud, she can’t hear the person next to her sometimes. There’s something magical about the courthouse, and she isn’t romanticising it, but the idea of fighting for justice, no matter how imperfect, it fills her with pride, even more so when she knows that what she is doing is for good.

Not to say that there aren’t any downsides to it, either. She gets threats almost on the daily, from disgruntled clients and from people who want her to take the case, even though she knows it would be an affront to her dignity. The Dean’s voice floats into her ear, reciting the Attorneys-at-act law that allows her to reject a case if she wants to. Right. It does not feel like an insult to her now like it had done then, the act, because she chose to take this case on, and yet, here she is, standing in front of the courthouse, wearing her nicest clothes (Yeseul had raised an eyebrow, but she was too tired to pay any attention to her) and dreading her turn to go inside.

“Eonni!” a voice calls out, and it’s Yeseul, dressed for a case, “how long do you have before you have to go in?” Sol doesn’t need to check her watch to tell the time that is left, ten minutes on the dot, and she’s waiting for her client to come through, still in police custody, something which she had failed to stop, “are you staring off into space again?”

She recovers quickly, “no, I was just waiting for the defendant to be brought here by the police.” She turns to Yeseul, who’s evidently not had much sleep, “why are you here in my case? Didn’t you wrap one up today?”

“Ah, I did,” Yeseul smiles, taking a hold of Sol’s arm, “but I’m here now, aren’t I? I thought you would need some support, you know, since you—”

She doesn’t complete the sentence. She doesn’t need to. Sol smiles at her, loops their arms together, and says, “do you want to have coffee?”

Yeseul grins, “I’d love to.”

—

No matter how many times she’s walked in here, and no matter how much the courthouse makes her feel at ease, there’s still a part of her that is anxious when she stands in front of it, hoping that she might be able to provide adequate justice to the person she was defending. It throws her off sometimes, the court of law. But she can always find her way back to it, and perhaps this is why she loves it, loves being able to defend people from being betrayed by the same system that they had put so much trust in, betrayed, just like she had been. It’s as though the law is apologising to her, albeit in its own, slightly twisted way.

The defendant, Je Sang-Hee, sits at her designated position, looking at her, and Sol draws herself up to her full height, careful to not catch anyone’s eye on the other side of the courthouse. Its oddly suffocating, the courthouse today, the air thick with a sort of anticipation that she doesn’t really want to address. Yeseul squeezes her arm, whispering, “you’ll do good, eonni,” and all of a sudden, she’s standing there, alone, with only her wits there for help. Shit. I wish I had had gotten drunk last night. At least this would have been hazier.

She approaches the bench, the defendant sitting silently, and tries to reassure her, “don’t worry, we’ll clear your name, all right?” she’s met with silence, as Sang-Hee only nods, her eyes welling with unshed tears. It’s heart-breaking, the way Sang-Hee has accepted her punishment, accepted that she would be going to prison anyway, so, nothing really matters. Sol doesn’t want that for her. She doesn’t want that for anyone, not even the worst of criminals. Sure, she may not be defending them in the court of law, but everyone should benefit from the assumption of innocence. She may not be the one speaking up for them, but she does wish that people have the opportunity to prove themselves innocent.

There aren’t many people in attendance in the courthouse today, which is a blessing, but she also has to deal with pesky reporters stationed outside, who seemed to have taken an interest in the woman accused of attempted murder, despite having really, no evidence against her. It was funny, how people jumped to conclusions, just because of the person’s backgrounds, or due to a particular defamatory article that may have been published about them online. Sang-Hee had had one published about her, filled with lies so vile that Sol couldn’t even read through it once.

“Sang-Hee ssi,” She says, approaching the defendant’s bench, “how are you feeling today?”

Je Sang-Hee looks at her, eyes still shining with tears, and lowers her gaze. She can’t even speak. Sol is angry, of course, but even more than the anger that simmers inside of her, is frustration, for not being able to protect her client, frustration at being unable to be the person there for the victim.

“Eonni,” Yeseul’s voice drags her out of her little reverie, “eonni, I think Joon-hwi oppa is here now.”

Sol squints at the younger girl, “who told you that?”

Yeseul holds up her phone, “Bok-gi is going to be here too, so he texted me. The two of them are going to come along, him and Jiho. Jiho should be here by now, but he hasn’t texted yet.”

Sol just—stares at Yeseul for a moment, trying to understand the volley of information that had just been thrown at her, in a manner not unlike that of Professor Yang, the man who, Sol recollects with regret, had heard about this whole mess from Sol B, but had not once offered to help. She didn’t need his help, though. It’s just that he could have offered to help her, and it would have been nice.

“Eonni,” Yeseul says, warning evident in her voice, “he’s here.”

What she doesn’t say, but Sol knows, is the sentence, don’t worry, I’m here for you. I’ll be here for you. She didn’t need it, per se, but it felt nice to know that at least one person had her back in this courthouse. Bok-gi was of course, on her side too, but she knew he wouldn’t sacrifice Joon-Hwi. Not now, anyway.

“You have your back to the Prosecutor’s bench,” Yeseul elbows her lightly, and she realises that yes, she has indeed been standing with her back towards the Prosecution’s bench all this while, and most importantly, there was someone behind her.

“Attorney Kang,” She knows that voice, has heard it in her head for years now, but Kang Sol finds herself unable to lift her gaze from the linoleum floor as she grasps the warm hand that was now being offered to her, “nice to meet you, finally.”

There’s a teasing lilt to the last word, a certain edge to the syllable that she knows all too well, having been subjected to it for hours on end, in classes, in the copy room, in the café, even in her mind. It’s from a voice she knows all too well, someone she had wronged.

Courage, Kang Sol.

“Hello, Prosecutor Han,” she looks up, extending one hand to the man in front of her, and—

She didn’t have any expectations of how she would meet Han Joon-Hwi after so many years, but in the deeper recesses of her mind, she had a thought; of his eyes widening at seeing her face for the first time in so many years, her falling in love with him all over again. She had thought of looking—no, not just looking, looking at him, for the first time in so many years, after that one fateful day when she ignored the words of her heat and went running far away from him, perhaps falling in love all over again.

Instead—she feels nothing. Perhaps a pang of guilt somewhere in the recesses of her mind, but when she looks into the eyes of Han Joon-Hwi, her best friend, the person she had fallen in love with, Kang Sol doesn’t see anyone but a weathered prosecutor, the boy who had called out her name on graduation day in Hankuk Law school long gone. Even though he looks not a day older, even though his eyes still crinkle in the same way when he smiles, and his hand still holds the same weight when he takes her hand for a handshake, but she can’t find the boy she was in love with anymore.

“Attorney Kang,” he grins, and his voice is the same, teasing when he looks at her, smiles at her, but he is her opponent, she has to defeat him today. This isn’t preparing for mock trials and judicial competitions, where they only played at being lawyers and prosecutors, this is real life. Je Sang-Hee’s life depends upon her, Kang Sol, winning this case. Against him, Han Joon-Hwi.

“Noona, nice to see you again,” Bok-gi pushes forward, giving her a warm hug, which does its job to dissipate all errant thoughts of a boy whose smile had haunted her in her dreams, “I’ll be watching today, my law firm asked me to—”

“Don’t worry about that,” she assures him, “you can take all the notes you want.” He’s still looking at her, she realises when she lets go of Bok-gi, Han Joon-Hwi is still staring at me. Do I have something in my teeth? “Good luck today, Prosecutor Han.”

He grins at her then, dimpled smile making her heart skip a beat, and says, “I don’t need luck, Attorney Kang,” before sauntering off to his seat.

Kang Sol clenches her jaw. Asshole.

--

He wasn’t sure how it would be—their meeting for the first time, but Joon isn’t going to say he’s dissatisfied with it. sure, she’s grown up now—she isn’t Kang Sol A anymore, she goes by just Kang Sol, and he doesn’t have the pesky tag of second-round judicial passer hanging around his neck anymore.

She had stared him down, and to no surprise, he still found her beautiful. Sure, he had always thought that there was a sort of magnetic aura around Sol, something that commanded the attention of an entire room when she walked in. She looked the same as she had looked, five years ago, when he had tried to confess to her, and she had rejected him. Sol hadn’t told him that she was rejecting him, at least not explicitly; Han Joon-Hwi was a man who could take a hint, especially if it ran away from him while he was in the middle of his confession. Really, Kang Sol. You made me chase you all the way to this courtroom.

A hand slams down on his desk, and Seo Jiho’s irritated voice tells him, “If you’re going to stare, at least do it properly.”

He sputters, suddenly thankful that his co-prosecutor was running late, as he stood up to stare at his ex-roommate, who was porting a very uncharacteristic grin, “what do you mean by that? I wasn’t staring.”

“Sure, you weren’t,” Jiho says, and even Bok-gi sniggers at him, “you were just looking in the general direction of Sol noona, so much so that everyone in the room thinks that the two of you are either dating, or that you want to kill her. Personally, I prefer the latter.”

He doesn’t say anything, just grumbles under his breath, and Jiho presses on, “did you prepare well for this case? You do realise that your evidence is weak, do you?”

“Ah, of course, hyung knows it,” Bok-gi steps in to intervene, and Joon-Hwi thinks for a moment that yes, Bok-gi was always one of the better ones, and then he opens his mouth again, “he’s just ignoring all the things he said before entering the courthouse, and proving to all of us how much of a hypocrite he is.”

Joon glares at Bok-gi, who is giggling at him now, and turns to look at the judge’s bench a pout on his face. Sure, he had proclaimed in the car that he would “not be looking at her, nope”, and the fact that it had taken him exactly three minutes to break that promise was bit laughable, but his friends didn’t have to rub it into his face.

“I don’t understand,” Bok-gi asks, “why are you still hung up on her? You basically took this case just so you could meet her again, and even though the two of you haven’t talked in years, you still talk about her, you still ask about her when you get the chance, so what is going on?”

Joon-Hwi doesn’t answer. He knows what is going on, why he has been so intent on meeting Kang Sol, even after so long, but he doesn’t want to—no, he can’t tell Bok-gi that. He feels a pang of guilt whenever he even thinks of telling Bok-gi the actual reason behind him running after Sol, even though she had made it abundantly clear that she didn’t want to have anything to do with him.

He wonders, sometimes.

His co-prosecutor arrives in the courtroom, almost gliding over the floor to take their seat, and he can see Kang Sol shrink back a little, obviously intimidated. He doesn’t hide his smile anymore, not that he needs to either. She didn’t have to get flustered over his co-prosecutor entering the damn courtroom. She’s never done that, at least from what Bok-gi and Yebeom have told him; even Jiho had pitched in with his own comments sometimes, knowing exactly how much it pissed him off, but he still did it. Every time he met Bok-gi or he met Yeseul, he would ask about her, waiting for them to respond with “oh, she’s doing okay, oppa” and “I met her a few weeks ago, she was fine, hyung” and they move on after that, but he can’t.

They don’t possibly expect him to move on from her, do they?

