#and not... unending story that's being worked on for five years

[emilykaldwen]

contemplating, as I face down emptying my backlog of chapters, if I should set the every other week posting schedule aside for Arc II (and perhaps? the remainder of Arc I, but I am almost done). I am juggling so many things with this story and I found that the front half of the story really benefited from me being able to sit with things more. Not that I would go to a write-as-I-post schedule, and I don't want to write the whole thing THEN post it (which had been the initial idea for maiden), but... I am wondering about it.

Generally, the internet kinda scared me that 'yeah if you don't have a regular schedule people aren't gonna read your fic' because now we live in a 'fandom is now consumerism and dance monkey dance time' and it's not that I post to get views/comments, this story is for me and my three friends basically, but I did want to challenge myself, and the schedule has helped.

So all this to say I might extend April Hiatus by an extra update day because I do actually want to post something *when* the show is airing but also like... life? I want to do other things that *aren't* just my fic. Like finally play some Baldur's Gate, work on other fic, read some books. But I do need the structure of a schedule of *some* kind.

[asterdisaster06]

Always and Forever

John "Soap" MacTavish x gn!reader

summary > childhood friends to lovers, with a dash of angst. well, a little more than a dash

word count > 4.9k

cw > lyrics from Sadie Jean as dialogue, Price having to bear witness to the awkward and emotional reunion

a/n >  honestly, this story pains me even writing it. sorry in advance. just be glad i didn’t decide to make it a series about how the reader joined the shadow company and betrayed soap. although, if anyone asks i wouldn’t be opposed to writing something like that. then again, i’m writing a similar plot with konig and a 141 reader so. maybe not

ao3

You had known John “Soap” MacTavish since you were wee little kids that had playdates together due to your mother’s long standing friendship with each other. They had spent their pregnancies together through the beautiful moments of wonder that comes with the first ultrasounds to holding each other’s hair back in the morning as they expelled their guts out of their body - all because the day smelled off. Your mothers had their water break on the exact same day; a wonder pushed by the divine forces as your parents would say. You were born first and then Johnny came a mere minute later. You’ve held that fact over his head for a long time.

You were raised together in matching onesies and moments spent rarely apart. You were as much of Johnny's family as he was yours. Seasons and holidays were celebrated side by side with photo upon photos to prove it - your mother still embarrasses you by bringing them out of their dusty boxes every time you come around. Which, isn’t enough as she states. 

New years parties that ended in cupcake crumbs on each of your faces. Valentine’s day arts and crafts that culminated in your mother’s unending giggling at the glitter that stuck to their children’s hands. Easter egg hunts that you suspect Soap always let you win; although he vehemently denies even considering such a thing. Fond memories of eating home-made hot cross buns with the icing always ending up smeared on the side of your mouth. April fools days spent with you two running around causing mischief around the neighbourhood much to the chagrin of your parents. Halloween costumes always matching to some degree even as you guys got older; and the tradition of Soap always giving you your favourite candy is something you still remember. The light shows viewed on your parents’ shoulders during Guy Fawkes night always bring a smile to your face as you remember the permanent face-splitting grins you two shared those nights. Christmases that had your parents wondering why they decided to have kids whenever the pair of you ran into their room at five in the morning jumping around and screaming about presents. Of course, they could never refuse the excitement that had an effect on even them as gift wrapping was ripped open and pretty bows were discarded in favour of the gift underneath the concealment. 

Every picture of every moment of you two together - which were most of the photos given that you two never seemed to be apart except for bathroom breaks - always had a toothy grin on each of your faces. A few images over the years exhibited the matching gap in your front teeth that you shared with your MacTavish. You vaguely remember Soap celebrating the fact that his very same tooth as yours was wiggly. Although, you also recall that the reason it was loose was due to the fact he got clocked after defending your - in his words - honour from an older school boy. However it ended up missing, it was always a sweet memory that you held close to your heart. 

You remember sneaking away after primary school to get ice cream - Soap always had the weirdest combination of flavours that somehow worked, magic as he called it. Everytime you got the sugary treat, MacTavish had always let you try his with the excuse that you needed to taste how good it ended up being. After the ice cream adventure the pair of you walked over to the nearby playground and stayed there until you were the only ones left; that and your parents began getting tired of waiting there after they ended up finding you. Swings were always the thing you two gravitated towards within the park because it let you guys talk about this and that. You also always had fun attempting to get yourselves in sync enough to hold hands. When spring came around Soap taught you how to make flower crowns while he continuously made rings of dandelions to propose to you with. It was always a promise to marry each other when you grew up - much to the amusement of your respective families. 

Of course, your school life just had to be spent with paper airplanes and study sessions that really were just spent gossiping about people around the school. You two hooligans were actually banned from the library at least twice, something that your mothers like to bring up whenever they can. Despite the library prohibition, studying was something done on the regular at each other’s houses the night before tests. In spite of the giggling fits and existential questions about the meaning of life, good grades were made on a majority of tests and assignments. It was always a point of teasing when one of you got a better grade than the other when “we practised the exact same shite!” 

Secondary school came and went, with so many hijinks occurring that you’ve lost count. Soap’s cousin came to visit once or twice during the holidays and it got him absolutely hooked on the possibility of following in their footsteps. His attempt to lie about his age was seen through, but he was promised first dibs whenever he was old enough to enlist for real. It was a topic spoken about a lot during the late hours of the nights, tossing a tennis ball back and forth between each other and sharing your thoughts out loud. 

If you were being honest, it was simultaneously intriguing and terrifying to you. You certainly weren’t going to stop him from achieving his seemingly heart set career, but at the same time it sent chills down your spine at the thought of losing him to a stray bullet on the field. A wound that he couldn’t heal from. A moment of pause too many that left the life that sparkled so beautifully in his eyes drained from the bright cadet blues. In all honesty, this very thought is likely the reason you decided to enlist as a combat medic. You wanted to be able to be out there in the field alongside soldiers in order to treat them then and there. Soap promised to keep in touch whenever he was deployed, and to his credit, he did for a while. 

The once abundant amount of calls that came from the familiar MacTavish son sizzled out as he got more and more busy and so did you. The once nightly tradition of talking to each other whether over the phone or a simple goodnight text had faded as your adult lives trickled into reality. It was something that pained you, and you thought of the man every day. You would’ve followed him to the ends of the earth if you had the time and heart, but unfortunately life moved on and the planet kept revolving. 

That doesn’t mean that your feelings for him faded in the slightest - in fact, they only grew stronger as you messed around with a few men at bars. You quickly learned that none of them would ever amount to anything compared to the Scot that still was all that you wanted. You climbed the ranks with the thought of Soap in the forefront of your mind, a single call made when you were drunk the last time you had heard from him two years ago. He could be dead for all you knew, but you knew he wasn’t from his family. They claimed that his captain had been giving simple updates. It just seemed like he didn’t want to talk to you - or anyone associated with you. Or maybe he was too busy with his new task force friends - and don’t get it wrong, you were goddamn proud of your old childhood friend achieving all that he wanted and more. It’s just the fact that you wish you were there alongside him. 

You remember that call like it was yesterday, regretting it just as much as you did when it happened. You got stood up by a soldier on base that you had been getting closer to until he asked you to go out to this one bar. Of course, it appears as if he wasn’t going to show up, effectively leaving you to the wolves. You figured it out after two texts and one call to him going unanswered after fifteen minutes of embarrassment. You sent one last call to someone that you didn’t even expect to answer, John MacTavish. It rang once, and then twice, and then his voice answered and sent your heart down to your stomach. 

“What are you doing calling at this hour, Bonnie?”

Bonnie. An affectionate term that he coined sometime around highschool to make you blush. He never meant anything beyond the simple compliment beyond it, but it became tied to you nonetheless that you’d still answer to, to this day. 

“I miss you, and-” You start babbling. 

“Are you drunk, love?” He asks. You can hear shuffling and laughter in the background. There’s the unmistakable voice of a girl asking if he’ll join her on the dance floor, and you swear your heart breaks in two immediately.

“I love you, I always have. No matter where we are, you still have my heart. You were all that I wanted, you still are. You’re the one I can see me growing old with.”

“Hold on, love-”

“No, let me finish. Remember how you said you’d build me a house and plant me roses in the front yard? I want to cash that in. I’ve been looking for love around - and maybe some of them are real good guys - but they’re never gonna be like you though. You set the bar above the moon, MacTavish. I don’t want to be twenty-something and still in my head about seventeen in my bedroom talking. You swore, you said by now we’d paint the walls of our shared apartment,” You start sobbing at this point, your makeup running down your face.

“I know, Bonnie, I know,” He says, his voice a low timbre that sends shivers down your spine.

“Now that you’ve finally got the job you like. I wish I was there with you. By your side. Are you with somebody right now? Should I even care? Is it wrong that I don’t? I still care about you, Johnny. Still have your faded t-shirt that I’ve kept this long from that one festival. I think I’ve always known that I would love you. Now and forever,” You let out, realising that there was a distinct silence on the other end of the line. “Johnny?”

“Bonnie, I can’t do this.”

Your heart freezes; your frantic nerves slowing to a gentle tremor manifesting through your shaking frame. 

“What do you mean? Shit, I’m sorry, I’m drunk and I don’t know what I’m saying. Forget I said anything. I won’t remember this in the morning anyways,” You awkwardly laugh, praying that he’ll go along. You didn’t know what you would do if he didn’t. You couldn’t bear the thought. 

“We can’t forget this happened. I can’t. Shit.” You hear an audible swallow over the phone, and you imagine his hands running through that oh-so soft mohawk of his. The very same one that you cut and styled for him when he was sixteen - much to the chagrin of his family. They learned to agree it suited him after a month or two though.

“I think it’s best if we move on from each other. I need to forget about us, and I think you do too,” Soap snaps, and it would’ve rang warning bells in your head if you weren’t so drunk and distraught.

“Please, please don’t leave me. I can’t do this without you Johnny,” Your knees give out and you collapse, clasping a hand over your mouth to stop the sobs from escaping. The harsh brick street would leave bruises on your knees and the cold puddle from the rain only empathised with the tears running down your cheeks. 

“Forget about me. It’s for the best, I’m sorry. . .” A click, and that was the last you ever heard from him. 

You turn that memory in your head over and over again. Every time coming up with a new theory as to why he would’ve said that - none being good enough to satisfy your depraved curiosity. Or maybe it was desperation. It didn’t really matter to you anyways; considering the fact that all you knew was that Soap wanted nothing to do with you. Wanted nothing more than to forget you even existed and to free himself from you. You’ve tried your best to honour his request even to this day. Even though it pains every single part of you from your bones to your blood cells. 

It’s the exact reason you’ve done your best to avoid anything regarding the infamous 141 Taskforce that you’ve heard so much about. The whispers across the battlefield through bated breaths tell you more than enough of what your old friend had achieved. You were proud of him, despite it all. It didn’t seem right to hold a grudge against someone just because he didn’t like you back - that and there’s always some part of you that remains stuck in the mindset of you as a teenager waving Soap off for his deployment. Letting go of that would mean disregarding all of the memories you two had shared together, and that wasn’t something you would do easily. Or willingly. 

What you could do though is actively avoid any conversations, transfers, or promotions that would be a step towards the one that broke your heart. Even though he promised he would never do that. You couldn’t move on though, not when he was never really too far gone. There were only so many times you could side step working with or towards the task force before your superiors volunteered you to be moved to their compound. Nothing you could reasonably say would sway their viewpoint, and if it could it’s already been used as an excuse in the past. The only thing you could do was take a deep breath and shield yourself as you walked past the gates. A small part of you wished there was something wrong with your ID and they wouldn’t let you in, but of course that wasn’t the case. Everything was up to date and your footfalls resounded down the long hall to Price’s office.

A renowned man that you’ve heard all too much about through both your fellow soldiers and Soap in the past. Always good, always with admiration lacing the words. Unfortunately that wasn’t what you were feeling right now - in spite of the fact that you knew you worked damn hard to be promoted to this position and deserved it. You wish you didn’t.

“I’ve heard a lot about you, Seer. You’ve saved more men than I can count. Your skills are unparalleled and you hold yourself in high regard. Which is why I wonder exactly why you’ve turned down this position three times over,” Price says with his head tilted to the side. 

Seer. The callsign given to you after you had saved your entire team with simple intuition about a mission gone bad - quickly. You had gotten all of your men out and relatively unscathed with only a few singe marks from the explosion. The explosion from the bombs that you insisted had to have been rigged and live just as a trap for your squad. It was furthered by your uncanny ability to be exactly in the right place at the right time to save numerous soldiers that would’ve died without your intervention. Divine intervention as your old captain said, adding a religious spin onto your nickname. 

“I thrive on continuity and felt as if I was doing a lot of good where I was previously stationed, sir,” You reply, knowing it’s complete bullshit.

“That’s complete bullshit.”

He wasn’t wrong, but you were pissed to no end that he could read you that well. The only other person that you believed held that skill was your old crush. John “Soap” MacTavish. The real reason why you were so determined to stay away from this place. 

“Do you want to know something? I’ve looked at your file. Laswell has looked at your file. And we both noticed an interesting little tidbit about your birth place. Scotland. If that wasn’t enough, I’ve been around Soap enough to know a Scottish accent from a specific small town when I hear it - despite your best attempts to mask it. All of that might not be enough, but you had the exact same reaction to my soldier’s name as he did yours. What’s your history?” 

Damn, he was good. What you focused on in his rant the most though was the fact that Soap had physically recoiled as much as you did if you were to believe Prices’ words. And you did. There was no reason to doubt it, no reason for him to lie. 

“Childhood friends. We lost touch over the years,” You stick with, not wanting to blurt out how hurt you’ve continuously been about his abandonment of your relationship. Platonic or not. 

“And? I wouldn’t be asking if I didn’t want you on this team; if I didn’t care about you as a soldier. I also wouldn’t be this concerned if it didn’t seem like it would be an object of vulnerability. A liability one might say. You deserve a position on this team, which is why we’ve been persistent in offering it to you,” Price says before he’s interrupted by a knock at the door. A single knock that seemed to only be one of pure courtesy before it was slammed open.

You’re met with a sight that’s haunted you for almost half a decade. A ghost of a person that’s still alive and kicking. Someone that’s been on your mind ever since he had gotten on that chopper and left you to fend for yourself with empty promises that he’d be back. That he wouldn’t forget you. Promises fueled by letters and flowers and a promise ring that he had gotten you when you were kids. One that you couldn’t bear to wear anymore but couldn’t imagine throwing it away. One that still rings true against the metal of your dog tags sitting so close to your heart. 

“Bonnie?” Ironic as it is, Soap looks equally if not more terrified - like he’s seen a ghost. 

“Sergeant,” You respond curtly, your body acting on a harsh auto-pilot immediately. 

A way of protecting yourself from ever getting your heart broken again. You bite your tongue in a feeble attempt to stop yourself from running into the arms - and screaming all of the little things you’ve kept bundled up - of your best friend. It wasn’t really him that you saw though, because he was always the first to sweep you off your feet and whisper sweet nothings after bittersweet reunions. Whether it was five minutes or five days or five months without seeing each other, he never failed to wrap you up in his arms and protect you from the idea of never seeing him again. Five years seemed to be too much to carry over for him though apparently. 

“Please don’t do that. I know I deserve all of it and more, but please hear me out. Bonnie, please,” His voice cracked alongside your heart at his words. 

You swallow harshly, speaking after a brief moment of silence. “Don’t call me that.”

Your sharp words met their mark, making the broken man in front of you wince like a kicked dog. Baby blue eyes sending a pleading look your way as he collapsed inwards, hunching over like he wanted to seem smaller. Small enough not to scare you off, as if it wasn’t too late. 

“Seer, let me explain.”

“I haven’t seen you in person in five fucking years, MacTavish. I haven’t heard from you in two. I think it’s a little late for that,” You hiss out sharply, a glare set on him. It didn’t seem to matter to you that Price was still there, watching intently. You pushed past Soap, begrudgingly brushing up against him as you did. It would be a lie to say that it didn’t satisfy you to see the look of hurt flash across Soap’s face as you all but shoved him to the side. 

“The night you called me,” Soap started.

That stopped you in your tracks, your nerves itching to run and never look back in anticipation of his next words. You were too curious to hear what he was going to say though, a small part of you hoping it was bad enough to make a dent in the walls you held so high for someone you used to open the doors to your soul for willingly. The rest of you was simply too curious and ready to argue that you couldn’t move from your spot. 

“It was the night of one last bar run before Ghost and I were sent into deep cover for a month. A month of hell and shame that still gives me nightmares to this day, but nothing compares to the pain of having to stop talking to anyone at the chance of risking not only my life, but theirs,” Soap admits, his eyes glazing over with tears threatening to fall. Real pain infiltrating his features. It’s a sight that you hadn’t seen in a long time. Not since his cousin - the very same that convinced him to join the army - had passed from a mission gone wrong. 

“Why didn’t you call me afterwards? Or better yet, let me know then and there?” You quietly whisper, staring down at your feet. 

“I was a dumbass. I thought it would be easier to not tell you that night. You deserved to move on with someone that was closer to you. Someone that you could talk to every night. Someone that wasn’t me. Someone who didn’t have a chance of dying every day. As for afterwards? I couldn’t drag you back if you had managed to move on, not after all I had put you through,” Soap says, his voice shaking almost as much as you were.

“I never moved on,” You say quietly.

“What?”

“I never moved on from you. I never could. They were never you, and if anyone came close; well, you still had my heart.” A single tear runs down your face at this, despite your best attempts to stop this. 

“You’re still as beautiful as the day I lost you, love. I never meant to hurt you that badly,” Is all Soap said in response. 

“Well, you did. It doesn’t matter anymore anyways. I listened to you finally and moved on, I think you need to as well,” You throw his own words back at him, taking sick pleasure in the way his face falls. 

“Obviously we need to have a talk. Privately. Both of you. This has turned into more than a liability. Letting either one of you go is not an option either. This isn’t something I want to let turn you two into loose cannons on the field. Sorting this out is happening, and then therapy,” Price intervenes. 

“Please, let me talk,” Soap starts. “I pushed you away, and no apology can fix that immediately. You trusted me with your feelings and I threw you to the wolves. Despite the situation, there were better ways to handle it - I understand that now. I loved you then. I love you now. I loved you when we were little kids on the playground and didn’t even understand what the word truly meant. What I did understand is that you deserved better than me. Better than someone like me,” He says, hanging his head low.

“Fuck, Johnny. You really fucked up,” You murmur, finally turning to face the man you had known all your life. Had grown up next to from diapers to enrolling in the army. You looked at him, truly looked at him. Truth and resignation for whatever you deemed his punishment was written all over his face - you never forgot how to read his signs, or maybe he never changed them. 

“I know, Bonnie. I know, and I’m sorry if that means anything.” 

“I love you too, if that means anything,” You reply, a bittersweet smile on your face. Something that pissed you off to no end was that you could never stay mad at Soap, whether it was for cheating off your test or ‘borrowing’ your favourite pencil. Or in this case, going MIA for two years. A hopeful expression dawns on Johnny’s face. 

