#Until I put the panels side by side I didn't even realize how the first set perfectly mirrors the second. They're getting ridiculous lol

[kyouka-supremacy]

Today's aesthetic is sskk discussing on the battleground like an old married couple

[beaulesbian]

[egghead spoilers, up to chapter 1110]

Sanji's humanity & Zoro's strength

(or lack thereof) - a theory of possible conflict between Luffy's wings before the end of Egghead arc. Long post ahead. Like.. very long post.

So the new chapter had a very interesting new "banter" between Sanji and Zoro, but no, actually just Sanji, because there was no usual back and forth quips followed after.

Yes, this whole post started because of these few panels: (" ...!!")

After rereading the chapter more times I realized, Sanji's not even speaking to Zoro or knows that Zoro can hear him. He's talking about Zoro, and calling him a burden to the team.

Which is just baffling to me? (fair, maybe I'm looking too much into it and next chapter it would be explained in different way) but for now, I need to put this out there and make my own small (long) theory on this.

There's lot to be said about the word burden here, and I will get to it later in the post, but for now, let's start with Sanji and his eyebrow!

It wouldn't be a perfect story if Oda didn't tangle threads of each respective characters from multiple arcs before and brought them up together later on during one of the most difficult times when Strawhats and Luffy are facing off with so much danger (reminds me of Sabaody but in a very different way).

In this instance Sanji's past could be brought up again, something that started worrying him since his fight with Queen in Wano, and especially given that his left eyebrow has been changing its shape quite a lot during the run of the Egghead arc.

Here's just few panels throughout end of Wano up to current Egghead chapter, where Sanji' left eyebrow is in the focus on the pages:

Chapter 1029 was the first part where Sanji was thinking his body might be undergoing some changes he couldn't control -broken bones insantly healed, stronger and faster than ever before, due to him beforehand using the Germa suit which possibly triggered this sort of superhuman modification he wasn't really aware of until then. When he realized he couldn't remember certain memories, he panicked, thinking he might be changing into something similar like his brothers, a scientific weapon created by his father. The worry and panic was all the more present because he thought he hurt someone without his knowing, and that'd slowly take away his kindness and sense of humanity. (Too bad I hoped the changes his body might be undergoing would only be realization of his non-cis gender status, but maybe that's still on the table for sometime in the future.):

^In this second panel his face is on purpose shadowed, which was the last time he was shown in that chapter,

and only again was in chapter 1031 - where his eyebrow changed:

and it takes him to think about Luffy and what his purpose would be if something so important of him would change. He knows why Luffy went after him in WCI, he knows what values are important for Luffy and his crew, and of course he doesn't want to be reminded of his family and his brothers and act as they did. He chooses the humanity, the kindness that Luffy loves in him.

Even to the extent to call Zoro and make a deal with him - to kill Sanji if anything would go wrong with him. "If I'm not in my right mind, I want you to kill me." That much trust he has in Zoro to protect the crew and Luffy!

Of course Zoro wouldn't do anything reckless without a good reason, but part of their banter and understanding each other would be to promise something like that - echo of Thriller Bark and the range of how far Zoro would go to take on someone elses pain. It's a promise to win their separate fights, but also this was something that Sanji put out there for Zoro to take notice of. (I will come back to that later.):

(still the "bad eyebrow" - he had that the whole chapter 1031).

After his fight with Queen (where it was also cleared what his actions were and weren't), he was only shown two times until he woke up, and both times he had his eyebrow back on good side.

1036 & 1044 (hearing Luffy awaken his powers):

All the way up to Egghead he seemed to have his eyebrow drawn this way, and it started to change only during fights -

ch 1075, still good eyebrow, tho.. ehh this behavior.. whatever:

ch. 1078, protecting his crew from Seraphim, bad eyebrow:

in between chapters 1090 - 1105 (most of which were flashbacks and Sanji nor Strawhats were shown) he appeared with his typical eyebrow:

and it changed again in ch 1107 - when he was again protecting Bonney / fighting against Kizaru:

interesting was chapter 1108 where he's standing between Saturn and Vegapunk, and he's describing Saturn with "he's less and less human by the minute" while his own face was obscured, (I mean.. interesting choice of words and what character said it, huh?):

and the next page he still has the bad eyebrow:

in chapter 1109 it's back on his typical side, where it continues from previous chapter of Sanji carrying Vegapunk- so at some point it must have shifted back (and I'm curious if these changes would be noticable in the animation). At this part he's watching how Saturn is summoning the other Gorosei to Egghead:

Which leads me to the point from above with Zoro.

chapter 1110 and their interactions (for me) was just off. I like their usual banter and bickering, it's funny (if it's in the manga and contained to few panels to make sense, not so much in the anime, but i'm not going into that now), but the thing to call anyone of their crew a "burden" just doesn't fit right. (Especially after WCI... c'mon Sanji, and especially to someone like Zoro, who's always the first one to think about the crew.)

I would understand it if he laughed along with the words to elevate their seriousness, or said something like "Finish it up, Mosshead, we need to get moving." but no. He calls him a burden. And again as I mentioned, it pretty much could have been even Sanji not realizing Zoro can hear that.

These words (in my opinion) were chosen on purpose for multiple reasons:

First we have the Zoro vs Lucci fight that goes on for a while in the real world - in the One Piece world it might be just few minutes - plus we don't know how tough were the fights with the Seraphim which let others be injured.

When Lucci attacked, Zoro immediately thrown himself with him away from the rest of the crew. Zoro was possibly stalling with the fight for time to leave. I feel he could have finished that fight earlier but that wasn't the point. The point might have been to hold him back from his crew.

also this was possibly the only fight after King where Zoro could test the limits of his powers and haki, just like Luffy in the Udon prison in Wano was basically training, this (and the Seraphim fights we haven't seen) could be something similar for Zoro.

Some people think that just because of these characters getting new powers it means they already understand how to use them/how it works, but that's usually not the point of how stories go - there can be progress and there can be setbacks, growing up but also falling back down, which makes the stories more interesting.

The words that Lucci used against Zoro were basically the same thing that Sanji said to Zoro few chapters later:

Amongst them he pointed out the Strawhats inability to cut off one of their own out of their crew to save others - like Lucci left Kaku behind just chapters before this fight when he attacked Vegapunk and Stussy (and Sanji trapped Kaku in the bubble prison). It's a play on very different characters and how they think and act to show clearly how they different they are.

The words burden or dead-weight really stood out, already when Lucci said it in chapter 1107, and the fact that they were targetting Zoro - someone who always blames himself (in his mind, not usually out loud) for not being strong enough, and someone who always has protecting his crew at the first place, was interesting in the connection to Sanji repeating basically the same words in the latest chapter.

I will probably make a different separate post only focusing on Zoro and his fear of being weak, but for the purposes of this post, just to pick a few moments where it's important in the manga:

One of the first time I've noticed how much Zoro keeps berating himself with words like "not strong enough" "too lax" "still too soft" "if I'd been stronger/ faster/ better..."

was just after Little Garden arc, where he almost cut off his ankles just to keep fighting. Time after time the crew encounters strong enemies and Zoro gets a new understanding how far up is the limit that he has to reach to keep the crew safe, so he keeps training. ch. 129:

When Luffy went to fight Crocodile and Zoro was worried and kept training on the way to Alubarna, this banter between Sanji and Zoro felt typical between them - it's about the two way street, the back and forth (that's why that new chapter and insult from Sanji feels so foreign, there's no reply, not quip back - only silence and some sort of determination, which isn't good nor bad, just.. weird.) ch. 179:

and after the final fight of Alabasta, possibly one of the first times I really started paying attention to how much it gets to Zoro, this question of how strong he needs to be. (along with what possibly was one of the first introduction of his haki and how he began training the Observation haki, disguised as meditation in the terms of the early manga) ch. 213:

Thriller Bark was one of the biggest arcs in this sense of Zoro and his protectiveness towards the crew and Sanji knows that - he knows what happened there, he even wanted to sacrifice himself in stead of Zoro for Luffy (but this is beside the point here, and I talked about it in other post before).

Zoro took on himself Luffy's pain, and after that arc he still went right to train as soon as he could despite being still injured, ch. 490. "still too weak!"

which goes through to Sabaody arc.

Chapter 510 until the end of that arc is just painful to go through again. Luffy was worried for Zoro and didn't know the scope of his injuries, while Sanji knew and was concerned in his own way too - that is another thing of how they care, sometimes wordlessly but there is that understanding of what to mention or not. ("Burden" still shouldn't be one of the words to use between them, not that far into the story.)

Now - fast forward to Punk Hazard where one of similar moments played out - Zoro telling Luffy not to goof around because they got in the New world and needed to take things seriously.

It was one of those small moments where Sanji was actually one of the few people shown with reaction to Zoro's words and his urgency, ch 678:

Sanji saying "He's so tough on himself" really puts into perspective how he sees Zoro - he knows what he's been through, and knows to what extremes he's willing to go to protect his crew.

He's definitely not someone who would carelessly call Zoro "a burden" even in the time and place and situation they found themselves on Egghead, if anything, he was supposed to be one of the first ones to know how serious is Zoro always about protecting the crew. (Even in the beginning of Egghead, Zoro stayed at first on the Sunny because "who will save them when they will need saving.")

There's few others scenes and parts where Zoro questions his worth and strength, especially in later Wano, calculating what needs to be done so they have strength to face off with Kaido, ch 980:

and later against King, ch 1033 "it was my strength that was lacking!" while unlocking his Conqueror's haki, still unknowingly:

The fact that it's been happening pretty much since the beginning of the story - how Zoro views himself as not strong enough, yet persisting in always getting stronger and protecting his crew - means so much for what character Zoro is and how much he values and loves his crew (just like all the other Strawhats in different ways), and also, as I've been catching up so quickly with the manga, there's been that hope for some call out of this behavior, to poke it where it hurts, to see what would happen if someone turns those words Zoro possibly feels in his mind against him out loud. And that's kind of what's been happening lately - and I'm curious what impact will this have on both Zoro personally and on the other Strawhats, depending who will be around for the conclusion.

Zoro is one of the few strawhats really thinking about the future, plans and what they need to still fight through, carefully calculating what his opponents might be doing, how strong they are and how much of a problem it would be to go through them.

And Sanji normally understands that, he knows how Zoro works and the other way around, that's why he still protected him when Zoro was injured, (if anything, in this moment Zoro could have been something like hinderance or annoyance to Sanji, yet he never said something like that), ch. 1015:

Even on Egghead, where there was temporary truce with Lucci and Kaku, Zoro pointed out how to recognize the Seraphim's weaknesses, and apologized for 'wasting their stamina' - again, calculating on his strength, ch. 1077:

Zoro isn't just fighting for the sake of a fight, he does have his dream and does know what's important to focus on (he himself always keeps the crew in focus when it's important!)

So it's difficult to have a conclusion about the whole Zoro vs Lucci fight without knowing what is Zoro thinking - hopefully in next chapter we will have more info on it (that is number 1111 - Zoro's birthday and bounty! so I hope it will be a big focus on Zoro again). But even beside that, it was obvious in such short time two people around him suddenly called him a burden to his team - something he takes very close to his heart and mind, something that will hopefully have some consequences for us to see and read, because as Oda is choosing words definitely carefully to have the right impact, two very similar words like "burden" don't seem like a coincidence.

To wrap this up - with Sanji telling this to Zoro felt different than their usuall banter, and as I said before - maybe because Sanji wasn't even speaking to Zoro. At the same time, on Wano Sanji gave Zoro a clue that somehting was happening with him, the fact that there was a panel with just Zoro's ear twitching and then being silent, thinking, and not replying to Sanji with anything that would hint to us about his state of mind, and it could mean he's also aware of some difference in Sanji's acting.

The way he says this reminds me of the what Sanji was thinking during his fight with Queen - "what would be more useful to Luffy, regular flesh-and-blood body? Or a cruel, cold emotionless warrior of science." Even for this small part of seeing him speak with Jimbei and hearing what Zoro was up to until then, he speaks without almost any emotions beside anger? Even with his eyebrow not indicating the change, precisely, it doesn't have to be connected in this way, except physical fights, but there could be something still changing within Sanji to make him act this way, a way that really isn't something we've seen before. I think if in next chapters he speaks to Nami, Robin or some other woman without his typical over-the-top pleasanteries, it could indicate how much of a problem this could be for the Strawhats.

So we have Sanji's need to stay human and kind, the pact created with Zoro to kill him if anything felt wrong; and we have Zoro - someone who's biggest purpose from the beginning was to protect the crew and Luffy, while many times we've seen him question his own strength, and now two people in the span of like 5 minutes in the One Piece time are calling him a burden.

It will be interesting to see if this is heading towards a clash or conflict between Luffy's wings while Luffy needs the support to fight / flee from the Gorosei.

To end this too long post, I feel it's very on point for One Piece not to have a sole focus on just one character going through it™ in one arc, but it's always a few crumbs here and few hints there. This sort of conflict would be perfect to deal with both of Zoro and Sanji's respective fears - because this is very much about fears in their minds, while at the same time if they can resolve this, it would only strengthen their crew once again.

[sithlordchopper]

Can I Ask You Something?

Tech x Reader (implied female, no y/n)

Tech decides to clarify something that has been on his mind as you two are stuck alone in a broken lift

18+

Word Count: 8194

Warnings: NSFW, face fucking, phone (comm channel) sex, oral sex, dirty talk, cum swallowing, slightly dom Tech, armor kink, mentions of voyeurism

"Can I ask you something?"

Your hands stilled as you took a second to comprehend what was just said to you. Reaching down to carefully put the panel still attached by it's wires against the wall of the lift, you let out a warm huff of air, scrunching down on your knees further as your head lolled down and to the side, you could feel the warmth of your breath radiate back into your face from just how close you were to the durasteel plate lining the lift wall.

"No, Tech, I haven't finished disconnecting the wires from the lift control panel, it's too dim in here and I can't quite see what I-"

"That was not the subject of my inquiry, but I do appreciate your honesty." Tech interjected, standing to your right. He did not change positions to look down at you as he attempted to clarify what he meant. His hands were still busy at work within the right side control panel located within the lift, or so you thought. From your position crouched on his lower left you couldn't really see much of what he was doing. For all you knew, the clone was elbow deep inside the walls of a broken Imperial lift, hard at work trying to fix a broken circuit. The light on the side of his goggles was still on, yet he stopped moving before reaching up to turn the light off. The small bit of illumination provided from the light now gone as the rich red glow from the emergency shut off light above, embedded in the ceiling was all that was left.

Turning to now look at your compressed form, Tech could see you without blinding you, albeit the red light did not allow for the eye to pick up much detail, especially from that distance. The sound of Tech shuffling around was enough to cause you to look up at him, instinctually turning towards the source of the sound.

"What did you want to ask me then?" You really had no idea where he was going with this. Your head was swimming with a thousand different thoughts right now, and for the first time in a long time, Tech was not one of them. Being trapped inside an inoperational Imperial Lift in a now abandoned outpost facility was the first and only thing that had your undivided attention. Yet every passing second where you and Tech were not working in tandem to get yourselves out of this situation, the realization that you and Tech were trapped together, in the tightest and most secluded place you could possibly fathom grew, until it was at the forefront of your brain. Still, you had no idea what to expect from the technician as you glanced up at him and placed the spanner grasped in your left hand onto the cool redlit durasteel floor.

Making eye contact with you, Tech blinked and then looked back into the opened control panel he had his hands inside. You couldn't extrapolate much emotion or intention from the extremely brief glance you two threw at one another, however, you knew that whatever it was, it was distracting enough to cause Tech some discomfort. He was still wearing his helmet after all, which blocked out all facial cues, except for the ones he unconsciously made with those brown eyes of his. Even so, you had no read on the trooper, but the lift was getting warm and any second longer you spent in here you swore you would begin to go stir crazy especially if Tech didn't get on with it. 

"Why do you look at me so often?" Tech stated in a very flat and critical manner, his voice catching you off guard and pulling you from the false sense of comfort provided by the previous silence. By the sound of it, Tech really had no idea. Not that you expected him to, but you were thrown off by how candid he was being. Before you could reply, Tech reached back up to turn the light on his goggles on once again and he resumed tinkering around in the opened panel.

"I need some more to go off of than just that, Tech." You countered, trying to keep your cadence and tone as close to his previous delivery as possible, not wanting to sound nervous.

"Let me rephrase my question." He kept his head straight, as you decided to take a much needed break from fiddling with the panel you removed from the wall earlier and changed positions to be sitting flat on the ground, back against the wall that was adjacent to you and Tech, on the left.

"Go on, I'm ready." You added, stretching out your legs behind Tech and removing your gloves.

"The frequency of you simply glancing in my direction as often as you do is far too low of a probability to be coincidental. I was wondering why that is. I tried to ask the opinion's of Hunter and Echo but they dismissed my concerns...seemed to find it quite amusing for some reason they did not fully explain to me. " You could hear the irritation towards his brothers in his voice, something about this was bothering Tech more than he was currently displaying physically. That compounded with the swift dismissal from Hunter and Echo, Tech was sure to be feeling disregarded about the true nature of your curious behavior, like he was the only one not in on this silly little secret.

Shit, did he know? Did he figure it out, or had Hunter been noticing you all but gawking at his brother and trying to keep your composure, and divulged Tech?

"Tech, don't put too much stock into whatever your brothers told you, you had a very valid question." You hummed out, feigning ignorance to his predicament and just flat out refusing to answer his question. Closing your eyes and crossing your arms you took in the borderline serene stillness of the broken lift before Tech could notice your own inner turmoil unfolding.

"So you do know you are doing it." Tech blurted out too quickly and curtly for your comfort as your eyes snapped back open and your hands grew clammy. Without thinking you recoiled your legs, knees moving up to your chest and jaw now clenched shut. Once you stopped moving, you realized that you couldn't hear Tech clamoring around in the wires anymore.

"D-doing what, looking at you?" You could feel your heart rate steadily increasing. "I didn't realize that I wasn't allowed to look at you or your brothers." The reply you gave was not very succinct or even a real reply at all, but the increase in adrenaline from Tech's impromptu interrogation was enough to ground your wit, preventing too large of a silence from being created and hopefully preventing Tech from prying some more. "There's some sort of clone joke in there somewhere, you know, similar appearance and...h-how you all look." You chuckled, but your accidental inflection on 'look' just gave away far too much, far too quickly and Tech's mind had already begun placing the pieces together. Tech could feel his mouth curling into a slight smirk before regaining his trademark level headed composure, however he stood still and didn't dare turn to look at you even as he formulated his reply. 

"And how do they...look?" He mimicked your emphasis on 'look' so well that you didn't even catch the fact that Tech said 'they' and not 'we'.