“All rise,” the bailiff announces, and he dutifully stands up, watching out of the corner of his eye as Sol gently helps the defendant to rise up alongside her, before being seated again. She still did that little thing when she looked around the entire courtroom for people watching her, he thinks to herself. She’s still the same Sol. No, she’s different now. We both are. We both are different, but there’s still things about her that remind me of the times we spent in Hankuk.

“Prosecutor Han,” the judge tells him, and he stands up quickly to his feet, “begin.”

“Thank you, Your Honour,” He says, walking out to the defendant’s bench, “defendant Je Sang-Hee, you were indicted on charges of attempted murder, following an attack on your fiancé, Seo Changmin, on the fourteenth of November, two weeks prior to your indictment.”

“Yes, I was,” she begins, “but I didn’t do anything to—”

“I’ll be the one asking questions here,” he cuts her off with a dismissive wave of his hand, and out of the corner of his eye, he can see Sol draw an almost-imperceptible breath, shaking her head at him. She isn’t flustered. He’s very sure she isn’t flustered, because the two of them have been on opposite sides of each other, time and time again, “could you confirm that Seo Changmin suffered injuries because of you?”

She stares at him, defiant, and replies, “he did not suffer injuries because of me, I found him and I called the police, I’ve told you this.”

“Yes, you have,” Joon walks to the front of the witness’ bench, “but your whereabouts were also unknown that night, until that fateful moment when you actually found your fiancé, and proceeded to assault him. Is that right?”

She looks at him, scowling. He’s hit a nerve, apparently. They had been harping on that aspect for far too long than what was necessary, Joon had noticed when he had been preparing. He couldn’t go that way when he questioned her, because he knows Sol has prepared for it.

So, he changes his track of questioning, “Ms Sang-Hee, would I be wrong in assuming that Mr Changmin had visited you five times over the three days prior to the accident?”

She stares at him, “he is my fiancé. Or he was, before the accident happened. It wasn’t unusual for him to visit me multiple times in a single day.”

He stops, “and yet, when the police asked you about the reason of his visits, you chose to remain silent, evading the question—”

“Objection,” Sol says calmly, standing up from her seat, “the prosecution cannot ask leading questions.”

“Sustained,” the judge replies smoothly, even before Joon-Hwi has a chance to respond, “Prosecutor Han, you cannot possibly expect me to accept this in the courthouse.”

He nods his head, slightly irritated, now that she has taken his advantage away, “moving on, Ms. Sang-Hee, when you found Seo Changmin unconscious, why did you not call for an ambulance? You waited ten minutes to call an ambulance, which most people would argue, looks strange, does it not?”

She doesn’t back down an inch. Good. He hadn’t thought she would either. They didn’t have enough evidence to show that she was guilty, her indictment based primarily on circumstantial evidence that even the most punishment-happy of all judges would find difficulty agreeing with. But they had had her indicted, and now they were here, trying to get her a sentence that would be as heavy as possible. Sol had been right. He didn’t have to worry about the defendant, not as a prosecutor. He just had to punish people to the full extent of the law.

“I tried to wake him up multiple times, but he didn’t respond,” Sang-Hee responds, staring at the judge, “I didn’t think it was out of the ordinary, since he had always had a drinking problem, but when he didn’t respond to me calling his name in the morning, that was when I grew worried.”

She looks at him once, then back to her lawyer, Sol, who looked as though she wanted to strangle him. good. This means I’m winning, and turns back to him, “it was like him to come back drunk, so drunk that he could barely remember where he was, and his friends would drop him off at my house, with apologies, but he would repeat his behaviour. I wasn’t too worried when he didn’t respond to my calls at night, but by morning, he would usually be awake and demanding breakfast. That was when I started to get anxious.”

“Anxious? Not worried?” he asks, curiosity spiked by her peculiar choice of words, “were you anxious that he was actually dead? Or were you anxious that your—”

“he’s my fiancé, of course I would be anxious if he was not responding to my calls,” Sang-Hee stares at him, “you must not have dated a lot if you think I wouldn’t have been worried about my fiancé.”

A wave of laughter runs through the court, and he can feel the tips of his ears turn red. Even the judge cracks a smile, and he can see both Bok-gi and Jiho sniggering. They’re never going to let me live this one down, “so, you called the police then, who found your fiancé almost dead from a drug overdose.”

“Yes,” she looks at her hands, fingers intertwined, “they told me he had taken it about four hours before I called them.”

Ah, there it is. He knew it would come to this, he had known there was no way to win this case after all, even if he really did want to win. There were things he couldn’t do after all, despite being what they called a ‘star prosecutor’. “No more questions.”

The smile on Sol’s face is enough to tell him that he’s lost this case. Oddly enough, he doesn’t feel disappointed, even as his partner shoots dirty looks at him, a clear violation of courtroom conduct, but he can’t bring himself to care, fixated on the way she looks while cross-examinating the defendant, the way she turns to the judge and says “no more questions, your Honour.” It’s a far cry from the Sol he remembers at law school, the one who would have him act as prosecutor whenever she went up in a mock trial, even if he had been assigned the role of prosecutor, going up against her. She always asked him to help her practise, and like the fool that he was, he always helped her. Even now, as he stands there, watching her, it’s almost as though he is back at Hankuk; almost, but not quite.

“Court adjourned for the day, and will convene for the next trial on—” Joon can feel himself growing more and more antsy, as the judge announces the date for the next trial, and that Sang-Hee can be released from Judicial custody, especially since her health had been failing due to the stress of the trial and asthma, from which she had suffered since she was young.

He hurries out of the courthouse, only to be cornered by Jiho and Bok-gi at the entrance, Bok-gi with a large grin on his face and Jiho with his trademark expressionless look, although he knows both of them were going to tease him about this, possibly till he died and perhaps even then, they would find a way to sneak it into his eulogy.

Strangely, he didn’t mind it at all.

“Hyung, where are you going?” Bok-gi asks, even as Joon desperately tries to catch a glimpse of Sol through the now-closing courtroom doors, “shouldn’t you be preparing for the next date?”

He looks at Bok-gi for a second, eyes widening, “what are you talking about?”

Bok-Gi’s smile gets wider, if that’s possible, “really? What were you thinking about, hyung? I was talking about the next court date.”

Joon-Hwi huffs, “I was thinking about the same thing, Min Bok-Gi; now, if you will—”

Jiho opens his mouth to say something, but Joon barrels past the two of them, running down the stone steps and to the driveway, where his car was parked, and, presumably, Sol’s too. She’s walking faster now, and he has to run to keep up with her. Her ponytail bobs as she takes quick steps, in a hurry to get away from the courthouse complex. He doesn’t blame her at all.

“Sunbae!” he calls out, loud enough to catch the attention of quite a few people, “Sunbae!”

That catches her attention all right, and she stops in her tracks, turning to him, an irritated expression on her face. It doesn’t stay for long, however, fading just as quickly as it came, “so, you’re still sticking with that name, Han Joon-Hwi?”

He grins, “of course. It wouldn’t be me and you, if I didn’t call you Sunbae, Sunbae.”

She stares at him, with an expression he can’t quite place. “I thought we didn’t have that sort of a relationship anymore, Prosecutor Han.”

And, there it is. He can’t deny it and say that it doesn’t hurt to be treated by Sol this way, but he’s nothing if not tenacious, so he pushes on, “you did good today, in there.”

She doesn’t say anything, simply nods her head, before replying with a curt, “good job today, Prosecutor Han.” Of course, she would say that; he doesn’t want to admit it, but it sort of feels like she had slapped him full across the face. Who am I kidding, if she had done that, it would have perhaps hurt less. He feels like a fool, standing in the middle of the road, calling out her name, and a years-old nickname that she didn’t like, and one that he felt only held significance for him.

What they had not had was closure; or at least for him, it was that, the absence of a final answer to his unasked question, something between them still hanging in the air. She could ignore it, live on with her life, but he cannot. There should have been closure, he’s told himself time and time again, or was I just too unimportant for her to even give a damn. It isn’t true, he knows, Sol wouldn’t do that to him, or to anyone else for that matter, but on some nights, it becomes impossible. He doesn’t blame her either; he blames his own self for the loss of his closest friend. If only he hadn’t been stubborn enough to ask her out on the day of graduation. He should have waited a little bit more.

But then, should he have waited?

“Sol!” he calls out again, jogging lightly to keep up with her steps, “Sol! Wait up for a minute—”

He’s interrupted, Sol turning abruptly to meet him halfway, which results in him having to backtrack, “what do you want now?”

He smiles brightly, “how about Pyongyang naengmyeon? I know a place nearby that’s good.”

She stares at him, like she can’t really figure out his deal. He holds up his hands, “look, all I’m asking for is a meal. No strings attached.”

Surprisingly, she nods once, turning on her heel, “lead the way, Prosecutor Han.”

--

I should not be doing this.

Her phone buzzes, and it’s Yeseul. You should not be doing this, the text reads, and Sol has to gather all her willpower to not scream in the middle of the street, I know, I fucking know, I shouldn’t be doing this with him right now, going for lunch when there’s—no, I just cannot do it.

She thinks it would be good, for her to have one lunch with him, to get him out of her system, Yeseul’s wisdom about not having lunch with someone who is technically her opponent in the court be damned. She just needs to have lunch with him once, and then she can stop feeling this way.

The restaurant is small, but bright light filters in through the large windows as they take a seat at one of the empty tables. There are a lot of them, she thinks, looking around, just after the lunchtime rush, or the restaurant wasn’t a very good one. Either way, she was supposed to be having a meal with Han Joon-Hwi right now, and as Sol takes a seat, she realises she had been vastly unprepared for this meeting.

He doesn’t look like the Joon she knew back in Hankuk, that is certain, but he doesn’t look like what her imagination had unhelpfully supplied her with either. He looks every inch the prosecutor, with dark circles underneath his eyes and that slouching posture she supposes every prosecutor has, as though he had been carrying the weight of the whole world. It’s sad, somehow.

“Are you going to order?”

“Hm?” She turns her gaze, and sure enough, he’s looking at her just like he had done all those years ago, when she had a stupid letter attached to her name like a real-life suffix that followed one around, and he used to lean over tables and grin all up in her face and mock her by saying Sunbae. It’s—uncomfortable. She didn’t think she would revert to her university self so easily, but with him, it feels like second nature, “You said Pyongyang naengmyeon, so we should get Pyongyang naengmyeon.”

“All right,” he teases, but it’s light, the kind of tone one would use with a co-worker, which strikes her as somehow offensive (am I not more important than a co-worker?) and she spots a glint of something else in his eyes, but shakes her head free of the thought, just as he says, “so, how is work?”

She rolls her eyes, “I don’t think you asked me to lunch after all these years just to talk to me about work, Han Joon-Hwi.”

He smiles, “right, I didn’t, two orders of beef bone soup, please.”

She stares at him, “it’s summer,” and turns back to the ahjumma, “two orders of Pyongyang naengmyeon, please.”