“Shit, doll, I will love you till the end of time, follow you to the ends of the earth, spend the rest of my life worshipping the ground you walk on if it means I can even be in the same room as you. I know damn well I have a lot to work on making up to you, and I won’t stop until every crack is mended in your heart, I swear,” Soap blurts out, falling to his knees in front of you. 

You couldn’t help but let out a poignant laugh at the fact that this all could’ve been easily avoided. It pained your very soul at the thought that you both loved each other, but never openly said it. The nostalgic memories flooded your mind at the possibility of how your lives could’ve been so very different if you confessed at a different time and place. 

“To think, I joined the army to do the very same for you, Johnny. I wanted to be here with you, make sure you stayed safe.” You don’t know why you admitted that, but it felt like the right thing to do.

“I wish I would have told you sooner,” He says, taking your hands in his and laying a gentle kiss on your knuckles that had fought for even a chance to be where you were right now.

“I think we both wished we did things differently,” You admit, kneeling down to cradle his face in your hands.

“Sweetheart, you have a heart of gold to not only have fallen for the mess of a man I am, enough to want to risk your life for a chance of saving mine, but to continue loving me through everything that’s happened.”

“It hurt like hell, I’m not going to lie, but I also can see where you’re coming from. I can’t say I didn’t think of doing the same when I was put in the same situation.”

“But you didn’t, and that’s what makes you a better person than I am. But I swear until the day I stop breathing, I will work to make it up to you. I’ll even let you try my ice cream like when we were kids,” Soap says, offering up a hopeful smile at the nostalgic memory. 

“You’re such a dork. I don’t forgive you, not yet. I don’t know if I’ll ever get over this-”

“And that would be completely reasonable. I would understand if you told me to fuck off. I would leave this team and become a hermit if you wanted me to,” Soap quickly interjects.

“And, let me finish. I don’t know if I’ll get over this, ever, but I do know that I want you by my side while I try.”

“I promise I won’t ever leave you again. Not even for a mission. Not again. It would never be more important than you,” Soap swears, holding your face between his fingers just like the morning paper. 

“Now I wouldn’t say ever. . .” Price starts, but Soap sends him a glare that says enough without anything being spoken.

“But I’m sure we could figure something out if it did occur,” Price swiftly amends his statement.

“You’re something, MacTavish, definitely something,” You softly say, your heart beginning to heal. 

“But I’m your MacTavish, right?” Soap says hesitantly, almost as if he was scared you would pull what he did and run away. Not like he would blame you, never in a million years. It would be what he deserved anyways.

“But you’re my MacTavish, Johnny,” You gently say, leaning into his tentative touch.

“I think we have a lot to talk about you two, but I think it can wait until tomorrow. I still want individual therapy for the both of you, separate doctors, but I can see that you need time alone together,” Price breathes out, likely exhausted by the back and forth between his two soldiers. 

“Thank you, Price, thank you,” Soap says, meaning more than what his captain had just said. He was thanking him for dragging you here, letting him talk, allowing there to be a safe place for blame and forgiveness. 

It wasn’t going to be easy or even vaguely okay for a long, long time, but you were willing to try. Your heart was still broken. Soap would inevitably do something to bring doubts and traumas back up. But he would be there, finally, to ease your pain and reassure you that he was there to stay. That he was there to hold your heart together as the glue set up. He was there to hold you as you cried and laughed and slept and woke up and cooked. He was finally there, and he wasn’t going anywhere as long as he could help it. And that promise is what kept you by each other’s side, forever and always. 

[strawberryicebreakers]

HELLO i hope this ask finds u well :]

so not to be annoying or anything but out of curiosity (and immense unending passion for the topic and also your fanfic) is there a chance the uhf fic will finish? not like, right now or in a month, but just in general :)) sorry ive read the draft like 10 times by now and yknow lol :)) have a lovely day from the weird al fans of tumblr!!

hello!!! your ask finds me in one of my labs, hunkered down between classes.

it's completely alright to ask! there's always a chance I'll go back to any of my drafts [including anything I've posted to ao3 and unfortunately abandoned over the years], but I'm still working on my longer ted lasso fic [which is now at 123k! very weird to know I wrote that much] and I'm a bit worried that trying to revisit an older draft might knock me out of my groove before I finish it.

that being said! I still do incredibly appreciate all the love you + others have given the draft so far; it's so sweet to see people so passionate about something I'm playing around with [and I think of the one comic that was drawn nearly every day]. there's a scene or two that're further down the plot of the story than I wrote in the draft [ergo, doesn't take place right where the draft stops] but I'd still love to share it as a thank-you. as always, it's very unedited, very rough, but hopefully something to y'all will enjoy. :) have a nice day as well!

Sinatra wasn’t the worst to listen to, but when it seemed as though all the radio stations in Oklahoma could loop through were the man’s Christmas albums, Robert could understand why some people would have a grudge against the guy. It’d been an hour and a half of Sinatra, Sinatra, and even more Sinatra, slowly driving a wedge into whatever Christmas spirit he still had at the ripe-old age of twenty-five. 

Teri’s parents lived all the way in the suburbs of Oklahoma City, a far cry away from his and George’s apartment in Tulsa. Usually, the traffic would make him wish for a day where faster-than-light travel was the norm, but at two in the morning on Christmas Day, I-44 had been all but deserted.

Even with the lights strung ‘round each house, little reindeer pulling plastic sleighs that gleamed back under his headlights, Robert had to turn his brights on to see the house numbers. His car slowed to a crawl, creeping through the picture of perfect suburbia. 

Each house was perfect in its own right; a blanket of snow on each lawn, a wreath on each door, a brand new car or two in each driveway. He’d bet his life savings that all (save one or two) of the houses had perfect families, too. A husband and his wife, their two kids, an overexcited dog or a temperamental cat. 

It used to nauseate him, seeing places like this, knowing this would be his life. That he’d be the father waking up on Christmas to a wife wrapped around him, that he’d have to -, do things with her that he didn’t want to think about doing. 

He shuddered, chilled despite his heater working overtime and then some. Usually, his car was on the colder side ‘cause Robert ran hot, but George was more delicate than he was. He hadn’t grown up in Oklahoma, wasn’t used to how cold the winters got. If George had it his way, they’d live in a damn blast furnace from the second the temperature began to drop. 

He parked, an inch from the curb of the nicest house he’d ever seen, staring at a mailbox that someone’d painted “The Cambells” on in curly, vintage font. 

With a pre-emptive cringe, he honked his horn, quick as he could. It was what he’d told George he’d do when he got here, letting him know he was good to run out. 

Robert stared at the door, waiting to see the familiar head of curls he’d grown fond of. He didn’t know what to expect, not after getting a frantic phone call at half-past midnight, begging for him to pick him up. 

There was a joke somewhere in there, that George got lucky that Robert’s a night owl, but before he could hoot down the phone, he’d realized George was serious. It wasn’t some midnight worry, not a kid asking his mom to pick him up ‘cause he can’t sleep without a certain blanket. 

George knew how far the drive was, how miserable it’d be to drive in the middle of the night. He knew how bad it’d be for him and Teri if he disappeared without goodbye.

And yet, he called.

Robert didn’t think there’d ever be a time in his life where he wouldn’t answer.

[blood-injections]

This is part 1. Part 2

I have a scrapped killjoy au that I got about five chapters in before I rewrote and the plot changed and I’ve been sitting on what to do with those chapters, cause they’re still good writing and a great idea for something, they just we’re going nowhere. Maybe I’ll make them into a one shot or something. The rewritten version changed the beginning and reused some of the stuff and that’s a fic in my drafts that I’m slowly but surely working on. It’ll be out at some point, maybe when I have time to write this Christmas break.

Anyway the scrapped au was called My Way Home Is Through You, it was about dealing with loss and grief and regret and hope and the joy of being reunited with something you thought you lost forever. Fun Ghoul was ghosted in a clap gone wrong and as I wrote in the first chapter:

Every killjoy knows they’ll be lucky to live to twenty-five, but this was still too soon. They had been through so many fights together over the past few years, even worse ones than the one they had had today- so how had this firefight been the one to take someone? How can everything be perfectly fine, everyone on their feet and all alive and then all of a sudden-

So they have to learn to deal with loss, Party Poison has to learn to live with the absence of the killjoy who was in pretty much every sense their soulmate. They ask, “How do we do this without him?” Jet Star says, “We keep running, keep loving and keep fighting.” And Poison thinks How do I do this without him?

Weeks go by before it happens for the first time. Poison sees Ghoul’s ghost. The three remaining killjoys are out on patrol when Poison hears a whisper on the wind, echoing in a tone so familiar it clenches their heart. He looked to the horizon and saw it, the shadow out in the wavering sand, the outline of a familiar figure. They run towards it but their arms close around nothing but air, the figure vanished, nothing but a mirage.

From then on the encounters started happening more often, Poison would hear that voice in their ear or head or they’d see that figure in front of them or they’d have violent dreams, reliving the moment they lost Fun Ghoul over and over again, listening to the words keep running escape his bloody lips on repeat. It’s what he said as he bled out onto the sand and the killjoys listened, running from his glassy eyes and the pursuing enemies.

The encounters gradually get more corporal, Poison swears they feel Ghouls lips on their forehead when he appears one evening, whispering killjoys never die to them in the darkness of the diner. The nightmares start blending with old memories of Poisons life, memories from when the brothers first escaped to the desert, memories from when they met Ghoul, memories of the stories Doctor D would tell the four of them, huddled around a campfire outside the radio shack.

Poison knew what they were, Hallucinations. Visions sent by their unending grief to torture them. Jet and Kobra do their best to support them, Kobra held them though each torturous night like they were little kids again but Poison knows that between their own grief and helping Poison though their screaming nightmares and heaving sobs whenever they see Ghouls ghost, it’s taking a real toll on the other two killjoys.

But one particular night, after two months of agony, one of Poison’s twisted dreams played them one of the old fireside memories and as I wrote:

There was an interesting dream. A sort of flashback to days when he was younger, when he and Kobra had only just escaped to the zones and were taken in by Jet Star and Doctor Death Defying, when they hadn't even met Fun Ghoul yet. It would be a few months more before they ran into the teenager that was drifting thorough the zones and somehow stirring up trouble wherever he went. But then the scrappy young Fun Ghoul had stumbled upon Poison and the others and wormed his way into their hearts, from that point becoming the fabulous four was inevitable.

But Doctor Death Defying would tell them all about the zones and the myths within them and on this particular night he remembered, he was telling them about the Phoenix Witch and about some of the beliefs surrounding her.

"Theres energy that flows through this static." Doctor Death spoke. "Energy that connects everything and everyone, something that will speak to you if you choose to listen and that will listen to you should you need it's guidance. The Phoenix Witch guides the souls of the departed to the afterlife but it's said she'll guide any lost soul, even a living one. If you allow her to, the Phoenix Witch will speak to you and guide your way when you need her." He told them, bathed in the light of a campfire outside his radio shack.

"We killjoys are one with the desert." He'd say and Ghoul's spector appeared, just staring at Poison and sitting by the campfire with the rest if them as if he had been in that memory.

As the dream ended and Poison woke up with a start. He didn't expect to see the hallucination still right there, now leaning over him.

Ghoul pressed a kiss to Poison's forehead and he swore he could feel it. "Killjoys never die" The entity said smoothly, then Ghoul's eyebrows furrowed and his voice became more his as he uttered his next words.

"My way home is through you."

That was the final straw for Party Poison, they needed to get out immediately. They needed air, they had to get out and drive too fast and feel the wind in their hair and fucking shoot at something, so that's what they did. They left before Jet could protest or Kobra could pester them to let him come along to 'have their back' and Poison wouldn't have been able to say no to their brother. They needed to be alone so, they left quickly.

They couldn't stop thinking about the dream, about the memory, about the ghost of Ghoul's words. He didn't mean to head in any specific direction but ended up at Doctor Death Defying's anyway.

"Fuck." He muttered, it seemed he'd have to voice his fears that he hadn't even accepted yet.

Show Pony greets him and soon enough, hes sat down with Doctor D, trying to figure out how to unravel the mess that is his mind. Doctor D asks them how they're doing and as I wrote:

Poison looked down, digging in the sand with the heel of his boot. "It's been really hard. It's been four months, it still feels like it was yesterday. I keep expecting to wake up next to him or see him walk into the diner but I never do." He confided, squinting his eyes as they grew closer to watering. His hand fell to the holster on his thigh, fingertips hovering over the handle of the old green gun he had kept.

"The others are still affected too, they don't say much but they don't smile like they used to, we're all flying half mast. The diner, it's so quiet now without him. When we'd go out a couple months ago, fighting like usual, we'd keep slipping up and having close calls, Jet's shoulder was grazed when he forgot he didn't have him to cover his flank." He explained. "So, we haven't been going out as much. Staying in and just fighting locally when we're needed."

And then they finally voice the doubts, the fears that have been stirring ever since they saw that first mirage.

"But there's- theres something else that's been going on." Poison finally said after a moment of silence had passed. "And recently I've been.. doubting it all. Wondering if- what if he isn't really dead? If he isn't then I- I left him there to die." He choked. This was the first time he had voiced any of this.

"I ran away like a coward while he bled out. Even if we barely stood a chance- what if there was a chance we could saved him? What if we left him there and- and now they have him."

Doctor D tries to let them down gently, saying he knows what it's like but that he remembers getting the news. That Fun Ghoul is gone, that he sacrificed himself so the rest of them could escape. That he couldn't survive a wound like that. But Poisons spiralling now, they stand up and start pacing.

"I know but- they got his body- who knows what technology they have. I know he's with the Witch and I- I've been seeing his fucking ghost." He said frantically.

"D, the last two months I've been having these hallucinations and these dreams and he keeps fucking telling me things, this morning I woke up and he was right in front of me and I swear I felt it when he touched me. He told me 'my way home is through you' and I just-"

He took a deep breath and stopped pacing, Doctor Death was watching him freak out with wide eyes.

"I remember the stories you'd tell us of the Witch and of the energy that connects us to eachother and the desert and all that hippie shit and I never really believed the deeper parts if it, but I know you do and I know Ghoul did more than me. You'd say how she guides lost souls and that if we need help that she could guide us too if we listen and what if what I'm seeing isn't just psychosis- what if it's actually him, connecting to me from wherever he's being held?"

He finished, sitting back down and wiping his face. "I know this is the craziest thing I've ever said, but even if it turns out it's just a case of moon madness- I don't care. I just need to know for sure."

They dont expect Doctor D to say "You're right." after the long silence that followed their tangent. He says he dies believe in the witch and he says, "If you really think what you've been seeing could actually be him reaching out, then I'll help you try to connect as well." And he asks what the hallucinations and dreams have been like. They conclude that it really does seem like Ghoul is haunting Poison and that the thing's he's saying are connected.

"If he's out there, his way home is through you, that was the truth."

Poison sniffed, quickly wiping his nose on a sleeve. "How?" He choked. "How can I bring him home?"

And then we get a scene out of ttlotfk comic, the one where Cherri's teaching the girl how to aim and hit a target, explaining that mystical energy. Except now it's Doctor D, telling Poison how to see.

"You'll start to see movement- like heatwaves in the air- auras bleeding into natural electricity. The unseen is all around us. If you were to fire a gun, the blast can ride those waves and make it a perfect shot every time. You can ride those waves too, you could see all the way to Bat City from here- and that's how you can try and connect to Fun Ghoul.

"It can be very overwhelming, but if he's out there your mind should connect to his. Just focus, see the waves, then think of him. Feel his energy surround you, his soul- connect to it and you'll be taken to it, you'll combine with it. Maybe he can show you where he is."

It was like nothing Poison had ever experienced before. The static, the airwaves, they could see it all, the energy that surrounded them.

"It's just like you said." He breathed, trying to focus on Ghoul, on the memory of him, on his voice and his laugh and his being that would always be inside of Poison even if it turned out he really was dead.

He wasn't sure if it was working but something was definitely happening and across the desert, behind buildings and barriers- a pair of dull emerald eyes snapped open.

[letmetellyouaboutmyfeels]

i have some questions, if you feel up to it: which of your published fics are you the proudest of? which of them have you reread the most? and, which of your wips should the average buddie fic enjoyer be most wary of?

Of my published fics it's hard to pick just one, since I have about five that I really consider the best examples of my work or milestones in my writing abilities.

(For example, my Hunger Games fic I wouldn't say is my best work today, but it's still one of the fics I'm the proudest of since it was in my opinion a really well-done fic for a sixteen-year-old and marked a milestone in trying to tackle really difficult subjects including unlikable characters and main character death.)

Of my Buddie fics the three I'd say I'm proudest of are Your Fingerprints Smeared on My Heart (Lead Me Back to You), In the Gray You are Golden, and Further Than Blood (Or Than Bones).

The first is my soulmate fic and a rare fic where I feel like I set myself a very high bar and actually accomplished what I set out to do in my head with the fic. The unending lament of a writer is that the story rarely turns out as good on the page as you see it in your mind, but I think with this one I came close. It was a challenge to write, and I'm really happy with the finished product.

The second is my Zombie Apocalypse AU that I dashed off in a fit of inspiration in 48 hours. I'm really proud of the atmosphere I created and the worldbuilding. My goal was to write a zombie fic where non-zombie and non-horror lovers could still enjoy it, and given the comments I've received I think I've succeeded.

The third is my long vampire fic that I wrote for Halloween this past year, and it wasn't coming together for me the way that I wanted. I was extremely frustrated and disappointed with myself. And then I got the idea to write Eddie's moment of being shot as if it were poetry, a 'life flashes before your eyes' moment, and sprinkle passages from that moment throughout the rest of the fic. This turns the fic into actually one long flashback, something the reader isn't aware of until they hit the shooting and all the fragments of the poem (so to speak) are repeated as one piece. That made the fic come together for me, and I'm really proud of that idea and how it turned out.

I'm actually not sure which fanfic of mine I've read the most since I uh actually don't reread my fanfics much. I do, however, enjoy reading the comments, since they help me see my fics through fresh eyes and appreciate them anew. I reread @extasiswings fics a lot, and so of my fics I'd say A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words (But Love is Undefinable) and Carbon Date Me, Excavate Me are the ones I've actually reread most since they were co-written with her and I adore her sections of them. But of my solo works... probably my Zombie AU if I'm being honest? I've reread it a few times, I just love what I did with that one.

Occasionally I'll get a comment on a slightly older fic like The Best Lie is a Truth (My Best Mask is My Face) or Even the Darkest Night (Can't Outshine the Stars) - to name the two examples I can recall at the moment - that inspires me to reread the fic. But I actually don't make a regular habit of rereading my fics. Does this make me an outlier? Mayhaps?

Which of my WIPs hmm... hmmmmm...

Probably All My Shattered Oaths. All four WIPs are angsty (the fifth is just fun monsterfucker smut) but I think that one is a little bit more painful than the others.

NOT THAT THERE'S ANYTHING ANYONE SHOULD WORRY ABOUT. BECAUSE YOU SHOULDN'T. SHHH. IT'S ALL FINE HERE.

[lovetraction-lines-review-scam]

Lovetraction Lines by Simon Mayers Scam or Legit?

