#also i am now completely convinced tongue was involved

[ingravinoveritas]

We finally got a comment from David about what it was like kissing Michael and it's the headline in this Guardian article. I need 5 to 7 business days to process this...

[lady-o-ren]

Just Between Lovers

Ao3 Link (Here)

There's going to be callbacks to earlier chapters (and a reference to the show Coupling that involves the number 3 that I couldn't shake). That's on purpose and not me being a super lazy writer. Although I am very forgetful 😅 Also the way this chapter begins is the way I first imagined this story and what made me want to write it.

And thank you to all you loyal readers and cheerleaders! I couldn't have done this without all of your immense support!

But please forgive for any mistakes and typos too. Google docs double saved some lines and I'm not entirely sure I spotted them all.

//

Chapter Eight

 My hands were shaking violently as I struggled to undress, desperate to get into the bath and burn the cold from my flesh and bones and drown out the world around me.

 But I was reluctant to bare myself completely for I wasn't entirely alone.

 Frank was watching me from the edge of the bathtub with unwavering, almost frightful attention, trying to figure out if I was in my right mind or not through the clouds of steam.  

 He thought I'd been attacked when I came staggering through the door home, seeing me mad-eyed and drenched to the bone with a red scrape down one side of my cheek and a fat lump above my brow.

 He had flown to my side, hands groping all over me without a care for gentleness, demanding what the hell had happened.

 My mouth had parted breathlessly as if I'd been slammed mercilessly in the gut before I finally gasped out a terrible sob realizing Frank wasn't some figment of my imagination. That he was as real as me. Which meant everything before had to have been a dream.

 Another stupid dream.

 "I can handle the rest from here," I assured Frank, crossing my arms awkwardly over my chest, as I shivered down to my toes. "Go on to bed. I'll - I'll be there shortly. "

 Frank made a dismissive sound as he gathered my clothes from off the floor, soaked with rainwater that pooled around my bare feet, and tossed them into the hamper.

 "I can't leave you alone, not with a bump that big. What if you have a concussion?"

 I went to check the water filling up the bathtub, trying to hold myself together and not fall apart in front of him again.

 "I don't have a concussion, Frank," I said, despite feeling every symptom cut me raw and to the bone. But I didn't have the strength to worry nor did I care. " I just took a bad fall. My own fault for running without paying attention."

 "Claire . . ." Frank came up behind me and laid a hand on my back that had me flinching away.  

 "I'm sorry," I apologized, and reluctantly turned to face him, unable to explain how his touch now felt like a strangers to me.

  How he wasn't the one I was dying inside for.

 Frank just shook his head but I could see how much my reaction troubled him by the tightening of his jaw that deepened the prominent lines around his mouth.

 "Don't be, Darling. I'm the one pestering you while you're shaking like a leaf. Go on and take a long hot soak while I make you a cup of tea and get something for that poor head of yours too. How does that sound?"

 I didn't want anything but I nodded anyway.

 "That sounds perfect," I said, giving Frank the most miserable attempt at a smile I could muster and pressed my palm to his smooth cheek.

 His face softened ever so slightly at the gesture and he kissed my hand with warm affection before closing the door behind him.

 Left alone, I finally broke down and collapsed against the side of the porcelain tub. My stifled cries slashed my throat raw and to the point I could barely breathe, trying to convince myself that he . . . he . . .

 My heart stopped dead, lifeless in my chest.

 I couldn't remember his name.

 Why couldn't I remember his name!

 It was there burning the tip of my tongue and I ached to speak it again.

 But the harder I tried to remember - tried to summon every detail of his face, the sound of his laugh - his joy - the way he made me feel when his heart spoke to mine - the faster he began to painfully slip away from mind and heart until all I had was a vague impression that there was something I'd forgotten.

 Something very precious . . .

 //

   Days passed by in a blur after that where I drifted from one moment to the next, not taking much notice of anything or anyone unless forced to, as I was overcome with a strange sense of loss and longing that I couldn't make sense of.

 Frank spent the rest of his time off watching over me with the patience of a much aggrieved saint, but did so at arms length. Afraid that he'd trigger me to tears or a splitting migraine which I was prone to now ever since that night I blacked out in the rain which only worried him more.

  Today, however, I guess he'd had enough.

 I was in the kitchen sitting by the window, wondering why my bowl of cereal was giving me a sharp stab of deja vu as I spooned it to glue, when I heard Frank's voice suddenly beside me.  

 "What were you saying?" I asked, glancing up at him apologetically.

 Frank sighed irritably (he must've called my name more than once) and took the seat opposite me.

 "I said that I'm taking an extended leave from work. I was already thinking about moving here anyway and I think now is as good a time as any to get things sorted between us before I hand in my notice."

 My spoon hit the side of the bowl with a hard clink as I stared at him, completely taken aback.

 "You mean to live here? With me?"

 "Maybe someplace larger, but yes," he said with some amusement as he pushed the bowl aside to grasp my hands. "I wanted to talk to you about it earlier but then you had that 'fall' of yours -" he eyed me speculatively, but continued on. "So I thought it better to wait. But that's been our problem hasn't it? We've been locked in this ridiculous stalemate waiting for the other to see reason and have only succeeded in driving each other further away. So if I'm the one that has to make the sacrifice and move then so be it. I miss you too much to keep away."

 If Frank was meaning to be romantic he was failing.

 "A sacrifice?" I repeated , jerking my hands from his. "You say it as if I'm the one who's been the problem."

 His eyes narrowed with surprising coldness at me.

  "You're the one that moved away, Claire. Not me."

 "For an opportunity that you agreed to! You promised that we could make it work but you've barely kept your end of it. I'm the one having to come to you more often than not."

 "And I'm keeping my promise now by giving you exactly what you've been wanting," he said with growing frustration.

 "And you? What do you want?"

 "Isn't that obvious? I'm moving here aren't I?"

 "Which you see as a sacrifice!"

 Frank groaned and leaned back into his chair, pinching the space between his eyes

 "You sound like a child, you know that? Arguing in circles and trying to pick a fight with me. "

 "What the hell does that mean?" I demanded.

 "You tell me." An angry flush crawled up Frank's throat and   darkened his eyes that glared at me. "You walk around here day after day as if your heart's been ripped out from your chest. I don't know if it's because you've lost a patient or - or -"

 I didn't justify filling in the accusatory blank for him and pushed myself away from the table.

 "I've been like this for months, Frank, and you're only just now bothering to give a damn about me?"

 "I could say the same about you," he shot back, and I felt something akin to a roar rip out of me that started a brutal back and forth over who was at fault for bringing misery to our relationship.

 Then there was a lull in our shouting and I found myself standing and grasping the kitchen counter for support, exhausted by the very idea of us.

 "I think you should go, Frank. Back to Oxfordshire before we hurt each other anymore."

 Frank looked at me with genuine alarm and grasped me by the arms. "You don't mean that, Claire."

 "I do," I said brokenly, and pushed his hands away. "And I'm sorry but . . ." I swallowed hard. "I can't do this anymore. All this heartbreak . . . it's killing me." It wasn't just him I was referring to. There was something wrong with me that had nothing to do with our relationship. " I just don't have anything left to give you anymore."

  "Claire . . ." He reached for me once more, his heart breaking before my eyes. But I took a step back.

 "Please, Frank." My throat tightened and my eyes began to burn. "Just go."

 After a long moment's pause, Frank reluctantly retreated to the bedroom to gather his things. But before he left, he pressed his hand to my shoulder and murmured something softly against my cheek that he sealed with a kiss goodbye.

 Maybe he had said I love you.

  I would never know.

 All I heard was a loving whisper by my ear that had me in tears.

 "It's not a sacrifice to be wi' ye."  

 //

   Frank of course didn't completely abandon me. He wasn't that much of a bastard.

 He was always calling me, wanting to know if I was eating and sleeping right, that I wasn't working myself to the bone (as I was prone to do in his opinion), and showering me with more attention now that we were on a break than he ever did when we were together which made me angrier than I was before.

 Geilie indulged me the best way she knew how.

 By celebrating as if I'd just been released from a twenty year prison sentence.

 We spent our days eating delicious trashy food and spending money on worthless trivial things and in-between she was my shoulder to cry on thinking my tears were for Frank. They were, but not entirely. What I truly grieved for still remained a mystery to me though I felt its presence in the painful, gaping hole that had formed in my heart and mind, pleading desperately for me to remember.

 I felt my chest throb just thinking about it as Geilie dragged me through the streets of Edinburgh like a mouse hunting for cheese.

 "Where are we going now, Geilie?" I asked her for the hundredth time.

  "Look ahead," she gestured with a cock of her head to where the last burst of sunlight caught on the lettering of a sign hanging above us.

       ~  T H E   W O R L D' S   E N D  ~  

   This was the pub that Frank, Geilie and I had been banned from after they both got nearly every person in the establishment into a glass and bone-breaking brawl.

 Frank ended up with a split lip, bruised rib and a puffy nose that I had to stuff with a tampon while Geilie nearly landed herself in jail and had never been more pissed when she was let go with only a stern warning.

 "We're not allowed in there, you know that," I said, but my friend tugged me in anyway.

 "Aye, but I sweet talked the owner last night. In bed. Would ye believe me if I said he had  three   fecking . . ."

 Once we were seated inside (and while Geilie entertained me about tripods over our free drinks) my eyes wandered around the pub that had been around before the days of Culloden, passing over one face to the next out of simple curiosity until one stranger in particular stole my breath away.

 He sat at the other end of the pub, broad-shouldered and straight backed, his face turned from mine, with vibrant red curls that I had only ever seen in the twilight hours of my bed, writhing in my sleep.

 "He's a big laddie that one," admired Geilie, following my line of sight. She drummed her fingers against her cheek nestled in her palm. "And redheided too," she winked.

 "I don't know what you mean," I lied and took a long drink from the cold pint between my hands.

 "Liar, liar, face on fire," Geilie cackled, kicking me teasingly under the table. "But ye're lucky the color suits ye, brings out that queenly gold in yer eyes, cause the laddie buck is coming this way and Christ, is he gorgeous. Definitely packing three big, bonnie -"

 I moved to clamp my hand over my friend's giggly, pervy mouth and she nearly fell out of her chair dodging me.

 "One of these days, Geilie!" I threatened even as I laughed.

 "Aye, aye, to the moon, I ken," Geilie said once she got herself upright and lifted her chin as an offering, laughing along with me until someone cleared their throat.

  I turned to a sight that made my heart take a soaring, joyful leap.

 The spirited blue of his eyes. The bold lines of his face. That sensitive, tender mouth. All familiar to me somehow!

 I think I even knew his -

 "Och, I'm sorry for interrupting," said the redheaded stranger looking shy. "But I saw ye there - I mean here. Sitting. And I thought - weel, ye looked just like -"

 "Jamie! You're Jamie aren't you?"

 I blurted, not knowing how I knew his name but felt like it had been secreted away somewhere inside me for this moment here and now to finally speak.

 "You remembered me?" He breathed with awestruck relief and passed a hand through his lovely curls setting them astray.

 "I didn't think ye would what wi' the blood and all and it being months ago now and wi' the punching and the kicking and -" He stopped himself from blabbering on with a shrug and bashful grin and for a moment we just stared at each other, lost in the others eyes.

 "So ye two ken each other?" Geilie was observing us with keen, curious eyes, glowing with something indistinct that surely must've belonged to that great, great grand witch she descended from.

 "Yes - I mean no. I mean -"

 Geilie took pity on me and directed her witching eyes on Jamie, his gaze having never wavered from me.

 "Why don't ye put yer tongue back in yer mouth foxcub and tell me how ye met my best lass?"

 Jamie sweetly blushed right to the tips of his ears peeking out from his thick mane of curls then pulled a chair from another table, hesitating for the slightest moment for permission, before moving it beside mine to tell the tale of how we came to know each other.  

 //  

 As it turned out I had met Jamie during the brawl at the pub nearly a year ago.

 I had been trying to get to my two idiots trapped in the middle of the rowdy crowd when some drunken sot staggered into me and knocked me down to the sticky floor. Before I could be trampled on however, a pair of strong hands had lifted me up from behind and pulled me away from the fray safely to the back where the exit door led to the alley outside.

 "Are ye a'right, lass?" Asked my rescuer, as he gently eased the curls from off my face to see if I were hurt. Just as I was about to answer, I glanced up and gasped at the sight of his face.

 Though the light was dim and threatened to go black with every flicker that somehow still attracted a ring of moths above us, I could see that the stranger had already experienced his bloody share of the fight. He had a spectacular knot on his brow the size of a small plum with a gash that cut across it and bruising that reached down to his eye, swollen shut.

 "I should be asking you that! What the hell happened?" I of course knew what happened, and carefully held his bloodied face between my two hands. The physician in me already claiming the poor lad mine to care for.

 "A bottle of Glenfiddich," he winced, skin hot to the touch, as I traced his injured features with my fingertips, feeling for bumps and breaks, right down to his chest where his shirt was spotted with blood and soaked with whisky. A damn waste of a cute Flaming Lips shirt.

 "The wee shiteheid who threw it got it twice as bad though. I think he's still flopping like a guppy on the floor somewhere."

 Seeing as he towered over me and was built like goddamn Thor, I bet the unfortunate fellow was halfway on his journey between heaven and hell and could only hope that it hadn't been Frank.

 "But dinna fash over me, lass. My heid is harder than a rock -" Which he tapped with his knuckles. " - and this lot is nothing compared to the wee savages I teach," he assured me before glancing warily over his shoulder.

 "You're going back in there aren't you?"

 He laid a big hand over mine stilled at his chest. "I'm afraid I have to."

 I yanked myself from his grasp with a sudden blood thirsty urge to punch this idiot on the nose.

 "You're all the same aren't you?! Bloody stupid men always needing to cockoff to a fight!" I shouted, fists clenched, thinking of Frank and his fucking pride.

 The lad's one good eye, a beautiful piercing blue, glimmered with humor that sparked a terrible thunder in me somewhere between rage and passion that had me shaking.

 "Any other day lass I'd like to argue wi' ye, ye look the type partial to a good bite," he smiled cheekily, making my heart's blood spike. "But I'm going back into that shitehole to get the Englishman before he's torn apart. He's yers isn't he?"

 My mouth parted wordlessly as I nodded, embarrassment coloring me ugly.

 "And I'm sure ye want him in one piece too if only to kill him yerself, am I right?" I nodded again. "So ye best meet us up front. But if ye dinna see me just holler for Jamie and I'll find ye, Sassenach. I promise ye."

 He then reached for me as if to caress my cheek but pulled back with regret plainly etched on his face, apparent even with the swelling. And I strangely felt something much the same as he left me with the warm whisper of his touch and the heady scent of whisky but most alluringly of balsam trees.  

 //

   "And then?" Geilie implored, looking excitedly between Jamie and I, likely imagining some great steamy love affair that I somehow kept from her.

 Jamie cast a sympathetic eye towards me knowing it hadn't been anything of the sort, having witnessed the fight that had erupted between Frank and I the second he was delivered to me, and left before I was able to thank him properly.

 "I brought back her man like I promised then went to see how my own lads had fared. And seeing as no one needed stitches we helped clean up the place a bit and earned ourselves a free pint after," he answered.

 "Aren't ye a boy scout," quipped Geilie, deflated with disappointment. "And you -" she bopped her chin at me." Why didn't ye tell me any of this?"

 I shrugged helplessly, having barely remembered much until that moment.

 "None of us were at our best that night, you know that especially -" my tongue stumbled on Frank's name and I hurried past it with a shake of my head. "So I tried my best to forget about it all."

  And so went my battered faced rescuer who became just another casualty of the night.

  Except now I was starting to realize with heart pounding clarity that I hadn't forgotten him at all. That Jamie was the one I had been dreaming about all this time.

 And somehow Geilie knew it too.

  "Oh, I think ye remembered plenty, lass," she smirked, and gave Jamie a wink. I groaned inwardly and kicked her under the table hoping violence would stop her from opening her big fat mouth.  

 But who was I kidding?

 The woman was the daughter of Lucifer and she kicked me right back.

 "I'm missing something aye?" Jamie tilted his head and lifted a ruddy brow at us.

 "No!"  

 "Yes!" Geilie grinned evilly. "This is kismet. Meant to be shite. Ye ken that right? I could puke my guts out right here on the both of ye but I think I'll go and talk up the bartender and leave ye two to talk."

 She was already on her feet when I tugged on her wrist.

 "Geilie, you can't -"

  She leaned down for only me to hear.

 "Forget about the professor, Claire. There's nothing for ye there. But this - Him -" she whispered with gentle encouragement before she pinched my side. "Ye're meant to fuck this bastard filthy."

 And off she went with a skip in her heels to the bar leaving me alone with a man I knew better naked than clothed.

 "What my friend said -" I began to say, smoothing my hair from my face.

 "About kismet and all that?" Jamie asked, tinged just as pink. "I have to admit when I saw ye here I thought the verra same and risked looking like a fool just to talk to ye, to see if maybe ye remembered me too."

 I glanced down to my fingers testing together in my lap.

 "I wouldn't think I was memorable enough to recall."

 He made a gruff sound that made me lift my eyes to his, looking at me as if I were mad.

 "How can ye say such a thing, mo nighean donn? You were so fierce and lovely that night. I haven't been able to forget how yer eyes burned like molten gold, the great thunderstorm of yer curls -" His big hands made a motion like an explosion that I wasn't sure I appreciated yet there was nothing but unbridled admiration beaming from his gaze, making my stomach flip.

  "Ye even had me wondering if ye gave yer man a black eye -" He paused, mouth twitching at the corner. "Did ye?"

 I fought back a grin and did a horrible job of it.

 "Very nearly. And you're terrible for asking." I shoved him playfully, making him laugh. A deep, hearty sound that sweetened his features. "But go on."

 He rubbed his shoulder in mock offense, continuing.

 "Aye, weel, it was only after that I realized I never asked for yer name and not a day passed that I didn't regret it. Until now that is - unless ye think me a fool and tell me to sod off, " he added jokingly, yet there was a hint of genuine worry in his tone that I would do just that.

 Instead, I brought my hand between us.

 "Claire Beauchamp," I smiled. "And no, I don't think you're a fool, Jamie -"

 "Fraser," he smiled back, looking at me as if he'd won some grand prize, and took my hand in his where a shockwave passed from his skin to mine, imparting a jumble of images through my mind of him, us, together, that went beyond any dream of ecstasy.

 It felt like a promise of a future yet to come.

 It should have sent me running, thinking myself mad just like I had that rainy day. Instead, for the first time in a month, I felt at peace.

 Like something infinite had finally clicked into place.

 "Did you feel that?" I breathed, feeling my body pulse with excitement.

 Jamie squeezed my hand, chest swelling beneath his shirt as if his own heart was fit to burst.

 "I felt it the very first time ye touched me, Claire."

 Just then my phone began buzzing where it laid on the table, making us both jump.

 "I'm sorry," I said , sounding flustered, and reluctantly reached for my phone where someone was calling me with the annoying persistence of a horsefly that needed to be swatted.

 Looking at the screen I saw it was Frank and felt an immediate twinge of guilt. There he was trying to get a hold of me, desperate to fix things between us, to prove himself to me. I had craved this type of attention from him before but now . . .

 I glanced back at Jamie. His eyes were on the screen, brows narrowed with recognition. I flipped it facedown.

 "We're not - We haven't been -"

 A small sad smile crossed his face, eyes filled with gentle understanding and the gray gloom of disappointment, as he asked me the only question that mattered.

 "Do ye want me to go?"

  "No," I breathed.

 His throat bobbed.

 "Want to talk about it - Him?"

 Jamie cocked his chin at my phone and I shook my head.

 "No."

 His ribs then expanded with eager breath and his fingers splayed on the table double tapped.

 "Weel then . . ." Jamie said, with a look of bright hope that mirrored my own as the tips of my fingers grazed his.

 "Well then . . ."

//

A/N: I have a long ass note on the ao3 link if you want a little insight into this chapter. Thank you again for reading!

[capricorn-0mnikorn]

I’m mentally stuck in a Story I want to write. So instead of writing it, I’m going to Describe it, in the hopes of getting Unstuck.

Inspiration: Being told -- and initially agreeing (!) -- that “C.P. Doesn’t Belong in Fairy Tales.” I am now determined to write a “Fairy Tale” with a protagonist (or strong second character, depending on how I  sort out the primary P.O.V.) that explicitly has Cerebral Palsy [though making it explicit by describing the character in a fairy tale-like idiom, rather than using medical terminology].

The inspirational ‘seed image’ that popped into my head was of my character riding on the back of a large enchanted animal -- or human enchanted into the form of an animal (For example, see: the girl riding on the back of a great white bear in “East of the Sun, West of the Moon”). That way, people are more likely to give her respect when she speaks, even though her speech is labored, and the enchanted animal-shaped (I’m thinking a black wolf) person (prince, it’s a prince) is less likely to get chased by hunters with a young woman riding its back.

She’s a “Wish-born child,” (See: the Grimm Brothers tales “Thumb-thick,” and “Hans my Hedgehog”) born as the second, smaller twin, to an elderly, previously childless couple, when the old woman casually, absent-mindedly wishes she had children to help with her daily chores, while unknowingly sipping water from a magic spring.

Her elder sister grows into a nimble and loquacious child that charms everyone in the village, while she never develops the ability to walk, but pulls herself along by her elbows, as she crawls on the ground. And her “tongue is slow in her mouth.” But her parents still love her, despite not being able to understand her properly, all the time, and her father builds her a wheeled, flat, cart she can pull herself around on.

Both sisters, thanks to the magic water her mother drank while wishing them into existence, have the ability to understand the voices of animals and the wind. But the younger, disabled, twin is the only one to develop that skill, because the villagers treat her warily, and are reluctant to speak with her, so she speaks with the animals instead (Her sister is too engaged with her fellow humans to notice her innate ability, so she never develops it.