"You look like.." you were trying to pick your next words oh so carefully, "you know...Jango Fett, tan skin, dark hair, brown eyes. You know, your nice, normal features."

Tech's hand dropped the tool he was holding within the panel he was working on as soon as 'your nice, normal features' fell off your tongue.

Shit, you said 'your nice features' and Tech heard it.

"So Hunter was telling the truth." Tech clicked the light on his goggles once again, turning the bright beam off as he turned to see you balled into yourself on the floor. Wide eyed, you looked up at Tech and suddenly back down, eyes falling level to the wall across from you, red light reflecting off of the shiny surface.

"Tech, what are you getting at?" Carefully, you stretched your legs back out in front of you trying to act as naturally and unassuming as possible as Tech stood there and observed. Moving his hand up to his mouth, he cleared his throat slightly before indulging you.

"Hunter told me that all of your glances and staring was due to the fact that you are attracted to me. I, however, did not believe him to be telling me the truth at the time." He pulled his left hand up to his helmet, fingers resting on the side of his head like he was deep in thought, right wrist resting on his hip slightly. "But that changed once you said 'you look nice' rather than 'they look nice.'"

It was far too dim in the room for you to gauge the expression of the clone standing above you. Not even sure if you did want to know, your mouth began to move before your brain had time to scrounge a comprehensive retort together. "Did you wait to ask me this until you got me alone because you're into me too?"

"Now that is an interesting extrapolation." The sound of Tech's smile was audible, causing you to swallow thickly before taking a steady breath.

"You aren't denying it." You couldn't think of any other way to get that statement out, so you just went for it. You two were already stuck in a lift so you might as well get it out in the open. At that thought, you glanced down at his codpiece, but were careful to keep your gaze moving, lest he catch you in the act of checking him out right now.

"That possibility was considered, however I did not want to corner you. Although from what I have read, that is sometimes the best way to invoke arousal with some individuals."

Did he really just say that out loud? There is no way that Tech wasn't flirting with you right now, but to be honest, you still couldn't get a good read on the clone.

"You didn't answer my question, Tech." You were trying to remain calm and keep your cool, and so far it was working. But you were still nowhere as calm as Tech seemed to be in this moment.

"I...have considered my feelings towards you and have come to the conclusion that I am attracted to you as well. Yet, I also came to the conclusion that that is irrelevant. The probability that you were attracted to my brothers was much higher than the probability of you being attracted to me; however, now that I know you do have a thing for clones, and more specifically, me, I have much more information to analyze and consider." Tech was now standing right in front of you, his arms crossed, legs apart and positioned over yours, still currently outstretched. Tech all but had you cornered in this lift, not like you could go anywhere else, it was broken, but damn was he right about being cornered creating a heightened state of arousal.

"What do you mean, a thing for clones?" You had an idea of where he was going with this, but your brain was short circuiting and you were left to think with the throbbing heat developing between your thighs instead.

Tech noticed you shift ever so slightly on the cold hard floor. He raised an eyebrow and looked down at you. Noticing a shift in his position as well, you whipped your head up to look at him, making sure to not look him up and down or stop your eyes on his body anywhere except his face.

"There are countless others on the run from the Empire and none of them are anymore wanted than we are. It is no more dangerous to travel with us than it is any other group or individual. Not to mention that statistically, you are not going to find another group of clones in the same predicament as we are currently. So why opt to travel with us?" Tech's breathing remained calm, yet you could hear the slight rasp growing in his voice as he explained his thinking to you. You opened your mouth to make a rebuttal, but nothing came out and you quickly shut it, huffing out slightly as you crossed your arms once more. He had a point but you weren't going to tell him that. He doesn't need any more ammunition against you, especially at a time like this. Tech shook his head slightly "I do not understand what is so appealing about us, sexually, I mean. We are no greater than any othe-"

"I like your armor. Brown eyes are my favorite. And you seem so stoic and hard to rouse. I want to know what makes you lose focus and let go. I want to watch you come undone." You can't help yourself as it all comes out all at once and it finally clicks once you're done telling Tech everything…well almost everything. The realization that Tech knows exactly what he's doing hits you hard and fast; a lesson you just can't seem to learn and now you are sitting in a durasteel prison of your own making knowing that Tech knows that you know exactly what he's doing, and it's getting to you far more than you or he ever thought it actually would. 

"No, I did not purposely wait to get you alone to ask you if you were glancing at me intentionally." Tech finally answered your question that by now you totally forgot all about. You blinked at him before he silently chuckled to himself. "The answer to your question earlier?"

"Riiight." You nodded slowly, looking back up at Tech, trying to glean something from his eyes from behind that helmet of his. "But here we are, alone. Alone alone." You emphasized. Tech's stance remained unchanged but his blank look made you nervously reconsider your mounting proposal. You could feel the throbbing between your legs strengthen and felt your face get hot as you blushed. Good thing the light in the lift was red so it prevented any change in your cheeks from being noticed.

"What are you suggesting exactly?" Tech was quick to inquire, squinting his eyes. His curiosity was noticeable but he tried his damnedest to prevent you from also coming to the realization that he was feeling the warmth of arousal too. Tech hardly ever had to worry about others being able to tell exactly what he was thinking or feeling but the way you were looking at him made him feel as if he was a very hard puzzle that you had just solved. Noticing how much you were squirming on the floor underneath him, he hadn't even considered that standing over you like this would cause such a reaction especially between your legs, as he was also resisting displaying how turned on he really was. However, observing you wasn't enough. He needed to experiment with you a bit and wanted to see what you would do next if he stepped a fraction closer to you. He gave you no time to reply before he took a slight step towards you, his codpiece all but touching your lips, his arms were now fully crossed across his breastplate, and his eyes half lidded and glued to the very slim distance between your mouth and his codpiece. He watched as you took a tentative breath and licked your lips. I would wager that her tongue is so soft Tech thought to himself as you sat there, gritting your teeth and tensing your hands into fists by your sides, fighting every urge not to reach up and touch him.

"It seems to me that you already have it figured out." You couldn't help the slight sarcastic tone of your statement, but Tech found it amusing that you suddenly had an attitude now that he was towering over you, almost like you wanted him to do something about it to force you into admitting every salacious detail of what you wanted him to do to you; what you wanted to do to him.

"There was little doubt that I was wrong. After all, I am hardly ever wrong..." 

You couldn't tell if he was being genuine or snide, but something about how he was towering over you, arm crossed, and all on display made you think the latter. 

So he went into this mission knowing full well that shit would go south, thanks to that lab experiment bullshit brain of his, and decided that's how he's gonna make a move? Your thoughts were scattered, you couldn't help feeling turned on yet you were beginning to feel irritated, why did he wait so long to bring this up?

Unclenching your fists, you crossed your arms once more and glanced up at the tall clone currently standing over you in a more than suggestive manner. Your glance morphed into a glare and you exhaled forcefully, trying to think of something intelligible to say. However, Tech's expression shifted slightly derailing your train of thought. You couldn't see his mouth, but by the way his brown eyes squinted slightly, you could just tell he was smirking down at you. 

"Arrogant little—" You gritted out through clenched teeth, eyes now squinting in annoyance before being cut off by the clone in front of you.

"Took you long enough to articulate yourself." Tech matter-of-factly pointed out. Despite his flat delivery you knew he was enjoying himself more than he led on. 

"Very cocky but I guess that's to be expected of a clone whose brain was engineered to be bigger than his di–" You managed to snap out quickly before Tech cut you off once more, sensing where you were going before you even had time to get there. 

"Oh, I think you enjoy my sense of confidence immensely by the way you are clenching your thighs and fighting the urge to do anything to me." So Tech definitely knew what he was doing to you, that asshole.

"You just said that you didn't think I returned your feelings, how does that equate to you having no doubt?" You had no idea what he was getting at or trying to prove, but it seemed like he was having too much fun playing with you for him to be sincere right now. 

"Ah, I said that you returning my attraction was improbable, not impossible. I did not doubt that you had some sort of interest in me, just that it would have been worth my time to pursue," his voice remained in that typical Tech tone, drenched in rationality and only a slight amount of the condescension that kept your hands busy when you were up way too late, "evidently it is well worth my time. I just had no idea how to press this matter…" Tech couldn't help his almost giggle as he finally admitted that this was something he had considered previously, yet you noticed immediately as his voice stilled after admitting to his trepidation. You began to feel bad for giving him so much lip earlier because he really couldn't help it. He was only going off of what he most likely researched, whatever Hunter and Echo told him, and now, he could only respond and react to the information that you were providing. You took a deep breath and looked back up to Tech. He was still standing over you however his confidence in his current  position and choice of action were starting to wane noticeably.

"Tech, do you trust me?" You said in a kind and steady voice, not letting your nerves get the best of you for what you were about to do.

"Of course, you have been kind to me since the day you joined us. I have no reason not to trust you fully." His reply was genuinely sweet, however you didn't let that sway you from leaning forward and placing a swift kiss on the outside of his plastoid codpiece. Pulling away from his armor, your lips created some slight suction, causing that distinct 'mwah' sound to reverberate through the small lift. Tech's face flushed and his goggles began to fog up at the slight pressure your kiss provided to his growing erection underneath his armor and the sight of you pulling your mouth away from between his legs. Tech let out a stifled grunt and stood rigid as a board, noticing your sudden shift in demeanor as well as his own. Regretfully, he wished that you retained that fiery defiance you had not long ago. Something about him watching you get aggressive over your feelings towards him was providing an ever growing stream of warmth to flow down to his center...and then some.

Looking up at the clone through your eyelashes, you licked your lips and sat back against the wall again.

"Oh, I might have miscalculated the effect your eyes have on me. The way you stare at me..." Tech trailed off as he closed his eyes and thoughtlessly palmed at his codpiece, still moist from the kiss you had just planted upon it. You watched in awe as the clone all but rutted himself against his own armor, trying desperately to soothe the excitement you instilled in him.

"Take that off and I can help you out with what's underneath." You chimed and Tech complied without hesitation. Watching as Tech unclipped his codpiece, you sat back and waited in anticipation. You wanted to watch this man come undone and you were determined to make it happen. Eyes glued to his fingers, the piece of plastoid fell to the floor of the lift with a muted clatter, but what really caught your eye was the sight of Tech's erection straining against his blacks. "Can I help you with something there, sir?" Tech let out a slight moan at the new title. You have only ever called Hunter sir out of respect, since he was technically the one in charge. However, the way it affected Tech was something neither of you expected. "You would like being called sir." You giggled as you leaned forward once again, hot breath exhaling out of your lungs and onto Tech's clothed dick.

"And you would like being cornered by a clone in a lift." Tech shot back, his voice straining as he felt the warm wetness of your breath over his now aching cock. Evidently he wasn't done trying to get you riled up either, though if he knew of the puddle you were sitting in right now... You sat thinking for a second, trying to ignore the fact that you were eye level with Tech's hard dick. Inches from your mouth, if he were to remove it from his under armor clothing you're sure that it would smack you in the face.

Oh Maker, that sounds wonderful.

You couldn't help the drool beginning to pool in your mouth at the thought of Tech this close to your face. "I would like it even more if that clone cornering me ordered me to suck his dick." A new sultry tone took over as you watched his dick throb and pulse. Damn, if you knew this was how this mission was going to go you would have pushed for it sooner.

"Is that so? And here I thought that you were one for voyeurism, as all you ever seem to do is stare at me..." Tech leaned down mid sentence and you hissed as his dick was removed from right in front of your flushed face, instead his face replacing it as he began to whisper, "and touch yourself while whimpering my name when you think everyone else is asleep."

You gasped at Tech and swung your arms up to swat at any part of him you could hit. You were able to knock that stupid bucket and visor from around his head, but he had anticipated your reaction and subsequent movements and managed to snatch both of your arms with his right hand and pin them up above your head and against the cold durasteel. You hissed once more at the sudden shift of temperature but that was soon forgotten as Tech grabbed his helmet from the ground where it fell next to your knee and abruptly smashed his lips against your own, eyes fluttering shut. He pulled away just as soon as he initiated the kiss and his eyes gleamed. "Interesting. I will need to research the effects of kissing and endorphins once we get back to the Marauder. You stopped resisting me immediately." There he was, back to his normal Tech self, albeit briefly, as he returned his gaze to you and your pinned arms, goggles fogging once again as he replaced his helmet upon his head and took a breath.

"How do you know that I-that I..."

"That you touch yourself to the thought of me? You are not as quiet as you think you are, darling. You really think I would not notice your high pitched whines and pleading. Sound carries exceptionally well along the metallic walls of the Marauder, not to mention the lewd sound of your fingers squelching in and out of yourself as you whine for me." Tech kept his voice steady, but there was a hint of arousal in there as you noticed the fog on his goggles growing once again. Too bad you couldn't see the way Tech's face was flustered, red light be damned. "It is also worth mentioning that Hunter can smell it. He can smell what I do to you as soon as he enters the room. Of course he would relay this information to me once I finally asked him about you and your wandering eyes. He does not like how…distracting it can be." Tech mused, so proud with himself over the way he got you so worked up without even trying to but he felt an uncharacteristic pang of jealousy over what Hunter told him several rotations ago. 

You couldn't help but feel at a disadvantage here. Tech really did have the upper hand which was not something you expected for the type of conversation you two were having. "And what about what I do to you? Or does having your arms elbow deep in an electrical panel just really get you going, Mr. Technician, sir?" You nodded your head towards his very evident erection. The inclusion of his new pet name caused a groan to escape from his throat involuntary. You got him there and eagerly awaited his reaction.

With a sudden snap of his hips, Tech stood up straight, towering over you once more as he continued to restrain your arms overhead. "Since you have presumably been 'run through' by several other clones in the past, you know what to do." Tech was regaining that cockiness that he had at the beginning of this conversation, and finally to your anticipation, removed his throbbing cock from underneath his blacks. You let out a small sigh that sounded more akin to a moan and Tech glanced down at you. Carefully pulling his helmet up, he rested it over his head in a similar manner to how you’ve seen Wrecker wear his through downtime during missions and you watched patiently trying to piece together what he was going to do next. Before you had a chance to open your mouth and ask for more direction or question what he was doing, Tech grabbed the base of his hard cock holding it straight out from himself and spit, coating his cock, making it nice and slick. At that display of himself and his accuracy you opened your mouth and whined, tongue darting between your lips. Not only did Tech just insinuate that you had been passed around between plenty of his non-batch brothers, but he made it sound like you liked being used as a clone plaything. The mental image of that alone was enough to send you down a spiral of arousal and it was maddening that you couldn’t even touch yourself about it. You tensed your restricted wrists at the impulse to relieve some of that tension, only Tech did not let go of your arms.

“Tech!” You whined, trying your hardest to sound as desperate and needy as you possibly could, hoping to receive some pity from Tech as you watched how his dick throbbed in his hand. It worked, and Tech began pumping himself to the sight of you throwing a tantrum at being denied sexual gratification, hoping to give you something to look at. 

He stopped stroking himself to put his helmet back on over his head fully and you huffed out in protest, not enjoying that your personal show was cut short for a seemingly stupid reason.

“I like your armor~!” Tech mocked you as he grabbed his dick once more, picking up on your displeasure towards something so trivial as him stopping to put his helmet back on. Tech wouldn't consider himself one for mocking others, but the way it was working on you was duly noted as he would surely remember this for later. You grunted in response to Tech and rolled your eyes, face burning much hotter than before. 

Analyzing his current situation, Tech decided to do something risky, but he knew the pay off would be wonderful. Angling his hips closer towards your mouth, he glanced from your lips to your eyes back down to your lips, noticing just how much he was currently holding your undivided attention. Time to put everything his brothers implied about the true nature of your behavior to the test. “Now use that pretty mouth of yours. That is an order, do not make me repeat myself.” Tech waved his spit coated cock in your face and you leaned forward, letting him gently smack it against your cheek. It was so damn hard and so damn hot, you could feel your face being smeared with his spit and it only made you squirm against the floor even more. You looked up at him, desire and lust painted across your face, and could see that his eyes were back to their original half lidded position as you opened your mouth and made eye contact with him, sticking your tongue out and licking the head of his dick. Tech let out a moan followed by some curses in what sounded like Mando’a. You pulled away from him and grinned, noticing how Tech’s eyes were now completely shut.

He's moaning this much and I've barely touched him, no wonder he waited until we were totally alone. 

Now it started to make a bit more sense as to why Tech would have waited this long to ask you what was up, he wanted to be sure he would be able to get away with this without the possibility of Hunter, or anyone for that matter, hearing him. That only increased your desire to make him lose control. Thinking about the fastest way to get this man to unravel, you started to pull your wrists from Tech’s loosening grasp once more. This time he hummed and obliged, letting your arms down and you immediately grabbed the base of his cock with both hands, causing the clone to choke out a grunt. Not giving him time to prepare himself, you positioned his cock at the opening of your mouth and then pawed at his hips, causing Tech to buck forward and push his dick down your throat. You moaned at his sudden reaction to you grabbing at his waist and felt as his dick throbbed from within your mouth.

Hearing you, Tech pulled his hips back as quickly he thrusted them forward. He wasn't sure if what he just did was okay or if it's what you even wanted, but your expression was slightly reassuring. You sat there, eyes glazed over and glued in-between Tech's legs, hands gripping the sides of his armor, drool dripping down your mouth and off your chin as it began to pool between your legs. Eyes nearly shut and face on fire you slowly looked up at Tech's concerned gaze, taking in every inch of the armor clad clone. You wanted nothing more than to reach up and drag your hands down his chest, whispering all the dirty things swirling in your mind to him.  

"Was that alright, I did not mean to…" Tech wasn't even able to finish his sentence as your current demeanor was far too distracting for his brain to function for once in his life. "Oh, my, you look so…mhmm." Once he began to speak, your focus was pulled away from his dick and back up to his face, however that was short lived as your eyes travelled back down his neck, torso, and once again, on to Tech's cock. Noticing how you looked him up and down, Tech's dick twitched, which only caused you to open your mouth and lick your lips in anticipation. 

"Tech, that was more than alright. Do it again. I…you—mmhmm, tastes so good." You slurred out, barely able to think straight. You didn't have to tell Tech twice and just as quickly as he thrusted into your mouth the first time he did it again with slightly more force. 

The quick and sudden addition of his cock to your throat was not something you anticipated so soon and it caused you to gag slightly. The wet sound of you choking on his dick filling the lift and you could feel Tech's dick, still down your throat, throb at the sound you emitted involuntarily. "Mmm you take clone cock down your throat exceptionally well. You have done this before." Tech's voice sounded unlike it ever had before, it was lower and raspier and by the way he fucked into your mouth it was evident that he was waiting for this moment for a long time. 