He just shakes his head, looking at her in that funny way, and asks, “so, do you remember, or do you not?”

What is he even asking me about? “No, I don’t,” she replies, pouring out water for the both of them, “what are you even talking about?”

He shakes his head at her again, “never mind. Let’s eat.”

She can’t help but feel as though she had just missed something important, at least by the look on his face. Or maybe that’s the naengmyeon talking.

[twdbegins]

could I possibly get Simon x fem!reader angst where Simon and her are in love but she doesn’t know the extent of what the saviors do to other groups and when she finds out she considers running away from the sanctuary and she feels guilty because she loves him so much but she’s horrified at the thought of what the saviors are capable of? thank u I’m in love with your blog so much

Of course! Thank you so much! :) Thanks for requesting!

__

How Fast It Can Change

Simon x Fem. Reader

Warnings: Language, Sexual implications.

Word Count: 2,582

“It doesn’t matter. You still did it.”

__

The Sanctuary was perfect. Too perfect. They had endless supplies, food, basic survival resources. Everything was well put together for the most part, and things usually ran smoothly. You had grown to love living here. You had made friends and acquaintances, as well as gained a lover along the way. You weren’t shy to admit that Simon sealed the deal for you.

The thought of spending everyday with him was enough for you to accept a full time commitment to this place. You had a nice bedroom, plenty of food, a steady job, and a social life of sorts. Having Simon as a boyfriend was the cherry on top. 

You had become quite the item around the Sanctuary. If someone saw Simon, odds were that you were close by, and vice versa. In a way, you were kind of like that one high school couple always running around. Everyone knew you were together, and no one dared to try and break it up. You fell in love quickly, and you were convinced there was nothing in the world that would’ve changed your mind.

His kisses were warm on your skin as he peppered your neck, stirring you from your deep sleep. You inhaled deeply, pushing him away for waking you so early. He had always been more of a morning person than you, so your response wasn’t surprising. His kisses stopped, and you almost fell back asleep before you felt him pulling you back to him and nibbling on your ear. 

You let out an annoyed groan, burying your head into the crook of his neck. He chuckled in a groggy voice. 

“Good morning to you too, baby.” He said sarcastically.

You huffed, wincing at the feel of his facial hair on your cheek.

“It’s so early.” You complained. 

“It’s 6:30.” He replied. 

“I concur.” You sneered.

He laughed again, turning to face the other way, but stopped when you whined in protest. 

“Oh, now you want me?” He asked as if he hadn’t just tried to shower you with attention. 

He brought you into his arms once more, content that you weren’t squirming away anymore. His nose was buried in your hair, and he was really beginning to dread having to get up soon.

“When will you be back?” You asked.

Simon was leaving with Negan and a few other Saviors for a “run of sorts” as Simon had explained it. Something felt fishy about it, but you tried not to ask too many questions. Negan didn’t really go on runs unless it was something major.

“Probably Thursday.” Simon replied.

Your eyes opened wider at that. It was currently Tuesday, which meant they’d only be gone for two days. Something was definitely up.

“That’s all?” You questioned, leaning up on your elbow to look at him better.

He scoffed.

“Well don’t sound so disappointed about it.” He joked.

“No, I mean that runs usually take a lot longer.” You pointed out.

Simon shrugged. Truth was, Simon wasn’t really 100% sure of what they were going to be doing. Although, he had a pretty good idea, and he thought it would be best to leave you out of it.

“It’s just a short run I guess. I don’t really know what to tell you.” He said, hoping you wouldn’t keep dwelling on this conversation.

There was a lot that went on around the Sanctuary that you didn’t know about. Simon saw all the ins and outs of how Negan ran this place, and had become very desensitized to it all. Simon didn’t really have a great radar between what was right and what was wrong anymore. Ever since getting involved with Negan, things had become pretty blurred. 

“You gonna stay busy while I’m gone?” He queried, changing the subject himself.

“Aren’t I always?” You wondered.

“When you’re not late.” He declared.

You laughed out loud, feeling much more awake now.

“Okay, so I’m late MAYBE once a week. If you didn’t keep me up so late then I wouldn’t sleep in.” You argued.

He smirked at that, sitting up to be level with you.

“This is the first time I’ve heard you complain about that.” He said, leaning to kiss you.

You kissed him back before he pulled away.

“Things change, you know.” You said with a nod.

“That they do, darlin’.” 

His alarm clock went off finally, signaling that it was really time for him to get up. He let out a growl, reaching to silence the screaming clock. He looked at you again, a devious smile playing across his features. 

“How about a quickie before I go to work?” He suggested coyly.

You hummed thoughtfully.

“Now who’s gonna be late for work?”

He laughed at your cheekiness, tackling you back onto the mattress, earning an excited shriek from you. He kissed you wildly, your hands roaming over his toned midriff. He hovered over you, stopping only for a moment to look into your eyes.

“I love you.” He purred.

“I love you, Si.” You replied before kissing him again and starting his morning off right.

Simon went to join Negan and his selected crew not long after, prepared for the next couple days ahead. You couldn’t pinpoint it, but the entire time that Simon was gone, you had a weird feeling in your chest. You felt like something horrible was going on, but you couldn’t identify what it was. Everything was business as usual around the Sanctuary, but something in the air was bugging you. 

It wasn’t until they returned on Thursday night that you discovered what it was. And it almost made you physically sick. A group of Saviors had passed you in the hall when you caught the tail end of their conversation.

“Negan apparently obliterated the guy. His brains were squashed out all over the place,” The first Savior claimed; “Right next to his wife too.”

“No kidding! I heard the first guy didn’t even make a sound when Negan “Lucilled” him.” 

You had heard that term before. Everyone knew about Negan’s famous weapon of choice. A baseball bat adorned with barbed wire. It was a nasty weapon that could do some serious damage. You had only heard people refer to it when talking about walkers, but you had a bad feeling that they weren’t talking about the dead. 

You stopped in your tracks. Surely...Negan hadn’t done that to a person. What did they mean by “the first guy”? How many people were involved with this? You did a full 360 and went back the direction you had come from, suddenly not interested in seeing Simon anymore. Your mind was reeling, and you caught yet another conversation from a different set of Saviors.

“It was brutal. My stomach almost couldn’t take it.” A voice that you knew to be Arat spoke out.

“At least it wasn’t another Oceanside situation. Simon was fucking nuts for pulling that stunt.” The older man she was talking to piped up.

You felt your blood run cold. What the hell was Oceanside? What did Simon have to do with it? You knew there was one person you could get some straight answers from. Richie was a pretty laid back guy. Never really got in the way, but was loyal to Negan. One thing you liked about him was that he always told it to you straight. 

As much as you loved that, it made the news so much harder. 

Turns out the “run” wasn’t really a run at all. Negan was scoping out a group in a little community called Alexandria. Negan had rounded them up execution style and brutally killed two of their members. Apparently, they had even taken one of them prisoner. Negan was going to start taking a portion of their resources for the Sanctuary and was planning on stripping them of all their weapons. Negan had even tried to get one of them to cut off his own son’s arm.

As gruesome as that was to hear, that wasn’t the worst of it. 

You asked Richie about Oceanside, and for the first time, Richie was apprehensive to answer. He almost seemed...sympathetic. Eventually, you squeezed it out of him. Part of you wished you hadn’t said anything. 

Richie said it was more of a rumor than anything, but that a few years ago, Simon had apparently wiped out an entire community in one go. People of all ages and backgrounds. Just completely disposed of them all. Negan had seriously considered throwing Simon out on his ass after that, but ultimately decided he was worth a second chance. 

You weren’t sure what was worse. The fact that he had killed an entire community or the fact that he did it without being told to. 

You left Richie in a fog, taking short and shallow breaths because you felt as if you were about to puke up everything you had eaten in the last three weeks. You needed time to process this, and you wanted to be as far away from Simon as possible. 

You returned to your room. You’d be sleeping on your own for the first time in forever. The moment your door was closed, you slid down the back of it and let out a gut wrenching sob, burying your head in between your knees. 

Could the man you loved so much really not be who you thought he was?

You didn’t sleep for the next three days. Words and disturbing images flashing through your head on an endless loop. You stayed away from Simon, Negan, Arat, or anyone that had been there. This was killing you to think that you were involved with a place that did these kinds of things. 

You didn’t want to be involved with that. That was so far from your moral compass that it gave you a headache. The thought of leaving crossed your mind in passing the first time. You could just get up and leave without a trace. No one would ever know when or why. Negan could find someone to replace your job. Someone who had more of a stomach for this sort of thing. There was only one thing keeping you from walking out right that second.

Simon. 

Despite how horribly you felt about this, you still loved him. Undeniably, you’d love him until you couldn’t anymore. He was the greatest thing that had ever happened to you...but you didn’t know if you could live knowing he had such a hand in the way Negan ran this place. You would never be able to justify the way Simon killed all those people. You wouldn’t be able to feel his touch the same again without thinking about what other horrid things he had done with his hands. You couldn’t look into his eyes anymore without wondering how many people he had seen take their last breath.

You’d never see him the same again.

It was hurting you. The thought of leaving him without saying anything. Knowing him, he’d go out looking for you the moment he knew you were gone. So, you decided to tell him, even if it hurt 100x more. Turns out, you didn’t have to go far to find him.

A knock on your door sounded out about midnight. You knew it was him before you even opened the door. You hadn’t seen him in days, and you hadn’t spent a day apart since you had arrived a year ago. It was only a matter of time before he came to find you. You took a breath before opening the door, to reveal a very worried Simon. 

You felt your heart sink into your shoes. This was going to be the hardest thing you had ever done. He looked at you through bleary, red eyes. He had been crying, and his demeanor told you everything he needed to know. 

He knew that you knew.

“[Y/N]...” He breathed out. 

You didn’t say anything. You fought the tears that were threatening to fill your eyes, you didn’t want to cry anymore. 

“I can’t stay here anymore.” You confessed, just above a whisper.

His fears had turned out to be correct. Every neuron in his body shut off and restarted it felt like. He was going to use everything in him, every nerve, cell, vessel, and fiber to fight for you. He couldn’t let you just leave.

“Let me explain.” He said, entering your room.

You closed the door slowly. You weren’t in the mood for excuses.

“You murdered them, Si,” You sighed; “You wiped them out like they were nothing.” 

He let out a shaky breath. He had no way to defend himself. Even he couldn’t defend what he had done.

“That was a long time ago.” He said truthfully.

You shook your head.

“It doesn’t matter. You still did it.” You said calmly. You couldn’t have screamed even if you wanted to.

He was at a loss. He really knew that this was probably it. He couldn’t even blame you for it. 

“And then you just watched...and let Negan kill two innocent people? And then allowed Negan to further traumatize that boy?” You asked incredulously; “He’s a kid, Simon.” 

Tears were streaming both of your faces now. You weren’t looking at him. Your head was lowered and you stared at the tips of your shoes. Your heart was beginning to crack. The more you spoke, the deeper it went. Your voice cracked in sorrow, and your head ached.