The older twin, as she grows, is able to help her mother with the physical chores, while the younger twin watches over the chickens and goats in the yard. Her parents don’t understand it, but as long as the younger twin is watching over the chickens, they no longer have to worry about the foxes getting them, and, as she wheels about on her cart, she’s able to find the eggs that the hens sometimes lay under the bushes and shrubbery, instead of the nest boxes built for them, and she also has an uncanny ability to predict the weather.

So both daughters are able to help the old couple around the house, and the old woman’s wish is fulfilled.

Then, one stormy winter night, an large black wolf comes to the door, and begs mercy and shelter from the storm. The younger twin understands what he is saying and convinces her family that it is safe.

Then, during the night, the Prince-in-Wolf-shape asks the younger twin to go on a quest with him, promising that her family will prosper if she does, and she agrees (again, see: “East of the Sun, West of the Moon”).

Now, this is the bit where my story gets tangled, and I get stuck.

Because the Prince’s quest is a whole complete story on its own -- he’s trying to rescue his sister (who is also a wish-born child -- or wish-bent child), from the jealous court wizard, who’s magically whisked her away. But the prince’s story is longer and more involved than the girl’s (it splices together motifs from “Sleeping Beauty,” “The Water of Life,” and a gender swapped “The Seven Ravens”), and I don’t know how to balance the two stories so they splice together well.

I can tell a complete story that starts with the old woman wishing for children, and ends when she realizes that her wish has been fulfilled.

I can tell another, almost complete, story that starts with the disabled girl going off on a quest with the wolf and ends with the rescue of his sister, but without the story of her life before the quest begins (and why she agrees to go off with the wolf), it’s empty representation, ‘cause it would skip over the “escaping the ableism of her community” motivation for everything she does, and make her agreement to go with him more passive than it really is.

And the Prince’s story is incomplete -- it stops dead 3/4 through -- until he meets the disabled twin.

So I can’t tell a  balanced “Story sandwich,” either.

And I’ve puzzled and puzzled till my puzzler is sore.

So I thought I’d commit this much to writing, to keep myself at least somewhat accountable to this idea.

(Oh, and the magic sleep the princess is under represents an acquired disability someone recovers from, the transformation into a wolf represents an acquired disability someone does not recover from -- no, the prince does not get transformed back -- but the only thing magic about the disabled twin is that her mother wished her into being, and she can talk to animals and the wind. Her actual disability is just ordinary, non-magical, every day cerebral palsy)

[sinnersandsaints-linwrites]

So what if the ROs were having a rough day and ended up saying something really hurtful to mc without meaning it. What would be their reactions to an MC bursting into tears and leaving the room after that? (Sorry, I love angst 😞)

it's already 2022 here so let's start it with a bang, why don't we. TW for very heavy self-hatred, dark thoughts in general

Sage immediately freezes in place, realising what they've done. Since the beginning, they knew sooner or later they'd hit where it hurts -- whether it would be intentional or not. Lashing out was something they did mindlessly, and now you ended up as a victim of it, and they hate that it makes them sick to their stomach.

They press their lips into a thin line, as their fingers grip their cane even tighter. You'd come back -- they thought, you always did -- as if the pain they caused you was a fix that you needed to survive. And if you didn't -- well, it was for the best anyway.

(if you're also involved with Ariel) Ariel sighs, loudly, and gives Sage a meaningful look. A 'I know what you're thinking and you're wrong' kind of look, that makes Sage shift uneasily in their place. Phares motions for them to follow, as they themself venture to find you. Someone has to be an adult here.

.

Morgan curses under their breath, staring after you, horrified. They did not mean to hurt you, never you -- you didn't deserve to be treated like a punching bag for them just because they had a rough day. They can't help but think maybe it is for the best if they've successfully driven you away -- it will spare you both grief in the long run.

They stretch out the sleeves of their hoodie, nervously pulling at loose threads. It is for the best, they told themself. They could never give you what you deserved, anyway.

(if you're also involved with Khari) Khari shoots Morgan a scolding glare, but their expression softens as soon as they realise what's going through Amuart's head. They sigh, and pull them closer by their hoodie, and march to find you.

.

Roan's mouth opens and closes in wordless apologies, as they realise -- terrified -- what they've just said. "[Name]-- My moon please--" they plead, reaching out to you as you leave, but they don't dare to follow you. You needed space, and to be away from them, they understand. However, it doesn't make the hurt in their chest go away. It only makes it worse, as it gnaws at their conscience.

A sob escapes them, as tears roll down their face. They wanted to give you the world, but all they managed to do was fail you in every way. It makes their soul rip into pieces, and they feel like they could never get close to piecing it back together.

.

As soon as the words leave Khari's mouth -- they regret it. Shit, they curse in their mind, fighting the instinct to make a step towards you as they see the tears well in your eyes. It wasn't anything new of them to be rude or hurtful, but this time it was different. This time they actually hurt you, their partner, someone they vowed to protect. Their fists open and clench again, as they stare after you, still with a clouded and angry expression.

They are angry with themself, not you. They should've been able to hold their tongue, to take a deep breath and think before they spoke. They fucked up, and could only blame themselves.

(if you're also involved with Morgan) Morgan gets their attention by quite literally waving in their face. It takes a bit of back and forth between the two, before Amuart finally convinces Khari that you don't completely hate them, and this can be fixed with apologies.

.

Ariel knows they crossed the line even before they see your face. "[Name] I am sorry--" they start, but your swift exit robs them of the opportunity to apologise. Their fists clench, and they wish they had something to destroy nearby. A pillar, a monster, a mirror, anything to take their mind off of the immense pain and guilt they felt right now. They couldn't even blame you if that was what would drive you away for good. And isn't it something that they wanted all along?

Oh, how they wish they've listened to their siblings and abandoned all ideas about love. Maybe it simply wasn't meant for them -- maybe they weren't capable of having it, and not destroying the person they shared it with?

(if you're also involved with Sage) Sage shakes their head in a mixture of disappointment and understanding at the same time. They know a thing or two about driving others away, and now they offer Ariel a comforting squeeze on the arm. "Do try and fix this, dear," they sigh, "I'd hate to have to choose between you two. I might set something on fire under such stress."

.

As soon as Riven notices your tears, they realise what they've said and curse loudly. "Shit, no, no, no, [Name]!" Their voice rises in panic, as they attempt to follow you, only giving up after a couple of steps. A pain emanates from their chest, and breathing just becomes so much harder than it should be.

Tears shine in their eyes, as they angrily pull at their hair, nearly ripping it out. "Fuck, fuck, fuck!" They cry, choking on the sobs that force their way past their lips. Were they even allowed to cry, since they were the ones to hurt you? Maybe the pain they felt was what they deserved.

.

Sasha's eyes widen, as the realisation sinks in. "Fuck, shit, I didn't-- [Name], fuck, I didn't mean that!" They yell after you, raising their hands in a helpless gesture, as if they were trying to grab you despite the distance. The panic sets in, and they can feel their arms trembling, as thoughts race through their mind.

This is it, they thought. I lost them, I fucked up as always and I lost them, and it's all my fault. Tears stream down their face, as they pull at their hair in frustration. For the first time in a long time, they wish they had no humanity left.

thank you for the ask! <333

[angstysebfan]

The Past Can Break You - 5

Pairing: Bucky x Reader

AU: Avengers

Summary: You and Bucky have been dating for aa few years. As far as you’re concerned he is the one. But what happens when a blast from the actual past shows up?

A/N: Ive seen a lot stories of Bucky getting his first love from the 40′s back. And I’ve always wondered... what would happen if he was dating someone already? Reader is from this time. Not proofread.

Warning: implied smut, angst is back

--

The next 2 weeks were amazing. Bucky really turned everything around and showed you that he was committed to you. It made you feel so much better. While you felt bad that he now completely avoided Dot, because she is still out of place, you didn’t feel that bad because you knew she was bad news. Whenever she saw you and Bucky together she would scoff and glare at you. It made you uncomfortable.

One day the whole Avengers team was called into a meeting to discuss an upcoming mission. Per Steve and Tony, everyone, except you, were needed. You didn’t like the thought of staying behind with Dot in the compound, but you were a team player, and wouldn’t argue. Bucky on the other hand let Steve have it with both barrels.

“Steve you know the situation with Dot. Can’t someone else stay behind?” he said to Steve.

Steve sighed, “Yes, I know this will be difficult, but everyone else is needed for their skill. Y/N’s skills aren’t needed on this mission. She agreed, so why are you fighting me on this?” Steve argued back.

“Of course Y/N won’t fight this, but I am trying to protect her from Dot. You remember how vicious Dot can be, and I don’t want her to upset Y/N when we just started to get back on track,” Bucky said.

“Look Buck, I get it. I do. But this is how it is. The compound is big enough that Y/N won’t need to be anywhere near Dot. By the way, when are you going to tell her that she needs to start looking for employment and another living situation. She makes everyone uncomfortable. Even Tony is starting to get annoyed at all her questions about FRIDAY, and he loves showing people how smart he is,” Steve asked.

“I-I don’t know. I mean I know I have to do it, especially after what she’s pulled, but I still feel bad for her. I mean she didn’t ask for this to happen, and doesn’t deserve to be thrown out on her ass, but I know it’s the right thing to do. I’ll talk to Y/N about it and see if she has any ideas. Maybe if we help setting her up I will feel better about it,” Bucky said.

“Yea, I know. Let me know if you need help. But we gotta get packed and head to the quinjet. And please don’t worry about Y/N. Your girl is strong, and she knows how Dot is. She will be fine. Besides, we are only gone for like 24 hours, what could happen?” Steve asked.

Bucky didn’t respond and watched as Steve walked out of the meeting room. He ran his hands through his hair, what could happen? He hoped nothing, but he didn’t trust Dot. It’s funny the way she is acting now didn’t bother him when he was in the 40s, but now, because of you, he sees that she is not as great as he thought.

Bucky sighs and heads to your shared room to find you packing his bag for him. He smiles as he walks in, “Hey baby,” he says.

You look up at him and give him a bashful smile, “Figured I would help you out,” you said.

Bucky walks up to you and wraps his arms around you, pulling you into his embrace. He looks into your eyes, and all you see is love and admiration in them. He leans in and connects his soft lips with yours. After a moment he deepens the kiss and you feel his tongue on your lower lip. You open you mouth in response, allowing him full access. When the need to breath becomes too great you pull away, panting.

“You’re only going to be gone a day,” you say with a chuckle.

Bucky also laughs, “Will you be ok? Here? With... her?” he asks.

You brush your hand through his soft hair, “Yea. I’ll stay clear of her as much as I can. But I’ll be ok,” you say.

Bucky pecks your lips again. “When I come home, I was wondering if you could help me with something,” he asks.

You look at him with confusion, “Like what?” you ask.

“I think it’s time for Dot to go off on her own, but I don’t want to just kick her out and make her fend for herself. I was thinking you could help me find her a job and a place to live? I would just feel better if I know I wasn’t kicking her out with nowhere to go,” he asks.

You smile and nod, “Sure. I’ll be glad to help. I’ll start while you’re gone,” you say. 

Bucky kisses you one more time, “I’ll be back tomorrow. I love you, Doll,” he says.

“I love you too, Buck.”

--

You have to say you are surprised when you find yourself not running into Dot at all. It’s almost like she doesn’t want to be near you either, which is fine. She has spent most of the last 24 hours in the lab, while you stayed in your room looking up possible jobs and apartment for her. 

You thought it was nice of Bucky to at least help set her up and not throw her to the wolves. It was something you admired about Bucky, his big heart. You both have been texting before the mission, but since then you haven’t heard from him. You hope everything is ok. 

“FRIDAY, any update on the team?” you ask the AI.

“No agent, I’m sorry,” she responds.

You decide to take a nap in hopes that when you wake up your boyfriend will be home. You want your family home safe and sound.

--

You woke up to the sounds of the team in the hallway. You walk out and see Nat and Wanda and hug them hello. You head toward the common room hoping to see the guys, but don’t. You walk back toward the elevator and heard something from Dot’s room.

“Oh Dot, I’ve missed you so much, Doll,” you hear Bucky moan.

You gasp in horror as you continue listening to Dot moan and beg for Bucky to go harder. You can’t help the tears that begin to fall as you hear your boyfriend and his ex having sex.

“So good baby, you’re so good. Taking me so well, you feel amazing. No one is like you, I love you so much,” Bucky moaned.

You’ve heard enough and turn, running back to your shared room. You can’t be near him when he comes in pretending he didn’t just fuck his ex. Your heart is in a million pieces as his voice continues to play in your head. All you hear is her and his moans and his words. He loves her. It will always be her. Maybe you just need to learn to accept that.

--

“Buck, I think you should have told Y/N you got hurt. She is going to be worried about you,” Steve scolded.

“Look, I know my girl. She will be mad at first, but then she will nurse me back to health. I will have to convince her to ride me later, but it will be so worth it,” Bucky says with a smirk as the doctor continues to pull out shards of shrapnel from his side.

“Seriously man? TMI!” Sam complained before leaving Medbay.

Bucky laughed and then hissed as the doctor pulled another shard out. “How much longer? I don’t want Y/N to think I’m dead if she knows we are back,” Bucky asked the doctor.

“One more piece... and....” she pulls the large piece out, “There! Now I will quickly clean and bandage. no stitches cause you will heal fast, but please no sex tonight. You might bleed all over her,” the doctor said with a glare.

Bucky and Steve laugh. “Oh I talked to Y/N about helping me out with Dot and she agreed. I figured it was best to have her involved with that situation from now on,” Bucky says to Steve as the doctor cleans and bandages his side.

“Good idea, less messy that way. I hope everything went well here with the 2 of them,” Steve says.

“I’ll find out,” Bucky says as he puts his shirt on. 

Both men walk to the elevator and head to their floor. They say their goodbyes in the hall as Bucky opens the door to your shared apartment. You aren’t in there, which confuses him, but he figures maybe you went to the kitchen.

When he walks into the bathroom he senses something is wrong. None of your toiletries are there. It was different from when you cleaned, plus his was still there. He walks back out to your room and sees that everything on your nightstand is gone too. Now he starts to panic as he goes to the closet and sees that all your clothes are gone. He tries to not have a panic attack because that will slow him down. He goes to head to the door and sees a piece of paper on the floor:

Bucky,

I guess I’m the stupid one. I’m stupid to think that everything you said to me was true. I was stupid to think that I could compete with your one true love. I was stupid to think that you really loved me. Well I won’t be stupid anymore. No need to lie and say what I heard isn’t true. I hope you and Dot are very happy together in your new apartment, but I’m done. Have a nice life.

Bucky dropped the letter and fell to his knees as tears pool down his cheeks. What the hell happened that you up and left him? You are angry with him, and he doesn’t understand why. He allows himself to cry for a moment before rereading it.

Dot.

--

Chapter 4 / Chapter 6

Oh Dot you dirty bitch! Feedback is appreciated.

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PLEASE LET ME KNOW IF I FORGOT ANYONE!

[azaleavi]

Injury

Requested by anon: Is it okay if I request a smut with Bucky being injured from a mission and reader doesn't wanna have sex with him because she's afraid to hurt him but he convinces her he's okay?

Word count: 2.7k

Warnings: smut 18+, talk about stabbing, language, dirty talk, kissing, oral sex (f receiving), fingering, vaginal sex, unprotected sex, multiple orgasms

Author’s note: Thank you for requesting dear nonnie! I hope you like it! I got a little carried away so I hope you don’t mind.

Feedback is always appreciated and don’t forget to reblog and like if you enjoyed it and want to see more. Thank you!

Masterlist

18+ MINORS DNI

The jet landing on the roof alerted you on you place on your couch. Switching between channels you waited for the team to walk out of the elevator. What you didn't expect was Friday's voice telling you that Bucky got injured and they were taking him to the med bay. Shooting up from your seat you ran to the elevator frantically pressing the buttons as if it could make it come faster. When the door finally opened you stepped inside, pushing the button to the floor where the man you loved was, injured. You didn't know how bad it was, not waiting for Friday to explain.

The doors opened again and you started running. Following the noise you quickly found the team standing outside a door.

"What happened? Is he fine?" you spoke fast, panicking, stopping in front of the door, wanting to go in.

"Hey, it's fine" Steve stepped forward and put his hands on your shoulder to keep you outside the room. "They are treating him so you can't go in." he pulled on your body to get away from the entrance.

"But what happened?" you calmed down a little, but your heart was still beating rapidly, worried for your man.

"He got stabbed in the side." you sucked in a sharp breath. "But he will be fine, the wound is not that deep and the serum will help him heal fast." he spoke calmly. You let out a sigh just as the door opened and the doctor walked out with Bucky right behind him. You were in front of him in a few steps, worry clear in your eyes.

"Shouldn't he be resting?" you turned to the doc. How can he just walk around like this when he was stabbed? Were you the only one worried for his health?

"No, it's only a small wound. He didn't even need stitches." the doctor reassured you.

"You realize I'm right here, right?" he teased you, but the look you gave him shut his mouth.

"Yes and you should to be in bed, resting" you grabbed his hand and started pulling him after you. You had a lot of strength for your small body so you could easily drag him along. And he also let you, but you didn't need to know that. "We are going to your room and you are not leaving that bed until tomorrow, understood?" you pointed at him when you were in the elevator again.

"Yes ma'am" he nodded with a smirk playing on his lips. He had a few ideas how he could spend the rest of the day in bed with you. And it definitely didn't involve resting.

Walking into his room you immediately pushed him onto the bed. He grabbed your waist to pull you into his lap, but you held yourself up by placing your hands on his shoulder.

"No, Bucky, you need to rest and heal" you shook your head.

"I'm not trying to do anything. I just want you close to me" his beautiful baby blue eyes were enough to convince you as you sighed and let him sit you on his lap. Legs on either side of him you buried your head in his neck, your hands going to his hair.

"I was worried, hell, I'm still worried" you mumbled into his shoulder.

"I know, doll, but I'm fine." he placed your hand on his injury to show you he was truly fine. It really wasn't that bad. "See? Everything is fine" he smiled at you when you pulled away to look at him. "So..." he stretched out the last syllable as each hand gripped one of your ass cheeks, pulling you closer so you could feel the already growing bulge in his pants. "as I'm perfectly fine. I haven't seen you in 3 days and I missed your beautiful body under me." breath hitting the shell of your ear he whispered, making you arch your back into him. You almost got lost in him, but then you remembered that he was injured so you pushed against his chest to put some distance between you.

"You are hurt, Bucky. We can't let it get worse just because you are horny." you explained to him, not amused.

"It won't get worse. I'm a super-soldier remember?" he pulled you back and in one swift motion he flipped the two of you around so you were lying under him. He pushed you up on the bed until your head was on the pillows, his body on top of you, between your legs.

"Bucky!" you let out a small scream at his fast movement, which turned into a moan as he rolled his hips against you.

"What was that, doll?" he smirked into the skin on your neck, his hands traveling down and disappearing into your sweatpants to rub your clit through the fabric of your panties. His name leaving your lips again like a prayer, you lifted your hips to get him to move harder, but he pulled his finger away. Letting out a needy whine you grabbed his shirt and pulled it over his head.

He pulled your pants down along with your panties in one swift motion, making you moan as the air hit your wet folds. You opened your legs for him as he stood up to take off his pants, making his hands halt at zipper, his whole body frozen as he stared at you like you were the most beautiful art he has ever seen. The sight of you lying only covered by a t-shirt on his bed, legs bent at the knees, open and so ready for him, so eager had his cock strain against his pants harder, almost painfully. He pulled it down with his boxers, leaving him completely naked for you, his cock standing at attention, ready to please you in every way you wanted. Eyes roaming up and down his body you let out a loud breath, his body never failing to awaken the butterflies in your stomach.

"Take off that shirt, babydoll" he growled, hating the piece of fabric hiding you from his eyes. You quickly sat up and removed every last clothing you had on, never closing your legs. Hungry eyes traveled down your waiting body as you laid back down. They stopped at your glistening center, making you move your hips slightly, only for him to see. He groaned at the sight, his hand going to his cock and stroking it a few times. He wanted to look at you looking like this for an eternity, but his body couldn't wait any longer so he knelt at the bottom of the bed, eyes never leaving you.

"I wish I could take a picture of you like this" he crawled towards you on all fours, like a predator stalking his prey and you were the subject of his hunger. You opened your legs further as if offering yourself up for him, ready to be devoured. "So beautiful and so ready for me" he came face to face with you, his eyes following his index finger brushing along your body from the base of your neck to your wet pussy that was leaking onto the bed. Your body followed his movement, arching into his touch. "Would you like that?" he pushed his finger inside you, sliding in easily as you were already so wet, earning a loud moan. "Hmm?" he hummed into your ear, not moving his finger, waiting for your answer. You didn't even remember what he said, all your senses focused on his touch.

"I-" just as you opened your mouth to speak he pulled out his finger, making the words get stuck in your throat as you threw your head back.

"I want you to use your words" he growled, not pleased by your lack of focus. "You understand?" he looked into your eyes, the intensity in them almost making you moan again.

"Yes, yes I understand" you scrambled to answer.

"Good girl" his finger entered you again as a reward. His praise and his touch together made you let out a loud breath, your nails scratching on his back.

"You are so responsive to me. I love it." his thumb circled your clit. "Such a good girl for me, aren't you?" he was testing you to see if you learned from what happened before.

"Yes, I am" you arched your back as he let out a pleased chuckle.

"That's a good girl" he kissed down your body until he reached your mound, your hips moving constantly, trying to feel more. His metal hand gripped your hips so strongly you were sure it would leave bruises the next day, but right now it only added to your desire, your walls clenching around his finger.

His tongue finally touched your clit, your legs unconsciously closing around his head to keep him there. He pulled his finger out so his hands can push open your legs by your thighs again, even more than it was before. Your hands gripped his hair, pulling him closer as his tongue moved in every direction between your folds. You couldn't stop moving your hips in sync with him, moans spilling out of your mouth one after the other. He grabbed your hips to keep you down, his forearms keeping your legs open for him.