In order to allow you to attempt a reply, Tech steadied himself as he pulled his dick from your mouth, moaning out, as you lifted your tongue slightly, licking the underside of his dick. You rounded your lips and applied some suction before Tech fully removed himself from your mouth, creating a slight 'pop.' Eyes glazed over, you looked back up at Tech, as he slowly started stroking himself to the sight of you, saliva dripping from your mouth and chin. "A-and what if I have done this before?" You spoke as clearly as anyone could after having a dick forcefully inserted into their mouth twice in quick succession. Truth be told it was hard for you to think and it seemed to get only increasingly hard for you to formulate more than disjointed thoughts and sentences. 

Tech, dick in hand, reached up to remove his helmet and tossed it to the ground carelessly. Looking you over once more he opened his mouth to reply. “I would not say that your behavior would surprise me. I have seen the way my brothers look at you, I know what they are thinking as I think it too.” Tech's jaw tensed as he huffed out a response, voice even lower, nearly whispering even though the two of you were alone in that lift shaft, almost like he was ashamed of the way he thought about you. However you knew better than that. Tech might not be the most charming or tactful out of his brothers but he was headstrong and confident to a level most would ascribe to arrogance; being ashamed of his thoughts was not something Tech was known for. 

All things considered, not to mention the way he was standing over you, cornering you within this little isolated lift, Tech's behavior had to be calculated. Nearly everything the man did was thought out well in advance and the few occasions where he improvised, well that was also planned. 

You glanced up at Tech quickly, hoping he didn't notice the quick side-eye you gave him as a smirk crept up upon your face as you listened to him, gloved hand moving up and down along his dick. “You must be so distracted by that. Thinking about me being underneath someone else…one of your brothers perhaps.” You sat forward, closer to Tech’s hand, held steady and firmly around himself.  Tech, looking down at you, raised an eyebrow. He was absolutely certain he knew where you were going with that little comment about being underneath one of his brothers, but he wasn't sure what you were going to do next until he decided for you, taking a step forward forcing you to back up immediately, head making contact with the cool durasteel behind you with a light ‘thwack.’ 

“I must admit, that thought has crossed my mind, but not for the reason you might be inclined to believe.” Tech’s demeanor was unintelligible, not like you could ever actually tell what was going on behind those damn goggles of his, but something about this was different than before, it almost seemed like Tech was still playing with you. Hard dick still in hand, he lined it up with your mouth, smearing more of your spit across your cheeks, "Truth be told I have imagined you underneath many men, underneath many clones," and with a single motion, Tech’s cock was being shoved back into your mouth, pushing your head backwards once more into the durasteel wall, this time with a much louder 'thwack.' To keep his balance, Tech held up an arm to rest up against the wall as he fucked into your mouth again, with his other hand falling down gently onto the top of your head. You tried your best to keep it together as the clone continued to thrust into your face. Tears spilled out from the corner of your eyes as you focused all your effort on timing your breathing and movements of your tongue together so every time he pulled out you had a swift moment to drink in a much needed breath of air before he sunk his dick back down your throat.

Reaching for anything to give yourself purchase, your hand instinctively raised and grabbed for any part of Tech you could touch, which happened to be high up on his thighs right below his toolbelt. The only sounds within the lift were Tech's grunts and moans and that undeniable wet 'glck glck glck' of someone being face fucked as your solid grip on Tech turned languid and your nails began to scratch across the plastoid surface with every snap of the clone's hips as he continued to use your mouth for his own pleasure.

Tech's grip on your head softened as he slowed down to a halt and pulled himself from your mouth with a breathy moan. Down your cheeks and face, your tears continued to fall, mixing with the saliva and traces of Tech's precum from in and around your mouth. Wiping your mouth with the back of your hand, you cleared your throat, "now who sounds like a voyeur," you all but laughed out now that you were able to talk. 

"That is cute that you would believe that watching you get fucked by my brothers is what I desire." Tech leaned down, his face right in front of yours and he grabbed your arms gently. His eyes darker than before "I think we both know that I have the capability to fuck you far better than anyone else." You watched Tech's eyes closely, not able to pick up on anything other than his arousal that was rapidly devolving into aggressive arrogance. It was not like you hadn't anticipated this behavior from Tech, he was engineered to be much more intelligent than others however he always seemed to be grounded and level-headed about that. After all, his intelligence was not through effort of his own, it's just how he was. 

"You are awfully arrogant for someone who couldn't tell why the pretty girl kept looking at him." Now was not the time to get mouthy, as Tech, still holding your arms lifted them up over your head at your stupidly timed remark. 

"You respond well to confidence and given instructions; two things that I excel at. Not to mention that-" Before Tech could finish his sentence, his comm buzzed from within his helmet, still lying on the cool floor where Tech has nonchalantly tossed it, interrupting the moment between you to thus far.

"Signal finally seems to be going through, Tech are you two still up in that lift?" 

You let out a frustrated sigh as you anticipated the release of your arms after Echo had so graciously interrupted the two of you, however that release never came. Instead, Tech casually looked down to his helmet and then back to you, his expression was extraordinarily blank considering his face fucking session was just interrupted. His expression remained blank as he took both of  your wrists into his right hand once more and bent down to grab for his helmet. Placing his helmet back onto his head, he could now respond to Echo as he returned his other hand to restrain your wrists once more but not before a new idea popped into your head as you sat as cool as you possibly could in this situation, not wanting to risk giving anything away to Tech, especially since he had a tendency be steps ahead, immediately comprehending your intentions before you could act upon them.

"Yes, we are still up here." Tech said flatly, his voice now back to its normal cadence and tone as he looked you up and down, grabbing his now half hard cock and suggestively waving it in your blushed face, making sure to gently slap it across your lips and cheek as if he was saying ‘now be a good girl and keep quiet.’

"Do you two need any assistance getting the lift up and running?" Echo's voice was still audible to both of you from within Tech’s helmet in the now silent lift and you sat forward in anticipation for Tech's reply.

"That is not necessary, we have everything under cont-'' before Tech could finish his sentence you leaned forward even further and opened your mouth, taking his dick into the warm wetness once again and this time you applied more than a generous amount of suction. Enough in fact to hollow your cheeks noticeably in the dim red light. Tech clearly did not anticipate this type of behavior, or more aptly, misbehavior, from you as he instinctually bucked his hips at your sudden touch and let out a stifled moan, trying not to let his brother hear him. 

"Is everything okay over there?" Echo, quick to concern, promptly replied to Tech’s incomplete sentence and to Tech's relief, nothing in the clones intonation implied curiosity or smugness as would be expected from someone who just overheard someone else getting their dick sucked.

"Yes. We are almost finished." Tech gritted out as you continued to suck and lick at him while he tried his hardest not to moan out, lest you actually bring him to orgasm as he speaks to one of his brothers in real time. 

"Okay, well, be sure to hurry up. Oh, and don’t mess with anything else. We don’t need to be signaling the Empire of another breach of security.” This time it was Hunter’s voice coming through. You two must have been up here for much longer than expected if he was contacting Tech.

“Copy that, Hunter. I estimate that we will be finishing up momentarily.” Tech all but spat out, trying to keep his voice as even as he could but obviously trying to wrap up the conversation in record time. Once the comm channel was quiet Tech reached up to turn his comm off before he spoke as he shot you a look brimming with disbelief, irritation, and arousal. However, to his annoyance you played coy, making sure to swiftly pull your head back without breaking the seal of your suction, creating a loud, wet ‘pop.’ 

"You are absolutely unbelievable!" As rarely as it happened, Tech had no words for what you just did. That was something he had not calculated for during his own mental playthrough of this mission beforehand, yet it did not go unnoticed. He would definitely be using this against you at a later date you were sure of it. But for the time being, you wanted to have a little fun with it. You watched as Tech reached again for his comm, turning it back on before Echo or Hunter decided to come looking for the both of you after your brief bout of dead air. You glanced at Tech through your lashes as you blinked seductively and once again took him into your mouth and started sucking with enthusiasm. With each swipe of your tongue, each bob of your head, Tech grew closer and closer to his climax. He was now thrusting his hips into your mouth and clenching his jaw, trying so damn hard to not let any sound escape from his mouth. 

"Alright, let us know when you g-." Echo’s voice crackled over the comm for the last time as Tech abruptly reached for his comm switch, fingers rapping against his helmet urgently.

“I, Oh Maker, going to--Ahh!” Tech moaned out unexpectedly and loudly, his face burning red hot with a mix of unchecked lust and a dash of shame, breathing ragged as he hit the comm switch turning it off just in time to prevent anyone from overhearing his climax as he slammed his hips into your face, cock throbbing as his cum spilled into your mouth and down your throat. You gagged, followed by a muffled moan at the sudden warm liquid, not expecting Tech to full on orgasm from you pleasuring him as he talked to his brothers. Making sure to swallow every drop so as to not raise Hunter’s suspicions on your return, you sat back and relaxed your sore neck and shoulders as best as you could considering Tech still had a hold on your arms.

"I think we should really get this lift fixed so we can get back to the Marauder before Hunter starts to put the pieces together." You spoke as you let Tech's now softening dick fall from your mouth. You didn't feel the need to remark about the specificities of how Tech came just now but you were going to tease him with that information another time, after all the ammunition you just provided him sexually about yourself…you're going to need something to retaliate with. 

"Do not worry about that, I had finished repairing the controls before you mentioned my nice features." Tech smirked as he recalled your words from earlier. "We will be out of here and back on board the Marauder in no time. Maybe we can continue this later as I imagine you are considerably lubricated for penetration.” Your face flushed at how clinical Tech's correct assumption of just how wet you were sounded, back to typical technical Tech…the man came once and he’s already back to normal. 

“...And finish momentarily he did.” You couldn’t help yourself at pointing out the irony of Tech’s words to Hunter, trying to brush over what Tech just said to you.

Tech shook his head and rolled his eyes, opting to ignore your own silly little comment about him orgasming while being addressed by his sergeant, but he would most definitely be revisiting that with you later, as you so eagerly anticipated. Lowering your arms, he helped you stand back up, letting you rest your weight on him to steady yourself. Once you were standing, you retrieved your gloves from the floor and grabbed Tech's spanner that he had lent you as Tech got himself together and redressed, retrieving his codpiece from the floor and positioning it back between his legs. "Oh, and one last thing." Tech didn't give you time to process his words as he lifted his helmet slightly and pulled you into his chest and tilted your chin up gingerly, kissing you. "Was I too rough with you?" Any arrogance or lust from before was long gone and replaced with concern as the clone held your face in front of his. 

"No, in fact you could have been a lot rougher, sir." You giggled as you placed the spanner back into a pouch on Tech's toolbelt. The technician rolled his eyes at you playfully as he turned back to the fixed control panel and fiddled with it some more, returning it within the wall causing the red emergency lights to shut off as they were replaced with the normal white ones as the lift returned to its original operational state and started descending.

[mishy-mashy]

Look at how Kudo fell once Yoichi died

Since he fell once Yoichi was shredded by the spatial Ability, it implies he was pulling him along really hard to get away. Once the object you're pulling breaks momentum, you usually fall over because of the displaced force, right?

Like when you pull on a rope and it snaps, so you fall over. Add in the sewer water they're wading through, with all the different motions from multiple people passing through and running, Kudo tripped up on both Yoichi's disappearance and on the heavy water

Well, the water is something I want to consider, but most of it goes toward Kudo pulling Yoichi who is. Suddenly Not There. And this makes him fall over from displaced force.

Bruce is tall, and we can see the water is almost as high as his knees. This is tall water, man. The water could've even stabilized Kudo's feet enough he could catch himself, but he still fell; man knew AFO was dangerous, what he did to Yoichi before, and Kudo wanted Yoichi to RUN

When Kudo fell, the only reason he didn't fall over onto his side was because Bruce happened to be there.

Bruce only noticed and turned around because Kudo happened to fall into his leg. That let Kudo at least sit up, and it's hidden by Kudo's body, but Bruce probably grabbed onto Kudo so he could get up

Look at how Bruce charged up Fa Jin immediately. While Kudo is in shock, Bruce is glaring. The way Bruce stands is different from when he was running earlier

Bruce was absolutely willing to fight AFO here. He realized Kudo fell, and put his foot forward with a charged Fa Jin, literally ready to protect Kudo and fight AFO if needed

(It's in his hand, so I assume that's his main way of using it, because the energy had to have charged beforehand; he had it ready to go. But the fact he charged it at all is what I'm focusing on here)

His foot is ahead of Kudo, he's looming over him to protect him, and his knees are bent to fight and grab onto Kudo; Bruce would've fought AFO for Kudo, even knowing he'd die.

Their first reactions to realizing the situation?

Kudo tears up. Bruce has a glare and is ready to fight.

They both registered the event differently. Kudo is first in shock, and immediately moved to tears, because the first thing he realizes is [Yoichi just died].

As for Bruce, the first thing he registers isn't that Yoichi is missing (he didn't see what Kudo saw; Kudo literally had Yoichi's blood splatter across his face, and Bruce just turns around after the fact), but [AFO is too close to us. This is dangerous.] and prepares to protect Kudo.

They both reacted accordingly to what they saw first. Kudo in shock, and Bruce ready to fight.

Bruce wasn't going to fight AFO until he realized Kudo was in danger when he fell over. He probably noticed Yoichi was missing and likely dead from all the flying blood, but he focused first on dealing with the situation.

Bruce knew Yoichi just died. But if they weren't careful, they'd be next. Kudo was almost next. Bruce didn't see the moment of Yoichi's death, but Kudo did; and Leader got stuck on that first.

***

***

(Also, cutting this out because it's not good enough to make heads or tails of, but

I think Bruce's glare in the sewers is different from the glare he has later fighting AFO one-on-one and dying. My first assumption was it's because he knows Yoichi just died, and that's like enraging to him in the sewers

Although now I'm noticing Bruce is smiling in the second panel below and am now very curious about that. His eyes are just naturally sharp.

[brisquad-unit-4402]

ok so what i was saying about fulgur and prosthetics

i said in this ask that there's a lot you can do in a selfship/fulgur x reader fic regarding his cynet limbs and i'm here to elaborate

SO it might be bc i'm not looking in the right places, but the bit about fulgur being an amputee is really untapped, in a way that i think really translates nicely to how he loves

if there's anything about fulgur it's that he doesn't do grand gestures. he can appreciate a good meal but he's not one for classy reservations. god knows he doesn't care enough about what he wears to those fancy outings, much less the outing itself. why would he? he doesn't get the appeal of putting on these polished faces. acting like anyone but himself, the guy that would down a can of soup in one gulp if you were the one serving it to him. it's the meaning behind the action that gets him, not candle-and-starlit balconies. these limbs are red enough to put any rose to shame.

these limbs. cold to the touch, layers of plate. the first time he reached out of his own volition he remembers how your back straightened to steel. he's never felt insecure about the chill until then, but it wasn't long before he realized how you leaned in anyways. where he tentatively brushes along with a fingertip, you take in his palm. not a single shred of fear or hesitance then.

he turns his back to face you the first night you slept together, detaching his cynets from where the socket ends. his right arm is the last to go. each limb rests on a cloth in order.

the next night you watch, and when he notices, he shuffles his left leg before taking off his right. there's an order to the panels. the legs are a series of hooks and latches in order to be properly doffed, while the arms are simple, but sensitive. there's a certain amount of force needed to press the buttons that detach the limb. the final button is under a tab within his palm—the end of the largest mesh crease, at the furthest point his thumb can stretch. it slides off cleanly.

the third night fulgur narrates it. he's forgotten some of the names because he's had this steel for so long, it's become instinct, not process. by the fourth it takes half as much time as usual and he's wondering if there's anything you can't make easier.

"the next part is... this latch, right?"

"yup. c'mon, use some more force. i've taken it harder than that."

the switch by his wrist unlocks under your thumb, and the last mechanism left is the panel on his palm. his thumb rests loosely. the flat of his hands are made of blackened mesh to simulate the give of flesh. it detects your own as your fingers skim his and reach for the button.

the socket is neat. the steel goes deeper than the prosthetic, and as you remove it, it exposes the ports where the wiring connects. fulgur rolls his shoulder, loosening the connection, before it fully detaches. that's not a required movement. he shifts back into his place in the bed sans prosthetics.

"what, you're not even going to call me a pervert?" he asks. his eyes are closed but his shit-eating smile is plain to see.

"fuck off." you poke his cheek. annoyance. then you raise the blanket up to his chest. a few inches below his throa2, just how he likes it. "i didn't want to mess up."

"it's hard for you to mess up. those limbs have gone through hell and back."

"yeah, but i wanna make sure it's okay though. 'cause what if it's not?"

"nah, you wouldn't mess up."

you lay down and toss the blanket over yourself. even without the cynets, fulgur is cool to the touch. you can feel the ridges of surgical steel along his shoulder blades, and where it's thinnest are the small, tiny bumps where the ports were screwed in. the pale skin, nonetheless, is soft in a way his mesh-palms aren't. without his arm there's more room for you to place your head along the plush of his chest and the paneling. the chest-pillow is cold on either side.

his eyes are still shut. you feel the rise and fall of his chest along your cheek as his breath travels through. when you close your eyes as well, there isn't much of a difference between your dark bedroom and the embrace of rest.

you almost forget how to speak.

"goodnight," you mumble five minutes later.

he relearns the skill a minute later, too. "yeah," he says.

you'll have to remember that later.

.　 . • ☆ . ° .• °:. *₊ ° . ☆

✧. ┊ masterpost ✧. ┊ kofi

[reality-liver-n0]

This is going to be my worst post to date (in my opinion)

But after the anguish and turmoil that has hit Balalaika fans after her appearence in the latest chapter like her lack of muscle/strength that we know she unleashed on Rock, the fading of her scars, and other things I decided to investigate myself to see how much she changed.

The majority of these pictures are from the anime. Sad, I know, and hopefully once I find the direct panel from the manga that mirrors it I will edit or add more to this post.

I will start this by saying that Anime Balalaika is an absolute fucking unit. Like reviewing the pictures I realized that she's built like a very beautiful Russian tank and that is really the best description here.

Do you see what I mean? It's most likely the coat but still, it has to touch her shoulders to even drape.

Although, it depends on the scene as she can be like this too

Her shoulders are less defined and aren't quite as cut as the top ones but her muscle is there at least.

Above is the Virgin Rock as physical comparision

She's obviously fucking built way beyond his physique and she knows it. She corners him in or crosses her arms while his remain at his side as he tries to be unaffected. And honestly, kudos to him. He stood pretty strong in this scene and I think he knew he had to do that to even try and talk on her level.

I mean we've seen what happens when he doesn't. Disclaimers ahead, Rock is in for a rough ride. I on the other hand, laughed my ass off when I took these screenshots.

Also, here is what I personally think went through Balalaika's head in each scene and the progression of it.