“The worst part is even after all that...I still fucking love you,” You admitted; “Do you know how messed up that is?”

He almost chuckled, but he knew better than to. It wasn’t an amused laugh by any means, but he knew what you meant. He walked carefully towards you, standing just a foot or so in front of you. You refused to look at him still.

“We can move past this.” He said, in a final attempt to get you to stay.

You looked at him finally, because you really wanted to read his expression for this.

Your heart panged in your chest

“Can we?” You asked seriously.

His hesitation and lack of an answer told you that he really didn’t know. The fact that there was any question at all was enough for you. You had to leave. You brushed past him to grab your backpack. 

Your heart cracked a little more.

You slung it on your shoulders. He wasn’t putting up a fight, because he knew it was over. You stopped in front of him once more, looking into his watery eyes. If nothing else, you wanted to give him a proper goodbye. Even if he didn’t deserve it.

You kissed him. 

It was deep and slow and full of hurt. It was the most painful kiss you had ever had. He knew it was the last time. He’d likely never see you again. Never feel your skin or wake you up in the mornings by leaving kisses on your neck. 

This was it.

You pulled away first. Not looking at him again. You had to leave now before you were tempted to stay. You walked past him and out your bedroom door, leaving behind your greatest and only love you’d ever know. The door closed with a loud echo. 

Your heart completely broke. 

You cried and cried as you walked out of the Sanctuary. One single thought running through your mind over and over. 

Things really could change.

[backtothestart02bts]

Just Best Friends - Ch.6 | Preview

A/N: Meant to finish this chap today but real life got in the way. I managed to write the first scene though. Hope you enjoy. 

...

Barry sped straight home after his…interlude with Iris.

More like an explosion, he thought. Interlude was putting it nicely.

He had done pretty well keeping Joe out of the loop so far, at least as far as the cheating was concerned. He’d come up with one excuse after another that surprisingly the older man had bought. It even got to the point where they could hang out, watch movies, whatever, and Joe wouldn’t question him about what happened just a few weeks ago the night Iris almost slept over.

And while he didn’t know if he’d be spilling that particular news tonight, he wouldn’t be surprised if it came up. He supposed to was his own fault Iris found out he was the Flash. He really shouldn’t have let her kiss him, and he shouldn’t have kissed her back. But even after Linda had totally rocked his world, and he’d still been bitter at Iris, due to their conversation, he found he couldn’t resist Iris even if he tried, even if she didn’t realize who she was really kissing.

He should’ve known the familiarity of his kissing style would’ve been a red flag.

Did that mean he was predictable and so would be a boring kisser if they had gotten together?

He supposed he’d never know now. Now that Iris knew he was the Flash, she wouldn’t be kissing him in or out of the suit ever again.

But Joe needed to know that she knew. It was late. Past 11. But Barry couldn’t wait until morning. He’d probably get an earful from the man, but he knew it was what he deserved. He also needed advice on what to do next, and he knew he’d get it. That was the important part. The outcome. He could deal with Iris the next day. If she didn’t go home immediately and tell Eddie, of course. That would be even more problematic, given Eddie’s opinion of the Flash in the past.

He tried not to think about that.

Finally arriving in the house, he sped to the top of the stairs and started calling for Joe. He flung open his bedroom door, expecting to find him in bed, but he wasn’t there.

“Joe?”

“I’m down here, Barry.”

Barry sped downstairs and found Joe walking out of the kitchen. He frowned.

“What are you still doing up?”

Joe took a sip out of the coffee mug he was holding.

“I woke up hungry, so I decided to come down for a snack and some warm milk.”

“Oh.”

Joe’s brows furrowed together.

“Why are you in your Flash suit? Out patrolling?”

“Uh…no. I…went to see Iris actually.”

His eyes widened. It was clear he didn’t know what was going on, but he sensed something was wrong.

“Barry…”

He took a deep breath.

“She knows I’m the Flash, Joe.”

“What?!” He nearly dropped his mug. Carefully, he set it down. “You told her?”

“No!” Barry took a few steps back. “Of course not! I told you I wouldn’t!”

“Then, how? How do you know that she knows? Were you not…vibrating your voice?”

“No, I was! I’m always careful.”

Joe was clearly aggravated.

“What aren’t you telling me, Barry? How does Iris know?”

“She pushed my cowl back when we were… When we…” He froze.

“When you were what?” he demanded.

Barry gulped. “When we were kissing,” he said timidly.

Joe’s eyes widened again.

“Oh.”

“Yeah…”

“I didn’t know you two were…as the Flash, I mean.”

“We weren’t! She left a message on her blog, saying she wanted to meet. I thought she wanted to talk, not…make out.”

“You made out?” Joe scrunched up his nose. He had not been prepared for this discussion, clearly.

“…yeah.” Barry held his breath. “Sorry. It’d just been so long since-”

“Wait, since? You’ve made out with her before? As, as…Barry?”

Barry’s mouth ran dry. Before he could recover to say another word, the front door slammed open, and in walked Iris.

“Oh, good,” she said bitterly. “I’ve caught you red-handed.”

She looked Barry up and down, and he had a nasty feeling she was not checking him out.

“Iris!” he said, shocked and unnerved. She wasn’t supposed to be here. “What are you doing here?”

“Demanding answers!” She came in and shut the door behind her. Barry tensed. Joe watched her warily. “From both of you.”

Barry gulped, and Iris sat down.

“Go on. I’m waiting.”

“I think I deserve some answers first,” Joe said, approaching her.

Iris narrowed her eyebrows.

“That’s ballsy. You two have been keeping this secret from me, since when? Months? Almost a year? What have I possibly not told you?”

“How about when you and Barry made out?”

Her eyes shot daggers at Barry, who only made a slight attempt to avoid her gaze.

“Well, aren’t you full of surprises tonight,” she spat.

“You can’t tell Eddie I’m the Flash, Iris.” Barry stepped forward.

“Why not? I’m already keeping one lie from him. I’m not keeping another.”

“That was your choice. I told you to tell him.”

She got to her feet. “He would’ve broken up with me if I had!”

“Wait,” Joe interjected. “Eddie doesn’t know you cheated on him with Barry?” Iris’ lips thinned. “I need to sit down.”

Joe pulled out a chair at the table. It screeched, but he didn’t take notice of it. His head fell in his hand as he fought to process all the information he’d just been given.

“Listen, I didn’t come here to talk about…that. I came to talk about the fact that my best friend has been lying to me for months. How long have you known, Dad? Since the beginning?”

“Just about,” Barry answered for him reluctantly.

Iris’ eyes shot daggers at her supposed best friend.

“He just wanted you to be safe, Iris. That’s why we didn’t tell you. But believe me…I wanted to. You were the first person I wanted to tell!”

“Wait, wait, wait.” She held up her hands. “Let me get this straight.” She looked at her dad. “You told him not to tell me?”

“Didn’t you hear what I said, Iris?” Barry tried to step between them. “He just wanted to keep you safe! He thought you knowing could’ve put you in danger.”

“Bullshit.” She looked around Barry towards her father again. “If I had known, instead of being in the way, I could’ve been prepared to be out of the way, helping you guys put the bad guys away instead of some…damsel in distress every time a damn meta came to attack the Flash.”

“I thought of that, Iris,” Joe finally said. “Of course I did! Every time you wrote about the Flash on your blog, and-”

“This isn’t just about that, Dad!” she finally admitted. “You knew how Barry felt about me for God knows how long, and you didn’t tell me that either!”

Barry and Joe were both shell-shocked she’d brought that up. She didn’t want to talk about the cheating, but she wanted to talk about…that?

“That wasn’t his secret to tell, Iris,” Barry said.

Joe nodded. “Exactly. I would’ve never-”

“And you,” Iris directed her next accusation at Barry. “You waited fifteen years to tell me how you felt. You waited until I was in a relationship!”

Barry couldn’t look at her. His head fell, and his shoulders slumped. All he could do was nod.

“I…I know.”

“You want to know why I didn’t leave Eddie for you? Because of that! You have no care in the world about what telling me something like that would do to me. I was fine before you told me. Eddie and I were fine. We were better than fine. We were perfect. And now…” She shook her head. “Now everything is wrong, and he doesn’t know why. And I can’t tell him!”

Joe and Barry stayed silent, not knowing what to say.

“God, I can’t even look at you two.”

She turned to leave, and Barry finally summoned the strength to say something and take a few steps toward her.

“Iris, wait.”

Her hand on the doorknob, she turned to look at him.

“Don’t worry, Barry. I won’t tell Eddie you’re the Flash.” She glanced over at Joe. “At least not tonight.”

She swung the door opened, stepped outside, and closed the door tightly behind her. Barry waited until he heard her car start and then speed down the block before turning to Joe.

“What do we do?”

[the-obiwan-for-me]

firstly, congrats on finishing She Said the Word!!! I've enjoyed it from start to finish and I've been reading it since almost the very beginning so it's been super fun to see it come to an end!!! Would you ever consider writing that "emotional" obi-wan and satine reunion after their respective stints in jail?? I can't find it at the moment but I feel like I remember you writing something about that??? :eyes emoji: anyway!! just thought I'd ask :)) hope you have a great day!!!

Thank you for this inspiration! And sorry it took a bit of time. I definitely had wanted to include this scene in the story itself, but sometimes you have to leave stuff out for the sake of pacing and mood. So, essentially, it’s a “deleted scene” (even if I wrote it after the fact).

If anyone else wants to offer up a prompt, either from this AU or one more aligning with canon, just send it my way! I will admit, I am not always fabulous with prompts, but if I think I can wrangle it, I will.

This contains spoilers up through chapter 65, Aftermath, of “She Said the Word,” so I will put the story below the break. Hope you enjoy!

Home

Any other time, it would seem like a fairly normal visit, Satine thought as she was bustled through the Senate building, surrounded by Coruscanti Guard. But this time the guards weren’t protecting her; they were guarding her, like some criminal mastermind or fearsome warlord.

In a strange way, Satine thought wryly to herself, she supposed she was some sort of warlord now.

 Beside Satine rushed her longtime aide, Kayla, who had finally bullied her way onto a transport from Mandalore, bringing with her endless apologies on Lily getting away from her, clothes appropriate for the family to wear in the Senate, and news from home, which she now hurriedly half whispered to Satine in an odd mix of Mando'a dialects in case of eavesdroppers. The petite woman had more than made up for Lily's escape, though Satine hardly blamed her for the girl's delinquency. Somehow, through sheer force of determination and grit, Kayla had kept the government from imploding or following its duchess and Mand'alor into a foolhardy rescue attempt. 

The troopers stopped at a door, and Satine had to reach out and grab Kayla's arm to keep her from running straight into the trooper, distracted as she was as she shared nearly two weeks' worth of news and relayed, from memory, messages from clan leaders and house heads. 

The door slid open, and troopers moved to allow Satine to pass. Kayla went to follow, but was stopped. "Prisoners only."