"Bucky, oh my god" you grabbed his hands as his tongue entered you briefly. He looked up from under his eyelashes as he did it again, your nails digging into his skin leaving crescent marks behind. Pupils blown as wide as they can be making your eyes almost fully black, mouth open in a silent moan, you were a sight he never wanted to forget. If it meant you looked like this under him every time he used his tongue on you, he would do it again and again and again until you couldn't take it anymore. He pushed harder against you, your back arching up from the bed in response. He pushed his tongue inside you again.

" 'm close- Bucky" you keened.

"Be a good girl and come for me" he talked into your wet folds, the vibration snapping the coil inside your stomach as white hot pleasure rushed through you, the butterflies in your stomach going crazy. He worked you through your orgasm and only stopped when you pulled him upwards by his hair, the bundle of nerves becoming sensitive. Climbing up he pressed a few wet, open mouthed kisses on your neck, his right hand drawing circles on your hipbone. The tip of his erect member brushed against your wet clit, making you gasp.

"Are you sensitive, doll?" he pressed his soft lips on your cheek.

"Yes" you closed your eyes as his lips found yours in a deep kiss, his tongue exploring your mouth. You could taste yourself on him, making you sigh.

"But you can take another one, can't you?" he nipped at the skin on your jaw. He spent enough time with and mostly inside your body to know the answer to his question, but he wanted to make sure you were fine. Forcing or pushing you was never something he wanted to do and if you said no he would immediately stop, no matter how turned on he was. He could always take care of himself if needed.

"Yes. I want you inside me" your words made his hand travel down to your clit again, rubbing a few circles on it.

"Mhm, so good to me" he mumbled into your skin as your hips started moving again. A finger entered your warm walls for a second time, a second one joining not long after, stretching you out.

"Bucky" you threw your head back on the pillows, his lips sucking on the skin on your neck. "Shit- I want your cock... please" you moaned, barely being able to form sentences. He pulled his fingers out, making you writhe at the emptiness. His tongue darted out to lick and suck his them clean, letting go with a pop. The sight was enough to get you even more wet than you already were. His hard cock pressed against you folds to gather the wetness on them. He grabbed you leg and pulled it up to wrap it around his hips. Your body never resting under him, you constantly fidgeted as the desire became too much.

"Inside me, Bucky please-" you pleaded and he heard your prayers as in one motion he was inside you to the hilt, your wetness strong enough for it to not hurt. The sound you let out was the sexiest thing Bucky had ever heard, making him move out and then forcefully back into you, your tight walls engulfing him. You felt every inch of him stretching you out, the slight pain only adding to the overwhelming feeling, your eyes rolling back in your head.

"You okay?" he stilled for a minute to make sure he wasn't hurting you.

"More than okay" you sighed, lifting your hips to make him move again. He understood your signal as he started sliding in and out of you in a slow pace, enjoying every minute of it.

"Bucky" his name was the only thing leaving your mouth, like a prayer. To whom, you didn't know.

He felt your walls clench around him, making him pick up the pace and bring your legs up and around his waist. The new angle allowed him to dive into your harder, your legs squeezing to pull him impossibly closer. Your lips found his in a messy kiss. You felt his cock twitch inside you as he moaned.

" 'm close" he groaned into your lips as he started moving more frantically, chasing his high. One hand found your clit as he rubbed circles on it, trying to get you to finish together.

"Fuck- Bucky" your arms wrapped around his neck as he bit down on your neck almost hard enough to draw blood. "Cum inside me please" you whined so close to the edge.

"Cum with me, doll" he snapped his hips against yours, balls slapping against your thighs, fingers not leaving the bundle of nerves between your legs.

"James!" you screamed as you fell apart, him not far behind you, his name leaving your lips sending him over the edge. He thrust inside you a few times before pulling out as you both came down from your orgasms. His body falling next to you he let out a puff of air.

"Are you tired, old man?" you turned your head at him, joking.

"You know very well I could go a few more rounds" he smirked at you, leaning over you to press a soft kiss on your mouth. Being a super-soldier had its perks, not getting tired that easily being one of them. But you weren't one so Bucky had to hold himself back from jumping you, fingers itching to touch you and make you sing underneath him again.

But then your eyes shut closed, your hand searching for his blindly and when it found it's missing puzzle piece, pulling it to your face to press it against your cheek a sigh leaving your lips, he realized that these moments were far more precious than anything else he could have done. A small smile worked it's way onto his face, watching you get comfortable, the need to feel him next to you while you rested, making his heart melt. The love he felt for you almost overwhelming him as he brushed a few strands of hair out of your face. A small smile showed on your lips as you sighed, content with his touch.

"I love you" you whispered so quietly he almost didn't hear you.

"I love you too" he whispered back, not wanting to break the moment by speaking louder.

The orange glow of the setting sun shone trough the window illuminating the two hearts beating for each other as their bodies touched, resting, knowing well that when the sun greeted them in the morning they would still be here, still holding onto the other, their hearts forever beating as one.

-

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[queenshelby]

The Secret – Part Four/Final Part

Featuring: Cillian Murphy x Fem Reader

Words: 2050

Warnings: Smut

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-----------

Over the next two weeks, Cillian and you continued to keep your relationship a secret on set. You both believed that no one knew that you were seeing each other. But this was far from the truth. By that time, both Emma and Anthony knew about you. Yet they never spoke about it.

Anthony could understand why you and Cillian weren’t forthcoming about your relationship. You only just started working on set during this season of Peaky Blinders and Cillian was one of the producers. There would clearly be some controversy and gossip if people found out especially since there also was a rather large age gap between you.

Nonetheless, you hated to keep your relationship a secret especially when you saw other women on set showing some interest in Cillian.

There was one woman in particular who bothered you and this was Cillian’s new assistant Amanda.

She showed an obvious interest in Cillian and, being Cillian, he was oblivious about it which was somewhat adorable. He never noticed when women were crushing on him, yet he was the one who tried very hard to set everyone else up on dates.

After some filming during early hours of the morning, Amanda had yet another breakdown. It seemed that she couldn’t handle Cillian’s erratic schedule and, whilst you knew that Cillian was somewhat frustrated about it, he remained calm and even gentle, telling her not to worry too much about getting things wrong.

He was a patient and kind man and you loved exactly that about him, but when it came to Amanda, his kind and patient nature irritated you and you were just about to have your first argument.

In his trailer, you couldn’t help but confront him about his interactions with Amanda.

‘You do realise she is doing these things on purpose to get your attention, right?’ you sighed as Cillian read through his schedule for the remainder of the day. By that time, you both had already been up for five hours and you were tired after you had spent all night together with Cillian.

‘Are you jealous?’ Cillian chuckled with a grin on his face, not taking you seriously at all.

‘No, why would I be jealous?’ you asked annoyed just before Cillian took both of your hands into his and pulled you closer towards him.

‘Exactly. You have no reason to’ Cillian said before pressing his lips onto yours. ‘I am in love with you, no one else’ he added as your lips drifted apart.

‘I am just over this…us hiding our relationship from everyone. Despite, she is clearly taking it a bit far don’t you think?’ you pouted, waiting for Cillian to kiss you again.

‘She is very attentive, that’s for sure’ Cillian chuckled, ignoring your comment and your pout, but deep down inside, he was sick of it too. He didn’t like Amanda’s behaviour and he hated having to hide his feeling for you. He wanted to spend every night with you without guilt or having to worry about getting caught, especially after a long day of filming.

‘You aren’t taking me seriously Cilly’ you pouted again and, just after you did, Cillian pressed his lips back onto yours.

Just as you were sharing another passionate kiss, you heard a knock on the trailer door.

‘Cillian, it’s Amanda. Would you like to grab some lunch?’ she asked, causing you to roll your eyes once again with his lips still on yours.

Cillian pulled away and laughed quietly for a moment before he shouted out ‘Sorry Amanda, I can’t. Y/N and I are rehearsing the next scene’ Cillian said loudly but yet politely.

‘We are?’ you asked, causing Cillian to laugh and nod at the same time.

Amanda left shortly thereafter and, just as she did, you placed your thumb over Cillian’s lips suggestively.

‘Alright, so, let’s rehearse’ you whispered and pulled him even closer towards you. In response, with one swift movement, he sat you up on the trailer’s kitchen bench.

‘You do realise this next scene is between Tommy and Lizzie though, right?’ you smiled.

‘I don’t think Amanda realises’ Cillian chuckled before running both of his hands over your legs.

‘Well, you can think about me later during your takes with Natasha’ you giggled as you ran your hand over his crotch and began unbuckling his belt as he positioned himself in between your legs.

‘What are you doing?’ Cillian asked as you finally reached the zipper of his suit pants. You wouldn’t admit it, but you liked it when he was dressed as Thomas Shelby, in the whole and entire outfit.

‘Claiming what is mine Mr Shelby’ you whispered with a slight giggle, causing Cillian to chuckle.

‘The crew is outside’ Cillian said, trying to push your hand away from his already erect cock.

‘Then we'll have to be quiet, won't we’ you responded before freeing his member slowly.

Cillian lost his composure at that point. As usual, when you showed Cillian your desire for him, he was completely under your control, ready to give you whatever you wanted.

He let out a deep sigh as you began stroking his cock for a moment before jumping down from the counter bench again and bending forward to take him in your mouth.

In response to your wet lips touching his hard cock, Cillian took in another sharp breath. It was hard for him to resist you, almost impossible.

You swirled your tongue over the top half of his hard member before taking him all in right against the back of your throat, testing your gag reflex each time.

‘Fuck’ Cillian moaned as he gave into the sensation and you began to bob your head up and down his long shaft.

You continued that for five minutes and by the you were gushing with wetness and couldn't wait any longer, you needed him inside you.

You broke away from his swollen cock and stood up before turning around leaning forward over the counter, facing the door of trailer.

Without words, Cillian positioned himself behind you and lifted up your skirt gently before pushing down your panties in a haste.

He couldn't stop you from getting what you wanted and he was certainly willing to give it to you now that he was all worked up.

Within seconds, he lined himself up with your wet entrance and pushed forward.

‘Mmm, god damn’ you whispered in blissful joy as he instantly hit your sweet spot. He always felt so good when he entered you, stretching and filling you the way he did.

‘Shhhhhh’ Cillian whispered as he began to move in and out of you slowly.

You adjusted yourself around Cillian’s cock and grounded into him, pushing back against him. You wanted him to take you hard, claim you. He grunted his approval as you started bouncing backwards and, as he pushed forwards with several heavy thrusts, you felt like he was hitting you in the throat with each thrust into your centre.

Cillian held your hips, urging you to bounce harder each time and you almost felt him pushing you into the counter with each thrust.

You knew this had to end quickly and, unlike other times where you would try and draw out your high for as long as possible, you let go as he slammed into you over and over again.

All hell broke loose in your body when Cillian reached between your legs to rub his fingers over your clit at the same time he thrusted into you. Stars shot through your vision and you thought you might pass out from the pleasure. You felt Cillian spasm inside you and a flood of his wet cum started leaking from your core.

Your orgasms washed over you in sync and so were you uncontrolled moans as, all of a sudden, the door to Cillian’s trailer opened.

‘Fuck’ Cillian shouted all of a sudden as he pulled out of you and quickly pulled up his pants.

Luckily, anything other than your upper bodies was covered by the counter front of the kitchenette. Nonetheless, it was obvious to anyone what you were doing as Cillian was leaning over you and his face rested on your neck before the door opened suddenly.

You wanted to sink to the ground with embarrassment right then and there as you saw Finn’s face, flushed and full of questions.

‘Amanda organised some sandwiches for you, saying you were busy rehearsing’ Finn said after he cleared his throat with a slight chuckle.

‘It’s not what it looks like’ you said with an equally flushed face.

‘Sure’ Finn said somewhat angrily as he placed the sandwiches onto the kitchen counter and walked out.

‘This…is bad’ Cillian said to you as Finn left and you nodded with agreement. You knew it was bad and unprofessional.

You pulled up your panties quickly and asked Cillian what he wanted to do now that Finn knew.

‘I will talk to him’ Cillian said just before he followed Finn, not knowing exactly what he would tell him just yet.

It took Cillian several minutes to catch up with Finn who, by that point, was furious about what he saw. Cillian knew that Finn was interested in you and Finn had asked Cillian for help several times, wanting to convince you to go on a date with him, to give him a chance.

‘Can we talk?’ Cillian asked as he finally found Finn down at the docks, preparing for his next scene.

‘So, you can find out who else I might be interested in and take your chances?’ Finn asked angrily as he put down his script.

‘Listen, I know it looks bad but I couldn’t tell anyone about it. I am sure you realise why’ Cillian said, causing Finn to nod.

‘Out of all women here you had to get involved with the one woman I am interested in’ Finn said, still annoyed about Cillian’s actions.

‘It was Y/N who pursued me and didn’t exactly plan for this to happen, falling for a woman half my age. It just happened’ Cillian said as he sat down next to Finn.

‘How long?’ Finn asked curiously.

‘Eight weeks. We’ve been keeping it quiet’ Cillian explained, causing Finn to nod.

‘Right. I feel like an idiot now’ Finn responded.

‘I think it should be me who feels like the idiot’ Cillian responded just as Anthony arrived, getting the area ready for the next scene.

‘Anything wrong?’ Anthony asked, causing Cillian to look at Finn with questions running through his mind.

Finn shook his head before telling Cillian politely that he needed to get ready for his next scene with Paul.

Cillian nodded and thanked Finn for his time before making his way back to you.

‘What did he say?’ you asked, desperately wanting to know where this would leave you and Cillian after the recent encounter.

‘Not much really, but I think we need to make our relationship public’ Cillian sighed.

‘Is he going to tell anyone?’ you asked worried.

‘That he caught us having sex in my trailer? Probably not’ Cillian laughed. ‘But, I think that we should still come clean’ Cillian suggested and you nodded in agreement and it was that same evening, over dinner, that you announced your relationship to the crew and the cast.

To your surprise, it wasn’t a surprise at all to some of your friends and cast members that you were a couple. In fact, Anthony had hatched a bet with one of the other crew members who didn’t believe the rumours.

He won $50 pounds and your best friend was glad to know that she would get the apartment you shared to herself for the next few months until filming wrapped up since, no doubt, you preferred spending your nights with Cillian from now on.

[teawiththegods]

Hey, Jess, I'm really struggling right now, as I just had to get someone out of my life who worships the same gods and it made me also realize that I have a lot of residual trauma that I'm scared my gods are upset at me for. I feel like a hot mess that they don't want to deal with, even though I'm probably just thinking irrationally. This brings me to my question:

Am I too broken to have close relationships with my gods? Do you think they could dislike me for sharing my issues with them and trying to rely on them (note that I already struggle a lot with opening up to them about my feelings, so I'm not coming to them with every little issue)? I'm terrified that they just don't care or don't like me, that my trauma has pushed them away, or even that this situation with this person was the final straw for my gods, in a way, as I've been through a similar friendship with a similarly abusive and toxic person.

I'm sorry if this is a heavy question, you just worship the same gods that I do (Hermes, Apollo, & Aphrodite), and I figured that you'd probably be able to answer this question. Thank you very much for your time, I hope you're doing well.

Hello, love!

Im really grateful you came to me with this because I can completely relate. Not just because I work with the same gods you do but because I have had these exact same thoughts and worries.

Those thoughts are likely echoes from your trauma. Extensions of what people have directly said to you or how their behavior made you feel. They are part of your trauma response.

From my experience as someone who also has a lot of trauma they are trying to sort out, the gods have NEVER gotten upset with me for sharing my problems/emotions with them. Actually quite the opposite, they get frustrated when I DONT confide in them or lean on them.

The gods love us and truly do care about us despite what those echoes of the past might try to say. And because they love us they want to help whenever and however way they can.

Aphrodite wants us to know love. For ourselves and from others. Have it live within us.

Hermes wants us to know joy. Have smiles and laughter flow freely and effortlessly from our beings.

And Apollo wants us to be the best versions of ourselves for ourselves. Because that’s the path that leads to happiness. So essentially Apollo just wants us to be happy.

Its of course all easier typed up in a tumblr post than actually done. Anything involving trauma takes time to process, heal, and relearn new behaviors. (Im still working on my shit!) It’s important you know that so you don’t get frustrated with yourself if it takes awhile to really absorb all this. The keys to healing are time and patience. Make sure you give yourself plenty of both!

Something I do whenever my trauma is trying to convince me that the gods (or any of my loved ones) don’t actually care or are annoyed with me is tell myself (usually out loud so I can hear the sound of my own voice) that those thoughts are just my wounds from past experiences. The gods have proven to me time and time again that they have no problem telling me how they feel and when they are upset with me. So if they haven’t said anything to me than all is well. Apollo especially being the god of truth is def not gonna hold his tongue or lie. If he’s annoyed he’s about to make it everyone’s problem! 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

I hope that helped ease some of your worries! ❤️

[the-king-andthe-lionheart]

A Dream is a Wish Your Heart Makes - Arya Stark and her Cinderella Motifs

In A Song of Ice and Fire, GRRM often uses fairy tale motifs to help tell a character’s story.  Sometimes this motif spans all throughout the characters arc while other times it will only be used for one or two scenes, or anywhere in between.  And often one character can have several fairy tale motifs at different times in their arcs or even running concurrently.  For Arya, she has quite a few fairy tale motifs in her arc, but for now I’m going to focus on her Cinderella motifs that are mainly prevalent in A Clash of Kings but do show up at other times all throughout her arc as well. I’m going to focus primarily on Arya’s A Clash of Kings arc, but we will be stopping by A Storm of Swords and A Feast for Crows a few times too.  And I am going to use several versions of the retellings of Cinderella, including the Disney version, but only the 1950 original and none of its sequels.  I also want to note that not all the parallels are obvious due to things being more metaphorical or symbolic, while other times being whatever subversion that tickled GRRM’s fancy at the time.

There are many common aspects across the board when it comes to Cinderella retellings.  Often it entails the heroine losing one or both of her parents, being oppressed by her abusive stepmother and stepsisters and being forced into menial, backbreaking labor that leaves the heroine dirty and often covered in ashes.  It usually entails a magical guardian who helps the heroine, magical transformations, ballgowns and a ball where she falls in love with either a Prince or a King. An identifying item is also involved, usually a slipper made of gold or glass, where one of the pair is lost when the heroine is running from her beloved.  And the Prince/King almost always searches the realm for the woman that identifying item belongs to, and when he finds the heroine they usually marry.

Written out like that it’s hard to believe that this is a motif used for Arya.  After all she’s not in the position to be going to balls and she’s just a child so it seems unlikely at the time she’s at Harrenhal she’s going to fall in love.  However, this motif appears all throughout her arc in various and creative and subversive and repetitive ways, and motifs don’t have to be all or none and they don’t have to be in the order the original stories were laid out.  A lot of people also don’t like the idea that Arya has an actual Disney Princess motif in her story because she’s a “tomboy”, but the fact is that Arya is a Princess at the time she’s at Harrenhal, it’s even explicitly stated in Arya X ACOK, whether people acknowledge it or not, where a lot of these motifs take place.  I know some people will be dismissive of this and think I’m reaching, but I hope upon reading this I’ll have convinced you of this motif being present. :)

Step-Mother and Step-Sisters

Some of the two most common features in any variant of Cinderella is the “Persecuted Heroine” and the “Female Persecutor”.  Often this manifests as the wicked stepmother and the evil step-sisters, but in some versions a stepmother does not appear, and it’s the heroine’s older sisters who confine her to the kitchens instead.  In the opera, La Cenerentola, Gioachino Rossini inverted the gender roles where the heroine Cenerentola is oppressed by her stepfather.  And in some retellings at least one of the step siblings is somewhat kind to the heroine even.  We symbolically see these archetypes many times in Arya’s narrative with various types of inversions.

When we enter ACOK, we find a dirty and disguised Arya traveling with Yoren and the Night’s Watch recruits, having just lost her father (a subversion of the prevalent theme of Cinderella losing her mother very young).  She is also being bullied by two older boys, Lommy and Hot Pie:

At Winterfell they [Sansa and Jeyne] had called her “Arya Horseface” and she’d thought nothing could be worse, but that was before the orphan boy Lommy Greenhands had named her “Lumpyhead.” - Arya I ACOK

That wasn’t the hardest part at all; Lommy Greenhands and Hot Pie were the hardest part. - Arya I ACOK

“Look at that sword Lumpyhead’s got there,” Lommy said one morning […] “Where’s a gutter rat like Lumpyhead get him a sword?”

[. . .]

“Maybe he’s a little squire,” Hot Pie put in. […] “Some lordy lord’s little squire boy, that’s it.”

“He ain’t no squire, look at him.  I bet that’s not even a real sword.  I bet it’s just some play sword made of tin.”

Arya hated them making fun of Needle.  “It’s castle-forged steel, you stupid,” she snapped, turning in the saddle to glare at them, “and you better shut your mouth.”

The orphan boys hooted.  “Where’d you get a blade like that, Lumpyface?” Hot Pie wanted to know.

“Lumpyhead,” corrected Lommy.  He prob’ly stole it.”

“I did not!” she shouted.  Jon Snow had given her Needle.  Maybe she had to let them call her Lumpyhead, but she wasn’t going to let them call Jon a thief.

“If he stole it, we could take it off him,” said Hot Pie.  “It’s not his anyhow.  I could use me a sword like that.”

Lommy egged him on.  “Go on, take it off him, I dare you.”

Hot Pie kicked his donkey, riding closer.  “Hey, Lumpyface, you gimme that sword.” […] “You don’t know how to use it.”

[. . .]

“Look at him,” brayed Lommy Greenhands.  “I bet he’s going to cry now.  You want to cry, Lumpyhead?” – Arya I ACOK

In the first two quotes we have Arya likening the behavior of Hot Pie and Lommy to that of Jeyne Poole and Sansa. In AGOT, Sansa and Jeyne took on the “evil step-sister” archetype (and before anybody attacks me, I don’t think these two are actually “evil”, just children who think it’s okay to bully someone who is different from them), but now we are shown that this archetype has temporarily shifted onto Lommy and Hot Pie, with some subversions.  These two are now male and they aren’t related to Arya in any way.  Some variants of the Cinderella story do portray male siblings mistreating the younger “Cinderella” sibling though.  One of the stories in One Thousand and One Nights depict a story called “Judar and his Brethren”, in which the main character is poisoned by his biological brothers in the end, depicting a rare tragic ending for this retelling. However, these subversions are completely fine because either way, they took on the role of the “bully” to Arya’s Cinderella archetype currently in the narrative.  