% Anger Level - Annoyance

Jesus Christ, he's on this bullshit again. Sounds like one of those family dogs I keep having to put down.

% Anger Level - Frustrated

Maybe if I make it clear I'm pissed right now he'll have some sense left in him. If he says one more word I am going to make him the hood ornament for the car.

% Anger Level - Hostility

Just looking at this cigarerette is giving me an idea. I could just throw him like I could with this. Sooner or later he'll be stepped on; fire dying out.

% Anger Level - Rage

I'm certain his face will never change in his casket

With one strike I could gouge his eyes out. Maybe then he'll see justice.

You've sealed your fate Rock. Now you'll suffer the death of a true hero.

(Woohoo! 🎉You passed the slideshow and now I'll do my commetary. Here's a Boris photo as a reward.)

This is the face he wanted to make right when Rock started talking.

Anyway, I must have forgotten just how Balalaika threw Rock since I took those screenshots. I knew that she did it but somehow forgot that she did it with one arm. Or at least how much power she put into flinging him like a ragdoll. LIke she fucking lifted him in the air with one hand and with a single move had him on the hood in split seconds.

Here's a funny picture I caught mid-shot as well

His feet aren't touching the ground. He's fully straight as if he didn't have have a second to take it in, meanwhile his hands are just open and it's like he forgot he was even alive. No doubt, he had a vision that when Balalaika even reached for him that she just punted him to the afterlife.

Meanwhile, I cannot imagine the raw terror Revy must have felt seeing this happen.

She is scared as hell here. Keep in mind that this entire exchange she can't see Balalaika's face or Rock's. Both their backs are to her until Balalaika throws Rock. Still, I doubt that she really could've seen him past Balalaika's frame. Meanwhile, she's probabaly just processing that Balalaika's strong enough to do what she just did. Most likely she already knew she has a lot of physical power, I mean look at her, but this is the first time she's seen it and it happened to the worst person possible.

I can fully say that Balalaika is a fucking beast in hand-to-hand combat with the body to match it. And this is only focusing on her throwing Rock! She already snapped a neck by this point. Rock saw that and again, he does have some courage or maybe stupidity to even do this since he saw that with his own eyes.

Revy hasn't. And I don't think Rock told her, at least not until he knew they were back in Roanapur and safe. He was still traumatized by it too so chances are he is suffering some recurring nightmare of it. To top it off, this event alone was so visceral in his mind that he draws a direct comparaision to Chang, symbolizing how truly helpess he was.

With all that out of the way here isthe recent manga depiction of Balalaika

(no comment needed)

Here are the earlier depictions of her in the previous chapters. All the thanks to @crystallinee-waters and @progmanx for the posts concerning the chapters and the usual girlboss stuff 💅

Love you two for that

In conclusion the only explanation for this is that Chang used his CIA connnections (Eda) to tamper with the latest chapter to make himself look cooler. And I guess he had enough mercy to include Rock in that upgrade too, for whatever reason.

Hero of the chapter was definitely Le Majeur

Homegirl got sacraficed by Balalaika to the gays

Which will probabaly be another cursed post sometime in the future with the Holy Trinity (Balalaika, Revy and Le Majeur)

✊ They're staying strong and holding down the series' reperesentation of the ABC Mafia

(😔 not canonically tho only Le Majeur has officially come out, or got outed by her comrade. But then Revy saved her ass and definitely did not hear anything and now does not knows what Le Majeur really is.)

A homosexual 🌈

Okay. I think I'm finally done with this, and I went off the rails by the end but this post now exists so I will return to my secluded hole 🕳️

(Forgot to add buff Revy too, so here she is)

She can be both happy and mad but she's still jacked af (and silently judging you at all times because of your gayness)

[runabout-river]

One thing that bothers me about jujutsu is that the author doesn't know how to develop some characters. 1 Shoko Ieri is an interesting character but I find her apathetic without a cold and superficial personality. 2 itadori yuji doesn't seem to be a protagonist he seems more like a tool than the protagonist of the work. 3 nobara had no development dry and emotionless death. and many other characters. There were only 2 characters that really had development, which was gojo and geto, for me, they were the only ones that had it. Why do you think the author did this, is it because he didn't want to develop the characters that's why he killed many important characters? I would appreciate it if you respond.

This is a lot to answer so sorry if it gets confusing a little.

1.) and you really have to keep this in mind, is that the manga isn't finished yet. It's also not about to finish. We have just reached the beginning of the end and we have at least another 6 months to go if not more. Without the last panel drawn, we can't really talk about the stuff Gege hasn't put into the story yet.

Still, many of your points can be addressed.

Shoko: In both the present and the past storylines, she is a side character without her side of the story being shown too much. Her being cold and apathetic can be a fitting description of her in the present but in the past she was more open and easy-going.

When you say she has a superficial personality that's where your interpretation is a little off. For one, her personality changes and for two, her current personality reflects the cost that living as a sorcerer has on people. We are also shown her inner thoughts on occasion but interestingly, one of those thoughts kind of comments her role in the story.

(This thought also establishes that she has trouble understanding Gojo's point of view on his godlike status)

The thing with Shoko is that we're never shown what she does: heal and save people. That's an aspect of her character that has been completely, and deliberately I say, missing until this point. But she has saved the lives of: Geto, Ino and Angel (plus some others) and she has therefore shaped the entire plot of the manga extremely.

But this I think will change in the most impactful way possible: with her saving Gojo's life by showing us for the first time what her CT is and how she heals people.

On Nobara, you're right. She had little character development and no reflection on her thoughts and beliefs. To this I say, read my post about her coming back because I believe that she will get that character develepoment and reflection when she re-enters the manga.

The same thing goes for Tsumiki. I was really disappointed when Yorozu died and Tsumiki basically disappeared from the story with her role never being more than that of a prop. But it was pointed out to me, that Tsumiki actually had been shown in an active role in the manga 70 chapters ago and that role will definitely be revisited when Megumi gets the spotlight again.

Now to Yuji. Did you realize that you contradicted yourself? You said that Yuji doesn't feel like a protagonist but you also said that Geto and Gojo had the best character developement. You're definitely talking about Hidden Inventory here but HI is and arc where Yuji is removed as the protagonist.

So the main protagonist being removed from the story temporarily has a purpose. You could say that that was a flashback and doesn't really count and that you mostly mean the 4 mini-arcs in Culling Games where Yuji wasn't present + the Sukuna/Yorozu fight + the Gojo/Sukuna fight.

Gojo/Suku we don't even count in this, that's a given, Sukuna/Yorozu is character showing plus setup for the future and Yuki/Choso/Tengen vs Kenjaku we don't count either, because that's a plot progression plus villain fight.

In my experience when people talk about Yuji not being a good protagonist because he isn't present often enough, they mean the arcs where Yuta, Maki and Hakari take centre stage. (The three other mini-arcs add to this)

Why would a mangaka do their story like this?

For world building. To be more precise: for plot building. Yuta, Maki and Hakari have important roles for the endfights and for that they needed character development (Maki), a show of their powers (all) and setups for the future (eg alliances with Kashimo and Uro).

Right from the beginning, JJK always moved the plot forward first. That's why the pace is so fast. The story is plot driven and not character driven, but that doesn't mean that the characters aren't given their time, just that that time isn't an entire chapter.

You can critizese this of course, I too would've liked small character scenes to have been expended on. That Yuji is taken off the picture for world building isn't sth I would critizise though. That's what happened in parts of Attack on Titan, and it also happens constantly in One Piece with Luffy albeit in Flashbacks.

It simply adds to the story when we can see other characters act on their own and while Yuji is back in the centre now, he will most likely take small steps back again to let other characters shine like Megumi eg. It also adds to his personality, but for the end of the manga he will be the centre of attention.

[exquisitelyrandom]

hi i know one of them is kinda old but if you're okay with it i would love to do a fic of either of these tacophone comics of yours, maybe even both (with credit ofc)

https://www.tumblr.com/exquisitelyrandom/690825927273463808/draw-something-tacophone-related-and-if-you-dont

https://www.tumblr.com/exquisitelyrandom/713112801221263360/angst-because-the-sillies-are-on-my-mind-again

oh my god ofc you can w credit holy sh

YES!!!! AAUGQHZHHQ I'D LOVE FOR YOU TO!!!!! yuo have no idea how much I've been looking for reading content of them plsplspslsplspls

btw where would you be posting the story? I'd love to read it,, if you do make a fic of them, please tag me/send me a link!! ^^

going into small detail abt the ideas behind the comics below because im insane abt them vvv

they're actually very similar to each other so they may as we 🐝 connected/have the same situation lmao

first comic is leaning more on mic's. side

;After getting into the hotel, she's. absolutely miserable but keeps trying to pretend she's fine (she is not). Of course, Soap and the others notice her mood and one of them eventually get to talk to her about it. But even as she does open up, she never outs Taco. Ever. And blames it on the contest. Soap/Whoever confronted her knows it isn't true, but doesn't push further. After the talk, Mic basically just sits there and contemplates, before deciding """past is past""". Eventually, she starts thinking about the whole thing less, and she's smiling a lot more the next few days/weeks. Er. Until. That one night.

The second comic - or, in both comics - , here's Taco's side

There was actually gonna be more similar..things.. in both of the panels i put up above,, but i decided they'd look too similar to each other so Taco looks angrier in the second one

It all starts when Mic walks through the portal. Yeah. She didn't expect that. Taco's not someone to be caught off guard; her moves are calculated, and she knows the outcome of something even before it had a chance to start. She's memorized the puzzles and patterns on an object's mind, knows how to use it to her advantage - knows how to manipulate it into what she needs it to do. So why was it that she..?

She's teleported to their little spot, and her emotions are. overwhelming. At first, she feels.. sad. Distraught. Distraught that Mic left. Then, she feels.. angry. Angry at Mic for even leaving without any further word. Angry at Mic to have the AUDACITY to blame ..her. And she's angry.. at herself. Then, she's sad again. Her mind goes back to the words Microphone last spoke to her, and it stings, just as much as when she first heard them, if not more. She sits on the log -[soft thud]- oh, nevermind, she's on her knees in the soft grass, head in hands. She grips her shell tight and tries to shout, to let out the scream that's been trying to claw its way out of her throat, to get all of the overwhelming thoughts out of her head, but all she can manage is a choked sob, her throat tightening as she curled into herself.

And I'm only now realizing I'm getting WAY too carried away so fast forward everyone:

Taco thinks back on all the mistakes she's made, and back at one of her.. biggest mistakes yet. And, after a while, she decides she's done running, and she's not letting her slip from her grasp that easily. Not again. Not like him.

So, she writes, and writes, and writes, and writes. Until, after over fifty crumpled papers and about three half empty cups of - now cold - tea, she's finished. A letter to Microphone. She spilled her heart out on it, not leaving a single detail on everything she's done, opening herself up completely to the object never expected to break down years worth of built up walls. She's a little hesitant as she sends it to the hotel's mail, and then she waits.

She doesn't respond. Its not the first time. She takes a deep breath. No, she's not letting it faze her. She needs Mic to see she's being genuine. Why couldn't you be genuine from the start? When she most needed you to be?

She sends another letter, this time, directly into her room. She drops it through the little window, and she runs off before anyone notices her. A week passes. She doesn't respond again. She doesn't give up. She sends another letter, and another, and another, and another..

Two months has passed since then - has it really been that long? - And she's on the floor, miserable. The cracks have gotten worse and she can barely see with her right eye, she can barely stand, and her knees feel weak. Her head feels heavy, and her mind goes back to quiet picnics, white bowties and purples hues. And it just.. hurts. It hurts. It hurts, so much and she doesn't want it to. It hurts, and she's angry. Angry at herself for even considering to leave Microphone after they get the million. She's angry at herself for not paying attention to what may have caused the whole thing. Angry at herself slipping up the one good thing she had.

Did you ever have her?

She's angry at herself for being the reason Microphone left.

She feels lightheaded, yet her head feels heavy. And she's so, so tired.. she blacks out

The next thing she knows, she's on her way to ..hotel oj.

Uh oh

so um when I said "small detail" i may have.. lied HEJHSJQJZNNQJXN I WAS GENUINELY GOING TO JUST DESCRIBE MY IDEA FOR THE COMIC IM OSRRY I GOT CARRIED AWAY i had many things to say about tacoy

YOU DONT HAVE TO FOLLOW THROUGH W THE PLOT I'd love to see ur take on the comic!! Ignore my gay little writings hehr

[taffywabbit]

some people were concerned about my joke in this earlier post regarding "putting tape on the fan", so let me just clarify what happened there lol

(this is kind of another computer storytime post, but it's longer and not really a joke like the other one, so i will put it behind a Read More for those who are curious)

ok so basically my computer started making this HORRIBLE screeching squealing noise intermittently back in October. it scared the hell out of me so badly that i just IMMEDIATELY turned off my computer because i thought that shit was about to catch fire. this happened multiple times and i couldn't figure out what was causing it and i just decided to leave my computer off for the rest of the night and open it up in the morning when i could get a second opinion from one of my techy roommates. but then it was just... fine? for a couple days? and i was like oh phew everything's ok i guess! that was really weird!

of course the noise started again, and i determined that it was coming from back end of my liquid CPU cooler, so for the first time ever, i figured out how to open up the side panel of my case and made sure everything was free of dust (it was fine) and there were no loose wires or components brushing up against the fans (also fine). then i took the top off to see if there were any loose screws where the cooler attached to it, and there weren't, but there WAS an inexplicably bent filament in the heatsink

and i was like oh shit! i wonder if that's causing some kind of air resistance sound or something and that's what i've been hearing! so i very very carefully bent it back into shape with a small screwdriver and then closed everything back up and tested it. it did not help. in hindsight it was kinda dumb of me to assume that would have anything to do with the issue, but oh well, i learned lots of things about computers throughout this process

anyways i looked inside the case with a flashlight WHILE it was running and pretty much immediately realized that the problem was very obviously one of the 3 fans on the CPU cooler that was stalling. it only started screeching when it tried to get up to higher speeds, but it was still slowing down/stopping every few seconds and creating a lot of vibration, which was something i COULD deal with while trying to get my work done, but it was distracting and made me really really anxious.

my phone's mic is always really quiet for some reason but you can still see/hear what was going on in there:

i think this was around the point in the process where i looked into fan control software, because i realized they didn't seem to be dynamically adjusting to my PC's resource usage or temperature and were instead just running full blast all the time. (it got SO much quieter after i did that. i can't believe i just dealt with hurricane winds under my desk for a year without questioning it lmao). it was AFTER i slowed their default running speed down a bit that i was able to see the problem more clearly and took this video.

i installed FanControl in the hopes that it would give me some kind of option to JUST turn off that one fan and leave the other two running, because obviously that fan isn't contributing anything to keeping things cool anyways so i may as well just shut it off and avoid further damage to the motors (and further squealing), right? well unfortunately the whole CPU cooler is treated as a single fan on the software end of things, so whatever i do to one fan, i do to all of them. it was still worthwhile to set up FanControl but it didn't solve my issue.

so THEN i did some digging, and according to some forums online it sounded like these 3 fans might at least be wired separately? or daisy-chained off of one set of wires via metal contacts on their sides? either way, it sounded like it'd be possible to just detach and remove the faulty fan until i could replace it, temporarily solving the issue. i figured out how to open up my PC even MORE than before and accessed the rear side where all the cables are kept. this is where i ran into a wall again re: my lack of expertise and confidence with this stuff.

looking at the back of the motherboard, this is what i was greeted with:

the part that's circled at the top is where the cables from all 3 fans (turned out they DID each have their own separate cables) were bundled together into two groups and fed into the back, behind the motherboard. the ones that run across the top to the left are bundled up back here and then feed back through to the front and connect o the motherboard, and the ones running down the right side go to the power supply in the bottom of the case (which i quickly found to be inaccessible because it was protected on both sides by solid metal plates that i couldn't figure out how to remove without breaking anything). in both cases, regardless of whether i could access the actual ports to disconnect them, it was nearly impossible to figure out which cables corresponded to which fan from this vantage point.

after spending a few minutes quietly coming to terms with the fact that i was WAY over my head and not equipped to carry out this particular solution, i closed the computer back up and went online to look for more possible solutions. i didn't find anything, but a piece of info i DID consistently come across throughout this whole process is that computer fans are typically very low-torque (so that they stop easily if anything obstructs them, to prevent damage to wires or anything like that). talking to a few friends about it, i decided i might have the temporary solution i needed.

this is where the tape finally comes in! i used scotch tape and just kinda... folded it around one of the fan blades and attached it to the outside of the fan casing, like a leash.

then, very very fearfully, i turned the PC back on and watched to see what happened, ready to cut the power if needed. but it worked, more or less! it would pull, meet resistance, immediately stop, and wait a moment before trying again. the important thing is that it couldn't get up to speed and it wasn't making noise. so i turned it off again, redid the tape (i don't have a pic of it but i did a much better job of securing it from multiple angles so it was 100% immobile), and it was good to go!

not a pretty or ideal solution, but my computer doesn't make funny noises anymore and still isn't having any temperature issues. if there was anything to actually attach it to then i might use a zip-tie or something instead, but this has been working fine for 2 months and will continue to work for the foreseeable future, or at least until i move and have computer-savvy friends living nearby who can help me remove and replace the fan/cooler.

anyways yeah after going through all of this chronologically, this is DEFINITELY why my computer sometimes turns red and evil and wants to kill me lmao

[davishater]

Random things I noticed in chapter 108:

1) Ok, so putting my Hutter and Chelsea ship off to the side for only one post, I really enjoy Hutter's reaction to her death for many reasons (mainly the ship reasons).

For comparison, let me explain that, when Hutter first discovers Yudi's death, he just screams her name and looks shocked, maybe with a little bit of fear. Alyssa actually goes and faints from finding Yudi.

When everyone finds Chelsea is dead, Hutter is looking MORTIFIED. Then he falls to his knees, screaming and blaming himself. These reactions just really show who cared a lot about each person and I love that so much!

2) Night is honestly such a respectable king for this!

Hutter's like, bro you look excited and Night's just over here apologizing for it! And it's so sincere, too! I was expecting him to be like, "Well duh, we got an interesting case on our hands." Like a snooty rich brat, but no, he actually apologizes for how his excitement looks! This shows that Night fully understands that Hutter is upset and is willing to take how he feels into consideration (Also, they keep being shown together and I enjoy that. I feel like they would have a really good friend dynamic, if they don't already).

3) ok, so hitch hiking to the other side of London, we got Winter and Spitz together. Not gonna lie, I really love seeing them interact, but I HATE how worthless Spitz is right now. Winter could seriously do so much all on his own without anyone's help. I mean, he found Spitz all by himself! There's almost 9 million people who live in London and Winter found him uncoincidentally! He was on the right track, too! If Ron and Toto aren't with Spitz, then he can use Spitz to track down the other two. Too bad Spitz can't even do that right 🙄 (Guys, I'm sorry, I've had a love/hate relationship with Spitz throughout the entire series).