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Men yearn for women who understand them, offering them the type of attention they crave. When a man finds a woman that can truly open up his heart — he will love and adore her. In fact, he’ll do anything to get her. Are you ready to address a man’s unconscious mind, making him fall for you? If so, it’s time to invest in this program.If any a lady uses these magical lines to a man despite him having shown interest in your friend because she is beautiful than you, the man will shift the attention to you and will be dying to have you. This can be evident in Simone's story of a man falling for her friend's beauty, but Simone's introduction made the man gets lost and forget the beauty of the other lady, and he now claims to have an unending love for Simone. That research is centered on the brain. Furthermore, the findings reveal that the brain is set up to respond to certain keywords and symbols in a pre-determined manner. A hormone is released when those keywords and symbols are uttered or seen. That hormone is known as a love hormone. It works on what is known as the “romantic nervous system.” When a man’s love hormones are released, the attraction to a woman is instant. It is also intense.

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[misterellyott]

I like to listen to Dusty Thunder read AITA stories while I'm at work at night. I do a lot of walking, so I just let my tiktok play with my headphones in. It's that or I watch youtube. A lot of my nightly things I do are boring, tedious and just bland so having this little bit of noise keeps my head in the game and gives me the ability to just keep going even when my brain starts trying to play the, I don't want to do this so I'm not going to do this till it's the very last second and stress myself out.

Anyways, there was a story tonight that was like 'aita for telling my wife that after five years of her mental breakdown and not being employed that I think she needs to get a job.'

Basically, he has been working 80+ hours a week and the wife continued to refuse to get a job or even really help out around the house because of her mental health.

Now don't get me wrong, I very much do believe in mental health issues. I, myself, suffer from many. But, I do understand that eventually when push comes to shove, there has to be a compromise on some part.

My wife and I aren't happy in our living situation. I mean, who can really be happy living in a trailer long term with a 14 year old and 13 pets. It's a lot, and chores often go overlooked and even when chores get done, by the end of the night the tiny home is almost back to the state it was before you even started and the exhaustion of fighting an unending uphill battle just starts to wear on you.

We realize that the amount of pets is ultimately a large part of our issues. But, neither of us is willing to part with them. How do you part with creatures that you whole heartedly love and treat like your children?

We are parents, yes, to a 14 year old and only very briefly thought about adding another human child to our mix. It was very apparent early on in our marriage/relationship that we were not going to be having any more kids. A mutual agreement that is still present at this time.

She turns 34 this year and I turn 32, not overly old, but as a dad who has been caring for a child for the past 14 years and I never really got to be a person of my own. (Yes, I realize that is a choice I made... as a teen... to have a child, and I knew what that would mean, ish. No, I do not regret my son. Yes, I do think and wish I could go back to have waited and had him at an older age, but you can't turn back the clock) That being said, my wife and I are excited that we get to see him grow up and in a few years we get to be our very own people. We will get to be included in whatever wonderful life awaits our son, and at the same time get to have our very own life as well.

That also means, like most people, our pets are our children. We treat them like children, we care for them like children (as much as you can a non-human creature). We feed them the best foods, we give them treats, toys, dog park, walks, trips outside (for our ferrets who love being in the grass and exploring), etc.

It also means expensive as HELL vet bills. Odin alone was one of our most expensive pets as he had a very serious illness that eventually led us to having to let him go this past May.

But again, I look at all their little tiny faces and I think what would life be like without them? Sure, there are some positives. We could go on vacation without wondering or trying to save up for whatever we need to do with them while we are gone. We could leave the house for long periods of time without having to crate them, Luna and Indi absolutely WRECK the house if we don't.

But, what would coming home be like? Not to see their beautiful faces greeting me, not to get their wonderful kisses and loves and cuddles.

Anyways, I'm getting away with the reason for this long as post.

I'm EXHAUSTED. I can't say it enough. My body is breaking down, I'm running on empty. I'm struggling to pull out all the stops just to make it through another day.

I'm sick again, for the second time in less than a week. I can feel the burn in the back of my throat and the way my breathing is getting all ragged.

We started getting a little spend happy again, and we gotta nip that back in the bud so we can get back on track for paying things off so that maybe, just maybe I can go down in hours.

I know my wife is exhausted working almost 50 hours a week and being the primary care of our home. And I try my hardest to make sure I do as many chores as I can, feed the pets, change the puppy pads, make sure everyone has water, pick up and tidy anytime I find things out of place, etc. But, I have no energy whatsoever to actually clean clean anything.

I'm working well over 70 hours a week and I have little to no time at home and what time I do have at home, I find it so draining to do anything other than lay in bed watching youtube or sleeping.

My son keeps bugging me to play video games with him, but the moment I sit down on my bed and grab my controller, I'm already tired and ready to just curl up under the blankets.

I try to offer to have him come and do things with me, chores like walking the dogs or taking them to the dog park, so we can at least see each other for a while, but he is 14, and those things a boring.

I've been making sure that I always tell him goodbye and tell him I love him when I'm leaving, etc, to at least let him know I'm thinking about him, but I know he just wants my attention and I'm trying so hard but I'm so burnt out that even just five minutes of a video game and I'm spent and just want to sleep.

My wife is constantly upset as well because we don't see each other like we used to. And I totally get that. She often gets upset when I don't want to go to the dog park on days where she can take them, cause I want more sleep. Or when I don't want to stay up to do laundry, but she won't do it later when I wake up cause she wants it done early in the day.

We all have right to feel the way we are feeling, but I think we are all not taking into consideration each others levels of 'can' right now.

I want to be able to just shoulder everything and be able to do all of it and still be happy and healthy. But, at the end of the day, I'm already collapsing under everything and I just hurt all the time and it sucks.

I don't really have much to look forward to most days. As of this week, we finally worked our schedules out so that I have one day off a week instead of working 7 days a week. But, that still leaves me working both jobs three days a week and one or the other job three days a week.

I need a vacation, but we can't afford for me to take any time off work. Not even with the laundry list of medical issues I need to have attended to.

I have a broken tooth that needs extracted, I have a large hernia in the upper portion of my stomach that's expanding up my ribs and causing mild to severe discomfort most days, I have blood in my stool, I have some sort of head condition that without my prescription that I'm currently on lands me laid up in bed begging for death and I still have several months to go before the first open appointment in December for it, my constant heartburn is getting worse and I feel like I'm always nauseous. My foot has mostly gotten used to the broken bone shard that is floating around near the front of my right foot, but occasionally I step down wrong and my whole day is ruined. In a nut shell, my check engine light has been on so long it's begun to blink rapidly and I know I need to go in but I can't find the motivation to actually do anything about most my issues because it requires being awake during normal people hours (one of my jobs is a full time overnight position), it requires me making phone calls (my absolute worst nightmare), and it requires me actually having to make and keep appointments (my adhd's worst nightmare).

If we had a better place to live, I honestly think a lot of our issues wouldn't be so bad. But, the trailer is slowly falling apart due to use, and we don't have the funds to repair it while still paying off debt.

We have no family, no friends to fall back on. No one we could move in with, or rent a place with. Our credit is shit, and we are absolutely exhausted living like this and yet, until our debt is paid and we can save and somehow magically find a place that allows ferrets, we are stuck living like this.

And still in, I don't want to give up our ferrets for a house. I keep holding on to hope that one of these days we will find someone a co-sign a house with, or rent with, or something amazing like some of the crazy fun amazing stories you see on tiktok and youtube and blah blah blah.

I often think about buying small amounts into the lottery to even see if we could get just a little lucky with like a thousand dollars or something, but then I can't even think about wasting the few dollars for that but then turn around and drop thirty bucks on fast food.

And there in is another problem. Unhappy, exhausted, tired, I'm turning to food again for comfort and I'm gaining weight, and I'm even more unhappy with myself.

Why can't this be easy? Why does working with such severe mental illnesses have to be so damn hard? Why does my brain work this way? Why can't I just be a normal person and just get through my day without wallowing, without thinking about every little thing we could possibly do to try and penny pinch to pay down our debts just a little bit faster and then end up fucking that up by buying something expensive to try and make myself feel better? (Food, I'm really just talking about the fast food / coffee / etc)

I won't spend 20-40 dollars on a video game, so why am I buying so much fast food for our family? Snacks? Chips? Ice Cream?

In Sept, things have got to change. And I just don't know what we can change or do different to help lift us up and change our currently negative, tired, outlook.

[xtruss]

Ravish Kumar, centre, with World’s Most Wanted Criminal Fascist Hindu Extremist Narendra Modi, left, and a BJP rally in Kolkata, right. Photograph: Observer Design

Media: ‘Resistance Is Possible’: Ravish Kumar, The Broadcaster Risking His Life To Tell The Truth About Extremist Hindus’ Fascist India​ (The Largest Hypocrisy of the World) Today​

The eminent journalist’s fearless reporting on India under Narendra Modi cost him his job and freedom. Now broadcasting to millions on YouTube, he is the subject of a new documentary

— BY Tim Adams | Sunday 02 July 2023 | The Guardian USA

Ravish Kumar was born near the same Indian city – Motihari in Bihar – as George Orwell. In his early years as a TV journalist and nightly news anchor, Kumar did not imagine that he would live to be part of a modern-day Nineteen Eighty-Four nightmare. But that changed almost a decade ago with the election of Narendra Modi’s government in India. In the years since then, Kumar has become an increasingly lone voice of truth-telling in an Indian media landscape in thrall to the Hindu nationalist politics of Modi’s Bharatiya Janata party (BJP). Kumar’s one-man campaign to maintain journalistic integrity, as mainstream news organisations became promoters of politicised fake news, earned him the “Nobel prize of Asia,” the Ramon Magsaysay award, in 2019. It also led to an unending campaign of harassment and death threats from government supporters.

Kumar, the Indian equivalent of, say, Jeremy Paxman in his prime, finally resigned from his post at NDTV in New Delhi last November, after the station was taken over by Indian billionaire Gautam Adani, a close friend of Modi. He now lives in virtual hiding with his family and broadcasts through a personal YouTube channel. His story, one of repression in modern India and of the existential crisis in truth-telling worldwide, is the subject of an urgently compelling documentary, While We Watched.

Ravish Kumar in While We Watched. Photograph: Ⓒ Britdoc Films

The director of that documentary, Vinay Shukla, tells me he knew he had to make his film when he turned on to watch Kumar’s news show back in 2018: Kumar interrupted the bulletin to berate his own viewers, telling them they had to start questioning the lies they were being fed, had to stop watching TV and look for information from other more reliable sources. “Most news presenters are always praising their audience, saying: ‘We are here to serve you’ and so on,” Shukla says. “Ravish, on the contrary, was chastising his audience, saying: ‘You’re the problem.’ I could see that here was an unusual protagonist – this huge figure in the [Indian] media – who has begun to wonder if the society for whom he is doing this work even cares for him any more.”

For the next two years, Shukla, who had previously made an award-winning documentary about the creation and struggle of an Indian opposition party, An Insignificant Man, essentially moved in with Kumar, filming him five days a week over that period. The result is an intimate portrait of a man struggling to preserve his conscience and freedom in the face of overwhelming hostility and political and commercial cynicism; a man trying, in Orwell’s terms, at 9pm every night, to tell the nation that two plus two actually equals four.

When I speak to Ravish Kumar himself on a long Zoom call, he describes himself now being “in exile” in his own country. He assumes our call is being monitored by his tormentors; before he joined it, he received the usual anonymous texts saying: “We will see you.” Once he left NDTV in November, he became “persona non grata” in Indian media, he says. He continues to try to get at the truth in the world’s largest democracy, researching and writing “about 8,000 words a day” for his YouTube broadcasts.

I wonder, looking back, when he first felt that things were falling apart? “It was June or July 2014,” he says. “I sensed that a kind of avalanche was coming in Indian media. At that time, many of my colleagues would say: ‘Well, power comes and power goes.’ And: ‘We have enough experience, Ravish, we have seen many leaders.’ But my gut was saying: ‘No, this is not something that has happened before. Something new is coming.’ In a very short span of time, the structures of newsrooms were demolished completely. That was not done step by step. It was done in one go.”

Shukla’s film contrasts Kumar’s meticulous efforts at reporting sectarian violence, or the desperate conditions in rural villages, with the shouty populist news channel Republic, which quickly became the Fox News of Indian media after Modi was elected prime minister. Republic’s excitable presenters are seen to fuel division and mistrust of the Country’s Minority (200 million) Muslim Population, to Routinely Call Political Opponents of the BJP Traitors, to promote Warmongering Against Pakistan and to neglect to report on the complex issues faced by ordinary Indians. In its manufactured culture wars and unhinged sloganeering, it is, you sense, the channel GB News aspires to be.

Now 51, Kumar, a history graduate, had by 2014 been at NDTV for 15 years, having risen from the mail room to become its most trusted and recognisable face. For a long time, the station supported his mission to call out what was happening elsewhere in the media. “NDTV started running a campaign that said: ‘We do not profit from hate,’” he says. “The owners were trying to save their core values. But in that process, everything became very tough. It was very tedious to always defend themselves.” Within the station, Kumar occasionally came under pressure to moderate his tone. “But if I said no to an editor,” he says, “they took it at once that this is my final word.”

The aftermath of sectarian clashes in Delhi in February 2020 between Hindus and Muslims protesting a contentious new citizenship law. Photograph: Rajesh Kumar Singh/AP

Did it come as a shock to him how shallow the ethical foundations of much of the media proved to be? “I wasn’t shocked,” he says, “but I was very pained and deeply hurt that no one stood up to stop this. A lot of [journalists] started making adjustments and those adjustments led them into that room with no windows, only the voice of command, saying: ‘You have to do this.’ And that is what they did.”

The film records something of the inside story of that playbook of fake news that we have all witnessed happening in plain sight: the undermining of properly sourced information across social media, the seeding of conspiracy theories, the targeting of individual journalists and organisations. There were, and remain, pockets of resistance to this pressure, Kumar insists: “But the force of avalanche was such that nobody was untouched in their newsroom, whether he was a senior reporter or whether he was an intern.”

“I’m a very fearful person. I wasn’t ready to handle that mental trauma. It destroyed me.”

Kumar’s eventual resignation is referenced in the recent scathing Index on Censorship report into the escalating repression by Modi’s populist government. “It has the structures of democracy but it has weakened democracy’s functions… it has a media which is eager to demonstrate how nationalistic and patriotic it is in order to curry favour with the ruling party.”

That determination is fuelled in part by fear. Seven journalists are now in prison in India and many more have been subject to targeted harassment; eight journalists at the Wire website were charged with sedition in 2021 for reporting that the family of a protester, killed at an anti-government rally, believed he was shot by police. Other news organisations have been subject to blackouts, while some have been raided by police, including the BBC offices in Delhi and Mumbai, which appear to have been singled out after the corporation produced a two-part investigation into Modi’s alleged history in sectarian violence. India – the world’s most populous nation – has been consequently sliding down the UN’s human rights tables; among the top 10 nations that jails writers and journalists, it is the only “Nominally Democratic” one, according to PEN, the international charity that supports freedom of expression.

A threat received by Ravish Kumar, as shown in While We Watched. Photograph: Britdoc Films

Shukla’s film examines the effect that the wider climate had on Kumar’s mental health. “I’m a very fearful person,” he insists, in the face of plenty of evidence to the contrary. “I had this strong feeling that I should not do anything immoral, but I wasn’t ready to handle that mental process. It destroyed me. When they launched [the continuous] attacks on me on social media, I could not handle it. I was very terrified, petrified. NDTV understood I needed security – but I also needed counselling. I stopped sleeping. I was awake all the time assessing the threat to my life and my family.”

In addition to the constant wave of texts and calls from people promising to cut his throat, Kumar was pushed around in the street while working. On one occasion he was chased down the road by men with clubs and iron bars, only just making it to his car. The family – his wife is an academic and they have two teenage daughters – stopped going out together; on the rare occasions they did, he would walk on the other side of the street so they would not all be subjected to any attack.

“If TV news is designed to desensitise you, I wanted to use the same form and sensitise people.” — Vinay Shukla, director

Watching all that again on Shukla’s film, he says, was almost too much for him to bear. “The first time, I had to shut my eyes because I could not see myself again, going through that process. My daughters haven’t watched it yet,” he says, “My wife saw it and she was very saddened too, but she’s a rational person. She said that people who watched the film would be able to see the story of any journalist, not just me.” He smiles a little ruefully. “The other thing I was surprised and amused about,” he says, “was that I finally saw what Vinay had been doing filming me for so many months and years. I used to tell him every day that my life was not exciting: who wants to watch a man get up from the bed and go to work?”

Director Vinay Shukla.

The director trusts that his story has a wider reference than that. “I think of the film,” Shukla says, “as my love letter to journalism, so that people understand, really, the price that proper journalists have to pay to be able to do their job. We are living in a time of disinformation. The dehumanisation of journalists is [part of that].”

Shukla is just about of the generation who came of age with social media. “I used to watch the news,” he says. “But it used to make me anxious all the time.” Much of that anxiety, he suggests, is built-in with the attention deficit structure of television news channels, which jump quickly between crisis and disaster and outrage. He has used the fast-cut techniques for his own film – but in order to dwell thoughtfully on a single life. “There are lots of quick cuts [in While We Watched] but I was hoping to have the opposite impact. If TV news is designed to desensitise you, I wanted to use the same form and sensitise people, to do the complete opposite.”

He sees an increasing desire for that kind of slowness and depth of inquiry among an emerging generation of Indian documentary-makers, who are using the form as a counterpoint to the noisy chatter of the mainstream media; presenting proper complexity as a political act. Kumar recognises that opportunity and is encouraged to be exhibit A in it.

“I hope that whoever watches this film will see that resistance is possible,” he says. In the film, he insists that even if one person witnesses the truth, then the political and sectarian lies cannot prevail. “I have a very deep sense of gratitude to the community of viewers who support me,” he says. “They offered me anything, from a car, to a house, to money, to food. We do not know how many journalists have sacrificed their lives around the world to save this profession. I hope this film brings a ray of hope that it is not easy to kill journalism.”

The film is released in the UK and the US this month. Shukla is working hard to get it shown in India, lobbying cinemas and streaming platforms, referencing the documentary awards it has won at the Toronto international film festival and elsewhere. Still, as Kumar says, the culture of fear is such that: “I can’t imagine that anyone is saying: ‘Bring your film, I will put your big poster for it on the front of my cinema hall.’” Even so, he suggests, he is confident that the film will be seen: “Lots and lots of people have been asking me how they will be able to see this film in India. Everyone should watch this film. Mr Modi should watch this film.”

A video on Kumar’s YouTube channel, which has more than 6m subscribers. Photograph: Ravish Kumar / Youtube

Kumar is not hopeful that fundamental changes in the news media in India – equivalent to the dismantling of the BBC – can be reversed. The vested interests, including at his old channel NDTV, are now too great. The politically favoured billionaires have taken over.

There’s a point in the film where he suggests that “people don’t question what they see on TV”. Given some of the extremes of what they now see, does he imagine that they may start to question that more? “To destroy Indian democracy,” Kumar says, “Indian media destroyed itself first. And it’s now very difficult to change this, even if there is a regime change. The news anchors who are spreading hate lies will not go away overnight. This media will never return for democracy. That’s gone.”