Furthermore, while Septa Mordane was the obvious “wicked stepmother” archetype to Arya’s Cinderella archetype in AGOT, I think arguably this has fallen to Cersei now (and the Lannister’s as a whole).  Cersei may not be present, but she is the reason why Arya is in the situation she is in right now.  After all, Cersei takes on the role of “Evil Queen” for Sansa and Jon (they both share Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs motifs) so I do think she is the metaphorical “wicked stepmother” in this equation regardless of the fact that Cersei isn’t anything remotely close to a stepmother to Arya in the narrative, but she fits the general archetype of “female persecutor” the most in the current situation.  For the case about Septa Mordane being a “wicked stepmother” archetype, I want to point to Cenerentola by Basile, in which the “wicked stepmother” started out as being the heroine’s governess, and Septa’s are the closest substitute to a governess in the universe of ASOIAF.

This isn’t the end to these archetypes being in play.  As the early chapters of ACOK go on we see the animosity between Lommy, Hot Pie, and Arya disappear to the point where they become allies and then friends. With this shift in dynamic we see the archetypes disappearing with some of these same characters taking on entirely new Cinderella archetypes, while the “wicked stepmother” and “evil step-sibling” archetypes move onto other characters as well.

At Harrenhal we are introduced to two wicked women who next take on the “evil step-sibling” archetype, Goodwife Harra and Goodwife Amabel.  These two even comment on Arya’s feet:

When Arya's turn came round, Goodwife Amabel clucked in dismay at the sight of her feet, while Goodwife Harra felt the callus on her fingers that long hours of practice with Needle had earned her. "Got those churning butter, I'll wager," she said. "Some farmer's whelp, are you? Well, never you mind, girl, you have a chance to win a higher place in this world if you work hard. If you won't work hard, you'll be beaten. And what do they call you?"

Arya dared not say her true name, but Arry was no good either, it was a boy’s name and they could see she was no boy.  “Weasel,” she said, naming the first girl she could think of.  “Lommy called me Weasel.”

“I can see why,” sniffed Goodwife Amabel.  “That hair is a fright and a nest for lice as well. We’ll have it off, and then you’re for the kitchens.”

“I’d sooner tend the horses.”  Arya liked horses, and maybe if she was in the stables she’d be able to steal one and escape.

Goodwife Harra slapped her so hard that her swollen lip broke open all over again.  “And keep that tongue to yourself or you’ll get worse.  No one asked your views.”

The blood in her mouth had a salty metal tang to it. Arya dropped her gaze and said nothing. If I still had Needle, she wouldn’t dare hit me, she thought sullenly.

“Lord Tywin and his knights have grooms and squires to tend their horses, they don’t need the likes of you,” Goodwife Amabel said. “The kitchens are snug and clean, and there’s always a warm fire to sleep by and plenty to eat.  You might have done well there, but I can see you’re not a clever girl.  Harra, I believe we should give this one to Weese.”

“If you think so, Amabel.”  They gave her a shift of grey roughspun wool and a pair of ill-fitting shoes and sent her off. – Arya VI ACOK

Later Goodwife Amabel even threatens to rape Arya:

Three Frey men-at-arms were using them that morning as Arya went to the well. She tried not to look, but she could hear the men laughing. The pail was very heavy once full. She was turning to bring it back to Kingspyre when Goodwife Amabel seized her arm. The water went sloshing over the side onto Amabel's legs. "You did that on purpose," the woman screeched.

"What do you want?" Arya squirmed in her grasp. Amabel had been half-crazed since they'd cut Harra's head off.

"See there?" Amabel pointed across the yard at Pia. "When this northman falls you'll be where she is."

"Let me go." She tried to wrench free, but Amabel only tightened her fingers.

"He will fall too, Harrenhal pulls them all down in the end. Lord Tywin's won now, he'll be marching back with all his power, and then it will be his turn to punish the disloyal. And don't think he won't know what you did!" The old woman laughed. "I may have a turn at you myself. Harra had an old broom, I'll save it for you. The handle's cracked and splintery—" - Arya X ACOK

Menial, Backbreaking Labor

When Arya is enslaved and forced into the oppressive walls of Harrenhal, she is forced to scrub floors and do other menial, backbreaking work from sunrise to sunset, just like Cinderella:

Weese used Arya to run messages, draw water, and fetch food, and sometimes to serve at table in the Barracks Hall above the armory, where the men-at-arms took their meals. But most of her work was cleaning. The ground floor of the Wailing Tower was given over to storerooms and granaries, and two floors above housed part of the garrison, but the upper stories had not been occupied for eighty years. Now Lord Tywin had commanded that they be made fit for habitation again. There were floors to be scrubbed, grime to be washed off windows, broken chairs and rotted beds to be carried off. The topmost story was infested with nests of the huge black bats that House Whent had used for its sigil, and there were rats in the cellars as well . . . and ghosts, some said, the spirits of Harren the Black and his sons. – Arya VII ACOK

She spent the rest of that day scrubbing steps inside the Wailing Tower. By evenfall her hands were raw and bleeding and her arms so sore they trembled when she lugged the pail back to the cellar. Too tired even for food, Arya begged Weese's pardons and crawled into her straw to sleep. – Arya VII ACOK

Magical Transformations and Mice

In Disney’s Cinderella, the fairy godmother transforms mice into different creatures.  On the road to Harrenhal, Arya not only likens herself to a sheep, but a mouse and continues her time at Harrenhal referring to herself as a “mouse”.  This is also a subversion, while Cinderella in the Disney incarnation befriends mice, in our story Arya becomes the meek mouse:

On the road Arya had felt like a sheep, but Harrenhal turned her into a mouse.  She was grey as a mouse in her scratchy wool shift, and like a mouse she kept to the crannies and crevices and dark holes of the castle, scurrying out of the way of the mighty. – Arya VII ACOK

He does not know me, she thought.  Arry was a fierce little boy with a sword, and I’m just a grey mouse girl with a pail. – Arya VII ACOK

She was very small and Harrenhal was very large, full of places where a mouse could hide. – Arya VII ACOK

Even Jaqen calls Arya a mouse:

She crept up quiet as a shadow, but he opened his eyes all the same.  “She steals in on little mice feet, but a man hears,” he said.  How could he hear me? She wondered, and it seemed as if he heard that as well.  “The scuff of leather on stone sings loud as warhorns to a man with open ears.  Clever girls go barefoot.” – Arya VIII ACOK

However, through Jaqen, Arya begins to feel more in control of her situation, stronger and is transformed, if only for a short time.

“…Some are saying it was Harren’s ghost flung him down.” He snorted to show what he thought of such notions.

It wasn’t Harren, Arya wanted to say, it was me. She has killed Chiswyck with a whisper, and she would kill two more before she was through.  I’m the ghost in Harrenhal, she thought.  And that night, there was one less name to hate. – Arya VII ACOK

I was a sheep, and then I was a mouse, I couldn’t do anything but hide.  Arya chewed her lip and tried to think when her courage had come back.  Jaqen made me brave again.  He made me a ghost instead of a mouse. – Arya IX ACOK

Lucifer the Cat

In Disney’s Cinderella, Lucifer is Lady Tremaine’s cat who is described as being a sly, wicked, and manipulative mouse consumer.  He spends the whole film trying to torment and catch the mice.  I feel that Weese takes on aspects of this feline character, and I think this because of certain descriptors that are given to Weese to make him appear almost catlike:

“Weasel,” Weese purred, “next time I see that mouth droop open, I’ll pull out your tongue and feed it to my bitch.” – Arya VII ACOK

In his own small strutting way, Weese was nearly as scary as Ser Gregor.  The Mountain swatted men like flies, but most of the time he did not even seem to know the fly was there.  Weese always knew you were there, and what you were doing, and sometimes what you were thinking.  He would hit at the slightest provocation, and he had a dog who was near as bad as he was, an ugly spotted bitch that smelled worse than any dog Arya had ever known. Once she saw him set the dog on a latrine boy who’d annoyed him.  She tore a big chunk out of the boy’s calf while Weese laughed. – Arya VII ACOK

So here we have Weese purring, strutting, being compared to the Mountain who swats at peoples, and being watchful and observant, very much like a cat.  And like in the movie, a dog attacks him.  Now Weese didn’t fall from a tower window, but Chiswyck fell/was pushed. Considering these two are the two people Arya had Jaqen kill, I wouldn’t be surprised if they are meant to make up two halves of a whole in this regard.  After all, they are both wicked creatures who prey upon the weak, just like Lucifer and they both got their just desserts for it.

Jaq the Mouse

In Disney’s Cinderella, Cinderella rescues mice from traps, as well as from Lucifer, and dresses and feeds them.  They perform favors in return.  At the beginning of the film, a mouse named Gus is trapped in a cage, and the leader of the mice finds him and retrieves Cinderella to free him.  The leader of the mice is a mouse named Jaq, and he was also a mouse that was saved by Cinderella from a cage.  This sounds awfully familiar…

Rushing through the barn doors was like running into a furnace.  The air was swirling with smoke, the back wall a sheet of fire ground to roof. Their horses and donkeys were kicking and rearing and screaming.  The poor animals, Arya thought.  Then she saw the wagon, and the three men manacled to its bed.  Biter was flinging himself against the chains, blood running down his arms from where the iron clasped his wrists.  Rorge screamed curses, kicking at the wood.  “Boy!” called Jaqen H’ghar.  “Sweet boy!”

[. . .]

“Good boys, kind boys,” called Jaqen H’ghar, coughing.

“Get these fucking chains off!” Rorge screamed.

[. . .]

Going back into that barn was the hardest thing she ever did.  Smoke was pouring out the open door like a writhing black snake, and she could hear the screams of the poor animals inside, donkeys and horses and men.  She chewed her lip, and darted through the doors, crouched low where the smoke wasn’t quite so thick.

A donkey was caught in a ring of fire, shrieking in terror and pain.  She could smell the stench of burning hair.  The roof was gone up too, and things were falling down, pieces of flaming wood and bits of straw and hay.  Arya put a hand over her mouth and nose.  She couldn’t see the wagon for the smoke, but she could still hear Biter screaming.  She crawled toward the sound.

And then a wheel was looming over her.  The wagon jumped and moved a half foot when Biter threw himself against his chains again.  Jaqen saw her, but it was too hard to breathe, let alone talk.  She threw the axe into the wagon.  Rorge caught it and lifted it over his head, rivers of sooty sweat pouring down his noseless face.  Arya was running, coughing.  She heard the steel crash through the old wood, and again, again. An instant later came a crack as loud as thunder, and the bottom of the wagon came ripping loose in an explosion of splinters. – Arya IV ACOK

So here we have Jaq who is leader of the mice, who also helps Cinderella by doing her favors.  Then we have Jaqen H’ghar who is the leader of Rorge and Biter (this name seems even more fitting now) and who is performing favors for Arya, which leads me to Jaqen’s dual Cinderella archetype: Fairy Godmother.

Magical Helpers

Some versions of Magical Helpers come from fairy godmothers or talking animals or genies.  In other versions this help comes to the heroine through her dead mother, often manifesting through animal aid.  In One Thousand and One Nights, in the story of “Judar and his Brethren” Judar is our Cinderella figure, whose own brothers betray and poison him, but before that he was gifted a genie named Al-Ra’ad al-Kasif who granted Judar’s wishes.  In the passage below Jaqen grants Arya three “wishes” which is typical for genies to grant in our popular consciousness:

She remembered that she hated him.  “You scared me.  You’re one of them now, I should have let you burn.  What are you doing here?  Go away or I’ll yell for Weese.”

“A man pays his debts.  A man owes three.”

“Three?”

“The Red God has his due, sweet girl, and only death may pay for life.  This girl took three that were his.  This girl must give three in their places.  Speak the names, and a man will do the rest.”

He wants to help me, Arya realized with a rush of hope that made her dizzy.  “Take me to Riverrun, it’s not far, if we stole some horses we could—”

He laid a finger on her lips.  “Three lives you shall have of me.  No more, no less.  Three and we are done.  So a girl must ponder.”  He kissed her hair softly.  “But not too long.” – Arya VII ACOK

Later, we also see that “wishes” have consequences, which is also prevalent when genies are concerned.  GRRM himself is a big fan of consequences and unintended side effects.  

Jaqen is not Arya’s only form of Magical Help at Harrenhal however.  Jaqen may take on the role of Fairy Godmother/Genie, but we also see Arya experiencing the help of not only an animal aid, but from a dead parent.  For instance, the heroine in Aschenputtel, by the Brother’s Grimm, is given a hazel twig by her father that she plants over her mother’s grave.  She waters it with tears and over the years it grows into a glowing hazel tree.  The girl prays under it three times a day, chanting, and a bird emerges from it that grants her wishes.  There are two instances of something similar happening in the books:

In the godswood she found her broomstick sword where she had left it, and carried it to the heart tree.  There she knelt.  Red leaves rustled.  Red eyes peered inside her.  The eyes of the gods.  “Tell me what to do, you gods,” she prayed.

For a long moment there was no sound but the wind and the water and the creak of leaf and limb.  And then, far far off, beyond the godswood and the haunted towers and the immense stone walls of Harrenhal, from somewhere out in the world, came the long lonely howl of a wolf.  Gooseprickles rose on Arya’s skin, and for an instant she felt dizzy.  Then, so faintly, it seemed as if she heard her father’s voice.  “When the snows fall and the white winds blow, the lone wolf dies, but the pack survives,” he said.

“But there is no pack,” she whispered to the weirwood.  Bran and Rickon were dead, the Lannisters had Sansa, Jon had gone to the Wall.  “I’m not even me now, I’m Nan.”

“You are Arya of Winterfell, daughter of the north. You told me you could be strong.  You have the wolf blood in you.”

“The wolf blood.”  Arya remembered now.  “I’ll be as strong as Robb.  I said I would.”  She took a deep breath, then lifted the broomstick in both hands and brought it down across her knee.  It broke with a loud crack, and she threw the pieces aside.  I am a direwolf, and done with wooden teeth. – Arya X ACOK

Here we see an inversion. Arya’s mother isn’t dead at this time, but her father, Ned is.  He is who we hear through the heart tree giving Arya this empowering “Mufasa” moment that gives way to Arya’s true transformation in this arc, she reclaims her identity.  And as soon as Arya asks the old gods for aid, a wolf howls in the distance as if in answer.  It’s not confirmed but I do truly believe that this howl came from Nymeria, by way of the Old Gods/Greenseers, who somehow helped strengthen their bond.  It is after this moment that Arya starts having full on wolf dreams in earnest and it’s through her first wolf dream that we see that Nymeria may have become Arya’s animal aid:

Her dreams were red and savage.  The Mummers were in them, four at least, a pale Lyseni and a dark brutal axeman from Ib, the scarred Dothraki horse lord called Iggo and a Dornishman whose name she never knew.  On and on they came, riding through the rain in rusting mail and wet leather, swords and axe clanking against their saddles.  They thought they were hunting her, she knew with all the strange sharp certainty of dreams, but they were wrong.  She was hunting them.

She was no little girl in the dream; she was a wolf, huge and powerful, and when she emerged from beneath the trees in front of them and bared her teeth in a low rumbling growl, she could small the rank stench of fear from horse and man alike.  The Lyseni’s mount reared and screamed in terror, and the others shouted at one another in mantalk, but before they could act the other wolves came hurtling from the darkness and the rain, a great pack of them, gaunt and wet and silent.

The fight was short but bloody.  The hairy man went down as he unslung his axe, the dark one died stringing an arrow, and the pale man from Lys tried to bolt.  Her brothers and sisters ran him down, turning him again and again, coming at him from all sides, snapping at the legs of his horse and tearing the throat from the rider when he came crashing to the earth. – Arya I ASOS

We see here that Nymeria and her pack protected Arya, Gendry, and Hot Pie against their pursuers after their escape from Harrenhal.

Here is another instance of Arya praying under the heart tree:

Arya went to her knees.  She wasn’t sure how she should begin.  She clasped her hands together.  Help me, you old gods, she prayed silently.  Help me get those men out of the dungeon so we can kill Ser Amory, and bring me home to Winterfell.  Make me a water dancer and a wolf and not afraid again, ever.

Was that enough?  Maybe she should pray aloud if she wanted the old gods to hear.  Maybe she should pray longer.  Sometimes her father had prayed a long time, she remembered. But the old gods had never helped him. Remembering that made her angry. “You should have saved him,” she scolded the tree.  “He prayed to you all the time.  I don’t care if you help me or not.  I don’t think you could even if you wanted to.”

“Gods are not mocked, girl.”

The voice startled her.  She leapt to her feet and drew her wooden sword.  Jaqen H’ghar stood so still in the darkness that he seemed one of the trees.  “A man comes to hear a name.  One and two and then comes three.  A man would have done.”

Arya lowered the splintery point toward the ground. “How did you know I was here?”

“A man sees.  A mean hears.  A man knows.”

She regarded him suspiciously.  Had the gods sent him?  “How’d you make the dog kill Weese?  Did you call Rorge and Biter up from hell?  Is Jaqen H’ghar your true name?

“Some men have many names.  Weasel.  Arry. Arya.”

She backed away from him, until she was pressed against the heart tree.  “Did Gendry tell?”

“A man knows,” he said again.  “My lady of Stark.”

Maybe the gods had sent him in answer to her prayers. – Arya IX ACOK

In Cenerentola, the heroine’s (Zezolla) father is given a date seedling by a fairy and he gives it to his daughter.  Zezolla cultivates the tree in which a fairy lives.  This fairy gives Zezolla magical aid.  When Arya prayed beneath the heart tree in the above quote it almost seems like Jaqen appeared from the trees, leaving Arya to question if the old gods sent him.

And like in Aschenputtel and Disney’s Cinderella, Arya spends time at Harrenhal singing/chanting to herself as well:

Barefoot surefoot lightfoot, she sang under her breath. I am the ghost in Harrenhal. – Arya IX ACOK

This is very strange for a couple of reasons.  When we first meet Arya she claims not to like songs and doesn’t sing.  She continues this up until she goes to Braavos. There she discovers that she likes the bawdy songs when she is using the name, Cat of the Canals.  The only exception to this is when Arya is at Harrenhal. Another reason this is odd is because of where Arya is at physically and mentally.  So either Arya was always lying about not liking songs, or Arya singing here is supposed to tell us something.

And while this might not mean anything, I found it interesting that Arya spends a lot of her time in ACOK barefoot.  Now Cinderella isn’t really said to be barefoot in the stories, but she did usually lose a shoe when running away from the Prince/King, hence making her barefoot. When Arya decides to escape Harrenhal, she does don a pair of shoes again and from then on out she mostly wears them.  This also leads to a fun bit of subversion.  In the originals tales it’s always the Prince/King saving Cinderella from further oppression.  But in Arya X ACOK, not only did she (a princess) plan the escape, but she saves Gendry, a lost (albeit bastard) prince, along with Hot Pie, from further oppression (and torture and death) by their slavers in their prison camp.  (Hot Pie definitely reminds me of Gus Gus as well by the way :D)

From Rags to Riches

In many versions of Cinderella, we also see the heroine become physically transformed.  The heroine is usually dirty, covered in ashes, and wearing “rags” before they are made over.  In the most popular version, Disney’s Cinderella, the Fairy Godmother magically turns her from dirty household servant to highborn lady, adorning her in a silver ballgown and glass slippers.  In Ye Xian, magical fish bones, help the heroine dress appropriately for a local Festival, including a light, golden shoe.  And in Aschenputtel, the doves that emerge from her hazel tree, that grant the heroine wishes, drop a gold and silver gown and silk shoes down to her to wear to the ball.  Also, noticeably, this is the time the Prince/King notices Cinderella and finally “sees” her.

While we didn’t get anything like that in ACOK, we don’t have to look much farther than ASOS, when Arya goes to Acorn Hall and meets Lady Smallwood, who puts her in two different dresses:

And afterward, they insisted she dress herself in girl’s things, brown woolen stockings and a light linen shift, and over that a light green gown with acorns embroidered all over the bodice in brown thread, and more acorns bordering the hem. – Arya IV ASOS

It was even worse than before; Lady Smallwood insisted that Arya take another bath, and cut and comb her hair besides; the dress she put her in this time was sort of lilac-colored, and decorated with little baby pearls.  The only good thing about it was that it was so delicate that no one could expect her to ride in it. – Arya IV ASOS

And while there is no ball, Arya and Gendry spend their time in the forge together.  This is the very first time Gendry has seen Arya look like a proper lady.  Cinderella and Arya are no longer dirty and in rags and they are now in gowns looking their place in society, despite Arya’s dress not being nearly as grand.  However, it’s enough of a change for Gendry to finally realize just who Arya truly is when it comes to her place in the world.  And judging by his behavior after this event, he also begins to acknowledge that if he continues to stay by her side he could potentially love her romantically in the future as well:  

Gendry reached out with the tongs as if to pinch her face, but Arya swatted them away.

[. . .]

Gendry put the hammer down and looked at her.  “You look different now.  Like a proper little girl.”

“I look like an oak tree, with all these stupid acorns.”

“Nice, though.  A nice oak tree.”  He stepped closer, and sniffed at her.  “You even smell nice for a change.” – Arya IV ASOS

Runaway Princess

Now we may not have had a ball, but while taking shelter in a stone stable with the Brotherhood Without Banners, Arya does run outside, trying to get away from everyone:

His words beat at her ears like the pounding of a drum, and suddenly it was more than Arya could stand.  She wanted Riverrun, not Acorn Hall; she wanted her mother and her brother Robb, not Lady Smallwood or some uncle she never knew.  Whirling, she broke for the door, and when Harwin tried to grab her arm she spun away from him quick as a snake.