3.5) I know this panel isn't in chapter 108, but I just imagine Winter saying the "How carefree..." part with literally no emotion and in the context of mocking and I love it so much, like I literally can't get enough of that one line replaying in my head!!! Also, is it just me, or do these lines seem very proper and.... idk, like Winter is honestly trying to be nice??? Winter seemed to stay in that kind of manner until Spitz gave him attitude and said, "you're in the Moriarty family!" and he replied with "Don't look down on me."

Idk, maybe I'm just speculating too much.

4) I love how Winter finally gave us the name of his brothers! And like, why is he just sharing this information with Spitz? It seems kind of random, but at the same time, not. Almost like he's unconsciously reminiscing about his family. 🤔

He and Spitz also say they're all Milo's siblings, not Winter's. Like, it really gives that affect that he really did leave the Moriarty family and I think that's kinda cool.

5) WAIT A DIGIDY DARN SECOND!!!!! Winter looks down a lot whenever he talks about his family.... 👀👀👀👀👀 (I'd show, but I'm at a picture limit)

6) ok, I just had to show this one last, cause it's the funniest one and it took me almost 10 hours to realize.

Spitz literally just helped Winter commit a crime!!! Winter impersonated an important public figure right in front of a police officer and Spitz didn't even rat Winter out! Yo, Spitz is an accomplish and he's just chillin'!!! 😂😂😂😂😂

Masterlist

[modern-day-bard]

Worth The Feeling

Content Warning: 18+ This series contains explicit smut, intimidation, and an age gap relationship. Minors, do not interact.

Chapter 20

The sun above me is prying into my eyes, knocking on my lids like an unwanted guest. Except it's much colder than I remember it being, it even has a cooler tone. Almost artificial. I let more of it in, cracking my eyes open to find that I am looking at a ceiling full of LED panels.

It takes a few moments for my eyes to adjust to the brightness. I realize that I'm facing the end of the rectangular room, and I can see a table with first aid material on the far side. I glance down slowly, realizing that I'm on a cot with a white sheet draped over me. On my left, a wrinkled hand adorned with multi-colored rings squeezes mine, and I follow it to find Barb smiling at me. A rare sight honestly.

"How are you feeling, doll?" She pats my hand now.

"Where am I?" I croak. I hear a creak at the other end of the room, and a woman with a stethoscope around her neck walks up to me.

"You're in the set clinic, Ava." Barb answers as the other woman approaches.

"Hi, Ava, are you doing okay? My name is Amy, I'm a nurse. You had a pretty bad fainting spell." The woman light touches my wrist, turning it over and checking my pulse.

"Hi...I'm fine I think. I'm really confused though."

"That's normal. I believe you were suffering from heat exhaustion. Have you fainted before?"

"Um, only like once when I was a kid. What happened?"

"You fainted on the beach," Barb responds. "They called for the medic and carried you back to home base. This is the popup clinic on set."

"Have you felt nauseous or dizzy at all today, Ava?" Amy asks, putting the back of her hand to my forehead.

I had, of course. But I just attributed it to the shit show that was produced by Blake Henley.

Oh my god. The shit show.

I shoot up, propping myself on my elbows. "Where is Pe–" I cut myself off, feeling another bout of dizziness.

"Shh, you'll want to take it slow for a bit." Amy gently pushes my shoulders so that I'm lying back once again.

"Have you felt nauseous or dizzy today?" She repeats her question.

"Yes. Both."

"Hmm. Alright. I'm going to get you some electrolytes. I'll be right back."

Amy leaves, and I turn my attention to Barb.

"They made you stay with me, huh?"

Barb scoffs. "I'm happy to stay with you, kid." A beat passes. "But yes, they asked me to come stay with you until you woke up."

"And how long ago was that? How long was I out?"

"I'm not sure, I wasn't on the beach when it happened. But we've been in here at least twenty minutes. Amy told everyone you needed to cool off, said you probably didn't need to go to the hospital."

"The hospital? That was an option? Geez." I stare at the ceiling, thinking of how to phrase my next question.

"Barb...There was a lot going on when this happened. Remember when I spoke with you in your trailer a few weeks ago, and you told me to live a little? Well, I've been living...a lot." I watch her out of the corner of my eye, and she nods slowly in understanding.

"And when I fainted, do you know what happened after? I-I was in the middle of a tense conversation."

"I heard a bunch of different things. I'm not sure how true they are. Mostly about Javi."

"What about Javi" My heartbeat quickens but I will myself to focus on my breathing and calm it down. The faster I do that, the sooner I can get out of here.

"Well, he went berserk. He stopped you from falling to the ground and he was shouting at the crew members to get a medic. No one had ever heard him use that sort of...tone. He carried you all the way up the beach. Met the medic on the way back to basecamp." Her mouth pauses halfway open, but then she closes it.

"What is it? What else is there?" I ask quietly.

"They need you to relax so you can go home safely."

"Barb, just tell me."

"It raised a lot of eyebrows, doll. Most people think that he was just concerned. But there was some chatter on my way over about Blake Henley. He was all fussy. He said that you had 'perfect timing' or something. He says you were being confronted about entertaining the actors. Javi's reaction to the issue made a couple people suspicious."

I feel a new wave of nausea as Amy reenters the medic trailer. She brought over a bottle of water and pedialyte, along with a few cookies from crafty.

"I need you to finish all of this before I can let you go. If you're able to keep it down for a while, then I'll check your vitals again and you'll be all set."

"Can someone radio to Dwayne and tell him I'll be back in like, thirty minutes then?" I look between the two.

"Ava, you're going back to your hotel when you finish up. I already told your boss the situation."

"But I'm flying out later tonight."

Amy looks confused, maybe about how those two things are related at all. "Great, then you can recuperate at home. Be sure to drink plenty of water on the plane." She gives me a curt smile, heading back out of the trailer.

As soon as she is out, I move to stand up. Barb clicks her tongue, pushing me back down.

"Where do you think you're going?"

"I need to talk to Dwayne," Tears spring to my eyes as the reality of the situation keeps boiling through my bones. The last thing he heard was that I was "entertaining" actors, and now I'm expected just to fly home like nothing happened? Even in regular circumstances, I would be clambering to get back out on set and finish my day. But now? It feels as though my job depends on it. And it very well might depend on it.

"Ava," Barb's tone stalls me in my tracks, halfway off the cot. "Listen to me. They're finishing up the scene. You returning would be the second interruption that day. They would be obligated to check on you. And from what I'm hearing, it seems like Dwayne will want to speak with you regardless." She uncaps the water bottle and thrusts it into my hand. The look on her face is not a suggestion, but a demand. So I drink as she continues. "The best thing you can do for yourself...and for Javi, is to go home. Take a breath. Speak with Dwayne when we get back to L.A."

"But," I take a deep breath after guzzling down half the water bottle, "I can't just sit with it. It makes both of us look bad. The way Blake said it made it look even worse. And Dwayne is so close to promoting me, I–" I shake my head rapidly, looking at Barb for answers she doesn't have.

"Breathe, doll," She gently pats my hand again, "Remember what I said before. No matter what happens, I'm glad you lived a little. Don't let today get in the way of that."

I nod along despite my racing heartbeat. I want to tell Barb she's right, but if this does cost me my job...what then?

- - -

When Amy finally let me go, I had 23 missed texts from Lana. Mostly apologies because her team was back in Milan instead of Lake Como where I was filming. Her schedule had her filming scenes of Emma when her character had been kidnapped and taken to an abandoned office building. I'd been so preoccupied with my real life that I forgot there were other pieces of the film that didn't involve Javi. As nice as it was for Lana to reach out, it made my heart sink knowing that the information had already gotten back to her. She assured me that Barb texted her first, but I can't be certain she wasn't just trying to placate me.

As soon as I get back to the hotel room, I pack up my things to keep busy. I text Lana and ask if she wants me to get her things together too, and she agrees, probably sensing my need to stress-clean but lacking cleaning supplies. After both our bags are packed, I triple-check my airline ticket and count the minutes until Lana gets back. I'm debating if I should text Dwayne first before I get home and ask for a meeting with him to explain. That seems like the most responsible thing to do. But I've written and deleted a potential message to him about ten times, and nothing seems right.

Hey! Sorry it seemed like I was hooking up with multiple actors and never disclosing it. Though that isn't true, it is true that Javi and I have been hooking up, and we didn't disclose it. But it also just happened and I'm not sure what it is yet. By the way, are we still good for that promotion? How am I actually supposed to phrase this?

I just started drafting lucky number eleven when Lana comes home. She gives me a big hug and grills me on making sure I have kept drinking water since I got back to the hotel. After reassuring her several times and walking her through my version of the story, I decide I need her advice on Dwayne.

"I don't know Ave...He's probably still working with Javi and Blake unless they've wrapped for today. I would wait until we get home."

"Do you think that I'll lose my job? Or that Blake will leak it to the papers and make Javi look like he took advantage of me?" Tears spring to my eyes for the second time today.

Lana's face constricts in contemplation, and she hesitates. "I think your job right now is to relax. You fainted today, and not to bring up the worst part but, we're going to have to get on a plane soon. Are you feeling okay about that?"

"I haven't even thought about it." I stare down at the patterned carpet for a few minutes.

"He hasn't texted me," I whisper.

"Well...like I said, he might still be shooting with Blake. And you know Lloyd. He's probably making them do five more takes than necessary."

I don't really believe her, but I nod anyway.

"What do you say we get our own taxi to the airport? That way we can leave early, get some snacks, hang out by the gate and leave this all behind us."

I nod again, afraid that if I say anything else then my tears will come on full-force.

We packed up the rest of our things, and I couldn't help but look back at our view one last time. I was always sentimental leaving hotels, but that window in particular held a very specific memory now. I try not to think of my bathrobe-clad leg wrapped around Javi's torso as I close the door behind me.

Typically my fear of flying will set in as soon as I arrive at the airport, but this time, it doesn't. I enjoy as much of the ride there as I can, taking in the final sights of Milan. I wish I had remembered to do the same when I left Lake Como earlier, but for over an hour I just stared at my hands, trying to think of what to text Dwayne. And though I had hated to admit it to Lana, I was also wondering why Javi hadn't checked in.

Lana and I bought a few magazines and an array of snacks to pick at while we sit at our gate. I flip through several pages, pausing to admire some red carpet looks. I know now from being in the business a few years how repetitive those events become for so many people, but I never tire of seeing the photos. Particularly, the gowns. I can't imagine that putting on a dress like that ever grows old. I keep flipping through, and freeze when I see a small shot of Javi from another red carpet premiere. The snippet attached to the photo details how he will be traveling to Italy soon to shoot for Lloyd Meyer's new untitled film. I feel a lump form in my throat.

"Hey, I didn't ask you how it went shooting with Emma today." I put down my magazine, hoping that Lana's day will distract me.

"I mean, super uneventful in comparison. But it was fine. Alice did a good job directing from what I could see. She's a lot more calm with her notes than Lloyd is."

"I'm not surprised."

"I'm jealous you got to spend the last day on the lake though. The building might as well have been back in L.A."

"I wish you were on the beach, too. Then we could've fainted together."

Lana chuckles, and I bend down to grab my water bottle. As I take a swig, I notice most of production has been filing in. A few other PAs are just two rows away, and when I make eye contact with them, they whisper to each other. My suspicion grows when I see Danny, one of the other sound members staring my way as well. He looks away as soon as I catch his eye.

"Lana," I whisper, "Are people staring at me?"

Lana, rather conspicuously, whips her head up to survey the gate.

"Um, they're probably just wondering if you're okay."

"And that's why they're just staring instead of asking if I'm okay?" I ask sarcastically.

"Yeah, well people are weird and antisocial like that." Not Lana's best effort. My heart hammers faster in my chest. Even if my job is safe, and that's still an if, would I be safe from the court of public opinion? There is a small flicker of hope in the back of my mind that everyone else is too preoccupied with their own journey home to put too much thought into today's episode. But some of their expressions seem icy, or at least a bit suspicious. I start to tab random pages of my magazine to look busy, needing some reason to look away.

The loud speaker announces that boarding is starting for our plane. Lana packs up the remainder of her snacks before placing her hand on my shoulder. "Is going home usually easier than the ride there? Fear-wise?"

"Yeah, I think so." I give her a halfhearted smile.

"Good. Let me know if you need anything on the plane, okay?" Lana's returning smile seems equally as halfhearted.

I wasn't lying. Usually the ride home was a bit easier. I think it was partial relief because I knew now that I had survived half of the trip, and I at least knew where I was heading. It was familiar.

But now, for the first time, the plane ride wasn't what worried me. I was far more fearful of what awaited me when I landed.

Next Chapter

Previous Chapter

Series Masterlist

[hiraganasakura]

Mantle evac asker again: thanks for a well-crafted response and apologies if I put you on the spot. TBH I'm not even sure Ironwood *needed* that semblance explanation for his unraveling (or a semblance *period;* a fair number of capable RWBY characters don't have one) with his pre-existing authoritarian tendencies and post-Beacon PTSD in play. Feel free to expand on Robyn if the mood hits, 'cause ye gods could watchers be giving her & the H-Huntresses a fairer shake.

Hi anon! Sry for the late reply, I've been busy

Yeah, true, the Semblance thing works to reinforce what we already understand. Honestly the primary reasons I wish it was talked about in-show is bcus the only reason we even know what his Semblance is is bcus the writers talked about it at some panel, and it could contribute another layer to Ironwood's character

According to the RWBY wiki's article on Mettle (link), apparently they wanted to explicitly state it in V7/V8, and had it in mind while writing Ironwood, but couldn't find a way to work the reveal in without damaging the flow of the show. I learned that just now and found it interesting

I just think it's cool to see negative aspects of Semblances tbh. They're meant to be the manifestation of a person's very soul and while they're usually shown in a positive light seeing the bad side of it is an interesting perspective. Like we see Qrow struggling with self-loathing (and the closely connected depression and alcoholism) due to Misfortune, in After the Fall/Before the Dawn Yatsuhashi fears his own Memory Wiping Semblance, etc. Seeing Ironwood have similar struggles I think would humanize him a bit while still not excusing his actions. It'd make him even more interesting imo. Does that make sense?

But now to the main point, yay, I get to talk about this! I only just had this realization as I was answering your previous ask

Ok so. Some ppl [nobody here] claim that Blake and Yang trusting Robyn with the info on Amity was "dumb" of them bcus they didn't know for certain if she was trustworthy at that point in time. Which, I can get why ppl may think that, but I respectfully disagree. I don't think "dumb" is the right word at all; in fact, I think the fact that Blake and Yang were even willing to try this shows a lot of how their characters have grown

Think about it: these two have rly bad trust issues

I mean, Blake was abused by Adam and faced harsh discrimination as a Faunus. In the early volumes of RWBY, she struggled to even trust her team for a while, hiding her cat ears under her little black bow until the truth came out completely on accident. And when she was finally able to trust them, the Fall of Beacon happened, her trauma with Adam came rearing its ugly head, and, blaming herself for Yang losing her arm, Blake left for Menagerie. (You can see in little details how high alert she is thru a lot of V4 and maybe even V5; off the top of my head, in the first V4 episode we see with her, when the captain of the ship to Menagerie approaches Blake, her immediate instinct is to reach for her weapon.) She didn't even trust herself for a very long time, and due to the horrible stuff she's seen, also had a hard time trusting other ppl

Then there's Yang, and gosh, she's been thru sm too. After she lost not one but two moms, her trust issues seem to manifest more in a fear of abandonment. Near the start of the show she was largely motivated by her search for Raven, hoping to understand why she left—but when she meets Raven in V5, she almost instantly sees thru most of Raven's lies. When Blake left after the Fall of Beacon, Yang had a harder time than the rest with it (see: the whole "Why isn't she here for me?" conversation she had with Weiss in V5), and even had a harder time accepting her return (the awkward air between them for the majority of V6 was palpable)

When Blake and Yang killed Adam and defeated some of their inner demons in the process, not only did they feel able to fully start trusting one another again, but I think it may have helped them to start trusting others, as well

Iirc Blake and Yang were talking about Adam right before they spoke to Robyn about Amity. Now I'm wondering, was that just a coincidence? Or was it a suble acknowledgement of their character development together?

Of course they didn't know whether Robyn could be trusted with that info, but the fact that they were willing to give it a shot demonstrates a lot. And I don't think it's stupidity, or naiveté. I think it is an amazing point in the development of Blake and Yang, a mark of their willingness to trust in the world again

And in hindsight, we can say it was a generally good choice. It was a little rocky at first, with the damage it caused to Ironwood's trust in RWBY. But for a wonderful fleeting moment, it led to James Ironwood and Robyn Hill (of all the ppl who could work together!), once diametrically opposed, standing in unity to help the ppl of Atlas and Mantle...

Well... Until the Black Queen arrived. But we covered that already

Also I totally agree with you that certain corners of the FNDM do the Happy Huntresses dirty. I mean, disagreeing with their methods from a political standpoint is whatever, but like... don't mix them up with the bad guys. They're rly not. They looked at the blantant inequalities between Atlas and Mantle, said "We won't stand for this", and started working for change. I'm pretty sure it was even said that they were all graduates of Atlas Academy that theoretically could have joined the military and done well in it—but they chose not to. Bcus they felt protecting Mantle was more important than upholding the Atlesian status quo. Bcus they too were hurt by the toxic culture of Atlas and decided to make it so that the ppl of the future didn't have the same struggles. (And honestly I think they made the right choice. Look what obeying the status quo did to the Ace Ops. Half of them are dead and the other half are super traumatized now, if they weren't already.) Good for the Happy Huntresses

Also briefly circling back to the Semblance conversation! I love Robyn's Semblance from the whole "manifestation of the soul" outlook bcus I think it fits her as a person so well. I mean, Lie Detection? For someone who is so unbending in her pursuit of the truth? For someone who will always stand up for what she believes in no matter the scorn she may receive? YES, I love it! And it even checks the boxes of having an additional layer of a setback: When empathizing with Qrow in V8, Robyn explains that having a Semblance that could detect lies led to it becoming difficult to make connections in her childhood bcus ppl were scared she would sniff out their secrets. Lie Detection is probably one of my favorite Semblances, despite its simplicity, purely from a storytelling pov

[a-mended-pact]

Let the Right One In

A/N: So this is for @boldlyvoid 's challenge. I had so much fun writing this. Even though I'm still super anxious about posting my stories. It's been a pleasure and an honor getting to know you Em. Congratulations on reaching 2k! 🖤

Warning: Mentions of insecurities. Maeve Donovan. Faking a death.