He does believe, however, that politics may find a way to bypass those structures. “The problem with social media,” he says, “is that it is rarely getting first-hand information. In India – and elsewhere – we have seen that social media can run in parallel and [amplify] compromised mainstream media. For this reason, the political opposition in India is going for a lot of mass contact. Rahul Gandhi [the former president of the Indian National Congress party], for example, is constantly on the road. Rallies, meetings, travelling by bus, by car, on foot. I cannot give a deadline that next year’s election, 2024, will mark the sunrise of new democracy. But I can see that the force of those who believe in democracy is multiplying at a fast rate.”

How, I wonder, before he finishes our call, is that colonial son Orwell viewed these days in his home town? “There is a museum to him,” Kumar says. “But most people are not very aware. It’s funny, over the years, I started talking about Nineteen Eighty-Four in my various programmes. Recently, the book has been translated into Hindi, along with Animal Farm. When [Donald] Trump was elected in the United States, I remember that Nineteen Eighty-Four suddenly became a very popular book to read and to buy.”

Perhaps, he suggests, that appetite will also be awakened in India. If so, the film of his life makes the perfect primer.

— “While We Watched” is in UK Cinemas from 14 July

[mohluskiepedard]

Rating ATLA Characters literally only from what I’ve seen in fandom

or: posts that probably shouldn’t be on my writeblr except I don’t have a sideblog

the context here is it’s half midnight and I have never seen ATLA except I have opinions now apparently so here we go whoop de do- 

I’m also not actually rating them like numerically that’s too much work i’m just stating opinions I know I’m a fraud

AANG

- A child?  - A son?  - he is Baby. but also. he has had It Rough  - would make the updog joke - has unspeakable power or smth and everyone says he’s better than the Korra girl who comes after him but honestly tastes like sexism to me - doesn’t kill people because he’s like twelve, right? he’s like twelve so he refuses to kill people - I stan honestly - less twelve year olds should kill people - Some people say his name WRONG and they are BAD but i don’t actually know what the right way or the wrong way is so. have fun w that yall - lived in peace unTIL THE FIRE NATION ATTACKED 

KATARA

- She is also like twelve???  - Is everyone here twelve - Cortana?? Katana?? Catbug??  - She has good hair, - Her mother is dead??? her mother is dead n she has a brother but she cares about her mother being dead WAY more than him (or apparently the entire fandom??) - Badass - She seems soft. good. sweet - she’s a water breather or whatever??? her brother is NOT but he is a meme - I love her 

SOKKA

- NGL looks like a fuckboy  - The meme brother! does not do the water things, but he has an aXe???  - dates BAMF lady - ngl until I talked to my ATLA watching friend I thought he canonically dated Zuko  - kinda mad he doesn’t - I haven’t actually seen anything about him except like. in zuko ship posts and also Suki appreciation posts - joined the white lotus not-a-cult by accident???  - dark ATLA tumblr show me more Sokka posts - is his name prounounced the same way as Soccer or isn’t it I need to know - HIS FIRST GIRLFRIEND TURNED INTO THE MOON - (AND THAT’S ROUGH, BUDDY) - He and Suki are a good ship, but also, Sokka Has Two Hands

SUKI

- the BAMF herself - she says STOP in that photo but also to sexism - Rlly all I see of her in fanon is abt her teaching Sokka to drink his respect women juice and I appreciate her doing that but also it’s sad she never gets talked about outside of what she did for a man - I hope she has other badass moments w/o him it would suck if she didn’t - she is NOT the girlfriend who turned into the moon, she is the one who didn’t - I don’t know much else about her ATLA Fandom y’all should appreciate her more

ZUKO

- Look at him... my son... - He has a good redemption arc - he and his sister are evil lesbian and redeemed gay guy??? - has a straight canon ship but should’ve been with Sokka this boy is gay - I Want To Protect Him - That’s literally it - he has a cool uncle and his dad sucks  - people ship him with Katara and I Do Not Get It that’s his sister in law except not really - “We don’t trust Zuko’s change of heart” [the next day] “so Zuko is my closest friend now,”  - His dad was like “fuck up the avatar to prove your worth to me” and Aang was like “counter argument you already have worth and we should fuck up your dad” and I think that’s beautiful - he becomes the fire man and he’s very good at it - Zuko for President 2020 - in the words of myself, half an hour ago: “ I was like "that kid with the burn on his face seems like a sad but then happy mlm who needs found family" and I was RIGHT” - took too long to find a happy picture of him :( Zuko rights NOW please - His mother’s story got compared to an OC of mine and all I can say is oh no and they deserve better based on that alone - I have had Zuko for five minutes but if anything else happens to him I will kill everyone in this throne room and then myself

TOPH

- She is badass but like also will murder you while laughing maniacally? - for some reason reminds me of Nott from Critical Role, another show I Have Not Seen - Is blind but gets more out of making jokes abt being blind than she would from being able to see - “Sight is just a cheap tactic to make weak benders stronger!!!” - Literally the opposite of Aang and has killed many people?? - She Can Tell When You’re Lying. But I do not know how and Am simply mildly threatened by this - Therapist: Toph’s ability to know if you’re lying isn’t real and can’t hurt you. Toph’s ability to know if I’m lying:  - She and Zuko.... buddies???  - if not they should be - tiny sad boy needs friends like toph

AZULA

- Evil Lesbian Culture - [BDG Voice] You committed a war crime! Oopsie! - took be gay do crime too literally - her and Zuko have accurate sibling writin except instead of “you ever want to murder your sibling for breathing in the same space as you,” being a Joke Azula took it seriously - okay but with a name like azula she should be the blue bender this ANNOYS me she should NOT be red bender - AZULa  - AZUL - IT MEANS BLUE - She was half of y’alls gay awakenings and it SHOWS - Should have maybe been redeemed too??? Jury is out no one knows - Was she gay for Ty Lee or wasn’t she I can’t tell how much of that Audio is a joke - IS SHE ALSO TWELVE??? IS EVERYONE HERE TWELVE?? IS THIS TWELVE YEAR OLD COMITTING ATROCITIES? 

UNCLE IROH

- A Good Man - Finally, Some Good Fucking [Adult Figures]  - he has the tea. literally and figuratively - Ozai is like “and I will permanently disfigure my son and throw him out” and Iroh is like “What The Fuck, Ozai,” thus voicing the entire audience’s thoughts - Literally the only adult in this that I trust - I? I love him. this is all I have to say. my love for him is unending. Some1 protect this man from all harm   - he’s Zuko’s uncle (and also Azula ig) but he does not seem related to Ozai. is it just a theme in this family that one sibling is chill and one sibling commits horrendous atrocities against your fellow human beings or  - something happened to his son???? :((((( I Don’t Want Him To Have Suffered Like This

OZAI

- A BAD MAN - Uh Oh (stinky)  - THE WORST OF THE MEN  - I do not like him - Bastard man. nasty. committed war crimes and then went “but what if - get this - i also abused my son,”  - I would like him to Not Be Like This - by Like This I mean present and alive  - :/ 

TY LEE

- She’s NOT the There Is No War In Ba Sing Se lady and I don’t know why i thought she WAS but until I looked up her photo I thought that was her  - She looks like a sweetheart tho - I hope nothing bad happens to her????  - talks about auras??? or smth??? let her vibe - She would talk animatedly to me about warrior cats if she was in my year seven class and I was sat alone and I would understand none of it but appreciate her anyway - if azula bullies her I’ll be :( at Azula and Azula will not care because she has Mommy Issues and therefore is slightly unhinged - She seems like that one kid with no trauma vibing at the edge of [every other kid having trauma] and not really getting it but trying her best - Is she also twelve?????? She maybe looks twelve

CABBAGE MAN 

- HIS CABBAGES - fulfills my favourite trope: ordinary person repeatedly has life disrupted by the inconveniences of relying on actual children to save the world - probably has a campaign post canon for letting trained adults fix the worlds’ problems in the future - or sets up the Very First Cabbage Insurance Company - look at him. he loves his cabbages so much. you go you funky lil cabbage man

ALSO THE MOST IMPORTANT ONES MOMO

- LOOK AT HIM HE’S SO GOOD - small. fluffy. big ears - Lord Momo of the Momo Dynasty: his Momoness - a Good Boy...

APPA

- he looks so soft... - he can fly but he just does it by??? vibing through the air?? motionless??? iconic - I saw that one post about mishearing it as Abba and thinking he was Aang’s dad and he looks like he would be a good stand in dad ngl - he’s so LORGE - a chonky boy - love him

that is everyone I have heard of it and if I left someone out it’s a sign that y’all should talk about em more bc I have no clue they exist put more ATLA On my Dash ig I’ll do Legend of Korra ig maybe apparently that one has canon wlw and i love me some canon wlw

[michpat6]

fic masterlist

it's about time i made a masterlist, so here it is!

ONE SHOTS:

your obedient servant:

You are born at the edge of time, brought into being by a woman who calls herself Hylia.

OR

The story of Fi, and her unending loyalty to the Masters she's served.

(part one of the aftermath cinematic universe, underrated and one of my favorites. fi rights!)

you got the world on its knees (now make it beg):

It is said that the kingdom of Hyrule is cursed, and that its people live in the shadow of the greatest Evil this world has ever known: Queen Zelda and her immortal Swordsman.

OR

To the rest of the world, Hyrule is terrifying.

(evil zelink, no plot just vibes)

as the sun sets on this world:

https://href.li/?https://archiveofourown.org/works/36723541

A dark mass of fur trots up to her, a dead fox in its mouth, and Zelda braces herself for a fight she knows she can’t win.

It’s a giant black wolf with strange white markings on its face and startlingly clear blue eyes. It just stands in front of her, staring, before it drops the dead fox at her feet and sits. Its tongue lolls out of its mouth as it pants, licking the blood from its lips, and stray droplets plink against a metal cuff shackled to its front left foot.

That’s strange, she thinks. Why would a wolf be held captive?

(And is its tail wagging?)

The Master Sword buzzes, rattling in her hands, and the wolf’s eyes light up before it pounces.

OR

After the Calamity strikes and her Hero falls, Zelda, wracked with grief, must return the whispering Master Sword to Korok Forest. She does so with a Good Boy by her side.

this world is cruel (but you are so beautiful)

Mikasa is warm against his side, and when her hand comes up to hold his sleeve Eren’s voice falters just a bit. Her breaths puff against his ear, growing slower and slower the more he talks.

He finishes the chapter about the girl who became friends with a monster, and he glances over to ask Mikasa if she wants to hear another story but stops himself the moment he opens his mouth.

She’s fast asleep, the lower half of her face nestled into her scarf and her twitching fingers wrapped up in his sleeve.

Eren, as close to her face as he is, can’t help but stare. He’s never had a girl this close to him, before, and Mikasa...

Well, like his father had told him in an effort to get him excited to meet her, Mikasa is very pretty.

OR

seven times eren watched mikasa sleep and one time he woke her up.

(my first attack on titan/eremika fic! ending spoilers galore!)

MULTI-CHAPTER:

aftermath:

The Calamity is dead, and Link never thought he would actually succeed. He is, somehow, still alive.

So is Zelda.

OR

Link and Zelda won. This is the aftermath.

(part five of the aftermath cinematic universe, complete, my first fic. if you like going in depth about the zelda lore and bending it to fit your desires, this one’s for you)

a memory of younger days:

One hundred years ago, there was a Princess, there was a Hero, and there was a great Calamity knocking on Hyrule's doors.

(They weren't supposed to let it in.)

OR

Before

(part four of the aftermath cinematic universe, in progress, fills in some blanks in aftermath and adds to zelink's dynamic within it)

that parting need not last forever (it's dangerous to go alone):

"Link."

He groans, turning his head away from the sound of the voice. He's tired, his body is so heavy-

"Link." A cold finger jabs into his cheek. "Open your eyes."

His eyes peel open, and his vision is blurry. There's a yellow and green blob in his face, but the more he blinks the more the world clears, and the more he can make out that the blob is the face of a girl.

(A beautiful girl.)

"Took you long enough," she says, her green eyes staring into his soul. Her golden hair is long, spilling over her back and brushing his hands. "I've been trying to wake you up for what feels like forever."

OR

The Hero wakes up after a hundred year sleep, no memory to his forgotten name, and finds that he's not alone.

(zelink amnesia fic, in progress, a lot of fun)

faded into legend:

In a golden age of peace, a man named Link pulls the Master Sword at age twenty-five, marking him as the first Hero with no Evil to fight.

At least, that's how it started.

OR

sometimes, legends are tragedies.

(part two of the aftermath cinematic universe, in progress, ten thousand years ago, fills in the blanks surrounding aftermath's ending)

lightning in a bottle (flashing before my eyes):

"'Bosa?" The girl asks, frowning as she sucks on the tube.

"Urbosa," Urbosa repeats, louder, staring hard at the strange object. The air is cold this far up north, and she rubs her hands over her arms as goosebumps break out over her brown skin.

"Ah!" The Hylian laughs, pulling the tube from her tongue, gray smoke spilling from her lips like a dragon's breath. "That makes much more sense! I'm sorry, my hearing has always been bokoblin shit."

Urbosa holds her breath, not liking the scent of the smoke as it drifts into her face. It's the same stuff the guards indulge in back home, but they use pipes instead of whatever...whatever that is. "What's your name?"

The girl's blue eyes sparkle in the moonlight as she looks Urbosa up and down. A small smile plays on her painted lips when she replies, "Faye."

OR

The Gerudo Chief's daughter and the Crown Princess of Hyrule meet at a political banquet, when both are young women unknowingly on the cusp of ascendance.

(According to Hyrule's historians, they were very close friends.)

OR OR

The story of Urbosa, and why she went down swinging.

(part three of the aftermath cinematic universe, in progress, the relationship between urbosa and the queen of hyrule, gives some flavor to the pre-calamity fic)

SERIES:

the aftermath cinematic universe:

my zelda fics that lowkey connect and tell one story, but only if you want it to. it's ordered "chronologically" but it doesn't really matter because they can work as standalones unless stated otherwise.

(currently four parts, in progress)

aftermath:

the aftermath fic, but broken out chapter by chapter as a series! this was how I first started posting the story before having a multi-chapter version updating alongside it. 52 parts, 51 chapters and one bonus.

(completed)

[catboygretzky]

best stucky fic recs pwease

Okay, disclaimer, these are all like five+ years old (which is the best Stucky era, imo) and definitely not the only ones I enjoy; these are just a few in my bookmarks on ao3.

In no particular order besides the order I bookmarked them and under a read more because there's a shit ton of them (really, it's a lot):

- hold me until we crumble; Not Rated, 23k

“Sam told me you were watching Antiques Roadshow,” Natasha says, shaking out her hair. “I assumed it was a national emergency.”

- despite the threatening sky and shuddering earth (they remained); Explicit, 72k

“They really didn’t want the mask to come off.” Hill thumbed through the scans, and pulled out a film that she then handed over to Sam, face mostly expressionless but for the flat line of her pursed lips.

Sam accepted the film and held it up to the light, angling so both he and Steve could see it, squinting at the outline of the Winter Soldier’s skull, and the blips of unnatural white that showed up, God, in his brain, not to mention about half his teeth, plus the mask, with its thin protrusions—

“Those are pins,” Steve realized. He looked over at Hill. “The mask—it’s nailed to his face.”

Hill’s face was as unmoved as ever. “Like I said. They really didn’t want it coming off.”

- family means no one gets left behind or forgotten; Teen, 11k

“Why did you think I wouldn’t like you for being gay?” Steve asks gently.

“You’re Captain America.” Eli’s got his teeth clenched and is resolutely looking ahead. “You stand for truth and justice and the American way. You stand for American morals. You stand for…” he shrugs awkwardly. “Not people like me.”

Steve blows the air out of his cheeks slowly, trying to figure out how to keep the anger out of his voice so Eli doesn’t think it’s at him.

Or, Steve comes to terms with his new world, and gains some children in the process.

- Mistake on the Part of Nature; Teen, 1.3k

Steve takes in Bucky's betrayed look and Sam's confusion, follows Sam's gaze to the pile of mangled fruit in the trash can. Sudden comprehension fills his face.

"Oh," he says. "Bucky found out about bananas."

In which an American icon is mourned. But probably not the one you're thinking of.

- Swear Jar; Teen, 1.5k

Bucky isn't the only troll in the future.

OR

Steve has a Swear Jar and he makes the Avengers pay up every time they cuss.

- Barnes & Rogers and the Goddamn Truth; Not Rated, 19k

There are three well-known facts at Shield High:

1. The history teacher Mr. Barnes is a stone-cold terror, and it’s not even because he only has one arm. 2. The other history teacher, Mr. Rogers, is a mysterious enigma, and it’s something to do with the body of a Greek God and contradicting stories of his past. (They’re all rumours, anyway.) 3. Mr Barnes and Mr Rogers hate each other.

Bucky wouldn’t have it any other way.

- perfectly right wrong number; Teen, 32k

It all starts because Steve is too dumb to handle his smartphone.

A wrong number AU in which Bucky Barnes doesn't enter Steve's life (meaning: Bucky wasn't born until the eighties, but Steve is still Captain America) until Steve accidentally dials the wrong number. Wherein there is a lot of texting, some advice via Natasha and Darcy, a bit of pining, and a first date in an amusement park. Oh, and on top of being a disabled veteran, Bucky is a professional catwalker. Literally.

- The power of the right shirt (a.k.a. God bless America); Teen, 1.2k

"He just…" Phil trails off, mouth gaping. He is staring at the field outside the house, eyes glazed.

Clint sighs. "Yeah, he just ripped a log in two with his bare hands."

- To fill it up with something; Teen, 21k

A fateful encounter with Dr. Strange leaves the Winter Soldier transformed, and Bucky Barnes reunites with Steve Rogers in a most unexpected way.

“Steve brings the puppy inside, into the apartment that doesn't quite feel like home no matter how much he's been trying. He isn't used to being alone. Before the war, he always had Bucky, and his mother until her death. During the war, Bucky was there, too—and the rest of the Howlers, of course—but Bucky always meant home. (And well, maybe Steve's already got a name for the puppy in mind)."

- build it bigger than the sun; Teen, 10k

“Yeah, because nothing says heteronormative like living in Dupont Circle for two years and wearing skin-tight shirts to hit on hot airmen when you go running in the morning.”

“Look, I know you’re being sarcastic but I really don’t get how no one picked up on that.”

Steve and Bucky try to work out their relationship. The Avengers keep getting in the way.

- Memories Circle (Like Birds of Prey), Teen, 32k

Everything seems to be going right, Steve's fighting with his Commandos, they've saving lives-- until Steve falls from a train, is taken prisoner, and turned into the Winter Soldier. Meanwhile, Bucky takes up Steve's mantle as Captain America, and thanks to Zola's experiments, he gets dropped into a whole new time, only to cross paths with a Steve who doesn't know who he is anymore.

Essentially, the events of CA:TFA, mild mentioning of Avengers, and CA:TWS but with Steve as the Winter Soldier and Bucky as Captain America

- The Gentleness That Comes; Mature, 9k

Steve Rogers never really views the things he had to do to get by before the War with any sort of shame or embarrassment. People ask him for his opinions on modern issues in interviews, but Steve has gotten good at talking around those types of questions. Fury insists that there's no way to answer them without casting a shadow of controversy across the reputation of the Avengers, and that's the last thing Steve wants.

But then a sex tape is released featuring Tony Stark in bed with another man, and Steve can't stay quiet any longer.