Outside the stables the rain was still falling, and distant lightning flashed in the west.  Arya ran as fast as she could.  She did not know where she was going, only that she wanted to be alone, away from all the voices, away from their hollow words and broken promises.  All I wanted was to go to Riverrun.  It was her own fault, for taking Gendry and Hot Pie with her when she left Harrenhal.  She would have been better alone.  If she had been alone, the outlaws would never have caught her, and she’d be with Robb and her mother by now.  They were never my pack.  If they had been, they wouldn’t leave me.  She splashed through a puddle of muddy water.  Someone was shouting her name, Harwin probably, or Gendry, but the thunder drowned them out as it rolled across the hills half a heartbeat behind the lightning.  The lightning lord, she thought angrily.  Maybe he couldn’t die, but he could lie. – Arya VIII ASOS

Now it’s not explicitly clear that it was Gendry who ran after Arya, calling her name, but due to the possible symbolism in the scene, and also his behavior in AFFC, it makes me think it was him.  But whether he was or not I believe just Arya believing it might be him makes this applicable enough as a loose parallel for the Prince chasing after Cinderella, only for Cinderella to disappear like in many of the Cinderella retellings.  

Searching the Realm

At the end of ASOS in the epilogue we learn that Lady Stoneheart and the Brotherhood Without Banners, who Gendry is a part of is actively searching for Arya:

The outlaw gave him (Merrett Frey) an encouraging smile. “Well, as it happens, we’re looking for a dog that ran away.”

“A dog?” Merrett was lost.  “What kind of dog?”

“He answers to the name Sandor Clegane […] Did you see him at the wedding, perchance?”

[. . .]

“He would have had a child with him,” said the singer.  “A skinny girl, about ten.  Or perhaps a boy the same age.”

“I don’t think so,” said Merrett.  “Not that I knew.” – Epilogue ASOS

In many retellings of the Cinderella story, the Prince/King searches the realm looking for the heroine with an identifying item, and typically that item is a shoe of some sort.  Once the shoe is placed on the heroine’s foot it symbolically means the heroine is reclaiming her identity.  Arya, however, didn’t lose a shoe, and I’d argue that when Ned/the Old Gods/the Greenseers spoke to Arya through the heart tree, empowering Arya, that’s when Arya reclaimed her identity, at least for that time as Arya must reclaim her identity multiple times in her arc.  I’d argue that Arya’s connection to the North and her family is her overall identifying item. But I fully believe Gendry himself might be another “identifying item,” along with him still taking on the archetypal role of “prince”.

Why do I say this? Because in AFFC Gendry is stationed at one of the last known places Arya was sighted at with the Hound, the Crossroads Inn, where he is blacksmithing while also helping to look after orphans. He was likely stationed there by Lady Stoneheart and the Brotherhood Without Banners because he knew Arya the best out of everyone (remember LSH would probably have a hard time recognizing Arya after two plus years and a resurrection).  So if she returned, he would not only have a better chance at recognizing her, but also possibly a better chance at keeping her there compared to anyone else.  If people are doubting that this is Gendry’s role, just remember that the BWB is actively looking for Arya, and also note Gendry’s personality shift post-ASOS. Gendry has always been rude and moody, but in AFFC it has been taken to the extreme.  He is absolutely furious and instead of being just plain rude, he’s actually become mean and more violent.  He also seems to have something against the Hound now, someone who he previously had nothing against during the Hound’s trial by combat earlier in ASOS:

…The boy came and stood beside her, his hammer in his hand.

Lightning cracked to the south as the riders swung down off their horses.  For half a heartbeat darkness turned to day.  An axe gleamed silvery blue, light shimmered off mail and plate, and beneath the dark hood of the lead rider Brienne glimpsed an iron snout and rows of steel teeth, snarling.

Gendry saw it too.  “Him.”

“Not him.  His helm.” Brienne tried to keep the fear from her voice, but her mouth was dry as dust. – Brienne VII AFFC

That “him” was very pointed and because of the symbolism in the scene surrounding that “him” and the overall change in Gendry’s behavior I definitely take it to mean Gendry does have a problem with the Hound now.  So what changed?  The Hound kidnapped Arya.  I think it’s safe to say that Gendry is just as invested as the rest of the BWB, if not more so, to finding Arya again, hence making him the “prince” searching the realm for his lost Cinderella.

A Dream Is a Wish Your Heart Makes

In Disney’s Cinderella, songs like “Bibbidi-Bobbidi-Boo”, “So This Is Love”, “Cinderella”, “A Dream Is a Wish Your Heart Makes”, “Oh, Sing Sweet Nightingale”, and “The Work Song” are included into the film.  This isn’t the first time we’ve seen something like this in the previous retellings however.  Like I mentioned earlier the Brother’s Grimm, Aschenputtel, features this as well to some extant.  In Aschenputtel, the heroine would “sing a chant” to call upon the white doves that came from her glowing hazel tree.  These birds would help her grant wishes and help her complete tasks, and it was most likely the inspiration for why birds were included in the Disney version, although birds have featured in more than just Aschenputtel.  I mention this because GRRM wrote Arya a song in the novels:

“My featherbed is deep and soft,

and there I'll lay you down,

I'll dress you all in yellow silk,

and on your head a crown.

For you shall be my lady love,

and I shall be your lord.

I'll always keep you warm and safe,

and guard you with my sword.

 “And how she smiled and how she laughed,

the maiden of the tree.

She spun away and said to him,

no featherbed for me.

I'll wear a gown of golden leaves,

and bind my hair with grass,

But you can be my forest love,

and me your forest lass.”

This is very clearly a love song also and we know it’s most likely about Arya and her foreshadowing a possible future relationship with Gendry.  And it’s very clearly about them as Gendry is a bastard Baratheon “prince”, hence the mentions of “yellow silk” and a “crown”, and also because Arya quite literally is dressed as an oak tree at this time and almost a maiden and will be a maiden when they reunite later in the series.  We also know the song is meant to foreshadow them because of the context.  Tom O’Seven’s specifically winked at Arya as he sang this song, and after the song was sung Lady Smallwood, when taking Arya to get changed into a different dress, said to Arya, “I have no gowns of leaves,” which further tells the readers that this song is Arya’s song, her future love song.

A Mother’s Legacy

In the Magical Helpers section above I mentioned that a dead parent may be the one to help the heroine instead of the typical fairy godmother, by either sending an animal to aid the heroine and/or granting wishes, or by the heroine’s mother transforming into an animal.  In some Greek versions, in “the Balkan-Slavonic tradition of the tale”, and in some Central Asian variants, the heroine’s mother comes back as a cow who is then killed by the heroine’s sisters.  The heroine eventually gathers the bones and from her mother’s grave the heroine is gifted wonderful dresses.  In other variants, the heroine’s dead mother comes back as a fish or a female dog. These animals represent the heroine’s mother’s legacy.

Jon chuckled. “Perhaps you should do the same thing, little sister.  Wed Tully to Stark in your arms.”

“A wolf with a fish in its mouth?” It made her laugh.  “That would look silly…” – Arya I AGOT

That night she went to sleep thinking of her mother, and wondering if she should kill the Hound in his sleep and rescue Lady Catelyn herself.  When she closed her eyes she saw her mother’s face against the back of her eyelids.  She’s so close I could almost smell her…

…and then she could smell her.  The scent was faint beneath the other smells, beneath moss and mud and water, and the stench of rotting reeds and rotting men.  She padded slowly through the soft ground to the river’s edge, lapped up a drink, then lifted her head to sniff.  The sky was grey and thick with cloud, the river green and full of floating things.  Dead men clogged the shallows, some still moving as the water pushed them, others washed up on the banks.  Her brothers and sisters swarmed around them, tearing at the rich ripe flesh.

[. . .]

The scent was stronger now [. . .] Only the scent mattered.  She sniffed the air again.  There it was, and now she saw it too, something pale and white drifting down the river, turning where it brushed against a snag.  The reeds bowed down before it.

She splashed noisily through the shallows and threw herself into the deeper water, her legs churning.  The current was strong but she was stronger.  She swam, following her nose.  The river smells were rich and wet, but those were not the smells that pulled her.  She paddled after the sharp red whisper of cold blood, the sweet cloying stench of death.  She chased them as she had often chased a red deer through the trees, and in the end she ran them down, and her jaw closed around a pale white arm.  She shook it to make it move, but there was only death and blood in her mouth.  By now she was tiring, and it was all she could do to pull the body back to shore. As she dragged it up the muddy bank, one of her little brothers came prowling, his tongue lolling from his mouth. She had to snarl to drive him off, or else he would have fed.  Only then did she stop to shake the water from her fur.  The white thing lay facedown in the mud, her dead flesh wrinkled and pale, cold blood trickling from her throat.  Rise, she thought.  Rise and eat and run with us. – Arya XII ASOS

“So you sewed his head on Robb Stark’s neck after both o’ them were dead,” said yellow cloak.

“My [Merrett Frey] father did that [. . .] I only drank some wine…you have no witness.”

“As it happens, you’re wrong there.”  The singer turned to the hooded woman.  “Milady?”

The outlaws parted as she came forward, saying no word.  When she lowered her hood, something tightened inside Merrett’s chest, and for a moment he could not breathe.  No.  No, I saw her die.  She was dead for a day and night before they stripped her naked and threw her body in the river.  Raymund opened her throat from ear to ear.  She was dead.

Her cloak and collar hid the gash his brother’s blade had made, but her face was even worse than he remembered.  The flesh had gone pudding soft in the water and turned the color of curdled milk. Half her hair was gone and the rest had turned as white and brittle as a crone’s.  Beneath her ravaged scalp, her face was shredded skin and black blood where she had raked herself with her nails.  But her eyes were the most terrible thing.  Her eyes saw him, and they hated.

“She don’t speak,” said the big man in the yellow cloak.  “You bloody bastards cut her throat too deep for that.  But she remembers.”  He turned to the dead woman and said, “What do you say, m’lady?  Was he part of it?”

Lady Catelyn’s eyes never left him.  She nodded. – Epilogue ASOS

In the Chinese retelling of Cinderella, Ye Xian, the heroine befriends a fish, which is the reincarnation of her deceased mother.  In The Story of Tam and Cam, a Vietnamese version, the heroine Tam also had a fish which was killed by the stepmother and the half-sister, and its bones also give her clothes.  And a typical scene in Kapmalaien tales is the mother becoming a fish, being eaten in fish form, the daughter burying her bones and a tree sprouting from her grave.

So not only is Lady Catelyn a symbolic fish, a daughter of House Tully, but she’s also been resurrected (reincarnated), and is looking specifically for our heroine, Arya, who I believe will be gifted several various things (both good and bad) by this incarnation of her mother, but we shall see if the parallel continues when TWOW and ADOS come out.

Conclusion

I really hope that after you read this monster you were as convinced as I am that Arya indeed has Cinderella motifs, and an extensive amount of them as well. Whatever it may mean I don’t rightly know, but what I do know is that at the end of the day, the many stories of Cinderella are an analogy.  An analogy about someone “who unexpectedly achieves recognition or success after a period of obscurity and neglect”.  Of someone whose attributes were unrecognized in their society, only for them to be recognized.  And I don’t know about you, but that sounds pretty hand in hand with one of her other biggest fairy tale motifs as well that runs concurrently with the Cinderella motif, and that is the story of “The Ugly Duckling”, who after years of neglect, finds acceptance within society, as well as self-acceptance within themselves. :)

[bookofmirth]

ok so this might come off as a bit rambly so please bear with me lol

i've noticed that the acotar fandom has this incessant need to be right when it comes to canon and it really sucks out the funness of fandom. shipping is supposed to be fun but when it comes to this fandom, it's almost like a competition to see who will be more right when the books come out. engaging with theories/predictions about characters and the plot is supposed to be exciting but when it comes to this fandom, some of the theories/predictions are problematic at worst and nonsensical at best. like how can you say with your full chest that you're so confident about where the series is heading in the future because of this or that theory when you're stuck in the past and refuse to see what all of the text is telling you in the present. it doesn't make sense. the selective reading is so strong that it has me looking sideways sometimes lol

i guess my question is why do you think the fandom is so divided when it comes to ships right now? i've seen people say this wasn't the case for feysand and nessian, so what's the difference here?

Oh boy Brielle, I have some thoughts on this. It's complex.

To be clear, I am not saying that this applies to literally every single person who ships a certain way. This is a commentary on the fandom as a whole, and there are always exceptions.

This got really, really long, so I'm putting it under the cut.

I think that one of the main draws of this series, and of sjm's writing in general, is her ships. I think that people get very, very attached to their ships.

I also think that sjm does NOT fully think through some of the choices that she makes when writing. See: the way that she takes from all these different cultures and mashes them together, which could be seen as disrespectful of their origin. She has retconned things, like Mor being queer and Lucien being Helion's son. I think that she thoroughly thinks about some of the aspects of her books, like Rhys's reaction to sleeping with Feyre for the first time, but then really half-asses other aspects of her books, like Mor coming out.

Then, we have your good old misogyny and homophobia - people in the fandom don't like Mor because she hurt the poor bat boy's feelings when she didn't sleep with him, and they don't have a mating bond, but she's never really told Azriel "no", and so every single moment of pain that Azriel has felt in 500 years is Morrigan's fault. And Mor's experience as a closeted queer woman who feels unsafe around the people she should trust the most is completely disregarded by the fandom.

Finally, I think that a combination of these factors has created the monster we know as e*riel, and that the fandom is perpetuating its own mythology.

What all of this comes down to, and the real reason I think that the fandom is behaving this way right now, is that e*riel is dead. It's never happened, it's not going to happen, but because we don't have the clear closure we got with moriel (where people would be accused of homophobia for continuing to ship it), people are still trying to figure out any possible way for e*riel to become canon, though every single sign points to it being a non-issue.

This weird thing where people have to be "right" all the time, and the way that "right" = "canon" is a relatively new development. It's as if everyone in this fandom forgot that they are in fact in a fandom, which inherently diverges from canon.

However, I think that the need to cling to canon is because the alternative would be to admit defeat and say "well, even if it doesn't happen I will still ship e*riel, it's fine, I will live with that." But they don't want to do that. In response, they look at canon so hard that they are reading the white space between the letters to create their theories, which as you noted as largely nonsensical and often fail to take into account who the characters are as individuals, how they are connected to other characters, and why it would or wouldn't be appropriate for them to be involved in various plots.

People could say, as eluciens having been saying since day one, "I really ship this thing but I can see that it might not become canon". But they don't say that. They literally refuse to see any other possibility than e*riel becoming canon.

You pointed out that people are stuck in the past - absolutely. The number of reimaginings I have seen of scenes where either Azriel or Elain has literally zero to do with the scene, but people try to shove one or both of them in there. And this from books ago. People are stuck on the Truthteller scene, and refuse to acknowledge that neither of them have acted on their feelings, whatever those might be, for years. And they ignore the fact that once Elain and Az do act, it goes horribly wrong.

Here are the facts as of right now:

ACOSF is the most recent book. In that book, sans extra chapter, those two had no interaction other than looking at one another.

If we include his POV, then he said it was wrong, we got confirmation that nothing has ever happened between them, she returned his necklace. Elain was aroused, but that does not mean she was ready to even have sex. "Yes" to a kiss is not "yes" to every single sexual act Az can think of. They parted on awkward, bad terms after a scene in which it seemed like they were about to start something. Yikes. Unlike Wings and Embers, they did not end that chapter still thinking of one another. After they part ways, the omniscient narrator does not mention Elain, or Az thinking about Elain, again.

His POV occurs months before the end of the book. They do not interact after that.

Elain has a mate she has not rejected, nor accepted.

So anyway, your question was why are people like this. lol. I think the fandom created a monster, and that monster is clinging to life. It can't accept the idea of morphing into a non-canon ship, though it never was canon in the first place. It had just convinced itself that it was.

There are other aspects to this, that have to do with gwynriel and elucien.

Gwynriel is a new ship, it's almost guaranteed to happen, people are super excited to ship it and give Gwyn all their love. I'm sure they would rather create content for that ship than argue about whether or not it's going to be canon, but they are in constant defense mode. Some people honestly didn't like e*riel before because they don't like Elain, or because they don't like Azriel, and those are valid reasons for not liking it. Why people ship gwynriel doesn't matter. The tone of the discussion is, unfortunately, being shaped elsewhere, which I will mention below.

Elucien is an old ship, older than e*riel. I can speak from this perspective - personally, I have been holding my tongue for 4.5 years. I have been letting people live, and just talking about the things I like. Then when acosf came out, it was like I could finally say all the things I had been thinking about Azriel, because I now had proof that the things I thought about his character (and because of that, about e*riel) now had solid canon foundation. This is 4.5 years of me holding in a lot of shit and finally being able to say it. Sometimes yes, I might take joy in having been right.

I think that a few people are clinging to canon, and that sets the tone for the discourse in the fandom. Someone says "according to page whatever, blah blah blah" and people feel the need to respond, and then it turns into and "I'm right" contest instead of... a fandom... A lot of us like debating. To me, it's fun. But when Person A starts a conversation that's about canon and it actually ignores canon, it's hard to let that conversation go by and just keep creating whatever we want to create. Instead, we respond, and so the tone of the conversation is shaped by what Person A decided to say.

I also think that there is a lack of distinction between theories (what will happen in the future) and meta (analysis of what we have now).

There is also a lack of "I" statements. Opinions are being stated as fact.

idk if there is a way to make it better, other than to just go back to ignoring one another. This whole situation makes me want to throw out every single canon ship I like and create exclusively non-canon content, just for spite. Except I really like doing meta, and so I don't want to. I guess for my point, I'll just keep doing meta, keep creating different content, and keep reminding people that they aren't here to continue perpetuating canon, but to play with it.

[ingravinoveritas]

no-paperwork replied to your post "We finally got a comment from David about what it…"

The part between parentheses makes me laugh, as if they were afraid that David might describe other kisses with Michael 😏

@no-paperwork My guess is that was more to clarify for the Guardian readers what kiss was being referred to in the question. But what's interesting to me is that GO 2 is (as far as we know) the only place Michael and David have kissed, yet the paper chose to add that in as if there were other kisses the question could be referring to. It would've been really funny if David started describing other kisses with Michael, though, but I suppose that's best kept for another interview.

Also let's not forget that this was the two of them in an interview talking about the kiss without talking about the kiss, so I don't buy that David didn't enjoy it just as much as Michael did...

[starshipsofstarlord]

Wild Thing 

This is a second part, find part one here

Pairing | James Cook x reader

Summary | the aftermath of that night not only has Cook feeling immensely heartbroken, but also furious. And you, the one that caused all that pain, are the whom he is intent of directing his feelings towards. This time however, he is not to make himself so vulnerable.

Warnings | angst, swearing, mentions of sex, shaming for sex (everyone is free to do what they want sexually and to their bodies), sex addiction.

Requested ☑️

Quick link to my masterlist, if you’re interested in reading more of my crap 😬

A fire burned in his chest, the flames reaching his face and causing a red hue to interpret the presentation of his milky skin. It was anger; he had been furious with you that night. broken by the shattering of his heart. It made him feel worthless, the way that you had just left with another bloke, abandoning him to satisfy the pity of his friends.

But you had returned to college, after your little suspension, and that amused and mischievous smile on your face riled him completely. Before if you wore it, he would want nothing more than to follow you into the nearest dark corner, and do unspeakable, yet brag worthy things with you.

However, he found himself not willing to give himself so easily away to you again. For you would do nothing more than discard him, and bend him to fulfil your insatiable lust during school hours. He knew that it wasn’t your best moment; there was shit tons of alcohol involved in your bloodstream, as there was his, but nevertheless, he saw your true colours, and had decided from then on out, that he had decided that he did not like them.

“Don’t worry about it mate, just ignore her.” Freddie was admittedly worried about his friend, albeit if he could easily annoy him and get under his skin. But nobody deserved such ignorant and hurtful treatment, after all, Freddie knew far too well of how that all felt. His relationship wit Effy was promptly messy, but he could not help but be enticed by the danger that she radiated.

“Yeah.” Cook shook his head, trying to convince himself to cool down, and listen to Freddie. “I, uh - I’ll meet you after class. Gonna go out and have a smoke, then, who fucking knows.” And thus, he walked away from his friend, heading towards the back doors that permitted him some fresh air.

Inside made him feel trapped, as though he were in a room again, surveying how you threw yourself at that stranger, willingly allowing him to grope you as you returned the favour. And then you left him, after he had made himself vulnerable to all eyes after opening up his heart.

That had been a grave mistake on his part, it was dumb idea for him to have thought of himself as anything more than another one of your toys, that you happened to throw away after one game, like a spoilt, and vindictive brat.

Everyone knew what you were like, Cook thought he had seen past the exterior that you flashed off, envisioning something deeper within you. But in the end, the only deep insight that a part of him ever had in you, was when his cock had been pounding in your pussy, that had swallowed god knows how many other dicks.

He breathed a breathy sigh, holding back his tears as he grew determined to stay strong through all that was happening. To his friends, he was the man. There was no soft side to him, and there sure as hell wasn’t supposed to be a girl that was able to break down his walls so easily.

You had made him feel weak, something he never wanted to experience again. And so he pulled out his box of cigarettes, wrapping his palm around the front so that he could light it without the wind dismissing his wishes, as you previously had done. He watched the fire balance on the end of the bud, but with a gust of wind, it disappeared, making him huff.

Nervously, you watched James from behind him, biting your lips as you silently closed the door. “Fucks sake!” He half yelled into the autumn day, throwing his useless lighter to the ground, finding it to be out of fuel, and no longer igniting the end of his fag.

“You need a light?” Your voice rang through his head like a painful echo, his shoulders wincing. He refused to turn, for he knew that taking one glimpse at your inducing face would break him all over again, and so he remained directing his eyes the opposite way, gulping before opening his gob.

“The fuck d’you want?” He spat out, shooting a droplet of saliva upon the concrete as he mindlessly dragged his shoes along the gravel. His tone made you shrink, though you continued closer, until you handed him the black encased lighter, unsurprised by how he roughly snatched it out of your hand.