Kayla pushed against the soldier. "But I need to speak with the Duchess. I have more news to-" 

"Prisoners only," he said again, stepping more solidly in her path. She looked up at Satine, who had stopped beside her.

"Your grace…"

"It will be alright, Kayla. You have done good work thus far, and I have no doubt you will continue to do so." She squeezed the woman's hand when she saw her eyes well with tears. "K'oyacyi, my dear friend. Mandalore will persevere. We will persevere."

Kayla pressed her lips together, clearly willing herself from letting her tears fall. She squeezed Satine's hand then bowed her head. "Yes, your grace. Oya manda," she whispered, then stepped back, letting the party cross the threshold into the room beyond.

Satine crossed through the antechamber of the conference room turned holding cell and stopped short in the archway, relief sweeping over her at the sight in front of her. Korkie and Ahsoka sat in a corner, heads close together, speaking in hushed tones, while Anakin stood near the floor to ceiling window, speaking with Fenn Rau, Greer Eldar, and Ursa Wren. At the expansive table sat Obi-Wan, methodically fixing tea for he and Lily, who sat beside him, watching him work.

At some point in her relationship with Qui-Gon Jinn, probably on one of her many heartsick nights, her mind clouded and stormy with grief and uncertainty, he had set about making them all tea, in his quiet, methodical way. He offhandedly mentioned that making tea could almost be a form of meditation. She knew Obi-Wan often thought about that, as did she. She wondered, as their daughter watched him carefully, if he had told her the same thing, to ease her fragile heart and still her frantic mind.

Satine watched them all quietly for a long moment, everyone too caught up in their own worries to notice her. That was fine. She wanted to take them all in for a heartbeat; her beautiful, strong children and her kind, brave husband. She just needed that beat to drink them in before the world crashed back down around her and she had to remember they were criminals in the mind of the Republic.

The moment paused for her, just enough, and then ended when Obi-Wan happened to glance up and caught sight of her standing there. His face passed from quiet contemplation to delighted surprise to joyous relief, and he leapt from his seat, bounding across the distance between them, and swept her into his arms. For the first time in over ten days, Satine felt like she was home. Though they were hundreds of lightyears from their physical home, locked in a conference room, treated like war criminals and treacherous beasts, this man was the living embodiment of home.

“Stars, Satine,” he breathed into her hair, and she was caught by the silly thought that she was glad Kayla had been unable to fit her normal headdress within her tight packing guidelines. “Master Windu told me time and time again that you were alright, but I’m just so glad to see it for myself.”

His arms were warm and strong, and she wished for him never to let go. She buried her head into the crook of his neck more, breathing deep. His skin smelled of the same industrial soap she had used to shower in the detention center, but the tunic Kayla had seen to him getting still held traces of the subtle warm scent of his preferred cologne. He smelled like home. 

She tried to speak, but found that no words would come, only a quiet sob of relief and fear and uncertainty that she hadn’t known she had been holding for days. “You are alright, aren’t you?” he whispered into her ear when her body trembled against him with the silent sob.

She didn’t trust her voice, so she merely nodded against his shoulder. “Good,” he said again, tightening his hold on her, rocking her gently. In turn, she wrapped her arms about his neck, holding onto him as if he could float away at any moment. 

She wasn't sure how much time passed as they stood like that, gently swaying, but he stirred her back to the present when he finally spoke again. "Everything will work out, my love. Be brave. Yes?"

She nodded against him again. "Yes," she agreed, finally managing to find her voice. She allowed herself to pull loose of his embrace, and found Lily standing beside her. She pulled the girl into her arms, hugging her tight, kissing the top of her head. "Are you well, little warrior?" she asked. Lily nodded, sinking into Satine's embrace.

"I missed you," Lily said. 

"And I missed you. But now we're together again." 

"All of us."

Satine looked up to find the other three had come over. She opened her arms and they entered the circle of her arms, trapping Lily against her. She hugged them all as best she could, her little warrior, her kind little jetii girl, and her two big Mando'ade boys. It wasn't just Obi-Wan who was home. This was home. These children. Her husband. Their love. This was her safe harbor. Her rest. Her joy.

Obi-Wan approached, and she felt the soothing weight of his warm hand against her back. "We must all be brave, now," he said softly. "There will be those who will see us fall, but we must be strong against them. Trust in the Force, my darlings. We will see this through."

Someone cleared their throat behind them, and Satine reluctantly let her children go. She turned, hand reaching out for Obi-Wan's and finding it, to find Bail Organa waiting, Padme brushing past him to come to Anakin. 

"It is time, my friends," he said, his voice somber. 

"Thank you, Bail," Obi-Wan said, straightening his back, as if preparing for a battle. Satine supposed that this was just one more battle for them. He looped her hand in the crook of his elbow, and went to lead their family toward the door, when Lily stopped them. 

Reaching up, the girl pushed a loose pin back into Satine's hair, trapping a wayward curl back where it belonged. She smoothed her hand across Satine's hair.

"That's better. Now you're ready," Lily said quietly, smiling softly. Satine kissed the top of her girl's forehead, running her hand through her long hair, left loose and brushed smooth by Padme. 

"Thank you, verd'ika. Now I am ready for anything."

With that, she allowed Obi-Wan to lead her out, holding her head high, ready to fight for her home.

[hockeynascarfan91258]

A/N: Please be kind and leave feedback. If you don’t like it keep scrolling and don’t be a troll and send hate anons! Hope you enjoy!

Banner made by me!

Eden had just moved to Pittsburgh and was loving her new job with the Penguins.    Despite being a southern bell and loving her Georgia Dawgs football she loved Hockey too.    She had a fun time dragging Chase to Canes games when they lived in Charlotte.   Much to his dismay she had all feeling Chase loved hockey too.   

It had only been a few months since she started and somehow as much as she tried to she couldn't help but fall for the charming Sidney Crosby.    She knew it was wrong to date a co worker especially the captain of the team but he wouldn't let up.    

Finally after months of him pursuing her and flirting Eden finally caved and let him take her out on a date.    That date ended up leading to a second and then a third.     And now she was getting ready for their fourth date and to make it official they were attending the Penguins Night of Assists which was their charity event they hosted every year.   It was disco themed this year and she was excited.  

She put on a blue dress and straightened her hair.  

She had a bag packed because she was going to stay at Sidney's house afterwards.   She grabbed said bag and headed down the hall just as a knock on her door.    She opened it finding Sid standing there looking as handsome as ever.

"Damn baby." Eden says breathless.

"I could say the same thing about you." Sid says kissing her cheek.

"Does it look okay?   Is it disco enough?" Eden asks.

"Eden baby it's fine.  You look beautiful and I'm so happy you will be on my arm and we can make it official." Sid says.

"Are you sure about this?   I don't want to loose my job." Eden says.

"You aren't going to.   There is no rule that says trainers or staff cannot date the players.   It's fine." Sid replies.

"If you say so." Eden says.

"Trust me there it's not the first and it won't be the last." Sid says.

She shook her head as she grabbed her overnight bag.    She grabbed her purse and made sure she had everything.   Phone, keys, money and extra make up.  

"Okay I think I have everything:" Eden says.

"Well then madam our chariot awaits." Sid says holding out his arm.

Eden loops her arm in his and they head out to the limo waiting for them.    Sid hands her bag to the driver who puts it int the trunk.    Sid opens the door for her and Eden slides on in.    Kris Letang was sitting in there dressed in his outfit.

"Hi Kris, sorry didn't realize that you would be here with us.   But should have known because you two are joined at the hip." Eden says.

"Hi Eden, and if you only knew." Kris says smirking at her.

She laughs shaking her head as Sid climbs in beside her.

"I am so happy that you are coming with me and we are making it official.    But before we do there is something you should know." Sid says.

"Are we telling her now?" Kris asks.

"Telling me what?" Eden asks looking between the two boys.

"Yes she deserves to know the truth and then she can make the decision on what happens next.    I trust her enough that no matter what she choices she will not say anything." Sid replies.

"Okay you guys what is going on?" Eden asks.

"Well you see Eden me and Kris well we are a package deal." Sid says.

"'Meaning?" Eden asks.

"Meaning Sid and I are bisexual.   We are in a relationship and have been since like 2009.    We are looking for our unicorn someone to share our life and our love." Kris says.

"Yes exactly so like I said we are a package deal meaning if you date me you have to date Kris too." Sid says

Eden sat there in shock.   

"Can you handle that?" Kris asks.

"Yes Eden say something please?" Sid begs.

"So I would be dating both of you at the same time.    Wouldn't that make me a whore?" Eden asks.

"No baby girl, it would be a poly relationship between you, me and Kris.   But you are not a whore." Sid says.

"Absolutely not." Kris says.

"And whatever I do with either of you wouldn't be considered cheating on the other?" Eden asks.

"Nope not at all." Both Kris and Sid reply.

"Okay I am willing to give it a try.   Remember I have never done anything like this before so I am new to this." Eden says.

"So are we.   Yes we both hooked up with other girls but never anything long term and we both never wanted to be with the same girl before until you."  Sid replies.

"So you guys hooked up with girls and are together?" Eden asks.

"Yes.   Kris and I have been seeing each other since 2009.   But we have to keep the appearance up that we aren't Bi.   Not that I am ashamed to be with him because I am not but no one can know." Sid says.

"Yeah the NHL wouldn't take it well if their face came out as Bi.   But to answer your question yes we used to hook up with girls.   None of them ever knew about me and Sid until you." Kris says.

"You both are pretty hot and I really really really like Sid so if I have to accept you Kris into this relationship then I will.   However I have a few stipulations." Eden says.

"I would be shocked if you didn't sweetheart." Sid says.

"What are they?" Kris asks.

"One: Sid and I go out like a normal couple and every so often Kris you can go with us we can make it look like we are hanging with our friend, two we all get tested for STI's and HIV regularly." Eden starts.

"We get tested every three months.   Also Kris and I are on a HIV medicine have been for a while because lord knows we both hate wearing condoms." Sid says.

"Well good because I am on birth control." Eden says.

"Good is that all?" Kris asks.

"Yes.   Now I have my apartment will I be staying there or what?" Eden asks.

"Maybe for a bit but then you can slowly move in with us." Sid says.

"You guys live together and that hasn't risen any red flags?" Eden asks.

"Oh no I have a house here but I stay at Sid's a lot so you might as well say I live there." Kris replies.

"Okay.   Then we are all in agreement." Eden says.

"Yes and I am so excited." Sid replies kissing her pulling her into his lap.

"Yeah I am happy too." Kris says chuckling.

"We are here." Eden says noticing they had just pulled up in front of PPG Paints arena.

The limo door opens and Eden climbs off Sid's lap and climbs out.    A few minutes later Sid get's out.      Kris  follows suit and they head inside.     They stop and get a picture together.    They then head into the main area.

"Baby I have a lot to do for the event.   Go have fun." Sid says.

"Okay I will come find you in a bit at whatever table you are at." Eden says.

"I will like that.   Laters baby." Sid says planting a small kiss on her lips.