- salt for the sea; Mature, 7.5k

Natasha comes home with intel regarding the fate of the Winter Soldier; Steve leaves to go and avenge Bucky Barnes.

“It's a list of everyone who was involved in his death, and a rough timeline of everything that happened beforehand,” she tells him.

“And the notebook?”

“I explained what they did,” Natasha says, “The blank pages are for you to explain what you do to them.”

- Lone Cat and Samurai; Teen, 8.4k

"We lost Kitten America sir!" Junior Agent blurted out. Then turned an unlovely shade of purple. "I mean, Captain America. Who’s a kitten. Because magic. Sir."

- Waiting To Prove You're Not Alone; Explicit, 41k

Months after he woke up on the banks of the Potomac, when a reporter mistakenly assumes Steve would disapprove of homosexuality being as accepted as it is in the modern day, Steve accidentally snaps and unleashes his real opinion on the matter... and with that, a secret he's hidden for over eighty years.

When that secret comes looking for him in New York, Steve can only hope that he can get a second chance at saving his best friend, even if it means keeping his heart in check.

“Yeah, back in my day it wasn't tolerated, and because of that I knew from the minute I figured it out, that I’d never get to tell my best friend that I loved him, and sure enough, he died without knowing that I’d been in love with him for a decade."

- I'm Not Sick (But I'm Not Well); Mature, 30k

Steve Rogers doesn’t meet Bucky Barnes in the 1930’s. Instead, Steve meets him April 17th, 2012.

Well…sort of meets him.

In actuality, Bucky had almost hit him with his truck.

Or: The fic where millennial Bucky Barnes nearly runs over a freshly thawed national treasure, and what Steve Rogers did to adjust to modern NYC during those two weeks before the events of The Avengers.

- pure as the driven slush; Explicit, 11k

He should have worked it out sooner. But then, Steve always was a sneaky little bastard—had to have been, just to survive this long.

For the SteveBucky Fest prompt, "Steve is quite experienced while Bucky's never gone beyond second base with anyone".

- Let's Be Exposed and Unprotected, Explicit, 5k

Bucky’s pretty sure he should be into getting fucked through the floor while walls explode around him like in that Mr and Mrs Smith movie that Clint loves. But he likes it like this. He likes being on his back with Steve looming above him, big and naked, blocking out the rest of the world.

- Man of Steel; Explicit, 6.7k

It’s like Steve looked at his metal arm and thought ‘Challenge Accepted.’

- 5 Times Steve Got Arrested and 1 Time They All Did; Teen, 4.9k

What it says, 5 times Steve Rogers ended up in jail (with and without Bucky) + 1 time all of the Avengers got arrested with him.

- the best of you; Teen, 16k

Bucky is on a mission when he gets the call.

They tell him that Steve has been compromised.

[The story wherein Hydra captures Steve to create a new weapon. Bucky, alongside the rest of the Avengers, come together and work through the fallout.]

- pull apart the dark; Teen, 79k

Steve's unending faith in his best friend was beginning to look less like hope and more like fantasy. When they'd caught the Soldier – in a fire fight that still gave Sam nightmares – the only thing the man seemed to recall was how to hit exactly where it hurt.

Four months later, Barnes still refused to speak English. Refused to heed anything but Steve's voice.

So, all in all, it was not a great time for Hydra to attack New York. All in all, Sam really wished they'd just killed him, instead of turning Captain America into a baby.

- Not Another Supersoldier Fantasy; Explicit, 8.9k

Bucky finds a popular sex toy modeled on Captain America's own anatomy. Well, isn't this just perfect? Because even after all this time, he still hasn’t seen Steve’s supersoldier cock. But apparently in this day and age anyone with $29.95 can get a decent replica. The unfairness of this is of galactic proportions.

- the blood of the covenant; Teen, 7.5k

Steve has a "thing" for hot water.

Or, Sam Wilson adopts Steve Rogers.

- Mighty like Love, Mighty like Sorrow; Teen, 19k

After freeing himself from the Russians' mind control, Bucky is left at loose ends, drifting through the decades. Still, he's in no hurry to take up Nick Fury's offer to once again fight the good fight -- especially not when Fury has the nerve to put some imposter in his best friend's old suit and send him out to fight against Chitauri.

- Read Me Like a Book; Gen, 1.5k

In which Bucky accidentally becomes a book collector, because when the universe gives you a million biographies about your boyfriend, you go bookcase shopping. And then he finds out about The Grenade Incident, and the boys actually talk about it like actual adults. (Somewhere, Sam sheds a proud tear.)

- the broadest stroke of color; Gen, 16k

Sarah Rogers always loved Steve's hands.

"Your hands will do a lifetime's work," she'd say. "Remember to do the work you can for those you love."

Almost a century later, Steve does just that.

[The story wherein Steve draws comics for Bucky to help him recover his memory. Through a series of events, the issues are leaked, and Steve finds himself reviving the Captain America comics. He still isn't sure how that happened.]

- If You're Loved By Someone (You're Never Rejected); Teen, 9.4k

You’re fifteen when you realize why you stare at Bucky’s lips more than normal when he laughs and when he says your name. You lean into his shoulder when you walk next to him and when you’re sick you don’t fight off his soft hands. You tease him, he teases back and being around him is so easy you forget what it was like to live without him. You can’t remember life pre-Bucky and it scares you.

- Unusual Weather; Explicit, 8.7k

Bucky’s been at the Avengers Tower for three weeks before he finally gives in to Steve’s gentle coaxing and Stark’s cheerful waving of fistfuls of circuits, and lets them scan the arm.

It doesn’t go well.

- this city bleeds its aching heart; Explicit, 35k

The one where Steve and Bucky pose as a happily married couple while on a mission for SHIELD, to catch an international arms dealer hiding in a suburban neighbourhood.

- Good Boy; Explicit, 13k

Bucky is still adjusting to life with the Avengers, and Steve is willing to do whatever it takes to make him feel comfortable. Increasingly, though, what seems to make him comfortable is strangely intimate.

Surprise, Steve! You're a gentle dom and Bucky wants to be your pretty pet!

- Brooklyn; Teen, 8.8k

"Captain America, what's your stance on gay marriage?"

Everyone knows that, by now. Everyone but Bucky.

[equivalent-exchanger]

The Archenmage

Rating: M A/N: It’s been a few years since I’ve posted to tumblr. Until now I’ve mostly been known for my fanfictions, but I was recently convinced to post my personal work online. This story has been through the washer since 2014, and I’m hoping if nothing else it’ll inspire others to post their own original fiction.  Summary: When Lilen’s sister is viciously killed by a stranger cloaked in black, a mysterious power befalls her through a swirling scar on her wrist. The only way to bring her sister back from the brink of death is to cast a powerful seal, entangling her sister’s life with that of her killer’s. Now, as she is forced from her home with the cold-hearted assassin in tow, she finds herself questioning everything she knows of good and evil, and everything she knows of herself.

Reynir travels alongside Lilen, his own botched murder attempt now chaining him to a life of servitude at the young mage’s whim. Begrudgingly, he accompanies her as they search for a saviour for her sister’s soul. But it’s becoming harder for him to hide from the demons sent after him, he’s struggling to find a cure for his own.

When the long-standing barrier protecting the mortal lands from the immortal begins to crumble in the North, Lilen and Reynir must learn to trust and forgive, or surrender their lives altogether. But in this world, trust is not easily given… And secrets are all they know.

The Archenmage is a high fantasy story of overcoming loss through the strength of forgiveness and finding love in unending darkness.

           Prologue

           Blood had never been a frightening thing to Lilen.

           Growing up in the forest, her father had taught them to gut rabbits before she knew how to read. But if she had known that the night would end with her sister lying on the forest floor, so like those rabbits and pheasants she’d grown up devouring, she might have chosen to savour the moments when blood was a sign of life and survival. Had she known all that was to come, she might have decided to pay closer attention.

           Closer attention to the way Sephona would plant her palms on the table before she made to gather the dishes. Closer attention to the sound of her voice when she chastised their father for telling weird stories at the dinner table.

           Maybe she would have paid closer attention to the legends that her father wove into the air through his voice.

           “The Council of Bridges, the stronghold of mages,” Her father would begin, crow’s feet crinkling at his eyes as he assumed his story-telling position. “Hundreds of magic wielders, under the guidance and protection of the Five who worked unseen at the top.”

           Lilen huffed, leaning her head against her hand.

           “This has to have been the three hundredth time you’ve told this one, dad.” She rolled her eyes.

           “Hey, I like this one!” Sephona called from the kitchen. Their mother shrugged from the end of the table. Lilen frowned into her hand and picked at the grain of the wood. She ignored the irate glare her father shot her.

           He cleared his throat. “Like I was saying,” He continued, “Five most powerful mages, sat at the top of the council—”

           “The Archenmages.” Lilen grumbled, trying to speed the tale along.            Her father glared again. She made a face at him.

           “Right, Archenmages. Now while all magic had been passed down by masters, and each mage inherited the powers of their tutor, the Archenmages were bound to no master. They were anomalies, born from the earth and placed among mortals to protect and to serve.”

           Sephona returned from the kitchen, shaking the water from her hands. “Oh, I want to tell this part this time!” She pulled out the chair from across the table, and the screech of the wood against the old board flooring interrupted her father’s musings.

           She wiggled a bit in her seat, tossing a long straw-blonde lock of hair over her shoulders. Her father sniffed in ire. Her mother just smirked and leaned back, rubbing a knot from her shoulders.

           The room seemed to dim as Sephona took up the tale.

           “The Archenmages protected the mortals, sewing peace and harmony between their kind, and the immortals who lived among them.” Her voice was soft and sweet, but held an air of foreboding, “Usually they moderated affairs of trade and land, bringing forth great houses hewn from earth and rock for those who sought shelter in another’s home. They called down rains from the sky to heal battered crops, and could fashion arrows of light to guide sailors home. Under their guidance, the immortals and the mortals lived in a sense of harmony, a symbiosis of sorts.” She paused, meeting Lilen’s eyes across from her own. Her voice deepened and hushed. “And then came the demons, far from the north… Promising riches and power and the unification of the immortal folk. Born from darkness and disparity, the demons spread a notion of superiority amongst those with immortal blood, wrenching a void between them and their mortal neighbors.”

           Lilen noted her mother glance towards the doorway. She, too, had thought she’d seen some shadow lurking at the window. But Seph continued.

           “As the mortals grew more wary of their longer-lived counterparts, fortresses were built and walls were hewn from great stacks of stone. They pleaded with the Archenmages for aid in this endeavour, but the Council of Bridges were wary of the segregation.

           “The Five travelled swiftly to the North on winds of their own creation, seeking to meet the with the Demon King. Few had ever seen the great lord in person, and those who had were certainly not of mortal origin.”

           Lilen swore the room growing darker.

           “But when they entered the halls of the Demon King’s lair, far beyond the reaches of man or mage, the gates closed. And the darkness swept in. The dark one had betrayed them, choosing to kill off the youngest of their council as a mark of power. The Five, now the Four, fled the castle, destroying half the face of it on their way out.”

           “They say you can see marks of the destruction in Nemarus to this day!” Her father piped in, oddly excited. Sephona rolled her eyes and continued.

           “It was then that the Great War began, like a horn of evil that rang across the land. Immortals slaughtered mortal beings, razed their forests and their crops, killed livestock and cut down great lineages. The Four Archenmages, battle worn and weary, saw the carnage and fires which overcame the land. In their last effort to protect mortal kind, they pooled their magic together and pushed the immortal forces to the North. It was too much to kill them, but great winds and storms and fires raged against their unending forces until they were far from the nearest mortal village. The last of the Five used the final dregs of their power to raise the barrier, the wall cutting the immortals off from mortal lands, thus ensuring the safety of mortal kind forever more.”

           Lilen had heard the legend a million times, she knew each word by heart, and could recite it front to back, left to right, up and down. It was all very taxing to hear once again.

           If she’d known what was to come, she’d have begged to hear the legend from told in the voices of her family once more.

           Sephona reached out to Lilen, clasping her calloused hands in soft and delicate ones. She looked at Lilen with warm eyes of deep blue. The gaze of safety, which Lilen wished she’d memorized.

           “It’s been a long day, hasn’t it.” She said to Lilen. Her parents nodded, her father grumbling something before they both rose from their seats and made their way to get ready for bed.

           “I’ve heard that story enough times that it’ll probably be written on my tombstone when I die.” Lilen mumbled.

           Sephona placed her hands at her side, and looked at Lilen with an oddly grave expression.

           “No, Lil,” Seph said, a sad little smile lifting her mouth, “I suspect you will have a different story to tell.”

[vidalinav]

Nessian Headcanon #12: Family Edition

Since I keep seeing baby headcanons I wanted to make a list of my own :D which I’ve briefly touched on in other posts but...

Cassian and Nesta have a boatload of children (5 at the end of it all I think). The others start joking that they’re building their own army. But what really happens is that they end up taking in many children over the years because they travel often with the work they do and they see so many conditions and there’s wars and all sorts of circumstances. It’s inevitable that kids don’t have homes but they have a giant house and unending resources and the House is like a big nanny itself so they think it’s fate. 

Nesta is actually the one who brings most of the children home. The first one is a 9 year old girl, who is the angriest kid alive. Has something to do with the plot of a story I’m writing, but Nesta is basically entrusted with this kid. She’s the grand niece of someone she ends up knowing and she’s pretty magically powerful so her family would have ate her alive, so she’s asked to keep her safe and whatnot. Her name is Magda but she goes by Maggie. She does not like Cassian whatsoever in the beginning, and she is horribly rude to Nesta. But Nesta does not care at all, she’s like okay get it out, say worse. Like she’s so chill, because she knows how it feels to be that angry. Maggie and Nesta end up being really close to the point where Maggie does not like being away from Nesta and gets very protective of her even to other members of the IC. She’ll fight first and ask questions later. Cassian and her form a bond actually not by fighting at all, but because Maggie does so many experiments that end up going awry. She’s a fae and has got magic up the wazoo and she’s a book nerd, and she’s kind of a trouble maker, and Cassian thrives. He loves her because she’s like a smaller more diabolical version of Nesta. The House is amused by their antics usually. 

Nesta ends up getting pregnant for their second child and this kid is the only one they actually have on their own. Her name is Lyra, and Maggie thinks that it’s hilarious that Cassian lives in a house with all girls. Maggie is about 12 when they have her, and Maggie at first does not take kindly to Lyra, because she starts feeling like they have their own family and she’s just the kid who eventually is going to have to go back to her other family (because that’s a plot too that I won’t go into to) but they try so much to include her, because Maggie is their child. No question. Nesta ends up telling Cassian that she’s pregnant by giving him an enchanted painting, which is the work of all three Archeron sisters. Elain for seeing what the child would look like, Feyre for painting, and Nesta for enchanting it so that if they have more children the picture will get bigger and there will be room for Feyre to paint the others. So one big family portrait. In that picture, Maggie is tucked in between the two with the baby/toddler. Dark hair, big blue eyes... maybe hazel. Maybe one of each (I’m really not sure). The best parts of both Nesta and Cassian though. She’s so gorgeous. Prettiest little girl. But yeah going back to Maggie, they ask her during this picture time (probably solstice present time) if Maggie wants to be an Archeron. (Another headcanon for another time, but Cassian marries Nesta too and becomes an Acheron). So, does she want to do this? Absolutely, and at this point she already start calling them mom and dad and just referring to them as such, so that’s their kiddos. 

Third and fourth are siblings. They’re from the continent. Maggie is 14, Lyra is close to 2. The siblings are brought by Nesta who is doing some thing that I cannot say because I have not made it up yet, but she finds them at the scene of a Massacre in hiding. The oldest is close to 6, the other is probably 1-ish. The oldest will not let them take the baby from her. The baby is a boy. They don’t speak the common tongue, which is any issue, but they hire a tutor to both talk to the little girl and then also to teach them ALL (everyone in their household) the language that the two siblings speak as well as teach them how to speak the common Prythrian language. So everyone ends up learning. The little girl is taken under the wing of Maggie, who is the perfect older sister/camp counselor as she likes to refer to herself after there’s more kids. They don’t know her name for the LONGEST time, because she won’t speak at all, but she ends up loving Cassian because he makes her laugh and he brings her a thousand stuffed bears because at one point she won’t stop crying and he brings them home and makes funny voices with them, and carries her on his shoulders, and she has the sweetest giggle. But eventually they end up naming her Ursella which she ends up going by Ella when she gets older, because her nickname with Cassian is little bear. They do ask her later when she talks if she remembers her old name and her birthday since they don’t know, but she doesn’t say that she does, which may be a lie, but Ella happily goes by Ella, and they give her a choice to choose one random day in the year to be her birthday, but she chooses to celebrate her birthday on the day they brought her in. She calls it her re-birthday.

The baby boy they name Nico. It’s actually a common Illyrian name and Cassian knows that the little boy is technically not Illyrian but it is his first son, and he really wants to give him that piece of him. Cassian does ask him when he’s about 10 if he’d prefer a name that’s based on his own culture, because they make sure that’s very integrated in their home life, because of course Cassian loves his culture and Nesta has that anthropological eye, so she knows and learns so much and they just love their children so much that they want all of them, every piece that they come with. But Nico likes his name, and he’s his dads through and through. But he LOVES Nesta. He’s a momma’s boy for sure, which I guess just makes him similar to Cassian. He does not like learning though, so Nesta usually has to teach him herself instead of having tutors, and she spends extra time with him going through his lessons. Lyra and him grow up together closer to age, so they pick on each other A LOT, but ultimately they grow up to have that relationship like I can pick on you but no one else can. They’re super close. If you want one, you find the other. They both will be together somewhere making a mess of things. Ella is the one who usually is like would you please be loud somewhere else. She ends up getting into music--playing instruments and so she generally prefers quietness to study and practice. Violin is her forte. 

The next boy comes about 4 yrs later. Maggie is 18, Lyra is 6, Nico is 5/6 ish. Ella is 10. The boy is about 12. He’s Illyrian and Cassian finds him this time and takes him to Nesta first, but Nesta is like why are you asking lol this is our new son. He’s a “bastard” unfortunately. I hate that word. But he has learned to fight, Cassian found him in the fighting pits in an Illyrian camp a couple hours away from Windhaven, and the situation was so much like his except this kid was never given a home like he was. So, he spent a good couple of weeks trying to get on his good side enough for him to trust him and to want to go someplace safer and warm. He hates Cassian a lot at first... while at the same time being like you’re the hero I’ve heard about. So admiration but also a touch of resentment and anger at the world. Cassian doesn’t know what to do with that, because still to the day he does not handle emotion like Nesta does. He understands it but he doesn’t know what to say, what to do, his go to is always training, but training is not what this child needs. So again, this is Nesta’s forte. Interestingly enough, she’s very gentle with kids. She’s empathetic, soft, but not condescending. She gives everyone the same respect so it helps a lot when he sees that and he’s never had a mom before who tucks him in or makes sure he’s feeling well. His name is Julian. I forgot that part and it turns out he’s HATES fighting. But he really likes plants. So he ends up spending a lot of time with Elain when she visits. He’s fascinated by them and ends up having his own garden. But because Nesta is magical in this headcanon (because she’s more witchy in my fics) he learns A LOT about poisons. Not because Nesta teaches him, but because he finds her books and reads them and starts growing them. This becomes a problem, because when Julian doesn’t like his tutors or teachers, he starts trying to poison them. Like not killing them, but he knows which will give stomach aches, which will give rashes. Nesta is both proud and reprimanding. 