He took a puff once he had brought fire to the end of his cigarette, refraining from turning from the side. “I’m a bitch.” You sighed, tugging your jacket closer around yourself, as the wind swept through your hair. Admitting you felt terrible would be a mistake, it would only set Cook off again, and that was the last thing you wanted. To make amends was your goal.

“Yeah, you are.” He agreed, carelessly throwing the s lighter sideways towards you, smirking as he heard you fumble to catch it. “Can’t even be polite about someone telling you that they care about you, all because you don’t care about yourself. You think of yourself as a rag doll that can be thrown around until the person playing with you makes you cum.”

Staring at the ground, you breathed through your nose as you really allowed the words to sink in. He wasn’t entirely wrong, pleasure was a distraction, an escape from the reality that you were forced to live in.

“I deserve that.” You nodded, finally feeling your heart stop as he turned to look at you. To say you looked different was an understatement, he hadn’t realised earlier since he was trying his utmost to avoid you, but you were dressed in baggy articles, and void of any traces of makeup. And you looked partially hungover, karma was a right bitch.

“You don’t deserve nothing.” He took another inhale of the toxins within the cigarette, trying to keep Freddie’s sense in his mind, though it was difficult to ignore you when you had sought him out to talk rather than a quick and mind fucking shag.

“Maybe.” You breathed steadily, shoving your hands in your pockets as your hidden fingers played with the lighter that he had returned. “But I messed up, and I know you understand that, because you push people away too Cook. It wasn’t my intention to hurt you, I mean, I woke up in that guy’s bed, ‘n all i could think about was you. I’ve never been so stupid.”

“Speaking to me right now is pretty stupid of you.” He retorted, releasing a tension filled scoff. “Tell me y/n did you fuck that guy? Did you allow him to run his nasty hands all over your body, did you shove his cock inside of you, using him like you use everyone?”

“You already know that answer to that.” You replied, for sure not proud of yourself. “I have a problem, I think. There’s something fucked up inside of me Cookie, and I can never say no to someone that wants to do me.” Your hands grasped the air, as tears spilled from your eyes. “I think I need help.”

“What problem y/n/n?” Cook dug in deeper, needing more of an answer. It wasn’t enjoyable to see you cry, it made his veins turn to acid, burning him from the inside out, but this was the first instance that you had been so open with him.

“I think I’m a sex addict.” The words weighed heavy on your tongue, making them feel more real as you spoke them. “The doctor said he needs to do a couple more assessments then we’ll know for sure, but I really am fucked; in both ways. I can’t stop fucking, and I’m fucked up. I’m unable to commit to anybody because of this, but that doesn’t mean that in this sickness in my mind doesn’t leave room for me to leave room about it...”

“Fuck.” James dropped his cigarette, allowing you to fall into pieces within his arms. “We’ll get through this, I’ll help you, yeah?” He stroked your hair, making you bite your lip, inwardly pushing away the dirty thoughts that sparked within your head.

“I can’t ask that of you.” Your whimpered, finally feeling safe yet pained in the worst way whilst in his embrace.

“You don’t have to ask me. I’m here.” You gulped at his words, deep down knowing that you would get again fuck up, and he would not remain by your side for the long run. If he did, then he’d be insane.

[offbrandhange]

hi! are you accepting requests? if so can i request a fic where levi and the reader are secretly seeing each other and their little interactions spark up the interest of hange, so hange tells the rest of the levi squad and they all try to find out whether theyre dating or not? thank you!!

Yes, I am!!! Tysm for this idea I had so much fun writing it!!!

𝖜𝖔𝖗𝖉 𝖈𝖔𝖚𝖓𝖙: ~1.4K

a/n -- I really hope this isn’t bad HHHHHHH

The mess hall was rowdy as always for a Friday night; all different regiments and ranks joined together—just to drunkenly blow off steam.

At the higher-ups’ table, a loud thud was heard; Hange had slammed down their beer-filled mug, laughing as they slightly splashed it on the man in front of them.

“Sorry,” They hummed cheerfully, despite knowing it was likely they would get berated for getting beer on him; He scolded them every chance he got.

Hange smiled stupidly while waiting for harsh words, but there were none. The man said nothing, his eyes completely elsewhere. He had no idea there was an ale stain on his white cravat.

“Levi?” Hange blurted in confusion, hiccuping while they did so. 

It was beyond uncommon for Levi to be spaced out and uncaring about a mess. He hated anything he deemed unclean—and he was picky about it, too. 

Hange was knowingly alarmed by their colleague’s strange behavior, and so, they curiously turned their head to see what he was staring at. 

His eyes were locked on a cadet belonging to the Scout regiment—one that Hange scarcely recognized as someone often around the Titan shifter, Eren Jaeger.

“That’s odd,” Hange murmured to themself, lifting the beer to their mouth to sip.“Wonder if this’ll work.” 

Mischievously, Hange ran their hand on the underside of the wooden table, getting a good heap of dust and dirt to stick to their palm. Afterward, Hange lifted themselves from their seat, leaned over the table, and softly flattened their hand on the top of Levi’s head; he didn’t move an inch. 

A booming “Woah,” escaped their lips, and in the typical Hange way, it caught everyone at the table’s attention—everyone except for Levi.

“Hange,” their co-worker called, a member of Levi’s squad; it was Petra. “What’s wrong?”

“He didn’t even flinch—I touched him with dusty hands!” Hange exclaimed, making dramatic gestures in disbelief. 

Petra raised an eyebrow and turned to look at Levi, who was now not only wearing a stained cravat; but also dust particles covering his usually impeccably shiny raven hair. 

Hange let out another scream in amazement; once again catching everyone’s attention—but not just those at the table. This time, the cadet noticed as well.

You began your strides over towards Levi—leaving behind your other members of the scouts. The closer you came towards him, the more his face began to change from pale to pink.

Hange watched in disbelief as you smiled at the short man, who now met your eyes with a softened gaze. 

You reached to his cravat; pinching the corner lightly to look at the stain Hange’s beer left. “Oh,” you scrunched your eyebrow. You weren’t sure why he hadn’t been freaking out over the stain.  “Do you want me to wash this for you? It’s dirty.” You asked,  pulling your hand back.

Levi’s gaze diverted from yours as his face changed from blushing pink to cherry red, practically ripping off his cravat to hand to you. “Sure.” He quickly replied.

Both Petra and Hange stared in shock. The usually strict, grumpy, short-tempered Levi was completely gone. Instead, he was now a wide-eyed, innocent virgin—who seemed to have not known what a woman was.

As you walked out of the mess hall with Levi’s cravat—to presumably wash—his focus was finally back to normal.

“What?” He growled, meeting Hange and Petra’s bewildered eyes with his violent ones.

They paused for a moment, saying nothing, until Hange deftly answered, “You got dust on your head.” 

Levi’s eyes widened, and he immediately started swatting at his head, disgusted by all the particles surrounding him.

“I need a shower.” He stated, rising from his seat, speed walking awkwardly out of the mess hall. It was clear he was very close to freaking out--grime was one of the only tame things in life that scared him.

After he left, Petra and Hange both silently sat, trying to comprehend what just happened. 

“Is Captain....dating?” Petra questioned, turning to look at Hange.

“Levi? Dating? No way.” Hange answered, not completely convinced of their own conviction.

There was another long silence between Petra and Hange—and then Hange opened their mouth to speak.

“We’re definitely investigating, right?” 

“What? Isn’t that an invasion of his privacy? I don’t think he would like it—“ Petra pleaded, but it was to no avail—Hange had already risen from their seat.

“Get the rest of Levi squad, then meet me outside of his office.” 

Petra sighed as she watched Hange leave the room; She was not too keen on snooping in on Levi’s personal life—mostly because she valued his opinion of her—and did not want to lose his trust. 

Hange, however, was giggling to themselves, bouncing as they walked to Levi’s office. 

The walk didn’t take long, since his room was relatively close to the mess hall; but picking the lock certainly would. Once they arrived at Levi’s door, Hange pulled a hairpin from the bird’s nest that rested atop their head—poking and prodding at the lock best as they could. 

When the lock had broken, Hange turned to see that Petra and the rest of the Levi squad were standing beside them.

“Good, you’re here.”

“Is Captain Levi really dating? He doesn’t seem like the type to get involved with others.” Eld questioned.

Oluo scoffed before he replied. “Of course not—he’s way too busy.” 

Petra rolled her eyes. “Like you’d know.”

“Of course I would—are you implying I don’t know what it’s like to be busy? My kill count—“ Oluo stopped, accidentally biting his tongue.

Gunther just sighed and made his way into the room; the rest following along. 

Hange and the Levi squad searched for what seemed like forever; they looked for anything they could find—a love letter, gifts, anything out of the ordinary that their Captain would not normally have—but they found nothing.

Eventually, Gunther sighed and slammed the desk drawer shut. “This is pointless.”

“And an invasion of privacy,” Petra added, sounding slightly annoyed.

Hange was starting to tire themselves—pushing up their glasses and rubbing their eyes, they spoke. “Fine, let’s call it a night; we can try and pair them up tomorrow during training and see then.” 

Everyone left the room, dragging their feet. Their mission failed, and everyone was beyond tired; They certainly weren’t going to stay up any later than they already had.

Goodbyes were exchanged, and they headed their separate ways; Hange specifically towards their dorm. 

And that’s when they turned the corner—and saw Levi talking with you in the deserted hall.

Hange hid, pushing their glasses back down to see clearer. Excited, they screamed internally.

Levi stood with the straightest posture possible; you could tell he was nervous. His hair was pushed back out of his face, still wet from his shower, with a towel draped around his neck. 

You handed him his cravat, teasing him for getting it dirty. It was exactly what you expected to see from two lovers.

Once you leaned in to kiss Levi on the cheek, Hange jumped out from the corner, revealing themselves.

“HOLY SHIT! YOU ARE DATING!” Hange screamed, standing strangely, pointing at you and Levi.

The short man went flying as he threw himself away from you—he was now flat against the wall, with an expression that mimicked a frightened cat.

Slightly spooked yourself, you turned to look at Hange. “Oh. Squad Leader Hange.” 

 “ARE YOU DATING?” Hange screamed down the hall—you could hear an angry cadet in their room yell back, “shut up.”

Levi peeled himself off the wall, walking down towards Hange angrily—you followed.

“What is this.” He sneered, glaring at his colleague.

“ARE. YOU. DATING.” Hange repeated, putting a lengthy amount of space between their words.

Levi turned bright pink again—and said nothing. Annoyed, you sighed and spoke for him. “Yes, we are.”

“HOLY SHIT!” Hange yelled, dragging out the o.

“Keep your mouth shut, four eyes.” Levi spat, returning to his typical grumpy demeanor.

You pat him on the shoulder, resting your hand there to represent a small, “be nice.” His face grew even more in color; instantly melting at your touch.

“Don’t go around telling people,” you said, trying to clarify what he meant. “I don’t want others to think I’m getting special privileges.”

Hange sucked in a long breath, trying to calm themselves. “Sure, sure, yep, yep, yep. I got you.” They smiled politely, beginning to walk off.

You and Levi watched as they turned to corner—and all of a sudden you heard them scream.

“PETRA!” 

Levi charged after Hange—and you muttered to yourself, “oh my god” before following along.

It was going to be a long night.

[tigerdrop]

in lieu of doing more strenuous hand-based activities heres the Dogboy Gordon In Heat Megamix ive been talking about. i wrote this over the course of a couple months in an effort to feel okay about writing horny shit again and i only just realized there are nearly 6 thousand words here. and they only really fuck for like 10% of that

ta-dah

ive thought a lot about gordon being stuck back at gordonhouse after getting kicked out of barneyhouse. i think its ripe for a lot of pining. (and yes, he is pining over the guy hes actively banging. hes being a big mopey idiot over the fact that he doesnt get to have his fuckbuddy around 24/7.) absence makes the heart grow fonder or whatever and gordons already at a baseline of "wheres benrey. wheres benrey"......and now i am about to turn it up to 11

so lets say......gordons starting to feel weirdly under the weather. sweaty and irritable and tired. hes holing himself up in his room a lot, wrapping himself up in blankets to fight off a chill and a sniffliness that wont go away. and hes gettin awfully moody, too. real fuckin testy. starting shit with freemind for no reason and snapping at og gordon like hes a teenager. and......hes nesting, almost, or at least, gathering up a whole bunch of blankets and pillows and anything that smells vaguely like benrey. (hes not really aware hes doing this last thing.)

basically, long story short, feetman is fucked up. hes pathetic. hes being a huge bitch. at least og gordon feels vaguely sorry for him, and expresses this by way of observing him and trying to treat it. for science. its better than freemind, who just loudly complains about him being a huge bitch and reeking up the place. theres something weird coming from vr gordons corner of the house.....a musky, heady, hormonal kind of thing that makes freemind act simultaneously territorial and irritable and more lascivious than normal. and that also piques og gordons attention, because having both of them be wound up little freaks at the same time is enough to make even the most resilient person pull their hair out

now gordon primes got his suspicions as to whats going on, but hes not gonna tell vr gordon that he suspects hes going into heat. that would compromise the experiment, and all that. so poor gordons just going thru all this shit not knowing what in the fuck is wrong with him and getting more worked up and irritable about it by the day. hes convinced that hes just got the flu, or something......except, uh, haha, jesus christ he is horny all the FUCKING TIME

he doesnt get it! he feels like shit all the time, so why is he constantly fighting off boners and having weird wet dreams and thinking about-- well. his fucking boyfriend, he guesses. (are they boyfriends?? he doesnt know. he gets a weird, sharp pang when he thinks about them not being boyfriends, at this point, but its not like theyve ever talked about it!) gordons half-convinced that hes just losing his mind from being stuck inside all the time and he really just wants to see benrey again. its, like, all he thinks about. (see? hes losing it. theres the proof.)

the sucks thing for everybody else is that gordon is also Extremely Vocal about how shitty he feels and how much he wishes he didnt feel shitty so he could go see benrey and how much he cant stand benrey for not being able to read his mind and come over when he feels bad. eventually freemind gets so sick of his shit that he decides to cut out the middleman and get benrey involved directly. "come take care of your fucking dog before i call the aspca! animal neglect is a crime, asshole!"

(if pressed, freemind would adamantly reject the idea that hes being nice to gordon. but on some level, hes kinda sympathetic. the guys clearly miserable, and he just keeps asking for the same fucking thing. might as well humor him to shut him up.)

vr gordon is completely unaware of these machinations, however. hes just holed up in his room trying to work out what makes him feel better because, uhh, powerade isnt helping

jacking off doesnt do a whole lot for him anymore. like, it feels good, but its not very satisfying. gordon just ends up feeling more restless than anything afterward. and hes always stupid horny. more blankets. a box fan. less blankets. sleeping with one of benreys shirts pressed up to his face. grinding into his pillow when he wakes up hard from yet another weird dream. theyre all a little helpful, and he feels like hes working towards the right thing, somehow, but its never really enough to take the edge off

and then.....he tries......jerking off more. especially when he realizes that its bizarrely soothing to do so while he can smell benrey up close and personal on that stupid shirt of his. better still when he rolls onto his side.....and then his stomach.......rocking his hips into the mattress until he gets the idea to lift his hips a little. and......oh. cool. something kind of......clicks. in his head. as he raises his hips higher while he keeps his arms wrapped around a pillow and benreys shirt jammed against his nose. hes got that lil moment of realization that this is good, actually. this feels like a good move. and its making some of that discomfort melt away

and gordon thinks about.....how it felt. earlier. when they were with barmey. and benrey had him just like this, ass up, face down, and was spreading him apart and licking him open and making him submit and he groans so fucking hard that embarassment just rips through him like lightning. but his tail starting to wag a little faster.....electricity shooting through his belly......and he cant help but wonder. what if benrey had kept going? pulled back and-- maybe, replaced his tongue with his fingers, one at a time, curling them inside him and telling him how well hes behaving and-- and his dick throbs, hard, and gordon realizes he wants fingers inside of himself right fucking now, thank you, hes not fully certain how to accomplish it be he is going to fucking try

(sigh) so my guy figures out about the old fingers in the ass trick. and i need you to understand that i am fully convinced that this is one of those guys who has an uproarious reaction to getting fingers in his ass. mr repressed and uptight over here doesnt really get what the big deal is until he gets braver and pushes a little deeper and hes rock hard in an instant, goodbye, just like everybodys favorite creative writing exercise

and this is what he decides to do for a solid day or two without leaving his room, because, honestly, this is awesome. and the longer he spends jerking off the less time he spends stressing about the fact that his imaginations getting really vivid, here. sure, like, hes no stranger to weird dreams even before this, but this is the first time hes really letting his mind run wild and this dude is nonstop thinking about being bred and gordon still has no fucking idea that hes in heat. doesnt even occur to him

unfortunately this also does not solve his problems but at least it feels baller and it keeps him occupied. also, unfortunately, the increased rate of jerking off is causing a serious uptick in Dog Smells, the effect of which is turning freemind into a nightmare. its just not good vibes in this house. enter: benrey

now i need you to understand that when these two meet up again i want gordon to get Emotional. think about how genuinely excited he gets to see some of his pals in canon. the like......excitement and disbelief when benrey shows up outside his window throwing rocks at it before noclipping in. he forgets to even act pissed off at first. i think it would be super fucking cute for him to drop the game for a moment just out of shock, basically. his tails waggin, his ears are perked up, and hed probably tackle benrey to the ground if he wasnt also a sweaty, trembling mess whos been holed up in his room for days.

and benrey has No Fucking Idea what he has walked in on here. as far as benrey knows, freemind just demanded he get over there and take care of his dog.

(INTERLUDE: here is the part where i gin up a freemind POV of this exact scene. b/c i am out of my fucking mind

so. i had the thought of a freemind POV chapter where hes spying on gordon and benrey.....because. gordons in heat. ive talked about that scenario before too (literally so many FUCKING times okay i just need this dude to have the uncontrollable urge to be bred like a little bitch! and for benrey to take pity on him and make him feel better by nutting in him literally as many times as is physically possible!!!)

but i wanna manifest it in this specific way: from an outside perspective. voyeurism is great and also i have a one track mind and basically the only time i traffic in Other Guys in this fandom anymore is as a participant in gordon and benreys horse shit. Im not apologizing for this

lets say.....vr gordons behavior has been getting worse and worse for "unknown reasons" and freeman prime just sees it as a key observational opportunity for his research. while freeminds getting really irritated at how much its cutting into his normal way of life. for one thing, vr gordons room reeks, and he cant even escape it in his own room! and its turning him into a feisty, aggressive, and loud son of a bitch. but he cant even resolve it in his usual fashion at this point (baiting vr gordon into another competition/fuckfest) b/c gordons being a little sadsack holed up in his room and doesnt wanna play

but also.....he kinda just feels bad for the guy at a certain point. hes clearly really miserable and looks downright ill and all hes asking for is to see his boytoy again. (gordons convinced that hes dying, and feels the need to dramatically speak to benrey one last time before he croaks.) so freemind decides, in all his benevolence, to go over gordon primes head and drag the guy over there anyway. (with machinations, not his literal bare hands. what is he, a caveman?) he reasons that itll be a good opportunity to twist gordons arm into groveling at his feet later

and he spies on the two of them in gordons room.....why? idk. possibly something to do with investigating this relationship between a gordon and a barney that he had yet to fully analyze. tl;dr he gets trapped in their closet for a remix of that one barmey voyeurism chapter b/c why the fuck not

i just.....i dont know.....i think theres something really charming about a 3rd party not being able to fully make out what theyre saying or doing but piecing things together anyway.....like benreys weirdly soft tone of voice when hes talking to a super agitated gordon. as far as any of them know, hes not really like that. he either sounds bored or smug, but either way, its usually straight-up antagonistic

it would make freemind bristle to hear it b/c its almost a mocking tone, but.....it makes gordons shoulders drop and gets him to let go of some of that tension and thats probably fascinating to watch. literally soothing him like a stressed out dog, huh. smoothing back his hair and murmuring things in a low, even tone that freeminds enhanced hearing still isnt good enough to make out. (the guy mumbles, okay? he needs a fucking toastmasters meetup.)

it would equal parts horrify and fascinate freemind, in my onion. watching a version of himself fall that hard into the loyal pet role.....its pathetic! for all that gordon goes on about not being a slave to his instinct or whatever, he sure is doing a bad job of acting like it! its like watching himself, but worse.

and benreys having to soothe him like a startled animal b/c he doesnt even know whats wrong with himself, but theres something thick enough on the air that even benrey can smell it, and hes taking some stabs at the dark. especially with how charged some of the shit gordons saying is......"i cant fucking take it anymore", "you smell so good", "i dont know whats wrong with me, man, my dick hasnt gone down for days and im pretty sure i need a doctor-- no, a real one, not the other gor-- NOT a vet, JESUS"

and the whole time.....freeminds peeking from behind a closet door. watching them devolve from outright hostility into "gordon climbing into benreys lap and shoving one of benreys hands up his shirt and demanding that he fucking touch him already"

normally i dont think freemind would be averse to a little bit of voyeurism, here. if it was anybody else, hed probably at least engage in a little heavy petting. but this is getting weird, man. he cant shake the uncanny feeling that this is something too intimate for him to be watching. for one thing, gordons whimpering like a goddamn dog just from a little necking, and for two, hes never really been the kind of guy to watch people make out for 15 minutes before they get to the good stuff

its just kind of unsettling how much these two clearly really, really like each other at this point. its not like watching gordon prime give vr gordon a handjob as part of a "test". freemind expected more of a hatefuck kind of deal out of these two, what with how often gordons normally going on about how much he hates the guy, what a pain in the ass benrey is, how he just wishes benrey would stop jerking him around.....etc. freemind could shit himself right now. that lying bitch!

i imagine its also kind of painful, on a personal level, for him to watch this borderline-sappy shit. he cant even fathom being on the receiving end of that behavior, let alone from......well. theyve all got their barneys, right? and gordon primes basically doomed himself to incel status b/c he wont nut up and do anything about it. freemind just assumed they were all in the same boat: cursed to casual sex with their roommates/clones, forever, and unable to achieve any kind of intimacy b/c all 3 gordons are fucked up in the exact same way. since theyre all just diff flavors of the same fucking guy, right?