Eden smiled.    She then goes and finds a chair to sit on.    It was in the Wag section near the bar.   She ordered herself a glass of wine.    He phone buzzed it was Chase.

"Hey what are you up to?" Chase texts.

"At the Night of the Assists with Sid." Eden texts back.

"Oh like a date, date?"  Chase asks.

"Yes Chase like a date, date.   But don't worry okay.   No one will ever take your spot in my life.  You are my ride or die and no one will ever change that." Eden replies.

"I know just be careful please.    I don't trust him." Chase says.

"I know and I will." Eden says.

"Have fun and enjoy your night.   I miss you." Chase says.

"I miss you too.   I have to work the 16th but as soon as I am done I am heading to the airport and flying to Daytona." Eden says.

"Awesome, you can stay at the coach with me, if you want to." Chase says.

"Sounds good to me,  I will text you the flight info and times." Eden says.

"Okay, because I will fly back with you.   Maybe attend a game or two?" Chase asks.

"Would love that.   Then you can meet Kris too." Eden replies.

"Okay.   Well go have fun.   Talk later." Chase says.

"Yes definitely talk later :)." Eden replies.

"Text me when you get home.   I love you." Chase says.

"I will and I love you more Clyde." Eden replies.

She then puts her phone back into her purse.    She sips her wine.     Some of the Wags come over and introduce their selves after seeing her come in on Sidney's arm.    They seemed to be nice and she started to let loose and have fun.

**********************************************

Chase had just gotten home from the shop after spending the day getting the cars ready to roll to Daytona.    He fixed dinner and then texted Eden.    He was so happy she was going to come to Daytona but since he started racing in NASCAR she always came to the big  races.      There was a knock on his door.    He opens it finding his other best friend Ryan Blaney standing there.  Fletch was so happy to see him.

"I think he likes seeing someone other then your ugly face from time to time." Ryan says chuckling.

He got down and was petting Fletch.

"Ha ha fuck off." Chase says flipping him the middle finger.

"Now now now is that anyway for a Georgia Peach to talk?" Ryan asks.

They both then let out laughs like hyenas.

"What's up?" Chase asks.

"Wanted to come hang.   Maybe race the Stimulator and prepare for Daytona." Ryan says as he helps himself to a beer.

"Sounds good." Chase says.

"What has got you so happy?" Ryan asks.

"I was just texting with Eden and she is coming to Daytona and I am so happy.   She is going to stay with me and Fletch  in the coach and then we are going to go visit her in Pittsburgh for a few days." Chase says.

At the sound of her name Fletch looked up ears perked looking for her.  

"That is good.   Will you finely tell her how you feel?" Ryan asks.

"She has a boyfriend Ryan.   Besides we are just friends and have been for 20 years man I don't want to ruin that." Chase says.

"Dude if you don't tell her, how are you gonna know how she feels?   Besides if you don't I don't think you will ever find someone and be happy." Ryan replies.

"I don't know we will see."  Chase says.

"Okay you know I will support you either way.    I adore Eden." Ryan says.

"I know, I think everyone does.   She likes you too.   You are my only racing friend that she actually enjoys talking to and hanging out with when she is around." Chase says.

"I am touched." Ryan says.

Chase rolls his eyes laughing.     They then headed into the room where the stimulators were.    Ryan takes a seat in one and Chase in the other and they start to race.     

Hours later they finished playing and Ryan was a few beers in so he decided to crash at Chase's and not risk driving.   Chase let Fletch out and made sure he had fresh water.    He then headed into his room.    He got changed and climbed into bed.    Fletch hopped up on the bed beside him.    

"Guess what Fletch Eden is coming to see us in Daytona." Chase says scratching his ears.

Fletch wagged his tail and got excited.

"I know boy I am excited too." Chase says.

He looked at his phone.   It was almost midnight and still no text from Eden.   

"Hope you made it home safe and sound from your event.   Text me and let me know.    Love you and see you soon.   :D." Chase texted her.

"Also Fletch says Hi and that he cannot wait to see you either. 

Attachment sent."

Chase put his phone on the charger and set it down.    He had a lot to do tomorrow to get ready to head to Daytona.

Chase and Fletch 

********************* 

It was a little after midnight when the charity event wound down.   Eden had a good time and she even got Sid out on the dance floor much to everyone's surprise.      Sid leads her out to the limo and opens the door.    She climbs in followed by Sid and then Kris.

"Did you have fun?" Sid asks.

"I did.   I had a good time." Eden says.

"That is good.   I am glad." Sid replies.

"Yeah you got Sid out on the dance floor something no one has ever done." Kris says.

"Well I am glad that I did." Eden replies.

"Yeah I had a blast tonight." Sid says.

"Good.   Oh before I forget after the game on the 16th, I am leaving to fly to Daytona." Eden says.

"Oh, what is going on in Daytona?" Kris asks.

"Chase is racing the Daytona 500 and I never miss it." Eden says.

"Okay." Sid says not happy.

"Look if this is going to work you will have to not be jealous of Chase.   He is my best friend and like you and Kris are a package deal, Chase and I are a package deal." Eden says.

"Okay but I don't like it.   He wants to jump your bones and I don't trust him." Sid replies.

"Stop it.   We are friends period.   We have been friends for 20 years." Eden says rolling her eyes.

"I want to meet this Chase guy." Kris says.

"You will because after the race he is coming here to spend a few days with me here." Eden replies.

"Okay." Kris and Sid both say.

They finally arrive at Sid's house and the Limo drops them off.   Sid gets Eden's bag out of the trunk and they all head inside.       It was really late and Sid and Kris would have practice later that next day so they head up to the master bedroom.      Eden pulls her phone out of her purse.   She saw Chase had sent her a text and a picture.

"I am home safely Clyde.   Love you more." Eden replies.

" Also tell Fletch hi for me, give him all the belly rubs and kiss his little nose for me.   Tell him Eden loves him and cannot wait to see him."   Eden replies back to the picture.

She then grabs her charger and plugs her phone in.   She unpacks her bag.   That was when Sid came up behind her kissing her neck.

"I have been dying to get you out of that dress since the moment I laid eyes on you." Sid says.

“I’ve been dying to get you out of those tight ass pants. They don’t hide anything.” Eden says.

“God Eden.” Sid moans as he pulls you closer to him.

What baby?” Eden smiles,

“My darling Eden ,” Sid whispers, kissing her face sweetly.

Sid unzips her dress as she motioned for him to pick her up, legs wrapped around his waist, kissing his lips slowly, hands running through his greyish dark hair. Pulling at it so she could press wet kisses to his neck, his hands gripped onto the underside of her ass as he hoisted her farther up his body, dress falling down to the floor, mouth still attached to his pale skin while he walked her over to the dresser.

Trying her best to pull him on top of her , he knelt between her open legs, peppering kisses to them while she covered her face with bashfulness of the attention she was receiving and the fact she was in nothing but her bra and panties while both Sid and Kris looked on fully clothed

“What’re you shy?” Sid joked while kissing her ankle, her leg in his grip,

“No,” Eden groaned while his hand met her waistband of the lacy underwear she was wearing.

Just I’m practically naked and you too have far to many clothes on.,” Eden moaned out while his fingers danced over her clothed pussy.

Sid chuckled at her statement, however that could quickly change and in a blink of an eye it did. Kris and Sid both stripped in an erotic sexy strip tease.

“You are awfully quiet Kristopher.” Sid says.

“Just enjoying the show.” Kris replies.

Sid nods.

“I love you so much Eden and I’m glad we are official to the world now,” Sid cooed, while pushing down the cups of her bra , exposing her tits to the cool room air, Sid watched as she squirmed at the new sensation of the cold air against her nipples.

“ I love you too Sid and I am glad too,” Eden moaned while using the heel of her foot to push Sid closer to her.

Sid happily obliged in pressing his body against hers. Feeling him hard against her stomach only spurred her on more.

“ Tell me what you want,” Sid spoke quietly in your ear, his scruff prickling the side of her neck, drawing a whimper from her throat.

“Please, Please,” Eden whimpered while bucking her hips towards his cock.

Within a swift motion your legs were placed on Sid’s shoulders, heels pressed to his back while he teased her clit. In seconds her panties were shredded to pieces. Now his head leveled with her swollen pussy, he placed small kisses on her inner thighs, biting slowly on the plush of them. Eden’s back was arched up as she waited for him to give you more, “Sidney , stop teasing me,” Eden pleaded, his fingers rest near her parted mouth, she turned her neck to the left to take his rough fingers into her mouth, hallowing her cheeks as if his fingers were a cock.

“Fuck Eden.” Sid moans.

“Good good.” Kris moans stroking himself watching.

“Loving the view Letang?” Eden asks.

“Fuck yes.” Kris says.

Shifting down her body, Sidney’s mouth became attached to her clit, his tongue moving in circles while he forced her hips down with his strong forearm, his ring and middle finger entered her. Moaning out with zero volume control, Sid chuckled against her pussy, gladly excepting her juices running down his lips.

“Oh my god!” Eden moaned out, “Mouth’s so good Sid ,” Eden whined, fingers lacing in his dark hair while she rocked her hips into his mouth.

“Doing so good baby,” Sid praised as she began to shake with over stimulation.

Even though he had only eaten her out a few times, however, Sid swore he could eat her pussy all day, his large hand gripped onto her ribs, before his fingers began to pinch her nipples.

“Fuck Sid!” Eden moaned while he brought her to another orgasm, his fingers rolling her clit, tongue fucking her entrance.

“ I want your cock, please,” Eden moaned while shutting her legs.

Sid’s head shot up with a grin, his eyes opened wide and mouth dripping with her.

“Do you baby? Will this cock, make you feel so full,” Sid teased, slapping her ass with his large hand, drawing a groan from her.

“Come here babe and get a taste.” Sid says.

Kris comes over and Sid pulls him in for a kiss. Kris sucks away some of the juices still on his tongue.

“Damn tastes so good..” Kris groans.

Eden giggled as Sid picked her up, trying to get her on the bed as quickly as possible.

“Bed now Crosby!” Eden teased.

Sid laughed at her while throwing his head back, “Eager little thing,” he teased back, as he moved.

As soon as he placed her down on the insanely large bed she took to her knees, kneeling in front of Sid. She then took his heavy cock in her hands, while she slowly ran her thumb over his leaking tip.

“Jesus Christ Eden,” Sid hissed.

Eden locked eyes with Kris as held Sids cock in her hands, she then twisted her wrists in the way she knew drove him insane.

“Damn.” Kris moans as he mimicked her movements almost cumming right there.

Eden then darted her tongue out of her mouth, pressing it to Sid’s cock.

Fuck Damn,” Kris groans at the sight.

“You are one lucky bastard Crosby.” Kris adds.

“We are both lucky bastards baby.” Sid says.

Eden laughed as she ran her hands up Sid abs, right before spitting onto his shaft and taking him into her mouth.

They could hear Kris shifting in his spot while a string of curse words left his mouth as Sidney praised Eden.