Word count: 2,082

It was midday when I heard knocking on the front door. I was half tempted not to answer. Spencer was away on a case and neither him nor I were expecting anyone. Anyone that would come over at all was away on the case with him or states over. So who could be coming over unannounced? I clumsily headed towards the door. My fuzzy socks are making it difficult to stay balanced on the hardwood floor. A knock came again. It was gentler this time. 

I looked through the peephole and saw a small woman looking around nervously leaning from foot to foot. “Who is it?” I wondered if I could at least get a name. 

“I’m here to see Doctor Spencer Reid. I got his address from Aaron Hotchner.”

  My face blanched at the sound of Hotch’s name. It had been quite some time since anyone had mentioned him. After he went into protective custody with Jack even though the reaper was dead he still chose to stay away. Contact with him was rare and slim. I quickly opened the door and watched her jump back slightly. 

“Who are you?” she asked. She looked around the same age as him. She is actually quite beautiful. I wonder how Spencer knows her? 

“ I’m Y/n Reid.” She tilted her head to the side as she studied me.

 “I didn’t realize Spencer had a sister.” She finally met my gaze and smiled.

 “Is he here or do I need to come back at another time?” A small laugh escaped me 

“No, I am not his sister. I am his wife.” I crossed my arms over my chest and locked my foot in place behind the door keeping it only slightly ajar not letting her see into our home. 

Her face shifted to one of slight surprise. “Oh well I better just go then.” She went to turn away. When a thought crossed my mind.

 “Wait, I can call him if you’d like and let him know you are looking for him. What’s your name?” I was wondering whether this was a good idea or not to even call him but i had already offered and i am already in far too deep to turn back now. 

She stopped not turning to face me again. “My name is Maeve. Maeve Donovan.” 

Maeve. Why did I know that name? Why is my brain going off with alarm bells? But why do I know that name? I watched as she vanished from the hallway down the flight of stairs never turning back around to look at me. 

I slammed the door shut as I racked my brain on if I should mention this to Spencer at all. Especially while he is away on a case. Maybe I should wait until he gets home. He should be home later tonight. At least if the weather was alright over in New Hampshire. He had left me a message earlier this morning to let me know the case was solved and it had started snowing there but their flight wouldn’t be ready till a little later. 

He should be home in about an hour now. I will wait. I’ll definitely wait.

 

~

When Spencer walked through the door he looked sluggish and about ready to just collapse. The exhaustion clearly got to him from not getting enough sleep while he was away. He took off his satchel and his suit jacket. He began undoing his tie as he walked his way into our bedroom. Not even making eye contact with me. 

He came back out moments later in nothing but his flannel sweatpants. “Sorry I know I should have said hello to you. I just felt like I was suffocating in my clothes today.” As he spoke he made his way to the couch where I sat at one end.

 Once he sat down he leaned down and put his head in my lap. I gently started running my fingers through his hair while scratching his head. 

“That feels really nice.” His voice was soft and he let out a quiet sigh as he relaxed into the couch and my lap.

 If I wasn’t petting his head I was gently caressing his back with my fingertips. I know I needed to tell him. I was just so nervous. I knew somewhere deep down this would be stressful to him. The day already has worn him out so completely. It was like he needed my touch to recharge himself. I began biting my lip as my hand stopped on his lower back. 

“Hey, Spence, A woman came by to see you today. She said she got your address from Aaron.” He made a humming noise to let me know that he heard me. “Her name was Maeve Donovan.” I felt his back muscles tense at the sound of her name. He sat up immediately. 

“Wh- what did you say?” He looked at me as if I had just grown an extra head or as if I had just spoken another language.  “Mae-” He cut me off. “No, I heard what you said. I don’t need you to repeat yourself. It’s not possible she was at the door. She is dead. She’s been dead for years.” 

He pushed himself up off the couch, the muscles in his arms flexing more than usual. He was more tense than I have seen him in a long time. The last time I saw him this upset or stressed was when he first came back from prison. We were just dating back then.

“I am going to go call Hotch.” he moved quickly to grab his phone when he finally reached it. It began to ring. He looked at it for a couple of seconds before he answered.

“Hello?” His eyes widened slightly. I watched as he clenched his jaw and tears brimmed his eyes. 

“M-m-maeve?” He leaned himself back against the wall. His breathing became irregular as he slid himself down the cold panel. At the same time I saw a couple of tears leave his eyes.

I sucked in a breath and sighed. Was this going to be the end of us? Now that all the stories Spencer told me of her came back once he said that she was dead.

She was his first love after all. It would only make sense right?

====Spencer’s Pov=====

My vision was blurred beyond recognition. I could hear my blood pumping in my ears as the sound of her voice drifted in and out. This isn’t real. It’s not possible. I watched her die. I saw her. She was pronounced dead at the scene. I mourned her. It’s been years. Nearly a decade.

“Spencer? Can you hear me?” I felt my tears stream down my face, nodding as if she could see me. 

“Yeah, Yeah I can hear you.” My voice cracked as I answered her. 

“Just like old times huh? It’s so nice to hear your voice. I’ve missed you.” My breath hitched at her words. 

I felt my heart hammer in my chest. I glanced up to see if I could find my wife. She was watching me with concern but otherwise she hadn’t moved not yet. All the guards Y/n had torn down throughout the years started building themselves up higher and higher. 

"H-how are you alive? I watched you die." The horrible memories of that fatal day still haunted me. What am I supposed to do now?

Do I still have feelings for her? Is it wrong if I do? I don't know how to handle this. What should I do?

"That's why I came to see you earlier.  It was an idea that I came up with at the last minute.  So I faked my death." Her voice was calmer than my breathing.  I felt the walls Barricading around me to keep me safe. I was suffocating.

I wasn't sure I had heard her right. I could feel my ears ringing as the blood in me ran cold.

"You faked your death and made me believe for a decade that the first person I ever loved died a brutal death because you wanted a new life?" My tone was harsher than I anticipated.

I felt my wife's hands run through my hair in a comforting manner as she lowered herself to the floor with me.

I glanced at Y/n as tears streamed down my face. The memories of Maeve and my feelings for her wreaking havoc on my heart.

"Darling, I think you should hang up. For now anyway." She whispered it as her hand lowered to the back of my neck giving me a gentle message. 

My back stiffened. I was so caught up in my own nightmare I hadn't realized that this is probably a living one for her.

"Spencer. I can expla-" I cut off the call before she could even finish her sentence.  Y/n was right.

"You have a lot you need to process and I'm sure you didn't want to say anything you would regret. I'm sorry if I've overstepped." She looked a little nervous as if I was gonna snap at her the way I had Maeve 

I gently grabbed the hand that was touching me and brought it up to my lips placing a kiss on it.

"Nonsense. You are my wife. You were right. I should have hung up. I just. I don't know how to explain what I was feeling." I could feel my breathing begin to slow slightly as I tried to match her breathing to get mine back to normal.

It was like my world paused for a moment and began to spiral faster than I could catch my balance. I felt air fill my lungs when I heard her voice but yet I was left gasping for oxygen. 

The very thought of Maeve brought back so many things I thought I had dealt with prior to now.  I leaned my head against my wife's shoulder as I just let the tears fall.

I felt awful having her comfort me over another woman. Yet I couldn't bring myself to completely care. She was the one offering me comfort.  

She held me in her arms. Whispering to me that things will be okay. That we'd figure things out.

I truly didn't deserve her. She loves me so unconditionally it's unnerving. That's when my phone went off again.

It was the same number Maeve had called me from.

I glanced at my wife. Who just watched me. That's when I fully knew and decided something that had been bothering me for over the past hour or so.

I let my phone continue to ring as I cupped her face. 

"You...you make me feel special and good and all these things that I still don't have the words for yet— good things… things I never thought I deserved to feel.” I pulled her in closer letting our lips caress one another.

"I love you Spencer.  You don't need to say all of this right now. I know you are still-" She tilted her head to the side as if she were trying to figure me out.  "Cluttered and that's okay."

I kissed her harder than I've ever kissed anyone before.

"I’m not in love with her, I’m in love with you”

I have no real idea on if she needed this reassurance all I knew is that I did. I wanted her to know out loud what she meant to me. I couldn't imagine a better partner. A better lover or a better best friend than her.

 I wasn't going to have her doubt everything about us. Not for anything.

I stayed close to her as my phone kept repeatedly going off until eventually it stopped. I was still figuring things out. 

Knowing that Maeve was alive before I met Y/n would have changed my life completely but now? I didn't want anything to change.  For once I was happy. I had someone in my life who put me first. Who cared about me. Who wasn't afraid to hurt my feelings as long as it kept me safe. She loved me for me and all the mess in between who I have yet to become.

She saw me for me. I wasn't Doctor Spencer Reid.  I wasn't a federal agent or a professor to her. I was just Spencer.  The man for some ungodly reason she chose to love. 

[kakejiszka]

Studio Fun

This is my first Jake smut, hope you enjoy! :)

Disclaimer: contains lots of smut, you have been warned.

After changing at least six times, you still hadn't chosen among the three set of clothes that were lying on your bed, surrounded by several other pieces of clothing that together created a mess in your entire room, that smelled like citrus, makeup and despair.

You couldn't help but tremble with anxiety at the sight of yourself in your lingerie in the mirror, after all, the occasion you were dressing for was unprecedented. Should you wear a fancy dress? A slutty short skirt? A rocker leather jacket?

You had hit the jackpot: after a few weeks going out with Jake, he had finally invited you to meet the studio where he and his band rehearsed every week. And furthermore, you would meet his brother Josh and Sam and their friend Danny for the first time. You were nervous, as shit was starting to get serious.

Jake was living rent free in your head. Since the first time you saw him, your standards for men had never been the same, after all, no one could surpass his beauty, talent and charisma. To top it all, he was so romantic: on the three times you went out together, he managed to surprise you even with the simplest things. On your first date, you had coffee together, but he gifted you white roses. On the second date, you two took a walk around the town and he held your hand the entire time. On the third date, where it's socially acceptable to have sex, he took you to a super fancy restaurant with wonderful food. You even wore a beatiful black dress and made sure to wear your best lingerie. But, despite taking you home and kissing you by the door (for the first time), that was it. Maybe he was shy, maybe he wasn't ready, but you couldn't help but feeling a bit disappointed for not spending the night with him.

You chose the skirt. If there was even the smallest chance of you seducing him that day, you were willing to try. You finished the look with a black tank top, which was so tight you didn't feel the need to wear a bra, an oversized jeans jacket and black boots. You applied some eyeliner and mascara.

You called an Uber to the address Jake had texted you and quickly you arrived. Your phone vibrated in your jacket's pocket. "Be there in 15" his text said. You felt your legs tremble during the whole time you spent waiting for him, which seemed like an eternity. Despite all his qualities, it wasn't new to you that Jake Kizka's worst flaw was that he was always late.

You noticed the studio: it was very big and it seemed like a place full of quality equipment. The street where it was located was full of different records and musical instruments stores, what made you realize you were in a part in town where you could find everything that was music-related. As you waited for him, all the thoughts in the world were crossing your mind: what if he's not so into me? What if his brothers don't like me? What am I doing here? What kind of idea was this? Do I still have time to go back home?

"Hey!" you were surprised by a familiar voice behind you.

"Jake!" you said, nervousness resonating in your voice.

"Did I scare you?" he asked, giggling.

"No, I'm okay, it's just that..." you didn't even have to finish what you were saying so that he could understarnd the situation.

"There's nothing to be nervous about, they will love to meet you."

Jake gave you his hand and you held it, now feeling much safer and calmer than before.

You two entered the studio and followed through a long dark hallway. The walls were painted black and were full of band posters and stickers. There were other rooms there and you could hear other bands rehearsing inside them. Jake guided you to the end of the hallway where a small set of stairs took you to the second floor.

For your surprise, there weren't other rooms on the second floor like there were on the first floor. It was a single room entirely, where you could find everything: a big couch, a frigo, technical equipment for recording, vending machines, snooker table, a mini bar, all sorts of things...

A section of the room was isolated by a thick glass wall. Inside it, the walls were covered in acoustic panels and the room was filled with many amplifiers, pedals, instruments and a bunch of other things you didn't know what were called were there.

Lying on the couch were Danny, Sam and Josh, waiting for Jake.

"Goddamnit, finally!" Josh shouted "we waited for like an hour!"

"I was getting ready for her" Jake answered, smirking and pulling you close to him by your waist. You couldn't hide the embarassment on your face.

"What a fancy studio!" you said, trying to change the subject "I didn't know you rehearsed in such a cool place."

"It wasn't always like this, ya know" Josh said while standing up and putting his hands in his pockets "we started playing at our house, but it was starting to get too noisy for miss Karen" he laughed.

"It's true, we had to look for cheap studios, but it was hard to find anything in a small town like Frankenmuth" Sam said.

You all talked a bit and, fortunately, the boys were all very nice. You felt very welcomed by Josh's sense of humor, Sam's big smile and Danny's kindness.

After you got to know them, they entered the acoustic room and started rehearsing. You sat on the couch to watch them and, although you were scared to feel bored, you had a lot of fun with the private show they were performing for you.

You couldn't take your eyes off Jake. What he did to the guitar was phenomenal, sexy and even pornographic. The way he slowly slid his hand over the guitar's neck while sweat drops fell on his forehead were making you cross your legs a bit too hard over the couch.

He noticed you were staring at him and smiled at you through the glass, making you cover your face with your hands out of embarassment. You must have been making a funny face, because he giggled at the sight of you.

After two or three hours of rehearsal, they were done. Although the air-conditioning was making you shiver, they left the room all sweaty. Josh, Sam and Danny went to the frigo to get some beer. Jake went there as well, but he made sure to get one for you too.

"Did you like to watch the rehearsal?" Jake asked, offering you an already open Corona bottle.

"I loved it!" you said, getting the bottle from his hand and taking a sip.

"I was scared you would get bored" he said while he sat by your side on the couch and opened his bottle.

"How could I? I felt very special for watching such an exclusive show!" you said, making him laugh.

For the first time, you noticed what he was wearing: a dark purple silk shirt with the buttons opened showing his chest, as he always wore them. He had tight black cuffed pants and brown boots. On his neck, some long necklaces that reached the middle of his bare chest, and on his wrists a few bracelets. His style was casual and attractive, but goddamn, he looked so fucking hot.

The rest of the day was very fun. You two drank together and talked a lot, what got you even closer to each other. Josh, Sam and Danny played snooker and drank a lot, until they decided to leave.

There were only you and Jake, that were now a bit tipsy and still had a lot to talk about. You noticed that, although you two had already went out before, this was the first time you talked this much. When you realized, you were physically very close: your legs were resting over Jake's left leg and his hand was caressing the back of your head. Your index finger was circling around Jake's bare chest. He looked so great in that shirt.

"Do you wanna see something?" he excitedly asked. You, curious as you were, immediately answered:

"Sure."

Jake stood up and walked towards the platform where there was a panel with a billion different buttons you had no idea were for. After pressing and regulating some of them, he made a sign with his fingers invinting you to join him.

"What does that thing do?" you asked, arching an eyebrow.

"Everything" he playfully answered.

"Everything what?" you asked again, laughing impatiently.

"This is the sound mixer, where we can control everything inside the acoustic room. Bass, treble, autotune, tuning, echo, volume... and so on" while he patiently explained to you, you admired him. He would get so excited when talking about music.

"Wow" you responded, without taking your eyes off his.

"Wanna try it out?" he asked.

"What? Are you serious?" you almost spit the liquid of the forth or fifth beer bottle you were having that day.

"Very serious" he said, looking deep in your eyes.

"Okay then..."

"Put this on" he said, grabbing the two headphones thar were lying on the table over the mixer and handing one over to you.

You did as he said and Jake left you responsible for the sound mixer and ran inside the acoustic room, almost tripping due to his light state of inebriation.

"What is he doing?" you quietly asked yourself.

He shut the door of the acoustic room and got one of the 6 or 7 guitars that were inside. After that, he put on the headphones that he brought with him to the room, turned on the microphone that was resting over a tripod and said:

"Can you hear me?"

The sound came out so loud in your headphones that you got scared and jumped, almost turning deaf. After that, you laughed a lot and so did he.

"How do I turn this thing down?" you asked him, screaming so he could hear you through the glass wall.

"Slide the red button down, on your right. Oh, and you don't have to scream, on your left there's a microphone that's meant for you to talk to me while I'm inside, just hold its button down."

You did as he told you to and laughed at yourself, feeling silly for not knowing how to use those things.

"There. Can I do what I want here?"

"Yeah!" he answered.

Jake started playing a random melody and you played with the sounds, having fun like a child. Distorting, increasing and decreasing the echoes, you two laughing like fools.

When you had enough fun, Jake spoke on the microphone again.

"Did you know this room has an almost perfect acoustic insulation?"

"Almost perfect? Like, no one can hear from the outside?" you said while pressing the mic's button and arching a brow, without believing him.

"Exactly" he said, putting his guitar away "I can scream as loud as I want here, no one will listen. Wanna try it?"

"How do I do that?" you asked, searching for the function among the million buttons on the sound mixer panel.

"Just turn the volume down, all of it."

And so you did. As you turned the volume down, it was getting harder and harder to hear what he said, until you couldn't hear a word. He only realized you couldn't hear him when he saw the surprise on your face, caused by the magic of the acoustic room. You could tell by his facial expression that he was laughing, and you laughed as well.

He made a gesture with his hand, like he asked you if you could hear him. You answered through the mic:

"I can't hear anything! This is amazing!"

He smiled and made another gesture, as if he was inviting you to the acoustic room. You quickly removed your earphones and walked to the door, thinking it would be your turn to stay there as he played with the sound.

When you opened the door, Jake immediately pulled you inside and shut the door with both of you inside. Then, he pressed you against the wall, pinning both of your wrists against it over your head.

You couldn't help but feeling surprised, after all, Jake had never acted like this before. He had always been romantic and careful, so you were pretty curious about his sudden dominating attitude.

He approached his face to yours, whispering close to your ear:

"Wanna test the acoustic of the room's acoustics?"

His tone was everything but innocent. You finally understood where he was getting to, so you decided to play his game.

"How can we test it?" you answered, faking innocence, and he smiled at your acting. So he put his leg in the middle of yours, gently rubbing his thigh against your groin and pressing you even harder agains the foamy wall.

"We can try it the best way possible."

After he said it, he kissed you deeply. His hands let go of your wrists and slowly slid down your arms, all the way to your neck. One of his hands held the back of your head and the other choked you slightly, but strong enough to make breathing a little harder. Your arms, now free of his grip, curled arould his shoulders, pulling him closer to you.