well, theres the evidence that hes wrong. and that vr gordons better than him, somehow. thats gotta suck, bro

anyway then he watches vr gordon get railed in the ass a bunch and jerks off anyway b/c its still hot. see ya)

“take care of your dog”. huh. hes got no clue what that means but, yknow, he does kinda miss his dog. hasnt seen gordon in awhile. and he immediately comments "wow. you look fucked up" in as blunt and unsympathetic a way as possible. but gordons so far gone that he cant even work up a good anger about it. he is pretty fucked up, man. and benrey sits on the bed and slaps his forehead with a palm to take his temperature (and that gets gordon to bitch at him, finally, that thats not how you do it, asshole) and judges that, uh, he is hot. in his expert opinion

and thats when gordon kinda grabs his sleeve and tugs it and starts tryin to say something. hes really bad at it, because he is having to perform the mortifying task of Owning Up To It, but eventually he manages to grind out that he needs benrey to touch him, please. just pet him. something. he feels really bad and he just needs benrey to scratch his fucking ears. this is the most gordon can cop to in one go, and it is such a sad struggle to watch, but benreys caught off guard by it and he feels weirdly bad for gordon upon hearing it so  hes just like "whoa, okay" when gordon tugs his hand to his head

gordon groans the moment his fingernails start scratching behind the ears and digging into his scalp. even just that much feels really fucking good. its comforting, for one thing, and its benrey, for another, and the physical touch feels so fucking good right now that goosebumps are crawling down his neck. gordon cant help but lean against benrey and bury his head in the crook of his shoulder. he wants to hide his face from scrutiny and he wants to get closer but he doesnt know how to say what his fucking problem is

and benreys weirdly quiet. just kinda mumbling and shushing him intermittently, awkward and not sure what to do b/c this is a level of intimacy he was not expecting but gordons sure is responding nicely to a second hand in his hair

so having both of benreys hands scratching at his scalp is really getting to gordon. hes scritchin behind the ears and gordons tails wagging at a mile a minute. the feelings making goosebumps race down his neck and arms. he starts kind of mumbling something into benreys shoulder, how hes been feeling so fucked up lately, and he squirms a little closer. hes not really aiming for anywhere in particular but every neuron thats firing in him right now is telling him to get closer. make contact. he missed the fucking guy, what can he say.

and one of benreys hands......slips down to gordons face. his jaw. a thumb pushing into that soft little divot between his jaw and neck, like hes trying to push up into gordons fucking teeth. its weird and bizarrely intrusive, but benreys hand is broad and warm and gordon leans into it anyway, groaning with relief. its not like its not doing anything for him. kind of the opposite, actually. then he palms at gordons neck, and gordon starts breathing harder. he can feel his heartbeat rabbit-fast, pushing against benreys skin (and theres no way benrey isnt feeling that, too).

benrey eyes are lidded and his breaths starting to get heavier, too. naturally, yknow, since gordons practically draped over him right now, melting all the more the longer benrey keeps petting him. oxytocin is crazy, man, especially when a guys in the full throes of some kind of chemical meltdown of the glands. gordons eyes are screwed shut, tail thumping furiously against the bed, and hes panting at benreys neck like hes a fucking dog.  he just doesnt know how to articulate what the fuck his problem is

benrey smells insanely good to him right now, and gordon just blurts that out. benrey gives him some shit for it, but when gordon only makes a weird noise in response and fists his hands in benreys hoodie, it makes him shut up real quick. hes squeezing out words about feeling like he needs something, but its clearly a fucking effort. its almost pitiful

so. gordons crawled right into benreys lap, too impatient after days and days of feeling like this (you know, being in heat, in so many words). hes been pounding off like crazy, that brand new collar of his strapped to his neck nearly every time b/c hes that desperate to feel… well. *benrey*. he cant fucking jerk off to thoughts of anything else - porn doesnt do it for him, and his fantasies slip right back to the same thing every single time. its frustrating! hes bisexual, for gods sake! its not like hes normally immune to the wiles of the Phat Ass White Girl, but lately he just keeps ending up on his hands and knees and whining benreys name into his pillow and he couldnt focus on a girls rack if he tried

point being. hes being awfully fucking demanding. (and also, hes wearing the collar *right fucking now)*. he shoves benreys hand up his shirt and shivers the moment he makes contact with gordons burning-hot flesh. and hes demanding that benrey touch him already, jesus, hes losing his mind! and benreys just crooning at him, “bossy, huh,” but hes scritching gordons ears and palming at his side and nosing at gordons neck and gordon starts to feel like hes melting into it. his protests at being talked down to are perfunctory at best

benrey licks a stripe up gordons neck and starts muttering his stupid horseshit right in gordons ear and it makes gordon clutch his shoulders so tight, claws digging into the meat of him. benreys kind of into it, though, and it just makes him laugh, low and harsh and right in gordons ear. that just makes gordons problem worse. he lets out quiet, nasal whines on every exhale, like a literal fucking dog.

he starts teasing, like, “haha, you’re *gagging* for it, bro,” but gordon doesnt respond with the defensiveness he expects. instead, its like opening a floodgate - he is, hes fucking *desperate*, okay, his dick hasnt gone down in days and he wants benrey so bad he cant see straight and he cant stop thinking about him and all of this comes tumbling out of him at once. gordons trying to press himself as close to benrey as he can physically get, legs straddling benreys lap and arms clutched tight around his back. and when benrey prods a little more, tells gordon to say what hes been thinkin about, gordon starts to pant, squeezing his eyes shut. but he cant bring himself to do anything more than choke and stutter on the words

hes half-hard in his underwear already (and, lets be be clear, he was only in boxer briefs and a tank top to begin with. hes sweating buckets and its the least amount of clothing he could get away with wearing around the house) and his tails thumping a mile a minute and hes so far gone, just from benrey talking down to him and kissing his neck and scratching his ears. but hes not budging yet, so benrey slides that hand on his ears over to his ponytail and *yanks*. tells him, “speak.” gordons dick twitches rapidly, and he lets out a sharp sound, and he finally says it: he needs benrey to *fuck* him, jesus

benrey lets out a harsh breath at that. “yeah? thats what puppy wants?” and the nickname should blister him, make him feel to embarrassed to continue, but gordons too desperate to care. he just starts spewing a litany of “god yes”s and “please”s. hes getting harder and harder, pressed up against benreys belly, and benrey can *feel* it. “good boy,” he mutters, and those claws dig harder, that panting gets louder and harsher

he slips a hand around to gordons back, rubbing slowly for a moment as if to soothe him, and then slides it under the back of gordons boxers. and lower still. starts rubbing at gordons hole. that gets a quiet “oh god” out of gordon.

gordon cant help himself - he rocks forward against benrey, just a little, rubbing his bulge against what he realizes is benreys *extremely* hard dick in his sweatpants. hes not the only one whos got it bad. but he *is* the only one whispering, “fuck, fuck, fuck,” as benrey pushes a little further, makes as if hes about to breach gordon dry. the poor guys so needy that he probably wouldnt even argue!

but benrey just stares at him, wide eyed and flushed, mouth hanging open a little. gordons so hot for this that it surprises the both of them.

anyway after some boring position finagling benrey coaxes gordon onto his hands and knees, running a broad hand down gordons shaking back. and he pulls back gordons tail, exposing him. its so fucking humiliating - gordons got his face buried in a pillow, and his ass in the air, and hes never felt so *vulnerable* before. he wants to argue, he wants to lift his head and look back to make sure that everythings, like, okay back there - benreys staring at his entire asshole, okay, and he wasnt exactly anticipating benrey making a house call to fuck him in the ass - but every time he lifts his head, or starts to say something neurotic about it, benrey chides him about it. clicks his tongue. tells him, “hey. dogs dont talk” or “i said *bow*, bro”.

for all his insisting that hes a real guy, that hes not just a dog, gordons feeling less and less like a human and more like something in thrall to his instincts. the condescension rankles like it always does, but doing what benrey tells him to feels good. feels natural. presenting himself like this feels like what hes *supposed* to do. it doesnt stop him from running his mouth entirely, but it helps to mitigate some of the embarrassment.

and then… benrey *licks*. gordon tenses and gasps. he doesnt know how benrey can stand it, its gotta be, like, unhygienic! but that didnt scare him off the last time they tried this, and its not like gordon hasnt thought about it since. hes thought about it a lot, actually. but hes been too neurotic to ask for it. benreys not stupid, though. hes a good dog owner (at least, so he thinks) and hes gonna take care of his dog. so he licks again, and again, pressing a little harder against gordons hole on each pass with the broad side of his tongue until he dares to breach it with the tip.

gordons rock hard again in an instant. his dick hangs between his legs and drips onto the sheets. he digs his fingers into the pillow now, tearing holes in its surface with those sharp nails of his, and he makes embarrassingly high noises that he muffles into into the pillow, too. hes tense, hes so fucking tense, he should be clamping down and making benreys task really fucking hard, but theres bright pink sweet voice dripping from his hole and benreys rubbing the side of his thigh in an effort to soothe him and both of these things work in tandem to get him to relax. and benrey works his tongue in further, further than a human ought to.

the tip was one thing, but it gets wider as benrey pushes it in, and its just as good as it was before - better, even, because now its just the two of them, just a master and his dog, and benreys the only one he wants to see him like this. bent over and whimpering. he cant— he cant stomach the thought of anybody else doing this to him. hell, there was a point once where the idea of stomaching *benrey* doing this to him would have made him laugh. but here he is. benreys fucking him open with his tongue and pressing against something thats making him see stars and gordon just wants *more*. he says it so sweet, too, voice growing hoarse and raw as he begs benrey to just fucking do it already, he doesnt wanna come like this!

gordon gets so worked up and emotional about it that benrey takes the time to scratch behind his ears again, shushing him and telling him to chill. benreys got him. hes been a good dog, and good dogs get treats. hearing the words “good dog” makes gordons entire body flush. thats all he wants, really. he wants to be a good dog. he wants to be *told*. he blurts out, “oh my god— say it again,” and benreys like, “huh? say what? youre gonna have to be more specific,” clicking the last syllable. it makes all the hairs on gordons head rise and prickle with shame. the best he can do is mumble it into his pillow.

benrey hears it, though, and tugs at gordons collar from behind, just enough to raise his head. “whassat? you want me to call you a good boy?” gordon cant bring himself to answer that directly, but his stupid body betrays him by making him whine. jesus christ, yes, thats all he WANTS! he needs benrey to be good and nice to him for once in his fucking life and give him what he wants instead of taking, taking, taking! but benrey just tells him that hes gonna have to earn it. gonna have to be *real* good for him. gordon could fucking snarl at that, but benreys pulling back to rub his dick between gordons cheeks and against his hole and that shuts him up pretty fast because hes *so close* to getting what he wants and hes not about to fuck it up now by running his big dumb mouth

and then… he starts to push in. that sweet voice has loosened gordon up enough to take even benrey, who, uh, is definitely the bigger of the two, in that regard. he goes slow, uncharacteristically so, and gordons chest heaves with the force of how hard hes breathing. a quiet string of “oh god”s spills out of him as he tries to crane his neck back to watch. the head breaches him with a strange popping sensation, and benrey groans, loud, as the rest of him slides in with little resistance in comparison. “good,” he pants in turn, “youre takin it so good,” and—

and gordon comes, in weak, aborted spurts. it snuck up on him. he clenches so fucking tightly that it winds benrey a little. he breathes out, “whoa. did you—” but gordon just begs him to shut up, keep going, hes not— hes not done yet, its always like this, its not *enough*. his dick barely even flags afterward, it just hangs there, achingly hard and dripping with cum. benrey cant even find it in himself to make fun of him. he wants it so fucking bad, doesnt he? and he feels so good, so fucking tight and slick around benrey that the only thought running through his head is “gotta take care of my dog gotta fuck my best friend gotta nut in him and make him howl”. so he pushes himself alllll the way in until theyre pressed together, skin to skin.

then he starts to move. slow, careful thrusts, more for benreys benefit than gordons. if hes not careful, hes gonna blow his load, right then and there, and hes trying to make it good for gordon, too, okay? unlike *some* of them, hes not gonna bust in two minutes and then spend the next half hour crying and trauma-dumping to the guy hes still got his dick inside of.

once he thinks hes got a grip, though, benrey starts fucking him in earnest, and that changes gordons vocalizations from weak little whimpers into something louder. less restrained. hes given up any pretense of being quiet so that his other selves dont hear that hes snuck his boytoy into his room. just loud, wordless moans on each thrust, initially muffled into the pillow but soon spilling into the wider room when he turns his head to catch his breath. the only words hes managing are “oh god” and “please” and “benrey, benrey, *benrey*”, and benrey just responds to him like, “yeah? thats good? fuuuck, bro, so good for me,” all short of breath and barely able to speak himself

he wants to see gordons face. he *needs* to see gordons face. needs to see what hes doing to him, needs to see that cute fuckin blush of his. so he tugs on gordons collar again, bringing him to his hands and knees properly instead of that bowing position. and then further still - pulls him back so that benreys on his knees, and gordons on his knees in turn, on his lap, cock still buried inside of him and fucking him in short, hurried thrusts. “paws up,” benrey tells him, and gordon does it. instantly. no resistance. just folds them at his chest like a real dog would.

“whos a good boy?” benrey croons, right in his ear again. gordon gasps, “i-i am!”

“yeah? youre a good boy?” nod, wail. “whose— whose good boy are you?”

and gordon chokes on his response. he cant say it, he *cant*, he doesnt want to be benreys but he does, he *does*. he doesnt want to be benreys because its not fucking fair! he cares so fucking much! so much more than benrey does, it feels like, obsessing over the guy like hes wrapped thorny vines all around gordons heart and he cant so much as shift in his seat without feeling the tug and the ache and thinking of benrey again. and benrey doesnt care, he never fucking cares, except—

except he showed up at gordons house, in his room. without even being asked. like he knew something was wrong. and he— hes always talking to gordon, shooting him stupid texts just to make him laugh. scheduling *date nights* for them. date nights where, yeah, maybe they couldnt see each other in person, and maybe they always end in some kind of depraved sexual act, but its not like gordons not into it. hes frighteningly into it, actually. and hes *so* into hearing benreys voice, low and crooning, right in his ear, and seeing him lean on an elbow and smile at him afterward. its— its practically genuine. and benreys always making excuses to talk with him, do things with him, watch stupid fucking movies that only gordon cares about and stream with him on twitch to help boost his subscriber count and—

and—

oh god. maybe he *does* care. that might be more terrifying than the alternative.

then benrey yanks the collar again. presses the whole of gordons back against his front in one hot, unbroken line. and asks, “i said, whose good boy are you, bro? *speak.*”

“benrey,” he blurts out, a ragged moan, “d-dont make me sa-AY it, oh god—”

“no?” benrey stills suddenly. his hands keep gordon stuck in place, unable to move or bounce or feel benrey shift inside of him. “thats, uh… thats too bad, friend. this trains for good boys only. good dogs go to heaven 2. no bad dogs allowed. gonna have to, uhh, escort you off—”

“im not a bad dog!”

“i dunno, gordo. bein’ kind of, uh… disobedient.”

(sorry. thats all i got . byeeee)

[tetsurobunni]

Blindsided

☞ atsumu miya x reader drabble (maybe intro to fic? who knows)

☼ frenemies? bickering=flirting, atsumu being a little shit

☼ i definitely wrote this just so i could make atsumu completely whipped; also, the word fuck is used flippantly, sue me

atsumu doesn't know when it happens, but it does.

“it” meaning the absolutely fucking confusing feelings contradicting his day-to-day life.

okay, that might be a little overdramatic, but cut him some slack. he hadn’t had feelings like this since kita shinsuke patted his cheek after a match at age 14. considering that was before atsumu even knew “bisexual” existed, having those same feelings at age 22 was slightly fucking concerning.

especially since they were about you.

one second it's flirtatious banter to annoy the living hell out of you like he does with everyone else. the next, he's tripping over his tongue because of your damn hand held to his forehead.

sure, it's been a few months since shoyo had introduced him to "one of his best friends from high school" and time flies quickly blah blah blah...

but what the fuck happened?

you two didn't mesh. didn't flow, didn't...whatever people that are made for each other do. he flirted. you rolled your eyes. he picked at you. you picked at him. sometimes there were even inanimate flying objects involved-but never feelings.

"miya. are you listening to me?" shit. he had completely zoned out. "of course i am, but ya got it wrong. m'fine." you didn't look so convinced, so he threw on a smirk, held his left pinky out, and said, "pinky promise?" que your infamous eye roll. he swears one day those pretty eyes of yours are going to get stuck.

"pretty eyes?"

atsumu not-so-gracefully chokes on his water, glaring daggers at your hand that patted his back lightly. clearing his throat and acting like he hadn't just almost hacked up a lung, he turned towards you with glamourous fluency and said, "what?"

oh my god.

he mentally bashed his head against the nearest wall as you burst into full-body laughter, your smile so wide it closed your eyes, hair falling over your forehead, cheeks a bright rosy-red.

atsumu forgot what he was supposed to be embarrassed about.

“earth to miyaaa, hellooo miya atsumu,” he broke out of the trance he was in, immediately coming to the horrifying realization that he was fucking staring at you, “anyone in there?”

he rolled his eyes (definitely not because he could feel his body temperature rise even more from your direct eye contact), scooched lower on his bed, and promptly covered his head underneath the comforter.

he heard your muffled chuckle from under the thick duvet. the bed dipped beside his left hip and he let the thought of you sitting there soak into his brain all the while blatantly ignoring the stirring in his chest.

“i didn’t really upset you…did i? i know you’re sick, i shouldn’t have been so…so,” you trailed off allowing atsumu to finish your sentence with a garbled “annoyin’?”

you laughed, saying, “nah, i’m never annoying, miya. just should have known you’d be a little more sensitive right now.”

that was all it took for him to shove the comforter down to his chin, eyes set in a glare and a middle finger just barely visible from the small opening he’d created.

he glowered at your inability to hold in the bubble of laughter, and even more when you had to cover your mouth with your hand when the smile stretched too far. “oh, please spare me tha’ court’sy,” atsumu grumbled, grabbing the edge of the comforter to yet again hide himself from more embarrassment.

“no-no look, look, i’m sorry, i am, but you were pouting, like a cute little puppy dog and i couldn’t help myself-“

“‘ya think i’m cute?” he hadn’t meant to say that out loud, but what the hell.

and, well, he might be running a fever, and the only light on in the room is coming from a dim lightbulb that he keeps forgetting to change, but atsumu could have sworn to tokyo and back that you were blushing.

“aww now look at ‘ya, yer blushin’”

the absolutely offended look on your face would have made anyone else delve into apologies, but not atsumu. he reveled in getting this reaction out of you.

“i am absolutely not blushing, miya.”

“sure ‘ya aren’t”

“i’m not”

“oookay…”

“you’re delusional”

“says tha’ one who called me cute”

“you complimented me first!”

“did not”

“did too”

“now yer the delusional one now, sweetheart” he bit back a smirk, watching as you rolled your eyes for the thousandth time tonight. at that same time, he watched as those same eyes widened, signaling to every nerve in his brain that you had come up with an idea.

and boy, was he right.

just a beat of silence had passed between the bickering, but somewhere in those brief few seconds, you had shifted your position from the side of the bed to laying your arms directly across atsumu’s chest, just inches away from his face.

‘m gonna die.

he screamed internally at his heart, telling it to slow the fuck down because you were right there and could feel, hell, probably hear the hammering beats of his heart. it couldn’t get any worse than this. this was horrible-

and, right on que, in non-mistakable y/n fashion, you made the situation worse.

he watched as you looked at him through your eyelashes, barely fluttering them, while ever-so-slightly pulling your bottom lip between your teeth. at that, he felt his soul promptly leave his body right there.

“c’mon, atsumu, are you sure you don’t think my eyes are pretty?”

july 10th, 6:04 p.m. 22 years old.

cause of death: tripping headfirst into a pit of snakes: aka: atsumu miya coming to the realization that he is absolutely totally fucking whipped.

and he didn’t even see it coming.

[nevertheless-moving]

Suicidal Misunderstanding X

Star Wars Time Travel AU #27

Part I - - - - - Part II - - - - - Part III - - - - - Part IV - - - - - Part V - - -  - - Part VI - - - - - Part VII - - - - - Part VIII - - - - - Part IX

“I realize this is incredibly difficult,” the Nautolan Soul Healer said calmly. “But in order for us to help Obi-Wan, we need to determine the cause of his current disconnection with reality. Based on the drug panel, and convenient surveillance, we have, to the best of our ability, ruled out temporary psychosis brought on by a drug interaction.”

Cody stiffened further, not sure how to react to anything anymore. When a brother tried to end his own life, it was usually obvious why.

Sife Aerdo continued on. “There have, of course, been cases of Jedi Seers giveing into their fears of the future, or losing their sense of reality, but every case study involving such an extreme reaction was the result a gradual degradation over the course of many years. Nevertheless, it seems clear that Obi-Wan experienced a vision, and it may have impacted his breakdown to some extent. The more we know, the more successful any attempts to convince him of reality will be.”

Bant furrowed her brow in thought, trying to replay three decades of increasingly vague discussions of nightmares.

”Considering the high profile nature of his position, we cannot rule out some kind of psychological attack, perhaps even a darksider incursion.

Anakin leaned forward intently, the inside of his skull buzzing with white noise.

"All that being said, we must be prepared to treat Obi-Wan’s self harm as the  culmination of a long and quiet mental health struggle. He would not be the first in the Order to disguise such a thing with durasteel self-discipline.”

At that, Bant and Mace took a moment to release their feelings to the force, while Anakin raised his shields defensively.

Master Aerdo finally hesitated, before continuing in the same smooth tone. “I would ordinarily prefer to structure this kind of conversation quite differently- allow Obi-Wan time to share his feelings first and invite you each separately to support him in the healing process. But he’s gone from fighting sedatives and force compulsions as though the fate of the galaxy depended on it, to a self-induced coma. All while barely lucid, yet still somehow maintaining Master Class mental shielding. We need to get a better understanding of his mental landscape if we’re going to even begin the process of treatment."