“Stroke yourself babe,” Sid chuckled.

Kris came closer so Sid and Eden could see him jerk himself off. Eden hands were behind her back as she took Sid down her throat, her throat slightly contracted around his thick cock. He moaned when he felt her choke on him, his moans filled the air.

Gripping tightly on the back of your hair, Sid began to manipulate her mouth on his cock. Edens hands were pressed to his hips to keep herself steady, wet sounds filled the air as she tried her best to take all of him.

Sid pulled back abruptly, making her gasp for air, tipping back her head, “Go help Kris ,” he urged, Eden whined pathetically.

Kris came over to her his cock in her face.

“Hi baby girl,” Kris cooed, his large hand stroking his cock. Pumping it for her.

“Mhmm,” Eden moaned while watching him, bottom lip pressed between her teeth.

“Suck it baby just like you did to Sid,” Kris begs.

Eden spit on his shaft before taking it slowly into her mouth at first. She hollowed out her cheeks as she did. Kris threw his head back in pleasure.

As Eden sucked Kris off she felt Sid playing with her hair, hands pressed to her lower back.

“God baby this mouth is going to make me cum. Are you ready to swallow my load pretty girl?” Kris asks.

Eden nods her need all while reaching for Sid’s cock behind her, she was squirming on her knees from how wet you she was , needy for relief and horny as hell needing to be fucked.

“Fuck,” Kris moaned, picking up the speed of his his thrusts while watching as Sid bent her over, hands gripped tight onto the sheets in front of her, were Kris was kneeling.

Moaning at Kris pulling her hair as she was flushed with his cock.

Sid’s cock bumped her ass, he dropped to his knees to taste her once more, before lining himself up with her entrance.

Eden took Kris all the way down choking as he thrusted.

“Fuck god damn fuck.” Kris calls out as he came straight down her throat.

Eden swallowed every drop and then proceeded to kick him clean. Kris pulls back needed time to recover.

Kris pulls Sid in for a kiss as Sid thrusted into her deeply, his hands squeezing her ass as she dropped herself onto his cock. His hands spread apart her ass as he fucked you.

“Think she can take us both?” Kris asks.

“I think so. Let’s find out.” Sid moans.

Kris didn’t waste no time he thrusted inside her as well. They kissed as they held their cooks together thrusting into her.

With every thrust Eden could feel them get deeper, one of their tips kissing her g spot every time she dropped herself deeper onto them. Sid and Kris moans were wild behind her, the sound of her two boys moaning was near religious, Kris’s deeper moans and Sid’s gasps.

They watched as her tits bounced with each of their thrusts, they watched while they each gripped tighter to her hips.

“Sid, Kris oh my fucking god,” Eden moaned.

Sid gripped a chunk of her hair, pulling her back to meet their thrusts, she didn’t trust herself to keep balance at the rate they were fucking you,

“Sidney ... i’m gonna,” Eden was cut off by a moan coming from the back of her throat.

“M’ sorry can I please cum,” Eden corrected herself.

“Why don’t you ask Kris.” Sid chuckled as they continued pounding into her.

“Kris please” Eden moaned.

Kris was mocking and chuckling at her whining, she could feel that they were both just as close as she was to cumming.

“But you look so good like this,” Kris spoke finally, “Just wanna watch you forever,” he groaned.

“You take Our cocks so good eh?” Sid teased while still not giving her the word, “Stretching out this pretty pussy?” he spoke to himself,.

“Yes,” Eden rasped out, “I love both your cocks,” Eden whined.

Kris pulled her hair back and sucked on her neck, grazing his teeth over her pulse point.

“Cum for us pretty girl,” Sid rasped out.

Eden happily obliged. Sid and Kris groan as they pump her full of their cum. When they could finally move they pull out. Kris goes and grabs stuff to wipe them all off and clean.! He then throws them in then hamper before joining them both in bed.

Post orgasm Eden was laying on Sid’s chest, finger nails running up it. His hand was pressed flat to your face, stroking your cheek with thumb.

“You did so good baby. How do you feel?” Sid asks.

“Sedated.” Eden says.

“How does it feel down there? Kris asks knowing they were both pretty big.

“Sore but I need to become adjusted to your sizes.” Eden says eyes fluttering.

“Yes you do. And you will. Now get some sleep baby girl.” Sid says kissing her head.

“Yes close those pretty eyes and sleep.” Kris says kissing her back.

Eden closed her eyes and was out pretty quickly. It didn’t take Kris and Sid long to follow.

First picture is The story banner, second picture is Eden in her dress, third and fourth are Sid and Kris in their outfits. Fifth and sixth is Chase Elliott and his Dog Fletch.

[sadistgalore]

Chapter 12: Burn Together, Friends Forever

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Taglist: @elliei-m

Please let me know if you would like to be added/removed from the taglist.

CW: Heavy dehumanization, pet whump, torture, burning, branding, conditioned whumpee, slapping, verbal abuse, kicking, referenced whump of a minor (nonsexual), implied starvation, Luther is his own warning, boils, impalement, left outside in the cold, implied noncon

Harper’s stomach dropped as soon as she heard the bastard’s voice, and heard a hard whimper behind her.

“Naughty, naughty girl, Harper. I don’t think your master would approve.”

Harper huffed. “You lied. You said you had a dog, not a human!”

Luther glared. “What’s the difference?”

“The difference? You people are fucking impossible!”

“I would watch your attitude, kitty. You’re just making this worse for yourself.”

“H-Ha-Harper,” said a voice behind her. The girl turned around, seeing Killian look up with tears in his eyes, trembling. “D-D-Don’t m-m-make h-“

“Doggy.” A voice cut him off. “That sounds an awful like talking to me.”

Killian lowered back down. Harper noticed this, and her police instincts kicked in once again. “Stop talking to him like that. You’re mad? Then take your anger out at me, you’ve hurt him enough.”

Luther smirked. “Fine, kitty. Come here.”

Harper looked once more to the shaking boy, then followed the orders given. Luther went across the room, looking towards the wall lined with Dark’s torture devices. He finally picked a long metal cord with a wire attached to it, and plugged said wire into the wall.

“I don’t know why Edward insisted on picking a defiant one like you, there’s so many other trained pets with black hair he can just buy for a few hundred bucks,” he muttered, beginning to loop the cord around her right arm.

“Sorry that me trying to preserve my dignity is a problem for you,” she spat.

Luther chuckled, hand moving to a button attached to the cord. “We’ll see about that,” he finished as he pushed the button.

At first, Harper didn’t feel anything, but soon felt a warm sensation after thirty seconds or so. That sensation only kept growing into a burning pain. She gasped, soon realizing what Luther was intending to do, and began trying to pull it off.

Luther grabbed her hand, “Bad kitty. You better stay still unless you want Doggy to have this looped around his throat.”

Harper looked up, eyes beginning to form tears, and put her hand down. She soon screamed as the heat only increased, the hot metal burning into her arm.

“Ruff!”

“No, doggy. Your punishment is later.” Luther said without even looking up, admiring the smoke coming from the kitty’s arm.

“S-stop, please! I’m begging you!” Harper screamed, beginning to grow nauseous as she smelt more and more of her burnt flesh.

“Just another minute,” Luther hummed, causing Harper to yell in frustration.

That minute felt like hours, during which the pain became too unbearable and she fell to the floor. She writhed on the ground, other hand burning as she tried to pry the clip off to no avail. Luther bent down, ignoring her defiance, and pushed the button on the wire.

“Such a crybaby,” he said as he walked towards his shackled dog.

Killian began whimpering loudly, crying out as Luther began to unshackle his wrists.

“You’re a very bad doggy, you know that?” Luther said as he cupped his face, feeling the tears streaming down his pet’s eyes. “How are you going to make it up to me?”

“B-bark-“ Slap.

“Stupid mutt. Use your words.”

“I-I’ll,” Killian started, not quite sure how exactly he was going to make it up to his captor. “I’ll be a b-bet-ter dog-“ Slap.

“Well you’re pretty fucking terrible at that, aren’t you?!” The man yelled, making Killian flinch back. “Answer me! Aren’t you a bad dog?”

“Yes sir-“ Instead of a slap, Luther punched Killian hard in the face. He got up, beginning to kick him to each word he spoke. “Stupid. Fucking. Dog! Why are you using your words?!”

“I don’t know what you want from me!” The young man screamed, Luther seeing a defiance in his eyes that he hadn’t seen since he was 17. Killian soon snapped back to reality, cringing at the cruel smile of his captor.

“No, no, I’m sorry. Please, I didn’t- ruff! Ruff, ruff, bark, woof!-“

Luther grabbed his hair and began to drag him upstairs. He stopped as he passed the girl on the floor, the coil around her arm now turning into a dull red instead of the fiery orange. “I’ll be back kitty. Once I’m back, I expect you to have dinner prepared for me only. Neither you or the doggy are getting food for a while.”

He didn’t stop to hear the choked gasps of the kitty as he walked upstairs, ripping the poor boy’s scalp as he continued to be dragged. Once they reached the kitchen, Luther threw the dog on the ground and stepped on his neck to prevent him from escaping.

The man grabbed a pot and filled it with water, setting the gas stove burner to high as he waited for it to boil. The boy was crying openly, not bothering to whimper or whine as he saw the rare aggression in his captor’s face.

“Oh, Killian,” Luther sighed as he leaned against the counter, foot still pressing on the dog’s neck. “You were doing so well, I thought I finally broke you.” Killian’s cries filled the room. “Still, you’re too incompetent to follow the rules.”

After a few minutes of more sobbing and the man’s silence, the water finally stopped boiling.

“You need to learn, pup,” Luther said as he grabbed the pot handle with a towel. “The only one who can give anything in this world,” he dumped the pot on the boy, ears straining at the blood-curdling scream that came with it.

“Is me.”

____________

“Wonderful dinner, kitty,” Luther complimented as he finished the last few bites of his steak.

The girl said nothing, completely exhausted from trying to ignore the unbearable pain on her arm and using what little energy she had to cook a meal for the bastard.

She can’t imagine what Killian must be going through, though.

The said boy was still on the kitchen floor, screams long since stopped and have resorted to painful crying. His face was an angry red, only a few boils on his face since he covered most of the splash with his arms. But those were scaly and irritated, raw skin being exposed. Harper had mentioned giving him some medicine, but one angry look from Luther was enough to shut her up.

Luther stood up from the table, and snapped his fingers. Harper moved hesitantly towards him, Killian didn’t. “Your punishment isn’t over. Since you two want to bond so much, you can bond in the cold outside. And no meals for three days. Clear?”

Harper nodded, dreading the thought of being chained up outside into the freezing cold.

Luther gripped her chin. “I said, are we clear?”

“Y-Yes, sir.”

Luther said nothing as he walked towards a drawer, pulling out chains that had very thick cuffs attached to the ends. He tightly gripped her burned out, smiling as she screamed in pain. He dragged her outside and pushed her to the ground outside the porch, connecting the cuff to her ankle and linking it to the wall. He left, and came out with Killian who was also crying out in pain. He did the same procedure with him, and then flipped a switch on each of their ankle cuffs.