I do feel like they might have more, but I don’t know for now I feel this is good for their set family. Five in total for their first gaggle of children lol. But all of them are asked if they want to be an Archeron. All of them say yes. All of them have each other’s back even if they have screaming matches on the daily. The house is mostly chaotic at all times but the House loves having people in it and laughing and being filled to the brim with stuffed animals and train sets and plants and music and family members coming in and out since Nyx visits often because he’s an only child for a very long time with Feyre taking more of a position in court rulings and Rhysand just being generally busy because you know High Lord/High Lady stuff. I don’t see Feyre being a stay at home mom but I also don’t see Rhys being a stay at home dad, but they’re also rulers so I peg them for both being working parents, which they feel guilty about A LOT at first, and it’s something that they struggle with in the confines of their own identities and their relationship, because they love Nyx and they know they’re parents but that’s not all they are, and without having the gender role of one parent staying home it’s very difficult for them to both rule, but Rhys does not want to stop being a high lord and Feyre is bored too often and she wants to rule and she knows she can, and she has that title for a reason and wants to utilize it. So it’s a hard time, with lots of arguments, but Nyx ends up mostly going with Cassian for a good amount of the day when he’s older and they have more kids in the house, and Nyx doesn’t really know that Feyre and Rhys had this problem, because he’d just prefer to be around the other kids and it ends up working really well. 

Cassian ends up being more of the stay at home parent. I don’t know why but I feel he just gives me that vibe where forget the courtier business, if there’s no war and if the armies are generally taken care of which he does, he wants to stay home and raise his kids, which is very surprising since he’s the one who doesn’t ever take vacations. He wants to be there for every moment no matter how awkward or loud. That’s his family and he’s waited so long for them, and it’s not even about him not having that family early on, it’s because he genuinely would rather be with his kids. He’s the one who as soon as they got the siblings was like I’m going to have to take a step back, because he saw his kids every day but he just didn’t want to be away for long periods of time, and at that point he’d already taken several steps back on working, so it became more of a done deal then. He still is the general, but he gives more responsibility to Devlon and to other people he’s trained over the years to step up. So generally, Cassian will work a couple of days a week for a couple of hours or just go quickly in the evenings, go over reports if the kids are in class with their teachers, and more during certain times of the year, but he’s generally more of a family man. 

Nesta in my fic/headcanon ends up being a queen as well as a leader of the witches and the founder/leader of the Valkyrie and she owns a shipping company and she’s the cauldron’s guardian which don’t ask me to explain, it’s in this fic I’ve barely written. But she’s a “I can bake the cake and eat it too” type of person to me, and because of her magic it is easy for her to do it all because it’s like a full time job. She goes home after a certain hour and she’s back with her kiddos, and most of her jobs have other people who have a handle on things as well. So she’s not an island, but she loves having the purpose and the drive, because as much as she did like being in the library and being in Velaris and having that day to day slice of life, she likes and yearns for adventure. She’s a go-getter and is not necessarily ambitious for power, but she’s got the whole world to discover and she can have anything she’s willing to work for. She wants to be and see it all. Cassian is endlessly proud of her and is like that’s my mate, my wife. My mate. My wife. And they both end up getting what they want without having to sacrifice their own ideals. Their marriage is a collaboration and it ends up working phenomenally for the two of them and their children. 

But ultimately it’s really the House that makes it possible. Because who cooks food and cleans and supplies every need and wish and whatnot? The House. Who baby proofs? The House. The House is like I’ve always wanted a big family and boy does it get a big family. 

[reinvent-and-believe]

Hi :) Dialogue prompt 44, Eskel + Geralt?

Dialogue prompt 44 - “I still remember the way you taste”

Wow anon. You get me. You really get me.

Firstly, what a perfect prompt. Secondly, sorry it took me 2+ months to actually write it! And thirdly...I added Jaskier. I’m sorry, I know you didn’t ask for that, I can’t keep him away. Geralt/Eskel is still the primary focus here, but in the context of established Geraskier and with Jaskier still very much involved. This accidentally turned into something like 7.5K of Jaskier and Eskel soft-domming the hell out of Geralt. So, uh...enjoy?

CW: rough sex/soft feelings, undernegotiated kink, nonexplicit references to teenage sexuality, brief discussions of internalized homophobia

—

“Really should be playing for coin.” Geralt grins as he clears his cards after his second victory of the night and shuffles his Nilfgaardian deck.

Eskel curses under his breath.

The witchers sit in a pair of ancient wingback chairs with worn, faded upholstery that might have been crimson in a former life, drawn close to the hearth, a small end table between them holding their Gwent cards and pints of mead. Jaskier sits perched on the arm of Geralt’s chair, his legs draped casually across his lover’s lap as he brushes soft white hair through his long fingers, humming softly to himself.

“Wiping the floor with me like that is its own reward.” It’s a grumble, but a good-natured one. Most everything Eskel does is good-natured, from what Jaskier’s seen. He appreciates that about the witcher.

It’s a fairly usual night at Kaer Morhen.

Well, as usual as a night at Kaer Morhen can be. After years of only vague, grunted acknowledgements of wintering in the mountains, Jaskier had been shocked and delighted at Geralt’s unexpected invitation when beset by an early first frost traveling through Kaedwen. “Winter’ll come before you reach Oxenfurt,” he’d justified brusquely, mindlessly tracing circles into the warm skin of Jaskier’s back as they huddled together on the inn’s musty straw pallet, but when the bard kissed him softly and told him he’d be delighted to see his home, the deep wrinkles on his forehead relaxed into something open, peaceful. They arrived a few weeks later, just before the snow drifts made the mountain pass nigh unbreachable.

Just being in these cold halls, rich with history and joy and pain, feels akin to the unsettling mystery of watching someone observe a religious sacrament, something Jaskier can only view from the outside, can never truly understand. But after upwards of a month sequestered in the remote keep, they’ve established something of a routine. Vesemir retires to the library after dinner most evenings. Every four or five days, Lambert gets restless and disappears into the surrounding mountains to hunt for a few nights.

(The first time Jaskier had been mortified, sure that he’d driven him away. “It’s just Lambert,” Geralt reassured him. “Bastard’s not well socialized.”

“And you know it’s bad, coming from Geralt,” Eskel added, but there’s nothing but fondness in his genial smirk.)

So most nights it’s the three of them whiling away the hours before retiring to their chambers. Jaskier finds he doesn’t mind; while Geralt clearly cares a great deal for Vesemir and Lambert, it’s only when they’re alone with Eskel that Geralt’s guard seems to vanish entirely. They catch up on jobs they worked throughout the year, drink together, occasionally reference shared history, although always briefly. In his years of friendship with Geralt and the years of something more, Jaskier has always been the one to keep the conversation going, an unending prattle that Geralt rarely interrupts, but here, Jaskier finds himself listening more often than not, observing the quiet, unassuming intimacy between the two witchers. Here within the walls of Kaer Morhen, here in Eskel’s warmth, Geralt is loose and comfortable and safe in a way Jaskier has rarely seen him in over a decade spent together on the Path.

Jaskier smiles at Eskel, a little too brightly, perhaps, but he doesn’t mind. He’s far from drunk, but between Geralt’s arm wrapped around his waist, the easy comfort of Eskel’s presence, the roaring fire before them and the honey-sweet mead, he feels pleasantly warm all over. “Eskel,” he starts as the witchers draw for another round, “you’ve known Geralt longer than anyone else in the world. Well, Vesemir excepted, of course.”

He hums in affirmation. “S’pose so. What about it?”

“That being the case, I think it only fair that you indulge me in some dirt.”

Eskel looks at him blankly.

“Come on, dirt! You must have plenty, you’ve known each other for, what, at least five hundred years now?”

“At least.” Geralt snorts at Jaskier’s obnoxious shit-eating grin at the exaggeration and plays a third spy card in a row, easily blocking the punch Eskel aims at his arm.

“Come now, Eskel, please? I’m sure you must have loads of dirt you’ve just been dying to, well, to unload! Let’s unlock those memories, boys, and tell me the greatest Kaer Morhen scoop of the past century.”

Eskel’s smiling, but it doesn’t quite reach his eyes. “Not sure you really want those memories unlocked, bard,” he says gently.

Jaskier’s breath catches. The last thing he wants is to spoil the relaxed evening with whatever cruelties spark the haunted looks he’s caught a few times during his stay. “No, no, of course not those kinds of memories,” he amends. “None of the witchery sort. The fun things, silly things! Come on, it can be anything. Embarrassing stories, charming anecdotes, stupid pranks you pulled on each other, youthful indiscretions—wait, no, what did I say?”

Both witchers suddenly seem preternaturally focused on their Gwent cards.

A delighted grin slowly creeps onto Jaskier’s face. “Youthful indiscretions?” he repeats, noting how Geralt looks almost sheepish. “I was joking about that one but by all means, I love a good scandal! I simply must have all the details, the tawdrier the better.”

“No scandal,” Eskel answers easily. “There’s nothing…”

“Oh ho ho no, my friend, I’m afraid I’m a bit too well acquainted with Geralt’s non-expressions to let this pass quite so easily.” He’s practically bouncing with excitement in Geralt’s lap, which earns him a glare, but not a very heartfelt one. The most delicate shade of pink has taken up residence in the tips of Geralt’s ears, the apples of his cheeks. Jaskier kisses him lightly on the nose. “What youthful indiscretions, Geralt?”

Geralt rolls his eyes, but his lips quirk upward. “Nothing as obscene as you’re dreaming up,” he mutters drily. “Dumb kid stuff.”

“Just a little healthy competition in the training yard.” Eskel’s smiling, but he’s watching Geralt carefully. “Everybody loves an incentive.”

Jaskier leans in conspiratorially. “Incentive?”

Eskel shrugs, placing a commander’s horn to double his ranged combat cards. “You know, loser jerks the winner off, that sort of thing. ‘Course, you dose up a bunch of horny teenagers with a couple times the regular helping of hormones, and, well, things tend to...escalate?”

“Of course.” Jaskier shifts and inadvertently rubs against the line of Geralt’s cock, which seems to have taken a distinct interest in the conversation, no matter how disinterested its owner tries to look behind his cards. “So, to the victor goes the handjob, eh? A noble endeavor.” He squirms again, very advertently rolling his hips in just the right place this time. The heavy arm around Jaskier’s waist slips down to stroke casually at his thigh. He stops himself from preening at the unexpected rift in Geralt’s composure, but only barely. “Was this all the young men in your—class? Cohort? Uh, battalion? What do you call it?”

“Hands caught on with some of them,” Eskel acknowledges. His eyes, all blown-wide black pupils rimmed with thin rings of gold, track every minute movement of Geralt’s hand on the bard’s thick thigh, straining beneath deep indigo satin. “But a few of us progressed to mouths. Thighs.”

“I’m sure that was delightful,” Jaskier breathes. He threads his fingers into Geralt’s hair, tugging gently on a lock. “So you partook in these escapades, did you, darling?”

Eskel snorts. “Partook,” he parrots, eyes flickering teasingly to Geralt. “Like he wasn’t the one casually suggesting it every time we hit the training yard.”

“Oh please, do tell.” The fire crackles in the hearth before them. By all the gods, there’s nowhere Jaskier would rather be than here, caught in this sparking current between the two witchers.

“Geralt’s the best fighter.” There’s a hint of a growl in Eskel’s gentle voice Jaskier’s never noticed before, low and hot and dangerous. “Always been the best with a sword since the first time he held one. But once we started messing around, didn’t take long to notice I was winning more than usual. After a few weeks I was beating him just about every time we fought.”

“Gods,” Jaskier breathes.

Eskel licks his lips. “Don’t act surprised, bard,” he says softly. There’s a new, intoxicating heat in his gaze. “The whole castle’s heard you two. You seem pretty familiar with Geralt’s taste for cock.”

Geralt’s arm slips tight around Jaskier’s waist, pulling him harder into the ever-more insistent press against the bard’s arse. He palms brazenly at Jaskier’s cock, but his eyes don’t leave Eskel, his face collected, calm. “Still remember the way you taste.”

“Fuck, Geralt.” Eskel’s hand drifts to mirror Geralt’s, grinding roughly against his codpiece.

Jaskier plants a hand on the chair’s back, twisting around enough to pull Geralt into a heated, messy kiss. “Gods, you’re stunning, you know that?” he moans against his lips, tangling a demanding hand into that long white hair. “Gorgeous, shameless thing, throwing fights you were perfectly capable of winning just to get a good dicking, was that the way of it, love?”

Geralt’s eyes flicker closed, accompanied by an aborted, keening noise in his throat.

“Which was all fine, until Vesemir called him out for holding back in the middle of the training yard.” Some of the teasing quality drains from Eskel’s voice. “You know Geralt. Being berated in front of the whole school by your mentor for your piss poor performance is devastating anyway, but for Geralt?”

“I’d forgotten about that,” he admits quietly. “That was a shit day. Halfway through his lecture I swore off sex forever. Nothing kills the mood quite like Vesemir’s disappointed face.”

Jaskier kisses his temple. “Glad that didn’t last, love.”

“Didn’t last long at all,” Eskel chuckles. “Pretty sure you had my dick down your throat in the back of the stables twenty minutes later.”

Geralt’s wry grin serves as confirmation. “It’d been a rough day. Sometimes you need a little consolation.”

Jaskier looks between the two, looks at the soft smiles on both of their faces. The sheer eroticism that was all-consuming a moment ago lingers, shifting into a background pulse as this gentle, familiar openness emerges.

They love each other.

Jaskier feels an overwhelming rush of relief, suddenly, of gratitude, to know that even with all the cruelties Geralt has faced over the past century, he’s had this easy warmth to come home to nearly every winter.

But love isn’t something readily acknowledged, let alone expressed, for Geralt—if anyone knows that, it’s Jaskier. So he smiles disarmingly and goes to work.

“How right you are, Geralt!” he says brightly. “Everyone needs a consoling touch now and then. What about after you left training? Any consolation during chance encounters on the Path? Or when you returned for the winter, perhaps?”

Jaskier doesn’t miss the way Geralt stares at the floor, nor the hunger that flashes in Eskel’s eyes before he looks away, too. When he speaks, it’s measured again. “It didn’t continue past training.”

“What a shame. Well, during training, then, what about fucking?” he asks blithely.

Geralt’s the first to find his voice, a defensive grunt. “Wasn’t like that.”

Eskel leans back in his chair, folding his hands in his lap. “Well, it was, of course,” he says slowly. “A hand or a mouth in the dark you can write off as just getting your rocks off. You start talk about fucking…” He shrugs stiffly. “It starts to mean something. Starts to say something about you.” He’s quiet for a moment, staring into the fire. “You get told a lot of things when you’re a kid. Think we all understood pretty clearly how it’d be if anybody found out. So you start coming up with reasons why it’s not like that, why you’re not like that. To make it easier.”

Geralt hasn’t spoken, but he clings a little closer, leaning his head on Jaskier’s shoulder.

“Takes time to sort through it all,” Eskel muses. “I think most of the stuff they taught us, Vesemir and the others...most of it came from a good place. They wanted us to survive, and part of that means not making yourself any more of a target than you already are. Doesn’t mean it didn’t fuck us up even more, though.” He leans forward in his chair, elbows on his knees and eyes fixed on Geralt. “I’m proud of you, Wolf,” he murmurs, a little sad smile on his lips. “Never thought either of us’d get to have this.” He gestures briefly at Geralt and Jaskier entwined in the chair, a twinge of something that might be yearning flashing through his eyes before he looks away, taking a drink.

Geralt plants a small kiss on Jaskier’s shoulder, holds him a little tighter. He wants to comfort Eskel, the bard understands suddenly, showering Jaskier with all the tender physical assurances he doesn’t feel he can give Eskel. And Eskel, with his sweet, melancholy smiles, his gentle percipience, his quiet understanding...he deserves everything Geralt wants to give him and more.

“It seems to me,” Jaskier begins in a delicate singsong, “that we have some unfinished business here.”

“How do you figure?”

“I feel this competition has not been followed to its logical conclusion. Not reached its full potential. You’ve played for hands, mouths, thighs. It seems that the natural progression should be playing for arse next. Winner takes the loser, as it were.”

Silence.

Jaskier wonders, briefly, if he’s made a mistake; but, he reasons, nothing ventured, nothing gained. He barrels on. “I think that the two of you want each other, quite a lot. Now, now, we’re being honest, Eskel just made that lovely speech, so save your protests, both of you. I think you want each other but you don’t know how to have that without the competition.” Jaskier gesticulates widely to emphasize his conclusion. “So compete.”

Eskel’s quiet for a moment, taking a deep breath as he meets Jaskier’s gaze. “Wouldn’t ask that of you,” he says finally. “The pair of you’s got a good thing here. I wouldn’t want to get in the way of that.”

“Oh, darling.” A surge of affection rushes through him as he takes in the Witcher’s concerned eyes, the hesitant posture, the look of astonishment at the endearment directed towards him. “I don’t think Geralt will love me any less for having loved you,” he says softly, leaning forward and placing a steady hand on Eskel’s forearm.

“We fuck other people,” Geralt adds helpfully.

Jaskier squawks in indignation, and Geralt’s mouth twitches in silent laughter. “Yes, Geralt, thank you for that ever so romantic assessment. So there you have it, Eskel! We fuck other people, no conflict there.”

Eskel’s looking back and forth between them, a small, slow smile breaking through. “It’s a little late for a sparring match,” he says. It’s not much of a protest.

Geralt shrugs casually. “Up for another game of Gwent?”

Golden eyes lock, a challenge. Eskel wets his lip and reaches for his cards.

Geralt gently steers Jaskier back onto the arm of the chair with a quick kiss to his shoulder, reaching to pull the forgotten box of his various decks into his lap. He packs his Nilfgaardians away carefully, muses over the cards, then reaches for the forest green deck.

And Jaskier may be no expert when it comes to the intricacies of Gwent strategy, but he’s watched Geralt play enough to know that Scoia’tael is his most neglected deck, the one he’s least likely to use in tournaments, the one he’s spent the least time building up.

Fuck.

From the way that Eskel’s gaze trains on Geralt’s big hands shuffling the sparse deck, a hungry, wrecked gleam reflecting in his golden eyes, he’s noticed, too.

It doesn’t take long, this Gwent game.

Geralt isn’t playing poorly, not really, he isn’t blatantly throwing the match, but the low-powered deck can’t compete with Eskel’s Northern Kingdoms and its unstoppable siege cards, its seemingly endless supply of spies. Even after Eskel passes the second round in a show of sportsmanship, there’s no real suspense.

Anticipation, on the other hand…

Jaskier drapes himself over Geralt languidly, tucking his chin over his lover’s shoulder to watch the game. “Geralt,” he coos, “it’s looking as though you may lose this one.”

“Hmm.”