The kiss was getting hotter. You felt the hand that held your neck go down to your waist, and the hand on the back of your head gently pull your hair, bringing your head back and making you moan softly. Jake stopped kissing you and smirked, watching your pleasure face.

"They might see us through the glass!" you said, but he didn't pay much attention as he immediately returned to kiss your lips.

"I don't care" he answered, and although it was a bit scary, the fear of getting caught was also thrilling and exciting.

Your neck was completely exposed now, inviting Jake's silky lips which left soft kisses on your skin, making their way to your ear lobes where he gently nibbled. It sent shivers down your spine and goosebumps on your skin, something Jake noticed and made sure to show he enjoyed.

"You like this, huh?" he whispered in your ear. You nodded with a small moan, still a little overwhelmed by the situation, but certainly enjoying it.

Jake went back to kissing your neck, now a little faster. The tiny threads of growing beard on his jaw scratched your face, the sensation was even more arousing. You were so focused on that that only later you realized that his hand wasn't on your waist anymore, but was grabbing your ass.

Your body was warm, but you had chills. The mix of sensations Jake was causing on you gave you so much pleasure, but at the same time it was torturous. It wasn't enough, you wanted more and he knew that, but he wanted to keep you waiting.

Jake put both on his hands on your ass, squeezing it hard and making you moan softly. But after a short period, you felt his hands leave the place, which surprised you. Only then you realized he was taking off your jeans jacket and tossing in on the floor. The black tank top you were wearing left your collarbone and your shoulders exposed, which was exactly what Jake's lips were looking for. But before he went back to what he was doing, he took a good look at your newly exposed body part. His eyes traveled from your face to your breasts and there they stood, what got you a little embarassed.

"You're so hot, did you know that?" he whispered, staring even harder at your cleavage and then at your eyes. You smiled and blushed. The way he said those things made you feel a way no other man had ever managed to do to you. "You don't have to feel ashamed..." he said, smirking at your reaction.

His lips met yours again, but only for a short period of time. They quickly moved to your collarbone. His hands were now were wandering around your whole body, moving from your neck to your shoulders, back, waist and ass, as if he was desperate to feel you. Which was amazing, because you were eager to feel his hands all over you.

You also wanted to feel him, so you did as he did: you took one of your hands to the back of his hand and slightly pulled back some of his long brown hair, what made him moan and smile in response. Your other hand traveled through his chest, gently dragging your nails around the small part of exposed skin. My god, he looked so hot in that purple jacket. The only way he could look hotter than that would be without it.

You started to slowly unbutton the shirt, which made him stop kissing you and look at you with a naughty smirk.

"So much hurry!" he giggled.

"You take mine off, I take yours, that's how it works" you answered, winking at him.

He helped you take off his shirt and toss it on the floor, next to your jacket. You enjoyed the view of his shirtless body, staring at it just like he did to you before, sliding your nails and digging them on his torso. He held your hand over his chest, looking deep into your eyes. you were expecting him to say something nasty, but instead he just went back to kissing you, now even more intensely.

He embraced your waist and pulled you closer to him, as if it were possible. Then, his hands slowly moved upwards, passing through your waist and reaching your breasts. He squeezed them softly, making you moan. Your skin, that was already shivered, got even more chills under his touch. You weren't wearing a bra, which made your nipples appear through your shirt. Jake noticed and liked it, since he touched and tweaked them over the thin cloth. At this moment, you were already wet and impacient, but you were only getting a small portion of Jake's sexual expertise.

"Jake..." you moaned in agony between his kisses, suffering with his touches over your clothes. Although it was very hot, the throbbing sensation in your groin was starting to feel unbearable and painful.

"I know, babe" he answered, resting his forehead on yours, without ceasing to fondle your breasts "you're eager, but I'm only getting started."

Hearing that made the situation of your arousal even worse, to the point where if he decided to just lift your skirt and fuck you at that moment you wouldn't even feel pain, so horny and ready you were. He went back to kissing you, never letting your breasts go. But suddenly, you felt him pull your shirt up and reveal your stomach.

He kept on pulling it, enough that your breasts dropped down from your top, due to how tight it was. He watched that pornographic scene without blinking, dazzled. Rapidly he went back to fondling your breasts, only now he took his lips to one of your nipples.

He sucked it gently, making you let go a pleasurable moan. Glad with your reaction, he kept on sucking it, sometimes licking, nibbling and kissing. He moved to the right breast, but without stopping to give attention to the left one, playing with the nipple with his thumb. The saliva he left on the thin skin of your nipple in contact with the air made you feel a little bit cold, but it gave you pleasure.

Jake took his time there, enjoying the sensation he was causing you. You, on the other hand, dig your nails a bit deeper all over his back, feeling his skin also get goosebumps.

Jake finishing sucking your nipples and went back to kissing your lips. He took off your top with a bit of hurry, tossing it on the floor and then pulling you closer to him by your waist. His hands were now back on your ass, but now he started to lift your skirt.

"This short skirt of yours... I spent the whole day thinking about lifting it and fucking you" he said, holding the cloth with the tip of his fingers and raising it slowly. The fingers that lifted the fabric softly scratched your thighs and your hip, making you shiver.

Jake saying those things made your legs tremble with pleasure. You didn't know how good it felt to hear that dirty-talk until it was Jake whispering it to you.

"I wore it thinking about it" you answered, what made him smile in a sexy and predatory way at the same time.

When he lifted your skirt high enough, he slid his right hand over your thigh. He gently slid back and forth towards your groin, torturing you with the desire of his touch. He looked you deep in the eyes with a serious expression, like he was in control of the situation. When you couldn't stand the teasing anymore, he caressed your pussy over your panties.

"Wow, you're soaking wet... I didn't know it was that easy to make you horny, baby."

You looked at him, almost not believing what you had just heard. After half an hour of teasing, he thought it was easy?

"Jake, please..." you moaned in desperation as he now rubbed your clit over the thin lacy fabric.

"I know, love, I'll give you what you want."

Jake pulled your panties down and slid his index finger between your fold, reaching your clit. You were so wet it was slippery inside you, making his job even easier. He then started to rub your clit in slow and circle motions.

You let go a fairly loud moan and, out of embarassment, you covered your mouth with your hand. He took your hand out of your mouth and pinned it against the wall behind you.

"Moan all you want, no one's gonna hear us. Moan loud for me."

And so you did. The harder he rub your clit, the more pleasure you felt and the more you moaned in his ear. He, who was also feeling pleasure, had his lips parted, watching you squirm against the wall.

Jake increased the speed with which he masturbated you, driving you insane. But you also wanted to torture him. Therefore, catching him by surprise, you took your hand to the huge bulge in his pants. He wasn't expecting that, but he enjoyed it.

You stroked his cock, that was very enhanced outside his pants. You were surprised with its lenght.

"You did this to me" he said, grabbing your hand and rubbing it harder against his dick.

But you didn't last for too long, since Jake's expertise in masturbating you was making your legs shake so you couldn't concentrate in anything but your own pleasure. You kept on moaning ach time louder until your orgasm finally hit. The pulsation made you almost scream.

You couldn't help but feel a little embarassed, but the look on his face comforted you and made you realize there was nothing to be ashamed of, since the man was clearly enjoying it.

He removed his fingers from your pussy and licked them. what made you feel another throb of pleasure. Next, he deeply kissed you.

"Fuck, your moans are so hot" he whispered in your ear. You couldn't answer him, since you were still recovering your breath.

Although you didn't say a word, you went back to stroking his erection. Gladly, he let you masturbate him over his clothes, torturing him as he had done to you.

"It's your turn to suffer" you said, and he smirked in response.

"This is nothing, I've been suffering since I first saw you in those tight clothes, your tits almost bursting out of that small top of yours. It was hard to hide how hard I was" he answered, gently pulling your hair behind your back so he could delight himself again with the sight of your naked breasts.

You rolled your eyes, giggling. He always had an answer on the tip of his tongue. But the fact that he said he got an erection only by looking at your cleavage made you feel powerful and sexy.

You kept masturbating him over the thick fabric of his pants, watching him twitch out of pleasure. After a few minutes, you removed his leather belt, tossing it on the floor together with the rest of your clothes. Next, he unzipped his pants himselft and lowered it a little, just enough so that you could see the bulge on his boxers. You could see the tip of his cock, since it had scaped the prison of its tight black fabric, which was already wet with his precum.

You licked your lips at the sight of his rigid cock. You wanted to suck it, but you would make him wait, just like he did to you. You stroked it over his underwear, which was way thinner and allowed you to move up and down much more easily. Jake was panting, anticipation taking over both of your bodies.

When he couldn't stand it anymore, he grabbed your hand and put it inside his underwear, surprising you.

"Couldn't handle it?" you laughed.

"I need to feel you" he murmured, almost out of breath.

So you masturbated him, now inside his underwear. You started off slowly, gently touching the tip of his cock with your thumb. It was wet with eagerness. You then started to move more quickly, but the fabric of his underwear was making the job a little difficult, so you impaciently pulled it down, completely revealing his penis. Now that you could see it completely, you masturbated him even faster.

You looked at his face saw the expression of pure pleasure, small groans escaping from his mouth. You smirked and he smirked back, pleased with how much fun you were having while touching him so intimately. You then looked back at his cock and realized you couldn't take it any longer: you had to suck him off.

When he noticed you were getting down on your knees, his eyes widened up in anticipation. Knowing what was about to happen, he helped you take off his pants and underwear and took off his shoes, tossing it all on the floor. Then, he grabbed all of your hair and held it tightly in the back of your head, not letting any strand of it get in the way of you doing your job, but at the same time being able to mildly control your movements.

You slowly licked his entire shaft from the base to the tip, making him shiver and moan. Next, you placed your lips around its head, gently sliding his whole cock inside your mouth. When it reached your throat you gagged, but you kept going. Starting off with slow movements and then increasing the speed, sometimes licking, sometimes kissing, sometimes harder, sometimes easier, sometimes just masturbating it while you gathered some air. With one hand you stimulated it, with the other you grabbed his butt. You looked him in the eyes, knowing he was enjoying it. His pleasure facial expression was incredible, only making you want to suck him even more.

You kept going, so eagerly you reached a very high speed, but it didn't last long. He gently pushed your head away from his cock and pulled you up, asking you to stand up.

"If you keep going like that, I won't stand for long, babygirl..." he murmured, catching some air.

"Sorry, I guess I got carried away..." you said while wiping your lips with your hand, making him giggle.

"Don't ever apologize for giving me the best head I've ever got."

Jake gave you a deep and sloppy kiss. Next, he is the one who went on his knees.

Jake laid kisses on your chin, neck, the middle of your breasts, your tummy and, after taking off your skirt and your boots and throwing them on the floor, he kissed your groin. Your body shivered in anticipation, nervous with what was about to happen.

Jake lifted one of your legs up and laid it over his shoulder, in a way he could be face-to-face to your entrance.

Before he got started, he looked up deep into your eyes, grinned and held your hip firmly with one of his hands, while the other squeezed the thigh that laid on his shoulder so tightly you had marks of it the day after.

Jake touched his tongue gently on your entrance, spreading your lips allowing his to explore your pussy. His hot and wet tongue in contact with your soaking folds sent shivers through your whole body, and several others followed it when he started to lick your clit.

The sensation was even better than the one he caused you with his fingers. Which was surprising, since he was a guitar player, you always thought he would be better with his hands. Turns out Jake Kiszka was god with incredible with string instruments and even more skilled in pleasing a lady.

He kept licking your clit, now harder. You, who were already having trouble standing on one leg while getting your pussy eaten like that, reached a tripod that stood nearby, dropping the microphone from it. Your other hand grabbed his light brown hair tightly between your fingers, trying to hold up to something and not lose grip from reality. You two were making a mess in the studio but you didn't mind, for he continued to go down on you and you kept moaning as loud as you could.

But it didn't stop there.

Jake slowly inserted his index finger inside you. You felt your walls clench around his finger as he moved it up and down, hitting your g-spot so easily you regretted not doing this earlier. The mix of sensations his tongue on your clit and his finger inside you were causing on you combined drove you insane. At this point, you were moaning so loudly you completely forgot where you two were. Your eyes were closed and all you could say was Jake's name between groans and breaths.

Jake inserted another finger and started to estimulate you really rapidly, as fast as he was sucking on your clit. Your pleasure had become unbearable and your second orgasm hit like a tsunami, wetting even more your folds and Jake's tongue. Although you had shown him he could stop so you two could move on, he didn't want to. He didn't stop, never allowing your orgasm to reach its end and making your legs shake uncontrollably.

When he thought he had enough he started to slow his movements down, for your relief. When he finally stopped, he laid a soft kiss on your wet entrance as a demonstration of affection and stood up, immediately kissing your lips making you taste your own bitter juices.

"You taste so delicious" he whispered between your lips "I can't get enough of it."

You two kissed once more, now more romanticaly and tenderly. When you two finally caught some breath, you looked at each other and smiled, excited with what was about to happen next.

He then grabbed your hair very firmly, bringing goosebumps to your skin. Next, he whispered in your ear:

"Are you sure you want it?" he asked, you thought it was sweet of him to ask for verbal consent.

"Yeah" you answered, embarassingly anxious.

"Then ask for it."

As he said it, he turned you over, making you face and lean against the wall, your back completely exposed to him. He still had his hand holding your hair very tightly. You moan at his dominance.

He bent you over in a way your ass was tilted up for him. He enjoyed the sight of it, caressing and squeezing it really hard. Next, he rubbed his hard cock over your entrance. You arched your back even more, feeling exposed like that felt hot and thrilling. The sensation of his entire lenght rubbing against your wet folds was torturous.

"Ask for it" he repeated impaciently.

"F-fuck me" you stuttered, nervously enjoying him telling you what to do.

"I can't hear you" he rubbed his cock against you even harder.

"Fuck me, goddamnit!" you shouted, feeling obligated to put all shame aside to please that wonderful bossy man.

"Good" he said in a husky voice, seeming pleased.

Jake finally put the tip of his cock inside you, slowly so your walls could adjust to his size. It wasn't necessary to wait for too long, since you were so horny and ready that he slipped right in. When his entire lenght slid inside you, you felt chills run from your neck to your back. Finally feeling Jake inside you was incredible.

Jake started to fuck you, increasing the speed bit by bit. You impaciently start to move your hips in his direction, showing him he could go faster.

"Oh, you want more, you slut?" he asked, squeezing and then slapping your ass, what would leave a red mark on the next day.

"Yeah..." you moan.

Jake then did as you asked, increasing the speed. You were now fucking really hard, his cock moving in and out of you at a rapid pace. The pressure of his shaft hitting deep into you gave you so much pleasure your eyes were rolling to the back of your head, and your moans had become screams.

Jake slapped your ass again. The pain was intense but extremely hot. He, looking for more pleasure, pulled your hair back even more while his other hand reached one of your breasts, which shook due to the harsh movements you were making. Jake's groans were low, but vibrant and rough. He moaned your name while gasping for air.

"Your pussy feels so tight, so good."

Then, for your surprise, he got out of you. You turned over to him to see what was going on, but he pulled you to the floor before you could say anything. He lied on the floor and placed you on top of him, then putting his arms under his head and laying down, enjoying the view of your completely naked body on top of his.

"Ride me" he commanded, and you obeyed without question.

You began to ride him, getting used to the position before doing it faster. As soon as you managed to find balance, you started to ride him really quickly. That position hit different a different spot inside you, and you could see by Jake's expression that it hit different for him too.

You were fucking him so hard Jake was cursing between his breaths. He put one of his hands on your butt to guide the movements as he wanted to and the other hand on your right breast, holding it and squeezing it. You two kept that position for a while, looking deep in each other's eyes, chills running through your spines.

Jake wanted to change positions again, laying you under him. For the first time you could feel how harsh the carpet felt under your soft skin, only then remembering the place the two of you were. But that didn't matter. Jake leaned on his knees and pulled one of your legs, placing it over his shoulder and going back to fuck you again.

That position was taking you to heaven, what seemed impossible. To make it even better, Jake began to estimulate your clit with his thumb while he slid his cock in and out of you. At that moment, any drop of sanity that you still had disappeared.

"Yes!" you moaned, biting your lower lip.

"Fuck!" he hissed, sweat running down his beautiful face.

He kept fucking you in that position, which didn't take long to make you come for the third time in a row. Your orgasm made you scream and moan his name for the millionth time that afternoon, and that was driving him insane.

"I'm gonna cum" he said, increasing the speed with which he fucked you, not allowing your orgasm to end. The noise your hips crashing against each other was so loud it filled the room.

Jake reached his limit, letting his fluids fill you up inside. You, still experiencing your multiple orgasms, enjoyed the sensation the hot liquid mixed with the bliss caused you. The two of you began to slow the pace, until you fully stopped. Jake laid over you, without pulling out. You two were dripping in sweat, his hair all messy and glued to his forehead.

The both of you stood there for a while, catching your breath. He caressed your hair and you stroked his back. When you could finally breathe again, Jake looked you in the eye and you both giggled in complicity.

Jake pulled out and lied next to you on the carpet while holding your hand.

"This was..." he said.

"Wow..." you said.

You two laughed for having spoken at the same time. You two stood there for a long time, staring each other in the eyes. His dark brown eyes sparkled with joy and both of you were enjoying the serotonin the intimate moment you two had just shared produced, cuddling.

"I think I'm falling for you" Jake said, breaking the silence.

You couldn't hide your surprise in hearing that declaration, but you gave him a big smile in response.

"Me too" you said, unable to contain the huge smile on your face.

"Phew!" he said, laughing "This means we will be able to do this more often."

"Obviously. But can we do it in a more comfortable place next time? This carpet is so rough!"

"You didn't like the studio? But we can make as much noise as we want in here!" he said, comically offended by your preference of having sex somewhere else.

"It has its advantages, yes, but I bet it can't be better than Egyptian silk sheets on a king-sized bed" you said, convinced you knew better than him.

"Okay, you've got a point. But I can't promise I'll be able to provide the Egyptian silk sheets and a king-sized bed by tonight."

You hit his arm and laughed, glad for having found such an amazing partner.

[staygolddindjarin]

Grief

Chapter two: Rebellion

Din Djarin x Reader x Cassian Andor

Series Summary: Raised on Mandalore, born into a bloodline of warriors, no one ever expected for the daughter of a Clan leader to go rogue. Leaving the life of security and making the journey to fight in the war against the empire meant many things... giving up the way of the Mandalore, and giving up a solid future. A future that involves an arranged marriage to a foundling from another clan.

Chapter warnings: some brief angst, this ones pretty mellow ngl

Words: 3.3k

A/n: i was not expecting such a good response from the first chapter but bruh you guys are amazing- anyway here's part two of my brain's misery

Part 2/?