Harper flinched as she felt spikes just grazing her skin, regretting that as they seemed to break contact and draw blood.

“Hurts, doesn’t it?” Luther smirked, seeing the girl’s face in pain. They are spikes embedded into those cuffs; the more you struggle, the more they get into your skin. So you don’t try to run away, of course.”

Harper resisted the urge to roll her eyes and looked towards Killian, who was now crying again.

“I hope you learned your lesson today, kitty. I’ll be sure to tell Edward about this.”

“You branded my fucking arm,” Harper growled. “Dark said not to scar me.”

Luther gave the girl a cold glare. “You’re gonna learn, like all of his other pets did, that I’m going to do whatever the fuck I want with you despite if your master likes it or not. I’m sure you’ll see that in the nights we’re going to spend together, kitty.”

With that, the man walked back inside, content that his new playthings wouldn’t try running away.

Harper tested Luther’s claims by doing little movements with her ankle, but the spikes only dug into her skin more.

“Shit,” she whispered as she slumped against the porch behind her. “We’re gonna be impaled even if we moved an inch.”

Killian whimpered, but remained still as he curled up against the porch wall. Harper looked over to him, seeing spike-like scars on his wrists and ankles. “This isn’t the first time he put these damn cuffs on you, isn’t it?”

The boy shook his head.

Harper looked at him with a sorrowful look; she spent mere hours with this man, how long had Killian been with him? “Hey, we’re gonna be okay, alright?” Harper started, gently placing her arm on his non burnt shoulder. “I’m a police detective for Washington, D.C. My friend has been investigating this group for years, a rescue will come for me soon.” She said it more to herself than to Killian. “I promise.”

Killian listened to her words, but couldn’t get himself to believe her. He might have been a street rat, but he’s been missing for seven years. He’s met other pets like her, with reputations and hopes of being rescued. But he’s also met other masters, ones that have too good of a reputation to ever be met with repercussions for what they’ve done to their pets, like Luther.

But Harper was nice, nicer than most people he’s met in almost a decade of hell. Maybe the cycle will change. Maybe his torment will finally end.

He looked up at her, and smiled, and was met with a warm smile back. He nuzzled into her, and closed his eyes when he felt her arm wrapping around his back and running it gently. Together, they could try their best to remain warm.

Harper rested her head on Killian’s, and yawned as she prepared for an uncomfortable and cold night of sleep. “One day, Kill-”

Killian groaned. Harper chuckled nervously. “Sorry, I like giving people nicknames. ‘Kill’s’ not a good one?”

The boy shook his head, Harper thought some more.

“How about Ian?” She got a head nod in affirmation.

“Okay, Ian, one day we’ll get out of here together. From now on, I’m gonna do whatever I can to protect you, alright?”

There was silence for a moment, just their steady breaths filling the space, then a very silent,

“Alright.”

[nerdypanda3126]

A Game of Snake and Mouse – Ch. 3

A little bit of angst makes the fluff sweeter, right?

Or: Viperion’s first akuma battle alongside his new girlfriend affects him more than he thought it would.

Read on Ao3

First Chapter | Previous Chapter | Next Chapter

"Second Chance!" Viperion called, resetting his timer for the third time. 

Desperately, he lunged towards Ladybug, tackling her to the ground just as an akuma blast exploded right where she'd been standing. He hopped to his feet instantly and tugged her with him, taking a step back and clutching her close to his chest as the side of the building crumbled away. 

"Third reset," he muttered in her ear, keeping a sharp eye turned on the akuma. "The explosions are problematic. We need to get close without attracting her notice somehow." 

"Chat Noir!" Ladybug called. 

Chat Noir turned to look at her right as an explosion went off next to him, sending him sprawling to the ground headfirst with a hard crack. He struggled to lift himself up, then fell back down, unconscious. 

Viperion cursed and reset again. 

Tackle. Duck. Stand up quick. He shushed Ladybug by putting a finger to her lips. "Fourth reset. Don't call out." 

She nodded and he tapped on her Multimouse pendant wordlessly. She'd taken to wearing both, just in case, despite his protests. Although it did come in rather handy right about now.  They needed Multimouse's ability to sneak up on this one. 

She nodded once more, short and curt, and combined her Miraculous before she looped an arm around his waist and slung her yoyo out as far as she could towards the rampaging akuma. They landed behind a billboard and Viperion detransformed, throwing Sass an egg and keeping an eye out at the same time. Without his suit, adrenaline and concern for his teammates pumped through him in equal measures, spiking his heart rate, making every minute feel like an endless second. 

Chat Noir was doing an excellent job of keeping the akuma’s blasts away from them, and Viperion was back in action within a few minutes. He set his timer and Multibug called on her Multitude power, shrinking as her clones separated. 

Viperion watched from his hiding place as Multibug snuck up from behind the akuma in all different directions. Another explosion went off and his eyes flicked to Chat Noir for the briefest moment, checking to make sure he hadn’t been hit. As per usual, Chat was being reckless, but in that calculated way of his, throwing himself just close enough before dancing away, playing cat and mouse with the akuma. 

Which is when things went sideways. Frustrated with Chat’s taunting, the akuma screamed and blew out a blast in all directions, scorching the rooftop they were on and blowing seven little Multibugs off their feet. Viperion’s ears were ringing as he watched Chat try to put his arms up in defense, losing his balance on his baton again as the aftershock of the explosion hit him. 

He fumbled at the snake’s head of his bracelet, his eyes stinging from the heat and the sudden onslaught of tears. None of the Multibugs were moving. He didn’t look any longer than he had to. 

“Second Chance!” he finally managed to choke out. 

Multibug had her jump rope in her hand, ready to call on Multitude and he stopped her, wrapping his arms around her to pull her close with his back turned to the billboard. 

“Wait,” he murmured, his voice thick with the emotion of having her back, having her safe, having her in his arms again. Losing Ladybug was par for the course at this point, not that he liked it, but it was his job to stay composed, and she counted on him to stay composed. 

To lose Marinette like that. He wasn’t prepared for it. Never wanted to be prepared for it. 

“Viperion…” she started, but he hushed her by squeezing her to him and pressing his lips to hers, hard. 

The akuma screamed. The resulting explosion rocked the billboard behind him, throwing him a step forward into her, and Marinette’s eyes widened as she clutched him tighter. 

“Chat’s down,” he said in her ear. “Go now.” 

She rushed to call on her power and Viperion stepped into the distraction role, pulling the akuma’s attention away as Marinette crept up behind her, too small to be noticed until the charm bracelet was thrown over to Viperion and he crushed it beneath his boot. 

All the tiny Marinettes combined again and Multibug called her Lucky Charm that they hadn’t used—a stuffed tiger, what would they have done with that?—before tossing it in the air. The magic Ladybugs washed over everything, setting it all right and fixing the damage from the explosions before Multibug captured and purified the akuma. 

As soon as it was over, she turned to him, smiling, offering him a fist bump, but he took her hand instead and tugged her to him again, capturing her lips in a kiss that said everything he couldn’t. He watched her eyes flutter closed, and she went up on her toes to return it, tangling her fingers in his hair. He barely registered that she tasted like vanilla mixed with the remnants of magic that clung to her, something like the air after a lightning strike, and he breathed her in, every second more cherished than the last. 

An obvious throat clear broke them apart, and when Viperion managed to tear his eyes away from Multibug, Chat Noir was helping the akuma victim to her feet with a teasing grin stretched across his face that didn’t meet his eyes. Before Viperion could say anything, Chat Noir waved him off with the excuse of helping the victim home before his timer ran out, even though he hadn’t used his Cataclysm and so didn’t have a time limit. 

“That’ll be an interesting conversation later,” Multibug mused before she turned back to him. “Cat’s outta the bag, I guess?” 

He groaned. “You’ve been hanging out with him too much—his puns are rubbing off on you.” 

“Sorry.” She giggled, then sighed. “I guess it was about time to tell him, though, don’t you think?” 

“I wasn’t really a fan of keeping the secret identity rule, anyways.” 

He traced her bottom lip where his fangs had nicked her in his rush to have her close to him. A tiny purple blister had formed where he hadn’t quite broken skin but definitely hadn’t remembered to be careful. Her fingers traced a nervous pattern at the base of his neck. 

“Was it bad?” she asked hesitantly. “You seem a little shaken up.” 

He shook his head, his eyes locked on that tiny mark on her lip, fighting for his words to come out normally past his dry throat. “Nothing out of the ordinary.”

She caught the strain in his tone and her eyelashes fluttered as she looked down at their feet. “You can tell me, you know. I know it’s all okay in the end, but it must be hard to see—” 

“I know,” he cut her off quickly. Seeing it was one thing. Hearing Marinette talk about it was another. “I know,” he said again, softer this time before he rubbed her back and dropped a kiss to the top of her head. “I just can’t. It’s…” He sighed. “It’s different, that’s all.” 

She nodded as if she understood before her earrings started beeping and she brought her eyes back up to meet his. 

“I have to go.” 

“Be right behind you,” he answered her, reluctantly letting her step out of his embrace so she could sling her yoyo away towards the bakery. She glanced back once before she tugged on the string and she was gone. 

Viperion sat on the roof and laid his head back against the wall, taking deep breaths as his timer ran down. Normally he’d circle back to the Liberty to solidify his alibi, but he was still rattled and he wouldn't be able to hide it from Juleka. 

When Sass appeared, he gave Luka a long look before settling quietly on his shoulder and starting in on his egg. 

A horrible thought twisted Luka's stomach and he grimaced as bile rose in his throat and mixed with the words of his question. "Sass? When I reset… those timelines, they disappear, right? They're not… still out there somewhere? Happening even though I tried to stop it?" 

"It isss unwissse to ponder such thingsss," Sass answered, which wasn't terribly comforting. Luka frowned. 

Objectively, he knew Sass was right; he shouldn't think about the things that theoretically hadn't happened. It was over, the day had been saved, his job was done. But he couldn't shake the feeling that somewhere out there was a Viperion dealing with the aftermath of all the things he hadn't been able to stop. Every time he'd failed and lost Chat Noir or Ladybug. Lost Marinette. His stomach took another awful twist and he turned his head to retch off to the side. 

When the dry heaving subsided, he laid his head on his hand, closed his eyes, and focused on breathing. On being in the present. The cold, hard concrete underneath him. The breeze lifting the hair from his neck and wicking his sweat away. Even his still rolling stomach and his trembling hands. He was here, in this moment. He was okay. 

And so was Marinette. Back in her room by now, humming happily at her sewing machine, or helping her parents in the bakery, or maybe, if he was lucky, she was lounging on her balcony, waiting for him. 

He opened an eye when Sass laid a tiny flipper on his wrist by his bracelet. He'd finished eating and seemed to know where Luka's thoughts had fled. Luka nodded to him and pushed himself up to stand on wobbly knees before he transformed again and started his brisk run towards the bakery.