“What a shame, I know you must be dreadfully disappointed by the prospect of taking his cock.” He’s staring shamelessly now, eyes running over Eskel’s sinewy arms, wide shoulders, broad chest, muscular thighs. “Gods, I bet he’s proportional, isn’t he. Big all over.” His breath is a warm tickle on Geralt’s ear before he begins lightly kissing the sensitive skin of his neck. “I bet he’s bigger than you, isn’t he, love?”

Geralt looks up from his cards, considering. “Girthier,” he concedes lightly.

“I can only imagine.” He sighs, musing with the tiniest of pouts. “You know, if you’d told me when we arrived at Kaer Morhen that one of us would wind up in bed with the gorgeous Eskel before winter’s end, I never would have dreamed you would be the one with that honor. Actually, I’d have put good coin on it being me.”

Eskel drops a scorch card in surprise that knocks out his own 24-point ballista.

“That counts.” Geralt shoves the card towards Eskel’s discard pile. “And you’d’ve lost your coin, bard. He never would have fucked you.” He shrugs off Jaskier’s offended whine. “Would’ve seen it as betraying me, even if you’d explained.” He’s studying Eskel carefully. “He felt guilty enough already, and all he’s done is look.”

Jaskier follows Geralt’s gaze, taking in the deep flush, the heavy breathing, the slightly abashed expression. “Have you been looking, dear Eskel?”

Eskel wets his scarred lip. “Looking respectfully,” he clarifies with the smallest of grins.

Jaskier laughs, delighted. He’s been uncharacteristically modest in his dress since arriving at Kaer Morhen, adjusting the biting chill of the drafty halls, but between the fire, the inferno of Geralt beneath him, and the strong rush of arousal, he’s plenty warm now. He slips his doublet off casually, dove gray shirt open halfway to his navel. “Look to your heart’s content, darling. Respectfully or otherwise.”

Eskel obeys, eyes raking over the bard’s flushed neck, the dark curls on his chest, the taut trousers doing little to disguise his erection. When he speaks, his voice is husky, grating. “If I win, will you be joining us?”

The breath catches in Jaskier’s throat.

He glances down at Geralt. They’ve always been welcome to take other lovers; it’s only practical, since they sometimes travel apart for months at a time and both have a few long-standing arrangements they’re loath to renounce. But they’ve never welcomed someone else into their bed, explored another lover together. Shared.

Geralt’s staring up at him, eyes questioning, hopeful.

Jaskier flits out of his embrace to situate himself easily in Eskel’s lap. “I thought you’d never ask.” He brushes a dark lock of hair out of the witcher’s eyes, tilts that strong, square jaw toward him with a single clever finger. “May I?” he asks, and when Eskel nods wordlessly he draws him into a soft kiss.

Eskel’s lips are slow and gentle, his kiss courteous, restrained in a way that threatens to break Jaskier’s heart. “Relax,” Jaskier whispers against him, “you’re not the first big scary witcher I’ve encountered.” He plants a teasing peck on the corner of his mouth before pulling away and shifting to take stock of the cards in Eskel’s hand. “So how is it looking? Oh.” He giggles helplessly, glancing across the table at his lover’s somewhat dazed expression. “Oh, Geralt, you are fucked.”

Their matching groans at his word choice are nothing short of intoxicating.

“Finish him off, darling,” Jaskier purrs, a hand drifting down Eskel’s sturdy chest. “Then we can play.”

--

Jaskier drags Eskel unabashedly into the bedroom, kicking off his boots as he goes in a practiced maneuver that might have otherwise proven disastrous. He tugs off Eskel’s padded jerkin, leaving him in a thin cream-colored shirt that Jaskier balls his fist in, pulling the witcher towards him in a breathless, giggling kiss.

Geralt trails slightly behind them, taking off his boots in silence. Jaskier can feel his eyes on the two of them as they part, not jealous, not upset, but unsure. Never one to shy away from tension in the bedroom, Jaskier reaches a hand toward his lover, beckoning him close, close enough to touch, and then he steps back to watch the moment unfold.

As if by instinct, Eskel moves to the side in an evasion of Geralt’s approach, where a sword would glance off him, had one been swung. Golden eyes lock as they circle automatically. It’s a dance. A witcher’s dance, dangerous and calculated, each move precise, graceful, deadly. It’s the most arousing thing Jaskier’s ever seen in his life.

And then Geralt shoves Eskel.

It’s just a light push to one shoulder, no real weight behind it, but the effect is instantaneous. Eskel pins him to the cold stone wall, the full weight of his body pressed into him, his hands trapping Geralt’s wrists tight. They’re both panting, hard, and when Eskel shoves his leg roughly between Geralt’s thighs, he’s met with Geralt rocking savagely against him.

“Like a bitch in heat, huh, Wolf?” Somehow, the words aren’t demeaning in the warm gravel of Eskel’s voice; instead, they’re fond, appreciative. Reverent.

Geralt bucks against him again, a cut-off, desperate growl from the back of his throat, and Eskel buries his face at the juncture of the neck and shoulder and bites the scarred flesh.

Geralt immediately goes limp and compliant against him, capitulation written into every line of his body. He stays that way as Eskel releases his bite, nipping lightly then nuzzling into the skin.

Jaskier lets out a shuddering breath at the sight of his lover so docile, so malleable. They’ve certainly explored such games before, power dynamics and what have you, and he’s known Geralt to drift into a gentle haze of submission on a handful of occasions when he felt particularly safe, but he’s never seen this immediate, intentional surrender. It’s breathtaking.

Eskel releases Geralt’s wrists, still kissing at his neck as he slides his hands down his sides. “Good,” he murmurs against skin, “being so good for me, Wolf. Don’t worry, gonna take care of you.” He tugs the black shirt from Geralt’s trousers, slips a big hand to stroke the bare skin at the small of his back. “Gonna fuck you so good. That what you want, sweetheart?”

“Fuck, Eskel.”

“Tell me.”

“Fuck.” His eyes flutter shut as Eskel’s hand moves to pull him forward by the curve of his arse, grinding their hips together roughly. “Want you to fuck me.”

“Mmm.” Eskel pulls the shirt over Geralt’s head and tosses it aside. “What about your boyfriend? What do you want from him?”

Geralt’s eyes shoot open, casting about frantically for a moment as though disoriented. “Jaskier?”

“I’m here, love,” he says, rushing to his side and pulling him into a soothing kiss. Geralt relaxes again in Eskel’s arms.

“You’re beautiful like this,” Jaskier continues, running his thumb reassuringly against Geralt’s cheekbone. “Do you want us to take you to bed, love? Let us work you over between the two of us, wring out every drop of pleasure we can?”

Eskel still supports Geralt’s weight, but he’s shifting, opening towards Jaskier, creating a space for him. Geralt pulls the bard in, kissing him desperately and tugging off his shirt, and Jaskier clings to them both.

He drinks in the sight of Eskel in the firelight, lips red and parted, eyes hooded beneath dark lashes. He cradles his smooth cheek with a gentle hand. “My, but you are just unreasonably handsome, aren’t you?”

Eskel freezes for a split second before flinching away from the touch, turning his scarred face to the safety of the shadows.

Before Jaskier can react, Geralt places a hand on the back of Eskel’s neck, drawing him in and massaging the flesh lightly. “He’s not mocking you.” His voice is soft and steady. “Or lying.”

After a moment, Eskel meets Geralt’s gaze, holds it silently for a moment before his shoulders relax, a rueful smile twitching on his lips. “Just got shit taste, huh.”

Geralt returns the grin. “He is with me.”

Jaskier splutters with indignation that’s only partially feigned. “Well, excuse you both, I happen to have exquisite taste, thank you very much!” He reaches out, his hand hovering over the scarred skin, a question in his eyes. Eskel takes a breath and turns his face into Jaskier’s touch.

He runs his fingers lightly over the hardened scar tissue, mapping the uneven terrain in caresses. Eskel’s eyes flutter shut. “I can’t speak for the rest of the world,” Jaskier murmurs. “I can’t imagine how cruelly men have treated you. But I do think you’re beautiful, Eskel, truly.” He pauses, glancing at Geralt. His gaze is fixed on the pale fingers and scarred flesh, concern writ large in his golden eyes. Jaskier wonders, not for the first time, how he ever thought his witcher inexpressive. “And I do believe Geralt thinks so, too.”

Geralt startles at the mention, but he leans in, resting his forehead against Eskel’s.

The intimacy of the position strikes Jaskier. Wasn’t like that, Geralt had immediately defended at the slightest implication that there was anything more than the occasional illicit orgasm between them. It’s not the first time he’s seen his dear witcher deny himself affection, connection, especially when it comes from another man, so he can’t help wondering how deep that denial may have run. “Geralt,” he asks softly, “have you and Eskel ever kissed?”

Geralt shakes his head, his eyes shut.

“I think you should.” It’s barely more than a whisper.

A moment of stillness stretches between them all, the two witchers looking at each other wordlessly. Eskel is the first to move. He carefully cradles Geralt’s face, eyes searching before he leans in, capturing his lips gently. It’s slow, hesitant, a meticulous exploration before Geralt moans against him, big hands threading through dark hair and pulling him in harder.

Jaskier moves deftly, slipping behind Eskel and threading his arms around the witcher as he plants reverent kisses down his neck, hands roaming luxuriantly across the hard body. Nimble fingers find the laces of Eskel’s trousers, untying them but making no immediate move to remove them, drawing the roughspun cotton of his shirt from the loosened pants so he can slip beneath to bare skin. He worships every inch of that broad torso with callused fingertips. Eskel is every bit as muscular as Geralt but built differently, thicker and wider and more pliable beneath Jaskier’s curious hands. An appealing layer of fat cushions his hard abdominals like a gambeson; strong, flexing pectorals have the give of flesh beneath his grasp. It’s an altogether delightful body, Jaskier thinks in warm contentment, belonging to an even more delightful man who Jaskier would be delighted to be absolutely railed by.

But that isn’t tonight’s objective; no, not with Geralt panting so beautifully, head thrown back against the stone wall as Eskel sucks a blood red mark on his collarbone. The finesse between them has vanished, replaced by the desperation of a century’s delay. Eskel paws at Geralt’s waist, nearly ripping the buttons from the fabric in his haste to get a hand down the front of the tight black pants, his other hand bracing him on the wall beside Geralt’s head.

Geralt is quick to return the favor, freeing Eskel’s cock from the codpiece, shoving the trousers roughly down his thighs, sinking to his knees.

Jaskier tries in vain to enjoy the sight from over Eskel’s shoulder, but the cream-colored shirt billows loosely enough around his body to veil Geralt. Yanking the offending garment off, Jaskier tucks his chin over the witcher’s shoulder and watches as his lover pumps Eskel’s cock in a pale hand, leaning in to lap greedily at the head before stretching his lips obscenely around the ruddy flesh.

When he speaks, Eskel’s voice is a hoarse wreck. “Isn’t that a sight for sore eyes.” Geralt growls in the back of his throat and takes him further down. “Fuck, Wolf.”

Jaskier snakes a hand down Eskel’s hip to his groin. He circles the base of his cock in a sure grip, grasping the thick shaft and moving in concert with Geralt’s shallow bobbing. Eskel inhales shakily, reaching the hand not buried in white hair back to anchor himself onto Jaskier by the back of the neck, arching into the bard’s embrace.

Jaskier pulls him into a messy kiss. The careful restraint has evaporated into something rough, strong, unleashed. Jaskier loses himself in the kiss, the racing tattoo of his rushing blood making the groan from Eskel something he feels more than hears.

Geralt bats away the bard’s hand jacking Eskel, and when Jaskier glances down he sees Geralt sinking down the thick shaft until his nose is buried in the dark hair at the base.

Eskel rips away from Jaskier’s kiss, breath ragged. “So good at that, shit.” His head falls back on Jaskier’s shoulder, eyes closed. “Used to choke on me when you tried,” he grunts. “Remember? Almost got us caught with your coughing a couple times. But you weren’t ever satisfied unless you tried.”

Jaskier massages at his chest, relishing the little gasp as he rubs a nipple. “He’s had plenty of practice since then. Haven’t you, love? Love swallowing cock, don’t you?” Geralt’s hands grasp Eskel’s hips roughly. “He wants you to fuck his face,” Jaskier says, planting a kiss on Eskel’s temple. “You wouldn’t deny him, would you?”

“Fuck.” Eskel complies, releasing Jaskier to anchor both hands in Geralt’s hair. He pistons forward experimentally, shallow. Geralt tugs at his hips until he’s set a brutal pace, the muscles in his thick body straining as he fucks him with abandon until there’s nothing else, nothing but slapping flesh, labored breathing, and pleased, desperate, muffled moans.

Eskel pulls abruptly back, holding Geralt off him by the hair.  “Fuck, Geralt, enough. Don’t wanna come yet.”

“Want you to.” Geralt’s voice is a raw rasp, his eyes red-rimmed. He nuzzles at the juncture of his thigh and groin, sucking at the sensitive flesh between words. “Want you to come fucking my throat. Come again later.”

Eskel pushes him away firmly, discipling his voice into something deep, reproachful, but with a surprising touch of tenderness cutting the sting of his words. “Listen, little cockslut, I said not yet.”

Geralt whimpers, but he withdraws, sitting back on his heels and awaiting further instruction, eyes fixed on the other witcher.

Eskel steps back from both of them, shoving his trousers the rest of the way down and stepping out of them before he looks at Geralt. “Up, Wolf.”

Geralt scrambles to obey.

Eskel pulls him into a kiss, praises spilling out against his lips. “So good,” he says. “Pants off.”

Once Geralt’s naked Eskel pulls him close, hoisting him easily into his arms as strong thighs wrap around Eskel’s waist. Eskel kisses him, holding him effortlessly. It’s a rare thing, Geralt not being far and way the strongest in a room at any given time, and to see him so evenly matched, see him carried about and manhandled as though he weighs nothing at all, is quite an alarming, appealing experience.

“Wanna take you to bed.” Eskel nuzzles against Geralt’s neck, his words barely audible. “Wanna be inside you, Wolf.”

“You did win the game,” Geralt grunts.

Eskel’s brow is furrowed when he pulls back. “Fuck the game, Geralt, wanted this as long as I can remember. It’s not just a game.” He carefully smoothes the messy white locks away from his face. “Wasn’t ever just a game.”

Geralt nods slowly. He holds Eskel’s gaze as he tilts his head, closing the space between them to brush his lips again Eskel’s. “So take me to bed.”

And he does.

Eskel lays Geralt out with an expression of sheer reverence. He crawls between his legs, slotting their bodies together, taking them both in a firm grasp before he leans down to capture Geralt in a sensuous kiss.

Jaskier observes the writhing pair silently as he makes necessary preparations. He rids himself of his trousers and smallclothes. Folds the discarded clothes and sets them neatly on a chair. Retrieves the oil from the chest at the foot of the bed. Stalls.

Because they are beautiful together, their touches familiar yet entirely new. There’s an unmistakable sense of scale between them, a history that Jaskier is loath to disrupt, a tale spanning a century in which Jaskier is barely a footnote.

“Jaskier.”

They’re still entwined, all muscled, scarred limbs curving around each other like one flesh, but they’re both looking at him. Eskel’s face crinkles into a crooked smile. “It’s a big bed, bard. Plenty of room.”

And there is. So much room in Geralt’s outstretched arm, curling immediately around his lover as he slips in bed beside them. In Eskel’s astute gaze as he runs a hand down Jaskier’s back and squeezes his hip reassuringly, pulling him into a nigh unbearably sweet kiss. In the way the three of them move together, exploring, discovering, building a gentle rhythm all their own.

“Have you ever fingered him?” Jaskier asks, his words nearly lost in the velvet-soft skin he’s thoroughly lavishing.

Geralt’s breath catches, though whether it’s at the question or the warm mouth on his balls is anyone’s guess.

“No,” Eskel says, his hand carding through the bard’s hair. “Show me what he likes?”

Jaskier reemerges to kiss them lightly, first Geralt then Eskel. “I’d be delighted.” He sits up on his heels, pulling Geralt with him. “Up, love.” He turns to Eskel as Geralt turns over to settle wordlessly into place. “Hands and knees is best for opening him up. He tends to get overwhelmed otherwise, don’t you, darling?” He kisses Geralt’s scarred shoulder, petting his arms, his back, his sides, nodding with a bright grin when Eskel’s hands join his in their caresses. “You can open him up when he’s lying on his back, but only when he’s absolutely relaxed and he’s already gotten off once. Otherwise he’s self-conscious, can’t lose himself in the sensation.” Geralt is already—perhaps unconsciously—rocking his hips ever so gently back towards him. A wave of warmth spreads through Jaskier as he rubs at the small of his lover’s back. “Eager for us, aren’t you, Geralt?”

A breathless grunt is the only answer.

“It’s all right, love, we’re going to take care of you.” He uncorks the oil, leaning down to nip lightly at the swell of Geralt’s cheek as he pours some into his palm. Cold. He warms it in his hand, rubbing vigorously. Eskel’s eyes track each movement. Silent, the bard holds out his lubricated hand. Eskel hesitates for a second then swipes his fingers through the mess until they’re dripping, coated thoroughly.

“Touch him before you touch him there.” It’s a rush, hearing the professorial tone of his own voice, seeing the witcher scramble to follow his instructions. Using his dry hand, Eskel pets the expanse of skin, running his fingers indulgently through the pale hair on his thighs, his arse. “Good.” Jaskier’s voice resonates deep in his chest, a low, soothing murmur. “Acquaint him with your touch. Let him know where you’re headed. Then when you’re both ready…” He takes Eskel’s wet hand by the wrist and guides it. “Just a finger. Start up here, down, down and past, and then up again. Again. Circle his rim, give him some lovely pressure, get him nice and wet but not in, not yet, not until…” He laughs as Geralt cants his hips back toward them with a desperate moan. “There we are. Now you can press in, just a little—oh, you’re being so good for us, love, taking his finger so well. Thicker than mine, isn’t it? What a treat.”

It’s too much, too arousing and too heady and too intoxicating, seeing hefty sword-callused fingers prodding carefully at the flesh Jaskier had seen stretched around his cock only this morning. He reaches out, an oiled finger lightly stroking the taut rim before slipping in effortlessly alongside Eskel’s.

A keening sound almost like a sob is muffled as Geralt rests his forehead on the bed, a full-body shiver running through him.

Eskel pats at his thigh. “Your boyfriend’s back here trying to kill me, Wolf.” He shoots a look of wonder at Jaskier before he leans forward, kissing the slight dimple at the small of Geralt’s back. “Hadn’t even thought about how good you’d look speared on us both ‘til right now.”

Geralt shoves back against them hard, pants as he fucks himself back on their fingers until Eskel adds another. “Not tonight, though,” he growls. “Tonight that hole is mine.”

“Gods, Eskel.” Jaskier pulls him into a breathless kiss. “He’s perfect, isn’t he?” he murmurs against scarred lips. “The way he can’t help seeking out more. Fuck, but he’s going to look so stunning on your cock. How do you plan to take him? Like this, let him whine and cry and shove himself back on your prick as hard as he can? Or have him ride you, watch him desperately take his pleasure as he stuffs himself full of you? Or…”

“Fuck, Geralt, does he always talk this much?” Eskel’s other hand shoots to the base of his own cock, giving himself a few rough strokes.

“Always,” a muffled rumble confirms. “It’s hot.”

Jaskier beams.