The trip from Mandalore to the planet of Dantooine was long, and still ongoing. We all took turns, watching to see if we were any closer. After each jump from hyperspace, the transport would stop at a space refueling tank, before slowly going onward toward the destination. We must have been traveling several systems across the galaxy. We had a few laughs, mainly while watching Gander try and steal Shyloh's food from his knapsack while he was sleeping. Most of the other time we all just sat in silence, up until this point.

"What do you think we're all going to do once we get to the rebel base?" Merc raised his voice slightly, barely capturing our attentions as we had all been dozing off, and Shyloh was taking watch at the view point.

"What do you mean?" I had asked, not quite sure of what he was getting at. I sat up straighter against the wall, showing my interest in the newfound conversation.

"What branch do you think you'll end up in?" He was in a daze as he spoke, almost unsure of his intentions of bringing it up. His dark eyes were nearly emotionless under his furrowed brow.

"I hadn't really thought about it. I would say maybe something like mechanics," I said, thinking of the best possible use of my talents. I'm sure there's plenty of mechanical help already assisting the rebels, but with the galactic empire growing it's forces by the day, they needed all the help they could get.

"What about flying?" Shyloh perked up from his seat at the window.

"What about it?" I asked, curious as to why he suddenly thought of the new topic.

"You could do it of you wanted to. Be a pilot, I mean. You have the skills," He told me, but I scoffed. He wasn't in any way shape or form was making an ounce of sense at all.

"Speeder control races are a bit different from piloting fighters against the imperial troops don't you think?" I laughed at the idea, but he rolled his eyes, persistent with his opinion.

"It's less different than you think it is. Also mind you, I never saw you lose a race," He objected, but I wasn't having any of it.

"That's because when I raced, my own credits were on the line," I joked, seeing what he would try and come up with next, only to be met with a cold hard stare, before an answer that would shake me to my core.

"Well, now the freedom of the galaxy is on the line."

My smile dropped from my face and I turned to face the other two, who were looking back at me. They didn't expect that answer either. Shyloh was well known to be a boy of few words, and only really spoke to his friends and family. He was a founding just like the rest of them, but he had been with ths clan longer, due to having been saved from a war infested home as a baby.

He could sometimes be very wise, even if he didn't think he was being so. We weren't sure what it was, but he had this sort of presense that was so powerful. We knew when he would walk in a room, or walk out of it. It's like the air would change. Much like it changed now, with his words rendering us all speechless.

The silence was uncomfortable, and I was the one who left it unresloved, so I spoke up in favor of my crewmates to not keep quiet any longer.

"Perhaps I shall see where I am needed first."

"Perhaps you shouldn't be so afraid to explore an option you would excel in," He again rendered me speechless, and I did not have anything else to say this time. I was young, but my mind was not. I could comprehend thoughts the same way that an adult could. I could handle things just as well and if not better than some, too. He was right. I was simply afraid.

"I think we're finally here," Shyloh said, turning back to look out of the view port again.

"Its about time," Gander stood up, slinging his knapsack over his shoulder and standing at the transport door waiting for it to slide up.

We all followed suit, but Shyloh stopped us and held up a warning finger to stay still.

"There's manding droids, we gotta sneak off carefully. They don't look like bulk but they could be armed," He suggested. We were not yet at the rebel base, meaning these were probably droids of the land, and belonged to whoever oversees the exports on this planet.

When the panel opened, we were all careful to first peek out of the transport. This planet was nothing at all like Mandalore, which was dry and hot. This planet was lush with plants. And the air was slightly humid. It was a very welcome contrast from where I spent most of my life.

We all sneakily bolted out of the transport, ducking down behind one of the cargo units placed outside. We saw an opening in what looked like some sort of forrest patch.

There was a chill in the air on this planet, even in the middle of the day. Mandalore only ever got colder at night, when the sun was down and the moons were shining.

"That was close." Merc mumbled as we began to turn around and head into the grasslands, trying to find the rebel base.

We made sure no one was behind us, and were careful to check if any droids had caught sight of us.

We all went to turn around, but as soon as I did, I collided with someone's chest, rather hard might I add, sending me to the ground on my bottom. I didn't even collide that hard with the person, it was just the shock that sent me backwards.

"Need a hand?" I looked up to see a man, a sly smirk on his face as he held his hand out towards me. I took it without question, heaving myself up from the grassy, and somewhat muddy ground beneath me.

"You must be our contact," Merc smiled, and the man nodded, turning and begining to lead us to a speader that was hovering nearby behind a large set of trees.

"We must be careful not to use names outside of the base. I would be more than happy to formally introduce myself once we reach our final destination," He chuckled. It was only now that I realized he had an accent, a thick one. Probably left over from his native tongue that spilled out his mouth when he spoke galactic basic.

I know that sometimes my accent slips in when i speak. I never had to worry about using Mando'a around my fellow crewmates. They were foundlings, and hadn't been raised to speak it. Shyloh was, but he prefered to use galactic basic anyways because he had forgotten so much of it.

We all boarded the speader, Gander and I sitting on the back, our legs hanging off as we held onto the side bars.

"This might be a bumpy ride for you two," The man said, looking at both of us before giving me a wink. I scrunched my face up, not sure how else to react to it. The man was definitely on the younger side, but I wasn't sure how he could possibly see an interest in me.

Maybe he did and I just didn't want him to. Maybe I was still hinged to the idea that I would go back to Mandalore someday and marry my betrothed. I was so young, and hadn't the slightest idea of what feelings I could possibly be harboring, if any at all.

I couldn't deny I found him appealing. Anyone would, at least any human with eyes that is.

His hair was dark, and so were his eyes. He had a bit of stubble along his jaw and above his lip. He was somewhat scruffy looking, but in a good way.

As the speeder went through the forresty stretch of pathway, I kept turning around to catch a glimpse of him. Each time I did I had to look away fast because Gander would give me weird stares.

I would play it off like I was simply taking in the view of the green planet around me, and he wouldn't seem to notice.

After a while, with quite a few twists and turns, and Gander and I nearly falling off the speeder twice, we arrived to our destination.

We all hopped out of the transport, following the man into a giant cargo port. As soon as I looked to my left I could see an X-wing fighter in all it's glory. I had never seen a real one before, just heard stories and viewed holograms.

"Alright. We have about twelve other recruits arriving on this base today, so you will all be attending orientation this evening. As for right now, you look beat, and should rest. PX-74 will assign you to your bunks," He said, gesturing to the droid before beginning to walk away with a nod, but I stopped him before he could take a step.

"Wait a minute... I believe I recall something about a formal introduction," I crossed my arms over my chest and shifted my weight, trying to give off the look of having as much confidence as I could muster. I was putting on a facade, possibly to make me seem more mature. I didn't know the real reason.

He smirked, raising an eyebrow as he scanned me up and down with his dark eyes.

"Cassian Andor," He smiled, then looking right back at me with questioning eyes. "And how about you... you got a name?"

"Y/n from clan Maldrix," I said, my confidence wavering a little when he looked at me the way that he did.

"She's a Mandalorian," Shyloh perked up, and I sent him a warning glare.

"Yeah, sixth generation," Merc added, his cocky smile pasted on his face for all to see and be annoyed by.

"A mandalorian? I've heard the stories but I haven't ever met one. Are you-?"

"I'm not," I cut him off before this got twisted into one big lie. "My mother and father are."

"Doesn't that make you one too?" Cassian furrowed his brow but his tone was somewhat joking and humorous.

"No, it does not," I wasn't harsh with the way my voice came out, but I was firm. Though I wasn't one of them, the mandalorians and all they stood for were very important to me.

"Mandalorian is not a race, it's a creed. Some of the best Mandalorians I ever had the pleasure of knowing didn't even have a bloodline from Mandalore. They were foundlings, like these three," I explained, laying out the facts so that there was no longer any confusion lingering, but now there was a tension that was thicker than the trees on this planet.

"Even still, she can fight just as good as any soldier taken the creed," Merc jumped in, trying to clear the air, and thankfully, it seemed to be working.

"She flies even better," Shyloh mentioned, and I swore I could kill him. He was just so pushy sometimes, even with his massive sense of wisdom.

"You fly?" This peaked Andor's interest, and immediately he seemed more engaged towards me.

"I'm not as good as they say I am," I admitted, but he shook his head.

"No, really... if you can fly we could really use you. We're putting together a team for an air raid that's set to happen about one month's time from now," He came up closer to me and stared me in the eye.

"I'm just a kid, I might really let you down," I joked, trying not to get too caught up in his eye contact. His eyes were much darker when you could see them closely.

"I tell you what, I can arrange for you to have time in the flight simulator after orientation. If we feel you would be an asset, we can add you to the strike team," He said, nodding along to his words. I understood that they might need backup, and if push came to shove, I could maneuver faster than any pilot back on Mandalore. I never lost a race, nor did I ever lose a bet.

"Okay."

I could tell I was blushing from the extra attention I was receiving. I wasn't so sure what about me was so enticing that I deserved it.

"I have to go now to pick up the other recruits from a drop station. I leave you in the capable hands of PX-74," He said, returning to his speeder and letting us be lead off into the base.

"There are only so many open bunks left. Two of you will share one, and the other two will be placed with bunk mates." The metalized voice of the PX unit was strong in our ears, and we all followed after him as we ventured into the long hallway at the end of the cargo port.

The droid stopped at a door about midway through the hall and opened it using the side panel on the wall, revealing a young man that seemed almost younger than me even.

"One of you will be staying here. Which will it be?" The droid asked, turning towards our small group.

"I'll take this one," Shyloh said, stepping forward into the bunk to meet his new roomate.

The boy looked a bit frightened at first, but because of Shyloh's powerful yet calming energy, he seemed to relax almost immediately.

He turned and smiled back at us, waving before the IG unit closed the door and kept us going.

He walked us down passed several more doors, maybe more than twenty, before he stopped at another one and opened it up.

Inside sat a young woman, her legs crossed as she sharpened a knife with a smirk on her face. She looked up and made eye contact with me first.

"I wondered how long it would be before they got someone else in here." Her voice was somewhat low and raspy, but it was kind of soothing in a way.

"One of you-" the IG unit began again, but I stopped him, stepping into the bunk with the girl inside.

"I'll take this one." I smiled at the two boys left before the door closed on my new bunk.

I moved to set my knapsack down on the bottom bunk, but my roomate stopped me.

"Bottom one's mine." She said, looking up from her sharpened knife again to inform me of the sleeping arrangements.

I instead threw my knapsack on the top bunk, trying to climb up into it, but failing miserably.

"You need a hand?" She chuckled, watching my lame attempts to swing my leg up high enough. The fact that there was no ladder should have tipped me off.

"I'll be okay, thanks," I laughed, keeping my attitude loose and positive, though this bunk bed was already causing unnecessary problems for me.

"If you say so," She chuckled again, seeing as I finally managed to haul myself up and onto the bed.

"First try," I joked, and she laughed like it was the funniest thing in the world. I think that we would be getting along, because no one ever laughed at my lame sense of humor.

I laid back, resting my arms behind my head and staring blankly at the ceiling.

"So, where are you from?" She piped up, not taking her eyes away from her previous knife. That thing must mean a lot to her.

"Mandalore," I let out, trying to get comfortable on this lumpy pad that was under my head.

"Actually?" She seemed surprised. Everyone had heard of the planet that the mandalorian tribes had resided upon, and usually they understood what kind of people the place would breed.

"Yeah. Left just in time. Tomorrow's my birthday," I shut my eyes continuing our converastion with one less sense. It didn't matter, though. I was still fully awake.

"What would you have had to do?" She pondered curiously, finally looking up towards the bunk in interest.

"Well, to put it short... tomorrow I would have had to swear my freedom away. No living being would ever be able to see my face again till the day I died," I laid it out plain and simple, and she seemed to understand.

"How old are you?" She asked, her trail of questions getting longer and longer.

"Sixteen tomorrow," I answered, feeling a bit more tired now that my eyes had been closed, and the lights in the bunk rooms were dim.

"You're just a baby," She scoffed. "How could they possibly expect you to make that choice so young?"

"It's just the way it's always been there. This is the way," I remembered. Those words used to be said to me nearly ten times a day, and now they only rung in my mind as a memory.

"That's insane. The people on your planet must be crazy to take an oath like that," She muttered.

"You would think so... the strangest part about it is that there are kids brought back as foundlings that take the creed without hesitation. They don't even belong to a bloodline, they just feel as though they have right to the creed as much as anyone else," I silently remembered Din for a moment. He was the bravest, strongest, most loyal Mandalorian I'd ever known. A foundling.

I began to get bitter at the thought of leaving him. He could have made things better for me if I had just given him a chance. I had to let my head get in the way. I needed to think about something else.

"What about you, huh? Where you from?" I asked, changing the subject as quickly and painlessly as possible.

"Alderaan. Born and raised," She said, getting up from the floor and dropping herself on the bottom bunk.

"You been a lot of places since then?" I asked, but she first let out a heavy sigh before speaking.

"Only too many to count," She said, settling herself on the bunk like I had done.

"Must be nice..." I muttered. Finally able to relax on this pathetic excuse for a bed pad. Of course I couldn't complain. I'm the one who chose the life of the rebellion, including their miserable bedding. "I've never been anywhere outside my home planet until now. I haven't even seen the entirety of my own planet."

"Most new comers are the same. They haven't been anywhere else, then they come here and its like we're moving non stop. Base to base, on just about every planet in this galaxy," She reassured. At least now I didn't feel so out of place.

"How long have you been stationed here?" I asked, unsure of how long I would get to adjust to things.

"A few months. It's likely we'll have to leave soon. There's rumors of the imperials knowing our location," She answered, rolling her eyes, thought I couldn't see from the top bunk.

"You're kidding," I scoffed. After just getting here, I might have to up and leave again. I'll have to learn to accept this new life, it's what I wanted.

"I wish I was, kid," She added.

"I have a name," I retorted back, not a fan of the nickname 'kid'. I waited for her to ask me what it was, but when she stayed silent I sighed. "It's Y/n."

"I'll call you what you are... now get some rest, they'll come pounding on that door in a few hours for orientation," She said, as though she somehow had grown to a habit of mothering me only five minutes after we met. I dropped the conversation and drifted off to sleep, my eyes were too heavy to keep open anymore anyway.

.

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Tags open

A/n: okay so like i wrote this a while before everything with gina carano happened and i do not in any way condone her whatsoever so let's pretend she's been recast already...

[tiredspacedragon]

BIONICLE Retrospective

2002: The Bohrok Swarms

Part 1.2: To Trap a Tahnok

The biggest problem with 2002 as a story year is that it is extremely repetitive. There's a fair amount of media to cover, but a great deal of it is going to be an utter slog to get through, because it's just telling the exact same story as everything else. So when something like this comic comes along, with its own unique story, it is a breath of fresh air.

I really like this comic. Which surprised me, because I didn't really pay much mind to it before. I knew I liked it well enough, but I didn't realize just how much I liked it until rereading it just now. The plainly stated time skip right at the start already makes me quite happy, and it just keeps going up from there.

Plotwise, it is admittedly nothing special. Gali and Pohatu execute a plan to trap a group of Tahnok (notably more than a single squad of 8, which is disappointingly inconsistent) and take their Krana, and that's pretty much it. Well, at least the title is accurate.

But I'm not really expecting any great showing in the plot department from a single comic, that's more something to be spread out across multiple issues. What I do expect to see, and where this comic shines, is in its character work. We get a couple snippets from the Bohrok's perspective, showing their nature as nigh-unstoppable drones, and even a small section from the Bahrag, giving us our first hint that there is a greater will behind the swarms.

The Toa have a good showing too, giving us more of that delightful teamwork that I love love love to see. I hadn't really noticed before, but all of the Toa put in an appearance in this issue, however brief. Gali and Pohatu are the main focus, an unusual duo that we rarely get to see working together, so points for that. Onua shows up for the one panel above, only mentioned in passing, but confirming his involvement with the plan and further showing how skilled the Toa have become in coordinating their efforts, which is cemented by Kopaka also being involved, and his later appearance when he relays his findings on the nature of the Krana to Tahu.

Speaking of Tahu, while he is not really the focus of this issue, I find him to be the most fascinating part of it. He's living up to his 2001 characterization, now taken a step further. He's once again giving a rousing speech, but to the Ta-Matoran this time, in which he declares them as mighty as any Toa because of the strength and courage in their hearts, which is just...yeeeeessss. Original-characterization Tahu continues to rule. Rousing speeches over temper tantrums any day, and it's clear he's come to value the Matoran more since his days of overlooking them to the point of mild disdain (though that was something that was added retroactively by Tale of the Toa, so ehhh...) Plus it's nice to see him and Kopaka getting along. Kopaka even calls him "my friend," and that's just warm and good and I love it.

Moving on, Tahu is also on the cover, having seemingly been cornered by a squad of Tahnok and having his mask replaced by a Krana Xa. This scene is never described in any canon material, but it is referred to briefly in 2003, making its depiction here, and in various commercials, and the panel below showing a Lehvak Va carrying Tahu's Hau officially canon, to some degree anyway. I do wish we had actually gotten to see this event in detail, but I appreciate that even though we never did, we do at least know that it happened.

On a side note, going forward, the Krana Xa will appear on quite a few Matoran faces, which has always bothered the heck out of me, because the lore suggests that each Bohrok Swarm has only one Xa as the swarm commander, so logically, that commander should only eject its Krana as either a last resort, or to take control of an obstacle it deems a more suitable commander for the swarm. Unlike pretty much every other instance we see of an ejected Xa, this one actually makes sense. Toa Tahu, Master of Fire, would of course make a far better swarm commander for the Tahnok than any Bohrok, so it's clear to see why they'd try to stick a Xa on his face. Certainly far more than the two Lehvak Xa we will later see on Le-Matoran...

On the topic of Lehvak Krana, though, this issue of course ends with our first look a Krana'd Lewa. Nothing happens with him in this issue, but this is part of why the little nod to time passing is so important. We don't know how long Lewa was in that Rama hive wearing his Infected Kanohi, but given his brief moment of clarity, the fact that he'd already finished collecting all his Kanohi by that point, and that the event didn't seem to leave any lasting effects on him, I think it's pretty safe to assume it wasn't that long. Here, though, we can definitively say that Lewa has been wearing this Krana for at least a week. No wonder the scars it leaves will run so much deeper.

I don't know if I'll be able to keep blasting through these, so further updates to the retrospective may be more spaced out, but it feels good to get back to it. I had let it sit for too long, and even just doing a little feels good. Can't have anyone thinking I'm just blowing hot air when I talk about continuing it. But yeah, don't expect them to come rapid fire.

Although I've already done two comics in one day, so who the heck knows. Just don't expect consistency, let's go with that :P

Next up: Into the Nest