It is necessary to note that everyone in that room had led, in one way or another, a somewhat miserable life. This was the main reason none of them could claim that the next five hours were the worst they had ever experienced. 

“But he’s always had terrible sleeping habits.” Anakin said hoarsely.

“Yes, but I think they got worse after Qui-Gon passed,” Bant argued, not sure what point she was making. 

“When I pointed out he couldn’t be getting more than three hours a night he told me that he could manage on meditation” Cody offered irritably.

“That’s technically true,” Mace confirmed. “If the Master in question is well-balanced otherwise���

“So its like his eating habits, crushing responsibilities, and repeated exposure to violence, then? Completely fine for a Jedi, in less it’s not, in which case it’s a major red flag?” 

“I think it would help to establish a timeline.“

Aerdo actually dredged up old mission reports, leading to the group reluctantly contacting Ashoka for her memories of Mortis.

At her Master’s insistence, she told them everything she remembered, hazy as it was, nervously elaborating on her own memories of falling. To her confusion, Master Windu all but brushed past that, assuring her that the important thing with stepping into darkness was the choice to the return to the light. Anakin bizarrely agreed with Windu. Out loud. Unnerved by the cooperation more than anything, she put her holographic foot down and demanded to know what was going on. 

Anakin took the comm-link into a separate room to speak privately.

Upon return, he informed the group (with a visibly red and puffy face) that Kit would be escorting her back from Mount Cala cleanup early, daring anyone to disagree. Windu nodded and the conversation continued on.

Together they rewatched holo-footage of Obi-Wan laughing amongst Ghost company the night before last, and debated reports from psychometric investigators who had scoured the cantina as well as Obi-Wan’s personal quarters for traces of illicit substances. Between that and another drug panel, they were finally forced to conclude that despite the timing, the alcohol at most confused Obi-Wan’s perception of a vision, or possibly simply loosened his tongue.

Bant prodded Cody to repeat every word from the holocar ride to the temple, taking furious notes. Cody was unable to stop the heat that crawled up his face.

Just when the looming horror of Obi-Wan actually preparing to intentionally die started to break over Anakin, Windu interjected.

“You don’t see what I do,” the Harun Kal said grimly. “Something galaxy-sized shattered around Obi-Wan and he didn’t break from it. The closest comparison I have is Master Yaddle’s presence when she meditated on her confinement. He’s chosen to keep going, even when, quite frankly, death would be a release. We’re missing something fundamental.”

“He said there were ‘other dark forces at work.’ Even if the fight was objectively hopeless... there’s no way he would choose to die because of it!” Anakin agreed vehemently, shaking off morbid fears.

“But he did choose to die.” Cody said quietly. And the wind went out of Anakin’s sails.

“Lets go back.”

Anakin gritted his teeth as they picked apart everything ‘unusual’ Obi-Wan had said and done leading up to his visit with Bant.

“What exactly did he...”

“So Plo Koon was able to get a read through his shields?”

“Did he have anything to eat?”

“How did that compare to...”

“When he's mentioned things in the future...did it seem good or bad to you?” Bant asked.

“Bad.” Cody and Anakin said in unison. Remembering the trip to the temple Cody spoke again, “Definitely bad.”

“Right. When we were talking he sometimes used the wrong tenses for things, people. I confronted him on not knowing ‘when’ he was after Knight Skywalker left. He told me that he knew what was real, but he was “enjoying not fully living in the moment” he also said that he intended to “wake up”

“Enjoying? That’s the exact word he used?” Cody asked incredulous. 

“He did seem...mostly happy yesterday. Giddy, at points.” Anakin said, slumping in on himself.

Bant looked at her notes once more before addressing the group.

“This isn’t vision psychosis in any manner I’ve heard of before...but I think I might have a theory. He used to have intense visions when we were kids; plenty of us did sometimes, but Obi-Wan would be unable to sleep after. What terrified him more than anything was the uncertainty that he might make the wrong choice- even when the vision was about something good, or neutral. His visions gradually stopped coming around puberty. We just had a conversation about this a few months ago- how relieved he was to only have to manage flashes of precognition. If he had a random, horrifying vision of a terrible future...suicide wouldn’t be his reaction. It’s too final.”

“Even if he blamed himself for what he saw coming?” Mace asked.

“Especially if he blamed himself.” Bant said. 

“What’s your theory?” Aerdo prodded.

“What if...what if he was telling the truth when he said he could separate out what was real and what was not? What if there was no distortion or blurring between now and then? What if he was just wrong about which was which?”

“That...would be a very extreme and abnormal manifestation of force-induced psychosis. He has training in distinguishing reality from visions. The continued presence of his mental shielding means that the fabric of his mind can’t be so horrifically collapsed in on itself.” 

“What if the vision was actually that realistic?” Bant said, pushing back against the soul healer. “So detailed and vivid that it effectively was a reality in itself, and everything else, all of us...”

“Were just memories” Anakin finished. “It would...actually explain pretty much everything. You said he wanted to wake up and when...when I found him.” He stopped, swallowing. “When I found him, he argued with me...what if he wasn’t trying to hurt himself? If you’re right...that would mean I found him trying to get back to reality.”

“It could explain his behavior in the halls...his desperation to wake...” Sife mused “But it runs counter to every other experience I’ve had with those managing prophetic visions. Master Windu, could that explain the shatterpoints you saw?”

“I’m not certain. It would have to have been extraordinarily real to create the echos of Shattering I witnessed. I don’t know if that depth of vision has occurred before, but then again, many things are possible in the force.”

“You really think he might have been...trying to wake up from dream? By killing himself?!” Cody asked incredulous.

“If that ends up being what happened I am going to give him such shit. That is the worst way to end a vision.” Anakin replied.

“Yes. It is.” Bant said pointedly. “That’s why it’s a last resort, after every other attempt to wake fails.” 

They all sat in silence, processing various implications. Cody was unnerved by another terrifying insight into force powers, as well as the idea that the General might vividly remember Cody being inexplicably mind-controlled into trying to kill him. Anakin was trying to understand what this would mean for them, and the conversations he had thought they had had. Did...any of it count, if he thought he was offering it to a hallucination?

“Alright, this is a valuable working idea, but let’s make sure to examine everything with an open mind before we draw any more conclusions. Anakin, what happened after you left the healers office?”

Obi-Wan’s critique of the practicalities of visiting a soul healer could be and was interpreted multiple ways. The incongruity of peacekeepers in war sparked a rehash of earlier discussion. More apologies. Self identifying as ‘crazy’ inspired new debate, especially in the context of the new theory. 

“When I saw him enter the fountain room I assumed he had had a brutal run-in with  dark force user.” Windu explained. “Based on everything we’ve gone over, I don’t understand when...but some of the more insidious sith compulsions work by taking whatever small anger or hurt you feel and magnifying them until they consume you. If Obi-Wan was already experiencing self loathing...”

Cody sucked in a breath. “Then a Sith mind suggestion would bring him to commit suicide. It...sounds like something he might do, if he was partially in control. Take the blow rather than let himself be used as a weapon against anyone else, even his worst enemy.”

“Hells, it could have been an even vaguer compulsion, driving him to attack the person he hates the most,” Bant added darkly.

Anakin buried his head in his hands, trying to hold it together. He couldn’t afford to lose control or get angry. Hells, getting angry at Obi-Wan for ‘failing him’ when in pain could be the reason Obi-Wan was currently in the healing halls. The man said he loved him unconditionally, then practically had a breakdown over how much Anakin pushed that unconditional love to the breaking point, then killed himself. How was he supposed to-

“Anakin? Are you alright to continue?” someone said.

“Yes. No. There’s more I have to tell you...I don’t know if it will help but - it was hurting Obi-Wan...I...”

“Let’s just take it one step at a time. What happened after you left Mace?”

Apparently even Cody somehow knew more about Bruck Chun than Anakin. Master Windu and Eerin told different sides of the same sad story, which spiraled back into a conversation about Obi-Wan’s inadequacy issues, which somehow devolved into a long rant about Qui-Gon Jinn that Master Windu had apparently been holding back for years. 

“My apologies.” He said afterwards, clearing his throat as the group stared, taken aback. “Old grievances. Go on Anakin, what did happened after you got to the ‘secret spot.’”

“He...was skirting around whatever was bothering him...I pushed him...told him I wanted to help...he said I couldn’t...because it was me...because of what I...”

Anakin stood up suddenly, feeling the walls of the room closing in.

“I’m sorry- I’m sorry I-” 

He ran out.

He turned around almost immediately, pacing in the small corridor, knowing he couldn’t leave, simply needing a minute to catch his breath.

Master Windu followed him out after a moment, not saying anything, just standing there. Watching him.

“What!” Anakin finally snapped. “What do you have to say that I don’t know already!”

“Knight Skywalker-”

“Don’t call me that! I DON’T DESERVE-” 

Anakin let out a frustrated snarl, punching a wall. The crumble of stone beneath this fist briefly made him feel better, but then he remembered Obi-Wan’s heartbroken expression in the light of an underworldly glow, and the tiny, choked sound he heard when the healers moved him and Anakin just...collapsed, falling to his knees.

Master Windu sank down gracefully beside him.

“Anakin. This isn’t about attachment issues, is it.”

“Not really, no. I mean, maybe you’ll blame attachment but it’s more about...”

“Anger.”

Anakin looked up at that, trying to regain the meditative calm he had felt for a glimmering moment yesterday, right in-between making peace in the cave and everything burning to ash. 

“You know that I have had my own struggles with anger. It is how and why I came to develop Vaapad.” 

“Yes, but you’ve Mastered your anger. And you’ve never...never given in to hate.”

A beat passed and Windu watched some of Skywalker’s familiar breaking points flicker into view. 

“You’ve done something. Something you know the Jedi won’t forgive.”

“Obi-Wan forgave me.” Anakin said, whispering. “He said that even though I couldn’t fix what I did he loved me anyway and I just needed to...to honestly regret what I did and not do it again. I told him I’d get rid of my lightsaber and I meant it and...I thought he forgave me. I was ready to go to the Council with him, come clean about everything. And then I left him alone to get dinner and when I came back...he was holding my lightsaber. My lightsaber.” 

Anakin buried his face in his hands, shuddering with creeping cold.

“I’m not going to critique your and Obi-Wan’s attachment to each other right now. I’m well aware that much of the order has turned to personal ties to maintain their stability given the ongoing horrors of war. I am, for many reasons, wary of the risks this brings us, yet it is also true that risks do not automatically mean failure. I myself have mastered my emotions in a different manner than conventional wisdom councils.” 

Windu spoke carefully. For all that he and Anakin had similar relationships with the force, they rarely saw eye to eye on any given subject. At a certain point, Mace had accepted that the volatile young man was determined to find the worst possible interpretation for anything he said. And Mace was not the order’s most patient diplomat.

“As for your crime, whatever it is, l will tell you this: Unless you choose to renounce the code and leave our number, you will be treated as a Jedi Knight, subject to our protections, as well as our judgement. You will receive appropriate mental counseling. If you are judged to be a danger to those around you, your actions will be curtailed and monitored, possibly through temporary confinement.  The Jedi do not believe in punitive measures for their own sake, but you may be required to provide restitution to those you harmed, perhaps indefinitely. 

Silence hung perilously between them. Windu watched a tremor run through the unfathomable kaleidoscopic of shatterpoints that had orbited Skywalker since he was a boy. A small one broke inward, and an attached tangle of larger, darker ones fell away, crumbling to dust. The rest faded from view, invisible for the moment. A choice had been made, some decision that closed off at least one path to the darkside.

“There’s no one to make restitutions to.”

“...You’re going to have to elaborate on that.”

“Let’s go back inside- I don’t want to do this twice.”

They returned to the increasingly hated meeting room.

Anakin spoke in an outpouring of words about love and hate, about misplaced revenge and now uncertain forgiveness. When he finally finished, the room was deathly silent.

The three Jedi sat quietly while Cody pinched the bridge of his nose. “I guess this is why Jedi have the no attachment rule, huh? I admit I never really got it, but I suppose even if I-”

Bant abruptly lunged up, fumbling to bring her lightsaber to Anakin’s neck. Everyone jumped to their feet, except for Anakin, who stared at Bant with a wretched expression.

“MASTER EERIN! This is not-”

“Did you do it?” she asked, ignoring the Master of the Order.

“Bant!”

“It was my first thought after I saw him. We all rushed in expecting a fight, or a bomb, only to find you, insane, and him with a hole next to his heart. I didn’t want to believe it of course, but you’ve always had a violent streak that Obi-Wan, force help him, couldn’t quite soothe away. A fight gone wrong. Master Windu said it was suicide, and I believed him, and I’ve been trying to make sense of that ever since. But Mace found you after, didn’t he? After you felt guilty? Did you think he was going to turn on you?”

“Bant Eerin, you are dangerously-”

“No.” Anakin whispered.

“Obviously I might be why. But I didn’t- I couldn’t. I know I’m not good but I can’t even imagine- holding a saber against him like that. Kriff, do you not get how much I can’t handle losing people I love? I was insane when you saw me because I saw someone trying to kill Obi-Wan and I couldn’t even fight them.”  

Bant held his gaze for several lingering seconds, deactivated her saber and dropping it with a clatter. They stared at each other, breathing heavily and not blinking. She returned to her seat, moving jerkily. “I apologize Knight Skywalker. That was uncalled for.” 

“I wish I could say I wouldn’t have done the same thing in your shoes” he responded lowly. Bant made a tiny, unintelligible noise in reply. 

Cody collapsed back into his chair, holstering his blaster.  “Alright then...so after you finished sitting in the fountain room...what happened next?”

Everyone stared at him.

“What?”

“You’re handling Anakin’s confession somewhat dispassionately. We’re simply surprised.” Mace said slowly, returning to his seat at the same time as Master Aerdo fell into theirs.

Cody shifted uncomfortably. “The vod were trained in a wide range of enemy suppression tactics. While we’re extremely glad the Jedi have never asked us to employ them, I’m not...unfamiliar with this scale of deliberate slaughter. At least in the hypothetical, sir.”

“I see.” Aerdo said. “That is a valuable insight to have, thank you. Knight Skywalker-”

“Just...call me Anakin. Or Skywalker.”

“Anakin. When did this happen?”

“About two years ago, immediately before the First Battle of Geonosis.”

“And have you had any similar experiences with giving into the darkside since?” they asked placidly.

“I don’t think so but...we went to war the next day and....I don’t know if I’ve stopped fighting since it- since I did what I did.”

“Hmm. Anakin, would you mind stepping outside the room and waiting in the corridor for a moment please?” 

He bit his tongue, tasting blood, and quietly walked out the door while the Masters decided his fate. He leaned back against a wall, desperately wanting to see Padme. 

To his surprise, the door opened barely a few minutes later, and he was politely invited back in.

“Anakin.” Master Windu spoke. “Thank you for telling us this. It’s an important insight into Obi-Wan’s feelings right now, and I recognize that you could have kept it a secret. As Head of the Order, and with the advice of a Senior Soul Healer, I have made a decision. You will be assigned a personal soul healer, who you will start seeing tomorrow. Commander Cody pointed out that over nearly two years of continuous warfare, you have maintained some of the the lowest trooper casualty units of any division, by a significant margin if we evaluate based on mission risk level. Your civilian and enemy casualties will be reviewed, but even considering constant war, since your massacre of the Tuskens, you have clearly managed to at least... direct your violence away from the innocent. We do not consider you a threat to the inhabitants of the world. For the time being, I see no real benefit to limiting or tracking your behavior within the temple or on planet, but you are barred from leaving orbit. I have decided to delay a full reckoning before the council until such time that your former Master is well enough to provide his own opinion. Give me just cause, and I will have you confined to a force-suppressing cell. Do you understand?”

Anakin nodded, bowing in acknowledgment. All things considered, it was...honestly better than he expected.

“Now, as Cody” Windu paused. “My apologies, as the Commander was saying-” 

“Cody’s fine, sir” Cody said, wrung out in a way different from anything Kamino had trained him for.

“...I think we can all consider ourselves on a first name basis at this point.” Bant said with a snort. She paused. “That includes you Anakin. I really don’t know how to handle what you did but kark it, I don’t want to hate you. For myself.”

Everyone nodded.

“As Cody was saying, what happened next?”

Peace. Comfort. Hunger. A warning in the force...

-

“I tried to pull the saber back but his finger was already on the igniter...” 

“You probably saved his life. Even a second later-”

“I know, that’s almost the worst part.”

-

“-his neck”

“Why would he change weapons?”

“What if-”

-

“He said what to you and Healer Che?”

“That has to support the detailed vision idea, think about-”

“I’m sorry, Emperor?”

-

“I think we’re done.”

Anakin stared blankly at Sife. “But we didn’t figure anything out.”

“Not conclusively, but we’re unlikely to make any more progress, you’ve given me enough information to preform a meaningful meditative scan, or guide a conversation, should Obi-Wan wake, or navigate through his mind, should we decide to make a more decisive attempt at his shields.”

“Master Aerdo... I leave the final judgement up to you, but I strongly urge you to make a more decisive attempt. I am more convinced now than I was...” Mace glanced at the chronometer “five hours ago that this was motivated by a specific, external stimuli, likely dark. Do you disagree?”

“No.” they said with a sigh. “But I don’t want to underestimate how much underlying factors might have contributed to his response to stimuli, including underlying factors that none of you were aware of.”

The Nautolan Soul Healer stood up, tucking their hands into their sleeves to address the room with classical Jedi serenity. It was a little irritating.

“In any case, we all need to sleep, eat, and meditate. Master Eerin, you have the rest of the day off, I've cleared it with Master Che already. Master Windu, I leave the final judgement up to you, and I am aware that your duties as Master of the Order are unceasing, but I urge you to take some time to center yourself before returning to the council. Commander Cody, I would be more than willing to arrange soul healing for you or any of the Vod, please let me know. Anakin, you will receive a comm later today with further details on your future healing sessions. 

They bowed low, then glided out the door.

Bant stood next, bowed individually to each soul, and sped walked out.

Commander Cody cleared his throat awkwardly, “Mace- what should I tell the troops? We’re supposed to have command briefings later tonight.”

“If anyone asks about General Kenobi, tell them its classified.” I’ll schedule a briefing on the subject. Now go find Captain Rex and take care of yourself, that’s an order.”

Cody saluted, first to the high General, then to Anakin.

Finally it was just Mace and Anakin.

“Is there anyone who you trust who I can call to stay with you.” Master Windu asked.

“I can manage on my own” Anakin replied, not willing to give the Master of the Order anything else he could use against him, even after everything.

Master Windu held back a sigh.

He continued once more, making a deliberate attempt to soften his tone. “Anakin- I know we’ve had our differences, but this is not a trick, nor a trap. You’ve suffered a series of great shocks in the last 24 hours and handled them with immense maturity. I myself am struggling to deal with the emotional fallout.”

Anakin looked up at that, surprised. He didn’t seem to be struggling, but maybe that was what made him a good Jedi Master...

“As I told you before, I am not going to begrudge you the comfort of attachment. I’m rather convinced it would do you more harm than good at this point. I don’t want you flying right now, and you don’t have to be alone. I hope we have come to a better understanding today, but I doubt my presence is suddenly a comfort, though please correct me if I’m wrong. Now is there someone I can call?”

-

Padme ended her call with Master Windu extremely discomfited. She had barely heard from Anakin since he ran out on her the night before last to take care of an apparently extremely drunk Obi-Wan. He had messaged her a few times that night, promising to make it up to her, but had been comm-silent since. She had been starting to get worried, and now the Master of the Order was asking her to pick him up from the temple. Fortunately, she had already cleared most of her meetings for the week well in advance (Courascant leave usually meant THEM time, not that she was jealous of Obi-Wan, of course).

The speeder ride back from the temple was silent. All Anakin would say was that he would explain everything once they were in ‘a secure location.’ 

The door to the apartment had scarcely closed behind them when Anakin fell into her arms, shaking.

“Anakin, talk to me love, what’s wrong?” She gently guided him to the couch, arranging him so she could hold him protectively.

“Obi-Wan tried to kill himself.”

She let out a harsh gasp, “No! He can’t have, he would never-” 

“I got to him in time, but Padme... he was holding a lightsaber to his heart. It was...really close” He burrowed deeper into the folds of her dress, and she gripped him fiercely.

“Oh gods, is he-”

“He’s physically healing, but he’s still...not all there. I spent all of today locked in a room, trying to figure out if it was a Sith Attack, or an insane vision, or..or me”

“Anakin! What do you mean ‘me’ - Obi-Wan loves you, you-”

“I know.” Anakin interrupted her again, knowing he was being unfair; he was just too exhausted to be patient.

“He told me loved me. He...he...found out about what I did to the Tusken village, You should have seen his face, Padme, he was horrified, but he still told me he loved me, and he was willing to forgive me, even though he shouldn’t”

“Of course he forgave you,” Padme whispered. “You’re not a monster, Anakin, I know you would never do something like that again.”

"And then after we talked, I left him alone and he-” Anakin choked out into her dress.

Tears ran down her face, heart breaking. “That’s- that’s horrible. Anakin...it must have have been a attack, Obi-Wan wouldn’t do that.” she said urgently.

He pulled away, horrified. “I made you cry. I made Obi-Wan cry too. I’m sorry- Padme please, promise me you won’t-”

She grabbed the sides of his head. 

Her nails bit into the soft skin behind his ears as she pulled him down so they were face-to-face, vowing, “Never. I swear by the force itself, I will never choose death over life.”

He let out a relieved sigh, eyes fluttering closed.

“Now you,” she demanded

“As long as I have anyone to live for, I swear by the force, I will never choose death over life.”

She pulled him the rest of the way in for a bruising kiss. He lifted her, and they desperately clung at one another as he carried her to bed. They continued like that, clinging and grasping, until exhaustion carried him to sleep. She pulled the covers over top them both and curled around him defensively as the day slowly faded away.

Part XI