He slips his finger nimbly from Geralt’s stretched hole, drizzling a little more oil where Eskel begins to tease a third before Jaskier reclines on the bed, lying his head on the pillow where Geralt’s buried his face. Gently, he tilts the witcher’s chin toward him, taking in the wrecked breaths, the serene, softened gaze. He runs a warm thumb over Geralt’s lips before following it with a tender kiss.

He runs a hand over the muscled abdomen, down the sharp angles of the juncture of his hips, the pale coarse hair at his groin. Geralt’s softened some in the excitement of penetration, as he’s wont to do. Jaskier cups that lovely, familiar cock, rubs against him with just the pressure he knows his lover needs to coax him gently back towards hardness.

A breathy, high-pitched whimper that barely sounds like it could come from the same throat as Geralt’s usual guttural utterances breaks through the hazy atmosphere. “He’s ready for you,” Jaskier murmurs softly, reaching to squeeze Eskel’s unoccupied hand.

Eskel drapes his body over Geralt’s, covering his back and shoulders with fiery kisses as he rocks against him soothingly, fingers still buried deep as they rut together. He turns his face toward Jaskier, a heady desperation in his eyes. “Can I take him on his back?” he begs. “Don’t want to...to overwhelm him. But…”

Jaskier plants a reassuring kiss on Eskel’s cheek.

Geralt whines piteously as fingers slip from him, but he follows the gentle hands guiding him onto his back.

“Love,” Jaskier whispers, soothing fingers massaging his scalp, “are you with us?”

Geralt takes a breath, as though opening his eyes to meet Jaskier’s takes tremendous energy. He nods.

“You’re doing so well, darling.”

Geralt leans into his hand at the praise, eyes fluttering shut again.

“Stay with me, Geralt. Do you need a break?”

“Need Eskel.”

Eskel, kneeling between his legs, surges forward to capture Geralt in a careful kiss, gripping his shaft as he lines himself up. “Oil?” he pants, and Jaskier slips a wet hand between the two bodies to coat the thick, twitching cock liberally. “I’ve got you, Wolf,” Eskel whispers, sinking slowly into the pulsing tight heat, Jaskier’s oiled fingers lingering, anointing the site of their union.

The electric energy swells, inundating them, sweeping them into its current. The rough, slow grind as the witchers find a rhythm. Meandering callused fingertips dancing across scarred skin. Oil and precome and sweat mingling as they slide together. The earthy, sharp smell of the fireplace meeting musk and heat and desperation. Goosebumps covering warm flesh against luxuriant soft furs.

Geralt comes with a harsh cry from nothing but the movement within him and the insistent rub of Eskel’s abdomen against his cock.

Eskel fucks him through the aftershocks gently, bringing himself to a stuttering halt as Geralt trembles beneath him. He pants against Geralt’s neck. “Fuck,” he swears, kisses messily at the sensitive skin, “so beautiful, Wolf, feel so good under me.”

Geralt lets out a long breath.

“Had enough?” Eskel whispers against him.

Blissed out, relaxed, all loose limbs and satisfaction written in every line of his body, Geralt grins, his eyes suddenly clear, kissing Eskel as he rolls his hips pointedly back onto his cock.

And with this second wind it’s different, Geralt’s haze melting into something far more vocal, more demanding. “More,” and “fuck, Eskel,” and “hard,” and “won’t break me, Eskel, fuck,” and movement and manhandling and Geralt back on his hands and knees, Eskel burying himself hard and fast and too much, it’s got to be too much, Jaskier’s sure of it until “don’t hold back, please, please I can take it.”

A hand reaches out to grab roughly at Jaskier’s hip, dragging him in place before Geralt, his back against the headboard. “Please,” Geralt moans, mouthing frantically at the base of his cock, his drawn-tight balls, “need you too.”

He threads his fingers through sweat-damp white locks as Geralt hungrily sucks him down. The harsh, accelerating thrusts from Eskel rip through Geralt, slamming him further onto Jaskier’s cock and it’s so much, the delicate arch of Geralt’s back, the loud slapping of skin against skin, the strange unifying sensation of the three of them melding into one, the tight fluttering of Geralt’s throat milking the head of his cock, the way Eskel’s whole body seems to convulse, the choked-off howl as he chases his climax, the way he shakes as he collapses forward onto Geralt...

The adoring light in those stunning amber eyes as Geralt looks up at Jaskier through thick lashes, the way his hand sneaks up to hold onto his lover’s as Jaskier’s breath hitches, coming with a cry as Geralt swallows around him.

They topple gracelessly into a breathless tangle of limbs. Geralt groans piteously as Eskel unsheathes himself, leaving the bed swiftly, and Geralt hates feeling empty while he’s still coming down so Jaskier finds himself trailing long fingers to his messy hole, pushing the escaping come back into him, massaging and plugging him gently and running a soothing thumb over the stretched rim as they trade languid, exhausted kisses.

Eskel watches them from the beside with a look that might be wonder. “You two are a handful,” he chuckles softly. He climbs back onto the bed, wiping away drying spend from Geralt’s stomach with a warm, wet cloth that drags down, down between his legs, down to where Jaskier extracts himself one finger at a time, cleaning him with attentive care.

Geralt smiles up at Eskel lazily before pulling him down into a quick, filthy kiss, nipping at his lower lip. “You like us, though.”

“Hmm.” Eskel pulls away enough to grab a cup of water, tilting it to Geralt’s lips, careful not to spill. Then he offers it to the bard, reaching over to pet his hair with unexpected tenderness. “Thank you, Jaskier,” he says. “For sharing him with me tonight.”

“Should be me you’re thanking,” Geralt yawns, shifting around until he’s nestled comfortably on Jaskier’s chest, ear pressed soothingly above his heart. His eyes flutter shut as Jaskier traces aimless patterns on his warm skin. “Arse you were fucking happens to belong to me.”

Eskel snorts. “You sure about that?” He blocks the sleepy, playful swat aimed at him, taking the cup back from Jaskier and setting it carefully on the bedside table. He looks down at Geralt, already halfway to sleep on the bard’s chest, and rolls his eyes fondly. “That didn’t take long.”

“Well, in his defense, you did work him over pretty thoroughly,” Jaskier murmurs. He reaches out, tracing the muscles in Eskel’s scarred upper arm gently.

He leans into the touch, looking down for a moment. When he meets Jaskier’s gaze, his eyes are unspeakably bright. “Thank you. For tonight.” There’s a reverent rasp in his voice. “And for being good to him.”

Geralt’s breathing has evened out as Eskel slips out of bed, rifling through the discarded clothes.

“Bloody witchers, gods save me,” Jaskier sighs, flopping a dramatic hand to his forehead. “Geralt always used to try to slink off into the night after sex, too.” He catches Eskel’s gaze and extends a long hand towards him. “It’s a big bed, darling.”

They stare at each other in silence for a moment, something like awe blooming on Eskel’s exquisite, kind face as he nods, climbing back into the bed and molding his body carefully against Geralt’s back, a square hand finding Jaskier’s and squeezing.

And though it’s the dead of winter, Jaskier doubts Kaer Morhen’s ever felt quite so warm. He drifts into a peaceful sleep.

[universallywriting]

60 and 70 could be fun !! (Poorly timed confession +locked in a room?)

gonna assume any of these without a pair next to it is connverse lol This is a reference to this post: https://universallywriting.tumblr.com/post/641505013940846593/fanfiction-trope-mash-up

feel free to send me more! (no NSFW)

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

“I guess I’m just frustrated because it feels like the gems can’t deal with me growing up,” he said. 

They walked along the maze-like gem colony corridors, clearing out any remaining traps while the rest of their group talked to the colony’s leaders about dismantling drills. It was always nice to talk to Connie - she was one of the few people his age that he knew, and she had always had a knack for navigating the problems that gave him complicated feeling.

"What do you mean?” she asked.

He shrugged, hands in his jean pockets. “Pearl gets all annoying whenever I bring home R-rated movies. Amethyst keeps trying to make me eat super sweet stuff, but it’s starting to taste gross now. I try to talk to Garnet about love stuff but the way she talks is so... I don’t know.” He groaned. “Innocent. Fairy tale love story stuff.”

Connie laughed, playfully nudging him. “What are you asking Garnet about love?”

“I know she’s a gem, but she’s good at this stuff,” he said, blushing a little as he rubbed at the back of his neck. “And she knows how to make it work when fusion gets involved. Dad can’t help with that.”

Another laugh, though this one sounded off. He looked sideways at her, and found the oddest expression on her face as she asked, “Who are you planning on fusing with?”

He blinked. “You’re kidding.”

“No,” she said, her voice unnaturally light. She wasn’t looking at him, staring vaguely down the hall. “I’m just curious who you like enough that you’re thinking about fusing with them.”

“What?” He choked on a giggle. “Connie, tell me you’re joking.”

She scowled at him. “You don’t have to make fun of me. If it’s a secret-”

"I’m talking about you.” Steven gawked at her, unable to look anywhere but her face at they padded on. “It’s always been you. Did you-”

Instead of being cut off by her, as he expected, he was cut off by a tile beneath his feet giving way. The two of them screamed as they tumbled down a slick metal slide, down into a simple stone prison below.

They groaned, getting to their feet in the cramped five by five room, and he eyed the sharply angled slide they’d fallen down. If he wasn’t too shocked to feel happy they could float right out. As it was, he was stuck in a hole with his best friend, who had somehow been unaware of his unending crush on her.

Her eyes were huge. “Okay, no big deal, we’ll just float-”

“I fuse with you by mistake,” he said, because they could get out at any time and this was clearly more important. “Fusion is really hard, remember? It’s the thing where you need to understand someone, and really care about them, unless you have some big purpose that you can ignore it for. And we do it by mistake.”

“You’re a Diamond,” she said, and climbed onto the slide.

“It’s not about power. It doesn’t happen by mistake with anyone else,” he retorted, standing back. “Did you... I... how did you not know?”

“Not know what?” she said, rubber soles squeaking noisily as she attempted to walk up the steep incline.

“That I’m in love with you.”

She yelped, sliding down to the end of it and staring up at him with round, wild eyes. "You can’t say that! You’re fifteen.”

“And I’ve been in love with you for at least a year,” he said, cocking his head at her confusion. “What’s the big deal?”

"It’s supposed to be awkward! You’re supposed to say that you have a crush on me,” she explained.

“I used to have a crush on you when I was twelve. Now I’m in love with you.” He grinned. “I was pretty obvious.”

“I’m not good at signals! We’re supposed to communicate!” She jerked her hand back and forth between the two of them. “And shouldn’t you be freaking out? You just confessed your love and I haven’t said it back!”

He shrugged. “If you’re not ready to say it back, that’s okay. I don’t need you to say it to know you love me.”

“What if I don’t love you back?” she said. Steven raised an eyebrow in response, and she rolled her eyes. “Okay, listen, it’s a possibility. You don’t have to make that face at me.”

“I mean, we’re not living in a sitcom. We don’t have to be weird about it to drag it out for tension,” he said, and crouched down to take her hands. “We’re in love, and one of these days we’re going to do real dating stuff. I wanna be prepared for it.”

She paused, then gave his hands a little squeeze. “I don’t get how the gems can’t tell how grown up you are. I always feel like I’m five years behind you.”

“Come on! You’re so smart and mature I can’t keep up.” he laughed, setting his forehead against hers. “I’m pretty sure you’re the adult out of the two of us.”

“I am still thinking about how to get out of here.” She said, “Think you can float us up?”

He shrugged. “Maybe. But I kind of like being alone with you down here.”

“Me too,” she confessed, and though neither of them particularly meant to, the white light of fusion lit up the room, and left a giggly Stevonnie in their place.

[jiaraforeverr]

Friends to Lovers in Canon Universe

I'll be the light and lead you home (when there's nowhere left to go) by @homebody-nobody and @hmspogue

“Hi, Dad,” he says, his heart pounding, his veins already humming with fight-or-flight adrenaline. He can feel his brain kicking into overdrive as his body is tensing to prepare for whatever comes next. Keep your voice down, his mind reiterates, reciting rules that governed years of his childhood, learned the hard way and necessary for his safety -- for survival. Stay an arms length away, nod and agree, don’t tell him no, respond with “yes sir”, keep your voice down for as long as possible, and get out before the yelling starts at all costs… But, now, in the midst of this frantic inventory, a new rule makes its way into his consciousness. Stay between him and Kiara.

baby, it’s halloween (we can be anything)

JJ tags along with Kie as she goes costume shopping but she leaves the store with much more than she bargained for.

The Haunting of Crowley Manor

After spending the night with JJ, going to Sarah's Halloween party at an abandoned, and allegedly haunted, Kook mansion is not high on Kiara's list of things she wants to be doing. When the Pogues do some exploring, what they find is unsettling at best. Even amidst all the pandemonium, Kiara would really just like to clear the air.

you wanna play with fire (stick and poke tattoo) by @homebody-nobody

'JJ chews on the information she’s given him, tracing his fingers down her arm, over the curve of her elbow and back up to her shoulder. “You’re still gonna go home, right?” He asks, uncertainty and maybe longing in his voice. She realizes, then, that of course she is. Her parents love her, even if they don’t know how to show it, don't understand what the Cut and its inhabitants (and one in particular) mean to her. Of course, she’s going to go home. Because JJ doesn’t get to. Because she still can.

touch me someone by @homebody-nobody

He pulls away from her, and his eyes are wide but dry as his chest heaves. He looks wild, uncaged and raw, the moonlight turning his blond hair white and his blue eyes into pools of silver. Tragedy and shock have destroyed him, the chains he’d wrapped around his brash, heedless, unending want twisted into shards by an explosion of hurt and grief. He has always been the victim, the boy left behind in empty rooms with nothing but loss and bloody fragments, told to piece himself back together. Finally, they’ve taken the last thing. When he told John B they had nothing to lose, they still had each other. And now, he doesn’t even have that. But she’s still here.

A Midsummers Night's Scheme

Kiara really doesn't want to go to Midsummers, and this time it isn't just about the socioeconomics of it all. When she runs into someone she was hoping never to see again, she enlists the help of JJ, who might already be more involved than she would've ever thought.

georgia (georgia, i love your son) by @jiaaras

Two years after Sarah and John B died (or disappeared, if you asked JJ), Kiara and JJ must deal with the return of a familiar face to the Outer Banks.

it was there the whole time

The rest of the pogues notice that JJ and Kiara are hopelessly in love with each other long before they do themselves.

because i'm still in love with you (i wanna see you dance again.)

post season one; John B and Sarah are gone, Pope is M.I.A and Kiara just wants to help JJ stop drinking so much.

lets go surfing by @simpforjiara

everything good happens in the surf

and even when you look away i know you think of me by @hvitstark

The night of graduation Kie worries about the future.

Her Boys *trigger warning character drugged against their will*

Some guy tries to drug Kiara during a kegger at the Boneyard, and her boys ride to the rescue, and then take her home and take beautiful care of her…which leads to a very unique first Jiara kiss.

five times JJ or Kie kissed the other as friends + 1 time they were definitely not friends by @simpforjiara

don't blame me for fallin' (i was just a little boy) by @simpforjiara

JJ Maybank could never just simply care about something, when it came to Kiara it was always too much

Home is Where the Puppy Lives by @tiggerusername

Four months after John B and Sarah disappear, everything in Outer Banks is strange. JJ and Kiara are hardly talking. Pope is hardly around. And storms keep coming. That is until Kiara decides to visit the chateau after work one day and finds a puppy stuck in the destruction of the night outside.

Snapshots Through Time

Just as the title implies, jumps in time depicting moments in JJ and Kiara’s lives. First as friends, then as a couple, and eventually as a family.

Don't overthink it

For the majority of the time she was not even sure she liked JJ as a person.

i don’t wanna be your friend (i wanna kiss your lips)

If she’s being honest, Kiara used to think about kissing JJ all the time. aka the five times kiara thinks about kissing jj, and the one time she finally does it.

I love you, ain't that the worst thing you ever heard?

JJ and Kiara grow closer in the aftermath of what should have been the best summer of their lives.

One of Us Must Know (Sooner or Later)

After spending a night with Pope, Kie runs to the person she was meant to be with in the first place.

it wasn’t special til i met you by @dayas

kiara never expects teaching jj to braid to matter so much. it does. or, alternatively, the four times kiara lets jj braid her hair and the one time she doesn’t.

every piece of you

Five places that Kie hadn’t expected to be intimate when kissed and one place she does.

if we were meant to be, we would've been by now by @alphinias

five times JJ was jealous, and one time he didn't have to be

and if my wishes came true (it would’ve been you)

the one where jj and kiara go on a road trip together and do a miserable job of pretending they’re not two idiots in love

tell me when you’re falling (can you hear me calling?)

being in love with your best friend makes vacationing pretty inconvenient. luckily for kiara, said best friend will never suspect a thing.

bare necessities by @rae-of-fricking-sunshine

the five times they were unintentionally undressed, and the one time they weren't

better date than never by @alphinias

Kiara is sick of her mom badgering her about the single groomsmen at her cousin's wedding, so obviously, taking JJ as her date is the perfect solution. It won't be complicated. Not at all.

i had a few (got drunk on you)

Kiara is a student at bartender school and JJ is helping her practice (when he isn’t hindering her by drinking all the liquor).

i'll be there 'til the stars don't shine by @maybankiara

in which the pogues throw a kegger, and jj keeps getting distracted by the feelings he might have for one of his closest friends.

What if... (Secrets are dug in the best friends' back yard?) by @tiggerusername

What if JJ and Kiara have been keeping a massive secret from the Pogues? What if JJ and Kiara were a lot closer than anyone had expected during Kiara's Kook year?

Standing On Younger Ground by @usnavisbubbly

If he really thinks about it, he knows it probably just took missing her for an entire year for him to realize that he never wanted to again. Miss her, that is. That shit was brutal. She’s his best friend and he wants her around all the time. It’s just that now, he sometimes wishes it was just them. Like, he’d never want John B and Pope to go away, per se, he just also wants Kie to himself? Or something? It’s confusing.

Bad Timing

the one where the Pogues all had a thing for Kie, all get rejected and JJ eventually finds the right time.

wish you were sober

The Pogues are growing up and following their dreams, which means it's time for JJ and Kiara to sort through some feelings.

around the world

You can take the boy out of the Outer Banks, but you can't take the Outer Banks out of the boy. when it's all calmed down, kiara travels the world. jj's not precisely an unwelcome addition.

drunk off of nothing but of each other until the sunrise (i swear to god it was the best night of my life)

The night before Kie leaves for collage JJ finally makes a move. It's the start and end of something all at once.

friends don’t look at friends that way

anyone observant can see that JJ and Kiara are clearly more than friends.

You Can Get Lost in the Music For Hours, Honey by @anniebibananie

A love story told (predominately) through text messages and a collaborative spotify playlist.

Come Down to the Black Sea Swimming with Me

JJ and Kiara try to deal with the aftermath of John B and Sarah's deaths, and find it easier together.

if this is love, i know it’s true (i won’t forget you)

kiara carrera doesn’t know when she falls in love with jj maybank. she just knows that she does, and there’s nothing she can do about it.

i want to see you stare at ceilings until you fall back asleep

jj and kie have a moment.

(au mid-season before any of that insane police chase stuff went down)